The Obstacle Race Part 71

Something in his look hurt her. She freed one hand and laid it pleadingly, caressingly, against his neck. "Oh, d.i.c.ky," she said, "try to understand!"

His face changed a little, and she thought his mouth quivered ever so slightly as he said. "It's now or never, Juliet. If I don't come to a perfect understanding with you to-night, we shall be strangers for the rest of our lives."

She s.h.i.+vered at the finality of his words, but they gave her light. "I have hurt you--horribly!" she said.

He was silent.

She pressed herself to him with a sudden pa.s.sionate gesture. "d.i.c.k--my husband--will you forgive me--can you forgive me--before you understand?"

Her eyes implored him, yet just for a second he hesitated. Then very swiftly he gathered her closely, closely against his heart, and kissed her pleading, upturned face over and over. "Yes!" he said. "Yes!"

She clung to him with all her quivering strength. "I love you, darling! I love you,--only--only--you!" she whispered brokenly.

"You believe that?"

"Yes," he said again between his kisses.

"And if I tried to do without you it was only because--only because--I loved you so," she faltered on. "Your anger is just--the end of the world for me, d.i.c.k. I can't face it. It tears my very self."

"My darling! My own love!" he said.

"And then--and then--I had such an awful doubt of you, d.i.c.ky. I thought your love was dead, and I thought--and I thought I couldn't hope to hold you--after that. I'd got to free you somehow. Oh, d.i.c.ky, what agony love can be!"

"Hush, darling, hus.h.!.+" he said.

She lay in his arms, her eyes looking straight up to his. "I never meant to do it, dear,--never meant to win your love in the first place. I always knew I wasn't worthy of it. I think I told you so. d.i.c.ky, listen!

I've had a horrid life. My mother was divorced when m.u.f.f and I were youngsters at school. My father died only a year after, and no one ever cared what happened to us after that. We had an aunt--Lady Beatrice Farringmore--and she launched me in society when I left school. But she never cared--she never cared. She was far too busy with her own concerns.

I just went with the crowd and pleased myself. No one ever took anything seriously in our set. It was just a mad rush of gaiety from morning till night. We were like a lot of empty-headed, mischievous children, horribly selfish of course, but not meaning any harm--at least not most of us.

Everyone had a nickname. It was the fas.h.i.+on. It was Saltash who first called me Juliet. He said I was so tragically in earnest--which was really not true in those days. And I called him Charles Rex."

She paused, for d.i.c.k's arms had tightened about her.

"Go on!" he said, in a low voice. "I suppose he--made love to you, did he?"

"Everyone did that," she said. "He was just a specimen of the rest--except that I always somehow knew he had more heart. It was just a game with us all. It used to frighten me rather at first till--till I got used to it. When I was quite young I had rather a bitter lesson. I began to care for a man who I thought was in earnest, and I found he wasn't.

After that, I never needed another. I played the game with the rest.

Sometimes I hurt people, but I didn't care. I always said it was their fault for being taken in."

"That doesn't sound like you," he said.

"That was me," she returned, with a touch of recklessness, "till I read that first book of yours--_The Valley of Dry Bones_. That brought me up short. It shocked me horribly. You cut very deep, d.i.c.ky. I'm carrying the scars still."

He bent without words and set his lips to her forehead, keeping them there in mute caress while she went on.

"I had just begun to play with Ivor Yardley. He was my latest catch, and--I was rather proud of him. He didn't trouble to pursue many women.

And then--after reading that book--I felt so evil, so unspeakably ashamed, that, when I knew he was really in earnest, I didn't throw him off like the rest. I accepted him."

She shuddered suddenly and twined her arm about her husband's neck.

"d.i.c.ky, I--went through h.e.l.l--after that. I tried--I tried very hard--to be honourable--to keep my word. But--when the time drew near--I simply couldn't. He always knew--he must have known--I didn't love him. But he just wanted me, and he didn't care. And so--almost at the last moment--I let him down--I ran away. And, oh, d.i.c.ky, the peace of this place after all that misery and turmoil! You can't imagine what it was like. It was heaven. And I thought--I thought it was going to be quite easy to be good!"

"And then I came and upset it all," murmured d.i.c.k, with his lips against her hair.

Her hold tightened. "It's been one perpetual struggle against appalling odds ever since," she said. "If it hadn't been for--Robin--I should never have married you."

"Yes, you would," he said quietly. "That was meant. I've realized that since."

"I am not sure," she said. "If you hadn't been so miserable, I should have told you the truth. You wouldn't have married me then."

"Yes, I should," he said.

She drew a little away to look into his face. "d.i.c.k, are you sure of that?"

"I am quite sure," he said, and faintly smiled. "It's just because I am sure, that I am with you now--instead of Saltash. It was his own test."

Her eyes met his unflinching. "d.i.c.k, you believe that Saltash and I are just--friends?"

"I believe it," he said.

"And you are not angry with him?"

"No." He spoke with slight effort. "I am--grateful to him."

"But you don't like him?" she said.

He hesitated momentarily. "Do you?"

"Yes, of course." Her brows contracted a little. "I can't help it. I always have," she said rather wistfully.

He bent abruptly and kissed them. "All right, darling. So do I," he said.

She smiled at him, clinging closely. "d.i.c.ky, that's the most generous thing you ever did!"

"Oh, I can afford to be generous," he said, "now that I know your secrets and you know mine. Will you tell me something else now, Juliet?"

"Yes, dear," she whispered.

He laid his cheek against hers. "I was going to tell you my secret when you had read that last book of mine. When were you going to tell me yours?"

"Oh, d.i.c.ky!" she said in some confusion, and hid her face against his neck.

"No, tell me!" he said. "I want to know."

But Juliet only clung a little faster to him and buried her face a little deeper.

"Weren't you ever going to tell me?" he said, after a moment.

"Oh, yes--some time," she murmured from his breast.