The Native Born; or, the Rajah's People Part 45

Stafford flung the other's detaining hand from him. Freed from his laming diseased conscience, and roused to activity, he acted like a man of lightning determination and iron will.

"That you will never have, and you are a scoundrel to ask for it. As you like--there are other exits than the door." He swung round and made for the open window.

Travers did not stop him. He stood rooted to the spot, his hand on the revolver which he carried at his side. The revolver had not been meant for Stafford. Travers' quick eyes had caught sight of something creeping slowly and stealthily up the verandah steps. He had seen the flash of a knife, and a cry of warning had rushed to his lips. The cry was never uttered. Devil and angel fought their last battle over Travers' drifting, rudderless nature. The word "scoundrel" had been the devil's winning cast.

"Go, then, and be d.a.m.ned to you!" Travers shrieked.

He saw Stafford reach the verandah steps. The stalwart khaki-clad figure was photographed on his reeling brain. He heard the clank of a sword against the first stone step. He tried to cry out--afterward he tried to believe that he had cried out--but it was too late. The hidden something which had crouched behind the heavy creepers sprang up--for a short second seemed to tower above the unconscious officer--then a gleam of light flashed down with the black hand. Stafford flung up his arms, swung around, and fell face downward on the verandah. There was a short, stifled groan, and then--and then only--Travers fired.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Then--and then only--Travers fired.]

CHAPTER VI

CLEARING AWAY THE RUBBISH

All the night following the momentous meeting of the Marut Diamond Company Mrs. Cary had kept to her room, the door locked against her daughter, and had sobbed and wailed in a manner befitting the victim of a hard and undeserved fate.

But in reality hers was the rage of a clumsy workman who has cut himself with his own tools. Her own child, her partner and co-worker, had upset the erection of years. She saw themselves cast out of Marut; she saw the desolate wandering over the earth's surface, this time without the consolation and protection of wealth. For she knew that Beatrice's confession was to go further. Beatrice had made the announcement of her plans quietly but firmly as they had driven home from the club-house.

"To-morrow everybody shall know everything there is to know," she had said, and had remained obdurate to all her mother's commands and pleadings. "I do consider you. I consider you even now. I mean to save you and myself. But this time it must be in another way. Your scheming has only brought us into deeper trouble. We must start afresh."

"But how? But how?" her mother had said, wringing her hands in uncontrolled despair. "Where are we to start? How are we ever going to make people believe in us, now we have no money?"

"It does not matter what people believe," Beatrice had replied. "With our money and our lies we have been building mud-hovels, and now we are going to build palaces. That's all that matters."

Mrs. Cary had not understood. She thought Beatrice had gone mad, and knowing that with madness, reasoning is in vain, she shut herself up in her room, pulled down the blinds, and believed by this ostrich-like proceeding that she could keep off the inevitable moment when they would have to be pulled up again and the cold, pitiless reality faced.

But Beatrice went her way undeterred. From Stafford's bungalow she drove to the Travers'. The place was little more than an ill-cared-for shanty, the garden overgrown with weeds, the rooms damp, ill-aired and badly furnished, its reputation for misfortune phenomenal. Travers had taken it as the only bungalow to be had for such a short period as he intended to stay in Marut, and Lois had made no objection. Her energy and determined striving after everything that was graceful and beautiful was systematically crushed out of sight. She never protested, never laid any difficulties in Travers' path. She seemed to shrink into herself and live an invisible life of her own, leaving him to go his way. She could not help him. She could build up nothing on a character whose foundations were of s.h.i.+fting sand.

And never had she been more fully convinced of her own powerlessness and of his absolute independence than after their brief and stormy interview before Stafford's entry. She had felt how for a moment their two diametrically opposed natures had faced each other. She had felt a brief joyful satisfaction in at last coming to a hand-to-hand struggle with him; but then, as usual, with a smile and an easy word he had eluded her. So it had always been--so it would always be. Too late she realized that she had thrown away her life upon a man who had no need of her devotion. Too late she realized that all sacrifices are wasted unless the enn.o.bling of the sacrificer's character be considered. For true happiness, true content and goodness can not be given. They must be self-won, or they are no more than hothouse plants which shrivel together in the cold blast of an east wind. Lois had sacrificed herself to bring true happiness and content and goodness into Travers' life, and had failed. She had failed all the more signally because she had never loved him. She had loved Stafford--extraordinary and terrible as it seemed to her, she still loved him. She could not root him out of her life, and though his image was overshadowed by a greater and more n.o.ble figure he retained his place.

The glance they had exchanged had pierced down to the very center of her being, and if it had revealed nothing to her it had also revealed everything. For she knew now that the strange bond which had linked them together from the beginning united them still. Some reckless and unscrupulous hand had sundered them outwardly, and her instinct, guided by a hundred significant incidents, told her whose hand it had been. She fled to her little gloomy sitting-room, with its worn-out, tasteless furniture and drab walls, and fought her sorrow and despair single-handed and in her own way. She had a man's dislike for tears--though, being a woman, they came all too easily to her--and she fought against them now with all the strength at her command, with all the pluck which in happier days had made her so splendid a partner in a "losing game." She had made a disastrous mistake in her life, but it was not too late.

The cathedral should go on in its unseen growth, and every conquered tear, every brave smile was a fresh stone bringing it nearer to perfection. G.o.d be thanked for the fetishes with which the less fortunate of us are still allowed to adorn the barren walls of our life! The cathedral, the imaginary "sheltering-place for others," was Lois' fetish, and the thought of it and of the strong-faced man with whom she worked in spiritual partners.h.i.+p was a deep, inspiring consolation. It stood at her right hand and helped partly to overthrow the weight of dread and evil presentiment which had borne down upon her all too sensitive and superst.i.tious temperament as she had left her husband and Stafford alone.

Thus it was that, when the curtains of her room were suddenly parted and Beatrice stood on the threshold, she could face the new-comer with a calm if grave demeanor. She remembered her husband's last injunctions, but it was too late; and moreover, there was an expression on Beatrice's face which told her that the visit was no ordinary one. A woman's instinct is her spiritual hand feeling through the darkness to another's soul. Beatrice and Lois watched each other without smile or greeting. They forgot the outward formalities of life in the suddenly aroused interest which they found in each other, in the consciousness that in this, their first meeting alone, they were to become closely united.

They were indeed striking contrasts. At no time had they seemed more so than now, as they stood there silently facing each other--Beatrice, tall, fair with the wonderful Madonna beauty; Lois, small and dark, the quick and fiery temperament flas.h.i.+ng to meet the other's dignity and apparent calm. And yet at no time had the barrier between them been so insignificant, so slight. Beatrice advanced slowly from the door, where she had first hesitated.

"May I speak with you, Mrs. Travers?" she asked.

Lois nodded, mechanically holding out her hand. Her eyes were riveted on the other's grave face, drinking in with a real admiration a loveliness from which the old marring lines of mockery and cynicism had been swept away.

"Won't you sit down?" she said gently. "You look tired and pale."

Beatrice seemed not to hear. She took the outstretched hand between both her own. Her head was a little bent, and as she looked full into Lois' face her expression softened and saddened.

"You, too, are unhappy!" she said.

Lois made no answer. She was overwhelmed by the directness of the statement, but still more by the change in Beatrice's voice. It sounded low and unsteady, as though a storm of feeling lay close beneath the surface. "Do you wonder how I know?" Beatrice went on, after an instant's pause.

"I don't know," Lois answered, "and for the moment we won't talk about such things. I can't bear to see you look so--so ill. You must sit there and let me get you something to drink. Have you walked?"

Beatrice yielded this time to the kindly persuasion. She sank down in the proffered chair, but she retained Lois' hand.

"No, I drove. But I am tired. It was not easy work getting through the crowd. They did not seem to want to let me pa.s.s. Once or twice I thought they were going to attack me."

Lois laughed.

"They are only pilgrims. They come every year, and are quite harmless.

Hark at them now! There must be a band of them going past. Would you like to watch from the verandah? It is really amusing--"

"No, no; this is not the time for amus.e.m.e.nt. I have something else to do. Mrs. Travers, you are very kind to me. You have the right to hate me."

"I--hate you? Why should I, Beatrice?"

"You call me Beatrice. But we have never been friends."

"Not till now."

"Do you think we are going to be?"

Lois drew up a stool and seated herself at Beatrice's side. Something in the other's firm, gentle hold and in the low voice made her heart ache.

"I don't know. I feel as though we were already."

"Don't feel that, because it is not possible. Mrs. Travers, do you know who it was who came between you and John Stafford?" Lois' head sank.

"I see that you do. Yes, I did my best. I wanted his position--and money. Are you still my friend?"

Lois met the grave, questioning eyes with a sudden energy.

"Yes. That is all over and past. I like you now. I liked you the moment you entered the room. You seemed different."

Beatrice smiled faintly.

"And you, too, are different from any one I have ever known. Another woman would not have been able to forgive as you have done. I have spoiled your life. I can see that."

Lois pressed her hand.

"Hus.h.!.+ You must not say so. I am married--"

"Lois, I have spoiled your life. I have come here to tell you the truth, and you also must be truthful. For pity's sake, let us put lies and humbug on one side. I am sick of them!" For a moment she seemed to fight desperately with herself, and then she went on more quietly: "I have spoiled your life. I have spoiled the life of a man who trusted me. I have spoiled my own. That is what I have done in the twenty-five years given me to work in. I have lied and cheated my way through. And this is the end--miserable bankruptcy."

"Yes," Lois said, nodding. "I heard about it."