The Bars of Iron Part 100

"Yes," she admitted.

"And you let such a thing as that come between you and--and--Piers!"

There was incredulous amazement in Ina's voice. "You actually had the--the--the presumption!" Coherent words suddenly seemed to fail her, but she went on regardless, not caring how they came. "A man like Piers,--a--a--Triton like that,--such a being as is only turned out once in--in a dozen centuries! Oh, fool! Fool!" She clenched her hands, and beat them impotently upon her lap. "What did it matter what he'd done? He was yours. He wors.h.i.+pped you. And the wors.h.i.+p of a man like Piers must be--must be--" She broke off, one hand caught convulsively to her throat; then swallowed hard and rushed on. "You sent him away, did you? You wouldn't live with him any longer? My G.o.d! Piers!" Again her throat worked spasmodically, and she controlled it with fierce effort. "He won't stay true to you of course," she said, more quietly. "You don't expect that, do you? You can't care--since you wouldn't stick to him. You've practically forced him into the mire. I sometimes think that one virtuous woman can do more harm in the world than a dozen of the other sort.

You've embittered him for life. You've made him suffer horribly. I expect you've suffered too. I hope you have! But your sorrows are not to be compared with his. He has red blood in his veins, but you're too attenuated with goodness to know what real suffering means. You had the whole world in your grasp and you threw it away for a whim, just because you were too small, too contemptibly mean, to understand. You thought you loved him, I daresay. Well, you didn't. Love is a very different thing.

Love never casts away. But of course you can't understand that. You are one of those women who keep down all the blinds lest the suns.h.i.+ne should fade their souls. You don't know even the beginnings of Love!"

Pa.s.sionately she uttered the words, but in a voice pitched so low that Avery only just caught them. And having uttered them almost in the same breath, she took up the speaking-tube and addressed the chauffeur.

Avery sat quite still and silent. She felt as if she had been attacked and completely routed by a creature considerably smaller, but infinitely more virile, more valiant, than herself.

Ina did not speak to her again for several minutes. She threw herself back against the cus.h.i.+on with an oddly petulant gesture, and leaned there staring moodily out.

Then, as they neared their starting-point, she sat up and spoke again with a species of bored indifference. "Of course it's no affair of mine.

I don't care two straws how you treat him. But surely you'll try and give him some sort of send-off? I wouldn't let even d.i.c.k go without that."

Even d.i.c.k! There was a world of revelation in those words. Avery's heart stirred again in pity, and still her indignation slumbered.

They reached the shop before which Gracie was waiting for them, and stopped.

"Good-bye!" Avery said gently.

"Oh, good-bye!" Ina looked at her with eyes half closed. "I won't get out if you don't mind. I must be getting back."

She did not offer her hand, but she did not refuse it when very quietly Avery offered her own. It was not a warm hand-clasp on either side, but neither was it unfriendly.

As she drove away, Ina leaned forward and bowed with an artificial smile on her lips. And Avery saw that she was very pale.

CHAPTER VII

THE PLACE OF REPENTANCE

Like a prince masquerading! How vivid was the picture those words called up to Avery's mind! The regal pose of the body, the turn of the head, the faultless beauty of the features, and over all, that nameless pride of race, arrogant yet wholly unconscious--the stamp of the old Roman patrician, revived from the dust of ages!

Aloof, yet never out of her ken, that picture hung before her all through the night, the centre-piece of every vision that floated through her weary brain. In the morning she awoke to a definite resolve.

He had left her before she could stay him; but she would go to him now.

Whether or not he wanted her,--yes, even with the possibility of seeing him turn from her,--she would seek him out. Yet this once more she would offer to him that love and faith which he had so cruelly sullied. If he treated her with cold contempt, she would yet offer to him all that she had--all that she had. Not because she had forgiven him or in any sense forgotten; but because she must; because neither forgiveness nor forgetfulness came into the matter, but only those white hairs above his temples that urged her, that drove her, that compelled her.

There were no white hairs in her own brown tresses. Could it be that he had really suffered more than she? If so, G.o.d pity him! G.o.d help him!

For the first time since their parting, the prayer for him that rose from her heart kindled within her a glow that burned as fire from the altar. She had prayed. She had prayed. But her prayers had seemed to come back to her from a void immeasurable that held nought but the echoes of her cry.

But now--was it because she was ready to act as well as to pray?--it seemed to her that her appeal had reached the Infinite. And it was then that she began to learn that prayer is not only a pa.s.sive asking, but the eager straining of every nerve towards fulfilment.

It seemed useless to go to the Abbey for news. She would master her reluctance and go to Crowther. She was sure that he would be in a position to tell her all there was to know.

Mrs. Lorimer warmly applauded the idea. The continued estrangement of the two people whom she loved so dearly was one of her greatest secret sorrows now. She urged Avery to go, shedding tears over the thought of Piers going unspeeded into the awful dangers of war.

So by the middle of the morning Avery was on her way. It seemed to her the longest journey she had ever travelled. She chafed at every pause.

And through it all, Ina's fierce words ran in a perpetual refrain through her brain: "Love never casts away--Love never casts away."

She felt as if the girl had ruthlessly let a flood of light in upon her gloom, dazzling her, bewildering her, hurting her with its brilliance.

She had forced aside those drawn blinds. She had pierced to the innermost corners. And Avery herself was shocked by that which had been revealed.

It had never before been given to her to see her own motives, her own soul, thus. She had not dreamed of the canker of selfishness that lay at the root of all. With shame she remembered her a.s.surance to her husband that her love should never fail him. What of that love now--Love the Invincible that should have shattered the gates of the prison-house and led him forth in triumph?

Reaching town, she drove straight to Crowther's rooms. But she was met with disappointment. Crowther was out. He would be back in the evening, she was told, but probably not before.

Wearily she went down again and out into the seething life of the streets to spend the longest day of her life waiting for his return. Looking back upon that day afterwards, she often wondered how she actually spent the time. To and fro, to and fro, this way and that; now trying to ease her soul by watching the soldiers at drill in the Park, the long, long khaki lines and sunburnt faces; now pacing the edge of the water and seeking distraction in the antics of some water-fowl; now back again in the streets, moving with the crowd, seeing soldiers, soldiers on every hand, scanning each almost mechanically with the vagrant hope of meeting one who moved with a haughty pride of carriage and looked like a prince in disguise. Sometimes she stood to see a whole troop pa.s.s by, splendid boys swinging along with laughter and careless singing. She listened to the tramping feet and merry voices with a heart that sank ever lower and lower. She had started the day with a quivering wonder if the end of it might find her in his arms. But ever as the hours pa.s.sed by the certainty grew upon her that this would not be. She grew sick with the longing to see his face. She ached for the sound of his voice. And deep in the heart of her she knew that this futile yearning was to be her portion for many, many days. For over a year he had waited, and he had waited in vain. Now it was her turn.

It was growing dusk when she went again in search of Crowther. He had not returned, but she could not endure that aimless wandering any longer. She went in to wait for him, there in the room where Piers had found sanctuary during some of the darkest hours of his life.

She was too utterly wearied to move about, but sat sunk in the chair by the window, almost too numbed with misery and fatigue for coherent thought. The dusk deepened about her. The roar of London's life came vaguely from afar. Through it and above it she still seemed to hear the tread of the marching feet as the gallant lines swung by. And still with aching concentration she seemed to be searching for that one beloved face.

What did it matter what he had done? He was hers. He was hers. And, O G.o.d, how she wanted him! How gladly in that hour would she have yielded him all--all that she had to offer!

There came a quiet step without, a steady hand on the door. She started up with a wild hope clamouring at her heart. Might he not be there also?

It was possible! Surely it was possible!

She took a quick step forward. No conventional word would rise to her lips. They only stiffly uttered the one name, "Piers!"

And Crowther answered her, just as though no interval of more than a year lay between them and the old warm friends.h.i.+p. "He left for the Front today."

With the words he reached her, and she remembered later the sustaining strength with which his hands upheld her when she reeled beneath the blow.

He put her down again in the chair, and knelt beside her, for she clung to him convulsively, scarcely knowing what she did.

"He ought to have let you know," he said. "But he wouldn't be persuaded.

I believe--right up to the last--he hoped he would hear something of you.

But you know him, his d.a.m.nable pride,--or was it chivalry this time? On my soul, I scarcely know which. He behaved almost as if he were under an oath not to make the first advance. I am very sorry, Avery. But my hands were tied."

He paused, and she knew that he was waiting for a word from her--of kindness or reproach--some intimation of her feelings towards himself.

But she could only utter voicelessly, "I shall never see him again."

He pressed her icy hands close in his own, but he said no word of hope.

He seemed to know instinctively that it was not the moment.

"You can write to him," he said. "You can write now--tonight. The letter will reach him in a few days at most. He calls himself Beverley--Private Beverley. Let me give you some tea, and you can sit down and write straight away."

Kindly and practical, he offered her the consolation of immediate action; and the crus.h.i.+ng sense of loss began gradually to lose its hold upon her.

"I am going to tell you everything--all I know," he said. "I told him I should do so if you came to me. I only wish you had come a little sooner, but that is beside the point."

Again he paused. Her eyes were upon him, but she said nothing.

Finding her hold had slackened, he got up, lighted a lamp, and sat down with its light streaming across his rugged face.