The Iron Woman Part 59

To-morrow she will go home with me."

She had taken off her bonnet, and with one unsteady hand she brushed back the tendrils of her soft hair that the rain had tightened into curls all about her temples; the glow in her cheeks from the cold air was beginning to die out, and he saw, suddenly, the suffering in her eyes. But for the first time in his life David Richie was indifferent to pain in his mother's face; that calm declaration that Elizabeth would go home with her, brushed the habit of tenderness aside and stung him into argument--which a moment later he regretted. "You say she'll 'go home.' Do you mean that you will take her back to Blair Maitland?"

"I hope she will go to her husband."

"Why?" He was standing before her, his shoulder against the mantelpiece, his hands in his pockets; his att.i.tude was careless, but his face was alert and hard; she no longer seemed a meddlesome good child; she was his mother, interfering in what was not her business. "Why?" he repeated.

"Because he is her husband," Helena Richie said.

"You know how he became her husband; he took advantage of an insane moment. The marriage has ended."

"Marriage can't end, David. Living together may end; but Blair is not unkind to Elizabeth; he is not unfaithful; he is not unloving--"

"No, my G.o.d! he is not. My poor Elizabeth!"

His mother, looking at the suddenly convulsed face before her, knew that it was useless to pretend that this was only a matter of preserving appearances by her presence. "David," she said, "what do you mean by that?"

"I mean that she has done with that thief." As he spoke it flashed into his mind that perhaps it was best to have things out with her now; then in the morning he would arrange it, somehow, so that she and Elizabeth should not meet;--for Elizabeth must not hear talk like this. Not that he was afraid of its effect; certainly this soft, sweet mother of his could not do what he had declared neither Blair Maitland, nor death, nor G.o.d himself could accomplis.h.!.+ But her words would make Elizabeth uncomfortable; so he had better tell her now, and get it over. In the midst of his own discomfort, he realized that this would spare him the necessity of a lie the next morning; and he was conscious of relief at that. "Mother," he said, gently, "I was going to write to you about it, but perhaps I had better tell you now.... She is coming to me."

"Coming to you!"

He sat down beside her, and took her hand in his; the terror in her face made him wince. For a moment he wished he had not undertaken to tell her; a letter would have been better. On paper, he could have reasoned it out calmly; now, her quivering face distressed him so that he hardly knew what he said.

"Materna, I am awfully sorry to pain you! I do wish you would realize that things _have_ to be this way."

"What way?"

"She and I have to be together," he said, simply. "She belongs to me. When I keep her from going back to Blair I merely keep my own. Mother, can't you understand? there is something higher than man's law, which ties a woman to a man she hates; there is G.o.d's law, which gives her to the man she loves! Oh, I am sorry you came to-night! To-morrow I would have written to you. You don't know how distressed I am to pain you, but--poor mother!"

She had sunk back in her chair with a blanched face. She said, faintly, "_David!_"

"Don't let's talk about it, Materna," he said, pitifully. He could not bear to look at her; it seemed as if she had grown suddenly old; she was broken, haggard, with appalled eyes and trembling lips. "You don't understand," David said, greatly distressed.

Helena Richie put her hands over her face. "Don't I?" she said.

There was a long pause; he took her hand and stroked it gently; but in spite of tenderness for her he was thinking of that other hand, young and thrilling to his own, which he had held an hour before; his lips stung at the memory of it; he almost forgot his mother, cowering in her chair. Suddenly she spoke:

"Well, David, what do you propose to do? After you have seduced another man's wife and branded Elizabeth with a--a dreadful name--"

His pity broke like a bubble; he struck the arm of his chair with a clenched hand. "You must not use such words to me! I will not listen to words that soil your lips and my ears! Will you leave this room or shall I?"

"Answer my question first: what do you mean to do after you have taken Elizabeth?"

"I shall marry her, of course. He will divorce her, and we shall be married." He was trembling with indignation: "I will not submit to this questioning," he said. He got up and opened the door. "Will you leave me, please?" he said, frigidly.

But she did not rise. She was bending forward, her hands gripped between her knees. Then, slowly, she raised her bowed head and there was authority in her face. "Wait. You must listen. You owe it to me to listen."

He hesitated. "I owe it to myself not to listen to such words as you used a moment ago." He was standing before her, his arms folded across his breast; there was no son's hand put out now to touch hers.

"I won't repeat them," she said, "although I don't know any others that can be used when a man takes another man's wife, or when a married woman goes away with a man who is not her husband."

"You drag me into an abominable position in making me even defend myself. But I will defend myself. I will explain to you that, as things are, Elizabeth cannot get a divorce from Blair Maitland.

But if she leaves him for me, he will divorce her; and we can marry."

"Perhaps he will not divorce her."

"You mean out of revenge? I doubt if even he could be such a brute as that."

"There have been such brutes."

"Very well; then we will do without his divorce! We will do without the respectability that you think so much of."

"n.o.body can do without it very long," she said, mildly. "But we won't argue about respectability; and I won't even ask you whether you will marry her, if she gets her divorce."

His indignation paused in sheer amazement. "No," he said. "I should hardly think that even you would venture to ask me such a question!"

"I will only ask you, my son, if you have thought how you would smirch her name by such a process of getting possession of her?"

"Oh," he said, despairingly, "what is the use of talking about it? I can't make you understand!"

"Have you considered that you will ruin Elizabeth?" she insisted.

"You may call happiness 'ruin,' if you want to, mother. We don't-- she and I."

"I suppose you wouldn't believe me if I told you it wouldn't be happiness?"

Her question was too absurd to answer. Besides, he was determined not to argue with her; argument would only prolong this futile and distressing interview. So, holding in the leash of respect for her, contempt for her opinions, he listened with strained and silent patience to what she had to say of duty and endurance. It all belonged, he thought, to her generation and to her austere goodness; but from his point of view it was childish. When at last he spoke, in answer to an insistent question as to whether Elizabeth realized how society would regard her course, his voice as well as his words showed his entire indifference to her whole argument. "Yes," he said; "I have pointed out to Elizabeth the fact that though our course will be in accordance with a Law that is infinitely higher than the laws that you think so much of, there will be, as you say, people to throw mud at her."

"A 'higher law,'" she said, slowly. "I have heard of the 'higher law,' David."

"That Elizabeth will obey it for me, that she is willing to expose herself to the contempt of little minds, makes me adore her! And I am willing, I love her enough, to accept her sacrifice--"

"Though you did not love her enough to accept the trifling matter of her money?" his mother broke in.

Sarcasm from her was so totally unexpected that for a moment he did not realize that his armor had been pierced. "G.o.d knows I believe it is for her happiness," he said; then, suddenly, his face began to burn, and in an instant he was deeply angry.

"David," she said, "you seem very sure of G.o.d; you speak His name very often. Have you really considered Him in your plan?"

He smothered an impatient exclamation; "Mother, that sort of talk means nothing to me; and apparently my reason for my course means nothing to you. I can't make you understand--"

"I don't need you to make me understand," she interrupted him; "and your reason is older than you are; I guess it is as old as human nature: You want to be happy. That is your reason, David; nothing else."

"Well, it satisfies us," he said, coldly; "I wish you wouldn't insist upon discussing it, mother, you are tired, and--"

"Yes, I am tired," she said, with a gasp. "David, if you will promise me not to speak to Elizabeth of this until you and I can talk it over quietly--"

"Elizabeth and I are going away together, to-morrow."

"You shall not do it!" she cried.