Lawrence Clavering Part 15

"Then G.o.d knows," he cried, "I would you were Sir John Rookley's son;"

and with that he plumped down on his knees and drew off my boots. And this time I suffered him to do it.

I had not done with him, however, even for that night. For an hour or so later, when I was asleep in bed, some one shook me by the shoulder.

I looked with blinking eyes at the flame of a candle held an inch from my nose. Behind the candle was Aron, with a coat b.u.t.toned up to his chin as though he had thrown it over his nightgear.

"Aron," I said plaintively, "the question will keep till to-morrow."

"It is no question, sir, and to-morrow I shall be in Newlands," he said gravely. "I know nothing--only, were I you, I would not ride again to Keswick."

"Well, I shall not ride there to-morrow, at all events," I said, "since to-morrow I leave for Grasmere."

But on the morrow I did ride thither after all. For I woke up the next morning with one thought fixed in my mind, as though it had taken definite shape there the while I lay asleep. I must discover Rookley's business with Anthony Herbert. The matter was too urgent for delay. My resolve to sit no more for my portrait, my journey to Grasmere I set on one side; and while I was yet at breakfast I ordered a horse to be saddled. The fellow hurried off upon the errand, and I seemed to detect, not merely in his bearing but in the bearing of all who had attended me that morning, a new deference and alertness in their service; and I wondered whether Aron had shared with them his recent knowledge of my purpose.

As I rode down the drive I chanced to look back to the house, and I saw Aron on the steps, shaking his head dolefully, but I kept on my way.

Mr. Herbert received me with the air of a man that seeks to master an excitement. He worked fitfully, with fitful intervals of talk, and I remarked a deep-seated fire in his eyes, and a tremulous wavering of the lips. His manner kept me watchful, but never a hint did he drop of any design between my steward and himself. On the contrary, his conversation was all in praise of his wife, and the great store and reliance he set on her. I listened to it for some while, deeming it not altogether extravagant; but after a little I began again to fall back upon my old question, "What end could my steward serve by playing me false?" and again, "In what respect could Herbert help him?"

In the midst of these speculations, an incident occurred which struck them clean out of my mind. I was attracted first of all by something which Herbert was saying.

"It is out of the fas.h.i.+on," he said, with a sneer, "for a man to care for his wife, and ludicrous to own to it. But it is one of the few privileges of an artist, however poor he be, that he need take no stock of fas.h.i.+ons; and for my part, Mr. Clavering, I love my wife."

I replied carelessly enough that the profession was very creditable to him, for in truth I had seen him behave towards her with so cruel an inconsistency of temper that I was disinclined to rate his protestations very high.

"And so greatly, Mr. Clavering," he went on--"so greatly do I love her, that"--and here he threw down his pencils and took a step or two until he reached the window--"that if aught happened amiss to her I do not think I should live long after it, If she deceived me, I do not think that I should care to live. I do not think I should even hold it worth while to exact a retribution from the man who helped in the deceit."

And I saw his wife in the open doorway. She must have caught every word. I saw a flush as of anger overspread her face, and the flush give place to pallor.

"Mr. Ashlock, my steward, was with you last night, Mr. Herbert. Was it upon this subject that you talked?"

Herbert flung round upon his heel

"You take a tone I do not understand," he said, after a pause. "You may have a right to pry into the conversations of your servants, Mr.

Clavering, but I am not one of them"--and of a sudden he caught sight of his wife in the doorway. "You here?" he asked with a start.

"It is only fair," she answered, "that I should be present when you discuss my frailties with your patrons. But it seems," and her voice hardened audibly, "you do me the kindness to discuss them with your patrons' servants too."

She stood before him superb in pride; every line of her body seemed to demand an answer.

"It is because I love you," he answered feebly; and at that her quietude gave way.

She flung up her arms above her head.

"Because you love me!" she cried "Was ever woman so insulted, and on so mean a plea?" And she sank down at the table in a pa.s.sion of tears.

Herbert stepped over to her, and laid a hand upon her shoulder.

She shook his hand off, and rising of a sudden, confronted me with a blazing face.

"And you!" she cried bitterly--"you could listen to such talk--ay, like your servant!" And she swept out of the room before either her husband or myself could find a word to say.

Indeed, though I had not thought of the matter in that light before, I considered her accusation of the justest, and the sound of her sobbing remained in my ears, tingling me to pity of the woman and a sore indignation against the husband. It was for myself I should have felt that indignation I knew well, but I am relating what occurred, and--well, maybe I paid for the offence heavily enough.

"Mr. Herbert," said I, rising, with as much calmness as I could command, "I will not trouble you to continue the work."

"But the portrait!" he exclaimed, almost in alarm. "It is my best work!" And he stood a little aloof gazing at it.

"The portrait!" I cried, in a fury at his insensibility--"the portrait may go hang!"

"On the walls of Blackladies?" he asked, with a quick sneer.

"Oh," said I slowly, "you gossiped to some purpose with my steward, it appears."

He stood confused and silent I went into the room where it was my habit to change my dress, and left him. But when I came out I found him standing in the pa.s.sage with a lighted candle in his hand, though it was broad noonday. Doubtless I looked my surprise at him.

"An ill-lighted staircase, Mr. Clavering, is the devil," he remarked; and with a sardonic deference he preceded me to the street.

"It will rain, I think," he said, looking op at the sky.

"The air is very heavy," said I.

He stretched out the candlestick to the full length of his arm, and the flame barely wavered.

"Yes, no doubt it will rain," he repeated.

I noticed that one or two people who were pa.s.sing up the street stopped, as well they might, and stared at us. I bent forward and blew out the candle.

"You will pardon me," I said.

"It has served its purpose," said he, and he kicked the door to behind me.

I mounted, and walked my horse slowly homewards. About two miles from the town I dismounted, and tethering my horse to a tree, paced about the lake sh.o.r.es, resolved to unpick his sentences word by word until I had disentangled from amongst them some reference which would give me an inkling into the steward's designs. He had told Herbert of that talk we had had together in the hall concerning the hanging of the picture. Of so much I was a.s.sured, and so much I still found myself abstractedly repeating an hour later. For alas! in spite of my resolve, my thoughts had flown along a very different path. I had a vision of the woman, and her alternations from pride to tears, ever fixed before my eyes. It was myself who had caused them. One moment I accused myself for not undertaking her defence, the next for that I had ever entered her lodging; and whatever outcry I made sprang from the single conviction that I was responsible to her for the distress which she had shown. Just for that moment there seemed but two people upon G.o.d's earth--myself and a woman wronged by me.

"Mr. Clavering."

The name was uttered behind me with an involuntary cry, and I knew the voice. I turned me about, and there was Mrs. Herbert standing in a gap of the trees.

She was dressed as I had seen her an hour ago, with the addition of a hood thrown loosely over her head.

"What can I do?" I cried. "I can think of nothing. It is my fault, all this. G.o.d knows I am sensible of the remorse; I feel it at the very core of my heart; but that does not help me to the remedy. What can I do?"

"It is not your fault," she replied gently. "This would have happened sooner or later. Jealousy is never at a loss to invent an opportunity.

No, it is not your fault."

"But it is," I cried. "You know it; you know that the excuse you make for me is no more than a kindly sophistry. It is my fault. What can I do?"

She gave me no answer; indeed, it almost seemed as though there was something of impatience in her att.i.tude.

I moved a few steps away and sat down upon a boulder by the water's edge, with my head between my hands.