Woman and Artist Part 29

Lorimer smiled as he realised that Dora continued to think of Philip.

"Oh, but it does, at least up to a certain point. First of all, what do you mean by all his obligations towards his wife? If to neglect her is to fail in all his duty towards her, my theory explains the phenomenon perfectly."

"Come, come, my dear friend, do you maintain, for instance, that a husband who loves his wife, or even only respects her, forces her to receive the visits of a man whom he knows to have been in love with her before her marriage, and who has earned for himself a well-merited reputation as a libertine? Is that kind of thing a natural consequence of the complete absorption?"

"We are getting on now," thought Lorimer.

"Does he invite that man to his house to dine, and then miss a train, so that they may be thrown together _en tete-a-tete_ for a whole evening?

Is that your absorption, too? Ah, don't talk to me, my dear Gerald; there are circ.u.mstances which awake the most absorbed man on earth."

Lorimer remained dumb, and looked at Dora in the strangest manner, as if seeking to know whether he had heard aright. He threw his cigarette on the tray and drew nearer to her. He hardly knew whether to pity her or to reproach her bitterly.

"What!" said he, "you do not know what happened to Philip at the moment that he was about to leave the Paris hotel to return to London in time to dine with Sabaroff? He never explained all that to you? Why, he told me that he had written you a long explanation of it all."

"It is quite true that he has written to me several times since that dreadful day, but I have torn up unread every letter he has sent me since I left that hated house."

"Well," said Lorimer, with an air of mixed pity and amazement, "upon my word, you can do clever things, when you set about it! If you had read his letters, you would have learnt the whole truth."

"Tell me yourself, tell me everything," said Dora breathlessly.

"Listen, then, while I show you how unfounded was your crowning suspicion of him. Philip's business in Paris being finished, he had breakfasted early, and was descending the staircase on his way to his cab, when, as he reached the first floor landing, a door opened, and a gentleman came out. Judge of his feelings at finding himself face to face with his father! One glance served to show Philip that a great change had come over him. From a hale, haughty, self-reliant man of sixty, he had turned into a pitiable invalid, and looked prematurely old and feeble. A broken cry, 'My son!' arrested Philip's steps. Struck with pity at the sight of the change in his father, he allowed himself to be led through the still-open door, and there ensued a moving scene in which the elder man humbled himself before the younger and implored his forgiveness. The minutes fled by meanwhile, and when Philip, unnerved and shaken, reached the station, it was only to find that the train had left two minutes before. The rest you know."

"Oh, my poor brain is on fire," murmured Dora.

"Dora, you have misjudged Philip. He made you rich, thinking to add to your happiness--that is the only harm he ever did you. Ah, say that you forgive him, and will go back to him--he is waiting for you."

"No, no, never in that house."

"No," said Lorimer softly; "not in that house, but the old studio in Elm Avenue."

"Where? what did you say?" exclaimed Dora.

"Philip has left the house you hate so, because of its cruel souvenirs.

He has gone back to St. John's Wood, where you spent the first six years of your married life, and, in order never to be turned out of that house, he has bought it."

"But the house is inhabited," said Dora.

"I know it."

"Why, then--it must be Philip" ...

"Who occupies it," said Lorimer; "he is only waiting for your presence, dear Dora, before beginning to work again. He will devote the rest of his life to painting in the old studio. It is his irrevocable resolution."

A ray of ineffable joy spread over Dora's face; but the shock had been too violent and too sudden. She was not strong enough to bear such emotion as the news had caused her. Repeating over Lorimer's phrase, "It is he who occupies the house! Oh, my dear old studio!" she fell fainting into his arms, and he called Hobbs to come quickly to her mistress's aid. After a few moments her eyes opened, she smiled at Lorimer, and he took her hands and kissed them.

It was five o'clock. Dr. Templeton arrived, and had Dora led to her bedroom, with a recommendation to rest quietly on the bed a while.

"It is only a little weakness," said he; "her pulse is almost normal.

This sort of thing is often caused by sudden emotion. It will soon be over, but I will stay near her for the present."

"My plan is working well," said Lorimer; "I will give the signal to Philip. Be careful that she does not enter this room until everything is ready."

The doctor nodded a.s.sent, as he opened Dora's door and disappeared inside.

Philip came upstairs, trembling like a culprit. When he looked around and took in the details of the poor studio, which was such a faithful copy of another dear to both, he could not restrain his emotion. All that Dora had kept back from his knowledge, this pathetic room revealed to him. He had difficulty in keeping back his tears.

"Dora is there," whispered Lorimer, pointing to the room.

"Ah, she is there!"

He stepped softly over on tiptoe. Through the door of this room, the heart of Philip sent a message to Dora: "If a man's devotion can revive a woman's long-lost smile, and redeem the wrong that he has thoughtlessly inflicted, you shall live joyously once more, cherished and adored. The remainder of my life shall be consecrated to your happiness."

Dr. Templeton came into the studio, and announced that Dora was sleeping.

"To tell you the truth," said he to Lorimer, "your plan frightened me somewhat at first. I was afraid that the shock might be a little too much for our fragile patient. She is far from strong, she has been overtaxing her strength, and the emotions of this day, followed up by such a scene as you have planned, would, I feared, be a heavy strain to subject her to. However, I have just carefully sounded her heart, and, thank Heaven, I feel relieved. It is beating regularly enough now, and I think we can, in all security, try the little manoeuvre you suggest.

It is a trifle melodramatic perhaps, but an excellent idea for all that."

"Well, then, to work at once," said Lorimer. "Let us proceed to make this room a still more faithful copy of the St. John's Wood studio than Dora has done, by adding to it the artist himself."

Philip, docile as a child in the hands of these two friends, lent himself to the scheme, and did exactly as he was bid. He began by taking off his coat and donning his working jacket, then, palette and brush in hand, he seated himself on the stool in front of the easel that bore the portrait of Dora.

"Perfect," said Lorimer, who surveyed every detail, as if he had been superintending a rehearsal of one of his plays. "If I am successful to-day, this scene will be my _chef-d'oeuvre_."

Dr. Templeton went to Dora's room and found her sleeping soundly.

"She sleeps still," he said, as he rejoined the others; "do not let us disturb her. When she wakens, Hobbs is going to let me know, and I will go in and fetch her."

They remained talking together in hushed tones for about twenty minutes.

Hobbs opened the door, and made a sign to signify that the patient was awake.

Immediately Dr. Templeton rose and went to the bedroom, while Lorimer lowered the blinds and darkened the studio, so that nothing could be clearly distinguished. Philip again took up his position at the easel.

"As soon as ever the room gets lighter, work away at the picture, so as to give the impression that you are finis.h.i.+ng it, and take no notice of anything else around you.... Hush, I think I hear her coming!"

Sounds were heard coming from Dora's room.

The door was opened slowly.

"Now then, attention!" whispered Lorimer, "and quite steady, please, as the photographers say."

The doctor led in Dora, followed by Hobbs.

"How dark it is!" said Dora; "have I slept a long while? Mr. Lorimer is gone, I suppose?"

Lorimer was watching from behind a screen the working out of his stratagem.

"Dear Mrs. Grantham," said Dr. Templeton, "I am going to make a particular request of you. I want to try an experiment. Just to please me, would you mind taking this palette and these brushes, and seating yourself in front of that easel?"

The reader remembers that Dora had placed, side by side, in her poor room, the two easels that had so stood in Philip's studio.