The Creators Part 116

"Of course, it does make your position a little difficult. Still, we don't want them to fret for her--we don't want them not to be fond of you. Besides, if you went, what on earth would they do without you?"

"They must learn to do without me. They would have some one else."

"Yes, and they'll be fond of _her_."

"Not in the same way. I think perhaps I've given myself too much to them. There's something unusual, something tragic in the way they cling to me. I know it's bad for them. I try to check it, and I can't. And I've no right to let it go on. n.o.body has a right except their mother."

"Well, it's awfully nice of you to feel like that about it. But as you say, I don't see how it's to be helped. I think you're taking an exaggerated view--conscientiously exaggerated. They're too young, you know, to be very tragic."

She smiled as through tears.

"I don't think you'll save tragedy by going. Besides, what should I do?"

"You?"

"Yes. You don't appear to have thought of me."

"Don't I?" She smiled again, as if at some secret, none too happy, of her own.

"If I had not thought of you I should never have come here a second time. If I had not thought of you I should not have thought of going."

"Did you think I wanted you to go?"

"I--was not quite sure."

He laughed. "Are you sure now?"

She looked at him again.

"I _do_ help you by staying?"

He was overwhelmed by his indebtedness.

"Most certainly you do. I must have been very ungracious if you haven't realized how indispensable you are."

"If you're sure of that--I'll stay."

"Good."

He held out his hand and detained hers for a moment. "Are you sure you don't want to leave us? I'm not asking too much of you?"

She withdrew her hand.

"You have never asked too much."

Thus Gertrude uncovered the knees of the G.o.ds.

LXII

Four days in every week Jane had a letter from Gertrude and once a week a letter from Brodrick. She was thus continually a.s.sured that all was well and that Brodrick was very comfortable with Gertrude.

She was justified in staying on, since her genius had come back to her, divinely placable, divinely propitiated and appeased.

She knew that in a measure she owed this supreme reconciliation to George Tanqueray. Her genius was virile. He could not give it anything, nor could it have taken anything he gave. He was pa.s.sive to her vision and humble, on his knees, as he always had been, before a kindred immortality. What he did for her was to see her idea as she saw it, but so that through his eyes she saw steadily and continuously its power and perfection. She was aware that in the last five years she had grown dependent on him for that. For five years he had lifted her out of the abyss when she had found herself falling. Through all the surgings and tossings that had beset her he had kept her from sinking into the trough of the wave. Never once had he let go his hold till he had seen her riding gaily on the luminous crest.

His presence filled her with a deep and strong excitement. For two years, in their long separations, she had found that her craving for it was at times unbearable. She knew that when her flame died down and she was in terror of extinction, she had only to send for him to have her fear taken from her. She had only to pick up a book of his, to read a sentence of his, and she would feel herself afire again. Everything about him, his voice, his look, the touch of his hand, had this penetrating, life-giving quality.

Three weeks pa.s.sed and Tanqueray was still staying in his inn at Chagford. In the mornings they worked, he on his book and she on hers.

She saw him every afternoon or evening. Sometimes they took long walks together over the moors. Sometimes they wandered in the deep lanes.

Sometimes, in rainy weather, they sat indoors, talking. In the last five years Tanqueray (who never used to show his work) had brought all his ma.n.u.scripts for her to read. He brought them now. Sometimes she read to him what she had written. Sometimes he read to her. Sometimes he left his ma.n.u.script with her and took hers away with him. They discussed every doubtful point together, they advised each other and consulted.

Sometimes they talked of other things. She was aware that the flame he kindled leaned to him, drawn by his flame. She kept it high. She wanted him to see how divine it was, and how between him and her there could be no question of pa.s.sion that was not incorruptible, a fiery intellectual thing.

But every day Tanqueray walked up from the village to the farm. She looked on his coming as the settled, natural thing. Brodrick continued to a.s.sure her that the children were happy without her, and that he was very comfortable with Gertrude; and Tanqueray reiterated that it was all right, all perfectly right.

One day he arrived earlier than usual, about eleven o'clock. He proposed that they should walk together over the moor to Post Bridge, lunch at the inn there and walk back. Distance was nothing to them.

They set out down the lane. There had been wind at dawn. Southwards, over the hills, the clouds were piled up to the high sun in a riot and glory of light and storm. The hills were dusk under their shadow.

The two swung up the long slopes at a steady pace, rejoicing in the strong movement of their limbs. It was thus that they used to set out together long ago, on their "days," over the hills of Buckinghams.h.i.+re and Hertfords.h.i.+re. Jane remarked that her state now was almost equal to that great freedom. And they talked of Brodrick.

"There aren't many husbands," she said, "who would let their wives go off like this for months at a time."

"Not many. He has his merits."

"When you think of the life I lead him at home it takes heaps off his merit. The kindest thing I can do to him is to go away and stay away.

George, you don't know how I've tormented the poor darling."

"I can imagine."

"He was an angel to bear it."

She became pensive at the recollection.

"Sometimes I wonder whether I ought, really, to have married. You told me that I oughtn't."

"When?"

"Six years ago."

"Well--I'm inclined to say so still. Only, the unpardonable sin in a great artist--isn't so much marrying as marrying the wrong person."

"He isn't the wrong person for me. But I'm afraid I'm the wrong person for him."

"It comes to the same thing."