Born in Exile Part 77

'Here is something that will interest you--possibly you have seen it.'

He began to read aloud:

'"On the 23rd inst. was celebrated at St. Bragg's, Torquay, the marriage of the Rev. Bruno Leathwaite Chilvers, late Rector of St Margaret's, Exeter, and the Hon. Bertha Harriet Cecilia Jute, eldest daughter of the late Baron Jute. The ceremony was conducted by the Hon.

and Rev. J. C. Jute, uncle of the bride, a.s.sisted by the Rev. F.

Miller, the Very Rev. Dean Pinnock, the Rev. H. S. Crook, and the Rev.

William Tomkinson. The bride was given away by Lord Jute. Mr Horatio Dukinfield was best man. The bridal dress was of white brocade, draped with Brussels lace, the corsage being trimmed with lace and adorned with orange blossoms. The tulle veil, fastened with three diamond stars, the gifts of"----Well, shall I go on?'

'The triumph of Chilvers!' murmured G.o.dwin. 'I wonder whether the Hon.

Bertha is past her fortieth year?'

'A blooming beauty, I dare say. But Lord! how many people it takes to marry a man like Chilvers! How sacred the union must be!--Pray take a paragraph more: "The four bridesmaids--Miss--etc., etc.--wore cream crepon dresses trimmed with turquoise blue velvet, and hats to match.

The bridegroom's presents to them were diamond and ruby brooches."'

'Chilvers _in excelsis_!--So he is no longer at Exeter; has no living, it seems. What does he aim at next, I wonder?'

Earwaker cast meaning glances at his friend.

'I understand you,' said G.o.dwin, at length. 'You mean that this merely ill.u.s.trates my own ambition. Well, you are right, I confess my shame--and there's an end of it.'

He puffed at his cigar, resuming presently:

'But it would be untrue if I said that I regretted anything.

Const.i.tuted as I am, there was no other way of learning my real needs and capabilities. Much in the past is hateful to me, but it all had its use. There are men--why, take your own case. You look back on life, no doubt, with calm and satisfaction.'

'Rather, with resignation.'

G.o.dwin let his cigar fall, and laughed bitterly.

'Your resignation has kept pace with life. I was always a rebel. My good qualities--I mean what I say--have always wrecked me. Now that I haven't to fight with circ.u.mstances, they may possibly be made subservient to my happiness.'

'But what form is your happiness to take?'

'Well, I am leaving England. On the Continent I shall make no fixed abode, but live in the places where cosmopolitan people are to be met.

I shall make friends; with money at command, one may hope to succeed in that. Hotels, boarding-houses, and so on, offer the opportunities. It sounds oddly like the project of a swindler, doesn't it? There's the curse I can't escape from! Though my desires are as pure as those of any man living, I am compelled to express myself as if I were about to do something base and underhand. Simply because I have never had a social place. I am an individual merely; I belong to no cla.s.s, town, family, club'----'Cosmopolitan people,' mused Earwaker. 'Your ideal is transformed.'

'As you know. Experience only could bring that about. I seek now only the free, intellectual people--men who have done with the old conceptions--women who'----

His voice grew husky, and he did not complete the sentence. 'I shall find them in Paris, Rome.--Earwaker, think of my being able to speak like this! No day-dreams, but actual sober plans, their execution to begin in a day or two. Paris, Rome! And a month ago I was a hopeless slave in a vile manufacturing town.--I wish it were possible for me to pray for the soul of that poor dead woman. I don't speak to you of her; but do you imagine I am brutally forgetful of her to whom I owe all this?'

'I do you justice,' returned the other, quietly.

'I believe you can and do.'

'How grand it is to go forth as I am now going!' G.o.dwin resumed, after a long pause. 'Nothing to hide, no shams, no pretences. Let who will inquire about me. I am an independent Englishman, with so and so much a year. In England I have one friend only--that is you. The result, you see, of all these years savage striving to knit myself into the social fabric.'

'Well, you will invite me some day to your villa at Sorrento,' said Earwaker, encouragingly.

'That I shall!' G.o.dwin's eyes flashed with imaginative delight. 'And before very long. Never to a home in England!'

'By-the-bye, a request. I have never had your portrait. Sit before you leave London.'

'No. I'll send you one from Paris--it will be better done.'

'But I am serious. You promise?'

'You shall have the thing in less than a fortnight.'

The promise was kept. Earwaker received an admirable photograph, which he inserted in his alb.u.m with a curious sense of satisfaction. A face by which every intelligent eye must be arrested; which no two observers would interpret in the same way.

'His mate must be somewhere,' thought the man of letters, 'but he will never find her.'

CHAPTER II

In his acceptance of Sidwell's reply, Peak did not care to ask himself whether the delay of its arrival had any meaning one way or another.

Decency would hardly have permitted her to answer such a letter by return of post; of course she waited a day or so.

But the interval meant more than this.

Sylvia Moorhouse was staying with her friend. The death of Mrs Moorhouse, and the marriage of the mathematical brother, had left Sylvia homeless, though not in any distressing sense; her inclination was to wander for a year or two, and she remained in England only until the needful arrangements could be concluded.

'You had better come with me,' she said to Sidwell, as they walked together on the lawn after luncheon.

The other shook her head.

'Indeed, you had better.--What are you doing here? What are you going to make of your life?'

'I don't know.'

'Precisely. Yet one ought to live on some kind of plan. I think it is time you got away from Exeter; it seems to me you are finding its atmosphere _morbific_.'

Sidwell laughed at the allusion.

'You know,' she said, 'that the reverend gentleman is shortly to be married?'

'Oh yes, I have heard all about it. But is he forsaking the Church?'

'Retiring only for a time, they say.'

'Forgive the question, Sidwell--did he honour you with a proposal?'

'Indeed, no!'

'Some one told me it was imminent, not long ago.'

'Quite a mistake,' Sidwell answered, with her grave smile. 'Mr Chilvers had a singular manner with women in general. It was meant, perhaps, for subtle flattery; he may have thought it the most suitable return for the female wors.h.i.+p he was accustomed to receive.'