II
And so we were again, again and for the last time, in that swift motorcar, wrapped in the gentle silences of the night. The oppression of the heat was gone since the rains of yesterday, but even yet London could not quite rouse itself from the stupor of the past tropical week. And tonight the flight of the stork did not torment the hosts of the midgets, “for,” said Iris from the shadow of her green hat, “there is no hurry, no hurry at all.”
A clock in the High Street of Kensington was at a little after half-past nine o’clock. The wide sweep of road towards Olympia was quiet with the gentle traffic of no-man’s-hour, for such is a little after half-past nine o’clock. I said: “I do wish you would tell me what all this is about.”
“It begins a long time ago, it is a long story. Having to do with the loves of babes, the wisdom of sucklings, and the sins of the fathers. And the sins of the fathers. But I will tell you more when we come to Harrod’s.”
“But we passed Harrod’s long ago!”
“There is another. You will see. Patience.” Through Hammersmith and Chiswick, by Ranelagh and Roehampton, we sped into the veiled countryside. The glow of London was a yellow arch in the night behind. We passed the last omnibus on its last journey to a far-flung corner of the town.
“But,” I pleaded, “I don’t even know where we are going to!”
“Why, to Sutton Marle! Didn’t I tell you? It’s not far. …”
“But I don’t know Sir Maurice! Really, Iris, how dare you let me in for this?”
“It is all right, dear, you are expected. I said to Hilary, not an hour ago on the telephone: ‘I am not for Sutton Marle unless I may bring my one friend.’ ”
“Well, I never heard such cheek! And why, Iris, am I your one friend?”
“Because once upon a time you shamed me of my shame. Because you did not hold me cheap. Because romance dies hard in you. Because, dear, I rather like you. And that is why I told Hilary that you were my friend and that I would not dare Sutton Marle without you, adding that as he had put you off for dinner it would be something for you to do.”
“Iris, you are laughing all the time, you who told me you were afraid!”
She glanced at me just then, and that second’s smile is like a wound on my memory. A car screamed and passed us, and she cried through the disordered air: “I am afraid, but of course I am gay, too! Haven’t I waited twelve years for my inheritance!”
The flame of the lights on the road ahead made a wall of blackness on each side of us. I was like a child in this blackness, and it seemed to me that her voice was the voice of the night. I did not know what to say. I said: “Iris, that girl will die without Napier.”
Minutes later, she said: “If people died of love I must have risen from the dead to be driving this car now!”
“Indeed, Iris, how can I argue about love against your experience!”
“My friend, you can’t shame me! For I am shame itself come to life. Yes, I have lit many small fires to quench one large fire. I have been unsuccessful. Thank God, thank God for that! And now let the one large fire burn, with a boy and a girl of eighteen for fuel. Nothing else matters.”
“My dear, so much else matters! Restraints, nobilities, decencies, sacrifices!”
We passed slowly through a village High Street, hailed and mocked good-naturedly by a group of men emerging from an inn.
She said: “In the ancient love-tales and the songs of the Jongleurs we read of maidens sacrificed on the altar of circumstance. I was a maiden, even I, once upon a time. Dear, I am afraid you must take my word for that. And I, a maid, was sacrificed to the vulgar ambitions of a Sir Maurice. So let us not talk of sacrifice. It makes me sick with anger.”
Not fast, not slow, the Hispano-Suiza swept through Surrey. Then she said sharply: “But if Venice had had a child!”
I could not see her face, for her hat and the darkness were between us. But ever so faintly I could see her mouth, and her lips were parted, as though she was praying. I wondered if she was praying to whom she could be praying. “She has a God,” had said that captain of men.
“And why did you say that so bitterly, Iris?”
“Was I bitter? Oh, that’s a sin, to think of that angel and to be bitter.”
“Angel? Did you say angel?”
“I said angel,” she said, and no other answer had I but from the stork crying dolorously to warn corners of our flight.
“If Venice,” she said reasonably, “had had a child, I would have called to Napier in vain. We can’t know the beginning and end of honour, nor what it is, nor what it will do, nor what will debauch it, nor what will make it unbending as iron. Let us say I have debauched Napier’s honour. Oh, let us say anything! We don’t stand on words on ultimate nights like these. Honour is like a little child, let us say, and like a little child it may be led away by a shining toy, and in this case I am the shining toy. But had Venice had a child I might have shone like Aldebaran and called Napier in vain. And that would have been right and just. We must all give way before children, always, always. Oh, if people had always done that, what miseries wouldn’t the world have been spared! Those whose dreams are clean must give way to children, for babies will carry clean dreams further than the wisest of old men, and slowly the world will rise above the age of smoke and savagery. …”
“But it’s absurd, Iris! What chance has the girl had of having a child yet!”
“But I am not pretending to play fair! Or did you think I was? I awoke from my illness, and I awoke suddenly to life. Awaking, I took my chance as it came. And quickly, quickly, for fear of giving Venice a longer chance. And it’s because I haven’t played fair that I am going to Sir Maurice’s house now.”
“Oh!” I said. “Good God! Let me out of this car, Iris! I will walk back to London.”
“Napier doesn’t know. Napier would be frantic if he knew. Napier is dining with Venice tonight. They would both be frantic if they knew I had taken Sir Maurice’s challenge and gone down to Sutton Marle. But I must go, to make unfairness a little less unfair. I must let Sir Maurice have his last joy of me. Besides, there is a fascination in letting men tell the truth to one. There is a fascination in wondering if it will ever be the truth. But look! Oh, look! There is Harrod’s!”
The car had pulled up on the brow of a small hill. The lights searched across the road into an unhedged field. Iris pointed along the flame of light.
“There is Harrod’s,” she said gravely.
“But where is Harrod’s? I see a field and what looks like a giant oak.”
“That is Harrod’s. Not an oak, but an ash. It is very old, and smells of fairies and moonlight.”
There were once two roads that led away from a certain tree.
The tree, a solitary giant of enormous girth, stood perhaps twenty yards from the road. Its trunk dammed the far-flung eyes of the car, and in the light its leaves were made of silver, and you fancied that, had there been a breath of wind, it had spoken from its ancient wisdom, of which this night stood so sorely in need; but never a whisper stirred the countryside.
“Iris, doesn’t that make your passions look … silly?”
She took my hand, and lifted it, and dropped it. I do not know why she did that. Her face was hidden. It seemed to me that a long time passed before she spoke, and I seemed to think of many things.
“If there was a moon,” she said at last, “a little way behind Harrod’s you would see a small hill, and on the hill you would see a white house. That is where Gerald and I were born. Perhaps Gerald knows why now. That is one of the many things Napier and I have to talk out in the solitudes, why all we men and women are born. There must be a reason. Across the fields this way is Sutton Marle, where Napier was born. We used to play beneath this tree, Gerald, Boy, Napier and I. Boy was older than us, and bossed us. So there was a revolt, and then we made two camps, Boy and Gerald, Napier and I. Sometimes Aunt Eve, who took care of Gerald and me when mother died, would take us all up to London, and we would have tea at Harrod’s. Napier and I loved Harrod’s because we at once got lost there. And so we called this tree Harrod’s, because we were happy here, too. We were twelve then. Later on they discouraged our being together. Aunt Eve didn’t want me to be made miserable when I grew up by not being allowed to marry Napier, for she knew that I didn’t come into Sir Maurice’s plans. Poor Maurice, I’ve crashed into them now, haven’t I! Father got poorer, we sold this house, and went to live in Cambridge Square. Napier was not allowed to see me any more, but we managed to meet somehow. Gerald helped, Aunt Eve helped, Boy helped. That was when Boy first loved me, he said later, because of my determination not to lose Napier. But Sir Maurice won. I was stronger than Napier, but I was not so strong as Sir Maurice. He wanted Napier to marry a rich girl, and Iris March was only the daughter of the younger branch of a bankrupt house. One day, when I was eighteen, I got a wire from Napier to meet him here at Harrod’s that afternoon. I borrowed the money for a taxi—bit from Boy, bit from Hilary—and here Napier was, white, desperate. In a general cleanup before going up to Oxford he had promised his father never to see me again. ‘I like Iris,’ Sir Maurice had said, ‘but she comes of rotten stock.’ I don’t think we had ever realised before that we were in love. I suppose I grew up in that one second. But Napier was still a boy of eighteen, while I was suddenly as old as the Queen of Hearts. I told him I loved him. Dear, I have known many men, I have married two, but I have only told one that I loved him, and he was a boy. Poor Napier, so torn, white, distracted. Afraid of my love, which seemed to him almost unholy, afraid of his father, who seemed to him almost holy. England, my England! His father was strong in Napier, and the Harpendens were strong in him. They were stronger than me at eighteen, and they were stronger than the sweet memories of Harrod’s. I said to Napier then, just over there where the lights fall by that trunk, I said, eighteen to eighteen: ‘Napier, I think I have a body that burns for love. Napier, I shall burn it with love, but I never will say “I love you” to any man but you, because it never will be true.’ And what I said at eighteen is true now at thirty, I have never said I loved him to any man but Napier, for it hasn’t been true. I have given myself, in disdain, in desire, with disgust, with delight, but I have kept to that silly, childish boast of mine. I say that to my shame, but now shame is a weed under my foot. I married because my body was hungry for love and born to love and must love. And I thought I would destroy my body with love’s delight, but all I did was to destroy a good man. Hector Storm went off to Ireland and died because one night in my sleep I whispered Napier’s name. Or perhaps I had whispered it many nights. I told him that he was being jealous of a ghost, but he wouldn’t believe. Now all those things are passed. The nymph unloosened her girdle to desire, and now she has unloosened it to her only love. One grows out of everything, even desire: and then one can love. Look, Harrod’s is smiling, all silver and smiling! Here Sir Maurice sacrificed me twelve years ago. Tonight I have to say to him: ‘This is what you have done, Maurice—the unhappiness of Venice, the unhappiness of your son, and twelve years of hell for me. Are you content?’ Oh God, it’s been hell, these twelve years! If you had kissed hell, as I have kissed hell, if you had sacrificed to hell, as I have sacrificed my body to hell, you would know what I mean. But now I can’t grudge Maurice the final satisfaction of telling me what he thinks of me. Dear, it matters so little what men like Maurice think of one. They worship all that is despicable, they despise all that is really good. From the beginning of time this world has been wounded by the manliness of fools. Oh, let Maurice have his say tonight! And mighty Guy. And my sweet Hilary! Let them have their say. I can only answer them with love. How could I answer them but with love? But I can silence them with love! Love, love, love! A glorious word, a matchless word! But isn’t it? Love, love! I am in love. I glory in love, I will die in love! Love, my sweet, love, love! To be in love as I am in love is to be in heaven before hell was made. I am in love!”
The car rushed on, up a wide slope that curved handsomely so that the light played on meadows and startled the beasts of the fields.
“And you are so sure, Iris, that these three men, who have known you all your life and one of whom has loved you with all his heart ever since he saw you walk down South Audley Street, all brown stockings and blue eyes—you are so sure, Iris, that nothing they can say will touch you?”
The lights swept over great lodge-gates standing wide open before a curving avenue of tall trees. We passed beneath them, showering gold on their trunks. The drive shone like a yellow carpet beneath our lights.
“I tell you,” Iris whispered, “I shall be a very Saint George for steadfastness!”
The stork fled up the curving avenue of Sutton Marle. It seemed, to me, to crouch with fear beneath the noble line of trees. They stood above us like towers. I was afraid.
“This is the lion’s den, Iris!”
“Well, I have killed lions, and tigers too, in twelve years’ wandering through hell.”
“But this is the den of the king of lions, Iris! This is the den of the lion of England!”
“Love smiles at lions. Love can never be a clown, but a lion can wear an ass’s skin. Darling, I’m no good at natural history, but I have studied history.”
“You couldn’t mock it so unless you loved it very deeply. You are like a child, dear Iris, daring her father and mother. These trees—”
“But I laugh at the trees of Sutton Marle! I always did, I never could play with them, not even believe in them. I tell you, there is no tree but Harrod’s, my servant, and my master and my playmate tree, Harrod’s. Oh, how Harrod’s hates Sir Maurice! It makes me afraid, to think how Harrod’s hates Maurice Harpenden. Let him beware as he walks beneath it!”
Then the trees parted from above us and we came into an open place where stood a fountain, and round the fountain we swept a circle and came before the doors of a long white manor house. De Travest’s car stood there. As we drew up beside it the doors of the white house opened and a fat old man stood at the head of the steps. His hair was like his house, quite white.
“Truble, we will go round by the garden,” Iris said.
The fat old butler looked very gravely down at Iris. She was like a small knight at the foot of the broad steps, he a kindly old dragon up above. Oh, he looked so grave!
Iris said to me: “Mr. Truble is my oldest friend. He is a very nice man. Truble, what have you to say to that?”
“Sir Maurice did not expect you, Miss Iris.”
“How, Truble! Sir Maurice knew I was coming!”
“But he did not think you would come, Miss Iris. But his lordship expected you. The gentlemen are in the library.”
“His lordship, Truble, does me too much honour in thinking I can keep my word. … Truble, my dear!”
I had been looking round me when that sudden cry shook me like the cry of a bird in pain. The fat old butler was weeping, there was not a doubt of it. There at the head of the broad steps, quite motionless, a broad black shape under his white hair. Iris had him by the shoulder, was shaking him, her hat like a toy against that black shape.
“Truble,” she said, so huskily, “that I should ever have made you cry! My dear, my dear!”
“Sir,” the old man appealed to me down below with a funnily outflung hand. “I never was so ashamed of myself in my life! But it came on me all of a sudden hearing Miss Iris say, here at the doors of Sutton Marle, in a voice as hard as that ash she was always in love with, that about his lordship doing her too much honour about her keeping her word. I held Miss Iris in my arms, sir, when she wasn’t above a year old, and now—I’m sure I beg your pardon, sir. And yours, Miss Iris. I’m sure I don’t know what’s come over me tonight. …”
One leather arm had the old man by the shoulder. Iris’s face seemed painted white.
“Truble,” she said, so huskily, “I am so sorry to have upset you. You have been faithful to me, Truble, for thirty years, and now, I suppose, you mustn’t love me any more. You don’t love me any more, Truble?”
“Miss Iris, Miss Iris! There’s no good comes from loving, I see that!”
“Then, Truble, I here and now do release you from giving me a thought ever again. Adieu, Truble.”
Her face painted white, her eyes absorbed in what they did not see, she came down to where I stood. “Come,” she said, expressionless. She could make her words into pieces of iron, and I did not dare to look at the motionless old man at the head of the steps. We skirted the house in silence. I supposed we were on a lawn. The rains of yesterday had not softened the drought, the grass was hard as stone under the feet. I said: “Iris, you are moved already—you who were not to be moved by anything that was said!”
I felt her fingers tightening round my arm. Hers were strong white fingers. “I hadn’t bargained for Truble. He should have been in bed by now. Often in moments of self-hatred and contempt I have taken a little heart from that old man’s devotion. And he would always send me wishes on my birthday. No, I hadn’t bargained for Truble. … Look!”
“Why, they are playing bridge!”
“And, dear, how grimly! See, Hilary is looking quite young, he must have a bad hand. And Guy Apollo Belvedere—Oh, he’s thinking!—and then he plays the wrong card! Ah, poor Guy! He always did treat his trumps as though they were tulips, with too much respect. And Sir Maurice! Now, dear heart, what do you think of Sir Maurice? Isn’t he the handsome soldier!”
“Oh, handsome! Napier with a gay sinner’s face. …”
“Judge him for me! Oh, do! Here we are, conspirators, whispering. Now, judge me, first, Mr. Townshend of Magralt.”
“Iris, must I! Can I? I can’t!”
“Of course you must, can, will! Speak without thinking. It is only thus that truth is made.”
“He is a good man. His goodness is supported by his principles, his kindness is rebuked by his prejudices. He is not a weak man, but he is the weakest man in that room. He has loved but one woman in his life, and she has crucified his heart on a hundred carnal Calvarys. But he still loves her, and that is why he is the weakest man in that room.”
“And you, satyr, you are the cruellest man I ever met in my life! But judge me, secondly, my lord Viscount de Travest.”
“He is the elder brother of honour. He is that rarest of men, a schoolboy who has grown out of his schooldays but remains, by strength of will, a schoolboy. He prefers to be that. He never did an unworthy thing, and has thought less mean ones than most people. Like all decent Englishmen, he is like a woman: he knows everything without ever having been taught anything. He has a profound sense of obedience, therefore he is a good commander. He never thinks when he is alone, lest thoughts should undermine his sense of obedience and paralyse his habit of command. One day a thought will strike him, and instantly he will cease to be the captain of his soul. He is the only man in England who actually believes in obeying the King.”
“Oh, how horrified the King would be! And of Sir Maurice, enemy to Iris March, what have you to say? Besides the fact that he is the cleverest man in that room. Oh, he is clever, that Maurice! It was he who had old Truble waiting for me. Judge me that man!”
“But I don’t know him, Iris!”
“His face is there, man—the proconsular features, the cunning Norman nose, the smile—Oh, my God, the smile! And you won’t, my friend, take my opinion of him?”
“Iris, how can you ask me to do that! We can’t take any woman’s opinion of any man. They find evil in good men, they overlook the vices of cads. …”
“Oh, Maurice is not good, not bad! Only immemorially infantile, like all successful men. …”
Where we stood now the lawn was damp and velvet-soft, the air whispered of flowers. The light that fell across the lawn from the three tall French-windows reached almost to our feet. It was a long, oak-panelled, scholarly room in which the three men sat, towards one side, about a card-table. They were absorbed in their game, silent figures of black and white. Yes, the fine profile of Sir Maurice seemed apt to smile. Iris murmured: “We will wait for them to finish their game.”
As my hand moved to throw away a cigarette I touched a cold stone, and I saw that we were standing by a sundial. Iris was looking at me, and clearest of all the happenings of that night I remember that long moment of Iris’s looking, and how, as I looked into her eyes, her beauty seemed to enwrap itself with the whisper of the flowers and enter into my being, so that I cared not for right nor wrong. My hand rested on the sundial. She laid her hand on mine, and her hand was colder than the sundial.