XX.
"Come in,"—Helen turns and faces her dressing room door as Braine enters.
"Not abed yet?" he says with a smile, taking her face between his hands, with the old, familiar action.
She puts her hands on his shoulders, and looks intently into his eyes, as he drops on his knees by the side of her chair. Longing, worship, anxiety, hesitancy are in her face. Braine smiles at her, and says in interrogation of her steady scrutiny:
"Yes, what is it?"
Her hands slip from his shoulders to her lap, where he clasps his own gently over them. She smiles at him a little wistfully and says nothing.
Braine is the lover in every glance, every gesture and attitude at these moments when they two are alone. Indeed, his love for her seems to have gained in intensity.
They have been in the Washington house for many weeks. Braine has been absorbingly occupied with schemes of business and politics every moment, save one like this, snatched now and then, when he seems to forget the whole universe in remembering this beautiful woman.
His love finds small expression in words, but much in a caress, a radiant joy of countenance instead.
After a long study of the face of the woman gazing so steadily at the fire in front of her, he says, anxiously, with a caress of voice and hand:
"You are not well, dearest? You look a little worn to-night."
She slowly withdraws her gaze from the coals, and turns her face towards him. There is an abstraction in the action. She says in a tone that indicates that her thoughts are on something else:
"Not well? Oh yes—yes," looking back at the fire. After a while he says, still watching her face:
"You are the most beautiful woman I have ever seen. It is not in the regularity of your features, but in the soul that radiates from even the tips of your fingers," touching the white, passive hands reverently.
"What woman so made for honor and glory! In a little year or two!"
He pauses, then continues in a low, passionate tone: "In a little year or two you shall have all in your hands. Women shall envy you and men shall reverence you. This first season shall make the road to success clear and direct. This winter will decide all. If it were not for you, I should be helpless, powerless, absolutely without belief in myself or the future. My ventures, so far, have been gigantic; I do not know that I could have taken one step without your presence, and the thought of you to stimulate me, and banish all fear of failure. My schemes for the future are desperate—and I shall win."
He is quivering in every limb. There is a fierce energy in his low tones. The nervous fire of this man's nature seldom flames save in these moments, with this woman. He has spoken the last words looking confidently in her face.
She listens without making any sign. Her lips are pressed tightly together. Braine goes on in his monologue—his words spoken with a clearness of utterance which has made him remarkable in public speech, and has an awesome impressiveness about it.
"It will be you who will have done it all. I shall look at you, commanding the homage of these people, and think great thoughts. I shall look at you, and be able to speak them. You will be ever at my side, thinking with me; both working for a common end.
"This social and political debut means all. It is by our mutual desires—the sympathy of each in every thought of the other—our cooperation—that we shall win the fight. I thought I loved you years ago, that you were necessary to me. It was true; but I worship you now, and without you all would be over. I am appalled when I think of what this year holds for me to accomplish; it is only the knowledge that you are by me that makes it possible. I have never needed you—never can need you—as I do now, as I shall in those immediate months to come. I—"
Helen turns her face towards him. She checks him with a sudden, imperative gesture. Her face is as white as death. For a moment she does not speak. Braine grows white, too, at the expression he sees. He dares not break the silence, but waits for her to do it. Presently she says, in a low voice, with apparent effort:
"I—I have something to tell you."
She stops abruptly for a moment, then begins again, looking steadily in his face:
"I have something to tell you. I—I fear it will make a difference; that it will cause you regret, and perhaps—if you meant what you have just said—failure. I—"
She stops as though unable to continue. Braine looks at her in amazement. He sees her suffering, and involuntarily lays his hand, with a sudden, assuring movement over hers.
It seems to arouse her, and she clasps her fingers around his with a despairing little action, half imploringly. She goes on in a hurried voice, tremulous and choked now and then:
"I have tried to tell you for a long time—a week. I—I—when I remembered and thought of all that it would mean to you—of the disappointment, just now, I could not speak, but—but—but—"
She stammers with emotion and excitement, and pauses to recover herself an instant. She does not take her eyes from his face. It can have no expression that she does not see. She says convulsively, with a pitiful effort at calm and control:
"I beg of you not to let this misfortune at this time kill your love for me. Oh, I have never wanted your love as I do now. I, too, have never known the necessity for you and your help as I do now. I—"
Braine is staring at her. She has spoken so rapidly that he could not interrupt her. He does not know what to expect. He tries to calm her panic by caresses. He says:
"Helen! Helen!"
She motions him to be quiet.
"If you reproach me, it will drive me mad. I am not to blame. Oh, I beg of you not to remember the desire I expressed long ago, and think that I have—have sacrificed your wishes—your commands, to satisfy myself. I am not to blame."
Braine takes her hands firmly between his own. She is beyond self-control, and is sobbing hysterically, but never looks away from his face. He says almost sternly:
"Be quiet, Helen. There is nothing on God's earth that you could be guilty of that I could reproach you for. Now, be perfectly calm and tell me about it. And remember that I love you."
He says it all in a very matter of fact tone, and it has an immediate effect on her. She ceases sobbing. After a moment, she says:
"You remember a conversation we had years ago, at the cottage in Thebes? You told me of the dearest wish of your heart—and said it must not be fulfilled then—"
She stops speaking. She loses no expression of his face. He says quietly:
"Yes; well?"
His voice tells nothing, but her hands are in his, and he forgets it and suddenly tightens his fingers. She says slowly, in a mechanical way:
"Yes."
She knows that he has understood. He knows by her reply that she knows it.
He puts his arms about her, and draws her gently to him—but she has seen an expression in his face that she never forgets.
XXI.
The time has passed in a whirl. Helen feels constantly dazed. She is ill; at times, terribly ill. Braine does not know it. He is with her almost constantly. His tenderness is extreme. He divines and gratifies her desires almost before she knows of them herself. Every glance, every touch, every word is a caress, and a love message. But there is the never-to-be-forgotten expression of rebellion and resignation. She has never by word or action alluded to it. He will never know that she has seen it—indeed, he is not conscious that his face has ever worn such an expression. He knows what his heart felt in the moment of disappointment, but he does not know that his emotion was expressed in his face.
He tells Helen of his plans, his work, for she seems to have a mania for "helping" him. He manufactures writing for her to do, when he accidentally discovers that it delights her to do it. At night, when he comes home late, she stands in her door as he ascends the stairs, draws him into the room, and makes him lie on the divan and tell her how things are going.
Since the first time, he has never protested against the procedure, though he feels that she is often worn out. He would never have protested but for her sake, and she seemed so uncontrollably grieved on the one occasion when he tried to reason about her late hours, that he has thought it best to indulge her.
He thinks it is an intense interest and desire to be pushing things with him which prompts her. He does not know that she has hours of madness over the thought that in the months to come, she will be forced out of his life, because of his hurry and her necessity—to be passive in it all; that she is a monomaniac on the subject; that she is afraid of the responsibility of his failure; that she has grown to be a madwoman on the subject of "interest."
She has but one thought: that she must appear interested in everything concerning him, in order to keep her place in his life. He does not know that night after night, hour after hour, as she sits with her face eager, questioning, offering suggestions with a woman's quick intelligence, which he accepts with readiness and gladness, and which are often of practical service to him, she is suffering tortures.
He plans a speech and tells her, as she insists, the arguments on either side, and the value of her interpolations amaze him. He is a logical man; she, a woman of intuitive perceptions only. The combination is capable of accomplishing much.
Braine finds himself deferring to her judgment in the smallest thing. He is amazed at his sudden dependence on her. She has developed a quality which would never have been developed under other circumstances, and the strain is terrible in its effects upon her. She is frantic with the necessity she feels for effort of some kind in his behalf.
She works like a demon when he is not present, and is "interested" to the verge of insanity when he is near.
He knows nothing of her state, mental or physical. He has no conception of her suffering. He is constantly solicitous about her health, and she is always "Well; perfectly well!"
Gladys Grayson is now in a whirl of social excitement. She brings to the Braine mansion all the news of society's doings. Helen goes out only in her carriage.
Once, Mr. Everet calls. She is seized with an aversion to seeing him, and sends word that she is engaged. Many other people call. She seldom sees any of them. Few have other than a vague idea of the reason. They have heard from Gladys and some others, of her exquisite charm and beauty, but forget about her in the attending to her husband.
Braine's first great effort in the Senate was a magnificent one. All that day Helen walked the floor of her room, saying to herself: "If he fails, I am to blame. If he fails, I am to blame."
When Braine came home she was temporarily a lunatic, and his enthusiasm of success was forgotten in an agony of apprehension for her safety. When she finally understood that he had suddenly become of interest to thousands of people, she accepted the triumph almost passively, the strain for days had been so great.
She now thinks constantly of the time she is losing. She thinks with terror of being left in the rush, and finally—not of Braine stopping for her, but of his rushing on without her.
Braine himself has become sternly calm—to all but his wife, the only person who understands him. To her the atmosphere is electric. She has constantly in her ears the whirr of the wheels of the political machinery. Braine is lovingly impatient for her to share it all, to be in it all, and says with an eager smile, full of tender happiness:
"When this is over, dearest, and I can have you with me in all this!"
And she smiles back as eagerly and says:
"Yes, when this is over!" And sometimes her hands are clasped beneath the table where he sits to write. She thinks constantly:
"I must keep up. I must impress him with my strength. I must make him feel that I am to be depended on; I must lose none of my power to charm; for fear my face grow unattractive, I must cultivate my mind,"—and her face is the face of a seraph.
Then she falls to planning how the child shall be effaced so that in these years of endeavor that are to come, Braine may find nothing to impede him, nothing to annoy him. If her child should weary him, would not the responsibility be hers, and would he not grow to look upon her with aversion?
She no longer thinks of the child as his, or "ours," but as "mine." It is a responsibility that she alone must bear. He must never find it a burden. She plans constantly how she shall accomplish this, and yet do all her duty to the child. She thinks she will not love it. It will only be hers. What is there to recommend it? No, she will not love it, therefore she must be over-careful in the matter of duty towards it. She will instil into it all those traits of character and qualities that Braine loves and admires most, if she can. She will keep it from its father's knowledge as much as possible; as soon as practicable, she will send it away to school, that Edgar may forget it as nearly as may be, until some day, perhaps, when the hurry and anxiety are past, and that time has come when he can pause, she will be able to bring the child—man or woman, if it must be years from now—before him, and not be ashamed of her work, and perhaps it will find favor in his eyes. Perhaps the old feeling will come back, when he has nothing else to think about, and he will even love the child a little because it is hers. She has longed so to love it, and cannot—because it is only hers.
Braine never hears a complaint, nor sees an expression of pain or suffering on her face. He knows nothing of her monstrous, morbid imaginings, and cannot set things right. He only says eagerly:
"When it is over!" And she responds in the same tone:
"Yes, when it is over," and thinks:
"Then I must catch up. Then I must make up this lost time. I must not be left; I must not be left!" She sobs away the night on her knees.
The months have rushed by. The time is long enough for the suffering—very short for so many agonies to be crowded into. Braine loves her as he has never loved her before. Sometimes he experiences a momentary emotion of gladness and desire for this child—but not often.
He seldom thinks of all that her condition means; and sometimes almost forgets that anything unaccustomed is or will be,—made forgetful by Helen's beauty and charm and brightness. He seldom thinks of her condition save as a cause that has had the effect to make him love her more.
And so, the winter wears away—and Helen with it.
XXII.
Braine's carriage stops at the door, and he gets out and runs hurriedly up the steps. It is three o'clock, and at a quarter past he has an appointment. He has come home for important papers which he had forgotten.
As he enters the door, Dobson says with some little excitement in his tone:
"I'm glad you've come, Mr. Braine. Mrs.—"
"Mrs. Braine?" Edgar suddenly takes the words out of his mouth. He remembers that he did not see Helen in the morning, and that when he went to her door, her maid said she was sleeping.
Dobson replies apologetically and with anxiety:
"She would not let us send for you—"
Braine springs up the stairs. He is suddenly seized with a nervous trembling, and stands for a moment in the hall to recover himself. He opens Helen's door. She lies on the divan, and Susanne, her maid, is moving quietly about the room, adjusting things.
At one of the windows a strange woman sits reading unconcernedly. Helen is apparently asleep; but when he enters, she opens her eyes and makes a quick attempt to get off the divan.
The two women leave the room, and Helen holds out her hand with a smile, and says eagerly:
"Well, how are things going?"
She is deathly pale, and even while she speaks, there is anguish in her face, though she controls her voice perfectly. Even in the supreme moment she will try to be "interested."
Braine is surprised, relieved. He does not know just what he expected, but he knows that he experiences an almost terrible relief. Helen! her usual lovely, eager, smiling self. Suddenly she sways a little, and Braine throws his arms about her. He says anxiously:
"You are ill. Why did you not send for me, Helen?"
She certainly is ill; so ill that her smile is ghastly, but she is conscious of having done her duty, and of having appeared "interested."
She sits down upon the divan, and Braine sits beside her with his arms about her. She replies as carelessly as the situation permits:
"Oh, no, I'm not ill—that is, nothing special is the matter, you know. There is no need to take you from the Senate."
Braine replies almost sternly:
"If you have even a headache it is sufficient to 'take me from the Senate.' You have been suffering all day, and have not given me the dear privilege of being near to help you bear it. It hurts me. It suggests a lack of—of faith in my sympathy—"
She puts her hand over his mouth. Though her words do not indicate it, her expression is one of a happy sort of despair. She would not ask for such an expression of love as this, but it is very dear, very grateful to her, just now. It was not expected; not that he is ever other than tender and loving, but she finds herself surprised and grateful for every expression of his love. She does not know why she no longer expects it, or why it is a surprise, but it is so. She catches her breath softly, but does not indicate her emotion in any other way. She has an idea that he will be impressed with her weakness and his responsibility if she shows him how much this means to her. She only says carelessly:
"Yes, I know, but there was nothing the matter, you see. Mrs. Case is here because Susanne thought she ought to have a few weeks in which to get accustomed to the house—"
"A few weeks—I don't know, Helen—" He looks anxious and doubtful. She says quickly:
"Yes, yes, Ed. A—few weeks—I know," decisively and encouragingly. She has not been honest with him as to the time of her coming peril. She has had one wild desire to have him away, out of town, anywhere, that he may not be worried or annoyed by her; that the approach of the crisis may not interrupt his work.
Her tone reassures him, and he remembers his appointment, and that he will be late. He says, tenderly:
"I will be home soon, dear. I have an appointment with Grayson now, but will come home as soon as we are through."
She nods cheerfully, and says:
"All right! don't neglect anything for me, Ed—it is not necessary. Isn't to-night the affair at Dalget's?"
"Yes, but I'm not going."
She lays her hand on his arm appealingly:
"Go, Ed. Please go. I want you to. I—"
Suddenly she stops. Braine thinks, by the expression of her face that she is dying, it is so drawn and old, in a moment. She draws a long, quivering sigh of agony. Her fingers clutch his arm convulsively. She makes no sound, not the least moan, nothing but that sigh that goes to his heart.
Braine watches her, holding his breath. She has slipped to her knees, and is clinging with the grip of a strong man to him. He is panic stricken, horrified, and cries in an awful voice:
"Helen—Helen!" And she lies limp and white in his arms. He is quivering in every limb. He covers her moist hand with kisses. There are tears in his eyes, and he cries aloud with a groan: "Great God!"
Helen hears him and opens her eyes. She smiles dreamily, and makes a weak little movement to touch his face. She says in a faint, comfortable voice:
"It's over now, Ed. Go to Grayson."
His face grows harsh, and he says in a sudden fury:
"Damn Grayson!"
She smiles. There is a certain comfort in that ebullition. She lies on the divan, and Braine wanders around the room, aimlessly. The languor she feels is possessing him almost. He is oppressed with a sense of impending disaster and his utter helplessness in face of it.
The situation seems to become actual to him for the first time. He feels some frantic desire to avert this horrible something that must happen. He feels suddenly like a weak, helpless child, and is seized with a desire to throw himself at her feet, and weep and be comforted.
In another moment, he feels like a great, strong man, with a desire to throw his arms about her, and prove his power to avert every agony of hers. The next moment he is on his knees beside her, imploring forgiveness in an incoherent, frenzied way, for this guilt that suddenly oppresses him! He feels like a criminal, and keeps saying brokenly:
"Oh Helen, forgive me! forgive me!"
She is half asleep, and opens her eyes to smile at him. She says, dreamily:
"I—I never loved you as I do now. If it had not been for your wretchedness, I could have exulted in that agony."
Braine covers her hands with kisses. He dares not kiss her face. She looks like a beautiful white saint. He touches her hands reverently. He draws the folds of her gown closer about her.
Presently she says:
"Ask Mrs. Case to come here. You go down-stairs now, if you won't go out. I will call you if I want you."
He protests, but resistance seems to excite her, and he obeys. He does not go down-stairs, however. He stays in the corridor just outside her door. For hours he walks tirelessly back and forth. Once in a while he hears that terrible sigh of suffering, and he leans heavily against the wall. The sweat springs out on his forehead in great drops. His suffering seems, for the moment, as terrible as hers. Once he groans aloud, and at once remembers that she has not made the faintest moan, and says between his teeth:
"Good God! A man could not endure that."
The nurse comes to the door now and then, sometimes calling him in, and then he kneels by the still, white woman, who gives his hands little weak, responsive pressures, and smiles at him. He remains until she motions him away, imperatively.
Night has settled. The lights are ablaze through the house. Dobson has spoken to him, and said that dinner was ready, and he has not heard him. He walks back and forth, back and forth, in the corridor. The heavy sighs sob more frequently through the half open door. Once Mrs. Case comes and tells him to send for the physician, and he gives the order, incoherently saying:
"Dr. Frame, and tell him to bring some more with him."
At this, Mrs. Case smiles quietly. The time passes fitfully. He looks at his watch once, and it is 8:30, and all is quiet in Helen's room.
In what seems to him but the next moment, he hears her make some moaning exclamation, and a slight rustling and moving about occurs. The agony lasts for what he thinks is three quarters of an hour, but when he looks at his watch again, it is only 8:40.
Helen's dog comes to the foot of the stairs, and looks up, and Braine leans over the balusters, and looks down at it. Once, he whispers down to it, as though it were a human being:
"It's terrible, isn't it?" and walks on, back and forth, through the hall again.
The physician came an hour ago. Braine knows that the nurse has been to her dinner, and feels a sudden violent disgust and aversion for her that she can eat.
Dr. Frame did not bring "some more," but after a time he comes into the dressing-room, where Braine now is, and sends for a colleague. Braine turns pale, but asks no questions, as he gives the order.
How the time drags! He pauses now and then in his walk, and leans weakly against something. He suddenly realizes that his brows are drawn, and his forehead scowled, and his hands clenched, and his teeth set. He is made conscious of it by hearing himself groan aloud, and then he relaxes for an instant until he hears a sound in the next room, again, and he finds himself experiencing so sharp an agony that he throws himself on the divan with his head in the cushions where she has lain.
He is in her dressing-room now and there is an odor of her presence in all the atmosphere. Her gown lies on a chair; in front of the dressing table lies a twisted handkerchief that tells the story of a moment of agony. He looks about at these things, and says under his breath:
"Oh, my God!"
The other physician has been in the next room for a long time now. Braine looks at his watch. It is past three. He tries to think how long this has lasted. He cannot remember whether it was to-day or yesterday that he came in here.
He stands in a half-daze in the middle of the floor, trying to recollect when. Suddenly an unearthly shriek comes from the next room. He stiffens like a wooden man. He puts his hands to his throat, and makes a peculiar metallic sound.
There is silence in the next room. He stands staring at the closed door. He thinks nothing. In a moment he hears another scream that causes his heart to give one wild bound, and then to seem pulseless. The silence in the room is intense. He stares fixedly at the door. The stillness is terrible. Gradually he becomes impressed that the woman—Helen, his wife, is dead.
He does not move. His mind begins to work. He sees a face like the dawn, a primrose face, with eyes as clear and untroubled as a child's; her hair a sunny glory in a little dismal room.
He feels the touch of a cool, soft hand, a touch as comfortable and calm as that of an angel's wing. Then comes to him the memory of a time when the touch of that hand thrilled him as no other touch on earth or in heaven could do; of the time when the sweet, loving girl became a glowing woman, intoxicating him, making him drunk with joy: and he again experiences that first sensation of proprietorship and possession.
And suddenly there appears to him the figure of a woman with a ghastly, drawn face, a face that he does not know, with staring eyes that gleam glassily, and accuse. He feels the touch of a rigid hand, cold and unresponsive. His eyes seem starting from his head.
The door opens, and one of the physicians stands looking at him in a startled way. There is something frightful in this man, with clenched hands, the veins like whip cords on his neck and forehead, and his ghastly face.
Braine says in a strange voice:
"Helen—"
"Lives; the child is dead."
XXIII.
[From Helen's Diary.]
In the mountains near Mauch Chunk, August, 18—. This is the first time for months I have felt like writing. We have been here since June. After my illness I had a great longing to get away, away, away; anywhere out of the excitement, away from the furniture, the servants, the surroundings that seemed to have become so hateful to me that if I looked upon them I must shriek. It seemed as though I should never be strong enough to go.
Edgar was as anxious to get away with me as I was to go. A great change has taken place in him. He has ever been good and thoughtful, but it is impossible to describe the lengths to which his affection drives him now. If his business has been pressing, these last months must have been disastrous to him, for he has hardly left my side for an hour. There is a new expression in his eyes when he looks at me. He seems to feel as if he were guilty of some terrible crime against me, and to be ever trying to expiate it. Sometimes this amuses me a little, but his earnestness makes me almost feel unhappy at times.
Once in a while, if we have been sitting quietly alone, he will look at me silently for a time, and then say with almost a groan:
"Oh, if you only knew, Helen! If you only knew all that I suffered in those weeks!"
I was very ill for a long time. He seems hardly to realize that I am again well and safe. I would never dare let him know the agony of mind as well as body, that I endured so long.
I feel differently, too, about some things. I think that whatever regret Edgar felt at first, and before my confinement, he suffered a keen disappointment and unhappiness at the loss of the child. He has made but one allusion to it, but he betrayed his deep feeling then, unconsciously.
It is strange; but after all my longing for the child, before it became a longing likely to be gratified, the relief that I experienced when I knew that I had none is indescribable.
At first I would burst out sobbing for very joy and relief. I cannot understand my feeling. I sometimes think if circumstances had been different, and Edgar had had the same emotions in regard to it that he has now, perhaps I should have felt differently. I am impressed, for some reason, that this aversion I have is abnormal. But it is so strong that it has decided one thing: I have had my last child. Nothing on earth can ever bring back the old feeling. That is something for which women in my position have no time. The horrible feeling of lost time and opportunity that I experienced in those months will never be forgotten. I will never live through it again. If I ever find it likely to become a necessity, I will kill myself at the outset, without a moment's hesitation. So this is settled for ever and ever.
I intimated as much to Edgar, involuntarily, the other night, and I think he felt a little hurt. I regretted that I had betrayed the feeling when I saw that it made him unhappy. I thought he would feel as I did about it. I presume he does, in some degree. I made some remark to the effect that people in our position could not afford to lose time in that way, and he said:
"But, dear, what would become of the people if all thought so?"
I told him that there were plenty whose talents lay principally in that direction, and that that part of life's work should be apportioned to them, and strictly confined to the lesser people.
He began a little argument, but saw that it did not please me, and changed the subject. But he said something that impressed me with its truth, for all that.
He said something to the effect that the "industry" was already confined too strictly to "lesser people;" that what the country needed to save it was high-bred, fine and greater fathers and mothers, instead of lesser; that if there was ever an "industry" that should be confined to the superior of the land, it was child-rearing. Perhaps this is so—I felt so too, once, and determined to do a duty in this direction that would be a loved duty. It is different now. It will never happen again—and I live through it. The suffering is not what I flinch from. I'm not cowardly. It is not that. But it will never happen again, if there is a means on earth to prevent it, even though the means be suicide.
I wonder if my character is degenerating? Am I as good a woman as I was when I married Edgar? I do not know. I only know how I feel now, and it is not so comfortable to feel in that way as to feel in the old way. Am I deteriorating? If so, what is the cause?
XXIV.
The Braines have been back in Washington for a month. Politics recalled Braine, and Braine recalled Helen. When she began to think of returning to the Washington house where she had endured one year of absolute wretchedness as an initiation, she was overwhelmed with distaste for the move, but she resolved to keep her repugnance to herself, and fight the feeling down.
She wondered once if she had rather return to the cottage in Thebes, but dismissed the idea quickly and impatiently. She knew that the meagre, provincial life would be intolerable to her now. She wanted the luxuries of the Washington house, but shrank from the thought of having to go thither to find them. She made up her mind to the inevitable, however, and they returned as late as business would allow.
The night of her return when she first entered the house she felt faint and weak for a moment, as a host of wretched memories arose, connected with every portion of the place. But she brought her will to bear, and Braine did not notice her distress.
He seemed affected differently. He seemed almost like a boy in his enthusiasm over their return, and went from room to room, showing her certain changes he had made surreptitiously during the summer for her surprise.
He pauses in the library, and suddenly takes Helen in his arms. He says:
"I cannot analyze the feeling that I experience; the peculiar gladness I have at returning here with you well and happy. Though I suffered agony in sympathy with the suffering you endured here, the experience seems to have endeared the place to me. You will never know what your counsel and help during those months meant to me. Our achievements shall now begin in earnest. Oh, Helen, Helen, the joy of striving and accomplishing for you is the dearest one of my life. To see you honored and admired and envied, and to know it comes through my exertions will be my supreme happiness."
"Am I not your supreme happiness?"
"Yes, and therefore less than all for you would mean supreme wretchedness for me."
There has been a wistful note in his voice, and he is tender beyond all imagining. They seem very near to each other this night of their return, and this new marriage somehow lessens Helen's feeling of disquietude, and reassures her. She finds herself looking forward with a certain delight and satisfaction to this winter when she will establish her social supremacy, that she may stand beside this man who is just becoming supreme in another field, and seem worthy to share some of the honors accorded him.
They have sat below by the library fire, far into the night. They have discussed the situation. They have planned the details of the campaign, and their confidence in each other, and the feeling of each that the advancement of the other is in his or her hands, has already won the fight.
The servants are in bed; the silence of the great house has not been broken for hours, save by the low, earnest, wooing tones of the man and woman in the soft light of the rare room. The woman in a half-dream of delight, as rosy visions of the future are conjured up by the man whose voice of the lover always intoxicates her senses; a dainty woman, a regal woman, a woman whose least motion suggests the patrician, morally, mentally, physically; a woman subtle in her frankness and simplicity, dignified in her naïveté; a woman perfectly matched with the man. And he, a man whose very presence suggests power and grace of mind; a temperament wherein reverence predominates, if audacity dominates; a man who must lend good, even to the worst, and make the worst seem not tolerable, but acceptable. And none in looking on him can decide whether his mind is responsible for his charming person, or the reverse.
All the room is in shadow save where they two sit, and as he takes the soft, shaded light in his hands, and conducts the woman to her door, my imagination plays a sudden trick; the room is one of statelier times, and one becomes a "bold, brave knight," the other one, "my lady."
XXV.
"Do you see Bogart and Mrs. Stevens?"
Gladys Grayson drops the question into Helen's ear as she stands listlessly leaning against the conservatory entrance.
Everet is looking away for the moment. Gladys has come up with Dalzel, the young congressman.
Helen looks at her inquiringly:
"Bogart and Mrs. Stevens? Where?"
Mrs. Grayson gives a silvery little laugh, and just lifts her eyebrows.
"Everywhere," with a comprehensive wave of her pretty hand.
Everet and Dalzel are talking together. Helen looks a little bewildered, and Mrs. Grayson looks a little amused, and a good deal contemptuous—or shocked, perhaps. She nods towards the conservatory, and at the moment a man and woman come from the shadow of a palm, towards the quartette, engrossed in conversation—at least, Bogart is. Mrs. Stevens is engrossed in looking charming. Gladys continues in little spasmodic asides:
"Every one in the room—" they are nearer, and she lowers her voice, "is talking about it. It is disgraceful."
"What?"
"Why, the very apparent affaire between them."
Helen stares—then looks at Mrs. Stevens. Gladys says under her breath, between her teeth:
"Don't stare at her in that way, you goose. She will come over here in a minute, and ask if the enamel on her neck is chipping."
Helen lowers her eyes. Gladys continues:
"Things are so very apparent, you know."
Mrs. Stevens is coming leisurely toward them. "There is a story of a little dinner." Mrs. Stevens is here. Gladys bows with her accustomed hauteur, with which she meets every one but the initiated, and without the suspicion of discourtesy in her manner, turns away on Dalzel's arm.
Mrs. Stevens begins to talk volubly to Helen and Everet. Helen is disconcerted. She has none of the studied, courteous rudeness that is her friend's stock-in-trade, with which to carry off a thing of this kind gracefully. She replies a little helplessly to Mrs. Stevens, and moves away as quickly as she can.
Mrs. Stevens perceives the slight—it amuses her a little. Later, when she is alone with Bogart, she mentions it, and remarks that "these ingénues try one's patience terribly."
Bogart says "Yes;" and thinks, "but they are delicious to teach."
Everet seldom leaves Helen's side. When he is not with her, he is watching her. The house is too crowded for comfort, and Helen has not had enough experience yet to enjoy it. She always feels a little bewildered after one o'clock, and remarks to Everet as he stands by her while she leans back in a chair, wearily, that she always feels as though she ought to be in bed after eleven. She laughs, a sweet, excited little laugh as she looks up at him. He wonders how long so charming a child will retain her naïveté in such an atmosphere.
She delights him. There is a simplicity about her manner and expression that fascinates him—and yet she is a polished woman of the world. She is surely that, but the difference between herself and other women of the world is—that she is not a worldly woman.
Once, during the evening, Braine is near her, and says with suppressed elation:
"You are charming to-night, Helen. I have never seen you more beautiful. Everet is strongly attracted."
Helen looks up quickly. She says with a little deprecation in her tone, and a little entreaty in her eyes;
"He only admires me as he does other nice looking women, Ed. Indeed, you need not mind. I will keep out of his way, if you don't like it."
Braine listens at first in surprise, then bursts into a low, happy laugh. He covertly presses her hand, and says, as he moves away to make room for Everet, who is coming with an ice for Helen:
"I don't mind, I assure you. You needn't take pains to keep out of his way. I am perfectly satisfied with my wife. I am delighted that this man is so interested as he is—only be cautious, dear; don't let it be too obvious to others—you understand?"
Helen does not understand, but Everet is at her side, and she has to turn to him, and say something, or listen to him.
Her mind runs on Braine's few words, and they trouble her. While she answers the questions of this one and that, and makes trite, witty, serious, politic, or straightforward little speeches, as one case or another demands, she is turning over Braine's words in her mind.
Perhaps Everet is one who can be of service to Edgar, and he thinks it as well for her to be civil. She is a little piqued at his last words—"be cautious, don't let it be too apparent to others—" as though she were likely to permit an aggression on Everet's part more quickly in private than she would in public. It wounds her a little that he should have said so thoughtless a thing. It would be terrible if he thought so horrible a thing.
As she sees Braine from to time to time in the crowd, she notices that the worried, anxious expression she has noted for the last week, is no longer on his face. He is charming to-night. His personality has never so strongly impressed her, or apparently other people either.
Everet notices how her glance follows Braine's flexile figure, that is full of strength and dignity, and once, remarks with a smile, and a little amusement in his tone:
"You are a great admirer of your husband?"
She looks up at him, and says quite innocently,
"I love him."
Everet's smile becomes one of approval, almost of tenderness.
At last she is near Braine again, and says a little wistfully:
"May we not go home soon?"
He looks at the flushed, weary face, beautiful in its ennui and excitement, and says:
"At once if you wish it," and suddenly the desire possesses him to have her in the carriage, alone, quite to himself, in his arms, and he seems a little impatient while Everet folds her wrap about her, and is asking which is her "day."
Helen says with an airy little informality that she has no day for her friends—the days are theirs.
As they step out into the cold air, Braine draws Helen's furs still closer about her throat. There is a tenderness and passion in his action that she has missed these last weeks. It delights her, and causes the hot blood to surge over her face and neck, leaving her in a quivering little ecstacy, for a moment after she is in the carriage.
Braine, standing outside, is pushing her gown about her, and pulling the rug over her lap as he directs the coachman. And Helen is saying in husky little trebles, so that only he hears:
"Ed.—Ed."
Some one at this moment runs down the steps to say some nearly forgotten thing to Braine, and as he talks he is acknowledging Helen's little appeals by covert pressure of the hand that is inside the coupé. Finally he gets in, and closes the door.
As they roll away, Braine draws her into his arms. It seems to both that they have been waiting all night for this moment. After a time, Braine says:
"I have never loved you more than at this moment. I believe until to-night I have never fully realized how magnificent you are. You are not where you belong. You are not where you shall be. I want to see you there," nodding his head in the direction of the White House.
Helen does not understand, but she is glad.
He is excited. Every fibre of his being is responsive. He holds her hand in his, and kisses it repeatedly, passionately. She laughs in a nervous, hysterical way, and leans her head against him. She half sobs:
"I want to be here, Ed. This satisfies me."
He presses her to him and answers:
"I am not satisfied for you. A little patience, and you shall have all. There is nothing that we cannot accomplish together. I am ambitious. There is no reason why I should not be. Ambition is a worthy sentiment. Yes, I am ambitious for myself, but it whets my appetite for the great things of earth, when I see you as you have been to-night, when I hold you as I do now. Sometimes it half angers me when I see you lacking appreciation of yourself. You do not know your own value, child; other people know it. You could be a power, if you would. You must. I—"
He leans back to look at her. He has imparted something of his enthusiasm and intensity to her, and her fingers play nervously with the cords of her cloak. Her eyes gleam in the dusk.
Braine notes every little detail about her—how the flash from an electric light makes the tiara in her hair sparkle; how white her hands look as they lie buried in the fur of the rug; how the little tendrils of hair cling to her neck. He thinks vehemently: "How I love this woman! How I love this woman!"
They stop in front of the house, and they go silently up the steps. Both are thinking. Woolet opens the door for them, making a vain endeavor to appear dignified and wide awake. But it is sufficiently evident that he has been asleep in the hall.
Helen goes directly up the stairs, and Braine passes on to the library, saying:
"I have a little work to do—I will be up in five minutes—wait for me."
Susanne is asleep with her head on the dressing-table. Helen says kindly, as the little, plump thing makes an effort to wake up:
"Go to bed, child. I will look after myself to-night."
Susanne goes, and Helen stands a moment, looking at her reflection in the glass. She smiles at it. She says half aloud:
"Yes, I am very beautiful. I love beautiful things"—with a nod at herself. She unfastens her gown, and it slips to the floor; she steps out of it. She takes the pins from her hair and it falls over her shoulders with a little swish. Braine taps at the door. She calls: "One moment, Ed."
She throws about her the negligée on the chair and calls, "Come in," adding, "You didn't have much to do," as Braine enters the room.
"If I did, I didn't do it," with a little laugh. He throws himself into a chair by her dressing-room fire. After a moment he says:
"Come here, dear."
Helen is brushing her hair at the mirror. She puts down the brush and goes over to him. He pulls her down beside him. For a moment they sit silently, cheek to cheek, looking into the fire together. Finally, Braine says in a low voice:
"I want to talk to you, dear, about—about a business matter." He pauses.
Helen smiles a little mistily. She does not know anything about business matters, but she will like to hear about anything if he tells it. She says:
"Well?"
Braine hesitates a moment, and then says, with a little effort to appear quite natural:
"I don't want to trouble you with details, dear, but I must, a little. I want you to help me in a difficult task—to help us, for this means everything to both. You believe in your husband, do you not, Helen?"
"I will not answer that question, Ed. You can answer it yourself." She caresses his head gently, and waits for him to go on.
"Well, I meant the question seriously enough. You know I can do much, but I wonder if you believe me capable of all I can do? You know how the newspapers talk of me as 'the wizard,' because I have achieved very quickly things that most men find it difficult to achieve at all. They believe in me, but they would think me insane if I were to tell them of the plans I am going to tell you of. I wonder if your belief in me is enough firmer than theirs, to let you share my ideas without distrusting my ability to make them facts?"
He receives sufficient answer in a caress which has tears of joy in it. He muses a while, and then takes up his discourse at a different point.
"It is rather a dramatic story, I suppose, as ordinary people look at things. I was rolling barrels on the levee at Thebes not many years ago. I got my fingers in on the Enterprise with my mind set on making myself felt, and I made the Enterprise a power. I was not easily appalled, as I showed when I set out to make the noblest woman in the world my wife, to take, as all my own, the one perfect example of what God meant when he created woman"—Here a long pause occurs in the monologue.
"When Hildreth thought to make me a serviceable tool for him and his millionaire partners to work with, I whipped out the combination in six or eight weeks, and I taught them once for all who was master by virtue of superior intellect, when they and I had occasion to work together in any matter. I was poor and needed wealth for the sake of the opportunity it gives. I set to work to achieve wealth, and in three months my name was good enough to stand alone in any bank from New York to San Francisco. I planned the systematizing of the railroad lines centering at Thebes, and created almost a new West by the operation, enriching a whole people. I decided to be a Senator, with my party in an apparently hopeless minority, and I achieved the result with as much precision as if it had been merely the drawing of a straight line with a ruler. I have not been taking wine, dear, and I am not running over these things to boast of them. I care nothing whatever for what is behind me. I only say all this to show you what I mean when I say that from the earliest time I can remember, I have never in my life made up my mind to accomplish anything, without succeeding in the attempt. I want you to bear that in mind when I tell you that I have made up my mind to be—well, to place you in the highest position possible to any American woman. With your help I can accomplish that, as I have accomplished everything else."
"Oh, Ed, you frighten me. I am content as we are. Your ambition is eating you up. For myself, life has brought me—no, it is you that have brought me all, and more than all. I only want—this!" clasping her arms about him, and pressing him close. "I would give up everything for you, Ed, and it is for your sake that I want you to give up all further ambitions for me. You do not care for these things, dear, except for my sake, and I care for nothing except to have you love me. You are great and good. You do not need honors. Let us let them alone."
"I cannot, Helen. I might but for you. I do not know; it is my nature to go forward; I cannot stand still: but I might if it were not for you. How can I rest when I remember that there is one woman in Washington whose place is so exalted that she is held exempt from the duty of returning calls, and that woman is not my Helen! I tell you I must work out the plans I have formed, and I need your help. Now let me explain. I'll spare you every detail I can, and keep to the bare outline."
"Go on," she says, "I like you to tell me stories, Ed, and you haven't told me many of late. Your business has taken you away so much, till I have almost come to hate business."
Braine feels a little sting in this reminder, which Helen has not meant to put there, but he is too intent upon his purpose to pause for its removal.
"I have worked already at this thing, dear, night and day for months. I have made alliances in all directions, in every quarter of the country. I have set every force at work which can be in any way controlled. The next step is to produce a break here. This administration is the obstacle in my way, and I mean to break it down!"
"Oh, Edgar!" exclaims Helen, less in protest against a proposal which startles and shocks her a little, than in admiration of the superb audacity of the man who sits holding her hand while he announces a purpose seemingly so stupendous. Braine continues, scarcely noticing the interruption:
"Yes, and I have that practically arranged, too, except for one thing. I must produce the break by getting the coming presidential appointments—the most important of the whole term, in some respects—rejected by the Senate. There are three men in the Senate who must make the fight their own in order to make the break in the party irreparable, except by the retirement of the President from the contest for nomination at the end of the term. These men are privately interested in the whiskey tax bill, which is certainly lost in committee unless I force its passage. I've been working at that for two months, and have not yet succeeded. I want your help in that."
"But, Edgar, you know I don't understand politics, or—"
"It's not necessary that you should. Heaven forbid that you ever shall! The only obstacle is Everet. He is chairman of the committee that has the bill in charge. He can report it favorably, and if I could induce him to do it, I could manage the rest. But I cannot. I have exhausted my resources of argument and persuasion, and he will not yield. It has worried me more than I like you to know, dear. I have said nothing, because I didn't want to trouble you. But you can help me now, if you will."
Helen looks up, elated:
"I can help? I'm glad of that, Ed, but it seems funny to think of my helping in business, doesn't it?" with a little laugh.
Braine is so intent on the matter that he only replies by a pat of the hand. He continues:
"Yes, you can help. I will tell you what I want you to do. Everet is fascinated with you. He hardly left your side to-night, and when he did, his eyes followed you. Everet is the only one whose support I must have now. You must get this for me. You can do it—"
"Why, Ed?—" She stares at him inquiringly. "What could I do, dear?"
For a moment Edgar looks annoyed. This is becoming a little awkward—for a husband. He starts to speak, then hesitates for a moment, then begins:
"Your woman's cleverness should prompt you, Helen. You understand little politic devices to a considerable extent; it is only necessary that you enlarge upon it in a smaller field. Everet will call, of course. There is—no reason why he should—" she is looking at him—"not call as often as he chooses, nor why he should not choose to call often—nor why you—should not use your influence to our advantage—to the end of gaining his support for me. Do you understand?"
He ceases. There is absolute silence. Helen is still looking at him. It is not comfortable for one's wife to look at one under all circumstances. She speaks hesitatingly:
"You—you mean for me to—to try and attract Everet—in order to cajole him into doing your will in this?"
There is bewilderment, disgust, astonishment expressed in her voice. She looks somewhat scandalized. Braine laughs a little uneasily:
"Yes, that—is about it."
She remains on her knees, looking at him for a moment—then slowly rises. There is indignation expressed in every movement of her body. She looks hurt, humiliated, insulted. She says excitedly:
"You don't know what you are saying. This miserable business—whatever it is—has gone to your head. I—I—I—"
She stammers in excitement. Braine rises and speaks entreatingly:
"No, I know what I am asking of you. It is not pleasant, to be sure. It hurts me worse than it can you, but, Helen—" with a desperate impulse—"Helen, this has got to be done. I must have Everet's support. Things have come to a desperate pass. There is no other way. When I saw you controlling his every thought to-night, it seemed like a sudden interposition of Providence. All the care and worry, that have gripped me like a dragon those late weeks, seemed to slip from me. I knew if you would do this, I was secure. I appeal to you, child. If you love me, you must consent to aid me in this. It is your happiness, your advancement as well as my own, that I ask you to achieve—"
"I am satisfied. I don't want to advance."
Her eyes flash ominously.
"Helen—Helen—" Braine holds out his hands to her, "you don't understand all you say. You do want it. If you were deprived of all this luxury and position, it would ruin your happiness—and yet, a few years ago you said as you do now—'I don't want it.' Could you live without it?"
"No. Not now. But I could if I had never known it—I—"
"You had to know it. You should. Of all women in the world you are the one best fitted for command, and for all that I am straining every nerve to gain for you. I do not sleep an hour, uninterruptedly. I wake, to plan and contrive after this end. I eat mechanically. I speak so, except under circumstances when my words will count. I make no acquaintance, no friend save that I may turn him to account. I deny myself honest affection in every association, that sentiment may never interfere at a critical hour—all this that I may see you where you deserve to be. I ask but one little thing of you. I implore it. This one effort on your part, and we have gained all. Helen—"
He is quivering with excitement. His eyes burn like coals of fire, and grow dark and scintillating.
The woman opposite him stands like a statue. There is not a vestige of color in her face. She turns slowly, and motions him from the room without a word.
XXVI.
[From Helen's Diary.]
February, —. Breakfasted this morning in my own room. Could not entertain the thought of ever seeing or speaking to Edgar again.
I looked haggard when I got up. I did not sleep an hour all night. While I was making a sorry attempt to eat some breakfast, and strengthening my determination never to speak to Edgar again, Woolet brought up a note, saying that Edgar told him to give it to me as soon as I was up.
I was like adamant and determined not to look at it. I should have sent it down to him immediately, but for the curiosity such a thing would have aroused among the servants.
As Woolet was going, he said:
"Mr. Braine said Madame would please forward all his mail that came to-day."
I was thunderstruck. Forward his mail! I snatched up the note, all my determination gone.
It was but a few lines, saying that he took the 9:10 train for New York, on business, and would return on Friday—this is Tuesday.
I felt like a baby. I sent Susanne away, and burst out crying. It seemed to me that I must see him, and soften the situation a little.
I could never have consented to this thing that he proposed, but it does not seem terrible enough to justify such severity—this morning.
It seems to me that I cannot endure the time until Friday—but when he returns I shall treat him with proper dignity, of course. It is my duty to make him feel that I judge his conduct severely. And yet, I will be forgiving and affectionate—to an extent. Only to an extent. (This will be very hard for me.)
I felt so wretched that I thought a drive would do me good, so at two, I went out. I became so tired and disgusted with meeting people and bowing to them, that I turned around and came home. There is nothing that makes a miserable person feel more miserable than to see people happier than herself.
I felt as though I was ready to drop when I got up the steps, and who should be in the reception-room but this very bone of contention, awaiting my return. I felt like flying up the stairs and locking myself in my room, but instead of doing so childish a thing, I walked into the room with admirable dignity.
I intended to see that he made his call very short; but after a moment we got talking of the new minister and his funny little wife, and in the gossip I seemed quite to forget my wretchedness for a while, and we went into the library, where it is cosier, and sat down by the fire and had a delightful afternoon.
Mrs. Hetherington called—as she pays no attention to days, but runs in promiscuously—and I sent word, "Not at home." I felt a little shocked at myself, and hardly knew what Mr. Everet thought—for it is a little unusual, of course, to keep a man whom you have met so seldom, gossiping a whole afternoon in your library, and denying yourself to all other callers—devoting yourself exclusively to him. And I shouldn't have done it—though there was really no harm in it—if Ed had not said what he did, last night.
I didn't encourage Mr. Everet to call again, nor try to be agreeable at all, but was just usual and everyday, just as I shall always be when he calls.
He seemed quite at home, and we had tea in the library, and he left just in time for me to dress for the English Minister's reception—where we met two hours later.
He—Mr. Everet—is more interesting than any of the men I have met. There is a dignity about him that I like, and that I have never found in anyone else but Edgar. I did not know what he would think of my letting him stay as I did, but he accepted it most naturally, as a matter of course—and it was a temptation, for I was so miserable that anything seemed acceptable that enlivened me a little.
He noticed my mood, I think, for he was not flippant and tiresome, but sympathetic—though we only referred to the most commonplace subjects. He remarked that I looked weary and pale. It does a woman good to have these little things noticed. It seemed quite like Edgar—as he used to be.
Mr. Everet said it was refreshing to find a natural, unaffected, candid woman in Washington. I do think it must seem a relief to men. If women did as Edgar wishes me to do, the men would be in a terrible plight. They would have to hate all the women in self-defence.
I couldn't help observing the interest Mr. Everet seems to feel in me—though I really should not have thought of it if Edgar had not suggested it. For a moment there was a certain fascination in the idea of making a strong, dignified man do just what a helpless insignificant little woman like me wants him to do.
As a sort of experiment, I made him go to Gladys Grayson's after the affair at the minister's although he had said that he had an important appointment at eleven, and that a great deal depended on his keeping it—but he went to the Graysons'. Of course, I didn't care a fig whether he went or not; only, as I say, it was a kind of experiment.
I'm frightfully tired, and here it is three o'clock and I still up.
Edgar will be at home on Friday, and this is Wednesday morning. I shall be glad to tell him again, how I scorn his proposition—I shall tell him that Mr. Everet noticed my pallor, and I think he will feel a little ashamed of himself. He ought to.