Agnes was too ill to appear at the Duchess of Pevensey's dinner that evening. Lord Reckage's melancholy, absent air during the entertainment, and his early withdrawal from the distinguished party, were referred, with sympathy, to the very proper distress he felt at Miss Carillon's tiresome indisposition. The time passed well enough for him--far better, in fact, than he had expected, for he was relieved from the strain of "dancing attendance" on his betrothed--a thing which he, even more than most men, found silly. In the chivalrous days of tournaments, troubadours and crusades this romantic exercise of seeming enslaved was, he held, justifiable, even interesting. But in modern life it had an appearance of over-emphasis.
Poor Agnes, however, could neither eat, nor sleep, nor rest. Her temples throbbed, her eyes ached; every nerve was a barbed wire; her soul was manacled by promises; she would not use her reason; the fever in her veins was not to be quelled, and the one agitating relief to her physical suffering was a constant perusal of David Rennes's letter. It was the first passionate love-letter she had ever received. Just as a river may stream peacefully through pastoral lands till it joins the sea and becomes one with that vast element of unrest, so the little flame of her girl's nature was absorbed at last into the great fire underlying all humanity. Was she in love? she asked herself. When she was with Rennes she became silent, incapable of conversation, of thought. All she asked was to be near him, to watch him, to hear him.
Was this love? Was it love to press his letter to her heart, to read it again and again, to keep it under her pillow at night? Was it love to think of him every moment of the day, to compare all others to him and find them wanting, to see his face always before her eyes? Was it love to know that if he called her, as he called her now, she would leave home, father, mother, friends, all things, all people, and follow him to the world's end, to the beginning of hell, or--further? At one-and-twenty such questions need no answer. They belong to the innocent rhetoric of youth which will cry out to June, "Are you fair?" and to the autumnal moon in mist, "Must there be rain?" Neither June nor the moon make reply, but youth has no doubts. The girl, weeping tears of joy over Rennes's perilous words, had but one clear regret in her mind--she could not see him for some hours. His declaration dispelled the terrible bitterness, scepticism, and indifference to all sentiment which had gradually permeated, during their acquaintance, her whole heart. Repulsed affection may turn to hatred in haughty, impatient souls. But in Agnes it produced a moral languor--a mental indolence--the feeling that no one was in earnest, and nothing ought to matter. The more this feeling deepened, the more attentively did she observe the mere outward etiquette of all that passes for seriousness, attending scrupulously to the minor obligations of existence and exhausting her courage in those petty matters which die with the day and yield no apparent fruit. How different now seemed the colourless, harsh fabric which she had mistaken for duty and wrapped--as a shroud--about her secret hopes! She had held every aspiration implying happiness as a "proverb of reproach"; she had endeavoured to believe that all poetry--except hymns--was false prophecy leading one to hard entanglements and grievous falls.
And what had been the impoverishment of her soul under this grim discipline? How could she tell the many thoughts which had travelled unquestioned over the highway of her heart during that process of disillusion? But all was changed now, and all that had been difficult, painful or obscure in the world seemed perfect with the inexhaustible glory of young passion. Rennes begged her to see him once more before he left England for some years. Would she meet him in Kensington Gardens? She had often walked there, under the old trees, with himself and Mrs. Rennes, and the place had become very dear, very familiar to her from these associations. At any other time, however, the idea of a clandestine meeting with David would have been intolerable. To go now was misery, yet she dared not stay away. The sunny morning mixed with her mood, which was one of determination to risk all in order to win all. Driven by a sense of her capabilities for endurance, she faced, with a kind of exultation, the possible disaster or remorse which might follow her action. Was there not a possible joy also? For ten days now she had been ill in body as well as mind; she had suffered a hard struggle. She knew now that she could not, could not, could not, no matter what happened, become the wife of Lord Reckage. The result of great self-delusion for so long a period was a condition of mind in which she was practically unable to distinguish between candour and disingenuousness. Any appearance of deceit--which she regarded as wrong in itself--always excited her scorn, but desperation now urged a step which might lead, she thought, to much good or much evil. That it could lead to more evil than a loveless marriage was not, however, to be feared. She started from the house with feverish cheeks, a beating pulse, and a new strange consciousness of power--power over herself, her fate, the world.
Rennes was waiting for her under the long avenue of trees by the Lancaster Gate walk. She had a tall, stately figure of that type immortalised by Du Maurier--indeed, she herself may be recognised in some of his famous society sketches about the year 1870. The clear, decisive features, the tender discerning expression, the poise of the head, were irresistibly attractive to all artists with a strong sense of grace--even artificial grace--as opposed to rude vigour or homeliness. She possessed naturally that almost unreal elegance which many painters--Frederick Walker, for instance--have been accused of inventing.
"This is very wrong of me," she said, blushing as Rennes advanced, hat in hand, to meet her, "very wrong. I never do these things."
"I said in my letter--right or wrong it matters not--what I thought. This is a thing which runs up into eternity, Agnes. It had to be. We needn't try to justify it."
"I cannot--I dare not regard it as you do."
"But you have come! Let me look at you!"
"Does it require much looking to see that I am really unhappy?"
"I see that you are beautiful, that you are here--with me. Ah, don't be unhappy! When we take into account our scanty time together"--he grew pale at the thought--"and the danger we have just missed of losing each other, perhaps for ever----" She caught his hand for a second and he kept it.
"What is to be done?" she asked, after an agitated silence. "What will people say? Not that I can think of anything to do."
"Darling, I know I have asked you to make an impossible sacrifice--to break off a most brilliant marriage, to marry me and share the despair, hardships, tortures of a life very different to any you have seen. Well has Goethe said--
_'Love not the sun too much, nor yet the stars,
Come, follow me to the realms of night.'_
This is what I offer you, dearest. You can hardly realise what a wretched, desolate existence mine has been. Resignation is a miserable refuge. They say work gives one contentment, but unless one is servile and gives in to the spirit of the age, it is rarely understood till one is dead. And so the discouragement is perpetual. Even your sympathy would pain me at such times. I feel then--as I feel now--that I will grasp Fate by the throat; it shall not utterly crush me."
"But," said Agnes, a little frightened at this outburst, "do you never think of God and His Will?"
He returned her anxious glance with gloomy, almost compassionate amazement.
"Does God think of me?" he asked. "Really, I cannot feel that the salvation of my soul is so important. Indeed, any idea of immortality is awful How could it ever be a consolation--except to a smug, very self-satisfied egoism? Call it the burden--or the cross of immortality--if you call it anything. I wish it could be proved that we end when we die. But physicians dissect dead bodies to find the soul. It would not be a soul if they could find it in the dead. And imagine one becoming penitent when the day of grace is over!"
"I keep Clement's words before me, 'The Lord who died for us is not our enemy.' Surely that is a splendid thought against final despair."
"Many thoughts are splendid," he replied, "if we could believe them now as the early Christians did in the first centuries."
Agnes, with parted, whitening lips, could find no response. Rennes painted her afterwards in the same attitude, and with all he remembered of her expression, in his now famous picture, Pilate's Wife.
"You will never be happy--never," she murmured at last. "But perhaps no one is happy."
"I can grant that the saints were always profoundly happy. Let me tell you why. The state of the saint is one of dependence. His convictions, therefore, are enduring and unclouded. He accepts his trials as privileges; he loses all sense of his own identity; his humanity is merged in God; his ecstasies lift him up to heaven and bring him down to a transfigured earth. He has been bought with a ransom, and he is the co-heir with Christ. He is found worthy of suffering. But with artists, all is different. The saint is in search of holiness. The artist thinks chiefly of beauty. Holiness is a state of mind--it is something permanent. Beauty, however, mocks one half the time--it may be a deception. Anyhow, one cannot define it, or keep it, or even satisfactorily catch it. Our inspired moments, therefore, alternate with a miserable knowledge of our individual wretchedness. We learn that we are no stronger than our individuality. That is the barrier between us and our visions. The saint has God before his eyes, and he carries Him in his heart. The artist sees only himself and bears only the weight of his own incompetence. But these, darling, are not the things I meant to say to you, although they may explain my life. The common run of people wouldn't understand all this in the least."
"I want to hear all--I want to enter into all your thoughts, David. I have always known that those who devote themselves to the study of what is sublime and beautiful suffer proportionately from the squalor of actual facts."
She quoted from one or her father's speeches which he invariably gave with much earnestness at the opening of schools of art and similar institutions.
"The world," replied Rennes, "rewards the beautiful only inasmuch as it flatters the senses, and the sublime remains--so far as the general taste is concerned--altogether without response."
"But one would think," said Agnes, "that you were a disappointed or an unsuccessful man, whereas every one admires your genius."
He laughed at her practical bent, which seemed the more fascinating because of her picturesque appearance.
"One often feels cast down without the least cause," said he; "the truth is we all want more praise than we get. We are a vain lot, that's the trouble. Let me paint myself in the blackest colours. You must know the worst--you must realise the bad bargain you may make. Reckage would never bore and tire you in this way. How can you care for me?"
"It is hard!" she said, smiling.
"Darling! Do you remember the white violets at Woodbridge, and sitting on that gate looking across that deep valley at the bonfires? Wasn't it perfect? Look through these trees now--see the flames and smoke? They are burning dead leaves and twigs. I wish I could burn my past. This may be a good omen for me. But I must not deceive you; that would be a bad beginning."
"We must decide on some course," said Agnes. "Your letter was quite clear, but I suppose I am not going on as I ought to do. My present position is that of a person telling a lie to people. Before you wrote, however, I had made up my mind to some change. I could give no good grounds for carrying out my engagement to Beauclerk. The motives would not bear examination. I intended to be patient till the way was mercifully cleared for me. Even birds, in cold weather, grow tame from distress. So I waited in a dull, frozen way for what might happen."
He remembered, with a pang of remorse, that he had once called this devoted woman an accomplished, incurable Philistine.
"I must put myself in the wrong with regard to Beauclerk," she continued quietly. "That is merely fair to him. Every one shall know that I have been weak and vacillating. May God forgive me and humble me--for I shall not be understood, even by many good people. But the next worst thing to making an error is to abide by it. Dear David, try to follow my feeling. It has all passed in my mind in such a way that it is impossible for me to describe it. In a sense, giving Reckage up seems to uproot me altogether from all my former life, and the future is only not a blank because it is such a mystery. I am sure, though, that sorrow is never in God's ordinance the whole law of life. These are great compensations."
"Anything is better than to sit still and dream," said Rennes. "I have dreamt too long. I find solitude oppressive. Yet you will admit how dreadful it is to live among those who don't know or don't care a bit about art."
"But there are other interests equally engrossing."
"Not to me. And even Epicurean advice is only the way to ignominious, contemptible happiness. I must have an ideal life or else annihilation--splendid misery or splendid content--nothing between the two."
"You have not half showed your capabilities yet," replied Agnes. "We have to look upon this world as the merest pilgrimage, but we can help each other. I have hope because I have faith. Sara de Treverell said the other day that, in men, experience often makes mere callousness of character. Is this true, David?"
"Not of me; you have saved me from the worst things. But it simply worries and almost exasperates me to hear religious talk from any one. When I hear a sermon I feel an inclination always to say, 'My dear fellow, can't you put your case better?' I want good stuff about Divine and human nature--not this vagueness and platitude. Why don't they tell one something about the optimism of God, even before the spectacle of men's weakness? But, instead, we are told to moan about this vale of tears; we are promised chastisements, disappointments, woes, persecution. A philosophy of suffering makes men strong, but a philosophy of despair is bound to make a generation of pleasure-seekers."
"And why?"
"Because the veritable world, even on its bare merits, is not so bad. It is full of beauty, and interest, and enjoyment. It is a lie to call it so many vile names. One's good sense revolts. Do you think, darling, that I could look at you, love you, be loved by you, and call life a bad joke?"
Since the beginning of time this logic has held its own against all scientific criticism. The two, being secure from observation, kissed each other and accepted the earth with perfect cheerfulness. They made some plans, and after the agony of parting till the next day, each went home to write the other a long letter. In the course of the afternoon Rennes passed through Arlington Street four times in a hansom and twice on foot. Agnes was always at one of the windows innocently observing the weather. He thought her the loveliest thing created. He pitied, with benevolence, all other men, and he spent an hour at his solicitor's office, without begrudging the time, or chafing under the fatigue.
Two days later Lord Reckage received the following communication from Miss Carillon:--
MY DEAR BEAUCLERK,--
This letter will astonish and grieve you. I have written several. None please me. All say too much and yet leave all unsaid. I must send this one and trust to your generosity. I am wholly to blame, wholly in the wrong. I am no actress but I have been acting a part--the part of a happy woman. My effort has deceived many--Papa, Mamma, and, I believe, you among them. Dear Beauclerk, you will think me ungrateful, false, weak. I don't excuse myself. As I have said, the blame is all mine, and the punishment must be all mine.
When you receive this I shall have left England with Mr. Rennes. He had arranged to go to the East for a long time. (This will show you how little he anticipated any change in my plans.) When I realised that I should have to say goodbye to him, probably for ever, I found myself unequal to the trial. I could not let him go alone. It is bad for me to dwell too much on my feelings. I ought to admit, however, that I have known all along, in a sort of way, that I should have to give in if he put the matter before me. I dislike the talk one hears so often about inevitability--much of it is made an excuse for appalling selfishness. At the same time, I understand what is meant and feel strongly, that, while I am using my own will--I cannot use it, with a good conscience, otherwise. Can you follow this? In reality, I was disloyal to Mr. Rennes when I became engaged to you. I was impatient, wilful, blind. I did you both an irreparable--yes, an irreparable injustice. He must always think me fickle, and you will always condemn my weakness. I dare not ask you to forgive me. I dare not hope for contentment after such a bad beginning. One of Papa's favourite texts rings in my ears--"Is it a small thing for you to weary men, but will ye weary my God also?" I mustn't be insincere with God. But I do want you to see that my affection for Mr. Rennes has taken such a hold of my life that I simply cannot fight against it. I am not sentimental, as you know: I can be quite as sensible as other people about life and its obligations. I don't expect romance or joy. Had I, by any misfortune, met Mr. Rennes after my marriage with you, I cannot bear to think what might have happened. It isn't nice of me to say this. It is a painful, humiliating reflection, and you won't like to think that you ever cared--even a little--for any one so unworthy. In your kindness you will say that this isn't like me. But indeed it is the real me. You have known the unreal, sham me. Every one of my friends will be surprised. I am not surprised. And oh! the relief to be quite, quite natural and straightforward at last. Nothing to pretend, nothing to hide. I wish you had never known me. Your ideals are so noble, and you depended on me to realise a few of them. I think of the plans we made, the hopes we formed. Alas! they were not for me. I am going forward into the darkness. I don't see one ray of light. Yet I haven't one misgiving or the least fear, because I have the unalterable conviction that I am fulfilling my true destiny--whatever it may be, good or evil.
All will agree that you are well rid of me. This is my consolation. You have been kind, considerate, affectionate, thoughtful always. And I have failed you.
Forget me, and never judge other women by me. I have been exceptionally foolish.
Your wretched friend,
AGNES CARILLON.
His lordship's emotion on reading this letter was one of relief for himself--but pity and terror for the girl. He was sincerely fond of Agnes, and the defiant misery of her words filled him with forebodings. But the sense of his own restored liberty soon dominated every other feeling; and his anxiety about Miss Carillon's future found complete assuagement in the thought that character, under suffering, came out with an energy and intensity which made, indisputably, for progress.
When the news, after twenty-four hours, became known, Agnes's wish to place herself in the wrong, beyond sympathy, or hope of pardon, was freely gratified. No criticism seemed too harsh for her conduct. No voice was lifted in mitigation of her offence. Rennes was excused, because he was an artist, erratic and passionate, and she was unfortunately beautiful. The poor old Bishop, however, rallied under the shock, preached more vigorously than ever, and showed a proud countenance to his daughter's adversaries. When he was able to announce to his friends--after a painful fortnight of suspense--that the young couple had travelled to Rome with Mrs. Rennes, and been married at the English Embassy there, he gave way to a little illness and indulged his grief. One could surrender to legalised folly; one could name it. But sin and scandal could only be faced by an implacable reserve. "I may die of dismay," said he to his wife, "but I will not die of disgrace."
