Chapter 15
Now that gordon was gone, at any rate, gone for good, and not to return,
he felt a sudden and singular sense of freedom. It was a feeling of
unbounded expansion, quite out of proportion, as he said to himself, to
any assignable cause. Everything suddenly appeared to have become very
optional; but he was quite at a loss what to do with his liberty. It seemed
a harmless use to make of it, in the afternoon, to go and pay another visit
to the ladies who lived at the confectioner's. Here, however, he met a
reception which introduced a fresh element of perplexity into the situation
that Gordon had left behind him. The door was opened to him by Mrs.
Vivian's maid-servant, a sturdy daughter of the Schwartzwald, who
informed him that the ladies — with much regret — were unable to receive
any one.
They are very busy — and they are ill,
said the young
woman, by way of explanation.
Bernard was disappointed, and he felt like arguing the case.
Surely,
he said,
they are not both ill and busy!
When you make excuses, you should make them agree with each
other.
The Teutonic soubrette fixed her round blue eyes a minute upon the
patch of blue sky revealed to her by her open door.
I say what I can, lieber Herr. It 's not my fault if I 'm not so
clever as a French mamsell. One of the ladies is busy, the other is ill.
There you have it.
Not quite,
said Bernard.
You must remember that
there are three of them.
Oh, the little one — the little one weeps.
Miss Evers weeps!
exclaimed Bernard, to whom the
vision of this young lady in tears had never presented itself.
That happens to young ladies when they are unhappy,
said the girl; and with an artless yet significant smile she carried a big red
hand to the left side of a broad bosom.
I am sorry she is unhappy; but which of the other ladies is
ill?
The mother is very busy.
And the daughter is ill?
The young woman looked at him an instant, smiling again, and the
light in her little blue eyes indicated confusion, but not perversity.
No, the mamma is ill,
she exclaimed,
and the
daughter is very busy. They are preparing to leave Baden.
To leave Baden? When do they go?
I don't quite know, lieber Herr; but very soon.
With this information Bernard turned away. He was rather
surprised, but he reflected that Mrs. Vivian had not proposed to spend her
life on the banks of the Oos, and that people were leaving Baden every
day in the year. In the evening, at the Kursaal, he met Captain Lovelock,
who was wandering about with an air of explosive sadness.
Damn it, they 're going — yes, they 're going,
said the
Captain, after the two young men had exchanged a few allusions to
current events.
Fancy their leaving us in that heartless manner! It 's
not the time to run away — it 's the time to keep your rooms, if you 're so
lucky as to have any. The races begin next week and there 'll be a
tremendous crowd. All the grand-ducal people are coming. Miss Evers
wanted awfully to see the Grand Duke, and I promised her an
introduction. I can't make out what Mrs. Vivian is up to. I bet you a
ten-pound note she 's giving chase. Our friend Wright has come back and
gone off again, and Mrs. Vivian means to strike camp and follow. She 'll
pot him yet; you see if she does n't!
She is running away from you, dangerous man!
said
Bernard.
Do you mean on account of Miss Evers? Well, I admire Miss
Evers — I don't mind admitting that; but I ain't dangerous,
said
Captain Lovelock, with a lustreless eye.
How can a fellow be
dangerous when he has n't ten shillings in his pocket? Desperation, do you
call it? But Miss Evers has n't money, so far as I have heard. I don't ask
you,
Lovelock continued —
I don't care a damn whether she
has or not. She 's a devilish charming girl, and I don't mind telling you I
'm hit. I stand no chance — I know I stand no chance. Mrs. Vivian 's down
on me, and, by Jove, Mrs. Vivian 's right. I 'm not the husband to pick
out for a young woman of expensive habits and no expectations. Gordon
Wright's the sort of young man that 's wanted, and, hang me, if Mrs.
Vivian did n't
want him so much for her own daughter, I believe she 'd
try and bag him for the little one. Gad, I believe that to keep me off she
would like to cut him in two and give half to each of them! I 'm afraid of
that little woman. She has got a little voice like a screw-driver. But for all
that, if I could get away from this cursed place, I would keep the girl in
sight — hang me if I would n't! I 'd cut the races — dash me if I would n't!
But I 'm in pawn, if you know what that means. I owe a beastly lot of
money at the inn, and that impudent little beggar of a landlord won't let
me out of his sight. The luck 's dead against me at those filthy tables; I
have n't won a farthing in three weeks. I wrote to my brother the other
day, and this morning I got an answer from him — a cursed, canting letter
of good advice, remarking that he had already paid my debts seven times.
It does n't happen to be seven; it 's only six, or six and a half! Does he
expect me to spend the rest of my life at the Hôtel de Hollande?
Perhaps he would like me to engage as a waiter there and pay it off by
serving at the table d'hôte. It would be convenient for him the next
time he comes abroad with his seven daughters and two governesses. I
hate the smell of their beastly table d'hôte! You 're sorry I 'm hard
up? I 'm sure I 'm much obliged to you. Can you be of any service? My
dear fellow, if you are bent on throwing your money about the place I 'm
not the man to stop you.
Bernard's winnings of the previous night
were burning a hole, as the phrase is, in his pocket. Ten thousand francs
had never before seemed to him so heavy a load to carry, and to lighten
the weight of his good luck by lending fifty pounds to a less fortunate
fellow-player was an operation that not only gratified his good-nature but
strongly commended itself to his conscience. His conscience, however,
made its conditions.
My dear Longueville,
Lovelock went on,
I have always gone in for family feeling, early associations, and all
that sort of thing. That 's what made me confide my difficulties to
Dovedale. But, upon my honor, you remind me of the good Samaritan, or
that sort of person; you are fonder of me than my own brother! I 'll take
fifty pounds with pleasure, thank you, and you shall have them again — at
the earliest opportunity. My earliest convenience — will that do? Damn it, it
is a convenience, is n't it? You make your
conditions. My dear fellow, I
accept them in advance. That I 'm not to follow up Miss Evers — is that
what you mean? Have you been commissioned by the family to buy me
off? It 's devilish cruel to take advantage of my poverty! Though I 'm
poor, I 'm honest. But I
am honest, my dear Longueville; that 's the
point. I 'll give you my word, and I 'll keep it. I won't go near that girl
again — I won't think of her till I 've got rid of your fifty pounds. It 's a
dreadful encouragement to extravagance, but that 's your lookout. I 'll
stop for their beastly races and the young lady shall be sacred.
Longueville called the next morning at Mrs. Vivian's, and learned
that the three ladies had left Baden by the early train, a couple of hours
before. This fact produced in his mind a variety of emotions — surprise,
annoyance, embarrassment. In spite of his effort to think it natural they
should go, he found something precipitate and inexplicable in the manner
of their going, and he declared to himself that one of the party, at least,
had been unkind and ungracious in not giving him a chance to say
good-bye. He took refuge by anticipation, as it were, in this reflection,
whenever, for the next three or four days, he foresaw himself stopping
short, as he had done before, and asking himself whether he had done an
injury to Angela Vivian. This was an idle and unpractical question,
inasmuch as the answer was not forthcoming; whereas it was quite simple
and conclusive to say, without the note of interrogation, that she was, in
spite of many attractive points, an abrupt and capricious young woman.
During the three or four days in question, Bernard lingered on at Baden,
uncertain what to do or where to go, feeling as if he had received a
sudden check — a sort of spiritual snub — which arrested the accumulation of
motive. Lovelock, also, whom Bernard saw every day, appeared to think
that destiny had given him a slap in the face, for he had not enjoyed the
satisfaction of a last interview with Miss Evers.
I thought she might have written me a note,
said the
Captain;
but it appears she does n't write. Some girls don't write,
you know.
Bernard remarked that it was possible Lovelock would still have
news of Miss Blanche; and before he left Baden he learned that she had
addressed her forsaken swain a charming
little note from Lausanne, where
the three ladies had paused in their flight from Baden, and where Mrs.
Vivian had decreed that for the present they should remain.
I 'm devilish glad she writes,
said Captain Lovelock;
some girls do write, you know.
Blanche found Lausanne most horrid after Baden, for whose delights
she languished. The delights of Baden, however, were not obvious just
now to her correspondent, who had taken Bernard's fifty pounds into the
Kursaal and left them there. Bernard, on learning his misfortune, lent him
another fifty, with which he performed a second series of unsuccessful
experiments; and our hero was not at his ease until he had passed over to
his luckless friend the whole amount of his own winnings, every penny of
which found its way through Captain Lovelock's fingers back into the
bank. When this operation was completed, Bernard left Baden, the Captain
gloomily accompanying him to the station.
I have said that there had come over Bernard a singular sense of
freedom. One of the uses he made of his freedom was to undertake a long
journey. He went to the East and remained absent from Europe for
upward of two years — a period of his life of which it is not proposed to
offer a complete history. The East is a wonderful region, and Bernard,
investigating the mysteries of Asia, saw a great many curious and
beautiful things. He had moments of keen enjoyment; he laid up a great
store of impressions and even a considerable sum of knowledge. But,
nevertheless, he was not destined to look back upon this episode with any
particular complacency. It was less delightful than it was supposed to be;
it was less successful than it might have been. By what unnatural element
the cup of pleasure was adulterated, he would have been very much at a
loss to say; but it was an incontestable fact that at times he sipped it as a
medicine, rather than quaffed it as a nectar. When people congratulated
him on his opportunity of seeing the world, and said they envied him the
privilege of seeing it so well, he felt even more than the usual degree of
irritation produced by an insinuation that fortune thinks so poorly of us as
to give us easy terms. Misplaced sympathy is the least available of
superfluities, and Bernard at this time found himself thinking that there
was a good deal
of impertinence in the world. He would, however, readily
have confessed that, in so far as he failed to enjoy his Oriental
wanderings, the fault was his own; though he would have made mentally
the gratifying reflection that never was a fault less deliberate. If, during
the period of which I speak, his natural gayety had sunk to a minor key, a
partial explanation may be found in the fact that he was deprived of the
society of his late companion. It was an odd circumstance that the two
young men had not met since Gordon's abrupt departure from Baden.
Gordon went to Berlin, and shortly afterward to America, so that they
were on opposite sides of the globe. Before he returned to his own
country, Bernard made by letter two or three offers to join him in Europe,
anywhere that was agreeable to him. Gordon answered that his movements
were very uncertain, and that he should be sorry to trouble Bernard to
follow him about. He had put him to this inconvenience in making him
travel from Venice to Baden, and one such favor at a time was enough to
ask, even of the most obliging of men. Bernard was, of course, afraid that
what he had told Gordon about Angela Vivian was really the cause of a
state of things which, as between two such good friends, wore a
perceptible resemblance to alienation. Gordon had given her up; but he
bore Bernard a grudge for speaking ill of her, and so long as this
disagreeable impression should last, he preferred not to see him. Bernard
was frank enough to charge the poor fellow with a lingering rancor, of
which he made, indeed, no great crime. But Gordon denied the allegation,
and assured him that, to his own perception, there was no decline in their
intimacy. He only requested, as a favor and as a tribute to
just
susceptibilities,
that Bernard would allude no more either to Miss
Vivian or to what had happened at Baden. This request was easy to
comply with, and Bernard, in writing, strictly conformed to it; but it
seemed to him that the act of doing so was in itself a cooling-off. What
would be a better proof of what is called a
tension
than an
agreement to avoid a natural topic? Bernard moralized a little over
Gordon's
just susceptibilities,
and felt that the existence of a
perverse resentment in so honest a nature was a fact gained to his
acquaintance with psychological science. It cannot be said, however, that
he suffered this fact to occupy
at all times the foreground of his
consciousness. Bernard was like some great painters; his foregrounds were
very happily arranged. He heard nothing of Mrs. Vivian and her daughter,
beyond a rumor that they had gone to Italy; and he learned, on apparently
good authority, that Blanche Evers had returned to New York with her
mother. He wondered whether Captain Lovelock was still in pawn at the
Hôtel de Hollande. If he did not allow himself to wonder too
curiously whether he had done a harm to Gordon, it may be affirmed that
he was haunted by the recurrence of that other question, of which mention
has already been made. Had he done a harm to Angela Vivian, and did
she know that he had done it? This inquiry by no means made him
miserable, and it was far from awaiting him regularly on his pillow. But it
visited him at intervals, and sometimes in the strangest places — suddenly,
abruptly, in the stillness of an Indian temple, or amid the shrillness of an
Oriental crowd. He became familiar with it at last; he called it his
Jack-in-the-box. Some invisible touch of circumstance would press the
spring, and the little image would pop up, staring him in the face and
grinning an interrogation. Bernard always clapped down the lid, for he
regarded this phenomenon as strikingly inane. But if it was more frequent
than any pang of conscience connected with the remembrance of Gordon
himself, this last sentiment was certainly lively enough to make it a great
relief to hear at last a rumor that the excellent fellow was about to be
married. The rumor reached him at Athens; it was vague and indirect, and
it omitted the name of his betrothed. But Bernard made the most of it, and
took comfort in the thought that his friend had recovered his spirits and
his appetite for matrimony.