The Man, Bram Stoker [smallest ebook reader .TXT] 📗
- Author: Bram Stoker
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‘Why, Harold, I’ve been in long frocks for years. Why should I come here on this special day on that account?’ Even as she was speaking she felt that it would be well to abandon this ground of inquiry. It had clearly told her all it could. She would learn more by some other means. So she went on in a playful way, as a cat—not a kitten—does when it has got a mouse:
‘That reason won’t work, Harold. It’s quite rusty in the joints. But never mind it! Tell me why you have come so early?’ This seemed to Harold to be a heavensent opening; he rushed in at once:
‘Because, Stephen, I wanted to ask you to be my wife! Oh! Stephen, don’t you know that I love you? Ever since you were a little girl! When you were a little girl and I a big boy I loved you. I have loved you ever since with all my heart, and soul, and strength. Without you the world is a blank to me! For you and your happiness I would do anything—anything!’
This was no acting. When once the barrier of beginning had been broken, his soul seemed to pour itself out. The man was vibrant through all his nature; and the woman’s very soul realised its truth. For an instant a flame of gladness swept through her; and for the time it lasted put all other thought aside.
But suspicion is a hard metal which does not easily yield to fire. It can come to white heat easily enough, but its melting-point is high indeed. When the flame had leaped it had spent its force; the reaction came quick. Stephen’s heart seemed to turn to ice, all the heat and life rushing to her brain. Her thoughts flashed with convincing quickness; there was no time for doubting amid their rush. Her life was for good or ill at the crossing of the ways. She had trusted Harold thoroughly. The habit of her whole life from her babyhood up had been to so look to him as comrade and protector and sympathetic friend. She was so absolutely sure of his earnest devotion that this new experience of a riper feeling would have been a joy to her, if it should be that his act was all spontaneous and done in ignorance of her shame. ‘Shame’ was the generic word which now summarised to herself her thought of her conduct in proposing to Leonard. But of this she must be certain. She could not, dare not, go farther till this was settled. With the same craving for certainty with which she convinced herself that Leonard understood her overtures, and with the same dogged courage with which she pressed the matter on him, she now went on to satisfy her mind.
‘What did you do yesterday?’
‘I was at Norcester all day. I went early. By the way, here is the ribbon you wanted; I think it’s exactly the same as the pattern.’ As he spoke he took a tissue-piper parcel from his pocket and handed it to her.
‘Thanks!’ she said. ‘Did you meet any friends there?’
‘Not many.’ He answered guardedly; he had a secret to keep.
‘Where did you dine?’
‘At the club!’ He began to be uneasy at this questioning; but he did not see any way to avoid answering without creating some suspicion.
‘Did you see any one you knew at the club?’ Her voice as she spoke was a little harder, a little more strained. Harold noticed the change, rather by instinct than reason. He felt that there was danger in it, and paused. The pause seemed to suddenly create a new fury in the breast of Stephen. She felt that Harold was playing with her. Harold! If she could not trust him, where then was she to look for trust in the world? If he was not frank with her, what then meant his early coming; his seeking her in the grove; his proposal of marriage, which seemed so sudden and so inopportune? He must have seen Leonard, and by some means have become acquainted with her secret of shame … His motive?
Here her mind halted. She knew as well as if it had been trumpeted from the skies that Harold knew all. But she must be certain … Certain!
She was standing erect, her hands held down by her sides and clenched together till the knuckles were white; all her body strung high—like an over-pitched violin. Now she raised her right hand and flung it downward with a passionate jerk.
‘Answer me!’ she cried imperiously. ‘Answer me! Why are you playing with me? Did you see Leonard Everard last night? Answer me, I say. Harold An Wolf, you do not lie! Answer me!’
As she spoke Harold grew cold. From the question he now knew that Stephen had guessed his secret. The fat was in the fire with a vengeance. He did not know what to do, and still remained silent. She did not give him time to think, but spoke again, this time more coldly. The white terror had replaced the red:
‘Are you not going to answer me a simple question, Harold? To be silent now is to wrong me! I have a right to know!’
In his trouble, for he felt that say what he would he could only give her new pain, he said humbly:
‘Don’t ask me, Stephen! Won’t you understand that I want to do what is best for you? Won’t you trust me?’ Her answer came harshly. A more experienced man than Harold, one who knew women better, would have seen how overwrought she was, and would have made pity the pivot of his future bearing and acts and words while the interview lasted; pity, and pity only. But to Harold the high ideal was ever the same. The Stephen whom he loved was no subject for pity, but for devotion only. He knew the nobility of her nature and must trust it to the end. When her silence and her blazing eyes denied his request, he answered her query in a low voice:
‘I did!’ Even whilst he spoke he was thankful for one thing, he had not been pledged in any way to confidence. Leonard had forced the knowledge on him; and though he would have preferred a million times over to be silent, he was still free to speak. Stephen’s next question came more coldly still:
‘Did he tell you of his meeting with me?’
‘He did.’
‘Did he tell you all?’ It was torture to him to answer; but he was at the stake and must bear it.
‘I think so! If it was true.’
‘What did he tell you? Stay! I shall ask you the facts myself; the broad facts. We need not go into details … ‘
‘Oh, Stephen!’ She silenced his pleading with an imperious hand.
‘If I can go into this matter, surely you can. If I can bear the shame of telling, you can at least bear that of listening. Remember that knowing—knowing what you know, or at least what you have heard- -you could come here and propose marriage to me!’ This she said with a cold, cutting sarcasm which sounded like the rasping of a roughly-sharpened knife through raw flesh. Harold groaned in spirit; he felt a weakness which began at his heart to steal through him. It took all his manhood to bear himself erect. He dreaded what was coming, as of old the once-tortured victim dreaded the coming torment of the rack.
Stephen went on in her calm, cold voice:
‘Did he tell you that I had asked him to marry me?’ Despite herself, as she spoke the words a red tide dyed her face. It was not a flush; it was not a blush; it was a sort of flood which swept through her, leaving her in a few seconds whiter than before. Harold saw and understood. He could not speak; he lowered his head silently. Her eyes glittered more coldly. The madness that every human being may have once was upon her. Such a madness is destructive, and here was something more vulnerable than herself.
‘Did he tell you how I pressed him?’ There was no red tide this time, nor ever again whilst the interview lasted. To bow in affirmation was insufficient; with an effort he answered:
‘I understood so.’ She answered with an icy sarcasm:
‘You understood so! Oh, I don’t doubt he embellished the record with some of his own pleasantries. But you understood it; and that is sufficient.’ After a pause she went on:
‘Did he tell you that he had refused me?’
‘Yes!’ Harold knew now that he was under the torture, and that there was no refusing. She went on, with a light laugh, which wrung his heart even more than her pain had done … Stephen to laugh like that!
‘And I have no doubt that he embellished that too, with some of his fine masculine witticisms. I understood myself that he was offended at my asking him. I understood it quite well; he told me so!’ Then with feminine intuition she went on:
‘I dare say that before he was done he said something kindly of the poor little thing that loved him; that loved him so much, and that she had to break down all the bounds of modesty and decorum that had made the women of her house honoured for a thousand years! And you listened to him whilst he spoke! Oh-h-h!’ she quivered with her white-hot anger, as the fierce heat in the heart of a furnace quivers. But her voice was cold again as she went on:
‘But who could help loving him? Girls always did. It was such a beastly nuisance! You “understood” all that, I dare say; though perhaps he did not put it in such plain words!’ Then the scorn, which up to now had been imprisoned, turned on him; and he felt as though some hose of deathly chill was being played upon him.
‘And yet you, knowing that only yesterday, he had refused me—refused my pressing request that he should marry me, come to me hotfoot in the early morning and ask me to be your wife. I thought such things did not take place; that men were more honourable, or more considerate, or more merciful! Or at least I used to think so; till yesterday. No! till to-day. Yesterday’s doings were my own doings, and I had to bear the penalty of them myself. I had come here to fight out by myself the battle of my shame … ‘
Here Harold interrupted her. He could not bear to hear Stephen use such a word in connection with herself.
‘No! You must not say “shame.” There is no shame to you, Stephen. There can be none, and no one must say it in my presence!’
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