The Magician, W. Somerset Maugham [english novels for beginners .TXT] 📗

dignity; and it seemed to Margaret fit thus to adore God. But it did not move her. She could not understand the words that the priests chanted; their gestures, their movements to and fro, were strange to her. For her that stately service had no meaning. And with a great cry in her heart she said that God had forsaken her. She was alone in an alien land. Evil was all about her, and in those ceremonies she could find no comfort. What could she expect when the God of her fathers left her to her fate? So that she might not weep in front of all those people, Margaret with down-turned face walked to the door. She felt utterly lost. As she walked along the interminable street that led to her own house, she was shaken with sobs.

“God has forsaken me,” she repeated. “God has foresaken me.”

Next day, her eyes red with weeping, she dragged herself to Haddo’s door. When he opened it, she went in without a word. She sat down, and he watched her in silence.

“I am willing to marry you whenever you choose,” she said at last.

“I have made all the necessary arrangements.”

“You have spoken to me of your mother. Will you take me to her at once.”

The shadow of a smile crossed his lips.

“If you wish it.”

Haddo told her that they could be married before the Consul early enough on the Thursday morning to catch a train for England. She left everything in his hands.

“I’m desperately unhappy,” she said dully.

Oliver laid his hands upon her shoulders and looked into her eyes.

“Go home, and you will forget your tears. I command you to be happy.”

Then it seemed that the bitter struggle between the good and the evil in her was done, and the evil had conquered. She felt on a sudden curiously elated. It seemed no longer to matter that she deceived her faithful friends. She gave a bitter laugh, as she thought how easy it was to hoodwink them.

Wednesday happened to be Arthur’s birthday, and he asked her to dine with him alone.

“We’ll do ourselves proud, and hang the expense,” he said.

They had arranged to eat at a fashionable restaurant on the other side of the river, and soon after seven he fetched her. Margaret was dressed with exceeding care. She stood in the middle of the room, waiting for Arthur’s arrival, and surveyed herself in the glass. Susie thought she had never been more beautiful.

“I think you’ve grown more pleasing to look upon than you ever were,” she said. “I don’t know what it is that has come over you of late, but there’s a depth in your eyes that is quite new. It gives you an odd mysteriousness which is very attractive.”

Knowing Susie’s love for Arthur, she wondered whether her friend was not heartbroken as she compared her own plainness with the radiant beauty that was before her. Arthur came in, and Margaret did not move. He stopped at the door to look at her. Their eyes met. His heart beat quickly, and yet he was seized with awe. His good fortune was too great to bear, when he thought that this priceless treasure was his. He could have knelt down and worshipped as though a goddess of old Greece stood before him. And to him also her eyes had changed. They had acquired a burning passion which disturbed and yet enchanted him. It seemed that the lovely girl was changed already into a lovely woman. An enigmatic smile came to her lips.

“Are you pleased?” she asked.

Arthur came forward and Margaret put her hands on his shoulders.

“You have scent on,” he said.

He was surprised, for she had never used it before. It was a faint, almost acrid perfume that he did not know. It reminded him vaguely of those odours which he remembered in his childhood in the East. It was remote and strange. It gave Margaret a new and troubling charm. There had ever been something cold in her statuesque beauty, but this touch somehow curiously emphasized her sex. Arthur’s lips twitched, and his gaunt face grew pale with passion. His emotion was so great that it was nearly pain. He was puzzled, for her eyes expressed things that he had never seen in them before.

“Why don’t you kiss me?” she said.

She did not see Susie, but knew that a quick look of anguish crossed her face. Margaret drew Arthur towards her. His hands began to tremble. He had never ventured to express the passion that consumed him, and when he kissed her it was with a restraint that was almost brotherly. Now their lips met. Forgetting that anyone else was in the room, he flung his arms around Margaret. She had never kissed him in that way before, and the rapture was intolerable. Her lips were like living fire. He could not take his own away. He forgot everything. All his strength, all his self-control, deserted him. It crossed his mind that at this moment he would willingly die. But the delight of it was so great that he could scarcely withhold a cry of agony. At length Susie’s voice reminded him of the world.

“You’d far better go out to dinner instead of behaving like a pair of complete idiots.”

She tried to make her tone as flippant as the words, but her voice was cut by a pang of agony. With a little laugh, Margaret withdrew from Arthur’s embrace and lightly looked at her friend. Susie’s brave smile died away as she caught this glance, for there was in it a malicious hatred that startled her. It was so unexpected that she was terrified. What had she done? She was afraid, dreadfully afraid, that Margaret had guessed her secret. Arthur stood as if his senses had left him, quivering still with the extremity of passion.

“Susie says we must go,” smiled Margaret.

He could not speak. He could not regain the conventional manner of polite society. Very pale, like a man suddenly awaked