Many Dimensions, Charles Williams [black authors fiction TXT] 📗

“Yes, think,”

he said. “Think, very carefully, yourself

 

Chloe pouted. “What about?” she said. “Isn’t there anything better to

do? It’s you that ought to think, not me.”

 

“Good God!” Lord Arglay said, really annoyed, “don’t talk such rubbish,

child.”

 

A quick tremor shook Chloe, she released his hand, and slid round to

face him. “Am I a child?” she said, and suddenly anger contended with

cunning in her eyes. She paused uncertainly, as if something within

her, unaccustomed to the instrument it was using, was fumbling with it;

she half put out her hand again and withdrew it; she leaned forward but

whether in desire or hate Arglay could not tell. He kept his eyes on

her now, saying nothing for a moment that the remembrance of the Chloe

Burnett be knew might gather more mightily within him. For the change

that had come upon her was provoked by no natural alteration of mood,

and for a moment he wondered whether indeed he had been wise in this

extremity to refuse the mysterious capacities of the Stone. If he could

use it to rescue Pondon might he not with a thousand times more reason

use it here? Might it not be a wise and proper thing to do? But however

wise or proper it might be he knew he could not; to do so would be

already to confess defeat—there was something else on which he relied

and it was the mere fact that they were what they were and had been

what they had been.

 

He said, with a certain slowness, “Child, I would have you think of

what we chose to do.”

 

“I do not want to think of anything that is past,” she answered

sullenly, and to that he said in a growing passion of authority, “But I

will have you do this, and therefore you shall do it now. I will have

you do it.”

 

She moved her head from side to side as if to avoid the charge he laid

upon her; then, abandoning a direct refusal, she said in almost a

whisper, “But first let us think of other things. “

 

“Child,” he answered, “the things of which you would think are neither

here nor there, nor do you think of them. You think and you shall think

of all that we have done together, and of how we determined to believe

in God.”

 

“I will believe in you instead,” Chloe said and took a small step

forward in the small distance that separated them.

 

The sentence was so unexpected, she was herself so close, that Arglay

for a moment hesitated. It was not so much desire for her that filled

him as a willingness to accept himself on those terms, to take this

offered substitution. To play deity to an attractive young girl—there

was, for a moment he felt, a certain point to the idea. But even as the

point pricked him ever so slightly he smiled to think of it, and the

consciousness of the prick passed from him. His own belief in God was

still small, but his feeling for Organic Law was very strong, and his

dislike of any human being pretending to be above that Law was stronger

still. The temptation rose and was lost in its absurdity. And yet…

She looked up with an inviting smile. He took her suddenly by one

shoulder with his hand.

 

“You will not believe in me,” he answered, “as more than a servant of

that which you serve. Answer me—what is that?”

 

“It is nothing with which you have anything to do,” she said, “unless

you will do also what I will.”

 

He smiled at her in a sudden serenity. “Now I know that I shall have my

way,” he said, either to her or to that which was within her, and added

to her alone, “since it is impossible that we should be so separated

for ever.”

 

“You!” she said harshly. “Will you govern me with your bit of filthy

pebble?”

 

“I have no need of the Stone,” he answered, still smiling at her, “for

all that is in the Stone, except the accidents of time, is here between

us and perhaps more than is in the Stone. And in that you will answer

me. Tell me, child, what is it you serve.”

 

She wrenched her shoulder away from him. “Keep your beastly hands

away,” she cried. “I am my own to keep and command.”

 

“And if that shall be true tomorrow,” Lord Arglay said, “it is not

true now.” His voice took on a sternness and he looked

on her with a high disdain. “Answer,” he said; “will you make me wait?

Answer—what is it that you serve?”

 

She moved back a step or two, and suddenly he put out his hand, caught

her wrist, and pulled her back close to him; then, his eyes on hers, he

said: “Child, you know me and I know you among the deceptions. What is

it, what is it that you serve?”

 

She gave a stifled cry, and slipped forward so that he caught her”I

know,” she said, “I know. Hold me; I know.” When at last he moved she

stood up and did something to her hair; then she looked at him with a

faint smile. “I do know,” she said.

 

“Then I think it is more than I do,” Lord Arglay said. “But that is

very possible.”

 

“Have I been saying anything—very silly?” she asked, picking up her

handbag and looking for her powder-puff.

 

The Chief justice considered her. “How do you feel?” he asked.

“Well enough to talk a little about it?”

 

“Quite,” Chloe answered, sitting down, and adding after a Moment’s

pause, “Have I been a nuisance?”

 

“Don’t you remember?” Lord Arglay asked. “Suppose you tell me first—whatever seemed to happen,”

 

“I don’t know that anything exactly happened,” Chloe said. “I just

began to think about….began to think in a different way.”

 

“In quite a different way?” Arglay interrupted. “I mean, in a way you

had never thought before?”

 

The colour flamed in Chloe’s cheeks. But she met his eyes, and

answered, “Partly. I don’t think I ever calculated before—not so much

anyhow. Or not at the same time that I felt…” she struggled bravely

on and ended… “desirous.”

 

The Chief Justice considered again. He had seen the farewell she had

taken of Doncaster; he had observed, when he had returned to the study,

the valuation to which she was bringing its furniture; he had remarked

the cold intention in her eyes when the two of them were talking; and

he decided that in this case desire and calculation were two different

things. But by what means, if by any outside herself, had they been

loosed?

 

“It came on you suddenly?” he asked.

 

“It came,” she answered, “as if I thought I was walking down one road

and found I was walking down another. it didn’t even come; it was

there. I lived into the midst of it.”

 

“And it?” Arglay said, “it seemed like some other self of yours? Did

you know yourself in it?”

 

“In a way,” she answered, “all the things that I have sometimes hated

most in myself. But not altogether. Never—no, in all my life, I never

wanted so utterly to grab without giving anything at all, never

before.” In her agitation she stood up, “I’m not like that,” she said,

“O indeed I’m not.”

 

“No,” Lord Arglay said, “but I think I could guess who is, and whose

mind was thrust upon yours then.’ But even he, even in the Stone, could

only affect you through your own habits and emotions. So that both he

and you troubled and hid your heart.” He mused for a moment and went

on.“Child, in those past times that you speak of, how have you governed

yourself?”

 

“By this and that,” Chloe said, “By trying to think clearly and by

trying to be as nice as I could to people,”

 

“It’is very well said,” Lord Arglay answered. “I do not think Giles or

anyone else will easily overcome that guard,

of yours.”

 

“I will take care of that,” Chloe said in quite a different voice. “I

shan’t be caught twice.”

 

“Well,” Lord Arglay answered comfortably, looking round the room, “I

mayn’t be what Reginald’s unfortunate American would call rich, but I

should think I am quite the most well-to-do person you know. So if you

are going to make an attempt on anyone it will probably be on me again.

Which won’t matter, will it?”

 

“No,” said Chloe, “though it seems funny that it shouldn’t. And in a

way it does.”

 

“O la la! in a way-” Lord Arglay said. “But only in a way conformable

to the Stone. Now it is funny, if you like, how determined I was not to

use the Stone. One might have thought I didn’t care what happened to

you. I might have been the Hajji; indeed I was worse than the Hajji,

for he at least thought about using it.”

 

“Why—if I may—why didn’t you?” Chloe asked shyly, but her eyes were

glad as she looked at him.

 

“I couldn’t see that it was going to be of the slightest use,” he

answered. “It just wasn’t there. Or else—since we have decided to

believe in it—it was there anyhow, and to have it materially wouldn’t

have helped.”

 

“Is there then something greater than the Stone?” she asked. “I dreamed

last night that the King lifted up his hand and there was a great

light.”

 

“Also the Hajji spoke of a greater secret,” he answered. “I do not

think Giles quite knows what he is doing.”

 

“Do you think it is—dangerous to him?” Chloe said.

 

“Anything that one uses is apt to become one’s master,” Arglay

answered. “And if the Stone should become Giles’s Master—what would he

find it to be?”

 

Chloe looked at her fingers. “Do you think,” she said doubtfully, “we

ought to try and… warn him or… help him… Or anything?”

 

“Help him—help Giles?” Lord Arglay exclaimed. “My dear

child, don’t be absurd! After he… O you’re tired out; I shall take

you home. Unless—I ask you again—unless you’ll stop here?”

 

“Not to-night, please,” she said. “I shall be quite safe now. If he

tries it again, I shall just think.”

 

“Do,” Lord Arglay approved. “My present problem in Organic Law is this—Good heavens, you want to know! O come along, you’re merely making

altruism into a habit.”