Simon Called Peter, Robert Keable [read e books online free txt] 📗

"I never thought of that before. I suppose I ought to have been—oh, I don't know, but our days together didn't seem to make any difference. That Love was too big. It seemed to me to be too big to be—well, jealous, I suppose."

She nodded. "That would be just it, Peter. That's how it would seem to you. You see, I know. It's strange, my dear, but I don't feel either—jealous."

He frowned. "What do you mean?" he said. "Don't you understand? It was
God's Love that I saw."

She hesitated a second, and then her face relaxed into a smile. "You're as blind as a bat, my dear, but I suppose all men are, and so you can't help it. Now go and ring for breakfast and smoke a cigarette in the sitting-room while I dress." And Peter, because he hated to be called a bat and did not feel in the least like one, went.

He rang the bell, and the maid answered it. She did not wait for him to give his order, but advanced towards him, her eyes sparkling. "Oh, sir," she said, "is madame up? I don't know how to thank her, and you too. I've wanted a frame for Jack's picture, but I couldn't get a real good one, I couldn't. When I sees this parcel I couldn't think what it was. I forgot even as how I'd give the lady my name. Oh, she's the real good one, she is. You'll forgive me, sir, but I know a real lady when I see one. They haven't got no airs, and they know what a girl feels like, right away. I put Jack in it, sir, on me table, and if there's anything I can do for you or your lady, now or ever, I'll do it, sir."

Peter smiled at the little outburst, but his heart warmed within him. How just like Julie it was! "Well," he said, "it's the lady you've really to thank. Knock, if you like; I expect she'll let you in. And then order breakfast, will you? Bacon and eggs and some fish. Thanks." And he turned away.

She made for the door, but stopped, "I near forgot, sir," she said. "A gentleman left this for you last night, and they give it to me at the office—this morning. There was no answer, he said. He went by this morning's train." She handed Peter an unstamped envelope bearing the hotel's name, and left the room as he opened it. He did not recognise the handwriting, but he tore it open and glanced at once at the signature, and got a very considerable surprise, not to say a shock. It was signed "Jack Donovan."

"MY DEAR GRAHAM, [the letter ran],

"Forgive me for writing, but I must tell you that I've seen you twice with Julie (and each time neither of you saw anyone else but yourselves!). It seems mean to see you and not say so, but for the Lord's sake don't think it'll go further, or that I reproach you. I've been there myself, old bird, and in any case I don't worry about other people's shows. But I want to tell you a bit of news—Tommy Raynard and I have fixed it up. I know you'll congratulate me. She's topping, and just the girl for me—no end wiser than I, and as jolly as anyone, really. I don't know how you and Julie are coming out of it, and I won't guess, for it's a dreadful war; but maybe you'll be able to sympathise with me at having to leave my girl in France! However, I'm off back to-morrow, a day before you. If you hadn't run off to Paris, you'd have known. My leave order was from Havre.

"Well, cheerio. See you before long. And just one word, my boy, from a fellow who has seen a bit more than you (if you'll forgive me): remember, Julie'll know best.

"Yours, ever,
"JACK DONOVAN."

Peter frowned over his letter, and then smiled, and then frowned again. He was still at it when he heard Julie's footstep outside, and he thrust the envelope quickly into his pocket, thinking rapidly. He did not in the least understand what the other meant, especially by the last sentence, and he wanted to consider it before showing Julie. Also, he wondered if it was meant to be shown to Julie at all. He thought not; probably Donovan was absolutely as good as his word, and would not even mention anything to Tommy. But he thought no more, for Julie was on him.

"Peter, it's started to rain! I knew it would. Why does it always rain on Sundays in London? Probably the heavens themselves weep at the sight of so gloomy a city. However, I don't care a damn! I've made up my mind what we're going to do. We shall sit in front of the fire all the morning, and you shall read to me. Will you?"

"Anything you like, my darling," he said; "and we couldn't spend a better morning. But bacon and eggs first, eh? No, fish first, I mean. But pour out a cup of tea at once, for Heaven's sake. I haven't had a drop this morning."

"Poor old thing! No wonder you're a bit off colour. No early tea after that champagne last night! But, oh, Peter, wasn't Carminetta a dream?"

Breakfast over, Peter sat in a chair and bent over her. "What do you want me to read, Julie darling?" he demanded.

She considered. "Not a magazine, not La Vie Parisienne, though we might perhaps look at the pictures part of the time. I know! Stop! I'll get it," She ran out and returned with a little leather-covered book. "Read it right through, Peter," she said. "I've read it heaps of times, but I want to hear it again to-day. Do you mind?"

"Omar Khayyám!" exclaimed Peter. "Good idea! He's a blasphemous old pagan, but the verse is glorious and it fits in at times. Do you want me to start at once?"

"Give me a cigarette! no, put the box there. Stir up the fire. Come and sit on the floor with your back to me. That's right. Now fire away."

She leaned back and he began. He read for the rhythm; she listened for the meaning. He read to the end; she hardly heard more than a stanza:

"Oh, threats of Hell and Hopes of Paradise!
One thing at least is certain—this Life flies;
One thing is certain, and the rest is lies—
The flower that once has blown for ever dies."

They lunched in the hotel, and at the table Peter put the first necessary questions that they both dreaded. "I'm going to tell them to make out my bill, Julie," he said. "I've to be at Victoria at seven-thirty a.m. to-morrow, you know. You've still got some leave, haven't you, dear; what are you going to do? How long will you stay on here?"

"Not after you've gone, Peter," she said. "Let them make it out for me till after breakfast to-morrow."

"But what are we going to do?" he demanded.

"Oh, don't ask. It spoils to-day to think of to-morrow. Go to my friends, perhaps—yes, I think that. It's only for a few days now."

"Oh, Julie, I wish I could stay."

"So do I, but you can't, so don't worry. What about this afternoon?"

"If it's stopped raining, let's go for a walk, shall we?"

They settled on that, and it was Julie who took him again to St. James's Park. As they walked: "Where did you go to church this morning, Peter?" she asked.

He pointed to the campanile. "Over there," he said.

"Then let's go together to-night," she said.

"Do you mean it, Julie?"

"Of course I do. I'm curious. Besides, it's Sunday, and I want to go to church."

"But you'll miss dinner," objected Peter. "It begins at six-thirty."

"Well, let's get some food out—Victoria Station, for instance. Won't that do? We can have some supper sent up afterwards in the hotel."

Peter agreed, but they did not go to the station. In a little cafe outside Julie saw a South African private eating eggs and bacon, and nothing would do but that they must do the same. So they went in. They ate off thick plates, and Julie dropped the china pepper-pot on her eggs and generally behaved as if she were at a school-treat. But it was a novelty, and it kept their thoughts off the fact that it was the last night. And finally they went to church.

The service did not impress Peter, and every time he looked at Julie's face he wanted to laugh; but the atmosphere of the place did, though he could not catch the impression of the morning. For the sermon, a stoutish, foreign-looking ecclesiastic mounted the pulpit, and they both prepared to be bored. However, he gave out his text, and Peter sat bolt upright at once. It would have delighted the ears of his Wesleyan corporal of the Forestry; and more than that it was the text he had quoted in the ears of the dying Jenks. He prepared keenly to listen. As for Julie, she was regarding the altar with a far-away look in her eyes, and she scarcely moved the whole time.

Outside, as soon as they were out of the crowd, Peter began at once.

"Julie," he said, "whatever did you think of that sermon?"

"What did you?" she said. "Tell me first."

"I don't believe you listened at all, but I can't help talking of it. It was amazing. He began by speaking about Adam and Eve and original sin and the Garden of Eden as if he'd been there. There might never have been a Higher Critic in existence. Then he said what sin did, and that sin was only truly sin if it did do that. That was to hide the face of God, to put Him and a human being absolutely out of communication, so to speak. And then he came to Christ, to the Cross. Did you hear him, Julie? Christ comes in between—He got in between God and man. All the anger that darted out of God against sin hit Him; all the blows that man struck back against God hit Him. Do you see that, Julie? That was wonderfully put, but the end was more wonderful. Both, ultimately, cannot kill the Heart of Jesus. There's no sin there to merit or to feel the anger, and we can hurt, but we can't destroy His love."

Peter stopped, "That's what I saw a little this morning," he said after a minute.

"Well?" said Julie.

"Oh, it's all so plain! If there was a way to that Heart, one would be safe. I mean, a way that is not an emotional idea, not a subjective experience, but something practical. Some way that a Tommy could travel, as easily as anyone, and get to a real thing. And he said there was a way, and just sketched it, the Sacraments—more than ours, of course, their seven, all of them more or less, I suppose. He meant that the Sacraments were not signs of salvation, but salvation itself. Julie, I never saw the idea before. It's colossal. It's a thing to which one might dedicate one's life. It's a thing to live and die gladly for. It fills one. Don't you think so, Julie?" He spoke exultantly.

"Peter, to be honest," said Julie, "I think you're talking fanatical rubbish."

"Do you really, Julie? You can't, surely you can't."

"But I do, Peter," she said sadly; "it makes no appeal to me. I can only see one great thing in life, and it's not that. 'The rest is lies,' But, oh! surely that great thing might not be false too. But why do you see one thing, and I another, my dear?"

"I don't know," said Peter, "unless—well, perhaps it's a kind of gift, Julie, 'If thou knewest the gift of God…' Not that I know, only I can just see a great wonderful vision, and it fills my sight."

"I, too," she said; "but it's not your vision."

"What is it, then?" said he, carried away by his own ideas and hardly thinking of her.

Her voice brought him back. "Oh, Peter, don't you know even yet?"

He took her arm very tenderly at that. "My darling," he said, "the two aren't incompatible. Julie, don't be sad. I love you; you know I love you. I wish we'd never gone to the place if you think I don't, but I haven't changed towards you a bit, Julie. I