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The Philanderers written by A.E.W. Mason

A >> A.E.W. Mason >> The Philanderers




'Never mind; you shall tell me after lunch.'

At lunch Mrs. Willoughby industriously beguiled her with anecdotes. She
talked of an uncle of Clarice, a Philistine sea-captain with pronounced
opinions upon the advance of woman, ludicrously mimicking his efforts to
adapt a quarter-deck style of denunciation to the gentler atmosphere of a
drawing-room. To sharpen his diatribes the worthy captain was in the
habit of straining ineffectually after epigrams. Mrs. Willoughby quoted
an unsuccessful essay concerning the novels women favoured. 'A woman with
a slice of intellect likes that sort of garbage for the same reason that
a girl with a neat pair of ankles likes a little mud in the streets.'
Clarice was provoked to a reluctant smile by a mental picture of a
violent rubicund face roaring the words. She was induced to play with a
fragment of sole; she ended by eating the wing of a chicken.

'Now,' said Mrs. Willoughby when she had set Clarice upon a sofa in front
of a cosy fire in her boudoir, 'tell me what all the trouble's about.'
She drew up a low chair and sat down with a hand upon the girl's arm.

'It's about Sid--I mean Mr. Mallinson,' she began. 'He called yesterday
afternoon after you had left. Papa had gone out for a walk, and aunt was
lying down with a sick headache. So I saw him alone. He said he was glad
to get the opportunity of speaking to me by myself, and he--he--well, he
asked me to marry him. He was quite different from what he usually is,
else I might have stopped him before. But he made a sort of rush at it. I
told him that I was very sorry, but I didn't care for him in that kind of
way--at all events yet. And then it was horrible!' The voice began to
break again.

Mrs. Willoughby took hold of Clarice's hand, and the latter nestled
towards her.

'He got angry and violent, and said that I had persuaded him to give up
his profession, and must have known quite well why he did it, and that no
woman had a right to interfere with a man's life until she was prepared
to accept the responsibility of her interference. I hardly understood
what he said, because he frightened me; but I don't think that was at all
a nice thing to say, do you, Connie?' and her hand tightened upon her
friend's. 'But he said other things too, much worse than that,--I can't
tell you. And at last I felt as if I wanted to scream. I should have
screamed in a minute or two, I know, so I told him to go away. Then he
became silent all at once, and just stood looking at me--and--and--I
think that was worse than being abused. At last he said "Good-bye," so
sorrowfully, and I knew it would be for ever, and we shook hands, and he
went out into the hall and closed the door. It seemed to me that the door
would never open again.'

The threatened tears began to fall; Mrs. Willoughby, however, did not
interrupt, and Clarice went on.

'So as I heard the front door unlocked to let him out, I opened the door
of the room and went into the hall. Mr. Mallinson was standing on the
first step. He never looked back--he was turning up his coat-collar--and
somehow it all seemed so sad. I felt as if I hadn't a friend left in the
world. So--I--I--I--'

'Well?' asked Mrs. Willoughby quickly.

'I called him back into the room, and asked him if we couldn't be
friends.'

'What did he answer?'

'That he didn't see how that was possible since he wanted to marry me.
But I said that wouldn't matter as long as he didn't tell me so. I think
men are so inconsiderate, don't you, Connie?' she broke off in a tone of
reproach. 'I can't understand what there is to laugh at. You wouldn't
either if you had seen him then, because he just sat down and cried, not
as you and I do, you know, but with great tears running through his
fingers and heaves of his shoulders. It was heartbreaking. Then he got up
and begged my pardon for what he had said, and that was the worst of it
all. He declared that if he went the rest of his way alone the journey
would be all the easier for the mile I went along with him, and at that
somehow I began to cry too, and--and--that's all.'

Mrs. Willoughby sat silent for a little. 'So you refused him,' she said
thoughtfully, and she bent towards Clarice. 'Is it to be Stephen Drake?'

Clarice started up from the sofa, and stood looking into the fire. 'What
an extraordinary thing that you should ask me that,' she replied slowly,
'because Mr. Mallinson asked it too.' She paused for a second or so and
went on. 'I have never thought of him in that way, I am sure. Oh no!' and
she roused herself from her attitude of deliberation and crossed to the
window, speaking briskly as she went. 'I had quite a different reason.'

Mrs. Willoughby looked at her sharply but said nothing, and presently
Clarice turned back into the room as though moved by a sudden impulse.
'Can I write a note here?' she asked.

'Certainly,' replied Mrs. Willoughby, and she set some envelopes and
paper on the table. Clarice wrote a few lines and tore them up. She
repeated the process on four sheets of note-paper, and as she was
beginning the fifth attempt the door was opened and the servant
announced that Mr. Conway was waiting in the drawing-room. Clarice tore
up the fifth sheet and rose from her chair. 'I can write it when I get
home,' she said.

'Percy Conway!' said Mrs. Willoughby when the door was closed again.
'What a funny thing! He's not in the habit of visiting me.'

'The fact is,' said Clarice, without the least embarrassment, as
she pinned on her hat, 'I asked him to call for me here. You don't
mind, do you?'

'Clarice!' exclaimed Mrs. Willoughby. She stared at the girl,
noticing the traces of tears still visible on her face, and then she
began to laugh.

'Connie!' said Miss Le Mesurier, and her tone showed that she was hurt.
'You _are_ unsympathetic.'

'I can't help it,' cried Mrs. Willoughby, and she laughed yet louder. 'I
can't help it, dear!'

'You can't imagine how lonely I have felt since--'

'Since yesterday,' cried Mrs. Willoughby, and her laughter increased.
'Clarice, you'll be the death of me.'

Clarice stood gazing at her patiently, her face grave with reproach,
until Mrs. Willoughby succeeded in composing herself to a fitting
seriousness. But for all her efforts her mouth worked, and the dimples
appeared and vanished in her cheeks, and a little ripple of laughter now
and again escaped from her lips.

'Really,' said Clarice, 'I am disappointed in you, Connie.'

'I know it was out of place, dear,' said Mrs. Willoughby with humility,
but nevertheless her voice shook as she spoke. Fearing another access she
began, as a resource, to lecture Clarice upon the impropriety of making
appointments with young gentlemen at other people's houses. The lecture,
however, was received with disdain.

'That seems to me still more out of place,' said Clarice.

'Well, we had better go into the drawing-room to Mr. Conway,' said Mrs.
Willoughby.

Clarice was indeed excessively indignant with Mrs. Willoughby, for she
was in the habit herself of treating her feelings with a tender
solicitude, and consequently disliked the want of respect shown to them
by her friend. She betrayed the extent of her indignation by a
proportionately excessive friendliness towards Conway that afternoon. He
was allowed to conduct her to four picture galleries, and a Panopticon
museum of tortures; his offer to refresh her with tea in Bond Street was
shyly accepted, and at parting he was thanked with effusion, 'for the
pleasantest afternoon she had spent for some time.'

On reaching home, however, Miss Le Mesurier immediately wrote out the
note which she had begun in Mrs. Willoughby's boudoir. She wrote it now
without hesitation, as though she had composed the form of its message
while in the company of Conway, and addressed it to Stephen Drake. She
had a question to ask him, she stated, of some importance to herself.
Would he call on Thursday afternoon and answer it? Clarice read through
the note before she sealed up the envelope. The word _importance_ caught
her eye, and she pondered over it for a moment. She crossed it out
finally and substituted _interest_. Then she sent her letter to the post.
At breakfast on the Thursday morning, Clarice casually informed her
father of Drake's visit. 'I wrote to him, asking him to call,' she added.

Mr. Le Mesurier looked up from the pages of his _Times_. 'Why?' he
asked quickly.

'I want him to tell me something.'

The _Times_ crackled in his hands and fluttered to the floor. He opened
his mouth to speak and thought better of it, and repeated the action more
than once. Then he scratched his head with a helpless air, and picked up
his newspaper. 'Silly girl!' he said at last; 'silly girl!' and relapsed
into silence. At the close of breakfast, however, he made an effort at
expostulation. 'You will make the man believe you're in love with him,'
he said, and in fact he could have chanced on no happier objection to
present to her. Clarice flushed to the temples. Sidney Mallinson, Mrs.
Willoughby, and now her father! All three had made the same suggestion,
and the repetition of it vexed her pride. There were others they might
have said it of with more appearance of truth, she thought: Sidney
Mallinson himself, for instance, or even Percy Conway. But he, Drake! For
a moment she felt inclined to telegraph to him telling him not to come.
Then she thought of the motive which had induced her to send for him. No!
She would ask her question that afternoon, and so have done with him for
good. Aloud she answered:

'How ridiculous! I should hardly think he has that sort of conceit.
Anyhow, if he has that impression, I will take care that he does not
carry it away.'

Mr. Le Mesurier did not pursue the argument, but he gave certain
instructions to his butler, and when Drake arrived at the house he was
shown into the library. Mr. Le Mesurier received him.

'Pull up a chair to the fire,' he said with an uneasy geniality. 'I have
something to say to you, Drake. It won't take long.'

Drake laid down his hat and seated himself opposite to Mr. Le Mesurier.

'My daughter told me this morning, quite spontaneously, of course, that
she had asked you to call in order that she might get from you a certain
answer to a certain question, and I thought that I had better prepare you
for what that question will be.' He hesitated in his speech, searching
for the best way to begin his explanation, and he caught sight of a
cigar-box on the mantelshelf above his head.

'By the way, do you smoke?'

'Yes, but I won't just now, thank you.'

'You had better. You can throw it away when I have done. These are in
rather a good condition.'

Mr. Le Mesurier seemed inclined to branch off upon the quality of
different brands, but Drake gave him no assistance. He lit his cigar and
patiently waited, his eyes fixed upon his host. Mr. Le Mesurier felt
driven back upon the actual point of his explanation, and almost
compelled to fine his words down to just the needful quantity.

'Clarice, I believe,' he said brusquely, 'means to ask you how Gorley
died. He was engaged to her.'

Drake did not so much as stir a muscle, even his eyes maintained their
steadiness, and Mr. Le Mesurier drew a breath of relief. 'I am glad you
take it like this,' he went on. 'I was afraid that what I had to say
might have been, well, perhaps a blow to you, and if so the fault would
have been mine; for I encouraged you to come here.'

Drake bent forward and knocked the ash off the end of his cigar.

'Yes,' he asked; 'why did you do that?'

Mr. Le Mesurier looked uncomfortable.

'It is only right that I should be frank with you,' he replied. 'The mere
fact of Gorley's death, apart from its manner, upset Clarice, more, I
confess, than we expected, and made her quite ill for a time. She is not
very strong, you know. So it was deemed best, not only by me, but by
Gorley's family as well, that she should be kept in ignorance of what had
actually happened. We simply told her that Gorley had died near Boruwimi.
But I fancy that she suspected we were concealing something. Perhaps our
avoidance of the subject gave her the hint, or it may have been Mrs.
Willoughby.'

'Mrs. Willoughby?'

'She is related to the Gorley family as well as to us. It was through her
Clarice first met Gorley,' he explained, and went on. 'Then you returned
to England, and were interviewed in the _Meteor_. Clarice read the
interview; you had described in it your march to Boruwimi, and she sent
through Mallinson at once an invitation to you. I only found that out the
night you were introduced to us at the theatre. It made me certain that
she had suspicions, and I admit that I asked you to call in the hope of
allaying them. I believed, foolishly as it seems, that if I was cordial,
she would give up any ideas she might have, that you were connected in
any way with Gorley's death. Afterwards, Drake, I need hardly tell you, I
was glad you came here upon other grounds.' Mr. Le Mesurier leaned
forward in his chair and touched Drake upon the knee. 'It didn't take
long for me to conceive a genuine liking for you, and, of course, I knew
all the time that you had only done your duty.'

Drake made no response whatever to Mr. Le Mesurier's sentiment.

'I understand, then,' he said, 'that Miss Le Mesurier was engaged to
Gorley at the time of his death?'

'Oh dear, no,' exclaimed the other, starting up from his chair. 'You are
aware, I suppose, why Gorley left England?'

Drake nodded assent.

'The engagement was broken off then and there. And Clarice at that time
did not seem to take it much to heart. I was inclined to believe that the
whole affair had been just a girl's whim. Indeed, in spite of her
illness, I am not certain now that that isn't the truth. She may have had
some notion of reforming him. I find Clarice rather difficult to
understand.'

Drake stood up. 'Where is Miss Le Mesurier?' he asked.

'Upstairs in the drawing-room.'

He took a step towards the door, and took the step unsteadily. He
stopped for a second, bracing his shoulders; then he walked firmly
across the room. While his hand was on the handle, he heard Mr. Le
Mesurier speaking.

'What do you mean to tell her?'

'I hardly understand,' he answered, turning round. 'There surely is but
one thing to say--the truth. She has a right to know that.'

'Has she? The engagement was broken off finally when Gorley left England.
They had nothing more to do with one another, no common interests, no
common future. Has she?'

'It seems to me, yes!'

'We have kept the knowledge from her up till now. No one could blame you
if you kept it from her a little longer.'

The argument smacked of sophistry to Drake. He had an unreasoned
conviction that the girl had a right to learn the truth from him.

'I think I ought to tell her if she asks me.'

'I might forbid you to do it,' grumbled Mr. Le Mesurier.

'Do you?' asked Drake. The question brought Mr. Le Mesurier up short. It
was a direct question, inviting a responsible decision, and Mr. Le
Mesurier was averse by nature to making such decisions out of hand. If
Drake cared for Clarice, he reflected, it was really in Drake's province
to decide the point rather than in his own.

'I don't know enough of you,' he replied, 'to either forbid or give you
permission.'

Drake wondered what the sentence meant.

'In that case I must take my own course,' he said, and he went out of the
room and mounted the stairs.




CHAPTER VI


It was the dusk of a February afternoon. Drake had found the lamps lit in
Mr. Le Mesurier's library, and the gas was burning in the hall and on the
stairs. But within the drawing-room all the light there was came from the
fire leaping upon the hearth and from the two recessed windows which
faced it. In the farthest of these windows Drake saw Miss Le Mesurier
standing, the outline of her face relieved, as it were, against a gray
panel of twilight. As the door closed, she turned and took a step into
the room. Drake could no longer see more than the shape of her head and
the soft waves of hair crowning it; he could not distinguish a single
feature, but none the less, as she stood facing him, he felt of a sudden
his heart sink within him and his whole strength race out of his body.

Clarice stood still; and he became possessed with a queer longing that
she would move again, forwards, within the focus of the firelight.
However, she spoke from where she stood.

'You have seen my father.'

Instinctively Drake walked to the fireplace, but she did not follow.

'I have just left him,' he replied. 'He told me what the question was
which you wished me to answer.'

'And forbade you to answer it, I suppose?'

'No. He left the choice to me.'

'Well?' she asked.

'I mean to answer it to the full,' he said. 'I was not aware till a
moment ago that you had been engaged to Gorley.' Then he hesitated.
Clarice was still standing in the shadow, and his desire that she should
move out of it and within the circle of light grew upon him until it
seemed almost as though the sight of her face and the knowledge of how
she was receiving the history of the incident were necessary conditions
of its narration.

'I suppose that is the reason,' he went on, 'which made you ask me here
at first. Why did you never put the question before?'

'Why?' repeated Clarice slowly, as if she was putting the question to
herself. Then she moved slowly towards the fireplace and seated herself
by the side of it, bent forwards towards its glow, her elbows upon her
knees, her hands propping her chin. Drake gave a sigh of relief, and
Clarice glanced at him in surprise, and turned again to the fire. 'Tell
me your story,' she said, and left his question unanswered.

Drake began; but now that his wish was accomplished, of a sudden all the
reality seemed to fade out of the tragic events he was to recount. His
consciousness became in some queer way centred upon the girl who was
listening, to the exclusion of the subject she was listening to. He was
intensely conscious of her face, of its changing expressions, of the ebb
and flow of the blood from time to time flushing her cheeks and temples,
and of the vivid play of lights and shadows upon them as the flames
danced and sank on the hearth. He noticed, too, with an observation new
to him, and quite involuntary, the details of the room in which he stood,
the white panelling of the walls, the engravings in their frames, the
china ranged upon a ledge near to the ceiling. Of these things his mind
took impressions with the minuteness almost of a camera. They were real
to him at this moment, because they formed the framework and setting of
the girl's face and figure.

But Gorley's crime and his expiation of it became by contrast as remote
to his apprehension in point of all connection with Clarice as they were
in point of locality. He could not realise them to himself as events
which had actually happened and in which he had played a part, and he
spoke in the toneless voice of one who relates a fable of which, through
frequent repetition, he is tired. Instinctively, in order to make the
truth of his story palpable, he began to corroborate it with particulars
which he would otherwise have spared his auditor, but with the same
impersonal accent. He told Clarice of the condition of the village after
Gorley's raid, as he first came within view of it: here the body of a
negro stood pinned upright against the wall of his hut by an assegai
fixing his neck; there another was lying charred upon still-smouldering
embers; and as he saw her turn pale and shudder he almost wondered why.

But in spite of his efforts to appreciate its actuality the incident grew
more unsubstantial the further he progressed in its narration, and he
ended it abruptly.

'Gorley was properly tried,' he said--'his relations testified to
the justice of his trial--and he was executed in accordance with
the verdict.'

Clarice sat motionless after he had ended. Drake watched the flames
sparkle in her gray eyes. At his elbow the clock ticked upon the
mantelshelf spacing the seconds, and the fire was hot upon his limbs.
That dream-world in Africa dissolved to a vapour.

Clarice recalled him to it at last.

'I never imagined,' she said in a low voice, 'that the truth was anything
like this. I shouldn't have asked you if I had. A long time ago I knew
that something was being concealed, but I thought it was an accident
or--well, I couldn't conceive what it was and I grew curious, I suppose.
When you came back to England I thought you might be able to tell me.
Lately, however, I began to fancy that you were concerned in it some way.
You might have sent Mr. ----' she checked herself with the name unspoken
and went on, 'you might have sent him on some fatal mission or something
of that sort. But this! Oh, why did you tell me?'

She took her hands from beneath her chin and clenched them with a
convulsive movement upon her knees. Her memory had gone back to the days
when she and Gorley had been engaged, to their meetings, their intimate
conversations. This man, in whose hand her hands had lain, whose lips had
pressed hers, been pressed by hers, this man had been convicted of a
double crime--dastardly murder and dastardly theft--and punished for it!
Her pride cried out against her knowledge, and cried out against the man
who had vouchsafed the knowledge.

'Why did you tell me?' she repeated, and the words were an accusation.

'You wished to know,' he replied doggedly, 'and it seemed to me that you
had the right to know.'

'Right!' she exclaimed, 'right! What right had I to know? What right had
you to tell me?'

She rose to her feet suddenly as she spoke and confronted Drake. He
looked into her eyes steadily, but with a certain perplexity.

'I felt bound to tell you,' he said simply, and his simplicity appealed
to her by its frank recognition of an obligation to her.

'Why,' she asked herself, 'why did he feel bound? Merely because I wished
to know the truth of the matter, or because he himself was implicated in
it as the instrument of Gorley's punishment?' Either reason was
sufficient to appease her. She inclined to the latter; there were
conclusions to be inferred from it which staunched her wounded pride.

Clarice turned away. Drake watched her set a foot upon the rail of the
fender, lay her hand upon the mantelshelf and support her forehead upon
it. After a little she raised her head and spoke with an air of
apologising for him.

'Of course,' she said. 'You could not know that there was anything
between myself and--and him.'

'No; I could not know that. How should I, for I did not know you? And I
am glad that I didn't know.'

Drake spoke with some earnestness, and Clarice looked at him in surprise.

'It would have made my duty so much harder to do,' he explained.

With a little cry of irritation Clarice slipped her foot from the fender
and moved from him back to the couch. She had given him the opportunity
to escape from his position and he refused to make use of it; he seemed
indeed unable to perceive it. However, she clung to it obstinately and
repeated it.

'You could not know there was anything between us'; she emphasised the
words deliberately. Drake mistook the intention of the emphasis.

'But was there,' he exclaimed, 'at the time? I didn't think of that, Miss
Le Mesurier--'

'Oh no, no!' she interrupted. 'Not at the time.' The man was
impracticable, and yet his very impracticability aroused in a measure her
admiration. 'So you would have shot him just the same, had you known?'

'Shot him?' asked Drake almost absently.

'Yes.'

'Didn't I tell you? I beg your pardon. I didn't shoot him at all. I
hanged him.'

Clarice was stunned by the words, and the more because of the dull,
seemingly callous accent with which they were spoken.

'You hanged him!' she whispered, dropping the words one by one, as though
she was striving to weigh them.

'Yes. I have been blamed for it,' he replied with no change of voice.
'People said I was damaging the prestige of the white man. The
argument bothered me, I confess, but I think they were wrong. I should
have damaged that prestige infinitely more if I had punished him
secretly or--'

'Oh, don't!' she cried, with a sharp interruption, and she stared at him
with eyes dilating in horror, almost in fear. 'You can discuss it like
that,--the man I had been engaged to,--you hanged him!'

She ended with a moan of actual pain and covered her face with her hands.
On the instant Drake woke to a full comprehension of all that he had
said, and understood something of the humiliation which it meant to her.

Clarice was sitting huddled in her chair, her fingers pressed lightly on
her eyes, while now and again a shiver shot through her frame.

'Still I was bound to tell her,' Drake thought. He waited for a little,
wondering whether she would look up, but she made no movement. An emerald
ring upon her finger caught the light and winked at him maliciously,
leering at him, he fancied. There was nothing more for him to say, and he
quietly went out of the room.