Part 37 (1/2)

”No. I never knew anything of the kind, not even when I was a chit of a girl.” Lingard seemed to accept this statement as an a.s.sertion of superiority. He inclined his head slightly. Moreover, she might have said what she liked. What pleased him most was her not looking at him; for it enabled him to contemplate with perfect freedom the curve of her cheek, her small ear half hidden by the clear mesh of fine hair, the fascination of her uncovered neck. And her whole person was an impossible, an amazing and solid marvel which somehow was not so much convincing to the eye as to something within him that was apparently independent of his senses. Not even for a moment did he think of her as remote. Untouchable--possibly! But remote--no. Whether consciously or unconsciously he took her spiritually for granted. It was materially that she was a wonder of the sort that is at the same time familiar and sacred.

”No,” Mrs. Travers began again, abruptly. ”I never forgot myself in a story. It was not in me. I have not even been able to forget myself on that morning on sh.o.r.e which was part of my own story.”

”You carried yourself first rate,” said Lingard, smiling at the nape of her neck, her ear, the film of escaped hair, the modelling of the corner of her eye. He could see the flutter of the dark eyelashes: and the delicate flush on her cheek had rather the effect of scent than of colour.

”You approved of my behaviour.”

”Just right, I tell you. My word, weren't they all struck of a heap when they made out what you were.”

”I ought to feel flattered. I will confess to you that I felt only half disguised and was half angry and wholly uncomfortable. What helped me, I suppose, was that I wanted to please. . . .”

”I don't mean to say that they were exactly pleased,” broke in Lingard, conscientiously. ”They were startled more.”

”I wanted to please you,” dropped Mrs. Travers, negligently. A faint, hoa.r.s.e, and impatient call of a bird was heard from the woods as if calling to the oncoming night. Lingard's face grew hot in the deepening dusk. The delicate lemon yellow and ethereal green tints had vanished from the sky and the red glow darkened menacingly. The sun had set behind the black pall of the forest, no longer edged with a line of gold. ”Yes, I was absurdly self-conscious,” continued Mrs. Travers in a conversational tone. ”And it was the effect of these clothes that you made me put on over some of my European--I almost said disguise; because you know in the present more perfect costume I feel curiously at home; and yet I can't say that these things really fit me. The sleeves of this silk under-jacket are rather tight. My shoulders feel bound, too, and as to the sarong it is scandalously short. According to rule it should have been long enough to fall over my feet. But I like freedom of movement. I have had very little of what I liked in life.”

”I can hardly believe that,” said Lingard. ”If it wasn't for your saying so. . . .”

”I wouldn't say so to everybody,” she said, turning her head for a moment to Lingard and turning it away again to the dusk which seemed to come floating over the black lagoon. Far away in its depth a couple of feeble lights twinkled; it was impossible to say whether on the sh.o.r.e or on the edge of the more distant forest. Overhead the stars were beginning to come out, but faint yet, as if too remote to be reflected in the lagoon. Only to the west a setting planet shone through the red fog of the sunset glow. ”It was supposed not to be good for me to have much freedom of action. So at least I was told. But I have a suspicion that it was only unpleasing to other people.”

”I should have thought,” began Lingard, then hesitated and stopped. It seemed to him inconceivable that everybody should not have loved to make that woman happy. And he was impressed by the bitterness of her tone.

Mrs. Travers did not seem curious to know what he wanted to say and after a time she added, ”I don't mean only when I was a child. I don't remember that very well. I daresay I was very objectionable as a child.”

Lingard tried to imagine her as a child. The idea was novel to him.

Her perfection seemed to have come into the world complete, mature, and without any hesitation or weakness. He had nothing in his experience that could help him to imagine a child of that cla.s.s. The children he knew played about the village street and ran on the beach. He had been one of them. He had seen other children, of course, since, but he had not been in touch with them except visually and they had not been English children. Her childhood, like his own, had been pa.s.sed in England, and that very fact made it almost impossible for him to imagine it. He could not even tell whether it was in town or in the country, or whether as a child she had even seen the sea. And how could a child of that kind be objectionable? But he remembered that a child disapproved of could be very unhappy, and he said:

”I am sorry.”

Mrs. Travers laughed a little. Within the muslin cage forms had turned to blurred shadows. Amongst them the form of d'Alcacer arose and moved.

The systematic or else the morbid dumbness of Mr. Travers bored and exasperated him, though, as a matter of fact, that gentleman's speeches had never had the power either to entertain or to soothe his mind.

”It's very nice of you. You have a great capacity for sympathy, but after all I am not certain on which side your sympathies lie. With me, or those much-tried people,” said Mrs. Travers.

”With the child,” said Lingard, disregarding the bantering tone. ”A child can have a very bad time of it all to itself.”

”What can you know of it?” she asked.

”I have my own feelings,” he answered in some surprise.

Mrs. Travers, with her back to him, was covered with confusion. Neither could she depict to herself his childhood as if he, too, had come into the world in the fullness of his strength and his purpose. She discovered a certain naiveness in herself and laughed a little. He made no sound.

”Don't be angry,” she said. ”I wouldn't dream of laughing at your feelings. Indeed your feelings are the most serious thing that ever came in my way. I couldn't help laughing at myself--at a funny discovery I made.”

”In the days of your childhood?” she heard Lingard's deep voice asking after a pause.

”Oh, no. Ages afterward. No child could have made that discovery. Do you know the greatest difference there is between us? It is this: That I have been living since my childhood in front of a show and that I never have been taken in for a moment by its tinsel and its noise or by anything that went on on the stage. Do you understand what I mean, Captain Lingard?”

There was a moment of silence. ”What does it matter? We are no children now.” There was an infinite gentleness in Lingard's deep tones. ”But if you have been unhappy then don't tell me that it has not been made up to you since. Surely you have only to make a sign. A woman like you.”

”You think I could frighten the whole world on to its knees?”