Part 23 (2/2)

He had left his cigarettes down stairs; there were some in a box on a table, she made him take one and lit it for him, then she disappeared into a room adjoining, returning in a few minutes dressed in a kimono covered with golden swallows and followed by the maid. Then she took her seat before a great mirror and the maid began to take down her hair and brush it.

As the brus.h.i.+ng went on she talked to the maid and to Jones upon all sorts of subjects. To the maid about the condition of her--Teresa's--hair, and a new fas.h.i.+on in hair dressing, to Jones about the Opera, the stoutness of Caruso, and kindred matters.

The hair having been arranged in one great gorgeous plait, Jones suddenly breaking free from a weird sort of hypnotism that had held him since first entering the room, rose to his feet.

”I'll be back in a minute,” said he.

He crossed the room, reached the door, opened it and pa.s.sed out closing the door. In the corridor he stood for half a moment with his hand to his head.

Then he came down the stairs, crossed the hall, seized a hat and overcoat, put them on and opened the hall door.

All the way down the stairs and across the hall, he felt as though he were being driven along by some viewless force, and now, standing at the door, that same force pushed him out of the house and on to the steps.

He closed the door, came down the steps, and turned to the right.

CHAPTER XVIII

THE MENTAL TRAP

It was a beautiful night, warm and starlit, the waning moon had just begun to rise in the east and as he turned into the green Park a breath of tepid wind, gra.s.s-scented and balmy blew in his face.

He walked in the direction of Buckingham Palace.

Where was he to go? He had no ideas, no plans.

He had failed in performing the Duty that Fate had arranged for him to perform. He had failed, but not through cowardice, or at least not through fear of consequences to himself.

The man who refuses to cut a lamb's throat, even though Duty calls him to the act, has many things to be said for him.

His distracted mind was not dealing with this matter, however. What held him entirely was the thought of her waiting for him and how she would feel when she found he had deserted her. He had acted like a brute and she would hate him accordingly. Not him, but Rochester.

It was the same thing. The old story. Hatred, obloquy, disdain levelled against Rochester affected him as though it were levelled against himself. He could not take refuge in his own personality. Even on the first day of his new life he had found that out at the club. Since then the struggle to maintain his position and the battles he had fought had steadily weakened his mental position as Jones, strengthened his position as Rochester.

The strange psychological fact was becoming plain, though not to him, that the jealousy he ought to have felt on account of this woman's love for Rochester was not there.

This woman had fascinated him, as women had perhaps never fascinated a man before; she had kissed him, she loved him, and though his reason told him quite plainly that he was Victor Jones and that she loved and had kissed another man, his heart did not resent that fact.

Rochester was dead. It seemed to him that Rochester had never lived.

He left the Park and came along Knightsbridge still thinking of her sitting there waiting for him, his mind straying from that to the kiss, the dinner, the bowl of roses that stood between them--her voice.

Then all at once these considerations vanished, all at once, and like an extinguisher, fell on him that awful sensation of negation.

His mind pulled this way and that between contending forces, became a blank written across with letters of fire forming the question:

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