Part 25 (1/2)
It was no use wasting time in sentiment and regrets. _a la Guerre, comme a la Guerre_. The episode was finished.
He would have work enough to divert his mind soon. There was nothing left to him now but the Cause.
He would see Sobrenski to-morrow, and hurry on all arrangements for departure.
After all, as he had once told Arith.e.l.li, in any venture it is only the first step that counts.
CHAPTER XVIII
”Would I lose you now? Would I take you then?
If I lose you now that my heart has need, And come what may after death to men, What thing worth this will the dead years breed?”
THE TRIUMPH OF TIME.
Three days later the early morning post brought Arith.e.l.li a letter.
She sat up in bed eagerly to receive it, and with the heaviness of sleep still upon her eyes. As she read, the lace at her throat trembled with her quickened breathing, and her heart called back an answer to the tender, reckless phrases.
Vardri was idealist as well as lover, and graceful turns of expression came to his pen readily and without effort. In many pages of characteristic, hurried, irregular writing he set forth wild and unpractical schemes for their future.
He urged her to take the dangerous step of leaving Barcelona and cutting herself free of the bonds of her allegiance to the Cause.
If there was risk in going, he wrote, there was infinitely more risk in remaining.
If he abandoned his political views it was more than likely that his father would receive him. Their quarrel and parting four years ago had been solely on those grounds, and he was the only son, and there were large estates to be inherited.
If it were the price of gaining her he was prepared to renounce all his theories, socialist and revolutionist.
He had been able to save a little money lately, enough for their journey to Austria. He was sure of a welcome among the officials and work-people of his former home. The wife of the steward had been his mother's maid, and she and her husband would give him shelter till he could see his father and make terms.
If things turned out well then his life and Arith.e.l.li's would be one long fairy-tale, which should begin where all other fairy-tales ended.
If his father refused to see him then surely they could both find some engagement in another circus or Hippodrome.
She had the advantage of the reputation she had gained here, and he could work in the stables again, and they would be free and together.
Arith.e.l.li kissed the letter, before she put it down, and lay back with her hands over her eyes, trying to think. She had begun her adventures by running away from home, and now for the second time her only course was flight. Even Emile had told her not to waste time in going. For her it seemed there was never to be any peace or rest.
If they could only find some haven away from all the world, she thought. A forest or desert, some unknown spot where there was air and s.p.a.ce and natural savage beauty, a tent to dwell in, a horse to ride, complete freedom, the life of her remote ancestors, simple, dignified.
Once she had craved for change. Now she feared it. She knew what Vardri had ignored, that the moment they both left Barcelona they would become fugitives. If they were discovered they would be treated simply as deserters from the ranks of an army.
Instinctively her thoughts turned to Emile. It was he who must help her to decide. She slid out of bed, and commenced her toilet, while she recalled to mind the things that must be got through during the day. There was a ma.n.u.script to be delivered to Sobrenski, an article of Jean Grave's from _Les Temps Nouveaux_ which she had copied for reproduction.
She finished dressing her hair, and pushed the window more widely open, for the sound of music in the distance had caught her ear.
Though it was now autumn, and in England there would have been mist and gloom and fogs, here the sun shone, and the air was sweet and mild.
The parching, exhausting heat of the summer was gone, and everything smelt fresh and clean, without any touch of winter cold.