Part 47 (1/2)
”You are certainly plain spoken,” said she, smiling. ”But I want to tell you--I've taken a little house. I've just been there with the painter, and it's all going to be ready by the end of the week.”
”Where is it?”
”Facing the bay--a funny little bungalow-cottage, with an old-fas.h.i.+oned garden and a straggly path through sea-pinks right down to nearly the edge of the waves.”
”It sounds altogether too romantic for Durban. I expect these features exist only in your imagination. But can you possibly mean Briony Cottage?”
”But, of course.”
”Good--it _is_ a dear little place--and with the bay right before you, you'll hardly know you're down in the town.”
”I'm having a companion.” She made a mouth, and Bramham himself could not disguise a faint twist of his smile.
”Mrs. Portal said it was necessary, if I didn't want to be black-balled by the Durban ladies, so she found me a Miss Allendner, a nice little old thing, who is lonely and unattached, but eminently respectable and _genteel_.”
”Ah! I know her--a weary sort of plucked turkey,” said the graceless Bramham, ”with a nose that was once too much exposed to the winter winds and has never recovered. Never mind, you'll need someone to keep off the crowd as soon as they find out who you are----”
”But they are not going to find out! Charlie, I see that I must speak to you seriously about this. I believe you think my not wanting to be known is affectation; it is nothing of the kind. It is _most imperative_ that my ident.i.ty should be kept secret. I must tell you the reason at last--I am working now for money to fight out a case in the Law Courts before anyone in Africa knows who I am. Under my own name no one will recognise me or be particularly interested; but, of course, pleading as _Eve Destiny_ would be another matter. I couldn't keep that quiet.”
”A law case! Great-- Well, Rosalind,” he said ironically, ”you certainly do spring some surprises on me. Is it about your plays? Why can't you let me manage it for you? But what kind of case can it be?”
”A divorce case--or, rather, I think a nullity case is what it would be called.”
”A _what_?” Bramham could say no more.
”Don't look at me like that, best of friends ... I know, I know, you are beginning to think I am not worth your friends.h.i.+p ... that I don't seem to understand even the first principles of friends.h.i.+p--honesty and candour!... Try and have patience with me, Charlie.... Perhaps I _ought_ to have told you before ... but I've never told a single soul ... in fact, I have always refused to consider that I am married. It is a long story, and includes part of my childhood. The man who adopted me and brought me up in an old farmhouse in the Transvaal allowed me to go through a marriage ceremony with him without my knowing what I was doing ... an old French priest married us ... he couldn't speak a word of English ... only Kaffir ... and he married us in French, which I could not understand at that time. Afterwards, my life went on as usual, and for years I continued to look upon the man simply as my guardian.
At last, here in Durban, when I was just eighteen, he suddenly sprang the story upon me, and claimed me for his wife. I was horrified, revolted ... my liking for him, which arose entirely from grat.i.tude, turned to detestation on hearing it.... I believed myself to have been merely trapped. In any case, whatever I might have felt for him didn't matter then. It was too late. I belonged to ... the man you know I belong to ... I didn't know what to do at first. There were terrible circ.u.mstances in connection with ... the man I love ... which made me think sometimes that I could never meet him again ... I would just keep the soul he had waked in me, and live for work and Fame. But the man I was married to wanted to keep me to my bond ... and then suddenly he found out ... something ... I don't quite know how it came to pa.s.s, but he _knew_ ... I was obliged to fly from his house half clad.... It was _then_ I found refuge with Sophie Cornell.”
”And these things all happened here? Do you mean to tell me that blackguard was some Durban fellow?”
”He did live here at that time.”
”And now?”
”He appears to be here still ... I saw him the other day. He behaved to me as though I were really Miss Chard ... but I know him. He will fight tooth and nail ... I don't suppose he cares about me in the least, but he will lie his soul away, I believe, and spend his last penny for revenge.”
”Well, upon my soul! I can't think who the fellow can be!” said Bramham artlessly, and Poppy could not refrain from smiling.
”I don't think there would be any good in telling you, Charlie. You may know him ... in fact, you are sure to, in a small place like this ...
and it would only make things difficult for you.”
Bramham was plainly vexed that she did not confide in him, but she was perfectly well aware that he knew Abinger intimately, and fearing that something might leak out and spoil her plans, she decided not to tell him.
”You should have tackled the thing at home,” said Bramham thoughtfully.
”They'd have fixed you up in no time there, I believe.”
”No, I had advice about it, and was told that as the ceremony had taken place in the Transvaal, and the man is out here, I must go to the Rand Courts ... and, by the way, I must tell you--I wrote to the mission monastery which the old priest belonged to and made inquiries. They wrote back that old Father Eugene was dead, but that they had already gone into the matter on behalf of _my husband_, who had made representations to them. That they could only inform me that the ceremony performed by the Father was absolutely valid, and they were prepared to uphold it in every way. They added that they were well aware that it was my intention to try and disprove the marriage and for my own purposes escape from my sacred bond, but that I must not expect any a.s.sistance from them in my immoral purpose.... So, you see, I have them to fight as well. Another thing is, that the only other witness to the ceremony was a woman who would swear her soul away at the bidding of the man who calls himself my husband.”
”By Jove! It looks as if you're up against a tough proposition, as they say in America!” was Bramham's verdict at last. ”But you'll pull through, I'm certain, and you've pluck enough. As for money--well, you know that I am not poor----”