Part 51 (1/2)
”You won't be able to see to darn holes,” said Poppy.
”Ah! you don't know Billy's holes,” Clem answered sadly. ”And Cinthie inherits the gentle trait. It is _too_ bad, for I hate darning.”
She settled as near the window as she dared, and sat peering her glimmering head over her work, while they talked in desultory fas.h.i.+on: but the storm got worse, the thunder groaned more terribly.
”G.o.d sounds as though He is tearing His heart out to throw it under the feet of dancing women and men,” said Poppy, in a voice that rang with some unusual emotion.
Clem Portal looked at her in astonishment.
”Darling, I ought to rebuke you for blasphemy.”
To her astonishment the girl burst into wild weeping.
”No ... it isn't blasphemy ... I am in pain, Clem ... these storms ... a storm like this reminds me of when I was a child ... I was once out in a storm like this.”
”You?”
”Yes ... once ... on the veldt ... for three days.”
”On the veldt!” repeated Clem; a streak of lightning tore through the room, showing her for an instant a tortured face. She reached out and took the girl's hands in hers, gripping them tight. Dimly, through the rumble of the thunder, she heard Poppy's voice.
”Yes ... out on the veldt ... I, whom you think have only been in Africa for a few months at a time ... I, the gently-nurtured English girl! ...
educated at Cheltenham College! ... I did not actually tell you these things, Clem, but I let you believe them ... they are all lies ... I was born in Africa ... I have roamed the veldt lean and hungry ... been a little beaten vagabond in the streets.”
”Dear,” said Clem, with the utmost tenderness and gentleness; ”what do these things matter--except that they have made you suffer? ... they have made you the woman you are, and that is all I care to know.... I have always known that there was a wound ... don't make it bleed afresh ... I love you too well to want to hear anything that it hurts to tell ... always believe this, Poppy ... I love and trust you above any woman I have ever known.”
”Clem, you are too kind and good to me.... I am not worthy even to speak to you, to touch you.... It is nothing when I say I love you ... I bless you ... I think there is nothing in the world I would not do for you....
I did not know one woman could be so sweet to another as you have been to me ... you are like the priceless box of sweet-smelling nard that the harlot broke over the feet of Christ ... and I ... Ah! Christ! What am I?”
Dense blackness filled the room. In it nothing was heard but the sound of deep weeping. Outside the storm raged on. But when next a gleam of light flashed through the windows, the figure of a kneeling woman was revealed clasped in another woman's arms.
”I am weary of falseness, Clem ... weary of my lips' false tales ...
since I have been near you and seen your true unafraid eyes ... the frank clear turn of your mouth that has never lied to anyone ... I have died many deaths ... you can never know how I have suffered ... pure women don't know what suffering there is in the world, it is no use pretending they do ... they are wonderful, they s.h.i.+ne.... O! what wouldn't _we_ give to s.h.i.+ne with that lovely cold, pure glow ... but they can't take from us what our misery has bought.”
”Poppy, don't tell me anything,” the older woman said steadily. ”I don't want to know ... whatever Life has made you do, or think, or say ... I don't care! I love you. I am your friend. I know that the root of you is sound. Who am I that I should sit in judgment? It is all a matter of luck ... G.o.d was good to me ... I had a good mother and a fleet foot ...
when I smelt danger I ran ... I had been trained to run ... you had not, perhaps, and you stayed ... that's the only difference----”
Poppy laughed bitterly at the lame ending.
”The difference lies deeper than that ... you are generous, Clem, but truth is truth, and I should like to speak it to you now and always ...
confession has no attractions for me, and I once told a man I should never confess to a woman----”
”Silence is always best, dear,” Clem said. ”When a woman learns to be silent about herself, she gains power that nothing else can give her.
And words can forge themselves into such terrible weapons to be used against one--sometimes by hands we love.”
”It would be a relief to clean my heart and lips to you, dear, once and for all. Let me tell you--even the name I use is not my own!”
”I don't care. What does a name matter?”