Possession (Bromfield)/Chapter 44
IN the morning, after coffee and brandy, Ellen rose at dawn to ride in the Bois. She went purposely without Schneidermann, leaving him to a vain pursuit, in order that she might be alone; and when she returned she found that Lily was already awake and had come down from her room to breakfast on the terrace. The May sunlight poured into the garden and beat against the stone of the façade, enveloping her with its reflected warmth, as she sat at the iron table before a bowl of hot chocolate, a dish of rolls and two piles of letters. One heap had been opened and the contents lay scattered over the table and on the flagging beneath. As Ellen, tall and slim in her riding habit and hard hat, stepped through the tall window Lily put down a letter and said, "I brought your mail out here. It isn't interesting this morning . . . mostly bills."
Ellen throwing down her crop and hat, ran her fingers through her dark hair and seated herself on the opposite side of the table, while Lily sent for more chocolate and hot rolls.
"You look tired," observed Lily. "Were you out late?"
"No. Rebecca couldn't go with me, and I was tired so I didn't go at all. But I slept badly."
Lily turned the page of the note she was reading. "You work too hard," she said. "Try taking a rest. Come down to the country with me in June."
"No, I can't do that. . . . I'm going to play in London. Rebecca and Schneidermann have arranged it. It will be my début."
She announced the news abruptly, without any show of emotion.
Lily put down the letter and leaned toward her. "You didn't tell me it would be so soon."
"I only knew it for certain last night. I'm superstitious about speaking of things until they're certain. I'm to play in Wigmore Street on the third."
Her cousin was all interest now. She drew her chair a little nearer and carelessly pushed her letters off the edge of the table. "Have you chosen a gown? We'll send for the motor and choose one this morning. That's important, you know . . . especially in England where they recognize good clothes but never wear them."
"I can't go this morning. . . . I'm going to Philippe."
"To-morrow then," said Lily. "I shall go over to London for the concert and bring Jean back with me. . . . Perhaps César can go too."
"Not him!" Ellen interrupted sullenly. "He'd spoil everything."
For a moment the two cousins regarded each other in silence. In Ellen's face there was a look of bitterness that appeared more and more frequently of late, a sort of devil-may-care expression that puzzled Lily and disturbed her. They had never recognized the breach before . . . not, at least, openly.
"Why shan't César come?" she put forward gently.
"He hates me! I know that!"
Lily endeavored to pour oil on the waters. "It's not true. You're rude to each other . . . both of you. Why is it? There's no reason. He doesn't really dislike you?"
For a time, Ellen came very close to being unpleasant; she was tempted to reveal all she had seen and heard from the window above the moonlit garden. The memory of César's words rang in her ears, a taunt in which there was too much of truth. But she could not say that she hated César because he never allowed her any peace of mind. She could not say that she never saw him without thinking of Callendar.
"It's nothing . . . nonsense, I daresay, on both sides." The power of Lily's eager friendliness overwhelmed her. "I'm sorry," she added, "that I'm disagreeable sometimes. . . . I've been worried lately. I know the quarrel is my fault too." She tore open one of her letters and then, looking very pale, she added, "Bring him, if he would like to come. . . . It won't matter."
And Lily never knew what it was that softened her so abruptly. She did not know, of course, that Ellen was thinking of Callendar, hoping desperately that he could be there to listen to her music as he had listened so many times, with all the passionate abandon which meant so much to her. She needed Fergus too, for she was frightened now that the chance, awaited so long, was at hand. With César present she would at least be reminded of Callendar. It would be the next best thing to having him or Fergus in a cold audience of strangers.
On the top of the little pile of letters was one from her mother from which she read portions aloud to her cousin.
"We are settled now in seven rooms in East Seventieth Street. There is room for Fergus and Robert and Papa and I, and a room for Gramp and his books, which he would not leave behind. And an extra room which I have let to a young man who works with an electrical company. He has nice manners and seems to be of a very good family. He talks a great deal about them. It seems that his family was rich once, a long time ago. He was very unhappy in a boarding house, but he likes it here. . . ."
Lily, who had been listening closely to the news, looked up as Ellen suddenly stopped reading and allowed the letter to slip to the ground. She saw that her cousin reached down hastily and recovered it, as if she wished to conceal her agitation.
"Not bad news?" asked Lily.
"No. I was just surprised for a moment by something in the letter. I think . . . I think I know the young man she writes of. Still I can't understand what chance brought him and Ma together. . . . It's an idiotic world. . . . There's no sense in it." She lighted a cigarette, and after a thoughtful silence added, "Ma is a remarkable woman. Think of her, tearing a whole family up by its roots and transplanting it without a thought."
Then she continued reading. The family, she learned, were all very comfortable in their new home. Fergus might be going abroad in a year or two . . . some sort of writing work, with a newspaper. Hattie had recaptured him only to lose him again at once. Robert was the same, the plodder of the family, silent, unbrilliant, a sort of rock and foundation as old Jacob Barr had been before him. They were hoping to see Ellen soon now. She must come home, now that they were settled in New York. And in the end there was the usual refrain. I am looking forward to the day when I can make a home for all my children.
When she had finished reading, they both sat for a time in silence and at last Lily said simply, "She'll never give up, will she?"
In the same pile there was a note from Rebecca sent by hand from the Regina where she was stopping. It read:
"I'm sorry about last night but it couldn't be helped. How was I to know that Aunt Lina was arriving from Vienna and hadn't been in Paris for twenty-five years? She had to be looked after and will take a great deal of my time, I suppose, as she plans to stay a month if I cannot get her off before that. She is important because she is very rich and has no children. Uncle Otto owns a sapphire mine in Cambodia. And I am her god-daughter. (Her real name is Rebecca, but in the family they call her Lina because there are so many Rebeccas.) Besides, some day she may be of use to us in Vienna, especially when the time comes for you to play there. She is rich and has myriads of rich friends who all spend money on the arts.
"I won't let her interfere with the plans for London. I've talked to Schneidermann and in case I can't get away at once, he will go over and arrange things in plenty of time. He knows the ropes. Don't let Lily help to choose your gown without my being there. She has beautiful taste but it's too quiet for an artist. The public, especially in England and America, expects something spectacular from a musician. I'll try to run out for a moment to-day if I can get rid of Aunt Lina. Perhaps I can make her believe she is tired from the journey and stay in bed all day. Here's to the triumph in London!
If Rebecca failed her now, either through Aunt Lina or otherwise, she felt that she would not have courage to go on. She would kill herself because there would be nothing left. She fancied the humiliation of playing before row upon row of empty seats. If fate played her such a dirty trick, she would put herself out of fate's way. She was sick to death of being buffeted about, this way and that, achieving neither success nor happiness.
Angrily she beat her skirt with her riding crop. If Schneidermann went to London, it would only put her hopelessly in his debt. She might have to marry him out of gratitude, and she wanted no more weak husbands to clutter up her life.
And then this business of Wyck turning up suddenly as a lodger in her mother's house! It could be no one else; her mother's description fitted him too perfectly . . . a man whose family had been rich once, who worked with an electrical company, who talked a great deal of past splendors. He had reappeared, armed with her secret. She could fancy her mother caring for him, making him comfortable, giving him all the attentions he yearned for and never received in a world which kicked him about. She could trust Fergus, but Mr. Wyck was nasty, feminine. Still he had not betrayed his acquaintance either with her or poor Clarence. If he had done that, her mother would have spoken of it in her letter. . . . A friend of one of Hattie's children would be like a child of her own. It may have been that he felt as guilty as she herself felt; if that were true, he would not be likely to betray her. She thought of his shifting green eyes, his mincing manner and his habit of talking perpetually of the past. He was a worm . . . something one might find on lifting a stone!
Twice she had made the round of the garden, indifferent now in the midst of her own worries to the nearness of the guilty pavilion, when she saw Augustine, the maid, coming toward her with a card. For some reason, she was overcome by a sudden feeling that this bit of paper which the red-faced Breton girl held in her hand was of immense importance. She found herself hurrying forward to meet her. She found herself reading the name and then, looking up, she saw in one of the tall windows that opened on the terrace, the figure of Sabine Cane . . . Sabine Callendar . . . standing in the brilliant sunlight, dressed all in gray, superbly, with a gray veil that fell over her shoulders . . . the same Sabine, poised, indifferent, striking. Nothing had changed save that she looked old, surprisingly so considering the perfection of her make-up.
The call must indeed be important, since Sabine had followed Augustine straight into the garden.
They sat in the long drawing-room where they might look out over the sun-drenched garden with its blue flame of irises lighting up the expanses of gray stone.
"What a lovely house!" remarked Sabine as she drew off her gloves. "I suppose it is your cousin's."
The speech was stiff, constrained by the vague shadow of hostility that had enveloped them, almost at once—an intangible thing, which it is probable both women felt but failed to understand, because each fancied herself too intelligent to be the victim of jealousy.
"Yes. It belongs to Madame Shane."
Sabine laughed. "It's the sort of house I would like. You see we live, when we're in Paris, in a sort of World's Fair exhibit in the Avenue du Bois."
It surprised Ellen to find that a single, small word such as "we" could cause her any feeling. She found too that the presence of Sabine had turned back the years; she was watching her now, as she might watch an enemy, as she had watched her in the days when she had gone, a young and awkward girl, to the big house on Murray Hill. She had not "watched" people in quite this fashion for a long time now.
She felt herself quite a match for the wordly woman who sat, carefully, with the brilliant light at her back; she could no longer be taken at a disadvantage.
"It is strange," said Ellen, "that we have not met before."
Sabine's scarlet lips curved in a bright hard smile. "I saw you once, in the distance, at the Ritz. It was nearly four years ago. You went out before I was able to speak to you." She coughed, nervously. "So I lost trace of you. I was sorry, because I was interested to know how you had come to Paris so soon."
"I just came. There was nothing strange about it."
"But I thought there were so many difficulties."
"They happened to disappear very quickly . . . through a series of chances."
The old Sabine, the one Ellen had known so well, the Sabine who was always prying into the affairs of other people, showed itself now, yet there was a difference, impossible to define save that now her interest seemed to be more personal, more intense, not so cold and abstract.
"You see," she continued, "Mrs. Callendar found your address through Madame de Cyon."
(So Mrs. Callendar had known all along that she was in Paris.)
"I have not seen her," said Ellen, "since I left New York."
For a moment, the shadow of a mocking, bitter smile crossed Sabine's face.
"She is just the same. . . . Just as vigorous, just as determined."
"I should like to see her again. . . . Perhaps she will be interested to know that I make my début in London in June."
At this, even the indifferent mask of Sabine betrayed a flicker of surprise. "So you're still working at your music."
Ellen laughed. "Of course. What did you think?"
"But it has taken a long time."
"Naturally. It meant work. I was taking no chances."
So they talked, rather stupidly, fencing with each other, making no progress. It was clear that Sabine had not called at such an hour simply through politeness, nor was it likely that she called because she sought to renew an old acquaintance. Both women were too intelligent to have misunderstood each other. As for Ellen, she found herself excited by the consciousness of a shadowy struggle; there was a devilish satisfaction in finding herself with an advantage over so experienced a woman as Sabine. The visitor wanted something; beneath all her indifference, she was clearly excited and nervous. Once Ellen caught her pulling a button from her gray gloves.
It occurred to her suddenly to be bold and strike at what might be the root of the matter.
"How is Mr. Callendar?" she asked, amused at the thought of speaking thus of him.
"He is well," Sabine replied with a terrible quietness, and then, after a little pause. "Do you see him frequently?"
For an instant Ellen was very near to losing her temper, a thing she might easily have done now that she found herself a match for Sabine. But she did not; instead she waited and said, "What do you mean? How could I have seen him? I have not seen him since I came to Paris."
The answer was so honest, so obviously true, that even Sabine was discountenanced. She looked at the floor and murmured, "I didn't know. I thought perhaps you had."
"Why didn't you ask him?" suggested Ellen.
"It would have done no good. Besides he would have thought me jealous." There was something pitiful in the terrible control exercised by the woman. Even Ellen forgot suddenly the strange sense of enmity. She kept silent and it was Sabine who spoke.
"Besides," she said. "You never spoke of him or of Mrs. Callendar to Madame de Cyon. That made me think you might have seen him."
"It would only have made complications," replied Ellen. "If you knew Madame de Cyon, you would understand." Her voice suddenly grew cold. "Did you think," she asked, "that he had brought me to Paris? Did you think I was carrying on an affair . . . secretly?"
The more they talked, the clearer grew the likeness of the one to the other. They were in both the same restraint, the same watchfulness, the same determination that the world should not hurt her.
When Ellen looked at her visitor again she saw that she had been weeping, silently; she was putting a handkerchief, stealthily, to her eyes, ashamed clearly that she should have so revealed her unhappiness.
"I have been wretched all day," she said. "You see little Thérèse and I . . . that's my little daughter, she's three years old . . . found a starving kitten yesterday. It had fleas and we washed it with carbolic soap. It's sick. I'm afraid we've hurt it and it may die. Little Thérèse is very fond of it."
Then, quite silently, the tears began to stream down her face. It was the only sign she gave. She did not sob. Her hands did not tremble. She simply wept.
It was a terrible sight, because Ellen understood plainly that the kitten had nothing to do with the tears.
Presently, after she had had a glass of port, Sabine took Ellen's hand and murmured, "You must forgive me. I was spiteful and rude . . . and unjust too. But you see there were so many things. You knew my husband a little, so you can guess perhaps something of the story."
Then pressing her hand to her head, she was silent for a time. "You see I have had a child . . . a daughter . . . and I can never have another. Mrs. Callendar and Richard want a son . . . I know that. . . . The old woman wants some one to care for all her money. You see, he's no good at it. They've never said anything, but I know she wants me to divorce him so that he can marry again. I can feel all their will working against me. . . . It's horrible. It's sinister. It's always concealed by smiles and smooth words. I can't do that. . . . I can't. . . . Not yet . . . perhaps some day." The tears began to flow again, for even Sabine could not keep from pitying herself. "And I know there are other women. . . . I think I am a little mad to behave in this fashion . . . to come to you, like this." She coughed nervously. "You were always so strong and so independent. So was I . . . once."
She rose and dried her eyes and powdered her nose. "Now," she said, "I look presentable again." Then she took Ellen's hand and murmured: "You'll forgive me, won't you? I've been a fool. . . . And you'll say nothing?"
Ellen moved with her toward the long stairs that led up to the door opening upon the street. Together they climbed them, quite close to each other in the friendliest fashion, and from the doorway Ellen watched her, composed once more, chic and worldly, step into her tiny motor and drive away.
As she turned from the door and descended the stairs, it occurred to her suddenly that save for chance she might have been the unhappy woman entering the motor. It was amazing what Callendar had done to Sabine. Last night she had been envying her, and to-day Sabine had come to her almost, one might say, seeking help. . . . Sabine who had been so cold and impregnable and aloof.
And in a strange way, in spite even of Sabine's insults, she had given her sympathy. It was as if they had, tacitly, become allies in the battle against him.