Chapter XXIV

Anthony had known moments in the years of his captivity when he had let himself go in a sudden compulsion of happiness. He had shut out by an effort of the will all sense of his imprisonment, and enjoyed as separate things the sight and smell of summer fields. He realized that he and Kitty were doing the same thing now; they had their single sunny hour, and behind and in front of it were monstrous experiences. It was a green space, with edelweiss growing between precipices. They had had to climb up, and they still had the dangers of the descent before them; but for a little while they stood safe and triumphant among the flowers.

Kitty managed their precarious footing better than Anthony; her pleasure was not invaded by thought or by the conscious effort of her own will. She had the strange humility of those who have not set themselves free by moral struggles. She could be happy because she expected nothing of herself and very little of others. She knew no more than that it was a fine day and she had Anthony.

Kitty loved her lunch in the old-fashioned, dark dining-room at Richmond, and when they reached Kew she loved the gardens even more. She caught sight of a squirrel making a brief excursion between the trees in an open avenue, and she held out her bare hands and laughed at the feeling of the warm sunshine touching them. Without a sign of fatigue, she drew Anthony on and on, across the lawn, where in the spring the azaleas bloom, and on into the leafless, empty bluebell wood.

“It’s like a sea,” Kitty told him, “when they’re out; not the big, clumsy sea, full of water, but a string of clear blue pools left behind by a tide. You look and look till the blueness closes over your head. I think the light to-day is a ghost light, for I can almost see the bluebells. We must come here together one day next spring.” She broke off suddenly, and said she wanted to see the palace where Henry VIII’s wives spent the gayer intervals of their precarious existences.

“It must have been rather nice,” Kitty observed speculatively, “to have been one of those short queens; only I don’t believe Henry would have cut my head off. I’d have been short more naturally. The thing with Henry would have been to get tired first. I could easily have managed that.”

“Aren’t you tired now,” Anthony asked anxiously, “without managing it?”

“Ah, you aren’t Henry VIII,” said Kitty; “I don’t have to take the precaution of being tired of you.”

He hadn’t the heart to tell her that there were other precautions which it would have been wise for her to take. It was as if Kitty had for the moment evaded the line of fatigue, and was holding by sheer will to the absence of pain.

She strolled with him round the wide pond that lay as flat as an upturned looking-glass within a whispering thicket of yellow water reeds.

“Fancy it’s being a fine day,” Kitty exclaimed, slipping her arm into Anthony’s, “and then seeing a squirrel and having nobody about! I like winter best, don’t you? There’s nothing to take your attention off what there is. The trees are so jolly and black and bare; the grass is like a special treat; the sky is nearer; and when it’s fine, you don’t expect it. It’s so nice not to be sold by a surprise.”

Anthony was puzzled by this revelation of Kitty. He had not supposed she would like anything undecorative or bare. She voiced his very thoughts for him, and then, with a sudden little shiver of discontent, she said:

“I hate the water reeds. They all shuffle and chatter so—like a crowd of underbred women in church. It’s cold, too. After all, I think I like hothouses best. Do you know the blue lotus? Let’s go there. I like blue lotuses. They lie in a pool and do nothing but stare at you—awfully nice, lazy, well-dressed flowers.”

They walked back to the blue-lotus house. Kitty flung off her furs and gazed down into the pool. Palms and tropical foliage surrounded them, and in the distance there was the broad back of a discreet custodian.

“Funny old thing!” said Kitty, looking down at the blue lotus. “It looks just the same as the one I saw ages ago. I wonder how long the flower lives.” Anthony told her, but Kitty did not listen to him. She said suddenly: “I got into an awful row after you left Rochetts. I suppose Jim must have said something to Daphne. When I went back to the lawn to say good-by, they both got up and walked into the house without speaking to me. It’s funny the way married people act in lumps, isn’t it? Your poor mother didn’t understand. She was awfully bothered and kind, and kept saying she was sure Daphne couldn’t be well. Finally I said:

“‘It’s quite all right, Mrs. Arden, really. Daphne thinks I’m not fit to speak to—and I’m _not_, you know.’ Your mother put her hand on my arm and said:

“‘My dear, I’m _so_ sorry.’ Wasn’t it sweet of her? I think it was the nicest thing anybody ever said to me. Papa was examining a rose-tree through his eyeglass. I don’t know what he heard or thought about it; what he said was:

“‘We must really get a Mabel Vernon.’ Then we went home. The nicest part of papa is he never says anything unless you do.”

Kitty gave a little inconsequent laugh.

“I think I must have been mad that night,” she added reflectively, “for I did such an absurd thing! I worked myself up into telling dear old Peckham all sorts of things she needn’t ever have known. It was so silly, for I wasn’t even going on with them. I knew I’d come to a stop. You can’t be ill and gay beyond a certain point, can you? Besides, I didn’t want to very much.

“Of course I’m as gay as I can be now, but nothing Peckham need have minded. I always think confessions are worse than sins. Don’t you? Usually you only upset yourself by your sins, but you upset other people by your confessions.”

Anthony drew Kitty to a seat.

“Tell me,” he asked her gently, “what made you make that scene there at Rochetts if you don’t believe in confessions and don’t like upsetting people?”

Kitty stared at him.

“Oh, that,” she said. “Don’t you know? I had to; I didn’t want you to get dragged into all this. I knew something or other was coming, and I meant you not to have the bother of it. I thought you wouldn’t go on caring for me if I was nasty enough and you got clean away. Heaps of people have got over caring for me beautifully. Of course I see you haven’t now; so it’s different. I can’t keep you out of things if you really care. I suppose I shall just have to do what you like.”

Anthony looked down at her eagerly.

“Will you really, Kitty?” he asked. “There is something else I want. I want it awfully, more than I can ever tell you; I’ve been thinking about it all night, hoping I could ask you, but afraid of being a bother, too. It makes the whole thing simpler if you can do it. I want you to marry me at once, in three days, before the operation. I want the right of taking care of you. If you give it to me, we needn’t have any nursing homes or nurses. I’ll take a furnished house, and look after you myself with Peckham. Whatever we have to go through, we can go through solidly together. It was my being such a fool as not to share everything with you that left you alone with this—this misery. I can’t let myself think of it. You won’t mind marrying me now, will you?”

Kitty laughed.

“Silly old thing!” she said. “It was I that didn’t want to share anything. It’s awfully sweet of you to think about marriage, but why need we be married? If you want so awfully to take care of me, I’ll let you do it; but marriage seems to me rather off the point.”

“It isn’t,” said Anthony, passionately; “it matters tremendously to me. I want the right, the sanction, whatever you like to call it; I want our lives held together before the world as well as in our hearts.

“I want every one to know that we’ve hit on something that lasts.”

Kitty looked at him consideringly.

“Marriage doesn’t always last,” she said a little dryly, then she slipped her hand over Anthony’s. “You want nobody to say anything horrid,” she said gently, “but I don’t care any more what people say.”

“I care,” Anthony said desperately, “and, O Kitty, I want you for myself. I don’t want any one else to interfere or speak or think between us. We’ve had so much of that already. Let’s fall in with the world, if it’s the only way to keep out the world.”

Kitty moved a little restlessly.

“It isn’t the world,” she said; “it’s your mother and Daphne. Those are the people I don’t want to come across. They’ve been good and dear and kind, but it hasn’t been possible—and it’s I, not they, who have made it impossible. Because I’m ill, doesn’t make me good, you know, Tony.”

Anthony bent his head and kissed her hands passionately, one after the other; he held them to his lips as if he could not let them go.

“I can’t stand any more, Kitty,” he said quietly. “I’d like to stop and think of them if you want me to, but I can’t. I think only of you. I need you as I never needed you. Don’t shut me out for anything on earth.”

Kitty watched him with bright, unshrinking eyes.

“How long would it be for, Tony?” she asked.

“Always, always,” he cried brokenly. “I hope so—I believe so, Kitty. I will have your life. It’ll be all right, if you can stand just for a time having to be ill—”

Kitty put her hand up to check the words on his lips.

“No, no,” she said; “don’t say doctors’ things, Tony. I don’t need to be reassured. Besides, it wouldn’t have the effect you want. If I thought marriage would really be for long, you see, I wouldn’t do it. I’d do anything else you want, but not tie you up—and hurt them. I’d think it boring; but if it’s for just a little while and you awfully wanted to, we could explain to them, and then they wouldn’t mind so much. But I must know the truth; is it only for a little while?”

Anthony bowed his head. The words that had stood outside his mind like armed sentries all the day rushed in and took possession: “She may live a year after the operation if her strength holds out.”

“Not awfully long,” he said thickly.

Kitty got up and peered down at the blue lotus.

“All right,” she said quietly. “Won’t it be fun being married? We’ll ask papa to give us lunch afterward at the Carlton. Will you see him for me, Tony, and tell him about it? Dear old thing! He’ll like ordering lunch.”

The shadows in the lotus-house had changed; the custodian approached them, jingling his keys significantly.

“It’ll be nicer in the air,” Kitty said, taking Anthony’s arm. “They’re rather stuffy things, blue lotuses, after all.”

Anthony became suddenly aware of how exhausted Kitty had become. Without a word they turned toward the gates. The garden was deserted, and the short winter day was drawing to a close. It seemed an eternity before the long road yielded them a taxi. Anthony lifted Kitty into it and held her in his arms.

She gave herself up to pain without resistance, in the same spirit in which she had given herself up to pleasure, only more quietly. The pain beat down on her as rain beats on a flower. Anthony was baffled by his separation from her suffering. His imagination struck and struck against it, as the sea fumbles and strikes against the walls of iron cliffs, seeking an entrance. He could not get in to share her pain with her, and Kitty could not let him in.

When they reached Trevor Road, the fire was burning brightly, and Peckham, vigilant and expectant, produced hot-water bottles and tea.

Moment by moment the gray pallor of Kitty’s face lightened.

“It’s been such a jolly day, Tony,” she whispered. “I hadn’t any idea Kew would be such fun. Go and see papa now; don’t forget to tell him about the lunch.”

Mr. Costrelle was always to be seen between four and eight o’clock at his club.

Bridge was his inflexible habit. He found the element of chance, he explained, purer in cards than in women, and nothing ever held Mr. Costrelle permanently, except the element of chance.

He told Anthony immediately that he could spare him only ten minutes.

“However,” he added reassuringly, “most things can be said in ten minutes. Will you have a whisky and soda?”

Anthony not only consented, but poured himself out a very stiff glass.

“Rattled!” thought Mr. Costrelle. “Kitty! What a mistake it is not to diffuse one’s sentiments!”

“I don’t know if you have any idea,” Anthony began after a short pause, “that I care for Kitty.”

“You spent the larger part of six weeks in my daughter’s company last year,” said Mr. Costrelle. “I never ask questions, but salient facts rarely escape me.”

“I want to marry her,” Anthony said, leaning forward, “immediately, within three days.”

Mr. Costrelle’s long, white face lifted for a moment; his blue eyes passed rapidly over Anthony, and then returned to his glass.

“Thursday,” he said, “I think that brings us to Thursday. People with superstitions, I believe, avoid Friday. I always respect superstitions; there seems as much reason to believe in them as to believe in anything else. I am glad you have avoided Friday.”

“Unfortunately,” pursued Anthony, “this is not all I have to tell you.” He hesitated for a moment. Mr. Costrelle screwed his eyeglass into his eye and waited patiently. He disliked sentences beginning with “Unfortunately,” especially if they referred to Kitty. “Do you remember,” Anthony began again, “that I thought last summer there was something wrong with her shoulder?”

Mr. Costrelle continued to regard Anthony with defensive passivity.

“Certainly I do,” he agreed. “Most doctors think there is something wrong with somebody—a most disconcerting profession.”

“Well,” said Anthony, impatiently, “in this case I happened to be right; there was a growth below the shoulder which threw it a little out of place. It has increased rapidly. I saw Hilton Laurence with her this morning; we both think we ought to operate immediately.”

Mr. Costrelle drew out a slim cigar-case, took out a cigar, lit it, and leaned back in his chair.

“What is the nature of the growth?” he asked when he completed this arrangement, “and what will be the effect of the operation if it is successful?”

“We are not absolutely certain of its nature,” replied Anthony, “but all the symptoms point to its being malignant. It is probably a fibroid cancer. The operation will prolong her life. She could not live six weeks if we left her as she is, and the pain—”

Anthony stopped abruptly. The memory of Kitty lying motionless in his arms choked him. He could not speak to Mr. Costrelle of Kitty’s pain. Mr. Costrelle finished his sentence for him.

“Naturally,” he observed, “the pain will be considerable in either case. Well, it’s a very disagreeable subject, and as I suppose you know all there is to be known about it, I leave it entirely in your hands.”

Anthony drew a deep breath. He had not known what to expect from Mr. Costrelle, but this entire detachment left him with a sense of its not having been necessary to expect anything. He realized what Kitty had always had to face, a responsibility from which in every emergency Mr. Costrelle invariably withdrew.

Mr. Costrelle wished to be quite friendly and nice about it, and as he met Anthony’s astonished eyes, it occurred to him that possibly he had not entirely fulfilled his future son-in-law’s expectations.

“I’m quite pleased about the marriage,” he added cordially. “The point of it, under the circumstances, entirely evades me, but I am sure it’s an admirable thing for Kitty. Marriage always suits women. Did she send me any message?”

It hardly seemed a convenient moment to suggest a luncheon party, but Anthony, remembering that it was Kitty’s wish, made the suggestion a little tentatively. Mr. Costrelle’s consent was as spontaneous as if the idea was a relief.

“Certainly she shall have a luncheon at the Carlton,” he said. “I could have arranged, perhaps, a more perfect meal elsewhere, but women like other things besides food. Shall we say lunch at two o’clock? I shall arrange to bring my own wine. I have a Château Yquêm which is tolerably well known. Our ten minutes is up, I think.”

Mr. Costrelle’s self-possession was complete. He shook hands with Anthony loosely and briefly, and joined his bridge four with his usual long-limbed, lounging gait. But despite Mr. Costrelle’s impassivity, his ten minutes had taken the zest from his life.

Sorrow could not disarrange his habits, but it could devitalize a failing taste. Mr. Costrelle knew that he would never enjoy his bridge so much again. Anthony thought his future father-in-law did not know the meaning of grief. He did not realize that the grief which the mind evades is a grief which dogs a man’s footsteps to the end of his days.

Anthony plunged into the short concentrated time which lay before the operation with a queer sense of relief. He had gained no support from Mr. Costrelle, but he would have Kitty all the more to himself.