The Fire Within

CHAPTER XV. LOVE MUST TO SCHOOL

ELIZABETH sat quite motionless for half an hour. Then she stirred, bent her head for a moment, whilst she listened to David's regular breathing, and then rose to her feet. She passed through the open door into her own room, and undressed in the dark. Then she lay down and slept.

Three times during the night she woke and listened. But David still slept. When she woke up for the third time, the room was full of the greyness of the dawn. She got up and closed the door between the two rooms.

Then she lay waking. It had been a strange wedding night.

The day dawned cloudy, but broke at noon into a cloudless warmth that was more like June than April.

“Take me down the river,” said Elizabeth, and they rowed down for half a mile, and turned the boat into a water-lane where budding willows swept down on either side, and brushed the stream.

David was very well content to lie in the sun. The strain was gone from him, leaving behind it a weariness beyond words. Every limb, every muscle, every nerve was relaxed. There was a great peace upon him. The air tasted sweet. The light was a pleasant thing. The sky was blue, and so was Elizabeth 's dress, and Elizabeth was a very reposeful person. She did not fidget and she did not chatter. When she spoke it was of pleasant things.

David recalled a day, ten years ago, when he had sat with her in this very place. He could see himself, full of enthusiasm, full of youth. He could remember how he had talked, and how Elizabeth had listened. She was just the same now. It was he who had changed. Ten years ago seemed to him a very pleasant time, a very pleasant memory. Pictures rose before him-stray words-stray recollections running into a long, soft blur.

They came home in the dusk.

“Are you going to see Ronnie again?” said Elizabeth, as they landed.

“Yes; he could n't be doing better, but I 'll look in, and to-morrow Skeffington will go with me so as to get him broken in to the change. We ought to get away all right now.”

David waked next day to find the sun shining in at his uncurtained window. From where he lay he could see the young blue of the sky, and all the room seemed full of the sun's gold. David lay in a lazy contentment watching the motes that danced in a long shining beam. There was a new stir of life in his veins. He stretched out his limbs and was glad of their strength. The sweetness and the glory and the promise of the spring slid into his blood and fired it.

“Mary,” he said, still between sleeping and waking-and with the name, memory woke. Suddenly his brain was very clear. He looked straight ahead and saw the door that led into the other room-the room that had been his mother's. Elizabeth was in that room. He had married Elizabeth -she was his wife. He lay quite still and stared at the door. Elizabeth Chantrey was Elizabeth Blake. She was his wife-and Mary-

A sudden spasm of laughter caught David by the throat. Mary was what she had promised to be-his sister; Mary was his sister. The spasm of laughter passed, and with it the stir in David's blood. He was quite cool now. He lay staring at that closed door, and faced the situation.

It was a damnable situation, he decided. He felt as a man might feel who wakes from the delirium of weeks, to find that in his madness he has done some intolerable, some irrevocable thing. A man who does not sleep is a man who is not wholly sane. David looked back and followed the events of the last few months with a critical detachment.

He saw the strain growing and growing until, in the end, on the brink of the abyss, he had snatched at the relief which Elizabeth offered, as a man who dies of thirst will snatch at water. Well-he had taken Elizabeth 's draught of water, his thirst was quenched, he was his own man again. No, never his own man any more. Never free any more- Elizabeth 's debtor- Elizabeth 's husband.

David set his face like a flint-he would pay his debt.

He went out as soon as he had breakfasted and walked for a couple of hours. It was a little after noon when he came into the drawing-room where Elizabeth was.

The floor was covered with a great many yards of green stuff which she was cutting into curtain lengths. As David came in, she looked up and smiled.

“Oh, please,” she said, “if you would n't mind, I shall cut them so much better if you hold one end.”

David knelt down and held the stuff, whilst Elizabeth cut it. She came quite close to him at the end, smiled again, and took away the two pieces which he still clutched helplessly.

“That 's beautiful,” she said, and sat down and began to sew.

David watched her in silence. If she found his gaze embarrassing, she showed no sign.

“We can start to-morrow,” he said at last. He gave a list of trains, stopping-places, and hotels, paused at the end of it, walked to the window, and then, turning, said with an effort:

“This has been a bad beginning for you, my dear-you 've been very good to me. You deserve a better bargain, but I 'll do my best.”

Elizabeth did not speak at once. David thought that she was not going to speak at all, but after what seemed like a long time she said:

“David!” and then stopped.

There was a good deal of colour in her cheeks. David saw that she, too, was making an effort

“Well,” he said, and his voice was more natural.

“David,” said Elizabeth, “what did you mean by 'doing your best'?”

David met her eyes. He had always liked Elizabeth 's eyes. They were so very clear.

“I meant that I 'd do my best to make you a good husband,” he said quite simply.

Elizabeth 's colour rose higher still. She continued to look at David, because she would have considered it cowardly to look away.

“A good husband to my good wife,” she said. “But, David, I don't think you want a wife just now.”

David came across the room and sat down by the table at which Elizabeth was working.

“Then why did you marry me, Elizabeth?” he asked.

Elizabeth did not turn her head at once.

“I think what we both want just now,” she said, “is friendship.” Her voice was low, but she kept it steady. “The sort of friendship that is one side of marriage. It is not really possible for a man and a woman to be friends in that sort of way unless they are married. I think you want a friend-I know I do. I think you have been very lonely-one is lonely, and it is worse for a man. He can't get the home-feeling, and he misses it. You did not marry me because you needed a wife. I don't think you do. When you want a wife, I will be your wife, but just now-”

She broke off. She did not look at David, but David looked at her. He saw how tightly her hands were clasped, he saw the colour flushing in her cheeks. She had great self-control, but that she was deeply moved was very evident.

All at once, he became conscious of great fatigue. He had walked far and in considerable distress of mind. He had put a very strong constraint upon himself. He rested his head on his hand and tried to think. Elizabeth did not speak again. After a time he raised his head. Elizabeth was watching him-her eyes were very soft. A sense of relief came upon David. Just to drift-just to let things go on in the old way, on the old lines. Not for always-just for a time-until he had put Mary out of his thought. Their marriage was not an ordinary one. It was for Elizabeth to make what terms she would. And it was a relief-yes, no doubt it was a relief.

“If I say, Yes,” he said, “it is only for a time. It is not a very possible situation, you know, Elizabeth -not possible at all in most cases. But just now, just for the present, I admit your right to choose.”

Elizabeth 's hands relaxed.

“Thank you, David,” she said.