CHAPTER XI

IN WHICH DICKIE GOES TO THE END OF THE WORLD AND LOOKS OVER THE WALL

The opera box, which Richard Calmady had rented along with the Villa

Vallorbes, was fifth from the stage on the third tier, to the right of

the vast horseshoe. Thus situated, it commanded a very comprehensive

view of the interior of the house. The _parterre_--its somewhat

comfortless seats, rising as on iron stilts, as they recede, row by

row, from the proscenium--was packed. While, since the aristocratic

world had not yet left town, the boxes--piled, tier above tier, without

break of dress-circle or gallery, right up to the lofty roof--were

well-filled. And it was the effect of these last that affected Richard

oddly, displeasingly, as, helped by Powell and Andrews,--the first

footman, who acted as his table-steward on board the _Reprieve_,--he

made his way slowly down to the chair, placed on the left, at the front

of the box. For the accepted aspects and relations of things seen were

remote to him. He perceived effects, shapes, associations of colour,

divorced from their habitual significance. It was as though he looked

at the written characters of a language unknown to him, observing the

form of them, but attaching no intelligible meaning to that form. And

so it happened that those many superimposed tiers of boxes were to him

as the waxen cells of a gigantic honeycomb, against the angular

darknesses of which little figures, seen to the waist, took the

light--the blond face, neck and arms of some woman, the fair colours of

her dress--and showed up with perplexing insistence. For they were all

peopled, these cells of the honeycomb, and--so it seemed to him--with

larvae, bright-hued, unworking, indolent, full-fed. Down there upon the

_parterre_, in the close-packed ranks of students, of men and women of

the middle-class, soberly attired in walking costume, he recognised the

working bees of this giant hive. By their unremitting labour the dainty

waxen cells were actually built up, and those larvae were so amply, so

luxuriously, fed. And the working bees--there were so many, so very

many of them! What if they became mutinous, rebelled against labour,

plundered and destroyed the indolent, succulent larvae of which he--yes,

he, Richard Calmady--was unquestionably and conspicuously one?

He leaned back in his chair, pulled forward the velvet drapery so as to

shut out the view of the house, and fixed his eyes upon the heads of

the musicians in the orchestra. The overture was nearly over. The

curtain would very soon go up. Then he observed that Powell still stood

near him. The man was strangely officious to-day, he thought. Could

that be connected in any way with the fact he had had his hair cut? For

a moment the notion appeared to Dickie quite extravagantly amusing. But

he kept his amusement, as so much else, to himself. And again the

working bees, down in the _parterre_, attracted his attention. They

were buzzing, buzzing angrily, displeased with the full-fed larvae in

the boxes, because these last were altogether too social, talked too

loud and too continuously, drowning the softer passages of the

overture. Those dull-coloured insects had expended store of hard-earned

_lire_ upon the queer seats they occupied, mounted as upon iron stilts.

They meant to have the whole of that which they had paid for, and hear

every note. If they swarmed, now, swarmed upward, clung along the edges

of those many tiers of boxes, punished inconsiderate insolence with

stings?---It would hardly be unjust.--But there was Powell still, clad

in sober garments. He belonged to the working bees. And Richard became

aware of a singular diffidence and embarrassment in thinking of that.

If they should swarm, those workers, he would rather the valet did not

see it, somehow. He was a good fellow, a faithful servant, a man of

nice feeling, and such an incident would place him in an awkward

position. He ought to be spared that. Carefully Dickie reasoned it all

out.

"You need not stay here any longer, Powell," he said.

"When shall I return, sir?"

The curtain went up. A roll of drums, a chorus of men's voices,

somewhat truculent, in the drinking song.

"At the end of the performance, of course."

But the valet hesitated.

"You might require to send some message, sir."

Richard stared at the chorus. The opera being performed but this once,

economy prevailed. Costumiers had ransacked their stock for discovery

of garments not unpardonably inappropriate. The result showed a fine

superiority to details of time and place. One Spanish bandit, a portly

_basso_, figured in a surprising variety of Highland dress designed,

and that locally, for a chieftain in the opera of _Lucia di

Lammermoor_. His acquaintance with the eccentricities of a kilt being

of the slightest, consequences ensued broadly humorous.--Again Dickie

experienced great amusement. But that message?--Had he really one to

send? Probably he had. He could not remember, and this annoyed him.

Possibly he might remember later. He turned to Powell, forgetting his

amusement, forgetting the too intimate personal revelations of the

unhappy _basso_.

"Yes--well--come back at the end of the second act, then," he said.

If the bees swarmed it would be over by that time, he supposed, so

Powell's return would not matter much one way or the other. A

persuasion of something momentous about to be accomplished deepened in

him. The madness of going, which had so pushed him earlier in the day,

fell dead before it. For this concourse of living creatures must be

gathered together to witness some event commensurate in importance with

the greatness of their number. He felt sure of that. Yes--before long

they would swarm. Incontestably they would swarm!--Again he drew aside

the velvet drapery and looked down curiously upon the arena and its

occupants. For a new idea had come to him regarding these last. They

still presented the effect of a throng of busy, angry insects. But

Richard knew better. He had penetrated their disguise, a disguise

assumed to insure their ultimate purpose with the greater certainty. He

knew them to be human. He knew their purpose to be a moral one. And,

looking upon them, recognising the spirit which animated them, he was

taken with a reverence and sympathy for average, toiling humanity

unfelt by him before. For he saw that by these, the workers, the final

issues are inevitably decided, by these the final verdict is

pronounced. Individually they may be contemptible, but in their

corporate intelligence, corporate strength, they are little short of

majestic. Of art, letters, practical civilisation, even religion, even,

in a degree, nature herself, they are alike architects and judges. It

must be so. It always has been so time out of mind in point of fact.

And then he wondered why they were so patient of constraint? Why had

they not risen long ago and obliterated the pretensions of those

arrogant, indolent larvae peopling the angular apertures of the honey

cells--those larvae of whom, by birth and wealth, sinfulness and

uselessness, he was himself so conspicuous an example?

But then still clearer understanding of this whole strange matter came

to him.--They, like all else,--mighty though they are in their

corporate intention,--are obedient to fate. They can only act when the

time is ripe. And then he understood yet more clearly. Their purpose in

congregating here, whether they were conscious of it or not, was

retributive. They were present to witness and to accomplish an act of

foreordained justice.--Richard paused a moment, struggling with his own

thought. And then he saw quite plainly that he himself was the object

of that act of foreordained justice, he himself was the centre of that

dimly-apprehended, approaching event. His punishment, his deliverance

by means of that punishment, was that which had brought this great

multitude together here to-night. He was awed. Yet with that awe came

thankfulness, gratitude, an immense sense of relief. He need not seek

self-obliteration, losing himself in far-away, tropic islands, or the

ice-bound regions of the uttermost South. He could stay here. Sit quite

still even--and that was well, for he was horribly tired and spent. He

need only wait. When the time was ripe, they would do all the rest--do

it for him by doing it to him.--How finely simple it all was!

Incidentally he wondered if it would hurt very much. Not that that

mattered, for beyond lay peace. Only he hoped they would get to work

pretty soon, so that it might be over before the end of the second act,

when Powell, the valet, would come back.

Richard's face had grown very youthful and eager. His eyes were

unnaturally bright. And still he gazed down at that great company. His

heart went out to it. He loved it, loved each and every member of it,

as he had never conceived of loving heretofore. He would like to have

gone down among them and become part of them, one with them in purpose,

a partaker of their corporate strength. But that was forbidden. They

were his preordained executioners. Yet in that capacity they were not

the less, but the more, lovable. They were welcome to exact full

justice. He longed after them, longed after the pain it was their

mission to inflict.--And they were getting ready, surely they were

getting ready! There was a sensible movement among them. They turned

pale faces away from the brilliantly lighted stage, and towards the

great horseshoe of waxen cells enclosing them. They were busy,

dull-coloured insects again, and they buzzed--resentfully, angrily,

they buzzed.

Yet even while Dickie noted all this, greatly moved by it, appreciating

its inner meaning, its profound relation to himself and the drama of

his own existence, he was not wholly unmindful of the progress of the

opera and the charm of the graceful and fluent music which saluted his

ears. He was aware of the entrance of the hero, of his greeting by his

motley-clad followers. He felt kindly, just off the surface of his

emotion so to speak, towards this impersonator of Ernani. The young

actor's appearance was attractive, his voice fresh and sympathetic, his

bearing modest. But the aristocratic occupants of the boxes treated him

cavalierly. The famous Milanese tenor, whose name was on the programme,

having failed to arrive, this local, and comparatively inexperienced,

artist had been called upon to fill his part. Therefore the smart world

talked more loudly than before, while the democratic occupants of the

_parterre_, jealous for the reputation of their fellow-citizen, broke

forth into stormy protest. And Richard could have found it in his heart

to protest also. For it was waste of energy, this senseless conflict!

It was unworthy of the dignity of that dull-coloured multitude, on whom

his hopes were so strangely set--of the men in whose hands are the

final rewards and punishments, by whose voice the final judgment is

pronounced. It pained him to see these ministers of the Eternal Justice

thus led away by trivial happenings, and their attention distracted

from the main issue. For what, in God's name, did he and his

sentimental love-carrollings amount to, this pretty fellow of a player,

this fictitious hero of the modern, Neapolitan, operatic stage? Weighed

in the balances, he and his whole occupation and calling were lighter,

surely, than vanity itself? Rightly considered, he and his singing were

but as a spangle, as some glittering trifle of tinsel, upon the veil

still hiding the awful, yet benign, countenance of that tremendous and

so surely approaching event.--Let him sing away, then, sing in peace.

For the sound of his singing might help to lighten the weariness of the

hours until the supreme hour should strike, and the glittering veil be

torn asunder, and the countenance it covered be at last and wholly

revealed.

Reasoning thus, Richard raised his opera glasses and swept those many

superimposed ranges of waxen cells. And the aspect of them was to him

very sinister, for everywhere he seemed to encounter soft, voluptuous,

brainless faces, violences of hot colour, and costly clothing cunningly

devised to heighten the physical allurements of womanhood. Everywhere,

beside and behind these, he seemed to encounter the faces of men,

gluttonous of pleasure, hungering for those generously-discovered,

material charms. They were veritable antechambers of vice, those

angular-mouthed, waxen cells. And, therefore, very fittingly, as he

reflected, he had his place in one of them, since he was infected by

the vices, active partaker in the sensuality, of his class.--Oh! that

the bees would swarm--swarm, and make short work of it all, inflict

completeness of punishment, and thereby cleanse him and set him free!

In its intensity his longing came near taking the form of articulate

prayer.

And then his thought shifted once more, attaching itself curiously,

speculatively, to individual objects. For his survey of the house had

just now brought a box into view, situated on the grand tier and almost

immediately opposite his own. It was occupied by a party of six

persons. With four of those persons Richard was aware he had nothing to

do. But with the remaining two persons--a woman fashioned, as it

appeared, of ivory and gold, and a young man standing almost directly

behind her--he had much, everything, in fact, to do. It was

incomprehensible to him that he had not observed these two persons

sooner, since they were as necessary to the accomplishment of that

terrible, yet beneficent, approaching event as he himself was. The

woman he knew actually and intimately, though as yet he could give her

no name, nor recall in what his knowledge of her consisted. The young

man he knew inferentially. And Dickie was sensible of regarding him

with instinctive repulsion, since his appearance presented a living and

grossly ribald caricature of a figure august, worshipful, and holy.

Long and closely Richard studied those two persons, studied them,

forgetful of all else, straining his memory to place them. And all the

while they talked.

But, at last, the woman fashioned of ivory and gold ceased talking. She

folded her arms upon the velvet cushion of the front of the box and

gazed right out into the theatre. There was a splendid arrogance in the

pose of her head, and in the droop of her eyelids. Then she looked up

and across, straight at Richard. He saw her drooping eyelids raised,

her eyes open wide, and remain fixed as in amazement. A something

alert, and very fierce, came into her expression. She seemed to think

carefully for a brief space. She threw back her head, and he saw

uncontrollable laughter convulse her beautiful throat. And, at that

same moment, a mighty outburst of applause and of welcome shook the

great theatre from floor to ceiling, and, as it died away, the voice of

the famous soprano, rich and compelling as of old, swelled out, and

made vibrant with passionate sweetness the whole atmosphere. And

Richard hailed that glorious voice, not that in itself it moved him

greatly, but because in it he recognised the beginning of the end. It

came as prelude to catastrophe which was also salvation.--Very soon the

bees would swarm now! He rallied his patience. He had not much longer

to wait.

Meanwhile he looked back at that box on the grand tier, striving to

unriddle the mystery of his knowledge of those two persons. He needed

glasses no longer. His sight had become preternaturally keen. Again the

two were talking--and about him, that was somehow evident. And, as they

talked, he beheld a being, exquisitely formed, perfect in every part,

step forth from between the lips of the woman fashioned of ivory and

gold. It knelt upon one knee. Over the heads of the vast, dull-coloured

multitude of workers, those witnesses of and participators in the

execution of Eternal Justice, it gazed at him, Richard Calmady, and at

him alone. And its gaze enfolded and held him like an embrace. It wooed

him, extending its arms in invitation. It was naked and unashamed. It

was black--black as the reeking, liquid lanes between the hulls of the

many ships, over which the screaming gulls circled seeking foul

provender, down in Naples harbour.--And he knew the fair woman it came

forth from for Helen de Vallorbes, herself, in her crocus-yellow gown

sewn with seed pearls. And he knew it for the immortal soul of her. And

he perceived, moreover, as it smiled on and beckoned him with

lascivious gestures, that its hands and its lips were bloody, since it

had broken the hearts of living women and torn and devoured the honour

of living men.

"_Ernani, Ernani, involami_"--still the air was vibrant with that

glorious voice. But the love of which it was the exponent, the flight

which it counseled, had ceased, to Richard's hearing, to bear relation

to that which is earthly, concrete, and of the senses. The passion and

promise of it were alike turned to nobler and more permanent uses,

presaging the quick coming of expiation and of reconciliation contained

in that supreme event. For he knew that, in a little moment, Helen must

arise and follow the soul which had gone forth from her--the soul of

which, in all its admirable perfection of outward form and blackness of

intimate lies and lust, was close to him--though he no longer actually

beheld it--here, beside him, laying subtle siege to him even yet. Where

it went, there, of necessity, she who owned it must shortly follow,

since soul and body cannot remain apart, save for the briefest space,

until death effect their final divorce. Therefore Helen would come

speedily. It could not be otherwise--so, at least, he argued. And her

coming meant the culmination. Then, time being fully ripe, the bees

would swarm, swarm at last,--labour revenging itself upon sloth, hunger

upon gluttony, want upon wealth, obscurity upon privilege,--justice

being thus meted out, and he, Richard, cleansed and delivered from the

disgrace of deformity now so hideously infecting both his spirit and

his flesh.

Of this he was so well assured that, disregarding the felt, though

unseen, presence of that errant soul, disdaining to do battle with it,

he leaned forward once more, looking down into the close-packed arena

of the great theatre. All those brilliant figures, members of his own

class, here present, were matter of indifference to him. In this moment

of conscious and supreme farewell, it was to the dull-coloured

multitude that he turned. They still moved him to sympathy.

Unconsciously they had enlightened him concerning matters of infinite

moment. At their hands he would receive penance and absolution. Before

they dealt more closely with him,--since that dealing must involve

suffering which might temporarily cloud his friendship for them,--he

wanted to bid them farewell and assure them of his conviction of the

righteousness of their corporate action. So, silently, he blessed them,

taking leave of them in peace. Then he found there were other farewells

to be said.--Farewell to earthly life as he had known it, the struggle

and very frequent anguish of it, its many frustrated purposes, fair

illusions, unfulfilled hopes. He must bid farewell, moreover, to art as

he had relished it--to learning, as he had all too intermittently

pursued it--to travel, as he had found solace in it--to the

inexhaustible interest, the inextinguishable humour and pathos, in

brief, of things seen. And, reviewing all this, a profound nostalgia of

all those minor happinesses which are the natural inheritance of the

average man arose in him--happiness of healthy, light-hearted

activities, not only of the athlete and the fighting-man, but of the

playing-field, and the ball-room, and the river--happinesses to him

inevitably denied. With an almost boyish passion of longing, he cried

out for these.--Just for one day to have lived with the ease and

freedom with which the vast majority of men habitually live! Just for

one day to have been neither dwarf nor cripple, but to have taken his

place and his chance with the rest, before it all was over and the tale

told!

But very soon Richard put these thoughts from him, deeming it unworthy

to dwell upon them at this juncture. The call was to go forward, not to

go back. So he settled himself in his chair once more, pulling the

velvet drapery forward so as to shut out the sight of the house.

Bitterness should have no part in him. When that happened which was

appointed to happen, it must find him not only acquiescent but serene

and undisturbed. He composed himself, therefore, with a decent and even

lofty pride. Then he turned his eyes upon the narrow door, there in the

semi-obscurity of the back of the box, and waited. And all the while

royally, triumphantly, Morbita sang.

During that period of waiting--whether in itself brief or prolonged, he

knew not--sensation and thought alike were curiously in abeyance.

Richard neither slept nor woke. He knew that he existed, but all active

relation to being had ceased. And it was with painful effort he in a

measure returned to more ordinary correspondence with fact, aroused by

the sound of low-toned, emphatic speech close at hand, and by a

scratching as of some animal denied and seeking admittance. Then he

perceived that the door yielded, letting in a spread of yellow

brightness from the corridor. And in the midst of that brightness, part

and parcel of it thanks to the lustre of her crocus-yellow dress, her

honey-coloured hair, her fair skin and softly-gleaming ornaments, stood

Helen de Vallorbes. Behind her, momentarily, Richard caught sight of

the young man whose face had impressed him as a ribald travesty of that

of some being altogether worshipful and holy. The face peered at him

with, as it seemed, malicious curiosity over the rounded shoulder of

the woman of ivory and gold, The effect was very hateful, and, with a

sense of thankfulness, Richard saw Helen close the door and come,

alone, down the two steps leading from the back of the box. As she

passed from the dimness into the clearer light, he watched her,

quiescent, yet with absorbing interest. For he perceived that the hands

of the clock had been put back somehow. Intervening years and the many

events of them had ceased to obtain, so that, of all the many Helens,

enchanting or evil, whom he had come to know, he saw now only one, and

that the first and earliest--a little dancer, with blush-roses in her

hat, dainty as a toy, finished to her rosy finger-tips and the toes of

her pretty shoes, merry and merciless, as she had pirouetted round him

mocking his shuffling, uncertain progress across the Chapel-Room at

Brockhurst fifteen years ago.

"Ah! so you have come back!" he exclaimed, almost involuntarily.

Madam de Vallorbes pushed a chair from the front of the box into the

shadow of the velvet draperies beside Richard.

"It is unnecessary that all Naples should take part in our interview,"

she said. She sat down, turning to him, leaning a little towards him.

"You do not deserve that I should come back, you know, Dickie," she

continued. "You both deserted and deceived me. That is hardly

chivalrous, hardly just indeed, after taking all a woman has to give.

You led me to suppose you had departed for good and all. Why should you

deceive me?"

"The yacht was not ready for sea," Richard said simply.

"Then you might, in common charity, have let me know that. You were

bound to give me an opportunity of speaking to you once again, I

think."

In his present state of detachment from all worldly considerations,

absolute truthfulness compelled Richard. The event was so certain, the

swarming of the bees so very near, that small diplomacies, small

evasions, seemed absurdly out of place.

"I did not want to hear you speak," he said.

"But doesn't it strike you that was rather dastardly in face of what

had taken place between us? Do you know that you appear in a new and

far from becoming light?"

Denial seemed to Richard futile. He remained silent.

For a moment Helen looked towards the stage. When she spoke again it

was as with reluctance.

"I was desperately unhappy. I went all over the villa in the vain hope

of finding you. I went back to that room of yours in which we parted. I

wanted to see it again."--Helen paused. Her speech was low-toned, soft

as milk.--"It was rather dreadful, Dickie, for the place was all in

disarray, littered with signs of your hasty departure, damp,

cheerless--the rain beating against the windows. And I hate rain. I

found there, not you--whom I so sorely wanted--but something very much

else.--A letter to you from de Vallorbes."--Once more she paused. "I

excuse you of anything worse than negligence in omitting to destroy it.

Misery knows no law, and I was miserable. I read it."

Richard had listened with the same detachment, yet the same absorbed

interest, with which he had watched her entrance. She was a wonderful

creature in her adroitness, in her handling of means to serve her own

ends! But he could not pay her back in her own coin. The time was too

short for anything but simple truth. He felt strangely tired. These

reiterated delays became harassing. If the bees would swarm, only

swarm! Then it would be over, and he could sleep. He clasped his hands

behind his head and looked at Madame de Vallorbes. Her soul kneeled on

her lap, its delicate arms were clasped about her neck--black against

the lustrous white of her skin and all those twisted ropes of seed

pearls. It pressed its breasts against hers, amorously. It loved her

and she it. And he understood that in the whole scope of nature there

was but it alone, it only, that she ever had loved, or did, or could,

love. And, understanding this, he was filled with a great compassion

for her. And, answering her, his expression was gentle and pitiful.

Still he needs must speak the truth.

"Perhaps it was as well that you should read Luigi's letter," he said.

She turned upon him fiercely and scornfully, yet even as she did so her

soul fell to beckoning to him, soliciting him with evilly alluring

gestures.

"My congratulations to you," she exclaimed, "upon your praiseworthy

candour! I am to gather, then, that you believe that which my husband

advises himself to tell you? Under the circumstances it is exceedingly

convenient to you to do so, no doubt."

"How can I avoid believing it?" Richard asked, quite sweet-temperedly.

"Surely we need not waste the little time which remains in argument as

to that? You must admit, Helen, that Luigi's letter fits in. It

supplies just the piece of the puzzle which was missing. It tallies

with all the rest."

"All the rest?"

"Oh yes! It is part of the whole, precisely that part both of you and

of Naples which I knew, and tried so hard not to know, from the first.

But it is worse than useless to practice such refusals. The Whole, and

nothing less than the whole, is bound to get one in the end. It is

contrary to the nature of things that any integral portion of the whole

should submit to permanent denial."--Richard's voice deepened. He spoke

with a subdued enthusiasm, thinking of the dull-coloured multitude

there in the arena and the act of retributive justice on the eve, by

them, of accomplishment.--"It seems to me the radical weakness of all

human institutions, of all systems of thought, resides in exactly that

effort to select and reject, to exalt one part as against another part,

and so build not upon the rock of unity and completeness, but upon the

sand of partiality and division. And sooner or later the Whole revenges

itself, and the fine-fanciful fabric crumbles to ruin, just for lack of

that which in our short-sighted over-niceness we have taken such mighty

great pains to miss out. This has happened times out of number in

respect of religions, and philosophies, and the constitution of

kingdoms, and in that of fair romances which promised to stand firm to

all eternity. And now, now, in these last few days,--since laws which

rule the general, also rule the individual life,--it has happened in

respect of you, Helen, to my seeing, and in respect of Naples."--Richard

smiled upon her sadly and very sweetly.--"I am sorry," he said, "yes,

indeed, horribly sorry. It is a bitter thing to see the last of one's

gods go overboard. But there is no remedy. Sorry or not, so it is."

Madame de Vallorbes looked at him keenly. Her attitude was strained.

Her face sombre with thought.

"My God! my God!" she exclaimed, "that I should sit and listen to all

this! And yet you were never more attractive. There is an unnatural

force, unnatural beauty about you. You are ill, Richard. You look and

you speak as a man might who was about to join hands with death."

But Dickie's attention had wandered again. He pulled the velvet drapery

aside somewhat, and gazed down into the crowded house. They lingered

strangely in the performance of their mission, that dull-coloured

multitude of workers!--Just then came another mighty outburst of

applause, cries, _vivas_, the famous soprano's name called aloud. The

sound was stimulating, as the shout of a victorious army. Richard

hailed it as a sign of speedy deliverance, and sank back into his

place.

"Oh yes!" he said civilly and lightly, "I fancy I am pretty bad. I am a

bit sick of this continued delay, you see. I suppose they know their

own business best, but they do seem most infernally slow in getting

under weigh. I was ready hours ago. However, they must be nearly

through with preliminaries now. And when once we're fairly into it, I

shall be all right."

"You mean when the yacht sails?" Madame de Vallorbes asked. Still she

looked at him intently. He turned to her smiling, and she observed that

his eyes had ceased to be as windows opening back on to empty space.

They were luminous with a certain gay content.

"Yes, of course--when the yacht sails, if you like to put it that way,"

he answered.

"And when will that be?"

The shout of the arena grew louder in the recall. It surged up to the

roof and quivered along the lath and plaster partitions of the boxes.

"Very soon now. Immediately, I think, please God," he said.--But why

should she make him speak thus foolishly in riddles? Of a surety she

must read the signs of the approach of that momentous and beneficent

event as clearly as he himself! Was she not equally with himself

involved in it? Was she not, like himself, to be cleansed and set free

by it? Therefore it came as a painful bewilderment and shock to him

when she drew closer to him, leaned forward, laid her hand lightly upon

his thigh.

"Richard," she said, very softly, "I forgive all. I am not satisfied

with loving. I will come with you. I will stay with you. I will be

faithful to you--yes, yes, even that. Your loving is unlike any other.

It is unique, as you yourself are unique. I--I want more of it."

"But you must know that it is too late to go back on that now," he

said, reasoning with her, greatly perplexed and distressed by her

determined ignoring of--to him--self-evident fact. "All that side of

things for us is over and done with."

Her lips parted in naughty laughter. And then, not without a shrinking

of quick horror, Richard beheld the soul of her--that being of lovely

proportions, exquisitely formed in every part, yet black as the foul,

liquid lanes between the hulls of the many ships down in Naples

harbour--step delicately in between those parted lips, returning whence

it came. And, beholding this, instinctively he raised her hand from

where it rested upon his thigh, and put it from him, put it upon her

glistering, crocus-yellow lap where her soul had so lately kneeled.

"Let us say no more, Helen," he entreated, "lest we both forfeit our

remaining chance, and become involved in hopeless and final

condemnation."

But Madame de Vallorbes' anger rose to overwhelming height. She slapped

her hands together.

"Ah, you despise me!" she cried. "But let me assure you that in any

case this assumption of virtue becomes you singularly ill. It really is

a little bit too cheap, a work of supererogation in the matter of

hypocrisy. Have the courage of your vices. Be honest. You can be so to

the point of insult when it serves your purpose. Own that you are

capricious, own that you have lighted upon some woman who provokes your

appetite more than I do! I have been too tender of you, too lenient

with you. I have loved too much and been weakly desirous to please. Own

that you are tired of me, that you no longer care for me!"

And he answered, sadly enough:--

"Yes, that last is true. Having seen the Whole, that has happened which

I always dreaded might happen. The last of my self-made gods has indeed

gone overboard. I care for you no longer."

Helen sprang up from her chair, ran to the door, flung it open. The

first act of the opera was concluded. The curtain had come down. The

house below and around, the corridor without, were full of confused

noise and movement.

"Paul, M. Destournelle, come here," she cried, "and at once!"

But Richard was more than ever tired. The strain of waiting had been

too prolonged. Lights, draperies, figures, the crowded arena, the vast

honeycomb of boxes, tier above tier, swam before his eyes, blurred,

indistinct, vague, shifting, colossal in height, giddy in depth. The

bees were swarming, at last, swarming upward through seas of iridescent

mist. But he had no longer empire over his own attitude and thoughts.

He had hoped to meet the supreme moment in full consciousness, with

clear vision and thankfulness of heart. But he was too tired to do so,

tired in brain and body alike. And so it happened that a dogged

endurance grew on him, simply a setting of the teeth and bracing of

himself to suffer silently, even stupidly, all that might be in store.

For the bees were close upon him now, countless in number, angry,

grudging, violent. But they no longer appeared as insects. They were

human, save for their velvet-like, expressionless eyes. And all those

eyes were fixed upon him, and him alone. He was the centre towards

which, in thought and action, all turned. Nor were the dull-coloured

occupants of the _parterre_ alone in their attack. For those

gay-coloured larvae--the men and women of his own class--indolent,

licentious, full-fed, hung out of the angular mouths of the waxen

cells, above the crimson and gold of their cushions, pointing at him,

claiming and yet denouncing him. And in the attitude of these the

democratic and the aristocratic sections--he detected a difference. The

former swarmed to inflict punishment for his selfishness, uselessness,

sensuality. But the latter jeered and mocked at his bodily infirmity,

deriding his deformity, making merry over his shortened limbs and

shuffling walk. And against this background, against this all-enclosing

tapestry of faces which encircled him, two persons, and the atmosphere

and aroma of them, so to speak, were clearly defined. They were close

to him, here within the narrow limits of the opera box. Then a great

humiliation overtook Richard, perceiving that they, and not the people,

the workers, august in their corporate power and strength, were to be

his executioners.--No--no--he wasn't worth that! And, for all his

present dulness of sensation, a sob rose in his throat. Madame de

Vallorbes, resplendent in crocus-yellow brocade, costly lace, and seed

pearls, the young man, her companion--the young man of the light,

forked beard, domed skull, vain eyes and peevish mouth--the young man

of holy and dissolute aspect--were good enough instruments for the

Eternal Justice to employ in respect of him, Richard Calmady.

"Look, M. Destournelle," Helen said very quietly, "this is my cousin of

whom I have already spoken to you. But I wished to spare him if

possible, and give him room for self-justification, so I did not tell

you all. Richard, this is my friend, M. Destournelle, to whom my honour

and happiness are not wholly indifferent."

Dickie looked up. He did not speak. Vaguely he prayed it might all soon

be over. Paul Destournelle looked down. He raised his eye-glass and

bowed himself, examining Richard's mutilated legs and strangely-shod

feet. He broke into a little, bleating, goat-like laugh.

"_Mais c'est etonnant!_" he observed reflectively.

"I was in his house," Helen continued. "I was there unprotected, having

absolute faith in his loyalty."--She paused a moment. "He seduced me.

Richard can you deny that?"

"_Canaille!_" M. Destournelle murmured. He drew a pair of gloves

through his hands, holding them by the finger-tips. The metal buttons

of them were large, three on each wrist. Those gloves arrested

Richard's attention oddly.

"I do not deny it," Dickie said.

"And having thus outraged, he deserted me. Do you deny that?"

"No," Dickie said again. For it was true, that which she asserted,

true, though penetrated by subtle falsehood impossible, as it seemed to

him, to combat,--"No, I do not deny it."

"You hear!" Helen exclaimed. "Now do what you think fit."

Still Destournelle drew the gloves through his hands, holding them by

the finger-tips.

"Under other circumstances I might feel myself compelled to do you the

honour of sending you a challenge, _monsieur_," he said. "But a man of

sensibility like myself cannot do such violence to his moral and

artistic code as to fight with an outcast of nature, an abortion, such

as yourself. The sword and the pistol I necessarily reserve for my

equals. The deformed person, the cripple, whose very existence is an

offense to the eye and to every delicacy of sense, must be condescended

to, and, if chastised at all, must be chastised without ceremony,

chastised as one would chastise a dog."

And with that he struck Richard again and again across the face with

those metal-buttoned gloves.

Mad with rage, blinded and sick with pain, Dickie essayed to fling

himself upon his assailant. But Destournelle was too adroit for him. He

skipped aside, with his little, bleating, goat-like laugh, and Richard

fell heavily full length, his forehead coming in contact with the lower

step of the descent from the back of the box. He lay there, too weak to

raise himself.

Paul Destournelle bent down and again examined him curiously.

"_C'est etonnant!_" he repeated.--He gave the prostrate body a

contemptuous kick. "Dear madame, are you sufficiently avenged? Is it

enough?" he inquired sneeringly.

And vaguely, as from some incalculable distance, Richard heard Helen de

Vallorbes' voice:--"Yes--it is a little affair of honour which dates

from my childhood. It has taken many years in adjusting. I thank you,

_mon cher_, a thousand times. Now let us go quickly. It is enough."

Then came darkness, silence, rest.