_ PART IV CHAPTER X. THE INDESTRUCTIBLE
Within the room all was dim.
An arm-chair piled with many pillows stood facing the open window, and as her eyes became accustomed to the twilight Chris discerned the outline of a figure that reclined in it. At the same moment there came to her the sound of a voice, husky and difficult, yet how strangely familiar.
"Ah, but the tide--the tide!" it said. "Can we not hold it back my dear Max--a little longer? It rushes up so fast--so fast. Soon all will be gone. Only a picture in the sand, you say? But no, it is more than that. See, it is greater than all the things in the world--greater than the Sphinx, _ma petite_--greater than your Cleopatra's Needle. Ah, you laugh, because you have no need of it. But yet it is your own, and so will it always be. Do you hear the tide among the rocks, _mignonne_? It is there that my heart is buried. Come with me, and I will show you the place--if the tide permit."
There came a gasp, and silence.
Some one guided Chris gently forward till she stood behind the great chair at the window, looking down upon the black head that rested against the pillow. Her fear had passed, but yet she drew no nearer. Instinctively she stood and waited.
Suddenly, and more clearly, the voice spoke again.
"We must climb, _cherie_, we must climb. We dare not stay upon these rocks. It is steep for your little feet, but to remain here is to die. _Alors_, we will say our prayers and go. _Le bon Dieu_ will keep us safe. And we have been--pals--since so long."
A softer note in the last sentence made her aware that he was smiling. She bent a little above him. But still she waited.
"_Comment_?" he said. "You are afraid? But why, my bird of Paradise? Is it life that you fear--this little life of shadows? Or Death--which is the gateway to our great Reality? Listen, _mignonne_! I am a prisoner while I live, but the gate opens to me. Soon I shall be free. No, no! I cannot take you with me. I would not, _cherie_, if I could. Your place is here. But remember--always--that I love you still. And my love is stronger than death. It stretches into eternity."
He paused, and made a slight gesture of refusal. "Ah, no!" he said. "I do not want a priest. My sins are all known--and pardoned. I only want--one thing now."
"What is it, old chap?" It was Max Wyndham's voice, but pitched so low that Chris scarcely recognized it.
The head on the pillow moved, turning towards the speaker. "So, _mon ami_, you are still there?"
"What is it you are wanting?" Max said.
Bertrand drew a breath that was cut short and ended in a gasp. "_Mon ami_, I only want--to hold her little hand in mine--and to hear her say--that she is--happy."
And then it was that Chris moved forward, as if impelled by a volition not her own, and knelt down by Bertrand's side.
"Do you want me, Bertie?" she said. "I've come, dear! I've come!"
He put out his hand to her at once, but slowly, as though feeling his way. "Christine!" he said.
She took the groping hand, and held it fast pressed between her own. "Yes, dear?" she murmured.
"You are really here?" he said. "It is not--a dream?"
"No, Bertie, no! It is I myself, here with you at Valpre."
She felt his hand close within her own. "You are come--to say good-bye to me?" he said. "And Mr. Mordaunt--is he here also?"
"He brought me," whispered Chris.
"Ah!" She heard the relief in his voice. "Then--Christine, all is right between you?"
But she was silent, for she could not answer him.
He stirred. He leaned slowly forward. "Tell me," he said, very earnestly, "tell me that all is well between you."
But Chris said no word. She only bowed her head over the hand she held.
There was a brief silence. Bertrand was bending over her. He seemed to be trying to see her face. He moved at last, passed his free arm around her, and spoke. "Mr. Mordaunt--is he here?"
"Yes, I am here." Very steadily came Mordaunt's answer. Mordaunt himself took Max's place beside him.
Bertrand looked up at him. "Monsieur--" he said, and hesitated.
"Ask him what he wants," muttered Max, gripping his brother-in-law's elbow with tense insistence.
"Do you want anything?" He uttered the question at once, quite clearly, without emotion.
"Monsieur," Bertrand said again, and there was entreaty in his voice, "out of your great goodness of heart you have brought _la petite_ to say adieu to me. Will you not--extend that goodness--a little farther? Will you not--now that you understand--now that you understand"--he repeated the phrase insistently--"remove the estrangement of which I have been--the so unhappy cause?"
"Bertie, no--no!" There was sharp pain in Chris's voice. She raised herself quickly. "You don't understand, dear, and I--can't explain. But you are not to ask that of him. I can't bear it."
There was a quiver of passion in the last words. It was as though they were uttered in spite of her.
Mordaunt stood motionless, in utter silence. His face was in shadow.
Bertrand turned to the kneeling girl. "Will you, then, plead for yourself, _cherie_?" he said. "He will not refuse you. He knows all."
"No, no; he doesn't," said Chris.
"But you will tell him," urged Bertrand gently. "See, I cannot leave you--my two good friends--thus. Since I have caused so much trouble between you, I must do my possible to redress the evil. _Cherie_, promise me--that you will go back to him. Not otherwise shall I die happy."
"I can't!" whispered Chris. "I can't!"
"But why not?" he said. "You love him, yes?"
But Chris was silent. She was trembling from head to foot.
"I know that you love him," Bertrand said, with confidence. "And for that--you will go back to him. You cannot live your life apart from him. You belong to him, Christine, and he--he belongs to you. Mr. Mordaunt--my dear friend--is it not so?"
But before he could answer, feverishly Chris again broke in. "Bertie, hush--hush! It isn't right! It isn't fair! Oh, forgive me for saying it! But can't you see that it isn't? He has forgiven me, and we are friends. But you mustn't ask any more than that, because--because it's no use." A sudden sob rose in her throat. She swallowed it with an immense effort. "He has been kind to me--for your sake," she said, "not my own. I have done nothing to deserve his kindness. I have never been worthy of him, and he knows it. I married him, loving you. Oh no, I didn't know it, but I ought to have known. And when I did know, I would have left him and gone with you. Nothing can ever alter that. And do you suppose he will ever forget it? Because I know--I know--that he never can!"
She ceased abruptly, and turned aside to battle with her agitation. Bertrand's hand stroked hers very tenderly, but his eyes were raised to the man who stood like a statue by his side.
He spoke after a moment very softly, almost as if to himself. "Neither will he forget," he said, "that our love was a summer idyll that came to us unawares in the days when we were young, and that though the idyll will come to an end, our love is a gift immortal--imperishable--indestructible--a flame that burns upwards and always upwards--reaching the Divine. And because he remembers this, he will understand, and think no evil. Christine," he turned to her again very persuasively, "you love him. You have need of him. I know it well. You are sad. You are lonely. Your heart cries out for him. Little Christine, will you not listen to it? Will you not go back to him?"
The man's whole soul was in the words. They quivered with the intensity of his appeal. Yet they went into silence. Chris was turned away from him. Only by the convulsive holding of her hand did he know that they had reached her heart.
The silence lengthened, became oppressive, became a burden too heavy to be borne.
"Christine!" He was becoming exhausted. His voice was no more than a whisper, but it throbbed with earnest entreaty.
Yet Chris remained silent still, for she could not speak in answer.
Several seconds passed. It seemed that the appeal would go unanswered. But at length the man who stood on Bertrand's other side made a quiet movement, bending down a little.
"You need not distress yourself, Bertrand," he said, very steadily, and as he spoke his hand was on the Frenchman's shoulder. "Chris will never leave me again."
"Ah!" Eagerly Bertrand looked up at him. He had begun to gasp again, and his words were hurried and difficult of utterance. "And you, monsieur--you will not--leave her?"
Mordaunt made no verbal answer, but their eyes must have met in the dimness and some message have passed between them, for there was a tremor of sheer relief in his voice when Bertrand spoke again.
"Oh, my friend!" he said. "My dear friend!" And, yielding to the hand that gently pressed him back, he reclined upon his pillows and became passive.
Mordaunt remained beside him for several seconds longer, but he did not speak again. When he straightened himself at length, he glanced round for Max, and motioned him away.
They went together into the adjoining room and softly closed the door.
And so Chris and her _preux chevalier_ were left alone by the open window to end their summer idyll to the music of the rising tide that crooned and murmured among the rocks of Valpre that had seen its beginning. _