CHAPTER IV.
"A bird of the air shall carry the voice, and that which hath wingsshall tell the matter."--_Eccles_.
"Tired already? Nonsense! The air at this height is pure elixirvitae. It gives one a foretaste of the joy of being disembodied! Ifeel five years younger since I left the bungalow."
"And I, on the other hand, feel uncomfortably aware that I shall neversee the forty-third milestone again!" And, seating himselfdeliberately on the trunk of a fallen deodar, James Garth looked up athis companion, where she stood above him on a rough-hewn block ofgranite, her alpenstock held high like a shepherd's crook, the slender,shapely form of her outlined upon a sky already athrill with theforeknowledge of dawn.
Standing thus, lightly poised, impatient of delay, slim and upright asa young birch-tree, a cluster of roses at her waist, her expressiveface shadowed by the wide-brimmed helmet, she appeared triumphantly,girlishly young, for all her eight-and-twenty years. Her cheeksglowed; irrepressible animation sparkled in her eyes. The shock andjar of twenty-four hours ago seemed forgotten, as though they had neverbeen, for Quita Maurice was blessed with the happy faculty of livingvividly and exclusively in the present, and the exhilaration of ascent,the prospect of watching the world's awakening from a pine-crownedpinnacle, nine thousand feet up, were, for the moment, all-sufficing.
James Garth, in his upward glance, appraised every detail of her dressand person; savoured to the full her very individual--if, at times,thorn-set--charm. He was a connoisseur of woman--of their moods, theirminor vanities, their methods of defence and attack--this man whosecareer had been mainly remarkable for a succession of sentimentalfriendship, innocuous and otherwise.
During the past air months he had spent an infinite deal of leisure ina pastime whose every move and countermove he knew by heart, and forthe first time in eighteen years he had found himself out of hisreckoning.
An element little known to him had upset the balance of power. He wasbeginning to be aware that, for all his unquenchable self-assurance, hehad never for one moment felt sure of this woman, whose companionshipwas so accessible, and whose inner self stood always just out of reach,airy, impregnable, and by a natural sequence, the more entirelydesirable. It had taken Garth some months to realise the truth: and onthis morning of golden promise he decided that Quita Maurice must bemade to realise it also.
Quita herself, meeting the eloquence of his eyes with that frank lookof hers which had been largely responsible for the unprecedented turnof affairs, was vainly trying to repress a mischievous enjoyment of thefact that her companion was patently out of his element; that hisdrawing-room attitudes and demeanour struck an almost ludicrous note ofdiscord with the untamed majesty of his surroundings.
Face, figure, and point-device attire, culminating in a buttonhole offreshly picked violets, stamped him as a man mentally and physicallyaddicted to the levels of life; a soldier of carpet conquests andball-room achievements. A brow not ill-formed, and a bold pair ofeyes, more green than brown, suggested some measure of cultivatedintelligence, without which Quita could not have endured hiscompanionship for many hours together. But the proportions of histhick-set figure, and a certain amplitude of chin and jaw, bewrayedhim; classed him indubitably with the type for whom comfort and leisureare the first and last words of life. The fact that he had ascended amatter of fifteen hundred feet before daybreak, and that with no morethan the mildest sense of martyrdom, was proof conclusive that thebalance of power had been very completely upset; and it is quite inkeeping with the delicate irony of things that the one woman who hadsucceeded in upsetting it was, at that moment, dissecting him with themerciless accuracy of the artist.
"Poor man!" she remarked, sympathetically. "I'm afraid I have beentreating you rather mercilessly; and you don't look particularly happysitting on that deodar, either! I suppose I may consider it somethingof a triumph to have dragged a high priest of the arm-chairunprotesting up to the heights at this unearthly hour of the morning?"
"A triumph exclusively your own," he answered, with lingering emphasis."No other woman in the world could have achieved as much."
Quita glanced at him quizzically.
"I honestly wonder," she said slowly, "if you could reckon up at randomhow many times you have said that sort of thing before."
Garth reddened visibly; less at the justice of the retort than at thehumiliation of being put out of countenance by a woman from whom hedesired no less a gift than the gift of herself.
"Well, I never meant it fair and square before," he declared stoutly.Whereat, to his consternation, she laughed outright.
"You seem to have a high opinion of my powers of credulity! That istoo big a compliment for me to digest without salt! But I think wehave talked nonsense enough for one while, and it's growing lighterevery minute. Are you coming on? Or would you sooner sit there inpeace while I push up to the top?"
The suggestion brought him to his feet.
"No, by no means. When I set out to do a thing, I go through with it."
"Rally your forces, then, for one more spurt of climbing. Time isprecious. Can you really manage this formidable boulder, or would youlike a hand up?"
She laughingly flung out her free left hand; and the mockery in herclear voice fired the man to make good his opportunity. He took promptpossession of the proffered hand, crushing it in his with unnecessaryforce, but made no attempt to scale the rock; while she, instantlyperceiving his manoeuvre, sprang down to his side and freed herselfwith imperious decision. Then she turned upon him, her head held high,a spark of genuine scorn in her eyes; and he realised that he wasdealing with no mere coquette, whose elusiveness might be taken as aninverted form of encouragement, but with a woman of character andspirit.
"Major Garth," she said in a tone of quietness more cutting than anger,"when I pay a man the compliment of going out alone with him, I take itfor granted that he is in the habit of behaving like a gentleman. Ishould be sorry to find myself mistaken in your case."
Without giving him time to answer, she leapt lightly on to her desertedrock, leaving him to follow, if he chose.
And he did choose. For her scorn, while it stung his vanity to thequick, fired his lukewarm blood with a lust of conquest far removedfrom his usual cool-headed assurance at the critical moment. He seemeddestined to experience more than one new sensation this morning; andnew sensations rarely came amiss to this epicure of the emotions.
Being quite incapable of emulating his companion's chamois method ofcutting corners, and striking out a direct line for the summit, he didnot succeed in coming up with her till the arduous feat wasaccomplished,--the Pisgah height attained. Here he found herestablished on a slab of granite, hands loosely clasped over her knee,helmet tilted a little backward, forming a halo round her head andface. He arrived in a very unheroic state of breathlessness, and shegreeted him with a frankly forgiving smile.
"That last bit came rather hard on you, I'm afraid. But surely allthis makes ample amends."
She included in a wide sweep of her arm the superb panorama of hill andvalley and far-stretching plain, robed in a haze of its own tiercebreath, through which a silver network of rivers could be faintlydiscerned in the crescent light. Uprising from this blue interminabledistance, the first crumplings of the foothills showed like purplevelvet, and from these again the giant Himalayas--the "home of thegreater gods"--sprang aloft, in a medley of lovely lines and hues, tillthey reached the uttermost north where the hoar head of Nanga Parbatsoared twenty-five thousand feet into the blue.
Quita motioned her companion to another rock, a little distance behindher own.
"Sit down there, and recover your lost breath," she commanded, gently."I would rather not talk for the present, if you don't mind. It wouldjar somehow. I daresay you understand what I mean."
He was many leagues removed from understanding: but he obeyed insilence, wondering at himself, no less than at her. And straightwayQuita forgot all about him, in the mere rapture of l
ooking, and offeeling in every fibre the incommunicable thrill of dawn.
A passionate nobility, freedom, and power breathed from the wide scene.Already a pearly glimmer pulsed along the east; already the mountainswere awake and aware. Peak beyond peak, range beyond range, a shadowypageant of purple and grey, they swept upwards to the far horizon,where the still wonder of the snows shone pale and pure against thedovelike tones of the sky. Away across the valley, where night stillbrooded, Kalatope ridge, serrated and majestic of outline, made amassive incident of shadow amid the tenderer tints around. The greathushed world seemed holding its breath in expectation of a miracle--theunconsidered miracle of dawn.
A Himalayan dawn is brief, as it is beautiful. One after one, thesnow-peaks passed from the pallor of death to the glow of life. Then,sudden as an inspiration, the full splendour of morning broke, sublimeas the eternity from which it came. Rapier-like shafts of lightpierced the purple lengths of shadows that engulfed the valley.Threading their way through fir and deodar and pine, they flung alltheir radiant length across a rock-studded carpet of fir-needles andmoss, and rested, like a caress, upon Quita's face and figure.
At last, with a long breath of satisfaction, she forced her sun-dazzledeyes and mind back to earth; only to discover that Garth had risen andwas standing at her side. The man had seen and studied her in manymoods. But never in one so exalted, so self-forgetful, as the present;and to the varied new experiences of the morning was added a wholesomesense of his own unworthiness to lay a hand upon her. In thatillumined moment he was vouchsafed a glimpse into the temple of Love; atemple he had desecrated and defiled time and again; whose holy ofholies he had never entered, nor ever could.
"Does it really mean as much as all that to you?" he asked, stillwatching her, with unusual concentration.
She nodded, and a soft light gleamed in her eyes. "Yes--as much asthat, and more--infinitely more. One's cramped mind and heart seem toneed expanding to take it all in."
Garth's smile lacked its habitual touch of cynicism.
"I am afraid even sunrise on Dynkund in your company has no power tolift me to such flights of ecstasy."
"I never supposed it had, you poor fellow! I wouldn't change soulswith you for half a kingdom. Nearly every day of my life I thank thegoodness and the grace that dowered me with the spirit of an artist.Think what a heritage it is to be eternally interested in a world fullof people who seem to be eternally bored!"
"I suppose you include me in that noble army of martyrs?"
"Decidedly. It is one of your worst faults."
"At least I never commit it in your presence."
She laughed, and lifted her shoulders.
"At least you know how to flatter a woman! But, for goodness' sake,don't let's talk trivialities in the face of these stupendousmountains."
"And why not? In my opinion, the trivialities of a human being areworth more than the grandeur of a mountain, any day. But, seriously,Miss Maurice--if you can be serious with me for five minutes--does allthis, and the Art in which you live and breathe, so satisfy you thatyou feel no need for the far better things a man might have to offeryou?"
She frowned, and looked with sudden intentness at a distant, abject inthe valley.
"Yes--seriously--it does. What is more, it seems to me that most menset too high a value on what they have to offer a woman, and that agood many of us are better off without it."
Garth set his teeth, and did not answer at once. That his firstgenuine attempt at a proposal of marriage should be thus cavalierlynipped in the bud was disconcerting, to say the least of it.
"But not you--of all women," he protested, incredulously. "Are youquite sure you understand what I mean? Won't you give me a chance toexplain----?"
Her low laughter maddened him.
"Oh, no--please have mercy on me! Explanations are the root of allevil! If only people had not such a passion for explaining themselves,there would be fifty per cent fewer misunderstandings in the world.Don't you know the delightful story of a zealous mother reading theBible to her boy, and explaining profusely to bring it within the scopeof his small mind, and when she asked him, anxiously, 'Are you quitesure you understand it all, darling?' he answered, with the heavenlyfrankness of childhood, 'Yes, beautifully, mummy--except when youexplain.' That's my feeling exactly; so we'll skip the explanations,if you don't mind."
He stifled an oath, and flung his half-smoked cigar down the khud.
"You're enough to drive a sane man distracted!" he declared hotly, andwas not a little surprised at his own vehemence.
"No, no! That's exaggeration, I assure you. The strong wine of themorning has got into your head. Do be reasonable now, and keeppersonalities at arm's length. I detest them."
He moved away for a space; then, turning on his heel, came back again.
"At least you don't object to my companionship?" he said, ignoring herrequest.
"Of course not, so long as it amuses you to bestow it upon me."
"Amuses me! God in heaven, what makes you so hopelessly detached?"
"Some radical defect in me, I suppose. The Pagan strain, perhaps, thatcomes out so strong in Michael. I believe I am incapable of _lesgrandes passions_. But that does not prevent me from being a goodfriend, and a constant one, as you will find, if you care to test me inthat capacity. Now you may sit down here," she patted her slab of rockinvitingly, "and discourse about anything you please, except myself.Egoist though I am, I have had enough of the subject for to-day!"
And Garth--the man of surface emotions and ready tongue--found nothingto say in answer to this kindly but inexorable dismissal of hisunspoken suit. He had no choice but to accept the inevitable, and theproffered seat. But the permission to discourse about anything hepleased left him dumb, and it was Quita herself who guided their talkinto a less personal channel.
"Have you had any new arrivals at the Strawberry Bank lately?" sheasked, conversationally; and the question was more relevant to thetabooed topic than Garth was likely to guess. He lived close to thehotel, and dined there when he felt convivially disposed.
"Yes; two new fellows came up this week. A doctor from Mooltan and aGunner from 'Dera Dismal,'--the Thibet man,--Lenox, who seems to bemaking a reputation of sorts. But he looks a wreck. Smokes like achimney; and is apparently working himself to death; a thankless formof folly."
"Perhaps. Yet India needs a few unsparing workers--like Captain Lenox."
She spoke with studied indifference; but her fingers were busyuprooting a patch of moss.
"Oh yes, India has a healthy appetite for unsparing workers! She is agrasping harridan, who demands all and offers nothing. She devours thelives of men who are foolish enough to lose their hearts to her, andwrecks their bodies by way of thanks."
Quita's lips lifted in the merest shadow of a smile. "Aren't you alittle ungrateful to her? She has been fairly merciful to you!"
"I have never given her the ghost of a chance to be otherwise! I don'tbelieve in overwork, plus the Indian climate. More men kill themselvesby a happy mixture of both than the importance of their achievementsjustifies. I was chaffing Lenox only last night about his leaningtowards that unrecognised form of suicide; and all the answer I got wasthat a man might die of a more degrading disease. You never by anychance get a rise out of old Lenox!"
"Do you know him well?"
"As well as it's possible to know a fellow who lives with all hisshutters up. And in any case an anchorite, and a woman-hater, wouldnever be much in my line. The symptoms appear to have developed in thelast few years. Not without reason, as I happen to know."
"_What_ do you happen to know?"
The question came almost in a whisper; but Garth, who had all a woman'sweakness for other people's affairs, was too intent upon his ill-gottenscrap of gossip to observe his companion's slight change of manner.
"Why, that it's simply a case of _cherchez la femme_, as usual," heanswered, lightly. "I believe it's a fact that he wen
t so far as tomarry one of these women he affects to despise, when he was on leavefive years ago."
Quita started, and bit her lips. "What reason can you have forbelieving anything . . . so improbable?"
"My dear lady, marriage is never improbable. You women have a knack oftripping up the most unlikely subjects! In this case, I had thedetails from an old friend of mine. She happened to be stopping at thesame hotel as Lenox at Zermatt. Then one morning he disappeared; and,as she had taken rather a fancy to him, she tried to find out what hadbecome of him. After a good deal of questioning, it transpired that hehad been seen coming out of the English church with a lady; and furtherinquiry revealed the fact that an officer named Lenox had been quietlymarried there the day before. Naturally, she scented a romance, andwas keen to know more. But he seemed to have vanished outright. Thenten days later she met him on the station platform, travelling alone,and obviously down on his luck. He told her he was off to join hisbattery in India: nothing more. Problem: What, in the name of mystery,had he done with the lady?"
At that Quita rose abruptly, her cheeks on fire, her whole frame tensewith suppressed agitation.
"Oh, stop--stop. I can't stand any more!" she protested, in asmothered voice; and at once Garth was beside her, contrite and amazed.
"Miss Maurice--what have I said to upset you so?"
"It's not your fault. You couldn't help it," she answered, withoutlooking up. "But--you were telling me my own story!"
"Good Lord! Then--it was _you_?"
"Don't say any more, please. I never meant to speak; only--one had tostop you--somehow. It's time we went back to the others now. I amsure you must be wanting your breakfast. And remember"--she faced himat last, with brave deliberation--"I trust you, as a gentleman, neverto speak of this again--to me, or to any one else."
And Garth bowed his head, and followed her, in a bewildered silence.