CHAPTER TWELVE
I was at the Hotel de Luynes--or Granger--early on the followingmorning. The mists were still hanging about the dismal upper windows ofthe inscrutable Faubourg; the toilet of the city was being completed;the little hoses on wheels were clattering about the quiet largerstreets. I had not much courage thus early in the day. I had startedimpulsively; stepping with the impulse of immediate action from thedoorstep of the dairy where I had breakfasted. But I made detours; itwas too early, and my pace slackened into a saunter as I passed the rowof porters' lodges in that dead, inscrutable street. I wanted to fly;had that impulse very strongly; but I burnt my boats with my inquiry ofthe incredibly ancient, one-eyed porteress. I made my way across thedamp court-yard, under the enormous portico, and into the chilly stonehall that no amount of human coming and going sufficed to bring back toa semblance of life. Mademoiselle was expecting me. One went up a greatflight of stone steps into one of the immensely high, narrow, impossiblyrectangular ante-rooms that one sees in the frontispieces of old plays.The furniture looked no more than knee-high until one discovered thatone's self had no appreciable stature. The sad light slanted in ruledlines from the great height of the windows; an army of motes movedslowly in and out of the shadows. I went after awhile and lookeddisconsolately out into the court-yard. The porteress was making her wayacross the gravelled space, her arms, her hands, the pockets of herblack apron full of letters of all sizes. I remembered that the_facteur_ had followed me down the street. A noise of voices cameconfusedly to my ears from between half-opened folding-doors; the thingreminded me of my waiting in de Mersch's rooms. It did not last so long.The voices gathered tone, as they do at the end of a colloquy, succeededeach other at longer intervals, and at last came to a sustained halt.The tall doors moved ajar and she entered, followed by a man whom Irecognized as the governor of a province of the day before. In thathostile light he looked old and weazened and worried; seemed to havelost much of his rotundity. As for her, she shone with a light of herown.
He greeted me dejectedly, and did not brighten when she let him knowthat we had a mutual friend in Callan. The Governor, it seemed, in hiscapacity of Supervisor of the Systeme, was to conduct that distinguishedperson through the wilds of Greenland; was to smooth his way and topoint out to him excellences of administration.
I wished him a good journey; he sighed and began to fumble with his hat.
"_Alors, c'est entendu_," she said; giving him leave to depart. Helooked at her in an odd sort of way, took her hand and applied it to hislips.
"_C'est entendu_," he said with a heavy sigh, drops of moisturespattering from beneath his white moustache, "_mais_ ..."
He ogled again with infinitesimal eyes and went out of the room. He hadthe air of wishing to wipe the perspiration from his brows and toexclaim, "_Quelle femme_!" But if he had any such wish he mastered ituntil the door hid him from sight.
"Why the ..." I began before it had well closed, "do you allow thatthing to make love to you?" I wanted to take up my position before shecould have a chance to make me ridiculous. I wanted to make a longspeech--about duty to the name of Granger. But the next word hung, and,before it came, she had answered:
"He?--Oh, I'm making use of him."
"To inherit the earth?" I asked ironically, and she answered gravely:
"To inherit the earth."
She was leaning against the window, playing with the strings of theblinds, and silhouetted against the leaden light. She seemed to be,physically, a little tired; and the lines of her figure to interlacealmost tenderly--to "compose" well, after the ideas of a certain school.I knew so little of her--only just enough to be in love with her--thatthis struck me as the herald of a new phase, not so much in her attitudeto me as in mine to her; she had even then a sort of gravity, thegravity of a person on whom things were beginning to weigh.
"But," I said, irresolutely. I could not speak to her; to this newconception of her, in the way I had planned; in the way one would talkto a brilliant, limpid--oh, to a woman of sorts. But I had to takesomething of my old line. "How would flirting with that man help you?"
"It's quite simple," she answered, "he's to show Callan all Greenland,and Callan is to write ... Callan has immense influence over a greatclass, and he will have some of the prestige of--of a Commissioner."
"Oh, I know about Callan," I said.
"And," she went on, "this man had orders to hide things from Callan; youknow what it is they have to hide. But he won't now; that is what I wasarranging. It's partly by bribery and partly because he has a belief inhis _beaux yeux_--so Callan will be upset and will write an ...exposure; the sort of thing Callan would write if he were well upset.And he will be, by what this man will let him see. You know what alittle man like Callan will feel ... he will be made ill. He would faintat the sight of a drop of blood, you know, and he will see--oh, the veryworst, worse than what Radet saw. And he will write a frightful article,and it will be a thunderclap for de Mersch.... And de Mersch will begetting very shaky by then. And your friend Churchill will try to carryde Mersch's railway bill through in the face of the scandal. Churchill'smotives will be excellent, but everyone will say ... You know whatpeople say ... That is what I and Gurnard want. We want people to talk;we want them to believe...."
I don't know whether there really was a hesitation in her voice, orwhether I read that into it. She stood there, playing with the knots ofthe window-cords and speaking in a low monotone. The whole thing, thesad twilight of the place, her tone of voice, seemed tinged withunavailing regret. I had almost forgotten the Dimensionist story, and Ihad never believed in it. But now, for the first time I began to have mydoubts. I was certain that she had been plotting _something_ with one ofthe Duc de Mersch's lieutenants. The man's manner vouched for that; hehad not been able to look me in the face. But, more than anything, hisvoice and manner made me feel that we had passed out of a realm offarcical allegory. I knew enough to see that she might be speaking thetruth. And, if she were, her calm avowal of such treachery proved thatshe _was_ what she had said the Dimensionists were; cold, with noscruples, clear-sighted and admirably courageous, and indubitablyenemies of society.
"I don't understand," I said. "But de Mersch then?"
She made a little gesture; one of those movements that I best rememberof her; the smallest, the least noticeable. It reduced de Mersch tonothing; he no longer even counted.
"Oh, as for him," she said, "he is only a detail." I had still the ideathat she spoke with a pitying intonation--as if she were speaking to adog in pain. "He doesn't really count; not really. He will crumble upand disappear, very soon. You won't even remember him."
"But," I said, "you go about with him, as if you.... You are gettingyourself talked about.... Everyone thinks--" ... The accusation that Ihad come to make seemed impossible, now I was facing her. "I believe," Iadded, with the suddenness of inspiration. "I'm certain even, that _he_thinks that you ..."
"Well, they think that sort of thing. But it is only part of the game.Oh, I assure you it is no more than that."
I was silent. I felt that, for one reason or another, she wished me tobelieve.
"Yes," she said, "I want you to believe. It will save you a good deal ofpain."
"If you wanted to save me pain," I maintained, "you would have done withde Mersch ... for good." I had an idea that the solution was beyond me.It was as if the controlling powers were flitting, invisible, just abovemy head, just beyond my grasp. There was obviously something vibrating;some cord, somewhere, stretched very taut and quivering. But I couldthink of no better solution than: "You must have done with him." Itseemed obvious, too, that that was impossible, was outside the range ofthings that could be done--but I had to do my best. "It's a--it's vile,"I added, "vile."
"Oh, I know, I know," she said, "for you.... And I'm even sorry. But ithas to be gone on with. De Mersch has to go under in just this way. Itcan't be any other."
"Why not?" I asked, because she had paused. I hadn't any desire forenlightenment
.
"It isn't even only Churchill," she said, "not even only that de Merschwill bring down Churchill with him. It is that he must bring downeverything that Churchill stands for. You know what that is--the sort ofprobity, all the old order of things. And the more vile the means usedto destroy de Mersch the more vile the whole affair will seem.People--the sort of people--have an idea that a decent man cannot betouched by tortuous intrigues. And the whole thing will be--oh,malodorous. You understand."
"I don't," I answered, "I don't understand at all."
"Ah, yes, you do," she said, "you understand...." She paused for a longwhile, and I was silent. I understood vaguely what she meant; that ifChurchill fell amid the clouds of dust of such a collapse, there wouldbe an end of belief in probity ... or nearly an end. But I could not seewhat it all led up to; where it left us.
"You see," she began again, "I want to make it as little painful to youas I can; as little painful as explanations _can_ make it. I can't feelas you feel, but I can see, rather dimly, what it is that hurts you. Andso ... I want to; I really want to."
"But you won't do the one thing," I returned hopelessly to the charge.
"I cannot," she answered, "it must be like that; there isn't any way.You are so tied down to these little things. Don't you see that deMersch, and--and all these people--don't really count? They aren'tanything at all in the scheme of things. I think that, even for you,they aren't worth bothering about. They're only accidents; the accidentsthat--"
"That what?" I asked, although I began to see dimly what she meant.
"That lead in the inevitable," she answered. "Don't you see? Don't youunderstand? We _are_ the inevitable ... and you can't keep us back. Wehave to come and you, you will only hurt yourself, by resisting." Asense that this was the truth, the only truth, beset me. It was for themoment impossible to think of anything else--of anything else in theworld. "You must accept us and all that we mean, you must stand back;sooner or later. Look even all round you, and you will understandbetter. You are in the house of a type--a type that became impossible.Oh, centuries ago. And that type too, tried very hard to keep back theinevitable; not only because itself went under, but because everythingthat it stood for went under. And it had to suffer--heartache ... thatsort of suffering. Isn't it so?"
I did not answer; the illustration was too abominably just. It was justthat. There were even now all these people--these Legitimists--sneeringineffectually; shutting themselves away from the light in their mournfulhouses and suffering horribly because everything that they stood for hadgone under.
"But even if I believe you," I said, "the thing is too horrible, andyour tools are too mean; that man who has just gone out and--andCallan--are they the weapons of the inevitable? After all, theRevolution ..." I was striving to get back to tangible ideas--ideas thatone could name and date and label ... "the Revolution was noble inessence and made for good. But all this of yours is too vile and toopetty. You are bribing, or something worse, that man to betray hismaster. And that you call helping on the inevitable...."
"They used to say just that of the Revolution. That wasn't nice of itstools. Don't you see? They were the people that went under.... Theycouldn't see the good...."
"And I--I am to take it on trust," I said, bitterly.
"You couldn't see the good," she answered, "it isn't possible, and thereis no way of explaining. Our languages are different, and there's nobridge--no bridge at all. We _can't_ meet...."
It was that revolted me. If there was no bridge and we could not meet,we must even fight; that is, if I believed her version of herself. If Idid not, I was being played the fool with. I preferred to think that. Ifshe were only fooling me she remained attainable. If it was as she said,there was no hope at all--not any.
"I don't believe you," I said, suddenly. I didn't want to believe her.The thing was too abominable--too abominable for words, and incredible.I struggled against it as one struggles against inevitable madness,against the thought of it. It hung over me, stupefying, deadening. Onecould only fight it with violence, crudely, in jerks, as one strugglesagainst the numbness of frost. It was like a pall, like descendingclouds of smoke, seemed to be actually present in the absurdly loftyroom--this belief in what she stood for, in what she said she stood for.
"I don't believe you," I proclaimed, "I won't.... You are playing thefool with me ... trying to get round me ... to make me let you go onwith these--with these--It is abominable. Think of what it means for me,what people are saying of me, and I am a decent man--You shall not. Doyou understand, you _shall_ not. It is unbearable ... and you ... youtry to fool me ... in order to keep me quiet ..."
"Oh, no," she said. "Oh, no."
She had an accent that touched grief, as nearly as she could touch it. Iremember it now, as one remembers these things. But then I passed itover. I was too much moved myself to notice it more than subconsciously,as one notices things past which one is whirled. And I was whirled pastthese things, in an ungovernable fury at the remembrance of what I hadsuffered, of what I had still to suffer. I was speaking with intenserage, jerking out words, ideas, as floodwater jerks through a sluicethe _debris_ of once ordered fields.
"You are," I said, "you _are_--you--you--dragging an ancient namethrough the dust--you ..."
I forget what I said. But I remember, "dragging an ancient name." Itstruck me, at the time, by its forlornness, as part of an appeal to her.It was so pathetically tiny a motive, so out of tone, that it stuck inmy mind. I only remember the upshot of my speech; that, unless sheswore--oh, yes, swore--to have done with de Mersch, I would denounce herto my aunt at that very moment and in that very house.
And she said that it was impossible.