It flashed and went out. He smiled a bashful smile, sighed:
“Pah! Foolishness. You ought to know better,” he said, more sad than annoyed. “But I forgot that you never knew Captain Anthony,” he added indulgently.
I reminded him that I knew Mrs Anthony; even before he—an old friend now—had ever set eyes on her. And as he told me that Mrs Anthony had heard of our meetings I wondered whether she would care to see me. Mr Powell volunteered no opinion then; but next time we lay in the creek he said, “She will be very pleased. You had better go to-day.”
The afternoon was well advanced before I approached the cottage. The amenity of a fine day in its decline surrounded me with a beneficent, a calming influence; I felt it in the silence of the shady lane, in the pure air, in the blue sky. It is difficult to retain the memory of the conflicts, miseries, temptations and crimes of men’s self-seeking existence when one is alone with the charming serenity of the unconscious nature. Breathing the dreamless peace around the picturesque cottage I was approaching, it seemed to me that it must reign everywhere, over all the globe of water and land and in the hearts of all the dwellers on this earth.
Flora came down to the garden-gate to meet me, no longer the perversely tempting, sorrowful, wisp of white mist drifting in the complicated bad dream of existence: Neither did she look like a forsaken elf. I stammered out stupidly, “Again in the country, Miss ... Mrs..” She was very good, returned the pressure of my hand, but we were slightly embarrassed. Then we laughed a little. Then we became grave.
I am no lover of day-breaks. You know how thin, equivocal, is the light of the dawn. But she was now her true self, she was like a fine tranquil afternoon—and not so very far advanced either. A woman not much over thirty, with a dazzling complexion and a little colour, a lot of hair, a smooth brow, a fine chin, and only the eyes of the Flora of the old days, absolutely unchanged.
In the room into which she led me we found a Miss Somebody—I didn’t catch the name,—an unobtrusive, even an indistinct, middle-aged person in black. A companion. All very proper. She came and went and even sat down at times in the room, but a little apart, with some sewing. By the time she had brought in a lighted lamp I had heard all the details which really matter in this story. Between me and her who was once Flora de Barral the conversation was not likely to keep strictly to the weather.
The lamp had a rosy shade; and its glow wreathed her in perpetual blushes, made her appear wonderfully young as she sat before me in a deep, high-backed armchair. I asked:
“Tell me what is it you said in that famous letter which so upset Mrs Fyne, and caused little Fyne to interfere in this offensive manner?”
“It was simply crude,” she said earnestly. “I was feeling reckless and I wrote recklessly. I knew she would disapprove and I wrote foolishly. It was the echo of her own stupid talk. I said that I did not love her brother but that I had no scruples whatever in marrying him.”
She paused, hesitating, then with a shy half-laugh:
“I really believed I was selling myself, Mr Marlow. And I was proud of it. What I suffered afterwards I couldn’t tell you; because I only discovered my love for my poor Roderick through agonies of rage and humiliation. I came to suspect him of despising me; but I could not put it to the test because of my father. Oh! I would not have been too proud. But I had to spare poor papa’s feelings. Roderick was perfect, but I felt as though I were on the rack and not allowed even to cry out. Papa’s prejudice against Roderick was my greatest grief. It was distracting. It frightened me. Oh! I have been miserable! That night when my poor father died suddenly I am certain they had some sort of discussion, about me. But I did not want to hold out any longer against my own heart! I could not.”
She stopped short, then impulsively:
“Truth will out, Mr Marlow.”
“Yes,” I said.
She went on musingly.
“Sorrow and happiness were mingled at first like darkness and light. For months I lived in a dusk of feelings. But it was quiet. It was warm...”
Again she paused, then going back in her thoughts. “No! There was no harm in that letter. It was simply foolish. What did I know of life then? Nothing. But Mrs Fyne ought to have known better. She wrote a letter to her brother, a little later. Years afterwards Roderick allowed me to glance at it. I found in it this sentence: ‘For years I tried to make a friend of that girl; but I warn you once more that she has the nature of a heartless adventuress’ ... ‘Adventuress!’ repeated Flora slowly. ‘So be it. I have had a fine adventure.’”
“It was fine, then,” I said interested.
“The finest in the world! Only think! I loved and I was loved, untroubled, at peace, without remorse, without fear. All the world, all life were transformed for me. And how much I have seen! How good people were to me! Roderick was so much liked everywhere. Yes, I have known kindness and safety. The most familiar things appeared lighted up with a new light, clothed with a loveliness I had never suspected. The sea itself! ... You are a sailor. You have lived your life on it. But do you know how beautiful it is, how strong, how charming, how friendly, how mighty...”
I listened amazed and touched. She was silent only a little while.
“It was too good to last. But nothing can rob me of it now... Don’t think that I repine. I am not even sad now. Yes, I have been happy. But I remember also the time when I was unhappy beyond endurance, beyond desperation. Yes. You remember that. And later on, too. There was a time on board the
“Excellent fellow,” I said warmly. “You see him often?”
“Of course. I hardly know another soul in the world. I am alone. And he has plenty of time on his hands. His aunt died a few years ago. He’s doing nothing, I believe.”
“He is fond of the sea,” I remarked. “He loves it.”
“He seems to have given it up,” she murmured.
“I wonder why?”
She remained silent. “Perhaps it is because he loves something else better,” I went on. “Come, Mrs Anthony,
