The Stronger Influence Part 26

"I don't know how to tell you," he added. "But the thing has got to be faced. Your body was found, and identified by your brother-in-law.

You've been dead these many years. And your wife--"

"Yes?" Hallam said, in a tone of deadly quiet.

"Your wife married again, and is living in Uitenhage."

Book 4--CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE.

Hallam recoiled from the news of Esme's marriage as a man might recoil from the effects of a blow. The thing staggered him. His first thought was to disappear again, to walk away from Huntley's office, and turn his back for ever on the country which was home to him no longer and held no place for him. He felt dazed with grief and anger. The thought of Esme as the wife of another man was intolerable. He could not reconcile it with his knowledge of her that she should seek consolation elsewhere.

It was like some hideous nightmare, some terrible hoax, that was being practised on him for the purpose of torturing him.

He could not determine how to act in the circ.u.mstances; he could not think; his mind was blank with despair. And then jealousy awoke; his thoughts gained stimulus, and worked in a new direction along fines that were fiercely personal and possessive in outlook. After all, she was his wife. This man had no claim on her; she belonged to him. He was not going to allow any one to hold what was lawfully his.

This sense of urgency to resume possession spurred him to a fever of aggressive activity, in which mood, and with the settled purpose of interviewing his brother-in-law, he went round to Port Elizabeth, and called on Jim Bainbridge at the latter's place of business as soon as he arrived.

To say that Jim Bainbridge was amazed at the sight of him, were to express his emotions as inadequately as it would be to describe a violent explosion as disquieting to the unfortunate persons within the affected area: the effect on him was rather similar to the effects of an explosion; he was literally bowled over on beholding a dead man returned to the world of the living. Had he been given to the cult of the supernatural he would have imagined that he saw Paul Hallam's ghost, when Hallam walked into his office. But he did not believe in ghosts; and there was something uncomfortably lifelike in the hostile gleam of Hallam's eyes, as he turned from shutting the door and regarded the man seated in his swivel-chair, with jaw dropped, and with protruding eyes which stared back at him stupidly.

"Oh h.e.l.l!" muttered Jim Bainbridge, and collapsed in his seat in a crumpled heap.

Hallam advanced deliberately, and seated himself opposite his dumbfounded brother-in-law.

"I knew I was bound to give you an unpleasant surprise," he said, "so I didn't make an appointment. I've come for news of my wife."

Bainbridge's jaw dropped lower in his increasing consternation. The man's florid countenance had turned the colour of putty.

"Your--Oh lord!"

The words gurgled in his throat. He gripped the arms of his chair and attempted to sit up straighter and to get control of himself. Compared with his nervous collapse the calm of Hallam's demeanour was remarkable.

"Look here," he muttered, fumbling for words, his bewildered gaze fixed upon the other's face. "Don't you try to rush things. I've got to get used to this idea. I'm all abroad. When a man has been missing for years one doesn't expect to see him walk in as if he had been away on a holiday. What in h.e.l.l do you mean by turning up here after all this time? Where've you been? Man, you were found--dead--and buried.

There's a stone erected to your memory out on the veld beyond Bulawayo.

You've no right to disappear and turn up again after six years. It's indecent."

"It's awkward, I admit," Hallam returned grimly, and regarded the other sternly with the angry light of accusation in his keen eyes. "I want an explanation of your reasons for swearing falsely to my ident.i.ty. You buried another man under my name--why?"

"Paul, I swear I thought it was you--believe me, or not, as you will."

Suddenly Bainbridge turned with quick suspicion in his look, and smote the arm of his chair fiercely. "You put that trick on us--to deceive us. Why was that man dressed in your clothes, and carrying your papers?

Poor devil! there wasn't anything else left of him that one could swear to."

"I see. No," Hallam shook his head; "you are on the wrong track. I owe my life to the man you buried--I don't know his name. I don't know how he came by his death. I know nothing about him; save that he came to my aid when I was past aiding myself. Then he left me to the care of natives, and robbed me; left me with his old clothes, and nothing of my own but my boots, which, presumably, didn't fit him. Oddly, he didn't discover that the boots had double soles and were lined with notes. He stole all the money I had on me, which was considerable, and which possibly cost him his life. He did me good service; though through his death he injured me more than he could have done had he murdered me.

It's a grim mistake; and it's going to lead to grim consequences."

Bainbridge stared hard at the speaker.

"The muddle is of your own making," he said sullenly. "Why did you never send a line? Esme fretted her heart out for news of you."

"She soon recovered from her distress," Hallam replied.

"You've heard?"--Bainbridge broke off in his question abruptly.

"That she married Sinclair--yes. That is what I have come to talk over with you."

"Well, look here!" Jim Bainbridge leaned his head on his hand and thought hard. "Why didn't you send a line?" he repeated in tones of exasperation. "Man, don't you see how a word from you would have saved the situation? It's your own fault, Paul. You've brought this on yourself."

"I acknowledge the justice of that. I might have written--in the early days. But, for reasons which Esme alone could appreciate, I refrained from writing then. Later communication became impossible. I went to England and joined up. I didn't mean to join up. But if you'd been on the spot you'd understand the pressing urgency that impelled a man to go. I was among the first batch of prisoners taken by the Germans.

It's a long story anyhow. I'll tell it to her. She will understand."

But that was exactly what Jim Bainbridge intended to dissuade him from doing. The moral rights of the case were too subtle for him to grasp; but he appreciated fully the insuperable difficulties of a readjustment under existing conditions. The lives of three people would be upset and the happiness of none secured. The only way to avoid further muddle was to allow the present muddle to go on. That was how he saw it; and he hoped to persuade Hallam into taking his view.

"Do many people know of your return?" he asked.

Hallam looked surprised.

"Only Huntley and yourself."

"In your place, I should clear out," Bainbridge advised. "Why not leave the country altogether, Paul? I'll keep my mouth shut."

As the drift of his meaning dawned on him, Hallam's face hardened; the grey eyes shone steel-like. Jim Bainbridge, observing him closely, realised that the task he had set himself would prove no easy matter; but he braced himself to fight for the peace of mind of the woman whose happiness hung in the balance.

"You know," he added, after a brief moment for reflection, "your long absence, your silence, amount pretty near to desertion. I don't know much about the blooming divorce laws in this country; but I fancy if we stretched our imaginations a bit we could make out a good case. Clear out, Paul. Make it a case of desertion proper. It's the only decent course to take. You don't want to injure Esme further. Leave her alone."

"And condone a bigamy--in which my own wife is concerned! She _is_ my wife. I will agree to a divorce only if she wishes it."

"Man, can't you see the unnecessary cruelty of letting her know you're alive? She's got used to thinking of you as dead. She's happy."

Bainbridge leaned nearer to him and threw out a protesting hand. "It's hard on you. I admit it's hard on you--d.a.m.ned hard. But--hang it all!--you created the muddle. If it were only a matter of your claim against George's, I wouldn't offer advice; but it isn't. It's a case which would baffle Solomon himself. There's a kid--a baby girl. If I'm not mistaken, the baby's got a stronger claim than either of you two men. Some women are like that. Esme lives for the child."

He broke off, heated by his unusual eloquence, and uncomfortably aware of the expression of black hate on his listener's face. Hallam sat silent, staring straight before him. The news of the child was the last dreg of bitterness in the cup which he was forced to drain. The thought of the child infuriated him, filled him with intolerable jealousy.

Esme, his wife,--with a child--which was not his! The thing would not bear thinking about. And yet it stuck in his thoughts, tormented his thoughts, would not be dismissed however much he strove to thrust it aside. In the moment when Jim Bainbridge let fall this bomb Hallam's feeling for his wife underwent a sudden revulsion. It seemed to him that his love died as surely as if it had never been. It seemed to him, too, though he knew the thought to be an injustice, that the wife he had loved was unworthy, was no better than a light woman. She had consoled herself very speedily. His years of self-discipline had been spent in vain. He had gained a victory over himself at a terrible price--the price of his wife. He had lost the fruits of his labour; even as a man who will sometimes strive, putting all his endeavour into one harvest, to be ruthlessly cheated of the profit of his toil by some unforeseen calamity, such as drought or other disaster. These things happen: it is the throw of the dice of chance.

"You had to know," remarked Jim Bainbridge abruptly, feeling the urgency to say something to end the strained silence which had followed upon his disclosure, and busying himself with his pipe in order to avoid seeing the play of bitter emotion which disfigured the other man's features.

"Some one had to tell you. It complicates matters."

"Yes." Hallam stood up. "I wasn't prepared for this," he said. "I've got to think about it. I'll see you again some other time. If you want me, I'm staying at the 'Grand.'"

"Man, I'm sorry about this," Bainbridge said, and held out his hand.

Hallam did not even see it. Like a man in a trance he turned and walked out of the place.

Book 4--CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO.

Jim Bainbridge whistled. He filled his pipe and lighted it, and let it go out again. He repeated this performance until he had exhausted all the matches in his box; then he put the pipe down and sat back in his seat, with his thumbs in his braces, and cogitated.

It was a h.e.l.l of a mess. No other phrase described the situation so aptly. It _was_ a h.e.l.l of a mess. He could not see how it was to be cleaned up exactly. Why the devil, instead of being taken prisoner, could not the fellow have stopped a bullet? That would have been a creditable finish. Well, he hadn't. He was back again; and it looked as though there was going to be the h.e.l.l of a fuss.

For several minutes Jim Bainbridge ceased from his meditations and coloured the air luridly with the variety and force of his expressions; then he cooled down again, and fell once more into thought. This thing had to be kept from his wife. The fewer the people in possession of the uncomfortable facts the better for the present. There was no need to confess to a cat in the bag until the brute mewed.

It wasn't his affair anyway.

Suddenly he remembered, with a distinct disinclination to face Esme in the circ.u.mstances, that they were dining at the Sinclairs' that night.