If Only etc. Part 8

She laughed recklessly.

"Oh, as to that--what is the good of looking back, anyhow? I have and I haven't--when I have been sick it has been awful lonesome. You didn't grieve much, that's certain. And you got your t.i.tle soon after I went. It was lucky for you. Scot! I should have been Lady Chetwynd if I had stopped with you, wouldn't I?"

"You would have been an honest woman."

"Ah!" She rose from her chair and looked curiously round the room. "I remember those bronzes," she said; "they used to hang in your little library in the old house. You are a good deal changed in the face; your manner is just the same. You were always a good fellow, I will say that. I know it better than I used to now I have had so--since I have been--"

"Hush--the past is dead. I was not so patient and tender with you as I should have been."

"You saw that--you had made a mistake, but you tried to hide how sorry you were--I know you did that and I--well, I didn't marry you to make you sorry. Do you know how we lived--he and I, when I left you? He took me to Paris; and didn't we make the dollars spin, the pair of us--rather; and then one fine morning we heard a beastly bank had gone smash and he had lost pretty well all he had got."

"And you left him?"

A smile curled the corners of her mouth.

"No," she said, slowly; "I didn't. We took two little rooms over a baker's shop in the High Street, Islington, and I stuck to him. I used to go out in an evening and do the marketing with a hand basket, to get it cheap. When we wanted a change we would take a bus to the Park and look at the swells across the railings; and sometimes Saidie gave us tickets for the theatres. Seems odd, don't it? but it's a fact. I was livelier then than ever I've been in my life. While he was fond of me--he showed me he was fond of me, you see."

"You were capable of love, then, after all?" he said bitterly.

"I don't know. I loved the freedom I think, anyway, and perhaps I took him with it. I don't know! what does it matter? It was a release for you and you are glad that it happened, eh? now that the shame of it is forgotten? We were never suited to each other, were we?"

"Why speak of what is past?"

"You see, if I had remained with you I should have been no happier,"

said Bella, reflectively; "you expected too much from me."

"I did my best to make you happy."

"Yes, perhaps! then if I had been more grateful and different, would you be glad if I was with you still?"

"I cannot answer that question. I loved you--I had no thought for any human being outside yourself."

"But now," she persisted, "now that the wound is old, do you not say to yourself, 'it was better so'? Suppose that you and I were still what we were once to each other, would you be happy to know that I was your wife to-day?"

"I beg you to be silent. It is impossible that we can discuss such a question."

She came close to his chair.

"I am," she said with a sort of feverish eagerness, "no more of a lady now than I was then. I am just what I used to be when I made you ashamed of my ignorance and my mistakes. But if I were pure, if I had never been divorced, if I were standing here your faithful wife, would you be glad?"

"Hus.h.!.+ You are paining yourself and me."

"Jack!"

"For G.o.d's sake be still!"

She fell on her knees beside him.

"Jack, say you would be glad."

"If you had never left me, if you had remained my faithful wife, heaven knows that I should be a happier man!"

Bella burst into tears and sobbed convulsively, then pressed her handkerchief to her mouth. It was bright with blood when she withdrew it.

"Oh, be careful of yourself," said John Chetwynd, terribly moved; "you must do what I advise."

"I'll try. I wonder why you should care one way or the other. It is more than I deserve--you make me so sorry and ashamed. I shall never see you any more, shall I?"

"I cannot."

"No; I understand, I ought not to ask you. Well, good-bye. There is my address if you should take a notion to come. It is only a six months' engagement over here, and if I'm not long for this wicked world, I may not live to finish it. Keep my card. If one day you should feel that you could come--just once. You don't hate me?"

"Hate you? No."

"I dare not ask you to forgive; but I begin to know and feel what my action towards you really meant. Jack, see I am on my knees. Forgive me!"

"I do. I forgive. If I was hard to you; if, as you say, I expected and exacted too much from you, may G.o.d forgive me."

The tears were still raining down Bella's cheeks.

"Kiss me, Jack."

He shrank back. "You must not ask me that. I cannot."

"Is it that you despise me so utterly?"

"No, no; you don't understand. I--"

"Kiss me."

"Why do you make me speak? I am going to be married again. I kissed her--a young girl--in this room half an hour ago. I could not outrage her trust in me."

A sort of stung expression came into the face of the kneeling woman and she staggered to her feet.

"You are going to take another wife! My G.o.d! I never thought--I never dreamt. It seemed so--so--impossible. I hope she will make you happier than I did."

"Oh, hush, hus.h.!.+"

"She is one of your own cla.s.s--a lady? What is her name?"

"I would rather not mention it. Give me your hand and let us part in peace."

"Tell it me," she pleaded. "What name do you call her by?"

"Ethel."

"Ethel and Bella. Ah, Ethel is far the nicer name. We didn't think once that you would ever be telling me you were going to be married to someone else, did we? It feels queer, and it hurts me--a little, I think. Good-bye, Jack. I see now why you could not kiss me--it would not be right of you. She is a young girl and she might find it hard to forgive you if she knew. I am going. You used to have a bell on your table, I recollect, with a little white k.n.o.b that you pressed when Mary was to go to the hall door. Do you use it still? Oh, I see.

Let me press it instead of you, may I? I sha'n't feel so much as if you were turning me out. Good-bye." She said the word lingeringly, tenderly. "Say 'Bella' once again, for the sake of old times."