Helen Vardon's confession
Just consider, Helen, what it is that we give up. It is the happiness
of a whole life-time. The abiding joy of the sweetest, the most
sympathetic companionship that is possible to a man and a woman. For
though we are lovers, we are still friends, and friends we shall
remain until death parts us. Our tastes, our interests, our sympathies
make us prefer one another as companions to all other human beings. Of
how many married couples can this be said? To us has been given that
perfect comradeship that makes married life an enduring delight, a
state of happiness without a cloud or a blemish. And this is what we
give up if we let this disability, this technical impediment, hinder
us from marrying.
“On the other hand, supposing we marry and dispense with the
formalities, what do we give up? Virtually nothing. The legal security
is of no value to us, for each of us is secure in the constancy of the
other. If we enter into a covenant, we shall abide by it, not by
compulsion, but because we shall never wish to break it. As to the
legal status and the social recognition, is it conceivable that two
sane persons should give up a life’s happiness for such trumpery?
Surely it is not. No, Helen, let us boldly take our destiny into our
own hands. Let us publicly denounce this sham marriage and cancel it
for ever. I ask you, dearest, to give me the woman of my heart for my
mate, my friend, my wife, for ever; to take me, unworthy as I am, for
your husband, who will try, as long as he draws the breath of life, to
make up to you by love and worship for what you have sacrificed to
make him happy.”
As I listened to Jasper’s appeal--delivered with quiet but impressive
earnestness--I think I was half disposed to yield. It was not only
that I admired the skill with which he put his case and the virile,
masterful way in which he trampled down the obstructing conventions;
but deep down in my heart I felt that he was right--that his
separation of the things that really mattered from those that were
trivial and inessential was true and just. But there was this vital
difference between us; that he was a man and I was a woman. Our
estimates of the value of the conventions were not the same. Without
the legal sanction I might be his wife in all that was real; but the
world would call me his mistress.
“Jasper, dear,” I said, “it is impossible. I admit the truth of all
that you have said, and I wish--Oh! Jasper, _how_ I wish, that I could
accept the happiness that you offer me! You need not tell me that our
companionship would be a delight for ever. I know it. But it cannot
be. Even if I could accept it for myself, I could not accept it for
you; I could not bear to think that, through me, you had been put
outside the pale of decent society. For that is what it would mean.
You--a gentleman of honour and reputation--would become a social
outcast, a man who was living with another man’s wife; who, if he were
admitted at all to the society of his own class, would have to be
introduced with explanations and excuses.”
“I think you exaggerate the social consequences, Helen,” said he. “I
propose that we should write to Otway and formally repudiate the
marriage. Then, if we were boldly and openly to state our position and
the exceptional circumstances that had driven us to it, I believe that
we should receive sympathy rather than condemnation. I don’t believe
we should lose a friend; certainly not one whose loss would afflict
us. And Otway could take his remedy, if he cared to.”
“You mean he could divorce me,” I said, with something like a shudder.
“Yes. But I am afraid he wouldn’t.”
“I don’t think he would. But if he did, it would be an undefended
suit, and the stigma of the Divorce Court would be on us for ever.”
“It would be unpleasant, I admit,” he replied. “But think of the
compensations. Think of the joy of being together always, of having
our own home, of going abroad and seeing the world together.”
“Don’t, Jasper!” I entreated. “It is too tantalizing. And even all
this would not compensate me for the knowledge that I had dragged you
from your honourable estate to a condition of social infamy.”
“You need not consider me,” he rejoined. “I have thought the matter
out and am satisfied that I should gain infinitely more than I should
lose; for I should have you, who are much more to me than all the rest
of the world.”
“You haven’t thought of everything, Jasper,” said I. “You know of the
folly I committed at the time of my father’s death--in withholding
facts at the inquest, I mean--and you have excused it and treated it
lightly. But others would view it differently. And now there is this
blackmailer of whom I have told you. At any moment, a serious scandal
may arise; and in that scandal you would be implicated.”
“It wouldn’t matter to me,” said he. “Nothing would matter to me if
only I had you.”
“So you think now. But, Jasper, think of the years to come. Think how
it might be in those years when the social ostracism, the loss of
position and reputation, had grown more and more irksome, if we should
regret what we had done, if we should blame ourselves--even, perhaps,
secretly blame one another----”
“We should never do that, Helen. We should always be loyal. And there
wouldn’t be any social ostracism. At any rate, I am quite clear as to
my own position. I want you for my wife. To get you I would make any
sacrifices and count them as nothing. But that is only my position. It
isn’t necessarily yours--or rather, I should say your sacrifices would
be greater than mine. A woman’s point of view is different from a
man’s.”
“It is, Jasper. I realise fully how essentially reasonable your
proposal is, and I am proud of, and grateful for, the love that has
impelled you to make it. But to me the thing is impossible. That is
the only answer I can give. What it costs me to give that answer--to
refuse the happiness that you offer me, and that I crave for--I cannot
tell you. But even if it breaks my heart to say ‘no,’ still, that must
be my answer.”
For a long time neither of us spoke. As I glanced furtively at Jasper,
the dejection, the profound sadness that was written on his face wrung
my heart and filled me with self-accusation. Why had I not foreseen
this? Why had I, who had nothing to give in return, allowed his
friendship to grow up into love under my eyes? Had I not acted towards
this my dearest friend with the basest selfishness?
Presently he turned to me, and, speaking in quiet, even tones, said:
“It would not be fair for me to make an appeal on my own behalf. I may
not urge you to accept a relation which your feeling and judgment
reject. But one thing I will ask. I have told you what I want; and you
are to remember that I shall always want you. I will ask you to
reflect upon what we have said to-day, and if perchance you should
come to think differently, remember that I am still wanting you, that
I am still asking you, and tell me if you can give me a different
answer. Will you promise me this, Helen?”
“Yes,” I replied, “I promise you, Jasper.”
“Thank you, Helen. And meanwhile we remain friends as we have been?”
“We can never be again as we have been,” said I. “Friendship may turn
to love, but love does not go back to friendship. That is as
impossible as for the fruit to change back into blossom. No, dearest
Jasper; this is the end of our friendship. When we part to-day it must
be farewell.”
“Must it be, Helen? Must we part for ever? Could we not go back to the
old ways and try to forget to-day?”
“I shall never forget to-day, nor will you. For our own peace of mind
we must remain apart and try to avoid meeting one another. It is the
only way, Jasper, hard as it will be.”
I think he agreed with me, for he made no further protest.
“If you say it must be, Helen, then I suppose it must,” he said,
dejectedly. “But it is a hard saying. I don’t dare to think of what
life will be without you.”
“Nor I, Jasper. I know that when I say ‘good-bye’ to you, the sun will
go out of my life and that I can look for no other dawn.”
Again we fell silent for a while; and again I reproached myself for
having let it come to this.
“Don’t you think, Helen,” he said at length, “that we might meet
sometimes, say at fixed intervals--even long intervals, if it must be
so--just that we might feel that we had not really lost one another
completely?”
“But that is what I should wish to avoid. For we have lost one
another. As to me, it has no significance. I have nothing to give and
nothing to lose. I am shackled for life to Mr. Otway. But you have
your life before you, and it would only be fair that I should leave
you free.”
“Free!” he exclaimed. “I am not free and never shall be. Nor do I wish
to be free. I am yours now and for ever. And so I would wish it to be.
We may not be married in any outward form, but we are married in the
most real sense. Our hearts are married. We belong to one another for
ever while we live, and neither of us will ever wish to change. You
know it is so, dearest, don’t you?”
What could I say? He had spoken my own thoughts, had expressed the
wish that I had not dared to acknowledge. Weak and unjust it may have
been, but the thought that in the dark days of our coming separation
we should still be linked, if only by an invisible thread, came as
something like a reprieve. It left just a faint spark of light to
relieve the gloom of the all too sombre future. In the end we agreed
to a monthly letter and a meeting once a year. And so, having fixed
the terms of our sentence, we tried to put our troubles away and make
the best of the few hours that remained before the dreaded farewell.
But despite our efforts to get back to our wonted cheerful
companionship, the swiftly-passing hours were filled with sadness and
heart-ache. Instinctively we went and looked at things and places that
recalled the pleasant jaunts that were to be no more; but ever Black
Care rode behind. It was like the journey of two lovers in a tumbril
that rolled its relentless way towards the guillotine; for at the end
of the day was the parting that would leave us desolate.
And at last the parting was upon us. At the corner of Cable Street we
halted and faced one another. For a few moments we stood in the
gathering gloom, hand clasped in hand. I dared not speak, for my heart
was bursting. Hardly did I dare to look at the man whom I loved so
passionately. And Jasper could but press my hand and murmur huskily a
few broken words of love. And so we parted. With a last pressure of
the hand I turned away and hurried along Cable Street. I did not dare
to look back, though I knew that he was gazing after me; for the
street swam before my eyes and I could barely hold back my sobs.
I did not go straight home. The tumult of emotion sent me hurrying
forward--whither I have no recollection save that somewhere in
Shadwell a pair of friendly policemen turned me back with the remark
that it “was no place for the likes of me.” At length, when the first
storm of grief had passed, and I felt myself under control, I made my
way to Wellclose Square, and pleading the conventional headache,
retired at once to my room.
And there, in quiet and seclusion, with tears that no longer need be
restrained, with solemn rites of grief, I buried my newborn
happiness--the happiness that had died almost in the moment of its
birth.
Chapter XIX.
Illusions and Disillusions
It is a generally accepted belief that of all the remedies for an
aching heart, the most effective is distraction of the mind from the
subject of its affliction. And probably the belief is well founded.
But it usually happens that the sufferer is the last to recognize the
virtues of the remedy, preferring to nurse in solitude a secret grief