The Raft
confessional. She recalled the dreamy Oxford days, with their desperate
dreams of love, when life was unexperienced. She even spoke of the great
disillusion that had followed; she spoke in general terms to include all
wives and husbands. She spoke of Waffles as he had been, only that she
might praise him as he had become. Her fierce loyalty to him, her
wilful consistency in shutting her eyes to his faults, was a form of
self-respect which never faltered. Nan found a difficulty in pretending
that he was all that was claimed for him; they both knew that he was
not. Still, she was convinced that he was mending.
Barrington, noticing the change in Jehane, said, “There are only two
things that could do it: money or love. It isn't love, so we have to
believe that it's----”
But it was love--love for Barrington and the effect of being near him.
Even she herself wondered at how the old infatuation had lasted. Her
very bitterness had been a form of love. Now that he went out of his
way to be kind to her all the passion in her responded--but she had to
disguise its response.
At night, with another man's child in her arms, she lay awake. In
the darkness and silence she told herself stories, juggling with
circumstances.
Once she heard a tapping on her door. She crouched against the wall,
shuddering.
The handle turned. Nan stood on the threshold. “I thought I heard you
moving.”
Guilty and angry, Jehane said nothing. Nan groped her way toward the bed
and found it empty.
“Jehane, Janey,” she called.
Then she saw her, stooped to her and caught her in her arms, begging for
an explanation. Just as once, when she had asserted, “Jehane I _did_,
I _did_ play fair,” so now she got no answer--only, “I'm stupid, dear;
I'll be better in the morning.”
Cold with alarm, Nan crept downstairs and hid herself in Billy's
arms. He was too sleepy to give the matter much attention. “She's odd,
darling. Never understood her. Poor old Ocky!”
The intoxication and the madness were gone. Fear had come. Any moment
they might guess. With fear came contrition: she would idolize her
husband more, till he became for her the man he was not. Next morning
she surprised Nan by announcing that she was homesick for Ocky, that her
things were packed and she would return to Sand-port at once. There
was no dissuading her. In her heart she had determined to wipe out her
faithlessness by educating her husband into largeness by love.
When the train had moved out of the station Billy stared at Nan puzzled.
“Really does look as if she'd grown fond of him! Eh what?”
Nan squeezed his arm. “Perhaps she always was fond of him and we were
sceptics.”
“She may be now. She wasn't.”
“Is it because he's got money?”
“Does make a difference, doesn't it?”
Nan pressed against him and looked up laughing. “Between you and me it
wouldn't.”
“Think not?”
“Never.”
Hidden in a cab, he caught her to him. “You darling!” She held him from
her, blushing. “But why now? What's this for?”
“Jehane makes me thankful for what I've got.”
That evening a man moved along the Terrace, halted as though he were
minded to turn back, moved on and at last knocked at Barrington's door.
While he waited he mopped his forehead; his manner was furtive.
Once inside the hall he became important, handing his card with a
flourish. Left alone while the maid announced his presence, he fiddled
with his necktie and twisted his soaped mustaches.
Barrington burst in on him. “Anything the matter, old man?”
“Matter? 'Course not.”
“Didn't you know that Jehane went home this morning?”
“Got your telegram just as I was leaving. Had business in London.
Couldn't put it off.”
“Must have been important. She'll be disappointed.”
“It was.”
“Suppose it's too late for you to start to-night?” Barrington pulled
out his watch. “Humph! Stop with us, won't you?--Had dinner?--All right.
Let's go out. Nan's in the garden.”
What was it that had brought him? Barrington kept asking himself that
question. As usual, Ocky was voluble and plausible, but---- His high
spirits were forced; he avoided the eye when watched. He rattled on
about the possibilities of Sandport. He talked of the friends he had
made--men whom Barrington guessed to be of no importance. He repeated
his friends' hilarious stories, “Here's a good one John told me----” It
was Ocky who discovered the humor in the story and laughed.
Trees grew more dense against the dark. Lights in houses were
extinguished. The roar of London, like a voice wearied of quarreling,
which mumbled vexatiously in a last retort, sank away into silence. But
this tireless voice at his side went on, babbling of nothing, talking
and talking.
Nan rose. “I'm sleepy. You'll excuse me, won't you? Billy, darling,
don't be long.”
Ocky refilled his foul pipe--with a pipe between his teeth he felt
fortified.
Barrington waited for him to reach his point--there _was_ a point he
felt sure. Ocky's visits always had an ulterior motive.
“Everything all right at Madeira Lodge?”
“Topping.”
“And the land investment?”
“Fine.”
“Then what brought you?”
Ocky was as shocked as if a gun had been fired in his face. The
question was unkind. He'd tried to be sociable and to stave off
unpleasantness--and this was the thanks he got. He squirmed uneasily;
the wicker-chair creaked, betraying his agitation.
“That's a rotten thing to say to a fellow, Billy. What brought me,
indeed!”
It was Barrington's turn to shift in his chair. He hated to be called
Billy by Waffles. The offence was repeated.
“You're confoundedly direct, Billy. Whenever I visit you, you always
think I've come to get something.”
“And haven't you?” Barrington's voice was hard. “Well, I have, now you
mention it.”
A pause.
Barrington lost patience. “Why can't you get it out like a man? You've
done something while Jehane's been away--something that made you afraid
to meet her. Haven't you?”
“Jehane!---- In a sense it's her doing. Don't see why she should make me
afraid.”
“Her doing! In what way?”
Ocky struck a match; finding his pipe empty, he held the match till it
burnt his fingers. “I'm not blaming Jehane, but it _is_ her doing up to
a point. She wants money to dress her girls up to the nines. She wants
money to make the house look stylish. If it hadn't been for Jehane, I
should never have left old Wagstaff's office. Mind, I'm not blaming her.
But where was the money to come from?”
“You let her believe you were making it.”
“Eh? So I was. So I shall if I can only get time.”
“Where'd you get the money she's already had?”
“It's her money that I invested for her.”
“You've been living on the principal--is that it? On the money that
should have gone to Glory.”
The tension proved too great for Ocky. A joke might relieve the
situation. “Seems to me that's where it's gone.” When no laugh followed
he hastened to add, “Financial pressure. Of course I'm sorry.” Then, “I
want you to lend me enough to tide me over.”
“I've been tiding you over all your life. You'll have to tell her. When
you've told her, I'll see what I can do once more.”
For the first time that evening the foolish tone of banter went out of
the weak man's voice.
“For God's sake! Don't make me do that. You don't know what a punishment
you're inventing. D'you know what that'd do to her?--kill what little
love she has for me. She'd hate me. She'd despise me even more than she
does already. I've got to live with her. Oh, my God!”
Barrington drew back into the shadow. He was deeply moved, and ashamed
of it.
The other man, goaded deeper into sincerity by his silence, continued,
pleading brokenly.
“You can't understand. Between you and Nan it's always been different.
You're strong and she's so tender. But I--I'm weak. I try to do right,
but I'm everlastingly in the wrong. I've had to crawl for every scrap of
love my wife ever gave me. She's thrown it at me like a bone to a
dog. I'm a poor flimsy devil. I know it. We never ought to have
married--she's too splendid. But she's all I've got. I thought--I
thought if I could take her money and double it, she'd respect me at
last--believe me clever. I did make money for her at first. I saw what a
difference it made. Then I lost. I was afraid to tell her, so went on.
I thought I'd win if I tried again. And she--after the first time, she
expected the extra money from me. Little by little it all went. But
don't make me tell her.”
“Then it wasn't lost in land speculation?”
“Part, but most in stocks bought on margins. My life's been hell for the
past six months. Don't make me tell her.”
Barrington rose. “It's late. I'll let you know to-morrow. You must give
me a complete list of your indebtedness. Whatever I decide, I think you
ought not to deceive Je---- And, by the way, say the thing you mean when
we talk of this to-morrow. Say _give_, instead of _lend_. I prefer
frankness.”
That “whatever I decide” told Ocky his battle was won. One night's sleep
placed all his dread behind him. His lack of self-respect permitted him
to recuperate rapidly. Early in the morning he was up and in the garden,
whistling cheerfully as though he had suffered no humiliation. Peter
heard him and ran to greet him. For an hour before breakfast they
exchanged secrets and Peter, in a burst of confidence, initiated his
uncle into the mystery of the loft.
“A fine place to hide, Peter?”
“Rather.”
“And you never told anyone before?”
“No one.”
“And you told me! Well, what d'you know about that? You must be somehow
fond of this poor old uncle.”
Peter's father heard them laughing and was annoyed. His night had been
restless. He was still more irritated when, on entering the stable, he
found Ocky with his arm round Peter's shoulder. In the sunlight he saw
at a glance how his cousin had deteriorated. His gait was more slouchy,
his expression more furtive, his teeth more broken with constant biting
on the pipe. His attempts at smartness--the soaped mustaches and the
dusty spats--were wretchedly offensive; they were so ineffectually
pretentious.
The weak man's hand commenced to fumble in his pocket as Barrington's
eyes searched him.
“Where's my baccy? Must have dropped it. Seen my pouch anywhere, Peter?”
“It's in your hand, uncle.” Peter went off into a peal of laughter.
“Surely you can do without smoking till after breakfast.”
Peter's laugh stopped, cut short by the sternness in his father's voice.
In his study, an hour later, Barrington asked, “You're sure there's
nothing else? There's no good in my giving you anything unless you make
a clean breast to me. And mind, this is absolutely the last time I save
you. From this moment you've got to go on your own.”
“On my honor, Billy, there's nothing.”
Ocky had a constitutional weakness for lies; so he told one now when it
hindered his purpose.
Barrington eyed him doubtfully. “If you've not told me the truth, Jehane
shall know all.”
“Can't pledge you more than my honor, Billy.”
The check was signed. He had gained a new lease on life. His contrition
left him, expelled by his fatal optimism. He was again a facetious dog,
whose paltry mistakes lay in the distant past. At parting he tipped
Peter a pound, with characteristic careless generosity. As he walked
down the Terrace, he tilted his hat to a more jaunty angle. On his
way to the station he bought some flashy jewelry for Jehane and the
children. Long before he reached Sand-port, he had so far risen in his
own estimation that he thought of himself as a bold financier, who had
done a most excellent stroke of business in an incredibly short space
of time. As for Barrington--oh, he'd always been narrowminded. The money
was a loan that he'd soon pay back.
As he approached Madeira Lodge, Jehane was watering flowers in the