The Fruit of the Tree - Edith Wharton (reading well txt) 📗

whole evening. She pushed back her chair, crumpling the letter in her hand; but as she did so, her eyes again fell on her reflection. She could not go to her husband with such a face! If she was not afraid, why did she look like that?

Well--she was afraid! It would be easier and simpler to admit it. She was afraid--afraid for the first time--afraid for her own happiness! She had had just eight months of happiness--it was horrible to think of losing it so soon.... Losing it? But why should she lose it? The letter must have affected her brain...all her thoughts were in a blur of fear.... Fear of what? Of the man who understood her as no one else understood her? The man to whose wisdom and mercy she trusted as the believer trusts in God? This was a kind of abominable nightmare--even Amherst's image had been distorted in her mind! The only way to clear her brain, to recover the normal sense of things, was to go to him now, at once, to feel his arms about her, to let his kiss dispel her fears.... She rose with a long breath of relief.

She had to cross the length of the room to reach his door, and when she had gone half-way she heard him knock.

"May I come in?"

She was close to the fire-place, and a bright fire burned on the hearth.

"Come in!" she answered; and as she did so, she turned and dropped Wyant's letter into the fire. Her hand had crushed it into a little ball, and she saw the flames spring up and swallow it before her husband entered.

It was not that she had changed her mind--she still meant to tell him everything. But to hold the letter was like holding a venomous snake--she wanted to exterminate it, to forget that she had ever seen the blotted repulsive characters. And she could not bear to have Amherst's eyes rest on it, to have him know that any man had dared to write to her in that tone. What vile meanings might not be read between Wyant's phrases? She had a right to tell the story in her own way--the true way....

As Amherst approached, in his evening clothes, the heavy locks smoothed from his forehead, a flower of Cicely's giving in his button-hole, she thought she had never seen him look so kind and handsome.

"Not dressed? Do you know that it's ten minutes to eight?" he said, coming up to her with a smile.

She roused herself, putting her hands to her hair. "Yes, I know--I forgot," she murmured, longing to feel his arms about her, but standing rooted to the ground, unable to move an inch nearer.

It was he who came close, drawing her lifted hands into his. "You look worried--I hope it was nothing troublesome that made you forget?"

The divine kindness in his voice, his eyes! Yes--it would be easy, quite easy, to tell him....

"No--yes--I was a little troubled...." she said, feeling the warmth of his touch flow through her hands reassuringly.

"Dear! What about?"

She drew a deep breath. "The letter----"

He looked puzzled. "What letter?"

"Downstairs...when we came in...it was not an ordinary begging-letter."

"No? What then?" he asked, his face clouding.

She noticed the change, and it frightened her. Was he angry? Was he going to be angry? But how absurd! He was only distressed at her distress.

"What then?" he repeated, more gently.

She looked up into his eyes for an instant. "It was a horrible letter----" she whispered, as she pressed her clasped hands against him.

His grasp tightened on her wrists, and again the stern look crossed his face. "Horrible? What do you mean?"

She had never seen him angry--but she felt suddenly that, to the guilty creature, his anger would be terrible. He would crush Wyant--she must be careful how she spoke.

"I didn't mean that--only painful...."

"Where is the letter? Let me see it."

"Oh, no" she exclaimed, shrinking away.

"Justine, what has happened? What ails you?"

On a blind impulse she had backed toward the hearth, propping her arms against the mantel-piece while she stole a secret glance at the embers. Nothing remained of it--no, nothing.

But suppose it was against herself that his anger turned? The idea was preposterous, yet she trembled at it. It was clear that she must say _something_ at once--must somehow account for her agitation. But the sense that she was unnerved--no longer in control of her face, her voice--made her feel that she would tell her story badly if she told it now.... Had she not the right to gain a respite, to choose her own hour? Weakness--weakness again! Every delay would only increase the phantom terror. Now, _now_--with her head on his breast!

She turned toward him and began to speak impulsively.

"I can't show you the letter, because it's not--not my secret----"

"Ah?" he murmured, perceptibly relieved.

"It's from some one--unlucky--whom I've known about...."

"And whose troubles have been troubling you? But can't we help?"

She shone on him through gleaming lashes. "Some one poor and ill--who needs money, I mean----" She tried to laugh away her tears. "And I haven't any! That's _my_ trouble!"

"Foolish child! And to beg you are ashamed? And so you're letting your tears cool Mr. Langhope's soup?" He had her in his arms now, his kisses drying her cheek; and she turned her head so that their lips met in a long pressure.

"Will a hundred dollars do?" he asked with a smile as he released her.

_A hundred dollars!_ No--she was almost sure they would not. But she tried to shape a murmur of gratitude. "Thank you--thank you! I hated to ask...."

"I'll write the cheque at once."

"No--no," she protested, "there's no hurry."

But he went back to his room, and she turned again to the toilet-table. Her face was painful to look at still--but a light was breaking through its fear. She felt the touch of a narcotic in her veins. How calm and peaceful the room was--and how delicious to think that her life would go on in it, safely and peacefully, in the old familiar way!

As she swept up her hair, passing the comb through it, and flinging it dexterously over her lifted wrist, she heard Amherst cross the floor behind her, and pause to lay something on her writing-table.

"Thank you," she murmured again, lowering her head as he passed.

When the door had closed on him she thrust the last pin into her hair, dashed some drops of Cologne on her face, and went over to the writing-table. As she picked up the cheque she saw it was for three hundred dollars.


XXXIV

ONCE or twice, in the days that followed, Justine found herself thinking that she had never known happiness before. The old state of secure well-being seemed now like a dreamless sleep; but this new bliss, on its sharp pinnacle ringed with fire--this thrilling conscious joy, daily and hourly snatched from fear--this was living, not sleeping!

Wyant acknowledged her gift with profuse, almost servile thanks. She had sent it without a word--saying to herself that pity for his situation made it possible to ignore his baseness. And the days went on as before. She was not conscious of any change, save in the heightened, almost artificial quality of her happiness, till one day in March, when Mr. Langhope announced that he was going for two or three weeks to a friend's shooting-box in the south. The anniversary of Bessy's death was approaching, and Justine knew that at that time he always absented himself.

"Supposing you and Amherst were to carry off Cicely till I come back? Perhaps you could persuade him to break away from work for once--or, if that's impossible, you could take her with you to Hanaford. She looks a little pale, and the change would be good for her."

This was a great concession on Mr. Langhope's part, and Justine saw the pleasure in her husband's face. It was the first time that his father-in-law had suggested Cicely's going to Hanaford.

"I'm afraid I can't break away just now, sir," Amherst said, "but it will be delightful for Justine if you'll give us Cicely while you're away."

"Take her by all means, my dear fellow: I always sleep on both ears when she's with your wife."

It was nearly three months since Justine had left Hanaford--and now she was to return there alone with her husband! There would be hours, of course, when the child's presence was between them--or when, again, his work would keep him at the mills. But in the evenings, when Cicely was in bed--when he and she sat alone, together in the Westmore drawing-room--in Bessy's drawing-room!... No--she must find some excuse for remaining away till she had again grown used to the idea of being alone with Amherst. Every day she was growing a little more used to it; but it would take time--time, and the full assurance that Wyant was silenced. Till then she could not go back to Hanaford.

She found a pretext in her own health. She pleaded that she was a little tired, below par...and to return to Hanaford meant returning to hard work; with the best will in the world she could not be idle there. Might she not, she suggested, take Cicely to Tuxedo or Lakewood, and thus get quite away from household cares and good works? The pretext rang hollow--it was so unlike her! She saw Amherst's eyes rest anxiously on her as Mr. Langhope uttered his prompt assent. Certainly she did look tired--Mr. Langhope himself had noticed it. Had he perhaps over-taxed her energies, left the household too entirely on her shoulders? Oh, no--it was only the New York air...like Cicely, she pined for a breath of the woods.... And so, the day Mr. Langhope left, she and Cicely were packed off to Lakewood.

They stayed there a week: then a fit of restlessness drove Justine back to town. She found an excuse in the constant rain--it was really useless, as she wrote Mr. Langhope, to keep the child imprisoned in an over-heated hotel while they could get no benefit from the outdoor life. In reality, she found the long lonely hours unendurable. She pined for a sight of her husband, and thought of committing Cicely to Mrs. Ansell's care, and making a sudden dash for Hanaford. But the vision of the long evenings in the Westmore drawing-room again restrained her. No--she would simply go back to New York, dine out occasionally, go to a concert or two, trust to the usual demands of town life to crowd her hours with small activities.... And in another week Mr. Langhope would be back and the days would resume their normal course.

On arriving, she looked feverishly through the letters in the hall. None from Wyant--that fear was allayed! Every day added to her reassurance. By this time, no doubt, he was on his feet again, and ashamed--unutterably ashamed--of the threat that despair had wrung from him. She felt almost sure that his shame would keep him from ever attempting to see her, or even from writing again.

"A gentleman called to see you yesterday, madam--he would give no name," the parlour-maid said. And there was the sick fear back on her again! She could hardly control the trembling of her lips as she asked: "Did he leave no message?"

"No, madam: he only wanted to know when you'd be back."

She longed to return: "And