Frank Frankfort Moore

“ Have you not heard of the curious charms possessed by rings, Harold—the strange spells which they carry with them? The ring is a mystery—a mystic symbol. It means what has neither beginning nor ending—it means perfection—completeness—it means love—love’s completeness.”
“That is what your ring must mean to us, my beloved,” said he. “Whether you take it from your finger or let it remain there, it will still mean the completeness of such love as is ours.”
“And I am to take it off, Harold?”
“Only so long as you stay at Abbeylands, Beatrice. What does it matter for one week? ”

“ She was in a passion of indignation.
“Edmund Airey and his tricks were defeated,” said Harold in a low voice. “Yes, we have got the better of him, Beatrice, so much is certain.”
“But the cruelty of it—the cruelty—oh, what does it matter now?” she cried. Then her paleness vanished into a delicate roseate flush, as she gave a laugh, and said, “After all, I believe that my indignation is due only to my wounded vanity. Yes, all girls are alike, Harold. Our vanity is our dominant quality.” ”

“ His voice was hoarse and quite unlike the voice that had whispered the lines of Shelley, with his face within the halo of moonlight that had clung about her hair.
She was more frightened still. Her hands were clasped over her heart—the lamplight gleamed upon the blood-red circle of rubies on the one ring that she wore—it had never left her finger.
He came into the room. She only retreated one step.
“For God’s sake, Beatrice, do not call me husband! I am not your husband!”
She came toward him; and now the look of fear that she had worn, became one of sympathy. ”

“ Harold lay back on his chair and laughed at first; then he gazed at her in wonder.
“You are cleverer than Edmund Airey and Helen Craven when they combine their wisdom,” said he. “Your woman’s instinct is worth more than their experience.”
“I never knew what the instincts of a woman were before this morning,” said she. “I never felt that I had any need to exercise the instinct of defence. I suppose the young seal, though it has never been in the water, jumps in by instinct should it be attacked. Oh, yes, I dare say I could swim as well as most girls of my age.” ”

“ Then it was that Helen Craven burst into a long, loud, and very unmusical laugh—a laugh that had a suspicion of a shrill shriek about some of its tones. When she recovered, her eyes were full of the tears which that paroxysm of laughter had caused.
“You are a fool, indeed!” said she. “You are a fool if you cannot see that your career is just beginning. People are talking of you to-day as the Conscientious One—the One Man with a Conscience. Isn’t the reputation for a Conscience the beginning of success in England?” ”

“ That was the one feeling which Harold had on leaving her.
He had scarcely ventured to entertain a hope that the result of his interview with her and of his confession to her would be different.
He knew her.
That was why he had gone to her without hope. He knew that her nature was such as made it impossible for her to understand how he could have practised a fraud upon her; and he knew that understanding is the first step toward forgiving.
Still, there ever pervades the masculine mind an idea that there is no limit to a woman’s forgiveness. ”

“ Supposing that I had been made a fool of by the compact into which you entered with Miss Craven, who would have been to blame? Was there ever a more shameful compact entered into by a clever man and a clever woman to make a victim of a girl who believed that the world was overflowing with sincerity? I was made acquainted with the nature of that compact of yours, Mr. Airey, but I cannot say that I have yet learned what are the terms of your compact—or is it a contract?—with Mrs. Mowbray. Still, I know something. And yet you complain that I have made a fool of you. ”

“ Archie, my lad, the sooner you get down to Abbeylands the better it will be for yourself.”
“I’ll go. Mind you, I don’t cry off when I know the chaps that she asks to supper—I’ll flutter the dimes for anyone I know; but I’m hanged if I do it for the chaps that chip in on her invite. They’ll not draw cards from my pack, Wynne. No, I’ll see them in the port of Hull first. That’s the sort of new potatoes that I am.”
“Give me your hand, Archie,” cried Harold. “I always thought you nothing better than a millionaire, but I find that you’re a man after all.” ”

“ He, at any rate, did not consider the rite a mockery.
Harold could not shake off the feeling that he was acting a part in a dream. When it was all over he dropped into a chair, and his head fell forward until his face was buried in his hands.
It was left for Beatrice to comfort this sufferer in his hour of trial.
Her hand—his mother’s ring was upon the third finger—was upon his head, and he heard her low sympathetic voice saying, “My husband—my husband—I shall be a true wife to you for ever and ever. We shall live trusting one another for ever, my beloved!” ”

“ It was rather ridiculous that anyone so well acquainted with him as Harold was, should make use of a phrase that suggested a doubt of his capacity.
“Women—and their motives?” said he.
“Quite so,” said Harold. “Their motives. You once assured me that there was no such thing as woman in the abstract. Perhaps, assuming that that is your standpoint, you may say that it is ridiculous to talk of the motives of woman; though it would be reasonable—at least as reasonable as most talk of women—to speak of the motives of a woman.” ”

“ Beatrice found herself standing with flushed cheeks and throbbing heart at the door through which her visitor had passed.
It was somewhat remarkable that the most vivid impression which she retained of the rather exciting series of scenes in which she had participated, was that Mrs. Mowbray’s sables were incomparably the finest that she had ever seen.
Mrs. Mowbray could scarcely have driven round the great square before the butler inquired if Miss Avon was at home to Miss Innisfail. ”

“ This was her reflection at the precise moment that Harold’s face was bent down to the face of Beatrice, while he whispered the words that thrilled her.
As for Edmund Airey, he, too, had his thoughts, and, like Helen, he considered himself quite capable of estimating the amount of importance to be attached to such an incident as the murder of Lord Fotheringay, as a factor in the solution of any problem that might suggest itself. A murder is, of course, susceptible of being regarded from a social standpoint. ”

“ The feeling on the part of a man that he has been badly treated by a woman, usually gives him much greater satisfaction than would result from his being extremely well treated by the same, or, indeed, by any other woman.
But this blessed consciousness of being badly treated was denied to Harold Wynne. He had been the ill-treater, not the ill-treated. He reflected how he had taken advantage of the peculiar circumstances of the girl’s life—upon the absence of her father—upon her own trustful innocence—to carry out the fraud which he had perpetrated upon her. ”

“ Is there any man in the county that can show as bright a pair of handcuffs as myself, sergeant? You know.”
“Show them now,” said the sergeant.
“You’ll have to come to the house with me, for there they be to be,” replied the constable. “Ay, but I’ve my truncheon.”
“Which way am I to go with you?” said Harold. “You don’t think that I’m such a fool as to make the attempt to resist you? I can’t remain here all day. Every moment is precious.” ”

“ Did you get into a carriage that had a lamp, sir?”
“I’ve seen some bungling at railway stations before now,” said Harold, “but bang me if I ever met the equal of this.”
“This isn’t properly speaking a station, sir, it’s a junction,” said the official, mildly, but with the force of a man who has said the last word.
“That simply means that greater bungling may be found at a junction than at a station,” said Harold. “Is it not customary to give some notice of the departure of a train at a junction as well as a station, my good man?” ”

“ The sequence of the phrases had not been the result of art or thought.
He had clearly under-estimated the effect of his own personality upon an impressionable girl who had a great historian for a father. The days that he had passed by her side—carrying out the compact which he had made with Helen Craven—had produced an impression upon her far more powerful than he had believed it possible to produce within so short a space of time. ”

“ Archie looked disappointed. “All? Isn’t it enough?” said Harold. “Why, you’re in luck if you let her discover you. I knew that her atheists couldn’t hold out. She used them up too quickly. One should he economical of one’s genuine atheists nowadays.”
“Great Godfrey! does she take me for an atheist?” shouted Archie.
“Did you ever hear of an atheist shooting pheasants?” said Harold. “Not likely. An atheist is a man that does nothing except talk, and talks about nothing except himself. Now, you’re asked to the shoot, aren’t you?” ”

“ Oh, Beatrice, do not allow yourself to be carried away by this caprice. It is unworthy of you.”
“Do not be too hard on me, I am only a woman,” said she, very meekly.
She was only a woman. He felt that very strongly as he walked away.
And yet he had told Harold that he had great hope of Woman, by reason of her femininity.
And yet he had told Harold that he understood Woman and her motives.
“Papa,” said Beatrice, from the door of the historian’s study. “Papa, Mr. Edmund Airey has just been here to ask me to marry him.” ”

“ It may be years before we can live together as those who love one another as we love, may live with the good will of heaven. I only want you to become my wife in name, dearest. Our marriage must be kept a secret. ”

“ Lampson.
“What’s the meaning of what?” said Harold. “Have you got beyond the restraint of Mr. Playdell alcoholically, that you ask me what’s the meaning of that envelope?”
“I mean what does the inside mean?” said Archie.
“I’m sure you know better than I do, if you’ve read what’s inside it.”
“Oh, you’re like one of the tarty chips in the courts that cross-examine other tarty chips until their faces are blue,” said Archie. “There’s no show for that sort of thing here. So just open the envelope and see what’s inside.”
“How can I do that and eat my kidneys?” said Harold. ”

“ Thus it is that men and women make (occasionally) excellent companions for one another, and live together (frequently) in harmony.
Thus it was that, in spite of the fact that his reason and his knowledge of the nature of Beatrice assured him that his confession of the fraud in which he had participated against her would not be forgiven by her, there still remained in the mind of Harold Wynne a shadowy hope that she might yet be as other women, who, understanding much, forgive much.
He left her presence, feeling that she was no as other women are. ”

“ She gave a little laugh—did he detect something of scorn in its ring?—as she said, “Oh, no; it is the sound of the greater ocean that we have about us here. It is the tide of the affairs of men that flows around us.”
No, her laugh could have had nothing of scorn about it.
“I cannot think of you as borne about on this full tide,” said he. “I see you with your feet among the purple heather—I wonder if there was a sprig of white about it—along the shores of the Irish lough. I see you in the midst of a flood of sunset-light flowing from the west, making the green one red.” ”

“ I give you my word, Wynne, I never spoke a sentence to Miss Avon that all the world mightn’t hear. Oh, there’s nothing so contemptible as a man like Airey—a fellow who is attracted to a girl only when he sees that she is attracting other men. Yes, I met a man yesterday who told me that Airey was in town. ‘Why should he be in town now?’ I inquired. ‘There’s nothing going on in town.’ He winked and said, ‘cherchez la femme’—he did upon my word. Oh, the days of the Government are numbered. ”

“ For God’s sake tell me if what this man says is true—is Lord Fotheringay dead—murdered?”
“He’s dead. You seem to know a lot about it, my gentleman,” said the sergeant. “You’re charged with his murder. If you make any attempt at resistance, I’ll shoot you down like a dog.”
The man had now his revolver is his right hand. Harold looked first at him, and then at the foolish man with the truncheon. He was amazed. What could the men mean? How was it that they did not touch their helmets to him? He had never yet been addressed by a policeman or a railway porter without such a token of respect. ”

“ What’s the matter with the letter, Archie, my lad?”
“It’s all right,” said Archie. “It’s an invite from your sister for a big shoot at Abbeylands. What does it mean—that’s what I’d like to know? Does it mean that decent people are going to make me the apple of their eye, after all?”
“I don’t think it goes quite so far as that,” said Harold. “I expect it means that my sister has come to the end of her discoveries and she’s forced to fall back on you.” ”

“ Indeed, Lord Fotheringay had never been at a loss for a pretext for reducing his son’s allowance; and now that he was posing—with but indifferent success, as Harold had learned from Mrs. Lampson’s postscript—as a Reformed Sinner, he would, his son knew, think that, in cutting off his son’s allowance, he was only acting consistently with the traditions of Reformed Sinners.
The Reformed Sinner is usually a sinner whose capacity to enjoy the pleasures of sin has become dulled, and thus he is intolerant of the sins of others, and particularly intolerant of the capacity of others to enjoy sin. ”