Henry James - Henry James - The Complete Novels (The Greatest Novelists of All Time – Book 10)

Nora blushed, but she answered simply, "Please don't say that."

"My dear girl," he said, "I religiously respect your secrets." But, in truth, he only half respected them. Stirred as he was by her beauty and by that sense of feminine appealingness which may be an inspiring motive even to a very shabby fellow, he was keenly mortified by feeling that her tenderness passed him by, barely touching him with the hem of its garment. She was doing mighty fine things, but she was using him, her hard, vulgar cousin, as a senseless stepping-stone. These reflections quickened his appreciation of her charm, but took the edge from his delicacy. As they rose to go, Nora, who in spite of her absent eyes had watched him well, felt that cousinship had melted to a mere name. George had been to her maturer vision a painful disappointment. His face, from the moment of their meeting, had given her warning to withdraw her trust. Was it she or he who had changed since that fervid youthful parting of sixteen months before? She, in the interval, had been refined by life; he had been vulgarized. She had seen the world; she had known better things and better men; she had known Hubert, and, more than ever, she had known Roger. But as she drew on her gloves she reflected with horror that distress was making her fastidious. She wished to be coarse and careless; she wished that she might have eaten a heavy dinner, that she might enjoy taking George's arm. And the slower flowed the current of her confidence, the softer dropped her words. "Now, dear George," she said, with a desperate attempt at a cheerful smile, "let me know where you mean to take me."

"Upon my soul, Nora," he said, with a hard grin, "I feel as if I had a jewel I must lay in soft cotton. The thing is to find it soft enough." George himself, perhaps, she might endure; but she had a growing horror of his friends. Among them, probably, were the female correlatives of the "parties" who had come to chat with Mr. Franks. She prayed he might not treat her to company. "You see I want to do the pretty thing," he went on. "I want to treat you, by Jove, as I would treat a queen! I can't thrust you all alone into an hotel, and I can't put up at one with you,—can I?"

"I am not in a position to be fastidious," said Nora. "I shall not object to going alone."

"No, no!" he cried, with a flourish of his hand. "I will do for you what I would do for my own sister. I am not a fine gentleman, but I know what 's proper. I live in the house of a lady who lets out rooms,—a very nice little woman; she and I are great cronies; I'm sure you 'll like her. She will give you the comforts of a home, and all that sort of thing."

Nora's heart sank, but she assented. They re-entered their carriage, and a drive of moderate length brought them to a brownstone dwelling of the third order of gentility, as one may say, stationed in a cheap and serried row. In a few moments, in a small tawdry front parlor, Nora was introduced to George's hostess, the nice little woman, Mrs. Paul by name. Nice enough she seemed, for Nora's comfort. She was young and fair, plump and comely; she wore a great many ringlets. She was a trifle too loving on short acquaintance, perhaps; but, after all, thought Nora, who was she now, to complain of that? When the two women had gone up stairs, Fenton put on his hat,—he could never meditate without it (he had written that last letter to Nora with his beaver resting on the bridge of his nose),—and paced slowly up and down the narrow entry, chewing the end of a cigar, with his hands in his pockets and his eyes on the ground. In ten minutes Mrs. Paul reappeared. "Well, sir," she cried, "what does all this mean?"

"It means money, if you 'll not scream so loud," he answered. "Come in here." They went into the parlor and remained there for a couple of hours with closed doors. At last Fenton came forth and left the house. He walked along the street, humming gently to himself. Dusk had fallen; he stopped beneath a lighted lamp at the corner, looked up and down a moment, and then exhaled a deep, an almost melancholy sigh. Having thus relieved his conscience, he proceeded to business. He consulted his watch; it was five o'clock. An empty hack rolled by; he called it and got in, breathing the motto of great spirits, "Confound the expense!" His business led him to visit successively several of the best hotels. Roger, he argued, starting immediately in pursuit of Nora, would have taken the first train from Boston, and would now have been more than an hour in town. Fenton could, of course, proceed only by probabilities; but according to these, Roger was to be found at one of the establishments I have mentioned. Fenton knew his New York, and, from what he knew of Roger, be believed him to be at the "quietest" of these. Here, in fact, he found his name freshly registered. He would give him time, however; he would take time himself. He stretched his long legs awhile on one of the divans in the hall. At last Roger appeared, strolling gloomily down the corridor, with his eyes on the ground. For a moment Fenton scarcely recognized him. He was pale and grave; distress had already made him haggard. Fenton observed that, as he passed, people stared at him. He walked slowly to the street door; whereupon Fenton, fearing he might lose him, followed him, and stood for a moment behind him. Roger turned suddenly, as if from an instinct of the other's nearness, and the two faced each other. Those dumb eyes of Roger's for once were eloquent. They glowed like living coals.

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The good lady who enjoyed the sinecure of being mother-in-law to Mrs. Keith passed on that especial Sunday an exceptionally dull evening. Her son's widow was oppressed and preoccupied, and took an early leave. Mrs. Keith's first question on reaching home was as to whether Nora had left her room. On learning that she had quitted the house alone, after dark, Mrs. Keith made her way, stirred by vague conjecture, to the empty chamber, where, of course, she speedily laid her hands on those two testamentary notes to which allusion has been made. In a moment she had read the one addressed to herself. Perturbed as she was, she yet could not repress an impulse of intelligent applause. "Ah, how character plays the cards!" she mused. "How a good girl's very errors set her off!" If Roger longed for Nora to-day, who could measure the morrow's longing? He might enjoy, however, without waiting for the morrow, this refinement of desire. In spite of the late hour, Mrs. Keith repaired to his abode, armed with the other letter, deeming this, at such a moment, a more gracious course than to send for him. The letter Roger found to be brief but pregnant. "Dear Roger," it ran, "I learned this afternoon the secret of all these years,—too late for our happiness. I have been strangely blind; you have been too forbearing,—generous where you should have been strictly just. I never dreamed of what this day would bring. Now, I must leave you; I can do nothing else. This is no time to thank you for what you have been to me, but I shall live to do so yet. Dear Roger, get married, and send me your children to teach. I shall live by teaching. I have a family, you know; I go to New York to-night. I write this on my knees, imploring you to be happy. One of these days, when I have learned to be myself again, we shall be better friends than ever. I beg you, I beg you, not to follow me."

Mrs. Keith sat a long time with her host. For the first time in her knowledge of him she saw Roger violent,—violent with horror and self-censure and vain imprecation. "Take her at her word," she said; "don't follow her. Let her knock against the world a little, and she will have you yet."

This philosophy seemed to Roger too stoical by half; to sit at home and let Nora knock against the world was more than he could undertake. "Whether she will have me or not," he said, "I must bring her back. I am morally responsible for her. Good God! think of her afloat in that horrible city with that rascal of a half-cousin—her 'family' she calls him!—for a pilot!" He took, of course, the first train to New York. How to proceed, where to look, was a hard question; but to linger and waver was agony. He was haunted, as he went, with dreadful visions of what might have befallen her; it seemed to him that he had never loved her before.