The suicide of Mr. Bates had a great effect on Dale. The sadness and regret that he felt at the time continued to tinge his thoughts for a long while afterward. He could not shake off the horror of that midnight scene, as he imagined it—the God-fearing man breaking the divine laws, the man full of years who was so near the grave and yet could not wait till it received him naturally, the poor feeble old creature taxing all his remnant of strength to knock out the small spark of life that already had begun to gleam so dimly. How long did he take to drag and raise the ladder, pausing to recover breath, holding his side and coughing, then again toiling?
Another thing that depressed Dale's spirits was the departure of Mr. Osborn, who had gone to the Midlands to take up the ministry of a large church in a large town. And never had Dale more felt the want of priestly support than at this period. The new pastor was a young man who preached eloquently, but Dale would not be able to talk to him as he had talked to Osborn.
Mavis observed again what she had not seen for ages, the gloom on her husband's face when he sat alone, or thought that he was alone. The dull brooding look that spoiled his aspect at such times was like the shadow of a dark cloud on a field; but as in the past the shadow went rapidly, and she fancied she could chase it away as surely as if she had been the sunshine. She would have been startled and pained if she could have seen his face now, as he rode from Manninglea after luncheon at the club.
It was a wet spring day, with dark clouds hanging low over the heath, a cold wind cheeping, soughing, sighing; and Dale's face was darker and sadder than the day. Before mounting his horse in the hotel yard at Manninglea he had gone to the station and bought The Times newspaper; now he drew the paper out of his pocket, and sheltering it with his rain cloak, read an advertisement on the front page.
The advertisement told him that a London hospital gratefully acknowledged the receipt of one hundred pounds, being the twenty-first donation from the same hand, and making two thousand and twenty pounds as the total received to date. In accordance with the request of their anonymous benefactor, they inserted this notice, and they offered at the same time their heartfelt thanks.
Dale tore out the advertisement and threw away the rest of the paper.
To his mind, this money was the payment of a very old debt. The amount of his first charitable donation sent nearly fifteen years ago, had been twenty pounds. That, the most urgent part of the debt, represented the four bank-notes given to the wife by Mr. Barradine in London. The other twenty instalments made up the amount of the legacy that came to her at his death. Mavis had lent the money to her husband, had in due course received a similar sum of money from him, and she held it now safely invested; but, as Dale told himself, she did not in truth hold one penny of the dead man's gifts. All that she had now was the gift of him, Dale; and the money that soiled her hands in touching it, the money that had burned his brain, the filthy gold that had made him half-mad to think of, had gone to strangers whom neither of them had ever seen. He had been slow about it; but, thank God, he had done at last what he wanted to do at the very beginning.
He folded the scrap of paper that was his receipt or quittance, put it in his breast pocket, and rode on at a foot-pace. He was absolutely alone, not a soul in sight wherever he turned his eyes, not a beast, not a bird moving, the desolate brown heath and the sad gray sky alike empty of life; straight ahead, about a mile distant, lay the Cross Roads, the tavern, and the small hamlet of cottages, but as yet they were hidden by a rise of the intervening ground; only the fringe of cultivated land at the point where it met the barren waste indicated the work or proximity of mankind. His face grew still darker as he approached these fields and saw the cluster of houses on their edge. He looked at the deep ditch that surrounded the outermost field; then turning his head looked again at the heath, its bleak contours mounting gradually till they showed an ugly ridge beyond which the downs swelled up soft and vague against the hanging curtain of clouds. And he thought of what lay on the far side of this long grass rampart of down country—the fat-soiled valley, the other railway line, the trains from the West of England, full of queer people, running by night as well as by day.
As he passed the Barradine Arms, he saw three louts leaning against a dry bit of wall under the eaves of an outhouse. They stared at him stupidly, not speaking or touching their caps, just loutishly staring; and he stared at them with black severity. He thought how he himself had been like one of those oafs, living in a cottage not so many miles from this spot. No one now seemed to remember his humble birth, his unhappy youth, his sordid home. Other people forgot everything; while he could forget nothing.
At the Cross Roads he drew rein for a moment, as if undecided as to which way to turn. Before going home he had to pay a business call, and his destination was straight ahead of him, about four miles off as the crow flies. The quickest way to get there, the line nearest to the crow's line, would be to leave the road here and ride through Hadleigh Wood, under the bare beeches, among the somber pines, along the gloomy rides; and the alternative route would be to turn to the right, hold to the open road, and follow its deflected course past the Abbey gates and park, and all round the wild forest. That way would be three miles longer than the other way. He turned his horse's head to the right; and as he went on by the road, he was thinking of the terrible chapter in his life that closed with the death of Mr. Barradine.
Nearly fifteen years ago; yet in all that time, although dwelling so near to the tragic fateful wood, he had been into it only once—and then he had gone there with the hounds and jolly loud-voiced riders, cub-hunting, on a bright September morning. The wood symbolized everything that he wished to forget. And he thought that if he were really a rich man—not a poor little well-to-do trader, but a fabulous millionaire—he'd buy all this woodland, cut down every tree, chase away every shadow, and grow corn in the sunlight. He would buy woodland and parkland too—he would burn Aunt Petherick's hidden cottage, the Abbey with its inner, outer and middle courtyards, yes, and its church also; he would burn and fell, and grub and plough, and then plant the seeds of corn that symbolize the resurrection of life; and the sun should shine on a wide yellow sea, with waves of hope rippling across it as the ripened ears bowed and rose; and there should be no trace or stain to mark the submerged slime that had held corruption and death. Then, if he could do that, he would have nothing to remind him of all he had gone through in the past.
Nothing to remind him?
It made no difference whether the Abbey towers and the North Ride chimneys were visible or invisible; no screen of trees, whether leafless as now or carrying the full weight of foliage, could really screen them from him; they were inside him, together with all that they had once signified, a part of himself. If he did not look at them with introspective eyes, if he ignored their existence, if he succeeded in not thinking of them, there was always something else, inside him or outside him, to carry his thoughts back into the black bad time.
At this moment it was the Orphanage, with its wet red roofs and dripping white verandas. His road took him close in front of it—a lengthy stretch of building composed of a central block that contained the hall and schoolrooms, and two lesser and lower blocks connected by cloisters. He glanced at these blocks—long and low, only a ground floor and an upper story—and noticed the veranda and broad balconies. The girls slept here, as Mavis had told him; the younger in one block and the older in the other block. The whole institution had an air of old-established order and unceasing care; all the paint was new and clean; the gardens and terraces, with hedges and shrubs that had grown high and thick, were beautifully kept; not a weed showed in borders or paths; the copper bell in the belfry turret was so well polished that it seemed to shine, even though no glint of sunlight touched it. As he rode by he heard the sound of children's voices, and, raising himself in his stirrups, looked over the clipped yew hedge that guarded the lower garden from the roadway. A dozen or fifteen small blue-cloaks were romping joyously under one of the verandas, and perhaps twenty of the bigger blue-cloaks were soberly parading two by two in a cloister.
Nothing carried him back so promptly and surely as the sight of these blue-cloaked girls, and scarcely a day ever passed without his seeing them. Two by two they were incessantly tramping the roads for miles round. He could not walk, ride, or drive without meeting them. When he heard their footsteps and knew that they were coming marching by Vine-Pits, he turned his back to the office window, or went into the depths of granary or stable. He had hated that day when Mavis brought them off the road and into the heart of his home.
With the sound of their shrill cries and merry laughter lingering in his ears he rode on.
What a hideous and damnable mockery! This was the monument of that good kind man, the late Mr. Barradine. Every red tile, every dab of white paint, every square inch of clean gravel, gave substance and solidity to the lasting fame of that dear sweet gentleman. Visitors to the neighborhood always stopped their carriages or motor cars outside the Orphanage gates, questioned and gaped, sent in their cards, begged for permission to go all over it. Inside, no doubt they admired the rows of clean white beds, some of them quite little cots, others big enough for almost full-grown bouncing lasses; they stood with hushed breath before his portrait in the refectory hall or his bust on the stairs; and perhaps they patted the cheeks of some pretty inmate and asked if, when saying her prayers, she always included the name of the patron saint. On high occasions clergymen and bishops came, there to hiccough and weep over his blessed memory. Great lords and ladies praised him, newspaper writers praised him, ignorant fools in cottages praised him; and to high and low the crowning grace of his glorious charity was the selection of the softer, gentler, and too often downtrodden sex as the object of such tender care. That was what set the sentimental rivers flowing. It proved the innate gentleness and sweetness of him who was now an angel in Heaven. When it came to choosing the guests for the lovely home he had built in his mind, he had said: "I will not fill it with a lot of hulking boys. Boys are naturally rough and coarse animals, and can generally fight their way out on top, no matter how stiff the struggle. Give me so many graceful delicate girls; pretty helpless things, dainty little innocent fascinating creatures; not necessarily fatherless girls, but unprotected girls—girls that grievously need protection."
And Dale thought how the man, when he was alive, dealt with any innocent unprotected girl who chanced to fall into his power. In imagination he saw him taking care of Mavis, when she was young and tender, and scarcely knew right from wrong. In imagination he saw it all again—the pattings and pawings, the scheming and devising, the luring and ensnaring—Barradine and Mavis—the man of many years and the girl of few years, the serpent and the dove, the destroyer and the destroyed. Those torturing mental pictures glowed and took form, and were as vivid now as when, in the hour of his grief and despair, he first made them and saw them.
This departed saint, whose memory had become as a fragrance of myrrh, whose name sounded like the clinking of an incense-pot swung by devout hands, whose monument stood firm as a temple built upon the rock, was simply a dirty old beast for whom no excuse could be possible. What worse crime can there be than that of befouling youth? Who is a worse enemy to the commonweal than he who snatches and steals for his transient gratification treasures that are accumulating to make some honest man's life-long joy? Such wanton abuse of society's law and nature's plan is the unpardonable sin; it is sin as monstrous as the enormities that brought down fire upon the dwellers in the cities of the plain.
To Dale the idea of an offense so gross that its perpetrator deserved neither pity nor mercy was if anything stronger now than when it had first entered and filled his mind.
Yet it seemed to him that now, after all the years that had gone by, he could for the first time perfectly understand the dark and shameful tangle of emotions through which the sinner moved onward to his sin. It seemed that with luminous clearness he could look right into the corrupt heart of the dead man. He could understand all, though he could forgive nothing. He could measure the force of every thought and sensation that had pushed the dead man on and on.
After middle-age the blood grows stagnant, habit dulls the edge of appetite, a weariness of the mind and of the body makes one cease to taste well-used delights; a strong new stimulus is required to revive the emotional life that is sinking to decay. Such a stimulus must not only be strong and new, it must be light, delicate, altogether strange. The effect it produces is due to charm and spell as much as to substance and form.
To people who are elderly, youth itself, merely because it is youth, exercises a tremendous fascination. It sheds an atmosphere that is pleasant to breathe. It seems like a fountain of life in which, if we might bathe, we should take some rejuvenating virtue as well as a soothing bliss. There is a common saying that it makes one feel young just to consort with young people.
Then imagine the selfish unprincipled wretch who at the same time feels the new stimulus, experiences the mysterious fascination, and craves for the revivifying delight. Putting himself in the sinner's place, Dale could realize the pressure that drove him to his sin. He could estimate the fearful temptation offered by the mere presence of the fresh young innocent creature that one has begun to think about in this improper manner. She comes and she goes before one's eyes, piercing them with her beauty; she fills one with desire as wine fills a cup; she absorbs one, whether she knows it or not, dominates, overwhelms, makes one her sick and fainting slave. And suppose that while one becomes her slave one remains her master. To what a gigantic growth the temptation must rush up each time that one thinks she is utterly in one's power! How irresistible it must seem if she herself does not aid one to resist it, if through her ignorance or childish faith she invites the disaster one is struggling to avoid, if instead of flying from her danger she draws nearer and nearer to it.
But to yield to such temptation, however tremendous it may be, is abominable, disgusting, and inexpressibly base. No explanation can palliate or apology prevail—the crime remains the same crime, and he who commits it is not fit to live with decent upright men. That was what Dale had felt fifteen years ago, and he felt it with increased conviction now because of the religious faith that had become his guide and comfort. To a believing Baptist there is a peculiar sacredness, in unsullied innocence.
Two hours afterward, when he had transacted his business and drew near to home, he was still thinking of Mr. Barradine and the Orphanage for unguarded innocent girls. He shook himself in the saddle, squared his shoulders, and held up his head as he rode into the yard.
"Here, take my horse," he said sternly, as he swung his foot out of the stirrup.
Then, at the sound of a voice behind him, he felt a little shiver run down his spine, like the cold touch of superstitious fear.
It was only Norah calling to him. She had come out into the rain to tell him that Mavis Dale had gone to Rodchurch and could not be back to tea.