Katharine Frensham: A Novel

She paused for a moment, and Willy Tonedale drawled out:

"But you did say once, Cousin Julia, that she had a most fearful temper. No fellow can stand that sort of thing for long."

Mrs Stanhope glanced at him sternly, and said:

"Could you imagine your temper improved under such conditions? She went to him sweet-tempered enough; and, if she became a little hasty as the years went on, it was only right that she should have won that protection for herself. I encouraged her. 'Let yourself be felt, Marianne,' I used to say."

"Poor devil of a man," whispered Willy, "if Marianne were anything like cousin Julia. By Jove! she must have made herself felt."

"It was temperamental strife," continued Mrs Stanhope, "and my poor darling was worsted. She was doomed from the beginning. She had no chance against that man's cruel neglect and selfishness. You had only to look at him to know that he had no emotions and no heart."

"That is not true," thought Katharine; but she remained silent, although increasingly stirred by Mrs Stanhope's incisive words.

"And," said Mrs Stanhope, "I know from my poor friend's confidences, how greatly she suffered from his unvarying unkindness. He killed her by a long series of tortures – temperamental tortures – and he must have given the finishing stroke to her on that last evening when, by his own confession at the inquest, they had had some miserable scene together, and he, no doubt to recover from his own outbreak of anger, went off riding, leaving her to right herself as well as she could. He knew that she had a delicate heart, and that she was always jeopardised by over-excitation. All this he knew well; and yet he never tried to make her life happy and calm. He never spared her anything. It was so like him to bring about a last access of unhappiness for her – and then leave her to die broken-hearted alone. I shall always say, that if ever a man killed a woman, Clifford Thornton killed his wife."

There was silence. Mrs Stanhope's words cut into every one's sensitiveness. Every one was suffering. But she herself leaned back as if resting from a newly accomplished task and well-earned triumph. She had raised her voice and testified once more against her dead friend's husband.

Then Katharine spoke.

"Well," she said, "it is a pitiful story; but nothing and no one will ever make me believe that Professor Thornton is a cruel man. He may have made mistakes, and probably did do so, being only human; but it is impossible to believe anything worse of him than that."

They all turned to her. Her face was flushed. There was a gleam in her eyes, and a curious tenseness in her manner. She looked as one who had divined some advancing danger, and was standing ready to ward off the evil from some friend loved and defenceless except for her.

"Do you know Professor Thornton, Kath?" Willy and Margaret exclaimed. "You never told us."

"I have met him," she answered. "I believe he is incapable of cruelty – physical, mental, or temperamental – quite incapable of it."

"I have known him for twelve years," said Mrs Stanhope in her steely voice. "And you?"

"I have known him for three days," said Katharine, undaunted. "But with what you would call 'temperamental knowledge,' Mrs Stanhope. I do not believe he ever said one unkind word to any one."

"He is lucky to inspire such faith in a stranger," Mrs Stanhope remarked. "He is lucky to have such a staunch defender."

Katharine looked at her steadily for a moment, and then said:

"It is well for him that he has even a stranger to defend him, if you go about the world saying that he murdered his wife."

"You are scarcely accurate, Miss Frensham," Mrs Stanhope said, flushing. "I did not use that word."

"I am as accurate as the ordinary outside world would be in the circumstances," said Katharine.

"Ah, you are right there," drawled out Willy Tonedale. "The outside world knows nothing about temperamental tortures and temperamental murders, and all that sort of confounded subtleness. Torture is torture, and murder is murder to the outside world of ordinary dense people like myself – and others. I ought to see that man and warn him against you, cousin Julia – 'pon my soul, I ought."

"Oh, there will be no need, Willy," she said with a short, nervous laugh. "No doubt Miss Frensham will do it instead of you."

Every one had stood up, by silent consent dissolving the meeting. Mrs Tonedale, Margaret, Willy, and the three or four visitors now looked towards Katharine again, wondering how she would meet Mrs Stanhope's parting thrust. She met it quite simply. She said:

"I will gladly warn him. Though I daresay he does not need to be warned. For at least Mrs Stanhope does not stab in the dark, does she?"

And directly she had spoken these words, she thought of the young boy, and a wave of sympathetic anxiety swept over her. Supposing that this woman did stab in the dark; supposing that out of mistaken loyalty to her dead friend's memory, she believed it to be a solemn duty to tell her version of the story to the young boy – Marianne's son – what then – what then? She was obviously such a bigot that she was capable of doing anything to forward the cause which she had at heart.

At that same moment Mrs Stanhope was saying to herself:

"The boy shall know – the boy shall know – it is only fair to my poor Marianne's memory that he should learn the true history of his mother's unhappy life."

The two women glanced at each other, and each read the other's thought. Then, after a hasty leave-taking, Mrs Stanhope hurried away. Katharine had an uneasy feeling that she ought to have followed her to her very door, and thus have made sure that Marianne's avenging colleague wrought no harm that afternoon to the boy and his father. She attempted several times to go, but was prevented by her friends, who wished to hear some of the details of her three years' travels.

"I believe you want to chase cousin Julia and give her a ducking in the Serpentine," said Willy. "By Jove, I should like to see it!"

Katharine laughed.

"Willy," she said, "you're really becoming quite electrically intelligent. What is the cause of it?"

"You are, my dear," he said. "And also that adorable female relative of mine always rouses my indignation. Shades of my ancestors, what a tongue! How she would yarn to the boy if she ever got hold of him alone."

"That is what I've been thinking," Katharine said, turning to him earnestly. "It would be too cruel."

"But why should you mind?" he said. "After all, they are nothing to you – just strangers – that's all. Can't let yourself be torn in pieces for strangers. Better do it for me instead. My word, Kath, but you did speak up for him well."

"Did I?" she asked, with a sudden thrill in her voice.

Willy Tonedale glanced at her and saw a light on her face which had never shone for him – never.

And the cold crept into his faithful heart.

CHAPTER X

Mrs Stanhope went on her way home fiercely indignant with this stranger who had dared to defend Clifford Thornton. In her own unreasoning anger she felt doubly fierce towards him for daring to have a defender. She had loved Marianne always, and she had disliked him always. She was of limited understanding – like all bigots. She knew nothing, and wished to know nothing about his side of the case. All she knew was that he had made her poor Marianne miserable, and had brought about her death. All she hoped now was that he might be miserable himself, for ever and ever. In memory of her dear, dead friend, she determined that her hand should always be against him. It was a simple creed, and therefore primitive and strong, like all primitive instincts. She knew even less than Marianne about sensitive brains, delicate nervous organisms, and the surcharged world of thought and imagination. When she spoke about temperament, it was as though a blacksmith were working at a goldsmith's goblet: as though a ropemaker were working at a spider's web. She honestly believed that Marianne had been sacrificed to him. She could not realise that Marianne was made of coarser fibre than Clifford Thornton. She knew nothing about Marianne's birth, antecedents, and environment. She was quite unequipped with delicate understanding of human nature to judge between any two people – much less two married people – that unfathomable twin-mystery. But she did judge, and she condemned him without any reservations. And she thought of Marianne's son, and resolved in her own mind that he, too, should judge his father and condemn him.

"It is only right," she said to herself repeatedly, "that the boy should know, and should carry in his mind a tender memory of his mother. His father will tell him only cruel things about her. She shall not have that injustice done to her."

She did not take into account the tenderness of Alan's years; she had no instincts of mercy and pity for his young thoughts, and his young birthright of forgetfulness. She did not stop to imagine that Marianne herself would have wished him to be spared. It never entered her mind that Marianne herself would have said:

"Let the boy be – he is only a boy – let him be – what does it all matter now? and he is so young still – let him be."

She never thought of that. She filled a cup of poison ready to put to his lips at the first opportunity: the poison of disbelief and doubt.

"I must find some means of seeing him," she said to herself. "Marianne shall not have the injustice of being misinterpreted."

Full of these thoughts she paused before going into Hyde Park.

"Shall I walk through the Park, or shall I go straight to St. James's Mansions?" she asked herself. "I think I will go straight home. I am tired."

But after she had advanced a few steps, she turned back and passed into the Park, impelled to do so against her will. It was a charming evening at the beginning of April. The spring had come early, and the borders were gay with flowers. A young boy came along, whistling softly. He stopped to look at some of the beds, and then went on again. After all, he thought, it was not so bad going for this journey to Japan. And all the fellows had said they envied him. And father was better already. And that was a bully new camera they had bought to-day. And, by Jove, he had enjoyed himself yesterday. And —

He looked up and saw Mrs Stanhope.

"Alan," she said in her steely voice, which had always jarred on him. His face clouded over. His heart sank. He had always disliked her.

"Alan," she said, "I have wanted to see you. I was thinking of you this very moment. I was by your mother's grave yesterday. Shall we sit down here? It is not cold this evening."

She had kept his hand, and led him to the nearest bench. He disengaged his hand, and shrank a little from her. She did not notice that.

"Yes," she repeated. "I stood by your mother's grave yesterday. It is a beautiful stone, simple but beautiful."

"Father and I liked it," the boy said a little nervously. "We – we went there to say good-bye before – before going away, you know."

"Ah," she said, "you are going away then? Are you going to leave 'Falun'?"

"Yes," he said, "for a few months. Father is not well."

There was a pause, and then she said suddenly:

"Alan, you will never forget your dear mother, will you? She died in such a sad, sad way – it breaks one's heart to think of it – doesn't it? – all alone – without a kind word – a kind look – nothing – no one near her – no one to help her – alone."

The boy bit his lips. Something pulled at his heartstrings.

"You must always think lovingly of her," she continued. "You must always think the very best of her. She was a grand, noble woman who had not been understood. When you are older, you will see it all clearly for yourself – see it with your own eyes, not with any one else's eyes, and then you will know how unhappy she was, and how sad she was all – all the days of her married life. Poor darling, she was lonely in life and lonely in death – you must never forget that – you must be loyal to her – you, her son. You were good to her; you loved her; you would have loved her more if – if your father had allowed you, Alan."

The boy's face was rigid.

"Father never stopped me from loving mother," he said, half to himself.

"Ah," she said bitterly, "when you are older you will understand it all only too well. And meanwhile be loyal to her memory – you, her son."

The boy's face softened again. The tears came into his eyes. The appeal to his sonship touched him deeply. He said nothing, but Mrs Stanhope realised that his silence was charged with grief; for she saw the tears in his eyes, the flush on his face, and the quivering of his mouth.

"Alan," she went on, "and the pity – the pity of it all. She might be here with us now – there was no reason for her death; it is that which makes it so sad. If she had had some terrible illness, one might be comforted a little by her release; but to be cut off like this – suddenly – and in this sad, sad way – ah, how your poor father must tear his heart to remember that he had angry words with her that night – to think that but for that unfortunate incident she might be alive this very moment – to think – "

She stopped suddenly, for she had already said more than she intended. Alan turned his face to her. The flush had gone now. He looked deadly pale.

"Father was always, always good to mother," he said, in a strained tone of voice. "You were not always with us. You couldn't know."

"No, no – of course I could not know all," she said soothingly; and again she put her hand on his arm. And again he freed himself.

"But this I do know," she continued with great gentleness, "that you have lost a noble and unselfish mother who loved you with her whole heart – more than you ever knew. But I knew. I knew all her hopes and fears and ambitions for you; and I knew, too, how she yearned for the time when you would love her more and more, and understand her more and more. For a mother clings heart and soul to her son, Alan. If he does not love her, she mourns always, always."

She rose from the bench; and he rose too, his young heart torn and his young spirit troubled. He stood there looking down on the ground, overpowered with many emotions.

"Good-bye, Alan," she said. "And remember you have a friend in me. Come to me in trouble, and I will not fail you – for your dear mother's sake."

She left him, and he lingered for a moment scratching the ground with his stick. Then he went on his way to the Langham. He was not whistling now. He ran up against an old gentleman.

"Look out where you're going, my boy!" the old man said angrily. "Dreaming, I suppose. Boys didn't dream in my time. I've no patience with this generation."

At the hotel he saw Katharine, who was standing in the hall giving some instructions to the porter. She had just come back from the Tonedales, whom she had left as soon as she could. She had been thinking of him all the time, of him and his father and that metallic woman; and she could not rest until she was back again at the Langham, mounting guard, as it were, over these strangers who had come so unexpectedly into her life. She greeted the boy and spoke some kindly words, which brought a faint smile into his face.

But he slipped away from her, and locked himself up in his room.

CHAPTER XI

Katharine spent that night wondering what she could say to Professor Thornton to warn him against Mrs Stanhope's biting tongue. She felt that she must warn him, even at the risk of seeming to intrude on the privacy of his personal concerns. She believed that it would be the part of a coward to shirk the task, and yet she dreaded to undertake it. She said to herself a hundred times over that there was no reason why she should interfere; they were nothing to her – these strangers, their troubles, their tragedy were nothing to her. That was the common-sense way of looking at the whole matter. They had their own lives to live. And she had hers. In a day or two their chance companionship would be a thing of the past. Why should she be troubled about them? Willy Tonedale was right. One could not take every one's burden and carry it. Ah, there was no common-sense about the matter; but there was something else, something infinitely more compelling than calm reason – the heart's insistence.

"I must tell him," she said. And her heart was lighter when she decided that. Then came the difficulty of deciding what to say. She did not solve that problem. She fell asleep and dreamed, and when she awoke, she said:

"What was it I dreamed I said to him? Ah, I remember I said that – Ah! it has gone again."

But it came back to her when she stood with Clifford Thornton alone in the reading-room. She made no preliminaries, she offered no excuses; she behaved exactly as though nothing else could be done by her in the circumstances, as though he and she were in some desolate region alone together, and she saw some terrible danger threatening him, and cried:

"Look out! Beware!"

"Professor Thornton," she said, "yesterday I met an enemy of yours. It sounds melodramatic, perhaps, to speak of an enemy. Nevertheless, that was what she appeared to me. You probably know who she is – a Mrs Stanhope. But you cannot know how she speaks of you. No one could imagine it, unless one heard it for oneself."

His drawn face seemed to become thinner as she spoke.

"She has always disliked me," he said in a painfully strained voice.

"It is not merely dislike, it is malice," Katharine said. "It would not matter so much if you were by yourself in the world. But there is the boy to think of. Keep him away from her. She might poison his heart against you. It would be cruel for him, and cruel for you."

The expression of intense anxiety on the man's face filled Katharine's heart with pity.

"Ah," he said, as if the words were torn from him. "That is the bitterness of it; he might turn against me simply and solely because he could not understand; he – "

He broke off and looked at Katharine hopelessly. He appeared to be appealing to her for help in his distress; she could almost have heard his voice saying:

"What shall I do – what shall I do? Help me."

But the next moment his pride and reserve got the better of his momentary weakness. He gathered himself together. He asked for no details, and made no attempt to justify himself in her eyes. He did not even give a passing thought as to how much or how little she knew of his sad story. He felt instinctively that she believed in him.

He came across to her, and leaned over the table by which she was standing.

"It was beautiful of you to warn me," he said quite simply. "I know it could not have been easy. But it was the act of a true friend."

Then he went away. And Katharine, alone with her thoughts, threw herself into the arm-chair and closed her eyes.

CHAPTER XII

Clifford Thornton passed on from that moment to a new chapter in his heart's history. He was too stern with himself to yield without a struggle to even any secret locked-up happiness; and so he tried to turn from the thought of Katharine Frensham as from something altogether out of his horizon. But, against his wishes, bright hopes sprang up within him. Unbidden and harshly rebuked possibilities of joy pressed themselves importunately on him. A fair vision of a fresh life rose before him. He dispelled it angrily, and returned to his former self, with the old tyranny of Marianne chafing him, and the added anxiety concerning his young son's love and loyalty. Nevertheless, he had passed on. He was of course too proud to ask Katharine what accusation Mrs Stanhope had brought against him, and too reserved to thank her the next morning for her words of warning. He did not even tell her that he had made up his mind to take an earlier boat to New York, and thus remove Alan from Mrs Stanhope's influence. His secret belief that he was responsible for Marianne's death made him morbidly anxious to keep Alan away from any one who might come between them. And Katharine Frensham's allusion to Mrs Stanhope's attitude towards him made him doubly apprehensive of her powers of making mischief. He knew that she had unceasingly stirred up strife between himself and Marianne, and he considered her capable of at least making the attempt to cause a breach between himself and his son. He knew that she disliked him, and that she believed he had always been hard and unkind to poor Marianne. Many a time Marianne herself had said to him:

"Julia at least appreciates and understands me; she at least knows of my unhappiness and your unkind indifference."

What would she say to Alan if by chance he passed her way? Alan, too, had always disliked her; he, too, had felt that she was an enemy to his father and himself; nevertheless she would certainly be able to influence him, for the very reason that his mother had died in circumstances of great sadness, and generous young hearts remember only the best things of the dead. Marianne would conquer as she had always conquered, and the boy's heart would turn from his father.

Clifford was greatly troubled.

"I must have my boy's love, I must have his loyalty," he said. "I cannot do without it. I desire with all my heart that he should think lovingly of his mother; but he must not, shall not turn from me. I have done nothing to deserve that he should not love me. He shall not see that woman if I can help it. She shall not have the chance of saying one word against me. His dear young heart shall keep its love and trust. The sadness of this tragedy in our lives will pass from him; it is passing from him even now. And the wound which I, in my selfishness, inflicted, shall be healed with a love which father never gave to son before. He must and shall believe in me. If I have missed other things, at least I will wrest this from life. She may say what she likes to the whole world, but not to him; he would not understand. If he were older, I would take my chance of his belief or disbelief. But the young judge and are hard."

Then in the midst of his distress he remembered Katharine, and again that vision rose before him. He tried to turn from it, but in vain.

"She believed in me," he said. "Whatever that woman may have said to her, she believed in me."

He went back to the hotel buoyed up in spite of himself, and found Alan moping in the reading-room. The boy looked miserable, and appeared to have no heart for anything that was suggested. Clifford remembered that he had been quiet at breakfast, and had eaten nothing. He had slipped away, evidently wanting to be alone. His father glanced at him with some uneasiness.

"What's the matter?" he asked kindly.

"Nothing," said Alan a little roughly, and he turned away with a slight flush on his face.

"Well, we shall soon be off," Clifford said. "I have changed our berths for a week earlier. In a fortnight we shall be in New York; then on we go to San Francisco, and so on to Japan. Knutty was right to send us away from 'Falun.' We shall both feel better for the change. I shall get rid of my moods and become quite a jolly companion for you. We'll have such splendid times. Won't we?"

"Yes," said Alan, but without any ring in his voice.

The father stood looking sad and puzzled.

"I am just going out to buy some books," he said. "Come, too?"

Alan shook his head.

"No, father," he said. "I thought I'd like to read."

Clifford nodded and went out.

"It will be all right between us when we are off on our travels," he thought. "We ought to have started long ago. I am glad I have berths for an earlier date. It will be better for him, and for me. And yet – "

He made a gesture of impatience with himself.

"It is high time that I took a journey," he said sternly.

He bought several dry treatises on scientific subjects, a new book on architecture for Alan, and a brochure on Alan de Walsingham. He was greatly pleased with this.

"Alan will be glad," he said. And then he found an amusing book about balloons, also for Alan. And after this he saw a Baedeker for Norway and Denmark.

"I should like Miss Frensham to have that from me," he said, as he handled it dreamily.

He hesitated over it, put it aside sternly, then went back to it, hesitated again, and finally bought it. He had a guilty smile on his face when he carried it off.