Born in Exile (55 page)

'Just what I can't do,' exclaimed Malkin, flinging himself into
a broad, deep, leather-covered chair. 'Yet I have leanings that
way. Only a few days ago I sat for a whole evening with the map of
England open before me, wondering where would be the best place to
settle down—a few years hence, I mean, you know; when Bella is old
enough.—That reminds me. Next Sunday is her birthday, and do you
know what? I wish you'd go down to Wrotham with me.'

'Many thanks, but I think I had better not.'

'Oh, but do! I want you to see how Bella is getting on. She's
grown wonderfully since you saw her in Paris—an inch taller, I
should think. I don't go down there very often, you know, so I
notice these changes. Really, I think no one could be more discreet
than I am, under the circumstances. A friend of the family; that's
all. Just dropping in for a casual cup of tea now and then. Sunday
will be a special occasion, of course. I say, what are your views
about early marriage? Do you think seventeen too young?'

'I should think seven-and-twenty much better.'

Malkin broke into fretfulness.

'Let me tell you, Earwaker, I don't like the way you habitually
speak of this project of mine. Plainly, I don't like it. It's a
very serious matter indeed—eh? What? Why are you smiling?'

'I agree with you as to its seriousness.'

'Yes, yes; but in a very cynical and offensive way. It makes me
confoundedly uncomfortable, let me tell you. I don't think that's
very friendly on your part. And the fact is, if it goes on I'm very
much afraid we shan't see so much of each other as we have done. I
like you, Earwaker, and I respect you; I think you know that. But
occasionally you seem to have too little regard for one's feelings.
No, I don't feel able to pass it over with a joke.—There! The deuce
take it! I've bitten off the end of my pipe.'

He spat out a piece of amber, and looked ruefully at the broken
stem.

'Take a cigar,' said Earwaker, fetching a box from a
cupboard.

'I don't mind.—Well—what was I saying? Oh yes; I was quarrelling
with you. Now, look here, what fault have you to find with Bella
Jacox?'

'None whatever. She seemed to me a very amiable child.'

'Child! Pooh! pshaw! And fifteen next Sunday, I tell you. She's
a young lady, and to tell you the confounded plain truth, I'm in
love with her. I am, and there's nothing to be ashamed of. If you
smile, we shall quarrel. I warn you, Earwaker, we shall
quarrel.'

The journalist, instead of smiling, gave forth his deepest
laugh. Malkin turned very red, scowled, and threw his cigar
aside.

'You really wish me to go on Sunday?' Earwaker asked, in a
pleasant voice.

The other's countenance immediately cleared.

'I shall take it as a great kindness. Mrs. Jacox will be
delighted. Meet me at Holborn Viaduct at 1.25. No, to make sure
I'll come here at one o'clock.'

In a few minutes he was chatting as unconcernedly as ever.

'Talking of settling down, my brother Tom and his wife are on
the point of going to New Zealand. Necessity of business; may be
out there for the rest of their lives. Do you know that I shall
think very seriously of following them some day? With Bella, you
know. The fact of the matter is, I don't believe I could ever make
a solid home in England. Why, I can't quite say; partly, I suppose,
because I have nothing to do. Now there's a good deal to be said
for going out to the colonies. A man feels that he is helping the
spread of civilisation; and that's something, you know. I should
compare myself with the Greek and Roman colonists—something
inspiriting in that thought—what? Why shouldn't I found a
respectable newspaper, for instance? Yes, I shall think very
seriously of this.'

'You wouldn't care to run over with your relatives, just to have
a look?'

'It occurred to me,' Malkin replied, thoughtfully. 'But they
sail in ten days, and—well, I'm afraid I couldn't get ready in
time. And then I've promised to look after some little affairs for
Mrs. Jacox—some trifling money matters. But later in the year—who
knows?'

Earwaker half repented of his promise to visit the Jacox
household, but there was no possibility of excusing himself. So on
Sunday he journeyed with his friend down to Wrotham. Mrs. Jacox and
her children were very comfortably established in a small new
house. When the companions entered they found the mother alone in
her sitting-room, and she received them with an effusiveness very
distasteful to Earwaker.

'Now you shouldn't!' was her first exclamation to Malkin.
'Indeed you shouldn't! It's really very naughty of you. O Mr.
Earwaker! Who ever took so much pleasure in doing kindnesses? Do
look at this
beautiful
book that Mr. Malkin has sent as a
present to my little Bella. O Mr. Earwaker!'

The journalist was at once struck with her tone and manner as
she addressed Malkin. He remarked that phrase, 'my little Bella',
and it occurred to him that Mrs. Jacox had been growing younger
since he made her acquaintance on the towers of Notre Dame. When
the girls presented themselves, they also appeared to him more
juvenile; Bella, in particular, was dressed with an exaggeration of
childishness decidedly not becoming. One had but to look into her
face to see that she answered perfectly to Malkin's description;
she was a young lady, and no child. A very pretty young lady,
moreover; given to colouring, but with no silly simper; intelligent
about the eyes and lips; modest, in a natural and sweet way. He
conversed with her, and in doing so was disagreeably affected by
certain glances she occasionally cast towards her mother. One would
have said that she feared censure, though it was hard to see
why.

On the return journey Earwaker made known some of his
impressions, though not all.

'I like the girls,' he said, 'Bella especially. But I can't say
much good of their mother.'

They were opposite each other in the railway carriage. Malkin
leaned forward with earnest, anxious face.

'That's my own trouble,' he whispered. 'I'm confoundedly uneasy
about it. I don't think she's bringing them up at all in a proper
way. Earwaker, I would pay down five thousand pounds for the
possibility of taking Bella away altogether.'

The other mused.

'But, mind you,' pursued Malkin, 'she's not a
bad
woman.
By no means! Thoroughly good-hearted I'm convinced; only a little
weak here.' He tapped his forehead. 'I respect her, for all she has
suffered, and her way of going through it. But she isn't the ideal
mother, you know.'

On his way home, Malkin turned into his friend's chambers 'for
five minutes'. At two in the morning he was still there, and his
talk in the meanwhile had been of nothing but schemes for
protecting Bella against her mother's more objectionable
influences. On taking leave, he asked:

'Any news of Peak yet?'

'None. I haven't seen Moxey for a long time.'

'Do you think Peak will look you up again, if he's in
London?'

'No, I think he'll keep away. And I half hope he will; I
shouldn't quite know how to behave. Ten to one he's in London now.
I suppose he couldn't stay at Exeter. But he may have left
England.'

They parted, and for a week did not see each other. Then, on
Monday evening, when Earwaker was very busy with a mass of
manuscript, the well-known knock sounded from the passage, and
Malkin received admission. The look he wore was appalling, a look
such as only some fearful catastrophe could warrant.

'Are you busy?' he asked, in a voice very unlike his own.

Earwaker could not doubt that the trouble was this time serious.
He abandoned his work, and gave himself wholly to his friend's
service.

'An awful thing has happened,' Malkin began. 'How the deuce
shall I tell you? Oh, the ass I have made of myself! But I couldn't
help it; there seemed no way out of it.'

'Well? What?'

'It was last night, but I couldn't come to you till now. By
Jove! I veritably thought of sending you a note, and then killing
myself. Early this morning I was within an ace of suicide. Believe
me, old friend. This is no farce.'

'I'm waiting.'

'Yes, yes; but I can't tell you all at once. Sure you're not
busy? I know I pester you. I was down at Wrotham yesterday. I
hadn't meant to go, but the temptation was too strong. I got there
at five o'clock, and found that the girls were gone to have tea
with some young friends. Well, I wasn't altogether sorry; it was a
good opportunity for a little talk with their mother. And I
had
the talk. But, oh, ass that I was!'

He smote the side of his head savagely.

'Can you guess, Earwaker? Can you give a shot at what
happened?'

'Perhaps I might,' replied the other, gravely.

'Well?'

'That woman asked you to marry her.'

Malkin leapt from his chair, and sank back again.

'It came to that. Yes, upon my word, it came to that. She said
she had fallen in love with me—that was the long and short of it.
And I had never said a word that could suggest—Oh, confound it!
What a frightful scene it was!'

'You took a final leave of her?'

Malkin stared with eyes of anguish into his friend's face, and
at length whispered thickly:

'I said I would!'

'What? Take leave?'

'Marry her!'

Earwaker had much ado to check an impatiently remonstrant laugh.
He paused awhile, then began his expostulation, at first treating
the affair as too absurd for grave argument.

'My boy,' he concluded, 'you have got into a preposterous
scrape, and I see only one way out of it. You must flee. When does
your brother start for the Antipodes?'

'Thursday morning.'

'Then you go with him; there's an end of it.'

Malkin listened with the blank, despairing look of a man
condemned to death.

'Do you hear me?' urged the other. 'Go home and pack. On
Thursday I'll see you off.'

'I can't bring myself to that,' came in a groan from Malkin.
'I've never yet done anything to be seriously ashamed of, and I
can't run away after promising marriage. It would weigh upon me for
the rest of my life.'

'Humbug! Would it weigh upon you less to marry the mother, and
all the time be in love with the daughter? To my mind, there's
something peculiarly loathsome in the suggestion.'

'But, look here; Bella is very young, really very young indeed.
It's possible that I have deluded myself. Perhaps I don't really
care for her in the way I imagined. It's more than likely that I
might be content to regard her with fatherly affection.'

'Even supposing that, with what sort of affection do you regard
Mrs Jacox?'

Malkin writhed on his chair before replying.

'You mustn't misjudge her!' he exclaimed. 'She is no heartless
schemer. The poor thing almost cried her eyes out. It was a
frightful scene. She reproached herself bitterly. What
could
I do? I have a tenderness for her, there's no denying that. She has
been so vilely used, and has borne it all so patiently. How
abominable it would be if I dealt her another blow!'

The journalist raised his eyebrows, and uttered inarticulate
sounds.

'Was anything said about Bella?' he asked, abruptly.

'Not a word. I'm convinced she doesn't suspect that I thought of
Bella like that. The fact is, I have misled her. She thought all
along that my chief interest was in
her
.'

'Indeed? Then what was the ground of her self-reproach that you
speak of?'

'How defective you are in the appreciation of delicate feeling!'
cried Malkin frantically, starting up and rushing about the room.
'She reproached herself for having permitted me to get entangled
with a widow older than myself, and the mother of two children.
What could be simpler?'

Earwaker began to appreciate the dangers of the situation. If he
insisted upon his view of Mrs. Jacox's behaviour (though it was not
the harshest that the circumstances suggested, for he was disposed
to believe that the widow had really lost her heart to her kind,
eccentric champion), the result would probably be to confirm Malkin
in his resolution of self-sacrifice. The man must be saved, if
possible, from such calamity, and this would not be effected by
merely demonstrating that he was on the highroad to ruin. It was
necessary to try another tack.

'It seems to me, Malkin,' he resumed, gravely, 'that it is you
who are deficient in right feeling. In offering to marry this poor
woman, you did her the gravest wrong.'

'What? How?'

'You know that it is impossible for you to love her. You know
that you will repent, and that she will be aware of it. You are not
the kind of man to conceal your emotions. Bella will grow up,
and—well, the state of things won't tend to domestic felicity. For
Mrs Jacox's own sake, it is your duty to put an end to this folly
before it has gone too far.'

The other gave earnest ear, but with no sign of shaken
conviction.

'Yes,' he said. 'I know this is one way of looking at it. But it
assumes that a man can't control himself, that his sense of honour
isn't strong enough to keep him in the right way. I don't think you
quite understand me. I am not a passionate man; the proof is that I
have never fallen in love since I was sixteen. I think a great deal
of domestic peace, a good deal more than of romantic enthusiasm. If
I marry Mrs. Jacox, I shall make her a good and faithful
husband,—so much I can safely say of myself.'

He waited, but Earwaker was not ready with a rejoinder.

'And there's another point. I have always admitted the defect of
my character—an inability to settle down. Now, if I run away to New
Zealand, with the sense of having dishonoured myself, I shall be a
mere Wandering Jew for the rest of my life. All hope of redemption
will be over. Of the two courses now open to me, that of marriage
with Mrs. Jacox is decidedly the less disadvantageous. Granting
that I have made a fool of myself, I must abide by the result, and
make the best of it. And the plain fact is, I
can't
treat
her so disgracefully; I
can't
burden my conscience in this
way. I believe it would end in suicide; I do, indeed.'