The wedding of Lord St Loo to Isabella Charteris was fixed for Thursday. It was very early, about one in the morning, I suppose, when I heard footsteps outside the window on the terrace.
I had not been able to sleep. It was one of my bad nights with a good deal of pain.
I thought to myself that fancy plays queer tricks, for I could have sworn that they were Isabella’s footsteps on the terrace outside.
Then I heard her voice.
‘Can I come in, Hugh?’
The french windows were ajar as they always were unless there was a gale blowing. Isabella came in and I switched on the lamp by my couch. I still had a feeling that I was dreaming.
Isabella looked very tall. She had on a long dark tweed coat and a dark red scarf over her hair. Her face was grave, calm and rather sad.
I could not imagine what she could be doing here at this time of the night – or rather morning. But I felt vaguely alarmed.
I no longer had the impression that I was dreaming. In point of fact I felt exactly the opposite. I felt as though everything that had happened since Rupert St Loo had come home was a dream, and this was the wakening.
I remembered Isabella saying, ‘I still feel I might wake up.’
And I suddenly realized that that was what had happened to her. The girl who was standing by me was no longer in her dream – she had woken up.
And I remembered another thing – Robert saying that there had been no bad fairies at Rupert St Loo’s christening. I had asked him afterwards what he meant and he had replied, ‘Well, if there’s not one bad fairy – where’s your story?’ That, perhaps, was what made Rupert St Loo not quite real, in spite of his good looks, his intelligence, his ‘rightness’.
All these things passed through my mind confusedly in the second or two that elapsed before Isabella said:
‘I came to say goodbye to you, Hugh.’
I stared at her stupidly.
‘Goodbye?’
‘Yes. You see, I’m going away …’
‘Going away? With Rupert, you mean?’
‘No. With John Gabriel …’
I was conscious then of the strange duality of the human mind. Half of my brain was thunderstruck, unbelieving. What Isabella was saying seemed quite incredible – a thing so fantastic that it simply couldn’t happen.
But somewhere, another part of me was not surprised. It was like an inner voice saying mockingly, ‘But surely, you’ve known this all along …’ I remembered how, without turning her head, Isabella had known John Gabriel’s step on the terrace. I remembered the look on her face when she had come up from the lower garden on the night of the whist drive, and the way she had acted so swiftly in the crisis of Milly Burt. I remembered her saying, ‘Rupert must come soon …’ with a strange urgency in her voice. She had been afraid then, afraid of what was happening to her.
I understood, very imperfectly, the dark urge that was driving her to Gabriel. For some reason or other the man had a strange quality of attraction for women. Teresa had told me so long ago …
Did Isabella love him? I doubted it. And I could see no happiness for her with a man like Gabriel – a man who desired her but did not love her.
On his part it was sheer madness. It would mean abandoning his political career. It would be the ruin of all his ambitions. I couldn’t see why he was taking this crazy step.
Did he love her? I didn’t think so. I thought that in a way he hated her. She was part of the things (the castle, old Lady St Loo) that had humiliated him ever since he came here. Was that the obscure reason for this act of insanity? Was he avenging that humiliation? Was he willing to smash up his own life if he could smash up the thing that had humiliated him? Was this the ‘common little boy’ taking his revenge?
I loved Isabella. I knew that now. I loved her so much that I had been happy in her happiness – and she had been happy with Rupert in her dream come true – of life at St Loo … She had only feared that it might not be real –
What, then, was real? John Gabriel? No, what she was doing was madness. She must be stopped – pleaded with, persuaded.
The words rushed to my lips … but they remained unspoken. To this day I don’t know why …
The only reason I can think of is that Isabella – was Isabella.
I said nothing.
She stooped and kissed me. It was not a child’s kiss. Her mouth was a woman’s mouth. Her lips were cool and fresh, they pressed mine with a sweetness and intensity I shall never forget. It was like being kissed by a flower.
She said goodbye and she went away, out of the window, out of my life, to where John Gabriel was waiting for her.
And I did not try to stop her …