Towards the end of that week, at a late hour one evening, Kalinova and Prince Bienjonetti entered a fashionable restaurant within a stone’s throw of the theatre district. They were merry. The danseuse clung to her stately, middle-aged companion with an abandon of manner which made the pair unmistakably conspicuous as they moved toward the table that had been reserved for them.
Not far away sat George Pethick, Mr. and Mrs. Gawthorpe and Densham. It was Pethick’s birthday and he had celebrated it by asking the Gawthorpes up to the city for the performance at the Hippodrome, with a little supper afterwards at the sort of place where Mrs. Gawthorpe—who rarely came to London—could see a little of what is falsely known as “high life.”
She was a silent, rather timid, melancholy woman, whose role in life kept her constantly in the background. Pethick, more than anyone, had the ability to amuse her. She was fond of him, and constantly remarked that an hour of his fun was more refreshing than a week at the seaside. “George is better than a dozen bottles of tonic.” These, and similar pronouncements were made the more often because she suspected her husband of secretly despising Pethick’s avocation.
The four of them were vivaciously engaged in calling up memories of old choirboy pranks when the entrance of Kalinova caused a perceptible stir that for a moment interrupted the conversation.
Densham was immediately interested in the newcomers. He leaned across Gawthorpe—whose demeanour was more languorous than usual, on account of the champagne—and asked: “Is that the Prince you spoke about, George?”
“T’is he; the ‘sweet prince,’ Griff,” observed Pethick, with a professional grimace.
Mrs. Gawthorpe laid a sobering hand on his arm. “Now, George, not a ‘really’ prince.”
“Certainly!” Pethick ejaculated, in a low tone. “A real Bohemian from Bohemia, with five Christian names, and the most sumptuous flat in Mayfair. By the way, Griff, your friend Milónoff seems to be getting the cold shoulder lately.”
Gawthorpe bestirred himself, caught Pethick’s eye and shot a meaning glance at his wife.
“What do you mean about Milónoff?” asked Mrs. Gawthorpe, immediately on the alert.
Pethick dabbed his lips on his serviette. “Griff and I were talking about Milónoff the other night,” he observed, airily, and was about to launch into some lengthy circumlocution when his glance—averted from Mrs. Gawthorpe—fastened with an expression of surprise on somebody or something over Densham’s shoulder.
“Speak of the archangels!” he muttered, under his breath, with a motion toward Gawthorpe. “Here’s Milónoff now!”
The Russian, paler than ever, and with an indescribable dullness of expression in his deep-set eyes, was already level with the table at which Kalinova and Bienjonetti were seated. Kalinova glanced up and looked him squarely in the face without a sign of recognition. Her wineglass was half way to her lips. Without turning her eyes away from Milónoff she thrust her arm toward the Prince in an invitation to clink glasses. Bienjonetti was quick to respond. Her eyes veered round to his as their fingers came together, and Milónoff, with an incredibly swift and involuntary clenching of his fists, passed on and sat down, some distance away.
Pethick did his best to minimize the significance of this incident, quieting Mrs. Gawthorpe’s suspicions as best he could. But the conversation did not again drift into easy or humorous channels. Fortunately there was little time left to get to the station for the last train to Croydon, and Pethick’s party soon broke up.
The next morning Densham had hardly commenced his breakfast, with the Times propped against the cruet, when the other occupants of the Suffolk dining room were startled by the sharp crash of falling china. Densham had upset his tea-cup; but quite unconscious of the hot liquid dripping on to his knees, his whole attention was grippingly concentrated on a brief item in the paper.
A waiter came hurrying to his side. Only then did he realize that something embarrassing had happened.
“My God!” he muttered, with the merest glance at the spilled tea and broken cup. “I’m sorry.” And then, again, more vehemently than before— “My God!”
Some sixth sense—for his glance had immediately leaped back to the paper—seemed to tell him that people were staring. Thrusting the paper under his arm he jumped up, almost upset the bending waiter, and hurried out.
Darting upstairs, two steps at a time, he kept repeating, under his breath, over and over again—“Milónoff murdered! Dead! Milónoff! Dead!”
He got to his room and slammed the door behind him. Catching sight of himself suddenly in the mirror he started back, flung the paper on the bed, and grasping his temples in both hands tried to calm himself. But from between his clenched teeth the words still issued:
“Dead! Dead! Dead!”
The news item was very brief. The shooting had occurred in the early hours of the morning at Bienjonetti’s flat. The Prince was being held on a charge of murder. He had told the police that Milónoff threatened him and he was forced to shoot in self defence. Kalinova’s name was not mentioned.
“Dead! Dead! Dead!”
While his lips moved slowly and mechanically Densham’s brain was racing. Presently he jumped up, flung some things into a handbag, and with an indescribable last look about the room strode heavily down the corridor, down the stairs, and out of the hotel.
In less than half an hour he was in a train bound for Croydon. The compartment was empty. He gave full rein to his whirling thoughts.
As soon as the train started to move Densham seemed able to leave the dead Milónoff behind. He counted for nothing. He had never really been between them.
Densham closed his eyes and whispered:
“Sov’reign dear!”
Slowly he withdrew and clinging thoughts from the sweet image of her, passionately remembered, with parted lips and widened eyes, close to him—intoxicatingly close! Lovely as were his memories of her, he wanted now to thrust forward into the future. He raised his hand and pressed a kiss into his palm.
“Goodbye, dear, for a tiny minute, while I think,” he murmured, as though she were actually there, opposite him, regarding him with those tender humid eyes.
But his mind would not fling out for him a projection of what was to come. Strive as he might only she came; she—radiant, joyous, with fluttered breath and all her soul poured into her gaze. He felt himself yearning toward her. His eyes closed again and he gave himself up to the contemplation of her exquisiteness. His lips trembled apart.
“Natálya Feódorovna!”
It was a whisper; but it seemed to ring and re-echo in his ears. He could do nothing but murmur her name and call up ecstatic memories of her.
Once in a while he would lean forward in the seat and put a question to himself, fiercely demanding an answer.
“Is it possible that she won’t marry me?”
But there was no answer; only her smile, her fingers thrusting through his hair, her cool lips touching his.
“Will she say, ‘I am too old. I’m an invalid. You would tire of me.’ Surely she won’t say that.”
As before: only her frank gaze bent tenderly upon him, her hands stretched out to him, her breath quickened with pleasure at his coming.
He felt her near him. His soul seemed filled with her presence, leaving no room for thoughts, doubts, fears, longings. Her being flooded into his, answering every question, satisfying every desire.
He struggled no longer. She was with him. She had not waited for him to come. She had joined him. Already they were one.
He did not look forward, as he had done earlier, to the thrill of running up the steps, going to her, taking her in his arms. He no longer tried to picture what room she would be in when he arrived, what they would say, how the day would pass.
They were together, now! He was more conscious of it than he was of the movement of the train. Many times before he had experienced this sensation; but never so vividly, so intensely. Some emanation of her tenderness seemed to envelop him.
The present was overwhelmingly satisfying. They could never now be parted. Distance, time, flesh, life, death—all these figments of the brain were dissolved in pure ecstasy. Their exile in the wrong world was at an end. They belonged to each other. They were together. She had come to him.
He looked out of the carriage window and noticed that the train was passing through Penge. It was raining. Spattered drops streaked the glass. He watched the steady downpour, the people moving about in the soaked streets under glistening umbrellas, the dejected cab-horses splashing through the mud.
“This is England!” thought Densham. He had not been back long enough to take it all for granted. Every now and then he experienced a curious pungent sensation of the flavour of England,—dwarfed, crowded, damp, insular; and yet—cosy!—even in the pouring rain.
In a few minutes he would reach Croydon, take a cab, and … it suddenly struck him with more force than usual that the house he was going to, Natálya herself, Anton, Polinka—were not a part of this England he sensed so keenly every little while.
He began to think of her foreignness—that something in her eyes, her bearing, her gestures, the unconstrained flow of her feelings expressed spontaneously by the facile motion of her quick fingers, the pouting of her lips or the contraction of her dark brows. There were moments when her challenging eyes, her serene brow, the composed curve of her lips, and the thrust of her deep throat, gave her a majestic and sovereign air. So he recalled her now.
A rush of excited anticipation, restlessness, passionate expectancy, swept through his soul.
The train was slowing down. Familiar sights flashed past the window— the coal-yards, Addiscombe Bridge, the row of larches along Lansdowne Road, the end of the long platform, … noise, steam, porters darting about, the guard’s whistle, a slight jerk … Before he knew it he was hurrying up the slope. Outside it was still pouring with rain.
He gave Madame Milónoff’s address in a parched tone to a waiting cabdriver. “I’m in a hurry,” he added, glancing sharply into the man’s haggard face. He sprang in and was driven off at a good pace.
Only then, as the four-wheeler rolled noisily down George Street, did Densham realize that there would be the opposite of rejoicing at the house he was approaching. He began to wonder how the news had been communicated to her. It would come as a shock; but she would not grieve. Milónoff had made that impossible. She had long ago ceased to love him, even think of him, except as an occasional intruder in her house. No, she would not grieve.
Nevertheless, when he at last ran up the steps, he felt a weight dragging at his heart. They were a long time coming to the door. He took off his hat and flicked the gathered raindrops from its brim. Finally Polinka appeared. At sight of him she covered her scared face with her little hands and began rocking herself to and fro, moaning in a low, liquid voice.
Densham stepped across the threshold, closed the door behind him, dropped his handbag, and grasped the girl’s elbows.
“Tell me,” he whispered fiercely, thrusting his face close to her fingers, through which tears were streaming, “tell me, how is madame?”
Responding to his pressure Polinka withdrew her hands. She darted one wild glance at him and flung herself upon the floor, clasping his knees, and crying out in a stifled voice—“O Holy Mother! O dear little sacred heart of Mary. Have mercy on us!”
Densham bent over her and tried to raise the tear-soaked face; but she fell back in a sitting posture, swaying from side to side, and muttering through her clasped fingers—now pressed violently against her mouth, as though to hold back her bursting heart—“Dear little mother of Jesus! Ah! Your honour, your honour!”
At that moment Anton appeared, coming out of a door at the end of a gloomy hall. As soon as he caught sight of Densham he hurried forward, with a downcast head. His hair was wildly tossed over his huge brow. One hand opened and closed convulsively in his thick beard. The other swung clenched and rigid at his side.
Densham waited for Anton to speak. His own tongue seemed fastened to the roof of his mouth, and he was trembling from head to foot.
“Your honour has seen the newspapers?” asked the old footman, stopping short in front of Densham, without looking at him.
“Yes, Anton.”
There was a pause. The two men stood stock still. Densham was gazing into the worn, withered old face in mute interrogation. Anton fixed his glance on the cowering Polinka, sobbing incessantly in a little heap on the floor.
“It is terrible,” said Anton, with low distinctness. “Murder is a sudden thing. Such a shock. Your honour will understand. Go upstairs, Polinka! Go away! You are not wanted, Polinka! Your honour will pardon Polinka, sir. She has the heart of a little mouse. Polinka!”
He went to her and bent his giant form over her, but she shrank from him, thrust him away, and broke into a more violent paroxysm of sobbing.
“Please come into the library, your honour,” Anton requested, when he saw it was no use attempting to calm her.
The guarded, subdued tone of the old servitor had a quieting effect on Densham’s nerves. He strode into the library. Anton pulled across the heavy curtain which hung over the door and faced the lover of his mistress, this time with a level gaze.
“Madame?” Densham whispered, his hands writhing behind him. “How is madame?”
With an effort to control his voice which showed in every seam of his gnarled face, Anton spoke at last in a hollow tone.
“Madame’s heart,” he said, and raised his hands as though about to fling them upward in a gesture of abandoned lamentation. Instead he twice beat his breast.
Densham groped forward.
“Yes … yes?”
The silence was full of dread. It fell about him like darkness, like a black pall.
Above him the deep voice spoke again:
“Polinka took in the newspaper with Madame’s breakfast. It is usual. Every morning she do that. Polinka began to read.”
Over Anton’s shoulder Densham saw the curtain flung back from the door. In another moment Polinka had dropped to her knees at his feet.
“I am the wicked one,” she sobbed. “I saw it in the paper. I shake very much. Madame ask me, ‘What is it, Polinka?’ I shake more. I speak nothing. Madame snatch the paper. I scream, ‘No, no, no, no!’ I fight—I—what you say? I struggle with madame. But she see. She see it. Ah! Holy Mother!”
The distracted girl smote the carpet with her forehead and a torrent of sobs convulsed her afresh.
Densham poured upon her a look of amazed and recoiling horror. She did not raise her head; but he saw—as in a dream—her hand creeping across the carpet until it found the toe of his shoe. He felt her patting his foot.
He looked away. Suddenly he thrust both hands deeply through his hair. The gleam of an unexpected and mysterious recognition flamed in his eyes. She—radiant, joyous, with fluttered breath and all her soul in her gaze—as she had come to him an hour before, flooded his sight and senses again with her presence. She had not waited for him to come. She had joined him.
In a strangely calm voice he presently spoke:
“Tell me, Anton.”
With half-averted head he stood, listening.
The old man took his hand from his beard. His eyes were suddenly glazed over with a stony look. His voice was like ice in the air:
“Madame Milónoff is dead!”