第22章

SHE had lost the sense of time, and did not know how late it was till she came out into the street and saw that all the windows were dark between Miss Hatchard's and the Royall house.

As she passed from under the black pall of the Norway spruces she fancied she saw two figures in the shade about the duck-pond.She drew back and watched; but nothing moved, and she had stared so long into the lamp-lit room that the darkness confused her, and she thought she must have been mistaken.

She walked on, wondering whether Mr.Royall was still in the porch.In her exalted mood she did not greatly care whether he was waiting for her or not: she seemed to be floating high over life, on a great cloud of misery beneath which every-day realities had dwindled to mere specks in space.But the porch was empty, Mr.

Royall's hat hung on its peg in the passage, and the kitchen lamp had been left to light her to bed.She took it and went up.

The morning hours of the next day dragged by without incident.Charity had imagined that, in some way or other, she would learn whether Harney had already left; but Verena's deafness prevented her being a source of news, and no one came to the house who could bring enlightenment.

Mr.Royall went out early, and did not return till Verena had set the table for the midday meal.When he came in he went straight to the kitchen and shouted to the old woman: "Ready for dinner----" then he turned into the dining-room, where Charity was already seated.

Harney's plate was in its usual place, but Mr.Royall offered no explanation of his absence, and Charity asked none.The feverish exaltation of the night before had dropped, and she said to herself that he had gone away, indifferently, almost callously, and that now her life would lapse again into the narrow rut out of which he had lifted it.For a moment she was inclined to sneer at herself for not having used the arts that might have kept him.

She sat at table till the meal was over, lest Mr.

Royall should remark on her leaving; but when he stood up she rose also, without waiting to help Verena.

She had her foot on the stairs when he called to her to come back.

"I've got a headache.I'm going up to lie down.""I want you should come in here first; I've got something to say to you."She was sure from his tone that in a moment she would learn what every nerve in her ached to know; but as she turned back she made a last effort of indifference.

Mr.Royall stood in the middle of the office, his thick eyebrows beetling, his lower jaw trembling a little.

At first she thought he had been drinking; then she saw that he was sober, but stirred by a deep and stern emotion totally unlike his usual transient angers.And suddenly she understood that, until then, she had never really noticed him or thought about him.Except on the occasion of his one offense he had been to her merely the person who is always there, the unquestioned central fact of life, as inevitable but as uninteresting as North Dormer itself, or any of the other conditions fate had laid on her.Even then she had regarded him only in relation to herself, and had never speculated as to his own feelings, beyond instinctively concluding that he would not trouble her again in the same way.But now she began to wonder what he was really like.

He had grasped the back of his chair with both hands, and stood looking hard at her.At length he said:

"Charity, for once let's you and me talk together like friends."Instantly she felt that something had happened, and that he held her in his hand.

"Where is Mr.Harney? Why hasn't he come back? Have you sent him away?" she broke out, without knowing what she was saying.

The change in Mr.Royall frightened her.All the blood seemed to leave his veins and against his swarthy pallor the deep lines in his face looked black.

"Didn't he have time to answer some of those questions last night? You was with him long enough!" he said.

Charity stood speechless.The taunt was so unrelated to what had been happening in her soul that she hardly understood it.But the instinct of self-defense awoke in her.

"Who says I was with him last night?"

"The whole place is saying it by now."

"Then it was you that put the lie into their mouths.--Oh, how I've always hated you!" she cried.

She had expected a retort in kind, and it startled her to hear her exclamation sounding on through silence.

"Yes, I know," Mr.Royall said slowly."But that ain't going to help us much now.""It helps me not to care a straw what lies you tell about me!""If they're lies, they're not my lies: my Bible oath on that, Charity.I didn't know where you were: I wasn't out of this house last night."She made no answer and he went on: "Is it a lie that you were seen coming out of Miss Hatchard's nigh onto midnight?"She straightened herself with a laugh, all her reckless insolence recovered."I didn't look to see what time it was.""You lost girl...you...you...Oh, my God, why did you tell me?" he broke out, dropping into his chair, his head bowed down like an old man's.

Charity's self-possession had returned with the sense of her danger."Do you suppose I'd take the trouble to lie to YOU? Who are you, anyhow, to ask me where I go to when I go out at night?"Mr.Royall lifted his head and looked at her.His face had grown quiet and almost gentle, as she remembered seeing it sometimes when she was a little girl, before Mrs.Royall died.

"Don't let's go on like this, Charity.It can't do any good to either of us.You were seen going into that fellow's house...you were seen coming out of it....I've watched this thing coming, and I've tried to stop it.

As God sees me, I have...."

"Ah, it WAS you, then? I knew it was you that sent him away!"He looked at her in surprise."Didn't he tell you so?