THE WOMAN AND THE PHILISTINE

 

 

I.—SHE.

 

DEAREST DEAREST—Just by chance, an hour ago, I heard that you would be back in England to-night. Oh! to think that we are in the same land again—that the same sky covers us, the same sounds ring in our ears, the same sights are before our eyes—that our thoughts will have but a little way to go before they find each other. You will go to the club as soon as you arrive, and find this letter waiting. Did you expect it? How I have waited for you! You must have known, so you have come. I have lived over those last hours we had together, till I know every moment of them by heart; but they would not have served much longer. Phil, dear, I ache with life and love, and longing to see you. I feel sometimes as if I must, and will, break away from my shackles and go out into the wide world with you, and live beneath a blue sky that shall seem as if it were only made to be a canopy for our heads. the monotonous round and round, day after day, that I live through now can’t be meant to go on for ever. For all lives, surely, there is somewhere a goal?

            I hurl these words at you; each one seems to burn its way through me to the tip of my pen, while the thoughts smites me, ‘ If he should have changed?’ But I know you have not. We shall only change towards each other when the sun has turned to snow. I can feel, with every word I write, that you are the same. Why, then, should we keep apart because, through my folly, you have a wife who is nothing to you, and I a husband taken in a fit of pique, and because it seemed so easy to marry and so necessary to show you that, thought I loved you—I never denied that, remember—you should not hold me unless I chose? I often wish we could unmarry ourselves and marry those two—the white-faced lady who bears your name, and the lanky gentleman who put a ring on my finger and imagines that I belong to him. What a chaste and edifying union it would be, for she is good and he is good, and their children would be gooder. Heredity would be proud of itself, and Ibsen would bless their union, while you and I took our way to the ends of the earth together, and whether the sun shone or the clouds gathered would be no concern at all to us: we should only know that we were each others’s.

            Phil, dear and dearest, even as I write my mood is flagging, and I am afraid. Perhaps, after all, you have changed and care no longer? But no—no—I could not bear it! My whole life is lived with you; the life that people see is a dream I go through mechanically, an excitement that never reaches my heart, a surface liveliness that carries me along while I wait for you. There have been days when I could have sobbed—I did often—with the weary waiting, with the slowness of time, the trivialness of everything; and others when I could have sung for joy because of the certainty of your coming back to me, the absolute knowledge that you must come and would.

            Write the moment you get this, and tell me that you love me and live for me and long to hold me again, and that she is nothing—nothing—nothing to you. Implore me to let you see me, and at once; say you cannot, will not wait, and say it with the imperiousness I love. If you get this in time, come to-morrow—at five. I shall be alone. Richard is always out between for and seven. Write and say you will come. And say you love me, say that first of all. I want to be told it afresh, to see it written down, to hear it said, to feel it in my heart and soul till they are brimful of a joy that is pain, and a burden to carry, till a swathing cloud of happiness life stifles and bewilders me.—Yours,                     M.

 

II.—HE.

 

            Love you? Yes, I love—as much as ever, and more, if it is any good to you to know it. If I were a different sort of man, knowing it would probably by your damnation. But I am not coming near you, understand that once and for all. You are married to a man a thousand times your superior, as I have a married a woman a thousand times too good for me; and thus, if fate has dealt us some blows and disappointments, it has also made us its apologies. If, in marking out our lives, it used your impatience as its instrument—I do not say it by way of reproach, but only to show you that, at leas, you did not resist it—it strong enough to wait, if you had been true to yourself and to me, we should have been together. As it is, we are apart, and the least we can do is to pay the penalty of our folly without crying out. I am not going to break the heart of the girl who has trusted me, nor help you to ruin the life of the man who has trusted you. We have created duties for ourselves, and we must do them—a prosaic thing, but the fact has to be faced.

            All the same, I love you, Moll, and God in Heaven only knows why,—because of the devil in you I think sometimes, because of the curb I want to put on you, because of the longing that comes over me, now and then, to put my hands round your neck and strangle you, or to hold you and kiss you till your heart stopped beating, and you were hidden away from him and his kisses for ever; for I can’t stand thinking of you in his arms—though I leave you to them.

            You had better burn this note, lest it should get you into trouble, though it would at least prove to him that the door of the Divorce Court will not be opened by me. Leave me alone, Moll, and be a good woman—if you can.            P. H.

 

 

III.—SHE

 

            But I can’t be a good woman, Phil, and I don’t want to be one; I want you, just you in the world. I belong to you, and, if you love me, then you belong to me. Why should two people who love each other keep apart for the sake of two others they do not love, or because in separate churches they have sworn to do a thing they knew to be impossible? We each went through a ceremony with a stranger—it was a mad and wicked thing to do—but why should we follow it up? Did your lips tremble while they lied? I could feel mine burn with scorn—scorn for myself, that tried to delude myself into thinking the obligations would become easy when promises had made them inevitable. I could almost hear Satan laughing at me. Perhaps he laughed at you as you walked down the aisle with your rustling bride, and thought you had outwitted the strongest feeling of your life. But that masquerading in churches, you in one, and I in another, was not marriage. We were married—you and I to each other—long since, when we were all that man and woman could be to each other, and swore to love each other always. Not a soul was there to hear, but, if it were not marriage, then tell me what else to call it, dear heart of mine? The ceremony was made for those who are so weak they need a fear of public shame to keep them to their vows. Had we waited, we should have made our professions before the world with the best and the worst; but, as it was, we made them to each other, and were together first, before we knew these stranger folk. Can anything undo it? No, dear Phil, nothing, nothing—neither time nor space, nor any living of mine with another man, nor of yours with another woman, nor any calling them by names that arte not theirs. No denying of Christ altered His divinity, and no denying of ourselves will tear the love that is life itself out of our hearts. Why, then, should we be tortured? Has the whiteness of your soul become so much to you that you will not speckle it a little for me? Don’t take up the self-regarding virtues, Phil; they are cruel and selfish, and make for Heaven at the price of human happiness. I cannot write more, I am worn out with the ache of these two days. Phil, my own—my dearest—I want you so. I want you—life of me, heart of me—I want you. It is a year, a whole year, since we parted, and I am sick and weary and hungry for the sight of your face and the sound of your voice and the words that will come rushing to your lips when we meet.                                                                       MOLL.

 

IV.—HE

 

            To-morrow, then, at five. I was a fool to England again; for, though I know you are not fit to tie the shoe-strings of the woman beside me—I sit and look at her as insensibly as though she were built of marble—I long for the sight of you till I could curse myself for a fool, and give five years of life to see you. I wonder sometimes whether, after all, I love you—or hate you most. I never had much faith in you, though I know you love me. My strongest feeling towards you is a desire to shake you off, out of my thoughts, and out of my life; but I couldn’t do it to save my life.

            I think you are a witch, Molly, for, in reality, I love you more than ever, and I believe the knowledge that I should see you there would send me flying from the gate of Heaven to the jaws of Hell. After all, it can do this poor girl—nor the man whose misfortune it is to have married you—no harm if we have one single hour together. On the contrary, it may prove that absense and imagination have given us an exaggerated idea of each other, and leave us in a better frame of mind towards all that is now inevitable—not that I believe it will. I am delirious with joy at the thought of seeing you again, you witch. You really are a witch, Moll, and ought to be burnt for one. Probably you will be, in another place, and my company.                                                                                                                                                PHIL.

 

V.—SHE

 

            Yes, dearest, yes. To-day at five. Exaggerated? Oh, yes, our ideas are exaggerated, for we have imagined ourselves strong enough to live without each other. Are we strong enough to live without food and light and warmth? We shall be when we are reconciled to life apart. I shall count the hours and the minutes till five o’clock is here. Phil, I love you so much that I want an earthquake or a revolution to happen in recognition of it—or to do some awful thing at which the world shall stand aghast, or some great deed at which it shall wonder and applaud. For love worth calling by its name is one of the forces of the world, a great wave that sweeps over and under us, and bears us on as the fates will, and only Heaven or Hell, if either cares one jot, knows whither. What blame, then, to you or to me if, having put ourselves at its mercy, we are forced to recognise its strength? The immortals did no less—shall we?

            To-day at five. I feel as if I were waiting for the supreme moment of my life. Richard will be out; I shall be here alone, listening for your knock and that most joyful sound, your step ‘ as it comes up the stair.’—Yours, dearest,         M.

 

VI.—HE

 

Later same day

 

            I can’t come. My wife has just started for Beechmere. Her mother is dying. I ought to have gone with her, but stayed behind. But I am not such a brute that I can meet you while she is going through one of the deepest of human sorrows. When I hear that things are better I will write again.                                                                                                     P. H.

 

 

VII.—TO P. H., FROM MOLLY

 

(Telegram)

 

            Don’t stay away because your mother-in-law is dying, you droll person. Surely we might meet without fear of her ghost.

 

 

ANSWER

 

Your telegram is hateful to me.—P. H.

 

 

VIII.—HIS WIFE TO HIM

 

DEAREST PHIL—I arrived an hour ago and found my dear mother hopelessly ill. She hardly recognised me at first, but she did after a little while, and asked for you. Perhaps it is better that you did not come, for every one is so distressed, and the house is full. There are two nurses here (to nurse mother) and Margaret and her children. But if I find I cannot bear it without you, you will come, darling, will you not? You could stay at the White Hart, in the village, so as not to give any trouble, and it would be less trying for you than being in the house. I know how busy you are, and won’t send for you if I can help it, but I don’t think I could bear being away from you, and in very great trouble.

            I want you to be careful about Baxter; I am sure we shall have to send him away. He is most disagreeable man, and Hannah tells me that he sits in the servants’ hall at night and abuses us both, and gets half tipsy and frightens the other servants. He might set the house on fire, or do something terrible. I am so afraid of anything happening to you while I am away. Please write to me, darling; I shall feel stronger then, and able to help them here.—Your loving wife,        ANNIE.

 

 

IX.—HE TO HIS WIFE

 

DEAR LITTLE ANNIE—Glad you arrived all right, and wish you had found the mother better; but perhaps she will pull through yet. Anyway, it is no good distressing yourself, and while there’s life, there’s hope.

Baxter celebrated your absence by getting drunk last night, and was astoundingly insolent this morning, so I took the liberty of turning him out of doors with a month’s wages, and minus a character. I have just discovered that he has helped himself pretty freely to my clothes, etc.; perhaps he means it as a compliment to my tailor.

            Of course, I’ll come if you want me, but I am awfully busy, and it’s no use my taking a long journey unless it’s necessary.—Yours affectionately,         PHIL.

 

 

X.—TO MOLLY

 

            No, I won’t till I know that her mother is out of danger. I am not quite such a brute as you seem to think. Your telegram was horrible, and your letter makes me hate you furiously: it reminds me of a ghastly story I once read of a man who kissed his mistress while he followed his wife to the grave. You may be the sort of woman who could stand it, but I am not the sort of man who could do it. If Annie comes back all right and in less distress we will meet again. Till then you may do your duty, if you can; and, in some sort of fashion, I will attempt to do mine. I wish I could throw off your accursed attraction for me. In three months’ time the sea will divide us once more: when it doesn’t, by some unholy means you draw me to you, or, at any rate, ruin my peace of mind. For, even in the face of this letter, I love you.                               P. H.

 

 

Three days later

 

XI.—PHIL TO HIS WIFE AT BEECHMERE

 

(Telegram)

 

How is the invalid? Why have you not written or wired? Reply paid.

 

 

ANSWER

 

Mother died this morning. Please do not come; could not bear it. Will make your excuses. Letter follows explaining.

 

XII.—ANNIE TO HER HUSBAND (enclosing Letter III.)

 

BEECHMERE

 

            This morning my dear mother died. The enclosed letter was sent me by Baxter. I suppose he stole it. I did not understand what it was about at first, and cannot believe it now. I feel as if it had killed me. Who is she? Why did you marry me at all if you belong to her, as she says? I am dazed and heart-broken, and can never see you again.               ANNIE.

 

 

XIII.—HE TO HIS WIFE

 

THE WHITE HART, BEECHMERE.

 

DEAREST LITTLE WOMAN AND MY WIFE—I would have given my life rather than that letter should have fallen into your hands. You will probably not believe me, and yet I swear that I love you, and respect you, and believe in you a thousand times more than I care for a respect any other woman in the world. And  don’t love her. There are times when I hate and loathe her. I have been infatuated with her, but that is altogether another matter. I rushed down here the moment I got your letter, and I entreat you to see me and hear my explanation.—Your miserable  

PHIL.

 

 

A message, ‘ Dangerously ill,’ from Dr. Seaton.

 

A month later

 

XIV.—HE TO MOLLY

 

            It was impossible to write before, but I hope you had my wire. My wife, by an accident, has seen one of your letters; she read it an hour after her mother had died. The two things, coming together, almost broke her heart. She has been desperately ill—at death’s door—and it was only yesterday that she could be persuaded to see me. You and I, Molly, can never meet again. I would rather blow my brains out than see you. I have cursed myself every hour of the day for a brute and a scoundrel, and I fear I have not let you off very generously. It has been my fault, and not yours; but now all things must, and shall, for ever come to an end. The silence between us ought never to have been broken. I don’t pretend that you have not fascination for me even yet, but nothing shall induce me to see you again, and my wife has, at any rate, my entire affection and regard. Forgive me all things.                 P. H.

 

 

XV.—MOLLY TO PHIL

 

            Good. By all means let her have your entire affection and regard. You had better swear to her that you never loved me at all, that I am bad and treated you shamefully—or, that you treated me shamefully, which will please her still more—that you love her only, and that the letter she found or stole, or anyway read, though it was not intended for her (good people do such astonishingly mean things) is merely a proof of my infatuation, not of yours: that is the sort of rope by which a man usually pulls himself out of a scrape, and I don’t suppose you will fail to make use of it. You might tell her that you respect her—which, thank God! you never did me—that you will never see me again; beg her to forgive you, and promise to go to church on Sundays. You will win her back in about six weeks; she will love you more than ever, pray for you night and morning, bring up your children in the fear of the Lord and the odour of respectability. In a couple of years you will be highly domesticated, wonder at yourself, pity me, and think of our old raptures with horror—and a little lingering tenderness. They were not so bad, after all? Who would have thought that you, like many other men, would have turned out to be a mere puppet at the beck of virtue—virtue as it is understood when expediency is its backbone? Oh, what an infinite scorn I have for you—you irresponsible thing in the hands of tradition—or heredity, as the fashion is to call it now. It is such a mere fluke, you poor ball tied by a string to a cup, whether you fall into wood or ivory. It all depends on the maker of the cup, and he—or she—was, perhaps, so much dust before the wind a century ago. But don’t be afraid; you appear to have come of respectability and the amenities of commonplace life, and you shall return to them. I shouldn’t wonder if your grandmother is in Heaven, and if you—provided you don’t break your string, and you won’t—one day find yourself there: it will suit you, cool and calm and uneventful. The other place will accord better with my temperament. I shall at home among the flames that curl and twirl, and the burning that I have tasted often enough already.

            Phil, what a coward you are. Yes; what a coward. You don’t love this milk-and-water Annie—did any one ever love a woman called Annie with anything more than the praiseworthy love of family life or a passing fancy?—this woman who would herself, from a mere sense of duty, love any man on earth who happed to be her husband. You are only sorry for her; you are annoyed because she has found you out (a man hates it, even worse than a woman), and you have a high sense of what is due to everybody with whom you have legitimate relations of any sort. Why—why shouldn’t she weep out her wrongs at home, with her own people? She would cultivate a chastened expression, wear dowdy clothes, do charitable deeds, and very soon be content. These highly moral people always find a world of comfort in their own superiority. While she found it, you could take me away, and we would laugh and be happy. For, happen what will, you know perfectly that you are mine. You may hate me if you like—hate is often a form of love, and always a form of passion—or despise me, or think what you will; your thoughts will come home to me for ever and ever, as mine will go home to you. Yes, dear heart of me, for hate or love, or best or worst, whether we be together or apart, though we never meet again while we live, you are mine, and I am yours. Yes, yours, and I love you: even though I call you a coward I love you. And there is this difference between us—I have courage to see things as they are, and you have not. If you had, I should not be here and you would not be there. She would soon be comforted, he would soon forget; and we should be together—Adam and Eve in their Eden, and no serpent to call upon us, or God to turn us out.

            I laugh when you said you would have given ten years of your life to have spared her this pain. My beloved and my dearest, I would give all my life, save just one year, to have you back again—to see and hear you and be with you every day for just that time. Nay, for this I would not care though I killed her, and it were counted murder; I would love you and rejoice, even while, on the night after the last one of our year, I sat alone in a condemned cell, knowing that in the dawn they’d hang me.

            Well, good-bye,           MOLLY.

 

 

XVI.—HE.

 

A letter has come from you. I burnt it unread. To-morrow I start with my wife for Italy.

Thank God, she has forgiven me!          P. H.

 

XVII.—SHE. (A Telegram)

 

Farewell, Philistine—a safe journey to Posterity.

 

 

 

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