Chapter 39

Peter, away from Vivette, knew only that he had wronged her. He did not understand exactly how he had transgressed. He could not read her conduct at all. Her strange lapse into sincerity simply puzzled him. She had seemed, at the moment when she had put herself into his hands, protective and thoughtful.

Peter knew her impulse was rooted in honour. He exaggerated the evil of his graceless words, treading the familiar way of abasement and remorse. He now desired only to be pardoned. He called upon her at an early hour.

Vivette had spent the time wondering at depths in herself unsuspected. Hitherto her life had run a career of adventurous and impulsive hedonism. She had loved easily, and easily taken the thing she desired. She only asked of life that delicacy and fair play should not be offended. She did not understand virtue. Her principle had always been lightly to take the way of least resistance. Now, suddenly from somewhere, sprang a devoted altruism—a passionate resolution that another should see life beautifully open its treasure.

Her impulse had been to save Peter from sordidly failing. She had not acted from jealousy. She had never less been sensually led than when she had entreated Peter. Her lips curved in[Pg 299] contemplation of a discovered irony in things. Peter had urged her to be serious. Very well: Peter should that day be made to realise how serious she could be. She had decided to talk to him frankly. She would not repeat her offer or allow it now to be accepted. She was glad that it had the previous evening miscarried. She had thought of a better way. Peter must be made to understand his condition.

She did not admit that her offer had been wrongly made. Peter's adventure would not with her have ended perfectly; but neither would it have ended in a fruition merely brutal. She realised how gradually he was losing grip of himself, and saw him soon as tinder for any woman with brains and a high temperature. She saw him slipping his self-respect. She would last night have saved him from the worst. There was friendliness and grace enough between them to justify their passion. But Vivette was now differently inspired. Surely Peter could be braced and stiffened. He was not yet attacked in his will. He was merely blind and drifting, perhaps unaware of his trouble.

He found her sitting, an image of graven severity, curiously out of tune with her cheerful room. He felt like a schoolboy called to repeat a lesson in which he had failed to satisfy.

"I have offended you," he tragically began.

But Vivette intended to be strictly sensible.

"That is what I want to talk about," she said, very matter-of-fact. "I don't think you [Pg 300]understand what happened last night. I am going to tell you."

Peter was puzzled. She was not Vivette of the shallow eyes. He caught her hands to draw her towards him, but she firmly resisted.

"No, Peter. Sit still and listen to what I have to say."

Peter flung himself, evilly discontented, in a far corner of the settee.

"You always wanted me to be serious," said Vivette, looking at him with some amusement. "But it does not seem to please you."

Peter could not at once recover from his rejected tenderness, but he felt he was behaving badly again. He contrived to put a little grace into his manner.

"I will listen," he said briefly.

"Tell me," Vivette began, "what are you supposed to be doing with yourself?"

"Doing with myself?" he echoed. Already he was conscious of her drift.

"You never talk of your work."

"I am reading for the Bar."

"What does that mean?" she smiled. Vivette had met these young barristers.

"I shall soon be called."

"Till then, you will be waiting for work."

"You are interested?" Peter inquired with an effort to assume an innocent detachment.

"Hasn't it occurred to you," Vivette persisted, "that you're in rather a bad way?"

[Pg 301]

He moved uncomfortably, then rushed to the point:

"You mean I'm just loafing about?"

"You're not really interested in your work."

"You are indeed serious," said Peter, again trying to make light of her catechism. "Aren't you overdoing it?"

Vivette sharply rebuked him, and he did not again interrupt. She held to him an unflattering mirror in which he saw an image of himself which frightened him. He was rich. He had nothing particular to do. He drifted about, meeting elegant and attractive people—mostly women. Everywhere he unconsciously opened himself to one appeal. He was idle; and he was obsessed.

He struggled against this indictment. He even became angry. What did this talk of Vivette really mean? It meant that he desperately loved her.

"This obsession you tell me of!" he cried. "It is you."

"For the time being," she shortly answered.

"Always," he insisted.

"It might easily be someone else. Think, Peter. Have you once been free during these last years?"

Peter was silent.

"What do you want me to say?" he asked at last.

"I want you to realise there are other things. You must not give way to this fixed idea."

[Pg 302]

Where before had Peter heard this? It seemed an echo. But he shut his ears.

"I have only one fixed idea. It is to marry you. You are pleading against yourself, Vivette."

"Put me out of account," she said sharply. "I have already refused."

They were again at the point where last night they had failed to agree.

Peter rose and walked to the end of the room and back to Vivette. He was beginning to measure her strength and subtlety, and they made it more difficult to lose her. His blood rose against the idea. He caught her roughly by the arm.

"Suppose I cannot put all this away? Suppose it has to be really an episode?"

Her arm tightened under his grip. She became cold and hostile.

"I don't understand," she said.

Peter felt his mind twisting like a serpent:

"Will you come back with me to last night?"

"You are talking nonsense. Put your head into your law-books, write plays, travel about—anything."

"I want you, Vivette."

She rose, and stood dismissing him. "This is worse than I thought. You are ready to take the second best."

"You are first and last."

"Therefore," she lashed at him, "you want me for a mistress."

"I have asked you to marry me."

[Pg 303]

"Marriage would not be the truth."

Peter clenched his hands: "On any terms I must have you."

"That is for me to say."

Peter looked at Vivette and found her inexorably set against him. Clearly she was not that day to be moved. His passion died, and her words went poignantly home. He released her arm. His increasing dejection prompted Vivette to soften the steel of her manner:

"Cool yourself, Peter. Put me out of your mind. You are not looking for a mistress, and I want you to wait for the real thing."

"To have you would be very real. You have proved already that you love me."

She saw again the serpent's head and crushed it.

"I have loved before," she said deliberately. "Last night would have meant less to me than to you. Is that what you want?"

Peter cursed himself, and went.

"Good-bye," Vivette called to him. "Next time we meet I expect you to be in a better mind."

Vivette now had leisure to be surprised at herself.

For the first time in her life she had refused something she really wanted. She decided that this was the limit of her generosity. She had refused Peter for herself, but at any rate no other woman should, without a title, pluck the fruit of her sacrifice. She would closely examine any claim on Peter which might be made.