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THREE WEEKS
BYELINOR GLYN
1907
INTRODUCTION TOMY AMERICAN READERS
I feel now, when my "Three Weeks" is to be launched in a new land,where I have many sympathetic friends, that, owing to themisunderstanding and misrepresentation it received from nearly theentire press and a section of the public in England, I would like tostate my view of its meaning. (As I wrote it, I suppose it could bebelieved I know something about that!) For me "the Lady" was a deepstudy, the analysis of a strange Slav nature, who, from circumstancesand education and her general view of life, was beyond the ordinarylaws of morality. If I were making the study of a Tiger, I would notgive it the attributes of a spaniel, because the public, and I myself,might prefer a spaniel! I would still seek to portray accuratelyevery minute instinct of that Tiger, to make a living picture. Thus,as you read, I want you to think of her as such a study. A greatsplendid nature, full of the passionate realisation of primitiveinstincts, immensely cultivated, polished, blase. You must see her atLucerne, obsessed with the knowledge of her horrible life with herbrutal, vicious husband, to whom she had been sacrificed for politicalreasons when almost a child. She suddenly sees this young Englishman,who comes as an echo of something straight and true in manhood which,in outward appearance at all events, she has met in her youth in theperson of his Uncle Hubert. She perceives in him at once the Soulsleeping there; and it produces in her a strong emotion. Then I wantyou to understand the effect of Love on them both. In her it rose fromcaprice to intense devotion, until the day at the Farm when it reachedthe highest point--a desire to reproduce his likeness. How, with themost passionate physical emotion, her mental influence upon Paul wasever to raise him to vast aims and noble desires for futuregreatness. In him love opened the windows of his Soul, so that he sawthe fine in everything.
The immense rush of passion in Venice came from her knowledge thatthey soon must part. Notice the effect of the two griefs on Paul. Thefirst, with its undefined hope, making him do well in all things--evenhis prowess as a hunter--to raise himself to be more worthy in hereyes; the second and paralysing one of death, turning him into adamantuntil his soul awakens again with the returning spring of her spiritin his heart, and the consolation of the living essence of their lovein the child.
The minds of some human beings are as moles, grubbing in the earth forworms. They have no eyes to see God's sky with the stars in it. Tosuch "Three Weeks" will be but a sensual record of passion. But thosewho do look up beyond the material will understand the deep pure love,and the Soul in it all, and they will realise that to such a nature as"the Lady's," passion would never have run riot until it wassated--she would have daily grown nobler in her desire to make herLoved One's son a splendid man.
And to all who read, I say--at least be just! and do not skip. No lineis written without its having a bearing upon the next, and in itssmall scope helping to make the presentment of these two human beingsvivid and clear.
The verdict I must leave to the Public, but now, at all events, youknow, kind Reader, that _to me_, the "Imperatorskoye" appears anoble woman, because she was absolutely faithful to the man she hadselected as her mate, through the one motive which makes a union moralin ethics--Love.--ELINOR GLYN.
THREE WEEKS
CHAPTER I
Now this is an episode in a young man's life, and has no realbeginning or ending. And you who are old and have forgotten thepassions of youth may condemn it. But there are others who areneither old nor young who, perhaps, will understand and find someinterest in the study of a strange woman who made the illumination ofa brief space.
Paul Verdayne was young and fresh and foolish when his episodebegan. He believed in himself--he believed in his mother, and in anumber of other worthy things. Life was full of certainties forhim. He was certain he liked hunting better than anything else in theworld--for instance. He was certain he knew his own mind, andtherefore perfectly certain his passion for Isabella Waring would lastfor ever! Ready to swear eternal devotion with that delightfulinconsequence of youth in its unreason, thinking to control an emotionas Canute's flatterers would have had him do the waves.
And the Creator of waves--and emotions--no doubt smiled to Himself--ifHe is not tired by now of smiling at the follies of the moles calledhuman beings, who for the most part inhabit His earth!
Paul was young, as I said, and fair and strong. He had been in theeleven at Eton and left Oxford with a record for all that should turna beautiful Englishman into a perfect athlete. Books had not worriedhim much! The fit of a hunting-coat, the pace of a horse, were thingsof more importance, but he scraped through his "Smalls" and his"Mods," and was considered by his friends to be anything but afool. As for his mother--the Lady Henrietta Verdayne--she thought hima god among men!
Paul went to London like others of his time, and attended thetheatres, where perfectly virtuous young ladies display nightly theirinnocent charms in hilarious choruses, arrayed in the latest_modes_. He supped, too, with these houris--and felt himself aman of the world.
He had stayed about in country houses for perhaps a year, and haddanced through the whole of a season with all the prettiest_debutantes_. And one or two of the young married women of fortyhad already marked him out for their prey.
By all this you can see just the kind of creature Paul was. There arehundreds of others like him, and perhaps they, too, have the latentqualities which he developed during his episode--only they remain ashe was in the beginning--sound asleep.
That fall out hunting in March, and being laid up with a sprainedankle and a broken collar-bone, proved the commencement of theIsabella Waring affair.
She was the parson's daughter--and is still for the matter ofthat!--and often in those days between her games of golf and hockey,or a good run on her feet with the hounds, she came up to VerdaynePlace to write Lady Henrietta's letters for her. Isabella was mostamiable and delighted to make herself useful.
And if her hands were big and red, she wrote clearly and well. TheLady Henrietta, who herself was of the delicate Later VictorianDresden China type, could not imagine a state of things whichcontained the fact that her god-like son might stoop to this daughterof the earthy earth!
Yet so it fell about. Isabella read aloud the sporting papers tohim--Isabella played piquet with him in the dull late afternoons ofhis convalescence--Isabella herself washed his dog Pike--that king ofrough terriers! And one terrible day Paul unfortunately kissed thelarge pink lips of Isabella as his mother entered the room.
I will draw a veil over this part of his life.
The Lady Henrietta, being a great lady, chanced to behave as such onthe occasion referred to--but she was also a woman, and not aparticularly clever one. Thus Paul was soon irritated by oppositioninto thinking himself seriously in love with this daughter of themiddle classes, so far beneath his noble station.
"Let the boy have his fling," said Sir Charles Verdayne, who was acoarse person. "Damn it all! a man is not obliged to marry every womanhe kisses!"
"A gentlemen does not deliberately kiss an unmarried girl unless heintends to make her his wife!" retorted Lady Henrietta. "I fear theworst!"
Sir Charles snorted and chuckled, two unpleasant and annoying habitshis lady wife had never been able to break him of. So the affair grewand grew! Until towards the middle of April Paul was advised to travelfor his health.
"Your father and I can sanction no engagement, Paul, before youreturn," said Lady Henrietta. "If, in July, on your twenty-thirdbirthday, you still wish to break your mother's heart--I suppose youmust do so. But I ask of you the unfettered reflection of three monthsfirst."
This seemed reasonable enough, and Paul consented to start upon a tourround Europe--not having spoken the fin
al fatal and binding words toIsabella Waring. They made their adieux in the pouring rain under adripping oak in the lane by the Vicarage gate.
Paul was six foot two, and Isabella quite six foot, and broad inproportion. They were dressed almost alike, and at a little distance,but for the lady's scanty petticoat, it would have been difficult todistinguish her sex.
"Good-bye, old chap," she said, "We have been real pals, and I'll notforget you!"
But Paul, who was feeling sentimental, put it differently.
"Good-bye, darling," he whispered with a suspicion of tremble in hischarming voice. "I shall never love any woman but you--never, never inmy life."
Cuckoo! screamed the bird in the tree.
And now we are getting nearer the episode. Paris bored Paul--he didnot know its joys and was in no mood to learn them. He mooned aboutand went to the races. His French was too indifferent to make theatresa pleasure, and the attractive ladies who smiled at his blue eyes werefor him _defendues_. A man so recently parted from the only womanhe could ever love had no right to look at such things, he thought. Howyoung and chivalrous and honest he was--poor Paul!
So he took to visiting Versailles and Fontainebleau and Compiegne witha guide-book, and came to the conclusion it was all "beastly rot."
So he turned his back upon France and fled to Switzerland.
Do you know Switzerland?--you who read. Do you know it at thebeginning of May? A feast of blue lakes, and snow-peaks, and thedivinest green of young beeches, and the sombre shadow of dark firs,and the exhilaration of the air.
If you do, I need not tell you about it. Only in any case now, youmust see it through the eyes of Paul. That is if you intend to readanother page of this bad book.
It was pouring with rain when he drove from the station to thehotel. His temper was at its worst. Pilatus hid his head in mist, theBuergenstock was invisible--it was chilly, too, and the fire smoked inthe sitting-room when Paul had it lighted.
His heart yearned for his own snug room at Verdayne Place, and thejolly voice of Isabella Waring counting point, quint and quatorze.What nonsense to send him abroad. As if such treatment could beeffectual as a cure for a love like his. He almost laughed at hismother's folly. How he longed to sit down and write to hisdarling. Write and tell how he hated it all, and was only gettingthrough the time until he saw her six feet of buxom charms again--onlyPaul did not put it like that--indeed, he never thought about hercharms at all--or want of them. He analysed nothing. He was soundasleep, you see, to _nuances_ as yet; he was just a splendidEnglish young animal of the best class.
He had promised not to write to Isabella--or, if he _must_, atleast not to write a love-letter.
"Dear boy," the Lady Henrietta had said when giving him her fondparting kiss, "if you are very unhappy and feel you greatly wish towrite to Miss Waring, I suppose you must do so, but let your letter beabout the scenery and the impressions of travel, in no way to beinterpreted into a declaration of affection or a promise of futureunion--I have your word, Paul, for that?"
And Paul had given his word.
"All right, mother--I promise--for three months."
And now on this wet evening the "must" had come, so he pulled out somehotel paper and began.
"MY DEAR ISABELLA:
"I say--you know--I hate beginning like this--I have arrived at thisbeastly place, and I am awfully unhappy. I think it would have beenbetter if I had brought Pike with me, only those rotten laws aboutgetting the little chap back to England would have been hard. How isMoonlighter? And have they really looked after that strain, do yougather? Make Tremlett come down and report progress to you daily--Itold him to. My rooms look out on a beastly lake, and there aremountains, I suppose, but I can't see them. There is hardly any one inthe hotel, because the Easter visitors have all gone back and thesummer ones haven't come, so I doubt even if I can have a game ofbilliards. I am sick of guide-books, and I should like to take thenext train home again. I must dress for dinner now, and I'll finishthis to-night."
Paul dressed for dinner; his temper was vile, and his valettrembled. Then he went down into the restaurant scowling, and wasungracious to the polite and conciliating waiters, ordering his foodand a bottle of claret as if they had done him an injury."_Anglais_," they said to one another behind the serving-screen,pointing their thumbs at him--"he pay but he damn."
Then Paul sent for the _New York Herald_ and propped it up infront of him, prodding at some olives with his fork, one occasionallyreaching his mouth, while he read, and awaited his soup.
The table next to him in this quiet corner was laid for one, and had abunch of roses in the centre, just two or three exquisite blooms thathe was familiar with the appearance of in the Paris shops. Nearly allthe other tables were empty or emptying; he had dined very late. Whocould want roses eating alone? The _menu_, too, was written outand ready, and an expression of expectancy lightened the face of thehead waiter--who himself brought a bottle of most carefully decantedred wine, feeling the temperature through the fine glass with the airof a great connoisseur.
"One of those over-fed foreign brutes of no sex, I suppose," Paul saidto himself, and turned to the sporting notes in front of him.
He did not look up again until he heard the rustle of a dress.
The woman had to pass him--even so close that the heavy silk touchedhis foot. He fancied he smelt tuberoses, but it was not until she satdown, and he again looked at her, that he perceived a knot of themtucked into the front of her bodice.
A woman to order dinner for herself beforehand, and have special wineand special roses--special attention, too! It was simply disgusting!
Paul frowned. He brought his brown eyebrows close together, and glaredat the creature with his blue young eyes.
An elderly, dignified servant in black livery stood behind herchair. She herself was all in black, and her hat--an expensive,distinguished-looking hat--cast a shadow over her eyes. He could justsee they were cast down on her plate. Her face was white, he saw thatplainly enough, startlingly white, like a magnolia bloom, andcontained no marked features. No features at all! he said tohimself. Yes--he was wrong, she had certainly a mouth worth looking atagain. It was so red. Not large and pink and laughingly open likeIsabella's, but straight and chiselled, and red, red, red.
Paul was young, but he knew paint when he saw it, and this red wasreal, and vivid, and disconcerted him.
He began his soup--hers came at the same time; she had only toyed withsome caviare by way of _hors d'oeuvre_, and it angered him tonotice the obsequiousness of the waiters, who passed each thing to thedignified servant to be placed before the lady by his hand. Who wasshe to be served with this respect and rapidity?
Only her red wine the _maitre d'hotel_ poured into her glasshimself. She lifted it up to the light to see the clear ruby, then shesipped it and scented its bouquet, the _maitre d'hotel_ anxiouslyawaiting her verdict the while. "_Bon_," was all she said, andthe weight of the world seemed to fall from the man's slopingshoulders as he bowed and moved aside.
Paul's irritation grew. "She's well over thirty," he said tohimself. "I suppose she has nothing else to live for! I wonder whatthe devil she'll eat next!"
She ate a delicate _truite bleu_, but she did not touch her wineagain the while. She had almost finished the fish before Paul's_sole au vin blanc_ arrived upon the scene, and this angered himthe more. Why should he wait for his dinner while this woman feasted?Why, indeed. What would her next course be? He found himselfunpleasantly interested to know. The tenderest _selle d'agneau aulait_ and the youngest green peas made their appearance, and againthe _maitre d'hotel_ returned, having mixed the salad.
Paul noticed with all these things the lady ate but a small portion ofeach. And it was not until a fat quail arrived later, while he himselfwas trying to get through two mutton chops _a l'anglaise_, thatshe again tasted her claret. Yes, it was claret, he felt sure, andprobably wonderful claret at that. Confound her! Paul turned to thewine list. What could it be? Chateau Latour at fifteen
francs? ChateauMargaux, or Chateau Lafite at twenty?--or possibly it was not here atall, and was special, too--like the roses and the attention. He calledhis waiter and ordered some port--he felt he could not drink anotherdrop of his modest St. Estephe!
All this time the lady had never once looked at him; indeed, exceptthat one occasion when she had lifted her head to examine the winewith the light through it, he had not seen her raise her eyes, andthen the glass had been between himself and her. The white lids withtheir heavy lashes began to irritate him. What colour could they be?those eyes underneath. They were not very large, that wascertain--probably black, too, like her hair. Little black eyes! Thatwas ugly enough, surely! And he hated heavy black hair growing inthose unusual great waves. Women's hair should be light and fluffyand fuzzy, and kept tidy in a net--like Isabella's. This looked sothick--enough to strangle one, if she twisted it round one'sthroat. What strange ideas were those coming into his head? Why shouldshe think of twisting her hair round a man's throat? It must be theport mounting to his brain, he decided--he was not given tospeculating in this way about women.
What would she eat next? And why did it interest him what she ate ordid not eat? The _maitre d'hotel_ again appeared with a dish ofmarvellous-looking nectarines. The waiter now handed the dignifiedservant the finger-bowl, into which he poured rose-water. Paul couldjust distinguish the scent of it, and then he noticed the lady'shands. Yes, they at least were faultless; he could not cavil at_them_; slender and white, with that transparent whiteness likemother-of-pearl. And what pink nails! And how polished! Isabella'shands--but he refused to think of them.
By this time he was conscious of an absorbing interest thrilling hiswhole being--disapproving irritated interest.
The _maitre d'hotel_ now removed the claret, out of which thelady had only drunk one glass.
(What waste! thought Paul.)
And then he returned with a strange-looking bottle, and this time thedignified servant poured the brilliant golden fluid into a tinyliqueur-glass. What could it be? Paul was familiar with mostliqueurs. Had he not dined at every restaurant in London, and suppedwith houris who adored _creme de menthe_? But this was none heknew. He had heard of Tokay--Imperial Tokay--could it be that? Andwhere did she get it? And who the devil was the woman, anyway?
She peeled the nectarine leisurely--she seemed to enjoy it more thanall the rest of her dinner. And what could that expression mean onher face? Inscrutable--cynical was it? No--absorbed. As absolutelyunconscious of self and others as if she had been alone in the room.What could she be thinking of never to worry to look about her?
He began now to notice her throat, it was rounded and intensely white,through the transparent black stuff. She had no strings of pearls orjewels on--unless--yes, that was a great sapphire gleaming from thefolds of gauze on her neck. Not surrounded by diamonds like ordinarybrooches, but just a big single stone so dark and splendid it seemedalmost black. There was another on her hand, and yet others in herears.
Her ears were not anything so very wonderful! Not so _very!_Isabella's were quite as good--and this thought comforted him alittle. As far as he could see beyond the roses and the table she wasa slender woman, and he had not noticed on her entrance if she weretall or short. He could not say why he felt she must be well overthirty--there was not a line or wrinkle on her face--not even theslight nip in under the chin, or the tell-tale strain beside the ears.
She was certainly not pretty, _certainly_ not. Wellshaped--yes--and graceful as far as he could judge; but pretty--athousand times No!
Then the speculation as to her nationality began. French? assuredlynot. English? ridiculous! Equally so German. Italian? perhaps.Russian? possibly. Hungarian? probably.
Paul had drunk his third glass of port and was beginning hisfourth. This was far more than his usual limit. Paul was, as a rule,an abstemious young man. Why he should have deliberately sat and drankthat night he never knew. His dinner had been moderate--distinctlymoderate--and he had watched a refined feast of Lucullus partaken ofby a woman who only _tasted_ each _plat!_
"I wonder what she will have to pay for it all?" he thought tohimself. "She will probably sign the bill, though, and I shan't see."
But when the lady had finished her nectarine and dipped her slenderfingers in the rose-water she got up--she had not smoked, she couldnot be Russian then. Got up and walked towards the door, signing nobill, and paying no gold.
Paul stared as she passed him--rudely stared--he knew it afterwardsand felt ashamed. However, the lady never so much as noticed him, nordid she raise her eyes, so that when she had finally disappeared hewas still unaware of their colour or expression.
But what a figure she had! Sinuous, supple, rounded, and yet veryslight.
"She must have the smallest possible bones," Paul said to himself,"because it looks all curvy and soft, and yet she is as slender as agazelle."
She was tall, too, though not six feet--like Isabella!
The waiters and _maitre d'hotel_ all bowed and stood aside as sheleft, followed by her elderly, stately, silver-haired servant.
Of course it would have been an easy matter to Paul to find out hername, and all about her. He would only have had to summon MonsieurJacques, and ask any question he pleased. But for some unexplainedreason he would not do this. Instead of which he scowled in front ofhim, and finished his fourth glass of port. Then his head swam alittle, and he went outside into the night. The rain had stopped andthe sky was full of stars scattered in its intense blue. It was warm,too, there, under the clipped trees, Paul hoped he wasn't drunk--sucha beastly thing to do! And not even good port either.
He sat on a bench and smoked a cigar. A strange sense of lonelinesscame over him. It seemed as if he were far, far away from any one inthe world he had ever known. A vague feeling of oppression and comingcalamity passed through him, only he was really as yet too materialand thoroughly, solidly English to entertain it, or any other subtlemental emotion for more than a minute. But he undoubtedly felt strangeto-night; different from what he had ever done before. He would havesaid "weird" if he could have thought of the word. The woman and hersinuous, sensuous black shape filled the space of his mentalvision. Black hair, black hat, black dress--and of course blackeyes. Ah! if he could only know their colour really!
The damp bench where he sat was just under the ivy hanging from thebalustrade of the small terrace belonging to the ground-floor suite atthe end.
There was a silence, very few people passed, frightened no doubt bythe recent rain. He seemed alone in the world.
The wine now began to fire his senses. Why should he remain alone? Hewas young and rich and--surely even in Lucerne there must be--. Andthen he felt a beast, and looked out on to the lake.
Suddenly his heart seemed to swell with some emotion, a faint scent oftuberoses filled the air--and from exactly above his head there came agentle, tender sigh.
He started violently, and brusquely turned and looked up. Almostindistinguishable in the deep shadow he saw the woman's face. Itseemed to emerge from a mist of black gauze. And looking down into hiswere a pair of eyes--a pair of eyes. For a moment Paul's heart felt asif it had stopped beating, so wonderful was their effect uponhim. They seemed to draw him--draw something out of him--intoxicatehim--paralyse him. And as he gazed up motionless the woman movednoiselessly back on to the terrace, and he saw nothing but the nightsky studded with stars.
Had he been dreaming? Had she really bent over the ivy? Was he mad?Yes--or drunk, because now he had seen the eyes, and yet he did notknow their colour! Were they black, or blue, or grey, or green? He didnot know, he could not think--only they were eyes--eyes--eyes.
The letter to Isabella Waring remained unfinished that night.