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Immortal Moment

<h2>[96]CHAPTER VIII</h2> KITTY was dressed. She was calling out to her companion, "Bunny, hurry up, you'll be late." No answer came from the adjoining room. She tapped at the door and there was no answer. She tried to open the door. It was locked on the inside. "Bunny," she cried, "are you there?" She laid her ear to the panel. There was the sound of a box being dragged across the floor. "You are there, are you? Why don't you answer? I can't hear you. Why can't you open the door?" Miss Keating unlocked the door. She held it ajar and spoke through the aperture. "Be good enough," she said, "to leave me alone." "All right; but you'll be awfully late for dinner." "I am not coming down to dinner." [97]Miss Keating shut the door, but she did not lock it. Kitty gave a cry of distress. "Bunny, what is the matter? Let me in—do let me in." "You can come in if you like." Kitty opened the door. But instead of going in, she stood fixed upon the threshold, struck dumb by what she saw. The room was in disorder. Clothes littered the bed. More clothes were heaped on the floor around an open trunk. Miss Keating was kneeling on the floor seizing on things and thrusting them into the trunk. Their strangled, tortured forms witnessed to the violence of her mood. "What are you doing?" "You can see what I'm doing. I am packing my things." "Why?" "Because I am going away." "Have you had bad news? Is—is anybody dead?"[98] "I wouldn't ask any questions if I were you." "I must ask some. You know, people don't walk off like this without giving any reason." "I am surprised at your asking for my reason." "Sur—prised," said Kitty softly. "Are you going because of me?" Miss Keating did not answer. "I see. So you don't like me any more?" "We won't put it that way." Kitty came and stood beside Miss Keating and looked down at her. "Bunny, have I been a brute to you?" "No." "Have I ever been a brute to any one? Have you ever known me do an unkind thing, or say an unkind word to any one?" "N—no." "Then why do you listen when people say unkind things about me?" Miss Keating stooped very low over the[99] trunk. Her attitude no doubt accounted for the redness of her face which Kitty noticed. "I think I know what they've been saying. Did you or did you not listen?" "Listen?" "Yes. I don't mean behind doors and things. But you let them talk to you?" "You cannot stop people talking." "Can't you? I'd have stopped them pretty soon if they'd talked to me about you. What did they say?" "You've said just now you knew." "Very well. Who said it?" "You've no reason to assume that anybody has said anything." "Was it Mr. Lucy, or his sister?" Miss Keating became agitated. "I have never discussed you with Mr. Lucy. Or his sister." There was a little click in Miss Keating's throat where the lie stuck. "I know you haven't. They wouldn't let you."[100] Kitty smiled. Miss Keating saw the smile. She trembled. Tears started to her eyes. She rose and began sorting the pile of clothing on the bed. Something in her action inspired Kitty with an intolerable passion of wonder and of pity. She came to her and laid her hand on her hair, lightly and with a certain fear. Miss Keating had once purred under Kitty's caresses. Now she jerked back suddenly and beat off the timid hand. "I wish you wouldn't touch me." "Why not?" "Because it makes me loathe you." Kitty sat down on the bed. She had wrapped her hand in her pocket-handkerchief as if it had been hurt. "Poor Bunny," she said; "are you feeling as bad as all that? You must want dreadfully to marry that long man. But you needn't loathe me. I'm not going to make him marry me." "Can you not think of anything but that?"[101] "I can think of all sorts of things. At present I'm thinking of that. It does seem such an awful pity that you haven't married. A dear little, sweet little, good little thing like you—for you are good, Bunny. It's a shame that you should have to live in rage and fury, and be very miserable, and—and rather cruel, just because of that." "If every word you said of me was true, I'd rather be myself than you, Mrs. Tailleur." "That, Miss Keating, is purely a matter of taste. Unhappiness is all that's the matter with you. You'd be quite a kind woman if it wasn't for that. You see, I do understand you, Bunny. So it isn't very wise of you to leave me. Think what an awful time you'll have if you go and live with somebody who doesn't understand and won't make allowances. And you're not strong. You never will be as long as you're miserable. You'll go and live with ill old ladies and get into that state you were in at Matlock. And there won't be anybody to[102] look after you. And, Bunny, you'll never marry—never; and it'll be simply awful. You'll go getting older and older and nervier and nervier, till you're so nervy that even the old ladies won't have you any more. Bad as I am, you'd better stop with me." "Stop with you? How can I stop with you?" "Well, you haven't told me yet why you can't." "I can't tell you. I—I've written you a letter. It's there on the dressing-table." Kitty went to the dressing-table. "I am returning you my salary for the quarter I have been with you." Kitty took up the letter. "I'd rather you did not read it until after I am gone." "That's not fair, Bunny." "Please—I've written what I had to say because I wished to avoid a scene." "There won't be any scene. I'm not going to read your beastly letter."[103] She opened the envelope and removed the notes and laid them on the dressing-table. Then she tore up the letter and the envelope together and tossed them into the grate. "And I'm not going to take those notes." "Nor am I." "You'll have to." She found her companion's purse and tucked the notes inside it. Miss Keating turned on her. "Mrs. Tailleur, you shall not thrust your money on me. I will not take it." "You little fool, you've got to." Miss Keating closed her eyes. It was a way she had. "I can't. And you must please take back the things you've given me. They are all there; in that heap on the bed." Kitty turned and looked at them. They were all there; everything she had ever given to her, the dresses, the combs, the little trinkets. She took some of these and stared at them as she held them in her hand. "Won't you keep anything?"[104] "I won't keep a thing." "Not even the little chain I gave you? Oh, Bunny, you liked your little chain." Miss Keating took the chain from her and laid it with the rest. "Please leave me to pack." "Presently. Bunny—look at me—straight. Why are you doing this?" "I wish to be spared the unpleasantness of speaking." "But you've got to speak. Out with it. What have I done?" "You know better than I do what your life has been." "My life? I should think I did. Rather." Kitty crossed the room to the bell. "What time does your train go?" "My——? I—must leave this at seven-thirty." Kitty rang the bell. A housemaid appeared. "I want a fly at seven-thirty. Please see that Miss Keating's luggage is downstairs by then. Her room will not be wanted."[105] Miss Keating's face was livid. "You wish," said she, "the hotel people to think that it is you who have given me notice?" "You poor thing. I only wanted the fly to go down to my account." "You expect me to believe that?" "I don't expect anything of you—now. I suppose it's Colonel Hankin who has been talking about my life? It wasn't Mr. Lucy, though you'd like to make me think so." "There's no need for anybody to talk. Do you suppose I don't know what you are? You can't hide what's in you. You're—you're full of it. And you've no shame about it. You can stand there, knowing that I know, and ask me what you've done. How do I know what you've done? I don't want to know it. It's bad enough to know what you are. And to know that I've been living with it for three months. You got hold of me, an innocent woman,[106] and used me as a cover for your evil life. That's all you wanted me for." "Whatever I've done, I've done nothing to deserve that." "You think not? Have you any idea what you've done—to me?" "No; I haven't. What have I done?" "I'm going to tell you. You've never ceased casting it up to me that I'm not married, that I haven't your attractions—I thank heaven I have not—I am not the sort of woman you take me for. I never have wanted to be married, but if—if ever I had, I shouldn't want it now. You've spoilt all that for me. I shall never see a man without thinking of you. I shall hate every man I meet because of you." "Well, hate them, hate them. It's better than loving them. Let me strap that box. You'll tear your poor heart out." Miss Keating wrenched the strap from Kitty's hands. "Ah, how you hate me! Hate the men,[107] dear, that can't do you any harm; but don't hate the other women. At my worst I never did that." Miss Keating shrugged her shoulders, for she was putting on her coat. Kitty looked at her and sighed. "Bunny," said she, "I want to make it quite clear to you why you're going. You think it's because you know something horrible about me. But it isn't. You don't know anything about me. You've only been listening to some of the people in the hotel. They don't know anything about me either. They've never met me in their lives before. But they've been thinking things and saying things, and you've swallowed it all because you wanted to. You're so desperately keen on making out there's something bad about me. Of course, you might have made it out; you might have proved all sorts of things against me. But you haven't. That's my whole point. You haven't proved a thing, have you? If you were my husband,[108] and wanted to get rid of me, you'd have to trump up some evidence, wouldn't you?" "There is no need to trump up evidence. I'm acting on my instinct and belief." "Oh, I know you believe it all right." "I can't help what I believe." "No, you can't help it. You can't help what you want. And you wouldn't have wanted it if you hadn't been so furiously unhappy. I was furiously unhappy myself once. That's why I understand you." "It is five-and-twenty minutes past seven, Mrs. Tailleur." "And in five minutes you'll go. And you won't hear a word in my defence? You won't? Why, if I'd murdered somebody and they were going to hang me, they'd let me defend myself before they did it. All I was going to say was—supposing everything you said was true, I think you might have made allowances for me. You can't? I was harder driven than you." "No two cases could well be more different."[109] "Once they were the same. Only it was worse for me. All your temptations are bottled up inside you. Mine rushed at me from inside and outside too. I've had all the things you had. I had a strait-laced parson for my father—so had you. I was poked away in a hole in the country—so were you. I had little sisters—so had you. My mother sent me away from home for fear I should harm them." Her voice shook. "I wouldn't have harmed them for the world. I was sent to live with an old lady—so were you. I was shut up with her all day, till I got ill and couldn't sleep at night. I never saw a soul but one or two other old ladies. They were quite fond of me—I made them. I should have died of it if it hadn't been for that. Then—do listen, Bunny—something happened, and I broke loose, and got away. You never had a chance to get away, so you don't know what it feels like. Perhaps, I think, when it came to the point, you'd have been afraid,[110] or something. I wasn't. And I was young. I'm young still. You can't judge me. Anyhow, I know what you've been through. That's what made me sorry for you. Can't you be a little sorry for me?" Miss Keating said nothing. She was putting on her hat, and her mouth at the moment was closed tight over a long hat-pin. She drew it out slowly between her shut lips. Meeting Kitty's eyes she blinked. "You needn't be sorry," said Kitty. "I've had things that you haven't." Miss Keating turned to the looking-glass and put on her veil. Her back was toward Kitty. The two women's faces were in the glass, the young and the middle-aged, each searching for the other. Kitty's face was tearful and piteous; it pleaded with the other face in the glass, a face furtive with hate, that hung between two lifted arms behind a veil. Miss Keating's hands struggled with her veil.[111] "I mayn't tie it for you?" said Kitty. "No, thank you." There was a knock at the door, and Miss Keating started. "It's the men for your boxes. Come into my room and say good bye." "I prefer to say good bye here, if it's all the same to you. Good bye." "You won't even shake hands with me? Well, if you won't—why should you?" "I am holding out my hand. If you won't take it——" "No, no. I don't want to take it." Kitty was crying. "I must let those men in," said Miss Keating. "You are not going to make a scene?" "I? Oh Lord, no. You needn't mind me. I'll go." She went into her own room and flung herself, face downward, on to her pillow, and slid by the bedside, kneeling, to the floor.[112] <hr /> <div style="break-after:column;"></div>

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