Читать книгу The End of the House of Alard онлайн

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The fire was piled high with great logs and posts, burning with a blue flame, for they had been pulled out of the barns of Starvecrow, which like many in the district were built of ships' timbers with the salt still in them. The sound of the fire was as loud as the sound of the rain. Both made a sorrowful music together in Peter's head.

He sat with his hands folded together under his chin, his large light blue eyes staring without seeing into the grey dripping world framed by the window. The clock in the passage struck three. Stella would not come till a quarter past. He had arranged things purposely so that he should be alone for a bit at Starvecrow before meeting her, strengthening himself with the old loyalties to fight the brief, sweet faithfulness of a year.

He felt almost physically sick at the thought of what lay before him, but he had made up his mind to go through with it—it had got to be done; and it must be done in this way. Oh, how he had longed to send Stella a letter, telling her that they must never see each other again, begging her to go away and spare him! But he knew that was a coward's escape—the least he owed her was an explanation face to face. . . . What a brute he had been to her! He had no right to have won her love if he did not mean to keep it—and though when he had first sought her he had thought himself free to do so, he had behaved badly in not telling her of the new difficulties created by his becoming the heir. It was not that he had meant to hide things from her, but he had simply shelved them in his own mind, hoping that "something would turn up," that Alard's plight would not be as bad as he had feared. Now he saw that it was infinitely worse—and he was driven to a definite choice between his people and Stella. If he married Stella he would have failed Alard—if he stood by Alard he would have failed Stella. It was a cruel choice—between the two things in the world that he loved best. But he must make it now—he could not keep Stella hanging on indefinitely any longer. Already he could see how uncertainty, anxiety and disappointment were telling on her. She was looking, worn and dim. She had expected him, on his return home after the wars, to proclaim their love publicly, and he was still keeping it hidden, though the reasons he had first given her for doing so were at an end. She was wondering why he didn't speak—she was hesitating whether she should speak herself. . . . He guessed her struggle and knew he must put an end to it.