But one day James told himself impatiently that all these thoughts were mad and foolish; he could only have them because he was still out of health. Life, after all, was the most precious thing in the world. It was absurd to throw it away like a broken toy. He rebelled against the fate which seemed forcing itself upon him. He determined to make the effort and, come what might, break the hateful bonds. It only required a little courage, a little strength of mind. If others suffered, he had suffered too. The sacrifice they demanded was too great.... But when he returned to Primpton House, the inevitability of it all forced itself once again upon him. He shrugged his shoulders despairingly; it was no good.
The whole atmosphere oppressed him so that he felt powerless; some hidden influence surrounded James, sucking from his blood, as it were, all manliness, dulling his brain. He became a mere puppet, acting in accordance to principles that were not his own, automatic, will-less. His father sat, as ever, in the dining-room by the fire, for only in the warmest weather could he do without artificial heat, and he read the paper, sometimes aloud, making little comments. His mother, at the table, on a stiff-backed chair, was knitting--everlastingly knitting. Outwardly there was in them a placid content, and a gentleness which made them seem pliant as wax; but really they were iron. James knew at last how pitiless was their love, how inhumanly cruel their intolerance; and of the two his father seemed more implacable, more horribly relentless. His mother's anger was bearable, but the Colonel's very weakness was a deadly weapon. His despair, his dumb sorrow, his entire dependence on the forbearance of others, were more tyrannical than the most despotic power. James was indeed a bird beating himself against the imprisoning cage; and its bars were loving-kindness and trust, tears, silent distress, bitter disillusion, and old age.
"Where's Mary?" asked James.
"She's in the garden, walking with Uncle William."
"How well they get on together," said the Colonel, smiling.
James looked at his father, and thought he had never seen him so old and feeble. His hands were almost transparent; his thin white hair, his bowed shoulders, gave an impression of utter weakness.
"Are you very glad the wedding is so near, father?" asked James, placing his hand gently on the old man's shoulder.
"I should think I was."
"You want to get rid of me so badly?"
"'A man shall leave his father and his mother, and shall cleave unto his wife; and they shall be one flesh.' We shall have to do without you."
"I wonder whether you are fonder of Mary than of me?"
The Colonel did not answer, but Mrs. Parsons laughed.
"My impression is that your father has grown so devoted to Mary that he hardly thinks you worthy of her."
"Really? And yet you want me to marry her, don't you, daddy?"
"It's the wish of my heart."
"Were you very wretched when our engagement was broken off?"
"Don't talk of it! Now it's all settled, Jamie, I can tell you that I'd sooner see you dead at my feet than that you should break your word to Mary."
James laughed.
"And you, mother?" he asked, lightly.
She did not answer, but looked at him earnestly.
"What, you too? Would you rather see me dead than not married to Mary? What a bloodthirsty pair you are!"
James, laughing, spoke so gaily, it never dawned on them that his words meant more than was obvious; and yet he felt that they, loving but implacable, had signed his death-warrant. With smiling faces they had thrown open the portals of that House, and he, smiling, was ready to enter.
Mary at that moment came in, followed by Uncle William.
"Well, Jamie, there you are!" she cried, in that hard, metallic voice which to James betrayed so obviously the meanness of her spirit and her self-complacency. "Where on earth have you been?"
She stood by the table, straight, uncompromising, self-reliant; by her immaculate virtue, by the strength of her narrow will, she completely domineered the others. She felt herself capable of managing them all, and, in fact, had been giving Uncle William a friendly little lecture upon some action of which she disapproved. Mary had left off her summer things and wore again the plain serge skirt, and because it was rainy, the battered straw hat of the preceding winter. She was using up her old things, and having got all possible wear out of them, intended on the day before her marriage generously to distribute them among the poor.
"Is my face very red?" she asked. "There's a lot of wind to-day."
To James she had never seemed more unfeminine; that physical repulsion which at first had terrified him now was grown into an ungovernable hate. Everything Mary did irritated and exasperated him; he wondered she did not see the hatred in his eyes as he looked at her, answering her question.
"Oh, no," he said to himself, "I would rather shoot myself than marry you!"
His dislike was unreasonable, but he could not help it; and the devotion of his parents made him detest her all the more; he could not imagine what they saw in her. With hostile glance he watched her movements as she took off her hat and arranged her hair, grimly drawn back and excessively neat; she fetched her knitting from Mrs. Parsons's work-basket and sat down. All her actions had in them an insufferable air of patronage, and she seemed more than usually pleased with herself. James had an insane desire to hurt her, to ruffle that self-satisfaction; and he wanted to say something that should wound her to the quick. And all the time he laughed and jested as though he were in the highest spirits.
"And what were you doing this morning, Mary?" asked Colonel Parsons.
"Oh, I biked in to Tunbridge Wells with Mr. Dryland to play golf. He plays a rattling good game."
"Did he beat you?"
"Well, no," she answered, modestly. "It so happened that I beat him. But he took his thrashing remarkably well--some men get so angry when they're beaten by a girl."
"The curate has many virtues," said James.
"He was talking about you, Jamie. He said he thought you disliked him; but I told him I was certain you didn't. He's really such a good man, one can't help liking him. He said he'd like to teach you golf."
"And is he going to?"
"Certainly not. I mean to do that myself."
"There are many things you want to teach me, Mary. You'll have your hands full."
"Oh, by the way, father told me to remind you and Uncle William that you were shooting with him the day after to-morrow. You're to fetch him at ten."
"I hadn't forgotten," replied James. "Uncle William, we shall have to clean our guns to-morrow."
James had come to a decision at last, and meant to waste no time; indeed, there was none to waste. And to remind him how near was the date fixed for the wedding were the preparations almost complete. One or two presents had already arrived. With all his heart he thanked his father and mother for having made the way easier for him. He thought what he was about to do the kindest thing both to them and to Mary. Under no circumstances could he marry her; that would be adding a greater lie to those which he had already been forced into, and the misery was more than he could bear. But his death was the only other way of satisfying her undoubted claims. He had little doubt that in six months he would be as well forgotten as poor Reggie Larcher, and he did not care; he was sick of the whole business, and wanted the quiet of death. His love for Mrs. Wallace would never give him peace upon earth; it was utterly futile, and yet unconquerable.