CHAPTER XI
HERRIARD AND ALEXIA
A LESS keen observer than Gastineau might have suspected that the position of Herriard and Countess Alexia was, at any rate on Herriard’s side, rapidly exceeding that of counsel and client. And it was, particularly in a man of Herriard’s temperament, scarcely to be wondered at. All through the trying stages of the case he had been brought into close and more than mere professional relations with the von Rohnburgs, while between him and the Count a friendship, founded on the secure foundation of reciprocal liking, had sprung up. Firmly and absolutely convinced as Herriard was of Alexia’s innocence, so completely, indeed, that the slander roused him to a quite unlawyer-like state of indignation, it came as a shock to find Gastineau coolly arguing upon the supposition and accepting the fact that she was guilty. Certainly, he told himself, Gastineau does not know her, has but a vague recollection of her over some four or five years back; he takes her as a mere pawn upon the legal chess-board: he has a cynical disbelief in women; it is but to be expected that he should think the worst of her; I might have realized all this, and not been such a fool as to resent his suggestion.
Nevertheless, the bare idea that any one, even a dry, quibbling lawyer, could for a moment admit the possibility that this woman, whose soul shone clear and true from her eyes, whose every word carried a conviction of honesty, could have done a man to death in secret, and then have entrenched herself behind a rampart of skilfully-woven lies, was to him utterly inconceivable. True, the deed, had she really been guilty of it, would naturally have been committed under stress of great provocation. Captain Martindale’s character and want of principle where women were concerned were well known: no one would have been surprised at his finding a reprisal at the hand of those whom, as a chartered Philander, he had loved and laughed at. Natural, too, it would have been, if having been driven to that fatal stroke, she should have fought against discovery by every means in her power. For, putting aside the consequences of the deed, it would have been a fight for her honour. No; it was not the probabilities of the case, considered generally, which weighed with Herriard, but his utter inability to believe this thing of this woman. And, as his feeling for her almost insensibly grew warmer, the more preposterous did the notion appear. So when Gastineau mooted it in his cold-blooded, cynical way, it came as a shock, as a suggestion which filled Herriard with abhorrence. His whole soul recoiled from the idea, as from a monstrous impossibility.
And this conviction was confirmed when, a night or two afterwards, he dined quietly with the Countess and her brother. All through her animated talk, happier now, in the good news that had come, he searched her face for a sign of guile, of a reservation of the truth, of an arrière pensée: looked till he was ashamed of himself for being led to doubt; and saw nothing but frankness and honesty. Clever she was, and possessed of wonderful self-command, but it was a cleverness unmixed with deceit, the reverse of wisdom, not falsehood.
Both Alexia and her brother were cheerful that night, happier than they had been since the charge was first levelled. There was a second guest, a countryman of the von Rohnburgs, Dr. Hallamar, the Austrian surgeon who had returned to England on a professional visit. It was a pleasant little party; the four being all completely in accord and sympathy. The doctor naturally felt strongly the way in which the Countess had been treated; he was a strong man, an acute thinker who suggested rather than expressed the depth of his opinions.
After dinner the two guests were left for a few moments alone.
“Mr. Herriard,” the doctor said, with more warmth than he seemed given to show, “you are a lawyer; it is your professional duty not only to defend but to think the best of your client, to maintain her innocence against the world; but now, tell me, not as a lawyer, but as a man, I will not say an English gentleman, for there the code of honour guides and restricts you, but as a man of brains and worldly knowledge, you do not in your heart believe that it is possible for our hostess to be guilty of this dastardly charge?”
Herriard had little difficulty in responding to the somewhat extraordinary invitation. “I should be willing to stake my life on the Countess’s absolute innocence,” he declared resolutely.
“I was sure of it,” the other observed.
“You, too, Doctor,” Herriard continued eagerly, “you are a man who has doubtless seen much of human nature and its capabilities of deception, does your observation tell you that disingenuousness is possible here?”
Hallamar shook his head emphatically. “Not for one moment.”
“I am glad to have your confirmation of my conviction,” Herriard replied. “But I would maintain it against any man’s opinion for all that,” he added with a smile.
The doctor merely acknowledged his enthusiasm with a gesture as Count Prosper rejoined them.
When they went upstairs the Count and Hallamar became deep in a discussion in their own language, and Herriard found himself with Alexia.
“You have a downright champion, Countess, in the Professor,” Herriard said.
“I was hoping,” she returned, “that I no longer needed one.”
“I hope and believe so too,” he replied. Then added in a lower tone, “I shall be sorry though, to think that my office has come to an end.”
For an instant her eyes rested on his face, then she looked away. “It may, happily, come to an end officially, since its work will have been accomplished, but it will never be forgotten.”
The last words were spoken low, with just the suspicion of a tremor in them. It seemed to pass to Herriard, as he responded, “Ah, Countess, how you reward me!”
“Reward you? Can I ever do that?” she said.
“Indeed you can, far above my deserts,” he answered, with the spell of her voice and presence, of her mood attuned, as it seemed, to his own, thrilling through him. “Although it is unnecessary; the fight in your cause has been its own reward.”
There was a little pause, as though the subject had run as far as it might venture. Then Alexia spoke.
“Ah, if I dared believe that the worst was over now!”
“I think you may,” he replied. “I do not see how this new evidence can be shaken.”
“You are not absolutely certain?” Her eyes were fixed on his face, and he felt she was reading him.
He thought of Gastineau and his almost scoffing scepticism. He longed to feel able to tell her that all fear and doubt were passed, yet, with the memory of his mentor’s views, he could not, and felt a brute in consequence.
“I believe it,” he answered, hoping the evasion was not apparent. “My own opinion is that this man’s evidence settles the question so far as you are concerned.”
“But you think others may not share it?” she asked shrewdly.
“I think,” he answered, “that others, who are interested, as half the world is, in believing the worst, may be reluctant to share it.”
Alexia was leaning back, bitterly reflective. “The world, our world, is very cruel,” she said.
“The world,” he replied, “craves for amusement. Left to its own resources it is a dull world, and is constantly growing duller. So its amusements must ever be increasing in pungency. Strong contrasts and mental vivisection are its intellectual pastimes, the cant of a spurious broad-mindedness which affects hesitation in condemning vice, since there is none who can claim virtue, and at the same time prejudges the maligned for a like reason. Our modern Pharisees’ boast is not that they are virtuous, but vicious, and they call Heaven to witness that they claim to be no better than the rest of mankind.”
Alexia was looking at him searchingly with a touch of disappointment.
“You are a cynic,” she said simply, yet with wistful conviction.
“Not I,” he replied frankly, and at his prompt denial her face brightened.
He hated himself for so easily falling into the trick of Gastineau’s pessimistic speech. “No: I am a believer in the honest, right-thinking minority, although my profession prevents me from shutting my eyes to the mental attitude of the rest. On the surface, at any rate, it is a cruel world, Countess, and I am more sorry than I can express, to know that you, of all women, have felt its hardness, its injustice. But please don’t think me a cynic.”
The smile she gave more than reassured him. “I won’t,” she murmured, “although I began to fear you were one.”
His voice was low as hers as he rejoined, “I never shall be now that I have known you.”
She laughed now. “If it were not too serious for a joke I should tell you to wait till our case is decided.”
“Countess,” he protested, “it has long been decided in my mind, unassailably decided.”
“Ah,” she said, “that was your duty. You could scarcely do less than believe in your client.”
“I might,” he rejoined, “have done much less.”
“And what convinced you?” she asked.
“My client herself,” he answered.
Then again, just as their hearts seemed to come near to one another, they drew away again. Perhaps to her the time appeared not ripe, while on his part, a chilling shadow seemed to intervene between him and his love; the figure of Gastineau, the brain, whose mouthpiece he was.
His relations with Gastineau formed, indeed, a consideration which had begun to exercise his mind very disagreeably, and which he felt must in honour make him pause before declaring his love for Alexia. She would take him as he took her, judging by fair outward appearance, by the affinity of their beings, by—in short—by that reciprocal personal attraction which produces love. On her side, doubtless, the foundation for regard, the regard which he hoped and believed was ripening into love, had been admiration. He had been in her service skilful, courageous, chivalrous; he seemed to have sprung to her side when sorely pressed, as her champion, almost heaven-sent, and, apart from the professional relation in the matter, her gratitude and admiration were unbounded. No doubt the personal element had much to do with this. Chance might have given for her defence a dry, crabbed old lawyer, a Macvee, dusty, aggressive and uncompromising, who would yet have served her well, at the same time regarding her merely as a client rather more interesting than usual. But Geoffrey Herriard was very different. He was comparatively a young man; he had, if not a handsome, at least an interesting clear-cut face; he was an attractive personality, a rising politician, an already risen member of the Bar. His career was assured, and his history carried with it that interest which successful cleverness can always claim. What wonder, then, that Alexia, almost a woman of the world, at least a femme faite, though she might be, should grow more and more attracted by her counsel who had quickly become her friend as well as her brother’s?
And yet, as Herriard kept telling himself all through the days and nights, he was a lie; a living, pleading, arguing, ingratiating lie. His form, his voice were his own, and that was all. The brain he took credit for was another man’s. The telling speeches, the masterly conduct of the case, the shrewd arguments, even the smart retorts by which he scored, were no more his than are Shakespeare’s lines the actor’s who utters them.
So he stood that day, a fraud, a living sham, a man who took credit for achievements which were not his, for work which he, unaided, could never have brought to a successful accomplishment. And the worst of his position was, as he now felt it, that the excuse he might make told against him, was, in fact, the crux of his situation. For its avowal, the confession of the fraud, was out of the question. Were he not bound in honour to the friend, to whom he owed everything, not to divulge the secret; could he for very shame make it known that for years he had been living and thriving and gaining fame by another man’s brains? True, the situation had been acquiesced in by the other man, but would that be accepted as an excuse by the world which had hailed him, Geoffrey Herriard, as a supremely clever fellow? The world would feel it had been swindled out of its applause; it would turn and resent the cheat.
Then, supposing he cared nothing for the world and its sneers, that he was prepared to brazen the matter out, should it come to light, to let its success justify the trick, how would it be with Alexia? Could he ever hope to rehabilitate himself in her eyes? He told himself, he knew it with absolute conviction, that she was as the soul of honour; how could he declare himself to her as an incarnation of falsehood? Sometimes he felt he could wish that she were guilty of this charge; it would at most have been a venial crime, and it would bring them a little nearer to an equality in wrong-doing.
Then, often, in the conflict of his love, he would wish that he could break himself free of Gastineau: that he could run alone now, looking upon the past partnership as a term of mere pardonable tutelage. Then honour, never driven out from his false life, would rise and rebuke him for ingratitude. Still, he would argue, the bond between himself and Gastineau could scarcely be expected to run for the term of their lives. It would have to be determined sooner or later; and, after all, the benefit derived from the partnership was in some degree mutual. The sword which Gastineau had put into his hand, and the skill in fence which he had taught him, had been greatly used to stab the disabled fencer’s rivals and enemies, to prevent them from profiting by the disappearance of their old adversary. In the intoxicating whirl of success which had hurried him onwards and upwards, Herriard had not found pause to realize the true, inevitable logic of his position. Love was now the Nemesis which was bringing it bitterly home to him.
And that same night the foreshadowing of another and totally unthought-of contingency rose to disturb him. This time it came from his fellow guest, and in this way.
The men had bid the Countess good-night, and had gone down to the Count’s study to smoke and chat before separating. Presently their host began to ask the Professor about his work, and then it was that Herriard learned a fact which gave him food for thought, welcome or unwelcome, he could not for the moment decide. He had met Dr. Hallamar several times already, had accepted without further question the fact that he was one of Vienna’s most distinguished pathologists, and although inclined to wonder that one so eminent and naturally sought after at home should spend so much time in England, had, from a reluctance to talk “shop,” which his good breeding prompted, spoken little to the doctor of their respective professions. But now he was for the first time to be made aware of Hallamar’s specialty.
The basis on which the Professor’s fame, now European, rested, was the treatment of spinal disease and lesions, in the practice of which he had performed some marvellous cures. And Herriard had up to that moment never been aware of this.
“Severe spinal injuries are not, then, necessarily incurable?” he asked, waking up to the knowledge and the interest the subject held for him, as he joined in the conversation with somewhat remarkable eagerness.
“Certainly not,” was the doctor’s laconic reply.
“Even when the patient has been deprived of the use of the lower limbs?”
Hallamar gave a shrug. “Some cases are incurable, yes. But it has been my privilege to cure many which had been pronounced hopeless.”
“The results of accidents, say railway accidents?”
“Certainly. It is to railway accidents that very many, if not the majority, of these cases of total loss of power in the lower limbs from shock are to be attributed.”
“And you cure them, Professor?”
Hallamar bowed, with a little deprecating smile. “I have the happiness to cure many.”
“Of course, Herriard,” Count Prosper struck in. “That is why the Professor is here. One does not travel a thousand miles to make experiments: one need not leave Vienna for that, eh? But what is fame? Here is Herriard, a great man at the Bar and in Parliament who has never heard of the wonders which Professor Rudolph Hallamar performs.”
“When one is deeply immersed in one’s own profession, one has little opportunity for looking round at the work of other men in other spheres,” the doctor observed, in polite excuse. “I have found that pathological work has little interest for healthy laymen.”
“Nevertheless,” Herriard replied, with more truth than the two other men gave him credit for, “your work, now I have heard of it, does interest me exceedingly.”