Hills of Han 26

Hills of Han 26

Betty opened her portfolio and slowly fingered the sheets of drawing

paper. Her eyes filled; she had to keep them down.

 

“Where are you going?” Her voice was no more than a murmur. She said it

again, a little louder: “Where are you going?”

 

“Back to the inn. And then, perhaps--”

 

“You mustn’t leave T’ainan.”

 

“That is the difficulty. I couldn’t save myself and leave you here.”

 

“On your account, I mean. We’re safe enough; I’ve heard them talking at

the house. Pao will protect us. And Chang, the tao-tai. But if you were

to go out alone--on the highway--”

 

“Oh, that is nothing. I have soldiers.”

 

“You said four soldiers. Father was attacked right here in the city,

with Chang and his body-guard defending him. They even tore Chang’s

clothes.”

 

“I don’t care about myself,” said he.

 

She glanced up at him. She knew he spoke the truth, however bitter his

spirit. He was talking on: “Don’t misunderstand me....”

 

“I don’t.”

 

“This journey has been a time of painful self-revelation. I used to

think myself strong. That was absurd, of course. I am very weak. In this

new trouble my will seems to have broken down. Yes, it has broken down;

I may as well admit it. I had no right to fall in love with you. Already

I have injured the life of one woman. Now, by merely coming out here

in this ill-considered way, I am injuring yours.... The worst of it is

these moments of terrible feeling. They make it impossible for me to

reason. At one time I can really believe that a fatal accident out

here--an accident to myself--would be the best thing that could happen

for everybody concerned: but then, in a moment, I become inflamed with

feeling, and desire, and a perfectly unreasonable hope.”

 

“I wonder,” mused Betty, moved now by something near a thrill of

power--a disturbing sort of power--“if love is like that.”

 

“I don’t know. I don’t even know if this is love Part of the time I

resent you.”

 

“Oh!... Well--yes, I can understand that.”

 

“Then you resent me?”

 

“Sometimes.”

 

“In my lucid moments I sec the thing clearly enough. It is simply an

impossible situation. And I have added the final touch by coming out

here.” He seated himself on a block of stone, and rested his chin

moodily on his two hands. “That is what disturbs me--it frightens me. I

have watched other men and women going through this queer confusion

we call falling in love. I’ve pitied them. They were weak, helpless,

surrendering the reasoning faculty to sheer emotion. Sometimes, I’ve

thought of them as creatures caught in a net.”

 

“Oh!” Betty breathed softly, “I’ve never thought.. I wonder if it is

like that.”

 

“It is with me. I see no happiness in it. I hope you will never have to

live through what I’ve lived through these past few weeks. And now I

sit here----weakly--knowing I ought to go at once and never disturb you

again. But the thought of going--of saying good-by--is terrible. It’s

one more thing I seem unable to face.”

 

Betty was struggling now against tumultuous thoughts. And without

overcoming them, without even making headway against them, she spoke:

 

“I can’t let you take all this on yourself. I must have--well made it

hard for you, there on the ship. I enjoyed being with you.”

 

This was all she could say about that.

 

There was a long, long silence.

 

Suddenly, with an inarticulate exclamation, he sprang up.

 

Startled, all impulses, she caught his hand. His fingers tightened about

hers.

 

“What?” she asked, breathless.

 

“I’ll go.”

 

“Not away from T’ainan?”

 

“Yes. It’s the only thing. After all, it doesn’t matter much what

happens to any individual. We’ve got to take that chance. When my--when

I’m--free, if I’m alive, and you’re alive. I’ll write you. I won’t

come--I’ll write. Meanwhile, you can make up your mind. All I’ll ask of

you then is a decision. I’ll accept it.”

 

Her fingers were twisting around his. She couldn’t look up at him, nor

he down at her.

 

“When shall you leave T’ainan?”

 

“Now--this afternoon.”

 

“No.”

 

“But... don’t you see?..

 

“I don’t know what to say.”

 

He knelt beside her.

 

“You dear child!” he murmured unsteadily, “can’t you see what a trouble

we’re in? It’s my fault--”

 

“It’s no more your fault than mine.”

 

“Oh, but it is! I’m an experienced man. You’re a girl. They’re right in

blaming me.”

 

“People can’t help their feelings.”

 

“God, if they could! Don’t you see, child, that I can’t stay near you?

I can’t look at you--you’re so little, so pretty, so charming! When

I’m with you, all this feeling, all the warm feminine quality, all the

beautiful magic that’s been shut out of my life comes to me through

you. It drives me crazy.... Betty, God forgive me! I can’t help it--this

once! It’s good-by.” He took her lightly, reverently, in his arms, and

brushed his lips against her forehead. Then he arose.

 

“Good-by, Betty!”

 

“It’s too late to start to-day. You can’t travel Chinese roads at

night.”

 

“I’ll start early in the morning.”

 

“I’ll--if you--I’ll come out here this evening. I think I can.”

 

“Oh--Betty!...”

 

“It may be a little late. Perhaps about half past eight. They’ll all be

busy then.... Just for a little while.”

 

He considered this. “It’s wrong,” he said. “But what’s the good of my

deciding not to come. Of course I will.”

 

“You came clear to T’ainan.”

 

“I know....”

 

“And how about me!” she broke out. “I’m shut in a prison here. You’re

the only friend that’s come--the only person I can talk with. Father is

wonderful, but he’s busy and worried, and I’m his daughter, and we can’t

talk much. And you and I--if you’re going in the morning--we can’t leave

things--our very lives”--her voice wavered--“like this.”

 

“I’ll come,” he said.

 

“And keep the soldiers with you.”

 

“I’ll come.”

 

“I wonder if it is like a net,” said she.

 

 

 

 

CHAPTER XII--STORM CENTER

 

 

1

 

CHINA, in its vastness, its mystery, its permanence, its ceaseless ebb

and flow of myriad, uncounted life, suggests the ocean. The surface

is restless, ripped by universal family discord, whipped by gusts of

passion from tong or tribe, upheaved by political storms, but everywhere

in the unsounded depths lies the peace of submissiveness. Within its

boundaries breathes sufficient power to overwhelm the world, yet only

on the self-conscious surface is this power sensed and slightly used.

Chinese life, in city and village, as in the teeming countryside, moves

in disorganized poverty about its laborious daily tasks, little more

aware of the surface political currents than are Crustacea at the bottom

of the sea of ships passing overhead; while to these patient minds the

mighty adventure of the Western World is no more than a breath upon the

waters.

 

This simile found a place among the darker thoughts of Griggsby Doane

as he tramped down into the fertile valley of the Han. Behind him lay

tragedy; yet on every hand the farmers were at work upon the narrow

holdings that terraced the red hills to their summits. At each

countryside well the half-naked coolies--two, three, or four of

them--were turning windlasses and emptying buckets of water into stone

troughs from which trickled little painstakingly measured streams to the

sunbaked furrow of this or that or another field. The trains of asses

anil camels wound ceaselessly up and down the road that led from the

northern hills to T’ainan. The roadside vendors and beggars chanted

their wares and their grievances. The villages, always indolent, lived

on exactly as always, stirred only by noisy bargains or other trivial

excitement. The naked children tumbled about. It w as hard to believe

that here could be--had so lately been--violence and cruelty. It was

simply one of the occasions, evidently, when no Lookers or hostile young

men happened to be about to shout their familiar taunts at the white

devil. Though the fighting of 1900, for that matter, had passed like a

wave, leaving hardly more trace. Still more, at dusk, the outskirts

of the great city stirred perplexing thoughts. The quiet of a Chinese