The Streets of Ascalon

Again and again she found herself with him separated from the others – sometimes alone with him on deck – and never quite understood how it came about so constantly.

As for Sprowl he made love to her from the first; and he was a trim, carefully groomed and volubly animated young man, full of information, and with a restless, ceaseless range of intelligence which at first dazzled with its false brilliancy.

But it was only a kind of flash-light intelligence. It seemed to miss, occasionally; some cog, some screw somewhere was either absent or badly adjusted or over-strained.

At first Strelsa found the young fellow fascinating. He had been everywhere and had seen everything; his mind was kaleidoscopic; his thought shifted, flashed, jerked, leaped like erratic lightning from one subject to another – from Japanese aeroplanes to a scheme for filling in the East River; from a plan to reconcile church and state in France to an idea for indefinitely prolonging human life. He had written several books about all kinds of things. Nobody read them.

The first time he spoke to her of love was on a magnificent star-set night off Martinique; and she coolly reminded him of the gossip connecting him with a pretty woman in Reno. She could not have done it a month ago.

He denied it so pleasantly, so frankly, that, astonished, she could scarcely choose but believe him.

After that he made ardent, headlong love to her at every opportunity, with a flighty recklessness which began by amusing her. At first, also, she found wholesome laughter a good defence; but there was an under-current of intelligent, relentless vigour in his attack which presently sobered her. And she vaguely realised that he was a man who knew what he wanted. A talk with Molly Wycherly sobered her still more; and she avoided him as politely as she could. But, being her host, it was impossible to keep clear of him. Besides there was about him a certain unwholesome fascination, even for her. No matter how bad a man's record may be, few women doubt their ability to make it a better one.

"You little goose," said Molly Wycherly, "everybody knows the kind of man he is. Could anything be more brazen than his attentions to you while Mary Ledwith is in Reno?"

"He says that her being there has nothing to do with him."

"Then he lies," said Molly, shrugging her shoulders.

"He doesn't speak as though he were trying to deceive anybody, Molly. He is perfectly frank to me. I can't believe that scandal. Besides he is quite open and manly about his unsavoury reputation; makes no excuses; simply says that there's good in every man, and that there is always one woman in the world who can bring it out – "

"Oh, mushy! What an out-of-date whine! He's bad all through I tell you – "

"No man is!" insisted Strelsa.

"What?"

"No man is. The great masters of fiction always ascribe at least one virtue to their most infamous creations – "

"Oh, Strelsa, you talk like a pan of fudge! I tell you that Langly Sprowl is no good at all. I hope you won't have to marry him to find out."

"I don't intend to… How inconsistent you are, Molly. You – and everybody else – believe him to be the most magnificent match in – "

"If position and wealth is all you care for, yes. I didn't suppose you'd come to that."

Strelsa said candidly: "I care for both – I don't know how much."

"As much as that?"

"No; not enough to marry him. And if he is what you say, it's hopeless of course… I don't think he is. Be decent, Molly; everybody is very horrid about him, and – and that is always a matter of sympathetic interest to a generous woman. When the whole world condemns a man it makes him interesting!"

"That's a piffling and emotional thing to say! He may be attractive in an uncanny way, because he's agreeable to look at, amusing, and very dangerous – a perfectly cold-blooded, and I think, slightly unbalanced social marauder. And that's the fact about Langly Sprowl. And I wish we were on land, the Yulan and her owner in – well, in the Erie Basin, perhaps."

Whether or not Strelsa believed these things, there still remained in her that curious sense of fascination in Sprowl's presence, partly arising, no doubt, from an instinctive sympathy for a young man so universally damned; partly, because she thought that perhaps he really was damned. Therefore, deep in her heart she felt that he must be dangerous; and there is, in that one belief, every element of unwholesome fascination. And a mind fatigued is no longer wholesome.

Then, too, there was always Sir Charles Mallison to turn to for a refreshing moral bath. Safety of soul lay in his vicinity; she felt confidence in the world wherever he traversed it. With him she relaxed and rested; there was repose for her in his silences; strength for her when he spoke; and a serene comradeship which no hint of sentiment had ever vexed.

Perhaps only a few people realised how thoroughly a single winter was equipping Strelsa for the part she seemed destined to play in that narrow world with which she was already identified; and few realised how fast she was learning. Laxity of precept, easy morals, looseness of thought, idle and good-natured acquiescence in social conditions where all standards seemed alike, all ideals merely a matter of personal taste – this was the atmosphere into which she had stepped from two years of Western solitude after a nightmare of violence, cruelty, and depravity unutterable. And naturally it seemed heavenly to her; and each revelation inconsistent with her own fastidious instincts left her less and less surprised, less and less uneasy. And after a while she began to assimilate all that she saw and heard.

A few unworldly instincts remained in her – gratitude for and quick response to any kindness offered from anybody; an inclination to make friends with stray wanderers into her circle, and to cultivate the socially useless.

Taking four o'clock tea alone with Mrs. Sprowl the afternoon of her return to town – an honour vouchsafed to few – Strelsa was relating, at that masterful woman's request, her various exotic experiences. Mrs. Sprowl had commanded her attendance early. There were reasons. And now partly vexed, partly in unwilling admiration, the old lady sat smiling and all the while thinking to herself impatiently; "Baby! Fool! Little ninny! Imbecile!" while she listened, fat bejewelled hands folded, small green eyes shining in the expanse of powdered and painted fat.

After a while she could endure it no longer, and she said with a wheeze of good-natured disdain:

"It's like a school-girl's diary – all those rhapsodies over volcanoes, palm trees, and the colour of the Spanish Main. Never mind geography, child; tell me about the men!"

"Men?" repeated Strelsa, laughingly – "why there were shoals and shoals of them, of every description!"

"I mean the one man?" insisted Mrs. Sprowl encouragingly.

"Which, please?"

"Nonsense! There was one, I suppose."

"Oh, I don't think so… Your nephew, Langly, was exceedingly amiable – "

"He's a plain beast," said his aunt, bluntly. "I didn't mean him."

"He was very civil to me," insisted Strelsa, colouring.

"Probably he didn't have a chance to be otherwise. He's a rotter, child. Ask anybody. I know perfectly well what he's been up to. I'm sorry you went on the Yulan. He had no business to ask you – or any other nice girl – or anybody at all until that Reno scandal is officially made respectable. If it were not for his money – " She stopped a moment, adding cynically – "and if it were not for mine – certain people wouldn't be tolerated anywhere, I suppose… How did you like Sir Charles?"

"Oh, he is charming!" she said warmly.

"You like him?"

"I almost adore him."

"Why not adore him entirely?"

Strelsa laughed frankly: "He hasn't asked me to, for one reason. Besides – "

"No doubt he'll do it."

The girl shook her head, still smiling:

"You don't understand at all. There isn't the slightest sentiment between us. He's only thoroughly nice and agreeable, and he and I are most companionable. I hope nobody will be silly enough to hint anything of that sort to him. It would embarrass him dreadfully."

Mrs. Sprowl's smile was blandly tolerant:

"The man's in love with you. Didn't you know it?"

"But you are mistaken, dear Mrs. Sprowl. If it were true I would know it, I think."

"Nonsense! He told me so."

"Oh," said Strelsa in amazed consternation. She added: "If it is so I'd rather not speak of it, please."