"My heart is as cold as a stone in the sea!""My soul is like a shrivelled leaf!""The woman with the crooked breast."This was the title of old Sara's story made into a little song.Poppy Destin dreamed of being a great writer some day; but she knew, with the sure instinct of the artist, that even if her dream came true she could never surpass these little studies in misery; these cries of wretchedness wrung from a child's heart by the cruel hands of Life.Nothing had ever yet been able to wipe from her mind the remembrance of those days. For six years she had lived a life in which fresh events and interests were of daily occurrence; and like a blighted seedling transplanted to a warm, kind climate, she had blossomed and bloomed in mind and body. But the memory of those days that had known no gleam of hope or gladness hung like a dark veil over her youth, and still had power to drive her into torments of hatred and misery. Her soul was still a shrivelled leaf, and her heart as cold as a stone in the sea. She was very sure that this should not be so; she knewthat she was incomplete. The instincts of her artist nature told her that somewhere in the world there must be someone or something that would wipe this curse of hatred from her; but she had never been able to find it, and she knew not where to seek it. Art failed her when she applied it to this wound of hers that bled inwardly. Despairingly she sometimes wondered whether it was religion she needed; but religion in the house of Luce Abinger was a door to which she found no key.Often, abroad, she had stolen away and knelt in quiet churches, and burnt candles in simple wayside chapels, trying, praying, to throw off the heavy, weary armour that cased her in, to get light into her, to feel her heart opening, like a flower, and the dew of God falling upon it. She had searched the face of the Madonna in many lands for some symbol that would point the way to a far-off reflection in herself of"The peace and grace of Mary's face."She had knelt in dim cathedrals, racking her ears to catch some note in gorgeous organ strains or some word from the lips of a priest that would let loose a flood of light in her and transform her life. But always, when the ecstasy and exaltation had passed off, and the scent of incense no longer wrapped her round, she could feel again the cold of the stone and the rustle of the leaf in her breast. She could hear without annoyance the bitter fleers of Abinger at religion and priests and churches, and though they offended her taste, could listen serene-eyed. She understood very well what ailed Luce Abinger, for she was touched with the blight that lay thick upon him. His nature was warped, his vision darkened by hatred and evil memories. His soul was maimed and twisted in the same cruel fashion that his face had been scarred and seamed, and he terribly hated God. Poppy oftenthought of it as an ironical trick of fate, that she and Luce Abinger—just the two people in all South Africa, perhaps, who could do least for each other's peace and healing—should be thrown together to live under the same roof for many years. In some ways they had served each other well. He had made his house a refuge for her from persecution, and had been the means of educating and bringing her to fine womanhood. She, on the other hand, had come into his life at a time when he was on the verge of madness and when it meant everything to him to have some interest that would tear his thoughts from himself and his disgust of life.The solitude of the quiet old farm, chosen for its isolated position, was lightened by the presence of the young girl. Abinger had been diverted to watch the change and development in the small, shipwrecked vagabond. Afterwards it had first amused, then interested him, to feed her eager appetite for learning. For three years he had taught her himself, in strange desultory fashion it is true, but it happened to be the fashion best suited to her needs and temperament. He imported from England huge weekly packages of books of both modern and classical literature, together with every variety of journal and magazine. He allowed Poppy the free run of all; only, always she must recount to him afterwards what she had read. A sort of discussion ensued, so dominated by his mordant cynicism and biting wit that she certainly ran no danger of developing anymawkishviews of life. This for two or three hours daily. The rest of time was hers to read in or wander for hours in the lovely silent country, knowing a peace and tranquillity she had never dreamed of in her early wretched years. The part of the Transvaal they were in was but thinly populated—a few scattered Boer farms, and a native mission-house with a chapel and school instituted by a brotherhood of French priests of the Jesuitorder. These were their only neighbours, and they not close ones.Abinger had chosen his retreat well.After three years it had occurred to him to leave the farm and go back to the world. He had tired of seclusion, and longed, even while he feared, to be amongst his fellows again. He was not yet prepared, however, to go back to the African haunts that had known him in the past, but made for the big open world beyond the seas; and Poppy went with him as his sister. Wherever they went he never allowed her to make any friends; only when they reached any city or place where he cared to stay for any length of time, he at once engaged masters and mistresses for her, to continue the education that he had by now tired of superintending, but which, for reasons of his own, he wished to perfect.CHAPTER IIAT five o'clock Kykie appeared with a tea-tray. She had assumed an air of calm, and her afternoon dress, which afforded a fine display of roses trellised on a bright blue background, and gave her the appearance of a large and comfortable ottoman. She cast an outraged look about the room."Haven't you unpacked yet, for gracious' sake, Poppy?""No, I haven't. Bring the tea over here, Kykie."She was lying on her bed, which was long and narrow as the path to heaven, and yet seemed to have grown too short for her, since she was obliged to perch her feet upon the brass bar across the end."Then what have you been doing, in the name of goodness me?""Nothing ... just thinking ... pour it out and come and sit by me here.... I haven't had a word with you yet."Kykie poured out the tea, and put some little toasted cakes on a plate, using her fat, yellow hands with extraordinary delicacy. Afterwards she sat in a chair with the things in her lap, waiting until Poppy should be ready."What is it like here in Durban, Kykie?... How long have you been here?"Kykie became very important, waggling her shoulders and rolling her eyeballs."More than six months getting this house ready for habitation ... men working in the garden day andnight, for it was a wilderness and the poor old place all gone to pot, dearest me.""It looks all right now; I should think Luce was pleased?""Never so much as a thank you extremingly.""Oh well, you know his ways ... but I am sure he appreciates all you do. He has often said to me while we were away that he wished you were with us."Kykie looked well pleased at this, but having passed the tea, she waved her hands deprecatingly."You're just buttering me up to heaven, Poppy!""No, I'm not. And he will eat again now he has you to cook for him. Abroad he used to eat frightfully little, but to-day I noticed he made an excellent lunch."Smiles wreathed Kykie's wide and dropsical face, and every tooth in her head was revealed."Dearest me, now Poppy, really? Well! but then I don't suppose they know how to cook very well abroad in London, do they?""Not so well as you, of course," said Poppy smiling and munching toast.Suddenly Kykie's face became dolorous."Did they look at his mark much, for heavenly goodness?" she inquired in a dismal whisper."Not so much. You know, Kykie, the world is full of all sorts of strange-looking people—especially France and Italy. In Naples, now, they didn't take the slightest notice of him.""For goodness' sake there must be some sights there!""More tea. It is lovely to be home again and have you waiting on me.""Ah! I expect you liked it best abroad in that London, now Poppy?""Never. IthoughtI should, but I had forgotten that my roots were planted out here. As soon as I got out ofsight of Africa they began to pull and hurt ... you've no idea of the feeling, Kykie ... it is terrible ... and it always came upon me worst in cities. I used to be sick with longing for a glimpse of the big open spaces with nothing in view but land and sky ... for the smell of the veldt,youknow, when it is baking hot and the rain comes fizzling down on it; and the early morning wind, when it has blown across a thousand miles of sun-burnt grass and little stalky, stripy, veldt-flowers and stubby bushes, and smells of the big black patches on the hill-sides where the fires have been, and of thedorn bloemson the banks of the rivers ... and the oozy, muddy, reeking, rushing rivers! Oh Kykie, when I thought of Africa, in some prim blue-and-gold continental hotel, I felt like a caged tiger-cat, raging at the bars of the cage!... In Paris and London I couldn't bear to go to the big open parks for fear the sickness would come upon me.... It was like being a wild ass of the desert, knee-haltered in a walled-in garden."Kykie might have been an amazingly-arrayed copper idol representing Africa, so benign and gratified was her smile."Tell me some more, Poppy. Where else did you think of Africa?""Well, Palermo nearly drove me wild. It has the same hot moist air as Natal, and the flowers have the same subtle scents. The big spotted mosquitoes bit like terriers and followed us as high as we could go; but I couldn't even hatethem, Kykie, they were so like the wretches we have out here—there's been one biting my instep all the afternoon." She pulled up her foot, and began to rub the spot gently through her stocking."I think Norway was the worst of all. The men there have beards and the same calm eyes as the Boers, and the people are all simple and kind, just as they were onthe farms in the Transvaal ... and sometimes on the top of a steep still hill I could close my eyes and pretend that I was on a wild mountain krantz and the hush of the waterfalls all round one was the hush of the tall veldt grasses waving in the wind.... But when I looked, and saw only the still green waters of the fjords and afar off a glacier thrust out between two hills like the claw of some great white monster ... oh Kykie, I could have torn the heart out of my breast and thrown it into the waters below.""Heavenly me! And were there coloured people there too?""Not in Norway; but America is full of them, and I hate them for cheats and frauds ... for I was always listening and waiting to hear some Kaffir or Dutch word from their lips ... and they never spoke anything but mincing, drawling American, through their noses, like this, Kykie:"'Oh say, wouldyoutellmewhat time thiskyaris due to start?'"Once I saw a boy in an elevated-railway car, who, though he was magnificently dressed in navy blue serge and wore a brimmer hat, looked soexactlylike Jim Basuto who ran away from the farm, that I said to him in Kaffir:"'You had better make haste and come back to the farm, Jim, and mind the sheep!'"He simply stared at me, and said to anotherboy, who might have been a Zulu chief except for his clothes:"'Say, this one looks to me as if she is dippy. I think she is the new star at Hammerstein's thatky-antspeak anything but French.'"Luce was so furious, he used fearful language at the Kaffir, and made me leave the train at the next station, and wouldn't speak to me for a week."Having finished her tea and eaten all the bread-and-butter and cakes, the girl lay back on her pillow and closed her eyes."For gracious' sake, and so you have seen the world!" said Kykie. "And now you have come back to the old quiet life?""Not at all, Kykie. I'm going to persuade Luce to go about here, and meet people, and let me do the same.""He'll never do it," said Kykie vehemently. "I can see that he is worse than ever about his mark.""But he knows a lot of people here. I don't see how he can keep them from coming to the house; and I heard theboyssaying that he had gone to the Club this afternoon. Surely that is a sign that he is not going to shut himself up again?""He may go to the Club, but he won't let anyone come here. He has given me strict orders that no one is to come in the front gates; they are to be locked and he will keep the key. Everything is to come by the back entrance and that, too, is to be locked."Poppy's face clouded."Oh Kykie! I wouldn't mind if we were back in the old farm with the free veldt all round us; but to be shut up in a house and garden—(and with Luce's devils," she added to herself),—"even if itisa lovely garden!"Kykie's face expressed lugubrious sympathy, but she held out no hope."You'll have to amuse yourself like you did before, with your music, and your reading, and writing, and be a good child," she said."But I'm not a child any longer. Can't you see how I've grown up?""I can see that you won't have to go and find milk-cactus to rub on your breasts any more," said Kykie, eyeing her with the calm candour of the native.Poppy coloured slightly, and made occasion to throwa corner of the quilt over her bare shoulders and arms."For the sake of grace you needn't mind me," remarked Kykie. "Haven't I watched you many a moonlight night stealing down to where it grew by the oldspruit?"The girl's colour deepened; she gave a wistful little side glance at the old woman."Ididso want to be beautiful. I would have dived to the bottom of the filthiest hole in that oldspruita dozen times a day to make myself the tiniest atom less ugly than I was. Do you remember that deep part where the water was so clear and we could see hundreds of crabs pulling pieces of flesh off the leg of the dead horse?""Ohsisyes! I wondered how you could go and look at the stinking thing day after day.""I used to be pretending to myself that it was my aunt they were eating. Oh Kykie! I have some dark caves in my soul!""And no wonder, surely to goodness. Never will I forget the night we opened the door and you fell into the house, all blood and mud, and your eyes like amal-meit's[3]flaring and flickering like the sulphur on a match."[3]Mad-maid.Poppy covered her eyes."Don't talk about it——"At this time a telephone bell began to ring somewhere in the house, and Kykie on her feet in an instant, flew from the room at top speed. She came back later to say that Luce Abinger had called up to tell her he would not be home to dinner. Poppy was delighted."Oh Kykie! that means that he is dining with old friends; and it will do himsomuch good, and he'll want to be cheerful and sociable with all the world again, and we shan't be locked up any more," she cried all in one breath. "And now you needn't bother about dinner,but come and help me unpack, and I'll show you all my clothes and the nice things I've brought back for you.""For me, gracious saints!""Yes, for you, you wicked old thing; silks and satins of every shade of the rainbow. You need never dress in anything else any more."They spent an engrossed hour unpacking, and afterwards Poppy dined alone, and betook herself to the garden. She knew that she had the whole place and the whole long evening to herself, without disturbance, for it was a peculiarity of Kykie's that she could not keep her eyes open after nine o'clock at night. As for theboys, after they had performed their duties in the kitchen and stables, their time was their own, and they made the most of it elsewhere than within reach or sight of their employers.It was early still, and though the darkness had fallen, the moon was at the full, and showed to advantage the solemn splendour of the trees, the long soft stretches of sward, and the festooned jungle-like arbours and arcades. In many a winding path she lost her way (for the place was of enormous extent), and had difficulty in locating once more the house or the gate or any point she was acquainted with. Coming to the gate once she tried it, and finding it securely locked she shook it with the sudden fury of a wild thing that finds itself caged. Then she stood still, and presently two great tears rolled down her face; but afterwards her wanderings became curiously systematised. Taking the gate as her starting-post she commenced adétourof the wilderness, keeping to its outskirts and examining as she travelled every inch of the enclosing walls. The part which gave on to the main road she found to be hopelessly impregnable; it had first a high stone wall with a cresting of particularly sharp and jagged bottle-glass; and further, was backed by a species of laurel that grew both tall and bushy, and rattled aggressively ifanyone so much as looked at it. Then came a long side-stretch of thick-set green bushes of what she judged—after pinching the leaf and smelling it—to be quince, with an undergrowth of pink pepper. After penetrating this, in a weak spot, and discovering that the outside rampart consisted of galvanised iron, standing lengthways and painted dark green, she did not feel so confident, but she went bravely on, until at last she came to a gate; it also was made of iron and painted green, but though it was unlocked, Poppy did not go through it, for she saw beyond, the stables and iron houses that were evidently the quarters of the black servants. She could hear their voices and the sound of a concertina. Plainly this was the back compound, through which all trades-people must make their way to the house. No doubt there was an entrance at the other side—but it was not for Poppy! She proceeded. The wall continued of the same quality, monotonously familiar; then occurred an impassable jungle that it would have taken a herd of buffalo to make any impression upon. After beating round this for some time, to the detriment of her trailing white gown, Poppy pursued her way with a frowning brow and a quivering under-lip. Next came a hedge of prickly-pear; she turned her head away from this in disgust. Farmers plant prickly-pears round their gardens to keep out cattle. It is the most perfect barrier in the world. Certainly, a human beingmightcut his way through it; but he would spend the rest of his life picking from his festering flesh tiny invisible white thorns. On and on she marched; it seemed to her that the large pale hands of the pear-hedge flapped mockingly at her. Sometimes she was obliged to make a widedétourto avoid a clump of trees, or a rockery, or a summer-house with a pergola leading to it, smothered with vines and passion-flowers and roses. It seemed that she walked miles and miles. Suddenly shesaw light glimmering through a trellised opening, and ran forward. Her hands touched cold wrought-iron. It was the front gate! This time, when she shook it, she did not cry. Her gown was torn, her hair was loosened, there was a scratch on her cheek and blood on her hands, but she laughed."Ah, myverydear Luce Abinger," she said, "we shall see if you can keep a creature of the veldt behind a padlock."Immediately she recommenced a fresh tour of the garden, and though the long hot day and all its incidents must have told upon her strength, she seemed to have suddenly acquired fresh life and buoyancy. She had that within which urged her on—a taste for liberty. At that time it seemed to her that the whole world was too small a place for a free spirit; and that if this were indeed the world, she would somewhere find some desperate edge and leap over, even if it should be into the abyss of nothingness. On this tour she included the arbours and the summer-houses in her itinerary. The third one she came to was only a small hut of a place, but it had a long spire to its roof, and from thence trailed and hung long lines and stalks of the passion plant—everyone knows it: vine-leaved, with great round cream-coloured flowers, a purple outer ring divided into ten thousand tiny leaves, signifying the crowd that gathered to listen to Christ on the Mount; and in the centre, mysteriously arranged, like the dishes upon the table of some oracle, the three loaves and the five fishes! They call it the grenadilla in Africa, and eat its fruit with port wine and cream. Poppy dived in under the trailing vinery, and entered the hut. All round it had a low seat running, but everything was old and damp and rotten she could feel by the touch, and in one place the wood crumbled under her fingers, and thrusting her arm forward, she was able to feel that itwas part of the wall itself; there was no further barrier beyond.She had found an exit.For a time she sat still on the cool mossy floor of the arbour, trembling a little at the thought of the spiders and strange beasts that might be dropping upon her from above. At last she nerved herself to the point of pushing and urging and disentangling the thick partition of green that kept her in. Her idea was to make an opening without making a gap; something she could re-arrange afterwards, leaving no sign of disturbance.At length she was through, and behold! she found herself in another garden. Was it a maze too, she wondered rather drearily? A maze without an opening? But no, there was a pleasing openness of view about the place. A few bushes and trees, a straggly flower-bed or two. Almost immediately she came upon a gravelled path; but she did not walk on it, choosing rather to follow its direction by way of the grass and soft earth which enflanked it. In the natural course of events a house was discovered. Quite a simple affair of galvanised iron, painted green, with a verandah running all round it and heaps of shrubs and bushes and creepers to hide its nakedness. Its front verandah was full of pale, heavenly light that was certainly not contributed by the moon; nor could the words that came floating over the bushes into the garden, be, by the wildest and most poetic imagination, endowed with a heavenly meaning."Oh, damn it, I'm sick of this rotten typewriter and everything else in the world. I wish Brookie would type his own beastly law-papers."Poppy approached with the utmost gentleness, and through the screen of a bush covered with tiny pink flowers that smelt of musk she surveyed the scene.The room itself was terrible as an army with banners.It contained "gypsy-tables," antimacassars, "what-nots," plush fans upon the walls, indescribable villainies of wool and paper, a crewel-worked mantel-border, and every atrocity under the moon. In the midst of all was a good solid mahogany table, with a typewriting-machine on it, and seated before this was a girl. For pity of herself Poppy was glad to see another girl; and more especially a girl who, like herself, appeared to have reason to be bored with her surroundings and the general management of the universe. In the enthusiasm engendered by a fellow-feeling, she had an inclination to march in and take the girl to her heart, but after a further survey she changed her mind.In a large, ripe fashion, the girl was very good-looking indeed, with a tall and generous figure of the kind that attracts prompt and frank attention from the generality of men, but is not deeply admired by other women. Her face was of a familiar Colonial type, large-featured but well-shaped, with big brown eyes, rather inclined to roll, suggestive of what is known as "a dash of colour"; a mouth of the kind that expresses nothing at all until the twenties, when by the aid of aretroussénose, grown unaccountably coarse it suddenly expresses things which should be left unexpressed; a round, rather plump chin, and masses of dark hair which had been sadly maltreated by curling-irons, and had a dusty appearance. On the whole a handsome girl, probably good-natured enough for the ordinary purposes, and of a personality pleasing enough for an ordinary acquaintance.Certainly not a girl to be made a friend of, thought Poppy, and decided that she would go no further."I'll wait and see first if Luce is going to let me out to meet nice people," she thought. "If he doesn't, this girl may help to pass away an idle hour sometimes, and she might serve as one of the characters in my novel.At any rate she could teach me to use the typewriter, and I could teach her not to live in a chamber of horrors."With these reflections she stole back soft-footed in her tracks, and through her little exit-hole, which she covered up with the greatest care and skill, for fear that in the future it should prove to be her only mode of entrance into the world of men and women she longed to know.For a whole week she refrained from broaching to the tyrant of the house the subject which lay uppermost in her thoughts. For one thing she thought it would be well to allow him to regain some semblance of good humour; for another she wished to give him full opportunity and time to make daily excursions into the town and lunch and dine with his friends, so that she might have some grounds for the reproaches she meant to level at him when she demanded freedom. In the meantime she was absorbed in affairs which included the inspection and re-arrangement of every room in the house, excepting only Abinger's, which she never ventured near. Touches of her personality soon lay upon everything, from the chintzes in the drawing-room which she had chosen herself at Waring's, and sent out to Kykie for the making, down to the curtaining of Kykie's own bedroom windows with some cobwebby snowy muslin she had bought in Shanghai. She spent several hours every day at the piano, playing old Irish melodies, for which she had a passion, and of which she had made an enormous collection; but she always waited until Luce was out of the house, for he had a peculiar aversion to melodies of any kind and more especially Irish melodies. He said:"There may have been something in them when the strolling poets played them on their harps, but since that fellow Moore made them pretty, I consider them damned mawkish."So Poppy kept her melodies to herself. The rest ofher time was divided between studying literature, writing, dreaming and wandering in the garden, which became dearer to her day by day.At last, one evening, on hearing from Kykie that Abinger would be dining at home, she made herself look as charming as possible in a pale maize satin gown with a wreath of green leaves on her hair, and went down prepared to do battle.Luce Abinger was already in the drawing-room, standing at one of the French windows, staring out into the garden—a sombre, solitary figure. She noticed, as often before, how tall and well-built he was, and the fine line of his head under the smooth, fair hair. He always looked distinguished and well-born in evening-dress. At the sound of Poppy he turned, and the lights shining on his maimed and distorted face, showed her that he was entertaining at least seven devils. A mental shiver passed through her and hope fell several degrees; but she advanced with a serene smile and a gay word. She had long ago learnt to control the expressions of her face, so that he might not guess the mingled terror, pity, and repulsion he often roused in her; and though she knew that in most things he had intuition as cruel as the grave, she believed that in this, at least, she was able to deceive him.The second gong had not yet sounded. She sat down at the piano and ran her fingers up and down the keys by way of bracing up her nerves."Luce," she began, "I hope you are in a good temper, for I want to talk to you very seriously about something."He gave a croaking sort of laugh."Oh certainly. I am at my very b-best. It is only necessary for you to p-play an Irish melody to have me p-purring at your feet.Il ne manquerait plus que ça."This was inauspicious, but Poppy refused to be daunted;and the gong sounding at this moment, she rose and put her hand upon his arm, saying cheerfully:"That's right, come along then, we'll talk it over in the dining-room."His smile was grim. They sat down to dinner, and Babiyaan and Umzibu, arrayed in white, hovered over them like guardian angels. Abinger ate little and said nothing. Only when theboyswere not in the room he fixed his eyes on Poppy in a curious way that caused in her a sensation of indescribable discomfort and annoyance. Once, for some unknown reason, she found herself remembering how she had covered herself up with the bed quilt from Kykie's eyes, and wishing that she had it round her now. She had never felt like that in a low gown before, and she could not understand it at all. For a time it quite unfitted her for the task she had in hand, but the idea occurring to her that this was perhaps what Luce intended, she plucked up heart again, and with the fruit fired her first shot."Luce, what are you going to do about getting me a chaperon?"He gave a little jerk of his fruit-knife, so that she knew that he was taken unawares, otherwise he remained undisturbed by what she supposed must be something in the nature of a bomb-shell going off under his nose. He did not, however, proceed with the business of peeling his peach, and on giving him a swift side-glance, she found that he was smiling at her. Now, his smile was at no time an alluring affair, but when it was field day for his devils——!"Am I not a sufficiently p-proper and responsible p-person to have the care of your young white s-soul?" he inquired blandly.She knewthatmood. Perhaps, after all, it would be better to postpone the discussion; but then, sometimesthese fits of fury and rudeness lasted for months. It was impossible to wait all that time."I am not particularly concerned about my soul," she answered carelessly, dipping her fingers in the fine Venetian bowl before her and drying them delicately. One of Abinger's devils betrayed itself by laughing loudly and with character, but she did not even wince."Your young white b-body, then?" He pushed back his chair from the table with a horrible scrench on the polished floor."You talk like some odious sultan, but you forget that I am not a slave," she flashed back at him.She pushed her chair from the table also, and loosening from her wrist a little painted inlaid fan which she had bought from a street-seller in Algiers, she essayed to cool her flushed face."Cigarettes, Babiyaan!" she said. "It is very hot; I think I will smoke out in the garden," she finished coldly to Abinger.But he had risen too, and lounged in the doorway leading to the verandah."Oh, p-pray let us finish this interesting discussion."They stood looking at each other for a moment: she, quite collectedly; he, smiling with his eyes and sneering with his mouth. Babiyaan, well aware that she was not allowed to smoke, knew better than to hand her the cigarettes, but placed them on the table and discreetly retired."There is no discussion, Luce," she said quietly, though her voice contained a tremor. "I simply want you to realise that it is impossible for me to go on living like this for ever. It isn't fair...." she added petulantly. He said nothing, only smiled. She regained her dignity and spoke more gently:"I am a woman now, Luce, and it is only natural that I should wish to know other women—and men too."At that he laughed raspingly."Why d-drag in the women?"She looked at him scornfully. It was ridiculous of him to pretend that men meant more to her than women."It is unreasonable of you to expect me to spend my youth in secrecy and seclusion, just because you—" she stopped hastily."Go on!" he said with a devilish gaiety. "'Just becauseyouhappen to have a face like a mutilated b-baboon'—was that what you were going to say?""Oh Luce, youknowit was not! Because ... because ..." she stood stammering with distress, while he stood grinning. "Becauseyoudon't happen to care for the society of other people—was what I was going to say.... Don't think," she went on appealingly, "that I don't appreciate all you have done for me. I remember it every day and every night.... I shall never forget it ... and though I know I can never repay you, I will show you all the rest of my life how grateful I am.... But I don't see what difference it would make to you to let me know a few people ... you have so many friends ... surely you know some nice women who would call on me——"He broke out in a harsh voice, smiling no longer. "You are mistaken; I have no friends. The whole thing is out of the question and impossible.""I don't see why it should be at all," she pursued valiantly; "if you get me some pleasant woman as a chaperon.""In God's name what do you want with women?" he burst out. "A g-girl like you will never find a friend amongst them. They will hate you for your face, and your brains, and your youth.... They are d-devils all—lock, stock and barrel.... They'll rip you open and tear the story of your life out of you; if they once findout that you are a South African they'll never rest until they have nosed out the whole thing, and then they'll fling the t-tale to the four winds and the first thing you know you'll have your Bloemfontein aunt bearing down on you——""Oh Luce! I don't believe they're as bad as all that——""Then don't believe it," he retorted, with the utmost rudeness. "But understand one thing, I'll have no she-devils round this house.""Very well, let them be he-devils," she flung back at him. "I am accustomed to those."At that he stamped away from her towards the other door, gesturing with rage, and throwing broken words in her direction."Isn't my life bad enough already?... Oh Hades!... I wouldn't stand it for a minute ... curse all women ... don't ever talk to me about this again ... I tell you.... It's monstrous ... a lot of thieves and blackguards.... You're driving me out of my own house ... I shall go to the Rand to-morrow ... why, by God, I!..."The door closed with a crash behind him.CHAPTER IIIAT two o'clock one afternoon Sophie Cornell walked into her sitting-room and flung upon the table by the side of her typewriter a great roll of MSS. She was gorgeously attired in a hat massed with roses of a shade that "never was on land or sea," and a furiously befrilled gown of sky-blue silk-muslin. But her face was flushed and heated, and her eyebrows met in a scowl of decided ill-temper. Opening a door that led through a long passage to the kitchen, she shouted:"Zambani! Zambani!Checchanow with my lunch. Send Piccanin to lay table.Checcha wena!"She flung her hat into one chair and herself into another, and stared at a telegram which she spread out before her."'Sorry can't come,'" she read, muttering; "'something better turned up; you understand!' Yes, I understand well enough! Just like the rotter to study her own convenience and throw me over at the last moment. What am I to donow, I'd like to know?"She lolled in her chair and glared angrily at a small blackboyin a blue twill tunic and short blue knickers above his knees, who was laying a cloth on one end of the table."Is there any soda in the house, Piccanin?" she demanded; and when he signified yes, ordered him to fetch it then and becheccha. In the meantime, she rose and unlocked from the sideboard a bottle of whiskey.Lunch was a slovenly meal, consisting of burnt mutton-chops, fried potatoes, and a beet-root salad liberallydecorated with rings of raw onion. Miss Cornell, however, ate heartily, and enjoyed a whiskey-and-soda. She then proceeded to attack a wobbly blanc-mange beringed with strawberry jam. Occasionally she demanded of some invisible personage:"And what am I going to donow, I'd like to know?" and the scowl returned to her brows.Suddenly, upon the front door which stood slightly ajar fell a soft knock. Miss Cornell's hands slipped to her hair, the scowl disappeared from her face, and in a high affected voice she called:"Come in!"Entered, with a shy and demure air, a girl dressed in the simplest kind of dress made of thin black muslin, with a white fichu over her shoulders falling in long ends below her waist. Her large white-straw hat had round it a wreath of lilac, which was of exactly the same colour as her eyes. Her lips were amazingly scarlet."I beg your pardon," she said in a soft, entrancing voice. "I am sorry to disturb you at your lunch——""That's all right," said Sophie affably; "I'm just done. Do sit down!"The girl seated herself daintily. Sophie, observing that she wore no jewelry of any kind except a ring, in which the diamond was so large that it must surely be paste, decided that her visitor must be "hard up." She (Sophie) had not much of an opinion of that "black rag of a gown" either, but she thought she detected the faint murmur of a silk lining as her visitor moved. The lilac eyes looked at her winningly."I heard that you had a typewriting machine," she said, "and I wondered if you would be so good as to do a little typing for me—" She indicated a tiny roll of writing which she held in her hand. Miss Cornell sat up with an air."Oh, I don't take in work!" she said perkily. "I couldn't be bothered with that sort of thing. I'msekertaryto a gentleman who has an office down town.""Lilac Eyes" regarded her calmly and did not seem overwhelmed by the importance of this communication."What a bother!" said she serenely.Miss Cornell became languid."I get an enormous salary, and I have more work than I know how to get through already. Indeed, I am trying to get an assistant.""Really?" said the other girl. "I wonder if I would suit you?""You!" Miss Cornell's face lit up with sudden interest and eagerness. She surveyed the other again.Of course, she was only a "hard-up" girl looking for work, and that air of gentle insolence that Sophie had been conscious of, was, after all, only "side" stuck on like the rose in the front of the simple black gown to hide poverty. Upon these reflections Miss Cornell's air became exceedingly patronising."You? Well, I don't know, I'm sure. Can you type?""Not at all. But I daresay I could soon learn.""Oh well! I couldn't give you much salary if you are only a beginner.""I shouldn't want any salary," said "Lilac Eyes"; but added quickly, as she saw the other's look of amazement: "At least, not for some months. If you would allow me to use your machine for my own work sometimes I should be repaid."At this Sophie had neither the wit nor the patience to conceal her satisfaction. Her haughty air departed and she beamed with delight. She had suddenly seen a clear way through a very difficultimpasse."You'll suit me down to the ground," she declared joyfully. "When can you move in?""Move in?" the other gave her a wondering smile. "Oh, I couldn't come to live—only for a few hours every day."Sophie's face clouded again, but in a moment her eyes took on the absorbed look of a person who is rapidly reviewing a difficult situation. Presently she said:"Well, perhaps that wouldn't matter so much if you wouldn't mindpretendingsometimes that you live here."The other girl looked puzzled."I'm afraid I don't quite understand.""Well, if there's any chance of you're doing as I ask you, I'll explain," said Sophie; "but, of course, I don't want to talk about my private affairs if it's no good. There's nothing in the reason forpretendingthat you need object to," she added boldly. "What is the reason you can't come and live? Got a sick mother, or an old aunt, or something?"The other hesitated for a moment, then her lovely lilac eyes took on a curious expression."Yes, I have an aunt," was her odd answer, but Sophie was no acute reader of eyes or odd answers."More fool you," said she cheerfully. "I'd like to see the old aunt who'd getmeto support her. Well, all right now, if you think you'll come I'll tell you the whole thing.""Yes, I think I'll come. But as I have said, it will only be for a few hours daily; sometimes in the mornings, more often in the afternoons.""That'll do all right. Have a whiskey-and-soda and we'll talk it over.""I don't care for whiskey, thank you," said "Lilac Eyes"; "but I am very thirsty, and will have some soda, if I may."Sophie shouted to Piccanin to bring another glass, and pushed the soda and lemons across the table."Make yourself at home," said she affably; "but I hope you're not one of those asses who don't drink!""No, I drink if I want to—but not spirits.""Oh, I know—those old Cape pontacs. Save me from them!" Miss Cornell looked piously at the ceiling. The other girl, who had never tasted Cape pontac in her life, only smiled her subtle smile.Sophie seated herself in a lounge-chair, opposite her visitor, and crossed her legs, incidentally revealing her smart French-heeled shoes and a good deal of open-work stocking through which to lilac-coloured eyes her legs looked as though they were painted red. Piccanin meanwhile removed from the room the luncheon débris, his bare feet cheeping on the pale native matting and his long black eyes taking interested glances at the visitor whenever she was not looking his way."And now let's get to business," said Miss Cornell. "First of all, you haven't told me your name yet."The lilac eyes were hidden for a moment under white lids, and a faint colour swept over the pale skin."Rosalind Chard.""Well, I shall call you Rosalind, of course, and you can call me Sophie if you like. Sophie Cornell's my name. Rather pretty, isn't it?""Very," said Miss Chard in her gentle, entrancing voice."Well, now I'll tell you: I come from Cradock, in the Cape Colony, but I've been living all over the place since I left home. First, I went to stay with my sister in Kimberley. Have you ever been to Kimberley?Man!I tell you it's the most glorious place—at least, it used to be before everybody went to Jo ... you know Jo-burg,of course?"Miss Chard shook her head."Never been to Johannesburg?" Sophie's tone expressed the utmost pity and contempt. "Well, butyou're an English girl, I can see. Not been long out here, have you?""Only a week or so.""Great Scott! you've got a lot to learn!"Miss Cornell took a packet of cigarettes from her pocket and lit one. She then offered the packet to Miss Chard, who did not, however, take one."Don't smoke either? Och, what! You're nothalfa good fellow! Well, take off your hat, then. Do be sociable."Miss Chard unpinned her floppy white hat and wore it on her knee for the rest of the interview. Sophie noticed the piled-up crown of black, black hair; also, the peculiar branching way in which it grew above the girl's brows. ("I wonder if she uses bay-rum to make it all dry and electriccy like that?" was her inward comment. "And I'll bet she wears a switch.")"Well, to continue my tale—I had a lovely time indarlingold Kimberley: dances, theatres, suppers, everything you can think of; then my sister's husband must needs go off and buy a rotten old farm at the back of nowhere—Barkly East, if you love me! They wantedmeto come, too, but I said, Dead off! No,thanks! I want something more out of life than mountain scenery."Rosalind Chard looked at her and could well believe it. At the moment Sophie reminded her of nothing so much as a full-blown cabbage-rose, dying to be plucked."And so you came here instead?""Well, no; first I went to Jo-burg, and Imustsay I had a heavenly timethere; but—well—it didn't suit my health, so I becamesekertaryto an old snook called Johnson. He had been in Rhodesia, poking about in some ancient ruins there, and—oh, my garden flower!—the stuff he used to give me to write and type! And the way he used to bully me when I didn't get through it! Andthen complained of my spelling, if you please. I didn't stay withhimany longer than I could help, you bet, though the screw was good. But Imusttell you, such fun—just as I was going to leave him I discovered from his correspondence that he was going up to Zanzibar to make some researches for some rotten old society or other, so I stuck to him for another month. I thought I might as well get a passage to Durban for nix. So I started with him from the Cape, but when the boat touched here, I said, Good-bye, Johnnie! Oh crumbs! The row he made when he found me trekking!"The listener's sympathy happened to be with the old snook, but Sophie was not asking for an opinion."And do you mean to say," demanded the latter unexpectedly, "that you would rather live with your old aunt than in a sweet little house like this, with me?"Miss Chard did not mean to say anything at all as far as her own affairs were concerned."Never mind about me, Sophie," was her reply. "Tell me some more of your interesting adventures, and how you came to live in this sweet little house."Miss Cornell's glance shifted from her new friend. She looked out of the window, round the room, at the pictures on the wall, at the typewriter—anywhere but into the two clear wells of lilac light opposite her, as she answered:"I rent it, of course. I told you, didn't I, that I amsekertaryto a man down town, named Brookfield. He thinks the world of me, and gives me a big salary; and then I get other work from a man called Bramham. Oh, I have more to do than I want, and I reallyhadto get help, so I wrote last week to a pal of mine up in Jo-burg, and told her to come and join me. She promised, and I expected her right up till to-day, when I got a telegram, if you please, to say that she'd got something better. Wasn't that a low-down trick? And after I had told Brookfield and Bramham and all! Brookie gave me the morning off to go and meet her, and I waited for the train and found she wasn't in it, and when I got back to the office there was the telegram! Fortunately Brookie was gone from the office when I got back, so he doesn't know that she hasn't come.""But why should it matter to him and to the other man whether she comes or not?"Again Miss Cornell's glance took flight."Because of the work, of course—there's such tons to do ... and I can't get through it all by myself."Miss Chard watched her narrowly."Well, but why do you wish me to pretend that I live here, and am your friend from Johannesburg?""You see, it's this way ... Brookie and Mr. Bramham take an interest in me.... They don't think that I ought to live alone here, and all that sort of rot—and if I could showyouto them they'd think it was all right."Miss Chard looked startled."Oh, I couldn't promise to meet strange men! I didn't suppose you would want me to do that or——"An exasperated look came over Miss Cornell's face."You're not going to back out now, after me telling you everything?" she demanded angrily, but Miss Chard's scarlet lips took a firm line."I don't wish to meet strange people," she said. To her surprise, the other girl at once became propitiatory and beseeching."Well, but I won't ask you to meet anyone else. I'll keep you a deadly secret. And I can assure you that Brookie and Bramham don't matter in the least. Brookie is—well, to tell you the truth, he is entirely my property; he's crazily in love with me, and he won't bother you at all. Neither will Brammie, if it comes to that. He is anawfullynice man—everybody likes him, and he's fearfully rich too. He's married, and his wife lives in England forher health, they say, but of coarse that must be all rot. Anyway, he never goes into society at all—only has men friends.""Well, what does he want here?" asked Miss Chard calmly, watching the flushed face before her."Nothing—nothing at all. It's only a matter of business, and a friendly interest in me, and all that—and, you see, as he employs me as well as Brookie, I have to be civil and ask him to tea sometimes."It seemed to Miss Rosalind Chard that there was more in this than met the eye, but she was not able to fathom it at present. However, after listening to another long description of Mr. Bramham's inoffensiveness, she consented at last to be at the house one afternoon when he called."As for Brookie——" began Sophie, ready to open up another chronicle of guilelessness."No, no! I won't meet Brookie, I absolutely jib at Brookie!"Sophie became lugubrious. "But he knows that you were to have arrived to-day——""Well," said Miss Chard decidedly. "Tell him that I came, but that I am as ugly as a monkey and as old as the sea. And now I must go, or my—aunt will be looking for me. I shall try and come in to-morrow and take a lesson on the typewriter. What time will be best?""You'll have to teach yourself, my dear. I go to the office every morning at ten, and I lunch in West Street, and don't get back until above five in the afternoon. But I'll bring you all the MSS. there is no immediate hurry for—and you can do it one day and I'll take it back the next. We shall get along like one o'clock.""That's all settled then; good-bye!" Miss Chard had stepped out of the room into the verandah and was gone before Sophie could remove her high heels from the bars ofthe chair in front of her, where she had hooked them for extra ease and comfort. Inadvertently she listened for the click of the gate. But the gate did not click. Miss Chard, having got out of view of both house and gate, made a dash for the tall green hedge on the right side of the garden. Stooping down, she instantly disappeared.A few moments later Poppy Destin sat in the passion-leaved summer-house, delicately smoking a cigarette and brushing all traces of dust from her thin black muslin gown. Between little puffs of smoke she presently spoke to herself."Certainly she is a terror ... a common mind, terrible clothes, Colonial slang ... I don't know that I can put up with her at all ... and those awful Brookies and Brammies! ... but it will be useful to be able to go through her garden whenever I want to make a little excursion into the world ... and, of course, I couldn't be there without some right or reason ... besides, it will be splendid to learn typewriting, and do all my own writing ready to send to the publishers ... but what a room! ... and those roses in her hat! Can such things be?... I must go and see whether Kykie has my tea ready."A few days later it would have been hard to recognise the sitting-room of Sophie Cornell's little green bungalow. Books had spread themselves about the room, the tawdrinesses had been removed, flowers were everywhere, and a fine vine in a long glass crept delicately up the side of the mirror above the mantel. When Poppy had hinted that she would like to change the room a little, Sophie had good-naturedly given hercarte-blancheto do anything she wished, saying:"It was notmytaste either, you know; but the place was furnished when I came into it and I haven't bothered to do anything since."The only things Miss Cornell would not allow to bebanished were the photographs of her numerous admirers, which she insisted on ranging along the narrow wooden ledge running round the room above the dado. They were in all degrees of preservation—some of them yellow with age or exposure, some quite new; all were autographed and inscribed. Some of the inscriptions ran thus: "From your loving Jack"; "To the best girl I know"; "To one of the best from one of the worst," etc. It was to be observed that the most ardentmotswere merely initialled. But Sophie was equally proud of them all, and would exhibit them on the smallest provocation, giving a short narrative-sketch of each person which included the most striking features of his character, together with a thrilling account of his passion for her and the reason why she did not marry him."Now, isn'thegood looking? Such a dear boy too ... andgenerous! My dear, that man would have given me the boots off his feet ... but there—he had no money; what was the good?... He's in Klondyke now ... I do hope he'll have luck, poor boy....""This is Captain Halkett. No, I don't know his regiment, and he never would give away his photos in uniform, though he had some perfectly lovely ones.... Someone told me he was a 'cashier' in the Army ... but that was silly, of course ... there are no such things as cashiers in the Army,arethere? ... he simply adored me ... he gave me this bangle ... such a darling ... but he was married—or,of course——""Oh,thatis Jack Truman, of Kimberley. Everyone knowshim... a fearful devil, but most fascinating.... Isn't he handsome? ... such eyes ... you simply couldn't look into them, they made you blush all over. The women were all crazy after him, but he told me he didn't give a pin for any of them except me.... He wanted me to run away with him ... but he had a wifein a lunatic asylum ... obliged to allow her forty pounds a month, and he wasdreadfullyin debt ... they tried to arrest him at Cape Town, but he got away dressed like a woman ... and now he is in the Australian Mounted Police, they say."And,of course, you know who this is? One of the biggest men on the Rand ... withthousands, my dear.... Och! you should see him in riding kit ... you never saw any one look so perfectlynoble... he wasmadlyin love with me ... everybody said so ... he told me I was the only girl who could ever keep him straight ... but he behaved rather badly.... I always believe some snake of a woman made mischief ... and when he went to England, one of those English girls snapped him up ... they live out at Jeppestown now ... and they say she's theliving imageof me ... funny, isn't it?... but I think it just proves how he adored me, don't you?"Listeners of defective vision and an over-developed sense of credulity might have believed that Helen of Troy II had come to town—unless they had been long enough in South Africa to realise that the best way to enjoy a little quiet humour is to take a Cape-Colonial girl at her own valuation.Poppy listened to all with tranquil eyes. She was willing to believe that it might be true that Sophie was admired and adored and desired. But in the type of men who formed the army of admirers and adorers and desirers she could not pluck up the faintest kind of interest. It seemed to her that it was impossible that any man worth knowing could forgive the size of Sophie's hands and the shape of her feet, the look about her mouth, the paint on her face, and the dust in her hair.She was aware, however, that life in South Africa is too busy and too eventful to allow men much time for digging into personality—and that it has to suffice, as arule, if the surface-metal shines pleasantly and looks like the real thing. Sophie's surface, no doubt, had an attractive glitter, but Poppy felt sure that if anyone with the time and inclination for such occupation had ventured to go a-quarrying into the nature of Sophie Cornell, the output would be found to be surprising, even in a land where surprises are every-day fare and the unexpected is the only thing that ever happens.CHAPTER IVIN the meantime all went well. Secure in the knowledge that Abinger was away for some weeks, that Kykie would never search for her except at meal-times, every day found Poppy spending four or five hours at her new occupation—typewriting. She had determined that she would master this art before she went adventuring further into the world that lay beyond Sophie Cornell's gate.Sometimes she would arrive before ten in the morning, in time to see Sophie depart, gloriously arrayed, with the air of one due at the same garden-party as royalty.When she inspected the huge rolls of work which Sophie invariably brought back, she would sometimes wonder if the latter had indeed been to a garden-party and never put in at the office at all, except to fetch the MSS.The little house in the morning hours was always calm and peaceful. Through the trees of the garden Poppy could hear the world go buzzing by—the grating of the tram-cars on the lines, the clatter of horses, and the hiss of wheels going down hill, and an occasional street cry. No one ever came down the little pathway. Only the click of the machine, the voices of Zambani and Piccanin, busy with the pots and the pans in the kitchen and yard, broke the silence; or Poppy's trilling whistle as she corrected her proofs. By half-past twelve there would be piles of neat manuscript ready for Sophie to take back the next day, and Poppy would be speeding home throughher own garden to luncheon. Sometimes in the afternoon she would finish early, and, going out into the kitchen, would toast buns and prepare the tea, and Sophie, coming home at five o'clock, would find it laid cool and dainty among flowers on the long table.One day, when Poppy had arrived almost directly after lunch, with the idea of getting in a long afternoon at her own work, she was disagreeably surprised to find Sophie stalk in a few moments later, flushed and handsome, and bringing with her a large bale of papers and the faint but unmistakable odour of good cigars.Poppy's little nose went up and a warmth ran through her; the smell of a good cigar unaccountably roused in her a vivid interest in life. For a moment she slightly envied Sophie, but a glance at the brilliant languid eyes and heavy mouth changed her mind, and singularly inspired her with the thought that good cigars were probably often smoked by hateful men."Would you like me to order you a cup of tea, Sophie?" she asked presently."No, thanks!" said Sophie, languidly stretching herself in a chair. "I couldn't drink tea. I've had a most tiring morning. Brookie brought Nick Capron in, and they simplywouldn'tlet me work."After which calmly contradictory statement, she closed her eyes and fanned herself with a legal-looking document, chosen for its stiffness from among the papers she had brought, and which were now at sixes and sevens upon the floor.At the name "Nick Capron," Poppy gave a little start. How well she remembered the day she had heard that name from the lips of a beautiful woman in Bloemfontein! Could this Nick Capron possibly be the "most fascinating man in Africa" whom the gold-haired heroine was going to marry? She must try and discover."I think a cup of tea would refresh you, Sophie," she presently said."Och ni vat!I can't eat or drink when I get worn out like this—I become a perfect wreck."Poppy surveyed the healthy, not to say opulent proportions stretched before her, and could not forbear to smile."Oh, you should keep up your strength," she said, with irony entirely thrown away."The only thing that would be theslightestuse to me, now," announced Sophie, "is a glass of champagne—and, of course, I can't have that."Poppy began to pore over her manuscript. She was in the mood for work and hated not to take advantage of it."I wish I were rich enough to drink champagne whenever I am tired," was Miss Cornell's next contribution; and Poppy laughed without being amused."You'd soon be bored with that.""Never!" said Miss Cornell fervently; then relapsed into languor."I hope those papers are not important, Sophie, they are blowing all over the room.""Yes, they'reveryimportant. They're all about a Malay abduction case which a friend of Brookie's is defending in the Courts next week. It's the greatest fun, Brookie and Capron were shrieking over it this afternoon.""Is Mr. Capron a lawyer?""Oh, no—he isn't anything; just a pal of Brookie's. He's a Johannesburger, but he has a house here as well, andtonsof money, and a lovely wife—a perfect stunner, my dear—Brookie says she is the loveliest woman in Africa; but Capron has always got his eye on some other woman. By the way, Rosalind, to-day he was describing a girl he had seen in a rickshaw, and from the descriptionI feel sure it was you. Your particular style of beauty appears to have struck him all in a heap."Miss Cornell made this statement as though she thought it humorous, which, indeed, she did, for that anyone should admire a girl so unlike her own type, and her own idea of beauty which that type represented, seemed to her really funny and incredible. Yet she looked intently now, and observed, so far as in her lay, "with the seeing eye," and for the first time since they had met—the girl before her. Nick Capron's unmistakable enthusiasm had made a great impression upon her."He said that you were alone in a rickshaw," she told Poppy, "and that he and Mrs. Portal were walking together and met you. And Mrs. Portal said you looked like a Burne-Jones dressed like a Beardsley poster. What rot these society women talk! Who can understand a thing like that?""What is Mrs. Portal like?" asked Poppy, remembering now the well-bred-looking woman who had been talking about Burne-Jones to the man with the dissipated eyes on the day of her arrival.But Sophie took no heed of the question. She was closely and furtively regarding Poppy, and thinking: "Has she any attraction for men, I wonder? She's not a bit smart ... and so pale ... and yet, and yet ..." Here Sophie's expression of thought gave out. If she could have expressed it, she would have added: "She is pale, and yet glows as though something within her is alight.""I hope you did not tell him anything about me?" asked Poppy suddenly."No, I didnot!" said Miss Cornell emphatically, and her annoyed look as she said it brought a ring of laughter from Poppy and a lovely mischievous glimmer to her eyes.Suddenly Sophie sprang up."Great Scott! Iquiteforgot to tell you—Brammie is coming to tea. That's why I came home so early. Do buck up, old girl, and make things look nice. Your papers are all over the place. I want the room to look as nice as possible for old Brammie.""Oh! blow Brammie," thought Poppy crossly. "I was just going to write something extraordinarily fine; now it will be lost for ever!"Nevertheless, she put her papers away with a good grace, tidied the room, laid the tea-things—as only she could—and went out to pluck fresh flowers for the vases. Sophie stood in her bedroom door buttoning a plaid silk blouse over her richly-endowed bosom."That's ripping," she said approvingly. "Och! but youcanarrange flowers—I'll say that for you, Rosalind. Wouldn't you like to run home and change your dress, though?""No," said Poppy, her head slightly on one side as she surveyed a great flaming hibiscus-blossom she had just put by itself amidst a heap of green on the mantlepiece. "Why should I change my gown?" she asked. "This is quite all right. And the man's coming to see you, Sophie, not me.""Oh, he reallywantsto see you, and I think you ought to try and look nice. I'll lend you one of my silk blouses, if you like.""No, no, thank you," hastily. "It's awfully good of you, Sophie, but I think my gown is quite presentable."She looked absolutely charming in a pale-blue linen, perfectly laundered by Kykie; but Sophie considered anything less than silk very ordinary wear indeed.Poppy began to arrange her hair at the mantel-mirror, pulling out her little side-combs, running them through strands of hair, then plunging them in deeper, so that greatwaves leaned out on either side of her face and delicate fronds fell veil-wise just over her eyes. Then she took a bunch of green leaves and fastened them under her throat with a big, old malachite brooch she had."Well, put some colour on your cheeks, or something," said Sophie discontentedly.Poppy flew into one of the fierce little rages that sometimes seized her. "I willnot, Sophie! Why on earth should you suppose that becauseyouhave a violent colour no one admires pale women? Do not make the mistake of thinking that everyone adores your type becauseyoudo!"Sophie, utterly taken aback, was about to make a tart rejoinder, when there came a light tap with a crop on the front door."Anyone at home?"Sophie flew to her room to complete her toilette, leaving Poppy to swallow her rage and open the door. A big, grey-eyed man, with a kind smile, was standing in the verandah. He was in riding-clothes and carried a crop in his hand."Come in," said Poppy, without enthusiasm; adding: "Miss Cornell will not be long.""Are you Miss Chard?" said he pleasantly, and came in.He looked round in a friendly, boyish way that rather charmed her."By Jove! How pretty you've made this place look! It's quite different.""Ah, I suppose you were here before, when it was a chamber of horrors," said Poppy coolly. "I never saw a more impossible place in my life."He looked at her curiously as though greatly surprised. Then he said carelessly, and rather curtly she thought:"Oh, yes, I have been here before."He sat down in one of the easy chairs and Poppy began to put in order some books that had fallen from the book-case on to the floor. When she turned she found him still staring at her in that curious fashion, but without his smile. She missed it because it was a singularly heart-warming smile.
"My heart is as cold as a stone in the sea!""My soul is like a shrivelled leaf!""The woman with the crooked breast."
"My heart is as cold as a stone in the sea!""My soul is like a shrivelled leaf!""The woman with the crooked breast."
This was the title of old Sara's story made into a little song.
Poppy Destin dreamed of being a great writer some day; but she knew, with the sure instinct of the artist, that even if her dream came true she could never surpass these little studies in misery; these cries of wretchedness wrung from a child's heart by the cruel hands of Life.
Nothing had ever yet been able to wipe from her mind the remembrance of those days. For six years she had lived a life in which fresh events and interests were of daily occurrence; and like a blighted seedling transplanted to a warm, kind climate, she had blossomed and bloomed in mind and body. But the memory of those days that had known no gleam of hope or gladness hung like a dark veil over her youth, and still had power to drive her into torments of hatred and misery. Her soul was still a shrivelled leaf, and her heart as cold as a stone in the sea. She was very sure that this should not be so; she knewthat she was incomplete. The instincts of her artist nature told her that somewhere in the world there must be someone or something that would wipe this curse of hatred from her; but she had never been able to find it, and she knew not where to seek it. Art failed her when she applied it to this wound of hers that bled inwardly. Despairingly she sometimes wondered whether it was religion she needed; but religion in the house of Luce Abinger was a door to which she found no key.
Often, abroad, she had stolen away and knelt in quiet churches, and burnt candles in simple wayside chapels, trying, praying, to throw off the heavy, weary armour that cased her in, to get light into her, to feel her heart opening, like a flower, and the dew of God falling upon it. She had searched the face of the Madonna in many lands for some symbol that would point the way to a far-off reflection in herself of
"The peace and grace of Mary's face."
"The peace and grace of Mary's face."
She had knelt in dim cathedrals, racking her ears to catch some note in gorgeous organ strains or some word from the lips of a priest that would let loose a flood of light in her and transform her life. But always, when the ecstasy and exaltation had passed off, and the scent of incense no longer wrapped her round, she could feel again the cold of the stone and the rustle of the leaf in her breast. She could hear without annoyance the bitter fleers of Abinger at religion and priests and churches, and though they offended her taste, could listen serene-eyed. She understood very well what ailed Luce Abinger, for she was touched with the blight that lay thick upon him. His nature was warped, his vision darkened by hatred and evil memories. His soul was maimed and twisted in the same cruel fashion that his face had been scarred and seamed, and he terribly hated God. Poppy oftenthought of it as an ironical trick of fate, that she and Luce Abinger—just the two people in all South Africa, perhaps, who could do least for each other's peace and healing—should be thrown together to live under the same roof for many years. In some ways they had served each other well. He had made his house a refuge for her from persecution, and had been the means of educating and bringing her to fine womanhood. She, on the other hand, had come into his life at a time when he was on the verge of madness and when it meant everything to him to have some interest that would tear his thoughts from himself and his disgust of life.
The solitude of the quiet old farm, chosen for its isolated position, was lightened by the presence of the young girl. Abinger had been diverted to watch the change and development in the small, shipwrecked vagabond. Afterwards it had first amused, then interested him, to feed her eager appetite for learning. For three years he had taught her himself, in strange desultory fashion it is true, but it happened to be the fashion best suited to her needs and temperament. He imported from England huge weekly packages of books of both modern and classical literature, together with every variety of journal and magazine. He allowed Poppy the free run of all; only, always she must recount to him afterwards what she had read. A sort of discussion ensued, so dominated by his mordant cynicism and biting wit that she certainly ran no danger of developing anymawkishviews of life. This for two or three hours daily. The rest of time was hers to read in or wander for hours in the lovely silent country, knowing a peace and tranquillity she had never dreamed of in her early wretched years. The part of the Transvaal they were in was but thinly populated—a few scattered Boer farms, and a native mission-house with a chapel and school instituted by a brotherhood of French priests of the Jesuitorder. These were their only neighbours, and they not close ones.
Abinger had chosen his retreat well.
After three years it had occurred to him to leave the farm and go back to the world. He had tired of seclusion, and longed, even while he feared, to be amongst his fellows again. He was not yet prepared, however, to go back to the African haunts that had known him in the past, but made for the big open world beyond the seas; and Poppy went with him as his sister. Wherever they went he never allowed her to make any friends; only when they reached any city or place where he cared to stay for any length of time, he at once engaged masters and mistresses for her, to continue the education that he had by now tired of superintending, but which, for reasons of his own, he wished to perfect.
AT five o'clock Kykie appeared with a tea-tray. She had assumed an air of calm, and her afternoon dress, which afforded a fine display of roses trellised on a bright blue background, and gave her the appearance of a large and comfortable ottoman. She cast an outraged look about the room.
"Haven't you unpacked yet, for gracious' sake, Poppy?"
"No, I haven't. Bring the tea over here, Kykie."
She was lying on her bed, which was long and narrow as the path to heaven, and yet seemed to have grown too short for her, since she was obliged to perch her feet upon the brass bar across the end.
"Then what have you been doing, in the name of goodness me?"
"Nothing ... just thinking ... pour it out and come and sit by me here.... I haven't had a word with you yet."
Kykie poured out the tea, and put some little toasted cakes on a plate, using her fat, yellow hands with extraordinary delicacy. Afterwards she sat in a chair with the things in her lap, waiting until Poppy should be ready.
"What is it like here in Durban, Kykie?... How long have you been here?"
Kykie became very important, waggling her shoulders and rolling her eyeballs.
"More than six months getting this house ready for habitation ... men working in the garden day andnight, for it was a wilderness and the poor old place all gone to pot, dearest me."
"It looks all right now; I should think Luce was pleased?"
"Never so much as a thank you extremingly."
"Oh well, you know his ways ... but I am sure he appreciates all you do. He has often said to me while we were away that he wished you were with us."
Kykie looked well pleased at this, but having passed the tea, she waved her hands deprecatingly.
"You're just buttering me up to heaven, Poppy!"
"No, I'm not. And he will eat again now he has you to cook for him. Abroad he used to eat frightfully little, but to-day I noticed he made an excellent lunch."
Smiles wreathed Kykie's wide and dropsical face, and every tooth in her head was revealed.
"Dearest me, now Poppy, really? Well! but then I don't suppose they know how to cook very well abroad in London, do they?"
"Not so well as you, of course," said Poppy smiling and munching toast.
Suddenly Kykie's face became dolorous.
"Did they look at his mark much, for heavenly goodness?" she inquired in a dismal whisper.
"Not so much. You know, Kykie, the world is full of all sorts of strange-looking people—especially France and Italy. In Naples, now, they didn't take the slightest notice of him."
"For goodness' sake there must be some sights there!"
"More tea. It is lovely to be home again and have you waiting on me."
"Ah! I expect you liked it best abroad in that London, now Poppy?"
"Never. IthoughtI should, but I had forgotten that my roots were planted out here. As soon as I got out ofsight of Africa they began to pull and hurt ... you've no idea of the feeling, Kykie ... it is terrible ... and it always came upon me worst in cities. I used to be sick with longing for a glimpse of the big open spaces with nothing in view but land and sky ... for the smell of the veldt,youknow, when it is baking hot and the rain comes fizzling down on it; and the early morning wind, when it has blown across a thousand miles of sun-burnt grass and little stalky, stripy, veldt-flowers and stubby bushes, and smells of the big black patches on the hill-sides where the fires have been, and of thedorn bloemson the banks of the rivers ... and the oozy, muddy, reeking, rushing rivers! Oh Kykie, when I thought of Africa, in some prim blue-and-gold continental hotel, I felt like a caged tiger-cat, raging at the bars of the cage!... In Paris and London I couldn't bear to go to the big open parks for fear the sickness would come upon me.... It was like being a wild ass of the desert, knee-haltered in a walled-in garden."
Kykie might have been an amazingly-arrayed copper idol representing Africa, so benign and gratified was her smile.
"Tell me some more, Poppy. Where else did you think of Africa?"
"Well, Palermo nearly drove me wild. It has the same hot moist air as Natal, and the flowers have the same subtle scents. The big spotted mosquitoes bit like terriers and followed us as high as we could go; but I couldn't even hatethem, Kykie, they were so like the wretches we have out here—there's been one biting my instep all the afternoon." She pulled up her foot, and began to rub the spot gently through her stocking.
"I think Norway was the worst of all. The men there have beards and the same calm eyes as the Boers, and the people are all simple and kind, just as they were onthe farms in the Transvaal ... and sometimes on the top of a steep still hill I could close my eyes and pretend that I was on a wild mountain krantz and the hush of the waterfalls all round one was the hush of the tall veldt grasses waving in the wind.... But when I looked, and saw only the still green waters of the fjords and afar off a glacier thrust out between two hills like the claw of some great white monster ... oh Kykie, I could have torn the heart out of my breast and thrown it into the waters below."
"Heavenly me! And were there coloured people there too?"
"Not in Norway; but America is full of them, and I hate them for cheats and frauds ... for I was always listening and waiting to hear some Kaffir or Dutch word from their lips ... and they never spoke anything but mincing, drawling American, through their noses, like this, Kykie:
"'Oh say, wouldyoutellmewhat time thiskyaris due to start?'
"Once I saw a boy in an elevated-railway car, who, though he was magnificently dressed in navy blue serge and wore a brimmer hat, looked soexactlylike Jim Basuto who ran away from the farm, that I said to him in Kaffir:
"'You had better make haste and come back to the farm, Jim, and mind the sheep!'
"He simply stared at me, and said to anotherboy, who might have been a Zulu chief except for his clothes:
"'Say, this one looks to me as if she is dippy. I think she is the new star at Hammerstein's thatky-antspeak anything but French.'
"Luce was so furious, he used fearful language at the Kaffir, and made me leave the train at the next station, and wouldn't speak to me for a week."
Having finished her tea and eaten all the bread-and-butter and cakes, the girl lay back on her pillow and closed her eyes.
"For gracious' sake, and so you have seen the world!" said Kykie. "And now you have come back to the old quiet life?"
"Not at all, Kykie. I'm going to persuade Luce to go about here, and meet people, and let me do the same."
"He'll never do it," said Kykie vehemently. "I can see that he is worse than ever about his mark."
"But he knows a lot of people here. I don't see how he can keep them from coming to the house; and I heard theboyssaying that he had gone to the Club this afternoon. Surely that is a sign that he is not going to shut himself up again?"
"He may go to the Club, but he won't let anyone come here. He has given me strict orders that no one is to come in the front gates; they are to be locked and he will keep the key. Everything is to come by the back entrance and that, too, is to be locked."
Poppy's face clouded.
"Oh Kykie! I wouldn't mind if we were back in the old farm with the free veldt all round us; but to be shut up in a house and garden—(and with Luce's devils," she added to herself),—"even if itisa lovely garden!"
Kykie's face expressed lugubrious sympathy, but she held out no hope.
"You'll have to amuse yourself like you did before, with your music, and your reading, and writing, and be a good child," she said.
"But I'm not a child any longer. Can't you see how I've grown up?"
"I can see that you won't have to go and find milk-cactus to rub on your breasts any more," said Kykie, eyeing her with the calm candour of the native.
Poppy coloured slightly, and made occasion to throwa corner of the quilt over her bare shoulders and arms.
"For the sake of grace you needn't mind me," remarked Kykie. "Haven't I watched you many a moonlight night stealing down to where it grew by the oldspruit?"
The girl's colour deepened; she gave a wistful little side glance at the old woman.
"Ididso want to be beautiful. I would have dived to the bottom of the filthiest hole in that oldspruita dozen times a day to make myself the tiniest atom less ugly than I was. Do you remember that deep part where the water was so clear and we could see hundreds of crabs pulling pieces of flesh off the leg of the dead horse?"
"Ohsisyes! I wondered how you could go and look at the stinking thing day after day."
"I used to be pretending to myself that it was my aunt they were eating. Oh Kykie! I have some dark caves in my soul!"
"And no wonder, surely to goodness. Never will I forget the night we opened the door and you fell into the house, all blood and mud, and your eyes like amal-meit's[3]flaring and flickering like the sulphur on a match."
[3]Mad-maid.
[3]Mad-maid.
Poppy covered her eyes.
"Don't talk about it——"
At this time a telephone bell began to ring somewhere in the house, and Kykie on her feet in an instant, flew from the room at top speed. She came back later to say that Luce Abinger had called up to tell her he would not be home to dinner. Poppy was delighted.
"Oh Kykie! that means that he is dining with old friends; and it will do himsomuch good, and he'll want to be cheerful and sociable with all the world again, and we shan't be locked up any more," she cried all in one breath. "And now you needn't bother about dinner,but come and help me unpack, and I'll show you all my clothes and the nice things I've brought back for you."
"For me, gracious saints!"
"Yes, for you, you wicked old thing; silks and satins of every shade of the rainbow. You need never dress in anything else any more."
They spent an engrossed hour unpacking, and afterwards Poppy dined alone, and betook herself to the garden. She knew that she had the whole place and the whole long evening to herself, without disturbance, for it was a peculiarity of Kykie's that she could not keep her eyes open after nine o'clock at night. As for theboys, after they had performed their duties in the kitchen and stables, their time was their own, and they made the most of it elsewhere than within reach or sight of their employers.
It was early still, and though the darkness had fallen, the moon was at the full, and showed to advantage the solemn splendour of the trees, the long soft stretches of sward, and the festooned jungle-like arbours and arcades. In many a winding path she lost her way (for the place was of enormous extent), and had difficulty in locating once more the house or the gate or any point she was acquainted with. Coming to the gate once she tried it, and finding it securely locked she shook it with the sudden fury of a wild thing that finds itself caged. Then she stood still, and presently two great tears rolled down her face; but afterwards her wanderings became curiously systematised. Taking the gate as her starting-post she commenced adétourof the wilderness, keeping to its outskirts and examining as she travelled every inch of the enclosing walls. The part which gave on to the main road she found to be hopelessly impregnable; it had first a high stone wall with a cresting of particularly sharp and jagged bottle-glass; and further, was backed by a species of laurel that grew both tall and bushy, and rattled aggressively ifanyone so much as looked at it. Then came a long side-stretch of thick-set green bushes of what she judged—after pinching the leaf and smelling it—to be quince, with an undergrowth of pink pepper. After penetrating this, in a weak spot, and discovering that the outside rampart consisted of galvanised iron, standing lengthways and painted dark green, she did not feel so confident, but she went bravely on, until at last she came to a gate; it also was made of iron and painted green, but though it was unlocked, Poppy did not go through it, for she saw beyond, the stables and iron houses that were evidently the quarters of the black servants. She could hear their voices and the sound of a concertina. Plainly this was the back compound, through which all trades-people must make their way to the house. No doubt there was an entrance at the other side—but it was not for Poppy! She proceeded. The wall continued of the same quality, monotonously familiar; then occurred an impassable jungle that it would have taken a herd of buffalo to make any impression upon. After beating round this for some time, to the detriment of her trailing white gown, Poppy pursued her way with a frowning brow and a quivering under-lip. Next came a hedge of prickly-pear; she turned her head away from this in disgust. Farmers plant prickly-pears round their gardens to keep out cattle. It is the most perfect barrier in the world. Certainly, a human beingmightcut his way through it; but he would spend the rest of his life picking from his festering flesh tiny invisible white thorns. On and on she marched; it seemed to her that the large pale hands of the pear-hedge flapped mockingly at her. Sometimes she was obliged to make a widedétourto avoid a clump of trees, or a rockery, or a summer-house with a pergola leading to it, smothered with vines and passion-flowers and roses. It seemed that she walked miles and miles. Suddenly shesaw light glimmering through a trellised opening, and ran forward. Her hands touched cold wrought-iron. It was the front gate! This time, when she shook it, she did not cry. Her gown was torn, her hair was loosened, there was a scratch on her cheek and blood on her hands, but she laughed.
"Ah, myverydear Luce Abinger," she said, "we shall see if you can keep a creature of the veldt behind a padlock."
Immediately she recommenced a fresh tour of the garden, and though the long hot day and all its incidents must have told upon her strength, she seemed to have suddenly acquired fresh life and buoyancy. She had that within which urged her on—a taste for liberty. At that time it seemed to her that the whole world was too small a place for a free spirit; and that if this were indeed the world, she would somewhere find some desperate edge and leap over, even if it should be into the abyss of nothingness. On this tour she included the arbours and the summer-houses in her itinerary. The third one she came to was only a small hut of a place, but it had a long spire to its roof, and from thence trailed and hung long lines and stalks of the passion plant—everyone knows it: vine-leaved, with great round cream-coloured flowers, a purple outer ring divided into ten thousand tiny leaves, signifying the crowd that gathered to listen to Christ on the Mount; and in the centre, mysteriously arranged, like the dishes upon the table of some oracle, the three loaves and the five fishes! They call it the grenadilla in Africa, and eat its fruit with port wine and cream. Poppy dived in under the trailing vinery, and entered the hut. All round it had a low seat running, but everything was old and damp and rotten she could feel by the touch, and in one place the wood crumbled under her fingers, and thrusting her arm forward, she was able to feel that itwas part of the wall itself; there was no further barrier beyond.
She had found an exit.
For a time she sat still on the cool mossy floor of the arbour, trembling a little at the thought of the spiders and strange beasts that might be dropping upon her from above. At last she nerved herself to the point of pushing and urging and disentangling the thick partition of green that kept her in. Her idea was to make an opening without making a gap; something she could re-arrange afterwards, leaving no sign of disturbance.
At length she was through, and behold! she found herself in another garden. Was it a maze too, she wondered rather drearily? A maze without an opening? But no, there was a pleasing openness of view about the place. A few bushes and trees, a straggly flower-bed or two. Almost immediately she came upon a gravelled path; but she did not walk on it, choosing rather to follow its direction by way of the grass and soft earth which enflanked it. In the natural course of events a house was discovered. Quite a simple affair of galvanised iron, painted green, with a verandah running all round it and heaps of shrubs and bushes and creepers to hide its nakedness. Its front verandah was full of pale, heavenly light that was certainly not contributed by the moon; nor could the words that came floating over the bushes into the garden, be, by the wildest and most poetic imagination, endowed with a heavenly meaning.
"Oh, damn it, I'm sick of this rotten typewriter and everything else in the world. I wish Brookie would type his own beastly law-papers."
Poppy approached with the utmost gentleness, and through the screen of a bush covered with tiny pink flowers that smelt of musk she surveyed the scene.
The room itself was terrible as an army with banners.It contained "gypsy-tables," antimacassars, "what-nots," plush fans upon the walls, indescribable villainies of wool and paper, a crewel-worked mantel-border, and every atrocity under the moon. In the midst of all was a good solid mahogany table, with a typewriting-machine on it, and seated before this was a girl. For pity of herself Poppy was glad to see another girl; and more especially a girl who, like herself, appeared to have reason to be bored with her surroundings and the general management of the universe. In the enthusiasm engendered by a fellow-feeling, she had an inclination to march in and take the girl to her heart, but after a further survey she changed her mind.
In a large, ripe fashion, the girl was very good-looking indeed, with a tall and generous figure of the kind that attracts prompt and frank attention from the generality of men, but is not deeply admired by other women. Her face was of a familiar Colonial type, large-featured but well-shaped, with big brown eyes, rather inclined to roll, suggestive of what is known as "a dash of colour"; a mouth of the kind that expresses nothing at all until the twenties, when by the aid of aretroussénose, grown unaccountably coarse it suddenly expresses things which should be left unexpressed; a round, rather plump chin, and masses of dark hair which had been sadly maltreated by curling-irons, and had a dusty appearance. On the whole a handsome girl, probably good-natured enough for the ordinary purposes, and of a personality pleasing enough for an ordinary acquaintance.
Certainly not a girl to be made a friend of, thought Poppy, and decided that she would go no further.
"I'll wait and see first if Luce is going to let me out to meet nice people," she thought. "If he doesn't, this girl may help to pass away an idle hour sometimes, and she might serve as one of the characters in my novel.At any rate she could teach me to use the typewriter, and I could teach her not to live in a chamber of horrors."
With these reflections she stole back soft-footed in her tracks, and through her little exit-hole, which she covered up with the greatest care and skill, for fear that in the future it should prove to be her only mode of entrance into the world of men and women she longed to know.
For a whole week she refrained from broaching to the tyrant of the house the subject which lay uppermost in her thoughts. For one thing she thought it would be well to allow him to regain some semblance of good humour; for another she wished to give him full opportunity and time to make daily excursions into the town and lunch and dine with his friends, so that she might have some grounds for the reproaches she meant to level at him when she demanded freedom. In the meantime she was absorbed in affairs which included the inspection and re-arrangement of every room in the house, excepting only Abinger's, which she never ventured near. Touches of her personality soon lay upon everything, from the chintzes in the drawing-room which she had chosen herself at Waring's, and sent out to Kykie for the making, down to the curtaining of Kykie's own bedroom windows with some cobwebby snowy muslin she had bought in Shanghai. She spent several hours every day at the piano, playing old Irish melodies, for which she had a passion, and of which she had made an enormous collection; but she always waited until Luce was out of the house, for he had a peculiar aversion to melodies of any kind and more especially Irish melodies. He said:
"There may have been something in them when the strolling poets played them on their harps, but since that fellow Moore made them pretty, I consider them damned mawkish."
So Poppy kept her melodies to herself. The rest ofher time was divided between studying literature, writing, dreaming and wandering in the garden, which became dearer to her day by day.
At last, one evening, on hearing from Kykie that Abinger would be dining at home, she made herself look as charming as possible in a pale maize satin gown with a wreath of green leaves on her hair, and went down prepared to do battle.
Luce Abinger was already in the drawing-room, standing at one of the French windows, staring out into the garden—a sombre, solitary figure. She noticed, as often before, how tall and well-built he was, and the fine line of his head under the smooth, fair hair. He always looked distinguished and well-born in evening-dress. At the sound of Poppy he turned, and the lights shining on his maimed and distorted face, showed her that he was entertaining at least seven devils. A mental shiver passed through her and hope fell several degrees; but she advanced with a serene smile and a gay word. She had long ago learnt to control the expressions of her face, so that he might not guess the mingled terror, pity, and repulsion he often roused in her; and though she knew that in most things he had intuition as cruel as the grave, she believed that in this, at least, she was able to deceive him.
The second gong had not yet sounded. She sat down at the piano and ran her fingers up and down the keys by way of bracing up her nerves.
"Luce," she began, "I hope you are in a good temper, for I want to talk to you very seriously about something."
He gave a croaking sort of laugh.
"Oh certainly. I am at my very b-best. It is only necessary for you to p-play an Irish melody to have me p-purring at your feet.Il ne manquerait plus que ça."
This was inauspicious, but Poppy refused to be daunted;and the gong sounding at this moment, she rose and put her hand upon his arm, saying cheerfully:
"That's right, come along then, we'll talk it over in the dining-room."
His smile was grim. They sat down to dinner, and Babiyaan and Umzibu, arrayed in white, hovered over them like guardian angels. Abinger ate little and said nothing. Only when theboyswere not in the room he fixed his eyes on Poppy in a curious way that caused in her a sensation of indescribable discomfort and annoyance. Once, for some unknown reason, she found herself remembering how she had covered herself up with the bed quilt from Kykie's eyes, and wishing that she had it round her now. She had never felt like that in a low gown before, and she could not understand it at all. For a time it quite unfitted her for the task she had in hand, but the idea occurring to her that this was perhaps what Luce intended, she plucked up heart again, and with the fruit fired her first shot.
"Luce, what are you going to do about getting me a chaperon?"
He gave a little jerk of his fruit-knife, so that she knew that he was taken unawares, otherwise he remained undisturbed by what she supposed must be something in the nature of a bomb-shell going off under his nose. He did not, however, proceed with the business of peeling his peach, and on giving him a swift side-glance, she found that he was smiling at her. Now, his smile was at no time an alluring affair, but when it was field day for his devils——!
"Am I not a sufficiently p-proper and responsible p-person to have the care of your young white s-soul?" he inquired blandly.
She knewthatmood. Perhaps, after all, it would be better to postpone the discussion; but then, sometimesthese fits of fury and rudeness lasted for months. It was impossible to wait all that time.
"I am not particularly concerned about my soul," she answered carelessly, dipping her fingers in the fine Venetian bowl before her and drying them delicately. One of Abinger's devils betrayed itself by laughing loudly and with character, but she did not even wince.
"Your young white b-body, then?" He pushed back his chair from the table with a horrible scrench on the polished floor.
"You talk like some odious sultan, but you forget that I am not a slave," she flashed back at him.
She pushed her chair from the table also, and loosening from her wrist a little painted inlaid fan which she had bought from a street-seller in Algiers, she essayed to cool her flushed face.
"Cigarettes, Babiyaan!" she said. "It is very hot; I think I will smoke out in the garden," she finished coldly to Abinger.
But he had risen too, and lounged in the doorway leading to the verandah.
"Oh, p-pray let us finish this interesting discussion."
They stood looking at each other for a moment: she, quite collectedly; he, smiling with his eyes and sneering with his mouth. Babiyaan, well aware that she was not allowed to smoke, knew better than to hand her the cigarettes, but placed them on the table and discreetly retired.
"There is no discussion, Luce," she said quietly, though her voice contained a tremor. "I simply want you to realise that it is impossible for me to go on living like this for ever. It isn't fair...." she added petulantly. He said nothing, only smiled. She regained her dignity and spoke more gently:
"I am a woman now, Luce, and it is only natural that I should wish to know other women—and men too."
At that he laughed raspingly.
"Why d-drag in the women?"
She looked at him scornfully. It was ridiculous of him to pretend that men meant more to her than women.
"It is unreasonable of you to expect me to spend my youth in secrecy and seclusion, just because you—" she stopped hastily.
"Go on!" he said with a devilish gaiety. "'Just becauseyouhappen to have a face like a mutilated b-baboon'—was that what you were going to say?"
"Oh Luce, youknowit was not! Because ... because ..." she stood stammering with distress, while he stood grinning. "Becauseyoudon't happen to care for the society of other people—was what I was going to say.... Don't think," she went on appealingly, "that I don't appreciate all you have done for me. I remember it every day and every night.... I shall never forget it ... and though I know I can never repay you, I will show you all the rest of my life how grateful I am.... But I don't see what difference it would make to you to let me know a few people ... you have so many friends ... surely you know some nice women who would call on me——"
He broke out in a harsh voice, smiling no longer. "You are mistaken; I have no friends. The whole thing is out of the question and impossible."
"I don't see why it should be at all," she pursued valiantly; "if you get me some pleasant woman as a chaperon."
"In God's name what do you want with women?" he burst out. "A g-girl like you will never find a friend amongst them. They will hate you for your face, and your brains, and your youth.... They are d-devils all—lock, stock and barrel.... They'll rip you open and tear the story of your life out of you; if they once findout that you are a South African they'll never rest until they have nosed out the whole thing, and then they'll fling the t-tale to the four winds and the first thing you know you'll have your Bloemfontein aunt bearing down on you——"
"Oh Luce! I don't believe they're as bad as all that——"
"Then don't believe it," he retorted, with the utmost rudeness. "But understand one thing, I'll have no she-devils round this house."
"Very well, let them be he-devils," she flung back at him. "I am accustomed to those."
At that he stamped away from her towards the other door, gesturing with rage, and throwing broken words in her direction.
"Isn't my life bad enough already?... Oh Hades!... I wouldn't stand it for a minute ... curse all women ... don't ever talk to me about this again ... I tell you.... It's monstrous ... a lot of thieves and blackguards.... You're driving me out of my own house ... I shall go to the Rand to-morrow ... why, by God, I!..."
The door closed with a crash behind him.
AT two o'clock one afternoon Sophie Cornell walked into her sitting-room and flung upon the table by the side of her typewriter a great roll of MSS. She was gorgeously attired in a hat massed with roses of a shade that "never was on land or sea," and a furiously befrilled gown of sky-blue silk-muslin. But her face was flushed and heated, and her eyebrows met in a scowl of decided ill-temper. Opening a door that led through a long passage to the kitchen, she shouted:
"Zambani! Zambani!Checchanow with my lunch. Send Piccanin to lay table.Checcha wena!"
She flung her hat into one chair and herself into another, and stared at a telegram which she spread out before her.
"'Sorry can't come,'" she read, muttering; "'something better turned up; you understand!' Yes, I understand well enough! Just like the rotter to study her own convenience and throw me over at the last moment. What am I to donow, I'd like to know?"
She lolled in her chair and glared angrily at a small blackboyin a blue twill tunic and short blue knickers above his knees, who was laying a cloth on one end of the table.
"Is there any soda in the house, Piccanin?" she demanded; and when he signified yes, ordered him to fetch it then and becheccha. In the meantime, she rose and unlocked from the sideboard a bottle of whiskey.
Lunch was a slovenly meal, consisting of burnt mutton-chops, fried potatoes, and a beet-root salad liberallydecorated with rings of raw onion. Miss Cornell, however, ate heartily, and enjoyed a whiskey-and-soda. She then proceeded to attack a wobbly blanc-mange beringed with strawberry jam. Occasionally she demanded of some invisible personage:
"And what am I going to donow, I'd like to know?" and the scowl returned to her brows.
Suddenly, upon the front door which stood slightly ajar fell a soft knock. Miss Cornell's hands slipped to her hair, the scowl disappeared from her face, and in a high affected voice she called:
"Come in!"
Entered, with a shy and demure air, a girl dressed in the simplest kind of dress made of thin black muslin, with a white fichu over her shoulders falling in long ends below her waist. Her large white-straw hat had round it a wreath of lilac, which was of exactly the same colour as her eyes. Her lips were amazingly scarlet.
"I beg your pardon," she said in a soft, entrancing voice. "I am sorry to disturb you at your lunch——"
"That's all right," said Sophie affably; "I'm just done. Do sit down!"
The girl seated herself daintily. Sophie, observing that she wore no jewelry of any kind except a ring, in which the diamond was so large that it must surely be paste, decided that her visitor must be "hard up." She (Sophie) had not much of an opinion of that "black rag of a gown" either, but she thought she detected the faint murmur of a silk lining as her visitor moved. The lilac eyes looked at her winningly.
"I heard that you had a typewriting machine," she said, "and I wondered if you would be so good as to do a little typing for me—" She indicated a tiny roll of writing which she held in her hand. Miss Cornell sat up with an air.
"Oh, I don't take in work!" she said perkily. "I couldn't be bothered with that sort of thing. I'msekertaryto a gentleman who has an office down town."
"Lilac Eyes" regarded her calmly and did not seem overwhelmed by the importance of this communication.
"What a bother!" said she serenely.
Miss Cornell became languid.
"I get an enormous salary, and I have more work than I know how to get through already. Indeed, I am trying to get an assistant."
"Really?" said the other girl. "I wonder if I would suit you?"
"You!" Miss Cornell's face lit up with sudden interest and eagerness. She surveyed the other again.Of course, she was only a "hard-up" girl looking for work, and that air of gentle insolence that Sophie had been conscious of, was, after all, only "side" stuck on like the rose in the front of the simple black gown to hide poverty. Upon these reflections Miss Cornell's air became exceedingly patronising.
"You? Well, I don't know, I'm sure. Can you type?"
"Not at all. But I daresay I could soon learn."
"Oh well! I couldn't give you much salary if you are only a beginner."
"I shouldn't want any salary," said "Lilac Eyes"; but added quickly, as she saw the other's look of amazement: "At least, not for some months. If you would allow me to use your machine for my own work sometimes I should be repaid."
At this Sophie had neither the wit nor the patience to conceal her satisfaction. Her haughty air departed and she beamed with delight. She had suddenly seen a clear way through a very difficultimpasse.
"You'll suit me down to the ground," she declared joyfully. "When can you move in?"
"Move in?" the other gave her a wondering smile. "Oh, I couldn't come to live—only for a few hours every day."
Sophie's face clouded again, but in a moment her eyes took on the absorbed look of a person who is rapidly reviewing a difficult situation. Presently she said:
"Well, perhaps that wouldn't matter so much if you wouldn't mindpretendingsometimes that you live here."
The other girl looked puzzled.
"I'm afraid I don't quite understand."
"Well, if there's any chance of you're doing as I ask you, I'll explain," said Sophie; "but, of course, I don't want to talk about my private affairs if it's no good. There's nothing in the reason forpretendingthat you need object to," she added boldly. "What is the reason you can't come and live? Got a sick mother, or an old aunt, or something?"
The other hesitated for a moment, then her lovely lilac eyes took on a curious expression.
"Yes, I have an aunt," was her odd answer, but Sophie was no acute reader of eyes or odd answers.
"More fool you," said she cheerfully. "I'd like to see the old aunt who'd getmeto support her. Well, all right now, if you think you'll come I'll tell you the whole thing."
"Yes, I think I'll come. But as I have said, it will only be for a few hours daily; sometimes in the mornings, more often in the afternoons."
"That'll do all right. Have a whiskey-and-soda and we'll talk it over."
"I don't care for whiskey, thank you," said "Lilac Eyes"; "but I am very thirsty, and will have some soda, if I may."
Sophie shouted to Piccanin to bring another glass, and pushed the soda and lemons across the table.
"Make yourself at home," said she affably; "but I hope you're not one of those asses who don't drink!"
"No, I drink if I want to—but not spirits."
"Oh, I know—those old Cape pontacs. Save me from them!" Miss Cornell looked piously at the ceiling. The other girl, who had never tasted Cape pontac in her life, only smiled her subtle smile.
Sophie seated herself in a lounge-chair, opposite her visitor, and crossed her legs, incidentally revealing her smart French-heeled shoes and a good deal of open-work stocking through which to lilac-coloured eyes her legs looked as though they were painted red. Piccanin meanwhile removed from the room the luncheon débris, his bare feet cheeping on the pale native matting and his long black eyes taking interested glances at the visitor whenever she was not looking his way.
"And now let's get to business," said Miss Cornell. "First of all, you haven't told me your name yet."
The lilac eyes were hidden for a moment under white lids, and a faint colour swept over the pale skin.
"Rosalind Chard."
"Well, I shall call you Rosalind, of course, and you can call me Sophie if you like. Sophie Cornell's my name. Rather pretty, isn't it?"
"Very," said Miss Chard in her gentle, entrancing voice.
"Well, now I'll tell you: I come from Cradock, in the Cape Colony, but I've been living all over the place since I left home. First, I went to stay with my sister in Kimberley. Have you ever been to Kimberley?Man!I tell you it's the most glorious place—at least, it used to be before everybody went to Jo ... you know Jo-burg,of course?"
Miss Chard shook her head.
"Never been to Johannesburg?" Sophie's tone expressed the utmost pity and contempt. "Well, butyou're an English girl, I can see. Not been long out here, have you?"
"Only a week or so."
"Great Scott! you've got a lot to learn!"
Miss Cornell took a packet of cigarettes from her pocket and lit one. She then offered the packet to Miss Chard, who did not, however, take one.
"Don't smoke either? Och, what! You're nothalfa good fellow! Well, take off your hat, then. Do be sociable."
Miss Chard unpinned her floppy white hat and wore it on her knee for the rest of the interview. Sophie noticed the piled-up crown of black, black hair; also, the peculiar branching way in which it grew above the girl's brows. ("I wonder if she uses bay-rum to make it all dry and electriccy like that?" was her inward comment. "And I'll bet she wears a switch.")
"Well, to continue my tale—I had a lovely time indarlingold Kimberley: dances, theatres, suppers, everything you can think of; then my sister's husband must needs go off and buy a rotten old farm at the back of nowhere—Barkly East, if you love me! They wantedmeto come, too, but I said, Dead off! No,thanks! I want something more out of life than mountain scenery."
Rosalind Chard looked at her and could well believe it. At the moment Sophie reminded her of nothing so much as a full-blown cabbage-rose, dying to be plucked.
"And so you came here instead?"
"Well, no; first I went to Jo-burg, and Imustsay I had a heavenly timethere; but—well—it didn't suit my health, so I becamesekertaryto an old snook called Johnson. He had been in Rhodesia, poking about in some ancient ruins there, and—oh, my garden flower!—the stuff he used to give me to write and type! And the way he used to bully me when I didn't get through it! Andthen complained of my spelling, if you please. I didn't stay withhimany longer than I could help, you bet, though the screw was good. But Imusttell you, such fun—just as I was going to leave him I discovered from his correspondence that he was going up to Zanzibar to make some researches for some rotten old society or other, so I stuck to him for another month. I thought I might as well get a passage to Durban for nix. So I started with him from the Cape, but when the boat touched here, I said, Good-bye, Johnnie! Oh crumbs! The row he made when he found me trekking!"
The listener's sympathy happened to be with the old snook, but Sophie was not asking for an opinion.
"And do you mean to say," demanded the latter unexpectedly, "that you would rather live with your old aunt than in a sweet little house like this, with me?"
Miss Chard did not mean to say anything at all as far as her own affairs were concerned.
"Never mind about me, Sophie," was her reply. "Tell me some more of your interesting adventures, and how you came to live in this sweet little house."
Miss Cornell's glance shifted from her new friend. She looked out of the window, round the room, at the pictures on the wall, at the typewriter—anywhere but into the two clear wells of lilac light opposite her, as she answered:
"I rent it, of course. I told you, didn't I, that I amsekertaryto a man down town, named Brookfield. He thinks the world of me, and gives me a big salary; and then I get other work from a man called Bramham. Oh, I have more to do than I want, and I reallyhadto get help, so I wrote last week to a pal of mine up in Jo-burg, and told her to come and join me. She promised, and I expected her right up till to-day, when I got a telegram, if you please, to say that she'd got something better. Wasn't that a low-down trick? And after I had told Brookfield and Bramham and all! Brookie gave me the morning off to go and meet her, and I waited for the train and found she wasn't in it, and when I got back to the office there was the telegram! Fortunately Brookie was gone from the office when I got back, so he doesn't know that she hasn't come."
"But why should it matter to him and to the other man whether she comes or not?"
Again Miss Cornell's glance took flight.
"Because of the work, of course—there's such tons to do ... and I can't get through it all by myself."
Miss Chard watched her narrowly.
"Well, but why do you wish me to pretend that I live here, and am your friend from Johannesburg?"
"You see, it's this way ... Brookie and Mr. Bramham take an interest in me.... They don't think that I ought to live alone here, and all that sort of rot—and if I could showyouto them they'd think it was all right."
Miss Chard looked startled.
"Oh, I couldn't promise to meet strange men! I didn't suppose you would want me to do that or——"
An exasperated look came over Miss Cornell's face.
"You're not going to back out now, after me telling you everything?" she demanded angrily, but Miss Chard's scarlet lips took a firm line.
"I don't wish to meet strange people," she said. To her surprise, the other girl at once became propitiatory and beseeching.
"Well, but I won't ask you to meet anyone else. I'll keep you a deadly secret. And I can assure you that Brookie and Bramham don't matter in the least. Brookie is—well, to tell you the truth, he is entirely my property; he's crazily in love with me, and he won't bother you at all. Neither will Brammie, if it comes to that. He is anawfullynice man—everybody likes him, and he's fearfully rich too. He's married, and his wife lives in England forher health, they say, but of coarse that must be all rot. Anyway, he never goes into society at all—only has men friends."
"Well, what does he want here?" asked Miss Chard calmly, watching the flushed face before her.
"Nothing—nothing at all. It's only a matter of business, and a friendly interest in me, and all that—and, you see, as he employs me as well as Brookie, I have to be civil and ask him to tea sometimes."
It seemed to Miss Rosalind Chard that there was more in this than met the eye, but she was not able to fathom it at present. However, after listening to another long description of Mr. Bramham's inoffensiveness, she consented at last to be at the house one afternoon when he called.
"As for Brookie——" began Sophie, ready to open up another chronicle of guilelessness.
"No, no! I won't meet Brookie, I absolutely jib at Brookie!"
Sophie became lugubrious. "But he knows that you were to have arrived to-day——"
"Well," said Miss Chard decidedly. "Tell him that I came, but that I am as ugly as a monkey and as old as the sea. And now I must go, or my—aunt will be looking for me. I shall try and come in to-morrow and take a lesson on the typewriter. What time will be best?"
"You'll have to teach yourself, my dear. I go to the office every morning at ten, and I lunch in West Street, and don't get back until above five in the afternoon. But I'll bring you all the MSS. there is no immediate hurry for—and you can do it one day and I'll take it back the next. We shall get along like one o'clock."
"That's all settled then; good-bye!" Miss Chard had stepped out of the room into the verandah and was gone before Sophie could remove her high heels from the bars ofthe chair in front of her, where she had hooked them for extra ease and comfort. Inadvertently she listened for the click of the gate. But the gate did not click. Miss Chard, having got out of view of both house and gate, made a dash for the tall green hedge on the right side of the garden. Stooping down, she instantly disappeared.
A few moments later Poppy Destin sat in the passion-leaved summer-house, delicately smoking a cigarette and brushing all traces of dust from her thin black muslin gown. Between little puffs of smoke she presently spoke to herself.
"Certainly she is a terror ... a common mind, terrible clothes, Colonial slang ... I don't know that I can put up with her at all ... and those awful Brookies and Brammies! ... but it will be useful to be able to go through her garden whenever I want to make a little excursion into the world ... and, of course, I couldn't be there without some right or reason ... besides, it will be splendid to learn typewriting, and do all my own writing ready to send to the publishers ... but what a room! ... and those roses in her hat! Can such things be?... I must go and see whether Kykie has my tea ready."
A few days later it would have been hard to recognise the sitting-room of Sophie Cornell's little green bungalow. Books had spread themselves about the room, the tawdrinesses had been removed, flowers were everywhere, and a fine vine in a long glass crept delicately up the side of the mirror above the mantel. When Poppy had hinted that she would like to change the room a little, Sophie had good-naturedly given hercarte-blancheto do anything she wished, saying:
"It was notmytaste either, you know; but the place was furnished when I came into it and I haven't bothered to do anything since."
The only things Miss Cornell would not allow to bebanished were the photographs of her numerous admirers, which she insisted on ranging along the narrow wooden ledge running round the room above the dado. They were in all degrees of preservation—some of them yellow with age or exposure, some quite new; all were autographed and inscribed. Some of the inscriptions ran thus: "From your loving Jack"; "To the best girl I know"; "To one of the best from one of the worst," etc. It was to be observed that the most ardentmotswere merely initialled. But Sophie was equally proud of them all, and would exhibit them on the smallest provocation, giving a short narrative-sketch of each person which included the most striking features of his character, together with a thrilling account of his passion for her and the reason why she did not marry him.
"Now, isn'thegood looking? Such a dear boy too ... andgenerous! My dear, that man would have given me the boots off his feet ... but there—he had no money; what was the good?... He's in Klondyke now ... I do hope he'll have luck, poor boy...."
"This is Captain Halkett. No, I don't know his regiment, and he never would give away his photos in uniform, though he had some perfectly lovely ones.... Someone told me he was a 'cashier' in the Army ... but that was silly, of course ... there are no such things as cashiers in the Army,arethere? ... he simply adored me ... he gave me this bangle ... such a darling ... but he was married—or,of course——"
"Oh,thatis Jack Truman, of Kimberley. Everyone knowshim... a fearful devil, but most fascinating.... Isn't he handsome? ... such eyes ... you simply couldn't look into them, they made you blush all over. The women were all crazy after him, but he told me he didn't give a pin for any of them except me.... He wanted me to run away with him ... but he had a wifein a lunatic asylum ... obliged to allow her forty pounds a month, and he wasdreadfullyin debt ... they tried to arrest him at Cape Town, but he got away dressed like a woman ... and now he is in the Australian Mounted Police, they say.
"And,of course, you know who this is? One of the biggest men on the Rand ... withthousands, my dear.... Och! you should see him in riding kit ... you never saw any one look so perfectlynoble... he wasmadlyin love with me ... everybody said so ... he told me I was the only girl who could ever keep him straight ... but he behaved rather badly.... I always believe some snake of a woman made mischief ... and when he went to England, one of those English girls snapped him up ... they live out at Jeppestown now ... and they say she's theliving imageof me ... funny, isn't it?... but I think it just proves how he adored me, don't you?"
Listeners of defective vision and an over-developed sense of credulity might have believed that Helen of Troy II had come to town—unless they had been long enough in South Africa to realise that the best way to enjoy a little quiet humour is to take a Cape-Colonial girl at her own valuation.
Poppy listened to all with tranquil eyes. She was willing to believe that it might be true that Sophie was admired and adored and desired. But in the type of men who formed the army of admirers and adorers and desirers she could not pluck up the faintest kind of interest. It seemed to her that it was impossible that any man worth knowing could forgive the size of Sophie's hands and the shape of her feet, the look about her mouth, the paint on her face, and the dust in her hair.
She was aware, however, that life in South Africa is too busy and too eventful to allow men much time for digging into personality—and that it has to suffice, as arule, if the surface-metal shines pleasantly and looks like the real thing. Sophie's surface, no doubt, had an attractive glitter, but Poppy felt sure that if anyone with the time and inclination for such occupation had ventured to go a-quarrying into the nature of Sophie Cornell, the output would be found to be surprising, even in a land where surprises are every-day fare and the unexpected is the only thing that ever happens.
IN the meantime all went well. Secure in the knowledge that Abinger was away for some weeks, that Kykie would never search for her except at meal-times, every day found Poppy spending four or five hours at her new occupation—typewriting. She had determined that she would master this art before she went adventuring further into the world that lay beyond Sophie Cornell's gate.
Sometimes she would arrive before ten in the morning, in time to see Sophie depart, gloriously arrayed, with the air of one due at the same garden-party as royalty.
When she inspected the huge rolls of work which Sophie invariably brought back, she would sometimes wonder if the latter had indeed been to a garden-party and never put in at the office at all, except to fetch the MSS.
The little house in the morning hours was always calm and peaceful. Through the trees of the garden Poppy could hear the world go buzzing by—the grating of the tram-cars on the lines, the clatter of horses, and the hiss of wheels going down hill, and an occasional street cry. No one ever came down the little pathway. Only the click of the machine, the voices of Zambani and Piccanin, busy with the pots and the pans in the kitchen and yard, broke the silence; or Poppy's trilling whistle as she corrected her proofs. By half-past twelve there would be piles of neat manuscript ready for Sophie to take back the next day, and Poppy would be speeding home throughher own garden to luncheon. Sometimes in the afternoon she would finish early, and, going out into the kitchen, would toast buns and prepare the tea, and Sophie, coming home at five o'clock, would find it laid cool and dainty among flowers on the long table.
One day, when Poppy had arrived almost directly after lunch, with the idea of getting in a long afternoon at her own work, she was disagreeably surprised to find Sophie stalk in a few moments later, flushed and handsome, and bringing with her a large bale of papers and the faint but unmistakable odour of good cigars.
Poppy's little nose went up and a warmth ran through her; the smell of a good cigar unaccountably roused in her a vivid interest in life. For a moment she slightly envied Sophie, but a glance at the brilliant languid eyes and heavy mouth changed her mind, and singularly inspired her with the thought that good cigars were probably often smoked by hateful men.
"Would you like me to order you a cup of tea, Sophie?" she asked presently.
"No, thanks!" said Sophie, languidly stretching herself in a chair. "I couldn't drink tea. I've had a most tiring morning. Brookie brought Nick Capron in, and they simplywouldn'tlet me work."
After which calmly contradictory statement, she closed her eyes and fanned herself with a legal-looking document, chosen for its stiffness from among the papers she had brought, and which were now at sixes and sevens upon the floor.
At the name "Nick Capron," Poppy gave a little start. How well she remembered the day she had heard that name from the lips of a beautiful woman in Bloemfontein! Could this Nick Capron possibly be the "most fascinating man in Africa" whom the gold-haired heroine was going to marry? She must try and discover.
"I think a cup of tea would refresh you, Sophie," she presently said.
"Och ni vat!I can't eat or drink when I get worn out like this—I become a perfect wreck."
Poppy surveyed the healthy, not to say opulent proportions stretched before her, and could not forbear to smile.
"Oh, you should keep up your strength," she said, with irony entirely thrown away.
"The only thing that would be theslightestuse to me, now," announced Sophie, "is a glass of champagne—and, of course, I can't have that."
Poppy began to pore over her manuscript. She was in the mood for work and hated not to take advantage of it.
"I wish I were rich enough to drink champagne whenever I am tired," was Miss Cornell's next contribution; and Poppy laughed without being amused.
"You'd soon be bored with that."
"Never!" said Miss Cornell fervently; then relapsed into languor.
"I hope those papers are not important, Sophie, they are blowing all over the room."
"Yes, they'reveryimportant. They're all about a Malay abduction case which a friend of Brookie's is defending in the Courts next week. It's the greatest fun, Brookie and Capron were shrieking over it this afternoon."
"Is Mr. Capron a lawyer?"
"Oh, no—he isn't anything; just a pal of Brookie's. He's a Johannesburger, but he has a house here as well, andtonsof money, and a lovely wife—a perfect stunner, my dear—Brookie says she is the loveliest woman in Africa; but Capron has always got his eye on some other woman. By the way, Rosalind, to-day he was describing a girl he had seen in a rickshaw, and from the descriptionI feel sure it was you. Your particular style of beauty appears to have struck him all in a heap."
Miss Cornell made this statement as though she thought it humorous, which, indeed, she did, for that anyone should admire a girl so unlike her own type, and her own idea of beauty which that type represented, seemed to her really funny and incredible. Yet she looked intently now, and observed, so far as in her lay, "with the seeing eye," and for the first time since they had met—the girl before her. Nick Capron's unmistakable enthusiasm had made a great impression upon her.
"He said that you were alone in a rickshaw," she told Poppy, "and that he and Mrs. Portal were walking together and met you. And Mrs. Portal said you looked like a Burne-Jones dressed like a Beardsley poster. What rot these society women talk! Who can understand a thing like that?"
"What is Mrs. Portal like?" asked Poppy, remembering now the well-bred-looking woman who had been talking about Burne-Jones to the man with the dissipated eyes on the day of her arrival.
But Sophie took no heed of the question. She was closely and furtively regarding Poppy, and thinking: "Has she any attraction for men, I wonder? She's not a bit smart ... and so pale ... and yet, and yet ..." Here Sophie's expression of thought gave out. If she could have expressed it, she would have added: "She is pale, and yet glows as though something within her is alight."
"I hope you did not tell him anything about me?" asked Poppy suddenly.
"No, I didnot!" said Miss Cornell emphatically, and her annoyed look as she said it brought a ring of laughter from Poppy and a lovely mischievous glimmer to her eyes.
Suddenly Sophie sprang up.
"Great Scott! Iquiteforgot to tell you—Brammie is coming to tea. That's why I came home so early. Do buck up, old girl, and make things look nice. Your papers are all over the place. I want the room to look as nice as possible for old Brammie."
"Oh! blow Brammie," thought Poppy crossly. "I was just going to write something extraordinarily fine; now it will be lost for ever!"
Nevertheless, she put her papers away with a good grace, tidied the room, laid the tea-things—as only she could—and went out to pluck fresh flowers for the vases. Sophie stood in her bedroom door buttoning a plaid silk blouse over her richly-endowed bosom.
"That's ripping," she said approvingly. "Och! but youcanarrange flowers—I'll say that for you, Rosalind. Wouldn't you like to run home and change your dress, though?"
"No," said Poppy, her head slightly on one side as she surveyed a great flaming hibiscus-blossom she had just put by itself amidst a heap of green on the mantlepiece. "Why should I change my gown?" she asked. "This is quite all right. And the man's coming to see you, Sophie, not me."
"Oh, he reallywantsto see you, and I think you ought to try and look nice. I'll lend you one of my silk blouses, if you like."
"No, no, thank you," hastily. "It's awfully good of you, Sophie, but I think my gown is quite presentable."
She looked absolutely charming in a pale-blue linen, perfectly laundered by Kykie; but Sophie considered anything less than silk very ordinary wear indeed.
Poppy began to arrange her hair at the mantel-mirror, pulling out her little side-combs, running them through strands of hair, then plunging them in deeper, so that greatwaves leaned out on either side of her face and delicate fronds fell veil-wise just over her eyes. Then she took a bunch of green leaves and fastened them under her throat with a big, old malachite brooch she had.
"Well, put some colour on your cheeks, or something," said Sophie discontentedly.
Poppy flew into one of the fierce little rages that sometimes seized her. "I willnot, Sophie! Why on earth should you suppose that becauseyouhave a violent colour no one admires pale women? Do not make the mistake of thinking that everyone adores your type becauseyoudo!"
Sophie, utterly taken aback, was about to make a tart rejoinder, when there came a light tap with a crop on the front door.
"Anyone at home?"
Sophie flew to her room to complete her toilette, leaving Poppy to swallow her rage and open the door. A big, grey-eyed man, with a kind smile, was standing in the verandah. He was in riding-clothes and carried a crop in his hand.
"Come in," said Poppy, without enthusiasm; adding: "Miss Cornell will not be long."
"Are you Miss Chard?" said he pleasantly, and came in.
He looked round in a friendly, boyish way that rather charmed her.
"By Jove! How pretty you've made this place look! It's quite different."
"Ah, I suppose you were here before, when it was a chamber of horrors," said Poppy coolly. "I never saw a more impossible place in my life."
He looked at her curiously as though greatly surprised. Then he said carelessly, and rather curtly she thought:
"Oh, yes, I have been here before."
He sat down in one of the easy chairs and Poppy began to put in order some books that had fallen from the book-case on to the floor. When she turned she found him still staring at her in that curious fashion, but without his smile. She missed it because it was a singularly heart-warming smile.