Even in the dusty glare of a dusty July sun, one of the largest houses in Queen's Gardens looked cool and pleasant with its delicate shades of grey on wall and portico, its striped jalousies and tiled window gardens gay with scarlet geraniums, yellow calceolarias, and blue lobelias; flowers, all of them, which seem somehow to have lost their flowerfulness by being so constantly associated in one's mind with area railings, barrel organs, and the eternal rat-tat of the postman's knock--to be brief, with London. For all the passer-by knew or cared, those lines of brilliant red, yellow, and blue blossoms might have been cunningly composed of paper, and would have served their purpose to the full as well had they been so, since no one, even inside the house, ever looked on them in the light of living, breathing plants going through a process of asphyxiation. It is difficult no doubt to resist the temptation to have pot-plants in London, but how often when brought face to face with the hideous ravages which a day or two of its poisonous atmosphere makes on our favourites has not the true flower-lover felt nothing short of murder. The inhabitants of the house in Queen's Gardens, however, had not even this chance for remorse, since the boxes were kept bright by contract, and if any poor plant was ill-advised enough to droop and complain, it was promptly rooted up and replaced by the man who came in the early mornings to "walk the hospitals" before the family appeared on the scene.
Within the house, the same spick and span, utterly impersonal attention to beauty prevailed. From basement to attic it was simply perfect in its appointments. As it might well be, since an artist in copper utensils had been let loose in the kitchen, the greatest authority in the world on wall papers had been allowed his will in friezes and dados; and so on from cellar to roof. There is, of course, a good deal to be said in favour of this modern specialism. It is distinctly comforting to know, that if you have not reached perfection, you have at any rate paid for it; but to some barbarians the loss of individuality in such houses is very grievous. To begin with, you lose a most delightful study of character. And after all, if Mrs. Jones has a sneaking admiration for a pea-green carpet with pink cabbage roses sprinkled over it, why, in heaven's name, should she conceal the fact? No green that ever was dyed is greener than grass, no flower that ever was woven is half as brilliant as the blossom-mosaic which Nature spreads for you to tread upon when the snow melts from the upland Alps. Yet the house was charming enough in detail if a little confusingen masseto those sensitive to their surroundings; since the drawing-room was Queen Anne, the dining-room Tudor, and various other corridors and apartments Japanesque, Renaissance, Early English, or Pompeian.
This again did not affect the inmates, who, indeed, would have scorned to feel as if time and space had been annihilated in the course of half-a-dozen steps; such fanciful imaginations being almost wicked, when time and space were distinctly necessary to the due performance of your duty in that state of life to which it had pleased Providence to call you.
On this particular morning in July, Mr. and Mrs. Woodward and their daughter Alice were seated at the breakfast table in the usual comfortable indifferent silence of people who keep a diary of outside engagements in a conspicuous place on the writing-table, and whose inner lives move in decorous procession from morn till eve. A canary was singing joyfully, but at the same time keeping a watchful eye on the grey Persian cat which walked up and down rubbing itself, as it passed and repassed, against Mrs. Woodward's gown, with an anxious look on the bread and milk she was crumbling for it. Mr. Woodward, at the other side of a central palm tree, studied the share list. Miss Alice Woodward, who had evidently come down later than the others, was still engaged listlessly on toast and butter; finally making a remark in an undertone to her mother that as Jack had settled to ride with her in the Park at eleven, she supposed it was about time to get ready; a remark which resulted in her pushing away her plate languidly.
"You have eaten no breakfast, my dear, and you are looking pale," said her mother, comfortably; "I will get you some more Blaud's from the Stores."
"Oh! I'm all right," replied the girl. "It's hot, and--and things are tiresome. They generally are at the end of the season, aren't they?"
She drifted easily, rather aimlessly, out of the room. Like everything else in the house she was costly and refined; pretty in herself but without any individuality. For the rest, blonde and graceful, with a faintly discontented droop of the mouth, and large, full, china-blue eyes.
Mr. Woodward watched her retreat furtively till the door closed behind her, then laid down his paper and addressed his wife with the air of a man who attends strictly to business. That was, in fact, his attitude towards his daughter at all times. He did not, he said, understand girls, but he did his duty by them.
"I heard from Macleod this morning, my dear."
Mrs. Woodward went on crumbling bread gently, and there was a pause. "Well, what does he say?"
"That the house will be ready for visitors by the 8th of next month, and that it will give him great pleasure to welcome us as soon after that date as we can manage."
"Nothing more?"
"Only the old story; that he is most anxious for our consent in order that he may speak definitely. There, read it yourself, a sensible, gentlemanly letter. I really don't think she could do better."
His tone was precisely what it would have been had he been recommending the purchase of debenture stock in a safe concern.
"Then I suppose we may consider it settled; I mean, if Alice likes the place."
"Just so; but I'm told it is charming; there is a man--in hooks-and-eyes, by the way--who has the moor next it. I met him at the Kitcheners' dinner. He said it only wanted money, and she will bring that. Besides, the man himself is all that can be desired, even by a girl."
Mrs. Woodward nodded her head. "Yes, that is such a comfort, and Lady George is so nice. Alice is quite fond of her, which is a great point with a sister-in-law. In fact, everything seems most satisfactory." She paused a moment, and a faint shade of doubt showed on her face. "Only, of course, there is Jack."
"Jack! heaven and earth, Sophia! what has Jack to do with it?"
"Nothing, of course, only you know, or at any rate you might have seen that he--well, that he may object."
Mr. Woodward's face passed from sheer amazement to that peculiar expression of virtuous indignation which so many English fathers reserve for those who, without a nomination, have the temerity to admire their daughters.
"Jack! that boy Jack?"
"He is older than Alice, my dear," put in his wife, with meek obstinacy. She, on the contrary, was smiling, for, no matter how ineligible the victim, a scalp is always a scalp to a mother; and Jack was not ineligible. On the contrary, he was the head of the soap-boiling business, now that her husband had received a consideration for his interest, and retired into the more genteel trade of blowing soap bubbles on 'Change.
"Pooh!" retorted Mr. Woodward, angrily, "if he is troublesome send him to me, I'll settle him. The lad must marry position, like Alice." He paused, and his manner changed. "You don't, of course, mamma, insinuate that--that Alice--that your daughter has been foolish enough----"
Mrs. Woodward rose with dignity, and gave the cat its bread and milk. "Mydaughter is a dear, good, sensible girl, Mr. Woodward; but that doesn't alter the fact that yournephewmay be foolish. I consider it extremely likely that he may be; it runs in the family."
Mr. Woodward took up the share list again, using it--after the manner of his kind when in domestic difficulties--as a shield, and his wife put a fresh lump of sugar in the canary's cage, saw to its seed and water, and left the room placidly. The bird was her bird, the cat her cat, and therefore she did her duty by them. In the same conscientious spirit she interviewed the housekeeper and ordered a very good dinner for her husband because he was her husband. Some people have the knack of getting a vast deal of purely selfish satisfaction out of their own virtues. Finally, she went into the morning-room, and began to think over the best way of doing her duty by her daughter also; for there was this difficulty in the way, here, that she and Alice were too much alike for sympathy. They found each other out continually, and, what is more, placidly disapproved of the various little weaknesses they shared in common. It is this inevitable likeness which is really at the bottom of that state of affairs, which is expressed in the feminine phrase, "they don't get on at home, somehow." But Alice was not a revolting daughter. Apart from other considerations, she would have thought it vulgar not to behave nicely to her parents, while Mrs. Woodward herself would have felt her complacent self-respect endangered if she had not had a high estimate of her own child; and Alice was, in this aspect, a far easier subject than her brother Sam, who, to tell truth, gave even his mother a few qualms in regard to his personal appearance.
But Alice was perfect in that respect, simply perfect. Not too pronouncedly pretty; not the sort of girl whose photograph would be put up surreptitiously in the shop windows, but really quite unexceptionable as she came in to her mother's room and stood at the window in her trim habit waiting for the horses to come round. Then she turned to her mother composedly.
"Father had a letter from Captain Macleod this morning, hadn't he? When does he expect us?"
Mrs. Woodward gave a sigh of relief. It was an advantage sometimes to be seen through, especially when you were anxious to give a word of warning before that long ride with Jack in the Park, and you did not quite know how to set about it.
"On the 8th; that will suit your father nicely; he will have done his meetings by then. And you will like the change, won't you, darling?"
"Immensely, of course. Then we had better go round to Redfern's to-day and order tailor-made things; something that looks rough, you know, but isn't. I hate rough things, they make me feel creepy. Ah! there is Jack coming round the gardens. Good-bye, dearest."
She stooped to kiss her mother dutifully ere leaving, and Mrs. Woodward seized the opportunity.
"Good-bye, darling, and before you go, Alice, about Jack."
"What about Jack, mamma?"
"You might tell him--perhaps."
"What shall I tell him?" asked the girl, a trifle petulantly. "That we are going down to stay at Gleneira with the Macleods. That is really all there is to tell--as yet."
"I know that, my dear; still--still it would be better if Jack did not follow you about so much."
"Of course, it would be better, and I have told him so often; I will tell him again, if you like, so don't be anxious, you good, pretty little mamma. I am very fond of Jack--he is a dear fellow--but I don't intend to marry him. I see quite well how foolish it would be for us both."
Mrs. Woodward, as she watched the riders pass down the road, told herself that Alice was one in a thousand, and deserved to be happy, as no doubt she would be if she married Paul Macleod, who was so very nice-looking. This point of good looks was one upon which Mrs. Woodward laid great insistence, and it enabled her to spend the next hour or two in finishing a sentimental novel in which the lovers, after sternly rejecting the counsels of parents and guardians, were rewarded in the third volume with £50,000 a year and a baronetcy. For, like most mothers, poor Mrs. Woodward was sadly at sea on the matrimonial question. Its romantic side appealed to her fancy, its business side to her experience, since no woman can have done her duty in the married state for a quarter of a century without seeing that where personal pleasure has been the motive power in one point, sheer personal self-abnegation has been the motive in ten.
Meanwhile the cousins, after cantering round the Row, had reined in their horses for a walk. Alice rode well, and the exercise had brought an unwonted animation to her appearance. Jack, on the other hand, was a tall, burly young fellow, a trifle over-dressed, but otherwise unobjectionable, looked his best, with a heartwhole admiration for his companion on his honest face. What a pretty couple they would make, thought an old spinster, taking her constitutional in Kensington Gardens, and began straightway to dream of a certain hunt ball where someone had danced with her five times before supper. How many times afterwards she had never had to confess, even to her twin sister; thanks to the extras, which, of course, need not count. And yet nothing had come of it! And just as she got so far in her reminiscences Alice was saying to Jack pleasantly, "I shall miss these rides of ours, Jack, shan't you?"
"Why should you miss them?" he asked anxiously, for there was a superior wisdom in her tone which he knew and dreaded. "I'm going down to Heddingford when you go. We can ride there."
"But we are going to Scotland first; didn't mamma tell you? We are to stay with Captain Macleod."
Poor Jack's heart gave a great throb of pain.
"Macleod?" he echoed, "that is the tall, handsome fellow, isn't it, who used to hang round you before I came up from the works?"
This allusion to Paul's good looks was unfortunate, since Jack's were not improved by the sudden flush which crimsoned even his ears.
"I don't know what you mean by hanging round," retorted the girl, quickly. "It is a very vulgar expression."
This again was unwise, for Jack, knowing his strong point was not refinement, felt instantly superior to such trivialities, and took the upper hand.
"Call it what you like, Ally. You know perfectly well what I mean, and what he meant, too."
There was no denying it, and, after all, why should it be denied? Had she not a right to have other lovers besides Jack?
"Let us come for another canter," she said, in the tone of voice which an elder sister might have used to a troublesome little brother, who required to be coaxed out of ill humour. "There is no use being cross about it, you know."
She went a little too far, and roused him into laying his hand on her rein, abruptly. And the action startled her, for she hated any display of emotion, being, in truth, totally unaccustomed to it.
"Not yet, Ally! I want to have this out first. It is time I did. And yet I don't know how to begin; perhaps because it never had a beginning. I've always cared for you--you know that. Ever since----" the young man's eyes grew moist suddenly over some childish recollection, and then an almost savage look came to his face. "And you--you cared. I'm sure you cared----"
Some people have the knack of saying the wrong thing, and in this case poor Jack Woodward gave his mistress a handle both to her pride and her prudence.
"Care," she echoed, in a patronising tone. "Of course, Jack, I cared. I cared for you very much, and I care for you now. So much so that I am not going to let you be foolish any more. We didn't understand what things really meant in those old days----"
"You don't understand now," he broke in hotly.
"Don't I," she continued; "perhaps I don't, for I don't really see what there is to make such a fuss about. And it is very selfish----"
"Do you mean to say that it is selfish of me to love you?" he cried. "Selfish to----"
She interrupted him again with the same facile wisdom.
"Very selfish, if we stand in each other's way. And, after all, Jack, what we both need to make life really successful is something we have neither of us got. We are only soap-boilers, you know, and society----"
"Society!" he echoed sternly. "What has society to do with it? I didn't think you were so worldly."
"I am not worldly," she retorted, in quite an aggrieved tone; "unless, indeed, it is worldly to be sensible, to think of you as well as of myself--to be unselfish and straightforward."
"Straightforward! What, do you call it straightforward to let me hang round you as I have done?"
"Really, Jack, you areimpayablewith your hangings round! Can you not find a less objectionable phrase?"
She was fencing with him, and he saw it, saw it and resented it with the almost coarse resentment of a nature stronger and yet less obstinate than hers.
"Yes, if you like. I'll say you have played fast and loose with me--as you have. You have known for years that I cared for you, and that I intended to marry you. And when a girl allows that sort of thing to go on without a word, and doesn't mean it, I say she is a flirt--a heartless flirt, and I have nothing more to do with her."
He turned his horse as he spoke, and without another word rode off, leaving her to go home with the groom. Inexcusable violence, no doubt. Alice told herself so again and again in the vain effort to get rid of a certain surprised remorse, for the girl was emphatically a moral coward, and any display of high-handed resentment, so far from rousing her opposition, invariably made her doubtful of her own wisdom. She hated scenes most cordially, hated, above all things, to have opprobrious epithets hurled at her; for she clung with almost piteous tenacity to her own virtue. It was too hard, too unkind of Jack to blame her, and yet despite this, his condemnation seemed to dim that lodestar of her firmament--common sense. After all, if he liked her, why should they not marry? Why should such devotion be sacrificed to the Moloch of position? In truth, as she thought over the incident, an odd mixture of anger and regret came to upset her usual placidity, so that, much to her own surprise, she broke down helplessly into tears over her mother's conventional inquiry as to how she had enjoyed her ride. Nor could she find any reason for this unwonted emotion, beyond the fact that Jack had been brutal and called her a flirt, and had ridden away, declaring that he would have nothing more to say to her. That such would be the case Mrs. Woodward, as she administered sal volatile and talked about the trying heat, felt was most devoutly to be wished; but a long course of three volume novels warned her of the danger of trusting to the permanence of lovers' quarrels. So after her daughter had been provided with darkness and eau-de-cologne, and a variety of other feminine remedies against the evil effects of emotion, she went off to her own sitting-room to consider the position by the light of her five-and-forty years of human experience. To begin with, the girl's feelings were clearly more deeply implicated than she, or for the matter of that Alice herself, had imagined. The question, therefore, came uppermost whether this fact ought to be admitted or deprecated; whether in short this evident dislike to giving her cousin pain was the result of a romantic attachment or simply the natural kindliness of a girl for a young fellow she had known from infancy. Now the cogitations of mothers over their daughters' matrimonial prospects are always fair game for both moralist and novelist. For some mysterious reason the least display of prudence is considered worldly; yet, on the face of it, a woman who has had, say, five-and-twenty years of married life cannot possibly fail to see how much of her own life has been made or marred by influences which she never considered in accepting Dick, Tom, or Harry. In nine cases out of ten it is the remembrance of her own ignorance which makes her espouse the cause of the lover who can bring the greatest number of chances for content. And it is idle to deny, for instance, that a girl marrying into a family which will welcome her is far less likely to quarrel with her husband than one who is looked on askance by her mother-in-law. There is, in sober truth, an immense deal to be said in favour of the French theory which holds that given a favourable nidus, and kindly atmosphere, the germ of happiness is more likely to grow into a goodly tree, and bear fruit a thousandfold, than when it is planted in a hurry by two inexperienced gardeners in the first pot which they fancy in the great Mart. Owing, however, to our somewhat startling views as to the sanctity of the romantic passion over the claims of duty towards oneself and others, these minor considerations are considered mercenary to the last degree, and the mother who is courageous enough to confess them openly is held up to obloquy. Why, it is difficult to say, since none of us really believe in the popular theory. It will not hold water for an instant when put to the practical test of experience; even if we leave out of consideration the fact that fully one-half of the people one meets have never felt, and have never felt the desire to feel, an absorbing passion.
Mrs. Woodward, for instance, had not; moreover she had brought Alice up from the cradle to share her views of life, and had never once found her way barred by any bias towards a more passionate outlook. In fact, she was, in her mother's estimate, the very last girl in the world to find sentiment soothing. On the contrary, it distressed her, made her cry, necessitated her lying down with smelling-salts and a hot-bottle. Then above all things she loved a certain refined distinction and exclusiveness. Even as a child she had held her head high in the soap-boiling connection, and though she would no doubt be very fairly happy with Jack, the Macleod family was distinctly more suitable. The question, therefore, soon resolved itself, not into whether the outworks of the girl's placidity should be defended, but how this could best be effected. How in short Jack could be prevented from posing as a martyr; for Mrs. Woodward was sharp enough to see that, at present at any rate, the danger lay entirely in her daughter's remorse.
"It was very unkind of Jack I must say," she commented skilfully on the story which Alice unfolded to her after a time; "but you mustn't be hard on him, my dear. Men never have so much self-control as we have, and no doubt the knowledge that you were right vexed him. They get over these little rebuffs very quickly."
"It--it seemed to hurt him though--and I hate--all that sort of thing," murmured the girl doubtfully, looking as if she were going to cry again.
"And it hurts you apparently, though you know quite well that you only did your duty."
"I suppose so," remarked Alice, still more doubtfully; "only I wish he hadn't been so unreasonable."
"So do I; but in these cases the girl always has to have sense for both. Besides Jack has a vile temper. But it is soon over. You will see that he will come to dinner as usual--it is the opera night, and he wouldn't miss that for anything--not even for you, my dear."
Alice smiled a watery smile, and said she did not think it meant so little to him as all that; but Mrs. Woodward maintained her position, having, in fact, some grounds for her belief, owing to the despatch of a certain little note which she had sent off before coming in to console Alice, and which ran thus:--
"Dear Jack,--Alice tells me you were very much put about to-day regarding our visit to Scotland; why, I can scarcely understand. Dear boy, if only for your own sake--since you can scarcely wish to quarrel with her, or us--do try and keep that temper of yours a little more under control. The poor girl came home crying, and I really cannot allow you to go out with her again if you are so inconsiderate. You ought to know quite well how sensitive she is, so for goodness' sake don't let this stupid misunderstanding disturb us all.--Your affectionate Aunt,
"Sophia Woodward."
P.S.--"We dine earlier to-day, as Alice wants to be in time for the overture, 'Tannhauser.'"
A note which meant all or nothing according to the wishes of the reader. In this case it meant all, for Jack, returning to his rooms after a disastrous attempt to begin his future rôle in life by playing whist with the old fogies at his club, was feeling that life, even as a misogynist, was unendurable, when the sight of his aunt's handwriting made his heart beat. The note was not in the least what he had expected to receive, and made him somehow feel as if he had grossly exaggerated the necessity for grief.
"Aunt Soph is on my side, anyhow," said the young man, with a certain elation, "and I was a brute, I'm afraid."
The result being, that before Alice, who had been spending the afternoon with Paul Macleod's sister, Lady George Temple, had returned from her drive, Jack, with a big gardenia in his coat, was ushered into the drawing-room, where his aunt, in satin and diamonds, was skimming through the last few pages of another novel which had to be returned to the library that evening.
"Good boy!" she said, smiling. "Now, I hope you won't spoil Alice's pleasure to-night by even alluding to your rudeness."
Jack looked a little aghast. "But, Aunt Sophia, I must beg her pardon."
"Then you had better do it at once," replied Mrs. Woodward, "and get it over. For there she is at the door. You can run downstairs and meet her, for she will have to go up to dress at once. She is late as it is."
Begging your mistress's pardon on the way upstairs, before the eyes of a butler and a footman, was not quite what Jack had pictured to himself; but it was better than nothing, and Alice's unfeigned look of relief at seeing him could not be mistaken.
Mrs. Woodward slept soundly that night, feeling that she had done a good day's work, and steered the bark of her daughter's happiness out of a great danger. And happiness to her philosophy meant much, since virtue was so very much easier of attainment when life went smoothly. This was partly the reason why she did not detail the past danger to her husband after the manner of some wives, who love to chase sleep from their good man's eyes by breaking in upon the delicious drowsiness of the first ten minutes in bed by perfectly needless revelations of past woe.
The tie, in fact, between these two whose night-capped heads reposed side by side, was a curious one if absolutely commonplace. It consisted of a vast amount of mutual respect for each other's position as husband or wife, a solid foundation of placid affection, and no confidence. For instance, Mrs. Woodward knew considerably more about her son Sam Woodward's debts than his father did, to say nothing of minor points in the matter of household management; but then at least two-thirds of Mr. Woodward's life was absolutely unknown to the wife of his bosom. He breakfasted and dined at home on week days, and on Sundays he added lunch to the other meals; what is more, he never deserted her for the club on the occasion of "At Homes." But of his life between 10 A.M. and 7 P.M. she knew nothing, except that he lunched at a bar in the City. So far as this went, he was to her exactly what he was to the outside world; that is to say, Mr. Woodward, the lucky financier, whose name meant money. Even the success or failure of the companies which she saw advertised with his name as director did not interest her, for she knew by experience that money and to spare was always forthcoming. And to tell the truth, Mr. Woodward was a singularly lucky man. When the smash came to the company "For Preserving the North American Indian from Total Extinction by Supplying him with a Sparkling Beverage, Exhilarating but non-Alcoholic, to take the Place of the Deleterious Fire Water," he had happened to sell his last remaining share the day before; and even when the scheme for supplying hard-boiled eggs to the settlers in Africa failed, it did not affect the home supply at all. And yet Mr. Woodward's character as a business man stood above suspicion, and the worst that had ever been said of him was that he could sail a point or two nearer to the wind with safety than most men.
So that night he also slept the sleep of the just, undisturbed by the thoughts of Jack's temerity. Even if he had known of it, it is to be feared that he would have set the question aside with the mental verdict that it was clearly the business of the girl's mother to see to such things. Poor mothers! who as they look at the bald head on the pillow beside their own cannot but feel, even while they would not now part with it for all the world, that life would have been less disappointing if circumstances had been more kind.
As for Alice herself, she slept peacefully also, the doubt which poor Jack's pain had raised in her gentle mind having been allayed by his prompt submission. And Jack snored--positively snored; for he was rather fatigued with his own excitement, being of the sort which takes most things not so much keenly as heavily. To tell the truth, also, his determination to marry his cousin was so fixed that the greater part of his pain had been sheer inability to grasp the idea of denial; so that he reverted gladly to the old position without asking questions as a less tenacious man might have done.
Lord George Temple sate moodily in the armchair of his study in his little house in Mayfair chewing the end of a cigar and looking disconsolately at a tray of whiskey and water and a plate of oval thin Captain's biscuits on the table. He was a red-haired smooth-faced man with rather a long upper lip, and a good-natured, somewhat whimsical expression.
"It is a confounded shame!" he said to his wife, who, with an opera cloak slipping from her pretty bare shoulders, was resting for a moment before going upstairs to bed. "Graham gives his cook twenty-five pounds a year--I heard her telling you so one day when she was wanting a new one--and yet there wasn't a thing fit to eat on the table----"
"Well, I don't know," put in Lady George, absently; "I think those stuffed larks came from Mirobolants. I saw that style of decoration in his place the other day, and I'm quite sure the iced soufflé was Bombardi's; I know the shape."
"Exactly what I said!" continued the husband, "not a thing fit for a gouty man to eat at the table, and yet a woman on twenty-five pounds ought to be up to roast chicken and a rice pudding."
Blanche Temple looked at her spouse with the compassionate air of tolerance which she invariably extended to his views.
"But you can't give your friends roast chicken and rice pudding; you can't, indeed, nowadays. People wouldn't come."
"My dear girl," interrupted Lord George, obstinately, "there were four men at the table who, like myself, partook of soup, fish, and cheese straws. And one poor beggar didn't even have the soup." The thought was apparently comforting, for he began more contentedly on a biscuit. But his wife was now interested in the subject. Most things interested her, either to affirmation or denial, for Paul Macleod's sister was a very clever woman, if at the same time curiously conventional.
"Well! I don't know who eats the things, then," she said, aggrievedly. "Why, the last time we had a dinner-party--I mean when the Woodwards were here--I'm sure Paul ought to be infinitely obliged to me for the trouble I take--the cook who came in used pounds on pounds of stock meat, and quarts on quarts of cream; to say nothing of a whole bottle of whiskey. 'You had better give it her, my lady,' said Jane, 'for fear as the dinner might 'ave no appearance.'"
Among other unknown and despised talents which did not suit Lady George's theory of her own rôle in life was a distinct turn for mimicry. Her admirable impersonation of Jane, therefore, made her husband burst out laughing; since by a whimsical perversion of affairs he loved his wife dearly for the very qualities which she feigned not to possess. For Blanche was essentially a theatrical woman, loving to pose in all the relations of life, her present one being that of a dutiful sister. On Paul's return from India she had not only hastened to impress on him the absolute necessity for his marrying an heiress if he wished to keep Gleneira in the family, but had also introduced him to Alice Woodward, as a girl who would suit the part admirably. For Lady George knew her brother's foibles thoroughly, and understood that if he married for money, the bride must be a person who would neither offend his refinement, nor require much display of affection; since Paul would certainly never give himself away by pretending a depth of sentiment he did not feel, and yet would not marry without something of the sort. That she felt was the worst of him.Au fondhe was absolutely truthful to himself.
"Of course you could sell if you liked," she had said to him skilfully, well knowing that the very thought was utterly repugnant; "trade is always ready to buy a Highland property. The only alternative is to marry a girl with money. I know one, pretty, lady-like, refined; a girl of whom you would be very fond if she were your wife. Her father is a speculator. Not quite so safe, of course, as a solid business--buttons or tallow--though, by the way, he has something to do with soap. Still, these Woodwards are quite presentable, andMonsieur le pèrehas his wits about him. And then you know there are always settlements, and deeds of gift, and those sort of things which creditors make such a fuss about."
Her brother winced visibly. "I should prefer not to have a row with anybody else's creditors," he said shortly. "Ishall have enough apparently to do in keeping my own quiet. England is a terribly expensive place to live in."
"London, you mean," retorted his sister, gaily. "You can always go down to Gleneira and vegetate."
That had been at the beginning of the season, and now Paul had gone down, not to vegetate, but to prepare the old place for the visit of inspection; not without a certain resentful irritation at the necessity for it. Though at the same time it put the affair on an easier footing for the present.
Afterwards, however, Paul had every intention of imparting sentiment into the transaction, if it could be done; and he knew himself to have a vast capacity for falling in love, after the approved romantic fashion, with any pretty girl who was willing to let him make love to her. So his sister, bewailing the pounds of stock meat and quarts of cream expended on his behalf, yet felt that she had been successful; but, then, she would hardly have recognised herself if she had not been so, since in her own little world, which she carefully avoided extending unwisely either upwards or downwards, Lady George Temple was always cited as a success in all the rôles which she felt called upon to play.
"I heard from Paul to-day, by the way," she said, as she gathered up her gloves and fan. "He wants me to go and call on that Mrs. Vane. You remember who I mean, of course?"
"No, I don't," replied Lord George, relapsing into moodiness over the biscuits.
"You never do remember what I mean, dear! But she is the Colonel's wife, who nursed Paul when he nearly died in India. Of course they do it very often, I know, and it is more confusing than sending for a woman whom you can pay and get rid of afterwards. Still, she really did save his life--under Providence, of course--at least, Paul always said so. Well, her husband, who, I believe, drank, or did something, died two years ago, leaving her dreadfully off, so she went to live with somebody--an uncle or an aunt, who, I fancy, must have left her some money, for she has just taken a house somewhere in Chelsea. And Paul, who hasn't seen her since those old days, has asked her to Gleneira, and wants me to make her acquaintance first. Rather a bore, for I wish to have a particularly pleasant party, and she will most likely be an old frump."
"Scarcely, my dear, if she nursed your brother, and he survived," remarked Lord George, gravely.
His wife frowned. "How can you be so absurd, dear; she must be quite old, for Paul wrote she was a perfect mother to him, and that is quite six years ago."
Lord George's eyes twinkled again. "My dear Blanche, you and Paul have exaggerated notions on the subject of a mother's----" He paused, at a rattle on the door-handle, and looked apprehensively at his wife. The next instant two charming little figures in frilled white nightgowns burst into the room, and flinging themselves into their mother's arms began to cover her with kisses. The daintiest little creatures, a boy and a girl, with angelic faces and shrill, excited, happy, little voices.
"Oh, you bad children!" cried Blanche, without a trace of vexation. "So you wanted to see mother, did you? And now you have seen her, off to bed with you before Nannie comes after you, there's dear ones! Quick! or she will be coming."
"Quick, Adam! Quick, Evie!" echoed the happy voices excitedly, in a rush to the open door, which ended in a sudden pull up, and a still more excited cry. "Oh, mammy! Oh, daddy! here's Blazes comin' down the stairs."
Lord George's face lost its apprehensiveness in resignation. Yet, as he settled himself back in his chair, his long upper lip betrayed a disposition to smile, for Blasius, his youngest son, was apt to amuse him. A very different child this, short, squat, and red-haired, who, after sundry thumpings and bumpings outside, suggestive of falls, appeared, rubbing his eyes sleepily, at the door; then the broad, good-natured face expanded into a grin. "Bickys'!" he said, laconically, as he toddled across to the tray.
"Oh! what a welly greedy little boy, ain't he, Evie?" said Adam. "We come to see our darlin' mummie, didn't we, duckums?" He was at her side for a swift caress, and back again to stand expectantly beside his sister, whose little dancing feet were keeping time to her nodding golden head. As pretty a picture of light-hearted innocent enjoyment as heart could desire, even at eleven o'clock at night!
"Give him a biscuit, do, and let him go," said Lady George, hurriedly. "It won't hurt him, they are quite plain. Dada will give you a biscuit, Blasius, and then you can go back to bed, like a dear, can't you?"
Blasius' large, round, blue eyes assumed a look of vacuity as the sentence proceeded; but as he stood sturdily on his little bare feet beside his father both little chubby hands went out at once, and a singularly full voice for so young a child gave out conglomerately:--
"Blathe's--'ll--take two, ta."
Lord George shot a glance at his wife and complied; while from the door came a little whisper, intended to be one of horror. "Oh, Addie! ain't he a welly greedy little boy?"
"And now Blasius will go to bed like a good boy, with his good little brother and sister," remarked Lady George, with forced optimism. "Adam and----" Her voice failed before a soft thud as Blasius sat down solidly, and stuck his little bare feet beyond his little white nightgown.
"Mummie can go, Blazeth'll stay with dada--ta."
Those two at the door stood bolt upright, with sidelong looks of pious horror at each other--
"Oh, Evie! \ > Ain't he a weally naughty little boy?" "Oh, Addle! /
"Blasiusmustgo to bed," began his mother, quite firmly, "or--or--mummie will be very much grieved. Her little boy wouldn't like to grieve his mummie, would he?"
Lord George, who had looked hopeful at the decision of tone, sank back in his chair and twiddled his thumbs.
"You had better ring for nurse at once, Blanche. It always comes to that in the end, and the child will get cold."
His wife frowned. Her theories had been so successful with Adam and Eve that the necessity for reverting to thevi et armiswith this baby was grievous. She sate down beside him on the floor, and began in mellifluous tones.
"Listen, Blasius. Mummie wants her little Blasius to do something to please her; she wants him to do something very much----" She got no further, being gagged by a little soft hand and a very hard biscuit together.
"Blazeth's not a deedy 'ickle boy. Blazeth'll give poor 'ickle mummie hith bicky, and be a dood 'ickle boy. Then daddy'll gif him anofer."
Little chortles of intense enjoyment came from those angelic faces at the door.
"Go to bed, children; off with you at once," said their father, quickly, whereupon an obedient patter of bare feet fled up the stairs with an accompanying cackle of high, eager voices, busy over the pros and cons of Blasius versus authority.
"Do you think she'll assuade him, Evie? I don't." "I think he ought to be smacked, I do." "I'd let him cry, it don't hurt a child to cry. Nanna's mother says it's good for the lungs." "And Blazes likes to cry, he does." "I say, Addie! how long will it be afore Duckum's mummie has to ring the bell?"
The last wonder being faintly audible from the landing above, settled the business downstairs. Lord George rose and took the law into his own hands.
"Oh, George!" cried his wife, reproachfully, "how can you expect to train up children in the way they should go if you are so impatient? If once I could have got Blasius to understand what was really required of him----"
Here the advent of a big, stalwart figure in a wrapper, bearing a white shawl, brought such sudden comprehension to the stalwart little one, that the room for one brief moment resounded with yells. The next found the door closed upon them, and Lady George looked disconsolately at her husband, as she listened to the retreating struggles of her youngest born.
"I cannot think what makes him so different from the others," she said, gloomily.
"My dear," replied her husband, consolingly, "Cain came after Adam and Eve; perhaps the next will be Abel. Besides, Blasius was a risky name. I told you so at the time."
"Saint Blasius was a very worthy man," retorted his spouse, hotly, "and, considering that you and the boy were both born on his day, I must say I think it quite natural that I should call my child George Blasius--or, let me see, was it Blasius George?"
"It is a matter of no importance, my dear," replied her husband, drily. He did not remind his wife, nor did she choose to remember that at the time she had been playing the ultra ritualistic rôle. To tell the truth, she did not care to be brought face to face with her past impersonations, unless the fancy seized her to revert to them; when, at a moment's notice, she could resume the character as if she had never ceased to play it.
So, the next day, with a view to making a suitable impression on Paul's widow, as she chose to call Mrs. Vane, she put on her most dowdy garments, and actually went in an omnibus down the King's-road. Thus far her environment suited her foregone conclusions, but, as she stood in the wide stretch down by the river, the brilliant sunshine streaming upon a very bright knocker and a very white door, a certain feeling of distrust crept over her. Nor was the darkened room into which she was ushered reassuring. The parquet floors were almost bare, the windows beneath the striped Venetian awnings were set wide open to a balcony wreathed with blossoming creepers, and hung with cages of singing birds. A scent of flowers was in the air, a coolness, an emptiness, and yet the first impression was one of ease and comfort. Not the room, this, of an old frump. And this was not an old frump rising from a cushioned lounge and coming forward like a white shadow in the half light.
"How good of you to come!"
Lady George, dazzled as she was by the change from the sunlight outside to the darkness within, yet saw enough to make her gasp. Lo! this little bit of a woman with syren written all over her from the tip of her dainty Parisian shoe to the crown of her fair, curly head, was Paul's widow. His mother, forsooth! A pretty mother, indeed!
Having got so far as this, Blanche, being, amongst other things, somewhat of an artist, felt bound to admit that Violet Vane was very pretty indeed; so pretty that it was a pleasure to watch the piquant face, full of a quaint sort of humour and freshness, grow clear of the shadows. In this half light she looked younger, no doubt, than she really was; still, even in the garish day, Lady George felt instinctively that her charm would remain. In fact, she was not at all, no! not in the least, a suitable companion for Paul, when so much depended on his being reasonable.
"I haven't seen your brother for years," came the sweet but rather thin voice. "It is so good of him to remember me. So more than good of him to ask me down to Gleneira that I mean to go, if only to ensure the kindness being credited to him. I wonder if he is much changed?"
There was a certain challenge in the speech which Lady George was quick enough to recognise, and, as she recognised it, wondered if her own astonishment had been too palpable, as that in itself would be a mistake, so she replied deftly:
"He is not changed in one thing--his gratitude to you. And I am grateful also, for Paul is very dear to me. The dearest fellow in the world, is he not?"
It was a statement to which, in the language of poker, Mrs. Vane could hardly go one better, and therefore it left her, as it were, to an under-study of devotion.
"He used to be very nice when I knew him; but, then, sick people are always nice; they are so much at one's mercy," said the little lady, airily. They were, in their way, admirable types of their kind, these two women; both artificial, yet with an artificiality which sprang from the head in the one case, from the heart in the other; for Mrs. Vane saw through herself, and Lady George did not.
"So that is Paul's sister," said the former to herself as, on the way back to her lounge, after escorting her visitor in friendliest fashion to the stairs, she paused to take up a photograph case lying on the table. It contained Paul's portrait as he had been before the time when she had watched his fair head tossing restlessly on the pillow in that hot Indian room which nothing would cool. The memory of those dreary days and nights came back to her in a rush, making her, paradoxically, look years older, worn, haggard, and anxious. She seemed to be back in them; to hear the gathering cry of the jackals prowling past the open door, to see the flicker of the oil night-light gleam on the splintered ice, turning it for a brief second to diamonds, as she prepared it for the burning forehead above those bright, yet glazed eyes; and, more than all, she seemed to feel the old passionate protest against the possibility of his passing for ever out of her life joined to the fierce determination to save him to the uttermost. From what? from herself, perhaps. For Mrs. Vane had performed the most unselfish act of her life when she had laughed and scoffed at the devotion and gratitude of her patient. She had had many, she said, and they had always felt like that during some period of their convalescence. There was nothing for these sequelæ of jungle fever like three months' leave to the bears in Kashmir; and, if he liked, he might bring her home one of those little silk carpets for her sitting-room as a fee; she would prefer a carpet to anything else. And so Paul had come back with his unromantic offering, cured, as she had prophesied, of his feverishness, but not of his friendliness. That had lasted, despite a separation of years. And something else had lasted also, to judge by the look on Mrs. Vane's face as she stood with Paul's photograph in her hand.
Lady George Temple took a cab home, and tried to regain a sense of lost importance by having the children down to tea. Paul had kept this thing secret from her; he had allowed her for years to speak kindly, effusively of the woman who had saved his life as if she were an old frump, when she was really--Blanche, being a person of sense, felt forced to acknowledge the truth--one of the most charming little creatures imaginable, with just that half-sympathetic, half-bantering manner which was so taking. And Paul, having done this, her own rôle of devoted sisterhood suffered thereby; so she fell back upon her motherhood.
Thus, when her husband returned, he found the room littered with Kindergarten toys, while Adam was threading beads by the multiplication table, and Eve was busily engaged in marking the course of the River Congo in red back-stitching on a remarkably black continent of Africa, which was afterwards to do duty as a kettleholder. Blasius, meanwhile, having been so far beguiled into the Zeit-Geist as to consent to build a puff-puff out of some real terra-cotta bricks and columns which were intended for an architectural object lesson.
"Oh, George!" began his wife, pausing with a lump of sugar in the tongs over his cup, "Paul's widow is dreadful; I don't know what I shall do with her."
"Hand her over to me--I can generally manage to get on with people," he said, watching the tongs greedily; for the question of sugar in his tea was the cause of much dispute between him and his wife. A slow smile came to her face as she replaced the lump.
"No! my dear; it wouldn't be good for you," she said, coming back to the present, and then she frowned. "I cannot think what induced Paul to ask her just when so much depends on the Woodwards feeling themselves to betheguestspar excellence," she continued, after a brief but picturesque description of the offender. "And this woman is sure to sing, and play, and dance, and act. I saw it in her face."
"Jolly sort of person to have in a country house, I should say," remarked her husband, secretly impressed.
"I knewyouwould say that, George," put in his wife, resignedly. "Yes! she is just the sort of woman men love to dangle round."
"Then ask someone to dangle. That will leave the coast clear for Paul and Miss Woodward."
Lady George raised her eyebrows scornfully. "As if that would do any good! That sort of woman always insists on having the best men, and Paul looks that in most society; besides I don't feel called upon to pave the way to an heiress for anyone else but my brother. That is what it would come to. No! I cannot conceive why Paul should make things so--so much more difficult for himself."
"Natural depravity, my dear," suggested her husband, helping himself on the sly to sugar. "There is such a thing--Hullo! what's that?"
That was the sudden discovery on Blazes' part that an Ionic column, when used as an engine funnel, would, if hit violently with a good, squat Norman one, break off in the middle; a discovery which was followed by an outburst of that craze for destruction which healthy children display on the least provocation.
"He--he is not a 'Kindergarten' child," remarked his mother, plaintively, when after a time the upstairs bell had once more been rung and the offender carried off shrieking amid awed whispers of intense enjoyment, about "welly welly naughty little boys" from Adam and Eve.
"No, my dear, he isn't," assented Lord George, cheerfully. "Some of us are made that way; his uncle, for instance; but he isn't a fool, and he knows which side his bread is buttered; a fact which has a marvellous effect in keeping a man straight."
"My dear George! what a terrible thing to say. It is a reversion to that fear of punishment----"
"My dear! I should like a second cup of tea, and this time I think you might let me have a small lump of sugar--quite a small one."
That evening Blanche wrote a long letter to her brother, which gave her some trouble to compose. In it she lavished endless praises on dear Mrs. Vane, who, to judge from herlooks, must have had greattrouble, and fully deserved dear, kind Paul's grateful remembrance of past services; which, by the way, she seemed to have extended to many other fortunate invalids. Altogether a most delightful woman, ofvaried experiencesif a triflemanierée; "though this," she added, "my dear Paul, is, I fear, a common fault with women who have been made much ofby many men."
As it so happened he read this remark at a small picnic party where Marjory, the only lady present, was dispensing tea to Will Cameron, himself, the Reverend James Gillespie, Father Macdonald, Mr. Wilson, and Donald Post, who had been waylaid on the road just above the little creek on the loch, where they had lit their fire, to say nothing of the minister's man holding the Manse dogcart until its occupants should choose to tear themselves away from temptation and proceed on their journey.
"Quid datur a Divis felice optatius hora?" quoted the minister gallantly, as he set aside the girl's offer of another cup and rose to go, while little Father Macdonald, following his example, quoted a verse from Tasso to show that the memory of a pleasant hour might give even greater pleasure than the hour itself. Paul Macleod, watching them, and fully alive to the adoring look on the Reverend James's face, continuing, as it were the kindly affection of Will's, gave a short laugh as he tore up his letter and threw it into the embers of the dying fire.
Marjory looked at him inquiringly.
"Only something that seems singularly out of place with my present surroundings," he said in quick response; "but the world has a knack of seeming very far away when one is in Gleneira."