Van Buren, who was a business man, was an idealist; while Harry de Freyne, the artist—was, emphatically, not.
Van Buren had been brought up on Thackeray and Dickens, above all on old pictures fromPunch; Du Maurier's drawings enjoyed at an early age had made him romantic about everything connected with London. As soon as he was able to leave his bank in New York—in fact, the moment he had retired from business—he had realised his dream and come to live in London. And Harry seemed to him the incarnation of everything delightfully, amusingly English. He had a real hero-worship for Harry, who was so astonishingly clever as well. Van Buren was not a snobbish Anglomaniac, at least his snobbishness was not of the common quality nor about the obvious things; he was a little ashamed of his money, but he did not worship rank and titles; it was Intellect—but Intellectthat had the stamp of fashion—that held a glamour for him. So did everything that he supposed to be modern, previous, and up-to-date. No one could ever, whether in New York or in London, have been in life less modern than poor Van Buren, though he was eminently contemporary and perhaps even in advance in matters connected with business. For business he had genius, and yet, curiously, no passion; he was unconsciously brilliant on the subject; it was hereditary. But in his innermost heart he believed that it was vulgar to be an American millionaire! And he had a childish horror of vulgarity, and an innocent belief that an Englishman who had been to Eton and Oxford and who wasdans le mouvement, smart and good-looking, and had deserted diplomacy for art, must of necessity be refined, superior, cultured, everything that Van Buren wanted to be.
Of course he soon found out that Harry was frightfully hard up, and in the most delicate manner imaginable—a delicacy rather wasted on his friend—implored, as a special favour, to be allowed to be his banker. But Harry had refused, having vague ideas of much more important extent than a mere loan with regard to making Van Buren useful. He had thus gone up in his friend's estimation, at the sametime placing him under a great and deeply felt obligation by gratifying his fancy for knowing clever people and celebrities.
At last the friendship had culminated in Harry's suggestion of a marriage between his young cousin, Daphne, and Van Buren. Harry felt that if he could compass this arrangement he would at one stroke give fortune to Daphne, freedom to himself—the child was very much in his way in Valentia's house—and make Van Buren eternally grateful.
Harry really liked Van Buren and respected him; he regarded him as touching, but also, at times, as a menace. A shadow sometimes came over their friendship, the alarming shadow of the future bore. What was now to his cynical mind screamingly funny about the American—his sensitive delicate feelings, his high standard of morals with regard to what he called the ladies, and illusions that one would rarely find in London in a girl of seventeen, might some day develop into priggishness and tediousness, and—especially—would take up too much time. For since Harry had been intimate with Van Buren he had discovered that the tradition of American hustling was, like most traditions, a fiction. Americans always have time; Englishmen never. The leisurely way in which Van Buren talked was an exampleof this—it was the way he thought; his brain worked slowly. Harry and his like have no time to drawl; they have to keep appointments.
On the evening of the Ritz dinner-party Harry was not in a particularly good temper, and thought to himself he was rather like a Barnum as he introduced his guests one by one to the modest millionaire, who said to them all, "Pleased to meet you", and fixed his admiring glance with a sentimental respect on Daphne, an undisguised admiration on Valentia, and an almost morbid curiosity on Miss Luscombe, the first actress he had ever met.
Miss Luscombe was a conventional, rather untidy-looking creature, very handsome, with loose hair parted and waved over her ears, and with apparently no design or general idea either in her dress or manner. She varied from minute to minute from being what she thought theatrical to appearing what she supposed to be social. She evidently hadn't settled on her pose, always a disastrous moment for a natural woman who wishes to be artificial. Practically she always wore evening dress except in the evening, so while at her own flat in the afternoon she was photographed in adécolletéetea-gown, this evening she was dressed as if for Ascot, except for the hat, with an emaciated feather boa and a tired embroideredcrêpe de Chinescarf thrown over her shoulders, also a fan, long gloves, and a rose in her hair by way of hedging. To these ornaments she added a cold, of which she complained as soon as she saw the other guests. But no one listened. No one ever listened to Miss Luscombe, no one ever could, and yet in a way she was popular—a kind of pet among a rather large circle of people. Women never disliked her because she created no jealousy and always unconsciously put herself at a disadvantage; men did not mind her prattle and coquettish airs, being well aware that nothing was expected of them. For Miss Luscombe, though vain, was a pessimist, and quite good-natured. She was also a standing joke.
The other guests besides Valentia in yellow and Daphne in pink—both looking as fresh as daisies and as civilised as orchids—consisted of Lady Walmer, a smart, good-looking, commonplace woman, rather fatter than she wished to be, but very straight-fronted, straightforward, and sporting, with dark red hair and splendid jewels; a faded yet powerful beauty who had been admired in the eighties, but had only had real success since she turned forty-six.
With her was her daughter, a girl who at the first glance looked eight feet high, but who really was not very much above the average length.She was a splendid athlete, and her talk was principally of hockey. She wore a very smart white dress and had a dark brown neck, pretty fair hair, and an entirely unaffected bonhomie that quite carried off the harshness of her want of style or charm—in fact it had a charm of its own. Besides, it was well known that her grandmother had left her an estate in the country and £ 7000 a year, and that Lady Walmer was anxious to get her married. Hence Miss Walmer never wanted for partners at balls nor for attention anywhere, but—it was always forle bon motif. As Valentia said, she was the sort of girl (poor girl!) that one could only marry.
Hereford Vaughan, who was an object of considerable curiosity to several of the guests on account of his phenomenal success in having eleven plays at the same time being performed in London, New York, Berlin, Paris, and every other European city, was, to those who did not know him before, an agreeable surprise. Heaven knows what exactly people expected of him; perhaps the men feared 'side' and the women that he would be overpowering after so many triumphs, but he was merely a rather pale, dark, and rather handsome young man. He behaved like anybody else, except that perhaps his manner was a little quieter than the average. Unless one was very observant (which one isn't), orunless one listened to what he said, he did not at first appear too alarmingly clever. He had one or two characteristics which must have at times led to misunderstandings. One was that whatever or whoever he looked at, his dark opaque eyes were so full of vivid expression that women often mistook for admiration what was often merely observation. For instance, when he glanced at Lady Walmer she at once became quite confused, and intensely flattered, nearly blushed and asked him to dinner. While, if she had but known, behind that dark glance was merely the thought, "So that's the woman that Royalty ... What extraordinary taste!"
Hereford Vaughan, who was himself thirty-four, did not share in the modern taste for the battered as a charm in itself, though he could forgive it—or, indeed, anything else—if he were amused.
Knowing that Miss Luscombe, hoping for a part, would be painfully nice to Vaughan, Harry had good-naturedly placed them as far apart as possible. Nevertheless she leaned across the table and said—
"Howdoyou think of all these clever things, Mr. Vaughan? I can't think how you do it!"
"Yes, indeed, we'd all like to know that," said Captain Foster, the baby Guardsman, as Valentia called him. He spoke enviously. He wasa perfectly beautiful blond, delightfully stupid, and had been longing for enough money to marry somebody ever since he was seventeen.
"I'm sure I'd jolly soon write a play if I only knew how."
"It's perfectly easy, really," said Vaughan; "it's just a knack."
"Is it though?"
"That's all."
"How do you get the things taken?"
"Oh, that's a mere fluke—a bit of luck," said Vaughan.
Every one who heard this sighed with relief to think that was how he regarded it.
Vaughan always used this exaggerated modesty as an armour against envy, for envy, as a rule, is of success rather than of merit. No one would have objected to his talent deserving recognition—only to his getting it.
"Now what do you think of Miss Luscombe?" Valentia asked the dramatist.
"I don't think of her. I never regard people on the stage as real people," Vaughan answered.
"Don't you, really? Well, you ought to know. You have made a sort of corner in 'leading ladies'. What curious clothes she wears!"
"Doesn't she? On the stage she dresses like an actress, and off the stage she doesn't dress like a lady. She's so extraordinarily vague," he said.
"Yes; and yet I've heard that, though she's so dreamy and romantic, she's quite wonderfully practical, really. She never accepts an engagement unless she gets a large salary—and all that sort of thing."
"I see. She lives in the clouds, but she insists on their having a silver lining," said Vaughan. "Who's the pink young man she's confiding in now?"
"It's Mr. Rathbone. He likes theatres—at least he collects programmes and posters, I think. Besides, he's tattooed."
"Oh, yes. That must be a great help in listening to Miss Luscombe. He's been trained to suffer."
Miss Luscombe was talking rather loudly and most confidentially to Rathbone, who had an expression of willing—but agonised—martyrdom on his fair pink, clean-shaven features.
"Itolddear George Alexander that I would have been onlytoopleased to understudy Irene in the new piece—in fact, it would have just suited me, Mr. Rathbone, and left me plenty of time for my social engagements too. Besides, if I once got a chance of a part like that I feel I should have made a hit. Oh, it was a cruel disappointment! After being too charming to me—or, at any rate, I was charming to him at the Cashmores' reception, you know—I remember hewas standing in the refreshment-room with Mrs. Cashmore, and I wentstraightup to him and said, 'Don't you remember me, Mr. Alexander?'—and after all this he only promised me—and that conditionally—a horrid, silly little part in the curtain-raiser in No. 2 B Company on tour. On tour! Of course I refused that—one must keep up one's prestige, Mr. Rathbone. There's a great deal of injustice in the profession. Talent counts for nothing—it's all influence. But I've always had a great ambition ever since I was a little girl." Miss Luscombe put her head on one side and talked as she had to the interviewer ofThe Perfect Lady. "It was always my dream—do you know?—to marry a great actor—or, at any rate, to be his great friend—like Irving and Ellen Terry—that sort of thing—a great, lifelong friendship! And as a child I was madly in love with the elder George Grossmith, but I don't think he ever knew it. Too bad!"
She pouted childishly, gave her arch musical laugh with its three soprano notes and upward inflection, and then accepted a quail with a heavy sigh.
"When I was a boy," said Rathbone in a low concentrated voice of reminiscence—he spoke rather quickly, for he had been trying in vain during the whole of dinner to get a word in edgeways and feared to lose his chance now—"whenI was a boy I was in love, too, with some one on the stage. Between ourselves—you won't mention it, will you, Miss Luscombe?——"
"You can trust me," she said earnestly, with a look of Julia Neilson.
"Good! Well, I was in love, and I've got her initials—C. L.—tattooed on me now!"
"Impossible! How exciting! Who is C. L.?"
He looked round the table and murmured in a low voice, "Cissie Loftus. Isn't it odd? I wrote and told her about it, but I never received an answer to my letter."
"Poor, poor boy! I call that really touching! Will you show me the initials some day?"
"Oh no. Impossible." He was stern, adamantine. She hastily went on. "So you're very keen—interested in the stage, Mr. Rathbone?"
"Well, in the stage door. I collect programmes, and I haven't missed a first night since I was twenty!"
"Fancy! Then I ought to remember your face, at all the theatres!"
"I mean at the Gaiety," he said, "only the Gaiety."
"Oh, the Gaiety!" she turned her shoulder to him.
"Yes, Miss Daphne, if you would come out to New York you'd have a real good time. You'dturn all the young fellow's heads. I'm afraid you'd do a terrible amount of damage there. I should like to show you and Mrs. Wyburn Newport in the season, too. You ladies have it all your own way over the other side of——may I say, the herringpond?"
"Oh, please do; yes,dosay the herringpond!"
Daphne leant forward and said to Harry:
"Do you know who is that very distinguished-looking man who has just come in—rather weary and a little grey on the temples? He bowed and kissed the woman's hand so charmingly—at the next table to us. Looks like a great diplomatist."
"Then he must be a stockbroker," said Valentia decidedly. "Every one with the grand manner always is."
"Really! I can't say; I don't know any stockbrokers," said Miss Luscombe.
"How distinguished that sounds!" murmured Vaughan.
"It's very clever of you, Miss Luscombe," said Lady Walmer; "I don't see how you can help it! I know nobody else. I always tell Alec she'll have to marry one, and when she says she doesn't want to, 'My dear child,' I say, 'you can't marry people you don't see!' And almost the only people she ever sees at our housearestockbrokers—except a few soldiers who never have a penny."
Alec was the daughter, named after her distinguished godmother.
"It's quite gone out to be snobbish now," Lady Walmer continued in a lower voice to Harry. "We're all only too glad to take all we can get in exchange for anything we give!"
"And you don't call that snobbish?" said Harry.
"My dear, no!—of course, we give as little as possible. I talk like this and yet I married for love—and you know the result! Walmer's always gambling, always running after—goodness knows what—and leaves me—not quite in the gutter, but certainly on the kerb!"
"Don't you want Alec to marry for love?"
"I'm afraid she'll have to, my dear—she's not very attractive. It's a blessing she's an heiress. But if she's allowed to play hockey, and skate, and fence, and dance, and the husband is fairly kind to her, I'm sure she'll be happy—I mean, I have no idea of her marrying a duke, Harry. I shall be satisfied if he's a charming man, and not too selfish." She lowered her voice still more to add—"You know she likes you, poor child, don't you?"
"You're making fun of me, dear Lady Walmer."
"No, I'm not.... Walmer's taken 'Flying Fish' again, and after Cowes we're going for a long cruise. You must come with us. Her father will be all right. He lets me have my own way about her. Well, aren't you coming?"
"You're too frightfully kind, Lady Walmer, of course. But——"
"My dear boy, of course you're going to the Green Gate, but I wish you'd listen to a woman of the world. That," she gave Valentia a piercing glance, "can't go on for ever! You will find Romer making a row some day, and that will be a bore for you. He's just the sort of man who would."
Valentia, noticing their confidential tone and feeling instinctively that some treachery was in the air, looked once angrily at Harry and then became apparently absorbed in the conversation of Vaughan.
Every one was talking volubly and gaily. Only Daphne and Captain Foster were silent as they sat side by side looking at their plates. But they were the only people who had found the dinner a real success.
Harry, who with all hisusage du mondewas peculiarly subject to sudden obscure impulses as of the primitive man, became pale with a strange and painful sensation as he looked at Valentia.
She was flirting with Vaughan, or so every one present must be thinking. Of course it was only from pique, and he would soon put a stop to it.
And Vaughan, with his ironical glance and quiet manner, why did he look into her eyes all the time?
What was he saying?
Harry asked them all to come back to the studio for some music, but even as he made the arrangement to drive Valentia, he remembered that,Ã la fin des fins, he would have to leave her at her husband's house. Would Romer be sitting up? What an ass he was! What rot the whole dinner was! It was all through Van Buren. Van Buren was a fool. Confound Romer!
Harry was jealous.
"More flowers from Van Buren? Let me look at them. A spray of lilies of the valley; how touching! He expects you to wear them at the opera. I think it'ssucha mistake to wear real flowers on an evening dress. They have a damp, chilly look, like fresh vegetables, at first, and when they begin to fade they make you look faded, too. Never mind, Daphne; I think perhaps you'd better wear them just to-night," said Valentia.
"Yesterday," said Daphne, "he sent me that basket of American Beauty roses. The day before he sent me Ella Wheeler Wilcox's poems."
Valentia smiled. "Poor darling!—I mean Van Buren's a poor darling, not you. You see, he's got the nice sort of Boston idea that a man ought only to send a girl flowers or books, or music. He thinks it's respectful. But, anyway, it's a very good sign."
"A good sign? But I thought there was somuch of that sort of thing—I mean fuss and attention, to girls in America. I thought that didn't mean anything. I mean anything particular."
"Daphne, dear, don't blind yourself; don't shut your eyes to obvious facts. It isn't a matter of what you think or what I think, or of speculation at all. Ihappen to knowthat Van Burenisgoing to propose to you. He'll probably do it at Henley or at Sandown, or in the Park. He's certain to want it to be on a typically English background; but you can take it from me, for a dead cert, that it's bound to come."
Daphne sat down and looked serious.
"Valentia, it's no good. Don't let him do it. It will be so frightfully uncomfortable meeting him afterwards."
"Frightfully uncomfortable meeting the man to whom you're engaged? Why?"
"Because I shan't be engaged to him."
"Why not?"
"I shall never marry, Valentia."
Valentia stared at her in silence.
"What is your idea, darling? Why, you won't be eighteen till June. You can't be sure you'll never want to marry!"
"Well, I don't care for Van Buren."
"I thought you liked him so much?"
"Well, he seems all right at first. But I simply couldn't stand him always about."
"Couldn't you? Poor pet! But he mightn'tbealways about."
"Well, I couldn't stand his marked attention. Valentia, Ihatemarked attention."
"Do you, really? Who'd have thought it?"
"Well—and he'd always be so considerate and so thoughtful and so respectful!"
"That mightn't last when you were married," said Valentia consolingly.
"Perhaps he might not be so bad after we were once married.... But I shouldn't like to risk it. And the engagement! Oh! I couldn't simplystandthe engagement! Just think of the ring, and the sentiment, and the fuss, and the letters! Oh, he'd enjoy it all so much! Oh, it would make me simply sick to see how pleased he'd be!"
"I know that feeling," said Valentia sympathetically, nodding her head.
"Oh, and don't you see how he'd think he was engaged to a well-brought-up, nice English girl who was a relation of Harry's, and knew all the right people, and all that sort of thing? And he'd take a big house—he's hinted this to me already—most likely in Park Lane—anyhow, something just like a millionaire in a book. It's all so dull, and cut-and-dried."
"Some of these cut-and-dried obvious thingsturn out quite jolly afterwards. It's the uncomfortable, romantic things that are more often failures. And you know, Daphne, you do like pretty things and clothes, and going everywhere, and—not only that, he's really such a dear, and a good sort, and so good-looking! And you'd put me into a very awkward position with Harry if you refuse him. But, of course, darling, you must do as you like."
"Well, then, Valentia, don'tletme refuse him. I don't want to. Don't let it come to that. I'm sure I should loathe to hear him propose."
"Why?"
"It would make me sick."
"What can I tell Harry really as your reason for not being able to stand Van?"
"I'm sureIdon't know!"
"He bores you," announced Valentia. "That's what's the matter. He doesn't amuse you."
"It isn't that, it isn't that!" cried Daphne vehemently. "I don'twantto be amused. Do you think I like a man because he's clever, or funny, and always making jokes? That bores me frightfully. Harry's way of being lively and clever bores me todeath! I don't want to marry a professional entertainer! No, Valentia, that's more the sort of thing you'd like.You'requite sorry Romer's not like that."
"I don't suggest that it would be ideal tomarry Harry Lauder, Daphne dear. But wouldn't you really like someone fairly intelligent?"
"No. Why should I? Do you think I want to marry a man so horribly clever that he wouldn't understand a word I said?"
"Let's have it out, dear. What do you think you want?" Valentia answered herself; "It's Foster, of course! That dull, empty-headed, commonplace, hard-up, handsome boy. You can't marry him. He's just twenty-two, and has only a miserable allowance, and is in an expensive regiment, and you, darling, will only have three hundred a year. I should love to see you happy in your own way and having your wish, but don't you think it's a childish fancy? You're both children. Of course he hasn't suggested marriage, yet, has he? He knows perfectly well it's out of the question."
"Valentia! Darling! Why, he proposed to me the day we were introduced—at Prince's, and he's been doing it ever since."
"Oh, how utterly absurd of him! Well, anyhow, you must wait and see. Even if he could afford it, I don't think it would be a success. Why, there's nothing in the boy! What do you see in him?"
"I like the way he laughs," said Daphne, after a pause.
"Do you mind telling me one thing straightout? I'm being very nice to you about this, dear. I ought to scold you. But, at any rate, you must treat me with complete confidence."
"Of course, of course, dear."
"Tell me, he hasn't ever kissed you, has he?"
"Oh, Valentia!"
"I beg your pardon, darling. I felt sure he hadn't."
"Of course he has."
"He has!—Where?"
"How do you mean, where? Oh! at every dance where we've ever met. He always does, whenever he can. Is it so dreadful? He's such a boy!"
"Fancy your liking him enough for that!" said Valentia, stupefied.
"Oh, he's a darling; and the only person I ever could possibly marry."
"It's rather serious," said Valentia; "and poor Van who is so devoted!"
"He isn't, really," said Daphne decidedly.
"Don't you think so? Why?"
"Oh, the whole thing's anidea—the sort of thing hewants to do. It's not genuine."
"I should have thought the feelings of a man of thirty-four who could marry any one he chose would be more real than the fancy of a mere boy! Boys like anybody."
"Van isn't genuine like Cyril," said Daphne.
"Who on earth's Cyril?"
"Captain Foster."
Valentia walked round the room and then said—
"And you really suppose you're going to adore him all your life?"
"Isupposeso. I really don't know. I know about now. Oh, Valentia, be a darling and let him come to the fancy ball with us." She kissed her. "And, oh, do tell Harry to explain to Van that it can't go on, that he must put it out of his head. Do, darling Valentia. Any well-brought-up young girl will do for him just as well!"
"And wouldn't any well-brought-up young girl do for Cyril?"
"I don't know. But only Cyril will do for me. Oh! the jolly way he has of saying 'Righto' and 'You're all right,' and calling me 'little girl!' Oh, heisa dear!"
"Oh, well, if he says such brilliant things asthat!"
"It isn't what hesays——"
"Oh, hush, Daphne, here is Romer. I shan't tell him a word about it. Well, I'll think it over." She called Daphne back and said in a half-hearted way—
"I suppose it wouldn't do just to sort of please Harry by marrying Van, and then seeing that silly boy now and then. You'd so soon get tiredof him—but, no! that wouldn't be right. Forget that I said it—I don't mean it."
"I couldn't stand Van at all," said Daphne definitely, "whether I saw Cyril or not."
"Then you shan't be bothered with him. But can't you give up Cyril? I know I'm right about it. It isn't only the hard-upness and the impossibility—of course, I know he's got relations and all that—but, it's he himself. You'll get bored with him, too, in a different way."
"I like him so muchnow," pleaded Daphne.
Romer came in and Valentia merely told him at great length every word of the foregoing conversation with lavish comments by herself. Secretly Romer was bitterly disappointed when he realised that the possibility of his being left alone with his wife was more remote, but of course he agreed with Valentia, as she changed her mind a dozen times on the subject, and as usual the conversation ended in a telephone message to Harry to come round at once.
Van Buren had had many pleasures, many gratifications since he had been in London; his dreams—the dreams inspired by Du Maurier's drawings when he was a little boy—had been very nearly realised. Perhaps the greatest triumph that he had had yet was the evening of the Artists' Fancy Ball.
He had succeeded in making up a party to go in costume. He was always making up parties, and he had for many years been obsessed by a longing to dress up.
Harry, in mockery of his passion for everything English, had advised him to go as an Ancient Briton, with a coat of blue paint. Scorning such ribald chaff, he had ordered a magnificent costume of chain armour. Greatly to his satisfaction he had persuaded Hereford Vaughan to go as Shakespeare, Valentia and Daphne respectively as Portia in scarlet and Rosalind in green.
A large party were to dine at Van Buren's rooms before the ball. Fancy dress has the effect of bringing out odd, unexpected little characteristics in people. For example, Harry, good-looking and a dandy, quite a romantic type, hated dressing up, and cared nothing whatever about his costume; while Romer, the sober and serious, enjoyed it immensely, and appeared to think his appearance of the utmost importance—almost a matter of life and death.
The women were far less self-conscious in costume than the men, and cared far less how they looked, probably because women are always more or less in fancy dress, and it was not so much of a novelty to them.
Valentia had pointed out that Shakespeare, to be quite correct, should wear ear-rings; so Vaughan called at her house on the way to Van Buren's, as she had promised to lend him some.
"He won't know how to put them on," said Daphne, drawing on her long boots. "Probably he hasn't had his ears pierced; you must go and screw them on for him."
Valentia ran down. Just as she was screwing the long coral and pearl ear-rings with rather painful energy on to the unfortunate young man's ears, the servant, with a slight expression of terror that could not be concealed, announced—
"Mrs. Wyburn."
The situation was really rather comic. Romer's mother, who was going to a dinner-party in the same street, could not forgo the pleasure of calling unexpectedly on them at half-past seven, vaguely hoping that it might be inconvenient to them, and that she would catch them in something they didn't want her to know—a true mother's instinct. But not in her wildest dreams had she expected what she saw when she entered the drawing-room—her daughter-in-law in her red mortar-board, red cloak and bands, with, apparently, her arms round the neck of a young man in purple silk stockings and jewelled embroidered gloves with rings outside them.
Mrs. Wyburn literally sank into a chair.
Valentia was perfectly equal to the occasion. She thoroughly enjoyed the baffling of Mrs. Wyburn.
"I can't think why Romer didn't tell you," she repeated several times, "that Van Buren is giving a dinner for the fancy ball!" and she rang and gave orders that her husband and sister were to come down immediately.
Romer had been four hours dressing; Daphne about ten minutes.
"I do think you ought to have a little make-up. Will you?" said Valentia to Vaughan.
"I should love to," he answered, to Mrs. Wyburn's disgust and horror, looking in theglass and taking very little notice of the indignant old lady.
"Hedoesneed just a touch of lip-salve and a little black under the eyes, don't you think so?" Valentia asked, caressingly, pretending to consult Mrs. Wyburn.
"I can't say, I'm sure. I've no idea what he wants," said Mrs. Wyburn with a snap.
"But don't you think it would improve him, darling?" Valentia went on, holding her head on one side and holding up her hand as if she were looking at a picture.
"Not at all," said Mrs. Wyburn.
"Then do you think his lips are red enough already?" asked Valentia.
Vaughan hastily interrupted the absurd discussion.
"The human lip is never red enough," he said decidedly; "they ought to be bright, light scarlet."
"That's just what I think. I've got some lovely scarlet stuff—the colour of sealing-wax. Shall I fetch it for you?"
"Yes, do," he said.
"But won't it look rather——"
"No; merely decent," said the young man decidedly.
"And what does Romer say toall this?" saidMrs. Wyburn with a forced smile and a voice trembling with uncontrollable rage.
"Oh, he likes it, darling. He loves it. No one's been so keen about their dress as Romer. I'll go and fetch him, and my roll of parchment—I had forgotten my roll of parchment."
She ran upstairs and came down saying—
"Romer won't be a minute, dear; he's awfully anxious for you to see his dress. He's just darkening his eyelashes. That's all. He's Louis XIX or something, you know."
She then deliberately and openly drew Vaughan to the window where there was still bright June daylight and painted his lips a brilliant scarlet to their mutual satisfaction and Mrs. Wyburn's unspeakable horror.
"Mad," murmured Mrs. Wyburn, half to herself, "quite mad! I shall be quite upset for the Trott-Hellyers' dinner-party. It's Dr. Trott-Hellyers' birthday. He onlylivesthree doors from you" (she said this rather reproachfully), "and I dine with himeveryyear on his birthday! And to think I only came in to see my son for a minute or two, because I couldn't bear to pass his door ... his very door...."
"Sweet of you," said Valentia.
... "And then to think I should find——" She screamed suddenly.
Daphne had come in, in her green cloak, doublet and hose, and little green cap, Romer in paint and powder, patches and lace ruffles, sword and snuffbox. There was a lavish amount of rouge on his cheeks and his eyes were blacked almost to the temples.
Hearing that his mother was there he had finished the left eye rather hurriedly, the result being that he looked as if he had been fighting.
While the poor lady was trying to adjust herself to this sight, and explaining for the sixth time why she was there, and making bitter remarks about a young girl going to a ball in what she (Mrs. Wyburn) called trousers, and while Daphne kept on wrapping herself in the folds of her cloak and then undoing them again to show her nice high boots, she was still more distressed at the arrival of herbête noireand mortal enemy, Harry de Freyne.
Van Buren had sent his motor for them, containing Harry.
Had his name not been announced by the servant, Mrs. Wyburn would certainly not have recognised Harry. He was a pierrot in white satin, with a violet tulle ruffle round his neck and a black velvet mask. One would know him solely by his single eye-glass, his pleasant voice, and fluent conversation.
Pretending to be a clown he jumped in,bowed low to Mrs. Wyburn, and kissed first Daphne and then Valentia.
With a last-straw expression Mrs. Wyburn drew herself up to her full height.
"Give me my cloak, Romer. I must go. No, don't come to the carriage with me. Suppose the Trott-Hellyers were to see you—they'd never get over it!"
"Why, it's all right, mother," Romer answered. "I'm all right. I'm a courtier—of the tenth century—you know. I'm all right."
"And you approve of your young sister-in-law going to a public ball dressed up as a man?"
"Rosalind wasn't a man, mother. You forget; you must read theMidsummer Night's Dreamagain. You've forgotten it."
"I shan't find Rosalind there. But that's not the point. When I came in I found Valentia with that man—the man who writes in purple knickerbockers——"
"No, he doesn't—he never writes in purple knickerbockers."
"Is this meant to be witty?" she asked with a freezing glare.
"What? No, I shouldn't think so."
"I foundyour wife," she said in a low hissing voice, as they passed through the hall where there was a large looking-glass—Romer's attentionwandered—"within an inch of that young man's face, putting ear-rings in his ears!"
"Well, she couldn't put them in a mile off," said Romer absently.
He was now frankly turning his back on his mother, and staring at his face in the glass.
"Hang it all! I don't look so bad, do I?"
"You look a gentleman," she answered coldly; "any son of mine must look a gentleman. Of course, you look ridiculous—and, as far as that goes, youareridiculous; but that doesn't matter quite so much as long as you look a gentleman."
"Oh, rot!"
Romer was trying to move a patch from one corner of his eye to the other.
"But as to Harry de Freyne?... And shall you allow your wife to dance with him in that costume?"
"Of course—why not? And—doesn'tValentia look—jolly?"
"I think the scarlet with her golden hair is rather too—striking," she answered spitefully.
"Oh,she'sall right!"
"I think you're all mad!" she answered as she reached the door.
The servant opened it.
"Oh, we're all right. Good night, mother. You'll be late for the Trott-Hellyers."
Drawing her cloak over her narrow shoulders, Mrs. Wyburn stepped angrily into the brougham.
Although it was only three doors from her son's house, she would not for the world have walked.
When she arrived there, still in a very bad temper at all she had seen, she nevertheless boasted to her neighbour about how remarkably distinguished and handsome her son and daughter-in-law had looked in costume, and of their success, charm, perfect domestic happiness, and importance and perfection generally.
She succeeded in depressing the fossils on both sides of her, but they smiled at each other, indulgent to the feminine weakness of so amiable and devoted a mother.
Miss Luscombe lived with her mother in a species of tank, or rather in a flat that gave that impression because it was in the basement. It was dark, and such glimpses as they had of people passing on the pavement were extremely odd; it seemed a procession of legs and skirts, like something in a pantomime or a cinematograph.
The Luscombes lived, as it were, beneath the surface; but that did not prevent their being very muchdans le mouvement, and coming up with great frequency to the surface to breathe. And when one had once walked down the steps and found one's way into the tank, it was an extremely pleasant one, and quite artistic. It seemed original, too. There was something almost freakish in being answered by the parlourmaid (who was suitably like a fish in manner and profile), "Miss Luscombe is at home, and will you please step downstairs?" when one had rungthe bell on the ground floor. And Miss Luscombe's ringing laugh with its three soprano notes and upward cadence always greeted one charmingly and cordially, and one always liked her; one couldn't help it. Her great fault was that she was never alone. She existed in an atmosphere of teaparties and 'afternoons'; like the Lotus-Eaters, she lived in 'that land where it was always afternoon'.
For an obscure person she led a singularly public life. In her existence there seemed no secrets, no shadows, no contrasts, and no domesticity. One could never imagine her except in what she regarded as full dress, nor without, by her side, a perpetual bamboo table with three little shelves in it, in which were distributed small cut pieces of very yellow cake with very black currants, sandwiches, made of rather warm thin bread and butter, pink and white cocoanut biscuits, and constant relays of strong dark tea made in a drab china teapot. On crowded afternoons—in fact, every other Thursday—little coffee cups containing lumpy iced coffee were also handed round. When they had music there were lemonade, mustard and cress sandwiches, and a buffet.
Even when Miss Luscombe was entirely alone she did not seem so. She had got into the habit of talking always as if she were surrounded bycrowds, and said so much about the celebrities who ought to have turned up that one felt almost as depressed as if they had really been there. Sometimes they came, for there was no one like Miss Luscombe for firmness. Also, she was never offended and was hospitality itself, and she had a way of greeting one that was a reward for all one's trouble—it seemed much more trouble than it really was, somehow, just to step down into the tank. And she was so charming no one could help being flattered till the next visitor arrived, when she was even more charming.
After the Fancy Ball she had got hold of Valentia, who came to see her on one of those Thursdays that she had pointed out as peculiarly her own—one ofmyThursdays. She really believed that for any one else to receive on that day was a kind of infringement of copyright.
Miss Luscombe was wearing on this occasion a drab taffeta silk dress with transparent sleeves and a low neck. She wore a rose in her hair, a necklace, and long gloves, because she said she wouldn't have time to dress again before going out to dinner.
About a dozen people were there—vague shamefaced young men with nothing to say, and confident, satirical, fluent young men with a great deal to laugh at. Most of the older womenseemed a shade patronising in tone, and looked as if they had never been there before. On the faces of the young women and the girls could be read the resolution never to go there again.
Mrs. Luscombe, the mother, was so refined that there was scarcely anything of her; her presence was barely perceptible. She had learnt the art of self-effacement to the point of showing no trace of being there at all. To add to the effect of not being noticeable, she wore a dress exactly the same colour as the sofa on which she sat—like those insects who, when hiding from their foes, become the colour of the leaves on which they live. She was practically invisible.
On the other hand, Miss Luscombe herself was very much there—very muchen évidence. Smiling, greeting, archly laughing, sweetly pouting; coquetting, eating, playing, singing, acting—almost dancing—an ideal and delightful hostess.
She said to every one as they arrived how sweet it was of them to come so early, or how naughty it was of them to come so late, or how horrid it was of them not to come last time, or how dear it would be of them if they came next. She always introduced people to each other who were not on speaking terms, and had intentionally cut each other for years. She had a real genius for making people accidentally meet whohad just broken off their engagement, or had some other awkward reason for not wishing to see each other—and then pushing them together so that they could not get away. At heart she was intensely a peacemaker, but people who had met there rarely made up their quarrels.
When the favourite actor arrived she introduced him to every one till he was ready to drop, and when the great singer telegraphed he couldn't come, she showed the wire to everybody. Most of the guests preferred his not coming. Very few could have endured her triumph had he really arrived. On the other hand, they would themselves have far preferred to receive a telegram of refusal rather than not to hear from him at all.
When these entertainments were over and the mother and daughter were left alone, the daughter became far more thoroughly artificial than she was when surrounded by her friends. There was no throwing off the mask; on the contrary, it was fixed more firmly on, and Miss Luscombe gave free vent to her sham passion for imitation comedy.
On this particular Thursday, as soon as Flora Luscombe had laughed her last visitor archly to the door, she knelt by her mother's side, put her arms round her, and said—
"Dear, dear Mummy, how sweet it is to be alone!"
Mrs. Luscombe shrank back a little. This pet name, only too appropriate, always got a little on her nerves, but she felt bound to play up in an amateurish sort of way to a certain extent.
"Hadn't you better go and take off that beautiful dress?" she said. "You're not really dining out, are you?"
"No, dearest, I managed to get out of it, but alas! I've got to go to the Reception—you know—that horrid Royal Institution of Water Colours—afterwards. It isn't worth while to change again. Oh, how weary one does get of the continual round! And then to-morrow!" She sighed.
"What is it to-morrow?"
"To-morrow! Don't talk of it! There's Mrs. Morris's At Home in Maida Hill, and then right at the other end of London the Hyslop-Dunn's in Victoria Grove. Oh, dear! And yet one feels one must beseenat all these places, darling, or else it's remarked at once."
"You live too much for the world," replied her mother, tidying up some half-finished watercress sandwiches with a sharp knife. She wondered if, thus repaired, they would do for next Thursday.
"You know, Mummy dear, that's the worstof our terrible profession. We must keep before the public, or else we drop out and are forgotten. What a sweet creature Valentia Wyburn is! I thought she was quite, quite dear. And the husband and the cousin are darlings too. Of course they wouldn't come; I couldn't get them to an afternoon."
She got up and looked in the glass.
"What a crowd there was to-day! Three people came up to the front door at the same time. I think they enjoyed themselves, don't you? Though I feel I can't pay every one proper attention when there's such a crush, but I do my little best.... Mr. Simpson came up to me and told me I looked quite wonderful. But he's a silly thing." She pouted and put her head on one side. "Did I look too hideous, darling?"
"Beautiful, of course. The only thing is ..."
Miss Luscombe clapped her hands and laughed.
"Did its little girlie really look as nice as all that? Oh, Mummy, Mummy!"
"Charming, dear, I only wish that ..."
"It's too proud of its little daughter, that's what it is," said Miss Luscombe, sitting on the arm of her mother's chair. "It's a silly, vain, conceited mother, that it is. It can't see any fault in its pet."
She tried to pat her mother's cheek. Mrs.Luscombe moved aside with justifiable irritation.
"Don't do that, Flora! Yes, dear, of course, I think you're wonderful, and looked sweet to-day; but I do wish ..."
"No, no, it doesn't want anything," said Flora.
"I should be so pleased—if you'd put on just a little less lip-salve and not quite so much of that bluish powder."
Having succeeded in completing her sentence, her mother got up and faded quickly out of the room and shut the door, leaving Flora looking quite surprised and rather upset with being found fault with.
Indeed, she did not quite recover her equanimity until she had looked over the cards in the hall and put on a great deal more powder and lip-salve, after which she told her mother perhaps she was right, and in any case she, Flora, would always do what she asked, and would always follow her dear, dear Mummy's advice.
She was so charming and amiable that Mrs. Luscombe pretended to believe her, and said it wassweetof her to take it all off and go out that evening without any adventitious aids to beauty; and this she said in spite of the obvious fact that Flora had evidently put on considerably more than usual.
The elder Mrs. Wyburn was seated at the gloomy window of her sulky-looking house in Curzon Street one bright day in the season, looking out with some anxiety.
"Of course she's late; but if that woman doesn't come I'll never forgive her. She's a silly fool, but at least she does hear what's going on," she reflected.
At this moment an old-fashioned-looking victoria drove up, drawn by two large grey horses. In it sat a rather fat and important-looking lady, with greyish red hair, a straight decided mouth, and several firm chins. Her most marked characteristic was her intense decision on trivialities. She was always curiously definite on the vaguest of subjects, and extraordinarily firm and sensible about nothing in particular.
Miss Westbury was a rich unmarried woman, with a peculiarly matronly appearance, a good-naturedlove of giving advice, and with views that obviously dated—one did not know exactly from when. If she had some of the Victorian severities of the sixties, she had also many of the sentimental vagaries of the eighties. The serious business of her life was gossip. In her lighter moments she collected autographs. But her gossip differed from that of the nervous, impatient Mrs. Wyburn in that it was far more pompous and moral, and not nearly so spiteful and accurate.
Miss Westbury sailed in—I need hardly say she was dressed in heliotrope—and sat down rather seriously in a large—and the only comfortable—armchair.
"My dear Millie, how extremely good of you to come!" exclaimed Mrs. Wyburn.
Miss Westbury had been christened Maria, but Millie was the name which she had chosen to be called by her friends.
"I am very pleased to come, dear Isabella. To call on you on one of your Wednesdays is, I know, quite hopeless if one has anything to say. To call on any one on a day at home, except as a mere matter of form, I do not consider sensible."
"Quite so. Will you have some tea?"
Mrs. Wyburn rang the bell rather fretfully.She did not care for Millie's made conversation, and hated her way of gaining time.
"I will have what I always have, dear Mrs. Wyburn, at five o'clock, if I may—hot water with one teaspoonful of milk, and a saccharine tablet which I bring with me. I am not a faddist, and I think all those sort of fancies about what is and what is not good for one are exceedingly foolish; but when I go in for a régime, dear, I give it a fair chance. Otherwise there is no sense in it!"
She settled herself still more sensibly and decidedly in her chair.
"I wonder," said Mrs. Wyburn nervously—one could see she was not listening, and thought Miss Westbury was merely drivelling on—"whether you will come to the point at once? It would be a great comfort if you would. I have been feeling quite anxious about your visit. I rather foolishly took some coffee after lunch, and it kept me awake the whole afternoon—either that, or my anxiety."
"If you take coffee after lunch," replied Miss Westbury, "you should take it made as I do. Two teaspoonfuls of coffee in a large breakfast-cup full of hot water, a saccharine tablet, and a teaspoonful of condensed——"
"What was it you really heard, Millie dear,about my daughter-in-law?" interrupted Mrs. Wyburn sharply.
Here the footman brought in the tea. Miss Westbury frowned, and ostentatiously changed the subject.
"Have you been to the Grafton? I was persuaded to go. I think, myself, there's a great deal too much fuss made about pictures nowadays. When one thinks of the money that's wasted on them, when it might be sent to a hospital, it makes one's blood boil! And some of those that are made the most fuss about—both the Old Masters and the very new ones—these post-men, or whatever they're called—seem to me perfect nonsense. A daub and a splash—no real trouble taken—and then you're expected to rave about it. There's one man—some one wants me to buy a picture of his—he paints all his pictures in tiny squares of different colours; when you're close you can't see anything, but it seems that if you walk five feet away it forms into a kind of pattern. It seems it's the tessellated school, and they tell me that in a few years nothing else will count. And what I thought was a mountain in a mist turns out to be 'A Nun with cows grazing.' Silly nonsense I call it!"
"Was the nun grazing, or the cows?" asked Mrs. Wyburn.
"Goodness knows, dear. Then there was that other one called Waning Day, or something. Two people in a boat sailing on dry land! Then that picture of a purple man with a green beard! Oh, my dear! The people who took me there told me it was full of—something French—essayage, ormouvement, I think. The man who tried to make me buy it said it was symbolical. But of course I refused. You know I never have anything to do with nonsense. Well now, my dear——" Taking pity on Mrs. Wyburn's extreme impatience, Miss Westbury came a little nearer. "What I heard was simply this. My cousin, Jane Totness, took her little boy, who is in London for the holidays, to the British Museum. She always likes to improve his mind as much as possible; besides, he had been promised a treat after having a tooth out; the first week of the holidays he always has a tooth out and a treat after. Jane is like that; she's a sensible woman, and I must say I think she brings her boys up very well. I myself might have been more inclined to take him to Madame Tussaud's, or even to a matinée, or to have an ice at Buzzard's; but I dare say I'm old-fashioned enough in some ways, and Jane knows her own business best."
"No doubt she does," said Mrs. Wyburn, quivering with impatience, tapping her foot onthe floor, and trying to restrain herself. "And so she took the little boy—Charlie, isn't it?—to the British Museum? Go on, dear!"
"Not Charlie, Mrs. Wyburn. It was little Laurence—little Laurence. He was called Laurence after his grandfather, Lord Dorking. It's the rule in the Totness family; the second son is always called after the grandfather, the eldest son after his father, and the third son—I mean, of course, if there is one—after the mother's father. Don't you think it's a very sensible plan, dear?"
Mrs. Wyburn gave her friend first a sympathetic smile, and then a murderous glance.
"Yes. Well?"
"Oh yes. Well, she was just pointing out something to little Laurence—he's an intelligent boy, and I dare say he was enjoying it very much—when, to her great surprise,whoshould she see but Mrs. Romer Wyburn, talking away like anything on a seat with—who do you think?"
"Who?"
"That young man Harry de Freyne—her cousin, isn't it?"
"How extraordinary!" exclaimed Mrs. Wyburn. "Did they seem uncomfortable when they saw Jane?"
"Oh dear, no, my dear. They seemed most comfortable. Jane bowed to them—of course rather coldly, she says—and they smiled and nodded, and Valentia kissed her hand to Laurence. Of course, Jane was very much pained and shocked about it all. I must say her first thought, dear, was that I should tell you. Jane Totness is a thoroughly good woman—so thoughtful."
"Do you see anything so very peculiar about it?" said Mrs. Wyburn. "You know, the young man—I disapprove of him as strongly as any one can—but he's an artist, and she is his cousin, and perhaps he wanted to show her something in the British Museum?"
"My dear Mrs. Wyburn, far be it from me to look on the dark side of things, but, as Jane said, who on earth would go to the British Museum, unless they were dragged there by force, except to have a private interview?"
"But if he wanted to speak to her alone, I don't see why he shouldn't call on her."
"That's just it. If it were a simple, innocent, harmless conversation, that is what he would have done. But it was quite clear that there was something clandestine about it, and you may be quite sure Romer knew nothing of it. Besides, they are always together."
"It does look odd," said Mrs. Wyburn. "Whatwould you advise me to do? Shall I speak to my son or my daughter-in-law about it?"
"To neither, my dear. If you speak only to your son, he will tell her, and she will get round him, and prove there's nothing in it. If you speak to her she will get round you, and say that Romer knew all about it. My advice is, if you really want to put a stop to this flirtation—I'm sure it's gossiped about—even Jane, who is the last person in the world to talk, speaks of it to every one. If I were you, I would speak to the young man himself."
"To Harry de Freyne? Yes, it's rather a good idea."
It struck Mrs. Wyburn that to do this would, perhaps, cause more annoyance than anything else. She was now anxious to get rid of Miss Westbury, who evidently had nothing more to impart. But that lady was not so easy to dispose of. She broke into a long monologue on the subject of régime, servants, and little dressmakers, occasionally returning to the subject of the British Museum, and the shocking frivolity there.
Mrs. Wyburn was just thinking of having a violent toothache or some other ill, when Miss Westbury suddenly made up her mind to depart.
As soon as she had gone Mrs. Wyburn flewto the Blue Book, looked up Harry's address, and wrote him the following note:—
"Dear Mr. de Freyne,"Probably you hardly remember me, but I have met you on two or three occasions at the house of my daughter-in-law, Mrs. Romer Wyburn. There is something I want to say to you which I hardly like to write. I should be glad if you would come and see me to-morrow afternoon at four o'clock. I shall not keep you long. You may think this a strange request, knowing you so slightly as I do, but when we meet, I am sure you will understand."Yours truly,"Isabella Wyburn."
"Dear Mr. de Freyne,
"Probably you hardly remember me, but I have met you on two or three occasions at the house of my daughter-in-law, Mrs. Romer Wyburn. There is something I want to say to you which I hardly like to write. I should be glad if you would come and see me to-morrow afternoon at four o'clock. I shall not keep you long. You may think this a strange request, knowing you so slightly as I do, but when we meet, I am sure you will understand.
"Yours truly,"Isabella Wyburn."
Having written this note, Mrs. Wyburn felt too impatient to send it by post; she was simply longing to know that Harry was feeling uncomfortable, as he was very certain to feel when he got the letter. Although she had a great suspicion and general dislike of the Messenger Boy Service, she relented for once in their favour so far as to make use of them, and the letter was sent by hand.
She was rewarded for thus conquering her prejudice. Harry was at home, and accepted herinvitation with most respectful alacrity. His manners—especially on paper—were, with old and young ladies, always equally perfect—unless he was out of temper.
Mrs. Wyburn eagerly hoped Harry would see Valentia, or somehow convey to her about the letter, because it would be sure to make her uneasy also.
The next day the young man was punctual to the moment. The old lady left him alone for a few minutes in the dark, dismal drawing-room. She thought it would have a salutary effect.
She found him, when she came in, stroking the china bird, and looking at himself in the mirror above it.
He received her with such charming grace that she felt almost disconcerted, and as if she ought to apologise.
"You received my letter?" she said, rather abruptly.
"With great pleasure. That is why I am here."
He was still standing, smiling delightfully.
"Sit down," she said, with cold graciousness. "I hope you are not in a great hurry?"
"All my day belongs to you," he replied with a low bow, taking the seat she had indicated.He looked at her with soft deference under his long eyelashes.
She found what she had to say more difficult than she had expected. She spoke quietly, in a low yet rasping voice, with a sharp dignity.
"I will come straight to the point. To put it plainly, a report has reached my ears, Mr. de Freyne, which has caused me very great pain and anxiety—I mean, as a mother. And I wondered whether you——"
"As a mother? Surely, Mrs. Wyburn, nothing against Romer? I'm sure I, as one of his oldest friends...."
"Against Romer!" She drew herself up stiffly. "Most certainly not! There's never been a word breathed otherwise than in dear Romer's favour since he was a little boy."
Harry appeared much relieved.
"It's a great comfort to hear you say that. It's only what I was going to assure you."
"Besides, do you suppose for one moment that if I had any fault to find with my son I should send for you?"
She already had an annoying fancy that he was defeating her, laughing at her, and turning the tables.
"It seemed certainly rather strange," Harry said.
"No, indeed! When I say I was troubled as amother, I meant it in a very different sense. What I'm afraid of is that dear Romer might be worried if he heard the report to which I refer."
"And that is?..."
She looked at him spitefully, yet with a reluctant admiration.
He was irritatingly good-looking, good-humoured, and at his ease, and particularly well-dressed, without appearing in the least conscious of it. She wished immensely that he had been plain, or awkward, or even out at elbows, or absurdly dandified, or lookednouveau riche, or something! She felt jealous of him for Romer, and, at the back of her brain, she grudgingly and perversely sympathised a little with her daughter-in-law. Harry radiated a peculiar charm for women of all ages. He did not study them nor try very much to please them; the fascination was involuntary; he simply used it.
"And that is, that you and my daughter-in-law, Valentia, were seenalone——" she paused a moment, showing a latent instinct for dramatic effect.
He smiled a little more, and bent his head forward with every sign of intelligent interest.
She spoke with emphasis.
"Alone—the other morning—at the British Museum!"
Somehow she felt the shot had missed fire. It had fallen flat. It was less effective than she had hoped. It did not sound so very shocking after all.
He continued to smile with the air of waiting for the climax. She gathered herself together and went on—
"I heard it from Miss Westbury, so it is a fact!"
Harry thought of saying that he preferred an old wives' tale any day to an old maid's fact, but he only smiled on.
"Of course, if this is untrue, Mr. de Freyne—if it is a mistake, or a false report, you have merely to deny it. Assure me it is incorrect—on your word of honour—and I will then contradict it in the proper quarter."
He decided on his line. "My dear lady, pray don't contradict it. As a report it is a gem—it is unique. Not merely because it's absolutely true—for, as a matter of fact, I think most reports are—but because of its utter unimportance! It seems to me so trivial—so dull—so wanting in interest to the general public."
"You think reports are usually true, Mr. de Freyne?"
"I am convinced they are. I believe firmly in the no-smoke-without-fire theory. Oh, do you know, I think it issotrue!... This certainly is true—it's a solemn fact."
"You admit it?"
"I do indeed! Surely I could hardly refuse to go when I was asked?"
"Oh, you were asked?"
"Certainly. And Romer is really such a very old friend of mine, I could hardly refuse his request. I may be wrong, but I think one should always be ready to take a little trouble for an old friend."
"No doubt you have very strict ideas on the duties and obligations of friendship! Athisrequest—my son's?"
"Yes; your son asked me to go and escort Valentia."
"It is very peculiar; you must see that your explanation sounds extremely odd."
"Not at all odd," he answered softly, "if you will allow me to contradict you." He thought a moment. Then he went on: "You may have heard, perhaps, about the dance that little American, Mrs. Newhaven, is getting up at the Grafton Galleries forDeaf and Dumb Dogs and Cats. No? Well, every one is going, and they're arranging to have, by way of novelty, Quadrilles of different nationalities. Romer and his wife are to dance in the Egyptian Quadrille, and he asked me to take her to the British Museum to look round and see if we could find some inspiration for Egyptian costumes that wouldn't be too impossible. But when we got there, wesuddenly remembered the awful story about one of the mummies being unlucky, so we went into the Print Room and remained there."