CHAPTER VI
A FORTNIGHT later Lee scanned her new boudoir with complacency and pride. The large tower-room beneath the suite above had been cleared of its rubbish, and she had availed herself to the full of Lady Barnstaple’s careless permission to take what she liked. Lee liked beautiful things, and, having been surrounded by many during the greater part of her life, regarded the best that could be had as her natural right. Therefore her stone walls had disappeared behind ancient tapestries, which she had thoughtfully selected from different rooms, that they might not be missed. Round two sides of the room ran a deep divan, made by a village carpenter, which was covered with Persian rugs, and cushions of many, but harmonious styles. Persian rugs also covered the floor. Some of the furniture was carved, high-backed, and ancient, cut with the Maundrell arms; other pieces were modern and luxurious. In two of the window-seats, which were five feet deep, were cushions, in the others noble marbles and bronzes. The room was further glorified by a writing-table which had belonged to Charles II., a wonderful brass and ivory chest with secret drawers which had been the property of Katherine of Aragon, an ancientspinet with a modern interior, a table inlaid with lapis-lazuli, a tortoise-shell cabinet, and a low bookcase curiously carved. On the mantel, heavily draped with the spoils of an obscure window, and on the top of the bookcase, were not too many bibelots, selected after much thought and comparison. The tapestries could meet across the narrow windows at night, but flat against the glass were silk curtains of a pale yellow colour, as a background for the marbles and bronzes. Altogether, Lee felt that she had some reason to be proud of her taste.
She sat down to await her father-in-law. He was kept at home by a sprained wrist, and she had invited him to be the first to pay her a call. He entered in a few moments, raised his eyebrows, then gave vent to a chuckle of unusual length.
“What amuses you?” asked Lee, rather tartly. “Don’t you think my room is pretty?”
“Oh, it’s charming! It’s close to being the prettiest room in the house. I congratulate you. You have excellent taste—and you are delicious!”
Lee never expected to understand her father-in-law, and felt little inclination to attempt the dissecting of him; she merely begged him to take the most comfortable chair, placed a cushion under his elbow, and sat down opposite him with an expression of genuine welcome; she liked him so much better than she liked Emmy that she was almost persuaded that she loved him. And he had been consistently kind and polite to her, whereas her mother-in-law had twice been the victim of a “mood,” and cut her dead in the corridors.
“It’s just as well to tell you,” said Lord Barnstaple, “that if Emmy happens to come to this room when she’s in one of her infernal tempers, she’ll raise the deuce of a row, and order you to send these things where they came from. If she does, stand to your guns, and tell her I gave ’em to you. They’re mine, not hers. Don’t refer her to me, for God’s sake! You’re quite able to take care of yourself.”
“She shan’t have them—and thanks so much. You can smoke if you like. I’ll light it for you.”
“Upon my word, I believe this will be the pleasantest room in the house—a haven of refuge! Well, how do you like us? What do you think of us? You’re an interesting child. I’m curious to hear your impressions.”
“I must say I do feel rather like a child since I came over here”—Lee made this admission with a slight pout—“and I thought I was quite a person-of-the-world after two winters in San Francisco and one in the East.”
“Oh, we’re pickled; you’re only rather well seasoned over there. But do you like us?”
“Yes—I think I do. The women are very nice to me, and although I don’t understand half they say, and they are quite unlike all my old ideals, and I’m never exactly sure whether they’ll speak to me the next time they see me, I feel as if I’d get on with them. I must say, though, I don’t see any reason why I should attempt to make myself over into a bad imitation of them, like Emmy——”
“Some of them—your countrywomen—are such jolly good imitations—that they no longer amusethe Prince of Wales. Emmy happens to be a fool.”
“The men look as if they’d be really charming if they could talk about anything but grouse, and I had one last night at dinner who was so tired he never made one remark from the time he sat down till he got up.”
“Men are not amusing during the shooting season; but, after all, my dear, men were not especially designed to amuse women.”
“That’s your way of looking at it.”
“Do you expect Cecil to amuse you?”
“Cecil has stayed home with me three whole days, and we’ve roamed all over the place, and had the jolliest times imaginable. He has a lot of fun in him when he has nothing on his mind.”
“I never attempt to discuss men during those periods when they are engaged in proving the rule. Cecil is in love. Long may he remain so”—he waved his uninjured hand gallantly—“but unless I am much mistaken, the longer you know him the less amusing you will find him. It is the prerogative of greatness to be dull. England is the greatest nation on earth, and is as dull as befits its dignity—mind you, I don’t say stupid, which is a wholly different quantity. Conversely, many of the most brilliant men living are Englishmen, but they are not great in the national sense. ReadThe Times, and you will see what I mean.”
“Do you think Cecil has it in him to be great?” asked Lee eagerly.
“Sometimes I’ve thought so. He has as good abrain for its age as there is in England, and I believe he’s ambitious. Do you think he is?”
“I can’t make out. I don’t think he knows, himself.”
“He’ll find out as soon as he’s in the running. Just now I fancy he imagines himself oppressed with the weight of family traditions, which I have neglected. But there are no half measures about him, and if he develops ambition he’ll make straight for the big prizes. It will be all or nothing.”
“I hope he’s ambitious.”
“Ah! Ambition is an exacting mistress—a formidable rival!”
“I’d not be afraid of that; I don’t know that I can explain.”
“Do—try.” Lord Barnstaple could be very charming when he chose; he tossed aside his cynical impassivity as it were a mask, and assumed an expression of profound and tender interest. His son was the only living being that he loved, and he had planned for an uninterrupted interview with Lee in order to ascertain, as far as was possible, what were Cecil’s prospects of happiness. He liked and admired his daughter-in-law as far as he knew her, but he despised and distrusted all women, and he had heretofore hated Americans with monotonous consistency.
Lee was very susceptible to a warm personal interest, and this was the first she had experienced in England. And she was in a surcharged state of mind to speak out freely at the first sign of unmistakablesympathy. Lord Barnstaple took the one step farther that was necessary.
“I am not given to sentimentalising, but I love Cecil. And next to him, I want you to regard me as your best friend in England.”
He was rewarded and somewhat taken aback by an enthusiastic hug and a kiss on either cheek. He laughed, but he felt more amiably disposed toward Americans.
“Now, tell me,” he said, “why do you want Cecil to be ambitious? Do you want a great politicalsalon?”
“I shouldn’t mind a bit, but that’s not the reason. The more Cecil wanted of life, the more he’d be dependent on me for consolation and encouragement—the most successful have so many disappointments. If he went through life animated by duty alone, content with the niche he drifted into, he’d close up at all points, become a mere spoke in the wheel, without a weak spot that I could get at. And then hewouldbe dull. It’s in Cecil to become terribly solid or to spread out in several different directions. I want him to spread out.”
“Ah! I see you have done some thinking, if you are a mere child.”
“I’m no child—really. I took care of my mother and did all her thinking for five years, and I have been treated like an individual, not like an Englishman’s necessary virtue, ever since. I’ve managed my own business affairs; I’ve read more books than any woman in this house; I’ve had heaps and heaps of men in love with me; and I’ve done a lot of thinking—particularly about Cecil.”
Lord Barnstaple at another moment might have smiled, but for the present his concern had routed his cynicism.
“You look as if you’d merely been made to fall in love with,” he said gallantly. “But I am surprised and gratified. Tell me what you have been thinking about Cecil.”
“I’d day-dreamed for years about him before he came, but it was all romantic and impossible nonsense. I don’t think I ever realised that he was the author of his own letters, and I persisted in imagining him a mixture of Byron, Marmion, Robert Dudley, Eugene Wrayburn, Launcelot, and several of Ouida’s earlier heroes. Of course, my imagination wore down a good deal after I came out and saw more of the world; nevertheless, when Cecil did come, he was wholly unlike anything I had concocted. But, somehow, he seemed quite natural, even in the first moment, and I would not have had him otherwise for the world. He seemed made for me, and it didn’t take me a second to get used to him.”
“Well?” Lord Barnstaple was watching her closely; the slightest acting would not have escaped him. She spoke with some hesitation, her eyes turned aside.
“He only stayed a little while, and I didn’t see him again for three days. During those days, and during two weeks a little later when I was alone again—he left me for a bear!—I did harder thinking than I’d ever done before. I realised two things, especially the second time: I was frightfully in love with him, and the whole happiness of our future wasin my hands. Cecil had told me, with his usual frankness, that I’d have to do the adapting—he couldn’t. I’m sure he had no idea of being egoistical; he always looks facts in the face, and he merely stated one. And there’s no doubt about it! He’s made for good and all—he’s centuries old. That threw the whole thing on me.”
“Considering that you look things in the face with something of the intellectuality of a man, you have undertaken no light responsibility.”
“It’s the less light because I am a Californian, and we have twice the individuality and originality of any people in the United States. We always get quite huffy when we are spoken of as merely Americans. Of course we take enormous pride in our Southern descent, but we are—those of us that were born there—Californians, first and last.”
“These fine distinctions are beyond me at present. Of course you will be good enough to initiate me further.”
“You need not laugh. Cecil did at first, but now he quite understands that it is the United StatesandCalifornia. What I was going to say was this: it’s the harder for us to adapt ourselves, in spite of the fact that we are malleable and made of a thousand particles. Compared with Englishwomen, who—who—are much more conservative and traditional, we are in a state of fusion. But the fact remains that we have tremendous individuality, and that we are—as Cecil says—self-conscious about it.”
“And you don’t fancy adapting yourself to anybody. Quite so.”
“It irritated and worried me at first, for I’d not only been on a pedestal, but I’d been a fearful little tyrant with men. You wouldn’t believe the way I used to treat them. Now”—she paused a moment, then blurted out: “I’m so much in love that I don’t care a rap about my individuality. I don’t care for a thing on earth but to be happy. Of course, before I married, I had made up my mind to make the best of many things I probably shouldn’t like, and not to attempt the impossible task of making Cecil over. But there is so much more in it than that. I am determined that my marriage shall be a success. I have had already enough happiness to want always more and more and more. I’ll live for that. I buried my private ambitions in the redwoods. It is a curious contradiction, that happiness is the one thing people really want, and that it is the one thing nearly everybody misses. I believe it is because people do not concentrate on it. They wish for it and make little grabs at it. I intend to concentrate on it, and live for nothing else. And of course that means that Cecil will be happy too. I’ll simply fling aside the thought of certain attributes I would wish Cecil had, and make the most of what he has. And, Heaven knows, Nature was not niggardly with him!”
Lord Barnstaple held his breath for half a moment. His interest had ceased to be speculative, and even, for the moment, paternal. He was in the presence of elemental passion and a shrewd modern brain, and the combination was a force from which he received a palpable shock. There was so profound a silencefor several moments that Lee stirred uneasily, wondering if she had tried his interest too far. When he spoke, it was in his most matter-of-fact tone.
“If I were a younger man I should say many pretty things to you, notably one which I don’t doubt Cecil has said very often—that you are the sort of woman a man imagines he could cheerfully die for. I am no longer young, but I recognise the type.” He hesitated a moment. “My wife belonged to it. Now, I am going to give you some hard practical advice. If you adopt it, I believe that, taken in connection with your purpose and with what Nature has been kind enough to do foryou, it will insure your success if anything can. Identify yourself with every one of Cecil’s pleasures and pursuits. By the first of October the guests will have gone, and Emmy with them; she spends the rest of the autumn and early winter in London, and in a round of visits further South. Cecil and I always stay on here for the pheasants, and I usually ask two or three men down at a time. There will be no other women here until next August. Come out with us, learn to shoot, stay out all day, and——learn to like it. I doubt, though, if you could help it. Then comes the hunting season. We always spend the month of November in Warwickshire at Beaumanoir, my brother-in-law’s place—you will remember he was here when you came. Cecil tells me that you are a fine horse-woman. You will learn to ride to hounds in no time, and Cecil is particularly keen on hunting. So much for his pleasures; and you will soon learn that you cannot know too much about sport of every sort.In December we must return here. Parliament may be prorogued for elections at any moment after February, and Cecil must begin as soon as possible to nurse his constituency. It’s been nursing for him in a way for several years, for it has always been understood that Cecil was to succeed old Saunderson, who has now had enough of it, and practically notified the Division. Nevertheless, Cecil has work of his own to do, for the Liberal element has been gaining strength here for some time. He must make speeches, open libraries, or whatever else demands the grace of his presence—and I believe several things of the sort are finishing. He must do everything he can to make himself known and liked, and to inspire confidence. And he will have to study very hard—will study, for he does nothing by halves. You must go about with him, and also visit a little among the village people. You will be a great help, for the lower classes love the compound of beauty and rank; and if it is known that you will sit on the platform while he speaks he will be doubly sure of a large audience. He may give an occasional lecture or preside at a magic-lantern show at the village schools. It is expected of us, for some six or eight villages skirting the estate were once ours. I, too, have been an oracle in my day. The bare thought bores me now, but it will amuse you and Cecil. And—here is another point—study with him. That will not be so interesting; in fact, it will bore you——”
“No, it will not. I’m immensely interested in English politics already.”
“You’ll find it something of a pull, tramping through Blue Books, Reports, Public Speeches, Statesman’s Year-Books, and all the data on the great question of the Landlordv.the Farmer. But if you have the brains and the energy to stick to it—and I believe you have—you will succeed in getting closer to Cecil than you ever would in any other way. He will be flattered at first, and pleased with the prospect of companionship; later, you will become his second self, and he could no more do without you than without one of his legs or arms. It’s a risky thing to say to a woman, but to live comfortably with an Englishman you’ve got to become his habit, and to be happy with him you’ve got to become his second self. Englishwomen are the first from tradition. When they have brains they usually bolt in the opposite direction. That is because they are deficient in passion. Let me see what you will make of the combination. I believe you will succeed. Thank Heaven, here comes the tea! I’ve never talked so much in my born days, and I’m as dry as a herring.”
They took their tea cosily in the dim beautiful room, and Lee, being a woman of tact, dropped the subject of herself, and attempted the seemingly impossible task of amusing Lord Barnstaple. She succeeded so well that he discarded his usual chuckle, and laughed heartily no less than five times.
“I foresee that you and Cecil and I shall be three jolly good comrades. Of course I shan’t see quite so much of you in London; you and Cecil will have to take a house of your own, and I’ve got to liveunder the same roof with Emmy, for decency’s sake. But here we can be a really comfortable family party. This year we’ll be here till April, and after that, of course, you’ll have to move up to London in January. Do you look forward to being the beauty of a London season? What a question!”
“Of course I want to be admired; and what is more, I don’t intend to let Cecil forget that I can be, when I choose. I suppose I’ll look horrid in a shooting outfit.”
“I am sure you will look charming; and, I don’t wish to be rude—Cecil will not know whether you do or not. But that’s not the point, and you can make yourself fascinating at dinner. Tea-gowns——” He waved his hand vaguely.
Lee’s eyes sparkled. “I have a delightful sensation of novelty,” she said. “I want to get right into the middle of it all. It may not be like my old dreams, but it glitters, all the same. I love doing new things.”
“Novelty is the half of many battles,” observed Lord Barnstaple dryly.
The conversation drifted again to other matters, but as he was leaving her a half-hour later, he turned at the door, and said:
“Cecil is very much under your spell. Keep him there.”
“I intend to.” Lee’s eyes rarely failed to express what leaped into the foreground of her mind. As Lord Barnstaple picked his way down the dark and winding stair his smile was much as usual.