THE SOCIAL BOARD.
"Where men of judgment creep and feel their way,
The positive pronounce without dismay;
Their want of light and intellect supplied
By sparks absurdity strikes out of pride:
Without the means of knowing right from wrong,
They always are decisive, clear, and strong."
COWPER.
DINNER at The Brow was in full swing before anybody held a match to the
combustible elements there gathered. Miss Devereux had made fretfully
sure of an explosion. She held a ladylike belief that if a gun is
present, it is sure to go off, forgetting that even a loaded gun will
lie quiescent until somebody pulls the trigger.
Cyril was at his best, handsome and conversational; and Lady Lucas'
beaming countenance seemed to bespeak her forgiveness of the company
into which she found herself plunged. After all, had not the Trevelyans
ancestors—and were there not blue ingredients in the Trevelyan blood?
Mrs. Trevelyan, "Jem's mother" as she was called by many, was the model
of a sweet elderly lady, and Evelyn was more like her old self than Jem
had yet seen her. Jem himself looked fagged and out of spirits with
the worries of the past month. Perhaps he felt a little disappointed
at not having to take Evelyn in; at all events, Jean thought so, even
while dutifully "not allowing herself" to think anything of the kind.
He quite failed to get any manner of a rise out of Miss Moggridge, for
the young baronet's entertainment; indeed, conversation flagged much
between the two. The one being a man of action, the other a woman of
theories, they were less likely to act match and match-box than Cyril
had expected.
Miss Moggridge was a lady of independent though small means; not a
"companion" in the ordinary sense of the word, since she received
nothing from Evelyn but a home and the privilege of dancing attendance
upon her. She had no home ties of her own, and she had fallen over
head and ears in love with Evelyn, as one woman does sometimes fall in
love with another. Miss Moggridge did not gush and fuss sentimentally
over her love, as some women do in a like case—women of Sybella's
calibre—but she was silently ready to give time and life to the object
of her affections. Evelyn, touched by this intense though commonly dumb
devotion, and feeling the need of permanent companionship, had somewhat
hastily suggested living together—in other words, had offered to take
Miss Moggridge into her ménage. The offer had been at once eagerly
accepted.
But to have a devoted friend out of the house, and to be with that
friend always in the house, are two different things. A friendship,
which is only enhanced by the little partings and meetings and
excitements of the one existence, will not always stand the pull of the
other. The compact had not long been made before Evelyn began, after
her wont, to regret it.
She was sincerely fond of Miss Moggridge; yet this fondness was a mild
affair compared with the absorbing and jealous worship of the older
lady. Miss Moggridge's dumbness of love lessened under the thawing
influence of perpetual nearness; and the ardour of a devotion which
could never leave its object alone became a weariness to that object.
Evelyn loved freedom, even while she craved for more ties; and she
found her freedom hampered.
Miss Moggridge was large in make, and superlatively plain. Her face,
no less than her body, was large; the nose was crooked; the eyes
were small; the teeth were discoloured; the complexion really was
"liver-hued." She had not in looks a single redeeming point; and she
was also somewhat gauche, somewhat excitable, somewhat opinionated,
somewhat clever, and by fits and starts a great talker. Towards Evelyn
she was monotonously mild and yielding on all questions of opinion:
towards other people she was hardly less monotonously argumentative.
All this had been a matter for amusement in the friend whom Evelyn saw
for an hour or two at a time, but in her perpetual companion, she did
not like it so well. She was equally teased by the inevitable agreement
with herself, and by the inevitable disagreement with the rest of the
world.
There were oppositions and inconsistencies in Miss Moggridge, as in
most human beings. Theologically she prided herself on being Broad;
and she showed her share of human contractedness by her unlimited
abuse of those whom she counted "Narrow." The abuse was not couched in
unladylike terms, but it was sufficiently severe; and to Evelyn such
tirades always came as an attack upon her husband's memory. Of course,
she never said so; and Miss Moggridge never guessed what Evelyn felt,
or the tirades would have ceased in her hearing. As they did not cease,
they helped to loosen the bond which attached the two ladies together.
Miss Moggridge was also an advocate for "female rights;" and on this
topic she was apt to wax explosive, to the immense delight of young
men, who, calm in the consciousness of their inborn superiority, could
afford to smile. Miss Moggridge might not "see it," but so much the
better fun. Evelyn, however, did not accept certain modern versions of
female rights, and she had begun to grow tired of the declamations on
this subject, once only entertaining.
Side by side with such characteristics were to be found in Miss
Moggridge a large modicum of womanly tenderness when something or
somebody called it out; a painful womanly consciousness of her own
ugliness; and a vehement love of beauty. There is something pathetic
in such a beauty-loving soul as hers, enshrined in so clumsy a casket.
If, in any mysterious sense, the soul can be supposed to secrete
the body, as a mollusc secretes it shell, one can only wonder how
Miss Moggridge's poetic soul should have put forth so inadequate an
expression of itself.
This jumble of characteristics in female form was now Evelyn's chosen
companion. For how long? Perhaps for the rest of her life. Could
anything ever separate them? Evelyn sometimes put this question to
herself drearily; not that she did not love Miss Moggridge, but that
she did not love to be bound.
"I must never marry again; that is certain," she said to herself, with
a flickering smile. "So soon as I am tied to a person, I want to be
free."
But would Miss Moggridge go, if Evelyn desired it? Could Evelyn ever
have the heart to ask her to do so? There were days when Evelyn felt
herself under a hopeless incubus. Companionship was all very well; but
to be incessantly watched, followed, petted, advised, cared for, was
a little too much—at her age, and after years of liberty. She panted
under the oppression. Had Miss Moggridge suddenly vanished, Evelyn
would have felt lonely; but none the less, this sensation that she
could not, if she would, get rid of Miss Moggridge, fretted her.
To return to the dinner-party at Ripley Brow.
Miss Moggridge, like Sybella, was fond of lively colouring. The
possession of a poetic soul did not imbue her with good taste in
clothing her body. To gratify Evelyn, she had suppressed a startling
cheese-hued costume, and wore nothing worse than sea-green. Lady Lucas
was in black velvet; Mrs. Trevelyan and Evelyn were in black silk;
Sybella alone was resplendent in sheeny mauve and snowy lace. Jean's
white dress was the simplest imaginable; her only ornament being one
large pearl-pin in her abundant hair; but Cyril again told himself that
"he had never seen Jean so handsome." He did not this time make the
observation aloud.
For a while Admiral Grice's gout and Sybella's assortment of mild
ailments had full swing. Some at table were amused to overhear scraps
of the dialogue, with its perpetual—
"I have had that—!" "I know so well what that is!" "I have gone through
just the same!" "I assure you, I suffered from—" "My doctor advised
me—" "I was recommended to take—" each seeming anxious to outvie the
other in dolefulness of experience.
If one cannot hope to shine in any other respect, one may at least seek
to excel in the matter of aches and pains.
Mr. and Mrs. Trevelyan were in a steady swing of talk; Giles Cuthbert
in subdued and sleepy tones made himself agreeable to Evelyn; Cyril
kept Lady Lucas going; and Jean, far from looking bored, enjoyed her
companion—a pleasant and gentlemanly young fellow, when he could be
kept clear of certain controversial subjects which were to him as a red
rag to a bull.
Rub the first, not to be called an explosion, was on the score of
weather—a fruitful subject at all times for discussion. Sybella had
long ago taken the winds of the neighbourhood under her especial
patronage. She knew all about them, always; and with a person who can
never be in the wrong, it is perilous to suggest a mistake. There could
be no surer road to Miss Devereux's displeasure, than to assert that a
breeze was northerly when she counted it westerly.
Unwittingly Mr. Trevelyan made this blunder. He alluded to the fact
of a "strong south-east wind" that day, not three minutes after Miss
Devereux had enlarged to her Admiral on the pleasantness of a "nice
soft south wind." Of course, he had not heard her; but, of course, she
did not believe this.
Sybella reddened, and turned from her gouty Admiral, who had wisely
listened without comment, to the offender.
"I assure you—" she interposed—"I assure you, the wind has been exactly
south all day. I watched the clouds for ever so long; and they were
coming precisely from the south. Some may be so easily mistaken,
because of currents of air down here; but up there, you know, one
cannot be wrong."
Miss Devereux was nothing if not scientific.
"And I know—The weathercock! Oh, I don't think one can always depend on
weathercocks. Beside, the weathercock must have pointed south to-day.
I know by my own feelings. Any east in the wind always affects me
directly. I am so sensitive to an east wind. It has been direct south
the whole day."
Mr. Trevelyan bowed slightly, and intimated that a gentleman might not
contradict a lady.
"But anybody must know who has paid attention," persisted the lady,
feeling the gentleman unconvinced. Miss Devereux not only counted
herself always in the right; she could not be content unless others
counted her the same; and this was rather difficult to bring about. "I
assure you, if there had been the very least east in the wind, I could
not have ventured out with my neuralgia. East winds are so dangerous.
People who are strong, of course—But it was because the wind was south
that I thought it so safe."
Mr. Trevelyan bowed again. He had a way of looking down upon Sybella,
mentally as well as bodily, from his superior height, which she was
conscious of, while unable to define it.
For the hundredth time, she wondered, "What dear Cyril could find to
like in that disagreeable man?"
And her voice had an injured intonation as she continued—
"It is quite extraordinary how few people understand the direction of
the wind."
"But we at The Brow, being near the clouds, are always accurately
informed," put in Cyril wickedly from the further end of the table.
"Suppose we agree to call it south, and settle the matter," suggested
Evelyn's soft tones. "Things are very much to us as we believe them."
"There was once an old gentleman," drawled Cuthbert, "who could never
go out in an east wind. Quite impossible, you know. It always gave him
bronchitis. Invariably. But a kind friend one day tied the weathercock,
with the vane pointing west, while the wind blew from the east. The old
gentleman went out for his constitutional, rejoicing in the west wind;
and—wonderful to say—he caught no cold."
Sybella was offended. "Of course, I understand," she said. "Of course;
Mr. Cuthbert means it is all fancy. But—" and a hiatus.
"I beg your pardon. There are no such things as fancies in the present
day. It is all neurotic," explained Giles, with fascinating mildness.
"My story was merely a little illustration of the interaction between
mind and matter—perhaps one may say, of the mastery of mind over
matter."
"I thought it was an old schoolmaster," Jean said, while Sybella was
trying to understand. "And a school-boy's trick."
"My dear Jean, never put a story right, when the moral is as good one
way as the other," murmured Evelyn.
Jean laughed; and before Miss Devereux could make up her mind about
that mysterious word, "neurotic," the talk drifted in a fresh direction.
Rub the second was again between the hostess and her Rector. Mr.
Trevelyan dropped among matters ecclesiastical in conversation with
gentle Mrs. Trevelyan, who always liked to dig a little information
out of a man, whether or no her feminine brain could entirely
assimilate it. He made unfortunate mention of "The Father's;" and Miss
Devereux—scarcely more apt to fall foul of east winds than to fall
foul of "the Fathers," all the more because she knew so little about
them—overheard the remark.
Sybella bristled up for action immediately; and Mr. Byng sent her a
startled glance of sympathy up the length of the table; but being far
distant, and being moreover a good deal charmed with his neighbour,
Jean Trevelyan, he left actual fighting to Miss Devereux. She was equal
to the occasion. Remedies for the Admiral's next attack of gout had to
wait, while Sybella plunged into the fray—mauve silk and all, to the
rescue of principle! Mr. Trevelyan found himself unexpectedly tackled,
and put upon the defensive.
Miss Devereux was "quite sure the Fathers were not infallible. So very
extraordinary that people should talk of them as they did! And only
last Wednesday, Mr. Kennedy had pointed out in his sermon—Mr. Byng of
course would remember—" with an appealing look—"had pointed out to
them so carefully how all the Fathers contradicted each other about
everything. So how could they possibly be infallible?"
Mr. Byng did remember, and he would have said more, but for a peculiar
expression in Jean's eyes. He had never felt himself under exactly the
same restraint.
"It is Mr. Kennedy who is infallible; not the Fathers," declared that
dreadful Miss Moggridge, whipping unexpectedly into the discussion. "I
don't know that they ever professed to be—did they, Mr. Trevelyan? But
if Mr. Kennedy holds up his finger, and says, 'I think—' we are all to
bow down to his decision."
Miss Devereux drew up her head, and opined that for anybody to say such
things of such a man as Mr. Kennedy—
"Say such things! I only say he is a modern Pope! Infallible
out-and-out. Much worse than to be an infallible company of old
gentlemen!" said Miss Moggridge irreverently. "One would at least keep
the others in check; but there's nobody to keep Mr. Kennedy in check.
As for their contradicting one another, Mr. Kennedy contradicts himself
every other minute. Infallible people always do—not only the Fathers."
A faint shadow of annoyance passed over Evelyn's face.
"Such a devotedly good man!" sighed Miss Devereux. "I am sure, if Mr.
Kennedy—"
"But I don't see what his goodness has to do with the question," said
Miss Moggridge, getting for the first time a little excited, and
flipping a crumb over the table. "Popes generally are pretty good men,
I believe—Protestants or otherwise. We're not in the Middle Ages now.
I suppose the Fathers were good men too—but that didn't make them
infallible, necessarily. Any more than Mr. Kennedy's goodness makes him
infallible—or keeps him from being dull!"—sotto voce.
"There is, perhaps, a possibility," interposed Mr. Trevelyan, in a
solemn and repressive voice, which somehow brought Miss Moggridge to
a halt, "just a possibility, viewed even from the mere standpoint of
common-sense, that the combined utterance of many good men may be
likely to speak fuller and more sober truth than the single voice of
one good man. Collective wisdom ought to contain more than individual
wisdom. If I am in doubt on some theological point, I am naturally
more disposed to turn to a consensus of thoughtful opinions, from the
Fathers of the Church generally, than to appeal merely to one excellent
man—however unexceptionable he may be as an individual."
Miss Devereux didn't see it, and in perturbed tones, she said so.
"The Fathers, she knew, were full of error. Full of error!—" and she
performed vehemently the "invisible soap and imperceptible water"
operation with her two hands.
"Is anything human not more or less full of error?" Jem asked in a low
voice.
Miss Devereux had no wish to listen to either Jem or Mr. Trevelyan.
Instruction was the last thing she desired. She felt that she had the
best of it; and so doubtless in a sense she had; for she was attacking
what Mr. Trevelyan was not defending; and since she knew a great deal
more about his views than he did himself, it was not of the slightest
use for him to disclaim belief in the infallibility of the Fathers.
Miss Devereux knew better. Let Mr. Trevelyan say what he would, she
could still go on with her monotonous protest—"Full of error! Full of
error!"
"May I ask which of the Fathers you studied last?" asked Mr. Trevelyan.
Sybella was horrified. Read the Fathers! How could he suppose that she
would do anything so fraught with peril? Then she looked appealingly at
Mr. Byng; but Mr. Byng was tongue-tied by the lurking disdain in Jean's
greenish eyes—a disdain more unequivocally expressed in the corners
of Mr. Trevelyan's mouth, as he sank into silence. Evelyn once more,
with her skilful grace, broke up the discussion, and resolutely started
other topics.
"Too bad," Miss Moggridge said to Jem, not referring to Evelyn, but to
the change of subject. "I should have liked to see those two fight it
out."
Jem moved his head negatively, smiling. "A waste of strength," he said.
"Life is too short for skirmishes which cannot lead to victory."
Rub number three did not come till they were all in the drawing-room,
the gentlemen having just joined the ladies. This time Cyril was the
offender, not Mr. Trevelyan; and Lady Lucas was the offended, not
Sybella.
Cyril had not altogether liked Jean's interest in her talk with the
Curate at dinner. He had enjoyed the discussions and Miss Moggridge;
but he had not enjoyed the sight of those two intent faces. It was all
very well for Mr. Byng to admire Jean; but for Jean to be so wrapped up
in a subdued dialogue, as not to hear when Cyril spoke to her, was by
no means right. Jean belonged to him; whether or no he meant to have
her for a permanent possession; and nobody else had a right to Jean.
He had not noticed before what a good-looking young fellow Mr. Byng
really was; and the confidential tone in which the Curate expounded
his ideas to his listener during dessert made Cyril wrathful. He was
no given to wrathfulness about small things; but this could hardly be
called a small thing.
Cyril had not recovered his equilibrium when he came into the
drawing-room. Jean was standing on the rug, in her white dress,
conspicuously tall and slight; the pale face, with its steadfast eyes,
conspicuously free from self-consciousness. She was looking at a
photograph; and straight as an arrow Mr. Byng went to her side. Cyril
forthwith did the same. He was not going to stand that sort of thing.
Mr. Byng made some allusion to their past conversation, which Jean
answered smilingly, turning a little towards him and from Cyril as she
did so.
Thereupon Cyril forgot himself. If there was one subject more than
another which he ought strenuously to have avoided, with Lady Lucas
seated only a few yards off upon the nearest sofa, it was aught
connected with family disagreeables. Whatever he might think of her
mode of action, she as his guest had a right to his silence. But Cyril
at that moment could only think of Jean; and in his eagerness to gain
her attention, he rushed into the first remark which occurred to him.
"I say, Jean—" with subdued determination to have his own way, though
with no outward sign of annoyance: "Jean!—"
Then, "I beg your pardon!" politely to Mr. Byng, and Mr. Byng retreated.
"Jean, you won't forget to take your father soon to call on my friends?
You know—at the red house—"
"Captain and Mrs. Lucas! O yes," Jean answered. She too forgot about
Lady Lucas. "I will remind my father. When do they come?"
"To-day. So the sooner you can go, the better."
"Hardly. It would be merciful to allow them a few days for settling in."
"Oh, no need. The house is furnished, and has been all put to rights.
Only a little unpacking to do; and they are too good travellers to
think anything of that. I shall go in to-morrow, and tell them to
expect you."
Lady Lucas stood up and moved forward, while her black velvet skirts
trailed imposingly. Her plump hands held a large feather fan.
"I think I can hardly be mistaken," she said, looking from Cyril to
Jean. "One does not wish to overhear; but—" with a dignified smile—"my
own name has a familiar sound, and you did not talk in whispers. Yet
surely—it is impossible. That unhappy man cannot have obtained a
footing in this house!"
Cyril felt rather like a naughty boy, and he had to brace himself
with the recollection that of "this house," he was master. He went a
little nearer to Lady Lucas, with his pretty air of courtesy—boyish
still—leaving Jean on the rug. Except Admiral Grice and the older
ladies, no one had yet sat down. Evelyn was talking with Jem and Mr.
Trevelyan in the distant bow-window; and Mr. Byng had retired to Giles
Cuthbert.
"I met Captain Lucas abroad," Cyril observed.
"But your aunt—Miss Devereux—"
"My aunt saw him once. Not oftener. They are friends of mine," said
Cyril bravely, as a sudden thought came to him of Emmeline—courageous
little Emmeline, with so much in life to render her sad.
"Miss Devereux will not call," Lady Lucas stated. She had ceased
smiling, and no longer looked gracious.
"Perhaps not." Cyril's manner became more resolute. "I am sorry this
has come up," he said frankly. "It is not the time or place—and I
forgot. But since it has, I ought to explain. I met the Lucases abroad;
and I assure you, I found them most kind—as pleasant as could be. I
like them immensely—yes—him!" in reply to a monosyllable. "I mean—one
is so sorry for him, and he does fight so hard not to be overcome. I
don't really think it's a case when everybody ought to stand aloof. I
don't—really, Lady Lucas."
"You will, I suppose, permit 'everybody' to judge for themselves," said
Lady Lucas. "I quite understand that Sir Cyril Devereux is perfectly
independent in these matters; and time alone can teach experience. It
is, of course, useless for me to assort that my unhappy nephew is unfit
to associate with gentlemen. That is only an old lady's opinion—though
it is held by some who are not old ladies."
"I am very sorry," apologised Cyril. "But if you were to see him now—"
"We shall, I think, do little good by discussing the question. Only I
must beg you to remember one thing, Sir Cyril—that I do not meet or
acknowledge Captain Lucas or his wife. And, excuse me—in your position
you ought to be careful. You do not know what you may be drawn into."
Sir Cyril made a little gesture of comprehension, not of assent, and
Lady Lucas swept her trailing skirts away. Sybella was on a more
distant sofa, and thither the lady retreated. A murmured conference
between the two began.
"You have been quite wrong, my dear," Lady Lucas said softly. "Sir
Cyril ought to have been put into some regular profession—the Army,
or anything—for a few years. I told you so long ago. He will get into
mischief from the sheer lack of something to do."
Then an interruption came. Jean still stood upon the rug; and Cyril
remained where Lady Lucas had left him, lost in thought. Emmeline's
dark sunny little face was before his mind's eye.
"I will call—of course, I will call. What rubbish!" he said to himself.
A curious croaking sound drew the attention of all—a sound as of
something giving way.
"Jean!" her father called in an agitated shout from the bow-window.
"Back, Jean!!" He was too far to do more than shout, as he saw the
great mirror over the mantelpiece seem to detach itself, and for an
appreciable fraction of a second lean forward. Jean, with her instinct
of obedience, born of long habit, sprang back, not hesitating for even
the fraction of a second; while Cyril, hearing both the loud crack and
the warning cry, as instinctively started forward. The huge mirror
crashed heavily down; one sharp edge tearing a wide rent down Jean's
white skirt, and bringing her to her knees; the other striking Cyril
prostrate.
Sybella's shrieks almost drowned the loud crash of shattered glass:
Sybella herself keeping at a safe distance. The gentlemen made a
simultaneous rush forward; and Jean spoke calmly: "I am not hurt.
Please see to Cyril. Never mind me."
Five pairs of hands lifting the massive frame released both; and Jean
sprang to her feet. She had been pinned down by the weight pressing on
her skirt, but was entirely uninjured.
Mr. Trevelyan held her fast, his hands visibly shaking, and his face
grey. "My child! You are sure! Nothing wrong?" he said hoarsely.
Jean had never seen him so overcome.
"Nothing—not a scratch. See—only my dress!" she said reassuringly.
"But—"
His lips touched her forehead, with a murmured—
"Thank God!"
And she hardly caught the words following, "I thought it was all up
with my Jean."
Then he leant against the back of a tall arm-chair, a glazed look
coming over his eyes, and Jean knew that he had difficulty in holding
himself upright. Before she could speak, however, he had rallied,
though not without a supreme effort of will.
"Merely a passing sensation—a touch of dizziness," he said cheerfully,
in response to her glance. "Not worth attention. Come—" and he walked
across the room, Jean following closely to the couch where Cyril had
just been laid, white to the lips with pain.
Evelyn knelt to support his head, and Sybella hovered round about, in a
state of incoherent though talkative distraction.
Cyril looked up at Mr. Trevelyan. "Jem has gone for Dr. Ingram,"
he said, bringing the words slowly. "I don't think it will be very
much . . . The frame caught my shoulder . . . Don't touch, please—"
with a shrinking gesture. "I'm only—so glad it wasn't Jean!"
Jean, to her own indignant surprise, actually burst into tears.