If Philip Rainham's name, during that long, hard winter and
ungracious spring--near the close of which he turned his face, with
the least little sigh of regret, to the wall--was not often
mentioned in the house in Parton Street, at whose door he had
formerly knocked so often, it must not be supposed that by its
occupants it had been in any way forgotten. He had not committed the
discourtesy of leaving Lady Garnett's note unanswered; on the
contrary, he had answered it both promptly and--as it seemed to
him--well, in a letter which was certainly diplomatic, suggesting as
it did--at least, to Mary Masters, to whom it had been shown--that
he was on the point of an immediate flight South.
Whether the elder lady was equally deceived by his ambiguous
phrases, it was not so easy to declare. She had, at this time less
than ever, the mode of persons who wear their hearts upon their
sleeves; her mask of half-cynical good-humour was constantly up; and
she met the girl's hinted interrogations--for directly the nature of
their uneasiness, by a sort of tacit agreement, was not alluded
to--with the same smiling indifference, the same air of bland
reassurance which she brought to the discussion of a sauce or an
_entremet_ at one of those select little dinner-parties on which she
piqued herself, and which latterly had been more incessant and more
select than ever.
Only on Mary's sensitive ear something in the elaborately cheerful
tone in which she mentioned their vanished friend would occasionally
jar. It was too perfectly well done not to appear a little
exaggerated; and though she could force a smile at Lady Garnett's
persistent picture of the recalcitrant godson basking, with his
pretext of ill-health, on the sunny terraces of Monte Carlo, she
none the less cherished a suspicion that the picture was as little
convincing to its author as to herself, that her aunt also had
silent moments in which she credited the more depressing theory.
And the long silence simply deepened her conviction that, all the
time they were imposing upon themselves with such vain conjectures,
he was actually within their reach, sick and sorry and alone, in
that terrible Blackpool, which she peopled, in her imagination of a
young lady whose eastward wanderings had never extended beyond a
flower show in the Temple Gardens, with a host of vague,
inconceivable horrors.
From Bordighera, from Monaco, she argued, he would certainly have
written, if it were only a line of reassurance, for there his
isolation was impregnable. Only the fact that he had stayed on in
London could account for the need of this second arm of silence, as
well as of solitude, to enforce his complete withdrawal from the
torment of tongues.
Certainly, wherever he might actually be, the girl had never
realized more fully than just then what an irreparable gap
estrangement from him made in her life.
There was, indeed, no pause in the stream of clever, cultivated,
charming persons who rang daily at their discriminating door, who
drank tea in their drawing-room, and talked felicitously for their
entertainment.
It was a miscellaneous company, although the portal was difficult in
a manner, and opened only on conditions of its own--conditions, it
may be said, which, to the uninitiated, to the excluded, seemed
fantastic enough.
One might be anything, Lady Garnett's constant practice seemed to
enunciate, provided one was not a bore; one could represent
anything--birth or wealth, or the conspicuous absence of these
qualities--so long as one also effectively represented one's self.
This was the somewhat democratic form which the old lady's
aristocratic tradition assumed.
It was not, then, without a certain pang of self-reproach that Mary
wondered one evening--it was at the conclusion of one of their most
successful entertainments--that a company so brilliant, so
distinguished, should have left her only with a nervous headache and
a distinct sense of satisfaction that the last guest had gone.
Was she, then, after all an unworthy partaker of the feast which her
aunt had so long and liberally spread for her delectation?
As she sat in her own room, still in her dress of the evening,
before the comfortable fire, which cast vague half-lights into the
dark, spacious corners--she had extinguished the illumination of
candles which her maid had left her, a sort of unconscious tribute
to the economical traditions of her youth--she found herself
considering this question and the side issues it involved very
carefully.
Was it for some flaw in her nature, some lack of subtilty, or inbred
stupidity, that she found the inmates of Parton Street so
uninspiring, had been so little amused?
The dozen who had dined with them to-night--how typical they might
be of the rest!--original and unlike each other as they were, each
having his special distinction, his particular note, were hardly
separable in her mind. They were very cultivated, very subtile, very
cynical. Their talk, which flashed quickest around Lady Garnett, who
was the readiest of them all, could not possibly have been better;
it was like the rapid passes of exquisite fencers with foils. And
they all seemed to have been everywhere, to have read everything,
and at the last to believe in nothing--in themselves and their own
paradoxes least of all. There was nothing in the world which existed
except that one might make of it an elegant joke. And yet of old,
the girl reflected, she had found them stimulating enough; their
limitations, at least, had not seemed to her to weigh seriously
against their qualities, negative though these last might be.
Had it been, then, simply the presence of Mr. Rainham which had
leavened the company, and the personal fascination of his
friendship--indefinable and unobtrusive as that had been--which had
enabled her to adopt for the moment their urbane, impartial point of
view?
Perhaps there had been a particle of truth in the charge so solemnly
levelled at her by Mr. Sylvester: it was a false position that she
maintained.
The attitude of Lady Garnett and her intimates, of persons (the
phrase of Steele's recurred to her as meeting it appropriately) "who
had seen the world enough to undervalue it with good breeding," must
seem to her at last a little sterile when she was conscious--never
more than now--of how clearly and swiftly the healthy young blood
coursed through her veins, dissipating any morbid imaginations that
she might feel inclined to cherish. She looked out at life, in her
conviction that so little of it had yet been lived, that for her it
might easily be a long affair, with eyes which were still full of
interest and, to a certain degree, of hope; and this did not detract
from at least one "impossible loyalty," from which it seemed to her
she would never waver. And Charles Sylvester's infelicitous proposal
recurred to her, and she was forced to ask herself whether, after
all, it was quite so infelicitous as it seemed. Might not some sort
of solution to the difficulties which oppressed her be offered by
that alliance? Conscientiously she considered the question, and for
a long time; but with the closest consideration the prospect refused
to cheer her, remained singularly uninviting. And yet, arid as the
notion appeared of a procession hand-in-hand through life with a
husband so soberly precise, to the tune of political music, she was
still hardly decided upon her answer when she at length reluctantly
left her comfortable fire and composed herself to sleep.
It was not until a day or two later that a prolonged visit from the
subject of these hesitations reminded her--perhaps more forcibly
than before--that, however in his absence she might oscillate, in
his actual presence a firm negative was, after all, the only answer
which could ever suffice.
At the close of what seemed a singularly long afternoon, during
which her aunt, who was confined to her room with a bad headache,
had left to her the burden of entertaining, Mary came to this
conclusion.
Mr. Sylvester had come with the first of her callers, and had made
no sign of moving when the last had gone. And in the silence, a
little portentous, which had ensued when they were left together,
the girl had read easily the reason of his protracted stay. She
glanced furtively, with a suggestion of weariness in her eyes, at
the little jewelled watch on her wrist, wondering if in the arrival
of a belated visitor there might not still be some respite.
"You are not going out?" he asked tentatively, detecting her. "I
expect my sister will be here soon."
"No, I am not going out," admitted the girl reluctantly. "I am on
duty, you know. Somebody may arrive at any minute," she added, not
quite ingenuously. "Let us hope it will be your sister."
"I hope not--not just yet," he protested. "It is so long, Miss
Masters, since I have seen you alone. That is my excuse for having
remained such an unconscionable time. I have to seize an
opportunity."
She made no remark, sitting back in the chair, her fine head bent a
little, thoughtfully, her hands folded quietly in her lap, in an
attitude of resignation to the inevitable.
"You can't mistake me," he went on at last eagerly. "I have kept to
the stipulation; I have been silent for a long time. I have been to
see you, certainly, but not so often as I should have liked, and I
have said nothing to you of the only thing that was in my head.
Now"--he hesitated for an instant, then completed his phrase with an
intonation almost passionate--"now I want my reward! Can't
you--can't you give it me, Mary?"
The girl said nothing for a moment, looking away from him into the
corners of the empty room, her delicate eyebrows knitted a little,
as though she sought inspiration from some of Lady Garnett's choicer
_bibelôts_, from the little rose and amber shepherdess of Watteau, who
glanced out at her daintily, imperturbably from the midst of her
_fête galante_. At last she said quietly:
"I am sorry, Mr. Sylvester, I can only say, as I said before, it is
a great honour you do me, but it's impossible."
"Perhaps I should have waited longer," suggested Charles, after a
moment's silence, in which he appeared to be deeply pondering her
sentence. "I have taken you by surprise; you have not sufficiently
considered----"
"Oh, I have considered," cried the girl quickly, with a sudden
flush. "I have considered it more seriously than you may believe,
more, perhaps, than I ought."
"Than you ought?" he interrupted blankly.
"Yes," she said simply. "I mean that if it could ever have been
right to answer you as you wished, it would have been right all at
once; thinking would not alter it. I am sorry, chiefly, that I
allowed this--this procrastination; that I did not make you take my
decision that night, at Lady Mallory's. Yes, for that I was to
blame. Only, some day I think you will see that I was right, that it
would never have done."
"Never have done!" he repeated, with an accent full of grieved
resentment. "I think it would have done so admirably. I hardly
understand----"
"I mean," said poor Mary helplessly, "that you estimated me wrongly.
I _am_ frivolous--your interests would not have been safe in my hands.
You would have married me on a misunderstanding."
"No," said Charles morosely, "I can't believe that! You are not
plain with me, you are not sincere. You don't really believe that
you are frivolous, that we should not suit. In what way am I so
impossible? Is it my politics that you object to? I shall be happy
to discuss them with you. I am not intolerant; I should not expect
you to agree with me in everything. You give me no reasons for
this--this absurd prejudice; you are not direct; you indulge in
generalizations."
He spoke in a constrained monotone, which seemed to Mary, in spite
of her genuine regret for the pain she gave him, unreasonably full
of reproach.
"Ah!" she cried sharply, "since I don't love you, is not that a
reason? Oh, believe me," she went on rather wearily, "I have no
prejudice, not a grain. I would sooner marry you than not. Only I
cannot bring myself to feel towards you as a woman ought to the man
she marries. Very likely I shall never marry."
He considered her, half angrily, in silence, with his unanimated
eyes; his dignity suffered in discomposure, and lacking this,
pretentious as it was, he seemed to lack everything, becoming
unimportant and absurd.
"Oh, you will marry!" he said at last sullenly, an assertion which
Mary did not trouble to refute.
He returned the next minute, with a persistency which the girl began
to find irritating, to his charge.
"I don't understand it. They seem to me wilful, unworthy of you,
your reasons; it's perverse--yes, that is what it is, perverse! You
are not really happy here; the life doesn't suit you."
"What a discovery!" cried the girl half mockingly. "I am not really
happy! Well, if I admit it?"
"I could make you so by taking you out of it. You are too good for
it all, too good to sit and pour out tea for--for the sort of people
who come here."
"Do you mean," she asked, with a touch of scorn in her voice, "that
we are not respectable?"
"That is not you who speak," he persisted; "it is your aunt who
speaks through you. I know it is the fashion now to cry out against
one, even in good society, to call one straitlaced, if one respects
certain conventions. There are some I respect profoundly; and not
the least that one which forbids right-minded gentlewomen to receive
men of notoriously disgraceful lives. One should draw the line; one
should draw it at that Hungarian pianist who was here this
afternoon. Your aunt, of course, is a Frenchwoman; she has different
ideas. But you, I can't believe that you care for this society, for
people like Kronopolski and--and Rainham. Oh, it hurts me, and I
imagine how distasteful it must be to you, that you must suffer
these people. I want to take you away from it all."
The girl had risen, flushing a little. She replied haughtily, with a
vibration of passion in her voice:
"You are not generous, Mr. Sylvester. You are not even just. What
right have I ever given you to dictate to me whom I shall know or
refuse to know? I, too, have my convictions; and I think your view
is narrow, and uncharitable, and false. You see, we don't agree
enough.... Ah, let it end, Mr. Sylvester!" She went on more gently,
but very tiredly, her pale face revealing how the interview had
strained her: "I wish you all the good in the world, but I can't
marry you. Let us shake hands on that, and say good-bye."
Sylvester had also risen to his feet, and he stood facing her for a
moment indecisively, as though he hardly credited the finality of
his rejection.
They were still in this attitude, and the fact gave a certain tinge
of embarrassment to their greetings, when the door opened, and Mrs.
Lightmark was announced.
"I was on the point of going," explained Charles nervously. "I
thought you were not coming, you know."
Eve made no effort to detain him, half suspecting that she had
appeared at a strenuous moment. When the barrister had departed
(Mary had just extended to him the tips of her frigid fingers), and
Eve's polite inquiries after Lady Garnett's health had been
satisfied, she remarked:
"I really only came in for a cup of tea. I walked across from Dorset
Square. I have sent the carriage to pick up my husband at his club:
it's coming back for me. You look tired, Mary. I think I oughtn't to
stay. You look as if you had been having a political afternoon. Poor
Charles, since he has been in the House, can think of nothing but
blue-books."
"Tired?" queried the girl listlessly; "no, not particularly.
Besides, I am always glad to see you, it happens so seldom."
"Yes; except in a crowd. One has never any time. Have you heard, by
the way, that my husband is one of the new Associates?"
She went on quickly, preventing Mary's murmured congratulations:
"Yes, they have elected him. I suppose it is a very good thing. He
has his hands full of portraits now."
Then she remarked inconsequently--the rapidity with which she passed
from topic to topic half surprised Mary, who did not remember the
trait of old:
"We are going to the theatre to-night--that is to say, if my husband
has been able to get seats. It's the first night of a new comedy. I
meant to ask you to come with us, only it was an uncertainty. If the
box is not forthcoming, you must come when we do go. Only, of
course, it will not be the _première_."
"I should like to," said Mary vaguely. "I don't care so much about
first nights. I like the theatre; but I go so seldom. Aunt Marcelle
does not care for English plays; she says they are like stale
bread-and-butter. I tell her that is not so bad."
"The _mot_, you mean?"
"Partly; but also the thing. Bread-and-butter is a change after a
great many _petits fours_."
Mrs. Lightmark smiled a little absently as she sat smoothing the
creases out of her pretty, fawn-coloured gloves.
"Oh, the _petits fours_," she said, "for choice. One can take more of
them, and amuse one's self longer."
They heard a carriage draw up suddenly in the street below, and Eve,
who had been glancing from time to time expectantly at the window,
went over and looked out. She recognised her liveries and the two
handsome bays.
"Perhaps I had better not let him come up," she said; "it is late
already, and you will be wanting to dress."
Lightmark had just alighted from the carriage when his wife joined
him in the street. He held the door for her silently, and stopped
for a moment to give the direction, "Home," to the coachman before
he took the place at her side.
She turned to him after a while inquiringly, finding something of
unwonted gravity in his manner.
"Did you get the box?" she asked.
"The box?" he repeated blankly. Then, pulling himself up, "No," he
said quickly, "I forgot all about it. The fact is, I heard something
this afternoon which put it out of my head. I am afraid," he went
on, with a growing hesitation, "you will be rather shocked."
"Ah," she cried quickly, catching at her breath, "something has
happened. Tell me. Don't preface it; I can bear anything if you will
only tell me straight out."
"It's Rainham," he murmured. "He died last night at Blackpool. I
heard it from McAllister, at the club."
He looked away from her vaguely out of his window at the pale
streets, where a few lamps were beginning to appear, waiting in a
fever of apprehension, which he vainly sought to justify, for some
word or comment on the part of his wife.
As none came, and the silence grew intolerable, he ventured at last
to glance furtively across at her. Her face seemed to him a shade
paler than before, but that might be exaggerated by the relief of
her rich and sombre furs. Her eyes were quite expressionless and
blank, although she had the air of being immensely thoughtful; her
mouth was inscrutable and unmoved. And he experienced a sudden pang
of horror at the anticipation of a dinner alone with her, with the
ghostly presence of this news dividing them, before he reminded
himself that Colonel Lightmark was to be of the party.
For, perhaps, the first time in his life the prospect of his uncle's
company afforded him a sensation of relief.