PARIS
Grafton went over to Paris to fetch Barbara, and Caroline and Young
George went with him. It was decided almost at the last minute. Young
George had no particular opinion of foreign parts, and was enjoying
every moment of his time at home. But Jimmy, who came over on Friday to
pay a formal call of congratulation to Beatrix, advised him not to be an
ass. "A couple of days in Paris clears the cobwebs off a man's brain,"
he said. "England's the best place in the world, of course, but you're
apt to get provincial if you don't run over to France occasionally. You
see things from a different point of view." So Young George was
persuaded. They would only be away from Saturday till Monday, and on the
whole it would be rather a lark. He wanted to see Barbara too. There
were lots of things to talk to her about, and he had never before come
home for his holidays without finding her there to meet him. He had
missed her during the first few days, more than he would have thought
possible.
They arrived in Paris in the afternoon and descended at the Meurice.
Leaving Caroline and her maid there, Grafton and Young George went off
in a taxi-auto to collect Barbara from her 'family' which, though
somewhat decayed in fortune, still inhabited its ancestral hotel in the
Faubourg Saint Germain. There was a Monsieur le Comte and a Madame la
Comtesse, and a daughter of about Barbara's age. There were also half a
dozen young English girls whom Madame la Comtesse made a great favour of
receiving, but whose parents contributed the bulk of the income
necessary to keep up the ancient dignity of the name. It was the genuine
French family life which these English girls, also of irreproachable
ancestry--that was a _sine qua non_, or announced to be--were invited to
share, and which Barbara said was as dull as ditchwater. They had their
professors, and were taken about here and there, and they talked French.
English was not permitted. Not a word was allowed to be spoken even
among themselves, except as a special concession going to and from
church on Sundays. As none of them were Catholics, Madame probably
thought the greater sin might on these occasions include the lesser.
Barbara had altered; not in her affectionate impetuousness, for she
almost overwhelmed her father and brother with the warmth of her
embraces. But her hair, if not yet 'up' was no longer 'down.' She had
grown taller and slimmer; she wore her pretty clothes as if she took an
interest in them; and her speech and manner were the tiniest little bit
affected by her three months' absence from English influences, though
this she indignantly denied when Young George taxed her with putting on
French frills.
"But as for French frills," she said, "there will be something to be
said about that later, but not to either of you. Why didn't my darling
Caroline come to fetch me? Oh, I _am_ glad to see you, my darling old
Daddy, and you too, my adorable Bunting. I wish the taxi was closed; I'd
hug you both again. I haven't had half enough yet."
They had already told her about Beatrix's engagement, and she had
expressed herself delighted. Now she wanted to hear more, and there was
not much more to tell her. "Oh, well, I'll get it all out of Caroline,"
she said. "How's that little ass Jimmy Beckley?"
"You'll be able to talk French to him. He's jolly good at it," said
Young George.
"I _don't_ think," said Barbara. "No more French till I come back here.
Oh, how lovely it is to be going home! Can't we start to-morrow, Dad?"
"What do you think we've come here for?" asked Grafton. "We are going to
enjoy ourselves."
"Oh, yes. I'd forgotten that Paris was supposed to be a gay city. I
think it's the dullest hole in the world. Look, there's the Odeon. Oh,
what a thing to call itself a theatre! We get taken there, you know. We
saw 'Esther' last week. It was like going to church. Are we going to see
something amusing to-night, Dad? I believe there _are_ amusing theatres
to go to in Paris."
"I believe there are," said Grafton. "Yes, we'll go somewhere."
"I say, you know, this isn't half bad," said Young George as they sped
across the Tuileries gardens, with the great purple mass of the Louvre
on one side of them and the gay flower beds on the other, with the long
vista up to the Arc de Triomphe. "I like it better than Hyde Park."
Which was a great concession for so sturdy an Englishman.
"There's a concert every afternoon in a sort of open-air theatre," said
Barbara. "We go there sometimes. Perhaps I shouldn't mind Paris so much
if I weren't in a family. But how joyful it will be to get back to
England again! I'm longing for bacon for breakfast. I think French food
is much overrated."
They dined early, at the 'Ambassadeurs,' and Barbara said that the food
was better than she was accustomed to. They were a merry, talkative
quartette, and people looked at them admiringly and talked about them.
Those young English girls, with their fair hair and their delicious
colouring--when they began to be beautiful they almost exaggerated it.
There were not a few who would have liked to make the _entente cordiale_
that evening with this English group.
They went to the Opera Comique and heard 'Louise,' that poignant story
in which a daughter's love brings a father's sorrow. They were all fond
of music and knew something about it, even Young George, who had asked
for an opera rather than a play. He and Barbara chatted gaily between
the acts, but Caroline, whose sensitive fibre responded to the emotion
of those she loved, divined that her father was moved by the music, and
the unfolding of the story. Before the last act, in which Louise
finally forsakes the father who has loved her and whom she has loved,
dying in his room, Grafton said: "I think I've had enough. I'll stay
outside and smoke; and wait for you."
He and Caroline had read what was coming, sitting in a corner of the
_foyer_. "Let's all go home," she said. "I expect Barbara and Bunting
would just as soon. They have lots to talk about."
Barbara and Bunting made no objection, and as it was still early they
went to supper at Henry's round the corner. Barbara said that evidently
Madame la Comtesse didn't know what cooking was.
When Caroline and Barbara were alone that night, Barbara said: "That was
rather a beastly play for Dad to see. I suppose that's why we came away
before the end. I hope B isn't behaving towards him as she did last
time."
Caroline was surprised. She had not credited Barbara with that amount of
intuition. "No, he's happy about B," she said. "And he likes Dick
immensely."
"I said it would be B when we first set eyes on Dick, you know," Barbara
said.
Caroline remembered that she had, and laughed. "You're very far-sighted,
darling," she said.
"Well, I do keep my eyes open," said Barbara. "I know I'm a _jeune
fille_, and all that sort of thing, but I'm not a _jeune_ fool. I
suppose Louise wasn't married to that posturing poopstick?"
Caroline did not reply to this question. "It was rather too sad," she
said, "though the music was lovely. I think I should have stuck to the
nice old father if I'd been Louise."
"I'm quite sure I should," said Barbara. "I think the whole business is
awful tommy-rot."
Caroline imagined her to be commenting upon the emotions and attractions
of love, and left it there.
The next day they motored out to Versailles, lunched there, and saw the
fountains play, and the crowds. On their way back they had tea at a
restaurant in the Bois, and saw more crowds. In the evening they went
out to the Parc Montsouris, on the very outskirts of Paris, and dined
there in the open.
"Food and people," said Barbara. "Food and people all the time. Now I
know what Paris really means."
The little restaurant on the edge of the Parc Montsouris is not very
widely known, and the park itself is right away from everywhere. There
were half a dozen tables laid on the verandah, and some people already
dining there. But they were not of the highest fashion, which forsakes
Paris in the month of August.
They went to feed the ducks by the lake, while their dinner was being
prepared. As they came back a man and a woman came out on to the
verandah with the _patron_ in deferential attendance. The man was in
evening dress, and the woman beautifully gowned. It was she who was
doing the talking, in the most voluble of Parisian French, while the
_patron_ was shrugging his shoulders and answering her with a sly,
quick manner, apparently annoying to her, but amusing to her companion.
He had his back half turned towards the Graftons, but as they approached
the verandah he moved. It was Lassigny, and he saw them as plainly as
they all saw him.
"We'll go across the bridge," said Grafton. "I don't suppose dinner's
quite ready yet." He turned his back on the restaurant, and his children
followed him.
They saw by his face, which was dark and angry, that he wanted nothing
said about the meeting. When they came back a little later, their dinner
was ready, but Lassigny and his companion were not there.
The incident was soon forgotten by Barbara and Young George as they all
made merry over their meal. But Caroline knew that her father had been
deeply disturbed by it, in spite of his successful efforts to amuse
them. She saw once or twice that reminiscent frowning look come over his
face which she had only known during the time that Beatrix had been
waiting for Lassigny. He had never worn it before, nor since the news of
Lassigny's marriage in America had come to them and broken it all off
short. It troubled her to see it again now. Surely he must know that it
was all over with Beatrix! It was awkward having met Lassigny like that.
But they would not see him again, or, if they did in London, they need
take no notice of him. Apparently that was what he wished, as well as
her father.
The dusk came on, and the park emptied itself. The lawns and the water
seen between the tree trunks were silvered by the moon to mysterious
beauty. "It's like a scene in a play," said Barbara. "Do let's have one
more little walk round, Dad."
She and Young George hurried off to the lake, while Grafton paid the
bill, and Caroline stayed with him. Then they followed the other two.
Caroline slipped her hand into her father's arm. "Darling," she said,
"don't let it worry you--meeting him. It's bound to have happened some
time or other. We've got it over now."
"I'm glad B wasn't here," was all he said.
"So am I. But if she had wanted curing, I think that would have cured
her. Fancy choosing that for his wife, after knowing B!"
"It wasn't his wife," he said quickly.
Caroline was silent, blushing to the roots of her hair in the darkness.
Then she said: "I think I should have come to know that--afterwards. I
felt there was something. Oh, Dad, supposing it had been B he had
married, and that had happened!"
"Yes," he said. "And your Aunt Katharine and Mary and the rest of them
were all at me for trying to stop it. And B almost cut herself off from
me, because--because I knew what would happen if she did marry him."
She was struck with compunction because she also had thought him not
altogether reasonable in his dislike for Lassigny, whom he had not
disliked, but had invited to his house, before his engagement to
Beatrix. She had liked him herself, and had known him longer than
Beatrix had. Now she had a horror of him. All her soul, unsullied by the
thought of evil, revolted against what had been forced upon it. Her
father had known all along what he was. It had not prevented his
treating him as a friend, or permitting him to associate with his
daughters. She put that fact away in her mind, for consideration later.
But he too had revolted, when it had come to giving up one of his
daughters to him. And yet, as he had said, all the pressure had been
against him, and if Lassigny had come back for Beatrix at the end of the
six months in which it had been agreed he was not to see her, he would
have given her up to him.
What were men like, under the surface they presented to the women who
gave them their friendship and confidence--men who lived in the world of
Lassigny, yes, and of Francis Parry, and Dick, and most of those among
whom she had made her friends? She felt shaken by this glimpse she had
had into what lay beneath all the commerce of life as she had known it,
the life of pleasure, innocent enough to her and such as her, but lived
on a crust of artificiality through which one's foot might slip at any
time. Beneath it there were untold depths of mire in which one might
even be engulfed, as Beatrix had nearly been engulfed. Her pleasure in
those days in Paris was spoiled. She longed for the sure ground of her
quiet country life, in which one lived from day to day occupying and
interesting one's self in one's duties and quiet pleasures, with the
beauties and changes of nature to freshen the spirit, and all around the
lives of others with which one could mingle, and trust them not to
contain shameful secrets.
So she thought of it, not yet taught by age and experience that evil is
everywhere where men and women are congregated together, and may rear
its head in a country village as well as in a foreign city.
As she and Barbara were alone together that night, Barbara said
seriously: "I can't think how B can ever have liked Lassigny. I never
did. Although I didn't know anything in those days, I felt it about him
all the same."
Caroline suddenly saw Barbara with new eyes. She and Bunting had always
been called 'the children,' and treated as such; and up till the time
Barbara had left home, only three months before, she had been a tomboy,
sexless almost, certainly with no appeal that would bring out the deeper
feminine confidences. But she had always had a shrewd eye for character,
and Caroline remembered that she had avoided Lassigny's society when he
had stayed at the Abbey with a large party of guests, saying that there
were other men she liked better.
But now she was a woman, with a woman's sensibilities, though her
childish freedom of speech and some of her childish ways still clung to
her. The very alteration in her appearance, slight as it had seemed at
first, marked a stage in her growth. She stood by the window, fingering
a chain she had taken off. In her pretty evening frock, nearly as long
as Caroline's own, she seemed already to be 'grown up.' Caroline saw her
as a companion to her such as Beatrix had been, one whom she could treat
as an equal in understanding, if not in experience, and not as a much
younger sister from whom many things must be kept.
"Of course I know what sort of woman that was he was with," Barbara went
on. "You don't live in Paris even as I have to, without knowing the
difference. I hate it all; and I hate him. Why couldn't B see?"
"I don't know," said Caroline slowly. "But I didn't see either."
Barbara looked up quickly, and a soft look came into her face. "You're
so sweet and good, darling," she said. "You know, I believe that I see
more in some ways than you and B--I don't mean horrid things like that,
but all sorts of things--about people, I mean."
"I think you have more brains than either I or B," said Caroline, with a
smile.
"I don't think it's brains so much. I don't know what it is, quite. I
know I'm not so _nice_ as you, or B either."
They had begun to undress, helping one another. Caroline kissed her.
"You're every bit as nice, darling, and much cleverer."
"I'm sharp, and amusing," she said. "Perhaps I'm rather too sharp. I
shouldn't like people to be afraid of me because of my tongue. I'd much
rather be like you, and have everybody love me. Cara, when B gets
married, you and I will be a lot to each other, won't we? I shall be
quite grown up by the time I come home for good; I'm nearly grown up
now. I suppose I shall always be much the same with Bunting, but I want
to be something different with you."
"Darling, it's just what I've been thinking about. I shall miss B
awfully, when she goes; but I shall have you, to make up. And I think
it's quite true that you can see more into things than I can--some
things. Dad told me once I hadn't got a masculine brain."
"No, you're all feeling. But it's right feeling. I don't believe you
would ever have fallen in love with Lassigny, though you didn't dislike
him as I did. I'm never quite so sure about B. Of course I love her
awfully, and she's very sweet, and good, too. But I think she wants
somebody to look after her. Do you think Dick is the right man for her?"
"Why, don't you? It's you who can judge."
"Well, then, I do, on the whole. I think he'll want to be master,
absolutely. He has that sort of strength. He wouldn't do for me, even if
I loved him, and all that. I should want somebody I could be more equal
with. But I think it will suit B--to adapt herself to what he wants. The
only thing I'm not quite sure about is whether he'll give her exactly
the sort of life she wants. He has his job and he is keen on it; and of
course she won't take an _enormous_ interest in that, though she'll like
to see him go up in it. Then he likes country life, and she doesn't
particularly. She likes going about much more than you do. I don't
quite see B settling down and living at Wilborough most of her life."
Caroline was rather struck by this view. "You've thought it out," she
said.
"Yes, I like thinking things out. Of course I may be all wrong because I
don't take all this _love_ business enough into account. That may alter
everything."
Caroline laughed outright. "You think it's all tommy-rot, don't you?"
she asked.
"Well, I know it can't be, really, because it seems to take the most
sensible people. I suppose most of them get married because of it, at
least in England. But I should _think_--I don't know--that the happiest
husbands and wives are those that like the same sort of thing, not those
that are most in love with each other to begin with."
"I used to think that," said Caroline. "I'm not sure that I do now. I
have never loved anybody--in the way that B has, I mean--so perhaps I
don't know more than you do about it. But I do think it ought to begin
with that. I suppose marriage isn't just having a companion you like. If
it were I shouldn't want to marry at all, because I have just the
companionship I want at home."
"Francis Parry wanted to marry you, didn't he?"
"You're very sharp, darling," said Caroline with a smile. "I didn't know
you'd noticed anything."
"You and B have always treated me rather too much like a baby. I haven't
minded much, or perhaps you wouldn't have, for I should have talked to
you about things more. But it's going to be different now. There are
lots of things I shall want to talk to you about. I like Francis; but
I'm rather glad you didn't marry him, all the same. I think he'd have
made exactly the right husband for B, though."
Caroline laughed. "That's a new idea," she said. "Do you think Dick
would have made exactly the right husband for me?"
"Well, yes, I do," was Barbara's rather surprising answer. "You'll be
happier settled down, when you do marry."
"You don't settle down much as a sailor's wife."
"No, but he'll live at Wilborough by and bye, or his wife will. That
would suit you. It would be like going on living at Abington. But
Francis would live sometimes in London and sometimes in the country, and
he and his wife would go about a lot. That's just what would suit B."
"Well, it just shows that love has most to do with it, after all," said
Caroline. "I like Dick, too, but I should never want to marry him. If I
had to marry either of them, I'd much rather marry Francis. And I
believe that if anything were to happen to stop B marrying Dick, she'd
feel it more than she did before."