had fallen from her eyes, and flattered herself that she was by way of
becoming a bit of a misanthrope; also, I believe, there was a note
concerning the hollowness of life and the worthlessness of society in
general. In a word, Margaret fell back upon the extreme cynicism and
world-weariness of twenty-three, and assured herself that she despised
everybody, whereas, as a matter of fact, she never in her life
succeeded in disliking anything except mice and piano-practice, and,
for a very little while, Billy Woods; and this for the very excellent
reason that the gods had fashioned her solely to the end that she
might love all mankind, and in return be loved by humanity in general
and adored by that portion of it which inhabits trousers.
But, "The rats always desert a sinking ship," said Miss Hugonin, with
the air of one delivering a particularly original sentiment. "They
make me awfully tired, and I don't care for them in the least. But
Petheridge Jukesbury is a _dear_, and I may be poor now, but I _did_
try to do good with the money when I had it, and _anyhow_, Billy is
going to get well."
And, after all, that was the one thing that really mattered, though of
course Billy would always despise her. He would be quite right, too,
the girl thought humbly.
But the conventionalities of life are more powerful than even youthful
cynicism and youthful heart-break. Prior to devoting herself to a
loveless life and the commonplaces of the stoic's tub, Miss Hugonin
was compelled by the barest decency to bid her guests Godspeed.
And Adèle Haggage kissed her for the first time in her life. She had
been a little awed by Miss Hugonin, the famous heiress--a little
jealous of her, I dare say, on account of Hugh Van Orden--but now she
kissed her very heartily in farewell, and said, "Don't forget you are
to come to us as soon as _possible_," and was beyond any question
perfectly sincere in saying it.
And Hugh Van Orden almost dragged Margaret under the main stairway,
and, far from showing any marked abhorrence to her in her present
state of destitution, implored her with tears in his eyes to marry him
at once, and to bring the Colonel to live with them for the rest of
his natural existence.
For, "It's damned impertinent of me, of course," Mr. Van Orden readily
conceded, "and I suppose I ought to beg your pardon for mentioning it,
but I _do_ love you to a perfectly unlimited extent. It's playing the
very deuce with my polo, Miss Hugonin, and as for my appetite--why,
if you won't have me," cried Hugh, in desperation, "I--I really, you
know, I don't believe I'll _ever_ be able to eat anything!"
When Margaret refused him--for the sixth time, I think--I won't swear
that she didn't kiss him under the dark stairway. And if she did, he
was a nice boy, and he deserved it.
And as for Sarah Ellen Haggage, that unreverend old parasite brought
her a blank cheque signed with her name, and mentioned quite a goodly
sum as the extent to which Margaret might go for necessary expenses.
"For you'll need it," she said, and rubbed her nose reflectively.
"Moving is the very deuce for wasting money, because so many little
things keep cropping up. Now, remember, a quarter is quite enough to
give _any_ man for moving a trunk. And there's no earthly sense in
your taking a cab, Margaret--the street-car will bring you within a
block of our door. These little trifles count, dear. And don't let
Célestine pack your things, because she's abominably careless. Let
Marie do it--and don't tip her. Give her an old hat. And if I were
you, I would certainly consult a lawyer about the legality of that
idiotic will. I remember distinctly hearing that Mr. Woods was very
eccentric in his last days, and I haven't a doubt he was raving mad
when, he left all his money to a great, strapping, long-legged young
fellow, who is perfectly capable of taking care of himself. Getting
better, is he? Well, I suppose I'm glad to hear it, but he'd much
better have stayed in Paris--where, I remember distinctly hearing, he
led the most dissipated and immoral life, my dear--instead of coming
over here and upsetting everything." And again Mrs. Haggage rubbed her
nose--indignantly.
"He _didn't_!" said Margaret. "And I _can't_ take your money,
beautiful! And I don't see how we can possibly come to stay with you."
"Don't you argue with me!" Mrs. Haggage exhorted her. "I'm not in any
temper to be argued with. I've spent the morning sewing bias
stripes in a bias skirt--something which from a moral-ruining and
resolution-overthrowing standpoint simply knocks the spots off Job.
You'll take that money, and you'll come to me as soon as you can,
and--God bless you, my dear!"
And again Margaret was kissed. Altogether, it was a very osculatory
morning for Miss Hugonin.
Mr. Jukesbury's adieus, however, were more formal; and--I am sorry to
say it--the old fellow went away wondering if the rich Mr. Woods might
not conceivably be very grateful to the man who had saved his life and
evince his gratitude in some agreeable and substantial form.
Mrs. Saumarez and Mr. Kennaston, also, were somewhat unenthusiastic in
their parting. Kennaston could not feel quite at ease with Margaret,
brazen it as he might with devil-may-carish flippancy; and Kathleen
had by this an inkling as to how matters stood between Margaret and
Billy, and was somewhat puzzled thereat, and loved the former in
consequence no more than any Christian female is compelled to love the
woman who, either unconsciously or with deliberation, purloins her
ancient lover. A woman rarely forgives the man who has ceased to care
for her; and rarelier still can she pardon the woman who has dared
succeed her in his affections.
And besides, they were utterly engrossed with one another, and utterly
happy, and utterly selfish with the immemorial selfishness of lovers,
who cannot for a moment conceive that the whole world is not somehow
benefited by their happiness and does not await with breathless
interest the outcome of their bickerings with the blind bow-god, and
from this providential delusion derive a meritorious and comfortable
glow. So Mrs. Saumarez and Mr. Kennaston parted from Margaret with
kindness, it is true, but not without awkwardness.
And that was the man that almost she had loved! thought Margaret, as
she gazed on the whirl of dust left by their carriage-wheels. Gone
with a few perfunctory words of sympathy!
And for my part, I think that the base Indian who threw a pearl away
worth more than all his tribe was, in comparison with Felix Kennaston,
a shrewd and long-headed man. If you had given _me_ his chances,
Margaret ... but this, however, is highly digressive.
The Colonel, standing beside her, used language that was unrefined.
His aspirations as to the future of Mr. Kennaston and Mr. Jukesbury,
it appeared, were both lurid and unfriendly.
"But why, attractive?" queried his daughter.
"May they be qualified with such and such adjectives!" desired the
Colonel, fervently. "They tried to lend me money--wouldn't hear of
my not taking it! In case of necessity.' Bah!" said the Colonel, and
shook his fist after the retreating carriages. "May they be qualified
with such and such adjectives!"
How happily she laughed! "And you're swearing at them!" she pouted.
"Oh, my dear, my dear, how hard you are on all my little friends!"
"Of course I am," said the Colonel, stoutly. "They've deprived me of
the pleasure of despising 'em. It was worth double the money, I tell
you! I never objected to any men quite so much. And now they've gone
and behaved decently with the deliberate purpose of annoying me! Oh!"
cried the Colonel, and shook an immaculate, withered old hand toward
the spring sky, "may they be qualified with such and such adjectives!"
And that, so far as we are concerned, was the end of Margaret's
satellites.
My dear Mrs. Grundy, may one point the somewhat obvious moral? I thank
you, madam, for your long-suffering kindness. Permit me, then, to
vault toward my moral over the shoulders of a greater man.
Among the papers left by one Charles Dickens--a novelist who is
obsolete now because he "wallows naked in the pathetic" and was
frequently guilty of a very vulgar sort of humour that actually made
people laugh, which, as we now know, is not the purpose of humour--a
novelist who incessantly "caricatured Nature" and by these inartistic
and underhand methods created characters that are more real to us than
the folk we jostle in the street and (God knows!) far more vital and
worthy of attention than the folk who "cannot read Dickens"--you will
find, I say, a note of an idea which he never afterward developed,
running to this effect: "Full length portrait of his lordship,
surrounded by worshippers. Sensible men enough, agreeable men enough,
independent men enough in a certain way; but the moment they begin
to circle round my lord, and to shine with a borrowed light from
his lordship, heaven and earth, how mean and subservient! What a
competition and outbidding of each other in servility!"
And this, with "my lord" and "his lordship" erased to make way for the
word "money," is my moral. The folk who have just left Selwoode were
honest enough as honesty goes nowadays; kindly as any of us dare
be who have our own way to make among very stalwart and determined
rivals; generous as any man may venture to be in a world where
the first of every month finds the butcher and the baker and the
candlestick-maker rapping at the door with their little bills: but
they cringed to money. It was very wrong of them, my dear lady, and in
extenuation I can only plead that they could no more help cringing to
money than you or I can help it.
This is very crude and very cynical, but unfortunately it is true.
We always cringe to money; which is humiliating. And the sun always
rises at an hour when sensible people are abed and have not the least
need for its services; which is foolish. And what you and I, my dear
madam, are to do about rectifying either one of these vexatious
circumstances, I am sure I don't know.
We can, at least, be honest. Let us, then, console ourselves at will
with moral observations concerning the number of pockets in a shroud
and the difficulty of a rich man's entering into the kingdom of
Heaven; but with an humble and reverent heart, let us admit that, in
the world we know, money rules. Its presence awes us. And if we are
quite candid we must concede that we very unfeignedly envy and admire
the rich; we must grant that money confers a certain distinction on a
man, be he the veriest ass that ever heehawed a platitude, and that we
cannot but treat him accordingly, you and I.
You are friendly, of course, with your poor cousins; you are delighted
to have them drop in to dinner, and liberal enough with the claret
when they do; but when the magnate comes, there is a magnum of
champagne, and an extra lamp in the drawing-room, and--I blush to
write it--a far more agreeable hostess at the head of the table. Dives
is such good company, you see. And speaking for my own sex, I defy any
honest fellow to lay his hand upon his waistcoat and swear that it
doesn't give him a distinct thrill of pleasure to be seen in public
with a millionaire. Daily we truckle in the Eagle's shadow--the shadow
that lay so heavily across Selwoode. With the Eagle himself and with
the Eagle's work in the world--the grim, implacable, ruthless work
that hourly he goes about--our little comedy has naught to do;
Schlemihl-like, we deal but in shadows. Even the shadow of the Eagle
is a terrible thing--a shadow that, as Felix Kennaston has told you,
chills faith, and charity, and independence, and kindliness, and
truth, and--alas--even common honesty.
But this is both cynical and digressive.
XXXI
Dr. Jeal, better than his word, had Billy Woods out of bed in five
days. To Billy they were very long and very dreary days, and to
Margaret very long and penitential ones. But Colonel Hugonin enjoyed
them thoroughly; for, as he feelingly and frequently observed, it is
an immense consolation to any man to reflect that his home no longer
contains "more damn' foolishness to the square inch than any other
house in the United States."
On all sides they sought for Cock-eye Flinks. But they never found
him, and to this day they have never found him. The Fates having
played their pawn, swept it from the board, and Cock-eye Flinks
disappeared in Clotho's capacious pocket.
All this time the young people saw nothing of one another. On this
point Jeal was adamantean.
"In a sick-room," he vehemently declared, "a woman is well enough, but
_the_ woman is the devil and all. I've told that young man plainly,
sir, that he doesn't see your daughter till he gets well--and, by
George, sir, he'll get well now just in order to see her. Nature is
the only doctor who ever cures anybody, Colonel; we humans, for
all our pill-boxes and lancets, can only prompt her--and devilish
demoralising advice we generally give her, too," he added, with a
chuckle.
"Peggy!"
This was the first observation of Mr. Woods when he came to his
senses. He swore feebly when Peggy was denied to him. He pleaded. He
scolded. He even threatened, as a last resort, to get out of bed and
go in immediate search of her; and in return, Jeal told him very
affably that it was far less difficult to manage a patient in a
straight-jacket than one out of it, and that personally nothing would
please him so much as a plausible pretext for clapping Mr. Woods into
one of 'em. Jeal had his own methods in dealing with the fractious.
Then Billy clamoured for Colonel Hugonin, and subsequently the Colonel
came in some bewilderment to his daughter's rooms.
"Billy says that will ain't to be probated," he informed her, testily.
"I'm to make sure it ain't probated till he gets well. You're to give
me your word you'll do nothing further in the matter till Billy gets
well. That's his message, and I'd like to know what the devil this
infernal nonsense means. I ain't a Fenian nor yet a Guy Fawkes,
daughter, and in consequence I'm free to confess I don't care for all
this damn mystery and shilly-shallying. But that's the message."
Miss Hugonin debated with herself. "That I will do nothing further in
the matter till Billy gets well," she repeated, reflectively. "Yes, I
suppose I'll have to promise it, but you can tell him for me that I
consider he is _horrid_, and just as obstinate and selfish as he can
_possibly_ be. Can you remember that, attractive?"
"Yes, thank you," said the Colonel. "I can remember it, but I ain't
going to. Nice sort of message to send a sick man, ain't it? I don't
know what's gotten into you, Margaret--no, begad, I don't! I think
you're possessed of seventeen devils. And now," the old gentleman
demanded, after an awkward pause, "are you or are you not going to
tell me what all this mystery is about?"
"I can't," Miss Hugonin protested. "It--it's a secret, attractive."
"It ain't," said the Colonel, flatly--"it's some more damn
foolishness." And he went away in a fret and using language.
XXXII
Left to herself, Miss Hugonin meditated.
Miss Hugonin was in her kimono.
And oh, Madame Chrysastheme! oh, Madame Butterfly! Oh, Mimosa San, and
Pitti Sing, and Yum Yum, and all ye vaunted beauties of Japan! if you
could have seen her in that garb! Poor little ladies of the Orient,
how hopelessly you would have wrung your henna-stained fingers! Poor
little Ichabods of the East, whose glory departed irretrievably when
she adopted this garment, I tremble to think of the heart-burnings and
palpitations and hari-karis that would have ensued.
It was pink--the pink of her cheeks to a shade. And scattered about it
were birds, and butterflies, and snaky, emaciated dragons, with backs
like saw-teeth, and prodigious fangs, and claws, and very curly tails,
such as they breed in Nankeen plates and used to breed on packages of
fire-crackers--all done in gold, the gold of her hair. Moreover, one
might catch a glimpse of her neck--which was a manifest favour of the
gods--and about it mysterious, lacy white things intermingling with
divers tiny blue ribbons. I saw her in it once--by accident.
And now I fancy, as she stood rigid with indignation, her cheeks
flushed, it must have been a heady spectacle to note how their
shell-pink repeated the pink of her fantastic garment like a chromatic
echo; and how her sunny hair, a thought loosened, a shade dishevelled,
clung heavily about her face, a golden snare for eye and heart; and
how her own eyes, enormous, cerulean--twin sapphires such as in the
old days might have ransomed a brace of emperors--grew wistful like a
child's who has been punished and does not know exactly why; and how
her petulant mouth quivered and the long black lashes, golden at the
roots, quivered, too--ah, yes, it must have been a heady spectacle.
"_Now_," she announced, "I see plainly what he intends doing. He is
going to destroy that will, and burden me once more with a large and
influential fortune. I don't want it, and I won't take it, and he
might just as well understand that in the very beginning. I don't care
if Uncle Fred did leave it to me--I didn't ask him to, did I? Besides,
he was a very foolish old man--if he had left the money to Billy
_everything_ would have been all right. That's always the way--my
dolls are invariably stuffed with sawdust, and I _never_ have a dear
gazelle to glad me with his dappled hide, but when he comes to know me
well he falls upon the buttered side--or something to that effect. I
hate poetry, anyhow--it's so mushy!"
And this from the Miss Hugonin who a week ago was interested in the
French _decadents_ and partial to folk-songs from the Romaic! I think
we may fairly deduce that the reign of Felix Kennaston is over. The
king is dead; and Margaret's thoughts and affections and her very
dreams have fallen loyally to crying, Long live the king--his Majesty
Billy the First.
"Oh!" said Margaret, with an indignant gasp, what time her eyebrows
gesticulated, "I think Billy Woods is a meddlesome _piece_!--that's
what I think! Does he suppose that after waiting all this time for the
only man in the world who can keep me interested for four hours on
a stretch and send my pulse up to a hundred and make me feel those
thrilly thrills I've always longed for--does he suppose that now
I'm going to pay any attention to his silly notions about wills and
things? He's abominably selfish! I shan't!"
Margaret moved across the room, shimmering, rustling, glittering like
a fairy in a pantomime. Then, to consider matters at greater ease, she
curled up on a divan in much the attitude of a tiny Cleopatra riding
at anchor on a carpeted Cydnus.
"Billy thinks I want the money--bless his boots! He thinks I'm a
stuck-up, grasping, purse-proud little pig, and he has every right
to think so after the way I talked to him, though he ought to have
realised I was in a temper about Kathleen Saumarez and have paid no
attention to what I said. And he actually attempted to reason with
me! If he'd had _any_ consideration for my feelings, he'd have simply
smacked me and made me behave--however, he's a man, and all men are
selfish, and _she's_ a skinny old thing, and I _never_ had any use for
her. Bother her lectures! I never understood a word of them, and I
don't believe she does, either. Women's clubs are _all_ silly, and I
think the women who belong to them are _all_ bold-faced jigs! If
they had any sense, they'd stay at home and take care of the babies,
instead of messing with philanthropy, and education, and theosophy,
and anything else that they can't make head or tail of. And they call
that being cultured! Culture!--I hate the word! I don't want to be
cultured--I want to be happy."
This, you will observe, was, in effect, a sweeping recantation of
every ideal Margaret had ever boasted. But Love is a canny pedagogue,
and of late he had instructed Miss Hugonin in a variety of matters.
"Before God, loving you as I do, I wouldn't marry you for all the
wealth in the world," she repeated, with a little shiver. "Even in his
delirium he said that. But I _know_ now that he loves me. And I know
that I adore him. And if this were a sensible world, I'd walk right in
there and explain things and ask him to marry me, and then it wouldn't
matter in the least who had the money. But I can't, because it
wouldn't be proper. Bother propriety!--but bothering it doesn't do
any good. As long as I have the money, Billy will never come near me,
because of the idiotic way I talked to him. And he's bent on my taking
the money simply because it happens to belong to me. I consider that
a very silly reason. I'll _make_ Billy Woods take the money, and
I'll make him see that I'm _not_ a little pig, and that I trust him
implicitly. And I think I'm quite justified in using a little--we'll
call it diplomacy--because otherwise he'd go back to France or some
other objectionable place, and we'd both be _very_ unhappy."
Margaret began to laugh softly. "I've given him my word that I'll
do nothing further in the matter till he gets well. And I won't.
_But_----"
Miss Hugonin rose from the divan with a gesture of sweeping back her
hair. And then--oh, treachery of tortoise-shell! oh, the villainy of
those little gold hair-pins!--the fat twisted coils tumbled loose
and slowly unravelled themselves, and her pink-and-white face,
half-eclipsed, showed a delectable wedge between big, odourful,
crinkly, ponderous masses of hair. It clung about her, a heavy cloak,
all shimmering gold like the path of sunset over the June sea. And
Margaret, looking at herself in the mirror, laughed, and appeared
perfectly content with what she saw there.
"But," said she, "if the Fates are kind to me--and I sometimes think
I _have_ a pull with the gods--I'll make you happy, Billy Woods, in
spite of yourself."
The mirror flashed back a smile. Margaret was strangely interested in
the mirror.
"She has ringlets in her hair," sang Margaret happily--a low,
half-hushed little song. She held up a strand of it to demonstrate
this fact.
"There's a dimple in her chin"--and, indeed, there was. And a dimple
in either cheek, too.
For a long time afterward she continued to smile at the mirror. I am
afraid Kathleen Saumarez was right. She was a vain little cat, was
Margaret.
But, barring a rearrangement of the cosmic scheme, I dare say maids
will continue to delight in their own comeliness so long as mirrors
speak truth. Let us, then, leave Miss Hugonin to this innocent
diversion. The staidest of us are conscious of a brisk elation at
sight of a pretty face; and surely no considerate person will deny its
owner a portion of the pleasure that daily she accords the beggar at
the street-corner.
XXXIII
We are credibly informed that Time travels in divers paces with divers
persons--the statement being made by a lady who may be considered to
speak with some authority, having triumphantly withstood the ravages
of Chronos for a matter of three centuries. But I doubt if even the
insolent sweet wit of Rosalind could have devised a fitting simile for
Time's gait at Selwoode those five days that Billy lay abed. Margaret
could not but marvel at the flourishing proportion attained by the
hours in those sunlit spring days; and at dinner, say, her thoughts
harking back to luncheon, recalled it by a vigorous effort as an
affair of the dim yester-years--a mere blurred memory, faint and vague
as a Druidical tenet or a Merovingian squabble.
But the time passed for all that; and eventually--it was just before
dusk--she came, with Martin Jeal's permission, into the room where
Billy was. And beside the big open fireplace, where a wood fire
chattered companionably, sat a very pallid Billy, a rather thin Billy,
with a great many bandages about his head.
You may depend upon it, Margaret was not looking her worst that
afternoon. By actual count, Célestine had done her hair six times
before reaching an acceptable result.
And, "Yes, Célestine, you may get out that pale yellow dress. No,
beautiful, the one with the black satin stripes on the bodice--because
I don't want my hair cast completely in the shade, do I? Now, let me
see--black feather, gloves, large pompadour, _and_ a sweet smile. No,
I don't want a fan--that's a Lydia Languish trade-mark. And _two_ silk
skirts rustling like the deadest leaves imaginable. Yes, I think that
will do. And if you can't hook up my dress without pecking and pecking
at me like that, I'll probably go stark, _staring_ crazy, Célestine,
and then you'll be sorry. No, it isn't a bit tight--are you perfectly
certain there's no powder behind my ears, Célestine? Now, _please_ try
to fasten the collar without pulling all my hair down. Ye-es, I think
that will do, Célestine. Well, it's very nice of you to say so, but I
don't believe I much fancy myself in yellow, after all."