MISS PAULO'S OBSERVATION
Miss Paulo sat for a while thoughtfully biting the top of her quill pen
and looking out dreamily into the street. Her little sitting-room faced
Knightsbridge and the trees and grass of the Park. Often when some
problem of the domestic economy of the hotel caused her a passing
perplexity, she would derive new vigour for grappling with complicated
sums from a leisurely study of those green spaces and the animated
panorama of the passing crowd. But to-day there was nothing particularly
complicated about the family accounts, and Dolores Paulo sought for no
arithmetical inspiration from the pleasant out-look. Her mind was wholly
occupied with the thought of what Captain Sarrasin had been saying to
her--of the possible peril that threatened the Dictator.
She drew the feather from between her lips and tapped the blotting-pad
with it impatiently.
'Why should I trouble my head or my heart about him?' she asked herself
bitterly. 'He doesn't trouble his head or his heart about me.'
But she felt ashamed of her petulant speech immediately. She seemed to
see the grave, sweet face of the Dictator looking down at her in
surprise; she seemed to see the strong soldierly face of Captain
Sarrasin frown upon her sternly.
'Ah,' she meditated with a sigh, 'it is only natural that he should fall
in love with a girl like that. She can be of use to him--of use to his
cause. What use can I be to him or to his cause? There is nothing I can
do except to look out for a possible South American with an especially
dark skin and especially curly moustache.'
As she reflected thus, her eye, wandering over the populous thoroughfare
and the verdure beyond, populous also, noted, or rather accepted, the
presence of one particular man out of the many. The one particular man
was walking slowly up and down on the roadside opposite to the hotel by
the Park railings. That he was walking up and down Dolores became
conscious of through the fact that, having half unconsciously seen him
once float into her ken, she noted him again, with some slight surprise,
and was aware of him yet a third time with still greater surprise. The
man paced slowly up and down on what appeared to be a lengthy beat, for
Dolores mentally calculated that something like a minute must have
elapsed between each glimpse of his face as he moved in the direction in
which she most readily beheld him. He was a man a little above the
middle height, with a keen, aquiline face, smooth-shaven, and
red-haired. There was nothing in his dress to render him in the least
remarkable; he was dressed like everybody else, Dolores said to herself,
and it must therefore have been his face that somehow or other attracted
her vagrant fancy. Yet it was not a particularly attractive face in any
sense. It was not a comely face which would compel the admiring
attention of a girl, nor was it a face so strongly marked, so out of the
ordinary lines, as to command attention by its ugliness or its strength
of character. It was the smooth-shaven face of an average man of a
fair-haired race; there was something Scotch about it--Lowland Scotch,
the kind of face of which one might see half a hundred in an hour's
stroll along the main street of Glasgow or Prince's Street in Edinburgh.
Dolores had been in both these cities and knew the type, and as it was
not a specially interesting type she soon diverted her gaze from the
unknown and resumed attentively her table of figures. But she had not
given many seconds to their consideration when her attention was again
diverted. A four-wheeled cab had driven up to the door with a
considerable pile of luggage on it. There was nothing very remarkable in
that. The arrival of a cab loaded with luggage was an event of hourly
occurrence at Paulo's Hotel, and quite unlikely to arouse any especial
interest in the mind of Miss Dolores. What, however, did languidly
arouse her interest, did slightly stir her surprise, was that the
smooth-shaven patroller of the opposite side of the way immediately
crossed the road as the cab drew up, and standing by the side of the cab
door proceeded to greet the occupant of the cab. Even that was not very
much out of the way, and yet Dolores was sufficiently interested to lay
down her pen and to see who should emerge from the vehicle, around which
now the usual little guard of hotel porters had gathered.
A big man got out of the cab, a big man with a blonde beard and amiable
spectacles. He carried under his arm a large portfolio, and in each hand
he carried a collection of books belted together in a hand-strap. He was
enveloped in a long coat, and his appearance and the appearance of his
luggage suggested that he had travelled, and even from some considerable
distance.
Curiosity is often an inexplicable thing, even to the curious, and
certainly Dolores would have been hard put to it to explain why she felt
any curiosity about the new arrival and the man who had so patiently
awaited him. But she did feel curious, and mingled with her curiosity
was a vague sense of something like compassion, if not exactly of pity,
for she knew very well that at that moment the hotel was very full, and
that the new-comer would have to put up with rather uncomfortable
quarters if he were lucky enough to get any at all. The sense of
curiosity was, however, stronger than her sense of compassion, and she
ran rapidly down stairs by her own private stair and slipped into the
little room at the back of the hotel office, where either her father or
her mother was generally to be found. At this particular moment, as it
happened, neither her father nor mother was in the little room. The door
communicating with the office stood slightly ajar, and Dolores, standing
by it, could see into the office and hear all that passed without being
seen.
The blonde-bearded stranger came up to the office smiling confidently.
He had still his portfolio under his arm, but his smooth-shaven friend
had relieved him of the two bundles of books, and stood slightly apart
while the rest of the new-comer's belongings were being piled into a
huge mound of impedimenta in the hall. Dolores expected the confident
smile of the blonde man to disappear rapidly from his face. But it did
not disappear. He said something to the office clerk which Dolores could
not catch; the clerk immediately nodded, rang for a page-boy, collected
sundry keys from their hooks, and handed them to the page-boy, who
immediately made off in the direction of the lift, heralding the
blonde-bearded stranger, with his smooth-shaven friend still in
attendance, while a squad of porters descended upon the luggage and
wafted it away with the rapidity of Afrite magicians.
Dolores could not restrain her curiosity. She opened the door wider and
called to the clerk, 'Mr. Wilkins.'
Mr. Wilkins looked round. He was a tall, alert, sharp-looking young man,
whose only weakness in life was a hopeless attachment to Miss Paulo.
'Yes, Miss Paulo.'
'Who was the gentleman who just arrived, Mr. Wilkins?'
Mr. Wilkins seemed a little surprised at the interest Miss Paulo
displayed in the arrival of a stranger. But he made the most of the
occasion. He was glad to have anything to tell which could possibly
interest _her_.
'That,' said Mr. Wilkins with a certain pride, 'is quite a distinguished
person in his way. He is Professor Wilberforce P. Flick, President of
the Denver and Sacramento Folk-Lore Societies. He has been travelling on
the Continent for some time past for the benefit of the societies, and
has now arrived in London for the purpose of making acquaintance with
the members of the leading lights of folk-lore in this country.'
Dolores laughed. 'Did he tell you all that just now?' she asked.
'Oh, no,' the young man replied, 'Oh, no, Miss Paulo. All that valuable
information I gained largely from a letter from the distinguished
gentleman himself from Paris last week, and partially also from the
spontaneous statements of his friend Mr. Andrew J. Copping, of Omaha,
who is now in London, and who came here to see if his friend's rooms
were duly reserved.'
'Was that Mr. Copping who was with the Professor just now?'
'Yes, the clean-shaven man was Mr. Andrew J. Copping, of Omaha.'
'Is he also stopping at the hotel?' Miss Paulo asked.
'No.' Mr. Wilkins explained. Mr. Copping was apparently for the time a
resident of London, and lived, he believed, somewhere in the Camden Town
region. But he was very anxious that his friend and compatriot should be
comfortable, and that his rooms should be commodious.
'How many rooms does Professor Flick occupy?' asked Miss Paulo.
It seemed that the Professor occupied a little suite of rooms which
comprised a bedroom and sitting-room, with a bath-room. It seemed that
the Professor was a very studious person and that he would take all his
meals by himself, as he pursued the study of folk-lore even at his
meals, and wished not to have his attention in the least disturbed
during the process.
'What an impassioned scholar!' said Miss Paulo. 'I had no idea that
places like Denver and Sacramento were leisurely enough to produce such
ardent students of folk-lore.'
'Not to mention Omaha,' added Mr. Wilkins.
'Is Mr. Copping also a folk-lorist then?' inquired Miss Paulo; and Mr.
Wilkins replied that he believed so, that he had gathered as much from
the remarks of Mr. Copping on the various occasions when he had called
at the hotel.
'The various occasions?'
Yes, Mr. Copping had called several times, to make quite sure of
everything concerning his friend's comfort. He was very particular about
the linen being aired one morning. Another morning ho looked in to
ascertain whether the chimneys smoked, as the learned Professor often
liked a fire in his rooms even in summer. A third time he called to
enquire if the water in the bath-room was warm enough at an early hour
in the morning, as the learned Professor often rose early to devote
himself to his great work!
'What a thoughtful friend, to be sure!' said Miss Paulo. 'It is pleasant
to find that great scholarship can secure such devoted disciples. For I
suppose Professor Flick is a great scholar.'
'One of the greatest in the world, as I understand from Mr. Copping,'
replied Mr. Wilkins. 'I understand from Mr. Copping that when Professor
Flick's great work appears it will revolutionise folk-lore all over the
world.'
'Dear me!' said Miss Paulo; 'how little one does know, to be sure. I had
no idea that folk-lore required revolutionising.'
'Neither had I,' said Mr. Wilkins; 'but apparently it does.'
'And Professor Flick is the man to do it, apparently,' said Miss Paulo.
'If Mr. Copping is correct about the great work,' said Mr. Wilkins.
'Ay, yes, the great work. And what is the great work? Did Mr. Copping
communicate that as well?'
Oh, yes, Mr. Copping had communicated that as well. The great work was a
study in American folk-lore, and it went to establish, as far as Mr.
Wilkins could gather from Mr. Copping's glowing but somewhat
disconnected phrases, that all the legends of the world were originally
the property of the Ute Indians, who, with the Apaches, constituted,
according to the Professor, the highest intellectual types on the
surface of the earth.
'Well,' said Dolores, 'all that, I dare say, is very interesting and
exciting, and even exhilarating to the studious inhabitants of Denver
and of Sacramento. I wonder if it will greatly interest London? Where
have you put Professor Flick?'
Professor Flick was located, it appeared, upon the first floor. It
seemed, according to the representations of the devoted Copping, that
Professor Flick was a very nervous man about the possibility of fires;
that he never willingly went higher than the first floor in consequence,
and that he always carried with him in his baggage a patent rope-ladder
for fear of accidents.
'On the first floor,' said Miss Paulo. 'Which rooms?'
'The end suite at the right. On the same side as the rooms of his
Excellency, but further off. Mr. Copping seems to like their situation
the best of all the rooms I showed him.'
'On the same side as his Excellency's rooms? Well, I should think
Professor Flick would be a quiet neighbour.'
'Probably, for he was very anxious to be quiet himself. But I am afraid
the fame of our illustrious guest does not extend so far as Denver, for
Mr. Copping asked what the flag was flying for, and when I told him he
did not seem to be a bit the wiser.'
'The stupid man!' said Miss Paulo scornfully.
'And Professor Flick is just as bad. When I mentioned to him that his
rooms were near those of Mr. Ericson, the Dictator of Gloria, he said
that he had never heard of him, but that he hoped he was a quiet man,
and did not sit up late.'
'Really,' said Miss Paulo, frowning, 'this Mr. Flick would seem to think
that the world was made for folk-lore, and that he was folk-lore's
Cæsar.'
'Ah, Miss Paulo,' said the practical Wilkins, with a smile, 'these
scholars have queer ways.'
'Evidently,' answered Miss Paulo, 'evidently. Well, I suppose we must
humour them sometimes, for the sake of the Utes and Apaches at least;'
and, with the sunniest of smiles, Miss Paulo withdrew from the office,
leaving, as it seemed to Mr. Wilkins, who was something of a poet in his
spare moments, the impression as of departed divinity. The atmosphere of
the hotel hall seemed to take a rosy tinge, and to be impregnated with
enchanting odours as from the visit of an Olympian. Mr. Wilkins had been
going through a course of Homer of late, in Bohn's translation, and
permitted himself occasionally to allow his fancy free play in classical
allusion. Never, though, to his credit be it recorded, did his poetic
studies or his love-dreamings operate in the least to the detriment of
his serious duties as head of the office in Paulo's Hotel, a post which,
to do him justice, he looked upon as scarcely less important than that
of a Cabinet Minister.
Since the day when Dolores first spoke to Hamilton about the danger
which was supposed to threaten the Dictator, she had had many talks with
the young man. It became his habit now to stop and talk with her
whenever he had a chance of meeting her. It was pleasant to him to look
into her soft, bright, deep-dark eyes. Her voice sounded musical in his
ears. The touch of her hand soothed him. His devotion to the Dictator
touched her; her devotion to the Dictator touched him. For a while they
had only one topic of conversation--the Dictator, and the fortunes of
Gloria.
Soon the clever and sympathetic girl began to think that Hamilton had
some trouble in his mind or in his heart which did not strictly belong
to the fortunes of the Dictator. There was an occasional melancholy
glance in his eye, and then there came a sudden recovery, an almost
obvious pulling of himself together, which Dolores endeavoured to reason
out. She soon reasoned it out to her own entire conviction, if not to
her entire satisfaction. For she felt deeply sorry for the young man. He
had been crossed in love, she felt convinced. Oh, yes, he had been
crossed in love! Some girl had deceived him, and had thrown him over!
And he was so handsome, and so gentle, and so brave, and what better
could the girl have asked for? And Dolores became quite angry with the
unnamed, unknown girl. Her manner grew all the more genial and kindly to
Hamilton. All unconsciously, or perhaps feeling herself quite safe in
her conviction that Hamilton's heart was wholly occupied with his love,
she allowed herself a certain tone of tender friendship, wholly
unobtrusive, almost wholly impersonal--a tender sympathy with the
suffering, perhaps, rather than with the sufferer, but bringing much
sweetness of voice to the sufferer's ear.
The two became quite confidential about the Dictator and the danger that
was supposed to be threatening him. They had long talks over it--and
there was an element of secrecy and mystery about the talks which gave
them a certain piquancy and almost a certain sweetness. Of course these
talks had to be all confidential. It was not to be supposed that the
Dictator would allow, if he knew, that any work should be made about any
personal danger to him. Therefore Hamilton and Dolores had to talk in an
underhand kind of way, and to turn on to quite indifferent subjects when
anyone not in the mystery happened to come in. The talks took place
sometimes in the public corridor--often in Dolores' own little room.
Sometimes the Dictator himself looked in by chance and exchanged a few
words with Miss Dolores, and then, of course, the confidential talk
collapsed. The Dictator liked Dolores very much. He thought her a
remarkably clever and true-hearted girl, and quite a princess and a
beauty in her way, and he had more than once said so to Hamilton.
One day Dolores ventured to ask Hamilton, 'Is it true what they say
about his Excellency?' and she blushed a little at her own boldness in
asking the question.
'Is what true?' Hamilton asked in return, and all unconscious of her
meaning.
'Well, is it true that he is going to marry--Sir Rupert Langley's
daughter?'
Then Hamilton's face, usually so pale, flushed a sudden red, and for a
moment he could hardly speak. He opened his mouth once or twice, but the
words did not come.
'Who said that?' he asked at last.
'I don't know,' Dolores answered, much alarmed and distressed, with a
light breaking on her that made her flush too. 'I heard it said
somewhere--I dare say it's not true. Oh, I am quite sure it is _not_
true--but people always _are_ saying such things.'
'It can't be true,' Hamilton said. 'If he had any thought of it he would
have told me. He knows that there is nothing I could desire more than
that he should be made happy.'
Again he almost broke down.
'Yes, if it would make him happy,' Dolores intervened once again,
plucking up her courage.
'She is a very noble girl,' Hamilton said, 'but I don't believe there is
anything in it. She admires him as we all do.'
'Why, yes, of course,' said Dolores.
'I don't think the Dictator is a marrying man. He has got the cause of
Gloria for a wife. Good morning, Miss Paulo. I have to get to the
Foreign Office.'
'I hope I haven't vexed you,' Dolores asked eagerly, and yet timidly,
'by asking a foolish question and taking notice of silly gossip?'
She knew Hamilton's secret now, and in her sympathy and her kindliness
and her assurance of being safe from misconstruction she laid her hand
gently on the young man's arm, and he looked at her, and thought he saw
a moisture in her eyes. And he knew that his secret was his no longer.
He knew that Dolores had in a moment seen the depths of his trouble.
Their eyes looked at each other, and then, only too quickly, away from
each other.
'Vexed me?' he said. 'No, indeed, Miss Paulo. You are one of the kindest
friends I have in the world.'
Now, what had this speech to do with the question of whether the
Dictator was likely or was not likely to ask Helena Langley to marry
him? Nothing at all, so far as an outer observer might see. But it had a
good deal to do with the realities of the situation for Hamilton and
Dolores. It meant, if its meaning could then have been put into plain
words on the part of Hamilton--'I know that you have found out my
secret--and I know, too, that you will be kind and tender with it--and I
like you all the better for having found it out, and for being so tender
with it, and it will be another bond of friendship between us--that, and
our common devotion to the Dictator. But this we cannot have in common
with the Dictator. Of this, however devoted to him we are, he must now
know nothing. This is for ourselves alone--for you and me.' It is a
serious business with young men and women when any story and any secret
is to be confined to 'you and me.'
For Dolores it meant that now she had a perfect right to be sympathetic
and kindly and friendly with Hamilton. She felt as if she were in his
absolute heart-confidence--although he had told her nothing whatever,
and she did not want him to tell her anything whatever. She knew enough.
He was in love, and he was disappointed. She? Well, she really had not
been in love, but she had been all unconsciously looking out for love,
and she had fancied that she was falling in love with the Dictator. She
was an enthusiast for his cause; and for his cause because of himself.
With her it was the desire of the moth for the star--of the night for
the morrow. She knew this quite well. She knew that that was the sole
and the full measure of her feeling towards the Dictator. But all the
same, up to this time she had never felt any stirring of emotion towards
any other man. She must have known--sharp-sighted girl that she
was--that poor Mr. Wilkins adored her. She _did_ know it--and she was
very much interested in the knowledge, and thought it was such a pity,
and was sorry for him--honestly and sincerely sorry--and was ever so
kind and friendly to him. But her mind was not greatly troubled about
his love. She took it for granted that Mr. Wilkins would get over his
trouble, and would marry some girl who would be fond of him. It always
happens like that. So her mind was at rest about Wilkins.
Thus, her mind being at rest about Wilkins, because she knew that, as
far as she was concerned, it never could come to anything, and her mind
being equally at rest about the Dictator, because she felt sure that on
his part it could never come to anything, she had leisure to give some
of her sympathies to Hamilton, now that she knew his secret. Then about
Hamilton--how about him?
There are moments in life--not moments in actual clock-time, but
eventful moments in feelings when one seems to be conscious of a special
influence of sympathy and kindness breathing over him like a healing
air. A great misfortune has come down upon one's life, and the
conviction is for the time that nothing in life can ever be well with
him again. The sun shines no more for him; the birds sing no more for
him; or, if their notes do make their way into his dulled and saddened
ears, it is only to break his heart as the notes of the birds did for
the sufferer on the banks of bonnie Doon. The afflicted one seems to lie
as in a darkened room, and to have no wish ever to come out into the
broad, free, animating air again--no wish to know any more what is going
on in the world outside. Friends of all kinds, and in all kindness, come
and bring their futile, barren consolations, and make offers of
unneeded, unacceptable service, as unpalatable as the offer of the Grand
Duchess in 'Alice in Wonderland,' who, declaring that she knows what the
thirsty, gasping little girl wants, tenders her a dry biscuit. The dry
biscuit of conventional service is put to the lips of the choking
sufferer, and cannot be swallowed. Suddenly some voice, perhaps all
unknown before, is heard in the darkened chamber, and it is as if a hand
were laid on the sufferer's shoulder, tenderly touching him and arousing
him to life once more. The voice seems to whisper, 'Come, arise! Awake
from mere self-annihilation in grief; there is something yet to live
for; the world has still some work to do--_for you_. There are paths to
be found for you; there are even, it may be, loves to be loved by you
and for you. Arise and come out into the light of the sun and the light
of the stars again.' The voice does not really say all this or any of
this. If it were to do so, it would be only going over the old sort of
consolation which proved hopeless and only a source of renewed anguish
when it was offered by the ordinary well-meaning friends. But the
peculiar, the timely, the heaven-sent influence breathes all this and
much more than this into a man--and the hand that seems at first to be
laid so gently on his shoulder now takes him, still so gently--oh, ever
so gently, but very firmly by the arm, and leads him out of the room
darkened by despair and into the open air, where the sun shines not with
mocking and gaudy glare, but with tender, soft, and sympathising light,
and the new life has begun, and the healing of the sufferer is a
question of time. It may be that he never quite knows from whom the
sudden peculiarity of influence streamed in so beneficently upon him.
Perhaps the source of inspiration is there just by his side, but he
knows nothing of it. Happy the man who, under such conditions, does know
where to find the holy well from which came forth the waters that cured
his pain, and sent him out into life to be a man among men again.
Poor Hamilton was, as he put it himself, hit very hard when he learned
that Helena Langley absolutely refused him. It was not the slightest
consolation to him to know that she was quite willing that their
friendship should go on unbroken. He was rather glad, on the whole, not
to hear that she had declared herself willing to regard him as a
brother. Those dreadful old phrases only make the refusal ten times
worse. Probably the most wholesome way in which a refusal could be put
to a sensitive young man is the blunt, point-blank declaration that
never, under any circumstances, could there be a thought of the girl's
loving him and having him for her husband. Then a young man who is worth
his salt is thrown back upon his own mettle, and recognises the
conditions under which he has to battle his life out, and if he is
really good for anything he soon adapts himself to them. For the time
the struggle is terrible. No cheapness of cynicism will persuade a young
man that he does not suffer genuine anguish when under this pang of
misprized love. But the sooner he knows the worst the more soon is he
likely to be able to fight his way out of the deeps of his misery.
Hamilton did not quite realise the fact as yet--perhaps did not realise
it at all--but the friendly voice in his ear, the friendly touch on his
arm, that bade him come out into the light and live once again a life of
hope, was the voice and the touch of Dolores Paulo. And for her part she
knew it just as little as he did.