He was spoilt--deplorably, absurdly spoilt. But, so far, that was
perhaps the worst that could fairly be said against him. There was
genuine manliness still, some chivalry even, yet struggling
spasmodically to make itself felt, and--what was practically, perhaps,
of more account as a preservative--some small amount of originality in
his character. He had still a good deal to learn, and something too to
unlearn before he could take rank as past-master in the stupid
worldliness of his class and time. For he was neither so _blase_ nor so
cynical as he flattered himself, but young enough to affect being both
to the extent of believing his own affectations real.
He was popular; his position and income were fair enough to have secured
this to a considerable extent in these, socially speaking, easy-going
days, even had he been without the further advantages of good looks and
a certain arrogance, not to say insolence of bearing, which, though
nothing can be acquired with greater facility and at less expenditure of
brain tissue, appears to be the one not-to-be-disputed hall-mark of the
period.
Why he went to Mrs Englewood's reception that evening he could scarcely
have told, or perhaps he would have vaguely shrunk from owning even to
himself the real motives--of sincere though feeble loyalty to old
associations, of faintly stirring gratitude for much kindness in the
past--which had prompted the effort. For Mrs Englewood was neither
very rich, nor very beautiful, nor--worst of "nors"--very fashionable;
scarcely, indeed, to be reckoned as of _notre monde_ in any very
exclusive sense of the words, though kindly, and fairly refined,
irreproachable as wife and mother, and so satisfied with her lot as to
be uninterestingly free from social ambition.
But her house was commonplace, she herself not specially amusing.
"If she'd be content to ask me there when they're alone--I like talking
to her herself well enough," thought Despard, as he dressed. In his
heart, however, he knew that would not do. He was more or less of a
lion from Mrs Englewood's point of view; she was not above a certain
pride in knowing that for "old sake's sake" she could count upon him for
her one party of the season. And for this, as she retained a real
affection for the man she had known as that delightful thing--a bright,
intelligent, and unspoilt boy, and as she thought of him still far more
highly than he deserved to be thought of, her conscience left her
unrebuked.
Year after year, it is true, her husband wet-blanketed her innocent
pleasure in seeing the young man's name on her invitation list.
"That fellow! In your place, my dear Gertrude!" and an expressive
raising of the eyebrows said the rest.
"But, Harry," she would mildly expostulate, "you forget. I knew him
when he was--"
"So high--at Whipmore. Oh, yes; I know all about it. Well, well, take
your way of it; it doesn't hurt me if you invite people who don't want
to come."
"But who always _do_ come, you must allow," she would reply
triumphantly.
"And think themselves mighty condescending for doing so," Mr Englewood
put in.
"You don't do Despard justice. It's always the way with men, I
suppose."
"Come now, don't be down upon me about it," he would say good-naturedly.
"I don't stop your asking him. It isn't as if we had daughters. In
that case--" but the rest was left to the imagination.
And this particular year Mrs Englewood had smiled to herself at this
point of the discussion.
"One can make plans even though one _hasn't_ daughters," she reflected.
"If Harry would let me ask him to dinner now--but I know there's no
chance of that. And, after all, a good deal may be done at an evening
party. I should like to do Despard a good turn, and give him a start
before any other. If I could give him a hint! But then there's my
promise to her father,--and Despard is sure to be sensitive on those
points. I might spoil it all. No; I shall appeal to his
kindheartedness; that is the best. How tender he used to be to poor
Lily when she was a tiny child! How he used to mount her up on his
shoulders when she couldn't see the fireworks! I will tell Maisie that
story! It is the sort of thing she will appreciate."
It was a hot, close evening. Though only May, there was thunder in the
air, people said. Despard's inward dissatisfaction increased.
"Upon my soul it's too bad," he ejaculated while examining the flowers
in his button-hole. "Why, when one's made up one's mind to do a
disagreeable thing, should everything conspire to make it more odious
than it need be, I wonder? I have really--more than half a mind--not
to--"
Poor Gertrude Englewood, at that moment smilingly receiving her guests!
She little knew how her great interest in the evening was trembling in
the balance!
It was late when he arrived. Not that he had specially intended this.
He cared too little about it to have considered whether he should be
late or early, and, as he slowly made his way through the crowd at the
doorway, he was conscious of but one wish--to get himself at once seen
by his hostess, and then to make his escape as soon as possible. As to
the first part of this little programme there was no difficulty.
Scarcely did the first syllables of his name, "Mr Despard Norreys,"
fall on the ear, before Mrs Englewood's outstretched hand was in his,
her pleasant face smiling up at him, her pleasant voice bidding him
welcome. Yes, there was something difficult to resist about her; it was
refreshing, somehow, and--there lay the secret--it brought back other
days, when poor Jack's big sister, Gertrude, had welcomed the orphan
schoolboy just as heartily, and when he had glowed with pride and
gratification at her notice of him.
Despard's resigned, not to say sulky, expression cleared; it was no
wonder Mrs Englewood's old liking for him had suffered no diminution;
he did show at his best with her.
"So pleased you've come, so good of you," she was saying simply.
Her words made the young man feel vaguely ashamed of himself.
"Good of me!" he repeated, flushing a little, though the same or a much
more fervent greeting from infinitely more exalted personages than
Gertrude had often failed to disturb his composure. "No, indeed, very
much the reverse. I'm sorry," with a glance round, "to be so late,
especially as--"
"No, no, you're not to begin saying you can't stay long, the very moment
you've come. Listen, Despard," and she drew him aside a little; "I want
you to do something to please me to-night. I have a little friend
here--a Miss Fforde--that I want you to be very good to. Poor little
thing, she's quite a stranger, knows nobody, never been out. But she's
a nice little thing. Will you ask her to dance? or--" for the shadow of
a frown on her favourite's forehead became evident even to Mrs
Englewood's partial eyes--"if you don't care to dance, will you talk to
her a little? Anything, you know, just to please her."
Despard bowed. What else could he do? Gertrude slid her hand through
his arm.
"There she is," she said. "That girl in black over there by the
fireplace. Maisie, my dear," for a step or two had brought them to the
indicated spot, "I want to introduce my old friend, Mr Despard Norreys,
to you. Mr Norreys--Miss Fforde;" and as she pronounced the names she
drew her hand quietly away, and turned back towards her post at the
door.
Despard bowed and, with the very slightest possible instinct of
curiosity, glanced at the girl before him. She was of middle height,
rather indeed under than above it; she was neither very fair nor very
dark; there was nothing very special or striking in her appearance. She
was dressed in black; there was nothing remarkable about her attire,
rather, as Despard saw in an instant, an absence of style, of finish,
which found its epithet at once in his thoughts--"countrified, of
course," he said to himself. But before he had time to decide on his
next movement she raised her eyes, and for half an instant his attention
deepened. The eyes were strikingly fine; they were very blue, but
redeemed from the shallowness of very blue eyes by the depth of the
eyelashes, both upper and lower. And just now there was a brightness,
an expectancy in the eyes which was by no means their constant
expression. For, lashes notwithstanding, Miss Fforde's blue eyes could
look cold enough when she chose.
"Good eyes," thought Despard. But just as he allowed the words to shape
themselves in his brain, he noticed that over the girl's clear, pale
face a glow of colour was quickly spreading.
"Good gracious!" he ejaculated mentally, "she is blushing! What a
bread-and-butter miss she must be--to _blush_ because a man's introduced
to her. And I am to draw her out! It is really too bad of Mrs
Englewood;" and he half began to turn away with a sensation of
indignation and almost of disgust.
But positive rudeness where a woman was concerned did not come easy to
him. He stopped, and muttered something indistinctly enough about "the
pleasure of a dance." The girl had grown pale again by this time, and
in her eyes a half startled, almost pained expression was replacing the
glad expectancy. As he spoke, however, something of the former look
returned to them.
"I--I shall be very pleased," she said. "I am not engaged for
anything."
"I should think not," he said to himself. "I am _quite_ sure you dance
atrociously."
But aloud he said with the slow, impassive tone in which some of his
admirers considered him so to excel that "Despard's drawl" had its
school of followers--
"Shall we say the--the tenth waltz? I fear it is the first I can
propose."
"Thank you," Miss Fforde replied. She looked as if she would have been
ready to say more had he in the least encouraged it, but he, feeling
that he had done his duty, turned away--the more eagerly as at that
moment he caught sight in the crowd of a lady he knew.
"Mrs Marrinder! What a godsend!" he exclaimed.
He did not see Miss Fforde's face as he left her, and, had he done so,
it would have taken far more than his very average modicum of
discernment to have rightly interpreted the varying and curiously
intermingling expressions which rapidly crossed it, like cloud shadows
alternating with dashes of sunshine on an April morning. She stood for
a moment or two where she was, then glancing round and seeing a vacant
seat in a corner she quietly appropriated it.
"The tenth waltz," she repeated to herself with the ghost of a smile.
"I wonder--" but that was all.
The evening wore on. Miss Fforde had danced once--but only once. It
was with a man whom her host himself introduced to her, and, though
good-natured and unaffected, he was boyish and commonplace; and she had
to put some force on herself to reply with any show of interest to his
attempts at conversation. She was engaged for one or two other dances,
but it was hot, and the rooms were crowded, and with a scarcely
acknowledged reflection--for Miss Fforde was young and inexperienced
enough to think it hardly fair to make an engagement even for but a
dance, to break it deliberately--that if her partners did _not_ find her
it would not much matter, the girl withdrew quietly into a corner, where
a friendly curtain all but screened her from observation, and allowed
her to enjoy in peace the dangerous but delightful refreshment of an
open window hard by.
The draught betrayed its source, however. She was scarcely seated when
voices approaching caught her ears.
"Here you are--there must be a window open, it is ever so much cooler in
this corner. Are you afraid of the draught?" said a voice she thought
she recognised.
"No-o--at least--oh, this corner will do beautifully. The curtain will
protect me. What a blessing to get a little air!" replied a second
speaker--a lady evidently.
"People have no business to cram their rooms so. And these rooms are--
well, not spacious. How in the world did you get Marrinder to come?"
The second speaker laughed. "It was quite the other way," she replied.
"How did he get me to come? you might ask. He has something or other to
do with our host, and made a personal matter of my coming, so, of
course, I gave in."
"How angelic!"
"It is a penance; but we're going immediately."
"I shall disappear with you."
"You! Why you told me a moment ago that you were obliged to dance with
some _protegee_ of Mrs Englewood's--that she had made a point of it.
And you haven't danced with her yet, to my certain knowledge," said the
woman's voice again.
A sort of groan was the reply.
"Why, what's the matter?" with a light laugh.
"I had forgotten; you might have let me forget and go off with a clear
conscience."
"What is there so dreadful about it?"
"It is that girl in black I have to dance with for my sins. Such a
little dowdy. I am convinced she can't waltz. It was truly putting old
friendship to the test to expect it of me. And of all things I do
detest a bread-and-butter miss. You can see at a glance that this one
has never left a country village before. She--"
But his further confidences were interrupted by the arrival of Mr
Marrinder in search of his wife.
"You don't care to stay any longer, I suppose?" said the new-comer.
"Oh,--no; I am quite ready. I _was_ engaged for this dance--the tenth,
isn't it? But I am tired, and it doesn't matter. My partner, whoever
he was, can find some one else. Good-night, Mr Norreys."
"Let me go with you to the door at least," he replied. "I'll look about
for that girl in black on my way, so that if I don't see her I can
honestly feel I have done my duty."
Then there came a flutter and rustling, and Miss Fforde knew that her
neighbours had taken their departure.
She waited an instant, and then came out of her corner.
"He is not likely to come back to look for me in this room," she
thought; "but in case he possibly should, I--I shall not hide myself."
She had had a moment's sharp conflict with herself before arriving at
this decision; and her usually pale face was still faintly flushed when,
slowly making his way in the direction of the sofa where she had now
conspicuously placed herself, she descried Mr Norreys.
"Our dance--the tenth--I believe," he said, with an exaggeration of
indifference, sounding almost as if he wished to irritate her into
making some excuse to escape.
In her place nine girls out of ten would have done so, and without
troubling themselves to hide their indignation. But Maisie Fforde was
not one of those nine. She rose quietly from her seat and took his arm.
"Yes," she said, "it is our dance."
Something in her voice, or tone, made him glance at her with a shade
more attention than he had hitherto condescended to bestow on "Mrs
Englewood's _protegee_" She was looking straight before her; her
features, which he now discovered to be delicate in outline, and almost
faultlessly regular in their proportions, wore an expression of perfect
composure; only the slight, very slight, rose-flush on her cheeks would
have told to one who knew her well of some inward excitement.
"By Jove!" thought Despard, "she's almost pretty--no, pretty's not the
word. I never saw a face quite like it before. I suppose I didn't look
at her, she's so badly, at least so desperately plainly dressed. I
don't, however, suppose she can talk, and I'd bet any money she can't
dance."
As regarded the first of his predictions, she gave him at present no
opportunity of judging. She neither spoke nor looked at him. He
hazarded some commonplace remark about the heat of the rooms; she
replied by a monosyllable. Despard began to get angry.
"_Won't_ talk, whether she _can_ or not," he said to himself, when a
second observation had met with no better luck. He glanced round the
room; all the other couples were either dancing, or smiling and talking.
He became conscious of a curious sensation as disagreeable as novel--he
felt as if he were looking ridiculous.
He turned again to his partner in a sort of desperation.
"Will you dance?" he said, and his tone was almost rough; it had
entirely lost its usual calm, half-insolent indifference.
"Certainly," she said, while a scarcely perceptible smile faintly curved
her lips. "It is, I suppose, what we are standing up here for, is it
not?"
Despard grew furious. "She is laughing at me," he thought.
"Impertinent little nobody. Where in Heaven's name has Gertrude
Englewood unearthed her from? Upon my soul, it is the very last time
she will see me at her dances!"
And somehow his discomfiture was not decreased by a glance, and almost
involuntary glance, at Miss Fforde as they began to dance. She was
certainly not striking in appearance; she was middle-sized, barely that
indeed; her dress was now, he began to perceive, plain with the
plainness of intention, not of ignorance or economy. But yet, with it
all--no, he could not honestly feel that he was right; she did not look
like "a nobody."
There was a further discovery in store for him. The girl danced
beautifully. Mr Norreys imagined himself to have outlived all
enthusiasm on such subjects, but now and then, in spite of the _role_
which was becoming second nature to him, a bit of the old Despard--the
hearty, unspoilt boy--cropped out, so to speak, unawares. This happened
just now--his surprise had to do with it.
"You dance perfectly--exquisitely!" he burst out when at last they
stopped. It was his second dance that evening only; neither he nor Miss
Fforde was the least tired, and the room was no longer so crowded.
She looked up. There was no flush of gratification on her face, only a
very slight--the slightest possible--sparkle in the beautiful eyes.
"Yes," she said quietly; "I believe I can dance well."
Despard bit his lips. For once in his life he felt absolutely at a loss
what to say. Yet remain silent he would not, for by so doing it seemed
to him as if he would be playing into the girl's hands.
"I _will_ make her talk," he vowed internally.
It was not often he cared to exert himself, but he could talk, both
intelligently and agreeably, when he chose to take the trouble. And
gradually, though very gradually only, Miss Fforde began to thaw. She,
too, could talk; though her words were never many, they struck him as
remarkably well chosen and to the point. Yet more, they incited him to
further effort. There was the restraint of power about them; not her
words only, but her tone and expression, quick play of her features, the
half-veiled glances of her eyes, were full of a curious fascination,
seeming to tell how charming, how responsive a companion she might be if
she chose.
But the fascination reacted as an irritant on Mr Norreys. He could not
get rid of a mortifying sensation that he was being sounded, and his
measure taken by this presumptuous little girl. Yet he glanced at her.
No; "presumptuous" was not the word to apply to her. He grew almost
angry at last, to the extent of nearly losing his self-control.
"You are drawing me out, Miss Ford," he said, "in hopes of my displaying
my ignorance. You know much more about the book in question, and the
subject, than I do. If you will be so good as to tell me all about it,
I--"
She glanced up quickly with, for the first time, a perfectly natural and
unconstrained expression on her face.
"Indeed--indeed, no," she said. "I am very ignorant. In _some_ ways I
have had little opportunity of learning."
Despard's face cleared. There was no question of her sincerity.
"I thought you were playing me off," he said boyishly.
Miss Fforde burst out laughing, but she instantly checked herself.
"What a pity," thought Mr Norreys. "I never heard a prettier laugh."
"I did, indeed," he repeated, exaggerating his tone in hopes of making
her laugh again.
But it was no use. Her face had regained the calm, formal composure it
had worn at the beginning of the dance.
"She is like three girls rolled into one," thought Despard. "The shy,
country-bred miss she seemed at first," and a feeling of shame shot
through him at the recollection of his stupid judgment, "then this cold,
impassive, princess-like damsel, and by fitful glimpses yet another,
with nothing in common with either. And, notwithstanding the _role_ she
has chosen to play, I--I strongly suspect it is _but_ a _role_," he
decided hastily.
The riddle interested him.
"May I--will you not give me another dance?" he said deferentially. For
the tenth waltz had come to an end.
"I am sorry I cannot," she replied. The words were simple and girlish,
but the tone was regal. "Good-night, Mr Norreys. I congratulate you
on your self-sacrifice at the altar of friendship. You may now take
your departure with a clear conscience."
He stared. She was repeating some of his own words. Miss Fforde bowed
coldly, and turned away. And Despard, bewildered, mortified even,
though he would not own it, yet strangely attracted, and disgusted with
himself for being so, after a passing word or two with his hostess, left
the house.
An hour or two later Gertrude Englewood was bidding her young guest
good-night.
"And oh, Maisie!" she exclaimed, "how did you get on with Despard? Is
he not delightful?"
Miss Fforde smiled quietly. They were standing in her room, for she was
to spend a night or two with her friend.
"I--to tell you the truth, I would _much_ rather not speak about him,"
she said. "He is very good looking, and--well, not stupid, I dare say.
But I am not used to men, you know, Gertrude--not to men of the day, at
least, of which I suppose he is a type. I cannot say that I care to see
more of them. I am happier at home with papa."
She turned away quickly. Gertrude did not see the tears that rose to
the girl's eyes, or the rush of colour that overspread her face at
certain recollections of that evening. She was nineteen, but it was her
first "real" dance, and she felt as if years had passed since the
afternoon only two days ago when she had arrived.
Mrs Englewood looked and felt sadly disappointed. She had been so
pleased with her own diplomacy.
"It will be different when you are a little more in the way of it," she
said. "And--I really don't think your father should insist on your
dressing _quite_ so plainly. It will do the very thing he wants to
avoid--it will make you remarkable."
"No, no," said Maisie, shaking her head. "Papa is quite right. You
must allow it had not that effect this evening. No one asked to be
introduced to me."
"There was such a crowd--" Gertrude began, but this time Maisie's smile
was quite a hearty one as she interrupted her.
"Never mind about that," she said. "But do tell me one thing. I saw
Mr Norreys speaking to you for a moment as he went out. You didn't say
anything about me to him, I hope?"
"No," said Mrs Englewood, "I did not. I would have liked to do so,"
she added honestly, "but somehow he looked queer--not exactly bored, but
not encouraging. So I just let him go."
"That's right," said Maisie; "thank you. I am so glad you didn't. I do
hope I shall never see him again," she added to herself.