Soaring.
The novelty of her life in Italy was full of charm for Gertrude. She
was still so young that she could escape, in any momentary emotion of
pleasure, from the hardening influence of the past, and the entire
change of scene had almost an intoxicating effect upon her. Here was
no association with anything in the past which could pain, or in the
present which might have the power to disconcert her. Her husband's
foot had never trodden the paths in which she wandered daily, with all
the pleasure of a stranger and all the appreciation of natural beauty
which formed a portion of her artistic temperament. He had never
gazed upon the classic waters of the Arno, or roamed through the
picture-galleries which afforded her such intense delight, and would
have been almost without a charm for his cynical materialistic nature.
At least, if he had ever visited Italy, Gertrude did not know it; and
with all her very real indifference, despite the wonderfully thorough
enfranchisement of her mind and heart from the trammels of her
dead-and-gone relation to him, Gertrude, with true womanly
inconsistency, still occasionally associated him sufficiently with her
present life to feel that distance from Gilbert Lloyd, that the
strangeness of the unfamiliar places with which he was wholly
unassociated, added to the reality of her sense of freedom, gave it
zest and flavour. She understood this inconsistency. "If I go on like
this," she would think, "it will never do. I am much too near hating
him at present to be comfortable. So long as he is not absolutely
nothing to me I am not quite free; so long as I prefer the sense of
the impossibility of my seeing him by any accident--so long as I am
more glad to know that he is staying with Lord Ticehurst, and Lord
Ticehurst's reputable friends, than I should be to know that he was in
the next house on the promenade--so long as either circumstance has
the smallest appreciable interest or importance for me--I am not free.
I must regard him as so utterly nothing, that if I were to meet him
to-morrow at the Cascine, or passing my door, it could have no
importance, no meaning for me. I don't mean only in the external
sense, of not appearing to agitate or concern me, but in the interior
convictions of my own inmost heart. Such freedom I am quite resolved
to have. It will come, I am sure, but not just yet. I am far too near
to hating him yet."
Gertrude had unusual power in the distribution of the subjects on
which she chose to exercise her thinking faculty, and in the absolute
and sustained expulsion from her mind of such topics as she chose to
discard. This faculty was useful to her now. There were certain phases
and incidents of her life with Gilbert Lloyd which she never thought
about. She deliberately put them out of her mind, and kept them out of
it. Among these were the occurrences which had immediately preceded
the strange bargain which had been made between her and her husband.
Of that bargain herself she thought with ever-growing satisfaction,
remembering with complacent content the obscurity in which she had
lived, which rendered such an arrangement possible, without risk of
detection. But she never travelled farther back in memory than the
making of that bargain. So then she determined to carry it out to the
fullest, to have all the satisfaction out of it she possibly could. "I
am determined I will bring myself to such freedom that the sight of
him could not give me even an unpleasant sensation--that the sound of
his name announced in the room with me should have no more meaning for
me than any other sound devoid of interest."
Gertrude was more happily circumstanced now for the carrying out of
this determination. All her surroundings were delightful and novel,
she was in high health and spirits, and her prospects for the future
were bright and near. The climate was enchanting, the hours and the
ways of foreign life suited her; and her masters pronounced her voice
all that could be desired in the case of a daughter of sunny Italy,
and something altogether admirable and extraordinary in the case of a
daughter of foggy Albion. She worked very hard. She kept her ambition,
her purpose steadily before her, and her efforts to obtain the power
of gratifying it were unrelaxing.
Hitherto Gertrude's experiences had been those only of a school-girl
and a woman married to an unscrupulous man who lived by his wits. She
had never been out of England before; and the interval of her life at
the villa, under the beneficial influence of the Carabas patronage,
though very much pleasanter than anything she had before experienced,
Lad not tended much to the enlargement and cultivation of her mind or
the expansion of her feelings. But this foreign life did tend to both.
She was entirely unfettered, and the sole obligation laid upon her was
the vigilant precaution it was necessary she should observe against
taking cold. It was in Gertrude's nature to prize highly this
newly-acquired sense of personal freedom, and to enter with avidity
into all that was strange in her life abroad. Her enjoyment of the
difference between the habits and customs of Italy and those of
England was unintelligible to Mrs. Bloxam, who had also never before
been out of England, and who carried all the true British prejudice in
favour of everything English with her. She could not be induced to
admit the superiority of foreign parts even in those lesser and
superfluous respects to which it is generally conceded. "I cannot
see," she remarked to a sympathising soul, whose acquaintance she had
made shortly after her arrival--a lady held in foreign bondage by a
tyrannical brother and his wife addicted to travel--"I cannot see,
Miss Tyroll, that the new milk can be so much better. Just look at the
cows! I'm sure I've seen some at Hampstead twice the size; and as for
condition! And then the bread again: how can we tell what stuff they
put into it to make it white? At home, we know there's alum in it; and
that's the worst of it, and all about it. But here, I never dare think
about it. Miss Lambert is quite foolish about violets; and I don't
deny it is very nice indeed to have them when you certainly could not
in England, and I like them as well as anyone; but I don't know that
it makes so much difference after all, in one's comfort, in the
long-run."
"Certainly not," replied Miss Tyroll, who was a person of decisive
mind and manners. "Foreign countries are much the best places for
having things which you can very well do without; but, for my part, I
like England best. Don't you get very tired of marble and pillars and
church-bells? I do."
"So do I," assented Mrs. Bloxam; "and all the places one is obliged to
go to are so large and bare." And then the two ladies discussed the
subject just started at great length. Even the climate had little
merit in the prejudiced estimation of Mrs. Bloxam. She had felt it
quite as cold by the Arno as ever she had felt it by the Thames; and
she thought the _tramontana_ was only a piercing wind with a pretty
name. She had felt very much the same sort of thing in London, where
she could take refuge from it in a snug room with warm curtains and a
coal fire. She had no fancy for sitting with her feet baking over
_braise_, and she had seen at Dulwich and Hampton Court pictures
enough to satisfy all her aspirations after art. There was something
educational in the way in which visitors to Florence--and, indeed,
Gertrude herself--did the churches and the galleries which was rather
oppressive to Mrs. Bloxam. She hated all that reminded her of the life
of sordid toil she had lived through and freed herself from; she did
not like to learn anything, because she could not get rid of the
feeling that by doing so she was exposing herself to the danger of
having to teach it again. But all her personal discontent did not
interfere with Mrs. Bloxam's interest in Gertrude, and did not render
her an unpleasant companion. She was not sympathetic; but Gertrude had
been little used to sympathy, and she did not greatly care about
it--it never interfered with her enjoyment of anything, that she had
to enjoy it alone. She did all in her power to make Mrs. Bloxam's life
comfortable and happy, and she never interrupted or withheld her
assent from the frequent reminiscences of Bayswater in which her
friend indulged; but she liked her life in Italy, and she entertained
a strong conviction that, as she had never been so happy before (for
she had come to regard the brief period of her love for Lloyd as an
interval of hallucination), so the future could hardly bring her
anything better. She had no doubts, no fears about success in her
adopted profession. The favourable opinions which had been pronounced
by competent judges in England were confirmed and strengthened by
those to which she attached most value in Italy, and her progress was
surprising to herself and her instructors.
The correspondence between Mrs. Bloxam and Lord Sandilands was
frequent and _suivie_. Mrs. Bloxam was a clever letter-writer, and the
recipient of her epistles found in them a source of interest which
life had long lacked for him. If the young lady in whom he had
discovered Gertrude Gautier's daughter had been merely handsome, he
would have been pleased with her, doubtless would have taken a kindly
interest in her; had she been only clever he would have felt a secret
pride in her talent, and watched its manifestations with a hidden
interest: but she was both handsome and clever, and highly gifted; and
all the feelings which, but for his own fault, he might once have
declared and indulged openly, had been gratified to the fullest
extent.
As time went on, the "working of the oracle" was done in London by the
_impresario_ and his assistants in a masterly fashion. The higher
branch of the same industry was also conducted by the Marchioness of
Carabas with all the success to which her ladyship was so well
accustomed in her social manoeuvrings. To such members of her coterie
as understood her passionate devotion to art, her untiring exertions
in its interests, and to its professors, she spoke in raptures of her
"dear Grace Lambert," carefully avoiding the distant precision of the
"Miss" and the too fond familiarity of the "Grace;" she read what she
called "pet bits" of her young _protégée's_ letters, which were
neither numerous nor lengthy; predicted the future value of those
precious autographs, and contrived to keep a flickering flame of
interest in Grace Lambert alive, which her appearance would readily
blow into a blaze. The steadiness of dear Lady Carabas to this
"fancy," as her friends called it, created some astonishment among her
circle. She was more remarkable for the vehemence than for the
duration of her attachments. It had happened to many aspirants for
fame, or for social success, or some other of the many objects--which
people think worth attainment, even if a little self-respect has to
be sacrificed in the process, to find themselves somehow unaccountably
set aside by Lady Carabas after a certain season of favour--happily,
sometimes, long enough to have enabled them to extract from it all the
profit they desired: not "dropped"--that is a rude proceeding, wanting
in finesse, quite unworthy of the Carabas _savoir faire_--but calmly,
imperceptibly set aside; whereat the wise among the number were
amused, and the foolish were savage. But Grace Lambert held her place
even during her absence. There was something captivating to the fancy
in the idea of the cultivation in "seclusion" of that great talent of
which the world had got an inkling, under the auspices of Lady
Carabas, and which would inevitably be a splendid testimony in the
future to her judgment and taste. Thus, the way for her appearance and
success in London being made plainer, easier, and pleasanter for her
day by day, and the purpose of her sojourn in Italy fulfilled in a
like ratio, time slipped away, and the period named for the return of
Grace Lambert and Mrs. Bloxam--who hailed it with delight, and who now
positively pined for Bayswater--drew near.
There had not been seen such a house at the Grand Scandinavian Opera
for years; there had not been heard such long-continued thunders of
applause, such rounds of cheering, since the Brödchen's _début_. Lady
Carabas and Mr. Munns had each "worked the oracle," according to their
lights; but the discrimination of her ladyship's friends rendered the
managerial _claque_ quite unnecessary. The opera was the _Trovatore_,
and Gertrude's entrance as Leonora was the signal for a subdued murmur
of applause. People were too anxious to see and hear her to give vent
to any loud expression of their feelings; but when, with perfect
composure, and without the smallest trace of nervousness in face or
voice, the girl burst into the lovely "Tacea la notte," the
connoisseurs knew that her success was accomplished; and long before
the enthusiastic roar surged forth at the conclusion of the air Mr.
Boulderson Munns, who had been nervously playing with the ends of his
dyed moustache, shut up his opera-glass, and said to his treasurer and
alter-ego, Mr. William Duff, "By--, Billy, she'll smash the other
shop!"
The lobbies and the refreshment-room were emptying of the crowds which
had been raving to each other after the first act of the beauty and
talent of the _débutante_, when Lord Ticehurst, who had been among the
loudest demonstrators in the omnibus-box, whither he was returning,
met Gilbert Lloyd quietly ascending the stairs.
"Only just come in?" asked his lordship.
"Only this instant; straight from Arlington-street; it's all right
about Charon."
"O, d--n Charon!" said Lord Ticehurst; "you've missed the most
splendid reception--Miss Grace Lambert, you know!"
"My dear fellow, I know nothing--except that Lady Carabas insisted on
my going to her box to-night, to hear a new singer."
"There never was such a cold-blooded fish, as you, Gilbert! Now be
quick, and you'll be in time to see her come on in the second act!"
Gilbert Lloyd walked very leisurely to Lady Carabas' box on the grand
tier, and received his snubbing for being late with due submission.
When the roar of applause announced the reappearance of the evening's
heroine, he looked up still leisurely; but the next instant his glass
was fixed to his eyes, and then his hand shook and his cheeks were
even whiter than usual, and his nether-lip was firmly held by his
teeth, as in Miss Grace Lambert, the successful _débutante_, he
recognised his wife.
BOOK THE SECOND.
CHAPTER I.
Progress.
Mr. Boulderson Munns was right in the remark which he made to his
treasurer and _fidus Achates_, Mr. William Duff, in regard to Miss
Grace Lambert's success, and to the effect which it would have on the
future of the opposition opera-house. That very night the triumph was
achieved. Ladies who "looked in for a minute" at various balls and
receptions after the opera talked to each other of no one but the new
singer; the smoking-rooms of the clubs rang with her praises. Schrink,
the humpbacked, critic of the _Statesman_, went off straight to the
Albion in Drury-lane; called for some hot brandy-and-water and a pen
and ink; seated himself in his accustomed box, into which no one else
dared intrude, and dashed off something, which, when it appeared in
print the next morning, proved to be an elaborate and scholarly eulogy
of the new singer. The other journals were equally laudatory, and the
result of the general commendation was soon proved. The box-office was
besieged from morning till night; boxes and stalls were taken for
weeks in advance; crowds began to collect round the pit and gallery
doors at three o'clock in the afternoon, and remained there,
increasing in size and turbulence, until the doors were opened; while
the fugitive Miramella and the recreant Jacowski were singing away for
dear life at the Regent Theatre, to empty benches. The fact of Miss
Lambert's being an Englishwoman was with many people a great thing in
her favour. Old people who recollected Miss Paton, and middle-aged
people who still raved about Miss Adelaide Kemble, hurried off to see
the young lady who had succeeded to the laurels erst won so gallantly
and worn so gracefully by these two great English singers, and came
back loud in her praise. The _Mirror_--the weekly journal of
theatricals and music--uplifted its honest, ungrammatical, kindly
voice in favour of the _débutante_, and gossiped pleasantly of Kitty
Stephens, Vestris, and the few other English-women who have ever sung
in time and tune. The _Illustrated News_ published Miss Lambert's
portrait on the same page with the portrait of the trowel with which
the Mayor of Mudfog had laid the foundation-stone of the Mudfog
Infirmary; and the _Penny Woodcutter_ reproduced the engraving
which had previously done duty as Warawaki, Queen of the Tonongo
Islands, and subscribed Miss Lambert's name to it. A very gorgeous
red-and-white engraving of the new singer figured also on the "Grace
Valse," inscribed to her by her obedient humble servant Luigi Vasconi,
who was leader of the orchestra of Mr. Munns' establishment, and who
played first fiddle under the renowned conductor, Signor Cocco; while
the enterprising hosier in the Arcade under the opera-house produced a
new style of neck-tie which he christened "The Lambert," and of which
he would probably have sold more had the Arcade been anything of a
thoroughfare. As it was, the young man who kept the books of Mssrs.
Octave and Finings, the wine-merchants, and who was known to have
plunged madly into love with the new singer when he went in once with
a gallery-order, sported a "Lambert," and led the fashionable world of
Lamb's-Conduit-street in consequence.
Was this fame? It was notoriety, at all events. To have your portrait
in all the photograph-shops and the illustrated journals; to see your
name blazing in large type in every newspaper, and on every hoarding
and dead-wall of London; to read constant encomiastic mention of
yourself in what are called, or miscalled, the organs of public
opinion; to be pointed out by admiring friends to other admiring
friends in the streets; to be the cynosure of crowds; to be the butt
of the _Scarifier_--when some artist or contributor to that eminent
journal has seen you on horseback while he was on foot, or seen
you clean while he was dirty, or heard you praised while he was
unnoticed--these are the recognitions of popularity received by
art-workers, be they writers, or painters, or actors. Not very great,
not very ennobling, perhaps, but pleasant--confess it, O my sisters
and brethren in art! Pleasanter to earn hundreds by the novel, or the
picture, or the acting--imperfect though each may be in its way--which
shall cause thousands to think kindly of us, than to receive two
guineas for verbal vitriol-throwing in the _Scarifier_; pleasanter
than to stand up, earning nothing at all, to be howled at night after
night by the vinous members of the opposite political party, and to be
switched morning after morning by their press-organs; pleasanter than
to go for forty years for six hours a day to the Tin-tax Office, and
at last to arrive at six hundred a-year, with the chance of receiving
a pension of two-thirds of the amount, if you prove by medical
certificate that you are thoroughly worn out! That worn, gray old
gentleman going in to enjoy the joint, and the table, and a pint of
sherry at the Senior United, lost his youth and his hopes and his
liver in India, and in a few years may perhaps get--just in time to
leave it to his heir--the prize-money which he won a quarter of a
century ago; that Irish gentleman with a chin-tuft has sold the last
of his paternal acres to carry him through his third election, and may
possibly obtain from the Government, which he has always earnestly
supported, a commissionership of five hundred a-year. We can do better
than that, we others! So, let us say, with the French actress, "_Qu'on
leur donne des grimaces pour leur argent et vivons hereux!_" and in a
modified and anglicised sense, "_Vive la vie de Bohème!_"
Did Gertrude care much for this kind of cheap incense burnt in her
honour? Truth to tell, she cared for it very little indeed. When she
accepted the stage instead of the concert-room for her career, she was
influenced, as we have seen, by an idea of the brilliancy of her
triumph, should she succeed; but that triumph once secured, there was
an end to such feeling in the matter, so far as she was personally
concerned. She took it all in a perfectly businesslike manner; it was
good, she supposed, for the theatre that she had succeeded. Gratified?
O yes, of course, she was gratified; but when people came and told her
there had never been anything heard like her, she was compelled to
show them that, in accepting professional singing for her livelihood,
she had not quite abnegated any pretension to common sense. With the
exception of devoting the necessary time to rehearsals and study, her
time was spent very much as it was before her departure to Italy. The
drawing-room of the little Bayswater villa was gorgeous and fragrant
with anonymous bouquets, offerings left the previous night at the
stage-door; but Miss Lambert had not made one single new acquaintance
since the night of her _début_. Occasionally on "off-nights" she would
be seen at Carabas House, or at one or two of the other houses which
she had been in the habit of visiting before the commencement of her
professional career; but though she was inundated with invitations,
she steadfastly refused to increase her visiting-list; and the
lion-hunters, male and female, in vain sought to get her to their
houses, and equally in vain sought admittance to hers.
To none was she a greater enigma than to her manager, Mr. Boulderson
Munns. Proud of her success, and disposed in his open-hearted
vulgarity to testify to her his appreciation of it, that liberal
gentleman purchased a gaudy and expensive diamond-bracelet, had an
appropriate inscription in gilt letters put on to its morocco-leather
case, and sent it to Miss Grace Lambert. The next morning, bracelet,
case and all were laid on the managerial table, with a little note
from Miss Lambert thanking Mr. Munns very sincerely for his kindness,
but declining the present on the grounds that Miss Lambert was doing
no more than fulfilling the terms of her engagement, and adding, that
if Mr. Munns had found that engagement profitable, the time to show
his appreciation of it would be when they came to settle terms for the
next season. There was a combination of independence and business in
this reply, which tickled Mr. Munns exceedingly. At first he was
annoyed at the note, read it with a portentous frown, and strode up
and down his room, plucking at the dyed whiskers wrathfully. But by
the time Mr. Duff arrived with his usual budget of letters to be read,
bills to be paid, questions to be asked, &c., the great _impressario_
had softened down wonderfully, and had forgotten his rage at what he
at first imagined the slight put upon him by his new singer, in his
impossibility to comprehend her.
"I can't make her out, Billy," said he, "and that's the fact. I've
known 'em of all kinds; but she licks the lot. Look here at her
letter! She won't have that bracelet, Billy--just shove it into the
strong-box, will you? we can get the inscription altered, and it'll do
for somebody else--and talks about fresh terms for next season.
Reg'lar knowing little shot, ain't she? Quiet little devil, too;
wouldn't come down to my garden-party at Teddington, on Wednesday,
though I had the Dook and Sir George, and a whole lot of 'em dyin' to
be introduced to her, 'No go, your Grace!' I said, 'she won't come;
but when Venus is bashful let's stick to Bacchus, who's always our
friend.' I haven't had a classical education, Billy, but I think that
was rather neat; and so they did, and punished the 'sham' awfully.
However, it's all good for trade. She and that old cat, her aunt--not
her aunt? well, Bloxam; you know who I mean--go about to Lady
Carabas', and all the right sort of people, and the more she won't
know the wrong sort of people, the more they want to know her, and the
'let's' tremendous. The other shop's done up, sir; chawed up, smashed!
MacBone and Ivory and Déloge, and the rest of 'em, tell me they can't
sell a stall for the Regent; and I hear that Miramella threatened
Jacowski with a fork at dinner the other day, because he spoke of Miss
Lambert, and swore she'd go to America. Best thing she could do,
stupid old fool!"
Although this feeling in regard to Miss Lambert was perhaps nowhere
expressed in language, so strongly symbolical as that used by Mr.
Munns, there is no doubt that it was generally felt. There is a
certain class of artist-patronising society which has the _mot
d'ordre_ of the _siffleur's_ box, and revels in the gossip of the
_coulisses_. These worthy persons were in the habit of talking to each
other constantly of the new _prima donna_--how she came in "a regular
fly, my dear;" how she was always dressed in black silk, "made quite
plain, and rather dowdy;" how she was always accompanied by the same
old lady, who, whether at rehearsal or in the evening, never left her
side; and how, with the exception of Lord Sandilands, with whom she
seemed to be very intimate, she entered into conversation with no one
during the performance;--in all which things Miss Grace Lambert
differed very much from Madame Miramella, who--depending on the kind
of temper in which she might happen to be--alternated between the most
gorgeous garments and the most miserable _chiffons_; between a
coroneted brougham with a five-hundred-gninea pair of horses, and a
four-wheeler cab; between the loveliest complexion, and the most
battered old parchment mask; between the most queenlike courtesy to
all around her in the theatre, and the use of French and Italian
_argot_-abuse, which fortunately was incomprehensible to those to
whom it was addressed. In this society Lord Sandilands was far too
well-known for the smallest breath of scandal ever to attach to Miss
Lambert's name by reason of his intimacy with her. People remembered
how devoted he had been to the Rossignol--who died, poor lady, in the
height of her success--who had the voice of an angel, and the face of
a little sheep; how he had fought an uphill fight for Miss Laverock
until he had seen her properly ranked in her profession; how he had
always been the kind and disinterested friend of musical talent. They
wondered that somebody else did not arrive, some English duke, some
Italian prince, some _millionnaire_, and bear her away as Madame
Sontag, Miss Chester, Miss Stephens, and Madame Duvernay had been
borne away before her. She was "thoroughly proper, my dear," they told
each other in confidence; and the obvious result of propriety being
marriage, they waited for that result with great impatience.
The successful _début_ of the young lady whom the world regarded as
his _protégée_, but whom he in his secret soul acknowledged as his
daughter, had given Lord Sandilands unmitigated satisfaction!
Unmitigated, because his worldly knowledge had given him sufficient
insight into Gertrude's character to enable him to perceive that she
could ride in safety over billows and through tempests in which a less
evenly-ballasted bark would inevitably suffer shipwreck; to perceive
that the triumph which she had achieved would leave her head unturned;
while in the position which she had gained, her heart would be just as
much at her command as it was when she first surprised society in the
drawing-room of Carabas House. So, thoroughly happy, the old nobleman
permeated society, listening with eager ears, to all comments on Miss
Grace Lambert. He heard them everywhere. Steady old boys at the
Portland had heard of the new singer from their "people," and
intended, the first evening they had to spare, to make one in
the family-box, and hear her. Fast men, young and old, at the
Arlington, relaxing their great minds--_neque arcum semper tendit
Apollo_--between turf-talk and whist-playing, spoke of her in
exaggerated laudation. In many of the houses where he had formerly
been accustomed to drop in with tolerable regularity, he had renewed
the habit since Gertrude's arrival in London; pleasant, genial,
hospitable houses, all the more genial that neither frisky matrons,
nor foolish virgins, nor gilded youth, were to be reckoned among the
component parts of the society to be found in them; and there he
found that Miss Lambert was universally popular. A very great lady
indeed--one who held herself, and, truth to tell, was generally held,
far above the Carabas set, or any other of the kind--no less a lady
than the Dowager Duchess of Broadwater--wrote to Lord Sandilands,
saying that she had heard very much of Miss Lambert, and hoping that
through Lord Sandilands' influence the young lady might be induced to
come and see an old woman who never went out. If you have studied
polite society and its Bible--the Peerage--you will know that the
dowager duchess is the widow of that good, kind duke who was nothing
more than the best landlord, and the most perfectly representative
English nobleman of his time; who reduced the rents of his tenants,
and built model cottages for his labourers, and loved music next to
his wife, and composed pretty little pieces, which were played with
much applause at the Ancient Concerts. A stately gentleman, tall,
clean shaven, with his white hair daintily arranged, with his blue
coat, buff waistcoat, and tight gray trousers in the morning; his
_culotte courte_, black-silk stockings, and buckled shoes in evening
attire. His son, the present duke, wears a rough red beard, buys his
frieze shooting-coat and sixteen-shilling trousers from a cheap
tailor, smokes a short pipe, and talks like a stable-man. His mother
who adores him--he adores her, let us confess, and is as soft and
docile with her as when he was a child--looks at him wonderingly; she
is of the _vieille cour_, and cannot understand the "lowering" tone of
the present day. _Grande dame_ as she is, she relaxes always towards
the professors of that art which her husband so loved; and when Miss
Lambert was brought to her by Lord Sandilands, and sang two little
convent-airs which the old lady recollected having heard, ah, how many
years ago! she drew the girl towards her, and with streaming eyes
kissed her forehead, and bade her thank God for the great talent which
He had bestowed upon her, and which ought always to be used in His
service. After that interview, Gertrude saw a great deal of the old
duchess, who always received her with the greatest affection, and
introduced her to the small circle of intimate acquaintances by which
she was surrounded.
And Lady Carabas, who was necessarily apprised of all that happened in
Grace Lambert's life, was by no means annoyed at or jealous of her
_protégée's_ introduction to the Dowager Duchess of Broadwater, of
whom, in truth, her ladyship stood somewhat in awe; not that she ever
confessed this for an instant, speaking of her always as a "most
charming person," and "quite the nicest old lady of the day;" but
having at the same time an inward feeling that the "charming person,"
though always perfectly polite, did not reciprocate the respect which
Lady Carabas professed, and, indeed, really felt for her. The dowager
duchess's society was as rigidly exclusive as Lady Carabas' was
decidedly mixed; and the platonic _liaisons_ into which the
Marchioness's Soul was always leading her were regarded with very
stony glances from under very rigid eyebrows by the Broadwater
faction. Lady Carabas had somewhat more than a dim idea of all this,
and had quite sufficient sense of the fitness of things to be aware
that it was more politic in her to accept the position than to fight
against it--to know that for a recognised _protégée_ of hers to be
received by the Broadwater clique tacitly reflected credit on her; and
so, while she shrugged her shoulders when she heard of Lady Lowndes,
and undisguisedly expressed her scorn at the attempts made by other
lion-hunters to get hold of Gertrude, she warmly congratulated Lord
Sandilands on the Broadwater connection, and redoubled her praises of
Miss Lambert's voice and virtues. These laudations, skilfully served,
as a woman of Lady Carabas' worldly experience alone knows how to
express them, were always well received by the old nobleman, who could
not hear too much in Gertrude's favour, and who day by day felt
himself growing fonder of her, and more thoroughly associated with her
plans and her welfare.
And there was one other person to whom this lady was equally
enchanting, who never wanted the song pitched in any other key, who
listened in rapt delight so long as he was allowed to listen and gaze
and dream--Miles Challoner, who had left town so soon as he found the
pretty Bayswater villa deserted, on Gertrude's departure for Italy. He
had no farther tie to London, and cared not to remain haunting the
neighbourhood of the nest whence his "bird with the shining head" had
fled. He became suddenly convinced of the utter emptiness of
metropolitan existence, and expatiated thereon to Lord Sandilands in a
way which greatly amused the old nobleman. He declared that these
nineteenth-century views of life were false and wrongly based; that
half the vices and shortcomings of the provincial poor and the
labouring classes were due to the absenteeism of the landlords, who by
example should lead their inferiors. The holder of an estate, Miles
said, be it small or large, had duties which should keep him among his
people. He felt that he had neglected these duties; and though he was
not specially cut for a country gentleman's life, he knew that he
ought to go down to Rowley Court, and do his best to get on in that
sphere of life to which he had been called. The young man said all
this with great earnestness, for at the moment he really believed it;
and he was half-inclined to be angry when Lord Sandilands, who had
listened to the rhapsody with a grave and attentive face, could
contain himself no longer, but broke into a smile as he said that he
thought Miles perfectly right, "particularly as the shooting-season
was coming on." So Miles left London, and went to his old ancestral
home. The bright bountiful beauty of summer still decked the woods and
fields; the old servants and the villagers vied with each other in
welcoming the young squire; and Miles felt that he had done rightly in
following what he was pleased to call the dictates of his conscience,
in coming back. The small sum of money which he had expended on the
estate had been judiciously laid out, and improvement was manifest
everywhere--in heavy crops, mended fences, and common land drained and
reclaimed; in repaired outhouses, and shooting properly preserved;
and, better than all, in a higher class of tenantry, and larger rents.
Miles Challoner had never felt the pleasant sense of proprietorship
until this visit to his home. He walked round his fields, he stood on
little vantage-points and surveyed his estate, with an inward feeling
of pride which he did not care to check. It _was_ something to be an
English country gentleman, after all. He had been nothing and no one
in London, a hanger-on, a unit in the great social stream--no better
than a dancing barrister, or a flirting clerk in a government office;
two-thirds of the people he visited knowing his name, and that he had
been properly introduced to them by some accountable person, but
nothing more. While here, he was the young squire; as he passed, the
"hat was plucked from the slavish villager's head;" everybody knew
him, and was anxious to be seen by him; he was the man of the place,
and--Yes, it would not be difficult to make out one's life in that
position; not as a bachelor, of course, but provided he had someone
with him. Someone? No difficulty in finding her! If he knew the
language of laughing eyes, Emily Walbrook would not object to become
the mistress of Rowley Court. And with her father Sir Thomas's money
what might not be done? The old place might be rehabilitated, the lost
lands recovered, the old dignity of the family restored.
But Miles Challoner, being a gentleman and not an adventurer, told
himself, after very little self-examination, that he did not care for
Miss Walbrook, and that he never could care for her, consequently that
he would be a scoundrel to think of proposing for her hand; told
himself further that he only did care and only had cared--apart
from some boyish follies which had not done him nor anyone else any
harm--for one person in the world, Grace Lambert. Did she care for
him? He did not know; but, honestly, he thought she did not. And if
she did, should he bring her there, to Rowley Court, as his wife? Did
he care for her sufficiently to suffer the universal inquiries as to
who she was, the generally uplifted eyebrows and supercilious remarks
when the reply was given? At present she was only known as a young
lady received in excellent society on account of her musical talents;
but if this report was true--this report that she had gone to Italy
with the intention of perfecting herself as a singer on the operatic
stage? A singer? The stage? The general and only notion of the stage
in the neighbourhood of Rowley Court was founded on reminiscences of
the travelling troupe of mummers who had once or twice come to
Bleakholme Fair; poor half-starved creatures, who had performed a
dismal tragedy in an empty barn, by the light of a hoop of guttering
tallow candles. How could he prepare the Bosotian mind of
Gloucestershire to receive as his wife a woman who would bring with
her such associations as these? What would be said by the old county
neighbours, by whom the old Challoner name was yet held in the highest
respect and regard? What by the wealthy new-comers, whose influence
was day by day increasing, and who gave themselves airs of pride and
position and exclusiveness far more intolerable than the loftiest
hauteur of the real territorial _seigneurie?_ Poor Miles! and after
all--even if he had made up his mind to brave all the outcry that
might arise; to say, "I love this woman, and I bestow on her my rank
and my position; accept her as my wife, or leave her alone; think as
you please, talk as you please, and go to the deuce!"--he was by no
means certain that Miss Grace Lambert would see the magnitude of the
sacrifice he was making for her, or, indeed, that she would have
anything to say to him.
That was a dull winter for Miles Challoner, that duty season when he
steadfastly went through the character of the English country
gentleman, to the tolerable satisfaction of his neighbours and his
tenants, but to his own intense disgust. He hunted twice a week, he
shot constantly; he attended church regularly, and kept rigidly awake
during the dear old vicar's dull sermons; he gave two or three dull
bachelor dinners, where the vicar, the curate, little Dr. Barford, and
two or three neighbouring foxhunting squires, ate and drank, and
prosed wearily for three or four hours; and he went out occasionally.
He dined with Lord Boscastle, the lord-lieutenant and principal
grandee of the county, where he met all "the best people," but where
his attention was principally concentrated on his hostess; for Lady
Boscastle was _née_ Amelia Milliken, and, as Amelia Milliken, had been
the great attraction for two seasons at the Theatre Royal Hatton
Garden, during the lesseeship of the great Wuff. Miles could
hardly realise to himself that the mild, elegant, dried-up,
farinaceous-looking old lady had been the incomparable actress who, as
he had heard his father relate, entered so thoroughly into her art
that she would shed real scalding tears upon the stage; and whose
Juliet yet remained in the memory of old playgoers as the most perfect
impersonation ever witnessed. She was an actress when Lord Boscastle
married her; and see her now, with a cabinet minister on her right
hand, and the best families of the county honoured by her intercourse!
Why could not he do the same with Grace Lambert? And then Miles
recollected that he was not so great a man as Lord Boscastle, had not
the same weight and _prestige_; remembered also that he had heard his
father say that Lady Boscastle made her way very slowly into the
county society; that she had an immense number of disagreeables to
contend with at first; and that it was only the sweetness of her
disposition, and her wonderful patience and forbearance, that carried
her through. And though Miles Challoner was undoubtedly in love with
Miss Lambert, he scarcely thought that sweetness of disposition,
patience, and long-suffering were the virtues in which she specially
excelled. Miles also dined with Sir Thomas Walbrook, where there was
much more display and formality than at Lord Boscastle's--only
that the display was in bad taste, and the formality betokened
ill-breeding; and he went to a hunt-ball, and tried to attend the
weekly meetings of a whist-club, but broke down in the attempt. In the
daytime he did not fare so badly, for he was full of life and health,
and the love for field-sports which had distinguished him when a boy
came back renewed when he again joined in those sports; but in the
long evenings he moped and moaned, and was dreadfully bored.
The fact is that, however much he endeavoured to persuade himself to
the contrary, he was in love with Miss Grace Lambert; and the more
persistently he turned his thoughts from that young lady, the more he
found himself taking interest in persons and things associated with
her. He corresponded regularly with Lord Sandilands, and his every
letter contained some inquiry after or allusion to "your young friend
in Italy." The old nobleman chuckled over the frequency and the tone
of these letters, but replied to them regularly, and invariably said
something about Grace; something, too, which he thought would please
the recipient of the letter, for he loved Miles with fatherly
affection; and, if Gertrude saw fit, nothing would have pleased him
better than that the two young people should make a match of it. That,
however, was entirely for Gertrude to determine; and nothing could
come of it yet, at all events, as she had the stage career before her.
Meantime, there was no reason why pleasant reports of her progress
should not go down to Rowley Court. And when Miles received the
letters, he ran his eye over them hurriedly to see where _the_ name
appeared, and read those bits first, and re-read them, and then
dropped very coolly and leisurely into the perusal of his old friend's
gossip.
He was a queer, odd fellow, though, this Miles Challoner; full of that
dogged determination which we call "British," and are extremely proud
of (though, like the man who "treated resolution," in the end we often
do the thing which we have so stubbornly refused to do); and although
he knew that Miss Lambert had returned, and was about making her
_début_ in public, he remained stationary at Rowley Court. He received
letters regularly from Lord Sandilands, but none of them ever
contained a hint or a suggestion that he should come up to town;
indeed, Miles guessed that Miss Lambert would be far too much occupied
to admit of his seeing her, and he had said he would "give that
up"--"that" being the guiding motive of his life--and he would hold to
it. So Miles Challoner was not in the Grand Scandinavian Opera-house
on the night when Gertrude made her triumphal entry into theatrical
life. But when, the next day, he read the flaming accounts of her
success in the newspapers; when he received letters from Lord
Sandilands and other friends, filled with ravings about her voice, her
beauty, and her elegance; when he felt that this fresh flame would
enormously increase the circle of her admirers, many of whom might
have the chance--which they would not neglect as he was neglecting
it--of personal acquaintance with her,--he could withstand the
influence no longer, but made immediate arrangements for returning to
London.
His old friend received him with his accustomed warmth, talked about
the length of time he had been away, and rallied him on the probable
cause of his detention. "I know, my dear boy!" said Lord Sandilands;
"I know all about what you're going to tell me,--the pleasure a man
feels in his own _terre_; the delightful days you used to have with
Sir Peter's pack; the unequalled cover-shooting, and all the rest of
it. Those things don't keep a young man down in the country, leading
that frightful dead-alive existence which we try to think pleasant. I
know all about it; and I know that there's nothing more horrible.
There must be _beaux yeux_ somewhere, when a man voluntarily accepts
that kind of life; and, by Jove! it's a kind of life to make one find
the most ordinary eyes _beaux_. That confounded country life has
produced more _mésalliances_, and more--hem! What are you going to do
with yourself to-day?" The old nobleman stopped his discourse
abruptly; with the reflection, perhaps, that _mésalliances_ scarcely
fitted him for a theme. Answering him, Miles said that he had nothing
to do, and that he was entirely at his friend's disposal.
"Then," said Lord Sandilands, "suppose we stroll out Bayswater way?
You have not seen Miss Lambert for a long time now, though you
know--for I wrote to you, and you must have heard in a hundred other
places--of her success. Really, the greatest thing for years.
Everybody enchanted; and, best of all, has not made the smallest
difference in her; just the same unaffected, quiet, unpretending girl
as when we met her that first night--don't you recollect?--at Carabas
House."
They walked across Kensington-gardens and speedily reached the
bye-road in which Miss Lambert's pretty villa was situated. Up and
down this road, fretting against the slowness of the pace allowed
them, stepping grandly, and sending the foam in flying flakes around
them, were a pair of horses in a handsome mail-phaeton, driven by a
correctly-appointed groom.
"Mr. Munns here!" said Lord Sandilands testily, as this sight broke
upon him. "Horribly vexing, when we hoped to have the young lady all
to ourselves, eh, Miles? A worthy man, Mr. Munns, but a dreadful
vulgarian. Tell me, is it my shortsightedness, or has this fellow
really mounted a cockade in his man's hat?"
"There certainly is a cockade in the man's hat," said Miles, with a
smile which died away as, on a nearer approach, he added, "and a
coronet on the harness."
"A coronet? Why, the man can never hare been ass enough to--eh? O dear
me, impossible! Who's phaeton's that, sir, eh?"
"Earl of Ticehurst's, my lord!" said the groom, touching his hat;
"lordship's in there, my lord," pointing to the villa with his whip,
"with her ladyship."
"With her ladyship!" echoed Lord Sandilands in bewilderment. "Let us
go in, Miles, and see what it all means."
They saw what it all meant when they found Lady Carabas talking about
education to Mrs. Bloxam in the drawing-room, and saw Lord Ticehurst
walking with Miss Lambert round the little garden. Lord Sandilands
frowned very gloomily, but Lady Carabas made straight at him. She had
been dying to see dear Miss Lambert; she wanted so to see how she bore
her success--ah, what a success!--and how charming she is over it all!
not changed in the smallest degree. And her own horses were regularly
knocked up with all their work just now; and as it was such a long way
(fashionable people think anything west of Apsley House or north of
Park-lane quite out of bounds), she had asked her nephew Etchingham to
drive her over. Lord Sandilands bowed very grimly, and Miles Challoner
then came forward. Lady Carabas was enchanted to see him; rallied him
on his absence on the night of the _début_; hoped to have him
constantly at Carabas House, and was overwhelmingly gracious. Then
Lord Ticehurst and Gertrude came in, and after a few conventional
remarks, the young patrician, after a casual glance out of the window,
informed his aunt that "the chestnuts had already stamped up the road
into a regular ploughed field, by Jove! and that, as the parish would
probably send in the paving-bill, perhaps the best thing they could do
was to be off;" and accordingly he and Lady Carabas retired, with many
adieux.
When they were gone, Lord Sandilands approached Gertrude and
congratulated her with mock solemnity on her new acquaintance. "You
have achieved an earl, my dear child, and there is no saying now to
what you may not aspire. Charles the Fifth picking up Titian's pencil
will be equalled by Lord Ticehurst's turning over the leaves of your
music-book for you. Or in time we might get a duke to--"
"We want no higher member of the peerage than a baron, apparently, to
render his order ridiculous," said Gertrude, turning upon him with a
sarcastic bow and a little _moue_. "Don't be angry, dear friend," she
continued; "but I own I cannot stand raillery where Lord Ticehurst is
concerned. I have no doubt he means well--I am sure of it; all he says
is genuine, and, so far as he can make it, polite; but he is very
silly and very slangy, and--I can't endure him.--And now, Mr.
Challoner, tell me of all your doings during your long absence in the
country."
Lord Sandilands had a great deal to say to Mrs. Bloxam on the subject
of any future visits which Lord Ticehurst might wish to pay to the
Bayswater villa, and said it pointedly, and without circumlocution.
When he rejoined the young people, he found them deep in conversation,
and Miles, at least, looking very happy.
CHAPTER II.
Integratio Amoris.
When Gilbert Lloyd satisfied himself that the new opera-singer, at
whose most successful debut he had "assisted," was none other than his
wife, the momentary agitation which had so shaken him passed away, and
he sat himself down at the back of Lady Carabas' box--not in the chair
usually reserved for the controller for the time being of the Soul,
but in a more retired position--and gave himself up, as any
uninterested auditor might have done, to listening to the singing. He
had never been particularly fond of music, and though he had always
known that his wife possessed a fine voice, and had even at one time
taken into consideration the probable profits which would accrue were
he to _exploiter_ her musical talent, he had never imagined the
possibility of her taking such a position as that in which he now
found her. Gilbert Lloyd was a man who believed thoroughly in the
truth of that axiom which tells us that "there is a time for
everything;" it would be quite time enough for him to analyse the new
light which had been let into his life, to weigh and balance the pros
and cons connected with the appearance of Gertrude on a scene which he
was accustomed to tread, mixed up with people with whom he was to a
certain extent familiar; it would be time enough for him to enter into
those business details on the next morning, when his brain would be
fresh and clear, and he would be recruited by his night's rest, and
able more clearly to see his way, and arrive at a more accurate
decision as to the advisability of steps to be taken. Meanwhile, he
would listen with the rest; and he did listen, with great pleasure,
joining heartily in the applause, and delighting Lady Carabas by the
warmth of his outspoken admiration of her favourite. And he escorted
her ladyship to her carriage, and went to the club, and played
half-a-dozen rubbers with admirable coolness and self-possession. It
was one of Gilbert Lloyd's strongest points that he could put aside
anything unpleasant that might be pressing upon him, no matter how
urgently, and defer it for future consideration. In the midst of
trouble of all kinds--pecuniary complications, turf anxieties, on the
issue of which his position in life depended--he would, after looking
at them vigorously with all his power, turn into bed and sleep as
calmly as though his mind were entirely free, rising the next morning
with renewed health and courage to tackle the difficulties again. Just
at this period of Miss Lambert's _début_, Lloyd happened to be
particularly busy; the Derby--on which he and his party were even more
than usually interested--was close at hand, and all Gilbert's time was
absorbed in "squaring" Lord Ticehurst's book and his own. But he knew
that he need be under no alarm from the new element in his life which
had just cropped out: though he had seen Gertrude, she had not seen
him; there was no reason as yet--why they should be thrown together;
and even if they were, he was too fully aware of her coldness and her
pride to imagine she would for an instant attempt to thrust herself
upon him, or even acknowledge him. So Gilbert Lloyd made no difference
in his life, beyond noting the name under which his wife was charming
the public, and paying attention whenever that name was pronounced in
his presence. He heard all that--as we know--people said about her;
but as that all was praise of her public performance, and astonishment
at the quietude of her private life, it caused him very little
emotion, and that little of no pleasurable kind.
It was the intervening week between Epsom and Ascot, and the season
was at its height. The Ticehurst party, thanks to the astute
generalship of Gilbert Lloyd, had pulled through the Derby very well.
Lord Ticehurst's horse had not won--no one had ever imagined that
possible--but it had been brought up to such a position in the betting
as to secure the money for the stable, and save its owner's credit
with the public. Matters for the future looked promising. To be sure,
Lord Ticehurst had not taken so much interest of late in his turf
speculations; but that did not particularly affect Mr. Lloyd. So long
as his patron kept up his stud, and left the entire management of
everything to him, that gentleman was content. It was not unnatural
that a man of Lord Ticehurst's youth and health and position should
wish to enjoy himself in society; and Gilbert rather encouraged his
pupil's new notions on this point. It was not that Orson was endowed
with reason, but rather that Orson had found out some _jeux innocens_
for himself, of which he did not require his keeper's constant
supervision.
One morning in the above-named week, Gilbert Lloyd was sitting in his
own room in Lord Ticehurst's bachelor-house in Hill-street. It was a
pleasant room on the first floor, and was furnished in a manner
half-substantial and half-pretty. The large oak writing-table in the
centre, the two or three japanned deed-boxes on the floor, the
handful of auctioneers' bills pinned to the wall, announcing property
to be disposed of at forthcoming sales--all these looked like
business; but they were diametrically contradicted by the cigar-boxes,
the pipe-rack, the Reynolds proofs, and the Pompeian photographs on
the walls; the ivory statuettes and the china monsters on the
chimney-piece; the deer-skins and the tiger-skins, the heavy bronzes,
the velvet _portières_, and the luxurious chairs and ottomans; all of
which indicated the possession of good taste and the means of
gratifying it. Gilbert Lloyd had chosen these rooms--his bedchamber
adjoined his sitting-room--when the _ménage_ was first transplanted to
Hill-street from Limmer's--where, during the reign of Plater Dobbs,
Lord Ticehurst had resided--and had kept them ever since. He had
chosen them because they were pleasant and airy, and so far out of the
way, that the ribald friends of the real proprietor--who were dropping
into their companion's rooms on the ground-floor at all hours of the
day and night--never thought of ascending to them. Trainers and
jockeys made their way up the stairs with much muttered cursing,
hating the ascent, which was troublesome to their short legs, and
hating the business which brought them there; for Mr. Lloyd had a
sharp tongue, and knew how to use it; and if his orders were not
carried out to the letter, so much the worse for those who had to obey
them. And latterly, a different class of visitors found their way to
Gilbert's room, demure attorneys and portly land-agents; for Mr. Lloyd
was now recognised as Lord Ticehurst's factotum; and all matters
connected with the estates, whether as regards sale, purchase, or
mortgage, passed through his hands.
It was twelve o'clock in the day, and Gilbert was seated at the oak
writing-table. A banker's pass-book lay open at his right hand, and he
was busied with calculations on a paper before him, when there was a
knock at the door, and upon the cry "come in," Lord Ticehurst entered
the room. Gilbert looked up from his writing, and on seeing who was
his visitor, gave a short laugh.
"Won't you send up a servant with your name, next time?" said he; "the
idea of a man knocking at a door in his own house--at least, when that
isn't the door of his wife's room! Then, I've heard it's advisable to
knock or cough outside, or something of that sort, just to keep all
straight, you know!"
"Funny dog!" said Lord Ticehurst, indolently dropping into an
easy-chair and puffing at his cigar. "How are you?"
"Well, but worried," answered Gilbert.
"That goes without saying," said his lordship; "you always are
worried, or you would never be well!"
"Look here, Etchingham," exclaimed Gilbert Lloyd, with a mock air of
intense interest, "you mustn't do this, 'pon my soul you mustn't, or
you'll hurt yourself. I've noticed lately a distinct tendency on your
part to be epigrammatic; you weren't intended for it, and it won't
agree with you. Take a friend's advice, and cut it."
"Considerate old boy! Tell me the news."
"Tell _you_ the news--I like that. Tell the news to a man whose life
is passed in what the newspaper fellows call the 'vortex of fashion:'
who is so much engaged that his humble servant here can't get five
minutes with him on business, when it's most particularly wanted. Tell
_you_ the news, indeed!"
"No. But I say, you know what I mean, Gilbert. How are we getting on?
Ascot, you know, and all that?"
"O, business! Well, Bosjesman will win the Trial Stakes, and Plume
will be beaten like a sack for the Cup; both of which facts are good
for us. We shall get Dumfunk's Derby-money, or most of it; he's come
to terms--nice terms--with that discount company at Shrewsbury; and
little Jim Potter's shoulder's better, and he'll be able to ride."
"And what about the house?"
"What house? Parliament? Does your lordship intend to put me in for
Etchingham? I'm as tit a fiddle for that work, and could roll them
speeches off the reel--"
"Don't be an ass, Gilbert! I mean the house for the week--at Ascot?"
"O, I see! Yes, that's all settled. I couldn't get anything nearer
than Windsor; but I've got a very pretty little box there. Charley
Chesterton rents it for the year--he's there with the Blues, you know;
but Mrs. Chesterton's going away, and Charley will go into barracks
for the week, and we can have the house. It's a stiffish figure, but
they can get any amount that week, you know."
"O yes, of course, that don't matter. And it's a nice house, you say?"
"Very pretty little place indeed--do very well for us."
"Yes. And Mrs. Chesterton's been living there? She's a nice woman,
ain't she?"
"Yes, she's nice enough, as women go. But what has she to do with it?"
"Well--I mean to say, it's a sort of crib that--don't you know--one
could ask a lady to stop in?"
"O--h!" exclaimed Gilbert Lloyd, with a very long face--"that's it, is
it?"
"No, no, 'pon my soul, you don't understand what I mean," said Lord
Ticehurst hurriedly. "Fact of the matter is, Lady Carabas wants to
come down for the Cup-day; and she'll bring a friend, of course; and I
told her about my having a house somewhere in the neighbourhood for
the week, and thought she and the other lady, and their maids and
people, could--don't you see--stay. What do you think?"
"My dear Etchingham, whatever you wish, of course shall be carried
out. It is not for me to teach etiquette to any lady, especially to
Lady Carabas, who despises conventionality, and who, besides, is quite
old enough to take care of herself. I should have thought that for a
lady to come to a bachelor's house--however, of course she'll have her
maid and her footman, and some one to act as her _âme damnées_--her
sheep-dog. Who is the sheep-dog, by the way?"
"I don't know about sheep-dog," said Lord Ticehurst, flushing very
red; "but Lady Carabas said the lady she proposed to do me the honour
to bring to my house was--was Miss Grace Lambert."
Gilbert Lloyd looked up without the smallest trace of perturbation,
and said, "Miss Grace Lambert? O, the--the celebrated singer! O,
indeed!"
"Yes," said Lord Ticehurst; "there's a chance of her getting a holiday
on Thursday night--town will be very empty, you know, and I think I
shall be able to square it with Munns--and then she might come down to
the races, and she and Lady Carabas could come over here afterwards.
She's a most charming person, Gilbert."
"Is she?" said Gilbert Lloyd very slowly. "I have not--what you seem
to have--the pleasure of her acquaintance. Have you known her long?"
"O, ever so long; ever since she first came out at a concert at
Carabas House one night. Don't you recollect my pointing out to you a
very stunning girl in a brougham, just as we were turning into Tatt's
one day?"
"My dear fellow, you've pointed me out so many stunning girls when
we've been turning into Tatt's, or elsewhere, that I really cannot
distinguish that bright particular star. But I've seen Miss Lambert at
the Opera."
"And she's a stunner, ain't she?"
"She seemed to be perfectly good-looking and ladylike on the stage.
But these people are so different in private life."
"My dear Gilbert, I've seen her in private life, as you call it, a
dozen times, and she's awfully nice."
"O, and she's awfully nice, eh?"
"What a queer fish you are! Of course she's awfully nice, and this
place of Charley Chesterton's will do for these ladies to come to?"
"Yes, I should think so. Mrs. Chesterton is a woman accustomed to have
the right thing about her; and it's good enough for her, so I presume
it will 'do' for Miss Lambert and Lady Carabas."
"I hate you when you've got this sneering fit on you, Gilbert," said
his lordship sulkily; and Gilbert Lloyd saw that he had gone far
enough. His patron was wonderfully good-tempered, but, like all
good-tempered men, when once put out, he "cut up rough" for a very
long time.
"Don't be angry, Etchingham;" and Lloyd rose and crossed the room, and
put his hand on the young man's shoulder. "I was only chaffing; and I
was a little annoyed, perhaps, because you seemed doubtful whether
this house that I have got, and only got after a great deal of
trouble, would suit you. You might have depended on me. Well, and so
you have made this young lady's acquaintance, and you find her
charming?"
"Quite charmin'," said Lord Ticehurst, his good-humour being restored.
"I've been with Lady Carabas several times to see her at a pretty
little place she's got out Bayswater way, where she lives with an old
tabby--by the way, I'll bet odds that old tabby don't let her come
here without her."
"Well, there's room for the old tabby," said Gilbert. "But, see,
Etchingham; do I really understand that you--that you care for this
girl?"
"D--n it, Gilbert, you press a fellow home! Well, then, I'm not given
to this sort of thing, as you know very well; but this time it's an
awful case of spoons."
"Ah!" said Gilbert, smiling quietly, "your expression is slangy but
vigorous. And what are your views with regard to her?"
"Jove!" said Lord Ticehurst, "only one way there, my dear fellow!
Wouldn't stand any nonsense; any of 'em, I mean,--Lady Carabas and all
that lot. Besides, she's a lady, you know--educated, and all that sort
of thing; and as to looks and breedin', she could hold her own with
any of 'em--eh?"
"Of course she could. Besides, chaff apart, when the Earl of Ticehurst
chooses to marry, his countess--however, there's time enough to talk
about that. Now run along, for I must write off at once about this
Windsor house; and I've a heap of things to do to-day."
Lord Ticehurst left his Mentor, after shaking hands warmly with him,
and took his departure in a very happy frame of mind. It was a great
comfort to him to have made Lloyd aware of the state of his feelings
towards Miss Lambert, immature as those feelings were, for Mentor had
such a hold over the young man that he never felt comfortable while he
was keeping anything back from him. But when he was gone, Gilbert
Lloyd did not begin to write the letter to Windsor, or settle to any
of the "heap of work" which he had mentioned as in store for him. He
got up and opened a drawer full of cigars, selected one carefully, lit
it, and threw himself into a low easy-chair, with his legs crossed,
and his hands clasped behind his head. At first he puffed angrily at
his cigar, but after a little time he gradually began to smoke more
quietly, and then he unclasped his hands and rested his elbows on his
knees, and his chin on his hands.
"That's it!" he said aloud, "that's the line of country! Fancy my
never having given a thought to where this fellow was going so often,
never wondering at the sudden fancy he had taken to his aunt's
society; and then discovering from his own lips that he has been
paying visits to my wife! More than that--that he is confoundedly in
love with her, and wants to marry her! Wants to marry my wife! There's
something deuced funny in that. I wonder whether any other fellow ever
had a man come to him and tell him he wanted to marry his wife. I
should think not! Not that I should care in the least if anyone
married Gertrude--anyone, that is to say, except this youth
downstairs. I have not done with him yet, and a wife would interfere
horribly with me and my plans. Yes, that's the right notion. There is
no reason why Etchingham should not be encouraged in this new fancy.
It will keep him from dangling after any other woman, and it can come
to nothing. I know her ladyship of Carabas rather too well to credit
her with any desire for Miss Lambert the opera-singer as a relative;
as a plaything, an amusement, she's well enough: but Lady Carabas
cries '_Halte là!_' and a hint from me to her would make her speak the
word. Besides, _I_ am not dead yet, and I might have something to say
about my wife's second marriage--that is, of course, supposing that
second marriage did not suit my views. But there will be no question
of that for some time. Now that I know the state of affairs, I can
keep myself _au courant_ to all that goes on through Lady Carabas; I
shall make her ladyship induce her charming nephew to moderate his
transports so far as any question of proposing is concerned; but he
may be 'awful spoons,' as he charmingly phrases it, as long as he
pleases. As for this Windsor notion, that must be knocked on the head
at once. I don't intend to give up the Cup-day at Ascot myself, and I
certainly could not well be there, if Gertrude were to be of the
party. I'll settle that with Lady Carabas."
Here behold Gilbert Lloyd's philosophy and views of life. Affection
for the woman whom he had wedded, and from whom he had separated, he
had not one scrap; nor even care as to what she did, what course of
life she pursued, whence she obtained the means of livelihood. Any
interest in that he had abnegated when he accepted the terms which she
dictated for their separation,--terms which meant oblivion of the past
and _insouciance_ for the future, terms which he had indorsed when
they were proposed, and which he was ready to hold to still. But when
his knowledge of his wife's previous life--of the thrall from which
she had actually, but not legally, escaped--gave him the mastery over
her actions, or the actions of those in relation with her, he was
prepared Halteto twist the screw to its tightest, if by so twisting it he
could aid in the development of his own plans.
Had Gilbert Lloyd no remnant of love for Gertrude, no lingering
reminiscence of the time when, a trusting school-girl, she placed her
future in his hands, gave up her whole life to him, and fled away from
the only semblance of home which she had known at his suggestion? Had
he no thought of the time immediately succeeding that, when for those
few happy weeks, ere the pleasant dream was dispelled, she lay
nestling in his bosom, building O such castles in the air, such
impossible pictures, prompted by girlish romantic fancies of the
future? Had Gilbert Lloyd any such reminiscences as these? Truth to
tell, not in the smallest degree. He had passed the wet sponge over
the slate containing any records of his early life, and all trace of
Gertrude had been effectually erased. When he heard of her now, when
it became necessary for him to give a certain number of moments to
thinking of her in connection with business matters, he treated the
affair simply from a business point of view. To him she was as dead
"as nail in door," as immaterial as the first woman he might brush
against in the street; she might be turned to serve certain ends which
he had in view; but he regarded her simply as one of the puppets in
the little life-drama of which he acted as showman. The pleasant
gathering which Lord Ticehurst had looked forward to on the Cup-day at
Ascot did not come off. Gilbert Lloyd had five minutes' interview with
Lady Carabas on the subject; and two days afterwards Mr. Boulderson
Munns announced the impossibility of his sparing Miss Grace Lambert's
services for that evening. Not that Miss Lambert would have accepted
Lord Ticehurst's hospitality if her services could have been spared,
but it was best to put the refusal on a strictly professional footing.
Mr. Lloyd did not in the least care about absenting himself from that
pleasant gathering on the Heath, and it was of course impossible for
him to be brought face to face with Lord Ticehurst's intended guest.
So the recipients of his lordship's hospitality in the cottage at
Windsor were Lady Carabas and Miss Macivor, a sprightly elderly
spinster, who was as well known in society as the clock at St. James's
Palace, and who was always ready to play what she imagined to be
propriety in any fast party. The ladies enjoyed themselves immensely,
they said; but their host's gratification was not so keen. He was
bored and ruffled, and he did not care to disguise it.
And now a change came over Gilbert Lloyd, which was to him
unaccountable, and against which he struggled with all the power of
his strong will, but struggled in vain. This change came about, as
frequently happens with such matters by which our whole future is
influenced, in an unforeseen manner, and by the merest accident. The
Ascot settling-day had not passed off very comfortably. Several heavy
bookmakers were absent; among them one who had lost a large sum of
money to the Ticehurst party. This man was known to have won hugely on
the Derby a fortnight before, and to have had a capital account at his
banker's a few days previously. It seemed therefore clear to Gilbert
Lloyd, with whom the management of the matter rested, that the money
was still in the possession of the absconding bookmaker, who would, in
all probability, take an opportunity of leaving the country with the
sum thus accumulated. Gilbert Lloyd put himself in communication with
the police authorities, furnished a correct description of the
defaulter, and caused a strict watch to be kept at the various
principal ports. One morning he received a telegram from Liverpool,
announcing that the offender had been seen there. It had been
ascertained that he was about to leave by the Cunard boat for Boston
the next morning; but that, as he had committed no criminal offence,
it was impossible for the police to detain him. This news made Gilbert
Lloyd furious; that he should have his prey under his hand, and yet be
unable to close that hand upon him, was maddening. He thought some
good might be effected by his hurrying to Liverpool by the afternoon
express, finding the defaulter, and frightening him out of at least a
portion of the money due. The more he turned this plan in his mind,
the more feasible it seemed to him, and the more he was determined to
carry it into effect. There were, however, certain affairs to be
transacted that day upon which it was most necessary he should, before
starting, communicate personally with Lord Ticehurst; and Gilbert,
from recent experience, knew that he should have considerable
difficulty in tracing that young nobleman's whereabouts. He made
inquiries at all the various haunts, but without any success; at
length, at the club someone said that Ticehurst had offered to drive
him down to the Crystal Palace, for which place he had started a
couple of hours--ago. The Crystal Palace! What on earth could take him
there? Gilbert Lloyd, who saw fewer "sights" than almost any man in
London, had been there once, but brought away a dazed recollection of
fountains and Egyptian idols, and statues and tropical trees, none of
which he thought would have any interest for his pupil. But his
wonderment was at an end when, taking up the newspaper and looking for
the advertisement, he saw announced that a grand concert, by the
principal singers of the Scandinavian Opera, would take place at the
Crystal Palace that afternoon, and that the chief attraction of the
concert was to be Miss Grace Lambert.
A swift hansom bore him to Victoria, and a tedious train landed him at
the Crystal Palace, just in time to hear the opening notes of Herr
Boreas' solo on the ophicleide. A charming performance that of Herr
Boreas, but one to which Mr. Lloyd gave no attention. He hurried
through the crowd, looking eagerly right and left; and at last his
eyes fell upon a group, where they remained.
Lord Ticehurst, Mr. Munns, and two or three others were component
parts of this little knot; but Gilbert Lloyd saw but one
person--Gertrude. How marvellously she had improved during the time
that had elapsed since they parted! She had been pretty as a girl; she
was lovely as a woman. How lovely she looked in her simple morning
dress and coquettish little bonnet! With what a perfect air of easy
grace she listened to the men bending before her, and how quietly she
received the homage which they were evidently paying! An angry flush
rose on Gilbert's pale cheeks, and his heart beat quickly as he
witnessed this manifest adoration. What right had anyone but he to
approach her, to--It stung him like a cut from a whip, it flared like
a train of gunpowder. He knew what it was in an instant: mad, raging,
ungovernable jealousy--nothing else. He had thrown off all love for
her--all thought of her; and now, the first time they met, the passion
which struck him when he first saw her, years before, looking out of
the window of the Vale House, sprung up with renewed fury within him,
and he raged and chafed as he recognised the obstacles which kept him
from her, but which were no barriers to other men. She seemed utterly
indifferent to them, though, he was glad to see--no! her face lights
up, she smiles and bends forward; and when she looks up again there is
a blush upon her cheek. Who has been speaking to her--the tall
handsome man with the brown beard--Miles Challoner! And Gilbert Lloyd
swore a deep oath of revenge--revenge of which his wife and his
brother should each bear their share.
CHAPTER III.
At the Crystal Palace.
To Herr Boreas was allotted the pleasing duty of opening the concert.
The jolly German gentleman, neatly and seasonably dressed in black,
with a large diamond-brooch in his plaited shirt-front, and with
stuffy-looking black-cloth boots with shiny tips, opened his big
chest, and puffed away at his ophicleide, evoking now the loudest and
now the softest notes; while the crowds kept pouring in to the
railed-off space, and took their seats, laughing and chattering, and
not paying the smallest attention to the performance. It was a great
day at the Palace, a day on which great people thought it proper to be
seen there. The little public-houses in the neighbourhood were filled
with resplendent creatures in gorgeous liveries, whose employers were
making their way through nave and transept, looking at nothing save
the other people there, and looking at them as though they were
singular specimens of humanity specially put out for show. In the
matter of staring, it must be confessed that the other people returned
the compliment. The regular attendants at the Crystal Palace are, for
the most part, resident in the neighbourhood, and the neighbouring
residents are, for the most part, of or belonging to the City. The
brokers of stocks, shares, and sugar; the owners of Manchester
warehouses, the riggers of markets, and the projectors of companies;
the directors of banks, and the "floaters" of "concerns," have, many
of them, charming villas, magnificent mansions, or delicious
snuggeries at Blackheath, Eltham, or Sydenham; and the Palace is the
great place of resort for their wives and daughters, and for
themselves when the cares of business are laid aside. How many
successful matches, in which money has been allied to money, have
commenced in flirtations by the side of the plashing fountains, or in
the shade of the stunted orange-trees! What execution has not been
done by flashing eyes in the central promenade! There, by the Dying
Gladiator, Lord Claude Votate proposed for Miss Meggifer, and secured
the fortune which rescued the Calfington estates from his lordship's
creditors; there, behind the Dancing Faun, Charles Partington,
of Partington Nephews, kissed Minnie Black, daughter of Black
Brothers--was seen to do it by Mrs. Black, consequently could not
escape, and thus cemented an alliance between those hitherto rival
houses, considered in Wood-street as the Horatii and Curiatii of the
Berlin-wool trade. Pleasant place of decorous festivity and innocent
diversion, whence instruction has been completely routed by amusement,
and where the Assyrian gods and the Renaissance friezes are deserted
for the dancing dogs and the Temple of Momus as constructed by Mr.
Nelson Lee!
By the time that Herr Boreas had finished his solo--which was not
until he had blown all the breath out of his body, and was apparently
on the verge of apoplexy--the audience had taken possession of all the
seats; and as the German gentleman bowed himself out of the orchestra,
amidst a great deal of applause from people who, indeed, could not
help having heard, but had not paid the least attention to him, there
was a general reference to the programmes to see what was coming next,
then a rustling, a whispering, and that curious settling stir which
electrically runs through an audience just before the advent of a
favourite artist. Gilbert Lloyd, not insensible to this, involuntarily
looked round from behind the pillar by which he was standing to the
spot where he had seen Gertrude, but she was no longer there. The next
instant thunders of applause rang through the building as she advanced
upon the platform. She bowed gracefully but coldly; then the conductor
waved his baton, and dead silence fell upon the audience, leaning
forward with outstretched necks to catch the first notes of her voice.
Soft and sweet, clear and trilling, comes the bird-like song, warbled
without the smallest apparent effort, while thrilling the listeners to
the heart--thrilling Gilbert Lloyd, who holds his breath, and looks on
in rapture. He had heard her before, but in Italian opera; now she is
singing an English ballad, of no great musical pretension indeed, but
pretty and sympathetic. At the end of the first verse the applause
burst out in peals on peals; and so carried away was Gilbert Lloyd,
that he found himself joining in the general feeling--he who scarcely
knew one note of music from another, and who had come to the place on
a matter of important business. That must stand over now, though--he
felt that. The absconding turfite might go to America, or to the
deuce, for the matter of that; Gilbert Lloyd felt it an impossibility
to leave the place where he then was, and tried to cheat himself by
pretending that it was expedient for his own interest that he should
keep a close watch upon Lord Ticehurst just at that time. That young
nobleman certainly took no pains to conceal his warm admiration for
Miss Lambert, and his intense delight at her performance. He applauded
more loudly than anyone else, and assumed an attitude of rapt
attention, which would have been highly interesting if it had not also
been slightly comic. When the song ceased, the cries for a repetition
were loud and universal. Gertrude, who had retired, again advanced to
the front of the orchestra. By an involuntary impulse, Gilbert Lloyd
stepped from behind the pillar which had hitherto shielded him, and
their eyes met--met for the first time since he left her at the
Brighton hotel, on the day of Harvey Gore's death.
A deep flush overspread Gilbert Lloyd's usually pallid cheeks, but
Gertrude's expression did not change in the slightest degree. Not a
trace of the faintest emotion, even of curiosity, could be seen in her
face. The conductor of the orchestra, just before he left her in front
of the audience, addressed some remark to her; and as she replied,
Gilbert noticed that her lips were curling with a slight sneer--an
expression which he fancied he understood, when the band commenced to
play an air which even he, all unmusical as he was, recognised as
"Home, sweet home." But she never looked at him again during the song,
which she sung even more sweetly than the first, and with a deep
pathos that roused the audience to enthusiasm. Gilbert Lloyd kept his
eyes fixed on her, never moving them for an instant; and as he marked
the calm air with which she received the public applause, and the
graceful ease of all her movements--as he saw how her face, always
clear cut and classically moulded, had ripened in womanly beauty and
intellectual expression--as he noticed the rounded elegance of her
figure, the tasteful simplicity of her dress--and he noticed all
these details down to the fit of her gloves and the colour of her
bonnet-strings--he raged against himself for having been fool enough
to relinquish the hold he once had on her. Could that hold be
reëstablished? If he were again to have an opportunity--But while
these thoughts were passing through his mind, Gertrude had finished
her song and quitted the orchestra, and her glance had not fallen on
him again.
Meantime Gilbert Lloyd saw he had been noticed by the group with whom
Miss Lambert had been sitting previous to her performance, and as
Miles Challoner was no longer with them he thought it better to join
the party. His appearance amongst them was evidently a surprise to
Lord Ticehurst, who expressed the greatest astonishment at his
Mentor's finding any amusement in so slow a proceeding as a concert,
and who grew very red and looked very conscious when Gilbert asked him
what particular charm such an entertainment could possess for him.
Lord Sandilands was, as usual in his behaviour to Mr. Lloyd,
scrupulously polite, but not particularly cordial. He had nothing in
common with Gilbert, detested the turf and all its associations, and
looked on Lord Ticehurst's turf Mentor as very little better than Lord
Ticehurst's stud-groom. Mr. Boulderson Munns still remained with them,
and intended so to remain. It was part of Mr. Munns' business that he
should be seen in close and confidential communication "with two
nobs," as he elegantly phrased it, and he took advantage of the
opportunity. Nothing pleased him so much as to notice when members of
the promenading crowd would elbow each other, look towards him, and
whisper together, or when he saw heads bent forward and opera-glasses
pointed in his direction. It was his concert, he thought: when Herr
Boreas blew his ophicleide, or Miss Lambert sang her song, he felt
inclined to place his thumbs in the arm-holes of his big white
waistcoat, and go forward and acknowledge the applause. He had done so
in former years in the transformation-scenes of pantomimes, when the
people called for Scumble the scene-painter, and why not now? Boreas
and the Lambert were quite as much his people as Scumble! Mr. Munns
restrained himself, however, from motives of policy. It was pretty
plain to him, as he afterwards explained to Mr. Duff, that this young
swell, this Ticehurst, was dead spoons on the Lambert; and as he had
no end of money, and was good for a box every night, and perhaps
something more if the screw were properly put on, it would be best to
make it all sugar for 'em. With this laudable intent he commenced
talking loudly to Lord Ticehurst of Miss Lambert's attractions, and
did not suffer himself to be interrupted for more than a minute by
Lloyd's arrival.
"As I was telling you, my lord," he recommenced, "she's a wonder,
this--this young lady--a wonder, and nothing but it! Not merely for
the hit she's made, though it's a great go, and I don't mean to deny
it; but I don't go by the public, I know too much of them. Why, Lord
Sandilands here, he remembers when--Well, it's no good going into
that; lots of them we've seen in our time, and then, after a season or
two, all dickey! regular frost! But there's something very different
from that with Miss Lambert--so quiet, and so quite the lady; none of
your flaring up, and ballyragging the people about. Why Miss Murch,
our wardrobe-woman, said to me only last night, that she only wished
the other prima donnas were like her--won't wear this, and won't wear
that--How d'ye do, Mr. Lloyd? I was talking to his lordship of Miss
Lambert, who's just been singing, and saying what a stunner she was.
Now, if you've got a filly to name--one that's likely to be something,
and do something, you know--you should call her Grace Lambert--"
"No, I think not; not quite that, Mr. Munns!" interposed Lord
Ticehurst; "that's scarcely the kind of compliment I should care to
pay to Miss Lambert."
"You may depend upon it that it's one which, if Miss Lambert had the
option, she would scarcely care to accept, my lord," said Lord
Sandilands tartly; "however, there she is to answer for herself;" and
he pointed through the glass to the garden, where Gertrude was seen
walking with Mrs. Bloxam. There was an evident intention on the part
of all composing the group to join them, and seeing this Gilbert Lloyd
would have withdrawn; but Lord Ticehurst took him by the arm, and
saying, "I've long wanted to introduce you to Miss Lambert, old
fellow, and now you can't possibly escape," led the way.
If he were ever again to have an opportunity! Had that opportunity
then come? Was his never-failing luck holding by him still, and giving
him this chance of retrieving the blunder he had made in the Brighton
hotel? He thought so. His breath came short and thick as he nerved
himself for the meeting. He saw her as she and Mrs. Bloxam strolled
before them up the gardenwalk, noticed the swimming ease of her gait,
the fall of her black-lace cloak, as it hung from her shoulders, the
graceful pose of her head. She turned, he heard the sound of her
approaching feet, he felt her presence close opposite to him, he heard
Lord Ticehurst's voice repeating the set formula of introduction, but
he saw nothing until he looked up to catch the faintest inclination of
Gertrude's head, and to see her face colder, more set, more rigid than
ever. Neither spoke; and the silence was becoming awkward, when Lord
Ticehurst said, "I imagine you must have heard me speak of my friend
Lloyd, Miss Lambert? Good enough to manage my racing matters for me,
and to manage them deuced well--with the greatest talent and skill,
and all that kind of thing. Not in your line, I know, Miss Lambert;
but still--still--" and his lordship's eloquence failed him, and he
broke down.
Again neither of them spoke, but Gilbert Lloyd looked up from under
his brow, and saw the stony glance which Gertrude cast upon him for an
instant, then turned to Mrs. Bloxam, and suggested that they should
return to the concert-room, where she would speedily be wanted. Lord
Sandilands was at her right hand, Lord Ticehurst on the other side of
Mrs. Bloxam. Mr. Munns preceded them, and caused a great sensation, on
which he had reckoned, when he flung open the door and ostentatiously
ushered them into the building; but Gilbert Lloyd walked slowly
behind, his hands plunged into his pockets, and his face--there
was no one to heed him, no reason for him to don an unnatural
expression--savage, set, and careworn.
So it had come at last, he thought. They had met after so long an
estrangement; and that was to be the end of the meeting. No
recognition--he had not expected that--no public recognition, no hint
that they had ever been anything to each other. He recollected the
words that he had addressed to her on their parting; they came surging
up and ringing in his ears: "It is not very likely that we shall ever
run across each other's path in the future, but if we do, we meet as
entire strangers; and the fact of our having been anything to one
another must never be brought forward to prejudice any scheme in which
either of us may be engaged." Memory brought before him the dingy cold
room of the second-rate hotel, with the dying sunlight streaking its
discoloured walls, in which these words had been spoken; brought
before him the slight figure and the deadly pallid face of the girl as
she listened to them, and acquiesced in their verdict. In that verdict
she acquiesced still, was acting up to its spirit, to its very letter.
It was his proposition to leave her alone and unfettered "in any
scheme in which she might be engaged." The fooling, the enslavement of
this idiot Ticehurst, who was a mere tool in his hands, was the game
which she was now playing, at which he was to look on helplessly,
having himself spoken the words which rendered her independent of his
control.
And she, how did she take it? Calmly enough; but not so calmly as
Gilbert Lloyd supposed. She had never gone in for much feeling, and
whatever she had was now completely at her command, far more
completely even than when she last had parted from her husband.
Moreover, while Gilbert had utterly given himself up to the business
of his turf profession, resolutely refusing to think of his wife, or
to acknowledge to himself that there was ever a possibility of their
again being brought into contact, the chance of such a meeting had
often occurred to Gertrude, and the manner in which she would demean
herself, should the occasion arise, had--been thought over by her and
settled in her mind. And now that it had arisen, so far as her outward
demeanour was concerned, she had behaved herself exactly as she had
always proposed. And her facial control was such, that no one looking
at her could have an inkling of what was passing in her mind, which
was fortunate on this occasion, for she was considerably more
disturbed than she had expected. The first sight of her husband was a
complete shock to her, and it was only by the exercise of the greatest
presence of mind that she prevented herself from betraying her
perturbation. When the first shock was past--and she owed it to the
strict discipline of professional training that she was enabled to get
over it so quickly--her thoughts reverted to the subject, and she was
able to discuss it calmly with herself. What brought Gilbert Lloyd to
that place? She knew him well enough to feel sure that there must have
been some strong inducement, and what could that be? Gilbert was _lié_
with Lord Ticehurst; and that that full-flavoured young nobleman was
considerably in love with her, Gertrude had never attempted to
disguise from herself; but what could that matter to the man from whom
she had been, so long estranged, and who had never shown the smallest
interest in her proceedings during that long estrangement? The
possibility of a desire on Gilbert's part to negotiate for a renewal
of intimacy crossed her mind for an instant, but was at once rejected;
and not even for an instant did she imagine the desire for such a
proceeding was based on anything but motives of policy. And, after
all, what did it matter to her? To her Gilbert Lloyd was dead and
buried, she had nothing to look for at his hands, nothing to fear from
him--her lip curled as she recollected that; she would dismiss him
entirely from her thoughts, she would--what could have brought him to
that concert, of all places in the world? It might be useful to know
something of his mode of life. She would lead Lady Carabas to talk of
him; the marchioness would be only too happy to dilate on such a
subject.
By the time Miss Lambert was to sing again, she had quite made up her
mind on this point, and the sight of Gilbert Lloyd, _planté là_, did
not cause her the slightest emotion. He stood as one rapt, fascinated
by her beauty, drinking-in her voice, with one constant idea beating
in his brain:--Was the past irrevocable? could not the mischief be
undone? The power he had had in the old days remained to him still; he
had but to exercise it, and all would be right again. True that just
then she had rebuffed him; but that was her way, always had been; she
had always piqued herself upon her pride, and after that had had its
fling he should be able to do with her as he liked. Miss Lambert was
in full song as these thoughts passed through Gilbert Lloyd's mind,
when suddenly she changed colour, a transient flush overspread her
face, dying away again almost instantaneously. At the same instant,
Gilbert Lloyd turned swiftly round in the direction in which he had
noticed her glance fall, and saw Miles Challoner, who had recently
entered and dropped into a chair just behind Lord Sandilands' seat. No
doubt of it, no doubt of it; her self-command was so shaken that her
voice faltered for an instant, and he--look at his eyes, fastened on
her face with a look of perfect love and trust, and it was impossible
to doubt the position. Lloyd's heart sunk within him at the sight, and
a bitter oath was rising to his lips, and would have found utterance,
when he felt his arm pressed, and looking round, saw Tommy Toshington,
of the clubs, standing behind him. Mr. Toshington had on a new and
curly wig, a light high muslin cravat, and looked bland and amiable.
He winked affably at Lloyd, and laying his finger lightly against his
nose, said, "You're wrong, my dear boy;--it's all right!" Mr. Gilbert
Lloyd shortly bade his friend not to be an ass, but if he had anything
to say, to out with it. Nothing abashed at the strength of Gilbert's
language, Tommy said,
"My dear fellow, I mean exactly what I say; you're under a mistake,
while all the time it's all right for _you!_"
"What's all right for me--with whom--where?"
"There!" said Tommy Toshington, wagging his new wig and his
curly-brimmed hat in the direction where Lord Ticehurst was sitting;
"his lordship is _entêté_ with a certain warbler, eh? Fourth finger of
the left hand--death do us part, and all that sort of thing, eh? That
wouldn't suit your book, I should think--have to give up your rooms;
she persuade him to cut the turf, go to church, and that kind of
thing. Don't you be afraid, my boy; I know the world better than you,
and that'll never come off!"
"You think not?" asked Gilbert.
"I'm sure not," replied Tommy. "Look here; he'd like it fast enough.
Etchingham would marry her to-morrow if he got the chance; but she's
full of pluck and spirit, and don't care a bit for him. How do I know?
Because she cares for somebody else. How do I know that? My dear
fellow, don't I know everything? What used the old Dook to say, 'Ask
Toshington, he'll know; he knows everything, Tommy does.' And he
didn't make many mistakes, the old Dook."
"Perhaps you know who is the 'somebody' else for whom the lady cares?"
said Gilbert, an evil light dawning in his face, and his lips
involuntarily tightening as he put the question.
"Of _course_ I do!" said Tommy, with a crisp little laugh; "keep my
eyes open, see everything; seen 'em together lots of times--Carabas
House, Lady Lowndes', and lots of places. You know him, I should
think; tall man from Gloucestershire--big beard--Chaldecott--some name
like that!"
This time the oath broke from Lloyd's lips unchecked. He turned
rapidly on his heel, and strode away.
"Dev'lish ill-bred young man that," said old Toshington, looking after
him; "dammy, there's no manners left in the men of the present day!"
END OF VOL. I.
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PRINTING OFFICE OF THE PUBLISHER.
End of Project Gutenberg's The Rock Ahead. (Vol. 1 of 2), by Edmund Yates