Destiny having apparently taken sides with Diana in her new existence,
she lost no time in availing herself of the varied and curious
entertainment thrown in her way. The first thing she did on the next
day but one of her arrival in London was to attempt a visit to her own
former old home in Richmond, in order to see her “bereaved” parents. A
private automobile from the hotel was supplied for her use at the hour
she named in the afternoon,--an hour when she knew by old experience
her mother would be dozing on the sofa after lunch, and her father
would be in a semi-somnolent condition over the day’s newspaper. As she
passed through the hotel lounge on her way to enter the car, she came
face to face with her quondam lover, Captain the Honourable Reginald
Cleeve, a heavily-built, fairly good-looking man of about fifty or
more. She wondered, as she saw him, what had become of the once rather
refined contour of the features she had formerly admired, and why the
eyes that had “looked love into eyes that spake again” were now so
small and peepy, and half hidden under lids that were red and puffy.
Dressed with a quiet elegance and simplicity, she moved slowly towards
him,--he was lighting a cigar and preparing to go out, but as he caught
sudden sight of her he dropped the lit match with a “By Jove!” stamped
its flame out under his foot, and hastening to the hotel door of exit,
opened it, and, lifting his hat, murmured “Allow me!” with a glance of
undisguised admiration. She bowed slightly and smiled her thanks--her
smile was most enchanting, creating as it were a dazzle of light in
the eyes of those who beheld it,--then she passed out into the street,
where the hotel porter assisted her into her automobile, and watched
her being driven away till she had disappeared. Captain Cleeve strolled
up to the hotel office where the manageress sat at her desk,--he was on
friendly terms with her, and could ask any question he liked.
“Is that young lady staying here?” he now inquired--“The one who has
just gone out?”
“Yes. She came two days ago from abroad. A very beautiful girl, is she
not?”
Cleeve nodded.
“Rather! I never saw anything like her. Do you know who she is?”
“Her name is May,--Miss Diana May,” replied the manageress. “She was
recommended here by,--dear me! Is there anything the matter?”
For Captain the Honourable had gone suddenly white, and as suddenly
become violently red in the face, while he gripped the edge of the
counter against which he leaned as though afraid of falling.
“No--no!” he answered, impatiently--“It’s nothing! Are you sure that’s
her name?--Diana May?”
“Quite sure! The manager of our bank brought her here, explaining that
she had just arrived from Switzerland, where she has been educated--I
think--in the house of one of his own friends who lives in Geneva--and
that she was for the present alone in London. He is looking out for a
lady chaperone and companion for her,--she has plenty of money.”
Cleeve pulled at his moustache nervously--then gave a forced laugh.
“Curious!” he ejaculated--“I used to know a girl named Diana May years
ago--before--before I was married. Not like this girl--no!--though she
was pretty. I wonder if she’s any relation? I must ask her.”
“She seemed to know _your_ name when she saw it in our register,” said
the manageress, “for she inquired if you and your family were staying
here. I said ‘Yes’--and ‘did she know Mrs. Cleeve?’--but she replied
that she did not.”
Captain the Honourable had become absent-minded, and murmured “Oh!” and
“Ah!” as if he were not paying very much attention. He strolled away
and out into the street, with the name “Diana May” ringing in his ears,
and the vision of that exquisitely lovely girl before his eyes. A dull
spark of resentment sprang up in him that he should be a married man
with a wife too stout to tie her own shoes, and the father of children
too plain-featured and ungraceful to be looked at a second time.
“We are fools to marry at all!” he inwardly soliloquized. “At
fifty-five a man may still be a lover--and lover of a girl, too--when
long before that age a woman is done for!”
Meanwhile Diana was having adventures of a sufficiently amusing kind,
had she retained the capability of being amused by anything “merely”
human. She arrived at her former old home a little on the outskirts of
Richmond, and bade the driver of her automobile wait at the carriage
gate, preferring to walk up the short distance of the drive to the
house. How familiar and yet unfamiliar that wide sweep of neatly-rolled
gravel was! banked up on each side with rhododendrons, through which
came occasional glimpses of smooth green lawn and beds of summer
flowers! How often she had weeded and watered those beds, when the
gardener went off on a “booze,” as had been his frequent custom,
pretending he had been “called away” by the illness of a near relative!
Pausing on the doorstep of the house she looked around her,--everything
was as it used to be,--the whole place expressing that unctuous pride
and neatness ordinary to the suburban villa adorned by suburban taste.
She rang the bell, and a smart parlour-maid appeared,--not one of the
old “staff” which had been under Diana’s management.
“Is Mrs. Polydore May in?” she asked.
The maid perked a saucy head. The dazzling beauty of the visitor
offended her--she had claims to a kind of music-hall prettiness herself.
“Mrs. May is in, but she’s resting and doesn’t wish to be disturbed,”
she replied--“Unless you’ve some pertikler appointment----”
“My business is very urgent,” said Diana, calmly. “I am a relative of
hers, just returned from abroad. I must see her--or Mr. May----”
“Perhaps Miss Preston----” suggested the parlour-maid.
Diana smiled. Miss Preston! Who was she? A new inmate of the
household?--a companion for “Ma”--and “young” enough for “Pa”?
“Yes--Miss Preston will do,” she said, and forthwith she was shown into
a shady little morning-room which she well remembered, where she used
to tot up the tradesmen’s books and sort the bills. A saucy-looking
girl with curly brown hair rose from the perusal of a novel and stared
at her inquiringly and superciliously.
“I have called to see Mrs. May”--she explained “on very particular and
personal business.”
“What name?” inquired the girl, with a standoffish air.
“The same as her own. Kindly tell her, please. Miss May.”
“I really don’t know whether she will see you,” said the girl,
carelessly. “I am her secretary and companion----”
“So I imagine!” and Diana, without being asked, sank gracefully into
an easy chair, which she remembered as comfortable--“I was also her
secretary and companion--for some time! She knows me very well!”
“Oh, in that case----But does she expect you?”
“Hardly!” And Diana smiled. “But I’m sure she’ll be glad to see me. You
are Miss Preston? Yes? Well then, Miss Preston, do please go and tell
her!”
At that moment, a loud voice called:
“Lucy! Loo--cee! Where’s my pipe?”
Diana laughed.
“The same old voice!” she said. “That’s Mr. May, isn’t it? He’s calling
you--and he doesn’t like being kept waiting, does he?”
Miss Preston’s face had suddenly flushed very red.
“I’ll tell Mrs. May,” she stammered, and hurriedly left the room.
Diana gazed about her on all the little familiar things she had so
often dusted and arranged in their different places. They were all so
vastly removed now in association that they might have been relics
of the Stone Age so far as she was concerned. All at once the door
opened and a reddish face peered in, adorned with a white terrier
moustache--then a rather squat body followed the face and “Pa” stood
revealed. With an affable, not to say engaging air, he said:
“I beg your pardon! Are you waiting to see anyone?”
Diana rose, and her exquisite beauty and elegance swept over his little
sensual soul like a simoon.
“Yes!” she answered, sweetly, while he stared like a man hypnotised--“I
want to see Mrs. May--and _you_!”
“Me!” he responded, eagerly--“I am only too charmed!”
“But I had better speak to Mrs. May first,” she continued--“I have
something very strange to tell her about her daughter----”
“Her daughter! Our daughter! My poor Diana!” And Mr. May immediately
put on the manner of a pious grocer selling short weight--“Our darling
was drowned last summer!--drowned! Drowned while bathing in a dangerous
cove on the Devon coast. Terrible--terrible!--And she was so----”
“Young?” suggested Diana, sympathetically.
“No--er--no!--not exactly young!--she was not a girl like
you!--no!--but she was so--so useful--so adaptable! And you have
something strange to tell us about her?--well, why not begin with me?”
He approached her more closely with a “conquering” smile. She repressed
her inclination to laugh, and said, seriously:
“No--I really think I had better explain matters to Mrs. May first--and
I should like to be quite alone, please,--without Miss Preston.”
At that moment Miss Preston returned and said:
“Mrs. May will see you.” Then, addressing Mr. May, she added: “This
lady says she is some relative of yours--her name is May.”
Mr. James Polydore’s small grey-green eyes opened as widely as their
lids would allow.
“A relative?” he repeated. “Surely you are mistaken?--I hardly
think----”
“Please don’t perplex yourself!” said Diana, sweetly. “I will explain
everything to Mrs. May--she will remember! Can I go to her now?”
“Certainly!” and Mr. May looked bewildered, but was too much
overwhelmed by his visitor’s queenly air and surpassing loveliness to
collect his wits, or ask any very pressing questions. “Let me show you
the way!”
He preceded her along the passage to the drawing-room where Mrs. May,
newly risen from the sofa, stood waiting to receive her mysterious
caller,--fatter and flabbier than ever, and attired in an ill-fitting
grey gown with “touches” of black about it by way of the remainder of
a year’s mourning. Diana knew that old grey gown well, and had often
deplored its “cut” and generally hopeless floppiness.
“Margaret,” announced Mr. May, with a jaunty air--“Here is a very
charming young lady come to see you--Miss May!” Then to Diana: “As
you wish to have a private talk, I’ll leave you, and return in a few
minutes.”
“Thanks very much!” answered Diana,--and the next moment the door
closed, and she was left alone, with--her mother. No emotion moved
her,--not a shadow of tenderness,--she only just wondered how she ever
came to be born of such a curious-looking person! Mrs. May stared at
her with round, unintelligent eyes like those of a codfish just landed.
“I have not the--the pleasure----” she began.
Diana advanced a step or two, holding out her hands. “Don’t you know
me?” she said, at once--“Mother?”
Mrs. May sidled feebly backwards like a round rickety table on casters,
and nearly fell against the wall.
“Don’t you know my voice?” went on Diana--“The voice you have heard
talking to you for over forty years?--I am your daughter!--your own
daughter, Diana! I am, indeed. I was not drowned though I let you all
think I was!--I ran away because I was tired of my hum-drum life at
home! I went abroad for a year and I have just come back. Oh, surely
something will tell you I am your own child! A mother’s instinct, you
know!” And she laughed,--a little laugh of chilliest satire. “I have
grown much younger, I know--I will tell you all about that and the
strange way it was done!--but I’m really your Diana! Your dear drowned
‘girl!’--I am waiting for you to put your arms round me and tell me how
glad you are to have me back alive and well!”
Mrs. May backed closer up against the wall and thrust both her
hands out in a defensive attitude. Her gooseberry eyes rolled in
her head,--her small, pursy mouth opened as though gasping for air.
Not a word did she utter till Diana made a swift, half-running step
towards her,--when she suddenly emitted a shrill scream like a
railway whistle--another and yet another. There was a scamper of feet
outside,--then the door was thrown open and Mr. May and Miss Preston
rushed in.
“What’s the matter? What on earth is the matter?” they cried,
simultaneously.
Mrs. May, cowering against the wall, pointed at her beautiful visitor.
“Take her away! Get hold of her!” she yelled. “Get hold of her quick!
Send for the police! She’s mad! Aa-aah! You’ve let a lunatic into the
house! She’s run away from some asylum! Lucy Preston, you ought to
be ashamed of yourself to let her in. James, you’re a fool! Aa-aah!”
Another wild scream. “Look how she’s staring at me! She says she’s
my daughter Diana--my daughter who was drowned last year! She’s
stark, raving mad! James, send for a doctor and a policeman to remove
her!--take care!--she may turn round and bite you!--you can never tell.
Oh, dear, oh, dear! To think that with my weak heart, you should let
a mad girl into the house! Oh, cruel, cruel! And to think she should
imagine herself to be my daughter Diana!”
Diana drew herself up like a queen addressing her subjects.
“I _am_ your daughter Diana!” she said--“Though how I came to be born
of such people I cannot tell! For I have nothing in common with you.
But I have told you the truth. I was not drowned on the Devon coast
in that cove near Rose Lea as I led you to imagine--I was tired of
my life with you and ran away. I have been in Switzerland for a year
and have just come back. I thought it was my duty to show myself
to you alive--but I want you as little as you want me. I will go.
Good-bye!--Good-bye you, who _were_ my mother!”
As she said this Mrs. May uttered another yell, and showed signs of
collapsing on the floor. Miss Preston hurried to her assistance,
while Mr. May, his knees shaking under him,--for he was an arrant
coward,--ventured cautiously to approach the beautiful “escaped
lunatic.”
“There, there!” he murmured soothingly,--he had an idea that
“there, there,” was a panacea for all the emotions of the sex
feminine--“Come!--now--er--come with me, like a good girl! Be
reasonable and gentle!--I’ll take care of you!--you know you are not
allowed to go wandering about by yourself like this, with such strange
ideas in your head!--Now come along quietly, and I’ll see what I can
do----”
Diana laughed merrily.
“Oh, Pa! Poor old Pa! Just the same Pa! Don’t trouble yourself and
don’t look so frightened! I won’t ‘bite’ you! My car is waiting and
I have to be back at the hotel in time for dinner.” And she stepped
lightly along out of the drawing-room without one backward glance at
the moaning Mrs. May, supported by Miss Preston, while James Polydore
followed her, vaguely wondering whether her mention of a car in waiting
might not be something like crazed Ophelia’s call for “Come, my coach!”
Suddenly she said:
“Is Grace Laurie still with you?”
He stared, thoroughly taken aback.
“Grace Laurie? My wife’s maid? She married and went to Australia six
months ago. How could you know her?”
“As your daughter Diana, I knew her, of course!” she replied. “Poor
Grace! She was a kind girl! _She_ would have recognised my voice, I’m
sure. Is it possible _you_ don’t?”
“I don’t, indeed!” answered “Pa” cautiously, while using his best
efforts to get her out of the house--“Come, come! I’m very sorry for
you,--you are evidently one of those ‘lost identity’ cases of which we
so often hear--and you are far too pretty to be in such a sad condition
of mind! You see, you don’t know yourself, and you don’t know what
you’re talking about! My daughter Diana was not like you at all,--she
was a middle-aged woman--Ah!--over forty----”
“So she was--so she _is_!” said Diana--“_I’m_ over forty! But, Pa, why
give yourself away? It makes _you_ so old!”
She threw him such a smile, and such a glance of arrowy brilliancy that
his head whirled.
“Poor child, poor child!” he mumbled, taking her daintily-gloved
hand and patting it. “Far gone!--far gone, indeed! And so beautiful,
too!--so very beautiful!” Here he kissed the hand he had grasped.
“There, there! You are almost normal! Be quite good! Here we are at the
door--now, are you sure you have a car? Shall I come with you?”
Diana drew her hand away from her father’s hold, and her laugh, silvery
sweet, rang out in a little peal of mirth.
“No, Pa! Fond as you are of the ladies, you cannot make love to your
own daughter! The Prayer Book forbids! Besides, a mad girl is not fit
for your little gallantries! You poor dear! One year has aged you
rather badly! Aren’t you a _leetle_ old for Miss Preston?”
A quick flush overspread James Polydore’s already rubicund countenance,
and he blinked his eyes in a special “manner” which he was accustomed
to use when feigning great moral rectitude. More than ever convinced
that his visitor was insane, he continued to talk on in blandly
soothing accents:
“Ah, I see your car? And no one with you? Dear, dear! I wish I could
escort you to--to wherever you are going----”
“No, you don’t--not just now!” said Diana, laughing. “You’re too
scared! But perhaps another time----”
She swung lightly away from him, and moved with her floating grace
of step along the drive to the carriage gate, where the car waited.
The driver jumped down and opened the door for her. She sprang in,
while James Polydore, panting after her, caught the chauffeur by the
coat-sleeve.
“I don’t think this young lady knows where she is going,” he said,
confidentially. “Where did you find her?”
The chauffeur stared.
“She’s at our hotel,” he answered--“And I’m driving her back there.”
Here Diana put her head out of the window,--her fair face radiant with
smiles.
“You see, it’s all right!” she said--“Don’t bother about me! You know
the----Hotel looking over the Park? Well, I’m there just now, but not
for long?”
“No, I’m sure not for long!” thought the bewildered James Polydore.
“You’ll be put in a ‘home’ for mental cases if you haven’t run away
from one already!” And it was with a great sense of relief that he
watched the chauffeur “winding up” and preparing to move off--the
lunatic would have no chance to “bite” him, as his wife had suggested!
But how beautiful she was! For the life of him he could not forbear
treating her to one of his “conquering” smiles.
“Good-bye, dear child!” he said. “Take care of yourself! Be quite good!
I--I will come and see you at your--your hotel.”
Diana laughed again.
“I’m sure you will! Why, Pa dear, you won’t be able to keep away! The
antique Mrs. Ross-Percival, whom you so much admire, is not ‘the’ only
beautiful woman in London! _Do_ remember that! Ta-ta!”
The car moved rapidly off, leaving James Polydore in a chaotic
condition of mind. He was, of course, absolutely convinced that the
girl who called herself his daughter Diana was the victim of a craze,
but how or when she became thus obsessed was a mystery to him. He
re-entered his house to struggle with the wordy reproaches of his
better-half, and to talk the matter over privately with the “companion
secretary,” Lucy Preston, whose attention he thought more safely
assured by a _tête-à-tête_, which apparently obliged him to put his
arm round her waist and indulge in sundry other agreeable endearments.
But the exquisite beauty of the “escaped lunatic” haunted him, and he
made up his mind to see her again at all costs, mad or sane, and make
searching inquiries concerning her.
Diana herself, speeding back to her hotel, realised afresh the
immensity of the solitude into which her new existence plunged her.
Her own father and mother did not recognise her,--her most trusted
friend, Sophy Lansing, refused to acknowledge her identity--well!--she
was indeed “born again”--born of strange elements in which things
human played no part, and she must needs accept the position. The
saving grace of it all was that she felt no emotion,--neither sadness
nor joy--neither fear nor shame;--she was, or she felt herself to be
a strange personality apart from what is understood as human life,
yet conscious of a life superior to that of humanity. If a ray of
light hovering above a world of shadows could be imagined as an
entity, a being, such would most accurately have described her curious
individuality.
That same evening her banker called upon her, bringing with him a
pleasant motherly-looking lady whom he introduced as Mrs. Beresford, a
widow, whose straitened circumstance made her very anxious to obtain
some position of trust, with an adequate salary. Her agreeable and
kindly manners, gentle voice, and undeniable good breeding impressed
Diana at once in her favour,--and then and there a settlement between
them was effected, much to the relief and satisfaction of the worthy
banker, who, without any hesitation, said that he “could not rest till
he felt sure Miss May was under good protection and care”--at which
she laughed a little but expressed her gratitude as prettily as any
“girl” might be expected to do. She invited him and her newly-engaged
chaperone to dine with her, and they all three went down to the hotel
dining-room together, where, of course, Diana’s amazing beauty made her
the observed of all observers. Especially did Captain the Honourable
Reginald Cleeve, seated at a table with an alarmingly stout wife and
two equally alarmingly plain daughters, stare openly and admiringly
at the fair enchantress with the wonderful sea-blue eyes and dazzling
complexion, and deeply did he ruminate in his mind as to how he could
best approach her, and ask whether she happened to be any relative to
the “Diana May” he had once known. He made an opportunity after dinner,
when she passed through the lounge hall with her companions, and paused
for a moment to look at the “Programme of Entertainments in London”
displayed for the information of visitors.
“Pray excuse me!” he said--“I chanced to hear your name--may I ask----”
“Anything!” Diana answered, smiling, while Mrs. Beresford, already
alert, came closer.
“I used to know,” went on the Captain, becoming rather confused
and hesitating--“a Miss Diana May--I wondered if you were any
relative----?”
“Yes, indeed!” said Diana, cheerfully--“I am!--quite a near relative!
Do come and see me to-morrow, will you? I have often heard of Captain
Cleeve!--and his _dear_ wife!--and his _sweet_ girls! Yes!--_do_ come!
Mrs. Beresford and I will be _so_ pleased!”
Here she took her new chaperone’s arm and gave it a little suggestive
squeeze, by way of assuring her that all was as it should be,--and with
another bewildering smile, and a reiterated “Do come!” she passed on,
with her banker (who had become a little stiff and standoffish at the
approach of Captain Cleeve) and Mrs. Beresford, and so disappeared.
Cleeve tugged vexedly at his moustache.
“A ‘near relative,’ is she? Then she knows! Or--perhaps not! She’s too
young--not more than eighteen at most. And the old Diana must be quite
forty-five! Hang it all!--this girl might be her daughter--but old
Diana never married--just like some old maids ‘faithful to a memory!’”
He laughed. “By Jove! I remember now! She got drowned last year--old
Diana did!--drowned somewhere in Devonshire. I read about it in the
papers and thought what a jolly good thing! Poor old Diana! And this
little beauty is a ‘near relative,’ is she? Well--well!--we’ll see!
To-morrow!”
But when to-morrow came, it brought him no elucidation of the mystery.
Diana had left the hotel. The manageress explained that through Mrs.
Beresford she had heard of a very charming furnished flat which she
thought would suit her, and which she had suddenly decided to take, and
she had gone to make the final arrangements.
“She left this note for you,” said the manageress, handing Cleeve
a letter. “She remembered she had asked you to call on her this
afternoon.”
He took the letter with a sudden qualm of “nerves.” It was simple
enough.
“Dear Captain Cleeve” (it ran),
“So sorry to put you off, but Mrs. Beresford and I are taking a flat
and we shall be rather busy for the next few days, putting things in
order. After that will you come and see me at the above address?
“Yours sincerely,
“Diana May.”
That was all,--but while reading it, Captain the Honourable’s head swam
round and round as if he were revolving in a wheel. For though the
letter purported to come from a “young” Diana, the handwriting--the
painfully familiar handwriting--was that of the “old” Diana!