LIONEL AND KATE
"What an appalling little bounder!" Kate's face was expressive as
she fanned the air with her apron.
Lionel shut his eyes and sniffed. "I can smell his handkerchief yet."
"Don't!" she implored. "I'm trying to forget it."
Fitz-Brown turned his attention to the rose bush. The flowers hung
their heads dejectedly, as if conscious of their guilty secret.
"How about the 'floral offering'?" he asked.
"I'll make you a present of it," said the countess.
"Thanks, awfully. I say, Kate," Lionel went on, "I don't mind
telling you I had all I could do to keep my hands off that half
crown. I give you my word if the fellow had brought out a half
sovereign I should have snatched it before he knew where he was."
"Don't be too sure," laughed Kate. "I was nearer to him than you
were, and I have a good long reach, too! See if I haven't."
She stretched out her arm, bare to the elbow, in bantering challenge.
As they faced each other the creamy curve of her forearm lay close
along his flanneled biceps, and her slender finger-tips pressed
lightly against his neck. Lionel's hand, like a bronze epaulette,
closed over her shoulder, and she felt the heat of his palm through
the thin muslin, as, with gentle strength, he held her immovable.
Ever since that unforgettable night on the golf links, over a week
ago, Lionel had kept his resolution to be no obstacle to Kate
Clendennin's prospects. To his idolatrous mind, Kate's ultimatum
that she was going to marry Robert Baxter settled the matter. To put
her altogether out of his thoughts, out of his dreams, was an
impossibility, but he had kept away from her as much as possible; he
had even "funked" the morning and evening handshake whenever he
could. And now the curve of her warm shoulder in the hollow of his
hand, the touch of her finger-tips, the white curve of her wrist so
near his lips, stirring a forbidden memory with its subtle fragrance,
this was more than Lionel had bargained for. It brought to bear on
his resolution a pressure "beyond its guaranteed capacity." And,
inasmuch as when a steam boiler explodes it is the engineer and not
the boiler that is held to blame, so Lionel must not be censured for
what was beyond his control.
Kate, with the supersentience of her sex, felt it coming before
Lionel had the least idea of it, and as she waited second by second
for the moment when her lover would press his lips passionately to
her wrist, all power to draw away left her. She felt his kisses on
her bare arm, up and up, and still she did not move, and when at last
his lips came to hers, and for a moment he held her unresisting in
his arms, Lionel had no disturbing delusion, as on a former occasion,
that Kate Clendennin had fainted.
When Kate, by the exercise of that mysterious power of unreasoning
possessed only by women, had made Lionel desperately ashamed of
having done just what she had wanted him to do, and when Lionel had
sufficiently humbled himself, she lifted him to a second best heaven
by allowing herself (much against her will) to be persuaded not to
renounce him forever. Then, discovering that the air was stifling in
the conservatory, she announced her intention of taking a walk. No!
On no account would she let Lionel accompany her. He might go
anywhere in the world except with her. She was going down by the
lake, and she wanted to be alone.
Lionel watched her dejectedly as she crossed the lawn and disappeared
through the firs. For ten minutes, fifteen minutes he waited, and
then, unable to endure it any longer, and choosing to brave her
displeasure rather than remain away from her another minute, Lionel
followed the path Kate had taken, and found her sitting in the summer
house at the end of the little rustic pier.
"I say, Kate," he plunged right in, "I can't stand this. I'll have
to clear out. I thought I could go through with it a week ago, but
it's too much for me. When I acted like a brute just now and--and
kissed you it was because I was such a beastly ass as to think a chap
like me could make you happy on nothing a year, love in a cottage and
all that. But that's what I'm going to do, Kate, only without the
love--just plain cottage."
"Yes?"
"The fact is," he floundered on, "I've begun to feel differently
about things, about money and all that. Old Baxter's right. Work is
the only thing, and--I've made up my mind I'm going to take up
farming. You know that place I told you of, Kate. I can get it for
next to nothing. It belongs to that uncle I told you about at
Wormwood Scrubbs--the disgustingly rich one--you know. You see I'm
his favorite nephew--I mean to say his only nephew--which comes to
the same thing, doesn't it? At all events he's my favorite uncle,
and he's bound to leave me his money sometime, as that's the only way
I could ever have enough to pay him back."
"Isn't he the aeroplane uncle?" asked Kate. Her voice sounded
listless, and her eyes were fixed on the further shore of the little
lake.
"That's the one. He goes in for biplanes. I had rather hoped he'd
get a monoplane--not that I bear the dear old chap any ill will,
don't you know." He paused and then went on more cheerfully: "But,
after all, an uncle is an uncle, isn't he, Kate?"
Lionel had a way of stating great truths that carried his hearers off
their feet.
"I believe he is, now that you speak of it," Kate assented. There
was a slight twinkle in her eye, but she looked away before Lionel
caught it, "What will you do on a farm?"
"Oh, I'm going in for vegetables, potatoes, you know, and all that
sort of thing. You get the names out of a catalogue. I'm told the
catalogues are free--that's one of the things that decided me--and
they contain photographs of all the vegetables--regular family album,
don't you know." Lionel laughed for the first time since his
downfall. "All you have to do is to compare the photographs with the
things, as soon as they come up, and that's how you know which is
which. It sounds hard, but really it's perfectly simple when you get
the hang of it."
"What if you failed to recognize a vegetable from its photograph?"
questioned Kate in a serious voice. "Photographs are sometimes very
flattering, you know, especially in catalogues. Suppose you mistook
a lettuce for a cabbage?"
"Ah, there you have me. I believe it's almost impossible to tell
them apart, that is, until they are ripe, but there's no use burning
your bridge--I mean spoiling your cabbage until you come to it--is
there, Kate? Of course," he continued, "I shall begin with potatoes.
I shall feel perfectly at home with a potato."
Kate turned her head away quickly.
"Did you see that swan?" she cried. "He turned a perfect somersault
in the water."
Lionel adjusted his monocle and stared at the unruffled surface of
the lake. "He must have dived and come up on the other side of the
island," he suggested.
"Please go on," she said. "What will be your attitude toward
a--toward a--po--po----" She was afraid to trust her voice.
"A potato? My dear girl, it's the simplest thing in the world. Once
plant the seeds and put the sticks in----"
"The sticks?" interrupted Kate.
Lionel permitted himself the smile of superior knowledge. "Of
course, for the little beggars to climb up. I say, Kate, didn't you
know that the potato is a creeper? Some of the catalogues call it a
vine, but that's confusing, because a vine, don't you know, bears
grapes, and a potato only bears potatoes. A chap might easily go
wrong on that, mightn't he? Gardening is full of pitfalls, but so is
every other profession when it comes to that, and I fancy I'll muddle
through somehow, and if I don't, well, there you are!"
Lionel leaned back in the rustic seat and blew out a triumphant cloud
of smoke. Kate watched him in silence.
Presently, in response to a pair of lifted eyebrows and an
outstretched palm, Lionel fumbled for his cigarette case. Kate
selected one, and, poising it delicately between her lips, tipped her
face toward his for a light. Lionel hastily removed his cigarette
and handed it to her. She took it silently, with a look that missed
its mark.
After lighting her cigarette the countess tossed Lionel's into the
lake with an exclamation that caused him to look round.
"How stupid of me!" she said. "Take mine."
He was feeling for the case. Kate wondered if he had heard. She
watched him with a curious expression as he took a fresh one, then as
he was feeling for a match she quickly leaned her face toward his,
steadying her cigarette with her slender fingers. There was no
evading it this time. To complicate matters, her hand shook ever so
slightly, but enough to necessitate Lionel's holding it close against
his.
"Thanks, awfully," said Lionel, puffing vigorously as he withdrew
from the danger zone.
Kate watched the struggling spark with a look of half-amused suspense.
"Thanks! I have it," he added, a moment later, as he leaned back and
exhaled an immense cloud of smoke.
Suddenly he jumped to his feet. "I must be getting back to my
'chores,' as old Baxter calls them."
Kate remained seated. "How soon do you go?" she asked in a tone of
elaborate unconcern, made perfect by the preoccupation of dusting an
imaginary cigarette ash from her knee.
"Go?" queried Lionel.
"To the farm?"
"Oh, yes, of course, the farm. I shall write to Uncle Cyril
to-night. By Jove, won't he be surprised to hear I'm going in for
farming and all that sort of thing? I'm afraid the old boy'll think
I'm pulling his leg, but I'm not, Kate, upon my word, I'm in dead
earnest. This working game has made another man of me. I never felt
fitter in my life. I feel better every way, physically and," he
hesitated, "yes, by Jove, morally." He paused breathless on this
pinnacle of thought.
"And how about me?" She had turned away and was looking out over the
lake, her chin resting on her hand. "I suppose you think it has made
no difference to me. You don't think I'm worth making over. If I
get up every morning at six and go to bed at nine, after working all
day in the kitchen, it's just a joke. And as for my morals--whatever
you mean by morals----"
Lionel had tried several times to get in a word, but Kate, never once
taking her eyes off the lake, had kept on in a low voice, as if no
one were there. It sounded to Lionel like some one talking in sleep.
Now, as she paused and turned toward him, he broke in.
"Kate!" he cried. "For God's sake don't talk like that. How can you
say those things? You know better. You know I don't mean that
you--that you----" he stopped for want of words and went on
disjointedly. "There's not another woman on earth to compare with
you--physically or morally or any other way. If I thought I was such
a beastly ass as not to think so I'd kick myself into that lake there
and lie down. The beastly lake isn't deep enough to drown standing
up in. There isn't another woman like you anywhere--I don't care who
she is. You're the best pal a chap ever had, and I'd back your say
so on a polo pony against anyone I know." He had reached another
thought pinnacle, and again he paused for breath.
Kate got up and came to him. "It's all right, Lionel. I know you
didn't mean to hurt me, but I want to tell you something. It has
made a difference to me--every way, just as it has to you,
Lionel--and I stand for every word Cousin Hiram said--I didn't at the
time, I admit." She smiled at the recollection. "A week ago
yesterday I went up to my room and packed my boxes, all by myself,
too. I just threw things in anyhow, higglety pigglety. You never
saw such a job as I made of it."
"By Jove!" exclaimed Lionel. "I did the same identical thing."
"I made up my mind," continued Kate, "I would go right out of that
house and never come back."
"So did I," said Lionel; "upon my word I did. I say, Kate," he went
on, "what made you change your mind?"
"The best reason in the world. I didn't know where to go."
"No more did I," admitted Lionel.
They both laughed, and the countess went on in a serious tone.
"I've learned a lot of things this last week, Lionel," she said, "and
I didn't get them all out of Mrs. Beeton's Family Cookery Book. One
is that the best imitation of happiness consists in----"
"Oh, come, I say," interrupted Lionel.
"In self-forgetfulness," continued Kate. "And the best receipt for
forgetfulness is good, hard work."
Lionel gave her a stare of glassy bewilderment. "I may be a silly
ass, I've been told so often enough by chaps who ought to know, but
I'm dashed if I see what you want with imitation happiness. There's
no imitation about you, Kate." He looked down. There was something
he had to say and every meeting of their eyes made it harder.
"Either you'll be happy or you won't be happy," he went on.
"Whichever it is, it won't be an imitation. It will be the real
thing and I hope--I hope----" He took a long breath, as if to pull
himself together, and hurried on, still without looking at her. "It
may sound a bit thick from a chap feeling the way I do, but I mean
it, upon my word, I do. I hope you'll be happy, Kate, I hope to God
he'll make you happy."
The countess was leaning back against the rustic doorway and her two
bare arms made a glowing worshipful "V" as they flowed downward, with
the gentle undulation of her body, to the slender link of her
drooping hands.
On the third finger of her left hand Lionel now saw for the first
time, what at first he took for a plain gold ring, but a second look
discovered a widening at one side that betrayed a setting of some
sort turned inward for concealment. As he looked up, Lionel knew by
the quick tightening of her mouth that Kate had been smiling, yet, in
her eyes, there was something very far from laughter.
"Why didn't you tell me, Kate?"
She put her hands behind her.
"Tell you what?"
"That it was all settled--your engagement, I mean."
"My engagement? But I'm not engaged--that is, I mean I haven't
accepted him."
"You haven't accepted him?"
There was a tremendous knocking of Hope at the door of Lionel's heart.
"Not yet," she answered. "It is ten days since he asked me and I
have given him no answer."
Lionel stared at her in blank amazement. Ten days ago! That was the
day when he had met Kate on the golf course and had held her in his
arms and thought she had fainted.
"That day? Kate, you don't mean it? You can't mean--do you know
what day that was?"
Suddenly she caught both of his hands in hers. "Yes, of course I
know, Lionel. It was there on the golf links--under the chestnut
tree--in the dark--that he asked me to marry him--the man I love
and--and I'm waiting to answer him here--now--this very minute! Now
do you understand?"
For a moment Lionel was quite dazed. It was as if he had bumped his
head against a rainbow.
"I say, Kate," he faltered, "this isn't a joke, is it? Do you know
what you're saying? Are you going to be my wife?"
Kate pulled the ring off her third finger, the one and only ring she
had on, and placed it on Lionel's little finger. It was a signet
ring with a small engraved seal of chrysophrase.
"It belonged to my grandmother, dear! Look," she said, pointing to
the pale green stone. And there, cut in minute script were the
words, "_Qui me négligé, me perde_."