A WANDERING STAR.
In that tall square block of buildings known as Vernon-chambers,
Piccadilly, a London bachelor must be fastidious indeed if he cannot,
no matter what his tastes may be, find a residence to suit him.
There are suites of rooms, easy of access and commanding enormous
rents, and there are single apartments, so loftily situate that they
look down upon Buckingham Palace in the distance, which, can be had
for a small sum--that is to say, a comparatively small sum when the
situation and accommodation are taken into consideration.
The advantages of a residence in Vernon-chambers are great and
manifold. It is a great thing for a young man new to the metropolis,
and just commencing his career in diplomacy, law, or commerce--for
commerce has been found to pay, and is now quite as fashionable as any
of the learned professions--to be enabled to put 'Vernon-chambers'
on his card, it being a recognised address amongst those
dinner-and-ball-giving members of society, the cultivation of whose
good will is so necessary to the well-being of all young men.
Then, again, it is in the most desirable quarter of the town; handy to
the clubs and to the park; within a shilling fare of all the theatres;
and yet providing its inhabitants--those who dwell in the topmost
stories at all events--with plenty of fresh air; and the pleasant
expanse of the Green-park to look upon, instead of the dismal line of
brick or stucco abomination on which most Londoners are compelled to
feast their eyes when they come to the window in ungratified search
for light and air.
It is probable, however, that none of these considerations figured as
inducements in the mind of Mr. Bryan Duval, when, some three years
before the period of our story, he took a set of rooms on the second
floor, and agreed, without hesitation or attempt at abatement, to pay
for them the rather stiff price of three hundred a year.
Mr. Duval did not go much into fashionable society; but at such great
houses as he was in the habit of frequenting in the season he would
have been as welcome if he lived in Greek-street, Soho--a choice
locality, in which, indeed, at some anterior period of his life, he
had once pitched his tent. He was not a member of any club, and he
would as soon have thought of going into the Thames as into the park;
he hated fresh air (his first order in connection with his new rooms
was to have double windows made to exclude the noise), and, if he
occasionally looked out on the Green-park, it was not with any idea of
pleasing his eyes with its verdure, or amusing himself with
contemplating what was going on there, but rather in a fit of
abstraction, when he had got into what he had called 'a knot' in the
work on which he was engaged, and during the disentanglement of which
he would, perhaps, lean his forehead against the window, and stare
straight out before him, with a prolonged gaze, which saw nothing.
It was not to be imagined, however, that Mr. Duval had selected this
residence haphazard; he had a motive for everything he did; and, when
it suited him, was ready to explain it in the most candid manner.
'I took these rooms,' he would say to any inquiring friend, 'and
I pay about twice what they are really worth, because I wanted
them. My business lies sometimes in Bayswater, and sometimes in
Basinghall-street'--he would smile grimly as he pronounced the last
name--'and I want to be right in the centre, "the hub of the wheel,"
as they say in America, whence I can fly out east or west with equal
ease. Then again, of late years, a certain number of swells, not being
able to spend their money quickly enough on the turf, have chosen to
mix themselves up with my profession, and this is a handy kind of
place to come and see me at when they want. I have not any feeling for
them but one of intense contempt; but that, of course, I keep to
myself. Out of them I get a certain portion of my bread-and-cheese,
and so I treat them civilly enough, never rubbing them the wrong way,
never bowing down and worshipping them. Then, again, I want large
rooms, for there are books and papers, and files of playbills, and all
sorts of things knocking about; and there is a little slip of a room
out there--the warm-bath, I call it--where my secretary works; and
altogether the crib suits me, and is not so bad.'
'The crib,' as Mr. Duval called it in his pleasant _argot_, was
furnished and fitted with such good taste that it might have puzzled
an ingenious Sybarite to suggest an improvement in it.
It has been said that the arrangement of a room often furnishes an
index to the owner's mind; and if there be truth in the dictum, Mr.
Bryan Duval must be a singular compound of many apparently
antagonistic qualities.
The broad, cosy-cushioned, spring-seated ottoman, or divan, in green
and gold, which ran the whole length of one side of the room, was
counter-balanced by three or four grave, high-backed, Puritan-looking
chairs, in the darkest of brown leather; a huge, massive black oak
writing-table, littered all over with papers, proof-sheets, and bills,
had its pendant in an elegant sandalwood davenport, inlaid with
mosaic, on which lay a green velvet blotting-book, with raised crest
and monogram. The wall opposite to the ottoman was taken up by a large
black oak bookcase, and among the treasures which filled it, and
overflowed on to the floor, were rare elzevirs in creamy vellum
covers, British classics in stout old leather jackets, a splendid
edition of French plays--ancient and modern--rare works on costume
splendidly illustrated, novels of the day, blue-books, political
pamphlets, two or three thick rolls of Irish ballads bought in Dublin
streets, French pasquinades, and comic songsters. A great roaring
double breechloader, by Lancaster, hung close over the head of an
ancient arquebuse, the stock of which was elegantly inlaid with pearl
and ivory, and on the writing-table a gold-hilted dagger--said to
have been worn by Henry of Navarre--lay side by side with a very
vicious-looking six-shooter, with an inscription on its barrel: 'Jacob
F. Bodges and Co., Danville, Pa.'
Nor was the room without examples of art; a wonderfully executed copy
of Greuze's 'La Cruche Cassée' hung in the place of honour, proof
engravings after Sir Joshua Reynolds and Landseer occupied every
available space on the walls, and in a recess, half shaded by
deep-green velvet curtains, was a marvellous Venus, by Pradier. But,
_en revanche_, the mantelpiece was studded with Danton's comic
caricatures of celebrities, and on the wall, suspended by the
frame of Sir Joshua's 'Strawberry Girl,' which overlapped it, was a
flaring-coloured lithograph of Pat Hamilton, in his favourite
character of Bryan Boroo, with on it a memorandum, in Mr. Duval's own
hand: 'Wants situation in third act altered; address Wolverhampton
till 29th.'
On a fine morning in early spring the occupant of these rooms stood
with his back to the fireplace, where--for the cold winds had not yet
abated--some logs were burning on the iron dogs, with an open letter
in his hand.
Mr. Bryan Duval was a man of middle size, with small, clear-cut,
regular features, and large, dark, melancholy eyes; his soft dark hair
was parted in the middle, and taken back behind his ears; his
moustaches and imperial were long, and carefully trained--there were
times when the exigencies of his profession required that these
luxurious appendages should be shaved off, and then, though he was
far too conscientious in his art not to sacrifice to it his personal
vanity, Mr. Duval mourned and refused to be comforted.
He was gorgeously dressed in a loose jacket and trousers of violet
velvet, his small shirt collar, turned down over the deep crimson
necktie, was clasped at his throat with a diamond stud, and on the
little finger of his small white right hand he wore a massive gold
signet ring, engraved with a viscount's coronet of the Duvals, of
which great family he always stated his father was a scion.
As Mr. Duval read the letter attentively, which was stamped with a
coronet and a large initial L, he brushed away with his hand the
wreaths of blue smoke from his cigar, which interfered with its proper
perusal, and shook his head slowly.
'It won't do, my dear Laxington,' he muttered, half aloud; 'it really
cannot be thought of. It is all very well for you to say that you will
stand the racket, that I shall not be liable for a penny, and shall
only have to give my name; but you don't appear to understand that
that is the exact commodity which is more valuable to me than anything
else! It is solely on the strength of my name that I hold my position.
I cannot afford to be connected with failure, and failure--and dead
failure--it undoubtedly will be, if your lordship proposes to take the
Pomona, in order that little Patty Calvert may play leading parts!
What a wonderful thing it is,' continued Mr. Duval, throwing down the
letter, and plunging his hands into his trousers pockets, 'to see a
man in Laxington's position so eager for such an affair as this! I
don't think, if I had been born a peer of the realm, with a couple of
hundred thousand a year, and vast family estates, that I should have
cared to go into management. I imagine I could have filled up my time
in a better way than that, and made a good thing of it too. Good
heavens, what a taste! To smell gas and orange-peel, to be pushed
about by carpenters and supers, to be estimated a nincompoop, and to
have to pay a couple of hundred a week for the pleasure! Let me see,'
he continued, taking up the letter, '"clear half the receipts, no
risk, only give your name. Think of it, and let me know. Yours
sincerely, Laxington." No, I think not. Very affectionate, but it
won't do. There is no part in any piece of mine which little Patty
could attempt to touch, and I have no time to write one for her; so we
shall have to fall back upon burlesques and breakdowns and Amazons in
their war paint, and that kind of thing, which would not suit my book
at all. Besides, that little door, just by the opposite prompt private
box, going between the house and the stage, would be always on the
swing, and we should have H.R.H.'s and foreign ambassadors, and Tommy
This of the Life Guards, and Billy That of the Garrick Club, always
tumbling about behind the scenes. I don't think I would entertain it
if I were free; but with this American business on hand, it is not
worth thinking of a second time, and so I will tell L. at once.'
He touched a handbell as he spoke, and a gray-haired keen-looking man
presented himself at the door.
'Good-morning, Mr. Marks,' said Duval. 'Come in, pray. You have
brought your usual budget with you, I perceive,' pointing to a bundle
of letters which the secretary held in his hand; 'anything of
importance?'
'No, sir,' replied Mr. Marks, 'not of any particular importance.
Price, the manager of the Alexandria at Ruabon, offers ten shillings a
night for the _Cruiskeen Lawn_ for a week certain.'
'Does he!' interposed Mr. Duval, smiling and showing all his white
teeth; 'and he has the impudence to call himself "Price." Of course,
no!'
'I have written so, sir,' said Mr. Marks. 'They want the music for
_Anne of Austria_ at Durham, and the plot of the scenery for _Varco
the Vampire_ at Swansea. I have sent the usual note to the Sunday
papers announcing that _Pickwick's Progress_ will be put into
rehearsal at the Gravity on Monday. By the way, sir, will you allow me
to suggest that that name has been used before?'
'What name, my dear Mr. Marks?' said Bryan Duval, looking up with an
affectation of the greatest innocence.
'Pickwick, sir,' said Mr. Marks; 'Mr. Dickens has a work in which that
name occurs.'
'Ah,' said Mr. Duval, stroking his silky moustache, 'by the way, now
you mention it, I think he has--curious that that idea did not occur
to me before. However, this is _Pickwick's Progress_, and I don't
think Mr. Dickens or Mr. Anybodyelse has ever had anything of that
sort; at all events, I am clear they can say nothing about
infringement of copyright, so we will hold to _Pickwick's Progress_,
Mr. Marks. Anything else?'
'A newspaper, sir, from Melbourne, evidently sent by Mr. Prodder.'
'Prodder,' repeated Mr. Duval, closing his eyes; 'ah, I remember--the
stage-struck pork-butcher. Yes, and what of Prodder?'
'He seems to have made a great success with Romeo, sir; the paper says
he quite hit the taste of the Melbourne audience.'
'Ah, that is not very complimentary to the Melbourne audience, is it,
Marks? However, anything more?'
'Yes, sir, a letter from Mr. Van Buren, acknowledging the receipt of
your signed copy of the engagement, saying he will take your rooms at
the Hoffman House, and either he or Mr. Jacobs will be at the Cunard
wharf when the Cuba comes in.'
'Good,' said Bryan Duval, slowly rubbing his hands together. 'Van
Buren is a man of business. That engagement is going to turn up
trumps, Marks, and my old friends, the Yankees, are going to do me
another good turn. By the way, any reply from Miss Montressor?'
'Yes, sir,' said Mr. Marks, 'this,' touching a small pink note. 'She
will be here at eleven, precisely.'
'That with a woman means half-past twelve,' said Duval, nodding his
head. 'All right. Now be good enough to write a letter for my
signature in reply to this from Lord Laxington--polite, of course, but
giving no loophole, saying that I should have been delighted, &c., but
that I have made other arrangements which prevent the possibility--you
understand. You may mention that I am going to America--no, on second
thoughts we must let the newspapers have that information first; they
would be wild if it leaked out through private sources.'
Mr. Marks bowed and retired to the warm-bath, Bryan Duval lit another
cigar, threw himself on the divan, and taking out a small gilt-edged
memorandum-book, began looking through its leaves, and scratching a
few figures upon them. 'That's it,' he said to himself after a pause.
'I have three hundred and eighty pounds in the bank now. _Pickwick's
Progress_, if it makes anything like a hit, will probably be good for
thirty pounds a night--let's say sixty; then before I sail, the
returns from the provinces for _Anne of Austria, Varco the Vampire_,
and the _Cruiskeen Lawn_--the idea of that fellow wanting it for ten
shillings a night--ought to bring me eighty pounds--eighty! O,
more--let's say two hundred and eighty. I should think that that must
be something like a thousand pounds that I ought to take away with me.
Then Van Buren's Varieties holds three thousand people at a dollar
each--three thousand dollars are six hundred pounds--but the exchange
will probably have risen by the time I get there--let us call it
eight hundred. It costs them to pull up the curtain two hundred
dollars a night. I will make an alteration there, however--great
reduction--let's call it seventy dollars. Seventy as against three
thousand--let me see,' said Bryan Duval, slowly pulling at his
imperial, 'I think I must bring back to England in three months' time
at least ten or twelve thousand pounds--'
His calculations were cut short by a whistle from a mouth-piece in the
wall, to which he applied his ear; immediately answering with the
words: 'Show her up.' 'Miss Montressor below, eh?' he muttered,
repeating the information which had been given him through the pipe.
'Now, I think I have got a card in Miss Montressor, if I only handle
her rightly.'
He opened a door of communication with his dressing-room, disappeared
for a moment, and returned with his hair fresh brushed, and a scented
handkerchief peeping out of his jacket pocket. Then he stepped on to
the staircase, and, as Miss Montressor reached the landing, he took
her by both hands and led her into the room.
Miss Clara Montressor was a woman of about six-and-twenty, not tall,
but what Mr. Duval called 'a good stage height,' not stout, but well
developed. Her features were anything but faultless, yet her face, as
a whole, was very pretty, and her expression quite charming. She had
long lustrous eyes, which, whether they were green or gray, no one had
ever been able to determine. Lord Alicampayne of the Life Guards said
they were 'bwight blue,' but Miss Theresa Colombo of the T.R.D.L.,
whose salary was two pounds a week less than Miss Montressor's, and
who did not get half so many bouquets, said they were 'cat's eyes.'
Her nose was a little retroussé, but she had rich pouting lips, sound
small white teeth, and her complexion was such as you only see on a
peach, or on a lady who uses _Poudre à la Bismuth, dite Veloutine_.
Her hair, which was one of her chief attractions, was gold-brown, and
she had had the sense not to attempt to change its colour. Altogether,
Miss Montressor was a very nice-looking person, and very becomingly
dressed.
So Mr. Bryan Duval thought, as he seated her on the divan and took up
his position in one of the high-backed armchairs in front of her. Mr.
Duval's thoughts about his present visitor, and indeed about most
ladies, were wholly professional--his time was too valuable to be
taken up with flirtation, and he had a free and-easy manner with him
which, while it was very agreeable, obviously meant nothing.
'It was very good of you to come here this morning, Miss Montressor,'
he commenced, sitting back and waving his scented pocket-handkerchief
gently in the air--it was excellent Ess. Bouquet, and he knew that
Patchouli and Jockey Club were about Miss Montressor's mark.
'It was very good of you to send for me, Mr. Duval,' said Miss
Montressor, without the slightest embarrassment, 'and I was very glad
to come--putting aside any question of business--I was anxious to see
what you were like without any make-up.'
'Well,' said Duval, jumping up from his seat and striking an attitude,
'and how do you find me?'
'O, exactly the same,' replied the visitor; 'there is no mistaking
those raven locks and those spikes,' drawing her finger across her
upper lip. 'You are not like old Franklin, who is quite black, or
rather quite blue, at night, and a lively piebald--like a horse in a
circus--when he comes to rehearsal in the morning. O, it must be
delightful to be made love to by you, more especially after a
fortnight's Juliet to Hedger's Romeo, and Mr. Hedger always will take
his supper between the acts, and he is so partial to spring onions.'
'Horrible Hedger!' cried Duval, throwing up his hands; 'my taste in
that line, my dear, don't go beyond the slightest _soupçon_ of garlic,
and I religiously deny myself that when I am acting. One great fault
of our English actors is that they know nothing of the delicacies of
the _cuisine_.'
'O, but you do, and you are yourself a most wonderful cook. I know all
about that,' she cried, clapping her hands. 'I heard it from a Mr.
Foster, an American gentleman whom I was introduced to the other day,
and who knew you when you first went out to New York.'
'Ah, by the way, I had a letter from Foster last night. He told me he
had met you, and sent you a rather jolly message, which I will deliver
to you later on.'
'Why not now?'
'Pleasure after business, my dear. I never do anything until the
business which I am transacting is out of hand. By the way, will you
have a glass of sherry? You can sip that and talk business at the same
time.'
'I think I will, please,' said Miss Montressor simply; 'and is there a
biscuit anywhere about? I am awful hungry.'
'Awfully hungry, my dear Clara,' said Bryan Duval, touching her
arm lightly with his finger; 'awfully, not awful--adverb, not
adjective--don't mind my telling you, do you, dear? These little
slips, you know, are awkward in public. A biscuit? Hundreds!
thousands! and something better than a biscuit--look here!'
He darted into the ante-room and speedily returned with a silver
waiter, covered with a white cloth, which he placed before her.
'Plovers' eggs, my dear Clara,' he cried, handing her a plate;
'shilling apiece in Covent-garden. I tell you the price, not to stint
you, but to tickle your appetite--Vienna bread from Popowaski's, the
man in the Quadrant; country butter just out of the refrigerator;
Oloroso sherry, and a bottle of Brighton seltzer. One, two, three, and
you're off.'
'What a ridiculous fellow you are!' said Miss Montressor, with a
plover's egg between her pretty, jewel-laden fingers. 'I have always
thought of you as a suffering lover, the fiery Raoul, the heart-broken
Edgar, but here, at home, you are as jolly as a sandboy.'
'That's because I have to be so uniformly miserable on the stage, my
dear,' said Mr. Duval, taking some choice loose tobacco out of the
drawer, and rolling up a _papelito_, 'and one cannot be always doing
the water-cart business. Are the plovers' eggs good?'
'Divine.'
'And the Oloroso?'
'Delicious--quite a nutty flavour.'
'O, don't,' cried Bryan Duval, putting up his hand, 'that is out of
the advertisement of the Standard Sherry. However, I am glad you like
it; and now to business. You have considered my proposition?'
'I have.'
'And you agree to it?'
'Provided the terms suit me; you were to mention them at this
meeting.'
'Wisest of females,' said Bryan, puffing a cloud of blue smoke through
his nose, and watching it waft away, 'so I was! I don't think there
will be any difficulty about them--sixty pounds a week, and half a
clear benefit in every town where we stop a fortnight.'
Miss Montressor threw her egg-shell into the plate, wiped her dainty
fingers on the napkin, and said, in a deep tragic voice:
'Selim, take me. I am yours!'
'Here,' cried Bryan Duval, in very deep chest notes, 'here and
hereafter--ha! ha! cue for prompter to ring for trap. Then we may look
upon that as settled.'
'That's so, colonel,' said Miss Montressor, with a slight nasal
intonation; 'they are all colonels out there, are they not?'
'There is my hand upon it--tip us your flipper,' cried Bryan Duval;
and after shaking hands with his visitor, he hitched up his trousers
and danced a few steps of the hornpipe round the room. 'Marks shall
draw up the agreement, and we will have it properly signed and sealed.
I will let you know the date of sailing, but you had better get ready
at once. O, by the way, Foster's message.'
'O yes! what was it?' cried Miss Montressor eagerly.
'Foster is one of those Americans who, when they crawl out of the
commercial shell in which they are engaged all day, find no such
pleasure, no such thorough change, as the theatre affords them. He is
over here on commercial matters, but he is mad about theatricals; and
he is going to give a dinner at Richmond on Sunday, and he wants you
to go.'
Miss Montressor hesitated for a moment. She had certain relations, of
which no one but herself and those in her immediate household were
aware, and she wondered whether these 'relations' would prove a
hindrance to her accepting the invitation.
Bryan Duval saw the look in her face, and had a vague idea of what she
was pondering over--vague, but still an idea--he had known so many
Miss Montressors in his life.
'Don't hesitate,' he said; 'don't make any mistake about it;
it is going to be a tremendously jolly party; lots of people you
know--fellows in the Guards, and fellows on the press, and a good
dinner, and no end of fun. Say "yes."'
'I will,' said Miss Montressor. 'You can tell Mr. Foster I shall be
delighted to come.'
'Right,' said Bryan Duval. 'Then I will drive you down. I will tool my
chestnuts up to the villa at four P.M. precisely.'
Miss Montressor stepped into her neat little brougham in a very
complacent state of mind. She had long wished to be a star, but her
chances in this hemisphere had not been great. Here was a fulfilled
ambition, accompanied, indeed, with certain difficulties, which,
however, the lady felt disposed to treat philosophically as mere
points of detail. She had time to make up her mind as to her mode of
action on a certain complex line very near her hand before the
brougham stopped at the unpretending entrance to her very pretty abode
at Brompton. She rather expected to find Mr. Dolby waiting for her,
and her first question to her maid was whether he had yet arrived.
The answer was in the affirmative, so she went straight into the
drawing-room, where she found Mr. Dolby occupied in patiently
examining the contents of a photograph-book, with which he had been
long familiar. Miss Montressor skilfully assumed a tone, not only of
satisfaction, but of girlish elation, as she ran forward, exclaiming:
'Isn't it delightful? It's all settled!'
Mr. Dolby closed the photograph-book, replaced it on the table, and
looked up at her. There was no elation nor delight in his countenance
as he said: 'Are you alluding to the engagement?'
'Of course I am. What else do you suppose I was talking about?'
'I did not presume to guess. You are extravagantly delighted or
inconceivably distressed, in the wildest spirits or in the depths of
despair, so frequently, for causes which my incomplete male
understanding is incapable of discerning, that I did not know whether
it might be a question of a new trimming, or an exchange of dogs
between you and Miss Campbell, which had produced that very becoming
animation to which you have not treated me lately.'
'O,' said Miss Montressor, 'you are out of temper. You were yesterday,
you know, and you have not got over it. How I hate men who keep up
spite! I have a great mind not to tell you anything that has occurred
to-day.'
'I should be aghast at the threat if I did not know by experience that
you are what you call "dying to tell me;" whereas I am quite willing
to hear, and I can therefore wait,' said Mr. Dolby.
All this was rather trying, and calculated to damp the high spirits
with which Miss Montressor had returned; but she was accustomed to the
acerbity of Mr. Dolby's humour, and she made light of it. 'What an
unpleasant man he would be as a husband!' she often thought in her odd
frank way. 'I would not be his wife for any consideration; he would
bully any one he could not get away from awfully.'
This familiar reflection passed through her mind on the present
occasion; but it did not impair the cheerfulness of her countenance,
or the glee in her voice, as she proceeded in a rather chattering
style to repeat to Mr. Dolby the particulars of her interview with
Bryan Duval, and to dilate upon the thorough appreciation of her gifts
and powers which that prince of dramatists, actors, and good fellows
had displayed. 'So encouraging,' she said, 'and so delightful, to find
a person really above the jealousy which had hitherto led to her being
so unjustly treated.'
After all, the faculty for discovering and utilising the powers of
others to hit the public taste was the great secret of the great
actor.
Miss Montressor did not know whether Bryan Duval had been quite so
judicious and wise in the selection of certain other members of the
company whom he proposed to take with him; she had her doubts on that
point; but one must only work with the materials one has at hand. His
fair Clara, in the character of critic and practical philosopher,
afforded Mr. Dolby not a little amusement; and as he was not easily or
often amused, he encouraged her to talk much more than usual. Mr.
Dolby was not very communicative, nor did he, as a rule, like much
talking--a defect in his disposition by no means agreeable to Miss
Montressor's taste. He was rather given to absence of mind, and that
is a tendency much disliked and resented by women, not unnaturally.
Sometimes Mr. Dolby would fall into fits of musing, under whose
influence he would rise and pace the room slowly to and fro, to and
fro, with an utter abstraction in his face, which told Miss Montressor
that his mind was far away, and that she was utterly banished from it,
that she had no place at all, not even as a speck on the horizon, in
his mental vision.
During these fits of abstraction he did not talk to himself aloud,
indeed, but his lips moved; and his knitted brows, and the inward look
of his eyes, were plain indications that he was not merely absent in
the direct sense of idle purposeless reverie, but that some subject of
deep, concentrated, and all-absorbing interest was occupying all the
approaches to the citadel of thought.
Miss Montressor regarded this kind of thing as tiresome, a bore, and a
mistake, a serious drawback to Mr. Dolby's excellence as a companion;
but it inspired her with no further feeling, it wakened no curiosity.
Business was almost as occult a phrase for Miss Montressor as it was
for Helen Griswold, and she invariably concluded either that something
had gone wrong in business or that Mr. Dolby was meditating some coup
in business when he forgot to listen to her, left off talking to her,
and walked up and down her pretty drawing-room, touching the chairs
and tables unconsciously as he passed them with his finger tips, as
she remembered having heard some one say Dr. Johnson used to touch the
posts in Fleet-street.
Miss Montressor would have been seriously annoyed, however, if Mr.
Dolby had gone off into one of his fits of absence on the present
occasion. Her own business was in the wind now, and she considered it
worthy of his undivided attention. He did not try her patience on this
point; he listened with genuine interest, which received a quite
perceptible stimulus when Miss Montressor mentioned that all the
arrangements and preparations were being greatly assisted and
facilitated by her American friend, Mr. Foster.
'Foster!' said Mr. Dolby, stooping to pick up his paper-knife; 'the
New York man, I suppose?'
'Yes, I think so; a very pleasant agreeable man, and very fond of
theatricals. He saw Bryan Duval years ago in New York, and called on
him as soon as he came to London. He gave me a delightful sketch of
the reception we are certain to meet with, and has promised us private
introductions to no end.'
'Foster I' repeated Mr. Dolby, in a pondering tone. 'I don't think I
know any one of the name--it is not common among us. What sort of
looking man is he?'
'Decidedly good-looking--more like an Englishman than an American, I
fancy, according to our notions of what you call the "American type."'
Mr. Dolby laughed. 'Don't talk stuff about the American type, my
child; there is no such thing. There are scores of types among us, the
most cosmopolitan and practical nation in the world. I now remember
exactly what you mean by Mr. Foster's being more like an Englishman
than an American. You mean that he looks healthy, cheery, and as if
neither his sleep nor his digestion was ever troubled by overwork and
anxiety. This is one of the favourite delusions of superficial writers
and random talkers. Nothing has struck me, since I have been in
London, more forcibly than the absence of the so-called English type
among Englishmen. The rosy complexions, the stalwart forms, the
unembarrassed open countenances, are just as scarce in London city as
in New York; everybody looks anxious, it seems to me, and most people
look tired. What is Foster?'
He asked the question with a strange suddenness. One would have
thought by his manner he had forgotten Miss Montressor's mention of
her friend in the discussion of the abstract question; but he had not.
'What is he? I don't know; I did not hear; but I presume he is over
here on business of some kind. O, yes, by the bye, he must be, for
Bryan Duval told me Mr. Foster had come against his will, and wants to
get back. That doesn't look like pleasure, does it?'
'Not particularly. However, Mr. Foster is no concern of mine, only
your meeting any New York man reminds me to impress upon you that you
must not talk about me. Are you attending to me, Clara?'
'O, yes, I am attending to you; and I am sure you need not be afraid
of my telling anything you don't want to have known. I have kept you
dark everywhere, and it is rather dull, I can tell you.'
'Rather dull, is it?' said Mr. Dolby, with a smile. 'You would like a
little more dash about our cosy little arrangements, wouldn't you? You
would like me to do the dinner-at-Richmond and drag-to-races business.
Mr. Foster has been putting that into your head. No, no, my dear, that
is not my line at all; and you must take me as I am, you know. You are
going to star it besides, and you will have plenty of fun and frolic
when away from me; and I am all alone by myself in this big place.'
Miss Montressor gave her head a toss, half disdainful, half
incredulous. She remembered the ease with which Mr. Dolby had made her
acquaintance, and she believed in his constancy as little as she
valued it.
'I shall not inquire too minutely into your sources of consolation,'
she said; 'and if I were discontented with the present state of
things, you may be quite certain that I should let you know it. It is
only men's wives, remember, who have to put up with the style of life
they don't like, because their husbands do like it; as for us, _Vive
la liberté!'_
'By all means,' said Mr. Dolby. 'I echo the sentiment which you have
declaimed so prettily.'
She had advanced her right foot, tossed her arm over her upreared
head, and made believe to wave a flag with a gesture full of spirit.
She often produced effects in private life of which her stage
performances fell very far short.
'And since you have mentioned dinners at Richmond,' said Miss
Montressor, with characteristic inconsequence, 'I may as well tell you
at first as last that I am going to dine at Richmond with Duval and
the whole lot. It is Mr. Foster's dinner, and he has sent me an invite
through Duval, so I said I should be delighted. Duval drives me
down--he is to call for me at four.'
She spoke with considerable volubility, which Mr. Dolby correctly
interpreted.
'All right,' he replied; 'have we not just agreed _Vive la liberté?_
and especially the _liberté_ which brings such pleasant things in its
train by its prolonged life. I am particularly grateful to my
hospitable compatriot with a taste for theatricals, for I am obliged
to go to Brighton to-morrow, and I shall not get back until Monday
morning.'
'I was just about to tell you I should not see you again till then, so
it all happens most conveniently. He doesn't like it a bit,' thought
Miss Montressor, 'but he carries it off pretty well--rather a clever
invention, that Brighton business; but it doesn't impose on me.' She
remarked aloud simultaneously, with great good humour, 'This is really
fortunate, as it turns out; but you might have come, you know, if you
hadn't any objection to meeting Mr. Foster--Bryan Duval would have got
an invite for you directly.'
'Thanks,' said Mr. Dolby, with perfect gravity; 'such a kindness would
have been invaluable under other circumstances; but, as you have just
said, I have no fancy for meeting Mr. Foster.'
'That is lucky,' thought Miss Montressor, as Mr. Dolby bade her adieu,
'for I have.'