THE LADY OF THE BLUE DRESS
Miss Mason was sitting in the lounge of the Wilton Hotel. Mr.
Davis--the lawyer--had given her the name of this hotel, telling her
that it was both quiet and comfortable.
A tiny cloud had arisen in Miss Mason's mind. It partially eclipsed the
sunshine of her morning mood. She knew vaguely what had caused it.
She had changed her dress on her arrival, donning a black satin gown
made in precisely the same style as the cashmere. A lace collar took
the place of the linen one. A cameo brooch, large, and set in gold as
massive as her watch, superseded the black bow. Miss Mason never wore
jewellery except in the evening.
She had dined excellently at a small table in a room adorned with
water-colour drawings. Between the courses she had found herself
admiring them. She was so intent on them that at first she did not
notice the covert smiles which two girls were directing towards her
table. When she did, the smiles began to make her feel uncomfortable.
At first she wondered if her cap were crooked, or her brooch unpinned,
but gradually it dawned on her that it was just she herself who was
affording them amusement.
Miss Mason had finished the last morsels of her gooseberry tart
hurriedly, had swallowed her glass of light wine, and gone out into the
lounge. She told herself that she was an old fool to worry over the
little incident, but it had caused a vague anxiety in her mind.
She took up a number of the "Graphic" and began turning the pages.
The style of the advertisements displayed within its covers had made
her previously imagine the periodical to be exclusively intended for
feminine perusal. She had been slightly alarmed before dinner to see
a stout elderly gentleman studying it profoundly. A momentary idea
took possession of her as to whether it was not her duty to go up to
him and warn him regarding the nature of some of the contents, but as
she saw it was the middle of the book he was studying, she concluded
that someone had already given him a delicate hint regarding the
advertisement pages. All the same, she could not imagine the editor of
the paper to be a modest man.
One or two people had come into the lounge for coffee after dinner, but
they had left it again, and, at the moment, it was deserted save for
Miss Mason and one other woman.
There was something about the woman that attracted her attention.
It was not merely her beauty, but something in the graceful way in
which she was sitting in her chair, and in her manner of speaking to
the waiter who brought her coffee. Miss Mason found herself watching
her. She liked the ivory whiteness of her skin, the vivid red-brown of
her hair, and the expression in her eyes. Her dress, too, which was a
curious deep blue, pleased her immensely.
Suddenly the woman looked up. She saw Miss Mason's eyes fixed on her,
and she smiled. There was something so frank and spontaneous about the
smile that Miss Mason found herself smiling too.
"We have the place to ourselves," said the woman. "Every one else has
departed for different theatres. I should have gone myself if I hadn't
an appointment with a friend of mine."
"Never been to a theatre in my life," said Miss Mason. "Lack of
opportunity, not prejudice."
"If you really care to have the opportunity it is certain to present
itself sooner or later," replied the woman calmly. "It's only a
question of the intensity of wishing."
Miss Mason leant a little forward.
"Doesn't the opportunity sometimes arrive too late?"
The question was put almost involuntarily. It was one she had been
asking herself for the last three-quarters of an hour--ever since her
somewhat hurried exit from the dining-room; and the question did not
refer merely to the opportunity of visiting the theatre. The woman
understood.
"That raises rather a fine point of question," she replied. "Can it
be fairly said that one has been given the opportunity if it is truly
impossible to accept it, which I imagine 'too late' would signify?"
Miss Mason did not reply at once. She wanted to tell this woman about
the little cloud which had covered the brightness of her sun, the
insidious little doubt which had crept into her mind. Yet she hardly
knew how to begin.
The woman waited. She was one of those to whom confidences are given.
If she had said anything at that moment the sentence Miss Mason was
slowly preparing in her mind would never have reached her lips. It came
suddenly and jerkily, it was spoken, too, almost below Miss Mason's
breath.
"Isn't one ever too old? Have waited a long time for the chance of
happiness. Got it now. But perhaps I am too old." A slow painful flush
had mounted in Miss Mason's face with the words.
The younger woman turned quickly towards her.
"Too old for happiness!" she cried, with a little laugh. "Never! If
happiness has come to you, welcome her with both hands; and with every
kiss she gives you years will roll away from your heart. Happiness is
like the spring, which wakes the world to brightness after a dreary
winter."
Miss Mason gave a little choke.
"Felt like that myself in the train this morning. Forgot I was sixty.
Thought it was splendid to be alive. Was going to enjoy myself. Was
so glad thinking about it thought everybody would be glad too. Can't
explain very well, but felt quite young. Thought all the young things
in the world would let me watch their happiness, and I'd be happy in my
own happiness and theirs. Didn't want to interfere with them, or try to
mix myself up with them. Just wanted to be a kind of onlooker. Never
thought they'd stop to laugh at me--make quiet fun of me, I mean. Made
me feel very old. Silly nonsense, of course. Oughtn't to care. Am
old."
The woman looked up quickly. She had noticed the little scene in the
dining-room.
"Age has nothing to do with the matter," she replied quietly. "There
is no reason why you should not enjoy yourself enormously. The dullest
person I know is a young man of twenty-three, and one of the gayest is
an aunt of mine who is seventy-five. Happiness is a gift of the gods,
and is bestowed by them irrespective of age."
"Think so?" said Miss Mason.
"I am sure of it."
Again there was a silence. Then, quite suddenly, Miss Mason began to
tell the woman the story of her life. She told it badly. For the last
forty years at least Miss Mason had talked little. Miss Stanhope had
never cared to encourage conversation other than her own. A daily and
minute recital of her own imaginary ailments had sufficed her. That had
been a subject which had never palled.
"And the summary of it all is," ended Miss Mason, "that my life has
been utterly narrow." She stopped and looked at the woman. There was
something half humorous, half pathetic, in the expression in her eyes.
"I think," said the woman slowly, "that one is too ready to use the
term 'narrow' for lives and opinions which have not covered, as we
imagine, a great deal of ground. Sometimes I think 'concentrated' would
be a better word to use for them. I know that people who have darted
hither and thither from one place to another, and from one excitement
to another, often talk about 'living' and the broadness of their lives.
But I fancy that if one could go up in a kind of mental aeroplane and
look down upon those lives, one might see that their grooves, though
they took an intricate pattern, were possibly narrower than some of
those which have gone along one straight and monotonous course."
"Think so?" said Miss Mason again. Then she smiled half-shamefacedly.
"There's one thing--in spite of all the monotony, I've never been able
to get rid of my belief in kind of fairy tale happenings. Utterly
ridiculous, of course."
The woman laughed, a low clear laugh, which pleased Miss Mason
enormously.
"Now we're on ground with which I'm far more familiar," she replied.
"I was trying to get hold of words and expressions before which were
rather outside my vocabulary, and I fear I sounded a little stilted in
consequence. But fairy tales! Why life is a fairy tale. Bad fairies and
wicked magicians get mixed up in it of course, or it wouldn't be one,
but there are good fairies and all kinds of unexpected and delicious
happenings right through it in spite of them. There's often, too, a
long journey through a wood. You've been through yours. What do you
hope to find on this side?"
"A studio," said Miss Mason promptly. This woman was making it
extraordinarily easy for her to tell her fairy tale. "Have wanted one
ever since I was seventeen, and I think almost before that. Perhaps
because my father was an artist."
"And now you'll take one?"
"Have come up to look for one," said Miss Mason. "Am going to look at
pictures too. There's the National Gallery, the Tate Gallery, and the
Academy. Used to read about them. Later I shall go abroad. Thought
I'd better get used to going about in England first. Have read a lot
about pictures. Used to take in a magazine called 'The Studio.' Saw it
advertised once and sent for it. Miss Stanhope used to make me a small
allowance. She was kind really, though didn't always understand."
"The kindest people don't always understand," said the younger woman
quickly. "Are you going to take an unfurnished studio? and will you
have some of the furniture sent up from your old home?"
There is a curious luxury in speaking of the details of a cherished
scheme, and especially to one who has never before found a sympathetic
audience. This the woman knew when she put the question.
Miss Mason gave a little laugh.
"Wouldn't ask that if you'd seen the furniture. Was so used to it it
was a wonder I still went on thinking it hideous. I think it was after
I'd been away from it for a year and came back to it that I knew how
terrible it was. After that it remained terrible. It will all be sold.
Have arranged for that. Couldn't stay with it any longer than was
necessary. Don't care what becomes of it now."
Miss Mason was feeling so light-hearted again she was almost reckless.
"Then you'll buy new things?" asked the woman.
"Yes. Soft colours--blues and greens. Love blue. Your dress is lovely."
The words were jerky but genuine.
"It's my favourite colour," said the woman.
Miss Mason looked in the direction of a mirror near her. She could see
both their figures reflected in it. Again a little wistful look crept
into her eyes.
"I suppose," she said suddenly, "that it was my dress those two girls
were laughing at. Perhaps it is queer. Never thought of that before.
Couldn't change now, any more than I could change my skin."
She stopped, then looked directly at the woman.
"I suppose people will always laugh at me?" she queried. "I suppose
those girls were right to laugh. I am queer."
There was a moment's pause. Then the woman in the blue dress spoke
deliberately.
"I am going to ask you a question which may sound rather conceited,"
she said. "Which would you value most--my opinion or the opinion of
those two girls?"
"Yours," said Miss Mason promptly.
"Then I am going to tell you exactly what I think, and you must forgive
me if what I say sounds impertinent. I don't think you are the least
queer. I think you are quaint and original. Any artist would infinitely
prefer your method of dressing than the method chosen by the older
women of the present day. I think it quite possible that you will find
a few people will laugh at you, for, as I've already said, in this
fairy tale world there are bad fairies, and, worse still, stupid ones.
But they don't count, because they aren't worth consideration, at least
not as regards their opinion of our actions." She spoke the words
slowly and simply, almost as she would have spoken them to a child.
Again there was a silence.
"Where will you take your studio?" asked the woman suddenly.
"Chelsea," said Miss Mason. "Whistler lived there."
"Conclusive," laughed the woman.
"Want it to be a nice studio," said Miss Mason. "Rent won't matter.
Miss Stanhope left me a lot of money. Can't spend it all."
"Now the fairy tale progresses," said the woman joyfully. "Plenty of
money and fairy tale ideas are the happiest of combinations."
Miss Mason laughed.
"Glad I met you," she said. "Feel like I did when I came up in the
train this morning."
"Our meeting was evidently part of the fairy tale," said the woman.
"Now I must go and get my cloak. It's five minutes to nine."
She went towards the stairs. Miss Mason watched her ascending them.
A moment after she had left, a man came into the lounge. He was wearing
a thin dark grey overcoat, and held a flat black hat in one hand.
Miss Mason had never before seen an opera hat. She looked at it with
interest. From it she looked at the man. He was tall and distinctly
aristocratic-looking. Miss Mason noticed that he wore a small moustache
and imperial.
She heard a step on the stairs. The woman in the blue dress was coming
down again. She had a black satin cloak round her.
"Christopher, darling," she cried, "is that you? I'm beautifully
punctual."
He went up to her and kissed her hand. There was something charming in
the courtliness of his manner. Miss Mason, who had been momentarily
shocked by the "darling," felt it somehow explained by the subsequent
action.
"One moment, and I'll come," said the woman.
She crossed to Miss Mason. The man waited for her.
"I shan't be home till midnight," she said, "and I'm leaving for Italy
at an unearthly hour to-morrow morning. But I am sure one day we shall
meet again. Good-bye."
"Good-bye," said Miss Mason. "Hope you'll enjoy yourself." She longed
to say something more, but the words failed her.
She watched her rejoin the man and leave the lounge. It seemed
extraordinarily empty after her departure.
"Don't suppose she'll ever lack friends," said Miss Mason to herself,
"but if ever she did need one----" She left the rest of the sentence
unspoken in her mind, and finding the place a little lonely went up to
her own room.
It was not till she was in bed that she realized that she had no idea
of the woman's name. It also never dawned on her to ask the hotel
management for it.