SARAH MAKES AN IMPRESSION
"What a shame!" said Flossie, when she heard of the invitation. "Just
like the nasty old thing, to remember an accident that I couldn't help.
Not that I care! I shall enjoy myself far better at home"; and Flossie
caught hold of Minnie's arm, and stalked along the Parade as if she
cared so little that she did not want to hear any more about that great
lady, her Aunt George.
"What did you think of her?" May asked of Sarah.
"Is she very ill?" Sarah asked, thinking of the bath-chair and her
aunt's languid wrists and tones.
"Ill?--no! Ma says she's a hy-po-chon-driac," returned May, pronouncing
the long word in syllables. "That's fancying yourself ill when you
ain't. See? But all the same, Aunt George is very stylish."
"She's not half so nice as Auntie," Sarah flashed out.
"No, she isn't! But she's a great deal stylisher than Ma is," May
returned. "Didn't you hear the way she told the man to go on?
'Go-on-Chawles!'" and May leant back on the seat, slightly waved a
languid hand, flickered her drooping eyelids, and gave a half-languid,
half-supercilious smile.
It was a fine imitation of Mrs. George's _stylish_ airs, and Sarah was
lost in admiration of it.
"I wonder," she remarked presently, after thinking the question over, "I
wonder if she eats her dinner like that; because, if she does, it must
generally get cold before she has half finished it."
"Oh, Aunt's much too stylish to eat much," May explained. "She nibbles
at this and picks at that. You'll see to-night."
And Sarah did see--saw that, in spite of her airs and her nibbling and
her picking, Mrs. George contrived to put a good meal out of
sight--quite as much as ever her sister-in-law could manage to do. That
evening was also a new experience to Sarah; it was so much more stately
than anything she had seen before.
Mr. and Mrs. George Stubbs lived in a very large house in a large square
in the best part of Brighton. A resplendent footman received them when
they got out of the cab--yes, they had a cab, though it was only a short
way from their own house--and a solemn butler ushered them into Mrs.
George's presence. She wore a tea-gown of soft yellow silk, with a very
voluminous trailing skirt, and showers of white lace and broad yellow
ribbons about it. It was a garment that suited the languid air, the
quivering eye-lids, the weak wrists, and the soft, drawling voice to
perfection.
The resplendent footman had relieved Sarah of her violin-case and
carried it upstairs for her. Mrs. George motioned to it as he announced
her visitors. "With great care, Chawles," and "Chawles" put it down on a
chair beside the inlaid grand piano as if it were a baby and might
squeal.
[Illustration: "With great care, Chawles."]
"How are you, dears?" Mrs. George said, giving each a limp and languid
hand. "How oppressive the evening is!" Then to "Chawles," "Let tea be
served."
Very soon tea was announced, and they went downstairs. It was all new
to Sarah--the large, spacious dining-room, with its rich, costly
art-furniture; the pretty round table, with flowers and pretty-coloured
glasses, with quaint little figures holding trays of sweets or
preserves, or wheeling barrows of tiny ferns or miniature palms.
And the board was well-spread, too. There was salmon, salad, and a
boiled chicken covered with white, frothy sauce. There was an aspic
jelly, with eggs and green peas, and certain dark things which May told
her afterwards were truffles; and there were several kinds of sweet
dishes, and more than one kind of wine.
To Sarah it was a resplendent feast--as resplendent as the gorgeous
footman who stood midway between her chair and May's, only a little in
the rear; the solemn butler keeping guard over his mistress, whom he
served first, as if she had been a royal queen.
"Now you shall play to me," Mrs. George said to Sarah, when they had got
back to the drawing-room again.
Sarah rose obediently
"What shall I play?" she asked.
"What _can_ you play?" Mrs. George asked, in reply.
"Oh, a great many things," Sarah said modestly.
"Let Sarah play what she fancies," put in May, who had established
herself in a low, lounging chair, and was fanning herself with a fan she
had found on a table at hand with the closest imitation of Mrs. George
she could manage; "she always plays the best then."
"Very well," Mrs. George said graciously. So Sarah began.
She felt that in all her life before she had never played as she played
then. The influence of the luxurious meal of which they had just
partaken was upon her. The exquisite coloured glass, the sweet-scented
flowers, the smell of the fragrant coffee, the stately servants moving
softly about with quiet footsteps and smooth gestures, each and all had
made her feel calm and peaceful; and now the soft-toned drawing-room,
with its plush and lace hangings, its delicate china, its Indian
embroideries, and those two quiet figures lying back in the half light,
making no movement except the slow waving to and fro of their fans,
completed the influence. It was all food to Sarah's artistic soul, and
she made the Amati speak for her all that was passing through her mind.
Mrs. George was spell-bound. She actually forgot to fan herself in the
desire not to miss a single note. Nay, she did more, she forgot to be
languid, and sat bolt upright in her chair, her head moving to and fro
in time with Sarah's music.
"Why, child, you are a genius!" she exclaimed, as Sarah came to a close
and turned her speaking eyes upon her for comment.
"That's just what Papa said," put in May, adjusting her language to her
company.
"If you go on--if you work," Mrs. George continued, "your violin will be
your fortune. You will be a great woman some day."
Sarah's great eyes blazed at the thought of it; her heart began to beat
hard and fast.
"Do you really think so, Aunt George?" she asked.
"I really do. I am sure of it. But, child, your violin seems to me a
very good one. Where did you get it?"
"Father gave it to me; it was his grandfather's," said Sarah, holding it
out for inspection. "It is an Amati."
"It is worth five hundred pounds," said May, who was eminently
practical, and measured most things by a pounds, shillings, and pence
standard.
"Of course--if it is an Amati," murmured Mrs. George, becoming languid
again. "But go on, my child. I should like a little more."
So Sarah played and played until the room grew darker and darker, and
gradually the shadows deepened, until it was only by the lamps from the
square that she could distinguish the outlines of the figure in the
yellow sweeping robes.
It was like a shock when the door was gently opened and the footman came
in, bearing a huge lamp with a crimson shade. Then the coffee followed,
and before very long one of the servants came back, and said that the
cab for the young ladies had come.
"You have given me great pleasure," said Mrs. George to Sarah; "and when
Mrs. Stubbs comes back I must make an afternoon party, and Sarah shall
play at it. I have not been so pleased for a long time." And then she
kissed them both, and with "good-night" they left her.
"Won't Ma be pleased!" remarked May, with great satisfaction, as they
drove along the Parade. "I shan't mind a bit her being vexed that
Flossie wasn't asked. Really, Sarah, I never saw Aunt George so excited
before. She's generally so die-away and all that."
But Sarah was hardly listening, and not heeding at all. With her
precious Amati on her knee, she was looking away over the moonlit sea,
thinking of what her aunt had said to her. "If you go on--if you
work--your violin will be your fortune. You will be a great woman."
"I will go on; I will work," she said to herself. "If I can be a great
woman, I will."