It was nearly time to dress for dinner when Anthony returned to Craford
Old Manor.
Adrian, his collar loosened, his hair towzled, his head cocked
critically to one side, was in his business-room, seated at his piano,
playing over and over again a single phrase, and now and then making a
little alteration in it, which he would hurriedly jot down in a
manuscript music-book, laid open on a table at his elbow.
"Are n't you going for a holiday this summer?" Anthony asked, with
languor, lounging in.
"Hush-sh-sh!" said Adrian, intent upon his manuscript, waving an
admonitory hand.
"It's time to dress," said Anthony. He lighted a cigarette.
Adrian strummed through his phrase again, brows knitted, looking
intensely judicial. Then he swung round on his piano-stool.
"Hey? What did you say?" he questioned, his blue eyes vague, his pink
face blank.
"I merely asked whether you were n't going for a holiday this summer,"
Anthony repeated, between two outputs of smoke.
"And you interrupt a heaven-sent musician, when you see the fit's upon
him, merely to ask an irrelevant thing like that," Adrian reproved him.
"I was holding an assize, a gaol-delivery. That phrase was on trial
before me for its life. In art, sir, one should imitate the methods of
a hanging judge. Put every separate touch on trial for its life, and
deem it guilty till it can prove itself innocent. Yea, even though
these same touches be dear to you as her children to a mother. Such is
the high austerity of art. I thought you said it was time to dress."
"So it is," said Anthony. "Are n't you going for a holiday this
summer?"
Adrian closed his music-book, and got up.
"Of course I am," he answered.
"When?" said Anthony.
"In September, as usual," said Adrian.
"I was wondering," said Anthony, twiddling his cigarette, "whether you
would mind taking your holiday a little earlier than usual this
year--in August, for instance?"
"Why?" asked Adrian, with caution.
"It would suit me better, I could spare you better," Anthony said.
Adrian eyed him suspiciously.
"In August? We 're in August now, are n't we?"
"I believe so," said Anthony. "Either August or late July. One could
find out from the almanac, I suppose. It would suit me very well if
you could take your holiday now--at once."
Adrian's suspicion became acute.
"What are you up to? What do you want to get rid of _me_ for?"
Anthony smoked.
"I don't want to get rid of you. On the contrary--I 'll go with you,
if you like."
Adrian scrutinized him searchingly, suspicion reinforced by
astonishment. All at once his eyes flashed.
"Aha!" he cried. "I see what you 've been at. You 've been trying to
philander with the Nobil Donna Susanna Torrebianca--and she 's sent you
about your business. Oh, _I 've_ seen how things were going." He
winked and nodded.
"Nothing of the sort," said Anthony. "You might tell Wickersmith to
pack our things. We 'll take the eight-fifteen up to-morrow morning.
That will get us to Victoria in time for the eleven o'clock Continental
express."
"Oh? We 're going abroad?" asked Adrian.
"I suppose so. Where else is there to go?" said Anthony.
"I could have told you beforehand," Adrian consoled him, "that you had
n't the ghost of a chance with her. You grim, glum, laconic sort of
men are n't at all the sort that would appeal to a rich, poetic,
southern nature like Madame Torrebianca's. She would be attracted by
an exuberant, expansive, warm, sunny sort of man,--a man genial and
fruity, like old wine,--sweet and tender and mellow, like ripe peaches.
If it were n't that I sternly discountenance the imperilling of
business interests by mixing them up with personal sentiment, I should
very probably have paid court to her myself. And now I expect you have
lost me a tenant. I expect she 'll not care to renew the lease."
"Don't know, I 'm sure," said Anthony. "You might ask her. We 're
dining with her to-night. That would make a graceful dinner-table
topic."
Adrian's blue eyes grew round.
"We 're dining with her to-night?"
That did n't at all fit his theory of the case.
"At least I am," affirmed Anthony, dropping the end of his cigarette
into an ash-tray. "And she said I might bring you, if you 'd promise
to be good."
"_The--deuce_!" ejaculated Adrian, in something between a whisper and a
whistle. "But--then--why--what--what under the sun are you going
abroad for?"
"A mere whim--a sheer piece of perversity--a sleeveless errand,"
Anthony answered. "So now we might set about sweeping and garnishing
ourselves," he suggested, moving towards the door.
Susanna was very beautiful, I think, in a rose-coloured dinner-gown
(rose-coloured chiffon, with accessories of drooping old pale-yellowish
lace), a spray of scarlet geranium in her hair, pearls round her
throat, and, as you could now and then perceive, high-heeled scarlet
slippers on her feet.
She was very beautiful, very pleasant and friendly; and if she seemed,
perhaps, a thought less merry, a thought more pensive, than her
wont--if sometimes, for a second or two, she seemed to lose herself,
while her eyes gazed far away, and her lips remained slightly parted--I
doubt if Anthony liked her any the less for this.
But what he pined for was a minute alone with her; and that appeared to
be by no means forthcoming. After dinner they all went out upon the
terrace, where it was lighted by the open French windows of the
drawing-room, and reposed in wicker chairs, whilst they sipped their
coffee. He looked at her, and his heart grew big--with grief, with
resentment, with delight, with despair, with hope. "She cares for
me--she has said it, she has shown it. But then why does she send me
on this egregious wild-goose chase? She cares for me. But then why
does n't she arrange to give me a minute alone with her to-night?"
In the end,--well, was it Adrian, or was it Miss Sandus, whom he had to
thank for their minute alone?
"Why does nobody say, 'Dear kind Mr. Willes, do be nice, and sing us
something'?" Adrian plaintively inquired.
Anthony grasped the skirts of happy chance.
"Dear kind Mr. Willes, do be nice, and sing us something," he said at
once.
"I 'll play your accompaniments," volunteered Miss Sandus.
And she and the songster went into the drawing-room.
"Thank heaven," said Anthony, under his breath, but fervently, gazing
hard at Susanna.
She gave a little laugh.
"What are you laughing at?" he asked.
"At your sudden access of piety," said she.
"At any rate," said he, "I owe no thanks to _you_. For all you cared,
apparently, we should have spent the whole of this last precious
evening surrounded by strangers."
"Mamam, dites-moi ce qu'on sent
Quand on aime,"
came the voice of Adrian from within.
"If you talk, we can't hear the music," said Susanna.
"Bother the music," responded Anthony.
"It was you who asked him to sing," she said.
"Bother his singing. This is my last evening with you. Do you think a
woman has the right to be as gloriously beautiful as you are to-night?
Do you think it's fair to the feelings of a poor wretched man, who
adores her, and whom she, in mere wanton wickedness, is sending to the
uttermost ends of the earth?"
Susanna had her fan of white feathers in her lap. She caressed it.
"I want to ask you something," said Anthony.
"What is it?" said she.
"A piece of information, to help me on my journey. Will you give it
me?"
"If I can, of course," said she, putting her fan on the table.
"You promise?" said he.
"If I have any information that can be of use to you, I 'll give it
with pleasure," she agreed.
"Very good. That's a promise," said he. "Now then, for my question.
I love you. Do you love me?"
He looked hard at her.
She laughed, in acknowledgment that she had been fairly caught. Then
her eyes softened.
"Yes," she said.
But before he could move, she had sprung up, and disappeared through
one of the French windows, joining Miss Sandus and Adrian at the piano.
In her flight, however, she forgot her fan. It lay where she had left
it on the table.
Anthony picked it up, pressed it to his face. He closed his eyes, and
kept it pressed to his face. Its fragrance was more than a mere
fragrance--there was something of herself in it, something poignantly,
intimately personal.
By and by he put the fan in his pocket, in the inside pocket of his
coat--feathers downwards, the better to conceal it. Then he too joined
the group at the piano.