I had no sooner entered the house than I knew something was wrong.
Though I had never been in so splendid a place before—it was one of
those big houses just off Fifth Avenue—I had a suspicion from the first
that the magnificence covered a secret disturbance. I was always quick
to receive impressions, and when the black iron doors swung together
behind me, I felt as if I were shut inside a prison.
When I gave my name and explained that I was the new secretary, I was
delivered into the charge of an elderly lady’s-maid, who looked as if
she had been crying. Without speaking a word, though she nodded kindly
enough, she led me down the hall, and then up a flight of stairs at the
back of the house to a pleasant bedroom in the third storey. There was a
great deal of sunshine, and the walls, which were painted a soft yellow,
made the room very cheerful. It would be a comfortable place to sit in
when I was not working, I thought, while the sad-faced maid stood
watching me remove my wraps and hat.
“If you are not tired, Mrs. Vanderbridge would like to dictate a few
letters,” she said presently, and they were the first words she had
spoken.
“I am not a bit tired. Will you take me to her?” One of the reasons, I
knew, which had decided Mrs. Vanderbridge to engage me was the
remarkable similarity of our handwriting. We were both Southerners, and
though she was now famous on two continents for her beauty, I couldn’t
forget that she had got her early education at the little academy for
young ladies in Fredericksburg. This was a bond of sympathy in my
thoughts at least, and, heaven knows, I needed to remember it while I
followed the maid down the narrow stairs and along the wide hall to the
front of the house.
In looking back after a year, I can recall every detail of that first
meeting. Though it was barely four o’clock, the electric lamps were
turned on in the hall, and I can still see the mellow light that shone
over the staircase and lay in pools on the old pink rugs, which were so
soft and fine that I felt as if I were walking on flowers. I remember
the sound of music from a room somewhere on the first floor, and the
scent of lilies and hyacinths that drifted from the conservatory. I
remember it all, every note of music, every whiff of fragrance; but most
vividly I remember Mrs. Vanderbridge as she looked round, when the door
opened, from the wood fire into which she had been gazing.
Her eyes caught me first. They were so wonderful that for a moment I
couldn’t see anything else; then I took in slowly the dark red of her
hair, the clear pallor of her skin, and the long, flowing lines of her
figure in a tea-gown of blue silk. There was a white bearskin rug under
her feet, and while she stood there before the wood fire, she looked as
if she had absorbed the beauty and colour of the house as a crystal vase
absorbs the light. Only when she spoke to me, and I went nearer, did I
detect the heaviness beneath her eyes and the nervous quiver of her
mouth, which drooped a little at the corners. Tired and worn as she was,
I never saw her afterwards—not even when she was dressed for the
opera—look quite so lovely, so much like an exquisite flower, as she did
on that first afternoon. When I knew her better, I discovered that she
was a changeable beauty; there were days when all the colour seemed to
go out of her, and she looked dull and haggard; but at her best no one
I’ve ever seen could compare with her.
She asked me a few questions, and though she was pleasant and kind, I
knew that she scarcely listened to my responses. While I sat down at the
desk and dipped my pen into the ink, she flung herself on the couch
before the fire with a movement which struck me as hopeless. I saw her
feet tap the white fur rug, while she plucked nervously at the lace on
the end of one of the gold-coloured sofa pillows. For an instant the
thought flashed through my mind that she had been taking something—a
drug of some sort—and that she was suffering now from the effects of it.
Then she looked at me steadily, almost as if she were reading my
thoughts, and I knew that I was wrong. Her large radiant eyes were as
innocent as a child’s.
She dictated a few notes—all declining invitations—and then, while I
still waited pen in hand, she sat up on the couch with one of her quick
movements, and said in a low voice, “I am not dining out to-night, Miss
Wrenn. I am not well enough.”
“I am sorry for that.” It was all I could think of to say, for I did not
understand why she should have told me.
“If you don’t mind, I should like you to come down to dinner. There will
be only Mr. Vanderbridge and myself.”
“Of course I will come if you wish it.” I couldn’t very well refuse to
do what she asked me, yet I told myself, while I answered, that if I had
known she expected me to make one of the family, I should never, not
even at twice the salary, have taken the place. It didn’t take me a
minute to go over my slender wardrobe in my mind and realize that I had
nothing to wear that would look well enough.
“I can see you don’t like it,” she added after a moment, almost
wistfully, “but it won’t be often. It is only when we are dining alone.”
This, I thought, was even queerer than the request—or command—for I knew
from her tone, just as plainly as if she had told me in words, that she
did not wish to dine alone with her husband.
“I am ready to help you in any way—in any way that I can,” I replied,
and I was so deeply moved by her appeal that my voice broke in spite of
my effort to control it. After my lonely life I dare say I should have
loved any one who really needed me, and from the first moment that I
read the appeal in Mrs. Vanderbridge’s face I felt that I was willing to
work my fingers to the bone for her. Nothing that she asked of me was
too much when she asked it in that voice, with that look.
“I am glad you are nice,” she said, and for the first time she smiled—a
charming, girlish smile with a hint of archness. “We shall get on
beautifully, I know, because I can talk to you. My last secretary was
English, and I frightened her almost to death whenever I tried to talk
to her.” Then her tone grew serious. “You won’t mind dining with us.
Roger—Mr. Vanderbridge—is the most charming man in the world.”
“Is that his picture?”
“Yes, the one in the Florentine frame. The other is my brother. Do you
think we are alike?”
“Since you’ve told me, I notice a likeness.”
Already I had picked up the Florentine frame from the desk, and was
eagerly searching the features of Mr. Vanderbridge. It was an arresting
face, dark, thoughtful, strangely appealing, and picturesque—though this
may have been due, of course, to the photographer. The more I looked at
it, the more there grew upon me an uncanny feeling of familiarity; but
not until the next day, while I was still trying to account for the
impression that I had seen the picture before, did there flash into my
mind the memory of an old portrait of a Florentine nobleman in a loan
collection last winter. I can’t remember the name of the painter—I am
not sure that it was known—but this photograph might have been taken
from the painting. There was the same imaginative sadness in both faces,
the same haunting beauty of feature, and one surmised that there must be
the same rich darkness of colouring. The only striking difference was
that the man in the photograph looked much older than the original of
the portrait, and I remembered that the lady who had engaged me was the
second wife of Mr. Vanderbridge and some ten or fifteen years younger, I
had heard, than her husband.
“Have you ever seen a more wonderful face?” asked Mrs. Vanderbridge.
“Doesn’t he look as if he might have been painted by Titian?”
“Is he really so handsome as that?”
“He is a little older and sadder, that is all. When we were married it
was exactly like him.” For an instant she hesitated and then broke out
almost bitterly, “Isn’t that a face any woman might fall in love with, a
face any woman—living or dead—would not be willing to give up?”
Poor child, I could see that she was overwrought and needed someone to
talk to, but it seemed queer to me that she should speak so frankly to a
stranger. I wondered why any one so rich and so beautiful should ever be
unhappy—for I had been schooled by poverty to believe that money is the
first essential of happiness—and yet her unhappiness was as evident as
her beauty, or the luxury that enveloped her. At that instant I felt
that I hated Mr. Vanderbridge, for whatever the secret tragedy of their
marriage might be, I instinctively knew that the fault was not on the
side of the wife. She was as sweet and winning as if she were still the
reigning beauty in the academy for young ladies. I knew with a knowledge
deeper than any conviction that she was not to blame, and if she wasn’t
to blame, then who under heaven could be at fault except her husband?
In a few minutes a friend came in to tea, and I went upstairs to my
room, and unpacked the blue taffeta dress I had bought for my sister’s
wedding. I was still doubtfully regarding it when there was a knock at
my door, and the maid with the sad face came in to bring me a pot of
tea. After she had placed the tray on the table, she stood nervously
twisting a napkin in her hands while she waited for me to leave my
unpacking and sit down in the easy chair she had drawn up under the
lamp.
“How do you think Mrs. Vanderbridge is looking?” she asked abruptly in a
voice that held a breathless note of suspense. Her nervousness and the
queer look in her face made me stare at her sharply. This was a house, I
was beginning to feel, where everybody, from the mistress down, wanted
to question me. Even the silent maid had found voice for interrogation.
“I think her the loveliest person I’ve ever seen,” I answered after a
moment’s hesitation. There couldn’t be any harm in telling her how much
I admired her mistress.
“Yes, she is lovely—everyone thinks so—and her nature is as sweet as her
face.” She was becoming loquacious. “I have never had a lady who was so
sweet and kind. She hasn’t always been rich, and that may be the reason
she never seems to grow hard and selfish, the reason she spends so much
of her life thinking of other people. It’s been six years now, ever
since her marriage, that I’ve lived with her, and in all that time I’ve
never had a cross word from her.”
“One can see that. With everything she has she ought to be as happy as
the day is long.”
“She ought to be.” Her voice dropped, and I saw her glance suspiciously
at the door, which she had closed when she entered. “She ought to be,
but she isn’t. I have never seen any one so unhappy as she has been of
late—ever since last summer. I suppose I oughtn’t to talk about it, but
I’ve kept it to myself so long that I feel as if it was killing me. If
she was my own sister, I couldn’t be any fonder of her, and yet I have
to see her suffer day after day, and not say a word—not even to her. She
isn’t the sort of lady you could speak to about a thing like that.”
She broke down, and dropping on the rug at my feet, hid her face in her
hands. It was plain that she was suffering acutely, and while I patted
her shoulder, I thought what a wonderful mistress Mrs. Vanderbridge must
be to have attached a servant to her so strongly.
“You must remember that I am a stranger in the house, that I scarcely
know her, that I’ve never so much as laid eyes on her husband,” I said
wamingly, for I’ve always avoided, as far as possible, the confidences
of servants.
“But you look as if you could be trusted.” The maid’s nerves, as well as
the mistress’s, were on edge, I could see. “And she needs somebody who
can help her. She needs a real friend—somebody who will stand by her no
matter what happens.” Again, as in the room downstairs, there flashed
through my mind the suspicion that I had got into a place where people
took drugs or drink—or were all out of their minds. I had heard of such
houses.
“How can I help her? She won’t confide in me, and even if she did, what
could I do for her?”
“You can stand by and watch. You can come between her and harm—if you
see it.” She had risen from the floor and stood wiping her reddened eyes
on the napkin. “I don’t know what it is, but I know it is there. I feel
it even when I can’t see it.”
Yes, they were all out of their minds; there couldn’t be any other
explanation. The whole episode was incredible. It was the kind of thing,
I kept telling myself, that did not happen. Even in a book nobody could
believe it.
“But her husband? He is the one who must protect her.”
She gave me a blighting look. “He would if he could. He isn’t to
blame—you mustn’t think that. He is one of the best men in the world,
but he can’t help her. He can’t help her because he doesn’t know. He
doesn’t see it.”
A bell rang somewhere, and catching up the tea-tray, she paused just
long enough to throw me a pleading word, “Stand between her and harm, if
you see it.”
When she had gone I locked the door after her, and turned on all the
lights in the room. Was there really a tragic mystery in the house, or
were they all mad, as I had first imagined? The feeling of apprehension,
of vague uneasiness, which had come to me when I entered the iron doors,
swept over me in a wave while I sat there in the soft glow of the shaded
electric light. Something was wrong. Somebody was making that lovely
woman unhappy, and who, in the name of reason, could this somebody be
except her husband? Yet the maid had spoken of him as “one of the best
men in the world,” and it was impossible to doubt the tearful sincerity
of her voice. Well, the riddle was too much for me. I gave it up at last
with a sigh—dreading the hour that would call me downstairs to meet Mr.
Vanderbridge. I felt in every nerve and fibre of my body that I should
hate him the moment I looked at him.
But at eight o’clock, when I went reluctantly downstairs, I had a
surprise. Nothing could have been kinder than the way Mr. Vanderbridge
greeted me, and I could tell as soon as I met his eyes that there wasn’t
anything vicious or violent in his nature. He reminded me more than ever
of the portrait in the loan collection, and though he was so much older
than the Florentine nobleman, he had the same thoughtful look. Of course
I am not an artist, but I have always tried, in my way, to be a reader
of personality; and it didn’t take a particularly keen observer to
discern the character and intellect in Mr. Vanderbridge’s face. Even now
I remember it as the noblest face I have ever seen; and unless I had
possessed at least a shade of penetration, I doubt if I should have
detected the melancholy. For it was only when he was thinking deeply
that this sadness seemed to spread like a veil over his features. At
other times he was cheerful and even gay in his manner; and his rich
dark eyes would light up now and then with irrepressible humour. From
the way he looked at his wife I could tell that there was no lack of
love or tenderness on his side any more than there was on hers. It was
obvious that he was still as much in love with her as he had been before
his marriage, and my immediate perception of this only deepened the
mystery that enveloped them. If the fault wasn’t his and wasn’t hers,
then who was responsible for the shadow that hung over the house?
For the shadow was there. I could feel it, vague and dark, while we
talked about the war and the remote possibilities of peace in the
spring. Mrs. Vanderbridge looked young and lovely in her gown of white
satin with pearls on her bosom, but her violet eyes were almost black in
the candlelight, and I had a curious feeling that this blackness was the
colour of thought. Something troubled her to despair, yet I was as
positive as I could be of anything I had ever been told that she had
breathed no word of this anxiety or distress to her husband. Devoted as
they were, a nameless dread, fear, or apprehension divided them. It was
the thing I had felt from the moment I entered the house; the thing I
had heard in the tearful voice of the maid. One could scarcely call it
horror, because it was too vague, too impalpable, for so vivid a name;
yet, after all these quiet months, horror is the only word I can think
of that in any way expresses the emotion which pervaded the house.
I had never seen so beautiful a dinner table, and I was gazing with
pleasure at the damask and glass and silver—there was a silver basket of
chrysanthemums, I remember, in the centre of the table—when I noticed a
nervous movement of Mrs. Vanderbridge’s head, and saw her glance hastily
towards the door and the staircase beyond. We had been talking
animatedly, and as Mrs. Vanderbridge turned away, I had just made a
remark to her husband, who appeared to have fallen into a sudden fit of
abstraction, and was gazing thoughtfully over his soup-plate at the
white and yellow chrysanthemums. It occurred to me, while I watched him,
that he was probably absorbed in some financial problem, and I regretted
that I had been so careless as to speak to him. To my surprise, however,
he replied immediately in a natural tone, and I saw, or imagined that I
saw, Mrs. Vanderbridge throw me a glance of gratitude and relief. I
can’t remember what we were talking about, but I recall perfectly that
the conversation kept up pleasantly, without a break, until dinner was
almost half over. The roast had been served, and I was in the act of
helping myself to potatoes, when I became aware that Mr. Vanderbridge
had again fallen into his reverie. This time he scarcely seemed to hear
his wife’s voice when she spoke to him, and I watched the sadness cloud
his face while he continued to stare straight ahead of him with a look
that was almost yearning in its intensity.
Again I saw Mrs. Vanderbridge, with her nervous gesture, glance in the
direction of the hall, and to my amazement, as she did so, a woman’s
figure glided noiselessly over the old Persian rug at the door, and
entered the dining-room. I was wondering why no one spoke to her, why
she spoke to no one, when I saw her sink into a chair on the other side
of Mr. Vanderbridge and unfold her napkin. She was quite young, younger
even than Mrs. Vanderbridge, and though she was not really beautiful,
she was the most graceful creature I had ever imagined. Her dress was of
grey stuff, softer and more clinging than silk, and of a peculiar misty
texture and colour, and her parted hair lay like twilight on either side
of her forehead. She was not like any one I had ever seen before—she
appeared so much frailer, so much more elusive, as if she would vanish
if you touched her. I can’t describe, even months afterwards, the
singular way in which she attracted and repelled me.
At first I glanced inquiringly at Mrs. Vanderbridge, hoping that she
would introduce me, but she went on talking rapidly in an intense,
quivering voice, without noticing the presence of her guest by so much
as the lifting of her eyelashes. Mr. Vanderbridge still sat there,
silent and detached, and all the time the eyes of the stranger—starry
eyes with a mist over them—looked straight through me at the tapestried
wall at my back. I knew she didn’t see me and that it wouldn’t have made
the slightest difference to her if she had seen me. In spite of her
grace and her girlishness I did not like her, and I felt that this
aversion was not on my side alone. I do not know how I received the
impression that she hated Mrs. Vanderbridge—never once had she glanced
in her direction—yet I was aware, from the moment of her entrance, that
she was bristling with animosity, though animosity is too strong a word
for the resentful spite, like the jealous rage of a spoiled child, which
gleamed now and then in her eyes. I couldn’t think of her as wicked any
more than I could think of a bad child as wicked. She was merely wilful
and undisciplined and—I hardly know how to convey what I mean—elfish.
After her entrance the dinner dragged on heavily.
Mrs. Vanderbridge still kept up her nervous chatter, but nobody
listened, for I was too embarrassed to pay any attention to what she
said, and Mr. Vanderbridge had never recovered from his abstraction. He
was like a man in a dream, not observing a thing that happened before
him, while the strange woman sat there in the candlelight with her
curious look of vagueness and unreality. To my astonishment not even the
servants appeared to notice her, and though she had unfolded her napkin
when she sat down, she wasn’t served with either the roast or the salad.
Once or twice, particularly when a new course was served, I glanced at
Mrs. Vanderbridge to see if she would rectify the mistake, but she kept
her gaze fixed on her plate. It was just as if there were a conspiracy
to ignore the presence of the stranger, though she had been, from the
moment of her entrance, the dominant figure at the table. You tried to
pretend she wasn’t there, and yet you knew—you knew vividly that she was
gazing insolently straight through you.
The dinner lasted, it seemed, for hours, and you may imagine my relief
when at last Mrs. Vanderbridge rose and led the way back into the
drawing-room. At first I thought the stranger would follow us, but when
I glanced round from the hall she was still sitting there beside Mr.
Vanderbridge, who was smoking a cigar with his coffee.
“Usually he takes his coffee with me,” said Mrs. Vanderbridge, “but
to-night he has things to think over.”
“I thought he seemed absent-minded.”
“You noticed it, then?” She turned to me with her straightforward
glance. “I always wonder how much strangers notice. He hasn’t been well
of late, and he has these spells of depression. Nerves are dreadful
things, aren’t they?”