VI

To remind her fond parent of the vanity of certain expectations which

she more than suspected her of entertaining, Mary Gosselin, while she

felt herself intensely watched (it had all brought about a horrid new

situation at home) produced every day some fresh illustration of the

fact that people were no longer imposed upon. Moreover these

illustrations were not invented; the girl believed in them, and when

once she had begun to note them she saw them multiply fast. Lady

Whiteroy, for one, was distinctly suspicious; she had taken the liberty

more than once of asking the future Lady Beaupré what in the world was

the matter with her. Brilliant figure as she was and occupied with her

own pleasures, which were of a very independent nature, she had

nevertheless constituted herself Miss Gosselin's social sponsor: she

took a particular interest in her marriage, an interest all the greater

as it rested not only on a freely-professed regard for her, but on a

keen sympathy with the other party to the transaction. Lady Whiteroy,

who was very pretty and very clever and whom Mary secretly but

profoundly mistrusted, delighted in them both in short; so much so that

Mary judged herself happy to be in a false position, so certain should

she have been to be jealous had she been in a true one. This charming

woman threw out inquiries that made the girl not care to meet her eyes;

and Mary ended by forming a theory of the sort of marriage for Lord

Beaupré that Lady Whiteroy really would have appreciated. It would have

been a marriage to a fool, a marriage to Maud Ashbury or to Charlotte

Firminger. She would have her reasons for preferring that; and, as

regarded the actual prospect, she had only discovered that Mary was even

more astute than herself.

It will be understood how much our young lady was on the crest of the

wave when I mention that in spite of this complicated consciousness she

was one of the ornaments (Guy Firminger was of course another) of the

party entertained by her zealous friend and Lord Whiteroy during the

Goodwood week. She came back to town with the firm intention of putting

an end to a comedy which had more than ever become odious to her; in

consequence of which she had on this subject with her fellow-comedian a

scene--the scene she had dreaded--half-pathetic, half-ridiculous. He

appealed to her, wrestled with her, took his usual ground that she was

saving his life without really lifting a finger. He denied that the

public was not satisfied with their pretexts for postponement, their

explanations of delay; what else was expected of a man who would wish to

celebrate his nuptials on a suitable scale, but who had the misfortune

to have had, one after another, three grievous bereavements? He promised

not to molest her for the next three months, to go away till his

"mourning" was over, to go abroad, to let her do as she liked. He

wouldn't come near her, he wouldn't even write (no one would know it),

if she would let him keep up the mere form of their fiction; and he

would let her off the very first instant he definitely perceived that

this expedient had ceased to be effective. She couldn't judge of

that--she must let _him_ judge; and it was a matter in which she could

surely trust to his honour.

Mary Gosselin trusted to it, but she insisted on his going away. When he

took such a tone as that she couldn't help being moved; he breathed with

such frank, generous lips on the irritation she had stored up against

him. Guy Firminger went to Homburg, and if his confederate consented not

to clip the slender thread by which this particular engagement still

hung, she made very short work with every other. A dozen invitations,

for Cowes, for the country, for Scotland, shimmered there before her,

made a pathway of flowers, but she sent barbarous excuses. When her

mother, aghast, said to her "What then will you do?" she replied in a

very conclusive manner "I'll go home!" Mrs. Gosselin was wise enough not

to struggle; she saw that the thread was delicate, that it must dangle

in quiet air. She therefore travelled back with her daughter to homely

Hampshire, feeling that they were people of less importance than they

had been for many a week. On the August afternoons they sat again on the

little lawn on which Guy Firminger had found them the day he first

became eloquent about the perils of the desirable young bachelor; and it

was on this very spot that, toward the end of the month, and with some

surprise, they beheld Mr. Bolton-Brown once more approach. He had come

back from America; he had arrived but a few days before; he was staying,

of all places in the world, at the inn in the village.

His explanation of this caprice was of all explanations the oddest: he

had come three thousand miles for the love of water-colour. There was

nothing more sketchable than the sketchability of Hampshire--wasn't it

celebrated, classic? and he was so good as to include Mrs. Gosselin's

charming premises, and even their charming occupants, in his view of the

field. He fell to work with speed, with a sort of feverish eagerness; he

seemed possessed indeed by the frenzy of the brush. He sketched

everything on the place, and when he had represented an object once he

went straight at it again. His advent was soothing to Mary Gosselin, in

spite of his nervous activity; it must be admitted indeed that at the

moment he arrived she had already felt herself in quieter waters. The

August afternoons, the relinquishment of London, the simplified life,

had rendered her a service which, if she had freely qualified it, she

would have described as a restoration of her self-respect. If poor Guy

found any profit in such conditions as these there was no great reason

to repudiate him. She had so completely shaken off responsibility that

she took scarcely more than a languid interest in the fact, communicated

to her by Lady Whiteroy, that Charlotte Firminger had also, as the

newspapers said, "proceeded" to Homburg. Lady Whiteroy knew, for Lady

Whiteroy had "proceeded" as well; her physician had discovered in her

constitution a pressing need for the comfort imbibed in dripping

matutinal tumblers. She chronicled Charlotte's presence, and even to

some extent her behaviour, among the haunters of the spring, but it was

not till some time afterwards that Mary learned how Miss Firminger's

pilgrimage had been made under her ladyship's protection. This was a

further sign that, like Mrs. Gosselin, Lady Whiteroy had ceased to

struggle; she had, in town, only shrugged her shoulders ambiguously on

being informed that Lord Beaupré's intended was going down to her

stupid home.

The fulness of Mrs. Gosselin's renunciation was apparent during the stay

of the young American in the neighbourhood of that retreat. She occupied

herself with her knitting, her garden and the cares of a punctilious

hospitality, but she had no appearance of any other occupation. When

people came to tea Bolton-Brown was always there, and she had the

self-control to attempt to say nothing that could assuage their natural

surprise. Mrs. Ashbury came one day with poor Maud, and the two elder

ladies, as they had done more than once before, looked for some moments

into each other's eyes. This time it was not a look of defiance, it was

rather--or it would have been for an observer completely in the

secret--a look of reciprocity, of fraternity, a look of arrangement.

There was however no one completely in the secret save perhaps Mary, and

Mary didn't heed. The arrangement at any rate was ineffectual; Mrs.

Gosselin might mutely say, over the young American's eager, talkative

shoulders, "Yes, you may have him if you can get him:" the most

rudimentary experiments demonstrated that he was not to be got. Nothing

passed on this subject between Mary and her mother, whom the girl none

the less knew to be holding her breath and continuing to watch. She

counted it more and more as one unpleasant result of her conspiracy with

Guy Firminger that it almost poisoned a relation that had always been

sweet. It was to show that she was independent of it that she did as she

liked now, which was almost always as Bolton-Brown liked. When in the

first days of September--it was in the warm, clear twilight, and they

happened, amid the scent of fresh hay, to be leaning side by side on a

stile--he gave her a view of the fundamental and esoteric, as

distinguished from the convenient and superficial motive of his having

come back to England, she of course made no allusion to a prior tie. On

the other hand she insisted on his going up to London by the first train

the next day. He was to wait--that was distinctly understood--for his

satisfaction.

She desired meanwhile to write immediately to Guy Firminger, but as he

had kept his promise of not complicating their contract with letters she

was uncertain as to his actual whereabouts: she was only sure he would

have left Homburg. Lady Whiteroy had become silent, so there were no

more sidelights, and she was on the point of telegraphing to London for

an address when she received a telegram from Bosco. The proprietor of

that seat had arrived there the day before, and he found he could make

trains fit if she would on the morrow allow him to come over and see her

for a day or two. He had returned sooner than their agreement allowed,

but she answered "Come" and she showed his missive to her mother, who at

the sight of it wept with strange passion. Mary said to her "For

heaven's sake, don't let him see you!" She lost no time; she told him on

the morrow as soon as he entered the house that she couldn't keep it up

another hour.

"All right--it _is_ no use," he conceded; "they're at it again!"

"You see you've gained nothing!" she replied triumphantly. She had

instantly recognised that he was different, how much had happened.

"I've gained some of the happiest days of my life."

"Oh, that was not what you tried for!"

"Indeed it was, and I got exactly what I wanted," said Guy Firminger.

They were in the cool little drawing-room where the morning light was

dim. Guy Firminger had a sunburnt appearance, as in England people

returning from other countries are apt to have, and Mary thought he had

never looked so well. It was odd, but it was noticeable, that he had

grown much handsomer since he had become a personage. He paused a

moment, smiling at her while her mysterious eyes rested on him, and then

he added: "Nothing ever worked better. It's no use now--people see. But

I've got a start. I wanted to turn round and look about, and I _have_

turned round and looked about. There are things I've escaped. I'm afraid

you'll never understand how deeply I'm indebted to you."

"Oh, it's all right!" said Mary Gosselin.

There was another short silence, after which he went on: "I've come back

sooner than I promised, but only to be strictly fair. I began to see

that we couldn't hold out and that it was my duty to let you off. From

that moment I was bound to put an end to your situation. I might have

done so by letter, but that seemed scarcely decent. It's all I came back

for, you know, and it's why I wired to you yesterday."

Mary hesitated an instant, she reflected intensely. What had happened,

what would happen, was that if she didn't take care the signal for the

end of their little arrangement would not have appeared to come from

herself. She particularly wished it not to come from anyone else, she

had even a horror of that; so that after an instant she hastened to say:

"I was on the very point of wiring to _you_--I was only waiting for your

address."

"Wiring to me?" He seemed rather blank.

"To tell you that our absurd affair really, this time, can't go on

another day--to put a complete stop to it."

"Oh!" said Guy Firminger.

"So it's all right."

"You've always hated it!" Guy laughed; and his laugh sounded slightly

foolish to the girl.

"I found yesterday that I hated it more than ever."

Lord Beaupré showed a quickened attention. "For what

reason--yesterday?"

"I would rather not tell you, please. Perhaps some time you'll find it

out."

He continued to look at her brightly and fixedly with his confused

cheerfulness. Then he said with a vague, courteous alacrity: "I see, I

see!" She had an impression that he didn't see; but it didn't matter,

she was nervous and quite preferred that he shouldn't. They both got up,

and in a moment he exclaimed: "Well, I'm intensely sorry it's over! It

has been so charming."

"You've been very good about it; I mean very reasonable," Mary said, to

say something. Then she felt in her nervousness that this was just what

she ought not to have said: it sounded ironical and provoking, whereas

she had meant it as pure good-nature. "Of course you'll stay to

luncheon?" she continued. She was bound in common hospitality to speak

of that, and he answered that it would give him the greatest pleasure.

After this her apprehension increased, and it was confirmed in

particular by the manner in which he suddenly asked:

"By the way, what reason shall we give?"

"What reason?"

"For our rupture. Don't let us seem to have quarrelled."

"We can't help that," said Mary. "Nothing else will account for our

behaviour."

"Well, I sha'n't say anything about _you_."

"Do you mean you'll let people think it was yourself who were tired of

it?"

"I mean I sha'n't _blame_ you."

"You ought to behave as if you cared!" said Mary.

Guy Firminger laughed, but he looked worried and he evidently was

puzzled. "You must act as if you had jilted me."

"You're not the sort of person unfortunately that people jilt."

Lord Beaupré appeared to accept this statement as incontestable; not

with elation however, but with candid regret, the slightly embarrassed

recognition of a fundamental obstacle. "Well, it's no one's business, at

any rate, is it?"

"No one's, and that's what I shall say if people question me. Besides,"

Mary added, "they'll see for themselves."

"What will they see?"

"I mean they'll understand. And now we had better join mamma."

It was his evident inclination to linger in the room after he had said

this that gave her complete alarm. Mrs. Gosselin was in another room, in

which she sat in the morning, and Mary moved in that direction, pausing

only in the hall for him to accompany her. She wished to get him into

the presence of a third person. In the hall he joined her, and in doing

so laid his hand gently on her arm. Then looking into her eyes with all

the pleasantness of his honesty, he said: "It will be very easy for me

to appear to care--for I _shall_ care. I shall care immensely!" Lord

Beaupré added smiling.

Anything, it struck her, was better than that--than that he should say:

"We'll keep on, if you like (_I_ should!) only this time it will be

serious. Hold me to it--do; don't let me go; lead me on to the

altar--really!" Some such words as these, she believed, were rising to

his lips, and she had an insurmountable horror of hearing them. It was

as if, well enough meant on _his_ part, they would do her a sort of

dishonour, so that all her impulse was quickly to avert them. That was

not the way she wanted to be asked in marriage. "Thank you very much,"

she said, "but it doesn't in the least matter. You will seem to have

been jilted--so it's all right!"

"All right! You mean--?" He hesitated, he had coloured a little: his

eyes questioned her.

"I'm engaged to be married--in earnest."

"Oh!" said Lord Beaupré.

"You asked me just now if I had a special reason for having been on the

point of telegraphing to you, and I said I had. That was my special

reason."

"I see!" said Lord Beaupré. He looked grave for a few seconds, then he

gave an awkward smile. But he behaved with perfect tact and discretion,

didn't even ask her who the gentleman in the case might be. He

congratulated her in the dark, as it were, and if the effect of this was

indeed a little odd she liked him for his quick perception of the fine

fitness of pulling up short. Besides, he extracted the name of the

gentleman soon enough from her mother, in whose company they now

immediately found themselves. Mary left Guy Firminger with the good lady

for half an hour before luncheon; and when the girl came back it was to

observe that she had been crying again. It was dreadful--what she might

have been saying. Their guest, however, at luncheon was not lachrymose;

he was natural, but he was talkative and gay. Mary liked the way he now

behaved, and more particularly the way he departed immediately after the

meal. As soon as he was gone Mrs. Gosselin broke out suppliantly:

"Mary!" But her daughter replied:

"I know, mamma, perfectly what you're going to say, and if you attempt

to say it I shall leave the room." With this threat (day after day, for

the following time) she kept the terrible appeal unuttered until it was

too late for an appeal to be of use. That afternoon she wrote to

Bolton-Brown that she accepted his offer of marriage.

Guy Firminger departed altogether; he went abroad again and to far

countries. He was therefore not able to be present at the nuptials of

Miss Gosselin and the young American whom he had entertained at Bosco,

which took place in the middle of November. Had he been in England

however he probably would have felt impelled by a due regard for past

verisimilitude to abstain from giving his countenance to such an

occasion. His absence from the country contributed to the needed even if

astonishing effect of his having been jilted; so, likewise, did the

reputed vastness of Bolton-Brown's young income, which in London was

grossly exaggerated. Hugh Gosselin had perhaps a little to do with this;

as he had sacrificed a part of his summer holiday, he got another month

and came out to his sister's wedding. He took public comfort in his

brother-in-law; nevertheless he listened with attention to a curious

communication made him by his mother after the young couple had started

for Italy; even to the point of bringing out the inquiry (in answer to

her assertion that poor Guy had been ready to place everything he had at

Mary's feet): "Then why the devil didn't he do it?"

"From simple delicacy! He didn't want to make her feel as if she had

lent herself to an artifice only on purpose to get hold of him--to treat

her as if she too had been at bottom one of the very harpies she helped

him to elude."