The women of Durban received Poppy into their midst with suspicion and
disfavour, which they carefully veiled because they could find out
absolutely nothing, damning or otherwise, about her, and also because
Mrs. Portal's introductions were as good as a certificate of birth,
marriage, and death, and to be questioned as little; and Mrs. Portal's
position was such that no woman dared assail her for exercising her
privileges. What they could do, however, was narrow their eyes, sharpen
their claws, and lie in wait, and this they did with a patience and zest
worthy of their species.
Meanwhile, those who sought Poppy might sometimes find her at the house
of Mrs. Portal; but not as often as she wished, for work chained her
almost perpetually, and she was working against time. She was straining
every nerve to have her work finished and paid for, and her law case
quietly settled in Johannesburg, before the time came for Carson to set
out for his five years' exile in Borapota. She was working for freedom
and bondage and life--for, indeed, all that life had to offer her now
was the word of a man bidding her to follow him into bondage. It was
hard on her that while she worked she must lose time and opportunities
of meeting him and winding more spells to bind him. But--she had grown
used to fighting her battles against odds. So she gave up six solid
hours of daylight and two of the night to hard labour; and she made a
rule never to count the hours, which were many, that were spent at her
desk _dreaming_. For no writer does work of any consequence without
dreaming, even if the dream is not always of work.
Miss Allendner might have found life a dull affair in Briony Cottage had
she not been of that domesticated type which finds satisfaction and
pleasure in managing a household and ordering good meals. Under her rule
the little cottage became a well-ordered, comfortable home, where things
ran on oiled wheels, and peace and contentment reigned. No one and
nothing bothered Poppy, and the long, bright hours of day were hers to
work in uninterruptedly. Such visitors as called, and some did call, if
only out of curiosity, were received by Miss Allendner, and regaled with
dainty teas and mysteriously impressive statements as to Miss Chard's
_work_ which unfortunately kept her so busy that she could see no
one--_at present_. The companion had of necessity been let into the
secret of her employer's work and identity, for Poppy was a careless
creature with letters and papers, and it irked her to have to exercise
caution with an intimate member of her household. Poor Miss Allendner
almost exploded with the greatness and importance of the information.
But she was a faithful and trustworthy soul, and happy for the first
time in all her needy, half-rationed life.
If Poppy had been a bread-and-butter woman she might have been happy,
too, in some fashion, within the trim, well-ordered confines of
comfortable mediocrity. But it was not there that her desire lay. She
had tasted of the wine and fruit of life--Love, and wanderings in far
lands, and vagabondage. Bread-and-butter could never satisfy her again.
Work was wine, too. She felt the fire of it circling in her veins, even
when wearied out she flung her books and pencils from her and ran out to
the sea. And play was wine--when on some lovely evening she arrayed
herself amazingly, took rickshaw and Miss Allendner and ascended the
wide, sloping road that led to Clem Portal's home on the Berea.
The Portals' social circle varied, because it was constantly being
enlarged or decreased by the comings and goings of travellers and
visitors; for, besides knowing everyone worth knowing in South Africa,
they could beckon friends and acquaintances from the four poles. Add to
this that they were both charming, witty, cultivated people, with the
true Irish love for bestowing hospitality and the true Irish grace in
bestowing it, and it will be easily understood that all delightful and
interesting people who came to South Africa sought them as the bee seeks
clover.
As a background to new faces could always be found those of fixed and
steadfast friends--Mrs. Capron's--the de Greys'--the Laces'. Always
Carson, when he came to Natal; and Abinger, because he was both
interesting and something of a crony of Bill Portal's.
A sprinkling of Durban people came and went.
Evening is a pleasant time in Natal, and the Portals' moonlit gardens
and lawns and long verandahs lent themselves agreeably to strolling
people, tired of the clang and glare of the day. With someone always at
the piano to sprinkle the still air with melody, it was pleasant to
saunter, the dew in your hair and all the sounds of the night-things
about you, while you talked with someone whose interest interested you,
or gossiped of life as it could, or would, or might be, or of "Home,"
meaning England, which through the glamour of an African night seems the
moon of all men's Desire. There are more intense sudden joys in Life
than these, but few more poignantly sweet.
To be Mrs. Portal's friend was to share her friends, to know them, to
gossip with them, to criticise and be in turn criticised by them.
Sport, books, music, pictures, people--all that goes to the making of
life worth the living, came under discussion; and in Africa, where
everyone is using every sense of mind and body, living and feeling every
moment of life, there are always new things to be said on these
subjects--or perhaps only things that are so many centuries old that
they sound new. Truth, after all, is older than the everlasting hills.
Naturally, there was never much grouping. General conversation has more
than a liability to platitude, or, at best, to flippancy, and the finest
talking is never done in groups, but _tete-a-tete_. Indeed, it is on
record by a thinker of some importance that the best things men say are
said to women who probably don't understand them:
"To the women who didn't know why
(And now we know they could never know why)
And did not understand."
That is as may be. Remains the fact that the best talkers (apart, of
course, from orators, politicians, and professional diners-out) do not
talk for a crowd, and the most potent phrases and epigrams--when
epigrams are not _vieux jeu_--are made for one, or at the most, two
listeners.
Poppy's ears took in many pretty and many witty things.
Bill Portal was a blithe soul, overflowing with gay parables and maxims
for the unwise, whom he claimed to be the salt of the earth.
Abinger was epigrammatic, sardonic, and satanic, and he never asked for
more than one listener--a woman for preference, as she would certainly
repeat what he said--and there were other reasons. But the women of the
Portals' circle recognised a serpent when they met him, however leafy
the garden, and always preferred to listen to his wisdom in twos and
threes. With Poppy he never encompassed any talk at all, unless she
felt Clem strong at her back. He smiled at this: the smile of the
waiting man to whom everything cometh at last.
Nick Capron never graced the assemblies with his handsome dissipated
presence. His lust was for poker and his fellow-men--which meant the
Club and small hours. He was never even known to fetch his wife. But
many a man was pleased and honoured to do his duty for him. Sometimes
she stayed all night with her friend Clem. Sometimes Carson took her
home in a rickshaw.
The women with attentive husbands pitied her amongst themselves; but she
gave no sign of discontent, and they never ventured to offer sympathy.
Invariably she looked wonderfully beautiful--and, therefore, it was not
necessary for her to exert herself to much conversation. Since Poppy's
soft thrush-note had first been heard in Clem Portal's verandah, Mrs.
Capron's laugh had been silent: though it was a pretty laugh, too. But
her smile was as alluring as the sound of a silvery brooklet, and
sometimes the sympathetic wives trembled when they saw their husbands
lingering near her--not to talk, but to look. She sat so fearlessly
under bright light, and looked so flawlessly good. It was, indeed, a
comfort to remember that she was as good as she looked, or she would not
be Mrs. Portal's closest friend. It was remembered, too, that she had
never tried to beguile any woman's man away from her.
When one wife after another had ceased to tremble for her man, realising
that this Circe did not use her toils, they rewarded her by saying
amongst themselves that it must be sad to be so _cold_. This warmed the
coldest of them--with a glow of self-satisfaction.
Mary Capron did not bother about any of them. The riddle she
sought to read was Rosalind Chard. Always she watched Poppy,
and pondered where she had seen her before. Poppy suspected
this, but it did not agitate her. She had prepared another
soft-answer-warranted-not-to-turn-away-wrath if Mary Capron should
attack her in the open again. But Mary Capron, if she was not witty,
was wise. She was no fencer, and had no intention of encountering Miss
Chard's foil with the button off. She preferred to choose her own
weapon, time, and place, and to pursue the little duel in her own
fashion. She was merely "getting her hand in" when she said to Abinger,
looking dreamily at Poppy the while:
"Did you ever hear of a Sphinx without a secret?"
"It's what Wilde taxed the modern society woman with being, I believe,"
he answered idly; he was easily one of the best-read men in Africa. "But
it would not apply out here."
"No," she said dreamily. "Everyone has a secret in this country, haven't
they? even girls."
At another time she and Carson were near when Poppy, with her arm in
Clem's, presented Luce Abinger with a suave answer, so heavily encrusted
with salt, that even his seasoned tongue went dry. However, his
impertinence had warranted punishment, so he bore it as best he might.
And Clem's tact oiled the troubled waters.
But Mary Capron said something to Carson that kept him awake that night.
"She's _quite_ clever, isn't she? Only it's a pity she has to begin at
the beginning for herself."
* * * * *
Carson had scarcely been struck by Miss Chard's
_cleverness_--considering that on both his first and second meeting with
her she had had odd lapses of something very like _gaucherie_. But he
thought her interesting, arresting, and beautiful. He knew of no reason
why he should think of her at all; but he sometimes found her face and
her voice amongst his thoughts and considered the fact a curious and
rather annoying thing.
And the sight and sound of her had an extraordinary power at times to
rouse to active, vivid life, a dream of the past that was old grief and
pain.
Circumstance sometimes threw them together in the verandahs or out under
the Southern-Cross flaming above the garden, and Poppy's low laugh might
be heard mingling with his voice; but she did not always laugh because
she was amused.
Carson's silver tongue could take on an amazingly sharp edge. Being an
Irishman, he was a law unto himself, with a fine taste for
unconventionality in other people. But if he knew South Africa from one
end to the other, he also knew men and cities, and the rules that govern
women all the world over. Gradually he had become to be aware that Miss
Chard outraged the most important of these by being both unclassifiable
and mysterious. Even in what calls itself society in South Africa, women
and their belongings and connections must be above-board and open to
inspection. An unattached woman has got to prove her right to social
status there, as elsewhere. If she cannot, she must prepare to take the
consequences--and the least unpleasant of these is to have the worst
believed of her.
Of course, Rosalind Chard was backed by Mrs. Portal, but that did not
prevent tongues from wagging.
Carson took it upon himself to let Miss Chard know something of these
things whenever Fate ordained that he and she should walk under the
stars together.
It was wittily done, by the delicate instrumentality of chosen
implication, and it never missed the mark: the arrow quivered in Poppy
every time. Hot and cold, with sudden rages and terrors, she would turn
on him only to find the strange eyes so pleasantly indifferent; his
expression so guileless that it was hard to suspect him of malicious
intent. Her refuge was a little laugh. Carson told himself sardonically
that the game amused him. It may have done so. Doubtless Indians were
amused when they threw barbs at their staked victims. But as a fact,
something more than an Indian sense of humour would have been appeased
in him, if, instead of the brave smile that flickered across his
victim's face, or the little dry retort that her lips gave out even
while they quivered, she had answered him haughtily with the pride of
race or family or position--the pride of _anything with a root to it_.
That was the important point: what were the roots of Rosalind Chard?
That she had pride was plain enough--the fine pride of courage; the
pride of a slim, strong young tree that stands firm in winds that tear
and beat, flaunting a brave green pennon.
But what was the name of the tree? In what strange garden had it first
grown? Was it of a garden at all? Or a highway? Whence came the
suggestion that it had bloomed in the desert?
Carson scarcely realised that he fiercely desired information on these
matters. He supposed it to be curiosity about a pretty and interesting
girl--pure curiosity. He had heard things said, a word dropped here and
there--mostly by women, and he knew that harsh winds had begun to blow
round the young slim tree with the brave green pennon.
So out of _pure curiosity_ he tormented her when opportunity arose; and
she--gave him witty, gentle little restrained answers, with her hand
against her heart when the shadows allowed. Or if she could touch a tree
she had greater strength to bear her torment and to laugh more easily.
Of all the rest she was careless. Let them think what they would--Clem
was her friend.
If her personality and appearance had been less fascinating, probably
the gossip about her mysterious appearance in Durban without friends or
connections, or a known home, would have died a natural death. But with
her first coming to Clem's house, her loveliness seemed to have grown.
In the heat of a room there was a dewiness about her that began in her
eyes, and was wonderfully refreshing to the jaded spirit. In the chill
of the late evening she seemed to glow with a warmth that was cheering
to the coldest heart. Unfortunately, she sometimes forgot to be
conventional and ordinary in little social matters. Clem never took
notice of such trivialities, but Mrs. Capron and the other women would
raise delicate eyebrows and even the men exchange inscrutable glances.
One day Mrs. Capron said:
"Clem, didn't you tell me that Miss Chard was a Cheltenham College
girl?" in an incredulous voice. (It is not always convenient to be faced
with your statements made at a pinch.)
"Mary," was the answer, after a little pause, "that girl has got a wound
that bleeds inwardly, and has spent her life trying to hide it from the
world. She has had no time to notice the little conventionalities and
banalities that count with us."
"One wonders sometimes if she ever had the opportunity--that is all. She
walked into the dining-room ahead of Lady Mostyn and everybody else last
night----"
Clem winced; then, remembering Lady Mostyn's outraged face, laughed.
"Well, one hardly picks up those things at school, _cherie_--and she may
have been on a desert island ever since."
"That would be an interesting reason for her bad manners, darling,
but----"
"I won't admit that they are bad--only unusual; and, besides, she has
the excuse of genius. If I might only tell you what I know of her
work----"
"_Miniatures?_" asked Mrs. Capron wickedly.
"No: lovey-dovey darling--don't tease and don't be uncharitable--you are
much too beautiful to be a cat. Some day that girl will burst forth upon
us all in the glory of fame."
"Clem, you are infatuated."
"You'll see," said Clem. "Only be patient and kind--I must really go and
see what cook has for lunch. If she gives us curried mutton once more
and stewed guavas and custard, Billy will calmly proceed to bust."
She escaped.