“Did you think that I was a yellow-headed doll, that you could
insult me beyond belief, mock me to my friends, slander me to
the Committee of which I was a member? Monsieur De Nemours was
good enough to warn me against you, also. I am no doll, you see;
I happen to be a woman. We have not yet mastered that curiously
devised code that you are pleased to term Honour--a code which
permits you to betray a woman but not a secret--to cheat a man
out of millions in business but not out of a cent at cards. It’s
a little artificial, and we’re ridiculously primitive. We use
lynch-law still; swift justice with the nearest weapon at hand.”
O’Hara was shaking like a man in a chill, his voice hardly above a
whisper. “What have you done? What have you done, Delilah?”
“Don’t you understand?” She spoke with pretty patience, as though
to some backward child. “I have ruined you--you and your Ireland,
too. I sent----”
And suddenly, shaken and breathless, she was in his arms.
“Oh, Ireland--Ireland and I!” But even at that strange cry she
never stirred. “It’s you--you who are ruined, my Magic--and it’s I
who have done it, driving you to this ugly madness.” He held her as
though he would never let her go, sheltering the bowed golden head
with his hand. “Though I forgive you a thousand thousand times, how
will you forgive yourself, my little Love? You who would not hurt a
flower, where will you turn when you see what you have done?”
He could feel her tears on his hand; she was weeping piteously,
like a terrified child.
“Oh, you do love me, you do love me! I was so frightened--I thought
that you would never love me.”
He held her closer, infinitely careful of that shining fragility.
“I love nothing else.”
“Not Ireland?”
He closed his hunted eyes, shutting out Memory.
“I hated Ireland,” wept the small voice fiercely, “because you
loved her so.”
“Hush, hush, my Heart.”
“But you do--you do love me best?”
“God forgive me, will you make me say so?”
There was a moment’s silence, then something brushed his hand,
light as a flower, and Delilah raised her head.
“No, no, wait.” She was laughing, tremulous and exquisite. “Did you
think--did you think that I had really sent your notes?”
O’Hara felt madness touching him; he stared down at her, voiceless.
“But of course, of course, I never sent them. They are upstairs;
wait, I’ll get them for you--wait!”
She slipped from his arms and was half way to the door before his
voice arrested her.
“Lilah!”
“Yes?”
“You say--that you have not sent the notes?”
“Darling idiot, how could you have thought that I would send them?
This is Life, not melodrama!”
“You never--you never thought of sending them?”
“Never, never.” Her laughter rippled about him. “I wanted to
see----”
But he was groping for the mantel, sick and dizzy now that there
was no need of courage. Delilah was at his side in a flash, her
arms about him.
“Oh, my dear!” He had found the chair but she still clung to him.
“What is it? You’re ill--you’re ill!”
Someone was coming down the stairs; she straightened to rigidity,
and was at the door in a flash.
“Captain Lawrence!”
The young Englishman halted abruptly--wheeled.
“Captain Lawrence, Mr. O’Hara is here; he had to see me about some
papers, and he has been taken ill. He’s been overworking hideously
lately. Will you get me some brandy for him?”
“Oh, I say, what rotten luck!” He lingered, concern touching his
pleasant boyish face. “Where do I get the brandy, Mrs. Lindsay?”
“Ask Lucia Dane, she knows how to get hold of the maids. And hurry,
will you?”
She was back at his side before the words had left; he could feel
her fingers brushing his face like frightened butterflies, but he
did not open his eyes. He was too mortally tired to lift his lids.
“Here you are, Mrs. Lindsay. Try this, old son. Steady does it.”
He swallowed, choked, felt the warm fire sweep through him, tried
to smile, tried to rise.
“No, no, don’t move--don’t let him move, Captain Lawrence.”
“You stay where you are for a bit, young feller, my lad. Awfully
sorry that I have to run, Mrs. Lindsay, but they telephoned for me
from the Embassy. Some excitement about Turkey, the devil swallow
them all. Good-night--take it easy, O’Hara!”
“Oh, Captain Lawrence!” He turned again. “Have you the letter that
I asked you to mail?”
“Surely, right here. I’ll post it on my way over.”
“Thanks a lot, but I’ve decided not to send it, after all.” She
stretched out her hand, smiling. “It’s an article on women in
public life, and it’s going to need quite a few changes under the
circumstances.”
“The circumstances?”
“Yes. You might tell them at the Embassy--if they’re interested.
I’m handing in my resignation on the International Committee
to-morrow.”
O’Hara gripped the arm of his chair until he felt it crack beneath
his fingers. Captain Lawrence was staring at her in undisguised
amazement.
“But I say! How in the world will they get along without you?”
“Oh, they’ll get along admirably.” She dismissed it as easily as
though it were a luncheon engagement. “That young Lyons is the very
man they need; he’s really brilliant and a perfect encyclopædia
of information. I’ll see you at the Embassy on Friday, won’t I?
Good-night.”
Her arms were about O’Hara before the hall door slammed.
“You’re better now? All right? Oh, you frightened me so! It wasn’t
that foolish trick of mine that hurt you? Say no, say no--I
couldn’t ever hurt you!”
“Never. I should be whipped for frightening you.” His arms were
fast about her, but his eyes were straying. What had she done with
that letter? He had caught a glimpse of it, quite a bulky letter,
in a large envelope, with a typewritten address--typewritten.
“Have you noticed my hair?” The magic voice was touched with gayety
again, and O’Hara brushed the silken mist with his lips, his eyes
still seeking. “I remembered what you said, you see; it grows most
awfully fast--one of these days it will be as long as Rappunzel’s
or Melisande’s. Will you like it then?”
Ah, there it was, face down on the lacquer table. He drew a deep
breath.
“Lilah, that letter--what did you say was in that letter?”
There was a sudden stillness in the room; he could hear the painted
clock ticking clearly. Then she spoke quietly:
“It’s an article that I have written on women in public life.
Didn’t you hear me telling Captain Lawrence?”
“Will you let me see it?”
Again that stillness; then, very gently, Delilah pushed away his
arms and rose.
“No,” she said.
“You will not?”
“No.” The low voice was inflexible. “I know what you are thinking.
You are thinking that those are the Irish notes; that I had fully
intended to send them this evening; that it was only an impulse of
mine that saved you, as it would have been an impulse that wrecked
you. You are thinking that next time it may fall differently. And
you are willing to believe me guilty until I am proved innocent.
You have always been that--always.”
He bowed his head.
“I could hand you that envelope and prove that I am entirely
innocent, but I’ll not purchase your confidence. It should be a
gift--oh, it should be more. It is a debt that you owe me. Are you
going to pay it?”
O’Hara raised haggard eyes to hers.
“How should I pay it?”
“If you insist on seeing this, I will show it to you; but I swear
to you that I will never permit you to enter this house again; I
swear it. Do you believe me?”
“Yes.”
“If you will trust me, I will give you your notes, love you for
the rest of my life--marry you to-morrow.” She went to the table,
picked up the envelope, and stood waiting. “What shall I do?”
He rose unsteadily, catching at the mantel. No use--he was beaten.
“Will you get me the notes?”
He saw her shake then, violently, from head to foot, but her eyes
never wavered. She nodded, and was gone.
He stood leaning against the mantel, his dark head buried in his
arms. Beaten! He would never know what was in that envelope--never,
never. She could talk to all Eternity about faith and trust; he
would go wondering all his life through. If he had stood his
ground--if he had claimed the envelope and she had been proven
innocent, he would have lost her but he would have found his faith.
He had sold his soul to purchase her body. The painted clock struck
once, and he raised his head----
No, no, he was mad. She was right--entirely, absolutely right--she
was just and merciful, she who might have scourged him from her
sight for ever. What reason in heaven or earth had he to distrust
her? Because her voice was silver and her hair was gold? Because
violets scattered their fragrance when she stirred? Oh, his folly
was thrice damned. If he had a thousand proofs against her, he
should still trust her. What was it that that chap Browning said?
“What so false as truth is
False to thee?”
That was what love should be--not this sick and faltering thing----
“Here are the notes,” said Delilah’s voice at his shoulder, and her
eyes added, wistful and submissive: “And here am I.”
O’Hara took them in silence, his fingers folding them mechanically,
measuring, weighing, appraising. The envelope could have held them
easily----
She turned from him with a little cry.
“Oh, you are cruel, cruel!”
He stood staring at her for a moment--at the small, desolate figure
with its bowed head, one arm flung across her eyes like a stricken
child--and suddenly his heart melted within him. She was weeping,
and he had made her weep. He took a swift step toward her, and
halted. In the mirror at the far end of the room he could see
her, dimly caught between firelight and candlelight, shadowy and
lovely--in the mirror at the far end of the room she was smiling,
mischievous and tragic and triumphant. He stared incredulously--and
then swept her to him despairingly, burying his treacherous eyes in
the bright hair in which clustered the invisible violets.
HER GRACE
The first time that the Black Duke saw her she was laughing--and
the last time that he saw her she was laughing, too.
He and a ruddy-faced companion had fared forth doggedly into the
long summer twilight in quest of some amusement to dispel the
memory of the extravagantly gloomy little dinner that they had
shared at the club, followed by a painful hour over admirable port
and still more admirable cigars. It was August, and London was
empty as a drum of the pretty faces and pretty hats and pretty
voices that made it tolerable at times--it was as dry and dusty
as life itself, and John Saint Michael Beauclerc, ninth Duke of
Bolingham, tramping along the dull street beside a dull comrade,
thought to himself with a sudden alien passion that youth was a
poor thing to look back on, and age an ugly thing to look forward
to, and middle age worse than either. He scowled down magnificently
from his great height at the once-gregarious Banford, whose flushed
countenance bore the consternation of one who has made a bad
bargain and sees no way out of it--no duke lived who was worth such
an evening, said Gaddy Banford’s hunted eyes. This particular duke
eyed him sardonically.
“Close on to nine,” he said. “Well, then, what time does this holy
paragon do her turn?”
“About nine,” replied his unhappy host. “But, I say, you know,
I don’t want to drag you around if you’d rather not. She’s
frightfully good in her line, but if dancing bores you----”
“You’re dashed considerate all at once,” remarked his guest. “If I
haven’t cracked by now, I fancy I’ll live through the best dancing
of the century. That’s what you called it, wasn’t it? Here, you!”
He waved an imperious hand at a forlorn hansom clattering down
the silent street, and it jolted to a halt under one of the gas
lamps. For it was not in this century that the Duke of Bolingham
met Miss Biddy O’Rourke. No, it was in a century when hansom
cabs and gas lamps were commonplaces--when ladies wore bonnets
like butterflies on piled-up ringlets, and waltzed for hours in
satin slippers and kid gloves two sizes too small for them--when
gentlemen cursed eloquently but noiselessly because maidens whisked
yards of tulle and tarlatan behind them when they danced--a century
of faded flowers and fresh sentiments and enormous sleeves--of
conservatories and cotillions and conventions--of long, long
letters and little perfumed notes--of intrigues over tea tables,
and coaching parties to the races, and Parma violets, and pretty
manners, and broken hearts. A thousand years ago, you might think,
but after all it was only around the corner of the last century
that the Duke of Bolingham stepped into the decrepit hansom closely
followed by his unwilling retainer, and in no uncertain tones bade
the driver proceed to the Liberty Music Hall.
He sat cloaked in silence while they drove, his heavy shoulders
hunched up, his eyes half closed, brooding like a despoiled monarch
and a cheated child over the sorry trick that life had played him.
He had had everything--and he had found nothing worth having. He
had the greatest fortune in England--and one of the greatest names.
He had Beaton House, the Georgian miracle that was all London’s
pride--and Gray Courts, that dream of sombre beauty, that was all
England’s pride--Gray Courts that even now held his three tall,
black-browed sons who could shoot and hunt and swear as well as any
in the country--yes, even fourteen-year Roddy. That held, too, a
collection of Spanish and Portuguese armour second to none, and a
collection of Van Dykes first of any, and the finest clipped yew
hedge in a thousand miles. That held the ladies Pamela, Clarissa,
Maud, and Charlotte, his good sisters, too acidulous to find a
husband between them, for all their great dowers and name and
accomplishments. That for six long years had held the Lady Alicia
Honoria Fortescue, a poor, sad, dull little creature, married in
a moment of pity and illusion when they were both young enough to
know better, who had gone in mortal terror of him from the night
that they crossed the threshold of the Damask Room to the day that
they laid her away under the kind marble in the little chapel.
He sat huddled in the corner of the hansom, remembering with the
same shock of sick amazement his despair at the discovery of her
fear of him; it still haunted every tapestried corridor of Gray
Courts--every panelled hall in Beaton House--he set his teeth and
turned his head, and swore that he would take the next boat to
France and drink himself to death in Cannes. And the hansom cab
stopped.
Gaddy Banford had two seats in the first row of stalls; had ’em
for every night that the lady danced, he informed the duke with
chastened pride. The duke, trampling over the outraged spectators
with more than royal indifference, eyed him grimly.
“Spend the rest of your valuable time hanging round the stage door,
what?” he inquired audibly.
Five of the outraged spectators said “Sh-s-h,” and the duke,
squaring about in his seat, favoured them with so black a glance
that the admonitions died on their lips and apologies gathered in
their eyes. Banford smiled nervously and ingratiatingly.
“Oh, rather not--no, no, nothing of that kind whatever. She doesn’t
go in for stage-door meetings, you know. I’ve had the honour of
meeting the lady twice and she’s most frightfully jolly and all
that, but----”
“Sh-h-h,” enjoined one rebellious spirit, studiously avoiding
the duke’s eye. That gentleman remarked “Ha!” with derisive
inflection and turned a contemptuous eye on the stage. A very
large and apparently intoxicated mouse was chasing a small and
agitated cat with rhythmic zest, the two having concluded the
more technical portion of their programme, in which they had ably
defended against all comers their engaging title of the “Jolly
Joralomons, Europe, Asia, Africa, and America’s Most Unique and
Mirth Compelling Acrobats, Tumblers, and Jugglers.” The Jolly
Joralomons scampered light-heartedly off, rolling their equipment
of bright balls before them with dexterous paws, and capered back
even more light-heartedly to blow grateful kisses off the tips of
their whiskers to an enraptured audience, with which the Duke of
Bolingham was all too obviously not in accord.
“Gad!” he remarked with appalled conviction. “Death’s too good for
them! Here, let’s get out of this while I’ve got strength----”
Banford lifted a pleading hand. There was a warning roll of drums,
a preliminary lilt of violins, and the orchestra swung triumphantly
into the “Biddy Waltz”--the waltz that all London had revolved to
for three good months. The house sighed like a delighted child, and
far up in the gallery an ecstatic voice called “Ah, there, lassie!”
And another echoed “Come ahn, Biddy--Alf and me’s ’ere!”
And onto a stage that was black as night, with one great bound as
though she had leapt through infinite space from a falling star
into the small safe circle of the spotlight, came Biddy O’Rourke,
straight on the tips of her silver toes, with laughter for a dark
world in both her outstretched hands--and the piece of the world
that faced her rose to its feet and shouted a welcome. All but one.
The Black Duke of Bolingham sat square in the centre in the first
row of seats in the Liberty Music Hall as still as though he had
been struck down by lightning, with the “Biddy Waltz” rising and
falling about him unheeded, his eyes fixed incredulously on the
Vision in the spotlight. The Vision had already fixed the eyes
and turned the heads and broken the hearts of half the masculine
population of London (the other half not having seen her!) but
nothing that the duke had heard had prepared him for this.
Who could have told him that a music hall dancer called Biddy
O’Rourke, late of Dublin, no taller than a child and seventeen
years old to the day, could look like a fairy and an angel and an
imp and a witch and a dream? Not Gaddy Banford, of a certainty--not
Gaddy, who, in a burst of lyric enthusiasm, had confided to
his duke that she was little and blonde and light on her feet.
“Little”--you who were more fantastically minute than any elf,
Biddy! Blonde--oh, sacrilege, to dismiss thus that foam and froth
of curls cresting and bubbling about your gay head like champagne,
with the same pure glitter of pale gold--that skin of pearl
beneath which danced little flames of rose fire--those eyes, bluer
than anything on earth--blue as the skies and seas and flowers
that haunt our dreams. Light on your feet--oh, Biddy, you, who
soared and floated and drifted like a feather in the wind, like a
butterfly gone mad--like a flying leaf and a dancing star! Had he
said that you had a nose tilted as a flower petal, and a mouth that
tilted, too? Had he said that when you blew across the dark stage
that you would be arrayed in silver brighter than foam and white
more airy than clouds? Had he said that you would dance not only
with those miraculous toes but with your curls and with your lashes
and with your lips and with your heart? Had he said that you would
come laughing, little Biddy?
High on the tips of those incredible toes she came--nearer and
nearer, so swift and light and sure that it seemed to Bolingham’s
dazzled eyes that it would take less than a breath to blow her
over that barrier of light straight into his arms--straight into
his heart--into his tired and lonely heart. He leaned forward, and
the vision of gold and silver stared back at him, faltered, tilted
forward on her toes, and flung down to him the airy music of her
mirth.
“Oh, I couldn’t any more dance with you looking like that than I
could grow feathers!” cried the Vision. “No, not if Saint Patrick
himself were to bid me. Whatever in the whole world’s the matter?”
The audience stopped howling its delirious approval at their
Biddy’s appearance in order to revel in their Biddy’s chaff. No
one could chaff like Biddy--no one nearer than Cork, at any rate.
It was better than seeing her dance to listen to her laugh, gentle
as a lamb, and pert as a monkey, and gay as a Bank Holiday. Free
as air, too; if any of those Johnnies in the stalls tried any of
their nonsense, it was a fair treat to hear her give ’em what for!
The audience stood on tiptoes and shoved and elbowed in riotous
good humour in their efforts to locate her latest victim--that
great black fellow with shoulders like a prize-fighter, likely. The
great black fellow promptly gratified their fondest expectations by
falling into the silver net of Biddy’s laughter and answering her
back.
“Thanks,” he replied distinctly. “Nothing in the whole world’s the
matter--now.”
“Whatever were you thinkin’ to make you scowl the big black ogre
himself then?”
And the Black Duke replied as clearly as though he were addressing
the lady in the hush of the rose garden at Gray Courts instead
of in the presence of the largest and most hilarious audience in
London.
“I was wondering how in God’s name I was going to get to you
quickly enough to tell you what I was thinking before I burst with
it.”
The transfixed Gaddy tottered where he stood, and the audience
howled unqualified approval, even while they waited for her to pin
him to the wall with her reply. But Biddy only came a step nearer,
staring down at him with the strangest look of wonder and delight
and enchanted mischief.
“Oh, whatever must you think of me, not knowing you at all?” she
cried to him over the muted lilt of her waltz. “’Twas the lights
in my eyes, maybe--or maybe the lights in yours. It’s the foolish
creature I am anyway you put it. Would you be waiting for ten
minutes?”
“No,” said His Grace firmly.
“Seven?”
“It’ll kill me,” said His Grace. “Where will you be?”
“There’s a wee door over beyond the red curtain,” said Biddy. “You
go through that, and you’re in an alley as black as a pit, and you
take three steps--no, with the legs you have you can do it in two
with no trouble at all--and there’ll be another door with a fine
big light over it, and I’ll be under the light. Don’t die.”
“No,” said His Grace. “I won’t.”
“Play it faster than that,” Biddy cried to her stupefied musicians,
once more poised high on her silver toes. “Ah, it’s the poor, slow,
thumb-fingered creatures you are, the lot of you! Play it fast as
my Aunt Dasheen’s spotted kitten chasin’ its tail or I’ll dance
holes in your drums for you--weren’t you after hearin’ that I have
five minutes to do three great dances? It’s black-hearted fiends
you are, with your dawdlin’ and your ditherin’. Ah, darlin’s, come
on now--spin it faster than that for the poor dyin’ gentleman and
the girl that’s goin’ to save him!”
And with a flash and a dip and a swirl she was off, and the Black
Duke was off, too. Gaddy Banford put up a feeble clamour as his
guest swept by him toward the aisle.
“Oh, but my dear fellow--no, but I say, wait a bit--she’s simply
chaffing you, you know; she’ll never in the world be there for a
minute----”
“Hand over my stick, will you?” inquired the duke affably. “You’ve
no earthly use for two. And don’t come trotting along after me,
either. She’s not expecting _you_, you know--rather not.” He swung
buoyantly off toward the red curtain, bestowing a benign nod on the
now deliriously diverted audience.
“Take a chair along, matey!” “Want a mornin’ paper? Come in ’andy
to pass away the time!” “Fetch ’im ’is tea at nine, Bertie--’e’ll
need it bad.” “Don’t you wait for her no more than twenty-four
hours, ole dear--promise us that, now----”
“Bolingham, I say----” panted the unfortunate Gaddy. “I say,
someone must have tipped her off, you know!”
“Tipped her off?”
“Told her who you were, you know?”
The duke laughed aloud and Gaddy Banford, who had never heard him
do this, jumped badly.
“D’you know what I’ve been wondering, Gaddy? I’ve been wondering
how the deuce I was going to own up to her--a duke’s such a damn
potty thing, when you come down to it. Why the devil didn’t someone
make me Emperor of Russia?”
He brushed aside the red curtain, grinned once more into Banford’s
stunned countenance, and passed with one great stride through the
door into the black alley. The door swung to behind him, and he
stood leaning against it for a minute, savouring the wonder and the
magic that he had fallen heir to. There was a drift of music in the
alley--the sky was powdered thick with stars--the air was sweet as
flowers against his face. He drew a deep breath, and turned his
head; and there she stood beneath the light, with a black scarf
over her golden head and a black cloak over her silver dress--and
it took him two strides to reach her, as she had said. She had one
hand to her heart and was breathing quickly in little light gasps,
as though she had come running.
“Were you waitin’ long?” she asked. “I never stopped at all to
change a stitch and dear knows ’twas a sin how I cheated on that
last one--no more than a flout and a spin, and not that maybe; only
I was afraid for my soul you’d be gone. Was it long you waited?”
“Forty-two years,” said His Grace. “Forty-two years and three
days.”
He watched the rose flood up to her lashes at that, but the joyous
eyes never swerved from his.