SAFE!
The season wore on to its perihelion--a period, the scientific books
advise us, of the highest clang and crash of speed and whirl, of the
greatest brilliancy and deepest glow of a planet's existence. The
business of life, the pursuit of pleasure, and the scientific demolition
of our common enemy, Time, received all the care which such matters
require.
Débutantes bloomed and were duly culled by aged connoisseurs of such
wares, or by youthful aspirants with the means to pay the piper in the
form of a handsome settlement. The usual number of young persons of the
gentler sex entered the lists of life, with the mistaken notion that it
is love that makes the world go round, to ride away from the joust wiser
and sadder women.
There was the same round of conventional pleasures which the reader and
his humble servant have mixed in deeply or dilettante, according to his
taste or capacity for such giddy work. There was withal the usual
heart-burning, heart-bartering, heart--anything you will but breaking.
For we have not breaking hearts among us to-day. Providence, it would
seem, has run short of the commodity, and deals out only a few among a
number of persons.
Amid the whirl of rout, and ball, and picnic, race-meeting, polo-match,
and what-not, Paul Howard Alexis stalked misunderstood, distrusted; an
object of ridicule to some, of pity to others, of impatience to all. A
man, if it please you, with a purpose--a purpose at the latter end of
the nineteenth century, when most of us, having decided that there is no
future, take it upon ourselves to despise the present.
Paul soon discovered that he was found out--at no time a pleasant
condition of things, except, indeed, when callers are about. That which
Eton and Cambridge had failed to lay their fingers upon, every
match-making mother had found out for herself in a week. That the
discovery had been carefully kept in each maternal breast, it is
needless to relate. Ces dames are not confidential upon such matters
between themselves. When they have scented their game they stalk him,
and if possible bag him in a feline solitude which has no fears for
stout, ambitious hearts. The fear is that some other prowling mother of
an eligible maiden may hit upon the same scent.
Paul was invited to quiet dinners and a little music, to quiet dinners
without the music, to a very little music and no dinner whatever. The
number of ladies who had a seat in a box thrown upon their hands at the
last minute--a seat next to Angelina in her new pink, or Blanche in her
sweet poult de soie--the number of these ladies one can only say was
singular, because politeness forbids one to suggest that it was
suspicious. Soft cheeks became rosy at his approach--partly, perhaps,
because soft and dainty toes in satin slippers were trodden upon with
maternal emphasis at that moment. Soft eyes looked love into eyes that,
alas! only returned preoccupation. There was always room on an
engagement card for Paul's name. There was always space in the smallest
drawing-room for Paul's person, vast though the latter was. There
was--fond mothers conveyed it to him subtly after supper and
champagne--an aching void in more than one maiden heart which was his
exact fit.
But Paul was at once too simple and too clever for matron and maid
alike. Too simple, because he failed to understand the inner meaning of
many pleasant things that the guileless fair one said to him. Too
clever, because he met the subtle matron with the only arm she feared, a
perfect honesty. And when at last he obtained his answer from the coy
and hesitating Etta, there was no gossip in London who could put forward
a just cause or impediment.
Etta gave him the answer one evening at the house of a mutual friend,
where a multitude of guests had assembled ostensibly to hear certain
celebrated singers, apparently to whisper recriminations on their
entertainer's champagne. It was a dull business--except, indeed, for
Paul Howard Alexis. As for the lady--the only lady his honest, simple
world contained--who shall say? Inwardly she may have been in trembling,
coy alarm, in breathless, blushing hesitation. Outwardly she was,
however, exceedingly composed and self-possessed. She had been as
careful as ever of her toilet--as hard to please; as--dare we say
snappish with her maids? The beautiful hair had no one of its aureate
threads out of place. The pink of her shell-like cheek was steady,
unruffled, fair to behold. Her whole demeanor was admirable in its
well-bred repose. Did she love him? Was it in her power to love any man?
Not the humble chronicler--not any man, perhaps, and but few women--can
essay an answer. Suffice it that she accepted him. In exchange for the
title he could give her, the position he could assure to her, the wealth
he was ready to lavish upon her, and, lastly, let us mention, in the
effete, old-fashioned way, the love he bore her--in exchange for these
she gave him her hand.
Thus Etta Sydney Bamborough was enabled to throw down her cards at last
and win the game she had played so skilfully. The widow of an obscure
little Foreign Office clerk, she might have been a baroness, but she put
the smaller honor aside and aspired to a prince. Behind the gay smile
there must have been a quick and resourceful brain, daring to scheme,
intrepid in execution. Within the fair breast there must have been a
heart resolute, indomitable, devoid of weak scruple. Mark the last. It
is the scruple that keeps the reader and his humble servant from being
greater men than they are.
"Yes," says Etta, allowing Paul to take her perfectly gloved hand in his
great, steady grasp; "yes, I have my answer ready."
They were alone in the plashy solitude of an inner conservatory, between
the songs of the great singers. She was half afraid of this strong man,
for he had strange ways with him--not uncouth, but unusual and somewhat
surprising in a finnicking, emotionless generation.
"And what is it?" whispers Paul eagerly. Ah! what fools men are--what
fools they always will be!
Etta gave a little nod, looking shamefacedly down at the pattern of her
lace fan.
"Is that it?" he asked breathlessly.
The nod was repeated, and Paul Howard Alexis was thereby made the
happiest man in England. She half expected him to take her in his arms,
despite the temporary nature of their solitude. Perhaps she half wished
it; for behind her business-like and exceedingly practical appreciation
of his wealth there lurked a very feminine curiosity and interest in his
feelings--a curiosity somewhat whetted by the manifold differences that
existed between him and the society lovers with whom she had hitherto
played the pretty game.
But Paul contented himself with raising the gloved fingers to his lips,
restrained by a feeling of respect for her which she would not have
understood and probably did not merit.
"But," she said with a sudden smile, "I take no responsibility. I am not
very sure that it will be a success. I can only try to make you
happy--goodness knows if I shall succeed!"
"You have only to be yourself to do that," he answered, with lover-like
promptness and a blindness which is the special privilege of those happy
fools.
She gave a strange little smile.
"But how do I know that our lives will harmonize in the least? I know
nothing of your daily existence; where you live--where you want to
live."
"I should like to live mostly in Russia," he answered honestly.
Her expression did not change. It merely fixed itself as one sees the
face of a watching cat fix itself, when the longed for mouse shows a
whisker.
"Ah!" she said lightly, confident in her own power; "that will arrange
itself later."
"I am glad I am rich," said Paul simply, "because I shall be able to
give you all you want. There are many little things that add to a
woman's comfort; I shall find them out and see that you have them."
"Are you so very rich, Paul?" she asked, with an innocent wonder. "But I
don't think it matters; do you? I do not think that riches have much to
do with happiness."
"No," he answered. He was not a person with many theories upon life or
happiness or such matters--which, by the way, are in no way affected by
theories. By taking thought we cannot add a cubit to the height of our
happiness. We can only undermine its base by too searching an analysis
of that upon which it is built.
So Paul replied "No," and took pleasure in looking at her, as any lover
must needs have done.
"Except, of course," she said, "that one may do good with great riches."
She gave a little sigh, as if deploring the misfortune that hitherto her
own small means had fallen short of the happy point at which one may
begin doing good.
"Are you so very rich, Paul?" she repeated, as if she was rather afraid
of those riches and mistrusted them.
"Oh, I suppose so. Horribly rich!"
She had withdrawn her hand. She gave it to him again, with a pretty
movement usually understood to indicate bashfulness.
"It can't be helped," she said. "We"--she dwelt upon the word ever so
slightly--"we can perhaps do a little good with it."
Then suddenly he blurted out all his wishes on this point--his quixotic
aims, the foolish imaginings of a too chivalrous soul. She listened,
prettily eager, sweetly compassionate of the sorrows of the peasantry
whom he made the object of his simple pity. Her gray eyes contracted
with horror when he told her of the misery with which he was too
familiar. Her pretty lips quivered when he told her of little children
born only to starve because their mothers were starving. She laid her
gloved fingers gently on his when he recounted tales of strong men--good
fathers in their simple, barbarous way--who were well content that the
children should die rather than be saved to pass a miserable existence,
without joy, without hope.
She lifted her eyes with admiration to his face when he told her what he
hoped to do, what he dreamed of accomplishing. She even made a few
eager, heartfelt suggestions, fitly coming from a woman--touched with a
woman's tenderness, lightened by a woman's sympathy and knowledge.
It was in its way a tragedy, the picture we are called to look
upon--these newly made lovers, not talking of themselves, as is the
time-honored habit of such. Surrounded by every luxury, both high-born,
refined, and wealthy; both educated, both intelligent. He,
simple-minded, earnest, quite absorbed in his happiness, because that
happiness seemed to fall in so easily with the busier, and, as some
might say, the nobler side of his ambition. She, failing to understand
his aspirations, thinking only of his wealth.
"But," she said at length, "shall you--we--be allowed to do all this? I
thought that such schemes were not encouraged in Russia. It is such a
pity to pauperize the people."
"You cannot pauperize a man who has absolutely nothing," replied Paul.
"Of course, we shall have difficulties; but, together, I think we shall
be able to overcome them."
Etta smiled sympathetically, and the smile finished up, as it were, with
a gleam very like amusement. She had been vouchsafed for a moment a
vision of herself in some squalid Russian village, in a hideous
Russian-made tweed dress, dispensing the necessaries of life to a people
only little raised above the beasts of the field. The vision made her
smile, as well it might. In Petersburg life might be tolerable for a
little in the height of the season--for a few weeks of the brilliant
Northern winter--but in no other part of Russia could she dream of
dwelling.
They sat and talked of their future as lovers will, knowing as little of
it as any of us, building up castles in the air, such edifices as we
have all constructed, destined, no doubt, to the same rapid collapse as
some of us have quailed under. Paul, with lamentable honesty, talked
almost as much of his stupid peasants as of his beautiful companion,
which pleased her not too well. Etta, with a strange persistence,
brought the conversation ever back and back to the house in London, the
house in Petersburg, the great grim castle in the Government of Tver,
and the princely rent-roll. And once on the subject of Tver, Paul could
scarce be brought to leave it.
"I am going back there," he said at length.
"When?" she asked, with a composure which did infinite credit to her
modest reserve. Her love was jealously guarded. It lay too deep to be
disturbed by the thought that her lover would leave her soon.
"To-morrow," was his answer.
She did not speak at once. Should she try the extent of her power over
him? Never was lover so chivalrous, so respectful, so sincere. Should
she gauge the height of her supremacy? If it proved less powerful than
she suspected, she would at all events be credited with a very natural
aversion to parting from him.
"Paul," she said, "you cannot do that. Not so soon. I cannot let you
go."
He flushed up to the eyes suddenly, like a girl. There was a little
pause, and the color slowly left his face. Somehow that pause frightened
Etta.
"I am afraid I must go," he said gravely at length.
"Must--a prince?"
"It is on that account," he replied.
"Then I am to conclude that you are more devoted to your peasants than
to--me?"
He assured her to the contrary. She tried once again, but nothing could
move him from his decision. Etta was perhaps a small-minded person, and
as such failed to attach due importance to this proof that her power
over him was limited. It ceased, in fact, to exist as soon as it touched
that strong sense of duty which is to be found in many men and in
remarkably few women.
It almost seemed as if the abrupt departure of her lover was in some
sense a relief to Etta Sydney Bamborough. For, while he, lover-like, was
grave and earnest during the small remainder of the evening, she
continued to be sprightly and gay. The last he saw of her was her
smiling face at the window as her carriage drove away.
Arrived at the little house in Upper Brook Street, Maggie and Etta went
into the drawing-room, where biscuits and wine were set out. Their maids
came and took their cloaks away, leaving them alone.
"Paul and I are engaged," said Etta suddenly. She was picking the
withered flowers from her dress and throwing them carelessly on the
table.
Maggie was standing with her back to her, with her two hands on the
mantel-piece. She was about to turn round when she caught sight of her
own face in the mirror, and that which she saw there made her change her
intention.
"I am not surprised," she said, in an even voice, standing like a
statue. "I congratulate you. I think he is--nice."
"You also think he is too good for me," said Etta, with a little laugh.
There was something in that laugh--a ring of wounded vanity, the wounded
vanity of a bad woman who is in the presence of her superior.
"No!" answered Maggie slowly, tracing the veins of the marble across the
mantel-piece. "No--o, not that."
Etta looked up at her. It was rather singular that she did not ask what
Maggie did think. Perhaps she was afraid of a certain British honesty
which characterized the girl's thought and speech. Instead she rose and
indulged in a yawn which may have been counterfeit, but it was a good
counterfeit.
"Will you have a biscuit?" she said.
"No, thanks."
"Then shall we go to bed?"
"Yes."