The direct blaze of the afternoon sun, partly refracted through the
crimson curtains of the window, and heightened by reflections from the
crimson-flock paper which covered the walls, and a carpet on the floor
of the same tint, shone with a burning glow round the form of a lady
standing close to Cytherea’s front with the door in her hand. The
stranger appeared to the maiden’s eyes--fresh from the blue gloom, and
assisted by an imagination fresh from nature--like a tall black figure
standing in the midst of fire. It was the figure of a finely-built
woman, of spare though not angular proportions.
Cytherea involuntarily shaded her eyes with her hand, retreated a step
or two, and then she could for the first time see Miss Aldclyffe’s face
in addition to her outline, lit up by the secondary and softer light
that was reflected from the varnished panels of the door. She was not
a very young woman, but could boast of much beauty of the majestic
autumnal phase.
‘O,’ said the lady, ‘come this way.’ Cytherea followed her to the
embrasure of the window.
Both the women showed off themselves to advantage as they walked forward
in the orange light; and each showed too in her face that she had
been struck with her companion’s appearance. The warm tint added to
Cytherea’s face a voluptuousness which youth and a simple life had not
yet allowed to express itself there ordinarily; whilst in the elder
lady’s face it reduced the customary expression, which might have been
called sternness, if not harshness, to grandeur, and warmed her decaying
complexion with much of the youthful richness it plainly had once
possessed.
She appeared now no more than five-and-thirty, though she might easily
have been ten or a dozen years older. She had clear steady eyes, a Roman
nose in its purest form, and also the round prominent chin with which
the Caesars are represented in ancient marbles; a mouth expressing a
capability for and tendency to strong emotion, habitually controlled by
pride. There was a severity about the lower outlines of the face which
gave a masculine cast to this portion of her countenance. Womanly
weakness was nowhere visible save in one part--the curve of her forehead
and brows--there it was clear and emphatic. She wore a lace shawl over a
brown silk dress, and a net bonnet set with a few blue cornflowers.
‘You inserted the advertisement for a situation as lady’s-maid giving
the address, G., Cross Street?’
‘Yes, madam. Graye.’
‘Yes. I have heard your name--Mrs. Morris, my housekeeper, mentioned
you, and pointed out your advertisement.’
This was puzzling intelligence, but there was not time enough to
consider it.
‘Where did you live last?’ continued Miss Aldclyffe.
‘I have never been a servant before. I lived at home.’
‘Never been out? I thought too at sight of you that you were too
girlish-looking to have done much. But why did you advertise with such
assurance? It misleads people.’
‘I am very sorry: I put “inexperienced” at first, but my brother said it
is absurd to trumpet your own weakness to the world, and would not let
it remain.’
‘But your mother knew what was right, I suppose?’
‘I have no mother, madam.’
‘Your father, then?’
‘I have no father.’
‘Well,’ she said, more softly, ‘your sisters, aunts, or cousins.’
‘They didn’t think anything about it.’
‘You didn’t ask them, I suppose.’
‘No.’
‘You should have done so, then. Why didn’t you?’
‘Because I haven’t any of them, either.’
Miss Aldclyffe showed her surprise. ‘You deserve forgiveness then at
any rate, child,’ she said, in a sort of drily-kind tone. ‘However, I
am afraid you do not suit me, as I am looking for an elderly person. You
see, I want an experienced maid who knows all the usual duties of the
office.’ She was going to add, ‘Though I like your appearance,’ but the
words seemed offensive to apply to the ladylike girl before her, and she
modified them to, ‘though I like you much.’
‘I am sorry I misled you, madam,’ said Cytherea.
Miss Aldclyffe stood in a reverie, without replying.
‘Good afternoon,’ continued Cytherea.
‘Good-bye, Miss Graye--I hope you will succeed.’
Cytherea turned away towards the door. The movement chanced to be one
of her masterpieces. It was precise: it had as much beauty as was
compatible with precision, and as little coquettishness as was
compatible with beauty.
And she had in turning looked over her shoulder at the other lady with a
faint accent of reproach in her face. Those who remember Greuze’s ‘Head
of a Girl,’ have an idea of Cytherea’s look askance at the turning.
It is not for a man to tell fishers of men how to set out their
fascinations so as to bring about the highest possible average of takes
within the year: but the action that tugs the hardest of all at an
emotional beholder is this sweet method of turning which steals the
bosom away and leaves the eyes behind.
Now Miss Aldclyffe herself was no tyro at wheeling. When Cytherea had
closed the door upon her, she remained for some time in her motionless
attitude, listening to the gradually dying sound of the maiden’s
retreating footsteps. She murmured to herself, ‘It is almost worth while
to be bored with instructing her in order to have a creature who could
glide round my luxurious indolent body in that manner, and look at me
in that way--I warrant how light her fingers are upon one’s head and
neck.... What a silly modest young thing she is, to go away so suddenly
as that!’ She rang the bell.
‘Ask the young lady who has just left me to step back again,’ she said
to the attendant. ‘Quick! or she will be gone.’
Cytherea was now in the vestibule, thinking that if she had told her
history, Miss Aldclyffe might perhaps have taken her into the household;
yet her history she particularly wished to conceal from a stranger.
When she was recalled she turned back without feeling much surprise.
Something, she knew not what, told her she had not seen the last of Miss
Aldclyffe.
‘You have somebody to refer me to, of course,’ the lady said, when
Cytherea had re-entered the room.
‘Yes: Mr. Thorn, a solicitor at Aldbrickham.’
‘And are you a clever needlewoman?’
‘I am considered to be.’
‘Then I think that at any rate I will write to Mr. Thorn,’ said Miss
Aldclyffe, with a little smile. ‘It is true, the whole proceeding is
very irregular; but my present maid leaves next Monday, and neither of
the five I have already seen seem to do for me.... Well, I will write to
Mr. Thorn, and if his reply is satisfactory, you shall hear from me. It
will be as well to set yourself in readiness to come on Monday.’
When Cytherea had again been watched out of the room, Miss Aldclyffe
asked for writing materials, that she might at once communicate with Mr.
Thorn. She indecisively played with the pen. ‘Suppose Mr. Thorn’s reply
to be in any way disheartening--and even if so from his own imperfect
acquaintance with the young creature more than from circumstantial
knowledge--I shall feel obliged to give her up. Then I shall regret that
I did not give her one trial in spite of other people’s prejudices. All
her account of herself is reliable enough--yes, I can see that by her
face. I like that face of hers.’
Miss Aldclyffe put down the pen and left the hotel without writing to
Mr. Thorn.