DIANA TAKES A MIDNIGHT DRIVE
Some people apparently understand how to be unhappy gracefully, as if it
were a kind of fine art. I don't. It seems too bad to be true that I
should be unhappy, and as if I must wake up to find that it was only a
bad dream.
I suppose I've been spoiled a good deal all my life. Everybody has been
kind to me, and tried to do things for my pleasure, just as I have for
them; and I have taken things for granted--except, of course, with Lisa.
But Lisa is different--different from everyone else in the world. I have
never expected anything from her, as I have from others. All I've wanted
was to make her as happy as such a poor, little, piteous creature could
be, and to teach myself never to mind anything that she might say or do.
But Ivor--to be disappointed in him, to be made miserable by him! I
didn't know it was possible to suffer as I suffered that day he went off
and left me standing in the railway-station. I didn't dream then of
going to Paris. If anybody had told me I would go, I should have said,
"No, no, I will not." And yet I did. I allowed myself to be persuaded. I
tried to make myself think that it was to please Aunt Lilian; but down
underneath I knew all the time it wasn't that, really. It was because I
couldn't bear to do the things I'm accustomed to doing every day. I felt
as if I should cry, or scream, or do something ridiculous and awful
unless there were a change of some sort--any change, but if possible
some novelty and excitement, with people talking to me every minute.
Perhaps, too, there was an attraction for me in the thought that I would
be in Paris while Ivor was there. I kept reminding myself on the boat
and the train that nothing good could happen; that Ivor and I could
never be as we had been before; that it was all over between us for ever
and ever, and through his fault. But, there at the bottom was the
thought that I _might_ have done him an injustice, because he had begged
me to trust him, and I wouldn't. Just suppose--something in myself kept
on saying--that we should by mere chance meet in Paris, and he should be
able to prove that he hadn't come for Maxine de Renzie's sake! It would
be too glorious. I should begin to live again--for already I'd found out
that life without loving and trusting Ivor wasn't life at all.
He couldn't think I had followed him, even if he did see me in Paris,
because I would be with my Aunt and Uncle, and Lord Robert West; and I
made up my mind to be very nice to Lord Bob, much nicer than I ever had
been, if Ivor happened to run across us anywhere.
Then that very thing did happen, in the strangest and most unexpected
way, but instead of being happier for seeing him, I was ten times more
unhappy than before--for now the misery had no gleam of hope shining
through its blackness.
That was what I told myself at first. But after we had met in the hall
of the hotel, and Ivor had seemed confused, and wouldn't give up his
mysterious engagement, or say what it was, though Lisa chaffed him and
he _must_ have known what I thought, I suddenly forgot the slight he had
put upon me. Instead of being angry with him, I was _afraid_ for him, I
couldn't have explained why, unless it was the look on his face when he
turned away from me.
No man would look like that who was going of his own free will to a
woman with whom he was in love, that same queer something whispered in
my ear. Instead of feeling sick and sorry for myself and desperately
angry with him, it was Ivor I felt sorry for.
I pretended not to care whether he stayed or went, and talked to Lord
Robert West as if I'd forgotten that there was such a person as Ivor
Dundas. I even turned my back on him before he was gone. Still I seemed
to see the tragic look in his eyes, and the dogged set of his jaw. It
was just as if he were going away from me to his death; and his face was
like that of the man in Millais' picture of the Huguenot Lovers. I
wondered if that girl had been broken-hearted because he wouldn't let
her tie round his arm the white scarf that might have saved him.
It is strange how one's mood can change in a moment--but perhaps it is
like that only with women. A minute before I'd been trying to despise
Ivor, and to argue, just as if I'd been a match-making mamma, to myself
that it would be a very good thing if I could make up my mind to marry
Lord Bob; that it would be rather nice being a Duchess some day; and
that besides, perhaps Ivor would be sorry when he heard that I was
engaged to somebody else.
But then, as I said, quite suddenly it was as if a sharp knife had been
stuck into my heart and turned round and round. I would have given
anything to run after Ivor to tell him that I loved him dreadfully and
would trust him in spite of all.
"You look as pale as if you were going to faint," said Lisa, in her
little high-keyed voice, which, though she doesn't speak loudly, always
reaches to the farthest corners of the biggest rooms.
I did think it was unkind of her to call everyone's attention to me just
then, for even strangers heard, and turned to throw a glance at me as
they passed.
"It must be the light," I said, "for I don't feel in the least faint."
That was a fib, because when you are as miserable as I was at that
minute your heart feels cold and heavy, as though it could hardly go on
beating. But I felt that if ever a fib were excusable, that one was.
"I'm a little tired, though," I went on. "None of us got to bed till
after three last night; and this day, though very nice of course, has
been rather long. I think, if you don't mind, Aunt Lil, I'll go straight
to my room when we get upstairs."
We all went up together in the lift, but I said good-night to the others
at the door of the pretty drawing-room at the end of Uncle Eric's suite.
"Shan't I come with you?" asked Lisa, but I said "no." It was something
new for her to offer to help me, for she isn't very strong, and has
always been the one to be petted and watched over by me, though she's a
few years older than I am.
Aunt Lilian had brought her maid, without whom she can't get on even for
a single night, but Lisa and I had left ours at home, and Aunt Lil had
offered to let Morton help us as much as we liked. I hadn't been shut up
in my room for two minutes, therefore, when Morton knocked to ask if she
could do anything. But I thanked her, and sent her away.
I had not yet begun to undress, but was standing in the window, looking
along the Champs Élysées, brilliant still with electric lights, and full
of carriages and motor-cars bringing people home from theatres and
dinner-parties, or taking them to restaurants for supper.
Down there somewhere was Ivor, going farther away from me every moment,
though last night at about this time he had been telling me how he loved
me, how I was the One Girl in the world for him, and always, always
would be. Here was I, remembering in spite of myself every word he had
said, hearing again the sound of his voice and seeing the look in his
eyes as he said it. There was he, going to the woman for whose sake he
had been willing to break with me.
But was he going to her? I asked myself. If not, when they had chaffed
him he might easily have mentioned what his engagement really was,
knowing, as he must have known, exactly how he made me suffer.
Still--why had he looked so miserable, if he didn't care what I thought,
and was really ready to throw me over at a call from her? The whole
thing began to appear more complicated, more mysterious than I had felt
it to be at first, when I was smarting with my disappointment in Ivor,
and tingling all over with the humiliation he seemed to have put upon
me.
"Oh, to know, to _know_, what he's doing at this minute!" I whispered,
half aloud, because it was comforting in my loneliness to hear the sound
of my own voice. "To _know_ whether I'm doing him the most awful
injustice--or not!"
Just then, at the door between my room and Lisa's, next to mine, came a
tapping, and instantly after the handle was tried. But I had turned the
key, thinking that perhaps this very thing might happen--that Lisa might
wish to come, and not wait till I'd given her permission. She does that
sort of thing sometimes, for she is rather curious and impish (Ivor
calls her "Imp"), and if she thinks people don't want her that is the
very time when she most wants them.
"Oh, Di, do let me in!" she exclaimed.
For a second or two I didn't answer. Never in my life had I liked poor
Lisa less than I'd liked her for the last four and twenty hours, though
I'd told myself over and over again that she meant well, that she was
acting for my good, and that some day I would be grateful instead of
longing to slap her, as I couldn't help doing now. But always before,
when she has irritated me until I've nearly forgotten my promise to her
father (my step-father) always to be gentle with her in thought and
deed, I have felt such pangs of remorse that I've tried to atone, even
when there wasn't really anything to atone for, except in my mind. I was
afraid that, if I refused to let her come in, she would go to bed angry
with me. And when Lisa is angry she generally has a heart attack and is
ill next day. "Di, are you there?" she called again.
Without answering, I went to the door and unlocked it. She came in with
a rush. "I feel perfectly wild, as if I must do something desperate,"
she said.
So did I, but I didn't mean to let her know that.
"I'm going out," she went on. "If I don't, I shall have a fit."
"Out!" I repeated. "You can't. It's midnight."
"Can't? There's no such word for me as 'can't,' when I want to do
anything, and you ought to know that," said she. "It's only being ill
that ever stops me, and I'm not ill to-night. I feel as if electricity
were flowing all through me, making my nerves jump, and I believe you
feel exactly the same way. Your eyes are as big as half-crowns, and as
black as ink."
"I _am_ a little nervous," I confessed. And I couldn't help thinking it
odd that Lisa and I should both be feeling that electrical sensation at
the same time. "Perhaps it's in the air. Maybe there's going to be a
thunder-storm. There are clouds over the stars, and a wind coming up."
"Maybe it's partly that, maybe not," said she. "But there's one thing
I'm sure of. _Something's going to happen._"
"Do you feel that, too?" I broke out before I'd stopped to think. Then I
wished I hadn't. But it was too late to wish. Lisa caught me up quickly.
"Ah, I _knew_ you did!" she cried, looking as eerie and almost as
haggard as a witch. "Something _is_ going to happen. Come. Go with me
and be in it, whatever it is."
"No," I said. "And you mustn't go either." But she was weird. She seemed
to lure me, like a strange little siren, with all a siren's witchery,
though without her beauty. My voice sounded undecided, and I knew it.
"Of course I'm not asking you to wander with me in the night, hand in
hand through the streets of Paris, like the Two Orphans," said Lisa.
"I'm going to have a closed carriage--a motor-brougham, one belonging to
the hotel, so it's quite safe. It's ordered already, and I shall first
drive and drive until my nerves stop jerking and my head throbbing. If
you won't drive with me I shall drive alone. But there'll be no harm in
it, either way. I didn't know you were so conventional as to think there
could be. Where's your brave, independent American spirit?"
"I'm not conventional," I said.
"Yes, you are. Living in England has spoiled you. You're afraid of
things you never used to be afraid of."
"I'm not afraid of things, and I'm not a bit changed," I said. "You only
want to 'dare' me."
"I want you to go with me. It would be so much nicer than going alone,"
she begged. "Supposing I got ill in a hired cab? I might, you know; but
I _can't_ stay indoors, whatever happens. If we were together it would
be an adventure worth remembering."
"Very well," I said, "I'll go with you, not for the adventure, but
rather than have you make a fuss because I try to keep you in, and
rather than you should go alone."
"Good girl!" exclaimed Lisa, quite pleasant and purring, now that she
had got her way; though if I'd refused she would probably have cried.
She is terrifying when she cries. Great, deep sobs seem almost to tear
her frail little body to pieces. She goes deadly white, and sometimes
ends up by a fit of trembling as if she were in an ague.
"Have you really ordered a motor cab?" I asked.
"Yes," said she. "I rang for a waiter, and sent him down to tell the big
porter at the front door to get me one. Then I gave him five francs, and
said I did not want anybody to know, because I must visit a poor, sick
friend who had written to say she was in great trouble, but wished to
tell no one except me that she'd come to Paris."
"I shouldn't have thought such an elaborate story necessary to a
waiter," I remarked, tossing up my chin a little, for I don't like
Lisa's subterranean ways. But this time she didn't even try to defend
herself.
"Let's get ready at once," she said. "I'm going to put on my long
travelling cloak, to cover up this dress, and wear my black toque, with
a veil. I suppose you'll do the same? Then we can slip out, and down the
'service' stairs. The carriage is to wait for us at the side entrance."
I looked at her, trying to read her secretive little face. "Lisa, are
you planning to go somewhere in particular, do something you want to
'spring' on me when it's too late for me to get out of it?"
"How horrid of you to be so suspicious of me! You _do_ hurt my feelings!
I haven't had an inspiration yet, so I can't make a plan. But it will
come; I know it will. I shall _feel_ where we ought to go, to be in the
midst of an adventure--oh, without being mixed up in it, so don't look
horrified! I told you that something was going to happen, and that I
wanted to be in it. Well, I mean to be, when the inspiration comes."
We put on our dark hats and long travelling cloaks. I pinned on Lisa's
veil, and my own. Then she peeped to see if anyone were about; but there
was nobody in the corridor. We hurried out, and as Lisa already knew
where to find the 'service' stairs, we were soon on the way down. At the
side entrance of the hotel the motor-cab was waiting, and when we were
both seated inside, Lisa spoke in French to the driver, who waited for
orders.
"I think you might take us to the Rue d'Hollande. Drive fast, please.
After that, I'll tell you where to go next."
"Is this your 'inspiration'?" I asked.
"I'm not sure yet. Why?" and her voice was rather sharp.
"For no particular reason. I'm a little curious, that's all."
We drove on for some minutes in silence. I was sure now that Lisa had
been playing with me, that all along she had had some special
destination in her mind, and that she had her own reasons for wanting to
bring me to it. But what use to ask more questions? She did not mean me
to find out until she was ready for me to know.
She had told the man to go quickly, and he obeyed. He rushed us round
corners and through street after street which I had never seen
before--quiet streets, where there were no cabs, and no gay people
coming home from theatres and dinners. At last we turned into a
particularly dull little street, and stopped.
"Is this the Rue d'Hollande?" Lisa enquired of the driver, jumping
quickly up and putting her head out of the window.
"_Mais oui, Mademoiselle_," I heard the man answer.
"Then stop where you are, please, until I give you new orders."
"I should have thought this was the sort of street where nothing could
possibly happen," said I.
"Wait a little, and maybe you'll find out you're mistaken. If nothing
does, and we aren't amused, we can go on somewhere else."
She had not finished speaking when a handsome electric carriage spun
almost noiselessly round the corner. It slowed down before a gate set in
a high wall, almost covered with creepers, and though the street was
dimly lighted and we had stopped at a little distance, I could see that
the house behind the wall, though not large, was very quaint and pretty,
an unusual sort of house for Paris, it seemed to me.
Scarcely had the electric carriage come to a halt when the chauffeur, in
neat, dark livery, jumped down to open the door; and quickly a tall,
slim woman sprang out, followed by another, elderly and stout, who
looked like a lady's maid.
I could not see the face of either, but the light of the lamp on our
side of the way shone on the hair of the slim young woman in black, who
got down first. It was gorgeous hair, the colour of burnished copper. I
had heard a man say once that only two women in the world had hair of
that exact shade: Jane Hading and Maxine de Renzie.
My heart gave a great bound, and I guessed in an instant why Lisa had
brought me here, though how she could have learned where to find the
house, I didn't know.
"Oh, Lisa!" I reproached her. "How _could_ you?"
"It really _was_ an inspiration. I'm sure of that now," she said
quietly, though I could tell by her tone that she was trying to hide
excitement. "You never saw that woman before, except once on the stage,
yet you know who she is. You jumped as if she had fired a shot at you."
"I know by the hair," I answered. "I might have foreseen this would be
the kind of thing you would think of--it's like you."
"You ought to be grateful to me for thinking of it," said Lisa. "It's
entirely for your sake; and it's quite true, it was an inspiration to
come here. This afternoon in the train I read an interview in 'Femina'
with Maxine de Renzie, about the new play she's produced to-night. There
was a picture of her, and a description of her house in the Rue
d'Hollande."
"Now you have satisfied your curiosity. You've seen her back, and her
maid's back, and the garden wall," I said, more sharply than I often
speak to Lisa. "I shall tell the driver to take us to the hotel at once.
I know why you want to wait here, but you shan't--I won't. I'm going
away as quickly as I can."
She caught my dress as I would have leaned out to speak to the driver.
Her manner had suddenly changed, and she was all softness and sweetness,
and persuasiveness.
"Di, dearest girl, _don't_ be cross with me; please don't
misunderstand," she implored. "I love you, you know, even if you
sometimes think I don't; I want you to be happy--oh, wait a moment, and
listen. I've been so miserable all day, knowing you were miserable; and
I've felt horribly guilty for fear, after all, I'd said too much. Of
course if you'd guessed where I meant to come, you wouldn't have stirred
out of the hotel, and it was better for you to see for yourself. Unless
Ivor Dundas came here with a motor-cab, as we did, he could hardly have
arrived yet, so if he does come, we shall know. If he _doesn't_ come, we
shall know, too. Think how happy you'll feel if he _doesn't!_ I'll
apologise to you then, frankly and freely; and I suppose you would not
mind apologising to him, if necessary?"
"He may be in the house now," I said, more to myself than to Lisa.
"If he is, he'll come out and meet her when he hears the gate open.
There, it's open now. The maid's unlocked it. No, there's nobody in the
garden."
"I can't stop here and watch for him, like a spy," I said.
"Not like a spy, but like a girl who thinks she may have done a man an
injustice. It's for _his_ sake I ask you to stay. And if you won't, I
must stay alone. If you insist on going away, I'll get out and stand in
the street, either until Ivor Dundas has come, or until I'm sure he
isn't coming. But how much better to wait and see for yourself."
"You know I can't go off and leave you standing here," I answered. "And
I can't leave you sitting in the carriage, and walk through the streets
alone. I might meet--" I would not finish my sentence, but Lisa must
nave guessed the name on my lips.
"The only thing to do, then, is for us to stop where we are, together,"
said Lisa, "for stop I must and shall, in justice to myself, to Ivor
Dundas and to you. You couldn't force me away, even if you wanted to use
force."
"Which you know is out of the question," I said, desperately. "But why
has your conscience begun to reproach you for trying to put me against
Ivor? You seemed to have no scruples whatever, last night and this
morning."
"I've been thinking hard since then. I want my warning to you either to
be justified, or else I want to apologise humbly. For if Ivor doesn't
come to this house to-night, in spite of his embarrassment when he spoke
about an engagement, I shall believe that he doesn't care a rap about
Maxine de Renzie."
I said no more, but leaned back against the cushions, my heart beating
as if it were in my throat, and my brain throbbing in time with it. I
could not think, or argue with myself what was really right and wise to
do. I could only give myself up, and drift with circumstances.
"A man has just come round the far corner," whispered Lisa. "Is it Ivor?
I can't make out. He doesn't look our way."
"Thank Heaven we're too far off for him to see our faces! I would rather
die than have Ivor know we're here," I broke out.
"I don't think it is Ivor," Lisa went on. "He's hidden himself in the
shadow, as if he were watching. It's _that_ house he's interested in.
Who can he be, if not Ivor? A detective, perhaps."
"Why should a detective watch Mademoiselle de Renzie's house?" I asked,
in spite of myself.
Lisa seemed a little confused, as if she had said something she
regretted.
"I don't know, I'm sure," she answered hastily. "Why, indeed? It was
just a thought. The man seems so anxious not to be seen. Oh--keep back,
Di, don't look out for an instant, till he's passed. Ivor is coming now.
He's walking in a great hurry. There! he can't see you. He's far enough
away for you to peep, and see for yourself. He's at Maxine de Renzie's
gate."
It was all over, then, and no more hope. His eyes when they gave me that
tragic look had lied, even as his lips had lied last night, when he told
me there was no other woman in his world but me.
"I won't look," I stammered, almost choking.
"Someone, I can't see who, is letting him in. The gate's shut behind
him."
"Let us go now," I begged.
"No, no, not yet!" cried Lisa. "I must know what happens next. We are in
the midst of it, indeed."
I hardly cared what she did, now. Ivor had come to see Maxine de Renzie,
and nothing else mattered very much. I had no strength to insist that we
should go.
"I wonder what the man in the shadow would do if he saw us?" Lisa said.
Then she leaned out, on the side away from the hiding man, and softly
told our chauffeur to go very slowly along the street. This he did, but
the man did not move.
"Stop before that house behind the wall with the creepers," directed
Lisa, but I would not allow that.
"No, he shall not stop there!" I exclaimed. "Lisa, I forbid it. You've
had your way in everything so far. I won't let you have it in this."
"Very well, we'll turn the corner into the next street, to please you,"
said Lisa; and she gave orders to the chauffeur again. "Now stop," she
cried, when we had gone half way down the street, out of sight and
hearing of anyone in the Rue d'Hollande. Then, in another instant,
before I had any idea what she meant to do, she was out of the cab,
running like a child in the direction whence we had come. I looked after
her, hesitating whether or not to follow (for I could not bear to risk
meeting Ivor), and saw that she paused at the corner. She was peeping
into the Rue d'Hollande, to find out what was happening there.
"She will come back in a moment or two," I said to myself wearily, and
sat waiting. For a little while she stood with her long dress gathered
up under her cloak: then she darted round the corner and vanished. If
she had not appeared again almost at once, I should have had to tell the
driver to follow, though I hated the thought of going again into the
street where Maxine de Renzie lived. But she did come, and in her hand
was a pretty little brocade bag embroidered with gold or silver that
sparkled even in the faint light.
"I saw this lying in the street, and ran to pick it up," she exclaimed.
"You might better have left it," I said stiffly. "Perhaps Mademoiselle
de Renzie dropped it."
"No, I don't think so. It wasn't in front of her house."
"It may belong to that man who was watching, then."
"It doesn't look much like a thing that a man would carry about with
him, does it?"
"No," I admitted, indifferently. "Now we will go home."
"Don't you want to wait and see how long Ivor Dundas stops?"
"Indeed I don't!" I cried. "I don't want to know any more about him."
And for the moment I almost believed that what I said was true.
"Very well," said Lisa, "perhaps we do know enough to prove to us both
that I haven't anything to reproach myself with. And the less you think
about him after this, the better."
"I shan't think about him at all," I said. But I knew that was a boast I
should never be able to keep, try as I might. I felt now that I could
understand how people must feel when they are very old and weary of
life. I don't believe that I shall feel older and more tired if I live
to be eighty than I felt then. It was a slight comfort to know that we
were on our way back to the hotel, and that soon I should be in my room
alone, with the door shut and locked between Lisa and me; but it was
only very slight. I couldn't imagine ever being really pleased about
anything again.
"You will marry Lord Robert now, I suppose," chirped Lisa, "and show
Ivor Dundas that he hasn't spoiled your life."
As she asked this question she was tugging away at a knot in the ribbons
that tied the bag she had found.
"Perhaps I shall," I answered. "I might do worse."
"I should think you might!" exclaimed Lisa. "Oh, do accept him soon. I
don't want Ivor Dundas to say to himself that you're broken-hearted for
him. Lord Bob is sure to propose to you to-morrow--even if he hasn't
already: and if he has, he'll do it again. I saw it in his eye all
to-day. He was dying to speak at any minute, if only he'd got a chance
with you alone. You _will_ say 'yes' when he does, won't you, and have
the engagement announced at once?"
"I'll see how I feel at the time, if it comes," I answered, trying to
speak gaily, but making a failure of it.
At last Lisa had got the brocade bag open, and was looking in. She
seemed surprised by what she saw, and very much interested. She put in
her hand, and touched the thing, whatever it was; but she did not tell
me what was there. Probably she wanted to excite my curiosity, and make
me ask. But I didn't care enough to humour her. If the bag had been
stuffed full of the most gorgeous jewels in the world, at that moment I
shouldn't have been interested in the least. I saw Lisa give a little
sidelong peep up at me, to see if I were watching; but when she found me
looking entirely indifferent, she tied up the bag again and stowed it
away in one of the deep pockets of her travelling cloak.
I was afraid that, when we'd arrived at the hotel and gone up to our
rooms Lisa might want to stop with me, and be vexed when I turned her
out, as I felt I must do. But she seemed to have lost interest in me and
my affairs, now that all doubt was settled. She didn't even wish to talk
over what had happened; but when I bade her good-night, simply said,
"good-night" in return, and let me shut the door between the rooms.
"I suppose," I thought, "that the best thing I shall have to hope for
after this, until I grow quite old, is to sleep, and be happy in my
dreams." But though I tried hard to put away thoughts of all kinds, and
fall asleep, I couldn't. My eyes would not stay closed for more than a
minute at a time; and always I found myself staring at the window, hour
after hour, hoping for the light.