Among other things, Lady Harden knew when to be silent, and now,
having made her speech, she sat watching Cleeve, as, aghast, he
dropped his rod until its flexible tip lay on the darkening water, and
stared off toward the house.
She had said it, and its effect on him was much what she had expected
it to be.
He was so young that his strength, she knew, was largely potential;
only she, as far as she knew, had ever observed its potentiality; to
others he was a handsome, merry, young animal, "keen on girls," as he
himself called it, and as innocent of any comprehension of the deeper
meanings of life as a pleasant poodle pup.
She, being of those who have eyes to see, had, during the three days
she had known him, watched him closely, with the result that he
interested her.
And now she had said to him this thing that so utterly disconcerted
him.
Partly out of kindness she had said it, and partly because it was the
quickest way to fix his genial but roving attention where she wished
it to be--on herself.
He was so young that her five years of seniority, and the existence of
her eleven-year-old son, had, to his mind, separated her from him by
something like a generation. He had found her a ripper as to looks,
awfully jolly to talk to and no end of a musician.
But he had never thought of her as belonging to his own class in
years, and she knew this.
And as she watched him first shrink and then straighten himself under
the blow she had given him, she knew that her first move was a
success.
For over a minute he did not speak. Then he looked up.
"How in the devil did you find that out?" he asked, abruptly.
"I saw it. Do you mind my warning you?"
"Good gracious, no. It's--most awfully kind of you. I--I really never
thought of such a thing. You see, she was always a great pal of
Dudley's--my eldest brother's."
Lady Harden laughed.
"So she seemed too old for--that sort of thing? I see. In fact, I
_saw_ from the first, and that is why I ventured---- We have drifted
nearly to the willows, by the way."
He laid his neglected rod in the bottom of the boat, and rowed in
silence until his companion resumed, lighting a cigarette, and
speaking with easy deliberation between puffs: "She is thirty-four,
and--that is not old, nowadays. The Duke of Cornwall is crazy to marry
her, by the way."
"Cornwall!"
"Cornwall. And--there are others. My dear Teddy--may I, a contemporary
of Miss--Methuselah--call you Teddy? Are you really so _naif_ as not
to have known?"
It was almost dark, but she could still see the flush that burnt his
face at the question.
"I hadn't the slightest idea," he protested, indignantly, jerking the
boat into the boathouse.
"But why have you been making love to her so--outrageously?"
She rose and stood balancing herself gracefully while she lit a fresh
cigarette. Her figure was remarkably good.
"Making love to her? I? Nonsense!" he returned, rudely. "She's the
best dancer in the house, and the best sort, all round--those
Warringham girls are frights, and the little Parham thing
is--poisonous."
"But--at breakfast, who fetched her eggs and bacon? Who made her tea?
Who----"
She held out her hand as she spoke, and leaned on him as she got out
of the boat.
"Who got _your_ eggs and bacon, then?" he retorted.
It was the first sounding of the Personal tone, and behind the
cigarette her lips quivered for a fraction of a second.
Then, looking up at him: "Colonel Durrant--a contemporary of my own,
as is right and proper."
"A contemporary--why, the man's old enough to be your father!"
"No." They had left the dusky darkness of the trees, and struck off
across the lawn. "He could hardly be my father, as he's forty-five and
I--thirty!"
Then silence fell, and she knew that he was somewhat tumultuously
readjusting his thoughts. If Mrs. Fraser, who was thirty-four, was in
love with him, then this woman with the sleepy, farseeing eyes, who
was only thirty--what an ass he had been! Just because he had known
Bess Fraser ever since he was a kid, and because Lady Harden was a
great swell, and wore diamond crowns and things, and had a son at
Harrow----
And Lady Harden, apparently dreamily enjoying the exquisite evening,
read his thoughts with the greatest ease, and smiled to herself--the
vague smile that consisted more of a slight, dimpled lift of her upper
lip than of a widening of her mouth.
That evening, by some caprice, she wore no diamonds, and the simplest
of her rather sumptuous gowns.
Colonel Durrant, who had fallen deeply in love with her ten years
before, and never fallen out, whispered to her that she looked twenty.
And as she smiled in answer, her eyes met Teddy Cleeve's.
* * * * *
Mrs. Fraser, quite unconsciously, gave the great Lady Harden all the
information she wanted.
And Lady Harden--her greatness, in several ways, was an undoubted
fact, and the proof of this is that only two people in the world
suspected it--was insatiable in the matter of information.
Like a boa constrictor, her tremendous curiosity would sleep for
months, and then, on awakening, it hungered with a most mighty and
most devastating hunger.
And her concentrative force was such that while one person interested
her, she lived in a small world, half of which was in blackest shadow,
half in brightest light, and in the shadow she stood, watching the
only other person who, for the time being, existed.
Bess Fraser, after dinner, told her, quite without knowing it, the
whole story of her own rather absurd love for the boy.
She had once been engaged to Dudley Cleeves; she had known Teddy as a
little fellow in long sailor trousers and white blouses; he had had
the _dearest_ curls--had Lady Harden noticed that the close-cropped
hair turned up at the ends even now?
He had been an obstinate child, always good-tempered but always bent
on his own way. He was his mother's pet, and was by her always
plentifully supplied with money, so that the world was for him a
smiling place.
He had insisted on going into the navy--or, rather, he had not
insisted; he had simply taken for granted that he was to go, and he
had gone.
He had always been in love, but never with one girl for long. "Of
course, he's a perfect child," Mrs. Fraser added, with elaborate
carelessness.
She herself had been a widow for five years. She was a magnificently
beautiful woman, much handsomer than Lady Harden, but she did not know
her own points, and wore the wrong colors.
Lady Harden, watching her while she talked, knew how ashamed she was
of her love for Teddy Cleeve, and, constitutionally kind and
comforting, the younger woman tried to put her at her ease by chiming
in with her tone of detached, middle-aged friendliness toward the
beautiful youth.
"He is a _dear_ boy," she agreed; "I do like to see him dance! He's so
big and strong. Billy, my boy, is going to be big, too, and I only
hope he'll turn out like this Teddy!"
And Teddy, attracted, while rather frightened, by the idea of Mrs.
Fraser's caring for him, made love to her spasmodically, just to
convince himself, and then, convinced by something in her voice, fled
to Lady Harden for protection, and was scolded by her.
"You are a wretch," she said, looking up at him. She was a small
woman, and in this day of giantesses this has its charm.
"A wretch?"
"Yes. You are a flirt."
Of course, he was delighted by this accusation, and smiled down, his
teeth gleaming under his young, yellow mustache.
"I am a saint," he declared, with conviction. "A young,
innocent--anchorite."
"Young--yes. You are _very_ young, Mr. Cleeve."
"You called me Teddy this afternoon."
"Then I was a very abandoned person."
"Please be abandoned again. By the way, the colonel expiated many
times at dinner, didn't he?"