IN THE PARK.
He only knew that he experienced a subtle pleasure in listening to the
talk of this young girl, in watching the varying expression of her face,
in admiring her beautiful eyes. The easy and graceful friendship they
both seemed to entertain for each other was the simplest, most natural
thing in the world. There could be no danger in it. Anerley's life had
been too full of action to give him the deadly gift of introspection;
but in no possible mood of self-analysis could he have regarded the
temporary satisfaction of being near to and talking with the young
actress as anything else than a pleasant and ordinary and harmless
accident. He never for a moment dreamed of its producing any great
result. Had the thing been suggested to him, he would have replied that
both he and she understood each other perfectly: they had plenty to
think of in life without indulging in folly: they had their separate
work and interests and duties, and the casual pleasure they might obtain
by meeting as acquaintances was nobody's concern but their own.
The first attitude of affection is exclusiveness. When one sees two
young people sending glances across a dinner-table which are
intelligible to themselves alone; when one perceives them whispering to
each other while elsewhere the talk is general; when one observes them,
on opposite sides at croquet, missing hoops, and slipping balls, and
playing to aid each other in the most gratuitous, open, and unblushing
manner, it needs no profound divination to detect a secret
co-partnership between them. Two quite unselfish lovers immediately
become selfish in their united position of antagonism to the rest of the
world. And when the girl is pretty, the rest of the world consider such
selfishness to be simply hateful.
These two young people, who were not lovers, nor had any intention of
becoming lovers, walked up Victoria Road, and so made their way into the
cool green shadow of the great elms and leafy lindens which make
Kensington Gardens so delightful a lounge. It was now May--the only
month in which London trees seem to look cheerful--and the weather was
at its freshest and best.
"Mr. Melton proposes to close the theatre in a week or so," said Annie
Brunel, "for a month, in order to have it done up anew. He is very
anxious that I should not accept any engagement for that month; and I
have been thinking I ought to take Mrs. Christmas down to the seaside,
or perhaps over to the warm banks of the Rhine, for a week or two. Did
you remark how very poorly she is?"
"I did," said Will. "I asked her about it. She seems to fancy that our
madcap journey to Hounslow Heath brought the attack on."
"The grass was so wet, you know. I blame myself for it all; and indeed
there's nothing I wouldn't do for the dear old creature. She was my
only companion and friend for many a year."
"Won't you find it very dull going away all by yourselves?"
"Well, no. She is never dull. I never tire of her society a
moment--she is so full of vivacity and kindliness and funny stories; but
I do not like the idea of our going away anywhere alone. Hitherto, you
know, I have always been in a manner compelled to go by an engagement."
"Bring her down to St. Mary-Kirby, and let Dove and you go about with
her."
"Thank you. You have told me so much of that quiet little valley, and
the quiet way of living there, that I should feel like an evil spirit
invading paradise."
"Now, now--you are at it again," he said, laughing. "I won't have you
malign our honest country folks like that. My mother would make you her
daughter: she has a general faculty for making pets of everybody. And
my father would give you a touch of the old squirelike courtesy he
sometimes brings out when he is very grand and polite to some London
young lady who comes down to see us."
She only smiled in reply--a trifle sadly.
"I should like to see a little of that peaceful sort of life--perhaps
even to try it. Day after day to be always the same, always meeting the
same people, always looking out on the same trees and fields and river,
and hoping only for some change in the weather, or for a favourable turn
to the fortunes of one's pet hero. But then other cares must come.
That gentle little Dove, for instance--isn't she sitting just now
wondering when you will come to see her, and getting quite vexed because
you stay so long away?"
"You seem to have a great affection for Dove," he said.
"Haven't you?"
"Well, of course; who could help it?"
"If I were a man I should not try to help it; I should be prouder of the
love of such a girl than of anything under heaven."
Such conversations are not common between young unmarried people, but
neither of these two seemed to consider it strange that they should so
talk; for, indeed, Annie Brunel assumed towards Will an amusingly
matter-of-fact, kindly, almost maternal manner--so much so that, without
hesitation she would have told him that a little more attention to the
brushing of his rough brown hair and moustache might not have been
inappropriate before visiting a lady. Sometimes he was amused,
sometimes tantalized by this tone. He was a man verging towards thirty,
who had all his wits about him, who had seen plenty of the world, and
knew far more of its ways and beliefs and habits than he would have
liked to reveal to his companion then beside him; and he could scarcely
refrain from laughing at the airs of superior worldly wisdom which the
young actress gave herself, revealing in the assumption the charming
simplicity of her character.
They walked down one of the long avenues and crossed over into Hyde
Park. The Row was very full at this time; and the brightness of the day
seemed to have awoke an artificial briskness among the melancholy men
and plethoric girls who had come out for their forced exercise.
"I have been in nearly every capital in Europe," said Will to his
companion, "and I have never seen such a company of handsome men and
women as you may see here almost any day. And I never saw anywhere
people out to enjoy themselves looking so intensely sad over it."
"These are my employers;" said Miss Brunel, with a smile on her pale
dark face. "These are the people who pay me to amuse them."
"Look at this big heavy man coming up now," said Will. "Look how he
bobs in his saddle; one doesn't often see such a---- Why, it is----"
"Count Schoenstein," said Miss Brunel.
It was. And as the Count came up and saw Will walking by the side of a
closely-veiled and gracefully-dressed young lady, he took off his hat in
his finest manner, and was about to ride on. Perhaps it was the
luxuriant black hair or the graceful figure of the young girl which made
him pause for a second and recognise her. At all events, he no sooner
saw who she was than he stopped his horse, clumsily got down from the
saddle, and drawing the reins over the animal's head, came forward to
the railing.
"The very two people whom I wished to see," he observed, with a pompous
magnanimity. (Indeed there were several reasons why he was glad just
then to observe that Annie Brunel had taken kindly to the young man whom
he had introduced to her.) "Do you know, Miss Brunel, that Melton is
going to close his theatre for a month?"
"Yes."
"Could anything be more opportune? Now listen to what I have to
propose. You want a good holiday in this fine weather. Very well. I
must go over to Schoenstein at once to see about some alterations and
improvements I want made; and I propose to make it worth Mr. Anerley's
while to go with me and superintend part of these improvements. That is
an affair of necessity and business on my part and his; but why should
you and Mrs. Christmas not accept our convoy over there? Even if you
only go as far as one of the Rhine villages, we could see you safely
that distance. Or if I could persuade you to come and see my place,
such as it is--for a week or two. I think the excursion would be
delightful; and if I can't entertain you as sumptuously as a king, yet I
won't starve you, and I'll give you the best wine to be bought for good
money in Baden."
Will coloured up at the hideous barbarity of the closing sentence; but
Miss Brunel answered, good-naturedly:
"You're very kind indeed, Count; and I am sure the wine must be a great
inducement to Mr. Anerley. But if I go anywhere for a holiday, it will
be for Mrs. Christmas' sake; and I must see what she says about it
first."
"Oh, if it is Mrs. Christmas," said the Count, with a laugh, "I must try
to persuade her."
"No; I won't have any coercion. I will place the matter before her in
all its details, and she shall decide. If we don't go, I hope you'll
have a pleasant journey all the same."
"And as for you, Anerley, what do you say?"
"As our arrangement will be a business matter, we'll settle it another
time," said Will, in a decided tone, which prevented the Count making
further reference to buying and selling.
"I won't take any denial from any one of you," said the Count, with a
prodigious laugh. "As for Mrs. Christmas, if that little woman dares to
thwart me, I'll have her portrait published in the illustrated papers as
the wife of Rip Van Winkle."
With which astounding witticism, the Count proceeded to get on horseback
again--a rather difficult matter. Will held the stirrup for him,
however; and eventually he shook himself into the saddle.
Annie Brunel had lifted her veil to speak to the Count; and as her
companion now saw that there was a good deal of whispering and nodding
going on among several knots of riders, he thought it prudent to
withdraw himself and her into the Park. From thence they took their way
back through Kensington Gardens, and so home.
"Would it look strange in English eyes," asked Miss Brunel, frankly, "if
Mrs. Christmas and I, in travelling about, were to visit the Count's
place?"
"I don't think so," said Will. "And if it did, it wouldn't matter. I
think the party would be a very merry and pleasant one; and you would
not allow Mrs. Christmas to feel that for her sake you were moping alone
in some dull seaside lodgings. The Count is really very good-natured
and kind; and I think you would enjoy the quaint old people and their
manners down in the Black Forest."
"Have you been there?"
"Oh, yes. I have had a passing glance at every place, pretty nearly.
There you may have a little deer-shooting, if you like: I have seen two
ladies go out with guns, though they never did anything beyond letting
one of the guns fall and nearly killing a keeper."
"Will it be very expensive going over?" she asked quite naively, as
though she had been calculating the propriety of accepting a country
engagement.
"Not at all. Are you going to say 'Yes'?"
"If Mrs. Christmas does, I will."