Ernestine was a delightful hostess, she loved situations, and her social
tact was illimitable. In a few minutes Trent was seated in a comfortable
and solid chair with a little round table by his side, drinking tea and
eating buttered scones, and if not altogether at his ease very nearly
so. Opposite him was Davenant, dying to escape yet constrained to be
agreeable, and animated too with a keen, distasteful curiosity to
watch Ernestine's methods. And Ernestine herself chatted all the time,
diffused good fellowship and tea--she made an atmosphere which had a
nameless fascination for the man who had come to middle-age without
knowing what a home meant. Davenant studied him and became thoughtful.
He took note of the massive features, the iron jaw, the eyes as bright
as steel, and his thoughtfulness became anxiety. Ernestine too was
strong, but this man was a rock. What would happen if she carried out
her purpose, fooled, betrayed him, led him perhaps to ruin? Some day her
passion would leap up, she would tell him, they would be face to face,
injured man and taunting woman. Davenant had an ugly vision as he sat
there. He saw the man's eyes catch fire, the muscles of his face twitch,
he saw Ernestine shrink back, white with terror and the man followed
her.
“Cecil! Aren't you well? you're looking positively ghastly!”
He pulled himself together--it had been a very realistic little
interlude.
“Bad headache!” he said, smiling. “By the by, I must go!”
“If you ever did such a thing as work,” she remarked, “I should say that
you had been doing too much. As it is, I suppose you have been sitting
up too late. Goodbye. I am so glad that you were here to meet Mr. Trent.
Mr. Davenant is my cousin, you know,” she continued, turning to her
visitor, “and he is almost the only one of my family who has not cast me
off utterly.”
Davenant made his adieux with a heavy heart. He hated the hypocrisy with
which he hoped for Scarlett Trent's better acquaintance and the latter's
bluff acceptance of an invitation to look him up at his club. He walked
out into the street cursing his mad offer to her and the whole business.
But Ernestine was very well satisfied.
She led Trent to talk about Africa again, and he plunged into the
subject without reserve. He told her stories and experiences with a
certain graphic and picturesque force which stamped him as the possessor
of an imaginative power and command of words for which she would
scarcely have given him credit. She had the unusual gift of making the
best of all those with whom she came in contact. Trent felt that he was
interesting her, and gained confidence in himself.
All the time she was making a social estimate of him. He was not by any
means impossible. On the contrary there was no reason why he should not
become a success. That he was interested in her was already obvious, but
that had become her intention. The task began to seem almost easy as she
sat and listened to him.
Then he gave her a start. Quietly and without any warning he changed the
subject into one which was fraught with embarrassment for her. At his
first words the colour faded from her cheeks.
“I've been pretty lucky since I got back. Things have gone my way a
bit and the only disappointment I've had worth speaking of has been in
connection with a matter right outside money. I've been trying to find
the daughter of that old partner of mine--I told you about her--and I
can't.”
She changed her seat a little. There was no need for her to affect any
interest in what he was saying. She listened to every word intently.
“Monty,” he said reflectingly, “was a good old sort in a way, and I had
an idea, somehow, that his daughter would turn out something like the
man himself, and at heart Monty was all right. I didn't know who she was
or her name--Monty was always precious close, but I had the address of a
firm of lawyers who knew all about her. I called there the other day and
saw an old chap who questioned and cross-questioned me until I wasn't
sure whether I was on my head or my heels, and, after all, he told me
to call again this afternoon for her address. I told him of course that
Monty died a pauper and he'd no share of our concession to will away,
but I'd done so well that I thought I'd like to make over a trifle to
her--in fact I'd put away 10,000 pounds worth of Bekwando shares for
her. I called this afternoon, and do you know, Miss Wendermott, the
young lady declined to have anything to say to me--wouldn't let me know
who she was that I might have gone and talked this over in a friendly
way with her. Didn't want money, didn't want to hear about her father!”
“You must have been disappointed.”
“I'll admit it,” he replied. “I was; I'd come to think pretty well of
Monty although he was a loose fish and I'd a sort of fancy for seeing
his daughter.”
She took up a screen as though to shield the fire from her face.
Would the man's eyes never cease questioning her--could it be that he
suspected? Surely that was impossible!
“Why have you never tried to find her before?” she asked.
“That's a natural question enough,” he admitted. “Well, first, I only
came across a letter Monty wrote with the address of those lawyers a
few days ago, and, secondly, the Bekwando Mine and Land Company has only
just boomed, and you see that made me feel that I'd like to give a lift
up to any one belonging to poor old Monty I could find. I've a mind to
go on with the thing myself and find out somehow who this young lady
is!”
“Who were the lawyers?”
“Cuthbert and Cuthbert.”
“They are most respectable people,” she said. “I know Mr. Cuthbert and
their standing is very high. If Mr. Cuthbert told you that the young
lady wished to remain unknown to you, I am quite sure that you may
believe him.”
“That's all right,” Trent said, “but here's what puzzles me. The girl
may be small enough and mean enough to decline to have anything to
say to me because her father was a bad lot, and she doesn't want to be
reminded of him, but for that very reason can you imagine her virtually
refusing a large sum of money? I told old Cuthbert all about it. There
was 10,000 pounds worth of shares waiting for her and no need for any
fuss. Can you understand that?”
“It seems very odd,” she said. “Perhaps the girl objects to being given
money. It is a large sum to take as a present from a stranger.”
“If she is that sort of girl,” he said decidedly, “she would at least
want to meet and talk with the man who saw the last of her father. No,
there's something else in it, and I think that I ought to find her.
Don't you?”
She hesitated.
“I'm afraid I can't advise you,” she said; “only if she has taken so
much pains to remain unknown, I am not sure--I think that if I were you
I would assume that she has good reason for it.”
“I can see no good reason,” he said, “and there is a mystery behind it
which I fancy would be better cleared up. Some day I will tell you more
about it.”
Evidently Ernestine was weary of the subject, for she suddenly changed
it. She led him on to talk of other things. When at last he glanced at
the clock he was horrified to see how long he had stayed.
“You'll remember, I hope, Miss Wendermott,” he said, “that this is the
first afternoon call I've ever paid. I've no idea how long I ought to
have stayed, but certainly not two hours.”
“The time has passed quickly,” she said, smiling upon him, so that his
momentary discomfort passed away. “I have been very interested in the
stories of your past, Mr. Trent, but do you know I am quite as much
interested, more so even, in your future.”
“Tell me what you mean,” he asked.
“You have so much before you, so many possibilities. There is so much
that you may gain, so much that you may miss.”
He looked puzzled.
“I have a lot of money,” he said. “That's all! I haven't any friends
nor any education worth speaking of. I don't see quite where the
possibilities come in.”
She crossed the room and came over close to his side, resting her arm
upon the mantelpiece. She was still wearing her walking-dress, prim and
straight in its folds about her tall, graceful figure, and her hair,
save for the slight waviness about the forehead, was plainly dressed.
There were none of the cheap arts about her to which Trent had become
accustomed in women who sought to attract. Yet, as she stood looking
down at him, a faint smile, half humorous, half satirical, playing about
the corners of her shapely mouth, he felt his heart beat faster than
ever it had done in any African jungle. It was the nervous and
emotional side of the man to which she appealed. He felt unlike himself,
undergoing a new phase of development. There was something stirring
within him which he could not understand.
“You haven't any friends,” she said softly, “nor any education, but you
are a millionaire! That is quite sufficient. You are a veritable Caesar
with undiscovered worlds before you.”
“I wish I knew what you meant,” he said, with some hesitation.
She laughed softly.
“Don't you understand,” she said, “that you are the fashion? Last year
it was Indian Potentates, the year before it was actors, this year it
is millionaires. You have only to announce yourself and you may take
any place you choose in society. You have arrived at the most auspicious
moment. I can assure you that before many months are past you will know
more people than ever you have spoken to in your life before--men whose
names have been household words to you and nothing else will be calling
you 'old chap' and wanting to sell you horses, and women, who last week
would look at you through lorgnettes as though you were a denizen of
some unknown world, will be lavishing upon you their choicest smiles and
whispering in your ear their 'not at home' afternoon. Oh, it's lucky
I'm able to prepare you a little for it, or you would be taken quite by
storm.”
He was unmoved. He looked at her with a grim tightening of the lips.
“I want to ask you this,” he said. “What should I be the better for it
all? What use have I for friends who only gather round me because I am
rich? Shouldn't I be better off to have nothing to do with them, to live
my own life, and make my own pleasures?”
She shrugged her shoulders.
“These people,” she said, “of whom I have been speaking are masters
of the situation. You can't enjoy money alone! You want to race, hunt,
entertain, shoot, join in the revels of country houses! You must be one
of them or you can enjoy nothing.”
Monty's words were ringing back in his ears. After all, pleasures could
be bought--but happiness!
“And you,” he said, “you too think that these things you have mentioned
are the things most to be desired in life?”
A certain restraint crept into her manner.
“Yes,” she answered simply.
“I have been told,” he said, “that you have given up these things to
live your life differently. That you choose to be a worker. You have
rich relations--you could be rich yourself!”
She looked him steadily in the face.
“You are wrong,” she said, “I have no money. I have not chosen a
profession willingly--only because I am poor!”
“Ah!”
The monosyllable was mysterious to her. But for the wild improbability
of the thing she would have wondered whether indeed he knew her secret.
She brushed the idea away. It was impossible.
“At least,” he said, “you belong to these people.”
“Yes,” she answered, “I am one of the poor young women of society.”
“And you would like,” he continued, “to be one of the rich ones--to take
your place amongst them on equal terms. That is what you are looking
forward to in life!”
She laughed gaily.
“Of course I am! If there was the least little chance of it I should be
delighted. You mustn't think that I'm different from other girls in that
respect because I'm more independent. In this country there's only one
way of enjoying life thoroughly, and that you will find out for yourself
very soon.”
He rose and held out his hand.
“Thank you very much,” he said, “for letting me come. May I--”
“You may come,” she said quietly, “as often as you like.”