A GLEAM OF SUNSHINE.
Lady Hilda Tregellis rang the bell resolutely. 'I shall have no
more nonsense about it,' she said to herself in her most decisive
and determined manner. 'Whether mamma wishes it or not, I shall go
and see them this very day without another word upon the subject.'
The servant answered the bell and stood waiting for his orders by
the doorway.
'Harris, will you tell Jenkins at once that I shall want
the carriage at half-past eleven?'
'Yes, my lady.'
'All right then. That'll do. Don't stand staring at me there like
an image, but go this minute and do as I tell you.'
'Beg pardon, my lady, but her ladyship said she wanted the carriage
herself at twelve puncshual.'
'She can't have it, then, Harris. That's all. Go and give my message
to Jenkins at once, and I'll settle about the carriage with my lady
myself.'
'She's the rummest young lady ever I come across,' the man murmured
to himself in a dissatisfied fashion, as he went down the stairs
again: 'but there, it's none of my business, thank goodness. The
places and the people she does go and hunt up when she's got the
fit on are truly ridic'lous: blest if she didn't acshally make Mr.
Jenkins drive her down into Camberwell the other mornin', to see
'ow the poor lived, she said; as if it mattered tuppence to us in
our circles of society 'ow the poor live. I wonder what little game
she's up to now? Well, well, what the aristocracy is coming to in
these days is more'n I can fathom, as sure as my name's William
'Arris.'
The little game that Lady Hilda was up to that morning was one that
a gentleman in Mr. Harris's position was certainly hardly like to
appreciate or sympathise with.
The evening before, she had met Arthur Berkeley once more at a small
At Home, and had learned from him full particulars as to the dire
straits into which the poor Le Bretons had finally fallen. Now,
Hilda Tregellis was a kind-hearted girl at bottom, and when she
heard all about it, she said at once to Arthur, 'I shall go and
see them myself to-morrow, Mr. Berkeley, whether mamma allows me
or not.'
'What good will it do?' Arthur had answered her quickly. 'You
can't find work for poor Le Breton, can you? and of course if you
can't do that you can be of no earthly use in any way to the poor
creatures.'
'I don't know about that,' Hilda responded warmly. 'Sympathy's
always something, isn't it, Mr. Berkeley? Nobody ought to know that
better than you do. Besides, there's no saying when one may happen
to turn up useful. Of course, I've never been of the slightest use
to anybody in all my life, myself, I know, and I dare say I never
shall be, but at least there's no harm in trying, is there? I'm on
speaking terms with such an awful lot of people, all of them rich
and many of them influential--Parliament, and Government offices,
and all that sort of nonsense, you know--people who have no end
of things to give away, and can't tell who on earth they'd better
give them to, for fear of offending all the others, that I might
possibly hear of something or other.'
'I'm afraid, Lady Hilda,' Berkeley answered smiling, 'none of those
people would have anything to offer that could possibly be of the
slightest use to poor Le Breton. If he's to be saved at all, he
must be saved in his own time and by his own methods. For my own
part, I don't see what conceivable chance of success in life there
is left for him. You can't imagine a man like him making money
and living comfortably. It's a tragedy--all the dramas of real life
always ARE tragedies; but I'm terribly afraid there's no conceivable
way out of it.'
Lady Hilda only looked at him with bold good humour. 'Nonsense,'
she said bravely. 'All pure rubbishing pessimistic nonsense. (I
hope pessimistic's the right word--it's a very good word, anyhow,
even if it isn't in the proper place.) Well, I don't agree with you
at all about this question, Mr. Berkeley. I'm very fond of Mr. Le
Breton, really very fond of him; and I believe there's a corner
somewhere for every man if only he can jog down properly into his
own corner instead of being squeezed forcibly into somebody else's.
The worst of it is, all the holes are round, and Mr. Le Breton's
a square man, I allow: he wants all the angles cutting down off
him.'
'But you can't cut them off; that's the very trouble,' Arthur answered,
with just a faint rising suspicion that he was half jealous of the
interest Hilda showed even in poor lonely Ernest Le Breton. Gracious
heavens! could he be playing false at last to the long-cherished
memory of little Miss Butterfly? could he be really beginning to
fall just a little in love, after all, with this bold beautiful
Lady Hilda Tregellis? He didn't know, and yet he somehow hardly
liked himself to think it. And while Edie was still so poor too!
'No, you can't cut them off; I know that perfectly well,' Hilda
rejoined quickly. 'I wouldn't care twopence for him if I thought
you could. It's the angles that give him all his charming delicious
originality. But you can look out a square hole for him somewhere,
you know, and that of course would be a great deal better. Depend
upon it, Mr. Berkeley, there are square holes up and down in the
world, if only we knew where to look for them; and the mistake
that everybody has made in poor Mr. Le Breton's case has been that
instead of finding one to suit him, they've gone on trying to poke
him down anyhow by main force into one of the round ones. That
goes against the grain, you know; besides which I call it a clear
waste of the very valuable solid mahogany corners.'
Arthur Berkeley looked at her silently for a moment, as if a gleam
of light had burst suddenly in upon him. Then he said to her slowly
and deliberately, 'Perhaps you're right, Lady Hilda, though I never
thought of it quite in that light before. But one thing certainly
strikes me now, and that is that you're a great deal cleverer after
all than I ever thought you.'
Lady Hilda made a little mock curtsey. 'It's very good of you to
say so,' she answered, half-saucily. 'Only the compliment is rather
double-edged, you must confess, because it implies that up to now
you've had a dreadfully low opinion of my poor little intelligence.'
So after that conversation Lady Hilda made up her mind that she
would certainly go the very next day and call as soon as possible
upon Edie Le Breton. Nobody could tell what good might possibly
come of it; but at least there could come no harm. And so, when the
carriage drew up it the door at half-past eleven, Hilda Tregellis
stepped into it with a vague consciousness of an important mission,
and ordered Jenkins to drive at once to the side street in Holloway,
whose address Arthur Berkeley had last night given her. Jenkins
touched his hat with mechanical respect, but inwardly wondered what
the dickens my lady would think if only she came to know of these
'ere extrornary goin's on.
At the door of the lodgings Hilda alighted and rang the bell herself.
Good Mrs. Halliss opened the door, and answered quickly that Mrs.
Le Breton was at home. Her woman's eye detected at once the coronet
on the carriage, and she was ready to burst with delight when the
tall visitor handed her a card for Edie, bearing the name of Lady
Hilda Tregellis. It was almost the first time that Edie had had
any lady callers; certainly the first time she had had any of such
social distinction; and Mrs. Halliss made haste to usher her up in
due form, and then ran down hastily to communicate the good news
to honest John, who in his capacity of past coachman was already
gazing out of the area window with deep interest at the carriage
and horses.
'There, John dear,' she cried, with tears of joy in her eyes,
forgetting in her excitement to drat the man for not being in the
back kitchen, 'to think that we should see a carriage an' pair like
that there a-drawin' up in front of out own very 'ouse, and Lady
'Ilder Tergellis, or summat o' the sort, a-comin' 'ere to see that
dear little lady in the parlour, why, it's enough to make one's
'eart burst, nearly, just you see now if it reelly isn't. You could
a' knocked me down with a feather, a'most, when that there Lady
'Ilder 'anded me 'er curd, and asked so sweet-like if Mrs. Le
Breting was at 'ome. Mr. Le Breting's people is comin' round, you
may be sure of it; 'is mother's a lady of title, that much we know
for certing; and she wouldn't go and let 'er own flesh an' blood
die 'ere of downright poverty, as they're like to do and won't let
us 'elp it, pore dears, without sendin' round to inquire and assist
'em. Married against 'er will, I understand, from what that dear
Mr. Berkeley, bless 'is kind 'eart, do tell me; not as I can believe
'e married beneath 'im, no, not no ways; for a sweeter, dearer,
nicer little lady than our Mrs. Le Breting I never did, an' that
I tell you. Sweeter manners you never did see yourself, John, for
all you've lived among the aristocracy: an' I always knew 'is people
'ud come round at last, and do what was right by 'im. An' you may
depend upon it, John, this 'ere Lady 'Ilder's one of his relations,
an' she's come round on a message from Lady Le Breting, to begin
a reconciliation. And though we should be sorry to lose 'em, as
'as stood by 'em through all their troubles, I'm glad to 'ear it,
John, that I am, for I can't a-bear to see that dear young fellow
a-eatin' 'is life out with care and anxiety.' And Mrs. Halliss, who
had always felt convinced in her own mind that Ernest must really
be the unacknowledged heir to a splendid fortune, began to wipe
her eyes violently in her delight at this evident realisation of
her wildest fancies and wishes.
Meanwhile, upstairs in the little parlour, Edie had risen in some
trepidation as Mrs. Halliss placed in her hands Lady Hilda Tregellis's
card. Ernest was out, gone to walk feebly around the streets of
Holloway, and she hardly knew at first what to say to so unexpected
a visitor. But Lady Hilda put her almost at her ease at once
by coming up to her with both her arms outstretched, as to an old
friend, and saying, with one of her pleasantest smiles:
'You must forgive me, Mrs. Le Breton, for never having come to
call on you before; but I have been long meaning to, and doubting
whether you would care to see me or not. You know, I'm a very old
friend of your husband's--he was SO kind to me always when he was
down at our place in dear old Devonshire. (You're a Devonshire girl
yourself, aren't you? just as I am. I thought so. I'm so glad of
it. I always get on so well with the dear old Devonshire folk.)
Well, I've been meaning to come for ever so long, and putting
it off, and putting it off, and putting it off, as one WILL put
things off, you know, when you're not quite sure about them, until
last evening. And then our friend, Mr. Arthur Berkeley, who knows
everybody, talked to me about your husband and you, and told me
he thought you wouldn't mind my coming to see you, for he fancied
you hadn't much society up here that you cared for or sympathised
with: though, of course, I'm dreadfully afraid of coming to call
upon you, because I know you're the sister of that very clever Mr.
Oswald, whose sad death we were all so sorry to hear about in the
papers; and naturally, as you've lived so much with him and with
Mr. Le Breton, you must be so awfully learned and all that sort of
thing, and no doubt despise ignorant people like myself dreadfully.
But you really mustn't despise me, Mrs. Le Breton, because, you
see, I haven't had all the advantages that you've had; indeed, the
only clever people I've ever met in all my life are your husband
and Mr. Arthur Berkeley, except, of course, Cabinet ministers and
so forth, and they don't count, because they're political, and so
very old, and solemn, and grand, and won't take any notice of us
girls, except to sit upon us. So that's what's made me rather afraid
to call upon you, because I thought you'd be quite too much in
the higher education way for a girl like me; and I haven't got any
education at all, except in rubbish, as your husband used always
to tell me. And now I want you to tell me all about Mr. Le Breton,
and the baby--Dot, you call her, Mr. Berkeley told me--and yourself,
too; for, though I've never seen you before, I feel, of course,
like an old friend of the family, having known your husband so very
intimately.'
Lady Hilda designedly delivered all this long harangue straight
off without a break, in her go-ahead, breathless, voluble fashion,
because she felt sure Edie wouldn't feel perfectly at her ease at
first, and she wanted to give her time to recover from the first
foolish awe of that meaningless prefix, Lady. Moreover, Lady Hilda,
in spite of her offhand manner was a good psychologist, and a true
woman: and she had concocted her little speech on the spur of the
moment with some cleverness, so as just to suit her instinctive
reading of Edie's small personal peculiarities. She saw in a moment
that that slight, pale, delicate girl was lost in London, far from
her own home and surroundings; and that the passing allusion to
their common Devonshire origin would please and conciliate her, as
it always does with the clannish, warm-hearted, simple-minded West
Country folk. Then again, the deft hints as to their friendship
with Arthur Berkeley, as to Ernest's stay at Dunbude, and as to
her own fear lest Edie should be too learned for her, all tended
to bring out whatever points of interest they had together: while
the casual touch about poor Harry's reputation, and the final
mention of little Dot by name, completed the conquest of Edie's
simple, gentle little woman's heart. So this was the great Lady
Hilda Tregellis, she thought, of whom she had heard so much, and
whom she had dreaded so greatly as a grand rival! Why, after all,
she was exactly like any other Devonshire girl in Calcombe Pomeroy,
except, perhaps, that she was easier to get on with, and smiled a
great deal more pleasantly than ten out of a dozen.
'It's very kind indeed of you to come,' Edie answered, smiling back
as well as she was able the first moment that Lady Hilda allowed
her a chance to edge in a word sideways. 'Ernest will be so very
very sorry that he's missed you when he comes in. He's spoken to
me a great deal about you ever so many times.'
'No, has he really?' Lady Hilda asked quickly, with unmistakable
interest and pleasure. 'Well, now, I'm so glad of that, for to tell
you the truth, Mrs. Le Breton, though he was really always very
kind to me, and so patient with all my stupidity, I more than
half fancied he didn't exactly like me. In fact, I was dreadfully
afraid he thought me a perfect nuisance. I'm so sorry he isn't in,
because the truth is, I came partly to see him as well as to see
you, and I should be awfully disappointed if I had to miss him.
Where's he gone, if I may ask? Perhaps I may be able to wait and
see him.'
'Oh, he's only out walking somewhere--ur--somewhere about Holloway,'
Edie answered, half blushing at the nature of their neighbourhood,
and glancing round the little room to see how it was likely to
strike so grand a person as Lady Hilda Tregellis.
Hilda noticed the glance, and made as if she did not notice it. Her
heart had begun to warm at once to this poor, pale, eager-looking
little woman, who had had the doubtful happiness of winning Ernest
Le Breton's love. 'Then I shall certainly wait and see him, Mrs. Le
Breton.' she said cordially. 'What a dear cosy little room you've
got here, to be sure. I do so love those nice bright little
cottage parlours, with their pretty pots of flowers and cheerful
furniture--so much warmer and more comfortable, you know, than the
great dreary empty barns that most people go and do penance by
living in. If ever I marry--which I don't suppose I ever shall do,
for nobody'll have me, I'm sorry to say: at least, nobody but stupid
people in the peerage, Algies and Berties and Monties I always call
them--well, if I ever do marry, I shall have a cosy little house
just like this one, with no unnecessary space to walk over every
time you come in or out, and with a chance of keeping yourself
warm without having to crone over the fire in order to get safely
out of the horrid draughts. And Dot, now let me see, how old is
she by this time? I ought to remember, I'm sure, for Mr. Berkeley
told me all about her at the time; and I said should I write and
ask if I might stand as godmother; and Mr. Berkeley laughed at
me, and said what could I be dreaming of, and did I think you were
going to make your baby liable to fine and imprisonment if it ever
published works hereafter on philosophy or something of the sort.
So delightfully original of all of you, really.'
Once started on that fertile theme of female conversation, Edie and
Hilda got on well enough in all conscience to satisfy the most
exacting mind. Dot was duly brought in and exhibited by Mrs. Halliss;
and was pronounced to be the very sweetest, dearest, darlingest
little duck ever seen on earth since the beginning of all things.
Her various points of likeness to all her relations were duly
discussed; and Hilda took particular pains to observe that she
didn't in the very faintest degree resemble that old horror, Lady
Le Breton. Then her whole past history was fully related, she had
been fed on, and what illnesses she had had, and how many teeth
she had got, and all the other delightful nothings so perennially
interesting to the maternal heart. Hilda listened to the whole
account with unfeigned attention, and begged leave to be allowed
to dance Dot in her own strong arms, and tickled her fat cheek with
her slender forefinger, and laughed with genuine delight when the
baby smiled again at her and turned her face to be tickled a second
time. Gradually Hilda brought the conversation round to Ernest's
journalistic experiences, and at last she said very quietly, 'I'm
sorry to learn from Mr. Berkeley, dear, that your husband doesn't
get quite as much work to do as he would like to have.'
Edie's tender eyes filled at once with swimming tears. That one
word 'dear,' said so naturally and simply, touched her heart at
once with its genuine half unspoken sympathy. 'Oh, Lady Hilda,'
she answered falteringly, 'please don't make me talk about that.
We are so very, very, very poor. I can't bear to talk about it to
you. Please, please don't make me.'
Hilda looked at her with the moisture welling up in her own eyes
too, and said softly, 'I'm SO sorry: dear, dear little Mrs. Le
Breton, I'm so very, very, very sorry for you! from the bottom of
my heart I'm sorry for you.'
'It isn't for myself, you know,' Edie answered quickly: 'for
myself, of course, I could stand anything; but it's the trouble
and privations for darling Ernest. Oh, Lady Hilda, I can't bear to
say it, but he's dying, he's dying.'
Hilda took the pretty small hand affectionately in hers. 'Don't,
dear, don't,' she said, brushing away a tear from her own eyes at
the same time. 'He isn't, believe me, he isn't. And don't call
me by that horrid stiff name, dear, please don't. Call me Hilda.
I should be so pleased and flattered if you would call me Hilda.
And may I call you Edie? I know your husband calls you Edie, because
Mr. Ronald Le Breton told me so. I want to be a friend of yours;
and I feel sure, if only you will let me, that we might be very
good and helpful friends indeed together.'
Edie pressed her hand softly. How very different from the imaginary
Lady Hilda she had pictured to herself in her timid, girlish fancy!
How much even dear Ernest had been mistaken as to what there was
of womanly really in her. 'Oh, don't speak so kindly to me,' she
said imploringly; 'don't speak so kindly, or else you'll make me
cry. I can't bear to hear you speak so kindly.'
'Cry, dear,' Lady Hilda whispered in a gentle tone, kissing her
forehead delicately as she spoke: 'cry and relieve yourself. There's
nothing gives one so much comfort when one's heart is bursting as a
regular good downright cry.' And, suiting the action to the word,
forthwith Lady Hilda laid her own statuesque head down beside Edie's,
and so those two weeping women, rivals once in a vague way, and
now bound to one another by a new-found tie, mingled their tears
silently together for ten minutes in unuttered sympathy.
As they sat there, both tearful and speechless, with Lady Hilda
soothing Edie's wan hand tenderly in hers, and leaning above her,
and stroking her hair softly with a sister's fondness, the door
opened very quietly, and Arthur Berkeley stood for a moment pausing
in the passage, and looking in without a word upon the unexpected
sight that greeted his wondering vision. He had come to call upon
Ernest about some possible opening for a new writer on a paper lately
started; and hearing the sound of sobs within had opened the door
quietly and tentatively. He could hardly believe his own eyes when
he actually saw Lady Hilda Tregellis sitting there side by side
with Edie Le Breton, kissing her pale forehead a dozen times in
a minute, and crying over her like a child with unwonted tears of
unmistakable sympathy. For ten seconds Arthur held the door ajar
in his hands, and gazed silently with the awe of chivalrous respect
upon the tearful, beautiful picture. Then he shut the door again
noiselessly and unperceived, and stole softly out into the street
to wait alone for Ernest's return. It was not for him to intrude
his unbidden presence upon the sacred sorrow of those two weeping
sister-women.
He lighted a cigar outside, and walked up and down a neighbouring
street feverishly till he thought it likely the call would be
finished. 'Dear little Mrs. Le Breton,' he said to himself softly,
'dear little Miss Butterfly of the days that are dead; softened
and sweetened still more by suffering, with the beauty of holiness
glowing in your face, how I wish some good for you could unexpectedly
come out of this curious visit. Though I don't see how it's
possible: I don't see how it's possible. The stream carries us all
down unresistingly before its senseless flood, and sweeps us at
last, sooner or later, like helpless logs, into the unknown sea.
Poor Ernest is drifting fast thitherwards before the current, and
nothing on earth, it seems to me, can conceivably stop him!'
He paced up and down a little, with a quick, unsteady tread, and
took a puff or two again at his cigar abstractedly. Then he held
it thoughtfully between his fingers for a while and began to hum
a few bars from his own new opera then in course of composition--a
stately long-drawn air, it was something like the rustle of Hilda
Tregellis's satin train as she swept queenlike down the broad marble
staircase of some great Elizabethan country palace. 'And dear Lady
Hilda too,' he went on, musingly: 'dear, kind, sympathising Lady
Hilda. Who on earth would ever have thought she had it in her to
comfort that poor, weeping, sorrowing girl as I just now saw her
doing? Dear Lady Hilda! Kind Lady Hilda! I have undervalued you
and overlooked you, because of the mere accident of your titled
birth, but I could have kissed you myself, for pure gratitude,
that very minute, Hilda Tregellis, when I saw you stooping down and
kissing that dear white forehead that looked so pale and womanly
and beautiful. Yes, Hilda, I could have kissed you. I could have
kissed your own grand, smooth, white marble forehead. And no very
great trial of endurance, either, Arthur Berkeley, if it comes to
that; for say what you will of her, she's a beautiful, stately,
queenlike woman indeed; and it somehow strikes me she's a truer
and better woman, too, than you have ever yet in your shallow
superficiality imagined. Not like little Miss Butterfly! Oh, no,
not like little Miss Butterfly! But still, there are keys and keys
in music; and if every tune was pitched to the self-same key, even
the tenderest, what a monotonous, dreary world it would be to live
and sing in after all. Perhaps a man might make himself a little
shrine not wholly without sweet savour of pure incense for beautiful,
stately, queenlike Hilda Tregellis too! But no; I mustn't think
of it. I have no other duty or prospect in life possible as yet
while dear little Miss Butterfly still remains practically unprovided
for!'