COMING NEAR THE FIRE
At the age of forty (a point now passed by some half-dozen years) Mrs.
Bonfill had become motherly. The change was sudden, complete, and
eminently wise. It was accomplished during a summer's retirement; she
disappeared a queen regnant, she reappeared a dowager--all by her own
act, for none had yet ventured to call her _passée_. But she was a big
woman, and she recognised facts. She had her reward. She gained power
instead of losing it; she had always loved power, and had the shrewdness
to discern that there was more than one form of it. The obvious form she
had never, as a young and handsome woman, misused or over-used; she had
no temptations that way, or, as her friend Lady Blixworth preferred to
put it, 'In that respect dearest Sarah was always _bourgeoise_ to the
core.' The new form she now attained--influence--was more to her taste.
She liked to shape people's lives; if they were submissive and obedient
she would make their fortunes. She needed some natural capacities in her
_protégés_, of course; but, since she chose cleverly, these were seldom
lacking. Mrs. Bonfill did the rest. She could open doors that obeyed no
common key; she could smooth difficulties; she had in two or three cases
blotted out a past, and once had reformed a gambler. But she liked best
to make marriages and Ministers. Her own daughter, of course, she
married immediately--that was nothing. She had married Nellie Towler to
Sir James Quinby-Lee--the betting had been ten to one against it--and
Lady Mildred Haughton to Frank Cleveland--flat in the face of both the
families. As for Ministers, she stood well with Lord Farringham, was an
old friend of Lord Glentorly, and, to put it unkindly, had Constantine
Blair fairly in her pocket. It does not do to exaggerate drawing-room
influence, but when Beaufort Chance became a Whip, and young Lord Mervyn
was appointed Glentorly's Under-Secretary at the War Office, and
everybody knew that they were Mrs. Bonfill's last and prime
favourites--well, the coincidence was remarkable. And never a breath of
scandal with it all! It was no small achievement for a woman born in,
bred at, and married from an unpretentious villa at Streatham. _La
carrière ouverte_--but perhaps that is doing some injustice to Mr.
Bonfill. After all, he and the big house in Grosvenor Square had made
everything possible. Mrs. Bonfill loved her husband, and she never tried
to make him a Minister; it was a well-balanced mind, save for that
foible of power. He was very proud of her, though he rather wondered why
she took so much trouble about other people's affairs. He owned a
brewery, and was Chairman of a railway company.
Trix Trevalla had been no more than a month in London when she had the
great good fortune to be taken up by Mrs. Bonfill. It was not
everybody's luck. Mrs. Bonfill was particular; she refused hundreds,
some for her own reasons, some because of the things Viola Blixworth
might say. The Frickers, for example, failed in their assault on Mrs.
Bonfill--or had up to now. Yet Mrs. Bonfill herself would have been
good-natured to the Frickers.
'I can't expose myself to Viola by taking up the Frickers,' she
explained to her husband, who had been not indisposed, for business
reasons, to do Fricker a good turn. For Lady Blixworth, with no other
qualities very striking to a casual observer, and with an appearance
that the term 'elegant' did ample justice to, possessed a knack of
describing people whom she did not like in a way that they did not
like--a gift which made her respected and, on the whole, popular.
'The woman's like a bolster grown fat; the daughter's like a sausage
filled unevenly; and the man--well, I wouldn't have him to a political
party!'
Thus had Lady Blixworth dealt with the Frickers, and even Mrs. Bonfill
quailed.
It was very different with Trix Trevalla. Pretty, presentable, pleasant,
even witty in an unsubtle sort of fashion, she made an immediate
success. She was understood to be well-off too; the flat was not a cheap
one; she began to entertain a good deal in a quiet way; she drove a
remarkably neat brougham. These things are not done for nothing--nor
even on the interest of twenty thousand pounds. Yet Trix did them, and
nobody asked any questions except Mrs. Bonfill, and she was assured that
Trix was living well within her means. May not 'means' denote capital as
well as income? The distinction was in itself rather obscure to Trix,
and, Vesey Trevalla having made no settlement, there was nothing to
drive it home. Lastly, Trix was most prettily docile and submissive to
Mrs. Bonfill--grateful, attentive, and obedient. She earned a reward.
Any woman with half an eye could see what that reward should be.
But for once Mrs. Bonfill vacillated. After knowing Trix a fortnight she
destined her for Beaufort Chance, who had a fair income, ambition at
least equal to his talents, and a chance of the House of Lords some day.
Before she had known Trix a month--so engaging and docile was Trix--Mrs.
Bonfill began to wonder whether Beaufort Chance were good enough.
Certainly Trix was making a very great success. What then? Should it be
Mervyn, Mrs. Bonfill's prime card, her chosen disciple? A man destined,
as she believed, to go very high--starting pretty high anyhow, and
starts in the handicap are not to be disregarded. Mrs. Bonfill doubted
seriously whether, in that mental book she kept, she could not transfer
Trix to Mervyn. If Trix went on behaving well---- But the truth is that
Mrs. Bonfill herself was captured by Trix. Yet Trix feared Mrs.
Bonfill, even while she liked and to some extent managed her. After
favouring Chance, Mrs. Bonfill began to put forward Mervyn. Whether
Trix's management had anything to do with this result it is hard to say.
Practical statesmen are not generally blamed for such changes of
purpose. They may hold out hopes of, say, a reduction of taxation to one
class or interest, and ultimately award the boon to another. Nobody is
very severe on them. But it comes rather hard on the disappointed
interest, which, in revenge, may show what teeth it has.
Trix and Mervyn were waltzing together at Mrs. Bonfill's dance. Lady
Blixworth sat on a sofa with Beaufort Chance and looked on--at the dance
and at her companion.
'She's rather remarkable,' she was saying in her idle languid voice.
'She was meant to be vulgar, I'm sure, but she contrives to avoid it. I
rather admire her.'
'A dangerous shade of feeling to excite in you, it seems,' he remarked
sourly.
The lady imparted an artificial alarm to her countenance.
'I'm so sorry if I said anything wrong; but, oh, surely, there's no
truth in the report that you're----?' A motion of her fan towards Trix
ended the sentence.
'Not the least,' he answered gruffly.
Sympathy succeeded alarm. With people not too clever Lady Blixworth
allowed herself a liberal display of sympathy. It may have been all
right to make Beaufort a Whip (though that question arose afterwards in
an acute form), but he was no genius in a drawing-room.
'Dear Sarah talks so at random sometimes,' she drawled. 'Well-meant, I
know, Beaufort; but it does put people in awkward positions, doesn't
it?'
He was a conceited man, and a pink-and-white one. He flushed visibly and
angrily.
'What has Mrs. Bonfill been saying about me?'
'Oh, nothing much; it's just her way. And you mustn't resent it--you owe
so much to her.' Lady Blixworth was enjoying herself; she had a natural
delight in mischief, especially when she could direct it against her
beloved and dreaded Sarah with fair security.
'What did she say?'
'Say! Nothing, you foolish man! She diffused an impression.'
'That I----?'
'That you liked Mrs. Trevalla! She was wrong, I suppose. _Voilà tout_,
and, above all, don't look hot and furious; the room's stifling as it
is.'
Beaufort Chance was furious. We forgive much ill-treatment so it is
secret, we accept many benefits on the same understanding. To parade the
benefit and to let the injustice leak out are the things that make us
smart. Lady Blixworth had by dexterous implication accused Mrs. Bonfill
of both offences. Beaufort had not the self-control to seem less angry
than he was. 'Surely,' thought Lady Blixworth, watching him, 'he's too
stupid even for politics!'
'You may take it from me,' he said pompously, 'that I have, and have
had, no more than the most ordinary acquaintance with Mrs. Trevalla.'
She nodded her head in satisfied assent. 'No, he's just stupid enough,'
she concluded, smiling and yawning behind her fan. She had no
compunctions--she had told nearly half the truth. Mrs. Bonfill never
gossiped about her Ministers--it would have been fatal--but she was
sometimes rather expansive on the subject of her marriages; she was
tempted to collect opinions on them; she had, no doubt, (before she
began to vacillate) collected two or three opinions about Beaufort
Chance and Trix Trevalla.
Trix's brain was whirling far quicker than her body turned in the easy
swing of the waltz. It had been whirling this month back, ever since the
prospect began to open, the triumphs to dawn, ambition to grow, a sense
of her attraction and power to come home to her. The _pensions_ were
gone; she had plunged into life. She was delighted and dazzled. Herself,
her time, her feelings, and her money, she flung into the stream with a
lavish recklessness. Yet behind the gay intoxication of the transformed
woman she was conscious still of the old self, the wide-awake, rather
hard girl, that product of the lodging-houses and the four years with
Vesey Trevalla. Amid the excitement, the success, the folly, the old
voice spoke, cautioning, advising, never allowing her to forget that
there was a purpose and an end in it all, a career to make and to make
speedily. Her eyes might wander to every alluring object; they returned
to the main chance. Wherefore Mrs. Bonfill had no serious uneasiness
about dear Trix; when the time came she would be sensible; people fare,
she reflected, none the worse for being a bit hard at the core.
'I like sitting here,' said Trix to Mervyn after the dance, 'and seeing
everybody one's read about or seen pictures of. Of course I don't really
belong to it, but it makes me feel as if I did.'
'You'd like to?' he asked.
'Well, I suppose so,' she laughed as her eyes rambled over the room
again.
Lord Mervyn was conscious of his responsibilities. He had a future; he
was often told so in public and in private, though it is fair to add
that he would have believed it unsolicited. That future, together with
the man who was to have it, he took seriously. And, though of rank
unimpeachable, he was not quite rich enough for that future; it could be
done on what he had, but it could be done better with some more.
Evidently Mrs. Bonfill had been captured by Trix; as a rule she would
not have neglected the consideration that his future could be done
better with some more. He had not forgotten it; so he did not
immediately offer to make Trix really belong to the brilliant world she
saw. She was very attractive, and well-off, as he understood, but she
was not, from a material point of view, by any means what he had a right
to claim. Besides, she was a widow, and he would have preferred that not
to be the case.
'Prime Ministers and things walking about like flies!' sighed Trix,
venting satisfaction in a pardonable exaggeration. It was true,
however, that Lord Farringham had looked in for half an hour, talked to
Mrs. Bonfill for ten minutes, and made a tour round, displaying a lofty
cordiality which admirably concealed his desire to be elsewhere.
'You'll soon get used to it all,' Mervyn assured her with a rather
superior air. 'It's a bore, but it has to be done. The social side can't
be neglected, you see.'
'If I neglected anything, it would be the other, I think.'
He smiled tolerantly and quite believed her. Trix was most
butterfly-like to-night; there was no hardness in her laugh, not a hint
of grimness in her smile. 'You would never think,' Mrs. Bonfill used to
whisper, 'what the poor child has been through.'
Beaufort Chance passed by, casting a scowling glance at them.
'I haven't seen you dancing with Chance--or perhaps you sat out? He's
not much of a performer.'
'I gave him a dance, but I forgot.'
'Which dance, Mrs. Trevalla?' Her glance had prompted the question.
'Ours,' said Trix. 'You came so late--I had none left.'
'I very seldom dance, but you tempted me.' He was not underrating his
compliment. For a moment Trix was sorely inclined to snub him; but
policy forbade. When he left her, to seek Lady Blixworth, she felt
rather relieved.
Beaufort Chance had watched his opportunity, and came by again with an
accidental air. She called to him and was all graciousness and
apologies; she had every wish to keep the second string in working
order. Beaufort had not sat there ten minutes before he was in his haste
accusing Lady Blixworth of false insinuations--unless, indeed, Trix were
an innocent instrument in Mrs. Bonfill's hands. Trix was looking the
part very well.
'I wish you'd do me a great kindness,' he said presently. 'Come to
dinner some day.'
'Oh, that's a very tolerable form of benevolence. Of course I will.'
'Wait a bit. I mean--to meet the Frickers.'
'Oh!' Meeting the Frickers seemed hardly an inducement.
But Beaufort Chance explained. On the one side Fricker was a very useful
man to stand well with; he could put you into things--and take you out
at the right time. Trix nodded sagely, though she knew nothing about
such matters. On the other hand--Beaufort grew both diplomatic and
confidential in manner--Fricker had little ambition outside his
business, but Mrs. and Miss Fricker had enough and to spare--ambitions
social for themselves, and, subsidiary thereunto, political for Fricker.
'Viola Blixworth has frightened Mrs. Bonfill,' he complained. 'Lady
Glentorly talks about drawing the line, and all the rest of them are
just as bad. Now if you'd come----'
'Me? What good should I do? The Frickers won't care about me.'
'Oh, yes, they will!' He did not lack adroitness in baiting the hook for
her. 'They know you can do anything with Mrs. Bonfill; they know you're
going to be very much in it. You won't be afraid of Viola Blixworth in a
month or two! I shall please Fricker--you'll please the women. Now do
come.'
Trix's vanity was flattered. Was she already a woman of influence?
Beaufort Chance had the other lure ready too.
'And I daresay you don't mind hearing of a good thing if it comes in
your way?' he suggested carelessly. 'People with money to spare find
Fricker worth knowing, and he's absolutely square.'
'Do you mean he'd make money for me?' asked Trix, trying to keep any
note of eagerness out of her voice.
'He'd show you how to make it for yourself, anyhow.'
Trix sat in meditative silence for a few moments. Presently she turned
to him with a bright friendly smile.
'Oh, never mind all that! I'll come for your sake--to please you,' she
said.
Beaufort Chance was not quite sure that he believed her this time, but
he looked as if he did--which serves just as well in social relations.
He named a day, and Trix gaily accepted the appointment. There were few
adventures, not many new things, that she was not ready for just now.
The love of the world had laid hold of her.
And here at Mrs. Bonfill's she seemed to be in the world up to her eyes.
People had come on from big parties as the evening waned, and the last
hour dotted the ball-room with celebrities. Politicians in crowds,
leaders of fashion, an actress or two, an Indian prince, a great
explorer--they made groups which seemed to express the many-sidedness of
London, to be the thousand tributaries that swell the great stream of
its society. There was a little unusual stir to-night. A foreign
complication had arisen, or was supposed to have arisen. People were
asking what the Tsar was going to do; and, when one considers the
reputation for secrecy enjoyed by Russian diplomacy, quite a surprising
number of them seemed to know, and told one another with an authority
only matched by the discrepancy between their versions. When they saw a
man who possibly might know--Lord Glentorly--they crowded round him
eagerly, regardless of the implied aspersion on their own knowledge.
Glentorly had been sitting in a corner with Mrs. Bonfill, and she shared
in his glory, perhaps in his private knowledge. But both Glentorly and
Mrs. Bonfill professed to know no more than there was in the papers, and
insinuated that they did not believe that. Everybody at once declared
that they had never believed that, and had said so at dinner, and the
very wise added that it was evidently inspired by the Stock Exchange. A
remark to this effect had just fallen on Trix's ears when a second
observation from behind reached her.
'Not one of them knows a thing about it,' said a calm, cool, youthful
voice.
'I can't think why they want to,' came as an answer in rich pleasant
tones.
Trix glanced round and saw a smart, trim young man, and by his side a
girl with beautiful hair. She had only a glimpse of them, for in an
instant they disentangled themselves from the gossipers and joined the
few couples who were keeping it up to the last dance.
It will be seen that Beaufort Chance had not given up the game; Lady
Blixworth's pin-pricks had done the work which they were probably
intended to do: they had incited him to defy Mrs. Bonfill, to try to win
off his own bat. She might discard him in favour of Mervyn, but he would
fight for himself. The dinner to which he bade Trix would at once assert
and favour intimacy; if he could put her under an obligation it would be
all to the good; flattering her vanity was already a valuable expedient.
That stupidity of his, which struck Viola Blixworth with such a sense of
its density, lay not in misunderstanding or misvaluing the common
motives of humanity, but in considering that all humanity was common: he
did not allow for the shades, the variations, the degrees. Nor did he
appreciate in the least the mood that governed or the temper that swayed
Trix Trevalla. He thought that she preferred him as a man, Mervyn as a
match. Both of them were, in fact, at this time no more than figures in
the great _ballet_ at which she now looked on, in which she meant soon
to mix.
Mrs. Bonfill caught Trix as she went to her carriage--that smart
brougham was in waiting--and patted her cheek _more materno_.
'I saw you were enjoying yourself, child,' she said. 'What was all that
Beaufort had to say to you?'
'Oh, just nonsense,' answered Trix lightly.
Mrs. Bonfill smiled amiably.
'He's not considered to talk nonsense generally,' she said; 'but perhaps
there was someone you wanted to talk to more! You won't say anything, I
see, but--Mortimer stayed late! He's coming to luncheon to-morrow. Won't
you come too?'
'I shall be delighted,' said Trix. Her eyes were sparkling. She had
possessed wit enough to see the vacillation of Mrs. Bonfill. Did this
mean that it was ended? The invitation to lunch looked like it. Mrs.
Bonfill believed in lunch for such purposes. In view of the invitation
to lunch, Trix said nothing about the invitation to dinner.
As she was driven from Grosvenor Square to the flat by the river, she
was marvellously content--enjoying still, not thinking, wondering, not
feeling, making in her soul material and sport of others, herself
seeming not subject to design or accident. The change was great to her;
the ordinary mood of youth that has known only good fortune seemed to
her the most wonderful of transformations, almost incredible. She
exulted in it and gloated over the brightness of her days. What of
others? Well, what of the players in the pantomime? Do they not play for
us? What more do we ask of or about them? Trix was not in the least
inclined to be busy with more fortunes than her own. For this was the
thing--this was what she had desired.
How had she come to desire it so urgently and to take it with such
recklessness? The words of the shabby man on the boulevards came back to
her. 'Life has played with you; go and play with it. You may scorch your
fingers; for the fire burns. But it's better to die of heat than of
cold.'
'Yes, better of heat than of cold,' laughed Trix Trevalla triumphantly,
and she added, 'If there's anything wrong, why, he's responsible!' She
was amused both at the idea of anything being wrong and at the notion of
holding the quiet shabby man responsible. There could be no link between
his life and the world she had lived in that night. Yet, if he held
these views about the way to treat life, why did he not live? He had
said he hardly lived, he only worked. Trix was in an amused puzzle about
the shabby man as she got into bed; he actually put the party and its
great _ballet_ out of her head.