"Which one do you mean?" asked Biddy.
"That of being charming and good, that of being indispensable to man."
"Oh that isn't an art."
"Then you leave her only the stage. Take it if you like in the widest
sense."
Biddy appeared to reflect a moment, as to judge what sense this might
be. But she found none that was wide enough, for she cried the next
minute: "Do you mean to say there's nothing for a woman but to be an
actress?"
"Never in my life. I only say that that's the best thing for a woman to
be who finds herself irresistibly carried into the practice of the arts;
for there her capacity for them has most application and her incapacity
for them least. But at the same time I strongly recommend her not to be
an artist if she can possibly help it. It's a devil of a life."
"Oh I know; men want women not to be anything."
"It's a poor little refuge they try to take from the overwhelming
consciousness that you're in very fact everything."
"Everything?" And the girl gave a toss. "That's the kind of thing you
say to keep us quiet."
"Dear Biddy, you see how well we succeed!" laughed Peter.
To which she replied by asking irrelevantly: "Why is it so necessary for
you to go to the theatre to-night if Miss Rooth doesn't want you to?"
"My dear child, she does want me to. But that has nothing to do with
it."
"Why then did she say that she doesn't?"
"Oh because she meant just the contrary."
"Is she so false then--is she so vulgar?"
"She speaks a special language; practically it isn't false, because it
renders her thought and those who know her understand it."
"But she doesn't use it only to those who know her," Biddy returned,
"since she asked me, who have so little the honour of her acquaintance,
to keep you away to-night. How am I to know that she meant by that that
I'm to urge you on to go?"
He was on the point of replying, "Because you've my word for it"; but he
shrank in fact from giving his word--he had some fine scruples--and
sought to relieve his embarrassment by a general tribute. "Dear Biddy,
you're delightfully acute: you're quite as clever as Miss Rooth." He
felt, however, that this was scarcely adequate and he continued: "The
truth is that its being important for me to go is a matter quite
independent of that young lady's wishing it or not wishing it. There
happens to be a definite intrinsic propriety in it which determines the
thing and which it would take me long to explain."
"I see. But fancy your 'explaining' to me: you make me feel so
indiscreet!" the girl cried quickly--an exclamation which touched him
because he was not aware that, quick as it had been, she had still had
time to be struck first--though she wouldn't for the world have
expressed it--with the oddity of such a duty at such a season. In fact
that oddity, during a silence of some minutes, came back to Peter
himself: the note had been forced--it sounded almost ignobly frivolous
from a man on the eve of proceeding to a high diplomatic post. The
effect of this, none the less, was not to make him break out with "Hang
it, I _will_ keep my engagement to your mother!" but to fill him with
the wish to shorten his present strain by taking Biddy the rest of the
way in a cab. He was uncomfortable, and there were hansoms about that he
looked at wistfully. While he was so occupied his companion took up the
talk by an abrupt appeal.
"Why did she say that Nick oughtn't to have resigned his seat?"
"Oh I don't know. It struck her so. It doesn't matter much."
But Biddy kept it up. "If she's an artist herself why doesn't she like
people to go in for art, especially when Nick has given his time to
painting her so beautifully? Why does she come there so often if she
disapproves of what he has done?"
"Oh Miriam's disapproval--it doesn't count; it's a manner of speaking."
"Of speaking untruths, do you mean? Does she think just the reverse--is
that the way she talks about everything?"
"We always admire most what we can do least," Peter brought forth; "and
Miriam of course isn't political. She ranks painters more or less with
her own profession, about which already, new as she is to it, she has no
illusions. They're all artists; it's the same general sort of thing. She
prefers men of the world--men of action."
"Is that the reason she likes you?" Biddy mildly mocked.
"Ah she doesn't like me--couldn't you see it?"
The girl at first said nothing; then she asked: "Is that why she lets
you call her 'Miriam'?"
"Oh I don't, to her face."
"Ah only to mine!" laughed Biddy.
"One says that as one says 'Rachel' of her great predecessor."
"Except that she isn't so great, quite yet, is she?"
"Far from it; she's the freshest of novices--she has scarcely been four
months on the stage. But no novice has ever been such an adept. She'll
go very fast," Peter pursued, "and I daresay that before long she'll be
magnificent."
"What a pity you'll not see that!" Biddy sighed after a pause.
"Not see it?"
"If you're thousands of miles away."
"It is a pity," Peter said; "and since you mention it I don't mind
frankly telling you--throwing myself on your mercy, as it were--that
that's why I make such a point of a rare occasion like to-night. I've a
weakness for the drama that, as you perhaps know, I've never concealed,
and this impression will probably have to last me in some barren spot
for many, many years."
"I understand--I understand. I hope therefore it will be charming." And
the girl walked faster.
"Just as some other charming impressions will have to last," Peter
added, conscious of keeping up with her by some effort. She seemed
almost to be running away from him, an impression that led him to
suggest, after they had proceeded a little further without more words,
that if she were in a hurry they had perhaps better take a cab. Her face
was strange and touching to him as she turned it to make answer:
"Oh I'm not in the least in a hurry and I really think I had better
walk."
"We'll walk then by all means!" Peter said with slightly exaggerated
gaiety; in pursuance of which they went on a hundred yards. Biddy kept
the same pace; yet it was scarcely a surprise to him that she should
suddenly stop with the exclamation:
"After all, though I'm not in a hurry I'm tired! I had better have a
cab; please call that one," she added, looking about her.
They were in a straight, blank, ugly street, where the small, cheap,
grey-faced houses had no expression save that of a rueful, unconsoled
acknowledgment of the universal want of identity. They would have
constituted a "terrace" if they could, but they had dolefully given it
up. Even a hansom that loitered across the end of the vista turned a
sceptical back upon it, so that Sherringham had to lift his voice in a
loud appeal. He stood with Biddy watching the cab approach them. "This
is one of the charming things you'll remember," she said, turning her
eyes to the general dreariness from the particular figure of the
vehicle, which was antiquated and clumsy. Before he could reply she had
lightly stepped into the cab; but as he answered, "Most assuredly it
is," and prepared to follow her she quickly closed the apron.
"I must go alone; you've lots of things to do--it's all right"; and
through the aperture in the roof she gave the driver her address. She
had spoken with decision, and Peter fully felt now that she wished to
get away from him. Her eyes betrayed it, as well as her voice, in a
look, a strange, wandering ray that as he stood there with his hand on
the cab he had time to take from her. "Good-bye, Peter," she smiled; and
as the thing began to rumble away he uttered the same tepid, ridiculous
farewell.