always been a great favourite was ordered to the south of France, and
implored her to go with her; which Ella, who had a real affection for
her relative, as well as a strong sense of duty, had consented to do.
This was a misfortune in one of two ways: it either curtailed that most
necessary and most delightful period during which _fiances_ discover one
another's idiosyncrasies and weaknesses, or it made it necessary to
postpone the marriage.
George naturally preferred the former, as the more endurable evil; but
Ella's letters from abroad began to hint more and more plainly at delay.
Her aunt might remain on the Continent all the summer, and she could not
possibly leave her; there was so much to be done after her return that
could not be done in a hurry; they had not even begun to furnish the
pretty little house on Campden Hill that was to be their new home--it
would be better to wait till November, or even later.
The mere idea was alarming to George, and he remonstrated as far as he
dared; but Ella remained firm, and he grew desperate.
He might have spared himself the trouble. About the middle of June
Ella's aunt--who, of course, had had to leave the Riviera--grew tired of
travelling, and Ella, to George's intense satisfaction, returned to her
mother's house in Linden Gardens, Notting Hill.
And now, when our story opens, George, who had managed to get away from
office-work two hours before his usual time, was hurrying towards Linden
Gardens as fast as a hansom could take him, to see his betrothed for the
first time after their long separation.
He was eager, naturally, and a little nervous. Would Ella still persist
in her wish for delay? or would he be able to convince her that there
were no obstacles in the way? He felt he had strong arguments on his
side, if only--and here was the real seat of his anxiety--if only her
objections were not raised from some other motive! She might have been
trying to prepare him for a final rupture, and then--'Well,' he
concluded, with his customary good sense, 'no use meeting trouble
halfway--in five minutes I shall know for certain!'
* * * * *
At the same moment Mrs. Hylton and her daughter Flossie, a vivacious
girl in the transitionary sixteen-year-old stage, were in the
drawing-room at Linden Gardens. It was the ordinary double drawing-room
of a London house, but everything in it was beautiful and harmonious.
The eye was vaguely rested by the delicate and subdued colour of walls
and hangings; cabinets, antique Persian pottery, rare bits of china, all
occupied the precise place in which their decorative value was most
felt; a room, in short, of exceptional individuality and distinction.
Flossie was standing at the window, from which a glimpse could just be
caught of fresh green foliage and the lodge-gates, with the bustle of
the traffic in the High Street beyond; Mrs. Hylton was writing at a
Flemish bureau in the corner.
'I suppose,' said Flossie meditatively, as she fingered a piece of old
stained glass that was hanging in the window, 'we shall have George here
this afternoon.'
Mrs. Hylton raised her head. She had a striking face, tinted a clear
olive, with a high wave of silver hair crowning the forehead; her
eyebrows were dark, and so were the brilliant eyes; the nose was
aquiline, and the thin, well-cut mouth a little hard. She was a woman
who had been much admired in her time, and who still retained a certain
attraction, though some were apt to find her somewhat cold and
unsympathetic. Her daughter Ella, for example, was always secretly a
little in awe of her mother, who, however, had no terrors for audacious,
outspoken Flossie.
'If he comes, Flossie, he will be very welcome,' she said, 'but I hardly
expect him yet. George is not likely to neglect his duties, even for
Ella.'
Flossie pursed her mouth rather scornfully: 'Oh, George is immaculate!'
she murmured.
'If he was, it would hardly be a reproach,' said her mother, catching
the word; 'but, at all events, George has thoroughly good principles,
and is sure to succeed in the world. I have every reason to be pleased.'
'Every reason?--ah! but _are_ you pleased? Mother, dear, you know he's
as dull as dull!'
'Ella does not find him so--and, Flossie, I don't like to hear you say
such things, even in Ella's absence.'
'Oh, I never abuse him to Ella; it wouldn't be any use: she's firmly
convinced that he's perfection--at least she was before she went away.'
'Why? do you mean that she has altered?--have you seen any sign of it,
Flossie?'
Mrs. Hylton made this inquiry sharply, but not as if such a circumstance
would be altogether displeasing to her.
'Oh, no; only she hasn't seen him for so long, you know. Perhaps, when
she comes to look at him with fresh eyes, she'll notice things more. Ah,
here _is_ George, just getting out of a hansom--so he has played truant
for once! There's one thing I _do_ think Ella might do--persuade him to
shave off some of those straggly whiskers. I wonder why he never seems
to get a hat or anything else like other people's!'
Presently George was announced. He was slightly above middle height,
broad-shouldered and fresh-coloured; the obnoxious whiskers did indeed
cover more of his cheeks than modern fashion prescribes for men of his
age, and had evidently never known a razor; he wore a turn-down collar
and a necktie of a rather crude red; his clothes were neat and well
brushed, but not remarkable for their cut.
'Well, my dear George,' said Mrs. Hylton, 'we have seen very little of
you while Ella has been away.'
'I know,' he said awkwardly; 'I've had a lot of things to look after in
one way and another.'
'What? after your work at the office was over!' cried Flossie
incredulously.
'Yes--after that; it's taken up my time a good deal.'
'And so you couldn't spare any to call here--I see!' said Flossie.
'George,' she added, with a sudden diversion, 'I wonder you aren't
afraid of catching cold! How _can_ you go about in such absurdly thin
boots as those?'
'These?' he said, inspecting them doubtfully--they were strong, sensible
boots with notched and projecting soles of ponderous thickness--'why,
what's the matter with them, Flossie, eh? Don't you think they're strong
enough for walking in?'
'No, George; they're the very things for an afternoon dance, and quite a
lot of couples could dance in them, you see. But for walking--ah, I'm
afraid you sacrifice too much to appearances.'
'I don't, really!' George protested in all good faith; 'now _do_ I, Mrs.
Hylton?'
'Flossie is making fun of you, George; you mustn't mind her
impertinence.'
'Oh, is that all? Do you know, I really thought for the moment that she
meant they were too small for me! You like getting a rise out of me,
Flossie, don't you?'
And he laughed with such genuine and good-natured amusement that the
young lady felt somehow a little small, and almost ashamed, although it
took the form of suppressed irritation. 'He really ought not to come
here in such things,' she said to herself; 'and I don't believe that,
even now, he sees what I meant.'
Just at this point Ella came in, with the least touch of shyness,
perhaps, at meeting him before witnesses after so long an absence; but
she only looked the more charming in consequence, and, demure as her
greeting was, her pretty eyes had a sparkle of pleasure that scattered
all George Chapman's fears to the winds. Even Flossie felt instinctively
that straggly-whiskered, red-necktied, thick-booted George had lost
none of his divinity for Ella.
They did not seem to have much to say to one another, notwithstanding;
possibly because Ella was called upon to dispense the tea which had just
been brought in. George sat nursing the hat which Flossie found so
objectionable, while he balanced a teacup with the anxious eye of a
juggler out of practice, and the conversation flagged. At last, under
pretence of renewing his tea, most of which he had squandered upon a
Persian rug, he crossed to Ella: 'I say,' he suggested, 'don't you think
you could come out for a little while? I've such lots to tell you
and--and I want you to go somewhere with me.'
Mrs. Hylton made no objection, beyond stipulating that Ella must not be
allowed to tire herself after her journey, and so, a few minutes later,
Miss Hylton came down in her pretty summer hat and light cape, and she
and George were allowed to set out.
Once outside the house, he drew a long breath of mingled relief and
pleasure: 'By Jove, Ella, I am glad to get you back again! I say, how
jolly you do look in that hat! Now, do you know where I'm going to take
you?'
'It will be quietest in the Gardens,' said Ella.
'Ah, but that's not where you're going now,' he said with a delicious
assumption of authority; 'you're coming with me to see a certain house
on Campden Hill you may have heard of.'
'That will be delightful. I do want to see our dear little house again
very much. And, George, we will go carefully over all the rooms, and
settle what can be done with each of them. Then we can begin directly;
we haven't too much time.'
'Perhaps,' he said with a conscious laugh, 'it won't take so much time
as you think.'
'Oh, but it _must_--to do properly. And while I've been away I've had
some splendid ideas for some of the rooms--I've planned them out so
beautifully. You know that delightful little room at the back?--the one
I said should be your own den, with the window all festooned with
creepers and looking out on the garden--well----?'
'Take my advice,' he said, 'and don't make any plans till you see it.
And as for plans, these furnishing fellows do all that--they don't care
to be bothered with plans.'
'They will have to carry out ours, though. I shall love settling how it
is all to be--it will be such fun.'
'You wouldn't call it fun if you knew what it was like, I can tell you.'
'But I _do_ know. Mother and I rearranged most of the rooms at home only
last year--so you see I have some experience. And what experience can
_you_ have had, if you please?'
Ella had a mental vision as she spoke of the house in Dawson Place when
George lived with his mother and sisters--a house in which furniture and
everything else were commonplace and _bourgeois_ to the last degree,
and where nothing could have been altered since his boyhood; indeed she
had often secretly pitied him for having to live in such surroundings,
and admired the filial patience that had made him endure them so long.
'I've had my share, Ella, and I should be very sorry for you to have all
the worry and bother I've been through over it!'
'But when, George? How? I don't understand.'
'Ah, that's my secret!' he said provokingly; 'and you know, Ella, if we
began furnishing now, it would take no end of a time, with all these
wonderful plans of yours, and--and I couldn't stand having to wait till
next November for you--I couldn't do it!'
'Mother thinks the marriage need not be put off now,' said Ella simply,
'and we shall have six weeks till then; the house can be quite ready for
us by the time we want it.'
'Six weeks!' he said impatiently, 'what's six weeks? You've no idea what
these chaps are, Ella! And then there are all your own things to get,
and they would take up most of your time. No, we should have had to put
it off, whatever you may say. And that would mean another
separation--for, of course, you would go away in August, and I should
have to stay in town: the office wouldn't give me my fortnight twice
over--honeymoon or no honeymoon!'
Ella looked completely puzzled. 'But what are you trying to prove
_now_, George?'
'I was only showing you that, even though you have come back earlier, we
couldn't possibly have got things ready in time, if I hadn't----' but
here he stopped. 'No, I want that to be a surprise for you, Ella; you'll
see presently,' he added.
Ella's delicate eyebrows contracted. 'I like to be prepared for my
surprises, please, George. Tell me now.'
They had turned up one of the quiet streets leading to the hill. They
were so near the house that George thought he might abandon further
mystery, not to mention that he was only too anxious to reveal his
secret.
'Well, then, Ella, if you must have it,' he said triumphantly, 'the
house is very nearly ready _now_--what do you think of that?'
'Do you mean that--that it is furnished, George?'
'Papered, painted, decorated, furnished--everything, from top to bottom!
I thought that would surprise you, Ella!'
'I think,' she answered slowly, 'you might have told me you were doing
it.'
'What! before it was all done? That would have spoilt it all, dear. I
should have written, though, if you hadn't been coming home so soon. And
now it's finished I must say it looks uncommonly jolly. I'm sure you'll
be pleased with it--it looks quite a different place.'
She tried to smile: 'And did you do it all yourself, George?'
'Well, no--not exactly. I flatter myself I know how to see that the
work's properly done, and all that; but there are some things I don't
pretend to be much of a hand at, so I got certain ladies to give me some
wrinkles.'
Ella felt relieved. She was disappointed, it is true--hurt, even, at
having been deprived of any voice in the matter. She had been looking
forward so much to carrying out her pet schemes, to enjoying her
friends' admiration of the wonders wrought by her artistic invention.
And she had never thought of George, somehow, as likely to have any
strikingly original ideas on the subject of decoration, although she
liked him none the less for that.
But it was something that he had had the good sense to take her mother
and Flossie into his confidence: she knew she could trust them to
preserve him from any serious mistakes.
'You see,' said George, half apologetically, 'I would ever so much
rather have waited till you came back, only I couldn't tell when that
would be. I really couldn't help myself. You're sure you don't mind
about it? If you only knew how I worked over it, rushing about from one
place to another, as soon as I could get away from the office, picking
up bits of furniture here and there, standing over those beggars of
painters and keeping 'em at it, and working out estimates and seeing
foremen and managers and all kinds of chaps! I used to get home
dead-tired of an evening; but I didn't mind that: I felt it was all
bringing you nearer to me, darling, and that made everything a
pleasure!'
There was such honest affection in his look and voice; he had so
evidently intended to please her, and had been in such manifest dread of
any further separation from her, that she was completely disarmed.
'Dear George,' she said gently, 'I am so sorry you took all the trouble
on yourself; it was very, very good of you to care so much, and I know I
shall be delighted with the house.'
'Well,' said George, 'I'm not much afraid about that, because I expect
our tastes are pretty much the same in most things.'
They were by this time at the house, and George, after a little fumbling
with his as yet unfamiliar latchkey, threw open the door with a flourish
and said, 'There you are, little woman! Walk in and you'll see what you
shall see!'
No sooner was Ella inside the hall than her heart sank: 'Looks neat and
nice, doesn't it?' said George cheerfully. 'You'd almost take that paper
for real marble, wouldn't you? See how well they've done those veins. I
like this yellowish colour better than green, don't you? It looks so
cool in summer. That's a good strong hall-lamp--not what you call high
art, exactly--but gives a rattling good light, and that's the main
thing. Here, I'll light it up for you--confound it! they haven't turned
the gas on yet. However, there's too much sunshine for it to show much,
if they had. This linoleum is a capital thing: you might scrub as long
as you liked and you'd never get _that_ pattern out!'
'No,' Ella agreed, with a tragic little smile, 'it--it looks as if it
would last.'
'Last! I should just think so! And here's a hatstand--you could almost
swear it was carved wood of some sort, but it's only cast-iron painted;
indestructible, you see; they told me that was the latest
dodge--wonderful how cheaply they turn them out, isn't it?'
'I thought you said you were helped?'
'Oh, I didn't want any help _here_--this is only the passage, you know!'
Yes, it was only the passage--and yet she had been picturing such a
charming entrance, with a draped arch, a graceful lamp, a fresh bright
paper, a small buffet of genuine old oak, and so on. She suppressed a
sigh as she passed on; after all, so long as the rooms themselves were
all right, it did not so very much matter, and she knew that her
mother's taste could be trusted.
But on the threshold of the dining-room she stopped aghast. The walls
had been distempered a particularly hideous drab; the curtains were
mustard yellow; the carpet was a dull brown; the mottled marble
mantelpiece, for which she had been intending to substitute one in
walnut wood with tiles, still shone in slabs of petrified brawn; there
was a huge mahogany sideboard of a kind she had only seen in
old-fashioned hotels.
'Comfortable, eh?' remarked George. 'Lots of wear in those curtains!'
Unhappily there was, as Ella was only too well aware. 'You did _this_
room yourself too, then, George?' she managed to say, without betraying
herself by her voice.
'Yes, I chose everything here. You see, Ella, we shall only use this
room for meals.'
'Only for meals, yes,' she acquiesced with a shudder; 'but--George,
surely you said mother had helped you with the rooms?'
'What! your mother? No, Ella; her notions are rather too grand for me.
It was Jessie and Carrie I meant. Just come and see what they've made of
my den.'
Ella followed. The window--which had commanded such a cheerful outlook
into one of the pretty gardens, with a pink thorn, a laburnum-tree or
two, and some sycamores which still flourish fresh and fair on Campden
Hill--was obscured now by some detestable contrivance in transparent
paper imitating stained glass.
'That was the girls' notion,' said George, following the direction of
her eyes; 'they fixed it all themselves--it was their present to me.
Pretty of them to think of it, wasn't it? I call it an immense
improvement, and, you see, it's stuck on with some patent cement
varnish, so it can't rub off. You get the effect better if you stand
here--_now_, see how well the colours come out in the sun!'
If only they _would_ come out! But what could she do but stand and
admire hypocritically? Her eyes, in spite of herself, seemed drawn to
that bright-hued sham intersected by black lines intended to represent
leading; of the room itself she only saw vaguely that it was not
unworthy of the window.
'Nothing to what they've done with the drawing-room!' said innocent
George, beaming; 'come along, darling, you'll scarcely know the place.'
And Ella, reduced to a condition of stony stupor, followed to the
drawing-room. She did not know the place, indeed. It was a
quaintly-shaped, irregular room, with French windows opening upon the
garden on one side and a deep bow-window on another; when she had last
seen it, the walls were covered with a paper so pleasing in tone and
design that she had almost decided to retain it. That paper was gone,
and in its place a gaudy semi-Chinese pattern of unknown birds, flying
and perching on sprawling branches laden with impossible flowers. And
then the furniture--the 'elegant drawing-room suite' in brilliant plush
and shiny satin, the cheap cabinets, and the ready-made black and gilt
overmantel, with its panels of swans, hawthorn-blossom, and landscapes
sketchily daubed on dead gold--surely it had all been transferred bodily
from the stage of some carelessly mounted farcical comedy!
Ella's horrified gaze gradually took in other features--the china
monkeys swinging on cords, the porcelain parrots hanging in great brass
rings, huge misshapen terra-cotta jars and pots, dead grass in bloated
drain-pipes, tambourines, beribboned and painted with kittens and
robins, enormous wooden _sabots_, gilded Japanese fans, a woolly white
rug and a bright Kidderminster carpet.
'_Oh_, George!' burst involuntarily from her lips.
'I knew you'd be pleased!' he said complacently; 'but I mustn't take all
the credit myself. It was like this, you see: I felt all right enough
about the other rooms, but the drawing-room--that's _your_ room, and I
was awfully afraid of not having it exactly as it ought to be. So I went
to the girls, and I said, "_You_ know all about these things--just make
it what you think Ella will like, and then we can't go wrong!" We had
that Grosvenor Gallery paper down first of all. "Choose something bright
and cheerful," I said, and I don't think they've chosen badly. Then the
pottery and china and all that--those are the girls' presents to _you_,
with their best love.'
'It--it's very good of them,' said poor Ella, on the verge of tears.
'Oh, they think a lot of you! They were rather nervous about doing
anything at first, for fear you mightn't like it; but I told them they
needn't be afraid. "What I like, Ella will like," I said; and, I must
say, no one could wish to see a prettier drawing-room than they've
turned it into--they've a good deal of taste, those two girls.'
Ella stood there in a kind of dreary dream. What had happened to the
world since she came into this house? What was this change in her? She
was afraid to speak, lest the intense rebellious anger she felt should
gain the mastery. Was it she that had these wicked thoughts of
George--poor, kind, unsuspecting, loving George? She felt a little
faint, for the windows were closed and the room stuffy with the odour of
the new furniture and the atmosphere of the workshop; everything here
seemed to her commonplace and repulsive.
'How about those plans of yours now, Ella, eh?' cried George.
This was too much; her overtried patience broke down. 'George!' she
cried impulsively, and her voice sounded hoarse and strange to her own
ear; 'George! I must speak--I must tell you!----' and then she checked
herself. She must keep command of herself, or she could not, without
utter loss of dignity, find the words that were to sting him into a
sense of what he had done and allowed to be done. Before she could go
on, George had drawn her to him, and was patting her shoulder tenderly.
'I know, dear little girl,' he said, 'I know; don't try to tell me
anything. I'm so awfully glad you're pleased; but all the money and
pains in the world wouldn't make the place good enough for my Ella!'
She released herself with a little cry of impotent despair. How could
she say the sharp, cruel speeches that were struggling to reach her
tongue now? It was no use; she was a coward; she simply had not the
courage to undeceive him here, on the very first day of their reunion,
too!
'You haven't been upstairs yet,' said George, dropping sentiment
abruptly; 'shall we go up?'
Ella assented submissively, much as even this cost her; but it was
better, she reflected, to get it over and know the very worst. However,
she was spared this ordeal for the present; as they returned to the
hall, they found themselves suddenly face to face with a dingy man,
whose face was surrounded by a fringe of black whiskers and crowned by a
shock of fleecy hair.
'Who on earth are you?' demanded George, as the man rose from the
kitchen-stairs.
'No offence, sir and lady! Peagrum, that's _my_ name, fust shop round
the corner as you go into Silver Street, plumber and sanitry hengineer,
gas-fittin' and hartistic decorating, bell-'anging in all its branches.
I received instructions from Mr. Jones that I was to look into a little
matter o' leakage in the back-kitchen sink; also to see what taps, if
hany, required seein' to, and gen'ally to put things straight like. So I
come round, 'aving the keys, jest to cast a heye over them, as I may
term it, preliminry to commencing work in the course of a week or so, as
soon as I'm at libity to attend to it pussonally.'
'Oh, the landlord sent you? All right, then.'