Dazed at the bloodlessness of the scene, feeling his heart torn by the
apparent lack of depth in the most primeval of all emotions, the parent
love, Craighouse strolled away, to find that the daughter was by his
side.
"You will miss your brother," he said.
"We shall," she said; "though, as a matter of fact, I haven't seen much
of Douglas the last three or four years."
"How is that?"
"Oh, he was at Eton, and only home during the holidays. I was always
away at those times; and, of course, he's been training for the last
year."
"He is joining the Horse Guards?"
"Yes. The eldest son always goes into the army until he succeeds to the
title."
"And the second son?"
"The navy."
A smile lurked in the corners of his mouth. "Supposing the second son
proved a bad sailor, what then?"
She shrugged her shoulders. "I suppose he would stay on shore, and
probably go to the devil."
He stooped to pick a blade of grass, and munched it meditatively. "And
what happens to the girls?" he asked, after a pause.
Her lips, which were like pomegranates, straightened into a line. "The
girls are not of great account," she said, a note of suppressed tension
in her voice, which he quite failed to note. "We are educated in a sort
of a way, introduced to the arts, but not allowed to pursue the
acquaintanceship; then we marry--if at all--some one of our set and
everybody says, 'Didn't she do well to get him?'"
"And then?"
Again she made a pretty shrug with her shoulders. "Then we move into
our new homes, which are much the same as the old ones, and we bring up
a family of descendants for our husbands. When the husband dies, the
eldest male child takes over the estate, and his wife rules in the
mother's place."
"And she leaves, in her declining years, the home which, naturally, she
has grown to love?"
"Yes. Why not?"
For several moments neither spoke. Always hasty in its judgments, his
brain was fired with a rankling sense of injustice. He thought he saw
the explanation of the bloodless good-by to the viscount. The mental
inertia of the sons and the emotional placidity of the girl were
natural consequences of a hereditary system which dulled personalities
and drove initiative into the scrap-heap of tradition. It was monstrous
that one's future and entity should be planned like the life of a
hot-house plant; it was no longer a puzzle to him that England's real
leaders and thinkers sprang from obscurity. He thanked "whatever gods
there be" that he was born in a country which had only one
tradition--that it once rebelled against the past.
He turned towards the girl and gazed argumentatively into her very deep
and very blue eyes; then he gasped, and a far-away look crept into his
own dark, restless ones.
"_Galatea_," he said, "_is coming to life_."
Subconsciously she had caught his spirit of resentment, and, being a
woman, she thrilled to the sense of rebellion in his nature. With the
unlocking of her emotions had come the sparkle in the blue depths of
her eyes, and the animation which had lit at once the dormant radiancy
of her beauty--and his sudden admiration. In addition--though none was
needed--the mellowing sun lingered on her hair till it seemed like
strands of gold.
"You look like a wild rose," he said irrelevantly, then dashed on into
a sea of words. "Are you content with this? Do you never feel a divine
restlessness in your nature, urging you to be the architect of your own
fate? Are you satisfied to be a mere link in the chain of generations?
Surely the individualistic instinct is not dead in this country?"
He paused, rather astonished, but quite pleased with his burst of
oratory.
"What would you have me do?"
"Anything--everything that expresses your own personality. Be yourself,
and get away from type."
"I have done a little."
"What? Appeared in a few charity _tableaux vivants_? Posed for your
photo in the _Sketch_ as a woman interested in war work?"
"I am sorry," she said demurely, "that you disapprove of me."
"Great Scott!" he said, thrusting his hands into his pockets with an
air of defiance, "you are one of the most charming women I've ever
seen." He drew himself up to his full height. "But before I succumb to
the beauty of these surroundings and the--the--loveliest----"
"Yes? Please don't hesitate."
"You are mocking me."
"Not at all, Don Quixote. Only why shy at the windmill?"
He surveyed her carefully with his head cocked to one side. "I believe
you have a sense of humor," he said.
"The daughter of an earl humorous?" She laughed gaily, and her beauty
was exceedingly good to look upon.
An uncomfortable feeling crept into the mind of Lawrence Craighouse,
officer and satirist, that, though armed with the broadsword of
masculine self-assurance, he was being beaten by the stiletto of
feminism. His embarrassment, however, was broken by the approach of a
servant.
"Pardon me," said Lady Dorothy. "It's the mail."
She took from the salver a letter, which bore the stamp of the Red
Cross, and opened it.
"I am so glad," she said, looking up at him; "I have been accepted for
France."
"As what?"
"As a V.A.D., my dear knight. I have been one for two years."
He began to think that his broadsword was decidedly worsted, but he
made one final and thoroughly masculine attempt to retain the posture
of superiority.
"I supposed you soothed a great many convalescent and gallant
lieutenants?" he said airily. It was a lamentable attempt, but he felt
a sudden jealously of all wounded subalterns.
She pirouetted daintily.
"I was in a Tommies' hospital," she said; "and when I wasn't scrubbing
floors I was waiting on the nurses at table--and you have no idea what
cats some of them were."
Whereupon Lawrence Craighouse of New York handed over his sword and
surrendered unconditionally.