The aunts expressed a mitigated approval of Charmion's proposal. Mrs
Fane came of a good family, and was "very well left". Her married
estate, moreover, gave her the privilege of chaperonage, so that the
dual establishment might be quite a good arrangement, all things
considered, "until--"
"_Until_!" echoed Aunt Eliza eloquently, nodding coyly at me, while I
stared into space with basilisk calm. I object to references to my
problematical marriage--especially by aunts. The great "until" never
arrived for them, yet they feel quite annoyed because twenty-six has
found me still a spinster!
I made my journey to London with a sense of great adventure, Bridget
going with me in the dual role of maid and mentor. She was the only
person who was to accompany me into the new life, and experience had
proved that her sound common sense might be trusted to act as a brake on
the wheels of my own impetuosity. We stayed the morning in town, when I
interviewed a house agent, and set him on the search for suitable flats,
and then we adjourned to the West End to buy a becoming new hat. It
always soothes me to buy hats. In times of doubt and depression it is
an admirable tonic to the feminine mind. At three o'clock we left
Waterloo for our two hours' journey, and arrived at the old-fashioned
inn, which was to act as rendezvous, before half-past five.
Charmion was awaiting us in a private sitting-room, long, oak-beamed,
spotlessly clean, and a trifle musty, with that faint but unmistakable
mustiness which hangs about old rooms and old furniture. Tea was set
out on one half of the oak dining-table. The china was of the
old-fashioned white and gold order, the cups very wide at the brim and
cramped at the handle, and possessing a dear little surprise rose at the
base, which peeped out through a hoar frost of sugar as you drained the
last gulp. Charmion laughed at my delight over that rose, but I was in
the mood to be pleased, to see happy auguries in trivial happenings. I
hailed that rose as a type of unexpected joys.
Charmion was dressed in business-like grey tweeds, with a soft grey felt
hat slouched over her head. She looked very pale, very frail,
intensely, vibratingly alive. This extraordinary contradiction between
body and mind made a charm and mystery which it is difficult to express
in words. One longed to protect and shield her, to tuck her up on a
sofa, and tend her like a fragile child, at the very same moment that
mentally one was sitting at her feet, domineered by the influence of a
master mind!
I ate an enormous tea, and Charmion crumbled a piece of cake upon her
plate; then we had the things taken away, and drew up to the fire, and
toasted our toes, and looked into each other's eyes, and exclaimed
simultaneously--"_Well_?"
Hitherto we had talked on general subjects, Kathleen's marriage, the
break-up of the old home, my own journey, etcetera, but now we were free
from interruption for an hour at least, and the great subject could be
safely tackled.
"Evelyn! Do you realise that _nothing_ is settled, and that nothing
need be, unless you are absolutely, whole-heartedly _sure_?"
"I am absolutely whole-hearted about several things already. What sort
of things were _you_ thinking about?"
"Well, take the house first. It meets my ideal, but it mayn't be yours.
You must promise to give an unvarnished opinion."
"Make your mind easy! If there is one thing that I may claim to be
above all others, it is `unvarnished'. I have a brutal frankness in
expressing my own opinion. If, through nice feeling, I try to disguise
it, my manner shrieks it aloud!"
"That's all right then. I'm glad to hear it. Next comes the question
of time. We should have to take a lease of three years. I don't know
if you'd care to bind yourself for so long."
That reminded me of the aunts' "until", and I said solemnly, "Charmion,
tell me the worst. _Is_ there an eligible bachelor who owns the next
`place' ready to discover me picking his roses, or trespassing on his
side of the stream, and to make love to me forthwith? They always _do_
in books, you know, when girls go to live in country houses."
Charmion smiled her slow, languorous smile.
"I have amused myself with looking up the names of the people living in
all the big houses around: They seem uniformly made up of couples. To
the best of my belief, there is not a single man, bachelor or widower,
within many miles."
I said, "Oh!" and felt the faint, natural dismay which any human girl
would feel in the circumstances. Charmion herself was enough romance
for the present, and a precipitate "lover next door" would for the
moment have been _de trop_, but still--
My expression (unvarnished!) evidently betrayed my feelings, for
Charmion smiled, sighed, and stretched out a caressing hand.
"Let's be honest. It is foolish to set up a partnership in the dark.
Is there _anyone_, Evelyn, who may swoop down upon us at a moment's
notice, and carry you off to share _his_ house?"
"To the best of my knowledge there is not a solitary one. I'm quite
sure of one thing, and that is, that however wildly he swooped, I
wouldn't go!"
"But there must be--you are so pretty, Evelyn, and so attractive--there
must _have_ been."
"Oh yes; two. But not real lovers, Charmion, only--_pretendus_. One
was young and needy and ambitious, and thought that I should look very
well sitting at the head of his table. Incidentally, that my money
would be useful to provide the table and the things upon it. The
other--he was rather a dear, and he cared enough to give me a pang. But
he was happily married last year to a girl who is as _un_-like me in
every respect as you can possibly imagine. They are both ancient
history now."
"And you? You yourself? You have never been in love?"
If any other woman had asked me such a question there would have been
short shrift with her. Charmion herself had never before attempted such
personalities; but now, when she deemed it necessary, she spoke without
a flicker of hesitation, her grey eyes staring full into mine. It would
have seemed ridiculous to take offence.
"Once. At first sight. Quite bowled over. We met at an hotel."
She knew what I meant, made a dainty little grimace, and bent her head
in a small bow of acknowledgment, which somehow managed to look quite
regal and stately. I longed to put one or two questions in return.
Widows _have_ been known to marry again! Why should I not wish to be
reassured on my own account? Why should it be wrong for me to force
confidences, when she herself had led the way? It would _not_ be wrong;
it would be right, and prudent, and praiseworthy. The only objection
was, _I could not do it_. After that little bow of acknowledgment,
Charmion threw back her head until it rested on the high cushioned back
of her chair.
"That's settled then," she said quietly.
Her heavy lids drooped over her eyes, her fine white hands were folded
in her lap. There was in voice and manner an air of finality, which was
as impervious as a barrier of barbed wire. Not for any bribe in the
world would I have attempted to scale it.
The next morning, bright and early, we chartered a "fly," and lumbered
along two miles of country lanes, and then, suddenly turning a corner,
found ourselves at the gate of Pastimes. It was a dull, grey day, of
which I was glad, for _any_ place can look attractive in spring
sunshine. I have seen even a third-rate London square look quite frisky
and inviting with a shimmer of green over the black trees, and the
spring-cleaned windows sending out flashes of light; it's a very
different spectacle on a November afternoon. Five minutes'
acquaintanceship with Pastimes showed, however, that its predominating
quality was cheerfulness. There was a great deal of panelling on the
walls, but it was of white wood, not oak, and the old, small latticed
windows had been converted into deep bays, filled with great panes of
plate glass--a pagan proceeding from an artistic point of view, but
infinitely cheerful and healthy. There was a large central hall from
either side of which opened two rooms of medium size, facing
respectively east and west; a quaint descent of two steps led the way to
a really spacious drawing-room, through the great windows of which was a
lovely vista of velvet lawn, and a great cedar drooping its green
branches to the ground.
Parallel with the drawing-room, and also facing south, was a long
glassed-in apartment which had evidently been used to harbour plants,
garden-chairs, and impedimenta, but which revealed itself to our eyes as
an ideal sun-parlour for chilly days. Sheltered from draughts by the
outstanding walls, yet with a glass roof and frontage to catch every ray
of sun, the parlour would be an ideal refuge for spring and autumn. So
far as public rooms went, we were well off with five apartments at the
disposal of two people.
"Mine!--yours!--_ours_!" cried Charmion, waving her hands descriptively,
first towards the two smaller rooms, and then to the other three in
turn.
"In the hall we will eat; the big room shall be no ordinary formal
drawing-room, but a living-room _a deux_. The sun-parlour also we shall
share, but the `sulkies' shall be private ground, hermetically sealed
against intruders! There is a spare room upstairs which can be spared
for muddles. I have a fastidiously tidy eye. It _offends_ me to see
things scattered about, but my hands _will_ go on scattering them, so it
is necessary for my peace of mind to have a muddle-room where I can
deposit bundles at a moment's notice, and feel sure that they will not
be tidied away. Well, shall we go upstairs and see the bedrooms?"
"Where _are_ the stairs?" I asked curiously, for from no corner of the
hall was there a glimpse of staircase visible. I had not thought about
it before, but now I realised that it was just this absence which gave
that touch of comfort and privacy which is wanting in the ordinary
entrance "lounge". There was no draughty well, no galleried space
overhead, from which curious ears could overhear private confidences. I
stared round mystified, till Charmion opened yet another doorway, and
behold! there was the staircase, the oddest, curliest specimen of its
kind, mounting up and up within a narrow well, for all the world like
the steps in a church tower, except that these were wide and shallow,
and that a thick brass rod had been placed on the outer wall to act as a
banister in the case of need. Whoever had built Pastimes had plainly
believed that stairs were needed for the purpose of transit only, and
had refused to waste space on their adornment.
On the first landing were several good bedrooms, two of which possessed
big sunny balconies, facing south.
"That settles it!" I told Charmion. "If I had had any doubts before,
the balconies would have decided me, once for all. All my life I have
yearned to have a bedroom opening on to a really big balcony. I'm crazy
about balconies! Think of the happy hours one has spent on balconies in
Switzerland and Italy! To have been in a room without one would have
been to lose half the joy. And even in England--think of all the things
one can do on a balcony of one's very own. Sleep out when it is hot.
Air your mattress. Hang up your sponge. Grow your pet flowers. Dry
your hair. Cry it out quietly when you feel blue. Sentimentalise over
the railings when you feel _rose_."
Charmion's fine brows arched, her lids drooped over her eyes. I
recognised the same expression which her face had worn the night before,
when for a moment I had seemed on the point of questioning her about her
own romance. Once more I felt myself up against an impenetrable wall of
reserve, and hastily switched the conversation to the more prosaic topic
of cupboards. The very sound of a balcony bristles with romance, but
cupboards may be discussed with safety under the most lacerating
circumstances. There is something comfortably safe and stodgy about
them. And Pastimes was so rich in this respect that we spent a happy
half-hour appointing their future uses, and jotting down notes for their
improvement.
Later on we visited the gardens, beautiful even in their sleep, and
promising a very paradise for summer days. The lawns and flower beds
immediately around the house were exquisitely in order, but by far the
greater part of the grounds was uncultivated. There was a strip of
_real_ woodland, where the light filtered down through the branches of
tall old trees on to a carpet of dried leaves and bracken, through which
could be seen the close-growing green shoots which foretold a harvest of
bulbs. Later on no doubt there would be primroses and bluebells, and
when summer came, if I knew anything about it, there would be two
hammocks swinging between spreading branches, and two happy women
reposing therein. It was this _real_ country air which gave Pastimes
its chief charm.
That evening Charmion came to my room, and we sat together by the fire
and talked for three solid hours. As a rule, I get fidgety in the
evening when talk is the only amusement, but I can sit and listen to
Charmion for as long as she chooses to go on. She is--interesting! She
says things in an interesting way, and has interesting things to say. I
have met extraordinarily clever and well-informed people who are
terrible bores. Charmion would be interesting if she told one how to
make an egg flip! As I watched the delicate play of expression on the
tired face, which was yet so thrillingly alive, as I listened to the
slow soft drawl of her voice, I felt a sudden rush of thankfulness and
exhilaration.
"Charmion!" I cried suddenly, "aren't you _thankful_ to be rich?"
She flinched as though I had struck her, and turned upon me a wild-eyed
look of affront.
"Rich? Who says I am rich? Who has been talking about my affairs?
Have you--have you been making inquiries to find out what I am worth?"