Never, never, did they go anywhere, together: neither to the play, nor
to a restaurant, nor to a ball; and only very seldom was he at her
house, a guest among many. But every afternoon Fay Avalon would steal to
her lover’s studio in a quiet street in Hampstead. Not, of course, in
her car, but in a taxi.
And what a relief it was, to enter the dim, bare silence of that studio!
The clatter of the voices of the luncheon-party she had just left faded
instantly from her mind, a lovely mist came in between the unquiet
delight of her heart and the usual labours of her life. She rested on a
divan in a corner of that secret studio, while Shuvarov would pace about
in his feverish way. It was a very bare studio, but it would not have
remained so bare if she had had her way. Though, indeed, Fay Avalon, she
who had so despised “the private life,” would have been shocked, she
simply could not have helped being shocked, if he had not impatiently
dismissed her offer to make of the studio a pavilion worthy of
Babylonian lovers. “I make just enough money not to starve,” said
Shuvarov. “And that is enough for any man.”
They were, of course, quite often unhappy, for Russians are like that.
There were scenes, introspective and bitter, there were accusations,
quarrels, reconciliations. It was some time before Mrs. Avalon realised
that it is in the Slav Temperament to make violent scenes about nothing
and then to yield adorably to passionate reconciliations. It was rather
wearing for the nerves, she protested. “You have lived smoothly for too
long,” he retorted in a harsh moment. “You have known no wretchedness,
Fay, because you have _felt_ nothing! God, you Englishwomen! In Russia
our women _live_, they _feel_....”
But Fay Avalon only sighed at that, certain that no woman anywhere could
feel so much as she ... and she was a little afraid for herself, the way
this thing she had not known before, this thing called love, had taken
hold of her.
One day their privacy suffered a shock. Mrs. Avalon had just left the
studio, in the evening, and had turned the corner into a more frequented
street in search for a taxi, when a tall, shabby young man confronted
her. He stood before her so that she could not pass, and his face
mocked her, a lean face made very sinister by his nose, perhaps a fine
nose once but now broken so that it inclined noticeably to one side. He
examined her with a sneer in his eyes. She did not at first know it for
a sneer, for no man had ever sneered at Fay Avalon before. He swept off
his hat, a sardonic gesture, and he replaced it. It was a soft, dirty,
dilapidated hat of the rakish sort, such as has been worn by every
pirate that has ever been heard of.
“Good-evening, Mrs. Avalon,” said the shabby young man.
“I am afraid ...” doubtfully began Fay Avalon.
“Not at all!” said the shabby young man. He smiled graciously.
“It is my misfortune,” he said, “that we have not been introduced. I
have not been going about very much in society lately, because of one
thing and another. And I called you by your name merely to show you that
I know who you are. I also know where you have been. I can’t, of course,
say that I know exactly what you have been doing, but I can’t help
thinking that your husband would have no doubt about it. Husbands are
like that, madam. Juries are also like that. I wonder, Mrs. Avalon, if
you will think me very boorish if I, well, insist on your lending me
fifty pounds?”
The young man was very shabbily dressed, but he was so very unpleasant,
so entirely and symmetrically unpleasant, that, she thought, he must
once have been a gentleman. She stared at him, and she shivered a
little. Perhaps, she thought, this is the first man I have ever met who
has simply no desire to please me. Perhaps most men are only possible
because they desire to please women. This one is unaffectedly foul....
“You are blackmailing me, then?” she asked him: and her voice did not
tremble more than ever so little.
“Yes,” said the shabby young man. “And I am doing it as unpleasantly as
I know how. I am sure, Mrs. Avalon, that you had rather I was unpleasant
than that I made love, like the greasy blackmailers one meets in books.
And, anyhow, I could not possibly compete with Prince Nicholas
Pavlovitch Shuvarov. These foreigners, I am told, have the
technique....”
She stared at him with unbelieving eyes. Could there be men such as
this, so foul! To what awful depths of bitterness must this revolting
man have sunk, that he could so wantonly and cruelly insult a stranger!
“I realise you dislike me very much,” said the young man with the
broken nose. “But, even so, I should prefer that that matter of the
fifty pounds should engage your attention more or less immediately.”
Mrs. Avalon shivered a little.
“Don’t, please, speak any more!” she breathed at last. “You seem to know
so much that I am sure you know the address of my house. The
telephone-book will, however, provide you with any details that may have
escaped your attention. If you will call at noon to-morrow you will be
given an envelope at the door. May I pass now, please?”
“Why, of course!” said he, and stood aside.
But somehow she did not pass immediately. She stared into his face with
very wide, childish eyes, and there was a queer sort of hurt smile
crucified in their depths.
“I have never been spoken to like this before,” she said. “Who are you?”
“I am the cavalier of the streets, madam,” said the tall shabby man with
the broken nose. She stared at him very thoughtfully.
“And is that a good thing to be?”
The cavalier of the streets smiled curiously.
“I had thought, Mrs. Avalon, that it was I who was detaining you....”
“You see,” said Mrs. Avalon gently, “you are the vilest man I have ever
met. You are probably the vilest man in the world, and so I am curious.
You will have your fifty pounds. Or would you not prefer a hundred?”
But the ice of Fay Avalon did not freeze the cavalier of the streets.
“I do not accept presents from ladies,” he said. “Fifty is business, but
the extra fifty is an insult to a gentleman.” He smiled right into her
face. “You may pass, Mrs. Avalon.”
“You are a gentleman? You were, perhaps, you mean?”
“A gentleman,” said the shabby young man, “is a man who is never
_unintentionally_ rude to any one. I am a gentleman.”
He stood aside, and swept off his dilapidated hat. She took one step,
two, three....
“I do hope,” she murmured swiftly, “that I will never see you again.”
The lean, weathered face with the fantastic nose mocked her. Fay Avalon
had never been mocked before.
“Didn’t I tell you,” he said, “that I was the cavalier of the streets? I
am alone, the solitary supporter of chivalry and all manner of outdoor
manliness. Thus, it will be very difficult to resist the pleasure of
seeing you again, Mrs. Avalon, for you are, without a doubt, a darling.
But I will try to resist it, really I will....”
“Please,” said Mrs. Avalon, and went swiftly.