As she traversed the smoking-parlour the cheerful sounds that had once
tinkled from the collar of a Flemish horse chimed through the house,
and simultaneously she became aware that there would be _macaroni au
gratin_ for lunch, which was very dear and remembering of Peppino.
But before setting fork to her piled-up plate, she had to question him,
for her mental craving for information was far keener than her appetite
for food.
"_Caro_, who is an Indian," she said, "whom I saw just now with
Daisy Quantock? They were the other side of il piccolo Avon."
Peppino had already begun his macaroni and must pause to shovel the
outlying strings of it into his mouth. But the haste with which he did
so was sufficient guaranty for his eagerness to reply as soon as it was
humanly possible to do so.
"Indian, my dear?" he asked with the greatest interest.
"Yes; turban and burnous and calves and slippers," she said rather
impatiently, for what was the good of Peppino having remained in
Riseholme if he could not give her precise and certain information on
local news when she returned. His prose-poems were all very well, but
as prince-consort he had other duties of state which must not be
neglected for the calls of Art.
This slight asperity on her part seemed to sharpen his wits.
"Really, I don't know for certain, Lucia," he said, "for I have not set
my eyes on him. But putting two and two together, I might make a
guess."
"Two and two make four," she said with that irony for which she was
feared and famous. "Now for your guess. I hope it is equally accurate."
"Well, as I told you in one of my letters," said he, "Mrs Quantock
showed signs of being a little off with Christian Science. She had a
cold, and though she recited the True Statement of Being just as
frequently as before, her cold got no better. But when I saw her on
Tuesday last, unless it was Wednesday, no, it couldn't have been
Wednesday, so it must have been Tuesday--"
"Whenever it was then," interrupted his wife, brilliantly summing up
his indecision.
"Yes; whenever it was, as you say, on that occasion Mrs Quantock was
very full of some Indian philosophy which made you quite well at once.
What did she call it now? Yoga! Yes, that was it!"
"And then?" asked Lucia.
"Well, it appears you must have a teacher in Yoga or else you may
injure yourself. You have to breathe deeply and say 'Om'----"
"Say what?"
"Om. I understand the ejaculation to be Om. And there are very curious
physical exercises; you have to hold your ear with one hand and your
toes with the other, and you may strain yourself unless you do it
properly. That was the general gist of it."
"And shall we come to the Indian soon?" said Lucia.
"_Carissima_, you have come to him already. I suggest that Mrs
Quantock has applied for a teacher and got him. _Ecco!_"
Mrs Lucas wore a heavily corrugated forehead at this news. Peppino had
a wonderful _flair_ in explaining unusual circumstances in the
life of Riseholme and his conjectures were generally correct. But if he
was right in this instance, it struck Lucia as being a very irregular
thing that anyone should have imported a mystical Indian into Riseholme
without consulting her. It is true that she had been away, but still
there was the medium of the post.
"_Ecco_ indeed!" she said. "It puts me in rather a difficult
position, for I must send out my invitations to my garden-party today,
and I really don't know whether I ought to be officially aware of this
man's existence or not. I can't write to Daisy Quantock and say 'Pray
bring your black friend Om or whatever his name proves to be, and on
the other hand, if he is the sort of person whom one would be sorry to
miss, I should not like to have passed over him."
"After all, my dear, you have only been back in Riseholme half an
hour," said her husband. "It would have been difficult for Mrs
Quantock to have told you yet."
Her face cleared.
"Perhaps Daisy has written to me about him," she said. "I may find a
full account of it all when I open my letters."
"Depend upon it you will. She would hardly have been so wanting in
proper feeling as not to have told you. I think, too, that her visitor
must only have just arrived, or I should have been sure to see him
about somewhere."
She rose.
"Well, we will see," she said. "Now I shall be very busy all afternoon,
but by tea-time I shall be ready to see anyone who calls. Give me my
letters, _Caro_, and I will find out if Daisy has written to me."
She turned them over as she went to her room, and there among them was
a bulky envelope addressed in Mrs Quantock's great sprawling hand,
which looked at first sight so large and legible, but on closer
examination turned out to be so baffling. You had to hold it at some
distance off to make anything out of it, and look at it in an abstracted
general manner much as you would look at a view. Treated thus, scattered
words began to leap into being, and when you had got a sufficiency of
these, like glimpses of the country seen by flashes of lightning, you
could hope to get a collective idea of it all. The procedure led to the
most promising results as Mrs Lucas sat with the sheets at arm's length,
occasionally altering the range to try the effect of a different focus.
"Benares" blinked at her, also "Brahmin"; also "highest caste";
"extraordinary sanctity," and "Guru." And when the meaning of this
latter was ascertained from the article on "Yoga" in her Encyclopaedia,
she progressed very swiftly towards a complete comprehension of the
letter.
When fully pieced together it was certainly enough to rivet her whole
attention, and make her leave unopened the rest of the correspondence,
for such a prelude to adventure had seldom sounded in Riseholme. It
appeared, even as her husband had told her at lunch, that Mrs Quantock
found her cold too obstinate for all the precepts of Mrs Eddy; the
True Statement of Being, however often repeated, only seemed to inflame
it further, and one day, when confined to the house, she had taken a
book "quite at random" from the shelves in her library, under, she
supposed, the influence of some interior compulsion. This then was
clearly a "leading."
Mrs Lucas paused a moment as she pieced together these first sentences.
She seemed to remember that Mrs Quantock had experienced a similar
leading when first she took up Christian Science. It was a leading from
the sight of a new church off Sloane Street that day; Mrs Quantock had
entered (she scarcely knew why) and had found herself in a Testimony
Meeting, where witness after witness declared the miraculous healings
they had experienced. One had had a cough, another cancer, another a
fractured bone, but all had been cured by the blessed truths conveyed
in the Gospel according to Mrs Eddy. However, her memories on this
subject were not to the point now; she burned to arrive at the story of
the new leading.
Well, the book that Mrs Quantock had taken down in obedience to the
last leading proved to be a little handbook of Oriental Philosophies,
and it opened, "all of its own accord," at a chapter called Yoga.
Instantly she perceived, as by the unclosing of an inward eye, that Yoga
was what she wanted and she instantly wrote to the address from which
this book was issued asking for any guidance on the subject. She had
read in "Oriental Philosophies" that for the successful practice of
Yoga, it was necessary to have a teacher, and did they know of any
teacher who could give her instruction? A wonderful answer came to that,
for two days afterwards her maid came to her and said that an Indian
gentleman would like to see her. He was ushered in, and with a profound
obeisance said: "Beloved lady, I am the teacher you asked for; I am your
Guru. Peace be to this house! Om!"
Mrs Lucas had by this time got her view of Mrs Quantock's letter into
perfect focus, and she read on without missing a word. "Is it not
wonderful, dearest Lucia," it ran, "that my desire for light should
have been so instantly answered? And yet my Guru tells me that it
always happens so. I was sent to him, and he was sent to me, just like
that! He had been expecting some call when my letter asking for
guidance came, and he started at once because he knew he was sent.
Fancy! I don't even know his name, and his religion forbids him to tell
it me. He is just my Guru, my guide, and he is going to be with me as
long as he knows I need him to show me the True Path. He has the spare
bedroom and the little room adjoining where he meditates and does
Postures and Pranyama which is breathing. If you persevere in them
under instruction, you have perfect health and youth, and my cold is
gone already. He is a Brahmin of the very highest caste, indeed caste
means nothing to him any longer, just as a Baronet and an Honourable
must seem about the same thing to the King. He comes from Benares where
he used to meditate all day by the Ganges, and I can see for myself
that he is a person of the most extraordinary sanctity. But he can
meditate just as well in my little room, for he says he was never in
any house that had such a wonderful atmosphere. He has no money at all
which is so beautiful of him, and looked so pained and disappointed
when I asked him if I might not give him some. He doesn't even know how
he got here from London; he doesn't think he came by train, so perhaps
he was wafted here in some astral manner. He looked so bewildered too
when I said the word 'money,' and evidently he had to think what it
was, because it is so long since it has meant anything to him. So if he
wants anything, I have told him to go into any shop and ask that it
shall be put down to me. He has often been without food or sleep for
days together when he is meditating. Just think!
"Shall I bring him to see you, or will you come here? He wants to meet
you, because he feels you have a beautiful soul and may help him in
that way, as well as his helping you. I am helping him too he says,
which seems more wonderful than I can believe. Send me a line as soon
as you get back. _Tante salute_!
"Your own,
"DAISY."
The voluminous sheets had taken long in reading and Mrs Lucas folded
them up slowly and thoughtfully. She felt that she had to make a swift
decision that called into play all her mental powers. On the one hand
it was "up to her" to return a frigid reply, conveying, without making
any bones about the matter, that she had no interest in nameless Gurus
who might or might not be Brahmins from Benares and presented
themselves at Daisy's doors in a penniless condition without clear
knowledge whether they had come by train or not. In favour of such
prudent measures was the truly Athenian character of Daisy's mind, for
she was always enquiring into "some new thing," which was the secret of
life when first discovered, and got speedily relegated to the
dust-heap. But against such a course was the undoubted fact that Daisy
did occasionally get hold of somebody who subsequently proved to be of
interest, and Lucia would never forget to her dying day the advent in
Riseholme of a little Welsh attorney, in whom Daisy had discovered a
wonderful mentality. Lucia had refused to extend her queenly
hospitality to him, or to recognise his existence in any way during the
fortnight when he stayed with Daisy, and she was naturally very much
annoyed to find him in a prominent position in the Government not many
years later. Indeed she had snubbed him so markedly on his first
appearance at Riseholme that he had refused on subsequent visits to
come to her house at all, though he several times visited Mrs Quantock
again, and told her all sorts of political secrets (so she said) which
she would not divulge for anything in the world. There must never be a
repetition of so fatal an error.
Another thing inclined the wavering balance. She distinctly wanted some
fresh element at her court, that should make Riseholme know that she
was in residence again. August would soon be here with its languors and
absence of stimulus, when it was really rather difficult in the drowsy
windless weather to keep the flag of culture flying strongly from her
own palace. The Guru had already said that he felt sure she had a
beautiful soul, and-- The outline of the scheme flashed upon her. She
would have Yoga evenings in the hot August weather, at which, as the
heat of the day abated, graceful groups should assemble among the
mottos in the garden and listen to high talk on spiritual subjects.
They would adjourn to delicious moonlit suppers in the pergola, or if
the moon was indisposed--she could not be expected to regulate the
affairs of the moon as well as of Riseholme--there would be dim seances
and sandwiches in the smoking-parlour. The humorous furniture should be
put in cupboards, and as they drifted towards the front hall again,
when the clocks struck an unexpectedly late hour, little whispered
colloquies of "How wonderful he was tonight" would be heard, and there
would be faraway looks and sighs, and the notings down of the titles of
books that conducted the pilgrim on the Way. Perhaps as they softly
assembled for departure, a little music would be suggested to round off
the evening, and she saw herself putting down the soft pedal as people
rustled into their places, for the first movement of the "Moonlight
Sonata." Then at the end there would be silence, and she would get up
with a sigh, and someone would say "Lucia mia"! and somebody else
"Heavenly Music," and perhaps the Guru would say "Beloved lady," as he
had _apparently_ said to poor Daisy Quantock. Flowers, music,
addresses from the Guru, soft partings, sense of refreshment.... With
the memory of the Welsh attorney in her mind, it seemed clearly wiser
to annex rather than to repudiate the Guru. She seized a pen and drew a
pile of postcards towards her, on the top of which was printed her name
and address.
"Too wonderful," she wrote, "pray bring him yourself to my little
garden-party on Friday. There will be only a few. Let me know if he
wants a quiet room ready for him."
All this had taken time, and she had but scribbled a dozen postcards to
friends bidding them come to her garden party on Friday, when tea was
announced. These invitations had the mystic word "Hightum" written at
the bottom left hand corner, which conveyed to the enlightened recipient
what sort of party it was to be, and denoted the standard of dress. For
one of Lucia's quaint ideas was to divide dresses into three classes,
"Hightum," "Tightum" and "Scrub." "Hightum" was your very best dress,
the smartest and newest of all, and when "Hightum" was written on a
card of invitation, it implied that the party was a very resplendent
one. "Tightum" similarly indicated a moderately smart party, "Scrub"
carried its own significance on the surface. These terms applied to
men's dress as well and as regards evening parties: a dinner party
"Hightum" would indicate a white tie and a tail coat; a dinner party
"Tightum" a black tie and a short coat, and a dinner "Scrub" would mean
morning clothes.
With tea was announced also the advent of Georgie Pillson who was her
gentleman-in-waiting when she was at home, and her watch-dog when she
was not. In order to save subsequent disappointment, it may be at once
stated that there never has been, was, or ever would be the smallest
approach to a flirtation between them. Neither of them, she with her
forty respectable years and he with his blameless forty-five years, had
ever flirted, with anybody at all. But it was one of the polite and
pleasant fictions of Riseholme that Georgie was passionately attached
to her and that it was for her sake that he had settled in Riseholme
now some seven years ago, and that for her sake he remained still
unmarried. She never, to do her justice, had affirmed anything of the
sort, but it is a fact that sometimes when Georgie's name came up in
conversation, her eyes wore that "far-away" look that only the
masterpieces of art could otherwise call up, and she would sigh and
murmur "Dear Georgie"! and change the subject, with the tact that
characterized her. In fact their mutual relations were among the most
Beautiful Things of Riseholme, and hardly less beautiful was Peppino's
attitude towards it all. That large hearted man trusted them both, and
his trust was perfectly justified. Georgie was in and out of the house
all day, chiefly in; and not only did scandal never rear its hissing
head, but it positively had not a head to hiss with, or a foot to stand
on. On his side again Georgie had never said that he was in love with
her (nor would it have been true if he had), but by his complete
silence on the subject coupled with his constancy he seemed to admit
the truth of this bloodless idyll. They talked and walked and read the
masterpieces of literature and played duets on the piano together.
Sometimes (for he was the more brilliant performer, though as he said
"terribly lazy about practising," for which she scolded him) he would
gently slap the back of her hand, if she played a wrong note, and say
"Naughty!" And she would reply in baby language "Me vewy sowwy! Oo
naughty too to hurt Lucia!" That was the utmost extent of their carnal
familiarities, and with bright eyes fixed on the music they would break
into peals of girlish laughter, until the beauty of the music sobered
them again.
Georgie (he was Georgie or Mr Georgie, never Pillson to the whole of
Riseholme) was not an obtrusively masculine sort of person. Such
masculinity as he was possessed of was boyish rather than adult, and
the most important ingredients in his nature were womanish. He had, in
common with the rest of Riseholme, strong artistic tastes, and in
addition to playing the piano, made charming little water-colour
sketches, many of which he framed at his own expense and gave to
friends, with slightly sentimental titles, neatly printed in gilt
letters on the mount. "Golden Autumn Woodland," "Bleak December,"
"Yellow Daffodils," "Roses of Summer" were perhaps his most notable
series, and these he had given to Lucia, on the occasion of four
successive birthdays. He did portraits as well in pastel; these were of
two types, elderly ladies in lace caps with a row of pearls, and boys
in cricket shirts with their sleeves rolled up. He was not very good at
eyes, so his sitters always were looking down, but he was excellent at
smiles, and the old ladies smiled patiently and sweetly, and the boys
gaily. But his finest accomplishment was needlework and his house was
full of the creations of his needle, wool-work curtains, petit-point
chair seats, and silk embroideries framed and glazed. Next to Lucia he
was the hardest worked inhabitant of Riseholme but not being so strong
as the Queen, he had often to go away for little rests by the sea-side.
Travelling by train fussed him a good deal, for he might not be able to
get a corner seat, or somebody with a pipe or a baby might get into his
carriage, or the porter might be rough with his luggage, so he always
went in his car to some neighbouring watering-place where they knew
him. Dicky, his handsome young chauffeur, drove him, and by Dicky's
side sat Foljambe, his very pretty parlour-maid who valetted him. If
Dicky took the wrong turn his master called "Naughty boy" through the
tube, and Foljambe smiled respectfully. For the month of August, his
two plain strapping sisters (Hermione and Ursula alas!) always came to
stay with him. They liked pigs and dogs and otter-hunting and
mutton-chops, and were rather a discordant element in Riseholme. But
Georgie had a kind heart, and never even debated whether he should ask
Hermy and Ursy or not, though he had to do a great deal of tidying up
after they had gone.
There was always a playful touch between the meetings of these two when
either of them had been away from Riseholme that very prettily
concealed the depth of Georgie's supposed devotion, and when she came
out into the garden where her Cavalier and her husband were waiting for
their tea under the pergola, Georgie jumped up very nimbly and took a
few chassee-ing steps towards her with both hands outstretched in
welcome. She caught at his humour, made him a curtsey, and next moment
they were treading a little improvised minuet together with hands held
high, and pointed toes. Georgie had very small feet, and it was a
really elegant toe that he pointed, encased in cloth-topped boots. He
had on a suit of fresh white flannels and over his shoulders, for fear
of the evening air being chilly after this hot day, he had a little
cape of a military cut, like those in which young ladies at music-halls
enact the part of colonels. He had a straw-hat on, with a blue riband,
a pink shirt and a red tie, rather loose and billowy. His face was pink
and round, with blue eyes, a short nose and very red lips. An almost
complete absence of eyebrow was made up for by a firm little brown
moustache clipped very short, and brushed upwards at its extremities.
Contrary to expectation he was quite tall and fitted very neatly into
his clothes.
The dance came to an end with a low curtsey on Lucia's part, an
obeisance hat in hand from Georgie (this exposure shewing a crop of
hair grown on one side of his head and brushed smoothly over the top
until it joined the hair on the other side) and a clapping of the hands
from Peppino.
"Bravo, bravo," he cried from the tea-table. "Capital!"
Mrs Lucas blew him a kiss in acknowledgment of this compliment and
smiled on her partner. "_Amico!_" she said. "It is nice to see you
again. How goes it?"
"_Va bene_," said Georgie to show he could talk Italian too.
"_Va_ very _bene_ now that you've come back."
"_Grazie!_ Now tell us all the news. We'll have a good gossip."
Georgie's face beamed with a "solemn gladness" at the word, like a
drunkard's when brandy is mentioned.
"Where shall we begin?" he said. "Such a lot to tell you. I think we
must begin with a great bit of news. Something really mysterious."
Lucia smiled inwardly. She felt that she knew for dead certain what the
mysterious news was, and also that she knew far more about it than
Georgie. This superiority she completely concealed. Nobody could have
guessed it.
"_Presto, presto!_" she said. "You excite me."
"Yesterday morning I was in Rush's," said Georgie, "seeing about some
_Creme de menthe_, which ought to have been sent the day before.
Rush is very negligent sometimes--and I was just saying a sharp word
about it, when suddenly I saw that Rush was not attending at all, but
was looking at something behind my back, and so I looked round. Guess!"
"Don't be tantalising, _amico_," said she. "How can I guess? A
pink elephant with blue spots!"
"No, guess again!"
"A red Indian in full war paint."
"Certainly not! Guess again," said Georgie, with a little sigh of
relief. (It would have been awful if she had guessed.) At this moment
Peppino suddenly became aware that Lucia had guessed and was up to some
game.
"Give me your hand, Georgie," she said, "and look at me. I'm going to
read your thoughts. Think of what you saw when you turned round."
She took his hand and pressed it to her forehead, closing her eyes.
"But I do seem to see an Indian," she said. "Ah, not red Indian, other
Indian. And--and he has slippers on and brown stockings--no, not brown
stockings; it's legs. And there's a beard, and a turban."
She gave a sigh.
"That's all I can see," she said.
"My dear, you're marvellous," said he. "You're quite right."
A slight bubbling sound came from Peppino, and Georgie began to
suspect.
"I believe you've seen him!" he said. "How tarsome you are...."
When they had all laughed a great deal, and Georgie had been assured
that Lucia really, word of honour, had no idea what happened next, the
narrative was resumed.
"So there stood the Indian, bowing and salaaming most politely and when
Rush had promised me he would send my _Creme de menthe_ that very
morning, I just looked through a wine list for a moment, and the Indian
with quantities more bows came up to the counter and said, 'If you will
have the great goodness to give me a little brandy bottle.' So Rush
gave it him, and instead of paying for it, what do you think he said?
Guess."
Mrs Lucas rose with the air of Lady Macbeth and pointed her finger at
Georgie.
"He said 'Put it down to Mrs Quantock's account,'" she hissed.
Of course the explanation came now, and Lucia told the two men the
contents of Mrs Quantock's letter. With that her cards were on the
table, and though the fact of the Brahmin from Benares was news to
Georgie, he had got many interesting things to tell her, for his house
adjoined Mrs Quantock's and there were plenty of things which Mrs
Quantock had not mentioned in her letter, so that Georgie was soon in
the position of informant again. His windows overlooked Mrs Quantock's
garden, and since he could not keep his eyes shut all day, it followed
that the happenings there were quite common property. Indeed that was a
general rule in Riseholme: anyone in an adjoining property could say,
"What an exciting game of lawn-tennis you had this afternoon!" having
followed it from his bedroom. That was part of the charm of Riseholme;
it was as if it contained just one happy family with common interests
and pursuits. What happened in the house was a more private matter, and
Mrs Quantock, for instance, would never look from the rising ground at
the end of her garden into Georgie's dining-room or, if she did she
would never tell anyone how many places were laid at table on that
particular day when she had asked if he could give her lunch, and he
had replied that to his great regret his table was full. But nobody
could help seeing into gardens from back windows: the "view" belonged
to everybody.
Georgie had had wonderful views.
"That very day," he said, "soon after lunch, I was looking for a letter
I thought I had left in my bedroom, and happening to glance out, I saw
the Indian sitting under Mrs Quantock's pear-tree. He was swaying a
little backwards and forwards."
"The brandy!" said Lucia excitedly. "He has his meals in his own room."
"No, _amica_, it was not the brandy. In fact I don't suppose the
brandy had gone to Mrs Quantock's then, for he did not take it from
Rush's, but asked that it should be sent...." He paused a moment--"Or
did he take it away? I declare I can't remember. But anyhow when he
swayed backwards and forwards, he wasn't drunk, for presently he stood
on one leg, and crooked the other behind it, and remained there with
his hands up, as if he was praying, for quite a long time without
swaying at all. So he couldn't have been tipsy. And then he sat down
again, and took off his slippers, and held his toes with one hand,
while his legs were quite straight out, and put his other hand round
behind his head, and grasped his other ear with it. I tried to do it on
my bedroom floor, but I couldn't get near it. Then he sat up again and
called 'Chela! Chela!' and Mrs Quantock came running out."
"Why did he say 'Chela'?" asked Lucia.
"I wondered too. But I knew I had some clue to it, so I looked through
some books by Rudyard Kipling, and found that Chela meant 'Disciple.'
What you have told me just now about 'Guru' being 'teacher,' seems to
piece the whole thing together."
"And what did Daisy do?" asked Mrs Lucas breathlessly.
"She sat down too, and put her legs out straight in front of her like
the Guru, and tried to hold the toe of her shoe in her fingers, and
naturally she couldn't get within yards of it. I got nearer than she
did. And he said, 'Beloved lady, not too far at first.'"
"So you could hear too," said Lucia.
"Naturally, for my window was open, and as you know Mrs Quantock's
pear-tree is quite close to the house. And then he told her to stop up
one nostril with her finger and inhale through the other, and then hold
her breath, while he counted six. Then she breathed it all out again,
and started with the other side. She repeated that several times and he
was very much pleased with her. Then she said, 'It is quite wonderful;
I feel so light and vigorous.'"
"It would be very wonderful indeed if dear Daisy felt light," remarked
Lucia. "What next?"
"Then they sat and swayed backwards and forwards again and muttered
something that sounded like Pom!"
"That would be 'Om', and then?"
"I couldn't wait any longer for I had some letters to write."
She smiled at him.
"I shall give you another cup of tea to reward you for your report,"
she said. "It has all been most interesting. Tell me again about the
breathing in and holding your breath."
Georgie did so, and illustrated in his own person what had happened.
Next moment Lucia was imitating him, and Peppino came round in order to
get a better view of what Georgie was doing. Then they all sat,
inhaling through one nostril, holding their breath, and then expelling
it again.
"Very interesting," said Lucia at the end. "Upon my word, it does give
one a sort of feeling of vigour and lightness. I wonder if there is
something in it."