"TANGO"
Madeline had taken the gossip about Rupert and Miss Chivvey very
bravely, but very seriously. It pained her terribly, but she was
grateful to Bertha for telling her.
A fortnight passed, during which she heard nothing from Rupert, and then
one morning, the day after a dance, she called to see Bertha.
Percy had had no more anonymous letters, and Nigel had remained away. He
was deeply grateful, for he supposed Bertha had managed with perfect
tact to stop the talk without giving herself away, or making him
ridiculous.
Bertha had never looked happier in her life. She was sitting smiling to
herself, apparently in a dream, when her friend came in.
"Bertha," she said, "I have some news. I danced the tango with Nigel's
brother Charlie last night, and at the end--he really does dance
divinely--what do you think happened? I had gone there perfectly
miserable, for I had seen and heard nothing of Mr. Denison except that
one letter after the Ballet--and then Charlie proposed to me, and I
accepted him, like in a book!"
Bertha took her hand.
"My dear Madeline, how delightful! This is what I've always wanted. It's
so utterly satisfactory in every way."
"I know, and he is a darling boy. I was very frank with him, Bertha. I
didn't say I was in love with him, and he said he would teach me to be."
"It's frightfully satisfactory," continued Bertha. "Tell me Madeline,
what made you change like this?"
"Well, dear, I've been getting so unhappy: I feel Rupert has been simply
playing with me. I heard the other day that _they_ were dining out alone
together--I mean Rupert and that girl. I don't blame him, Bertha. It was
I, in a sense, who threw myself at his head. I admired and liked him and
gradually let myself go and get silly about him. But this last week I've
been pulling myself together and seeing how hopeless it was, and just as
I'd begun to conquer my feeling--to fight it down--then this nice dear
boy, so frank and straightforward and sincere, came along, and--oh! I
thought I should like it. To stop at home with mother after my sort of
disappointment seemed too flat and miserable: I couldn't bear it. Now I
shall have an object in life. But, Bertha," continued Madeline, putting
her head on her shoulder, "I've been absolutely frank, you know."
"I guessed you would be; it was like you. But I hope you didn't say too
much to Charlie. It would be a pity to cloud his pleasure and spoil the
sparkle of the fun. By the time you're choosing carpets together and
receiving your third cruet-stand you will have forgotten such a person
as Rupert Denison exists--except as a man who played a sort of
character-part in the curtain-raiser of your existence."
"Well, I hope so. But I did tell Charlie I was not in love with him, and
he said he would try to make me."
"I only hope that you're not doing it so that your mother should ask
Rupert to the wedding? Not that I myself sha'n't enjoy that."
"Honestly, Bertha, I don't think so. More than anything it's because I
want an object in life."
"Here's a letter from Nigel," said Bertha. "I expect he'll be making
this an excuse to drop in again."
"Yes; but you mustn't tease Percy, because everything happened just as
you wanted it to," said Madeline. "I really was surprised at how
suddenly and determinedly Charlie began again. He had seemed almost to
give me up. He dances the tango so beautifully; I think it all came
through that. We got on so splendidly at tango teas. At any rate, but
for that I shouldn't have seen him so often."
"It's a tango marriage," said Bertha.
* * * * *
Bertha strongly suspected a little manoeuvring of Nigel's in the
course of the last fortnight, but did not realise how much there had
been of it. The day Bertha had practically said he was not to interfere
any longer, Nigel thoroughly realised that Percy must be jealous. He was
wildly annoyed at this, since it would be a great obstacle, besides
proving Percy was in love, but he saw the urgency of falling in at once
with her wish; not opposing it, being absolutely obedient to it. This
was not the moment to push himself forward--to show his feelings. Tact
and diplomacy must be used. Of course, he had not the faintest notion
about Mary and her letters, but merely thought that a sudden relapse of
conjugal affection on Percy's side--confound him!--and an attack of
unwonted jealousy had made Percy say something to Bertha to cause her
coldness.
He remained away, but he thought of more than one plan to regain the old
intimacy.
Quite unscrupulously he played several little tricks, at least he made
several remarks about one to the other, to make the apparently
hesitating Rupert more interested in Miss Chivvey and less so in
Madeline, while he urged his brother Charlie on, and insisted on his
continuing his court. The result was quicker than he had expected, and
after a very little diplomacy Charlie had found Madeline willing to
accept him. As Madeline was to Bertha just like a sister, it was natural
that they should meet again now, and in this letter Nigel asked
permission to call and have a chat.
Bertha agreed, for although she was slightly on her guard against the
possibility of his wishing to flirt, she had not the faintest idea, as I
have said, of Nigel's determined resolve.
Nigel had been fairly unhappy of late. Caring very little for any of his
other friends, and having this _idee fixe_ about Bertha--which became
much stronger at the opposition and the idea of Percy's jealousy--he
moped a good deal and had spent more time than usual with Mary. Nigel
was one of those very rare men, who are becoming rarer and rarer, who,
having passed the age of thirty-five, still regard love as the principal
object of life. That Nigel did so was what made him so immensely popular
with women as a rule. Women feel instinctively when this is so, and the
man who makes sport, ambition or art his first interest, and women, and
romance in general, a mere secondary pleasure, is never regarded with
nearly the same favour as the man who values women chiefly, even though
that very man is naturally far less reliable in his affection and almost
invariably deceives them. To be placed in the background of life is what
the average woman dislikes the most; she would rather be of the first
importance as a woman even if she knows she has many rivals.
Bertha was exceptional, in that she did not care for the Don Juan type
of man, but was rather inclined to despise him. She would far rather
have ambition, business, art, duty, any other object in life as her
rival, than another woman.
* * * * *
Percy received no more of the singular typewritten letters. He kept
those that he had locked up in a box. Mary had grown a little frightened
at the apparent success of those she sent. She never heard anything
about them, but she knew that Nigel had not been seeing Bertha since the
note about the picture gallery. She began to be happier again. Nigel was
a great deal more at home, though not more affectionate. And Mary was
one of those women, by no means infrequent, who are fairly satisfied if
they can, by hook or by crook, by any trick or any tyranny, keep the man
they care for somehow under the same roof with them--if only his body is
in the house, even if they know it is against his will, and that his
soul is far away. She would far rather that his desire was elsewhere, if
only _he_ were positively present--the one dread, really, being that he
should be enjoying himself with anyone else. Mary preferred a thousand
times a silent, sulky evening with Nigel going up to his room about the
same time that she went to hers, than, as he used to be when they were
first married, gay, affectionate and caressing to her, and then going
out. She would gladly make him a kind of prisoner, even at the cost of
making him almost dislike her, rather than give him his freedom--even to
please him--a freedom which included the possibility of his seeing
Bertha again.
Although she was unjust and mistaken in her facts, it was, of course, a
correct instinct that made her aware that Bertha was the great
attraction--the one real object of passion in Nigel's life. But she was
incapable of believing that Bertha did not care for him, that if she had
she would never have flirted with the husband of another woman. Merely
because Bertha was pretty and admired, Mary, with her strange
narrow-minded bitterness, took it for granted that it was impossible
that she could be also a delicately scrupulous, generous, and
high-minded creature. But just as passion will make one singularly
quick-sighted, it can also make one dense and stupid. Considering that
Mary was madly in love with her own husband, it was absurd she should
suppose it impossible that Bertha should take the slightest interest in
hers. Of course Mary had heard that they were very devoted--if she had
not, what would have been the use of writing the letters?--but she chose
to believe that it was only on the husband's side, and that Bertha must
of necessity be, of course, sly and deceitful. She hated Bertha
violently, and yet she was by nature the kindest of women; only this one
mania of hers completely altered her, and made her bitter, wild, hard
and unscrupulous, stupid and clever, cowardly and reckless. A woman's
jealousy of another woman is always sufficiently dreadful, but when the
object of jealousy is hers by legal right, when the sense of personal
property is added to it, then it is one of the most terrible and
unreasonable things in nature.