reflected as she rang the bell. "It is so expensive and in such good
taste and so comfortable and so cold--is Mrs. Hadwell in, Ella? Yes, I
know she is, but see here! can you smuggle Bob somewhere where he won't
be in the way of the girls? You know Mrs. Hadwell doesn't like dogs."
She divested herself of some of her wraps and crossed the hall. The
perfume of roses pervaded the air and the soft strain of violins was
faintly heard beneath the hubbub of voices as she made her way toward
the large old-fashioned drawing-room whence the sounds of festivity
proceeded. This room, hung with crimson velvet and panelled in dark oak,
was almost sumptuous in its comfort. Beautifully carved Turkish lamps
hung from the ceiling: a splendid wood fire burned on the hearth: great
vases of dark red roses and carnations were disposed wherever
opportunity offered: and, at the further end of the room, one caught a
delicious glimpse of cool green ferns and various-coloured blooms. The
room was filled with daintily dressed girls and young women: and behind
a superlatively dainty tea table sat the hostess who hastily pushed
aside a cream jug and rushed in the direction of her latest guest.
"Help yourselves, girls," she exclaimed. "I want to speak to Lynn. Why
are you so late, child? and where have you been, lately? I haven't seen
you for an age."
"Which, being interpreted, means four days," said Lynn, laughing and
returning her hostess' kiss. "How lovely the rooms look, Del! and what
a sweet frock that is! I do like you in mauve."
"I think it _is_ rather successful," said Mrs. Hadwell, contentedly: and
both women laughed. In their girlhood days they had entered into a
compact which had ever since been observed faithfully; namely, to tell
no useless lies to one another. "Only don't let us forget to tell them
to other people, Lynn," Mrs. Hadwell had remarked, solemnly. "Don't let
it get us into bad habits." It had never got her into bad habits: she
had lied her way successfully into public esteem, riches and an old
man's heart; and, even on reaching the giddy pinnacle of social success
where rudeness is frequently condoned, she had faithfully followed the
policy of telling the truth only to her one intimate friend, Lynn
Thayer.
"Edie, do pour Lynn some tea," she cried, now, turning to a pretty
brown-eyed girl who hovered near, watching her adoringly. "And put piles
and piles of cream in it and five lumps or so of sugar--that's the way
she likes it, the incomprehensible creature! ... Another of those
sickening debutantes," she observed in a confidential undertone, turning
to Lynn and gently propelling her in the direction of a couch, "simply
worships me, you know! follows me around like a dog and--that's right,
dear! how sweet of you to save me the trouble! now get her an Italian
cream and a nice cake, will you? like an angel!--I don't know what I
shall do if it keeps up: you know I can't bear bread and butter misses
and she actually asked me for a lock of my hair the other day. I felt
like telling her that I paid eighty dollars for my switch in New York
and that my own hair was too precious to--oh, _thank_ you, dear! Lynn,
this is the sweetest girl; she saves me all sorts of trouble and her
name is Miss Roland; Edie, this is my friend, Miss Thayer, of whom you
have often heard me speak--oh, dear! there are all the girls coming up
to speak to you, Lynn, and anyway I ought to go and pour out some more
tea. When you have done the polite, do come and keep me company at the
tea-table."
"Little Mrs. Hadwell," as her friends usually called her, fled, casting
a bewitching smile at the group of girls who were clustering about Lynn.
Estelle Hadwell's teeth were her strong point, a fact which she never,
for an instant, lost sight of. She had no complexion worth terming
such, her features were irregular and her figure decidedly angular. Yet
she contrived to be considered a beauty, as any woman can who has time
and money to devote to her appearance.
Lynn watched her curiously as she settled herself at the tea-table with
a coquettish little flirt of her silken skirts, and marvelled anew at
the unconscious dramatic instinct which enabled this tiny creature to
play the role of a beauty with such unfailing success. As "Little Mrs.
Hadwell" sat pouring the tea with one pretty arm gracefully raised, she
was a vision for an artist. Her mauve gown fell about her petite form in
folds that were almost statuesque in their grace: her beautiful
hair--which looked just as beautiful as though it had not grown on an
Irish housemaid's head--was arranged with such taste as to make her
small head a thing of beauty: her really pretty neck and arms were set
off by a fichu and falling cuffs of rich yellow lace. A cluster of
violets was carelessly tucked in the front of her fichu: and a long
chain of amethysts outlined her slender waist--which had hardly been so
slender, had it not been for the skill and strength of her French maid.
Altogether, as she sat there, Lynn recognized for the fiftieth time--and
with precisely the same sense of wonder--that, in spite of Estelle's
entire lack of beauty, she was the daintiest and most fascinating thing,
imaginable.
Among the girls who surrounded Lynn were several whose beauty was
sufficiently apparent to make them noticeable, anywhere. Edith Roland,
the adoring debutante, had big, brown eyes, a pretty colour and a figure
whose slenderness and grace owed nothing to artificial aid; yet, beside
her diminutive hostess she sank into insignificance. Erma Reed was a
beautiful girl, tall, splendidly proportioned with the features of a
Greek statue and the air of a grand dame; but, after the first
admiration which her almost flawless pulchritude provoked, one's eyes
wandered instinctively to the sinuous figure and piquante, appealing
face of Mrs. Hadwell. "Magnetism--that is the only word for it, I
suppose," thought Lynn. "Yet she didn't always have it as she has it
now. Can that sort of thing be cultivated, I wonder?"
"Lynn, we never see you, now," declared Joan Cadding, one of her
friends. "What's the reason?"
"Old age, laziness and lots to do. At twenty-eight one can't be always
gadding. Besides, a teacher must keep early hours."
"Oh, aged one, it is not so many years since a certain teacher was out
every night in the week until one or two o'clock and absolutely refused
even to lie down for half an hour when she left school at three. Mrs.
Thayer used to say to mother, 'Really, Lynn must have the constitution
of a horse; she comes home from school, skates for an hour, rushes into
calling costume and drops into a dozen things before dinner: then, as
soon as that is over, prepares for a dance or a tobogganing party.'"
"As you say, I was a few years younger, Joan."
"But why have you given everything up so? You can't complain of being
shelved. Why, at the only dance where I've met you this winter your card
was filled to overflowing before you had been in the room five minutes.
You certainly can't worry about lack of attention."
"No, I have no beauty to fade and no youthful fascinations to take wing,
so the people who liked me ten years ago are just as apt to like me,
now."
"Then why do you slip out of things so? Even Del says she never sees
you."
"Del means that I don't live here as I used to. I see her three or four
times a week: any one but Del would be sick of me. But, seriously,
girls, this idea of combining public school teacher and society girl
isn't the best in the world. As far as I know, I am the only woman who
has ever done it successfully for years and I'm getting tired of it.
And that reminds me! Do you want to hear a good story? I went to a
man-tea at Mrs. Dean-Everill's the other day--you see I'm not altogether
a hermit yet--and I met a Mrs. Howden there--a very common woman with
money. No one else wanted to talk to her and she seemed a good-natured
soul and anxious to be affable, so I sacrificed myself as usual. She
simply beamed on me--till, in the course of conversation, it transpired
that I taught from nine to three five days out of the seven. Then she
froze: suddenly and completely did she freeze: and took the earliest
opportunity of sidling away from my contaminating presence. A little
later on I was talking to some of the other people when Dick Ashe, who
has just returned from Europe, you know, rushed up to me and said in his
usual boisterous way, 'Oh, Miss Thayer, you should see the lovely pin
that your cousin, Lord Haviland, has entrusted to me for you.' I caught
sight of the woman's face; she looked like a devotee who had unwittingly
slapped a seraph. I felt so sorry for her that I hastened to murmur,
'Oh, Harry's only my third cousin, you know!' but even that didn't seem
to wipe the tortured look from her fat face. Think what it must be to a
social climber to have snubbed an earl's third cousin."
In the burst of laughter and talk which followed this, only Mrs. Hadwell
noticed that Lynn had made a definite effort to turn the course of
conversation from discussion of herself.
"Well," said Agatha Ladilaw in her flute-like voice, "I don't see what
is amusing you all so. It couldn't have been very pleasant for Mrs.
What's-her-name to think that she had been rude to an earl's third
cousin: and, on the other hand, if Lynn were an ordinary teacher you
couldn't expect her to be treated in the same way."
"Why not?" asked some one. Lynn merely laughed and looked at the first
speaker with covert yet kindly mirth.
"I don't see why you laugh," said Agatha, with soft stubbornness.
"Why, you see, Agatha," said Lynn, looking at her thoughtfully, "this
Mrs. Howden liked me till she found I was a teacher. Then she couldn't
endure my society till it transpired that I was related to an earl.
Then she loved me once more."
"And why shouldn't she?" asked Agatha, lifting her lovely lashes.
"Earls are not so common."
"Not so common as snobs, no. Still having an earl for a cousin is no
reason why people should like one."
"But you see, Lynn, it is a reason. You say, yourself, that she liked
you as soon as she found it out."
Lynn abandoned argument.
"She liked me in the first place, too," she said, laughing.
"Oh, but then she didn't know you were a teacher," Agatha explained,
very sensibly.
"She liked me until I was found out, in other words."
"Exactly," said Agatha, pleased to find that her logic had penetrated.
"It often happens so. Look at that young Italian with the lovely eyes
who wrote the magnificent poetry that you weren't allowed to read! and
had to smuggle into the dormitory at night after the lights were out!
Now everybody raved about him until they found that he took opium and
drank."
"And then they promptly dropped him: just as this Mrs. Howden did Lynn,
when she found that she taught. It's an exactly parallel case," agreed
Mrs. Hadwell, looking straight at Lynn with a perfectly innocent face
and inwardly wondering how her friend could preserve such a stony
impenetrability of countenance.
"Certainly it is," said Agatha, triumphantly, "except that of course
it's wicked to drink and it's quite respectable to teach. But it comes
to the same thing in the end."
"So many things do," said Lynn with a little laugh. "Still, Agatha,
it's not necessarily wickedness that makes people drink. Some people
drink in the same way that they breathe--because to stop would be to die
or to go mad."
"What unpleasant people," said Agatha, virtuously. "I'm glad I'm not
like that. Still, even if I were I'm sure that I could stop it--I can't
understand people being so weak. And, speaking of that
Ricossia--whatever became of him? He was so wicked and he did look so
nice in evening clothes. I used to be awfully gone on him and so were
all the girls in the Sixth. It wasn't because he was wicked, you know,"
she added hastily.
"No, indeed; the wickedness of Beelzebub would have availed him nothing
if he hadn't also been decorative in evening clothes. Agatha, don't you
want this little chocolate cake with the nut in the top?"
Agatha did: and she also wanted some information on the subject of
Ricossia.
"Why are you so determined not to talk about him? He was your protege
from the start. You took him up--you and Mr. Amherst--I don't believe
he would ever have been so popular and run after if you hadn't started
it."
"Yes, what has become of that boy?" queried Mrs. Hadwell with sudden
interest. "Of course he has gone to the dogs, we all know that: but what
particular dogs and where?"
"I am not his keeper," answered Lynn, lightly. "Do you know that it's
about time I left, Del?"
"Oh, no!" cried Mrs. Hadwell, starting up. "You mustn't. Why, you
don't even know why I asked you to come here, this afternoon: you simply
must stay long enough to hear that."
"Well, I'll stay five minutes"--
"Very well, five minutes!" returned Mrs. Hadwell, who knew quite well
how long a period of time five minutes can cover. "Now, girls, attend!
You knew that Henry's brother Carl settled in the States and that he has
a grown-up family. Well, the third child is twins--I mean the third
children are twins--well, never mind! what's the use of explaining when
you all know what I mean, anyway. The point is that I've invited them
one and all to visit me, every year: but they've consistently refused
because the brother is indignant at Henry's marrying a young wife, just
when they had quite come to count on getting his money. These twins,
however, seem to have a mind between them--they're only nineteen, too, I
believe--very young to have a mind, even if it is only half a one--and
they have written with gusto, accepting my invitation and telling me
that they're dying to see something of the Canadian sports. Now, as you
know, I've no taste for sports and I thought some of you might help me
out. They are only going to be here for a week or so, as they both go
to college, and I want to give them what our American friends call 'a
real good time.' I have thought of several of the ordinary things--a
tea for the girls and a bridge the night after they arrive: and a little
later on, I am going to give a fancy dress ball--yes, consider
yourselves all invited--but I thought it would be nice if I got a few of
you girls together and organized some parties for tobogganing and
ice-boating and so on."
"Don't forget the Conquerors-Wales hockey match."
"No, detestable thing! they'll want to see that, I suppose. I can't
stand hockey. Lynn, you're not going?"
"I must. It's getting very late."
"Oh, nonsense!" cried Mrs. Hadwell, piteously: and at that moment, the
clang of the doorbell, followed by the advent of a fresh visitor, seemed
to give the lie to Miss Thayer's assertion.
"Mrs. Langham-Greene! Lynn, forgive me. I swear I didn't ask her,"
murmured the hostess: then glided forward eagerly.
"So glad to see you. What good genius prompted you to drop in this
particular afternoon? _All_ the girls have done the same. (And if that
doesn't pacify her," reflected the ingenuous hostess, "nothing will.")
The newcomer laughed, a pretty, soft, disagreeable laugh, and glanced
about her.
"So I see," she rejoined, smoothly. "We old married women will have to
entertain one another. These young girls," her glance wandered from
Lynn Thayer to two or three others and she smiled thoughtfully, "these
young girls have their own topics of conversation."
"Now that," said Mrs. Hadwell to herself with unwilling admiration, "is
neat, distinctly neat. Insult to me, insult to my best friend and
insult to half a dozen of my guests and all in one short breath. Lynn,
you're not going?" she added, aloud.
"I am indeed. Bob will be wondering what's become of me."
"_Bob_! You didn't bring him here?"
"I did, Del. You know I'm away all day and Aunt Lucy never takes him
out. Poor little fellow! it's pathetic, the way he greets me when I get
home."
"Miss Thayer is such an attractive person, isn't she?" murmured Mrs.
Langham-Greene with a peculiar gleam in her lazy cat-like eyes. "She
has such a fascination--for dogs and cats."
"You, Mrs. Langham-Greene," returned Lynn with equal sweetness, "can
have _no_ idea how nice it is to be able to fascinate something."
With that, she left. Mrs. Hadwell was delighted with the Parthian shot
and indignant at Mrs. Langham-Greene's impudence in classing herself
with her hostess under the title of "old married women." She therefore
launched forth into a eulogy of her absent friend which, judging from
appearances, went far to spoil the elegant widow's enjoyment of her cup
of tea.
"Lynn is such a favourite with men, too," she concluded.
"Really," rejoined the green-eyed siren, carelessly. "But girls who
teach do age so rapidly, don't you think so, Mrs. Hadwell? and they are
apt to become soured and to mistake rudeness for repartee."
"A mistake that is frequently made," said Mrs. Hadwell, inwardly
furious. "But, when one has such a clever tongue as Lynn, don't you
think one is apt to take advantage of duller people than one's self?"
Agatha broke in.
"Isn't it funny, Mrs. Hadwell, how Lynn never will talk about Mr.
Ricossia? She used to like him so much. And I am sure she must know
what has become of him."
"Dreadful creature!" purred Mrs. Langham-Greene, arching her delicate
eyebrows. "Your friend wasn't really infatuated with him, was she, Mrs.
Hadwell? People do talk so."
"Don't they?" assented Mrs. Hadwell, looking grieved. "I daresay even
you and I don't escape. Poor Lynn presumed on her twenty-eight years
and her plain face to take a sisterly interest in an eccentric genius,
little more than a child in years; and people immediately assume that
she must be in love with him. So absurd! As if a girl who--oh, they
are all going! what a shame! How I wish you had dropped in a little
sooner, Mrs. Langham-Greene. We've had a delightful chat but such a
short one!"
*CHAPTER X*
*"A FIN-DE-SIECLE PAIR"*
"I have seen Hayes argue with a tough horse--I have seen a tonga
driver coerce a stubborn pony--I have seen a riotous setter
broken to gun by a hard keeper--but the breaking-in of Pluffles
... was beyond all these."--_Kipling_.
"But, Henry, you should be glad to see your brother's children."
"I don't see why. A pair of young ragamuffins who'll pull the house
about my ears."
"My dear Henry! They're nineteen."
"Worse and worse! The boy will be certain to fall in love with you."
"Do you think so?" asked Mrs. Hadwell, eagerly.
"I think it won't be your fault if he doesn't," responded her husband
with acerbity.
"Well, at all events the girl won't fall in love with you," said Mrs.
Hadwell with a twinkle in her eye.
Her spouse grunted something unintelligible.
"Not if she sees you with that expression on your face," went on Mrs.
Hadwell, rather sadly. "It always seems so strange to me that a man of
your experience and charm--a finished man of the world, in other
words--should give way to these useless moods."
Mr. Hadwell's brow slightly cleared in spite of his efforts to hide the
fact.
"If I had seen when I first met you," went on Mrs. Hadwell in chastened
accents, "that, beneath the mask of courtly politeness and delicate
flattery, you concealed the nature of a gloomy tyrant."
"Da--I mean, confound it all!" said Mr. Hadwell, much affected, "what on
earth do you want, Estelle?"
"Why, I'm afraid I don't quite understand you," said Mrs. Hadwell,
raising her pretty eyebrows in pained surprise.
"My dear little girl, you know I am not a tyrant," said Mr. Hadwell,
miserable at the thought of being so misunderstood, yet, at the same
time, secretly delighted at the reference to his "courtly politeness."
His delight was natural when one considers the fact that, at no time of
his life, had his manners surpassed those of an average groom.
"No--perhaps not," said Mrs. Hadwell, softly. "Yet, Henry, there are
times when--when--"
"When what, darling?" inquired Mr. Hadwell, abjectly.
"When," said Mrs. Hadwell with sorrowful dignity, "when, Henry, I am
actually afraid to ask you for the little extra money which will provide
for the entertainment of your brother's children."
"Must they be so much entertained?" asked Mr. Hadwell, humbly yet
uneasily. He was a kind old man, but the prospect of parting with a
dollar never failed to cause him acute agony.
"They need not be entertained," responded Mrs. Hadwell with feeling.
"Those unfortunate children may come here and stay with us three weeks
and return to Ohio to tell their father and mother that the woman who
has deprived them of their uncle's fortune, grudges them a ball or a"--
She wept: and Mr. Hadwell writhed in agony. There were only two things
in life that he really loved: his big income and his small wife. Of the
two, he really preferred his wife: and after a few moments' silent
struggle, he succumbed to her tears and her fascinations and drew out
his cheque book.
"How much?" he inquired, hardily.
Little Mrs. Hadwell dried her eyes.
"How much?" she inquired, innocently. "How mu--oh, Henry! were you
thinking of giving me some money?"
Mr. Hadwell regarded her with perplexity.
"Isn't that what you wanted?" he inquired looking puzzled.
Mrs. Hadwell buried her eighty-dollar head in her pretty hands.
"I wanted you to show some interest in these children--your own
brother's children!" she wept. "And you--offer--me--money!"
Mr. Hadwell groaned, feeling that he was a tactless brute yet not quite
seeing why. Suddenly a bright thought struck him: he tore out a blank
cheque, signed it and tossed it playfully to his wife.
"There, there!" he observed, soothingly. "Don't cry any more, Estelle.
Of course these children must be entertained--of course I am pleased
about their coming. But, you see, we business men have so much to worry
us."
Mr. Hadwell's business consisted in driving to his office every morning,
receiving the obsequious greetings of his manager--and drawing his
handsome income. Mrs. Hadwell knew this as well--better than he
did--therefore----
"Of course," she cooed, drying her eyes and regarding her spouse with
mingled awe and wonder. "Of course, dear. You must forgive me if I
seem a little unreasonable, sometimes; but it did hurt me so when you
seemed to think that all I wanted from you was money"----
"Of course--of course!" said her husband, hastily. "Now I must be off.
What are you going to do, to-day?"
"Well, let me see! Lynn is coming to dinner and we are going for a
drive first."
"Ah!" said Mr. Hadwell, looking pleased. He heartily approved of Lynn
and took great pleasure in the thought that this exceptionally "nice"
young woman was his wife's best friend; feeling that Estelle's evident
devotion to Lynn overbalanced her quite as evident love of flattery and
attention. Mr. Hadwell never forgot that Lynn insisted on teaching in
the public schools rather than allow her uncle to support her, wholly: a
piece of unselfishness that went straight to his heart. Needless to
say, he did not know that Estelle had talked him over with Lynn from
every point of view, both before and after his marriage to the former.
Estelle Harding had been the granddaughter of a wealthy man who had died
when she was sixteen, leaving her penniless. For the next five years she
had lived with different relatives, positively refusing to follow the
example of her friend, Lynn Thayer, who was preparing at the High and
Normal schools, to earn her living as a teacher. Being tremendously
popular both with girls and boys, she was deluged with invitations and
love affairs; but at twenty-one, she met Mr. Hadwell, a wealthy and
retiring bachelor of sixty-three, and, from that time on, she paid
assiduous and tactful court to him. The net result of this campaign was
that, in six months from the time she had first met him, Mr. Hadwell was
a married man. It speaks well for our small heroine's tactics that her
husband, to his dying day, believed that he had fallen madly in love
with her when he saw her first and that nothing but his overpowering
fascinations had induced the shy damsel to become his wife. "You were
the first man who had ever cared for me," Estelle would say to him,
sometimes. "The others--oh, they were just boys! I couldn't look up to
them, dear: they were on a level with myself." This was a particularly
tactful lie on Mrs. Hadwell's part: she knew well that among her
admirers had been young men whose intellect and strength of character
had far surpassed her husband's. But tactful lying was Mrs. Hadwell's
forte.