'That depends. Love is not a joy that lasts for ever,' the old lady
added with a chuckle.
'But did no woman make you happy, Mr. Harding?' asked Lilian, and she
fixed her round, prominent eyes upon him.
'The woman who gives most happiness gives most pain. The man who
leaves an adoring mistress at midnight suffers most. A few minutes of
distracted happiness as he drives home. He falls asleep thanking God
that he will see her at midday. But he awakes dreading a letter
putting him off. He listens for the footstep of a messenger boy.'
'If she doesn't disappoint him?'
'She will disappoint him sooner or later.'
'I have never disappointed you,' said Lilian, still looking at
Harding.
'But you have not been to see me.'
'No; I've not been to see you,' she replied, and played distractedly
with some dried fruit on her plate.
'These are confessions,' said Lady Castlerich, laughing.
'Confessions of missed opportunities,' said Moulton.
'So, then, your creed is that love cannot endure,' said Lord Chadwick.
'The love that endures is the heaviest burden of all,' Harding replied
incautiously. A silence fell over the lunch table, and all feared to
raise their eyes lest they should look at Mrs. Lahens and Lord
Chadwick.
'I suppose you are right,' said Mrs. Lahens. 'It is not well that
anything should outlive its day. But sometimes it happens so. But
look,' she exclaimed, laughing nervously, 'how Agnes is listening to
St. Clare. Those two were made for each other. Celibacy and Work.
Which is Celibacy and which is Work?'
'I think, Olive,' said the Major, 'that you are rather hard upon the
girl. You forget that she has only just come from school and doesn't
understand,'
'My dear Major,' said Mrs. Lahens, and her voice was full of contempt
for her husband, 'is it you or I who has to take Agnes into society?
As I told you before, Agnes will have to accept society as it is. She
won't find her convent in any drawing-room I know, and the sooner she
makes up her mind on that point, the better for her and the better for
us.'
'Society will listen for five minutes,' said Lilian, 'to tales of
conventual innocence.'
'And be interested in them,' said Lord Chadwick, 'as in an account of
the last burlesque.'
'With this difference,' said Moulton, 'that society will go to the
burlesque, but not to the convent.'
Agnes glanced at her mother, seeing very distinctly the painted,
worldly face. That her mother should speak so cruelly to her cut her
to the heart: and she longed to rush from the room--from all these
cruel, hateful people; another word and she would have been unable to
refrain, but in the few seconds which had appeared an eternity to
Agnes, the conversation suddenly changed. Lilian Dare had returned to
the idea expressed by Harding that he had only found happiness in
work, and this was St. Clare's opportunity to speak of the opera he
was writing.
'In the first act barbarians are making a raft.'
'What are they making the raft for?' asked Lady Castlerich.
'To get to the other side of a lake. They have no women, and they hope
to rob the folk on the other side of theirs.'
St. Clare explained the various motives he was to employ; the motive
of aspiration, or the woman motive, was repeated constantly on the
horns during the building of the raft. St. Clare sang the motive. It
was with this motive that he began the prelude. Then came two
variations on the motive, and then the motive of jealousy. St. Clare
was eager to explain the combinations of instruments he intended to
employ, and the effect of his trumpets at a certain moment, but the
servant was handing round coffee and liqueurs, and the story of what
happened to the women who were carried off on the raft had to be
postponed. St. Clare looked disappointed. But he was in a measure
consoled when Lady Castlerich told him that they'd go through the
opera together when he came to stay with her for her shooting party.
'Won't you sing something, Lilian?' said Mrs. Lahens, as they went
upstairs.
'No, dear, I'd sooner not, but you will.'
'I'd sooner sing a little later. I don't know where my music is, it
has been all put away. But do you sing. St. Clare will accompany you.
Do, to please me,' and Mrs. Lahens sat down in a distant corner.
She had said that very morning, as she painted her face before the
glass, 'I am an old woman, or nearly. How many more years? Three at
most, then I shall be like Lady Castlerich.' And the five minutes she
had spent looking into an undyed and unpainted old age had frightened
her. She had hated the world she had worshipped so long. She had hated
all things, and wished herself out of sight of all things. That she
who had been so young, so beautiful, so delightful to men, should
become old, ugly, and undesirable. That she should one day be like
Lady Castlerich! That such things should happen to others were well
enough; that they should happen to her seemed an unspeakable and
revolting cruelty. And it was at that moment that her husband had sent
for her. He had told her she must give up her lover for her daughter's
sake. Should she do this? Could she do this? She did not know. But
this she did know, that the present was not the time to speak to her
of it. Give him up, hand him over to that horrid Mrs. Priestly, who
was trying all she could to get him. Whatever else might be, that
should not be.... She loved her daughter, and would do her duty by her
daughter, but they must not ask too much of her.... She had lost her
temper, she had said things that she regretted saying; but what
matter, what did the poor Major matter--a poor, mad thing like him?
These were the thoughts that filled Mrs. Lahens' mind while Lilian
sang. The purity of Lilian's voice was bitterness to Mrs. Lahens, and
it was bitterness to remember that St. Clare loved that face. For no
one now loved her face except perhaps Chad, and they wanted her to
give him up. It was the knowledge that the time of her youth was at an
end that forced Mrs. Lahens to say that Lilian sang out of tune, and
to revive an old scandal concerning her.
'Surely, mother,' said Agnes, 'all you say did not happen to the young
girl who has just left the room?'