GEORGE NEARLY GOES TO BRIGHTON.
One evening, about a week after what Mr. Espion called the final
_esclandre_, Tommy Myles made his appearance in the smoking-room of
the Themis. More important matters have ousted the record of Tommy's
marriage and blissful honeymoon, and he came back to find that a
negligent world had hardly noticed his absence.
"How are you?" said he to Sidmouth Vane.
"How are you?" said Vane, raising his eyes for a moment from _Punch_.
Tommy sat down by him. "I say," he remarked, "this Neston business is
rather neat. We read about it in Switzerland."
"Been away?"
"Of course I have--after my wedding, you know."
"Ah! Seen _Punch_?" And Vane handed it to him.
"I had a pretty shrewd idea of how the land lay. So had Bella."
"Bella?"
"Why, my wife."
"Oh, a thousand pardons. I thought you rather backed Mrs. Witt."
"My dear fellow, we wanted her to have fair play. I suppose there's no
question of the marriage now?"
"I suppose not."
"What's the fair Mrs. Witt going to do?"
Vane wanted to be let alone, and Tommy worried him. He turned on the
little gentleman with some ferocity. "My dear Tommy," he said, "you
backed her through thick and thin, and blackguarded George for attacking
her."
"Yes, but----"
"Well, whoever was right, you weren't, so hadn't you better say no more
about it?" And Mr. Vane rose and walked away.
In fact, he was thoughtful. What would Mrs. Witt do next? And what would
George Neston do? Vane knew of cases where the accusation suggests the
crime; it seemed not unlikely that if George had to bear the contumely
attaching to a connection with Mrs. Witt, he might think it as well to
reap the benefit. He might not have sought to win her favour yet, but
it was very possible he might do so now. If he didn't--well, some one
would. And Mr. Vane considered that he might find it worth his while to
be the man. His great relatives would cry aloud in horror; society would
be shocked. But a man will endure something for a pretty woman and five
thousand a year. Only, what did George Neston mean to do?
It will be seen that Sidmouth Vane did not share Laura Pocklington's
conviction that George cared nothing for Mrs. Witt. Of course he had not
Laura's reasons: and perhaps some difference between the masculine and
feminine ways of looking at such things must be allowed for. As it
happened, however, Vane was right--for a moment. After George had been
for a second time repulsed from Mrs. Pocklington's doors, finding
the support of his friends unsatisfying and yearning for the more
impassioned approval that women give, he went the next day to Neaera's,
and intruded on the sorrow-laden retirement to which that wronged lady
had betaken herself. And Neaera's grief and gratitude, her sorrow and
sympathy, her friendship and fury, were all alike and equally delightful
to him.
"The meanness of it!" she cried with flashing eyes. "Oh, I would rather
die than have a petty soul like that!"
Gerald was, of course, the subject of these strictures, and George was
content not to contradict them.
"He evidently," continued Neaera, "simply cannot understand your
generosity. It's beyond him!"
"You mustn't rate what you call my generosity too high," said George.
"But what are you going to do, Mrs. Witt?"
Neaera spread her hands out with a gesture of despair.
"What am I to do? I am--desolate."
"So am I. We must console one another."
This speech was indiscreet. George recognised it, when Neaera's
answering glance reached him.
"That will make them talk worse than ever," she said, smiling. "You
ought never to speak to me again, Mr. Neston."
"Oh, we are damned beyond redemption, so we may as well enjoy
ourselves."
"No, you mustn't shock your friends still more."
"I have no friends left to shock," replied George, bitterly.
Neaera implored him not to say that, running over the names of such as
might be supposed to remain faithful. George shook his head at each
name: when the Pocklingtons were mentioned, his shake was big with
sombre meaning.
"Well, well," she said with a sigh, "and now what are you going to do?"
"Oh, nothing. I think some of us are going to have a run to Brighton. I
shall go, just to get out of this."
"Is Brighton nice now?"
"Nicer than London, anyhow."
"Yes. Mr. Neston----?"
"Yes, Mrs. Witt? Why don't you come too."
"At any rate, you'd--you and your friends--be somebody to speak to,
wouldn't you?" said Neaera, resting her chin on her hand and gazing at
George.
"Oh yes, you must come. We shall be very jolly."
"Poor us! But perhaps it will console us to mingle our tears."
"Will you come?" asked George.
"I shan't tell you," she said with a laugh. "It must be purely
accidental."
"A fortuitous concurrence? Very well. We go to-morrow."
"I don't want to know when you go."
"No. But we do."
Neaera laughed again, and George took his leave, better pleased with
the world than when he arrived. A call on a pretty woman often has this
effect; sometimes, let us add, to complete our commonplace, just the
opposite.
"Why shouldn't I?" he argued to himself. "I don't know why I should get
all the blame for nothing. If they think it of me, I may as well do
it."
But when George reached his lodgings, he found on the table, side by
side with Mr. Blodwell's final letter about the Brighton trip, Laura
Pocklington's note. And then--away went Brighton, and Neaera Witt, and
the reckless defiance of public opinion, and all the rest of it! And
George swore at himself for a heartless, distrustful, worthless person,
quite undeserving to receive such a letter from such a lady. And when
the second letter came the next morning, he swore again, at himself for
his meditated desertion, and by all his gods, that he would be worthy of
such favour.
"The child's a trump," he said, "a regular trump! And she shan't be
worried by hearing of me hanging about in Mrs. Witt's neighbourhood."
The happy reflections which ensued were appropriate, but hackneyed,
being in fact those of a man much in love. It is, however, worth notice
that Laura's refusal to think evil had its reward: for if she had
suspected George, she would never have shown him her heart in those
letters; and, but for those letters, he might have gone to Brighton,
and----; whereas what did happen was something quite different.