“Fancy about your book, dear!” wrote Aunt Beryl. “Well I _am_ pleased.
Aunt E. and Olive are back here now, and so surprised to hear your
news. Mind you tell us when to order the book from the library. I
always said you had it in you to write, dear.”
Lydia could not remember any such flattering prediction, but she put
Aunt Beryl’s name down on the list of people to whom one of the six
presentation copies of her book, that Lady Honoret had said she would
receive, must be sent.
The list cost her a certain amount of thought.
Aunt Beryl went without saying--and of course, Lady Honoret, to
whom it would be a real pleasure to present anything so certain to
be rapturously received--Nathalie Palmer--rather a nuisance, that,
perhaps?--but Lydia stifled the thought, with the remembrance that,
after all, it was Nathalie who had typed the book--Grandpapa--one would
like to show Grandpapa that even earning one’s own living in London was
not without its higher side--and then Uncle George would be hurt if he
alone of the Regency Terrace household were left out--four copies gone
already, and one to keep for herself--that was five--and Lydia surveyed
with dismay the number of people to each one of whom she would have
liked to send the remaining copy.
Mr. Monteagle Almond--who would think more highly of her intellectual
attainments than ever--Miss Glover, who had so much wanted to have
Lydia on her staff of highly-qualified teachers--the Senthovens, who
could themselves do nothing except play games--even Madame Elena passed
through Lydia’s perplexed mind as a possible candidate, for of late the
principal had appeared to pay very little attention to her assistant.
But, in the end, Lydia reluctantly decided that the sixth copy of her
book must be given to Miss Forster.
There was a tendency about Miss Forster, slight but unmistakable,
to show herself affronted at the ease and rapidity with which her
protégée had risen to undreamed-of heights of intimacy in the Honoret
establishment.
Lydia indeed, inwardly, was rather annoyed with Lady Honoret for her
want of discretion. It had become quite difficult to answer Miss
Forster’s sharply-put questions as to the number of her visits to
Lexham Gardens, on occasions when Miss Forster herself had received no
invitation there.
Lydia had always been very popular at the boarding-house, and she
felt that it would be unpleasant, and would spoil her triumph in
the appearance of the book, if anyone were to feel injured and show
vexation--particularly Miss Forster, who was also popular, and was,
moreover, always quite ready to exploit any emotion that she might be
experiencing, in conversation with the other boarders.
Lydia planned to give her the book, and to inscribe in it a grateful
inscription, and meanwhile she was careful to dwell upon the fact that
she had never yet met Sir Rupert Honoret--whom Miss Forster, of course,
knew so very well indeed.
Imperceptibly enough, however, the opinion of the boarders ceased to
matter, just as that of the girls at Madame Elena’s had ceased to
matter, a little while before.
Lydia’s book was a success.
Some quality, at which the writer herself was secretly surprised,
was found by the public and the reviewers alike in the slight little
story. It met with something that very nearly approached the reception
predicted for it so gushingly by the enthusiastic Lady Honoret.
Various people, their names for the most part well known to Lydia
through the agency of Aunt Evelyn and her ladies’ paper, asked to meet
her, and her publisher’s advertising-manager wrote and asked for her
photograph, to appear in the Press.
Lady Honoret was triumphant.
“A child--a young, fresh child of eighteen--isn’t it too, too
Arcadian?” she would inquire of her friends, although Lydia, at first
rather inclined to be offended at having such juvenility thrust upon
her, had already distinctly stated that she was twenty.
Then, it seemed with paralyzing suddenness, the day came when Lady
Honoret said to her without any preliminary at all:
“Why don’t you leave that d’eadful shop--I’m sure it _is_ d’eadful--and
give up your _whole_ time to your real work?”
Why?
Lydia could think of innumerable reasons, although she might not be
disposed to put them before Lady Honoret.
Because it was well known to Aunt Beryl, Grandpapa, Rosie Graham,
everybody--that to leave a good post unless it were for a better one,
was a wanton and foolish flying in the face of Providence--because
Mr. Monteagle Almond would revoke all his good opinion of her, after
she had justified his recommendation of her so splendidly--because
Grandpapa would call her a little fool, whose head had been
turned--and, finally, because the writing of a successful first novel
could not be looked upon in the light of earning one’s own living, as
Lydia and Lydia’s relations understood the term.
This last was the reason she chose to give Lady Honoret:
“I ought to do something for myself. My aunt and uncle, who brought me
up, couldn’t afford to have me living at home doing nothing at all--it
wouldn’t be fair.”
“Oh, no, no!” cried Lady Honoret with a slight shudder. “I’m sure
you oughtn’t to live with any uncle and aunt--they’re always such
Philistines, too--but if you _really_ have to think about the te’ible
money part of it, of course you know you’re bound to make a little
money from writing. Only I suppose you simply can’t bear to think of
writing for money? It would paralyze it all?”
Lydia did not like to say that all that she was afraid of was that
the money made by writing would be insufficient in quantity, so she
remained silent, and Lady Honoret squeezed her hand sympathetically.
“You must think it all over, you dear little strange, wild thing,” she
declared affectionately, “and then if you settle to leave your shop, as
I’m sure you ought, you must let me know.”
And she said nothing more of her astonishing suggestion.
That was just the way of those new, strange people whom Lydia was now
coming to know! They made the wildest and most revolutionary plans,
proposing lightly such wholesale changes as the people from whom Lydia
sprang would never contemplate in a lifetime bound by tradition and
practical considerations alike, and then, when one pleaded for time to
assimilate the scheme, to weigh and consider it, and to consult one’s
relations, they brushed it all aside in a moment and seemingly forgot
all about it!
Lydia marvelled at them, and was rather inclined to despise them for
want of self-control, and lack of the bread-winner’s early acquired
self-discipline.
All the same, Lady Honoret’s suggestion that she should leave the shop
unwillingly allured Lydia, as holding vague possibilities of some
higher, more splendid preferment in store.
One Sunday she found her patroness in despair over a little
writing-table that was loaded with morocco-bound account-books, silver
and enamel pencils, carved penholders and spoilt nibs, photographs in
mosaic frames, a mosaic clock telling the wrong time, a china inkpot
with ink running down its steep, purple sides, a small silver mirror on
legs, and all round and underneath and on the top of all these, a vast
quantity of detached bills and scribbled-over half-sheets of notepaper.
“These _mis’eable_ accounts!” cried Lady Honoret quite desperately.
“Sir Rupert has told me to put all these in order and let him have what
he calls a statement, and all my charities are mixed up with personal
expenses, and heaps of things I can’t possibly let him see, and I’ve
lost my cheque-book--though I don’t really mind that, because I know
I’m ter’ibly, ter’ibly overdrawn--but ev’ey time I add these things up
they come diff’ent. Oh, _darling_, are you good at a’ithmetic?”
Lydia could never become in the least used to the terms of endearment,
so much in vogue amongst Lady Honoret and her friends, and “darling,”
in particular, was a word that she had never heard applied except to
small children. She blushed involuntarily, and said:
“I am accountant at the place where I work, you know.”
“Does that mean that you can y’eally, y’eally understand accounts?”
demanded Lady Honoret, assuming an even more infantile guilelessness
than was habitual to her.
“Oh, do take _all_ these, and make the statement or whatever it is he
wants. I’m so _tired_!”
“Is any of this private?” rather hesitatingly asked Lydia, brought up
in that strict creed of reticence, as to money affairs, that is so
essentially of the middle classes.
“Not in the least, darling,” said her hostess languidly, and flung
herself into an arm-chair with every sign of exhaustion, while Lydia
sat down at the unbusiness-like little writing-table, of which she felt
inwardly scornful, and began to disentangle its confusion.
Her task was not made any easier by the ceaseless flow of Lady
Honoret’s talk, and it took her over an hour to produce order from so
much elegant chaos.
Then she said succinctly:
“Since the New Year fifty-five pounds have gone to various charities
and societies--I have the list of accounts here--and all the rest
is--is personal expenditure.”
She did not like to say “clothes,” although the bills were for nothing
else, and there was not a single household item amongst them all.
“How much?”
“Two hundred and twenty-eight pounds, sixteen shillings and sixpence,”
said Lydia.
“Oh! Darling thing, you’re so clever at all this--would you mind
putting it all down on paper the other way round--the fifty for dress
expenses, and the other to charity? He never asks to see the bills.”
Lydia was thunderstruck.
“Cook the accounts?” She worded it bluntly in her confusion, but her
voice was shaky.
“What a quaint expression!” said Lady Honoret delightedly. “Is that
what you call it? Oh, yes, _do_ cook them for me!”
No wonder that certain of the novels read by Lydia with so much
interest talked about the immorality of the upper classes!
Lydia was highly scandalized, but she had not the slightest intention
of risking Lady Honoret’s friendship, and she “cooked” the accounts
very neatly and skilfully.
“But if Sir Rupert asks to see the bills from the shops, or the
receipts from the charity places?” she suggested.
“Then you’ll have to come and help me to _cook_ again, or I can always
say I have lost them,” Lady Honoret declared. “It may _sound_ the
teeniest bit deceitful”--it certainly did, reflected Lydia grimly--“but
I make it a rule never to lie unless I _have_ to, and then do it
tho’oughly, tho’oughly well, you know. Sir Rupert really drives me to
it sometimes--you’ve no idea what he’s like.”
Lydia rather wished that she had, and less than a week later her
curiosity was gratified, and she met Sir Rupert Honoret.
He was quite unlike her conception of a wealthy Jew, taken mainly
from the stage. She had expected a pompous and corpulent presence,
with a fur-lined coat, and a cigar, an immense hooked nose and a lisp.
Instead she saw a small, wizened figure, with a broken front tooth,
that gave him an oddly dilapidated appearance, prominent and rather
bilious-looking eyes, and a discontented expression. His voice was low
and nasal, and came with a peculiar hiss through the gap of the broken
tooth.
“Are you the girl who does accounts?” he asked her.
Lydia’s breath caught in her throat as she reflected how exceedingly
probable it was that the financier had become aware of the particular
direction in which her skill had recently taken her.
She shot a glance at Lady Honoret, who nodded gaily and quite openly.
“Yes,” said Lydia.
“She writes, you know, Rupert. So ve’y, ve’y wonderful to think----”
“Are you fond of figures?” Sir Rupert demanded, ignoring his wife.
“Very.”
“Any good at book-keeping? Double entry?”
“I’ve learnt it, and am working now as accountant.”
“Where?”
“At a--a shop,” hesitated Lydia. “A ladies’ shop, called Elena’s, in
Day Street.”
“Yes--run by an old woman called Ribeiro. I know.”
Lydia looked upon him as nothing less than omniscient after that.
“D’you like the work there?”
Instinct made Lydia reply without enthusiasm:
“Pretty well.”
“You’d like something better, eh? Can you do typing and shorthand?”
“No.”
“Only accounts? Well, if you can keep those properly you can do more
than most women.”
He turned on his heel and went away without saying anything more, and
it was with genuine astonishment that Lydia heard Lady Honoret exclaim:
“Oh, how, how clever of you! You’ve managed to get on the right side of
Sir Rupert at once--and he _is_ so difficult. Now I can have you here
as much as I like, without his being disag’eeable.”
Sir Rupert was not disagreeable. Once or twice he spoke to Lydia, and
once he handed over to her an elaborate collection of figures, and
asked her to “see what she made of that.” Various unfamiliar terms,
“shares” and “preference shares,” “debenture stock,” perplexed her, but
the figures themselves could be capable of no combination too baffling
for the mathematical mind, and Lydia tabulated very neatly and clearly
the result of her work.
“Good.”
Sir Rupert put the paper down.
“Give Ribeiro notice, and I’ll make you my secretary at two pounds a
week. You can have your luncheon here. Hours ten to six, and overtime
when I want you. That will probably include Sundays as well.”
“But--but--Lady Honoret....”
“You can help her when I’ve nothing for you to do--but that won’t be
often. Think it over and give me an answer to-morrow.”
Sir Rupert walked into his study and shut the door almost in Lydia’s
face, leaving her completely bewildered.
It was an opportunity--it might lead to anything! Already Lydia
had learnt to look upon even her newfound triumphs merely as
stepping-stones to some further splendid destiny, the form of which she
did not particularize.
After all, she was practically a shop-girl--that was all that her
position at Madame Elena’s represented, to those outside. Private
secretary to Sir Rupert Honoret would be a very different thing. And
her salary doubled--even Mr. Monteagle Almond would see no imprudence
in making a change so much for the better.
Practical although Lydia undoubtedly was, she allowed her imagination
a brief excursion into various alluring by-paths, such as the pleasure
of telling Miss Rosie Graham and the other girls at Elena’s that her
services as a private secretary were so much in request as to have led
to a flattering offer, that she felt it her duty to accept....
She wondered whether lunch every day at Lexham Gardens would mean the
dining-room and all Lady Honoret’s smart friends, or merely a tray in
the study. With the thought came one of those flashes of intuition to
which Lydia owed a great deal more than she as yet knew.
The first person to approach must be Lady Honoret.
Lydia guessed already that Sir Rupert was not in the habit of taking
his wife into his confidence, which made it all the more necessary that
she, the latest discovery and protégée, should not allow herself to be
annexed without reference to her original owner--the light in which
she could not help feeling sure that Lady Honoret regarded herself.
The effect of a tactful appeal proved to be its own immediate
justification.
Lady Honoret at first looked startled, and then said, in a very open
and candid way:
“Now I’ll tell you the whole thing quite, quite f’ankly....”
She then made several contradictory statements, to the effect that she
had herself advised Sir Rupert to take Lydia for his secretary, and
that, of course, she had no idea that he even thought of suggesting
such a thing, but, then, he was hatefully secretive, always, and if
Lydia did come, then of course Lady Honoret knew that she must never
hope for her help over the d’eadful accounts and things any more,
because, of course, she’d have no time for anything but stocks and
shares, and advisory committees, and it would be far, far better for
Lydia--darling thing--than the awful shop in Upper Tooting, and give
her the chance of writing another wonderful novel, and meeting all
sorts of critics and interesting people....
Finally Lady Honoret exclaimed that it really all seemed just like a
fai’y tale come true, and Lydia must leave the terrible shop the very
next day and come to them.
Lydia reserved herself on the point, having long ago contemptuously
decided that it was of no use ever to mention practical considerations
to her patroness, but she went away with the assurance that Lady
Honoret had definitely committed herself to a statement that she would
welcome Lydia’s presence, as Sir Rupert’s private secretary, at Lexham
Gardens.
Far-sighted as Miss Raymond’s calculations might be, she had as yet no
thought of allowing for the repudiation of a spoken word.
That night Lydia carefully indited a letter.
“SIR RUPERT HONORET.
“DEAR SIR,
“I have considered your offer of a private secretaryship at £2 weekly
and lunch in, and am prepared to accept same, after giving the usual
week’s notice to my present employer.
“If you can give me till the end of the month before coming to you I
shall be obliged, as giving me time to take a few days at home and
explaining to my people.
“Hoping to give you every satisfaction, as I shall certainly make it
my endeavour,
“I remain,
“Yours faithfully,
“L. RAYMOND.”
After that, much more rapidly and easily, she wrote to Aunt Beryl, and
explained what a very flattering offer Sir Rupert’s was, and how glad
Lydia felt that now she would be able to pay all her own expenses,
instead of letting Uncle George kindly undertake half of them. If she
could, she would try and get a few days, to come and talk it all over
before beginning her new work. And would dear auntie please explain it
all to Grandpapa, and Uncle George, and Mr. Almond and everybody?
Lydia was not altogether without guile in relegating to Aunt Beryl the
announcements to be made to, at all events, Mr. Monteagle Almond. After
all, it was he who had found for her the post at Madame Elena’s, of
which they had all been so proud less than a year ago. Lydia did not
wish him to think her either ungrateful or capricious. She felt sure
that Aunt Beryl would certainly be the best person to guard against any
such unfavourable impression.
There were two announcements of her change of plans, however, which
could not be deputed. Lydia was looking forward with pleasure neither
to giving Madame Elena the week’s notice stipulated for on her
engagement, nor to explaining to Miss Forster that she was about to
enter the establishment of Miss Forster’s dear friends, to whom that
lady had so very recently introduced her.
If Miss Forster made herself disagreeable, then Lydia decided that
she would leave the boarding-house and live by herself in lodgings.
But that would certainly offend Miss Nettleship, and perhaps Aunt
Beryl as well, and Lydia had no desire to stand anything but well with
everybody. It was a pity that other people were not more reasonable.
She spent some time in thinking out a tactful method of presenting
her case to Miss Forster. Finally she did so with many expressions of
gratitude for all that she owed to Miss Forster’s kind introduction,
and with a very distinct emphasis laid upon the subordinate position
to be hers at Lexham Gardens. Not for her, Lydia implied, the freedom
of the Bridge table and tea-party, as for Miss Forster. Merely an
excellent business appointment, with a salary higher than her present
one. And it was all Miss Forster’s doing, and Lydia was so grateful.
To her extreme relief, Miss Forster was gracious. She took the credit
for Lydia’s triumph upon herself and apparently enjoyed telling all the
other boarders of the far-reaching effects of her great influence with
Sir Rupert and Lady Honoret.
Telling Madame Elena was less successful.
“A week’s notice in the middle of the summer! What the dickens are you
talking about?” demanded the auburn-headed principal, her eyes flashing
fury.
“I’ve decided that clerical work will suit me better,” Lydia said
calmly.
“Can you type?”
“No, but it’s easily learnt.”
“Or write shorthand?”
“Not yet.”
“And how many people, do you suppose, want a clerk that can’t do either
shorthand or typewriting?” said Madame Elena, with a fine irony.
Lydia was stung into an unguarded reply.
“I’ve already had a most excellent post offered to me, as it happens,
Madame. Book-keeping is all that’s wanted.”
“That’s exactly what I wanted to get at,” said Elena, with one of her
most disconcerting thrusts. “You’ve already taken on another job, you
little rotter. That’s a dirty trick, if you like.”
Lydia kept silence, partly because it was really rather difficult to
think of any very satisfactory reply, and partly from the old habit of
deferring to authority.
She was feeling thoroughly uncomfortable, and had to tell herself
inwardly that, after all, Madame Elena’s opinion didn’t _really_
matter. A very few days after leaving the shop, and Lydia knew that
Madame Elena and all her girls would seem to be shadowy and unreal as
dreams.
The actual moment in which one discarded an out-worn phase was
unpleasant, but it was the way of progress.
“Just when I’ve taught you the work, too!” came the climax of this
storm.
“I can stay on and show my work to anyone who is going to take my
place,” Lydia ventured.
“You can do no such thing. The quicker you clear out of here the better
I shall be pleased,” retorted the principal. “This day week you go, and
I only wish I could send you packing straight away.”
Elena flounced into her little room, slamming books and ledgers about
noisily, and was in a terrible temper for the rest of that day.
Lydia told the other girls in the dressing-room in the basement at
closing time.
“You must have something very good up your sleeve to chuck this,” said
Gina Ryott. “It isn’t everywhere that they give you a decent meal like
ours.”
“I know,” said Lydia.
“You aren’t getting married, are you?” said someone else, giggling.
“No fear.”
“Is Peroxide furious? She was in the D’s own temper this afternoon, I
know that much.”
“Old Peroxide doesn’t like us girls to give notice. I suppose she
thinks we ought to be only too thankful to stay on here for ever, with
what she does for us.”
“Do you know if anyone is taking on your job?” asked Rosie Graham.
“No one, yet. She’ll have to find somebody in a hurry, because I’m
leaving this day week.”
“All right. I shall apply for it myself. I’m sick of that everlasting
stool of mine behind the glass, and she can easily find another
cashier. Just put me up to a wrinkle or two about your old ledgers and
things.”
“I will to-morrow,” said Lydia promptly. “I hope you’ll get on all
right. It’s a good job.”
“Then why are you leaving it?”
“Because,” said Lydia slowly, “I am going to be private secretary
to Sir Rupert Honoret, at his own house in Lexham Gardens, for just
exactly twice the money that I get here.”
The announcement created all the sensation that she had hoped for.
The girls congratulated her, and expressed their envy, and made much
enthusiastic noise.
The little pale cashier, Rosie Graham, was the only one to keep
silence, and she looked at Lydia with uplifted eyebrows and a
mocking expression, that conveyed quite clearly an opinion nearly
as unfavourable as Madame Elena’s own of Lydia’s methods of
self-advancement.
But Lydia did not care any longer what Rosie might choose to think.
After the next week she would probably never see her again.
Nevertheless, when she did say good-bye to the girls with whom she
had worked for nearly a year, and with whom she had made herself so
popular, Lydia exchanged really affectionate farewells with them, and
echoed eagerly their plans for not losing sight of one another, but
meeting on an occasional Sunday afternoon.
“I should like to hear how it’s all getting on,” she declared
vehemently, taking a last look at the diamond-paned window, with the
careless gilt lettering above it.
But, after all, the Sunday afternoon meetings did not take place.
Lydia had her holiday at Regency Terrace, and then she came back with a
new silk frock, bought out of her savings, just in case lunch at Lexham
Gardens should ever turn out to mean Lady Honoret’s dining-room table,
and not a tray in Sir Rupert’s study, and she became very quickly
absorbed in new work, new surroundings, and many new people.
Lydia and the staff at Elena’s now had really nothing in common.