Frances, when in trouble, went out of doors among the trees as
naturally as other women take to their beds. Lisa's sharp eyes saw her
sitting in the Green Park as they passed. The mist, which was heavy as
rain, hung in drops on the stretches of sward and filled the far aisles
of trees with a soft gray vapor. The park was deserted but for an old
man who asked Mrs. Waldeaux for the penny's hire for her chair. As he
hobbled away, he looked back at her curiously.
"She gave him a shilling!" exclaimed Lisa, as he passed them. "I told
you she was not fit to take care of money."
"But why not wait until to-morrow to talk of business? She is hurt and
unnerved just now, and she--she does not like you, Lisa."
"I am not afraid. She will be civil. She is like Chesterfield. 'Even
death cannot kill the courtesy in her.' You don't seem to know the
woman, George. Come."
But George hung back and loitered among the trees. He was an honest
fellow, though slow of wit; he loved his mother and was penetrated to
the quick just now by a passionate fondness for his wife. Two such
good, clever women! Why couldn't they hit it off together?
"George?" said Frances, hearing his steps.
Lisa came up to her. She rose, and smiled to her son's wife, and after
a moment held out her hand.
But the courtesy which Lisa had expected suddenly enraged her. "No!
There need be no pretence between us," she said. "You are not glad to
see me. There is no pretence in me. I am honest. I did not come here
to make compliments, but to talk business."
"George said to-morrow. Can it not wait until to-morrow?"
"No. What is to do--do it! That is my motto. George, come here!
Tell your mother what we have decided. Oh, very well, if you prefer
that I should speak. We go to Paris at once, Mrs. Waldeaux, and will
take apartments there. You will remain with Miss Vance."
"Yes, I know. I am to remain----" Frances passed her hand once or
twice over her mouth irresolutely. "But Oxford, George?" she said.
"You forget your examinations?"
George took off his spectacles and wiped them.
"Speak! Have you no mind of your own?" his wife whispered. "I will
tell you, then, madam. He has done with that silly whim! A priest,
indeed! I am Catholic, and priests do not marry. He goes to Paris to
study art. I see a great future for him, in art."
Frances stared at him, and then sat down, dully. What did it matter?
Paris or Oxford? She would not be there. What did it matter?
Lisa waited a moment for some comment, and then began sharply, "Now, we
come to affaires! Listen, if you please. I am a woman of business.
Plain speaking is always best, to my idea."
Mrs. Waldeaux drew herself together and turned her eyes on her with
sudden apprehension, as she would on a snapping dog. The woman's tones
threatened attack.
"To live in Paris, to work effectively, your son must have money. I
brought him no dot, alas! Except"--with a burlesque courtesy--"my
beauty and my blood. I must know how much money we shall have before I
design the menage."
"George has his income," said his mother hastily.
"Ah! You are alarmed, madam! You do not like plain words about the
affaires? George tells me that although he is long ago of age, he has
as yet received no portion of his father's estates."
"Lisa! You do not understand! Mother, I did not complain. You have
always given me my share of the income from the property. I have no
doubt it was a fair share--as much as if my father had left me my
portion, according to custom."
"Yes, it was a fair share," said Frances.
"Ah! you smile, madam!" interrupted Lisa. "I am told it is a vast
property, a grand chateau--many securities! M. Waldeaux pere made a
will, on dit, incredibly foolish, with no mention of his son. But now
that this son comes to marry, to become the head of the house, if you
were a French mother, if you were just, you would---- You appear to be
amused, madam?"
For Mrs. Waldeaux was laughing. She could not speak for a moment. The
tears stood in her eyes.
"The matter has somewhat of droll to you?"
"It has its humorous side," said Frances. "I quite understand, George,
that you will need more money to support a wife. I will double your
allowance. It shall be paid quarterly."
"You would prefer to do that?" hesitated George. "Rather than to make
over a son's share of the property to me absolutely? Some of the
landed estate or securities? I have probably a shrewder business
talent than yours, and if I had control could make my property more
profitable."
"I should prefer to pay your income as before--yes," said Frances
quietly.
"Well, as you choose. It is yours to give, of course." George coughed
and shuffled to conquer his disappointment. Then he said, "Have it
your own way." He put his hand affectionately on her shoulder. "And
when you have had your little outing and go home to Weir, you will be
glad to have us come to you, for a visit--won't you, mother? You
haven't said so."
"Why should I say so? It is your home, George, yours and your wife's."
She caught his hand and held it to her lips.
But Lisa had not so easily conquered her disappointment. This woman
was coolly robbing George of his rights and was going instead to kill
for him a miserable little fatted calf! Bah! This woman, who had
maligned her dead mother!
She should have her punishment now. In one blow, straight from the
shoulder.
"But you should know, madam," she said gently, "who it is your son has
married before you take her home. I assure you that you can present me
to the society in Weir with pride. I have royal blood----" "Lisa!"
George caught her arm. "It is not necessary. You forget----"
"Oh, I forget nothing! I said royal blood. My father, madam, was the
brother of the Czar, and my mother was Pauline Felix. You don't seem
to understand----" after a moment's pause. "It was my mother whose
name you said should not cross any decent woman's lips--my mother----"
She broke down into wild sobs.
"When I said it I did not know that you---- I am sorry." Frances
suddenly walked away, pulling open her collar. It seemed to her that
there was no breath in the world. George followed her. "Did you know
this?" she said at last, in a hoarse whisper. "And you are--married to
her? There is no way of being rid of her?"
"No, there is no way," said Waldeaux stoutly. "And if there were, I
should not look for it. I am sorry that there is any smirch on Lisa's
birth. But even her mother, I fancy, was not altogether a bad lot.
Bygones must be bygones. I love my wife, mother. She's worth loving,
as you'd find if you would take the trouble to know her. Her dead
mother shall not come between her and me."
"She's like her, George!" said Mrs. Waldeaux, with white, trembling
lips. "I ought to have seen it at first. Those luring, terrible eyes.
It is Pauline Felix's heart that is in her. Rotten to the
core--rotten----"
"I don't care. I'll stand by her." But George's face, too, began to
lose its color. He shook himself uncomfortably. "The thing's done
now," he muttered.
"Certainly, certainly," Frances repeated mechanically. "Tell her that
I am sorry I spoke of her mother before her. It was rude--brutal. I
ask her pardon."
"Oh, she'll soon forget that! Lisa has a warm heart, if you take her
right. There's lots of hearty fun in her too. You'll like that. Are
you going now? Good-by, dear. We will come and see you in the
morning. The thing will not seem half so bad when you have slept on
it."
He paused uncertainly, as she still stood motionless. She was facing
the grim walls of Stafford House, looming dimly through the mist, her
eyes fixed as if she were studying the sky line.
"George," she said. "You don't understand. You will come to me always.
But that woman never shall cross my threshold." "Mother! Do you mean
what you say?"
It was a man, not a shuffling boy that spoke now. "Do you mean that we
are not to go to you to-morrow? Not to go home in October? Never----"
"Your home is open to you. But Pauline Felix's child is no more to me
than a wild beast--or a snake in the grass, and never can be." She
faced him steadily now.
"There she is," said Frances, looking at the little black figure under
the trees, "and here am I. You can choose between us."
"Those whom God hath joined together," muttered George. "You know
that."
"You have known her for three weeks," cried Frances vehemently. "I
gave you life. I have been your slave every hour since you were born.
I have lived but for you. Which of us has God joined together?"
"Mother, you're damnably unreasonable! It is the course of nature for
a man to leave his parents and cleave to his wife."
"Yes, I know," she said slowly. "You can keep that foul thing in your
life, but it never shall come into mine."
"Then neither will I. I will stand by my wife."
"That is the end, then?"
She waited, her eyes on his.
He did not speak.
She turned and left him, disappearing slowly in the rain and mist.