I
In the lives of all, even the least enterprising or adventurous,
moments now and then arrive when a decision has to be made; and our
demeanour at such times throws a strong light upon our character. Many
of us postpone action, either sheltering behind a natural reluctance to
do anything emphatic, or feeling that the Fates ought to arrange our
affairs for us. After all, it is their _métier_.
But my Ben was not like that. My Ben (to give her her full name, Benita
Staveley) was instantly practical, and her disapproval of the pastoral
process known as letting the grass grow under your feet was intense.
All her actions were prompt, without, however, coming within the zone
of impulse. Even at twenty-two she envisaged a situation with perfect
clearness, and knew her mind; but why I should mention twenty-two as
though it were a tender age, I can't explain, except as the result of
pure want of thought. To say of a man that he is twenty-two is often
merely to accuse him of callowness; but in a woman twenty-two can be
maturity in everything but actual physique; and this is especially
the case with those who, like Ben, even from young girlhood have been
relied upon by father, mother, brothers and sisters to solve their
difficulties and make things smooth for them.
Ever since I have known Ben--and her mother and I were playfellows half
a century and more ago--she has been a mixture of factotum and oracle,
yet without ever for a moment declining into a drudge or losing gaiety.
A Cinderella perhaps; but a Cinderella who went to the ball without
any supernatural assistance; a Cinderella with a laugh and a retort;
a Cinderella who won respect and as much chocolate as she wanted,
both from those within the home and out of it. Not a few boxes, for
instance, from my own hand.
But there had, as yet, been no glass slipper and no Prince, unless, of
course, you count poor Tommy Clinton as one: Tommy, who has been coming
home every summer from his billet in Madeira for the past six years
with two mastering motives to impel him--one being the wish to carry
off something, either in singles or doubles, at Wimbledon, and the
other to propose again to Ben--and so far has had no success in either
enterprise.
Personally I am glad that she didn't marry Tommy, for he takes his
defeats too sweetly, almost indeed as though he preferred them to
victories. Such plastic and easy-going youths, although they may be
agreeable enough during the time of courtship, and as dancing partners,
or even as husbands for a little while, never grow into the sterner
stuff that our Bens require, desire and deserve. But girls who have the
Atlas habit run, of course, great risks of attracting the men who want
to be treated as though they were the world.
Under the circumstances it is a little odd that Ben, save for the
punctual, if casual, annual attack of Tommy Clinton, was unpursued; but
one has to remember that Colonel Staveley did not like young men about
the house. Not that that makes any difference when passion rules, for
we know how Love treats locksmiths; but at the time this story opens
Ben was heart-free. She might appear indeed to strangers to look like
becoming one of those attractive girls who somehow or other seem to be
insufficiently attractive ever to marry. But I never thought so. She
had, however, no doubt, missed the first matrimonial train, the one
that conveys to the altar carriage-loads of immature, high-spirited
couples on the edge of the twenties. Other trains come along later, but
the service is not so good.