hope,' he answered. 'I am a good cosmopolitan. I allow Continental
nations all their own good points, and each has many. But their women,
Miss Cayley--and their point of view of their women--you will admit that
there they can't hold a candle to English women.'
I drew a circle in the dust with the tip of my parasol.
'On that issue, I may not be a wholly unprejudiced observer,' I
answered. 'The fact of my being myself an Englishwoman may possibly to
some extent influence my judgment.'
'You are sarcastic,' he cried, drawing away.
'Not at all,' I answered, making a wider circle. 'I spoke a simple fact.
But what is _your_ ideal, then, as opposed to the German one?'
He gazed at me and hesitated. His lips half parted. 'My ideal?' he said,
after a pause. 'Well, _my_ ideal--do you happen to have such a thing as
a pocket-mirror about you?'
I laughed in spite of myself. 'Now, Mr. Tillington,' I said severely,
'if you're going to pay compliments, I shall have to return. If you want
to stop here with me, you must remember that I am only Lady Georgina
Fawley's temporary lady's-maid. Besides, I didn't mean that. I meant,
what is your ideal of a man's right relation to his _maedchen_?'
'Don't say _maedchen_,' he cried, petulantly. 'It sounds as if you
thought me one of those sentimental Germans. I hate sentiment.'
'Then, towards the woman of his choice.'
He glanced up through the trees at the light overhead, and spoke more
slowly than ever. 'I think,' he said, fumbling his watch-chain
nervously, 'a man ought to wish the woman he loves to be a free agent,
his equal in point of action, even as she is nobler and better than he
in all spiritual matters. I think he ought to desire for her a life as
high as she is capable of leading, with full scope for every faculty of
her intellect or her emotional nature. She should be beautiful, with a
vigorous, wholesome, many-sided beauty, moral, intellectual, physical;
yet with soul in her, too; and with the soul and the mind lighting up
her eyes, as it lights up--well, that is immaterial. And if a man can
discover such a woman as that, and can induce her to believe in him, to
love him, to accept him--though how such a woman can be satisfied with
any man at all is to me unfathomable--well, then, I think he should be
happy in devoting his whole life to her, and should give himself up to
repay her condescension in taking him.'
'And you hate sentiment!' I put in, smiling.
[Illustration: MISS CAYLEY, HE SAID, YOU ARE PLAYING WITH ME.]
He brought his eyes back from the sky suddenly. 'Miss Cayley,' he said,
'this is cruel. I was in earnest. You are playing with me.'
'I believe the chief characteristic of the English girl is supposed to
be common sense,' I answered, calmly, 'and I trust I possess it.' But
indeed, as he spoke, my heart was beginning to make its beat felt; for
he was a charming young man; he had a soft voice and lustrous eyes; it
was a summer's day; and alone in the woods with one other person, where
the sunlight falls mellow in spots like a leopard's skin, one is apt to
remember that we are all human.
That evening Lady Georgina managed to blurt out more malicious things
than ever about the ways of adventuresses, and the duty of relations in
saving young men from the clever clutches of designing creatures. She
was ruthless in her rancour: her gibes stung me.
On Monday at breakfast I asked her casually if she had yet found a
Gretchen.
'No,' she answered, in a gloomy voice. 'All slatterns, my dear; all
slatterns! Brought up in pig-sties. I wouldn't let one of them touch my
hair for thousands.'
'That's unfortunate,' I said, drily, 'for you know I'm going to-morrow.'
If I had dropped a bomb in their midst they couldn't have looked more
astonished. 'To-morrow?' Lady Georgina gasped, clutching my arm. 'You
don't mean it, child; you don't mean it?'
I asserted my Ego. 'Certainly,' I answered, with my coolest air. 'I said
I thought I could manage you for a week; and I have managed you.'
She almost burst into tears. 'But, my child, my child, what shall I do
without you?'
'The unsophisticated Gretchen,' I answered, trying not to look
concerned; for in my heart of hearts, in spite of her innuendoes, I had
really grown rather to like the Cantankerous Old Lady.
She rose hastily from the table, and darted up to her own room. 'Lois,'
she said, as she rose, in a curious voice of mingled regret and
suspicion, 'I will talk to you about this later.' I could see she was
not quite satisfied in her own mind whether Harold Tillington and I had
not arranged this _coup_ together.
I put on my hat and strolled off into the garden, and then along the
mossy hill path. In a minute more, Harold Tillington was beside me.
He seated me, half against my will, on a rustic bench. 'Look here, Miss
Cayley,' he said, with a very earnest face; 'is this really true? Are
you going to-morrow?'
My voice trembled a little. 'Yes,' I answered, biting my lip. 'I am
going. I see several reasons why I should go, Mr. Tillington.'
'But so soon?'
'Yes, I think so; the sooner the better.' My heart was racing now, and
his eyes pleaded mutely.
'Then where are you going?'
I shrugged my shoulders, and pouted my lips a little. 'I don't know,' I
replied. 'The world is all before me where to choose. I am an
adventuress,' I said it boldly, 'and I am in quest of adventures. I
really have not yet given a thought to my next place of sojourn.'
'But you will let me know when you have decided?'
It was time to speak out. 'No, Mr. Tillington,' I said, with decision.
'I will _not_ let you know. One of my reasons for going is, that I think
I had better see no more of you.'
He flung himself on the bench at my side, and folded his hands in a
helpless attitude. 'But, Miss Cayley,' he cried, 'this is so short a
notice; you give a fellow no chance; I hoped I might have seen more of
you--might have had some opportunity of--of letting you realise how
deeply I admired and respected you--some opportunity of showing myself
as I really am to you--before--before----' he paused, and looked hard at
me.
I did not know what to say. I really liked him so much; and when he
spoke in that voice, I could not bear to seem cruel to him. Indeed, I
was aware at the moment how much I had grown to care for him in those
six short days. But I knew it was impossible. 'Don't say it, Mr.
Tillington,' I murmured, turning my face away. 'The less said, the
sooner mended.'
'But I must,' he cried. 'I must tell you now, if I am to have no chance
afterwards. I wanted you to see more of me before I ventured to ask you
if you could ever love me, if you could ever suffer me to go through
life with you, to share my all with you.' He seized my trembling hand.
'Lois,' he cried, in a pleading voice, 'I _must_ ask you; I can't expect
you to answer me now, but _do_ say you will give me at least some other
chance of seeing you, and then, in time, of pressing my suit upon you.'
Tears stood in my eyes. He was so earnest, so charming. But I remembered
Lady Georgina, and his prospective half-million. I moved his hand away
gently. 'I cannot,' I said. 'I cannot-- I am a penniless girl--an
adventuress. Your family, your uncle, would never forgive you if you
married me. I will not stand in your way. I-- I like you very much,
though I have seen so little of you. But I feel it is impossible--and I
am going to-morrow.'
[Illustration: I ROSE OF A SUDDEN, AND RAN DOWN THE HILL.]
Then I rose of a sudden, and ran down the hill with all my might, lest I
should break my resolve, never stopping once till I reached my own
bedroom.
An hour later, Lady Georgina burst in upon me in high dudgeon. 'Why,
Lois, my child,' she cried. 'What's this? What on earth does it mean?
Harold tells me he has proposed to you--proposed to you--and you've
rejected him!'
I dried my eyes and tried to look steadily at her. 'Yes, Lady Georgina,'
I faltered. 'You need not be afraid. I have refused him; and I mean it.'
She looked at me, all aghast. '_And_ you mean it!' she repeated. 'You
mean to refuse him. Then, all I can say is, Lois Cayley, I call it pure
cheek of you!'
'What?' I cried, drawing back.
'Yes, cheek,' she answered, volubly. 'Forty thousand a year, and a
good old family! Harold Tillington is my nephew; he's an earl's
grandson; he's an _attache_ at Rome; and he's bound to be one of the
richest commoners in England. Who are you, I'd like to know, miss, that
you dare to reject him?'
I stared at her, amazed. 'But, Lady Georgina,' I cried, 'you said you
wished to protect your nephew against bare-faced adventuresses who were
setting their caps at him.'
She fixed her eyes on me, half-angry, half-tremulous.
'Of course,' she answered, with withering scorn. 'But, _then_, I thought
you were trying to catch him. He tells me now you won't have him, and
you won't tell him where you are going. I call it sheer insolence. Where
do you hail from, girl, that you should refuse my nephew? A man that any
woman in England would be proud to marry! Forty thousand a year, and an
earl's grandson! That's what comes, I suppose, of going to Girton!'
I drew myself up. 'Lady Georgina,' I said, coldly, 'I cannot allow you
to use such language to me. I promised to accompany you to Germany for a
week; and I have kept my word. I like your nephew; I respect your
nephew; he has behaved like a gentleman. But I will _not_ marry him.
Your own conduct showed me in the plainest way that you did not judge
such a match desirable for him; and I have common sense enough to see
that you were quite right. I am a lady by birth and education; I am an
officer's daughter; but I am not what society calls "a good match" for
Mr. Tillington. He had better marry into a rich stockbroker's family.'
It was an unworthy taunt: the moment it escaped my lips I regretted it.
[Illustration: I WAS GOING TO OPPOSE YOU AND HAROLD.]
To my intense surprise, however, Lady Georgina flung herself on my bed,
and burst into tears. 'My dear,' she sobbed out, covering her face with
her hands, 'I thought you would be sure to set your cap at Harold; and
after I had seen you for twenty-four hours, I said to myself, "That's
just the sort of girl Harold ought to fall in love with." I felt sure he
would fall in love with you. I brought you here on purpose. I saw you
had all the qualities that would strike Harold's fancy. So I had made up
my mind for a delightful regulation family quarrel. I was going to
oppose you and Harold, tooth and nail; I was going to threaten that
Marmy would leave his money to Kynaston's eldest son; I was going to
kick up, oh, a dickens of a row about it! Then, of course, in the end,
we should all have been reconciled; we should have kissed and made
friends: for you're just the one girl in the world for Harold; indeed, I
never met anybody so capable and so intelligent. And now you spoil all
my sport by going and refusing him! It's really most ill-timed of you.
And Harold has sent me here--he's trembling with anxiety--to see whether
I can't induce you to think better of your decision.'
I made up my mind at once. 'No, Lady Georgina,' I said, in my gentlest
voice--positively stooping down and kissing her. 'I like Mr. Tillington
very much. I dare not tell you how much I like him. He is a dear, good,
kind fellow. But I cannot rest under the cruel imputation of being moved
by his wealth and having tried to capture him. Even if _you_ didn't
think so, his family would. I am sorry to go; for in a way I like you.
But it is best to adhere to our original plan. If _I_ changed my mind,
_you_ might change yours again. Let us say no more. I will go
to-morrow.'
'But you will see Harold again?'
'Not alone. Only at dinner.' For I feared lest, if he spoke to me alone,
he might over-persuade me.
'Then at least you will tell him where you are going?'
'No, Lady Georgina; I do not know myself. And besides, it is best that
this should now be final.'
She flung herself upon me. 'But, my dear child, a lady can't go out into
the world with only two pounds in pocket. You _must_ let me lend you
something.'
I unwound her clasping hands. 'No, dear Lady Georgina,' I said, though I
was loth to say it. 'You are very sweet and good, but I must work out my
life in my own way. I have started to work it out, and I won't be turned
aside just here on the threshold.'
'And you won't stop with me?' she cried, opening her arms. 'You think me
too cantankerous?'
'I think you have a dear, kind old heart,' I said, 'under the quaintest
and crustiest outside such a heart ever wore; you're a truculent old
darling: so that's the plain truth of it.'
She kissed me. I kissed her in return with fervour, though I am but a
poor hand at kissing, for a woman. 'So now this episode is concluded,' I
murmured.
'I don't know about that,' she said, drying her eyes. 'I have set my
heart upon you now; and Harold has set his heart upon you; and
considering that your own heart goes much the same way, I daresay, my
dear, we shall find in the end some convenient road out of it.'
Nevertheless, next morning I set out by myself in the coach from
Schlangenbad. I went forth into the world to live my own life, partly
because it was just then so fashionable, but mainly because fate had
denied me the chance of living anybody else's.
III
THE ADVENTURE OF THE INQUISITIVE AMERICAN
In one week I had multiplied my capital two hundred and forty-fold! I
left London with twopence in the world; I quitted Schlangenbad with two
pounds in pocket.
'There's a splendid turn-over!' I thought to myself. 'If this luck
holds, at the same rate, I shall have made four hundred and eighty
pounds by Tuesday next, and I may look forward to being a Barney Barnato
by Christmas.' For I had taken high mathematical honours at Cambridge,
and if there is anything on earth on which I pride myself, it is my firm
grasp of the principle of ratios.
Still, in spite of this brilliant financial prospect, a budding
Klondike, I went away from the little Spa on the flanks of the Taunus
with a heavy heart. I had grown quite to like dear, virulent, fidgety
old Lady Georgina; and I felt that it had cost me a distinct wrench to
part with Harold Tillington. The wrench left a scar which was long in
healing; but as I am not a professional sentimentalist, I will not
trouble you here with details of the symptoms.
My livelihood, however, was now assured me. With two pounds in pocket, a
sensible girl can read her title clear to six days' board and lodging,
at six marks a day, with a glorious margin of four marks over for
pocket-money. And if at the end of six days my fairy godmother had not
pointed me out some other means of earning my bread honestly--well, I
should feel myself unworthy to be ranked in the noble army of
adventuresses. I thank thee, Lady Georgina, for teaching me that word.
An adventuress I would be; for I loved adventure.
Meanwhile, it occurred to me that I might fill up the interval by going
to study art at Frankfort. Elsie Petheridge had been there, and had
impressed upon me the fact that I must on no account omit to see the
Staedel Gallery. She was strong on culture. Besides, the study of art
should be most useful to an adventuress; for she must need all the arts
that human skill has developed.
So to Frankfort I betook myself, and found there a nice little
_pension_--'for ladies only,' Frau Bockenheifner assured me--at very
moderate rates, in a pleasant part of the Lindenstrasse. It had dimity
curtains. I will not deny that as I entered the house I was conscious of
feeling lonely; my heart sank once or twice as I glanced round the
luncheon-table at the domestically-unsympathetic German old maids who
formed the rank-and-file of my fellow-boarders. There they sat--eight
comfortable Fraus who had missed their vocation; plentiful ladies,
bulging and surging in tightly stretched black silk bodices. They had
been cut out for such housewives as Harold Tillington had described, but
found themselves deprived of their natural sphere in life by the
unaccountable caprice of the men of their nation. Each was a model
Teutonic matron _manquee_. Each looked capable of frying Frankfort
sausages to a turn, and knitting woollen socks to a remote eternity. But
I sought in vain for one kindred soul among them. How horrified they
would have been, with their fat pudding-faces and big saucer-eyes, had I
boldly announced myself as an English adventuress!
I spent my first morning in laborious self-education at the Ariadneum
and the Staedel Gallery. I borrowed a catalogue. I wrestled with Van der
Weyden; I toiled like a galley-slave at Meister Wilhelm and Meister
Stephan. I have a confused recollection that I saw a number of stiff
mediaeval pictures, and an alabaster statue of the lady who smiled as she
rode on a tiger, taken at the beginning of that interesting episode. But
the remainder of the Institute has faded from my memory.
In the afternoon I consoled myself for my herculean efforts in the
direction of culture by going out for a bicycle ride on a hired machine,
to which end I decided to devote my pocket-money. You will, perhaps,
object here that my conduct was imprudent. To raise that objection is to
misunderstand the spirit of these artless adventures. I told you that I
set out to go round the world; but to go round the world does not
necessarily mean to circumnavigate it. My idea was to go round by easy
stages, seeing the world as I went as far as I got, and taking as little
heed as possible of the morrow. Most of my readers, no doubt, accept
that philosophy of life on Sundays only; on week-days they swallow the
usual contradictory economic platitudes about prudential forethought and
the horrid improvidence of the lower classes. For myself, I am not built
that way. I prefer to take life in a spirit of pure inquiry. I put on my
hat: I saunter where I choose, so far as circumstances permit; and I
wait to see what chance will bring me. My ideal is breeziness.
The hired bicycle was not a bad machine, as hired bicycles go; it jolted
one as little as you can expect from a common hack; it never stopped at
a Bier-Garten; and it showed very few signs of having been ridden by
beginners with an unconquerable desire to tilt at the hedgerow. So off
I soared at once, heedless of the jeers of Teutonic youth who found the
sight of a lady riding a cycle in skirts a strange one--for in South
Germany the 'rational' costume is so universal among women cyclists that
'tis the skirt that provokes unfavourable comment from those jealous
guardians of female propriety, the street boys. I hurried on at a brisk
pace past the Palm-Garden and the suburbs, with my loose hair straying
on the breeze behind, till I found myself pedalling at a good round pace
on a broad, level road, which led towards a village, by name Fraunheim.
As I scurried across the plain, with the wind in my face, not
unpleasantly, I had some dim consciousness of somebody unknown flying
after me headlong. My first idea was that Harold Tillington had hunted
me down and tracked me to my lair; but gazing back, I saw my pursuer was
a tall and ungainly man, with a straw-coloured moustache, apparently
American, and that he was following me on his machine, closely watching
my action. He had such a cunning expression on his face, and seemed so
strangely inquisitive, with eyes riveted on my treadles, that I didn't
quite like the look of him. I put on the pace, to see if I could
outstrip him, for I am a swift cyclist. But his long legs were too much
for me. He did not gain on me, it is true; but neither did I outpace
him. Pedalling my very hardest--and I can make good time when
necessary--I still kept pretty much at the same distance in front of him
all the way to Fraunheim.
[Illustration: HE KEPT CLOSE AT MY HEELS.]
Gradually I began to feel sure that the weedy-looking man with the alert
face was really pursuing me. When I went faster, he went faster too;
when I gave him a chance to pass me, he kept close at my heels, and
appeared to be keenly watching the style of my ankle-action. I gathered
that he was a connoisseur; but why on earth he should persecute me I
could not imagine. My spirit was roused now-- I pedalled with a will; if
I rode all day I would not let him go past me.
Beyond the cobble-paved chief street of Fraunheim the road took a sharp
bend, and began to mount the slopes of the Taunus suddenly. It was an
abrupt, steep climb; but I flatter myself I am a tolerable mountain
cyclist. I rode sturdily on; my pursuer darted after me. But on this
stiff upward grade my light weight and agile ankle-action told; I began
to distance him. He seemed afraid that I would give him the slip, and
called out suddenly, with a whoop, in English, 'Stop, miss!' I looked
back with dignity, but answered nothing. He put on the pace, panting; I
pedalled away, and got clear from him.
[Illustration: I WAS PULLED UP SHORT BY A MOUNTED POLICEMAN.]
At a turn of the corner, however, as luck would have it, I was pulled up
short by a mounted policeman. He blocked the road with his horse, like
an ogre, and asked me, in a very gruff Swabian voice, if this was a
licensed bicycle. I had no idea, till he spoke, that any license was
required; though to be sure I might have guessed it; for modern Germany
is studded with notices at all the street corners, to inform you in
minute detail that everything is forbidden. I stammered out that I did
not know. The mounted policeman drew near and inspected me rudely. 'It
is strongly undersaid,' he began, but just at that moment my pursuer
came up, and, with American quickness, took in the situation. He
accosted the policeman in choice bad German. 'I have two licenses,' he
said, producing a handful. 'The Fraeulein rides with me.'
I was too much taken aback at so providential an interposition to
contradict this highly imaginative statement. My highwayman had turned
into a protecting knight-errant of injured innocence. I let the
policeman go his way; then I glanced at my preserver. A very ordinary
modern St. George he looked, with no lance to speak of, and no steed but
a bicycle. Yet his mien was reassuring.
'Good morning, miss,' he began--he called me 'Miss' every time he
addressed me, as though he took me for a barmaid. 'Ex-cuse _me_, but why
did you want to speed her?'
'I thought you were pursuing me,' I answered, a little tremulous, I will
confess, but avid of incident.
'And if I was,' he went on, 'you might have con-jectured, miss, it was
for our mutual advantage. A business man don't go out of his way unless
he expects to turn an honest dollar; and he don't reckon on other folks
going out of theirs, unless he knows he can put them in the way of
turning an honest dollar with him.'
'That's reasonable,' I answered: for I am a political economist. 'The
benefit should be mutual.' But I wondered if he was going to propose at
sight to me.
He looked me all up and down. 'You're a lady of con-siderable personal
attractions,' he said, musingly, as if he were criticising a horse; 'and
I want one that sort. That's jest why I trailed you, see? Besides which,
there's some style about you.'
'Style!' I repeated.
'Yes,' he went on; 'you know how to use your feet; and you have good
understandings.'
I gathered from his glance that he referred to my nether limbs. We are
all vertebrate animals; why seek to conceal the fact?
'I fail to follow you,' I answered frigidly; for I really didn't know
what the man might say next.
[Illustration: SEEMS I DIDN'T MAKE MUCH OF A JOB OF IT.]
'That's so!' he replied. 'It was _I_ that followed _you_; seems I didn't
make much of a job of it, either, anyway.'
I mounted my machine again. 'Well, good morning,' I said, coldy. 'I am
much obliged for your kind assistance; but your remark was fictitious,
and I desire to go on unaccompanied.'
He held up his hand in warning. 'You ain't going!' he cried, horrified.
'You ain't going without hearing me! I mean business, say! Don't chuck
away good money like that. I tell you, there's dollars in it.'
'In what?' I asked, still moving on, but curious. On the slope, if need
were, I could easily distance him.
'Why, in this cycling of yours,' he replied. 'You're jest about the very
woman I'm looking for, miss. Lithe--that's what I call you. I kin put
you in the way of making your pile, I kin. This is a _bona-fide_ offer.
No flies on _my_ business! You decline it? Prejudice! Injures you;
injures me! Be reasonable anyway!'
I looked round and laughed. 'Formulate yourself,' I said, briefly.