THE TENDER DIPLOMATIST
The coming of the Easter legal vacation set Arthur free for the time
from professional hopes and fears. He was due on a visit to his mother
and sister at Malvern, but excused himself at the last moment. It was
not in him to leave London. The Temple indeed he forsook, but he abode
in his lodgings and spent his spare time with the Sarradets. Amabel
Osling was staying with them, and Raymond was now in close attendance on
her. There were two young couples, then, ready for lawn-tennis, for
theatres, for concerts, or any other diversion. Yet pleasantest of all
were the walks in Regent's Park on the offdays, when nothing special had
been arranged, but Arthur would happen to stroll up to the Broad Walk,
and Marie would chance to be giving her dog a run. Then they would
saunter about together, or sit on a seat in the spring sunshine, talking
of all manner of things--well, except of the particular form which
Sidney Barslow's rudeness had taken. Somehow, in the end, Marie never
could bring herself to tell him that and ask him to be indignant about
it. She left the enormity vague and undefined; it was really none the
less effective left like that, just as provocative of reprobation for
the sinner and sympathy for the ill-used friend. And it was safer to
leave it like that; she could never rid herself of the fear that the
actual thing, if revealed, might appear to Arthur rude indeed--rough,
ill-mannered, as much of all this as one could conceive--but not so
overwhelmingly absurd and monstrous as it ought to seem, as the demands
of her uneasy heart required that he should find it.
For she could hardly believe in what looked now like coming to pass. She
had known him for a long time--more than a year--as a good friend but
rather a reserved one; cordial and kind, but keeping always a certain
distance, actually, if without intention, maintaining a barrier round
his inner self, refusing to abandon the protective aloofness of a proud
and sensitive nature. Was he changing from this to the opposite
extreme--to that most open, intimate, exposed, and unprotected creature,
a lover? Well as she had known him, she had not thought of him as that.
But her mind fastened on the idea eagerly; it appealed to more than one
side of her nature.
"As a rule I just can't talk about myself," he said once. "How is it
that I can to you?"
"It's because I love you, and in your heart you know it," she wanted to
say, but she answered, laughing, "I've always been rather a good
listener."
"If you tell most people a single thing about yourself, they bombard you
with a dozen silly questions. Now you never do that."
"That's because I'm afraid of you, if you only knew it," she wanted to
say, but she answered merrily, "I find out more by my way in the end,
don't I?"
For every step forward his feelings had taken, hers had taken ten. She
knew it and was not ashamed; she gloried in it. From the moment she had
come over to his side, making herself his champion and asking for his
gratitude in return, her heart had brooked no compromise. Hers was a
mind quick of decision, prompt in action. To romance she brought the
qualities of business. A swift rush of feeling had carried her to the
goal; she watched him now following in her steps, and was tremulously
careful not to anticipate by an iota the stages he had yet to pass. She
marvelled that she had not loved him from the beginning, and almost
convinced herself that she had. She could scarcely persuade herself to
accept even now the signs of his nascent love.
Thus in truth, though all unknown to him, she did the wooing. Her answer
was ready before his question. She watched and waited with a passivity
that was to a man of his disposition her best lure. Some of this fine
caution she learnt from her observation of him, and some of it from
Sidney Barslow's taunt. She subdued her natural coquetry lest, even in
eyes the most unfriendly and malicious, it should seem forwardness. She
gave always just a little, little less than his words and eyes asked.
Schooling herself after this fashion, modelling her behaviour to what
she conceived to be his ideals, she sought to win him. If she succeeded
she would achieve not only her heart's desire, but a great triumph over
those disturbing doubts. His approval would, she felt, set on her the
stamp that she longed to wear--the social diploma to which she aspired.
A fine slap in the face for Sidney Barslow it would be, for instance!
Arthur's generous impulse, the desire to show himself a warm and
grateful friend to his champion, was merged now in a great and absorbing
contentment. It prevented him from considering how an engagement and a
marriage would consort with his prospects and his career; it narrowed
his vision of his own life and mind to the present moment. He had got
what he had been pining for--that intimate and (so to say) ministering
sympathy which a man perhaps can get, and certainly can ask, from a
woman only. That had been a need so great that its satisfaction seemed
to satisfy all the needs of his being, and deluded him into thinking
that all his instincts and aspirations asked no more than this, that his
keen appetite for beauty could be fed on her vivacious prettiness, that
all his impulses, wayward, fanciful, sometimes extravagant, could be
lulled to sleep by the spell of her shrewd and pleasant common sense. It
made him forget that the prime function of a lover and his supreme
expression lie in giving, and that the woman truly makes the man in love
with her when she makes him give all he has and think that he is giving
brass for gold. But if this it is to be a lover, Arthur Lisle was no
lover now; if this it is to be a lover, Marie Sarradet had never seen
and scarce imagined one.
But the spring sunshine, the impulses of youth, the ministering sympathy
blinded his eyes. He seemed to have all because he liked so much that
which he had. Gaily and happily, with that fine gallantry which she so
admired, on he came, step by step. She grew secure.
By now father and brother were on the alert. They had canvassed the
matter in all its bearings. Raymond was Arthur's enthusiastic adherent.
Old Mr. Sarradet affected reserve and doubt; he complained that the
suitor was far from rich. But in his heart he was delighted at the
prospect. He admired Arthur, he believed in his abilities, he thought
the marriage would be a "step up" for his darling daughter--and perhaps
for her family. Above all he saw the time draw near when he should enjoy
the greatest pleasure that he had to look forward to in life--surprising
Marie by the handsome dimensions of her dowry. He hugged the thought of
it; he loved her, and he knew she was a good woman of business. It would
be a great moment when she saw in him, at one and the same moment, a
more munificent father and a cleverer man of business than ever she had
thought. Incidentally the disclosure might cause Master Raymond to
realise what very considerable things he stood to lose if he did not
mind what he was about. The old fellow had no real thought of
disinheriting his son, but he loved the power his money gave him, and
would now and again flourish the sword that he would have been most loth
to use.
So all things promised bravely--Marie, the tender diplomatist, held a
winning hand and was playing it well. Leave her to the skill that her
heart taught her, and the game was won!
Among the accidents of life are relatives appurtenant to but ordinarily
outside of the family circle. Mr. Sarradet owned one--an elder
sister--in his eyes, by early memory and tradition, exceptionally
endowed with the knowledge of the way to look after girls, and the
proper things to be done in the interest of their dignity and virtue.
She came up from Manchester, where she lived, to have her teeth seen
to--not that there were not excellent dentists in Manchester, but her
father had always gone to Mr. Mandells of Seymour Street and she had a
fancy to go to Mr. Mandells's son (of Seymour Street still)--and stayed
with her brother from Friday to Tuesday. Having seen what she saw, and
had her doubts, and come to her own conclusions, she sat up late on
Monday night, sat up till Arthur Lisle had departed and Marie was
between the sheets, and even Raymond had yawned himself on to bed; and
then she said abruptly to her brother Mr. Sarradet:
"It's a settled thing, I suppose, though it's not announced yet?"
Mr. Sarradet passed his hand over his hair-brush of a head, and pulled
his moustache perplexedly. "I suppose it is," he answered lamely, quite
conscious that Mrs. Veltheim possessed knowledge and commanded
deference, but conscious also that, up to now, matters had gone on very
well without her.
"You suppose!" said the lady. The two words carried home to a conscience
hitherto guiltily easy. But Mrs. Veltheim left nothing to chance; she
rammed the charge in. "If dear Marie had a mother!"
She alarmed the cautious old _bourgeois_--to the point of protesting
that he felt no alarm whatever.
"He's a gentleman." He took a sip at his toddy. "No girl in the world
has more self-respect." Another sip ended in "Perfect confidence!"
vaguely murmured.
"Young men are young men."
"Not at all! I don't believe it of him for a minute." His protest was
against the insinuation which even an identical proposition may carry.
"I rescued my Harriet just in time!"
"Damn your Harriet, and I wish you'd go back to Manchester!" It was not
what he said to his respected sister. "Cases differ," was the more
parliamentary form his answer took.
But the seed was sown before Mrs. Veltheim did go back to Manchester. It
germinated in the cautious suspicious soul of the old shopkeeper, so
trustful of a man's credit till the breath of a suspicion blew upon it,
then so acute to note every eddying current of the air. He grew minded
to confront Arthur Lisle with the attitude of Mrs. Veltheim--a lady for
whom Arthur, on the strength of one evening's acquaintance, had
conceived a most profound aversion.
She was a fat woman--broad, heavy, fair and florid, married to an
exceedingly prosperous German. To Mr. Sarradet her opinion was, like her
person, weighty; not always agreeable, but never unimportant. To Arthur
she was already--before ever he had conceived of her as having or being
entitled to have an opinion about him, his sentiments, or his
intentions--an appreciable drawback, though not a serious obstacle, to
the alliance which he was contemplating. He was, in fine, extremely glad
that she and her husband, whom he defined and incarnated with all his
imagination's power of vividness, lived in Manchester. If they too had
dwelt in Regent's Park, it would not have been the same place to him.
Collateral liabilities would have lurked round every corner.
By now, and notwithstanding a transitory disturbance created by the
revelation of Mrs. Veltheim, Arthur's mind had subconsciously chosen its
course; but emotionally he was not quite ready. His feelings waited for
a spark to set them in a blaze--such a spark as might come any moment
when he was with Marie, some special note of appeal sounded by her, some
quick intuition of him or his mood, raising his admiration and
gratitude, even some especially pretty aspect of her face suddenly
striking on his sense of beauty. Any one of these would serve, but one
of them was needed to change his present contentment into an impulse
towards something conceived as yet more perfect. The tender shrewd
diplomatist divined pretty well how things stood; she would not hurry or
strive, that way danger lay; she waited, securely now and serenely, for
the divine chance, the happy coincidence of opportunity and impulse. It
was bound to come, and to come now speedily. Alas, she did not know that
clumsy hands had been meddling with her delicate edifice!
Two days after Mrs. Veltheim had gone back to Manchester, old Sarradet
left his place of business early, travelled by omnibus from Cheapside to
the corner of Bloomsbury Street, and presented himself at the door of
Arthur's lodgings. Arthur was at home; Marie had told him that she would
not be able to meet him in Regent's Park that afternoon, as some
shopping business called her elsewhere, and he was lounging through the
hours, not (as it happened, and it does happen sometimes even when a man
is in love) thinking about her much, but rather about that problem of
his legal career which the waning of the vacation brought again to his
mind. The appearance of Mr. Sarradet--who had never before honoured him
with a visit--came as something of a surprise.
"As I was passing your corner, I thought I'd look in and see if you were
coming up to our place this afternoon," Mr. Sarradet explained.
"Because, if so, we might walk together."
Arthur said that he understood that Marie would be out, and therefore
had not proposed to pay his friends a visit that day.
"Out, is she? Ah, yes!" He smiled knowingly. "You know what she's doing
better than her father does!" He was walking about the little room,
looking at Arthur's pictures, photographs, and other small possessions.
"Well, you'll be coming again soon, I expect?"
"I expect so, if you'll have me," said Arthur, smiling.
Mr. Sarradet took up a photograph. "That's a nice face!"
"It's my mother, Mr. Sarradet."
"Your mother, is it? Ah, well now! And she lives at----? Let me see! You
did mention it."
"At Malvern--she and my sister."
"Your sister? Ah, yes! Unmarried, isn't she? Have you no other brothers
or sisters?"
Under these questions--and more followed, eliciting a good deal of
information about his family and its circumstances--Arthur's face
gradually assumed its distinctively patient expression. The patience was
very closely akin to endurance--in fact, to boredom. Why did the fussy
old fellow worry him like that? Instinctively he hardened himself
against Sarradet--against Sarradet's implied assertion of a right to ask
him all these questions. Perhaps he knew that this resentment was not
very reasonable. He felt it, none the less. To put him in any way to the
question, to a test or a trial, was so entirely contrary to what had
been Marie's way.
"And you're practising at the Bar, Mr. Lisle, eh?"
The infusion of obstinacy in the patience grew stronger. "I'm what is
commonly called a briefless barrister."
Now old Sarradet knew that--and did not mind it under the circumstances.
But the thought of that dowry was too much for him. He could not resist
a little flourish. "Briefless! Oh, come, don't say that!" He pursed up
his lips and shook his head humorously.
"It's unfortunately the case, Mr. Sarradet. I hope it won't always be
so, of course."
"We must hope that, we must all hope that!" said Sarradet, rubbing his
hands slowly together. "And in any case we none of us know what fortune
has in store for us, do we?" He smiled, looking at Arthur with an
interrogative air. He thought he had given the young man a lead, a good
cue on which to speak. Arthur said nothing, and Sarradet's smile
gradually vanished, being replaced by a look of some perplexity. He did
not know how to go on; Mrs. Veltheim had told him what to do but had not
told him how to do it. There was an awkward silence. Sarradet had taken
up his hat and stood in the middle of the room, fingering it and eyeing
Arthur with an air that seemed almost furtive. "Well, I must be going,"
he said at last.
Arthur moved towards the door of the room and opened it. Sarradet
stepped into the hall, saying, "Perhaps you'll be looking in on us
to-night?"
"Thanks awfully, but I've arranged to go to the theatre with a man
to-night."
"To-morrow then?" Sarradet's tone sounded persistent.
Arthur had meant to look in to-morrow. It had been a pleasant prospect.
Why was the old fellow making an obligation, a duty, of it?
"Yes, I'll come to-morrow," he said, rather curtly.
"Ah, that's right, that's right!" Arthur had opened the hall door by
now. Sarradet took his hand and pressed it hard. "That'll be good news
for Marie, won't it?" He had at last got a little nearer to what Mrs.
Veltheim wanted.
"I'm very much flattered by your putting it like that." Arthur was still
distant and defensive.
But Sarradet was desperate now--he must get out what he wanted to say
before the door was shut on him. "Oh, nonsense! Come, Mr. Lisle, as man
to man, we understand one another?"
The question was out at last. If he had put it a quarter of an hour
earlier, Arthur Lisle would have answered it to his satisfaction,
however little he relished its being put. But now it was not fated to
have an answer. For on the very moment of its being put, there came
interruption in a form which made the continuance of this momentous
conversation impossible.
A barouche with a pair of fine bay horses, a barouche on Cee-springs,
sumptuously appointed, clattered up the street and to the common
amazement of the two men stopped at the door. The footman sprang down
from the box and, touching his hat to a lady who occupied the carriage,
waited for her instructions. But she paid no heed to him. She leant over
the side of the carriage and looked at the two men for a moment.
Sarradet took off his hat. Arthur Lisle just stared at the vision, at
the entire vision, the lady, the carriage, the footman--the whole of it.
The lady's face broke into a bright smile of recognition.
"I came to call on Mr. Arthur Lisle. You must be Arthur, aren't you?"
she said.
No, there was no possibility of Mr. Sarradet's getting his question
answered now.