Lord and Lady Chesterford were expected home on the 6th of December.
The marriage took place late in August, and they had gone off on the
yacht directly afterwards, in order to spend a few warm months in the
Mediterranean. Dodo had written home occasionally to Mrs. Vane, and now
and then to Jack. To Jack her letters had never been more than a word
or two, simply saying that they were enjoying themselves enormously,
and that Jack had been hopelessly wrong. Mrs. Vane also had much reason
to be satisfied. She had spent her autumn in a variety of fashionable
watering-places, where her dresses had always been the awe and wonder
of the town; she had met many acquaintances, to whom she had poured
out her rapture over Dodo's marriage; had declared that Chesterford
was most charming, and that he and Dodo were quite another Adam and
Eve in Paradise, and that she was really quite jealous of Dodo. When
they left England, they had intended to spend the winter abroad and
not come back till February, but early in December a telegram had
arrived at Winston, Lord Chesterford's country house, saying that they
would be back in ten days. About the same time Jack received a letter,
saying that their change of plans was solely owing to the fact that
Dodo was rather tired of the sea, and the weather was bad, and that
she had never been so happy in her life. Dodo's eagerness to assure
Jack of this struck him as being in rather bad taste. She ought to have
entirely ignored his warnings. The happiness of a newly-married woman
ought to be so absorbing, as to make her be unaware of the existence
of other people; and this consciousness in Dodo of her triumphant
superiority of knowledge, led him to suppose he was right rather than
wrong. He was unfeignedly sorry not to be sure that she had been right.
When he told Dodo that he wished to be jealous of Chesterford, he was
quite sincere. Since he could not have Dodo himself, at any rate let
her make someone happy. Dodo also informed him that they were going to
have a house-party that Christmas and that he must come, and she had
asked Mrs. Vivian, to show that she wasn't afraid of her any longer,
and that Maud was coming, and she wished Jack would marry her. Then
followed a dozen other names belonging to Dodo's private and particular
set, who had all been rather disgusted at her marrying what they chose
to call a Philistine. It had been quite hoped that she would marry
Jack. Jack was not a Philistine at all, though the fact of his having
proposed to her remained a secret. Maud, on the other hand, was a
Philistine; and it was one of Dodo's merits that she did not drop those
who originally had claims on her, when she became the fashion. She was
constantly trying to bring Maud into notice, but Maud resisted the
most well-meant shoves. She had none of Dodo's vivacity and talents;
in fact, her talents lay chiefly in the direction of arranging the
places at a dinner-party, and in doing a great deal of unnecessary
worsted work. What happened to her worsted work nobody ever knew. It
was chiefly remarkable for the predominance of its irregularities,
and a suggestion of damaged goods about it, in consequence of much
handling. To Dodo it seemed an incredible stupidity that anyone should
do worsted work, or, if they did do it, not do it well. She used to
tell Maud that it was done much more cheaply in shops, and much better.
Then Maud would drop it for a time, and take to playing the piano, but
that was even more oppressively stupid to Dodo's mind than the worsted
work. Maud had a perfect genius for not letting her right hand know
what her left hand was doing, a principle which was abhorrent to Dodo
in every application. The consequence of all this was, that Dodo was
apt to regard her sister as a failure, though she still, as in the
present instance, liked giving Maud what she considered a helping hand.
It must be confessed that Dodo's efforts were not altogether unselfish.
She liked her environment to be as great a success as herself, as it
thus added to her own completeness, just as a picture looks better in
a good frame than in a shabby one. Maud, however, had no desire to
be a success. She was perfectly happy to sit in the background and
do the worsted work. She longed to be let alone. At times she would
make her escape to the iron works and try to cultivate the domestic
virtues in attending to her father. She thought with a kind of envy
of the daughters of country clergymen, whose mediocre piano-playing
was invaluable to penny readings and village concerts, and for whose
worsted work there was a constant demand, in view of old women and
almshouses. She had hoped that Dodo's slumming experiences would bring
her into connection with this side of life, and had dispensed tea and
buns with a kind of rapture on the occasion of Dodo's tea-party, but
her sister had dropped her slums, as we have seen, at this point, and
Maud was too shy and uninitiative to take them up alone. She had an
excellent heart, but excellent hearts were out of place in Mrs. Vane's
establishment. Dodo had confessed her inability to deal with them.
Dodo's general invitation to Jack was speedily followed by a special
one from Winston, naming the first week in January as the time of the
party. Jack was met on his arrival by Chesterford, and as they drove
back the latter gave him particulars about the party in the house.
"They are chiefly Dodo's friends," he said. "Do you know, Jack, except
for you, I think I am rather afraid of Dodo's friends, they are so
dreadfully clever, you know. Of course they are all very charming, but
they talk about character. Now I don't care to talk about character.
I know a good man when I see him, and that's all that matters as far
as I can judge. Dodo was saying last night that her potentiality for
good was really much stronger than her potentiality for evil, and that
her potentiality for evil was only skin deep, and they all laughed,
and said they didn't believe it. And Dodo said, 'Ask Chesterford if it
isn't,' and God only knows what I said."
Jack laughed.
"Poor old fellow," he said, "you and I will go to the smoking-room, and
talk about nothing at all subtle. I don't like subtleties either."
"Ah, but they expect great things of you," said Chesterford ruefully.
"Dodo was saying you were an apostle. Are you an apostle, Jack?"
"Oh, that's only a nickname of Dodo's," he said, smiling. "But who are
these dreadfully clever people?"
"Oh, there's Ledgers--you know him, I suppose--and a Miss Edith
Staines, and a girl whom I don't know, called Miss Grantham, whom
Ledgers said, when she was out of the room last night, that he had
'discovered.' What he meant Heaven knows. Then there's Maud, who is a
nice girl. She went round to the keeper's with me this afternoon, and
played with the baby. Then there's Bertie Arbuthnot, and I think that's
all."
Jack laughed.
"I don't think we need mind them," he said. "We'll form a square to
resist cavalry.".
"Bertie's the best of the lot," said Chesterford, "and they laughed at
him rather, I think. But he is quite unconscious of it."