The Duchess did like good music for nothing, and when, a week later, she
was told on her arrival that Joyselle was to be of the party, she was
much pleased. She was only an ancient dowager, full of aches and pains
and sad and merry memories, but she was a great favourite nevertheless,
for her aches and pains and sad memories were kept safely in the
background, whereas her merry and sometimes somewhat shocking
recollections made her the very best of good company.
"A great man, my dear," she told Lady Kingsmead, "one of the finest
artistes I ever heard. I remember once in Petersburg, heaven only knows
how many centuries ago, hearing him play before the Czar. He was
extraordinarily handsome then, a tall young fellow--he can't be much
over forty now--very broad and strong-looking, with beautiful wavy brown
hair and gorgeous black eyes. The Grand Duchess Anastasia-Katherine was
very much in love with him, and he with her. She gave him a rose before
everybody--a red rose--and he kissed it quite boldly before he put it
into his coat. A remarkably dashing young man!"
"You have heard, I suppose, that my girl is going to marry his son?"
"Bless me, no! Has the creature a son? Men of that type ought never to
marry and have sons. What is he like, the boy?"
"A delightful person, Duchess, and we are all so pleased about it. I had
hoped for some time that she would take him--anyone could see how things
were going with _him_--but she was always so peculiar, and I rather
feared at one time that she would say no," and so on, and so on. Lady
Kingsmead did not know she was lying, and the Duchess, who was sleepy
and had on a tight dress, did not care. When she had found out who the
other guests were to be, and that dinner was at half-past eight, she
waddled upstairs, looking remarkably like Guillaume le Conquérant in her
grey dress, and went to sleep.
Lady Kingsmead had a cup of Bovril, which she had been told was
excellent for the complexion (although as her complexion was always
carefully concealed from the eye of man, also from the far more piercing
one of woman, it may be asked why she considered it). Then she had her
maid lock her dressing-room door, and give her an hour's facial massage.
At seven Joyselle arrived, and she was told that he had arrived.
"Ask Mr. Joyselle to come to my boudoir, Burton."
"Very good, my lady."
When Joyselle was ushered in he found a beautiful person in a lacy white
tea-gown reading Maeterlinck on a satin _chaise-longue_.
He kissed her hand.
"I am glad to have an opportunity of seeing you, Lady Kingsmead," he
began abruptly, fixing his dark eyes on hers. "Our little private
correspondence has, I trust, been as pleasing to you as it has to me?"
"I have greatly enjoyed it."
"I am delighted. And they, the _fiancés_, know nothing of it?"
"Of course not, Monsieur Joyselle." Her ladyship bowed with some dignity
as she spoke, for, besides being a very great artiste, this person with
the quiet air of authority was also a peasant.
"As I said, I rather doubted the wisdom of writing to you, but Théo is a
baby regarding money, and as you, of course, must consider the matter as
not altogether advantageous in the point of birth--for we have no birth,
my wife and I, we were just born,"--he smiled delightfully--"I thought
it only just to reassure your"--he was on the point of saying "mother's
heart," but thought better of it, and hastily substituted the word
"mind,"--"on this point of money. Théo, by the will of my dear friend,
Lady Isabel Clough-Hardy, does not come of age until he is twenty-five,
in something less than three years' time. But you now understand that I,
as guardian, am prepared to do all I can for the two dear children."
He _was_ handsome, the Duchess was right. And he was beautifully
dressed. And he would play for her guests after dinner.
Lady Kingsmead held out her jewelled hand.
"I am very glad that it happened," she said sweetly. "Théo's a dear
boy, and seems to make my little girl very happy."
"Yes, they seem happy. Ah--is this Tommy?"
It was. A spick-and-span Tommy, with very wet hair and a nervous smile;
a Tommy with cold hands and a curious twitching behind his knees. For he
had come to Olympus to see a god.
Joyselle held out his big, strong hand and Tommy's disappeared in it.
Thus, sometimes, are friendships made.
"I say--you _can_ play," stammered the boy. "I--it is glorious."
"You love music, Brigitte says."
"Don't I just! She says you'll play for me some time."
Tommy's small, greenish eyes were wet with irrepressible tears of
adoration.
Joyselle rose. "Come with me to my room now, Tommy, and I will play for
you. _Vous permettez, madame?_"
Lady Kingsmead bowed graciously, but when the door closed, frowned with
disgust, and putting Maeterlinck on the table, drew Claudine from under
an embroidered pillow and began to read.
Tommy, treading on air, accompanied Joyselle to his room, and sitting on
the floor as the easiest place in which to contain almost unbearable
rapture, listened.
Joyselle as he played recalled another little boy who, years before, had
listened in much the same way to another man playing the violin, and the
comparison is not so far-fetched as it seems, for although the blind
fiddler of the sunny day in Normandy had been only a third-rate scraper
of the bow, and Joyselle one of the world's very greatest artists, yet
in one thing they joined issue. Each of them gave to the listening child
before him his very best.