"No, no. He's downstairs; wants to see you. There's been some kind of a
row in Golden Square. _Petite mère_ and the Master have been talking for
an hour, as hard as ever they can talk, and Théo is upset, and the
Master has gone off in a tearing rage--do go down and find out, Brigit,
and then come back and tell me."
Lord Kingsmead's pristine curiosity regarding everything with which he
came into contact had by no means suffered eclipse since he had been
living in London.
Devoted as he was to Joyselle and to his music, the little boy's passion
for knowledge of all kinds seemed to increase, and there was in his
small, pale, pointed face a strained, overkeen look that troubled his
sister at times. Now, however, she had no leisure to think of it, and
hurried downstairs to the drawing-room, where she found Théo walking
restlessly up and down.
"Brigit," he burst out abruptly, as she came in, "when will you marry
me?"
"Good gracious, Théo--what--what has put that into your head?" she
parried ineffectively, sitting down, as he did not offer to give her any
further greeting.
"Into my head? Has it ever been out of it? I am sorry to have startled
you, dear," he continued, more gently, sitting down by her and taking
her hands in his, "but surely I have been patient. And--I am tired of
waiting."
She sat with bent head, looking at their joined hands. His hands were
smaller and whiter than his father's, but very like them in shape. If
they had been Joyselle's! If he had been able to come to her with that
question: "When will you marry me?"
"You are very good," she said slowly, after a long pause.
"Then--?"
"Suppose you tell me why this sudden frenzy of haste?"
He hesitated. "Well--we have been engaged nearly eight months--and I
love you, dear."
But she remembered Tommy's story and persisted.
"Surely, though, something must have happened to-day? You were quite
content yesterday."
He flushed. "_Eh bien, oui._ It is that my grandmother has written. In
September is to be their Golden Wedding. They are very old, and--they
want--me to bring my wife to them. Brigit," he added, his boyish face
flushing with anticipatory pink, "may I not do it?"
She rose and went to the window, her temples beating violently. For
weeks Théo had played such a subordinate _rôle_ in her mind, owing as
much to his native modesty as to her absorption in his father, that his
mood of to-day came to her as a shock. After all, put the thought away,
forget the inevitable future in an almost hysterical enjoyment of the
present, as she would, it must be faced some time. Could she possibly
marry this boy whom her sentimental contemporaneousness with his father
naturally seemed to relegate to a generation younger than herself?
It would be horrible, unnatural. A husband, be he ever so modern, and
his wife ever so unruly, is in the nature of things more or less a
master, whereas, she realised with a flash of very miserable amusement,
she would, if displeased with him, feel less inclined to use wifely
diplomacy than to box his ears. Emphatically, she had hopelessly
outgrown him. Then, what should she do?
If she refused him now, what would be his father's attitude? She did not
know. A week ago Joyselle would have hated her--or thought that he did,
which is practically the same thing _pro tem_.
But now! Now that the violinist had had time to face and measure his own
passion, would he not realise the futility of trying to force one's
inclinations in such matters? Again she could only shake her head; she
was out of her depth. Meantime, behind her, Théo was waiting for his
answer. Suddenly the horrors of the situation seemed to burst on her
from all sides. What had she done? Accepted this boy because he had
money, and because she disliked her mother and her mother's friends;
then she had, finding that she loved her future father-in-law,
deliberately torn from his eyes the veil of family sentiment that had
protected him from her, and later, when he had by an accident learned
that she was to be loved, and that he loved her, she had by an ignoble
trick kept him in England, refusing to let him play the decent part he
had chosen. What was she, then, to have done this abominable and
traitorous thing?
"Brigit--is it so--horrible to you?"
There was in his voice something like a repressed sob, and she had an
extravagant horror of melodrama. If he wept she would, she knew, lose
her temper.
"Listen, Théo. I--I will tell you to-night. I mean, I'll set a date.
Only you must go now. I--I have an engagement."
"Then----"
"Then you are a goose to be so upset! I must think it over. I know I'm
queer and--rather horrid, but--I have not changed. You knew what I was
when you asked me to marry you. And--I never pretended to be--romantic,
did I?"
He watched her dumbly. She had never looked to him more beautiful than
at that moment in her simple blue frock, her hands behind her, her eyes
almost deprecating. He rose with an effort. "All right, then. To-night.
Thank you, Brigit."
As full of humble doubts as he had been the night he asked her to marry
him, his honest eyes shining with the tears she had arrested in their
course, he kissed her hand and withdrew.
When she had heard the front door close she went to a mirror on the wall
and looked at herself.
"And now, you loathsome creature," she said aloud, fiercely, "you must
make up your mind what you are going to do."
Like many nervous people, she had a habit of walking while she thought
hard, and now after a few turns up and down the overcrowded room she
went upstairs, put on a hat, and, leaving the excited Tommy a prey to a
most maddening attack of thwarted curiosity, left the house.
She walked rapidly, looking straight ahead, seeing nothing, a rather
ferocious frown causing many people to stare at her in surprise. She
wore a delicately hued French frock and a mauve hat covered with blue
convolvuli, but in her extraordinary self-absorption and intentness of
thought there was something uncivilised about her. Her clothes were
unsuited to her, and she walked as if quite alone in a vast plain.
Her answer to Théo? What was it to be? Should she find it here, in
Sloane Street? How could she decide, not having the remotest idea what
effect her decision would have on Joyselle? Could she live without him?
As things now stood, he might, on her announcement that she was willing
to marry Théo in, say, three months' time, fly to the ends of the earth
that he might hide his own suffering, or--he might have the strength to
endure it in silence for his son's sake.
If on the other hand she said no, that she could not marry his son,
would he look on her decision as perfidy, and refuse to see her ever
again, or--A man in a hansom swore softly with relief as she just
escaped being knocked down by his horse, and quite unconscious of her
danger, hurried on, her head bent.
Or--would he then--allow himself to love her--to love her frankly, so
far as she was concerned?
At the corner of Sloane Square a man coming towards her saw her
trance-like condition, and stopping short, forced her almost to run into
his arms. "I beg your pardon," she began mechanically, and then her face
changed. "You, Gerald! How d'ye do?"
She had not seen him for days, and then it had been in the evening, so
that now in the strong afternoon sun she saw with a momentary shock that
he looked very ill indeed.
"Seedy?" she asked, some unanalysed feeling of understanding urging her
to an unusual gentleness of tone.
"Yes. What is wrong with you, Brigit?"
She had never forgiven him the affair of the evening when Tommy had
walked in his sleep, but her mind was too full of her own trouble to
have much room for resentment, and his value as an enemy had gone down.
He looked too broken and ill to be dangerous.
"I--I'm all right," she returned.
"Where are you walking so fast?"
"I'm just walking."
"I see. A race with the demons," he said in a curious, hurried voice. "I
do it, too. Everyone does, it seems. I just met Joyselle tearing out
Chelseaward--the father, I mean."