EXEUNT OMNES
Carrissima, in her curiosity to know the identity of the "people" whom
Bridget wished her to meet, paid a visit to Upper Grosvenor Street.
Sybil Clynesworth's breach of trust had been long ago forgiven, and now
she was asked, in the most casual tone, whether she was to make one of
the party at Aberdeen Mansion on Thursday.
"My dear," said Sybil, "Bridget quite understands that I do not care
for that sort of thing. I must say she is kindness itself, and she
wouldn't hear of my turning out of this house; she wouldn't hear of it.
And really Jimmy seems exceedingly happy."
When Thursday evening arrived, Carrissima proved once more very
exacting while she was being dressed for dinner. Her hair had to be
twice taken down again, and at the last minute she changed her mind
about her gown. Her maid had not found her so troublesome since that
evening in March when she went to dine with Lawrence and Phoebe in
Charteris Street, and on that disappointing occasion Carrissima
expected to meet Mark Driver.
She could not feel quite so confident of his presence at Aberdeen
Mansion this evening, and in any case such an encounter might not
necessarily tend to mitigate the unfortunate coolness which had grown
up between them. Still it would be a satisfaction to sit in the same
room with him; perhaps he would even take her in to dinner, and
to-night might prove the beginning of better days. Those through which
Carrissima was living at present could scarcely be much worse!
Even Colonel Faversham remarked how well she was looking when she said
"good-bye."
"I hope you won't feel very dull by yourself," she suggested.
"Dull!" he retorted. "Why in the world should I feel dull! You speak
as if I couldn't tolerate my own society for a few hours. Give me a
decent cigar and the _Field_, and I ask for nothing more. Besides,
what do you imagine will become of me when you're married?"
"Oh well," said Carrissima, "there's no need to anticipate anything of
that kind just yet."
"No," was the answer. "So it seems. What has happened to Mark Driver?
He used to haunt the house, but now we never see him. I tell you what,
Carrissima. A good many of you young women are just a little bit too
exacting!"
"If I don't go I shall be late for dinner," exclaimed Carrissima
hastily, and a few minutes later she was on the way to Aberdeen Mansion
in a hired brougham.
Reaching the block of flats two minutes before the clock struck
half-past seven, Carrissima went up to the second floor in the lift,
pressed the bell button and was at once admitted by Jimmy's man. A
tall parlour-maid met her in the hall, and took her to a bedroom, where
Carrissima removed her cloak.
"Will you come this way?" said the parlour-maid, and led her to a
miniature drawing-room which, to Carrissima's astonishment, was empty.
"I am very sorry," the girl continued, in response to an inquiring
glance, "but Mr. and Mrs. Clynesworth have not come in yet."
"Can I have made a mistake in the day?" said Carrissima. "Are you
certain Mrs. Clynesworth expected me this evening?"
"Yes," was the answer, given with some hesitation.
"At what time?"
"Dinner is ordered for eight o'clock," said the parlour-maid.
"Oh, then that accounts for it," cried Carrissima. "I understood it
was to be half-past seven."
"We always dine at eight," returned the parlour-maid, as she stirred
the fire. "If you wouldn't mind taking a chair," she added, "Mr. and
Mrs. Clynesworth will not be many minutes."
With that she left the room and shut the door, only to re-open it again
a few moments later, whereupon Mark Driver entered without any
announcement. To judge by appearances, he was far more astonished to
behold Carrissima than she to see him. For a second he stood stock
still just within the door, gazing down at her face in silence. It was
she who at last broke through the embarrassment, rising and offering
her hand.
"Good-evening, Mark!" she said.
"Good-evening," he replied, and then the conversation threatened to
languish.
"What," asked Carrissima, "do you imagine has become of our host and
hostess?"
"Goodness knows," said Mark. "There's obviously some mistake. Anyhow,
I was immensely surprised to see their other guest."
"Really!" cried Carrissima, sitting down again in an easy-chair. "I
don't quite see why!"
"The fact remains that I was," he answered, with the faintest of smiles.
"Were you also pleased, by any chance?"
"Suppose we say I was--well, dazzled," said Mark, drawing closer to her
chair.
"The simple explanation must be," returned Carrissima, with a tremor in
her voice, "that Bridget said eight, and we understood half-past seven."
"In that event we must have been dreaming!"
"But then," she suggested, "it isn't likely that two persons would
dream the same thing, is it?"
"Oh well, I'm not certain," said Mark, and he rested a hand on the arm
of her chair.
"You see, Bridget invited me when I was here last week," Carrissima
explained. "I might easily have made a blunder."
"She wrote to me," was the answer. "I have it in black and white.
There's no getting out of that."
"It must be a quarter to eight!" Carrissima suggested.
"Seventeen minutes to," said Mark, taking out his watch.
"I hope no accident has happened," suggested Carrissima, and bringing
forward a chair, he sat down close to her side. "One is reminded," she
added, "of a certain evening when Lawrence and Phoebe waited for
you--do you remember?"
"Oh dear, yes," said Mark, passing a hand over his forehead. "Let us
hope these people won't be quite so much behind as I was!"
"Are you afraid of being bored?" asked Carrissima. "Or are you merely
hungry?"
"It seems a long time since I saw you last," he remarked.
"Whose fault was that?"
"My misfortune, anyhow," he admitted.
"You had only to come to Grandison Square," said Carrissima. "You knew
I was always on view!"
They both lapsed into silence, thinking in common of his last visit to
Colonel Faversham's, when, perhaps, neither of them had shown to the
best advantage.
"It's difficult to shut one's mind to facts," exclaimed Mark suddenly.
"I fancy I have heard you protest that few things can be more
misleading," she retorted.
He sat leaning forward in his chair, close to Carrissima's, his arms
resting on his knees.
"Yes, that's all right," he said. "But I have sometimes to advise
patients to submit to operations, thinking how I should hate the ordeal
on my own account. I quite understand that the only way is often to
shut one's eyes. Life seems to include a good many things which simply
won't bear thinking about. One realizes the fact, yet goes on thinking
of them just the same."
"Well," murmured Carrissima, "you should try--you should try to mend
your ways in the future."
"Do you think you could do it?" he asked.
"What?" asked Carrissima.
"Shut your eyes!"
"Mark!" she cried, after a pause.
"Well?" he said.
"Look----"
She was leaning back with her eyes tightly closed; her little face
puckered, and one hand resting on each arm of the chair.
At the sight all Mark's hesitation fell away, and rising impulsively,
he took her cheeks between his palms and kissed her lips. The touch of
nature made them kin, but not within the tables of affinity. They
might have reasoned with themselves for months longer in vain, but
being thrown alone together, their feelings quickly found free play.
It was true that Carrissima, although she may have hoped, and indeed
she did devoutly hope for such a consummation, was in the sequel taken
rather sharply by surprise. She had not anticipated this sudden
_dénouement_! The time for procrastination had passed, however, and as
she opened her eyes she wound her arms about Mark's neck.
"It must be nearly eight o'clock," she remarked, as she rose from her
chair a few minutes later, going at once to look in the mirror which
formed part of the overmantel.
"Carrissima," said Mark, "I begin to suspect----"
"What?" she demanded.
"That this must be a put-up job!"
"Oh, but Bridget would never dream of such a thing," said Carrissima.
"I should be rather sorry to say what she wouldn't be capable of.
Anyhow," Mark added, "it would be a pity to spoil a good intention!
You haven't said you will be my wife, you know."
"I--I fancied that I had," she was answering, when there arose a noise
outside the drawing-room as if some one had violently knocked over a
metal tray.
By the time the door opened, Carrissima was seated in the easy-chair
gazing at the fire, while Mark stood at the farther side of the small
room with one of David Rosser's novels (hastily snatched from a side
table) in his hand.
Enter Bridget, accompanied by Jimmy and looking her best in what might
have been her wedding dress.
"So immensely sorry!" she cried, hastening forward as Carrissima rose.
"She looks sorry, doesn't she?" said Jimmy, with a laugh. "You must
both try your hardest to forgive us," he added, as Bridget turned
towards Mark.
"I do hope you two good people haven't been bored to death," she
continued. "Especially as Mark seems to be reading one of my father's
books!"
"We've done our level best--in the circumstances," he answered, with an
embarrassed, boyish laugh, and then, dinner being announced, Jimmy
offered his arm to Carrissima. While the servants were present
everybody seemed to have a great deal to say with the exception of Miss
Faversham, whose silence failed, however, to attract the least
attention. By the time dessert was reached she began to show symptoms
of recovering from her not unnatural embarrassment; Jimmy's glass was
full. He drank champagne this evening.
"I was wondering," said Mark, when the four were left by themselves,
"whether I might be of some use before the evening ended. Carrissima
suggested an accident."
"There was not much you could call accidental about it, was there,
Bridget?" said Jimmy.
"Oh dear!" she exclaimed, "I wish somebody would say something
illuminating! I am positively dying from curiosity!"
"The important question is," suggested Jimmy, "what did Carrissima say?"
"And," said Bridget, "what did Mark ask her?"
Carrissima looked entreatingly into his face across the table.
"The fact is," he explained, disregarding her mute appeal, "I asked her
to marry me!"
Bridget was on her feet in an instant.
"Oh, how immensely pleased I am!" she cried, stooping to kiss
Carrissima's forehead. "Jimmy, you may drink your wine now!"
He lost no time in raising his glass.
"Carrissima!" he said. "Mark, old chap!"
She looked across the table, half smiles, half tears.
THE END