Collected Works of E M Delafield

by E M Delafield

  “It’s nothing very much, of course, and you must criticize hard. When would you like it? Any time will do, of course — there’s naturally no hurry.”

  “I am in a hurry,” smiled the tactful Stephanie; “there is no time like the present. Won’t you fetch it now?”

  “Oh, are you sure?” said Zella, getting up and moving towards her writing-table. “Yes, indeed, if you will.”

  “Let me see...” said Zella, one hand on the drawer of the writing -table, “where is the thing?”

  Almost before she had finished speaking, the opened drawer revealed the manuscript, and she carried it to a corner of the sofa.

  Mdlle de Kervoyou possessed to the full the quality, as rare as it is undefinable, of believing absolutely in the sincerity of those with whom she came into contact.

  Consequently Zella, abnormally sensitive to atmosphere, read aloud with perfect self-confidence the dreary philosophy in the midst of which moved her central figure, an aged Polish violinist, an exile in London.

  “Oh, Zella! it is very sad.”

  “Is it? I do not think I meant it to be, exactly — only true to life.”

  This was exactly what Mdlle de Kervoyou did not think it, but she only said gently:

  “You are very young to have such a sad idea of life.”

  Zella looked broodingly into the fire and felt delighted. This was exactly what she wanted Tante Stephanie to think. But her satisfaction was dashed a moment later.

  “But, after all, it really is the young who see things so darkly. You will learn to look for the silver lining, Zella.”

  Zella hoped that she successfully masked her annoyance by deepening the intensity of her gaze as she replied quietly:

  “Perhaps. It is not of a silver lining to my own clouds that I was thinking, but to those of the poor, the oppressed, the starving.”

  Mdlle de Kervoyou laid down her work. She had given up her beautiful Church embroidery, and sewed instead for the mothers and babies in the village.

  “Mon enfant cherie,” she said very earnestly, “indeed I understand you, and it is very good that you should think of the poor. But you will be able to give much help later on. And you will certainly write books, to give people pleasure and help them in that way.”

  “Do you think I shall?” said Zella in quite a different tone, one of shy, eager pleasure and interest.

  “But yes,” exclaimed Tante Stephanie, delighted. “It is very clever to have thought of all that at your age, about that poor old Count Stanilas. I liked very much the part about his music, when the tunes seem to take him back to his own country again and his old home. It is most touching and beautiful.”

  “Oh, Tante Stephanie, I’m so glad! But tell me what you think of it as a whole; remember you promised to tell me truly,” urged Zella unwisely.

  Tante Stephanie hesitated.

  “I think, perhaps, it is a little discouraging,” she said at last, “when you say so much about the sordidness of life, and that there is no real happiness anywhere. And I don’t think, somehow, he would have said to the little girl, when he was teaching her the violin, ‘There is no God but Chance, and no Chance but God.’”

  “Why not?” said Zella, who had regarded the mot in question as a profound epigram.

  “Perhaps I do not quite see what it means,” said her aunt diffidently, “but I am sure it was not quite the thing to say to a child. Besides, if she had repeated it to her parents, as she most likely would, they would not have liked it at all, and the poor Count might have lost his pupil.”

  Zella had no reply.

  Mdlle de Kervoyou looked at her rather wistfully. “But I love the part about his music,” she repeated, “it is charming.”

  Zella revived.

  “Of course anything about music appeals to me very deeply,” she murmured.

  “Of course,” assented Mdlle de Kervoyou, who happened to be absolutely unmusical.

  But her ready acceptance of Zella’s statement was perhaps indirectly responsible for Zella’s next convictions as to her means of self-expression.

  The Polish count was laid aside, after a final outburst of realism in which every item of his meagre supper had been described with a minuteness that extended from the glistening oil of silvery and crumbling sardines to the white irregularity of a lump of salt. At which stage Zella perceived that the book was on such a scale as to need a lifetime’s work before she could hope to complete it, and thereupon characteristically decided to wait until she could give more time to it.

  She played the piano.

  All through the spring, Villetswood was haunted by fragments of Debussy, renderings of Tchaikovsky and minor passages from the works of Sibelius. Zella retained all her old facility for reading at sight, and there was little she did not attempt.

  Louis, in the evening, sometimes asked her for his old favourite, Haydn, but for the most part smoked in silence during her performances, and said “Thank you, mignonne,” without comment.

  Stephanie looked at the music pages from time to time, and said admiringly:

  “It looks terribly hard. You must be very musical indeed, Zella, to play such difficult things.”

  Zella, who had sometimes felt an unacknowledged doubt as to her being really so very musical, gradually became convinced that Tante Stephanie must be right.

  She played more furiously than ever.

  As the spring turned into summer and the evenings grew longer, Zella found much enjoyment in opening the window at twilight, rejecting any offer of lamp or candles, and straying into minor fragments of Bach or the first half-dozen bars of the “Moonlight Sonata.” It gave her peace of mind.

  “This room does seem to me airless. What can we do, Tante Stephanie?”

  “I can open this one wider, perhaps,” placidly replied Mdlle de Kervoyou.

  “What about the door?” cried Zella brightly, “could you feel that too much?”

  “No, dear, not at all.”

  Zella set it open, casting a quick side-glance at her it as she did so. Stephanie was counting the stitches a tiny sock, but Zella, who generally missed her effects in sheer nervous anxiety to secure them, felt compelled a final touch of over-acting.

  “I hope they won’t hear the piano from the dining room, with the door open,” she said, laughing nervously.

  “I never thought of that.” Upon which even the guileless Mdlle de Kervoyou suddenly perceived from whence had arisen her niece’s sire for fresh air.

  But she only remarked, after an infinitesimal pause: “Your cousin is fond of music, is he not?” If so, it appeared that James preferred it at a distance, for neither Grieg nor Chopin brought him from the dining-room; and when at last Zella, oddly nervous and disconcerted, rushed with more impetus than discretion into “L’Apres-midi d’un Faune,” Louis and James night have been seen emerging from the French window of the dining-room, and pacing slowly towards the farther end of the terrace.

  Zella did not perceive the two black shadows until they moved deliberately across the bar of light cast through the open window, and a few seconds later she rose from the piano and threw herself into an armchair.

  “Thank you, Zella dear; that was very nice,” said Tante Stephanie amiably.

  “I really think I shall go to bed.”

  “Yes, do, dear, if you are tired.” The tall form of James Lloyd-Evans appeared at the window.

  “Zella, are you game to mark the tennis-court with me to-morrow? It’s high time to begin tennis, don’t you think?”

  “Perhaps it is,” smiled Zella faintly. “Dear what a strain Debussy’s chords are!”

  She stretched her slender fingers wide.

  “Do you still care for music, James?”

  “Oh yes,” answered her cousin vaguely, and frowned at the carpet.

  Zella felt with annoyance that he did not want to discuss the subject with her.

  “Zella plays to us a great deal now,” observed Mdlle de Kervoyou. “She is so fond of music.”


  “Are you?” demanded James abruptly, with effect of rudeness, but rather as one striving to solve a perplexing enigma.

  Upon which Zella replied very seriously, in St. Craye’s favourite catchword of the moment:

  “It means a great deal to me.”

  James still continued to gaze at her with a frown of perplexity that oddly recalled the dogmatic sulky school boy at Boscombe.

  ‘Why do you play?” he demanded suddenly.

  Zella flushed scarlet, was angry with herself for flushing and could find no reply that would not betray her with mortification or fury.

  At last she said feebly, with a feeling that she must either speak or dissolve into scalding tears:

  “Why not? Don’t you play?”

  James’s face cleared abruptly, and Zella, with her odd insight, guessed that he suddenly felt himself to be comforting and reassuring the hurt vanity of an angry mortified child.

  “Good gracious, no! I gave it up when I heard real music. And my fingers aren’t bits of quicksilver like yours, either. I couldn’t tackle all those runs and shakes and things, and I can’t imagine how you do it.”

  It was the small glittering toy held out to pacify the discomfited child.

  “Then, you do not play at all?” murmured Mdlle de Kervoyou, still intent on the nearly completed sock.

  “I only play tennis,” laughed James. “Will you have a single to-morrow, Zella?”

  For the rest of her cousin’s short visit, Zella was the bright, fresh, outdoor maiden of English fiction, and discovered half a dozen charming new poses in which to view herself, garbed in a short white skirt and cotton blouse and swinging a tennis racquet.

  XXV

  In the course of that summer Mrs. Lloyd-Evans, thankfully relinquishing possession of the London flat which had served its purpose so well as regarded Muriel, decided that neither Providence nor her brother-in-law were exerting themselves sufficiently on Zella’s behalf.

  To think, with Mrs. Lloyd-Evans, was to act.

  “Henry,” she said, “I have a good mind to spend a couple of nights at Villetswood on our way home.”

  “It isn’t on our way, dear.”

  “You need not pick my words to pieces in that carping manner, Henry dear. I do not say that Devonshire is on the direct line between London and Boscombe; but one cannot say a duty is ever out of one’s way, after all, and it does seem to me a most clear duty to see that’ poor little Zella is given a chance.”

  “A chance of what?”

  “Why insist on putting things into words, Henry? Surely you know the kind of thing I mean: whom does she ever meet at Villetswood, where there is not another house within miles? You may tell me Louis brings her to spend a week in London every now and then; but mark my words, Henry, a week here and there does not make things happen.”

  “I suppose not,” said Henry doubtfully.

  “What is Villetswood for, I should like to know,” demanded his wife with increasing warmth, “if not to have people staying there, now that the child is growing up? I feel bound to speak to Louis about it sooner or later, and you know, Henry, what I always say is, Never put off till to-morrow what you can do to-day.”

  Henry made no reply to this electrifying axiom, and Mrs. Lloyd-Evans said with gentle reproachfulness:

  “You are not very sympathetic, darling, but Zella has always looked upon me as a second mother, as you know, and I cannot fail her now, just at the most crucial moment in a girl’s life. If necessary, I will offer to go and act hostess myself at Villetswood, so that Louis can have a nice amusing little house-party there for Zella’s birthday.”

  “It is very good of you, my dear, but you know how much you dislike entertaining, and, after all, there is that sister of his always there.”

  “My dear Henry! what are you thinking of? A Frenchwoman is not at all the sort of person whom one could have as hostess at a house-party for young people. You know how very lax foreign ideas always are, and one has heard some very strange stories indeed.”

  “Not of that old sheep, Marianne!”

  Mrs. Lloyd-Evans smiled with a mixture of reproof and tolerance — reproof at Henry’s unseemly analogy, and tolerance since it was only applied to a foreigner.

  “No, dear, not that I know of,” she said darkly, with a veiled intimation that there might be much of which she did not, and had better not, know. “But you can see for yourself how unsuitable it would be, apart from the fact that the poor thing would probably be quite bewildered by a large party, since she cannot have seen anything of the sort in that tiny Paris flat — their drawing-room not more than half the size of this room, and most of it taken up with that huge embroidery frame of hers. It would be quite out of the question; and as to my disliking having to entertain, which I certainly do, that is not to be weighed in the balance for a moment, Henry, when it is a clear question of right and wrong, as you agree with me that this is.”

  “Well, my dear, it is very good of you,” said Henry sincerely, Mrs. Lloyd-Evans’s eloquence having by this time succeeded in persuading them both that she was the victim of an unescapable duty.

  Louis did not view the matter in the same light, when his sister-in-law, led, as she piously supposed, by the hand of Providence, unexpectedly encountered him that very afternoon in Piccadilly, and was enabled to cause the divergence of a considerable stream of pedestrians by earnestly expounding her views to him then and there.

  “It is most remarkable, Louis, that you and I, of all people, should meet here and now. I can hardly believe it, though really what I always say is, that London is not such a very large place, after all, since one is constantly running up against someone.”

  “I am afraid several people are running up against us now, Marianne. Which way are you going?”

  “I am going through the Park, because at any rate there are trees of a sort there, and it always makes one think of the country, though the poor things are black instead of green, and have no leaves to speak of. But I dare say you know what I mean.”

  Louis did.

  “But it really is the most curious coincidence possible,” pursued his sister-in-law, her active mind again springing to this remarkable aspect of the case. “Will you believe it, Louis, it was only this morning that Henry and I were talking of you, and wishing we could discuss these new plans with you!”

  “That was very kind of you. But what new plans, unless you mean my being in London to-day, which was quite unexpected?”

  “No, Louis, certainly not. I never ask questions, as you know, and I should not dream of even wondering what on earth can have brought you all the way to London in this mysterious manner, without even letting us know you were coming, and asking us for lunch at the flat, which you could so easily have done.”

  “As a matter of fact, I thought you were leaving the flat for good this week.”

  “So we are, Louis,” said Mrs. Lloyd-Evans with great rapidity; “but as this is only Tuesday, that leaves four whole days, even if you don’t count Sunday, and we are not going home till Saturday afternoon, so that is no argument. But, as I say, one knows that gentlemen frequently have little matters of business about which one knows nothing, and I have not the least wish to pry or seem inquisitive. But all this is beside the point. Tell me about this question of dear little Zella.”

  “Zella is very well. She has been riding her new mare, which she enjoys.”

  “Louis, this is all very well,” said Mrs. Lloyd-Evans with great earnestness, and once more stopping short in the middle of the way. “But what will riding a new mare lead to, I should like to know, with a girl of Zella’s age, and no mother to see to these things?”

  “Do you mean you think it is too much for her?” asked the astounded Louis.

  “On the contrary, I mean that it is not enough — in fact, it is of no use at all. Zella ought to meet other young people, make friends of her own age, and, in fact, see a little of the world. You would like to see her settled, after all, Louis.”
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  Mrs. Lloyd-Evans belonged to the class of women to whom “settled” is synonymous with “married.”

  Louis became conscious of this, and temporized feebly.

  “I see what you mean.”

  “One knows that a happy marriage means everything to a girl, once she has really found her mate; and in Zella’s case that ought to be done easily,” said Mrs. Lloyd-Evans with a kind smile, and evidently under the impression that she was saying something complimentary.

  “I disagree with you there. The higher the type, mentally and morally, the more restricted selection becomes, and in Zella’s case the question of cosmopolitanism complicates matters. There is small chance of affinity between the complex Anglo-Gallic organism”

  “My dear Louis!” interrupted his sister-in-law in a tone which admirably expressed her firmly unuttered “do not talk nonsense.”

  “Zella has been given a pretty face, and, what I always think is so much more important, is a good, nicely brought-up girl, and any man ought to be pleased and proud to win her. Besides which, it is nonsense to deny that money does smooth the way in many cases, and Zella’s fortune”

  “Zella has nothing but what I choose to give her,” said Louis coolly.

  “Of course not, at present. The heir, so long as he is a child, differeth in nothing from a servant, as I always say,” said Mrs. Lloyd-Evans hastily, and in her agitation attributing the Apostle’s wisdom to herself.

  “But you are not going to pretend, Louis, to me, dear Esmee’s only sister, and whom you know so well, that Zella will not inherit Villetswood — at some far, far distant date, of course,” she added, apparently with a sense that an emphasis on the remoteness of the date might serve to secure Zella’s inheritance.

  But Louis continued to remain unaccountably cryptic.

  “Zella is, of course, my natural heiress, but Villetswood is entirely in my own hands, and I might sell it to-morrow. When she marries, or if she marries, a suitable provision will be made for her; but she is not to be looked upon as heiress to a property or anything else.”

  “Louis, you stagger me! said Mrs. Lloyd-Evans, walking faster than ever. “For once I really do not understand you, and you sound to me most callous and unnatural. Not that I want to hurt your feelings or to seem unkind.”