The House of Defence v. 1

by E. F. Benson

  CHAPTER IV.

  It was mid-June, but no Londoner of any intelligence could possibly haveguessed it, because, instead of the temperature being absolutely Arctic,it was extremely warm--a condition of things which in England we are notaccustomed to associate with the midsummer months. Middlesex, we mustsuppose, had somehow come into conjunction with the Dog-star, who hadbent his beneficent rays onto the county, and given birth to a wholeweek-long litter of delicious dog-days. It was really hot; there wasreally a sun, a big, blazing, golden sun, instead of the lemon-colouredplate which in general shines so very feebly and remotely through thefog and dark mists of Thames-side, and this was not only delightful initself, but it actually made the shade a delightful thing to get into.The tops of omnibuses were thick with folk, and the Londoner of even theparks and palaces left the black silk tube, with which he is accustomedto roast and destroy his few remaining hairs, at home, and wore a strawhat instead, even when he went out, as he usually did, to lunch--anddidn't care. Indeed, there was no reason why he should, since only theobviously insane wore top-hats in such weather, and insanity was surelya more serious defect to have on the head than straw. A thin blue hazehung over distances. Piccadilly, a hundred yards away, had a bloom uponit like the dust on a ripe plum, and horses (those intelligent animals)had followed the lead of their masters, and wore straw hats too, withrims coquettishly raised at the sides to allow plenty of ear-play.Sarsaparilla was on tap out of large yellow barrels, and theirresponsible happiness which only fine weather or a consciousness ofvirtue so pronounced as to be priggish can give, flooded the town likethe sunshine itself. It may still be a question whether it is happinessthat makes people good, or virtue that makes people happy, but there canbe no doubt at all that beautiful weather makes us all somewhat kinderand more charitably disposed than we are wont to be in March, and alsoimmensely happy, so that the Zadkiel of spiritual almanacs will probablybe right in prophesying the coincidence of the millennium with realmidsummer weather.

  * * * * *

  The haze of heat which made a plum of Piccadilly, which the progressiveLondon County Council, after their affectionate visit to the broadboulevards of Paris, had, at enormous expense, widened by at least sixinches, dealt still more magically, having more suitable material towork upon, with the Green Park, as seen from the windows of ThursoHouse, and with Thurso House as seen from the Green Park. For it was agreat square Italian palace, which looked as if it had been takenstraight from the Grand Canal at Venice, and its stately white walls ofPortland stone, with its long rows of tall windows, wore an air ofextraordinary distinction among its squat or gawky neighbours. Theentrance to it, faced by a deep covered porch, supported onRoman-Corinthian pillars, was in Arlington Street, while towards thePark it was faced by a broad stone terrace, from which two curvedstaircases went down into the small formal Italian garden, screened fromthe Park itself by a hedge of tall lilacs. Thus, though it stood in thevery centre of the beating heart of London, it was admirably quiet, andthe bustle and hum of the streets came muffled to it, not causingdisturbance and distraction, but rather stimulating to activity by itspersistent though gentle reminder that the world was very busy indeed.

  The dining-room was at the back of the house, and opened onto the broadterrace that ran the whole length of the building, and to-day the row ofits eight huge windows was thrown wide, so that the lace curtains thatprevented the Park lounger from looking in, but allowed the diner tolook out, swayed and bulged and were withdrawn in the hot summer breezethat came like breaking waves against them, while the bourdon note ofthe busy town came in like the hum of great bees burrowing into goldenflowers. Listening, you could divide the noise up into its componentparts. The sound of human voices was there, and the tread of feet, theclip-clop of single horses, the tattoo of the hoofs of pairs, and thethrob and rattle of machine-driven vehicles; but the ear receiving itwithout poised attention knew only that many busy lives were active, andmany wheels rolling.

  The room itself was parquetted with oak and walnut, and the floor, asbefitted the heat and the season, was left bare, except for somehalf-dozen of silk Persian rugs that made shimmering islands on the seaof its shining surface. The wall which faced the Park was, indeed,rather window than wall, and was unadorned but for the brocaded curtainswhich were looped back from the windows; but the other three wallsglowed with the presentments of bygone Raynhams. The first Lord Thursowas there, and his son, the first Earl, a portrait in peer's robes byReynolds, who had also painted the superb picture of his wife, and thegreat family group of them, with their two sons and a daughter, whichhung over the Italian chimney-piece. The second Earl was there, too, theeldest boy in the family group, grown to man's estate, and painted byGainsborough. The picture of his wife was a Romney, with the redjewelled shadows of that master, while Lawrence was the artist for thenext generation. Then, after a gap, bridged over in part by the elderRichmond, came the present Thurso and his wife, two brilliant andstartling canvases, claiming kinship by right of their exquisite artwith the earlier masters.

  In other respects--for nothing could spoil these glorious decorations orthe more smouldering brilliance of the painted ceiling--the room did notat this moment appear at the level of its best possibilities, for thefloor was "star-scattered" with a multitude of small round tables inpreparation for the supper of the ball that was to take place thatnight; while at the end, in front of the chimney-piece, was a long,narrow table, laid on one side only, for the very elect. Thoughnumerous, they were to be very elect indeed, and whole constellations ofstars and yards of garters would not find a place there to-night, butshine at the small round tables. In any case, however, so CatherineThurso had arranged, everybody was going to have proper things to eatand drink, which should be presented to her guests' notice in decentfashion. There was to be no buffet-supper for the mere rank and file,where, as at the refreshment-room of a railway-station, her friendswould scramble for sandwiches and pale yellow drinks, with mint andanise and cummin floating about in them, among footmen who jogged theirelbows with plates of strawberries, while the elect, Olympian-wise,refreshed themselves behind closed doors. To-night, in fact, ThursoHouse was to be reopened with a due regard for its stateliness and thehuge hospitality that it ought to exercise after a period of ten leanyears, so to speak, in which the late lord had lived alone here, withhalf the rooms closed, a secret and eccentric life. He had not even beenwicked and held infamous revel, which would have been picturesque andfull of colour; but he had only been morose, and shut himself up;miserly, and had not entertained anybody; gouty, and devoted to port. Hehad died just a year ago, and to-night the house was going to belaunched again, after its period of dry-dock. Lady Thurso would almosthave liked to rechristen it too. It was associated in her mind and inthe mind of everybody else with such a very disagreeable old gentleman.

  * * * * *

  Lady Thurso, during these ten lean years, in which she and her husbandhad "pigged it," as she expressed it, in a poky little house inGrosvenor Square, owing to the tightness of the purse-strings, had laidvery solid foundations for the position she meant to occupy when sheshould be installed here. She fully intended to be magnificent, and tofill the place of mistress of this house in a manner worthy of it. Butno one had a greater contempt than she for the modern hostess, who makesuse of her time and money and position only to give enormouscaravanserai entertainments, and to spend the rest of her days in goingto similar functions provided by her friends. Such methods were futile:they never led to anything worth doing, while those who thought that bylavish entertainment they could get, socially speaking, anywhere thatwas worth getting to, made an even greater error. She had seen duringthese last ten years the incessant invasion of London by those whosesole invasive power was money and the willingness to spend it to anyextent in order to be considered what is called "smart." And sheentirely disagreed with those ignorant and old-fashioned moralists whoshook their heads and lifted up their voices in lamentatio
ns over thecapitulation of London to the almighty dollar. London--all London thatwas worth anything, that is to say--had not, with all due deference tothe loud crowings from Farm Street, capitulated in the very least to thealmighty dollar, and those--there were many of them--who imagined thatthey were making a great splash in the world, and were becoming ofsocial importance, merely because they were rich and willing to spendtheir money on bands and prima-donnas and ortolans, made a mistakealmost pathetic in its ineptitude. Such folk never got anywhere really.They never became _intime_ with the society they coveted, however manyweird parties they gave, where one met the latest African explorer, orlooked at magic-lantern slides of the bacillus of cholera, or turned outall the lights and observed the antics of radium, or listened (this wasrather popular this year, for everybody was bent on improving his mind)to short lectures on the ideals of England or the remoteness of thestars. The poor dears thought they were laying the foundation of whatthey considered "smartness," whereas they were only turning their housesinto free restaurants, where the world, with the merest commonsense,went to be fed, if it had nothing better to do. There were, of course,others who had some further capacity than that of mere spending--peoplewho were witty, agreeable, and with the power to charm. Certainly, theirwealth helped such of them as desired, for some inexplicable reason, tohave the details of their parties in the _Morning Post_; but it was nottheir wealth that gave them success, but their wit. As if anybody ofsense cared whether the latest sensation of the music-halls came and didconjuring tricks or not, or whether they ate cold beef or picked andpecked through a two-hour dinner! What made going out to dinner pleasantwas the intercourse with pleasant people, not the screeching of anoperatic tenor or performing dogs. Of course, many people would goanywhere in order to be fed, if the food was decent; but then they"wiped their mouths and went their journey," leaving the poorself-deceived hostess to think that she was going hand over hand up thesocial ladder.

  Catherine Thurso, being half American by birth, was a compatriot of manyof these, and her short, perfectly modelled nose went instinctively intothe air when she thought of them. In London, she was sure, you could notbecome of any importance merely by spending money, though many peoplethought you could, and, indeed, thought they had. In New York, it istrue, such a thing was not only possible, but easy, for there, so itseemed to her, the standard of social success was the preposterouscharacter of your extravagance. But those who thought that the samerecipe was good in London were wanting in the sense of moral geography.Wealth in London brought to your house shoals of the Hon. Mrs.Not-quite-in-it, second-rate pianists, and the crowd of everybody elsewho wanted to get on. Or if you flew a little higher in the way ofintelligence, you could get harmless little connoisseurs who were fullof second-rate information about the world in general and their ownbranch of art, who picked up mouldy Correggios and doubtfulStradivariuses. The cream of the second-rate could be skimmed by thewealthy, but unless they were something more, they got no higher thanthat. Your wealth could give you that and publicity, and the fatal errorthese pathetic climbers fell into lay in thinking that publicity meantcelebrity, and that the fact that you had "been seen in the Park,looking charming," meant anything at all. Her "ten lean years" hadcertainly not been spent in these futile strivings.

  At this moment she was sitting with Jim Raynham, her husband's youngerbrother, and Ruby Majendie--who, she hoped, would soon persuade Jim tomarry her, for the sake of the happiness of them both--having lunch atone of those little round tables in the dining-room, in order to directthe decoration of the room for the supper this evening. Time, as usual,was precious with her to-day, and the minutes in which it was necessaryto sit at a table and eat could thus be used. She had just given ordersthat all the hydrangeas, pale pink and pale blue, of which a perfectcopse had been made at the far end of the room, should be taken awayagain, for really the Italian fireplace was much more decorative.

  "Besides, hydrangeas always remind me of Mr. James Turner," she said inparenthesis.

  "And who is he?" asked Jim.

  "He isn't he--he's it. It's a little art gentleman, plump, like abullfinch, with a little grey moustache. You must know him, because,when one lunches or dines out, he is invariably there, and he isinvariably the one person whom one can't remember. Hydrangeas remind meof him, because he looks as if he had been grown in a pot in amoderately warm greenhouse. He is like a hydrangea beginning to getstout, just as those dreadful shrubs are. He always opens conversationby saying that I cut him the other day in Bond Street. I explain that Ididn't see him, which is quite true. I never can see him."

  The florist had removed all the hydrangeas except a small group thatscreened the centre of the grate. These were the "choicest," and hewaited for further orders.

  "No, take them all away," called out Lady Thurso. "All, every one. Isn'tit so, Ruby?"

  Ruby put her head on one side and looked.

  "Yes, quite right," she said. "I wish you wouldn't always be right.Nobody else would have thought of having nothing there."

  "Because people don't see the value of empty places," said she. "Theywant to fill everything up--the walls, the fireplaces, the hours,everything. Oh, think of the unemployed! How nice it sounds! One worksand subscribes and does all kinds of things for them, but if only theywould be as kind, and work for the employed, so that they might beunemployed! Fancy having time to do nothing at all! That is thecondition which I envy, though, of course, if it were offered me, likeso many things I envy, I would not accept it, because it would meanparting with my individuality. But I would really give any sum to beable to buy a couple of hours this afternoon."

  "What for?"

  "Why, to be unemployed. I want to sit in a chair and doze if I like. No,I think that would be waste; but for two hours to feel that I hadnothing whatever to do. Who was it--Queen Elizabeth, I think--who saidshe wanted to be a milkmaid? Don't you understand? I understand thatenormously. I would even be a hydrangea, and stand in a pot, or be Mr.James Turner in his curator's room, with nothing to do until it isclosing time. Instead, I am supposed to belong to the leisured classes,and never have a moment. No ferns, either," she called to theflorist--"nothing at all."

  A footman was markedly waiting at her elbow to get in a word edgeways.

  "The carriage is round, my lady," he said.

  Lady Thurso hastily finished an egg in aspic, with which she had begunlunch.

  "For me?" she said.

  "Yes, my lady. It was ordered for a quarter-past two."

  Lady Thurso pressed her fingers against her eyelids for a moment.

  "I can't remember," she said. "Go to my room quickly, and bring me alarge blue engagement-book--the one with 'Where am I?' written on it.And bring me anything--cold mutton or bread and cheese."

  She turned to Ruby.

  "And I am so hungry!" she cried. "And it is exceedingly likely I shallhave to fly off without any lunch. Oh, if I were only unemployed for twohours, I should spend one in eating! Besides, I had no breakfast, and isone egg in aspic sufficient for an active female until tea-time?"

  Ruby laughed.

  "It wouldn't be for this one," she said. "But why no breakfast? Is thata new plan?"

  "New? No; it's as old as the hills, for that delightful old Professor,the one like a pink bear at the British Museum, told me the otherday----"

  "Is he a hydrangea, too?" asked Jim.

  "Not at all. When one goes out to lunch, he is the one person in theroom whom everybody knows. Don't interrupt. He told me that the ancientEgyptians never had any breakfast, because the word for breakfast is thesame as afternoon, or something of the sort--and think how marvellousthey were! I've been an ancient Egyptian for nearly a fortnight."

  "But they never had motor-cars," said Jim. "It may have been that."

  "Oh, how flippant! How could we ever get anywhere without them,considering how frequently we don't, even with them? Ah, now for thebook!"

  Catherine turned hurriedly over the pages of "Where am I?" and foundwhere she wa
s. She breathed a sigh of relief as she closed it again.

  "Thank Heaven!" she said, "because otherwise I really shouldn't havetasted food since yesterday until tea-time. Send the carriage back,please. It's only the bazaar at St. Ursula's, and I told them I almostcertainly couldn't go. Besides, the Princess is opening it, so Ineedn't. I should only have to stand up and curtsey, and agree that theday is vile."

  "It isn't," said Jim.

  "I know; but one can't argue. Oh, the carriage must come back in twentyminutes," she added to the footman.

  Jim helped himself largely to the next course.

  "Catherine, that is the first time you have ever disappointed me," hesaid. "I thought you would always rather go somewhere and do somethingthan sit down and be comfortable. I thought you never even wanted to beunemployed."

  "I don't really," said she. "I only think I do."

  "But, anyhow, you prefer to have lunch than go to St Ursula's."

  "Ah, you don't understand! I have got to be at the Industrial Sale atthree, in order to open it myself, and I literally haven't enoughminutes to get down to St Ursula's, and stand and grin, and get back toPortland Place by three. It couldn't happen. My anxiety was that thequarter-past two engagement might leave me time, if I had no lunch, toget to Portland Place at three. It won't. Hurrah!"

  Lady Thurso poured herself out a glass of very hot water from ablanketed jug that stood at her elbow, and drank it in rapid sips. Shenever took alcohol in any form, except on those rare occasions when shewas really dead beat, and had to do something energetic the next moment.But since every fad appealed to her, she, Athenian-wise, in her desirefor some new thing, tried them all. She had just abandoned, in fact, theplan of drinking nothing whatever at meals, but sipping distilled waterat eleven in the morning and half-past three in the afternoon. It seemedto suit her quite well, but as she was, and had always been, in perfecthealth already, there was nothing particular to be gained by it, whereasfor other reasons the _regime_ was inconvenient, since at those hourswhen she ought to be sipping distilled water she was usually very busy,and either forgot, or, as at a bazaar, was so placed that distilledwater was practically unattainable. So, just for the moment, she drankhot water at meals, and found it suited her as well as everything else.

  "Good gracious, what nonsense people talk," she said, "when they speakof the idle and luxurious upper classes! Look at us all. From the Kingdownwards, we are worked to death for the sake of the classes who revileus. I stopped in the Park the other day to listen to one of thoseunwashed orators of the Marble Arch. He read out from a grimy newspaperthat the King had been shooting somewhere, and was to return next day'in a motor-car,' said the speaker, with unspeakable irony, and therewere groans. Oh, how I longed to speak, too--but I hadn't time--andremind them that he did a far longer day's work than any two of them puttogether, and would come up in a motor-car because otherwise he couldn'topen the new wing of the Ophthalmic Hospital next morning. But that isjust the weak point about Socialism. I am a Socialist until I hear themtalk. Good gracious, how I should welcome an Eight-Hours Bill! It wouldbe a holiday! Eight hours! Lazy brutes!"

  Lady Thurso paused for a moment to eat the slice of cold mutton whichshe had ordered. Having been a disciple of Dr. Haig for several monthsin the past year, she had veered round, and now ate hardly anything butmeat and pulses. She felt magnificently well.

  "Not long ago, too, I saw an article in some Socialistic paper," shesaid, "which struck me as exceedingly forcible, and I wrote to theauthor, asking him to come and see me at ten one morning, and bookedthe engagement when I heard from him. I was interested in what he said;I wanted to know what he went on. He came on the morning in question,but at half-past ten, and what was the reason, do you think? Because hehad only just got up! He told me so himself. But I was anxious to do himjustice, and said I supposed he had gone to bed very late the nightbefore. Not at all; he had been in bed by twelve. And there was I, whohad not gone to bed till four, expecting and waiting for this bedriddencreature! And he had written about the indolence of me! Ah, that week Ihad felt strong Socialistic leanings, but he cured me at once. Thursowas so funny, too. He shuffled--you know Thurso's shuffle ofdisapproval--when I told him about it. Why shouldn't I have seen theman? I was interested, until I saw him, anyhow."

  Jim considered this. He was not a person of action, but liked inquiringinto motive. It was this that made Catherine almost despair of gettinghim to marry Ruby; he could easily spend so many years in theoreticalstudy of the advantages and drawbacks of matrimony.

  "Is that sufficient?" he asked. "May one do anything that one findsinteresting?"

  "Certainly, if it doesn't injure anybody. The first rule of life is togive other people a good time if you can; the second is not to hurt themunder any pretext; and the third to enjoy yourself in every other way.That is why I adore what Thurso calls "quackery" of all kinds. I lovediscovering the secret of life which solves everything for about tenminutes. I have--what did the pink bear say?--oh yes: the mostinsatiable appetite for novelties. Wasn't it darling of him? It keepsone busy, and that, after all, is the true elixir of life. I should bemiserable if I hadn't got more to do than I can possibly manage."

  "But just now you said you would give anything for a couple ofunemployed hours this afternoon," said Ruby.

  "I know, because the flesh was weak, and I was very hungry anddog-tired. I feel better now--nearly ready to begin again."

  Ruby turned her pale Botticelli face towards her.

  "How you can go on, I don't know," she said. "You play all the time weplay, and work all the time we rest. You make me feel lazy too, which Iresent."

  "Darling, I will make you feel industrious this afternoon," saidCatherine, "because I want you and Jim to stop here, and criticise andalter and direct till the ballroom and this room and the staircase areall absolutely perfect. You know what I want done: I want you to seethat it is done. Don't judge by daylight only. Have the blinds andcurtains drawn, and see that it looks right by electric light. I shallnot be able to get home till just before dinner, and then it will betoo late. English decorators are hopeless; they know as much aboutdecoration as I know about the lunar theory. I wonder they haven't sentsome plush monkeys climbing up into spiders' webs to hang in thewindows."

  "They sent hundreds of yellow calceolarias," said Ruby, "which is aboutas bad. I sent them all back. And poor Mr. Hopkinson didn't seem to knowwhat wild-flowers were, when I told him you wanted wild-flowers all upthe staircase."

  "He knows now," remarked Lady Thurso.

  * * * * *

  It was probable that poor Mr. Hopkinson did "know now," for ever sincemorning tall flowering grasses, meadow-sweet, cornflowers, cistus,ox-eye daisies, tendrils of wild-rose, clumps of buttercups, and all themyriad herbage of rural June, had been poured into the house, and thestaircase, with great boughs of hawthorn and rose overhanging thelowlier growths, was like an apotheosised lane lying between ribands ofshaded hayfield. Lady Thurso, inheriting the American love of doingsomething which has never been done before, a thing which leads tofailure in a dozen cases, and hits the bull's-eye on the luckythirteenth, had never been better inspired, and the staircase, a ratherheavy and not very admirable feature in the house, had been gloriouslytransformed by the lightness and spring of this feathery decoration. Butpoor Mr. Hopkinson's ignorance of what wild-flowers were had been cappedby his ignorance of how wild-flowers grew, and the original order todecorate the stairs with only wild-flowers had led to his placing thepoor dears in neat and orderly rows, as in a riband bed. Consequently,he and his assistant florists had, about twelve-thirty that morning, todemolish and begin all over again, having first, under Lady Thurso'ssupervision, "made a salad" of all these fragrant hampers of flowers andgrasses, and then stuck them "properly"--that is to say, absolutely atrandom--into the trays of moist clay and troughs of water that linedeach side of the staircase, which would keep them alive and bright-eyedtill morning.

  There was still five m
inutes before the carriage came, and Lady Thurso,"while the bread was yet in her mouth," hurried out to see if Mr.Hopkinson had at length grasped the nature of her scheme. It appearedthat he had. The staircase was a country lane, just as she hadvisualised it. And, somehow, with the adaptability that was as naturalto her as is the sympathetic change of colour in a chameleon, as shestood below a clump of flowering hawthorn, she looked, for all her airof the world and patrician aspect, like some exquisite milkmaid, theembodiment of Queen Elizabeth's ideal. But the milkmaid had the criticaleye, and she looked very slowly and carefully up and down this vista ofthe hayfields.

  She examined and re-examined.

  "More buttercups in that corner," she said--"all in a clump likesunlight--and another big bough of hawthorn--two boughs. Not twigs likethat, just buttonholes, but boughs."

  She waited, sitting on the top step with Ruby, till this was done; theneagerly, but carefully, she looked at it again with her eyes half shut.

  "I _think_ it will do," she said, "but please have all the curtainsdrawn, dear Ruby, and look at it by electric light. I'm not sure thereis enough yellow even yet. I hope it won't give Thurso hay-fever, for heand I will be planted here till the royal quadrille begins. He and Maudget here this afternoon."

  "And the typhoid?" asked Ruby.

  "For the last week there has been no further case," she said, "andeverybody is getting better. No deaths for the last week, either. Itlooks as if it is all over. I was quite wrong, it seems, about the needof Thurso's going there. It seems that he was of the utmost use inmaking the people obey doctors' orders. I had not thought of that; itwas stupid of me."

  This was completely characteristic of her. If she were wrong, she ownedup at once. It spared one the degradation of arguing against one'sconvictions.

  "But I hope he will stop in town for the rest of the season," she wenton. "People already think it is odd of him to be in Scotland now; andthough it matters very little what people think, it is much better thatthey should not think at all."

  "And Maud?" asked Ruby.

  "It is from her I had all this news, though I have beenwriting--type-writing, I should say--to Thurso. Maud was interesting.She told me about a Mr. Cochrane, to whom Thurso let the fishing. He isa Christian Scientist, which sounds silly, but Maud says she saw himcure a bad case. She writes quite gravely, too, as if she reallybelieved it, and she is not fanciful. I think I shall study ChristianScience next August."

  "Why August?"

  "Because I sha'n't have any time in July. Oh yes, and Maud did not knowthat the fishing was let--so like Thurso not to tell her--and was caughtby Mr. Cochrane poaching in his river. He wasn't annoyed, it appears,though it certainly ought to have been annoying. Do you think I shallnever be annoyed any more if I study Christian Science all August?"

  "Oh, conceal your want of annoyance, then," said Ruby, "and in any casedon't get the Christian Science smile. It wouldn't suit you, and it isparticularly fatiguing for others. Alice Yardly has it. That is why Ican't look at her any more."

  Lady Thurso was still not quite satisfied with her staircase, or, at anyrate, she wanted to be sure that she was.

  "Still more buttercups," she proclaimed. "A hundred--two hands full ofthem."

  Then she detached herself again completely, and turned to Ruby.

  "Oh, you must be just, Ruby," she said. "Alice was always fatiguing,whether she smiled or not, and she is not really more fatiguing now thanshe used to be. Maud loves her, and so do I, and we both yawn our headsoff when she is with us. It is true that she now seems to smile with apurpose, but if we didn't know she was a Christian what's-his-name, weshouldn't notice the change. Her plan is to be helpful now, but she isjust as helpless as ever, so it doesn't matter. Of course, nobody canreally help anybody else. We all have to help ourselves."

  "Then, why do you spend your life----" began Ruby.

  "In bazaars and industries, you mean. I hardly know. I daresay you thinkit is insincere--that I ought to sell the diamond palisade and the rubyplaster, or induce Thurso to do so. But I am sincere. I want to live agorgeous life, and I will. At the same time, I am delighted to workwhile you rest, as you said, if my work will make some poor wretches inCaithness a little less uncomfortable. If I didn't, I should lie awakeat night, thinking about them. That would be uncomfortable for me, too,so you are quite at liberty to suppose that it is all selfishness--refinedselfishness, if you like, which is the worst sort. Certainly, if Iwasn't a very hard-working woman, which I am, I should have bad dreamsby day, as well as no sleep at night."

  Again she paused.

  "And I've been talking about myself," she said, "which you will allow isunusual. And the carriage is here, and I must go. Ruby, you see the ideaof the corner, don't you? It must be sunlight--sunlight of buttercups,bless them! Oh, to be a milkmaid, now that June is here! But otherwisedon't let them touch the staircase any more. It is so nearly what Imeant it to be that it is safer not to run any risks. It is darling ofyou to stop and superintend these stupid people. And please, if theybring any gardenia or tuberose, make them take it away, like thecalceolarias. Gardenias are so 'powerful.' What a heavenly expression! Iam sure it was invented at Clapham. The same people say 'carriage sweep'and 'soiled handkerchiefs.' I hate the middle classes!"

  * * * * *

  Lady Thurso would probably have been much surprised if she had been toldthat she was a genius, because she had a dim idea that, in order to be,or, rather, have been, a genius, it was necessary to live a sordid andunsuccessful life, and to die prematurely and unnoticed in a garret. Butif the stock definition of genius was at all correct, she had a veryreasonable claim to the title, for her power of taking pains bordered onthe infinite. It made no matter to her on what she was engaged.Whatever she did, she approached her task with the transcendent aim forperfection, and whether it was the decoration of her staircase, or thespeech that she had to make at the Industrial Sale, she bestowed on itthe utmost effort of which she was capable. Another gift crowned this,which, though almost as rare, is not less remunerative; for when herutmost pains had been bestowed, she could dismiss the subject from hermind, and not worry about it any more. Thus now, the moment she had lefther door, the staircase decoration ceased to exist for her. She had doneher best, and her connection with it was severed. The speech, too, thatshe would have to make in a quarter of an hour was non-existent also,since this morning she had thought it over till she knew no more tothink, had written it down, and had said it aloud to herself until shewas perfectly satisfied that she knew what she wanted to say, and couldsay it.

  This being so, she abandoned herself to the joy of looking about her--afascinating pursuit, if one looks with intelligence. It was she, infact, who was the author of a word that had gone round London--namely,that by driving for an hour at the right time and through the rightstreets you could, without exchanging a word with anybody, know all thatthe morning papers had contained of importance, and predict all thatwould be in the evening sheets. In the course of such a drive you couldsee the leader of what had been the Opposition and was now theGovernment stepping into a hansom, with a face elate but anxious, at hisdoor in Grosvenor Square. The hansom argued a sudden emergency. Therewas no luggage, and the probable goal was Buckingham Palace. Who, then,was the new Prime Minister? Again, in Chesham Place you could see theRussian Ambassador getting into his motor, with luggage piled on thetop. Clearly, then, he was going out of town, and an amelioration inRussian affairs might reasonably be argued, since it was impossiblethat he should leave if the crisis were as critical as it had beenyesterday. Or, again, the blinds were down where A was very ill, theblinds were still up where B was yesterday supposed to be critically illafter an operation. Therefore, A had thought worse of it, and died; Bhad thought better of it, and still lived. Then there was a block atHyde Park Corner, and the royal liveries flashed by. The new PrimeMinister would only just get to Buckingham Palace first.

  But much as she observed, it was probable that, as far as
observationwent, she was more the victim than the priest, for in all the littleLondon world which is called the great there was no one at this momentquite so important as she. She "mattered"--a thing of rare occurrence inso republican a place--and she mattered publicly, openly, superbly. Inthe ever-shifting kaleidoscope of London life, in which nothing, neitherbeauty nor blood nor wit, nor any pre-eminence, carries with it anycertain distinction, she was just now the centre of the whole astoundingmixture of sordidness and brilliance, of intelligence and stupidity.To-morrow or next year, as she knew quite well, it might be a music-hallartist, or a foreign king, or a twopenny philosopher, or an infantprince, or somebody who played tunes on his front teeth, who wouldabsorb general attention, but just now it was she. She rated "generalattention" at about its proper value, knowing quite well that theaffection of one friend was worth all the general attention of acentury; but she found that it was, as she expressed it, "rather fun."

  The movements and conjunction of these stars and planets of London lifeare far more inscrutable than the vagaries of the simpler constellationsof the heaven, but just at this moment Catherine Thurso was the centralsun round which all else revolved. There were twenty other people whohad wealth, beauty, and charm in no less degree than she, though in thematter of beauty forty-nine Parises out of fifty would have awarded thegolden apple to this Juno among women, and the world, for that reason oranother, had chosen her to be their temporary idol. She was the personwho mattered, and this was her hour. And her hour, no less than her ownenjoyment of it, she used, as Thurso had said, magnificently, for itreally seemed as if charity, no less than social entertainment, wouldcollapse without her support. She made herself a slave to any schemethat helped the helpless, or encouraged the would-be worker to work, andyet all the time she lived, and intended to live, gorgeously. So, likethe driver of a pair of horses, she did not suffer the social horse tobe lazy or shirk its work, for she knew (and acted on the knowledge)that her social distinction brought buyers to her bazaars. She played,therefore, the brilliant woman of the world for all it was worth, inorder to assist deserving objects, though she enjoyed the _role_enormously for its own sake. Both horses, charitable and social, felther indefatigable lash, and she spurred herself on, just as she spurredon all those who surrounded her, inducing activity in them by thespectacle of her own glorious vitality.

  Anyone as radically efficient as Catherine Thurso undoubtedly was has tomarch through life with as few impedimenta as possible, and allemotional baggage which is not likely to be needed must be firmly leftbehind. She had long ago realised this, and had always acted on it, sothat now it was more from force of habit than by any conscious effortthat she eliminated from her mind any emotion on its first appearance ifit was likely to clog or hinder her energies. Worry, sorrow, regret forall that was past or irremediable, she simply threw away as one throwsthe envelopes of opened letters into the wastepaper basket. They were ofno earthly use; they but made an unprofitable litter if they wereallowed to lie about, nor did you want the drawers and compartments inyour brain crammed with rubbish like this. Thus, it was but very seldomthat she let her thoughts dwell on the one great thing that she hadmissed all her life. She had never loved. Her marriage with Thurso had,as the Press most truly announced, "been arranged," and she had fallenin with this arrangement. Even as a girl she had wanted the sort ofposition and opportunity that such a marriage gave her, and she hadmade, certainly outwardly, and to a very considerable extent inwardly,the most splendid success of it. She had done her duty, too, as a wifein giving him three sons, and had filled her place superbly. But lovehad never really come to her. That, by no fault of hers, had apparentlybeen left out of her emotional equipment, and since she was convincedthat this omission was not her fault, and that it was out of her powerto remedy it, she did not worry about it. But to-day, though she did notworry, she could not help wondering about a certain time now long pastin her life, since it was conceivable that certain things which as yetbelonged only to time long past would begin to be factors in her life inthe immediate future. So now that the question of the staircase and thecoming speech at the Industrial Sale were off her mind, these thingsoccupied her somewhat insistently. There was no mystery about it all,and nothing whatever to fear either in the past or the future; butcertain possibilities interested her.

  Count Villars had just arrived in England, having at an extraordinarilyearly age--for he could be scarcely forty yet--been appointed HungarianAmbassador to the Court of St. James; and there were quite a number ofpeople resident in that parish who remembered very distinctly howdesperately he had fallen in love with Catherine Thurso twelve yearsago, when she had first come out, and, as her mother expressed it, taken"the shine" out of the rest of the girls of the year. Then, so the worldstill remembered, rather perplexing events had happened in rapidsuccession. Her engagement to young Villars had been actually supposedto have taken place, but hardly had that become news when it wascontradicted, and Villars, then a junior secretary in the Embassy ofwhich he was now the head, had been transferred elsewhere; while beforethe season was over Catherine Etheridge's engagement to her presenthusband was formally announced, and was followed before the end of theyear by her marriage. For Mrs. Etheridge had always meant that herdaughter should marry Lord Raynham, as he then was; and if anybodythought that her plans were going to be interfered with by any volcanicyoung Austrian, however brilliant and handsome, without a penny of hisown, and removed by half a dozen lives from the succession to the hugeestates of Villars (those lives certainly made a lot of difference), shewould show him his mistake. There were, in fact, many who thought thatMrs. Etheridge's plans were going to be interfered with; but theirmistake had been duly demonstrated to them when Catherine Etheridge sosoon after became Catherine Raynham.

  * * * * *

  Rudolf Villars, in this long interval of twelve years between his abruptdeparture and his return to England, had done everything except marry,and in all that he did Fortune had declared herself to be his parent.His really brilliant gifts had reaped their reward before he was too oldto care about success, relations neither near nor dear had died, and hewas now next in succession to the estates of Villars--with only adecrepit old great-uncle between him and them--and Ambassador to theEnglish Court. To the world at large this situation, which just now wasbeing rather largely discussed, had elements of interest. It was knownthat Catherine Thurso and her husband were not romantically attached toeach other; it was conjectured that, since Rudolf Villars had remainedsingle, he was still romantically attached to her, and it was impossibleto help wondering whether at last she would show signs of being attachedto anybody. To the world she was, in spite of her beauty, her charm, herbrilliance, a somewhat irritating enigma. All the glory of her belongedto nobody. She did not care for her husband, which was a pity, but whatmade it worse was that she did not care for anybody else. And so manymen had been wildly devoted to her, and of them all not one had met witha single particle of success, or, to do her justice, of encouragement,for she had nothing in common with the flirt. She was not in the leastshocked, either, at their protestations. If she had been, her attitudewould, at any rate, have been a moral and an intelligible one. But shemerely laughed at them, and told them not to be absurd. If theypersisted, she yawned. She forgot all about it, too, a week afterwards,even if she had been made to yawn very much, asked them to the house asusual, and was specially friendly.

  * * * * *

  Catherine Thurso, as will have been gathered, did her duty withexemplary fullness in the state of life to which her mother, in themain, had called her. As soon as she married she grasped the idea oflife that her position entailed, if she was to fill it adequately andwith any credit to herself; welcomed the prospect almost with rapture;and, with all the splendid energies of her mind and body, lived up to areally high ideal of it. Her time, her talents, and her money werealways at the service of any scheme which she believed to be one thatmerited support, and she bro
ught to her task not the sense of duty only,but a most warm-hearted kindliness. An unsupported sense of duty aloneis a barren road to tread, but her genuine kindliness, her real interestin those who were in need, made it break out for her into flowers. Shetruly cared for the causes at which she so slaved; she wanted everybodyto enjoy himself. But this warmth, this amiability, which pervaded hernature was both the strongest and the highest motive she knew. She dideverything warmly, but nothing passionately, because it seemed as ifpassion had been left out of her nature. Yet sometimes, as on thisafternoon, when the factors for years long past were coming up above thehorizon again, she wondered whether that was quite strictly the case. Itwas years, certainly, since any hint or suggestion of it had come nearher, but she remembered now that unquiet and perplexity, half bliss,half unhappiness, which she had known in those few weeks, and which hadculminated in her half promise (it had not been more than that) to marryRudolf Villars. Whatever that feeling was, it had been a bud only,something unopened, and had never expanded into a flower, for swiftmaternal hands had, without any figure of speech, nipped it off. She hadbeen called a sentimental schoolgirl with such extraordinary assuranceand acidity that she had felt that it must be the case.

  But to-day, when she knew that this evening the man who had roused inher the sentimentality at any rate of a schoolgirl would, after thislong lapse of years, come to her house again, she wondered (though thiswas useless emotional baggage) if she would feel anything that wouldshow her that he had once been different to all others. She had not seenhim since. Probably he was rather bald, rather stout, rather of thediplomatist type, which seemed to her often to be slightly tinged withpomposity. Very likely, when his name was announced, she would see atotal stranger, shake hands with a stranger. She almost hoped that thiswould prove to be so.

  Yes; she did not want to feel again anything which resembled the memoryof that bewildering unrest, which, considering how long ago it all was,was so strangely vivid still. Her life was very full, she enjoyed itenormously; she was happy, she was nearly content, and she did not, asfar as she knew herself, wish to risk agitation and upheaval in order toexperience a new emotion. She had seen love, at the most, like distantlightning winking on the horizon; she did not want the thunderstorm tocome any nearer. She wished it would go away.

  * * * * *

  Yet, yet ... even now, in the midsummer and zenith of her life, shesometimes asked herself, "Is this all?" And then, if she allowed herselfto think further, it seemed to her a sorry comedy never to feel moreacutely than she felt, never to be more absorbed, more eager, than this.Frankly, she did not believe in God, in any huge central force that wasutterly good; and, that being denied her, she felt sometimes that itwould have been something to believe in the devil. But she had neverseen any reason to believe in him either. She had never been tempted tobe wicked, as those moralists would say who believed in the devil. Shewas a woman healthy both in mind and body, with countless opportunitiesfor doing good, of which she availed herself nobly, not because shebelieved in God, but because she was of a most kindly nature; and shewas not what is called wicked, because she did not care sufficiently.Morality, perhaps it would be right to say, had no existence for her,and she was absolutely moral in thought and action because she had noreal temptation to be otherwise. To her, as a married woman, it seemedalso rather bad form to have a lover; it was not dignified. You had toplay a mean part. But she realised that if only she had ever reallycared for any of those men who certainly had "cared" for her, no moralcode would have stood in her way for a moment. Simply she did not want,and she wondered whether the failure to want was strength or weakness.

  * * * * *

  The Industrial Sale went off with the success that always attended anyscheme that she took up, and an hour after she had opened it most of thestalls were nearly empty, though the prices charged and paid for theobjects sold were of the most fancy order. She herself had soldstockings, nothing but stockings, and all male London, it appeared, hadbeen in dire want of stockings. They had been frightfully expensive, butthe sense of her own cheapness in charging so much was counteracted bythe knowledge of the good cause. Irish peasants had made them, and shewillingly lent her place and position in order that Irish peasants mightreap the benefits of what was adventitiously hers. She was sorry forpeople who had to live like that; she willingly gave her time, herenergy, even her sense of "cheapness," to help them.

  But even before her stall was empty she had seen somebody in the crowdwhom, though she had not seen him for so long, she recognisedinstantaneously. He was neither bald nor stout, nor did he lookpompous. He was as she remembered him. And, again, though it had notcome any nearer yet, the distant lightning flickered on the horizon.

  Apparently, though he had only arrived in England two or three days ago,he had still more than two or three friends here, and for half an hourafter she had seen him first he was occupied with hand-shakes andrecognitions. Then, after her stall, which had been so besieged bypurchasers, was bare, he passed and caught her eye.

  "Ah, Lady Thurso," he said, in that accurate foreign accent which shefound now that she remembered so well, "a thousand greetings! I tried toget near your stall, but it was impossible. And I never waste time overthe impossible. But now you have nothing that I can buy, so I, as apurchaser, am impossible too."

  "Yes, I have sold everything," she said. "You are too late."

  She, who was generally so apt of speech, so quick to take up a point, ordrop it for another, felt suddenly tongue-tied. She could think ofnothing more to say, though, indeed, as she thought impatiently toherself, it was his turn. She had spoken last. For, as she stood therelooking at him, finding him so utterly unchanged, in one moment twelveyears had been softly sponged off her life, and some thrill, somenameless bitter-sweet agitation, flickered through her. She was nostranger to that feeling; she had felt it before. But for the moment,infinitesimal in duration, it tied her tongue. It was like some tunethat we have heard in childhood, and suddenly hear again, so that wemust pause and say to ourselves, "What is that?"

  Then she partly recovered herself. If he would not speak, she must.

  "Being late is almost a crime in a diplomatist," she said. "You shouldalways be a little earlier than other people."

  Then she pulled herself together, determining on her attitude towardshim, and smiled.

  "And your Excellency is going to honour my little dance this evening,are you not?" she said.

  A faint smile answered hers, quivering for a moment on his clean-shavenmouth and being reflected in his dark eyes. "Your Excellency" was adelicious phrase, considering the last phrase before to-day that he hadheard from that mouth. She--a woman's privilege--had made a map, so tospeak, of their future relations, colouring its boundaries as suitedher. It amused him to pretend that he recognised the validity of them.

  "I have already accepted your ladyship's very kind invitation," hesaid.