“I’m afraid he will hardly consult me,” I said, a little stiffly. “You see, Barbara, for Graham, it isn’t altogether a business matter.”
“I know,” said Barbara simply, “it isn’t. It ought to be, and it isn’t. That’s just it. So it mustn’t be for us either—for me, or for mother. Poor mother—that’s the only thing. But you do forgive me?” she insisted.
“Yes, I do, dear Barbara,” I told her. “I would have forgiven you anyhow.”
Barbara embraced me. “I wish I wasn’t going to lose you,” she said affectionately. “But we shan’t, shall we? And you’ll promise to come and see us in Ireland?”
“Oh, dear!” I said, suddenly remembering complications. “Ireland! Poor Lady Doleford! And who is to live at Pavis Court?”
“That’s the nice part of it,” Barbara replied cheerfully. “Graham can keep it if he really wants it, and if he doesn’t, Hofmeyer wrote the other day offering five thousand more than it came back to us for. I’m so glad you gave me the chance of telling you—it wasn’t a thing I could write to Graham.”
I suppose it was reasonable that Barbara should consider this a lucky circumstance; but I could not help feeling a trifle offended.
“I don’t think he will sell it to Hofmeyer,” I said.
Barbara looked at me. We had reached the door. “Because of the five thousand pounds,” she said, and I nodded. She opened the door.
“You don’t know what it is to want five thousand pounds,” she said. “But—I don’t think so either. He’s funny!”
“He is funny!” I agreed, and as Barbara sank down in the lift I turned to contemplate the communication in the letter-box that would tell him how funny he had been.
CHAPTER XXVI
“THE marriage arranged between Graham Trent, Esq., and Lady Barbara Pavisay will not take place.”
When the Morning Post said it, as briefly, as finally, as that, one might dismiss the idea that there was any sort of doubt about the matter. On further consideration, the Morning Post could hardly refer to it in terms less brief or less final—could hardly say, for instance: “The marriage arranged between Graham Trent, Esq., and Lady Barbara Pavisay is not quite so likely to take place as it was.” It would have no way of hinting at the dreary week of fuss and talk and expostulation that had gone over all our heads since Barbara went down in the lift, leaving her letter in the letter-box. It would have been the height of impropriety to inform the public of how Graham posted off to Pavis Court at the screech of dawn next morning, openly and devoutly wishing that the place and all that was in it would burn down in the night, and so enable him to marry the girl he wanted with no idiotic complications. Of how Lady Doleford carried the matter, quite in vain, before the Lord and the Duchess. Of how Peter declined absolutely to come near the scene of disarray or even to express an opinion; of how Barbara was spending her time in the arms of her friends and the reprobation of her relations.
All this I realised; in the Court Circular a thing must either take place or not take place. Still, the two lines of the announcement seemed brusque and uncomfortable and damaging, as if it only lacked that to complete the wretchedness of everybody concerned, which was now quite public and perfect. I did not see why Graham should be further depressed by it, with a fire in the room. It was a paper he seldom asked for, anyway, the Morning Post.
We were to sail in two days. Everything we had become possessed of was already packed and shipped. I noticed with regret that Graham entrusted the task to strangers—did not even superintend it. I was in no anxiety about him; but I never knew him so dull. He had long periods of meditation, out of which he would come with a baffled air, and straightway bury himself in the Toronto papers. He was in no sense heartbroken—how could he be?—but his heart, all the same, appeared to have suffered a reverse. He was living, I suppose, in the reaction from his high attempt. There was a kind of flatness in the check he had received which was more disconcerting than the sting of defeat. He was not to be allowed to immolate his heart on the altar of Pavis Court; that was how it summed itself up to me. Dear Barbara, the priestess of the occasion, would not allow it. How it summed itself up to him there was no way, after his first outburst over the letter, of finding out; but his spirits did not seem to indicate a very lively appreciation of his escape. It was odd that only Barbara seemed able to cheer him. He saw her two or three times, and always came back refreshed and heartened for his task of abdication.
Well, it had proceeded to the end, and there in the back of the fire, was the announcement to the world. We were having our last breakfast in the flat. Towse had put it on the table and left the room, again wiping her eyes on her apron. To do anything for the last time affected Towse in that way toward her apron. She had felt the same earlier about Graham’s boots and taking in the milk. I tried to cheer her with the thought that she would presently be beginning everything over again for Miss Game; but she would not see it in that light; she said Miss Game was a very peculiar lady, almost too particular, and it would not be at all the same. We had to infer that whatever we were we were not peculiar and not particular. We tried to find it as flattering as we could.
“I’m dead sick,” Graham was remarking, “of reading that the fine weather tempted a great many people into the Park yesterday.” He put down the paper. “I believe I shall be glad to get back, Sis.”
“Wouldn’t it be rather curious,” I said inclusively, “if we weren’t?”
“Here is another interesting announcement,” he returned. “Lady Halleigh, whose beautiful house in Curzon Street is really too big for her now that both her daughters are married, is trying to dispose of it, and if she succeeds will in future live almost altogether in the country, which she adores.”
“Is it an advertisement?” I asked.
“I think it is,” said Graham. “Well, I don’t want her house in Curzon Street.”
I suppose what the poor dear boy thought was that a house in Curzon Street, acquired to enable Lady Halleigh to live in the country which she adores, was all that was necessary to make him perfectly ridiculous.
“Certainly not,” I said vaguely, wishing to be sympathetic.
“I expect they like it—the British public,” said Graham, “being taken into Lady Halleigh’s confidence in that way. Being told it is really too big for her just in that confidential tone, and for such natural reasons. Here’s something about the Duke of Barnstaple on the Riviera—very kindly written! ‘Warmly wrapped up’ they say His Grace motors somewhere and back every morning before breakfast. They pet and pat and cajole these people like tame animals. I wonder how long one would be obliged to live in England to care whether the Duke of Barnstaple were warmly wrapped up or not?”
“I don’t know,” I said. “I’m afraid we shan’t do it this time,” but there was no great spirit in my reply.
“This is a country of lofty traditions,” continued Graham; “but like the horse which is a noble animal it does not always do so. Of the five men I dined with last night—the conversation at dinner turned upon clothes—three of them took me aside afterwards and recommended their tailors. Well, Sis, some of our Colonial ways mayn’t be pretty, but when we recommend our tailors we don’t do it privately.”
“I was present,” I reminded him, “when Lord Doleford recommended his to you. So was Evelyn and Billy Milliken. Isn’t he giving satisfaction?”
“Oh, yes, in a way. But I’m waiting now till I get home. I’m tailored to death already; and half the things won’t be wearable there.”
This, I reflected, was exaggerated; the island’s tailors at least were pre-eminent. “I thought it wasn’t a thing you minded much about—clothes,” I said soothingly.
“I’d rather not look more of a fool than I need. These things, walking down King Street, would shout aloud,” he persisted.
“King Street, Toronto?”
“That is the thoroughfare the name suggests to me,” said Graham, rather severely.
“I have been tol
d how many King Streets there are in London,” I observed, “but I forget.”
Towse brought in our last eggs. I sliced the top off mine properly. Graham turned his into a wineglass.
“Somebody,” I remarked, “I can’t think who—told me not long ago about being proposed to on board ship, and while she was considering it they went down to breakfast and she saw him eat an egg—like that. It had such an effect on her that she had to tell him she really couldn’t.”
“She must have been attached to him!”
“It hadn’t got as far as that. Here is such a nice letter from Miss Pedlington, Graham, to say goodbye.”
“The last time I met that woman I inadvertently mentioned the fiscal outlook. I must have been hard up for something to say; but I asked her whether she was a Free Fooder. ‘My great-grand-father,’ she informed me, ‘was the only Bishop that signed the Reform Bill. We are not likely to hold any other views!’ I told her she was a credit to her country.”
“The Bishop was, anyway,” I said. “Have you any interesting letters?”
“Here’s a bill of five pounds fifteen from the fishmonger,” he replied. “I thought we had some game of a weekly book.”
“We had,” I said, “and I paid it every week up to ten days ago, by the man who called for orders, and he signed the book. But now they say they’ve lost the book. Do you think we’re likely to have had five pounds fifteen of fish in ten days?”
“I have no way of knowing. But if you haven’t got the receipts you must pay the bill.”
“It’s unlucky,” I said, “but the same thing has happened with the laundry-book. Do you suppose they have done it on purpose?”
“Oh, no!” said Graham grimly; “but you’ll have to pay. We can’t stay to discuss it, unfortunately.”
I did not like his tone, but I was willing to make every allowance. “Are they all bills?” I asked, referring to his letters.
“No,” said he. “Some of them are dilapidations. Do your remember the young man from the agent’s?”
“I remember a young man,” I said, bringing him back with difficulty as if from the other side of the Flood. “A young man who represented that he was there on my behalf. A very unnecessary young man.”
“I’m afraid you didn’t encourage him enough. He wasn’t altogether unnecessary,” said Graham. “He was here again two days ago looking for damages. He seems to have found a lot.”
“I know of only three,” I declared. “One tumbler, one kitchen plate, and the handle off the dresser drawer. I told Towse particularly to show them to him. Did she?”
“I have no doubt she did, in spite of every natural instinct, if you told her to. But he doesn’t seem to have needed showing. Did you know, for instance, that we had put the spring roller blinds in this room out of order?”
“Towse must have concealed it.”
“We have—hopelessly it seems. Eleven and six.”
“I’ll speak to Towse.”
“There are four further serious offences against the dining-room. We have marked Miss Game’s table, scratched her chairs, chipped her mantelpiece, and removed one of the wooden apostles from her blessed Armada-oak sideboard.”
“Removed one of the wooden apos——! But that was Luke and he never was there! Don’t you remember pointing out to Peter that Luke wasn’t there, and Peter said he must have gone down with the Armada?”
Graham looked at me critically.
“You mean Doleford,” he said. “I would not lend myself to this fashion of Christian-naming every Tom, Dick, and Harry if I were you. It’s one of the decadent things about England.”
There was no use in saying that I meant Peter the Apostle on the sideboard, so I merely reiterated, “He never was there.”
“The most interesting item in the kitchen,” said Graham, “is the linoleum. ‘Holes burnt in several places. One pound five and sixpence halfpenny.’ The halfpenny is touchingly honest.”
“Towse may have done it,” I confessed, “but she always stood on that place by the range, and it was impossible to see.”
“Bathroom—ceiling discoloured.”
“Could we help her old water-pipe bursting?”
“Principal object of water-pipes in this country. With us they don’t burst, no doubt because we have so much more frost. But that is not the point. Twenty-seven and sixpence.”
“Do they just charge at random?” I asked.
“They charge at anything they see. I can’t go into all they’ve found in the drawing-room, but I notice a considerable sum for calendering the furniture covers.”
“But we weren’t to! She didn’t for us—and they were anything but fresh, and it was agreed!” I cried with indignation. “Miss Game herself ”
“Has left it entirely to her excellent agents,” said Graham calmly. “And do you remember what you signed?”
“I signed the list.”
“And a statement to the effect that everything not otherwise described was in good order,” said Graham.
“Never!” I cried.
“To do you justice I don’t think you did. But the statement was there—this tiling came in yesterday and I went round to see the people—between the end of the list and your signature. They probably stuck it in afterwards.”
“They could,” I said with conviction. “There was plenty of space. What a contemptible trick!”
“It’s a certain way of doing business,” returned Graham, who seemed to be enjoying himself, “to which we don’t happen to be accustomed—that’s all. But I could wish we had taken better care of the mantel-ornaments.”
“The mantel-ornaments!” I exclaimed wildly. “There are forty-two, and thirty of them are in the closet.”
“One match-holder—toad design—cracked.”
“It was done before!”
“One yellow cat—chipped behind the ear.”
“We never chipped it behind the ear!”
“One green dog, right paw damaged; one ditto pig, left leg ditto.”
“Ah!” I cried with triumph; “but I put all the green animals in the closet. So that proves it.”
“Not a bit,” said Graham, “since you have stated that the whole forty-two were in good order. The list totals up handsomely. Twenty-one pounds, ten shillings, and elevenpence.”
“That was what he meant by being there on my behalf! And worrying me to pick holes in things! What shall we do about it?” I exclaimed with excitement.
“Oh, we’ll pay it!” he replied contemptuously. “What else is there to do?”
This was not at all my inclination. I did not wish to pay the twenty-one pounds ten shillings and whatever it was. It seemed to me improper, almost immoral, to pay it; and I would have rushed into the courts rather, or submitted to be dragged there, whichever the circumstances required. I would even have been willing to postpone sailing for a week or two to do it. I said so. Indeed, the more I thought of postponing sailing the more desirable and necessary it seemed not to be trampled upon by the young man from the agent’s. But of course my frame of mind was different from Graham’s. I had not evolved an ideal and chivalric project and had it returned on my hands as not quite ideal and chivalric enough. I wasn’t suffering, in the most delicate and high-minded region of my consciousness, from a fearful, fearful snub. And poor Graham was. It was quite enough, what Graham was suffering from, to impel a person to wash his hands of everybody and everything involved, with just the criticism that such a demonstration implies, a hint that departure was cheap at any price. I was obliged to let him wipe them, as it were, there and then, upon a cheque.
Still I had to put in my word on behalf of the island.
“It seems to me,” I said, “that if people allow themselves to be overreached like that they have no business to complain of it.”
“Oh, it isn’t worth complaining of!” said Graham. And I daresay, by comparison, it wasn’t.
Towse came up for the last time to take away, and as Graham gathered up the newspap
ers a letter appeared under the Times. “It’s for you,” he said. “Sorry; I didn’t see it.”
“I don’t know the handwriting,” I remarked; and this was not surprising, as it turned out to be from the Duchess of Dulwich by a new secretary. It contained a kind invitation to spend my last whole day in town with Her Grace.
“I know I must not expect your brother,” said the note. “He will have a thousand things to do and must keep every moment free. But it will be very nice to see you. I have an Empire First tea-party in the afternoon, and we shall expect you to explain to us all this trouble about Newfoundland.”
“Shall you go?” asked Graham dissuasively. “You’re not in the least obliged to.”
“Oh, yes, I think so,” I said. “But I don’t know anything about Newfoundland. How shall you spend the day, dear old man? Mooning about Westminster?”
“No,” said Graham, “I’m a landed proprietor now, and I don’t moon as much as I did. I shall spend it with my agent.”
CHAPTER XXVII
HIS Grace was in the country; the Duchess and I lunched alone. I had not seen her since the evening she motored over with Barbara to dine at Knowes, the evening of the day we all learned that Peter had left so irretrievably for Ireland. It was Evelyn’s motor, I remembered, that brought the news in the forlorn person of the Countess in the morning; and Evelyn’s motor again which delivered the Duchess, in plain triumph and exultation, in the evening, while Evelyn herself remained in accepted grief and seclusion at Pavis Court with her darling Lady Doleford and the Marquis of Scansby, who had a cold. I remember thinking at the time that this use of the motor was not altogether delicate on the part of the Duchess, though it was just like Evelyn’s American magnificence to lend it, even to an enemy.
But this was not so very long ago; and there seemed very little necessity for the Duchess to explain having seen nothing of us during the past month, on the ground that she was a woman of business, that she had had no less than two cases of appendicitis “downstairs,” and on the top of all had herself been in bed three days with a chill.
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