Works of E F Benson

by E. F. Benson

  But her generosity and sense of fair play had come to her aid. She was not alone in this matter, and she quite realised that it was worse for Chesterford than herself.

  Chesterford had evinced the most intense interest in the baby in itself. Dodo, on the other hand, had frankly declared that the baby’s potentialities possessed a far greater attraction, for her than its actualities. But she had voluntarily linked her life with his; and she must do her part — they had had a great loss, and he must not feel that he bore it alone. Dodo shook her head hopelessly over the unknown factor, that made her so much to him, and left him so little to her, but she accepted it as inevitable. Almost immediately after she had left him in the hall, she felt angry with herself for haying done so, just as she had been vexed at her reception of his proposal of family prayers, and a few minutes afterwards she sent for him, and they had gone together to see the baby. And then, because she was a woman, because she was human, because she was genuinely sorry for this honest true man who knelt beside her and sobbed as if his heart was broken, but with a natural instinct turned to her, and sorrowed more for her than for himself, her intense self-centredness for the time vanished, and with a true and womanly instinct she found her consolation in consoling him.

  Dodo felt as if she had lived years since this morning, and longed to cut the next week out of her life, to lose it altogether. She wanted to get away out of the whole course of events, to begin again without any past. From a purely worldly point of view she was intensely vexed at the baby’s death; she had felt an immense pride in having provided an heir, and it was all no use; it was over, it might as well never have been born. And, as the day wore on, she felt an overwhelming disgust of all the days that were to follow, the darkened house, the quieted movements, the enforced idleness. If only no one knew, Dodo felt that she would fling herself at once, this very minute, into the outside world again. What was the use of all this retirement? It only made a bad job worse. Surely, when misfortune comes on one, it is best to forget it as soon as possible, and Dodo’s eminently practical way of forgetting anything was to absorb herself in something else. “What a sensible man David was,” she thought. “He went and oiled himself, which, I suppose, is the equivalent of putting on one’s very best evening dress.” She felt an inward laughter, more than half hysterical, as to what would happen if she went and oiled Chesterford.

  She got up and went languidly across to the window. Lord Chesterford’s room was on the story below, and was built on a wing by itself, and a window looked out on her side of the house. Looking down she saw him kneeling at his table, with his face buried in his hands. Dodo was conscious of a lump rising in her throat, and she went back to her chair, and sat down again.

  “He is such a good, honest old boy,” she thought, “and somehow, in a dim-lit way, he finds consolation in that. It is a merciful arrangement.”

  She walked downstairs to his study, and went in. He had heard her step, and stood near the door waiting to receive her. Dodo felt infinitely sorry for him. Chesterford drew her into a chair, and knelt down beside her.

  “You’ve no idea what a help you have been to me, darling,” he said. “It makes me feel as if I was an awful coward, when I see you so brave.”

  Dodo stroked his hand.

  “Yes, yes,” she said, “we must both be brave, we must help one another.”

  “Ah, my own wife,” he said, “what should I have done if it had been you? and I was dreadfully afraid at one time! You know you are both the baby and yourself to me now, and yet I thought before you were all you could be.”

  Dodo felt horribly uncomfortable. She had been aware before that there had been moments when, as Jack expressed it, she was “keeping it up,” but never to this extent.

  “Tell me about it, Chesterford,” she said.

  “It was only half an hour after you went,” he said, “that he suddenly got worse. The doctor came a few minutes after that. It was all practically over by then. It was convulsions, you know. He was quite quiet, and seemed out of pain for a few minutes before the end, and he opened his eyes, and put out his little arms towards me. Do you think he knew me, Dodo?”

  “Yes, dear, yes,” said Dodo softly.

  “I should be so happy to think he did,” said Lord Chesterford. “Poor little chap, he always took to me from the first, do you remember? I hope he knew me then. Mrs. Vivian came very soon after, and she offered to go for you, and met you in the Park, didn’t she?”

  “Yes,” said Dodo; “Jack and I were together. She is very good to us. Would you like to see her to-night?”

  “Ah no, Dodo,” he said, “I can’t see anyone but your dear self. But make her come and see you if you feel inclined, only come and talk to me again afterwards.”

  “No, dear,” said Dodo. “I won’t have her, if you feel against it.”

  “Then we shall have an evening together again, Dodo,” he said. “I seem to have seen you so little, since you began to go about again,” he added wistfully.

  “Oh, it must be so,” said Dodo; “you have one thing to do, and I have another. I’ve seen so many different people this last week, that I feel as if I had seen no one person.”

  “You are so active,” he said; “you do half a dozen things while I am doing one.”

  “Oh, but you do great important man things,” said Dodo, “and I do silly little woman things.”

  She felt the conversation was becoming much more bearable.

  Chesterford smiled. Dodo seized on it as a favourable omen.

  “I like seeing you smile, old boy,” she said; “you look more yourself than you did two hours ago.”

  He looked at her earnestly.

  “Dodo, you will not think me preaching or being priggish, will you, darling? You know me too well for that. There is one way of turning this into a blessing. We must try and see why this was sent us, and if we cannot see why, we must take it in faith, and go on living our lives simply and straightforwardly, and then, perhaps, we shall know sometime. Ah, my darling, it has taught me one thing already, for I never knew before how much I loved you. I loved you all I could before this, but it has somehow given me fresh power to love. I think the love I had for the boy has been added to the love I had for you, and it is yours, darling, all of it, always.”

  CHAPTER TEN.

  That same evening Edith Staines and Miss Grantham were seated together in a box at the opera. The first act was just over, and Edith, who had mercilessly silenced every remark Miss Grantham had made during it, relaxed a little. Miss Grantham’s method of looking at an opera was to sit with her hack to the stage, so as to command a better view of the house, and talk continuously. But Edith would not stand that. She had before her a large quarto containing the full score, and she had a pencil in her hand with which she entered little corrections, and now and then she made comments to herself.

  “I shall tell Mancinelli of that,” she murmured. “The whole point of the motif is that rapid run with the minim at the end, and he actually allowed that beast to make a rallentando.”

  But the act was over now, and she shut the book with a bang.

  “Come outside, Grantie,” she said, “it’s so fearfully hot. I had to hurry over dinner in order to get here in time. The overture is one of the best parts. It isn’t like so many overtures that give you a sort of abstract of the opera, but it hints at it all, and leaves you to think it out.”

  “Oh, I didn’t hear the overture,” said Miss Grantham. “I only got here at Mephistopheles’ appearance. I think Edouard is such a dear. He really looks a very attractive devil. I suppose it’s not exactly the beauty of holiness, but extremes meet, you know.”

  “I must open the door,” said Edith. “I want to sit in a draught.”

  “There’s Mr. Broxton,” remarked Miss Grantham. “I think he sees us. I hope he’ll come up. I think it’s simply charming, to see how devoted he still is to Dodo. I think he is what they call faithful.”

  “I think it’s scandalous,” said E
dith hotly. “He’s got no business to hang about like that. It’s very weak of him — I despise weak people. It’s no use being anything, unless you’re strong as well; it’s as bad as being second-rate. You may be of good quality, but if you’re watered down, it’s as bad as being inferior.”

  Jack meantime had made his way up to the box.

  “We’ve just been saying all sorts of nice things about you,” remarked Miss Grantham sweetly. “Have you seen Dodo to-day?”

  “Haven’t you heard?” asked Jack.

  Edith frowned.

  “No; what?” she asked.

  “Their baby died this morning,” he said.

  Edith’s score fell to the ground with a crash.

  “Good heavens! is it true?” she asked. “Who told you?”

  “I was riding with Dodo this morning,” said he, “and Mrs. Vivian met Dodo and told her. I knew something had happened, so I went to inquire. No one has seen either of them again.”

  “Did you try and see her?” said Edith severely.

  “Yes, I went this evening.”

  “Ah!” Edith frowned again. “How does he take it?” she asked.

  “I don’t know,” he said; “no one has seen them since.”

  Edith picked up her score.

  “Good-night, Grantie,” she said. “Good-night, Mr. Broxton. I must go.”

  Miss Grantham looked up in astonishment. Edith was folding her opera cloak round her. Jack offered to help her.

  “Thanks, I can do it,” she said brusquely.

  “What are you going for?” asked Miss Grantham, in surprise.

  “It’s all right,” said Edith. “I’ve got to see someone. I shall come back, probably.”

  The door closed behind her.

  “Of course it’s awfully sad,” remarked Miss Grantham, “but I don’t see why Edith should go like that. I wonder where she’s gone. Don’t you adore the opera, Mr. Broxton? I think it’s simply lovely. It’s so awfully sad about Marguerite, isn’t it? I wish life was really like this. It would be so nice to sing a song whenever anything important happened. It would smooth things so. Oh, yes, this is the second act, isn’t it? It’s where Mephisto sings that song to the village people. It always makes me feel creepy. Poor Dodo!”

  “I am more sorry for him,” said Jack; “you know he was simply wrapped up in the baby.”

  “Dodo certainly finds consolation quickly,” said Miss Grantham. “I think she’s sensible. It really is no use crying over spilt milk. I suppose she won’t go out again this season. Dear me, it’s Lady Bretton’s ball the week after next, in honour of Lucas’s coming of age. Dodo was to have led the cotillion with Lord Ledgers. That was a good note. Isn’t the scene charming?”

  “I don’t know what Dodo will do,” said Jack. “I believe they will leave London, only — only—”

  Miss Grantham looked at him inquiringly.

  “You see Dodo has to be amused,” said Jack. “I don’t know what she would do, if she was to have to shut herself up again. She was frightfully bored after the baby’s birth.”

  Miss Grantham was casting a roving London eye over the occupants of the stalls.

  “There’s that little Mr. Spencer, the clergyman at Kensington,” she said. “I wonder how his conscience lets him come to see anything so immoral. Isn’t that Maud next him? Dear me, how interesting. Bring them up here after the act, Mr. Broxton. I suppose Maud hasn’t heard?”

  “I think she’s been with her father somewhere in Lancashire,” said Jack. “She can only have come back to-day. There is Mrs. Vane, too. Dodo can’t have telegraphed to them.”

  “Oh, that’s so like Dodo,” murmured Miss Grantham; “it probably never occurred to her. Dear me, this act is over. I am afraid we must have missed the ‘Virgo.’ What a pity. Do go, and ask them all to come up here.”

  “So charmed,”, murmured Mrs. Vane, as she rustled into the box. “Isn’t it a lovely night? Dear Prince Waldenech met me in the hall, and he asked so affectionately after Dodo. Charming, wasn’t it? Yes. And do you know Mr. Spencer, dear Miss Grantham? Shall we tell Miss Grantham and Mr. Broxton our little secret, Maud? Cupid has been busy here,” she whispered, with a rich elaborateness to Miss Grantham. “Isn’t it charming? We are delighted. Yes, Mr. Spencer, Miss Grantham and Mr. Broxton, of course — Mr. Spencer.”

  Mr. Spencer bowed and smiled, and conducted himself as he should. He was a fashionable rector in a rich parish, who had long felt that the rich deserved as much looking after as the poor, and had been struck with Maud’s zeal for the latter, and thought it would fit in very well with his zeal for the former, had won Maud’s heart, and now appeared as the happy accepted lover.

  Mrs. Vane was anxious to behave in the way it was expected that she should, and, finding that Miss Grantham sat with her back to the stage and talked, took up a corresponding attitude herself. Miss Grantham quickly decided that she did not know about the death of Dodo’s baby, and determined not to tell her. In the first place, it was to be supposed that she did not know either, and in the second, she was amused by the present company, and knew that to mention it was to break up the party.

  Mr. Spencer had a little copy of the words, with the English on one side and the Italian on the other. When he came to a passage that he thought indelicate, he turned his attention to the Italian. Maud sat between him and Miss Grantham.

  “I am so delighted, Maud,” Miss Grantham was saying, “and I am sure Dodo will be charmed. She doesn’t know yet, I suppose? When is it to be?”

  “Oh, I don’t quite know,” said Maud confusedly. “Algy, that is Mr. Spencer, is going to leave London, you know, and take a living at Gloucester. I shall like that. There is a good deal of poverty at Gloucester.”

  Miss Grantham smiled sympathetically.

  “How sweet of you,” she said; “and you will go and work among the poor, and give them soup and prayer-books, won’t you? I should love to do that. Mrs. Vivian will tell you all about those things, I suppose?”

  “Oh, she took me to an awful slum before we left London,” said Maud, in a sort of rapture— “you know we have been away at Manchester for a week with my father — and I gave them some things I had worked. I am doing a pair of socks for Dodo’s baby.”

  Miss Grantham turned her attention to the stage.

  “The Jewel song is perfectly lovely,” she remarked. “I wish Edith was here. Don’t you think that girl sings beautifully? I wonder who she is.”

  At that moment the door of the box opened, and Edith entered. She grasped the situation at once, and felt furiously angry with Miss Grantham and Jack. She determined to put a stop to it.

  “Dear Mrs. Vane, you can’t have heard. I only knew this evening, and I suppose Mrs. Vivian’s note has missed you somehow. I have just left her, and she told me she had written to you. You know Dodo’s baby has been very ill, quite suddenly, and this morning — yes, yes—”

  Mrs. Vane started up distractedly.

  “Oh, my poor Dodo,” she cried, “I never knew! And here I am enjoying myself, when she — Maud, did you hear? Dodo’s baby — only this morning. My poor Dodo!”

  She began crying in a helpless sort of way.

  Maud turned round with a face full of horror.

  “How awful! Poor Dodo! Come, mother, we must go.”

  Mr. Spencer dropped his English and Italian version.

  “Let me see you to your carriage,” he said. “Let me give you an arm, Mrs. Vane.”

  Maud turned to Jack, and for once showed some of Dodo’s spirit.

  “Mr. Broxton,” she said, “I have an idea you knew. Perhaps I am wrong. If I am, I beg your pardon; if not, I consider you have behaved in a way I didn’t expect of you, being a friend of Dodo’s. I think—” she broke off, and followed the others. Jack felt horribly uncomfortable.

  He and Edith and Miss Grantham stood in silence for a moment.

  “It was horrible of you, Grantie,” said Edith, “to let them sit here, and tell them nothing about it.�
�

  “My dear Edith, I could do nothing else,” said Miss Grantham, in an even, calm voice. “There would have been a scene, and I can’t bear scenes. There has been a scene as it is, but you are responsible for that. You are rather jumpy to-night. Where have you been?”

  “I have been to see Mrs. Vivian,” said Edith. “I wanted to know about this. I told her I was coming back here, and she gave me this for you, Mr. Broxton.”

  She handed him a note. Then she picked up her big score, and sat down again with her pencil.

  The note contained only two lines, requesting Mr. Broxton to come and see her in the morning. Jack read it and tore it up. He felt undecided how to act. Edith was buried in her score, and gave no sign. Miss Grantham had resumed her place, and was gazing languidly, at the box opposite. He picked up his hat, and turned to leave. Edith looked up from her score.

  “I think I ought to tell you,” she said, “that Mrs. Vivian and I talked about you, and that note is the result. I don’t care a pin what you think.”

  Jack opened his eyes in astonishment. Edith had always struck him as being rather queer; and this statement seemed to him very queer indeed. Her manner was not conciliatory.

  He bowed.

  “I feel complimented by being the subject of your conversation,” he replied with well-bred insolence, and closed the door behind him.

  Miss Grantham laughed. A scene like this pleased her; it struck her as pure comedy.

  “Really, Edith, you are very jumpy; I don’t understand you a bit. You are unnecessarily rude. Why did you say you did not care a pin what he thought?”

  “You won’t understand, Grantie,” said Edith. “Don’t you see how dangerous it is all becoming? I don’t care the least whether I am thought meddlesome. Jack Broxton is awfully in love with Dodo, anyone can see that, and Dodo evidently cares for him; and that poor, dear, honest fool Chesterford is completely blind to it all. It was bad enough before, but the baby’s death makes it twice as bad. Dodo will want to be amused; she will hate this retirement, and she will expect Mr. Broxton to amuse her. Don’t you see she is awfully bored with her husband, and she will decline to be entirely confined to his company. While she could let off steam by dancing and riding and so on, it was safe; she only met Mr. Broxton among fifty other people. But decency, even Dodo’s, will forbid her to meet those fifty other people now. And each time she sees him, she will return to her husband more wearied than before. It is all too horrible. I don’t suppose she is in love with Jack Broxton, but she finds him attractive, and he knows it, and he is acting disgracefully in letting himself see her so much. Everyone knows he went abroad to avoid her — everyone except Dodo, that is, and she must guess. I respected him for that, but now he is playing the traitor to Chesterford. And Mrs. Vivian quite agrees with me.”