Works of E F Benson

by E. F. Benson

  Colonel Chase mounted his bicycle when he came out having been unable to induce the custodian to refund anything, and went off for his ride. He did not intend to return to Wentworth for lunch, and had taken with him what he called ‘a snack’, which caused the pockets of his Norfolk jacket to bulge with light refreshment. In one there were some rolls stuffed with ham, and a large lump of cheese, in another a couple of hard-boiled eggs, an apple and a stick of chocolate, in a third a flask of whiskey, a cold sausage and a small thermos flask containing coffee. His regard for Miss Howard had soared since breakfast, and his contemptuous compassion for her unpatronised wares and unpurchased walls had given place to a strong feeling of respect for one whose work was so eminently marketable and had won the admiration of a Dowager Countess. She could go warbling out in the morning with a paint-box and a bit of paper, just for her own amusement, and bring back the best part of half-a-guinea. That was a gift, a solid asset, and as he selected a convenient fallen tree-trunk by the wayside on which he could sit and spread out his little snack, where the sun was warm on his back, and his folded mackintosh kept him safe from damp, he began to consider, as he was periodically wont to do, whether on the whole he would be more comfortable if he was married, and whether he was likely to find anyone more suitable than Miss Howard to make him so. She was not young, she was not, though neat and presentable, pretty any longer, but that was all to the good, for the excited, hysterical element which entered, he believed, into alliance between boys and girls, must have no place in this union. Wentworth, with a few weeks of lodgings in London and meals at his club, was a very easy sort of existence, but the worry and trouble of a house and household would, of course, if he married, be borne by his wife: his part in it would only be to mention if the bath water was not hot, or the food not to his liking, much as he did now. She, in fact, would be a sort of Mrs. Oxney, though honoured with his name. Then there was the question of expense, but since Miss Howard could afford to live at Wentworth, and go off once or twice a year to Torquay, it looked as if she ought to be able to bear half the charge of a small household. Besides, she had her little place in Kent, near Tunbridge Wells; when the lease of her present tenants came to an end, they could live there, rent free. He figured it, on the impression he had got from her allusions to it, as a pleasant manorial house of stone or old brick, with a stable and a garden and ‘grounds’, too small perhaps to call a Park, but with room no doubt for a miniature golf links, and an air of landed dignity. There was sure to be a club at Tunbridge Wells, frequented by business men, who went up to the City by early trains, and by local gentry, and he could drop into the club for a cup of tea and a rubber of bridge before getting back to his little place and Mrs. Colonel, who would scold him if he was late. The days would pass very pleasantly: he would bicycle as usual all the morning, and she, after seeing to her household duties, would turn sheets of drawing-paper into half-guineas: he would potter about his garden or golf links in the afternoon, and, perhaps he would have a small car. ‘Squire Chase’ he thought to himself.

  The snack had almost completely disappeared during these reflections, and Colonel Chase, nourished now and well-warmed by the sun felt very benevolent towards the whole world. There was just one egg still uneaten, and this he peeled and chipped into small pieces with his pocket-knife generously strewing them on the trunk of the tree where he sat, so that the birds might eat and be filled, and bless him in their pretty twitterings. He mounted his bicycle again and wondered how he could find out more concerning Miss Howard’s little place in Kent. She let it, as she had said, because she could not afford to live in it, but with Squire Chase to share expenses, which he would be quite willing to do if the little place was a nice little place, it might be manageable. The more he thought about Miss Howard in connection with her little place the brighter grew Miss Howard’s prospect in connection with him. This marriage would be a sensible contract for mutual advantage: she would get a husband who would look after her place for her, and he a wife who would look after his comfort.

  Unconscious of these plans for her advantage, Miss Howard meantime had flown rather than walked up to Wentworth for lunch, with all this wonderful news to give of the Green Salon, and positively eager to recant her blasphemy against Mind. Yesterday at this time when no picture had been sold and not a visitor had demanded toilet-paper, she had firmly announced that she gave up Mind, and that fell determination had been confirmed by the subsequent revelation that Colonel Chase’s pedometer had not been miraculously wafted into Mrs. Bliss’s possession by Mind’s mysterious agency but had been placed there in answer to her simple request by an ordinary chemist. But now she thought no more about pedometers: a cataract of purchasers had descended on the Green Salon, and she unhesitatingly accepted the benevolent power which had guided them there and opened their hearts and their purses, as identical with that which had removed the Colonel’s cold in a single night. And there was Mrs. Bliss in the lounge smiling and joyful, though as yet she knew nothing of what had occurred.

  “Dear one!” she said. “And how have things gone to-day? Have you less of that despondency which keeps you in Error, and of the Error which keeps you in despondency? Sweet one, how lovely! I see it has gone from you. You have been denying it, and Mind has shown you its nothingness. Evil is nothing, nothing is Evil. Love, Mind, Omnipotence deny hate, Error — Tell me all about it. I could jump for joy.”

  Miss Howard could have jumped too.

  “Oh, Mrs. Bliss, it’s too wonderful,” she said. “It has turned out just as you said it would. I went down to the Green Salon this morning, still in Error, and expecting to find that nobody had been in, or bought anything, and instead there was the most wonderful news. Kind dear Mr. Bullingdon whom I had thought rather unappreciative of my pictures — and oh, how wrong I was — I suppose that was Error too — and dear kind Mrs. Holders, who, I thought, didn’t care about them either, each bought a picture yesterday morning, and they had hardly gone when two ladies came in, and would you believe it, each of them bought two pictures, which made six—”

  She broke off a moment, as Mrs. Holders hobbled downstairs from her rest.

  “Oh, Mrs. Holders,” she said, “how good it was of you and Mr. Bullingdon to buy those pictures yesterday! That started everything: I mean Mind began then, I was just telling Mrs. Bliss. Do you know that you and Mr. Bullingdon had scarcely gone when two ladies came in, and each of them bought two more. I can’t think who they can have been, for their names were quite unknown to me. I suppose they came from one of the hotels: they were just two ladies, the boy at the door told me, and he couldn’t describe them at all. And then they had hardly gone when two gentlemen came in and they each bought two, and I didn’t know their names either, and that made ten pictures all in one morning. Wasn’t it wonderful? Just when I was beginning to feel so dreadfully low about it, and to wish that I had never thought of having an exhibition at all.”

  Mrs. Holders looked very much surprised: up went the eyebrows.

  “That looks like Mind, doesn’t it?” she said, in a rather cold sarcastic tone, and she hobbled off without another word in the direction of the dining-room.

  Miss Howard thought it very kind of her to have bought a picture, but her manner was far from sympathetic. She turned to ecstatic Mrs. Bliss again.

  “And that wasn’t all, not nearly,” she resumed, “for soon after I went down this morning, and was hearing about all this, in came the dear padre and Mrs. Banks, and not their first visit either, and though I made myself busy with checking the names and that sort of thing, so as not to look as if I wanted them to buy anything—”

  “Quite right, dear one,” said Mrs. Bliss, “We have to trust to Mind completely, when we have done our best, and make no interference. Yes?”

  “ — they asked for the catalogue of prices,” said Miss Howard who had held her mouth open during this interruption, so as to go on again at once, “and first she bought God’s Acre, and then he bought Evening Bells, which
was the highest priced of all. And they had hardly bought theirs, when Colonel Chase came in — dear Colonel Chase, what wrong thoughts I have had about him too, for I thought he was not meaning to come to my exhibition at all, and as for buying anything! But it was all Error. Let me see, where was I? I had gone out, but I kept just peeping in, as I walked about outside. . . . So Colonel Chase came in and he bought Golf Links, Wentworth, and then dear Florence Kemp (I’m getting so much drawn to her) bought ‘Oh, to be in England now that April’s here’, and looked at me so lovingly and sympathetically.”

  “Mind again!” crowed Mrs. Bliss.

  “Yes, and then who do you think? Lady Appledore and Miss Jobson. She thought so highly of them — I was introduced to her afterwards, and she implored me almost to go and sketch in the Park at the Grange — and bought Curfew tolls the knell, and told Colonel Chase, so the boy informed me, that he should certainly buy Geraniums, which was a guinea. I think perhaps he only meant to buy one—”

  “But Mind took him by the hand and led him up to Geraniums,” said Mrs. Bliss.

  “Yes, it really looks like it,” said Miss Howard, “or anyhow Lady Appledore did. Oh, Mrs. Bliss, how untrustful I was yesterday, thinking that nobody cared. I shall go down again after lunch, and I shan’t be a bit surprised to find that somebody else has come in and bought some more. Sixteen sold already within twenty-four hours: nearly one an hour! Or do you think I ought not to go down this afternoon but leave it all to Mind? Which would Mind like best?”

  Mrs. Bliss uttered a peal of musical laughter.

  “Sweet one, Mind loves you to do whatever gives you most joy and happiness,” she said. “Just deny evil, depression, unhappiness, which don’t exist. Didn’t I tell you that all would be harmony and prosperity at your lovely exhibition if only you trusted Mind?”

  “But I didn’t,” said Miss Howard, contrite but still joyful. “I gave Mind up yesterday. I remember telling you so.”

  “No, you only thought you did, and that was Error, as is now proved. I worked away at your Error yesterday, and I knew it would be removed. And the pretty gong — such a beautiful sonorous note — has sounded, and here’s Mrs. Oxney come to scold us for not going in to lunch, and to hear your good news.”

  Mrs. Oxney was seriously alarmed to hear that so many pictures had been sold, and that Miss Howard apparently was not certain whether ‘Pussy-dear’ was among them. Miss Howard, as a matter of strict fact, was quite sure ‘Pussy-dear’ was still in the market, but it would be good for Mrs. Oxney to have a little fright owing to her remissness.

  “There was such a crowd of purchasers,” she said, “and really those little red stars to show that pictures were sold, were being put up here, there and everywhere. I should not wonder if I had to get another supply of them. But ‘Pussy-dear’ may be unsold still. I don’t think Lady Appledore bought it.”

  “And has the Countess of Appledore been among your visitors?” said the awe-struck Mrs. Oxney. “Dear me, what I’ve missed by not going down this morning! I must put on my hat directly I’ve had a bite of lunch. . . . Oh, Mrs. Bliss, but you’re walking without a stick, and moving along so that I can scarcely keep up with you! I never saw such an improvement. Dr. Dobbs will be pleased with you. I declare it’s like one of his own conjuring tricks. You’ve got reason to be thankful to Bolton Spa.”

  Colonel Chase came back with a sound appetite for tea, after the mere snack by the wayside shared with the birds, and heard the new and gratifying intelligence that the button queen staying at the “Warwickshire” had bought two more pictures, and that Mrs. Oxney had secured Pussy-dear, a thing she would never have done had she not seen the button queen regarding it with an admiring eye. Owing to Mrs. Bliss’s deceitful conduct with regard to his pedometer he addressed no conversation whatever to her, and had only the shortest and coldest replies for her when she spoke to him, for if there was one thing he disapproved of (and indeed there were many) it was anything that savoured of deception. But his displeasure seemed to have no effect on one who basked in the effulgence of Mind, and, though his attitude was most marked, (for he was full of agreeable conversation for everyone else, including Mrs. Holders) it may be considered doubtful if she ever noticed it. As he had been unable to get out of his purchase of Golflinks, Wentworth, for the leap-frog boy refused to refund a penny of his takings, it was best to be congratulatory to Miss Howard, and console himself with the fact that there were now many financial victims of the Green Salon. Another reason for being pleasant to her was that he wanted to learn more about her little place in Kent.

  “My Geraniums!” he said, (grasping the nettle, so to speak, for it was the guinea that smarted most,) “I was delighted to secure Geraniums, and much gratified to find that Lady Appledore, with her fine taste, approved my choice. One of your masterpieces, she said, Miss Howard. Where did you paint that? I cannot remember seeing a bed of geraniums of such wonderful brightness here. Perhaps it was at your little place in Kent.”

  Miss Howard, secure beneath the aegis of Mind, was rather daring.

  “Was it there?” she said, pressing her finger to her forehead in the effort of recollection. “Perhaps it was. Let me see: the herbaceous border and then the little sunk rose-garden. No: I think I painted it here last summer long after my tenants were in possession of my old home. Or did I paint it from memory? Somehow I seem to feel—”

  Mrs. Oxney felt she had to claim Geraniums for a product of Wentworth: Pussy-dear and Geraniums and ever so many more were inspired by Wentworth.

  “Oh no, Miss Howard,” Mrs. Oxney said. “You painted Geraniums from the bed below the dining-room windows. Such a show there was of them. I saw you doing it, and I said to myself, ‘Now Miss Howard’s got a beautiful subject. That’ll be one of her best sketches.’ And I was right, for it and Pussy-dear were a guinea each. So here am I with Pussy-dear, and the Colonel with Geraniums, and the Reverend Banks with Evening Bells, which was the choicest of all. How things move about, don’t they and what a pleasure they give!”

  “And were there no sketches of your old home in the exhibition?” asked Colonel Chase.

  Again Miss Howard had to press her finger to her forehead.

  “Now did I put Chrysanthemums into it?” she asked. “Or Hearts of Oak? I remember painting Hearts of Oak just before I was obliged to let my little place. Two such wonderful trees, ever so many hundreds of years old, and quite hollow inside. The dear old place! How I long to see it again! Such a lovely view over the valley, and the sweet little old-world town once so fashionable. The Pantiles.”

  “But a very charming little town still, I believe,” said Colonel Chase. “A golf links, isn’t there, and a country club?”

  “Yes, oh yes,” said Miss Howard. “Papa used to like his round of golf and his rubber before dinner. He thought it his duty to take part in the social life of the little town. I have such sweet memories of the Croft — my little place, you know — and it is dreadful to think of it in the hands of strangers. But what was I to do? We’re all so hard hit by these monstrous taxes. And my tenants are very good, nice people, and they promised to take great care of my little bits of things.”

  Miss Howard was enjoying this immensely: without being guilty of downright fabrication, she was building up a most interesting fabric.

  “Beautiful furniture, I suppose,” said Colonel Chase.

  “Just some little family things,” said she with a sigh. “But after all what does it matter? If one cannot afford to live in the family place, one has to live somewhere else. It has happened to so many of us.”

  Miss Howard’s chance of matrimony, had she only known it was soaring upwards as on eagle’s wings. She had said nothing really definite but a great deal that was truly impressive in a vague and sumptuous manner. Colonel Chase allowed his imagination to run riot and it flowered into a paved courtyard with a sundial, and a gallery-room with Queen Anne furniture and portraits. His regiment, on his retiring had presented him with one of himself, one hand
holding a rifle and one foot in a beautifully polished boot on the famous man-eater. It hung at present in the dining room at Wentworth just opposite his table, but Mrs. Oxney could put ‘Pussy-dear’ there when it was removed to the gallery-room at the Croft. He felt that he might even change his name to Howard-Chase.

  Miss Howard was certainly the heroine of the day and to none was she more worshipful than to Florence Kemp. For a couple of weeks now Florence’s admiration of her had been ripening into a shy and silent adoration, and this afternoon, as the drawing-room emptied, she felt that it could be stifled in silence no longer, but must be allowed to begin expressing itself. Miss Howard must know in what tender esteem she was held, and how Florence longed to dedicate her affection by open avowal. She aspired to intimate friendship, and if that was out of reach, she wanted definite and indulgent permission to cherish and serve. Miss Howard (who surely would permit herself to be Alice for the future: that would be something) seemed to her the incarnation of brilliant existence. She could improvise, she could paint and sell those beautiful little sketches she dashed off so easily; she was gay and independent and self-reliant. Then again how picturesque was the background she had several times indicated of an ancestral home to which she was evidently so much attached, though she accepted without unavailing regrets the penury which debarred her from living there. But all these gifts and qualities and conditions were but little decorations and fineries fitly adorning the surface; admirable accessories and attributes of the adorable. Florence felt moreover with the infallible certainty of instinct that the other was not one who cared much or indeed at all for the companionship or affection of men, and in this she recognised a secret kinship of nature with herself. Yet at present Miss Howard had no devoted friend or she would not be living at Wentworth in this unattached manner, and Florence longed to take a place that was clearly vacant.