Chapter Sixteen.
Straws.
By Sunday Millie had given up all thought of seeing Wareham. He had told her that his stay in London could not exceed a few days, business might keep him there so long, but he had even talked of a quicker escape, and laughed at his probable solitude and discomfort at a club where workmen would be in possession, and he’d be hunted out of his favourite corners. The difference in comfort between a train on and off the line, he declared. “Women manage better in their worst domestic emergencies, but man is a helpless animal.”
“From what you have told me, though, you have liked to rough it in other places?” Millie remarked in wonder.
“To rough it—yes. That is easy enough. To be uncomfortable in the midst of luxury is quite another matter, and there I rebel. If the best cook in London is in the kitchen, why should I dine on a burnt chop?”
He laughed as he said it, and she consoled herself for what seemed the blemish of self-indulgence in her hero, by the conviction that he spoke in jest. But it came back to her, and she reflected with a sigh that he had probably found his conditions irksome, and fled from them. She was spared shock to vanity, for she had never thought of her own attractions as strong enough to influence his staying, and it had only been a modest hope that they had become so friendly that he would keep his promise to see them which was disappointed. When Sunday afternoon came, it was not expectation which held her at home, but a dislike to Miss Burton, to whose house Lady Fanny, accompanied by Mrs Ravenhill, had dutifully betaken herself. She sat with a book on her lap, languidly idle, when Wareham was introduced. Pleasure leapt into her eyes.
“We thought you were gone!”
“Only delayed and busy.”
“You have been able to endure your club?”
He laughed. “I have not had the time to consider my miseries. I dare say they have been of the worst. How is Mrs Ravenhill? Your maid said that she was at home, and I hoped in this weather!”
“I expect her every moment. You know she never minded weather, for as to that we seem to have left all that is delightful in Norway. You have not heard from them?” Wareham laughed.
“I see you have already forgotten the fate of letters, how slowly they get out of your delightful country! Besides, I expect none.” He looked healthy and in good spirits. Millie’s own rose. She pointed out all the treasures to him; he had seen them before, but already they had acquired memories, which is but another word for history. This came from Stavanger, that from Odde.
“But nothing from Gudvangen, which was the nicest place of all,” she cried.
“Pity that strawberries are not solid reminiscences,” he said, laughing, whereupon she ventured a bantering remark upon his own experiences.
“You nearly had too much of my nicest place.”
“Very nearly.”
His tone did not encourage her to continue, and she was sensitive to all its changes, yet the subject attracted her inevitably. If she left it, it was only in appearance. Wareham, on his part, was always freshly struck with the fact that she was prettier than he imagined, and as he wanted to forget Anne, he carefully impressed the discovery upon himself. A heart which had suddenly grown restless was something new to him, for many years he had declared that it would trouble him no more, and from its quiet vantage-point had discoursed philosophically and wisely to Hugh and his fellows. It is bewildering to conceive yourself standing on a solid hill, and to find yourself shot into the air by a volcano, and Wareham was annoyed both with the volcano and with Anne. Away from her, her power waned; he admitted her charm, but could weigh it against this or that, and face probabilities. What he told himself was, that it was, after all, probable that Hugh would win the day. His youth, his impetuosity, and the liking she acknowledged, would all stand him in good stead. Vanity might whisper that she had shown decided marks of preference for himself, but if he had had the chance, it was very certain that he had put it behind him. Even—and here there came another restless throb—even if Hugh were once more dismissed, she was not likely to forget what almost amounted to rejection of her overtures.
He did not repent. He thought of her as a splendid woman, dwarfing others, but at any cost to himself he was glad to have been true to his friend. What he did writhe under, and heartily wish he could undo, was the letter, the pursuing letter, by this time probably in Hugh’s hands. His first act, on reaching London, had been to go to Hugh’s club and ask for his letters, hoping that he might thus intercept his own. All that he learnt, however, was that those that had reached had been already forwarded. Vexation—more than vexation—he might feel and did, but for the letter there was no recall.
Therefore, nothing remained but to wait and leave matters as they were. And his blood had cooled. Away from her, he could even imagine obeying wise dictates, and resigning her, though she might be free; nevertheless he was conscious all the while that once remove the restraint, and his heart might again astonish him by independent action.
Meanwhile he was glad to find that he liked being with Millie. Towards her he felt calm friendliness, and the sensation was as refreshing as cool air to a fevered head. He thought of her as some one to whom he could talk without dread of misconception, the idea that she liked him had never entered his mind; the companionship which might easily have proved irksome had not chafed, because she and Mrs Ravenhill were careful to avoid anything which had the appearance of a fetter.
The two were chatting gaily when Mrs Ravenhill and Lady Fanny returned. Fanny had pointed, in dumb show, to a man’s hat in the hall, and lifted her eyebrows interrogatively. Questions in a small house were to be avoided. Mrs Ravenhill shook her head. Fanny had already guessed, but the mother had no more thought of Wareham than of any other accidental acquaintance, and expressed her astonishment upon seeing him.
“I hardly thought you would have found us out, or, indeed, that you would have stayed on in town.”
“You have not flown yourselves?”
“Oh, women, women! They do not require all that a man demands; besides, a house is an anchor, and we only occasionally drag ours. Let me introduce you to Lady Fanny Enderby.”
The ground was gone over again, and the possibility of Lord Milborough falling in with the friends they had left discussed. Lady Fanny promptly showed her interest in Miss Dalrymple.
“And I hear that Mr Forbes is of the party, so now one knows what to expect.”
In spite of philosophy, Wareham felt keen inclination to fall foul of this assurance. Mrs Ravenhill said briskly that she hoped things might turn out well for the young man, for there was something very attractive about him. She asked Wareham whether he would dine with them on the following day, with a sort of apology.
“We don’t give dinner-parties, but we have shared a good many indifferent meals together of late.”
“Thank you—I am afraid I am leaving London to-morrow,” he said hesitatingly. The next moment he added—“After all, I don’t see why I shouldn’t afford myself the pleasure. I will put off going until Tuesday.”
Lady Fanny drew her own conclusions, and they were favourable. For a man to stay in London for the sake of dining with three women, she felt, spoke volumes. Her own experience in signs was so much more extensive than that of either Mrs Ravenhill or Millie, that she looked on them from heights as a professor would look at a tyro, and smiled at the mothers unconsciousness, and at Millie’s—to her—evident perturbation. She longed to cry at her—“Dear, don’t be a goose! Take your due, or you will never have it!” but comforted herself with the reflection that perhaps Wareham was used to women who expected much, and that Millie’s absence of assertion might constitute her charm. The censor thought it bad for him, and her fingers tingled with the wish to teach a lesson, but it must be remembered that she judged him as an incipient lover; and that her haste for the happiness of her beloved Millie led her to jump at unwarrantable conclusions. They would have amazed Wareham, who felt that here he was free from the heated atmosphere in which he had lived of late.
Prudent Fanny avoided comments, of which she knew the danger. She contented herself with remarking that evening to Mrs Ravenhill—
“I am so glad you asked Mr Wareham to dine. I am sure it was a tribute to my curiosity.”
“To be candid, I believe it was because I thought I must, after having seen so much of him in Norway, but I am glad if it pleases you. Were you really curious to meet him?”
“Of course I was. Ever since I heard that you had travelled with Miss Dalrymple and Mr Wareham, I have felt that life had been unfairly generous to you for a whole fortnight, and I was so dull all that time! The most humdrum people you ever saw were collected at Thorpe. Whatever wits I possessed before were sat upon, and the poor things don’t yet know whether they may peep out again.”
Millie remarked that she appeared to have amused herself.
“No, no, no such thing! Neither myself nor any one else. And there were you with an author, a beauty, and a revived romance. How could you come away?”
Mrs Ravenhill laughed.
“We didn’t feel necessary.”
“And you brought the author.”
“Yes. If Millie’s ideas were correct, the poor man had nothing for it but to fly.”
“Why?” Lady Fanny pricked her ears.
“She fancied he had lost his heart to Miss Dalrymple. I don’t know, I am sure, if she was right, but it is quite possible. According to you, Fanny, such matters don’t take long, now-a-days.”
Lady Fanny had received a shock, though she carried it off stoutly.
“Oh, no, not long. But his heart is safely buttoned up under his waistcoat; trust me! Admire her, he would, he must—that doesn’t include loving. Besides—his friend! Why it would be base, dishonourable! Millie, you are an uncharitable little ignoramus, to take such ideas into your head.”
And Millie was content to think so.
The next day was brilliantly fine, and they were to go to tea at the Tower, and as Lady Fanny had never seen it, the sights were to be pointed out to her beforehand by a special warder. They went by Underground, and on the way to the South Kensington station, a gentleman doubtfully crossed the road, and was struck by amazement at finding himself before Lady Fanny. Mrs Ravenhill perceived that he was a clergyman, tall, and, at this moment, pink. He began to stammer vague sentences, mixtures of pleasure, astonishment, apology, Lady Fanny surveying him with a frown.
“What could bring you to London at such a time?” she exclaimed severely, and introduced him as Mr Elliot, Mrs Ravenhill gathered that he came from the neighbourhood of Thorpe, and inspiration led her to see in him a supporter for Mr Wareham that evening, with the want of which her mind had been troubled. She asked him to dinner, as an acquaintance of Lady Fanny’s, and increasing pinkness did not prevent his absolutely leaping at the proposal. But when they had left him, Fanny fell upon her.
“What possessed you? The idea of being saddled with Mr Elliot! He will sit mute.”
“He might do worse. But I am not afraid. You will make him talk.”
“I? Not I! I have no patience with him. He is the most preposterous man!”
“Fanny, you’re not really vexed?” whispered Millie, as they went down the steps. Her friend darted a look at her. They had to fall into single file, and there was a rush for the train.
On a fine autumn afternoon there is no more delightful spot in London than the Tower. The great river flows by, alight with sunshine, crowded with life; and here as elsewhere, privilege leads to pleasant paths. They strolled where they pleased, and lingered. The river front held them long. Transforming sunshine softened stones and the old tragedies which clung to them; as for the green, it was so inviting a spot that Fanny declared it made her wish to be beheaded there. She flashed here and there in her most fitful mood. Millie could not make her out; she herself declared that the sun intoxicated her, yet once the other girl imagined that she caught a gleam of tears in the grey eyes, swept out of sight the next moment. Something was amiss. Perhaps she would rather go home. Millie did not dare put the question, but she flung out a rope.
“This tea? Must we go to it?”
“Must we! How soon may we? was in my mind,” said Fanny promptly. “Sympathy with Guy Fawkes has exhausted me, and my ideas drop greedily to the level of tea-cakes. Come, Mrs Ravenhill.”
No more suspicion of a tear. Millie, happy herself, believed she had been mistaken, and amused herself by watching how the young men of the party drifted to Fanny’s side. She flung sparkling sentences about, and told one or two stories with irresistible mimicry. The Tower was talked of, and the old traditions which are not permitted to live on, even there; history was compared to a captive balloon, kept floating before our eyes till a prick collapses it.
“More like an old picture, gaily painted over. We bring our turpentine and away flies the decorative colour, leaving truth dingy,” said Lady Fanny.
“The warders of the Tower are placed there to prevent either catastrophe,” said young Sir Walter Holford. “They have strict orders to admit neither dynamite nor Professor Winter.”
“Is he dangerous?”
“Destructive. If any man can pull down Church and State, there you have him.”
“And he looks so amiable! Once I met him, and he fascinated me with the history of our own village, until I saw it in all its developments.”
“Yes, he can be graphic, when he is not shy,” remarked an old gentleman.
Lady Fanny instantly inveighed against shy men.
“They spoil conversation,” he agreed.
“Their own lives, and other people’s.”
Millie thought of the pink clergyman, and was sorry that her mother had been so precipitate, but could not understand rancour on the part of her friend, whose heart was so kind that she would have expected pity. Going home, Fanny was silent, and Mrs Ravenhill openly wished they had a quiet evening before them instead of two gentlemen to entertain.
She delivered this sentiment as they reached the door. Fanny murmured to herself—“Dear blind woman!” while she went wearily up-stairs. She wanted to be alone, she was afraid that Millie would follow her, but she did not. Each girl was on the defensive, conscious of something in her heart, which she was pressing back, and inclined to avoid the other. Lady Fanny did not come down until the two guests had arrived; her greetings were formal. She swept the room, and discovered that Millie had been at work with dainty touches, which somehow vexed her. As for Mr Elliot, he became hopelessly embarrassed in his attempts to explain what had brought him to London, until Mrs Ravenhill took pity on him and engaged him gently, while Wareham was left to the two girls.
He was conscious of a curious dual feeling, as if he had two natures, the one persuading the other against its will. He almost believed that his short sharp fever was at an end, and encouraged the pleasure he took in Millie’s society as offering proof of returning reason. It was true that the sight of the girl, the sound of her voice, now and again recalled some incisive remark of Anne’s. He recollected, for instance, that she had called her “an embodied conscience,” but the remembrance was free from disturbance. Once, however, quite unreasonably, for the talk was of a lately written book, a vision of Anne, radiant as the morning, standing between walls of rye in the rocky little path at Haare, flashed upon him, and for the moment he saw nothing else. It cost him a wrench to come back, and he turned almost eagerly to Millie. Metaphorically, she was the shield to present between himself and distracting memories. Fanny was neglected, and smiled.
“Talk, talk,” she said to herself, “for the more you get below the surface, the better you will appreciate her. But if I thought Miss Dalrymple was a rival, I should try to crush poor Millie’s incipient liking.”
She was uneasy, but there was nothing for it but to keep on the watch for the blowing of straws. And her other side engaged one ear. Mr Elliot was talking, and talking coherently, to Mrs Ravenhill. Fanny caught a sentence and smiled.
“Sense, thank heaven!” she went on. “Why on earth can’t he keep to it?”
She was forced, presently, into closer contact. Mrs Ravenhill became a little annoyed at having the stranger so persistently thrown on her hands; dinner, and Fanny’s near neighbourhood, gave her an opportunity for insisting upon her sharing in the conversation.
“You did not tell me, Fanny,” she said, “that Mr Elliot was so near a neighbour of yours at Thorpe.”
“It is difficult to believe it, at times,” said Fanny demurely. She flung him a glance through her long lashes, under which he became incoherent.
“Not—not near enough, and the road is de—delightfully muddy,” he stammered.
“Delightfully, when you are in search of an excuse! I did not know that men were so afraid of mud. No, no, Mrs Ravenhill, if you want to know the truth, it is that one must be a pauper to be worthy of Mr Elliot’s friendship. With parish pay and a craving for grocery tickets, you might hope to be the object of his warm regard, but other people are not even believed to possess souls.”
Mrs Ravenhill was surprised. The words jested, but there was a sting at their back unlike Lady Fanny, who never wilfully hurt.
“She is giving you a good character.” She smiled at Mr Elliot, by way of offering consolation, and Fanny tossed out her next words in a sharper tone.
“Why? For supposing that incomes preclude souls? That’s the way with your clergymen. Rich people have pockets, but no souls; or if they do possess any poor shrivelled little things, they can be left to take care of themselves.”
“No, no, Lady Fanny,” protested her victim, pinker than ever. “You forget. They—they have other opportunities.”
“Do you mean being sat next to at dinner?” Her eyes smiled at him an invitation to say more, to use his; as he was silent, she drummed the table with impatient fingers, and dropped her voice. “What brought you to London?”
“There was—there is—question of a living.”
“Offered?”
“Yes.”
“And accepted?”
“I—I hardly know—I believe it may be.”
Silence. Then—
“Where?”
“In Oxfordshire.”
“And good? I mean good as we mercenary people weigh goodness?”
“Oh, yes.” He ventured to look directly at her. “You—you think I should take it?”
She turned her head away. A smile was on her lips, and she mimicked his hesitation slightly.
“I—I think that’s a matter you must decide for yourself.”
His voice gained confidence.
“Laugh at me as much as you like, if only you will advise me. That is why I came to London.”
It was Lady Fanny’s turn to look discomposed.
“Hush!” she said, under her breath, and glancing at Mrs Ravenhill. “I do think that you shy men, when once you speak, become absolutely audacious. Pray how should I advise?”
“Am I fit? You know me.”
This time she laughed out.
“I don’t indeed. You must go to your old people for a character. Very possibly they might give you one.”
“And if—if that question were answered,” he went on hesitatingly, “there are others—”
She cried impatiently—“I don’t believe you ever would be without them.” But by this time Mrs Ravenhill, thinking that Lady Fanny had had enough of her silent neighbour, struck in with an observation.
Wareham and Millie were in full tide of talk. Released from the usual daily remarks of travel, they had touched on many subjects, and reached books. He found she had read a good deal, and with delicate observation. Miss Dalrymple’s taste was of stronger calibre, and she admired what Millie shrank from; but he recognised that this was not so much from the timidity he expected, as from finding what was bad, ugly, and unsympathetic. Millie steered carefully away from Wareham’s own books; he caught himself, however, reflecting gratefully that he had never written anything he should be ashamed for her to read.
Lady Fanny played in the evening, wishing, as she said, to promote conversation. Perhaps it was also to afford a cover for Mr Elliot’s silence; certain it is that he subsided into a chair which commanded a view of the piano, and uttered no sound. Mrs Ravenhill asked Wareham where he was going when he left London, more for the sake of saying something than from interest. He named Wales, as a place where he had never been and which seemed to offer advantages, among them that of being easily got out of.
“Failure can be remedied in an hour,” he said, with a laugh at himself. “I dare say I shall drift back to London before I have long been out of it.”
Mrs Ravenhill did not even say, “Come and see us.” She was indifferent, little dreaming how hopefully Millie hung on the suggestion.
When Wareham left, Mr Elliot, by a superhuman effort, managed also to take his leave. He had said no more to Fanny, but his eyes must have expressed entreaty, for she remarked, on shaking hands, that if chance brought him in that direction again, she would be there a few days longer.
“Fanny!” cried Millie, reproachfully, as the door closed.
“Yes—terrible, isn’t it? But the poor man is lost in London. One must do what one can. How hot it is!” And she went singing to the window, and out on the balcony.
The night was fine. Wareham and his companion walked the length of the park instead of calling a hansom. Away from bewildering woman Mr Elliot could talk quietly and sensibly; he told Wareham that a living was awaiting decision, and Wareham honoured the young fellow for the manner in which he discussed it, half envied the enthusiasm with which he spoke of his work. They parted friendly, Mr Elliot to strike off to the Marble Arch, Wareham to make his way slowly down Piccadilly, twinkling with lights even in August.
He felt more at peace than he had felt of late; hailing the return of common-sense as a sick man hails convalescence. Anne Dalrymple had filled his mind so that other women were dwarfed by her to nothingness; now he was able, he thought, to relegate them to their true proportion. The longer he reflected upon the state of affairs he had left behind, the more fully he was convinced that Hugh would regain his lost position, the two would return to England engaged, and Anne would not descend to another fit of freakishness.
To have broken his own chains by that time would be to regain his self-respect, to look Hugh frankly in the face, laugh, if he laughed, at a transient folly. Now and then, it is true, thought glanced off to the other possibility, and dizziness warned him of danger. For, if Hugh were rejected—Wareham found himself once more at Anne’s side; with a flutter of Love’s wings, away went the defences he had built up round his heart, tumbling into pitiable ruin, and the traitor heart rejoicing. This was not like the victory of common-sense; he pulled himself together, and dragged back his scattered forces, marshalling Millie in the van, praising her delicate unobtrusiveness, and applauding himself for appreciating it. The dimple, even, was hauled up to the rescue. Nothing was more charming, more womanly than a dimple. By the time he slept, he was satisfied to have regained his position. He slept well, too, another proof of foolish Love defeated. Avaunt, teasing boy, too feeble to overthrow real resistance!
By morning a capricious rain was falling, washing the blackened leaves. Wareham was not leaving until the afternoon; he took a turn in Saint James’s Park, to have a look at the wood-pigeons there, before going to his club for letters. A telegram awaited him. The name of Martyn as sender awoke no association until he read—“Forbes ill. Some one should come. Bergen, August 17th.”
He had scarcely finished before he remembered that Hugh’s sister was in Germany, and old Sir Michael incapacitated from moving by rheumatism. Another reflection, as instantaneous, reminded him that the Hull steamer started that evening. There was no question. He sent a telegram to Sir Michael, drove to his rooms, where fortunately his man had his things ready, and caught the train for Hull.