Chapter Six.
Scarlet Slippers.
So soon as Mr Bertrand’s arrival in town became known, he was inundated with invitations of every description. To most of these it was impossible to take Hilary, but Miss Carr was indefatigable in escorting the girl to concerts and entertainments, and insisted that she should accompany her father when it was possible.
“If the child is old enough to have the responsibility of a household, she is old enough to have a little enjoyment, and to make her entrance into society. She is eighteen next May, she tells me, and she is old for her age. You must certainly take her to Lady Mary’s ‘At Home.’ There will be music, and recitations, and a crowd of people—just the sort of thing to please a young girl!”
Mr Bertrand shrugged his shoulders and affected to be horrified at the idea of having to take out a grown-up daughter. “It makes a man feel so old,” he said, “and I know quite well I shall forget all about her when I begin talking to my old friends! However, I’ll do my best. See that the child has something decent to wear, like a good soul. I’m not so short of money now as in the days when you used to send hampers to my rooms in Oxford, and I should like her to look well. She is not a beauty like Lettice, but she is a nice-looking little girl in her way, isn’t she, Helen?”
“Oh, I think we may give her credit for more than that. She has an exquisite complexion, and holds up her little head as if she were quite conscious of being the eldest child of a famous man. You won’t be ashamed of your daughter, I promise you.”
Hilary was delighted at the thought of accompanying her father to the “At Home,” but though she gushed over the prospect in her letters to her sisters, she did her utmost to hide her excitement from Miss Carr. The old lady had a habit of making sly little hits at her expense, the cause of which the girl totally misunderstood. She imagined that it was her youth and want of experience which annoyed her hostess, whereas, in reality, it was her affectation of age and worldly knowledge. When the night arrived, however, it was impossible to keep as calm as she would have liked, as she arrayed herself in her dainty new frock before dinner. Miss Carr’s choice had been eminently successful. A plain white satin dress with an overskirt of chiffon, which gave an effect of misty lightness, a wreath of snowdrops among the puffings at the neck, and long ends of ribbon hanging from the waist. Hilary looked very sweet and fresh as she walked into the drawing-room, with a flush of self-conscious pleasure on her cheeks, and her father gave a start of surprise as he saw her.
“So! My little girl!” Miss Carr was not yet in the room, and he took Hilary by the hands, holding her out at arm’s length, and looking down at her with grave, tender eyes. “It’s very nice, dear. I’m proud of you!” Then drawing her to him, and kissing her on the forehead, “We must be great friends, you and I, my big daughter. This is the beginning of a new life for you, but you will not grow to think less of the old home and the old friends?”
“No, no, father! no, never!” Hilary spoke in a quick, breathless whisper, and there was an unusual moisture in her eyes. Her father saw that she was nervous and excited, and hastened to change the subject before there was any danger of a breakdown. The door opened at this moment to admit Miss Carr, and he advanced to meet her holding Hilary’s hand in his, in the high, stately fashion in which a knight of old led out his partner in the gavotte.
“Miss Hilary Maud Everette Bertrand—at your service. And many thanks to the good fairy who has worked the transformation!”
“Humph!” said Mrs Carr, shortly. “Fine feathers make fine birds. There’s the gong for dinner, and if you two are not hungry, I am, so let us get the serious business over first, and then I’ll have a look at the fineries.” Then, after her usual fashion, she slipped her hand through the girl’s arm and led her affectionately across the hall. “Sweet seventeen! Ah, dear me, I wonder how many years ago it is since I went out in my first white dress? I was a pretty girl then, my dear, though you may not think it to look at me now, and I remember my excitement as if it were yesterday.”
When the carriage came to the door two hours later on, Hilary wrapped herself up in fleecy shawls and went into the drawing-room to bid her hostess good-night, but she was not allowed to take her departure so easily. Miss Carr protested that she was not wrapped up sufficiently, and sent upstairs for a hood and a pair of hideous scarlet worsted bedroom slippers, which she insisted upon drawing over the dainty white satin shoes. Hilary protested, but she was not allowed to have a say in the matter.
“Nonsense, my dear; it’s a bitterly cold night, and you have half an hour’s drive. We can’t have you catching cold, just to have your feet looking pretty in a dark carriage. Go along now, and ‘Good-night,’ for I shall be in bed when you come back. I’ll hear all your adventures in the morning,” and she waved the girl away in the imperious fashion which no one dare resist.
Hilary was annoyed, but she soon forgot the ugly slippers in the fascination of a drive through the brightly-lighted streets, and when the carriage drew up beneath an awning, and she had a peep at a beautiful hall, decorated with palms and flowering plants, and saw the crowd flocking up the staircase, her breath came fast with excitement. Her father led her into the house and disappeared through a doorway on the left, while she herself was shown into a room on the right, wherein a throng of fashionable ladies were divesting themselves of their wraps, and giving finishing touches to their toilets before the mirrors. Those who were nearest to Hilary turned curious glances at her as she took off her shawls, and the girl felt a sudden and painful consciousness of insignificant youth. They were so very grand, these fine ladies. They wore such masses of diamonds, and such marvellous frocks, and mantles, and wrappings, that she was over-awed, and hurried out of the room as quickly as possible, without daring to step forward to a mirror. Such a crowd of guests were making their way up the staircase, that Hilary and her father could only move forward a step at the time, but after they had shaken hands with a stout lady and a thin gentleman at the head of the stairs, there was a sudden thinning off, for a suite of reception rooms opened out of the hall, and the guests floated away in different directions.
Mr Bertrand led the way into the nearer of the rooms, and no sooner had he appeared in the doorway, than there came a simultaneous exclamation of delight from a group of gentlemen who stood in the centre of the floor, and he was seized by the arm, patted on the shoulder, and surrounded by a bevy of admiring friends. Poor Hilary stood in the background, abashed and deserted. Her father had forgotten all about her existence. The group of friends were gradually drawing him further and further away. Not a soul did she know among all the brilliant throng. Several fashionably dressed ladies put up their eye-glasses to stare at her as she stood, a solitary figure at the end of the room, then turned to whisper to each other, while the youngest and liveliest of the party put her fan up to her face and tittered audibly. They were laughing at her, the rude, unkind, unfeeling creatures.
“What could there be to laugh at?” asked Hilary of herself. Her dress had been made by a fashionable modiste; Miss Carr’s own maid had arranged her hair. “I may not be pretty, but there’s nothing ludicrous about me that I know of,” said the poor child to herself, with catching breath. In spite of her seventeen years, her new dress, and all her ecstatic anticipations, a more lonely, uncomfortable, and tearfully-inclined young woman it would be difficult to find. She looked round in despair, espied a seat in a retired corner, and was making for it as quickly as might be, when she came face to face with a mirror, and in it saw a reflection which made the colour rush to her cheeks in a hot, crimson tide. A girlish figure, with a dark head set gracefully upon a slender neck, a dainty dress, all cloudy chiffon, satiny ribbons, and nodding snowdrops, and beneath—oh, good gracious!—beneath the soft frilled edgings, a pair of enormous, shapeless, scarlet worsted bed slippers! It would be difficult to say which was the more scarlet at that moment—the slippers themselves or Hilary’s cheeks. She shuffled forward and stood in the corner, paralysed with horror. There had been such a crowd in the cloak-room, and she had been so anxious to get away, that she had forgotten all about the wretched slippers. So that was why the ladies were laughing! Oh, to think how she must have looked—standing by herself in the doorway, with those awful, awful scarlet feet shown up against the white skirts!
“Sit down and slip them off, and hide them in the corner. No one will see you!” said a sympathetic voice in her ear, and Hilary turned sharply to find that one end of the seat was already occupied by a gentleman, who was regarding her with a very kindly smile of understanding. His face was thin, and there were signs of suffering in the strained expression of the eyes, so that Hilary, looking at him, found it impossible to take his advice otherwise than in a friendly spirit.
“Th–ank you,” she stammered, and pulling off the offending slippers, hid them swiftly behind the folds of the curtains, and seated herself on the sofa by his side.
“That’s better!” cried the stranger, looking down with approving eyes at the little satin shoes which were now revealed. “Forgot to take them off, didn’t you? Very natural. I did the same with snow-shoes once, and was in the room for half an hour before I discovered that I still had them on.”
“But snow-shoes are black. They wouldn’t look half so bad. I saw those ladies laughing at me. What must they have thought?”
“Do you think it matters very much what they thought?” The stranger turned his face towards Hilary, and smiled again in his slow, gentle manner. “Why trouble yourself about the opinion of people whom you don’t know, and whom you will probably never see again? I suppose it is a matter of perfect indifference to them, but what I think about them is, that they were exceedingly ill-bred to behave as they did, and I should attach no value whatever to their opinions. Have you—er—lost sight of your friends?”
“No, they have lost sight of me.” The stranger was at once so kind, and so sensible, that Hilary began to feel a delightful sense of restored equanimity, and even gave a little laugh of amusement as she spoke. “I came with my father, and he has gone off with some friends and forgotten all about my existence. He is over there at the end of the room; the tall man with the brown moustache—Mr Austin Bertrand.”
The stranger gave a little jump in his seat, and the colour tinged his cheek. “Bertrand!” he exclaimed. “You are Bertrand’s daughter!” He stared at Hilary with newly-awakened interest, while she smiled, well pleased by the sensation which the name caused.
“Yes; Austin Bertrand, the novelist. You know him, then? You are one of his friends?”
“Hardly that, I am afraid. I know him slightly, and he has been most kind to me when we have met, but I cannot claim him as a friend. I am one of his most ardent admirers.”
“And do you write yourself?” queried Hilary, looking scrutinisingly at the sensitive, intellectual face, and anticipating the answer before it came.
“A little. Yes! It is my great consolation. My name is Herbert Rayner, Miss Bertrand. I may as well introduce myself as there is no one to do it for me. I suppose you have come up to town on a visit with your father. You have lived in the Lake district for the last few years, have you not? I envy you having such a lovely home.”
Hilary elevated her eyebrows in doubtful fashion. “In summer it is perfectly delightful, but I don’t like country places in winter. We are two miles from a village, and three miles from the nearest station, so you can imagine how quiet it is, when it gets dark soon after four o’clock, and the lanes are thick with snow. I was glad to come back to London for a change. This is the first grown-up party I have been to in my life.”
Mr Rayner smiled a little, repeating her words and lingering with enjoyment on the childish expression. “The first party! Is it indeed? I only wish it were mine. I don’t mean to pretend that I am bored by visiting, as is the fashionable position nowadays. I am too fond of seeing and studying my fellow-creatures for that ever to be possible, but a first experience of any kind has an interest which cannot be repeated. I am like you, I don’t like winter. I feel half alive in cold weather, and would like to go to bed and stay there until it was warm again. There is no country in the world more charming than England for seven months of the year, and none so abominable for the remaining five. If it were not for my work I would always winter abroad, but I am obliged to be in the hum of things. How do you manage to amuse yourself in the Lakes?”
“We don’t manage at all,” said Hilary frankly. “At least, I mean we are very happy, of course, because there are so many of us, and we are always having fun and jokes among ourselves; but we have nothing in the way of regular entertainments, and it gets awfully dull. My sisters and I had a big grumbling festival on New Year’s Day, and told all our woes to father. He was very kind, and said he would see what could be done, and that’s why I came up to London—to give me a little change.”
“I see!” Mr Rayner looked into the girl’s face with a scrutinising look. “So you are dull and dissatisfied with your surroundings. That’s a pity! You ought to be so happy, with such a father, brothers, and sisters around you, and youth, and health! It seems to me that you are very well off.”
Hilary put up her chin with an air of offended dignity. For one moment she felt thoroughly annoyed, but the next, her heart softened, for it was impossible to be vexed with this interesting stranger, with his pathetic, pain-marked face. Why had he used that word “consolation” in reference to his work? And why did his voice take that plaintive note as he spoke of “youth and health”? “I shall ask father about him,” said Hilary to herself; and just at that moment Mr Bertrand came rushing across the room with tardy remembrance.
“My dear child, I forgot all about you. Are you all right? Have you had some coffee? Have you found anyone to—er—” He turned a questioning glance upon the other occupant of the seat, knitted his brows for a second, and then held out his hand, with an exclamation of recognition. “Rayner! How are you? Glad to see you again. I was only talking of you to Moss the other day. That last thing of yours gave me great pleasure—very fine indeed. You are striding ahead! Come and lunch with me some day while I am in town. I should like to have a chat. Have you been making friends with my daughter? Much obliged to you for entertaining her, I have so many old friends here that I don’t know which way to turn. Well, what day will you come? Will Tuesday suit? This is my present address, and my kind hostess allows me to ask what guests I will. There was something I had specially on my mind to ask you. Tuesday, then—half-past one! Good-bye till then. Hilary, I will look you up later on. Glad you are so well entertained.” He was off again, flying across the room, scattering smiles and greetings as he went, while the two occupants of the corner seat exchanged glances of amusement.
“That’s just like father. He gets so excited that he flies about all over the house, and hardly knows what he is doing.”
“He is delightfully fresh and breezy; just like his books. And now you would like some refreshments. They are in the little room over there. I shall be happy to accompany you, if you will accept my somewhat—er—inefficient escort.”
Hilary murmured some words of thanks, a good deal puzzled to understand the meaning of those last two words. Somewhat to her surprise, her new friend had not risen to talk to her father, and even now, as she stood up in response to his invitation, he remained in his seat, bending forward to grope behind the curtains. A moment later he drew forth something at the sight of which Hilary gave an involuntary exclamation of dismay. It was a pair of crutches; and as Mr Rayner placed one under each arm and rose painfully to his feet, a feeling of overpowering pity took possession of the girl’s heart. Her eyes grew moist, and a cry of sympathy forced themselves from her trembling lips.
“Oh—I—I’m sorry!” she gasped, with something that was almost a sob of emotion, and Mr Rayner winced at the sound as with sudden pain.
“Thank you,” he said shortly. “You are very kind. I’m—I’m used to it, you know. This way, please.” And without another word he led the way towards the refreshment room, while Hilary followed, abashed and sorrowful.