A SOIRÉE AT WALPOLE LODGE.
When the lute is broken,
Sweet notes are remembered not;
When the lips have spoken,
Loved accents are soon forgot.
As music and splendour
Survive not the lamp and the lute,
The heart's echoes render
No song when the spirit is mute.
Shelley.
About three miles from Hyde Park Corner, somewhere among the cross-roads between Mortlake and Kew, there stands a rambling, old-fashioned house, within about four acres of garden, surrounded by a very high, red-brick wall. It is one of those houses of which there used to be scores within the immediate neighbourhood of London—of which there still are dozens, although, alas! they are yearly disappearing to make room for gay rows of pert, upstart villas, whose tawdry flashiness ill replaces the sedate respectability of their last-century predecessors. But, uncoveted by the contractor's lawless eye, untouched by the builder's desecrating hand, Walpole Lodge stands on, as it did a hundred years ago, hidden behind the shelter of its venerable walls, and half smothered under masses of wisteria and Virginia creeper. On the wall, in summer time, grow countless soft green mosses, and brown, waving grasses. Thick masses of yellow stonecrop and tufts of snapdragon crown its summit, whilst the topmost branches of the long row of lime-trees within come nodding sweet-scented greetings to the passers-by along the dusty high road below.
But in the winter the wall is flowerless and the branches of the lime-trees are bare, and within, in the garden, there are only the holly-trees and the yew-hedge of the shrubbery walks, and the empty brown flower-beds set in the faded grass. But winter and summer alike, old Lady Kynaston holds her weekly receptions, and thither flock all the wit, and the talent, and the fashion of London. In the summer they are garden parties, in the winter they become evening receptions. How she manages it no one can quite tell; but so it is, that her rooms are always crowded, that no one is ever bored at her house, that people are always keen to come to her, and that there are hundreds who would think it an effort to go to other people's parties across the street who think it no trouble at all to drive nearly to Richmond, to hers. She has the rare talent of making society a charm in itself. No one who is not clever, or beautiful, or distinguished in some way above his or her fellows ever gains a footing in her drawing-rooms. Every one of any note whatever is sure to be found there. There are savants and diplomatists, poets and painters, foreign ambassadors, and men of science. The fashionable beauty is sure to be met there side by side with the latest type of strong-minded woman; the German composer, with the wild hair, whose music is to regenerate the future, may be seen chatting to a cabinet minister; the most rising barrister of the day is lingering by the side of a prima-donna, or discoursing to an Eastern traveller. Old Lady Kynaston herself has charming manners, and possesses the rare tact of making every one feel at home and happy in her house.
It was not done in a day—this gathering about her of so brilliant and delightful a society. She had lived many years at Walpole Lodge, ever since her widowhood, and was now quite an old lady. In her early life she had written several charming books—chiefly biographies of distinguished men whom she had known, and even now she occasionally put pen again to paper, and sent some delightful social essay or some pleasantly written critique to one or other of the Reviews of the day.
Her married life had been neither very long nor very happy. She had never learnt to love her husband's country home. At his death she had turned her back thankfully upon Kynaston, and had never seen it again. Of her two sons, she stood in some awe of the elder, whose cold and unresponsive character resembled her dead husband's, whilst she adored Maurice, who was warm-hearted and affectionate in manner, like herself. There were ten years between them, for she had been married twelve years; and at her secret heart Lady Kynaston hoped and believed that John would remain unmarried, so that the estates and the money might in time become Maurice's.
It is the second Thursday in December, and Lady Kynaston is "at home" to the world. Her drawing-rooms—there are three of them, not large, but low, comfortable rooms, opening one out of the other—are filled, as usual, with a mixed and brilliant crowd.
Across the square hall is the dining-room, where a cold supper, not very sumptuous or very recherché, but still sufficient of its kind for the occasion, is laid out; and beyond that is Lady Kynaston's boudoir, where there is a piano, and which is used on these occasions as a music-room, so that those who are musical may retire there, and neither interfere, nor be interfered with, by the rest of the company. Some one is singing in the music-room now—singing well, you may be sure, or he would not be at Walpole Lodge—but the strains of the song can hardly be heard at all across dining-room and hall, in the larger of the three rooms, where most of the guests are congregated.
Lady Kynaston, a small, slight woman in soft gray satin and old lace, moves about graciously and gracefully still, despite her seventy years, among her guests—stopping now at one group, now at another, talking politics to one, science to a second, whispering a few discreet words about the latest scandal to this great lady, murmuring words of approval upon her clever book or her charming poem to another. Her smiles are equally dispensed, no one is passed over, and she has the rare talent of making every single individual in the crowded room feel himself to be the one particular person whom Lady Kynaston is especially rejoiced to see. She has tact, and she has sympathy—two invaluable gifts in a woman.
Conspicuous among the crowd of well-dressed and handsome women is Helen Romer. She sits on an ottoman at the further end of the room, where she holds a little court of her own, dispensing her smiles and pleasant words among the little knot of men who linger admiringly by her side.
She is in black, with masses of gold embroidery about her, and she carries a large black and gold feather fan in her hands, which she moves rapidly, almost restlessly, up and down; her eyes wander often to the doorway, and every now and then she raises her hand with a short, impatient action to her blonde head, as though she were half weary of the talk about her.
Presently, Lady Kynaston, moving slowly among her guests, comes near her, and, leaning for a moment on the back of the ottoman, presses her hand as she passes.
Mrs. Romer is a favourite of hers; she is pretty, and she is piquant in manner and conversation; two very good things, which she thinks highly of in any young woman. Besides that, she knows that Helen loves her younger son; and, although she hardly understands how things are between them, nor how far Maurice himself is implicated, she believes that Helen will eventually inherit her grandfather's money, and, liking her personally, she has seen no harm in encouraging her too plainly displayed affection. Moreover, the love they both bear to him has been a link between them. They talk of him together almost as a mother and a daughter might do; they have the same anxieties over his health, the same vexations over his debts, the same rejoicings when his brother comes forward with his much-needed help. Lady Kynaston does not want her darling to marry yet, but when the time shall come for him to take unto himself a wife, she will raise no objection to pretty Helen Romer, should he bring her to her, as a daughter-in-law.
As the old lady stoops over her, Helen's upturned wistful eyes say as plainly as words can say it—
"Is he coming to-night?"
"Maurice will be here presently, I hope," says his mother, answering the look in her eyes; "he was to come up by the six o'clock train; he will dine at his club and come on here later." Helen's face became radiant, and Lady Kynaston passed on.
Maurice Kynaston's regiment was quartered at Northampton; he came up to town often for the day or for the night, as he could get leave; but his movements were never quite to be depended upon.
Half-an-hour or so more of feverish impatience. Helen watches the gay crowd about her with a feeling of sick weariness. Two members of Parliament are talking of Russian aggression and Turkish misrule close to her; they turn to her presently and include her in the conversation; Mrs. Romer gives her opinion shrewdly and sensibly. An elderly duchess is describing some episode of Royalty's last ball; there is a general laugh, in which Helen joins heartily; a young attaché bends over her and whispers some admiring little speech in her ear, and she blushes and smiles just as if she liked it above all things; while all the time her eyes hardly stray for one second from the open doorway through which Maurice will come, and her heart is saying to itself, over and over again,
"Will he come, will he come?"
He comes at last. Long before the servant, who opens the door to him, has taken his coat and hat from him, Helen catches sight of his handsome head and his broad shoulders through an opening in the crowd. In another minute he is in the room standing irresolute in the doorway, looking round as if to see who is and who is not there to-night.
He is, after all, only a very ordinary type of a good-looking soldierly young Englishman, just such a one as may be seen any day in our parks or our drawing-rooms. He has clearly-cut and rather prononcé features, a strong-built, well made figure, a long moustache, close-shaven cheeks, and eyes that are rather deep-set, and are, when you are near enough to see them well, of a deep blue-gray. In all that Maurice Kynaston is in no way different from scores of other good-looking young men whom we may have met. But there is just something that makes his face a remarkable one: it is a strong-looking face—a face that looks as if he had a will of his own and knew how to stick to it; a face that looks, too, as if he could do and dare much for truth and honour's sake. It is almost stern when he is silent; it can soften into the tenderness of a woman when he speaks.
Look at him now as he catches sight of his mother, and steps forward for a minute to press her loving hands. All the hardness and all the strength are gone out of his face now; he only looks down at her with eyes full of love and gentleness—for life as yet holds nothing dearer or better for him than that little white-haired old woman. Only for a minute, and then he leaves go of her hands, and passes on down the room, speaking to the guests whom he knows.
"He does not see me," says Helen, bitterly, to herself; "he will go on into the next room, and never know that I am here."
But he had seen her perfectly. Next to the woman he most wishes to see in a room, the one whom a man first catches sight of is the woman he would sooner were not there. He had seen Helen the very instant he came in, but he had noticed thankfully that some one was talking to her, and he said to himself that there was no occasion for him to hurry to her side; it was not as if they were openly engaged; there could be no necessity for him to rush into slavery at once; he would speak to her, of course, by-and-by; and whenever he came to her he well knew that he would be equally welcomed: he was so sure of her. Nothing on earth or under Heaven is so fatal to a man's love as that. There was no longer any uncertainty; there was none of the keenness of pursuit dear to the old hunting instinct inherent in man; there was not even the charm of variety in her moods. She was always the same to him; always she pouted a little at first, and looked ill-tempered, and reproached him; and always she came round again at his very first kind word, and poured out her heart in a torrent of worship at his feet. Maurice knew it all by heart, the sulks and the cross words, and then the passionate denials, and the wild protestations of her undying love. He was sorry for her, too, in his way; he was too tender-hearted, too chivalrous, to be anything but kind to her; but though he was sorry, he could not love her; and, oh! how insufferably weary of her he was!
Presently he did come up to her, and took the seat by her side just vacated by the attaché. The little serio-comedy instantly repeated itself.
A little pout and a little toss of the head.
"You have been as long coming to speak to me as you possibly could be."
"Do you think it would look well if I had come rushing up to you the instant I came in?"
"You need not, at all events, have stood talking for ten minutes to that great black-eyed Lady Anderleigh. Of course, if you like her better than me, you can go back to her."
"Of course I can, if I choose, you silly little woman; but seeing that I am by you, and not by her, I suppose it is a proof that I prefer your society, is it not?"
Very polite, but not strictly true, Captain Maurice! At his heart he preferred talking to Lady Anderleigh, or to any other woman in the room. The admission, however, was quite enough for Helen.
"Dear Maurice," she whispered, "forgive me; I am a jealous, bad-tempered wretch, but," lower still, "it is only because I love you so much."
And had there been no one in the room, Maurice knew perfectly that at this juncture Mrs. Romer would have cast her arms around his neck—as usual.
To his unspeakable relief, a man—a clever lawyer, whose attention was a flattering thing to any woman—came up to Helen at this moment, and took a vacant chair beside her. Maurice thankfully slipped away, leaving his inamorata in a state of rage and disgust with that talented and elderly lawyer, such as no words can describe.
Captain Kynaston took the favourable opportunity of escaping across the hall, where he spent the remainder of the evening, dividing his attention between the music and supper rooms, and Helen saw him no more that night.
She saw, however, some one she had not reckoned upon seeing. Glancing carelessly across to the end of the room, she perceived, talking to Lady Kynaston, a little French gentleman, with a smooth black head, a neat, pointed, little black beard, and the red ribbon of the Légion d'Honneur in his button-hole.
What there was in the sight of so harmless and inoffensive a personage to upset her it may be difficult to say; but the fact is that, when Mrs. Romer perceived this polite little Frenchman talking to her hostess, she turned suddenly so sick and white, that a lady sitting near her asked her if she was going to faint.
"I feel it a little hot," she murmured; "I think I will go into the next room." She rose and attempted to escape—whether from the heat or the observation of the little Frenchman was best known to herself.
Her maneuver, however, was not destined to succeed. Before she could work her way half-way through the crush to the door, the man whom she was bent upon avoiding turned round and saw her. A look of glad recognition flashed into his face, and he instantly left Lady Kynaston's side, and came across the room to speak to her.
"This is an unlooked-for pleasure, madame."
"I certainly never expected to meet you here, Monsieur D'Arblet," faltered Helen, turning red and white alternately.
"Will you not come and have a little conversation with me?"
"I was just going away."
"So soon! Oh, bien! then I will take you to your carriage." He held out his arm, and Helen was perforce obliged to take it.
There was a little delay in the hall, whilst Helen waited for her, or rather for her grandfather's carriage, during which she stood with her hand upon her unwelcome friend's arm. Whilst they were waiting he whispered something eagerly in her ear.
"No, no; it is impossible!" reiterated Helen, with much apparent distress.
Monsieur D'Arblet whispered something more.
"Very well, if you insist upon it!" she said, faintly, and then got into her carriage and was driven away.
Before, however, she had left Walpole Lodge five minutes, she called out to the servants to stop the carriage. The footman descended from the box and came round to the window.
They had drawn up by the side of a long wall quite beyond the crowd of carriages that was waiting at Lady Kynaston's house.
"I want to wait here a few minutes, for—for a gentleman I am going to drive back to town," she said to the servant, confusedly. She was ashamed to give such an order to him.
She was frightened too, and trembled with nervousness lest any one should see her waiting here.
It was a cold, damp night, and Helen shivered, and drew her fur cloak closer about her in the darkness. Presently there came footsteps along the pathway, and a man came through the fog up to the door. It was opened for him in silence, and he got in, and the carriage drove off again.
Monsieur Le Vicomte D'Arblet had a mean, cunning-looking countenance; strictly speaking, indeed, he was rather handsome, his features being decidedly well-shaped, but the evil and vindictive expression of his face made it an unpleasant one to look upon. As he took his seat in the brougham by Helen's side she shrank instinctively away from him.
"So, ma mie!" he said, peering down into her face with odious familiarity, "here I find you again after all this time, beautiful as ever! It is charming to be with you again, once more."
"Monsieur D'Arblet, pray understand that nothing but absolute necessity would have induced me to drive you home to-night," said Helen, who was trembling violently.
"You are not polite, ma belle—there is a charming franchise about you Englishwomen, however, which gives a piquancy to your conversation."
"You know very well why it is that I am obliged to speak to you alone," she interrupted, colouring hotly under his bold looks of admiration.
"Le souvenir du beau passé!" murmured the Frenchman, laughing softly. "Is that it, ma belle Hélène?"
"Monsieur," she cried, almost in tears, "pray listen to me; for pity's sake tell me what you have done with my letters—have you destroyed them?"
"Destroyed them! What, those dear letters that are so precious to my heart? Ah, madame, could you believe it of me?"
"You have kept them?" she murmured, faintly.
"Mais si, certainement, that I have kept them, every one—every single one of them," he repeated, looking at her meaningly, with a cold glitter in his black eyes.
"Not that—that one?" pleaded Helen, piteously.
"Yes—that one too—that charming and delightful letter in which you so generously offered to throw yourself upon my protection—do you remember it?"
"Alas, only too well!" she murmured, hiding her face in her hands.
"Ah!" he continued, with a sort of relish in torturing her, which resembled the feline cruelty of a wild beast playing with its prey. "Ah! it was a delightful letter, that; what a pity it was that I was out of Paris that night, and never received it till, alas! it was too late to rush to your side. You remember how it was, do you not? Your husband was lying ill at your hotel; you were very tired of him—ce pauvre mari! Well, you had been tired of him for some time, had you not? And he was not what you ladies call 'nice;' he did drink, and he did swear, and I had been often to see you when he was out, and had taken you to the theatre and the bal d'Opéra—do you remember?"
"Ah, for Heaven's sake spare me these horrible reminiscences!" cried Helen, despairingly.
He went on pitilessly, as though he had not heard her, "And you were good enough to write me several letters—there were one, two, three, four of them," counting them off upon his fingers; "and then came the fifth—that one you wrote when he was ill. Was it not a sad pity that I had gone out of Paris for the day, and never received it till you and your husband had left for England? But think you that I will part with it ever? It is my consolation, my trésor!"
"Monsieur D'Arblet, if you have one spark of honour or of gentleman-like feeling, you will give me those mad, foolish letters again. I entreat you to do so. You know that I was beside myself when I wrote them, I was so unhappy—do you not see that they compromise me fatally; that it is my good name, my reputation, which are at stake?" In her agony she had half sunk at his feet on the floor of the carriage, clasping her hands entreatingly together.
Monsieur D'Arblet raised her with empressement.
"Ah, madame, do not thus humiliate yourself at my feet. Why should you be afraid? Are not your good name and your reputation safe in my hands?"
Helen burst into bitter tears.
"How cruel, how wicked you are!" she cried; "no Englishman would treat a lady in this way."
"Your Englishmen are fools, ma chère—and I—I am French!" he replied, shrugging his shoulders expressively.
"But what object, what possible cause can you have for keeping those wretched letters?"
He bent his face down close to hers.
"Shall I tell you, belle Hélène? It is this: You are beautiful and you have talent; I like you. Some day, perhaps, when the grandpapa dies, you will have money—then Lucien D'Arblet will come to you, madame, with that precious little packet in his hands, and he will say, 'You will marry me, ma chère, or I will make public these letters.' Do you see? Till then, amusez vous, ma belle; enjoy your life and your liberty as much as you desire; I will not object to anything you do. Only you will not venture to marry—because I have these letters?"
"You would prevent my marrying?" said Helen, faintly.
"Mais, certainement that I should. Do you suppose any man would care to be your husband after he had read that last letter—the fifth, you know?"
No answer, save the choking sobs of his companion.
Monsieur D'Arblet waited a few minutes, watching her; then, as she did not raise her head from the cushions of the carriage, where she had buried it, the Frenchman pulled the check-string of the carriage.
"Now," he said, "I will wish you good-night, for we are close to your house. We have had our little talk, have we not?"
The brougham, stopped, and the footman opened the door.
"Good-night, madame, and many thanks for your kindness," said D'Arblet, raising his hat politely.
In another minute he was gone, and Helen, hoping that the darkness had concealed the traces of her agitation from the servant's prying eyes, was driven on, more dead than alive, to her grandfather's house.