CHAPTER IV
Once a mere cottage, now a long ornate bungalow jutting into angles, full of unexpected rooms, the Bellews' river-side house is more luxurious than many big structures of brick and mortar.
"We run down to picnic here," but Belle Bellew knew that picnicking without everything out of season, and a chef of quality, could not appeal to the people she gathered about her. The picnic element was kept up by breakfast-tables laid under trees, things deserted and unused—man likes his breakfast free from fly and midge. The ideal, talked of in the gleam of electric light, is fresh air, the plash of old Father Thames, morning sunshine; the real is that we prefer tempered light, copper heaters, and a roof.
The long low house jutted out in two wings, all the windows opening onto a covered veranda.
Dull people turned their heads aside when they rowed past on Sunday evenings, for the flash of lights, the sound of raised voices, could be seen and heard from the river.
The chairs were wicker, but the rugs on the stained floors Persian. It was wealth, less ostentatious than the Holbrooks'; light, frothy, merry, careless wealth, with pleasure for its high priest.
Jimmie Gore Helmsley motored Denise and Sybil down; the place seemed empty when they came, but looking closer one could see groups here and there, see flutter of light dresses; hear tinkle of light laughter, bass of man's deeper note.
A thin, svelte woman, green-eyed, ferret-faced, came out of the open door. Mousie Cavendish said she found her ugliness more powerful than other women's beauty. A bitter-tongued little creature, stirring every surface maliciously to point out something foul below it. But clever, moderately rich, perfectly gowned; gaining what income she lacked through her too keen power of observation.
You sat with her, sweetly pulling some reputation to pieces; you left full-fed with evil spice; and then you shivered. Were not the same thin fingers pulling out your secrets now, those secrets you foolishly hinted at?
"Ah! pretty Esmé!" Mousie blew a kiss from her reddened lips. "You here! Where's Mrs Bellew, Miss Chauntsey? We may see her at dinner-time; we may not, if she has taken a tea-basket to the backwater close by." Mousie laughed at Sybil. "Does your young mind run upon hostesses who wait to receive their guests? You will not find them here, my child. Tell the men to get tea, Jimmie; we'll have it here."
The veranda was a series of outdoor rooms, wooden partitions, rose-grown, dividing it.
Sybil's grey eyes were sparkling; this was so different from tea in decorous drawing-rooms, from a stately week-end spent at Ascot with her mother.
"Tea?" Mousie turned to the footman. "Cream sandwiches and fruit. This riverside hotel," said Mrs Cavendish, "is an excellent one. Why, fair Esmé, you look pallid. And what pretty emeralds, chérie. Oh! the rewards of beauty!"
The keen little eyes were frankly malicious, frankly open as to what they meant.
Esmé flushed a little; she saw the green eyes flash on at Gore Helmsley. Esmé was almost crudely virtuous; the hint offended.
Servants were preparing the lawn for the night's revel. Temporary lights were being hung on strings, the turf swept and rolled; a great mirror was set up.
"For the cotillon?" Esmé asked.
"For the cotillon. We begin at nine. So that at twelve the cock shall crow and we shall all—not go to bed."
"More people coming. Mrs Bellew," said Sybil, "was not out; she is coming into the garden now."
"Ah! tiens, my child! it was my kindness to say that she was out, knowing it was the hour of electricity. Once the knell of forty sounds we must have our faces recharged daily. The Prince is coming—look ye!"
Prince Fritz—young, fat, extremely volatile, a thorn in the side of his august mother and his wife—came tripping across the grass. He talked English with a strong accent, and he bemoaned the future when he must go home.
Yet, though Belle Bellew might box his ears later in a romp, she must bob to him now discreetly as she greeted him.
Prince Fritz boomed out content and delight. "There is no place such as this river house," he said, "none, fair lady." Then he looked round for the dancer, who was his special attraction.
"Don't be alarmed, sir—she arrives," mocked Mousie from her balcony, "she arrives. The revenues can continue to be squandered, and a nice little woman's heart torn by the snapshots she sees of you in the picture papers."
Prince Fritz grinned equably; he was not dignified.
"Like to see the river?" Gore Helmsley asked Sybil.
The girl was charming in her simple dress. Fresh and sweet and unspoiled, eagerly delighted with everything.
But down by gliding, stately Thames, Jimmie was fatherly. She must be careful here, keep quiet; a good deal of romping went on—and girls could not behave as married women could.
"I'm your godfather here, you see." His dark face came close to hers, showing the crinkles round his eyes, the hard lines near his mouth; but he was at the age girls delight to worship. Someone who knows the mysteries they only dream of; someone so different to honest, pleasant boys, who thought more of sport than their companions.
Friendship! It was Jimmie Gore Helmsley's deadly weapon; there was nothing to frighten the maid—he was only a pal—a pal to win her confidences, to tell her how sweet she looked, to point out the perfect smoothness of her fresh young skin, to find beauty in the lights in her hair, the curves of her dimpled neck; to take her about discreetly in town, to walk and talk with her at country houses; to listen, with a face set a little wistfully, about some boy who adored her. Frank or Tom was a good sort, a brick; youth went to youth; heaven send she would be happy, and—appreciated—that the blind boy would see plainly the perfection of the treasure he was winning. Ah! if someone who could see could win it!
After this, next day, meeting her young lover, mademoiselle the debutante would fret and sulk because Frank or Tom talked of his last score at cricket, or his great day with the Team, instead of worshipping her beauty.
And, later, the confidences would grow fewer; would come a day when the boy's image faded; when a fool's heart beat for the world-worn man who set her up as goddess, and then.... There were broken hearts and lives in high society which could tell the rest. There were women, married now, who shivered angrily at one hidden corner in their lives.
This nut-brown maid, with her grey eyes and cloud of dusky hair, appealed to Jimmie. He came with a careless zest to each new conquest. But first there was bright, flashing Esmé, paid court to now for half a year. The girl attracted vaguely as yet. Esmé's careless coldness had made him the more determined, but to-day he felt more confident.
Dinner was in two rooms, divided by an arch; the clatter of voices, the flash of lights at the little tables, made it like a restaurant.
Belle Bellew, slim and tall, perfectly preserved, sorted her more important guests, took scant trouble with the others.
The drawing-room almost dazzled Sybil. Lights glowed through rose petals; jewels flashed on women's dresses and necks and arms; silks shimmered; chiffons floated round cleverly-outlined forms.
The finger-bowls at dinner all held stephanotis flowers; the cloying, heavy scent floated through the hot air.
Navotsky, the dancer, was in black, dead and unrelieved, clinging to her sensuous limbs, outlining her white skin, and when she moved the sombre draperies parted, with flash of orange and silver underneath, sheath fitting, brilliantly gorgeous. A great band of diamonds outlined her small, sleek head.
"More taxes on Grosse Holbein," murmured Mousie Cavendish. "Oh, what a joy to dine where there is a cook and not a preparer of defunct meats."
There was no ostentation here, but a cunning which reached perfection.
"Laying up for ourselves water-drinking in Homburg," remarked Jimmie, as he finished fish smothered in a sauce compound of many things, and went on with a soufflet of asparagus. "Well, it's worth it. Look at our Fritz, he's longing for stewed pork and plums; the butler tells me he has cold galantine and bread and pickles left in his room at night to assuage his hunger."
As the blue smoke haze drifted, and black coffee and liqueurs came to interfere with digestion, Jimmie had dropped his voice to the note intime which women recognize. He half whispered to Esmé; his admiration for her was more open than usual.
Sybil talked to a clean-shaven youth who found her very dull, and almost showed it. Who stared when she chattered and admired, and seemed to think it provincial not to take all the world for granted.
"Think her lovely, that dancer woman. All right in her way, I imagine. What a lovely ice, did you say? S'pose it's all right. Nevah eat 'em myself."
Lord Francis Lennon got up with a sigh of relief to confide to the fair lady of forty who amused him that he hated "dinin' in the nursery."
Outside a new moon lay silver on her azure, star-spangled bed. The lights in the garden were making a glittering circle.
Mr Bellew, a sleek, dark man, who was occasionally recognized by his own guests as their host, rang a bell and read out some rules.
Twenty minutes were given, and then every guest must have assumed a character, and only used what materials they could find in the heap prepared in the hall. Prizes to be given.
"Think us fools," said Mousie, pulling a green overdress from under a cushion and becoming Undine.
But the picnic had begun. Men pinned on newspapers, rushed for cardboard to cut out armour, rifled the linen cupboards for tablecloths. Journals, sandwich men, knights, ghosts, came laughing to the garden, odd ends fluttering, pins proving unstable friends.
Women got at the heap of odds and ends—gauzes, tinsel crowns, veils and lace, tying great sashes over their evening dresses, shrieking for inspiration.
With a ripple of laughter, Lady Deverelle, wife of the tenth earl, flung off her long green skirt, and stood forth audaciously in a froth of green silk reaching not far below her knees; put a paper crown on her head, and called herself a fairy.
Echo of their laughter drifted to the river. Boats massed outside as people peered through the shrubs.
"Those dreadful people at the Bungalow," said Lady Susan Ploddy to her sister; they were on a houseboat a short way off.
Into the circle of light ran a crowd of laughing people, snatching at enjoyment. Out on the velvet turf, dancing to the music of hidden musicians.
"Idyllic but exhausting," said Undine to her partner. "There will be more fun to-night in looking on."
The dance would not last long; it was only an excuse for a romp.
Prince Fritz, his stout person hung about with dusters, calling himself a cheque, held the dancer in his arms, whirling her round. Navotsky shrugged her shoulders. "She was Night," she said, and merely put on a black veil, floating from her crown of diamond stars.
The great mirror reflected them all; they danced the cotillon, taking up handsome presents carelessly; scarfs, pins, studs, a hundred pounds' worth of toys which no one wanted.
Sybil Chauntsey had picked up roses, pinned them in her hair and in her dress, wrote on her card "Summer." She was left alone as they danced, until some man, seeing her, whirled her noisily round and laughed and dropped her. The girl felt that she was not one of this romping crowd; her pleasure began to taste bitterly to her.
Esmé, forgetting her troubles, had tied a sash round her dress, twisted some stuff into a head-dress, and called herself a Spaniard. The yellow gown and scarlet sash suited her.
She only did one figure in the cotillon; she liked looking on. Then they formed up for the prize before the judges.
Lady Deverelle, in her green underskirt, took first easily. They gave the Prince the next.
The musicians thrummed, but the dancers were weary of fooling; shadow-like, they melted away into nooks and summer-houses, until from every corner echoed the hushed treble of women's voices, the hushed depth of men's.
"See, I have marked down my corner." Captain Gore Helmsley tore off a shield of paper off his arm and took Esmé's arm. She felt his fingers press on her warm, soft flesh. "See here." He had the key of a small outdoor room, a glorified summer-house hung about with fragrant roses, furnished with lounge chairs and soft cushions. Darkness wrapped it, but with a click Esmé turned on a shaded light, giving a faint glimmer through the gloom.
Gore Helmsley pulled the chairs to one side, so that to curious passers-by they were in shade. The dim glow fell on Esmé, on her shining hair, her brilliantly pretty face.
"So, it was good of you to come down," Jimmie said. "I was afraid you wouldn't. And once here—" he said.
"And here," Esmé's voice, interrupting, was not lowered. "Here we can be amused for two days—no more."
"No more," he whispered.
His hands pressing hers, his voice was more eloquent than words.
"No more? After all these months, Esmé," he said. "Here, where no one watches, where it is so easy to arrange—where—"
Esmé Carteret sat up in her chair, impatient, annoyed; she interrupted again sharply.
"Where people make awful fools of themselves," she said.
Gore Helmsley moved nearer to her. "Sweet fools," he muttered, and stooping suddenly, he kissed her.
Esmé got up; she neither started nor showed emotion. "My husband said no woman could trust you," she said coldly. "Come—I am going in."
Captain Gore Helmsley stammered as he realized that Esmé would never be pieced into the puzzle of his loves. Then, being extremely offended, he endeavoured to hide it, and Esmé's faint malicious smile made him her enemy for life.
Except for the kiss he had not committed himself in any way, and except for her one sharp speech Esmé had said nothing to show resentment; they talked carelessly going in. He knew that he had thrown and lost.
Sybil Chauntsey, overlooked in the prize-giving, while she had been involved in a romping dance, came towards the veranda. The partitions each held its Jack and Jill; she could hear rustles, whispers, low-toned laughter.
From one Prince Fritz's guttural was unmistakable, as indiscreetly he muttered his adoration.
"Mein angel," said Prince Fritz, as Sybil passed. "You shall haf the pearl—so that I clasp it on your neck."
A big, squarely-built man stood at the lighted doorway; Sybil had met him in London—Lord Innistenne. He whistled as he saw her.
"What the—why are you here, Miss Chauntsey?" he said slowly.
"I came to see it all." Sybil's voice brightened. "It was fun, wasn't it? I made mother let me come."
She was panting, her rose crown crooked, one of her chiffon sleeves torn.
"Fun, for grown-ups," he said shortly. "I thought your mother"—he paused—"did not know the Bellews."
"Captain Gore Helmsley got them to ask me. He wanted me to come down to see it all."
Innistenne frowned. "Look here," he said. "Let me motor you up to town to-morrow. Leave this place."
Sybil shook her head, doubtfully. She was not enjoying herself.
There was no solemn meeting at breakfast at the Bellews. People who liked to come down strolled in to a meal which was kept hot until twelve. Others breakfasted outside their bedrooms; pretty women in silken wrappers might send invitations to a friend to join them in the rose-covered partitions outside their windows.
The fresh air of a June day came whispering across the water and the shaven lawns. Later it would be very hot, but as yet the coolness of the dew was on the grass; the sun beamed softly gold through fresh green leaves.
Esmé smiled a little, for, coming into the breakfast-room, she saw that Jimmie Gore Helmsley meant to have no more to do with her. He did not come to her table, get her fruit, hang over her lovingly. Sybil, fresh as the day itself, was listening to his caressing voice, tasting her first plate of delicately-flavoured flattery.
Feminine eighteen comes gaily to its breakfast. It has had no weary thoughts to trouble it, no fading skin to cream and powder.
What was she going to do to-day? Oh! anything and everything; boat, play tennis, idle, watch the people.
The silver sweetness of the morning called to Sybil. She would have breakfast out, under the trees. She saw tables ready there. Cool damp of dew, a gentle cloud of midges and flies did not deter Sybil. Cold tea and a narrow choice of breakfast, brought by a languid footman, were enough for her. Gore Helmsley, with the morning peevishness which comes when we are forty, brushed mosquitoes from his hair, stabbed irritably at congealing bacon and leathery egg, listened with tempered enthusiasm to Sybil's picture of ideal life.
Out in the woods somewhere, breakfast and lunch and dinner with the lovely trees overhead, and the lovely grass at one's feet, and no stuffy rooms and cold roast beef, but eggs and fish and tea, she chattered.
Captain Gore Helmsley said, "With pneumonia sauce," and said it irritably. He sat watching the girl's fresh face, the sparkle of her grey eyes, and presently deemed her worth even outdoor breakfast.
As cigarettes banished midges his voice grew soft again; he knew how to listen, how to make youth talk of itself. He planned the day out; he bought a box of sweets for Sybil to crunch.
The girl was excited, pleased by her conquest. She had seen Jimmie in attendance on well-known beauties; had never dreamt the black eyes would look at her with open admiration; or that the man would talk of lunches together, of a drive somewhere in his car, of singling her out.
She thanked him warmly, with flushed cheeks which made her lovely. "Take her to Brighton some day, down to the sea, for a picnic! Oh, how lovely, and how good of him; he had so much to do, so many friends."
Lord Innistenne, strolling across the gardens, saw the two under the big beech tree—saw Esmé reading alone on the veranda.
He walked down to the river, where two long chairs were hidden in a nook of shrubs, a slight, brown-eyed woman sitting in one, sitting palpably waiting.
"Joan, would you do good works?" he said. "Let this day slip for it."
She looked up at him quickly.
"Come with me, use persuasion, get the Chauntsey child back to London to her mother. I'll drive her up."
Joan Blacker looked at the river, seen dimly through the trees, at the wall of shrubs about the hidden nook. They had not many days like this. Then wistfully she looked at Innistenne's strong, rugged face—a look with a shade of fear in it, the fear which must haunt each woman who has sold her birthright, purity, that what is so much to her may be mere pastime to the man she loves. Joan Blacker might have been moderately unhappy, moderately lonely all her life, if Innistenne had not come across her path.
"The dark Adonis is fitting arrows to his bow," said Innistenne. "He delights in the bringing to earth of foolish, half-fledged birdlings. We shall be back early, Joan. Come—help me."
She had counted on her morning; on a few hours of the talking women delight in, of tender memories referred to, of future plans discussed. But without a word she got up.
"She is very pretty, Fred." Joan Blacker stopped once, looked up at Innistenne.
"She may be," he said carelessly. "There is a brick wall named Joan built across my vision, you see."
It was her reward—she was satisfied.
Jimmie Gore Helmsley's black eyes did not smile at a pair of intruders. He was taking Sybil out in a punt after lunch, with a tea-basket for a picnic. He strolled off now with a last low word to Sybil. "Come to the rose garden. I'll wait there. Bother these people!"
Joan Blacker did not fail in her good deed. She said some simple things to Sybil—told her quietly that the Bungalow was not fit for her; that if her mother realized, or heard, it might stop liberty for evermore.
"To go back to London," cried Sybil, "to the house in Lancaster Gate, to the dreariness of a dull dinner there. Navotsky was to dance to-night. Besides—Mrs Bellew—"
"The servants may tell her that there is a vacant room," said Joan, equably, "otherwise she will not know. And for to-night—we'll take you out somewhere if you like, in London. I warn you your mother does not understand."
When Gore Helmsley, attractive to those who admired him in his flannels, strolled back to look for a Sybil who came not, he only saw the dust of a motor on the road at the back of the house.
"Miss Chauntsey has gone back to London," said Esmé. "Her mother, I think, telephoned."
Gore Helmsley nodded carelessly. But Esmé, looking drearily out across the gardens, trying hard not to think, had made a bitter enemy.
She was rung up by Denise Blakeney later.
"Yes. Cyril leaves next week. I tell you, Esmé, I am afraid—afraid of when he comes back. Be careful of cross lines. No one will know. Dismiss your maid at once. Come to me here and write to her if you think it best."
Esmé hung up the receiver with a sigh. The great scheme was becoming greater, looming before her. But money and liberty and an allowance made it all feasible.
A week later Bertie Carteret sailed for South Africa, and on the same day a broad, quiet man left London for a year's shooting. Both thought of their wives as the big steamers began to churn up the water. But one with wistful longing, looking back at a figure on the quay which waved and waved until it was lost, a blur among other figures; and one whose mouth set grimly as he recalled a good-bye in a luxurious dining-room, arms which he had put away from his neck, and an unsteady voice which had hinted of some confession which he would not hear.
"Later," said Cyril Blakeney, "later." But his eyes were full of bitter hatred for the thing which, for his name's sake, he meant to do.
Some hours after the steamer had left port Marie Leroy was rung up on the telephone.
She stood listening, a curious expression on her dark face, her lips murmuring, "Oui, madame. Oui, certainement, madame."
Esmé was dismissing her, was going away with Lady Blakeney, wanted no maid. Marie was to receive extra wages, a superfine character; to pack Madame's things.
Marie walked away, her slim brown fingers pressed together.
"And—what means it?" said the Frenchwoman, softly. "That would I like to know. What means it?"