After dinner I received yet another little note from Mrs. Hayes-Billington. “Do come and see me in my room. D. B.”
In fear and trepidation I accepted the invitation, but did not, as I anticipated, find my chaperon in sackcloth and ashes and tears, but as calm as usual, only deathly pale. She looked a beautiful, tragic figure, as she stood in the middle of the room, wrapped in an old pink tea gown. Like myself, I could see that she was making preparations for an imminent departure. Before she uttered a word she walked over and closed the door—most of our doors stuck, or rattled—then she turned about and faced me.
“Eva, I am most frightfully sorry that this has happened, more for your sake than mine—although to me it means social ruin. You have been a dear girl, so simple and so loyal; I am really fond of you, and as I would not like you to think worse of me than is necessary I have sent for you to tell you my true story.”
As she concluded, she indicated a chair, into which I sank in silence, but she still continued to pace about the room.
“You must know,” she began, “that I was the daughter of a West Country parson. When I was eighteen years of age Robert de Lacy, who was fishing in the neighbourhood, saw me in church and fell in love with my face on the spot. He soon contrived to make my father’s acquaintance and mine. He was fifteen years older than I was, and had a fine appointment in Northern India. As his furlough was nearly ended we were married after a month’s acquaintance. I was not in love with him but in love with the idea of going to India—always the land of my dreams—also thankful to be released from a detestable stepmother and a hateful country groove. India enchanted me; in her I was neither disappointed nor disillusioned—but then as the wife of a wealthy civilian I saw the country from its best aspect. I had numbers of servants, horses, and crowds of appreciative friends. We entertained a good deal. At nineteen I was queen of the station! My husband, who was exceedingly proud of me, loaded me with jewels and lovely clothes. At first I was happy—my home and children were all in all to me.”
“Children!” I ejaculated.
“Oh, yes, I have two boys; the elder is seventeen. They were sent to England when they were about three years old. My husband had certain fixed ideas. One of them was that no child should remain in India after that age. Another, that a woman’s place was with her husband. He did not care about home life; his work and big game shooting absorbed all his interests, but it was my duty to remain at my post as mistress of his house. In the hot weather he sent me to the hills, or to Cashmere, and himself went away on shooting trips into Nepaul or Tibet.
“Except as a sort of ornamental figurehead, I believe Robert soon grew tired of me. I had not been well educated; I could sing, and act, and dance, but none of these accomplishments appealed to him. He liked a woman who was deeply read, who could talk politics, statistics, Indian famines, and so on, and when we were alone, without guests, we would spend whole days scarcely exchanging a word; and thus I lived, in a sense, solitary—my soul starving. My good looks, which were famous, were something of a drawback; they made me too conspicuous; women were afraid of me. On the other hand, men were my slaves. I had numbers of admirers, and to fill my idle hours I embarked on harmless flirtations, merely pour passer les temps—and so the years passed. Then up in Cashmere amid the most romantic and exquisite scenery, I met my other self—my twin soul. He was in a cavalry regiment stationed at Umballa. Well, I need not dwell on this. You have never seen Cashmere or Gulmerg, ‘the meadows of roses,’ or the Dal Lake, by a full moon; or breathed an atmosphere trembling with an appeal, or looked into the blue eyes of Rupert Vavasour. After struggling for a whole year I listened to him, and the end of it was that we went away together to Japan.” She caught her breath, and paused for a moment—standing with her back to me.
I felt myself blushing violently, and was conscious of a sort of undeserved, shamefaced embarrassment.
“Our elopement was not a nine days’ wonder,” she resumed, “but a whole season’s talk! Of course I was divorced. We went to Italy to await the decree nisi, hoping to marry and be happy ever afterwards. Rupert had given up the army and we intended to live abroad until our story was forgotten. But at Florence he got fever, and, to my indescribable anguish, died within a week. His people hurried out from home, ignored me altogether, and wound up his affairs. Captain Vavasour was immensely wealthy, but had made no will, and I, neither wife nor widow, was thrown upon the world, almost destitute. My own people would not receive me, excepting one old aunt, who, like myself, was very poor, and I lived with her until she died. How often and often I wished that I was dead too! I used to walk about the streets of London, with nowhere to go, with no one to speak to, and entirely without friends. I realised then all the loneliness, misery, and despair of a lost dog! I had no interest in free museums, picture galleries, or libraries; my tastes did not tend toward Botticelli prints or blue Hawthorn china; inanimate objects bored me to death, but I hungered and starved for the society to which I had been accustomed, when one lived and experienced thrills! For years I breathed an atmosphere of change, excitement, and luxury; this poverty-stricken, dull isolation was insupportable. The friends I had known and entertained in my palmy days passed me by with blank faces, and people of shady character, who would have welcomed me with open arms, I avoided like the black plague. It was a case of Mohammed’s coffin! Then last summer I made the acquaintance of Bertie. It all came about through the loan of an umbrella. I had recovered my looks, and he fell in love with me and asked me to marry him. Of course I told him my story, but it made no difference. Bertie is a truly unselfish man and has been more than good to me. Then I longed with a sort of aching to see the East again, and finding that his work was in the south, where I did not know a soul, and as it was four years since the divorce, I ventured to return to India, hoping that I could make a fresh start. I was getting on, as you know, and beginning to feel so happy and safe, enjoying the old familiar life and surroundings, when Mrs. Hancock descended from that former existence and shattered my house of cards. She beheld me acting the principal character in a play she had once seen me appear in in Peshawar—evidently received in society, and instantly signed my social death warrant. Although she sat in the front row, strange to say I had not noticed her, and I was unaware of my sentence until I received a note from Mrs. Dane early this morning. I wired at once to Bertie. Poor old fellow! I know he will be dreadfully cut up; he will take me away as soon as possible. Meanwhile, I shall remain ‘purdah’ until I go down to the mines, and will never, never again endeavour to show my face in Indian society.”