Wilhelmina in London

by Barry Pain

I ran this business for about two months. It began slowly, but after the first fortnight I really had as much as I could do. I always asked the people to whom I sent letters to recommend me to their friends, and in many cases I know that they did so. I gave the best advice that I could, and I had a small shilling book on the marriage laws which I found very useful. Not one couple in a hundred that wants to get married really knows how it may or may not be done. My clients were chiefly women, and I have grave doubts as to the seriousness of some of the few men who applied to me. But I did not mind in the least so long as their postal orders were enclosed. The women seemed to belong almost exclusively to two sets—domestic servants and foolish people in smart society. The middle-class would have nothing to do with me, and I am not sure, although I always gave the best advice I could, that the middle-class was not right. Only once or twice, in the curious confessions that were poured out on me, did I come upon anything that I should have called real romance. There was plenty of vanity, there was plenty of sentimentality, and there was a good deal of acute money-grubbing. It was really interesting work, though it kept me a great deal indoors, and though I am not sure even now that it was quite honest.

At the end of the first month some blessed young man, whom I am glad to have this opportunity of thanking, wrote a short and chaffing article about my advertisement. For days after this I was simply inundated with letters, and I had to send out post cards to my clients explaining that, owing to the pressure of business, my letters of advice to them would probably be delayed for some days. Among those letters was one bearing the address of a house in Berkeley Square, which was so extraordinary that I give it in full. It was one of the few letters that I received from men:—

“DEAR MADAM,—I have seen your advertisement, and also the short article upon it in the Daily Courier, and my own case is so curious that I have decided to address you. I enclose a postal order for half a crown as required, but I am a man of means, and in the event of your being able to assist me I shall, as you will see, propose a more adequate remuneration. I have been a great traveller and sportsman, and you may possibly have come upon my recent work on Sport in Thibet. I have now returned to England and am anxious to marry. But I am prevented by a strange psychological characteristic of my own.

“The fact, put briefly, is that I cannot stand fear. Any evidence of timidity in a man inspires me with rage, and in a woman with disgust. However attractive she may be, at the slightest sign that she fears me, love vanishes completely. I cannot stand her, I cannot bear to be with her. This is the more unfortunate because I am by nature a dominant person. I have been told that my eyes are mesmeric. I do not believe in this nonsense, but certainly women seem to find it difficult to meet my gaze fairly and squarely. I have a somewhat hasty temper, and nothing exasperates it more than the attempt to smooth it down, accompanied as it always is by fear of what I may do next. I want a woman who does not care one straw what I do next—who will be absolutely free from every form of cowardice, physical or moral, as I am myself. The mother of my children must not be a coward.

“I am thirty-seven years of age, wealthy, and not, I believe, much uglier than other men, and I cannot find the woman that I require. Possibly, among the many cases which must have been brought to your notice, you will have come across some such woman. If so, and if you will arrange a meeting between her and me, I will pay you the sum of one hundred pounds, provided, of course, that I am satisfied on the question of her courage. If, though satisfied on this point, I do not wish to marry her, I will pay her also the sum of one hundred pounds for the trouble which I have given her. She must, of course, not be older than I am myself, and I confess that good looks are a great consideration with me. Social standing is of no importance whatever. I do not allow popular prejudices to interfere with my actions, even when they are of the least importance, and far less do I admit of such interference in my choice of a wife.—I am, my dear madam, faithfully yours, ——.”

I do not give his signature. It is a name that you will find in Debrett, though I did not look it up at the time. That letter gave me a great deal to think over. There was a queer mixture of bragging and modesty about it. Yet, I asked myself, how could he give me the facts which it was necessary for me to know without appearing to brag? The commission of one hundred pounds was certainly tempting, but none of my correspondents occurred to me as being likely to meet his requirements, even if they had not had their own affairs on their hands. Fear is a feminine quality. Women have a right to it; without being cowardly, they may be able to realise a danger, and they may have delicate nerves. Nor can I see that they are any the worse for it. After a little reflection I wrote to say that I believed I should be able to assist him if he could wait for about a fortnight. And I had a reply on the following day to say that he would wait with pleasure.

I was not, decidedly not, thirty-seven, and I was as pretty as I thought he had any right to expect. I was not the creature of steel that he required, but, none the less, my nerves were in fairly good order, and I thought that I could get through, at any rate, any of the preliminary tests to which he might subject me. Two hundred pounds are better than one hundred. Possibly I might marry this man. I did not know, and did not want to marry anybody. But he might take his chance and, in case of failure, fall in line with the doctor at Castel-on-Weld and the young Hindoo in the boarding-house. It is wonderful how many excuses one can find for an action which brings in two hundred pounds.

At the end of the fortnight I wrote and gave him an appointment for the afternoon of two days later, outside the Stores in Victoria Street, when I said that the young lady whom I had selected as likely to meet his requirements would meet him. I suggested that there should be some sign by which he might be known. Next day I received a telegram in these words:—

“I shall come dashing up. The red rose is, and always has been, my sign.”

I thought over that telegram for a long time, and I did not quite like it. It was altogether too queer. But I meant to see the thing through. After all, I had given him no sign by which he could recognise me, and I could always back out at the last moment if I thought it necessary. So, at the time appointed, which was at three in the afternoon, I was in Victoria Street at some little distance from the Stores, waiting to see what might happen.