For the burden of the next six days Lady Cherubic shall speak.
My dear, she wrote to her sister, I can’t come yet. If I do I shall spoil such sport as never you saw. I told you Belinda Seneschal had compelled me to become her guest—at half an hour’s notice, quite late last Monday night. And I told you why. Well, it’s better than any play you ever thought of. Captain Pomeroy is a perfectly charming man. He’s tall and fair, and he’s got a merry eye and a very good nose. He’s thirty-four, clean-shaven and laughs delightedly. Very easy-going and a strong sense of humour. We get on admirably. He loves Belinda very much. Belinda’s dark and a beauty. Great brown eyes and an exquisite mouth: straight as an arrow, and the figure that everyone wants. You know. The more you take off, the better it looks. In her bathing-dress. . . . And she’s really a sweet girl. Since I turned fifty I’ve learned to expect nothing from twenty-five. But this child is not like that. Belinda treats me as if I were her very rich aunt. But she treats Ivan Pomeroy as if he were a hideous wedding-present which she can’t throw out for fear of offending the donor—a certain sign of love, as you will agree.
Well, there you are, Mary.
Tuesday—my first day here—was rather hectic. The servants, of course. Rival staffs in the same basement, determined to serve two masters with the same range and pantry at the same time, were almost bound to realize the worst misgivings of The Litany—even if they were all compatriots, which they aren’t. Ivan has brought out his English servants. Only a man could do such a hopeless thing. An English cook-housekeeper who can’t talk a word of French and is accustomed to dealing in St. James’s! Can you see her in a French market? More. Can you see her in a French kitchen, explaining in the tone one reserves for the stone-deaf to a French cook who believes in France for the French that ‘the Captain deserved the best and it wouldn’t be her fault if he didn’t get it’? I intervened at last, to prevent murder being done. The French butler had been ducked in the sink and then shut in the coal-cellar. This, because he had intimated that the kitchen crockery was good enough for Ivan. The brosseur had been obstructive when Ivan’s housemaid had sought for a dust-pan and brush and, when she found them, had tried to drag them away. Polly criticized his conduct, and the brosseur pinched her arm. Ivan’s chauffeur immediately knocked him down and was kneeling on his stomach when I arrived. The two cooks were under arms, eyeing each other wildly and giving violent tongue. Belinda’s maids and Polly and Dewlap—Ivan’s man—were in support, reviling one another’s countries in terms which, had they been intelligible to those for whom they were meant, could not have been endured. I straightened things out somehow. Then I called a council upstairs. I told Belinda that if I wasn’t fed I should go, and I said that I shouldn’t be fed if she didn’t tell her staff that Ivan’s servants had as much right here as they. Finally things were arranged—in the only possible way. Henri was compensated and fired, and Dewlap was given his place. Belinda’s cook was appointed cook to the household, and Ivan’s housekeeper put in charge of the house. Since then peace has reigned—below stairs. It was also a step forward upon the ground floor, because it meant that we three must feed together. . . .
Our meals are a perfect scream. Belinda sits at one end of the table, Ivan at the other, and I sit in between. They both talk to me vivaciously, but such conversation as they use to each other is of the armoured type. The impression that I am the guest of a married couple who are upon their dignity is sometimes overwhelming. Ivan delights to enhance this. The other night he looked across at Belinda. ‘I don’t like these finger-bowls,’ he said. ‘Haven’t we got any other ones, dear?’ Belinda choked, and I began to laugh. Then—‘Aren’t these big enough?’ says my lady. ‘Too big,’ says Ivan. ‘I’m afraid of wetting my ears.’ Belinda fought not to smile. ‘Consult the inventory,’ she said. ‘Right,’ said Ivan. ‘What’s the French for “finger-bowls”?’ ‘Consult a dictionary,’ says Belinda. ‘I can’t,’ says Ivan. ‘I gave mine to Henri. His need was greater than mine.’ Belinda broke down at that, as was right and proper: but order was soon restored. They never meet except at meals, but never once so far has either had a meal out. Thus, under the guise of insisting upon their rights, they improve the opportunity of being together.
Ivan keeps his end up and is thoroughly at home, but he never intrudes or oversteps the mark. After dinner we go to the drawing-room, and he retires to the library. Both rooms command the terrace, but if we sit outside Ivan never comes out. Of course he’s as much my host as Belinda’s my hostess, but he never lets me feel that. His attitude to me is that of a fellow-guest.
To-day Belinda’s car was out of action. The first she or I knew of it was when we came down to go out and found Ivan’s Rolls at the door. Belinda stopped dead. Then she turned upon Dewlap. ‘I thought you said the car was here.’ The chauffeur intervened. ‘You’ve broken a spring, Miss. So Captain Pomeroy ’opes that you’ll use ’is car.’ Belinda began to flush, so I got in—quick. After a moment she followed me. ‘I couldn’t let you refuse,’ I said. ‘Ivan’s not the man to do this for gain.’ She just squeezed my fingers. ‘I hoped,’ she said, ‘I hoped you would force my hand.’ ‘I’ll remember that,’ said I. She blushed exquisitely.
So, you see, the end is approaching.
And now I must fly down to dinner. I wouldn’t be late for worlds.