“I accept your invitations to all your balls, and all your concerts, and as many as possible of your dinners,” she said. “You’ll get sick of the sight of my face before the season is over.”
“That I never shall, my dear,” said Mrs. Osborne, “nor afterward, neither. And you’ll come down to Grote, won’t you, after July, and stay quiet there till the little blessed one comes, if you don’t mind my alluding to it, my dear, as I’m going to be its grandmother, though it’s a thing I never should do if there was anybody else but you and me present. Lord, and it seems only yesterday that I was expecting my own first-born, and Mr. O. in such a taking as you never see, and me so calm and all, just longing for my time to come, and thinking nothing at all of the pain, for such as there is don’t count against seeing your baby. But you leave Claude to me, and I’ll pull him through. Bless him, I warrant he’ll need more cheering and comforting than you. And are you sure your rooms are comfortable here, dearie? I thought the suite at the back of the house would be more to your liking than the front, being quieter, for, to be sure, if you are so good as to come and keep us old folks company, the least we can do is to see that you have things to your taste and don’t get woke by those roaring motor-buses or the stream of vegetables for the market.”
“But they are delightful,” said Dora. “They’ve given me the dearest little sitting room with bedroom and bathroom all together.”
Mrs. Osborne beamed contentedly. She had had a couple of days without any return of pain, and as she said, she had had a better relish for her dinner to-night than for many days.
“Well, then, let’s hope we shall all be comfortable and happy,” she said. “And I don’t mind telling you now, my dear, that I’ve been out of sorts and not up to my victuals for a fortnight past, but to-day I feel hearty again, though I get tired easily still. But don’t you breathe a word of that, promise me, to Mr. Osborne or Claude, for what with the honour as is going to be done to Mr. O. and the thought of his grandchild getting closer, and him back to work again, which, after all, suits him best, I wouldn’t take the edge off his enjoyment if you were to ask me on your bended knees, which I should do, if he thought I was out of sorts. Lord, there he comes now, arm-in-arm with Claude. I declare he’s like a boy again, with the thought of all as is coming.”
The evening of the next day, accordingly, saw, with flare of light and blare of band, the beginning of the hospitalities of No. 92 Park Lane, the doors of which, so it appeared to Dora, were never afterward shut day or night, except during the week-ends when the doors of Grote flew open and the scene of hospitality changed to that of the country. Yet cordial though it all was, it was insensate hospitality—hospitality gone mad. Had some hotel announced that anyone of any consequence could dine there without charge, and ask friends to dine on the same easy terms, such an offer would have diverted the crowds of carriages from Park Lane, and sent them to the hotel instead. Full as her programme originally was, Mrs. Osborne could not resist the pleasure of added hospitalities, and little dances, got up in impromptu fashion with much telephoning and leaving of cards, were wedged in between the big ones, and became big themselves before the night arrived. Scores of guests, utterly unknown to their hosts, crowded the rooms, and for them all, known and unknown alike, Mrs. Osborne had the same genial and genuine cordiality of welcome. It was sufficient for her that they had crossed her threshold and would drink Mr. O.’s champagne and eat her capons; she was glad to see them all. She had a shocking memory for faces, but that made no difference, since nothing could exceed the geniality of her greeting to those whom she had never set eyes on before. It was a good moment, too, when, not so long after the beginning of her hospitalities, her secretary, whose duty it was to enter the names of all callers in the immense volume dedicated to that purpose, reported that a second calling book was necessary, since the space allotted to the letters with which the majority of names began was full. She could not have imagined a year ago that this would ever happen, yet here at the beginning of her second season only, more space had to be found. And Dora’s name for the second volume, “Supplement to the Court Guide,” was most gratifying. Alf’s allusion to the “London Directory,” though equally true, would not have been so satisfactory.
But her brave and cheerful soul needed all its gallantry, for it was an incessant struggle with her to conceal the weariness and discomfort which were always with her, and which she was so afraid she would, in spite of herself, betray to others. There were days of pain, too, not as yet very severe, but of a sort that frightened her, and her appetite failed her. This she could conceal, without difficulty for the most part, since the times were few on which her husband was not sitting at some distance from her, with many guests intervening; but once or twice when they were alone she was afraid he would notice her abstention, and question her. Her high colour also began to fade from her cheeks and lips, and she made one daring but tremulous experiment with rouge and lip-salve to hide this. She sent her maid out of the room before the attempt, and then applied the pigments, but with disastrous results. “Lor, Mr. O. will think it’s some woman of the music halls instead of his wife,” she said to herself, and wiped off again the unusual brilliance.
But though sometimes her courage faltered, it never gave way. She had determined not to spoil these weeks for her husband. It was to be a blaze of triumph. Afterward she would go to the doctor and learn that she had been frightening herself to no purpose, or that there was something wrong.
And those endless hospitalities, this stream of people who passed in and out of the house, though they tired her they also served to divert her and take her mind off her discomforts and alarms. She had to be in her place, though Dora took much of the burden of it off her shoulders, to shake hands with streams of people and say—which was perfectly true—how pleased she was to see them. Friends from Sheffield, for she never in her life dropped an old acquaintance, came to stay, and the pleasurable anticipation she had had of letting them see “a bit of real London life” fell short of the reality. Best of all, Sir Thomas and Lady Ewart were in the house when the list of honours appeared in the paper.
It happened dramatically, and the drama of it was planned and contrived by Claude. He came down rather late to breakfast, having given orders that this morning no papers were to be put in their usual place in the dining room, and went straight up to his father.