He had recklessly brought up the subject, but he suddenly felt the meanness of every excuse he had concocted. Should he tell her the truth? Why not first as last? She would not be long discovering it. While he hesitated, she came to his rescue. Before leaving Munich Princess Nachmeister had casually remarked that she feared dear Adela was too puritanical to receive a stage artist under her roof; for the matter of that, the Anglo-Saxon races, compared with the continent of Europe, were so provincial on many subjects that she never met an English or American woman who did not make her feel as if she were the mistress of every man in Europe. But as regarded stage folk, it must be remembered that Munich was almost exceptional in its catholicity. In Paris, in Rome, in many other capitals, they were anathema outside their proper spheres. Therefore was Styr prepared for the dark brow and nervous manner of her friend. She knew that as he had not written her before this of receptions arranged in her honour and begging her to reserve certain dates, his family must have refused point-blank to receive her. She was hardly disappointed, for she had little of the American’s romantic weakness for the social citadels of the old world, and she knew Ordham so well that her sympathy in any case would have been for him, not for herself. She leaned forward and said impulsively:
“Do promise me one thing! This is not only my first visit to England, but it may be a long time before I can come again. I want to be a tourist. I want to see all the sights. And to see them with you! Ah, fancy! Don’t be haughty and tell me that you scorn sight-seeing. Don’t tell me that you want me to meet a lot of tiresome people. I have not time for both. Do you hate the idea?”
“Hate it?” He seized her hand and kissed it in his immense relief. “I should love it. I have never been inside the Tower, nor the British Museum, and only once to the Abbey—to a wedding. It will be too enchanting to have all those hours alone with you. We will go to Windsor and Hampton Court, Madame Tussaud’s and the National Gallery, exactly like two American tourists. Promise that you will not go to a single place with any one else.”
“I do not expect to see any one else except the opera house people.”
“But—of course!—attentions will be showered upon you. It is most unfortunate that my wife—”
“Oh, do let me forget that you are married. We shall wander about just as we did in Bavaria, and in this crowded city no one will be the wiser. Will you take me to the Tower this afternoon?”
“Will I? Rather!”
His good humour was quite restored, and he spent an entirely happy afternoon, even condescending to share her interest in that mighty volume of tragic drama, the Tower of London.
LII
MATRIMONY
Mabel rustled into her husband’s dressing room as he was giving the last careful strokes to his front locks, which he arranged in a manner peculiar to himself. He nodded to her absently, longing for the time when he could ask her bluntly to respect his privacy, since she was impervious to hints, and she wandered to the window and fingered the bright flowers in the boxes.