By the side of her sister, Brenda Gilholme might easily pass unnoticed. Mrs. Huston was, in the usual sense of the word, a beautiful woman, and such women live in an atmosphere of notoriety. Wherever they go they are worshipped at a distance by those beneath them in station, patronized by those above them, respected by their equals, because, forsooth, face and form are moulded with delicacy and precision. The mind of such a woman is of little importance; the person is pleasing, and more is not demanded. Only her husband will some day awaken to the fact that worship from a distance might have been more satisfactory. The effect of personal beauty is a lamentable factor which cannot be denied. All men, good and bad alike, come under its influence. A lovely woman can twist most of us round her dainty finger with a wanton disregard for the powers of intellect or physical energy.
Brenda was not beautiful; she was only pretty, with a dainty refinement of heart which was visible in her delicate face. But her prettiness was in no way tainted with weakness, as was her sister's beauty. She was strong and thoughtful, with a true woman's faculty for hiding these unwelcome qualities from the eyes of inferior men. She had grown up in the shadow of this beautiful sister, and men had not cared to seek for intellect where they saw only a reflected beauty. She had passed through a social notoriety, but eager eyes had only glanced at her in passing. She had merely been Alice Gilholme's sister, and now—here on Plymouth platform—Alice Huston was assuming her old superiority. My brothers, think of this! It must have been a wondrous love that overcame such drawbacks, that passed by with tolerance a thousand daily slights. And Brenda's love for her sister accomplished all this. Ah, and more! In the days that followed there was a greater wrong—a wrong which only blind selfishness could have inflicted—and this also Brenda Gilholme forgave.
The sisters had met on the steamboat landing a few moments previously. A rattling drive through the town had followed, and now they were able to speak together alone for the first time. There had been no display of emotion. The beautiful lips had met lightly, the well-gloved fingers had clasped each other with no nervous hysterical fervour, and now it would seem that they had parted but a week ago. Emotion is tabooed in the school through which these two had passed—the school of nineteenth-century society—and, indeed, we appear to get along remarkably well without it.
'My dear,' Mrs. Huston was saying, 'he will be home by the next boat if he can raise the money. We cannot count on more than a week's start.'
'And,' inquired Brenda, 'can he raise the money?'
'Oh yes! If he can get as far as the steamboat office without spending it.'
Brenda looked at her sister in a curious way.
'Spending it on what ... Alice?'
'On—drink!'
Mrs. Huston was not the woman to conceal any of her own grievances from quixotically unselfish motives.