"It's good to see you again, Jerry," he said heartily, "mighty good!" And with his hand gripping mine, I had a moment of whimsical wonder that any woman born should have been able to threaten such a friendship for (or by!) the twinkling of an eye.
We talked of our plans, mine, such as they were, being only too ready to merge into his, which included a stiff climb through the Swiss Alps; of my Oxford sojourn; of Margarita's music and his readiness to get back to America as soon as she should feel equal to it. It amused me a little to discover how simply Roger accepted his rôle of indulgent American husband: those men are born to it, I believe—there seems no crisis, no period of instruction, even. I never pretended to half his real strength of character, but I could not have imagined myself stopping in circumstances more or less distasteful to me until my wife's whim should release us! I had spoken to no woman for many months, you must remember, but my landlady and the Professor's trained nurse, and unflattering though it may sound to the much-desired sex, I had not been conscious of any special lack, after the first few weeks.
To this day I have never known the name of the street nor the number of that Paris appartement. We were deep in our plans for mountaineering, and except that I noted the wheezy little lift of Mrs. Upgrove's letter, I remember literally nothing about that excursion but the familiar odour of the Paris asphalt, the snapping and cracking of the Gallic horsewhip, and the smoke of my own cigarette which blew into my eyes as I threw it away on entering the house.
The late afternoon sun poured into the gay little drawing-room, all buff and dull rose, in the charming French style, and full of sweet spring flowers in bowls and square jars of Majolica ware. The height of the appartement made it delightfully airy and bright, and through the western windows I glimpsed the feathery tips of the delicate new green of the trees. A small grand piano stood near an open window and a gorgeous length of Chinese embroidery on the opposite wall was reflected in a tall, narrow mirror that doubled the apparent size of the room and gave a pleasant depth and richness to all the airy clearness of the spring that seemed to fairly incarnate itself in the spot and the hour. I have never liked Oriental embroideries since that day, and the clogging scent of hyacinth is a thing I would take some trouble to avoid; those sad little spires of violet, pink and white spell only sorrow to one man, at least: sorrow and memories of pitiful and unmanly weakness.
For standing by the piano, one hand with its cloudy, flashing sapphire white among the pale stiff spikes, her deer-like head dark against the fantastic rose and orange of the embroidered dragons, was Margarita, a lovely smile curving her lips and the warm light in her deep slate-coloured eyes burning down, down into my very vitals. In that one rich, welcome smile all my calm English months melted like wax in a furnace, and Oxford was a drab dream and Surrey a stupid sick-bay! As I faced her, the old wound burst and widened, with that torturing sweet shock that I had relegated sagely to poets and youthful heats, and I knew that I loved her hopelessly, with a love that put out my love for Roger and my mother as the sun puts out the small and steady stars.
I had left a bewitching, unlikely elf; I found a magnificent woman. She seemed to my gloating eyes to have grown tall, though that might have been the effect of her loosely flowing, long-trained gown, which was as if she had put on a garment of shot green and blue silk and then another over it of rich, yellowish lace. The neck was cut in a sort of square, such as one sees in the pictures of Venetian ladies in the cinque cento, and at the base of her full throat lay an antique necklace of aqua marines. Heavens! How perfect she was! As she moved over in her grand free stride and took my hands in both of hers, vitality and glowing strength seemed to pour along her veins into mine; she seemed almost extravagantly alive, and I a pallid, stupid dabbler on the shore of things. Her figure was much fuller; her arm, where the loose lace sleeve fell back from it, was plump and round, and this and the increased softness of her throat and chin added a year or two—yes, three or four—to what I had hitherto believed to be her age. She was a fit mate for Roger now; no longer a captured child-witch.
I bent over her hands, to cover my emotion, and ceremoniously kissed the backs of them; there was a creamy dimple below each finger now. As I lifted my head and heard Roger's chuckle of delight at my amazement at her, I saw for the first time that we three were not alone in the room, and found myself bowing to a neat, chill British spinster, big and white of tooth, big and flat of waist, big and bony of knuckle. She wore sensible, square-toed boots and the fashion of her clothing suggested a conscientious tailor who had momentarily lost sight of her sex. She bore a pince-nez upon her flat chest, the necessity for which was obvious, but her short-sighted blue eyes were kind and the grasp of her knuckly hand was human. She was a thorough-going lady if she was a trifle grotesque, and my respectful friendship for Barbara Jencks, late of the household of the Governor-General of Canada, has never waned.
"You find Mrs. Bradley somewhat changed, I dare say," she remarked, by way of breaking a rather strained silence, for Roger, never talkative, was hunting among a pile of guide-books and Margarita was staring dreamily into the sunset, now a miracle of golden rose.
"Somewhat, indeed," I responded politely, my mind darting back to that girl in the red jersey who had sat cross-legged like a Turk on the sand, and told me that I loved her. What would the Governor-General have thought of that girl?
Again a pause, and now Miss Jencks addressed Margarita, affectionately, but firmly—oh, very firmly!