Then she recovered herself with an effort. The name, or the intelligence of Lawrence Colquhoun's return, gave her a great shock.
"Mr. Colquhoun your guardian! I did not know. And is he coming home?"
"You will come and see me when I am staying—if I am to stay—at his house?"
"I shall certainly," said Mrs. Cassilis, setting her lips together—"I shall certainly make a point of seeing Mr. Colquhoun on his return, whether you are staying with him or not. Here is Carnarvon Square. No, thank you, I will not get down, even to have a cup of tea with you. Good-bye, Phillis, till this evening. My dear, I think the white dress that you showed me will do admirably. Home at once."
A woman of steel? Rubbish! There is no man or woman of steel, save he who has brooded too long over his own perfections. A metallic statue, the enemies of Mrs. Cassilis called her. They knew nothing. A woman who had always perfect control over herself, said her husband. He knew nothing. A woman who turned pale at the mention of a name, and longed, yet feared, to meet a man, thought Phillis. And she knew something, because she knew the weak point in this woman's armour. Being neither curious, nor malignant, nor a disciple in the school for scandal, Phillis drew her little conclusion, kept it to herself, and thought no more about it.
As for the reasons which prompted Mrs. Cassilis to "take up" Phillis Fleming, they were multiplex, like all the springs of action which move us to act. She wanted to find out for her husband of what sort was this system of education which Joseph Jagenal could not discover anywhere. She was interested in, although not attracted by, the character of the girl, unlike any she had ever seen. And she wanted to use Phillis—an heiress, young, beautiful, piquante, strange—as an attraction to her house. For Mrs. Cassilis was ambitious. She wished to attract men to her evenings. She pictured herself—it is the dream of so many cultured women—as another Madame Récamier, Madame du Deffand, or Madame de Rambouillet. All the intellect in London was to be gathered in her salon. She caught lions; she got hold of young authors; she made beginnings with third-rate people who had written books. They were not amusing; they were not witty; they were devoured by envy and hatred. She let them drop, and now she wanted to begin again. An idle and a futile game. She had not the quick sympathies, the capacity for hero-worship, the lovableness of the Récamier. She had no tears for others. She did not know that the woman who aspires to lead men must first be able to be led.
There was another fatal objection, not fully understood by ladies who have "evenings" and sigh over their empty rooms. In these days of clubs, what man is going to get up after dinner and find his melancholy way from Pall Mall to Kensington Palace Gardens, in order to stand about a drawing-room for two hours and listen to "general" talk? It wants a Phillis, and a personal, if hopeless, devotion to a Phillis, to tear the freshest lion from his club, after dinner, even if it be to an altar of adulation. The evening begins properly with dinner: and where men dine they love to stay.
"Jack Dunquerque came to see me to-day," Phillis told Joseph. "You remember Mr. Dunquerque. He was at Mrs. Cassilis's last night. He came at two, to have luncheon and to tell me about Mr. Colquhoun; but he did not tell me anything about him. We talked about ourselves."
"Is Mr. Dunquerque a friend of yours?"
"Yes; Jack and I are friends," Phillis replied readily. There was not the least intention to deceive; but Joseph was deceived. He thought they had been old friends. Somehow, perhaps, Phillis did not like to talk very much about her friendship for Jack.