“I? Oh no, not I,” he replied heartily. He repeated this asseveration to himself while dressing for dinner. Why indeed should he be unhappy? Had he not looked a few hours before at God's earth and found that it was good? Besides, to add to the common stock of the world's unhappiness were a crime. “Yes, a crime,” he said aloud, with a vigorous pull at his white tie. Then he perceived that it was hopelessly mangled, and wished for Aline, who usually conducted that part of the ceremony of his toilette.
“It will have to do,” he said cheerfully, as he turned away from the glass.
Yet, for all his philosophising, he was surprised at the relief that his wild confession to Connie had afforded him. The burden that had seemed too heavy for him to bear had now grown magically light. He attributed the phenomenon to Connie Deering, to the witchery of her sweet sympathy and the comfort of her sisterly kiss. By the time he had finished dressing the acute pain of the past two days had vanished, and as he went down the stairs he accounted himself a happy man. In the drawing-room he met Norma, and chatted to her almost light-heartedly. He did not notice the constraint in her manner, her avoidance of his glance, the little pucker of troubled brows; nor was he aware of her sigh of relief when the door opened and the servant announced Mr. Theodore Weever, who with one or two other people were dining at the house. Mr. and Mrs. Hardacre followed on the American's heels, and soon the rest of the party had assembled. Jimmie had no opportunity for further talk with Norma, who studiously kept apart from him all the evening, and during dinner devoted herself to subacid conversation with Morland and to a reckless interchange of cynical banter with Weever. Jimmie, talking with picturesque fancy about his student days in the Rue Bonaparte to his neighbour, a frank fox-hunting and sport-loving young woman, never dreamed of the chaos of thoughts and feelings that whirled behind the proud face on the opposite side of the table; and Norma, when her mind now and then worked lucidly, wondered at the strength and sweetness of the man who could subdue such passion and laugh with a gaiety so honest and sincere. For herself, Theodore Weever, with his icy humour that crystallised her own irony into almost deadly wit, was her sole salvation during the interminable meal. Once Morland, listening with admiration, whispered in her ear:
“I've never heard you in such good form.”
She had to choke down an hysterical impulse of laughter and swallow a mouthful of champagne. Later, when the women guests had gone, she slipped up to her room without saying good-night to Morland, and, dismissing her maid, as she had done the night before, sat for a long time, holding her head in her hands, vainly seeking to rid it of words that seemed to have eaten into her brain. And when she thought of Morland, of last night, of her humiliation, she flushed hot from hair to feet. She was only five-and-twenty, and the world had not as yet completed its work of hardening. It was a treacherous and deceitful world; she had prided herself on being a finished product of petrifaction, and here she lay, scorched and bewildered, like any soft and foolish girl who had been suddenly brought too near the flame of life. Keenly she felt the piteousness of her defeat. In what it exactly consisted she did not know. She was only conscious of broken pride, the shattering of the little hard-faced gods in her temple, the tearing up of the rails upon which she had reckoned to travel to her journey's end. Hers was a confused soul state, devoid of immediate purpose. A breach of her engagement with Morland did not occur to her mind, and Jimmie was merely an impersonal utterer of volcanic words. She slept but little. In the morning she found habit by her bedside; she clothed herself therein and faced the day.
Much was expected of her. The great garden-party was to take place that afternoon. Her Serene Highness the Princess of Herren-Rothbeck had signified that she would do Mr. and Mrs. Hardacre the honour of being present. Her Grace the Duchess of Wiltshire would accompany the princess. The ban and arriere-ban of the county had been invited, and the place would be filled with fair women agog to bask in the smiles of royalty, and ill-tempered men dragged away from their partridges by ambitious wives. A firm of London caterers had contracted for the refreshments. A military band would play on the terrace. A clever French showman whom Providence had sent to cheer the dying hours of the London season, and had kept during the dead months at a variety theatre, was coming down with an authentic Guignol. He had promised the choicest pieces in his repertoire—la vraie grivoiserie française—and men who had got wind of the proposed entertainment winked at one another wickedly. The garden-party was to be an affair of splendour worthy of the royal lady who had deigned to shed her serenity upon the county families assembled; and Mr. Hardacre had raised a special sum of money to meet the expenses.
“I shall have to go to the Jews, my dear,” he had said to his wife when they were first discussing ways and means.
“Oh, go to the—Jews then,” said Mrs. Hardacre, almost betrayed, in her irritation, into an unwifely retort. “What does it matter, what does any sacrifice matter, when once we have royalty at the house? You are such a fool, Benjamin.”
He had a singular faculty for arousing the waspishness of his wife; yet, save on rare occasions, he was the meekest of men in her presence.
“Well, you know best, Eliza,” he said.