It was at Merriston, installed, apparently, so happily with her friends, that the second group of impressions became clearer for her than it had been in London, when she had herself made part of it--the group that had to do with Helen, Franklin, and herself. In London, among all the wider confusions, this smaller but more intense one had not struck her as it did seeing it from a distance. Perhaps it had been because Franklin, among all that glided, had been the raft she stood upon, that, in his company, she had not felt to the full how changed was their relation.
His devotion to her was unchanged; of that she was sure. Franklin had not altered; it was she who had altered, and she had now to look at him from the new angle where her own choice had placed her. Seen from this angle it was clear that Franklin could no longer offer just the same devotion, however truly he might feel it; she had barred that out; and it was also clear that he would continue to offer the devotion that she had left it open to him to offer; but here came the strange confusion--this devotion, this remnant, this all that could still be given, hardly differed in practice from the friendship now so frankly bestowed upon Helen as well as upon herself; and, for a further strangeness, Franklin, whom she had helplessly seen as pa.s.sing from her life, no longer counting in it, was not gone at all; he was there, indeed, as never before, with the background of his sudden millions to give him significance. Franklin was, indeed, as firmly ensconced in this new life that she had entered as he chose to be, and did he not, as a matter of fact, count in it for more than she did? If it was confusing to look at Franklin from the angle of her own withdrawal, what was it to see him altered, for the world, from drab to rose-colour and to see that people were running after him? This fantastic result of wealth, Althea, after a stare or two, was able to accept with other ironic acceptations; it was not indeed London"s vision of Franklin that altered him for her, though it confused her; no, what had altered him more than anything she could have thought possible, was Helen"s new seeing of him.
Helen, she knew quite well, still saw Franklin, pleasantly and clearly, as drab-colour, still, it was probable, saw him as funny; but it was evident that Helen had come to feel fond of him, if anything so detached could be called fondness. He could hardly count for anything with her--after all, who did?--but she liked him, she liked him very much, and it amused her to watch him adjust himself to his new conditions. She took him about with her in London and showed him things and people, ironically smiling, no doubt, and guarding even while she exposed. And Helen wouldn"t do this unless she had come to see something more than drab-colour and oddity, and whatever the more might be it was not the millions. No, sitting in the drawing-room at Merriston, with its memories of the two emotional climaxes of her life, Althea, with a sinking heart, felt sure that she had lost something, and that she only knew it lost from seeing that Helen had found it. It had been through Helen"s blindness to the qualities in Franklin which, timidly, tentatively, she had put before her, that his worth had grown dim to herself; this was the cutting fact that Althea tried to edge away from, but that her sincerity forced her again and again to examine. It was through Helen"s appreciation that she now saw more in Franklin than she had ever seen before. If he was funny he was also original, full of his own underivative flavour; if he was drab-colour, he was also beautiful.
Althea recalled the benignity of Helen"s eyes as they dwelt upon him, her smile, startled, almost touched, when some quaint, telling phrase revealed him suddenly as an unconscious torch-bearer in a dusky, self-deceiving world. Helen and Franklin were akin in that; they elicited, they radiated truth, and Althea recalled, too, how their eyes would sometimes meet in silence when they both saw the same truth simultaneously. Not that Helen"s truth was often Franklin"s; they were as alien as ever in their outlook, of this Althea was convinced; but though the outlook was so different, the faculty of sight was the same in both--clear, unperturbed, and profoundly independent. They were neither of them dusky or self-deceived. And what was she? Sitting in the drawing-room at Merriston and thinking it all over, Althea asked herself the question while her heart sank to a deeper dejection. Not only had she lost Franklin; she had lost herself. She embarked on the dangerous and often demoralising search for a definite, recognisable personality--something to lean on with security, a standard and a prop.
With growing dismay she could find only a sorry little group of shivering hopes and shaken adages. What was she? Only a well-educated nonent.i.ty with, for all coherence and purpose in life, a knowledge of art and literature and a helpless feeling for charm. Poor Althea was rapidly sinking to the nightmare stage of introspection; she saw, fitfully, not restoringly, that it was nightmare, and dragging herself away from these miserable dissections, fixed her eyes on something not herself, on the thing that, after all, gave her, even to the nightmare vision, purpose and meaning. If it were only that, let her, at all events, cling to it; the helpless feeling for charm must then shape her path. Gerald was coming, and to be subjugated was, after all, better than to disintegrate.
She drove down to meet him in the little brougham that was now established in the stables. It was a wet, chilly day. Althea, wrapped in furs, leaned in a corner and looked with an unseeing gaze at the dripping hedgerows and grey sky. She fastened herself in antic.i.p.ation on the approaching brightness. Ah, to warm herself at the light of his untroubled, unquestioning, unexacting being, to find herself in him. If he would love her and charm her, that, after all, was enough to give her a self.
He was a little late, and Althea did not feel willing to face a public meeting on the platform. She remained sitting in her corner, listening for the sound of the approaching train. When it had arrived, she heard Gerald"s voice before she saw him, and the sound thrilled through her deliciously. He was talking to a neighbour, and he paused for some moments to chat with him. Then his head appeared at the window, little drops of rain on his crisp hair, his eyes smiling, yet, as she saw in a moment, less at her in particular than at the home-coming of which she was a part. "Yes," he turned to the porter to say, "the portmanteau outside, the dressing-case in here." The door was opened and he stepped in beside her. "h.e.l.lo, Althea!" He smiled at her again, while he drew a handful of silver from his pocket and picked out a sixpence for the porter. "Here; all right." The brougham rolled briskly out of the station yard. They were in the long up-hill lanes. "Well, how are you, dear?" he asked.
Althea was trembling, but she was controlling herself; she had all the pain and none of the advantage of the impulsive, emotional woman; consciousness of longing made instinctive appeal impossible. "Very well, thank you," she smiled, as quietly as he.
"What a beastly day!" said Gerald, looking out. "You can"t imagine London. It"s like breathing in a wet blanket. The clean air is a comfort, at all events."
"Yes," smiled Althea.
"Old Morty Finch is coming down in time for dinner," Gerald went on. "I met him on my way to the station and asked him. Such a good fellow--you remember him? He won"t be too many, will he?"
"Indeed no."
Gerald leaned back, drew the rug up about his knees, and folded his arms, looking at her, still with his generally contented smile. "And your guests are happy? You"re enjoying yourself? Miss Arlington plays the violin, you said. I"m looking forward to hearing her--and seeing her again, too; she is such a very pretty girl."
"Isn"t she?" said Althea. And now, as they rolled on between the dripping hedges, she knew that the trembling of hope and fear was gone, and that a sudden misery, like that of the earth and sky, had settled upon her. He had not kissed her. He did not even take her hand. Oh, why did he not kiss her? why did he not know that she wanted love and comfort? Only her pride controlled the cry.
Gerald looked out of the window and seemed to find everything very pleasant. "I went to the play last night," he said. "Kane took a party of us--Helen, Miss Buchanan, Lord Compton, and Molly Fanshawe. What a good sort he is, Kane; a real character."
"You didn"t get at him at all in the summer, did you?" said Althea, in her deadened voice.
"No," said Gerald reflectively, "not at all; and I don"t think that I get much more at him now, you know; but I see more what"s in him; he is so extraordinarily kind and he takes his money so nicely. And, O Lord!
how he is being run after! He really has millions, you know; the mothers are all at his traces trying to track him down, and he is as cheerful and as unconcerned as you please." Gerald suddenly smiled round at her again. "I say, Althea, don"t you regret him sometimes? It would have been a glorious match, you know."
Althea felt herself growing pale. "Regret him!" she said, and, for her, almost violently, the opportunity was an outlet for her wretchedness; "I can"t conceive how a man"s money can make any difference. I couldn"t have married Franklin if he"d been a king!"
"Oh, my dear!" said Gerald, startled; "I didn"t mean it seriously, of course."
"It seems to me," said Althea, trying to control her labouring breath, "that over here you take nothing quite so seriously as that--great matches, I mean, and money."
Gerald was silent for a moment; then, in a very courteous voice he said: "Have I offended you in any way, Althea?"
Tears stood in her eyes; she turned away her head to hide them. "Yes, you have," she said, and the sound of her voice shocked her, it so contradicted the crying out of her disappointed heart.
But though Gerald was blind on occasions that did not seem to him to warrant any close attention, he was clear-sighted on those that did. He understood that something was amiss; and though her exclamation had, indeed, made him angry for a moment, he was now sorry; he felt that she was unhappy, and he couldn"t bear people to be unhappy. "I"ve done something that displeases you," he said, taking her hand and leaning forward to look into her eyes, half pleading and half rallying her in the way she knew so well. "Do forgive me."
She longed to put her head on his shoulder and sob: "I wanted you to love me"; but that would have been to abase herself too much; yet the tears fell as she answered, trying to smile: "It was only that you hurt me; even in jest I cannot bear to have you say that I could have been so sordid."
He pressed her hand. "I was only in fun, of course. Please forgive me."
She knew, with all his gay solicitude, his gentle self-reproach, that she had angered and perplexed him, that she made him feel a little at a loss with her talk of sordidness, that, perhaps, she wearied him. And, seeing this, she was frightened--frightened, and angry that she should be afraid. But fear predominated, and she forced herself to smile at him and to talk with him during the long drive, as though nothing had happened.
CHAPTER XXII.
Some days after Gerald had gone to Merriston, Franklin Kane received a little note from old Miss Buchanan. Helen, too, had gone to the country until Monday, as she had told Franklin when he had asked her to see some pictures with him on Sat.u.r.day. Franklin had felt a little bereft, especially since, hoping for her on Sat.u.r.day, he had himself refused an invitation. But he did not miss that; the invitations that poured in upon him, like a swelling river, were sources of cheerful amus.e.m.e.nt to him. He, too, was acquiring his little ironies and knew why they poured in. It was not the big house-party where he would have been a fish out of water--even though in no sense a fish landed--that he missed; he missed Helen; and he wouldn"t think of going to see pictures without her. It was, therefore, pleasant to read Miss Buchanan"s hospitable suggestion that he should drop in that afternoon for a cup of tea and to keep an old woman company. He was very glad indeed to keep Miss Buchanan company. She interested him greatly; he had not yet in the least made out what was her object in life, whether she had gained or missed it, and whether, indeed, she had ever had one to gain or miss. People who went thus unpiloted through life filled him with wonder and conjecture.
He found Miss Buchanan as he had found her on the occasion of his first visit to the little house in Belgravia. Her acute and rugged face showed not much greater softening for this now wonted guest--showed, rather, a greater acuteness; but any one who knew Miss Buchanan would know from its expression that she liked Franklin Kane. "Well," she said, as he drew his chair to the opposite side of the tea-table--very cosy it was, the fire shining upon them, and the canaries trilling intermittently--"Well, here we are, abandoned. We"ll make the best of it, won"t we?"
Franklin said that under the circ.u.mstances he couldn"t feel at all abandoned. "Nor do I," said Miss Buchanan, filling the tea-pot. "You and I get on very well together, I consider." Franklin thought so too.
"I hope we may go on with it," said Miss Buchanan, leaning back in her chair while the tea drew. "I hope we are going to keep you over here.
You"ve given up any definite idea of going back, I suppose."
Franklin was startled by this confident a.s.surance. His definite idea in coming over had been, of course, to go back at the end of the autumn, unless, indeed, a certain cherished hope were fulfilled, in which case Althea should have decided on any movements. He had hardly, till this moment, contemplated his own intentions, and now that he did so he found that he had been guided by none that were definable. It was not because he had suddenly grown rich and, in his funny way, the fashion, that he thus stayed on in London, working hard, it is true, and allowing no new developments to interfere with his work, yet making no plans and setting no goal before himself. To live as he had been living for the past weeks was, indeed, in a sense, to drift. There was nothing Franklin disapproved of more than of drifting; therefore he was startled when Miss Buchanan"s remarks brought him to this realisation. "Well, upon my word, Miss Buchanan," he said, "I hadn"t thought about it. No--of course not--of course, I"ve not given up the idea of going back. I shall go back before very long. But things have turned up, you see. There is Althea"s wedding--I must be at that--and there"s Miss Helen. I want to see as much of her as I can before I go home, get my friendship firmly established, you know."
Miss Buchanan now poured out the tea and handed Franklin his cup. "I shouldn"t think about going yet, then," she observed. "London is an admirable place for the sort of work you are interested in, and I entirely sympathise with your wish to see as much as you can of Helen."
She added, after a little pause in which Franklin, still further startled to self-contemplation, wondered whether it was work, Althea"s wedding, or Helen who had most kept him in London,--"I"m troubled about Helen; she"s not looking at all well; hasn"t been feeling well all the summer. I trace it to that attack of influenza she had in Paris when she met Miss Jakes."
Franklin"s thoughts were turned from himself. He looked grave. "I"m afraid she"s delicate," he said.
"There is nothing sickly about her, but she is fragile," said Miss Buchanan. "She can"t stand wear and tear. It might kill her."
Franklin looked even graver. The thought of his friend killed by wear and tear was inexpressibly painful to him. He remembered--he would never forget--the day in the woods, Helen"s "I"m sick to death of it."
That Helen had a secret sorrow, and that it was preying upon her, he felt sure, and there was pride for him in the thought that he could help her there; he could help her to hide it; even her aunt didn"t know that she was sick to death of it. "What do you suggest might be done?" he now inquired. "Do you think she goes out too much? Perhaps a rest-cure."
"No; I don"t think she over-tires herself; she doesn"t go out nearly as much as she used to. There is nothing to cure and nothing to rest from.
It isn"t so much now; I"m here now to make things possible for her. It"s after I"m gone. I"m an old woman; I"m devoted to my niece, and I don"t see what"s to become of her when I"m dead."
If Franklin had been startled before, he was shocked now. He had never given much thought to the economic basis of Helen"s life, taking it for granted that though she would like more money, she had, and always would have, quite enough to live on happily. The idea of an insecure future for her had never entered his head. He now knew that, for all his theories of the independence of women, it was quite intolerable to contemplate an insecure future for Helen. Some women might have it in them to secure themselves--she was not one of them. She was a flower in a vase; if the vase were taken away the flower would simply lie where it fell and wither. He had put down his tea-cup while Miss Buchanan spoke, and he sat gazing at her. "Isn"t Miss Helen provided for?" he asked.
"Yes, in a sense she is," said Miss Buchanan, who, after drinking her tea, did not go on to her m.u.f.fin, but still leaned back with folded arms, her deep-set, small grey eyes fixed on Franklin"s face. "I"ve seen to that as best I could; but one can"t save much out of a small annuity.
Helen, after my death, will have an income of 150 a year. It isn"t enough. You have only to look at Helen to see that it isn"t enough.
She"s not fit to sc.r.a.pe and manage on that."
Franklin repeated the sum thoughtfully. "Well, no, perhaps not," he half thought, only half agreed; "not leading the kind of life she does now.
If she could only work at something as well; bring in a little more like that." But Miss Buchanan interrupted him.
"Nonsense, my dear man; what work is there--work that will bring in money--for a decorative, untrained idler like Helen? And what time would she have left to live the only life she"s fit to lead if she had to make money? I"m not worried about bare life for Helen; I"m worried about what kind of life it"s to be. Helen was brought up to be an idler and to make a good marriage--like most girls of her cla.s.s--and she hasn"t made it, and she"s not likely to make it now."
"One hundred and fifty pounds isn"t enough," said Franklin, still thoughtfully, "for a decorative idler."
"That"s just it," Miss Buchanan acquiesced; and she went on after a moment, "I"m willing to call Helen a decorative idler if we are talking of purely economic weights and measures; thank goodness there are other standards, and we are not likely to see them eliminated from civilised society for many a generation. For many a generation, I trust, there"ll be people in the world who don"t earn their keep, as one may say, and yet who are more worth while keeping than most of the people who do. To my mind Helen is such a person. I"d like to tell you a little about her life, Mr. Kane."
"I should be very much obliged if you would," Franklin murmured, his thin little face taking on an expression of most intense concentration.
"It would be a great privilege. You know what I feel about Miss Helen."
"Yes; it"s because I know what you feel about her that I want to tell you," said Miss Grizel. "Not that it"s anything startling, or anything you wouldn"t have supposed for yourself; but it ill.u.s.trates my point, I think, very well, my point that Helen is the type of person we can"t afford to let go under. Has Helen ever spoken to you about her mother?"