"Why?" said Septimus. "Isn"t that the history of the best lives?"
This philosophic plane was too high for Emmy, who had her pleasant being in a less rarified atmosphere. "To want, to get, to enjoy," was the guiding motto of her existence. What was the use of wanting unless you got, and what was the use of getting unless you enjoyed? She came to the conclusion that Septimus was only sentimentally in love with Zora, and she regarded his tepid pa.s.sion as a matter of no importance. At the same time her easy discovery delighted her. It invested Septimus with a fresh air of comicality.
"You"re just the sort of man to write poetry about her. Don"t you?"
"Oh, no!" said Septimus.
"Then what do you do?"
"I play the ba.s.soon," said he.
Emmy clapped her hands with joy, thereby scaring a hen that was straying on the common.
"Another accomplishment? Why didn"t you tell us? I"m sure Zora doesn"t know of it. Where did you learn?"
"Wiggleswick taught me," said he. "He was once in a band."
"You must bring it round," cried Emmy.
But when Septimus, prevailed on by her entreaties, did appear with the instrument in Mrs. Oldrieve"s drawing-room, he made such unearthly and terrific noises that Mrs. Oldrieve grew pale and Zora politely but firmly took it from his hands and deposited it in the umbrella-stand in the hall.
"I hope you don"t mind," she said.
"Oh, dear, no," said Septimus mildly. "I could never make out why anybody liked it."
Seeing that Septimus had a sentimental side to his character, Emmy gradually took him into her confidence, until Septimus knew things that Zora did not dream of. Zora, who had been married, and had seen the world from Nunsmere Pond to the crater of Mount Vesuvius, treated her sister with matronly indulgence, as a child to whom Great Things were unrevealed. She did not reckon with the rough-and-tumble experiences of life which a girl must gain from a two years" battle on the stage. In fact, she did not reckon with any of the circ.u.mstances of Emmy"s position. She herself was too ignorant, too much centered as yet in her own young impulses and aspirations, and far too serene in her unquestioning faith in the impeccability of the Oldrieve family. To her Emmy was still the fluffy-haired little sister with caressing ways whom she could send upstairs for her work-basket or could reprimand for a flirtation. Emmy knew that Zora loved her dearly; but she was the least bit in the world afraid of her, and felt that in affairs of the heart she would be unsympathetic.
So Emmy withheld her confidence from Zora, and gave it to Septimus.
Besides, it always pleases a woman more to tell her secrets to a man than to another woman. There is more excitement in it, even though the man be as unmoved as a stock-fish.
Thus it fell out that Septimus heard of Mordaunt Prince, whose constant appearance in Emmy"s London circle of friends Zora had viewed with plentiful lack of interest. He was a paragon of men. He acted like a Salvini and sang like an angel. He had been far too clever to take his degree at Oxford. He had just bought a thousand-guinea motor car, and--Septimus was not to whisper a word of it to Zora--she had recently been on a three-days" excursion with him. Mordaunt Prince said this and Mordaunt Prince said that. Mordaunt paid three guineas a pair for his brown boots. He had lately divorced his wife, an unspeakable creature only too anxious for freedom. Mordaunt came to see her every day in London, and every day during their absence they corresponded. Her existence was wrapped up in Mordaunt Prince. She traveled about with a suit-case (or so it appeared to Septimus) full of his photographs. He had been the leading man at the theater where she had her last engagement, and had fallen madly, devotedly, pa.s.sionately in love with her. As soon as the divorce was made absolute they would be married. She had quarreled with her best friend, who had tried to make mischief between them with a view to securing Mordaunt for herself. Had Septimus ever heard of such a cat? Septimus hadn"t.
He was greatly interested in as much of the story as he could follow--Emmy was somewhat discursive--and as his interjectory remarks were unprovocative of argument, he const.i.tuted himself a good listener. Besides, romance had never come his way. It was new to him, even Emmy"s commonplace little romance, like a field of roses to a town-bred child, and it seemed sweet and gracious, a thing to dream about. His own distant worship of Zora did not strike him as romantic. It was a part of himself, like the hallowed memory of his mother and the conception of his devastating guns. Had he been more worldly-wise he would have seen possible danger in Emmy"s romance, and insisted on Zora being taken into their confidence. But Septimus believed that the radiant beings of the earth, such as Emmy and Mordaunt Prince, from whom a quaint destiny kept him aloof, could only lead radiant lives, and the thought of harm did not cross his candid mind. Even while keeping Emmy"s secret from Zora, he regarded it as a romantic and even dainty deceit.
Zora, seeing him happy with his guns and Wiggleswick and Emmy, applauded herself mightily as a contriver of good. Her mother also put ideas into her head.
From the drawing-room window they once saw Emmy and Septimus part at the little front gate. They had evidently returned from a walk. She plucked a great white chrysanthemum bloom from a bunch she was carrying, flicked it laughingly in his face, and stuck it in his b.u.t.tonhole.
"What a good thing it would be for Emmy," said Mrs. Oldrieve, with a sigh.
"To marry Septimus? Oh, mother!"
She laughed merrily; then all at once she became serious.
"Why not?" she cried, and kissed her mother.
Mrs. Oldrieve settled her cap. She was small and Zora was large, and Zora"s embraces were often disarranging.
"He is a gentleman and can afford to keep a wife."
"And steady?" said Zora, with a smile.
"I should think quite steady," said Mrs. Oldrieve, without one.
"And he would amuse Emmy all day long."
"I don"t think it is part of a husband"s duty, dear, to amuse his wife,"
said Mrs. Oldrieve.
The sudden entrance of Emmy, full of fresh air, laughter, and chrysanthemums, put an end to the conversation; but thenceforward Zora thought seriously of romantic possibilities. Like her mother, she did not entirely approve of Emmy"s London circle. It was characterized by too much freedom, too great a lack of reticence. People said whatever came into their minds, and did, apparently, whatever occurred to their bodies. She could not quite escape from her mother"s Puritan strain. For herself she felt secure. She, Zora, could wander unattended over Europe, mixing without spot or stain with whatever company she listed; that was because she was Zora Middlemist, a young woman of exceptional personality and experience of life. Ordinary young persons, for their own safe conduct, ought to obey the conventions which were made with that end in view; and Emmy was an ordinary young person. She should marry; it would conduce to her moral welfare, and it would be an excellent thing for Septimus. The marriage was therefore made in the unclouded heaven of Zora"s mind. She shed all her graciousness over the young couple. Never had Emmy felt herself enwrapped in more sisterly affection. Never had Septimus dreamed of such tender solicitude.
Yet she sang Septimus"s praises to Emmy and Emmy"s praises to Septimus in so natural a manner that neither of the two was puzzled.
"It is the natural instinct that makes every woman a matchmaker. She works blindly towards the baby. If she cannot have one directly, she will have it vicariously. The sourest of old maids is thus doomed to have a hand in the perpetuation of the race."
Thus spake the Literary Man from London, discoursing generally--out of earshot of the Vicar and his wife, to whom he was paying one of his periodical visits--in a corner of their drawing-room. Zora, conscious of matchmaking, declared him to be horrid and physiological.
"A woman is much more refined and delicate in her motives."
"The highly civilized woman," said Rattenden, "is delightfully refined in her table manners, and eats cuc.u.mber sandwiches in the most delicate way in the world; but she is obeying the same instinct that makes your lady cannibal thrust raw gobbets of missionary into her mouth with her fingers."
"Your conversation is revolting," said Zora.
"Because I speak the truth? Truth is a Mokanna."
"What on earth is that?" asked Zora.
The Literary man sighed. "The Veiled Prophet of Khorasan, Lalla Rookh, Tom Moore. Ichabod."
"It sounds like a cypher cablegram," said Zora flippantly. "But go on."
"I will. Truth, I say, is a Mokanna. So long as it"s decently covered with a silver veil, you all prostrate yourselves before it and pretend to worship it. When anyone lifts the veil and reveals the revolting horror of it, you run away screaming, with your hands before your eyes. Why do you want truth to be pretty? Why can"t you look its ghastliness bravely in the face? How can you expect to learn anything if you don"t? How can you expect to form judgments on men and things? How can you expect to get to the meaning of life on which you were so keen a year ago?"
"I want beauty, and not disgustfulness," said Zora.
"Should it happen, for the sake of argument, that I wanted two dear friends to marry, it is only because I know how happy they would be together. The ulterior motive you suggest is repulsive."
"But it"s true," said Rattenden. "I wish I could talk to you more. I could teach you a great deal. At any rate I know that you"ll think about what I"ve said to-day."
"I won"t," she declared.
"You will," said he. And then he dropped a very b.u.t.tery piece of b.u.t.tered toast on the carpet and, picking it up, said "d.a.m.n" under his breath; and then they both laughed, and Zora found him human.
"Why are you so bent on educating me?" she asked.
"Because," said he, "I am one of the few men of your acquaintance who doesn"t want to marry you."
"Indeed?" said Zora sarcastically, yet hating herself for feeling a little pang of displeasure. "May I ask why?"
"Because," said he, "I"ve a wife and five children already."