"I shall have to give it up, and you will tell me yourself out of grat.i.tude, for ceasing to tease you."
Katherine leaned back on the soft green silk cushions of the sofa. She was looking most alluring in her new role of honoured guest. It was so delightful to be perfectly at ease and able to lean there, and not sit bolt upright in a chair in an att.i.tude of respect. The Duke found the sight of her extremely soothing.
"You come to London sometimes, I expect?"
"Yes, for a part of the year."
"Ah! I thought so! I did not believe that Iceland produced such a polished creature. You know you are quite unusual, Miss Bush. You have consented, without apparent reluctance, to talk upon interesting subjects to a wearied and middle-aged man, and you have not spoken of golf or dancing--and you have not smoked!"
"I do smoke sometimes, but only when I am doing some tiresome mechanical work like typing."
"Typing?--I suppose it is useful--but what can you have to type? Are you writing a book?"
Katherine gave a sudden soft laugh, infinitely provoking; it made the blood run in Gerard Strobridge"s veins, and he viciously played a knave while quivering with a sense of rebellion. He knew what it meant when she laughed like that! When would this ghastly evening end?
And Katherine half whispered: "No, not writing one, but trying to learn out of that greatest volume of all time--the book of life!"
"What can you know of life?" The Duke asked the question as Gerard Strobridge had asked it long ago. "Protected and pampered and kept from all but its pleasant sides--what can girls of our cla.s.s know of life?"
"Tell me, then, what it is--since I could not be supposed to know?" and her mouth still looked mischievous as well as her eyes.
The Duke thrilled a little.
"Life is either a muddle through, or an achievement. And it contains good things and bad things, and pa.s.sions--and it is forever trying to express itself, and proclaim its meaning quite regardless of laws."
""Tis not to stalk about and draw fresh air, From time to time, or gaze upon the Sun."
"Oh! it is a splendid thing!" Katherine cried, and her voice vibrated.
"And unlike the _Spanish Student_, I shall not "grow weary of the bewildering masquerade," "where strangers walk as friends and friends as strangers." And even if they did, the unexpectedness of it would be delightful!"
Mordryn looked at her. At the fresh, young firm, smooth cheeks, the living red, voluptuous mouth, the ashen-hued hair, every strand of which seemed to be specially alive and to hold its own silvery glitter. And then at her strange, compelling eyes, and he sighed a little. She seemed such an embodiment of vital things.
"You are ready for the great adventure?"
"Quite, and I mean to know everything before I grow old and indifferent."
He sighed again.
"Age does not always produce indifference; it would be merciful if it did."
"There can be no need really to grow old. Age comes because people lose their grip on things."
"Probably. But responsibilities and sorrows and disappointments age. You have no doubt a very sheltered life, and so it seems to you that all is easy."
Katherine laughed again softly. It was so delicious to think of the reality in contrast to his supposition!
"My life is indeed sheltered--by a very strong shield, but not by the one your words would suggest."
"No? What then?"
"It is not at all interesting to talk of me; I have already told you so--Why do you persist? I would much rather hear of foreign countries--Italy, for instance. I have never been there."
There was not the least subjective deference in her manner to him. It was as if an equal were talking to one of her own brain calibre and that equal a woman, who had a right to be humoured. Women--especially girls--were not wont so to treat him, but were always more or less impressed by his great position, or his aloofness, or his satirical but courteous wit. He had sometimes an expression of contemptuous, amiable tolerance, which was eighteenth century and disconcerting. It made all but the most simple or most highly cultivated among them slightly uneasy--Was he laughing at them? They were never quite sure.
He found himself piqued now, and in no mood to be balked, so he contradicted Katherine.
"You may not find yourself interesting to talk about; it chances that I do. I wish to know what it is that shields you so effectively."
"A clear idea of what I want, I expect, and a strong enough will not to be much buffeted about by any wind of opinion."
"What a _rara avis_! And you look so young!"
"I am twenty-three; that is fully grown."
"And what is it you want?"
"To be free to soar--to see the world--to feel its throb--to demonstrate some of my ideas."
"On what subjects?"
"The meanings of things--and why they are--and the common sense aspect of them. Then one could help humanity. Lady Garribardine is my ideal of what a woman should be. There is nothing small about her; she is as big as a great man and far more sagacious."
"There I am with you!" and his voice became eager. "Her Ladyship has always been the perfection of things feminine, in my opinion. You know her well?"
"Extremely well. She is not afraid of her views and principles. She is really an aristocrat. She believes in herself, so everyone believes in her, too!"
"Most of us are shaky about ourselves."
"You are not--I shall turn the tables now and say I want to talk about you! What does it feel like to be a Duke?--A real Duke, not a _parvenu_ or one who makes a laughing stock of his order."
He smiled; she was a most engaging and audacious young person, because she did not speak with childish artlessness, but with deliberation.
"It feels a great responsibility sometimes, and a thing of very little consequence at others. It enforces perhaps a standard of behaviour which it is difficult always to follow. If the circ.u.mstances of my life had been different when I was younger, I should have endeavoured not to let our order slip into impotency; now the whole modern political outlook disgusts me so that I seldom speak in the House."
"That is very wrong of you, and cowardly." She was quite fearless. "You should never give up a fight or remain pa.s.sive when what really belongs to you is being filched from you. If you do, as a band, you deserve to be put aside. You should fight with the same fierceness with which those Radicals do who know they are shams, but are indeed in earnest to obtain their own ends."
"You are quite right. There are some women who stimulate in all ways, who are, as it were, sent into the world as electric dynamos. They get the best out of everyone; they make men work better and play better--and love better."
He looked at her now with his fine eyes sparkling, but flirtation was far beneath his feet. To his mistresses he was a master, a generous, tolerant, contemptuous master; to his friends like Lady Garribardine the essence of courtly consideration; to the general company politely aloof.
But to the woman who could arouse his love, what might he not be!
Katherine thought this, and a quiver ran through her of a kind she had never experienced before, so that her composure was not so perfect as usual when she answered:
"If one really knew exactly what is love!"
"You have no dim guess at it, then?" He was quite surprised that it should interest him to know what her reply would be.
"Yes, I have--more than that. I know that some phases of it make one feel mad, agitated, unbalanced, animal, even motherly and protective--but what it could be if it touched the soul, I cannot fathom."