Thus it was that she came to Roddy Seddon, who was certainly enjoying himself: this, however, was not the first ball of his life nor even, if all the truth were known, his best. He had expected it to be solemn and sedate--you could not hope to find here the jolly kind of dance that they had had at the Menets", for instance, last week; that would not be possible in a Beaminster household.
It was all, to be honest, a little old-fashioned. Things were moving a bit faster nowadays. Waltzes and Lancers were all very well, but one might have had a cotillon, something unexpected! However, May Eversley and one or two other girls had had the right kind of go about them. He smiled a little and tugged at his short bristling yellow moustache, and then discovered that it was time to take Rachel Beaminster down to supper.
This event was of more than ordinary interest to him. He was perfectly aware that most of his friends and relatives thought that it would be a very good thing for him to marry Rachel Beaminster. He was, himself, not scornful of this idea.
He was thirty-two, and it was time that Seddon Court in Suss.e.x had a mistress; his life had been varied and exciting and it was right now that he should make some ties. There were a number of other reasons in favour of his marrying.
As to Rachel Beaminster, she was not pretty, but she was interesting.
She was unusual; moreover she was a Beaminster, and an alliance with that ancient family would be, past dispute, a magnificent alliance. But the element in it all that intrigued him most was the fact that n.o.body could tell him anything about Rachel, even May Eversley who knew her so well was not sure about her. "You"ll go on being surprised," she had said.
Surprise, indeed, was waiting for him this evening. On the few occasions that he had seen Rachel he had seen her grave, shy, a little awkward, most reserved. Now she met him as though she had known him for years, glowing, almost pretty, so burning were her eyes. At supper she laughed, called across the room to May, agreed with everything that everybody said, and with it all was younger than any girl that he had ever known.
The girls who were Roddy"s friends talked about life at times more boldly than he would have talked with his men friends, and were, at all events, for ever hinting at the things that they knew.
Rachel hinted at nothing; she kept nothing back, she allowed him no disguises.
"Oh! don"t I wish," she cried, "that this night could go on for ever just like this"--and he, taking the compliment to himself, agreed with her. He had expected to find someone haughty and cold, a young Aunt Adela with a dash of foreign temper.
He found someone entirely delightful. Afterwards, when they sat out on a balcony overlooking Portland Place, he was encouraged to talk about himself.
"I like all this, you know," he said, waving his hand at the grey mysterious street that the pale lamps so mournfully guarded. "I like this air comin" along from the park. I"m all for the open, Miss Beaminster--horses and dogs and rushin" along with the wind at your back. It"s a rippin" little place I"ve got down in Suss.e.x. I hope you"ll see it one day--old as anything, with jolly Roman roads and such hangin"
around, and the most spiffin" lot of gees. Look, the sun will be gettin"
above the houses soon. I"ve seen some sunrises in my day. You ought to be on the Downs at night, Miss Beaminster."
Roddy was surprised at himself at the way that he was talking, but she really looked quite beautiful there in the window with her dark hair and her eyes and white dress.
"I can"t tell you," she said, when it was time for them to part, "how much all you say interests me. I love horses too, and I adore dogs----"
"I"ve got a dog I"d like you to have," he began. "It"s a----"
"Oh no," she answered. "Aunt Adela would never let me keep one here.
Thank you all the same. But you"ll let me come down to Seddon Court one day, won"t you?"
"Let you!" Roddy could find no words.
She flung one glance at the square, where the dawn was beginning, and then was back in the ballroom again, dancing, dancing, dancing....
The sky was all pink above the roofs, and the birds were making a whirl of chattering, when her bedroom received her again.
Her maid was sleepy but proud.
"They all say it"s been a great success, Miss Rachel."
"Success!" She stood for a moment in the middle of the room with her arms extended. "Oh! It"s been glorious, glorious. I"ve never----"
She paused. Her arms fell to her sides--"Oh! Dr. Chris! Dr. Chris! He never came--he said that he mightn"t be able. It was the only thing that was wrong"--Then more slowly, as she moved to her dressing-table--"And all the last part I never missed him."
"Well, I dare say," said Lucy, standing behind Rachel"s chair and staring at the white face in the mirror, "that with his patients and the rest he couldn"t get away----"
"Oh! But I ought to have missed him," said Rachel, and afterwards, lying in bed, sleepless with excitement, it was Dr. Christopher"s face that she saw.
CHAPTER VI
FANS
"Il est doux de sommeiller a l"ombre chaude, sur le tiede oreiller d"un mal epicurisme et d"une intelligence ironique, tres simple, a.s.sez curieuse, et prodigieus.e.m.e.nt indifferente, au fond."
Romain Rolland.
I
On the afternoon that followed the ball Lady Adela took Rachel to tea with Lord Richard.
It was a superb May afternoon; white clouds, bolster-shaped, were piled in the heavens and made, so rounded were they, the blue sky seem an infinite distance away. It was a day of sparkling dazzling gaiety--the air seemed electric with the happiness of the world, and, as they drove down to Grosvenor Street, Rachel felt that the little breeze that just touched the hats and coats of the people on the omnibuses was created simply by the joy of the beautiful weather.
As they moved slowly down Bond Street Rachel looked at the world and thought of last night. She looked at the men with their shining hats and shining boots; at the messenger boys and the young women with parcels and the young women without; at the old men who thought themselves young and the young men who thought themselves old; at the fish shops and the picture galleries, at the jewellers" and the book shops, at the place where they taught you Swedish exercises and the place where there was a palmist with a j.a.panese name, and it was all splendid and magnificent and simply carried on the glories of the night before. Before the turning into Grosvenor Street there was a great crush of carriages and a long pause. In the carriage next to Rachel there was a very stout, very richly coloured lady with a strong scent and a pug dog. A little farther away there were two young gentlemen in a smart little carriage, and their hats were so large and their expression so haughty and the top of their canes so golden that it seemed absurd that they should have to wait for anybody, and near them was a small boy on a little butcher"s cart and near him an omnibus with a red-faced driver and any number of interested ladies, and all these incongruities seemed only to add to the haphazard happiness of this shining afternoon.
Rachel had many things to consider as she sat there. Aunt Adela did not interfere with her thoughts, because she never talked when she was in a carriage, but always sat up and looked wearily at the people about her.
She had never very much to say, but the open air made her feel stupid.
Rachel was aware that last night had altered her point of view for all time. She was aware, as she sat there in sunshine, of a new world. By one glance at Aunt Adela was this new world made apparent. Aunt Adela had hitherto been important--Aunt Adela was now unimportant.
Had this afternoon been wet and gloomy, then Rachel might have doubted that pa.s.sionate discovery of the world that she now felt was hers, but here with this blazing sun and sky the note was sustained. Surely never again would Rachel be afraid of her grandmother, surely never again would she be afraid of anyone. Holding herself very proudly in a dress that was a soft primrose colour and in a hat that was dark and shady, Rachel looked round about her on the world.
"There"s Lady Ma.s.siter!" Lady Adela smiled lightly and bowed a very little--"Monty Carfax is with her."
Rachel thought of Lord Ma.s.siter, and wondered again at last night"s dinner--"How could I have been like that? How _could_ I?"
There pa.s.sed them a very handsome carriage with a little dark handsome lady who looked happily round about her, all alone in her magnificence.
Rachel did not know whether her aunt had seen or no: here was the Beaminster arch-enemy, Mrs. Bronson, a young American widow, incredibly rich, incredibly fascinating, incredibly bold. Mrs. Bronson had been in London only a year, had snapped her jewelled fingers at the Beaminsters and everything that they stood for, had laughed at snubs and threats, was intending, so it was said, to have London at her feet in a season or two.
Rachel considered her. She was like some jewelled bird of paradise. She was--one must admit it--better suited to this glorious day than was Aunt Adela.
Why need Aunt Adela refuse to be glad because the sun was shining? Why could not Aunt Adela have said something pleasant about last night"s dance? Why must this absurd outward dignity be so carefully maintained?
Why when one was looking attractive in a primrose dress could one"s aunt not say so?
That reminded her of Roddy Seddon.
She liked him. He might be a real friend like Dr. Christopher. The thought of him made her, as she sat there in the sun, feel doubly certain that the world was a comfortable, rea.s.suring place and that that vision of cold s.p.a.ces and dark forests that had been so often with her was now to be banished like an evil dream never to return.
At the end of Grosvenor Street the trees were so green that they might have been painted, and here they were at Uncle Richard"s house.
II