"I"ve never seen Mr. Allerton," remarked Mrs. Crowley, presently. "He must be a horrid man."
"On the contrary, he"s the most charming creature I ever met, and I don"t believe there"s a man in London who can borrow a hundred pounds of you with a greater air of doing you a service. If you met him you"d fall in love with him before you"d got well into your favourite conversation on bimetallism."
"I"ve never discussed bimetallism in my life," protested Mrs. Crowley.
"All women do."
"What?"
"Fall in love with him. He knows exactly what to talk to them about, and he has the most persuasive voice you ever heard. I believe Lady Kelsey has been in love with him for five and twenty years. It"s lucky they"ve not yet pa.s.sed the deceased wife"s sister"s bill, or he would have married her and run through her money as he did his first wife"s. He"s still very good-looking, and there"s such a transparent honesty about him that I promise you he"s irresistible."
"And what has happened to him since the catastrophe?"
"Well, the position of an undischarged bankrupt is never particularly easy, though I"ve known men who"ve cavorted about in motors and given dinners at the _Carlton_ when they were in that state, and seemed perfectly at peace with the world in general. But with Fred Allerton the proceedings before the Official Receiver seem to have broken down the last remnants of his self-respect. He was glad to get rid of his children, and Lady Kelsey was only too happy to provide for them. Heaven only knows how he"s lived during the last two years. He"s still occupied with a variety of crack-brained schemes, and he"s been to me more than once for money to finance them with."
"I hope you weren"t such a fool as to give it."
"I wasn"t. I flatter myself that I combined frankness with good-nature in the right proportion, and in the end he was always satisfied with the nimble fiver. But I"m afraid things are going harder with him. He has lost his old alert gaiety, and he"s a little down at heel in character as well as in person. There"s a furtive look about him, as though he were ready for undertakings that were not quite above board, and there"s a shiftiness in his eye which makes his company a little disagreeable."
"You don"t think he"d do anything dishonest?" asked Mrs. Crowley quickly.
"Oh, no. I don"t believe he has the nerve to sail closer to the wind than the law allows, and really, at bottom, notwithstanding all I know of him, I think he"s an honest man. It"s only behind his back that I have any doubts about him; when he"s there face to face with me I succ.u.mb to his charm. I can believe nothing to his discredit."
At that moment they saw Lucy walking towards them. d.i.c.k Lomas got up and stood at the window. Mrs. Crowley, motionless, watched her from her chair. They were both silent. A smile of sympathy played on Mrs.
Crowley"s lips, and her heart went out to the girl who had undergone so much. A vague memory came back to her, and for a moment she was puzzled; but then she hit upon the idea that had hovered about her mind, and she remembered distinctly the admirable picture by John Furse at Millbank, which is called _Diana of the Uplands_. It had pleased her always, not only because of its beauty and the fine power of the painter, but because it seemed to her as it were a synthesis of the English spirit.
Her nationality gave her an interest in the observation of this, and her wide, systematic reading the power to compare and a.n.a.lyse. This portrait of a young woman holding two hounds in leash, the wind of the northern moor on which she stands, blowing her skirts and outlining her lithe figure, seemed to Mrs. Crowley admirably to follow in the tradition of the eighteenth century. And as Reynolds and Gainsborough, with their elegant ladies in powdered hair and high-waisted gowns, standing in leafy, woodland scenes, had given a picture of England in the age of Reason, well-bred and beautiful, artificial and a little airless, so had Furse in this represented the England of to-day. It was an England that valued cleanliness above all things, of the body and of the spirit, an England that loved the open air and feared not the wildness of nature nor the violence of the elements. And Mrs. Crowley had lived long enough in the land of her fathers to know that this was a true England, simple and honest; narrow perhaps, and prejudiced, but strong, brave, and of great ideals. The girl who stood on that upland, looking so candidly out of her blue eyes, was a true descendant of the ladies that Sir Joshua painted, but she had a bath every morning, loved her dogs, and wore a short, serviceable skirt. With an inward smile, Mrs. Crowley acknowledged that she was probably bored by Emerson and ignorant of English literature; but for the moment she was willing to pardon these failings in her admiration for the character and all it typified.
Lucy came in, and Mrs. Crowley gave her a nod of welcome. She was fond of her fantasies and would not easily interrupt them. She noted that Lucy had just that frank look of _Diana of the Uplands_, and the delicate, sensitive face, refined with the good-breeding of centuries, but strengthened by an athletic life. Her skin was very clear. It had gained a peculiar freshness by exposure to all manner of weather. Her bright, fair hair was a little disarranged after her walk, and she went to the gla.s.s to set it right. Mrs. Crowley observed with delight the straightness of her nose and the delicate curve of her lips. She was tall and strong, but her figure was very slight; and there was a charming litheness about her which suggested the good horse-woman.
But what struck Mrs. Crowley most was that only the keenest observer could have told that she had endured more than other women of her age. A stranger would have delighted in her frank smile and the kindly sympathy of her eyes; and it was only if you knew the troubles she had suffered that you saw how much more womanly she was than girlish. There was a self-possession about her which came from the responsibilities she had borne so long, and an unusual reserve, unconsciously masked by a great charm of manner, which only intimate friends discerned, but which even to them was impenetrable. Mrs. Crowley, with her American impulsiveness, had tried in all kindliness to get through the barrier, but she had never succeeded. All Lucy"s struggles, her heart-burnings and griefs, her sudden despairs and eager hopes, her tempestuous angers, took place in the bottom of her heart. She would have been as dismayed at the thought of others seeing them as she would have been at the thought of being discovered unclothed. Shyness and pride combined to make her hide her innermost feelings so that no one should venture to offer sympathy or commiseration.
"Do ring the bell for tea," said Mrs. Crowley to Lucy, as she turned away from the gla.s.s. "I can"t get Mr. Lomas to amuse me till he"s had some stimulating refreshment."
"I hope you like the tea I sent you," said d.i.c.k.
"Very much. Though I"m inclined to look upon it as a slight that you should send me down only just enough to last over your visit."
"I always herald my arrival in a country house by a little present of tea," said d.i.c.k. "The fact is it"s the only good tea in the world. I sent my father to China for seven years to find it, and I"m sure you will agree that my father has not lived an ill-spent life."
The tea was brought and duly drunk. Mrs. Crowley asked Lucy how her brother was. He had been at Oxford for the last two years.
"I had a letter from him yesterday," the girl answered. "I think he"s getting on very well. I hope he"ll take his degree next year."
A happy brightness came into her eyes as she talked of him. She apologised, blushing, for her eagerness.
"You know, I"ve looked after George ever since he was ten, and I feel like a mother to him. It"s only with the greatest difficulty I can prevent myself from telling you how he got through the measles, and how well he bore vaccination."
Lucy was very proud of her brother. She found a constant satisfaction in his good looks, and she loved the openness of his smile. She had striven with all her might to keep away from him the troubles that oppressed her, and had determined that nothing, if she could help it, should disturb his radiant satisfaction with the world. She knew that he was apt to lean on her, but though she chid herself sometimes for fostering the tendency, she could not really prevent the intense pleasure it gave her. He was young yet, and would soon enough grow into manly ways; it could not matter if now he depended upon her for everything. She rejoiced in the ardent affection which he gave her; and the implicit trust he placed in her, the complete reliance on her judgment, filled her with a proud humility. It made her feel stronger and better capable of affronting the difficulties of life. And Lucy, living much in the future, was pleased to see how beloved George was of all his friends.
Everyone seemed willing to help him, and this seemed of good omen for the career which she had mapped out for him.
The recollection of him came to Lucy now as she had last seen him. They had been spending part of the summer with Lady Kelsey at her house on the Thames. George was going to Scotland to stay with friends, and Lucy, bound elsewhere, was leaving earlier in the afternoon. He came to see her off. She was touched, in her own sorrow at leaving him, by his obvious emotion. The tears were in his eyes as he kissed her on the platform. She saw him waving to her as the train sped towards London, slender and handsome, looking more boyish than ever in his whites; and she felt a thrill of grat.i.tude because, with all her sorrows and regrets, she at least had him.
"I hope he"s a good shot," she said inconsequently, as Mrs. Crowley handed her a cap of tea. "Of course it"s in the family."
"Marvellous family!" said d.i.c.k, ironically. "You would be wiser to wish he had a good head for figures."
"But I hope he has that, too," she answered.
It had been arranged that George should go into the business in which Lady Kelsey still had a large interest. Lucy wanted him to make great sums of money, so that he might pay his father"s debts, and perhaps buy back the house which her family had owned so long.
"I want him to be a clever man of business--since business is the only thing open to him now--and an excellent sportsman."
She was too shy to describe her ambition, but her fancy had already cast a glow over the calling which George was to adopt. There was in the family an innate tendency toward the more exquisite things of life, and this would colour his career. She hoped he would become a merchant prince after the pattern of those Florentines who have left an ideal for succeeding ages of the way in which commerce may be enn.o.bled by a liberal view of life. Like them he could drive hard bargains and ama.s.s riches--she recognised that riches now were the surest means of power--but like them also he could love music and art and literature, cherishing the things of the soul with a careful taste, and at the same time excel in all sports of the field. Life then would be as full as a man"s heart could wish; and this intermingling of interests might so colour it that he would lead the whole with a certain beauty and grandeur.
"I wish I were a man," she cried, with a bright smile. "It"s so hard that I can do nothing but sit at home and spur others on. I want to do things myself."
Mrs. Crowley leaned back in her chair. She gave her skirt a little twist so that the line of her form should be more graceful.
"I"m so glad I"m a woman," she murmured. "I want none of the privileges of the s.e.x which I"m delighted to call stronger. I want men to be n.o.ble and heroic and self-sacrificing; then they can protect me from a troublesome world, and look after me, and wait upon me. I"m an irresponsible creature with whom they can never be annoyed however exacting I am--it"s only pretty thoughtlessness on my part--and they must never lose their tempers however I annoy--it"s only nerves. Oh, no, I like to be a poor, weak woman."
"You"re a monster of cynicism," cried d.i.c.k. "You use an imaginary helplessness with the brutality of a buccaneer, and your ingenuousness is a pistol you put to one"s head, crying: your money or your life."
"You look very comfortable, dear Mr. Lomas," she retorted. "Would you mind very much if I asked you to put my footstool right for me?"
"I should mind immensely," he smiled, without moving.
"Oh, please do," she said, with a piteous little expression of appeal.
"I"m so uncomfortable, and my foot"s going to sleep. And you needn"t be horrid to me."
"I didn"t know you really meant it," he said, getting up obediently and doing what was required of him.
"I didn"t," she answered, as soon as he had finished. "But I know you"re a lazy creature, and I merely wanted to see if I could make you move when I"d warned you immediately before that--I was a womanly woman."
"I wonder if you"d make Alec MacKenzie do that?" laughed d.i.c.k, good-naturedly.
"Good heavens, I"d never try. Haven"t you discovered that women know by instinct what men they can make fools of, and they only try their arts on them? They"ve gained their reputation for omnipotence only on account of their robust common-sense, which leads them only to attack fortresses which are already half demolished."
"That suggests to my mind that every woman is a Potiphar"s wife, though every man isn"t a Joseph," said d.i.c.k.
"Your remark is too blunt to be witty," returned Mrs. Crowley, "but it"s not without its grain of truth."
Lucy, smiling, listened to the nonsense they talked. In their company she lost all sense of reality; Mrs. Crowley was so fragile, and d.i.c.k had such a whimsical gaiety, that she could not treat them as real persons.
She felt herself a grown-up being a.s.sisting at some childish game in which preposterous ideas were bandied to and fro like answers in the game of consequences.
"I never saw people wander from the subject as you do," she protested.
"I can"t imagine what connection there is between whether Mr. MacKenzie would arrange Julia"s footstool, and the profligacy of the female s.e.x."
"Don"t be hard on us," said Mrs. Crowley. "I must work off my flippancy before he arrives, and then I shall be ready to talk imperially."