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author: nfenwick <nfenwick@pglaf.org> 2025-03-03 04:27:43 -0800
committer: nfenwick <nfenwick@pglaf.org> 2025-03-03 04:27:43 -0800
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+<body>
+<div>*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 35079 ***</div>
+<div class="document" id="the-rustle-of-silk">
+<h1 class="document-title level-1 pfirst title">The Rustle of Silk</h1>
+</div>
+
+<hr class="vspace" style="height: 4em"/>
+
+<div class="container" id="pg-produced-by">
+<p class="noindent pfirst">Produced by Roger Frank and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at <a class="reference external" href="http://www.pgdp.net">http://www.pgdp.net</a>.</p>
+
+<hr class="vspace" style="height: 1em"/>
+
+</div>
+</div>
+<div class="figure">
+<div class="align-center container image-wrapper">
+<img alt="images/illus-fpc.jpg" src="images/illus-fpc.jpg"/>
+</div>
+<div class="caption">
+Betty Compson and Conway Tearle</div>
+</div>
+<div class="center class container titlepage">
+<p class="pfirst"><span class="x-large">THE RUSTLE OF SILK</span></p>
+<p class="pnext">BY</p>
+<p class="pnext"><span class="large">COSMO HAMILTON</span></p>
+<div class="line-block">
+<div class="line">
+ </div>
+</div>
+<p class="pfirst">Author of <cite>Scandal</cite>, Etc.</p>
+<div class="line-block">
+<div class="line">
+ </div>
+<div class="line">
+ </div>
+<div class="line">
+ </div>
+</div>
+<p class="pfirst">GROSSET &amp; DUNLAP</p>
+<p class="pnext">Made in the United States of America</p>
+</div>
+<div class="align-center line-block">
+<div class="line">
+ </div>
+<div class="line">
+ </div>
+<div class="line">
+Copyright, 1922,</div>
+<div class="line">
+By Cosmo Hamilton.</div>
+<div class="line">
+All rights reserved</div>
+<div class="line">
+ </div>
+<div class="line">
+Published April, 1922</div>
+<div class="line">
+Reprinted April, 1922 (twice)</div>
+<div class="line">
+Reprinted June, 1922</div>
+<div class="line">
+Reprinted July, 1922</div>
+<div class="line">
+ </div>
+<div class="line">
+<span class="smaller">Printed in the United States of America</span></div>
+</div>
+<div class="contents level-2 section" id="id1">
+<h2 class="level-2 pfirst section-title title">Contents</h2>
+<ul class="simple">
+<li class="level-2 toc-entry"><a class="reference internal pginternal" href="#part-i" id="id54">PART I</a></li>
+<li class="level-2 toc-entry"><a class="reference internal pginternal" href="#part-ii" id="id55">PART II</a></li>
+<li class="level-2 toc-entry"><a class="reference internal pginternal" href="#part-iii" id="id56">PART III</a></li>
+<li class="level-2 toc-entry"><a class="reference internal pginternal" href="#part-iv" id="id57">PART IV</a></li>
+<li class="level-2 toc-entry"><a class="reference internal pginternal" href="#part-v" id="id58">PART V</a></li>
+<li class="level-2 toc-entry"><a class="reference internal pginternal" href="#part-vi" id="id59">PART VI</a></li>
+<li class="level-2 toc-entry"><a class="reference internal pginternal" href="#part-vii" id="id60">PART VII</a></li>
+<li class="level-2 toc-entry"><a class="reference internal pginternal" href="#part-viii" id="id61">PART VIII</a></li>
+</ul>
+</div>
+<div class="level-2 section" id="part-i">
+<h2 class="level-2 pfirst section-title title"><a class="toc-backref pginternal" href="#id54">PART I</a></h2>
+<div class="level-3 section" id="i">
+<h3 class="level-3 pfirst section-title title">I</h3>
+<p class="pfirst">The man had followed her from Marble Arch,—not
+a mackerel-eyed old man, sensual and without respect,
+but one who responded to emotions as an artist
+and was still young and still interested. He had seen
+her descend from a motor omnibus, had caught his
+breath at her disturbing femininity, had watched her
+pass like a sunbeam on the garden side of the road,
+and in the spirit of a man who sees the materialization
+of the very essence of woman, turned and followed.</p>
+<p class="pnext">All the way along, under branches of trees that were
+newly peppered with early green, he watched her and
+saw other men’s heads turn as she passed,—on busses,
+in taxicabs, in cars and in the infrequent horse-drawn
+carriage that was like a Chaucerian noun dropped into
+the pages of a modern book. He saw men stop as he
+had stopped and catch their breath and then pursue
+their way reluctantly. He noticed that women, especially
+passée, tired women, paid her tribute by a flash
+of smile or a sudden brightness of the eye. There
+was no conscious effort to attract in the girl’s manner,
+nothing bizarre or even smart in her clothing. Her
+young figure, the perfection of form, was plainly
+dressed. She wore the clothes of a student of the
+lower middle class, of the small shopkeeping class, and
+probably either made them herself or bought them off
+the peg. There was no startling beauty in her face or
+anything wonderful in her eyes, and certainly nothing
+of challenge, of coquetry,—nothing but the sublime
+unself-consciousness of a child. And yet there was so
+definite and disordering a sense of sex about her that
+she passed through a very procession of tribute.</p>
+<p class="pnext">The man was a dramatist whose business was to
+play upon the emotions of sex, and to watch this child
+and the stir she made seemed to him to refute once
+more the ludicrous attempts of would-be reformers to
+remold humanity and prohibit the greatest of the urges
+of nature, and made him laugh. He wondered all the
+way along not who she was, because that didn’t matter,
+but what she would do and become,—this girl with
+her wide-apart eyes, oval face and full red lips, with
+the nose of a patrician and the sensitive nostrils of a
+horse,—if she would quickly marry in her own class
+and drift from early motherhood into a discontented
+drabness, or burst the bonds and be transferred from
+her probable back yard into a great conservatory.</p>
+<p class="pnext">He marveled at her astonishing detachment and
+was amused to discover that she was playing at some
+sort of game all by herself. From time to time, as
+she danced along, she assumed suddenly a dignified
+and gracious personality, walking slowly, with a high
+chin, bowing to imaginary acquaintances and looking
+through the railings of Kensington Gardens with an
+air of proprietorship. Then she as quickly returned to
+her own obviously normal self and hurried a little,
+conscious of approaching dusk. Finally, with the
+cunning of city breeding, she nicked across the road,
+and he saw her stop outside the tube station at Bayswater,
+arrested by the bill of an evening paper,—“Fallaray
+against reprisals. New crisis in the Irish
+Question. Notable defection from Lloyd-George
+forces.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">He watched the girl stand in front of these glaring
+words and read them over and over with extraordinary
+interest. Standing at her elbow, he heard her heave
+a quick excited sigh. He imagined that she must be
+Irish and watched her enter the station, linger about
+the bookstall and fasten eagerly upon a magazine,—so
+eagerly that he slipped again to her elbow and looked
+to see why. On the cover of this fiction monthly was
+the photograph of the man whose name was set forth
+on the poster,—the Right Hon. Arthur Napier Fallaray,
+Home Secretary. He knew the face well. It
+was one of the few arresting faces in public life; one
+in which there was something medieval, something also
+of Savonarola, Manning, and, in the eyes, of Christ,—a
+clean-shaven face, thin and hawk-like, with a hatchet
+jaw line, a sad and sensitive mouth and thick brown
+hair that went into one or two deep kinks. It might
+have been the face of a hunchback or one who had
+been inflicted from babyhood with paralysis, obliged
+to stand aloof from the rush and tear of other children.
+Only the head was shown on the cover, not the
+body that stood six foot one, the broad shoulders and
+the long arms suggestive of the latent strength of a
+wrestler.</p>
+<p class="pnext">The flush that suffused the girl’s face surprised the
+watcher and piqued his curiosity. Fallaray, the
+ascetic, the married bachelor who lived in one wing of
+his house while Lady Feodorowna entertained the resuscitated
+Souls in the other,—and this young girl of
+the lower middle class, worshiping at his shrine!
+He would have followed her for the rest of the
+afternoon with no other purpose than to study her
+moods and watch her stir the passers-by like the whir
+of an aeroplane or the sudden scent of lilac. But the
+arrival of a train swept a crowd between them and he
+lost her. He took a ticket to see if she were on one
+or other of the platforms, returned to the street and
+searched up and down. She had gone. Before he
+left, another bill was posted upon the board of the
+<em>Evening Standard</em>. “Fallaray sees Prime Minister.
+May resign from cabinet. Uneasiness in Downing
+Street,” and as he walked away, no longer interested
+in the psychology of crowds, but with his imagination
+all eager and alight, the playwright in him had grasped
+at the germ of a dramatic experiment.—Take the man
+Fallaray, a true and sensitive patriot, working for
+no rewards; humanitarian, scholar, untouched by
+romance, deaf to the rustle of silk—and that girl,
+woman to the tips of her ears, Eve in every movement
+of her body——</p>
+</div>
+<div class="level-3 section" id="ii">
+<h3 class="level-3 pfirst section-title title">II</h3>
+<p class="pfirst">“Lola’s late,” said Mrs. Breezy. “She ought to
+have been home half an hour ago.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">Without taking from his eye the magnifying glass
+through which he was peering into the entrails of a
+watch, John Breezy gave a fat man’s chuckle. “Don’t
+you worry about Lola. She’s the original good girl
+and has more friends among strangers than the
+pigeons in Kensington Gardens. She’s all right, old
+dear.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">But Mrs. Breezy never gave more than one ear to
+her husband. She was not satisfied. She left her
+place behind the glistening counter of the little jewelry
+shop in Queen’s Road, Bayswater, and went out into
+the street to see if she could see anything of her ewe
+lamb,—the one child of her busy and thrifty married
+life. On a rain-washed board above her head was
+painted “John Breezy, Watchmaker and Jeweler,
+Founded in 1760 by Armand de Brézé.” The name
+had been Bowdlerized as a concession to the careless
+English ear.</p>
+<p class="pnext">On the curb a legless man was seated in a sort of
+perambulator with double wheels, playing a concertina
+and accompanying another man with no arms and a
+glass eye who sang with a gorgeous cockney accent,
+“Come hout, Come hout, the Spring is ’ere.” A few
+yards farther down a girl with the remains of prettiness
+was playing the violin at the side of an elderly
+woman with the smile of professional supplication who
+held a small tin cup. The incessant crowd which
+passed up and down Queen’s Road paid little attention
+either to these stray dogs or to those who occupied
+other competitive positions in this street of constant
+noises. Flappers with very short skirts and
+every known specimen of leg added to the tragic-comedy
+of a thoroughfare in which provincialism and
+sophistication were like oil and water. Here was
+drawn the outside line of polite pretence. The tide of
+<em>hoi polloi</em> washed up to it and over. Ex-governors of
+Indian provinces, utterly unrecognized, ex-officers and
+men of gallant British regiments, mostly out of employment,
+nurse girls with children, and women of
+semi-society who lived in those dull barrack houses
+of Inverness Terrace, where cats squabbled and tradesmen’s
+boys fought, passed the anxious mother.</p>
+<p class="pnext">Not a day went by that she did not hear from Lola
+of one or perhaps a series of attempts, in the street,
+in the Tube, in busses and in the Park, to win her into
+conversation. The horror stirred by these accounts in
+the heart of the little woman, to say nothing of the
+terror, seemed oddly exaggerated to the daughter,
+who, with her eyes large and gleaming with fun,
+described the manner in which she left her unrestrained
+admirers flat and inarticulate. There was
+nothing vain in this acceptance of male admiration,
+the mother knew. It was something of which the
+child had been aware ever since she could remember;
+had accepted without regret; had hitherto put to no
+use; but which, deep down in her soul, was recognized
+as the all-powerful asset of a woman, not to be bought
+with money, achieved by art or simulated by acting.</p>
+<p class="pnext">Not in so many words had this “gift,” as Lola
+called it, been interpreted and discussed by Mrs.
+Breezy. On the contrary, she tried to ignore and hide
+it away as a dangerous thing which she would have
+been ashamed to possess. In the full flower of her
+own youth there had been nothing in herself, she
+thanked God, to lift her out of the great ruck of
+women except, as Breezy had discovered, a shrewd
+head, a tactful tongue and the infinite capacity for
+taking pains. And she was ashamed of it in Lola.
+It gave her incessant and painful uneasiness and fright
+and made her feel, in sleepless hours and while in
+church, that she had done some wicked thing before
+her marriage that must be punished. With unusual
+fairness she accepted all the blame but never had had
+the courage to tell the truth, either to herself or her
+husband, as to her true feelings towards this uncanny
+child, as she sometimes inwardly called her. Had she
+done so, she must have confessed that Lola was the
+only human being with whom she had come into touch
+that remained a total stranger; she must have owned
+to having been divided from her child almost always by
+a sort of wall, a division of class over which it was
+increasingly impossible to cross.</p>
+<p class="pnext">There were times, indeed, when the little woman
+had gone down to the overcrowded parlor behind
+the shop so consumed with the idea that she had
+brought into the world the offspring of another woman
+that she had sat down cold and puzzled and with an
+aching heart. It had seemed to her then, as now,
+that something queer and eerie had happened. At the
+back of her mind there had been and was still a sort
+of superstition that Lola was a changeling, that the
+fairies or the devil or some imp of mischief had taken
+her own baby away at the moment of her birth and
+replaced it with an exquisite little creature stolen from
+the house of an aristocrat. How else could she account
+for the tiny wrists, small delicate hands, those
+wide blue eyes, those sensitive nostrils and above all
+that extraordinary capacity for passing with superb
+unconsciousness and yet with supreme sophistication
+through everyday crowds.</p>
+<p class="pnext">There was nothing of John in this girl, of that fat
+Tomcat-like man, with no more brain than was necessary
+to peer into watches and repair jewelry, to look
+with half an eye at current events and grow into increasing
+content on the same small patch of earth.
+Neither was there anything of herself, nothing so
+vulgar as shrewdness, nothing so commonplace as tact
+and nothing so legitimate as taking pains. Either she
+did things on the spur of an impulse, by inspiration, or
+she dropped them, like the shells of nuts.</p>
+<p class="pnext">In spite of this uncanny idea, Mrs. Breezy loved her
+little girl, adopted though she seemed to be, and constant
+anxiety ran through her heart like a thread behind
+a needle. If any man had spoken to <em>her</em> on the
+street, she would have screamed or called a policeman.
+She certainly would have been immediately covered
+with goose flesh. Beyond that, if she had ever discovered
+that she had been born with the power to stir
+the feelings of men at first sight, as music stirs the
+emotions of an audience or wind the surface of water,
+she would have been tempted to have turned Catholic
+and taken the veil.</p>
+<p class="pnext">Not an evening went by, therefore, that did not find
+Mrs. Breezy on the step of the shop in Queen’s Road,
+Bayswater, looking anxiously up and down for the
+appearance of Lola among the heterogeneous crowd
+which infested that street. Always she expected to
+see at her side a man, perhaps <em>the</em> man who would take
+her child away. She had her worries, poor little
+woman, more perhaps than most mothers.</p>
+<p class="pnext">That evening, the light reluctant to leave the sky,
+Spring’s hand upon the city trees, Lola did bring some
+one home,—a woman.</p>
+</div>
+<div class="level-3 section" id="iii">
+<h3 class="level-3 pfirst section-title title">III</h3>
+<p class="pfirst">Miss Breezy, sister of John, made a point of spending
+every Thursday evening at the neat and gleaming
+shop in Queen’s Road. It was her night off. Sometimes
+she turned up with tickets for the theater given
+to her by the great lady to whom she acted as housekeeper,
+sometimes to a concert and once or twice during
+the season for the opera. If there were only two
+tickets, it was always Lola who enjoyed the other.
+Mr. and Mrs. Breezy were contented to hear the
+child’s account of what they gladly missed on her behalf.
+Frequently they got more from the girl’s
+description than they would have received had they
+used the tickets themselves.</p>
+<p class="pnext">It was this woman who unconsciously had made
+Fallaray the hero of Lola’s dreams. She had brought
+all the latest gossip from the Fallaray house in which
+she had served since that strange wedding ten years
+before, when the son of the Minister for Education,
+himself in the House of Commons, had gone in a sort
+of trance to St. Margaret’s, Westminster, and come
+out of it surprised to find himself married to the eldest
+daughter of the Marquis of Amesbury,—the brilliant,
+beautiful, harum-scarum member of a pre-war
+set that had given England many rude shocks, stepped
+over all the conventions of an already careless age and
+done “stunts” which sent a thrill of horror and
+amazement all through the body of the old British
+Lion; a set whose cynicism, egotism, perversion, hobnobbing
+with political enemies, manufacture of erotic
+poetry and ribald jests had spread like an epidemic.</p>
+<p class="pnext">Miss Breezy, whose Christian name was Hannah,
+as well it might be, entered in great excitement.
+“Have you seen the paper?” she asked, giving her
+sister-in-law peck to the watchmaker’s wife. “Mr.
+Fallaray’s declared himself against reprisals. He’s
+condemned the methods of the Black and Tans. They
+yelled at him in the House this afternoon and called
+him Sinn Feiner. Just think of that! If any other
+man had done it, I mean any other Minister, Lloyd
+George could have afforded to smile. But Mr. Fallaray!
+It may kill the coalition government, and then
+what will happen?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">All this was given out in the shop itself, luckily
+empty of customers. “Woo,” said John. “Good
+gracious me,” said Mrs. Breezy. “Just as I expected,”
+said Lola, and she entered the parlor and
+threw her books into a corner and perched herself on
+the table, swinging her legs.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“‘Just as you expected?’ What do you know
+about it all, pray?” Miss Breezy regarded the girl
+with the irritation that goes with those who forget
+that little pitchers have ears. She also forgot that the
+question of Ireland, of little real importance among all
+the world’s troubles, was being forced into daily and
+even hourly notice by brutal murders and by equally
+brutal reprisals and that England was, at that moment,
+racked from end to end with passionate resentment
+and anger with which even children were tainted.</p>
+<p class="pnext">And Lola laughed,—that ripple of laughter which
+had made so many men stand rooted to their shoes
+after having had the temerity to speak to her on the
+spur of the moment, or after many manœuverings.
+“What I know of Mr. Fallaray,” she said, “you’ve
+taught me. I read the papers for the rest.” And she
+heaved an enormous sigh and seemed to leave her body
+and fly out like a homing pigeon.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Don’t say anything more until I come back,” cried
+Mrs. Breezy, rapping her energetic heels on the floor
+on the way out to close the shop.</p>
+<p class="pnext">Beamingly important, the bearer of back-stairs gossip,
+Miss Breezy removed her coat,—one of those curious
+garments which seem to be made especially for
+elderly spinsters and are worn by them proudly as a
+uniform and with the certain knowledge that everybody
+can see that they have gone through life in single
+blessedness, dependent neither for happiness nor livelihood
+on a mere man.</p>
+<p class="pnext">John Breezy, who had lost all suggestion of his
+French ancestry and spoke English with the ripest
+Bayswater, removed his apron. He liked, it is true,
+to remember his Huguenot grandfather and from time
+to time indulged in Latin gestures, but when he ventured
+into a few words of French his accent was
+atrocious. “Mong Doo,” he said, therefore, and
+shrugged his fat shoulders almost up to his ears. He
+had no sympathy with the Irish. He considered that
+they were screaming fanatics, handicapped by a form
+of diseased egotism and colossal ignorance which could
+not be dealt with in any reasonable manner. He belonged
+to the school of thought, led by the <em>Morning
+Post</em>, which would dearly like to put an enormous
+charge of T. N. T. under the whole island and blow
+it sky high. “Of course you buck a good deal about
+your Fallaray,” he said to his sister, “that’s natural.
+You take his money and you live on his food. But I
+think he’s a weakling. He’s only making things more
+difficult. I wish to God I was in the House of Commons.
+I’d show ’em what to do to Ireland.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">There was a burst of laughter from Lola who
+jumped off the table and threw her arms around her
+father’s neck. “How wonderful you are, Daddy,”
+she said. “A regular old John Bull!”</p>
+<p class="pnext">Returning before anything further could be said,
+Mrs. Breezy shut the parlor door and made herself
+extremely comfortable to hear the latest from behind
+the scenes. It was very wonderful to possess a sister-in-law
+who regularly, once a week, came into that dull
+backwater with the sort of thing that never got into
+the papers and who was able to bandy great names
+about without turning a hair. “Now, then, Hannah,
+let’s have it all from the beginning and please, John,
+don’t interrupt.” She would have liked to have added,
+“Please, Lola,” too, but knew better.</p>
+<p class="pnext">Then it was that Miss Breezy settled henwise among
+the cushions on the sofa and let herself go. It was a
+good thing for her that her family was unacquainted
+with any of those unscrupulous illiterates who wrote
+the chit-chat in the <em>Daily Mirror</em>.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“It was last night that I knew about all this,” she
+said. “I went in to see Lady Feo about engaging a
+new personal maid. Her great friend was there,—Mrs.
+Malwood, who was Lady Glayburgh in the first
+year of the War, Lady Pytchley in the second, Mrs.
+Graham Macoover in the third, married Mr. Aubrey
+Malwood in the fourth and still has him on her hands.
+I was kept waiting while they finished their talk. Mrs.
+Malwood had to hurry home because she was taking
+part in the theatricals at the Eastminsters. I heard
+Lady Feo say that Mr. Fallaray had decided to throw
+his bomb in the House this afternoon. She was
+frightfully excited. She said she didn’t give a damn
+about the Irish question—and I wish she didn’t speak
+like that—but that it would be great fun to have a
+general election to brighten things up and give her a
+chance to win some money. I don’t know how Lady
+Feo knew that her husband had decided to take this
+step, because they never meet and I don’t believe he
+ever tells her anything that he has on his mind. I
+shouldn’t be surprised if she got it from Mr. Fallaray’s
+secretary. I’ve seen them whispering in corners
+lately and once she starts her tricks on any man,
+good-by loyalty. My word, but she’s a wonderful
+woman. A perfect devil but very kind to me. I’ve
+no grumbles. If we do have a general election, and I
+hope to goodness we don’t, there’s only one man to be
+Prime Minister, and that’s Mr. Fallaray. But there’s
+no chance of it. All the Prime Minister’s newspapers
+are against him, and all his jackals, and he has more
+enemies than any man in the Cabinet, and not a soul
+to back him up. Office means too much to them all
+and they’re all in terror of being defeated in the
+country. He’s the loneliest man in the whole of London
+and one of the greatest. That’s what I say. I’ve
+been with the family ten years and there are things I
+like about Lady Feo, for all her rottenness. But I
+know this. If she’d been a good wife to that man and
+had given him a home to come back to and the love
+that he needs and two or three children to romp with
+even for half an hour a day, there’d be a very much
+better chance for England in this mess than there is at
+present.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">Stopping for breath, she looked up and caught the
+eyes of the girl whose face had flushed at the sight of
+the picture on the cover of the magazine. They were
+filled with something that startled her, something in
+which there was so great a passion that it threw a hot
+dart at her spinsterhood and left her rattled and confused.</p>
+</div>
+<div class="level-3 section" id="iv">
+<h3 class="level-3 pfirst section-title title">IV</h3>
+<p class="pfirst">Miss Breezy was to receive another shock that evening.</p>
+<p class="pnext">It happened that several neighbors came in unexpectedly
+and stayed to play cards. It was necessary,
+therefore, to adjourn from the cosy little parlor behind
+the shop and go up to the drawing-room on the
+second floor,—a stiff uncomfortable room used only
+on Sundays and when the family definitely entertained.
+It smelt of furniture polish, cake and antimacassars.
+Lola had no patience with cards and helped her
+mother to make coffee and sandwiches. Miss Breezy,
+who clung to certain old shibboleths with the pathetic
+persistence of a limpet, regarded a pack of cards as
+the instrument of the devil. Besides, she resented the
+intrusion of every one who put her out of the limelight.
+Her weekly orgy of talk emptied the cistern of
+her brain.</p>
+<p class="pnext">She suspected something out of the way when Lola
+suddenly jumped on the sofa like an Angora kitten,
+snuggled up and began to purr at her side, saying how
+nice it was to see her, how terribly they would miss
+her visits, and how well-informed she was. The little
+head pressed against her bosom was not uncomforting
+to the childless woman. The warm arm clasped
+about her shoulder flattered her vanity. But this display
+of affection was unusual. It drew from her a
+rather shrewd question. “Well, my dear, and what
+do you want to get out of me? I know you. This is
+cupboard love.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">She won a gleam of teeth and a twinkle of congratulation
+from those wide-apart eyes. “How clever you
+are, Auntie. But it isn’t cupboard love, at least not
+quite. I want to consult you about my future because
+you’re so sensible and wise.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Your future.—Your future is to get married and
+have babies. That was marked out for you before
+you began to talk. I never saw such a collection of
+dolls in a little girl’s room in all my life. A born
+mother, my dear, that’s what you are. I hope to
+goodness you have the luck to find the right sort of
+man in your own walk of life.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">Lola shook her head and snuggled a little closer,
+putting her lips to the spinster’s ear. “There’s plenty
+of time for that,” she said. “And, anyway, the right
+man for me won’t be in my own walk of life, as you
+call it.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“What! Why not?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Because I want to better myself, as you once said
+that every girl should do. I haven’t forgotten. I remember
+everything that <em>you</em> say, Auntie.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Oh, you do, do you? Well, go on with it.” What
+a pretty thing she was with her fine skin and red lips
+and disconcerting nostrils. Clever as a monkey,
+too, my word. Amazing that Ellen should be her
+mother!</p>
+<p class="pnext">“And so I want to get away from Queen’s Road, if
+I can. I want to take a peep, just a peep for a little
+while into another world and learn how to talk and
+think and hold myself. Other girls like me have become
+ladies when they had the chance. I can’t, I
+<em>know</em> I can’t, become a teacher as Mother says I must.
+You know that, too, when you think about me. I
+should teach the children everything they ought not to
+know, for one thing, you know I should, and throw it
+all up in a week. I overheard you say that to Mother
+the very last time you were here.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“My dear, your ears are too long. But you’re
+right all the same. I can’t see <em>you</em> in a school for the
+shabby genteel.” A warm fierce kiss was pressed suddenly
+to her lips. “But what can I do to help you
+out? I don’t know.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“But I do, Auntie. You’re trying to find a personal
+maid for Lady Feo. Engage me. I may work
+up to become a housekeeper like you some day even.
+Who knows?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">So that was it.—Good heavens!</p>
+<p class="pnext">Miss Breezy unfolded herself from the girl’s embrace
+and sat with her back as stiff as a ramrod.
+“I couldn’t think of such a thing,” she said. “You
+don’t belong to the class that ladies’ maids come from,
+nor does your mother. A funny way to better yourself,
+that, I must say. Don’t mention it again, please.”
+She got up and shook herself as though to cast away
+both the girl’s spell and her absurd request. Her
+sister-in-law, after a long day’s work, was impatient
+for bed and yawning in a way which she hoped would
+convey a hint to her husband’s friends. She had already
+wound up the clock on the mantelpiece with extreme
+deliberation. “I think my cab must be here,”
+said Miss Breezy loudly, in order to help her. “I
+ordered him to fetch me. Don’t trouble to come down
+but do take the trouble to find out what’s the matter
+with Lola. She’s been reading too many novels or
+seeing too many moving pictures. I don’t know which
+it is.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">To Mrs. Breezy’s entire satisfaction, her sister-in-law’s
+departure broke up the party. There was always
+a new day to face and she needed her eight
+hours’ rest. Mr. Preedy, the butcher whose inflated
+body bore a ludicrous resemblance to a punch ball and
+who smelt strongly of meat fat, his hard-bosomed
+spouse and Ernest Treadwell, the young man from the
+library who would have sold his soul for Lola, followed
+her down the narrow staircase. But it was
+Lola who got the last word. She stood on the step
+of the cab and put a soft hand against Miss Breezy’s
+cheek. “Do this for me, Auntie,” she wheedled.
+“Please, please. If you don’t——”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Well?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“There are other great ladies and very few ladies’
+maids, and if I go to one of them, how will you be
+able to keep your eye on me,—and you ought to keep
+your eye on me, you know.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Well!” said Miss Breezy to herself, as the cab
+rattled home. “Did you ever? What an extraordinary
+child! Nothing of John about her and just as
+little of Ellen. Where does she get these strange
+things from?” It was not until she arrived finally
+at Dover Street that she added two words to her attempted
+diagnosis which came in the nature of an
+inspiration. “<em>She’s French!</em>”</p>
+</div>
+<div class="level-3 section" id="v">
+<h3 class="level-3 pfirst section-title title">V</h3>
+<p class="pfirst">It was a lukewarm night, without wind and without
+moon, starless. Excited at having got in her request,
+which she knew from a close study of her aunt’s character
+was bound to be refused and after a process of
+flattery eventually conceded, Lola waved her hand to
+the Preedys and graciously consented to give a few
+minutes to Ernest Treadwell. The butcher and his
+wife, after a lifetime of intimacy with animals, had
+both taken on a marked resemblance to sheep. They
+walked away in the direction of their large and prosperous
+corner shop with wide-apart legs and short
+quick steps, as though expecting to be rounded up by
+a bored but conscientious dog. As she leaned against
+the private door of her father’s shop, with the light
+of the lamp-post on hair that was the color of buttercups,
+she did look French. If Miss Breezy were to
+take the trouble to read a well-known book of memoirs
+published during the reign of Louis XIV, it would
+dawn upon her that the little Lola of Queen’s Road,
+Bayswater, daughter of the cockney watchmaker and
+Ellen who came from a flat market garden in Middlesex,
+threw back to a certain Madame de Brézé, the
+famous courtesan. Whether her respect for her
+brother would become less or grow greater for this
+discovery it is not easy to say. Probably, being a
+snob, it would increase.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Don’t stand there without a hat, Lola dear. You
+may catch cold.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Mother always says that,” said Lola, “even in the
+middle of the summer, but she won’t call again for ten
+minutes, so let’s steal a little chat.” She put her hand
+on Treadwell’s shoulder with a butterfly touch and
+held him rooted and grateful. He had the pale skin
+that goes with red hair as well as the pale eyes, but as
+he looked at this girl of whom he dreamed by day and
+night, they flared as they had flared when he had seen
+her first as a little girl with her hair in a queue at the
+other end of a classroom. He stood with his foot on
+the step and his hands clasped together, inarticulate.
+Behind his utter commonplaceness there was the soul
+of Romeo, the passion of self-sacrifice that goes with
+great lovers. He had been too young for gun fodder
+in the war but he had served in spirit for Lola’s sake
+and had performed a useful job in the capacity of a
+boy scout messenger in the War Office. His bony
+knees and awkward body had been the joke of many
+a ribald subaltern, mud-stained from the trenches.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“What are you doing on Saturday afternoon?”
+asked Lola. “Shall we walk to Hampton Court and
+see the crocuses? They’re all up now like little soldiers
+in a pantomime.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“I’ll call for you at two o’clock,” answered the boy,
+thrilling as though he had been decorated. “We’ll
+have tea there and come back on top of a bus. I
+suppose your mother wouldn’t let me take you to the
+theater? There’s a great piece at the Hammersmith,—Henry
+Ainley. He’s fine.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">Lola laughed softly. “Mother’s a dear,” she said.
+“She lets me do everything I want to do after I’ve told
+her that I’m simply going to do it. Besides, she likes
+you.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Do <em>you</em> like me, Lola?” The question came before
+the boy could be seized with his usual timidity.
+It was followed by a rush of blood to the head.</p>
+<p class="pnext">The girl’s answer proved her possession of great
+kindness and an amazing lack of coquetry. “You are
+one of my oldest friends, Ernest,” she replied, thereby
+giving the boy something to hope for but absolutely
+nothing to grasp. He had never dared to go so far as
+this before and like all the other boys who hung round
+Lola had never been able, by any of his crude efforts,
+to get her to flirt. Friend was the only word that any
+of them could apply to her. And yet even the least
+precocious of these boys was convinced of the fact that
+she was not innocent of her power.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“I love the spring,—just smell it in the air,” said
+Lola, going off at a tangent, “but I shall never live in
+the country—I mean all the time. I shall go there
+and see things grow and get all the scent and the
+whispers and the music of the stars and then rush back
+to town. Do you believe in reincarnation, Ernest? I
+do. I was a canary once and lived in a cage, a big
+golden cage, full of seeds and water and little bells
+that jingled. It stood on the table in a room filled
+with tapestry and lovely old furniture. Servants in
+livery gave me a saucer for a bath and refilled my seed
+pans.—I feel like a canary now sometimes. I like to
+fly out, perfectly tame, and with no cats about, sing a
+little and imagine that I am perfectly free, and then
+flick back, stand on a perch and do my best singing to
+the noise of traffic.” And she laughed again and
+added, “What rot we talk when we’re young, don’t
+we? I must go.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“No, not yet. Please not yet.” And the boy put
+his hands out to touch her and was afraid. He would
+gladly have died then and there in that street just to
+be allowed to kiss her lips.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“It’s late. I must go, Ernest. I have to get up so
+awfully early. I hate getting up early. I would like
+breakfast in bed and a nice maid to bring me my letters
+and the papers. Besides, I don’t want to worry
+Mother. She has all the worries of the shop. Good
+night and don’t be late on Saturday.” She held out
+her hand.</p>
+<p class="pnext">The boy seized it and held it tight, his brain reeling,
+and his blood on fire. He stood for an instant unable
+to give expression to the romance that she stirred in
+him, with his mouth open and his rather faulty teeth
+showing, and his big awkward nose very white. And
+when she had gone and the door of her castle was
+closed, the poor knight, who had none of the effrontery
+of the troubadour, paced up and down for an hour
+in front of the shop, saying half aloud all the things
+from Shakespeare which alone seemed fit for the ears
+of that princess,—princess of Queen’s Road, Bayswater!</p>
+</div>
+<div class="level-3 section" id="vi">
+<h3 class="level-3 pfirst section-title title">VI</h3>
+<p class="pfirst">The room at the back of the house in which Lola
+had been installed since she had been old enough to
+sleep alone had been her parents’ bedroom and was
+larger than the one to which they had retired. While
+Breezy had argued that he damned well didn’t intend
+to turn out for that kid, Mrs. Breezy had moved the
+furniture. The best room only was good enough for
+Lola. The window gave a sordid view of back yards
+filled with packing cases, washing, empty bottles and
+one or two anæmic laburnum trees which for a few
+days once a year burst into a sort of golden smile and
+then became sullen again,—observation posts for the
+most corrupt of animals, the London cat. It was in
+this room that Mrs. Breezy, trespassing sometimes,
+stood for a few moments lost in amazement, feeling
+more than ever the changeling sense that she did her
+best to forget.</p>
+<p class="pnext">With the money that she had saved up—birthday
+money, Christmas money and a small allowance made
+to her by her father—Lola had bought a rank imitation
+of an old four-poster bed made probably in Birmingham.
+Over it she had hung a canopy of chintz
+with a tapestry pattern on a black background, copied
+from an illustration in the life of Du Barry. From
+time to time pillows with lace covers had been added
+to the luxurious pile, a little footstool placed at the
+side of the bed and—the latest acquisition—an
+eiderdown now lent an air of swollen pomp to the
+whole thing, which, to the puzzled and concerned
+mother, was immoral. Hers was one of those still
+existing minds which read immorality into all attempts
+to break away from her own strict set of conventions,
+especially when it was in the direction of beautifying
+a bed, to her, of course, an unmentionable thing. In
+America, without doubt, she would be a cherished and
+respected member of the Board of Motion Picture
+Censors, as well as—having a cellar—a militant
+prohibitionist.</p>
+<p class="pnext">For the rest, the room possessed a sofa which was
+an English cousin to an Italian day bed and curtains
+of china silk in which there was a faint tinge of pink.
+A small table on which there was a collection of dainty
+things for writing, mementos of many Christmases
+and several lines of shelves crammed with books gave
+the room something of the appearance of a boudoir,
+and this was added to by half a dozen cheap French
+prints framed in gold which looked rather well against
+a wall paper of tiny bouquets tied up with blue ribbon.
+Lola’s collection of books had frequently sent John
+Breezy into gusts of mirth. There was nothing among
+them that he could read. Very few of them were in
+English and those were of French history. The rest
+were the lives and memoirs of famous courtesans, including
+those of the Madame de Brézé, to whom the
+watchmaker always referred with a mixture of pride
+and levity,—but not when his wife was in hearing.
+A bulky French dictionary, old and dog-eared, stood
+in solitude upon the writing table.</p>
+<p class="pnext">It was to this room that Lola withdrew as often as
+possible to cut herself off from every suggestion of
+Queen’s Road, Bayswater, and the shop below, and to
+forget her daily journeys to and from the Polytechnic
+where she was supposed to be taking a commercial
+course in bookkeeping and shorthand with a view
+either to going into an office or becoming a teacher in
+one of the many small schools which endeavored to
+keep their heads up in and about that portion of
+London.</p>
+<p class="pnext">The game of make-believe, which the dramatist who
+followed Lola from Hyde Park corner that afternoon
+had watched her play, had been carried on in this bed-sitting
+room ever since she had fallen under the spell
+of the de Brézé memoirs. It was here, especially on
+Sunday mornings, that this young thing let her imagination
+have full play while her father and mother,
+dressed in their Sabbath best, attended the Methodist
+Church near-by. Then, playing the part of her celebrated
+ancestress, she put on a little lace cap and a
+<em>peignoir</em> over her nightgown and sat up in bed to receive
+the imaginary friends, admirers and sycophants
+who came to her with the latest gossip, with rare and
+beautiful gifts and with the flattery of their kind,
+which, while it pleased her very much, failed to turn
+her head, because, after all, she had inherited much
+of her mother’s shrewdness. With her door locked,
+her nose powdered and her lips the color of a cherry,
+Lola conducted, for her own amusement, a brilliant
+series of monologues which, if given on the stage in a
+setting a little more elaborate, would have set all London
+laughing.</p>
+<p class="pnext">The girl’s mimicry of the people whom she brought
+to life from the pages of those French books was perfectly
+delightful. She brought her master to life.
+With a keen sense of characterization she built him
+up—unconsciously assisted by Aunt Hannah—into
+as close a resemblance to Fallaray as she could,—a
+tired, world-worn man, starving for love and adoration,
+weighed down by the problems of a civilization
+in chaos, distrait and sometimes almost brusque, but
+always chivalrous and kind, who came to her for refreshment
+and inspiration and left her with a lighter
+tread and renewed optimism. Ancient dames whose
+days were over came to her with envy in their hearts
+and the hope of charity in their withered souls to tell
+her of their triumphs and the scandals of their time.
+But the character upon whom she concentrated all her
+humor and sarcasm was the friend of her master, an
+unscrupulous person who loved her and never could
+resist the opportunity of pressing his suit in flowery
+but passionate terms and with an accent which, elaborately
+Parisian, was reproduced from that of the
+French journalist who had taught Lola his language
+in a class that she had attended for several years.
+These word fencings had begun, of course, as a child
+would naturally have begun them, with the stilted
+sentences and high-flown remarks which she had lifted
+from Grimm’s Fairy Tales. They had become more
+and more sophisticated as the years had passed and
+were now full of subtleties and insinuations against
+which, egging the man on, Lola defended herself with
+what she took to be great wit and cleverness.</p>
+<p class="pnext">If her little mother had ever gone so far as to put
+her ear to the keyhole of that bedroom, she would
+have listened to something which would probably have
+sent her to a doctor to consult him as to her daughter’s
+mental condition. She would have heard, for
+instance, the well-modulated voice of that practised
+lovemaker and the laughing high-pitched replies of a
+girl not unpleased with his attentions but adamant to
+his pleadings and perfectly sure of herself. It is true
+that Mrs. Breezy would not have understood one word
+that was spoken because it was all in French, but the
+mere act of conducting long conversations with imaginary
+characters as a hobby would have struck deep
+at her sense of the fitness of things, especially as Sunday
+was the day chosen for such a game. The Methodist
+mind is strangely inelastic.</p>
+<p class="pnext">What would have been said to all this by a disciple
+of Freud it is easy to conceive. He would have read
+into it the existence of a complex proving a suppressed
+desire which must have landed Lola in a lunatic asylum.
+Common sense and a rudimentary knowledge
+of heredity might, however, have given to the
+mother and the psychoanalyst the key to all this.
+The fact was that Lola threw back to her French ancestress
+who, like herself, was the daughter of humble,
+honest people, and the glamor of the de Brézé memoirs
+had not only caught and colored her imagination,
+which was her strongest trait, but had shown her how
+to exploit the gift of sex appeal in a way that would
+make her essential to a man who had it in him to become
+a great political figure, the only way in which
+she, like the de Brézé, could be placed in a golden cage
+with all the luxuries, share in the secrets of government,
+meet the men who counted, bask in the reflected
+glory of power, and give in return so whole-hearted a
+love, devotion, encouragement and refreshment that
+her “master” would go out to the affairs of his country
+grateful and humanized. She could not, of course,
+ever hope to achieve this ambition by marriage. No
+such man would marry the daughter of a watchmaker.
+It was that the spirit of this woman lived again in the
+Breezys’ little daughter; that in her there had been
+revived the same desire to force a place for herself in
+a world to which she had not been born, and that she
+had been endowed with the same feminine qualities
+that were necessary to such a scheme. In the knowledge
+of this and pinning her faith to a similar cause—the
+word was hers—Lola Breezy had gone through
+those curious years of double life more and more determined
+to perform this kind of courtesanship, believing
+that she had inherited the voice with which to
+sing the little songs of a canary in the secret cage of
+no less a man than one of proved ability and idealism,
+who was within an ace of premiership, and—so that
+her vanity might be satisfied in the proof of her own
+ability to help him—against whom was pitted all that
+was mean, ignorant, jealous and reactionary in a bad
+political system.</p>
+<p class="pnext">What more natural, therefore, than that the man
+who fulfilled all these requirements and whom she
+would give her life to serve was Fallaray. He had
+been brought home to her every Thursday evening by
+her aunt for ten years. She had read in the papers
+every word that he had spoken; had followed his
+course of action through all the years of the War
+which he had done his best to prevent; had watched
+his lonely struggle to substantiate a League of Nations
+free from blood lust and territorial greed; had seen him
+pelted with lies and calumny when he had cried out
+that Germany must be allowed to live if Europe were
+to live; and that very day had stood trembling in front
+of the billboard which announced that he would not
+stand for the bloody and disastrous reprisals in Ireland
+that were backed by the Prime Minister. He was
+the one honest man, the one idealist in English politics;
+the one great humanitarian who possessed that strength
+and fairness of mind which permitted him to see both
+sides of a question; to belong to a party without being
+a slave to its shibboleths; to commit the sudden volt-faces
+so impossible to brass hats and to the Junkers of
+all nationality; the one man in the House of Commons
+who didn’t give a damn for limelight, self-aggrandizement,
+titles, graft and all the rest of the things which
+have been brought into that low and unclean business
+by men who would sell the country for a drink. And
+above all he was unhappy with his wife.</p>
+<p class="pnext">The housekeeper aunt had built up for this girl a
+hero who fitted exactly into the niche in her heart and
+ambitions. All the stories and backstairs gossip about
+him had excited her desire to become a second Madame
+de Brézé in his life and bring the rustle of silk to this
+Eveless man. Never once did there enter into her
+game of make-believe or her dreams of achievement
+the idea of becoming Fallaray’s wife, even if, at any
+time, he should be free to marry again. She had too
+keen a sense of psychology for that. She saw the
+need to Fallaray, as to other such men in his position,
+of a secret romance,—stolen meetings, brief
+escapes, entrancing interludes, and the desire—the
+paradox of asceticism—for feminine charms. She
+had read the story of Parnell and understood it; of
+Nelson and sympathized with it. She knew the history
+of other men of absorbing patriotism and great
+intellect who had kept their optimism and their humanity
+because of a woman’s tenderness and flattery,
+and whenever she looked at the picture of Fallaray, in
+whom she recognized a modern Quixote tilting at
+windmills, she saw that he stood in urgent need of a
+woman who could do for him what Madame de Brézé
+had done for that minister of Louis XIV. During all
+her intelligent years, therefore, she had conducted herself
+in the hope, vague and futile as it seemed, of some
+day being discovered to Fallaray, and in her heart
+there had grown up a love and a hero worship so strong
+and so passionate that it could never be transferred to
+any other man.</p>
+<p class="pnext">The reason, then, why Lola had turned the whole
+force of her concentration upon entering the house in
+Dover Street as lady’s maid becomes clear. Here,
+suddenly, was her chance. Once in this house, in attendance
+upon Lady Feo, it would be possible for her
+not only to learn the manners and the language of the
+only women who were known to Fallaray, but eventually,
+with luck and strategy, to exercise her gift, as
+she called it, upon Fallaray himself. What did she
+care whether, as her aunt had said, she went down a
+peg in the social scale by becoming a lady’s maid?
+She would willingly become a crossing sweeper or a
+beggar girl.</p>
+<p class="pnext">If it were true that Fallaray never went into the
+side of the house that was occupied by his wife, then
+she would eventually, when she felt that her apprenticeship
+had been served, slip into the other side. Like
+all women she had cunning and like very few courage.
+Opportunity comes to those who make it and she was
+ready and eager to undergo any humiliation to try
+herself, so to speak, on Fallaray. Ernest Treadwell
+loved her and would, she knew, die for her willingly.
+There was the hero stuff in him. Other boys, too
+numerous to mention, would go through fire and water
+for her kisses. Life was punctuated with turned heads,
+sudden flashes of eye and everyday attempts to win her
+favor. Once in that house in Dover Street——</p>
+</div>
+<div class="level-3 section" id="vii">
+<h3 class="level-3 pfirst section-title title">VII</h3>
+<p class="pfirst">Saturday came. Ernest Treadwell arrived early,
+his face shining with Windsor soap. He had bought
+a spring tie at Hope Brothers, the name and the season
+going well with his mood. It was a ghastly affair,—yellow
+with blobs of red. It was indeed much more
+suited to Mr. Prouty, the butcher. It illustrated something
+at which he frequently looked,—animal blood on
+a sawdust floor. But Ernest Treadwell was one of
+those men who could always be persuaded into wearing
+anything that was offered to him. He was a
+dreamer, the stuff that poets are made of, impractical,
+embarrassed. He went about with his young and incoherent
+brain seething with the tail end of big
+thoughts. If he had not been watched by a fond
+mother, he would probably have left the house with
+his trousers around his neck and his legs thrust
+through the sleeves of his coat. He walked up and
+down the street for half an hour with his cap on the
+back of his head and a tuft of hair sticking out in
+front of it,—an earnest, ungainly, intelligent, heroic
+person who might one day become a second Wells and
+write a Joan and Peter about the children of Joan and
+Peter.</p>
+<p class="pnext">Saturday was a good day for the Breezys and much
+of Friday night had been spent cleaning and rearranging
+the cheap and alluring silverware—birthday
+presents, wedding presents, lovers’ presents—which
+invariably filled the windows. Twice Lola had looked
+down and watched her young friend as he marched
+up and down beneath, with an ecstatic smile on his
+face. It was after her second look that she made up
+her mind to desert the crocuses in Hampton Court and
+make that boy escort her to Dover Street. Acting
+under a sudden inspiration she determined to go and
+see her aunt. She knew perfectly well that Miss
+Breezy had had time to think over the point which
+had been suggested to her and was by now probably
+quite ready to accept it. That was the woman’s
+character. She began by saying no to everything and
+ended, of course, by saying yes to most of them, and
+the more emphatic she was in the beginning the more
+easily she caved in finally. After all, she was very
+fond of her niece and would welcome the opportunity
+of having the girl’s company at night and during the
+hours when Lady Feo was out. Lola knew all that
+and her entrance into Dover Street had become an
+obsession, a fixed idea, and if her aunt should develop
+a hitherto undemonstrated stiff back,—well then her
+hand must be forced, that’s all, either by hook or by
+crook. Dressed as simply as usual but wearing her
+Sunday hat, Lola passed through the shop, dropped a
+kiss on her father’s head, twiddled her fingers at her
+mother, who was “getting off” a perfectly hideous
+vase stuck into a filigree silver support and must not,
+therefore, be interrupted in her diplomatic flow of persuasion.
+She was met at the door by Ernest Treadwell,
+who sheepishly removed his cap. He would have
+given ten years of his life to have been able to doff it
+in the manner of Sir Walter Raleigh and utter a
+string of highly polished phrases suitable to that epoch-making
+occasion. Instead of which he said, “’Ello,”
+and dropped his “h” at her feet.</p>
+<p class="pnext">Queen’s Road wore its usual Saturday afternoon
+appearance and its narrow pavement was filled with
+people shopping for Sunday,—the tide of semi-society
+clashing with that of mere respectability.
+“Hampton Court’ll look great to-day,” said Ernest,
+who felt that with the assistance of the crocuses he
+might be able to stammer a few words of love and
+admiration.</p>
+<p class="pnext">Lola glanced up at the clear sky and the April sun
+which was in a very kindly mood. “I’m sure it will,”
+she said, “but I’m afraid I’ve got a disappointment
+for Ernie. I want you to be a dear and take me to
+see my aunt in Dover Street. It’s—it’s awfully important.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">The boy’s eyes flicked and a curious whiteness
+settled about his nose. But he played the knight.
+“Whatever you say, Lola,” he said, and forced himself
+to smile. Poor boy, it was a sad blow. He had
+gone to bed the night before, dreaming of this little
+adventure. It would have been the first time that he
+had ever spent an afternoon and evening alone with
+the girl who occupied the throne of his heart.</p>
+<p class="pnext">Lola knew this. She could see the whole story behind
+the boy’s smile. So she took his arm to compensate
+him,—knowing how well it would. “There
+are crocuses in Kensington Garden,” she said. “We’ll
+have a look at those as we pass.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">Every head that turned and every eye that flared
+made Ernest Treadwell swell with pride as well as resentment.
+A policeman held up the traffic for Lola
+at the top of the road and one of the keepers of the
+Gardens, an old soldier, saluted her as she went
+through the gates. She rewarded these attentions with
+what she called her best de Brézé smile. Some day
+other and vastly more important men should gladly
+show her deference. They followed the broad path
+which led to Marble Arch, raising their voices in order
+to overcome the incessant roar of traffic in the
+Bayswater Road. Lola did most of the talking that
+afternoon and it was all inspirational, to fire the boy
+into greater ambition and effort. She had read some
+of his poetry,—strange stuff that showed the influence
+of Masefield, crude and half-baked but not untouched
+with imagery. She believed in Ernest Treadwell
+and took a very real delight in his improvement.
+But for her encouragement it might have been some
+years before he broke out of hobble-de-hoydom and
+the semi-vicious ineptitude that goes with it. He was
+very happy as he went along with the warm hand on
+his arm. His vanity glowed under her friendship, as
+she intended that it should.</p>
+<p class="pnext">The old Gardens were green and fresh, gay with
+new leaves and daffodils. Only the presence of
+smashed men made it look different from the good days
+before the War. Would all those children who played
+under the eyes of mothers and nurses be laid presently
+in sacrifice upon the altars of the old Bad Men of
+politics who had done nothing to avert the recent
+cataclysm?</p>
+<p class="pnext">Lola was excited and on her mettle. She was nearing
+the crossroads. On the one that she had marked
+out stood Fallaray,—the merest speck. Success with
+Aunt Hannah meant the first rung of her ladder. Oxford
+Street was like a once smart woman who had become
+<em>déclassé</em>. It seemed to be competing with High
+Street, Putney. There was something pathetically
+blatant in the shop window arrangements, a strained
+effort to catch what little money was left to the public
+after the struggle to make both ends meet and pay the
+overwhelming taxation. The two young people were
+unconscious of the change. Lola babbled incessantly.
+Among other things she said, “I suppose you’re a socialist,
+aren’t you, Ernest? You’ve never discussed it
+with me, but I think you must be because you write
+poetry, and somehow all poets seem to be socialists.
+I suppose it’s because poetry’s so badly paid.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“I dunno about that. I’ve never tried to sell my
+stuff. I’m against everything and everybody, if that’s
+what you mean. But I don’t know whether it’s true
+to call it Socialism. There’s a new word for it which
+suits me,—intelligensia. I don’t think that’s the way
+to pronounce it but it’s near enough. It’s in all the
+weekly papers now and stands for anarchy with hair
+oil on the bombs. Why do you ask me?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">Lola still had her hand on his arm. “Well, I’m
+afraid I’m going to give you a shock soon. I’m going
+to be a servant.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Good God,” said Ernest. His grandfather had
+been a valet, his father a piano tuner, he himself had
+risen to the heights of assistant librarian in a public
+library, and if his ambition to become a Labor member
+ever was realized he might very easily wind up as a
+peer. His children would then belong to the new
+aristocracy with Lola as Lady Treadwell. He gasped
+under the blow. “What will your mother say?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“I’m afraid Mother will hang her head in shame
+until she gets my angle of it. Luckily I can always
+point to Aunt. She’s a housekeeper, you see, and after
+all that’s only a sort of upper servant, isn’t it?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“But,—what’s the idea?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">This was not a question to which Lola had any
+intention of giving an answer. It was a perfectly
+private affair. She went off at one of her inevitable
+tangents so useful in order to dodge issues. She
+pointed to an enormous Rolls-Royce which stood
+outside Selfridge’s. On the panel was painted a coat
+of arms as big as a soup tureen. She held Ernest
+back to watch the peculiar people who descended from
+it,—the man small and fat, with bandy legs and a
+great moustache waxed into points; the woman bulbous
+and wobbly, cluttered up with diamonds, made
+pathetic by a skirt that was almost up to her knees.
+What an excellent thing the War had been for them.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“New rich,” said Lola. “I saw them the other
+day coming out of a house at the top of Park Lane
+which Father told me used to belong to a Duke. Good
+Lord, why shouldn’t I be a servant without causing a
+crack in the constitution of the country?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">Fundamentally snobbish as all socialists are, the boy
+shook his head. “You should lead, not serve,” he
+said, quoting from one of his masters. And that was
+all he could manage. Lola,—a servant! They
+turned into Bond Street in which all the suburban
+ladies who were not enjoying the matinées were gluing
+their noses to the shop windows. Ernest Treadwell
+was unfamiliar with this part of London. He preferred
+the democratic Strand when he could get away
+from his duties. He felt more and more sheepish
+and self-conscious as Lola drew up instinctively at
+every shop in which corsets were displayed and diaphanous
+underwear spread out. The silk stockings on
+extremely well-shaped wooden legs she admired extremely
+and desired above all things. The bootmakers’
+shops also came in for her close attention. The
+little French shoes with high vamps and stubby noses
+drew exclamations of delight and envy. Several
+spots on the window of Aspray’s bore the impression
+of her nose before she could tear herself away. A
+set of dressing-table things made of gold and tortoiseshell
+made her eyes widen and her lips part. Ernest
+Treadwell would willingly have sacrificed all his half-baked
+socialism to be able to buy any one of those
+things for Lola.</p>
+<p class="pnext">Finally they came to Dover Street, that oasis in
+the heart of Mayfair where even yet certain houses
+remain untouched by the hand of trade. The Fallaray
+house was on the sunny side, where it stood
+gloomily with frowning windows and an uninviting
+door. It was the oldest house in the street and wore
+its octogenarian appearance without camouflage. It
+had belonged originally to the Throgmorton family
+upon whom Fate had laid a hoodoo. The last of the
+line was glad to sell it to Fallaray’s grandfather, the
+cotton man. What he would have said if he could
+have returned to his old haunts, opened his door with
+his latch key and walked in to find Lady Feo and her
+gang God only knows.</p>
+<p class="pnext">It was well known to Lola. Many times she had
+walked up and down Dover Street in order to gaze at
+the windows behind which she thought that Fallaray
+might be sitting, and several times she had been into
+her aunt’s rooms which overlooked the narrow yards
+of Bond Street.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Wait for me here, Ernest,” she said. “I don’t
+think I shall be very long. If I’m more than half an
+hour, give me up and we’ll have another afternoon
+later on.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">She waved her hand, went down the area steps and
+rang the bell. Ernest Treadwell, to whom the house
+had taken on a sinister appearance, sloped off with
+rounded shoulders and a tight mouth. They might
+have been in Hampton Court looking at the crocuses.—Lola,—a
+servant. Good God!</p>
+</div>
+<div class="level-3 section" id="viii">
+<h3 class="level-3 pfirst section-title title">VIII</h3>
+<p class="pfirst">Albert Simpkins opened the door.</p>
+<p class="pnext">It wasn’t his job to open doors, because he was a
+valet. But it so happened that he was the only person
+in the servants’ quarters who was not either dressing,
+lying down after a heavy lunch or out to enjoy an
+hour’s fresh air.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Miss Breezy, please,” said Lola.</p>
+<p class="pnext">Simpkins gasped. If he had been passing through
+the hall and a footman had opened the front door to
+this girl he would have slipped into a dark corner to
+watch her enter, believing that she had come to visit
+Lady Feo. He knew a thoroughbred when he saw
+one. That she should have come to the area of all
+places seemed to him to be irregular, not in conformity
+with the rules of social rectitude which were his religion.
+All the same he thrilled, and like every other
+man who caught sight of Lola and stood near enough
+to catch the indefinable scent of her hair, stumbled
+over his words.</p>
+<p class="pnext">Lola repeated her remark and gave him a vivid
+friendly smile. If she carried her point with her
+aunt presently, this man would certainly be useful.
+“If you will please come in,” said Simpkins, “I’ll go
+and see if Miss Breezy’s upstairs. What name shall I
+say?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Lola Breezy.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Miss Lola Breezy. Thank you.” He paused for
+a moment to bask, and then with a little bow in which
+he acknowledged her irresistible and astonishing effect,
+disappeared,—valet stamped upon his respectability
+like a Cunard label on a suit case.</p>
+<p class="pnext">Lola chuckled and remained standing in the middle
+of what was used by the servants as a sitting room.
+How easy it was, with her gift, to shatter men’s few
+senses. She knew the place well,—its pictures of
+Queen Victoria and of famous race horses cut from
+illustrated papers cheaply framed and its snapshots of
+the gardens of Chilton Park, Whitecross, Bucks. Discarded
+books of all sorts were piled up on various
+tables. <em>The Spectator</em> and <em>The New Statesman</em>, Massingham’s
+peevish weekly, <em>Punch</em>, <em>The Sketch</em> and <em>The
+Tatler</em>, <em>Eve</em> and the <em>Bystander</em>, which had come downstairs
+from the higher regions, were scattered here and
+there. They had been read and commented upon first
+by the butler and then downwards through all the gradations
+of servants to the girl who played galley slave
+to the cook. Lola wondered how long it would be before
+she also would be spending her spare time in that
+room, hobnobbing with the various members of the
+family below stairs. A few days, perhaps, not more,—now
+that she had fastened on this plan.</p>
+<p class="pnext">Simpkins returned almost immediately. “If you
+will follow me,” he said, and gave her an alluring
+smile which disclosed a row of teeth that were peculiarly
+English. He led the way along a narrow passage
+up the back staircase and out upon a wide and imposing
+corridor, hung with Flemish tapestry and old
+portraits, which appealed to Lola’s sense of the decorative
+and sent her head up with a tilt of proprietorship.
+This was her atmosphere. This was the corridor
+along which her imaginary sycophants had
+passed so often to her room in Queen’s Road, Bayswater.
+“We’re not supposed to go through here,”
+said Simpkins, eager to talk, “except on duty. But
+it’s a short cut to the housekeeper’s quarters and
+there’s no one in to catch us. You look well against
+that hanging,” he added. “Like a picture in the
+Academy,”—which to him was the Temple of Art.</p>
+<p class="pnext">A door opened and there were heavy footsteps.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Look out. The governor.” He seized Lola’s
+arm and in a panic drew her into the shadow of a
+large armoire.</p>
+<p class="pnext">Her heart jumped into her mouth!—It was her hero
+in the flesh, the man at whose feet she had worshipped,—within
+a few inches of her, walking slowly,
+with his hands behind his back, his mouth compressed
+and a sort of hit-me-why-don’t-you in his eye. Still
+with Simpkins’s hand upon her arm she slipped
+out,—not to be seen, not with any thought of herself,
+but to watch Fallaray stride along the corridor;
+and get the wonder of a first look.</p>
+<p class="pnext">A door banged and he was gone.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“A pretty near thing,” said Simpkins. “It always
+happens like that. I don’t suppose he would have
+noticed us. Mostly he sees nothing but his thoughts,—looks
+inwards, I mean. But rules is rules. He
+lives in that wing of the ’ouse,—has a library and a
+bedroom there and another room fitted up as a gym
+where he goes through exercises to keep hisself fit.
+Give ’im enough in the House to keep ’im fit, you’d
+think, wouldn’t yer? A wonderful man.—Come on,
+Miss, nick through here.” He opened a door, ran
+lightly up a short flight of stairs and came back again
+into the servant’s passage. “’Ere you are,” he said
+and smiled brilliantly, putting in, as he thought, good
+work. This girl——! “I’ll be glad to see you ’ome,”
+he added anxiously.</p>
+<p class="pnext">Lola said, “Thank you, but I have some one waiting
+for me,” and entered.</p>
+</div>
+<div class="level-3 section" id="ix">
+<h3 class="level-3 pfirst section-title title">IX</h3>
+<p class="pfirst">“Well!” said Miss Breezy.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“I hope so,” said Lola, kissing the ear that was
+presented to her.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“I’m just rearranging my things. Her Ladyship’s
+just given me some new pictures. They used to be in
+the morning room, but she got sick of them and
+handed ’em over to me. I’m going to hang them up.”
+She might have added that nearly everything that the
+room contained had been given to her by Lady Feo
+with a similar generosity but her sense of humor was
+not very keen or else her sense of loyalty was. At
+any rate, there she stood in the middle of a nice airy
+room with something around her head to keep the dust
+out of her hair, wearing a pair of gloves, a stepladder
+near at hand.</p>
+<p class="pnext">There were six fair-sized canvases in gold
+frames,—seascapes; bold, excellent work, with the
+wind blowing over them and spray coming out that
+made the lips all salty. They made you hear the mewing
+of sea gulls.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Lady Feo bought them to help a young artist.
+He was killed in the War. She hates the sea, it makes
+her sick, and doesn’t want to be reminded of anything
+sad. I don’t wonder, and anyway, they’ll look very
+nice here. Do you like them?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">Lola had sized them up in a glance. She too would
+have turned them out. They seemed to her rough and
+draughty. “Yes,” she said, “they’re very good,
+aren’t they?” She mounted the ladder and held out
+her hands. She had come to ask a favor. She might
+as well make herself popular at once. “Hand them
+up, Auntie, and I’ll hang them for you.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Oh, well now, that’s very nice. I get giddy on a
+ladder. You came just at the right moment. Can
+you manage it? It’s very heavy. The first time I’ve
+ever seen you making yourself useful, my dear.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">This enabled Lola to get in her first point. “Mother
+never allows me to be useful,” she said, “and really
+doesn’t understand the sort of thing that I can do
+best.” She stretched up, hung the cord over a brass
+bracket and straightened it.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Well, you can certainly do this job! Go on and
+do the rest while you’re at it. I was looking forward
+to a very tiring afternoon. I didn’t want to have any
+of the maids to help me. They resent being asked to
+do anything that is outside their regular duty.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">And so Lola proceeded, hating to get her hands
+dirty and not very keen on indulging in athletics, but
+with a determination made doubly firm by the fleeting
+sight of Fallaray.</p>
+<p class="pnext">Miss Breezy was in an equable mood that afternoon,—less
+pompous than usual, less consumed with
+the importance of being the controlling brain in the
+management of the Fallaray “establishment,” as she
+called it in the stilted language of the auctioneer. She
+became almost human as she watched Lola perform
+the task which would have put her to a considerable
+amount of physical inconvenience. When one is relieved
+of anything in the nature of work, equability is
+the cheapest form of gratitude.</p>
+<p class="pnext">The room was a particularly nice one, large, with a
+low ceiling and two windows which overlooked Dover
+Street. It didn’t in the least indicate the character of
+the housekeeper because not a single thing in it was
+her own except a few books. Everything else had
+been given to her by Lady Feo, and like the pictures,
+had been discarded from one or other of the rooms
+below. The Sheraton sofa had come from the drawing-room.
+A Dowager Duchess had sat on it one
+evening after dinner and let herself go on the question
+of the Feo gang. It had been thrown out the following
+morning. The armoire of ripe oak, made up of
+old French altarpieces—an exquisite thing worth its
+weight in gold—had suffered a similar fate. Rappé
+the ubiquitous photographer had taken a picture of
+Lady Feo leaning against one of its doors. It turned
+out badly. In fact, the angel on the other door looked
+precisely as though it were growing on Lady Feo’s
+nose. It might have been good art but it was bad
+salesmanship. Away went the armoire. The story
+of all the other things was the same so that the room
+had begun to assume the appearance of the den of a
+dealer in old furniture. There were even a couple of
+old masters on the walls,—a Reynolds and a Lely,
+portraits of the members of Lady Feo’s family whose
+faces she objected to and whose admonishing eyes she
+couldn’t bear to have upon her when she came down
+to luncheon feeling a little chippy after a night out.
+These also were priceless. It had become indeed one
+of the nicest rooms in the house. Every day it added
+something to Miss Breezy’s increasing air of dignity
+and beatitude.</p>
+<p class="pnext">Lola did not fail to admire the way in which her
+aunt had arranged her wonderful presents and used
+all her arts of flattery before she came round to the
+reason of her visit. This she did as soon as Miss
+Breezy had prepared tea with something of the ceremony
+of the Japanese and arranged herself to be
+entertained by the child for whose temperament she
+had found some excuse by labelling it French. Going
+cunningly to work, she began by saying, “What do
+you think? You remember Mother’s friends, the
+Proutys, who were playing cards the other night?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Indeed I do,” replied Miss Breezy. “Whenever I
+meet those people it takes me some time to get over
+the unpleasant smell of meat fat. What about them?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Cissie, the daughter, has gone into the chorus of
+the Gaiety, and is very happy there. She’s going to be
+in the second row at first, but she’s bound to be noticed,
+she says, because she has to pose as a statue in the
+second act covered all over with white stuff.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Nothing else?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“No, but it will take an hour to put on every night.
+And before the end of the run she’ll probably be married
+at St. Margaret’s to an officer in the Guards, she
+says. She told me that she couldn’t hope to become
+a lady in any other way. I was wondering what you
+would say if I did the same thing?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">Miss Breezy almost dropped her cup as Lola knew
+that she would. “You don’t mean to say you’ve come
+to tell me that you’ve got <em>that</em> fearful scheme in the
+back of your head, you alarming child? A chorus
+girl?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">Lola laughed. “You know <em>my</em> way of improving
+myself: to serve an apprenticeship as a lady’s maid, a
+respectable way,—the way in which you’re going to
+help me now that you’ve thought it all over.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">The answer came like the rapping of a machine gun.
+“I’ve not thought it over and what’s more, I’m not
+going to begin to think it over. I told you so.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">Without turning a hair Lola handed a plate of cakes.
+“But you wouldn’t like me to follow Cissie’s example,
+would you,—and that’s the alternative.” Poor dear
+old Aunt! What was the use of pretending to be firm.
+All the trumps were against her.</p>
+<p class="pnext">But for once Lola miscalculated her hand and the
+woman. “If you must make a fool of yourself,” said
+Miss Breezy, “you must. I’m not your mother and
+luckily you can’t break my heart. I told you the other
+night and I tell you again that I do not intend to be a
+party to your lowering yourself by becoming a servant
+and there’s an end of it.” And she waved her disengaged
+hand.</p>
+<p class="pnext">It was almost a minute before Lola recovered her
+breath. She sat back, then, and put her head on one
+side. “In that case,” she said in a perfectly even
+voice, “I must try to get used to the other idea. I
+think I might look rather well in tights and Cissie
+tells me that if I were to join her at the Gaiety I should
+be put into a number in which five other girls will come
+on in underclothes in a bedroom scene. Of course I
+should keep my own name and before long you’d see
+my photograph in the <em>Tatler</em> as ‘the latest recruit to
+the footlights,—the great-great-granddaughter of the
+famous Madame de Brézé.’ I should tell the first reporter
+that, of course, to make it interesting.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">Miss Breezy rocked to and fro, gripping her cup.
+How often had she shuddered at the sight of scantily
+dressed precocious girls sitting in alarming attitudes
+on the shiny paper of the <em>Tatler</em>. To think of Lola
+in underclothes, debasing a highly respectable name!
+Nevertheless, “I am not to be bullied,” she said, wobbling
+like a turkey. “I have always given way to you
+before, Lola, but in this case my mind is made up.
+Can’t you understand how awkward it would be to
+have you in the house on a level with servants who
+have to be kept in order by me? It would undermine
+my authority.” That was the point, and it was a
+good one. And then her starchiness left her under
+the horror of the alternative. “As for that other
+thing,—well, you couldn’t go a better way to kill your
+poor mother and surely you don’t want to do that?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Of course I don’t, Auntie.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“There’s no call for you to think about any way of
+earning a living, Lola. Your parents don’t want to
+get rid of you, Heaven knows, and even in these bad
+times they can get along very nicely and keep you too.
+You know that.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">Lola had never dreamed of this adamantine attitude.
+Her aunt had been so easy to manage before. What
+was she to do?</p>
+<p class="pnext">Thinking that she was winning, Miss Breezy went at
+it again. “Come, now. Be a good child and forget
+both these schemes. Go on with your classes and it
+won’t be long before a suitable person will turn up
+and ask you to marry him. Your type marries
+young. Now, will you promise me to think no more
+about it all?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">But this was Lola’s only chance to enter the first
+stage of her crusade. She would fight for it to the
+last gasp. “The chorus, yes,” she said. “As for the
+other thing, no, Auntie. If you won’t help me I must
+get the paper in the morning and search through the
+advertisements. I’m sure to come across some one
+who wants a lady’s maid and after all, it won’t very
+much matter who it is. You see, I want to earn my
+living, and I have made up my mind to do it in this
+way. There’s good pay, a beautiful house to live in,
+no early trains to catch, no bad weather to go through,
+holidays in the country and with any luck foreign
+travel. I can’t understand why many more girls like
+me don’t go in for this sort of life. I only thought, of
+course, it would be so nice to be under your eye and
+guidance. Mother would much prefer it to be that
+way, I’m sure.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">But even this practical argument had no effect except
+to rouse the good lady’s dander. “You are a
+very nagging girl,” she cried. “I can see perfectly
+well what you’re driving at but you won’t undermine
+my decision, I can tell you that. I will not have you
+in this house and that’s final.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">Lola was beaten. To her astonishment and chagrin
+she found that her nail was not to be hammered in.
+There was steel in the old lady’s composition, after all.
+But there was steel in her own and she quickly decided
+to leave things as they stood and think out another line
+of attack before the following Thursday. And then,
+remembering Ernest Treadwell, who was living up to
+his name from one end of the street to the other and
+back, she rose to tear herself away with an air of great
+patience and affection. Just as she was about to bend
+down and touch the usual ear with her lips, the door
+suddenly swung open and a woman with bobbed hair,
+wearing a red velvet tam-o’-shanter and a curious one-piece
+garment of brown velvet which disclosed a pair
+of very admirable legs, stood smiling in the doorway.
+Her face was as white as the petals of a white rose.
+Her large violet eyes had lashes as black as her eyebrows
+and her wanton mouth showed a set of teeth as
+white and strong as a negro’s. “Oh, hello, Breezy,”
+she cried out, her voice round and ringing. “Excuse
+my barging in like this. I want to know what you’ve
+done about the table decorations for to-morrow night.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">Miss Breezy rose hurriedly to her feet, and Lola,
+although she had never seen this woman before, followed
+her example, sensing the fact that here was the
+famous Lady Feo.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“I sent Mr. Biddle round to Lee and Higgins in
+Bond Street, my lady. You need have no anxiety
+about it.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“That’s all right but I’ve altered my mind. I don’t
+want flowers. I’ve bought a set of caricatures and I’m
+going to put one in front of every place. If it’s too
+late to cancel the order, telephone to Lee and Higgins
+and tell them to send the flowers to any old hospital
+that occurs to them.” Lady Feo had spotted Lola
+immediately and during all this time had never taken
+her eyes away from the girl’s face and figure, which
+she looked over with frank and unabashed curiosity
+and admiration. With characteristic effrontery she
+made her examination as thorough as she would have
+done if she had been sizing up a horse with a view to
+purchase. “Attractive little person,” she said to herself.
+“As dainty as a piece of Sèvres. What the
+devil’s she doing here?” Making conversation with a
+view to discover who Lola was, she added aloud, “I
+see you’ve hung the pictures, Breezy.—Breezy and
+seascapes; they go well together, don’t they?” And
+she laughed at the little joke,—a gay and boyish
+laugh.</p>
+<p class="pnext">With her heart thumping and a ray of hope in front
+of her, Lola marked her appreciation of the joke with
+her most delighted smile.</p>
+<p class="pnext">And Miss Breezy indulged in a diplomatic titter.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Isn’t it a little remiss of you, Breezy, not to introduce
+me to your friend?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Oh, I beg your ladyship’s pardon, I’m sure. This
+is my niece Lola.” She wished the child in the middle
+of next week and dreaded the result of this most unfortunate
+interruption.</p>
+<p class="pnext">Lady Feo stretched out her hand,—a long-fingered
+able hand, born for the violin. “How do you do,”
+she said, as though to an equal. “How is it that I
+haven’t seen you before? Breezy and I are such old
+friends. I call her Breezy in that rather abrupt manner—forgive
+me, won’t you?—because I’m both
+rude and affectionate. I hope I didn’t cut in on a
+family consultation?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">Lola braced herself. Here was her opportunity
+indeed! “Oh, no, my lady. It <em>was</em> a sort of consultation,
+because I came to talk to Aunt about my
+future. It’s time I earned my own living and as she
+doesn’t want me to go on the stage, she’s going to be
+kind enough to help me in another way.” She got all
+this in a little breathlessly, with charming naïveté.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“What way?” asked Lady Feo bluntly. “I should
+think you’d make a great success on the stage.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">Lola took no notice of her aunt’s angry and frantic
+signs. She stood demure and modest under the
+searching gaze of Lady Feo and with a sense of extreme
+triumph took the jump. “The way I most
+wanted to begin,” she said, “was to be your ladyship’s
+maid. That’s my great ambition.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“And for the love of heaven, why not? Breezy,
+why the deuce haven’t you told me about this girl? I
+would like to have her about me. She’s decorative.
+I wouldn’t mind being touched by her and I’m sure
+she’d look after my things. Look how neat she is.
+She might have come out of a bandbox.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">Miss Breezy bit her lip. She was bitterly annoyed.
+She was unaware of the expression but she felt that
+Lola had double-crossed her,—as indeed she had.
+“Well, my lady,” she said, “to tell you the truth, I
+didn’t think that you would care to have two people
+of the same family in your house. It always leads to
+trouble.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Oh, rot,” said Lady Feo, “I loathe those old
+shibboleths. They’re so silly.” She turned to Lola.
+“Look here, do you really mean to say that you’d
+rather be a lady’s maid than kick your heels about in
+the chorus?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“If you please, my lady,” said Lola.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Well, I think you’ll miss a lot of fun, but as far as
+I’m concerned, you’re an absolute Godsend. The girl
+I’ve had for two years is going to be married. Of
+course, I can’t stop that, as much as I shall miss her.
+The earth needs repeopling, so I must let her go. The
+question has been where to get another. With all the
+unemployment no one seems very keen on doing anything
+but work in factories. I’d love to have you.
+Come by all means. Breezy, engage her. I hope we
+shall rub along very nicely together.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">As much to hide the gleam in her eyes from her
+aunt as to show deference to her new mistress, Lola
+bowed. “I thank you, my lady,” she said.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Fine,” said Lady Feo, “fine. That’s great. Saves
+me a world of trouble. Pretty lucky thing that I
+looked in here, wasn’t it?” She went to the door and
+turned. “When can you come, Lola?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“To-morrow.—To-night.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“To-night. I will let Emily off at once. She’ll be
+glad enough. I’ll send you home in the car. You
+can pack your things and get back in time to brush my
+hair. I suppose you know something about your
+job?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">Miss Breezy broke in hurriedly. Even now perhaps
+it might not be too late to beat this girl at her own
+game. “That’s it, my lady,” she said, tumbling over
+her words. “She doesn’t know anything about it.
+I’m afraid I ought to say——”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Oh, well, Breezy, that’s nothing new. They none
+of ’em know anything. I’ll teach her. I don’t want
+a sham expert with her nose in the air. All I need
+is a girl with quick fingers, nippy on her feet, good
+to look at, who will laugh at my jokes. You promise
+to do that, Lola?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">A most delicious smile curled all about Lola’s mouth.
+“I promise, my lady,” she said.</p>
+<p class="pnext">Lady Feo nodded at her. “She’ll make a sensation,”
+she thought. “How jealous they’ll all be.—Righto,
+then. Seven o’clock. Don’t be late. So
+long.” And off she went, slamming the door behind
+her.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“You little devil,” said Miss Breezy, her dignity in
+great slabs at her feet.</p>
+<p class="pnext">But Lola had won. And the amazing part of it was
+that the door of the house in Dover Street had been
+opened to her by Fallaray’s wife.</p>
+</div>
+</div>
+<div class="level-2 section" id="part-ii">
+<h2 class="level-2 pfirst section-title title"><a class="toc-backref pginternal" href="#id55">PART II</a></h2>
+<div class="level-3 section" id="id2">
+<h3 class="level-3 pfirst section-title title">I</h3>
+<p class="pfirst">Mrs. Malwood was hipped. She had been losing
+heavily at bridge, her Pomeranian had been run over in
+Berkeley Square and taken to the dog’s hospital, her
+most recent flame had just been married to his colonel’s
+daughter, and her fourth husband was still alive.
+Poor little soul, she had lots to grumble about. So
+she had come round to be cheered up by Feo Fallaray
+who always managed to laugh through deaths and
+epidemics to find her friend in the first stages of being
+dressed for dinner. She had explained her mental
+attitude, received a hearty kiss and been told to lie
+down and make herself comfortable. There she was,
+at the moment, in one of the peculiar frocks which had
+become almost like the uniform of Feo’s “gang.”
+She was not old, except in experience. In fact, she
+was not more than twenty-three. But as she lay on
+the sofa with her eyes closed and her lashes like black
+fans on her cheeks, a little pout on her pretty mouth
+and her bobbed head resting upon a brilliant cushion,
+she looked, in those clothes of hers, like a school girl
+whose headmistress was a woman of an aesthetic turn
+of mind but with a curious penchant for athleticism.
+Underneath her smock of duvetyn, the color of a ripe
+horse-chestnut, she wore bloomers and stockings rolled
+down under her knees,—as everybody could see. She
+might have been a rather swagger girl scout who never
+scouted, and there was just a touch of masculinity
+about her without anything muscular. She was, otherwise,
+so tiny a thing that any sort of a man could have
+taken her up in one hand and held her above his head.
+Very different from Lady Feo, whose shoulders were
+broad, whose bones were large, who stood five foot
+ten without her shoes, who could hand back anything
+that was given to her and swing a golf club like a
+man.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“I’ve just been dipping into Margot’s Diary,
+Georgie. Topping stuff. I wish to God she were
+young again,—one of us. She’d make things hum.
+I can’t understand why the critics have all thrown so
+many vitriolic fits about her book and called her the
+master egotist. Don’t they know the meaning of
+words and isn’t this an autobiography? Good Lord, if
+any woman has a right to be egotistical it’s Margot.
+She did everything well and to my way of thinking
+she writes better than all the novelists alive. She can
+sum up a character as well in ten lines as all our
+verbose young men in ten chapters. In her next book
+I hope to heaven she’ll get her second wind and put a
+searchlight into Downing Street. Her poor old bird
+utterly lost his tail but the public ought to know to
+what depths of trickery and meanness politics can be
+carried.—You can make that iron a bit hotter if
+you like, Lola. Don’t be afraid of it.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">Lola gave her a glint of smile and laid the iron back
+on its stand.</p>
+<p class="pnext">During the process of being dressed, Lady Feo reclined
+in a sort of barber’s chair—not covered with a
+<em>peignoir</em> or a filmy dressing jacket but in what is called
+in America a union suit—a one-piece thing of silk
+with no sleeves and cut like rowing shorts. It became
+her tremendously well,—cool and calm and perfectly
+satisfied with herself. She glanced at Lola, who stood
+quiet and efficient in a neat frock of black alpaca, with
+her golden hair done closely to her small head, and
+then winked at Georgie and gave a hitch to her elbow
+to call attention to the new maid whom she had already
+broken in and regarded as the latest actor in her private
+theatricals. Her whole life was a sort of play in which
+she took the leading part.</p>
+<p class="pnext">There was something in that large and airy bedroom
+which always did Mrs. Malwood good. She
+liked its Spartan simplicity, its white walls, white furniture,
+white carpet and the curtains and cushions
+which were of delicate water-color tones suggestive of
+sweet peas. It had once been wholly black as a background
+for Lady Feo’s dead-white skin. But her
+friend had grown out of that, as she grew out of almost
+everything sooner or later.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“New, isn’t she?” asked Mrs. Malwood without
+lowering her voice.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“A month old,” replied Lady Feo, “and becoming
+more and more useful every moment. Aren’t you,
+Lola?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">Lola bowed and smiled and once more put the hot
+tongs to the thick wiry hair which eventually would
+stand out around her mistress’s head like that of some
+Hawaiian girl.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Where did you pick her up?” asked Georgie.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“She fell into my lap like a ripe plum. She’s a
+niece of my Breezy, the housekeeper. You’d never
+think it, would you? I’m more and more inclined to
+believe, as a matter of fact, that she escaped from a
+china cabinet from a collection of Dresden pieces.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">Mrs. Malwood perched herself upon an elbow and
+examined Lola languidly,—who was quite used to this
+sort of thing, having already been discussed openly
+before innumerable people as though she were a freak.</p>
+<p class="pnext">They little knew how closely Lola was studying
+them in turn,—their manner, their accent, their tricks
+of phrase and for what purpose she was undergoing
+this apprenticeship. Out for sensation, they would
+certainly have attained a thrilling one could they have
+seen into the mind of this discreet and industrious girl
+who performed her duties with the deftest fingers and
+went about like a disembodied spirit.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Where are you dining?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Here,” said Lady Feo. “I’ve got half a dozen of
+Arthur’s friendly enemies coming. It will be a sort
+of Cabinet meeting. They’re all in a frightful stew
+about his attitude on the Irish question. They know
+that he and I are not what the papers call ‘in sympathy,’
+so why the dickens they’ve invited themselves
+I don’t know,—in the hope, I suppose, of my being
+able to work on his feelings and get him to climb down
+from his high horse. The little Welshman is the last
+man to cod himself that his position is anything but
+extremely rocky and he knows that he can’t afford to
+lose the support of a man like Arthur, whose honesty
+is sworn to by every Tom, Dick and Harry in the
+land; this is in the way of a <em>dernier ressort</em>, I suppose.
+I shall be the only woman present. Pity me among
+this set of indecisive second-raters who are all in a
+dead funk and utterly unable to cope with the situation,
+either in Germany, France, Ireland, India or anywhere
+else and have messed up the whole show. If I had
+Margot’s pen, just think what a ripping chapter I
+could write in my diary if I kept one, eh, Georgie?”
+She threw back her head and laughed.</p>
+<p class="pnext">As far as Fallaray’s hard-and-fast stand against
+reprisals was concerned she cared nothing. In fact,
+Ireland was a word with which she was completely fed
+up. She had erased it from her dictionary. It meant
+nothing to her that British officers were being murdered
+in their beds and thrown at the feet of their
+wives or that the scum of the army had blacked and
+tanned their way through a country burning with
+passion and completely mad. The evening was just
+one of a series of stunts to her out of which she would
+derive great amusement and be provided with enough
+chitchat to give her friends gusts of mirth for weeks.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“I saw Fallaray to-day,” said Georgie. “He was
+walking in the Park. He only needs a suit of armor
+to look like Richard Cœur de Lion. Is he really and
+honestly sincere, Feo, or is this a political trick to get
+the Welshman out of Downing Street? I ask because
+I don’t believe that any man can have been in the
+House as long as he has and remain clean.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Don’t you know,” said Lady Feo, with only the
+merest glint of smile, “that Arthur has been divinely
+appointed to save civilization from chaos? Don’t you
+know that?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Yes, but I know a good many of the others who
+have—when any one’s looking. You really can’t
+make me believe in these people, especially since the
+War. Such duds, my dear.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“All the same, you can believe in Arthur.” She
+spoke seriously. “He has no veneer, no dishonesty,
+no power of escape from his own standards of life.
+That’s why he and I are like oil and water. We don’t
+speak the same language. He reminds me always of
+an Evangelist at a fancy-dress ball, or Cromwell at a
+varsity binge. He’s a wonderful dull dog, is Arthur,
+absolutely out of place in English politics and it’s perfectly
+ridiculous that he should be married to me. God
+knows why I did it. His profile fascinated me, probably,
+and the way he played tennis. I was dippy about
+both those things at the time. I’m awfully sorry for
+him, too. He needs a wife,—a nice cowlike creature
+with no sense of humor who would lick his boots, put
+eau de cologne on his high forehead, run to meet him
+with a little cry of adoration and spring out of bed to
+turn on his bath when he came home in the middle of
+the night. All Cromwells do and don’t they love the
+smell of powder!—Good for you, Lola. Don’t you
+get frightfully fed up with this thick wiry hair of
+mine?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">Lola smiled and shook her head. It was only when
+she was alone with her mistress that she permitted herself
+to answer questions. But as she listened and with
+a burning heart heard her hero discussed and dismissed
+and knew, better and more certainly than ever, the
+things that he needed, one phrase ran like a recurring
+motif through her brain,—the rustle of silk, the
+rustle of silk.</p>
+</div>
+<div class="level-3 section" id="id3">
+<h3 class="level-3 pfirst section-title title">II</h3>
+<p class="pfirst">Lola and Miss Breezy were not on speaking terms.</p>
+<p class="pnext">The elderly spinster considered that she had been
+used and flouted, treated as though she were in her
+dotage and had lost her authority to engage and dismiss
+the members of the Fallaray ménage. She had
+nursed, therefore, a feeling of bitter antagonism
+against Lola during her three weeks under the same
+roof. She had not treated her niece to anything in
+the nature of an outburst on her return from Queen’s
+Road to take up her duties. “Dignity, dignity,” she
+repeated again and again and steeled herself with two
+other wonderful words that have helped so many similar
+women in the great crisis of wounded vanity,—“my
+position.” She had simply cut her dead. Since
+then they had, of course, met frequently and had even
+been obliged to speak to each other. They did so as
+though they were totally unrelated and had never met
+before.</p>
+<p class="pnext">All this led to a certain amount of comedy below
+stairs, it being perfectly well known to every one that
+Lola was the housekeeper’s niece. What Lola did
+when Miss Breezy entered the servants’ sitting room
+the night of her arrival filled the maids with astonishment,
+resentment and admiration,—astonishment because
+of her extraordinary capacity of holding in her
+laughter, resentment because she treated Miss Breezy
+with the sort of respect which that good lady never got
+from them, and admiration because of the innate breeding
+which seemed to ooze from that child’s finger tips.
+She had risen to her feet. And ever since she had
+continued to do so—a thing, the possibility of which
+the others had never conceived—and when spoken
+to had replied, “Yes, Miss Breezy,” with a perfectly
+straight face and not one glint of humor in her eye.
+It was wonderful. It was like something in a book,—an
+old book by a man who wrote of times that were
+as dead as mutton. It was gorgeous. It gave the girls
+the stitch from laughing. It became one of their
+standard jokes. “Up for Miss Breezy,” the word
+went after that and there was a scramble out of chairs.
+All this made the elderly spinster angrier than ever.
+Not only had she been done by this girl but, my word,
+the child was rubbing it in.</p>
+<p class="pnext">It was curious to see the effect that Lola had upon
+the other servants. They were all tainted with the
+Bolshevism that has followed in the wake of the War.
+They drew their wages and grumbled, slurred their
+duties, ate everything that they could lay their hands
+on, thought nothing of destroying the utensils of the
+kitchen and the various things which they used in the
+course of work, went out as often as they could and
+stayed out much later than the rules of the house permitted.
+But under the subtle influence of this always
+smiling, always good-tempered girl who seemed to have
+come from another planet, ribaldry and coarse jokes
+and the rather loose larking with the footmen began
+gradually to disappear. Without resentment, because
+Lola was so companionable and fitted into her new
+surroundings like a key into a lock, they toned themselves
+down in her presence, and finding her absolutely
+without “side,” hurried to win her friendship, went
+into her room at night, singly, to confide in her,—were
+not in the least jealous because Albert Simpkins,
+the butler and the two footmen competed with one
+another to grovel at her feet. In a word, Lola was as
+great a favorite below stairs as she was above. She
+had realized that the ultimate success of her plan depended
+on her popularity in the servants’ sitting room
+and in winning these people to her side had used all her
+homogeneous sense, even, perhaps, with greater care
+and thoughtfulness than she had applied to her task
+of ingratiating herself with Lady Feo. She knew very
+well that if the servants didn’t get on with her she
+would never be able to stay. They would make it
+impossible.</p>
+<p class="pnext">How Madame de Brézé would have chuckled had
+she been able to see her little imitator sitting on the
+sofa at night, beneath an oleograph of Queen Victoria,
+going through the current <em>Tatler</em> in the midst of a
+group of maids, with a butler and two footmen hanging
+over her shoulders and a perfect valet dreaming of
+matrimony sitting astride a chair as near as he could
+get. How she would have laughed at her descendant’s
+small quips and touches of wit and irony as she discussed
+the people who were known to her companions
+by sight and by name and seemed to belong to a sort
+of menagerie, separated from them by the iron bars
+of class distinction through which they could be seen
+moving about,—well fed and well groomed and performing
+for the public.</p>
+<p class="pnext">It was no trouble to Lola to do all this. She had
+done it almost all her life with the gradations of children
+with whom she had been at school,—admired by
+the girls, keeping the boys at arms’ length and yet retaining
+their friendship. It was perfectly easy. Lady
+Feo had liked her instantly and so no effort was necessary.
+Tactfulness alone was required,—to be
+silent when her mistress obviously required silence, to
+be merry and bright when her mood was expansive and
+to anticipate her wishes whenever in attendance. All
+Lola’s period of make-believe, during which she had
+played the celebrated courtesan in her little back bedroom,
+had taught her precisely how to conduct herself
+in her new surroundings. Had not she herself been in
+the hands of just such a lady’s maid as she had now
+become and seen her laugh when she had laughed, remain
+quiet when she had demanded quietude? It
+merely meant that she had exchanged roles with Lady
+Feo for a time and was playing the servant’s part
+instead of that of the leading lady. She reveled in the
+whole thing. It gave her constant delight and pleasure.
+Above all, she was under the same roof as her
+hero, of whom she caught a momentary glimpse from
+time to time,—from the window as he got into his
+car, from the gallery above the hall as he came back
+from the House of Commons, or late at night when
+he passed along the corridor to his lonely rooms, sometimes
+tired and with dragging feet, sometimes scornful
+and impatient, and once or twice so blazing with anger
+that it was a wonder that the things he touched did not
+burst into flames.</p>
+</div>
+<div class="level-3 section" id="id4">
+<h3 class="level-3 pfirst section-title title">III</h3>
+<p class="pfirst">The only one of the servants who took the remotest
+interest in the arrival of those members of the Cabinet
+who were to dine with Lady Feo was Lola. With the
+butler’s connivance she stood inside the hat room in the
+hall and peeped through the door. To her there was
+something not only indescribably interesting in the
+sight at close quarters of men of whom she had read
+daily for years and who were admired or loathed by
+her father and his friends, but something moving, because
+they had it in their power to help or hinder the
+work of Fallaray. She found them to be a curiously
+smug and well-fed lot, undistinguished, badly dressed
+and not very different from the ordinary run of
+Queen’s Road tradesmen. She thought that they
+looked like piano tuners and was astonished and disappointed.</p>
+<p class="pnext">The most important person, who arrived late and
+whose face was of course familiar to her from caricatures,
+made up for all the rest. He stood in the full
+light for a moment while he gave his coat and hat to a
+footman,—a soft dump hat and a coat lined with very
+shiny black satin. He looked more than ever like a
+quack doctor, one who was a cross between a comedian
+and a revivalist. His uncut hair, very white now,
+flopped over the back of his collar in a most uncivilized
+manner and his little moustache of the walrus type was
+quite out of keeping with it. If he had been clean-shaven
+he could have passed for a poet, or a dramatist
+who desired to advertise the fact, as some of them do
+who flourished in the Victorian period. His short
+plebeian figure, with legs far too small and apparently
+too frail to carry his fat little trunk, gave him a gnome-like
+appearance, but in his eyes, which were very wonderful,
+there was a gleam of humor and resourcefulness
+which stamped him as a consummate leader of
+men, while his forehead denoted imagination and keen
+intelligence. It made Lola laugh to see the way in
+which he tried to win the callous footman with a cheery
+word, never losing an opportunity of making a client,
+and to watch his rabbit-like way of going upstairs to
+the drawing-room.</p>
+<p class="pnext">She was met by Simpkins, who darted quickly and
+eagerly to her side. “Look ’ere,” he said in a whisper.
+“You’re free for the evening. How about doing a
+show with me? I can get you back before Lady Feo’ll
+want you again. What d’yer say?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Yes,” said Lola, “I should love it. What shall we
+see?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">Simpkins was a gallery first nighter and an ardent
+patron of the drama. Whatever he recommended,
+therefore, was sure to be worth seeing. “Well,” he
+said, “there’s Irene Vanbrugh in a new American
+play,—‘Miss Nell o’ New Orleans.’ I couldn’t get
+to see it but I read old man Walkley and I saw what
+Punch said. I don’t think the play’s much, but Irene
+is orlright. Nip up and get your things on. Let’s go
+and test it.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">Lola nipped. Her little bedroom was in the servants’
+corridor. She was lucky that it wasn’t, like most
+servants’ bedrooms, in the basement, cheek by jowl
+with the coal cellar. She changed quickly, excited at
+the prospect of stealing a few hours away from the
+house in Dover Street. She had been home twice on
+her nights off, there to be gazed at in silent wonder by
+the little mother who seemed to know her even less
+than ever and to be put through an exhaustive cross-examination
+by her father, whose mind ran to small
+details, as was natural in one who wore a magnifying
+glass perpetually in his eye. She met Simpkins in the
+servants’ sitting room,—very spruce in a tail coat
+and a bowler with his black tie ingeniously pulled
+through a gold ring in which there was a most depressed
+diamond.</p>
+<p class="pnext">She was received with a chorus of inquiries from
+the maids. “Hello, Lola,” “On the loose with
+Simpky?” “This is something new, ain’t it?”
+“Going to do the shimmy in ’Ammersmith?” and so
+forth. To all of which she replied in one sentence.
+“Mr. Simpkins is taking me to an organ recital,” and
+won a scream of mirth.</p>
+<p class="pnext">Simpkins was ecstatic. He had made a bet with
+himself that his appeal would be refused. Always before
+Lola had turned him down and he knew that the
+frequent pestering of the butler and the two footmen
+had been unable to move her to adventure. “We’ve
+just time to do it,” he said, put two fingers into his
+mouth and sent a piercing whistle into the muggy April
+evening. A prowling taxi drew up short and quivered,
+and a well-shaped head looked round to see from
+whom this urgent call had issued. Taking Lola’s hand,
+Simpkins ran her across the street and opened the
+door. “The Dooker York’s.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Righto, Sir,” said the driver, giving a quick and
+appreciative glance at his customer’s companion.
+Exactly three years ago the owner of that particularly
+nice voice, straight nose and small moustache had
+commanded a battery of the R. F. A. and fired with
+open sights at the advancing enemy. With nothing
+to eat except apples plucked from the orchards through
+which he had retired with his ragged and weakening
+men, he had fought coolly and cheerily for many days
+and nights, utterly out of touch with the main army
+and eventually, looking like a scarecrow, had removed
+his guns from impossible positions and fallen on his
+face in Amiens. Thus does a grateful Parliament
+reward its saviors.</p>
+<p class="pnext">Simpkins slipped his hand through Lola’s arm.
+“I’ve been looking forward to this,” he said. “You
+don’t know what you’ve done for me. I’m a different
+man since I saw you first.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“I,” said Lola quickly, “am precisely the same
+girl,” and very kindly and definitely gave him back his
+hand and drew a little farther into her corner of the
+cab. But Simpkins wasn’t hurt. On the contrary he
+esteemed her the more highly for this action. She
+proved herself so to be different from the girls with
+whom he was acquainted and thus lived up to his
+preconceived idea of her. “Sorry,” he said, “thank
+you,” and glowed with love.</p>
+<p class="pnext">It was perfectly true that Simpkins was a different
+man since he had seen Lola. She had revolutionized
+his life and his thoughts and strengthened his ambitions.
+He was a good fellow, clean-minded, with one
+or two ideals to which he had clung faithfully and well
+through the many temptations which were provided by
+his like below stairs. He had character. He was
+illiterate but not unintelligent. He had something that
+the human sensibility is frequently without,—a soul,
+and because of that he had imagination and a sense of
+worship. He was the sort of man of whom fanatics
+are made under a crisis of deep emotion. As a gentleman’s
+gentleman he regarded himself as having a
+sort of mission in life. He must be honest, always
+ready for his master’s call; spruce, cheerful and discreet.
+When tempted to make himself acquainted with
+the contents of private letters he must never give anything
+away. He had held himself in waiting, so to
+speak, for a great love affair and had built up in his
+mind a good and wholesome picture of home and wife
+and children. Lola fitted into this picture and dominated
+it as no other girl had ever done, and he had
+fallen actually and metaphorically before her like a
+shack before a hurricane. At any time now he could
+leave service and branch out for himself, because he
+had inherited from his father a sum of money which
+would enable him to buy a public house somewhere in
+the country—preferably on the upper Thames—and
+let rooms to nice people,—they would have to be nice
+people. He was a man in the middle thirties with
+plenty of time to add to his good nest egg, bring up a
+little family with great care and put his son in a good
+school with a view to making him a gentleman,—a
+dentist perhaps, or a clerk in Coutts’s bank. He could
+see only Lola as the mother of this boy and the fact
+that she had accepted his invitation to go to the theater
+filled him with a great hopefulness; he rejoiced in her
+having disallowed his familiarity.</p>
+<p class="pnext">To Lola, Simpkins was less than the dust. She had
+already sized him up as a rather curious character to
+be respected and even liked but not, of course, to be
+considered as anything but an infrequent escort into
+the theater life of London.</p>
+<p class="pnext">She placed him among the Treadwells,—though
+not so high up in the list as Ernest. One of these fine
+days she hoped to be able to lift the Bayswater poet
+out of the public library into the public gaze, to do for
+him what Madame de Brézé had done for Paul Brissac.</p>
+<p class="pnext">They arrived at the theater in good time. With a
+curious touch of embarrassment, because he had seen
+at once that the cab was being driven by a gentleman,
+Simpkins handed over half a crown and said, “That’s
+all right, you can keep the change.” He received a
+crisp and unabashed “Thank you” and a little bow
+from the waist down which was a cross between extreme
+politeness and ineffable cheek, and before Lola
+turned to go into the theater she was given a pucka
+salute with the hand almost flat upon the ear. She returned
+a smile that was like one of those electric advertisements
+which flick in and out of the sky in all really
+progressive American cities. It nearly knocked the
+man over and almost caused him to collide with a
+policeman.</p>
+<p class="pnext">Simpkins was tempted to buy two seats in the stalls
+and could have done so without question in these after-war
+times when almost the only people who have
+enough money for their laundresses are the profiteers.
+But tradition prevailed and he took her up to the dress
+circle,—where nobody dressed. The people were
+coming reluctantly into the theater in the usual manner
+of Londoners. English people are not ardent theater
+goers and have to be dragged in to see a play almost
+in the same manner as in the old days of barnstorming,
+when the manager beat a drum on the threshold of the
+tent, the hero and the heroine stood at his elbow and
+made pathetic appeals to passers-by, and the villain,
+lurking in the background, grimaced at all the girls.</p>
+<p class="pnext">The orchestra had just begun to tune up and the
+scraping of fiddles sent a tingle through Lola’s veins.
+It put her in the mood, as it always did, to forget life,
+her own personality and the presence of Simpkins, and
+place herself into the character of the play’s heroine.
+From an unexpected pocket Simpkins brought out a
+small box of chocolates. He was one of those
+strange people who, although they have just risen from
+a hearty meal, cannot go through an evening at the
+theater without munching something. “’Ave one,”
+he said. “They’re nice.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“You think of everything,” said Lola, and in order
+not to hurt his feelings, took one and dropped it under
+the seat. “There’s going to be a good house,” she
+added.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Irene always draws ’em in. By Gum, she’s given
+me some good evenings in her time. She’s what I call
+safe. You can bank on her. She dresses like a lady,
+too, and that gets me. Good old Irene.” And then
+he put his face rather close to Lola’s. “Some one
+said you thought of going on the stage before you
+joined us. That’s not true, is it?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“No,” said Lola. “Not in the least true. I discussed
+it with my aunt. In fact, to be quite honest, I
+put it to her head like a pistol.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Oh, I see.” Simpkins heaved a sigh of relief.
+If Lola were to go on the stage,—and all these young
+officers buzzing about, treating marriage as though it
+were a betting transaction——</p>
+<p class="pnext">“I think,” said Lola with naïve gravity, “that it’s
+better to play a leading part in life than to be in the
+chorus on the stage. Cleverer acting is required, too,
+don’t you think so?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">A leading part in life? Simpkins was worried.
+Would she consider the wife of a man who owned the
+“Black Bell” at Wargrave to be a leading part?
+“You’re not ambitious, are yer?” he asked, peering
+at her patrician profile.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Oh,” she said, “Oh,” and suddenly threw out her
+hands.</p>
+<p class="pnext">And then the lights went out and the buzz of
+talking ceased gradually as though bees were retiring
+in platoons from a feeding place.</p>
+</div>
+<div class="level-3 section" id="id5">
+<h3 class="level-3 pfirst section-title title">IV</h3>
+<p class="pfirst">They walked to Trafalgar Square. Lola was still
+in the old garden of Miss Nell among the Creoles and
+the music of the Mardi Gras frolickers. She had no
+ears for the expert criticisms of her escort. There
+were plenty of unoccupied taxis scouting for fares but
+Lola pulled up under the shadow of the National
+Gallery to watch the big play of life for a moment or
+two. From force of a habit which she had not yet
+conquered, she looked up at the sky, half expecting to
+see the great white beams of searchlights swing and
+stammer until they focussed upon something that
+looked like a silver fish, and then to twinge under the
+quick reports of anti-aircraft guns. Twice during the
+War she had been caught on that spot during a raid
+and had stood transfixed to the pavement between
+fright and a keen desire to see the show. Memories of
+those never-to-be-forgotten incidents, small as they
+were and of no consequence in the story of the War—the
+loss of a few well-fed noncombatants who made
+themselves targets for stray shrapnel because they
+wouldn’t dip like rabbits into funk holes—came back
+to her then, as well they might. The War’s evidences
+forced themselves every day upon the notice even of
+those who desired to forget,—the processions of unemployed
+with their rattling collection boxes among
+the ugliest of them all.</p>
+<p class="pnext">Big Ben struck the quarter and Lola returned to
+earth. “Simpky,” she said, “cab, quick.” And he
+called one and gave the address. And then she began
+again to hear what the valet was saying. He had used
+up Miss Nell o’ New Orleans and had come to Miss
+Lola of Queen’s Road, Bayswater. “Look ’ere, can’t
+we do this often, you and me? We can always sneak
+off when there’s a dinner on or Lady Feo’s out in the
+push. It don’t cost much and I’ve got plenty of
+money.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“I should like to very much,” said Lola. “Once a
+fortnight, say. You see, I go home every Wednesday
+night. I don’t think we ought to do it more often
+than once a fortnight because, after all, I feel rather
+responsible to Auntie and I don’t want to set a bad
+example to the other girls.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Well, promise you won’t go out with the other
+men. I let you into the ’ouse first, don’t forget that,
+and that was a sort of omen to me and if you could
+bring yourself to look upon me as—well——” He
+broke off nervously and ran his hand over his forehead,
+which was damp with excitement.</p>
+<p class="pnext">But Lola was not in the least nonplussed. She had
+had so much practice. She was an expert in mentally
+making all sorts and conditions of men her brothers.
+She said, “Simpky,”—although the man looked extremely
+un-Russian,—“you mustn’t spoil me. Also
+you must remember that Ellen Glazeby has hopes.
+She’s a friend of mine.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Oh, my God,” said Simpkins, with a touch of
+melodrama. “If I’d been engaged to ’er and on the
+verge of marriage, and then ’ad seen you,—or even if
+I’d been married for a couple of years and was ’appy
+and ’ad seen you——Religious as I am——”</p>
+<p class="pnext">Lola turned to him with extreme simplicity. “But
+I’m a good girl, Simpky,” she said.</p>
+<p class="pnext">And he gave a funny throaty sound, like a frog at
+night with its feet in water; and one of his hands
+fluttered out and caught hold of the end of Lola’s
+piece of fur, and this he pressed to his lips. “Oh, my
+God,” he said again, words failing.</p>
+<p class="pnext">And so Lola was rather glad when the cab drew up
+at the house in Dover Street.</p>
+<p class="pnext">A car arrived at the same time and honked impatiently
+and imperiously. Simpkins leapt from the
+taxi and said, “Pull out of the way, quick.” It did so.
+And as Lola descended and stood at the top of the area
+steps, she saw Fallaray go slowly up to the front door
+with rounded shoulders, as though he were Atlas with
+the weight of the world on his back. He was followed
+by a man whose step was light and eager.</p>
+</div>
+<div class="level-3 section" id="id6">
+<h3 class="level-3 pfirst section-title title">V</h3>
+<p class="pfirst">It was George Lytham.</p>
+<p class="pnext">The editor of a new weekly called <em>Reconstruction</em>
+which had not as yet done more than take its place
+among all those elder brothers on the bookstalls which
+were suffering from a combination of hardening of the
+arteries and shrinkage of the exchequer, Lytham was
+a live wire, a man who could make mistakes, eat his
+own words, and having gone halfway up the wrong
+road, turn around without giving a curse for what
+other men would call dignity and retrace his steps at
+a run. Eton and Balliol, he had been a wet-bob, had
+a chest like a prize fighter and a forearm as hard as a
+cricket bat. The third son of old Lord Lockinge, he
+had sat in the House as member for one of those
+agricultural constituencies which are too dull and
+scattered to attract Radical propagandists and nearly
+always plump for Unionism. He had quickly made
+his mark. <em>Punch</em> drew him in rowing shorts after his
+maiden speech and the Northcliff press made a point
+of referring to him as Young Lochinvar. But he had
+chucked the House in disgust after two years of it,
+one year of enormous enthusiasm during which he had
+worked like a dog and another year of sickly pessimism
+and disillusion brought about by contact with a
+set of political crows who fluttered over the carcass of
+England,—traditionless, illiterate, dishonest, of low
+minds and low accents, led by the Old Bad Men who
+had inherited the right or tricked their way to the
+front benches and had all died before the War but
+were still living and still clinging to office. He owed
+allegiance to no leader and had started <em>Reconstruction</em>,
+backed with the money of the great mine owners and
+merchants who should have been members of the
+Cabinet, for the purpose of cleaning out the Augean
+stables. He numbered among his contributors every
+political free-thinker in England,—ex-members of
+Parliament, ex-war correspondents who spoke with
+horror of brass hats, and men who had served in all
+capacities in the War and were, for that reason, determined
+to remove the frightful burden of taxation
+caused by the maintenance of a great war machine for
+the indulgence of escapades in Mesopotamia and
+Ireland.</p>
+<p class="pnext">Lytham was young,—not yet thirty-five; unmarried,
+so that his purpose was single, his time his own.
+His paper was his wife and he was out for blood,—not
+with a bludgeon, not with a gun, but with an
+intellect which, supported by other intellects, alone
+provided some hope for the future of England and the
+Human Family. He had fastened upon Fallaray and
+dogged his heels. He regarded him as a brother, was
+ready to back him through thick and thin and had
+come home with him that night to discuss one or two
+of the great questions of the moment and to make
+plans for quick functioning.</p>
+<p class="pnext">When Fallaray led the way into his den and turned
+up the lights—all of them, so that there should be no
+shadows in the room and no ghosts—Lytham took
+his place with his back to the fire, standing in the frame
+of black oak like the picture of a crusader who had
+left his armor at home; he liked that room for its size
+and simplicity and tradition, its books and prints and
+unashamed early-Victorianism. He was as tall as
+Fallaray but not as thin and did not look as though
+the fires of his soul had burnt him down to the bone.
+His hair was brown and crisp and short, his moustache
+small, his nose straight and his eyes large and full of
+humor and irony. Except for his mouth there was
+nothing sensitive in his face and the only sign of restlessness
+that he permitted himself to show was in his
+habit of lighting one cigarette from the butt of another
+just finished,—the cheapest stinkers that were on the
+market and which had been smoked by the men of the
+regiment to which he had been attached from the beginning
+to the end of the War,—fags, in other words.
+His holder was far too long for the comfort of people
+who stood too close.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Now, Fallaray,” he said, “let’s get down to it.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">Fallaray sat on the edge of his desk which he gripped
+tight with both his hands. “I’m ready,” he answered.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“The point is this. You have come out against
+reprisals, which means that you have dared to voice
+the overwhelming sentiment of the country at a moment
+when the Government has plumped for whole
+hoggism and given Sinn Fein its finest advertisement.
+So far so good. But this is only the beginning. To
+carry the thing on to its right conclusion, you must
+not only resign from the Cabinet but you must lead us
+to an immediate settlement of the Irish question. You
+must organize all that section of British opinion and
+American opinion—which counts for so much—and
+work for the overthrow of the coalition government.
+Will you do it?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Of course.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Ah!”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“But wait a second. Here we are marching with
+France into Germany, occupying towns for the purpose
+of wringing out of these whimpering liars the
+fruits of victory which they say they cannot pay and
+which they may not be able to pay. Already the fires
+of Bolshevism are breaking out everywhere as a result.
+Are we to put the Irish question before one that
+is surrounded with the most amazing threads of difficulty
+and may lead to the death of Europe? In
+other words, my dear Lytham, is murder and arson
+in one small island of greater importance to the world
+at this moment than the possibility of a new and even
+more terrible war in Europe, with disease and famine
+following at its heels? The men I have served with
+during the last war say ‘no.’ They have even gone
+so far as to dine here to-night with my wife to try
+and get her to move me out of what they call my
+rut,—to persuade me, because they have failed to do
+so, to shelve the Irish question and back up France in
+her perfectly righteous demand for reparations. I
+can’t make up my mind whether I will see this German
+question through, or swing body and soul to the Irish
+question and handicap them in this new crisis. If
+you’ve got anything to say, for God’s sake, say
+it.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">For a moment Lytham had nothing to say. It did
+seem to him, as he stood there in that quiet room with
+all its books and with hardly a sound coming in from
+the street below, that the troubles of that green and
+egotistical island melted away before those which did
+not affect merely England and France and Germany,
+Austria, Russia, Poland, Belgium but America also.
+It did seem to him that the murder of a few Britishers,
+a handful of loyal Irishmen and the reprisals of the
+Black and Tans for cowardly ambushes, brutally carried
+out, were in the nature of a side show in a circus
+of shows, of a small family quarrel in a city of families
+who were up against a frightful epidemic,—and
+he didn’t know what to say.</p>
+<p class="pnext">The two men looked into each other’s eyes, searched
+each other’s hearts and waited, listening, for an inspiration,—from
+God probably, whose children had
+become strangely out of hand.</p>
+<p class="pnext">Thus they stood, silent and without a sign, as others
+were standing,—bewildered, embarrassed, groping.</p>
+<p class="pnext">And then the door was flung open.</p>
+</div>
+<div class="level-3 section" id="id7">
+<h3 class="level-3 pfirst section-title title">VI</h3>
+<p class="pfirst">Feo Fallaray’s ideas of evening clothes were curious.
+Her smock-frock, or wrapper, or whatever she
+called the thing, had a shimmer of green about it.
+Her stockings were green and she wore round her
+head a circlet of the most marvelous pieces of jade.
+The result was bizarre and made her look as though
+she were in fancy dress. She might have been an
+English Polaire ready to enter the smarter Bohemian
+circles of a London Montmartre. Or, to quote the
+remark of a woman in the opposite set, “a pre-Raphaelite
+flapper.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">She drew up short on seeing Lytham. He was no
+friend of hers. He was far too normal, far too
+earnest, and both his hands were on the wheel. But
+with all the audacity of which she was past mistress,
+she gave him one of her widest smiles. “Oh, it’s
+you,” she said. “They told me some one was with my
+beloved husband. Well, how’s young Lochinvar?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">Lytham bowed profoundly and touched her hand
+with the tips of his fingers. “Very well, thank you,”
+he said. How he detested green. If he had been
+married and his wife had dared to appear in such a
+frock, he would have returned her to her mother for
+good.</p>
+<p class="pnext">Fallaray rose from the desk on which he was sitting
+and walked to the farthest end of the room. There
+was no one in the world who gave him such a sense
+of irritation as this woman did.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“I’m not welcome, I know,” said Feo, “but I
+thought you might like me to come and tell you what
+happened to-night, Arthur.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">Fallaray turned, but did not look at her. “Thanks
+so much,” he said. “Yes. You’re very kind. I’m
+afraid you’ve been pretty badly bored.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">She echoed the word, giving it all its dictionary interpretations
+and some which are certainly not in any
+dictionary.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“When I see those people,” she said, “I marvel at
+our ever having got through the War. Well, the end
+of it is that I am to ask you to reconsider your attitude.
+The argument is that your secession puts them
+into the cart just at a moment when they think, rightly
+or wrongly, that they are forcing the fear of God into
+the Sinn Feiners. They can’t imagine that my influence
+with you is absolutely nil, because they have
+the bourgeois idea of marriage and think that because
+two people are tied together by Church and law they
+must of necessity be in full sympathy. So all I can
+do is to make my report and add on my own account
+that I never saw such a set of petty opportunists in
+all my career.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">Lytham gave her a match for the cigarette that she
+had put into a black holder with a narrow band of
+diamonds. “Did you give them any views of your
+own?” he asked.</p>
+<div class="figure">
+<div class="align-center container image-wrapper">
+<img alt="images/illus-268.jpg" src="images/illus-268.jpg"/>
+</div>
+<div class="caption">
+A SCENE FROM THE PHOTOPLAY.</div>
+</div>
+<p class="pfirst">“Rather,” she said, the light on her hair like moonlight
+on black water. “I held forth at length with
+my back to the fireplace. As a matter of fact, quite
+on the spur of the moment, I handed them a very
+brilliant idea.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Yes?” It was a little incredulous.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Yes, odd as it very obviously seems to you,
+Lochinvar. I said that I thought that this was the
+psychological moment for a nice piece of theatricality.
+I said that some one, probably Kipling, should draft a
+letter for the King, in which he should set forth the
+fact that he was going to withdraw every one of his
+soldiers and all his officials from Ireland at once and
+leave the Irish to run themselves, giving them the same
+kind of dominion government that they have in Australia
+and Canada, wishing them Godspeed and a happy
+Easter,—a manly, colloquial letter, very simple and
+direct, and ending with a touch of real emotion, the
+sort of thing that the King would write on his own,
+better than any one.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">There was a moment’s pause, during which Lytham
+darted a quick look at Fallaray. A gleam came into
+the eyes of both men.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“What did they say to that?” he asked.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“My dear man, what do you suppose they said?
+Having no imagination and precious little knowledge
+of the facts of the case, they dragged in Ulster and
+talked about civil war, which I think is absurd, because
+already, as Arthur knows perfectly well, Ulster
+is feeling the pinch of the boycott and has deserted
+Carson to a man. They’re longing for a settlement
+and only anxious to go on making bawbees in the good
+old Scotch Presbyterian manner.—They couldn’t see,
+and I don’t suppose they will ever be made to see, this
+lot, that a letter from the King would immediately
+have the effect of withdrawing all the sympathy from
+the Irish and reduce them from martyrs to the level
+of ordinary human beings. They couldn’t see that
+every Irish grievance would be taken away in one
+fell swoop, that the priests would be left without a leg
+to stand on and that above all America would be the
+first to say ‘Now show us.’ It would be a frightful
+blow to Collins and de Valera and also to the Germans
+and the Sinn Feiners in the United States, and
+make all the world admire the British sense of sportsmanship,—which
+we have almost lost by everything
+that has been done during and since the War by our
+people in Ireland.—What do <em>you</em> think of it,—both
+of you?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">She threw her head back and waited for a scoffing
+laugh from Lytham and a look from her husband that
+would move her to ribaldry. Her long white neck
+rose out of her queer gown like a pillar, the pieces of
+jade in her hair shimmered oddly and there was the
+gleam of undergraduate ragging in her eyes.</p>
+<p class="pnext">Fallaray looked at his wife for the first time. “It
+was an inspiration,” he said. “I confess that I have
+never thought of this solution.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">Feo was amazed but bowed ironically. “Very
+generous, Arthur, very generous. I couldn’t have been
+married to you all this time without having acquired
+a certain amount of intelligence, though, could I?”
+Even at such a moment she could not remain serious,
+although she was perfectly ready to confess to a considerable
+flutter of vanity at Fallaray’s favorable
+comment.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“My God,” said George Lytham, “it takes a woman
+to think of a thing like this.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“You’ll make me swollen-headed in a moment, you
+two.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">Lytham took no further notice of her. He strode
+over to Fallaray. “Could this be done? I quite
+agree with your wife in her interpretation of the effect
+of such a letter and of course it could be made the sort
+of human document which would electrify the world.
+I agree, too, that once our soldiers were withdrawn
+with all the brass hats from the castle, the huge majority
+of reasonable Irishmen would insist on taking
+hold of things against the very small minority of Republicans
+who have merely used Ireland as a means
+of feathering their own nests, and be obliged to prove
+that they are fit to run their own country without
+bloody squabbles, cat-calling, filthy recriminations and
+all the other things for which they have earned a
+historical reputation. But—can it be done?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">Fallaray paced up and down the room with his
+hands clasped behind his back and his great shoulders
+rounded. Lytham and Lady Feo watched him. It
+was a peculiar moment. They both saw in it the test
+of Fallaray’s imagination and, in a way, humor. They
+could see that he was looking at this thing from every
+possible angle, dissecting it as a chemist would dissect
+bad water. At last he gave a groan and stopped and
+faced them.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Not with these men,” he said. “Not with this
+political system, not in these times. Do you imagine
+for a moment that the present Cabinet holds a single
+man big enough, humble enough, patriotic enough to
+permit even the King to step on the stage and absorb
+the limelight? No. Not one. There is some microbe
+in the House of Commons, some atrocious cootie which
+gets under the skin of its members and poisons them so
+that they become the victims of a form of egomania
+of which they never can be cured. Then, too, my dear
+Lytham, we must get it into our heads that the Irish
+trouble is like a cancer in the body of the Constitution.
+We may hit upon a medicine that seems likely to give
+temporary relief—the withdrawal of the troops, the
+appointment of a new Lord Lieutenant, even the
+establishment of a Dominion Government—but we
+have got to remember that the hatred of the Irish for
+the English is fundamental and permanent. What
+may seem to us to-day to offer a solution to this age-old
+problem becomes futile and unworkable to-morrow.
+In our efforts to deal with the question we must not
+allow ourselves to be influenced by the quick transitory
+events that chase each other across the front pages
+of the paper. We must, if we can, go to the root of
+the malady,—the deep human emotion that burns in
+the hearts and souls of the Irish and endeavor to
+understand. Otherwise we are as children making
+foolish marks on shifting sand. What we write to-day
+is obliterated to-morrow.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">He turned about, walked slowly over to the chair at
+his desk and dropped into it heavily, rising again immediately
+because Feo was standing.</p>
+<p class="pnext">Seeing which, and having an engagement to join
+Mrs. Malwood and several others at a private dance
+club, she made for the door. “Well,” she said,
+“there it is. I did my best for you.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“An excellent best,” said Fallaray. “Thank you
+again. Are you leaving us?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">She waved her hand, that long able hand which
+might have achieved good things but for that fatal
+kink in her,—and went.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Brilliant woman,” said Fallaray.
+It was on the tip of Lytham’s tongue to say “Brilliant
+what?” but he swallowed the remark.</p>
+<p class="pnext">And presently they heard Feo’s high-pitched voice
+in the street below, giving an order to her chauffeur.</p>
+<p class="pnext">And they resumed the discussion, coming back always
+to the point from which they started. The Old
+Bad Man, shuffling, juggling, lying to others as well
+as themselves, without the sense to realize that something
+far worse than the War was coming hourly to a
+head, blocked every avenue of escape.</p>
+</div>
+<div class="level-3 section" id="id8">
+<h3 class="level-3 pfirst section-title title">VII</h3>
+<p class="pfirst">Lytham walked home in the small hours of that
+morning. He had the luck to live in the Albany, at
+the Piccadilly end. The streets, but for a silent-footed
+Bobby or two, were deserted. Even the night birds
+had given up hope and withdrawn to their various
+nests.</p>
+<p class="pnext">He wondered once more, as he went along, what on
+earth had made Fallaray marry Feo, of all women.
+It was one of his favorite forms of mental pastime to
+try and discover the reason of ninety-nine per cent, of
+the marriages which had come under his fairly intimate
+observation. It seemed to him, in reviewing
+the whole body of his friends, not only that every
+man had married the wrong woman but that every
+woman had married the wrong man.</p>
+<p class="pnext">There was his brother, for instance,—Charlie
+Lytham, master of foxhounds and one of the most
+good-natured creatures to be found on earth,—hearty,
+honest, charitable, full of laughter, a superb
+horseman, everybody’s friend. For some unexplained
+and astounding reason he hadn’t married one of the
+nice healthy English girls who rode and golfed and
+stumped about the countryside, perfectly content to
+live out of town for ten months of the year and enjoy
+a brief bust in London. He had been dragged to the
+altar by a woman who looked like a turkey and gobbled
+like one when she spoke, who wore the most impossible
+clothes with waggling feathers and rattling beads,
+spoke in a loud raucous voice and was as great a form
+of irritation to every one who came in contact with
+her as the siren of a factory. What was the idea?—Poor
+devil. He had condemned himself to penal
+servitude.</p>
+<p class="pnext">Then there was his sister, Helena Lytham, a beautiful
+decorative person born to play the queen in pageants
+and stand about as in a fresco in a rather thick
+nightgown which clung decorously to her Leightonian
+figure,—respectable but airy. On Lytham’s return
+from Coblenz after the Armistice she had presented
+him to a little dapper person who barely came up to
+her shoulder, who smoked a perpetual cigar out of the
+corner of his mouth, wore a waistcoat with a linoleum
+pattern, skin-tight trousers and boots with brown
+leather uppers. He realized George’s idea of the riding
+master of a Margate livery stable. And so it went
+on all the way through.—And here was Fallaray.</p>
+<p class="pnext">The truth of the thing was that Fallaray had not
+married Lady Feo. Lady Feo had married Fallaray.
+What she had said to Mrs. Malwood was perfectly
+true. At eighteen her hobbies were profiles and tennis.
+At twenty-four Fallaray’s profile was at its best. He
+looked like a Greek god, especially when he was playing
+tennis with a shirt open at the neck, and she had
+met him during the year that he had put up that
+superb fight against Wilding in the good old days.
+The fact that he was Arthur Fallaray, the son of a
+distinguished father, born and bred for a place on the
+front bench, a marked man already because of his
+speeches in the Oxford Union, didn’t matter. His
+profile was the finest that she had seen and his tennis
+was in the championship class, and so she had deliberately
+gone for him, followed him from house
+party to house party with the sole intention of acquiring
+and possessing. At the end of six weeks she
+had got him. He had been obliged to kiss her. Her
+face had been purposely held in place to receive it.
+The rest was easy. Whereupon, she had immediately
+advertised the engagement broadcast, brought her relations
+down upon Fallaray in a swarm, sent paragraphs
+to the papers and made it literally impossible
+for the unfortunate man to do anything but go
+through with the damned thing like a gentleman,—dazed
+by the turn of events and totally unacquainted
+with the galloping creature who had seemed to him to
+resemble a thoroughbred but untrained yearling, kicking
+its heels about in a paddock. It had all been just
+a lark to her,—no more serious than collecting postage
+stamps, which eventually she could sell or give
+away. If ever she were to fall really in love, it would
+be perfectly simple, she had argued, either to be
+divorced or to juggle affairs so that she might divorce
+Fallaray. Any man who played tennis as well as he
+had done could do a little thing like that for her. The
+result was well known. A man of high ideals, Fallaray
+had gone through with this staggering marriage
+with every intention of making it work. Being in love
+with no other girl, he had determined to do his utmost
+to play the game and presently stand proudly among
+a little family of Fallarays. But he had found in Feo
+some one who had no standards, no sense of right and
+wrong, give and take; a girl who was a confirmed anarchist,
+who cared no more for law and order, Church
+and State or the fundamentals of <em>life</em>, <em>tradition</em>, <em>honor</em>,
+womanhood than an animal, a beautiful orang-outang,
+if there is such a thing, who or which delighted in
+hanging to branches by its tail and making weird
+grimaces at passers-by. The thing had been a
+tragedy, so far as Fallaray was concerned, an uncanny
+and terrible event in his life, almost in the nature of
+an incurable illness. The so-called honeymoon to
+which he never looked back, had been a nightmare
+filled with scoffing laughter, brilliant and amazing remarks,
+out of which he had emerged in a state of
+mental chaos to plunge into work as an antidote.
+They had always lived under the same roof because
+it was necessary for a man who goes into politics to
+truckle to that curious form of hypocrisy which will
+never be eradicated from the British system. Her
+people and his people had demanded this, and his first
+constituency had made it a <em>sine qua non</em>. Not requiring
+much money, he had been and continued to be
+very generous in his allowance to his wife, who did
+not possess a cent of her own. On the contrary, it
+was frequently necessary for her to settle her brother’s
+debts and even to pay her father’s bills from time to
+time. The gallant old Marquis was without anything
+so bourgeois as the money sense and couldn’t possibly
+play bridge under five pounds a thousand.
+There was also the system with which he had many
+times attempted to break the bank at Monte Carlo.</p>
+<p class="pnext">To-day, never interfering with her way of life and
+living in his own wing like a bachelor, he knew less
+of Feo’s character than he did when she had caught
+him first. What he knew of her friendships and her
+peregrinations he got from the newspapers. When it
+was necessary to dine at his own table, he treated her
+as though she were one of his guests, or rather as
+though he were one of hers. There was no scandal
+attaching to his name, because women played absolutely
+no part in his life; and there was no actual
+scandal attaching to hers. Only notoriety. She had
+come to be looked upon by society and by the vast
+middle class who discussed society as a beautiful freak,
+an audacious strange creature who frittered away her
+gifts, who was the leader of a set of women of all
+ages, married and unmarried, who took an impish delight
+in flouting the conventions and believed that they
+established the proof of unusual intelligence by a self-conscious
+display of eccentricity.</p>
+</div>
+<div class="level-3 section" id="id9">
+<h3 class="level-3 pfirst section-title title">VIII</h3>
+<p class="pfirst">And in the meantime Lola continued to be an apt
+little pupil. Her quick ear had already enabled her to
+pick up the round crisp intonation of Lady Feo and
+her friends and at any moment of the day she could
+now give an exact imitation of their walk, manner of
+shaking hands and those characteristic tricks which
+made them different from all the women who had had
+the ill fortune to come into the world in the small
+streets.</p>
+<p class="pnext">Up in the servant’s bedroom in Dover Street, before
+a square of mirror, Lola practised and rehearsed for
+her eventual debut,—the form of which was on the
+knees of the gods. She had entered her term of apprenticeship
+quite prepared to serve conscientiously
+for at least a year,—a long probation for one so
+young and eager. Probably she would have continued
+to study and listen and watch, with gathering impatience,
+but for a sudden hurrying forward of the
+clock brought about by the gift of a frock,—rustling
+with silk. A failure, because the dressmaker, with the
+ineffable cheek of these people, had entirely departed
+from Feo’s rigid requirements, it provided Lola with
+the key to life. Giving one yell at the sight of it, Feo
+was just about to rip it in pieces when she caught the
+longing eyes of her maid. Whereupon, with the generosity
+which is so easy when it is done with other
+people’s money, she said, “Coming over,” rolled it
+into a ball and threw it at Lola. It was, as may be
+imagined, a very charming and reasonable garment
+such as might have been worn by a perfectly respectable
+person.</p>
+<p class="pnext">On her way home that night, Lola dropped in to
+her own little dressmaker who lived in one of the
+numerous dismal villas off Queen’s Road, for the purpose
+of having it altered to fit her. It was miles too
+large. She had eventually brought it back to Dover
+Street and hidden it away behind one of her day
+frocks in her only cupboard, and every time that she
+took a peep at it, her eyes sparkled and her breath
+came short and she wondered when and how she could
+possibly wear it.</p>
+<p class="pnext">Filled with a great longing to try her wings and
+fly out of the cage like the canary of which she had
+spoken to Ernest Treadwell, there were moments in
+her life now when she was consumed with impatience.
+The poet of the public library, the illiterate and
+ecstatic valet, the pompous butler and the two cockney
+footmen,—she had grown beyond all these. She was
+absolutely sure of herself as an honorary member of
+the Feo “gang.” She felt that she could hold her
+own now with the men of their class. If she were
+right, her apprenticeship would be over. Fully fledged,
+she could proceed with her great scheme. The chance
+came as chances always do come, and as usual she
+took it.</p>
+<p class="pnext">Several days after Lytham’s talk with Fallaray—which
+had left them both in that state of irresolution
+which seemed to have infected every one—Lady Feo
+went off for the week-end, leaving Lola behind. The
+party had been arranged on the spur of the moment
+and was to take place in a cottage with a limited number
+of bedrooms. If Lady Feo had given the thing a
+moment’s thought, she would have told Lola to take
+three days holiday. But this she had forgotten to do.
+And so there was Lola in Dover Street with idle
+hands. The devil finds some mischief still——</p>
+<p class="pnext">At four o’clock that evening Simpkins entered the
+servants’ sitting room. Lola happened to be alone,
+surrounded by <em>Tatlers</em>, <em>Punches</em> and <em>Bystanders</em>, fretting
+a little and longing to try her paces. “Good
+old,” he said, “Mr. Fallaray has got to dine at the
+Savoy to-night with his Ma and Auntie from the country.
+One of them family affairs which, not coming
+too frequently, does him good. And you’re free.
+How about another show, Princess?” He had recently
+taken to calling her princess. “There’s another
+American play on which ain’t bad, I hear. Let’s sample
+it. What do you say?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">Mr. Fallaray.—The Savoy——</p>
+<p class="pnext">Without giving the matter an instant’s thought,
+Lola shook her head. “<em>Too bad, Simpky,</em>” she said,
+“I promised Mother to go home to-night. She has
+some friends coming and I am going to help her.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Oh,” said Simpkins, extremely disappointed.
+“Well, then, I’ll take you ’ome and if I’m very good
+and put on a new tie I may be asked,—I say I
+may——” He paused, having dropped what he considered
+to be a delicate hint.</p>
+<p class="pnext">This was a most awkward moment. Mr. Fallaray—The
+Savoy—That new frock. And here was
+Simpkins butting in and standing with his head craned
+forward as if to meet the invitation halfway. So she
+said, as cool as a cucumber, “Mother will be very
+disappointed not to be able to ask you, Simpky, because
+she likes you so much. She enjoyed both times
+you came home with me. So did Father. But, you
+see, our drawing-room is very small and Mother has
+asked too many people as it is. Get tickets for tomorrow
+night and I shall be very glad to go with
+you.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">There was no guile in Lola’s eye and not the smallest
+hesitation in her speech. Simpkins bore up bravely.
+He knew these parties and the way in which some
+hostesses allowed their rooms to brim over. And,
+anyway, it was much better to have Lola all to himself.
+He could live for Saturday. “Righto,” he said.
+“Let me know when you’re ready to go and if you
+feel like a taxicab——”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“I couldn’t think of it,” said Lola. “You spend
+much too much money, Simpky. You’re an absolute
+profiteer. I shall go by Tube and this time a friend
+of mine is fetching me.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Treadwell?”
+She nodded and calmly examined a picture of Lopodoski
+in one of her latest contortions.</p>
+<p class="pnext">There was a black cloud on Simpkins’s face. He
+had met Ernest at the Breezys’ house. He had seen
+the way in which this boy gazed at Lola,—lanky,
+uncouth, socialistic young cub. He was not jealous,
+good Lord, no. That would be absurd. A junior
+librarian with a salary that was far less than any
+plumber got, and him a man of means with the “Black
+Bull” at Wargrave on the horizon. All the same, if
+he heard that Ernest Treadwell had suddenly been
+run over by a pantechnicon and flattened out like a
+frog——</p>
+<p class="pnext">And that was why he sat down on the sofa a little
+too close to Lola and dared to possess himself of her
+hand. “Princess,—you know ’ow I feel. You know
+what you’ve done to me.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">Lola patted his hand and gave it back and rewarded
+him with a smile which she considered to be matronly.
+“Nice Simpky,” she said. “Very nice Simpky,” as
+though he were a rather faulty terrier a little too keen
+on the thrown stick. “I must go now,” she added and
+rose. “I have some sewing to do for Lady Feo.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">And as Simpkins watched her go, his whole heart
+swelled, and something went to his head that blurred
+everything for a moment. He would sell his soul for
+that girl. For her sake he would even set light to the
+“Black Bull” and watch it burn, if that would give
+her a moment’s amusement.</p>
+<p class="pnext">Mr. Fallaray.—The Savoy——</p>
+<p class="pnext">What Lola did in Lady Feo’s room was not to sew
+but to seat herself at the dressing table, do her hair
+with the greatest care and practise with the make-up
+sticks,—rouge, and the brush of water colors with
+which she emphasized her eyebrows. Finally, time
+having flown, she borrowed a pair of lace stockings,
+some shoes and gloves, made her way stealthily along
+the servants’ corridor to her own room, and packed
+them, with the new frock, into a cardboard box.
+Dressed and hatted for the street, she carried the
+magic costume in which she was going to transplant
+herself from Cinderella’s kitchen to the palace of the
+Prince and went down to the servants’ sitting room
+through which it was necessary for her to go in order
+to escape.</p>
+<p class="pnext">Miss Breezy was there, issuing, as she would have
+said, orders to one of the housemaids. That was
+lucky. It saved Lola from answering an outburst
+of questions. As it was, she gave a little bow to her
+aunt, said “Good evening, Miss Breezy,” opened the
+door and nipped up the area steps into the street. A
+little involuntary laugh floated behind her like the
+petals of a rose. A prowling taxi caught her eye.
+She nodded and was in before any one could say Jack
+Robinson,—if any one now remembers the name of
+that mystic early Victorian.</p>
+<p class="pnext">The address she gave was 22 Castleton Terrace,
+Bayswater.</p>
+<p class="pnext">Mr. Fallaray.—The Savoy!</p>
+</div>
+<div class="level-3 section" id="id10">
+<h3 class="level-3 pfirst section-title title">IX</h3>
+<p class="pfirst">“My word,” said Mrs. Rumbold, getting up from
+her knees and taking a pin out of her mouth. “I
+never see anything like it before. It’s my opinion
+that you could ’old your own in that frock with any of
+the best, my dear. It’s so quiet—yet so compelling.
+The best of taste. If I see you coming down the steps
+of the Ritz, I should nudge the person I was with and
+say, ‘Duke’s daughter. French mother probably.’”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Thank you,” said Lola. And that was exactly
+how she felt. Carried forward on the current of her
+impatience, she didn’t stop to ask herself what was the
+use of going to the Savoy, of all places, alone,—the
+danger, the absurdity. “I wonder if you’ll be so kind
+as to fold up my day dress, put it in the box and string
+it up. You’re sure you’ll be up as late as half-past
+eleven? If so, it won’t take me a moment to change
+and I’ll leave the evening dress here.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Oh, that’ll be all right,” said Mrs. Rumbold. “I
+shall be up, my dear. The old man’s going to a dinner
+and will come staggering back later than that. He’ll
+be a regular Mason to-night, bless him.” And she
+stood back, looked Lola all over with the greatest admiration
+and a certain amount of personal pride. She
+was a good dressmaker, no doubt about it. An awful
+lot of stuff had had to be taken out of that frock. It
+must have been made for a woman with the shoulders
+of a rowing man. It wasn’t for her to ask what the
+little game was, to inquire why a lady’s maid was going
+out on the sly, looking like her mistress. She had
+her living to make and dressmaking was a precarious
+livelihood in these times. “Have a good evening, my
+dear,” she said; “enjoy yourself. Only live once, yer
+know.” And added inwardly, “And I’ll lay you’ll
+manage to do yourself pretty well,—a lot better than
+most, with that face and figure and the style and all.
+Lord, but how you’ve come on since I see yer last.
+All the zwar-zwar of the reg’ler thing, sweep-me-bob.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">The taxi was still waiting at the door, ticking up
+sixpences, but in Lola’s pocket was a little purse bulging
+with her savings. She turned at the door. “Mrs.
+Rumbold,” she said, and it might have been Lady Feo
+who was speaking, “you certainly are one in a
+million.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">There was a sudden cry of despair.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Lord ’a’ mercy, what’s the trouble?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">Lola had become herself again, a tragic, large-eyed
+self. “I can’t go like this,” she said. “I have no
+evening cloak.” The whole framework of her adventure
+flapped like the sides of a tent in a high wind.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“My dear!” cried Mrs. Rumbold. “Well, there’s
+a nice lookout. What in the world’s to be done?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">Fallaray.—The Savoy——</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Wait a second. I’ve got an idea.” The woman
+with tousled hair made a dart at a curtain which was
+stretched across one of the corners of her workroom.
+She emerged immediately with something thin and
+black which gleamed here and there with silver. “Put
+that on,” she said. “I’ve just made it for Mrs. Wimpole
+in Inverness Terrace. She won’t be calling for
+it until to-morrer. If you’ll promise to bring it back
+safe——”</p>
+<p class="pnext">All Lola’s confidence returned and a smile of triumph
+came into her face. “That will do nicely,” she
+said, and placed herself to receive the borrowed garment.
+A quick glance in the mirror showed her that
+if it wasn’t exactly the sort of thing that she would
+have chosen, it passed.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“You’re a brick, Mrs. Rumbold, a perfect brick. I
+can’t tell you how grateful I am.” And she bent forward
+and touched the withered cheek with her lips.
+One of these days she would do something for this
+hard-working woman whose eldest boy sat legless in
+the back parlor,—something which would relieve the
+great and persistent strain which followed her from
+one plucky day to another.</p>
+<p class="pnext">And then, pausing for a moment on the top of the
+steps in order to make sure that there was no one in
+the street who could recognize her—Queen’s Road
+was only just round the corner—Lola ran down and
+put her hand on the door of the taxi cab.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“The Savoy,” she said.</p>
+</div>
+</div>
+<div class="level-2 section" id="part-iii">
+<h2 class="level-2 pfirst section-title title"><a class="toc-backref pginternal" href="#id56">PART III</a></h2>
+<div class="level-3 section" id="id11">
+<h3 class="level-3 pfirst section-title title">I</h3>
+<p class="pfirst">Sir Peter Chalfont’s cork arm had become one of
+the institutions of the town. Long ago the grimness
+had gone out of everybody’s laughter at the tricks he
+played with it,—presenting it with the palm the wrong
+way, making it squeak suddenly and wagging it about
+from the wrist as a greeting to his friends. Every one
+had grown accustomed to his frequent changes of
+gloves and his habit of appearing at dinner with those
+dreadful stiff fingers in white buckskin. He had indeed
+trained the thing to perform as though it were
+an animal and he could do almost anything with it
+except tie a dress tie. That was beyond him.</p>
+<p class="pnext">At quarter to eight on the evening of Lola’s first
+dip into life, he turned away from the telephone and
+presented himself to the man who had been his batman
+during the last year of the War. He had had three
+since the miracle of the Marne. He was rather bored
+because he had just been told by the girl who had
+promised to dine with him that she didn’t feel like
+eating and he knew that meant that some one else had
+cropped up who was more amusing than himself. He
+had a great mind to give the Savoy a wide berth and
+walk round to Boodles and have dinner with the <em>Pall
+Mall Gazette</em>. But on second thoughts the idea of
+accompanying his cold salmon and cucumber with the
+accumulating mass of depressing evidence of the
+world’s unrest, as set forth in the evening paper,
+appalled him. Charles was trying to edge his way
+back into Hungary. The Russian Reds were emptying
+their poison all over the map. English miners had
+gone out on strike and with a callousness altogether
+criminal had left the pumps unmanned. Viviani had
+landed in the United States to endeavor to prove to
+the new President that if he did not jerk the Senate
+out of Main Street he would inevitably sentence
+Europe to death. And Lloyd George, even to the
+amazement of those who knew him best, was continuing
+his game of poker with Lenin and Trotsky.</p>
+<p class="pnext">It couldn’t be done. And so, his tie duly tied by
+the clumsy-fingered man who had received lessons from
+a shop in the Burlington Arcade, the gallant Peter left
+his rooms in Park Place and stood on the curb in St.
+James’s Street. Should he walk or drive? Should he
+try to raise a friend equally at a loose end, or carry on
+alone? How he missed his dear old father, who, until
+the day of his peaceful death, was always ready to join
+him in a cheery dinner at the Marlborough or the
+Orleans or at one of the hotels where he could see the
+pretty girls. After all, dining at the Savoy was not
+such a lonely proceeding as it seemed. Among the
+profiteers and the new rich there might be a familiar
+face. And there was at any rate an orchestra. With
+a dump hat at an angle of forty-five and a light overcoat
+over his dinner jacket, he was a mark for all the
+prowling cabs which found business worse than usual.
+Two or three of them knew this tall wiry man and had
+served in his Division. One of the youngest of the Brigadier
+Generals in the British Army, he had worn
+his brass hat as though it were the cap of a man with
+one pip; they loved him for that and any day and any
+night would cheerfully have followed him to hell.
+Many of them had called him “Beauty Chalfont,”
+which had made him uncomfortable. It was better
+than “Bloody” Chalfont or “Butcher” Chalfont,—adjectives
+that had been rather too freely applied to
+some of his brother Brigadiers. So far as the majority
+of passers-by were concerned, this man to whom
+willing hands had gone up in salute and who had
+turned out to be a born soldier was, like so many
+demobilized officers all over the country, of no account,
+a nobody, his name and his services forgotten.</p>
+<p class="pnext">The pre-war cheeriness which had belonged to the
+Savoy was absent now. Chorus ladies and Guards officers,
+baby-faced foreign office clerks and members of
+the Bachelors, famous artists and dramatists and the
+ubiquitous creatures who put together the musical
+potpourris of the town, beautiful ladies of doubtful
+reputation and highly respectable ones without quite so
+much beauty no longer jostled the traveling Americans,
+tennis-playing Greeks and Indian rajahs in the foyer.
+Chalfont marched in to find the place filled with
+wrongly dressed men with plebeian legs and strange
+women who seemed to have been dug out of the residential
+end of factory cities. Their pearls and diamonds
+were almost enough to stir Bolshevism in the
+souls of curates.</p>
+<p class="pnext">Shedding his coat and hat and taking a ticket from
+a flunkey, on whose chest there was a line of ribbons,
+he looked across the long vista of intervening space to
+the dining room. The band was playing “Avalon”
+and a buzz of conversation went up in the tobacco
+smoke. What was the name of that cheery little soul
+who had dined with him in March, 1914? March,
+1914. He had been a happy-go-lucky Captain in the
+21st Lancers in those days, drawing a generous
+allowance from the old man and squeezing every ounce
+of fun out of life. The years between had brought
+him up against the sort of realities that he did not
+care to think about when left without companionship
+and occupation. Two younger brothers dead and
+nearly all his pals.—Just as he was about to go down
+the stairs and be conducted to one of the small tables
+in the draught he saw a girl in a black cloak with
+touches of silver on it standing alone, large-eyed, her
+butter-colored hair gleaming in the light, and caught
+his breath. “Jumping Joseph,” he said to himself,
+“look at that,” and was rooted to the floor.</p>
+<p class="pnext">It was Lola, as scared as a child in the middle of
+traffic, a rabbit among a pack of hounds, asking herself,
+cold and hot by turns, what she had done—oh,
+what—by coming to that place with no one to look
+after her, wishing and wishing that the floor would
+open up and let her into a tunnel which would lead her
+out to the back room of the nerve-wrung dressmaker.
+Every passing man who looked her up and down and
+every woman who turned her head over her shoulder
+added stone after stone to the pile of her folly, so
+childish, so laughable, so stupendous. How could she
+have been such a fool,—the canary so far away from
+the safety of its cage.</p>
+<p class="pnext">Chalfont looked again. “She’s been let down by
+somebody,” he thought. “What sort of blighter is it
+who wouldn’t break his neck to be on the steps to meet
+such a—perfectly——All these cursed eyes, greedily
+signaling. What’s to be done?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">And as he stood there, turning it all over, his
+chivalry stirred, Lola came slowly out of her panic.
+If only Mrs. Rumbold had asked her with whom she
+was going, if only she had had, somewhere in all the
+world, one sophisticated friend to tell her that such a
+step as this was false and might be fatal. The way
+out was to stand for one more moment and look as
+though her escort were late, or had been obliged to go
+to the telephone, and then face the fact that in her
+utter and appalling ignorance she had made a mistake,
+slip away, drive back to that dismal Terrace and change
+into her Cinderella clothes. Ecstasy approaching madness
+must have made her suppose that all she had to do
+was to sail in to this hotel in Lady Feo’s frock and all
+the rest would follow,—that looking, as well as feeling
+“a lady” now and loving like a woman, something
+would go out from her soul—a little call—and
+Fallaray would rise and come to her. Mr. Fallaray.
+The Savoy. They were far, far out of her reach.
+Her heart was in her borrowed shoes. And then she
+became aware of Chalfont, met his eyes and saw in
+them sympathy and concern and understanding. And
+what was more, she knew this man. Yes, she did.
+He was no stranger; she had seen him often,—that
+very day. It was a rescue! A friendly smile curled
+up her lips.</p>
+<p class="pnext">Chalfont maintained his balance. Training told.
+He gave it fifty seconds—fifty extraordinary seconds—during
+which he asked himself, “Is she—or
+not?” Deciding not by a unanimous vote, he went
+across to her and bowed. “I’m awfully afraid that
+something must have happened. Can I be of use to
+you?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“I’m longing for asparagus,” said Lola in the manner
+of an old friend.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“That’s perfectly simple,” said Chalfont, blinking
+just once. “I’m alone, you’re alone, and asparagus
+ought to be good just now.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Suppose we go in then,” said Lola, buying the
+hotel, her blood dancing, her eyes all free from fright.
+She was perfectly happy in the presence of this man
+because she recognized in him immediately a modern
+version of the Chevalier who had so frequently brought
+her bonbons to her room at Versailles which overlooked
+the back yard of Queen’s Road, Bayswater.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“My name’s Chalfont, Peter Chalfont.” A rigid
+conventionality sat on his shoulders.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“I know,” she said, and added without a moment’s
+hesitation, “I am Madame de Brézé.” And then she
+knew how she knew. How useful was the Tatler.
+Before the War, during the War, after the War, the
+eyes of this man had stared at her from its pages in
+the same spirit of protection. That very afternoon she
+had paused at his photograph taken in hunting kit,
+sitting on his horse beside the Prince of Wales, underneath
+which was printed, “Sir Peter Chalfont, Bart.
+V. C. Late Brigadier General,”—and somewhere
+among that crowd was Fallaray.</p>
+</div>
+<div class="level-3 section" id="id12">
+<h3 class="level-3 pfirst section-title title">II</h3>
+<p class="pfirst">As they went down the red-carpeted stairs and
+passed through what Peter called “the monkey house,”
+the people who had dined at a cheap restaurant and
+now at the cost of a cup of coffee were there to watch
+the menagerie followed Lola with eager eyes. Some
+of them recognized Chalfont. But who was she? A
+chorus girl? No. A sister? He was certainly not
+wearing a brotherly expression. A lady? Obviously,
+and one who could afford not to wear a single jewel.
+What a refreshing contrast to the wives of profiteers.
+And she was so young, so finished,—a Personality.
+Even Grosvenor Bones, the man who made it his duty
+to know everybody and supplied the <em>Daily Looking
+Glass</em> with illiterate little paragraphs, was puzzled and,
+like a dramatic critic who sees something really original
+and faultless, startled, disconcerted.</p>
+<p class="pnext">Feeling her own pulse as she passed through the
+avenue of stares, Lola was amazed to find that her
+heart-beats were normal, that she was not in the least
+excited or frightened or uncertain of herself any
+longer. She felt, indeed—and commented inwardly
+on the fact—as though dinner at the Savoy were
+part of her usual routine, and that Peter Chalfont was
+merely Albert Simpkins or Ernest Treadwell in a better
+coat and cast in a rarer mold. How Chalfont would
+have laughed if she had told him this. She felt, as a
+matter of fact, like a girl who was playing a leading
+part on the London stage as a dark horse, but who had
+in reality gained enormous experience in a repertory
+company in the Provinces. She thanked her stars that
+she had indulged in her private game for so long a
+time.</p>
+<p class="pnext">The bandmaster, a glossy person with a roving and
+precocious eye, bent double, violin and all, and
+signaled congratulations to Chalfont with ears and
+eyes, eyebrows and mouth. He had the impertinence
+of a successful jockey. A head waiter came to the
+entrance of the dining room and washed his hands,—his
+face wearing his best bedside manner. “For two,
+Sir Peter?” he asked, as though he were not quite
+sure that some miracle might not break them into three.
+And Peter nodded. But Lola was not to be hurried
+off to the first of the disengaged tables. Fallaray was
+somewhere in the room and her scheme was, if possible,
+to sit at a table well within his line of vision. She
+laid the tips of her fingers on Chalfont’s arm and
+inspected the room.—There was Fallaray, as noticeable
+in that heterogeneous crowd as a Rodin figure
+among the efforts of amateur sculptors. “That
+table,” she said to the head waiter and indicated one
+placed against a pillar. One or two of Chalfont’s
+friends S. O. S.’d to him as he followed the young,
+slim erect figure across the maze. Luck with her once
+more, Lola found herself face to face with Fallaray,
+only two tables intervening. She decided that the
+charming old lady was his mother. The other had no
+interest for her.</p>
+<p class="pnext">A thousand questions ran through Chalfont’s head.
+Madame de Brézé.—Widow of one of the gallant
+Frenchmen who had been killed in the War, or the
+wife, let down by her lover, of an elderly Parisian
+blood? He would bet his life against the latter conjecture,
+and the first did not seem to be possible because
+he had never seen any face so free from grief, pain or
+suffering. De Brézé. The name conveyed nothing.
+He had never heard it before. It had a good ring
+about it. But how was it that this girl talked English
+as well as his sister? She looked French. She wore
+her dress like a Frenchwoman. There was something
+about the neatness of her hair which Frenchwomen
+alone achieve. Probably educated in England. He
+was delighted with her acceptance of the situation.
+That was decidedly French. An English girl, even in
+these days, would either have frozen him to his
+shoes or lent to the episode a forced note of irregularity
+which would have made it tiresome and
+tasteless.</p>
+<p class="pnext">It was not until after the asparagus had arrived that
+Lola succeeded in catching Fallaray’s eyes. They
+looked at her for a moment as though she were merely
+a necessary piece of hotel decoration and wandered off.
+But to her intense and indescribable joy, they returned
+and remained and something came into them which
+showed her that he had focused them upon her as a
+human being and a woman. She saw that he wore
+the expression of a man who had suddenly heard the
+loud ringing of a bell, an alarm bell. And then, having
+seen that his stare had been noticed, he never looked
+again.</p>
+<p class="pnext">The rustle of silk!—The rustle of silk!</p>
+<p class="pnext">And presently, Chalfont being silent, she leant forward
+and spoke in a low voice. Luckily the band was
+not playing a jazz tune but at the request of some old-fashioned
+person Massenet’s “Elegy.” She said, “Sir
+Peter, will you do something for me?” And he replied,
+“Anything under the sun.” “Well, then, will
+you introduce me to Mr. Fallaray before he leaves the
+room? He’s at a table just behind you. I admire
+him so much. It would be a great—the greatest——”</p>
+<p class="pnext">Her voice broke and a flush ran up to her hair, and
+something came into her eyes that made them look like
+stars.</p>
+<p class="pnext">Luckily Chalfont was not looking at her face. Her
+request was a large order, and as usual when puzzled,—he
+was never disconcerted—he began twisting
+about his comic cork hand. “Fallaray?” he said, and
+raised his eyebrows. “Of course, I’d love to do it
+for you. I know him as well as anybody else does, I
+suppose—I mean ordinary people. But he doesn’t
+remember me from Adam. He passed me to-night in
+the foyer, for instance, and looked clean through my
+head. I had to put up my hand to see that I hadn’t
+left it at home. He’s the only man, except the sweep
+who used to come to our house when I was a kid, of
+whom I’ve ever been afraid. However—you wish it
+and the thing must be done.” And he gave her a
+little bow.</p>
+<p class="pnext">Lola could see that she had given her new friend a
+task from which he would do almost anything to
+escape. After all, there was not much in common
+between Fallaray, whose nose was at the grindstone,
+and Peter Chalfont, who had nothing to do but kill
+time. But she must meet Fallaray that night. It was
+written. Every man was a stepping-stone to this one
+man who needed her so, but did not know her yet.
+Therefore, with a touch of ruthlessness that came to
+her directly from her famous ancestress, she thanked
+him and added, “It can be managed near the place
+where you put your hat and coat.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">Chalfont was amused and interested and even perhaps
+a little astonished at this pretty young thing who
+had the ways of a woman of the world. “I agree with
+you,” he said, “but——” and looked at the menu.</p>
+<p class="pnext">Lola shook her head. “I hate buts. They are at
+the meat course and we’ve only just begun. Dinner
+doesn’t really interest you and I’m a mere canary. The
+moment they rise from the table we can make a quick
+exit.” It was on the tip of her tongue to quote
+Simpkins and say “nick out.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">Chalfont grinned, pounced upon his roll and started
+to eat. “After all,” he said, “it will give me an
+admirable opportunity of inviting you to supper. Keep
+an eye on the old birds and as soon as they show a
+disposition to evacuate the situation we’ll limber up
+and wait for them in the foyer. He’s a hero of yours.
+Is that the idea?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Yes,” she said simply.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Do you happen to know Lady Feo?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Very well, indeed. She has been very kind to me.
+I like her.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">Chalfont shifted his shoulders. That was quite
+enough. “Are you going to give me the whole of the
+evening?” he asked. “Or will that escort of yours
+show up sooner or later and claim you?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“He’s as good as dead, as far as I’m concerned.
+What do you suggest?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">He bent forward eagerly. “I dunno. A show of
+sorts. Not the theater. I can’t stand that. We
+might drop into one of the Reviews or see what they
+are doing at the Coliseum. I love the red-nosed comedian
+who falls over a pin and breaks a million plates
+in an agony of economical terror. Do you like that
+sort of thing?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">Lola’s experience of Reviews and Variety entertainments
+was limited to Hammersmith and the suburbs.
+“You’re going to do something for me,” she said, “so
+I am perfectly ready to do something for you. I’m
+rather keen about give and take.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">Which was good hearing for Chalfont. He hadn’t
+met many women who understood that golden rule.
+He could see even then that the little de Brézé was
+going to play ducks and drakes with his future plans,
+put him to a considerable amount of inconvenience and
+probably keep him hanging about town,—for which
+he had very little use now that the sun was shining.
+Already Lola’s attraction had begun its disturbing
+effect. He was on the verge of becoming brother of
+a valet, a butler, two footmen and the Lord knew how
+many of the hobble-de-hoys of Queen’s Road, Bayswater.</p>
+<p class="pnext">The fish came and they both fell to,—Lola watching
+Fallaray’s table keenly. “I saw a rather decent
+photograph of you in the <em>Tatler</em> to-day,” she said. It
+might have been Feo who spoke. “You won the point
+to point, didn’t you?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“I did,” said Chalfont. “But I should have been
+beaten by the Boy if I hadn’t had a better horse. He
+rode like the devil.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“You don’t think that point to points are rather
+playing the fool just now, then?” The question came
+quietly but had the effect of making Chalfont suspend
+his fork in mid-air.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Yes. I do. But under the present system what is
+the ordinary plain man to do but stand aside and
+watch our political muddlers mess everything up? I
+was asked to rejoin and take over a district in Ireland.
+Not me. I could see myself raising Cain in about ten
+minutes and washed out at the end of a week. Soldiers
+aren’t required in Ireland.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“No?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“No. Nor policemen, nor machine guns. Ireland
+stands in need of a little man with an Irish accent and
+the soul of Christ.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">Lola rose to her feet. Fallaray had done the same
+thing and was bending over his mother.</p>
+<p class="pnext">And so Chalfont with, it must be confessed, a
+slightly rueful glance at his plate, told the waiter to
+give his bill to his chief, and followed Madame de
+Brézé along the lane between the tables and up the
+long path of the “monkey house.” And presently,
+when Fallaray gave his number to the flunkey and
+waited for his coat and hat, Chalfont carried out his
+orders. He went forward. “How do you do?” he
+said. “Wonderful weather.” It was a little lame.</p>
+<p class="pnext">Fallaray did not recognize the speaker except as a
+man who obviously had been a soldier. A left hand
+had been presented. The other was eloquent enough.
+“How are you?” he replied. “Yes, it <em>is</em> wonderful
+weather.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">And then Chalfont made the plunge. “I want to
+introduce you, if I may, to one of our Allies who
+admires you very much, Madame de Brézé—Mr.
+Fallaray.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">Fallaray turned. From the little eager hand that
+nestled into his own Lola sent a message of all the
+hero-worship and adoration that possessed her soul
+and all the desire to serve and love that had become
+the one overwhelming passion of her life. But neither
+spoke.</p>
+<p class="pnext">A moment later she was standing with Peter Chalfont,
+watching Fallaray on his way out with the two
+little ladies.—Her heart was fluttering like the wings
+of a bird.</p>
+<p class="pnext">But half-way through the evening, after having been
+swept away by Tschaikowsky’s “Francesca da Rimini”
+and the Fantasy from “Romeo and Juliet”
+and stirred deeply by Wagner’s “Ride of the Valkyries,”
+Fallaray underwent a strange and disconcerting
+experience. Leaving his place between his mother
+and old Lady Ladbroke, he went to smoke a cigarette
+in the foyer of the hall during the intermission. The
+music had gone to his brain and driven out of it for
+the moment the anxieties that beset him. All the vibrations
+of that wonderful orchestra flew about him
+like a million birds and the sense of sex that he had
+got from Lola’s touch ran through his veins.</p>
+<p class="pnext">He went through the swing-doors and out onto the
+steps of the building. It was one of those wonderful
+nights which come sometimes in April and touch the
+city with magic. It was like the advance guard of
+June bringing with it the warmth and the scents of that
+exquisite month. The sky was clear and almost Italian,
+and the moonlight lay like snow on the roofs. It cast
+long shadows across the street. Fallaray looked up at
+the stars and a new and curious thrill of youth ran
+through him and a sort of impatience at having missed
+something—he hardly knew what. Wherever he
+looked he seemed to see two wide-apart eyes filled with
+adoration and longing and a little red mouth half open.
+“De Brézé,” he said to himself. “De Brézé.” And
+the name seemed to hold romance and to carry his
+thoughts out of London, out of the present and back
+to the times of beflowered garments and powdered
+heads, of minuets and high red heels.</p>
+<p class="pnext">And as he stood there, far away from the bewilderment
+and futility of Parliament, a car drove up to the
+hall and two women got out. They were Mrs. Malwood
+and Feo and they were dressed in country clothes—the
+curious country clothes affected by them both.
+Mrs. Malwood, who was laughing and excited, passed
+Fallaray without noticing him and entered the building.
+But Feo drew up short in front of him, amazed
+at his expression. “Good Lord, Arthur,” she said,
+“what are you doing here and what on earth are you
+thinking about?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">Music and the stars and Lola were in his eyes as he
+looked at her. “I thought you were in the country,”
+he said.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“I was. I shall be again in an hour or two. In
+the middle of dinner I suddenly remembered that a
+protégé of mine, Leo Kirosch, was to sing here to-night.
+So I dashed up. He’s in the second part of
+the program, so I shall be in time to hear him. It entirely
+rotted the party, but that couldn’t be helped.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">She had never seen that look in Fallaray’s eyes before
+and was intrigued. It had never been brought to
+life by her. Could it be possible that this Quixote,
+this St. Anthony, had looked at last upon the flesh
+pots? What fun if he had! How delicious was the
+mere vague idea of Fallaray, of all men, being touched
+by anything so ordinary and human as love, and how
+vastly amusing that she, who had worked herself into
+a sort of half belief that she was attracted by this
+young Polish singer, should now stand face to face
+with the man to whom she was tied by law, though by
+no other bonds. The dash up from the country was
+worth it even though she had risen unsatisfied from
+dinner and missed her coffee and cognac.... Or
+was it that she herself, having dropped from the
+clouds, and looking as she knew she did, more beautiful
+and fresh than usual because of her imaginary love
+affair with this long-haired youth who sang like a
+thrush, had brought this unaccustomed look into her
+husband’s eyes?... How very amusing!</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Do you mean to say that having only driven down
+this afternoon to the country, you’ve come all the way
+up again just to hear two or three songs?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“I do,” she said. “Mad, isn’t it? ‘That crazy
+woman Feo on the rampage again.’ Is that what
+you’re thinking?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Something like that,” he answered, and smiled at
+her. He felt queerly and charmingly young that night
+and lenient and rather in sympathy with madness.
+The Cromwellianism in which he had wrapped himself
+had fallen temporarily from his shoulders. He put his
+hand under her elbow and brought her up to the top
+step on a level with himself.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“My God,” thought Lady Feo, “the man’s alive for
+once. He tingles. I <em>must</em> be looking well.” What
+did it matter if Leo Kirosch was singing and she would
+miss his songs? It was much better sport to stand on
+the steps of that old building and flirt with her husband.
+She took his arm and stood close against him
+and looked up into his face with her most winning
+smile. “It gave me the shock of my life to see you
+here,” she said. “I didn’t know that you had a
+penchant for these suburban orgies. Who are you
+with?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“My mother and Aunt Betsy.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">Under any other circumstances Feo would have
+thrown back her head and laughed derisively. Those
+two old birds. Instead of which she snuggled a little
+closer just to see the effect. It was ages since she had
+treated this man to anything in the nature of familiarity,
+in fact it was the first time since that night when
+she had made him kiss her because his profile and his
+tennis playing had obsessed her.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“After you’ve taken them home,” she said, “why
+not motor back with us? It’s a gorgeous night, and
+the Eliots’ cottage is high up on a range of hills almost
+within reaching distance of the stars.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">Her grotesque sense of humor carried her away.
+How immense it would be to tempt this man out of
+the stony path of duty and see what he would do.
+What a story for her little friends! What screams of
+mirth she could evoke in her recital of so amazing an
+event, especially as she could dress it all up as she alone
+knew so well how to do! And then to be able to add
+to it all the indignant broken English of Kirosch at
+finding himself deserted. He had promised to sing to
+her that night. What a frightfully funny story.</p>
+<p class="pnext">For a moment or two, with the intoxication of music
+and of those wide-apart eyes still upon him, Fallaray
+stood closer to his wife than he had ever been. It
+seemed to him that she had grown softer and sweeter
+and he was surprised and full of wonder, until he remembered
+that she had come to see Kirosch, whom she
+called her protégé—and then he understood.</p>
+<p class="pnext">Mrs. Malwood came out and luckily broke things up.
+“He’s singing,” she said. “Aren’t you coming in?
+Good heavens, Feo, what the deuce are you playing at?
+You’ve dragged me up and ruined everything, only to
+miss the very thing you seemed so keen to hear. What
+is the idea?” She recognized Fallaray and said, “Oh,
+it’s you.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">And he bowed and got away—that kink in Feo’s
+nature was all across her face like a birthmark.</p>
+<p class="pnext">And when Feo looked again, she saw in Fallaray’s
+eyes once more the old aloofness, the old dislike. And
+she laughed and threw back her head. “<em>Cherchez la
+femme</em>,” she said. “One of these days I’ll get you to
+tell me why you looked like that.” And she disappeared
+with Mrs. Malwood to smile down on Kirosch
+from her seat near the platform.</p>
+<p class="pnext">And Fallaray remained out under the stars, his intoxication
+all gone. Nowhere could he see and nowhere
+did he wish to see those wide-apart eyes with
+their adoration. The tingle of that little hand had left
+him. And just as he turned to go back into the building
+a newspaper boy darted out to a side street with a
+shrill raucous cry, “Speshall. Mines Floodin’. Riots
+in Wales. Speshall.”</p>
+</div>
+<div class="level-3 section" id="id13">
+<h3 class="level-3 pfirst section-title title">III</h3>
+<p class="pfirst">The tears that blinded her eyes had gone when
+Chalfont came back from the cloakroom. He saw on
+Lola’s face a smile that made him think of sunlight on
+a bank of primroses.</p>
+<p class="pnext">But they didn’t go to the Coliseum, after all. It so
+happened that just as they were about to leave the
+Savoy, Chalfont was pounced upon by a little woman,
+the sight of whom made Lola long to burst into a
+laugh. She was amazingly fat, almost as fat indeed
+as one of those pathetic women who go round with
+circuses and sit in a tent all by themselves dressed in
+tinsel and present an unbelievable leg to gaping yokels
+and say, “Pinch it, dearie, and see for yourself.” Her
+good-natured face, with eyes as blue as birds’ eggs,
+ran down into three double chins. It was crowned
+with a mass of hair dyed a brilliant yellow, the roots
+of which grew blackly like last year’s leaves under
+spring’s carpet. With an inconceivable lack of humor
+she was dressed like a flapper. She was a comic note
+in a tragic world. “Oh, hello, Peter,” she said.
+“You bad boy, you’ve deserted me,” and then she
+looked at Lola with a beaming smile of appreciation
+and added, “No wonder.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">More than a little annoyed, because the one thing
+that he most wanted was to keep Lola to himself, Peter
+presented his cork hand. “I’ve been in the country,”
+he said. “I’m awfully sorry I had to miss your
+party. Lady Cheyne—Madame de Brézé.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“There, I knew you were French. I’ve been betting
+on it ever since you came in. We could see you two
+from our table.” She waved her hand towards a
+group of six or seven people who were standing at the
+top of the stairs. “Come along home with me now,”
+she said. “We’re going to have some music. I’ve
+got a new Russian violinist—you needn’t be afraid,
+he’s been thoroughly disinfected—and a dear thing
+who sings the roof off. I can’t pronounce her name.
+It’s a cross between a sneeze and an oath. I believe
+she comes from Czecho-Slovakia. Also I’ve got Alton
+Cartridge, the poet. He’s going to read one of his
+latest effusions. He’s the great futurist, you know.
+That is, he doesn’t bother himself about rhymes and
+not very much about reason. Why don’t you both
+come?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">Chalfont looked quickly at Lola and signaled,
+“For God’s sake, no.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">So she said, “I should love to.” The name and
+fame of Lady Cheyne was well known to her through
+the medium of the “Letters of Evelyn.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“That’s very sweet of you, my dear. One hundred
+Kensington Gore. Memorize it, because I know that
+Peter will forget. He always does. We can’t raise a
+car between us so we’re all going in taxis. See you
+later then.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">She squeezed Lola’s hand, nodded roguishly at Peter
+and bounced away to join her friends, watched hypnotically
+by people on their way out who, although she
+was one of London’s landmarks, had never seen her
+before.</p>
+<p class="pnext">Chalfont was abominably disappointed. It would
+have been so jolly to have had Lola all to himself.
+“Wasn’t that rather unkind of you?” he asked.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Yes,” said Lola, “it was, but I couldn’t resist the
+chance to see Lady Cheyne at home and discover if all
+the stories about her are true. I’m so sorry, but after
+all we can do the Coliseum another night.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Oh, well, then, that’s all right.” He brightened
+up considerably. “Probably you will be more amused
+at number One Hundred than you would have been
+at the Coliseum. Poppy manages to surround herself
+with all the latest freaks.” He led her out, captured
+a cab and gave the man the address.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Tell me about her,” said Lola. “You know her
+very well, it seems.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“No, I don’t. I’ve only met her twice. She arrives
+at Christian names within half an hour. She calls
+herself the mother of thousands, and is, although she’s
+never had a child of her own. Nobody knows who
+she was before she married Sir William Cheyne, the
+contractor, but it’s generally believed that she’s the
+daughter of a country parson brought up between the
+Bible and the kitchen garden. She tells everybody that
+she was very pretty as a girl. It’s her horticultural
+training that makes her look like a cauliflower. The
+old man died about ten years ago and left her very
+well off. She’s really a remarkable little soul, greatly
+to be respected. Every struggling artist who has ever
+found his way into London has been financed by her.
+She has a heart of gold and during the War she was
+the chairman of one of the soldiers’ entertainment
+committees. I shall never forget seeing her behind
+the lines, surrounded by muddy Tommies just relieved.
+She was a prime favorite out there and was known as
+Poppy throughout the British Army. How long are
+you going to be in London?” He switched suddenly
+to personalities.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“For the rest of the season,” said Lola, “and then
+my plans are uncertain. I may go down to Buckinghamshire
+or I may spend July at Dinard. It isn’t
+settled yet.” She had heard Lady Feo talk over both
+places with Mrs. Malwood.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“I wonder if I’ve met your husband about London?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“I am a widow,” said Lola. Her tone was a little
+sad but, at the same time, it was filled with resignation.</p>
+<p class="pnext">That was something to know. There was no further
+information forthcoming, however, and as Peter
+was one of those men who had a great respect for
+fourth walls, he left it at that.</p>
+<p class="pnext">They were the last to arrive. Their cab had stalled
+three times in Piccadilly and coughed badly through
+Knightsbridge. Every window of number One Hundred
+was alight and as they entered the hall a high
+soprano voice was sending piercing vibrations all
+through the house. A long oak settle in the hall was
+covered with strange coats and stranger hats and there
+were queer people sitting on the stairs. The drawing-room
+was obviously overflowing.</p>
+<p class="pnext">Lola picked her way upstairs, Chalfont following
+closely. Among these people who conveyed the impression
+of having slept in their clothes—Art is always
+a little shy of cold water—Lola felt a sense of
+distress. Democratic in her ability to make friends
+with all honest members of the proletariat, like those in
+the servants’ sitting room in Dover Street, she felt
+hopelessly aristocratic when it came to affection with
+dandruff on its velvet collar.</p>
+<p class="pnext">The drawing-room, wide and lofty, was one great
+square of bad taste, filled, overfilled, with what America
+aptly calls “junk.” Spurious Italian furniture
+jostled with imitation English oak. Huge pieces of
+fake tapestry hung on the walls side by side with
+canvases of extremely self-conscious nudes. Early
+Victorian whatnots covered with silver apostle spoons
+jostled with Tottenham Court Road antiques. All the
+lamp shades on the numerous electric lamps were red
+and heavy, so that the light crept through. To add to
+the conglomeration of absurdities the whole place
+reeked with burning josh sticks. A woman who dyes
+her hair a brilliant yellow invariably burns something
+on the altar of renewed optimism. The only thing
+that rang true in the room was the grand piano and
+that was kept in tune.</p>
+<p class="pnext">Sprawling on divans which were ranged around the
+walls Lola could make out the forms of men and
+women of all sizes, ages and nationalities. The men
+had more hair than the women. There must have
+been at least sixty people present, among whom Peter
+Chalfont looked like a greyhound and Lola like an
+advertisement of somebody’s soap. A tremendous
+woman, standing with her feet wide apart like a sea
+captain in a gale, or a self-conscious golfer on the
+first tee, was singing Carmen’s most flamboyant song.
+She was accompanied by a little person of the
+male gender whose lank black locks flapped over his
+eyes. They seemed to be competing in making the
+most noise because when the pianist attempted to overwhelm
+the voice with all the strength that he possessed,
+the singer filled herself with breath, gripped the floor
+with her well-trained feet, and sent forth sounds that
+must have been excessively trying to the Albert Memorial.</p>
+<p class="pnext">At the end of this shattering event Lady Cheyne
+bubbled forward and took Lola’s hand. “What do
+you do, my dear?” she asked, as though she were a
+performing dog to be put through her tricks. To which
+Lola replied, “Nothing. Nothing at all,” with rock-like
+firmness.</p>
+<p class="pnext">So the exhibitor of human vanities turned persuasively
+to Peter. “But you whistle, don’t you?” she
+asked. And Peter with a stiffening spine replied,
+“Yes, but only for taxis.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“In that case,” said Lady Cheyne, genuinely
+astonished that neither of the new arrivals showed any
+eagerness to jump at her suggestion to advertise, “find
+a corner somewhere. A little protégée of mine is going
+to dance for us. She is an interpreter of soul moods.
+So wonderful and inspiring. You’ll love it, I’m
+sure.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">Obeying orders, Peter led Lola into a distant corner,
+eyed by various artists who labeled him “Soldier” and
+dismissed him loftily. The passing of Lola sent a
+quiver through them and they were ready for the first
+available opportunity to attitudinize about her chair.
+At a sign from Lady Cheyne the little pianist commenced
+to play one of Heller’s “Sleepless Nights”
+and a very thin girl, wrapped in a small piece of
+chiffon, dropped into the middle of the room like a
+beam of moonlight.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“A spring onion,” said Chalfont, in a whisper,
+“newly plucked from the warm earth.” The burst of
+applause drowned Lola’s flutter of laughter. The interpretation
+of soul moods resolved itself, of course,
+into the usual series of prancings and high jumps, scuttlings
+round and roguish bendings, a final leap into
+the air and a collapse upon the floor.</p>
+<p class="pnext">And so the evening unwound itself. There were
+violin solos by men in a frenzy of false ecstasy, piano
+solos by women who put that long-suffering instrument
+through every conceivable form of torture, readings of
+nebulous drivel by the poet Cartridge in a high-pitched
+minor-canon voice, and recitations by women without
+restraint or humor,—disciples of the new poetry,
+which Chalfont, quoting from one of the precocious
+members of the Bachelors’ Club, called “Loose Verse.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">And then came supper, a welcome event for which
+all those sixty people had been waiting. This was
+served in the dining room, another large and eccentric
+apartment where an embittered man manipulated the
+punch bowl and was in great request. As soon as she
+had seen all her guests fully occupied with chicken
+salad and fish croquettes, Lady Cheyne returned to the
+deserted drawing-room where she found Chalfont and
+Lola in deep conversation. She burst upon them like
+a hand grenade, crying, “Aren’t they darlings? Every
+one a genius and all of them hungry. They come to
+me like homing pigeons and I do my best to get them
+placed. Always I have here one or two of the great
+impressarios,—agents, you know, and sometimes I
+achieve the presence of an actor-manager. But
+Shakespeare is out of fashion now and so all my
+Romeos and Juliets stand a poor chance. I often sigh
+for dear Sir Herbert who came here for what he
+called ‘atmosphere and local color.’ You must come
+again, my dear. Peter will be very glad to bring you,
+I’m sure, and I shall be delighted to have you for my
+week-end parties. I have a place at Whitecross,
+Bucks. The garden runs down to the Fallaray place,
+you know.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">From that point on, that big point, Lola ceased to
+listen.</p>
+<p class="pnext">The whole evening had been filled with amazing
+sensations. Panic, the sudden switch to reassurance,
+the excitement of meeting Chalfont, the sweeping joy
+of touching Fallaray’s hand and the knowledge that
+having broken through the hoop she could now continue
+to emerge from Dover Street with her new and
+eager companion to serve an apprenticeship for her
+final rôle. She had lived a year in an evening. But
+there was still another sensation lying in wait for her.
+The moment had come when she must return unseen
+to Castleton Terrace and get back to Dover Street in
+good time to reassume the part of lady’s maid so that
+she might not be caught by the housekeeper and reported,—a
+chance for which Miss Breezy was eagerly
+waiting. And as she sat unconscious of Lady Cheyne’s
+babble and the buzz of conversation which drifted in
+from the dining room, she switched on her brain.</p>
+<p class="pnext">How, in the name of all that was wonderful, was
+she to give Chalfont the slip. That was the new
+problem to solve; because, of course, he would naturally
+insist on seeing her home in the ordinary course
+of events. If he had thought about it at all, she knew
+that he must have imagined that she was staying either
+at the Ritz, the Carlton or the Berkeley, or that she
+was living in one of the smaller houses in Curzon
+Street, Half Moon Street or Norfolk Street, Park
+Lane. The jagged end of panic settled upon her once
+more and her hands grew icy. It was utterly essential
+to her future plans that Chalfont should remain in
+complete ignorance of her identity. He must be used
+by her during the remainder of the season. He must
+bring her again to this house. Lady Cheyne had become
+an important factor in her scheme because the
+garden of her country house ran down to Chilton
+Park. It was to Chilton Park that Fallaray loved to
+go alone for the week-end and wander about, gaining
+refreshment for his tired brain; and always it had
+seemed to Lola, when she had dared to look into the
+future, that this place, standing high up on the ridge
+of hills above the vale of Aylesbury, backed by a great
+beech forest and landmarked by the white cross that
+had been cut by the Romans, was the first milestone on
+her road to love and to the fulfillment of the dream
+which had held her all those years.</p>
+<p class="pnext">The problem of her escape and her Cinderella flight
+became more and more pressing. What fib could she
+invent to tell Chalfont? Without any doubt he would
+ask her for permission to call. He would want to
+know her telephone number and her address. In his
+eye already there was the Simpkins look, the Ernest
+Treadwell expression and, but for his innate chivalry
+and breeding, she knew that he would have given
+tongue to some of the things which she could see at
+the back of his eyes. It was past eleven. She had
+heard the clock in the hall strike just now.</p>
+<p class="pnext">She began to rehearse a series of scenes. She saw
+herself rise and say, “I must go now. A thousand
+thanks for all that you have done for me this evening.
+Will you please ask Lady Cheyne if I may have a
+taxi?” She saw herself standing on the doorstep, the
+taxi waiting, with Chalfont assuming that he was to
+play the cavalier and eventually stand bareheaded,
+holding her hand, opposite the shabby little villa in
+Castleton Terrace. Which would never do. Madame
+de Brézé did not live anywhere near Queen’s Road,
+Bayswater.</p>
+<p class="pnext">She saw herself driven by Chalfont to the Ritz or
+the Carlton, escorted by him to the lift where he would
+wait to see the last of her as she was taken up to the
+rooms that she did not possess. That also was impossible.
+Great heavens, what was she to do? Trying
+again, her hands icier than ever, she saw Chalfont
+with growing incredulity listening to cock-and-bull
+stories which ran like this:</p>
+<p class="pnext">“I don’t want you to see me home. As a matter
+of fact I’m very old-fashioned.” Or, “We must say
+good night here. I’m staying with a puritanical aunt
+who will be sure to ask me who brought me home and
+when I say, ‘Sir Peter Chalfont’ her answer will be
+‘I didn’t know you knew Sir Peter Chalfont. Where
+did you meet him?’ And then I shall have to tell the
+story of how you picked me up. Can you imagine the
+result?”—And this was hopeless because, of course,
+Peter would say, “How in the name of all that’s marvelous
+will your good old aunt know who brings you
+home? Good old aunts haven’t got to know the truth.
+Besides, if it comes to that, you can drop me about ten
+doors from the house and then go on alone. It’s perfectly
+easy, and it’s done every day.” And who, after
+all, was this aunt? Miss Breezy, the housekeeper.</p>
+<p class="pnext">Phew!</p>
+<p class="pnext">And then came an inspiration. “I’m very hungry,”
+she said aloud. “I begin to remember that dinner was
+a little unsatisfactory.” She laughed and Peter
+laughed. “But I must go and powder my nose.
+Please don’t bother, Lady Cheyne. I’ll find my way
+and rejoin you in a moment.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">She picked up the cloak which she had brought into
+the drawing-room, threw at Chalfont a smile of the
+most charming camaraderie, touched Lady Cheyne’s
+arm in a way that asked for friendship and left the
+drawing-room. With one quick look at the deserted
+hall with all its strange coats and stranger hats, she
+made for the front door, opened it, closed it behind
+her stealthily and ran down the stone path which led to
+the street. The theater traffic was all headed towards
+High Street, Kensington. There was not a vacant
+taxi to be seen. It would not do to stand about in
+front of the house, so the little Cinderella who had
+not waited for the magic hour of twelve and had taken
+good care not to leave her crystal slipper behind her
+ran up the street to the first turning and stood quivering
+with excitement and glee beneath a friendly lamp
+post. A little laugh floated into the muggy air.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Yes, it’s a funny world, ain’t it?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">It was a Bobby who had sidled up from the shadow
+of a wall and towered above her, with a sceptical grin
+about his mouth.</p>
+<p class="pnext">Instantly a new thought came into Lola’s head.
+“What would Lady Feo do?” She gave it five seconds
+and turned coolly, calmly and graciously to the
+arm of the law,—a strong and obviously would-be
+familiar arm. This girl—running about alone in
+evening dress—at that time of night.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“I told my car to wait here,” she said. “Evidently
+there has been some mistake. Will you be good enough
+to call me a cab?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">A hand swept up to the peak of the helmet. “Nothing
+simpler, Madam.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">By the grace of God and the luck that follows drunkards,
+a taxi was discharging a fare halfway down the
+road. The ex-sergeant of the Sussex regiment put two
+fingers into his mouth. With a new interest in life the
+cab made a wide turn and came up not without style,
+but with a certain amount of discretion, because of the
+uniform which could be seen beneath the lamp post.</p>
+<p class="pnext">The Bobby opened the door. There was admiration
+in his eyes. “A good fairy, ma’am,” he said.</p>
+<p class="pnext">And Lola paused and looked up into his face,—a
+man face, with a big moustache and rather bristling
+eyebrows, a dent in a firm chin and the mark of shrapnel
+on the left cheek bone. “A very good fairy,” she
+said. “You’ll never know how good. Thanks, most
+awfully.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">And once more the hand flicked to the brim of the
+helmet as Lola in an undertone gave her address to the
+driver. Not even the Bobby must see the anti-climax
+which would be brought about by such an address as
+Castleton Terrace.</p>
+<hr class="docutils"/>
+<p class="pfirst">A scrawny black cat rose and arched its back as
+Lola, telling the taxi man to wait, ran up the steps.
+One of those loose bells that jangle indiscreetly woke
+the echoes in the sleeping street, and the door was
+opened by the invincible Mrs. Rumbold, tired-eyed,
+with yawn marks all over her face. “Well, here you
+are, dearie,” she said, as cheerful as usual, “absobally-lootely
+to the minute. The old man ain’t turned up
+yet. But you’re not going to keep the taxi waiting, are
+you?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Yes,” said Lola.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Gor blimey.” The comment was a perfectly
+natural one under the circumstances.</p>
+<p class="pnext">And while Lola changed back again into the day
+clothes of the lady’s maid, Mrs. Rumbold lent a willing
+hand and babbled freely. It was good to have
+some one to speak to. Her legless son had been put
+to bed two hours before, asking himself, “Have they
+forgotten?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">Finally the inevitable question, which Mrs. Rumbold,
+for all her lessons in discretion, simply could not
+resist. “Where have yer bin, dearie?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">And Lola said, “The Savoy. I dined with a knight
+in shining armor with a white cross on his chest.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Oh,” said Mrs. Rumbold, “he was going on to a
+fancy ball, I suppose. Lord, how these boys love to
+dress themselves up.” But a lurking suspicion of
+something that was not quite right edged its way into
+that good woman’s thoughts. What was little Lola
+Breezy from the shop round the corner doing with a
+gent as ’ad enough money to dine at the Savoy and
+sport about in old-time costumes? “Well, of course,
+as I said before, you can only live once. But watch
+your step, dearie. Lots of banana skins about.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">And Lola threw her arms round the woman’s neck
+and kissed her warmly. “Fate has swept the pavement
+for me,” she said, once more as Feo would have
+spoken. “I shall not make any slip.”</p>
+</div>
+<div class="level-3 section" id="id14">
+<h3 class="level-3 pfirst section-title title">IV</h3>
+<p class="pfirst">Ernest Treadwell faced her at the bottom of the
+steps, and beneath the peak of his flabby cap his eyes
+were filled with fright.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Is anything the matter with Father or Mother?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“No,” he said.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Why do you look like that, then?” Her hand
+fell away from his coat. If there was nothing wrong
+with her parents——</p>
+<p class="pnext">He edged her away from the cab and spoke quickly,
+without the usual stammer and timidity. He was laboring
+under a passion of apprehension. It made him
+almost rude. “I came this way round from the Tube
+and saw you get out of this cab dressed up like a—a
+lady. What are you doing? Where’ve you been?”
+He caught her by the wrist, excited by a sense of impending
+evil. Oh, God, how he loved this girl!</p>
+<p class="pnext">And Lola remembered this, although her brain was
+filled with pictures of the Savoy, of Chalfont and of
+Fallaray. Irritation, in which was mingled a certain
+degree of haughtiness, was dropped immediately. She
+knew that she had always been enthroned in this boy’s
+heart. She must respect his emotion.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Don’t worry about me, Ernie,” she said, soothingly.
+“Lady Feo gave me the dress. I changed
+into it at Mrs. Rumbold’s and brought it back for her
+to work on again. It isn’t quite right.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“But where could you go to wear a thing like that—and
+the cloak? You looked so—so unlike——”
+He could only see her as she used to be behind the
+shop counter and out for walks with him.</p>
+<p class="pnext">And Lola gave a little reassuring laugh because an
+answer was not ready. If instead of Ernest Treadwell
+the man who held her up had been Simpkins!
+“One of the girls had two stalls for the St. James’s—her
+brother’s in the box office—and so we both
+dressed up and went. It was great fun.” Why did
+these men force her into lying? She took her hand
+away.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Oh,” he said, “I see,” his fear rising like a crow
+and taking wings.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“And now if you’ve finished playing the glaring inquisitor,
+I’ll say good night.” She gave him her hand
+again.</p>
+<p class="pnext">Covered with the old timidity, he remained where
+he stood and gazed. There was something all about
+her, a glow, a light; a look in her eyes that he had put
+there in his dreams. “Can’t I go with you to Dover
+Street?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">Why not? Yes, that might be good, in case Simpkins
+should be waiting. “Come along then. You’ve
+made me late. Tell him where to go.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">The cab turned into Queen’s Road and as it passed
+the narrow house with the jeweler’s shop below—all
+in darkness now—Lola leaned forward and kissed
+her hand to it. Her father with the glass in his eyes,
+the ready laugh, the easy-going way, the confidence in
+her; her capable mother, a little difficult to kiss, peeping
+out of a shell; her own old room so full of
+memories, the ground in which she grew. They were
+slipping behind. They had almost been specks on the
+horizon during all that eventful night, during which
+she had found her wings. And this Treadwell boy, his
+feet in a public library, his soul among the stars, such
+clothes and such an accent.—And now there were
+Chalfont and Lady Cheyne and—Fallaray? No, not
+yet. But he had touched her hand and heard the songs
+of birds.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Lola, it hurts me now you’ve gone. I hate to pass
+the shop. There’s nothing to do but”—he knew the
+word and tumbled it out—“yearn.” If only he might
+have held her hand, say halfway to the house that he
+hated.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Is that a new cap, Ernie? Take it off. You
+don’t look like a poet. Nothing to do? Have you
+forgotten your promise to read and learn? You can’t
+become a Masefield in a day!”</p>
+<p class="pnext">He put his hands up to his face and spoke through
+sudden sobs. “With you away I shall never become
+anything, any time. Come back, Lola. Nothing’s the
+same now you’re away.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">And she gave him her hand, poor boy. And he
+held it all too tight, like a drowning man, as indeed
+he felt that he was. Since Dover Street had come
+into life he hadn’t written a line. The urge had gone.
+Ambition, so high before, had fallen like an empty
+rocket. Lola,—it was for her that he had worked
+his eyes to sightlessness far into all those nights.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“This will never do,” she said. Inspiration—she
+could give him that, though nothing else—was almost
+as golden as love. He was to be Some One,—a
+modern Paul Brissac. She needed that. And she
+refired him as the cab ran on, rekindled the cold stove
+and set the logs ablaze. Work, work, study, feel, express,
+eliminate, temper down. Genius could be
+crowded out by weeds like other flowering things.</p>
+<p class="pnext">And as the cab drew up the hand was raised to burning
+lips. But the shame of standing aside while the
+driver was paid—that added a very big log.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Good night, Poet.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Good night, Princess.” (Oh-h, that was Simpkins’s
+word.)</p>
+<p class="pnext">Dover Street—and the area steps.</p>
+</div>
+</div>
+<div class="level-2 section" id="part-iv">
+<h2 class="level-2 pfirst section-title title"><a class="toc-backref pginternal" href="#id57">PART IV</a></h2>
+<div class="level-3 section" id="id15">
+<h3 class="level-3 pfirst section-title title">I</h3>
+<p class="pfirst">For a Marquis he was disconcertingly hairy. So
+much so that even those fast diminishing people who
+still force themselves to believe that a title necessarily
+places men on a high and ethereal plane were obliged
+to confess that Feo’s father might have been any
+one,—a mere entomologist for instance, bland, concentrated
+and careless of appearance, who pottered
+about in the open after perfectly superfluous insects
+and forgot that such a thing as civilization existed.
+He had the appearance indeed of a man who sleeps
+in tents, scorns to consult a looking-glass and cuts his
+own hair with a pair of grass clippers at long intervals.
+On a handsome and humorous face, always somehow
+sun-tanned, white wiry hairs sprouted everywhere. A
+tremendous moustache, all akimbo, completely covered
+his mouth and spread along each cheek almost to his
+ears, from which white tufts protruded. The clean-cut
+jaw was shaved as high as the cheek bones, which
+were left, like a lawn at the roots of a tree, to run
+wild. Deep-set blue eyes were overhung by larky
+bushes and the large fine head exuded a thick thatch
+of obstreperous white stuff that was unmastered by a
+brush. And as if all this were not enough, there was
+a small cascade under the middle of the lower lip kept
+just long enough to bend up and bite in moments of
+deep calculation. There may have been hairs upon
+his conscience too, judging by his exquisite lack of
+memory.</p>
+<p class="pnext">His was, nevertheless, a very old title and a long
+line of buried Marquises had all done something, good
+and bad, to place the name of Amesbury in the pages
+of history. Rip Van Winkle, as most people called
+the present noble Lord, had done good and bad things
+too, like the rest of us,—good because his heart was
+kind, and bad from force of circumstances. If he
+had inherited a fine fortune with his father’s shoes
+instead of bricks and mortar mortgaged from cellar
+to ceiling, his might have been a different story and
+not one unfortunately linked up with several rather
+shady transactions. At fifty-five, however, life found
+him still abounding in optimism on the nice allowance
+granted to him by Fallaray, and always on the lookout,
+like all Micawbers, for something to turn up.</p>
+<p class="pnext">He had driven the large brake to the station to meet
+Feo and her party who were on their way down for
+the week-end. His temporary exile at Chilton Park,
+brought about by a universal disinclination to honor
+his checks, had been a little dull. He was delighted
+at the prospect of seeing people again, especially Mrs.
+Malwood. He was fond of Angoras and liked to hear
+them purr. So with a rather seedy square felt hat
+over one eye and a loose overcoat of Irish homespun
+over his riding kit, he clambered down from the high
+box, saw that the groom was at the horses’ heads and
+strolled into the station to talk over the impending
+strike of the Triple Alliance with the station master,—the
+parlor Bolshevist of Princes Risborough. An express
+swooped through the station as he stood on the
+platform and made a parachute of his overcoat. The
+London train was not due for fifteen minutes.</p>
+<p class="pnext">Tapping on the door of Mr. Sparrow’s room, he
+entered to find that worthy exulting over the morning
+paper, his pale, tubercular face flushed with excitement.
+The headlines announced that “England faces
+revolution. Mines flood as miners steal coal and await
+with confidence the entire support of allied unions.
+Great Britain on the edge of a precipice.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“All wrong,” said Rip Van Winkle quietly.
+“Panicky misinterpretation of the situation, Sparrow,—much
+as you desire the opposite.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">The station master whipped round, his fish-like
+eyes strangely magnified by the strong glasses in his
+spectacles. “What makes yer say that, m’ Lord?”
+he asked, even at that moment flattered at the presence
+of a Marquis in his office. “Labor has England
+by the throat.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“England has Labor by the seat of the pants, you
+should say, Sparrow. Take my word for it, the strike
+is not only doomed to eventual failure, however the
+fluctuations go, but the Labor movement will grow
+less and less terrorist in its methods from this day
+onwards.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">Mr. Sparrow threw back his head and laughed
+loudly,—showing an incomplete collection of very
+disastrous teeth. “Well, there won’t be a damned
+train running by this time Monday,” he said.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“I’ll bet you a thousand oak apples to one there
+will,” replied Lord Amesbury, “and I’ll tell you why.
+Every sane and law-abiding Englishman, from the
+small clerk to the most doddering duke, has begun to
+organize and this mighty revolution of yours is already
+as dead as mutton.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Oh, is that so?” Mr. Sparrow laughed again.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“That is so. You see, Sparrow, you Labor gentlemen,
+talking paradoxically, have got hold of the wrong
+end of the stick, not merely in this country but all
+over the world. You have been the bullies of the
+school and for a considerable number of years you
+have made our politicians stiff with fright. They have
+licked your boots and given way to you whenever you
+demanded higher wages. They pampered and petted
+you all through the War, from which you emerged
+with swollen heads and far too many pianos. When
+history turns its cold eye upon you, you will be
+summed up as a set of pretty dirty blackguards who
+did less to win the War than all the dud shells piled
+into a heap. You slacked, grumbled, threatened and
+held up governments for wages out of all proportion
+to your work. You proved the possession of criminal
+as well as unpatriotic instincts and you finally showed
+yourselves up in your true light when you deserted
+the mines and took the pumpers away. There isn’t
+any word in any dictionary to define the sort of
+indignation which that dastardly and wanton action
+has caused. The result of it has been to put the first
+big nail in the coffin of Labor unions. You have been
+discovered as men with a yellow streak. Governments
+now see, what they have never been able to recognize
+before, that labor does not form the most important
+section of the three sections of society, the other two
+being capital and the purchasing power. You have
+made clear to them, Master Sparrow, that labor and
+capital are at the mercy of the third element,—the
+great middle class, the people who buy from capital,
+pay your wages and who can at any moment, by not
+buying, reduce both capital and labor to nothingness.
+The new strike, the epoch-making strike, is of this
+middle class, and they haven’t struck against you but
+against strikes. At last the worm has turned and I
+venture to prophesy, foolish as it is, that after a series
+of damaging and expensive kicks, labor will descend
+to its proper place, with a just share in profits that
+will enable it to get a little joy out of life, freed from
+the tyrannical hand of unions, and with more spare
+time than is at present enjoyed by the members of the
+middle class who will continue to take the rough with
+the smooth, without squealing, as heretofore. In fact,
+I look upon this strike of miners as one of the best
+things that has ever happened in history and nothing
+gives me greater joy and greater satisfaction than to
+watch, as I shall do from to-day onwards, the gradual
+diminishing of the excessive size of the labor head.—How
+are your potatoes coming along?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">Without waiting for an answer, the tall old man
+turned quietly and left the room; while the parlor
+Bolshevist, stuffed with the pamphlets of Hyndman
+and Marks, Lenin and Trotsky, gave a vicious kick to
+the leg of the table and eyed the receding figure with
+venom.</p>
+<p class="pnext">The train was late and so Rip Van Winkle killed
+time by studying the contents of the bookstall, looking
+with a sort of incredulity at the stuff on which the
+public is fed,—illiterate fiction with glaring covers and
+cheap weeklies filled with egregious gossip and suggestive
+drawings. The extra fifteen minutes of waiting
+was passed very pleasantly by his Lordship because
+many of his old friends from the village came
+up to him and talked. The chemist, who had driven
+down personally to collect his monthly box of drugs
+from London, was very affable. So also was the
+blacksmith who had known Lord Amesbury for many
+years and treated him with <em>bonhomie</em>. They talked
+racing with great earnestness. The postman, the
+gardener from the house of the war profiteer, and the
+village policeman, all of them very good friends of the
+man upon whom they looked as representing the good
+old days, livened things up. With the real democracy
+that belongs solely to the aristocrat, Rip Van Winkle
+knew all about the ailments of their wives, the prospects
+of their children, the number of their hens and
+pigs and their different forms of religious worship,
+which he duly respected, whether they were Little
+Baptists, Big Baptists or Middle-sized Baptists, Minor
+Methodists or Major Methodists, Independent Churchmen
+or Dependent Churchmen, Roman Catholics or
+Anglicans whose Catholicism is interpreted intelligently.
+The village consisted perhaps of twenty-five
+hundred souls, but they all had their different cures,
+and there were as many churches and chapels in and
+off the High Street as there were public houses. It
+had always seemed to Feo’s father that honest beer is
+infinitely preferable to the various sorts of religion
+which were to be obtained in those other public houses
+in their various bottles, all labeled differently, and he
+hoped that the prohibition which had been the means
+of developing among the people of the United States
+so many drinks far more injurious than those in which
+alcohol prevailed would never be forced by graft and
+hypocrisy, self-seeking and salary-making upon the
+tight little island,—not always so tight as prohibitionists
+supposed.</p>
+<p class="pnext">Lady Feo bounded out of the train, followed by
+Mrs. Malwood and their two new friends recently
+picked up,—Feo’s latest fancy, Gordon Macquarie, a
+glossy young man who backed musical plays in order
+that he might dally with the pretty members of his
+choruses, and Mrs. Malwood’s most recent time-killer
+whose name was Dowth,—David Dowth, the Welsh
+mine owner, who had just succeeded to his father’s
+property and had invaded London to see life. Cambridge
+was still upon the latter’s face and very obviously
+upon his waistcoat. He was a green youth
+who would learn about women from Mrs. Malwood.
+They were both new to Rip Van Winkle and for that
+reason all the more interesting. Lola, carrying a jewel
+case, emerged from a compartment at the back of the
+train with Mrs. Malwood’s maid, similarly burdened,
+and it was at Lola that Lord Amesbury threw his most
+appreciative glance.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“French,” he said to himself. “The reincarnation
+of those pretty little people made immortal by
+Fragonard.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">Feo threw her arms round her father’s neck and
+kissed him on those places of his cheeks which were
+clear of undergrowth. “Good old Rip,” she said.
+“Always on the spot. Been bored, old boy?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">Lord Amesbury laughed. “To be perfectly frank,
+yes,” he said. “I have missed my race meetings and
+my bridge at Boodles, but I have been studying the
+awakening of spring and the psychology of bird life,
+all very delightful. Also I have been watching the
+daily changes among the trees in the beech forest.
+Amazingly dramatic, my dear. But it’s good to see
+you again and I hope your two friends are gamblers.
+Possibly I can make a bit out of them.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">He patted her on the shoulder and looked her up
+and down with admiration not unmixed with astonishment.
+Among the many riddles which he had never
+been able to solve he placed the fact that he of all men
+was Feo’s father. What extraordinary twist had
+nature performed in making his only daughter a girl
+instead of a boy? Standing there in her short skirt
+and manly looking golf shoes with lopping tongues,
+her beautiful square shoulders lightly covered with a
+coarsely knitted sweater of chestnut brown and a sort
+of Tyrolean hat drawn down over her ears, she looked
+like a young officer in the First Life Guards masquerading
+in women’s clothes.</p>
+</div>
+<div class="level-3 section" id="id16">
+<h3 class="level-3 pfirst section-title title">II</h3>
+<p class="pfirst">When Lord Amesbury mounted the box with Feo
+at his side and turned out of the station yard into the
+long road which led to the old village of Princes Risborough,
+the first thing that caught Lola’s eyes was
+the white cross cut by the Romans in the chalk of the
+hill, on the top of which sat Chilton Park. Again and
+again she had stood in front of photographs of this
+very view. They hung in Miss Breezy’s room, neatly
+framed. Many times Miss Breezy herself had explained
+to Lola the meaning of that cross, so far as its
+historical significance went, and Lola had been duly
+impressed. The Romans,—how long ago they must
+have lived. But to her, more and more as her love
+and adoration grew, that white cross stood as a mark
+for the place to which Fallaray went from time to
+time for peace, to listen to the wind among the beech
+trees, to watch the sheep on the distant hills, to wander
+among the gardens of his old house and forget the
+falsity and the appalling ineptitude of his brother
+Ministers. The photographs had indicated very well
+the beauty of this scene but the sight of it in the life,
+all green in the first flush of spring, brought a sob to
+Lola’s throat. Once more the feeling came all over
+her that it would be at Chilton Park that she would
+meet Fallaray at last alone and discover her love to
+him,—not as lady’s maid but as the little human
+thing, the Eve.</p>
+<p class="pnext">She sat shoulder to shoulder with the groom opposite
+to Mrs. Malwood’s maid,—Dowth, Macquarie
+and Mrs. Malwood in close juxtaposition. But she
+had no ears for their conversation. As the village
+approached, not one single feature of it escaped her
+eager eyes,—its wide cobbled street, its warm Queen
+Anne houses, its old-fashioned shops, its Red Lion and
+Royal George and Black Bull, its funny little post office
+up three stairs, its doctor’s house all covered with
+creeper, its ancient church sitting hen-wise among her
+children. It seemed to her that all these things, old
+and quiet and honest, had gone to the making of Fallaray’s
+character; that he belonged to them and was
+part of them and represented them; and it gave her a
+curious feeling of being let into Fallaray’s secrets as
+she went along.</p>
+<p class="pnext">From time to time people hatted Lady Feo and one
+or two old women, riddled with rheumatism, bobbed—not
+because of any sense of serfdom, but because they
+liked to do so—a pleasant though inverted sense of
+egotism which is at the bottom of all tradition. Rip
+Van Winkle saluted every one with his whip; the
+butchers—and there were several, although meat was
+still one of the luxuries—the landlords of the public
+houses who were not so fat as they used to be before
+the War, the vicar, a high churchman with an astonishingly
+low collar, and the usual comic person who
+invariably retires to such villages, lives in a workman’s
+cottage among the remnants of passed glory and talks
+to any one who will listen to him of the good old days
+when he tooled his team of spanking bays and hobnobbed
+in London, when society really <em>was</em> society,
+with men of famous names and ladies of well-known
+frailty. This particular gentleman, Augustus Warburgh,
+pronounced Warborough, made himself up to
+look like Whistler and wore the sort of clothes which
+would have appealed greatly to a character actor.
+What he lived on no one knew. One or two people
+with nasty minds were convinced that his small income
+was derived from blackmail,—probably a most
+pernicious piece of libel. On his few pounds a week,
+however, he did himself extremely well and lived alone
+in a four-room cottage as antediluvian as himself, in
+which there were some very charming pieces of
+Jacobean furniture, a collection of excellent sporting
+prints and numerous books all well-thumbed, “Barry
+Lyndon” being the most favored.</p>
+<p class="pnext">In this little place, with its old beams and uneven
+floors of oak, Augustus Warburgh “did” for himself,
+cooking his own meals, making his own bed and bringing
+home from his occasional trips to London mysterious
+bottles filled with delicatessen from Appenrodts,
+amazing pickles and an occasional case of unblended
+Balblair which he got from a relative of his who owned
+half of the isle of Skye. Nips of this glorious but
+dangerous juice he offered to his cronies in his expansive
+moods and delighted in seeing them immediately
+slide under his table with the expression worn
+by Charlie Chaplin after he has been plumped on the
+head with a meat axe. Needless to say that he and
+Rip Van Winkle got along together like a house on
+fire. They talked the same language, enjoyed the
+same highly spiced food, dipped back into the same
+period and had inevitably done the same people. The
+Warburgh bow as the brake passed in the High Street
+was not Albertian but Elizabethan.</p>
+<p class="pnext">Feo laughed as she waved her hand. “When he
+dies,” she said, “and I don’t think he ever will, Princes
+Risborough will lose one of its most beautiful
+notes,—like London when they did away with
+Jimmies. Not that I remember Jimmies, except from
+what you’ve told me about it. Let’s have him up to
+dinner one night and make him drunk.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“You can’t,” said Lord Amesbury. “It’s impossible.
+There is a hole in every one of the soles of his
+shoes through which all the fumes of alcohol leak.
+You can stew him, you can pickle him, you can float
+him, but you cannot sink him. When everybody else
+is down and out, that is the time when Augustus takes
+the floor and rises to the eloquence and vitriolic power
+of Dr. Johnson.—Tell me, Feo, who is that remarkable
+child that you have got in tow?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“My maid, you mean? She’s the niece of my old
+Breezy. Isn’t she charming? Such an honest little
+soul too. Does her job with the most utter neatness
+and nicety of touch and listens excellently. I rescued
+her from the stage,—I mean, of course, the chorus.
+A good deed in a naughty world.” That’s how she
+liked to put it, her memory being a little hazy. “I
+don’t know what will become of her. Of course, she
+can’t be my maid forever. Judging from the way in
+which my male friends look at her whenever they get
+the chance, I shouldn’t be a bit surprised if one of
+these days she eloped with a duke. It would fill me
+with joy to meet her in her husband’s ancestral home
+all covered with the family jewels and do my best to
+win a gracious smile. Or else she’ll marry Simpkins,
+who is, I hear, frightfully mashed on her, and retire
+to a village pub, there to imitate the domestic cat and
+litter the world with kittens. I dunno. Anything
+may happen to a girl like that. But whatever it is, it
+will be one of these two extremes. I hate to think
+about it because I like her. It’s very nice to have her
+about me.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">Rip Van Winkle smiled. “To parody a joke in last
+week’s <em>La Vie Parisienne</em>, I am not so old as I look,
+my dear.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“You dare,” said Feo. But she laughed too.
+“Good Lord, Father, don’t go and do a thing like
+that. If I had to call that girl Mother, I think that
+even my sense of humor would crack.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“A little joke, Feo,” said Rip. “Nothing more.
+I can’t even keep myself, you see.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">Whereupon, having left the village, the brake turned
+into the road that ran up to Whitecross at an angle
+of forty-five. The old man slowed the horses down
+to a walk and waved his whip towards the screen of
+trees which hid Chilton Park from the public gaze.
+“It’s been a wonderful spring,” he said. “I have
+watched it with infinite pleasure. It has filled my old
+brain with poetry and very possibly with regrets. All
+the same, I’m glad you have come down. I’ve been
+rather lonely here. The evenings are long and ghosts
+have a knack of coming out and standing round my
+chair.—How is Edmund? I regret that I have forgotten
+to ask you about him before. One somehow
+always forgets to ask about Edmund, although I see
+that he is regarded by George Lytham and his crowd
+as the new Messiah.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">Feo laughed again, showing all her wonderful teeth.
+“I had a quaint few minutes with Edmund the other
+night on the steps of Langham Hall. He had taken
+his mother and Aunt Betsy to a symphony concert.
+Do you know, I rather think that George is right about
+Edmund? He has all the makings of a Messiah and
+of course all the opportunities. I shouldn’t be a bit
+surprised if he emerged from the present generation
+of second-raters and led England out of its morass.
+But he’ll only achieve this if he continues to remain
+untouched by any feminine hand. Of course, he’s
+absolutely safe so far as I’m concerned, but there was
+a most peculiar look in his face the other night which
+startled me somewhat. I thought he’d fallen in love
+with me,—which would have been most inconvenient.
+But I was wrong.—Well, here we are at the old homestead.
+How it reeks of Fallaray and worthiness.”</p>
+</div>
+<div class="level-3 section" id="id17">
+<h3 class="level-3 pfirst section-title title">III</h3>
+<p class="pfirst">But the party was not a success. Very shortly after
+lunch, during which Feo and Mrs. Malwood had put
+in good work in an unprecedented attempt to charm
+their new acquisitions, they all adjourned to the terrace,—that
+wonderful old terrace of weather-beaten
+stone giving on to a wide view of an Italian garden
+backed by a panorama of rolling hills and of the
+famous beech forest ten miles deep, under which, in
+certain parts, especially in the Icknield Way through
+which the Romans had passed, the leaves of immemorial
+summers, all red and dry, lay twenty feet
+deep.</p>
+<p class="pnext">Gilbert Jermyn, Feo’s brother, had dashed over on
+his motor bicycle from Great Marlow where he was
+staying with several friends, ex-flying men like himself
+and equally devoid of cash, trying to formulate
+some scheme whereby they might get back into adventure
+once more. Lord Amesbury had gone down
+to a pet place of his own to take a nap in the long grass
+with the sun on his face. Feo, who had been dancing
+until five o’clock that morning, was lying full
+stretch on a dozen cushions in the shadow of the house,
+Macquarie in attendance. Mrs. Malwood, petulant
+and disgruntled, was sitting near by with David
+Dowth. Gilbert Jermyn, who could see that he was
+superfluous, sat by himself on the balustrade gazing
+into the distance. His clean-cut face was heavy with
+despondency. He had forgotten to light his cigarette.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“You’re about the liveliest undertaker I’ve ever
+struck,” said Feo. “What the deuce is the matter
+with you?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">Macquarie shrugged his shoulders,—his girlishly
+cut coat with its tight waist and tight sleeves crinkling
+as he did so. “Oh, my dear,” he said, “it’s no good
+your expecting anything from me to-day. Under the
+circumstances it’s impossible for me to scintillate.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“What do you mean?” asked Feo roughly. She
+had ordered this man down in her royal way, being
+rather taken with his tallness, youngness and smoothness,
+and demanded scintillation.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“But look at the position! I hate to be mercenary
+and talk about money, but you know, my dear thing,
+almost every bob I’ve got is invested in the three
+musical comedies now running, and if things go on as
+they are, every one of them will be shut down because
+of the coal strike. That’s a jolly nice lookout.
+I’m no Spartan, and I confess that I find it very
+difficult to be merry and bright among the gravestones
+of my hopes.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">And while he went on like that, dropping in many
+“my dears” and “you dear things” as though he
+had known Feo all his life, instead of more or less for
+twenty minutes, making gestures in imitation of those
+of the spoilt small-part lady, Lord Amesbury’s daughter
+and Fallaray’s wife became gradually more and
+more aware of the fact that she had made a fool of
+herself. There was something broadly déclassé about
+this man which, even to one of her homogeneous nature,
+became a reproach. She was getting, she could
+see, a little careless in her choice of friends and for
+this one, whom she had picked out of semi-society and
+the musical comedy night life of London—so dull,
+so naked, so hungry and thirsty and so diamond seeking—to
+play the yellow dog and find excuses for his
+lack of entertainment left her, she found with astonishment,
+wholly without adjectives. It was indeed altogether
+beyond words. And she sat watching and
+listening to this vain and brainless person with a sort
+of admiration for his audacity.</p>
+<p class="pnext">As for Dowth and Mrs. Malwood they, too, were
+not hitting it off, and in reply to Mrs. Malwood’s
+impatient question the young Welshman’s answer had
+many points of excuse. “Three of my mines have
+been flooded,” he said gravely, “which knocks my
+future income all cock-eyed. God knows how I shall
+emerge from this frightful business. A week ago I
+was one of the richest men in England. To-day I face
+pauperism. It’s appalling. You expect me to sit at
+your feet and make love to you with the sword of
+Damocles hanging over my head. It can’t be done,
+Mrs. Malwood. And, mind you, even if the remainder
+of my mines escape ruin, I go under. That’s as plain
+as the nose on my face. The Government, always in
+terror of labor, has been amazingly supported in this
+business by the whole sanity of England, but the end
+of it will be that the miners will be given less wages
+but large shares in the profits of the coal owners. I
+shall probably be able to make a better living by becoming
+a miner myself. You sit there petulant and
+annoyed because I am in the depths of despondency.
+You’ll cry out for cake when bread has run out, like
+all the women of your kind, but you see in me a
+doomed man unable to raise a finger to save property
+which has been in my family for several generations.
+I simply can’t jibber and giggle and crack jokes with
+you and talk innuendoes. I was a fool to come down
+at all.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Oh,” said Mrs. Malwood aghast. “Oh—I suppose
+you think that I ought to amuse <em>you</em>?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Yes, I do,” said Dowth.</p>
+<p class="pnext">And Mrs. Malwood also was at a loss for adjectives.</p>
+<p class="pnext">And when, presently, Rip Van Winkle appeared,
+smiling and sun-tanned to join what he expected to
+be a jovial group, he found a strange silence and a
+most uncomfortable air of jarring temperaments. He
+was well accustomed to these little parties of Feo’s and
+to watch her at work with new men whom she collected
+on her way through life. Usually they were
+rather riotous affairs, filled with mirth and daring.
+What in the name of all that was wonderful had happened
+to this one? He joined his son and put his
+hand on the boy’s shoulder.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Gibbie,” he said, “enlighten me.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">But he got no explanation from this young man,
+who seemed to be like a bird whose wings had been
+cut. “My dear Father,” he said, “I’ve no sympathy
+with Feo’s little pranks. She and the Malwood girl
+seem to have picked up a bounder and a shivering
+Welsh terrier this time, and even they probably regret
+it. I ran over this afternoon to yarn with you, as a
+matter of fact. Come on, let’s get out of this. Let’s
+go down to the stream and sit under the trees and
+have it out.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">And so they left together, unnoticed by that disconcerted
+foursome with whose little games fate had
+had the impudence to interfere. And presently, seated
+on the bank of the brook which ran through the lower
+part of the park, Lord Gilbert Jermyn, ex-major Royal
+Air Force, D. S. O., M. C., got it off his chest. “O
+God,” he began, “how fed up I am with this infernal
+peace.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">The old man gazed at his son with amazement. “I
+don’t follow you,” he said. “Peace? My dear lad,
+we have all been praying for it and we haven’t got
+it yet.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">The boy, and he was nothing more than that, sat
+with rounded shoulders and a deep frown on his face,
+hunched up, flicking pieces of earth into the bubbling
+water.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“I know all about that,” he went on. “Of course
+you’ve prayed for peace. So did everybody over
+twenty-four. But what about us,—we who were
+caught as kids, before we knew anything, and taught
+the art of flying and sent up at any old time, careless
+of death, the eyes of the artillery, the protectors of the
+artillery, the supermen with beardless faces. What
+about us in this so-called peace of yours? Here we
+are at a loose end, with no education, because that was
+utterly interrupted, able to do absolutely nothing for
+a living,—let down, let out, looked on rather as
+though we were brigands because we have grown into
+the habit of breaking records, smashing conventions
+and killing as a pastime. Do you see my point, old
+boy? We herd together in civics when we’re not in
+the police courts for bashing bobbies and not in the
+divorce courts for running off with other people’s
+wives, and we ask ourselves, in pretty direct English,
+what the hell is going to become of us,—and echo
+answers what. But I can tell you this. What we
+want is war, perpetual bloody war, never mind who’s
+the enemy. You made us want it, you fitted us for it
+and for nothing else. We’re all pretty excellent in the
+air and in consequence utterly useless on earth. And
+when I read the papers, and I never read more than
+the headlines anyway, I long to see that Germany is
+going to take advantage of the damned stupidity of all
+the Allied governments, including that of America,
+gather up the weapons that she hasn’t returned and the
+men who are going to refuse to pay reparations and
+start the whole business over again. My God, how
+eagerly I’d get back into my uniform, polish up my
+buttons, stop drinking and smoking and get fit for
+flying once more. I’d sing like Caruso up there among
+the clouds and empty my machine gun at the first Boche
+who came along with a thrill of joy. That’s my job.
+I know no other.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">The old man’s hair stood on end,—all of it, like
+a white bush.</p>
+</div>
+<div class="level-3 section" id="id18">
+<h3 class="level-3 pfirst section-title title">IV</h3>
+<p class="pfirst">Something happened that afternoon which might
+have swung Lola’s life on to an entirely different set
+of rails and put Fallaray even farther out of her
+reach. The unrest which had followed the War had
+made the acquisition of servants very difficult. The
+young country girls who had been glad enough to go
+into service in the large houses now preferred to stick
+to their factories, because they were able to have free
+evenings. The housekeeper at Chilton Park was very
+short-handed and in consequence asked Lola and Mrs.
+Malwood’s maid if they would make themselves useful.
+Mrs. Malwood’s didn’t see it. She had been well
+bitten by the trades-union bug and, therefore, was not
+going to do anything of any sort except her specific
+duties, and those as carelessly as she could. The
+housekeeper could go and hang herself. Violet, the
+girl in question, intended to lie on her bed and read
+<em>Scarlet Bits</em> until she was needed by her mistress.
+Lola, whose blood was good, was very glad to lend
+a hand. With perfect willingness she committed an
+offence against lady’s maids which shocked Violet to
+the very roots of her system. She donned a little cap
+and apron and turned herself into a parlor maid, a
+creature, as all the world knows, many pegs of the
+ladder beneath her own position as a lady’s maid.
+When, therefore, tea was served on the terrace, Lola
+assisted the butler, looking daintier than ever, and so
+utterly free from coquetry, because there was no man
+in the world except Fallaray for her, that she might
+have been a little ghost.</p>
+<p class="pnext">But the trained eye of Gordon Macquarie looked her
+over immediately. He turned to Lady Feo, to whom
+he had not addressed a word for twenty minutes, and
+said with a sudden flash of enthusiasm, “Ye gods and
+little fishes, what a picture of a girl! Wouldn’t she
+look perfectly wonderful in the front line of the chorus
+on the O. P. side! An actress too, I bet you. Look
+at the way she’s pretending not to be alive. Of course
+she knows how perfectly sweet she looks in that saucy
+make-up.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">If Mr. Gordon Macquarie had deliberately gone out
+of his way to discover the most brilliant method of
+sentencing himself to the lethal chamber he could not
+have been more successful than by using that outpouring
+of gushing words. Feo had fully realized, from
+the moment that she had left the dining room, that in
+acquiring Gordon Macquarie she had committed the
+gravest <em>faux pas</em> of her life. Not only was he a
+bounder but he did not possess the imagination and
+the sense of proportion to know that in being invited
+down to Chilton Park by Lady Feo he had metaphorically
+been decorated with a much coverted order.
+His egotism and his whining fright had made him unable
+to maintain his fourth wall and at least imitate
+the ways of a gentleman. Never before in her history
+had Feo spent an afternoon so unpleasant and so
+humiliating, and now, to be obliged to listen to a
+pæan of praise about her maid, if you please, was the
+last straw. Any other woman would probably have
+risen from her place among her cushions, followed
+Lola into the house and either boxed her ears or ordered
+her back to town.</p>
+<p class="pnext">But Feo had humor, and although her pride was
+wounded and she would willingly have given orders
+for Macquarie to be shot through the head, she pursued
+a slightly different method. She rose, gave
+Macquarie a most curious smile, waited until Lola had
+retired from the terrace, followed her and called her
+back just as she was about to disappear into the servants’
+quarters. “Lola,” she said, “run up at once
+and pack my things. We are going back to town.
+Say nothing to anybody. Be nippy,” the word was
+Simpkins’s, “and in the meantime I will telephone for
+a car. Do you understand?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Yes, my lady.” In Lola’s voice there must have
+been something of the tremendous disappointment that
+swept over her. But it was ignored or unnoticed by
+her mistress. To leave Chilton Park almost as soon as
+she had seen it,—not to be able to creep secretly into
+Fallaray’s room and stand there all alone and get from
+it the feeling of the man, the vibrations of his
+thoughts,—not to be able to steal out in the moonlight
+and wander among the Italian gardens made
+magic by the white light and picture to herself the
+tall ascetic lonely figure in front of whom some night
+she intended to move Heaven and earth to stand.</p>
+<p class="pnext">But she turned away quickly, obeyed orders without
+a single question and ran up the wide staircase
+blindly, because, for the moment, her eyes were filled
+with tears. But only for the moment. After all,
+there was nothing in this visit that could help her
+scheme along. She must keep her courage and her
+nerve, continue her course of study, watch her opportunities
+and be ready to seize the real chance when it
+presented itself. Lady Feo was bored,—which, of
+course, was a crime. Macquarie was a false coin.
+Lola could have told her that. How many exactly
+similar men had ogled her in the street and attempted
+to capture her attention. She had been amazed to see
+him join Lady Feo at Paddington station that morning.
+She instantly put him down as a counter jumper
+from a second-rate linen draper’s in the upper reaches
+of Oxford Street.—She was ready for Feo when
+she came up to put on her hat. Her deft fingers had
+worked quickly, and she was alert and bright, in spite
+of her huge disappointment.</p>
+<p class="pnext">It was characteristic of Feo to break up her houseparty
+with the most unscrupulous disregard for the
+convenience of the other members of it, and to care
+nothing for the fact that she would spoil the pleasure
+of her father. He and her brother, her little friend,
+Mrs. Malwood, and the two disappointing men must
+pay her bill. She never paid. It was characteristic
+of her, also, to turn her mind quickly, before leaving,
+upon some other way of obtaining amusement, as she
+dreaded to face a dull and barren Sunday in London.
+She remembered suddenly that Penelope Winchfield,
+one of the “gang,” had opened her house near Aylesbury,
+which was only a short drive from Princes Risborough.
+It was a brain wave. So she went to the
+telephone and rang up, invited herself for the week-end
+and went finally into the car and slipped away with
+Lola without saying good-by to a single person.
+“How I hate this place,” she said. “Something always
+goes wrong here.” And she turned and made a
+face at the old building like a naughty child.</p>
+<p class="pnext">Any other woman—at any rate, any other woman
+whose upbringing had been as harum-scarum as
+Feo’s—would have given Lola her notice and dropped
+her like an old shoe. But she had humor.</p>
+</div>
+<div class="level-3 section" id="id19">
+<h3 class="level-3 pfirst section-title title">V</h3>
+<p class="pfirst">Queen’s Road, Bayswater, so far as the jeweler’s
+little shop was concerned, was in for a surprise that
+evening. Just as Lola’s mother was about to close
+up after a rather depressing day which had brought
+very little business—a few wrist watches to be attended
+to, nothing more—a car drove up, and from it
+descended Lola, carrying a handbag and smiling like
+a girl let out of school.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Why, my dear,” cried Mrs. Breezy, “what does
+this mean? I thought you were going to Chilton
+Park.” But she held her ewe lamb warmly and gladly
+in her arms, while a shout of welcome came from behind
+the glass screen where the fat man sat with the
+microscope in his eye.</p>
+<p class="pnext">Lola laughed. “I went there,” she said, “but
+something happened. I’ll tell you about that later.
+And then Lady Feo altered her plans, drove over to
+Aylesbury and told me I might do anything I liked until
+Monday night, as there was no room for me in
+Mrs. Winchfield’s house. And so, of course, I came
+home. How are you, Mummy darling? Oh, I’m so
+glad to see you.” And she kissed the little woman
+again with a touch of exuberance and ran into the shop
+to pounce upon her father, all among his watches. It
+was good to see the way in which that man caught his
+little girl in his arms and held her tight.—A good
+girl, Lola, a good affectionate girl, working hard when
+there was no need for her to do so and improving herself.
+Good Lord, she had begun to talk like a lady
+and think like a lady, but she would never be too grand
+to come into the little old shop in Queen’s Road, Bayswater,—not
+Lola.</p>
+<p class="pnext">He said all that rather emotionally and this too.
+“It isn’t as if we hadn’t seen yer for such a long
+time. You’ve never missed droppin’ in upon us whenever
+you could get away, but this’s like a sunny day
+when the papers said it was goin’ to be wet,—like
+finding a real good tot of cognac in a bottle yer thought
+was empty.” And he kissed her again on both cheeks
+and held her away from him, the Frenchman in him
+coming out in his utter lack of self-consciousness. He
+looked her all over with a great smile on his fat face
+and stroked the sleeve of her blue serge coat, touched
+the white thing at her throat and finally pinched the
+lobe of one of her tiny ears.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“It isn’t that yer clothes are smarter, or that yer’ve
+grown older or anything like that. It’s that you seem
+to have pulled yer feet out of this place, me girl. It
+doesn’t seem to be your place now.—It’s manner.
+It’s the way yer hold yer head, tilt yer chin up.—It’s
+accent. It’s the way you end yer sentences. When
+a woman comes into the shop and speaks to me as you
+do, I know that she won’t pay her bills but that her
+name’s in the Red Book.—You little monkey, yer’ve
+picked up all the tricks and manners of her ladyship.
+You’ll be saying ‘My God’ soon, as yer aunt tells us
+Lady Feo does! Well, well, well.” And he hugged
+her again, laughed, and then, finding that he showed
+certain points of his French antecedents, began to exaggerate
+them as he had seen Robert Nainby do at the
+Gaiety. He was a consummate actor and a very
+honest person. The two don’t always go together.</p>
+<p class="pnext">And then Mrs. Breezy, who in the meantime had
+been practical and shut the shop, followed them into
+the parlor, which seemed to Lola to be shrinking every
+time she saw it and more crowded with cardboard
+boxes, account books, alarm clocks and the surplus
+from the shop, and sprang a little surprise. “Who
+do you think’s coming to dinner to-night?” she
+asked.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Is anybody coming to dinner? What a nuisance,”
+said Lola, who had looked forward to enjoying the
+company of her father and mother uninterrupted.</p>
+<p class="pnext">John Breezy gave a roguish glance at his wife and
+winked. “Give yer ten guesses,” he said.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Ernest Treadwell.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“No,” said Mrs. Breezy, “Albert Simpkins.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Simpky? How funny. Did you ask him or did
+he ask himself?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“He asked himself,” said John Breezy.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“I asked him,” said Mrs. Breezy.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“I see. The true Simpky way. He suggested that
+he would like to have dinner with you and you caught
+the suggestion. He comes of such a long line of men
+who have worn their masters’ clothes that he is now a
+sort of second-hand edition of them all, and I shouldn’t
+be a bit surprised if, when he falls in love, he goes to
+the parents first and asks their permission to propose
+to the daughter; and he’ll probably ask not for the
+daughter herself but for her hand,—which never
+seems to me to be much of a compliment to the
+daughter.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">Mrs. Breezy and her husband exchanged a quick
+glance. Either there was something uncanny about
+Lola or she knew that this very respectable man was
+madly in love with her. During his numerous visits
+to the jeweler’s shop Simpkins had invariably led the
+conversation round to Lola, finding a thousand phases
+of her character which he adored. But the last time
+he had been with them there was something in his
+manner and voice which made it easy to guess that
+his visit that evening was for the purpose of asking
+them whether they considered him worthy of becoming
+their son-in-law. It may be said that they considered
+that he was, especially after he had told them about
+the money inherited from his father and his own savings
+and confided in them his scheme of buying that
+very desirable inn at Wargrave, in which they could,
+of course, frequently spend very pleasant week-ends
+during the summer months. They had before this
+recognized in him a man of great depth of feeling, of
+excellent principles and a certain strange ecstasy,—somewhat
+paradoxical in one who nearly always appeared
+in a swallow-tail coat, dark trousers and a
+black tie.</p>
+<p class="pnext">Seeing that this was an occasion of considerable importance,
+Mrs. Breezy had arranged to dine in the
+drawing-room. It now behooved her to hurry up to
+her room and change her clothes and lay an extra
+place for Lola. The dinner itself was being cooked
+at that moment by the baker next door,—duck, new
+peas and potatoes and apple pie with a nice piece of
+Gruyère cheese, which, with two bottles of Beaujolais
+from the Breezy cellar, would be worthy of Mr. Simpkins’s
+attention even though he did come from Dover
+Street, Mayfair.</p>
+<p class="pnext">As a matter of fact, Lola’s remark about the daughter’s
+hand was merely an arrow fired into the air.
+She had been encouraging Simpkins to look with favor
+upon the lovesick girl who sat so frequently upon her
+bed and poured out her heart. She never conceived
+the possibility of being herself asked for by good old
+Simpky, who had been so kind to her and was such a
+knowledgable companion at the theater. The idea of
+becoming his wife was grotesque, ridiculous, pathetic,
+hugely remote from her definite plan of life. She
+considered that the girl Ellen was exactly suited to
+him. Had she not inherited all the attributes of an
+innkeeper’s wife from her worthy parents who had
+kept the Golden Sheaf at Shepperton since away back
+before the great wind? So she ran up to her room
+to tidy herself, with her soul full of Chilton Park and
+Fallaray.</p>
+<p class="pnext">Simpkins arrived precisely on time, smelling of
+Windsor soap and brilliantine. He had indulged in a
+tie which had white spots upon it, discreet white spots,
+and into this he had stuck a golden pin,—a horse-shoe
+for luck. He was welcomed by Mr. Breezy in
+the drawing-room and immediately twigged the fact
+that there were four places laid.</p>
+<p class="pnext">Mr. Breezy was waggish. It is the way of a parent
+in all such circumstances. “My boy, who do you
+think?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“I dunno. Who?” His tone was anxious and
+his brows were flustered.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Lola,” said Mr. Breezy.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Lola!—I thought she was at Chilton Park with
+’er ladyship. I chose this evening because of that.
+This’ll make me very—well——”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Not you,” said John Breezy. “You’re all right,
+me boy. We like you. That inn down at Wargrave
+sounds good. I can see a nice kitchen garden. I shall
+love to wander in it in the early morning and pull up
+spring onions. I’m French enough for them still.
+You can take it that the missus and I are all in your
+favor,—formalities waived. We’ll slip away after
+dinner, go for a little walk and you can plump the
+question. The betting is you’ll win.” And he clapped
+the disconcerted valet heartily on the back,—the
+rather narrow back.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“I’m very much obliged, Mr. Breezy,” said Simpkins,
+who had gone white to the lips, “and also to
+Mrs. Breezy. It’s nice to be trusted like this, and all
+that. But I must say, in all honesty, I wanted to take
+this affair step by step, so to speak. If I’d ’ad the
+good fortune to be encouraged by you in my desire to
+ask for Lola’s ’and,”—there it came,—“I should
+’ave taken a week at least to ’ave thought out the
+proper things to say to Lola ’erself. Sometimes
+there’s a little laugh in the back of ’er eyes which
+throws a man off his words. I don’t know whether
+you’ve noticed that. But this is very sudden and
+I shall ’ave to do a lot of thinking during the
+meal.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Oh, you English,” said John Breezy and roared
+with laughter. “Mong Doo!”</p>
+<p class="pnext">One of Simpkins’s hands fidgeted with his tie while
+the other straightened the feathers on the top of his
+head. Jumping Joseph, he was fairly up against it!
+How he wished he was a daring man who had traveled
+a little and read some of the modern novels. It was a
+frightful handicap to be so old-fashioned.</p>
+<p class="pnext">And then the ladies arrived,—Mrs. Breezy in a
+white fichu which looked like an antimacassar, a thing
+usually kept for Christmas day and wedding anniversaries;
+Lola in a neat blue suit and the highest
+spirits,—a charming costume.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Hello, Simpky.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Good evening, Mr. Simpkins.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">Simpkins bowed. He certainly had the Grandison
+manner. And while Lola brought him up to date with
+the state of affairs, so far as she knew them, Mrs.
+Breezy disappeared, stood on a chair against the fence
+in the back yard and received the hot dishes which
+were handed over to her by the baker’s wife. A couple
+of scrawny cats, with tails erect, attracted by the
+aroma of hot duck, followed her to the back door,—but
+got no farther. “You shall have the bones,” said
+Mrs. Breezy, and they were duly encouraged.</p>
+<p class="pnext">The dinner was a success, even although Simpkins
+sat through it in one long trance. He ate well to
+fortify himself and it was obvious to John Breezy,
+sympathetic soul that he was, that his guest was rehearsing
+a flowery speech of proposal. The unconscious
+Lola kept up a merry rattle of conversation and
+gave them a vivid description of the village through
+which she had passed that afternoon and of her drive
+back to town alone from Aylesbury. Of Chilton Park
+she said nothing. It was too sacred. And when
+presently John Breezy’s programme was carried out,
+the table cleared, the two cats rewarded for their
+patience and Simpkins left alone with Lola, there was
+a moment of shattering silence. But even then Lola
+was unsuspecting, and it was not until the valet unbuttoned
+his coat to free his swelling chest and placed
+himself in a supplicating attitude on the sofa at her
+side, that she tumbled to the situation.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Oh, Simpky,” she said, “what <em>are</em> you going
+to do?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">It was a wonderful cue. It helped him to take the
+first ditch without touching either of the banks. The
+poor wretch slipped down upon his knees, all his pre-arranged
+words scattered like a load of bricks. “Ask
+you to marry me, Lola,” he said. “Lola, darling,
+I love you. I loved you the very minute you came
+down the area steps, which was all wrong because I
+thought you’d come from heaven and therefore your
+place was the front door. I love you and I want you
+to marry me, and I’ll buy the inn and work like a dog
+and we’ll send the boy to Lansing or the City of
+London School and make a gentleman of ’im.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">Not resentment, not amusement, but a great pity
+swept over Lola. This was a good, kind, generous
+man and his emotion was so simple and so genuine.
+And she must hurt him because it was impossible,
+absurd.</p>
+<p class="pnext">And so for a moment she sat very still and erect,
+looking exactly like a daffodil with the light on her
+yellow head, and her eyes shut, because there might be
+in them that twinkle which Simpkins had noticed and
+which he must not see. And presently she said,
+putting her hand on his shoulder, “Oh, Simpky, dear
+old Simpky, why couldn’t you have loved Ellen?
+What a difficult world it is.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Ellen,” he said. “Oh.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“I can’t, Simpky. I simply can’t.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">And he sat on his heels and looked like a pricked
+balloon. “Ain’t I good enough, Lola?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Yes, quite good enough. Perhaps too good. But,
+oh, Simpky, I’m so awfully in love with some one else
+and it’s a difficult world. That’s the truth. I have
+to tell it to you. I can never, never marry you, never.
+Please accept this. Whatever happens to me, and I
+don’t know whatever <em>will</em> happen to me, I shall always
+remember how good you were and how proud
+you made me feel. But I’m so awfully in love with
+some one else. Awfully. And perhaps I shall never
+be married. That’s the truth, Simpky.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">And she bent down and kissed him on the forehead,
+and then got up quickly and raised the kneeling man
+to his feet. And he stood there, shattered, empty
+and wordless, with the blow that she had given him
+ever so softly marking his face, marking his soul.</p>
+<p class="pnext">And Lola was very, very sorry. Poor old Simpky.
+Poor little Ellen. It was indeed a difficult world.</p>
+</div>
+<div class="level-3 section" id="id20">
+<h3 class="level-3 pfirst section-title title">VI</h3>
+<p class="pfirst">The next day was Saturday,—a busy day for the
+Breezys, the one day in the week upon which they
+pinned their faith to make up for slack business during
+the remainder of it. In the morning Lola helped
+her mother to make an enticing display in the windows
+and along the counter in the shop itself. Mrs. Breezy
+had recently broadened out a little and now endeavored
+to sell kodaks and photographic materials,
+self-filling pens and stationery for ladies, which is
+tantamount to saying that it was stationery unfit for
+men. During this busy and early hour, while John
+Breezy, one-eyed, was looking into the complaints of
+wrist watches, most of which were suffering from
+having been taken into the bath, Lola answered her
+mother’s silent inquiry as to what had happened the
+previous evening. With a duster in one hand and a
+silver sugar basin in the other, she looked up suddenly
+and said, “No, Mother, it wasn’t and will never be
+possible. Poor old Simpky.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">And Mrs. Breezy nodded and shrugged her shoulders.
+And Lola hoped that that would be the end of
+it. But why should she have hoped so, knowing
+women? A few minutes later Mrs. Breezy began.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“The inn at Wargrave would have been so nice.
+He said that it had an orchard on one side and a large
+lawn running down to the river on the other, shaded
+with old trees,—little tables underneath and lovers’
+nooks and sweet peas growing in tubs. Ah, how nice
+after Queen’s Road, Bayswater. And your father
+could have fished for hours and I could have rearranged
+the furniture—and very good furniture too,
+he said—and made things look spick and span. And
+he’s a good man, is Albert Simpkins, a very unusual
+man, educated, religious, honest, with a sort of white
+flame burning in him somewhere. He would have
+made a good husband, dearie.—However, I suppose
+you know best.” And she threw an anxious glance
+at her little girl who had become, if anything, more
+of an enigma to her than ever. It didn’t matter about
+the apron that she wore; nor did the fact that she was
+very efficiently cleaning that silver thing detract from
+the new and subtle dignity and poise that she had acquired.
+And her accent, and her choice of words,—they
+were those of Mrs. Breezy’s favorite actress who
+played fashionable women. It was very extraordinary.
+What a good ear the child must have and
+what a very observant eye,—rather like her father’s,
+although he had to be assisted by a microscope. “You
+won’t think it over, I suppose?” she asked finally, long
+after Lola had believed the subject to be closed.
+Mothers have an amazing way of recurring to old
+arguments. But Lola shook her head again and gave
+a little gesture that was peculiarly French, as who
+should say, “My dear! Marriage!”</p>
+<p class="pnext">As soon as the shop was opened and Mrs. Breezy
+was on duty and John Breezy was humming softly
+over his most monotonous job, Lola went upstairs to
+the little bedroom which she had completely outgrown
+now, put on her hat and presently slipped out of the
+house. All the usual musicians were already at work
+on the curbstone of Queen’s Road. The strains of
+“Annie Laurie” were mixed with those of “Son o’
+Mine” and there was one daring creature with a concertina
+who was desecrating Gounod’s “Ave Maria.”
+Perambulators cluttered the pavements and eager
+housewives were in earnest conversation with butchers
+and greengrocers who had arranged their wares
+temptingly outside their shops so that they could be
+handled and considered and sampled. Lola made her
+way to Kensington Gardens filled with a desire which
+had been growing upon her ever since she woke up
+to make another Cinderella dash into the great world.
+She was seized with another overpowering eagerness
+to meet Fallaray on his own level. He was to be in
+town over the week-end. She knew that. The Government,
+as though it had not already enough troubles
+to contend with—Germany haggling and France
+ready to fly at her throat and America hiding her head
+in the sand of dead shibboleths like an ostrich—was
+in the throes of the big strike and its members were
+hurrying from one conference to another with the
+labor leaders. Lady Feo away, she had a wonderful
+chance to use that night and nothing would be easier
+than to dress once more at Mrs. Rumbold’s and slip
+into her mother’s house with a latchkey. But she was
+not able to go into the Gardens because they had been
+closed to the public. They had been turned over to
+the military to be used as a center for the mobilization
+of supplies. She could see men in khaki everywhere,
+going about their work with a sort of merry energy.
+“Back to the army agin, Sergeant, back to the army
+agin.” Unconcerned by the crisis which had fallen
+upon England and unable to wander along her favorite
+paths, she turned away just at the moment when a
+large car, followed by a line of motor busses and
+heterogeneous traffic, was being held up by a policeman
+to enable a company of boy scouts to cross the
+high road. She heard a shout. She saw a man in
+khaki with a red band round his cap and much brass
+on its peak and two long lines of ribbons on his chest
+become suddenly athletic under the stress of great excitement.
+The next instant her hand was seized and
+she looked up. It was Chalfont.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“I was just going to think about you,” she said.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“I’ve never stopped thinking of you,” said Chalfont.
+“What became of you? Where did you go?
+Where have you been? I searched every hotel in the
+town. I’ve been almost through every street, like
+Gilbert à Beckett, calling your name. Good God,
+why have you played with me like this?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">Somehow, for all his height and finish, in spite of
+his uniform and his big car and his obvious importance,
+he reminded her of Simpkins. (“Lola, I love you.”)
+The same emotion was in the voice, the same desire
+in the eyes. What <em>was</em> there in her that made her
+do this thing to men,—while the one man was unattainable,
+unapproachable? It was a difficult world.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“I’m very sorry,” she said. “I had to go away
+that night. But I was just on the verge of thinking
+about you again. You can’t think how glad I am to
+see you.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">Still holding her hand as though he would never let
+her escape, Chalfont mastered his voice. “You little
+lovely de Brézé,” he said, not choosing his words.
+“You strange little bird. I’ve caught you again and
+I’ve a damned good mind to clip your wings and put
+you in a cage.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">And Lola laughed. “I’ve always been a canary,”
+she said, “and some day you may find me in a cage.”
+But she didn’t add, “not your cage, however golden.”
+Fallaray’s was the only cage and if that were made of
+bits of stick it would be golden to her.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Well, you’re back in town. That’s the chief thing.
+Get into my car and I’ll drive you home and let’s do
+something to-night. Let’s dine at the Savoy or the
+Carlton. I don’t care. Or don’t let’s dine. Anything
+you like, so long as you’re with me. I’ve got
+to go along to the War Office now, but I have my evening
+off, like any factory hand.” And he drew her towards
+the car, which was waiting by the curb.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“You can drive me as far as Marble Arch,” said
+Lola. “I must leave you there because I want to buy
+something in Bond Street.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“All right, Bond Street then. I want to buy something
+there too.” He helped her in and said to his
+man, “Masterman’s, quick.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">The scout master who had drawn his company up
+against the railings gave a command as Chalfont
+helped Lola in. The boys presented arms and Chalfont
+returned their salute with extreme gravity.
+“The future strike-breakers of the country,” he said.
+“The best institution we’ve got.—How well you
+look. Don’t you think you might have sent me a line?
+I felt like a man in a parachute dropping from twenty-two
+thousand feet in the dark when I found that you
+had left me. It was rather a rotten trick of yours.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“It was very rotten,” said Lola, “but it couldn’t be
+helped, and I may have to do it again. I don’t want
+you to ask me why. I don’t want you to ask me anything.
+There’s a wee mystery about me which I must
+ask you to respect. Don’t think about it. Don’t let
+it worry you, but whenever we go out again just let
+me disappear. One of these days I’ll tell you all about
+it, General, and probably you will be very much
+amused.” She ran her finger along his ribbons and
+gave him a little smile of respect and admiration which
+almost made him blush. “Well, then,” she added,
+“what about to-night? I’m free. That’s why I was
+just going to think of you and really wasn’t a bit surprised
+when you suddenly pounced upon me. Things
+happen like that, don’t they? I can meet you at the
+Savoy or the Carlton or anywhere else you like. Personally,
+I’m all for the Carlton.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“The Carlton then,” he said. “Seven-thirty, and
+after that,—what?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Let’s leave it,” said Lola. “I love doing things
+on the spur of the moment.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“You swear you’ll come?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">And Lola made a little cross over her heart.</p>
+<p class="pnext">Chalfont heaved a sigh and settled back and looked
+at her, longing to touch her, longing, in front of all
+the world, to draw her into his arms and kiss her
+lips. God, if only this girl knew what she had done
+to him.—And all the while the car bowled along,
+competing with every other type of car for precedence,
+all selfish and many badly driven. Lola had no eyes
+for the undercurrent of excitement that gave the
+crowds the look that they had worn in the first days
+of the War or for the outbreak of khaki that lent the
+streets their old familiar appearance. She was thinking
+ahead and making plans and tingling at the idea
+of dipping once more into the current of life.</p>
+<p class="pnext">Masterman’s, it turned out, was a florist’s shop,
+filled attractively with lovely blossoms. Chalfont
+sprang out and gave Lola his hand. “Come in,” he
+said, “and tell them where to send enough flowers to
+make a garden of your house. Please,—to celebrate
+my having found you at last.” He wished to Heaven
+that he might have taken her to Aspray’s and covered
+her with diamonds. He would willingly have gone
+broke to do her honor.</p>
+<p class="pnext">And one of the men came forward to offer his eager
+services to one who certainly must be of great importance
+to appear so plainly dressed.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“How kind of you,” said Lola. “Those, then,”
+and she pointed to a bunch of proud red roses that
+were standing in a vase.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Is that all?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“I want to carry them,” she said.</p>
+<p class="pnext">Chalfont was almost boyishly disappointed. He
+would like to have pictured her among a riot of color.
+He had not brought her there with a Machiavelian desire
+to hear her give her address. He was not that
+kind of man. “Won’t you have some more?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">But somehow—what was it in her that did these
+things to men—Lola could see the inn at Wargrave,
+its orchard and its smooth lawn with little tables under
+the trees and the silver stream near by, and hear the
+words, “I love you, Lola; am I good enough——”
+And she shook her head. “No more,” she said.
+“They’re lovely,” took them from the man and put
+them to her lips.</p>
+<p class="pnext">Chalfont gave his name and followed her to the
+street. “Now where?” he asked.</p>
+<p class="pnext">Lola held out her hand. “Nowhere else. I’m
+walking. A thousand thanks. Seven-thirty, the Carlton
+then.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">And once more Chalfont saluted, not as though to a
+company of boy scouts but to a queen.</p>
+<p class="pnext">And when he had gone, Lola heaved a great big sigh
+and put the roses to her heart. If they had come
+from Chilton Park—if Fallaray had cut them for
+her—If.</p>
+</div>
+</div>
+<div class="level-2 section" id="part-v">
+<h2 class="level-2 pfirst section-title title"><a class="toc-backref pginternal" href="#id58">PART V</a></h2>
+<div class="level-3 section" id="id21">
+<h3 class="level-3 pfirst section-title title">I</h3>
+<p class="pfirst">Fallaray had been lunching with George Lytham
+at his rooms in the Albany. There had been half a
+dozen of the men who backed <em>Reconstruction</em> to
+meet him. From one o’clock until three every one of
+the numerous troubles which affected England had
+been discussed and argued about,—disarmament, unemployment,
+the triple alliance, Mesopotamia, Indian
+unrest, the inevitable Ireland, the German chicanery
+and the hot-tempered attitude of France in the matter
+of Ruhr; and, as though with an impish desire to invent
+new troubles, George Lytham had brought up the
+subject of Bolshevism in the universities. Every one
+of the men present had, of course, his own pet solution
+to these questions, and as usual, argument had run
+about like a terrier out for a walk,—backwards and
+forwards and in circles. Finally, with his head in a
+whirl, Fallaray had broken up the party to go along
+to the House. He was down to answer questions
+from the critics of the Government, and, according to
+his custom, to dodge the truth as far as he could. He
+walked out into Piccadilly with his host and together
+these two tall men, who were giving themselves up to
+an apparently abortive attempt to put together again
+the peace of the world—deliberately and ruthlessly
+smashed by the country which now whined and
+squealed and cried out excuses while it hid money and
+machine guns in secret places—made for Westminster
+arm in arm.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Where’s your car?” asked young Lochinvar.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“I gave it up,” said Fallaray. “The sight of our
+unemployed going about in processions made the keeping
+of a car grotesque. I’ve tried to cut down in every
+other way too. If I were a bachelor, I would let the
+house in Dover Street, go and live in two rooms and
+give the money I thus saved to the fund for out-of-work
+soldiers. I can’t do that. There’s Feo.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">Lytham nodded and said to himself, “Yes, there’s
+Feo and her old scamp of a father and Gilbert Jermyn,—with
+nothing back from any of them, not even
+gratitude.” If he had stood in Fallaray’s shoes he
+would long since have brought an action for divorce
+against that woman and gone in quest of a girl who
+understood the rudimentary rules of sportsmanship
+and the art of give and take. He held in utter contempt
+the old adage that having made your bed it is
+necessary to lie upon it. What bosh that was. Wasn’t
+the town full of beds of every size and price? Sometimes,
+when he thought of the way in which Fallaray
+permitted himself to be run and worked and milked
+and used by his so-called wife and her family, by the
+Government, by all sorts of societies and even by himself,
+a huge impatience swept over him and he wanted
+to cry out, “Fallaray, for God’s sake, kick somebody.
+Don’t be so damned fair. Give a little consideration
+to yourself. Don’t always look at everything from
+everybody else’s point of view. Be selfish for a
+change.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">And yet, all the while, different as he was from Fallaray
+in nature and character—with that strong streak
+of ruthlessness which permitted him to climb over the
+bodies of his opponents—Lytham loved Fallaray and
+would willingly have blacked his boots. There were
+moments when, looking into the eyes of his friend, he
+saw behind them a spirit as pure, as unselfish and as
+merciful as that of Christ, and he stood back, almost
+in awe. It was all the more galling, therefore, to see
+his friend hipped and hedged in by the rotten tricks of
+his party, by the quick shifting changes of his chief
+and by the heavy blundering of the other old bad men.
+How could he stand it? Why didn’t he give it all up,
+get out, try and find a corner of the earth where people
+didn’t quarrel and cheat,—and fall in love. He
+needed, no man more so, the “rustle of silk.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">Fallaray was on his own chain of thought. “Hookwood’s
+line about the Irish leaders,” he said suddenly,
+“if based on any truth, makes negotiations with them
+futile. They have got a great deal of American
+money in their possession,—every Irish servant girl
+in the United States has been forced by the priests to
+subscribe to the Sinn Fein funds. We know that.
+But if, as Hookwood says, the Irish Republican leaders
+are afraid of an inquiry as to how they have spent or
+misspent these funds, it stands to reason that they
+will continue to fight tooth and nail for something
+which they know they can never get. It’s the only
+way in which they can maintain a barrier between
+themselves and disgrace and that brings us back to the
+beginning. Robert Cecil, Lord Derby, Horace Plunkett,
+Philip Gibbs and all the rest of us may just as
+well toss up the sponge. Don’t you think so,
+Lytham?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Oh, God,” said Lytham, “I’m sick of the Irish.
+The mere mention of the name gives me jaundice. A
+rabble of egomaniacs led by a set of crooks and gunmen
+who are no longer blessed by the Roman Catholic
+Church.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">After which, as this was certainly a conversation
+stop, there was silence. They walked down St.
+James’s Street into the Mall, through the Horse
+Guard’s parade to Parliament Street and so to the
+courtyard of the House of Commons. The undercurrent
+of excitement and activity brought about by
+the strike was noticeable everywhere. Military lorries
+carrying men and kit moved about. St. George’s barracks
+was alive with recruits and old soldiers going
+back. In and out of the Horse Guards ex-officers in
+mufti came and went. The girls who had served in
+the W. A. A. C.’s streamed back again to enroll, and
+through it all, sarcastic emblems of a peace that did
+not exist, sat the two figures on horseback in their
+plumes and brass.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“London enjoying itself,” said Fallaray ironically.
+“There is the taste of blood in the mouths of all our
+people. Fighting has become a habit, almost a hobby.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">And young Lochinvar nodded. Would he ever forget
+the similar scenes that had taken place away back
+in that August of ’14?</p>
+<p class="pnext">“I’m tired,” said Fallaray, with a groan. “I’m
+dog-tired. If Feo were not at Chilton Park this weekend,
+I would escape after question time and go down
+and lie on the earth and sleep.—Well, good by, my
+dear lad. Don’t be impatient with me. Bring out
+your numbers of <em>Reconstruction</em>, hit hard and truly
+from the shoulder and see what you can do, you young
+hot-heads. As for me——!”</p>
+<p class="pnext">They stood on the edge of the courtyard with all its
+indifferent pigeons struggling for a living, oblivious
+to the intricacies, secrecies and colossal egotisms of the
+men who passed into the House. But before they
+separated something happened which made both their
+hearts beat faster.</p>
+<p class="pnext">A tall, primly dressed elderly man, who had apparently
+been waiting, sprang forward, a glint of great
+anger in his eyes and two spots of color on his pale
+cheeks. He said, “Mr. Fallaray, a word with you,
+Sir.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">And Fallaray turned with his usual courtesy and
+consideration. “What can I do?” he asked.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“I’ll tell you what you can do. You can stop showing
+sympathy for the Irish murderers and assassins.
+You can stop pussyfooting. You can withdraw all
+your remarks about reprisals. That’s what you can
+do. And if you’re interested, I’ll tell you why I say
+so.” His voice shook and blood seemed to suffuse his
+pale eyes.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“My only son went all through the War from the
+beginning to the end. He joined as a Tommy because,
+as an insignificant doctor, I had no pull. He was promoted
+to a commission for gallantry and decorated
+with the M. C. for distinguished work in the field.
+He was wounded three times—once so severely that
+his life was given up—but he returned to his regiment
+and finally marched with it into Germany. He
+was almost the last officer to be demobbed. After
+which, failing to get employment because patriots are
+not required in the city, he volunteered for the Black
+and Tans. Last Friday afternoon, in the course of
+carrying out orders, he was set upon in the streets of
+Cork by a dozen men in masks, foully murdered and
+hideously desecrated. My God, Mr. Fallaray, do you
+wonder that my blood boils when I hear of your weak-kneed
+treatment of these dirty dogs?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">He stood for a moment shaking, his refined face distorted,
+his gentle unathletic figure quivering with rage
+and indignation. Then he turned on his heel and went
+away, walking like a drunkard.</p>
+<p class="pnext">Fallaray and George Lytham looked at each other
+and both of them made the same gesture of impotence.</p>
+<p class="pnext">It was a difficult world.</p>
+</div>
+<div class="level-3 section" id="id22">
+<h3 class="level-3 pfirst section-title title">II</h3>
+<p class="pfirst">Fallaray’s position in the Cabinet was a peculiar
+one. It was rather like that of a disconcerting child
+in the house of orthodox church people who insisted
+on asking direct and pertinent questions on the Bible
+story, especially after having read Wells’s first volume
+of the “Outline of History.” How did Adam and
+Eve get into Eden? If God never sleeps, isn’t he very
+cross in the morning? And so on.</p>
+<p class="pnext">All through the War, Fallaray had been a thorn
+in the side of his chief. His honesty and his continual
+“why” were a source of irritation and sometimes
+of anger. He had no patience whatever with
+shiftiness, intrigue and favoritism, the appointment of
+mere duffers to positions of high responsibility. He
+made no bones whatever about expressing his opinion
+as to the frivolity that prevailed in certain quarters,
+together with the habit of dodging every grave issue.
+On the question of the League of Nations too, he was
+in close accord with Lord Robert Cecil and often made
+drastic criticisms of the frequent somersaults of his
+chief. His definite stand on the Irish question was
+extremely annoying to the brass-hat brigade and to the
+master-flounderer and weathercock, who showed himself
+more and more to be a mixture of Billy Sunday
+and Mark Anthony, crying out that black was white
+at one end of the town and ten minutes later that
+white was black at the other end. And yet, when it
+came to results, Fallaray might almost as well have
+been on the town council of Lower Muddleton as in
+the Cabinet of the British Government. Respected
+for his faithfulness to duty, he was disliked for his
+honesty and feared for his utter disregard for personal
+aggrandizement and the salary that went with it.</p>
+<p class="pnext">No wonder, therefore, that he was tired. He had
+been under a long and continual strain. In Parliament
+he found himself still dealing with the men who had
+suffered from brain anæmia before the War and had,
+therefore, been unable ever to believe, in spite of Lord
+Roberts, that war was possible,—that same body of
+professional politicians who were mentally and physically
+incapable of looking at the numerous problems
+of the hour, the day and the week with sanity and with
+courage. At home—if such a word could be used
+for Dover Street—there was Feo, who had no more
+right to be under his roof than any one of the women
+that passed him in the street. He was a tired and
+lonely man on the verge of complete disillusionment,
+disappointed with his fellow Ministers and deeply
+disappointed with the suspicion and jealousy which
+had grown up between England and her allies. It
+seemed to him, also, that the blank refusal of the
+United States to have anything to do with the League
+of Nations, even as revised from the original draft
+of President Wilson, the Messiah who had failed to
+function mainly because of the personal spite of the
+Republican leaders, jeopardized the future of the world
+and gave Germany a springboard which one of these
+days she would not fail to use. In spite of her reluctantly
+made promises, she was very busy inventing
+new and diabolical weapons of war and taking out
+patents for them in Washington, while pretending to
+observe the laws laid down by the Allies as to her disarmament
+and the manufacture of war materials under
+her treaty obligations. Krupps had designed new
+methods of artillery fire control, new fuses for projectiles,
+new gas engines, new naval fire-control devices,
+new parts for airplanes, new chemicals and new
+radio apparatuses. To what end? In the face of
+these facts he could perfectly well understand the
+French attitude, hysterical as it seemed to be. They
+knew her for a liar, a cheat and an everlasting enemy
+and whenever Fallaray returned from those interminable
+conferences in Paris, he did so with the recollection
+upon him of something in the eyes of Foch
+and other Frenchmen whose love of country was a
+religion that put a touch of fear into his soul. What
+were they all doing, these politicians of England, of
+the United States, of Italy? Were they not those
+very same ostriches who during all the years that led
+up to the War had hidden their heads in the sand,—the
+same heads, precisely the same sand?</p>
+<p class="pnext">As he entered the House that afternoon to be
+heckled with questions which he dared not answer
+truthfully, he wished that he had been born not to
+politics but to sportsmanship. He wished that he had
+carried on his undergraduate love of games, had kept
+himself fit, had joined the army as a subaltern in
+August, ’14, and had found the German bullet
+upon which his name had been written. In such a
+way, at any rate, he could better have served his country
+than by being at that grave moment an impotent
+piece on the political chessboard. Both publically
+and privately this man felt himself to be a failure.
+In the House of Commons he was more or less friendless,
+regarded as an unreliable party man. In his
+home he was a lodger, ignored by the woman who ran
+his house. He was without love, joy, kindness, the
+interest and devotion of any one sweet person who
+could put her soft fingers on his forehead and give
+him back his optimism. He was like Samson shackled
+to the windlass which he pushed round and round with
+gradually diminishing strength.</p>
+</div>
+<div class="level-3 section" id="id23">
+<h3 class="level-3 pfirst section-title title">III</h3>
+<p class="pfirst">Lola spent the afternoon with Ernest Treadwell.
+Loyalty to her old friend took her to the public library
+on her way back to lunch to ask him to fetch her for
+a little walk in the afternoon. The flash of joy that
+came into that boy’s eyes at the sight of her rewarded
+her well and sufficiently. To tell the truth, she would
+much have preferred to devote the whole of that afternoon
+to daydreams, but she knew, no one better, the
+peculiar temperament of young Treadwell and his
+hungry need of the inspiration which she alone could
+give him. But just as the boy arrived, a telegram
+was handed in addressed abruptly to “Breezy, 77
+Queen’s Road, Bayswater.” It was opened, naturally
+enough, by John, who, to the astonishment of half a
+dozen customers, emitted a howl of rage. Getting
+up from his chair behind the glass screen, he wobbled
+into the back parlor where Lola was seated with
+Ernest, deciding as to whether they should take the
+motor bus to Wimbleton Common or the train to
+Windsor. With an air of comic drama, though he
+did not intend it to be comic, the watchmaker flung
+the telegram upon the crowded table. The remains of
+lunch hobnobbed with kodaks, tissue paper, balls of
+string and empty cardboard boxes. The telegram fell
+on a pat of butter and to Ernest Treadwell’s imaginative
+eye it looked like a hand grenade stuck into a
+blob of clay. To him, somehow, there was always
+something sinister about a telegram. Was this one
+going to ruin the brief happiness of his afternoon?</p>
+<p class="pnext">It was from Feo and ran like this. “I shall need
+you at six o’clock. Sorry. You had better be at
+Dover Street at five-thirty. Am dining in town.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">Lola read these words over again and again. Windsor
+was impossible. Even the trip to Wimbleton
+Common could not be made. But how was this going
+to affect the Carlton at seven-thirty? She longed
+above all things once more to get into the clothes and
+the proper social surroundings of Madame de Brézé,
+and hear people talking what had become her own
+language and listen to the music of a good orchestra.
+She felt that she deserved another adventure with
+Chalfont. This erratic twist by Lady Feo, whose
+movements seemed that week-end to resemble those of
+the woodcock, shattered all these plans. At least,—did
+they? Not if she knew it.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Well, there it is,” she said and gave the telegram
+to Ernest Treadwell, who had been watching her face
+with the most painful anxiety. “She who must be
+obeyed. I’m afraid this means that all we can do is
+to wander about for a couple of hours and that our
+little jaunt to Windsor must be postponed. And we
+never went to Hampton Court to see the crocuses,
+did we? Bad luck.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">But while she was speaking, her brain was hitting
+all its cylinders and racing ahead. She would go to
+the Carlton, Lady Feo or no Lady Feo. She would
+get her dress from Mrs. Rumbold, with her shoes and
+stockings, and take them to Dover Street. She would
+have to dress at Dover Street, bribe Ellen to get her
+a taxicab and slip down at twelve o’clock to let her
+in to the area door. That must be the plan of action,
+whatever the risks might be.</p>
+<p class="pnext">She sprang to her feet and flung an arm round her
+father’s neck,—her disappointed, affectionate father
+who had looked forward to a merry evening at the
+local music hall and to one of the old-time Sundays
+when he could march out in his best clothes and show
+off Lola to the neighbors. “It’s life, Daddy,” she
+said. “It can’t be helped. You have your wrist
+watches. I have Lady Feo. What’s the good of
+grumbling? Tell Mother when you get the chance.
+At the moment she is busy and mustn’t be disturbed.
+Come on, Ernest, let’s go.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">But Ernest had other views, now that the country
+was impossible. “I’ve got something in my pocket
+I want to read to you,” he said. “Might we go up
+to the drawing-room, do you think?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">That was excellent. That made things ever so
+much easier. She could give Ernest until four o’clock
+or a little after and then get rid of him, go round
+to Mrs. Rumbold and get eventually to Dover Street
+in time to have everything ready for Lady Feo on her
+arrival.</p>
+<p class="pnext">And so they went upstairs and opened up the aloof
+room, with its persistent and insular odor of the Sabbath
+and antimacassars, and drew up chairs to the
+window. The row of houses opposite, which had been
+converted into shops, was bathed in the afternoon sun.
+A florist’s windows alight with flowers looked like a
+line from Tennyson in the middle of a financial article
+in a newspaper. Traffic roared in the street below
+but did not quite succeed in drowning a weather-beaten
+piano accompanying a throaty baritone singing,
+“She dwelt amid the untrodden wiys.—And h’oh the
+differ-rence ter me.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">With a thoughtfulness that seemed to Ernest Treadwell
+to be exquisite, Lola shut the window so that she
+might not miss a single word that she was about to
+hear. Without any preliminaries and with the colossal
+egotism that is part and parcel of all writing, the
+young librarian took from his pocket a wad of manuscript,
+and in a deadly monotone commenced to read
+his epic. It was in blank verse and ran to about sixteen
+pages. It retold the old story of Paola and Francesca,
+not in the manner of Stephen Phillips and not
+in imitation of Masefield or any of the younger poets,
+but in the Treadwell way,—jerky, explosive and here
+and there out of key; but for all that filled with a
+rough picturesqueness and passion, with a quite extraordinary
+sense of color and feeling which held Lola
+breathless from beginning to end. It was this boy’s
+greatest effort, on which he had been working for innumerable
+months, burning the midnight oil with the
+influence of Lola upon him, and his great love which
+lifted him into ecstasy.—And when he had finished
+and ventured to look into her face, he saw there something
+that crowned his head with laurels and filled his
+heart with tears.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Oh,” she said. “Oh.—Ernie, you’ve done it.
+It’s beautiful. You are a poet. However far behind
+them all, you are in the line of great singers.” And
+she reached out for the manuscript and saw that on the
+first page, in angular boyish writing, were the words,
+“To Lola,—of whom I dream.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">Simpkins, Treadwell, Chalfont,—but, oh, where
+was Fallaray, her hero, the man who needed love?</p>
+</div>
+<div class="level-3 section" id="id24">
+<h3 class="level-3 pfirst section-title title">IV</h3>
+<p class="pfirst">When Feo bounced into her room a little after five-thirty
+she found a perfectly composed and efficient
+Lola who had laid out a selection of her mistress’s
+most recent frocks with the accompanying shoes and
+stockings. There was nothing about the girl to indicate
+her latent excitement and her determination under
+any circumstances to keep her appointment at the
+Carlton. The cardboard box from Mrs. Rumbold’s
+was up in her room. Ellen had been interviewed and
+had promised to slip down and open the area door at
+twelve o’clock.</p>
+<p class="pnext">Feo nodded and gave one of her widest smiles.
+“Good for you, Lola,” she said. “If you had been
+out for the day or something, I should, of course,
+have been able to do my hair, dress and get off,—but
+not so well as when you’re here. If it came to a
+push I suppose I could do everything for myself, even
+cook my breakfast; but I should hate it and it wouldn’t
+give me any pleasure.—That one,” she said, and
+pointed to a most peculiar frock that looked like the
+effort of that overconscientious chameleon when it endeavored
+to imitate the tartan of the Gordon Highlanders.
+It was a very chaos of colors, but she was in
+the highest spirits and evidently felt in a riotous mood.
+And while she gave herself up to Lola, in order to
+have a few deep waves put in her wiry bobbed hair,
+she babbled as though she were talking to Mrs. Malwood
+or one of her other particular friends.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“I don’t know what the devil’s happened to this
+week-end,” she said. “Every blessed thing’s gone
+wrong. That glossy scoundrel at Chilton,—good
+Lord, I must be more careful,—and all those dullards
+at Aylesbury! We played bridge nearly all night and
+no one ever doubled. It was like going to a race meeting
+and finding the anti-vice brigade where the bookies
+ought to be. I simply couldn’t stay there another
+night, so I slept until four o’clock this afternoon, had
+a cup of tea in my room and dashed up. To-night I
+hope for better things. An old friend of mine—and
+really old friends have their points—got back from
+India yesterday. I saw his name in the paper and
+rang him up at the Rag. We’re going to dine and
+dance and so forth, quite like old times; so do your
+best with me, Lola. I haven’t seen this man for five
+years.—Don’t allow any of them to remain round my
+eyes.—Oh, by the way, I’m really awfully sorry to
+have smashed up your plans and I don’t see how you
+can go back to your father and mother to-morrow because
+I shall want to be dressed about ten o’clock and
+I shall be home again to sleep. So it pretty well rots
+your day, Lola. Never mind, I’ll see that you have a
+little holiday before long.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">And she smiled up into Lola’s face and for the moment
+looked very womanly and charming and perfectly
+sincere. For all her curious tangents and unexpected
+twists and the peculiar hardness and unscrupulous
+selfishness that she brought into her dealings
+with every one, this woman had good points; and
+even when she hurt her friends deeply she had an unexplainable
+knack of retaining their loyalty. She
+really liked Lola and admired her and would have gone
+very far out of her way to look after her.—The pity
+of it was that she had not been born a man.</p>
+<p class="pnext">She babbled on while Lola polished her up and did
+all those quite unnecessary things which modern life
+has invented for women before they will show themselves
+to the public. In the frankest possible way and
+without the least reserve she roughed out the history
+of the man who had come back,—a pucca soldier who
+had been in India since the War and was one of Feo’s
+earliest friends. He had loved her violently, been
+turned down for Fallaray and had never married. It
+so happened that he had not seen Feo during his
+periods of leave while the War was on and had told
+her over the telephone that if he didn’t see her then,
+at once, he’d either have apoplexy or be taken to Bow
+Street for smashing the town. Feo laughed when she
+repeated this.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“And he would too,” she said. “He’s just that
+sort. Those tall, dark men with a dash of the Oriental
+in them somewhere go through life with the apparent
+indifference of a greyhound until the bursting point
+comes, and when they give way,—whew, look out
+for the splinters.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">She was excited,—almost as excited as Lola was.
+And finally, dressed and scented, with her nails pink
+and her full lips reddened, she had never looked more
+characteristically Feo, more virile, more audacious,
+more thoroughbred and at the same time more bizarre.
+“Now for the Ritz,” she said (Ah, then the Carlton
+was safe), turned at the door and in a moment of
+impulse took a diamond bracelet from her wrist and
+pitched it at Lola as though it were a tennis ball.
+“You’re a jolly good sportsman, child,” she added,
+with her widest smile.</p>
+<p class="pnext">All the way downstairs she sang an aria from “Le
+Coq d’Or,”—a strange, wistful, moonlit thing.—And
+hardly had she gone before Lola seated herself
+at the dressing table, where she commenced those
+operations which would transform her also into a
+woman of the world.</p>
+</div>
+<div class="level-3 section" id="id25">
+<h3 class="level-3 pfirst section-title title">V</h3>
+<p class="pfirst">And then, with her nose in the air and her hands
+folded over her tummy, Miss Breezy marched into the
+dressing room. “Oh,” she said, which was quite
+enough.</p>
+<p class="pnext">And Lola sprang to her feet, caught in the act of
+using her mistress’s make-up. But it was so long, or
+it seemed to be so long, since she had held any conversation
+with her aunt that nearly all sense of relationship
+had faded out. This was Miss Breezy the
+housekeeper, natural enemy of servants and on the
+lookout especially to find something which would form
+the basis of an unfavorable report in regard to Lola.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Good afternoon, Miss Breezy.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Oh, don’t be absurd. I’m your aunt and there’s
+no getting away from it. This playing of parts makes
+me impatient.” Her tone was snappy but there was,
+oddly enough, nothing antagonistic in her expression.
+On the contrary—and this put Lola immediately on
+her guard—there was all about her a new air of
+armistice, an obvious desire to call off unfriendly relations
+and bury the hatchet.</p>
+<p class="pnext">The thought that ran through Lola’s head was,
+“What does she want to know?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">With a touch of the adventurous spirit for which
+Lola had not given her credit, the good lady, who had
+recently somewhat increased in bulk, clambered into
+Feo’s extraordinary chair, in which she looked exactly
+as if she were waiting to have a tooth filled. Her
+thinning hair, streaked with white, was scrupulously
+drawn away from her forehead. Her black shiny
+dress was self-consciously plain and prim, and she
+wore those very ugly elastic-sided boots with patent
+leather tips that are always somehow associated with
+Philistinism. She might have been the Chairwoman
+of a Committee of Motion Picture Censorship. “I
+spent Thursday evening with your mother and father,”
+she said. “I’m glad to hear business is improving.
+Young Treadwell was there,—a precocious sort of
+person, I thought.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“A poet,” said Lola.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Poet, eh? Yes, I thought he was something of
+that sort. If I were his mother I’d spank the poetry
+out of him. What do we want poets for? Might as
+well have fiddlers to imitate whatever the man’s name
+was who played frivolous tunes when some place or
+other was burning. Men should work these days, not
+write sloppy things about gravestones.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“He’ll make his mark,” said Lola.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“You should say a scratch,” corrected Miss Breezy.
+“However, that isn’t the point. It appears that Simpkins
+has become a friend of the family.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">Ah, so that was it. She had heard the gossip about
+Simpky and it was curiosity, not kindness, which had
+brought her into the dressing room.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Simpkins,” said Miss Breezy, “is a warm member.
+His father left him some money and he has saved.
+For Ellen, for Elizabeth or even for Annie, whose
+father is a Baptist minister, he would make a very
+desirable husband. I have nothing to say against
+him—for them,” and she looked Lola fully and firmly
+in the eyes.</p>
+<p class="pnext">And Lola nodded with entire agreement, adding,
+“Simpky is a good man.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“So there’s nothing in that, then? Is that what you
+mean?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Nothing,” replied Lola.</p>
+<p class="pnext">And Miss Breezy gave a sigh of relief. It was bad
+enough for her niece to have become a lady’s maid.</p>
+<p class="pnext">Would she go now? Or was there something else
+at the back of her mind?</p>
+<p class="pnext">For several minutes Miss Breezy babbled rather
+garrulously about a number of quite extraneous things.
+She talked about the soldiers in the park, the coal
+strike, what was likely to happen during the summer,
+the effect of unemployment on prices, all obviously for
+the purpose of presently pouncing hawk-like on the
+unsuspecting Lola,—who, as a matter of fact, had
+no intention of falling into any trap. “In yesterday’s
+<em>Daily Looking Glass</em>,” she said suddenly, “there was
+a short paragraph that set me thinking. I don’t remember
+the exact wording but it was something like
+this. ‘A short time ago a beautiful young French
+woman, bearing a name which occupies several interesting
+chapters in the past history of her country, paid
+a brief visit to London, dined at the Savoy with one
+of our best known generals and disappeared as though
+she had melted with the morning dew. The said general,
+we hear on the best authority, was distraught
+and conducted several days’ search for his dinner companion.
+Inquiries were made at every hotel in town
+without success until the name of de Brézé became
+quite well known.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">Lola had caught her breath at the beginning of this
+quotation which Miss Breezy obviously knew by heart,
+and had metaphorically clapped her hand over her
+mouth to prevent herself from crying out. But
+knowing that her aunt would turn round and fix her
+analytical eye upon her, Lola immediately adopted an
+attitude of mild impersonal interest.</p>
+<p class="pnext">The eye duly came, in fact both eyes, and they found
+Lola polite and unconcerned, the well-trained lady’s
+maid who was forced to listen to the gossip of her
+overseer. So that was what it was! Good Heavens,
+how much did this woman know? And was she, acting
+on instinct, going to stay in that room until it
+would be too late for Lola to dress and keep her appointment
+“with one of our best known generals”?
+Never before had Lola hung so breathlessly on her
+aunt’s words.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Did <em>you</em> read these lines by any chance?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“No,” said Lola.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“I asked your father if there was anybody of the
+old name in France and he said he didn’t think so.
+He said he understood from his grandfather that the
+name would die with him. It had already become
+Breezy in England. Somehow or other, I think this
+is rather strange.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Oh, I don’t know,” said Lola. “You see these
+famous names are never allowed to die right out.
+This Madame de Brézé is probably an actress who is
+just using the name to suit herself. It has a good
+ring to it.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“That may be so, and it’s true that actresses help
+themselves to any name that takes their fancy. You,
+I remember, when you threatened to go into the
+chorus, talked about claiming relationship with
+Madame de Brézé.” And again she darted a sharp
+look at Lola.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“I have the right to do that,” said Lola quietly, but
+with a very rapid pulse.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Well, sometimes I go out of my way to satisfy a
+whim. It so happens that I have a friend in the detective
+department at Scotland Yard. I’ve asked him
+to keep his eye open for me and let me know what he
+finds out. As soon as he comes to me with any definite
+information, I’ll share it with you, Lola, you may be
+sure.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Oh, thank you, Auntie. That’s very kind of
+you.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">But being unable to force back a tide of color that
+swept slowly over her, Lola opened a drawer in the
+dressing table and began to put back the various implements
+that she had used upon her mistress and herself.
+To think of it! It was likely, then, that she
+was to be watched in future and that presently, perhaps,
+the story of her harmless adventures would become
+the property of her aunt and her parents, of
+Treadwell and Simpkins, and that the detective, whom
+she could picture with a toothbrush moustache and
+flat feet, would one day march into the rooms of
+General Sir Peter Chalfont and say to him, “Do
+you know that your friend Madame de Brézé is a
+lady’s maid in the employment of the wife of Mr.
+Fallaray?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">With the peculiar satisfaction of one who has succeeded
+in making some one else extraordinarily uncomfortable,
+Miss Breezy gathered herself together,
+scrambled out of the chair which might have belonged
+to a dentist and left the room like an elderly peahen
+who had done her duty by the world.</p>
+<p class="pnext">And then, having locked the door, Lola returned
+to the dressing table. “Detective or no detective, I
+shall dine at the Carlton to-night,” she said to herself.
+“You see if I don’t.”</p>
+</div>
+<div class="level-3 section" id="id26">
+<h3 class="level-3 pfirst section-title title">VI</h3>
+<p class="pfirst">“I want you to meet my sister, one day soon,” said
+Chalfont. “She’s a good sort. You’ll like her.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“I’m sure I shall,” said Lola. “Will she like <em>me</em>?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">Chalfont laughed and answered the question with a
+look of complete admiration. Who could help liking
+a girl so charming, so frank, so cool, whose love of
+life was so young and so peculiarly unspoilt? “You
+would do her good,” he said. “Her husband was
+killed a week before the armistice. She adored him
+and is a lonely soul. No children, and will never
+marry again. She’s looking after my place in Devonshire,
+buried alive. But I’ve persuaded her to come
+to London and hook on to things a bit and I’ll bring
+you together one day next week,—if you’re not going
+to disappear again. Are you?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">Lola shrugged her shoulders. “So far as I know
+at present, my plans will keep me in town until the end
+of June.” How could she be more definite than that?</p>
+<p class="pnext">So Chalfont had to be satisfied and hope for the
+best. It was not his habit to drive people into a corner
+and force confidences. He had told Lola where he
+was to be found and she had promised to keep in touch
+with him. That, at any rate, was good. “We haven’t
+decided where to go to-night,” he said. “Don’t you
+think we’d better make up our minds?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">Lola rose from the table. The pleasant dining room
+at the Carlton was still well-filled, and the band was
+playing one of those French things with an irresistible
+march time which carry the mind immediately to the
+Alcazar and conjure up a picture of an outdoor stage
+crowded with dancing figures seen through a trickle
+of cigarette smoke and gently moving branches of
+young leaves. “Don’t let’s make up our minds what
+we’ll do till we get to the very doors. Then probably
+one or other of us will have a brain wave. In any
+case I’m very happy. I’ve loved every minute of this
+evening and it’s so nice to be with you again.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">Chalfont touched her arm. He could not resist the
+temptation. “I’d sell my soul in return for a dozen
+such nights,” he said, and there was a Simpkins quiver
+in his voice and a Treadwell look of adoration in his
+eyes. He was in uniform, having later to return to
+the Guards encampment in Kensington Gardens. They
+passed through the almost empty lounge into the hall
+with its cases of discreet, ruinous jewelry on the walls
+under gleaming lights, and there a man in plain clothes
+drew himself up as Chalfont approached and clicked
+his heels.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Oh, hello, Ellingham,” said Chalfont. “How are
+you, my dear chap? Thought you were in India.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“I was, Sir. Got back yesterday. Curious place,
+London, by Jove.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">Chalfont turned to Lola. “Madame de Brézé, may
+I introduce my friend Colonel Ellingham?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">Those tall dark men with a touch of the Oriental in
+them somewhere—Lola caught her breath, but managed
+to smile and say the conventional thing.</p>
+<p class="pnext">But at the sound of her voice, the woman who had
+been standing with her back to them, talking to the
+obsequious <em>maître d’hôtel</em>, whirled round. It was
+Feo—Feo with her eyes wide and round and full of
+the most astonishing mischief and amusement—Feo
+with her mouth half open as though she were on the
+point of bursting into a huge laugh. Lola, that discreet
+little Lola, that little London mouse, niece of the
+stiff old Breezy, daughter of those little people in
+Queen’s Road, Bayswater, with a brigadier general, if
+you please, the famous Sir Peter Chalfont with a
+comic cork arm to catch whom every match-making
+mother had spread her net for years!</p>
+<p class="pnext">Without turning a hair, Lola held out her hand
+impulsively. “My dear,” she said in a ringing voice,
+“I thought you said that you were going to the Ritz.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">Her own words as she had left her dressing room
+came back into Feo’s mind. “You’re a jolly good
+sportsman, child.”—Well, although she could hardly
+believe her eyes and the incident opened up the
+widest range of incredulity, she would show this
+astonishing girl that there were other sportsmen about.
+“We went to the Ritz,” she replied, as though to one
+of her “gang,” “but it looked hideously depressing
+and so we came on here.” And she went forward and
+put her arm around Lola’s shoulder in her most affectionate
+way. How well her old frock came out on
+that charming figure. She suspected the shoes and
+stockings. “So this is what you do, Lola, when the
+cat’s away!”</p>
+<p class="pnext">And Lola laughed and said, “Oh, but doesn’t one
+deserve a little holiday from time to time?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Of course,—and you who are so devoted to good
+causes.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“The best of causes and the most beautiful.” Lola
+would return the ball until she dropped.</p>
+<p class="pnext">Feo knew this and had mercy, but there was an
+amazing glint in her eyes. The little monkey!</p>
+<p class="pnext">It was obvious to Lola that Feo had not met Chalfont
+or else that she had met him and was not on
+speaking terms. Either way how could she resist the
+chance that had been brought about by this extraordinary
+contretemps. So she said, “Lady Feo, may
+I introduce my old friend, Sir Peter Chalfont,—Lady
+Feodorowna Fallaray.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">It so happened that these two had not met,—although
+Feo’s was not the fault. It was that Chalfont
+disliked the lady and had gone deliberately out of his
+way to avoid her acquaintance. He bowed profoundly.—Lola,
+her name was Lola. What a dear
+little name.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“We’ve got a box at the Adelphi,” said Feo.
+“Berry’s funny and Grossmith’s always good. There’s
+room for four. Won’t you come?” What did she
+care at the moment whether this invitation made
+Ellingham’s eyes flick with anger or not. All this
+was too funny for words.—That little monkey!</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Thanks so much,” said Lola, with a slight drawl,
+“but it so happens that we’re going round to the
+House of Commons to hear a debate. Perhaps we can
+foregather some other night.” And she looked Feo
+full in the face, as cool as a fish.</p>
+<p class="pnext">It didn’t matter what was said after that. There
+was a murmur from the other three and a separation,
+Ellingham marching the laughing Feo away, Chalfont
+crossing over to the hatroom, greatly relieved. Lola,
+alone for a moment, stood in the middle of what
+seemed to be an ocean of carpet under hundreds of
+thousands of lights, with her heart playing ducks and
+drakes, but with a sense of thrill and exultation that
+were untranslatable. “What a sportsman,” she
+thought.—“But of course she noticed her stockings.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">And when Chalfont returned to her side he said,
+“I don’t like your knowing that woman. You seem
+frightfully pally. You didn’t tell me that she was a
+great friend of yours.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Well,” said Lola, “I haven’t told you very much
+of anything, have I? That’s because I like to hear
+you talk, I suppose.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“You draw me out,” said Chalfont apologetically.
+“But what’s all this about the House of Commons?
+First I’ve heard of it.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Oh, just an idea,” said Lola lightly. “Couldn’t
+you wangle it?” She had caught the word from him.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“I don’t know a blessed soul in that monkey shop,
+except Fallaray.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Who better?” asked Lola. “Let’s go round, send
+in your name and ask Mr. Fallaray for a card.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“My dear Lola—I beg your pardon, I mean, my
+dear Madame de Brézé—if you remember, Fallaray
+didn’t know me from Adam that night at the Savoy.
+I really don’t think I can push myself in like that, if
+you’ll forgive me. Let’s take a chance at the Gaiety.
+No one’s going to the theater just now. There’s sure
+to be plenty of room.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">By this time they were in the street, with a huge
+commissionaire waiting for a glance from Chalfont to
+bring up a taxi with his silver whistle. It was another
+lovely night, clear and warm and windless,—a
+night that would have been admirable for Zeppelins.
+Lola went over to the curb and looked up at all the
+stars and at the middle-aged moon. Think of that
+light so white and soft on the old gardens of Chilton
+Park.—“Don’t let’s go in to a fuggy building,” she
+said. “Let’s walk. London’s very beautiful at night.
+If you won’t take me to the House of Commons, at
+any rate walk as far as the Embankment. I want to
+see the river. I want to see the little light gleaming
+over Parliament. It’s just a whim.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Anything you say,” said Chalfont. What did it
+matter where they went, so long as they were together?
+Lola,—so that was her name.</p>
+</div>
+<div class="level-3 section" id="id27">
+<h3 class="level-3 pfirst section-title title">VII</h3>
+<p class="pfirst">They crossed to Trafalgar Square, the figure of
+Nelson silhouetted against the sky. They went down
+Northumberland Avenue to the Embankment and
+crossed the road to the river side. The tide was high
+but the old river was deserted and sullen. Westminster
+Bridge faced them, alive with little lights, and on
+the opposite bank the dark buildings ran along until
+they joined the more cheerful looking St. Thomas’s
+Hospital, whose every window was alight. Pre-war
+derelicts who were wont to clutter the numerous seats
+were back again in their old places, their dirty ranks
+swelled by members of the great new army of unemployed.
+Many of these had borne arms for England
+and wore service ribbons on their greasy waistcoats.
+Two or three of them, either from force of habit or
+in a spirit of irony and burlesque, sprang up as Chalfont
+approached and saluted. It threw a chill through
+his veins as they did so,—those gallant men who had
+come to such a pass. The House of Commons and the
+Victoria Tower loomed ahead of them.</p>
+<p class="pnext">To Chalfont, Parliament stood as a mere talking
+shop in which a number of uninspired egotists schemed
+and struggled in order to cling to office and salaries
+while the rest answered to the crack of the party whip
+and used whatever influence they had for self-advertisement,—commercializing
+the letters which they had
+bought the right to place against their names. He
+detested the place and the people it sheltered and regarded
+it as a great sham, a sepulchre of misplaced
+hopes and broken promises. But to Lola, who walked
+silently at his side, it symbolized the struggles of
+Fallaray, stood dignified and with a beautiful sky line
+as the building in which that man might some day take
+his place as the inspired leader of a bewildered and a
+patient country. And as she walked along on the
+pavement which had been worn by the passing of many
+feet, glancing from time to time at the water over
+which a pageant of history had passed, her heart
+swelled and her love seemed to throw a little white
+light round her head. Was it so absurd, so grotesque,
+that she should have in a sort of way grown up for and
+given herself to this man who had only seen her once
+and probably forgotten her existence? Sometimes it
+seemed to her not only to be absurd and grotesque but
+impudent,—she, the daughter of the Breezys of
+Queen’s Road, Bayswater, the maid who put waves
+into the wiry bobbed hair of an irresponsible lady of
+fashion, and who, from time to time, masqueraded in
+the great city under the name of a relative long since
+dead and forgotten. Nevertheless, a tiny figure at the
+side of Chalfont, her soul flowered at that moment
+and she knew that she would very willingly be burnt
+at the stake like Joan of Arc if, by so doing, she
+could rub away from Fallaray’s face even one or
+two of the lines of loneliness which life had put
+upon it.</p>
+<p class="pnext">Chalfont was silent, because he was wondering how
+far he dared to go with this girl who had talked about
+a “wee mystery” and who did not hold him in sufficient
+confidence to tell him where she lived or let him
+see her home. This was only the second time that he
+had met her and he asked himself with amazement
+whether it could be true that he was ready to sacrifice
+career, position and everything else for her sake.
+There were other women who had flitted across his
+line of vision and with whom he had passed the time.
+They had left him untouched, unmoved, a confirmed
+bachelor. But during the days that he had spent in an
+eager search for Lola he knew that this child had conquered
+him and brought him down with a crash. He
+didn’t give a single curse who she was, where she came
+from or what was this mystery to which she referred.
+He loved her. He wanted her, and he would go
+through fire and water to make her his wife. And
+having come to that conclusion, he broke the silence
+hitherto disturbed only by the odd wailing of machinery
+on the other side of the river and by the traffic passing
+over Westminster Bridge like fireflies. He put his
+hand under Lola’s elbow, stopped her and drew her to
+the stonework of the embankment. “In an hour or
+two,” he said, “I suppose you will disappear again
+and not give me another thought until you cry out,
+‘Horse, horse, play with me,’ and there isn’t a horse.
+I can’t let that happen.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">Instinct and the subconscious inheritance of a
+knowledge of men kept Lola from asking why not.
+The question would obviously provide Chalfont with a
+dangerous cue.</p>
+<p class="pnext">So Chalfont went on unhelped. He said, “Look
+here, let’s have all this out. I want you to marry me.
+I want you to be perfectly frank and treat me fairly.
+You’re a widow and you appear to be alone. I don’t
+want to force your hand or ask you to haul down your
+fourth wall. Nor do I hope that you will care more
+about me than any girl after two meetings. I just
+want to know this. Are there any complications? Is
+there anything in the way of my seeing you day after
+day and doing my utmost to show you that I love you
+more than anything on earth?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">Simpkins, Treadwell, Chalfont. But where, oh,
+where was Fallaray?</p>
+<p class="pnext">Lola didn’t know what to say. What was there
+in her that did these things to men? She looked up
+into Chalfont’s face and shook her head. “You’re a
+knight,” she said. “You stand in silver armor with
+a crusader’s cross on your chest. You came to my
+rescue and proved that there are good men in this
+world. You have made an everlasting friend of me
+but,—I love some one else. Oh, Sir Peter Chalfont,
+I love some one else. He doesn’t know it. He may
+never know it. I may never see him again. I may
+die of love like a field daisy put in a dry vase, but when
+I cross the Bridge I shall wait until he comes, loving
+him still.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">Leaning on the parapet side by side they watched the
+waters go by, dark and solemn, undisturbed even by the
+passing of a barge, licking the stonework away below.
+And as they stood there, moved to great emotion, Big
+Ben sang the hour. It was ten o’clock. On a seat
+behind them four men were grouped in attitudes of
+depression,—hungry, angry. A little way to their
+right stood that place in which the so-called leaders sat
+up to their necks in the problems of the world, impotent,
+bewildered.</p>
+<p class="pnext">And finally Chalfont said, “I see. Well, I wish
+you luck, little Lola, and I congratulate you on loving
+like that. Oddly enough, we both love like that. I
+wish to God——”</p>
+<p class="pnext">And as Lola moved away she put her hand through
+his arm as a sister might have done, which was better
+than nothing; and they walked back along that avenue
+of broken men, that street of weary feet, up Northumberland
+Avenue and back into the lights and the
+whirl. “I think I’ll leave you now,” said Lola.
+“There’s a cold hand on my heart. I want to be
+alone.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">And so, without a word, Chalfont hailed a passing
+taxi, opened the door, handed Lola in, and stood back,
+very erect, very simple, with his cork arm most uncomic.
+And before the cab started he flung up his left
+hand to the peak of his cap, not as though saluting a
+company of boy scouts or a queen, but the woman he
+loved, the woman he would always love, the woman for
+whom he would wait on the other side of the Bridge.</p>
+<p class="pnext">And all the way to Dover Street Lola wept.</p>
+</div>
+<div class="level-3 section" id="id28">
+<h3 class="level-3 pfirst section-title title">VIII</h3>
+<p class="pfirst">In the servants’ sitting room Simpkins was sitting
+alone, not reading, not smoking; thinking of Lola and
+of the inn at Wargrave which had become so detestable,—a
+dead ambition, the ghost of a dream. And
+when the door opened and Lola let herself in, tear-stained,
+he sprang to his feet, gazing in amazement.
+Lola—dressed like a lady—crying.—But she held
+up her hand, went swiftly across the room and out,
+upstairs. She was back an hour and a half too soon.
+There was no need for Ellen to slip down and open
+the door. The evening had been a dismal failure. It
+would be a long time before she would play Cinderella
+again,—although the Prince loved her and had told
+her so.</p>
+<p class="pnext">But instead of going through the door which led
+to the servants’ quarters, she stood for a moment in
+the corridor through which Simpkins had taken her
+when she had first become an inmate of that house and
+once more she stayed there against the tapestry with a
+cold hand on her heart. Simpkins loved her. Treadwell
+loved her. Chalfont loved her, but oh, where
+was Fallaray? What a little fool she had been ever
+to suppose, in her wildest dreams, that Fallaray, Fallaray
+would see her and stop to speak, set alight by the
+love in her eyes! What a silly little fool.</p>
+<p class="pnext">A door opened and Fallaray came out,—his shoulders
+rounded, his Savonarola face pale and lined with
+sleeplessness. At the sight of the charming little
+figure in evening dress he drew up. Mrs. Malwood
+perhaps, or another of Feo’s friends. She was entertaining
+again, of course.</p>
+<p class="pnext">And Lola trembled like a frightened bird, with great
+tears welling from her eyes.</p>
+<p class="pnext">Fallaray was puzzled. This child did not look like
+one of Feo’s friends,—and why was she crying? He
+knew the face, he remembered those wide-apart eyes.
+They had followed him into his work, into his dreams,—de
+Brézé, de Brézé,—the Savoy, the Concert.</p>
+<p class="pnext">He held out his hand. “Madame de Brézé,” he
+said, “what have they done to you?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">And she shook her head again, trembling violently.</p>
+<p class="pnext">And Fallaray, with the old curious tingle running
+through his veins, was helpless. If she wouldn’t tell
+him what was the matter, what was he to do? He
+imagined that some flippancy or some sarcasm had
+wounded this astonishing girl and she had fled from
+the drawing-room and lost her way. But women were
+unknown to him, utter strangers, and he was called to
+work. He said, “My wife’s room is there,” stood
+irresolute for a moment, although his brain was filled
+with the songs of birds, and bowed and went away.</p>
+<p class="pnext">And when Lola heard the street door close, she
+moved like a bird shot through the wings, fumbled her
+way to the passage which led to her servant’s bedroom
+and flung herself face downwards upon her bed. What
+was it in her that did these things to every man,—except
+Fallaray?</p>
+</div>
+</div>
+<div class="level-2 section" id="part-vi">
+<h2 class="level-2 pfirst section-title title"><a class="toc-backref pginternal" href="#id59">PART VI</a></h2>
+<div class="level-3 section" id="id29">
+<h3 class="level-3 pfirst section-title title">I</h3>
+<p class="pfirst">To Ellingham’s entire satisfaction, Feo did not sit
+out the performance at the Adelphi. She left in the
+middle of the second act. It was not a piece demanding
+any sort of concentration. That was not its
+métier. It was one of those rather pleasant, loosely
+made things, bordering here and there on burlesque, in
+which several comedians have been allotted gaps to fill
+between songs which, repeated again and again, give
+a large chorus of pretty girls an opportunity of wearing
+no dress longer than five minutes or lower than the
+knees. But Feo’s mind was wandering. The last
+twenty-four hours had been filled with disappointment.
+She agreed with the adage that if you can’t make a
+mistake you can’t make anything. But this last one,
+which had taken the Macquarie person into her circle
+of light, proved to her that she was losing not only
+her sense of perspective but her sense of humor. It
+rankled; and it continued to rankle all through the
+jokes and songs and horseplay of the company behind
+the footlights that Saturday night.</p>
+<p class="pnext">Then, too, she found herself becoming more and
+more disappointed in Ellingham. He had aged. Still
+just on the right side of forty, he seemed to her to
+have had all the youth knocked out of him. His
+resilience had gone—sapped by the War—and with
+it his danger, which had been so attractive. He was
+now a quiet, repressed, responsible, dull—yes, dull,—man; in a sort of way the father of a family. When
+he talked it was about his regiment in India, his
+officers, his quartermaster sergeant, the health of his
+men, the ugly look of things in the East. All this made
+it seem to Feo that Beetle Ellingham had pulled away
+from her, left her behind. She was still fooling, while
+he, once as irresponsible as herself and almost as mad,
+had found his feet and was standing firmly upon them.
+Disappointment, disappointment.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“What to do?” she asked, as they got into a taxicab.
+She rather hoped that he would say “Nothing.
+I’ll see you home and say good night.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">But he didn’t. “I’ll drive you home and talk for an
+hour, if you can stand such a thing. I’m going to see
+my old people in Leicestershire to-morrow, and I don’t
+suppose I shall be back in town for a month or two.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">She told him to make it Dover Street, and he did so,
+and there was silence until the cab drew up at the door
+of the house in which the man—whom she had for
+the first time seriously considered as the new Messiah—burnt
+himself up in the endeavor to find some
+solution to all the troubles of his country, and, like a
+squirrel in a cage, ran round and round and round.</p>
+<p class="pnext">Feo let herself in and led the way to what she called
+her den,—a long, low-ceilinged room, self-consciously
+decorated in what purported to be a futuristic manner,
+the effect of which, as though it had been designed by
+an untrained artist striving to disguise his ignorance
+behind a chaos of the grotesque, made sanity stagger.
+And here, full stretch on an octagonal divan, she
+mounted a cigarette in her long green holder and commenced
+to inhale hungrily.</p>
+<p class="pnext">Hating the room and all its fake, Ellingham, who
+more than ever justified the nickname of Beetle which
+had been given to him at Eton because of his over-hanging
+black eyebrows, prowled up and down with his
+hands in his pockets. He, too, was disappointed. It
+seemed to him that Feo had remained the hoyden, the
+overgrown, long-legged girl with boy’s shoulders and
+the sort of sex illusiveness which had so greatly attracted
+him in the old days, and had set him to work
+to eliminate and replace. But now she was thirty
+something, and although he hated to use the expression
+about her of all women, he told himself that she was
+mutton playing lamb, and a futile lamb at that. Perhaps
+it was because he had been all the way through
+the War and had come out with a series of unforgettable
+pictures stamped upon his brain that he had expected
+to find some sort of emergement on the part of
+Feo, who, although she had been spared the blood and
+muck of Flanders, was the sister of a flying man, the
+relation of innumerable gallant fellows who had been
+made the gun fodder of that easily preventable orgy,
+and the friend of many a young soldier whose bones
+now lay under the shallow surface of French earth.
+So far as she was concerned, he could see that the War
+might never have happened at all. It made him rather
+sick. Nevertheless he had loved her violently and had
+never married because of his remembrance of her and
+he wanted to find out how she stood. He was entirely
+in the dark. He had not been alone with her once
+since the end of July, 1914,—a night on the terrace
+of a house overlooking the Thames at Cookham, when
+all the world already knew that slaughter was in the
+air and the wings of the angel of death rustled overhead.</p>
+<p class="pnext">He stopped in front of her, all stretched out among
+cushions, her short and pleated frock making her
+appear to be in a kilt. “Well, how about it?” he
+asked.</p>
+<p class="pnext">And she shrugged her shoulders and tossed the ash
+of her cigarette at a small marble pot. “I dunno,”
+she said. “Pretty badly, one way and another.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“How’s that?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Oh, I dunno,” she said again. “One gets nowhere
+and does really nothing and spends one’s life looking
+for something that never turns up,—the glamour of
+the impossible. Disappointment, disappointment.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“H’m,” said Beetle. “Is there no chance of your
+getting on better with Fallaray? He seems to be the
+only live creature in politics, the one honest man.” He
+had never imagined that he would ever have put that
+question to her.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“That’s true,” said Feo. “He is. I have nothing
+but admiration for Edmund,—except dislike. Profiles
+and tennis are no longer my hobbies and there is
+no more hope of our getting on, as you call it, than of
+my becoming an earnest worker among the slums.
+Once Feo, always Feo, y’know. That’s the sentence I
+labor under, Beetle. As a rule, I’m perfectly satisfied
+and have no grumbles. I rot about and play the giddy
+ox, wear absurd clothes, do my best to give a jar to
+what remains of British smugdom and put in a good-enough
+time. You mustn’t judge me as you find me
+to-night. I have the megrims. Ghosts are walking
+and I’m out of form. To put it truthfully, I’m rather
+ashamed of myself. I’ve become a little too careless.
+I must relearn the art of drawing the line. That’s all.
+But, for the Lord’s sake, don’t let me depress <em>you</em>,—that
+is, if I have any longer the power of doing
+so.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">She hadn’t, he found, and it hurt. In the old days
+he would have said so and in a sort of way got even
+with her for turning him down and marrying Fallaray.
+He would have taken a certain amount of joy in hitting
+her as hard as he could. But he had altered. He was
+not the old Beetle, the violent, hot-tempered, rather
+cruel individualist. Men had died at his side,—officers
+and Tommies. And so his days of hurting
+women were over. He was rather a gentle Beetle
+now. Curious how things shaped themselves. And
+so he prowled up and down with his hands in his
+pockets, inarticulate, out of touch,—like a doctor in a
+lunatic asylum, or an Oxford man revisiting the scenes
+of his giddy youth in his very old age.</p>
+<p class="pnext">And Feo continued to smoke,—smarting. Not
+because she cared for Beetle or had ever given him a
+thought. But because everything was edgeways, like
+a picture puzzle that had fallen in a heap. She would
+have given a great deal to have had this man take his
+hands out of his pockets and stop prowling and become
+the old violent Beetle once again. She would have
+liked to have heard him curse Fallaray and accuse her
+of being a rotter. She would have liked to have seen
+the old hot look in his eyes and been compelled to laugh
+him off, using her old flippant words. Anything,—anything
+but the thing that was.</p>
+<p class="pnext">But even as he prowled—up round the wispy
+table and down in front of that damn-fool altar, or
+whatever it was—he became more and more the ancient
+friend, distantly related, who had little to talk
+about and little that he cared to hear. Once more he
+went over all the old India stuff, the regiment, the
+officers and men, their health, the underlying unrest
+of the East. Then he jerked, as a sudden glorious
+new thought, to his people and the place they lived
+in, but all the same this unsatisfactory reunion lasted
+twenty minutes less than the given hour.</p>
+<p class="pnext">Suddenly Ellingham stopped walking and stood in
+front of Feo and said, “Good-by. I don’t suppose
+I shall see you again.” And wheeled off and went,
+quickly, with relief.</p>
+<p class="pnext">And when Feo heard the front door bang, she remained
+where she was lying until the hour was fulfilled,
+with the hand that he had shaken all stiff, and
+with two tears running slowly down her face.</p>
+<p class="pnext">Disappointment.—Disappointment.</p>
+</div>
+<div class="level-3 section" id="id30">
+<h3 class="level-3 pfirst section-title title">II</h3>
+<p class="pfirst">Lola woke early and went to the window and pulled
+up the blind. The sun was shining and half a dozen
+London sparrows were chirping and hopping about
+in the back yard of one of the houses in Bond Street.
+One poor anæmic tree stood in the middle of it, and
+an optimist, condemned to live in the city, had worked
+on the small patch of earth and made a little garden
+where cats met at night and sang duets and swore, and
+talked over all the feline gossip of the neighborhood,
+fighting from time to time to keep their claws in, to
+the cruel derangement of the bed of geraniums, which
+looked that morning as though the Germans had passed
+over it.</p>
+<p class="pnext">All Lola’s dreams during the night had been filled
+with tragedies, but the effect of the one that was upon
+her still was that she had died, withered up, after
+having been left by Fallaray in the corridor where she
+had been caught by him in tears,—unable, because, for
+some reason, there had been a cold hand on her heart,
+to jump at the great and wonderful opportunity that
+had come to her and which she had worked so long
+to achieve. And in this last just waking dream, the
+reality of which still left her awed, she had stood, bewildered,
+on the unfamiliar side of a short wide bridge,
+to be faced suddenly by a scoffing and sarcastic woman
+who had taunted her for her impotence and lack of
+grit and called her middle class, without cunning and
+without the necessary strength to be unscrupulous, so
+vital to success.</p>
+<p class="pnext">And as she stood facing a new day with these words
+ringing in her ears, she told herself that she ought to
+have died, that she deserved death, for having lost her
+nerve and her courage. She accepted the biting criticism
+of the successful de Brézé and offered no
+excuses. This was far too big a thing to win by a
+series of easy steps. And up to that time they all had
+been easy and had led actually to Fallaray. Everything
+seemed to have played into her hands and it was
+she, Lola, who had failed. If she had possessed even
+half the cunning of which the de Brézé had spoken,
+with what avidity and delight she must have seized
+her opportunity when Fallaray had come suddenly
+upon her. But she had proved herself to be witless
+and without daring, a girl who had played at being a
+courtesan in a back room, who had sentiment and
+sympathy and emotion and whose heart, instead
+of being altogether set on the golden cage, had
+become soft with love and hero worship and
+the delay of hope,—just Lola Breezy, the watchmaker’s
+daughter, the little Queen’s Road girl
+suffering from the reaction of having set alight unwillingly
+all the wrong men, stirring, finally, her
+friend Chalfont, who had been so kind and good.
+So that when Fallaray had come to her at last, remembering
+her name, she had let him go unstirred, without
+an effort, because she was thinking of him and not of
+herself and her love and the passionate desire of her
+life. Yes, she deserved to be dead, because her courage
+had oozed out of her finger tips and left her
+trembling.</p>
+<p class="pnext">But what was she to do now? Give up? Devote
+herself to lady’s maiding and develop into an Ellen, or
+resign from this position and return home to help her
+mother in the shop and dwindle into love-sickness?
+Give up and shake herself back to a normal frame of
+mind in which, some day, she would walk to chapel
+with Ernest Treadwell,—or go to Chalfont and tell
+him the truth and put his love to the test? Or, refusing
+to own herself a weakling, a dreamer and a
+failure, begin all over again, this time with as much
+of cunning as she could find in her nature and all the
+disturbing influence of that too well-proved gift?
+Which?</p>
+<p class="pnext">And the answer came in a woman’s voice, ringing
+and strong. “Go on, go on, de Brézé. Begin all over
+again. You were born to be a canary, with the need of
+a golden cage. You inherit the courtesan nature; you
+must let it have its way. As such there’s a man you
+can rescue, lonely and starved of love. It is not as
+wife that he needs you, but as one with the rustle of
+silk——”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“I will go on,” said Lola. “I will begin again.”
+And with a high head once more and renewed hope
+and eagerness and courage, she set her brain to work.
+All the rungs of the ladder were without the marks of
+her feet. But she waved her hand to the pathetic patch
+of miniature garden with its anæmic city tree, caught
+its optimism and began to think. Where was she to
+begin?</p>
+<p class="pnext">Into her mind came some of the gossip of the servants’
+sitting room, to which as a rule she paid no
+attention. Ellen had given out that Simpkins had said
+that he was to have time off from the following Friday
+to Tuesday because Mr. Fallaray had made his plans
+to go down alone to Chilton Park for a short holiday.
+To Chilton Park for a short holiday! Ah! Here was
+a line to be followed up. Here was something which
+might enable her to pick up the thread again.</p>
+<p class="pnext">She began to walk up and down her little room, in
+a nightgown which certainly did not belong to a
+courtesan, repeating to herself again and again “Chilton
+Park, Chilton Park,” worrying the thing out like
+a schoolgirl with a difficult lesson. By some means,
+by hook or by crook, she also must get to Chilton Park
+during that time; that was certain, even if she had to
+ask Lady Feo to let her give up her position as lady’s
+maid. But following this thought came another, instantly,—that
+she would regret above all things to
+put her mistress to inconvenience, because she was
+grateful for many kindnesses and maids were scarce.
+And she was glad that the de Brézé could not hear her
+think and call out “weakness, weakness.” How to get
+there? How to be somewhere in the neighborhood so
+that she might be able to slip one night into the garden
+to be seen by Fallaray, and then, for the first time,
+prove to herself and to him that she was not any
+longer the Lola Breezy of Queen’s Road, Bayswater,
+the little middle-class girl, timid and afraid, but the
+reincarnation of her famous ancestress, as she had
+always supposed herself to be, and had played at being
+so often, and had tried to be during her brief escapes
+into life.</p>
+<div class="figure">
+<div class="align-center container image-wrapper">
+<img alt="images/illus-076.jpg" src="images/illus-076.jpg"/>
+</div>
+<div class="caption">
+A SCENE FROM THE PHOTOPLAY.</div>
+</div>
+<p class="pfirst">How?—How?</p>
+<p class="pnext">She might, of course, ask Lady Feo for a week’s
+leave—a large order—go to Whitecross and engage
+a room at the little inn that she had noticed at the
+corner of the road at the top of the hill. But what
+would be the use of that? How could she play
+Madame de Brézé in such a place, with one evening
+frock and her own plain everyday dress with two
+undistinguished hats and a piece of luggage that yelled
+of Queen’s Road, Bayswater? It was absurd, impossible.
+Brick wall number one. And so she tackled the
+task grimly, thinking hard, swinging from one possibility
+to another, but with no better luck. Everything
+came back to the fact that all her savings amounted to
+no more than ten pounds. How could she go forward,
+unaided, on that? And then in a flash she saw herself
+at the house in Kensington Gore with Chalfont and
+remembered the words of Lady Cheyne, who, in asking
+her to come down to her little place in the country, had
+said that the garden ran down to Chilton Park. It
+had been pigeonholed in her brain and she had found
+it! And with a little cry of delight she pounced upon
+it like a desert wanderer on water.</p>
+<p class="pnext">Lady Cheyne,—that kindly soul who was never so
+happy as when giving a hand to a stray dog. It might
+easily happen, the weather being so good, that she had
+already left town. That would be wonderful. But if
+not, if she were still busy with her musicians and their
+concerts, then she must be seen and influenced to leave
+town, or, better still, called up on the telephone at once.
+A tired little woman of the world needed a breath of
+fresh air and the peace of a country garden. Would
+Lady Cheyne take mercy on her, as she took mercy on
+so many people, and give her this peace and this
+quietude?—Yes, that was the way. It was a brain
+wave.</p>
+<p class="pnext">Filled with determination no longer to wait for an
+opportunity, but to make one, not to rely on fate, as
+she had been doing, but to treat fate as though it were
+something alive, a man—Simpkins, Treadwell or
+Chalfont—and cajole him, Lola proceeded to dress,
+with the blood tingling in her veins, and imbued with
+the feeling of one who faces a forlorn hope. But it
+was still too early to use the telephone to the elderly
+lady who, if she were in town, had probably listened
+to music into the small hours. She must wait and go
+on thinking. There were other things to overcome,
+even if this one came right. How to wheedle a holiday;
+to hint, if she dared, at her lack of clothes, a suit-case,
+shoes.</p>
+<p class="pnext">The servants’ sitting room was empty. On Sunday,
+the ménage, except for the cook, slept late. And so
+Lola marked time impatiently, achieving breakfast
+from the sulky woman by flattery. Lady Feo had
+given out that she was not to be disturbed until her
+bell rang. She would wake to find Sunday in London,—a
+detestable idea. There was nothing for
+which to get up.</p>
+<p class="pnext">Watching a clock that teased her with its sloth, Lola
+went over and over the sort of thing to say to Lady
+Cheyne, disturbed in her current of thought by the
+suddenly garrulous cook who insisted on telling the
+whole story of her life, during the course of which she
+had buried a drunkard and married a bigamist and lost
+her savings and acquired asthma,—a dramatic career,
+even for a cook. But at nine-thirty, unable to control
+herself any longer, she ran upstairs to Feo’s alarming
+den, hunted out Lady Cheyne’s number in the book
+and eventually got into communication with an operator
+who might, from her autocratic manner, very easily
+have been Mrs. Trotsky, or the wife of a labor leader,
+or a coal-miner’s daughter, or indeed a telephone
+operator of the most approved type.</p>
+<p class="pnext">A sleepy and rather irritable voice said, “Well?—but
+isn’t it a little early to ring any one up and on a
+Sunday morning too?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">Lola made a wry face. That was not a good beginning.
+And then, in her sweetest voice, “Am I
+speaking to dear Lady Cheyne?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Yes, it’s Fanny Cheyne, lying in bed with this
+diabolical instrument on her chest, but not feeling very
+dear, my dear, whoever you are, and I don’t know your
+voice.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“It’s Madame de Brèzè and I’m so very sorry to
+disturb you.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Why did you then, if I may say so,—de Brézé.
+I’m sorry too, but really I hear so many names, just as
+odd.—If it’s about being photographed, please no.
+I’m far too fat. Or if it’s about a subscription for the
+starving children of Cochin China, I have too many
+starving children of my own.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">Quick, de Brézé, quick, before the good old lady
+cuts off.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“The Savoy, the little widow, Sir Peter Chalfont,
+your wonderful house so full of genius, and what do
+you do, my dear.—Don’t you remember, dear Lady
+Cheyne?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Oh,—let me think now.” (The tone was
+brighter, interest was awakening! Good for you, de
+Brézé.) “My dear Peter with the comic-tragic leg—no,
+arm—the Savoy——”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“You were with Alton Cartridge and the disinfected
+Russian violinist, and you betted on my being French
+and invited me to Whitecross and when I went up to
+powder my nose——”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“You never came back! Golden hair like butter-cups,
+wide-apart eyes and fluttering nostrils, a mouth
+designed for kissing and all about you the rattle of
+sex. You dear thing! How sweet of you to ring
+me up and on a Sunday too. Where on earth did
+you go?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">Go on, de Brézé, go on! A little mystery, a touch of
+sadness, a hint of special confidence, flattery, flattery.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Ah, if only I could see you. I dare not explain
+that sudden disappearance over the telephone,—which
+must have seemed so rude. You are the only woman
+in all the world who could keep an amazing secret and
+advise a troubled woman in a tangle of romance——”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Secret, romance—who but Poppy for that!”</p>
+<p class="pnext">It worked, it worked! Lola could <em>see</em> the kind little
+lady struggle into a sitting posture, alert and keen, her
+vanity touched. Go on, de Brézé, go on.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Ever since then I’ve been thinking of you, dear
+Lady Cheyne, and, at last, this morning, on the spur of
+the moment, longing for help, driven into a corner,
+remembering your kind invitation to Whitecross——”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“My dear, you excite me and I adore excitement.
+Of course you must see me, at once. But to-day’s impossible.
+I’ve a thousand things to do. And to-morrow—let
+me see now. How can I fit you in?
+Probably you don’t want to be seen at my house or the
+Savoy, you mysterious thing. So what can we arrange?
+I know. I have it. Quite French and appropriate.
+Meet me on the sly at a place where no
+one ever would dream of our being. Mrs. Rumbold’s,
+a jobbing dressmaker. I’m going to see her to-morrow
+to alter some clothes. Castleton Terrace, Bayswater,
+22. She used to work for me. A poor half-starved
+soul, but so useful. Half-past eleven. And
+we’ll arrange for a week-end at my place, perhaps, or
+elsewhere, wherever you like.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Oh, Whitecross, Whitecross,—it sounds so right.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“And, it is so right,—romance in every rose bowl.
+To-morrow then, and I shall love to see you, my dear,
+and thank you for thinking of Poppy. I’m so excited.
+Good-by.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Good-by, dearest Lady Cheyne,—a thousand
+thanks.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">Well played, de Brézé. That’s the way to do it.
+Keep on like that and prove your grit, my dear.</p>
+<p class="pnext">And presently for Lady Feo, who would certainly
+have something to say about the Carlton episode, and
+if all went well the frocks, the hats, the shoes,—but
+nothing yet about the holiday. That must wait until
+after the interview at Mrs. Rumbold’s to-morrow.</p>
+</div>
+<div class="level-3 section" id="id31">
+<h3 class="level-3 pfirst section-title title">III</h3>
+<p class="pfirst">After all, then, Feo was to spend a dull and dreary
+Sunday in London; but she had slept endlessly, hour
+after hour, and when at last she woke at twelve o’clock,
+the sun was pouring into her room. Wonder of wonders,
+there was nothing dull about this Sunday! London
+lay under an utterly blue sky and those of its
+people who had not fled from its streets to the country,
+afraid of its dreariness, were out, finding unexpected
+touches of beauty in their old city and a lull of traffic
+that was restful.</p>
+<p class="pnext">The sight of Lola as she came into the room in the
+discreet garments of her servitude brought instant
+laughter back to Feo’s lips. Only a few hours ago she
+had been claimed as an intimate friend by the girl, with
+all the confidence and aplomb of a member of the
+enclosure. How perfectly delightful. She took her
+cup of tea and sat up in bed, forgetting everything
+except the backwash of her great amusement. Madame
+de Brézé.—By Jove, those quiet ones,—they knew
+their way about. When she had been undressed the
+night before, Feo had been in no mood to chaff her
+maid, then a mere human machine, about her general
+and her escapade. Depression, disappointment and
+humiliation had driven the Carlton incident out of the
+way. But now the sun was shining again and she had
+slept in a great chunk. What did Gilbert Macquarie
+count in the scheme of things now, or, for the matter
+of that, Ellingham? She thanked all her gods that
+she possessed the gift of quick recovery.</p>
+<p class="pnext">And now to pull the little devil’s leg. “Oh, hello,
+old girl,” she said, carrying on her attitude of the
+previous night, “how awfully nice of you to bring me
+my tea.” She expected utter embarrassment and confusion,
+and certainly an apology. Good Lord, the girl
+had pinched those stockings!</p>
+<p class="pnext">But the answer was quiet and perfectly natural.
+“That’s all right, Feo. Only too glad.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">After the first gasp of surprise there was a loud
+guffaw. Nothing in this world was more pleasing to
+Feo than the unexpected. “Sunday in London! But
+this is as good and a jolly sight better than Saturday
+night at the Adelphi. Bravo, Lola. The bitter bit.
+Keep it up. I love it.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">And with her black hair all tousled, her greenish
+eyes dancing with amusement, her large mouth wide
+open and the collar of her black silk pajamas gaping,
+she stirred her tea and waited for the fun.</p>
+<p class="pnext">And seeing that her mistress was all for laughing
+and that she had hit the right note, Lola kept it up.
+Witless and without daring, eh? Well, wait and see.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“I rather wish we’d gone on with you to the theater,”
+she said, lighting a cigarette and sitting on the
+arm of a chair in a Georgie Malwood pose. “It might
+have amused you to see something of Peter Chalfont,
+who has refused to join the gang.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">Feo was amazed at the perfection of what was, of
+course, an imitation of herself. Breezy’s niece was a
+very dark horse, it seemed.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“But where the deuce did you pick him up?” she
+asked, continuing the game.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Oh, my dear, I’ve known him for years. He was
+an old pal of the man I married in my teens and was
+always hanging about the place. I call him the White
+Knight because he has such a charming way of rescuing
+women in distress. If you’re keen about getting
+to know him, I’ll work it for you, with all the pleasure
+in life.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">Back went that black head with hair like a young
+Hawaiian. Oh, but this was immense. A lady’s maid
+and a bedside jester, rolled into one. And how inimitably
+the girl had caught her intonation and manner
+of expression. A born actress, that was what she
+was.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Don’t bother about me. What are you going to
+do with him? That’s what I want to know.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">Lola shrugged her shoulders. “Oh, I dunno,” she
+said, with a lifelike Feo drawl. “What can I do with
+him? Only trail him round.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Marry him, of course. That man’s a catch, you
+fool. Stacks of money, three show places in the
+country, a title as old as Rufus, and only one hand to
+hit you with.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“But I’m not marrying,” said Lola.</p>
+<p class="pnext">And that was too much for Feo. She threw the
+clothes back and kicked up her heels like a schoolgirl.
+But before she could congratulate her lady’s maid on a
+delightful bit of acting and an egregious piece of impertinence
+that was worth all the Sundays in London
+to watch, the telephone bell rang and brought her back
+to facts.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Just see who that is, will you? And before you
+say I’m here, find out who it is.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Yes, my lady,” said Lola. The little game was
+over. It hadn’t lasted long. But if it had put her
+ladyship into a generous mood——</p>
+<p class="pnext">It was Mrs. Winchfield, calling up from Aylesbury.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Oh, well,” said Feo, with the remembrance of great
+dullness. “Give me the ’phone and get my bath ready.
+And tell them to let me have lots of breakfast in half
+an hour, here. I could eat a horse.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Very good, my lady.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">And when Lola returned, having carried out her
+orders and still tingling with the triumph of having
+proved her courage and her wit, she found Lady Feo
+lying in the middle of the room, on her back, doing
+exercises. “All the dullards have left the Winchfields’,”
+she said. “There’s to be a pucca man there
+this afternoon, one I’ve had my eye on for weeks.
+Quick’s the word, Lola. Get me dressed and into the
+car. This is Sunday and I’m in London. It’s perfectly
+absurd. I shall stay the night, of course, and I
+shan’t want you till to-morrow at six. What’ll you do?
+Lunch at the Carlton?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“I shall go home, my lady.” But the twinkle returned.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Oh, yes, of course. I spoilt your holiday, didn’t
+I? By the way, does your mother know that you’re
+in society now?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">And Lola replied, “The bath is ready, my lady.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">And once more Feo laughed, lit a cigarette and went
+towards the bathroom. Here she turned and looked at
+the now mouse-like Lola with a peculiarly mischievous
+glint in her eyes. “Wouldn’t it be a frightful spree if
+I went after Peter Chalfont and told him all I know
+about you?” Two minutes later she was singing in
+the bath.</p>
+<p class="pnext">Tell Peter Chalfont!—But Lola knew that this was
+an empty threat. Mr. Fallaray’s wife was a sportsman.
+<em>Mr. Fallaray’s wife</em>.</p>
+<p class="pnext">For the first time in all this business, these words
+stood out in ghastly clearness, with all that they meant
+to Lady Feo and her, who was “after” Mr. Fallaray.
+Was she, Lola, a sportsman too? The question came
+suddenly, like a bomb dropped from a Zeppelin, and
+drew the girl up short. But the answer followed
+quickly and it was Yes, yes, because this woman was
+<em>not</em> Fallaray’s wife and never had been.</p>
+<p class="pnext">But there was more than a little irony in the fact
+that she liked Lady Feo, was grateful to her, had seen
+many of her best points and so far as the Carlton
+episode went, recognized in her a most unusual creature,
+imbued with a spirit of mischief which was almost
+like that of a child. And yet for all that, she <em>was</em>
+Fallaray’s wife.—It was more than conceivable, as
+Lola could guess, that if the whole story were confided
+in detail, with the de Brézé background all brought out,
+Lady Feo would first of all laugh and then probably
+help her little lady’s maid for the fun of the thing, and
+to be able, impishly, one night when she met Fallaray
+coming back from the House worn and round-shouldered,
+to stand in front of him, jumping to conclusions,
+and say, “Ha, ha! Sooner or later you <em>all</em> come off
+your pedestal, don’t you? But look out, Master Messiah.
+If the world spots you in the first of your
+human games, pop goes the weasel, and you may as
+well take to growing roses.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">Still singing, and back again in the highest
+spirits, Feo breakfasted in her room and Lola dressed
+her for the country. Not once but many times during
+the hour that followed she endeavored to pump Lola
+about Chalfont and as to the number of times that she
+had gone out into “life.” But Lola was a match for
+her and evaded all questions; sometimes with a perfectly
+straight face, sometimes with an answering
+twinkle in her eye. Although she was piqued by the
+girl’s continued elusiveness, Feo was filled with admiration
+at her extraordinary self-control,—a thing that
+she respected, being without it herself. And then
+Lola, with a little sigh, and as though drawn at last,
+got to <em>her</em> point in this strange and intimate talk. “I’m
+afraid I shall never be able to see Sir Peter again,” she
+said sadly. “I have only one evening frock and he
+has seen it twice.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">At which Feo went to her wardrobe, flung open the
+doors, took down dress after dress, threw them on
+her bed and said, “Take your choice. Of course, you
+can’t always wear the same old frock. Sir Galahad
+has a quick eye. Take what stockings you need also
+and help yourself to my shoes. There are plenty more
+where these came from,—you little devil. If you
+catch that man, and I shan’t be a bit surprised if you
+do, you will have done something that nearly every
+girl in society has taken a shot at during the last five
+years. I make one bargain with you, Lola, in return
+for these things. Spend your honeymoon at Chilton
+Park and let me present you at Court.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">An icy hand had touched her heart again. A honeymoon
+at Chilton Park,—with Chalfont.</p>
+</div>
+<div class="level-3 section" id="id32">
+<h3 class="level-3 pfirst section-title title">IV</h3>
+<p class="pfirst">And so Lola was free to go home again and spend
+the remainder of Sunday with her people, after all.
+But when, having tidied up and dressed herself, she
+ran downstairs into the servants’ sitting room on her
+way to the area steps, there sat Simpkins, a crestfallen
+and tragic figure, looking at a horizon which no longer
+contained the outline of his dream upon the banks of
+the Thames. He got up as Lola entered,—done for,
+but in the spirit of a protector, a Cromwellian spirit.
+“Where ’ad you bin last night?” he asked, “in them
+clothes?” He had not slept for thinking of it. His
+Lola, dressed like a lady, coming in with a tear-stained
+face, late at night, alone, from a devouring world. All
+his early chapel stuff had been revived at the sight.
+Disappointment had stirred it up.</p>
+<p class="pnext">Another cross-examination! Wasn’t the world large
+enough for so small a little figure to escape notice?</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Dear old Simpky,” she said, with that wide-eyed
+candor of hers, “I’m in such a hurry. With any luck
+I shall just be able to catch the bus that will take me
+home to lunch.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">But Simpkins put his back against the door. “No,”
+he said. “Not like that. Even if I’ve lost yer, I
+love yer, and it’s my job to see you don’t come to no
+’arm. You’ve got to tell me what you’re doing.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">There was something in the man’s eyes and in the
+whiteness of his face that warned Lola immediately
+of the need to be careful. Her mother had said that
+Simpkins was a good man with something of ecstasy
+in his nature, and she guessed intuitively that the latter
+might take the form eventually, in his ignorance and
+his love, of a dangerous watchfulness. So she was
+very patient and quiet and commonplace, remembering
+a similar scene which had taken place with Treadwell
+outside Mrs. Rumbold’s battered house.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“I went to a concert with a married friend of mine.
+Lady Feo gave me the frock. It’s very kind of you
+to worry, Simpky. And now, please——”</p>
+<p class="pnext">And after a moment’s hesitation Simpkins opened
+the door and with a curious dignity gave the girl her
+freedom. He loved her and believed in her. She was
+Lola and she was good, and but for some catastrophic
+accident she might be engaged to be married to him.</p>
+<p class="pnext">But Lola didn’t go immediately. She turned round
+and put her hand on the valet’s arm. “What are you
+going to do?” she asked, affectionately concerned.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“There isn’t anything for me to do,” he said,
+“now.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Come home with me.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">But he shook his head. “I couldn’t,” he said.
+“Your father is a friend of mine and might slap me
+on the back and tell me to go on ’oping—and there
+isn’t any—<em>is</em> there?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">And she said, “No, Simpky dear. I’m sorry to
+say there isn’t. But you can’t sit here looking at the
+carpet with the sun shining and so much to see. Why
+not come on the bus as far as Queen’s Road and then
+go for a walk. It would do you good.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">And he said, “Nothing can do me good.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">And she could see that he had begun to revel in his
+pain, and nurse it, and elevate it to a great tragedy.
+And for the first time she recognized in this man a
+menace to her scheme. He loved her too well and she
+had made him a fanatic.</p>
+<p class="pnext">This scheme of hers, so like one of the Grimm’s
+fairy tales in which the woodcutter’s daughter dared to
+love the prince,—was it to get all over the town?
+Miss Breezy had a friend in Scotland Yard, a detective.
+Lady Feo was on the watch, and here was
+Simpkins turned into a protector. And all the while
+Prince Fallaray lived in the same house and did nothing
+more than just remember her name, thinking that
+she was a friend of the woman who called herself his
+wife.</p>
+<p class="pnext">Never mind; the sun was shining, tears had dried,
+courage had returned, frocks and shoes and stockings
+had come and the impossible was one of the things that
+nearly always happened.</p>
+<p class="pnext">An hour later the door of the watchmaker’s shop
+opened in answer to her knock. There stood the fat
+man with his beaming smile of welcome and surprise,
+and out of the little parlor came an enticing aroma
+of roast lamb and mint sauce.</p>
+</div>
+<div class="level-3 section" id="id33">
+<h3 class="level-3 pfirst section-title title">V</h3>
+<p class="pfirst">That evening, controlling her excitement and anxious
+to make her people happy, Lola went to the family
+chapel with them,—the watchmaker in a gargantuan
+tail coat, a pair of pepper and salt trousers, and a
+bowler hat in which he might have been mistaken for
+the mayor of Caudebac-sur-Seine or a deputy representing
+one of the smaller manufacturing towns of
+France. Beside him his little wife stood bluntly for
+England. Everything that she wore told the story not
+only of her birth and tradition but of that of several
+grandmothers. There must have been at that moment
+hundreds of thousands of just such women, dressed
+in a precisely similar manner, on their way to answer
+the summons of a bell which was not very optimistic,—the
+Church having fallen rather low in popular
+favor. It had so many rivals and some of them were,
+it must be confessed, more in the mood of the times.</p>
+<p class="pnext">It was a sight worth seeing to watch these Breezys
+ambling up Queen’s Road, proudly, with their little
+girl. And it was because Lola knew that she was conferring
+a great treat upon her parents that she submitted
+herself to an hour and a half of something
+worse to her than boredom. Only a little while ago
+she had looked forward to the evening service on
+Sundays and had been gently moved by the hymns, by
+the reading from the Scripture and even by the illiterate
+impromptus of the minister; and she had found,
+in moments that were dull, the usual feminine pleasure
+in casting surreptitious glances about the small, plain
+unbeautiful building to see what Mrs. This wore or
+Mrs. That. But now she found herself going through
+it all like a fish out of water. As Ellingham had outgrown
+Lady Feo, so had she outgrown that flat, uninspired,
+and rather cruel service, in which the name of
+God was always mentioned as a monster of vengeance,
+without love and without forgiveness, and with a suspicious
+eye to the keyhole of every house. With a sort
+of shame she found herself finding fault with the
+rhymes of the hymns, which every now and then were
+dreadful, and were, oh, so badly sung; and when a
+smug-faced, uneducated man came forward, shut his
+eyes, placed himself in an attitude of elaborate piety
+and let himself go with terrible unction, treating God
+and death and life and joy and humanity as though
+they were butter, or worse still, margarine, goose flesh
+broke out upon her and a curious self-consciousness
+as though she were intruding upon a scene at which
+she had no right to be present. Away and away back,
+church had not been like this to her. Out of a dream
+she seemed to hear the deep reverberation of a great
+organ, the high sweet voices of unseen boys and the
+soft murmur of an old scholar retelling the simple
+story of Christ’s pathetic struggle, and of God’s mercy.—Oh,
+the commonplace, the misinterpretation, the hypocrisy,
+the ignorance. No wonder the busses were
+filled, she thought, the commons crowded on the outskirts
+of the city. To her there was more religion in
+one shaft of evening sun than in all those chapels put
+together.</p>
+<p class="pnext">It was with thankfulness and relief that Lola went
+back with her parents to the street and turned into
+Queen’s Road again, which wore a Sunday expression.
+Gone for a brief time were the itinerant musicians,
+the innumerable perambulators, the ogling flappers
+with their cheap silk stockings and misshapen legs, the
+retired colonels eking out a grumbling living on infinitesimal
+pensions.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Let’s take a little walk,” said Mrs. Breezy. “It’s
+nice now. The Gardens look more like the country in
+the twilight.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Of course,” said Breezy, “walk. Best exercise in
+the world. Oils a man up.” But all the same he
+didn’t intend to go far. Athleticism was a pose with
+him. He had grown so fat sitting on that backless
+chair behind the glass screen, looking into the works
+of sick watches like a poor man’s doctor who treated
+a long line of ailing people. If it wasn’t the mainspring,
+then it was over-winding. Very simple.</p>
+<p class="pnext">But Lola steered them away from Kensington
+Gardens because soldiers were there under canvas, and
+Chalfont was in command of the London district, and
+it might happen easily that all of a sudden that purring
+car would draw up at the curb and her name be called
+by the man with the cork arm.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Let’s go the other way,” she said, “for a change.
+I love to look at all the houses that are just the same
+and wonder what the people are like who live in them,
+and whether they’re just the same.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">It was her evening. She was no longer the little
+girl to be told to do this or that and taken here and
+there with or against her will. She had broken out of
+all that, rather strangely and quietly and suddenly;
+and in a sort of way her parents had become her children.
+It always happens. It is one of the privileges
+of parenthood eventually to obey. It is the subtle
+tribute paid by them to a son or daughter of whom
+they are proud, who is part of them and who has come
+through all the vicissitudes of childhood and adolescence
+under their care and guidance. It is one of the
+nicer forms of egotism.</p>
+<p class="pnext">And so these three little people, the Breezys, went
+into the labyrinths of villadom, up one street and down
+another. Some of the houses were smarter than the
+rest, with little trees in tubs, and Virginia creepers
+twined about their pillars, and perhaps a fat Cupid,
+weather-stained, standing in a little square of cat-fought
+garden, or with two small lions eying each
+other from opposite sides of the doorway with bitter
+antagonism. But the waning light of a glorious day
+still clung to the sky, in which an evening star had
+opened its eye, and even Bayswater, that valley of
+similitude, wore beauty of a sort. And all the way
+along, up and down and across, the high-sounding
+names of the various terraces ringing with sarcasm,
+they went together, these three little people, one far
+from little outwardly, in great affection. To Lola
+there was something unreal, almost uncanny about the
+whole thing. She had grown out of all these streets,
+all this commonplace, that entire world. She felt like
+some one who hears a very old tune played in a
+theater and looks down with surprise and a little
+thread of pain from a seat in a box,—a tune which
+seemed to take her back, away and away to far distant
+days, and stir dim memories.—Only last night she had
+been sitting in the Carlton with Chalfont as Madame
+de Brézé, and next Friday, if all went well——</p>
+<p class="pnext">With a sudden thrill of intense excitement and longing,
+she then and there made up her mind that some
+day it would be her privilege and joy to lift those two
+estimable people out of Queen’s Road and place them,
+not too old for enjoyment, among spreading trees and
+sloping lawns and all the color of an English garden,—away
+from watches and silver wedding presents,
+kodaks and ugly vases, from need of work, from
+clash of traffic and the inevitable voices of throaty
+baritones. Ah, that was what she wanted to do, so
+much, and if possible before it was too late. Time has
+an ugly way of slipping off the calendar.</p>
+<p class="pnext">And when, presently, they returned to the shop and
+let themselves in, it was Lola, with a curious emotion,
+because she might never see them again as she was
+that night, who got the supper, who placed them, arguing,
+in the stuffy drawing-room, and made many
+journeys up and down the narrow staircase to the
+kitchen. “Please,” she said. “Please. This is my
+evening. Even a lady’s maid can lay a supper if she
+tries hard enough.” And they did as they were told,
+reluctantly, but delighted,—and a little surprised. It
+was something of a change. And before the evening
+was over Treadwell came, wearing a flapping tie, the
+mark of the poet, and a suit of reach-me-downs
+egregiously cut but with something in his face that
+lived it down,—love. Poor boy, he had a long way
+to go alone.</p>
+<p class="pnext">When at last, having said good night, Lola went
+upstairs to the room in which she had played that little
+game of hers so often and sat in the dark as quiet as
+a mouse, holding her breath, not one, no, not a single
+one of all her old friends came in to see her,—not
+the ancient marquis with his long finger nails and
+curious rings and highly polished boots; not the gossipy
+old women in furbelows and dangling beads; not
+the gallant courtier with his innuendoes and high flow
+of compliments; and not the little lady’s maid who was
+wont to do her hair. They were dead. But in their
+place came Fallaray, stooping, pale and bewildered,
+hungry for love, hungry for comfort, dying for inspiration
+and the rustle of silk. And when he had sat
+down with his chin in his hand, she crept up to his
+chair and went on her knees and put her golden head
+against his heart, and said, “I love you. I love you.
+I’ve always loved you. I shall love you always. And
+if you never know it and never see me and miss me
+altogether in the crowd, I shall wait for you across
+the Bridge,—and you will see me then.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">But as she got up from her knees, blinded with
+tears, the voice came to her again, strong and full.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Go on, go on, de Brézé,—courage, my girl, courage.
+You have not yet won the right to cry.”</p>
+</div>
+<div class="level-3 section" id="id34">
+<h3 class="level-3 pfirst section-title title">VI</h3>
+<p class="pfirst">There were two reasons, then, for the visit to
+Castleton Terrace.</p>
+<p class="pnext">Feo’s handsome present to Lola reacted most favorably
+upon Mrs. Rumbold and came at a moment in
+that poor woman’s existence when cash was scarce and
+credit nil. Optimism also had been running a little
+low. But for this divine gift how many more suicides
+there would be every year.</p>
+<p class="pnext">Mrs. Rumbold was sitting in her workroom in the
+front of the house, waiting, like Sister Ann, for some
+one to turn up, when Lola’s taxi stopped at the door,
+and with a thrill of hope she saw the driver haul out
+a large dress case on which the initials F. F. were
+painted. This was followed by Lola, an hour early
+for her appointment with Lady Cheyne, and they were
+both met at the top step by the woman who saw
+manna.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Well,” she cried, shabby and thin, with wisps of
+unruly hair. “You’re a sight for sore eyes, I will
+say. I knew I was in for a bitter luck to-day. I read
+it in the bottom of me cup. Come in, miss, and let’s
+have a look at what you’ve brought me.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">The case was deposited in the middle of the room
+in which half a dozen headless and legless trunks
+mounted on a sort of cage were ranged along one wall,
+out of work and gloomy. Because the driver had been
+batman to a blood in the 21st Lancers, the case was
+duly unfastened by him,—a courtesy totally unexpected
+and acknowledged by Mrs. Rumbold in astonished
+English.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Thank you very much,” said Lola, with a rewarding
+smile. “It’s very kind of you.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Honored and delighted,” was the reply, added to
+by a full-dress parade salute with the most wonderful
+waggle before it finally reached the ear and was cut
+away.—And that meant sixpence extra. So every
+one was pleased.</p>
+<p class="pnext">And when Mrs. Rumbold, with expert fingers, drew
+out one frock after another, all of them nearly new
+and bearing the name of a dressmaker who hung to
+the edge of society by a hyphen, exclamation followed
+upon exclamation.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Gorblime,” she cried out. “Where in the world
+did you get ’em? I never see anything like it. It’s a
+trousseau.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">And Lola laughed and said, “Not this time.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">And Mrs. Rumbold started again, putting Feo’s
+astonishing garments through a more detailed inspection.
+“Eccentric, of course,” she said. “But, my
+word, what material, and look at these ’ere linings.
+Pre-war stuff, my dear. Who’s your friend?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">And Lola told her. Why shouldn’t she? And extolled
+Lady Feo’s generosity, in which Mrs. Rumbold
+heartily concurred. “I know what you want,” she
+said. “What I did to the last one. Let ’em down at
+the bottom and put a bit of somethin’ on the top.
+That’s it, isn’t it?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Yes,” said Lola. “That’s it. As quickly as
+you can, Mrs. Rumbold, especially with the day
+frocks.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Going away on a visit, dearie?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“No—yes,” said Lola. “I don’t know—but, like
+you, I live a good deal on hope.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">The woman made a wry face. “Umm,” she said.
+“You can get awful scraggy on that diet. Keeps yer
+girlish, I tell yer.” And then she looked up into Lola’s
+face. It was such a kind face, with so sympathetic
+a mouth, that she had no hesitation in letting down
+her professional fourth wall. “I’d be thankful if you
+could let me have a bit on account, miss,” she added,
+with rather pathetic whimsicality. “Without any
+bloomin’ eyewash, not even Sherlock Holmes could
+find as much as a bob in this house, and I have a bill
+at the draper’s to be met before I can sail in and give
+’em perciflage.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Nothing easier,” said Lola, who had come armed
+to meet this very request, having imagination. And
+out came her little purse and from it five nice pristine
+one-pound notes which she had most carefully hoarded
+up out of her wages.</p>
+<p class="pnext">And then for an hour and more Lola transferred
+herself, taking her time, from frock to frock, while
+Mrs. Rumbold did those intricate things with pins and
+a pair of scissors which only long practice can
+achieve. But Lady Cheyne failed to appear. Had she
+forgotten? Had some one steered her off? Ten minutes,
+fifteen minutes, twenty minutes, thirty minutes.
+Lola’s heart began to sink into her shoes. But just
+as she was about to lose hope, there was a loud
+and haughty ring at the bell which sent Mrs. Rumbold
+helter-skelter to the window, through which she
+peered eagerly. “Well, upon my word,” she cried in
+a hoarse whisper. “If you ain’t a bloomin’ mascot.
+It’s Lady Cheyne who used to be one of my best customers,
+and I haven’t seen ’er for a year.” And she
+ran out excitedly and opened the door and hoped her
+neighbors would be duly impressed by the rather
+dilapidated Mercedes which was drawn up in front of
+the house.</p>
+<p class="pnext">There was a burst of welcome, and then Lady
+Cheyne entered the workroom much in the same way
+as a broad-beamed cargo-boat floats into harbor. And
+then followed another surprise for Mrs. Rumbold,
+who was in for a day of surprises, it appeared.
+“Well, you dear thing, here you are. Punctual to the
+minute, as I always am. How are you, and where
+have you been, and why haven’t you run in to see me,
+and how sweet you look.” And the kind and exuberant
+little lady, whose amazing body seemed to require
+more than one dressmaker to cover it up, drew Lola
+warmly to her side and kissed her. It is true that she
+had forgotten her name again. She saw so many people
+so often who had such weird and unpronounceable
+names that she never even made an effort to remember
+any of them. But that golden head and those wide-apart
+eyes reminded her of the conversation over the
+telephone, brought back that evening at her house and
+linked them with the tall figure of the one-armed soldier,—her
+dear friend Peter something, so good looking,
+<em>such</em> a darling, but <em>so</em> unkind, never coming near
+her. “Extraordinary enough, I was thinking of you
+only a few nights ago. I was dining at the Savoy and
+the little crowd who were with me spoke of you.
+They had been with me the night I met you there and
+were <em>so</em> interested. One of the men said that if I could
+find you and take you to his concert he would try and
+draw your lips to his with the power of his art. He
+often says things like that. But he’s only an artist, so
+it doesn’t matter. Mrs. Rumstick, I want you to find
+something to do in the next room until I call you. No,
+leave my things alone. I’ll explain what has to be
+done to them in my own good time. That’s right.—We’re
+alone, my dear. Now tell me all about it.”
+She sat on a chair that had the right to groan and
+caught hold of Lola’s hand.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“It’s love,” said Lola.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Ah!”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“It’s love and adoration and long-deferred hope.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Oh, my dear, how you excite me!”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“And it can’t come right without you.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Me! Good gracious, but what can I do?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">Lola leaned closer. The pathetic farcicality of the
+dear old lady’s wreaths and becks left the seriousness
+of all this untouched. She clasped the dimpled hand
+in both her own and set her will to work. “Bring us
+together,” she whispered, setting fire to romance, so
+that Lady Cheyne bobbed up and down. “Help us to
+meet where no one can see, quickly, quickly. The
+world is getting old.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Well, there’s the library at Number One Hundred!
+No one has ever been in there except me since
+Willy passed away. You can come there any time
+you like and not a soul will see you. And he, if he
+doesn’t mind his trousers, can climb over the back
+wall, so that he shan’t be seen going into the house.
+I wouldn’t do it for any one but you, my dear. That
+room has dear memories for me.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">Kind and sweet,—but what was the use? It must
+be Chilton, Chilton, or nothing at all. And so Lola
+kissed her gratitude upon the hot, rouged cheek, but
+shook her head and sighed. (Go on, de Brézé, go on.)</p>
+<p class="pnext">“He wouldn’t dare,” she said. “Nowhere in town;
+it’s far too dangerous. The least whisper, the merest
+hint of gossip——”</p>
+<p class="pnext">Lady Cheyne wobbled at the thought. There was
+more in this than met the eye,—a Great Romance,
+love in High Places. How wonderful to be in, perhaps,
+on History. “But at night,” she said. “Late,
+when every one’s in bed. I assure you that after
+twelve One Hundred might be in the country.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Ah,” said Lola, “the country. Isn’t there some
+place in the country, high up near the sky, with woods
+behind it where we can meet and speak——”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Whitecross!” cried Lady Cheyne, brilliantly inspired.
+“Made for love and kisses, if ever there was
+a place. How dull of me only just to have thought of
+that.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Whitecross? What is that?” How eager the
+tone, how tremulous the voice.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“My darling nest on the Chilterns, where I’m so
+seldom able to live. If only I could get away,—but
+I’m tied to town.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Next Friday, perhaps,—that’s the last, the very
+last——”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Well, then, it must be Friday. I can’t resist this
+thing, my dear, so I’ll tell you what I’ll do. I’ll leave
+on Thursday. It will give a new bevy of my protégés
+a little rest and a quiet time for practise. And you can
+come down on Friday.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“You darling!” (Good for you, de Brézé. Very
+well done, indeed.)</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Now get a pencil and a piece of paper and write
+everything down. The station is Princes Risborough.”
+(As if Lola didn’t know that!) “You go
+from Paddington and you catch the two-twenty arriving
+there just before four. I can’t send a car to
+meet you, because my poor old ten-year-old outside
+would drop to pieces going up to Whitecross. So you
+must take a station cab and be driven up in time for
+tea, and you will find one Russian, one Pole, two
+Austrians, one Dane and a dear friend of mine with a
+voice like velvet who was a Checko-Slovak during the
+War and German before and after. A very nice lot,
+full of talent. I don’t know where they’re all going
+to sleep and I’m sure they don’t care, so what’s it
+matter? They’ll give us music from morning to night
+and all sorts of fun in between. Killing two birds
+with one stone, eh?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">Was it the end of the rainbow at last? “Oh, dear
+Lady Cheyne, what can I say?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Nothing more, now, you dear little wide-eyed
+celandine; wait till we meet again. Run away and
+leave me to Mrs. Rumigig. It’s a case of old frocks
+on to new linings. Income tax drives us even to that.
+But I’m very glad, oh, so very glad you came to me,
+my dear!”</p>
+<p class="pnext">And Lola threw her arms round the collector of
+stray dogs and poured out her thanks, with tears.
+One rung nearer, two rungs nearer.—And in the next
+room, having heroically overcome an almost conquering
+desire to put her ear to the keyhole, stood Mrs.
+Rumbold, still suffering from the second of her surprises.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Do your best to let me have two day frocks and
+an evening frock,” said Lola. “And I will come for
+them sometime Friday early. Don’t fail me, will you,
+Mrs. Rumbold? You can’t think and I couldn’t possibly
+explain to you how important it is.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Well, I should say not. I should think it is important,
+indeed! Little Lola Breezy’s doing herself
+well these days, staying with the nobility and gentry
+and all.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">The woman was amazed to the extent of indiscretion.
+How did a lady’s maid, daughter of the
+Breezys of Queen’s Road, Bayswater, perform such a
+miracle? They were certainly topsy-turvy times,
+these.</p>
+<p class="pnext">And then Lola turned quickly and caught Mrs. Rumbold’s
+arm. “You are on your honor to say nothing
+about me to Lady Cheyne, remember, and if, by any
+chance, you mention my name, bear in mind that it is
+Madame de Brézé. You understand?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">There was a moment’s hesitation followed by a little
+gasp and a bow. “I quite understand, Modum,
+and I thank you for your custom.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">But before Mrs. Rumbold returned to her workroom,
+in which the trunks looked more perky now,
+she remained where she stood for a moment and rolled
+her eyes.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Well,” she asked herself, “did you <em>ever</em>? Modum
+de Brézé!—And she looks it too, and speaks it.
+My word, them orders! Blowed if the modern girl
+don’t cop the current bun. It isn’t for me to say anything,
+but for the sake of that nice little woman in
+the watchmaker’s shop, I hope it’s all right. That’s
+all.—And now, your ladyship, what can I have the
+pleasure of doing for you, if you please? And thank
+you for comin’, I’m sure. Times is that dull——”</p>
+</div>
+<div class="level-3 section" id="id35">
+<h3 class="level-3 pfirst section-title title">VII</h3>
+<p class="pfirst">When Lola went into Feo’s room that evening it
+was with the intention of asking for her first holiday.
+It was a large order; she knew that, because her mistress
+had made innumerable engagements for the
+week. But this was to be another and most important
+rung in that ladder, which, if not achieved, rendered
+useless the others that she had climbed.</p>
+<p class="pnext">She was overjoyed to find Feo in an excellent mood.
+Things had been going well. The world had been full
+of amusement and a new man had turned up, a pucca
+man this time, discovered at the Winchfields’, constant
+in his attentions ever since. He owned a string of
+race horses and trained them at Dan Thirlwall’s old
+place behind Worthing, which made him all the more
+interesting. Feo adored the excitement of racing.
+And so it was easy for Lola to approach her subject
+and she did so at the moment when she had her ladyship
+in her power, the curling irons steaming. “If
+you please, my lady,” she said, in a perfectly even
+voice and with her eyes on the black bobbed hair,
+“would it be quite convenient for you if I had a week
+off from Thursday?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“But what the devil does that matter?” said Feo.
+“If I don’t give you a week off, I suppose you’ll take
+it.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">Lola’s lips curled into a smile. It was impossible to
+resist this woman and her peculiar way of putting
+things. “But I think you know me better than that,”
+she said, twining that thick wiry hair round the tongs
+as an Italian twines spaghetti round a fork.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“What makes you think so? I don’t know you.
+I haven’t the remotest idea what you’re like. You
+never tell me anything. Ever since you’ve been with
+me you’ve never let me see under your skin once. I
+don’t even believe that you’re Breezy’s niece. I’ve
+only her word for it. After Sunday morning’s exhibition,
+I’m quite inclined to believe that you <em>are</em>
+Madame de Brézé masquerading as a lady’s maid. If
+the War was still going on, I might think that you
+were a spy. A great idea for you to get into this house
+and pinch the papers of a Cabinet Minister. Yes, of
+course you can have a week off. What are you going
+to do? Get married, after all?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">Lola shook her head and the curl went away from
+her lips. “I want to go down to the country for a
+little rest,” she said.</p>
+<p class="pnext">Something in the tone of Lola’s voice caught Feo’s
+ears. She looked sharply at her reflection in the glass
+and saw that the little face which had captured her
+fancy and become so familiar had suddenly taken on
+an expression of so deep a yearning as to make it almost
+unrecognizable. The wide-apart eyes burned
+with emotion, the red lips and those sensitive nostrils
+denoted a pent-up excitement that was startling.
+What was it that this strange, secretive child had made
+up her mind to do—to commit—to lose? “There is
+love at the bottom of this,” she said.</p>
+<p class="pnext">And Lola replied, “Yes, my lady,” simply and with
+a sort of pride. And then took hold of herself, tight.
+If there had been any one person in all the world to
+whom she could have poured out her little queer story
+of all-absorbing love and desire to serve and comfort
+and inspire and entertain and rejuvenate—— But
+there wasn’t one—and it was Mr. Fallaray’s wife who
+fished to know her secret. Was it one of the ordinary
+coincidences which had brought, them together—meaningless
+and accidental—or one of those studied
+ironies which fate, in its mischievous mood, indulges
+in so frequently?</p>
+<p class="pnext">“It wouldn’t have been any good to deny it. It’s
+all over you like a label. It’s an infernal nuisance,
+Lola, but I’ll try and get on without you. If you’re
+not going to get married, watch your step, as the
+Americans say. I don’t give you this tip on moral
+grounds but from the worldly point of view. You
+have your living to make and there’s Breezy to think
+about and your people.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">She put her hand up and grasped the one in which
+Lola held the tongs, and drew her round. Strangely
+enough, this contradictory creature was moved.
+Whether it was because she saw in Lola’s eyes something
+which no one had been able to bring into her
+own, who can say? “It’s a married man,” she told
+herself, “or it’s Chalfont who isn’t thinking of marriage.”
+“Go easy, my dear,” she added aloud. “Believe
+only half you hear and get that verified. Men
+are the most frightful liars. Almost as bad as women.
+And they have a most convenient knack of forgetting.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">And then she released the girl so that she might resume
+her job, as time was short, and she was dining
+rather early with the new man at Ranelegh where
+“Twelfth Night” was to be acted as a pastoral by
+Bernard Fagan’s players. All the same, her mind
+dwelt not so much with curiosity as with concern upon
+Lola’s leave of absence, because she liked the girl and
+had found her very loyal, consistently cheery and always
+ready to hand.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Let me see,” she said, with an uncharacteristic
+touch of womanliness that must have been brought out
+by the flaming feminism of Lola. “Among the frocks
+that I hurled at you on Sunday there’s pretty certain
+to be something that you can wear. Help yourself to
+anything else that you need. You must look nice. I
+insist on that. And you’ll also want something to put
+these things in. Tucked away somewhere there are
+one or two dress cases without my initials. They’ve
+come in useful on other occasions. Rout them out. I
+can’t think of anything else, but probably you will.”
+And she waved her hand with those long thin capable
+fingers, as much as to say, “Don’t thank me. You’d
+do the same for me if I were in your shoes.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">But Lola did thank her and wound up an incoherent
+burst by saying, “You’re the most generous woman
+I’ve ever imagined.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Oh, well, I have my moments,” replied Feo, who
+liked it all the same. “Y’see, ‘The Colonel’s lady and
+Judy O’Grady are sisters under the skin.’” She
+was very generous and very much interested and if
+the truth were to be told a little worried too. For all
+her coolness at the Carlton, Lola seemed to her to be
+so young and so obviously virginal,—just the sort of
+girl who would make a great sacrifice, taking to it a
+pent-up ecstasy for which she might be asked to pay a
+pretty heavy price. And it was such a mistake to pay,
+according to Feo’s creed.</p>
+<p class="pnext">Finally, dressed and scented and wearing a pair of
+oddly shaped lapis earrings, she stood in front of a
+pier glass for a moment or two, looking herself over,
+finding under her eyes for the first time one or two
+disconcerting lines. What was she? Ten years older
+than this girl whose face was like an unplucked flower?
+Ten years certainly,—all packed with incidents, not
+one of which had been touched by ecstasy.</p>
+<p class="pnext">When she turned away it was with a short quick
+sigh. “Damn,” she said, off on one of her sudden
+tangents. “I can see myself developing into one of
+those women who join the Salvation Army because
+they’ve lost their looks, or get out of the limelight to
+read bitter verses about dead sea fruit, if I’m not
+precious careful.” And her mind turned back to the
+hour with Ellingham in that foolish futuristic room
+of hers and the way in which he had paced up and
+down, inarticulate, hands in pockets, and eventually
+been glad to go. Glad to go,—think of it.—Never
+mind, here was the man with the race horses. He
+might be a little medieval, perhaps. And on her way
+out she put her hand under Lola’s chin and tilted up
+her face. “Mf,” she said, “you <em>have</em> got it, badly,
+haven’t you?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">And Lola replied, “Yes, my lady,” and felt as
+though she had never left Queen’s Road, Bayswater.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Well, good luck.” And Feo was gone.</p>
+</div>
+<div class="level-3 section" id="id36">
+<h3 class="level-3 pfirst section-title title">VIII</h3>
+<p class="pfirst">So once again Lola stepped out on to the platform
+of Princes Risborough station to wait while a sulky
+porter, thoroughly trades-union in all his movements,
+made up his mind to carry Feo’s two cases out to a
+cab. He first of all read the name on the labels, pronouncing
+Brézé to himself as it was known to Queen’s
+Road, Bayswater. Then, with great deliberation and
+condescension, having placed a new quid in his mouth,
+he tilted them on to the barrow and wheeled them
+along the platform to the station yard, followed by
+Lola. “Want a cab?” he asked. To which Lola replied,
+“I don’t think I’m quite strong enough to carry
+them myself.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">And he gave her a quick look. “Cheeky,” he
+thought. “Knows enough English fer that, all right.”
+Whereupon he chi-iked the cab driver who was asleep
+on his box and yelled out, “Don’t yer want ter occupy
+yerself once in a way? Sittin’ up there orl day, doin’
+nothin’! Do yer good to ’ave my job fer a bit. Come
+on darn. Give a hand with these ’ere. What d’yer
+think I’m paid fer?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">Lola opened the door of the rickety and rather
+smelly cab for herself. Neither of the men had
+thought of that. And then she handed the porter a
+shilling and looked him straight in the face with her
+most winning smile. “It doesn’t reward you for
+your great politeness,” she said. “But these are hard
+times.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">And as the cab drove slowly off, the porter spat upon
+the coin. What did he care for snubs? He was as
+good as anybody else and a damned sight better, he
+was, with his labor union and all. Politeness! Heh!—Missionaries
+have introduced the gin bottle to the
+native and completely undermined his sense of primitive
+honor while trades unions have injected the virus
+of discontent into the blood of the English workman
+and made him a savage.</p>
+<p class="pnext">And so once more the white cross seen above the
+village; once more the Tillage with its chapels and other
+public houses,—warm old buildings as yet untouched
+by the hand of progress, which generally means a cheap
+shop-front and goods made in Germany; once more
+the road leading up to the Chiltons, with the shadows
+of old trees cast across. Chilton Park was passed
+on the right, with its high wall, time-worn, behind
+which Fallaray might even then be walking among his
+gardens. And presently the cab turned in to the driveway
+of what had once been a farmhouse, to which, by
+an architect who was an artist and not a builder, wings
+had been added. The long uneven roof was thatched,
+the walls all creeper covered, the windows diamond
+paned, the door low, wide and welcoming. A smooth
+lawn was dignified with old oaks and beeches and
+ablaze with numerous beds of sweet Williams and
+pansies and all the rustic flowers. A charming little
+place, rather perhaps self-consciously pretty, like a set
+on the stage. But oh, how delightful after Queen’s
+Road, Bayswater, and the labyrinths of similitude.</p>
+<p class="pnext">Lady Cheyne was followed to the door by all her
+guests and for a moment Lola thought that she had
+stumbled on a place crowded with European refugees.
+A more eccentric collection of human various she had
+never seen, even during that epoch-making evening at
+Kensington Gore.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Here you are, then, looking just as if you had
+stepped out of one of the pictures in the boudoir of the
+Duchess de Nantes.” Lola received a hearty kiss on
+both cheeks, and her hostess took the opportunity,
+while so close, of asking an important question in a
+whisper. “Your name, my dear. I’m too sorry, but
+really my capacity for remembering names has gone
+all loose like a piece of dead elastic.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">Lola laughed and told her, and then followed her
+introduction to the little group of hairy children who
+were all waiting on tenterhooks for a chance to act.
+It was a comical introduction, because by the time
+Lady Cheyne had said “Lola de Brézé” she had forgotten
+the names of all her other guests. And so, with
+a gurgle of laughter, she pointed to each one in turn,—and
+they stepped forward and spoke; first the
+women, “Anna Stezzel,” a bow and a flash of teeth,
+“Regina Spatz,” a bow and a gracious smile, and then
+the men, “Salo Impf,” “Valdemar Varvascho,”
+“Simon Zalouhou,” “Max Wachevsky,” “Willy
+Pouff,” fired in bass, baritone and tenor and accompanied
+by a kiss upon the little outstretched hand. It
+was all Lola could do to stop herself from peals of
+laughter.</p>
+<p class="pnext">Zalouhou, the violinist, was one of the biggest men
+Lola had ever seen. He stood six foot six in a pair
+of dilapidated boots and possessed a completely unathletic
+figure with hips like a woman, large soft hands
+with long loose fingers and a splendid leonine head
+with a mass of black hair streaked with white. He
+towered over the other little people like a modern
+Gulliver. His face was clean-shaven, with fine features
+and a noble forehead and a pair of eyes which
+had never failed to do more to attract crowded matinées
+of his country women in the old days than the
+beauty of his playing and the mastery of his technique.
+He had only just arrived in London, penniless, and in
+a suit of clothes in which he had slept on many waysides.
+He had fought for his country and against his
+country, never knowing why and never wanting to
+fight, and all the while he had clung desperately to his
+violin which he had played to ragamuffin troops in
+order to be supplied with an extra hunk of bread and a
+drink of coffee. The story of his five or six years of
+mental and physical chaos, every moment of which
+was abhorrent to his gentle spirit, was stamped deeply
+upon his face.</p>
+<p class="pnext">Even as Lola was being escorted upstairs to her
+room by a thrilled country maid, there was a crash
+upon the piano in the hall and an outburst of song.
+What that little house thought of all those extraordinary
+people who could not keep quiet under any circumstance
+would have filled a book. The ghosts of
+former residents, farming people, must have stood
+about in horror and surprise. And yet, as Lady Cheyne
+well knew, they were all simple souls ready to go into
+ecstasies at the sight of a daisy and imbued with genuine
+loyalty towards each other.</p>
+<p class="pnext">Lady Cheyne followed Lola up. She arrived in the
+tiny bedroom, whose ceiling sloped down to two small
+windows, breathless and laughing. “You can’t swing
+a cat in here,” she said. “But, after all, who ever does
+swing a cat? I hope you’ll be comfortable and I know
+you’ll be amused. I just want to tell you one thing,
+my dear. You are at perfect liberty to do whatever
+you like, to wander away out of range of the piano,
+with or without any of my dear delightful babies, or
+stay and listen to them and watch the fun. Until sleep
+overcomes them they will sing and play and applaud
+and have the time of their lives,—which is exactly
+what I’ve brought them here to do, poor things. All
+the men will fall in love with you, of course. But
+you’re perfectly used to that, aren’t you? You’ll look
+like a miniature among oleographs, but the change will
+do you good and show you another side of life. One
+thing I can guarantee. You won’t be disturbed in the
+morning before eleven o’clock. No one thinks of getting
+up until then. I’m particularly anxious for you
+to like Zalouhou. I predict that he will have an extraordinary
+success in London when he makes his appearance
+next week at Queen’s Hall. Did you ever see
+such a man? If I know anything about it at all,
+women will rush forward to the platform to kiss his
+feet,—not because he plays the violin like Kreisler
+but because of those magnetic eyes. Success in every
+walk of life is due entirely to eyes. You know that,
+my dear. And as to the Great Affair, I will ask no
+questions, see nothing and hear nothing, but rejoice
+in believing that I am being of use. It is exactly right,
+isn’t it, golden head? Ah, me, those dear dead days.
+Now come and have some tea and taste my strawberries.
+They’re wonderful this year.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">But before going down—and how kind everybody
+was—Lola stood at one of her windows from which
+she could see a corner of Chilton Park, and her heart
+went out to Fallaray like a white dove. It was in the
+air, in the cloudless sky, in the birds’ songs, in the
+rustle of the leaves, in the beauty and glory of the
+flowers that her time had come at last, that all her
+work and training were to be put to the supreme test.
+Success would mean the little gold cage of which she
+had heard again in her dream but which would be the
+merest lead without love. Failure——</p>
+<p class="pnext">Her appearance eventually in the hall, a long, many-windowed
+room, with great bowls of cut flowers on
+gate-legged tables and old dressers, was celebrated by
+Salo Impf with an improvisation on the piano that was
+filled with spring and received with noisy approval.
+Imbued with a certain amount of crude tact, the men
+of the party did nothing more than pay tribute to Lola
+with their eyes while they surrounded Lady Cheyne
+as though she were a queen, as indeed she was, having
+it in her power not only to provide them with bed and
+board but to bring them out and give them a chance
+in a country always ready to support talent. It was a
+funny sight to see this amazingly fat, kind woman
+pouring tea at a tiny table into tiny cups surrounded
+by people who seemed to be perpetually hungry, but
+who sang even while they ate, and laughed and jabbered
+in between.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“What would Simpkins say if he could see me
+here?” thought Lola. “And Mother and Ernest and
+Sir Peter Chalfont—and Lady Feo?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">But she felt happy and in a way comforted among
+these people. Like her, they were all struggling towards
+a goal, all striving after something for which
+they had served their apprenticeship. Not one of them
+had yet successfully emerged and they were living
+on what Mrs. Rumbold called, “the scraggy diet of
+hope.” It did her good to be among them at that moment,
+to hear their discussions in amazingly broken
+English of a début in London, to be aware of the extraordinary
+encouragement which they gave to each
+other, without jealousy,—which was so rare. She
+found herself listening enthralled to the arias sung by
+Anna Stezzel, and the Grieg songs which were so perfectly
+played by Impf. But it was when Zalouhou
+stood up with his violin and played some of the wistful
+folk songs of his country that she sat with her
+hands clasped together, leaning forward and moved to
+a deep emotion. Hunger, the daily wrestle with surly
+earth, illness, the subjection to a crushing autocracy,
+and beneath it self-preservation,—they were all in
+these sad, fierce songs, which sometimes burst into
+passionate resentment and at others laughed a little and
+jogged along. What a story they told,—so much
+rougher and so much sterner than her own. They
+gave her courage to go forward but they left her uncertain
+as to what was to be her next step.</p>
+<p class="pnext">When Zalouhou played, it was with his eyes on
+Lola. Her sympathy and understanding drew out his
+most delicate and imaginative skill and gave him inspiration;
+and when he had finished and laid aside his
+violin, he went to the sofa on which she was sitting
+and crouched hugely at her feet, and said something
+softly in his own tongue. He spoke no English, but
+she could guess his meaning because in his eyes there
+was the look with which she was familiar in the eyes
+of Treadwell, Simpkins and Chalfont. And she said
+to herself, “As there is something in me that stirs the
+hearts of men, give me the chance, O God, to let it
+be felt by the only man I shall ever love and who is
+all alone on earth!” And while the room rang with
+music, she went forward in spirit to the gate in the
+wall of Chilton Park, which she had seen from her
+window, opened it and went inside to look for Fallaray.
+The intuition which had been upon her so long
+that she might touch the heart of Fallaray in Chilton
+Park was strong upon her then, once more.</p>
+<p class="pnext">But she had to wait until after dinner before her
+opportunity came to slip away, and this she did when
+her fellow-workers had returned to the hall, drawn
+back to the piano as by a magnet. And then she escaped,
+in Feo’s silver frock, stole into the placid garden
+which was filled with the aroma of sweet peas
+and June roses, went down to the gate in the high
+wall, and stood there, trembling.</p>
+<p class="pnext">(Go on, de Brézé, go on!)</p>
+</div>
+<div class="level-3 section" id="id37">
+<h3 class="level-3 pfirst section-title title">IX</h3>
+<p class="pfirst">Except for the servants, Fallaray was alone in his
+house.</p>
+<p class="pnext">He had slept late that morning, put newspapers
+aside, and allowed the telephone to ring unanswered.
+He was determined, at least for a few days, to cut
+himself off from London and especially from the new
+and futile turn that was taking place in politics. It
+didn’t seem to him to matter that, because his chief
+had boxed the political compass again and, like Gladstone,
+talked with furious earnestness on both sides of
+every question only to leave anger and stultification
+at every step, the papers were making a dead set at
+him, holding him up to ridicule and abuse and working
+with vitriolic energy against his government at every
+bi-election. If this man were dragged at last from
+the seat that he had won by a trick and held by trickery,
+another of the same kidney and possibly worse
+principles would be put into his place to build up another
+and a similar rampart about himself with bribes
+and honors. It was the system. Nothing could prevent
+it. Professional politicians had England by the
+throat and they were backed by underground money
+and supported by politically owned newspapers. What
+use to struggle against such odds? He wanted to forget
+Ireland for a little while, if it were possible to forget
+Ireland even for so short a space of time as his
+holiday would last. He wanted to put out of his mind,
+the horrible mess in Silesia which was straining the
+<em>entente cordiale</em> to the breaking point, and the bungling
+over the coal strike, and so he had been wandering
+among his rose gardens, hatless, with the breeze in
+his hair, and the scent of new-mown hay in his nostrils,
+listening to the piping of the thrush, to the passionate
+songs of larks, and watching bees busy themselves
+from flower to flower with a one-eyed industry and
+honesty which he did not meet in men.</p>
+<p class="pnext">He had lunched out on the terrace and looked down
+with a great refreshment upon the sweeping valley of
+Aylesbury, peaceful beneath the sun. He had slept
+again in the afternoon, out of doors, lulled by the
+orchestra of birds, and had then gone forth to walk
+behind those high walls into the forest of beech trees,
+the dead red leaves of innumerable summers at their
+roots, and to listen to the tramping feet of the ghosts
+of Roman armies whose triumphs had left no deeper
+mark on history than the feet of sea gulls on the sands.
+And as his brain became quiet and the load of political
+troubles fell from his shoulders, he began to imagine
+that he was a free man once more, and a young man,
+and the old aspirations of adolescence returned to him
+like the echo of a dream,—to love, to laugh, to build
+a nest, to wander hand in hand with some sweet thing
+who trusted him and was wholly his. O God, how
+good. That was life. That was truth. That was
+nature.</p>
+<p class="pnext">And when, after dinner, he strolled out once more
+to look at the sky patterned with stars, dominated by
+a moon in its cold elusive prime, he was no longer the
+London Fallaray, round-shouldered, anxious, overworked,
+immeshed like an impotent fly in the web of
+the bad old spiders. His chin was up, his shoulders
+back, a smile upon his lips. That gorgeous air filled
+his lungs and not even from the highest point of
+vantage could there be seen one glimpse of the little
+light burning in the tower of the House of Commons.
+He was nearer heaven than he had been for a very long
+time. Exquisite lines from the great poets floated
+through his mind and somewhere near a nightingale
+poured out a love song to its mate.</p>
+<p class="pnext">And when presently he took a stand on that corner
+of the terrace which overlooked the Italian garden, it
+seemed to him that the magic of the moonlight had
+stirred some of the stone figures to life. The arm of
+Cupid seemed to bend and send an arrow into the air
+and where it fell he saw a shimmer of silver and heard
+the rustle of silk. And he saw and heard it again and
+laughed a little at the pranks which imagination
+played, especially on such a night. And not believing
+his eyes or his ears, he saw this silver thing move
+again and come slowly up along the avenue of yews
+like a living star; and he watched it a little breathlessly
+and saw that it was a woman, a girl, timid, like
+a trespasser, but still coming on and on with her head
+up, and the moonlight in her hair,—golden hair
+wound round her head like an aureole. And when at
+last, born as it seemed of moonlight and poetry, she
+came to the edge of the terrace and stopped, he bent
+down with the blood tingling in his veins, hardly believing
+that she was there, still under the impression
+that he had brought her to that spot out of his never
+realized longing and desire, and saw that she was not
+a dream of adolescence but a little live thing with
+wide-apart eyes and red lips parted and the white halo
+of youth about her head.</p>
+</div>
+<div class="level-3 section" id="x">
+<h3 class="level-3 pfirst section-title title">X</h3>
+<p class="pfirst">A bat blundered in between them and broke the
+spell.</p>
+<p class="pnext">And Fallaray climbed over the parapet and dropped
+on his feet at Lola’s side. All that day, as indeed,
+briefly, in the House, at his desk, at night in dreams,
+ever since the introduction at the Savoy, the eyes of
+that girl and the thrill of her hand had come back to
+him like a song, to stir, like the urge of spring. And
+here, suddenly, she stood, moonlit, but very real, in
+answer to his subconscious call.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“This is wonderful,” he said, blurting out the truth
+like a naïve boy. “I’ve been thinking of you all day.
+How did you get here?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">His eager clasp sent a rush of blood through Lola’s
+body. His alone among men’s, as she had always
+known, was the answering touch. “I’m staying with
+Lady Cheyne,” she said. “I saw the gate in the wall
+and it wasn’t locked and I tiptoed in.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“You knew that I was here?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Yes, and I came to find you.” She blurted out the
+truth like an unsophisticated girl.</p>
+<p class="pnext">Was it moonlight, the magic of the night, the throbbing
+song of the nightingale that made him seem as
+young as she?—No. What then? And as he looked
+into the eyes of that girl and caught his breath at her
+disturbing femininity and disordering sense of sex and
+the sublime unself-consciousness of a child, without
+challenge and without coquetry, he knew that it was
+something to be summed up by the words “the rustle
+of silk,” which epitomized beauty and softness and
+scent, laughter, filmy things and love. And he thanked
+his gods that not even Feo and the wear and tear of
+politics had left him out of youth.</p>
+<p class="pnext">And he thanked her for coming to break his loneliness
+and led her through the sleeping flowers, and
+those figures which had died again since life had come
+amongst them, to the arbor made of yews where he
+had slept that afternoon. And there, high above the
+sweeping valley among whose villages little lights
+were blinking like far-off fireflies, they sat and talked
+and talked, at first like boy and girl, meeting after
+separation, telling everything but nothing, shirking the
+truth to save it for a time, and then, presently, with no
+lights left below and all the earth asleep, like man and
+woman, reading the truth in eyes that made no effort
+to disguise it; telling the truth, in broken words;
+learning the truth from heart that beat to heart until
+the moon had done her duty and stars had faded out
+and up over the ridge of hills, reluctantly, a new day
+came.</p>
+</div>
+</div>
+<div class="level-2 section" id="part-vii">
+<h2 class="level-2 pfirst section-title title"><a class="toc-backref pginternal" href="#id60">PART VII</a></h2>
+<div class="level-3 section" id="id38">
+<h3 class="level-3 pfirst section-title title">I</h3>
+<p class="pfirst">Fallaray was to meet Lola at the gate in the wall
+at four o’clock. He wanted to show her how the vale
+looked in the light of the afternoon sun. But it was a
+long time to wait because, instead of going to bed after
+he had taken Lola to Lady Cheyne’s cottage at the
+moment when a line in the sky behind it had been
+rubbed by a great white thumb, he had walked up and
+down the terrace and watched the dawn push the night
+away and break upon him with a message of freedom.</p>
+<p class="pnext">He paced up and down while the soft blur of the
+valley came out into the clear detail of corn fields, rolling
+acres of grass, sheep dotted, a long white ribbon
+of road twisting among villages, each one marked by
+the delicate spire of an old church, spinneys of young
+trees and clumps of old ones, gnarled and twisted and
+sometimes lonely, standing like the sentinels that receive
+“the secret whispers of each other’s watch.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">He stood up to the new day honestly and without
+shame. Like a man who suddenly breaks away from
+a Brotherhood with whose creeds he has found himself
+no longer in sympathy, he rejoiced in his release. Lola
+had come to him at the moment when he was lying on
+his oars at the entrance to a backwater. He had been
+in the main river too long, pulling his arms out against
+the stream. He was tired. It was utterly beyond argument
+that he had failed. He had nothing in him
+of the stuff that goes to the making of a pushing
+politician. He detested and despised the whole unholy
+game of politics. In addition, he had come to the
+dangerous age in the life of a man, especially the
+ascetic man. He was forty. He had never allowed
+himself to listen to the rustle of silk. He had kept
+his eyes doggedly on what he had conceived to be his
+job, wifeless. And when Lola came, the magnet of
+her sex drew him not only without a struggle but with
+an insatiable hunger into the side of life against which
+Feo had slammed the door, leaving him stultified and
+disgusted. He had welcomed in this girl what he now
+regarded as the unmet spirit of his adolescence, and he
+fell to her as only such a man can fall. The fact that
+she loved him and had told him of her love with the
+astounding simplicity of a child gave the whole thing a
+beauty, a depth and permanence that made him regard
+the future with wonder and delight, though not yet
+with any definite plan. At present this <em>volte face</em> was
+too astonishing, too new in its happening, to be dissected
+and balanced up. For a few days at least he
+wanted irresponsibility, for a change. He wanted,
+like a man wrecked on the shore of Eden, to explore
+into beauty and dally, unseen, with love. The time
+was not yet for a decision as to which way he would
+go, when, as was certain, some one would discover the
+wreckage and send out a rescue party. He had promised
+himself a holiday and all the more now he would insist
+upon its enjoyment. Whether at the end of it he
+would refuse ever to go back into the main stream, or
+go back and take Lola with him, were questions that
+he was not yet formulating in his mind. But as to
+one thing he was certain, even then. Lola was his; she
+had brought back his youth like a miracle, and he
+would never let her out of his sight.</p>
+<p class="pnext">He breakfasted in his library, ignoring the papers.
+Their daily story of chaos made more chaotic by the
+lamentable blundering of fools and knaves, seemed to
+deal with a world out of which he had dropped, hanging
+to a parachute. He went smiling through the
+morning, watching the clock with an impatience that
+was itself a pleasure. He felt the strange exhilaration
+of having lived his future with all his past to spend,
+of returning as a student to a school in which he had
+performed the duties of a Master. And there were
+times when he drew up short and sent out a great boyish
+laugh that echoed through his house, at the paradox
+of it all. And once, but only once, he stood outside
+himself and saw that he was placing his usefulness
+upon the altar of passion. And before he leaped back
+into his skin and while yet he retained his sanity and
+cold logic, he saw that he loved Lola for her golden
+hair and wide-apart eyes, her red lips and tingling
+hand, her young sweet body,—but not her soul, not
+the intangible thing in a woman that keeps a man’s love
+when passion passes. But to this he said, “I am
+young again. I have the need and the right. When
+I have had time to find her soul, she shall have my
+quiet love.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">And finally, at three o’clock, with an hour still to
+drive away, he went down to the gate in the wall,
+eager and insatiable to wait for the rustle of silk.</p>
+</div>
+<div class="level-3 section" id="id39">
+<h3 class="level-3 pfirst section-title title">II</h3>
+<p class="pfirst">Lady Cheyne had encouraged her flock to lateness in
+order that she might lock the door after Lola had come
+back. She was terrified of burglars, and although she
+had sold most of her pearls and diamonds to help her
+various protégés over rainy days, she shuddered at the
+thought of being disclosed by a flash light to a probably
+unshaven man. Nothing could shake her from
+her belief that a man who could go bearded after five
+o’clock in the afternoon must be a criminal,—and this
+in spite of the fact that she had lived among artists for
+years. But she was a woman who cultivated irrational
+idiosyncrasies as other women collect old fans
+or ancient snuffboxes. She would never live in a flat,
+for instance, because if she passed away in one it would
+be so dreadfully humiliating to be taken down to the
+street in a lift, head first.</p>
+<p class="pnext">Becoming irritable from want of sleep, she had kept
+everybody up until two in the morning, by which hour
+even Salo had ceased from Impfing and Willy could
+Pouff no more. Zalouhou, who was as natural as a
+dog, had yawned hugely. And then, sending her
+party up to bed, she had proved the sublimity of her
+kindness by doing something that she had never done
+before. She had left a lamp burning in the hall and
+the front door wide open.</p>
+<p class="pnext">It was four o’clock when, a very light sleeper, she
+woke at the sound of creaking stairs and went out,
+giving Lola time to arrive at her room, to peer over
+the banisters to see that the lamp was out and the
+front door closed. Then, returning to bed, she lay in
+great rotundity and with a wistful smile, to think back
+to the days when she had been as young and slim as
+Lola and just as much in love.</p>
+<p class="pnext">It was not until after breakfast, at which Lola did
+not appear, that she became aware of a curiosity that
+was like the bite of a mosquito. Where had that girl
+been all those hours and who was the man? But it was
+not a sinister curiosity, all alive to gather gossip and
+spread innuendoes, as women give so much to do. It
+was the desire to share, however distantly, in what she
+had at once imagined was a Great Romance. Age had
+turned sentiment into sentimentality in this kind fat
+lady and she thought of everything to do with the
+heart in capital letters. Lola’s words in Mrs. Rumbold’s
+parlor came back to her. “It’s love and adoration
+and long-deferred hope,” and she was stirred to a
+great sympathy. Shutting the drawing-room door
+upon the after-breakfast rush to music, she went upstairs
+to Lola’s room in the newest wing, distressed at
+her inability to creep. The dear thing was in her care
+and must be looked after.</p>
+<p class="pnext">It was nearly midday and the house had echoed with
+scales and badinage, bursts of operatic laughter and
+pæans of soprano praise to the gift of life for an hour
+and more. And so, of course, she expected to find her
+young friend lying in a daydream, reluctantly awake.
+But when she opened the door of Lola’s room as
+quietly as she could, it was to see the silver frock spilt
+upon the floor like a pool of moonlight and the girl
+lying under the bedclothes in the attitude of a child in
+irresistible sleep, breathing like a rose. Her golden
+hair was streaming on her pillow, the long, dark lashes
+of her wide-apart eyes seemed to be stuck to her
+cheeks. Her lips were slightly apart and one arm was
+stretched out, palm up, with fingers almost closed upon
+something that she had found at last and must never
+let go.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Love and adoration and long-deferred hope,”—the
+words came back again and told their story to the
+woman of one great love, so that she was moved to
+renewed sympathy and re-thrilled. She stood over the
+slight form in its utter relax and saw the lips tremble
+into a smile and the fingers close a little more. She
+said to herself, little knowing how exact was the
+simile upon which she stumbled, “She has found the
+gate in the wall.” But before leaving the room to
+keep her song birds as quiet as possible, in order that
+her friend might sleep her fill, she caught sight of a
+book that lay open on the dressing table, upon the inner
+cover of which was pasted the photograph of a
+familiar face. “Fallaray!”—She read the title:
+“Memoirs de Madame de Brézé.” And she looked
+again at the strong, ascetic face, with the lonely eyes,
+the unwarmed lips, the cold high brow. It might have
+been that of St. Anthony.</p>
+<p class="pnext">And she stood for a moment before going down to
+her children—her only children—and repeated to
+herself, with great excitement, her former thought.
+“A Great Romance, Love in High Places. How wonderful
+to be in, perhaps, on History.”</p>
+</div>
+<div class="level-3 section" id="id40">
+<h3 class="level-3 pfirst section-title title">III</h3>
+<p class="pfirst">If, during all their inarticulate talks, Fallaray had
+ever remembered to ask Lola about herself, she would
+have told him, with perfect truth, the little story of
+her life and love. She was now wholly without fear.
+She had found the gate in the wall and had entered to
+happiness. But Fallaray went through that week-end
+without thinking, accepting the union that she had
+brought about without question and with a joy and
+delight as youthful as her own. From the time that
+she had found him at four o’clock waiting for her, not
+caring where she came from so that she came, and saw
+that she had brushed the loneliness from his eyes and
+brought a smile to his mouth, all sense of being merely
+temporary lifted from her heart. In the eagerness of
+his welcome, in the hunger of his embrace, she saw that
+she belonged, was already as much a possession and a
+fact as the old house, hitherto his one treasure and
+refreshment.</p>
+<p class="pnext">They went hand in hand through those lovely days,
+like a boy and a girl. He led her from one pet place
+to another and lay at her feet, watching her with wonder,
+or going close to kiss her eyes and hair, to prove
+again and yet again that she was not a dream. And
+every moment smoothed a line from his face and
+pointed the way to his need of her in all the days to
+come. But while he showed that he had lived his future
+and had begun to spend his past, she, even then,
+forgot her past and turned her eyes to the future.
+Those holiday days which bound them together must
+come to an end, of course. And while she reveled in
+them as he did and avoided any mention of the work
+to which he must return, she had found herself in finding
+him, and becoming woman at last, saw her great
+responsibility and developed the sense of protection
+that grows with woman’s love.</p>
+<p class="pnext">And this new sense was strengthened and made all
+the more necessary because his desire to make holiday
+had come about through her. And while she lay in his
+arms in all the ecstasy of love, she knew that she would
+fall far short of her achievement if she should become
+of more importance in his life than the work that he
+seemed to have utterly forgotten. It was for her, she
+began to see, to send him back with renewed energy
+and fire, and then, installed in a secret nest, to fulfil the
+part marked out for her as she conceived it and give
+him the rustle of silk.</p>
+<p class="pnext">If she had been the common schemer, using her sex
+magnetism to provide luxuries and security—the
+golden cage, as she had called it in her youth—the
+way was easy. But love and hero-worship had placed
+her on another level. Her cage was Fallaray’s heart,
+in which she was imprisoned for life. Looking into
+the future with the suddenly awakened practicality
+that she had inherited from her mother, she began to
+lay out careful plans. She must find a girl to take
+her place with Lady Feo. Gratitude demanded that.
+She would go home until such time as she could take
+a furnished flat to which Fallaray could come without
+attracting attention. What her parents were to be told
+required much thinking. All her ideas of a Salon, of
+meeting political chiefs, of going into a certain set of
+society were foolish, she could see. The second of
+the most important of her new duties, she told herself,
+was to shield Fallaray from gossip which would be of
+use to his political enemies and so-called friends; the
+first to dedicate her life henceforward, by every gift
+that she possessed and could acquire, to the inspiration
+and the relaxation of the man who belonged more to
+his country than he did to her.</p>
+<p class="pnext">She knew from the observation of specific cases and
+from her study of the memoirs and the lives of famous
+courtesans that men were not held long by sex
+attraction alone, although by that, rather than by
+beauty and by wit, they were captured. She must,
+therefore, she owned, with her peculiar frankness, apprentice
+herself anew, this time to the cultivation of
+intelligence. She must be able, eventually, to talk
+Fallaray’s language, if possible, and add brain to what
+she called her gift.</p>
+<p class="pnext">All these things worked in her mind, suddenly set
+into action like one of her father’s doctored watches,
+while she wandered through the sunny hours with Fallaray.
+All that was French and thrifty and practical
+in her nature awoke with all that was passionate and
+love-giving. And when at night she had to leave him
+to return to the cottage of the sympathetic woman
+whose discretion deserved a monument, she lay awake
+for hours to think and plan. She was no longer the
+lady’s maid, going with love and adoration and long-deferred
+hope from one failure to another, no longer
+the trembling girl egged forward to a forlorn hope.
+She had found the gate in the wall, entered into a
+golden responsibility and blossomed into a woman.</p>
+</div>
+<div class="level-3 section" id="id41">
+<h3 class="level-3 pfirst section-title title">IV</h3>
+<p class="pfirst">Feo’s new man, Clive Arrowsmith, had driven her
+down to the races at Windsor. Two of his horses,
+carrying colors new to the betting public, were entered.
+No one knew anything about them, so that if they won,
+and they were out to win, the odds would be good.
+There was a chance of making some money, always
+useful.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“I rather like this meeting,” she said. “It’s a sort
+of picnic peopled with caricatures,” and sailed into the
+enclosure, elastically, in more than usually characteristic
+clothes. She had discarded the inevitable tam-o’-shanter
+for once in favor of a panama hat, which
+looked very cool and light and threw a soft shadow over
+her face. She was in what she called a soft
+mood,—meaning that she was playing a feminine role
+and leading up to a serious affair. Arrowsmith was
+obviously pucca and his height and slightness, well-shaped,
+close-cropped head, small straw-colored moustache,
+straight nose, strong chin with a deep cleft, and
+gray eyes which had a way, most attractive to women,
+of disbelieving everything they said had affected Feo
+and “really rather rattled” her, as she had confessed
+to Georgie Malwood late one night. After her recent
+bad picks, which had left a nasty taste of humiliation
+behind, she was very much in the mood for an old-fashioned
+sweep into sentiment. She had great hopes
+of Arrowsmith and had seen him every day since
+Sunday. He was not easy. He erected mental bunkers.
+He was plus two at the game, which was good
+for hers. Altogether he was very satisfactory, and his
+horses added to the fun, on the side.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“It’s rather a pet of mine,” he said, looking round
+with a sort of affectionate recognition, “because when
+I was at Eton I broke bounds once or twice and had
+the time of my life here. Everything tastes better
+when there’s a law against drinking. But I never
+thought I should come here with you.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Have you ever thought about it then?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Yes,” he said, leaning on the rail and looking
+under her hat with what was only the third of his un-ironical
+examinations. She had memorized the other
+two. Was she approaching the veteran class? “The
+day you were married I happened to be passing St.
+Margaret’s and the crowd of fluttering women held me
+up. I saw you leave the church and I said to myself,
+‘My God, if I ever know that girl, I’ll have a try to
+put a different smile on her face,’”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“You interest me, Cupid,” she said, giving him a
+nickname on the spur of the moment. “What sort of
+smile, if you please?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“One that wouldn’t make me want to hit you,” he
+answered, still looking.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“You’ll never achieve your object on the way out
+of church.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“No, that’s dead certain.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">And she wondered whether he had scored or she
+had. She would like to feel that he was hard hit
+enough to go through this affair hell for leather, into
+the Divorce Court and out into marriage. It came to
+her at that moment, for the first time, that she liked
+him,—more than liked him; that he appealed to her
+and did odd new things to her heart. She felt that
+she could make her exit from the gang with this man.</p>
+<p class="pnext">As for Arrowsmith, he was sufficiently hard hit to
+hate Feo for the record that she had made, sufficiently
+in love with her to resent her kite-tail of indiscriminations.
+He loved but didn’t like her, and this meant
+that he would unmagnetize himself as soon as he could
+and bolt. The bunkers that she had found in his nature
+were those of fastidiousness, not often belonging
+to men. But for being the son of Arrowsmith, the
+iron founder, whose wealth had been quadrupled by
+the War, he would have been a poet, although he
+might never have written poetry. As it was, he considered
+that women should be chaste, and was the object
+of derision for so early-Victorian an opinion.
+The usual hobby thus failing, he raced, liking thoroughbreds
+who played the game. A queer fish, Arrowsmith.</p>
+<p class="pnext">Georgie Malwood came up. She was with her
+fourth mother-in-law, Mrs. Claude Malwood, whose
+back view was seventeen, but whose face was older
+than the Pyramids. And Arrowsmith drifted off to
+the paddock.</p>
+<p class="pnext">But they lunched and spent the day together and
+one of the horses, “Mince Pie,” won the fourth race
+at six to one, beating the favorite by a short head.
+And so Feo had a good day. They got away ahead of
+the crowd, except for the people of the theater, who
+had to dine early and steady down before entering
+upon the arduous duties of the night, especially those
+of the chorus who, in these days of Reviews, are called
+upon to make so many changes of clothes. Art demands
+many sacrifices.—It had been decided that the
+Ritz would do for dinner and one of the dancing clubs
+afterwards. But on the way out Gilbert Macquarie
+pranced up to Feo, utterly inextinguishable, with a hatband
+of one club and a tie of another and clothes that
+would have frightened a steam roller. “Oh, hello,
+old thing,” he cried, giving one of his choicest wriggles.
+“How goes it?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">To which Feo replied, with her most courteous insolence,
+“Out, Mr. Macquarie,” touched Arrowsmith’s
+arm and went.</p>
+<p class="pnext">But the nasty familiarity of that most poisonous
+bounder did something queer to Arrowsmith’s physical
+sense, and he couldn’t for the life of him play conversational
+ball with Feo on the road home. “To follow
+<em>that</em>,” he thought, and was nauseated.</p>
+<p class="pnext">But Feo was in her softest, her most feminine mood.
+After dinner she was going to dance with this man and
+be held in his arms. It was a delightful surprise to
+discover that she possessed a heart. She had begun to
+doubt it. She had been an experimentalist hitherto.
+And so she didn’t have much to say. And when they
+emerged from the squalor of Hammersmith and were
+passing Queen’s Road, Bayswater, the picture of Lola
+came suddenly into her mind, the girl in love, and she
+wondered sympathetically how she was getting on.
+“What shall I wear to-night? I hate those new
+frocks.—I hope the band plays Bohème at the Ritz.—No
+diamonds, just pearls. He’s a pearl man, I think.
+And I’ll brush Peau d’Espagne through my hair.
+What a profile he has,—Cupid.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">And she shuddered. She had married a profile, the
+fool. To be set free was impossible. The British
+public did not allow its Cabinet Ministers to be divorced.</p>
+<p class="pnext">At Dover Street Arrowsmith sprang from the car.
+He handed Feo out and rang the doorbell.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“You look white,” she said. “What’s the matter?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">He was grateful for the chance. “That old wound,”
+he said. “It goes back on me from time to time.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“That doesn’t mean that you’ll have to chuck tonight?”
+She was aghast.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“I’m awfully afraid so, if you don’t mind. It
+means bed, instantly, and a doctor. Do forgive me.
+I can’t help myself. I wish to God I could.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">She swallowed an indescribable disappointment and
+said “Good night, then. So sorry. Ring me up in
+the morning and let me know how you feel.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">But she knew that he wouldn’t. It was written
+round his mouth. And as she went upstairs she
+whipped herself and cursed Macquarie and looked back
+at her kite-tail of indiscriminations with overwhelming
+regret. Arrowsmith was a pucca man.</p>
+</div>
+<div class="level-3 section" id="id42">
+<h3 class="level-3 pfirst section-title title">V</h3>
+<p class="pfirst">Ernest Treadwell watched the car come and go.</p>
+<p class="pnext">Lola had given out at home that she was to be away
+with Lady Feo, but that morning he had seen in the
+paper that her ladyship was in town. She had “been
+seen” dining at Hurlingham after the polo match with
+Major Clive Arrowsmith, D. S. O., late Grenadier
+Guards. Dying to see Lola, to break the wonderful
+news that his latest sonnet on Death had been printed
+by the <em>Westminster Gazette</em>, the first of his efforts to
+find acceptance in any publication, Treadwell had hurried
+to Dover Street, had ventured to present himself
+at the area door and had been told by Ellen that Lola
+was away on a holiday.</p>
+<p class="pnext">For half an hour he had been walking up and down
+the street, looking with puzzled and anxious eyes at
+the house which had always seemed to him to wear a
+sinister look. If she had not been going away with
+Lady Feo, why had she said that she was? A holiday,—alone,
+stolen from her people and from him to
+whom hitherto she had always told everything?
+What was the meaning of it?—She, Lola, had not
+told the truth. The thought blew him into the air, like
+an explosion. Considering himself, with the egotism
+of all half-baked socialists, an intellectual from the fact
+that he read Massingham and quoted Sidney Webb,
+he boasted of being without faith in God and constitution.
+He sneered at Patriotism now, and while he
+stood for Trades-Unionism remained, like all the rest
+of his kind, an individualist to the marrow. But he
+had believed in Lola because he loved her and she inspired
+him, and without her encouragement and praise
+he knew that he would let go and crash. Just as he
+had been printed in the <em>Westminster Gazette</em>!</p>
+<p class="pnext">And she had not told the truth, even to her people.
+Where was she? What was she doing? To whom
+could she go to spend a holiday? She had no other
+relation than her aunt and she also was in town. Ellen
+had told him so in answer to his question.—Back into
+a mind black with jealousy and suspicion—he was
+without the habit of faith—came the picture of Lola,
+dressed like a lady, getting out of a taxicab at the
+shady-looking house in Castleton Terrace. Had she
+lied to him then?</p>
+<p class="pnext">Dover Street was at the bottom of it all, and her
+leaving home to become a lady’s maid to such a woman
+as Lady Feo. She must have caught some of the
+poison of that association, God knew what! In time
+of trouble it is always the atheist who is the first to call
+on God.</p>
+<p class="pnext">He was about to leave the street in which the Fallaray
+house had now assumed the appearance of a
+morgue to him when Simpkins came up from the area,
+with a dull face. After a moment of irresolution he
+followed and caught the valet up. “Where’s Miss
+Breezy?” he asked abruptly.</p>
+<p class="pnext">Simpkins was all the more astonished at the question
+for the trouble on that young cub’s face. He looked
+him over sharply,—the cheap cap, the too long hair,
+the big nose, the faulty teeth, the pasty face, the un-athletic
+body, the awkward feet. Lola was in love.
+He knew that well enough. But not with this lout,
+that was certain, poet or no poet. “I don’t know as
+’ow I’ve got to answer that question,” he said, just to
+put him in his place.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Yes, you have. Where is she?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“You ought ter know.” He himself knew and as
+there was no accounting for tastes and Lola had made
+a friend of this anæmic hooligan, why didn’t <em>he</em>? He
+lived round the corner from the shop, anyhow.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“But I don’t know. Neither do her father and
+mother.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“What’s that?” Simpkins drew up short. “You
+don’t know what you’re talkin’ about. She went ’ome
+last Thursday to get a little rest until to-morrer,—Tuesday.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">Treadwell would have cried out, “It isn’t true,” but
+he loved Lola and was loyal. He had met Simpkins in
+Queen’s Road, Bayswater, and had seen him on familiar
+terms with Mr. Breezy, but he was a member of
+the Fallaray household and as such was not to be let
+into this—<em>this</em> trouble. Not even the Breezys must
+be told before Lola had been seen and had given an
+explanation. They didn’t love her as much as he did,—nor
+any one else in the world. And so he said,
+loyalty overmastering his jealousy and fear, “Oh, is
+that so? I haven’t had time to look in lately. I didn’t
+know.” And seeing a huge unbelief in Simpkins’s pale
+eyes, he hurried on to explain. “Being in the neighborhood
+and having some personal news for Lola, I
+called at your house. Was surprised to hear that she
+was away. That’s all. Good night.” And away he
+went, head forward, left foot turning in, long arms
+swinging loose.</p>
+<p class="pnext">But he had touched the spring in Simpkins to a
+jealousy and a fear that were precisely similar to his
+own. Lola was <em>not</em> at home. Treadwell knew it and
+had called at Dover Street, expecting to find her there.
+They had all been told lies because she was doing
+something of which she was ashamed. The night that
+she had come in, weeping, dressed like a lady.—The
+words that had burned into his soul the evening of his
+proposal,—“so awfully in love with somebody else
+and it’s a difficult world.—Perhaps I shall never be
+married and that’s the truth, Simpky. It’s a difficult
+world.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Hi,” he called out. “Hi,” and started after
+Treadwell, full stride.</p>
+<p class="pnext">But rather than face those searching eyes again, at
+the back of which there was a curious blaze, Treadwell
+took to his heels, and followed hard by Simpkins,
+whose fanatical spirit of protection was stirred to its
+depths, dodged from one street into another. The
+curious chase would have ended in Treadwell’s escape
+but for the sudden intervention, in Vigo Street, of a
+policeman who slipped out of the entrance to the Albany
+and caught the boy in his arms.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Now then, now then,” he said. “What’s all this
+’ere?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">And up came Simpkins, blowing badly, with his tie
+under his left ear. “It’s—it’s alri, Saunders. A
+friendly race, that’s all. He’s—he’s a paller mine.
+Well run, Ernie!” And he put his arm round
+Treadwell’s shoulders, laughing.</p>
+<p class="pnext">And the policeman, whose wind was good, laughed,
+too, at the sight of those panting men. “Mind wot
+yer do, Mr. Simpkins,” he said, to the nice little fellow
+with whom he sometimes took a drink at the bottom of
+the area steps. “Set up ’eart trouble if yer not careful.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">Set up heart trouble? Simpkins looked with a sudden
+irony at the boy who also would give his life to
+Lola. And the look was met and understood. It put
+them on another footing, they could see.</p>
+<p class="pnext">After a few more words of badinage the policeman
+mooched off to finish his talk with the tall-hatted
+keeper of the Albany doorway. And Simpkins said
+gravely and quietly, “Treadwell, we’ve got to go into
+this, you and me. We’re in the same boat and Lola’s
+got ter be—looked after, by both of us.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">Treadwell nodded. “I’m frightened,” he said,
+without camouflage.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“So am I,” said Simpkins.</p>
+<p class="pnext">And they went off together, slowly, brought into
+confidence by a mutual heart trouble that had already
+set up.</p>
+</div>
+<div class="level-3 section" id="id43">
+<h3 class="level-3 pfirst section-title title">VI</h3>
+<p class="pfirst">But there was no uneasiness in Queen’s Road, Bayswater.
+John Breezy and his good wife were happy in
+the belief that their little girl was enjoying the air and
+scents of the country with her ladyship. They had
+neither the time nor the desire to dig deeply into the
+daily papers. To read of the weathercock policy of
+the overburdened Prime Minister, traditionally, nationally,
+and mentally unable to deal with the great
+problems that followed upon each other’s heels, made
+Breezy blasphemous and brought on an incapacity to
+sit still. And so he merely glanced at the front page,
+hoping against hope for a new government headed by
+such men as Lord Robert Cecil, Lord Derby, Lord
+Grey and Edmund Fallaray, and for the ignominious
+downfall of all professional scavengers, titled newspaper
+owners and mountebanks who were playing
+ducks and drakes with the honor and the traditions of
+Parliament. He had no wish to be under the despotism
+of a Labor Government, having seen that loyalty
+to leaders was unknown among Trades Unionists and
+that principles were things which they never had had
+and never would have the courage to avow.</p>
+<p class="pnext">As for Mrs. Breezy, she never had time for the
+papers. She didn’t know and didn’t care which party
+was in power, or the difference between them, and
+when she heard her husband discuss politics with his
+friends, burst into a tirade and get red in the face, as
+every self-respecting man has the right to do, she just
+folded her hands in her lap, smiled, and said to herself,
+“Dear old John, what would he do in the millennium,
+with no government to condemn!” Therefore, these
+people had not seen in the daily “Chit Chat about Society”
+the fact that Lady Feo had not left town.
+They never read those luscious morsels. Because
+Lady Feo had not left town Aunt Breezy had been too
+busy to come round on her usual evening, when she
+would have discovered immediately that Lola was up
+to something and put the fat in the fire. And so they
+were happy in their ignorance,—which is, pretty
+often, the only state in which it is achieved.</p>
+<p class="pnext">Over dinner that night—a scrappy meal, because
+whenever any one entered the shop Mrs. Breezy ran
+out to do her best to sell something—the conversation
+turned to the question of Lola’s marriage, as it frequently
+did. That public house on the river, with its
+kitchen garden, still rankled. “You know, John,”
+said Mrs. Breezy suddenly, “I’ve been thinking it all
+over. We were wrong to suppose that Lola would
+ever have married a man like Simpkins.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Why? He’s a good fellow, respectable, clean-minded,
+thinks a good deal of himself and has a nice
+bit of money stowed away. You don’t want her to
+become engaged to one of these young fly-by-nights
+round here, do you,—little clerks who spend all their
+spare money on clothes, have no ambition, no education
+and want to get as much as they can for nothing?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“No,” said Mrs. Breezy. “I certainly do not,
+though I don’t think it matters what you and I want,
+my dear. I’ve come to the conclusion that Lola knows
+what she’s going to do, and we couldn’t make her alter
+her mind if we went down on our knees to her.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">Breezy was profoundly interested. Many times he
+had discovered that the little woman who professed to
+be nothing but a housewife, and very rarely gave forth
+any definite opinions of her own, said things from
+time to time which almost blew the roof off the shop.
+She was possessed of an uncanny intuition, what he
+regarded almost as second sight, and when she was in
+that mood he squashed his own egotism and listened to
+her with his mouth open.</p>
+<p class="pnext">So she went on undisturbed. “What I think is that
+Lola means to aim high. I’ve worked it out in my
+mind that she got into the house in Dover Street to
+learn enough to rise above such men as Simpkins and
+Ernest Treadwell, so that she could fit herself to
+marry a gentleman. And I think she’s right. Look
+at her. Look at those little ankles and wrists and the
+daintiness of her in every way. She’s not Queen’s
+Road, Bayswater, and never was. She’s Mayfair
+from head to foot, mind and body. We’re just accidents
+in her life, you and I, John, my dear. She will
+be a great lady, you mark my words.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">Breezy didn’t altogether like being called an accident.
+He took a good deal of credit for the fact that
+Lola was Mayfair, as Emily called it, rather well.
+And he said so, and added, “How about the old de
+Brézé blood? You forget that, my being a little jeweler
+in a small shop. She’s thrown back, that’s what
+she’s done, and I’ll tell you what it is, missus. She
+won’t be ashamed of us, whoever she marries. <em>She</em>
+doesn’t look upon us as accidents, whatever you may
+do, and if some man who’s A 1 at Lloyd’s falls in love
+with her and makes her his wife, her old father and
+mother will be drawn up the ladder after her, if I know
+anything about Lola. But it’s a dream, just a dream,”
+hoping that it wasn’t, and only saying so as a sort of
+insurance against bad luck. It was a new idea and an
+exciting one, which put that place on the Thames into
+the discard. Personally he had hitherto regarded the
+Simpkins proposal in a very favorable light. That
+little man had more money than he himself could ever
+make, and, after all, a highly respectable public house
+on the upper Thames, patronized by really nice people,
+had been, in his estimation, something not to be sneezed
+at, by any means.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Well,” said Mrs. Breezy, “you may call it a dream.
+I don’t. Lola thinks things out. She’s always thought
+things out. She became a lady’s maid for a purpose.
+When she’s finished with that, she’ll move on to something
+else. I don’t know what, because she keeps
+things to herself. But she knows more than you and
+I will ever know. I’ve noticed that often. And when
+she was here on Sunday, and we walked about the
+streets, she was no more Lola Breezy than Lady Feo
+is, and there was something in the way she laid the
+dinner and insisted on waiting on us which showed me
+that she knew she wasn’t. She was what country people
+call ‘fey’ that night. Her body was with us, but
+her brain and heart and spirit were far out of our
+reach. I’m certain of that, John, and I’m certain of
+something else, too. She’s in love, and she knows her
+man, and he’s a big man, and very soon she’ll have a
+surprise for us, and it will <em>be</em> a surprise. You mark
+my words.”</p>
+<div class="figure">
+<div class="align-center container image-wrapper">
+<img alt="images/illus-204.jpg" src="images/illus-204.jpg"/>
+</div>
+<div class="caption">
+A SCENE FROM THE PHOTOPLAY.</div>
+</div>
+<p class="pfirst">And when she got up to answer the tinkle of the bell
+on the shop door, she left the fat John Breezy quivering
+with excitement and a sort of awe. Emily was
+not much of a talker, but when she started she said
+more in two minutes than other women say in a week.
+And after he had told himself how good it would be
+for his little girl to win great happiness, he put both his
+pale hands on the table, and heaved a tremendous
+sigh. “Oh, my God,” he said. “And if she could
+help us to get out of this shop, never to see a watch
+again, to be no longer the slave of that damned little
+bell, to go away and live in the country, and grow
+things, and listen to the birds, and watch the sunsets.”</p>
+</div>
+<div class="level-3 section" id="id44">
+<h3 class="level-3 pfirst section-title title">VII</h3>
+<p class="pfirst">At that moment George Lytham drove his car
+through the gates of Chilton Park and up to the old
+house. He asked for Mr. Fallaray, was shown into
+the library and paced up and down the room with his
+hands deep in his pockets, but with his chin high, his
+eyes gleaming and a curious smile about his mouth.</p>
+<p class="pnext">The moment had come for which he had been waiting
+since the Armistice, for which he had been working
+with all his energy since he had got back into civilian
+clothes. He had left London and driven down to
+Whitecross on a wave of exhilaration. There had
+been a meeting at his office at which all the men of his
+party had been present,—young men, ex-soldiers and
+sailors temporarily commissioned, who had come out
+of the great catastrophe to look things straight in the
+face. “Fallaray is our man,” they had all said unanimously.
+“Where is he?” And Lytham, who was
+his friend, had been sent to fetch him and bring him
+back to London that night. The time was ripe for
+action.</p>
+<p class="pnext">But when the door opened and Fallaray strolled in—he
+had never seen him stroll before—George drew
+up short, amazed.—But this was not Fallaray. This
+was not the man he had seen the previous Friday with
+rounded shoulders, haggard face and eyes in the back
+of his head. Here was one who looked like a younger
+brother of Fallaray, a care-free younger brother, sun-tanned,
+irresponsible, playing with life.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“My dear Fallaray,” he said, hardly knowing what
+to say, “what have you done to yourself?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">And Fallaray sent out a ringing laugh and clapped
+young Lochinvar on the shoulder. “You notice the
+change, eh? It’s wonderful, wonderful. I say to myself
+all day long how wonderful it is.” And he flung
+his hands up and laughed again and threw himself into
+a chair and stuck his long legs out. “But what the
+devil do you want?” he asked lightly, enjoying the
+opportunity of showing the serious man who came out
+of a future that he himself had forgotten that he was
+beginning to revel in his past. “I said that some one
+would jolly soon see the wreckage on the shore of my
+Eden and send out a rescue party, and here you are.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">Lytham didn’t understand. The words were Greek
+to him and the attitude so surprising that it awakened
+in him a sort of irritation. Good God, hadn’t this
+man, who meant so much to them, read the papers?
+Wasn’t he aware of the fact that the time had arrived
+in the history of politics when a strong concerted effort
+might put a new face upon everything? “Look here,
+Fallaray,” he said, “let’s talk sense.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“My dear chap,” said Fallaray, “you’ve come to the
+wrong man for that. I know nothing about sense, and
+what’s more, I don’t want to. Talk romance to me,
+quote poetry, tell me your dreams, turn somersaults,
+but don’t come here and expect any sense from me.
+I’ve given it up.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">But Lytham was not to be put off. He said to himself,
+“The air of this place has gone to Fallaray’s head.
+He needed a holiday. The reaction has played a trick
+upon him. He’s pulling my leg.” He drew up a chair
+and leaned forward eagerly and put his hand on Fallaray’s
+knee. “All right, old boy,” he said. “Have
+your joke, but come down from the ether in which
+you’re floating and listen to facts. The wily little
+P. M. who’s been between the devil and the deep sea
+for a couple of years is getting rattled. With the
+capitalists pushing him one way and the labor leaders
+shouldering him the other, he’s losing his feet. The
+by-elections show the way the wind’s blowing in the
+country and they’ve made a draught in Downing
+Street. Trust a Celt as a political barometer.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“There’s been no wind here, George,” said Fallaray,
+putting his hands behind his head. “Golden days, my
+dear fellow, golden days, with the gentlest of breezes.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">But Lytham ignored the interruption. In five minutes,
+if he knew his man, he would have Fallaray sitting
+up straight. “Our anti-waste men are winning
+every seat they stand for,” he went on, “and this
+means the nucleus of a new party, our party. The
+country is behind us, Fallaray, and if we keep our
+heads and get down to work, the next general election
+will not be a walk-over for the labor men but for us.
+Lloyd George is on his last legs, in spite of his newspapers,
+and with him the Coalitionists disappear to a
+man. As for Trades-Unionism, the coal strike has
+proved that it oscillates between communism and socialism,
+the nationalizing of everything—mines, railways,
+land, capital—and the country doesn’t like it
+and isn’t ready for it. The way, therefore, is easy if
+we organize at once under a leader who has won the
+reputation for honesty, and that leader is yourself.
+But there is not a moment to waste. My car is outside.
+Drive up with me now and meet us to-morrow
+morning. Unanimously we look to you.” He sprang
+to his feet and made a gesture towards the door.</p>
+<p class="pnext">But Fallaray settled more comfortably into his chair
+and crossed one long leg over the other. “Do you
+know your Hood?” he asked.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Hood?—Why?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Listen to this:</p>
+<blockquote><div>
+<div class="line-block">
+<div class="line">
+“‘Peace and rest at length have come,</div>
+<div class="line">
+All the day’s long toil is past,</div>
+<div class="line">
+And each heart is whispering Home,</div>
+<div class="line">
+Home at last.’”</div>
+</div>
+</div></blockquote>
+<p class="pfirst">“But what has that got to do with it?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“That’s my answer to you, George.” And Fallaray
+waved his hand, as though the question was settled.</p>
+<p class="pnext">If Lytham had been older or younger, and if his admiration
+and esteem for Fallaray had not become so
+deep-rooted, he must have broken out into a torrent of
+incredulity and impatience. What he did, instead,
+persuading himself, easily enough, that his friend had
+not recovered from his recent disappointments, although
+he had obviously benefited in health, was to go
+over the whole ground again, more quietly and in
+greater detail, and to wind up with the assertion that
+Fallaray was essential to the cause.</p>
+<p class="pnext">To all of which Fallaray listened with a sort of respectful
+interest but without the slightest enthusiasm,
+and remained lolling in his chair. He might have been
+a Buckinghamshire Squire who knew no language but
+his own, hearing a Frenchman holding forth for no
+apparent reason on Napoleon. He watched his
+friend’s mouth, appraised his occasional gestures, ran
+his eyes with liking over his well-knit body and found
+his voice pleasant to the ear. Beyond that, nothing.</p>
+<p class="pnext">Lytham began to feel like a man who throws stones
+into a lake. All his points seemed to disappear into an
+unruffled and indifferent surface of water. It was incomprehensible.
+It was also indescribably baffling.
+What on earth had come over this man who, until a
+few days before, had been burning with a desire to reconstruct
+and working himself into a condition of
+nervous exhaustion in an endeavor to pull his country
+out of chaos?</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Well,” he said, after an extraordinary pause, during
+which everything seemed to have fallen flat.
+“What are you going to do?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“But I’ve told you, my dear George,” said Fallaray,
+with a long sigh of happiness. “I have found a home,
+at last.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“You mean that you are going to let us down?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“I mean that I am going to live my own life.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“That you’re out of politics?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Yes. My resignation goes in to-morrow.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“My God! Why?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">Fallaray got up and went to the window. He stood
+for a moment looking out at a corner of the terrace
+where several steps led down to a fountain in which,
+out of an urn held in the hands of a weather-worn boy,
+water was flowing, colored like a rainbow by the evening
+sun.</p>
+<p class="pnext">And Lytham followed him, wondering whether he
+had gone off his head, become feeble-minded as the result
+of overstrain. And then he saw Lola sitting on
+the edge of the fountain, with her face tilted up, her
+hands clasped round one of her knees and her golden
+hair gleaming.</p>
+<p class="pnext">And there both men remained, gazing,—Fallaray
+with a smile of possession, of infinite pride and pleasure;
+Lytham with an expression of profound amazement
+and quick understanding.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“So it’s a woman,” he thought. And as he continued
+to look, another picture of that girl came back into
+his mind. He had seen her before. He had turned as
+she had passed him somewhere and caught his breath.
+He remembered to have said to himself as she had
+walked away, “Eve, come to life! Some poor devil
+of an Adam will go to hell for her.”—The Carlton—Chalfont—the
+foyer with its little cases of glittering
+jewels, the long strip of carpet leading to the stairs of
+the dining room—the palms—the orchestra. It all
+came back.—Well, this might be a form of madness
+in a man of Fallaray’s age and womanless life, but,
+thank God, it was one with which he could deal. It
+was physical, not mental, as he had feared. Fallaray
+might very well play Adam without going into hell.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Can’t you combine the two,” he said. “Politics
+and that girl? It’s been done before. It’s being done
+every day. The one is helped by the other.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">But Fallaray shook his head. “I am not going to
+do it,” he said. “I have had a surfeit of one and
+nothing of the other. Take it from me finally, George,—I
+am out of the political game. I think I should
+have been out of it in any case, because I came here
+acknowledging failure, fed up, nauseated. I am not
+the man to juggle with intrigues, to say one thing to
+placate the capitalists to-day and another to fool labor
+to-morrow. It isn’t my way and I shall not be missed.
+On the contrary, my resignation will be accepted with
+eagerness. I am going to begin all over again, free,
+perfectly firm in my belief that there are better men to
+do my job. I was a bull in a china shop, and it will
+remain a china shop, whether it’s run by one party or
+another. It’s the system. Nothing can alter it. I
+couldn’t, you and your party won’t be able to. It’s
+gone too far. It’s a cancer. It will kill the country.
+And so I’m out. I consider that I have earned the
+right to love and make a home. Row off from my
+Eden, my dear fellow, and leave me in peace. I am
+not going to be rescued.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“We’ll see about that,” thought Lytham. “This is
+not Fallaray who speaks. It’s the man of forty suddenly
+hit by passion. I’ll fight that girl to the last
+gasp. We must have this man, we <em>must</em>.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">He turned away, deeply disappointed at the queer
+tangent at which his chief had gone off, bitterly annoyed
+to find that here was a fight within a fight at a
+time when unity was vital. He was himself a perfectly
+normal creature who regarded the rustle of silk
+as one of the necessities, like golf and tobacco, but to
+sacrifice a career or let down a cause for the sake of a
+woman was to him an act of unimaginable weakness
+and folly. If only Fallaray had been younger or
+older, or, better still, had been contentedly married to
+Feo! Cursed bad luck that he had been caught at
+forty.—But, struck with an idea in which he could
+see immediate possibilities, he stopped on his way to
+the door and went back to Fallaray. To work it out
+in his usual energetic way he must use strategy and appear
+to accept his friend’s decision as irreparable.
+“All right,” he said. “You know best. I’ll argue no
+more. But as there’s no need now for me to dash back
+to town, mayn’t I linger with you in Arcadia for a
+couple of hours?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">Fallaray was delighted. Lola was to dine at Lady
+Cheyne’s, and he would be alone. It would be very
+jolly to have George to dinner, especially as he saw the
+futility of argument and recognized an ultimatum.
+“Stay and have some food,” he said. “I’ve much to
+tell you. But will you let me leave you for ten minutes?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">That was precisely what young Lochinvar intended
+to do before he drove away,—speak to that woman.</p>
+<p class="pnext">He watched Fallaray join Lola at the fountain, give
+her his hand and wander off among the rose trees,
+wearing what he called the fatuous smile of the middle-aged
+man in love. And then, so that he might obtain
+a point or two for future use, he rang the bell for
+Elmer. The butler and he had known each other for
+years. He would answer a few nonchalant questions
+without reserve. “Good afternoon, Elmer,” he said,
+when the old man came in.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Good afternoon to you, Sir.” He might have been
+an actor who in palmy days had played Hamlet at
+Bristol.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“I’m staying to an early dinner with Mr. Fallaray.
+A whiskey and soda would go down rather well in the
+meantime.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Certainly, Sir.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Oh, and Elmer.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Sir?” His turn and the respectful familiar angle
+of his head were only possible to actors of the good old
+school.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“The name of the charming lady who has so kindly
+helped to brighten up Mr. Fallaray’s week-end.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Madame de Brézé, Sir.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Oh, yes, of course.” He had never heard it before.
+Married then, or a widow. French. ’Um.
+“And she is staying with——”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Lady Cheyne, Sir.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Oh, yes,—that house——”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“A stone’s throw from the gate in the wall, Sir.
+You can see the roof from this window.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Thanks very much, Elmer. How’s your son getting
+on now?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Very well indeed, Sir, thank you, owing to your
+kindness.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“A very good fellow,—a first-rate soldier. One of
+our best junior officers. Not too much soda, then.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“No, Sir.” He left the room like an elderly sun-beam.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Good!” said George Lytham. “Get off early,
+hang about by the gate, intercept this young woman on
+her way back to Fallaray and see what her game is.
+That’s the idea.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">And he sat down, lit a cigarette and picked up a copy
+of Hood that lay open on the table. His eyes fell on
+some marked lines.</p>
+<blockquote><div>
+<div class="line-block">
+<div class="line">
+“Peace and rest at length have come,</div>
+<div class="line">
+All the day’s long toil is past,</div>
+<div class="line">
+And each heart is whispering Home,</div>
+<div class="line">
+Home at last.”</div>
+</div>
+</div></blockquote>
+<p class="pfirst">And he thought of Feo whom he had seen several
+nights running with Arrowsmith and before that, for a
+series of years, with Dick, Tom and Harry. Never
+with Fallaray.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Poor devil,” he thought. “He’s been too long
+without it. It won’t be easy to rescue him now.”</p>
+</div>
+<div class="level-3 section" id="id45">
+<h3 class="level-3 pfirst section-title title">VIII</h3>
+<p class="pfirst">And at the gate in the wall Fallaray held Lola close
+in his arms and kissed her, again and again.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“My little Lola,” he said softly, “how wonderful
+you are,—how wonderful all this is. You had been
+in the air all round me for weeks. I used to see your
+eyes among the stars looking down at me when I left
+the House. I used to wake at night and feel them
+upon me all warm about my heart. Lots of times, like
+the wings of a bird, they flashed between me and my
+work. And the tingle of your hand that never left me
+ran through my veins like fire. I could have stopped
+dead that night at the Savoy and followed you away.
+And when I found you weeping in the corridor in
+Dover Street I was confused and bewildered because
+then I was old and I was fighting against you for the
+cause. De Brézé, de Brézé,—the name used to come
+to me, suddenly, like the forerunner of rain to a
+dried-up plant. And at last I got away and came
+down here, as I know now, to throw off my useless
+years and go back, past all the milestones on a long
+road, and wait for you. And then you heard my cry
+and opened the gate and walked among those stone
+figures of my life and gave me back my youth.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“With love and adoration and long-deferred hope,”
+she said and crept closer to his heart. “I love you. I
+love you. I’ve always loved you. And if I’d never
+found you, I should have waited for you on the other
+side of the Bridge,—loving you still.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“My dear—who am I to deserve this?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“You are Fallaray. Who else?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">And he laughed at that and held up her face and
+kissed her lips and said, “No. I’m no longer Fallaray,
+that husk of a man, emptying his energy on the
+ribs of chaos. I’m Edmund the boy, transformed to
+adolescence. I’m Any Man in love.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">And again she went closer, feeling the far-off shudder
+of thunder, with a new-born fear of opening the
+gate in the wall. “Who was that man who came to
+see you?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Young Lochinvar,—Lytham. He’s interested in
+politics.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“What did he want to see you about?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Nothing.” And he brushed away the lingering
+recollection with his hand.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“No. Tell me. I want to know.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“I forget.” And he laughed and kissed her once
+again.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“But in any case you have to go back to-morrow?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">He shook his head and ran his fingers over her hair.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“But you said you’d have to,—that night.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Did I? I forget.” And he put his hand over her
+heart and held it there.</p>
+<p class="pnext">And again there came that thunder shudder, and she
+eyed the gate with fear. “Did he want you to go back
+to-night? Tell me; I’ve <em>got</em> to know.” And she
+drew away a little—a very little—in order to force
+her point.</p>
+<p class="pnext">But he drew her back and kissed her eyes. “Don’t
+look like that,” he said. “What’s it matter? Let
+him want. I’m not going back. I’m never going
+back. If George Lytham were multiplied by a hundred
+thousand and they all landed on my island with
+grappling irons, I’d laugh them back to sea. They
+shan’t have me. I’ve given them all I had. I’ve
+found my youth and I’ll enjoy it, here, anywhere, with
+you.” He stretched out and opened the gate. “And
+now, I must let you go, my sweet. But don’t be longer
+than you can help. Get dinner over quickly and come
+back to me again. Wear that silver frock and I’ll wait
+for you on the terrace, as I did before. I want to be
+surprised again as you shimmer among those cold
+stones.” He let her go.</p>
+<p class="pnext">And she went through the gate and stood irresolute,
+as the shudder came again. With a little cry she
+turned and flung her arms round his neck as though
+she were saying, “Good-by.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">And yet there was only a cloud as big as a man’s
+hand in that clear sky.</p>
+</div>
+<div class="level-3 section" id="id46">
+<h3 class="level-3 pfirst section-title title">IX</h3>
+<p class="pfirst">No one, it might be thought, could hear to think at
+the narrow table in Lady Cheyne’s house. Those natural,
+childlike creatures who, if they had ever learned
+the artificialities forget them, talked, argued, sang
+and screamed each other down all at the same time.
+They could not really be musicians if they didn’t.</p>
+<p class="pnext">Zalouhou, whose only preparations for dinner consisted
+in bushing out his tie and hair, sat at his hostess’
+left; Willy Pouff, in an evening suit borrowed from a
+waiter friend who had gone to a hospital with a poisoned
+hand, on her right. Lola, at the end of the
+table, sat between Valdemar Varvascho and Max
+Wachevsky, who had remembered, oddly enough, to
+wash their faces, though Varvascho’s beard had
+grown darkly during the day. Both the women had
+changed and made up for artificial light. The result
+of Anna Stezzel’s hour was remarkable, as well, perhaps,
+as somewhat disconcerting. A voluptuous person,
+with hair as black as a wet starling, she had plastered
+her face with a thick coating of white stuff on
+which her lips resembled blood stains in the snow. Her
+beaded evening gown saved the company from panic
+merely by an accident and disclosed also the whole
+wide expanse of a rather yellow back. Regina Spatz
+was built on Zuluesque lines, too, but more by luck
+than judgment a white blouse tempered her amazing
+ampleness. She had used henna on her hair so that it
+might have been fungus in a tropic sea and sat in a perpetual
+blush of indiscriminate rouge. Salo Impf was
+wedged against her side and looked like a Hudson
+River tugboat under the lee of the <em>Aquitania</em>.</p>
+<p class="pnext">Like all fat women, Lady Cheyne was devoted to
+eating and had long since decided to let herself go.
+“One can only live once,” she said, in self-defense;
+“and how does one know that there’ll be peas and potatoes
+in the next world.” The dinner, to the loudly
+expressed satisfaction of the musicians, was substantial
+and excellent. Each course was received with a
+volley of welcome, expressed in several languages.
+The hard exercise of singing, playing, gesticulating,
+praising and breathing deeply gave these children of
+the exuberant Muse the best of appetites. It was a
+shattering meal.</p>
+<p class="pnext">But Lola could hear herself think, for all that. She
+sat smiling and nodding. Her body went through the
+proper mechanics, but her spirit was outside the gate
+in the wall, trembling. There was a cloud in the sky,
+already. Fallaray was going to make her more important
+than his work, and she had not come to him for
+that. Her métier was to bring into his loveless life
+the rustle of silk,—love, tenderness, flattery, refreshment,
+softness, beauty, laughter, adoration, which
+would send him out of her secret nest strengthened,
+humanized, eager, optimistic. She must fail lamentably
+if the effect of her absorbed him to the elimination
+of everything that made him necessary to the man who
+had come from London and to all that he represented.
+George Lytham, of <em>Reconstruction</em>, the organizer of
+the Anti-waste Party,—she had heard him discussed
+by Lady Feo. Without Fallaray he might be left
+leaderless,—because of her.</p>
+<p class="pnext">She went upstairs as soon as she could to put on the
+silver frock. There had been no time to change before
+dinner. Fallaray had kissed her so often that she had
+been late. She was joined immediately by Lady,
+Cheyne, who was anxious. She had seen something in
+Lola’s eyes.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“What is it, my dear?” she asked. “I’m worried
+about you.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">And Lola went to her, as to a mother, and shut her
+eyes and gave a little cry that seemed to come from
+her soul.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“There’s something wrong!—Has he hurt you?
+Tell me.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">And Lola said, “Oh, no. He would never hurt me,
+never. He loves me. But I may be hurting him, and
+that’s so very much worse.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“I don’t understand. You mean—his reputation?
+But what if you are? We’re all too precious careful
+to guard the reputations of our politicians, to help them
+along in their petty careers.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“But he isn’t a politician, and he isn’t working for a
+career.” She drew away sharply. No one must have
+a word against Fallaray.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Well, what is it then? I want you to be happy.
+I want this to be a Great Romance. And, good
+Heavens, my darling, it’s only three days old.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">Lola spoke through tears. Yes, it was only three
+days old. “He may love me too much,” she said.
+“I may become more important than his work.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">Lady Cheyne’s anxiety left her, like smoke. And
+she gave a laugh and drew what she called that old-fashioned
+child into her arms again. “My dear,” she
+said, “don’t let <em>that</em> distress you. Make yourself
+more important than his work. Encourage him to
+love you more than himself. He’ll be different from
+most men if he is capable of that! But perhaps happiness
+is something new in his life, and I shouldn’t wonder,
+with Lady Feo for a wife.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">It never occurred to Lola to ask her friend how she
+had discovered the secret. She listened eagerly to her
+sophistries, trying to persuade herself that they were
+true.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Get him to take you away. There are beautiful
+places to go to, and he never will be missed. There’ll
+be a paragraph,—‘ill-health causes the resignation of
+Mr. Fallaray’; the clubs will talk, but the people will
+believe the papers, and presently Lady Feo will sue for
+divorce, desertion. A nice thing,—she being the deserter!
+And you and he,—what do you care? Is
+happiness so cheap that you can throw it away, either
+of you? If he loves you, <em>that’s</em> his career, and a very
+much better one than leading parties and making empty
+promises and becoming Prime Minister. If he loves
+you well enough to sacrifice all that, for the sake
+of womanhood see that he does it, and you will
+build a bigger statue for him than any that he could
+win.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">And she kissed her little de Brézé, who seemed to
+have undergone a perfectly natural <em>crise de neuf</em>, being
+so much in love, and patted her on the shoulder.
+“Take an old woman’s advice, my pet. If you’ve won
+that man, keep him. He’ll live to thank you for it one
+of these days.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">And finally, when Lola slipped into the twilight in
+her silver frock, there didn’t seem to be a single cloud
+in the sky. Only an evening star. What Lady Cheyne
+had said she believed because she wanted to believe it,
+because this Great Romance was only three days old
+and hope had been so long deferred.—She stopped in
+the old garden and picked a rose and pulled its thorns
+off so that she might give it to Fallaray, and she lingered
+for a moment taking in the scents and the quiet
+sounds of that most lovely evening,—more lovely and
+more unclouded even than that other one, which was
+locked in her memory. And then she went along the
+path through the corner of a wood. A rabbit disappeared
+into the undergrowth, but the fairies were not
+out yet, and there was no one to spy. Was happiness
+so cheap that she could throw it away,—his and her
+own? “If you’ve won that man, keep him.” She
+danced all the rest of the way and over the side road
+to the gate in the wall,—early, after all, by half an
+hour. She would wait outside until she heard Fallaray’s
+quick step and watch the star. “I’ll get him to
+take me away,” she thought. “There are beautiful
+places to go to, and he never will be missed.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">She turned quickly, hearing some one on the road.
+She saw a car drawn up a little distance away, and a
+man come swinging towards her.</p>
+<p class="pnext">It was young Lochinvar.</p>
+</div>
+<div class="level-3 section" id="id47">
+<h3 class="level-3 pfirst section-title title">X</h3>
+<p class="pfirst">“Madame de Brézé,” he said, standing bareheaded,
+“my name is Lytham. May I ask you to be
+so kind as to give me ten minutes?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Twenty,” she answered, with the smile that she
+had flashed at Chalfont that night at the Savoy. “I
+have just that much to spare.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Thank you.” But now that he was there, after all
+his strategy, after saying good-by to Fallaray, driving
+all the way down the hill from Whitecross and up
+again into that side road, he didn’t know how to begin,
+or where. This girl! God,—how disordering a
+quality of sex! No wonder she had shattered poor
+old Fallaray.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Shall we walk along the lane? It turns a little
+way up and you can see the cross cut in the hill.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Yes,” he said. “But there are so many crosses,
+aren’t there, and they’re all cut on somebody’s hill.”
+He saw that she looked at him sharply and was glad.
+Quick to take points, evidently. This interview would
+not be quite so difficult, after all.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“You came down from town to see Edmund?”
+She called him by his Christian name to show this man
+where he stood.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“On the most urgent business,” he said, “I saw
+you sitting at the side of the fountain. It’s a dear old
+place.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">She was not beautiful, and she was not sophisticated.
+That way of dragging in Fallaray’s Christian name
+was childish in its naïveté. But all about her there
+was something so fresh and young, so sublimely unselfconscious,
+so disturbingly feminine, so appealing in its
+essence of womanhood that he had to pay her tribute
+and measure his words. He would hate to hurt this
+girl. De Brézé—Madame de Brézé—how was it
+that he hadn’t heard of her before? She knew Chalfont.
+She was staying with Poppy Cheyne. Fallaray
+had met her somewhere. Odd that he had missed her
+in the crowd.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“I’ll come to the point, if I may,” he said. “And
+I must bore you a little with a disquisition on the state
+of affairs.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“I’m interested in politics,” she said, with a forlorn
+attempt to keep a high head.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Then perhaps you know what’s happened, to a
+certain extent, although probably not as much as those
+of us who stand in the wings of the political stage and
+see the actors without their make-up,—not a pretty
+sight, sometimes.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Well?” But the cloud had returned and blotted
+out the evening star, and there was the shudder of distant
+thunder again.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Well, the people are turning against the old gang,
+at last. The Prime Minister has only his favorites and
+parasites and newspapers left with him. The Unionists
+are scared stiff by the sudden uprising of the Anti-waste
+Party and Labor has been drained of its fighting
+funds. The Liberals have withered. There is one
+great cry for honest government, relief from crushing
+taxation, a fair reward for hard work, and new leadership
+that will make the future safe from new wars.
+We must have Fallaray. He’s the only man. I came
+here this evening to fetch him. He refuses to come
+because of you. What are you going to do?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">As he drew up short and faced her, she looked like
+a deer surrounded by dogs. He was sorry, but this
+was no time for fooling. What stuff was this girl
+made of? Had she the gift of self-sacrifice as well as
+the magnetism of sex? Or was she just a female, who
+would cling to what she had won, self before everything?</p>
+<p class="pnext">“I love him,” she said.</p>
+<p class="pnext">Well, it was good to know that, but was that an
+answer? “Yes,” he said. “Well?” He would like
+to have added “But does he love you and can you keep
+him after passion is dead,—a man like Fallaray, who,
+after all, is forty.” But he hadn’t the courage or the
+desire to hurt.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“And because I love him he must go,” she said.</p>
+<p class="pnext">He leaned forward and seized her hand. He was
+surprised, delighted, and a little awed. She had gone
+as white as a lily. “You will see to that? You will
+use all your influence to give him back to us?” He
+could hardly believe his ears and his eyes.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“All my influence,” she said, standing very straight.</p>
+<p class="pnext">He bent down and touched her hand with his lips.</p>
+<p class="pnext">They were at the gate. They heard steps on the
+other side of the wall.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Go,” she said, “quickly.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">But before he went he bowed, as to a queen.</p>
+<p class="pnext">And then Lola heard the voice again, harshly. “Go
+on, de Brézé, go on. Don’t be weak. Stick to your
+guns. You have him in the palm of your hand.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">But she shook her head. “But I’m not de Brézé.
+I’ve only tried to be. I’m Lola Breezy of Queen’s
+Road, Bayswater, and this is love.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">She opened the gate and went in to Fallaray.</p>
+</div>
+</div>
+<div class="level-2 section" id="part-viii">
+<h2 class="level-2 pfirst section-title title"><a class="toc-backref pginternal" href="#id61">PART VIII</a></h2>
+<div class="level-3 section" id="id48">
+<h3 class="level-3 pfirst section-title title">I</h3>
+<p class="pfirst">There was a hooligan knock on Georgie Malwood’s
+bedroom door.</p>
+<p class="pnext">Saying “Aubrey” to herself without any sign either
+of irritation or petulance, she put down her book,
+gathered herself together, and slid off the bed. In a
+suit of boy’s pajamas she looked as young and undeveloped
+as when, at seventeen, she had married Clayburgh
+in the first week of the War. Her bobbed hair
+went into points over her ears like horns, and added to
+her juvenile appearance. She might have been a
+schoolgirl peeping at life through the keyhole, instead
+of a woman of twenty-four, older than Methuselah.</p>
+<p class="pnext">She unlocked the door. “Barge in,” she said,
+standing clear.</p>
+<p class="pnext">And Aubrey Malwood, with his six foot two of
+brawn and muscle, his yellow Viking hair, eyebrows
+and moustache, barged, as he always did.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“I’ve just dropped in to tell you,” he said, going
+straight to the looking-glass, “that Feo rang up an
+hour ago. She wants you to lunch with her in Dover
+Street.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">Perching herself on the window seat, like a pillow
+girl in Peter Pan, Georgie gazed uninterestedly at that
+portion of the Park at Knightsbridge which is between
+the barracks and the Hotel.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Oh, damn,” she said, “I wish she’d leave me
+alone.”
+Young Malwood was so astonished at this sentiment
+that he was drawn away from self-admiration. He
+liked his type immensely.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“I never expected to hear you say that! What’s
+the notion?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">His much-married wife’s doglike worship of Feo
+Fallaray had, as a matter of fact, immediately eliminated
+him from her daily pursuits and long ago sent
+him after another form of amusement.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Oh, I dunno,” said Georgie. “She’s been different
+lately; lost her sense of humor, and become serious
+and sentimental,—the very things she’s always hated
+in other people. You’re so fond of yourself that I
+don’t suppose you’ve ever noticed the shattering effect
+of having the teacher you imitated go back suddenly to
+the sloppy state you were in at the beginning of your
+lessons. I’ll go this time and then fall away. Feo’s
+over.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">Malwood went back to the glass and posed as a
+gladiator with an imaginary sword and shield. His
+magnificent height and breadth and bone made him
+capable of any gladiatorial effort. Only as to brain
+was he a case of arrested development. At twenty-eight
+he was still only just fit for Oxford. In any
+case, as things were, this desertion from her leader
+would leave Georgie exactly what she was,—someone
+who had the legal right to provide him with
+funds.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Well,” he said, “it’s your funeral,” and let it go.
+The fact that the elaborate dressing table was covered
+with framed photographs of his three equally young
+predecessors, as well as toilet things bearing their
+crests and initials, left this perpetual undergraduate
+unmoved. He had never been in love with Georgie.
+He had been somewhat attracted by her tinyness and
+imperturbability, but what had made him ask her to be
+his wife was the fact that everybody was talking about
+her as a creator of a record,—three times a widow in
+five years,—and he was one of those men, who, being
+unable to attract attention by anything that he could
+do, felt the need of basking in reflected glory. He had
+been fatuously satisfied to follow her into a public place
+and see people nudge each other as she passed. It was
+a thousand to one that if he had not married Georgie,
+he would have hunted London to find a girl who had
+won her way into the <em>Tatler</em> as a high diver or a
+swallower of knives. Why Georgie had married him
+was the mystery. Having acquired the married habit,
+it was probable that she had accepted him before she had
+had time to discover that beneath his astonishing good
+looks and magnificent physique there was the mind of
+a potato. He had turned out to be an expensive hobby
+because when his father’s business had been ruined by
+the War, he possessed nothing but his pay as a second
+lieutenant. Peace had removed even that and left him
+in her little house in Knightsbridge with eight pairs of
+perfect riding boots, a collection of old civvies, and an
+absolute incapability of earning a legitimate shilling.
+With characteristic cold-bloodedness she had, however,
+immediately advertised that she would not be responsible
+for his debts, and made him an allowance of ten
+pounds a week, a fourth of her income after the depredation
+of income tax. An invulnerable sponge, with
+a contagious chuckle, a fairly good eye for tennis, and
+a homogeneous nature, he managed to hang on by the
+skin of his teeth and was perfectly happy and satisfied.
+But for Georgie, he must have been a farm laborer in
+Canada or a salesman in a motor-car shop on the
+strength of his appearance. Or he might have gone
+to Ireland in the Black and Tans.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Well,” he said, having delivered his message,
+“cheerio. I’m going to Datchet for a week to stay on
+the Mullets’ houseboat.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">Georgie looked round at him, stirred to a slight
+curiosity.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Mullet? New friends?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Yes. War profiteers. Rolling in the stuff. Great
+fun. Know everybody. Champagne and diamonds
+for breakfast. Haven’t got a loose fiver about you,
+I suppose?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">With a faint smile Georgie pointed to her cigarette
+case on the dressing table. And without a qualm
+Malwood opened it, removed his wife’s last night’s
+bridge winnings, murmured, “Thanks most awfully,”
+and barged out, whistling a tune from “The League
+of Notions.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“All right, then. For the last time, lunch with
+Feo,” thought Georgie, moving from the window seat
+lazily. “She’s over.”</p>
+</div>
+<div class="level-3 section" id="id49">
+<h3 class="level-3 pfirst section-title title">II</h3>
+<p class="pfirst">For the first time since Feo had lifted Georgie Malwood
+into her intimacy, in that half-careless, half-cautious
+way that belongs usually to the illegitimate
+offspring of kings, her small, unemotional friend was
+late for her appointment. Always before, like every
+other member of the gang, Georgie Malwood had reported
+on the early side of the prescribed moment and
+killed time without impatience until it had occurred
+to Feo to put in an appearance. That morning, which
+was without word from Arrowsmith, as she had predicted
+with the uncanny intuition that makes women
+suffer before as well as after they are hurt, Feo was
+punctual. She entered her den with the expectation
+of finding Georgie curled up on the sofa, halfway
+through a slim volume of new poems. The room was
+empty and there had been no message of apology, no
+hastily scribbled note of endearment and explanation.</p>
+<p class="pnext">During the longest forty-five minutes that she had
+ever spent, Feo passed from astonishment to anger and
+finally into the chilly realization that her uncharacteristic
+behavior of the last few weeks had been discussed
+and criticized, and that the judgment of her friends
+was unmistakably reflected in the new attitude of the
+hitherto faithful and obsequious Georgie,—always
+the first to catch the color of her surroundings. She,
+Feo, the Queen of Flippancy, the ringleader of eroticism,
+had had the temerity to play serious, an unforgivable
+crime in the estimation of the decadent set
+which had ignored the War and emerged triumphantly
+into the chaos of peace. Well, there it was. A long
+and successful innings was ended. She would be glad
+to withdraw from the field.</p>
+<p class="pnext">She waited in her favorite place with her beautiful
+straight back to the fireplace, both elbows on the low
+mantel board and one foot on the fender. Her face
+was as white as a candle, her large violet eyes were
+filled with grim amusement, and her wide, full-lipped
+mouth was a little twisted. She wore a frock that was
+the color of seaweed, cut almost up to her knees, with
+short sleeves, a loose belt, and a great blob of jade
+attached to a thin gold chain lying between her breasts.
+Her thick, wiry hair was out of curl and fell straight,
+like that of a page in the Court of Cesare Borgia.
+For all her modernity there was something about
+her that was peculiarly medieval, masculinely girlish
+rather than effeminately boyish. She might have been
+the leading member of a famous troupe of Russian
+ballet dancers, ready at a moment’s notice to slip out
+of her wrapper and spring with athletic grace high into
+the air.</p>
+<p class="pnext">Her first remark upon Georgie’s lazy entrance was
+Feoistic and disconcerting.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“So I’m over, I see,” she said, and waited ironically
+for its effect.</p>
+<p class="pnext">Not honest enough to say, “Yes, you are,” Georgie
+hedged, with some little confusion.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“What makes you think so, Feo?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Your infernal rudeness, my dear, which you
+wouldn’t have dared to indulge in a week ago. You’ve
+all sensed the fact that I’m sick to tears of the games
+I’ve led you into, and would gladly have gone in for
+babies if I’d had the luck to seem desirable to the
+right man.” She made a long arm and rang the bell.
+“I am ripe for repentance, you see, or perhaps it
+might be more accurate, though less dramatic, to say
+eager for a new sensation. It isn’t coming off, but
+you can all go and hang yourselves so far as I’m concerned.
+I’m out. I’m going to continue to be serious.
+Bring lunch in here,” she added, as a footman framed
+himself in the doorway, “quickly. I’m starving.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">Almost any other girl who had been the favorite of
+such a woman as Feo would have found in this renunciation
+of leadership something to cause emotion.
+Mere gratitude for many favors and much kindness
+seemed to demand that. But this young phlegmatic
+thing was just as unmoved as she had been on receipt
+of the various war office telegrams officially regretting
+the deaths of Lord Clayburgh, Captain Graham Macoover,
+and Sir Harry Pytchley. She lit the inevitable
+cigarette, chose the much-cushioned divan, and
+stretched herself at full length.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“I can do with a little groundsel too,” she said, as
+though the other subject had been threshed out.</p>
+<p class="pnext">And so it had, for the time being. Feo, oddly
+enough, had no bricks to throw. She could change
+her religion, it seemed, without pitching mud at the
+church of her recent beliefs. It was not until lunch
+was finished and the last trickle of resentment at
+Georgie’s failure to apologize had gone out of her
+system that she returned to the matter and began, in
+a way, to think aloud. It was not as indiscreet as it
+might have been, because Georgie Malwood was completely
+self-contained and had developed concentration
+to such a degree, her first three husbands having been
+given to arguing, that she could lie and follow her
+own train of thought as easily in a room in which a
+mass of women were playing bridge as in a monkey
+house. Her interest in Feo was dead. She was over.</p>
+<p class="pnext">And so Feo gave herself away to a little person
+whose ears were closed.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“I don’t know what exactly to do,” she said. “At
+the moment, I feel like a fish out of water. If Arrowsmith
+had liked me and been ready to upset the conventional
+ideas of his exemplary family, I’d have
+eloped with him, however frightfully it would have
+put Edmund in the cart. I don’t mind owning that
+Arrowsmith is the only man I’ve ever met who could
+have turned me into the Spartan mother and worthy
+<em>haus-frau</em>. I had dreams of living with him behind
+the high walls of a nice old house and making the
+place echo with the pattering feet of babes. It’s the
+culminating disappointment of several months of ’em,—the
+bad streak which all of us have to go through
+at one time or another, I suppose. However, he
+doesn’t like me, worse luck, and so there it is. So I
+think I’d better make the best of a bad job and cultivate
+Edmund. I think I’d better study the life of
+Lady Randolph Churchill and make myself useful to
+my husband. Politics are in a most interesting state
+just now, with Lloyd George on the verge of collapse
+at last, and the brainy dishonesty of a woman suddenly
+inspired with political ambition is exactly what
+Edmund needs to push him to the top. He has been
+too long without a woman’s unscrupulous influence.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">She began to pace the room with long swinging
+strides, eagerly, clutching at this new idea like a
+drowning man to a spar. Her eyes began to sparkle
+and the old ring came back to her voice. Here was a
+way to use her superabundant energy and build up a
+new hobby.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“I’m no longer a flapping girl with everything to
+discover,” she went on, “I’ve had my share of love
+stuff. By Jove, I’ll use my intelligence, for a change.
+I’ll get into the fight and develop strategy. Every
+one’s looking to Edmund as the one honest man in the
+political game, and I’ll buckle to and help him. He’s
+an amazing creature. I’ve always admired him, and
+there’s something that suits my present state of mind
+in making up to him for my perfectly rotten treatment
+all these years. If I can’t make a lover into a husband,
+by Jingo, I can set to work to make a husband
+into a lover. There’s an idea for you, Feo, my pet!
+There’s a mighty interesting scheme to dig your teeth
+into, my broad-shouldered friend!”</p>
+<p class="pnext">She sent out an excited laugh and flung up her hand
+as though to welcome a brain wave. Her amazing
+resilience stood her in good stead in this crisis of her
+life,—to say nothing of her courage and queer sense
+of humor. Her blood began to move again. Fed up
+with decadence, she would plump whole-heartedly for
+usefulness now, be normal, go to work, get into the
+good books of George Lytham and his party, surprise
+Fallaray by her sudden allegiance to his cause and to
+him, and gradually break down the door that she had
+slammed in his face.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“I’ll let my hair grow,” she continued gayly, working
+the vein that was to rescue her from despondency
+and failure with pathetic eagerness.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“I’ll chuck eccentric clothes. I’ll turn up slang and
+blasphemy. I’ll teach myself manners and the language
+of old political hens. I’ll keep brilliance within speed
+limits. Yes, I’ll do all that if I have to work like a
+coolie. And I’ll tell you what else I’ll do. I’ll bet you
+a thousand pounds to sixpence that before the end of
+the year I’ll be the wife—I said the wife, Georgie—of
+the next Prime Minister. Will you take it?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">She drew up short, alight and excited, her foot already
+on the beginning of the new road, and paused
+for a reply.</p>
+<p class="pnext">Georgie stretched like a young Angora cat and
+yawned with perfect frankness.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“I’ll take whatever I can get, Feo,” she said. “But
+what the devil are you talking about? I haven’t heard
+a blessed word.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">And Feo’s laugh must have carried into Bond
+Street.</p>
+</div>
+<div class="level-3 section" id="id50">
+<h3 class="level-3 pfirst section-title title">III</h3>
+<p class="pfirst">And when Georgie had transferred herself from the
+many-cushioned divan to her extremely smart car, in
+which, with an expressionless face and a mind as calm
+as a cheese, she was going to drive to Hurlingham to
+be present at, rather than to watch, the polo, Feo went
+upstairs.</p>
+<p class="pnext">She felt that she must walk, and walk quickly, in
+an endeavor to keep up with her new line of thought,
+at the end of which she saw, more and more clearly,
+a most worth-while goal. Before she could arrive at
+this, she could see a vista of bunkers ahead of her to
+negotiate which all her gifts of intrigue would have,
+happily, to be exercised. To give interest and excitement
+to her plan of becoming Fallaray’s wife in fact,
+as well as by law, she required bunkers and needed
+difficulties. The more the merrier. She knew that,
+at present, Fallaray was as far away from her as
+though he were at the North Pole,—and as cold.
+She was dead certain of the fact that she had been of
+no more account to him, from the first few hours of
+their outrageous honeymoon, than a piece of furniture
+in one of the rooms in his house of which he never
+made use. That being so, she could see the constant
+and cunning employment of the brains that she had
+allowed to lie fallow through all her rudimentary rioting,—brains
+that she possessed in abundance, far
+above the average. In the use of these lay her salvation,
+her one chance to swing herself out of the great
+disappointment and its subsequent loose-endedness
+which had been brought about by Arrowsmith’s sudden
+deflection. Her passionate desire for this man was not
+going easily to die. She knew that. Her dreams
+would be filled with him for a considerable time, of
+course. She realized, also, looking at that uncompleted
+episode with blunt honesty, that, but for him,
+she would still be playing the fool, giving herself and
+her gifts to the entertainment of all the half-witted
+members of the gang. To the fastidious Arrowsmith
+and her unrequited love she owed her sudden determination
+to make herself useful to Fallaray and finally
+to become, moving Heaven and earth in the process, his
+wife. This was the paradoxical way in which her
+curious mind worked. No tears and lamentations for
+her. She had no use for them. On the contrary, she
+had courage and pride, and by setting herself the most
+difficult task that she could possibly have chosen, two
+things would result,—her sense of adventure would
+be gratified to the hilt and Arrowsmith shown the stuff
+of which she was made.</p>
+<p class="pnext">But on her way to her room, which was to be without
+Lola until the following morning, she stopped in
+the corridor, turned and went to the door of Fallaray’s
+den. After a moment’s hesitation she entered, feeling
+that she was trespassing, never before having gone into
+it of her own volition. She could not be caught there
+because Fallaray had escaped to his beloved Chilton,
+she remembered. Her desire was to stand there alone
+for a few moments, to merge herself into its atmosphere;
+to get from its book-lined walls and faint odor
+of tobacco something of the sense of the man who had
+unconsciously become her partner.</p>
+<p class="pnext">The vibrations of the room as they came to her were
+those of one which had belonged to an ascetic, long
+dead and held in the sort of respect by his country
+that is shown by the preservation of his work place. It
+was museum-like and tidy, even prim. The desk was
+in perfect order and had the cold appearance of not
+having been used for a century. The fireplace was
+clean and empty. The waste-paper basket might never
+have been employed. There was nothing personal to
+give the place warmth and life. No photographs of
+women or children. No old pipes. And even in the
+cold eyes of the bust of Dante that looked down upon
+her from the top of one of the bookcases there was
+no expression, either of surprise or resentment at her
+intrusion.</p>
+<p class="pnext">Most women would have been chilled, and a little
+frightened, there. It would have been natural for
+them, in Feo’s circumstances, had they possessed imagination,
+to have been struck with a sense of remorse.
+It should have been their business, if nothing else, to
+see that this room lived and had personality, comfort
+and a little color,—flowers from time to time, and at
+least one charming picture of a youngster on the
+parental desk. And Feo did feel, as she looked about
+in her new mood, a little shiver of shame and the red-hot
+needle of repentance pricking her hitherto dormant
+conscience.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Poor old Edmund,” she said aloud, “what have I
+done to him? This place is dry, bloodless, like a
+mausoleum. Well, I’ll alter it all. I have a job, thank
+God. Something to set my teeth into. Something to
+direct my energy at,—if it isn’t too late.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">And as this startling afterthought struck her, she
+wheeled round, darted across the room to the place
+where a narrow slip of looking-glass hung in an old
+gold frame, and put herself through a searching examination.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Mf! Still attractive in your own peculiar way,”
+she said finally, with relief. “The early bloom gone,
+of course; lines here and there, especially round the
+eyes. Massage and the proper amount of sleep will
+probably rub those away. But there’s distinction about
+you, Feo dear, and softness can be cultivated. You’re
+as hard as an oil painting now, you priceless rotter.
+However, hope springs eternal, and where there’s a
+will there’s a way.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">She laughed at herself for these nursery quotations
+and clenched her fists for the fray. But as she turned,
+fairly well satisfied with the result of her inspection,
+she heard steps in the corridor—Fallaray’s steps—and
+the blood rushed into her face. By George, she
+was going to be caught, after all.</p>
+</div>
+<div class="level-3 section" id="id51">
+<h3 class="level-3 pfirst section-title title">IV</h3>
+<p class="pfirst">Fallaray? This sun-tanned, smiling man with
+shoulders square, chin high, and a song in his eyes,
+who came into the room like a southwest gale?</p>
+<p class="pnext">If he felt surprise at the unfamiliar sight of Feo
+in his den, he allowed nothing of it to show. He held
+out a cordial hand and went to her eagerly.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“I’ve come up to town to see you,” he said. “You
+must have got my S. O. S.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">The manner provided the second shock. But Feo
+returned the pressure of his hand and tried instantly
+to think of an answer that would be suitable to her
+new rôle.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“I think I must have done so,” she said quietly, returning
+his smile. “Your holiday has worked wonders,
+Edmund.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“A miracle, an absolute miracle!”</p>
+<p class="pnext">A nearer look proved that his word was the right
+one. Here was almost the young Fallaray of the
+tennis courts and the profile that she had set herself
+impishly to acquire in those old days. Good Heavens,
+could it be that she <em>was</em> too late, and that another
+woman had brought about this amazing change? She
+refused to permit the thought to take root. She told
+herself that she had had her share of disappointments.
+He had needed rest and his beloved Chilton, bathed
+in the most un-English sunlight, had worked its magic.
+It must be so. Look at this friendliness. That wasn’t
+consistent with the influence of another woman. And
+yet, as an expert in love, she recognized the unmistakable
+look.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“I’m only staying the night here,” he said. “I’m
+off to Chilton again in the morning. So there’s no
+time to lose. Can you give me ten minutes?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Of course,” she said. “And as many more as you
+care to ask for. I’m out of the old game.” She hurried
+to get that in, astonished at her uncharacteristic
+womanliness.</p>
+<p class="pnext">But he was one-eyed, like a boy. What at any
+other time would have brought an incredulous exclamation
+left him now incurious, without surprise. He
+was driving hard for his own goal. Anything that
+affected Feo, or any one else, except Lola, didn’t matter.
+Her revolutionary statement passed almost unheard.
+He pushed an armchair into place.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Sit down,” he said, “I want to talk to you.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">And as she sat down it was with a sudden sense of
+fatalism. There was something in all this that was
+predetermined, inevitable. That flame had been set
+alight in him by love, and nothing else. She felt, sitting
+there, like that most feeble of all figures, Canute.
+What was the use in trying to persuade herself that
+what she dreaded to hear was not going to be said?
+She was too late. She had let this man go.</p>
+<p class="pnext">He walked up and down for a moment, restless and
+wound up, passing and repassing the white-faced
+woman who could have told him precisely what he
+was about to say.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“I want to be set free,” he said, with almost as little
+emotion as would have been called up by the discussion
+of a change of butchers. “I want you to let me arrange
+to be divorced. Something has happened that
+has altered my entire scheme of life. I want to begin
+all over again. I have come back this afternoon to put
+this to you and to ask you to help me. I think I know
+that many times since we’ve been married you would
+have asked me to do this, if I hadn’t been in politics.
+I’m grateful to you, as I’m sure you know, for having
+respected what was my career to that extent. I am
+going out. My resignation is in my pocket. It is to be
+sent to the P. M. to-night. When I go back to-morrow,
+it will be as a free man, so far as Westminster
+is concerned. I want to return to Chilton, having left
+instructions with your lawyers, with your permission,
+to proceed with the action. The evidence necessary
+will be provided and the case will be undefended. I
+shall try to have it brought forward at the earliest
+possible moment. May I ask you to be kind enough to
+meet me in this matter?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">He drew up in front of her and waited, with as little
+impatience as breeding would permit.</p>
+<p class="pnext">If this question had been put to her a week ago,
+or yesterday, she would have cried out, “Yes,” with
+joy and seen herself able to face a future with Arrowsmith,
+such as she had pictured in her dreams. It
+came upon her now, on top of her determination to
+turn over a new leaf, like a breaker, notwithstanding
+the fact that she had seen it coming. But she got up,
+pride and courage and tradition in every line of her
+eccentrically dressed body, and faced him.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“You may,” she replied. “And I will help you in
+every possible way. It’s the least that I can do.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Thank you,” he said. “I am deeply grateful. I
+knew that you would say just that.” And he bowed
+before turning to go to his desk. “Who <em>are</em> your
+lawyers?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">She hadn’t any lawyers, but she remembered the
+name of the firm in which one of the partners was the
+husband of a woman in the gang, and she gave it to
+him.</p>
+<p class="pnext">He wrote it down eagerly. “I’m afraid it will be
+necessary for you to see these people in the morning.
+Is that perfectly convenient?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Perfectly,” she said. “I have no engagements, as
+it happens.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Then I will write a statement of the facts,” he
+said, “at once. The papers can be served upon me at
+Chilton.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">It was easy to get out of marriage as it had been to
+get into it.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Is that all?” she asked, with a touch of her old
+lightness.</p>
+<p class="pnext">He rose. “Yes, thank you,” he said, and went to
+the door to open it for her. There were youth and
+elasticity and happiness all about him.</p>
+<p class="pnext">But as she watched him cross the room, something
+flashed in front of her eyes, a vivid ball of foolish
+years which broke into a thousand pieces at her feet,
+among the jagged ends of which she could see the
+ruins of a great career, the broken figure of a St.
+Anthony, with roses pinned to the cross upon his chest.</p>
+<p class="pnext">He stopped her as she was going and held out his
+hand again.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“I am very grateful, Feo.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">And she smiled and returned his grasp. “The best
+of luck,” she said. “I hope you’ll be very happy, for
+a change.”</p>
+</div>
+<div class="level-3 section" id="id52">
+<h3 class="level-3 pfirst section-title title">V</h3>
+<p class="pfirst">Having now no incentive to go either to her room
+or anywhere else, her new plan dying at its birth, Feo
+remained in the corridor, standing with her back
+against one of the pieces of Flemish tapestry which
+Simpkins had pointed out to Lola. She folded her
+arms, crossed one foot over the other, and dipped her
+chin, not frowning, not with any sort of self-pity, but
+with elevated eyebrows and her mouth half open, incredulous.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Of course I’m not surprised at Edmund’s being
+smashed on a girl,” she told herself. “How the Dickens
+he’s gone on so long is beyond belief. I hope
+she’s a nice child,—she must be young; he’s forty;
+I hope he’s not been bird-limed by one of the afterwar
+virgins who are prowling the earth for prey. I’m
+very ready to make way gracefully and have a dash
+at something else, probably hospital work, sitting on
+charity boards with the dowagers who wish to goodness
+they had dared to be as loose as I’ve been. But—but
+what I want to know is, who’s shuffling the cards?
+Why the devil am I getting this long run of Yarboroughs?
+I can’t hold anything,—anything at all,
+except an occasional knave like Macquarie. Why this
+run of bad luck now? Why not last year, next year,
+next week? Why should Edmund deliberately choose
+to-day, of all days, to come back, with no warning,
+and put a heavy foot bang in the middle of my scheme
+of retribution? Is it—meant? I mean it’s too beautifully
+neat to be an accident. Is it the good old upper
+cut one always gets for playing the giddy ox, I wonder?—Mf!
+Interesting. Very. More to come, too,
+probably, seeing that I’m still on my feet. I’ve got
+to get it in the solar plexus and slide under the ropes,
+I suppose, now they’re after me. ‘Every guilty deed
+holds in itself the seed of retribution and undying
+pain.’ Well, I’m a little nervous, like some poor creature
+on the way to the operating table; and—and I’ll
+tell you what else I am, by George! I’m eaten up with
+curiosity to know who the girl is, and how she managed
+to get into the line of vision of this girl-blind
+man,—and I don’t quite know how I shall be able
+to contain myself until I satisfy this longing.—Oh,
+hullo, Lola. This is good. I didn’t expect you till the
+morning. But I don’t mind saying that I’ve never
+been so pleased to see anybody as you, my dear. Had
+a good time?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">She went to the top of the stairs and waited for
+Lola to come up, smiling and very friendly. She was
+fond of this girl. She had missed her beyond words,—not
+only for her services, which were so deft, so
+sure-fingered, but also for her smile, her admiration.
+Good little Lola; clever little Lola too, by George.
+That Carlton episode,—most amusing. And this recent
+business, which, she remembered, was touched
+with a sort of—what? Was ecstasy the word?
+Good fun to know what had happened. Thank the
+Lord there was going to be a pause between knock-outs,
+after all.</p>
+<p class="pnext">Dressed in her perfectly plain ready-made walking
+frock, her own shoes and a neat little hat that she had
+bought in Queen’s Road, Bayswater, Lola came upstairs
+quickly with her eyes on Feo’s face. She seemed
+hardly to be able to hold back the words that were
+trembling on her lips. It was obvious that she had
+been crying; her lids were red and swollen. But she
+didn’t look unhappy or miserable, as a girl might if
+everything had gone wrong; nor in the least self-conscious.
+She wore neither her expression as lady’s
+maid, nor that of the young widow to whom some one
+had given London; but of a mother whose boy was in
+trouble and must be got out of it, at once, <em>please</em>, and
+helped back to his place among other good boys.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Will you come down to your room, Lady Feo?”
+she asked. “Mr. Lytham will be here in a few minutes
+and I want you to see him.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">Lytham—young Lochinvar! How priceless if he
+were the man for whom she had dressed this child up.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Why, of course. But what’s the matter, Lola?
+You’ve been crying. You look fey.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">Lola put her hand on Feo’s arm, urgently. “Please
+come down,” she said. “I want to tell you something
+before Mr. Lytham comes.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">Well, this seemed to be her favor-granting day, as
+well as one of those during which Fate had recognized
+her as being on his book. First Edmund and then
+Lola,—there was not much to choose between their
+undisguised egotism. And the lady’s maid business,—that
+was all over, plainly. George Lytham,—who’d
+have thought it? If Lola were in trouble, she had a
+friend in that house.</p>
+<p class="pnext">And so, without any more questions, she went back
+to her futuristic den which, after her brief talk with
+Fallaray, seemed to belong to a very distant past. But
+before Lola could begin to tell her story, a footman
+made his appearance and said that Mr. Lytham was
+in the hall.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Show him in here,” said Feo and turned to watch
+the door.</p>
+<p class="pnext">She wondered if she would be able to tell from his
+expression what was the meaning of her being brought
+into this,—a disinclination on his part to take the
+blame, or an earnest desire to do what was right under
+the circumstances? She never imagined the possibility
+of his not knowing that Lola was a lady’s maid dressed
+in the feathers of the jay. Unlike Peter Chalfont, who
+accepted without question, Lytham held things up to
+the light and examined their marks.</p>
+<p class="pnext">There was, however, nothing uncomfortable in his
+eyes. On the contrary, he looked more than ever like
+the captain, Feo thought, of a County Cricket Club,
+healthy, confident and fully alive to his enormous responsibility.
+He wore a suit of thin blue flannels, the
+M. C. C. tie under a soft low collar, and brown shoes
+that had become almost red from long and expert treatment.
+He didn’t shake hands like a German, with a
+stiff deference contradicted by a mackerel eye, or with
+the tender effusion of an actor who imagines that
+women have only to come under his magnetism to offer
+themselves in sacrifice. Bolt upright, with his head
+thrown back, he shook hands with an honest grip,
+without deference and without familiarity, like a good
+cricketer.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“How do you do, Lady Feo,” he said, in his most
+masculine voice. “It’s kind of you to see us.” Then
+he turned to Lola with a friendly smile. “Your telephone
+message caught me just as I was going to dash
+off for a game of tennis after a hard day, Madame de
+Brézé,” he added.</p>
+<p class="pnext">Oh, so this was another of the de Brézé episodes,
+was it, like the one with Beauty Chalfont. Curiosity
+came hugely to Feo’s rescue. Here, at any rate, was a
+break in her run of bad luck, very welcome. What on
+earth could be the meaning of this quaint meeting,—George
+Lytham, the earnest worker pledged to reconstruction,
+and this enigmatic child, who might have
+stood for Joan of Arc? If Lola had caught Lytham
+and brought him to Dover Street to receive substantiation,
+Feo was quite prepared to lie on her behalf.
+What a joke to palm off the daughter of a Queen’s
+Road jeweler on the early-Victorian mother of the
+worthy George!</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Well?” she said, looking from one to the other
+with a return of her impish delight in human experimentation.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Mr. Lytham can explain this better than I can,”
+said Lola quietly.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“I’m not so sure about that, but I’ll do my best.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">He drew a chair forward and sat down. Under ordinary
+circumstances, where there was the normal
+amount of happiness, or even the mutual agreement to
+give and take that goes with the average marriage, his
+task would have been a difficult one. But in the case
+of Feo and his chief he felt able to deal with the matter
+entirely without self-consciousness, or delicacy in
+the choice of words.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“I needn’t worry you with any of the details of the
+new political situation, Lady Feo. You know them,
+probably, as well as I do. But what you don’t know,
+because the moment isn’t yet ripe for the publication
+of our plans, is that Mr. Fallaray has been chosen to
+lead the Anti-waste Party, which is concentrating its
+forces to rout the old gang out of politics at the next
+General Election, give Parliament back its lost prestige,
+and do away with the pernicious influence of the
+Press Lords. A big job, by Jove, which Fallaray alone
+can achieve.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Well?” repeated Feo, wondering what in the
+world this preamble had to do with the case in question.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Well, at the end of the meeting of my party yesterday,
+I was sent down to Chilton Park to tell Mr.
+Fallaray our plans. I was stultified to be told that he
+had decided to chuck politics.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“And go in for love. Yes, I know. But what has
+this got to do with Lola,—with Madame de Brézé?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">That was the point that beat Feo, the thing that
+filled her with a sort of impatient astonishment. Was
+this uncommunicative girl, who seemed to her to be so
+essentially feminine, whose métier in life was obviously
+to purr under the touch of a masculine hand, who had
+been given a holiday to go on a love chase with Chalfont,
+presumably, somehow connected with politics?
+It was incredible.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Oh, you’ve seen Fallaray.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Yes, my dear man, yes! He broke the news to
+me the moment he came in,”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Did he ask you to give him a divorce?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“He did, without a single stutter.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“And you said——”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“But—my dear young Lochinvar, may I make so
+bold as to ask why this perfectly personal matter has
+to be discussed in the open, so to speak?”
+She made her meaning unmistakably clear. This
+girl was not so close a friend as he might have been
+led to suppose.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“What did you say to Mr. Fallaray?” asked Lola,
+leaning forward eagerly.</p>
+<p class="pnext">And Lytham waited with equal anxiety for an answer.</p>
+<p class="pnext">It did not come for an extraordinary moment and
+only then in the form of a tangent. Feo turned slowly
+round to the girl who was in the habit of dressing
+her and putting her to bed. With raised eyebrows and
+an air of amused amazement, she ran her eyes over
+every inch of her, as though trying very hard to find
+something to palliate the insufferable cheek that she
+was apparently expected to swallow.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“My good Lola,” she said finally, “what the devil
+has this got to do with you?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Madame de Brézé is the <em>dea ex machina</em>,” said
+Lytham, evenly.</p>
+<p class="pnext">It didn’t seem to him to be necessary to lead up to
+this announcement like a cat on hot bricks, considering
+that Lady Feo had openly flouted his chief from the
+first. She had no feelings to respect.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“<em>What did you say?</em>”</p>
+<p class="pnext">He repeated his remark, a little surprised at the
+gaping astonishment which was caused by it.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Madame de Brézé—Lola—the woman for
+whom I am to be asked to step aside?—Is this a
+joke?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“No,” he said. “Far from a joke.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Ye Gods!” said Feo. And she sat for a moment,
+holding her breath, with her large intelligent mouth
+open, her dark Italian eyes fixed on Lytham’s face, and
+one of her long thin capable hands suspended in mid-air.
+She might have been struck by lightning, or
+turned into salt like Lot’s inquisitive wife.</p>
+<p class="pnext">It was plain enough to Lola that her mistress was
+reviewing in her mind all the small points of their connection,—the
+engagement in the housekeeper’s room,
+the knowledge of her parentage, the generous presents
+of those clothes for her beautification, the half-jealous,
+half-sympathetic interest that had been shown in her
+love affair with Chalfont, as she had allowed Lady
+Feo to imagine. She had come to Dover Street, not
+to take this woman’s husband away, but to give him
+back, to beg that he should be retained by all the hollow
+ties of Church and law; bound, held, controlled,
+rendered completely unable to break away,—not for
+Feo’s sake, and not for his, but for his country’s. And
+so, having committed no theft because Fallaray was
+morally free, and being unashamed of her scheme
+which had been merely to give a lonely man the rustle
+of silk, she hung upon an answer to her question.</p>
+<p class="pnext">Once more Feo turned to look at Lola, leaning forward,
+and for a moment something flooded her eyes
+that was like blood, and a rush of unformed words of
+blasphemous anger crowded to her lips. With distended
+nostrils and widening fingers, she took on the
+appearance, briefly, of a figure, half man, half woman,
+stirred to its vitals with a desire to kill in punishment
+of treachery, suffering under the sort of humiliation
+that makes pride collapse like a toy balloon. And
+then a sense of humor came to the rescue. She sprang
+to her feet and burst into peal after peal of laughter
+so loud and irresistible and prolonged, that it brought
+on physical weakness and streaming tears. Finally,
+standing in her favorite place with her back to the
+fireplace, dabbing her eyes and steadying her voice, she
+began to talk huskily, with anger, and sarcasm, and
+looseness, puncturing her sometimes pedantic choice
+of words with one that was appropriate to a cab driver.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Well, I’ll be damned,” she said, “Lola—purring
+little Lola, and in those clothes, too! I don’t mind
+confessing that I would never have believed it possible.
+I mean for you to have had the courage to aim
+so high. It’s easy to understand <em>his</em> end of it. The
+greater the ascetic, the smaller the distance to fall.
+Ha!—And you, you busy patriot, you earnest, self-confident
+young Lochinvar, if only I could make clear
+to you the whole ludicrous aspect of this bitter farce,
+this mordant slice of satire. You wouldn’t enjoy it,
+because you’re a hero-worshipper, with one foot in
+the Albert period. And in any case I can’t let you into
+it because my inherited instinct of sportsmanship is
+with me still, even in this. And so you’ll miss the
+point of the orgy of laughter that gave me the stitch.
+But I don’t mind telling you that it’s a scream, and
+would make a lovely chapter in the history of statesmen’s
+love affairs.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">That Fallaray should have turned from her to pick
+up this bourgeois little person, a servant in his house,—that
+was what rankled, in spite of her saying that
+she understood his end of it. Good God!</p>
+<p class="pnext">But to Lytham, who knew Lola as Madame de
+Brézé, and had found her to be willing to make a
+great sacrifice for love, the inner meaning of Feo’s
+outburst was lost. He told himself, as he had often
+done before, that Feo was an extraordinary creature,
+queer and erotic, and came back to the main road
+bluntly.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“May I ask you to be so kind as to tell me,” he
+said, “what answer you gave to Mr. Fallaray when he
+asked you to give him a divorce? A great deal depends
+upon that.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“You mean because of his career and the success
+of your political plans?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Yes.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“And why do you want to know, pray?” Feo shot
+the question at Lola.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Because of Mr. Fallaray’s career,” Lola replied
+simply, “and the success of these political plans.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">But this was something much too large to be swallowed,
+much too good to be true. Regarding Lola as
+a deceitful minx, a most cunning little schemer, Feo
+took the liberty to disbelieve this statement utterly, although
+on the face of it Lola appeared to have thrown
+in her lot with Lytham. Why?—What was she up
+to now?—An impish desire to keep these two on
+tenterhooks and get a little fun out of all this—it
+was the only thing that she could get—suddenly
+seized Feo strongly. Here was a gorgeous chance for
+drama. Here was an epoch-making opportunity unexpectedly
+to force Lytham and the young vamp, as
+she called her, to ask Fallaray himself for an answer
+to this question, and watch the scene. It was probably
+the only opportunity to satisfy an avid curiosity to
+see how Fallaray would behave when faced with his
+“affinity,” and find out what game the girl who had
+been her servant was playing. This high-faluting attitude
+of Lola’s was all nonsense, of course. She had
+caught Fallaray with her extraordinary sexiness and
+meant to cling to him like a limpet. To become the
+second Mrs. Fallaray was naturally the acme of her
+ambition, even although she succeeded to a man who
+must place himself on the shelf in order to indulge
+in an amorous adventure.
+A great idea! But it would have to be carried out
+carefully, so that no inkling of it might escape.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Excuse me for a moment,” said Feo, and marched
+out of the room with a perfectly expressionless face.</p>
+<p class="pnext">Shutting the door behind her, she caught the eye of
+a man servant who was on duty in the hall. He came
+smartly forward.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Go up to Mr. Fallaray and say that I shall be
+greatly obliged if he will come to my den at once on an
+important matter.” And then, having taken two or
+three excited turns up and down the hall, she controlled
+her face and went back into the room.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Saint Anthony, Young Lochinvar, the lady’s
+maid,” she said to herself, “and the ex-leader of the
+erotics. A heterogeneous company, if ever there was
+one.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">Once more, standing with her back to the fireplace,
+her elbows on the low mantel board, Feo looked down
+at Lola, whose eyes were very large and like those of
+a child who had cried herself out of tears.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Where have you been?” she asked.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“At Whitecross, with Lady Cheyne,” replied Lola.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Oh!—The little fat woman who has the house
+near the gate in the wall? I see. And you came back
+this afternoon?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Yes,” said Lola.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“With my husband?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“No,” said Lola.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Does he know that you intended to give me the
+pleasure of seeing you here with our mutual friend?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“No,” said Lola.</p>
+<p class="pnext">Was that a lie or not? The girl had been crying,
+that was obvious. Something had evidently gone
+wrong with her scheme. But why this surreptitious
+meeting, this bringing in of Lytham? It was easy, of
+course, to appreciate <em>his</em> anxiety. He needed an impeccable
+Fallaray. He was working for his party, his
+political campaign, and in the long run, being an
+earnest patriot, for his country.—She had a few
+questions to put to him too.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Where did you meet Lola de Brézé, Young Lochinvar?”
+she asked.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“At Chilton Park,” said Lytham, who had begun to
+be somewhat mystified at the way in which things were
+going; and, if the truth were told, impatient. All he
+had come to know was whether he had an ally in Lady
+Feo or an enemy, and make his plans accordingly. He
+could see no reason for her to dodge the issue. His
+game of tennis looked hopeless. What curious creatures
+women were.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“When?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">There was the sound of quick steps in the hall.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Last night.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">The door opened and Fallaray walked in.</p>
+<p class="pnext">With a gleeful smile Feo spoke through his exclamation
+of surprise. “Edmund, I would like you to
+tell your friends what my answer was to your request
+for a divorce.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">Hating to be caught in what was obviously an endeavor
+to influence his chief’s wife against a decision
+to unhitch himself from marriage and politics,
+Lytham sprang to his feet, feeling as disconcerted as
+he looked.</p>
+<p class="pnext">Lola made no movement except to stiffen in her
+chair.</p>
+<p class="pnext">Watching Fallaray closely, Feo saw first a flare of
+passion light up his eyes at the sight of Lola, and
+then an expression of resentment come into them at
+not being able, others being present, to catch her in
+his arms. An impetuous movement had taken him to
+the middle of the room, where he drew up short and
+stood irresolute and self-conscious and looking rather
+absurd under the gaze of Lytham and his wife.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“What is all this?” he asked, after an awkward
+pause, during which he began to suspect that he had
+been tricked by Feo and was faced by a combination
+of objection.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Don’t ask me,” said Feo, waving her hand towards
+Lytham and Lola.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Then I must ask you, George,” said Fallaray,
+making an effort to disguise his anger. He could see
+that he had been made the subject of discussion, as if
+he were some one to be coerced and who did not know
+his own business.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“This is not quite fair,” said Lytham. “Our intention
+was to see Lady Feo, get her views and cooperation,
+and then, to-night or to-morrow, come to
+you and beg you to do the sane thing in this affair.
+We had no hand in your being dragged into this
+private meeting.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">He too was angry. Feo had cheated and brought
+about the sort of crisis that should have been avoided.
+Any one who knew Fallaray’s detestation of personalities
+must have seen what this breaking down of his
+fourth wall would bring about.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Who do you mean by ‘we’?” demanded Fallaray.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Madame de Brézé and myself,” said Lytham.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“What! You ask me to believe that Madame de
+Brézé has come here with you to persuade my wife to
+go back on her promise to set me free? What do you
+take me for?”
+He laughed at the utter absurdity of the idea and
+in doing so, broke the tension and the stiltedness of the
+scene, as he realized that Feo had deliberately intended
+it to become. And then, with a certain boyishness that
+went oddly with his monk-like face, he went over to
+Lola and put his hand on her shoulder.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“All right,” he added. “Let’s have this out and
+come to a final understanding. It will save all further
+arguments. Just before you brought Lola here, having,
+as I can see, worked on her feelings by talking
+about your party and telling her that her coming into
+my life would ruin my career—I know your dogged
+enthusiasm, George—I saw my wife. I put my case
+to her at once and she agreed very generously to release
+me. A messenger will be here in ten minutes to
+take my statement to her lawyers and my resignation
+to the Prime Minister. I shall return to Chilton to-morrow
+to wait there, or wherever else it may suit
+me, until the end of the divorce proceedings. You
+won’t agree with me, but that is what I call doing the
+sane thing. Finally, all going well, as please God it
+may, this lady and I will get married and live happily
+ever after.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">He spoke lightly, even jauntily, but with an undercurrent
+of emotion that it was impossible for him to
+disguise.</p>
+<p class="pnext">And then, to Feo’s complete amazement, Lola, who
+had been so quiet and unobtrusive, rose and backed
+away from Fallaray, her face as white as the stone
+figures at Chilton under moonlight, her hands clasped
+together to give her strength, her eyes as dry as an
+empty well. She was bereft of tears.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“But I am not going to marry you,” she said, “because
+if I do everything will go badly.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">Fallaray sprang forward to take her in his arms
+and kiss her into love and life and acquiescence, as he
+had done before,—once at the gate and once again
+last night under the stars.</p>
+<p class="pnext">But she backed away and ranged herself with
+Lytham.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“I love Fallaray,” she said. “Fallaray the leader,
+the man who is needed, the man who has made himself
+necessary. If I were to marry Fallaray the deserter,
+there would be no such thing as happiness for me or
+for him.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">Fallaray’s eager hands fell suddenly to his sides.
+The word that had come to Lola as an inspiration,
+though it broke her heart to use it, hit him like a well-aimed
+stone. Deserter!—A man who turned and ran,
+who slunk away from the fight at its moment of
+crisis, who absconded from duty in violation of all
+traditions of service, thinking of no one but himself.
+Deserter! It was the right word, the damnable right
+word that rears itself up for every man to read at the
+crossroads of life.—And he stood looking at this
+girl who had brought him back to a momentary youth
+through a glamor that gave way to the cold light of
+duty. His was a pitiful figure, middle-aged, love-hungry,
+doomed to be sacrificed upon the altar of
+public service.</p>
+<p class="pnext">Lytham didn’t rejoice at the sight, having sympathy
+and imagination. Neither did Feo, who had
+just lost her own grasp upon a dream.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Is it possible that you love me so much?” he asked.</p>
+<p class="pnext">And Lola said, “Yes, yes!”</p>
+<p class="pnext">It was on Lytham’s tongue to say, “My dear man,
+don’t you gather what I mean by the ‘sane thing’?
+There’s no need to take this in the spirit of a Knight
+Crusader. A little nest somewhere, discreetly
+guarded.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">And it was on Feo’s tongue to add, also completely
+modern, “Of course. Why not? Isn’t it done every
+day? No one need know, and if it’s ever found out,
+isn’t it the unwritten law to protect the reputations of
+public men so long as there is no irate husband to stir
+up our hypocritical moral sense by bringing the thing
+into the open?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">But neither spoke. There was something in the way
+in which Lola stood, brave but trembling, that kept
+them silent; something in Fallaray’s expression of
+adoration and respect that made them feel ashamed of
+their materialism. They were ignorant of all that had
+gone to the making of Lola’s apprenticeship to give
+that lonely man the rustle of silk, and of the fact that
+he had grown to love this girl not as a mistress, but
+as a wife.</p>
+<p class="pnext">And after a silence that held them breathless, Fallaray
+spoke again. “I must be worthy of you, my
+little Lola,” he said, “and not desert. I will go on
+with the glory of your love as a banner—and if I die
+first, I will wait for you on the other side of the
+Bridge.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“I will be faithful,” she said.</p>
+<p class="pnext">He held out his arms, and she rushed into them with
+a great cry, pressed herself to his heart, and took her
+last living kiss.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Till then,” said Fallaray finally, letting her go.</p>
+<p class="pnext">But nothing more came from Lola except a groping
+movement of her hands.</p>
+<p class="pnext">At the door, square of shoulder, Fallaray beckoned
+to Lytham and went out and up to his room.</p>
+<p class="pnext">It was Feo who wept.</p>
+</div>
+<div class="level-3 section" id="id53">
+<h3 class="level-3 pfirst section-title title">VI</h3>
+<p class="pfirst">Leaving his cubby-hole behind the screen and taking
+the inevitable glass out of his eye, John Breezy waddled
+through the shop to the parlor to enjoy a cup of
+tea. It was good to see the new brightness and daintiness
+assumed by the whole of that little place since
+Lola had come back and put her touch upon everything.
+It was good also to break away from the
+mechanism of unhealthy watches for a quarter of an
+hour and get into contact with humanity that was
+cheerful and well.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Hurray!” he said, “what should I do without my
+cupper tea?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">With one eye on the shop door and the other on the
+teapot, Mrs. Breezy presided at the chaotic table. The
+tea tray had cleared an opening among the heterogeneous
+mass of accumulation. It was the ritual of
+week-day afternoons, faithfully performed year in and
+year out,—and of late, since Lola had been helping in
+the shop, more frequently interrupted than ever before.
+Now that she had fallen into the steady habit of sitting
+behind the counter near the window, business had
+perked up noticeably and it was astonishing how many
+young men were discovering the need of safety-razor
+blades, Waterman’s fountain pens, silver cigarette
+cases, and the like. Was it astonishing?</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Nice weather for Lola’s afternoon off,” said
+Breezy, emptying his cup into his saucer, cabman’s
+fashion. Tea cooled the sooner like that and went
+down with a more succulent sound. “Hampton Court
+again?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Yes, dear,” replied Mrs. Breezy, “with Ernest.
+Wonderful how much better he looks since Lola came
+back,—cleaner, more self-respecting. He had another
+poem in the paper yesterday. Did you read it?”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Um. I scanned it over. Pretty good coming from
+behind a face like that. Somehow, I always think of a
+poet as a man with big eyes, a velvet coat, hair all over
+his face, who was born with a dictionary in his hand.
+Funny thing, breaking out in a lad like Ernest.
+Caused by the War, p’raps. It’s left a lot of queer
+things behind it. He’d make more money if he tried
+to turn out stories like Garvice wrote. I think I shall
+speak to him about it and get him to be practical.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“No, don’t,” said Mrs. Breezy, “you’d upset Lola.
+She believes in Ernest and wants him to make a
+name.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">“What’s the good of a name without money?
+However, I won’t interfere. You—you don’t suppose
+that Lola’s thinking of marrying that boy some
+day, do you?” It was a most uncomfortable thought.
+His little girl must do better than that.</p>
+<p class="pnext">Mrs. Breezy was silent for a moment and her face
+wore a look of the most curious puzzlement.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“I don’t know what she thinks, John. To tell you
+the truth, dear, I don’t know anything about her, and
+I never did. I don’t know why she went to Dover
+Street or why she came back. She’s never told me and
+I’ve never asked her. When I catch her face sometimes,
+I can see in it something that makes my heart
+miss a beat. I can’t describe it. It may be pain, it
+may be joy,—I don’t know. I can’t tell. But it isn’t
+regret and it isn’t sorrow. It lights her up like, as
+though there was something burning in her heart.
+John, our little girl’s miles away from us, although
+she’s never been nearer. She dreams, I think, and
+walks in another world with some one. We’ve got to
+be very kind to her, old man. She’s—she’s a strange,
+strange child.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">Breezy pushed himself out of the sofa as a rather
+heavily laden boat is oozed out of mud. He was irritable
+and perhaps a little frightened.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“I don’t find her strange,” he said. “Strange!
+What a word! She’s a good girl, that’s what she is,—as
+open as a book, with nothing to hide. And she’s
+our girl, and she’s doing her job without grumbling,
+and she’s doubling the business. And what’s more,
+she’s cheerful and happy and loving. I’m damned if
+I can see anything strange about her. You certainly
+have a knack of saying queer things about Lola, one
+way ’n’ another, you have!” And he marched out of
+the parlor in a kind of fat huff, only to march back
+again immediately to put his arm round the little
+woman’s neck and give her an apologetic kiss. He
+was one of these men who loved peace at any price
+and erected high barriers round himself in order that
+he shouldn’t see anything to disturb his ease of mind.
+It was the same form of brain anæmia, the same lack
+of moral courage from which the Liberal Government
+had suffered in the face of the warning of Lord Roberts.
+In other words, the policy of the ostrich. Knowing
+very well that his wife had all the brains of the
+partnership and never said anything for the mere sake
+of saying it, he was quite sure that she was right as
+to Lola, and he had himself almost swallowed one of
+the little screws that played so large a part in the interior
+of his watches on seeing the look that Mrs.
+Breezy had described on the face of his little girl as
+she sat perched up on a high stool waiting for the next
+customer, with her eyes on something very far away.
+And because this gave him a jar and frightened him
+a little, he persuaded himself that what he had seen
+he had not seen, because it was uncomfortable to see
+it. It is a form of mental dope and it suits all sorts
+of constitutions,—like religion.</p>
+<p class="pnext">And so, blotting out of his mind the little conversation
+which had taken place over the teapot, Breezy returned
+to his job, his fat hands working on the intricate
+mechanisms of his Swiss and American invalids with
+astonishing delicacy of touch; and all the while he
+whistled softly through his teeth. He was never at a
+loss for a tune because the flotsam and jetsam that
+came in and went out of Queen’s Road, Bayswater,
+with their tired pianos, their squeaky fiddles, and their
+throaty baritones provided him with all the sentimental
+ballads of yesterday and to-day.</p>
+<p class="pnext">It was seven o’clock when he looked up and saw
+Lola enter with Ernest Treadwell,—the girl with a
+reflection of all the flowers of Hampton Court in her
+eyes and the boy with love and adoration in his. It
+was true that all about him there was a great improvement,
+a more healthy appearance, a look of honest
+sleep and clean thinking. But he was still the same
+ugly duckling with obstreperous hair and unfortunate
+teeth and a half-precocious, half-timid manner. All
+the same, the fairies had touched him at his birth and
+endowed him with that strange thing that is called
+genius. He had the soul of a poet.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Come up,” said Lola, “you’re not doing anything
+to-night, so you may as well stay to dinner.
+I’ve found something I want to read to you.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">She waved her hand to her father, smiled at her
+mother who was selling note-paper to a housemaid
+from Inverness Terrace for love letters—and so the
+paper was pink—and led the way upstairs to the
+drawing-room which had been opened up and put in
+daily use. Its Sabbath look and Sabbath smell, its
+antimacassars had disappeared. There were books
+about, many books; sevenpenny editions of novels that
+hadn’t fallen quite stillborn from the press, and one or
+two by Wells and Lawrence and Somerset Maugham.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Sit down for a moment, Ernie,” she said, “and
+make yourself happy. I’ll be with you again in five
+minutes.” And he looked after her with a dog’s eyes
+and sat down to watch the door with a dog’s patience.</p>
+<p class="pnext">In her own room she went to her desk, unlocked a
+drawer and took out a page cut from <em>The Tatler</em> on
+which was reproduced a photograph of Fallaray. She
+had framed it and kept it hidden away under lock and
+key, and always when she came home from her walks,
+and several times a day when she could slip up and
+shut herself in for a moment or two, she took it out
+to gaze at it and press it to her breast. It was her
+last link, her last and everlasting link with the foolish
+dreams with which that room was so intimately associated,—a
+room no longer made up to represent
+that of a courtesan; a normal room now, suitable to
+the daughter of a watchmaker in Queen’s Road, Bayswater.</p>
+<p class="pnext">The evening sun gilded the commonplace line of the
+roofs opposite as she stood in the window with Fallaray’s
+face against her heart.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“I love you,” she said, “I love you. I shall always
+love you, and if I die first, I shall wait for you on the
+other side of the Bridge.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">She returned it to its hiding place, took off her hat,
+tidied her hair, picked up a little book and went back to
+the drawing-room.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“Listen,” she said, “this is for you.</p>
+<blockquote><div>
+<div class="line-block">
+<div class="line">
+“‘I shall see my way as birds their trackless way.</div>
+<div class="line">
+I shall arrive,—what time, what circuit first,</div>
+<div class="line">
+I ask not; but unless God send His hail</div>
+<div class="line">
+Or blinding fire-balls, sleet or stifling snow,</div>
+<div class="line">
+In some time, His good time, I shall arrive;</div>
+<div class="line">
+He guides me and the bird. In His good time.’”</div>
+</div>
+</div></blockquote>
+<p class="pfirst">And as the boy watched her and saw her light up
+as though there were something burning in her heart,
+he knew that those lines were as much for herself as
+for him.</p>
+<p class="pnext">THE END</p>
+<div class="line-block">
+<div class="line">
+ </div>
+<div class="line">
+ </div>
+</div>
+<p class="bold pfirst">“The Books You Like to Read at the Price You Like to Pay”</p>
+<p class="pnext">There Are Two Sides to Everything—</p>
+<p class="pnext">—including the wrapper which covers
+every Grosset &amp; Dunlap book. When
+you feel in the mood for a good romance,
+refer to the carefully selected list
+of modern fiction comprising most of
+the successes by prominent writers of
+the day which is printed on the back of
+every Grosset &amp; Dunlap book wrapper.</p>
+<p class="pnext">You will find more than five hundred
+titles to choose from—books for every
+mood and every taste and every pocketbook.</p>
+<p class="italics pnext">Don’t forget the other side, but in case
+the wrapper is lost, write to the publishers
+for a complete catalog.</p>
+<p class="pnext">There is a Grosset &amp; Dunlap Book
+for every mood and for every taste.</p>
+<div class="line-block">
+<div class="line">
+ </div>
+<div class="line">
+ </div>
+</div>
+<p class="bold pfirst">ETHEL M. DELL’S NOVELS</p>
+<p class="pnext">May be had wherever books are sold. Ask for Grosset &amp; Dunlap’s list.</p>
+<p class="pnext">THE LAMP IN THE DESERT</p>
+<p class="pnext">The scene of this splendid story is laid in India and
+tells of the lamp of love that continues to shine through
+all sorts of tribulations to final happiness.</p>
+<p class="pnext">GREATHEART</p>
+<p class="pnext">The story of a cripple whose deformed body conceals
+a noble soul.</p>
+<p class="pnext">THE HUNDREDTH CHANCE</p>
+<p class="pnext">A hero who worked to win even when there was only
+“a hundredth chance.”</p>
+<p class="pnext">THE SWINDLER</p>
+<p class="pnext">The story of a “bad man’s” soul revealed by a
+woman’s faith.</p>
+<p class="pnext">THE TIDAL WAVE</p>
+<p class="pnext">Tales of love and of women who learned to know the
+true from the false.</p>
+<p class="pnext">THE SAFETY CURTAIN</p>
+<p class="pnext">A very vivid love story of India. The volume also
+contains four other long stories of equal interest.</p>
+<p class="pnext">Grosset &amp; Dunlap, Publishers, New York</p>
+<div class="line-block">
+<div class="line">
+ </div>
+<div class="line">
+ </div>
+</div>
+<p class="bold pfirst">FLORENCE L. BARCLAY’S NOVELS</p>
+<p class="pnext">May be had wherever books are sold. Ask for Grosset &amp; Dunlap’s list.</p>
+<p class="pnext">THE WHITE LADIES OF WORCESTER</p>
+<p class="pnext">A novel of the 12th Century. The heroine, believing she
+had lost her lover, enters a convent. He returns, and interesting
+developments follow.</p>
+<p class="pnext">THE UPAS TREE</p>
+<p class="pnext">A love story of rare charm. It deals with a successful
+author and his wife.</p>
+<p class="pnext">THROUGH THE POSTERN GATE</p>
+<p class="pnext">The story of a seven day courtship, in which the discrepancy
+in ages vanished into insignificance before the
+convincing demonstration of abiding love.</p>
+<p class="pnext">THE ROSARY</p>
+<p class="pnext">The story of a young artist who is reputed to love beauty
+above all else in the world, but who, when blinded through
+an accident, gains life’s greatest happiness. A rare story
+of the great passion of two real people superbly capable of
+love, its sacrifices and its exceeding reward.</p>
+<p class="pnext">THE MISTRESS OF SHENSTONE</p>
+<p class="pnext">The lovely young Lady Ingleby, recently widowed by the
+death of a husband who never understood her, meets a fine,
+clean young chap who is ignorant of her title and they fall
+deeply in love with each other. When he learns her real
+identity a situation of singular power is developed.</p>
+<p class="pnext">THE BROKEN HALO</p>
+<p class="pnext">The story of a young man whose religious belief was
+shattered in childhood and restored to him by the little
+white lady, many years older than himself, to whom he is
+passionately devoted.</p>
+<p class="pnext">THE FOLLOWING OF THE STAR</p>
+<p class="pnext">The story of a young missionary, who, about to start for
+Africa, marries wealthy Diana Rivers, in order to help her
+fulfill the conditions of her uncle’s will, and how they finally
+come to love each other and are reunited after experiences
+that soften and purify.</p>
+<p class="pnext">Grosset &amp; Dunlap, Publishers, New York</p>
+<div class="line-block">
+<div class="line">
+ </div>
+<div class="line">
+ </div>
+</div>
+<p class="bold pfirst">BOOTH TARKINGTON’S NOVELS</p>
+<p class="pnext">May be had wherever books are sold. Ask for Grosset &amp; Dunlap’s list.</p>
+<p class="pnext">SEVENTEEN. Illustrated by Arthur William Brown.</p>
+<p class="pnext">No one but the creator of Penrod could have portrayed
+the immortal young people of this story. Its humor is irresistible
+and reminiscent of the time when the reader was
+Seventeen.</p>
+<p class="pnext">PENROD. Illustrated by Gordon Grant.</p>
+<p class="pnext">This is a picture of a boy’s heart, full of the lovable, humorous,
+tragic things which are locked secrets to most older
+folks. It is a finished, exquisite work.</p>
+<p class="pnext">PENROD AND SAM. Illustrated by Worth Brehm.</p>
+<p class="pnext">Like “Penrod” and “Seventeen,” this book contains
+some remarkable phases of real boyhood and some of the best
+stories of juvenile prankishness that have ever been written.</p>
+<p class="pnext">THE TURMOIL. Illustrated by C. E. Chambers.</p>
+<p class="pnext">Bibbs Sheridan is a dreamy, imaginative youth, who revolts
+against his father’s plans for him to be a servitor of
+big business. The love of a fine girl turns Bibb’s life from
+failure to success.</p>
+<p class="pnext">THE GENTLEMAN FROM INDIANA. Frontispiece.</p>
+<p class="pnext">A story of love and politics,—more especially a picture of
+a country editor’s life in Indiana, but the charm of the book
+lies in the love interest.</p>
+<p class="pnext">THE FLIRT. Illustrated by Clarence F. Underwood.</p>
+<p class="pnext">The “Flirt,” the younger of two sisters, breaks one girl’s
+engagement, drives one man to suicide, causes the murder
+of another, leads another to lose his fortune, and in the end
+marries a stupid and unpromising suitor, leaving the really
+worthy one to marry her sister.</p>
+<p class="pnext">Ask for Complete free list of G. &amp; D, Popular Copyrighted Fiction</p>
+<p class="pnext">Grosset &amp; Dunlap, Publishers, New York</p>
+<div class="line-block">
+<div class="line">
+ </div>
+<div class="line">
+ </div>
+</div>
+<p class="bold pfirst">KATHLEEN NORRIS’ STORIES</p>
+<p class="pnext">May be had wherever books are sold. Ask far Grosset &amp; Dunlap’s list</p>
+<p class="pnext">SISTERS. Frontispiece by Frank Street.</p>
+<p class="pnext">The California Redwoods furnish the background for this
+beautiful story of sisterly devotion and sacrifice.</p>
+<p class="pnext">POOR, DEAR, MARGARET KIRBY. Frontispiece by George Gibbs.</p>
+<p class="pnext">A collection of delightful stories, including “Bridging the
+Years” and “The Tide-Marsh.” This story is now shown in
+moving pictures.</p>
+<p class="pnext">JOSSELYN’S WIFE. Frontispiece by C. Allan Gilbert.</p>
+<p class="pnext">The story of a beautiful woman who fought a bitter fight for
+happiness and love.</p>
+<p class="pnext">MARTIE, THE UNCONQUERED. Illustrated by Charles E. Chambers.</p>
+<p class="pnext">The triumph of a dauntless spirit over adverse conditions.</p>
+<p class="pnext">THE HEART OF RACHAEL. Frontispiece by Charles E. Chambers.</p>
+<p class="pnext">An interesting story of divorce and the problems that come
+with a second marriage.</p>
+<p class="pnext">THE STORY OF JULIA PAGE. Frontispiece by C. Allan Gilbert.</p>
+<p class="pnext">A sympathetic portrayal of the quest of a normal girl, obscure
+and lonely, for the happiness of life.</p>
+<p class="pnext">SATURDAY’S CHILD. Frontispiece by F. Graham Cootes.</p>
+<p class="pnext">Can a girl, born in rather sordid conditions, lift herself through
+sheer determination to the better things for which her soul
+hungered?</p>
+<p class="pnext">MOTHER. Illustrated by F. C. Yohn.</p>
+<p class="pnext">A story of the big mother heart that beats in the background
+of every girl’s life, and some dreams which came true.</p>
+<p class="pnext">Ask for Complete free list of G. &amp; D. Popular Copyrighted Fiction</p>
+<p class="pnext">Grosset &amp; Dunlap, Publishers, New York</p>
+<div class="line-block">
+<div class="line">
+ </div>
+<div class="line">
+ </div>
+</div>
+<p class="bold pfirst">STORIES OF RARE CHARM BY GENE STRATTON-PORTER</p>
+<p class="pnext">May be had wherever books are sold. Ask for Grosset &amp; Dunlap’s list.</p>
+<p class="pnext">MICHAEL O’HALLORAN, Illustrated by Frances Rogers.</p>
+<p class="pnext">Michael is a quick-witted little Irish newsboy, living in Northern
+Indiana. He adopts a deserted little girl, a cripple. He also assumes
+the responsibility of leading the entire rural community upward
+and onward.</p>
+<p class="pnext">LADDIE. Illustrated by Herman Pfeifer.</p>
+<p class="pnext">This is a bright, cheery tale with the scenes laid in Indiana. The
+story is told by Little Sister, the youngest member of a large family,
+but it is concerned not so much with childish doings as with the love
+affairs of older members of the family. Chief among them is that
+of Laddie and the Princess, an English girl who has come to live in
+the neighborhood and about whose family there hangs a mystery.</p>
+<p class="pnext">THE HARVESTER. Illustrated by W. L. Jacobs.</p>
+<p class="pnext">“The Harvester,” is a man of the woods and fields, and if the
+book had nothing in it but the splendid figure of this man it would
+be notable. But when the Girl comes to his “Medicine Woods,”
+there begins a romance of the rarest idyllic quality.</p>
+<p class="pnext">FRECKLES. Illustrated.</p>
+<p class="pnext">Freckles is a nameless waif when the tale opens, but the way in
+which he takes hold of life; the nature friendships he forms in the
+great Limberlost Swamp; the manner in which everyone who meets
+him succumbs to the charm of his engaging personality; and his
+love-story with “The Angel” are full of real sentiment.</p>
+<p class="pnext">A GIRL OF THE LIMBERLOST. Illustrated.</p>
+<p class="pnext">The story of a girl of the Michigan woods; a buoyant, loveable
+type of the self-reliant American. Her philosophy is one of love and
+kindness towards all things; her hope is never dimmed. And by
+the sheer beauty of her soul, and the purity of her vision, she wins from
+barren and unpromising surroundings those rewards of high courage.</p>
+<p class="pnext">AT THE FOOT OF THE RAINBOW. Illustrations in colors.</p>
+<p class="pnext">The scene of this charming love story is laid in Central Indiana.
+The story is one of devoted friendship, and tender self-sacrificing
+love. The novel is brimful of the most beautiful word painting of
+nature, and its pathos and tender sentiment will endear it to all.</p>
+<p class="pnext">THE SONG OF THE CARDINAL. Profusely illustrated.</p>
+<p class="pnext">A love ideal of the Cardinal bird and his mate, told with delicacy
+and humor.</p>
+<p class="pnext">Grosset &amp; Dunlap, Publishers, New York</p>
+
+<hr class="vspace" style="height: 5em"/>
+
+<div>*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 35079 ***</div>
+</body>
+</html>
author	nfenwick <nfenwick@pglaf.org>	2025-03-03 04:27:43 -0800
committer	nfenwick <nfenwick@pglaf.org>	2025-03-03 04:27:43 -0800
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tree	6385cf997b533a4057d534a8714c67bfc648ca67 /35079-h/35079-h.htm
parent	1febaccc67f3b36f288873758f8bf83cb7a20d7d (diff)