The present pleasant, easy stage of his life had come to an end, and unpleasant realities must be dealt with, but he would keep ever the memory of this splendid girl in his heart, the memory that she had not been weak or permitted him to make a fool of himself or of her.
And as he walked on out of the Park he felt a new self-reliance and determination.
Meanwhile, Katherine Bush had got into an omnibus and was on the way to Victoria, and once arrived at Laburnum Villa and her attic, she carefully wrote down on the little book which she kept for jottings, "Mademoiselle de Maupin, in a book by Théophile Gautier," while her thoughts ran:
"He did not say what was the name of the story, but I can read the whole lot this man wrote. I'll go to a French library on Monday."
Then she sat down in her armchair by the fire and reviewed the entire chain of events.
She was embarked upon a new current which would help to carry her to some definite goal – she was out of the backwater. It was not a voyage to Cythera, but youth was at the prow, and ambition, not pleasure, at the helm; and there live philosophers who say these two things bring more lasting good than all the bliss that is to be snatched from the other combination. – Who knows! – They may be right!
Matilda was nervous with excitement when after supper she was told of the definite settlement of her sister's affairs.
"So you are really engaged, Kitten!" she exclaimed. "Now, do tell me all about it. There's a dear – and what was she like, and is it a grand house and are you going to be properly treated as a real lady?"
"Yes, I am engaged. I am to go in on Wednesday, 'bag and baggage,' as Lady Garribardine said."
"My! what a vulgar expression for a lady to use, Kitten – are you sure she's all right?"
Matilda hated what was not genteel.
"Oh! yes, Tild – she's all right – and the house is beautiful – and, yes, what you'd call grand – and you may be sure they will treat me exactly in the way I deserve to be treated. If you aren't respected it's your own fault – people don't make a mistake as to whom they are with a second time, even if they do the first. If anyone gets put upon continually, or gets snubbed, it's her own fault."
Matilda totally disagreed.
"There you are quite wrong. Why, look at Gladys! Bob treats her anyhow sometimes of a Sunday, and her as good as gold."
"Well, she has made him think that he can by not stopping it in the beginning. It is never a question of goodness as I often tell you about things, it is a question of force. Goodness does not count unless it is so perfect that it is a force, too – like Christ's."
"Oh, my! What awful things you do say, Katherine!"
Matilda felt so uncomfortable when her sister spoke of what she thought ought only to be mentioned in church!
"No, I merely tell the truth, it is the weaklings who do all the harm in the world, never the bad or good."
"Well, what was Lady Garribardine like?" Matilda was tired of abstract speculations.
"She was tall and rather stout, and had a golden wig – and black eyes – and she understood things. She knows how to order her house, because the servants had the same awe for her as the office-boy has for Liv. Her writing-table was awfully untidy, though. I expect she has not much method, and it is just personality and temper which causes her to be obeyed."
"You won't stand being ordered about ever, Kitten?"
"It will depend on how much good I feel I am getting out of it. If the place and people in it are being lessons for me, I shan't mind what she says – I shall stick it out and try never really to deserve a scolding."
"Was there anyone else there?" Matilda was still curious.
"Yes – a man left when I was going in. He had a clever face. I shall like him, I believe, if he comes there often."
"You won't go falling in love with any of them gentlemen, Kitten," Matilda pleaded affectionately.
She felt that things might develop as they did in the cases of the innocent actresses and governesses and the villains in her serials.
"Have I ever been given to falling in love?" Katherine asked with a humorous flash in her eyes. – "You have not seen me tumble into the arms of Charlie Prodgers or Percy Watson – have you?"
"No, dearie, but these gentlemen in your new biz might be different and might not mean so honest by you. I do wish I could hope to see you settled with Charlie some day. He is such a dear fellow, and very rising. He'll be head clerk at the estate agent's he is in very soon, and could give you a comfortable home like this is for your own; and no need to be hanging on for years like Glad and Bob."
"Can you picture me settled in a comfortable home with Charlie Prodgers, Tild!" Katherine laughed out at the idea, it seemed so comic to her. "He is as great a snob as Fred, and even more ignorant. I would not let him button my boots, much less call himself my husband! I'd as soon be dead as tied to that! At Brixton, too! With the prospect of being the mother of numbers of sandy-haired little Prodgers. What an outlook!"
Matilda was hurt. They had never spoken in words upon this secret hope of hers, but she had often hinted at it, and Katherine had been silent and seemingly preoccupied, but not actually scornful, and to have the scheme denounced with derision and the happy picture scoffed at was a blow to her which she could not bear in silence. She felt indignant.
"Charlie Prodgers is good enough for any young lady. Mabel herself thinks highly of him. He is one of the few of Fred's gentlemen friends that she thinks worthy to be asked into her mother's house – and I would have liked to have seen you married into her set safely before she becomes our sister-in-law, and can patronise you."
"Then I am afraid I must disappoint you, dear," Katherine now tried to hide her smile. "I have quite another game to play in life. But why don't you keep him for Ethel – she is nearly sixteen and will soon be looking out for a young man – or take him yourself?"
This was a new idea for Matilda. She had always been too loyal to dream of turning her eye in the direction of one whom she regarded as exclusively her sister's property.
She bridled a little – the picture was so glorious – if it only could be hers! Charlie Prodgers who scorned to be seen in anything but a frock coat, unless, of course, he went golfing – Charlie Prodgers who each Sunday attended the church parade in Hyde Park as a matter of course! But would he ever look at her? Proud, haughty fellow! and she not so pretty as Katherine – and not half so nobby as Gladys. But stranger things than that happened in her serials, and she need not feel that it was quite hopeless. But how could Kitten willingly relinquish such triumph? There must be something of a suffragette in her after all, since no girl in her senses could ask more of fortune!
The Sunday was spent by Katherine in packing up all her belongings and in selecting the books she meant to take with her, a volume or two of Voltaire, Bacon's Essays, Kant and Bergson, and a new acquisition, Otto Weininger's "Sex and Character." This latter had interested her deeply. There was a great deal of biting truth in his analysis of women, and it was probably also true that they did not possess souls; but she totally disagreed with his ending of the matter that the solution of the problem lay in a voluntary annihilation of the human species through abstinence from procreation. She, for her part, thought that it was taking things out of the Hand of God, or the Divine Essence, or whatever the great Principle should be called – and her eminently practical mind failed to see the use of such far-reaching speculations. "The poor man was mad, of course," she said, as she closed the book again before packing it. "But I will try to watch the feminine traits in myself and crush them. He has taught me that amount, in any case. And if I have no soul, I have a brain and a will, and so I am going to obtain as much as a woman can get with those two things. As for the infinite, men are welcome to that, as far as I am concerned!"
She looked forward with deep interest to perusing the story with Mademoiselle de Maupin in it. What could it be about? She had hardly thought that Lord Algy had read at all, he never spoke of books – but it was perhaps not surprising; they had been always too occupied in more agreeable converse. How good it was to remember all that, even though never in her life she should have such foolish sweetness again!
She had not the slightest sentiment about "leaving home"; she would have found such a thing quite ridiculous. On the contrary, a sense of exaltation filled her. She was going forever from this cramped, small attic and the uncongenial environment of the house. And she must hold herself in stern command and never waste an opportunity to improve herself in manner and mind. Of course, she might be liable to make a few mistakes at first, and the work might be hard, but if will was strong and emotions were checked, the road to success and development of her personality could not be a long one. And when she had gained freedom – how splendidly would she use it! There should be no false values for her!
Her new dress, the one in the style of Lady Beatrice Strobridge, would be home by the Tuesday night, and she had got a "dressy" blouse from Oxford Street, in case she should ever have to appear in the evenings. She would do very well, she felt.
The family, with the exception of Matilda, were not sorry that she was departing. The father had left Laburnum Villa and a certain sum to keep it up for the benefit of the whole bunch of them; and when Mr. Frederick Bush would move into a house of his own with the refined Mabel Cawber, Gladys and Bert and Ethel looked forward to an uninterrupted time of jollity, unclouded by Katherine's aloofness and contempt.
Matilda alone grieved in secret. She thought Katherine was superior to them all in spite of her reserve, and the last evening, while she sat with her by the attic fire, she told her so.
"No, I am not, Tild – I am not superior. I am just different – all our aims are as wide apart as the poles. Glad and Ethel and the boys never want to learn anything – they resent the thought that there could be anything that they do not know. Their whole attitude is resentful towards any knowledge. They like to browse on deceiving themselves over every question and aspect of life. So they will all just stay where they are. Fred, an auctioneer, henpecked by Mabel; Bert, a clerk. Poor Glad, the downtrodden drudge of Bob Hartley, and Ethel probably something of the same. You, dear old Tild, will be a sentimental old maid looking after the others' children – because you are entirely a 'mother woman' – unless you take Charlie Prodgers, as I said the other day, and have heaps of little Prodgers! Oh! it is all just respectable, comfortable squalor – and words won't express how glad I am to get out of it!"
Matilda was quite incensed.
"I'd rather be a lady, however poor, in my own circle, and treated as such there, than a servant in a grand house as you're going to be, Kitten. I'd let them see I'd be above taking their orders!"
She hoped this taunt would tell, but Katherine only smiled.
"Poor, dear old Tild," she said. "You do not know, perhaps, that it is a wise man who understands how to obey those placed over him, and to exact the same obedience from those beneath. When I have learned my lessons and have obtained a place of command, then I shall not only enforce obedience, but I shall remove from my path anyone who crosses my will."
"Oh, my!" gasped Matilda.
"Do you suppose I argued with Liv and Dev and showed them that I would not take their orders? No, of course not; they valued me and raised my salary because I did what I was told to do. They were paying me money and were in a position to command. No one forced me to take their money; I went there of my own free will, and was to do specified things for a specified remuneration. I did them to the best of my ability, and so I am going on to something better. Lady Garribardine is paying me ninety pounds a year with a rise; and I am to be hers to command for certain things. When I have learned all that that situation can teach me, I shall get a larger and higher position, and so on until I reach my goal, when I shall rule – do not fear, Tild. I shall rule."
"I daresay you will," Matilda admitted, awed.
Katherine's face had a strange, compelling force when she spoke thus.
"But we aren't all the same, Kitten. Glad, for instance, has more pride; look how she left Brown and Melbury's, where she was getting more than at Ermantine's, because she would not take orders from the new manager they put over her department."
"That sort of pride was entirely worthy of Gladys' intelligence, and it had landed her with a less salary, no one's added respect, and not much to look forward to in the future." And then, with a burst of feeling, "Oh! Tild, if I only could make laws, I would enforce education to such an extent that there could not be left any fools like Gladys!"
Then she said good-night to Matilda and gently pushed her from the room, where she looked as though she meant to stay for another half-hour, and returning to her armchair, she began to read that book of Théophile Gautier's which she had bought on the Monday morning, and discovered that its title was simply "Mademoiselle de Maupin."
CHAPTER VI
Lady Garribardine was having a tea-party with some good music, when Katherine Bush arrived. She realised immediately that it was stupid of her to have chosen the afternoon for her entrance into her new post, and Bronson, the dignified butler, left her in no doubt as to his view of the matter, as he directed the hurried transport of her luggage through the hall.
"Her Ladyship expected you this morning, miss," he said, severely.
"Then she should have told me at what hour I was to come," Katherine answered, quietly; "she mentioned none."
Bronson stared. Miss Arnott, clergyman's daughter though she was, would never have said a thing like that; she would have been nervous and apologetic in a minute, poor thing! But this young woman, whom Bronson had very good reason to believe, from what he had been able to gather, belonged merely to the lower middle class, had yet the audacity to give herself all the airs and calm assurance appertaining to a lady of the world!
Here the entrance of two guests took up his attention, a man and a woman.
Katherine stood back and waited for directions, while she watched closely. The man was the same that she had seen on the former occasion. The woman interested her; she was tall and droopy, with wide vague eyes, and a wisp of buffish chiffon about her neck inside her furs, which Bronson assisted her to remove. Then Katherine saw that she wore the dress which Gladys had described, and which in its general features had been taken more or less as the model for her own.
This must be Lady Beatrice Strobridge.
"Gerard," the lady said, rather querulously, "I don't mean to stay for more than ten minutes – so don't get away into some difficult corner with Läo, if you mean to leave with me."
The man answered with polite indifference.
"Bronson will see you safely to the motor; I promised my aunt to stay to hear Venzoni; he is sure to be late."
Then they went on up the marble stairs and a young footman was sent with Katherine Bush in the lift at the back of the hall.
"'Gerard' – it is a nice name – and he looks a nice man," she mused, while they were carried aloft, "and he is bored with his wife. Gladys was quite right; why did she have that rag of chiffon? It spoilt the whole dress."
The housekeeper met her when they arrived in the top passage, and took her under her wing.
"Some tea will be sent to your room, miss," she informed her, "and Her Ladyship said she would not have time to see you this evening, but you would doubtless have things to unpack and arrangements to make for yourself. Your trunks will be up in a minute."
And then she opened the door into a back room which faced west, so the afterglow of the setting sun made it not quite dark. There was a fire burning, and it all appeared gay when the housekeeper turned on the lights, with its old-fashioned rose-flowered chintz on a bright parrot-green ground. There was a scent of lavender, too, and Katherine Bush was pleasantly impressed; nothing looked cheap and gimcrack like the bedrooms in Laburnum Villa, she thought, or still more those at the house of Mabel Cawber, which were the envy of Matilda's soul. The furniture here was solid mahogany of early Victorian make, and the armchair gave the impression that it would be a pleasant place to rest in.
When she was alone, Katherine Bush made herself take in every detail. Lady Garribardine had suggested that she was observant; she must remember that and always cultivate this faculty, for she realised that every trifling thing would be different from anything she had ever known.
She liked the space of the place, she would not feel that she was tumbling over things. There was an empty bookcase awaiting her books, no doubt, and a big sensible writing-table there in the window where there would be plenty of light. The wardrobe was a monster, ample room in it for any amount of clothes! How pleasant not to have to put most things away in cardboard boxes under one's bed – often to find them discoloured by dust when taking them out again! And how pretty and quaint was the china on the washstand, matching the chintz. And the towels! Of finer quality – and nearly as many as there had been at the Palatial in Paris, which she had supposed was a case of French hotel extravagance and not what would be the custom in private life.
She fingered them softly. They were arranged peculiarly, too, with the top fold turned back so that one could pick them up in a second. Katherine Bush smiled cynically when she remembered her two coarse huckabacks, changed only every Saturday at Laburnum Villa!
Everything gave the impression of spotless cleanliness and order. The brass hot-water can and the fender and the fire-irons all shone with superlative polishing.
Presently her tea was brought up by a housemaid in neatest black, with a cap and apron which would have made Em'ly snort with indignation had she been asked to wear them, so unmodish was their style! It was a joy to have a perfectly arranged tea-tray with shining silver and pretty porcelain, a tray all to herself, too, instead of a breakfast cup already poured out and mixed with milk and sugar, and probably a little of the contents upset into the saucer, which also contained a thick slice of bread and butter and a piece of cake! This is what she had always been accustomed to at the office, or on Saturday afternoons at home, while she read her books and a sister brought her tea up to her attic. And with the exceptions of a Lyons or an A. B. C. restaurant, and the brief time of glory in Paris, when chocolate was the order of the day, this one unappetizing cup had represented to her what many women look forward to as the most delightful meal of all.
The housemaid's manner had been quiet and respectful, as she drew the curtains and shut out the dying light, the muffin was done to a turn, and, above all, the tea tasted as tea had never tasted before. She was too ignorant as yet to know that it was China, not the rankest Ceylon which she was accustomed to, but she found it particularly nice, though rather weak. The whole room and the service and the atmosphere spoke of inhabitants who, somehow she knew, belonged to the same class as those whose voices she had always admired from beyond the half-high glass screen.
She sat and dreamed for a while before beginning her unpacking. Her heart ached underneath for Lord Algy – but aches are possible to bear when there is an element of triumph and self-glorification about them. She was quite aware that she had behaved remarkably well, and in a manner which Lord Algy could never look back upon but with respect. And to renounce happiness and union when the other person is clamouring for a continuance of relations, brings a great measure of consolation, because there is no wound to the self-love, no disastrous feeling that but for personal stupidity the ache need not be. There is even a melancholy pleasure in it, giving a pensive sadness not all pain.
After a while, she began to arrange her clothes and books, and it had struck seven o'clock before all was complete and she had sat down again to finish "Mademoiselle de Maupin," which had so thrilled her far into the night.
She read French quite easily, but she was not accustomed to judge of its style, and as yet hardly appreciated nuances, but the story, the cynical, enchanting, wonderful story, seized hold of her imagination. As she read the last words, the book dropped into her lap and she stared in front of her. She saw what Lord Algy had meant – and it flattered her greatly. She understood entirely Thédore's feelings. How wise she had been to go! How she had grasped the salient points of life! And she, Katherine Bush, no great lady, but a daughter of the lower middle class, had evolved some such instincts herself – had played her game with equal coolness, and had lived through some such joys.
She thrilled and thrilled. The subtle, whimsical, polished wit of the book seemed to open some new vista of comprehension to her. She did not perceive its immorality. She would read it over again and again – and everything else this man had written. It seemed that she was newly awakened to a sense of power that she had not known she possessed. If only she could have read this before she had gone to Paris, what a help it would have been!
"So Algy was not so ignorant, after all," she mused. "Of course, he must have thought I was, and so did not let me see that he himself was more than a fool – darling Algy." But, at all events, he had thought she was like Théodore, only kinder – that was good enough! Well, she would make that true some day, and meanwhile she was away from stultifying squalor – away from minds only interested in petty local affairs – away from sham gentility, away from gramophones and cinemas – away from pretence, away among the real things where she could learn to understand every shade of the meaning of life step by step! And at this stage of her musings, after a gentle knock the same housemaid opened the door with a can of hot water.
"Your dinner will be served in the secretary's room at eight o'clock, miss; it is half-past seven now. When would you like me to return to fasten you up?"
The two red spots appeared in Katherine Bush's cheeks. So she had been expected to change her dress – and she had not thought of doing so! She had not even imagined that she would go again downstairs or have any dinner after that wonderful tea! A little supper probably on a tray later on, or something like that.
But here was dinner! perhaps the same kind of meal as she had had with Lord Algy. Of course, she ought to have known that she must change her dress. She felt very angry with herself, and after the exaltation over her own instincts this was a fall! But she would never err again, and fortunately the housemaid would not know that she had been ignorant.
"My things fasten in the front, thank you, so that I need not trouble you," she answered, graciously; "but will you tell me, please, where I shall find the secretary's room?"
The housemaid gave directions – but one of the footmen would be certain to be in the hall and would show her. Thomas, the one who had brought her up, would wait on her.
"When you are ready, miss, will you please ring, and I will whistle down to say you are coming. We always did for Miss Arnott, and then they serve the dinner at once. This bell rings up and this one down; it is the upstairs one for me. I am Martha, the second housemaid, miss, and will be pleased to do anything I can for you."
Katherine Bush thanked the girl again and quickly began to dress, and at a minute or two to eight was on her way. This upper staircase she found descended to the ground floor independently of the stately, shallow marble one she had walked up on to the sitting-room on her former visit and which went no farther than the first floor.
Thomas was waiting for her and conducted her to a room down the corridor, whose windows she discovered later looked out on a dull, blank wall. It had comfortable, solid, leather-covered furniture, the relic possibly of some country smoking-room, and faded crimson silk brocade curtains, the discarded splendour of a salon, perhaps. These were cosily drawn, and there was plenty of electric light, and she saw that there would be space to do her typing on the solid, large table, and to keep all records in those capacious cupboards which lined the walls. The feeling that she was in space again gave her satisfaction; she had so often longed to break down the partition of her attic, or stretch out and push away the glass screen at Liv and Dev's. The room was very high, too – another advantage.
"I shall always have large, high rooms when I have won my game," she said to herself.
A small table by the fire was laid for one. She made herself notice the silver and the glass and the cloth, and almost immediately Thomas brought in a large tray with her dinner. There was soup in a quaint covered cup with two handles, and some hot silver dishes.
He placed them all with regularity within her reach, and then asked respectfully if she would please to ring when she was ready for her sweet. Miss Arnott was wont to take claret, he informed her, but what would she, Miss Bush, desire to drink?
"A cup of tea," almost escaped from the tip of Katherine's tongue – but she stopped herself. Probably one did not take tea with one's dinner even alone like this, and if she had it, Thomas would know that she was not accustomed to the regulation things. Water would be safest. So she indicated her wishes and Thomas left the room.
A sense of strangeness, almost of awe, stole over her, a sensation she had not felt even when with Lord Algy in the gilded luxury of the Paris hotel. She had known then that those surroundings were just part of any demi-mondaine's life, and could be had by the lowest for money – but these were quite different. These were rather shabby, but were the expression of people who had had them for countless years, and were, of course, ordinary and everyday in their existences – the whole atmosphere affected her.
She was glad that Thomas had gone out of the room. She knew that at the present stage she should hate to be watched, while she ate, by a silent servant.
"But I must accustom myself to that," she told herself, for Algy, she remembered, had never seemed to remark servants at all, and would go on talking to her, while his coat was being handed or his boots put on, as though Hanson did not exist.
She was hungry and began to break her bread. She wished she felt quite sure whether or no she was expected to turn the soup out into the soup plate or drink it as it was? She decided to try the former course, since of what use was the soup plate if it had not been brought for that purpose?
The food proved to be excellent; and the sweet and fruit just to her taste, and when all was finished, Thomas removed everything and folded up the small table and put it back into its, evidently, accustomed corner, and bringing her the evening papers, he made up the fire and left her alone.
This, she supposed, would be the time she would have to herself. She hardly noticed the headlines as she glanced at the news; her mind was too full of herself and her new life to take interest in outside things.
Where did that door lead to? she wondered – a heavy mahogany door; but she was soon to know, for it opened suddenly, and the man she had already twice seen came in, leaving it open after him, so that she could perceive that the room he had left was a dim, vast library; it was lined with books.
"I beg your pardon," he said. "I have come for some large-sized paper. My aunt used to have it kept in this drawer, I think."
Katherine Bush rose while he went to get it out for himself – he was not her employer, and she did not yet know where things were kept, so she did not offer to help him. He was in evening dress, and his hair was as well groomed as Lord Algy's, but not cut quite so short, and it was brushed straight back from his forehead and was brown and thick. His face was tired and humorous and very distinguished, but for the moment he looked cross and impatient. The paper was evidently not where he had thought that it would be.
"Confound it!" he muttered, almost inaudibly, and then aloud, "I am in a great hurry. Will you please look in those cupboards while I look in these?"
Katherine Bush did as she was asked, and chanced upon the paper immediately. She handed it to him without a word. She noticed that he hardly looked at her, and did not take in her personality at all. She was just his aunt's new secretary and typist; and more important matters pressed.
"Thanks, awfully;" then he glanced at the table, where the typing machine used by Miss Arnott stood. "Oh! – er – I was wondering if you would be so awfully kind as to type this when I have written it; it is a letter I must send to the Times, and I shall have to go in to dinner in a minute.'
"I have not seen how this machine works yet," Katherine Bush answered, "but if you care to dictate, I can take it down in shorthand and then write it out very quickly afterwards."
"That is most kind of you – will you come into the library then? – my notes are there."
She followed him silently, and when he had found some scribbled words written on the back of an envelope, he went to the hearth-rug, and, leaning against the mantelpiece, began to speak. Katherine had taken up a block and pencil and was waiting ready.
He was not coherent at first; he had neither Mr. Livingstone's precise, oily slowness, nor Mr. Devereux's crisp fluency. She took down exactly what he had said. Then he asked her to read it aloud.