Bella Donna Part 7

"Yes, when there's a woman to be hounded down. They hang together when there's a work of destruction on hand. But do they hang together when there's a work of construction to be done?"

"Do you mean a reputation to be built up?"

Armine pulled his moustache. In the electric light Meyer Isaacson could see that his blue eyes were shining.

"Because," Meyer Isaacson continued, "if you do mean that, I should be inclined to say that each of us must build up his or her reputation individually for himself or herself."

"We need help in nearly all our buildings-up, and how often, how d.a.m.nably often, we don't get it!"

"Was Mrs. Derringham specially down upon some particular woman to-night?"

"Yes, she was."

"Do you care to tell me upon whom?"

"It was Mrs. Chepstow."

"You were talking about Mrs. Chepstow?" Isaacson said slowly. "The famous Mrs. Chepstow?"

"Famous!" said Armine. "I hardly see that Mrs. Chepstow is a famous woman. She is not a writer, a singer, a painter, an actress. She does nothing that I ever heard of. I shouldn't call such a woman famous. I daresay her name is known to lots of people. But this is the age of chatterboxes, and of course--"

At this moment the brougham rolled on to the rubber pavement in front of the Savoy Hotel and stopped before the entrance.

As he was getting out and going into the hall, Meyer Isaacson remembered that the letter Mrs. Chepstow had written to him asking for an appointment had been stamped "Savoy Hotel." She had been staying at the hotel then. Was she staying there now? He had never heard Armine mention her before, but his feminine intuition suddenly connected Armine's words, "I'm very happy at the Savoy," with the invitation to sup there, and the conversation about Mrs. Chepstow just reported to him by his friend. Armine knew Mrs. Chepstow. They were going to meet her in the restaurant to-night. Meyer Isaacson felt sure of it.

They left their coats in the cloak-room and made their way to the restaurant, which as yet was almost empty. The _maitre d'hotel_ came forward to Armine, bowing and smiling, and showed them to a table in a corner. Meyer Isaacson saw that it was laid for only two. He was surprised, but he said nothing, and they sat down.

"I really can't eat supper, Armine," he said. "Don't order it for me."

"Have a little soup, at least, and a gla.s.s of champagne?"

Without waiting for a reply, he gave an order.

"We might have sat in the hall, but it is more amusing in here.

Remember, I haven't been in London--seen the London show--for over eight months. One meets a lot of old friends and acquaintances in places like this."

Meyer Isaacson opened his lips to say that Armine would be far more likely to meet his friends during the season if he went to parties in private houses. America was beginning to stream in, mingled with English country people "up" for a few days, and floating representatives of the nations of the earth. In this heterogeneous crowd he saw no one whom he knew, and Armine had not so far recognized anybody. But he shut his lips without speaking. He realized that Armine had a purpose in coming to the Savoy to-night, in bringing him. For some reason his friend was trying to mask that purpose, but it must almost immediately become apparent. He had only to wait for a few minutes, and doubtless he would know exactly what it was.

A waiter brought the soup and the champagne.

"If any of the patients to whom I have strictly forbidden supper should see me now," said the Doctor, "and if they should divine that I have come straight from a long dinner!--Armine, I am making a heavy sacrifice on friendship's altar."

"You don't see any patients, I hope?"

"Not as yet," the Doctor answered.

Almost before the words were out of his mouth, he saw Mrs. Chepstow at some distance from them, coming in at the door. She came in alone. He looked to see her escort, but, to his surprise, she was not followed by any one. Holding herself very erect, and not glancing to the right or left, she walked down the room escorted by the _maitre d'hotel_, pa.s.sed close to Armine and the Doctor, went to a small table set in the angle of a screen not far off, and sat down with her profile turned towards them. She said a few words to the _maitre d'hotel_. He spoke to a waiter, then hurried away. Mrs. Chepstow sat very still in her chair, looking down. She had laid a lace fan beside the knives and gla.s.ses that shone in the electric light. Her right hand rested lightly on it. She was dressed in black, and wore white gloves, and a diamond comb in her fair, dyed hair. Her strange, colourless complexion looked extra-ordinarily delicate and pure from where the two friends were sitting. There was something pathetic in its whiteness, and in the quiet att.i.tude of this woman who sat quite alone in the midst of the gay crowd. Many people stared at her, whispered about her, were obviously surprised at her solitude; but she seemed quite unconscious that she was being noticed. And there was a curious simplicity in her unconsciousness, and in her att.i.tude, which made her seem almost girlish from a little distance.

"There's Mrs. Chepstow," said a man at the next table to Armine's, bending over to his companion, a stout and florid specimen from the City. "And absolutely alone, by Jove!"

"Couldn't get even a kid from Sandhurst to-night, I s'pose," returned the other. "I wonder she comes in at all if she can't sc.r.a.pe up an escort. Wonder she has the cheek to do it."

They lowered their voices and leaned nearer to each other. Armine lifted his gla.s.s of champagne to his lips, sipped it, and put it down.

"If you do see any patients, you can explain it's all my fault," he said to the Doctor. "I will take the blame. But surely you don't have to follow all your prescriptions?"

His voice was slightly uneven and abstracted, as if he were speaking merely to cover some emotion he was determined to conceal.

"No. But I ought to set an example of reasonable living, I suppose."

They talked for a few minutes about health, with a curious formality, like people who are conscious that they are being critically listened to, or who are, too consciously, listening to themselves. Once or twice Meyer Isaacson glanced across the room to Mrs. Chepstow. She was eating her supper slowly, languidly, and always looking down. Apparently she had not seen him or Armine. Indeed, she did not seem to see any one, but she was rather sadly unconscious of her surroundings. The Doctor found himself pitying her, then denying to himself that she merited compa.s.sion. With many others, he wondered at her solitude. To sup thus alone in a crowded restaurant was to advertise her ill success in the life she had chosen, her abandonment by man. Why did she do this? He could not then divine, although afterwards he knew. And he was quietly astonished. Just at first he expected that she would presently be joined by some one who was late. But no one came, and no second place was laid at her table.

Conversation flagged between Armine and him, until the former presently said:

"I want to introduce you to some one to-night."

"Yes? Who is it?"

He asked, but he already knew.

"Mrs. Chepstow."

The Doctor was on the verge of saying that he was already acquainted with her, when Armine added:

"I spoke about you to her, and she told me she had never met you."

"When was that?"

"Four days ago, when I was introduced to her, and talked to her for the first time."

The Doctor did not speak for a minute. Then he said:

"I shall be delighted to be presented to her."

Although he was remarkably truthful with his friends, he was always absolutely discreet in his professional capacity. He did not know whether Mrs. Chepstow would wish the fact of her having consulted him about her health to be spoken of. Therefore he did not mention it. And as Armine knew that four days ago Mrs. Chepstow and he were strangers, in not mentioning it he was obliged to leave his friend under the impression that they were strangers still.

"She is staying in this hotel, and is sitting over there. But of course you know her by sight," said Armine.

"Oh, yes, I have seen her about."

"I think you will like her, if you can clear your mind of any prejudices you may have formed against her."

"Why should I be prejudiced against Mrs. Chepstow?"

"People are. No one has a good word for her. Both women and men speak ill of her."

From the tone of Armine's voice Meyer Isaacson knew that this fact had prejudiced him in Mrs. Chepstow's favour. There are some men who are born to defend lost causes, who instinctively turn towards those from whom others are ostentatiously turning away, moved by some secret chivalry which blinds their reason, or by a pa.s.sion of simple human pity that dominates their hearts and casts a shadow over the brightness of their intellects. Of these men Nigel Armine was one, and Meyer Isaacson knew it. He was not much surprised, therefore, when Armine continued:

"They see only the surface of things, and judge by what they see. I suppose one ought not to condemn them. But sometimes it's--it's devilish difficult not to condemn cruelty, especially when the cruelty is directed against a woman. Only to-night Mrs. Derringham--and you say she's a good sort of woman--"