Flames Part 41

"Oh, but you must," he said. "Have some of these sugar-biscuits."

She took some from him and began to sip and munch steadily, but still in silence. Julian began to fear that the festival must be a dire failure, for her obvious and extreme constraint affected him, and he was also seized with an absurd sense of shyness in the presence of Valentine, and, instead of talking, found himself immersed in a boyish anxiety as to Valentine's att.i.tude of mind towards the girl. He looked at Cuckoo in the firelight as she mutely ate and drank, and was all at once profoundly conscious of the dreary vulgarity of her appearance, against which even her original prettiness and her present youth fought in vain. Her hat cast a monstrous shadow upon the wall, a shadow so distorted and appalling that Julian almost grew red as he observed it, and felt that Valentine was probably observing it also. He wished poor Cuckoo had left the crying scarlet gown at home, and those black lozenges, which were suited to the pavement of the hall of a financier. Everything she had on expressed a mind such as Valentine must become acquainted with in amazement, and have intercourse with in sorrow. The pathetic side of this preposterous feathered and bugled degradation he would fail to see.

Julian felt painfully certain of this. All the details of the woman would offend him, who was so alive to the value of fine details in life. He must surely be wondering with all his soul how Julian could ever have contemplated continuing the intercourse with Cuckoo which had been begun for a definite purpose already accomplished. Yet Julian's feeling of friendship towards this rouged scarecrow with the pathetic eyes and the anxious hands did not diminish as he blushed for her, but rather increased, fed, it seemed, by the discordant trifles in which her soul moved as in a maze. He was so much in the thrall of thought that he had become quite unconscious of the awkwardness of the brooding silence, when he heard Valentine's voice say:

"Are you fond of art, Miss Bright?"

The question sounded as if addressed to some society woman at home in Melbury Road. Addressed to Cuckoo it was entirely absurd, and Julian glanced at Valentine to deprecate the gay sarcasm which he suspected.

But Valentine's face disarmed him, it was so gravely and serenely polite.

"Eh?" said Cuckoo.

"Are you fond of art? or do you prefer literature?"

"I don't know," she said nervously.

"Or perhaps music?"

"I like singing," she said. "And the organs."

"Do sing us something, Val," Julian said, to create a diversion.

But Valentine shook his head.

"Not to-day. I have got a cold in my throat."

"Well, then, play something."

But Valentine did not seem to hear the last request. He had turned again to Cuckoo, who visibly shied away from him, and clattered the teacup and saucer, which she held like one alarmed.

"Music is a great art," he said persuasively. "And appeals essentially to one's emotions. I am certain now that you are emotional."

"I don't know, I'm sure," she said, with an effort at self-confidence.

"You feel strongly, whether it be love or hate."

This last remark seemed to reach her, even to stir her to something more definite than mere _mauvaise honte_. She glanced quickly from Julian to Valentine.

"Love and hate," she responded. "Yes, that's it; I could feel them both.

You're right there, my d--, I mean yes."

And again she looked from one young man to the other. She had put up her veil, which was stretched in a bunched-up ma.s.s across her powdered forehead, and Julian had an odd fancy that in the firelight he saw upon her haggard young face the rapid and fleeting expression of the two violently opposed emotions of which she spoke. Her face, turned upon him, seemed to shine with a queer, almost with a ludicrous, vehemence of yearning which might mean pa.s.sion. This flashed into the sudden frown of a young harridan as her eyes travelled on to Valentine. But the frown died quickly, and she looked downcast, and sat biting her thin lips, and crumbling a biscuit into the tiny blue and white china plate upon her knee.

"And do you give way to your impulses?" Valentine continued, still very gravely.

"What?"

"Do you express what you feel?"

A flash of childish cunning crept into her eyes and mouth, giving her the aspect of a _gamin_.

"No; I ain't such a fool," she answered. "Men don't like to be told the truth. Do they, now?"

The question went to Julian.

"Why not?" he asked

"Oh, they like to be fooled. If you don't fool them, they fool you."

"A sufficiently clear statement of the relations of the s.e.xes through all time," said Valentine. "Have you ever studied Schopenhauer?"

"Ah, now, you're kiddin' me!" was her not inappropriate answer.

She was getting a little more at her ease, but she still stole frequent furtive glances at Valentine from time to time, and moved with an uncomfortable jerk if he bent forward to her or seemed about to come near to her. He seemed now really interested in her personality, and Julian began to wonder if its very vulgarity came to him with a charm of novelty.

"Kidding?" Valentine said, interrogatively.

"Gettin' at me! Pullin' my leg! Oh, I know you!" cried Cuckoo. "I'm up to all them games. You don't get a rise out of me."

"The lady speaks in parables," Valentine murmured to Julian. "I a.s.sure you," he added aloud, "I am speaking quite seriously."

"Oh, seriously be hanged!" said Cuckoo, recklessly. "You're a regular funny feller. Oh yes. Only don't try to be funny with me, because I'm up to all that."

She seemed suddenly bent on turning the tables on one whom she apparently regarded as her adversary. Some people, when they do make an effort of will, are always carried forward by the unwonted exertion into an almost libertine excess. Miss Bright's timidity was now developing into violent impudence. She tossed her head till the gigantic shadow of the sarcophagus that crowned it aspired upon the wall almost to the ceiling. She stuck her feet out upon the stool aggressively, and her arms instinctively sought the akimbo position that is the physical expression of mental hardihood in vulgar natures.

"Go along!" she said.

Valentine pretended to take her at her word. He got up.

"Where shall I go? I am your slave!"

She laughed shrilly.

"Go to blazes if you like."

Valentine crossed to the door, and, before Julian had time to speak, opened it and quietly vanished. Julian and Cuckoo were left staring at one another. The latter's impudence had suddenly evaporated. Her face was working as if she was astonished and afraid.

"What's he after? What's he after, I say?" she e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed. "Go and see."

But Julian shook his head.

"It's all right. He has only done it for a joke. He will be back directly."

"Yes, but--but."

She seemed really frightened. Julian supposed she realized her rudeness vaguely, and imagined she had made an abominable _faux pas_. Acting on this supposition, he said rea.s.suringly:

"He didn't mind your chaff. He knew you were only joking."