Poppy Part 62

"Oh, yes ... you can have it, if you like."

"_What?_"

"Yes, really--and whichever others you like." Bramham seized her card blithely.

"Now this comes of getting ahead of pirates like Abinger and Carson----"

"But ... _he_ ... has not returned?" she asked quickly. It occurred to Bramham to be wily in the interest of his dances. Carson is big enough and ugly enough to look after himself, was his thought.

"No ... not yet. But he _might_ run in, mightn't he? You're not thinking of going back on me, are you?"

"Of course not!" She turned away.

He dotted his initials thickly on her card, for he had discovered at a little informal affair that she danced delightfully. When he gave it back, her hands were trembling violently. Even the mention of Carson's return had power to shake her whole being.

Mrs. Portal came in, looking thin and worn, but with her little gay air that carried everything along and made people forget to observe that her eyes were ringed, and her cheeks drawn, or what colour she was dressed in. Laughing and apologising, she implored Poppy to give a glance at the back of her gown to see if it was all right.

"Really, I believe I laced it with my toes," she said. "My hands haven't had a moment since daybreak.... Come along, or we shall be late, and have to sit glued to the wall all night.... Miss Allendner, you simply take the shine out of us all in that gown ... you are _all_ shine ... I never saw any one so shamefully magnificent.... Come along, good peoples." She pushed the pleased old soul gently out of the room before her, and Bramham and Poppy followed. Miss Allendner was, indeed, at her best in a shining sequined gown, which Mrs. Portal had been at some pains to reconstruct and bring up-to-date.

Eventually they set off--Poppy still carrying her bunch of orange leaves, faintly scenting the carriage. Sometimes when the others were absorbed in talk, she secretly pressed them against her heart. She felt as though she had gone back again to the days of her childhood, when misery claimed her, and there was no hope of comfort, or strength, or kindness, from anything but trees and green leaves. She was glad that she wore her mother's old green brooch and that there were great pieces of green malachite in the high Empire comb she had stuck in her piled-up crown of black, black hair; she needed all the strength that green things could give her to-night.

One of the first people they saw on entering was Mary Cap.r.o.n, standing in the centre of the ball-room, a little crowd of people about her, supremely beautiful in black lace and diamonds. She came over to them at once with a little loving pat of welcome for Clem and a brilliant smile for the others. She half extended her hand to Poppy, in friendliness; but Poppy turned away from her. She could not welcome the touch of a hand that had smitten happiness out of her life. They all moved down the big ball-room together. There were little groups everywhere of laughing men and women, and the seats that ran all round the room were all occupied. The bandsmen up on the stage, ma.s.sed with palms and flags and greenery, were making quivery-quavery sounds on their instruments.

Other women came up and greeted them.

"What a crush!... we shall have the gowns torn off our backs when the dancing begins ... don't you think it was a mistake to have the ball so early?... so hot still!"

Behind her Poppy heard one of the Maritzburg women say to the other in a low voice:

"Clem's got paint on again.... She never used to do it ... I wonder if Bill has been badly hit in the slump? There's _something_ wrong!"

"I hear that Nick came in from the camp at the last moment. Do you think it could possibly be true, Clem?" said Mrs. Cap.r.o.n.

"That depends on who told you."

"Young Head. He said he heard someone say that Nick and your Billy were both at the Club. Perhaps they are going to surprise us by appearing."

Mrs. Cap.r.o.n's voice did not express much enthusiasm. Clem's eyes flashed like lightning round the room, in search of young Head, and she saw him immediately, busily collecting dances. She had an inclination to rush straight over to him, but she curbed it. Another inclination that almost overwhelmed her was to fly from the hall, and take a rickshaw to the Club; but she curbed that too, though to do so cost an effort that threw up her rouge-spots more clearly by reason of the increased pallor of her cheeks. She continued to talk easily.

"How did you get here, Mary?"

"I drove down with Mrs. Lace. How do I look, darling? This is my _Mac.h.i.n.ka_ gown ... you haven't seen it before, have you?"

"Perfect, dear. I never saw you look more beautiful.... Isn't Poppy wonderful to-night, too? ... she looks like a woman who has stepped out of a dream ... no wonder the men crowd round her. If I could only catch her eye, we'd move on."

When Poppy's card was all but full, a voice said at her elbow:

"Don't forget _me_." Nothing could have looked more out of place in that gay ball-room than Abinger's scarred, sardonic face. But he stood there, cool and irreproachably dressed.

"I'm sorry. I'm afraid there are none left."

"I am unfortunate." He shrugged and turned away, and Poppy, looking round for the others, caught Clem Portal's face with the mask off for one moment. With that sight her faltering, fainting purpose changed to firm resolution. Softly she called after Abinger, but when he reached her again she seemed breathless.

"I have a dance ... number five--" She held out her card, and while he wrote upon it she spoke again, swiftly and low. The preliminary soft bars of the first waltz were already floating down the room.

"Will you please be where I can see you--and reach you _instantly_ ...

if I should want you?"

A slight, bitter smile came to his lips.

"Certainly! The middle of the room would be a good place, I should say."

Her eyes blazed at him for a moment. Then a subtle, alluring look crossed her face, for all her lips were the lips of a ghost. She half whispered to him:

"Do you want me--_Luce_?"

Her eyes looked into his for one short instant before she veiled them quickly, and her heart seemed to turn over within her, for desire stalked, naked and unashamed, in the eyes of Luce Abinger.

"Do I want you. By G.o.d!" he said, under his breath.

"Well--to-night--I think I may come--_home_," she faltered; then without another word or look she turned away, and took Bramham's arm for the first waltz.

Abinger did not approach her again; neither did he dance. He lounged conspicuously in a doorway, and if anyone spoke to him, he snarled at them and they went hastily away. When the fifth dance came, he waited until the music began; then walked across to where Poppy was sitting, offered his arm nonchalantly, and they took the floor together. When they had been dancing for a few moments he spoke:

"Poppy ... _to-night_?"

"To-night," her pale lips gave back answer. Her feet moved in time to the waltz, but she lay half fainting in his arms. He had the daring to bend his head and touch her face with his burning lips. Amid the flashing lights of jewels, and the whirling faces, it was almost safe to have gone unnoticed; everyone was too busy to watch what others were doing.

But there happened to be a man standing in a doorway, hiding his grey travelling tweeds behind two or three immaculates, who were trying to persuade him that it would be quite a remarkable joke if he would come in as he was, and pirouette amongst the dancers.

"Come on now, Carson ... give us a taste of the old Karri of old, mad days," a Rand man was saying; and Carson, though listening and laughing, was watching two people in the room. So it happened that he saw the kiss--and the woman's face almost lying on Abinger's shoulder. How could he know that she was dazed, half unconscious, not knowing what she did, or caring? Abruptly he pushed through the laughing group and stood full in the doorway. For an instant he was on the verge of trampling over everyone in the room to get to those two and tear them apart; for an instant the other men thought they were going to have a return of mad Carson with a vengeance, and were sorry they had spoken; one of them laid a hand on his arm. But in that instant a woman's eyes had met Carson's--long, topaz-coloured eyes, full of eager welcome and tenderness. The next moment he had flung away from the other men, and was striding through the wide vestibule, down the Town Hall steps towards a rickshaw, to take him G.o.d knew where. As he put his foot on it a hand fell to his shoulder, and Brookfield's voice to his ear--full of relief.

"Carson! By gad! I'm glad you're back; Cap.r.o.n's cut his throat, and they say he's dying at the Club. Come on!"

Carson stared at him with a stunned air.

"Cap.r.o.n!" he stammered.

"Yes; sliced his head off nearly. He was too drunk to go home, so they hid him in Ferrand's room at the Club with Portal in charge. But while Portal was out of the room for a moment, Nick found Ferrand's best razor."

"Well, I can't come," said Carson roughly, after a pause. "I have business of my own."

"You've _got_ to come, Karri. He's raving for you. Someone said you'd arrived, and Ferrand told me to find you, or he'd have another haemorrhage. Come on, now. He won't keep you long; he's booked!"

Carson cursed and muttered, but eventually they got into the rickshaw and went off together.

Five minutes later a woman shrouded in a long, black satin cloak, her head m.u.f.fled in veils, slipped down the steps and beckoned a rickshaw.

In a whisper she directed the _boy_ and told him to hurry.