The Beauty Part 14

And Eugene hastened to retrieve his blunder, and soon Perdita, who was never long impervious to his spell, was smiling once more.

Miss Carmine, however, was of sterner stuff. She did not wince, although she saw that there was no remedy for Wallace's malady but the knife, and he, unwittingly, wasted no time in precipitating his destiny.

"What are you doing with all those photographs of yourself and Mrs.

Hepworth?" he asked.

"We are going to give them to some reporters, who are getting up stories for the Sunday papers."

"Maud!" Martin spoke in the deep, pained tones of his leading man.

"Maud, I have said nothing. In fact I admired and approved when you and Mrs. Hepworth went into this business venture. But such methods for you, for her! Do you not feel that you owe something to yourselves, and that she at least owes something to Hepworth? Oh, of what are you thinking?"

"Money," said Maud succinctly. "Something you evidently are not thinking of." She glanced toward the stage.

"I hope not," he answered stiffly. "Art--"

"Art, art! Don't prate about art." Maud did not intend to spare the knife. "Art must be an individual expression and your play is simply hash seasoned with reminiscences. Oh, dear, dear Wallace, you can write a good play. I know you can, when you will write as Wallace Martin, and not after Sudermann, Ibsen, Hauptmann, Shaw. Look at this act. Wallace, tell me, is there no other way of picturing the gay, irresponsible life than by a costume ball in an artist's studio? Must the _vie de Boheme_ always be thus presented? Then why does the lover in a problem play usually have to be a Russian prince in Moujik costume? And the heroine's midnight visit to his apartments! Couldn't you, wouldn't they allow you, to write just one play without it? And need the lady, after her past has been discovered and fully discussed, always go out into the tempest in search of her better self, and slam the door behind her?"

"Maud! Maud! You--you are pulling down the pillars of the temple,"

gasped Martin. "It's blasphemous! Every one says the play is good. You can not judge from a rehearsal. Let us change the subject," with dignity. "Since you have not hesitated to criticize me, I feel that I am justified in again urging you not to go into these gaudy advertising methods. Willoughby Hewston seems to feel that Cresswell was terribly chagrined at his wife's going into business. And truly, you should urge her to show some consideration for him."

"A fig for Willoughby Hewston." Maud fumbled in her bag and drew forth an envelope. "Here is a letter I got from Cresswell yesterday. He congratulates me on the enterprise we have shown, and says that he is delighted that Dita's interests have found so congenial and healthful a channel in which to flow."

CHAPTER XV

A WIDOW'S SMILE

One morning, a California morning, all sea-breezes and flower-scents and golden sunshine, Mr. Hepworth read, as he ate his breakfast, a letter from Willoughby Hewston. The letter, in itself, was a long one, and it also contained a bulky enclosure. This enclosure was the full page of a sensational New York newspaper. This exhibited enormous, black head-lines, screaming innuendo of the most blasting character. In the center of the page were pictures of Hepworth and a dark, heavy-browed young woman, with large eyes and strongly-marked Hebraic features. The page was further embellished by pen sketches surrounding these photographic reproductions, sketches of a startling and romantic nature, a wrecked automobile, a picturesque young woman in very high heels and a very long coat, fainting into the arms of a tall, rather elderly man, presumably Hepworth.

Hepworth had scowled and reddened at the first sight of this dreadful page, and his expression did not improve as he continued his perusal of it. Finally, however, his face cleared. He folded it neatly together and placed it carefully in his pocket-book. Not a pleasant incident, but closed. No use in crying over spilled milk. This newspaper account of an adventure had occurred nearly nine days ago and therefore any wonder it may have excited was practically over. He turned again to Hewston's letter and re-read it with mixed expressions in which amus.e.m.e.nt predominated.

When Hewston set out to be profoundly serious, Hepworth always found him intensely funny. Finishing his friend's admonitory epistle, Hepworth next picked up one addressed to him in a smart feminine hand, Alice Wilstead's. He ran his eye over several pages, and then paused at a paragraph which he read over two or three times, his rather worried look changing the while to one of profound dismay, for Mrs. Wilstead not only stated that she was carrying out a long-cherished intention of visiting California with her friends, the Warrens, but, what was more, she was staying not upon the order of her coming, but coming at once.

She digressed at this point to express her pleasure at the thought of seeing him so soon again. He bestowed upon these protestations of friendship one bare, ungrateful glance and rustled over the various sheets of her letter, hoping to gain, if possible, some more definite information; and there it was before his incredulous and resentful eyes.

She was, she explained, writing this "hasty note" (it was eight pages) within an hour of leaving. She expected to arrive in Santa Barbara on the Thursday afternoon train. Why, Great Heavens! He clattered his coffee-cup impatiently in the saucer. This was Thursday morning and he had made all arrangements to spend a rather diversified day, including golf and a luncheon at Monticito with Fuschia and her father, a little fete in honor of Jim's triumphant return, with "the earth, by George, the earth and nothing less in my vest pocket."

"And Alice," Hepworth clattered his cup again, he knew her of old. She was quite as inquisitive as her delicately-pointed tip-tilted nose indicated, and if he wasn't on hand to greet her, she would make life a burden to him until she discovered why.

Hepworth, however, was used to coping with difficult situations. He took what odds fortune offered him and coldly, nonchalantly played to win. He sat for a few moments in deep thought. He had no intention whatever of giving up his day's pleasuring. The only problem which occupied him was what to do with Alice. Inspiration followed thought. He rang the bell and despatched a hasty request that Mr. Hayward Preston come to him at once.

Mr. Preston was a favorite with all mothers, especially those with daughters. They spoke of him in an almost lyric strain. Naturally, one might expect to find him an egregious a.s.s, and avoided of all men. The wonder is that he was not. He had an agreeable appearance, admirable manners, excellent business abilities. His virtues were all a little obvious and robust, and if one insisted on a flaw, it might be said that he lacked subtlety. So much the better. Subtlety destroys a healthy interest in the commonplace and makes of the straight and narrow way a tame and monotonous pathway too rocky for speed.

"Preston," said Hepworth with his usual courteous charm when this younger a.s.sociate in certain business enterprises appeared, "I wish to ask you a favor, or, to put it more correctly, I am going to do you a favor. I have just received a letter from an old friend of mine, Mrs.

Wilstead, saying that she will arrive this afternoon on the three-thirty train. Unfortunately I have another engagement and can not meet her at the station, as, under other circ.u.mstances, I should very much wish to do; so," with another cordial smile, "I am hoping that you will be free to act as my proxy."

Mr. Preston was not free. He had something else on hand, but this fact he did not hint by so much as a flicker of an eyelash, relegated it to the background of his thoughts to be settled later. He was not letting any opportunities to do "the chief" a favor slip lightly by him.

"I shall be very glad to meet Mrs. Wilstead, if you can a.s.sure me that she will accept me as your proxy," he said with a frank smile. "Let me see. The afternoon train. And how shall I know the lady?"

"I will send my chauffeur with you. He knows her. You are sure, Preston," solicitously, "that this does not interfere with any of your plans?"

"Quite sure," returned Preston with convincing sincerity.

"Thank you," said Mr. Hepworth devoutly; he made a mental vow to the effect that Preston should never rue this day.

Thus, it happened that Alice Wilstead, on stepping from the train at the conclusion of her trip across the continent, found, instead of her old friend, a good-looking young man awaiting her, a young man after her own heart, with that gravity and stability of mien, and the dependable smile, which, being in strong contrast to her own volatile self, always impressed her pleasantly.

Hayward Preston, on his part, gazed at the most attractive woman he had ever seen, of the type he particularly admired. Tall, graceful, her vivacious irregular face lighted by the gleam of white teeth and the sparkle of dark eyes, the air of the great world clinging about her as lightly as a perfume.

To her joy, this delightful, wholesome-looking, grave man stopped before her. "Mrs. Wilstead?" he asked.

She looked at him and smiled. It was the most effective smile in her whole a.r.s.enal reserved only for very special occasions.

"Mr. Hepworth was at the last moment detained by certain business matters which are holding him a prisoner at his office and he asked me to act as his proxy. This ought to identify me, ought it not?" with a smile, and he gave her the card upon which Hepworth had written a few lines.

She barely glanced at it and then smiled again, the same smile, only a little diluted. She had seen at once that it was strong wine for Preston.

"You must meet Mr. and Mrs. Warren," she turned to the two who were fussing over their luggage. Warren was a tall, good-looking man and his wife an amiable, attractive little person.

Preston left the question open to them whether they wished to go to their hotel at once or would prefer to drive about, and see something of this new world, into which they had just stepped, and they decided in favor of the latter suggestion.

Through the town they drove, exclaiming over the roses, along the palm-lined boulevard by the sh.o.r.e and then in a rash moment at Alice's request, they turned toward the mountains. A rash suggestion and one that Preston had cause to rue, for presently they pa.s.sed a carriage being rapidly driven in another direction and all apparently in the highest spirits. It was a party of three, two men and a girl, a slender, tanned, laughing girl, who caught Alice's eye at once. The next glance revealed the man who sat beside her, and who was leaning toward her explaining something, to be Cresswell Hepworth. As Alice bent forward, doubting the evidence of her senses, this girl lifted a bonbon from a box on her knees and held it out toward Hepworth with a pair of tiny gilt tongs. He s.n.a.t.c.hed it deftly in one bite, to the accompaniment of immoderate laughter from his friends, in which he joined.

Oh, dignity! Oh, austere grief! What crimes are committed in thy name!

In these days one might well paraphrase the famous lines from _The School for Scandal_ and render them: "When a young girl marries a middle-aged man, what is she to expect?" The situation was graver than even Willoughby Hewston could have predicted. In the first surprise Alice had exclaimed, "Why, that's Cress!" And then to relieve Preston of embarra.s.sment before the Warrens, an embarra.s.sment which was manifesting itself in the deep flush which overspread his face, "He probably got through sooner than he expected," she said in a matter-of-fact tone and dropped the subject.

But she thanked fortune that both Mr. and Mrs. Warren were talkative people given volubly to voice their enthusiasm over the beauty about them, and thus her rather stunned preoccupation pa.s.sed unnoticed.

She had upon her journey, and even before she started, pictured herself as a sort of missionary, with the not altogether unpleasant task before her of cheering up poor Cresswell. She knew the strength of his few affections, his devotion to Perdita and therefore she had some idea of how deeply this breach between them had affected him. But like most women, even the experienced ones, she had never realized that the masculine and feminine att.i.tude toward grief is as wide apart as the poles. They may both wear rue, but with a difference. Woman seeks a cloister that she may brood over her sorrow, commune with it, hug it to her heart in solitude, but man does his best to shake that black, haunting shape, tries to lose it in a crowd, and willingly sips any kind of a nepenthes which seems to offer him forgetfulness.

Alice Wilstead had not expected that Hepworth would make any unmanly exhibition of his woes, weep on her shoulder or be excitingly dramatic; she knew him too well. But she had expected to see him a little older, perhaps; a little grayer, sadder, more quiet, with a hint of melancholy in his eyes. He might--occasionally she pictured the scene--open his heart to her now and then in a grave and reticent way and disclose a strong man's grief; but instead she had seen him sitting up in a very smartly appointed carriage beside a correspondingly smart young woman in a white serge gown, who was in the very act of popping an enormous _marron glace_ between his willing teeth.

"Men," said Mrs. Wilstead to herself, with cynical humor, "are all alike." A nugget of wisdom, by the way, which frequently falls from the lips of a s.e.x p.r.o.ne to generalize from a personal experience.

On arriving at the hotel, Mrs. Warren professed herself a bit weary and retired to her rooms, followed by her dutiful husband, but Alice Wilstead, afire with repressed curiosity, suggested, with another of those smiles, full strength now, that Mr. Preston take a cup of tea with her. She was more tired than she had thought.

For a few moments, Mrs. Wilstead spent herself in enthusiasm for the beauty and charm of the place. Such air! Such scenery! Such flowers!

Then she was solicitous about Preston's tea; two lumps of sugar and two slices of lemon? What mathematical exactness! She took a sip of her own.

Just the right strength and of excellent flavor. What interesting looking people at the table over there; she believed, no, she was quite sure that she had seen them, perhaps met them before. Yes, she remembered the daughter distinctly. It was in Switzerland, a year ago.

She was completely absorbed in the scene before her. "Look at that absurd man yonder, Mr. Preston." Preston eagerly fell in with her mood, lulled to a false sense of security. Then without a minute's warning she opened fire.

"A charming young woman," she began, "is a much more plausible, less hackneyed and convincing excuse than a 'pressing business engagement.'

I'm surprised Cresswell did not think of it. But that would be telling the truth, and you men avoid that as much as possible in dealing with women, do you not?"