The Limit Part 19

She blushed crimson, turned her face away, and said, "Please yourself."

Unable to help laughing, he kissed the top of her head, told her to write to him, and left the house, feeling like an entirely new and recently-discovered kind of bounder.

He hated the double game. It didn't amuse him a bit. But now he felt he was free for a month's holiday, during which he had, however, the unpleasant holiday task of breaking the news to Valentia.

He was driving home, but changed his mind and called out to the cabman to drive to Valentia's house.

He found her trying on furs--furs in mid-summer!

She greeted the arrival of his exquisite discrimination and taste with clapped hands, soft, beaming eyes, and her smile--Valentia's smile. Miss Walmer couldn't smile at all--she didn't know how. She could only laugh.

CHAPTER XVI

MRS. FOSTER

Daphne had come to say good-bye to Mrs. Foster.

This lady lived in a kind of model cottage in a garden in Ham Common. It was not at all like the ideal, 'quaint' model cottages that one sees advertised by well-known firms of furnishers, though it might have been.

Mrs. Foster was rebellious to Waring, and sincerely disliked anything modern.

The little drawing-room, and indeed every other room in the house, was princ.i.p.ally furnished by photographs and groups of her son Cyril--Cyril as a very plain boy, in a skirt, with hardly any eyes or hair, and a pout; Cyril as a 'perfect pet' of a sailor, at six. Then Cyril in cricketing groups (how he stood out against the other ordinary boys!)--in Etons (looking neat and supercilious), and then in his uniform, in which he looked simply lovely.

Daphne had an intense and growing desire to please his mother. In fact, curiously, she was more anxious to gain her approbation than that of Cyril himself. To this end she usually remade her hats, when possible, in the train on her way to Ham Common, and her pocket when she arrived there was usually filled with artificial flowers, feathers, or other ornaments that she had taken off her hat, so as to look simple. Also she turned it down all the way round to make it look as if it were merely a protection from the sun--not a hat.

To-day she wore a pink-spotted muslin dress and a straw hat, with pink ribbon. She certainly looked extremely pretty, and not at all what she had such a dread of before Mrs. Foster, smart. Mrs. Foster had a horror of smartness in the _jeune fille_.

Daphne delighted her. She was a very sentimental woman, with a strong theoretical bias for the practical. She was by way of teaching Daphne housekeeping and how to manage on a small income (of which art she knew very little herself, but was supposed to know a great deal because she wore a kind of cap). She had a pretty, delicate, kind face, and was wearing large wash-leather gloves, in case she should wish to do a little gardening later on.

Daphne had still much of the child in her, and there was nothing she enjoyed quite so much as gardening with Mrs. Foster, and occasionally stopping to eat a gingerbread-nut, and hear something about Cyril and the brilliant remarks he had made as a child.

Mrs. Foster had a chiffonnier of a kind Daphne had never seen before, which fascinated her because such queer delightful things came out of it in the middle of the morning--slices of seed cake, apples, and the gingerbread-nuts. There were pink shavings in the fireplace, and wherever there was not a photograph of Cyril there was one of the Prince Imperial. Evidently he had been the pa.s.sion of Mrs. Foster's earlier life. She loved to tell the story of how she had seen him at Chislehurst, and how she thought he had looked at her.

There were other nice things in the cottage: there were two rather large vases of pink china on which were reproduced photographs of Cyril's great-uncle and great-aunt--one in whiskers, the other in parted but raised hair with an Alexandra curl on the left shoulder. In these vases folded slips of paper called spills were kept. A modern note was struck by the presence of a baby Grand--a jolly, clumsy, disproportioned youthful piano, rather like a colt, on which Daphne played Chopin to Mrs. Foster, and sometimes The Chocolate Soldier to Cyril; and Mrs.

Foster, at twilight, sometimes played and even sang, "_I cannot sing the old songs, they are too dear to me,_" which her mother used to sing, or, coming a little nearer to the present, "_Ask nothing more, nothing more, all I can give thee, I give,_" a pa.s.sionate song of the early eighties.

No one, except Daphne, ever did ask any more.

The whole thing was, to Daphne, a treat. Something in the atmosphere of Ladysmith Cottage--that was its name--fascinated and amused her.

Mrs. Foster was a widow. Her husband had been a distinguished soldier.

Almost the whole of her extremely small income had been devoted to Cyril's education, and with the a.s.sistance of an uncle who took interest in him, he had been got into the Guards, where he existed happily with a comparatively small allowance.

Mrs. Foster had not been at all surprised or annoyed at his wishing to marry at twenty-two. She thought it extremely natural. It seemed to her very sensible of Daphne to accept him, and that she was the most fortunate girl in existence.

"I hope your sister doesn't mind my taking you away from the gay, fashionable world for a day?" she archly asked.

"Oh no, of course not. We're going in the country next week, so I wanted to see you."

"Cyril's at Aldershot. I don't think he'll be able to come down this afternoon. He can't get away this week, I'm afraid."

"I shall see him before I go," said Daphne.

"Do you have a letter from him every day, darling?"

"Oh yes, a few lines."

"He is a n.o.ble boy!" said Mrs. Foster enthusiastically. "How he always hated writing letters! I remember how I guided his little hand to write his first letter to his uncle, General Rayner. Just as we got to the end of the letter Cyril suddenly jumped up and threw over the table. The letter was simply drenched in ink. Dear boy! I've got it still.... Oh, you must come into the garden, Daphne. I've something new to show you. A friend of mine has just let her house. She didn't know what to do with her dovecot--n.o.body wanted it--so she's given it to me. Come and see the dear little creatures--they are so pretty."

They went out into the garden and stood looking at a sort of depressed pigeon-house.

Mrs. Foster made strange noises, which she thought suitable to attract the inmates, and Daphne saw two doves who struck her as if they had married in haste and were repenting at leisure.

"Why don't you let them go free?" suggested the girl. "Just think how happy and delighted they'd be."

"I doubt it. I don't think they'd know what to do with their freedom.

They're not used to my garden yet, that's what's the matter. I do wish they would coo; perhaps they will a little later on." (This was a favourite expression of Mrs. Foster's.) "I want to see one perched on your shoulder, Daphne. It would make such a pretty picture."

"I'd rather give them something to eat," said Daphne.

Mrs. Foster started.

"Oh yes, of course. I fed them all yesterday afternoon, but I forgot about them this morning. Henry! Henry!"

The smallest boy appeared that had ever been called by that name.

"Henry, feed the doves."

"Yes, ma'am."

"Then bring the watering-can. We're going to water the flowers."

Henry, who seemed of a morose nature, went to obey.

"I'm obliged to have a boy for the knives, and he acts as a gardener when I'm busy," explained Mrs. Foster. "There isn't much of a kitchen garden, only a few gooseberries and apples, as you know, dear, but it's nice to think they grow there, isn't it?"

"Very."

"Of course, I can't make much show with them. Henry always eats them before they're ripe, which is _rather_ hard. But he's a good, honest boy. One of his sisters has gone in for making blouses--in the village, you know. She's a brave girl, and I feel sure will get on."

"She must be! Have you ever ...?"

"Oh _no_. Of course not. _I_ couldn't. When a woman reaches a certain age, my dear, a certain style is necessary. I don't mean great expense, but simple little things that would suit you, darling, wouldn't do for me. Now that little pink thing that you're wearing--I should look _nothing_ in it, and yet I dare say Henry's sister.... Where did you get it, dear?"

"Well, it _came_ from Paquin's," said Daphne. "It's not new."