The Lost Girl Part 33

"Nonsensical?" laughed Alvina. "But I don't know what you call my nonsense."

"Ah," said Madame wearily. "They never understand. But I like you, my dear. I am an old woman--"

"Younger than I," said Alvina.

"Younger than you, because I am practical from the heart, and not only from the head. You are not practical from the heart. And yet you have a heart."

"But all Englishwomen have good hearts," protested Alvina.

"No! No!" objected Madame. "They are all ve-ry kind, and ve-ry practical with their kindness. But they have no heart in all their kindness. It is all head, all head: the kindness of the head."

"I can't agree with you," said Alvina.

"No. No. I don't expect it. But I don't mind. You are very kind to me, and I thank you. But it is from the head, you see. And so I thank you from the head. From the heart--no."

Madame plucked her white fingers together and laid them on her breast with a gesture of repudiation. Her black eyes stared spitefully.

"But Madame," said Alvina, nettled, "I should never be half such a good business woman as you. Isn't that from the head?"

"Ha! of course! Of course you wouldn't be a good business woman.

Because you are kind from the head. I--" she tapped her forehead and shook her head--"I am not kind from the head. From the head I am business-woman, good business-woman. Of course I am a good business-woman--of course! But--" here she changed her expression, widened her eyes, and laid her hand on her breast--"when the heart speaks--then I listen with the heart. I do not listen with the head.

The heart hears the heart. The head--that is another thing. But you have blue eyes, you cannot understand. Only dark eyes--" She paused and mused.

"And what about yellow eyes?" asked Alvina, laughing.

Madame darted a look at her, her lips curling with a very faint, fine smile of derision. Yet for the first time her black eyes dilated and became warm.

"Yellow eyes like Ciccio's?" she said, with her great watchful eyes and her smiling, subtle mouth. "They are the darkest of all." And she shook her head roguishly.

"Are they!" said Alvina confusedly, feeling a blush burning up her throat into her face.

"Ha--ha!" laughed Madame. "Ha-ha! I am an old woman, you see. My heart is old enough to be kind, and my head is old enough to be clever. My heart is kind to few people--very few--especially in this England. My young men know that. But perhaps to you it is kind."

"Thank you," said Alvina.

"There! From the head _Thank you_. It is not well done, you see. You see!"

But Alvina ran away in confusion. She felt Madame was having her on a string.

Mr. May enjoyed himself hugely playing Kishwegin. When Madame came downstairs Louis, who was a good satirical mimic, imitated him.

Alvina happened to come into their sitting-room in the midst of their bursts of laughter. They all stopped and looked at her cautiously.

"Continuez! Continuez!" said Madame to Louis. And to Alvina: "Sit down, my dear, and see what a good actor we have in our Louis."

Louis glanced round, laid his head a little on one side and drew in his chin, with Mr. May's smirk exactly, and wagging his tail slightly, he commenced to play the false Kishwegin. He sidled and bridled and e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed with raised hands, and in the dumb show the tall Frenchman made such a ludicrous caricature of Mr. Houghton's manager that Madame wept again with laughter, whilst Max leaned back against the wall and giggled continuously like some pot involuntarily boiling. Geoffrey spread his shut fists across the table and shouted with laughter, Ciccio threw back his head and showed all his teeth in a loud laugh of delighted derision. Alvina laughed also. But she flushed. There was a certain biting, annihilating quality in Louis' derision of the absentee. And the others enjoyed it so much. At moments Alvina caught her lip between her teeth, it was so screamingly funny, and so annihilating. She laughed in spite of herself. In spite of herself she was shaken into a convulsion of laughter. Louis was masterful--he mastered her psyche. She laughed till her head lay helpless on the chair, she could not move. Helpless, inert she lay, in her o.r.g.a.s.m of laughter.

The end of Mr. May. Yet she was hurt.

And then Madame wiped her own shrewd black eyes, and nodded slow approval. Suddenly Louis started and held up a warning finger. They all at once covered their smiles and pulled themselves together.

Only Alvina lay silently laughing.

"Oh, good morning, Mrs. Rollings!" they heard Mr. May's voice. "Your company is lively. Is Miss Houghton here? May I go through?"

They heard his quick little step and his quick little tap.

"Come in," called Madame.

The Natcha-Kee-Tawaras all sat with straight faces. Only poor Alvina lay back in her chair in a new weak convulsion. Mr. May glanced quickly round, and advanced to Madame.

"Oh, good-morning, Madame, so glad to see you downstairs," he said, taking her hand and bowing ceremoniously. "Excuse my intruding on your mirth!" He looked archly round. Alvina was still incompetent.

She lay leaning sideways in her chair, and could not even speak to him.

"It was evidently a good joke," he said. "May I hear it too?"

"Oh," said Madame, drawling. "It was no joke. It was only Louis making a fool of himself, doing a turn."

"Must have been a good one," said Mr. May. "Can't we put it on?"

"No," drawled Madame, "it was nothing--just a non-sensical mood of the moment. Won't you sit down? You would like a little whiskey?--yes?"

Max poured out whiskey and water for Mr. May.

Alvina sat with her face averted, quiet, but unable to speak to Mr.

May. Max and Louis had become polite. Geoffrey stared with his big, dark-blue eyes stolidly at the newcomer. Ciccio leaned with his arms on his knees, looking sideways under his long lashes at the inert Alvina.

"Well," said Madame, "and are you satisfied with your houses?"

"Oh yes," said Mr. May. "Quite! The two nights have been excellent.

Excellent!"

"Ah--I am glad. And Miss Houghton tells me I should not dance tomorrow, it is too soon."

"Miss Houghton _knows_," said Mr. May archly.

"Of course!" said Madame. "I must do as she tells me."

"Why yes, since it is for your good, and not hers."

"Of course! Of course! It is very kind of her."

"Miss Houghton is _most_ kind--to _every one_," said Mr. May.

"I am sure," said Madame. "And I am very glad you have been such a good Kishwegin. That is very nice also."

"Yes," replied Mr. May. "I begin to wonder if I have mistaken my vocation. I should have been _on_ the boards, instead of behind them."

"No doubt," said Madame. "But it is a little late--"

The eyes of the foreigners, watching him, flattered Mr. May.