The Mischief-Maker Part 41

"I am glad to hear that you feel like that, Julien. I remember sometimes when we were alone together in England, we seemed to find it a trifle difficult."

"Since then," he replied, "we have both burst the bonds--I of necessity, you of choice."

"I don't believe," she declared, helping herself to _hors d'oeuvres_, "that we are either of us going to be sorry for it."

"One can never tell. So far as you are concerned, I haven't got over the wonder of it yet. You never showed me so much of the woman throughout our engagement as you have shown me during the last few days."

"My dear Julien," she protested, "you didn't know where to look for it.

Why does this funny little man with the mutton-chop whiskers hover around our table all the time?"

"He is distressed," Julien explained, "to see you eating so much bread and b.u.t.ter. He fears that you will not have an appet.i.te for the very excellent dinner which I have ordered."

"He is right," she decided. "Never mind, I will leave the rolls alone.

I am still, I can a.s.sure you, ravenous."

She leaned back and, looking out into the room, began to laugh. People who pa.s.sed never failed to notice her. She was certainly a striking-looking girl and she had, above all, the air.

"Julien," she cried, "this is really too amusing! Did you see who went by just then? It was Lord Athlington--my venerable uncle--with the lady with the yellow hair. He saw you here with me--saw us sitting together alone, having dinner--me unchaperoned, a runaway! Isn't it delicious?"

Julien looked after his companion's elderly relative with a smile.

"I wonder," he remarked, "whether your uncle's magnificent unconsciousness is due to defective eyesight or nerve?"

"Nerve, without a doubt," she insisted. "We all have it. Besides, don't you see he's changed their table so as to be out of sight? I wonder what he really thinks of me! If we'd belonged even to the really smart set in town, it wouldn't have been half so funny. They do so many things that seem wrong that people forget to be shocked."

"I can conceive," he murmured, "that your mother's ambitions would scarcely lead her in that direction."

Lady Anne shrugged her shoulders.

"I don't think she could get in if she tried. The really disreputable people in Society are so exclusive. I wonder, Julien, if I shall be allowed to come out and dine with you when I am Madame Christophor's secretary?"

"Once a week, perhaps," he suggested,--"scarcely oftener, I am afraid."

"Ah! well," she declared, "I shall like work, I am convinced. Julien, you are spoiling me. I am sure this is a _cuisine de luxe_. I told you to take me to a cheap restaurant."

"We will try them all in time," he answered. "I had to start by taking you to my favorite place."

"You really mean, then," she asked, "that you are going on being nice to me? Of course, I haven't the slightest claim on you. I suppose, as a matter of fact, I treated you rather badly, didn't I?"

"Not a bit of it," he a.s.sured her. "I was a failure, that was all. But of course I am going on being nice to you. There aren't too many people over here whom one cares to be with. There aren't very many just now,"

he continued, "who care to be with me."

"Idiotic!" she replied. "Tell me about this work of yours?"

He explained Kendricks' idea. Her eyes glistened.

"It's really splendid," she declared. "How I should love to have seen your first article!"

"You shall read it afterwards," he told her. "I have a copy of _Le Grand Journal_ in my overcoat pocket."

She beckoned to the _vestiaire_.

"I will not wait a moment," she insisted. "I shall read it while dinner is being served. It's a glorious idea, this, to fight your way back with your pen. There are those nowadays who tell us, you know, Julien, that there is more to be done through the Press than in Parliament.

Your spoken words can influence only a small number of people. What you write the world reads."

She explained what she desired to the _vestiaire_. He reappeared a minute or two later with the newspaper. She spread it out before her.

Julien read it over her shoulder. He himself had seen it before, but his own eyes were the brighter as he reread it. When she had finished she said very little. They ate the first course of their dinner almost in silence. Then she laid her hand suddenly upon his.

"Julien, dear," she said, "I have done you a wrong. I am sorry."

"A wrong?" he repeated.

She looked at him almost humbly. There was something new in her eyes, something new in her expression.

"I am afraid," she continued, "that I never looked upon you as anything more than the ordinary stereotyped politician, a skilful debater, of course, and with the chessboard brains of diplomacy. This,"--she touched the newspaper with her forefinger--"this is something very different."

"Do you like it, then?"

"Like it!" she repeated scornfully. "Can't you feel yourself how different it is from those precise, cynical little speeches of yours?

It is as though a smouldering bonfire had leapt suddenly into flame.

There is genius in every line. Go on writing like that, Julien, and you will soon be more powerful than ever you were in the House of Commons."

He laughed. It was absurd to admit it, but nothing had pleased him so much since the coming of his misfortune! She was thoughtful for some time, every now and then glancing back at the newspaper. Over their coffee she broke into a little reminiscent laugh.

"Did I tell you about Mrs. Carraby?" she asked. "Mother and I met her at Wumbledon House, two or three days after her husband's appointment had been confirmed. I can see her now coming towards us. There were so many people around that she had to risk everything. Oh, it was a great moment for mother! She never troubled even to raise her lorgnettes. She never attempted any of that glaring-through-you sort of business. She just looked up at Mrs. Carraby's hand and looked up at her eyes and walked by without changing a muscle. Of course I did the same--very nearly as well, too, I believe. Cat!"

Julien frowned slightly.

"You can imagine," he said, "that I am not very keen about discussing Mrs. Carraby. Yet, after all, her husband and his career were, I suppose, the most important things in life to her."

"Then she's going to have a pretty rocky time," Lady Anne decided. "I don't understand much about politics, but I know it's no use putting a tradesman into the Foreign Office. He's wobbly already, and as for Mrs.

Carraby--well, I don't know if she ever went on with you like it, Julien, but you remember Bob Sutherland--the one in the Guards, I mean?--well, she's going an awful pace with him."

"I think," he declared, "that Mrs. Carraby can take care of herself."

"Perhaps," Lady Anne replied, looking thoughtfully at her cigarette.

"You see, the woman knows in her heart that she's impossible. She copies all our bad tricks. She sees that we all flirt as a matter of course, and she tries to outdo us. It's the old story. What one person can do with impunity, another makes an awful hash of. We can go to the very gates because when we get there we know how to shrug our shoulders and turn away. I am not sure that Mrs. Carraby has breeding enough for that. She'll go through, if Bob has his way."

"You are becoming rather an advanced young person," Julien remarked, as he paid the bill.

"My dear Julien," she said, "I've told you before that you never knew me. If you had appreciated me as I deserved, when you came that cropper you wouldn't have called on me to say good-bye. You'd have left that red-headed friend of yours at home and told me that the empty place in the taxicab was mine."

He laughed and then suddenly became grave.

"Supposing I had?" he whispered.

She looked at him, startled. In that moment he seemed to see a new thing in her face, a new and marvelous softness. It pa.s.sed like a flash--so swiftly that it left him wondering whether it was not indeed a trick of his imagination.

"Absurd!" she murmured. "Tell me, what is there we can do now? Must I go home?"