When Ghost Meets Ghost Part 38

But the gentleman was not going to let her off, though he was ready to suppose the wheels were the carriage coming back. "It won't catch us up for ever so long, you'll see! Such a quiet evening as this, one hears miles off...." He interrupted his own speech by a variation of tone, repeating the pitfall words:--"'Contrive to exist without'"--and then supplied as sequel:--"'womankind somehow or other.' That's what you mean to say, isn't it?"

"Yes." No qualification!--more pitfalls, perhaps.

"Only I never said anything of the sort! Never meant it, anyhow. What I meant was that I had never caught the disorder like my blind friend. He went off at score like Orlando in 'Winter's Tale.'"

"In 'As You Like It.'"

"I meant 'As You Like It.' I suppose it was because he happened to come across thingummybob--Rosalind."

"It always is."

"P'r'aps I never came across Rosalind. Anyhow, I give you my honour I never had any experience to make me an authority on the subject. I expect you are a much better one than I."

"Why?" Miss d.i.c.kenson's share of the conversation had become very dry and monosyllabic.

What was pa.s.sing in her mind, and reducing her to monosyllables, was the thought that she was a woman, and, as such, handicapped in speech with a man; while he could say all he pleased about himself, and expect her to listen to it with interest. They had been gradually becoming intimate friends, and this intimacy had ripened sensibly even during this short chat, the sequel of the separation from the Archaeological Congress, which it suited them to believe only just out of sight and hearing: quite within shot considered as _chaperons_. Their familiarity had got to such a pitch that the Hon. Percival had contrived to take her into his confidence about his own life, and she had to remain tongue-tied about hers, being a woman.

How could she say to him:--"I have never had the ghost of a love-affair in the whole of my colourless, but irreproachable, life. A mystic usage of my family of four sisters, a nervous invalid mother, and an absent-minded father, determined my status in early girlhood. I was to show a respectful interest in the love-affairs of my sisters, who were handsome and pretty and charming and attractive and _piquantes_, while I was relatively plain and backward, besides having an outcrop on one cheek which has since been successfully removed. I was not to presume upon my position as a sister to express opinions about these said love-affairs, because I was not supposed to know anything about such matters. They were not in my department. My _role_ was a domestic one, and I had a high moral standpoint; which I would gladly have dispensed with, but the force of family tradition overpowered me. It has been a poor consolation to me to carry about this standpoint like a campstool to the houses of the friends I visit at intervals, now that my sisters are all married, and my mother has departed this life, and my father has married a Mrs. Dubosc, with whom I don't agree. I lead a life of constant resentment against unattached mankind, who decide, after critical inspection, that they won't, when I have really never asked them to. You and I have been more companionable--more like keeping company, as Lutwyche would say--than any man I ever came across, and I should like to be able to say to you that, even as you never met with Rosalind, even so I never met with Orlando, but without any phase of my career to correspond with the one you so delicately hinted at just now, in your own. For I fancied I read between your lines that your scheme of life had not been precisely that of an anchorite. Pray understand that I have never supposed it was so, and that I rather honour your attempt to indicate the fact to me without outraging my maidenly--old maidish, if you will--susceptibilities"?

It was because Miss Constance d.i.c.kenson, however improbable it may seem, had wanted to say all this and a great deal more, and could not see her way to any of it, that she had become dry and monosyllabic. It was because of this compulsory silence that she felt that even her brief:--"Why?" in answer to Mr. Pellew's suggestion that an Orlando must have come on her stage though no Rosalind had come on his, struck her after it had pa.s.sed her lips as a false step.

He in his turn was at a loss to get something worded so as not to overstep his familiarity-licence. Rough-hewn, it might have run thus:--"Because no girl, as pretty as you must have been, fifteen or twenty years ago, ever goes without a lover _in posse_, though he may never work out as a husband _in esse_, nor even a _fiance_." He did not see his way to polishing and finishing it so that it would be safe. He could manage nothing better than "Obviously!" He said it twice certainly, and threw away the end of his cigar to repeat it. But he might not have done this if he had not been so near departure.

Somehow, it left them both silent. Sauntering along on the new-fallen beechmast, struck by the gleams of a sunset that seemed to be giving satisfaction to the ringdoves overhead, it could not be necessary to prosecute the conversation. All the same, if it had paused on a different note, an incredibly slight incident that counted for something quite measurable in the judgment of each, might have had no importance whatever.

But really it was so slight an incident that the story is almost ashamed to mention it. It was this. An island of bracken, with briars in its confidence, not negotiable by skirts--especially in those days--must needs split a path of turf-velvet wide enough for acquaintances, into two paths narrow enough for lovers. Practically, the choice between walking in one of these at the risk of some little rabbit misinterpreting their relations, and going round the island, lay with the gentleman. The Hon. Percival did not mince the matter, as he might have done last week, but diminished his distance from his companion in order that one narrow pathway should accommodate both. It was just after they had pa.s.sed the island that Miss d.i.c.kenson exclaimed:--"There's the carriage," and Gwen perceived their consciousness of its proximity. The last episode of the story comes abreast of the present one.

The story is ashamed of its own prolixity. But how is justice to be done to the gradual evolution of a situation if hard-and-fast laws are to be laid down, restricting the number of words that its chronicler shall employ? Condemn him by all means, but admit at least that every smallest incident of the foregoing narrative had its share of influence on the future of its actors.

It is true that nothing very crucial followed. For when, after the carriage had pulled up and interrupted the current of conversation, and gone on again leaving it doubtful how it should be resumed, it again stopped for the pedestrians to overtake it, it became morally inc.u.mbent on them to do so, and also prudent to accept its statement that it was nearly half-past six, and to take advantage of a lift that it offered.

For Mr. Pellew must not miss that train. The carriage may have noticed that it never overtook the Archaeological Congress, which must have walked very quick, unless indeed the two stragglers walked very slow.

Miss d.i.c.kenson must have dressed for dinner much quicker than they walked along the avenue. For when Mr. Pellew, after a short snack, on his way to put himself in the gig beside his traps, looked in at the drawing-room to see if there was anyone he had failed to say good-bye to, he found that lady very successfully groomed in spite of her alacrity, and suggesting surprise at its success. Fancy her being down before everyone else after all! Here is the conversation:

"Well, good-bye! I'll remember the book. I've enjoyed my visit enormously."

"It has been quite delightful. We've had such wonderful weather. Don't put yourself out of the way to bring the book, though. I don't want it back yet a while."

"All right. Thursday morning you leave here, didn't I hear you say? I shall have read it by then. I could drop round Thursday evening. Just suit me!"

"That will do perfectly. Only not if it's the least troublesome to bring it."

"Oh no; not the very slightest! Nine?--half-past?"

"Nine--any time. I would say come to dinner, only I haven't mentioned it to Miss Grahame, and I don't know her arrangements...."

"Bless me, no--the idea! I'll drop round after dinner at the Club. Nine or half-past."

"We shall expect you. Good-bye!"

"Good-bye!" But Mr. Pellew, turning to go and leaving his eyes behind him, collided with the Earl, who was adhering to a conscientious rule of always being punctual for dinner.

"Oh--Percy! You'll lose your train. Stop a minute!--there was something I wanted to say. What _was_ it?... Oh, I know. Gwen's address in London--have you got it? She's going to stay with her cousin, you know--hundred-and-two, Cavendish Square. She'll be glad to see you if you call, I know." This was founded on a misapprehension, which the family resented, that it was not able to take care of itself in his absence. The Countess would have said:--"Fancy Gwen wanting to be provided with visitors!"

This estimable n.o.bleman was destined to suspect he had put his foot in it, this time, from the way in which his suggestion was received. An inexplicable _nuance_ of manner pervaded his two guests, somewhat such as the Confessional might produce in a penitent with a sense of humour, who had committed a funny crime. It was, you see, difficult to a.s.sign a plausible reason why Mr. Pellew and Miss d.i.c.kenson should have already signed a treaty on the subject.

Perhaps it was not altogether disinterested in the gentleman to look at his watch, and accept its warning that nothing short of hysterical haste would catch his train for him. However, the grey mare said, through her official representative in the gig behind her, that we should do it if the train was a minute or so behind. So possibly he was quite sincere.

CHAPTER XXV

CONCERNING CAVENDISH SQUARE, AND ITS WHEREABOUTS IN THE EARLY FIFTIES. MRS. FITZHERBERT AND PRINCESS CAROLINE. TWO LONG-FORGOTTEN CARD-PACKS. DUMMY, AND HOW MR. PELLEW TOOK HIS HAND. GWEN'S PERVERTED WHIST-SENSE. THE DUST OF AGES, AT ITS FINEST. HOW IT TURNED THE TALK, AND MOULDED EVENT. HOW GWEN'S PEN SCRATCHED ON INTO THE NIGHT

Aesthetic Topography is an interesting study. Seen by its light, at the date of this story, Oxford Street was certainly at one and the same time the South of the North of London, and the North of the South. For whereas Hanover Square, which is only a stone's throw to the south of it, is, so to speak, saturated with Piccadilly--and when you are there you may just as well be in Westminster at once--it is undeniable that Cavendish Square is in the zone of influence of Regent's Park, and that Harley and Wimpole Streets, which run side by side north from it, never pause to breathe until they all but touch its palings. Once in Regent's Park, how can Topography--the geometric fallacy apart--ignore St. John's Wood? And once St. John's Wood is admitted, how is it possible to turn a cold shoulder to Primrose Hill? Cross Primrose Hill, and you may just as well be out in the country at once.

But there!--our impressions may be but memories of fifty years ago, and our reader may wonder why Cavendish Square suggests them.

He himself, probably very much our junior--a bad habit other people acquire as Time goes on--may consider Harley Street and Wimpole Street just as much town as Hanover Square, and St. John's Wood--even Primrose Hill!--as on all fours with both. We forgive him. One, or possibly we ought to say several, should learn to be tolerant of the new-fangled opinions of hot-headed youth. We were like that ourself, when a boy. But let him have his own way. These streets shall be unmitigated Town now, to please him, in spite of the walks Dr. Johnson had in Marylebone Fields. To be sure, Marylebone Fields soon became Gardens then-abouts, like Ranelagh, and you drove along Harley Street to a musical entertainment there, with music by Pergolesi and Galuppi.

The time of this story is post-Johnsonian, but it is older than its readers; unless, indeed, a chance oldster now and then opens it to see if it is a proper book to have in the house. The world in the early fifties was very unlike what it is in the present century, and _that_ isn't yet in its teens. It was also very unlike what it had been in the days when the family mansion in Cavendish Square, that had not had a family in it then for forty years, was as good as new. It was so, no doubt, for a good while after George the Third ceased to be King, because the thorough griming it has had since had hardly begun, and fields were sweet at Paddington, and the Regent could be baccha.n.a.lian in that big drawing-room on the first floor without any consciousness that he had a Park in the neighbourhood. Oh dear--how near the country Cavendish Square was in those days!

By the time Queen Victoria was on the throne the grime had set in in earnest, and was hard at work long before the fifty-one Exhibition reported progress--progress in bedevilment, says the Pessimist? Never mind him! Let him sulk in a corner while the Optimist dwells on the marvellous developments of which fifty-one was only symptomatic--the quick-firing guns and smokeless powder; the mighty ships, a dozen of them big enough to take all the Athenians of the days of Pericles to the bottom at once; the machines that turn out books so cheap that their contents may be forgotten in six months, and no one be a penny the worse; the millionaires who have so much money they can't spend it--heaps and heaps of wonders up-to-date that no one ever feels surprised at nowadays. The Optimist will tell you all about them. For the moment, let's pretend that none of them have come to pa.s.s, and get back to Cavendish Square at the date of the story, and the suite of rooms on the second floor that had been Sister Nora's town anchorage when she first made Dave Wardle's acquaintance as an unconscious Hospital patient, and that had been renovated since her father's death to serve as a _pied-a-terre_ until she could be sure of her arrangements in the days to come.

Her friends were not the least too tired, thank you, after the journey, to be shown the great drawing-room, on which the touching incident in the life of a Royal Personage had conferred an historical dignity. "I think--" said she "--only I haven't quite made up my mind yet--that I shall call this ward Mrs. Fitzherbert, and the next room Princess Caroline. Or the other way round. Which do you think?" For one of her schemes was to turn the old family mansion into a Hospital.

"Let me see!" said Gwen. "I've forgotten my history. Mrs. Fitzherbert was his wife, wasn't she?"

Miss d.i.c.kenson was always to be relied on for general information.

"Unquestionably," said she. "But he repudiated her for political reasons, a course open to him as heir to the throne. Legally, Princess Caroline of Brunswick was his lawful wife...."

"And, lawfully," said Gwen, "Mrs. Fitzherbert was his legal wife.

Nothing can be clearer. Yes--I should say certainly call the big room Mrs. Fitzherbert. Whom shall you call the other rooms after, Clo?"

"All the others. There's any number! Mrs. Robinson, Lady Jersey, Lady Conyngham ... one for every room in the house, and several over. Just fancy!--the room has never been altered, since those days. It was polished up for my poor mother--whom no doubt I saw in my youth, but took no notice of. You see, I wasn't of an age to take notice, when she departed to Kingdom-come, and my father exiled himself to Scotland...."

"And he kept it packed up like this--how long?"

"Well--you know how old I am. Twenty-seven."

Aunt Constance corrected dates. "George the Fourth," said she chronologically, "ascended the throne in 1820. Consequently he cannot have become intoxicated in this room...."

Sister Nora interrupted. Of course he couldn't--not in her father's time. The cards and dice were going in her great-uncle's time, who drank himself to death forty years ago. "There used to be some packs of cards," said she, "in one of these drawers. I know I saw some there, only it's a long time back--almost the only time I ever came into the room. I'll look.... Take care of the dust!"

It was lucky that the cabinet-maker who framed that inlaid table knew his business--they did, in his day--or the rounded front might have called for a jerk, instead of giving easily to the pull it had awaited so patiently, through decades. "There they are!" said Gwen, "with n.o.body to deal them. Poor cards--locked up in the dark all these years!