Between the Dark and the Daylight Part 31

Miss Hardy gave her look for look. One felt that the woman knew that the girl was speaking the truth, although she might not choose to own it.

"May did many things of which her mother had no knowledge. How could it be otherwise? When a mother makes it her business to repress at any cost the reasonable desires which are bound up in her daughter's very being, she must expect to be deceived. As I say, my brother Claud saw her act in some private theatricals. And he was persuaded that, for once in a way, hers was not a case of a person mistaking the desire to be, for the power to be, because she was an actress born. Then things came to a climax. May wrote to me to say that she was leaving college, that her mother was in America, and that so far as her ever becoming an actress was concerned, so far as she could judge, it was a case of now or never. I showed her letter to Claud. He at once declared that it should be a case of now. A new play was coming out, in which he was to act, and in which, he said, there was a part which would fit May like a glove. It was not a large part; still, there it was. If she chose, he would see she had it. I wrote and told her what Claud said. She jumped for joy--through the post, you understand. Then they began to draw me in. Until her mother's return, May was to have gone, for safe keeping, to one of her mother's particular friends. If she had gone, the thing would have been hopeless. But, at the last moment, the plan fell through. It was arranged, instead, that she should go to her aunt--to you, Mrs. Plaskett. You had not seen her since her childhood; you had no notion of what she looked like. I really do not know from whom the suggestion came, but it was suggested that I should come to you, pretending to be her. And I was to keep on pretending till the rubicon was pa.s.sed and the play produced. If she once succeeded in gaining a footing on the stage, though it might be never so slight a one, May declared that wild horses should not drag her back again. And I knew her well enough to be aware that, when she said a thing, she meant exactly what she said. Mrs. Plaskett, I should have made you this confession of my own initiative next week. Indeed, May would have come and told you the tale herself, if Mrs. Riddle had not returned all these months before any one expected her. Because, as it happens, the play was produced last night----"

Mrs. Riddle had been listening, with a face as black as a thunder-cloud. Here she again laid her hand upon Miss Hardy's shoulder.

"Where? Tell me! I will still save her, though, to do so, I have to drag her through the streets."

Miss Hardy turned to her with a smile.

"May does not need saving, she already has attained salvation. I hear, not only that the play was a great success, but that May's part, as she acted it, was the success of the play. As for dragging her through the streets, you know that you are talking nonsense. She is of an age to do as she pleases. You have no more power to put constraint upon her, than you have to put constraint upon me."

All at once Miss Hardy let herself go, as it were.

"Mrs. Riddle, you have spent a large part of your life in libelling all that I hold dearest; you will now be taught of how great a libel you have been guilty. You will learn from the example of your daughter's own life, that women can, and do, live as pure and as decent lives upon one sort of stage, as are lived, upon another sort of stage, by 'Women Crusaders.'"

She swept the infuriated Mrs. Riddle such a curtsy.... Well, there's the story for you, Dave. There was, I believe, a lot more talking. And some of it, I dare say, approached to high faluting. But I had had enough of it, and went outside. Miss Hardy insisted on leaving the house that very day. As I felt that I might not be wanted, I also left.

We went up to town together in the same carriage. We had it to ourselves. And that night I saw May Riddle, the real May Riddle. I don't mind telling you in private, that she is acting in that new thing of Pettigrewe's, "The Flying Folly," under the name of Miss Lyndhurst.

She only has a small part; but, as Miss Hardy declares her brother said of her, she plays it like an actress born. I should not be surprised if she becomes all the rage before long.

One could not help feeling sorry for Mrs. Riddle, in a kind of a way. I dare say she feels pretty bad about it all. But then she only has herself to blame. When a mother and her daughter pull different ways, it is apt to become a question of pull butcher, pull baker. The odds are that, in the end, you will prevail. Especially when the daughter has as much resolution as the mother.

As for Daisy Hardy, whatever else one may say of her proceedings, one cannot help thinking of her--at least, I can't--as, as they had it in the coster ballad, "such a pal." I believe she is going to the Plasketts again next week. If she does I have half a mind----though I know she will only laugh at me, if I do go. I don't care. Between you and me, I don't believe she's half so wedded to the stage as she pretends she is.

Miss Donne's Great Gamble

You cannot keep on meeting the same man by accident--not in that way.

To suggest such a possibility would be to carry the doctrine of probabilities too far. Miss Donne began herself to think that such might be the case. She had first encountered him at Geneva--at the Pension Dupont. There his bearing had not only been extremely deferential, but absolutely distant. Possibly this was in some measure owing to Miss Donne herself, who, at that stage of her travels, was the most unapproachable of human beings. During the last few days of her stay he had sat next to her at table, in which position it had seemed to her that a certain amount of conversation was not to be avoided. He had informed her, in the course of the remarks which the situation necessitated, that he was an American and a bachelor, and also that his name was Huhn.

So far as Miss Donne was concerned the encounter would merely have been pigeon-holed among the other noticeable incidents of that memorable journey had it not been that two days after her arrival at Lausanne she met him in the open street--to be exact, in the Place de la Gare. Not only did he bow, but he stopped to talk with the air of quite an old acquaintance.

But it was at Lucerne that the situation began to a.s.sume a really curious phase. Miss Donne left Lausanne on a Thursday. On the day before she told Mr. Huhn she was going, and where she intended to stop.

Mr. Huhn made no comment on the information, which was given casually while they waited among a crowd of other persons for the steamer. No one could have inferred from his manner that it was not his intention to end his days at Lausanne. When therefore, on the morning after her arrival, she found him seated by her side at lunch she was thrown into a flurry of surprise. As he seemed, however, to conclude that she would take his appearance for granted--not attempting to offer the slightest explanation of how it was that he was where he was--she presently found herself talking to him as if his presence there was quite in accordance with the order of Nature. But when, afterwards, she went upstairs to put her hat on, she--well, she found herself disposed to try her best not to ask herself a question.

Those four weeks at Lucerne were the happiest she had known. A sociable set was staying in the house just then. Everyone behaved to her with surprising kindness. Scarcely an excursion was got up without her being attached to it. Another invariable pendant was Mr. Huhn. It was impossible to conceal from herself the fact that when the parties were once started it was Mr. Huhn who personally conducted her. A better conductor she could not have wished. Without being obtrusive, when he was wanted he was always there. Unostentatiously he studied her little idiosyncrasies, making it his especial business to see that nothing was lacking which made for her own particular enjoyment. As a conversationalist she had never met his equal. But then, as she admitted with that honesty which was her ruling pa.s.sion, she never had had experience of masculine discourse. Nor, perhaps, was the position rendered less enjoyable by the fact that she was haunted by misgivings as to whether her relations with Mr. Huhn were altogether in accordance with strict propriety. She was a lady travelling alone. He was a stranger; self-introduced. Whether, under any circ.u.mstances, a lady in her position ought to allow herself to be on terms of vague familiarity with a gentleman in his, was a point on which she could hardly be said to have doubts. She was convinced that she ought not. Theoretically, that was a principle for which she would have been almost willing to have died. When she reflected on what she had preached to others, metaphorically she s.h.i.+vered in her shoes. She was half alarmed by the necessity she was under to acknowledge that it was a kind of s.h.i.+vering which could not be correctly described as disagreeable.

The domain of the extraordinary was entered on after her departure from Lucerne. At the Pension Emeritus her plans were public property. It was generally known that she proposed to return to England by way of Paris and Dieppe. In Paris she was to spend a few days, and in Dieppe a week or two. Practically the whole pension was at the station to see her off. She was overwhelmed with confectionery and flowers. Mr. Huhn, in particular, gave her a gorgeous bouquet, and a box of what purported to be chocolates. It was only after she had started that she discovered the chocolates were a sham; and that, hidden in the very midst of them, was another package. The very sight of it filled her with singular qualms. Other people were in the carriage. She deemed it prudent to ignore its existence in the presence of what quite possibly were observant eyes. But directly she had a moment of comparative privacy she removed it from its hiding-place with what--positively!--were trembling fingers. It was secured by pink baby-ribbon tied in a true-lover's knot. Within was a leather case. In the case was a flexible gold bracelet, with on one side a circular ornament which was incrusted with diamonds. As she was fingering this she must have touched a hidden spring, because all at once the glittering toy sprang open, revealing inside--of all things in the world--a portrait of Mr. Huhn!

She gazed at it in bewildered amazement. All the way to Paris she was rent by conflicting emotions. That a perfect stranger should have dared to take such a liberty! Because, after all, she knew nothing of him--absolutely nothing, except that he was an American; which one piece of knowledge was, perhaps, a sufficient explanation. For all she knew, the Americans might have ideas of their own upon such subjects. This sort of behaviour might be in complete accord with their standard of propriety. The contemplation of such a possibility made her sigh. She actually nearly regretted that her standard was the English one, so strongly did she feel that there was something to be said for the American point of view, if, that is, it truly was the American point of view; which, of course, had still to be determined.

Had the bracelet been trumpery trash, costing say, fifteen or twenty francs, the case would have been altered. Of that there could be no doubt. But this triumph of the jeweller's art, with its costly diamond ornaments! She herself had never owned a decent trinket. Her personal knowledge of values was nil. Yet her instincts told her that this cost money. Then there was the name of "Tiffany" on the case. She had a dim consciousness of having heard of Tiffany. It might have cost one hundred--even two hundred--pounds! At the thought she burned. Who was she, and what had she done, that wandering males--the merest casual acquaintances--should feel themselves at liberty to throw bank notes into her lap? As if she were a beggar--or worse. There was a moment in which she was inclined to throw the bracelet out of the carriage window.

The mischief was that she did not know where to return it. She had Mr.

Huhn's own a.s.surance that he also was leaving Lucerne on that same day.

Where he was going she had not the faintest notion. At least, she a.s.sured herself that she had not the faintest notion. To return it, by post, to Ezra G. Huhn, America, would be absurd. She might send it back to the person whose name was on the case--to Tiffany. She would.

Then there was the portrait--hidden in the bracelet--which he had had the capital audacity to palm off on to her under cover of a box of chocolates. It was excellent--that was certain.

The shrewd face, with the kindly eyes in which there always seemed to be a twinkle, looked up at her out of the little gold frame like an old familiar friend. How pleasant he had been to her; how good. How she always felt at ease with him; never once afraid. Although he had never by so much as a single question sought to gain her confidence, what a curious feeling she had had that he knew all about her, that he understood her. How she had been impressed by his way of doing things; his quick resource; his capacity of getting--without any fuss--the best that was obtainable. How she had come to rely upon him--in an altogether indescribable sort of way--when he was at hand; she saw it now. How, in spite of herself, she had grown to feel at peace with all the world when he was near. How curious it seemed. As she thought of its exceeding curiousness, fancying that she perceived in the portrayed glance the twinkle which she had begun to know so well, her eyes filled with tears, so that she had to use her handkerchief to prevent them trickling down her cheeks. During the remainder of her journey to Paris that bracelet was about her wrist, covered by her jacket-sleeve. More than once she caught herself in the act of crying.

She found it impossible to remain in Paris. The weather was hot. In the brilliant suns.h.i.+ne the streets were one continuous glare. They seemed difficult to breathe in. They made her head ache. She longed for the sea. Within three days of her arrival she was hurrying towards Dieppe.

In Dieppe she alighted at the Hotel de Paris. The first person she saw as she crossed the threshold was Annie Moriarty--at least, she used to be Annie Moriarty until she became Mrs. Palmer. The two rushed into each other's arms--Mrs. Palmer going upstairs with Miss Donne to a.s.sist in the unpacking. When they descended Miss Donne was introduced to Mr.

Palmer, who had been Annie's one topic in the epistolary communications with which Miss Donne was regularly favoured. Mr. Palmer, who was a husband of twelve months' standing, proved to be a sort of under-study for a giant, towering above Miss Donne's head in a manner which inspired her with awe. While she was wonderful whether, when he desired to kiss his wife and retain his perpendicular position, he always lifted her upon a chair--for Annie was a mere pigmy in petticoats--who should come down the staircase into the hall but Mr. Huhn!

At that sight not only did Miss Donne's cheeks flame, but she was overwhelmed with confusion to such an extent that it was impossible to conceal the fact from the sharp-eyed person who was in front of her.

Although Mr. Huhn merely raised his hat as he pa.s.sed into the street, her distress continued after he was gone. She accompanied the Palmers--in an only partial state of consciousness--into the Etabliss.e.m.e.nt grounds. While her husband continued with them Annie was discretion itself; but when Mr. Palmer, going into the building--it is within the range of possibility on a hint from her--left the two women seated on the terrace, she a.s.sailed Miss Donne in a fas.h.i.+on which in a moment laid all her defences low.

The whole story was told before its narrator was conscious of an intention to do anything of the kind. It plunged the hearer into raptures. Although, with a delicacy which well became her, she concealed the larger half of them, she revealed enough to throw Miss Donne into a state of agitation which was half pathetic and altogether delightful. As she sat there, listening to Annie's innuendoes, conscious of her delighted scrutiny, the heroine of all these strange adventures discovered herself hazily wondering whether this was the same world in which she had been living all these years, and whether she was awake in it or dreaming. After all the miracles which had lately changed the whole fas.h.i.+on of her life, was the greatest still upon the way?

Eva Donne was thirty-eight and three-quarters, as the children say. For over twenty years she had been a governess--without kith or kin. All the time she was haunted by a fear that the fat season was with her now, and that the lean one was coming soon. She was not a scholar; she was just the sweetest woman in the world. But while of the second fact she had no notion, of the first she was hideously sure. She had strained every nerve to improve her mental equipment; to keep herself abreast of the educational requirements of the day; to pa.s.s examinations; to win those certificates which teachers ought to have.

Always and ever in vain. The dullest of her scholars was not more dull than she. How, under these circ.u.mstances, she found employment was beyond her comprehension. Why, for instance, Miss Law should have kept her upon her teaching staff for nearly thirteen consecutive years was to her, indeed a mystery. That Miss Law should consider it well worth her while to retain in her establishment a well-mannered, dainty lady; possessed of infinite patience, kindliness, and tact; the soul of honour; considering her employer's interests before her own; willing to work late and early: who was liked by every pupil with whom she came into contact, and so was able to smooth the head mistress's path in a hundred different ways; that the shrewd proprietress of St. Cecilia's College should esteem these qualifications as a sufficient set-off for certain scholastic deficiencies never entered into Miss Donne's philosophy. Therefore, though she said not a word of it to anyone, she was tortured by a continual fear that each term would be her last.

Dismissed for inefficiency at her age, what should she do? For she was growing old; she knew she was. She was grey--almost!--behind the ears; her hair was thinner than it used to be; there were tell-tale wrinkles about her eyes; she was conscious of a certain stiffness in her joints.

A governess so soon grows old, especially if she is not clever. Many a time she lay awake all through the night thinking, with horror, of the future which was in store for her. What should she do? She had saved so little. Out of such a salary how could she save?--with her soft, generous heart which could not resist a temptation to give. She sometimes wondered, when the morning dawned, how it was that she had not turned quite grey, after the racking anxieties of the sleepless night.

And then the miracle came--the G.o.d out of the machine. A cousin of her mother, of whom she had only heard, died in America, in Pittsburg--a bachelor, as alone in the world as she was--and left everything he had to his far-off kinswoman. Eight hundred sterling pounds a year it came to, actually, when everything was realized, and everything had been left in an easy realizable form. What a difference it made when she understood that the incredible had come to pa.s.s, and what it meant. She was rich, independent, secure from want and from the fear of it, thank G.o.d. And she thanked Him--how she thanked Him!--pouring out her heart before Him like some simple child. And she ceased to grow old; nay, she all at once grew young again. She was nearly persuaded that the greyness had vanished from behind her ears; her hair certainly did seem thicker. The wrinkles were so faint as to be not worth mentioning, while, as for the stiffness of her joints, she was suddenly conscious of an absurd and even improper inclination to run up the stairs and down them.

Then there came the wonderful journey. She, a solitary spinster, who had never been out of England in her life, made up her mind, after not more than six month's consideration, to go all by herself to Switzerland. And she went. After the strange happenings which, in such a journey, were naturally to be expected, to crown everything, here, on the terrace at Dieppe, sat Annie Moriarty that was--and a troublesome child she used to be--telling her--her!--the young woman's former and ought-to-be-revered preceptress--that a certain person--to wit, an American gentleman--was in love with her--with her! Miss Eva Donne. Not the least extraordinary part of it was that, instead of correcting the presumptuous Annie, Miss Donne beamed and blushed, and blushed and beamed, and was conscious of the most singular sensations.

A remark, however, which Mrs. Palmer apparently inadvertently made, brought her back to earth with a sudden jolt.

"I suppose that whoever does become Mrs. Huhn will become an American."

It was just a second or so before she comprehended. When she did it was with a quick sinking of the heart. Something, all at once, seemed to have gone out of the world. Perhaps because a cloud had crept over the sun.

Was it possible? A thing not to be avoided? An inevitable consequence?

Of course, Mr. Huhn was an American; she did know so much. And although--as she had gathered--this was by no means his first visit to Europe, it might reasonably be imagined that he spent most of his time in his native country. It was equally fair to a.s.sume that his wife would be expected to stop there with him. Would she, therefore, perforce lose her nationality, her birthright, her t.i.tle to call herself an Englishwoman? To say the least of it, that would be an extraordinary position for--for an Englishwoman to find herself in.

Mischievous Annie could not have succeeded better had it been her deliberate intention to make Miss Donne's confusion worse confounded.

She dined with the Palmers at a little table by themselves. Mr. Huhn was at the long table round the corner, hidden from her sight by the peculiar construction of the room. Mrs. Palmer announced that he had gone there before she entered. Miss Donne took care that she went before he reappeared. She spent the evening in her bedroom, in spite of Mrs. Palmer's vigorous protestations, writing letters, so she said. It is true that she did write some letters. She began half-a-dozen to Mr.

Huhn. Among a thousand and one other things, that bracelet was on her mind. Her wish was to return it, accompanied by a note which would exactly meet the occasion. But the construction of the note she wanted proved to be beyond her powers. It was far from her desire to wound his feelings; she was only too conscious how easy it is for the written word to do that. At the same time it was necessary that she should make her meaning plain, on which account it was a misfortune that she herself was not altogether clear as to what she did precisely mean. She did not want the bracelet; certainly not. Yet, while she did not wish to throw it at him, or lead him to suppose that she despised his gift, or was unconscious of his kindness in having made it, or liked him less because of his kindness, it was not her intention to allow him to suspect that she liked him at all, or appreciated his kindness to anything like the extent she actually did do, or indeed, leave him an excuse of any sort or kind on to which he might fasten to ask her to reconsider her refusal. How to combine these opposite desires and intentions within the four corners of one short note was a puzzle.

It was a nice bracelet--a beauty. No one could call it unbecoming on her wrist. She had had no idea that a single ornament could have made such a difference. She was convinced that it made her hand seem much smaller than it really was. She wondered if he had sent for it specially to New York, or if he had been carrying it about with him in his pocket. But that was not the point. The point was that, since she could not frame a note which, in all respects, met her views, she would herself see Mr. Huhn to-morrow and return him his gift with her own hands. Then the incident would be closed. Having arrived at which decision she slept like a top all night, with the bracelet under her pillow.

In the morning she dressed herself with unusual care--with so much care, indeed, that Mrs. Palmer greeted her with a torrent of e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.i.o.ns.

"You look lovelier than ever, my dear. Just like What's-his-name's picture, only ever so much sweeter. Dosen't she look a darling, d.i.c.k?"

"d.i.c.k" was Mr. Palmer. As this was said not only in the presence of that gentleman, but in the hearing of several others, Miss Donne was so distressed that she found herself physically incapable of telling the speaker that, as she was perfectly aware, she intensely disliked personal remarks, which were always in the very worst possible taste.

Nothing was seen of Mr. Huhn. She went with the Palmers to the market; to the man who carved grotesque heads out of what he called vegetable ivory; to watch the people bathe, while listening to the band upon the terrace; then to lunch. All the time she had that bracelet on her person. After lunch she accompanied her friends on a queer sort of vehicle, which was not exactly a brake or quite anything else, on what its proud proprietor called a "fas.h.i.+onable excursion" to the forest of Arques. It was nearly five when they returned. The Palmers went upstairs. She sat down on one of the chairs which were on the pavement in front of the hotel. She had been there for some minutes in a sort of waking dream when someone occupied the chair beside her.

It was Mr. Huhn. His appearance was so unexpected that it found her speechless. The foolish tremors to which she seemed to have been so liable of late seemed to paralyze her. She gazed at the shabby theatre on the other side of the square, trying to think of what she ought to say--but failed. No greetings were exchanged.

Presently he said, in his ordinary tone of voice:--