The Mountebank Part 25

England was no place for her. It was divided into two social kingdoms separated by a vast gulf--one jazzing and feasting and otherwise Sodom-and-Gomorrah-izing its life away, and the other growling, envious, sinister, with the Bolshevic devil in its heart. What could a woman with brains and energy do? The Society life of the moment made her sick. A dance to Perdition. The middle cla.s.ses were dancing, too, in ape-like imitation, while the tradesman cla.s.s were clinging for dear life on to their short skirts, with legs dangling in the gulf. On the other side, seething ma.s.ses howling wors.h.i.+p of the G.o.ddess of Unreason. Cross the gulf--one would metaphorically be torn to pieces. Remain--no outlet for energy but playing the wild Ca.s.sandra. Her pessimism was Tartarean.

"General Lackaday, the last time I saw him, agreed with me that the war was a d.a.m.ned sight better than this."

It was the first time she had mentioned him. Lady Verity-Stewart and I exchanged glances.

She went on. Not a monologue. We all made our comments, protests and what not. But in the theatre phrase we merely fed her, instinctively feeling for the personal note. On ordinary occasions very subtly aware of such tactics, she seemed now to ignore them. She rose to every fly. Public life for women? Parliament? The next election would result in a Labour Government.

Women would stand no chance. Labour counted on cajoling the woman's vote.

But it would have no truck with women as legislators. If there was one social cla.s.s which had the profoundest contempt for woman as an intelligent being it was the labouring population.

For Heaven's sake remember, I am only giving you Lady Auriol's views, as expressed over the dinner table. What mine are, I won't say. Anyhow they don't amount to a row of pins.

Lady Auriol continued her Jeremiad. Suppose she did stand for Parliament, and got in for a safe Conservative const.i.tuency. What would happen? She would be swept in to the muddiest and most soul-destroying game on G.o.d's earth. No, my dear friends, no. No politics for her. Well, what then? we asked.

"Didn't you say something about--what was it, dear--Borneo?" asked Lady Verity-Stewart.

"I don't care where it is, Aunt Selina," cried Lady Auriol. "Anywhere out of this melting-pot of civilization. But you can't get anywhere. There aren't any s.h.i.+ps to take you. And there's nowhere worth going to. The whole of this miserable little earth has been exploited."

"Thibet has its lonely spots."

"And it's polyandrous--so a woman ought to have a good time--" she laughed.

"Thanks for the hint. But I'm not taking any. Seriously, however, as you all seem to take such an interest in me, what s a woman like me to do in this welter? Oh, give me the good old war again!"

Lady Verity-Stewart lifted horrified hands. Sir Julius rebuked her unhumorously. Lady Auriol laughed again and the Jeremiad petered out.

"She's got it rather badly," Charles murmured to me when the ladies had left the dining-room.

But I was not going to discuss Lady Auriol with Charles. I grunted and sipped my port and told a gratified host that I recognized the '81 c.o.c.kburn.

Sir Julius and Lady Verity-Stewart went to bed early after the sacramental game of bridge. Charles, obeying orders, followed soon afterwards. Lady Auriol and I had the field to ourselves.

"Well?" said she.

"Well?" said I.

"You don't suppose these subtle diplomatists have left us alone to discuss Bolshevism or Infant Welfare?"

There was the ironical gleam in her eyes and twist in her lips that had attracted me since her childhood. I have always liked intelligent women.

"Have they been badgering you?"

"Good Lord, no. But a female baby in a pink sash would see what they're driving at. Haven't they been discussing me and Andrew Lackaday?"

"They have," said I, "and they're perfect dears. They've built up a fairy-tale around you and have taken long leases in it and are terribly anxious that the estate shan't be put into liquidation."

"That's rather neat," she said.

"I thought so, myself," said I.

Stretched in an arm-chair she looked for some minutes into the glow of the wood fire. Then she turned her head quickly.

"You haven't given me away?"

"My good girl!" I protested, "what do you take me for?"

She laughed. "That's all right. I opened out to you last year about Andrew.

You remember? You were very sympathetic. I was in an unholy sort of fog about myself then. I'm in clear weather now. I know my own mind. He's the only man in the world for me. I suppose I've made it obvious. Hence the solicitude of these pet lambs--and your appointment as Investigator. Well, my dear Tony, what do they want to know?"

"They're straining their dear simple ears to catch the strain of wedding bells and they can't do it. So they're worried."

"Well, you can tell them not to worry any longer. There aren't going to be any wedding bells. They've made sentimental idiots of themselves. General Lackaday and I aren't marrying folks. The question hasn't arisen. We're good intimate friends, nothing more. He's no more in love with me than I am with him. Savvy?"

I savvied. But--

"That's for the pet lambs," said I. "What for me?"

"I've already told you."

"And that's the end of it?"

"As far as you are concerned--yes."

"As you will," I said.

I put a log on the fire and took up a book. All this was none of my business, as I had explained to Evadne.

"I'm sorry you're not interested in my conversation," she remarked after a while.

"You gave me to understand that it was over--as far as I was concerned."

"Never mind. I want to tell you something."

I laid down my book and lit a cigar.

"Go ahead," said I.

It was then that she told me of her last interview with Lackaday. Remember I had not yet read his version.

"It's all pretty hopeless," she concluded.

For myself I knew nothing of the reasons that bade him adopt the att.i.tude of the Mysterious Unknown--except his sensitiveness on the point of his profession. He would rather die than appear before her imagination in the green silk tights of Pet.i.t Patou. I asked tentatively whether he had spoken much of his civilian life.

"Very little. Except of his knowledge of Europe. He has travelled a great deal. But of his occupation, family and the rest, I know nothing. Oh yes, he did once say that his father and mother died when he was a baby and that he had no kith or kin in the world. If he had thought fit to tell me more he would have done so. I, of course, asked no questions."

"But all the same," said I, "you're dying to know the word of the enigma."

She laughed scornfully. "I know it, my friend."

"The deuce you do!" said I, thinking of Pet.i.t Patou and wondering how she had guessed. "What is it?"