XVI
It was pouring with rain the evening Lord Bracondale arrived from Parisat the family mansion in St. James's Square. He had only wired at thelast moment to his mother, too late to change her plans; she wasunfortunately engaged to take Morella Winmarleigh to the opera, and wasdining early at that lady's house, so she could only see him for a fewmoments in her dressing-room before she started.
"My darling, darling boy!" she exclaimed, as he opened the door andpeeped in. "Streatfield, bring that chair for his lordship, and--oh, youcan go for a few minutes."
Then she folded him in her arms, and almost sobbed with joy to see himagain.
"Well, mother," he said, when she had kissed him and murmured over himas much as she wished. "Here I am, and what a sickening climate! Andwhere are you off to?"
"I am going to dine with Morella Winmarleigh," said Lady Bracondale,"early, to go to the opera, and then I shall take her on to theBrantingham's ball. Won't you join us at either place, Hector? I feel itso dreadfully, having to rush off like this, your first evening,darling."
She stood back and looked at him. She must see for herself whether hewas well, and if this riotous life she feared he had been leading latelyhad not too greatly told upon him. Her fond eyes detected an air ofweariness: he looked haggard, and not so full of spirits as he usuallywas. Alas! if he would only stay in England!
"I am rather tired, mother; I may look in at the opera, but I can't facea ball. How is Anne, and what is she doing to-night?" he said.
"Anne has a bad cold. We have had such weather--nothing but rain sinceSunday night! She is dining at home and going to bed early. I have justhad a telephone message from her; she is longing to see you, too."
"I think I shall go round and dine with her then," said Hector, "andjoin you later."
They talked on for about ten minutes before he left her to dress,running against Streatfield in the passage. She had known him since hisbirth, and beamed with joy at his return.
He chaffed her about growing fat, and went on his way to telephone tohis sister.
"His lordship looks pale, my lady," said the demure woman, as shefastened Lady Bracondale's bracelet. She, too, disapproved of Paris andbachelorhood, but she did not love Morella Winmarleigh.
"Oh, you think so, Streatfield?" Lady Bracondale exclaimed, in a worriedvoice. "Now that we have got him back we must take great care of him.His lordship will join me at the opera. Are you sure he likes thoseaigrettes in my hair?"
"Why, it's one of his lordship's favorite styles, my lady. You need haveno fears," said the maid.
And thus comforted, Lady Bracondale descended the great staircase to hercarriage.
She was still a beautiful woman, though well past fifty. Her splendid,dark hair had hardly a thread of gray in it, and grew luxuriantly, butshe insisted upon wearing it simply parted in the middle and coiled in amass of plaits behind, while one braid stood up coronet fashion well atthe back of her head. She was addicted to rich satins and velvets, andhad a general air of Victorian repose and decorum. There was no attemptto retain departed youth; no golden wigs or red and white paintdisfigured her person, which had an immense natural dignity andstateliness. It made her shiver to see some of her contemporariesdressed and arranged to represent not more than twenty years of age. Butso many modern ways of thought and life jarred upon her!
"Mother is still in the early seventies; she has never advanced a stepsince she came out," Anne always said, "and I dare say she was behindthe times even then."
Meanwhile, Hector was dressing in his luxurious mahogany-panelled room.Everything in the house was solid and prosperous, as befitted a familywho had had few reverses and sufficient perspicacity to marry a richheiress now and then at right moments in their history.
This early Georgian house had been in the then Lady Bracondale's dower,and still retained its fine carvings and Old-World state.
"How shall I see her again?" was all the thought which ran in LordBracondale's head.
"She won't be at a ball, but she might chance to have thought of theopera. It would be a place Mr. Brown would like to exhibit her at. Ishall certainly go."
Lady Anningford was tucked up on a sofa in her little sitting-room whenher brother arrived at her charming house in Charles Street. Her husbandhad been sent off to a dinner without her, and she was expecting herbrother with impatience. She loved Hector as many sisters do a handsome,popular brother, but rather more than that, and she had fine senses andunderstood him.
She did not cover him with caresses and endearments when she saw him;she never did.
"Poor Hector has enough of them from mother," she explained, when MonicaEllerwood asked her once why she was so cold. "And men don't care forthose sort of things, except from some one else's sister or wife."
"Dear old boy!" was all she said as he came in. "I am glad to see youback."
Then in a moment or two they went down to dinner, talking of variousthings. And all through it, while the servants were in the room, sheprattled about Paris and their friends and the gossip of the day; andshe had a shocking cold in her head, too, and might well have beenforgiven for being dull.
But when they were at last alone, back in the little sitting-room, shelooked at him hard, and her voice, which was rather deep like his, grewfull of tenderness as she asked: "What is it, Hector? Tell me about itif I can help you."
He got up and stood with his back to the wood fire, which sparkled inthe grate, comforting the eye with its brightness, while the wind andrain moaned outside.
"You can't help me, Anne; no one can," he said. "I have been ratherbadly burned, but there is nothing to be done. It is my own fault--soone must just bear it."
"Is it the--eh--the Frenchwoman?" his sister asked, gently.
"Good Lord, no!"
"Or the American Monica came back so full of?"
"The American? What American? Surely she did not mean my dear Mrs.McBride?"
"I don't know her name," Anne said, "and I don't want you to say a thingabout it, dear, if I can't help you; only it just grieves me to see youlooking so sad and distrait, so I felt I must try if there is anything Ican do for you. Mother has been on thorns and dying of fuss over thisFrenchwoman and the diamond chain--("How the devil did she hear aboutthat?" thought Hector)--until Monica came back with a tale of yourdevotion to an American."
"One would think I was eighteen years old and in leading-strings still,upon my word," he interrupted, with an irritated laugh. "When will sherealize I can take care of myself?"
"Never," said Lady Anningford, "until you have married MorellaWinmarleigh; then she would feel you were in good hands."
He laughed again--bitterly this time.
"Morella Winmarleigh! I would not be faithful to her for a week!"
"I wonder if you would be faithful to any woman, Hector? I have oftenthought you do not know what it means to love--really to love."
"You were perfectly right once. I did not know," he said; "and perhaps Idon't now, unless to feel the whole world is a sickening blank withoutone woman is to love--really to love."
Anne noticed the weariness of his pose and the vibration in his deepvoice. She was stirred and interested as she had never been. This dearbrother of hers was not wont to care very much. In the past it hadalways been the women who had sighed and longed and he who had beenamused and pleased. She could not remember a single occasion in the lastten years when he had seemed to suffer, although she had seen himapparently devoted to numbers of women.
"And what are you going to do?" she asked, with sympathy, "She ismarried, of course?"
"Yes."
"Hector, don't you want me to speak about it?"
He took a chair now by his sister's sofa, and he began to turn over thepapers rather fast which lay on a table near by.
"Yes, I do," he said, "because, after all, you can do something for me.I want you to be particularly kind to her, will you, Anne, dear?"
"But, of course; only you must tell me who she is and where I sha
ll findher."
"You will find her at Claridge's, and she is only the wife of animpossible Australian millionaire called Brown--Josiah Brown."
"Poor dear Hector, how terrible!" thought Anne. "It is not the American,then?" she said, aloud.
"There never was any American," he exclaimed. "Monica is the mostridiculous gossip, and always sees wrong. If she had not Jack to keepher from talking so much she would not leave one of us with a rag ofcharacter."
"I will go to-morrow and call there, Hector," Lady Anningford said. "Mycold is sure to be better; and if she is not in, shall I write a noteand ask her to lunch? The husband, too, I suppose?"
"I fear so. Anne, you are a brick."
Then he said good-night, and went to the opera.
Left to herself, Lady Anningford thought: "I suppose she is some flashy,pretty creature who has caught Hector's fancy, the poor darling. Onenever has chanced to find an Australian quite, quite a lady. I almostwish he would marry Morella and have done with it."
Then she lay on her sofa and pondered many things.
She was a year older than her brother, and they had always been theclosest friends and comrades.
Lady Anningford was more or less a happy and contented woman now, butthere had been moments in her life scorched by passion and infinitepain. Long ago in the beginning when she first came out she had had themisfortune to fall in love with Cyril Lamont, married and bad andattractive. It had given him great pleasure to evade the eye of LadyBracondale, pure dragon and strict disciplinarian. Anne was a good girl,but she was eighteen years old and had tasted no joy. She was not aneasy prey, and her first year had passed in storms of emotion suppressedto the best of her powers.
The situation had been full of shades and contrasts. The outward, astrictly guarded lamb, the life of the world and aristocratic propriety;and the inward, a daily growing mad love for an impossible person,snatched and secret meetings after tea in country-houses, walks inKensington Gardens, rides along lonely lanes out hunting, and, finally,the brink of complete ruin and catastrophe--but for Hector.
"Where should I be now but for Hector?" her thoughts ran.
Hector was just leaving Eton in those days, and had come up anddiscovered matters, while she sobbed in his arms, at the beginning ofher second season. He had comforted her and never scolded a word, andthen he had gone out armed with a heavy hunting-crop, found CyrilLamont, and had thrashed the man within an inch of his life. It was oneof Hector's pleasantest recollections, the thought of his cowering form,his green silk smoking-jacket all torn, and his eyes sightless. CyrilLamont's talents had not run in the art of self-defence, and he had beenvery soon powerless in the hands of this young athlete.
The Lamonts went abroad that night, and stayed there for quite sixmonths, during which time Anne mended her broken heart and saw the follyof her ways.
Hector and she had never alluded to the matter all these years, onlythey were intimate friends and understood each other.
Lady Bracondale adored Hector and was fond of Anne, but had nocomprehension of either. Anne was a _frondeuse_, while her mother's mindwas fashioned in carved lines and strict boundaries of thought andaction.