CHAPTER V--AT THE CARLTON
There are certain natures to whom each appearance of evil, each form ofdelinquency is a fresh surprise. They are born simple, in the sweetsense of the word, and they go down to old age never of the world,although in a sense worldly. If Dan Blair's eyes were somewhat opened attwenty-two, he had yet the bloom on his soul. He was no fool, but hisideals stood up each on its pedestal and ready to appear one by one tohim as the scenes of his life shifted and the different curtains rose.He had been trained in finance from his boyhood and he was a bornfinancier. Money was his natural element; he could go far in it. But_woman_! He was one of those manly creatures--a knight--to whom each womanis a sacred thing: a dove, a crystal-clear soul, made to cherish and toprotect, made to be spoiled. And in Dan were all the qualities that goto make up the unselfish, tender, foolish, and often unhappy Americanhusband. These were some of the other things he had inherited from hisfather. Blair, senior, had married his first love, and whereas his boyhad been trained to know money and its value, how to keep it and spendit, to save it and to make it, he had been taught nothing at all aboutwoman. He had never been taught to distrust women, never been warnedagainst them; he had been taught nothing but his father's memory of hismother, and the result was that he worshiped the sex and wondered at themystery.
With Gordon Galorey and the others he had ridden, shot better than they,and had played, but with Lady Galorey and the Duchess of Breakwater hewas nothing but a child. As far as his hostess was concerned, on severaloccasions she had put to him certain states of affairs, well,touchingly. Dan had been moved by the stories of sore need among thetenants, had been impressed by the necessity of reforms and rebuildingsand on each occasion had given his hostess a check. She had asked him tosay nothing about it to Gordon, and he had kept his silence. Dan likedLady Galorey extremely: she was jolly, witty and friendly. She treatedhim as a member of the family and made no demands on him, save the onesmentioned.
In the time that he had come to know the Duchess of Breakwater she, onher part, had filled him full of other confidences. Into his young earsshe poured the story of her disappointment, her disjointed life, fromher worldly girlhood to her disillusion in marriage. She was beautifulwhen she talked and more lovely when she wept. Dan thought himself inlove with the Duchess of Breakwater. His conversations with her hadbrought him to this conclusion. They had motored from Osdene Parktogether, and he had been extremely taken with the pleasure of it, andwith the fact of their real companionship. Two or three times the wordshad been on his lips, which were fated not to be spoken then, however,and Dan reached the Gaiety still unfettered, his duchess by his side.And then the orchestra had begun to play _Mandalay_, the curtain hadgone up and Letty Lane had come out on the boards. But her apparitiondid not strike off his chains immediately, nor did he renounce his planto tell the duchess the very next day that he loved her.
When with sparkling eyes Lady Galorey raved about _Mandalay_, Danlistened with eagerness. Everybody seemed to know all about Letty Lane,but he alone knew from what town she had come!
They went for supper at the Carlton after the theater.
"Letty," Lady Galorey said, "tells it herself how the impresario heardher sing in some country church--picked her up then and there and broughther over here, and they say she married him."
Dan Blair could have told them how she had sung in that little churchthat day. Dan was eating his caviare sandwich. "Her name _then_ wasSally Towney," he murmured. How little he had guessed that she wassinging herself right out of that church and into the London GaietyTheater! Anyway, she had made him "sit up!" It was a far cry fromMontana to the London Gaiety. And so she married the greasy Jew who haddiscovered her!
Dan glanced over at the Duchess of Breakwater. She was looking well,exquisitely high bred, and she impressed him. She leaned slightly overto him, laughing. He had hardly dared to meet her eyes that day, fearingthat she might read his secret. She had told him that in her own rightshe was a countess--the Countess of Stainer. Titles didn't cut any icewith him. At any rate, she would be able to "buy back the old farm"--thatis the way Dan put it. She had told him of the beautiful old StainerCourt, mortgaged and hung up with debts, as deep in ruins as the ivy wasthick on the walls.
As Dan looked over at the duchess he saw the other people staring andlooking about at a table near. It was spread a little to their left forfour people, a great bouquet of orchids in the center.
"There," Galorey said, "there's Letty Lane." And the singer came in,followed by three men, the first of them the Prince Poniotowsky,indolent, bored, haughty, his eye-glass dangling. Miss Lane was dressedin black, a superb costume of faultless cut, and it enfolded her like ashadow; as a shadow might enfold a specter, for the dancer was as paleas the dead. She had neither painted nor rouged, she had evidentlyemployed no coquetry to disguise her fag; rather she seemed to be on theverge of a serious illness, and presented a striking contrast to thebrilliant creature, who had shone before their eyes not an hour before.Her dress was a challenge to the more gay and delicate affairs the otherwomen in the restaurant wore. The gown came severely up to her chin. Itshigh collar closed around with a pearl necklace; from her ears fellpearls, long, creamy and priceless. She wore a great feathered hat,which, drooping, almost hid her small, pale face and her golden hair.She drew off her gloves as she came in and her white, jeweled handsflashed. She looked infinitely tired and extremely bored. As soon as shetook her seat at the table intended for her party, Poniotowsky pouredher out a glass of champagne, which she drank off as though it werewater.
"Gad," Lord Galorey said, "she _is_ a stunner! What a figure, and what ahead, and what daring to dress like that!"
"She knows how to make herself conspicuous," said the Duchess ofBreakwater.
"She looks extremely ill," said Lady Galorey. "The pace she goes will doher up in a year or two."
Dan Blair had his back to her, and when they rose to leave he was thelast to pass out. Letty Lane saw him, and a light broke over her pallidface. She nodded and smiled and shook her hand in a pretty littlesalute. If her face was pale, her lips were red, and her smile was likesunlight; and at her recognition a wave of friendly fellowship sweptover the young man--a sort of loyal kinship to her which he hadn't feltfor any other woman there, and which he could not have explained. Inwarm approval of the actress' distinction, he said softly to himself:"_That's_ all right--she makes the rest of them look like thirty cents."