COLONEL KINGSWARD had been flattered, he had been pleased. He had felt himself for a moment one of the exceptional men in whom women find an irresistible attraction, and then he had been put down and dismissed with the calmest decision, with a peremptoriness which nobody in his life had ever used to him. All these sweetnesses, and then to be, as it were, huddled out of doors the moment he said a word which was not satisfactory to that imperial person! He could not get it out of his mind during the evening nor all the night through, during which it occurred to him whenever he woke, as a prevailing thought does. And he had been right, too. To send for men, any kind of men, artists whom she herself described as having so much freedom in their ways, and have interviews with them, was a thing to which he had a good right to object. That is, her friend had a right to object to it—her friend who took the deepest interest in her and all that she was doing. That it was for Charlie’s advantage made really no difference. This gave a beautiful and admirable motive, but then all her motives were beautiful and admirable, and it must be necessary in some cases to defend her against the movements of her own good heart. Evidently she did not sufficiently think of what the world would say, nor, indeed, of what was essentially right; for that a woman of her attractions, still young, living independently in rooms of her own, should receive artists indiscriminately, nay, send for them, admit them to sit perhaps for an hour with her, with no chaperon or companion, was a thing that could not be borne. This annoyance almost drove Charlie out of Colonel Kingsward’s head. He felt that when he went to her next day he must, with all the precautions possible, speak his mind upon this subject. A woman with such attractions, really a young woman, alone; nobody could have more need of guarding against evil tongues. And artists were proverbially an unregulated, free-and-easy race, with long hair and defective linen, not men to be privileged with access under any circumstances to such a woman. Unquestionably he must deliver his soul on that subject for her own sake.
He thought about it all the morning, how to do it best. It relieved his mind about Charlie. Charlie! Charlie was only a young fellow after all, taking his own way, as they all did, never thinking of the anxiety he gave his family. And no doubt he would turn up of his own accord when he was tired of it. That she should depart from the traditions which naturally are the safeguards of ladies for the sake of a silly boy, who took so little trouble about the peace of mind of his family, was monstrous. It was a thing which he could not permit to be.
When he went into his private room at his office, Colonel Kingsward found a card upon his table which increased the uneasiness in his mind, though he could not have told why. He took it up with great surprise and anger. “Mr. Aubrey Leigh.” He supposed it must have been a card left long ago, when Aubrey Leigh was Bee’s suitor, and had come repeatedly, endeavouring to shake her father’s determination. He looked at it contemptuously, and then pitched it into the fire.
What a strange perversity there is in these inanimate things! It seemed as if some malicious imp must have replaced that card there on that very morning to disturb him.
Colonel Kingsward did not remember how it was that the name, the sacred name, of Miss Lance was associated with that of Aubrey Leigh. He had been much surprised, as well as angry, at the manner in which Bee repeated that name, when she heard it first, with a vindictive jealousy (these words came instinctively to his mind) which was not comprehensible. He had refused indignantly to allow that she had ever heard the name before. Nevertheless, her cry awakened a vague association in his mind. Something or other, he could not recollect what, of connection, of suggestion, was in the sound. He threw Aubrey’s card into the fire, and endeavoured to dismiss all thought on the subject. But it was a difficult thing to do. It is to be feared that during those morning hours the work which Colonel Kingsward usually executed with so much exactitude, never permitting, as he himself stated, private matters—even such as the death of his wife or the disappearance of his son—to interfere with it, was carried through with many interruptions and pauses for thought, and at the earliest possible moment was laid aside for that other engagement which had nothing to do either with the office or the Service, though it was, he flattered himself, a duty, and one of the most lofty kind.
To save a noble creature, if possible, from the over generosity of her own heart; to convince her that such proceedings were inappropriate, inconsistent with her dignity, as well as apt to give occasion for the adversary to blaspheme—this was the mission which inspired him. If he thought of a natural turning towards himself, the friend of friends, in respect to whom the precautions he enforced were unnecessary, in consequence of these remonstrances, he kept it carefully in the background of his thoughts. It was a duty. This beautiful, noble woman, all frankness and candour, had taken the part of an angel in endeavouring to help him in his trouble. Could he permit her to sully even the tip of a wing of that generous effort. Certainly not! On the contrary, it became doubly his duty to protect her in every way.
This time Miss Lance was in her drawing-room, seated in one of the pair of chairs which were arranged for intimate conversation. She did not rise, but held out her hand to him, with a soft impulse towards the other—in which Colonel Kingsward accordingly seated himself, with a solemnity upon his brow which she had no difficulty in interpreting, quick-witted as she was. She did not loose a shade upon that forehead, a note of additional gravity in his voice. She knew as well as he did the duty which he had come to perform. And she was a woman—not only quick-witted and full of a definite aim, but one who took real pleasure in her own dexterity, and played her rôle with genuine enjoyment. She allowed him to open the conversation with much dignified earnestness, and even to begin, “My dear Miss Lance,” his countenance charged with warning before she cut the ground from under his feet in the lightest, yet most complete way.
“I know you are going to say something very serious when you adopt that tone, so please let me discharge my mind first. Mrs. Revel kindly came to me after you left yesterday, and she has made every inquiry—indeed, as she compelled me to go back with her to dinner, I saw for myself——”
“Mrs. Revel?” said the Colonel.
“Didn’t you know he was married? Oh, yes, to a great friend of mine, a dear little woman. It is in their house I meet my artists, whom I told you of. Tuesday is her night, and they were all there. I was able to make my investigations without any betrayal. But I am very, very sorry to say, dear Colonel Kingsward, equally without any effect.”
“Without any effect,” Colonel Kingsward repeated, confused. He was not so quick-witted as she was, and it took him some time to make his way through these mazes. Revel, the painter, was a name, indeed, that he had heard vaguely, but his wife, so suddenly introduced, and her “night,” and the people described as my artists, wound him in webs of bewilderment through which it was very difficult to guide his steps. It became apparent to him, however, after a moment, that whatever those things might mean, the ground had been cut from under his feet. “Does Mrs. Revel know?” he added after a moment, in his bewilderment.
“Know—our poor dear boy? Oh, yes; I took him there—in my foolish desire to do the best I could for him, and thinking that to see other circles outside of his own was good for a young man. I couldn’t take him the round of the studios, you know—could I? But I took him to the Revels. She is a charming little woman, a woman whom I am very fond of, and—more extraordinary still, don’t you think, Colonel Kingsward?—who is fond of me.”
The Colonel was not up to the mark in this emergency. He did not give the little compliment which is expected after such a speech. He sat dumb, a dull, middle-aged blush rising over his face. He had no longer anything to say; instead of the serious, even impassioned remonstrance which he was about to address to her, he could only murmur a faint assent, a question without meaning. And in place of the generous, imprudent creature, following her own hasty impulses, disregarding the opinion of the world, whom he had expected to find, here was female dignity in person, regulated by all the nicest laws of propriety. He was struck dumb—the ground was cut from beneath his feet.
“This is only an interruption on my part. You were going to say something to me? And something serious? I prize so much everything you say that I must not lose it. Pray say it now, dear Colonel Kingsward. Have I done something you don’t like? I am ready to accept even blame—though you know what women are in that way, always standing out that they are right—from you.”
Colonel Kingsward looked at her, helpless, still without a word to say. There was surely a laughing demon in her eyes which saw through and through him and knew the trouble in his mind; but her face was serious, appealing, a little raised towards him, waiting for his words as if her fate hung upon them. The colour rose over his middle-aged countenance to the very hair which was beginning to show traces of white over his high forehead.
“Blame!” he stammered, scarcely knowing what he said, “I hope you don’t think me quite a fool.”
“What,” she cried, picking him up as it were on the end of her lance, holding him out to the scorn—if not of the world, yet of himself. “Do you think so little of a woman, Colonel Kingsward, that you would not take the trouble to find fault with her? Ah! Don’t be so hard! You would not be a fool if you did that—you should find that I would take it with gratitude, accept it, be guided by it. Believe me, I am worthy, if you think me in the wrong, to be told so—I am, indeed I am!”
Were these tears in her fine eyes? She made them look as if they were, and filled him with a compunction and a shame of his own superficial judgment impossible to put into words.
“I—think you wrong!” he said, stammering and faltering. “I would as soon think that—heaven was wrong. I—blame you! Dear Miss Laura, how, how can you imagine such a thing? I should be a miserable idiot indeed if——”
“Come,” she said, “I begin to think you didn’t mean—now that you have called me by my name.”
“I beg you a thousand pardons. I—I—It was a slip of the tongue. It was—from the signature to your letters—which is somehow so like you——”
“Yes,” she said. “It pleases me very much that you should think so—more like me than Lance. Lance! What a name! My mother made a mésalliance. I don’t give up my father, poor dear, though he has saddled me with such a family—but Laura is me, whereas Lance is only—an accident.”
“An accident that may be removed,” he said, involuntarily. It was a thing that might be said to any unmarried woman, a conventional sort of half compliment, which custom would have permitted him to put in even stronger terms—but to her! When he had said it horror seized his soul.
“No,” she said, gently shaking her head. “No. At my age one does not recover from an accident like that; one must bear the scar all one’s days. And you really had nothing to find fault with me about?”
“How monstrous!” he cried, “to entertain such a thought.” Then, for he was really uneasy in his sense of guilt, he plunged into a new snare. “My little daughter, Betty,” he said, “is coming to town to-day to visit some friends in Portman Square. I wonder if I might bring her to see you.”
“Your daughter!” cried Miss Lance, clasping her hands, “a thing I did not venture to ask—the very first desire of my heart. Your daughter! I would go anywhere to see her. If you will be so nice, so sweet, so kind as to bring her, Colonel Kingsward!”
“I shall, indeed, to-morrow. It will do her good to see you. At her susceptible age the very sight of such a woman as you—”
“No compliments,” she cried, “if I am not to be blamed I must not be praised either—and I deserve it much less. Is she the eldest?” There was a gleam under her half-dropped eyelids which the Colonel was vaguely aware of but did not understand.
“The second,” he said. “My eldest girl is Bee, in many respects a stronger character than her sister, but on the other hand—”
“I know,” said Miss Lance, “a little wilful, fond of her own way and her own opinion. Oh, that is a good fault in a girl! When they are a little chastened they turn out the finest women. But I understand what a man must feel for this little sweet thing who has not begun to have a will of her own.”
It was not perhaps a very perfect characterisation of Betty, but still it flattered him to see how she entered into his thoughts. “I think you understand everything,” he said.