IV
"I wish the old homes of England had electric lights," thought MissOtis, with a sigh.
There were four candles on the dressing-table, two on the mantel-shelf;beyond the radius of their light the room was barely visible. Shecarried one of the candles over to the cheval-glass and held it aboveher head, close to her face, low on either side.
"I feel as if I had been put together by some unpleasant mechanicalprocess. It is well I am not inordinately vain, but when one puts on anew dress for the first time--" She shrugged her shoulders hopelessly,replaced the candle, and walked up and down the room swinging thetrain--her first--of the charming gown of pale blue satin; patting thehair coiled softly about the entire head in a line eminently becoming tothe profile, and prolonged by several little curls escaping to the neck.
She felt happy and excited, her fine almost severe face far moregirlishly alive than when she had told her story, provocatively dry, toFlora Thangue. She directed an approving glance at the high heels of herslippers, which, with her lofty carriage, produced the effect ofnon-existing inches. She was barely five feet five, but she ranked withtall women, her height as unchallenged as the chiselling of her profile.
"What frauds we all are!" she thought, with a humor of which she hadnot vouchsafed Miss Thangue a hint. "But what is a cunningly madeslipper on a foot not so small, at the end of a body not quite longenough, but an encouraging example of the triumph of art over nature?Not the superiority, perhaps, but they are the best of workingpartners."
She sat down and recalled the conversation with her new friend, givingan amused little shudder. She had heard much of, and in her travels comeinto contact with, the cold-blooded frankness of the English elect; withwhom it was either an instinct or a pose to manifest their carelesssense of impregnability. When pressed to give an account of herself thedramatic possibilities of the method suddenly appealed to her,accompanied by a mischievous desire to outdo them at their own game andobserve the effect. She had found herself as absorbed as an actress in anew and congenial role.
"After all," she thought, "clever women make themselves over in greatpart, uprooting here, adopting there, and as we have so little chance to_be_ anything, there is a good deal to be got out of it. If one cannotbe a genius one can at least be an artist. I have never had much causeto be as direct as stage lightning, but as I enjoyed it I suppose I mayinfer that even brutal frankness is not foreign to my nature. Perhaps,like father, I am a snob at heart and liked the sensation of a sort ofartistic alliance with the British aristocracy. Well, if I developsnobbery I can root out that weed--or persuade myself that some othermotive is at the base of a disposition to adopt any of thecharacteristics of this people: a woman can persuade herself of anysophistry she chooses. Not for anything would I be a man. Absolutely toaccept the facts of life, even the ugly unvarnished fact itself, and atthe same time to invent one's own soul-tunes--that is to be a woman andfree!"
A printed square of card-board on her writing-table had informed herthat the dinner-hour was half-past eight. She looked at her watch. Itwas five minutes to the time. Once more she peered into the glass, shookout her skirts, then sought a door in a far and dusky corner. It openedupon a long dimly lit corridor which led into another at right angles,and Isabel presently found herself at the head of a staircase similar tothe one on her side of the house. Here, too, the walls were hung withportraits and landscapes, and as far down as the eye could follow; butafter glancing over them for a moment with the recurring weariness ofone who has seen too many pictures in the hard ways of European travel,her eyes lit and lingered on the figure of a young man who stood on thelanding, his back to her, examining, with a certain tensity, a canvas ona level with his eyes.
"Uncle Hiram--John Elton Cecil Gwynne! What a likeness and what adifference!"
The young Englishman's hair, pale in color and very smooth, was wornlonger than the fashion, the ends lilting. As he turned slowly at therustle of descending skirts, this eccentricity and his colorless skinmade him look the pale student rather than the gallant soldier, the bestfighter on the hustings that England had seen for five-and-twenty years.As Isabel walked carefully down the slippery stair she veiled her eyesto hide the wonder in them. She had expected personality, magnetism, asa compensation for nature's external economies. His apparent lack ofboth made him almost repellent, awakened in Isabel a sensation ofantagonism; and the cool speculation in his light gray eyes merelyaccentuated his general dearth of charm. True he had height--althoughhis carriage was unimposing--his head was large and well-proportioned,his nose and chin salient, but the straight heavy mouth was ascontemptuous as a Prussian officer's, and in spite of his grooming helooked old-fashioned, absurdly like the Uncle Hiram who had been acountry lawyer and farmer, and had always worn broadcloth in the hottestweather--except, to be sure, when he wore a linen "duster," or sat onthe veranda in his shirt-sleeves, his feet on the railing.
However, she smiled, and he smiled politely in return, advancing a fewsteps to meet her. "I hope you have heard of me," she said. "Your motheris so busy--English people are so indifferent to details--I am yourcousin, Isabel Otis--"
"Of course my mother has spoken of you. I am very glad to see you in myhouse," he added, hospitably. "Shall I show you the way?"
He made no further remark as they descended the darker section of thestair, and she could think of nothing to say to him. Nor did sheparticularly care to think of anything, the American in her resentinghis lack of effort. But as they reached the door she paused abruptly.
"I forgot! Miss Thangue asked me to knock at her door--"
"You take us too seriously," he said, with a slight sneer. "Flora hasevidently forgotten you; she came down a quarter of an hour ago."
Isabel lifted her head still higher, annoyed at the angry blood thatleaped to her face. "I am afraid I am rather literal," she said, withmore hauteur than the occasion demanded. "But perhaps you will tell mewhere to go. There seems to be a bewildering number of rooms. Afterthree years of lodgings in Europe, to say nothing of the modestarchitecture of Rosewater, I feel as if astray in a maze."
"You got that off as if you were a masquerading princess," he said, witha flicker of humor in his eyes. "Americans generally bluff the otherway." He opened the door. "We meet here in the hall. There is my mother.You are not obliged to speak to her, you know. We are less formal inlife than in novels." With this parting shot he left her abruptly andjoined a small dark woman with a plebeian face, a sensual mouth, andmagnificent black eyes.
"The rude beast!--Julia Kaye, of course." But Isabel forgot them both inthe novelty of the scene. The square white hall was lit with wax-candlesand shaded lamps, and filled with the murmur of voices--beautifulgowns--the sparkle of jewels. Isabel dismissed the memory of earlytrials, the long years she had lived in the last three, her philosophicresignation to the disillusions and disappointments with which herliberty had been pitted; it was her first appearance in the world offashion--which she entered, after all, by a sort of divine right.Trepidation was undeveloped in her, and when she had stood for a moment,quite aware that her proud and singular beauty had won her instantrecognition, she walked over to her hostess.
No fresh demand was made on her courage. Lady Victoria's earlier mood ofcolossal indifference had been dissipated by her son's return. Shegreeted Isabel with a dazzling smile and a winning gesture.
"Isn't Jack a darling? Isn't he a dear?" she commanded. "I have put youon his left, that you may be sure not to be bored. What hair! That is_your_ legacy from Spain. I have the eyes, but I never had a foot ofhair. I hope you are comfortable. I expect you to remain a week. I am soglad that Jack will be here. The place is intolerably dull without him."
Isabel, warming to such maternal ardor in a beauty whose years wereprematurely emphasized by a son as conspicuous as Elton Gwynne, summoneda few vague words of enthusiasm. She was reproached politely forwandering about England for two months before discovering herself to herrelatives; then, Lady Victoria's interest waning, she
turned to a youngman, handsome and Saxon and orthodox, and said, casually, "Jimmy, youwill take in Miss Otis."
Dinner had already been announced. The twain, in complete ignorance ofeach other's identity, walked through a long line of rooms, almostunfurnished but for the scowling or smiling dead crowding the walls.Isabel decided that she would be as effortless as the English and seewhat came of it. The practised instinct of the American girl, added tothe excessive hospitality of the Californian, would have led her to puther companion immediately at ease, but not only was she fond ofexperimenting with racial characteristics upon her own hiddenpossibilities, but she was intensely proud, and the English attitude hadstung her more than once.
"Why should I please them?" she thought, contemptuously. "Let themplease me."
Her companion betrayed no eagerness to please her; and during the firstten minutes at table he talked to Gwynne about the late elections.Evidently, he too had emerged from the political fray triumphant. Isabelsat like a stately picture by Reynolds, and after her slow gaze hadtravelled over the dark full-length portraits of the kings and queensthat had honored Capheaton, it dropped to the more animated faces in theforeground. The men were good-looking, with hardly an exception; judgingby their carriage they might all have been army men, but as every wordthat floated to the head of the table was political, they possibly hadfollowed their successful host's example and adopted an equallyintermittent career. One or two of the women were almost as handsome asLady Victoria, with their superb figures, their complexions of claretand snow, that blending of high breeding and warm palpitating humanityone never sees outside of England. But others within Isabel's range weretoo haggard for beauty, although one had a Burne-Jones face and her eyesgazed beyond the company with an expression that made her seem purespirit; but she too looked tired, delicate, curiously overworked.
Opposite Isabel was a tall buxom young woman of the purest Saxon type,who was talking amiably with the man on her right, and occasionallyshaking with deep and silent laughter; her intimate casual manner, herslight movements, her accentuation, manifestly bred in the bone.Suddenly it was borne in upon Isabel's always sensitive consciousnessthat she was the only haughty and reserved person present, and she feltprovincial and laughed frankly at herself. The lady across the tableclaiming the attention of the host, she turned to her own partner. Herblack eyelashes were long, and under their protecting shadow she swept aglance at the card above the young man's plate. It was inscribed, "LordHexam." She saw her opportunity and asked, ingenuously:
"How can you be a member of the House of Commons?"
He looked up from his fish and replied, somewhat cuttingly, "Bycontesting a borough and getting elected."
"But I thought a peer could not be in the House of Commons."
"He can't."
"Then how can you be?"
"I am not a peer." He looked very much annoyed.
"But you are Lord Hexam."
He answered, sulkily: "I happen to be the son of a peer."
"Are you irritated because I know nothing about you?" asked Isabel,cruelly. "Do you suppose I have wasted my time in England readingBurke?"
"No, there are too many sights," he replied, more cruelly still.
"They are far more interesting than most of the people I have met." Thenshe changed her tactics and smiled upon him; and when she smiled sheshowed a dimple hardly larger than a pin's head at one corner of herflexible mouth. For the first time he looked under her eyelashes intothe odd blue eyes, with their dilated pupils and black rim edging thelight iris. He suddenly realized that she was beautiful, in spite of thethree little black moles on her face--he detested moles--and smiled inreturn.
"I am afraid I was rude. But I am really shy, and you quite took it outof me. I am more afraid of the American girl than of anything on earth."
"How did you know I was an American?"
"By your accent." He laughed good-naturedly. "Now I am even with you."
"Well, you are. Californians pride themselves upon having no accent."
"Oh, it is not nearly so bad as some. But it is there all the same. Nota twang nor a drawl, but--well--every country has its unmistakablestamp."
"Well, I have no desire to be taken for anything but an American," shesaid, defiantly. "A Californian, that is. After all, we are quitedifferent. But we do have an appalling variety of accents in the UnitedStates. I have lived abroad long enough to discover that. When I am anold maid I am going to mount the platform and preach the training of thevoice in childhood. I have taken a violent dislike to more than oneclever American man merely because he trailed his voice through hisnose. I don't mind our vices being criticised as much as our crudities."
"I never before heard an American girl make a remark that indicated theleast interest in her country--even when--pardon me--they brag. Theygenerally give the impression that they don't even know who happens tobe the President of the moment. Somehow, you look as if you might."
"I was brought up by a man, and my uncle was a great politician in asmall way. That is to say he was identified with country politics only,but he and my father were everlastingly discussing the national issues.Of course you have only met girls from the great cities, where the menare too busy making money to take any interest in public affairs. Thewomen rarely hear them mentioned, practically forget there are suchaffairs--except on the Fourth of July, which they resent as a personalgrievance. I have met scores of them in Europe. To know anything ofpolitics they regard as the height of bad form."
"Sometimes I wish that our women would let them alone for a while. Thatis my sister over there," indicating the lady with the Burne-Jones face."She has worn herself to a shadow working for her husband, who is in theHouse, and she is heart and soul in politics--which she regards as asort of divine mission. She is on several committees, is far more usefulto her husband than his secretary, for she has the gift of style--and noone would accuse Rex of that--and during an election she never rests.Besides which, of course she has her little family, the usual number ofestablishments to look after, and great social pressure. I alwaysmaintain that our women are of immense service to us, but many of themare physically unfit. I expect to see my sister go to pieces any day,and as she is little short of an angel it worries me."
"She does look angelic," said Isabel, sympathetically. "Is that what isthe matter with the rest of them?--the thin ones, I mean?"
"Generally speaking. The thinnest is my cousin. I went in for a cup oftea a week or two before the end of last session. There were several ofus about the tea-table when a footman entered and muttered something toher, and with a vague word of apology she left the room and did notreturn for half an hour. I thought the baby must be dying, and was aboutto ring, when she reappeared and remarked that she had been sitting atthe telephone listening to a paper her husband had just finished on oneof the questions before the House. Some of them stand it better." Heindicated a fair beautiful creature with a determined profile and deepwomanly figure. "There is Mrs. Sefton, for instance. She presides atcommittee meetings--she is great on colonial politics--for three or fourhours at a time, and always sails out as fresh as a rose; but she hasburied her husband and entertains when and whom she chooses. LadyCecilia opposite understands politics as well as any woman in England,but does not go in for them--Spence isn't in the House; that may accountfor it!"
"Your fashionable women do not in the least resemble ours," said Isabel,meditatively. "They are far more like the women of our small towns."
"What!"
"It sounds paradoxical, but it is more than half true. Say two-thirds;the other third is all in favor of your women, for obvious reasons. Butthose I speak of, the best women of every small town, are constantlyactive in civic affairs. Most of the sanitary improvements and theeducational, all schemes for parks and better streets, come from them.There is no village too small to have its 'Woman's Improvement Club.'And it is the women that have saved all the historical buildings in thecountry from destruction."
"I thought they we
nt in for Browning Societies."
"Doubtless you would scorn really to know anything of American humor.Perhaps our comic papers have never heard of the Improvement Clubs, orfind nothing in them that is humorous. Not that I would decry theBrowning Clubs, nor any literary clubs, however crude. It is all in theline of progress. 'Culture' is a tempting morsel for the jokemaker, butas an alternative for dull domesticity and the vulgar inanities ofgossip it is not to be despised."
"By Jove, you are right," said Hexam, not without warmth.
"Is my fair cousin converting you to something?" asked the host. Hisvoice had been little heard, and he looked sulky.
"Cousin?"
"Yes, he is my cousin," said Isabel, with the accent of resignation.Hexam laughed. Gwynne looked as if the grace of humor had been left outof him. Isabel, innocent and impassive, turned her eyelashes upon herpartner. "I was quite wild to meet my cousin," she went on, in thetoneless voice that contrasted so effectively with her occasionalextravagance of speech; "and now I find him the precise image of myuncle Hiram, who never spoke to me except to say: 'Little girls shouldbe seen and not heard,' or 'Run off to bed now, little one.'"
Without repitching her voice she yet infused it with a patronizingmasculinity that once more startled Hexam into laughter, and caused asilent convulsion in the massive frame of Lady Cecilia Spence.
"She knows that was a bit of vengeance," thought Isabel. "But of course,manlike, he'll never suspect it." She turned her deep thoughtful gazefull upon her cousin. His eyes were glittering under their heavy lids.He replied, suavely:
"I hope you will find us more polite--if less picturesque. I cannotflatter myself that my likeness to your uncle Hiram extends that far.'Precise image'--is not that perhaps a bit of national exaggeration?"
"Well, I take that back," said Isabel, sweetly. "But you really might behis son instead of his second cousin."
"Perhaps that accounts for a good many things," said Lady Cecilia. "Youknow, Jack, I have always said there was something exotic about you. Youare much too energetic and progressive for this settled old country. Ifyou had been born in America I suppose you would have been president atthe earliest moment the constitution permitted."
He hesitated a moment, then delivered himself of a bombshell. "I wasborn in America," he said.
His eyes moved slowly from one stupefied face to another. "As I left atthe age of five weeks I can hardly claim that the incident left anindelible impress. But the fact remains that I should be eligible forthe presidency if I chose to become an American citizen."
Isabel looked at her relative with an accession of interest; he hadsuddenly ceased to be an alien, become in a measure a personalpossession. "Come over and try it," she said, impulsively. "_There_ is acareer worth while! A young country as full of promise as of faults!Think of the variousness of achievement! England's history is made. Ifyou are all they claim, you might really make history in the UnitedStates. If I only had a brother--" Her eyes were flashing for the firsttime. "However--they say you love the fight. It is far more difficult tobecome a president of the United States than a prime-minister ofEngland, for with us family influence counts for nothing."
"I am afraid I have not the qualities that do count. To be as frank asyourself--I don't think I could stand your politics."
"But think of the excitement of really sounding your capacities!"Impersonality was an achievement with Isabel and she could alwayscommand it. "You can never do that here, no matter how brilliant yoursuccess. There must always be the question of how far you would havegone without your family, and friends of equal power. The ugliest lessonof life is its snobbishness. Even when the herd can expect no return, ablind instinct--doubtless an inheritance from the days when there werebut two classes--drives it to beat the drums for the socially elect. Wehave enough of that in America, heaven knows, but the best thing thatcan be said of American politics is that they are free of it. Besides,if our politics are bad, so much the better for you. You might do forthe United States what your English great-grandfather helped to do forthis country in 1832. You might be another 'Great Revolutioner,' likeyour still more illustrious ancestor, Sam Adams. You'll never, neverhave such an opportunity to become a great historical figure over here,for English dissatisfaction hardly counts, and in the United Statesthere are increasing millions that demand reform, a closer approach tothe ideal republic promised by their ancestors, and the man for thehour."
The angry glitter had left his eyes and he was looking at her withinterest and curiosity. He respected her courage and obvious power torise above the personal attitude of her sex.
"I dislike intensely many things in your country," he said, slowly; "butI will confess that it interests me greatly. If it has failed in some ofits original ideals it has at least continued to be a republic for morethan a century; and when one considers its enormous size and conflictingelements--for I suppose you will not claim that you are a homogeneousrace--that is very inspiring! It makes one believe that fundamentallythe country must be sound--that unswerving fidelity to an ideal. It is agreat thing! a stupendous thing! I wish I knew that I should live tosee England, all Europe, a republic. There is no other state fit forself-respecting men--that voice in the selection of their own rulers."
"By Jove, Jack!" cried Lord Hexam. "I never heard you go as far as thatbefore."
"Possibly you never will again. I have no desire to rank with thosebrilliant failures that are born before their time, and no intention ofwasting my energies on the unattainable. Moreover, radicals andsocialists per se are merely a nuisance. The Liberal party is the onlychoice in England to-day, and when I get it at my back, I can, at least,after I have led it to a stronger position, fight for the soundest ofthe extremist dogmas, as well as for the reorganization of the House ofPeers. Hereditary legislation in the twentieth century and the mostcivilized country in the world! Why not an hereditary army and navy?Russia has few greater anachronisms. And when one thinks of the careersit has ruined! Look at Barnstaple."
The two men plunged into discussion, and Isabel, her eyes expressing apolite interest, studied the face of her cousin. She appreciated for thefirst time something of its power. A brief illumination of his eyes hadbetrayed the soul of the idealist; a passion that in a less sound mindmight result in fanaticism. He was talking with none of the fieryenthusiasm that made him so irresistible a public speaker, but hisnegative suggestion of vitality, of mature thought, his very lack ofevery-day magnetism, fascinated her; not the woman, but the acute,receptive, and antagonistic intelligence. As he sat there talking, withhardly a change of expression in his voice or on his cold face, faintlysneering, he seemed to be holding his powers in solution; to haveresolved them for the time being into their elements, that they mightrest and recuperate. While no doubt in first-rate physical condition, helooked as if he had not a red corpuscle in his body, and this verycontrast to the warm full-blooded people surrounding him gave him adistinction of his own, the distinction of pure brain independent ofthose auxiliaries that few public men have been able to dispense with.It was obvious that he was too self-centred, too haughtily indifferent,or too spoilt, to make any effort in private life to charm or bewilder;when he vanquished from the platform it was by the awakened rush of theforces within him; and this very indifference, this contemptuousknowledge of his mighty reserves, this serene faith in his star,invested his personal unattractiveness with a formidable significance.Isabel's imagination dilated him into a disembodied intellect surroundedby mere statues of human flesh. As she left the dining-room the illusionvanished. She liked him less than ever, nevertheless wished that he wereher brother and the rising star in American politics.
Ancestors: A Novel Page 4