CHAPTER III
Ailsa and her sister-in-law, Mrs. Craig, had been unusuallyreticent over their embroidery that early afternoon, seatedtogether in the front room, which was now flooded with sunshine--anattractive, intimate room, restful and pretty in spite of theunlovely Victorian walnut furniture.
Through a sunny passageway they could look into Ailsa'sbedroom--formerly the children's nursery--where her maid sat sewing.
Outside the open windows, seen between breezy curtains, new budsalready clothed the great twisted ropes of pendant wistaria with asilvery-green down.
The street was quiet under its leafless double row of trees, maple,ailanthus, and catalpa; the old man who trudged his roundsregularly every week was passing now with his muffled shout:
Any old hats Old coats Old boots! _Any_ old mats Old suits, Old flutes! Ca-ash!
And, leaning near to the sill, Ailsa saw him shuffling along,green-baize bag bulging, a pyramid of stove-pipe hats crammed downover his ears.
At intervals from somewhere in the neighbourhood sounded thepleasant bell of the scissors grinder, and the not unmusical callof "Glass put in!" But it was really very tranquil there in thesunshine of Fort Greene Place, stiller even for the fluted call ofan oriole aloft in the silver maple in front of the stoop.
He was a shy bird even though there were no imported sparrows todrive this lovely native from the trees of a sleepy city; and hesat very still in the top branches, clad in his gorgeous livery oforange and black, and scarcely stirred save to slant his head andpeer doubtfully at last year's cocoons, which clung to the barklike shreds of frosted cotton.
Very far away, from somewhere in the harbour, a deep sound jarredthe silence. Ailsa raised her head, needle suspended, listened fora moment, then resumed her embroidery with an unconscious sigh.
Her sister-in-law glanced sideways at her.
"I was thinking of Major Anderson, Celia," she said absently.
"So was I, dear. And of those who must answer for his gove'nment'smadness,--God fo'give them."
There was no more said about the Major or his government. After afew moments Ailsa leaned back dreamily, her gaze wandering aroundthe sunny walls of the room. In Ailsa Paige's eyes there wasalways a gentle caress for homely things. Just now they caressedthe pictures of "Night" and "Morning," hanging there in their roundgilt frames; the window boxes where hyacinths blossomed; theEnglish ivy festooned to frame the window beside hersister-in-law's writing-desk; the melancholy engraving over thefireplace--"The Motherless Bairn"--a commonplace picture whichharrowed her, but which nobody thought of discarding in a day wheneven the commonplace was uncommon.
She smiled in amused reminiscence of the secret tears she had weptover absurd things--of the funerals held for birds found dead--ofthe "Three Grains of Corn" poem which, when a child, elicited fromher howls of anguish.
Little golden flashes of recollection lighted the idle path as herthoughts wandered along hazy ways which led back to her own nurserydays; and she rested there, in memory, dreaming through thestillness of the afternoon.
She missed the rattle and noise of New York. It was a little tootranquil in Fort Greene Place; yet, when she listened intently,through the city's old-fashioned hush, very far away the voices ofthe great seaport were always audible--a ceaseless harmony of riverwhistles, ferry-boats signalling on the East River, ferry-boats onthe North River, perhaps some mellow, resonant blast from the bay,where an ocean liner was heading for the Narrows. Always thestreet's stillness held that singing murmur, vibrant with deepundertones from dock and river and the outer sea.
Strange spicy odours, too, sometimes floated inland from the sugarwharves, miles away under the Heights, to mingle with the scent oflilac and iris in quiet, sunny backyards where whitewashed fencesreflected the mid-day glare, and cats dozed in strategicalpositions on grape trellis and tin roofs of extensions, preparedfor war or peace, as are all cats always, at all times.
"Celia!"
Celia Craig looked up tranquilly.
"Has anybody darned Paige's stockings?"
"No, she hasn't, Honey-bell. Paige and Marye must keep theirstockings da'ned. I never could do anything fo' myse'f, and Iwon't have my daughters brought up he'pless."
Ailsa glanced humorously across at her sister-in-law.
"You sweet thing," she said, "you can do anything, and you know it!"
"But I don't like to do anything any mo' than I did befo' I hadto," laughed Celia Craig; and suddenly checked her mirth, listeningwith her pretty close-set ears.
"That is the do'-bell," she remarked, "and I am not dressed."
"It's almost too early for anybody to call," said Ailsa tranquilly.
But she was wrong, and when, a moment later, the servant came toannounce Mr. Berkley, Ailsa regarded her sister-in-law in pinkconsternation.
"I did _not_ ask him," she said. "We scarcely exchanged a dozenwords. He merely said he'd like to call--on you--and now he's doneit, Celia!"
Mrs. Craig calmly instructed the servant to say that they were athome, and the servant withdrew.
"Do you approve his coming--this way--without anybody invitinghim?" asked Ailsa uneasily.
"Of co'se, Honey-bell. He is a Berkley. He should have paid hisrespects to us long ago."
"It was for him to mention the relationship when I met him. He didnot speak of it, Celia."
"No, it was fo' you to speak of it first," said Celia Craig gently."But you did not know that."
"Why?"
"There are reasons, Honey-bud."
"What reasons?"
"They are not yo' business, dear," said her sister-in-law quietly.
Ailsa had already risen to examine herself in the mirror. Now shelooked back over her shoulder and down into Celia's prettyeyes--eyes as unspoiled as her own.
In Celia Craig remained that gracious and confident faith inkinship which her Northern marriage had neither extinguished norchilled. The young man who waited below was a Berkley, a kinsman.Name and quality were keys to her hospitality. There was alsoanother key which this man possessed, and it fitted a little lockedcompartment in Celia Craig's heart. But Ailsa had no knowledge ofthis. And now Mrs. Craig was considering the advisability oftelling her--not all, perhaps,--but something of how matters stoodbetween the House of Craig and the House of Berkley. But not howmatters stood with the House of Arran.
"Honey-bud," she said, "you must be ve'y polite to this young man."
"I expect to be. Only I don't quite understand why he came sounceremoniously----"
"It would have been ruder to neglect us, little Puritan! I want tosee Connie Berkley's boy. I'm glad he came."
Celia Craig, once Celia Marye Ormond Paige, stood watching hertaller sister-in-law twisting up her hair and winding the thickbraid around the crown of her head _a la coronal_. Little wonderthat these two were so often mistaken for own sisters--the matronnot quite as tall as the young widow, but as slender, and fair, andcast in the same girlish mould.
Both inherited from their Ormond ancestry slightly arched anddainty noses and brows, delicate hands and feet, and the samesplendid dull-gold hair--features apparently characteristic of theline, all the women of which had been toasts of a hundred yearsago, before Harry Lee hunted men and the Shadow of the Swamp Foxflitted through the cypress to a great king's undoing.
Ailsa laid a pink bow against her hair and glanced at hersister-in-law for approval.
"I declare. Honey-bud, you are all rose colour to-day," said CeliaCraig, smiling; and, on impulse, unpinned the pink-and-white cameofrom her own throat and fastened it to Ailsa's breast.
"I reckon I'll slip on a gay gown myse'f," she added mischievously."I certainly am becoming ve'y tired of leaving the field to mysister-in-law, and my schoolgirl daughters."
"Does anybody ever look at us after you come into a room?" askedAilsa, laughing; and, turning impulsively, she pressed Celia'spretty hands flat together and kissed them. "You darling," shesaid. An unaccountable sense of expect
ancy--almost of exhilarationwas taking possession of her. She looked into the mirror and stoodcontent with what she saw reflected there.
"How much of a relation is he, Celia?" balancing the rosy bow witha little cluster of pink hyacinth on the other side.
Celia Craig, forefinger crooked across her lips, considered aloud.
"_His_ mother was bo'n Constance Berkley; _her_ mother was bo'nBetty Ormond; _her_ mother was bo'n Felicity Paige; _her_mother----"
"Oh please! I don't care to know any more!" protested Ailsa,drawing her sister-in-law before the mirror; and, standing behindher, rested her soft, round chin on her shoulder, regarding the tworeflected faces.
"That," observed the pretty Southern matron, "is conside'd ve'y badluck. When I was a young girl I once peeped into the glass over myole mammy's shoulder, and she said I'd sho'ly be punished befo' theyear was done."
"And were you?"
"I don't exactly remember," said Mrs. Craig demurely, "but I thinkI first met my husband the ve'y next day."
They both laughed softly, looking at each other in the mirror.
So, in her gown of rosy muslin, bouffant and billowy, a pink flowerin her hair, and Celia's pink-and-white cameo at her whiter throatAilsa Paige descended the carpeted stairs and came into the mellowdimness of the front parlour, where there was much rosewood, and aFrench carpet, and glinting prisms on the chandeliers,--and a youngman, standing, dark against a bar of sunshine in which golden motesswam.
"How do you do," she said, offering her narrow hand, and: "Mrs.Craig is dressing to receive you. . . . It is warm for April, Ithink. How amiable of you to come all the way over from New York.Mr. Craig and his son Stephen are at business, my cousins, Paigeand Marye, are at school. Won't you sit down?"
She had backed away a little distance from him, looking at himunder brows bent slightly inward, and thinking that she had made nomistake in her memory of this man. Certainly his features werealtogether too regular, his head and body too perfectly mouldedinto that dark and graceful symmetry which she had hitherto vaguelyassociated with things purely and mythologically Olympian.
Upright against the doorway, she suddenly recollected with a blushthat she was staring like a schoolgirl, and sat down. And he drewup a chair before her and seated himself; and then under thebillowy rose crinoline she set her pretty feet close together,folded her hands, and looked at him with a smiling composure whichshe no longer really felt.
"The weather," she repeated, "is unusually warm. Do you think thatMajor Anderson will hold out at Sumter? Do you think the fleet isgoing to relieve him? Dear me," she sighed, "where will it allend, Mr. Berkley?"
"In war," he said, also smiling; but neither of them believed it,or, at the moment, cared. There were other mattersimpending--since their first encounter.
"I have thought about you a good deal since Camilla's theatreparty," he said pleasantly.
"Have you?" She scarcely knew what else to say--and regrettedsaying anything.
"Indeed I have. I dare not believe you have wasted as much as onethought on the man you danced with once--and refused ever after."
She felt, suddenly, a sense of uneasiness in being near him.
"Of course I have remembered you, Mr. Berkley," she said withcomposure. "Few men dance as well. It has been an agreeablememory to me."
"But you would not dance with me again."
"I--there were--you seemed perfectly contented to sit out--therest--with me."
He considered the carpet attentively. Then looking up with quick,engaging smile:
"I want to ask you something. May I?"
She did not answer. As it had been from the first time she hadever seen him, so it was now with her; a confused sense of thenecessity for caution in dealing with a man who had inspired in hersuch an unaccountable inclination to listen to what he chose to say.
"What is it you wish to ask?" she inquired pleasantly.
"It is this: are you _really_ surprised that I came? Are you, inyour heart?"
"Did I appear to be very much agitated? Or my heart, either, Mr.Berkley?" she asked with a careless laugh, conscious now of herquickening pulses. Outwardly calm, inwardly Irresolute, she facedhim with a quiet smile of confidence.
"Then you were not surprised that I came?" he insisted.
"You did not wait to be asked. That surprised me a little."
"I did wait. But you didn't ask me."
"That seems to have made no difference to you," she retorted,laughing.
"It made this difference. I seized upon the only excuse I had andcame to pay my respects as a kinsman. Do you know that I am arelation?"
"That is a very pretty compliment to us all, I think."
"It is you who are kind in accepting me."
"As a relative, I am very glad to----"
"I came," he said, "to see _you_. And you know it."
"But you _couldn't_ do that, uninvited! I had not asked you."
"But--it's done," he said.
She sat very still, considering him. Within her, subtle currentsseemed to be contending once more, disturbing her equanimity. Shesaid, sweetly:
"I am not as offended as I ought to be. But I do not see why youshould disregard convention with me."
"I didn't mean it that way," he said, leaning forward. "I couldn'tstand not seeing you. That was all. Convention is a pitifulthing--sometimes--" He hesitated, then fell to studying the carpet.
She looked at him, silent in her uncertainty. His expression wasgrave, almost absent-minded. And again her troubled eyes rested onthe disturbing symmetry of feature and figure in all theunconscious grace of repose; and in his immobility there seemedsomething even of nobility about him which she had not beforenoticed.
She stole another glance at him. He remained very still, leaningforward, apparently quite oblivious of her. Then he came tohimself with a quick smile, which she recognised as characteristicof all that disturbed her about this man--a smile in which therewas humour, a little malice and self-sufficiency and--many, manythings she did not try to analyse.
"Don't you really want an unreliable servant?" he asked.
His perverse humour perplexed her, but she smiled.
"Don't you remember that I once asked you if you needed anable-bodied man?" he insisted.
She nodded.
"Well, I'm that man."
She assented, smiling conventionally, not at all understanding. Helaughed, too, thoroughly enjoying something.
"It isn't really very funny," he said, "Ask your brother-in-law. Ihad an interview with him before I came here. And I think there'sa chance that he may give me a desk and a small salary in hisoffice."
"How absurd!" she said.
"It is rather absurd. I'm so absolutely useless. It's onlybecause of the relationship that Mr. Craig is doing this."
She said uneasily: "You are not really serious, are you?"
"Grimly serious."
"About a--a desk and a salary--in my brother-in-law's office?"
"Unless you'll hire me as a useful man. Otherwise, I hope for abig desk and a small salary. I went to Mr. Craig this morning, andthe minute I saw him I knew he was fine enough to be yourbrother-in-law. And I said, 'I am Philip Ormond Berkley; how doyou do!' And he said, 'How do you do!' And I said, 'I'm arelation,' and he said, 'I believe so.' And I said, 'I waseducated at Harvard and in Leipsic; I am full of uselessaccomplishments, harmless erudition, and insolvent amiability, andI am otherwise perfectly worthless. Can you give me a position?'"
"And he said: 'What else is the matter?' And I said, 'The stockmarket.' And that is how it remains, I am to call on himto-morrow."
She said in consternation: "Forgive me. I did not think you meantit. I did not know that you were--were----"
"Ruined!" he nodded laughingly. "I am, practically. I have alittle left--badly invested--which I'm trying to get at. Otherwisematters are gay enough."
She said wonderingly: "Had this happened when--I saw you that first
time?"
"It had just happened. I looked the part, didn't I?"
"No. _How_ could you be so--interesting and--and be--what youwere--knowing this all the while?"
"I went to that party absolutely stunned. I saw you in a corner ofthe box--I had just been hearing about you--and--I don't know nowwhat I said to you. Afterward"--he glanced at her--"the world wasspinning, Mrs. Paige. You only remained real--" His face alteredsubtly. "And when I touched you----"
"I gave you a waltz, I believe," she said, striving to speaknaturally; but her pulses had begun to stir again; the sameinexplicable sense of exhilaration and insecurity was creeping overher.
With a movement partly nervous she turned toward the door, butthere sounded no rustle of her sister's skirts from the stairs, andher reluctant eyes slowly reverted to him, then fell in silence,out of which she presently strove to extract them both with somecasual commonplace.
He said in a low voice, almost to himself:
"I want you to think well of me."
She gathered all her composure, steadied her senses to choose areply, and made a blunder:
"Do you really care what I think?" she asked lightly, and bit herlip too late.
"Do you believe I care about anything else in the world--now?"
She went on bravely, blindly:
"And do _you_ expect me to believe in--in such an exaggerated andromantic expression to a staid and matter-of-fact widow whom younever saw more than once in your life?"
"You _do_ believe it."
Confused, scarcely knowing what she was saying, she still attemptedto make light of his words, holding her own against herself for themoment, making even some headway. And all the while she was awareof mounting emotion--a swift inexplicable charm falling over themboth.
He had become silent again, and she was saying she knew notwhat--fortifying her common-sense with gay inconsequences, when helooked up straight into her eyes.
"I have distressed you. I should not have spoken as I did."
"No, you should not----"
"Have I offended you?"
"I--don't know."
Matters were running too swiftly for her; she strove to remaincool, collected, but confusion was steadily threatening her, andneither resentment nor indifference appeared as allies.
"Mrs. Paige, can you account for--that night? The moment I touchedyou----"
She half rose, sank back into her seat, her startled eyes meetinghis.
"I--don't know what you mean."
"Yes--you know."
Flushed, voices unsteady, they no longer recognised themselves.
"You have never seen me but once," she said. "You cannotbelieve----"
"I have not known a moment's peace since I first saw you."
She caught her breath. "It is your business worries that tormentyou----"
"It is desire to be near you."
"I don't think you had better say such a thing----"
"I know I had better not. But it is said, and it is true. I'm nottrying to explain it to you or to myself. It's just true. Therehas not been one moment, since I saw you, which has been free frommemory of you----"
"Please----"
"I scarcely know what I am saying--but it's true!" He checkedhimself. "I'm losing my head now, which isn't like me!" He chokedand stood up; she could not move; every nerve in her had becometense with emotions so bewildering that mind and body remainedfettered.
He was walking to and fro, silent and white under his self-control.She, seated, gazed at him as though stunned, but every pulse wasriotously unsteady.
"I suppose you think me crazy," he said hoarsely, "but I've notknown a moment's peace of mind since that night--not one! I_couldn't_ keep away any longer. I can't even hold my tongue now,though I suppose it's ruining me every time I move it. It's acrazy thing to come here and say what I'm saying."
He went over and sat down again, and bent his dark gaze on thefloor. Then:
"Can you forgive what I have done to you?"
She tried to answer, and only made a sign of faint assent. She nolonger comprehended herself or the emotions menacing her. Acurious tranquillity quieted her at moments--intervals in which sheseemed to sit apart watching the development of another woman,listening to her own speech, patient with her own silences. Therewas a droop to her shoulders now; his own were sagging as he leanedslightly forward in his chair, arms resting on his knees, whilearound them the magic ebbed, eddied, ebbed; and lassitude succeededtension; and she stirred, looked up at him with eyes that seemeddazed at first, then widened slowly into waking; and he saw in themthe first clear dawn of alarm. Suddenly she flushed and sprang toher feet, the bright colour surging to her hair.
"Don't!" he said. "Don't reason! There will be nothing left of meif you do--or of, these moments. You will hate them--and me, ifyou reason. Don't think--until we see each other again!"
She dropped her eyes slowly, and slowly shook her head.
"You ask too much," she said. "You should not have said that."All the glamour was fading. Her senses were seeking their balanceafter the incredible storm that had whirled them into chaos.
Fear stirred sharply, then consternation--flashes of panic piercedher with darts of shame, as though she had been in physical contactwith this man.
All her outraged soul leaped to arms, quivering now under thereaction; the man's mere presence was becoming unendurable; theroom stifled her. She turned, scarce knowing what she was doing;and at the same moment her sister-in-law entered.
Berkley, already on his feet, turned short: and when she offeredhim a hand as slim and white as Ailsa's, he glanced inquiringly atthe latter, not at all certain who this charming woman might be.
"Mrs. Craig," said Ailsa.
"I don't believe it," he said. "You haven't grown-up children!"
"Don't you really believe it, Mr. Berkley? Or is it just theflattering Irish in you that natters us poor women to ourdestruction?"
He had sense and wit enough to pay her a quick and really gracefulcompliment; to which she responded, still laughing:
"Oh, it is the Ormond in you! I am truly ve'y glad you came. Youare Constance Berkley's son--Connie Berkley! The sweetest girlthat ever lived."
There was a silence. Then Mrs. Craig said gently:
"I was her maid of honour, Mr. Berkley."
Ailsa raised her eyes to his altered face, startled at the changein it. He looked at her absently, then his gaze reverted to AilsaPaige.
"I loved her dearly," said Mrs. Craig, dropping a light, impulsivehand on his. "I want her son to know it."
Her eyes were soft and compassionate; her hand still lingeredlightly on his, and she let it rest so.
"Mrs. Craig," he said, "_you_ are the most real person I have knownin many years among the phantoms. I thought your sister-in-lawwas. But you are still more real."
"Am I?" she laid her other hand over his, considering himearnestly. Ailsa looking on, astonished, noticed a singularradiance on his face--the pale transfiguration from some quickinward illumination.
Then Celia Craig's voice sounded almost caressingly:
"I think you should have come to see us long ago." A pause. "Youare as welcome in this house as your mother would be if she wereliving. I love and honour her memory."
"I have honoured little else in the world," he said. They lookedat one another for a moment; then her quick smile broke out. "Ihave an album. There are some Paiges, Ormonds, and Berkleys init----"
Ailsa came forward slowly.
"Shall I look for it, Celia?"
"No, Honey-bell." She turned lightly and went into the backparlour, smiling mysteriously to herself, her vast, pale-bluecrinoline rustling against the furniture.
"My sister-in-law," said Ailsa, after an interval of silentconstraint, "is very Southern. Any sort of kinship means a greatdeal to her. I, of course, am Northern, and regard such matters asunimportant."
"It is very gracious of Mrs. Craig to remember it," he sa
id. "Iknow nothing finer than confidence in one's own kin."
She flushed angrily. "I have not that confidence--in kinsman."
For a moment their eyes met. Hers were hard as purple steel.
"Is that final?"
"Yes."
The muscles in his cheeks grew tense, then into his eyes came thatreckless glimmer which in the beginning she had distrusted--a gay,irresponsible radiance which seemed to mock at all things worthy.
He said: "No, it is not final. I shall come back to you."
She answered him in an even, passionless voice:
"A moment ago I was uncertain; now I know you. You are what theysay you are. I never wish to see you again."
Celia Craig came back with the album. Berkley sprang to relieveher of the big book and a box full of silhouettes, miniatures, anddaguerreotypes. They placed the family depository upon the tableand then bent over it together.
Ailsa remained standing by the window, looking steadily at nothing,a burning sensation in both cheeks.
At intervals, through the intensity of her silence, she heardCelia's fresh, sweet laughter, and Berkley's humorous and engagingvoice. She glanced sideways at the back of his dark curly headwhere it bent beside Celia's over the album. What an insolentlyreckless head it was! She thought that she had never before seenthe back of any man's head so significant of character--or the wantof it. And the same quality--or the lack of it--now seemed to herto pervade his supple body, his well-set shoulders, his voice,every movement, every feature--something everywhere about him thatwarned and troubled.
"What an insolently reckless head it was!"]
Suddenly the blood burnt her cheeks with a perfectlyincomprehensible desire to see his face again. She heard hersister-in-law saying:
"We Paiges and Berkleys are kin to the Ormonds and the Earls ofOssory. The Estcourts, the Paiges, the Craigs, the Lents, theBerkleys, intermarried a hundred years ago. . . . My grandmotherknew yours, but the North is very strange in such matters. . . .Why did you never before come?"
He said: "It's one of those things a man is always expecting to do,and is always astonished that he hasn't done. Am I unpardonable?"
"I did not mean it in that way."
He turned his dark, comely head and looked at her as they benttogether above the album.
"I know you didn't. My answer was not frank. The reason I nevercame to you before was that--I did not know I would be welcomed."
Their voices dropped. Ailsa standing by the window, watching theorioles in the maple, could no longer distinguish what they weresaying.
He said: "You were bridesmaid to my mother. You are the CeliaPaige of her letters."
"She is always Connie Berkley to me. I loved no woman better. Ilove her still."
"I found that out yesterday. That is why I dared come. I found,among the English letters, one from you to her, written--_after_."
"I wrote her again and again. She never replied. Thank God, sheknew I loved her to the last."
He rested on the tabletop and stood leaning over and looking down.
"Dear Mr. Berkley," she murmured gently.
He straightened himself, passed a hesitating hand across hisforehead, ruffling the short curly hair. Then his preoccupied gazewandered. Ailsa turned toward him at the same moment, andinstantly a flicker of malice transformed the nobility of his setfeatures:
"It seems," he said, "that you and I are irrevocably related in allkinds of delightful ways, Mrs. Paige. Your sister-in-law verycharmingly admits it, graciously overlooks and pardons my manydelinquencies, and has asked me to come again. Will you ask me,too?"
Ailsa merely looked at him.
Mrs. Craig said, laughing: "I knew you were all Ormond and entirelyIrish as soon as I came in the do'--befo' I became aware of yourracial fluency. I speak fo' my husband and myse'f when I say,please remember that our do' is ve'y wide open to our own kin--andthat you are of them----"
"Oh, I'm all sorts of things beside--" He paused for asecond--"Cousin Celia," he added so lightly that the grace withwhich he said it covered the impudence, and she laughed insemi-critical approval and turned to Ailsa, whose smile in responsewas chilly--chillier still when Berkley did what few men have doneconvincingly since powdered hair and knee-breeches becameunfashionable--bent to salute Celia Craig's fingertips. Then heturned to her and took his leave of her in a conventional mannerentirely worthy of the name his mother bore,--and her mother beforeher, and many a handsome man and many a beautiful woman back totimes when a great duke stood unjustly attainted, and the Ormondsserved their king with steel sword and golden ewer; and served himfaithfully and well.
Camilla Lent called a little later. Ailsa was in the backyardgarden, a trowel in her hand, industriously loosening the eartharound the prairie roses.
"Camilla," she said, looking up from where she was kneeling amongthe shrubs, "what was it you said this morning about Mr. Berkleybeing some unpleasant kind of man?"
"How funny," laughed Camilla. "You asked me that twice before."
"Did I? I forgot," said Mrs. Paige with a shrug; and, bending overagain, became exceedingly busy with her trowel until the fire inher cheeks had cooled.
"Every woman that ever saw him becomes infatuated with PhilBerkley," said Camilla cheerfully. "I was. You will be. And theworst of it is he's simply not worth it."
"I--thought not."
"Why did you think not?"
"I don't know why."
"He _can_ be fascinating," said Camilla reflectively, "but hedoesn't always trouble himself to be."
"Doesn't he?" said Ailsa with a strange sense of relief.
Camilla hesitated, lowered her voice.
"They say he is fast," she whispered. Ailsa, on her knees, turnedand looked up.
"Whatever that means," added Camilla, shuddering. "But all thesame, every girl who sees him begins to adore him immediately untilher parents make her stop."
"How silly," said Ailsa in a leisurely level voice. But her heartwas beating furiously, and she turned to her roses with a blindenergy that threatened them root and runner.
"How did you happen to think of him at all?" continued Camillamischievously.
"He called on--Mrs. Craig this afternoon."
"I didn't know she knew him."
"They are related--distantly--I believe----"
"Oh," exclaimed Camilla. "I'm terribly sorry I spoke that wayabout him, dear----"
"_I_ don't care what you say about him," returned Ailsa Paigefiercely, emptying some grains of sand out of one of her gloves;resolutely emptying her mind, too, of Philip Berkley.
"Dear," she added gaily to Camilla, "come in and we'll have tea andgossip, English fashion. And I'll tell you about my new duties atthe Home for Destitute Children--every morning from ten to twelve,my dear, in their horrid old infirmary--the poor littledarlings!--and I would be there all day if I wasn't a selfish,indolent, pleasure-loving creature without an ounce of womanlyfeeling--Yes I am! I must be, to go about to galleries and dancesand Philharmonics when there are motherless children in thatinfirmary, as sick for lack of love as for the hundred and oneailments distressing their tender little bodies."
But over their tea and marmalade and toast she became lesscommunicative; and once or twice the conversation betrayed anunexpected tendency to drift toward Berkley.
"I haven't the slightest curiosity concerning him, dear," saidAilsa, attempting corroboration in a yawn--which indiscretion shewas unable to accomplish.
"Well," remarked Camilla, "the chances are that you've seen thelast of him if you showed it too plainly. Men don't come back whena girl doesn't wish them to. Do they?"
After Camilla had gone, Ailsa roamed about the parlours, apparentlyrenewing her acquaintance with the familiar decorations.Sometimes she stood at windows, looking thoughtfully into the emptystreet; sometimes she sat in corners, critically surveying emptyspace.
Yes, the chances were that he would scarcely care to come back. Aman of that kind
did not belong in her sister-in-law's house,anyway, nor in her own--a man who could appeal to a woman for afavourable opinion of himself, asking her to suspend her reason,stifle logic, stultify her own intelligence, and trust to asentimental impulse that he deserved the toleration andconsideration which he asked for. . . . It was certainly well forher that he should not return. . . . It would be better for her tolay the entire matter before her sister-in-law--that was what shewould do immediately!
She sprang to her feet and ran lightly up-stairs; but, fast as shefled, thought outran her slender flying feet, and she came at lastvery leisurely into Celia's room, a subdued, demure opportunist,apparently with nothing on her mind and conscience,
"If I may have the carriage at ten, Celia, I'll begin on theDestitute Children to-morrow. . . . Poor babies! . . . If theyonly had once a week as wholesome food as is wasted in this cityevery day by Irish servants . . . which reminds me--I suppose youwill have to invite your new kinsman to dine with you."
"There is loads of time for that, Honey-bud," said hersister-in-law, glancing up absently from the note she was writing.
"I was merely wondering whether it was necessary at all," observedAilsa Paige, without interest.
But Celia had begun to write again. "I'll ask him," she said inher softly preoccupied voice, "Saturday, I think."
"Oh, but I'm invited to the Cortlandt's," began Ailsa, and caughther under lip in her teeth. Then she turned and walked noiselesslyinto her bedroom, and sat down on the bed and looked at the wall.
Ailsa Paige: A Novel Page 3