The Buccaneers

by Edith Wharton

  “You look ten years younger; you look young, I mean, Val dear,” she corrected herself with a smile.

  “Well, that’s the way I want you to look, my child. No; don’t ring for your maid—not yet! First let me look through your dresses and tell you what to wear this evening. You know, dear, you’ve never thought enough about the little things; and one fine day, if one doesn’t, they may suddenly grow into tremendously big ones.” She lowered her fine lids. “That’s the reason I’m letting my hair wave a little more. Not too much, you think? ... Tell me, Nan, is your maid clever about hair?”

  Nan shook her head. “I don’t believe she is. My mother-in-law found her for me,” she confessed, remembering Conchita’s ironic comment on the horn buttons of her dressing-gown.... “Lady Churt?—Is that the Lady Churt Jinny and Lizzy and Mabel once told us about?”

  “The same. She stopped here on her way from one house-party to another. To tell the truth, Lady Glenloe was a bit unhappy. That old scandal with Lord Seadown hasn’t been forgotten, and neither Lady Glenloe nor I was sure about letting Kitty and Cora meet her. But she couldn’t very well be refused when she wrote to invite herself; and it was a simple family dinner, none of the sons was here, even; and nothing was said that the girls shouldn’t have heard. They saw nothing remarkable about her except, as I say, her wonderful French paints and powders and lotions!”

  Presently Lady Glenloe appeared, brisk and brown, in rough tweed and shabby furs. She was as insensible to heat and cold as she was to most of the finer shades of sensation, and her dress always conformed to the calendar, without taking account of such unimportant trifles as latitudes.

  “Ah, I’m glad you’ve got a good fire. They tell me it’s very cold this evening. So delighted you’ve come, my dear; you must need a change and a rest after a series of those big Longlands parties. I’ve always wondered how your mother-in-law stood the strain.... Here you’ll find only the family—we don’t go in for any ceremony at Champions—but I hope you’ll like being with my girls.... By the way, dinner may be a trifle late; you won’t mind? The fact is, Sir Helmsley Thwarte sent a note this morning to ask if he might come and dine, and bring his son, who’s at Honourslove. You know Sir Helmsley, of course? And Guy—he’s been with you at Longlands, hasn’t he? We must all drive over to Honourslove.... Sir Helmsley’s a most friendly neighbour; we see him here very often, don’t we, Miss Testvalley?”

  The governess’s head was bent to the grate, from which a coal had fallen. “When Mr. Thwarte’s there, Sir Helmsley naturally likes to take him about, I suppose,” she murmured to the tongs.

  “Ah, just so!—Guy ought to marry,” Lady Glenloe announced. “I must get some young people to meet him the next time he comes.... You know that there was an unfortunate marriage at Rio—but, luckily, the young woman died ... leaving him a fortune, I believe. Ah, I must send word at once to the cook that Sir Helmsley likes his beef rather underdone.... Sir Helmsley’s very particular about his food.... But now I’ll leave you to rest, my dear. And don’t make yourself too fine. We’re used to pot-luck at Champions.”

  Annabel, left alone, stood pondering before her glass. She was to see Guy Thwarte that evening—and Miss Testvalley had reproached her for not thinking enough about the details of her dress and hair. Hair-dressing had always been a much-discussed affair among the St. George ladies, but something winged and impatient in Nan resisted the slow torture of adjusting puffs and curls. Regarding herself as the least noticeable in a group where youthful beauty carried its torch so high, and convinced that, wherever they went, the other girls would always be the centre of attention, Nan had never thought it worth while to waste much time on her inconspicuous person. The Duke had not married her for her beauty—how could she imagine it, when he might have chosen Virginia? Indeed, he had mentioned, in the course of his odd wooing, that beautiful women always frightened him, and that the qualities he especially valued in Nan were her gentleness and her inexperience—“And certainly I was inexperienced enough,” she meditated, as she stood before the mirror; “but I’m afraid he hasn’t found me particularly gentle.”

  She continued to study her reflection critically, wondering whether Miss Testvalley was right, and she owed it to herself to dress her hair more becomingly, and wear her jewels as if she hadn’t merely hired them for a fancy-ball. (The comparison was Miss Testvalley’s.) She could imagine taking an interest in her hair, even studying the effect of a flower or a ribbon skilfully placed; but she knew she could never feel at ease under the weight of the Tintagel heirlooms. Luckily, the principal pieces, ponderous coronets and tiaras, massive necklaces and bracelets hung with stones like rocs’ eggs, were locked up in a London bank, and would probably not be imposed upon her except at Drawing-rooms or receptions for foreign sovereigns; yet even the less ceremonious ornaments, which Virginia or Conchita would have carried off with such an air, seemed too imposing for her slight presence.

  But now, for the first time, she felt a desire to assert herself, to live up to her opportunities. “After all, I’m Annabel Tintagel, and as I can’t help myself I might as well try to make the best of it.” Perhaps Miss Testvalley was right. Already she seemed to breathe more freely, to feel a new air in her lungs. It was her first escape from the long oppression of Tintagel and Longlands, and the solemn London house; and freed from the restrictions they imposed, and under the same roof with the only two friends who truly understood her, she felt her spirits rising. “I know I’m always too glad or too sad—like that girl in the German play that Miss Testvalley read to me,” she said to herself, and wondered whether Guy Thwarte knew Clarchen’s song, and would think her conceited if she told him she had always felt that a little bit of herself was Clarchen. “There are so many people in me,” she thought; but tonight the puzzling idea of her multiplicity cheered instead of bewildering her.... “There can’t be too many happy Nans,” she thought with a smile, as she drew on her long gloves.

  Her maid had had to take her hair down twice before each coil and ripple was placed to the best advantage of her small head, and in proper relation to the diamond briar-rose on the shoulder of her coral-pink poult-de-soie.

  When she entered the drawing-room she found it empty; but the next moment Guy Thwarte appeared, and she went up to him impulsively.

  “Oh, I’m so glad you’re here. I’ve been wanting to tell you how sorry I am to have behaved so stupidly the day you found me in the temple—” “of Love,” she had been about to add; but the absurdity of the designation checked her. She reddened and went on: “I wanted to write and tell you; but I couldn’t. I’m not good at letters.”

  Guy was looking at her, visibly surprised at the change in her appearance, and the warm animation of her voice. “This is better than writing,” he rejoined, with a smile. “I’m glad to see you so changed—looking so ... so much happier....”

  (“Already?” she reflected guiltily, realizing that she had been away from Longlands only a few hours!)

  “Yes, I am happier. Miss Testvalley says I’m always going up and down.... And I wanted to tell you—do you remember Clärchen’s song?” she began in an eager voice, feeling her tongue loosened and her heart at ease with him again.

  Lady Glenloe’s ringing accents interrupted them. “My dear Duchess! You’ve been looking for us? I’m so sorry. I had carried everybody off to my son’s study to see this extraordinary new thing—this telephone, as they call it. I brought it back with me the other day from the States. It’s a curious toy; but to you, of course, it’s no novelty. In America they’re already talking from one town to another—yes, actually! Mine goes only as far as the lodge, but I’m urging Sir Helmsley Thwarte to put one in at Honourslove, so that we can have a good gossip together over the crops and the weather.... But he says he’s afraid it will unchain all the bores in the county.... Sir Helmsley, I think you know the Duchess? I’m going to persuade her to put in a telephone at Longlands.... We English are so backward. They have them in all the principal hotels in
New York; and when I was in St. Petersburg last winter they were actually talking of having one between the Imperial Palace and Tsarskoe—”

  The old butler appeared, to announce dinner, and the procession formed itself, headed by Annabel on the arm of the son from the Petersburg Embassy.

  “Yes, at Tsarskoë I’ve seen the Empress talking over it herself. She uses it to communicate with the nurseries,” the diplomatist explained impressively; and Nan wondered why they were all so worked up over an object already regarded as a domestic utensil in America. But it was all a part of the novelty and excitement of being at Champions, and she thought with a smile how much less exhilarating the subjects of conversation of a Longlands dinner would have been.

  XXIX.

  The Champions party chose a mild day of February for the drive to Honourslove. The diplomatic son conducted the Duchess, his mother and Miss Testvalley followed in the wagonette, and the others followed in various vehicles piloted by sons and daughters of the house. For two hours they drove through the tawny winter landscape bounded by hills veiled in blue mist, traversing villages clustered about silver-gray manor-houses, and a little market-town with a High Street bordered by the wool-merchants’ stately dwellings, and guarded by a sturdy church-tower. The dark green of rhododendron plantations made autumn linger under the bare woods; on house-fronts sheltered from the wind, the naked jasmine was already starred with gold. This merging of the seasons, so unlike the harsh break between summer and winter in America, had often touched Nan’s imagination; but she had never felt as now the mild loveliness of certain winter days in England. It all seemed part of the unreality of her sensations, and as the carriage turned in at the gates of Honourslove, she recalled her only other visit there, when she and Guy Thwarte had stood alone on the terrace before the house, and found not a word to say. Poor Nan St. George—so tongue-tied and bewildered by the surge of her feelings; why had no one taught her the words for them? As the carriage drew up before the door, she seemed to see the pitiful figure of herself at eighteen flit by like a ghost; but in a moment it vanished in the warm air of the present.

  The day was so soft that Lady Glenloe insisted on a turn through the gardens before luncheon; and, as usual when a famous country-house is visited, the guests found themselves following the prescribed itinerary, saying the proper things about the view from the terrace, descending the steep path to the mossy glen of the Love, and returning by the walled gardens and the chapel.

  Their host, heading the party with the Duchess and Lady Glenloe, had begun his habitual and slightly ironic summary of the family history. Lady Glenloe lent it an inattentive ear; but Annabel hung on his words, and, always quick to discover an appreciative listener, he soon dropped his bantering note to unfold the romantic tale of the old house. Annabel felt that he understood her questions, and sympathized with her curiosity, and as they turned away from the chapel he said, with his quick smile: “I see Miss Testvalley was right, Duchess—she always is. She told me you were the only foreigner she’d ever known who cared for the real deep-down England, rather than the sham one of the London drawing-rooms.”

  Nan flushed with pride; it still made her as happy to be praised by Miss Testvalley as when the little brown governess had sniffed appreciatively at the posy her pupil had brought her on her first evening at Saratoga.

  “I’m afraid I shall always feel strange in London drawing-rooms,” Nan answered; “but that hidden-away life of England, the old houses and their histories, and all the far-back things the old people hand on to their grandchildren—they seem so natural and home-like. And Miss Testvalley, who’s a foreigner too, has shown me better than anybody how to appreciate them.”

  “Ah—that’s it. We English are spoilt; we’ve ceased to feel the beauty, to listen to the voices. But you and she come to it with fresh eyes and fresh imaginations—you happen to be blessed with both. I wish more of our Englishwomen felt it all as you do. After luncheon you must go through the old house, and let it talk to you. You hadn’t enough time for it when you came before. My son, who knows it all even better than I do, will show it to you....”

  “I remember a painting by Hoibein—a young man in Tudor dress, with a sensitive face.”

  “Ah! Yes, the portrait of Brereton Thwarte ... Poor chap, he has his niche in history. He was one of the men accused of being Queen Anne Boleyn’s lovers. He was beheaded before her eyes, before she was executed.”

  “You spoke the other day about Clärchen’s song—the evening my father and I drove over to dine at Champions,” Guy Thwarte said suddenly.

  He and Annabel, at the day’s end, had drifted out again to the wide terrace. They had visited the old house, room by room, lingering long over each picture—the Cavalier Thwarte, and the Holbein—each piece of rare old furniture or tapestry, and already the winter afternoon was fading out in crimson distances overhung by twilight. In the hall Lady Glenloe had collected her party for departure.

  “Oh, Clärchen? Yes—when my spirits were always jumping up and down Miss Testvalley used to call me Clärchen, just to tease me.”

  “And doesn’t she, any longer? I mean, don’t your spirits jump up and down any more?”

  “Well, I’m afraid they do sometimes. Miss Testvalley says things are never as bad as I think, or as good as I expect—but I’d rather have the bad hours than not believe in the good ones, wouldn’t you? What really frightens me is not caring for anything any more. Don’t you think that’s worse?”

  “That’s the worst, certainly. But it’s never going to happen to you, Duchess.”

  Her face lit up. “Oh, do you think so? I’m not sure. Things seem to last so long—as if in the end they were bound to wear people out. Sometimes life seems like a match between oneself and one’s gaolers. The gaolers, of course, are one’s mistakes; and the question is, who’ll hold out longest? When I think of that, life, instead of being too long, seems as short as a winter day.... Oh, look, the lights already, over there in the valley ... This day’s over. And suddenly you find you’ve missed your chance. You’ve been beaten....”

  “No, no; for there’ll be other days soon. And other chances. Goethe was a very young man when he wrote Clärchen’s song. The next time I come to Champions I’ll bring Faust with me, and show you some of the things life taught him.”

  “Oh, are you coming back to Champions? When? Before I leave?” she asked eagerly; and he answered: “I’ll come whenever Lady Glenloe asks me.”

  Again he saw her face suffused with one of its Clärchen-like illuminations and added, rather hastily: “The fact is, I’ve got to hang about here on account of the possible bye-election at Lowdon. Ushant may have told you—”

  The illumination faded. “He never tells me anything about politics. He thinks women oughtn’t to meddle with such things.”

  Guy laughed. “Well, I rather believe he’s right. But, meanwhile, here I am, waiting rather aimlessly until I’m called upon to meddle.... And as soon as Champions wants me I’ll come.”

  In Sir Helmsley’s study, he and Miss Testvalley were standing together before Sir Helmsley’s copy of the little Rossetti Madonna. The ladies of the party had been carried off to collect their wraps, and their host had seized the opportunity to present his water-colour to Miss Testvalley. “If you think it’s not too bad—”

  Miss Testvalley’s colour rose becomingly. “It’s perfect, Sir Helmsley. If you’ll allow me, I’ll show it to Dante Gabriel the next time I go to see the poor fellow.” She bent appreciatively over the sketch. “And you’ll let me take it off now?”

  “No, I want to have it framed first. But Guy will bring it to you. I understand he’s going to Champions in a day or two for a longish visit.”

  Miss Testvalley made no reply, and her host, who was beginning to know her face well, saw that she was keeping back many comments.

  “You’re not surprised?” he suggested.

  “I—I don’t know.”

  Sir Helmsley laughed. “Perhaps we shall all know
soon. But, meanwhile, let’s be a little indiscreet. Which of the daughters do you put your money on?”

  Miss Testvalley carefully replaced the water-colour on its easel. “The ... the daughters?”

  “Corisande or Kitty ... Why, you must have noticed. The better pleased Lady Glenloe is, the more off-hand her manner becomes. And just now I heard her suggesting to my son to come back to Champions as soon as he could, if he thought he could stand a boring family-party.”

  “Ah—yes.” Miss Testvalley remained lost in contemplation of her water-colour. “And you think Lady Glenloe approves?”

  “Intensely, judging from her indifferent manner.” Sir Helmsley stroked his short beard reflectively. “And I do too. Whichever of the young ladies it is, cela sera de tout repos. Cora’s eyes are very small, but her nose is straighter than Kitty’s. And that’s the kind of thing I want for Guy: something safe and unexciting. Now that he’s managed to scrape together a little money—the first time a Thwarte has ever done it by the work of his hands or his brain—I dread his falling a victim to some unscrupulous woman.”

  “Yes,” Miss Testvalley acquiesced, a faint glint of irony in her fine eyes. “I can imagine how anxious you must be.”

  “Oh, desperately; as anxious as the mother of a flirtatious daughter—”

  “I understand that.”

  “And you make no comment?”

  “I make no comment.”

  “Because you think in this particular case I’m mistaken?”

  “I don’t know.”

  Sir Helmsley glanced through the window at the darkening terrace. “Well, here he is now. And a lady with him. Shall we toss a penny on which it is—Corisande or Kitty? Oh—no! Why, it’s the little Duchess, I believe....”

  Miss Testvalley still remained silent.