by Edith Nesbit
“Daffer-down-dilly.
My loyally lily,”
suggested Doris, kindly anxious to advise and assist. “Too long,” said Claud, promptly; and the two laughed, and she said:
“Daphne, I suppose, cousin.”
“I do think cousins are such darlings,” said the child, snuggling her black head close to him. “Don’t you, Daff?”
That evening Green Eyes came, and the two girls talked in the quiet of the room where Doris slept and the water in the great cisterns interjected splashings and gurglings into their talk. And their talk was of work and of work and of work again. And also of Henry, when Daphne engineered it on to that line.
“Oh, no, he’s not the only one who believes in his art and himself; only the rest don’t make themselves so jolly disagreeable over it. And then, of course, he’s not a student any more. And he knows all the big painters. I can’t think why he doesn’t stick to them and keep away from us students.”
“You don’t like him?”
“Oh, I like him right enough. But he can be a fiend. Prides himself on saying just what he thinks, and then every now and then he’ll say anything he can lay his tongue to — whether he thinks it or not — for the simple pleasure of quarrelling with the person he happens to be with.”
“I think he’s interesting,” said Daphne.
“All girls do,” the other answered dryly. “It’s only because he’s rude to them.”
“He hasn’t been rude to me.”
“Give him time. You’ll know it when he is.”
“I shouldn’t think Mr. Winston was ever rude to anyone.”
Oh — isn’t he! He’s rude in that casual easy way of his; if he doesn’t happen to be interested.. But the more the other one’s interested the more he hits.”
“I do think the world’s full of interesting people,” said Daphne, “cramful. And they’re nice, too.”
“Some of them,” said Green Eyes. “You have to be careful who you trust.”
“I’d rather die than do that,” said Daphne, strongly. “You have either to think everyone’s nice till you know they aren’t, or that everyone’s horrid, till you find out that they’re decent. I’d rather believe that everyone’s nice. Nearly everyone is.”
“You’ll hurt yourself if you think everyone nice and everyone interesting. Because they aren’t, and when you find that out it’ll hurt. It’s safer to mistrust everyone.”
“Do you mistrust everyone?”
“Yes.”
“And do you,” said Daphne, slowly, “tell everyone this?”
“I should think not! I don’t know why I’m telling you. They all think I’m so jolly and friendly, and undiscriminating. They haven’t the sense to see that I’m simply nice to everyone because anyone may have the chance of doing you an ill-turn some day, and it’s as well to be on the safe side. I don’t trust one of the lot.”
“You’re trusting me, now,” said Daphne.
“Oh, well, everyone’s a fool sometimes,” said Green Eyes, hardly.
“Everyone’s wise sometimes,” said Daphne. “I do like it — your telling me things you don’t tell everybody.”
“Pleases your vanity, doesn’t it? I suppose you know that you’re as vain as a pretty peacock? Oh, it becomes you.”
“Oh, I’m not,” said Daphne. “How can you! And I don’t think it’s that. I’m sure it isn’t only that. Do you know I’ve never had a girl to talk to except the girls at school? And I never knew a young man — to speak to — till two months ago.”
“No wonder you find them interesting — and nice.”
“You’ve told me things. I’ll ask you something. Are young men really more interesting than girls, or do they only just seem so?”
“Of course they are — to us.”
“It’s not — not quite nice, do you think? — to find them all so interesting. It ought to be only one.” Green Eyes laughed. “Not nice? It’s nature. The One will come fast enough, and then for a little time all men else will be but shadows, as the silly song says.”
“I thought,” said Daphne, low-voiced, “that he had come. But it’s two months ago — and he’s never written.”
“And other people aren’t shadows?”
“I think they would be,” said Daphne, trying to be honest, “if he were here. I don’t mean that I care the least bit for anyone else. I don’t; I couldn’t. Only, people are — interesting.”
“Have you ever let a man kiss you?” The question was abrupt, yet somehow not to be resented. “Yes — once.”
“And did you like it?”
“I — isn’t it rather horrid to talk about things like that?”
“No. But don’t tell me if you’d rather not.”
“I will — I’ll try to. I don’t know whether I liked it. It seemed quite right then. And it was as if —— as if there was no one in the world but us — and he didn’t exactly kiss me. It just happened as if nothing else was possible.”
“I know,” said Green Eyes; and plainly she did. “And then?”
“I’ve never heard from him. I’ve been very unhappy. Because you see, if I was never going to see him again it made it all different — about the kiss, you know.”
“You thought he loved you?”
“I didn’t think at all.”
“Some men kiss every girl who’ll let them. And half the girls I know will let anybody kiss them. There was a Slade dance once, and two University College men bet that they’d kiss all their partners.”
“Oh!” breathed Daphne, on a note of horror. “And when they came to compare notes they found they’d each kissed all their partners except three, and they were the same three.
“Do you mean to say men tell those sort of things?”
“Of course they do — and that’s one of the first things you’ve got to learn.”
“I don’t believe,” said Daphne, “that he would have told anyone.”
“Of course you don’t. That’s just it. If one cares one never does believe it. And there you are.”
“I hope,” said the girl who found men so interesting, “that it’s only art students who are so hateful.”
“Those two at the dance weren’t art students. They were just ordinary college students. Don’t you trust any of them. That’s all.”
“If you mean don’t let them kiss me,” said Daphne loftily, “you needn’t be afraid. I’m not likely to.”
“You see,” the other went on, slowly, “I didn’t understand when I first went to the Slade. I thought a kiss meant — everything it ought to mean. I don’t want anyone to hurt you like that.”
“I’m afraid” — Daphne got hold of the other girl’s hand—”I’m afraid you’re very unhappy.”
“Not now. But I have been. Light the lamp, will you? I must go. And I don’t like having to make you think differently of people. And you’re so horribly trustful.”
“I’m afraid I always shall be,” said Daphne, “but not about kissing people. I think all that’s simply hateful. Any way, I’ve got a friend I can trust haven’t I?”
“Well, so have I, it appears,” said Green Eyes. She went, and Daphne, left alone, felt a little sick. So much gilt had so roughly and so suddenly been scraped from the gingerbread.
“But I don’t think she can be right,” she told herself. “She’s soured, I expect. Some one must have hurt her very much. But I do like her.”
The next day Daphne rose with the stem determination not to be interested in anyone but Doris; and Doris, in consequence, had lessons. Lessons with Daphne were a complete novelty, and therefore, as complete a success.
The child had written six times, “My cat is pink,” an interesting sentence and one giving food for reflection, and that not of the trite, repugnant kind suggested by the abstract reflections which usually head the pages of copybooks. “Be virtuous and” on one page “you will be happy” on the next lent wings to no such romance as lay for the child behind that plain statement of the colour
of her cat.
“I haven’t got a cat,” she said, “but if I had, oh, how pink it should be, and I should know why and I should tell you, and it would be our deep and loyally secret.”
“7 know the reason why your cat was pink,” said Daphne; “just write it once more, that’ll make seven, for luck — write that it was pink, to make quite sure, and then I’ll tell you exactly how it came to be pink, and what particular kind of pink it became.”
“And when it became to be pink, and where it was when it became to be it?”
“Yes, my Dormouse, every single pink thing I can think of about your cat I’ll ten you the minute you’ve put the K to pink. No, don’t put it in Cat.”
“You said put K,” said the child, labouring with stiff, warm, inky fingers. “I’ll put a C as well — it makes it more Catty, 7 think. Kcat — and may I put an extry K to pink — to make it as pink as ever it can be? Oh, here’s someone come to ask us to tea again.”
“It’s only me, miss,” said the sailor-hatted charwoman. “It was only to ask you if you knew when Mr. Claud’ll be in, and where ‘e is.”
“No, of course I don’t,” said Daphne. “Why should I?”
“Young ladies often does,” said Mrs. Delarue, “especially when cousins.”
“I’ll give him a message when he comes in,” said Daphne, “if you like.”
That ain’t no good, miss, thanking you kindly. ‘E’s wanted at once, an’ Mr. Henry said ‘e’d hang me to the stoodio stove pipe if I come back without ‘im.”
“Don’t go back; then,” was the obvious suggestion.
“I ‘ave a ‘eart,” said Mrs. Delarue, with dignity, “and a conscience. I couldn’t recognize it to my conscience leaving ‘im there in that state of blood — and is language!”
“Blood? said Daphne, aghast.
“He never will nave no cleaning,” said Mrs. Delarue, “but yesterday ‘im being out I took down ‘is big looking-glass to dust behind it — such a muck an’ crock you never see, except it might be down a harea-grating, and all the letters ‘e never answers stuffed down behind to ‘arbour all sorts.”
“But the blood?”
“Oh, don’t you ‘urry me,” said the woman, her voice as flat as her feet. “I’m a coming to the blood if you give me time. ‘E says it was my doing, not fixing the glass up again — but if you leave a nail in forever it stands to reason it ain’t going to ‘old forever. So down it all come when ‘e was a shoving ‘is letters in behind the frame as usual, and smashed to hatoms on ‘is foot and the blood spurted out all over.”
“For goodness sake fetch a doctor,” cried Daphne, in extreme and disgusted impatience.
“Much as my place is worth,” said the charwoman. calmly. “He’ll be all right. Only wants tying up. It’s a errand ‘e wants done and ‘e won’t let me — and—”
“He’ll bleed to death,” said Daphne. “Some one ought to go at once.”
Thank you, miss,” said the woman, in tones of relief. “I was sure you’d say so when you come to think it over. Don’t stop to put your gloves on. It’s only just down opposite the Omopatty Orspittle in Great Ormonde Street.”
“You expect me to go?”
“Thank you kindly, miss — yes — and I wouldn’t lose no time. You could go of ‘is errand. And if you’ve got a bit of clean rag, for there’s not a stitch in ‘is place that ain’t thick with chalk and charcoal. I’ll stay along of the little girl and get her her bit of dinner while you’re gone.”
“You’d much better go yourself,” Daphne urged, in intense indecision, “and get a doctor.
“Not to have my head sworn off I don’t,” said Mrs. Delarue firmly, “so I tell you.”
The woman would not go back. So much was plain. If she went, it would be a liberty, an intrusion. She did not want to take liberties with that man. She did not like him or the detached way he had of looking at people. But suppose he bled to death. She would not like anyone to bleed to death — not even people who half shut their eyes when they looked at you. And the youth in her leapt to meet the little adventure — an injured man, a ministering angel... But of course she couldn’t go. It was absurd.
“You’d best be starting, miss,” said Mrs. Delarue, as though everything were settled.
“Would you like Mrs. Delarue to stay with you, Dormouse?” Daphne was pulling out drawers in a hunt for handkerchiefs.
“Yes — very,” said Doris, cheerfully. “She’ll tell me about when she was a little girl — won’t you?”
“Yes, lovey — I’ll be bound she will,” said Mrs. Delarue. “If I was you, miss, I should ‘urry. You don’t know what a hour may bring forth, when it comes to bleeding, more so when ‘e’s swearing like ‘e is, which always makes the blood run free, as well I know by my husband’s nose.”
“Does he swear at you?” Daphne asked, spearing on a hat with hasty hat-pins.
“Till he’s black in the face sometimes. Not that I ever give him cause.”
“Then he’s not a gentleman,” said Daphne, definitely.
“Oh, miss, ‘e is now,” the tone was of injured protest, “the very way he swears shows it. Never a low word — only gentleman’s swearing.”
“I shall fetch a doctor,” said Daphne, firmly.
“I wouldn’t, not if I was you,” said Mrs. Delarue. “Leastways see ‘im first. I don’t ‘old with doing anything for nothing — and ‘e’d send ‘im off with a flea in is ear as likely as not. Best go quiet and find out what is errand is.”
“Who says I ain’t got a ‘eart,” she added to herself, as the stairs yielded hollow echoes to the quick patter of Daphne’s descending feet. “Oo says I ‘aven’t a eye for a likeness? I’d a got her over to get acquainted with ‘im one way or the other even if ‘e ‘adn’t ‘appened to ‘ave hurted of ‘is foot. Well, then, what did ‘e want to draw fifty little pictures of her red ‘ead all on one bit of paper for?”
“When you was a little girl?” said Doris encouragingly.
“When I was a little girl,” said Mrs. Delarue, smartly, “I ‘ad to wash my ‘ands an’ face thorough, and comb my ‘air out afore I ‘ad my dinner, same as what you’re agoing to do, miss. See?”
CHAPTER XI. GUIDE
THE stairs of number 7b Great Ormonde Street lacked the spacious quality of Daphne’s own staircase, for number 13 had been a great house once, where salons had been held, and hooped and powdered gentry of the Third George’s time had passed up and down those stairs which now echoed so emptily to the pitter-patter of Doris’s brown shoes, and the more strenuous music of Claud’s big boots. The houses in Great Ormonde Street have never, one imagines, welcomed any guest more finicking than a prosperous tradesman and his comfortable family; and now they are fallen to a social level from which no well-to-do tradesman would choose his associates —— no respectable tradesman, even, however well or ill Fate determined the matter of his doing. The houses now — at least some of them, for there were just men in Zoar if not in Sodom, and one must not hurt the feelings of any — are mean and grimy. Queer trades are plied there. Men accurately costumed as stage anarchists go furtively in and out. Strange, frowzy ladies in unmentionable undress haunt the basements — ladies whose toilets seem all to depend desperately on the one hand with which they close errant bodices across their bosoms, while with the other they open the door to callers. They are affable ladies, and visitors find them kind and helpful.
“I dunno, my dear,” said the one who opened the door to Daphne; “he may be in, or he mayn’t. I tell you what — you just go up and see. You know the way, I lay.”
“No,” said Daphne.
“Oh, a new one? You look out for his temper, then. That’s my advice — if you’re new.”
“New?” said Daphne.
“Ain’t you a model?”
Daphne reflected that she was.
“Yes,” she said, “but—”
“Oh, it’s all right,” said the frowzy lady. “New to it, ain’t you? But it’s what we
must all come to, isn’t it? — that or something else. It’ll be all the same a hundred years ‘ence. It’s the second floor and turn to the right and along the passage across the roofs and then up all the stairs there are. I’d run up with you, it being your first time, only I was just doing me hair.”
“Thank you,” said Daphne, and went.
The stairs were as frowzy as the lady. On the first floor a door was open, affording glimpses of plush and displaying with little reserve triumphs of the cheap cabinetmaker’s art. The second floor lodger used its landing as a kitchen. An evil lamp stank there — a cooking lamp, on it a crooked-handled kettle, belching forth violent steam. There was a pot of drooping musk on the staircase window ledge, and it seemed that the reeking scent of musk that filled the air could not all come from one innocent earth-rooted plant. Then came a glass door, and a glass-framed ridge across roofs. Daphne thought of the Bridge of Sighs as represented in oleographic reproductions of the work of the late Mr. Turner. Then three steps, another door, a short passage — corridor is too wide a name for it — then more stairs very steep and many, and finally a door, not quite shut, on which she knocked, a knock that had no effect on the perceptible universe. The place allotted in Daphne’s scheme of things to Daphne’s heart felt hollow. One’s heart in moments of extreme nervousness doesn’t really beat heavily as novelists would have us believe — it seems to go away altogether. And it is missed.
She knocked again.
“Damnation!” was the immediate response. “Come in, can’t you?”
“I can,” said Daphne, very distinctly, “but I don’t think I will.”
There was a pause. Then:
“I am very sorry. Will you please come in. If you don’t I must come to the door, and if I do—”
Visions of blood “spurting out all over” painted the stone-coloured door red, and that with no niggard brush. Daphne pushed the door open and entered. No blood was visible.
The studio was large and airy, in violent contrast to the musk-paraffin staircase. In the middle of it, on a small couch, lay the invalid raised on one elbow, scowling at the door. He found a false, polite smile, difficult as it seemed.