We had both received a distant bow as we entered the room, but not a word had been vouchsafed us. I am afraid my nature is too indolent to be greatly upset by this kind of neglect. The Seraph, I could see, grew rather unhappy when his presence was overlooked every time he came within speaking distance. It was not till the end of the evening that she unbent. I had promised to take Gladys on to a ball, and at eleven I came out of hiding and went in search of her. Culling had just been told off to find Robin, and Sylvia stood alone.
“Are you going on anywhere?” she asked the Seraph when they had the room to themselves.
“It’s the Marlthrops, isn’t it?” he asked.
“And Lady Carsten. Robin and I are going there. Are you coming?”
The Seraph’s hand went to his pocket and made pretence of weighing three or four invitations in the balance. Finally he selected the Carsten card and glanced at it with an air of doubt.
“Will my presence be welcome?” he asked.
“You must ask Lady Carsten, she’s invited you.”
“Welcome to you?”
“It depends on yourself.”
“What must I do?”
Sylvia pursed up her mouth and looked at him with head on one side.
“Be a little more particular in the company you keep.”
“I usually am.”
“With some startling lapses.”
“I’m not aware of any.”
Sylvia drew herself up to her full height.
“How have you spent the last week?”
“In a variety of ways.”
“In a variety of company?”
“The same nearly all the time.”
She nodded.
“This is my objection.”
“If she doesn’t object.…” A dawning flush on Sylvia’s cheek warned him to leave the sentence unfinished.
“I’m giving you advice for your own sake because, apparently, you’ve no one else to advise you,” she said with the slow, elaborate carelessness of one who is with difficulty keeping her temper. “You’ve spent the last week thrusting yourself under every one’s notice in company with a woman who’s just been divorced from her husband. Every one’s seen you, every one’s talking about you. If you like that sort of notoriety.…”
“Can it be avoided?”
“You can drop the woman.”
“She’s none too many friends.”
“She’s one too many.”
“I cannot agree.”
“Then you put yourself on her level.”
“I should be proud to rank with her.”
Sylvia paused a moment to steady her voice.
“I’ve got a temper,” she remarked with exaggerated indifference, “it’s never wise for anybody to rouse it, and many people would be annoyed if you talked to them as you’re talking to me. I—simply don’t think it’s worth it, but can you wonder if I ask you to choose between her and me?”
The Seraph’s face and voice were grave.
“The choice seems unnecessary,” he said.
“You must take it from me that I have no wish to be seen about with a man who allows his name to be coupled with a woman of that kind.”
“What kind, Sylvia?”
“You know my meaning.”
“But your meaning is wrong.”
“I mean an ugly word for an ugly sin. A woman of the kind that breaks the Seventh Commandment.”
The Seraph began tearing his card in narrow strips.
“Elsie Wylton didn’t,” he said quietly.
“She told you so?”
“I didn’t need telling.”
Sylvia’s expression implored pity on the credulity of man. The Seraph was still nervously fingering his card, but no signs of emotion ruffled her calm. The face was slightly flushed, but she bent her head to hide it.
“Part friends, Seraph,” she said at last, “if you’re not coming to the Carstens’. Think it over, and you’ll find every one will give you the same advice.”
“I dare say.” He pocketed the torn card and prepared to accompany her. “What would you do in my place if you believed the woman innocent?”
Sylvia shirked the question.
“Innocent women don’t get into those positions.”
“It is possible.”
“How can she prove her innocence?”
“How do you prove her guilt?”
“I don’t attempt to go behind what the Court finds.”
At the door the Seraph hesitated.
“Tonight’s only an armistice, Sylvia,” he stipulated. “I must have time to think. I’m not committed either way.”
She gave him her old friendly smile.
“If you like.” Then the smile melted away. “My ultimatum comes in force tomorrow morning, though. You must make up your mind then.”
CHAPTER VIII
Henley—and After
“We shall find no fiend in hell can match the fury of a disappointed woman.”
—Colley Cibber
“Love’s Last Shift.”
Henley Regatta was something of a disappointment to me. I had furbished up the memories of twenty years before—which was one mistake—and was looking forward to it—which was another. In great measure the glory had departed from the house-boats, every one poured into the town by train or car, and the growth of ad hoc riverside clubs had reduced the number of punts and canoes on the river itself. Being every inch as much a snob as my neighbour, I regretted to find Henley so deeply democratised.…
I think, in all modesty, my own party was a success. Our houseboat was the “Desdemona,” a fair imitation of what the papers call “a floating hotel”: we brought my brother’s cook from Pont Street and carried our cellar with us from town. And there was a pleasant, assiduous orchestra that neither ate nor slept in its zeal to play us all the waltzes we had grown tired of hearing in London. A Mad Hatter’s luncheon started at noon and went on till midnight. Any passing boat that liked the “Desdemona’s” looks, moored alongside and boarded her: no one criticised the food or cigars, many dropped in again for a second or third meal in the course of the afternoon, and if they did not know Gladys or myself, they no doubt had a friend among my guests or waiters.
Both those that slept on board and those that visited us at their stomachs’ prompting were cheery, light-hearted, out to enjoy themselves. I admit my own transports were moderated by the necessity of having to dance attendance on Lady Roden. The air became charged with Rutlandshire Morningtons, and our conversation showed signs of degenerating into a fantastic Burke’s Auction Bridge. Two earls counted higher than three viscounts; I called her out with one marquis, she took the declaration away with a duke, I got it back again with a Russian prince: she doubled me.… Apart from this, I enjoyed myself. All the right people turned up, except Gartside who was kept in town discussing Governorships with the India Office.
There were Rodens to right of us, Rodens to left of us: in a field behind us, unostentatiously smoking Virginia cigarettes, loitered a watchful Roden bodyguard. The Regatta started on July 3rd and on the previous day Rawnsley had given the House its time-table. There would be no Autumn Session, but the House would sit till the end of the third week in August to conclude the Third Reading of the Poor Law Bill; no fresh legislation would be introduced. The New Militants had their answer without possibility of misconstruction, and the families of Cabinet Ministers moved nowhere without a lynx-eyed, heavy-booted, plain-clothes escort.
I summoned Scotland Yard out of its damp, cheerless meadow, gave it bottled beer and a pack of cards, and told it to treat the “Desdemona” as its own and to ring for anything likely to contribute to its comfort. Though we had never met before and were only to meet once again, I felt for those men as I should feel for any one deputed to bear up the young Rode
ns lest at any time they dashed their feet against stones.…
Sylvia was laconic and decisive. She had engaged and defeated her father, met and routed her brothers. Any one who guarded her reckless person did so at their peril; she declined to argue the point. I fancy Lady Roden accepted a detective more or less as part of her too-often-withheld due; Philip was constitutional, guided by precedent, anxious to help peace and order in the execution of their arduous duties. The only active molestation came from Robin: left to himself he would have ignored the detectives’ very existence, but at the fell suggestion of Culling I discovered him whiling away the morning by bursting into the guard-room at five-minute intervals with hysterical cries of “Save me! Oh, my God! save me!”
The saturnine, enigmatic Michael pursued his own methods. How he had escaped from Winchester in the midst of the terminal examinations, I never discovered. His telegram said, “What about me for Henley, old thing? Michael.” I wired back, “Come in your thousands,” and he came in a dove-grey suit, grey socks and buckskin shoes, grey tie, silk handkerchief and Homburg hat. I appreciated Michael more and more at each meeting. Of a detached family he was the most detached member. Observing me staring a trifle unceremoniously at his neck-tie, he produced a note-book and pencil and invited my written opinion. “On Seeing my New Tie” was inscribed on the front page, and the comments—so far as I remember the figures—were:—
(1) “Oh, my God!” (40%).
(2) “Have you seen Michael’s tie?” (40%).
(3) “Michael darling!” (Sylvia’s cri de cœur, 10%).
(4) “It’s a devilish good tie” (my own verdict, perhaps not altogether sincere). (10%.).
“Come and shew yer ticket o’ leave,” urged Culling with derisory finger outstretched to indicate the forces of law and order.
“No bloody peelers for this child,” Michael answered in a voice discreetly lowered to keep the offending epithet from his sister’s ears.
I noticed an exchange of glances between Culling and himself, but was too busy to think much of it at the time. Eleven minutes later, however, the majesty of Scotland Yard had been incarcerated in its own stronghold. Culling sat outside their door improvising an oratorio on an accordion. “The Philistines are upon thee,” I heard him thunder as I passed that way. Michael was lying prone on the deck of the house-boat, dangling at safe distance the key of the cabin at the end of a Japanese umbrella.
“Quis custodiet ipsos custodes?” he asked, as an official hand shot impotently out of the cabin window. The question may have been imperfectly understood.
“Sanguineos quis custodes custodiet ipsos?” he ventured.
As there was still no answer, common humanity ordained that I should possess myself of the key and hold a gaol delivery. The detectives were near weeping with humiliation, but I comforted them in some measure, won a friendship that was to serve me in good stead, and was at length free to resume my duties as host.
From time to time perfunctory racing took place, without arousing either interest or resentment. We all had our own ways of passing the time between meal and meal; one would study the teeth and smile of a musical-comedy star, another would watch Culling at the Three Card Trick, a third would count the Jews on a neighbouring house-boat.… There was no sign of Elsie or the Seraph, but that was only to be expected. He was to provide her with luncheon and publicity at Phyllis Court, and give the “Desdemona” a wide berth. Those, at least, were his sailing orders if he came; but Elsie had been over-tired and over-excited for some weeks past, and I should not have been surprised to hear she had stayed in town at the last moment.
It is one thing to set a course, and another to steer it—of Henley this is probably truer than of any other stretch of water in the world. When half the punts are returning from island to post after luncheon, and the other half paddle down stream to look at the house-boats, the narrow water midway between start and finish becomes hopelessly, chaotically congested. One or two skiffs and dinghies—which should never be allowed at any regatta—make confusion worse confounded till a timely collision breaks their sculls, or the nose of a racing punt turns them turtle; and with the closing of the booms, three boats begin to sprout where only one was before.
Through a forest of dripping paddles, I watched punt, dinghy and canoe fighting, pressing, yielding; up-stream, down-stream, broad side on, they slid and trembled like a tesselated pavement in an earthquake. The fatalists shipped their poles and paddles, and abandoned themselves to the line of least resistance. Faces grew flushed, but tempers remained creditably even.…
“Mary, mother of God! it’s our sad, bad, mad Seraph!”
Having exhausted the possibilities of the Three Card Trick, and being unable to secure either a pea or two thimbles, Paddy Culling had wandered to my side and was watching the crowd like a normal man.
I followed the direction of his eyes. The Seraph had turned fatalist and was being squeezed nearer and nearer the “Desdemona.” A last vicious thrust by a boatload of pierrots jammed the box of his punt under our landing-stage. He waved a hand to me and began distributing bows among my guests.
“Droppit sthraight from Hiven,” cried Culling with unnecessary elaboration of his already strong brogue. “The tay’s wet, Mrs. Wylton, and we waiting for some one would ask a blessing. Seraph, yer ambrosia’s on order.”
They would not leave the punt, but we brought them tea; and a fair sprinkling of my guests testified to the success of our last few weeks’ campaign by coming down to the raft and being civil to Elsie. There was, of course, no commotion or excitement of any kind; of those who lingered on deck or in the saloon, fully half, I dare say, were unconscious of what was going on below. Such was certainly the case with Sylvia. While Paddy and I served out strawberries to the crew of the punt, she had been washing her hands for tea, and as we crowned a work of charity with a few cigars and a box of matches, she came out onto the raft for assistance with the clasp of a watch-bracelet.
Paddy volunteered his services, I looked on. Her eyes travelled idly over the crowded segment of river opposite my boat, and completed their circuit by resting on the punt and its occupants. Elsie bowed and received a slight inclination of the head in return. The Seraph bowed, and was accorded the most perfect cut I have ever witnessed. Sylvia looked straight through him to a dinghy four yards the other side. It was superbly, insolently done. I have always been too lazy to cultivate the art of cutting my friends, but should occasion ever arise, I shall go to Sylvia for the necessary tuition.
As soon as the congestion was in some measure relieved, the Seraph waved good-bye to me and started paddling up stream towards Henley Bridge. Elsie had seen all that was to be seen in the cut, and—womanlike—had read into it a variety of meanings.
“I hope you’re not tired,” the Seraph said, as they landed and walked down to the station.
“I’ve had a lovely time,” she answered. “Thanks most awfully for bringing me, and for all you’ve done these last few weeks. And before that.” She hesitated, and then added with a regretful smile, “We must say good-bye after today.”
“You’re not going away?”
“Not yet; but you’ve got into enough trouble on my account without losing all your friends,” she answered.
“But I haven’t.”
“You’re risking one.”
“On your account?”
She nodded.
He had not the brazenness to attempt a direct denial.
“Why should you think so?” he hedged.
“Seraph, dear child, I couldn’t help seeing the way she took your bow. I got you that cut.”
“She doesn’t cut Toby,” he objected. “And he and I are equally incriminated.”
“There is a difference.”
“Is there?”
“She’s quite indifferent how much he soils his wings.”
The Seraph was left to dige
st the unspoken antithesis. His face gradually lost the flush it had taken on after their encounter at the raft, his eyes grew calmer and his hands steadier; on the subject of their contention, however, he remained impenitent.
“I shan’t say good-bye till you honestly tell me you don’t want to see me again.”
“You know I can’t say that, Seraph.”
“Very well, then.”
“But it isn’t! The good you do me is simply not worth the harm you do yourself. It didn’t matter so much till Sylvia came to be reckoned with.”
The Seraph shifted impatiently in his corner.
“Neither Sylvia Roden nor any other woman or man in the world is going to dictate who I may associate with, or who I mayn’t.”
“You must make an exception to the rule in her case.”
“Why should I?”
“Every man has to make an exception to every rule in the case of one woman.”
His chin achieved an uncompromising angle.
“To quote the Pharisee of blessed memory,” he said, “I thank God I am not as other men.”
Elsie was well enough acquainted with his moods to know nothing was to be gained by further direct opposition.
“I should like you to come to Chester Square,” she compromised; “but you mustn’t be seen with me in public any more.”
“I shall ride in the Park tomorrow as usual,” he persisted.
“I shan’t be there, Seraph.”
A surprise was awaiting me when Gladys and I returned to Pont Street in the early hours of Sunday morning, after waiting to see the fireworks—by immemorial tradition—extinguished by a tropical downpour. Brian notified me by wireless that he was on his way home and halfway through the Bay. He was, in fact, already overdue at Tilbury, but had been held up while the piston of a high-compression cylinder divested itself of essential portions of its packing.
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