“Ever been to Canada?” he asked.
She smiled — the charmingly even row of imitation pearls gleaming between the parted ruby lips.
“No, indeed! I should love to go!”
“Think so?” The Boy puffed a tiny ring of smoke from his cigarette. “It might be too cold for you.”
“Is it cold?” This with a child-like air of ignorance.
“Why, you know it is!” he said, with a touch of impatience. “Especially at this time of year. You must have read about it, and seen cinema shows of it.
There’s one of your writing chaps over there who rails it ‘Our Lady of the Snows.’”
“Charming,” she murmured, listlessly.
“I don’t think it charming at all,” declared the Boy. “It’s a very stupid name. Because it’s not always snow. Just now, in winter, of course it is. And it’s very jolly snow. Dry and sparkling like diamonds. My mother’s house is a perfect picture in the snow.”
“Yes?” She looked up from under her curved lashes. “How pretty it must be!”
The Boy’s face had become serious mid wistful. “Yes,” he answered, dreamily. “It’s very pretty — and so is she!”
“She?”
“Yes — my mother.”
The Girl — if girl she might still be called — was silent “You’ve no idea,” went on the boy, speaking with sudden energy, “how pretty she is! She’s young yet, though she is my mother — I’m only nineteen — and she looks younger than she is. I don’t think she’ll ever grow old — she won’t to me. She has the loveliest eyes in the world!”
“Oh! Really!”
“Yes, really!” And the Boy smiled happily. “They are so sweet and tender! Have you a nice mother?”
The Girl flushed hotly, as for a moment she thought, “If he knew!” But she merely flicked the ash from her cigarette with her little finger and answered softly, “I have no mother.”
“Oh, by Jove! I’m sorry I asked! I’m such a clumsy chap! Do forgive me! It’s jolly hard on you!”
She looked at him, surprised and amused.
What a great baby he was!
“Oh! I don’t mind!” she said. “We don’t trouble much about our mothers over here.”
“Don’t you?” he said. “That’s queer! I’ve only’ been over six weeks, and in training all the time, so I don’t know much about the Old Country — but I always thought it was a sort of ‘no place like home,’ you know, where mothers and fathers and sons and daughters loved each other better than all the rest of the world.”
“Some do — but some don’t,” replied the Girl with a touch of mockery in her smile, “and I think the ‘don’ts’ have it! Your notion of family affection is quite ideal! Is that the way you live there?”
“It’s the way I live,” said the Boy, simply. “Mother, father, sister, home — these are all I want and all I care for!”
“I wonder you could tear yourself away from them to come over here,” she said, coldly.
“It was a pull!” he answered with a quick sigh. “But I came because the Old Homeland wanted me — and I wanted to fight for it, and I’m ready to die for it, if die I must!”
She looked at him, and a sudden thrill of shame and compunction ran through her little, vain, hardened soul. In fancy she saw all the young strength of him shattered, and the fair, open face a mere blank white mask upturned to the pitiless heavens on the field of battle.
“When do you leave for the front?” she asked.
“The day after to-morrow,” he answered.
She thought a moment. He had accepted an invitation to go with her to the theatre that evening and to supper at her flat after the play. It would be a hurried, early affair, certainly, but... she alone knew how it would be “managed” or what that supper at the flat would cost him! Not only whatever money he had about him, but all his self-respect! She also knew he was alone in London, with nowhere to go to, and no friends. And while she was thinking out the problem of evil against good, and good against evil, he spoke again.
“I said that my mother’s house was a picture in the snow, and so it is” — there he smiled as he looked at her — he thought she seemed suddenly prettier. “It is like a fairy house covered with diamonds. But I like it better in autumn, for we have lots of trees about the place and they turn all sorts of splendid colours; much brighter tints than you get in this country. The maples out there are just wonderful — they grow almost scarlet — you can’t think what a fire they look like out in the woods. The last thing I saw when I left home was — what do you think?”
“I can’t imagine,” she said, softly.
“My little sister — she’s only twelve — standing under the big maple on the lawn. The leaves of the tree had only just begun to turn a little — but I saw a red branch, and my sister’s gold hair. Her hair is long and bright, and the glow of the setting sun just caught the leaves and the hair together.” He paused. Then— “If the Boches finish me off, that’s the last thing I shall see as I die — the red leaves of the old maple and my sister’s gold hair!”
Another pause. She had nothing to say.
“Shall we go now?” he suggested.
They rose and passed out of the restaurant. At the door she held out her hand, smiling.
“Good-bye!” said she.
“Good-bye?” He looked astonished. “Aren’t we going to the theatre presently?”
“I’m so sorry!” she answered. “I ought to have told you before — but there’s extra work at the War Office and I’m wanted there till quite late. So I’m obliged to put you off. I hope you’ll excuse it?”
“Certainly — but — but—”
“I’ll write!” she interrupted him hurriedly— “I’ll see you sometime to-morrow before — you go. I know your address — good-bye!”
The Boy gazed at her, bewildered.
“But,” he stammered, “this is so sudden!”
“Yes, it is — but you mustn’t mind! The War Office, you know! I’ll see you to-morrow. Take care of yourself — and — and I hope you’ll have as happy a Christmas as you can — away from home!”
She smiled again — her roving eyes were almost human and womanly with a sparkle as of dew in them — and in another moment she was gone. The Boy stood inert, gazing after her as in a dream.
“What a curious girl!” he said to himself. “The most curious girl I ever met!”
And he swung along on his way at marching pace, still wondering.
She, meanwhile, hurried through the streets, feverishly nervous and impatient lest he should follow and overtake her, and, reaching her flat at last, entered and locked herself in.
“That’s one good deed done in a bad life!” she said, with a reckless scorn of herself as she looked at her flushed face in a mirror. “A plunge to the rescue! Yet, not I, but his mother and sister have saved him — red maple leaves and gold hair! It’s Christmas time, too, and — he’s only a Boy!”
CLAUDIA’S BUSINESS
ALL men’s ways are, in theory, admirable; but some men’s ways, in practice, are peculiar. All men are bound to be considered (by them selves at least) reasonable and logical — yet truth compels the statement that some men do not know their own minds. All men must be admitted as masters— “virile” and self-controlled — nevertheless, the fact remains that some men are more faddish than the most nervous spinster. All men indignantly repudiate the accusation of selfishness; yet the chief drawback to some men is that they cannot escape from their own private demon of profound, unalterable egoism. Many hopelessly selfish men take peculiar delight in the play “A Message from Mars.” They cannot see themselves anywhere in the piece and that’s where the fun comes in!
There was once a certain Man who was by way of being rather fond of, or somewhat in love with, a certain woman. He had dangled half-vaguely after her pretty petticoats for a considerable period, all the while cogitating with himself as to whether he would do a wise or a foolish thing if he asked her to mar
ry him. He never expressed any sentimental emotion toward her, either by touch of hand or word of mouth — and why? Because in his absurd self-consciousness he thought he might look foolish — or that she might think he looked, or was going to look foolish. Whenever he was in her company he imagined that every gnat in the air, every fly on the window-pane was staring at him and commenting on his appearance. And the most curious part of his mental attitude was that he never once thought of Her at all in the matter. He felt that there was really no need to think of her, as of course if he proposed she would naturally jump to acceptance. He laboured under the pleasing delusion, so common to the male sex, that any woman, no matter how independent, wealthy or beautiful, must, must, MUST be delighted with an offer of marriage, even if the wooer were but an uglier type of the Simian ancestor according to Darwin. Besides, he was an Englishman, and a lord — and he was in New York.
To be an Englishman is of course the greatest privilege on earth; to be a lord is but a doubtful honour nowadays, as there are so many of them — but when one is both, and in “N’York,” one may perhaps be permitted to indulge in a pleasing estimate of one’s possible success among the Four Hundred. This particular lord — Lord Francis Markham, to give him his full appellation — certainly did so, and not without cause. He had stayed a month at the Astor House, and meant staying a month more, if Claudia Strange also remained in the city. He had met her a year ago in Paris, and had taken her to be a rather fascinating little doll of fashion, with a head full of no more serious matters than jewels and chiffons. She seemed to have plenty of money to spend; she was travelling alone “en princesse” with a French maid and an Italian courier, and she was received at the American Embassy with much affectionate enthusiasm. She dressed exquisitely, and though she owned to five-and-twenty looked about eighteen. Discreet inquiries concerning her or her belongings elicited very little information; the representative in France of the great American Republic had smiled pleasantly on being questioned and had answered with cheerful readiness:
“Claudia Strange? — Well, I guess she’s just Claudia Strange and that’s enough for most people! No — she hasn’t a father living nor a mother, nor sisters, nor brothers — she’s an unencumbered woman alone in the world, but she can worry through! She’s made her pile!”
Lord Markham’s curiosity was piqued, but not satisfied. He tried to find out something more definite about her, but his efforts were unavailing. Finally, becoming stimulated by his vain investigations, he followed her to the States when she returned thither, whereby it will be seat that he had not much to do in his own country. Truth to tell, his own country bored him a little. He was only vaguely conscious of its worth. He belonged to that ultra-superior “set” who find all home produce whether in food, art, music, or literature, unsatisfactory, and everything foreign — delightful perfection! He was no use whatever to his party in politics; and his presence at Markham Hall, his estate in Berkshire, was of no particular joy or advantage to this tenantry as he took no active interest in the place beyond such as concerned the preserving of game. Among his acquaintance he counted a few men of position and average intelligence, and several “rapid” women of fashion; and with these things taken all together his time was more or less wastefully occupied. Claudia Strange was a surprise to him. He had met many American women, but never one like her. She broke upon him, as it were, like a flashlight from an unexpected dark corner of life. She was pretty, in a mutinous mignonne style, but not extraordinarily so, for it was the extreme daintiness and elegance of her attire that went at least half-way to the making of her general attractiveness — but she had a careless dash and independence about her, combined with such an open and evidently sincere indifference to all and sundry of his sex that his pride was stung, and his interest in her sufficiently goaded to make a very good simulation of “love.” It was not really love — he merely felt that he would rather have such a woman as Claudia for a wife than any of the semi-masculine, golfing, hockey-playing British girls who from season to season were trotted out for inspection in the matrimonial market. Then he stood rather in terror of lady nurses — fascinating females wearing white caps, and white aprons with the Red Cross blazoned on their breasts had become more than he could bear. So he himself saw nothing in any way singular or eccentric in his act of following Claudia over the Atlantic — she was a something quite new, and in his jaded state of mind he craved for novelty. So utterly weary was he of the sameness of things, that if he had happened to have a wife he would have made occasion to divorce her, just for the mere love of change.
A month in the States would have bored him as much as anything else if Claudia had not been there. But there she was, brilliant, provocative, mysterious, and apparently always too busy to amuse herself in the ordinary ways and methods of her sex. And a month was all too short to find out anything definite about her. He became irritable and ill-tempered over the stereotyped reply which his questions elicited.
“Claudia Strange? Weill I guess she’s just Claudia Strange!” With shameless persistence he angled for invitations to any and every house where he thought he might meet this attractive personality; and being an English “lord” he had little trouble in knowing whomsoever he wished to know, and in being a frequent “guest of the occasion” at every dinner and reception wherein the Four Hundred were concerned. But Claudia was not always to be seen among these “select.” It was as difficult to find her as it might be to find a pearl in a field of clover. On one occasion when he did suddenly discover her in the far corner of a dimly lit corridor, during a ball given at one of the most ultra-”swagger” houses in N’York, he was captivated afresh by the dazzling vision of fair hair, blue eyes, laughing lips, white arms, and delicate snowy chiffon attire, and was suddenly moved to ask her if he might have the pleasure of taking her to the theatre to see a special piece that was just then the vogue. She looked up, smiling, and simply “floored” him by the question:”
“Why?”
He was curiously embarrassed. What an odd creature! No woman with any tact would ask a man “why” he wished to escort her to the theatre or anywhere else! He drew himself up a little stiffly, bent his neck in his starched collar and repeated, with laboured politeness and an uplifting of his eyebrows:
“Why?... you ask why?”
“Yes” — said Claudia, frankly— “I ask why? You Englishmen never act on impulse! Why do you invite me? There are heaps and heaps of other women. Perhaps you want a ‘tip,’ eh!”
A “tip”? Really, really! His lordship’s collar positively creaked in his amazement.
“I can give you one or two,” went on the charming lady, confidentially. “You wouldn’t lose, but you mightn’t gain for a year or two. However, you might put in five hundred without much risk, and there’s always the chance of a boom! We’d better talk it over. Yes — I’ll come to-morrow. You’ll have to call and fetch me. No, I won’t dine, thanks! My day’s rather crowded. Here’s my number.”
And from a jewelled chatelaine dangling at her waist she took up a gold card-case, opened it, found a card, and gave it to him.
“That’s my flat,” she said. “My real home is on Long Island, but I’m having a new wing built and a Pompeian Court, so I’m not living there just now, and it’s no use ringing up at my office after five. Call me twenty minutes before the curtain rises — I’ll be ready. So long!”
She gave him another bright smile with this adieu, and rose from her corner seat as a good-looking young man approached and claimed her for a dance. In two minutes she was whirled away in a maze of floating, gliding couples that filled the ballroom as a summer field is filled with flowers. Lord Markham stood for a moment under the light of an electric torch supported by the bronze figure of a flying cupid, and studied the card he held. It bore the name “Miss Claudia Strange” with the number of a flat in a huge block of “skyscrapers” not far from Central Park.
“Claudia got anything good on hand?” queried a strong nasal voice close behind him.
Lord Markham turned sharply round.
“I beg your pardon?”
“Granted! — though I don’t know why you ask it!” and the speaker, a tall, wiry man with a sandy-coloured beard, smiled broadly. “I guess it’s only English folk who beg pardon when there’s nothing to beg it for. I saw Claudia Strange and Co talking to you, and her talk costs money, so I thought if there was any scent in the wind I might perhaps get a sniffle!”
“I really don’t understand you,” said Lord Markham, coldly, “Miss Strange—”
“Oh, it’s ‘Miss’ Strange, is it! Wal! — I guess you don’t know much about her. N’York calls her Claudia.”
Markham winced with a sense of shock. He could never marry a woman whom N’York called “Claudia!”
“Very familiar!” he said, with a stiff smile, “almost as if she were a chorus girl — or — a public dancer!”
“Yes, that is so!” agreed the sandy-bearded man— “Only she’s more run after than any chorus kiddie or dancing doll alive. Chorus kids don’t shake Wall Street — but Claudia does! — you bet! My business is ile — Wilcox’s He Wells — that’s me! and I know!” Lord Markham had recourse to his eyeglass. It was a great assistance to him in matters of difficulty, and he fixed it in his right eye as a shield to ward off the metallic glance of this “ile” personage who presumed to speak to him without an introduction.
“Most interesting!” he murmured. “Perhaps, Mr. er — er — Mr. Wilcox, you can tell me—”
“How she shakes Wall Street?” interposed Wilcox. “I can certainly do that! She’s one of our sharpest brokers, and if she says ‘Sell out!’ there’s a rush, and if she says ‘Buy up!’ there’s a bigger rush!”
“One of your sharpest brokers!” repeated Lord Markham, in bewilderment. “Do you mean to say that Miss Strange is a broker?”
“That is so!” answered Wilcox, evidently delighted at the impression his statement had made on the mind of an English Conservative. “And as far-sighted as a native Injun on a trail! You can deceive a weasel mebbe, but you can not deceive Claudia! Bogus companies don’t get a look in with her! What she don’t know about stocks and shares isn’t worth knowing at all. If she puts you on anything you’re there all the time! She’s got a whole army of clerks under her working like movies on piece jobs, and you bet she keeps things humming! If you’re one of her pals—”
Delphi Collected Works of Marie Corelli Page 952