by E. F. Benson
Lucia presented a brave front.
“Then do come and dine and sleep here to break your journey on your return,” she said. “I shall expect you to propose yourself at any time, like all my friends. Just a wire or a telephone call. Georgie and I are sure to be here. Impossible for me to get away in these crowded months—”
“That would be nice,” said Poppy. “Good-bye: Mrs. Pillson, isn’t it? Quite. Charmed, I’m sure: so pleasant. Drive straight on to the quay at Seaport,” she called to her chauffeur.
Lucia kissed her hand after the car.
“How lucky just to have caught her for a moment,” she drawled to Elizabeth, as they went back into ye olde tea-house. “Naughty of her not to have let me know. How dreadfully bad her memory is becoming.”
“Shocking,” said Elizabeth. “You should persuade her to see somebody about it.”
Lucia turned on the full horse-power of her courage for the coming encounter in ye olde tea-house. The moment she saw the faces of her friends assembled there, Evie and Leg and Diva, she knew she would need it all.
“You’ve just missed an old friend, Lucia,” said Susanna. (Was there in her words a touch of the irony for which Rudolph da Vinci was celebrated?)
“Too unfortunate, dear Susanna,” said Lucia. “But I just got a word with her. Off to stay at Le Touquet, she said. Ah! I never told her she would find Georgie there. My memory is getting as bad as hers. Diva, may I have a one and sixpenny?”
Diva usually went down to the kitchen to see to the serving of a one and sixpenny, but she only called the order down the stairs to Janet. And her face lacked its usual cordiality.
“You’ve missed such a nice chat,” she said.
There was a silence pregnant with trouble. It was impossible, thought Lucia, that her name should not have figured in the nice chat, or that Poppy should not have exhibited that distressing ignorance about her which had been so evident outside. In any case Elizabeth would soon promulgate the news with the addition of that hideous detail, as yet undiscovered, that she had been asked to Sheffield Castle only because Poppy thought that Georgie was Mayor of Tilling. Brave cheerfulness was the only possible demeanour.
“Too unfortunate,” she repeated, “and I could have been here half an hour ago, for we had quite a short Council meeting. Nothing controversial: all went so smoothly—”
The memory of that uncontroversial rejection of her portrait brought her up short. Then the sight of Elizabeth’s wistful, softly smiling face lashed her forward again.
“How you will laugh, Susanna,” she said brightly, “when I tell you that the Council unanimously refused to accept my gift of the portrait Irene painted of me which you admired so much. A small Committee advised them against it. And ecco!’’
Susanna’s laugh lacked the quality of scorn and contempt for the Council, for which Lucia had hoped. It sounded amused.
“Well, that was a pity,” she said. “They just didn’t like it. But you can’t get people to like what they don’t like by telling them that they ought to.”
The base desertion was a shock. Lucia looked without favour at the sumptuous one and sixpenny Janet had brought her, but her voice remained calm.
“I think I was wrong to have offered it them at all,” she said. “I ought to have known that they could not understand it. What fun Irene and I will have over it when I tell her. I can hear her scream ‘Philistines! Vandals!’ and burst into shrieks of laughter. And what a joy to have it back at Mallards again!”
Elizabeth continued to smile.
“No place like home is there, dear?” she said. “Where will you hang it?”
Lucia gave up the idea of eating her sardine-tartlet. She had intended to stay on, until Susanna and Elizabeth left, and find out from Diva what had been said about her before she came in. She tried a few light topics of general interest, evoking only short replies of paralyzing politeness. This atmosphere of veiled hostility was undermining her. She knew that if she went away first, Elizabeth would pour out all that Poppy had let slip on the doorstep, but perhaps the sooner that was known the better. After drinking her tea and scalding her mouth she rose.
“I must be off,” she said. “See you again very soon, Susanna. One and sixpence, Diva? Such a lovely tea.”
Elizabeth continued smiling till the door closed.
“Such odd things happened outside,” she said. Her Poppy didn’t recognise her. She asked her who she was. And Worship wasn’t invited to Sheffield Castle at all. Poppy thought that Mr. Georgie was the Mayor, and the invitation was for him. That was why Worship came back so soon.”
“Gracious, what a crash!” said Diva.
“It always comes in time,” said Elizabeth thoughtfully. “Poor thing, we must be very gentle with her, but what a lot of things we must avoid talking about!”
She enumerated them on her plump fingers.
“Duchesses, Castles, photographs — I wonder if they were picture postcards — prima-donnas, for I’m sure she’d have gone to Le Touquet, if she had been asked — portraits — it was my duty to recommend the Council not to accept that daub — gad-about husbands — I havn’t got enough fingers. Such a lot of subjects that would tear old wounds open, and she’s brought it all on herself, which makes it so much more bitter for her.”
Diva, who hated waste (and nothing would keep in this hot weather) ate Lucia’s sardine-tartlet.
“Don’t gloat, Elizabeth!” she commanded. “You may say sympathetic things, but there’s a nasty tone in the way you say them. I’m really rather sorry for her.’’
“Which is just what I have been trying to express,” retorted Elizabeth.
“Then you haven’t expressed it well. Not that impression at all. Goodness, here’s a fresh party coming in. Janet!”
Lucia passed by the fishmonger’s, and some stir of subconscious cerebration prompted her to order a dressed crab that she saw in the window. Then she went home and out into the garden-room. This second blow falling so fast on the heels of the first, caused her to reel. To all the dismal reflections occasioned by the rejection of her portrait there were added those appropriate to the second, and the composite mental picture presented by the two was appalling. Surely some malignant Power, specially dedicated to the service of her discomfiture, must have ordained the mishaps (and their accurate timing) of this staggering afternoon: the malignant Power was a master of stage-craft. Who could stand up against a relentless tragedian? Lucia could not, and two tears of self-pity rolled down her cheeks. She was much surprised to feel their tickling progress, for she had always thought herself incapable of such weakness, but there they were. The larger one fell on to her blotting-pad, and she dashed the smaller aside.
She pulled herself together. Whatever humiliations were heaped on her, her resolve to continue sprightly and dominant and unsubdued was as firm as ever, and she must swallow pity or contempt without apparently tasting them. She went to her piano, and through a slightly blurred vision had a good practice at the difficult treble part of the duet Georgie and she had run through before his departure. She did a few bracing physical exercises, and a little deep breathing. “I have lost a great deal of prestige,” she said to herself as she held her breath and puffed it out again, “but that shall not upset me. I shall recover it all. In a fortnight’s time, if not less, I shall be unable to believe that I could ever have felt so abject and have behaved so weakly. Sursum corda! I shall—”
Her telephone-bell rang. It required a strong call on her courage to answer it, for who could tell what fresh calamity might not be sprung on her? When she heard the name of the speaker, she nearly rang off, for it seemed so impossible. Probably some infamous joke was being played on her. But she listened.
“I’ve just missed my boat,” said the voice, “and sleeping in a hotel makes me ill for a week. Would you be wonderfully kind and let me dine and sleep? You were so good as to suggest that this afternoon. Then I can catch the early boat to-morrow.”
A sob of joy ros
e in Lucia’s throat.
“Delighted, Duchess,” she answered. “So glad you took me at my word and proposed yourself.”
“Many thanks. I shall be with you in an hour or so.”
Lucia skipped to the bell, and kept her finger on it till Grosvenor came running out.
“Grosvenor, the Duchess of Sheffield will be here in about an hour to dine and sleep,” cried Lucia, still ringing. “What is there for dinner?”
“Couldn’t say, except for a dressed crab that’s just come in—” began Grosvenor.
“Yes, I ordered it,” cried Lucia excitedly, ceasing to ring. “It was instinctive, Grosvenor, it was a leading. Things like that often happen to me. See what else, and plenty of strong coffee.”
Grosvenor went into the house, and the music of triumphant meditations poured through Lucia’s brain.
“Shall I ask Benjy and Elizabeth?” she thought. “That would crush Elizabeth for ever, but I don’t really wish her such a fate. Diva? No. A good little thing, but it might seem odd to Poppy to meet at dinner a woman to whom she had paid a shilling for her tea, or perhaps eighteen-pence. Susanna Leg? No: she was not at all kind about the picture. Shall I send for the Mayor’s book and get Poppy to write in it? Again, no. It would look as if I wanted to record her visit officially, whereas she only just drops in. We will be alone, I think. Far more chic.”
Grosvenor returned with the modest menu, and Lucia added a savoury.
“And I shan’t dress, Grosvenor,” she said. “Her Grace (rich words!) will be leaving very early, and she won’t want to unpack, I expect.”
Her Grace arrived. She seemed surprised not to find Georgie there, but was pleased to know that he was staying with Olga at Le Touquet. She went to bed very soon after dinner, and left at eight next morning. Never had Lucia waited so impatiently for the shopping hour, when casually, drawlingly she would diffuse the news.
The first person she met was Elizabeth herself, who hurried across the street with an odious smile of kindly pity on her face.
“So lonely for you, Worship, all by yourself without Mr. Georgie,” she said. “Pop in and dine with us to-night.”
Lucia could have sung aloud to think how soon that kindly pity would be struck from the Mayoress’s face. She pressed a finger to her forehead.
“Let me think,” she said. “I’m afraid . . . No, that’s tomorrow . . . Yes, I am free. Charmed.” She paused, prolonging the anticipation of the wonderful disclosure.
“And I had such a queer little surprise last night,” she drawled. “I went home after tea at Diva’s, — of course you were there — and played my piano a while. Then the eternal telephone rang. Who do you think it was who wanted to dine and sleep at such short notice?”
Elizabeth curbed her longing to say “Duchess Poppy,” but that would have been too unkind and sarcastic.
“Tell me, dear,” she said.
“The Duchess,” said Lucia. “I begged her, do you remember, when we three met for a minute yesterday, just to propose herself . . . And an hour afterwards, she did. Dear vague thing! She missed her boat and can’t bear hotels and telephoned. A pleasant quiet evening. She went off again very early to-day, to catch the morning boat. I wonder if she’ll succeed this time. Eight o’clock this evening then? I shall look forward to it.”
Lucia went into a shop, leaving Elizabeth speechless on the pavement, with her mouth wide open. Then she closed it, and it assumed its grimmest aspect. She began to cross the street, but leaped back to the pavement again on the violent hooting, almost in her ear, of Susan’s Royce.
“So sorry if it made you jump,” said Susan, putting her face out of the window, “but I hear that Lucia’s Duchess was here yesterday and didn’t know her from Adam. Or Eve. Either of them. Can it be true?”
“I was there,” said Elizabeth. “She hadn’t the slightest idea who Worship was.”
“That’s odd, considering all those photographs.”
“These’s something odder yet,” said Elizabeth. “Worship has just told me she had a visitor to dine and sleep, who left very early this morning. Guess who that was!”
“I never can guess, as you know,” said Susan. “Who?”
“She!” cried Elizabeth shrilly. “And Lucia had the face to tell me so!”
Mr. Wyse, concealed behind the immense bulk of his wife, popped his head round the corner of her shoulder. The Mayoress’s savage countenance so terrified him that he popped it back again.
“How Worship’s conscience will let her tell such whoppers, is her concern and not mine, thank God,” continued the Mayoress. “What I deplore is that she should think me idiotic enough to believe them. Does one woman ask another woman, whom she doesn’t know by sight, to let her dine and sleep? Does she?”
Mr. Wyse always refused to be drawn into social crises. “Drive on,” he said in a low voice down the speaking-tube, and the car hooted and moved away. Elizabeth screamed “Does she,” after it.
The news spread fast, and there was only one verdict on it. Obviously Lucia had invented the story to counter the mortification of being unrecognised by Poppy the day before. “So silly,” said Diva, when Elizabeth plunged into the tea-house and told her. “Much better to have lived it down. We’ve all got to live things down sometimes. She’s only made it much harder for herself. What’s the good of telling lies which nobody can believe? When you and I tell lies, Elizabeth, it’s in the hope anyhow — What is it Janet?”
“Please ma’am, Grosvenor’s just told me there was a visitor at Mallards last night, and who do you think—”
“Yes, I’ve heard,” said Diva. “I’ll be down in the kitchen in a minute.”
“And making poor Grosvenor her accomplice,” said Elizabeth. “Come and dine to-night, Diva. I’ve asked Worship, and you must help Benjy and me to get through the evening. You must help us to keep her off the subject, or I shall lose my self-control and forget that I’m a lady and tell her she’s a liar.”
Lucia spent a wonderfully happy day. She came straight home after telling Elizabeth her news, for it was far more lofty not to spread it herself and give the impression that she was gratified, and devoted herself to her music and her reading, as there was no municipal business to occupy her. Long before evening everyone would know, and she would merely make casual allusions at dinner to her visitor, and inflame their curiosity. She went out wearing her seed-pearls in the highest spirits.
“Dear host and hostess,” she said as she swept in. “So sweet of you to take compassion on my loneliness. No, Major Benjy, no sherry thanks, though I really deserve some after my long day. Breakfast at half-past seven—”
“Fancy! That was early!” interrupted Elizabeth. Diva entered.
“So sorry,” she said. “A bit late. Fearfully busy afternoon. Worn out. Yes, Major Benjy: just half a glass.”
“I was just saying that I had had a long day, too,” said Lucia. “My guest was off at eight to catch the early boat at Seaport—”
“Such a good service,” put in Benjy. “Liz and I went by that route on our honeymoon.”
“ — and would get to Le Touquet in time for lunch.”
“Well, dinner, dinner,” said Benjy, and in they went.
“I’ve not seen Susan Leg to-day,” remarked Diva. “She usually drops in to tea now.”
“She’s been writing hard,” said Elizabeth. “I popped in for a minute. She’s got some material now, she told me.”
This dark saying had a bright lining for Lucia. Her optimistic mind concluded that Susanna knew about her visitor, and she laughed gaily as dressed crab was handed to her.
“Such a coincidence,” she said. “Last night I had ordered dressed crab before — dear Elizabeth, I never get tired of it — before I was rung up from Seaport. Was not that lucky? Her favourite food.”
“And how many teas did you say you served to-day, Diva?” asked Elizabeth.
“Couldn’t tell you yet. Janet hadn’t finished counting up. People still in the garden when
I left.”
“I heard from Georgie to-day,” said Lucia. “He’ll be back from Le Touquet on Saturday. The house was quite full already, he said, and he didn’t know where Olga would put another guest.”
“Such lovely September weather,” said Elizabeth. “So good for the crops.”
Lucia was faintly puzzled. They had all been so eager to hear about her visit to Sheffield Castle, and now whenever she brought up kindred topics, Elizabeth or Diva changed the subject with peculiar abruptness. Very likely Elizabeth was a little jealous, a little resentful that Lucia had not asked her to dine last night. But she could explain that.
“It was too late, alas,” she said, “to get up a small party,” she said, “as I should have so much liked to do. Simply no time. We didn’t even dress.”
Elizabeth rose.
“Such a short visit,” she said, “and breakfast at half-past seven. Fancy! Let us have a rubber, as we needn’t get up so early to-morrow.”
Lucia walked home in the bright moonlight, making benevolent plans. If Poppy broke her return journey by staying a night here she must certainly have a party.
She vaguely regretted not having done so last night: it would have given pleasure, and she ought to welcome all opportunities of making treats for her friends . . . They were touchy folk; to-night they had been harsh with each other over Bridge, but to her they had been scrupulously polite, receiving all her criticisms of their play in meek silence. Perhaps they were beginning to perceive at last that she was a different class of player from them. As she caressed this vainglorious thought, she stopped to admire the chaste whiteness of the moonlight on the church-tower, which seemed to point skywards as if towards her own serene superiority among the stars. Then quite suddenly a violent earthquake happened in her mind, and it collapsed.
“They don’t believe that Poppy ever stayed with me at all,” she moaned. “They think I invented it. Infamous!”
CHAPTER XII.
For the whole of the next day no burgess of Tilling, except Mrs. Simpson and the domestic staff, set eyes on the Mayor. By a strong effort of will Lucia took up her market-basket after breakfast with the intention of shopping, but looking out from the window of her hall, she saw Elizabeth on the pavement opposite, sketching the front of the ancestral house of her aunt by marriage. She could not face Elizabeth yet, for that awful mental earthquake in the churchyard last night had shattered her nerve. The Mayor was a self-ordained prisoner in her own house, as Popes had been at the Vatican.