Helen Vardon's confession
and refreshed myself with a wash, I decided that, whatever the
surroundings of the house might be like, its interior seemed to have
the makings of a home.
Nor was I less favourably impressed when I went downstairs. The
dining-room, in which I found the ladies assembled, was pervaded by an
air of spotless cleanliness with a severity approaching bareness. The
absence of superfluous furniture and useless ornaments and bric-a-brac
struck me, indeed, as rather odd in a household composed--so far as I
knew--entirely of women.
“I must introduce you to the family,” said Miss Polton, with a
pleasant wrinkly smile, “at least those who are at home. There are
three more who will come in to dinner. This is Miss Blake, and these
ladies are Miss Barnard and Miss Finch.”
I shook hands with my new comrades--the last being the little lady who
had skipped up the stairs so actively with my luggage--and then we sat
down to the table, at the head of which Miss Polton presided, and made
the tea in a delightful Delft teapot from a brass kettle on which I
cast an expert and somewhat disapproving eye, for it was of a
blatantly commercial type and quite unworthy of the teapot.
At first, conversation was spasmodic and punctuated by considerable
pauses. Miss Polton was evidently a silent, self-contained woman,
though genial in a quiet, restful way. Miss Finch, too, who sat by me,
was quiet and a little shy, speaking rarely but silently plying me
with food. Miss Blake, on the other hand, had a restless manner, and,
though she spoke little at first, was undisguisedly interested in me,
for whenever I looked at her I caught her wide-open, blue eyes fixed
on me with an intensity that was almost embarrassing. She was a rather
remarkable-looking girl, with a wealth of red-gold hair, a white and
pink complexion, and a profile which, with its sharp, projecting chin
and retroussé nose, might have been taken direct from one of
Burne-Jones’s allegories; indeed, my first glance at her had made me
think of the “Briar Rose” and the “Golden Stairs.” And now, as I
caught her intense gaze again and again, I had the feeling that she
was wanting to say something to me; and the more so since I thought I
detected a certain expectancy in the expression of her neighbour, Miss
Barnard. Nor was I mistaken; for, after one of the periodic pauses in
the conversation, she leaned over the table towards me and said in
low, portentous tones:
“Mrs. Otway, I want to ask you a question, if you won’t think me too
inquisitive.” Here she paused--and Miss Barnard also paused in the
conveyance to her mouth of a large piece of bread and marmalade.
“I don’t suppose your question would be too inquisitive,” I said,
guardedly.
“It isn’t really,” said she. “You know, I have been looking at your
face, and I’ve been wondering--it’s an extraordinary psychic face, do
you know?”
“Is it?” said I, noting that Miss Barnard had broken out into a slow
smile, which she was trying to obliterate with the lump of bread and
marmalade.
“Oh, very. Intensely so. It is a face, you know, in which the workings
of the subconscious appear, as it were, like an undercurrent moving
beneath the surface of the conscious. I have been watching it with
deep interest, and I have been wondering if you are, as I am, a
dweller in the larger world beyond that inhabited by the conscious
self, beyond the mere material universe. Is it not so, Mrs. Otway?”
Now this was a “facer.” As my dear father would have expressed it in
his playful fashion, it “knocked me sideways.” I cast a bewildered
glance round the table, and was aware of a very extensive outbreak of
the subconscious, Miss Polton was blandly indulgent, her face
transformed into a network of amiable wrinkles; Miss Finch was engaged
in an intense scrutiny of the bowl of a jam spoon; while Miss
Barnard’s feats, with the bread and marmalade, were becoming
positively dangerous.
“I am not sure that I quite understand your question,” said I.
“You generally don’t,” murmured Miss Finch, as Miss Polton explained
that “Miss Blake was somewhat of a mystic.”
“Like her famous namesake,” said I.
“And ancestor,” Miss Blake added, eagerly.
“Really!” I exclaimed, clutching at this straw; “you are actually a
descendant of William Blake? And I daresay you are a great admirer of
his works?”
“I should think she is!” exclaimed Miss Barnard. “You should just see
her fashion plates.”
Recalling Blake’s usual rendering of the human figure and its
unadaptability to the conditions of our climate, I secretly resolved
to take an early opportunity of examining those fashion plates.
Meanwhile, I remarked, “I was thinking of his poems rather than the
drawings.”
“Yes,” said Miss Blake; “though the drawings are very spiritual, too.
But to return to my question. You see, I had been looking at your
intensely psychical face, and hoping that, at last, I had met with a
kindred spirit. And I do hope--I feel convinced--that I have. Perhaps
I did not put my question very clearly--it is difficult to be very
definite when one is speaking of the psychic life; but I was wondering
if you had ever had experiences that had made you aware of that larger
world beyond the world of mere matter and sense-perception; if you had
sometimes felt the thoughts of other minds stealing into your own
without the aid of speech or bodily presence and even, perhaps, held
converse with those dear to you who, while they have passed out of
this little, material world, still share with you the greater world in
which soul speaks to soul unhampered by the limitations----”
The humorous wrinkles had suddenly faded from Miss Polton’s face,
leaving it grave and quiet; and now, in a quiet, grave voice, she
interposed:
“I think, Lilith, dear, that Mrs. Otway’s griefs are too new and too
real----”
“I know!” Miss Blake exclaimed, impulsively. “I am an egotistical
wretch. It was horrid of me to be so wrapped up in my own interests. I
am so sorry; so very, very sorry. Please forgive me, dear Mrs. Otway!
Let us talk of something else.”
“I don’t think we must talk of anything much longer,” said Miss
Polton. “We have finished tea and we ought to get on with our work.
Besides, Mrs. Otway will want to unpack her things and set her room in
order.”
On this there was a general up-rising. Miss Finch immediately fell to
work gathering up the débris and returning the cups and saucers to
the tray, while Miss Blake renewed her apologies and expressions of
sympathy. Then Miss Polton took possession of me, and, having shown me
my workshop--a smallish, well-lighted room, with a paved floor and a
large window looking on an unexpectedly pleasant garden--took me
upstairs to a box-room in which my personal luggage had been
deposited.
“Supper is at eight o’clock,” said she. “We have made it rather late
so that everyone may have a good, long day’s work and all the
wanderers may have come home. It is the social event of the day. And
now I will leave you to your unpacking.”
She tripped away up a narrow flight of stairs that opened from the
landing, towards what I took to be the attics; from whence presently
came a rhythmical “click-clack” that I associated with the loom of
which Dr. Thorndyke had spoken. Meanwhile, I fell to work on my
trunks, with a view to transferring their contents to my room; but I
had hardly got them open when Miss Finch appeared at the open door.
“Can I help you?” she asked. “If I carry some of the things down you
won’t have so many journeys.”
“But aren’t you busy?” I asked in return.
“Do I look like it? No, I’m lazy this afternoon, but I should like to
help you, if you will let me.”
Of course I was only too glad, and forthwith loaded her with an armful
of books, following her with a second consignment. For some time we
continued our journeys up and down the stairs with very little said on
either side, and gradually my room began to lose its emptiness and
severity, and to take on the friendly aspect of an inhabited
apartment.
“It doesn’t look so bad,” said Miss Finch, surveying it critically.
“Looks as if someone lived in it. Do you like the wash-stand?”
“I’ve been admiring it. It’s so simple and so tasteful and unusual.”
“Yes; and yet it is only stained deal, with a few touches of gesso.
Phillibar made it--Phyllis Barton, you know. You’ll meet her at
supper.”
“Is she a carpenter?”
“No; she makes frames for mirrors and pictures; wooden frames
decorated with gesso, or compo, or else carved. But she’s very
thorough. Does it all herself. Makes up the frames from the plank,
makes the compo and the moulds and does the gilding. And she is quite
a good wood-worker and carves beautifully.”
“And does she make a pretty good living?” I asked, bearing Dr.
Thorndyke’s observations in mind.
“She does quite well now, though she had a hard struggle at first. But
now she works direct for the artists and gets as much as she can do.
You will often see her frames in the exhibitions. The floor-cloth is
rather nice, too, isn’t it, though it is only stencilled sacking.
You’d be surprised to see how durable it is. The more it is worn, the
better it looks--if it is properly done. This is stencilled with a
stain. Lilith did it.”
“Lilith? Is that Miss Blake?”
“Yes. Her name is really Winifred, but we call her Lilith because she
looks as if she had come out of a stained-glass window. You might
think that she was a little--well, a little barmy. But she’s awfully
clever.”
“She does fashion-plates, doesn’t she?”
“Yes, poor Lilith! She hates them, but she does them rippingly all the
same. She would rather paint pictures or mural decorations or design
tapestries, but you’ve got to do what you can sell, you know, if you
want to make a living; and Lilith has a little brother whom she keeps
at school--an awfully nice little kiddie. She’s a really good sort,
you know, though frightfully spooky--planchette, crystal ball and all
that sort of tosh; and she thinks she has found a fellow-spook, so you
will have to look out.”
As Miss Finch paused to take another survey, her eye and mine fell
upon the wash-stand, or rather on what it supported.
“I think,” I remarked, “that I shall have to treat myself to some new
crockery. That jug and basin are hardly worthy of Miss Barton’s
masterpiece.”
“No; they’re horrid, aren’t they? Regular Whitechapel china-shop
stuff. But I believe I’ve got some--I’ll just run up and see.”
She tripped away up the stairs and presently returned, bearing a basin
and pitcher of simple, reddish-buff earthenware glazed internally with
a fine green glaze.
“They are frightfully crude and coarse,” she said apologetically (and
with cheeks several shades redder than the ware), “but they aren’t
vulgar. Would you like to have them until you can get something
better?”
“I shall have them a long time, then,” said I. “They are
charming--delightful, and they suit the wash-stand perfectly. What a
house this is for pottery! I noticed the teapot and the beautiful cups
and plates, all so interesting and uncommon. And now you produce these
wonderful things like some benevolent enchantress. How do you do it?
Do you keep a crystal ball, too?”
Miss Finch laughed and blushed very prettily. “We all do our little
bit towards making the home presentable and saving expense. Miss
Polton distempered these walls, and Joan Allen painted the
woodwork--you’ll like Joan, I think; she paints portraits when she can
get them, and fills in her time by doing magazine covers and
book-wrappers. We shall expect a diploma work from you, too. You’re a
goldsmith, aren’t you?”
It was my turn to laugh and blush as this magnificent title was
applied to me. “Not exactly a goldsmith,” I protested. “Say, rather, a
very elementary jeweller and metal-worker, or perhaps a coppersmith.