Love and Lucy
little was much. It was as if he was on the downward slide of the
wave, no longer cresting the flow, which surged on ahead of him,
carrying him no longer. The fact was that he was now at the difficult
part of an enterprise which had been so far too easy. At the moment it
was not obvious to him what he was to do. James was aware, that was
plain; and James had a strong hand--if he knew that too, he had an
unassailable hand. But did he? Urquhart thought not. He chuckled
grimly to himself as he saw his complacent host taken at his word. He
looked at his wrist. "Half-past three? D---- him, I'll go and see her
now."
But Lucy, as James had truly put it, held firmly to the bank. Glad of
him she certainly was, amused by his audacities; but not tempted to
plunge. He saw very soon that he must be careful with her. A reference
to the Hardanger woods at night, to the absence of nightingales,
absence of the dark--she veiled her eyes with blankness, and finally
shut down the topic. "Don't let's talk of what is not in Norway. Tell
me what is there. I have to keep Lancelot supplied you know." No man
has so little self-esteem as to suppose that a woman can definitely
put him away. Urquhart had plenty, and preferred to think that she
thrust him more deeply within her heart. "Quite right," he said, and
exerted himself on her amusement. James, coming home early, found him
on the hearth-rug, talking really well about his flying. Nobody could
have behaved better than James. He took his cup of tea, listened, was
interested, smoked a cigarette; then touched Lucy's shoulder, saying,
"I leave you to your escapades." He went to his own room, with nothing
to do there, and sat it out. He fought his nervousness, refused to see
his spectres, sat deep in his chair, grimly smoking. He heard the
drawing-room door open, Urquhart's voice: "Yes, it will be all right.
Leave all that to me." Lucy said something, he could not tell what.
His heart beat faster to hear her tones. Urquhart let himself out: she
had not gone with him to the front door. Was that a good sign? or a
bad one? He frowned over that intricate question; but kept himself
from her until dinner-time. She might have come in--he half expected
her; but she did not. What was she doing in there by herself? Was she
thinking where she stood? So pretty as she was, so innocent, such a
gentle, sweet-natured creature! Alas, alas!
In short, James was growing sentimental about Lucy. Man of fashion as
he was, with that keen eye for style and the mode, it may well be that
Urquhart's interest in her was a kind of _cachet_. A hall-mark!
However that may be, James looked at her more curiously during that
July than he had done since he saw her first in the garden of Drem
House. Yes, Lucy was pretty; more than that, she had charm. He saw it
now. She moved her head about like a little bird--and yet she was not
a little woman by any means; tall, rather, for a woman. But there was
an absence of suspicion about Lucy--or rather of fundamental suspicion
(for she was full of little superficial alarms), which was infinitely
charming--but how pathetic! It was deeply pathetic; it made him
vaguely unhappy, and for a long time he did not know why tears swam
into his eyes as he watched her over the top of his evening paper, or
was aware (at the tail of his eye) of her quick and graceful motions
before her dressing-glass. Studying his feelings deeply, as never
before, he found himself out. It was that he was to lose her, had
perhaps lost her, just as he had found out how inexpressibly dear she
was to be. And amazement came upon him, and dismay to realise that
this sweetness of hers, this pliancy of temper, this strength within
beauty were really there in her apart from him. As if he had believed
that they lay in his esteem! No, indeed: they were her own; she could
bestow them where she pleased.
But he couldn't touch her--now: he would die sooner than touch her.
And he couldn't say anything to her: that would have been to throw up
the game. She should never pity him, and give him for pity what would
have become, in the very giving, negligible to herself. He knew
himself well: he could never ask for a thing. No! but could he get her
to ask for something? Ah, then she might find out whom she had
married! A man, he judged, of spendthrift generosity, a prodigal of
himself. Yes, that was how it must be, if to be at all. He kept his
eyes wide, and followed her every movement, with a longing to help
which was incessant, like toothache. At the same time he was careful
to keep himself quiet. Not a tone of voice must vary, not a daily
action betray him. That hand on the shoulder, now, when Urquhart was
last here. Too much. There must be no more of it, though he could
still feel the softness of her in the tips of his fingers. Thus he
braced himself.
He held good cards: but he didn't know how good.
CHAPTER XVI
AMARI ALIQUID
Lingen was exceedingly gratified by Lucy's letter. James had thought
the invitation should come from her, and, as the subject-matter was
distasteful to her, sooner than discuss it she had acquiesced. Few
pin-pricks had rankled as this one. She had never had any feeling but
toleration for Lingen; James had erected him as a foible; and that he
should use him now as a counter-irritant made her both sore and
disgustful. She wished to throw up the whole scheme, but was helpless,
because she could neither tell James, who would have chuckled, nor
Urquhart either. To have told Urquhart, whether she told him her
reason or left him to guess it, would have precipitated a confession
that her present position was untenable. In her heart she knew it, for
the heart knows what the mind stores; but she had not the courage to
summon it up, to table it, and declare, "This robe is outworn,
stretched at the seams, ragged at the edges. Away with it." Just now
she could not do it; and because she could not do it she was trapped.
James had her under his hand.
Therefore she wrote her, "Dear Francis," and had his grateful
acceptance, and his solemn elation, visible upon his best calling
face. "I can't tell you how happy you have made me. It is beautiful,
even for you, to make people happy. That is why you do it: what else
could you do? Life is made up of illusions, I think. Let me therefore
add to the sum of mine that you have desired my happiness." This sort
of thing, which once had stirred her to gentle amusement, now made her
words fall dry. "You mustn't forget that James has desired it too."
"Oh," said Francis Lingen, "that's very kind of him."
"Really, it is Mr. Urquhart's party. He invented it."
"Did he desire my happiness too?" asked Lingen, provoked into mockery
of his own eloquence by these chills upon it.
"At least he provided for it," said Lucy, "and that you shouldn't be
uncomfortable I have asked Margery Dacre to come."
Lingen felt this to be unkind. But he closed his eyes and said, "How
splendid."
That was the fact. It had been an afterthought of hers, and partially
countered on James. Margery Dacre also had accepted. She had said,
"How too delicious!" James, when made aware that she was coming,
ducked his head, it is true, but made a damaging defence.
"Is she?" he said. "Why?"
"She'll make our number a square one," she replied, "to begin with.
And she might make it more pleasant for the others--Francis Lingen and
Mr. Urquhart."
If she hadn't been self-conscious she would never have said such a
thing as that. James's commentary, "I see," and the subsequent
digestion of the remark by the eyeglass, made her burn with shame. She
felt spotted, she felt reproach, she looked backward with compunction
and longing to the beginning of things. There was now a tarnish on the
day. Yet there was no going back.
Clearly she was not of the hardy stuff of which sinners must be made
if they are to be cheerful sinners. She was qualmish and easily
dismayed. Urquhart was away, or she would have dared the worst that
could befall her, and dragged out of its coffer her poor tattered robe
of romance. Between them they would have owned to the gaping seams
and frayed edges. Then he might have kissed her--and Good-bye. But he
was not at hand, and she could not write down what she could hardly
contemplate saying.
Never, in fact, was a more distressful lady on the eve of a party of
pleasure. Lancelot's serious enjoyment of the prospect, evident in
every line of his letters, was her only relish; but even that could
not sting her answers to vivacity. "I hope the Norwegians are very
sensible. They will need all their sense, because we shall have none
when the pirate is there." "There used to be vikings in Norway. They
came to England and stole wives and animals. Now we bring them a man
for wives. That is what for with the chill of." "I must have a new
reel to my fishing-rod. The old one has never been the same since I
made a windlass of it for the battleship when it was a canal-boat, and
it fell into the water when we made a landslide and accident which was
buried for three days and had a worm in the works. Also a v. sharp
knife for reindeer, etc. They are tough, I hear, and my knife is
sharpest at the back since opening sardines and other tins, all rather
small." He drove a fevered pen, but retained presence of mind enough
to provide for his occasions: "The excitement of Norway may lose me
some marks in term's order. Not many I dare say." Again, "When you are
excited reports go bad. I have been shouting rather, kicking up a
shine. Once there was a small fight which was twigged. Norway is a
serious matter." There was an undercurrent of nervousness, discernible
only to her eyes. She could not account for it till she had him home,
and they were on the edge of adventure. It was lest he should be
seasick and disgrace himself in the esteem of young Nugent, who, as a
naval officer, was of course sea-proof. "I expect Nugent likes it very
rough," he said--and then, "I don't, you know, much. Not for weeks at
a time. Rather a nuisance." However, it was solved in the event by
Nugent being prostrate from the time they left the Tyne. Between his
spasms he urged his mother to explain that Lord Nelson was always
seasick. But Lancelot was very magnanimous about it.
There was diversion in much of this, and she used it to lighten her
letters to Urquhart, which, without it, had been as flat as
yesterday's soda-water. As the time came near when they should leave
home she grew very heavy, had forebodings, wild desires to be done
with it all. Then came a visitation from the clear-eyed Mabel and a
cleansing of the conscience.
Mabel said that she was sorry to miss Norway. It would have amused her
enormously. "To see you in the saddle, with two led horses!" She
always talked as if she was an elder sister. "I almost threw Laurence
over; but of course I couldn't do that. He's so dependent and silent
and pathetic--but thank goodness, he hasn't found out, like James, the
real use of wives. That is, to have somebody to grumble to who really
minds. There's your James for you. He doesn't want to go a bit; he'd
much rather be at Harrogate or somewhere of that sort. Perhaps he'd
like Homburg. But he wouldn't go for the world. He's not pathetic at
all, though he wants to be; but he wants to be sarcastic at the same
time, and is cross because the two things won't go together. Of course
he stuck in Francis Lingen. He would. As if he cared about Francis
Lingen, a kind of poodle!"
"You oughtn't to abuse James to me," Lucy said, not very stoutly; "I
don't abuse Laurence."
"Abuse him!" cried Mabel. "Good Heavens, child, I only say out loud
what you are saying to yourself all day. We may as well know where we
are." Then came a pause; and then, "I suppose you and Jimmy Urquhart
are in a mess."