Set in Silver
treacherous to women, and to accept bribes for being guardian to their
children? I do wish I knew what to make of it all--and of him.
He has taken the funny little Bengalese valet, who has been, and is to
be, his chauffeur, to try the new car this morning. He meant to have
gone before this to look at his partly burnt castle in Warwickshire, but
he says London has captivated him, and he can't tear himself away; that
he will go in a day or two, when he has trotted Mrs. Norton and me about
to see a few more sights. Of course, we could quite well see the sights
by ourselves. Mrs. Norton has seen them all, anyhow, and only revisits
them for my sake; while as for me, you and I "did" London thrillingly
together in the last two months of our glory. But Sir Lionel has an
interesting way of telling things, and he is as enthusiastic as a boy
over his England. Not that he gushes; but one knows, somehow, what he is
feeling. I can't imagine his ever being tired, but he is very
considerate of us--seems to think women are frail as glass. I suppose
women _are_ a sex by themselves, but we aren't as different as all that.
Once in a while he threw a sideways glare at Dick Burden, when D. B. was
talking with a confidential air to me. I know from Ellaline and Mrs.
Norton that Sir Lionel dislikes women; but all the same I believe he
thinks we ought to be kept indoors unless veiled, and never allowed to
talk to men, except our relatives.
Mrs. Norton is _so_ funny, without knowing it. She asked her brother as
gravely as possible at breakfast this morning: "Had you a harem in
Bengal, dear?"
"Good heavens, no!" he answered, turning red. "What put such a ghastly
idea into your head?"
"Oh, I only thought perhaps it was the thing, and you were obliged to,
or be talked about," she explained, calmly.
He went on to tell her that it was not at all necessary to have harems,
and she was quite surprised. You would think that she'd have taken pains
to find out every detail of her brother's life in a country where he was
one of the head men, wouldn't you? But she hardly feels that any country
except her own is worth serious inquiries. She has the impression that
"heathen" are all alike, and mostly naked, but not as embarrassing to
meet as if they were white.
Good-bye, dearest. I'm afraid I write very disconnected letters. But I
feel "disconnected" myself, somehow, like a telephone that's been "cut
off."
Your loving and well-dressed
Deceiver.
P. S. It's to-morrow, for I forgot to post this, there were so many
things "doing." Please forgive me. The car's splendid, and I am to
christen her. We're going to have a kind of ceremony like a launching,
and I have to think of a name for her, and throw wine on her bonnet. Sir
Lionel is longing to get off on the tour, he says; and as he's to leave
town for Warwickshire to-morrow, turning me over temporarily to the
tender mercies of the good--(his sister)--I almost hope that after all
Mrs. Senter mayn't have time to "sweedle" him into taking her with us,
as I _know_ she hopes to do.
We, by the way, are not to see his place until the burnt bit is mended.
We're to avoid Warwickshire in starting out, go away up North as far as
the Roman Wall, visit Bamborough Castle, where he thinks friends of his,
who own it, will actually invite us to lunch, or something (it seems
like a dream), and then stop in Warwickshire at the end of the tour,
when all the dilapidations have been made good. The Dragon naturally
expects me, not only to finish the trip, but to take up my residence at
Graylees until next spring, when his plan is that his ward shall be
presented. Oh, mice and men, and dragons, how aft your plans gang agley!
Of course, mine depend altogether upon Ellaline. I hold myself ready for
marching orders from her. But I must confess to you that, whether right
or wrong, I don't look forward to the weeks of my duties as understudy
with the same feelings I had when I was engaged to perform them.
Little did Sir Lionel guess what was in my mind this morning, when I
asked if one could see most of England in a few weeks when motoring! But
I may have to take my flight from the car, so to speak, unless Ellaline
be detained for some reason. I'm expecting a letter from her any day
now, and there may be definite news.
Good-bye, again, dearest.
VIII
AUDRIE BRENDON TO HER MOTHER
_Royal Hotel, Chichester_,
_July 17th_
Brightest and Best: _La Donna e automobile._ _I_ am "la donna";
and the most inward Me-ness of my Me _e automobile_.
Some people--Mrs. Norton, for instance--might say: "What on earth does
the silly thing mean?" But you always know what I mean. You and I were
born knowing quite a lot of nice little things like that, weren't we?
Things we picked up during our various incarnations; things _new_ souls
haven't had time to collect, poor dears.
My automobiliness is the reason I've only sent you snippy "how-do-you-do
and good-bye" notes, interspersed with telegrams, for the last few days,
just thanking you for wise advice, and saying "Glad-you're-well;
so-am-I."
You will guess from my very handwriting that I'm feeling more at home in
life than I did when I wrote you last. And I can't help being pleased
that Ellaline's adored one won't be able to leave his manoeuvres, to
make her his own, till a fortnight or so later than she expected. That
is, I can't help being glad, as the doctor thinks you ought to stop at
Champel-les-Bains till after the first week of September, and we
_couldn't_ be together, even if I were back in Paris. You swear you
didn't hypnotize him to say that? I would enjoy more peace of mind,
while careering through England in Apollo, if I were certain.
Oh, that reminds me, I forgot to tell you what fun it was christening
Apollo. I quite enjoyed it, and felt immensely important. Don't you
think "Apollo" an appropriate name for such a magnificent car as I've
described to you? The Sun God--Driver of the Chariot of the Sun? Sir
Lionel likes it; but he says he isn't sure "The Cloud" wouldn't be a
more appropriate name, because the car costs such a lot that "she" has a
silver lining. I began by calling her "it," but he won't let me do that.
He doesn't much mind my being amateurish, but he hates me to be
disrespectful.
I am so dazzled by the motor and enchanted with the sport of
motoring--as well as seeing things even more lovely than I hoped
for--that I'm not worrying over Dick Burden and his mysterious hints
about himself as a detective. Besides, when he and his aunt came to tea
(you'll remember I told you in a scrap of a note that it was the day Sir
Lionel went to Warwickshire, and how vexed Mrs. Senter was to find him
gone), Mr. Dick made himself quite pleasant. He wasn't impertinent, or
too admiring, or anything which a well-brought-up young Englishman ought
not to be. Indeed, I thought by his manner that he wanted tacitly to
apologize for his bad behaviour when we first met; so probably, when I
fancied he looked wicked that night at Ennis's Rooms, it _was_ because
he wanted to sneeze. You have taught me to give everybody, except young
men, the benefit of the doubt; but I don't see why one shouldn't give it
to young men, too. I think they're rather easier to forgive, somehow,
than women. Is that why they're dangerous? But D. B. could never be
dangerous to me, in the sense of falling in love.
His aunt certainly wishes to throw us together; I suppose on account of
Ellaline's money. She doesn't like girls, I'm sure, but would always be
ready, on principle, to give first aid to heiresses. It is something to
be thankful for that she hasn't grafted herself on to our party, as I
feared she might; and though they're both going to stop at some country
house near Southsea, and they "hope we may meet," I dare say I shan't be
bothered by them again while I'm in England. I don't intend to worry.
_La donna e automobile!_
I haven't properly described our start, or told you about the things
I've seen _en route_, and I promised to tell you everything; so I'll go
back to the beginning of the trip.
There was Apollo, throbbing with joy of life in front of the hotel door,
at nine o'clock of a perfect English morning. There were statuesque,
Ritzy footmen, gazing admiringly at the big golden-yellow car (that was
one of the reasons I thought she should be named after the Sun God, she
is so golden). There was Charu Chunder Bose, alias Young Nick, who would
think it a sin against all his gods to dress as a chauffeur, and who
continues to garb himself as a self-respecting Bengali--Young Nick, with
his sleepy eyes, and his Buddha-when-young smile, about as appropriate
on a motor-car as a baby crocodile. There was Sir Lionel waiting to tuck
us in. There were we two females in neat gray motor dust-cloaks, on
which the Dragon insisted; Mrs. Norton in a toque, which she wore as if
it were a remote and dreaded contingency; your Audrie in a duck of an
early Victorian bonnet, in which she liked herself better than in
anything else she ever had on before. There, too, was our luggage, made
to fit the car, and looking like the very last word of up-to-dateness--if
you know what that look is.
Of course, it wasn't the first time I'd been out in the car, for I think
I told you, the day Apollo was christened I had a spin; but it rained,
and we went only through the Park. That was nothing. This morning we
were bidding good-bye to London, and our pulses were beating high for
the Tour. Young Nick drove on the christening day, but this time Sir
Lionel took the driver's seat, with the brown idol beside him; and I saw
instantly, by the very way he laid his hand on the steering-wheel, with
a kind of caress--as a horse-lover pats a beloved mare's neck--that he
and the golden car were in perfect sympathy.
We were starting early, because Sir Lionel had planned a good many
things for us to see before dark; but early as it was, Piccadilly and
Knightsbridge were seething with traffic. Motor-'buses like mad
hippopotamuses; taxi-cabs like fierce young lions; huge carts like
elephants; and other vehicles of all sorts to make up a confused medley
of wild animals escaped from the Zoo. It looked appalling to mingle
with, but our own private Dragon drove so skilfully, yet so carefully,
that I never bit my heart once. Always the car seemed sentient, steering
its way like a long, thin pike; then when the chance came, flashing
ahead, dauntless and sure.
We went by a great domed palace--Harrod's Stores--and then over Putney
Bridge, passing Swinburne's house, whose outside is as deceiving as an
oyster-shell that hides a pearl; through Epsom, Charles the Second's
"Brighton" (which I've been reading about in a volume of Pepys Sir
Lionel has given me), to Leatherhead, along the Dorking Road, slowing up
for a glimpse of Juniper Hall, glowing red as a smouldering bonfire
behind a dark latticed screen of splendid Lebanon cedars. I dare say
it's a good deal changed since dear little Fanny Burney's day, for the
house looks quite modern; but then neither buildings nor the people who
live in them show their age early in England.
Close under Box Hill we glided; and Sir Lionel pointed out a little path
leading up on the left to George Meredith's cottage. Just a small house
of gray stone it is (for I would get out and walk up part way to see it
from far off, not to intrude or spy); and there that great genius shines
out, a clear, white light for the world, like a beacon or a star.
Evidently Surrey air suits geniuses. Do you remember reading about
Keats, that he wrote a lot of "Endymion" at Burford Bridge? It was only
a little after ten o'clock when we passed the quaint-looking hotel
there, but already at least a dozen motors were drawn up before it. I