The Girl Philippa
"Perhaps I am dancing with him now. One never knows--in a cabaret."
When the music ceased she was breathing only a trifle faster, and her
cheeks under the paint glowed softly pink.
"Could you join us?" he asked. "Is it permitted?"
"I'd like to.... Yes."
So he took her back to the table, where Halkett rose and paid his
respects gracefully; and they seated themselves and ordered a grenadine
for her.
Old Wildresse, sidling by, paused with a non-committal grunt:
"Eh bien? On s'amuse? Dis, petit galopin!"
"I'm thirsty," said the girl Philippa.
"And your _caisse_?"
"Tell them to find Melanie," she retorted indifferently.
"Bon! A _jour de fete_, too! How long are you going to be?" But as
she glanced up he winked at her.
She shrugged her shoulders, leaned forward, chose a straw, and plunged
it into the crimson depths of her iced grenadine.
Old Wildresse looked at her a moment, then he also shrugged his
shoulders and went shuffling away, always apparently distrustful of that
invisible something just behind his back.
Halkett said:
"Mr. Warner and I have been discussing an imaginary portrait of you."
"What?" The clear, grey eyes turned questioningly to him, to Warner.
The latter nodded:
"I happen to be a painter. Mr. Halkett and I have agreed that it would
be an interesting experiment to paint your portrait--_as you really
are_."
The girl seemed slightly puzzled.
"As I really am?" she repeated. "But, Messieurs, am I not what you see
before you?"
The music began again; the Louvain student, a little tipsy but very
decorous, arose, bowed to the girl Philippa, bowed to Halkett and to
Warner, and asked for the honor of a dance with her.
"Merci, Monsieur--another time, perhaps," she replied indifferently.
The boy seemed disposed to linger, but he was not quarrelsome, and
finally Halkett got up and led him away.
From moment to moment Warner, glancing across during his tete-a-tete
with the girl Philippa, could see the Louvain student continually
shaking hands with Halkett who seemed horribly bored.
A little later still the entire Louvain delegation insisted on
entertaining Halkett with beer and song; and the resigned but polite
Englishman, now seated at their table, was being taught to sing "La
Brabanconne," between draughts of Belgian beer.
The girl Philippa played with the stem of her glass and stirred the ice
in it with her broken wheat straw. The healthy color in her face had now
faded to an indoor pallor again under the rouge.
"So you are a painter," she said, her grey eyes fixed absently on her
glass. "Are you a distinguished painter, Monsieur?"
He laughed:
"You'll have to ask others that question, Philippa."
"Why? Don't you know whether you are distinguished?"
"I've had some success," he admitted, amused.
She thought a moment, then leaned forward toward the Louvain table.
"Mr. Halkett," she called in English. "Is Mr. Warner a distinguished
American painter?"
Halkett laughed.
"One of the most celebrated American painters of the day!"
The Louvain students, understanding, rose as a man, waved their glasses,
and cheered for Warner, the "_grand peintre Americain_." Which
embarrassed and annoyed him so that his face grew brighter than the
paint on Philippa's lips.
"I'm sorry," she said, noticing his annoyance. "I did not mean to make
you conspicuous."
Everybody in the cafe was now looking at him; on every side he gazed
into amused and smiling faces, saw glasses lifted, heard the cries of
easily aroused Gallic enthusiasm.
"Vive le grand peintre Americain! Vive l'Amerique du Nord!"
"This is tiresome!" exclaimed Philippa. "Let us walk down to the river
and sit in one of our boats. I should really like to talk to you
sensibly--unless you are too much annoyed with me."
She beckoned a waiter to bring her apron; and she put it on.
"When you are ready, Monsieur," she said serenely.
So they rose; Warner paid the bill, and, with a whimsical smile at
Halkett, walked out beside Philippa through one of the rear doors, and
immediately found himself in brightest sunshine, amid green trees and
flower beds.
Here, under the pitiless sky, the girl's face became ghastly under its
rouged mask--the more shocking, perhaps, because her natural skin, if
pale, appeared to be smooth and clear; and the tragic youth of her
seemed to appeal to all out of doors from the senseless abuse it was
enduring.
To see her there in the freshness of the open breeze, sunshine and
shadow dappling the green under foot, the blue overhead untroubled by a
cloud, gave Warner a slightly sick sensation.
"The air is pleasant," she remarked, unconscious of the effect she had
on him.
He nodded. They walked down the grassy slope to the river bank, where
rows of boats lay moored. A few were already in use out on the calm
stream; young men in their shirt sleeves splashed valiantly at the oars;
young women looked on under sunshades of flamboyant tints.
There was a white punt there called the _Lys_. Philippa stepped into it,
drew a key from her apron pocket, unlocked the padlock. Then, lifting
the pole from the grass, she turned and invited Warner with a gesture.
He had not bargained for this; but he tossed the chain aboard, stepped
in, and offered to take the pole.
But Philippa evidently desired to do the punting herself; so he sat
back, watching her sometimes and sometimes looking at the foliage, where
they glided swiftly along under overhanging branches and through still,
glimmering reaches of green water, set with scented rushes where dragon
flies glittered and midges danced in clouds, and the slim green frogs
floated like water sprites, partly submerged, looking at them out of
golden goblin eyes that never blinked.
"The town is _en fete_," remarked Philippa presently. "Why should I not
be too?"
Warner laughed:
"Do you call this a _fete_?"
"For me, yes." ... After a moment, turning from her pole: "Do you not
find it agreeable?"
"Certainly. What little river is this?"
"The Recollette."
"It flows by Sais, too. I did not recognize it for the same. The
Recollette is swifter and shallower below Sais."
"You know Sais, then?"
"I live there in summer."
"Oh. And in winter?"
"Paris."
An unconscious sigh of relief escaped her, that it was not necessary to
play the spy with this man. It was the other man who interested
Wildresse.
The girl poled on in silence for a while, then deftly guided the _Lys_
into the cool green shadow of a huge oak which overhung the water, the
lower branches touching it.
"The sun is warm," she observed, driving in the pole and tying the white
punt so that it could swing with the current.
She came and seated herself by Warner, smiled frankly.
"Do you know," she said, "I've never before done this for pleasure."
"What haven't you done for pleasure?" he inquired, perplexed.
"This--what I am doing."
"You mean you never before went out punting with a customer?"
"Not for the pleasure of it--only for business reasons."
He hesitated to understand, refused to, because, for all her careless
freedom and her paint, he could not believe her to be merely a _fille de
cabaret_.
"Business reasons," he repeated. "What is your business?"
"Cashier, of course."
"Well, does your business ever take you boating with customers? Is it
part of your business to dance with a customer and drink grenadine with
him?"
"Yes, but you wouldn't understand----" And suddenly she comprehended
his misunderstanding of her and blushed deeply.
"I am not a _cocotte_. Did you think I meant that?"
"I know you are not. I didn't know what you meant."
There was a silence; the color in her cheeks cooled under the rouge.
"It happened this way," she said quietly. "I didn't want to make it a
matter of business with you. Even in the beginning I didn't.... You
please me.... After all, the town is _en fete_.... After all, a girl
has a right to please herself once in her life.... And business is a
very lonely thing for the young.... Why shouldn't I amuse myself for an
hour with a client who pleases me?"
"Are you doing it?"
"Yes. I never before knew a distinguished painter--only noisy boys from
the schools, whose hair is uncut, whose conversation is _blague_, and
whose trousers are too baggy to suit me. They smoke soldier's tobacco,
and their subjects of discussion are not always _convenable_."
He said, curiously:
"As for that, you must hear much that is not _convenable_ in the
cabaret."
"Oh, yes. I don't notice it when it is not addressed to me.... Please
tell me what you paint--if I am permitted to ask."
"Soldiers."
"Only soldiers?"
"Portraits, sometimes, and landscapes out of doors--anything that
appeals to me. Do pictures interest you?"
"I used to go to the Louvre and the Luxembourg when I was a child. It
was interesting. Did you say that you would like to make a portrait of
me?"
"I said that if I ever did make a portrait of you I'd paint you _as you
really are_."
Her perplexed gaze had the disconcerting directness of a child's.
"I don't understand," she said.
"Shall I explain?"
"If you would be so kind."
"You won't be offended?"
She regarded him silently; her brows became slightly contracted.
"Such a man as you would not willingly offend, I think."
"No, of course not. I didn't mean that sort of thing. But you might not
like what I have to say."
"If I merit what you say about me, it doesn't matter whether I like it
or not, does it? Tell me."
He laughed:
"Well, then, if I were going to paint you, I'd first ask you to wash
your cheeks."
She sat silent, humiliated, the painful color deepening and waning under
the rouge.
"And," he continued pleasantly, "after your face had been well scrubbed,
I'd paint you in your black gown, cuffs and apron of a _caissiere_, just
as I first saw you there behind the desk, one foot swinging, and your
cheek resting on your hand.
"But behind your eyes, which looked out so tranquilly across the tumult
of the cabaret, I'd paint a soul as clean as a flame.... I'm wondering
whether I'd make any mistake in painting you that way, Philippa?"
The girl Philippa had fixed her grey eyes on him with fascinated but
troubled intensity. They remained so for a while after he had finished
speaking.
Presently, and partly to herself, she said:
"_Pour ca_--no. So far. But it has never before occurred to me that I
look like a _cocotte_."
She turned, and, resting one arm on the gunwale, gazed down into the
limpid green water.
"Have you a fresh handkerchief?" she asked, not turning toward him.
"Yes--but----"
"Please! I must wash my face."
She bent swiftly, dipped both hands into the water, and scrubbed her
lips and cheeks. Then, extending her arm behind her for the
handkerchief, she dried her skin, sat up again, and faced him with
childish resignation. A few freckles had become visible; her lips were
no longer vivid, and there now remained only the faintest tint of color
under her clear, cool skin.
"You see," she said, "I'm not attractive unless I help nature. One
naturally desires to be thought attractive."
"On the contrary, you are exceedingly attractive!"
"Are you sincere?"
"Perfectly."
"But I have several freckles near my nose. And I am pale."
"You are entirely attractive," he repeated, laughing.
"With my freckles! You are joking. Also, I have no pink in my cheeks
now." She shrugged. "However--if you like me this way----" She
shrugged again, as though that settled everything.
Another punt passed them; she looked after it absently. Presently she
said, still watching the receding boat:
"Do you think you'll ever come again to the Cafe Biribi?"