The Rustle of Silk
bareheaded, holding her hand, opposite the shabby little villa in
Castleton Terrace. Which would never do. Madame de Breze did not live
anywhere near Queen's Road, Bayswater.
She saw herself driven by Chalfont to the Ritz or the Carlton, escorted
by him to the lift where he would wait to see the last of her as she was
taken up to the rooms that she did not possess. That also was
impossible. Great heavens, what was she to do? Trying again, her hands
icier than ever, she saw Chalfont with growing incredulity listening to
cock-and-bull stories which ran like this:
"I don't want you to see me home. As a matter of fact I'm very
old-fashioned." Or, "We must say good night here. I'm staying with a
puritanical aunt who will be sure to ask me who brought me home and when
I say, 'Sir Peter Chalfont' her answer will be 'I didn't know you knew
Sir Peter Chalfont. Where did you meet him?' And then I shall have to
tell the story of how you picked me up. Can you imagine the
result?"--And this was hopeless because, of course, Peter would say,
"How in the name of all that's marvelous will your good old aunt know
who brings you home? Good old aunts haven't got to know the truth.
Besides, if it comes to that, you can drop me about ten doors from the
house and then go on alone. It's perfectly easy, and it's done every
day." And who, after all, was this aunt? Miss Breezy, the housekeeper.
Phew!
And then came an inspiration. "I'm very hungry," she said aloud. "I
begin to remember that dinner was a little unsatisfactory." She laughed
and Peter laughed. "But I must go and powder my nose. Please don't
bother, Lady Cheyne. I'll find my way and rejoin you in a moment."
She picked up the cloak which she had brought into the drawing-room,
threw at Chalfont a smile of the most charming camaraderie, touched Lady
Cheyne's arm in a way that asked for friendship and left the
drawing-room. With one quick look at the deserted hall with all its
strange coats and stranger hats, she made for the front door, opened it,
closed it behind her stealthily and ran down the stone path which led to
the street. The theater traffic was all headed towards High Street,
Kensington. There was not a vacant taxi to be seen. It would not do to
stand about in front of the house, so the little Cinderella who had not
waited for the magic hour of twelve and had taken good care not to leave
her crystal slipper behind her ran up the street to the first turning
and stood quivering with excitement and glee beneath a friendly lamp
post. A little laugh floated into the muggy air.
"Yes, it's a funny world, ain't it?"
It was a Bobby who had sidled up from the shadow of a wall and towered
above her, with a sceptical grin about his mouth.
Instantly a new thought came into Lola's head. "What would Lady Feo do?"
She gave it five seconds and turned coolly, calmly and graciously to the
arm of the law,--a strong and obviously would-be familiar arm. This
girl--running about alone in evening dress--at that time of night.
"I told my car to wait here," she said. "Evidently there has been some
mistake. Will you be good enough to call me a cab?"
A hand swept up to the peak of the helmet. "Nothing simpler, Madam."
By the grace of God and the luck that follows drunkards, a taxi was
discharging a fare halfway down the road. The ex-sergeant of the Sussex
regiment put two fingers into his mouth. With a new interest in life the
cab made a wide turn and came up not without style, but with a certain
amount of discretion, because of the uniform which could be seen beneath
the lamp post.
The Bobby opened the door. There was admiration in his eyes. "A good
fairy, ma'am," he said.
And Lola paused and looked up into his face,--a man face, with a big
moustache and rather bristling eyebrows, a dent in a firm chin and the
mark of shrapnel on the left cheek bone. "A very good fairy," she said.
"You'll never know how good. Thanks, most awfully."
And once more the hand flicked to the brim of the helmet as Lola in an
undertone gave her address to the driver. Not even the Bobby must see
the anti-climax which would be brought about by such an address as
Castleton Terrace.
----
A scrawny black cat rose and arched its back as Lola, telling the taxi
man to wait, ran up the steps. One of those loose bells that jangle
indiscreetly woke the echoes in the sleeping street, and the door was
opened by the invincible Mrs. Rumbold, tired-eyed, with yawn marks all
over her face. "Well, here you are, dearie," she said, as cheerful as
usual, "absobally-lootely to the minute. The old man ain't turned up
yet. But you're not going to keep the taxi waiting, are you?"
"Yes," said Lola.
"Gor blimey." The comment was a perfectly natural one under the
circumstances.
And while Lola changed back again into the day clothes of the lady's
maid, Mrs. Rumbold lent a willing hand and babbled freely. It was good
to have some one to speak to. Her legless son had been put to bed two
hours before, asking himself, "Have they forgotten?"
Finally the inevitable question, which Mrs. Rumbold, for all her lessons
in discretion, simply could not resist. "Where have yer bin, dearie?"
And Lola said, "The Savoy. I dined with a knight in shining armor with a
white cross on his chest."
"Oh," said Mrs. Rumbold, "he was going on to a fancy ball, I suppose.
Lord, how these boys love to dress themselves up." But a lurking
suspicion of something that was not quite right edged its way into that
good woman's thoughts. What was little Lola Breezy from the shop round
the corner doing with a gent as 'ad enough money to dine at the Savoy
and sport about in old-time costumes? "Well, of course, as I said
before, you can only live once. But watch your step, dearie. Lots of
banana skins about."
And Lola threw her arms round the woman's neck and kissed her warmly.
"Fate has swept the pavement for me," she said, once more as Feo would
have spoken. "I shall not make any slip."
IV
Ernest Treadwell faced her at the bottom of the steps, and beneath the
peak of his flabby cap his eyes were filled with fright.
"Is anything the matter with Father or Mother?"
"No," he said.
"Why do you look like that, then?" Her hand fell away from his coat. If
there was nothing wrong with her parents----
He edged her away from the cab and spoke quickly, without the usual
stammer and timidity. He was laboring under a passion of apprehension.
It made him almost rude. "I came this way round from the Tube and saw
you get out of this cab dressed up like a--a lady. What are you doing?
Where've you been?" He caught her by the wrist, excited by a sense of
impending evil. Oh, God, how he loved this girl!
And Lola remembered this, although her brain was filled with pictures of
the Savoy, of Chalfont and of Fallaray. Irritation, in which was mingled
a certain degree of haughtiness, was dropped immediately. She knew that
she had always been enthroned in this boy's heart. She must respect his
emotion.
"Don't worry about me, Ernie," she said, soothingly. "Lady Feo gave me
the dress. I changed into it at Mrs. Rumbold's and brought it back for
her to work on again. It isn't quite right."
"But where could you go to wear a thing like that--and the cloak? You
looked so--so unlike----" He could only see her as she used to be behind
the shop counter and out for walks with him.
And Lola gave a little reassuring laugh because an answer was not ready.
If instead of Ernest Treadwell the man who held her up had been
Simpkins! "One of the girls had two stalls for the St. James's--her
brother's in the box office--and so we both dressed up and went. It was
great fun." Why did these men force her into lying? She took her hand
away.
"Oh," he said, "I see," his fear rising like a crow and taking wings.
"And now if you've finished playing the glaring inquisitor, I'll say
good night." She gave him her hand again.
Covered with the old timidity, he remained where he stood and gazed.
There was something all about her, a glow, a light; a look in her eyes
that he had put there in his dreams. "Can't I go with you to Dover
Street?"
Why not? Yes, that might be good, in case Simpkins should be waiting.
"Come along then. You've made me late. Tell him where to go."
The cab turned into Queen's Road and as it passed the narrow house with
the jeweler's shop below--all in darkness now--Lola leaned forward and
kissed her hand to it. Her father with the glass in his eyes, the ready
laugh, the easy-going way, the confidence in her; her capable mother, a
little difficult to kiss, peeping out of a shell; her own old room so
full of memories, the ground in which she grew. They were slipping
behind. They had almost been specks on the horizon during all that
eventful night, during which she had found her wings. And this Treadwell
boy, his feet in a public library, his soul among the stars, such
clothes and such an accent.--And now there were Chalfont and Lady Cheyne
and--Fallaray? No, not yet. But he had touched her hand and heard the
songs of birds.
"Lola, it hurts me now you've gone. I hate to pass the shop. There's
nothing to do but"--he knew the word and tumbled it out--"yearn." If
only he might have held her hand, say halfway to the house that he
hated.
"Is that a new cap, Ernie? Take it off. You don't look like a poet.
Nothing to do? Have you forgotten your promise to read and learn? You
can't become a Masefield in a day!"
He put his hands up to his face and spoke through sudden sobs. "With you
away I shall never become anything, any time. Come back, Lola. Nothing's
the same now you're away."
And she gave him her hand, poor boy. And he held it all too tight, like
a drowning man, as indeed he felt that he was. Since Dover Street had
come into life he hadn't written a line. The urge had gone. Ambition, so
high before, had fallen like an empty rocket. Lola,--it was for her that
he had worked his eyes to sightlessness far into all those nights.
"This will never do," she said. Inspiration--she could give him that,
though nothing else--was almost as golden as love. He was to be Some
One,--a modern Paul Brissac. She needed that. And she refired him as the
cab ran on, rekindled the cold stove and set the logs ablaze. Work,
work, study, feel, express, eliminate, temper down. Genius could be
crowded out by weeds like other flowering things.
And as the cab drew up the hand was raised to burning lips. But the
shame of standing aside while the driver was paid--that added a very big
log.
"Good night, Poet."
"Good night, Princess." (Oh-h, that was Simpkins's word.)
Dover Street--and the area steps.
PART IV
I
For a Marquis he was disconcertingly hairy. So much so that even those
fast diminishing people who still force themselves to believe that a
title necessarily places men on a high and ethereal plane were obliged
to confess that Feo's father might have been any one,--a mere
entomologist for instance, bland, concentrated and careless of
appearance, who pottered about in the open after perfectly superfluous
insects and forgot that such a thing as civilization existed. He had the
appearance indeed of a man who sleeps in tents, scorns to consult a
looking-glass and cuts his own hair with a pair of grass clippers at
long intervals. On a handsome and humorous face, always somehow
sun-tanned, white wiry hairs sprouted everywhere. A tremendous
moustache, all akimbo, completely covered his mouth and spread along
each cheek almost to his ears, from which white tufts protruded. The
clean-cut jaw was shaved as high as the cheek bones, which were left,
like a lawn at the roots of a tree, to run wild. Deep-set blue eyes were
overhung by larky bushes and the large fine head exuded a thick thatch