“Quite so, madam,” he responded, with downcast eyes.
“If only I could find someone here who would understand me, to whom I could confess, I think I should be happier. I have done so much harm in Vorta, dear Feo—”
Feo raised his eyes. Colonel Leyland struck his stick on the parquetry floor.
“—and at last I thought I would speak to you, in case you understood me. I remembered that you had once been very gracious to me—yes, gracious: there is no other word. But I have harmed you also: how could you understand?”
“Madam, I understand perfectly,” said the concierge, who had recovered a little, and was determined to end the distressing scene, in which his reputation was endangered, and his vanity aroused only to be rebuffed. “It is you who are mistaken. You have done me no harm at all. You have benefited me.”
“Precisely,” said Colonel Leyland. “That is the conclusion of the whole matter. Miss Raby has been the making of Vorta.”
“Exactly, sir. After the lady’s book, foreigners come, hotels are built, we all grow richer. When I first came here, I was a common ignorant porter who carried luggage over the passes; I worked, I found opportunities, I was pleasing to the visitors—and now!” He checked himself suddenly. “Of course I am still but a poor man. My wife and children—”
“Children!” cried Miss Raby, suddenly seeing a path of salvation. “What children have you?”
“Three dear little boys,” he replied, without enthusiasm.
“How old is the youngest?”
“Madam, five.”
“Let me have that child,” she said impressively, “and I will bring him up. He shall live among rich people. He shall see that they are not the vile creatures he supposes, always clamouring for respect and deference and trying to buy them with money. Rich people are good: they are capable of sympathy and love: they are fond of the truth; and when they are with each other they are clever. Your boy shall learn this, and he shall try to teach it to you. And when he grows up, if God is good to him he shall teach the rich: he shall teach them not to be stupid to the poor. I have tried myself, and people buy my books and say that they are good, and smile and lay them down. But I know this: so long as the stupidity exists, not only our charities and missions and schools, but the whole of our civilization, is vain.”
It was painful for Colonel Leyland to listen to such phrases. He made one more effort to rescue Miss Raby. “Je vous prie de ne pas—” he began gruffly, and then stopped, for he remembered that the concierge must know French. But Feo was not attending, nor, of course, had he attended to the lady’s prophecies. He was wondering if he could persuade his wife to give up the little boy, and, if he did, how much they dare ask from Miss Raby without repulsing her.
“That will be my pardon,” she continued, “if out of the place where I have done so much evil I bring some good. I am tired of memories, though they have been very beautiful. Now, Feo, I want you to give me something else: a living boy. I shall always puzzle you; and I cannot help it. I have changed so much since we met, and I have changed you also. We are both new people. Remember that; for I want to ask you one question before we part, and I cannot see why you shouldn’t answer it. Feo! I want you to attend.”
“I beg your pardon, madam,” said the concierge, rousing himself from his calculations. “Is there anything I can do for you?”
“Answer ‘yes’ or ‘no’; that day when you said you were in love with me—was it true?”
It was doubtful whether he could have answered, whether he had now any opinion about that day at all. But he did not make the attempt. He saw again that he was menaced by an ugly, withered, elderly woman, who was trying to destroy his reputation and his domestic peace. He shrank towards Colonel Leyland, and faltered: “Madam, you must excuse me, but I had rather you did not see my wife; she is so sharp. You are most kind about my little boy; but, madam, no, she would never permit it.”
“You have insulted a lady!” shouted the colonel, and made a chivalrous movement of attack. From the hall behind came exclamations of horror and expectancy. Someone ran for the manager.
Miss Raby interposed, saying, “He will never think me respectable.” She looked at the dishevelled Feo, fat, perspiring, and unattractive, and smiled sadly at her own stupidity, not at his. It was useless to speak to him again; her talk had scared away his competence and his civility, and scarcely anything was left. He was hardly more human than a frightened rabbit. “Poor man,” she murmured, “I have only vexed him. But I wish he would have given me the boy. And I wish he would have answered my question, if only out of pity. He does not know the sort of thing that keeps me alive.” She was looking at Colonel Leyland, and so discovered that he too was discomposed. It was her peculiarity that she could only attend to the person she was speaking with, and forgot the personality of the listeners. “I have been vexing you as well: I am very silly.”
“It is a little late to think about me,” said Colonel Leyland grimly.
She remembered their conversation of yesterday, and understood him at once. But for him she had no careful explanation, no tender pity. Here was a man who was well born and well educated, who had all those things called advantages, who imagined himself full of insight and cultivation and knowledge of mankind. And he had proved himself to be at the
