Sometimes this making or doing was their profession; sometimes it was a parergon carried on deliciously in leisure hours. In either case it was the most important part of their lives. Mr. Dunk kept rabbits; Mr. Farraday kept boats, and sailed interminably in his cutter or rowed about in an almost invisible dinghy. However innocent and respectable they looked, each of them, one felt, was capable of secret pottery, or privately addicted to modelling or engraving. There was nothing The Chase could not do.
When these people came in the At Home brightened appreciably; there was a loud noise of really intelligent conversation, and Mrs. Whittaker was satisfied. Whittaker laboured assiduously at his homemade cocktails, and was suitably rewarded by their rapid consumption. Whittaker’s cocktails had the advantages and the defects of an impromptu composition, which is precisely what they were. He was bound by no cast-iron rules as to ingredients in manufacture. But they were always powerful and generally popular; and most of the ladies attempted them if only because they were such a glorious gamble. Only Mrs. Ambrose resolutely declined. And as they drank them they were all pleasurably excited by the imminent advent of Stephen Byrne.
The door opened violently, striking the psychologist in the middle of the back, and a wave of people surged into the room, with much chattering and loud laughter. Towering in the centre of the mob was a huge clergyman, with large, round spectacles and a brick-red face, who reminded one instantly of Og, Gog, and Magog, however vague one’s previous impressions of those personages had been. He had a voice like a Tube train, rumbling far off in a tunnel, and his laugh was like the bursting of shells. He was six foot eight, and magnificently proportioned. With him was a man about twenty-seven, a Civil Servant and resident of The Chase, by name John Egerton. In front of these two, hopelessly dwarfed by the Rev. Peter, were two young ladies—and Stephen Byrne, a tall figure in a black velvet smoking-jacket.
It said much for the personality, and indeed the person, of the young poet that in the arresting presence of the Rev. Peter most of the company looked immediately at Stephen Byrne. Many of them, indeed, thought it more seemly for some reason to conceal their interest, and went on talking or listening to their neighbours; they swivelled their eyes painfully towards the door without moving their heads, and suddenly said “Quite” or “Really” with a vain affectation of intelligence and usually in an inappropriate context.
These were mostly men, who could not be expected openly to admit that there was present a more important male than themselves. But most of the women, and especially the older ones, regarded with evident admiration the black-haired, bonny celebrity of Hammerton Chase. It was very black, that hair, unbelievably black, and of a curious, attractive texture. One wanted to touch it. And, although he was a poet, it was not too long.
Smiling happily under the light, Stephen Byrne was very good to look at. A high brow gave him a perhaps spurious suggestion of nobility, for the rest of the face was not so noble. The modern habit is to affix a label to every man, and be affronted if he forgets or ignores his label. But the most inveterate labeller would have been puzzled by the face of Stephen Byrne. In repose it was a handsome, impressive face, full of what is vaguely described as “breeding,” the nose straight and thin, the mouth firm and unobtrusive. One felt confidence, sympathy, attraction. But when he spoke or smiled, one thought again. There was attraction still, and for most people an immediate irresistible charm, but less confidence. There was a certain weakness in the mobile mouth, a certain fleshliness. You could imagine this young man being noble or mean, cruel or kind, good-humoured or petulant, selfish or magnanimous or simply damnable. Which is merely to say that he was a complicated affair. But if indeed he had a darker side, it had never been revealed to the people of The Chase; and they loved him.
The two ladies were Margery Byrne, his wife, and Muriel Tarrant, a favourite niece of the Reverend Peter. They were both very fair, both very delightful without being exactly beautiful. Miss Muriel Tarrant was the sole unmarried and still marriageable maiden in The Chase. It was a curious thing; the female population of The Chase consisted almost entirely of married ladies, young or old, elderly ladies who were past that sort of thing, and small children. Muriel Tarrant swam like a solitary comet in this galaxy of fixed or immature stars. None could imagine why she remained single for a moment, so young and fresh and admirable she was. People indeed said that John Egerton … but no one knew.
Muriel’s young brother, George Edwin, a tall youth with the precise features of Greek sculpture and the immaculate locks of a barber’s assistant, brought up the rear, looking a little dazed.
There was a third young lady, disconcertingly tall and slightly abashed, and an obviously artistic youth in a blue collar, clinging timidly to the skirts of the party—both strangers to The Chase.
Stephen Byrne introduced them.
“All these people,” he explained, with a comprehensive gesture, “do pottery and engraving. They are The Chase. Give me one of your cocktails, Whittaker. No—give me two.”
With two thin glasses of Whittaker’s latest concoction he walked over
