“Now, perhaps—but what do I know of the past?”
“If in the past I have admired and even fancied I loved women less admirable than yourself, be sure this woman was not one of them. No ghost of a dead love looks out of her eyes, beautiful as they are.”
“I must believe you,” sighed Eve. “I want to believe you, and to be happy again.”
“Foolish Eve. Can it be that an irrepressible young woman’s greeting could interfere with your happiness?”
“It was foolish, no doubt. Women are very foolish when they love their husbands as I love you. There are scores of women I meet who think of their husbands as lightly as of their dressmakers. Would you like me to be that kind of wife—to be lunching and gadding, and driving and dancing in one direction, while you are betting and dining and card-playing somewhere else? I should be nearer being a woman of fashion than I am now.”
“Be ever what you are now. Be jealous, even, if jealousy be a proof of love.”
“There was a child in the boat—a handsome black-eyed boy. Is he her child, do you think?”
Having affected ignorance at the outset, Vansittart was forced to maintain his attitude.
“Chi lo sa?” he said, with a careless shrug.
“Was it not odd that Mr. Sefton should be escorting her?”
“Not especially odd. She is a public character, and has troops of admirers, no doubt. Why should not Sefton be among them?”
“I never heard him mention her when he was talking of the theatres.”
“Men seldom speak of the woman they admire—especially if the lady is not in society—and Sefton is reticent about a good many things.”
After this they talked of trifles, lightly, but with a somewhat studied lightness. Eve seemed again content; but her gaiety was gone, as if her spirits had drooped with the vanishing of the sun, which now at five o’clock was hidden by threatening clouds.
At Richmond Bridge they left their boat, to be taken back by a waterman, and walked through the busy town to the station. An express took them to London in good time for dressing and dining at Lady Hartley’s state dinner. She had a large house in Hill Street this year, and was entertaining a good deal.
“My dear Eve, you are looking utterly washed out,” she said to her sister-in-law in the drawing-room after dinner. “You must come to us at Redwold directly after Goodwood—you could come straight from Goodwood, don’t you know—and let me nurse you.”
“You are too kind. I think, though, it would be a greater rest if I were to go to Fernhurst for a few days, and let the sisters and Nancy take care of me. A taste of the old poverty, the whitewashed attics, and the tea-dinners would act as a tonic. I am debilitated by pleasures and luxuries.”
“You were looking bright enough last night at Mrs. Cameron’s French play.”
“Was I? Perhaps I laughed too much at Coquelin cadet, or eat too many strawberries.”
Lady Hartley had an evening party after the dinner, and it was a shock for Vansittart on coming into the drawing-room at half-past ten, after a long-drawn-out political discussion with a bigwig of Sir Hubert’s party, to find Sefton and Eve sitting side by side in a flowery nook near the piano, where at this moment Oscar de Lampion, the Belgian tenor, was casting his fine eyes up towards the ceiling, preparatory to the melting strains of his favourite serenade—
“And them canst sleep, while from the rain-washed lawn
Thy lover watches for thy passing shade
Across the blind, and sobs and sighs till dawn
Glows o’er the vale and creeps along the glade.
And thou canst sleep—thou heedest not his sighing;
And thou canst sleep—thou wouldst if he were dying;
Yes, thou canst sleep—canst sleep—sleep.”
There was a second verse to the same effect, exquisitely sung, but worn threadbare by familiarity, which Vansittart heard impatiently, watching Eve and her companion, and longing to break in upon their seclusion. They were silent now, since they could not with decency talk while De Lampion was singing.
There were only two verses. De Lampion was too much an artist to sing lengthy songs, although too lazy to extend his repertoire. He liked people to be sorry when he left off.
Vansittart dropped into a chair near his wife. The rooms had not filled yet, so there was a possibility of sitting down, and this quiet corner, screened by an arrangement of palms and tall golden lilies, was a pleasant haven for conversation in the brief intervals between the music, which was of that superior order which is heard in respectful silence by everybody within earshot, though the people outside the room talk to their hearts’ content, a buzz of multitudinous voices breaking in upon the silence whenever a door is opened.
Sefton and Vansittart shook hands directly the song was over.
“I was told you were to dine here,” said Vansittart, as an obvious opening.
“Lady Hartley was kind enough to ask me, but I had an earlier engagement in Chelsea. I have been dining with the Hawberks—the composer, don’t you know. Sweet little woman, Mrs. Hawberk—so sympathetic. You know them, of course.”
“Only from meeting them at other people’s houses.”
“Ah, you should know Hawberk. He’s a glorious fellow. You must spare me an hour or two to meet him at breakfast some Sunday morning, when Mrs. Vansittart doesn’t want you to go to church with her.”
“I always want him,” said Eve, with a decisive air.
“And does he always go?”
“Always.”
“A model husband. I put down the husbands who attend the morning service among the great army of henpecked, together with the husbands who belong to only one rather fogeyish club. But that comes of my demoralized attitude towards the respectabilities. Well, it shall not be a Sunday, but you must meet
