Chapter VII

"You must have a talk with Ethel, have a talk with Ethel," said Charlie Hardinge. "My dear fellow, you must have a talk with Ethel."

Philip looked gloomy and distrustful.

He did not tell himself that Ethel Hardinge always roused in him a feeling of irritation that temporarily embraced the whole family of Hardinge, nor did he realize that she had a precisely similar effect upon most of those people who, with reluctant admiration, spoke of her as being such a good mother.

He told himself instead that Ethel was the mother of three daughters, and that therefore she understood everything about all young girls.

Without enthusiasm, he embarked upon a talk with Ethel.

"My motherless little child," said Philip, thereby involving himself in misunderstanding at the very outset, since Ethel supposed him to be alluding to little Kenneth.

"No, no," said Philip, pained. "Kenneth is at school. Besides, he is a boy. It's my poor little Lily that troubles me."

"Oh, but she's not a _child_," said Ethel brightly. "I assure you, you mustn't think of her as a child. A girl of nineteen is grown up, or she ought to be. My Dorothy is a year younger than Lily, but I should never dream of saying she wasn't grown up. Besides, she'd resent it so much if I did!"

"I think Lily is content to let me judge for her----" said Philip stiffly.

Nothing in Lily's conduct justified the assertion--rather the reverse--but while Philip's necessity constrained him to ask for assistance, his dignity constantly impelled him to deny any need of it. This naturally increased the delicacy of his adviser's position, but Ethel Hardinge was cheerfully impervious to atmospheric conditions.

"There's a stage when they get discontented and out of hand," she remarked thoughtfully. "I went through it with Dorothy, and I'm going through it with Janet now. Girls thinking they can't get on at home, you know."

Philip was sincerely horrified.

"That is very sad and shocking," said he gravely. "Home is a young girl's natural sphere above all others, I should have thought. But I hope little Lily has no terrible ideas of that kind in her head."

"Oh, they all go through it," Ethel repeated comfortably. "It'll be my Sylvia next."

"Indeed?" said Philip, who felt no interest in Ethel's Sylvia, but would have thought it unsympathetic not to simulate one.

His conscientious observance of this self-imposed law retarded the course of the consultation a good deal, since everything that either of them said invariably served to remind Ethel of its applicability to one or more of her own children.

"It goes off, once they get other things to think about," Mrs. Hardinge observed optimistically. "Dorothy was quite all right again when we had those nice boys staying here. They had plenty of fun all together, and it quite took her mind off her grievances."

"But why should little chil--should young girls, living at home, have grievances at all?" demanded Philip piteously. "They ought to be as happy as the day is long."

"Of course, our kiddies have everything to make them jolly--and really, I think they know it, at the bottom of their hearts. Dorothy and Sylvia are cheery enough, now, and Janet is only going through a phase. But your Lily--of course it's lonelier for her. And then, she's very affectionate and sensitive, after all--my girls always say she wants bracing--perhaps it rather reacts on her spirits to know that you--that you----"

Ethel called up a fit of coughing to her aid. It was never easy to make a personal remark to Philip Stellenthorpe.

He grew more rigid than ever as the sense of this one was borne in upon him.

"You mean that my own happiness is, naturally, no longer to be found in this life? But my little Lily can know nothing of that," said he in all good faith. "I should never dream of speaking about my grief to her, or allowing it to cloud her spirits."

"I don't see how you can help it," said Ethel bluntly.

Philip sat in astonished silence.

He had never thought of his children save as beings of quite undeveloped perceptions, and it was to him an incredible and unwelcome suggestion that Lily might possibly be aware of anything that had not expressly been put into words for her information.

"We always imagined, Charlie and I, that you'd give Lily a regular season in London as soon as she grew up. I only wish we could afford it for our kiddies--but it's out of the question, with three of them."

"If Lily's dear mother had been spared to us, no doubt there would have been something of that sort," said Philip dejectedly. "But in the circumstances, it hardly occurred to me that I should actually spend three or four months in town, and take her to balls and parties and all the rest of it, myself. And I am really quite out of touch with London society nowadays. But if my duty to the child requires a sacrifice----"

"No--no," said Ethel hastily.

She rightly conjectured that the spirit in which Philip would approach the proposed immolation might safely be counted upon to victimize Lily quite as thoroughly as himself.

"Isn't there anyone to whom you could send her? It's so easy to make arrangements of that sort, as a rule. Most people are only too pleased to take a pretty girl about--by arrangement, of course."

"I could only entrust the charge of Lily to near relations, naturally," said Philip.

If Mrs. Hardinge failed to appreciate the force of the axiom, she made no sign of it.

"Surely there are aunts and people?"

"My wife was an only daughter, as of course you know, and her brothers are not married. I have only one sister, and she is unmarried and lives abroad."

Philip's manner suggested strongly that "abroad" in this connection might cover a multitude of sins. But Ethel knew all about Miss Clotilde Stellenthorpe.

"Oh, but wouldn't she be the very person? I remember her quite well. Last time I was in town taking Sylvia to the dentist I met your sister in the waiting-room. We had quite a long talk."

"My sister has a small villa in Italy, outside Rome. She lives there almost altogether, and I fancy she would dislike London."

Ethel entirely disbelieved that any woman would dislike London for a sojourn of which the expenses of herself and a young and pretty companion would be liberally met. But she felt unable to put this into words which should leave Philip's susceptibilities unwounded.

So she said instead, with an air of bright inspiration:

"Then why not send Lily to Italy? It would be a splendid education. I've often thought how much I should like Janet to get a trip abroad! She's the clever one, you know--it would be rather wasted on Dorothy, I'm afraid. From what your sister told me she has a most interesting circle of friends amongst the English colony in Rome, and knows all the Embassy people."

"Yes, that is so."

Philip appeared to be much more favourably struck with this scheme than with Ethel's previous suggestion.

He put from him the painful recollection of certain heartless words, spoken nearly ten years ago, and tried only to remember that poor Clo was his nearest relation, and Lily's aunt.

After all, she had loved the children in her own way, and Philip had long ago euphemized her terrible speech about Vonnie into "poor Clo's rather unsympathetic way of speaking about things that should be held sacred."

Whenever Philip Stellenthorpe came to within measurable distance of a decision, however, it was his invariable instinct to make earnest search for difficulties or disadvantages that might stand in the way of its execution.

"There are several drawbacks to the plan, of course," he began at once. "My sister may have other arrangements of her own, or the idea may not appeal to Lily."

"I shouldn't dream of consulting her, if I were you," said Ethel in a surprised voice. "Just tell her it's all settled, as a tremendous surprise for her, and she'll be delighted. Girls are like that."

"I'm sure my little girl would never be ungrateful for anything I had arranged on her behalf," said Philip sadly. "But I don't know whether this is the right time of year for Italy. I should have to find out about that."

"You would hardly send her for less than six months, surely," urged the practical Mrs. Hardinge. "_Some_ of that would be sure to be the right time of year."

"And what about the journey?"

Philip pounced upon a further debatable point with gloomy triumph.

Ethel misunderstood him.

"That would be one point in favour of letting her go this autumn. She wouldn't have that long journey in the heat."

"I was wondering who should take her."

"Take her? Isn't she old enough to take herself?"

"It is one of my rules," said Philip sublimely, "that Lily should not go about alone. I have never allowed her to travel by herself, and I shouldn't dream of letting her begin by a journey to Italy."

"Of course, if she's never travelled by herself, she can't begin by going all that way. Our kiddies always go about together--but perhaps one by herself may be different. Only it seems a pity she should be so helpless at her age."

Philip looked offended as he always did at any form of criticism.

"You could send a maid with her."

"My sister's establishment would probably not admit of an additional servant."

"She could see Lily into the train in Paris, and then come back. Come, you wouldn't mind her going straight through in a ladies' carriage by herself, would you?" said Ethel persuasively.

Philip reluctantly conceded that this might be permitted, less because the idea appeared to him satisfactory, than because he had just thought of a fresh objection to the whole scheme, and was desirous of bringing it forward immediately.

"I should be sorry if Lily made her friends amongst Roman Catholics, I must admit."

"I daresay most of Miss Stellenthorpe's friends are English. I believe there's quite a colony there. In any case, she wouldn't be likely to be attracted by a foreigner, would she?"

Ethel's abrupt descent from the general to the particular slightly scandalized her hearer.

"No--no. I don't know that I was thinking of anything very specific," he said untruthfully. "Only on general grounds."

"Oh well, of course, she's very pretty. There are sure to be plenty of people who'll admire her. That boy we had here, Colin Eastwood, was a good deal smitten."

Ethel laughed comfortably, but Philip remained quite unsmiling.

"Boy-and-girl nonsense is all very well," he remarked in tones which implied the contrary, "but of course it can't lead to anything, and only puts foolish ideas into the heads of little people. I naturally hope to see my poor little Lily happily and suitably settled some day, but there's plenty of time before her."

"I approve of early marriages," Ethel declared stoutly. "I hope if our girls are to marry, that they'll all marry young."

"I have no doubt of it," mechanically said Philip. "Thank you a thousand times for your help. I shall think over our discussion, and let you know what I decide."

He went away trying not to let himself perceive that it would afford his own harassed sense of paternal responsibility an immense relief to send Lily away from home for several months.

It was a disappointment to him when she received his announcement almost doubtfully, although he would certainly have felt, and said it, to be sad and unnatural had she exhibited unrestrained pleasure at the prospect of leaving home.

They continued to remain, therefore, at cross-purposes during the correspondence embarked upon with Aunt Clo, and the resulting arrangements for Lily's journey in September to the villa at Genazzano.

"No doubt Aunt Clo will either meet you in Rome herself, or send somebody else to meet you, and take you to Genazzano. The difficulty is your journey as far as Rome. Your Cousin Ethel suggested sending one of the maids with you to Paris, and letting her see you into the train there. Or I could take you so far myself."

Philip sighed heavily. He detested travelling.

"Why couldn't I go by myself?" Lily demanded, suddenly rebellious. "I'm sure Cousin Ethel would let Dorothy."

Philip looked at her in unfeigned surprise.

"Why, my little pet," he said gently, "you know very well that Father doesn't allow you to go about alone."

"But why?"

"Not that argumentative tone, my child. Some day you will be very, very grateful for all the care that I have lavished on you, and perhaps when it's too late you may wish that you'd shown a more affectionate and dutiful recognition of it. Now, don't let me hear anything more about it. You know it's a very old rule that you mayn't go about by yourself, so there's no more to be said."

And such was the time-honoured immutability of those arbitrary rules, that there really was no more to be said. It occurred not at all to Philip and only remotely to Lily, that the manner, if not the matter, of his prohibitions was senselessly tyrannical. He was honestly convinced that his favourite catchword--"Father says it will be better so" would serve as ample justification to the minds of his children for any commands that he might choose to lay upon them.

The resulting condition of resentful obedience induced in Lily, who was at once too sensitive and too fond of her father to risk reducing him to one of those states of despairing depression that were his only form of displaying vexation, Philip described as "a nice, happy, friendly, little home-party, with no unpleasant discussions."

Since the death of his wife, he had known no more definite happiness than his own pitifully negative contentment whenever such a state of affairs appeared to him to prevail in his house. He would have thought it a disloyalty to Eleanor's memory to suppose that he could ever be happy again.

The children might be so--in fact he wished them to be so, and was bewildered and hurt when his own lack of proportion created an atmosphere to which Lily, at least, reacted at a cost infinitely greater to herself than either of them realized.

Kenneth, ten years younger, was different.

The "difference" of Kenneth, in fact, was becoming positively appalling, to his entirely humourless father.

Kenneth disregarded the code with blatant impunity, and that not from a spirit of defiance, but apparently from sheer constitutional inability to regard it seriously.

He obviously did not believe that grown-up people were infallible.

Remonstrance never made him cry, nor imputations of heartlessness and disloyalty.

He never willingly sat upon anybody's knee after he was three years old, but would say cheerfully: "I'd rather not, thank you," as he walked away.

He held opinions of his own, and expressed them freely.

He did not instantly relinquish them when Philip gravely and gently told him that he was an ignorant little boy and that Father always knew best.

He was addicted to making personal remarks.

He spoke crudely and candidly about subjects that Philip had always tacitly impressed upon his children as being sad or unpleasant, and therefore unfit to be mentioned freely.

He asked indiscreet questions.

"How old are you, Father?"

"Hush, hush, little boy. That's a very rude question. You know you must never ask grown-up people their age."

"Why not?"

"Because it's very bad manners."

"Cousin Charlie asked Lily how old she was, the other day, and Lily didn't mind."

"That's different." Philip was at last beginning to learn that one could not put an end to Kenneth's enquiries merely by saying: "Come, come, you know Father doesn't like arguments."

"Cousin Charlie is a great deal older than Lily, and can say what he likes to her."

"Then it's only old people who mind being asked their age. Is that why you won't tell me yours, Father, because you're so old?"

Philip was exceedingly sensitive about his age, and quite incapable of assessing the utter meaninglessness of his son's estimate.

"That's a naughty, heartless way of speaking," he said, deeply hurt. "I don't want to talk any more to little people who can speak like that."

"Oh well, it doesn't matter," said Kenneth with supreme indifference. "I s'pose you're about seventy or eighty. I didn't know you'd mind being asked."

In the last assertion lay the painful core of the matter. Kenneth really didn't know, as Lily, and even Vonnie, had known, as much by intuition as by training, what Philip would "mind."

He transgressed constantly, and was gaily impervious to the devastating effect of his transgressions upon his father and, by reflection, upon Lily. But Lily secretly admired Kenneth, and envied him that pachydermatous courage of his own convictions that she herself had never acquired.

Kenneth was never afraid of being himself, although that self in no slightest degree corresponded to Philip's ideal of a motherless little boy of nine years old.

He went to school and was not in the least homesick, and he seemed to be neither grieved nor ashamed when Philip expressed great disappointment at his first report.

"I hoped you would have been proud to bring back some nice prize or other to show me," said Philip wistfully.

"Prizes are fearful rot," said Kenneth.

He afterwards remarked in a detached way to Lily that, after all, what he did at school was his own business, more or less.

"Father pays for you to go there," said Lily, instinctively aware that only such practical considerations would carry any weight to her youthful hearer.

"Yes, of course. But he needn't want to know whether I've made any nice friends, and rot of that sort."

"I know it's rather aggravating to be asked about that sort of thing," half whispered Lily, feeling herself to be guilty of treason. "But after all, it's because he's fond of us, that he wants to know everything about us."

"Being fond is such rot," said Kenneth, in his graceless and limited vocabulary.

Lily was quite glad to see him return to school before her own departure for Italy.

"I'm afraid you won't see your sister at home next holidays, my boy, so you and I will have to cheer one another up," said Philip nervously. "But it'll be a great treat for Lily to go abroad."

"Mind you send me some stamps for my collection, Lily," Kenneth said earnestly.

"Come, come, Kenneth. Try and not think quite so much about your own little concerns. Now say good-bye, my boy."

But the most determined sentimentalist upon earth could extract no conventional emotion out of Kenneth.

"Good-bye," he said casually, and turned an inattentive cheek to Lily's salute.

She would willingly have omitted the ceremony of kissing him altogether, knowing that he disliked it, but for her certainty that Philip, shocked and pained, would have insisted upon its due performance.

"I hope little Kenneth is not a heartless boy," said his father, turning away dejectedly from the scene of farewell that had impressed him so unsatisfactorily.

But hope was not the predominant note in his voice.

Lily was so sorry for her father--all the sorrier because she was conscious that her own inmost sympathies lay with Kenneth's point of view--that she felt it incumbent upon her to show no elation at all at her own projected departure, although she was in reality fast becoming both excited and pleased at the prospect of going into entirely new surroundings.

The result of which filial piety was that Philip told Ethel Hardinge, in a resigned way and with a smile of great melancholy, that little people realized very few of the sacrifices made for them, and one must not expect to see them display gratitude.