Chapter I

She was constitutionally a matchmaker, and though recognising the infirmity was not without its advantages, I refused to be made an accessory after the fact. I declined to lend myself to the introduction of my best masculine friend, Lorraine, to my best feminine one, Clair Conway. There was no petty jealousy at bottom of the dissent, for sixty winters had rolled over this philosophic head; it was merely that I shirked the responsibility of meddling with Fate.

But my sister, Sarah Sargent, had no such qualms. "Matchmaker!" she exclaimed. "Perhaps so--a woman without romance is like an exotic without scent; and what woman could know a lovely girl, and a man who is intellectually gifted and eligible to boot, without planning to introduce them?"

About Clair Conway's beauty there admitted little dispute, though it was complex to apprehend. Every feature was in drawing, but nowhere arrogantly classical. A faint scumbling, which poets might have described as the mists of youth's Aurora, endowed the face with a soothing indefinitude. In effect, it acted like dew on summer turf which drapes the emerald crispness in silver sheen. The only obvious irregularity was a contumacious tooth which peeped impertinently over the centre of the lower lip, dimpling its fulness with a tiny shadow. In that dimple lurked the most fascinating lisp that was ever modelled--a lisp not sufficiently full-bodied to disturb the accent, but strong minded enough to put stress upon it. Her figure was in the bud. It had small natural curves, which hinted at feminality, but it was fitted far too well; the tailor had forced a masculine exactness which was foreign to the subject and to the statuesque creasings of her neck.

To me from her youth she had always been a centre of interest. She was like some half-studied volume of _belles lettres_--full of temptations, subtleties, prose melodies, poetic realisms. Her speech was fragile, and her words, subdued by their passage through the dimple, lagged now and then. Her expression was seldom either animated or pensive; never did green and yellow melancholy chase the vermeil from her cheek, seldom did excitement heighten it. She was as serene as innocence and as clean-eyed, the very woman I would have worshipped had youth quickened in my veins.

"I knew Philip would admire her," my sister related, when describing the kettledrum she had given in furtherance of her scheme, "so I introduced them at once!"

"Lorraine's fancies are protean, my good Sarah. They are the result of appreciative faculty. Someone--I think Emerson--says that 'love is a mutual perception of the same truth,' or something to that effect. Unfortunately, as the artist soul is always in pursuit of new truths, the deduction is perilous."

"But," argued she, "Clair is the white light of truth itself. One might go about studying nuances, contrasting tones, and yet value that truth eternally. I expected Mr Lorraine would appreciate her for this reason. He is a colour theorist, and with his knowledge of values he can gauge the true beauty of white light."

"Well, and the result?" I questioned, with interest; for I myself had seen him spy out Clair from among crowds of women, watched his eyes lean on her, on the picturesque brim of her hat and the curling feathers which insinuated themselves against the contour of her transparent ear, but had afterwards escaped to avoid participation in Sarah's plot.

"They seemed designed for each other," my sister pursued, "and I introduced them, quite informally, of course. All the girls had appropriate cavaliers, and I started some music to give a spurt to the conversation."

"Music is certainly an excellent dam for discoursive shallows," I muttered in soliloquy.

"Whether the introduction pleased her or not," she continued, heedless of my remark, "I could scarcely observe. She is an equable enigma."

"A puzzle that is a wonder rather than a challenge," I agreed. "And Lorraine?"

"He, with his whole soul--and not a driblet of it as usual--beaming in his eyes faced her on the ottoman. The light from the hanging lamp treated him kindly. It threw some ripples on the silvery edge of his hair, and shrouded the cynical depths of his eyes in pensive shadow."

"If you were a younger woman, Sarah, I should say you were in love with him yourself."

"You may say what you please. He had dropped his eye-glass--his solace in boredom, as you know--and was listening, interestedly listening, while she talked."

"Perhaps you exaggerated his interest?"

"No; there is a way of listening with the eyes as well as with the ears. I could see his fixed on the lisp dimple as it dipped. Then the music began; I turned over the leaves, and struggled to applaud, flatter, question, but my brain was with them."

"Much better have left them alone," I grunted.

"After all, they are your best friends--he is your prince of poets, and she is your ideal heroine."

"One does not express friendship by laying traps--but go on," I urged, curious in spite of myself.

"Tea was distributed, and, either from laziness or diplomacy, Philip never vacated his perch. He sat intently watching her while she dipped inquiring fingers into each tier of the muffiniere, and piled a huge meal on the Japanese plate at her elbow. She seemed bent on advertising a Cassowary digestion."

"An implied antithesis to poetic ideals," I volunteered, to enhance my sister's discomfiture.

"Perhaps so," owned Sarah, vexedly. "Girls are very contrary. But," she continued, "he perseveringly looked on with his quaint air of critical inquiry while she spread her handkerchief upon her lap, distending every corner in ostentatious preparation for her feast."

"Talking to him meanwhile?"

"Yes, _par parenthese_--between the nibbles at a chocolate bouchee, an anchovy muffin, two biscuits, and a tartine."

"My good Sarah, it is scarcely hospitable to register the appetites of your guests."

"I was really burning to hear them talk, but Percy Vansittart buttonholed me to say the muffiniere had run short of supplies. We rang for a fresh consignment, then more music was proposed. I induced Vaudin to sing those exquisite verses of Philip's--about the poet's tears, you know, which froze to pearls on the neck of the woman he loved."

"Just the thing to annoy Lorraine!"

"He ought to have been highly flattered. At the end of the song," Sarah pursued, "people began to go, and I thought I would take a seat in their direction without disturbing the conversation."

"In fact you played the eavesdropper?"

"I merely wanted to catch some stray sentence as guide to the situation. Had I felt _de trop_ I should have moved. I approached cautiously and affected to be busy with plates and dishes on a neighbouring table. Philip's attitude was full of interest--he was intent on some argument apparently.

"'I believe a pin is the orthodox weapon,' I heard him saying with questioning eagerness; to which Clair replied, 'Take my advice next time and try a darning-needle.'

"A darning-needle! My curiosity was aroused, and, as the subject seemed to admit of invasion I adroitly wedged in.

"'A darning-needle? for what?'

"'Oh,' she exclaimed with _empressement_, 'we were talking of periwinkles--discussing the efficacy of pins _versus_ darning-needles--what do you say?'"