Chapter IV: Part I: Acquaintance (4)

When the ladies had withdrawn, the conversation fell on some important news from the Far East contained in the Sunday papers that Geoffrey Cliffe had brought down, and presumed to form part of the despatches which the two ministers staying in the house had received that afternoon by Foreign Office messenger. The government of Teheran was in one of its periodical fits of ill-temper with England; had been meddling with Afghanistan, flirting badly with Russia, and bringing ridiculous charges against the British minister. An expedition to Bushire was talked of, and the Radical press was on the war-path. The cabinet minister said little. A Lord Privy Seal, reverentially credited with advising royalty in its private affairs, need have no views on the Persian Gulf. But Ashe was appealed to and talked well. The minister at Teheran was an old friend of his, and he described the personal attacks made on him for political reasons by the Shah and his ministers with a humor which kept the table entertained.

Suddenly Cliffe interposed. He had been listening with restlessness, though Ashe, with pointed courtesy, had once or twice included him in the conversation. And presently, at a somewhat dramatic moment, he met a statement of Ashe's with a direct and violent contradiction. Ashe flushed, and a duel began between the two men of which the company were soon silent spectators. Ashe had the resources of official knowledge; Cliffe had been recently on the spot, and pushed home the advantage of the eye-witness with a covert insolence which Ashe bore with surprising carelessness and good-temper. In the end Cliffe said some outrageous things, at which Ashe laughed; and Lord Grosville abruptly dissolved the party.

Ashe went smiling out of the dining-room, caressing a fine white spaniel, as though nothing had happened. In crossing the hall Harman found himself alone with the Dean, who looked serious and preoccupied.

"That was a curious spectacle," said Harman. "Ashe's equanimity was amazing."

"I had rather have seen him angrier," said the Dean, slowly.

"He was always a very tolerant, easy-going fellow."

The Dean shook his head.

"A touch of _soeva indignatio_ now and then would complete him."

"Has he got it in him?"

"Perhaps not," said the little Dean, with a flash of expression that dignified all his frail person. "But without it he will hardly make a great man."

Meanwhile Geoffrey Cliffe, his strange, twisted face still vindictively aglow, made his way to Kitty Bristol's corner in the drawing-room. Mary Lyster was conscious of it, conscious also of a certain look that Kitty bestowed upon the entrance of Ashe, while Cliffe was opening a battery of mingled chaff and compliments that did not at first have much effect upon her. But William Ashe threw himself into conversation with Lady Edith Manley, and was presently, to all appearance, happily plunged in gossip, his tall person wholly at ease in a deep arm-chair, while Lady Edith bent over him with smiles. Meanwhile there was a certain desertion of Kitty on the part of the ladies. Lady Grosville hardly spoke to her, and the girls markedly avoided her. There was a moment when Kitty, looking round her, suddenly shook her small shoulders, and like a colt escaping from harness gave herself to riot. She and Cliffe amused themselves so well and so noisily that the whole drawing-room was presently uneasily aware of them. Lady Grosville shot glances of wrath, rose suddenly at one moment and sat down again; her girls talked more disjointedly than ever to the gentlemen who were civilly attending them; while, on the other hand, Miss Lyster's flow of conversation with Louis Harman was more softly copious than usual. At last the Dean's wife looked at the Dean, a signal of kind distress, and the Dean advanced.

"Lady Kitty," he said, taking a seat beside the pair, "have you forgotten you promised me some French?"

Kitty turned on him a hot and mutinous face.

"Did I? What shall I say? Some Alfred de Musset?"

"No," said the Dean, "I think not."

"Some--some"--she cudgelled her memory--"some Théophile Gautier?"

"No, certainly not!" said the Dean, hastily.

"Well, as I don't know a word of him--" laughed Kitty.

"That was mischievous," said the Dean, raising a finger. "Let me suggest Lamartine."

Kitty shook her head obstinately. "I never learned one line."

"Then some of the old fellows," said the Dean, persuasively. "I long to hear you in Corneille or Racine. That we should _all_ enjoy."

And suddenly his wrinkled hand fell kindly on the girl's small, chilly ringers and patted them. Their eyes met, Kitty's wild and challenging, the Dean's full of that ethereal benevolence which blended so agreeably with his character as courtier and man of the world. There was a bright sweetness in them which seemed to say: "Poor child! I understand. But be a _little_ good--as well as clever--and all will be well."

Suddenly Kitty's look wavered and fell. All the harshness dissolved from her thin young beauty. She turned from Cliffe, and the Dean saw her quiver with submission.

"I think I could say some 'Polyeucte,'" she said, gently.

The Dean clapped his hands and rose.

"Lady Grosville," he said, raising his voice--"Ladies and gentlemen, Lady Kitty has promised to say us some more French poetry. You remember how admirably she recited last night. But this is Sunday, and she will give us something in a different vein."

Lady Grosville, who had risen impatiently, sat down again. There was a general movement; chairs were turned or drawn forward till a circle formed. Meanwhile the Dean consulted with Kitty and resumed:

"Lady Kitty will recite a scene from Corneille's beautiful tragedy of 'Polyeucte'--the scene in which Pauline, after witnessing the martyrdom of her husband, who has been beheaded for refusing to sacrifice to the gods, returns from the place of execution so melted by the love and sacrifice she has beheld that she opens her heart then and there to the same august faith and pleads for the same death."

The Dean seated himself, and Kitty stepped into the centre of the circle. She thought a moment, her lips moving, as though she recalled the lines. Then she looked down at her bare arms, and dress, frowned, and suddenly approached Lady Edith Manley.

"May I have that?" she said, pointing to a lace cloak that lay on Lady Edith's knee. "I am rather cold."

Lady Edith handed it to her, and she threw it round her.

"Actress!" said Cliffe, under his breath, with a grin of amusement.

At any rate, her impulse served her well. Her form and dress disappeared under a cloud of white. She became in a flash, so to speak, evangelized--a most innocent and spiritual apparition. Her beautiful head, her kindled and transfigured face, her little hand on the white folds, these alone remained to mingle their impression with the austere and moving tragedy which her lips recited. Her audience looked on at first with the embarrassed or hostile air which is the Englishman's natural protection against the great things of art; then for those who understood French the high passion and the noble verse began to tell; while those who could not follow were gradually enthralled by the gestures and tones with which the slight, vibrating creature, whom but ten minutes before most of them had regarded as a mere noisy flirt, suggested and conveyed the finest and most compelling shades of love, faith, and sacrifice.

When she ceased, there was a moment's profound silence. Then Lady Edith, drawing a long breath, expressed the welcome commonplace which restored the atmosphere of daily life.

"How _could_ you remember it all?"

Kitty sat down, her lip trembling scornfully.

"I had to say it every week at the convent."

"I understand," said Cliffe in Darrell's ear--"that last night she was Doña Sol. An accommodating young woman."

Meanwhile Kitty looked up to find Ashe beside her. He said, "Magnificent!"--but it did not matter to her what he said. His face told her that she had moved him, and that he was incapable of any foolish chatter about it. A smile of extraordinary sweetness sprang into her eyes; and when Lady Grosville came up to thank her, the girl impetuously rose, and, in the foreign way, kissed her hand, courtesying. Lord Grosville said, heartily, "Upon my word, Kitty, you ought to go on the stage!" and she smiled upon him, too, in a flutter of feeling, forgetting his scolding and her own impertinence, before dinner. The revulsion, indeed, throughout the company--with two exceptions--was complete. For the rest of the evening Kitty basked in sunshine and flattery. She met it with a joyous gentleness, and the little figure, still bedraped in white, became the centre of the room's kindness.

The Dean was triumphant.

"My dear Miss Lyster," he said, presently, finding himself near that lady, "did you ever hear anything better done? A most remarkable talent!"

Mary smiled.

"I am wondering," she said, "what they teach you in French convents--and why! It is all so singular,--isn't it?"

* * * * *

Late that night Ashe entered his room--before his usual time, however. He had tired even of Lord Grosville's chat, and had left the smoking-room still talking. Indeed, he wished to be alone, and there was that in his veins which told him that a new motive had taken possession of his life.

He sat beside the open window reviewing the scenes and feelings of the day--his interview with Kitty in the morning--the teasing coquette of the afternoon--the inspired poetic child of the evening. Rapidly, but none the less strongly and steadfastly, he made up his mind. He would ask Kitty Bristol to marry him, and he would ask her immediately.

Why? He scarcely knew her. His mother, his family would think it madness. No doubt it was madness. Yet, as far as he could explain his impulse himself, it depended on certain fundamental facts in his own nature--it was in keeping with his deepest character. He had an inbred love of the difficult, the unconventional in life, of all that piqued and stimulated his own superabundant consciousness of resource and power. And he had a tenderness of feeling, a gift of chivalrous pity, only known to the few, which was in truth always hungrily on the watch, like some starved faculty that cannot find its outlet. The thought of this beautiful child, in the hands of such a mother as Madame d'Estrées, and rushing upon risks illustrated by the half-mocking attentions of Geoffrey Cliffe, did in truth wring his heart. With a strange imaginative clearness he foresaw her future, he beheld her the prey at once of some bad fellow and of her own temperament. She would come to grief; he saw the prescience of it in her already; and what a waste would be there!

No!--he would step in--capture her before these ways and whims, now merely bizarre or foolish, stiffened into what might in truth destroy her. His pulse quickened as he thought of the development of this beauty, the ripening of this intelligence. Never yet had he seen a girl whom he much wished to marry. He was easily repelled by stupidity, still more by mere amiability. Some touch of acid, of roughness in the fruit--that drew him, in politics, thought, love. And if she married him he vowed to himself, proudly, that she would find him no tyrant. Many a man might marry her who would then fight her and try to break her. All that was most fastidious and characteristic in Ashe revolted from such a notion. With him she should have _freedom_--whatever it might cost. He asked himself deliberately, whether after marriage he could see her flirting with other men, as she had flirted that day with Cliffe, and still refrain from coercing her. And his question was answered, or rather put aside, first by the confidence of nascent love--he would love her so well and so loyally that she would naturally turn to him for counsel; and then by the clear perception that she was a creature of mind rather than sense, governed mainly by the caprices and curiosities of the _intelligence_, combined with a rather cold, indifferent temperament. One moment throwing herself wildly into a dangerous or exciting intimacy, the next, parting with a laugh, and without a regret--it was thus he saw her in the future, even as a wife. "She may scandalize half the world," he said to himself, stubbornly--"I shall understand her!"

But his mother?--his friends?--his colleagues? He knew well his mother's ambitions for him, and the place that he held in her heart. Could he without cruelty impose upon her such a daughter as Kitty Bristol? Well!--his mother had a very large experience of life, and much natural independence of mind. He trusted her to see the promise in this untamed and gifted creature; he counted on the sense of power that Lady Tranmore possessed, and which would but find new scope in the taming of Kitty.

But Kitty's mother? Kitty must, of course, be rescued from Madame d'Estrées--must find a new and truer mother in Lady Tranmore. But money would do it; and money must be lavished.

Then, almost for the first time, Ashe felt a conscious delight in wealth and birth. _Panache_? He could give it her--the little, wild, lovely thing! Luxury, society, adoration--all should be hers. She should be so loved and cherished, she must needs love in turn.

His dreams were delicious; and the sudden fear into which he fell at the end lest after all Kitty should mock and turn from him, was only in truth another pleasure. No delay! Circumstances might develop at any moment and sweep her from him. Now or never must he snatch her from difficulty and disgrace--let hostile tongues wag as they pleased--and make her his.

His political future? He knew well the influence which, in these days of universal publicity, a man's private affairs may have on his public career. And in truth his heart was in that career, and the thought of endangering it hurt him. Certainly it would recommend him to nobody that he should marry Madame d'Estrées' daughter. On the other hand, what favor did he want of anybody? save what work and "knowing more than the other fellows" might compel? The cynic in him was well aware that he had already what other men fought for--family, money, and position. Society must accept his wife; and Kitty, once mellowed by happiness and praise, might live, laugh, and rattle as she pleased.

As to strangeness and caprice, the modern world delights in them; "the violent take it by force." There is, indeed, a dividing-line; but it was a love-marriage that should keep Kitty on the safe side of it.

He stood lost in a very ecstasy of resolve, when suddenly there was a sharp movement outside, and a flash of white among the yew hedges bordering the formal garden on which his windows looked. The night outside was still and veiled, but of the flash of white he was certain--and of a step on the gravel.

Something fell beside him, thrown from outside. He picked it up, and found a flower weighted by a stone, tied into a fold of ribbon.

"Madcap!" he said to himself, his heart beating to suffocation.

Then he stole out of his room, and down a small, winding staircase which led directly to the garden and a door beside the orangery. He had to unbolt the door, and as he did so a dog in one of the basement rooms began to bark. But there could be no flinching, though the whole thing was of an imprudence which pricked his conscience. To slip along the shadowed side of the orangery, to cross the space of clouded light beyond, and gain the darkness of the ilex avenue beyond was soon done. Then he heard a soft laugh, and a little figure fled before him. He followed and overtook.

Kitty Bristol turned upon him.

"Didn't I throw straight?" she said, triumphantly. "And they say girls can't throw."

"But why did you throw at all?" he said, capturing her hand.

"Because I wanted to talk to you. And I was restless and couldn't sleep. Why did you never come and talk to me this afternoon? And why"--she beat her foot angrily--"did you let me go and play billiards alone with Mr. Cliffe?"

"Let you!" cried Ashe. "As if anybody could have prevented you!"

"One sees, of course, that you detest Mr. Cliffe," said the whiteness beside him.

"I didn't come here to talk about Geoffrey Cliffe. I _won't_ talk about him! Though, of course, you must know--"

"That I flirted with him abominably all the afternoon? _C'est vrai--c'est ab-sol-ument vrai!_ And I shall always want to flirt with him, wherever I am--and whatever I may be doing."

"Do as you please," said Ashe, dryly, "but I think you will get tired."

"No, no--he excites me! He is bad, false, selfish, but he excites me. He talks to very few women--one can see that. And all the women want to talk to him. He used to admire Miss Lyster, and now he dislikes her. But she doesn't dislike him. No! she would marry him to-morrow if he asked her."

"You are very positive," said Ashe. "Allow me to say that I entirely disagree with you."

"You don't know anything about her," said the teasing voice.

"She is my cousin, mademoiselle."

"What does that matter? I know much more than you do, though I have only seen her two days. I know that--well, I am afraid of her!"

"Afraid of her? Did you come out--may I ask--determined to talk nonsense?"

"I came out--never mind! I _am_ afraid of her. She hates me. I think"--he felt a shiver in the air--will do me harm if she can."

"No one shall do you harm," said Ashe, his tone changing, "if you will only trust yourself--"

She laughed merrily.

"To you? Oh! you'd soon throw it up."

"Try me!" he said, approaching her. "Lady Kitty, I have something to say to you."

Suddenly she shrank away from him. He could not see her face, and had nothing to guide him.

"I haven't yet known you three weeks," he said, over-mastered by something passionate and profound. "I don't know what you will say--whether you can put up with me. But I know my own mind--I shall not change. I--I love you. I ask you to marry me."

A silence. The night seemed to have grown darker. Then a small hand seized his, and two soft lips pressed themselves upon it. He tried to capture her, but she evaded him.

"You--you really and actually--want to marry me?"

"I do, Kitty, with all my heart."

"You remember about my mother--about Alice?"

"I remember everything. We would face it together."

"And--you know what I told you about my bad temper?"

"Some nonsense, wasn't it? But I should be bored by the domestic dove. I want the hawk, Kitty, with its quick wings and its daring bright eyes."

She broke from him with a cry.

"You must listen. I _have_--a wicked, odious, ungovernable temper. I should make you miserable."

"Not at all," said Ashe. "I should take it very calmly. I am made that way."

"And then--I don't know how to put it--but I have fancies--overpowering fancies--and I must follow them. I have one now for Geoffrey Cliffe."

Ashe laughed.

"Oh, that won't last."

"Then some other will come after it. And I can't help it. It is my head"--she tapped her forehead lightly--"that seems on fire."

Ashe at last slipped his arm round her.

"But it is your heart--you will give me."

She pushed him away from her and held him at arm's-length.

"You are very rich, aren't you?" she said, in a muffled voice.

"I am well off. I can give you all the pretty things you want."

"And some day you will be Lord Tranmore?"

"Yes, when my poor father dies," he said, sighing. He felt her fingers caress his hand again. It was a spirit touch, light and tender.

"And every one says you are so clever--you have such prospects. Perhaps you will be Prime Minister."

"Well, there's no saying," he threw out, laughing--"if you'll come and help."

He heard a sob.

"Help! I should be the ruin of you. I should spoil everything. You don't know the mischief I can do. And I can't help it, it's in my blood."

"You would like the game of politics too much to spoil it, Kitty." His voice broke and lingered on the name. "You would want to be a great lady and lead the party."

"Should I? Could you ever teach me how to behave?"

"You would learn by nature. Do you know, Kitty, how clever you are?"

"Yes," she sighed. "I am clever. But there is always something that hinders--that brings failure."

"How old are you?" he said, laughing. "Eighteen--or eighty?"

Suddenly he put out his arms, enfolding her. And she, still sobbing, raised her hands, clasped them round his neck, and clung to him like a child.

"Oh! I knew--I knew--when I first saw your face. I had been so miserable all day--and then you looked at me--and I wanted to tell you all. Oh, I adore you--I adore you!" Their faces met. Ashe tasted a moment of rapture; and knew himself free at last of the great company of poets and of lovers.

They slipped back to the house, and Ashe saw her disappear by a door on the farther side of the orangery--noiselessly, without a sound. Except that just at the last she drew him to her and breathed a sacred whisper in his ear.

"Oh! what--what will Lady Tranmore say?"

Then she fled. But she left her question behind her, and when the dawn came Ashe found that he had spent half the night in trying anew to frame some sort of an answer to it.