Stand Fast, Craig-Royston! (Volume III). William Black

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СКАЧАТЬ that's all right!" she made answer, cheerfully enough. "Miss Martinez will get a place somewhere else – Mr. Collins will arrange that – I dare say she will be rather pleased to be set free."

      And so it came to pass that at dinner Vincent found himself in the seat that had been vacated by the useful Isabel; and perhaps his promotion provoked a few underhand comments and significant glances at certain of the other tables, for very small trifles are noted on board ship. At all events he only knew that Mrs. de Lara was as engaging, and complaisant, and loquacious as ever; and that she talked away with very little regard as to who might overhear her. Nor was she any longer the merry, rattle-pated creature of the Queenstown hotel. Oh, no. Her conversation now was of a quite superior order. It was literary; and she had caught up plenty of the phrases of the rococo school; she could talk as well as another of environments, conditions, the principal note, style charged with colour, and the like. Nay, she adventured upon an epigram now and again – or, at least, something that sounded like an epigram. "England," she said, "was a shop; France a stage; Germany a camp; and the United States a caucus." And again she said, "There are three human beings whom I wish to meet with before I die: a pretty Frenchwoman, a modest American, and an honest Greek. But I am losing hope." And then there was a tirade against affectation in writing. "Why should the man thrust himself upon me?" she demanded. "I don't want to know him at all. I want him to report honestly and simply what he has seen of the world and of human nature, and I am willing to be talked to, and I am willing to believe; but when he begins to posture and play tricks, then I become resentful. Why should he intrude his own personality at all? – he was never introduced to me; I have no wish for his acquaintance. So long as he expresses an honest opinion, good and well; I am willing to listen; but when he begins to interpose his clever little tricks and grimaces, then I say, 'Get away, mountebank – and get a red-hot poker ready for pantaloon.'" And in this way she went on, whimsical, petulant, didactic by turns, to the stolid astonishment of a plethoric and red-faced old lady opposite, who contributed nothing to the conversation but an indigestion cough, and sate and stared, and doubtless had formed the opinion that any one who could talk in that fashion before a lot of strangers was no better than she should be.

      But it was not of literature that Mrs. de Lara discoursed when Vincent returned that evening to the saloon, after having been in the smoking-room for about an hour, watching the commercials playing poker and getting up sweepstakes on the next day's run. When she caught sight of him, she immediately rose and left the group of newly-formed acquaintances with whom she had been sitting – in the neighbourhood of the piano – and deliberately came along and met him half-way.

      "Let us remain here," said she; "and then if we talk we shan't interfere with the music."

      She lay back in her chair as if waiting for him to begin; he was thinking how well her costume became her – her dress of black silk touched here and there with yellow satin – the sharp scarlet stroke of her fan – the small crescent of diamonds in her jet-black hair. Then the softened lamplight seemed to lend depth and lustre to her dark eyes; and gave something of warmth, too, to the pale and clear complexion. She had crossed her feet; her fan lay idle in her lap; she regarded him from under those long, out-curving lashes.

      "They cannot hear you," she said – perhaps thinking that he was silent out of politeness to the innocent young damsels who were doing their best at the piano – "and you cannot hear them, which is also fortunate. Music is either divine – or intolerable; what they are doing is not divine; I have been listening. But good music – ah, well, it is not to be spoken of. Only this; isn't it strange that the two things that can preserve longest for you associations with some one you have been fond of are music and scent? Not painting – not any portrait; not poetry – not anything you have read, or may read: but music and scent. You will discover that some day."

      He laughed.

      "How curiously you talk! I dare say I am older than you – though that is not saying much."

      "But I have seen the world," said she, with a smile, almost of sadness.

      "Not half of what I have seen of it, I'll answer for that."

      "Oh, but you," she continued, regarding him with much favour and kindliness, "you are an ingénu– you have the frank English character – you would believe a good deal – in any one you cared for, I mean."

      "I suppose I should," he said, simply enough. "I hope so."

      "But as I say," she resumed, "the two things that preserve associations the longest – and are apt to spring on you suddenly – are music and scent. You may have forgotten in every other direction; oh, yes, forgetting is very easy, as you will find out; for 'constancy lives in realms above,' and not here upon earth at all: well, when you have forgotten the one you were fond of, and cannot remember, and perhaps do not care to remember all that happened at that too blissful period of life – then, on some occasion or another there chances to come a fragment of a song, or a whiff of scent, and behold! all that bygone time is before you again, and you tremble, you are bewildered! Oh, I assure you," she went on, with a very charming smile, "it is not at all a pleasant experience. You think you had buried all that past time, and hidden away the ghosts; you are beginning to feel pretty comfortable and content with all existing circumstances; and then – a few notes of a violin – a passing touch of perfume – and your heart jumps up as if it had been shot through with a rifle-ball. What is your favourite scent?" she asked, somewhat abruptly.

      "Sandal-wood," said he (for surely that was revealing no secret?)

      "Then she wore a string of sandal-wood beads," said Mrs. de Lara, with a quick look.

      He was silent.

      "And perhaps she gave them to you as a keep-sake?" was the next question.

      Here, indeed, he was startled; and she noticed it; and laughed a little.

      "No, I am not a witch," she said. "All that has happened before now: do you think you are the first? Why, I'm sure, now, you've worn those beads next your heart, in the daytime, and made yourself very uncomfortable; yes, and you've tried wearing them at night, and couldn't sleep because they hurt you. Never mind, I will tell you what to do: get them made into a watch chain, with small gold links connecting the beads; and when you wear it with evening dress, every woman will recognise it as a love-gift – every one of them will say 'A girl gave him that.'"

      "Perhaps I might not wish to make a display of it," said Vincent.

      "Then you're in the first stage of inconstancy," said she, promptly. "If you're not madly anxious that the whole world should know you have won her favour, then you've taken the first step on the downward road to indifference; you are regarding certain things as bygone, and your eyes are beginning to rove elsewhere. Well, why not? It's the way of the world. It's human nature. At the same time I want to hear some more about the young lady of the sandal-wood necklace."

      "I have told you more than I intended," he answered her.

      "You haven't told me anything: I guessed for myself."

      "Well, now, I am going to ask your advice," said he – for how could he tell but that this bright, alert, intrepid person, with her varied experience of the world, might be able to help him? She was far different from Maisrie, to be sure; different as night from day; but still she was a woman; and she might perhaps be able to interpret a nature wholly alien from her own.

      So she sate mute and attentive, and watching every expression of his face, while he put before her a set of imaginary circumstances. It was not his own story; but just so much of it as might enable her to give him counsel. And he had hardly finished when she said —

      "You don't know where to find her; and yet you have never thought of a means of bringing her to you at once?"

      "What СКАЧАТЬ