In the drawing-room, after dinner, he went up to her, but she gave him no greeting. She only looked at him with an expression he had never seen before – a strange, bold expression of displeasure.
‘Why have you come down here?’ she asked. ‘Have you come to watch me?’
Waterville coloured to the roots of his hair. He knew it was terribly little like a diplomatist; but he was unable to control his blushes. Besides, he was shocked, he was angry, and in addition he was mystified. ‘I came because I was asked,’ he said.
‘Who asked you?’
‘The same person that asked you, I suppose – Lady Desmesne.’
‘She’s an old cat!’ Mrs Headway exclaimed, turning away from him.
He turned away from her as well. He didn’t know what he had done to deserve such treatment. It was a complete surprise; he had never seen her like that before. She was a very vulgar woman; that was the way people talked, he supposed, at San Diego. He threw himself almost passionately into the conversation of the others, who all seemed to him, possibly a little by contrast, extraordinarily genial and friendly. He had not, however, the consolation of seeing Mrs Headway punished for her rudeness, for she was not in the least neglected. On the contrary, in the part of the room where she sat the group was denser, and every now and then it was agitated with unanimous laughter. If she should amuse them, he said to himself, she would succeed, and evidently she was amusing them.
VII
IF she was strange, he had not come to the end of her strangeness. The next day was a Sunday and uncommonly fine; he was down before breakfast, and took a walk in the park, stopping to gaze at the thin-legged deer, scattered like pins on a velvet cushion over some of the remoter slopes, and wandering along the edge of a large sheet of ornamental water, which had a temple, in imitation of that of Vesta, on an island in the middle. He thought at this time no more about Mrs Headway; he only reflected that these stately objects had for more than a hundred years furnished a background to a great deal of family history. A little more reflection would perhaps have suggested to him that Mrs Headway was possibly an incident of some importance in the history of a family. Two or three ladies failed to appear at breakfast; Mrs Headway was one of them.
‘She tells me she never leaves her room till noon,’ he heard Lady Demesne say to the general, her companion of the previous evening, who had asked about her. ‘She takes three hours to dress.’
‘She’s a monstrous clever woman!’ the general exclaimed.
‘To do it in three hours?’
‘No, I mean the way she keeps her wits about her.’
‘Yes; I think she’s very clever,’ said Lady Demesne, in a tone in which Waterville flattered himself that he saw more meaning than the general could see. There was something in this tall, straight, deliberate woman, who seemed at once benevolent and distant, that Waterville admired. With her delicate surface, her conventional mildness, he could see that she was very strong; she had set her patience upon a height, and she carried it like a diadem. She had very little to say to Waterville, but every now and then she made some inquiry of him that showed she had not forgotten him. Demesne himself was apparently in excellent spirits, though there was nothing bustling in his deportment, and he only went about looking very fresh and fair, as if he took a bath every hour or two, and very secure against the unexpected. Waterville had less conversation with him than with his mother; but the young man had found occasion to say to him the night before, in the smoking-room, that he was delighted Waterville had been able to come, and that if he was fond of real English scenery there were several things about there he should like very much to show him.
‘You must give me an hour or two before you go, you know; I really think there are some things you’ll like.’
Sir Arthur spoke as if Waterville would be very fastidious; he seemed to wish to attach a vague importance to him. On the Sunday morning after breakfast he asked Waterville if he should care to go to church; most of the ladies and several of the men were going.
‘It’s just as you please, you know; but it’s rather a pretty walk across the fields, and a curious little church of King Stephen’s time.’
Waterville knew what this meant; it was already a picture. Besides, he liked going to church, especially when he sat in the Squire’s pew, which was sometimes as big as a boudoir. So he replied that he should be delighted. Then he added, without explaining his reason –
‘Is Mrs Headway going?’
‘I really don’t know,’ said his host, with an abrupt change of tone – as if Waterville had asked him whether the housekeeper were going.
‘The English are awfully queer!’ Waterville indulged mentally in this exclamation, to which since his arrival in England he had had recourse whenever he encountered a gap in the consistency of things. The church was even a better picture than Sir Arthur’s description of it, and Waterville said to himself that Mrs Headway had been a great fool not to come. He knew what she was after; she wished to study English life, so that she might take possession of it, and to pass in among a hedge of bobbing rustics, and sit among the monuments of the old Demesnes, would have told her a great deal about English life. If she wished to fortify herself for the struggle she had better come to that old church. When he returned to Longlands – he had walked back across the meadows with the canon’s wife, who was a vigorous pedestrian – it wanted half an hour of luncheon, and he was unwilling to go indoors. He remembered that he had not yet seen the gardens, and he wandered away in search of them. They were on a scale which enabled him to find them without difficulty, and they looked as if they had been kept up unremittingly for a century or two. He had not advanced very far between their blooming borders when he heard a voice that he recognised, and a moment after, at the turn of an alley, he came upon Mrs Headway, who was attended by the master of Longlands. She was bareheaded beneath her parasol, which she flung back, stopping short, as she beheld her compatriot.
‘Oh, it’s Mr Waterville come to spy me out as usual!’ It was with this remark that she greeted the slightly embarrassed young man.
‘Hallo! you’ve come home from church,’ Sir Arthur said, pulling out his watch.
Waterville was struck with his coolness. He admired it; for, after all, he said to himself, it must have been disagreeable to him to be interrupted. He felt a little like a fool, and wished he had kept Mrs April with him, to give him the air of having come for her sake.
Mrs Headway looked adorably fresh, in a toilet which Waterville, who had his ideas on such matters, was sure would not be regarded as the proper thing for a Sunday morning in an English country-house: a négligé of white flounces and frills, interspersed with yellow ribbons – a garment which Madame de Pompadour might have worn when she received a visit from Louis XV., but would probably not have worn when she went into the world. The sight of this costume gave the finishing touch to Waterville’s impression that Mrs Headway knew, on the whole, what she was about. She would take a line of her own; she would not be too accommodating. She would not come down to breakfast; she would not go to church; she would wear on Sunday mornings little elaborately informal dresses, and look dreadfully un-British and un-Protestant. Perhaps, after all, this was better. She began to talk with a certain volubility.
‘Isn’t this too lovely? I walked all the way from the house. I’m not much at walking, but the grass in this place is like a parlour. The whole thing is beyond everything. Sir Arthur, you ought to go and look after the Ambassador; it’s shameful the way I’ve kept you. You didn’t care about the Ambassador? You said just now you had scarcely spoken to him, and you must make it up. I never saw such a way of neglecting your guests. Is that the usual style over here? Go and take him out for a ride, or make him play a game of billiards. Mr Waterville will take me home; besides, I want to scold him for spying on me.’
Waterville sharply resented this accusation. ‘I had no idea you were here,’ he declared.
‘We weren’t hiding,’ said Sir Arthur q
uietly. ‘Perhaps you’ll see Mrs Headway back to the house. I think I ought to look after old Davidoff. I believe lunch is at two.’
He left them, and Waterville wandered through the gardens with Mrs Headway. She immediately wished to know if he had come there to look after her; but this inquiry was accompanied, to his surprise, with the acrimony she had displayed the night before. He was determined not to let that pass, however; when people had treated him in that way they should not be allowed to forget it.
‘Do you suppose I am always thinking of you?’ he asked. ‘You’re out of my mind sometimes. I came here to look at the gardens, and if you hadn’t spoken to me I should have passed on.’
Mrs Headway was perfectly good-natured; she appeared not even to hear his defence. ‘He has got two other places,’ she simply rejoined. ‘That’s just what I wanted to know.’
But Waterville would not be turned away from his grievance. That mode of reparation to a person whom you had insulted which consisted in forgetting that you had done so, was doubtless largely in use in New Mexico; but a person of honour demanded something more. ‘What did you mean last night by accusing me of having come down here to watch you? You must excuse me if I tell you that I think you were rather rude.’ The sting of this accusation lay in the fact that there was a certain amount of truth in it; yet for a moment Mrs Headway, looking very blank, failed to recognise the allusion. ‘She’s a barbarian, after all,’ thought Waterville. ‘She thinks a woman may slap a man’s face and run away!’
‘Oh!’ cried Mrs Headway, suddenly, ‘I remember, I was angry with you; I didn’t expect to see you. But I didn’t really care about it at all. Every now and then I am angry, like that, and I work it off on any one that’s handy. But it’s over in three minutes, and I never think of it again. I was angry last night; I was furious with the old woman.’
‘With the old woman?’
‘With Sir Arthur’s mother. She has no business here, any way. In this country, when the husband dies, they’re expected to clear out. She has a house of her own, ten miles from here, and she has another in Portman Square; so she’s got plenty of places to live. But she sticks – she sticks to him like a plaster. All of a sudden it came over me that she didn’t invite me here because she liked me, but because she suspects me. She’s afraid we’ll make a match, and she thinks I ain’t good enough for her son. She must think I’m in a great hurry to get hold of him. I never went after him, he came after me. I should never have thought of anything if it hadn’t been for him. He began it last summer at Homburg; he wanted to know why I didn’t come to England; he told me I should have great success. He doesn’t know much about it, any way; he hasn’t got much gumption. But he’s a very nice man, all the same; it’s very pleasant to see him surrounded by his –’ And Mrs Headway paused a moment, looking admiringly about her – ‘Surrounded by all his old heirlooms. I like the old place,’ she went on; ‘it’s beautifully mounted; I’m quite satisfied with what I’ve seen. I thought Lady Demesne was very friendly; she left a card on me in London, and very soon after, she wrote to me to ask me here. But I’m very quick; I sometimes see things in a flash. I saw something yesterday, when she came to speak to me at dinner-time. She saw I looked pretty, and it made her blue with rage; she hoped I would be ugly. I should like very much to oblige her; but what can one do? Then I saw that she had asked me here only because he insisted. He didn’t come to see me when I first arrived – he never came near me for ten days. She managed to prevent him; she got him to make some promise. But he changed his mind after a little, and then he had to do something really polite. He called three days in succession, and he made her come. She’s one of those women that resists as long as she can, and then seems to give in, while she’s really resisting more than ever. She hates me like poison; I don’t know what she thinks I’ve done. She’s very underhand; she’s a regular old cat. When I saw you last night at dinner, I thought she had got you here to help her.’
‘To help her?’ Waterville asked.
‘To tell her about me. To give her information, that she can make use of against me. You may tell her what you like!’
Waterville was almost breathless with the attention he had given this extraordinary burst of confidence, and now he really felt faint. He stopped short; Mrs Headway went on a few steps, and then, stopping too, turned and looked at him. ‘You’re the most unspeakable woman!’ he exclaimed. She seemed to him indeed a barbarian.
She laughed at him – he felt she was laughing at his expression of face – and her laugh rang through the stately gardens. ‘What sort of a woman is that?’
‘You’ve got no delicacy,’ said Waterville, resolutely.
She coloured quickly, though, strange to say, she appeared not to be angry. ‘No delicacy?’ she repeated.
‘You ought to keep those things to yourself.’
‘Oh, I know what you mean; I talk about everything. When I’m excited I’ve got to talk. But I must do things in my own way. I’ve got plenty of delicacy, when people are nice to me. Ask Arthur Demesne if I ain’t delicate – ask George Littlemore if I ain’t. Don’t stand there all day; come in to lunch!’ And Mrs Headway resumed her walk, while Rupert Waterville, raising his eyes for a moment, slowly overtook her. ‘Wait till I get settled; then I’ll be delicate,’ she pursued. ‘You can’t be delicate when you’re trying to save your life. It’s very well for you to talk, with the whole American Legation to back you. Of course I’m excited. I’ve got hold of this thing, and I don’t mean to let go!’ Before they reached the house she told him why he had been invited to Longlands at the same time as herself. Waterville would have liked to believe that his personal attractions sufficiently explained the fact; but she took no account of this supposition. Mrs Headway preferred to think that she lived in an element of ingenious machination, and that most things that happened had reference to herself. Waterville had been asked because he represented, however modestly, the American Legation, and their host had a friendly desire to make it appear that this pretty American visitor, of whom no one knew anything, was under the protection of that establishment. ‘It would start me better,’ said Mrs Headway, serenely. ‘You can’t help yourself – you’ve helped to start me. If he had known the Minister he would have asked him – or the first secretary. But he don’t know them.’
They reached the house by the time Mrs Headway had developed this idea, which gave Waterville a pretext more than sufficient for detaining her in the portico. ‘Do you mean to say Sir Arthur told you this?’ he inquired, almost sternly.
‘Told me? Of course not! Do you suppose I would let him take the tone with me that I need any favours? I should like to hear him tell me that I’m in want of assistance!’
‘I don’t see why he shouldn’t – at the pace you go yourself. You say it to every one.’
‘To every one? I say it to you, and to George Littlemore – when I’m nervous. I say it to you because I like you, and to him because I’m afraid of him. I’m not in the least afraid of you, by the way. I’m all alone – I haven’t got any one. I must have some comfort, mustn’t I? Sir Arthur scolded me for putting you off last night – he noticed it; and that was what made me guess his idea.’
‘I’m much obliged to him,’ said Waterville, rather bewildered.
‘So mind you answer for me. Don’t you want to give me your arm, to go in?’
‘You’re a most extraordinary combination,’ he murmured, as she stood smiling at him.
‘Oh, come, don’t you fall in love with me!’ she cried, with a laugh; and, without taking his arm, passed in before him.
That evening, before he went to dress for dinner, Waterville wandered into the library, where he felt sure that he should find some superior bindings. There was no one in the room, and he spent a happy half-hour among the treasures of literature and the triumphs of old morocco. He had a great esteem for good literature; he held that it should have handsome covers. The daylight had begun to wane, but whenever, in the rich-looking dimness,
he made out the glimmer of a well-gilded back, he took down the volume and carried it to one of the deep-set windows. He had just finished the inspection of a delightfully fragrant folio, and was about to carry it back to its niche, when he found himself standing face to face with Lady Demesne. He was startled for a moment, for her tall, slim figure, her fair visage, which looked white in the high, brown room, and the air of serious intention with which she presented herself, gave something spectral to her presence. He saw her smile, however, and heard her say, in that tone of hers which was sweet almost to sadness, ‘Are you looking at our books? I’m afraid they are rather dull.’
‘Dull? Why, they are as bright as the day they were bound.’ And he turned the glittering panels of his folio towards her.
‘I’m afraid I haven’t looked at them for a long time,’ she murmured, going nearer to the window, where she stood looking out. Beyond the clear pane the park stretched away, with the greyness of evening beginning to hang itself on the great limbs of the oaks. The place appeared cold and empty, and the trees had an air of conscious importance, as if nature herself had been bribed somehow to take the side of country families. Lady Demesne was not an easy person to talk with; she was neither spontaneous nor abundant; she was conscious of herself, conscious of many things. Her very simplicity was conventional, though it was rather a noble convention. You might have pitied her, if you had seen that she lived in constant unrelaxed communion with certain rigid ideals. This made her at times seem tired, like a person who has undertaken too much. She gave an impression of still brightness, which was not at all brilliancy, but a carefully preserved purity. She said nothing for a moment, and there was an appearance of design in her silence, as if she wished to let him know that she had a certain business with him, without taking the trouble to announce it. She had been accustomed to expect that people would suppose things, and to be saved the trouble of explanations. Waterville made some haphazard remark about the beauty of the evening (in point of fact, the weather had changed for the worse), to which she vouchsafed no reply. Then, presently, she said, with her usual gentleness, ‘I hoped I should find you here – I wish to ask you something.’