CHAPTER XXI
Time passed. A year went by after this with a gradual but unmistakableupward advance on the part of Katherine Bush. Moments of depression anddiscouragement came, of course, but her iron will carried her beyondthem. All would go well for a while, and then would come a barrier, asit were, which was difficult to climb, and which would baffle herintentions for a week or two, and then she would surmount it, and raceonward.
Her manipulation of Gerard Strobridge was masterly. She never permittedhim to go beyond the bounds of friendship, and he gradually grew toentertain the deepest worship and respect for her, which influenced hiswhole life. She spurred him on in his career, while obtaining from himall the polish his cultivated mind could bestow. Lady Garribardinewatched the passage of events with her wise old eyes, assisting them,moreover, when she deemed it necessary.
If Katherine's dominion over her beloved nephew was for his good, shemust not let class prejudice stand in the way of her sympathy. The worldfor Sarah Garribardine was full of incredible fools, who, however strongtheir desire might be for a given end, were yet too stupid to see thattheir actions and methods--nearly always inspired by personalvanity--militated against the attainment of that end, and so they wenton their blundering way, continually surprised at their own want ofsuccess!
It was the quality of reasoning and of analysis in her secretary whichgrew to interest her most deeply. Katherine was her perpetual study,inasmuch as she stood so far apart from the world of fools.
Their visit to Paris had been a great experience for Katherine. She tookthe place historically, not as she had taken it before, as the settingfor a love dream. She had had a recurrence of the violent longing forLord Algy when they arrived at the Gare du Nord, that strangely suddenseizure of passion to which she seemed periodically subject; when sheknew that if at the moment Fate were to offer him to her again she wouldfind the temptation of acceptance too strong to resist. She wasafterwards always extremely thankful that this did not occur, and thatshe was given time to resume her self-command.
When first she drove down the Champs Elysees, a strange sense of fearcame over her--what if after all that Palatial Hotel episode in her lifeshould have power one day to raise up its ghost and destroy the fabricof her ambitions? The more she saw of the great world, the more sherealised that such a breach of convention, such a frank laying aside ofall recognised standards of morality, would never be forgiven ifdiscovered. Incidents of the kind occurred every day, but must always berigorously kept out of sight. She grew to understand that it is a muchmore punishable offence to hold unorthodox views and act honestly bythem, than to profess orthodox, stringent virtue, and continually blinkat the acting against conscience, by secret indulgences!
One day it chanced that she could discuss the point with her mistress.
"You must remember the good of the community always first, girl," LadyGarribardine had said. "If you want to benefit humanity you must not betoo much occupied with the individual. For the good of the communitycertain standards must be kept up, and sensible people should put onblinkers when examining the frailties of human nature. Nature says onething and civilisation and orthodox morality another; there mustlogically be an eternal conflict going on between the two and the onlychance for souls to achieve orthodox morality is for hypocrisy to assistthem by hiding bad examples given when nature has had an outburst andwon the game. If you won't conform to these practical rules it is wiserand less harmful to your neighbours for you to go and live in thewilds--I am all for _tenue_, I am all for the uplifting of the soulwhere it is possible, and decency and good taste where it is not."
"I see," responded Katherine. "One must in this, as in all other things,look to the end."
"You have indeed said it!" Her Ladyship cried. "That faculty is thequintessence of statesmanship, as it is of wisdom, and one we never seedisplayed by a radical government!"
As the season went on in London, various peeps at society were affordedKatherine, and as her eyes opened, and the keenness of her understandingdeveloped, she learned many useful lessons.
On rare Saturday afternoons, she visited the museums again with GerardStrobridge, to her intense delight, and with much pain as well aspleasure to him, and when the big Saturday to Monday parties came downto Blissington, Lady Garribardine often found her secretary invaluablefor the entertainment of unavoidable bores.
Thus by the autumn, when Gerard's aching soul and denied passionsthought to take solace in flight on that mission to Teheran, KatherineBush was an established institution at tea time, and had acquired theart of conversation in a degree which would have pleased Chesterfieldhimself!
To make herself liked by women was the immediate objective she had laiddown for herself. Of what use to gain the little pleasure by the way, ofthe gratification of her vanity from the incense of men? She must waituntil some one man appeared upon the scene, the securing of whom wouldbe her definite goal--then she could pursue her aims without thestumbling-block of female antagonism.
She learned many things from her employer: tolerance--kindness ofheart--supreme contempt for all shams, apart from that of necessarymoral hypocrisy, which seeming paradox she grew to realise was asensible assistance to the attainment of a general moral ideal. Her witssharpened, her brain expanded, her cultivation increased and her mannersassumed an exquisite refinement and graciousness; and when the secondChristmas came and the New Year of 1913, no one could possibly havediscovered the faintest trace of Bindon's Green, or of the lower middleclass from which she had sprung.
Lady Garribardine had materially augmented her salary, and substantialcheques found their way to poor Gladys, whose baby was born dead, muchto Matilda's disappointment.
"But it is often like that," she told Katherine as they walked in thepark one Sunday, "with a seven months' child, and Glad don't take onabout it as I should."
Mrs. Robert Hartley was firmly determined to go to America.
"We've had enough hell in these few months, Bob," she informed herhusband as she was getting better, "and I am going to be like Katherineand make a career for myself. I'm tired of your grumbling and yourrudeness to me, and every bit of love I had for you is gone--We've nobaby--There's nothing to keep us chained up together like a pair ofanimals, and I'm off to make my fortune--so I tell you flat."
Mr. Robert Hartley asserted the rights of an English husband, but to noavail. Gladys had the money from her sister in her hand to start herselfwith, and a warm recommendation from Madame Ermantine, and so in theearly autumn sailed for New York and almost immediately obtainedlucrative employment.
Thus the family at Bindon's Green was reduced to Matilda, Ethel, and thetwo young men, and still further diminished in the New Year by themarriage (and retirement to a villa of his own!) of Mr. Frederick Bushwith the genteel Mabel Cawber!
The wedding of the pair was a day of unalloyed pleasure to Matilda.Katherine had manoeuvred so that she could not possibly be spared toattend it; thus the festivities were unclouded by the restraint whichher presence--quite undesired by herself--always imposed upon herrelations. They were all admittedly uncomfortable with her, not she withthem. They felt in some vague way that they were of less account intheir own eyes when in her company, and that an impassable gulf nowseparated them. They had nothing to complain of, Katherine gave herselfno airs, she neither patronised them nor talked over their heads, but asubtle something divided them, and all were glad of her seeminglyenforced absence. All except the bride, who was sorry the poor secretarysister-in-law should not be chastened by witnessing her triumph!
For was she not having four bridesmaids dressed in pink pongee silk withblue sashes, and two pages to carry her court train! Pages in"Renaissance" costume. The Lady Agatha Tollington's were so described inthe _Flare_, and why should not hers be also? "Renaissance!" She did notknow what the word meant, but it had such a nice sound and seemed sowell to fit the picturesque suits advertised as copied from Millais'immortal Bubbles which had been secured at the local emporium to adornthe tw
o smug-faced infants who would carry--very shamefacedly it must beadmitted--the confection of cheap satin and imitation lace which woulddepend from Miss Cawber's angular shoulders.
If Katherine could have seen all that! Miss Cawber felt that a humblermien in this obstreperous creature might have resulted!
But Katherine never saw it, and when Matilda recounted all the gloriesto her, she had the awkwardness to ask why Mabel had indulged in a courttrain?
"Bridesmaids were natural enough," she said, "if you all wanted to havesome gaiety and a jolly party, but Fred's wife will never go to Court,so why pages and a train?"
"Oh--well," Matilda returned in annoyance, "who's to know that atBindon's Green? And it has given her ever such a tip-top position tobegin her home upon. The Perkins girls and Bob Hartley's mother andcousins were just mad with envy, and Fred as pleased as Punch to havesuch a stunning turn-out at his side to down the aisle with."
"I am so glad you are all happy then," Katherine said kindly.
How merciful, she reflected when she had left her sister at StanhopeGate, that their ambitions were so easily satisfied! How merciful alsothat only Matilda's affection for her need count in her futureconnection with the family--and Matilda might at no distant date be abride too! The bride of Katherine's old devoted admirer, CharlieProdgers! While Ethel announced her intention of following Gladys'example and migrating to America the moment she was seventeen, in thespring.
Thus, visits to Bindon's Green were no longer desired by the inhabitantsof Laburnum Villa, nor of Talbot Lodge, where Mr. and Mrs. FrederickBush were installed, and Katherine felt she could drift from them allwithout hurting their feelings, indeed, with mutual satisfaction.
So the winter of 1912 drew to a close, and the spring of 1913 came, andwith it Gerard Strobridge.
He was well and sunburnt and seemed more resigned on his first visitafter he returned to Blissington accompanied by Lady Beatrice.
Katherine was pouring out the tea--now her daily task--when he came in,and a glad thrill ran through her. Would he see any change in her? Wouldhe be pleased with her advancement? He was her friend, and her helpmatein literature, and never by word or look did she recognise that he couldfeel any other emotion but a platonic one for her.
Her attractions always struck Gerard afresh after his absences, and madehim remark upon them each time he returned.
"How beautiful you have grown, Katherine," he said when presently theyhad a chance of talking a little apart. "You are the most wonderfulthing in the world--I came back hoping to find you less attractive, andyou are just as fascinating as ever--more so--Oh! shall I never make youcare the least for me?"
"Never."
"It is a wonder that I should love you so madly, when you are as cold asice to me, and never melt--I believe you could see me on the rackwithout turning a hair--if it suited your purpose!"
"Probably."
But she smiled softly, so he asked eagerly:
"Is it so, Katherine?"
"Will you never understand even after the hundreds and hundreds of talkswe have had? I have marked out a settled, determined path in life whichI intend to follow--so that even if I loved you I would crush allemotion out of myself, since indulging in it would ruin my aims, anddrag us both to social perdition meanwhile. It is extremely fatiguing tohave to recommence explaining our positions every time you come backfrom abroad. As a friend I delight in you--I love our talks, ourdiscussions and controversies. I have tried in every way to improveunder your tuition, but if you will be weak and give way to otherfeelings--it is you who put yourself on the rack--And if you do it Icannot help it, it cannot change my determination, even if I see yousuffering."
"How can a man worship anything so logical?"
"I don't know; what I do know is that I never mean to admit that youhave any feelings for me but those I have for you, of warm friendship. Ishall always act as if you were only my friend, and only consider any ofmy actions as affecting you from that point of view. If you are hurt itis your own fault, I cannot be responsible for the pain."
He clenched his hands with sudden violence.
"And if I refused to bear it--if I broke all friendship and never spoketo you again--what then?"
"You would be quite right to do so if it gave you any satisfaction. Ishould miss you--but I should understand."
He gave a faint groan.
"Well, I have not the strength to throw off your influence. I alwaysthink I have done it when I go to foreign climes, and I dwell upon thepleasure that your intellect gives me. I come back quite resigned, butthe first sight of you, the sight of those red, wicked lips and thatwhite skin drives me mad once more, and I feel I do not care whether youhave any brain or no, in the overwhelming desire to hold you in myarms."
Katherine gave an exclamation of weariness.
"Oh, it is tiresome that you must always have these scenes when youreturn, they spoil everything. You force me to seem cruel. Why can't youaccept the situation?"
"Because I am a man and you are a woman," and his eyes sought hers withpassion, "and all the rest of emotion is but make-believe; the only realpart is the tangible. To have and to hold, to clasp and to kiss, tostrain the loved one next the heart--Katherine, you make me suffer thetortures of the damned."
"No--you permit yourself to suffer them, that makes all the difference.If I made you, then I should feel as wicked as you say my lips look."
Here Lady Beatrice interrupted them in her plaintive, drawling voice.
"Gerard, can you imagine it! Aunt Sarah has just had a letter from TomHawthorne by the evening's post, announcing that Laeo has quietly marriedthat boy in Paris, and they are going to Monte Carlo for theirhoneymoon! Isn't it quite too tragic for them, poor things!"
Lady Garribardine joined the group, with the epistle in her hand.
"Laeo was always a fool, but I believed even the sense of a rabbit wouldhave kept her from this!"
"They are madly in love, dear Sarah!" old Gwendoline d'Estaire saidsentimentally.
Her ladyship snorted.
"Tut, tut! Laeo is forty-two years old and the boy not more than six andtwenty, sixteen years between them! Quite an immaterial discrepancywhile he remained a lover--but a menace which even the strongest braincannot combat when the creature turns into a husband. The situation isridiculous at once. It means that the woman has to spend her time notonly fighting old age as we all have to do, but watching for every signof weariness in the youth, trembling at every fresh wrinkle in herself,and always on the tiptoe of anxiety, so that she loses whatever charmlured the poor child into her net."
"But really Laeo had made it so evident--the affair--perhaps shethought----"
"That a second wedding ring was essential! Ridiculous nonsense,Gwendoline! We are not of the _bourgeoisie_--there is an epidemic ofthese rich widows rushing these penniless young men into matrimony. Noone objects to their amusing themselves, but these respectable unionsoffend the sensibilities at once from their obvious unsuitableness. Thewoman loses prestige--almost caste, I was going to say. The man growseither sheepish or intolerably insolent, and if you notice, the paireventually drop out of all agreeable society."
"How awful to contemplate!" and Lady Beatrice sighed sadly. "To thinkthat after one had _pretended_ for years that one was full of emotionsand sex and horrible things, one should succumb to them really--It is acruel retribution--Gerard, aren't you interested?"
For Mr. Strobridge had raised a whimsical eyebrow.
"Perfectly thrilled. I am amply revenged for her indifference to me!"
"Is it not possible for them to be happy, then?" Katherine whispered tohim in the din of a chorus of remarks the news had provoked.
"They have about a hundred to one chance for a few months; then eitherwill suffer, probably both. Oh! the intolerable bond ofmatrimony!--Unless, of course----"
Katherine shrugged her shoulders.
"Yes, I suppose so, if one was not quite sure what the reason was thatone was marrying for, and had not weighe
d it and found out if it wouldbe worth while or no."
"What will you marry for?"
"Contentment, I expect."
"And what is contentment--only the obtaining of one's heart's desire."
"I shall not marry unless it is to obtain my heart's desire," and thatsphinxlike smile grew round her mouth, which always roused GerardStrobridge's curiosity. After all this time, he could never quite fathomwhat was going on inside that clever brain.
"I refuse to think about it--Let us talk about something else--booksyou have been reading--something I can do for you."
"There is one thing I would like you to do very much--only I do not knowif it could be managed. Last week, Her Ladyship allowed me to go withMiss Arabella d'Estaire to see the House of Commons. I would so muchlike to see the House of Lords and hear a debate there before the Easterrecess. I am trying to study politics."
"That will not be very difficult. I can get an order from Blackrod;there will be something to listen to next week, when I believe my auntwill be in town. I shall love to gratify your wish, Katherine."
"We must ask Lady Garribardine first if I may."
"Model of circumspection! Of course."
Then the company drifted from the tea table and Miss Bush returned toher sanctum, while Gerard Strobridge went up to his aunt's sitting-room.
They talked of numbers of things, and at last that lady said:
"G.,--more than ever I understand your passion for my secretary. I donot even find your fidelity ridiculous; she is one of the mostfascinating creatures I have ever met. A masterpiece of balance andcommon sense, she will rise to the highest position one day--mark mywords, boy!"
"I daresay--I cannot feel interested in that. I am still horribly inlove. I thought Teheran had dulled the ache for her, but it has not."
Lady Garribardine sighed as she arranged a cushion.
"I live in terror that one day she will come and tell me quite honestlythat she has learned all that my situation can teach her, and that sheis going on to something new."
"She could not be so ungrateful."
"It would not be ingratitude--she works for money, not for love. Itwould be part of her plan of life. Sentimental emotion does not enterinto it--that is what makes her so interesting, and so invaluable."
"But I know, Seraphim, that she has a deep affection for you--she hasexpressed it to me many times. You are her model for all fine conductand point of view."
"Yes--the girl is devoted to me, I think. Well, we must hope that she iscontent here, for I do not know how I could quite get on without her. Ihave had her down for a little at each party during the winter, G. Sheliterally devours bores for me, and gets all the cranks into goodtempers. And all the women like her; that shows triumphant astuteness onher part."
"Triumphant! You did not after all marry her to Sir John while I wasaway. I almost hoped that you would do so when I left in October."
"Sir John was willing; he wanted but a hint from me to have shown allthe ardour of a young lover. One even pictured verses--it is in this waythat it takes aged politicians. One imagined a discreet wedding andalmost by now the inevitable preparatory layette!--But Miss Bush wouldhave none of it! When I approached her upon the subject she looked mestraight in the face and said quite respectfully, but with a hauteurbefitting a D'Estaire, that she had other views, and while sensible ofmy kindness she must decline the honour! I was immensely diverted."
"Danger is still ahead, then--She has told me just now that she meansonly to marry when she can gain her heart's desire--but what that isGod--or the devil--alone knows."
Lady Garribardine looked at him shrewdly for a second; she did notspeak, so Mr. Strobridge went on:
"By the way, she wants me to take her and Arabella to hear a debate inthe House of Lords--may I?"
"Of course."
If he had not been so preoccupied with his own thoughts he would haveremarked his aunt's tone, but he was absently staring out of the windowand did not even see her face with its sagacious, querying expression.
"She is greatly interested in politics, I believe; she is well up inthem already--she is well up in everything. I daresay she could open abazaar, or give an address better than I could myself. I can spare hernext Wednesday afternoon when the debate on the Land Bill will be infull swing. You can arrange it."
"I will.--Seraphim, isn't it pitiful about poor Laeo!--Younger or olderit would not have mattered quite so much--but at forty-two--Heavens! Theonly thing the poor darling had--her beauty--won't be worth looking atin a year or so. The mentality of women is beyond me, so utterlyunaccountable their actions are."
"Not at all, my precious G. They are as plain as a pikestaff--only anyman can be bamboozled by the silliest of them. They all answer to typeand sex. Laeo has the brains of her type, the female guinea pig, raisedunder artificial conditions which have altered, but not stifled, theguinea pig's strongest instinct--prolific reproduction. It came out inLaeo, not in the desire to have a numerous family, but in an intensedesire to attract the male--_pas pour le bon motif, bien entendu!_--butfor variety--Then she falls in love at a foolish age, and the emotion,being one of nature, the instinct rights itself for the moment, andswamps the effect of artificial conditions. Hence the passion for thewedding ring--vows--the male in the cage, all unconscious preparationfor a family--the last thing she would desire, in fact--and all sense ofproportion lost sight of."
Mr. Strobridge laughed delightedly.
"You should write a 'Guide to the Knowledge of Women,' Seraphim, for theenlightenment of your men friends."
His aunt smiled, showing all her strong, well-preserved white teeth.
"I would like to, but not one of them would speak to me again, theywould tear my new grey _toupee_ from my snowy locks, and denounce me asa liar, because I would tell the one thing they strongly dislike--thetruth!"
"Yes, a thoroughly lovable feminine woman loathes the truth, doesn'tshe! I have always found my greatest success with her lay in adistortion of every fact to suit her personal view. Katherine Bush andyourself, sweet Aunt, are the only two of your sex that I have ever metwhom a man need not humour, and can speak his real mind out to."
And with this he kissed her fat hand and took his way from her presencedown the gallery to his room to dress for dinner.
But all the while Stirling was coaxing the real silver and auxiliaryiron grey waves into a superbly simple triumph of hairdressing, herladyship wore a slight frown of concentrated thought.
What did it mean, this desire on the part of her secretary to see theHouse of Lords?
"Vermondsay--Hankhurst--Upper Harringway." She counted over a long listof the names of peers who frequented Blissington and BerkeleySquare--but at the end she shook her head. "No--none of these--Whothen--and what for?"
Katherine Bush was no guinea pig answering to type. What type was she,by the way? A complicated, conglomerated mixture, not easy to dissect atany time, was this new move a manifestation of sex--or type?
Time alone would show--Until then the solution must remain in the lap ofthe gods. And in all cases, dinner should not wait, and it behooved ahostess to be punctual.