CHAPTER VIII
Matilda had been told to meet her sister, if it should be fine on thisSunday, in the Park by the Serpentine; they would walk about and then goand have an early tea at Victoria Station, whence Matilda could take atrain back to Bindon's Green.
They met punctually at the time appointed on the bridge, and the elderMiss Bush was filled with joy. She had missed Katherine dreadfully, asbrowbeating husbands are often missed by meek wives, and she was full ofcuriosity to hear her news.
"You look changed somehow, Kitten!" she exclaimed, when they had greetedeach other. "It isn't because you'd done your hair differently; you hadit that way on the last day--it isn't a bit 'the look', but it suitsyou. No, it's not that--but you are changed somehow. Now tell meeverything, dearie--I am dying to hear."
"I like it," began Katherine, "and I am learning lots of things."
This information did not thrill Matilda. Katherine's desire to be alwayslearning was very fatiguing, she thought, and quite unnecessary. Shewanted to hear facts of food and lodging and people and treatment, notunimportant moral developments.
"Oh--well," she said. "Are they kind to you?"
"Yes--I am waited on like a lady--and generally the work isn't half soheavy as at Liv and Dev's."
"Tell me right from the beginning. What you do when you get up in themorning until you go to bed."
Katherine complied.
"I am waked at half-past seven and given a cup of tea--real tea, Tild,not the stuff we called tea at home." (A slight toss of the head fromMatilda.) "The second housemaid waits on me, and pulls up my blind, andthen I have my bath in the bathroom across the passage--a nice, deep hotbath."
"Whatever for--every day?" interrupted Matilda. "What waste of soap andtowels and things--do you like it, Kitten?"
"Of course, I do--we all seem to be very dirty people to me now,Tild--with our one tub a week; you soon grow to find things a necessity.I could not bear not to have a bath every day now."
Matilda snorted.
"Well--and then--?"
"Then I go down and have my breakfast in the secretary's room--mysitting-room, in fact. It is a lovely breakfast, with beautiful chinaand silver and table-linen, and when I have finished that I take myblock and pencil and go up to Lady Garribardine's bedroom to take downmy instructions for the day in shorthand."
"Oh, Kitten, do tell me, what's her room like?" At last somethinginteresting might be coming!
"It is all pink silk and lace and a gilt bed, and numbers ofphotographs, and a big sofa and comfortable chairs--and when she hasrheumatism she stays there and has people up to tea."
"What! Folks to tea in her bedroom? Ladies, of course?"
"Oh! dear no! Men, too! She has heaps of men friends; they are devotedto her."
"Gentlemen in her bedroom! I do call that fast!" Matilda was franklyshocked.
"Why?" asked Katherine.
"Why? My dear! Just fancy--gentlemen where you sleep and dress! Mabelwould not dream of doing such a thing--and I do hope she'll never hearyou are in that kind of a house. She'd be sure to pass remarks."
"Lady Garribardine is over sixty years old, Tild! Don't you think youare being rather funny?" and Katherine wondered why she had nevernoticed before that Matilda was totally devoid of all sense of humour.And then she realised that the conception was new even to herself, andmust have come from her book reading, though she was conscious that itwas a gift that she had always enjoyed. No one had spoken of the "sensesof humour" in their home circle, and Matilda would not have understoodwhat it meant or whether she did or did not possess it!
Things were things to Matilda, and had not different aspects, and for alady to receive gentlemen in her bedroom if she were even over sixtyyears old and suffering from rheumatism was not proper conduct, andwould earn the disapproval of Mabel Cawber and, indeed, of refined andselect Bindon's Green in general.
"I don't see that age makes a difference; it's the idea of tea in abedroom, dearie--with gentlemen!"
"But what do you think they would do to her, Tild?" Katherine withdifficulty hid her smile.
"Oh! my! what dreadful things you do say, Katherine!" Matilda blushed."Why, it's the awkwardness of it for them--I'm wondering whatever Fredand Bert and Charlie Prodgers would feel if Mabel had them up to hersof a Sunday, supposing she had a cold--and what _would_ anyone say!"
"Yes, I am sure Bindon's Green would talk its head off, and Fred andBert and Charlie Prodgers would be awfully uncomfortable and get everysort of extraordinary idea into their heads, and if a person like Mabeldid do such a thing, as to have them up there, she would be fidgetyherself--or she would be really fast and intend them to go ahead. ButLady Garribardine is always quite sure of herself, and her friends are,too, and they don't have to consider convention--they are reallygentlemen, you see, and not worried at all as to what others think orsay, and it seems quite natural to them to come up and see an oldrheumatic lady anywhere they want to see her. That is just thedifference in the class, Tild--the upper are perfectly real, and don'tpretend anything, and aren't uncomfortable in doing natural things."
Matilda was still disapproving, and at once became antagonistic when hersister made reflections upon class.
"I call it very queer, anyway," she sniffed. "And wherever do they findroom to sit--in a bedroom, dearie?"
Katherine laughed--she wondered if she had never had a glimpse of lifeand space and comfort with Lord Algy, should she, too, have been asignorant and surprised at everything in her new sphere as Matilda was atthe description of it. She supposed she would have been equallysurprised, but would certainly have viewed it with an open mind. Afterten days of peeps at a world where everything new and old was looked atand discussed with the broadest toleration, the incredible narrownessof the Bindon's Green outlook appalled her--the forces of ignorance andprejudice and ridiculous hypocrisy which ruled such hundreds of worthypeople's lives!
She came back from these speculations to the reality of her sister'svoice, reiterating her question as to where the visitors found place,and she answered, still smiling:
"It is a great big room, Tild, twice as big as the drawing-room athome--no--bigger still, and twenty people could sit in it withoutcrowding."
"Goodness gracious!" ejaculated Matilda; "it must be grand."
"You see, you are such an old goose, Matilda. You think the whole worldmust be like Bindon's Green, although I have told you over and overagain that other places, and other grades of life, are different, butyou and Mabel and Fred and Bert, and the whole crew of you, measureeverything with your own tiny measure. You make me gasp at your outlooksometimes."
Matilda bridled--and Katherine went on.
"Lady Garribardine's house does not seem to be a bit grand to her, norto any of the people who come there. They are not conscious of it; it isjust everyday to them, although some of them live in quite small housesthemselves and aren't at all rich. She has two cousins--elderly ladies,who live in a tiny flat--but oh! the difference in it to Mabel's villa!I had to take them a message last week and waited in their mite of adrawing-room--it was exquisitely clean and simple, and they are probablypoorer than we are."
Matilda felt too ruffled to continue this conversation; she always hatedthe way Katherine argued with her; she wanted to get back to the farmore interesting subject of carpets and curtains and arrangements in therooms of Lady Garribardine's house. Numbers of the people in herserials, of course, were supposed to own such places, and she had oftenseen bits of them on the stage, but until she found Katherine reallylived now in one, somehow she had never believed in them as livingactualities, or rather their reality had not been brought home to her.So she questioned Katherine, and soon had an accurate description of herladyship's bedroom, and the rest of the house, then she got back to thehappenings of her sister's day.
"Well, when you have got up there, you take down orders, and then?"
"I sort everything that has come by the post and mark on the envelopeshow I am to answer them, and I someti
mes read her the papers aloud ifher eyes are tired."
"Yes?"
"And then I go down and write the letters; she hardly ever answers anyherself, and I have to write them as if I were she. Her friends mustwonder how her hand and style have changed since Miss Arnott left!"
Here was something thrilling again for Matilda.
"Oh, my! What a lot you must get to know about the smart set, Kitten;isn't it interesting!"
"Yes, as I told you, I am learning lessons."
"Oh, bother that! Well, what do they write about, do tell me--?"
"All sorts of things; their movements, their charities--invitations,little witticisms about each other--politics, the last good story--and,some of them, books."
"And you have to answer as if you were her? However do you do it,Kitten?"
"She gives me the general idea--she showed me the first time for theprivate letters, and now I know, but sometimes perhaps I write as if itwere me!"
"And don't they know it is not her hand?"
"Of course, but they don't care. She is a great lady and a character,and she is very powerful in their circle of society, and it is wortheveryone's while to be civil to her."
"It is all funny. Well, what else do you do?"
"Sometimes I have to do errands--shopping and so on--and then myluncheon comes--the food is lovely, and I am waited on by a footmancalled Thomas; he is the third; and on Wednesday Lady Garribardine tookhis and the butler's heads off because I had not been given coffee. Shemeans me to be perfectly treated, I can tell you!"
"Coffee after your lunch, how genteel! And my! what a lot of servants.Whatever do they all do?"
"Their work, I suppose. You forget it is a big house and everything issplendidly done and beautifully clean, and regular and orderly."
Here Matilda insisted upon a full list of all the retainers, and anaccount of their separate duties; her domestic soul revelled in thesedetails, and at the end of the recital her awe knew no bounds. Katherinewas able to give her a very circumstantial set of statements, as allaccounts passed through her hands.
"Well, your old lady must spend pints of money," Matilda said, with asigh, "but we've not got to your afternoons yet, dearie. Do you work allthem, too?"
"When I am very busy--it depends how much I have to do; if I am not veryoccupied and I have not been out in the morning, I go for a walk beforetea. I have to take her ladyship's two fox-terriers, Jack and Joe; theyare jolly little fellows, and I love them. We scamper in the square, orgo as far as the Park."
"And your tea? They bring you up a cup, I suppose, every day--regular?"
"Not a cup--a whole tray to myself, and lovely muffins and cream, Tild.Lady Garribardine has a Jersey herd of cows at her place in Blankshire,and the cream comes up each day from there."
"My! how nice!" Matilda sighed again. Her imagination could hardly takein such luxury. It seemed to her that Katherine must be living in almostgilded vice!
"Then after tea, if I am not sent for to do any special thing, I read tomyself. I look up anything that I don't know about that I have chancedto hear spoken of by the people who come--I am allowed to take booksfrom the library."
"Then you do see people sometimes?" Matilda's interest revived again."What are they like, Kitten?"
"Sometimes I do, but not often--only when I chance to be sent for, butnext week Her Ladyship has got a big charity tableaux entertainment onhand, that she is arranger and patroness of, and I shall come acrosslots of people of society, some of the ones you know the names of sowell in the _Flare_."
"The Duchess of Dashington and the Countess of Blanktown--really,Kitten!"
This was fashion, indeed!
"Probably--but I don't know about the Duchess of Dashington. I don'tthink Lady Garribardine approves of her."
"Not approve of the Duchess of Dashington!" Matilda exclaimed,indignantly. "Her that has gentlemen to tea in her bedroom to giveherself airs like that! Well, I never!"
This particular Duchess' photographs were the joy of the halfpennyillustrated papers, and Matilda was accustomed to see her in skatingcostume waltzing with her instructor, and in golf costume and in privatetheatrical costumes, almost every other week.
"No--she speaks of her very cheaply--but I will tell you all about it onSunday fortnight. I'll have heard everything by then, because thetableaux will be over."
Matilda returned to her muttons.
"Then you have supper, I suppose?"
"No--I go up and dress myself and put on my best blouse and have mydinner at eight o'clock; after that I generally read the paper or Frenchbooks--and at ten I go to bed."
"Gracious! what's the good of dressing if you don't see anyone? Howyou'll use up your blouse!"
Matilda was aghast at such folly!
"I am supposed to be a lady, Tild, and a lady is expected to dress inthe evening if she is alone on a desert island."
"What stuff! Whatever for?"
"Self-respect."
"Fiddlesticks."
Presently Katherine grew reflective, her catechism over. "I wish youcould see it all, Tild; it would enlarge your brain--it is all sodifferent from Bindon's Green. If you could only hear their point ofview, I assure you, dear, it might be two different nations--thosebarefoot urchins climbing on the rails are much nearer their level thanwe are."
But Matilda could not stand this; her wrath rose.
"Those dirty boys nearer your new people than a real lady like MabelCawber, and your own brothers and sisters! Katherine, how dare you!Horrid little guttersnipes with no pride of themselves; why, they aren'teven ashamed to be here of a Sunday among decent people--they'd doanything!"
"That is just it, Tild--so would the aristocrats if they wanted to, andwouldn't be a bit ashamed or even think of it, and they have 'no prideof themselves,' either--but you'll never understand, Tild, not if youlive to be a hundred years old."
"And I don't want to, there!"
"Then it is perfectly useless my talking, I see that. We had better goand have some tea."
And so they turned out of Albert Gate and walked to Victoria.
Matilda, when she had smoothed her ruffled feelings, began now to relatethe home news. Gladys and her fiance were not happy together; they hadnot been so since that visit which Katherine would remember they hadtaken to Brighton to stay with his aunt--it was nearly six weeks ago nowand both grew more and more gloomy.
"And so uppy as Glad is with Fred, too, and never a bit back on BobHartley!"
Matilda felt things would be better for her sister if a little morespirit were shown. Mabel and her betrothed had been up for church paradeas usual in the Park that morning, and this lady had also supped withthem at Laburnum Villa the night before, and they had had oysters and ajolly time.
Katherine felt a strange emotion when she heard of this. She seemed tosee a picture of Lord Algy enjoying oysters, and all the reflectionsthis action had called up--oh! how long ago it all appeared!
"And have you met that gentlemen you spoke of?" Matilda asked, beforethey parted at the station.
"Mr. Strobridge, you mean--Lady Garribardine's nephew. Yes--he ishusband of the lady Glad dresses, the one who had the model she wantedme to have. He is a clever man--we have not really spoken yet, but Imean to know him very well some day."
"Oh! Kitten, do be careful! And him a married man, too!"
"For what I want of him, it does not matter whether he is married orsingle," Katherine reassured her, and soon the train moved off.
How good Matilda was! Katherine thought, as she walked briskly back toBerkeley Square--an unselfish, worthy, honest, hopelessly stupidcreature, whom somehow she was fond of. But what could it be that madeher herself so utterly different from them all? Nothing could bechance--everything had its reason, only we were generally too blind toperceive it. So was there some truth in that vague story of thegreat-grandmother having been someone of high family fallen low in theworld and married to the auctioneer great-grandfather, whom her ownfather remembered very well? C
ould it be that some drop of gentle bloodflowed in her veins, transmitted from this source and concentrated inher, having escaped the others--or was it simply from the years of herreading that her mind had developed? But it could not be altogetherthat, because she remembered instincts and tastes in uneducated earlychildhood completely aloof from the family's.
"Father gave me this business capacity," she mused, "but somethingbeyond must have given me this will to achieve--and I _shall_achieve--all I desire--in time! Only I must be ruthless and have noemotions. I must follow what Bacon asserts about great spirits," and shequoted softly: "'There is not one that hath been transported to the maddegree of love, which shows that great spirits and great business dokeep out this weak passion.'"
Yes, she would keep out this weak passion! She had tasted its joys, andthat memory must last her a lifetime.
On the doorstep she encountered Gerard Strobridge just coming out--heraised his hat and said politely that it was an abominably coldday--then he passed on down the steps and so towards Hill Street.
And Katherine Bush went up to her room.