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The Author's Press Series of the Works of Elinor Glyn
THE POINT OF VIEW
ELINOR GLYN
CHAPTER I
The restaurant of the Grand Hotel in Rome was filling up. People weredining rather late--it was the end of May and the entertainments werelessening, so they could dawdle over their repasts and smoke theircigarettes in peace.
Stella Rawson came in with her uncle and aunt, Canon and the HonorableMrs. Ebley, and they took their seats in a secluded corner. They lookeda little out of place--and felt it--amid this more or less gay company.But the drains of the Grand Hotel were known to be beyond question,and, coming to Rome so late in the season, the Reverend Canon Ebleyfelt it was wiser to risk the contamination of the over-worldly-mindedthan a possible attack of typhoid fever. The belief in a divineprotection did not give him or his lady wife that serenity it mighthave done, and they traveled fearfully, taking with them their ownjaeger sheets among other precautions.
They realized they must put up with the restaurant for meals, but atleast the women folk should not pander to the customs of the place andwear evening dress. Their subdued black gowns were fastened to thethroat. Stella Rawson felt absolutely excited--she was twenty-one yearsold, but this was the first time she had ever dined in a fashionablerestaurant, and it almost seemed like something deliciously wrong.
Life in the Cathedral Close where they lived in England was not highlyexhilarating, and when its duties were over it contained only mildgossip and endless tea-parties and garden-parties by way of recreation.
Canon and the Honorable Mrs. Ebley were fairly rich people. The UncleErasmus' call to the church had been answered from inclination--notnecessity. His heart was in his work. He was a good man and did hisduty according to the width of the lights in which he had been broughtup.
Mrs. Ebley did more than her duty--and had often too much momentum,which now and then upset other people's apple carts.
She had, in fact, been the moving spirit in the bringing about of herniece Stella's engagement to the Bishop's junior chaplain, a younggentleman of aesthetic aspirations and eight hundred a year of his own.
Stella herself had never been enthusiastic about the affair. As a man,Eustace Medlicott said absolutely nothing at all to her--though to besure she was quite unaware that he was inadequate in this respect. Noman had meant anything different up to this period of her life. She hadseen so few of them she was no judge.
Eustace Medlicott had higher collars than the other curates, andintoned in a wonderfully melodious voice in the cathedral. And quite anumber of the young ladies of Exminster, including the Bishop's seconddaughter, had been setting their caps at him from the moment of hisarrival, so that when, by the maneuvers of Aunt Caroline Ebley, Stellafound him proposing to her, she somehow allowed herself to murmur somesort of consent.
Then it seemed quite stimulating to have a ring and to be congratulatedupon being engaged. And the few weeks that followed while the thing wasfresh and new had passed quite pleasantly. It was only when about amonth had gone by that a gradual and growing weariness seemed to befalling upon her.
To be the wife of an aesthetic high church curate, who fasted severelyduring Lent and had rigid views upon most subjects, began to grow intoa picture which held out less and less charm for her.
But Aunt Caroline was firm--and the habit of twenty-one years ofobedience held.
Perhaps Fate was looking on in sympathy with her unrest. In any case,it appeared like the jade's hand and not chance which made UncleErasmus decide to take his holiday early in the year and to decide tospend it abroad--not in Scotland or Wales as was his custom.
Stella, he said, should see the eternal city and Florence beforesettling down in the autumn to her new existence.
Miss Rawson actually jumped with joy--and the knowledge that EustaceMedlicott would be unable to accompany them, but might join them lateron, did not damp her enthusiasm.
Every bit of the journey was a pleasure, from the moment they landed onFrench soil. They had come straight through to Rome from Paris, wherethey had spent a week at a small hotel; because of the lateness of theyear they must get to their southern point first of all and returnnorthward in a more leisurely manner.
And now anyone who is reading this story can picture this respectableEnglish family and understand their status and antecedents, so we canvery well get back to them seated in the agreeable restaurant of theGrand Hotel at Rome--beginning to partake of a modest dinner.
Mrs. Ebley (I had almost written the Reverend Mrs. Ebley!) was secretlyenjoying herself--she had that feeling that she was in a place whereshe ought not to be--through no fault of her own--and so was free tomake the most of it, and certainly these well-dressed people were veryinteresting to glance at between mouthfuls of a particularlywell-cooked fish.
Stella was thrilling all over and her soft brown eyes were sparklingand her dazzlingly pink and white complexion glowing with health andexcitement, so that even in the Exminster confection of black grenadineshe was an agreeable morsel for the male eye to dwell upon.
There were the usual company there: the younger diplomats from theEmbassies; a sprinkling of trim Italian officers in their prettyuniforms; French and Austrian ladies; as well as the attractive-lookingnative and American representatives of the elite of Roman society.
The tables began to fill up before the Ebleys had finished their fish,and numbers of the parties seemed to know one another and nod andexchange words en passant.
But there was one table laid for a single person which remained emptyuntil the entrees were being handed, and Stella, with her freshinterest in the whole scene, wondered for whom it was reserved.
He came in presently--and he really merits a descriptive paragraph allto himself.
He was a very tall man and well made, with broad shoulders and a smallhead. His evening clothes, though beautifully pressed, with that lookwhich only a thoroughly good valet knows how to stamp upon his master'shabiliments as a daily occurrence, were of foreign cut and hand, andhis shirt, unstarched, was of the finest pleated cambric.
These trifles, however, were not what rendered him remarkable, but thathis light brown hair was worn parted in the middle and waved back a lavierge with a rather saintly expression, and was apparently just cutoff in a straight line at the back. This was quite peculiar-lookingenough--and in conjunction with a young, silky beard, trimmed into asharp point with the look of an archaic Greek statue, he presented atype not easily forgotten. The features were regular and his eyes weresingularly calm and wise and blue.
It seemed incredible that such an almost grotesque arrangement ofcoiffure should adorn the head of a man in modern evening dress. Itshould have been on some Byzantine saint. However, there he was, andentirely unconcerned at the effect he was producing.
The waiters, who probably knew his name and station, precipitatedthemselves forward to serve him, and with leisurely mien he ordered arecherche dinner and a pint of champagne.
Stella Rawson was much interested and so were her uncle and aunt.
"What a very strange-looking person," Mrs. Ebley said. "Of what nationcan he be? Erasmus, have you observed him?"
Canon Ebley put on his pince-nez and gave the newcomer the benefit of akeen scrutiny.
"I could not say with certainty, my dear. A northerner evidently--butwhether Swedish or Danish it would be difficult to determine," heannounced.
"He does not appear to know he is funny-looking," Stella Rawson said,timidly. "Do you notice, Aunt Caroline, he does not look about him atall, he has never glanced in any direction; it is as if he were alonein the room."
"A very proper behavior," the Aunt Caroline replied severely
, "but hecannot be an Englishman--no Englishman would enter a public place,having made himself remarkable like that, and then be able to sit thereunaware of it; I am glad to say our young men have some sense ofconvention. You cannot imagine Eustace Medlicott perfectly indifferentto the remarks he would provoke if he were tricked out so."
Stella felt a sudden sympathy for the foreigner. She had heard soceaselessly of her fiance's perfections!
"Perhaps they wear the hair like that in his country," she returned,with as much spirit as she dared to show. "And he may think we all lookfunny, as we think he does. Only he seems to be much better manneredthan we are, because he is quite sure of himself and quite unconsciousor indifferent about our opinion."
Both her aunt and uncle looked at her with slightly shockedsurprise--and she saw it at once and reddened a little.
But this incident caused the remarkable looking foreigner tocrystallize in interest for her, especially when, in raising his glassof champagne, she saw that on his wrist there was a bracelet ofplatinum with a small watch set with very fine diamonds. She couldhardly have been more surprised if he had worn a ring in his nose, sounaccustomed was she to any type but that of the curates and younggentlemen of Exminster.
Canon and Mrs. Ebley finished their dinner in disdainful silence andsailed from the room with chilling glances, but as Stella Rawsonfollowed them demurely she raised her soft eyes when she came to theobject of her relatives' contempt, and met his serene blue ones--andfor some reason thrilled wildly.
There was a remarkable and powerful magnetism in his glance; it was asif a breath of some other world touched her, she seemed to see intopossibilities she had never dreamed about. She resented being drawninto a far corner on the right hand of the hall, and there handed anEnglish paper to read for half an hour before being told to go to bed.She was perfectly conscious that she was longing for the stranger tocome out of the restaurant, that she might see him again.
But it was not until she was obediently following her aunt's blackbroche train to the lift up the steps again that the tall man passedthem in the corridor. He never even glanced in their direction, andwent on as though the space were untenanted--but had hardly got beyond,when he turned suddenly, and walked rapidly to the lift door, passingthem again. So that the four entered it presently, and were taken uptogether.
Stella Rawson was very close to the remarkable looking creature. Andagain a wild nameless attraction crept over her. She noticed his skinwas faintly browned with the sun, but was otherwise as fine as achild's--finer than most children's. And now she could see that threemost wonderful pearls were his shirt-studs.
He got out on the second floor, one beneath them, and said, "Pardon,"as he passed, but not as a French word, nor yet as if it were English.
During these few seconds Stella was quite aware that he had neverapparently looked at her.
"I call such an appearance sacrilegious," Mrs. Ebley said. "A man hasno right to imitate one of the blessed apostles in these modern days;it is very bad taste."