Part 10

At dinner that night General Brandon told Elizabeth about his meeting with Mrs. Clavering, and the renewal of their acquaintance. “The poor lady seemed much pleased at meeting some one associated with her former life,” said the General. “She invited me to call on Thursday, which is their first reception day of the season, and especially urged that you should come. I believe their receptions are large and brilliant—the newspapers are always full of them; so I told her that owing to your very recent mourning it would be impossible for you to go to any large or gay entertainment. I have no doubt Sara Luttrell will ask you to many of her parties,—she keeps a very gay house,—and it is a source of the keenest regret to me that you cannot for the present accept invitations. But another winter I shall hope, my dear child, that you will have the spirit to enter once more into the society you are so admirably fitted to adorn.”

Good General Brandon was quite unconscious that in the society to which Elizabeth had been long accustomed a year was considered the period of a widow’s mourning. He never dreamed for one moment that she could have been induced to go into society at that time. As a matter of fact, it was the one thing which Elizabeth really hoped might rouse her from her torpor of mind and heart into which she had sunk in the last few months. She had a good and comprehensive mind, which had been much improved by reading under Pelham’s direction. Then had come that brilliant year in London, in which she had really seen the best English society and had liked it, as every one must who knows it. During her whole married life she had taken part in the continual round of small gayeties which prevail at army posts all over the world. Her belle–ship had made this particularly gratifying and delightful to her. Society had become a habit, although very far from a passion, with her, and she had expected to return to it, as one resumes one’s daily habits.

She had taken a strange interest in the Claverings from the very beginning—they constituted her first impressions of Washington; and she would have found some diversion from her sad and wearying thoughts in Mrs. Luttrell’s brilliant and interesting house. But it was impossible for her to go against her father’s implied ideas of propriety. He had always assumed that she was properly and dutifully heart–broken at her husband’s death. She did indeed mourn good, brave, honest, stupid Jack Darrell as a woman mourns a husband for whom she feels gratitude and tenderness, without being in the least in love with him; all the sentiment which belongs to love she had secretly and hopelessly given to Pelham. She often thought that if she had not been so young, so ignorant, she never would have married Darrell.

“I think you should force yourself, however painful it may be to your feelings, to go to see Sara Luttrell some day when she is not formally receiving,” said General Brandon, thinking he was proposing a tremendous sacrifice to Elizabeth; and he felt quite triumphant when she agreed to go.

When the Thursday afternoon came, there was no need to tell Elizabeth that the Clavering receptions were large and brilliant. By four o’clock carriages came pouring into the street, and by five there was almost an _impasse_. Great numbers of stylish men, both foreigners and Americans, passed in and out the splendid doors.

While Elizabeth was watching this procession with curious interest, Mrs. Luttrell’s great old–fashioned coach, with the long–tailed black horses, stopped before the tall, shabby house, and Serena brought up Mrs. Luttrell’s and Baskerville’s cards. Mrs. Luttrell, although militant, was not the sort of woman to hit another woman when she was down, and was most gracious when Elizabeth appeared. The sight of the dingy drawing–room, of Elizabeth’s pallor and evident signs of stress and trial, touched Mrs. Luttrell. She mentioned to Elizabeth that a card would be sent her for a large dinner which she was giving within a fortnight, and when Elizabeth gently declined Mrs. Luttrell was really sorry. Baskerville was sincerely cordial. He had liked Elizabeth as a girl, and her forlornness now touched him as it did Mrs. Luttrell.

When the visit was over and they were once more out of the house, Mrs. Luttrell exclaimed: “That’s Dick Brandon’s doings—that poor Elizabeth not going to a place and moping in that hole of a house. If she would but go about a bit, and leave her card at the British Embassy, where she would certainly be invited, she could see something of society and recover her spirits and good looks. By the way, I think she’s really more enticing in her pallor and her black gown than when she was in the flush of her beauty. Of course she looks much older. Now, as I’m going into the Claverings’ I suppose you will leave me.”

Baskerville, with a hangdog look, replied, “I’m going into the Claverings’, too.” Mrs. Luttrell’s handsome mouth came open, and her ermine cape fell from her shoulders without her even so much as knowing it. “Yes,” said Baskerville, assuming a bullying air, now that the cat was out of the bag, “Mrs. Clavering asked me last Sunday, and I accepted.”

“Where on earth, Richard Bas—“

“Did I see Mrs. Clavering? I met her out walking with Miss Clavering. Mrs. Clavering is a most excellent woman—quiet and unobtrusive—and I swear there is something of her in Miss Clavering.”

“Richard Baskerville, you are in love with Anne Clavering! I know it; I feel it.”

“Don’t be a fool, Sara Luttrell. Because I happen to pay a visit at a house where I have been asked and could have gone a year ago, you at once discover a mare’s nest. That’s Sara Luttrell all over.”

“And what becomes of the doubtful propriety of your going to Senator Clavering’s house? And suppose you succeed in driving him out of public life, as you are trying to do?”

“I swear you are the most provoking old woman in Washington. Hold your tongue and come along with your dutiful nephew.”

Grasping her firmly by the arm, Baskerville marched Mrs. Luttrell up the broad stone steps of the Clavering house. The splendid doors were opened noiselessly by gorgeous footmen who looked like the prize–winners at a chrysanthemum show. The entrance was magnificent, and through the half–drawn silken draperies of the wide doorways they could see the whole superb suite of rooms opening upon the large Moorish hall. Great masses of flowers were everywhere, and the mellow glow of wax lights and tinted lamp globes made the winter twilight softly radiant.

Half a dozen butterfly débutantes were serving tea in the huge dining room, furnished with priceless teak–wood and black oak, bright with pictures and mirrors, a magnificent Turkish carpet on the parquet floor and chandeliers from a royal palace lighting the dim splendor of the room. Here, brilliant with candelabra, was set out a great table, from which an expensive collation was served by more gorgeous footmen. This was the doing of Élise and Lydia, who overruled Anne’s desire for a simple tea–table set in the library. There, however, a great gold and silver bowl was constantly replenished with champagne punch, and over this Élise and Lydia presided, much preferring the champagne bowl to the tea–table.

The library was thronged with men, old and young, native and foreign. Élise and Lydia, their handsome faces flushed and smiling, their elaborate gowns iridescent with gold and silver embroidery and spangles sweeping the floor, laughed, talked, and flirted to their hearts’ content. They also drank punch with a great many men, who squeezed their hands on the sly, looked meaningly into their large, dark eyes, and always went away laughing.

Mrs. Luttrell, escorted by Baskerville, and meeting acquaintances at every turn, entered the great drawing–room, which was a symphony in green and gold. Near the door Anne Clavering, in a simple gray gown, stood by her mother, who was seated. Anne received the guests, and then introduced them to Mrs. Clavering, who made the pretence of receiving, looking the picture of misery meanwhile. The poor soul would much rather have remained upstairs; but on this point Anne was inexorable—her mother must show herself in her own drawing–room. A handsome black gown, appropriate to an elderly lady, showed Mrs. Clavering at her best, and Anne, with perfect tact, grace, and patience, silently demanded and received for her mother the respect which was due her and which there was occasionally some difficulty in exacting. As Anne caught sight of Mrs. Luttrell, she smiled with obvious pleasure; but on seeing Baskerville her face lighted up in a way which by no means escaped Mrs. Luttrell’s sharp eyes.

Mrs. Clavering was nearly frightened out of her life on the rare occasions when the redoubtable Mrs. Luttrell called, but on this afternoon Mrs. Luttrell was as soft as milk and as sweet as honey itself. Mrs. Clavering was not the least afraid of Baskerville, and said to him earnestly, as he took her hand, “I’m real glad to see you.”

“And I am very glad to be able to come,” answered Baskerville. Then, seating himself by her side, he began to talk to her so gently on subjects the poor lady was interested in that she was more delighted with him than ever. A soft flush came into Anne’s delicate cheeks; she appreciated the sweet and subtle flattery in Baskerville’s attitude. It was not interest in Mrs. Clavering’s conversation, nor even the pity he might have felt for her forlorn condition, which induced him to spend twenty minutes of his visit in talking to her.

Meantime the dusk was deepening. Many visitors were departing and few coming. Mrs. Luttrell was entertaining a select coterie of men around the large fireplace at the other end of the room, and Baskerville was the only person left near Anne and Mrs. Clavering.

“Will you be kind enough,” he said to Anne, “to go with me to get a cup of tea? I see a table in yonder, but I am afraid of so many young girls at once. I think I can count six of them. Now if you will go with me, I shall feel as brave as a lion.”

The temptation was strong, but Anne looked down at her mother. Apprehension was written on Mrs. Clavering’s simple, homely face at the notion of being left alone.

“Why can’t Mr. Baskerville have his tea with me?” said she. “There ain’t any more folks coming. Make Peer bring a table here, Anne, and we’ll have it comfortable together.”

“Yes,” Baskerville added, drawing up a chair. “Mrs. Clavering is far more amiable and hospitable than you. I am sure you would never have thought of so kind a solution.”

Anne, with a happy smile, gave Pierre the order, and in a minute they were sitting about a little table, with an opportunity for a few minutes’ talk at a moderate pitch of voice, differing from those hurried, merry meetings in a crowd of laughing, talking, moving people which usually constitute a Washington call.

While they were sitting there, all three enjoying themselves and Mrs. Clavering not the least of the three, a belated caller was announced, General Brandon. The General was in his Sunday frock coat, which had seen good service, and his silk hat, which belonged by rights on the retired list; but each was carefully brushed and clearly belonged to a gentleman. General Brandon himself, handsome, soldierly, his white mustache and hair neatly clipped, was grace, elegance, and amiability personified. His head was none of the best, but for beauty, courage, and gentleness he was unmatched. Anne received him with more than her usual cordiality, and Mrs. Clavering was so pleased at seeing him that she actually invited him to sit down at her tea–table and have tea. This he did, explaining why his daughter had sent her cards instead of coming.

“Another year, I hope, my dear madam, my daughter may be persuaded to reënter society, which, if you will pardon a father’s pride, I think she adorns. But at present she is overwhelmed with grief at her loss. It is scarcely eighteen months since she became a widow and lost the best of husbands.”

General Brandon prattled on, and presently said: “I had hoped to meet Senator Clavering here this afternoon, and made my visit late on purpose. His exacting senatorial duties, however, must leave him little time for social relaxation.”

“I think I hear his step in the hall now,” said Anne. “He will, I know, be very much pleased to meet you again.”

As she spoke Clavering’s firm tread was heard, and he entered, smiling, debonair, and distinguished–looking. Nobody would have dreamed from anything in his air or looks that this man was nearing a crisis in his fate, and that even then his conduct was being revealed in the newspapers and examined by his fellow–senators in a way which opened a wide, straight vista to state’s prison.

Clavering was surprised, but undeniably pleased, and even amused at seeing Baskerville; and Baskerville felt like a hound, and inwardly swore at himself for letting the wish to see a woman’s eyes bring him to Clavering’s house. He put a bold face upon it, however, shook Clavering’s outstretched hand, and called himself a fool and a rogue for so doing.

The warmth of Clavering’s greeting to General Brandon delighted the simple old warrior. Clavering, who had too much sound sense to avoid allusions to his early life or to tell lies about it, recalled the time when he was a sutler and General Brandon was an officer. Then he carried the latter off to an alcove in the library, which was now deserted except by Élise and Lydia. These two young women, reclining like odalisks among the cushions of a luxurious sofa, discussed Rosalka and the rest of their swains in low voices and in terms which luckily their father did not overhear.

Into the alcove Clavering caused his choicest brands of whiskey to be brought, and at once plunged into talk; and into that talk he infused all his powers of pleasing, which soon produced upon the simple old General a species of intoxication. If any one had told him that Clavering’s attention was due to the sight, more than once obtained since Sunday, of Elizabeth Darrell’s graceful figure and interesting, melancholy face, General Brandon would have called that person a liar.

“You know,” said Clavering, as soon as the two were comfortably established with the whiskey and the cigars, “that I am being badgered and bothered by a set of sharks, calling themselves lawyers, who want to rob me of every dollar of my fortune. You have perhaps read in the newspapers something about this K. F. R. land–grant business.”

“I am aware the public prints have given considerable space to it,” replied General Brandon, “but I have no knowledge of the merits of the case.”

“Neither have the newspapers. The long and short of it is that the sharks, after fighting me through every court in the country, where I may say I have managed to hold my own pretty well, have contrived by political wire–pulling to get a Senate committee to investigate the matter. Now I don’t want to be lacking in courtesy to my brother senators, but of all the collection of asses, dunderheads, and old women, sneaks, hypocrites, and snivelling dogs, that ever were huddled together, that select committee of my esteemed contemporaries—Good Lord! let’s take a drink.”

General Brandon drank solemnly. Whiskey of that brand was not to be treated lightly.

“I know well all the country embraced in and contiguous to that K. F. R. land grant,” said the General, putting down his glass reverently. “I scouted and fought and hunted over all that region more than forty years ago, when I was a young lieutenant just turned loose from West Point.”

“Why, then,” cried Clavering, his handsome eyes lighting up with a glow like fire, “you might be of real service to me.” He did not specify what manner of service he meant, and General Brandon innocently thought Clavering meant about the K. F. R. land grants. But no man who ever lived could tell Clavering anything he did not know about any piece of property he had ever owned; least of all could simple, guileless General Brandon tell him anything.

“I should be most happy,” replied the General. “I have a considerable quantity of memoranda, maps and surveys of the region, which are quite at your service.”

“Capital,” said Clavering, his deep eyes shining with a keen delight. “Now as the investigation is going on, which you have seen in the newspapers, I shall have to make immediate use of any information you might be able to give me. Suppose you were to let me come over to your house to–night and take our first view of what you have? And of course you’ll stay and dine with me.”

“I thank you very much, Senator, but I cannot leave my daughter to dine alone—she is too much alone, poor child. And immediately after dinner I am engaged to spend an hour with an old friend, General Mayse, a former classmate of mine who is now inflicted with paralysis and to whom I pay a weekly visit. Besides, I should have to rummage among my papers to find those that we require. To–morrow night I shall be at your service.”

But it was not Clavering’s nature to delay the accomplishment of any wish. He wanted to see and know Elizabeth Darrell, so he said cordially: “At all events I should like to talk the matter over with you. Would you allow me to come in this evening then, after you have returned from your visit?”

“Certainly, Senator. I shall be at home by half after nine.”

Then Clavering, seeing that General Brandon was his, began to talk about other things, even to hint at chances of making money. To this General Brandon only sighed and said: “Those enterprises are for men with capital. I have only the equity in my house and my salary, and I cannot, for my daughter’s sake, jeopardize what little I have. She was left with but a small provision from her husband’s estate, which was strictly entailed.” Clavering could not refrain from smiling at General Brandon’s simplicity in refusing such an offer, if even but a hint, for such a reason; but he said no more on the subject.

As the General passed into the drawing–room to say good–by to Mrs. Clavering, he was surprised to find Baskerville still sitting at the tea–table. Baskerville had not been asked to stay to dinner, but when Mrs. Luttrell was ready to leave a very mild invitation from Mrs. Clavering, who had no notion of the duration of fashionable visits, had made him ask permission to remain—a permission which Mrs. Luttrell gave with a wink. Anne was not displeased with him for staying—her eyes and smile conveyed as much; and man–like, Baskerville had succumbed to the temptation. But when General Brandon came in and found him the very last visitor in the drawing–room he felt himself distinctly caught, and made his farewells with more haste than grace. Mrs. Clavering urged him to come again, and Anne’s tones conveyed _auf wiedersehen_ to him as eloquently as a tone can without specific words; nevertheless, when Baskerville found himself out in the cool, crisp night, he began to doubt, as he had ever doubted, the propriety of his going to Senator Clavering’s house at all. But General Brandon was saying to him most earnestly, as they stood under the lamp–post before going their different ways:—

“Senator Clavering is a very cruelly maligned man; of that I am certain. And I think, Mr. Baskerville, that most of the testimony you and the Civil Service League and the K. F. R. attorneys have collected will break down when it is introduced before the committee. Why, Senator Clavering tells me that he has been accused, on evidence that wouldn’t hang a dog, of wholesale bribery, of having bought his seat in the Senate, of having bought up courts and legislatures. But he will be triumphantly vindicated—I make no doubt at all of that.”

“I wish he might be,” replied Baskerville, with a degree of sincerity that would scarcely have been credited; “but I don’t think he can be.”

When General Brandon let himself into his own house, dinner was ready to be served. He was full of enthusiasm about the Claverings. At the table he assured Elizabeth of his entire belief in Clavering and of his respect for him. Mrs. Clavering he pronounced to be a most excellent and unpretending woman, Anne altogether admirable, Reginald Clavering a worthy fellow and a sound churchman, and Élise Denman and Lydia Clavering two much–abused young women, in whom mere high spirits and unconventionality had been mistaken for a degree of imprudence of which he felt sure they could never be guilty. Then he mentioned Clavering’s proposed visit, and asked Elizabeth if she would, the next day, find the trunk in which he kept certain papers, open it, and get out of it everything dated between ’56 and ’61.

When dinner was over and General Brandon had gone out to pay his weekly visit to his paralyzed comrade, Elizabeth went upstairs to a small back room, called by courtesy the study. Here were General Brandon’s few books; he was not, and never had been, a man of books, but he liked to be considered bookish. There was in the room an open grate fire, a student’s lamp, and some old–fashioned tables and easy–chairs. To this room Elizabeth had succeeded in imparting an air of comfort. She sat down before the fire to spend the evening alone, as she had spent so many evenings alone in the last eighteen months, and would, she feared, continue to spend her evenings for the rest of her life. She had expected to find her life in Washington dull, but the weeks she had been at home had been duller than she had thought possible. Her father’s old friends had called upon her, but they were all staid and elderly persons, and the circle had grown pitifully small in her ten years of absence. Those ten years had practically obliterated her own acquaintances in the ever changing population of Washington, and the few persons left in the gay world whom she knew, like Mrs. Luttrell, it was plain that her father did not expect her to cultivate.

One resource—reading—occurred to her on this particular evening. She had a mind well fitted for books, but she had never been thrown with bookish people, except Pelham, and reading had formed no essential part of her life. Pelham was a man of great intelligence, and a reader; but both his intelligence and his reading were confined to his profession. No matter where Elizabeth’s thinking began, Pelham was sure to come into it somewhere. She started up from her chair as the recollection of him, which always hovered near her, took shape in thought and almost in speech, and going to the book–case took out the first volume her hand fell upon. It was an old translation of Herodotus, and Elizabeth, determined upon a mental opiate, opened it at random and read on resolutely. She fell upon that wonderful story of Cyrus, the reputed son of Mithradates the herdsman; and in following the grandly simple old narrative, told with so much of art, of grace, of convincing perspicacity, that not even a translation can wholly destroy its majestic beauty, Elizabeth lost herself in the shadowy, ancient past. She was roused by Serena’s voice and Serena’s hand, as black as the Ethiopians in Herodotus’s time, who worshipped no other gods save Jupiter and Bacchus. Serena produced a card. It was simple and correct, and read: “Mr. James Clavering,” with the address.

“It is Senator Clavering,” said Elizabeth, in a moment. “Tell him that General Brandon is not at home.”

“De gent’mun seh he got er ’p’intment wid de Gin’l, an’ he gwine ter wait for him. I t’ink, Miss ’Liz’beth, you better lemme ax him up heah. De parlor is jes’ freezin’ col’,” answered Serena, who never forgot that people should be made comfortable.