Chapter 2

Oh, _ma petite poupee de Mere_, only think of it! I go to-morrow--into space. I disappear. I cease to exist _pro tem_. There will be no me, no Audrie, but, instead, two Ellalines. I've often told her, by the way, that I would make two of her. Evidently I once had a prophetic soul. I only wish I had it still, so I might see beforehand what will happen to the Me-ness of Ellaline in the next few weeks. Anyhow, whatever comes, I expect to be supported by the consciousness that I'm paying a debt of gratitude as perhaps such a debt was never paid before.

Of course I shall have a perfectly horrid time. Not only shall I be wincing under the degrading knowledge that I'm a base pretender, but I shall be wretchedly homesick and bored within an inch of my life. I shall be, in the sort of environment Ellaline describes, like a mouse in a vacuum--a poor, frisky, happy, out-of-doors field-mouse, caught for an experiment. When the experiment is finished I shall crawl away, a decrepit wreck. But, thank heaven, I can crawl to You, and you will nurse me back to life. We'll talk everything over, for hours on end, and I'll be able to abuse the Dragon to my heart's content. I know you'll let me do that, provided I don't use naughty words, or, if any, disguise them daintily in a whisper.

Ellaline and I have discussed plans and possibilities, and if all goes as she expects (I don't see why it shouldn't), I ought to be freed from the unpleasant rôle of understudy in five or six weeks. The instant my chains are broken by a telegram from the bride saying, "Safely married," or words to that effect, I shall do "all my possible" to fold, my tent like an Arab and silently steal--not to say sneak--away from the lair of the Dragon, without his opening a scaly red eye to the dreadful reality, until I'm beyond his power.

It must be either that or the most awful scene with him--a Regular Row. He, saying what he thinks of my deception; me, defending myself and the real Ellaline by saying what I think of his general beastliness. If it came to that, I might in my rage wax unladylike; so perhaps, of the two evils, the lesser would be the sneak act--_n'est ce pas_? Well, I shall see when the time comes.

In five or six weeks I had thought, in any case, of allowing you to leave Champel-les-Bains, should you grow too restive lacking my society. I thought of proposing by then, if you were sufficiently braced by Swiss air, milk, and honey and Champel douches, that we should join forces at a cheap but alluring farmhouse somewhere.

That idea may still fit in rather well, mayn't it? But if, for any unforeseen reason, I should have to stay sizzling on the sacrificial altar longer than we expect, you mustn't come home to hot Paris to economize and mope in the flat. You _must_ stop in Switzerland till I can meet you in some nice place in the country. Promise that you won't add to my burdens by being refractory.

I'll wire you an address as soon as I am blessed--or cursed--with one. And _whatever_ you do, don't forget that I'm merged in Ellaline Lethbridge. If her identity fits me as badly as her dresses would do it will come about down to my knees and won't meet round the waist.

As soon as I have your letter to-morrow morning, dearest, I'll write again, if only a few lines. Then, when I've seen the Dragon and have gained a vague idea how and where he means to dispose of his prey, I'll scribble off some sort of description of the man and the meeting, even if it's on board the Channel boat, in the midst of a tossing.

Your

Iphegenia.

(Or would Jephtha's daughter be more appropriate? I'm not quite sure how to spell either.)

III

AUDRIE BRENDON TO HER MOTHER

_Rue Chapeau de Marie Antoinette_, _July 6th. Early Morning_

Dearest Dame Wisdom: You ought to be Adviser-in-Chief to Crowned Heads. You'd be invaluable; worth any salary. What a shame you aren't widely known: a sort of public possession! But for my sake I'm glad you aren't, because if you were discovered you'd never have a spare minute to advise me.

Of course, dear, if you hadn't reached your conclusions just as you did about this step you wouldn't have counselled, or even allowed, me to take it. And I will remember every word you say. I'll do exactly as you tell me to do. So now, don't worry, any more than you would if I were an experienced and accomplished young parachutist about to make a descent from the top of the Eiffel tower.

It's eight o'clock, and I've satisfied my soul with your letter and my body with its morning roll and coffee. When I've finished scribbling this in pencil to you, I shall pack, and be ready--_for anything_.

By the way, that reminds me. What a tangled web we weave when first we practise to deceive, etc.

Won't the Dragon think it queer that his rich ward should make no better toilettes than I shall be able to produce--after living at Versailles, practically in Paris, with a huge amount of spending money--for a schoolgirl?

I thought of that difficulty only last night for the first time, after I was in bed, and was tempted to jump up and review my wardrobe. But it was unnecessary. Not only could I call to mind in the most lively way every dress I have, but, I do believe, every dress I ever did have since my frocks were let down or done over from yours. I suppose that ought to make me feel rather young, oughtn't it? To remember every dress I ever owned? But it doesn't. I'll be twenty-one this month, you know--a year older than you were when your ears were gladdened by my first howl. I'm sure it was unearthly, yet that you said at once to Dad: "The dear child is going to be musical!"

But to return to the wardrobe of the heiress's understudy. It consists of my every-day tailor-made, two white linen coats and skirts, a darned collection (I don't mean that profanely) of summer blouses, and the everlasting, the immortal, black evening dress. Is it three or four years old? I know it was my first black, and I did feel so proud and grown-up when you said I might have it.

You'll be asking yourself: "Where is the blue alpaca she bought in the Bon Marché sale, which was in the act of being made when I left for _la Suisse_?" Up to now I've concealed from you the tragical fact that that horrid little Mademoiselle Voisin completely spoiled it. I was so furious I could have killed her if she'd been on the spot. There is no rage like the dress rage, is there?

My one hope is that the Dragon may take as little interest in Ellaline's clothes as he has taken in Ellaline's self, or that, being used to the costumes of the Bengalese, which, perhaps, are somewhat sketchy, he may be thankful that his ward has any at all.

You see, I can't tell Ellaline about this, because she couldn't help thinking it a hint for her to supply the deficiency, and I wouldn't let her do that, even for her own credit. Anyhow, there'd be no time to get things, so I must just do the best I can, and carry off the old gray serge and sailor hat with a stately air. Heaven gave me five foot seven and a half on purpose to do it with.

Now I must pack like heat-lightning; and when I've finished I shall send the brown box and the black Gladstone to the Gare de Lyon, where _he_ will arrive from Marseilles. That is rather complicated, as of course we must go to the Gare du Nord for Calais or Boulogne; but he mayn't wish to start at once for England, and in my new character, as his ward, I must be prepared to obey his orders. I hope he won't treat me as he seems to have treated the Bengalese! The luggage of Miss Ellaline Lethbridge obviously can't be called for at the flat of Mrs. Brendon and her daughter Audrie, for there would be questions--and no proper answers. Therefore, when I present myself at the Gare de Lyon, I intend to be "self-contained." All my worldly goods will be there, to be disposed of as the Grand Mogul pleases.

When I've packed I shall hie me to Madame de Maluet's, looking as good and meek as a trained dove, to take charge of Ellaline--and to change into Ellaline.

After that--the Deluge.

Good-bye, darling!

Me, to the Lions!

But I shall have your talisman-letter in my pocket, I can't be eaten, though I do feel rather like

Your

Martyr Child

IV

AUDRIE BRENDON TO HER MOTHER

_On Board the Boat, half-Channel over_, _July 6th. Night_

Mother Dear: The dragon-ness doesn't show at all on the outside.

I expected to meet a creature of almost heraldic grimness--rampant, disregardant, gules. What I did meet--but I'm afraid that isn't the right way to begin. Please consider that I haven't begun. I'll go back to the time when Ellaline and her chaperon (me) started away from school together in a discreet and very hot cab with her trunks.

She was jumpy and on edge with excitement, and got on my nerves so that it was the greatest relief when I'd seen her off in her train for St. Cloud. Just at this point I find another break in my narrative, made by a silly, not at all interesting, adventure.

I'd been waving my hand for the twenty-fifth time to Ellaline, in response to the same number of waves from her. When at last she drew in her head, as the train steamed away, I turned round in a hurry lest she should pop it out again, and bumped into a man, or what will be a man in a few years if it lives. I said, "_Pardon, monsieur_," as gravely as if it were a man already, and it said in French made in England that 'twas entirely its fault. It was such a young youth, and looked so utterly English, that I smiled a motherly smile, and breathed, "Not at all," as I passed on, fondly thinking to pass forever out of its life at the same time. But, dearest, the absurd little thing didn't recognize the smile as motherly. Perhaps it never had a mother. I had hardly observed it as an individual, I assure you, except as one's sub-conscious self takes notes without permission from headquarters. I was vaguely aware that the creature with whom I had collided was quite nice-looking, though bullet-headed, freckled, light-blue-eyed, crop-haired, and possessing the shadow of a coming event in the shape (I can't call it more) of a moustache. I had also an impression of a Panama hat, which came off in compliment to me, a gray flannel suit, the latest kind of collar (you know "Sissy Williams says, 'the feeling is for low ones this year'!") and mustard-coloured boots. All that sounds hideous, I know, yet it wasn't. At first sight it was rather attractive, but it lost its attractiveness in a flash when it mistook the nature of my smile.

You wouldn't believe that a nice, clean little British face could change so much for the worse in about the eighth part of a second! It couldn't have taken longer, or I shouldn't have seen, because it happened between my smile and my walking on. But I did see. A disagreeable kind of lighting up in the eyes, which instantly made them look full of--consciousness of sex, is the only way I can express it. And instead of being inoffensive, boyish, blue beads, they were suddenly transformed into the sharp, whitey-gray sort that the Neapolitans "make horns" at.

Well, all that was nothing to fuss about, for even _I_ know that misguided youths from Surbiton or Pawtucket, who are quite harmless at home, think they owe it to themselves to be gay dogs when they run over to Paris, otherwise they'll not get their money's worth. If it hadn't been for what came afterward I wouldn't be wasting paper and ink on a silly young bounder. As it is, I'll just tell you what happened and see if you think I was to blame, or whether there's likely to be any bother.

At that change my look slid off the self-conceited face, like rain off a particularly slippery duck's back. He ought to have known then, if he hadn't before, that I considered him a mere It, but I can just imagine his saying to himself: "This is Paris, and I've paid five pounds for a return ticket. Must have something to tell the chaps. What's a girl doing out alone?"

He came after me and said I'd dropped something. So I had. It was a rose. I was going to disclaim it, with all the haughty grace of a broomstick, when suddenly I remembered that it was my _carte d'identité_, so to speak. The Dragon had prescribed it in his last letter to Madame de Maluet about meeting Ellaline. As there might be difficulty in recognition if she came to the station with a chaperon as strange to him as herself, it would be well, he suggested, that each pinned a red rose on her dress. Then he would look out for two ladies with two roses.

I couldn't make myself into two ladies with two roses, but I must be one lady with one rose, otherwise the Dragon and I might miss each other, and he would go out to Versailles to see what the dickens was the matter. Then the fat would be in the fire, with a vengeance!

You see, I had to say "Yes" to the rose, because there wasn't time to call at a florist's and try to buy another red label before going on to the Gare de Lyon. I put out my hand with a "thank you" that sounded as if it needed oiling, but, as if on second thought the silly idiot asked if he might keep the flower for himself. "It looks like an English rose," said he, with a glance which transferred the compliment to me.

"Certainly not--sir," said I. "I need it myself."

"If that's all, you might let me give you a whole bunch to make up for it," said he.

Then I said, "Go away," which mayn't have been elegant, but was to the point. And I walked on with long steps toward the place where there were cabs. But quite a short man is as tall as a tall girl, and his steps were as long as mine.

"I say," said he, "you needn't be so cross. What's the harm, as long as we're both English, and this is Paris?"

"I'm not English," I snapped. "If you don't go away I'll call a gendarme."

"You will look a fool if you do. A great tall girl like you," said he, trying to be funny. And it did sound funny. I suppose I must have been pretty nervous, after all I'd gone through with Ellaline, for I almost giggled, but I didn't, quite. On the contrary, I marched on like a war-cloud about to burst, and proved my non-British origin by addressing a cabman in the Parisian French I've inherited from you. I hoped that the boy couldn't understand, but he did.

"Mademoiselle, I have to go to the Gare de Lyon, too," he announced, "and it would be a very friendly act, and show that you forgive me, if you'd let me take you there in a taxi-motor, which you'll find much nicer than that old Noah's ark you're engaging."

"I don't forgive you," I said, as I mounted into the alleged ark. "Your only excuse is that you're not grown up yet."

With that Parthian shot I ordered my _cocher_, who was furtively grinning by this time, to drive on as quickly as possible.

Of course the horrid child from Surbiton or somewhere didn't have to go to the Gare de Lyon; but evidently he regarded me as his last hope of an adventure before returning to his native heath or duckpond; so, naturally, he followed in a taxi-motor, whose turbulent, goodness-knows-what-horse-power had to be subdued to one-half-horse gait. I didn't look behind, but I felt in my bones--my funny bones--that he was there. And when I arrived at the Gare de Lyon so did he.

The train I'd come to meet was a P. and O. Special, or whatever you call it, and it wasn't in yet, so I had to wait.

"Cats may look at kings," said my gay cavalier.

"Cads mayn't though," said I. Perhaps I ought to have maintained a dignified silence, but that _mot_ was irresistible.

"You _are_ hard on a chap," said he. "I tell you what. I've been thinking a lot about you, mademoiselle, and I believe you're up to some little game of your own. When the cat's away the mice will play. You've got rid of your friend, and you're out for a lark on your own. What?"

Oh, wouldn't I have loved to box his ears! But this time I was dignified and turned my back on him. Luckily, the train came puffing into the station, and he ceased to bother me actively, for the time; but the worst is to follow.

Now I think I've got to the part of my story where the Dragon ought to appear.

Suddenly, as the train stopped, that platform of a Paris railway station was turned into a thoroughly English scene. A wave from Great Britain swept over it, a tall and tweedy wave, bearing with it golf clubs and kitbags and every kind of English flotsam and jetsam. All the passengers had lately landed from the foreignest of foreign parts, coral strands, and that sort of remote thing, but they looked as incorruptibly, triumphantly British, every man, woman, and child of them (except a fringe of black or brown servants), as if they had strolled over from across Channel for a Saturday to Monday in "gay Paree." One can't help admiring as well as wondering at that sort of ineradicable, persistent Britishness, can one? I believe it's partly the secret of Great Britain's success in colonizing. Her people are so calmly sure of their superiority over all other races that the other races end by believing it, and trying to imitate their ways, instead of fighting to maintain the right to their own.

That feeling came over me as I, a mere French and American chit, stood aside to let the wave flow on. Everyone looked so important, and unaware of the existence of foreigners, except porters, that I was afraid my particular drop of the wave might sail by on the crest, without noticing me or my red rose. I tried to make myself little, and the rose big, as if it were in the foreground and I in the perspective, but the procession moved on and nobody who could possibly have been the Dragon wasted a glance on me.

Toward the tail end, however, I spied two men coming, followed by a small bronze figure in "native" dress of some sort. One of the two was tall and tanned, and thirty-five or so. The other--I had a bet with myself that he was my Dragon. But it was like "betting on a certainty," which is one of the few things that's dull and dishonest at the same time. Some men are born dragons, while others only achieve dragonhood, or have it thrust upon them by the gout. This one was born a dragon, and exactly what I'd imagined him, or even worse, and I was glad that I could conscientiously hate him in peace.

The other man had the walk so many Englishmen have, as if he were tracking lions across a desert. I quite admire that gait, for it looks brave and un-self-conscious; but the old thing labelled "Dragon" marched along as if trampling on prostrate Bengalese. A red-hot Tory, of course--that went without saying--of the type that thinks Radicals deserve hanging. In his eyes that stony glare which English people have when they're afraid someone may be wanting to know them; chicken-claws under his chin, like you see in the necks of elderly bull dogs; a snobbish nose; a bad-tempered mouth; age anywhere between sixty and a hundred. Altogether one of those men who must write to the _Times_ or go mad. Dost like the picture?

Both these men, who were walking together, looked at me rather hard; and I attributed the Dragon's failure to stop at the Sign of the Rose to the silly vanity which forbade his wearing "specs" like a sensible old gentleman. Accordingly, with laudable presence of mind, I did what seemed the only thing to do.

I stepped forward, and addressed him with the modest firmness Madame de Maluet's pupils are taught in "deportment lessons." "I beg your pardon, but aren't you Sir Lionel Pendragon?"

"I am Lionel Pendragon," said the other man--the quite young man.

Mother, you could have knocked me down with the shadow of a moth-eaten feather!

They both took off their travelling caps. The real Dragon's was in decent taste. The Mock Dragon's displayed an offensive chess-board check.

"Have you come to say--that Miss Lethbridge has been prevented from meeting me?" asked the real one--the R. D., I'll call him for the moment.

"I am----" It stuck in my throat and wouldn't go up or down, so I compromised--which was weak of me, as I always think on principle you'd better lie all in all or not at all. "I suppose you don't recognize me?" I mumbled fluffily.

"What--it's not possible that you're Ellaline Lethbridge!" the R. D. exclaimed, in surprise, which might mean horror of my person or a compliment.

I gasped like a fish out of water, and wriggled my neck in a silly way, which a charitable man, unaccustomed to women, might take for schoolgirl gawkishness in a spasm of acquiescence.

Instantly he put out his hand and wrung mine extremely hard. It would have crunched the real Ellaline's rings into her poor little fingers.

"You must forgive me," he said. "I saw the rose"--and he smiled a wonderfully agreeable, undragonlike smile, which put him back to thirty-two--"but I was looking out for a very different sort of--er--young lady."

"Why?" I asked, losing my presence of mind.

"I--well, really, I don't know why," said he.

"And I was looking for a very different sort of man," I retorted, feeling idiotically schoolgirlish, and sillier every minute.

He smiled again then, even more nicely than before, and followed the example I had set. "Why?" he inquired.

Unlike him, I did know why only too well. But it was difficult to explain. Still, I had to say something or make things worse. "When in doubt play a trump, or tell the truth," I quoted to myself as a precept; and said out aloud that, somehow or other, I'd thought he would be old.

"So I am old," he said, "old enough to be your father." When he added that information, he looked as if he would have liked to take it back again, and his face coloured up with a dull, painful red, as if he'd said something attached to a disagreeable memory. That was what his expression suggested to me; but as I know for a fact that he has not at all a nice, kind character, I suppose in reality what he felt was only a stupid prick of vanity at having inadvertently given his age away. I nearly blurted out the truth about mine, which would have got me into hot water at once, as Ellaline's hardly nineteen and I'm practically twenty-one--worse luck for you.

By this time the Mock Dragon had walked slowly on, but the brown image in "native" dress had glued himself to the platform near by, too respectful to be aware of my existence. While I was debating whether or no the last speech called for an answer, the R. D. had a sudden thought which gave him an excuse to change the subject.

"Where's your chaperon?" he snapped, with a flash of the eye, which was his first betrayal of the hidden devil within him.

"She was called away to visit a relative," I answered, promptly; because Ellaline and I had agreed I was to say that; and in a way it was true.

"You didn't come here alone?" said he.

"I had to," said I.

"Then it's a monstrous thing that Madame de Maluet should have let you," he growled. "I shall write and tell her so."

"Oh, don't, please don't," I begged, you can guess how anxiously. "She really _couldn't_ help it, and I shall be so sorry to distress her." He was still glaring, and desperation made me crafty. "You wouldn't refuse the first thing I've asked you?" I tried to wheedle him.

I hoped--for Ellaline's sake, of course--that I should get another smile; but instead, I got a frown.

"Now I begin to realize that you are--your mother's daughter," said he, in a queer, hard tone. "No, I won't refuse the first thing you ask me. But perhaps you'd better not consider that a precedent."

"I won't," said I. He'd been looking so pleased with me before, as if he'd found me in a prize package, or won me in a lottery when he'd expected to draw a blank; but though he gave in without a struggle to my wheedling, he now looked as if he'd discovered that I was stuffed with sawdust. My quick, "I won't," didn't seem to encourage him a bit.

"Well," he said, in a duller tone, "we'll get out of this. It was very kind of you to come and meet me. I see now I oughtn't to have asked it; but to tell the truth, the thought of going to a girls' school, and claiming you----"