Part 14

For a moment it flashed through Madge's brain what was coming. Considering what her mind was full of, it was not surprising. And it came.

"I want to ask a favour of you, dear," he said. "I call it a favour because it is a real favour--it implies your doing something that I know you don't want to do. It also will make somebody cease to think you a brute, and instead of sacrificing a principle in its performance--you will satisfy one, and that a very good one, the principle of fairness."

Madge had left the sofa where they were sitting together during this, and simply in order to be doing something instead of inertly listening, poured herself out another cup of tea. So her back was turned to Philip when she replied:

"You state it as if I couldn't help saying 'Yes,'" she said, her voice trembling a little. "What is it, Philip?"

"Merely this, that you give Evelyn another sitting," he said. "I had no idea how strongly and keenly he felt about it till this afternoon. Shall I tell you about it?"

"Yes, do."

"Well won't you come and sit here again?"

She did not dare, for she felt too uncertain of herself, and as she poured the milk into her tea, her hand was no longer master of itself, and the saucer was flooded.

"Ah! what a mess," she cried. "Go on, Philip."

"He feels that you are treating him shabbily," he said. "Mind, he never said that; he never would. But it was clear to me. He believes that his portrait of you is the best piece of work he is ever likely to do, and though I may disagree with him, that says nothing against his right to his opinion, which is probably correct. Well, he wants one more sitting----"

"Did he say that this afternoon?"

"No, but he did before, and this afternoon he told me I might fetch it away if I liked, and he would offer no opposition, but that he would not send it. I can't take it like that; neither you nor I can take it if that is his feeling about it. It isn't as if I paid for it; it is a present--a most generous, splendid present. So will you be very kind, Madge, and though he bores you, just go back once? Indeed, it is only fair that you should. After all, it is only for an hour or so, and really, I don't believe he bores you much."

Though in the next moment Madge thought of so much, the pause was not long, for her thoughts flashed lightning-wise through her mind. First came the dramatic wonder that it should be Philip--Philip of all people in the huge world, who should be asking her to do this. If it had been anybody else the thing would not have been so astounding, but it was he. Then came the thought of her mother, and the promise she had given her. Even before this that promise, set in the scales with larger issues, had weighed light: now it just kicked the beam. But then, after that, and stronger than all else, came the sense of solution, of a riddle answered. How often had she puzzled over the manner in which it would turn out that the twenty-eighth should be to her a day without significance. Here was the answer, different from all her imaginings, and told her by Philip himself. And of imaginings and puzzlings she had had enough, and she did not put her brain to the task of imagining what that sitting would be like, how he would speak, what he would say. Simply, she was going to meet him again. And her voice when she answered was perfectly calm, without vibration. She felt indeed now so certain of herself that she came and sat by Philip again.

"Yes, if he feels it like that," she said, "and if you feel it like that, I will do as you wish. As you say, an hour or two doesn't matter much. I will write to him; it had better be as soon as possible--to-morrow if he has time. I have rather an empty day to-morrow."

She got up again.

"I will write now, I think," she said, "because I must eat a little, just a little, humble pie, and as I have no relish for that, I will get it done with as soon as possible. Now, what shall I say? Let me think."

Her pen travelled with remarkable ease over the paper; the humble pie, it appeared, was being consumed without much difficulty. Once only she stopped for a word, then the scream of the quill underlined her own name.

"Will this do?" she asked, and read:

Dear Mr. Dundas.--I feel that I have no right whatever, since you wish me to give you another sitting, to refuse it. This has been pointed out to me quite clearly by Philip, who is with me now, and I see that it is not fair either on you or the portrait. I wonder if to-morrow would suit you? I could come any time between three and six. If three will do, pray do not trouble to answer, and I will assume the affirmative.

Philip's habit of considering business letters led him to pause.

"Yes, that is _amende honorable_," he said at length. "It will do excellently. But if you are bored, Madge, why not take your mother with you, or I would meet you there?"

"Oh, no, he would think it so odd," she said lightly. "You see, I am accustomed to go alone. And he has told me that he hates other people in the studio while he is painting."

She directed the note and rang the bell.

"There is one thing more, Philip," she said, "and that is that I don't want my mother to know I am going. You see, I told her, too, that I was not going to sit again, and if one goes back on one's word, well, the fewer people who know about it the better. Everyone hates a changeable person who doesn't know her own mind."

Philip willingly gave his assurance on this point, for though it seemed to him rather a superfluous refinement, he was, on the whole, so pleased to have met with no opposition that he was delighted to leave the matter settled without more discussion. Then, since it was already time for him to go home and dress for the early dinner before the theatre, he got up.

"Ah! Madge," he said, lingering a moment. "You don't know, and you can't guess, how divinely happy you make me. In the big things I knew it was so, but in little things it is so also. You are complete all through."

This struck her like a blow. She could scarcely look at him, it was even harder to return his caress.

"Oh, don't think too well of me," she said, "and--and go now, or you will be late."

Then, after he had gone, Madge felt tired as she had never felt tired before. The fact that the tension was over showed her what the tension had been; she had struggled, and while she struggled the need for effort had postponed the effect of weariness which the effort produced. She could go on living her ordinary life, and had not this occurred she could still have gone on, but it was only now, when the need for going on was over, that she knew how utterly weary she was. Yet with the weariness there was given her a draught of wine; it would no longer be "to-morrow and to-morrow and to-morrow," but to-morrow only. She knew as surely as she knew how tired she was, that to-morrow would see her with him, and the rest she was content to leave; no imagination or picturing of hers was necessary. It would be as it would be.

After Philip had left her, there was still half an hour before she need go to dress, but the thought that her solitude might be disturbed here by anyone who called, or by her mother, who would be returning any minute, caused her to go upstairs to her own room, where, till the advent of her maid at dressing-time, she would be alone.

Thus it was scarcely a minute after her lover had gone that she went upstairs. As she mounted the steps to the storey above, she heard the front-door bell ring, congratulated herself on having just escaped, and went more softly, and closed the door of her bedroom very gently behind her.

The ring at the bell which she had heard was her mother returning. The footman who had taken Madge's note, who had also just let Philip out, let her in, having laid down the note in question on the hall table, meaning to put a stamp on it, and drop it into the letter-box. Madge's handwriting was unmistakable; it was brilliantly legible, too, and the address leaped from the envelope.

Now, Lady Ellington, as both her friends and her possible enemies would have at once admitted, was a very thorough woman. She did not, in fact, when she desired or designed anything, neglect any opportunity of furthering that desire or design, or on the other hand, neglect to remove any obstacle which might possibly stand in the way of its realisation. She had excellent eyes, too--eyes not only of good sight, but very quick to observe. Yet even a short-sighted person might easily have involuntarily read the address, so extremely legible was it. And Lady Ellington, with her excellent sight, read it almost before she knew she had read it. The footman in question had meantime just gone out to deliver her order to the chauffeur for the motor this evening, and before he had got back again into the hall, Lady Ellington was half-way upstairs with the note in her hand.

William--the footman--had a week before received a month's warning on the general grounds of carelessness and inattention. Whether justified or not before they were justified now, for on re-entering he thought no more at all about the note he had to post, but stared at himself in a looking-glass, and hoped the next butler might be more agreeable to a sensitive young fellow, than the one he at present served under. He was a student of the drama, and smiled to himself in the glass, detecting in that image a likeness to Mr. George Alexander. So he smiled again. And as befits so vacant-minded a young man, he vanishes from this tale after a short and inglorious career. His career he himself regarded in a different fashion.

Lady Ellington went into the drawing-room on her way upstairs. Philip, she knew, since she had passed him fifty yards from the house had gone, and Madge, so it appeared, had gone too. But the tea was still there. For herself, she had already had tea, but she took the trouble to rinse out a cup, pour a little boiling water into it, and proceeded to lay the note face upwards over it. Thorough in every way, she took the precaution of sitting close to the table, ready at any moment to snatch the note away and be discovered sipping hot water--a practice to which she was known to be addicted, and to which she attributed much of her superlative health and freedom from all digestive trouble. How well founded that belief was may be judged from the fact that she digested without qualms of any kind what she was doing now. The good purpose that lurked behind assimilated apparently any meanness. In fact, the good purpose was of the nature of the strongest acid; the meanness ceased to exist--it was absorbed, utterly eaten away.

She was in no hurry, for there was still plenty of time before she need dress, and she waited till the flap of the envelope began to curl back of its own accord as the gum that fastened it was made fluid again by the steam. This happened very soon, because it was not yet really dry. Then, taking precaution against the sheet inside being touched by it, she drew it out and read. The clear, neat handwriting--she had taken great pains with Madge's early tuition in this art--was as intelligible as print, and she only needed to read it through twice before she placed it back again in its envelope, pressed the flap back, and left it to cool and dry. Yet during this very short process her own ideas were also cool and dry, and the reasoning sound and effective. So she put a stamp on the envelope, and went downstairs herself, and dropped it into the letter-box.

That was necessary, since in her note Madge had stated that she would be at the studio at three unless she heard to the contrary. Therefore there was no object to be gained in merely sequestrating the note, since Madge proposed to go there unless stopped. For Lady Ellington knew well that no plan, however well-founded, could be quite certain of success; uncertainty, the possibly adverse action of Fate might work against it, and thus to let this note go--of which she had mastered the contents--was to provoke an accident the less, since, on her present scheme, she had not stopped it. For the fewer dubious things one does on the whole, the less is the risk. It is the unfortunate accident of guilt which in nine cases out of ten hangs a man. So though she had been guilty--in a way--when she wrote to Evelyn, implying Madge's acquiescence in her letter, she had the more excellent reason now, especially since she had completely mastered the contents of this note, in not taking the more questionable step of stopping it. For she knew for certain, and at the moment did not require to know more, the immediate movements of the enemy; if Madge heard nothing, she would go to the studio to-morrow at three. But no one under any circumstances could prevent her mother making her appearance there too.

Again, it is true, some sort of reply might come. But the fact of a reply coming was equivalent to Evelyn's saying that he could not be there at three to-morrow, which rightly she put down as being a negligible contingency. And in this case again, if Lady Ellington could not keep watch over Madge's movements during the next ten days she felt she would be really ashamed of herself. And as she had never been that yet, she saw no reason why she should begin now. She was probably right--the chances were immensely at this moment in favour of her not beginning to be ashamed of herself. For the beginnings of shame are searchings of the heart; Lady Ellington never searched her heart, she only did her best.

The evening passed in perfect harmony; and though she had a good deal to think about, she could yet spare time to be characteristically critical about the play. That was easy, since it was a very bad one, and the deeper consolations of her brain were devoted all the time to certain contingencies. This note had been posted by half-past seven; it would be received that night. Supposing there was a reply to it, it was almost certain that the answer would come at the second morning post, the one that rapped towards the end of breakfast time. If so, and if that reply was received by Madge, she had merely, in the most natural manner possible, to suggest complete occupations for the day, challenging and inquiring into any other engagement. But she did not seriously expect this--no reply was the almost certain rejoinder. In this case, Lady Ellington would be quite unoccupied after lunch.

The ramifications went further. Madge had consented to give Mr. Dundas another sitting after she had declared she would not take the next step. It was better, therefore, to meet guile with guile, and not suggest a suspicion or possibility of it till the last moment. She would go out to lunch to-morrow herself, with regrets to Madge, leaving her free to spend the afternoon as she chose, without asking questions. She herself, however, would leave lunch early, and manage to be at Mr. Dundas's by three o'clock, five minutes before perhaps; it was always well to be on the safe side.

Lady Ellington's applause at the end of the second act was rather absent-minded. Her thoroughness made her examine her own position a little more closely, and there was one point about it which she did not much like, namely, the fact that she had written to Mr. Dundas from Brockenhurst, implying Madge's concurrence in what she said. It would be rather awkward if any hint of that ever reached Madge; it really would be difficult to explain. Explanation, in fact, was impossible, since there was none. But it followed from this, as a corollary, that he must not see Madge alone; the chances then were enormous of the whole thing coming out. Yet how again would she be able to explain her own presence at Evelyn's house in the King's Road at three o'clock that afternoon? It was childish to say she happened to be passing. Then a solution occurred to her--one which was extraordinarily simple, and extremely probable--Philip had told her that Madge was sitting again. So probable, indeed, was this, that she could, almost without effort, persuade herself that he had done so.

Lady Ellington was happily unconscious at this moment what an extremely tangled web she was weaving, and how impossible it was for her to disentangle it, for not having had the privilege of overhearing Madge's conversation with Philip, she had, by no fault of hers, no idea that he was pledged to secrecy. True, he had not actually mentioned, a thing which he might be expected to have done, the fact that Madge was going to sit again, but no doubt a little well-turned conversation might make him do so. Madge, at the end of the third act, was talking to a neighbour in the stalls, and she herself turned to Philip.

"A stupid act, rather," she said. "Those two laid their plans so badly."

Then, with a sudden sense of the inward humour of her words:

"It isn't enough to open people's letters," she said, "you must hear their conversations too. I should really have made an excellent villain, if I had studied villainy. I should have hidden behind the curtains, and under the tables, and listened at key holes, for the private conversations of other people, and carefully looked in such places, and hung a handkerchief over the key-hole before indulging in any of my own."

Philip laughed.

"Yes, I think you would be thorough in all you did," he said, "and certainly, whatever your line was, I should 'pick you up' first, as schoolboys say, to be on my side."

"Ah! I am certainly on your side," said she. "Now, what have you done with yourself all day? I like to hear always exactly what people have done. A few weeks of what people have done gives you the complete key to their character."

"Is that why you ask?" said he.

"No, because I know your character. I ask merely from interest in you."

"Well, I rode before breakfast," said he, "and got down to the city about half-past ten. I worked till half-past two, dull work rather--but, by-the-bye, hold on to your East Rand Mining, I think they are going better--then I ate three sandwiches and a piece of cake; then I sat to Evelyn for two hours, then I went round to see Madge, dressed, dined, and didn't think much of the play."

"And your portrait?" asked Lady Ellington. "Is it good?"

"Ah! all he does is good," said Philip. "A man like that cannot do a bad thing. But it is more than good. It's Mary Jane's top-note."

"I thought Madge was his top-note," said Lady Ellington.

"Well, I think he has gone a semitone higher," said he. "Of course I am the worst person to judge, but it seems to me that he is even more sure in this than he was in her portrait. Haven't you seen it?"

Lady Ellington was quite quick enough to catch at this.

"No, but I should so much like to," she said. "Do you think he would let me see it?"

"I'm sure he would."

Philip paused a moment.

"Send him a note, or I will," he said. "I shouldn't go to-morrow, if I were you, because I know he is busy."

"Ah! what a pity," said Lady Ellington, lowering her voice a little. "I have nothing to do to-morrow afternoon."

"I know he is busy," repeated Philip. "He told me so."

"And Madge's portrait," she said, "when shall we see that? It is quite finished, is it not?"

Suddenly the preposterous idea occurred to Philip that he was being pumped. No doubt it was only Madge's rather ridiculous request that her mother should not know that she was going to sit again that suggested it, but still it was there. On this point also he had given his promise to her, and he went warily in this time of trouble.

"I fancy he is going to work a little more at it," he said, anxious to tell the truth as far as possible. "Indeed, he told me so to-day. But he said that if I sent for it in a couple of days it would be ready for me to take."

It was quite clear, therefore--indeed, the letter that had so providentially come into her hands told her that--that Philip knew that Madge was going to sit again to-morrow. The letter anyhow had told her that she was going to sit again; Philip's suggestion that she herself should not go to see his portrait to-morrow was quite sufficiently confirmatory of the rest. He had not told her, it is true, that Madge was going to do this, but it would answer her purpose well enough. There was only one thing more to ask.

"I think Madge said she would not sit for him again," she observed.

"Yes, I know she did," said he, "because I was the bearer of that message from her. I thought it was a mistake, I remember, at the time."

It was on the tip of Lady Ellington's tongue to say, "And have told her so since," but she remembered how terribly this would fall below her usually felicitous level of scheming. So, as the curtain went up at this moment, she turned her attention to the stage. Had it not gone up, she would have diverted the talk into other channels; the raising of the curtain was not a deliverance to her.

"Let us see what these second-rate schemers make of it all," she said.

The act was played to a tragic end, and Philip helped her on with her cloak.

"No, they committed an initial fault," she said; "they didn't lay their original schemes well enough."

But though the play was a disappointment, she pondered over it all the way home.

ELEVENTH

Madge lunched alone next day, a thing that seldom happened to her and a thing that was always in a childish way rather a "treat." For in order to counteract the natural tendency of mankind to gobble over the solitary meal, or else to eat nothing at all, it was her custom to bring some book down with her, prop it up against the mustard-pot, and intend, anyhow, to read slowly and to eat slowly. These sensible results seldom happened, since, as a matter of fact, the result was that she read two pages of her book, and then took a dozen rapid mouthfuls. And to-day not even that result was attained, for she read nothing, not even opening the book she had brought down with her, and ate hardly more. For in spite of all that lay before her, the rupture with Philip, his inevitable pain and sorrow, his natural and justified indignation and contempt of her, all of which were scarcely faceable if she faced them only, in spite, too, of all that her mother would feel and no doubt say, in spite of the fear she felt in the face of that, in spite of all that the world in general would say, she was too happy to read, and too happy to eat. For the birthday of her life, she knew, had come: this afternoon, in an hour or two, she would be face to face with the man who loved her, the man she loved, and in front of that tremendous fact, the fact that swallowed up the rest of the world in a gulp, nothing else could really count for anything. Everything else was like minute type of some kind, while in the middle was just the one sentence, in huge, glowing capitals.

Everything had fallen out so conveniently, too: Lady Ellington had told her at breakfast that she was going to be out for lunch, and engaged after lunch, and she did not inquire into Madge's plans at all. She had received no reply to her note to Evelyn, and the very fact that there was none seemed to bring her into more intimate relations with him. Then after lunch she had to change to her white evening dress, over which she put a long dark cloak, her maid arranged her hair, for it was best to go complete, and she took with her, in case of need, the scarlet opera cloak. And all this preparation was so much joy to her, she felt in her very bones that it was while he was looking at her dressed thus that he first knew he loved her, and thus dressed she would come back to him to-day. Above all, the long riddle of these days was solved now; here was the answer, she was the answer.