Chapter 32

THE LOVE OF LORD STRATHAY.

May 5.

Lord deliver me from the well-meaning!

Because of one pestilential dun, I've done what the weary waiting for money, money, money would never have driven me to do. I've been to Uncle, unknown to his wife, to ask advice. I might have known better.

It was with a wildly beating pulse that I entered the familiar little private office, thinking that Ned might be on the other side of the partition--near enough, perhaps, to hear me; that he might at any moment rap upon the door and enter the room as he used to do, upon such flimsy errands! I wondered how he would look, and what he'd say if he came; but he never did come, though the talk was long enough, mercy knows; long and profitless.

It was hard, with that cold sinking at my heart, to talk to the Judge, as he sat with his keen eyes fixed upon me, leaning back in his chair, at times frowning absent-mindedly.

"I've come to tell you--I've written home for money," I began breathlessly to explain. "But they don't understand, of course--it isn't half what I need, now. I really don't quite know what to do. And so I came to--"

My words died away into unintelligibility.

"Anticipated your allowance a little? Well, well, how much do you need?" he asked indulgently.

"I don't exactly know; not much," I cried eagerly, "I haven't asked Father to send it all at once. Two or three thousand dollars would be a great help--for the present."

"Two or three thousand! Is it little Nelly Winship who is talking about thousands? And what important scheme has she in mind?"

His tone was playful.

"To pay my bills.'"

"Bills aggregating thousands?" He dropped his paper cutter sharply. "Is it possible that in so short a time--if the recital be not too painful, pray explain."

"Oh, it's simple enough; the dressmaker would say: 'Do let me make you this, it's such a pleasure to fit you;' or, 'That would be the rage, if you'd introduce it.' And Mrs. Van Dam begged me to buy a hat from a protegee just starting in business, because it would be a help to have the beautiful Miss Winship for a customer. It did help the milliner, too, for I bought three and they were printed in the papers. But she wants her pay just as if it hadn't been worth the price twice over as an advertisement. And all the things for the flat--"

"Furniture?"

"Why, yes; we've rearranged the place and I've contributed a little. Uncle Timothy, you can see--I need more money than other women. I can't walk without attracting notice, and cab hire or a carriage by the month--and--and I can't shop for myself, you don't know what a difference that makes; and--oh, everything is different! Why, I've just had my portrait painted. But Father isn't a poor man." "He is poor, measured by New York standards. And he is sending you a great deal of money."

"Yes, but--I must have a _lot_ more."

The Judge frowned slowly, considering what he had heard. Finally he said, slowly shaking his head:--

"Doubtless we should have warned you, upon your coming to New York, but I did not anticipate that one of your substantial Western stock would develop habits of extravagance; nor were they apparent while you were with us. I cannot think it was altogether our fault, and certainly it was not your father's. I am not unmindful of the recent unsettling experiences which furnish excuse for confusion of ideas; but, Nelly, I appeal to a head that should be logical, even if--I have never thought it giddy with adulation--to see the facts as they exist. You must yield to your aunt's wish and return to her or to Marcia--"

"Impossible!"

"--you must bring me your bills; doubtless we can give up the furniture--"

"Give it up!"

The coolly spoken words struck to my heart. Why, we had just finished arranging it! But he misunderstood my exclamation, and added:--

"I comprehend your reluctance, and I confess that I should little like to advise returning goods bought in good faith, if there were any chance of payment; but--let me see; are you of age?"

"Why, yes; just twenty-one."

"Is it possible? How time passes, to be sure! Yet--ah, the point is not important; the tradespeople should not have trusted you. Consider that you are unable to pay; the less of two evils is to return the goods as soon as possible, that they may be received undamaged."

"Oh, it's not so bad as that?" I said hastily. "Nearly everybody is willing to wait, and I--you know Aunt Frank doesn't want me, and I should be a--white elephant to Miss Baker. I must live somewhere. It's not my fault if my only friends are rich, and if I--but why can't Father--"

"I do not believe your father can pay your debts," he interrupted, "in addition to the generous sums he has already forwarded, unless--surely you were not suggesting that he should mortgage the farm in order to--pay for paintings?"

"I didn't mean that at all!" I cried; "I never thought of that. But how _do_ people--"

"You and I must do what is to be done, if possible without distressing him," he said; "your father is not so young as he once was. If you have bought things for which your allowance will not pay, although"--he hesitated a moment, "--the situation is--ah--trying to Mrs. Whitney. I suppose her half of the common stock is secure?"

"Her half!"

"Has she been leaning upon your slender purse?" he asked not unkindly.

"Why--she saves money by me and I increase her social importance. Of course she had furniture, but it was old and--and--"

I could not find the words to explain to a man my horror of ugliness. He wouldn't have understood.

"Well, well, it makes no difference now. I must arrange matters for you, and I think you will agree, upon reflection, that the first step must be to give up whatever we can."

"But, Uncle--" I tried to speak calmly, to show him the situation--"Mrs. Whitney is a Van Dam, and they befriended me when--why, they would never forgive me; it would be ruin. And even from the practical standpoint--you wouldn't like to have your lawbooks sold, would you? Well, people have introduced me--and pretty furniture and pretty clothes and not to have any scandal or any talk--oh, you can see!"

"In the light of reports that reach me," said the Judge, "I might suppose that you"--he hesitated a moment, then continued, in an attempt at a bantering manner, "that you refer to your luxuries as preliminary to--ah--matrimony, which is said to be the only gainful occupation that my sex leaves almost exclusively to yours, and in which fine clothing is undoubtedly an adjuvant. But observation leads me to think that it is a business less profitable than is often imagined. Hm!"

He drummed on the table, and when he continued, he seemed talking to gain time, considering what he wished to say.

"I grant you," he said with his cumbrous playfulness, "that the sensibility of flesh and blood to beauty is as broad a fact as the effect of heat or cold. It is so universally recognised that we take a pretty girl, like original sin or the curse of labour, as a _chose jugeé_. Her sway must have begun with the glacial drifters and the kitchen middeners and the Engis skull man, when they and the rest of the paleoliths were battling with the dodo and the dinornis and the didifornis, and had no time for the cult of beauty except by proxy. Did it ever occur to you that we men drove a hard bargain with your sex when we compelled you to beauty, made you carry the topknots and the tail-feathers? Men propose marriage, women adorn themselves to listen. Let women choose their mates, and they might go as plain as peahens; and men would strut about, displaying wattles, combs and argus-eyed plumes."

"Women would be less beautiful if they proposed?"

"Some could not be, I fear." He pulled down his brows, considering the proposition, then shook his head positively, with a little sigh. "You will remember--was it not Darwin who said that women, in order to attract men, borrow the plumage of male birds, which these have acquired to please the females of their kind? Beauty must be the first law of life to the sex that has not the privilege of choosing. Under the circumstances, it is surprising how much of plainness women have preserved. Possibly because of the extraordinary directions which beauty culture may take. Burton asserts that the Somali choose wives by ranging the women in line for inspection; she wins a husband of note who projects farthest _a tergo_. Yet among famous Greek statues there is also a steatopygous Venus."

The office boy came to the door, and his knock woke Uncle out of his revery. He excused himself to his caller, and, returning to me, went on:--

"I have been--ah--I admit, rather evading the personal question. I wish, without seeking embarrassing confidences, to remind you that young people are apt to think bad matters--other than business matters--worse than they are. I am not asking questions, but, when I was younger, cynicism usually hid but ill the scars of heartache. Do not, I pray you, throw yourself away in the gloom of momentary unhappiness."

Did he guess--about Ned? That I was the one most hurt there? He should never know that I winced. I shrugged my shoulders, ignoring his fatherly glance, and faced him with a stare meant to be brazen.

"You do not at the present time believe in sentiment?" he said. "Then I shall adapt my argument to your whim of practicality, and speak of the rumours which connect your name with that of young Lord Strathay."

"Oh; that boy!"

"I presume you are right; he does seem to have fallen deeply in love with you. But--if indeed, you are dazzled by the glamour of a title--do not be too confident of his fealty. I know men better than you know them, my dear. Man loves beauty, but he does not always want to marry it. The rare white swan is admired, but the little brown partridge, clucking as she marshals her covey of chicks, is the type of the marrying woman. Again, no man is master of himself. That Strathay wishes to marry you, I can understand; but, perhaps, when he is not under the spell of your presence, he falls to wondering how you will pronounce the social shibboleths, and may let 'I dare not' wait upon 'I would.' It is idle to deny that, admitting as one must the existence of lines of social cleavage in modern life, it is often a mistake to overstep their boundaries in matrimony; though as to international alliances--"

"Oh," I said, interrupting his prosings with a light laugh, "you mustn't take the matter _au sérieux_."

"I take it so because it is serious." The Judge's eyes and his tone were very grave. "Forgive me if I remind you that these _obiter dicta_ have grown out of a discussion of your money affairs, wherein you are bankrupt. If--and I ask your pardon if the supposition does you wrong--if you are relying on a brilliant marriage to help you out of financial difficulties--"

He hesitated a moment, then went on slowly: "Perhaps I ought to warn you that, if at any time this does become a serious matter, you will have powerful opposition. I had not intended to tell you--though now I deem it best--that Mr. Stephen Allardyce Poultney has lately done me the honour to call; and--"

"Lord Strathay's cousin?" I thought he could hear the thrumming of my heart. This was why he had beaten so long about the bush! "Was he--was he speaking about me?"

I felt a sudden chill of apprehension, and almost feared to hear the answer.

"He was; he came to the point with a refreshing directness worthy of a business man, and said that he wanted to know all about you."

"And you--"

"I need not trouble you with our conversation. In view of the attentions which his Lordship has been paying you, his cousin felt it a duty, he intimated, to make inquiries. He did not care a button, I inferred, for your position here, as it could not affect Lord Strathay's in England; but he had read the newspapers with pardonable perplexity, and asked if you were really the only daughter of a bonanza farmer. I did not feel it necessary to enter into particulars, but informed him that your father was rich in honesty and in the possession of a daughter good and beautiful enough for any Lord that lives. He thanked me and said 'quite so,' as Englishmen usually do say when they disagree with one. He added that he would try to get the poor beggar--for so he referred to his kinsman--away fishing.

"You will note that, in the higher social strata, the choice of matrimonial partners has progressed beyond the personal selection so confidently assumed by the scientists, and has become a matter for relatives to--"

"And my only relative in New York," I said slowly, wondering how fatal was this unexpected news, "has made it impossible for me to achieve a success that was almost within my grasp."

I don't see that the remark was so very terrible, but he looked at me with an odd air of astonishment and consternation. Then he seemed to consider it best to treat my natural disappointment as a joke.

"Not very serious is this conversation, as you have reminded me," he said. "You don't wish me to tell that which is not?"

"Why, naturally--no." I was stunned, but I forced a laugh. "But it _is_ funny. Why--I was nearer landing the prize than I supposed, wasn't I?--that is, if I had wanted to land it?"

"Um--yes; it was rather close. But in this world you'll find strong men often dissuading weak ones from action briefly meditated."

He gazed at me solemnly, portentously, critically.

"Yes," I said, trying to speak with careless ease; "one Lord gone, but there are others. Don't be too hard upon Strathay, though. He's not so bad. His estates are not heavily encumbered, and he's as likely now to wed a music hall singer as a daughter of the Beerage. Perhaps such a marriage as he might have offered is not the best in life, but it is something that women who love their daughters as well as you love yours are glad to arrange for them. I should have made Strathay a very decent wife--"

But at the word I stopped; something in the sound of it shattered my cool philosophy.

"Of course, of course," Uncle assented. Then after a pause he went on, hesitatingly:--

"Nelly, these are not matters for a man to discuss with you. Why don't you run in and talk with your aunt?"

I hadn't the least intention of calling, but I answered him according to his folly.

"I must, some time; but I'm so worried--"

"Ah, yes; those debts. Could you not, if you are determined not to come home to us, seek less expensive apartments? You know that for any wants in reason your aunt and I--"

"I--I can't, just yet," I faltered, with a dreary vision before my eyes of such a boarding house as that from which Kitty rescued me.

"Very well, Nelly, but think about it; you will see that to go on as you are doing would be only throwing money into a bottomless pit. But bring me your bills to-morrow; I must have facts and figures, if we are to straighten your affairs. Now--you need money--"

He was fumbling for his check book. Badly as I needed help, instinctively I cried:--

"Oh, no; not that!"

"Quite sure? It is the situation that troubles you and not the butcher, the baker--"

"Quite sure."

"I desist. But sleep on what I have said. Remember that I am in your father's place, that I--your aunt and I--are very anxious about you."

He took my hand, seeming as perplexed as I am myself. He looked affectionate enough, but so futile.

So I came away heartsick. It's useless to argue with Judge Baker. He's a plebeian from his thick shoe soles to his thin hair; but he's honest. And yet--if he had been less ponderously precise--he might have said: "Why, really, I don't exactly know. Mr. Winship is a well-to-do man. It has been years since I knew, but I can ascertain and--"

Or he might just have told the plain truth--that Father has a large Western farm. Englishmen think all Western folks are rich. Why, I believe Meg Van Dam would dower me if I were to marry Strathay. I could make it worth her while. It wouldn't be the first arrangement of that sort in New York, either.

If only Strathay had seen me once more, no power on earth could have prevented an avowal; and marriage with a peer of England would have given me a station befitting my beauty.

But perhaps it's not too late. Strathay may not heed his cousin. If he comes wooing again, I shall not be so silly as I was the last time. Strange that I have not seen him. Can he have gone already?

I might do the London season by borrowing from Meg. It would cost a fortune, and--unless Strathay does propose--perhaps even she wouldn't care to finance me now.

I wish---

Oh, I wish I could get out of my dreams the ghastly form of Darmstetter, as I saw him dead at my feet! He haunts me all day long, and all the night I dream of him!

And I wish I had not broken John Burke's honest heart--how wistful he looked, as he waited for me at the door of the office and helped me to my carriage! Perhaps Ned wasn't in the building; perhaps--he may have avoided me.

I wish I had not brought him sorrow, and I wish--

No, I don't! I just hope Milly is even more wretched than I am!

Father really might mortgage. I could easily pay it back. I wonder I never thought of that. I'll ask him. I will not take my bills to Judge Baker--to be lectured on the dodo and on lines of social cleavage--as if any man could be a match for me.

I'll never go back to Aunt Frank! There is Bellmer, now--and Strathay must soon return to New York, to sail.