Part 8

When she reached Albert Place neither Mrs. Lambert nor Alexandra was in. They had been detained somewhere and had telephoned through to say so. The maid showed her into the drawing room. Somewhat to her dismay she found it occupied by a man. She did not know him by sight, but she immediately came to the conclusion that he must be Lord Chalfont. She felt awkward, uncertain whether it was "proper" to speak or not. She had not encountered any men of rank before, and had not the average chorus girl's assurance with male members of the peerage.

Lord Chalfont got up.

"I fancy we're both here for the same reason: to lunch," he said pleasantly. "Shall we become known to each other? I'm Lord Chalfont."

"My name's Delamere," rejoined Maggy.

"We both owe something to the French, then. It ought to provide us with a sort of _entente cordiale_."

"Oh, I don't believe Delamere's my right name. It's too high-falutin'. But it's the only one I know of. My mother took it for the stage and it had to do for my christening."

The statement was made quite innocently. Chalfont was amused.

"I'm sure I've seen you before," he said.

His easy manner gave her confidence. She liked him. She felt she could talk to him without being on her guard. The way in which he looked at her had nothing disturbing in it. It was not the hunting look which she was accustomed to see in men's eyes, and against which she was for ever armed. If there was a touch of admiration in it there was also respect. She recognized the difference, and knew she had to do with a gentleman. Woolf had spoken of him as a bounder. There he was obviously wrong. Lord Chalfont looked the sort of person she had seen in historical pictures, dressed in silk and lace, walking unconcernedly to have his head chopped off.

"I daresay you've seen me often," she agreed. "I'm in the front row at the Pall Mall Theater--black chiffon over pink. Then I'm somebody's boot polish in the advertisements--my photograph, you know--cleaning my own shoes without dirtying my frock. And I'm somebody else's motorcoats, and nearly everybody's mouth-wash and cigarettes."

Chalfont laughed.

"By Jove! Do you know, I've always wondered who they got to sit for those advertisements. How's it arranged? Do you mind telling me?"

"Not at all. Sometimes the people--cigarettes or motorcoats, you know--write and ask you to come and pose for them at their shops; but generally it's done through a photographer. He gets paid for taking the photos, and you get a little cheque and a lot of advertisement. When it's for a mouth-wash you have to put on a broad grin and show your teeth. It's awfully tiring sometimes. For a hair-restorer you wear your hair down, and if you haven't much they fluff it out with a long switch so as to make people believe in the stuff."

"You're not tempted to use it, I suppose?"

"Rather not! I've got too much hair as it is. It won't even fall out in the autumn and spring."

"How about the cigarettes?"

"Oh, I daresay they're all right, though I don't suppose you'd want to smoke them."

"Just what I thought. Personally, I never buy anything that's advertised if I can help it. When I have it I invariably have a feeling that I'm being taken in."

"I think it's the women more than the men who are taken in," said Maggy thoughtfully. "Women believe anything they see in the papers. I used to once."

"But not now?"

She shook her head. "You get to know a lot about make-believe when you're on the stage."

"I suppose you do. How is it I've never met you here before?"

"I'm Lexie's friend. I mean Miss Hersey. Excuse my bad habit of speaking of people by their Christian names. I know it's not right. I don't, myself, like to hear women call their husbands 'Daddy' or 'Father' before strangers. It always sounds to me as if they wanted you to consider yourself one of the family."

"But you know Mrs. Lambert, don't you?"

"Hardly. I met her with Lexie in a shop the other day and she asked me to lunch. So here I am. Have I come too early?"

"On the contrary. I'm very glad you're here, relieving my solitude."

"I was afraid I was boring you. I can only talk rubbish. I can't help it. You see, I don't know anything about the things that sensible people talk about. Pictures and books and politics."

"I think you do yourself an injustice. Please don't imagine I say it out of compliment, but it's evident you are full of ideas, jolly interesting ones, too."

"Everybody has ideas of a sort, I suppose. What I mean is, I can't discuss any of the subjects that really matter. Religion, for instance. I know there are a thousand and one different ways of worshiping God, but I haven't brains enough to argue about them. I'm far more interested in a thousand different patterns for crochet, or the everyday things you see from the top of a bus. I'm just hot and cold, or happy or miserable."

"Which is it to-day?" asked Chalfont.

There was no flippancy in his tone. He saw that Maggy was an innately simple girl, quite natural, and by no means unintelligent. He found her frankness very refreshing, and he could but admire her delightful appearance. He was anything but bored.

"Which is it to-day?" he repeated.

"Warm and happy--just now. I'm not often miserable. I love my life," she said.

She meant it. The pretty room, the flowers abounding in it, the shaded windows framing masses of pink geranium, the soft ease of the big armchair she was seated in, so different from the new-art, unadaptable chairs of her own flat, had induced in her bodily comfort and mental contentment. For the moment she had forgotten the anxieties caused by her physical state. Unconsciously too she had fallen under the charm of Chalfont's amiability. She had never met a man like him. She felt she did not want to be on her guard with him. Whether he was more honest or more reasonable than other men she had known she did not stop to think about. Had she been asked for her chief impression of him she would have expressed it in the word clean.

So while she waited for Alexandra's return she let her candor have full play, keeping Chalfont amused by her cheery talk and quaintly humorous accounts of her life behind the scenes at the Pall Mall. She had brought with her a number of picture postcards of herself to give to Alexandra, for recently she had become quite a photographic favorite, and these she showed him.

"This is the one I like best," he said. "In the dress you have on now. It's charming."

"The dress, you mean. I'm so glad you like it. I was afraid it was too quiet. I'm never quite sure about my dresses and hats. My taste in clothes isn't always quiet. I love bright colors. They make me feel warm and comfy. You know how dogs like rolling in mud. I have the same feeling about colors. If I see anything very bright and gorgeous I want to hug it to me for joy. People are always staring at me in the street because of what I'm wearing."

Chalfont could quite understand that any one, in the street or elsewhere, would find pleasure in looking twice at such a beautiful creature. But he did not say so in so many words.

"You need not mind that," he said. "There's an esthetic sense in nearly everybody that makes them glad to look at anything--radiant."

"Radiant means brilliance, doesn't it? Talking of brilliance, do you like this?"

She held out her arm with the bracelet on it. Chalfont had already noticed it. Now he gave it a closer inspection. Whilst being a good judge of precious stones he had a great liking for paste when it was old and good, but what he saw now was merely a product of the modern manufacturer.

"A French copy, isn't it?" he asked, thoughtlessly.

Maggy's eyes widened. French--copy? Her diamond bracelet a copy--imitation! She could not credit it.

"But--they're diamonds!" she stammered, filled with a horrible misgiving.

Chalfont noticed the sharp note of disappointment in her voice and put it down to one of two causes. Either she had been defrauded by somebody or the bracelet was a present meant to deceive her. He made haste to modify the opinion he had expressed about it. Looking at it once more, he said:

"Is it? I'm awfully sorry. Of course, I must be mistaken. Hullo!" he interjected with relief, "here are Mrs. Lambert and Miss Hersey."

XIX

Lunch was over. Chalfont had taken his departure; Mrs. Lambert had excused herself on account of a bad headache and gone to lie down. The two girls were alone. The personal equation began to trouble Maggy again.

"I haven't seen you to talk to since you came to the flat," she said diffidently. "Were you really cross with Fred? Of course, what he said about Lord Chalfont was only what he'd heard. I could see by your face you were shocked."

"No, I wasn't exactly shocked," Alexandra answered.

"But you didn't like it. Fred didn't mean any harm. He's like me: he doesn't think what he says. I wish you liked him. You don't, do you?"

"You make me uncomfortable, Maggy. We can't all like the same people."

"But you're sorry I'm so fond of him?"

"Very sorry," said Alexandra in a low voice.

"I can't stop caring because of that. It's--it's in my system. Some girls fall in love with a man because they believe he's good or noble or brave or something they're particularly keen on; but if they find out they're mistaken they're off that man like fleas from a dead rabbit. If that sounds vulgar please forgive me, Lexie. The words just came out. It's one of Fred's expressions. What I mean is, I can't love like that, though I know I should be much more comfortable if I could. If I knew you'd stolen Mrs. Lambert's purse or gone off with a rag-picker it wouldn't make a bit of difference to me. It's you I love, not what you do. And I feel the same about Fred, only more so."

Prior to this, Mrs. Lambert had asked Alexandra a few questions about Maggy's relations with Woolf. The answers she had fitted in with certain information about the man himself previously imparted to her by Chalfont. What she deduced from the two statements made her sorry for Alexandra's friend and a little anxious about her.

"No girl is safe with a man like that," she had said to Alexandra. "If I were you I should try and persuade her to break with him."

And Alexandra meant to try. There was one weapon she might have used to shake Maggy's loyalty to Woolf: the cruelly belittling way in which he had referred to her just before her cab drove off. But she shrank from that. It was too poisonous.

"What would you say if I asked you to leave him?" she asked. "Supposing I needed you back with me?"

Maggy weighed the problem.

"I should say you jolly well knew I couldn't come," she answered. "I'm all in. If Fred was in Hell and wanted me there I believe I'd have to get to him. You don't know what it is."

"What is it?"

"It's the little things about him that have eaten into me. I'm corrupted, or corroded, whatever it is. Perhaps it's both. I love the white lock in his hair, the little pellet in his ear where he got peppered out shooting once, the scent of his tobacco, the smell of a Harris tweed suit he's got." She sniffed sensuously. "And there are other things I can't tell you about...."

"If he were to die or married some one else you would have to resign yourself to doing without him," argued Alexandra.

"Perhaps. I don't know. He's not dead or married, and I'm his. I know he could manage without me. I'm just like an ornament to him. He dusts me and puts me back on my shelf, and takes me down sometimes and has a look at me. I hope to God he'll never drop or break me!"

Alexandra was disturbed by the depth of passion in her voice.

"I know what you think about Fred," Maggy went on. "You think he's something near a cad. Well, there are lots of women who love cads and who don't know that they are cads. Perhaps I'm one of them. You can't put me out of this, Lexie dear. I don't know how it's going to end and I don't want to know. That's where real life is rather like the stage. The tag to a play's kept dark, never spoken until the curtain's about to hide the players from view. If we knew how things were going to end with us--knew the tags to our lives--I guess some of us wouldn't be able to go on with our parts off the stage."

It was like arguing with a fatalist. Her loyalty to Woolf was as unalterable as destiny. Alexandra gave up trying to move her. She changed the conversation, and an hour later Maggy went upstairs in response to a message from Mrs. Lambert, who wanted to say good-by to her.

Mrs. Lambert's bedroom was in half darkness. She was still racked with a headache, but she wanted to see Maggy and to hear whether Alexandra had succeeded in persuading her to break with Woolf. For this purpose she had left the two girls alone together. Maggy closed the door gently behind her and tip-toed toward the bed.

"I'm so sorry you feel bad," she said feelingly. "It won't do for me to stop talking to you. That will make your head worse. I'll just say good-by and go. Thank you for being so kind to me. It was nice to come and see Lexie here."

"You're very fond of her?" asked Mrs. Lambert.

"She's fine. I lived with her, you see. When you live for weeks with another girl in one room, and don't have a cross word it stands to reason one of you must be eighteen-carat. That's Lexie. She never complained or lost heart, not even when things were bad and I left her. She's the quiet sort but she's a fighter. There were soldiers in her family. It comes out in her. But I've started to talk--"

"You don't tire me. Sit down. It's refreshing to hear a woman speak well of another. Rather a novelty too. Aren't you jealous of her going away with me?"

"No, I'm awfully glad she's found you. I was thinking this afternoon how well she fitted in with everything here. She's a lady, like you. Things that I never fretted about because I wasn't used to them, she must have missed terribly. She's fine lace. I'm crochet work."

Mrs. Lambert laid her thin hand on Maggy's.

"How would you like to come on tour with us?" she asked. "I could make room for you. But I suppose your contract at the Pall Mall wouldn't permit of it?"

The unexpected proposition was tempting enough. Under different circumstances Maggy would have jumped at it.

"It isn't the contract that would stop me," she said with some hesitation. "But I've got a--flat."

There was a pregnant pause.

"And there's another reason.... I--I have to go away for a little while ... and I was glad that Lexie would be away. Oh, what have I said? You don't understand?"

"I think I do."

Maggy's face flushed crimson and then went white. Mrs. Lambert's hand still lay on hers. Contact with it gave her a feeling of sisterhood, a longing to confide. Her pent up feelings suddenly found voice.

"I want to tell some one," she choked. "I've got to go through with something I hate--and dread. I've longed to speak to another woman about it, but there was only Lexie, and she's not"--she stumbled over the word--"married. I wouldn't tell her. It wouldn't have been right."

"Tell me."

"I--can't see your face," whispered Maggy fearfully.

"It's not turned from you."

Then Maggy unburdened her soul. A flood of unreserved words broke from her. Mrs. Lambert neither moved nor spoke, but the grasp of her hand tightened as the poignant story culminated.

"I daren't let myself think about it," Maggy's faltering voice went on. "If I think too much my brain begins to rock, and I'm afraid. It's wonderful and awful and I don't feel the same. The other day I saw a woman in the street. She had such a pretty baby in her arms. It was too heavy for her to carry, and she looked dead tired, but I could see by her face how she loved it, weight and all, and I had to hold on to myself to stop from screaming out, 'You're lucky. You can keep yours. I--'" Something she dimly discerned in Mrs. Lambert's face brought her to a sudden stop. "Why, I've made you cry!" she said contritely. "What a brute I am!"

"No, no. Don't take your hand away," was the soft rejoinder. "You poor child! My heart aches for you."

When Maggy re-entered the drawing room her eyes were suspiciously red. She seemed anxious to get away. She put her arms round Alexandra and hugged her.

"Good-by, Lexie," she said breathlessly. "Don't forget me. The best of luck. Mrs. Lambert's an angel. T-tell her so--from me."

She tore herself away, pulled down her veil, and was gone, leaving Alexandra bewildered.

Maggy stopped at a jeweler's on her way home. Taking off her bracelet, she handed it to the man behind the counter.

"Don't bother to tell me what it's worth. Just say whether it's real or sham," she said.

It was sham.

She dropped it into her bag and went out, with a new pain gripping at her heart. She never wore the bracelet again.

After dinner that evening Woolf remarked its absence. She had worn it ever since he had given it to her.

"Where's your bracelet?" he inquired. "I hope you haven't left it about or had it stolen."

"Fred," she said, looking him steadily in the eyes, "I found out quite by accident that it isn't real. Wait a minute. Let me finish. You know I don't care tuppence about the value of anything you give me. It isn't the cost I think of. If you'd given me a ring out of a penny cracker I wouldn't have changed it for another from somebody else a million times its value. But don't sham to me. I--I can't bear it."

"I never told you they were real diamonds," he rejoined in a nettled voice. "If I didn't say they were paste you ought to have guessed it. Anyhow, the bracelet cost me twenty pounds. Genuine stones that size would have run to the price of a damn good race horse." He gave her a disparaging look. "Why, all in, you don't cost me as much as one of the animals I've got in training."

The words froze her. She stared at him in dumb agony.

"Oh, my heart!" she cried, with a sudden catch at her breath.

He sat still, coldly indifferent.

"And I've given it to you!" she presently whispered.

XX

Alexandra's longing to act, to appear before an impartial audience in a play reflecting every-day life, was at last satisfied when the tour began. Her part was a very small one, that of a parlormaid only, but it did not prevent her going through the usual phases of stage fright at the first performance. On the second night she was calm and collected. At the end of a week it surprised her to find that she was no longer under the spell of theatricalism.

Had she joined the company in the ordinary way the glamour of the stage would have got hold of her and remained with her for a long time. As an insignificant member of it, out of touch with its leading light, she would have imagined mysteries where none existed. But from the very first all these so-called mysteries were exposed. She was like the assistant to the conjuror: she saw how things were done.

In the first place, Mrs. Lambert did not pose as any high-priestess of the drama: she was rather contemptuous of the stage. She thought of it as a way to make an easy living, that was all. Alexandra's notions about the stage were all associated with Art: Mrs. Lambert's were confined to figures. She and her manager talked business unexcitedly for an hour every day, never esthetics. She was mildly amused when Alexandra showed her enthusiasm for acting, as she did in that first week.

"You'll get over it, my dear," she said. "It's not an art, merely a matter of temperament. If acting were creative one could take it seriously, but it isn't. The author creates; the actor only represents. When I'm acting I often feel like the inside of a moving picture show. It's all mechanical."

"But," said Alexandra, "you weren't always like that? When you first went on the stage--"

"I felt as you do, all emotion and inexperience. Now that I've lived and am disillusioned I know that the stage is only a business, and not a very edifying one. The public don't see that side of it, fortunately. They think only of the amusement it provides. If they would stop there it wouldn't matter: but they have such a mania for everything theatrical in this country, such a desire to penetrate beyond the footlights, that they quite forget the necessity for a curtain between the make-believe of the stage and themselves. They're like a child with a toy. They want to see the inside mechanism, and directly they do they suffer the usual disappointment. I never take people 'behind'; if I do I always find they never again want to pay for a seat 'in front.' We're only shop-keepers, after all, and shop-keepers don't invite their customers behind the counter, any more than the customers are in the habit of asking their butcher or their baker to dinner. Somehow you can't get the public to see things like that. Instead of keeping members of the stage at a distance, treating them like kennel-dogs, they invite them to their houses and pamper them. It makes them more conceited and self-sufficient than they are already. I don't deny that a few actors and actresses are decently born and bred, indoor dogs, so to speak, knowing their manners; but that's no reason why the whole pack should be made free of the public's drawing rooms.... Let us walk up to the cathedral and spend a quiet hour there."

The tour had opened in a small cathedral town, and the three hours spent at the theater each night hardly counted in their daily round. They motored about the surrounding country, or read, talked and did needlework in the private sitting room of their quiet hotel. Such a life, placid and yet full of pleasant occupation, was delightful to Alexandra. She found the weekly change from town to town exhilarating, and the journey each Sunday in Mrs. Lambert's comfortable landaulette a luxurious mode of traveling.

At the end of their first week Chalfont came down and remained with them for the rest of the tour. Both he and Mrs. Lambert treated Alexandra on terms of equality so that she never felt an intruder on their intimacy. Before her they made no secret of their attachment, but she never regarded it as anything more close than what might exist between old and tried friends. Sometimes she detected in Mrs. Lambert quite a sisterly attitude toward Lord Chalfont. That was probably accounted for by the differences in their ages, she being a few years the elder.

Chalfont often asked after Maggy. He had quite an open admiration for her, which Mrs. Lambert shared. But, unlike him, she seldom asked for news of her. At the time, Alexandra did not notice this apparent lack of interest. She was not able to impart anything about Maggy for the simple reason that she had not heard from her. Only twice during the early days of the tour had there been a letter from her. After that, although Alexandra repeatedly wrote, she got no reply. She could not help wondering at this silence. It was not like Maggy. Later, when she spoke of it to Mrs. Lambert, the latter did not seem surprised.

"You're sure to hear from her soon. She may be away," she said.

And a letter did arrive from Maggy shortly afterwards. It was written in pencil and strangely shaky, quite unlike her habitual hand, which although childish, was remarkably firm. She said very little, confirmed Mrs. Lambert's prophecy by admitting that she had been away for a change, owing to which she had not received Alexandra's letters until her return. She ended with a postscript which had evidently been added in a burst of feeling.

"I love Fred more than ever, Lexie. I couldn't exist without him. He has been such a dear since I got back."

Alexandra passed it across the breakfast table to Mrs. Lambert, with the remark:

"It's from Maggy. She doesn't say what has been the matter with her, though."

Chalfont looked up.