Short Stories 1895-1926 (78 page)

Strangely enough, with the morrow, all idea of seeking consolation of his loneliness, and betterment of his fortunes, from any other of the excellent ladies, whose caps were at his feet, passed out of his mind. The thought of marriage simply evaporated. He met Miss Seymour with unaffected pleasure and sincerity. He suddenly became perfectly content to remain the widower adversity had brought him up – even smiled gently at remembrance of his former enterprise. And with this new contentment he became even more charming, more robust in his opinions, and in the conduct of his church and people, yet more tender in his affection for the girls with flaxen hair, and for texts taken from the Book of Ruth. He played a remarkable, albeit brief, innings in the local cricket match, raced an elderly and boyish visitor from his pear-tree to his garden gate for the stake of a new hat, and purchased a bicycle.

Despite this activity, his lonely thoughts of his ‘own dear lady' more frequently brought vacancy into his eyes and sharp and difficult pain into his heart. He was more often abroad, yet more often in perfect seclusion with his Donne, and his gold pencil, and a scrap of paper for occasional verse.

The Match-Makers

The Match-Makers
1

‘No, Herbert,' repeated my aunt firmly, ‘when a man reaches your age, has a comfortable income – a fact I assume mainly from your expenditure – and, possibly, prospects, it is his
duty
to marry.'

‘But who – I mean whom – my dear aunt, whom?' said I. ‘No one will have me.'

‘How many,' inquired my aunt crisply, ‘have you asked?'

‘Oh! two or three,' I said, somewhere between modesty and shame.

‘Two
or
three?' repeated my aunt.

I counted them wildly over, conscious of that ruthless glance on my face.

‘I think three, Aunt,' I said.

‘Who, then,' said my aunt cheerfully, ‘who shall be the fourth?'

‘I suppose,' I murmured apologetically, ‘
you
mayn't?'

My aunt obviously brightened.

‘Don't be facetious, Herbert! Tell me the names of
all
you'd
like
to have.'

‘
All,
Aunt!' I gasped.

‘To select from,' said my aunt severely. ‘And please, Herbert, be less indolent; I have a mission-meeting at seven.'

‘But, my dear kind lady, you don't expect me to get married in an hour?'

‘I do not expect, I insist,' said my aunt. ‘Now, then!'

I placed one leg deliberately over the other, leaned finger on finger, and said:

‘There's Zannie Treves, there's Betty Hamilton, there's – there's —'

But at that precise moment the maid tapped on the door and admitted Rose Saumarez. I own I started; I would own, if pressed, I blushed.

‘There, Herbert,' said my aunt triumphantly, ‘how very propitious!'

‘Who? Me?' said Rose, smiling from one to the other of us.

‘Yes, my dear,' said my aunt; ‘and when my bachelor nephew desists from his dumb-crambo, I'll tell you why.
Which,
in your deliberate opinion, would make the better wife for him: Betty Hamilton or Zannie – I think you said Zannie, Herbert? – Zannie Grieves?'

‘Treves, Aunt,' I said gently, ‘not Grieves yet.'

‘Zannie Treves,' said my aunt.

Rose narrowed her lids and looked rather oddly, I thought, at me.

‘Don't you think,' she said suavely, ‘that after a lady has tried so many, it's almost impossible for one to say which she's at last likely to – to select?'

‘You refer —' said my aunt.

‘Oh! to dear Zannie,' said Rose, rather sweetly.

‘You mean —?' said my aunt.

‘I mean, dear Miss Mittenson, she's so
frightfully
fascinating, you know, and so of course has heaps —'

‘And Herbert?' suggested my aunt rather gloomily.

‘Oh, yes, he's quite one,' said Rose. ‘Aren't you?'

‘Quite,' I said.

‘You mean —?' said my aunt inquiringly.

‘Rose means, Aunt, Zannie's no zany. She means I'm a rank outsider.'

‘I gather, my dear, from his shocking language,' said my aunt, ‘that we can dismiss Miss Treves.'

‘But doesn't that depend a little on – on our client, Miss Mittenson?'

‘Speak up, Herbert!' commanded my aunt.

‘Very well,' I said firmly; ‘I dismiss Miss Treves.'

‘That leaves, then, only —' began Rose, and tried in vain to recall the name. ‘Oh yes, Betsy Hamilton!'

‘I fancy no
s
” I said.

‘Betty – Betty Hamilton,' said Rose. ‘I
beg
your pardon. Now, Betty's a thoroughly nice, homely, unsophisticated – girl; and I think
any
man could be immensely happy with her. I congratulate you, Herbert.'

‘Thank you, Rose, immensely!' I replied.

‘Then,' said my aunt acidly, ‘you have decided on Betty Hamilton?'

‘No,' I said, ‘not decided, Aunt; but Rose is thinking of my thinking about her?'

My aunt turned sharply.

‘Age?' she said.

Rose reflected with a beautiful smile.

‘Thirty, would you think?' she said.

‘Twenty-four,' I said, ‘on May the first.'

‘Age, twenty-seven,' said my aunt. ‘Means?'

‘I
believe
Mr Hamilton is something in the City,' said Rose rather vaguely.

‘Hardware,' I said, ‘and £200 a year in her own right.'

‘Twenty-eight, merchant's daughter, £60 per annum,' said my aunt. ‘Domesticated?'

‘Oh yes!' said Rose eagerly. ‘You should see her home-made hats, Miss Mittenson! – and boots!'

‘A man doesn't marry hats and boots,' I said sententiously.

‘No!' said Rose, ‘one
must
think of the contents.'

‘Twenty-eight, merchant's daughter, £60 per annum, thrifty,' summed up my aunt once more. ‘Brains?'

Rose stooped to stroke the cat on the hearthrug, and the flames played in her hair quite strangely with the gold.

‘Brains?' repeated my aunt sternly, and this time gazed at me.

‘Well,' I said, ‘Rose says she makes her own boots, that's —'

‘I never!' said Rose, looking indignantly at me over Selim's white fur.

‘Miss Hamilton would never say “I never!”' I said frigidly; ‘she'd say, “Excuse me, dear Herbert”; or, “Forgive me, sweet, such was not —”'

My aunt repeated for the third time: ‘Brains?' but in so half-hearted a fashion I wondered if it had been intentional.

Then, it seemed, a most awkward silence followed.

My aunt shook out her skirts.

‘It's a quarter to seven, Herbert,' she said.

‘I'll put my bonnet on. Be prepared for me when I return.' She glanced shrewdly, and yet I fancied almost tenderly, at our visitor. ‘And do please aid the poor man!' she added.

I waited till the door was quite shut.

‘My aunt,' I said, ‘did not mention another name.'

Rose did not stir.

‘But really – really, Herbert,' she said, ‘Betty Hamilton would make —'

‘My aunt,' I said, ‘did not mention another name.'

She stroked Selim with one finger-tip from his nose to the extremity of his tail.

‘Whose?' she said suddenly, lifting her clear eyes on me.

‘Yours, Rose,' said I.

The Budget

The Budget
1

I scanned the unspeakable thing patiently and soberly, and then took Nancie's hand.

‘You won't be cross?' I said.

‘Cross? Of course not, silly boy.'

‘Or – or hurt?'

‘Hurt! How could I be, dear, after all your
immense
kindness?'

‘Oh, nonsense!' I said; ‘but still – there – well, it's a
tiny
bit stiff, eh?'

Nancie looked not the least bit hurt or cross – simply astonished.

‘I don't mean so much the individual items – each separate thing, you know: it's the total – the whole thing together. You see, dear, we're not so very rich – we're not the Duke of Westminster, are we?'

‘No, I suppose not,' said Nancie ruminatingly; ‘but what exactly do you mean, dear – the total?'

I felt the faintest suspicion of dizziness, but I passed my hand over my head and rather gingerly took up the bill again.

‘I am perfectly well aware,' I said candidly, ‘perfectly well aware I may seem just like any other ordinary husband, dear – I mean the kind of thing you see in plays and all that. I've seen it myself, and perhaps it is very funny on the stage; but, you see, we don't quite catch the drift sometimes.' I playfully brandished the bill. ‘Why so much bait when the trap's sprung, eh?'

‘Oh, please, Harry! You seem to think I'm so awfully clever. What
do
you mean? What trap? I am sure Madame Lalingerie is
immensely
scrupulous. I have sometimes wondered even if she can be really French, for that very reason.'

‘Oh!' I replied hurriedly, ‘I didn't mean that, a bit. I dare say she's as honest as day, and the name's simply a decoy; but she's a dressmaker – a bonneteer, isn't she? And they know an extra when they see one, don't they, dear?'

‘An extra?' said Nancie, unfathomably perplexed.

‘I mean they take care of the pence; they prefer guineas to pounds, which is much the same thing.'

‘But
you
are paid in guineas, Harry; and aren't lawyers? and I know dentists are, and that kind of thing. I don't
quite
see the harm in that,
really
.'

I sighed, and as negligently as possible surveyed the list again.

‘Now there's one, two … five hats,' I said. ‘I dare say it sounds like a silly question in one of those idiotic dialogues one reads sometimes; but honestly, dear – five hats?'

‘But it isn't five, dear; there's two more at the bottom there, and they were
much
the prettiest: it's seven, Harry.'

‘Well, seven, then.' But the brilliance of the question seemed to have evaporated somehow. ‘Leave the hats, then,' I cried, ‘and just tell me this: what the – why on earth, when a woman buys a hat, does she rip out all the trimming?'

‘Rip – out – all – the trimming!'

‘You must have, Nancie! Just look at all these gimcracks – flowers and ribbons and chiffons. Good heavens! That's trimmings, isn't it?'

‘
Is
it?' said Nancie. ‘I thought there seemed so few just pretty little things. I suppose, dear, it's having dolls when one's a child. I'm sure they make
huge
mistakes when one's a child. One gets used to little things like that – but they're cheap, that's one blessing.'

I searched frantically for the faintest symptom of anything cheap anywhere; but it was no use losing my case on trifles. I advanced boldly and firmly on the main position.

‘Not at all, not at all; that was only a little pleasantry, dear, merely that. It's the frocks and the gowns, you know, blouses, and – er – all that. Now, would you believe it, Nancie, your evening things alone – alone – would have paid the rent, rates, and taxes – yes, and gas!' I added, catching a wild and terrifying glimpse suddenly of an infinitesimal P.T.O.

‘But I thought you
said,
Harry,' replied Nancie, the least bit injured – ‘you said you had got the house rated
much
lower than that; is that the word? Besides, we never burn a bead of gas at night, though it does seem dangerous in case of burglars, and only lamps in the drawing-room.'

‘My dear, dear child, we must really keep to the point, and I honestly, deliberately think three tea-and-coffee gowns a bit stiff. I never saw
one
. Besides, what would you think of a
man
who bought a Bass jacket, or a whiskey waistcoat, or a —?'

‘As for your not seeing one, Harry,' said Nancie, and I knew I had lost again, her eyes shone as dim and lovely as an April sky before rain, ‘you never looked. And I do think if you are going to be hard and angry and unjust, it's not a bit nice to make fun of me, too. You know perfectly well men don't wear Bass jackets; then what is the use of saying they do?'

‘I am not angry, Nancie. I try not to be hard or unjust and I'll bolt the coffee-things and all that with pleasure; but I must say, frankly and finally, Madame Lalingerie may fit like an angel, and be as French as Marie Antoinette, but she's deucedly expensive – deucedly. I have had sisters, you must remember, and I think that for just last year's bill, and considering we scarcely went out at all because of your grandmother, poor soul! I think it's – it's a sheer atrocity.'

Something began to sparkle behind Nancie's tears, I couldn't for the life of me say why. ‘Now isn't it?' I demanded cheerfully.

‘But it isn't,' she said, smiling.

‘Not five guineas for a flimsy frock of chiffon that's ruined by the steam of a cup of tea?'

‘I mean it isn't last year's bill,' said Nancie, with infinite forbearance. ‘You paid that, dear, in February.'

‘Do you mean to tell me,' I said, profoundly moved, ‘that this monstrous acre of extortion is only for three months?'

‘Please, please don't, Harry! You've no idea how funny you look when you're serious. It's not a bill at all, dear.'

‘An I.O.U., a deed of gift, then?' I remarked ascetically.

‘No, dearest boy; it's just a silly little list I made out, just so as to be frightfully economical, dear, so that you could
see
– don't you understand? – before I ordered
anything
. Just so that you could suggest any little something extra, Harry, you thought, living in such a cheap house, we might be able to afford.'

‘You mean,' I said, vainly trying to hide an immeasurable relief, ‘you mean it's only a kind of try-on – an estimate?'

‘Yes, dear; how well you put it!'

‘Oh!' I said.

We paused, and I suddenly became aware that Nancie was looking as intently at me as I at her.

‘And you will? And I
may
go to just a tiny scrap more? I mustn't look dowdy, Harry, and you so famous, dear.'

I stared vaguely forward to a February that seemed centuries away.

‘Of course,' she continued exquisitely, ‘I won't, dear, if —'

‘You could never look dowdy, Nancie,' I said brokenly. ‘I thought it was last year's, that was all.'

‘That's just it,' said Nancie magnanimously. ‘I
thought
you thought that. I knew you didn't realize what bargains I was going to get … Poor Madame! you did say very horrid things about her, now didn't you, Harry?'

‘Eh?' I said, rather vacantly.