Monica, Volume 2 (of 3)

And here Tom stopped short, seeing that Monica was not alone.

“I beg your pardon,” he added, drawing himself up with a ceremoniousness quite unusual with him.

“Not at all,” answered Monica, quietly. “Let me introduce you to Lady Beatrice Wentworth – Mr. Tom Pendrill.”

They exchanged bows very distantly. Monica became suddenly aware, in some subtle, inexplicable fashion, that these two were not strangers to one another – that this was not their first meeting. Moreover, it appeared as if their former acquaintance, such as it was, could have been by no means agreeable to either, for it was easy to see that a sort of covert antagonism existed between them which neither of them took over much pains to conceal.

Tom’s face assumed its most sharply cynical expression, as he drew at once into his hardest shell of distant reserve and sarcastic politeness.

Beatrice opened her feather fan, and wielded it with a sort of aggressive negligence. She dropped into a seat beside Monica, and began to talk to her with an air of studied affectation utterly at variance with her ordinary manner, ignoring Tom as entirely as if no introduction had passed between them, and that with an assumption of hauteur that could only be explained by a deeply-seated antipathy.

Monica tried to include Tom in the conversation; but he declined to be included, returned an indifferent answer, and withdrew to a distant corner of the room, where he remained deeply engrossed, as it seemed, in the study of a photographic album.

Monica was perplexed. She could not imagine what it all meant. She had never heard the Pendrills speak of Lady Beatrice Wentworth, and she was sufficiently acquainted with Tom’s history to render this perplexity the greater. She was certain Mrs. Pendrill had heard the name of her expected guest, and it had aroused no emotion in her. Yet she would presumably know the name of a lady towards whom her nephew cherished so great an antipathy. Monica could not make it out. But one thing was plain enough: those two were sworn foes, and intended to remain so – and they were guests beneath the same roof!

CHAPTER THE TWENTY-SECOND.

AN ENIGMA

It was a relief when the other men came in, and when dinner was announced. Randolph evidently knew nothing of any disturbing element in the party as he handed Beatrice in to dinner, and again made a sort of attempt to introduce her to Tom, who was seated opposite, not knowing that Monica had already had an opportunity of performing that little ceremony.

“You are two of my oldest friends, you know,” said their host, in his pleasant, easy fashion, “and you are both my guests now, so you will have a capital opportunity of expatiating together upon my many perfections.”

“No need for that, Randolph,” answered Beatrice, gaily. “They speak too loud for themselves, and your wife’s eyes tell too many tales of them. You know I never could bear paragons. If you turn into one, I shall have no more to say to you.”

“You are very cutting, Beatrice; almost as much so as Tom here. It is really rather a trying position to be hedged in between a clever woman and a clever man.”

“If you call me a clever woman again, Randolph, I’ll never forgive you. I abominate the whole race!” cried Beatrice, hotly; “and as for clever men – I detest them!”

This was said so heartily as to elicit a guffaw of laughter from a ruddy-faced young gentleman of sporting tastes, who was her neighbour on the other side. She turned to him with one of her most sparkling glances.

“Now you, I am quite certain, agree with me. Your face tells me you do. Don’t you think that it is the clever people who make the world an intolerable place?”

“They’re the greatest nuisance out,” assented that young gentleman, cordially. “I always did say so. I was never clever. I was plucked three times, I think, for my little-go.”

“Then you and I are sure to be great friends,” said Beatrice, laughing. “I am quite, quite sure I should never have passed any examination if I had been a man. I was at Oxford once, long ago; and oh! you know, the only men that were any good at all were those who had been ‘plucked,’ as they call it, or fully expected to be. The clever, good, precocious boys were – oh! well, let us not think of them. It takes away one’s appetite!”

The sporting gentleman laughed, and enjoyed this summary verdict; but Randolph just glanced across at his wife. He, too, was aware that there was something odd in Beatrice’s manner. He detected the covert vein of bitterness in her tone; and he was as much at a loss to understand it as any one else could be. Tom’s face and impenetrable silence puzzled him likewise.

Dinner, however, passed smoothly enough. Beatrice was very lively, and her witticisms kept all the table alive. Her young neighbour lost his heart to her at once, and she flirted with him in the most frank and open fashion possible. She could be very fascinating when she chose, and to-night, after the first edge had been taken off her sallies, she was, undoubtedly, exceedingly attractive.

If there was something a little forced in her mirth, at least nobody detected it, save those who knew her very well, and not even all of those, for Haddon was obviously unconscious that anything was wrong, and talked to Monica in the most unconcerned fashion possible. What Tom thought of it all nobody could hazard an opinion.

At length Monica gave the signal to her animated guest, and they two withdrew together. Beatrice laughed gaily, as she half walked half waltzed across the hall, humming a dance tune the while.

“What a lovely place this would be for a dance!” she exclaimed, “a masked, or, better still, a fancy dress ball. Shouldn’t we look charming in these panelled rooms, flitting about this great baronial hall, and up and down that delightful staircase? Monica, you and Randolph mustn’t get lazy; you must live up to your house. It is too beautiful to be wasted. If you don’t know how to manage matters, I must come and teach you?”

And so she rattled on, first on one theme, and then on another, in restless, aimless fashion, as people do who are talking against time, or talking with a purpose, determined not to let silence fall between them and their companions. It was easy to see that Beatrice wished to avoid any confidential conversation – wished to escape from any kind of questioning, or from quiet talk, of whatever description it might be. When at length she did let Monica go back to the drawing-room, it was not with any idea of silence. She went straight to the piano, and began playing stormily.

Presently, after dashing off fragments vocal and instrumental in a sort of confused medley, Monica, growing dreamy as she listened to the succession of changing harmonies, she began once again with more of purpose and of passion in her voice – indeed, there was so much of pain and passion, that Monica was aroused to listen.

“My heart, my heart is like a singing bird
Whose nest is in a watered shoot;
My heart, my heart is like an apple-tree,
Whose boughs are hung with thick-set fruit.
My heart, my heart is like a rainbow-shell
That paddles in a halcyon sea;
My heart, my heart is gladder than all these,
Because my love, my love has come to me.
My heart – ”

And then the singer’s voice failed utterly; a dismal discordant chord broke the eager harmonies that had followed one another so rapidly. Beatrice broke into a sudden storm of tears, and hurried from the room without a word.

Monica sat aghast and bewildered. What could it all mean? Was she by chance to come upon the secret sorrow of Beatrice’s life? – the sorrow she had half suspected sometimes, but had never heard in any way explained. Was it to be explained to her now? Was Tom Pendrill connected with that sorrow? If so, what part had he taken? Could they ever have been lovers? Did she not remember, long ago, hearing something of a suspicion on Mrs. Pendrill’s part that Tom had been “jilted” by the woman he loved? Was there not a time, long ago, when he was not the reserved, cynical man he affected now to be; but was genial, brilliant, the pleasantest of companions? Yes, Monica was sure of it – was certain that he had changed, and changed somewhat suddenly, many years since; but she had paid but little heed to the matter then, as it was about that time when every faculty was absorbed in watching over Arthur, who long lay hovering between life and death. Changes after that passed almost unheeded. Had not her whole life been changed too?

She did not follow Beatrice, however, to try and comfort her, or attempt to force her confidence. She treated her as she would wish herself to be treated in similar case; and shortly after the gentlemen had joined them, had the satisfaction of seeing Beatrice come back as brilliant and full of vivacity as ever, and there was no need after her appearance, to wonder how the evening should be passed, it seemed quite sufficient entertainment for the company to sit in a circle round her, and hear Beatrice talk. Tom Pendrill was the one exception. He did not attempt to join the magic ring. He took Monica a little apart, and talked over with her the latest news from Germany.

When the guests had departed, and Beatrice, as well as her brother and Monica, had gone upstairs, Tom turned his face towards Randolph with its hardest and most cynical look.

“Tell you what, Trevlyn, don’t you ask that poor young fellow Radlet here again, so long as that arrant flirt is a guest under your roof.”

Randolph simply smiled.

“The ‘arrant flirt,’ as you are polite enough to call my guest, is one of my oldest friends. Kindly keep that fact in mind in talking of her to me.”

“I am not talking of her. I am talking of poor young Radlet.”

“It seems to me that poor young Radlet, as you call him, is very well able to take care of himself.”

“Oh, you think that, do you? Shows how much you know! Can’t you see she was doing her very best to enslave his fancy, and that he was falling under the spell as fast as ever he could?”

“Pooh! Nonsense!” answered Randolph; “they were just exchanging a little of the current coin that is constantly passing in gay society. Young Radlet is not a green-horn. They understand their game perfectly.”

“She does, of course – no one better; but it’s a question if he does.”

“Well, he’s a greater fool than he looks, if he does not!” answered Randolph. “Does he expect a girl like Beatrice Wentworth to be enslaved by his charms in the course of a few hours? The thing’s a manifest absurdity!”

“Possibly; but that woman can make a man think anything.”

Randolph looked at his friend with some attention.

“You seem to have formed very exhaustive conclusions about Lady Beatrice Wentworth.”

It almost seemed as if Tom coloured a little as he turned impatiently away.

Next day Beatrice seemed to have regained her usual even flow of spirits. She met Tom at breakfast as she would meet any guest under the same roof, and neither courted nor avoided him in any way. He seemed to take his cue from her; but his face still wore the thin-lipped cynical expression that betrayed a certain amount of subdued irritation. However, sport was the all-prevailing topic of the hour, and as soon as breakfast was concluded, the men departed, with the dogs and keepers in their wake.

“What would you like to do, Beatrice?” asked Monica when the sportsmen had disappeared. “We have the whole day before us.”