Kitabı oku: «Tales of two people», sayfa 8

II

SHE had not, as a fact – and a fact which came to my knowledge even before I reached my own threshold. I stepped into the train at Liverpool Street, fat, brown, and still knickerbockered. In one corner of the carriage sat Thistleton, in another Charley Miles.

“Not seen you for a day or two, old chap,” said the latter genially.

I nodded and sat down opposite Thistleton, who welcomed my reappearance in a few well-chosen words. I reciprocated his civility with inquiries after his family, and finally, before taking up my paper, I added —

“And your distinguished visitor? The charming Princess? Have you any news of her?”

At the same moment I happened to catch Charley’s eye. It was cocked at me in a distinctly satirical manner. For an instant I feared that the Princess had run off with the spoons, or annexed Mrs Thistleton’s garnets (we all knew them) to enrich the Boravian diadem. But after the briefest pause – which was a pause, all the same – Thistleton answered —

“She is still with us, and very well indeed, thank you.”

He cleared his throat, opened The Globe, and said no more. Charley’s eye drew me with an irresistible attraction; it was still cocked at me over the top of the Evening News. But he made no remark, so I fell back on my own organ of opinion, and silence was unbroken until we had passed the station immediately before Beechington – we alight (as the Company puts it) at Beechington for Southam Parva. Then, when there were just three minutes left, Thistleton glanced at Charley, saw that he was busy with his paper (the “racing” corner unless I’m mistaken), leant forward and tapped my knee with his gold eyeglasses. I started slightly and accorded him my attention. There seemed to be a little embarrassment in his manner.

“By the way, Tregaskis,” he said, “you remember I told you that I was engaged on certain – er – delicate negotiations on behalf of our guest?”

I nodded. “About Her Royal Highness’s private fortune?”

He nodded. “They involve,” he proceeded, “approaches to the present King in – er – an amicable spirit – more or less amicable. We have thought it well that for the present – provisionally and without prejudice – Her Highness should employ a designation to which her claim is absolutely beyond dispute. By a disuse – temporary, perhaps – of her proper style, she may smooth certain – er – susceptibilities, and so render my task easier and give us a better prospect of success. Our guest now prefers to be known as the Countess Vera von Friedenburg.”

I nodded again – it was the only safe thing to do. Thistleton said no more, save to express a hope (as he got into his waggonette) that they would see me soon at the Manor. Charley and I started together to walk the long mile from Beechington Station to Southam Parva; the cart was to bring my luggage. We had covered some half of the distance when Charley pushed his hat well over his left ear and ejaculated —

“Rum go, ain’t it, Treg? What do you make of it?”

“Her being still here, you mean?”

“Yes; and the business about her name. For a fortnight she was Her Royal Highness. Then she was Her Highness for three weeks. And for the last three she’s been Countess Vera von Friedenburg!”

“Thistleton gave what appeared to me an admirable reason.”

“I don’t believe he’ll get a sou, not if he offered to endorse the cheque ‘Sarah Smith.’ Is it likely they’d part?” By “they,” I understood him to mean the Court of Boravia.

“I’m sorry for her, then.”

“So am I, and for old Thistleton too. He’s out of pocket, I expect, besides losing his comm. And there she is!”

“The Princess?”

“The Countess, you mean.” His smile was sardonic.

“Yes, there she is,” I agreed, not very hopefully however.

“Rum go!” he added, just as he had begun, and then fell to whistling the ditty of the hour. He made only one more remark, and that fell from him just as we parted.

“Ta-ta, Treg,” said he. “Old Thistles (he had an objectionable habit of abbreviating names) has got a tidy practice; but there are a good many mouths to fill, eh? And no comm.! Ta-ta!”

Was it really as bad as that? The thought made me uncomfortable. Poor girl! The title that had filled our mouths would not fill hers. And her descent in rank had been remarkable and rapid. Her fall in public esteem had, as I soon found, kept pace with it. The word as to her style of address had gone round. She was “Countess Vera” now. Mrs Marsfold said: “Poor Countess Vera.” Miss Dunlop’s accent was less charitable: “Susan Thistleton’s Countess” was her form of expression, and beneath it lay an undoubted sneer at the Princess’s pretensions. Boravia, too, was spoken of with scant respect. “Really a barbarous place, I’m told,” said the Rector. “They call their kings kings; but of course – !” He shrugged his shoulders, without, however, indicating what title the Boravians might, in accordance with British standards, appropriate to the person who had the doubtful good fortune of ruling over them. In fact, they – and I don’t know that I am altogether entitled to except myself – all felt a little hot when they remembered the high-mightiness of that dinner-party.

I took advantage of Thistleton’s kind intimation and called on his wife. It was a fine autumn afternoon, and while we sat in the drawing-room and talked, I looked through the open windows on to the lawn. Countess Vera sat there, surrounded by the four youngest Thistleton children – Gladys, Myra, Molly, and the boy Evanstone (Mrs Thistleton was a Miss Evanstone). The Countess and the children all held books in their hands, and snatches of the French tongue fell on my ear from time to time.

“It’s really very perplexing,” said Mrs Thistleton, “and it’s difficult to do the right thing. I’m sure you credit us with wanting to do the right thing, Mr Tregaskis?”

“I’m sure you’d do the right and the kind thing.”

“The money she brought over is quite exhausted. Mr Thistleton has spent a considerable sum in getting up her case and presenting it to the Boravian Court. His efforts meet with no attention – indeed with absolute contempt.”

“They’re not afraid of her?”

“Not in the least. And here she is – literally without a farthing! And hardly a gown to her back – at least, hardly one suitable for – ” She broke off, ending: “But what do you know about gowns?”

“Rather a remarkable situation for a princess!”

“If she would let us beg for her, even! The Government might do something. But she won’t hear of it. Then she says she’ll go. Where to? What can she do? If she won’t beg, she’d starve. We can’t let her starve, can we? But times aren’t good, and – Oh, well, I must give you some tea. Would you mind ringing?”

I obeyed. Merry laughs came from the children on the lawn.

“The kids seem to like her,” said I, for want of better consolation.

“She’s very nice to them. She’s helping them with their French.” She caught me looking at her and blushed a little. I had not seen Mrs Thistleton blush before. Suddenly the plan came before my eyes. There was no need to blush for it; it seemed to me rather great – rather great, perhaps, on both sides, but greater on Mrs Thistleton’s. “It gives her a sense of – of doing something in return, I suppose,” Mrs Thistleton went on.

The maid brought in tea.

“Is nursery tea ready?” Mrs Thistleton asked.

“Yes, ma’am.”

“Then send the children upstairs and tell the Countess that tea is here.”

“Yes, ma’am.”

Soon the Countess came – as small, as slight, as dark as ever, even more timid. I rose as she entered; she bowed nervously, and, going to the table, busied herself with making the tea. Mrs Thistleton lay back in her arm-chair.

“Sit down, Mr Tregaskis,” she said. “You like making tea for us, don’t you, Countess?”

“Yes, Mrs Thistleton, thank you,” said Countess Vera von Friedenburg.

But I didn’t sit down – I couldn’t do it. I leant against the table and looked an ass all the time she made tea.

III

THE next chapter, or division, or what you will, of this small history may be very short. I write it with two objects, which seem to me to justify its appearance, in spite of its fragmentary character. In the first place, it serves to exhibit the final stage of the descent of the Princess – the logical conclusion of the process which was begun when Thistleton dropped “Royal” from between “Her” and “Highness” in the train from Liverpool Street to Beechington. In the second place, it exhibits Mrs Thistleton’s good sense and fine feeling for the suitability of things. You couldn’t have princesses – nay, nor countesses – about the house in that sort of position. It would have been absurd.

So here it is. I seldom give even small dinner-parties; such gatherings annoy my cook. But about a month after my return, I got leave to have four or five friends, and I bade to my board the Rector and his wife and Mr and Mrs Thistleton. If for no other reason than to “balance,” I said in my note to Mrs Thistleton that I should be exceedingly pleased if Countess Vera von Friedenburg would do me the honour of accompanying them. Perhaps that was a mistake in taste. I meant no harm, and I don’t think that Mrs Thistleton intended to rebuke me; though she did, I imagine, mean to convey to me a necessary intimation.

“Dear Mr Tregaskis,” she wrote, “Mr Thistleton and I are delighted to accept your very kind invitation, and we shall be charmed, as always, to meet our dear Rector and Mrs Carr. I am told to thank you very sincerely for your kind invitation to our young friend, but Fräulein Friedenburg agrees with me in thinking that during my absence she had better stay with the children. Yours very sincerely,

“Susan Thistleton.”

Fräulein Friedenburg! Even her particle – her last particle – of nobility gone! Fräulein Friedenburg! Her Royal Highness – ! Let us forget – let us and all Southam Parva forget!

It was not unkind of Mrs Thistleton. It was right and suitable. Who should not come out to dinner, but stay and mind the children? Who save Fräulein – Fräulein Friedenburg? It would have been a ludicrous position for Her Royal Highness Princess Vera of Boravia. Leave it to Fräulein Friedenburg!

So, as Fräulein Friedenburg, she passed into our ordinary lives, and out of our ordinary thoughts, as is the way with things when they become familiar. Mrs Thistleton’s courage and talent had saved the situation – and her own face. The Princess was forgotten, and the Thistletons’ nursery governess little heeded. Who does heed a nursery governess much?

But one night, as I turned over the atlas looking for something else, I came on the map of Boravia and saw the city of Friedenburg set astride the great river, dominating the kingdom, a sentinel at the outposts of Western Europe. If Divine Right were not out of fashion, the key of that citadel should have been in the hand which ruled exercise-books for the Thistleton children. For a few moments after that I went on thinking about the nursery governess.

IV

SO Fräulein – she soon came to be called just “Fräulein” – was not at my dinner-party; but two or three weeks later I had a little talk with her. I went up to the Manor one afternoon in October, seeking a game of croquet with Bessie Thistleton – such are our mild delights at Southam Parva – but found the whole family gone off to a Primrose League bazaar at Beechington. Only Fräulein was at home, said the parlour-maid; and Fräulein was visible in the garden, sitting under a tree, turning over the leaves of a big book. I used the privilege of a friend of the house, strolled out on to the lawn, and raised my hat to the – I mean to Fräulein. She smiled brightly and beckoned to me to come and sit by her; her words were beyond reproach, but her gestures were sometimes obstinately un-Fräuleinish, if I may so express myself. I sat down in the other deck-chair and said that it was very fine for so late in the year.

She made no reply and, raising my eyes to her face, I found her looking at me with an unmistakable gleam of amusement.

“Do you think this very funny?” she asked.

“I think it’s deplorable,” I answered promptly.

“It’s very simple. I owe Mr Thistleton two hundred pounds. I do this till I have worked it off.”

“How many years?”

“Several, monsieur.”

“And after that?”

“The children will grow up.”

“Yes. And then?”

“Mrs Thistleton will give Fräulein Friedenburg a good character.”

“Meanwhile you work for nothing?”

“No. For clothes, for food, to pay my debt.”

“And how do you like it?”

That question of mine, which sounds brutal, was inspired and, as I still believe, excused by the satirical amusement in her eyes; our previous meetings had shown me no such expression. Her answer to the question had its irony too. She turned over a dozen pages of the big book and came on a picture. She held the book out to me, saying —

“That’s my home.”

I looked at the picture of her home, the great grim castle towering aloft on the river bank. A few centuries ago the Turks had fallen back beaten from before these giant walls. Then I glanced round Mrs Thistleton’s gentle trim old garden.

“I think you’ve answered my question,” I said.

She closed the book, with a shrug of her thin little shoulders, and sat silent for a moment. The oval of her face was certainly beautiful, and the thick masses of her hair were dark as night, or the inside of a dungeon in her castle of Friedenburg. (I liked to think of her having dungeons, though I really don’t know whether she had.)

“And is it for ever?” I asked.

She leant over towards me and whispered: “They know where I am.” An intense excitement seemed to be fighting against the calm she imposed on herself; but it lasted only a moment. The next instant she fell back in her chair with a sigh of dejection; a listless despair spread over her face; the satirical gleam illuminated no more the depths of her eyes. The veil had fallen over the Princess again. Only Fräulein sat beside me.

Then I made a fool of myself.

“Are there no men in Boravia?” I asked in a low voice.

This at Southam Parva, in the twentieth century, and to the governess! Moreover, from me, who have always been an advanced Liberal in politics, and hold that the Boravians are at entire liberty to change the line of succession, or to set up a republic if they be so disposed! None the less, in the Thistletons’ garden that afternoon, I did ask Fräulein whether there were men in Boravia.

She answered the question in the words she had used before.

“They know where I am,” she said, but now languidly, with half-closed eyes.

That I might be saved from further folly, from offering my strong right arm and all my worldly goods (I was at the moment overdrawn at the bank) as a contribution towards a Legitimist crusade in Boravia – Fortune sent interruption. The family came back from the bazaar, and most of them trooped into the garden. Charley Miles was with them, having joined the party at the fête on his way back from town. As they all came up Fräulein put the big book – with its picture of her home – behind her back; I rose and walked forward to greet Mrs Thistleton. In an instant Charley, passing me with a careless “Hallo, Treg!” had seated himself by Fräulein and begun to talk to her with great vivacity and every appearance of pleasure – indeed of admiration.

I joined Mrs Thistleton – and Bessie, who stood beside her mother. Bessie was frowning; that frown was to me the first announcement of a new situation. Bessie was grown up now, or so held herself, and she and Charley were great friends. Charley was doing remarkably well on the Stock Exchange, making his three or four thousand a year; I remembered that Thistleton had thrown out a conjecture to that effect in conversation with me once. As the father of a family of eight, Thistleton could not neglect such a circumstance. And Charley was a good-looking fellow. The frown on Miss Bessie’s brow set all this train of thought moving in my mind. The fact that, the next moment, Miss Bessie swung round and marched off into the house served to accelerate its progress.

Mrs Thistleton cast a glance at the couple under the tree – Charley Miles and Fräulein – and then suggested that I should go with her and see the chrysanthemums. We went to see the chrysanthemums accordingly, but I think we were both too preoccupied to appreciate them properly.

“It’s a very difficult position in some ways,” said Mrs Thistleton suddenly.

It was so difficult as to be almost impossible. I paid my compliment with absolute sincerity. “You’ve overcome the difficulties wonderfully,” I remarked. “I never admired your tact more. Nobody thinks of her at all now, except just as Fräulein.”

“I have been anxious to do the right thing, and she has improved the children’s French.” She did not add that the liquidation of Thistleton’s bill by services rendered was a further benefit. We cannot be expected always to remember every aspect of our conduct.

“But it is difficult,” Mrs Thistleton went on. “And the worst of it is that Bessie and she aren’t very congenial. With an ordinary governess – Well, the only thing is to treat her like one, isn’t it?”

“Does she object?”

“Oh no, never. But I can’t quite make her out. After all, she’s not English, you see, and one can’t be sure of her moral influence. I sometimes think I must make a change. Oh, I shouldn’t do anything unkind. I should ask her to stay till she was suited, and, of course, do all I could to recommend her. But Bessie doesn’t like her, I’m sorry to say.”

By this time we had walked past all the chrysanthemums twice, and I said that it was time for me to go. Mrs Thistleton gave me her hand.

“You don’t think me unkind?”

“Honestly, I think you have been kind all through, and I don’t think you’ll be unkind now. The situation is so very – ”

“Difficult? Yes,” she sighed.

I had been going to say “absurd,” but I accepted “difficult.” I would have accepted anything, because I wanted to end the conversation and get away. I was surfeited with incongruities – Mrs Thistleton, Bessie, Charley Miles, and, above all, Fräulein – set in contrast with the picture in the big book – with the castle of Friedenburg frowning above the great river, waiting for its mistress, Princess Vera; the mistress who came not because – I couldn’t get away from my own folly – because there were no men in Boravia! “Absurd” was the right word, however.

V

THE next few weeks developed the situation along the lines I had foreseen, but endowed it with a new wealth of irony, so that it became harder than ever to say whether we were dealing with tragedy or with farce. The women of the village took arms against Fräulein. Mrs Marsfold, Miss Dunlop (of the Elms), even the Rector’s gentle wife, became partisans of Bessie Thistleton and demanded the expulsion of Fräulein. Only Mrs Thistleton herself still resisted, still sought after the kind thing, still tried to reconcile the interests of her family with the duty she had undertaken towards the stranger within her gates. But even she grew weaker. They were all against her, and Bessie had the preponderating word with her father now. In fine, there was every prospect that, even as the Princess Vera was banished from Boravia, so Fräulein Friedenburg would be expelled from Southam Parva.

And why? She had designs on Charley Miles! That was the accusation; and it was also, and immediately, the verdict. She wanted to catch Charley Miles – and that three or four thousand a year which, by plausible conjecture, he was making on the Stock Exchange! The Princess was now utterly forgotten – she might never have existed. There was only the designing governess, forgetful of her duty and her station, flying at game too high for her, at the most eligible match in the village, at the suitor (the destined suitor) of her employer’s daughter, at prosperous Charley Miles of the Stock Exchange! The human mind is highly adaptable, and the relativity of things is great. These two conclusions were strongly impressed on my mind by the history of Fräulein Friedenburg’s sojourn in the village of Southam Parva.

Charley had the instincts of a gentleman and was furious with “the old cats,” as he called the ladies I have named, with a warmth which for my part I find it easy to pardon. Yet his mind was as their minds; he was no whit less deeply and firmly rooted in present facts. He may have been a little afraid of Bessie, perhaps in a very little committed to her by previous attentions. But that was not the main difficulty. That he was in love with Fräulein I believed then and believe now; indeed, he came very near to admitting the fact to me on more than one occasion. But he was a young man of social ambitions, and the Thistletons stood high among us. (I began by admitting that we do not dwell on the highest peaks.) Mr Thistleton’s daughter was one thing, Mr Thistleton’s governess another. That was Charley’s point of view, so that he wrestled with erring inclination and overthrew it. He did not offer marriage to Fräulein Friedenburg. He contented himself with denouncing the attempt to banish her, for which, after all, his own conduct was primarily responsible. But I found no time to blame him; he filled me with a wonder which became no less overwhelming because, in regard to present facts, it was in a large measure unreasonable. In truth, I couldn’t stand firm on present facts. The walls, the towers, the dungeons of Friedenburg, and the broad river running down below – these things would not leave the visions of my mind. They stood in obstinate contrast to Charley Miles and three or four thousand on the Stock Exchange.

One evening – it was a Monday, as I remember – Charley came to see me after dinner, and brought with him a copy of The Morning Post, an excellent paper, but one which, owing to the political convictions to which I have already referred in connection with my feelings about the lack of men in Boravia, I do not take in. He pointed to a spot in the advertisement columns, and, without removing his hat from his head or his cigar from his mouth, sank into my arm-chair.

“Mrs Thistles has paid for six insertions, Treg,” he said.

I read the first “insertion.”

“A lady strongly recommends her German nursery governess. Good English. Fluent French. Music. Fond of children. Salary very moderate. A good home principal object. Well-connected. – Mrs T., The Manor House, Southam Parva.”

Well-connected! I looked over to Charley with some sort of a smile. “The good English is, of course, all right?” I said.

“Isn’t it an infernal shame?” he broke out. “She won’t stay a week after that!”

“It may bring an engagement,” said I.

“Look here, do you think it’s my fault?”

“I’m glad she says Fräulein is well-connected.”

“Do you think it’s my fault? I – I’ve tried to play square – by her as well as by myself.”

“I don’t think we need discuss the Princess.”

“Hallo, Treg!”

“Good heavens! – I – I beg pardon! I mean – why need we talk about Fräulein’s affairs?”

“I was talking about mine.”

“I see no connection.”

He was not angry with me, though (as will have been seen) I had lost my temper hopelessly and disastrously. He got up and stood in front of the fire.

“I hadn’t the pluck, Treg, my boy,” he said. His voice sounded rather dreary, but I had no leisure to pity him.

“Good Heavens, do you suppose she’d have looked at you?” I cried. “Remember who she is!”

“That’s all very well, but facts are facts,” said Charley Miles. “I didn’t mean to make trouble, Treg, old boy. On my honour, I didn’t.” He made a long pause. “I hope I shall be asking you to congratulate me soon, Treg,” he went on.

“Ask me in public, and I’ll do it.”

“That’s just being vicious,” he complained, and with entire justice. “Bessie’s a first-rate girl.”

“I’m very sorry, Charley. So she is. She’ll suit you a mile better than – than Fräulein.”

He brightened up. “I’m awfully glad you do think me right in the end,” he said. “But I’m a bit sorry for Fräulein. She’d have had to go soon, anyhow – when the children got a bit older. She’ll get a berth, I expect.”

“No doubt,” said I. “And I’ll congratulate you even in private, Charley.”

“You’re a decent old chap, but you’ve got a queer temper. I don’t above half understand you, Treg.” He hesitated a little. “I say, you might go and have a talk with Fräulein some day. She likes you, you know.”

“Does she?” The eager words leapt from my lips before I could stop them.

“Rather! Will you go?”

“Yes. I’ll have a talk with Fräulein.”

“Before she goes?”

“She’ll go soon?”

“I think so.”

“Yes, before she goes, Charley.”

With that, or, rather, after a little idle talk which added nothing to that, he left me – left me wondering still. He was sorry for Fräulein, and not only because she must go forth into the world; also because she had not been invited to become Mrs Charley Miles! He conceived that he had made a conquest, and he didn’t value it! His mistake of fact was great, but it shrank to nothing before the immensity of his blunder in estimation. I could account for it only in one way – a way so pleasing to my own vanity that I adopted it forthwith. And I’m not sure I was wrong. The veil had not been lifted for him, and he had no eyes to see through it. For me it had been raised once, and henceforth eternally hung transparent.

“That’s my home.” She had looked in that moment as if no other place could be.

Now, however, she was advertising for a situation, and I speculated as to how much of the truth Mrs Thistleton would deem it wise to employ in justifying that sublime “Well-connected.”