December Love Part 38

"I don't know that I want to wait quite so long as that," she murmured.

"Besides--I think I rather come in between. At least, I hope so."

At this point in the conversation the cab stopped before the Ritz.

To Francis Braybrooke's intense astonishment--and it might almost be added confusion--the first person his eyes lit on as they walked towards the tea-tables was f.a.n.n.y Cronin, comfortably seated in an immense arm-chair, devouring a m.u.f.fin in the company of an old lady, whose determined face was completely covered with a criss-cross of wrinkles, and whose withered hands were flas.h.i.+ng with magnificent rings. He was so taken aback that he was guilty of a definite start, and the exclamation, "Miss Cronin!" in a voice that suggested alarm.

"Oh, old f.a.n.n.y with Mrs. Clem Hodson!" said Miss Van Tuyn. "She's a school friend of f.a.n.n.y's from Philadelphia. Let us go to that table in the far corner. I'll just speak to them while you order tea."

"But I thought Miss Cronin never went out."

"She never does, except with Mrs. Clem, unless I want her."

"How singularly unfortunate I am to-day!" thought Braybrooke, as he bowed to Miss Cronin in a rather confused manner and went to do as he was told.

He ordered tea, then sat down anxiously to wait for Miss Van Tuyn. From his corner he watched her colloquy with the two school friends from Philadelphia, and it seemed to him that something very important was being told. For f.a.n.n.y Cronin looked almost animated, and her manner approached the emphatic as she spoke to the standing girl. Mrs. Hodson seemed to take very little part in the conversation, but sat looking very determined and almost imperious as she listened. And presently Braybrooke saw her extremely observant dark eyes--small, protuberant and round as b.u.t.tons--turn swiftly, with even, he thought, a darting movement, in his direction.

"I shall be driven, really driven, to make the matter quite clear," he thought, almost with desperation. "Otherwise--"

But at this moment Miss Van Tuyn came away to him, and their tea was brought by a waiter.

He thought she cast a rather satirical look at him as she sat down, but she only said;

"Dear old things! They are very happy together. Mrs. Clem is extraordinarily proud of having 'got f.a.n.n.y out,' as she calls it. A boy who had successfully drawn a badger couldn't be more triumphant. Now let's forget them!"

This was all very well, and Braybrooke asked for nothing better; but he was totally unable to forget the two cronies, whom he saw in the distance with their white and chestnut heads alarmingly close together, talking eagerly, and, he was quite sure, not about the dear old days in Philadelphia. What had they--or rather what had Miss Cronin said to Miss Van Tuyn? He longed to know. It really was essential that he should know. Yet he scarcely knew how to approach the subject. It was rather difficult to explain elaborately to a beautiful girl that you had not the least wish to marry her. He was certainly not at his best as he took his first cup of tea and sought about for an opening. Miss Van Tuyn talked with her usual a.s.surance, but he fancied that her violet eyes were full of inquiry when they glanced at him; and he began to feel positive that the worst had happened, and that f.a.n.n.y Cronin had informed her--no, misinformed her--of what had happened at Claridge's. Now and then, as he met Miss Van Tuyn's eyes, he thought they were searching his with an unusual consciousness, as if they expected something very special from him. Presently, too, she let the conversation languish, and at last allowed it to drop. In the silence that succeeded Braybrooke was seized by a terrible fear that perhaps she was waiting for him to propose. If he did propose she would refuse him of course. He had no doubt about that. But though to be accepted by her, or indeed by anyone, would have caused him acute distress, on the other hand no one likes to be refused.

He thought of Craven. Was it possible to make any use of Craven to get him out of his difficulty? Dare he hint at the real reason of his visit to Miss Cronin? He had intended delicately to "sound" the chaperon on the subject of matrimony, to find out if there was anything on the _tapis_ in Paris, if Miss Van Tuyn had any special man friend there, in short to make sure of his ground before deciding to walk on it. But he could hardly explain that to Miss Van Tuyn. To do so would be almost brutal, and quite against all his traditions.

Again he caught her eye in the desperate silence. Her gaze seemed to say to him: "When are you going to begin?" He felt that he must say something, even though it were not what she was probably expecting.

"I was interested," he hurriedly began, clasping his beard and looking away from his companion, "to hear the other day that a young friend of mine had met you, a very charming and promising young fellow, who has a great career before him, unless I am much mistaken."

"Who?" she asked; he thought rather curtly.

"Alick Craven of the Foreign Office. He told me he was introduced to you at Adela Sellingworth's."

"Oh yes, he was," said Miss Van Tuyn.

And she said no more.

"He was very enthusiastic about you," ventured Braybrooke, wondering how to interpret her silence.

"Really!"

"Yes. We belong to the same club, the St. James's. He entertained me for more than an hour with your praises."

Miss Van Tuyn looked at him with rather acute inquiry, as if she could not make up her mind about something with which he was closely concerned.

"He would like to meet you again," said Braybrooke, with soft firmness.

"But I have met him again two or three times. He called on me."

"And I understand you were together in a restaurant in--Soho, I think it was."

"Yes, we were."

"What did you think of him?" asked Braybrooke.

As he put the question he was aware that he was being far from subtle.

The vision in the distance--now eating plum cake, but still very observant--upset his nervous system and deprived him almost entirely of his usual savoir faire.

"He seems quite a nice sort of boy," said Miss Van Tuyn, still looking rather coldly inquisitive, as if she were secretly puzzled but intended to emerge into complete understanding before she had done with Braybrooke. "His Foreign Office manner is rather against him. But perhaps some day he'll grow out of that--unless it becomes accentuated."

"If you knew him better I feel sure you would like him. He had no reservations about you--none at all. But, then, how could he have?"

"Well, at any rate I haven't got the Foreign Office manner."

"No, indeed!" said Braybrooke, managing a laugh that just indicated his appreciation of the remark as an excellent little joke. "But it really means nothing."

"That's a pity. One's manner should always have a meaning of some kind.

Otherwise it is an absolute drawback to one's personality."

"That is perhaps a fault of the Englishman. But we must remember that still waters run deep."

"Do you think so? But if they don't run at all?"

"How do you mean?"

"There is such a thing as the village pond."

"How very trying she is this afternoon!" thought poor Braybrooke, endeavouring mentally to pull up his socks.

"I half promised Craven the other day," he lied, resolutely ignoring her unkind comparison of his protege to the abomination which is too often veiled with duckweed, "to contrive another meeting between you and him.

But I fear he has bored you. And in that case perhaps I ought not to hold to my promise. You meet so many brilliant Frenchmen that I dare say our slower, but really I sometimes think deeper, mentality scarcely appeals to you."

(At this point he saw f.a.n.n.y Cronin leaning impressively towards Mrs.

Clem Hodson, as if about to impart some very secret information to that lady, who bent to receive it.)

"Again those deep waters!" said Miss Van Tuyn, this time with unmistakable satire. "But perhaps you are right. I remember a very brilliant American, who knew practically all the nations of Europe, telling me that in his opinion you English were the subtlest--I'm afraid he was rude enough to say the most artful--of the lot."

As she spoke the word "artful" her fine eyes smiled straight into Braybrooke's, and she pinched her red lips together very expressively.

"But I must confess," she added, "that at the moment we were discussing diplomats."

"Artful was rather unkind," murmured Braybrooke. "I--I hope you don't think my friend Craven is one of that type?"

"Oh, I wasn't thinking of Mr. Craven."