Poppy Part 23

Poppy had no inclination to disguise her feelings from Miss Cornell.

"Sophie, you make me sick!" she said and turned away.

"Yes, that's all very well; but you made a bargain with me, that you would meet Bramham sometimes, and if he likes you, so much the better.

You don't seem to know when you're lucky!"

"Lucky?" Something broke from her lips, that might have been only an exclamation, but had the sound of a moan.

"Pooh!" said Sophie. "Some fellow's been kidding you, I suppose, and you don't like it. Oh! I know all about it."

"You know some wonderful things, Sophie!" said Poppy at last, in her soft, low voice. "Your mind must be a treasure-house of dainty thoughts and memories."

But irony was ever wasted on Sophie. She got up and stretched her well-shaped arms above her head until the heliotrope sleeves cracked and gaped at the seams.

"Well, all I can say is that you are a donkey not to want to meet nice fellows when you get the chance. Don't you ever intend to marry?"

Poppy, who had gone over to smell some flowers, probably Bramham's, which were clumsily bunched in rows on the mantel-shelf, faced her with an air of insolent surprise.

"What can that possibly have to do with you or your men visitors?"

"Oho!" said Sophie aggressively. "You won't get many chances of marrying without _my_ a.s.sistance, my dear. Perhaps you don't know it, but men don't come to Africa with the idea of entering into the holy state of matrimony. When they _do_ marry, it's _quite_ by accident, and the girl has to work the accident. You don't know much about that business, my child," she added contemptuously. "Better take a few lessons from me."

"Why? Have you been very successful?" Poppy's tone was one of polite inquiry. The other girl flushed.

"Jolly sight more than _you'll_ ever be, with your white face and thin figure," she retorted, adding pleasantly: "Your eyes remind me of a snake's."

Poppy sauntered carelessly towards the door.

"And _you_ remind me of the man who, when he was getting the worst of a discussion on original sin, said to the other man: 'If I were you, I would not drink with my mouth full.' I am quite willing to believe anything you like to tell me about your conquests, Sophie; only please don't bother to hunt a husband for me. The good G.o.d kindly supplied me with the same instincts as other women. I can do my own hunting."

She went out and closed the door behind her with a gentle, sad movement, as though she was shutting in the light of the world and regretted doing it. A little colour had come to her face. She felt better.

Abinger had gone away. This time his destination was really the Rand, for the _boys_ had taken his luggage to the station and seen him leave.

He had told Kykie that he would be away for six weeks at least.

After that stormy scene in the drawing-room, when he had left Poppy wrapped in wild weeping, nothing further had pa.s.sed between them on the subject of their marriage. Indeed, she had not seen him again. But he had left a letter for her, and enclosed was a copy of the marriage certificate, to show her that he had not been inventing. He further informed her that Father Eugene was still alive, and that by writing to the Jesuit Monastery in the Transvaal she could at any time ascertain the simple truth. The rest of the letter was written in a strain of casual indifference, that Poppy found singularly rea.s.suring. His att.i.tude appeared to be that of a man rather bored with the subject because it bored her; but, facts being facts, he plainly felt it his duty to show her that there were less pleasing and many more boring things in life than to be called Mrs. Abinger. He told her first of all, not to be a foolish girl and make herself ill about nothing; that it would be in every way to her advantage to make her _debut_ in South African society as the wife of a well-known man.

"I have not disguised from you," he wrote, "that I have what is called a bad reputation, but that will not affect you--rather redound to your credit in fact, since the wives of rakes are always looked upon as possessing something unusual in the way of brains and charm. As my wife, your lines will be laid in not unpleasant places. You may have as many friends as you like, and I will allow you five thousand pounds a year to entertain them and yourself upon. In making the matter public, no painful details need be gone into. All that is necessary is that you give me permission to make the truth public. Tell me when you are ready to a.s.sume the t.i.tle of Mrs. Abinger--I'll do the rest. In this, dear girl, as in all things, pray please yourself. Only, remember that if you don't choose to accept the situation, the situation still remains--_we are married_. And it is only under the conditions stated that I can permit you to live any other life than the one you have lived so long."

When first she received this letter, Poppy read it and flung it from her. But in the calm that came after a week's intolerable torment of longing, and despair, she read it again. The fierce fires that had consumed her were burning low then, and cast but a faint and dreary flicker down the pathway of the future. That future looked a land all shadows and gloom, whatsoever pathway she chose to take towards it. The simplest thing to do seemed the most desirable; and surely it was simplest just to let things stay as they were! She would tell Luce Abinger that her choice was to let things remain as they had always been, and then she would live on, drifting through the weary days and months and years, working a little every day, until work at last would become everything and fill her whole life. Perhaps, as she had missed love she would find fame. It did not seem to matter very much whether she did or not.

All she asked was to find peace. Knowing very little of life she did not realise that in asking for this she asked for everything. For no woman finds peace until she has tasted of all the poisoned dishes at the banquet of life--and then the peace is either of the dead body or the dead mind.

After those seven days of suffering, Poppy sat with her broken love-dream, like a pale child with a broken toy. She thought because she was numb that all was over then, except the dreary living through the dreary days. But the young have a great capacity for suffering, and she had forgotten how very young and strong she was, and how hot the blood ran in her veins. After a day she was back again in the trough of the sea. When at last she emerged she was a child no longer, but a woman with something to hide from the world--a wound that bled inwardly and would always ache.

Abinger had been gone nearly three weeks then, and wrote to say that he should probably be away for two or three months, as he was selling all the property he owned on the Rand, and the final settlements would take him quite that time. The thought of the long respite from his presence was a great relief to the girl, and by unconsciously lifting a little of the strain from her mind helped her to come back the sooner to her normal self. Kykie's delight was enormous when Poppy was to be seen wandering aimlessly through the house once more and into the garden; though _there_ she never stayed long now, and there were parts of it she did not go near.

From Kykie she learned incidentally, and without resentment, that the front gate was locked once more and the key safe with Abinger. That reminded her of her secret exit, and then she remembered Sophie Cornell, whose image had quite faded from her memory. It occurred to her that she ought to visit her self-imposed employer, and make her excuses and farewells as simply as possible, for something in her now strongly repudiated further a.s.sociation with the Colonial girl.

The visit and quarrel had braced her in a remarkable way. Afterwards she felt that in spite of all she was really alive still, and she found herself regretting that through Sophie's garden must lie her only way into the world beyond. The restrictions of the house began to irk her, and she was afraid of the garden. She felt she _must_ go out. She determined to visit the sea and explore the Berea; choosing such times as would be safest to make entries and exits through the little opening in the pa.s.sion-flower house. In the early mornings she knew well that wild horses might pa.s.s through Sophie's garden without her knowing or caring--and again, under cover of darkness it would be simple to slip through unseen. She told Kykie that in the future she always desired dinner at six-thirty; and Kykie, who had grown curiously meek and obedient of late, made no demur. This arrangement gave Poppy a long evening to herself, and she had never allowed anyone to intrude upon her evening hours. It would be supposed that she spent them in the garden, for always she had found great pleasure in wandering in the moonlight, and in the early morning hours, and the servants were well acquainted with her habits.

So she took to going forth. As soon as darkness fell she would depart, darkly-cloaked and with her head draped mantilla-wise, to see what the forbidden world looked like "'twixt gloam and moon." Her favourite route was by the Musgrave Road, a long thoroughfare that leads to the top of the Berea. Over gates would come to her glimpses of charmingly-lighted rooms, and pretty women sitting down to dinner, or sauntering with their husbands, enjoying the gardens after the heat of the day. Past one house and another she would go, catching little pictures between the trees, at windows, and through open doors--sometimes an exquisite little vision of a mother romping with her children and kissing them good-night; or a husband standing back with a critical c.o.c.k to his head to get a better view of his wife's new gown, or the way she had done her hair. She never stayed for the kiss that would come after the verdict, but flew swiftly on with her eyes suddenly hot and teeth set in her lip. Other sights were amusing: a face contorted and a head and arm screwed in the agony of fixing a collar-stud; a man grooming his head before an open window with two brushes, and a drop of something golden out of a bottle. Once she saw quite a sensible-looking man practising a charming smile on himself in the gla.s.s, and at that could not restrain a little jeer of delight at the "n.o.bler" s.e.x. When she caught children at windows in their nightgowns, peering out, she just gave a weird "_Who! Who!_" like the lesser-owl common in Natal, and they scuttled like rats.

These things affected her variously. Times she mocked the peaceful citizens of Natal for Philistines and flesh-potters. Times her heart came into her throat and tears scalded her eyes, and she felt like a prowling hungry jackal. But most often she flung a bitter laugh to the wind and said:

"I have the best of it--better prowl the veldt lean and free, than be caged and full."

Once or twice she had occasion to recall a French saying she had come across while her French was in the elementary stage. She had studied the phrase for an hour or two, and applied the dictionary to it, and eventually it read to the effect that if all the roofs in Paris were lifted one night the devil might be observed in every house lighting the fires to make the pots boil. The remark seemed to have lost some of its original point in translation, but it still bore an air of significance, and came singularly to hand once or twice, startling Poppy to the thought that Paris and Durban are both under the same sky, and that fuel of fire is the same all the world over. On these occasions it was she who scuttled, and she did it with good-will, almost cured of her taste for living pictures. But the pastime was fascinating to a lonely and lonesome creature, and she returned to it.

Many of the houses she pa.s.sed stood hidden away in thick gardens, with nothing to indicate their presence but glimmering lights and voices, or sometimes music, or the clank of dinner plates. But if sound attracted her, Poppy was not deterred by gates or gravelled paths. With a fleet foot, a sweet tongue, and an excellent imagination, there is little to fear in forbidden gardens, or anywhere else for that matter. The chief thing is to have the b.u.mp of adventure sufficiently developed!

Sometimes she found that there were others abroad for adventure also--some of these of a sociable temperament most inconvenient. Once a magnificent person in evening-dress followed her so persistently, that she was driven at last to the expedient of walking under the glare of a street lamp with her shoulders humped and her skirts held high enough to display to all who took an interest in the matter a pair of knock-kneed legs and horribly pigeon-toed feet. The device worked like magic; she was followed no further.

On another occasion she allowed a youthful Romeo to sit beside her on a bench, only to discover that she was afflicted with a painful sniffing cold--about forty sniffs to the minute. She was soon left sole occupant of the bench.

There were other _contretemps_. Once her evening out cost her sixpence, and she was very much annoyed, for her stock of sixpences was low.

Abinger paid all bills and did not expect her to have any need for money. It was her habit, if she saw a native policeman eye her suspiciously, to step quietly up to him with a most grand air and tell him to send her a rickshaw when he reached the main road, as she was in a hurry and could not wait for the car. The minute he was out of sight she would scud down a side street. But upon this occasion a rickshaw was so close at hand that she was obliged to take it and boldly direct the boy to Sophie's front gate. Arrived there, she ran full into a man coming out. The light from a pa.s.sing car showed her his face, dark and dissipated, but keen. He was carrying his hat in his hand, as men do on hot nights, and she observed that his hair was parted down the centre with a curl on either side.

"Ah! What Luce calls a German from Jerusalem!" was her comment.

Incidentally she smelled a smell she was familiar with, from daily contact with Sophie and sheets of MSS. This made her certain that it was the redoubtable "Brookie" himself whom she had encountered.

Often as she glided like a wraith through Sophie's garden the sound of laughter and the flavour of smoke came to her through the trees, or Sophie's voice, outraging the gentle night by some sentimental ballad.

One late February evening, when all the world was steeped in silver light, Poppy's heart seemed to her to be lying very still in her breast.

As she walked over the trembling moonlight shadows a curious feeling of happiness stole across her.

"Am I at peace already?" she asked herself wonderingly at last. "Has my soul forgotten what I did to it, and how I found it only to give it away to a man who called me by another woman's name?"

It must have been late, for carriages and cars pa.s.sed her, bearing homewards people who had been to the theatre or dining out. She caught sc.r.a.ps of conversation concerning the play, and little intimate remarks about people were flung freely to her upon the night wind. But her ears heeded nothing, for she had a companion who singularly engrossed her attention. She believed it was herself she walked with--a new-found, detached, curiously-contented self. She did not know that it was Destiny who had her by the hand.

At the top of the Berea Hill, not far from her own gate, she stopped a moment under the deep shadow of some wayside trees. All in black she seemed part of the shadow, and she stood very still, for she heard rickshaws coming up the hill, and she thought she would let them pa.s.s before she essayed the glare of a street lamp a few yards ahead. As it happened, the first rickshaw stopped at a double white gate which was full under the light of the lamp. A man descended, turned, and held out his hand, and a woman stepped daintily down. She was a thin, slim woman, wrapless, in a black satin gown with silvery sleeves. She looked as interesting, though not as wicked, as the Notorious Mrs. Ebbsmith. In the lamp-light her hair, which was dark brown, appeared to have seven red lights in it. Her face was neither beautiful nor pretty, but well-bred and harmonious, with a sort of glimmering gaiety about the eyes. Poppy instantly recognised her as the woman she had seen on the day of her first arrival in Durban and had subsequently ascertained to be Mrs. Portal. She was carrying on a desultory conversation with the man, and they continued it as he stood feeling in his pockets for money for the _boy_.

"Why don't you flirt with her yourself, Billy--Bill?" said she. "You would be good for her and she wouldn't do you any harm!"

He was a heavily-built, sullenly-handsome man, who looked as though he had never said a good-tempered thing in his life.

Poppy was astounded when he blithely answered:

"Darling, when there is only one woman in a man's life, he can't convincingly imply to the woman he is with that she is the only one in the world----"