Poppy Part 59

On their way home from the Point, Mrs. Portal and Miss Allendner looked in for a while at a friend's house on the Musgrave Road, where an "At Home" was in full swing.

Everyone cl.u.s.tered about Clem with solicitous inquiries for the health of Miss Chard, and she found herself detained a good while longer than she had intended. When at last she reached home she was flushed with haste, for not only were there people coming to dine, but two women friends were arriving that night to stay for some days; and the margin of time she had allowed herself to dress, give a final survey to the bedrooms, inspect the _menu_, and attend to the table-flowers, was far from wide. Also, she had a longing for a few moments' gossip and rest in Poppy's room, for through the rush of small affairs she had been barely able to exchange a word with her friend all day.

As soon as she entered the hall Sarah handed her a telegram, which she tore open and read immediately, supposing it to be from one of her expected guests. But as her eyes fell on the flimsy paper, both Sarah and the elderly spinster saw by the change that swept over her face that this must be something more serious than a guest's telegraphed regrets.

A look of blank astonishment was followed by one of horror. Her lips went white and the deadly shade crept over her face, seeming to age it suddenly. Then, her dazed eyes perceived the two women looking anxiously at her. Instantly she controlled herself; gave an order to Sarah, asked Miss Allendner if she could possibly arrange the table-flowers for her as she didn't think she would have time to do it herself, and with apparent indifference took up and read the cards of some visitors who had called during the afternoon. She even called Sarah back and made some inquiries as to whether any of the visitors had asked to see Miss Chard.

"They did so, ma'am. But I could not find Miss Chard anywhere, and I thought she was with you--afterwards she came in from the garden."

"Very well, Sarah--give cook as much help as you can this evening."

"Oh, _yes_, m'm."

The maid went her ways, and Mrs. Portal to her room.

When she had closed her door she stood still and re-read the telegram upon which her hand had retained a convulsive clutch. Afterwards, with a little groan, she dropped it and fell upon her knees by her bed.

Kneeling there, her face buried in her hands, she after a while lost count of time, and did not hear a knock on her door.

When the senses are dulled by suffering they play strange tricks on the poor human beings who depend on them. Poppy, who knocked, imagined that she distinctly heard a voice say:

"Come in," and opening the door she softly entered.

Clem sprang to her feet and turned her haggard face to the intruder, anger in her eyes; and Poppy, aghast and trembling, suddenly shrank back.

"Oh, Clem!... I beg your pardon," she stammered. "I was so certain I heard you say 'Come in' ... I ... Oh, you _know_ I would not dream of intruding on you...." She was whiter even than when she entered; her lips were quivering so much she could hardily speak coherently.

Unwittingly she had seen Clem kneeling there--abandoned to misery! And now she saw the tragic eyes that looked at her--and she knew what it all meant! _This_ was the first moment in the whole long day Clem had had to herself ... and she ... _she_ must needs intrude on the secret grief of the woman she loved _and had robbed_! She put out her hand with a gesture that implored forgiveness and told of love. Almost for the moment she forgot her misery in Clem's. But Clem had turned away and was standing at her dressing-table. Over her shoulder she said in a strained voice:

"It doesn't matter ... I don't mind _you_ ... I have had some bad news.

But don't ask me about it, dear. I can't speak of it--_even with you_!"

Was this said in bitterest irony? Poppy wondered dully, and she did not know what she answered before she left the room, and that did not matter, for Clem Portal did not hear. They were two people walking in heavy darkness that cut them off from the voices of their fellows.

Half an hour later the house rang with the laughter and merriment of the two new arrivals--old friends of the Portals--who had come down from Maritzburg to spend a few days and attend the Durban Club Ball, which was to take place the next night. In the drawing-room, before dinner was announced, Clem's laughter was the gayest of all; but to Poppy's ear there was a note in it like the clank of a broken bell. The Maritzburgers were two light-hearted, pretty women of the military set, whose husbands' regiments had so recently come from India that they were still keenly and sorely feeling the difference between Simla and the benighted capital of Natal. But their repinings were for the time forgotten in vivacious crowing over the fact that their husbands had been unable to accompany them at the last moment, so that there would now be nothing to prevent them from having a delightful fling and dancing their heels off at the coming ball.

"Robbie is all very well up to supper-time," cried Mrs. Dorand to the world at large, "but after supper he gets sleepy, and I meet his sulky face at every corner imploring me to come home."

"_Everybody_ knows how foolish Theodore is about my adoration for your Billy, Clem." The wife of Major Monk was a violet-eyed, jolly girl from the Curragh. "But _now_ I shall be able to dance with him uninterruptedly all night."

"Indeed then you won't," said Clem, "for he's been called away on business quite suddenly, and I doubt if he'll be back in time for the ball--so we shall be a hen party."

Amidst moans and expostulations she added: "But I daresay I can beat up a few wild-geese from somewhere. There are several coming to-night." She proceeded to recount the names and accomplishments of the men expected, and during the tale the rest of the party arrived and dinner was announced.

Poppy found herself upon the arm of Luce Abinger.

There were moments during the course of that dinner when she believed herself to be on the point of going mad; when the lights and the jewels and the wine and the faces were all hideously mixed, and she could have shrieked like a banshee at the two merry Maritzburg women, and fled from the table and the house. But always she was recalled to herself by just glancing to the head of the table where Clem Portal sat, the wittiest and most charming of hostesses, with two badly-painted streaks of red in her cheeks, and flaming lips which gradually lost their colouring and looked oddly at variance with the rest of the "make up" by the end of the dinner. Even bad dreams come to an end some time.

If there were two things in Poppy's world impossible to a.s.sociate with peace and grat.i.tude, they were a.s.suredly the darkness of a garden and the exclusive society of Luce Abinger. Yet she found herself during a part of that nightmare-evening looking upon these things as blessings for which to be distinctly thankful to Heaven.

Two other people were sauntering afar, and in the drawing-room a quartette had settled down to Bridge, with Miss Allendner at the piano playing the stilted _polonaises_ and polkas of her vanished youth.

Abinger and Poppy talked together in a friendly, natural fas.h.i.+on that they had never known before. He congratulated her about her work, said how much he had enjoyed reading her last book, and asked her if she had sold the African rights of her plays, as they were sure to bring in a large sum. She told him she had long ago sold all rights and spent the money; that, indeed, she had spent most of her money, and must begin to think about earning more at once. He knew, of course, about her loss of all the work she had recently done. Suddenly the recollection swept over her that it was to fight him that she wanted the money. She stood still in their idle sauntering, and faced him. All the terror and misery of the past, that he indirectly had been the cause of, came back. Yet she could not hate him when she saw his haggard, distorted face. And how ill he looked! For a moment she forgot her wrongs, in womanly pity.

"You look ill, Luce," she said kindly.

"I am ill; I am a starving man." He came near her and looked at her.

"You and I are both starving--for something we can't have. I have never been able to discover what it is you want--or, to be more precise, _who_--but you know very well who it is, and what, that I want."

She drew back from the look in his eyes. His tone changed instantly; he looked and spoke idly.

"Well--my offer holds good at any time."

"Your offer?"

"Yes ... don't forget it ... I know that the mere fact of money is nothing to you ... but you're not happy. If you like work and fame, well--you don't look like a girl who does, that's all!"

They were walking now over the dew-spangled lawn, and she was wondering what he meant. Suddenly he stood still and began to stammer at her incoherently.

"When I told you the truth in that letter, I did not do it in the spirit that a man throws up the sponge--don't think that! I did it," he continued hoa.r.s.ely, "to be fair and square with you for once. To begin again with the way clear before us--if you will. It was a rather fine thing to do, I thought," his tone changed to the old, sneering one; "but like all the fine things I've ever done it ended in repentance. I know now that I was a fool to tell you."

"What are you talking about, Luce?" she wonderingly asked. Then for the first time since she had locked her studio door on it she remembered his unread letter. "Is it something you told me in the letter you sent to the cottage?--I never read it. It was burned unopened the night of the fire."

A change came over his face. His scar seemed to twitch and gleam spasmodically in the moonlight. There was a silence. Then very softly he began to laugh, looking at her intently and feeling in all his pockets.

"What was in the letter, Luce?" she said beguilingly. She knew now that it was something she ought to know. But he only went on laughing softly.

She tried to recall and understand the words he had been saying, but she could not.

He thought of all the furious rage and contempt he had expended on himself within the last few weeks while he waited and waited for some word of thanks from her for the fine generous thing he had done in telling her the truth at last--that she was not his wife at all; that Carmen Braganza, the beautiful Spanish dancer, whom he had secretly married in Johannesburg, was still living at the time of the ceremony between himself and Poppy----

And she had never read the letter! All was as before!

She did not know, and there was still a fighting chance that, wearied out with the strife and siege, she would turn and surrender.

Then he would say:

"Yes--but we will not take the world into our confidence about the little ceremony in the White Farm. We'll go and be married publicly."

Thinking of these things, what could he do but look at her and softly laugh?

As for her, sick at heart, hopeless, remembering her misery, she turned away and set her desolate face towards the house, where a woman whom she loved well wore two little painted flames in her cheeks.

"What need to strive, with a life awry?"

Life was awry with everyone it seemed! What did it matter what Luce Abinger had to say?

She had no fight left in her. Her feet, as she walked up the sloping lawn, seemed too heavy to lift--they caught in the gra.s.s as she stumbled wearily towards the house, Abinger following.

"Good-night, Luce," she said lifelessly as they reached the verandah.

She felt no anger towards him now. She let him take her hand and she listened without resentment to his whispered words.