Winding Paths Part 46

"Once," offering his hand to Hermon. "Delighted to see you again. I hear you've made a hit already. My cousin tells me his friend is charmed with your way of grappling with her case."

"Did you take her by the shoulders?" asked Hal wickedly, rubbing her own.

"No,' Lord Denton told her. "He was very grave indeed. You must give him his due, Miss Pritchard. You've seen him grave yourself, haven't you now?"

"Yes; and he looked like a boiled owl. On the whole, I prefer him imbecile."

Alymer turned on her threateningly, but she slipped behind the other two, saying:

"Have you met these also, Lord Denton. Mr. St. Quintin, of Sh.o.r.editch, and my cousin, d.i.c.k Bruce, poet, novelist, and mother's help."

Denton shook hands with them genially, and then Lorraine came back, and they all followed her to the dining-room.

The repast was a very gay one. Every one was in the best of spirits, and, which is more important still, all were in attune, and there was no dissentient note. Hal was perhaps the gayest, and Lord Denton found himself watching her almost if he were seeing her for the first time.

She seemed to him to have developed amazingly in the few months since he last met her, but he supposed girls of her age often developed quickly.

Yet even then it seemed a little strange that the merry, rather crude young typist, as he had regarded her before, should so easily appear a sparkling, distinguished guest. He could not help a little mental comparision with Lorraine, not in any way to the latter's detriment, but with a vague thought at the back of his mind concerning her and Hermon.

Lorraine would always be beautiful: her whole face and form were modelled on lines that would stand the ravages of many years; and for him she would ever be one of the dearest of women; but could she match Hal's young, vigorous, independence, that was very likely to prove more attractive than a generously given devotion?

Men, like women, are drawn to an indifference that piques them; and he, man of the world that he was, foresaw a strong irresistible attraction about Hal's spirited independence.

But, on the other hand, Lorraine was intensely sympathetic and understanding, as well as beautiful; and it seemed strange indeed if any man she chose to enslave could resist her.

He watched Hermon bend his fair head down to her dark one, with an affectionate, protective air, that was very becoming to him; and observed that with Hal it was all sparring, and told himself Lorraine had nothing to fear.

They toasted Hermon on his brief, and on the laurel wreath d.i.c.k announced he already perceived sprouting on his manly brow. Hal said it was only a daisy chain, or the halo of a cherubim; and the laurels were rightly sprouting on d.i.c.k's brow as a novelist.

Hermon returned thanks in a witty, clever little speech, during which Lorraine seemed scarcely able to take her eyes from his face, and Lord Denton recognised more fully the extraordinary attraction such a man must wield, whether by intention or quite unconsciously.

He pictured him towering a head and shoulders above nearly every one around at the law courts, with his clear-cut, fine face, looking yet more striking in the severe setting of a wig and gown; and he knew that Lorraine had made no mistake when she said he only wanted impetus and a chance to make a name for himself. If he could rap out a dainty little speech like this at a moment's notice, wearing just that air of unpretentious, boyish humour, his path ought undoubtedly to be a path of roses, petted by women, admired and appreciated by men.

"In conclusion," he was saying, "may I suggest a toast to Miss Pritchard? I am sure you will all join me in offering her our warmest congratulations upon her sudden and unlooked-for promotion, from a somewhat nondescript young person to a brilliant and beautiful society belle."

"Speech! speech!" cried d.i.c.k and Quin to her gleefully, noisely rattling their gla.s.ses, and Hal got to her feet.

"Ladies and gentleman and Baby Alymer Hermon," she began. "You must allow me to acknowledge your kind toast by congratulating you all, in return, upon the sudden and swift development of you powers of vision and perspicacity: equalled only, I may say, by your extraordinary dulness in not having observed long ago those traits for which you are pleased, at this late hour, to offer me your congratulations. Before I sit down I should like to suggest we all drink the healths of the celebrated actress who is our hostess, of a bishop in the making -"

signifying Quin; "a great novelist in the brewing, and a gentleman justly celebrated for the eloquence and ease with which he does nothing at all" - and she bowed to Lord Denton.

"Capital!" he exclaimed. "I am evidently dining in very distinguished company to-night"; a little later, turning to d.i.c.k, he added: "How soon, may I ask, will this great novel be procurable by the general public?"

Before d.i.c.k could reply, Hal intercepted gaily:

"Well, I think the carrots and turnips have fallen out as to which takes precedence at a dinner-party: isn't that so, d.i.c.k? And until the difficult question is settled, progress halts."

"Something of the kind," agreed d.i.c.k promptly; "and there is also discord among the vegetable marrows and pumpkins on a similar question; but when the Baby Brigade has settled the views of the Trade Unions, and reversed the Osborne Judgment, we shall be able to proceed smoothly."

"It sounds a very extraordinary type of novel," said Lorraine.

"It is. I wanted, if possible, to write something even more imbecile than has ever yet been written. I have not the patience for great length; nor the wit for brilliant satire; nor the imagination for te popular, spicy, impossible, ill-flavoured romance; so I have chosen the other line, adopted by the great majority, and aim at purposeless, pointless imbecility."

"And is Hal the model for your heroine?" asked Hermon.

When Hal's indignation and epithets had subsided, Quin remarked that he supposed the book fairly bristled with mothers, and with paragraphs of good advice to them.

"Well, yes," d.i.c.k admitted. "There are certainly a good many mothers - far more mothers than wives, in fact."

"Oh, naughty!" put in Lord Denton.

"Not at all. It has to do with a theory. It is to bring out the common sense of vegetables compared to humans. Humans condemn millions of women, specially born for motherhood, to purposeless, joyless spinsterhood, all on account of a prejudice. No green, brainless, commonplace vegetable would be guilty of such unutterable folly as that."

"Don't be too sweeping," quoth Quin. "In the East End women are still mothers from choice; and given decent, healthy conditions, they would proudly raise an army to protect their country from her threatening foes. It is not their fault that 50 per cent of their offspring are sickly, anaemic little weeds."

"It sounds as if your book has a serious side in spite of its imbecility?" suggested Lorraine.

"Imbecility and madness are usually full of seriousness," d.i.c.k told her - "far more so than commonplace rationalism."

"And do you want to revolutionise society?"

"Oh dear no; what an alarming idea!"

"Then what do you want?" - they asked him.

"I want to see all the superfluous unemployed spinsters busy, happy mothers, patriotically contributing to raise a splendid fighting-force, for one thing, which will certainly be regarded as an utterly imbecile idea by a magnificently rational world."

"And have you any theory about it?" asked Lord Denton.

"Nothing but the worn-out, commonplace, absurdly natural theories of the vegetable and animal kingdoms. My only chance is that, being so ancient, and so absurdly natural, the modern world may mistake them for something entirely new, and seize upon them with the fasionable avidity for novelties."

"Or they may lock you up," suggested Quin.

"In any case I'm afraid you'll be too late," Hal commented, with a half grave, half sarcastic air; "for before your theories can make any headway, England is likely to have given all her life-blood to systems, and restrictions, and cut-and-dried conventions, utterly regardless of her need for a strong protecting force to maintain her existence at all. Taken in the aggregate, she never has bothered much about the primary necessity for the best possible conditions for the mothers of the future."

"What a learned sentence, Hal," put in Lorraine, looking amused.

"Quite worthy of a militant suffragette."

"The announced suffragettes are not the only ones who care for England's future," she said. "I suppose I care a good deal because I'm in the newspaper world, and I know something of what she has to contend against in the way of petty party spirit and the self-aggrandising of some of her so-called leaders, who haven't an ounce of true patriotism, and only want to shout something outrageous in a very loud voice, just to attract public attention."

"I think Bruce is right up to a certain point," remarked Lord Denton.

"We can hardly contemplate the reinst.i.tution of polygamy, but it certainly ought to be the business of the State to see that every child born into the country is given the best possible conditions in which to become a good citizen and, if necessary, a good soldier."

"Isn't there a Poor Law for that express purpose?" asked Lorraine.

"Don't speak of it," commented Quin sadly. "Our Poor Law, like so many excellent inst.i.tutions, is mostly run on a wrong basis. Huge sums of money are expended in procuring homes for homeless children, and the last thing that seems to be considered is the suitability of the home.

Applications are accepted in a perfunctory, business-like way by guardians and others - and perhaps an inspector takes a casual glance round; but the moral aspect of the whole matter, as to character and habits, is mostly left to chance. We, who are on the spot, often have to rescue children from the homes the State has provided for them."

"It is more supervision, then, that you want?" asked Lord Denton.

"It is a different sort of supervision altogether. It ought to be woman's work, not man's - women who are paid and encouraged and helped."