The Beautiful Wretch; The Pupil of Aurelius; and The Four Macnicols Part 24

'I generally take that as a precaution,' Nan said, simply.

'I thought so,' said Mr. Tom, with great satisfaction at his own shrewdness. 'I can tell in a minute. For you always come back looking highly pleased with yourself and inclined to be cheeky. I don't like the look of you when you're too set up. Your tongue gets too sharp.

I'd advise you people to look out.'

Nan's conscience smote her. Was she so glad, then, that even outsiders saw it in her face? She became graver; and she vowed that she would be most reticent at dinner. Had she not promised to herself to try to be ten times kinder to everybody?

And she very soon, at dinner, had an opportunity of displaying her generosity. They were busy making havoc of the manner of a distinguished person who was much talked of at that time, and whom they had all chanced to meet. Now Nan ordinarily was very intolerant of affectation; but had she not promised to be ten times kinder to everybody? So she struck in in defence of this lady.

'But it is her nature to be affected,' said Nan. 'She is quite true to herself. That is her disposition. It wouldn't be natural for her to try not to be affected. She was born with that disposition. Look at the idiotic grimaces that infants make when they try to show they are pleased. And Mrs. ---- wouldn't be herself at all if she wasn't affected. She might as well try to leave off her affectations as her clothes. She couldn't go about without any.'

'She goes about with precious little,' said Mr. Tom, who strongly disapproved of scanty ball-dresses. And then he added, 'But that's Nan all over. She's always for making the best of everything and everybody. It's always the best possible world with her.'

'And isn't that wise,' said Frank King, with a laugh, 'considering it's the only one we've got to live in at present?'

Nan was very bright and cheerful during this dinner, and Captain Frank King was most markedly attentive to her, and interested in her talking.

When Nan began to speak, he seemed to consider that the whole table ought to listen; and his was the first look that approved, and the first laugh that followed. Then he discovered that she knew all sorts of out-of-the-way things that an ordinary young lady could by no possibility have been expected to know. It was more than ever clear to him that these solitary wanderings had taught her something. Where had she acquired all this familiarity, for example, with details about his own profession--or what had been his profession?

They went on to talk of the jeers of cabmen at each other, and how sharp some of them were. Then again they began to talk about other common sayings--the very origin of which had been forgotten; and Frank King spoke of a taunt which was an infallible recipe for driving a bargee mad--'_Who choked the boy with duff?_'--though n.o.body, not the bargees themselves, now knew anything whatever about the tragic incident that must have happened sometime and somewhere.

'Yes,' said Nan at once, 'and there is another like that that the collier-boats can't stand. If you call out to a collier, "_There's a rat in your chains_" he'd drive his schooner ash.o.r.e to get after you.'

'I suppose you have tried,' said her mother, with calm dignity.

'I believe Nan spends most of her time,' said the Beauty, 'in making mud-pies with the boys in Sh.o.r.eham Harbour.'

'Never you mind, Nan,' her brother said to encourage her. 'Next time we go to Newhaven, you'll call out to the colliers, "_There's a rat in your chains_," and I'll stop behind a wall and watch them beating you.'

All during that dinner Nan was both amused and amusing, until a trifling little incident occurred. She and Frank King on the other side of the table had almost monopolised the conversation, although quite unwittingly; and everybody seemed to regard this as a matter of course. Now it happened that Madge, who sat next her betrothed, made some slight remark to him. Perhaps he did not hear. At all events, he did not answer, but addressed Nan instead, with reference to something she had just been saying about lifeboats. Instantly, a hurt expression came over Madge's face, and as instantly Nan saw it. From that moment she grew more reserved. She avoided addressing herself directly to Captain Frank King. She devoted herself chiefly to her mother; and when, at the end of dinner, they adjourned in a body to the billiard-room (with the happy indifference of youth) she followed Lady Beresford up to the drawing-room and would herself make tea for her.

'Do you know, Nan,' she said, quite plainly, 'that whenever you are in the room Frank pays no attention to any one else?'

'I thought he was doing his best to amuse everybody at dinner,' Nan said--though she did not raise her eyes. 'He told some very good stories.'

'Yes, to you,' Madge insisted. Then she added, 'You know I like it. I hope he will always be good friends with all the family: for you see, Nan, it will be lonely for me at Kingscourt for a while, and of course I should like to have somebody from Brighton always in the house. And I know he admires you very much. He's always talking about your character, and your disposition, and your temperament, as if he had been studying you like a doctor. I suppose I've got no character, or he would talk about that sometimes. I don't understand it--that talking about something inside you, as if it was something separate from yourself; and calling it all kinds of sentiments and virtues, as if it was clockwork you couldn't see. I don't see anything like that in you, Nan--except that you are very kind, you know--but not so different from other people--as he seems to think.'

'It doesn't much matter what he thinks, does it?' suggested Nan, gently.

'Oh no, of course not,' Madge said, promptly. 'He said I was a very good skater, considering the horrid condition of the ice. They have a large lake at Kingscourt.' Then after a pause, 'Nan, where did you learn all that about the lighthouses and the birds at night?'

'Oh, that? I really don't know. What about it?--it is of no consequence.'

'But it interests people.'

'It ought not to interest you, or Captain King either. You will have to think of very different things at Kingscourt.'

'When you and Mr. Jacomb come to Kings----'

'Madge,' said Nan, quickly, 'you must not say anything like that. I do not mean to marry Mr. Jacomb, if that is what you mean.'

'No? Honour bright?'

'I shall not marry Mr. Jacomb; and I am not likely to marry any one,'

she said, calmly. 'There are other things one can give one's life to, I suppose. It would be strange if there were not.'

Madge thought for a second or two.

'Oh, Nan,' she said cheerfully, 'it would be so nice to have an old-maid sister at Kingscourt. She could do such a lot of things, and be so nice and helpful, without the fuss and pretension of a married woman. It would be really delightful to have you at Kingscourt!'

'I hope, dear, you will be happy at Kingscourt,' said Nan, in a somewhat lower voice.

'I shall never be quite happy until you come to stay there,' said Madge, with decision.

'You will have plenty of occupation,' said Nan, absently. 'I have been thinking if a war broke out I should like to go as one of the nurses; and of course that wants training beforehand. There must be an inst.i.tution of some kind, I suppose. Now, good-night, dear.'

'Good-night, Mother Nan. But we are not going to let you go away into wars. You are coming to Kingscourt. I know Frank will insist on it.

And it would just be the very place for you; you see you would be in n.o.body's way; and you always were so fond of giving help. Oh, Nan,'

her sister suddenly said, 'what is the matter? You are crying! What is it, Nan?'

Nan rose quickly.

'Crying? No--no--never mind, Madge--I am tired rather--there--good-night.'

She got her sister out of the room only in time. Her overstrained calmness had at length given way. She threw herself on the bed, and burst into a pa.s.sion of weeping; and thus she lay far into the night, stifling her sobs so that no one should hear.

CHAPTER XX.

THE SHADOW.

The process of disenchantment is one of the saddest and one of the commonest things in life; whether the cause of it be the golden youth who, apparently a very Bayard before marriage, after marriage gradually reveals himself to be hopelessly selfish, or develops a craving for brandy, or becomes merely brutal and ill-tempered; or whether it is the creature of all angelic gifts and graces who, after her marriage, destroys the romance of domestic life by her slatternly ways, or sinks into the condition of a confirmed sigher, or in time discovers to her husband that he has married a woman comprising in herself, to use the American phrase, nine distinct sorts of a born fool. These discoveries are common in life; but they generally follow marriage, which gives ample opportunities for study. Before marriage man and maid meet but at intervals; and then both are alike on their best behaviour. The slattern is no slattern now; she is always dainty and nice and neat; the golden youth is generous to a fault, and n.o.ble in all his ways; and if either or both should be somewhat foolish, or even downright stupid, the lack of wisdom is concealed by a tender smile or a soft touch of the hand. It is the dream-time of life; and it is not usual for one to awake until it is over.

But it was different with Frank King. The conditions in which he was placed were altogether peculiar. He had made two gigantic mistakes--the first in imagining that any two human beings could be alike: the second in imagining that, even if they were alike, he could transfer his affection from the one to the other--and he was now engaged in a hopeless and terrible struggle to convince himself that these were not mistakes. He would not see that Madge Beresford was very different from Nan. He was determined to find in her all he had hoped to find. He argued with himself that she was just like Nan, as Nan had been at her age. Madge was so kind, and good, and nice; of course it would all come right in the end.

At the same time, he never wished to be alone with Madge, as is the habit of lovers. Nor if he was suddenly interested in anything did he naturally turn to her, and call her attention. On the other hand, the little social circle did not seem complete when Nan, with her grave humour, and her quiet smile, and her gentle, kindly ways, was absent.

When she came into the room, then satisfaction and rest were in the very air. If there was a brighter green on the sea, where a gleam of wintry suns.h.i.+ne struck the roughened waters, whose eyes but Nan's could see that properly? It was she whom he addressed on all occasions; perhaps unwittingly. It seemed so easy to talk to Nan. For the rest, he shut his eyes to other considerations. From the strange fascination and delight that house in Brunswick Terrace always had for him, he knew he must be in love with somebody there; and who could that be but Madge Beresford, seeing that he was engaged to her?

Unhappily for poor Madge, Frank King was now called home by the old people at Kingscourt; and for a time, at least, all correspondence between him and his betrothed would obviously have to be by letter.

Madge was in great straits. A look, a smile, a touch of the fingers may make up for lack of ideas; but letter-writing peremptorily demands them, of some kind or another. As usual, Madge came to her elder sister.

'Oh, Nan, I do so hate letter-writing. I promised to write every morning. I don't know what in the world to say. It is such a nuisance.'

Nan was silent; of late she had tried to withdraw as much as possible from these confidences of her sister's; but not very successfully.

Madge clung to her. Lady Beresford would not be bothered. Edith was busy with her own affairs. But Nan--old Mother Nan--who had nothing to think of but other people, might as well begin and play the old maid at once, and give counsel in these distressing affairs.

'I wish you would tell me what to say,' continued Madge, quite coolly.