Читать книгу Lady Jim of Curzon Street - Fergus Hume - Страница 13

Keeping up the necessary Darby-and-Joan comedy, Kaimes strolled into his wife's dressing-room half an hour before dinner to inquire if she was ready. Leah had a second-hand view of him in a full-length mirror before which she posed, while her maid added a few final touches to an eminently successful frock. From the composed expression of his face she guessed that he had not yet renewed his acquaintance with Mr. Askew, and therefore must be ignorant that the free-spoken sailor had let the cat out of the bag. Lady Jim possessed the animal now, but she did not intend to reveal her capture until Jim explained how he had sped with the Duke. A slight nod towards the glass showed her husband that she was aware of his presence, and the maid continued to use experienced fingers. But Leah looked so charming, that further trouble in this way was like adding sugar to honey. Jim stared approvingly, and, when the maid was dismissed, saw his way to a compliment.

"You have the good points of several women rolled into one, Leah," he said, with the look of a sultan appraising an odalisque.

"That polite speech means much, coming from a man of your experience, my dear Jim. What good point of Mrs. Penworthy's have I annexed?"

"You're jealous!"

"Horribly! You are so deeply attached to that bundle of faded chiffon."

"I don't care two straws for her."

"Appearances are misleading, then. But," added Leah, remembering Askew's eulogy, "it may be that you prefer something that's good and holy and pure."

"I don't know why you should say that," grumbled Jim, annoyed at being credited with such primitive tastes.

"You may know before long," and she laughed at the thought of the marine bomb-shell which would shortly shatter Jim's complacency.

"I don't know what you're talkin' about," said Kaimes, with unaffected surprise, "an' I'm confoundedly hungry."

"Ah! Did the Duke's lecture give you an appetite?"

"Leah!" Jim became so serious as to look almost intelligent. "My father is the best man who ever wore shoe-leather."

"He is usually condemned to cloth boots for gouty feet," murmured Leah, patting the back of her head. "So you've pulled the wool over his eyes again?"

"I wish you wouldn't use slang," protested Jim, virtuously.

"I can't pretend to vie with Mrs. Penworthy's purity of speech, my dear man. How much have you got out of the Duke?"

"Well, he hasn't given me money----"

"Oh!"

"But he's promised----

"Ah!"

"I wish you'd let me speak," cried Kaimes, testily, "My father has promised to pay all the debts----"

"Good heavens! Is he aware of the amount?"

"Wait, I've not finished. He'll pay the debts, and reduce our income to a thousand a year till he recoups himself."

"Really! I thought you had seen your father, and not a money-lender. Have you accepted this most generous offer?"

"Yes, I have," said Jim, sulkily, and kicking a mat out of the way.

"I see. It's to be Bayswater after all, James."

"If you talk like that, I'll go down to dinner without you."

"By all means. You've taken away my appetite."

She laughed in a way calculated to still further infuriate Jim, who paced the room in a towering passion. Nevertheless, she was seriously angry. Had the Duke refused all help, it would have been more decent; but this bargain, which was all on one side, annoyed her beyond measure. What did the Duke mean by taking their money?

"It seems to me we've got to pay our own debts, then," she said, while Jim seethed like a whirlpool.

"An' why shouldn't we? It's only fair."

Leah stared, and began to think that Jim was too good for this world.

"I hope you are not going to die," she said, anxiously.

"Not in your way," cried Kaimes, misunderstanding her, "we aren't going to have any buryin' alive or substituted corpses, an' I'm goin' to hang on as a respectable member of society."

"I'll come and hear you preach, Jim."

"I'm preachin' now," raged her husband, "an' don't you make any mistake, Leah. I've told the Duke everythin'."

"How injudicious! He might have had a fit."

"He didn't even blame me," said Jim, breaking down, "an' there were tears in his eyes."

Leah laughed amazingly long and loud, considering the tightness of her corset.

"I wish I had been present. Did you cry too, Jim?"

"I jolly well nearly did," said Kaimes, truthfully, if ungrammatically, "though it's no good explainin' to an icicle like you. But the pater's goin' to pay the debts, free our income, an' let the Curzon Street house."

"Better and better. Then we do go to Bayswater?"

"He'll allow us one thousand a year till the debts are wiped off," went on Kaimes hurriedly, and wishing to get the explanation over, "an' we can go abroad for a couple of years."

"You can. I shan't!"

"As my wife, you must."

"As an individual, I shan't," retorted Lady Jim, calmly. She was getting over her rage now, as she foresaw a very different interview between herself and Jim before they retired for the night. "It is very good of you to have settled all this without consulting me. And now that you have done so, let us go to dinner."

"But I----"

"There's the gong," observed Leah, opening the door, "and I don't like cold soup."

"You'll have to like lots of things now you didn't like before," said Jim, as they went down.

"The selection doesn't include you, my good man, so don't be disappointed."

Jim could have shaken her, and began to understand why the lower orders indulged in wife-beating. But as they were entering the drawing-room at this moment, he had to play the part of a devoted husband. Leah floated radiantly into the brilliantly lighted apartment, and Jim sought out the oldest and ugliest woman he could find. When he thought of his wife, beauty sickened him for the time being. Thus it came about that Miss Jaffray had the pleasure of shouting into his ear throughout a long and wearisome dinner.

Whether it was the work of the fetish or of Lady Frith, Leah did not know, but she found herself seated at the table with Askew on her right hand.

The young man looked flustered, and ill at ease. "I'm so sorry!" he began apologetically, and, as she thought, tactlessly.

"That you're my neighbour?" she interrupted sweetly. "How unkind!"

"No! But I never knew he was your husband."

"Who? Mr. Berring?"

"Don't make it harder for me," he entreated softly. "I've been calling myself names ever since we parted."

"You should have left that to me, Mr. Askew."

"There's nothing in it, you know," he stuttered, heedlessly. "Of course, she never married him."

"I hope not, for the sake of morality," said Lady Jim, lightly, and thinking that the soup was worse than usual. "However, it doesn't matter. My husband is a modest man, and sometimes drops his title when travelling. I daresay, as Mr. Berring, he thought he was free to make love."

"But he wasn't," protested Askew, with a glance towards the unconscious Jim, who apparently had not recognised him.

"You should tell him so."

"I intend to--in the smoking room."

Lady Jim looked at him imperiously, and softened her voice to a very direct whisper. "Don't make trouble," she said, in a somewhat domineering tone; "that will do no good and much harm. And after all, married or unmarried, every man has a right to admire a pretty woman."

"But not to make love to her," muttered the young man, with another vengeful glance.

"I am no casuist," replied Leah, calmly; "and you should be pleased that things are as they are. You can now return to Lima, or Rosario, and marry the lady."

"She wouldn't have me!"

"Is she so much in love with Mr. Berring, then?"

"Please don't, Lady James. I can't talk like this to you."

She gave a light laugh. "It seems to me that you are talking; therefore I repeat my question."

"It might only have been gratitude," he murmured.

"For what?"

"Berring--I mean your husband--saved her from being trampled upon by a mustang."

"How picturesque, and how suited to Jim's qualifications! And she----?"

"No, she didn't," interrupted Askew, hurriedly. "I see I have been mistaken. It was gratitude, not love."

"Of course," said Lady Jim, jeeringly; "a woman always prefers to exercise the former rather than the latter."

"I wish I'd stopped and tried my luck," muttered the sailor, not clever enough to interpret this speech.

"It's not too late. Mr. Berring is safely secured, by love and the law, to my apron-strings, so you can go back and----"

"No; I've just come in for a property of sorts, and the service has seen the last of me."

"Is Señorita Fajardo in the same predicament as the service?"

"There's a cousin, Lady James----"

"A female cousin, who goes with the property, as a fixture. I quite understand. You have to marry her, out of gratitude for the money, and without the discomforting passion of love. The Spanish lady's history repeats itself, I see."

Askew was rather discomfited. "How quick you are!"

"You can't have had much to do with women," she murmured; "but I hope you will make no trouble in the smoking-room."

"No; as things are, it's none of my funeral," he observed, grumpily.

"Quite so. I am the chief mourner."

"But I say, Lady James," said the lieutenant, anxiously, "I hope what I've inadvertently told you won't----"

"Of course not," she assured him, mendaciously; "my husband is most trustworthy, as you can see by his choice of that ugly old maid as a dinner companion. You were mistaken."

"I think I must have been," said Askew, with great relief. "Of course, people talk at Lima, as elsewhere," he ended apologetically.

"Unless South America is inhabited by the deaf and dumb, I suppose they do."

"You're laughing at me, Lady James."

"I always laugh. It's good for the digestion."

"At everything?"

"At everything."

"Even at love?" he asked timidly.

She shot an amused glance at his colouring face. "Remember you are engaged to the fixture, Mr. Askew."

"But I say, can't I come and see you in town?"

"I shall be delighted, if you can find your way to Curzon Street."

"You live there?" he asked obtusely.

"In a most respectable manner with my husband, Mr. Berring. I'm known as Lady Jim of Curzon Street. Most improper, isn't it, when Berring----?"

"I say, don't," expostulated the young man, quickly. "I'll never forgive myself for being such a fool. Can I call you Lady Jim?"

He was getting on very fast, and Leah, in the interests of virtue, deemed it necessary to snub him. "Certainly not. Only people who have known me fifty years address me so familiarly."

"You must believe in re-incarnation then," he retorted.

This was clever and pleased her. "I was Circe in the days of Homer, Mr. Askew. But as to my name now, there is another Lady Jim--a horrid woman who carries tracts and meddles with morals, and dresses in a piously shabby fashion. So that we may not be mixed up, I am known by the name of the street I live in. To you I am Lady James Kaimes!"

"And Circe, the sorceress," he murmured.

Leah laughed. "We'll see what sort of animal my magic will turn you into," she observed, with an encouraging smile.

This was a distinct promise, or at least he construed it as such, for his eyes brightened, and he glanced at her in a way which assured her that she was looking her best. He was certainly a delightful boy, she reflected, if somewhat fickle. But a man who was catholic enough to marry the fixture, and adore the Spanish lady, and make sudden love to herself, must be worth feminine appreciation and study. Besides, he was good-looking, and had money, conjoined with a frank and unsuspicious nature. Assuredly, he might be useful, if not inclined to explore the Land of Tenderness too assiduously. But in that case, he might compromise her in an earnest, pig-headed way, which would be at once boring, ridiculous, and dangerous. Leah approved of playing with fire, but she was too careful to risk a personal conflagration. Though allured by the prospect of tormenting an honest heart, she had not made up her mind to enjoy the opportunity by the time she left the dining-room. But a distinctly tigerish glance, sent to her address by Demetrius, almost inclined her to give young Askew the chance of making a fool of himself. The Russian had apparently noticed the embryo flirtation.

"All the better," thought Leah, sailing into the Adamless Eden of the winter garden; "it will be an additional card to play"--which showed that Lady Jim was by no means satisfied with the arrangement come to between her husband and his father.

"A cigarette, dear Lady Jim?" simpered Mrs. Penworthy.

"No, thanks; I leave smoking to women who bait their hooks with agreeable vices;" and she moved towards Lady Canvey.

It was horribly rude, and Mrs. Penworthy choked back an hysterical scream.

"Delightful woman, Lady James," said Miss Jaffray.

"Delightful," assented the other, who at the moment would gladly have mounted the scaffold on a charge of murdering her insolent rival. "I call her perfectly lovely. Such a perfect complexion, and exquisite figure, and heavenly eyes, and large hands."

But this piece of spite was wasted, as by this time Lady Jim was seated by her godmother, assuring that sceptical lady how absolutely delighted she was to learn that dear Jim had arranged matters with the dear Duke. "And so sweet of the Duke to tell you," she went on. "I know how anxious you have been about me.

"Can you wonder at it, my dear, when you are so sweet and gentle and womanly?" said Lady Canvey, who was quite equal to a war of words.

"You must be thinking of Hilda Frith," replied Lady Jim, calmly. "I cannot call myself such an angel."

"No; you left that to the sailor-boy you were flirting with."

"Poor boy, he doesn't know how to flirt."

"You'll teach him, my dear," chuckled the old lady.

"Not without fees."

"Humph. His education will cost him a pretty penny."

"Possibly. But I might teach him for love, after the fashion of Miss Tallentire and Lionel."

"Rubbish! Joan doesn't know how to flirt."

"Or to dress either. I must ask her how the Whiteley sales are getting on."

"Leah!" said Lady Canvey, with a pained look. "Why have you such a bitter tongue?"

"I must defend myself somehow. You wouldn't have me scratch and bite, would you?"

"I would have you be more womanly and lovable, my dear."

"On a thousand a year, and such a husband as I have?"

"Every man is what his wife makes him."

"They generally go to other men's wives to be manufactured. Besides, so far as Jim is concerned, you can't make a silk purse out of a certain animal's ear."

"My dear, I am an old woman, and perhaps rather sharp-tongued at times, but I have a motherly feeling for you. Can't you give up this wild life, and go abroad to devote yourself to Jim? He has his good points, my dear, and if you would try and live more amicably with him, I am sure you would be a happy woman. Then, in a year or so, you could come back to Curzon Street, with all the debts paid, and your full income to live on. Believe me"--she laid a withered hand on Leah's beautiful arm--"I speak for the best, my dear girl."

Leah smiled disdainfully. "Now that the sermon's over, can I pass round the plate?" she said cruelly.

"Not for me to put money in," said Lady Canvey, with a flush. "I shan't give you a penny. It is useless talking to you, Leah; your one idea is money and enjoyment and love of admiration."

"It seems to me that those are three ideas," replied Lady Jim, rising; "but as our conversation is neither enjoyable nor instructive, I shall go away." All the same she lingered, and talked in a low tone, with unexpected emotion. "You blame me, Lady Canvey, for being what I am. Pray, what chance have I had of being otherwise? I lost my mother when I was a child; I was brought up by a neglectful and selfish father; I am married to a husband who has nothing of the man about him, save those handsome looks, which lured me into a much-regretted marriage. All my life I have lived with worldly and material people, and your counsel has been as worldly as that of any one of them. I have never been shown the difference between right and wrong, and there isn't a single soul in the world who has a spark of love for me. If my up-bringing and surroundings had been better, I might be a good woman--so far as I can be, I am a good woman. I have my moments of regret--I have my moments when I wish I could be a religious, dowdy saint. But who will help me out of the mire--who will----?" Here she broke off, for her emotion was becoming too strong for the publicity of the place. With a violent effort, which showed the strength and courage of her nature, she calmed down, and the colour faded from her face, as did the frown, which gave place to a cynical smile. Annoyed with herself for having given Lady Canvey a glimpse of her better nature, she walked away, leaving the old woman surprised and startled, and, in her own selfish way, truly sorry. There was much truth in what Leah had said.

But her mask was on again the moment she crossed to the door, and Demetrius, who was obviously looking for her, saw only the beautiful, calm woman he knew so well. His face was as agitated as Leah's had been a few minutes previously.

"Madame, I must see you privately."