Читать книгу Petticoat Loose - Rita - Страница 9

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Brianna was plainly and neatly dressed in a dark serge gown and black straw sailor hat, but her tall figure and beautiful brilliant face were none the less remarkable because of her attire.

She walked on by Max Lorrimer's side; Clive and Templeton followed behind. The restaurant where they ordered supper was almost empty. They secured a table at the far end of the room, and Brianna looked round at the novel scene with intense curiosity. She had never been in such a place, or seen a meal served with the luxurious additions of flowers and glass and silver and delicate napery. That quickness of observation and ready adaptability so peculiar to the Irish character stood her friend now. She was neither awkward nor bold. The three men who were keenly observant of her every action could detect unfamiliarity with her surroundings, but nothing coarse or objectionable.

"Now," said Max, cheerfully, as he filled her glass with champagne. "Now, tell us how it came to pass that you were in the caste to-night, and acquitted yourself so admirably. I assure you I found it a difficult matter to convince myself or my friends that Jessica was really you."

Her eyes shone with excitement.

"It was just as wonderful to me," she said. "You remember I told you that Mickey used to be an actor, and that he knew almost every play of Shakespeare's, and had taught me ever so many parts?"

"Yes, I remember that."

"Well, he knows the manager of this company, and learnt that two of the girls had suddenly left, and they did not know what to do for a Jessica to-night. He thought of me. I knew every line of the part, and they said, even if I was letter perfect it would do for the emergency. But Mickey made me act it, and feel it, and we had a rehearsal on the stage before the performance, and the manager said I would do very well. That was all."

"All!" said Raemore Clive, looking at her with his strange eyes. "You don't make much of it, but it seems incredible that a girl with no experience, scarcely any teaching, and only one rehearsal, could go on and act as you acted to-night."

"It seemed very easy," she said, simply. "You see, I knew it all so well. It wasn't a bit strange. Indeed, I could have repeated all Portia's part also, though I would not have dared to act it."

"You are a born actress, I am sure," said Raemore Clive. "No one could doubt that."

A waiter placed a dish of cutlets before Max Lorrimer, and he handed her one. She was hungry and ate it with evident enjoyment. Clive watched her with languid interest. She was a new study to him, this daughter of the people, with her frankness and unconventionality and utter ignorance of his own world. He led her on to speak of her life in the caravan, and she described Sally Dunne and mimicked her oddities of speech in a way that at once set the original before their eyes. The champagne exhilarated her, but Max was watchful and careful, and took care that she should have no cause to regret the acceptance of his invitation. Certainly, she had no reason to complain of want of respect on the part of his companions.

But Raemore Clive drew her out as no one else could. She bared her nature, her feelings, her ambitions, her very soul at his bidding. It angered Max Lorrimer to hear such naked confessions, but he could not stay them. Finally, at the thought-reader's bidding, she held out her hand, brown, coarsened by work, hard of palm, with no redeeming quality save its slender shape. He took it in his own and examined the lines carefully.

"A hard life," he said. "And you are not one to take things easily. You are emotional, headstrong, and passionate. You crave fame, and it will be yours; but the path is thorny, and your feet will bleed and blister as they tread it. You have courage and strength; you will need them. Men will love you, but love will always be less to you than your art and your ambitions."

He released her hand and her eyes met his in wonder.

"Do you mean that you can really tell what will be?" she asked. "That you see it written here?"

"Yes," he said. "The lines of destiny are easily translated when one has learnt the alphabet."

She shuddered and turned pale. Lorrimer interposed.

"Come, come, Clive," he said, "you are frightening the child. Enough of this. Have some fruit, Brianna, and tell us how you are going to break with caravan life. Will your aunt allow you to go on the stage? You say she knows nothing of this appearance to-night, or the offer made to join the company."

"No, sir, but I shall tell her I am going. She can't keep me. Why, 'tis the most glorious chance that could happen. Indeed, it's hard to believe it myself."

"Everything must have a beginning," observed Lorrimer. "I am glad, Brianna, that I have seen yours."

She clasped her hands and leant suddenly forward, her soul in her eyes.

"Oh, I can hardly believe it," she said, brokenly. "To have dreamt and thought and thought of one thing for so long, and then to wake up one day and find it is yours. . . . Oh, it is too much even to speak of."

"You make me feel ungrateful," said Templeton languidly. "Providence has dowered me with a fair share of this world's goods, and yet I fancy I have never looked upon them as anything but my right."

Her brilliant eyes flashed on him.

"I don't understand," she said. "But then, of course, men are different. The world seems made for them. Now, a woman, she must take what she can get."

"I fancy a good many of them take what they want, and are not too particular as to the means employed," sneered Clive. "The world is composed of two classes. Those who drive and those who are driven. You had better seize whip and reins at your first chance and keep them."

"Don't bring your cynical, worldly wisdom here, Clive," said Max Lorrimer. "It's a pure atmosphere as yet."

The girl glanced from one face to the other in some perplexity.

"It must be late," she said, suddenly. "I ought to be getting home."

"Do you call that caravan on wheels home?" asked Templeton.

"It is the only one I have had," she answered simply. "And it wasn't such a bad life after all, when Aunt Sal was in a good temper. And there was always Mickey."

She rose, and her eyes looked regretful.

"It has been very pleasant here," she said. "But I am sure he didn't think it right of me to come. I wonder why?"

The three young men exchanged looks. How odd and embarrassing innocence can be. Then Max rose, setting aside a proffered cigarette from Raemore Clive.

"I'll see you home," he said. "You fellows go back to the smoking-room. We'll meet there later."

The girl shook hands.

"Thank you all," she said, "and good night."

"A wonderful piece of nature," observed Raemore Clive, as he and Templeton watched the retreating figure. "Nature pure and simple. Unspoilt, untampered with, fed on ideals, educated on Shakespeare. How one wonders what the woman will develop into! It would be interesting to watch that career."

"She is wonderfully beautiful," said Templeton, between puffs of languid enjoyment. "I hope poor old Max isn't caught. He's such a Quixotic sort of fellow, and beauty in distress always appeals to him. But of all mistakes a man can make there's no mistake so irretrievable as that of a marriage beneath him."

"There speaks the conventional worldling," said Clive. "The voice of one who has never looked beneath the surface. Social equality is often the merest veneer. It is the nature of a man or woman that alone creates the title of nobility. Here is a case in point. That girl comes of obscure parents, was brought up in poverty and ignorance, yet the innate delicacy of feeling is unharmed, the soul illumines the body like a clear, burning lamp, and Nature will mould her, will fit her to take a place in the world, that at present seems beyond her hopes or her powers."

"The voice of the prophet!" observed Templeton. "It must be a strange thing, Clive, to have that faculty of foreseeing. Not altogether pleasant either, I should imagine."

"You are right. It is not altogether pleasant—sometimes. Come, let us get back to the smoking-room. How the moon shines. On such a night as this did Jessica steal to Lorenzo's arms. Let us hope our Jessica and Lorenzo are not drifting on to the usual romance, the way of a man with a maid, as saith Solomon. Poor human nature, unchanged for centuries past, and unchangeable for centuries to come! Do you know, Templeton, I came here—to Ireland—for a mere whim, and almost by a mere accident, and I find myself suddenly the spectator of a drama whose very first act is so replete with interest that I long to see the whole."

"Why should there be a drama?" asked Templeton. "It might be only farce, comedy, burlesque, for aught we know."

"I think otherwise. The pulse of youth stirs to thrilling music. It can't laugh or jest at the obstacles in its path. Romance is a cup of tragedy filled to the brim with sweetness and pain. The boy writhes as a victim to every petty sting which manhood would ignore. Yet manhood envies the boy. For when time has deadened the power of feeling, the longing to feel may awaken. I—I have forgotten how to feel. My feet move over a frozen sea. I cannot gaze into its depths again. What I killed out of myself I alone know. You are happy, and Max is happy, and that girl is happy. But I? To look at happiness through the eyes of others is sadder than any loss in life, believe me."

Templeton looked and listened with that surprise of the prosaic temperament at anything beyond prosaic comprehension that is often a fatal barrier to confidence. This sort of talk was Greek to him, and Greek had ever been the bugbear of his student days. All he hoped was that Max didn't intend making a fool of himself over the girl, and that hope led him to resolve on a speedy departure from Cork. On the morrow the races ended. They would hurry on to Killarney, and return by way of Glengarriff and Bantry, to Dublin. Then back to England, and duty.

He drew a deep breath. Raemore Clive looked at him and smiled oddly.

"What a Philistine you are still!" he said.