Best Short Stories Omnibus - Volume 3

CHAPTER II.

CHAPTER II.

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One summer evening Mademoiselle was seated in her schoolroom as usual, which was a very pretty room though at the top of the house, a room with a balcony overlooking the garden, and refreshed by all the air which was kept up by the fanning of the trees and the open space. It was covered with fresh cool matting, and lighted by a reading-lamp, which scarcely added to the heat, and diffused a mild light. The large window was wide open. The balcony with its seats seemed to form part of the room, and Mademoiselle had put herself into a white dressing-gown. The children were in bed, and a grateful stillness filled this part of the house. The rest, the quiet, and the coolness were very refreshing after the intolerable heat and noise of the day. There had been a dinner-party down-stairs, and, as usual, the carriages coming and going had been heard in the schoolroom. The children had brought up a description, as they generally did, of the splendour of the ladies, for they had been in the drawing-room in all their finery when the guests arrived. Mademoiselle had listened to their remarks and criticisms, but she had not regretted her own absence. She had accomplished all her little tasks after Edith and Dorothy had gone to bed—corrected their exercises, looked over their lessons for next day—and then she had put on her dressing-gown, and concluded to put off certain mendings that were necessary till next evening, as it was so hot, and had taken up her book.

She was thus seated in great luxury when the sound of some one running and stumbling up-stairs startled her—evidently a maid in great haste, her foot catching in her gown. She put down her book and listened, feeling that she was about to be called upon for some service. Then came a hurried knocking and a cry of "Mademoiselle!" "Oh, if you please, come down-stairs; Mrs Wargrave has gone off quite dead-like, and they don't know what to do. O Mademoiselle, come quick, for the gentlemen is off their heads," cried the messenger, continuing in her excitement to drum against the door. Mademoiselle sprang up, and only pausing to take a bottle of eau-de-cologne and a fan from a table, hurried down-stairs. "It will be a faint," she said. "I don't know what it is, but she looks like death," said the maid. The governess had forgotten her dressing-gown, her loosened hair, her aspect altogether informal and out of character with her position. She rushed into the drawing-room to find Mrs Wargrave lying on the floor, her husband slapping her hands and calling to her, half in fright, half in anger, "Marian, Marian! wake up; what's the matter? Wake up, dear!" Charles Wargrave had gone to fetch some water, and came in with it ready to discharge it upon the head of the poor lady. When something white descended between them, shedding odours of some perfume and raising a sudden air with the fan, the two men were more startled than ever. Neither of them had ever had to do with a woman in a faint before.

"It will be nothing," said Mademoiselle. "She has fainted. It is the great heat. She has not been well all day." She took the command of the situation quite simply, taking the water from Charles Wargrave's hand without even looking at him, and sending the aggrieved husband out of the way. The men ran about quite humbly, obeying the orders of Mademoiselle, who knew what to do, setting the door open to make a draught, bringing cushions, doing everything she told them. It is doubtful for the moment whether even Mr Leicester Wargrave, though he was her employer, said good morning to her every day at breakfast, and gave her a cheque every quarter, was at all clear as to who she was; and Mr Charles Wargrave did not know her at all. She did not look like Mademoiselle, a mere official without any name of her own. In her loose white dressing-gown, her hair falling out of its very insecure fastenings, her mind entirely occupied with her patient, she looked like one of those beings whom men call angels, when they come in unexpectedly and save a great deal of trouble. This was the position which Mademoiselle had suddenly taken. They had been about to send for the doctor, to do all sorts of desperate things. Mademoiselle in a moment took everything out of their hands.

By-and-by, when Mrs Wargrave had recovered consciousness, the white figure with the falling hair disappeared as suddenly as she had come. When the lady came to herself she had looked up and asked, "What is the matter? Where am I?" and then she had breathed out with a faint vexation, "Oh, is it you, Mademoiselle?"

"She ought to go to bed," said Mademoiselle to the husband.

"I feel as if I had been ill," said Mrs Wargrave. "Where am I? Where is Jervis? I want Jervis. O Jervis, send these gentlemen away and let me get to bed."

Mademoiselle had disappeared. She had slightly shrugged her shoulders with a gesture which was not British; and suddenly, no one knew how, had stolen away. To have her services of kindness so repulsed and the maid called for—the maid who had been too frightened to do or think of anything while her mistress lay insensible—was painful enough. No, she said to herself, not painful—nothing so tragic—only disagreeable; for, after all, it was not gratitude nor tenderness which she looked for from Mrs Wargrave. She had not done any great thing—only the most common good offices of one human creature to another. Why should Mrs Wargrave be grateful? And, naturally, she liked the services of her maid, to whom she was used, best. There was nothing in it to resent, nothing to be pained by. And just then Mademoiselle had caught sight of herself with the white dressing-gown and her hair hanging loose, in the great dim mirror between the windows, and this had so quickened the effect upon her of Mrs Wargrave's cry for Jervis that in a moment she was gone. She flew up-stairs like an arrow from the bow. She was horrified by the sudden sight of her own negligent apparel, of which till now, in the necessity of the moment, she had not thought.

When Mademoiselle arrived again in the shelter of the cool schoolroom, with its windows open to the night and its mild lamp burning steadily, she was panting with the haste and slight excitement of the moment, and still more with her hurried rush up-stairs; but she was not excited in any other way, and she would have laughed, or, at least, smiled to scorn the idea that anything had happened in those few minutes which could in any way affect her life. Nevertheless, she was a little struck by the sight of herself which suddenly appeared to her in the glass which was over the mantelpiece of the schoolroom, straight in front of her, as she came hurriedly in. The white figure seemed to fill the mirror with light. Her hair had not got completely detached, but hung loosely, forming a sort of frame round her face, which, naturally pale, had now a slight rose-flush; and her eyes, generally so quiet, were shining with the commotion produced in her physical being by the accelerated throbbing of her heart and pulses—due, as much as anything else, to her rapid flight, first down- and then up-stairs. Everything had passed in the course of a few minutes; and, of course, the hasty movement, the momentary thrill of alarm and anxiety, had made her heart beat; but it was curious that it should have produced the change in her appearance which she could not but perceive as she caught the reflection of her own face in the glass. She half laughed to herself with amusement and surprise, and no doubt a little pleasure too. She looked (she thought) as she had done when she was a girl of twenty. The reflection passed through her mind that white was very becoming, très flatteur. It is not flatteur to everybody, but it certainly was to Mademoiselle. She laughed to herself at the young, bright figure which she saw in the glass, and then shook her head with a sort of amused melancholy. No, Claire! no white gowns for you to make you look young and fair. Why should you look young and fair, not being either? White dresses, like other illusory pleasures, are not adapted for a governess of thirty-five. With this thought she shook back those loose locks, thrusting them behind her ears. Many people have grey hair at her age, but not a thread of white was in that dark-brown chevelure, which was so abundant and vigorous. Mademoiselle had always been a little proud of her hair—a small and innocent vanity. She pushed it away, and sat down again to her book, which, somehow, did not arrest her attention after that very brief, very insignificant episode. Mrs Leicester Wargrave was a pretty woman in her way. As she lay on the floor in her faint, Mademoiselle had admired her straight features, her fine shoulders, partially uncovered, the dazzling whiteness of her complexion. She was a year or two older than the governess, but her circumstances were very different. She had a devoted husband, nice children, a beautiful house, plenty of money. Why did she faint, par exemple? This question, however, did not produce in Mademoiselle any conjectures of mystery or mental trouble. She concluded, more sensibly and practically, that it was the heat, the thunder in the air, or that something had gone wrong in the unromantic regions of the stomach. Faints come from these reasons rather than from the non-ethereal causes to which they are attributed in dramatic art. If it is true that men die and worms eat them, but not for love, it is also true that women faint, in most cases, from anything but mental trouble. Mademoiselle did not attempt to hunt out any mystery. She did not dwell upon the enormous difference between the woman to whom she had just been ministering, and who did not want her ministrations, and herself. With one of those exercises of the philosophy of experience which were habitual to her, she said to herself that nobody would willingly change their own identity for that of another, however much they might like the advantages belonging to the other, and that she herself would certainly rather be Claire de Castel-Sombre than Mrs Leicester Wargrave: though she added also to herself that this, too, was a delusion, and that there was nothing so delightful in Claire de Castel-Sombre that a reasonable mind should prefer her personality in this decided way. However, Mademoiselle was wise enough to see that there was little progress to be made by entering into the region of metaphysics in this way; so that, with a smile at herself, she returned to her book in earnest, and found the thread of interest in it again. The one result which remained from the incident of the evening was a sensation of pleasure, at which she mocked, but which was quite real, in her own momentary return to her youthful brilliancy—a sensation expressed in the passing reflection that white was très flatteur, and that she was not too old to look well in it, but yet——

"Who is the angel and minister of grace that you keep in your house, ready for any emergency?" said Mr Charles Wargrave to his cousin, when the mistress of the house had been transported to her room and left in the care of her maid.

"Eh?" said Mr Leicester Wargrave, dully; but his mind was occupied with other questions. "I wonder what made my wife faint?" he said; "there was nothing in what we were talking of that could have made her faint." He was of the romantic opinion that mental shocks were the causes of such disturbances, and not the weather or the digestive organs. He had not the least suspicion or jealousy of his wife, but he was a man of some temper, and took such a performance as more or less an offence to himself.

"I have no doubt it was the heat."

"Oh, the heat! in this cool room? And why to-night, specially? It has been as hot for the last three days."

"I suppose that having borne it for three days would make one all the more likely to succumb on the fourth," said Charlie.

Leicester Wargrave shook his head. "Suppose we had been out," he said; "suppose it had been in somebody else's house. What a nuisance it would have been—making everybody talk! I shall have to speak to Marian seriously——"

"You don't suppose she fainted to annoy you?" said Charles.

"Oh, you never can tell what a woman will do," said the husband. "If I could only remember what we were talking of when she went off in that ridiculous way——"

"We were talking of nothing of the least importance, Leicester."

"Ah, you don't know. A wife's a great comfort in some circumstances, I don't deny, and Marian's a good wife; still, there's nobody can make a man look so ridiculous—when she chooses."

"Poor Marian! It must have been very unpleasant for herself: she couldn't have done it on purpose, you know."

"You can never tell," said the aggrieved master of the house. He looked so rueful and so annoyed that the young man burst into a laugh. He was aware that his cousin was prone to blame some one for every accident that occurred, but it seemed a new way of dealing with a fainting-fit. After a minute of silence, during which Leicester Wargrave kept walking up and down the room in an impatient way, Charles repeated his previous question. "I say, old fellow, who was the angelic being in white?"

"Eh?" said the other again, with half attention; then he added angrily, "Don't be such a fool—the angelic being was simply Mademoiselle."

"Mademoiselle! the governess? That's nonsense, Leicester."

"What is nonsense? I hope I know as much as that: and there is no doubt about it. She was in a nightgown, or something; that woman Jervis, who is good for nothing, fetched her, I suppose. I'll tell Marian to send that useless fool away. She's no good."

"Mademoiselle," said Charlie, "the governess? I thought she was a dowdy, elderly person—but this one was a beautiful girl. Are you sure you are not making a mistake?"

"Girl!" said Mr Leicester Wargrave; "she's nearer forty than thirty. She's not a bad-looking woman—there's a good deal in her: I've often said as much to Marian. But Marian says she's very French—though that's what we have her for, I suppose."

"I don't mind what country she is of. She's——" But here Charles Wargrave seemed to check himself, and said no more.

"You—don't mind? No, I don't suppose so. Between ourselves, I don't see what you've got to do with it," said Leicester, with a laugh.

Charles, who had been sitting with his hands in his pockets, thrust deeply down, and his head bent as if in deep consideration, here roused himself a little, and gave his head a shake as if to chase some cobwebs away. "No," he said, after a moment's pause, "I don't suppose I have got anything to do with it—as you say."

This being granted, and his grievance in respect to his wife's faint beginning to subside a little, Mr Wargrave unbent. "Yes," he said, "I noticed she looked very well to-night. She had a little colour; that's the drawback of Frenchwomen, they have so little colour—except what they put on themselves, don't you know."

The two men laughed at this, though it was not very funny. "By Jove! they do make up!" said the elder. "There's plenty of that in the Park, but still Englishwomen have complexions. The French like it—they talk of blanc mat, though there's not much blanc either, by nature, any more than red—except what's put on."

The joke failed the second time, and did not even elicit a smile from Charlie Wargrave, who sat with a perfectly grave face staring straight before him and swinging his leg. He was seated on the arm of a sofa—not the legitimate part to sit upon—and either he did not care to discuss the charms of Frenchwomen or he was fatigued by the discussion. He got up suddenly and held out his hand.

"You want to get up-stairs, I'm sure, to see after Marian. I think I'd better go."

"Oh, don't hurry yourself, Charlie. I could go up and come back to you again if I was so anxious as that."

"Anyhow, I must go, it's getting late," said the visitor, getting up. He paused a moment, as if he were trying to recall something as he stood in the middle of the room, where his cousin's wife had lain fainting with Mademoiselle bending over her. To think that it was only Mademoiselle! He felt a sort of dazzle in his eyes, not thinking, as she had done, that white was becoming, but wondering how it was that a sort of light seemed to diffuse itself from the white figure—healing and consolation. She had scarcely spoken at all; she had not so much as looked at him or taken any notice of his existence. She had taken the water out of his hands as if he had been a servant—more than that, as if he had been the table on which it stood—without looking at him. She had said "Get me a cushion" with the same non-recognition of him or his existence. And the moment that the necessity for her presence was over she had disappeared like a vision. It was curiously disappointing, tantalising, provoking to hear that she was only Mademoiselle. Charles Wargrave was not a man whom ladies generally—women much more imposing than any governess—passed over without notice. He reflected that of those he knew very few, even in a similar emergency, would have treated him with that calm and absolute indifference. There would have been a glance in recognition of the fact that he was he, never an unimportant person. There would have been something in the shape of a smile of thanks, or of apology. But this lady had taken no more notice of him than if he had been a wooden figure made to hold things in his hands, like the grinning n***o candelabras of Venice. One would not say "thank you" to the painted and gilded blackamoors, and neither did she say "thank you" to him. He could think of no fitter image. As if he were made of wood! Charles Wargrave was not used to this sort of treatment. He laughed to himself softly at the thought of it—laughed, yet was piqued and a little rueful. And all the time it was only Mademoiselle!