E. Delafield - The Collected Works of E. M. Delafield (Illustrated Edition)

She found life there very dull, and the atmosphere, in spite of Aunt Marianne's kindness and Muriel's companionship, strangely uncongenial. She was often oppressed with a sense of her own ingratitude and discontent.

But, after that odd little conversation with James, Zella felt as though she had found something which she had subconsciously been missing. She would have liked to resume the same sort of discussion again, and appealed to her cousin at luncheon one day with the quick look of interest that was the expression most natural to her pretty face.

"James, you know what we said about self-deception the other day. Isn't it a form of cowardice?"

James looked annoyed, "glanced at his mother, and said in the most expressionless of voices, " Oh, I don't know." And Mrs. Lloyd-Evans remarked gently: "Deceit is always wrong, dear, but no one should be afraid to tell the truth. Don't you remember the piece of poetry Aunt Marianne is so fond of ?—

"'Dare to be true, nothing can need a lie;

The fault that needs it most grows two thereby.'"

"Have some more salad, Zella?" said her Uncle Henry, looking slightly uncomfortable.

The lesson sank into Zella's receptive mind, and she never repeated her mistake.

That same afternoon Mrs. Lloyd-Evans, finding Zella alone in the schoolroom, said to her:

"Come down and help me with the drawing-room flowers, dear. It's Muriel's little job as a rule, but she has had to go for her violin lesson now, as that tiresome man altered his time. It was really rather artful of him, for he took care to let us know at the last minute possible, knowing very well that I shouldn't like it. It's much too late and too dark for Muriel to be out, and I've had to send James with her."

Zella, reluctantly closing her book, rather unwillingly followed her aunt to the drawing-room. She had already learnt that it was of no use to decline any proffered kindness, however unwelcome, of Aunt Marianne's. They carried the silver vases from the drawing-room to the pantry, filled them with water, and bore them solemnly on a little tray to the hall table, where lay a selection of late autumn flowers.

"Put all those red sweet-peas together, dear, in that bowl. No, not any pink ones. I don't like two colours together unless they match. It is not artistic."

Zella thought she knew better, but lacked the courage to say so. As a compromise, she thrust one or two white sprays among the red. Mrs. Lloyd-Evans gently removed them.

"I keep all the white ones apart," she said in a voice that hinted at solemnity. "Put them in these two little silver vases, dear, and bring them into the drawing-room."

Zella, feeling inexplicably depressed, obeyed.

"You see," explained her aunt, "I only put white flowers on this little velvet table in the corner—my little shrine."

The little shrine was loaded with silver-framed photographs of those friends and relations of Mrs. Lloyd-Evans who had departed this life.

She placed her white sweet-peas before the central photograph, an enlarged one of Archie, the baby son who had died.

"I call this my In Memorial table," said Mrs. Lloyd-Evans in hushed accents.

"In Memoriam?"

"In Memorial, dear," corrected Mrs. Lloyd-Evans firmly. "When you are a little older, you will know what that means. A very beautiful poem has been written about it."

Zella was outraged at having it supposed that she did not know her Tennyson.

"I have read 'In Memoriam,' " she said coldly, "and all Tennyson's poems."

"I don't suppose you've read them all, dear. He wrote a great many, and even Aunt Marianne has never had time to read all through the book," said Mrs. Lloyd-Evans, unperturbed. "Put those white roses there, Zella, in front of poor grandpapa."

Mrs. Lloyd-Evans patted the sweet-peas delicately once or twice with her thumb and finger.

"I always think it's the last little touch that makes all the difference in arranging flowers," she observed.

The last little touch did not seem to Zella to have made much appreciable difference to the sweet-peas, but they looked very nice against the massive silver of Archie's frame.

"Is that little cousin Archie ?" she asked in reverent tones, knowing perfectly well that it was, but feeling instinctively that decorum forbade taking even the most obvious facts for granted when dealing with an In Memorial table.

"Yes, darling. You know poor dear little Cousin Archie was only five when he was taken away from us. Aunt Marianne can hardly bear to speak of it. Ah, Zella, life is very sad! but only a mother who has lost her child can really know what suffering means."

Zella felt rather resentful.

"Not that Aunt Marianne has not had many, many other sorrows too," said Mrs. Lloyd-Evans, with some determination. "And that reminds me of something I wanted to do, and that you can help me over. Fetch the photograph of your dear, dear mother from the back drawing-room writing-table, Zella dear, and bring it here."

Zella fetched it, the tears rising to her eyes as she looked at the pretty, laughing pictured face.

Tears also rose to the eyes of Mrs. Lloyd-Evans as she gazed upon the photograph.

"It must go here," she said finally, clearing a space between poor grandpapa and little Archie. "But not in this red leather frame. Let me see. ..."

She gazed reflectively round the room.

"Let me have that photograph of Muriel as a baby. The frame is silver, and looks as though it would fit."

The photographs changed frames, and the one of Muriel, now surrounded by red leather, was sent to the back drawing-room writing-table; while Esmée de Kervoyou, silver-framed, took a place on the now crowded In Memorial table.

By this time the tears were streaming down Zella's face. Aunt Marianne said "My poor child" two or three times, kissed her very kindly, and sent her upstairs to He down and rest for a little before the others came in.

That evening, in her room, Zella, in floods of tears, withdrew her own copy of her mother's photograph from the flat leather travelling frame in which she had kept it ever since she could remember, and placed it in the middle of the mantelpiece, from whence she had carefully removed the clock and a few small china ornaments.

Then she took the little vase of flowers with which her dressing-table was kept supplied, and placed it in front of the photograph. There was a certain mournful pleasure in the aspect of the shrine when completed, and Zella's tears only broke out again next day upon discovering that an officious housemaid had replaced the clock and china ornaments upon her mantelpiece, and restored the vase of flowers to its original position on the dressing-table.

Table of Contents

I HATE Sundays," growled James.

Muriel looked sincerely shocked, but was too much in awe of her brother to make any remonstrance.

Zella, conscious that the stronger part of her audience was with her, remarked airily: "Sunday is the most amusing day of the week in Paris."

She felt superior and cosmopolitan as she spoke.

"You won't find it that here," said James grimly, as they entered the dining-room for breakfast.

On the two preceding Sundays, Zella had not been taken to church with her cousins, because it was feared that it might "upset" her, and the day had been unmarked save by the absence of the Lloyd-Evans family during a couple of hours, which had enabled her to read a story-book alone in the schoolroom. Consequently Zella, who scarcely ever went to church at Villetswood, felt no desire whatever to fulfil her duties as a member of the Church of England.

But with characteristic adaptability she assented in grateful tones when Mrs. Lloyd-Evans, kissing her, said:

"Good-morning, Zella dear. This will be a nice fine Sunday for you to come to church, won't it?"