James Cabell - The Eagle's Shadow

"Yes," said Mrs. Saumarez—and oh, she startled him; "I fancy they're both quite dead by now. Billy," she cried, earnestly, "don't laugh at them!—don't laugh at those dear, foolish children! I—somehow, I couldn't bear that, Billy."

"Kathleen," said Mr. Woods, in admiration, "you're a witch. I wasn't laughing, though, my dear. I was developing quite a twilight mood over them—a plaintive, old-lettery sort of mood, you know."

She sighed a little. "Yes—I know." Then her eyelids flickered in a parody of Kathleen's glance that Billy noted with a queer tenderness.

"Come and talk to me, Billy," she commanded. "I'm an early bird this morning, and entitled to the very biggest and best-looking worm I can find. You're only a worm, you know—we're all worms. Mr. Jukesbury told me so last night, making an exception in my favour, for it appears I'm an angel. He was amorously inclined last night, the tipsy old fraud! It's shameless, Billy, the amount of money he gets out of Miss Hugonin—for the deserving poor. Do you know, I rather fancy he classes himself under that head? And I grant you he's poor enough—but deserving!" Mrs. Saumarez snapped her fingers eloquently.

"Eh? Shark, eh?" queried Mr. Woods, in some discomfort.

She nodded. "He is as bad as Sarah Haggage," she informed him, "and everybody knows what a bloodsucker she is. The Haggage is a disease, Billy, that all rich women are exposed to—'more easily caught than the pestilence, and the taker runs presently mad.' Depend upon it, Billy, those two will have every penny they can get out of your uncle's money."

"Peggy's so generous," he pleaded. "She wants to make everybody happy—bring about a general millenium, you know."

"She pays dearly enough for her fancies," said Mrs. Saumarez, in a hard voice. Then, after a little, she cried, suddenly: "Oh, Billy, Billy, it shames me to think of how we lie to her, and toady to her, and lead her on from one mad scheme to another!—all for the sake of the money we can pilfer incidentally! We're all arrant hypocrites, you know; I'm no better than the others, Billy—not a bit better. But my husband left me so poor, and I had always been accustomed to the pretty things of life, and I couldn't—I couldn't give them up, Billy.

I love them too dearly. So I lie, and toady, and write drivelling talks about things I don't understand, for drivelling women to listen to, and I still have the creature comforts of life. I pawn my self-respect for them—that's all. Such a little price to pay, isn't it, Billy?"

She spoke in a sort of frenzy. I dare say that at the outset she wanted Mr. Woods to know the worst of her, knowing he could not fail to discover it in time. Billy brought memories with him, you see; and this shrewd, hard woman wanted, somehow, more than anything else in the world, that he should think well of her. So she babbled out the whole pitiful story, waiting in a kind of terror to see contempt and disgust awaken in his eyes.

But he merely said "I see—I see," very slowly, and his eyes were kindly. He couldn't be angry with her, somehow; that pink-cheeked, crinkly haired girl stood between them and shielded her. He was only very, very sorry.

"And Kennaston?" he asked, after a little.

Mrs. Saumarez flushed. "Mr. Kennaston is a man of great genius," she said, quickly. "Of course, Miss Hugonin is glad to assist him in publishing his books—it's an honour to her that he permits it. They have to be published privately, you know, as the general public isn't capable of appreciating such dainty little masterpieces. Oh, don't make any mistake, Billy—Mr. Kennaston is a very wonderful and very admirable man."

"H'm, yes; he struck me as being an unusually nice chap," said Mr. Woods, untruthfully. "I dare say they'll be very happy."

"Who?" Mrs. Saumarez demanded.

"Why—er—I don't suppose they'll make any secret of it," Billy stammered, in tardy repentance of his hasty speaking. "Peggy told me last night she had accepted him."

Mrs. Saumarez turned to rearrange a bowl of roses. She seemed to have some difficulty over it.

"Billy," she spoke, inconsequently, and with averted head, "an honest man is the noblest work of God—and the rarest."

Billy groaned.

"Do you know," said he, "I've just been telling the roses in the gardens yonder the same thing about women? I'm a misogynist this morning. I've decided no woman is worthy of being loved."

"That is quite true," she assented, "but, on the other hand, no man is worthy of loving."

Billy smiled.

"I've likewise come to the conclusion," said he, "that a man's love is like his hat, in that any peg will do to hang it on; also, in that the proper and best place for it is on his own head. Oh, I assure you, I vented any number of cheap cynicisms on the helpless roses! And yet—will you believe it, Kathleen?—it doesn't seem to make me feel a bit better—no, not a bit."

"It's very like his hat," she declared, "in that he has a new one every year." Then she rested her hand on his, in a half-maternal fashion. "What's the matter, boy?" she asked, softly. "You're always so fresh and wholesome. I don't like to see you like this. Better leave phrase-making to us phrase-mongers."

Her voice rang true—true, and compassionate, and tender, and all that a woman's voice should be. Billy could not but trust her.

"I've been an ass," said he, rather tragically. "Oh, not an unusual ass, Kathleen—just the sort men are always making of themselves. You see, before I went to France, there was a girl I—cared for. And I let a quarrel come between us—a foolish, trifling, idle little quarrel, Kathleen, that we might have made up in a half-hour. But I was too proud, you see. No, I wasn't proud, either," Mr. Woods amended, bitterly; "I was simply pig-headed and mulish. So I went away. And yesterday I saw her again and realised that I—still cared. That's all, Kathleen. It isn't an unusual story." And Mr. Woods laughed, mirthlessly, and took a turn on the terrace.

Mrs. Saumarez was regarding him intently. Her cheeks were of a deeper, more attractive pink, and her breath came and went quickly.

"I—I don't understand," she said, in a rather queer voice.

"Oh, it's simple enough," Billy assured her. "You see, she—well, I think she would have married me once. Yes, she cared for me once. And I quarreled with her—I, conceited young ass that I was, actually presumed to dictate to the dearest, sweetest, most lovable woman on earth, and tell her what she must do and what she mustn't. I!—good Lord, I, who wasn't worthy to sweep a crossing clean for her!—who wasn't worthy to breathe the same air with her!—who wasn't worthy to exist in the same world she honoured by living in! Oh, I was an ass! But I've paid for it!—oh, yes, Kathleen, I've paid dearly for it, and I'll pay more dearly yet before I've done. I tried to avoid her yesterday—you must have seen that. And I couldn't—I give you my word, I could no more have kept away from her than I could have spread a pair of wings and flown away. She doesn't care a bit for me now; but I can no more give up loving her than I can give up eating my dinner. That isn't a pretty simile, Kathleen, but it expresses the way I feel toward her. It isn't merely that I want her; it's more than that—oh, far more than that. I simply can't do without her. Don't you understand, Kathleen?" he asked, desperately.

"Yes—I think I understand," she said, when he had ended. "I—oh, Billy, I am almost sorry. It's dear of you—dear of you, Billy, to care for me still, but—but I'm almost sorry you care so much. I'm not worth it, boy dear. And I—I really don't know what to say. You must let me think."

Mr. Woods gave an inarticulate sound. The face she turned to him was perplexed, half-sad, fond, a little pleased, and strangely compassionate. It was Kathleen Eppes who sat beside him; the six years were as utterly forgotten as the name of Magdalen's first lover. She was a girl again, listening—with a heart that fluttered, I dare say—to the wild talk, the mad dithyrambics of a big, blundering boy.