Invincible Minnie/Book 2/Chapter 13
Mr. Naylor telephoned the next morning.
“I’m waiting downstairs in the hall,” he said. “I don’t care to come up.”
Frances hurried into her hat and jacket and went down. She got into the motor-car beside him, indescribably relieved to get away from the flat for a while. She looked at him with a smile.
“Well!” she said.
“Well!” he repeated. “Upon my word, that was a jolly little party last night! That German chap!”
“You don’t know how sorry I felt, bringing that on you. But, of course, I never imagined”
“You know, though, it’s no place for you, Miss Defoe. That woman’s not”
“Please! You really can’t understand her as I do. She—really, she’s....”
She stopped, at a loss, but quite determined to protect the poor wretch who had begged for pity the night before.
“She has so many good points,” she went on, “Oh, I’m not quite an idiot, Mr. Naylor.... I see her as she is. Only—I’d rather dwell on her good qualities. She’s been very kind to me.”
Not for worlds would she have told anyone of the two dreadful scenes. She enlarged on Miss Eppendorfer’s friendliness and good humour and the excellence of her work.
“That’s all very well,” said he, “but I stick to it that it’s no place for you.”
They didn’t talk much more on the way down; Mr. Naylor was too much occupied with his driving, which was minutely careful. He took no risks, and he muttered furiously against those who did. He seemed to Frankie unnecessarily prudent; she would have liked to go faster, as lots of other cars did. However, a look at his frowning face reproved her; she felt that this driving business must be more difficult, more perilous than her inexperience imagined.
As soon as they reached the beach he proposed taking their swim at once, and she very readily agreed. Poor girl! She hadn’t been in the sea for years, since those long gone days, those happy days when she had been a school-girl. She was, it must be admitted, rather eager to “show off” to her Englishman, for she was a good swimmer, and not at all an unpleasant object in a bathing suit. She came out of her bath-house and walked down on to the beach, conscious of her splendid symmetry, her strong, straight limbs, her face gay and boyish under a tight rubber cap. It was obvious to both of them at once that Mr. Naylor was physically not at all her equal. Gone his chic, his superiority; he was thin, fragile, rather wretched. Within her stirred faintly an old, old instinct, perverted and crushed out through generations of false training, the instinct of the woman to seek for strength and beauty in her mate. Her smile was artificial.
“Beastly cold!” he grumbled.
But Frances dashed by him, through the breakers, and began swimming out in strong and beautiful strokes, her bare arms flashing up rhythmically, her white teeth showing in a broad smile. She looked back, and saw Mr. Naylor moving slowly near the shore; after ten minutes or so he came out on to the sand, and lay in the sun watching her. And presently began to wave.
She came inshore reluctantly.
“What is it?” she asked. “It’s glorious in the water to-day. I never want to come out!”
“It’s time to come out now,” he said.
“Oh, it can’t be! I’ll have to stop longer!”
“But, I say, I want my lunch. This isn’t much of a lark for me, you know, roasting out here like this.”
“Why don’t you go back into the water again?”
“I can’t. It gives me a chill.”
“A chill!” said Frances, and couldn’t keep a faint contempt out of her voice. “You’d better go and dress. I’ll be out presently.”
“I shouldn’t think of leaving you; you’re so rash. Go ahead, enjoy yourself; I’ll wait.”
His good nature conquered Frances; she gave one more look at the glittering sea and went back into her bath-house.
She had to wait quite twenty minutes for him.
“You’re quick, aren’t you?” he said, artlessly.
“Or is it that you’re slow?” she returned. Now he was his own self again, the imperturbable, the superior. She wished to forget the shivering, frail being who had for a time supplanted him.
He ordered an amazing lunch, in the old “Oriental,” which was still standing then, with its unique flavour; he saw people whom he knew by sight and could point out to Frankie. He ordered champagne, which she had never before tasted. He was like a prince, or rather, like a millionaire....
After this meal, which was nothing less than a banquet, Frances said she would have to go home.
“The awful cook’s gone out,” she explained, “and I’ll have to help poor Miss E. to get something ready.”
“What!” he cried. “Do you mean to tell me you’re going to cook!”
“And eat,” she answered, cheerfully. “Please don’t be mediæval.”
“I don’t like it. A girl of your class—and your ability”
They were spinning along the road by the marshes, passed by an incessant stream of motors going down.
“It’s a confounded shame to go home now anyway,” he said. “If we could only have had the evening!”
“Another time,” she said, before she thought, and was rather confused at her own forwardness.
“I hope so,” he answered gravely, “I can’t tell you how much I—like to be with you. I—altogether—I’ve never met anyone like you. I—altogether—I’ve never met anyone like you.... I’m very anxious for old Horace to see you.... Do you suppose you could meet him some time? Without his wife, I mean? It’s irregular, I know, but you’re not conventional.”
She said no, that she wasn’t.
“Could you set a time? Next Wednesday?”
And she said she thought that would do.
“You don’t mind if I go out to tea on Wednesday, do you?” Frances asked Miss Eppendorfer the next morning.
“Not a bit!” said she, cheerfully. “I like to see you enjoy yourself like a human being. Is it your English friend?”
“Yes. The only trouble is, I haven’t a thing fit to wear, and it’s at a hotel,” she said. “Couldn’t you come down town with me and help me pick out something?”
Miss Eppendorfer was only too pleased; it was one of her good days and she was cheerful and energetic. She led Frances from shop to shop, imperiously rejecting every suggestion.
“I know what suits you,” she insisted, “I’m a wonderful judge of value, too. You leave it all to me.”
At last she was pleased by a grey broadcloth suit.
“Oh, yes!” cried Frankie, ironically. “A hundred and fifty dollars is just what I always pay!”
“I’m going to get it for you.”
“Oh, no, I couldn’t!” she protested, shocked.
“You must. To make up for all I said that night,” whispered the authoress. “Be generous, Frances! Don’t be petty!”
She allowed herself to be persuaded, accepted the suit and with it a new hat and blouse. She felt guilty and ashamed and yet delighted. She was so very anxious to make a favourable impression on this brother Horace.
She started off, very nervous and still more ashamed. The whole exploit seemed wrong, meeting the man without his wife, and wearing clothes she could never have bought for herself.... It was common.
“Cheap,” she reflected.
But Horace would have made a supper-club respectable. They were waiting in the corridor; she saw her Mr. Naylor at once though he didn’t see her; slender and drooping, quietly conscious of his impeccable British elegance, he was watching the wrong door. Near him was a heavy, bull-necked, red-faced man with a black moustache and melancholy, bilious eyes, who smoked a big cigar and stared nowhere. This was Horace.
He surprised Frances by his lack of everything that pleased her in his brother. He was altogether the merchant, not a hint of the man-of-the-world. He shook hands with her and smiled, but it was a sad, dull smile. He was distrait, and couldn’t conceal it.
“Well,” he said, with a sigh, “Lead the way, Lionel, my boy!”
They entered an engaging little tea-room with shaded lamps and sofas. Lionel took charge of everything, chose a table, and ordered the cocktails, but the management of the conversation was evidently beyond him. There was a long and awkward silence, while the drinks were coming. No one looked at either of the others.
It was Horace who first revived, after two cocktails.
“Well,” he observed again, “He’s a handful. You’ll have to keep an eye on him, I can tell you.”
Frances was startled; was he talking to her?... She looked up and caught his gaze, melancholy and kindly, fixed on her.
“You’ll have all you can manage, with him,” he continued.
She was alarmed and confused. It wasn’t possible that he thought.... And yet, very evidently, he did think so, for he went on, with a sort of gloomy archness:
“I hope he won’t be too much for you.”
She was anxious to refute the suggestion of any responsibility for Lionel, to tell this brother, subtly and politely, but unmistakably, that he misread the situation. But she could not, on the spur of the moment, think of anything that would do.
“I don’t really know Mr. Naylor very well,” she attempted.
Horace smiled.
“Plenty of time!” he said.
And this time his glance wandered to his brother, and was curiously altered, rested upon that futile young face with limitless fidelity and affection
“Yes,” he said again, fatuously, “You’ll have your hands full.”
Frances had a horrible feeling of being caught in a net.
“I’m afraid I can’t undertake such a responsibility,” she said, with a sickly smile.
Horace smiled indulgently at her. After a third cocktail, he was becoming a little garrulous on the subject of his brother; partly because he thought it would interest Frankie and partly because it was his great topic anyway. His pride in his brother was rather surprising to Frankie; she couldn’t know, of course, from what a stodgy, obscure family this charming irresponsibility had sprung, couldn’t imagine how audacious his extravagances appeared, how remarkable his social progress; in fine, she couldn’t see him as a Naylor.
It was not until much later that she divined something of the relations between these two. Sons of a well-to-do manufacturer, they had both “received advantages” in the way of education and so forth, but while Horace remained immutably the son of a wealthy manufacturer who had had “advantages,” Lionel in some mysterious way, not unusual in this world, had turned out to be aristocratic, elegant, fashionable. His brother took a naïve pride in this; he admired Lionel as he did royalty, not very useful, but immensely valuable in his place. He never urged him to go into business; he was quite satisfied that he should go his own dazzling way. For Horace was not the classic business man of stage and story, who despises and berates the idler; he was something much newer, the money-maker who is apologetic and secretly bewildered; who feels called upon to justify his activity. Lionel was what he would have liked to be, only that he knew it to be impossible. He acknowledged that they were of different clay.
He told Frankie how Lionel had no idea of time, and was always late.
How he kept the most exclusive people waiting for him and never had a proper excuse.
How he spent preposterous sums on handkerchiefs, his hobby.
How altogether idle and rude and popular he had been “at home.”
In spite of her common-sense, Frankie began to feel that the attentions of such a man were something to boast of, to treasure. He wasn’t rude to her, ever.
After a fourth cocktail and a minute sardine sandwich, Horace said he was obliged to go.
“Au revoir!” he said to Frankie, with a very bad accent. “If this boy gives you any trouble, you let me know, eh?”
He clasped her hand in his warm, moist one with genuine good-will, slapped Lionel on the shoulder, and went out, edging his way clumsily among the little low tables.
Lionel gave a sigh of comfort, and leaned across the table.
“May I have another cup?” he asked.
Frances was looking at him sternly.
“Mr. Naylor!” she said, “You have given your brother a false impression.”
He was startled.
“I ... so it seems,” he said, weakly, “I ... he does seem....”
“It isn’t fair,” she went on, “I’m surprised at you! What could I do? Or say? Mr. Naylor, really, it was not right of you!”
“I know it.... But I give you my word I never exactly said—anything. I dare say I was—oh, enthusiastic.... I suppose he drew his own conclusions.”
He went on, after a pause:
“I did talk a lot about you.... You see”
He tapped his cigarette nervously on his plate.
“I say!” he said. “Couldn’t it be true, you know?”
She understood him well enough, and a bright colour surged into her face.
“What?” she asked, disingenuously.
“I mean—what Horace thinks.... I mean—do you think you could”
She faltered.
“I don’t know.... It’s been such a short time”
“You know that doesn’t matter. Time! Why, the first minute I saw you, there in that beastly school, I knew I was done for. You looked so lovely and so dignified. Such a lady. Just the sort of girl I’d always thought about. My lovely girl! My dear, beautiful girl!”
For some reason her eyes filled with tears. His voice touched her so, moved her so profoundly. She couldn’t pretend, couldn’t hesitate. Because she knew, too, perfectly well. She looked up at him with a trembling smile.
“It’s silly!” she said. “We don’t know each other.”
“I know you, darling, as well as if I’d seen you every day for a year.”
“But, really, we must be sensible,” she said, seriously. “We’ll have to wait—not commit ourselves to anything definite. We’ll be friends”
“Not I! I want to commit myself as much as possible. Won’t you commit yourself just a little bit, darling girl? Just go so far as to say you like me?”
“You know I like you,” she said, smiling.
He could laugh now, tease her; he knew she was won.
They left the tea-room and began to stroll down Fifth Avenue. And at every crossing he took her arm and their eyes met, and a ridiculous and passionate happiness filled them both.
“My girl!” he whispered.
Frances was almost ashamed of being so happy; she was anxious to appear practical and reasonable. She said she had shopping to do, and that Lionel might come with her, if he liked. He insisted upon augmenting her little purchases, choosing very expensive things, and things he had realised she wanted. In spite of her independence, all this was delightful to her; she hesitated, refused, accepted....
A shop girl looked after them, was amused at their long, long glances and their unwarranted smiles: she thought them a well-matched couple, both so tall and so nice-looking and so well-bred. And she was very right; they were well-matched, by God Himself, Who had filled Lionel’s need of a strong and sober and honest lover, who had given to Frankie the gay and careless companion her heart required, the clinging and exigent affection she could so well support. Lionel had the power to soften the touch of austerity latent in her, the hint of priggishness; she had the nobility and the resoluteness which he needed as an example, a stimulus to his plastic soul. They had, in each other’s company, a sense of absolute completeness and satisfaction; they knew that this love was altogether right.
Frances inspected the new pocketbook he had bought her, so unnecessarily and unsuitably costly, and then again at Lionel’s happy face. And she would have liked to cry out what she and all women know enough to conceal:
“Oh, my love, I want to protect you, to care for you, to shield your raw pride, forever and ever to stand between you and the world!”
And that mustn’t be said. She knew she must call his weakness strength, or she would destroy him. No man must ever see his true self mirrored in a woman’s eyes. He could not endure it.