Madame Claire/Chapter 19
Very satisfactory, thought Madame Claire, as she finished reading the letter. All sorts of ends were furthered by this visit. Stephen would take a new lease on life with Judy there. It was just the tonic that he needed. He would be certain to want to settle something on her. If he had wished to before he knew her, how much more would he now! She would, more or less unconsciously, present her own image to him, as she was to-day. Heaven alone knew how he had been picturing her all these years! And, too, Judy would meet—was meeting—new people. She already had an admirer. Madame Claire was no matchmaker; she abhorred matchmaking; but she knew that Judy was interested in Major Crosby and it would help her to know how deeply she was interested if she could compare him with other men. This Mr. Colebridge—he wasn't at all Judy's sort, perhaps—and yet he might attract her by his very differences. Or, if he failed to attract her, he might help her to define her feelings for the other more clearly.
Madame Claire was no advocate of marriage as the only career for women, but Judy's gifts seemed all to be in that direction. She had charm, tact, good sense. Her other qualities would emerge once she was away from the suffocating atmosphere of Eaton Square and Millie. She had never had a chance. Not that marriage with Major Crosby, for instance, would offer much scope for her talents . . . and yet, on the other hand, it might . . . it might. Well, well, Madame Claire told herself, she wouldn't raise a finger to bring it about. But she meant the girl to have a breathing space . . . time to think, and a new environment to think in. If she herself had had that at a certain period of her own life. . . .
She was expecting Eric this afternoon between five and six. Eric and Louise . . . there was a problem for her untangling! Two charming people—for Louise could be charming—who were at heart fond of each other, and yet were utterly at cross purposes. Madame Claire held the remarkable belief that no problem existed without its solution—however difficult that solution might be to come by—just as she believed that every poison had its antidote, and every evil its complementary good. Why, then, couldn't she think of a way to bring those two together? Louise's mind wanted prying open. It had closed on its jealousies as a pitcher plant closes on its food. Nothing that was in could get out, and nothing that was out could get in. An unfortunate state of affairs!
Eric came in bringing with him something fresh and vital that always seemed to accompany him. Judy called it his aura. He was quick in all his movements—the sort of man who gets through a great deal in a day and without fuss or bustle.
He advanced on Madame Claire and kissed her.
"You look wonderful! I've half an hour to spend with you to-day."
He drew up a chair beside hers.
"Don't you get very tired of being always busy?" she asked him, smiling.
"Yes. I do. But I must either be in the thick of things or out of them altogether. And just now things are very thick indeed, and getting thicker."
"I really enjoy being outside," she said. "One sees so much better."
"But are you outside?" He looked narrowly at her with humorous, quizzical eyes. "Are you? I never knew you to be, puller of many threads!"
She laughed.
"Oh, I give a feeble jerk now and then. It's all I can do. Tell me about Louise. I haven't seen her for a week or more."
"About Louise? But, my dear mother, if I once start talking about Louise . . ."
"Yes? Well, why not? What am I here for? Is there any . . . improvement, do you think?"
"Improvement? Let me tell you, then. You've brought it on yourself. I warned you." He laughed. "I'll tell you about last night. Last night we had Sir Henry Boyle-Stevens to dinner, and Mr. Stedman. About halfway through dinner Sir Henry said to Louise, but looking at me and smiling, 'It's a great comfort to me to be working with your husband. He is untiring and dependable.' Old Sir Henry does like me, and we've always got on together like anything. Would you like to hear what Louise said in reply? Would you? Very well. She said—I will give you her exact words and their emphasis—'I suppose Eric is dependable, politically.' 'I suppose,' you observe, and then the accent on 'politically.' Sir Henry looked quickly at her, and then at me, and changed the subject. She meant me to hear. Then the next thing. After dinner the Lewis Pringles came in. We were still in the dining room—the men, I mean—and when we joined the rest in the drawing-room Louise greeted me with these words—for my ears alone—'You needn't have hurried, Eric. I was just enjoying hearing my own voice for a change.' You ask me if there's any improvement! What am I to do? We can't go on like this much longer."
"No. And I don't think you ought to."
He flung himself back into his chair.
"Why does she live in my house if she dislikes me as much as that?"
"She doesn't dislike you, my dear. It's an extraordinary nature. Do you remember the unfortunate girl in the fairy tale? Every time she opened her mouth toads and snails and other horrid things came out of it. Well, that's Louise. That old hag jealousy has bewitched her. She's not happy, poor thing."
"I don't suppose she is happy. I don't see how she can be. But I can't make her happy, and she can't help making me miserable. I can't even ignore her."
"Try living apart for six months."
"She suggested that herself. Of course she expects me to go down on my knees and beg her to stay."
"Don't you do it! Let her go. Make her go. Give it out to your friends that the doctor says she must live in the country for a while. Insist on her going."
"And who would look after the house? I could shut it up I suppose and go to a hotel."
"No, no. Don't do that. I'll find some one," said Madame Claire. "You leave that to me."
"You mean a housekeeper?"
"I don't know, at the moment. I'll think of somebody."
"Louise may not come back," he said.
"Of course she'll come back. She has no intention of letting any other woman have you. You'll see . . . only you must see that she stays away six months this time. That last visit to Mistley wasn't long enough."
"I think you understand her better than I do."
"Oh, I do understand her. That's the curious thing about it. But it always seems to me that odd people are much easier to understand than simple people. Once you give people credit for being odd, nothing that they do surprises you. What's so difficult is to give people credit for being simple. Now if Louise would only understand that you are very simple"
"Am I?"
"Very. You're one of the least complex people I've ever known. None of my children are complex. Not even Connie, who thinks she is. By the way, have you seen her lately?"
"Not for several days. I called at her hotel just before coming here, but she was out."
"Yes, didn't you know? This is the afternoon of Petrovitch's concert. She's there, with Noel."
"Ah! Feasting her eyes and ears."
"You'd better stay and hear Noel's account of it." She looked at her watch. "He promised he'd come in afterwards. I'm glad he took her. It will be an outlet for her emotions. The papers just hint that Petrovitch is on the downward grade, Eric. Not the master that he was. He's not very young, you know."
"I suppose not. He wasn't a young man when she first knew him. But if the world were to reject and despise him, Connie would cling to him all the more. So there's no hope in that direction."
"Oh, yes," agreed Madame Claire. "She'd pride herself on it."
They talked for nearly half an hour, and Eric was about to go when Dawson opened the door to announce "Master Noel."
"Hello!" exclaimed Noel. "Two birds with one stone. That's splendid. Greetings, Claire. I'm bursting with talk. How are you, Eric?"
"We're bursting to hear you talk," Madame Claire told him. "Sit down and tell us all about it."
"Whew!" Noel stretched himself out in a chair and ran his fingers through his hair. "I feel a bit of a rag. Concerts always make me feel like that, but this one was rather more exhausting than usual."
"Was it a good concert?"
"Well, of course I'm no musician, but it seemed all right to me. Several thousand people had come to hear the lion roar, and they all seemed pleased with his roaring. But first of all, I wish you could have seen Connie, complete with dark shadows under her eyes, large black hat and a bunch of gardenias. Petrovitch saw her at once—we had seats almost under the piano—and they exchanged soul to soul looks. And then he sat down to play. Gosh, the fellow can play! He even had me spellbound. As for Connie—but I leave that to your imagination. I'll bet Petrovitch played as never before. Sees nephew sitting beside beautiful aunt. Tries to charm aunt away from nephew. Does so—or jolly near it. Connie sat there with her soul in her eyes. I'm sorry to have to mention souls so often, but the narrative seems to require it. Well, I wish you could have heard the applause. People stood up and clapped and clapped and clapped. The gallery yelled and shouted. Illiodor—that's his un-Christian name—tore off two or three encores and bowed and bowed, and then gazed at Connie and bowed some more, and then finally came back and played something very tender—you know the sort of thing—a fragment, a thought, a tear—and then gazed some more at Connie and that was the end of it. I sat there feeling proud all the time. Proprietary, I suppose you'd call it. Something like this: 'You like it? Good. Oh, yes, in a way he's one of the family. Fellow my aunt ran off with. Quite one of the family.'"
"How absurd you are, Noel!" laughed Madame Claire.
"And then what happened?" asked Eric.
"Well, we got out finally and headed for home. Connie hung on my arm like a wilted flower, and I can tell you, she's no light weight. I couldn't possibly put her in a 'bus in the state she was in—I have some sense of the fitness of things—so we took a taxi and she sat in it with her hands clasped and her eyes fixed before her, murmuring, 'Wasn't he divine, divine!' I felt that the situation was becoming a bit too tense, so I said, 'Yes, he's all right, but I think Grock's more amusing.' But it didn't annoy her a bit. She just kept on rocking herself and murmuring, 'Divine, divine!'"
"Did you leave her in that state?" Eric inquired.
"Oh, she won't recover for several days. When we got back to the hotel she thanked me as if I'd saved her from drowning—I didn't tell her it was all your idea, Claire—and said she'd carry the memory of that afternoon in her heart forever. I wonder? I'm pretty sure she will see him, or write to him. But there's one thing about Connie—she's honest. She won't see him and not tell me. I can trust her for that."
Later on the conversation turned on Major Crosby. Madame Claire asked Noel if he had seen him.
"Oh, about that," said Noel. "I went to see his doctor . . . the nice old fellow who came in that night; and I asked him to please send the bill to me. 'Bill?' he said. 'What bill?' When I said 'Major Crosby's,' he clapped me on the back and said, 'I don't send bills to the man who risked his life to get my son out of a shell-hole, under fire.' So now we know. He seems to think the world of Chip."
"Ah," said Madame Claire. "Yes, gallant. . . . I knew that. I hope he comes to see me."
"He said he meant to when I saw him last."
"I seem to be the only one of the family who hasn't met him," said Eric. "What do the others think of him?"
"Well," Noel told him, "Gordon didn't think anything—or anyhow, didn't say. Helen liked him—she's a good sort when she wants to be, and talks about having him meet influential people—publishers, I suppose she means. Mother said he wasn't connected with any Crosbys she ever heard of, and dad looked him up in Who's Who? and not finding him asked me how long I'd known him and what clubs he belonged to. Connie thinks he's quite charming, but doesn't understand women! Yes, I thought you'd smile. But what I want to know is, what does Judy think of him?"
"She's rather interested," said Madame Claire. "What do you think of him yourself, Noel?"
"One of the decentest fellows I ever knew."
"But hasn't a bob, I understand," remarked Eric. "Judy's a brave girl if she doesn't funk it. If only she had something of her own. . . ."
Madame Claire nodded.
"Yes, that would make all the difference. However, I'm certain nothing's been said, and I rather think nothing will be said, unless . . ." But she changed her mind about finishing her sentence.
"And what's your own news, Noel?" asked Eric. "Have you settled everything with Teal, about going to Germany?"
"Yes, thanks to you. Reparations Committee. And I haven't spoken a word of German, except to Hun prisoners during the war, since I was at school. I don't think it's my line, but the screw's fair, and it ought to be interesting, and besides, there aren't too many things going for a pore cripple. I like Cecil Teal, in spite of his name."
"When do you go?" Madame Claire asked.
"In three weeks. Do you think Judy'll be back?"
"I'm certain she'll come back."
"That's all right, then. Well, I must be off. Coming my way, Eric? I'm going to the club."
As they were leaving, Madame Claire called Noel back.
"Noel, tell Connie that I want to see her to-morrow or the next day. As soon as she's recovered. And, Eric, you'll let me know about Louise, won't you? She's not to go without saying good-by to me . . . if she does go."
"Oh, she's going," he said. "My wife," he explained, turning to Noel, "finds life with me intolerable."
"Well, there's divorce, thank Heaven!" Noel said. "I always feel about marriage and divorce the way I feel about those illuminated signs in theaters—the exits, you know, in case of fire. One simply wouldn't go into a theater unless they were there."
"In this case, however," said Madame Claire, "there isn't going to be a fire, and Eric's only seen the first act of the play. Good night, my dears."