The Duchess of Wrexe, Her Decline and Death. Hugh Walpole
about her. Her nose was too thin, her mouth too large, her face too white and pinched.
Her body as she stood there was graceful, but not yet disciplined, so that she made movements and then checked them, giving the impression that she wished to do a number of things, but was uncertain of the correctness of any of them.
She was of foreign blood Arkwright decided—much too black and white for England. But it was her expression that demanded his attention. As she watched Felix Brun talking to Lady Adela, she seemed to be longing to express the contempt that she felt for both of them, and yet to have behind that desire a pathetic hesitation as to whether she had a right to be contemptuous of anyone.
It was the pathos, Arkwright decided, that one ultimately felt concerning her. She looked lonely, she looked frightened, and she looked "in the devil of a temper." Her black eyes would be beautiful, whether they were filled with tears or with anger, and it seemed that they must very often be filled with both. "I wouldn't like to have the handling of her," thought Arkwright, and then instantly after, "I'd like to take away some of that loneliness."
"She'll have a fine old time," he thought, "if she isn't too sensitive."
Lady Adela had now moved forward with Brun to look at the picture, but the girl did not move with them. She did not look at the portrait nor did she appear to take any interest in the other pictures. She stood there, making, every now and again, little nervous movements with her black gloves.
Arkwright moved about the gallery by himself a little, and he was conscious that the girl's large black eyes followed him. He fancied, as, for an instant he glanced back, that the Duchess from her high wall leaned forward on her cane just a little further, so that she might force the girl to give her attention. "That girl's got plenty of spirit," thought Arkwright, "I'd like to see a battle between her and the old lady. It would be tooth and nail."
Then once again the door opened—there was again an addition to the company. Arkwright was, at that moment, facing the girl, and as he heard the sharp closing of the door he saw in her eyes the welcome that the new-comer had received.
She was transformed. The pallor of her face was now flooded with colour, and she seemed almost beautiful as the hostility left her, and her mouth curved in a smile of so immense a relief that it emphasized indeed her earlier burden. Her whole body expressed the intensity of her pleasure; her awkwardness had departed; she was suddenly in possession of herself. Arkwright's gaze went past her to the door. The man who stood there was greeting the girl with a smile that had in it both surprise and intimacy, as though they were the two oldest friends in the world, and yet he was astonished to see her there. The man was large, roughly built, with big limbs and a face that, without being good-looking, beamed kindness and good-nature. His eyes and mouth were sensitive and less ragged than the rest of him, his nose the plainest thing about him, was square and too large for his mouth. His hair was white, although he looked between forty and fifty years of age. His dress was correct, but he obviously did not give his clothes more consideration than the feelings of his friends required of him. Ruddy of face, with his white hair and large limbs and smiling good-humour, he was pleasant to look upon, and Arkwright did not wonder at the girl's welcome; he would be, precisely, the kind of friend that she would need—benevolent, understanding, strong.
They greeted one another, and then they moved forward and spoke to Lady Adela and Brun.
Arkwright watched them. There they all were, gathered together under the sharp eyes of the Duchess, and she seemed, so Arkwright fancied, to hold them with her gaze. Little Brun was neater than ever, and Lady Adela drier than ever by the side of the stranger. They talked; they were discussing the picture—their eyes travelled up to it, and for an instant there was silence as though they were all charging it with their challenge or surrender, as the case might be. The girl's eyes moved up to it with a sudden sharpened, thinning of the face that brought back the gleam of hostility that it had worn before. Then her eyes fell, and, with a smile, they sought her friend.
Arkwright did not know any reason for his interest, but he watched them breathlessly, and the sense that he had had, on first entering the room, of being on the verge of some new experience, deepened with him.
Brun was apparently suddenly conscious that he had left his friend alone long enough, for he detached himself from the group, shook hands with Lady Adela and the girl, bowed stiffly to the man and joined Arkwright.
"Seen enough?" he said.
"Yes," said Arkwright.
They went out together.
IV
Felix Brun and Arkwright were not intimate friends. No one was intimate with Brun, and the little man came and disappeared, was there and was not there, was absent for a year, and then back again as though he had been away a week, was, indeed, simply a succession of explanatory footnotes to the social history of Europe.
It was for the social history of Europe that he lived, for the eager penetrating gaze into this capital and that, something suddenly noted, some case examined and dismissed. Life is discovered most accurately by those who learn to watch for its accidents rather than its intentions, and it was always the things that occurred by change that gave Brun his discoveries. He was a cosmopolitan of a multitude of acquaintances, no friends, no occupation, an enthusiasm only for cynical and pessimistic observation, invaluable as a commentator, useless as a human being.
When, as was now the case, some chance meeting had assisted his theories his neat little body shone like a celluloid ball. If, having made his discovery, he might also have his audience to whom he might declare it, then his very fingers quivered with the excitement of it. His hands, white and thin and tapering, waved now. His eyes were on fire. As they walked up Bond Street one might have imagined air-bladders at his armpits, Mercury's wings at his heels. The quiet evening air was charged with him.
"Well," said Arkwright, smiling and looking down at his companion. "Who are they all?"
"Lady Adela Beaminster, Rachel Beaminster, Christopher–"
"Christopher?"
"Dr. Christopher, the Harley Street man. He's the Duchess' doctor, has been for years. The girl was the Duchess' granddaughter—Lady Adela's niece."
"Well?"
"The girl's coming out in three days' time. They're giving a ball in Portland Place for her. Nobody knows much about her. She's been educated abroad, and always kept very close when she's here. I shouldn't think the old Duchess loves her much. She loved the girl's father, but he married a Russian actress, bolted to Russia with her, and the old lady never forgave him. He and the actress were both killed in a Petersburg fire, and the child was sent home—only tiny then–"
"Ah! that explains the foreign air she had. She didn't look as though she loved her aunt very much either."
"No—don't suppose she does. But that's not it—that's not it."
They had arrived now at the top of Bond Street, and they paused for a moment to allow the Oxford Street traffic to sweep past them.
It was an hour of stir and clatter—hansoms, carts, lumbering omnibuses, bicycles, all were hurled along as though by some impatient hand, and the evening light crept higher and higher along the walls of the street, leaving grey-purple shadows beneath it.
They crossed over, and were instantly in a dim, golden, voiceless square. It was as though a door had been closed.
Brun still held Arkwright's arm. "Now we can talk—no noise. Francis Breton has come back."
To Arkwright this name, unfortunately, conveyed nothing.
"You don't know?" Brun was disappointed.
"Never heard of him."
"Fancy that. World of wonders; what have you been doing with your time? He is the Duchess's grandson, son of the beautiful, the wonderful Iris Beaminster, who eloped with Kit Breton thirty years ago. I believe the old Duchess pursued her relentlessly until the end. They were married only a few years and then Iris Breton committed suicide. Kit Breton beat her and was always drunk; an absolute rascal. There was one boy, and he wandered about Europe with his father until he was twenty or so. Then Kit Breton died, and the boy came home.