The Squaw Man. Faversham Julie Opp
impossible, Petrie. Next week, after the wedding, or after we return from Scotland, I'll have leisure then to discuss these things with you, and I really mean this time to have you adjust everything and set me quite straight."
Johnston Petrie shook his head.
"Oh, I know," Henry continued, "I've been careless, but I mean to pull up. I'll start fair from next week."
Johnston Petrie looked up sharply. He knew more of his client's career than Henry cared to remember. He had known him from boyhood, and his shrewd summing up of human nature could see only pitfalls ahead for Lady Elizabeth's son. He had tried in every way to stop the reckless living of his client. From the incessant demands made on the estate for large sums of ready money he knew that Henry Wynnegate, irritated by the conservative principles of his firm, had used outside help to prevent his family adviser from obtaining knowledge of some recent speculations.
Long ago Johnston Petrie would have asked to be released from the responsibilities of the Kerhill affairs, out for a loyal devotion to his dead client, the late Earl, and a desire to protect Lady Elizabeth's fast diminishing rights. He was not in the least deceived by Henry's machinations, but wilfully allowed himself to seem blind to certain matters. He wished to be able to keep his hand at the lever, and argued with his brother that the end justified the means.
Lady Elizabeth in a recent interview had assured him that the coming marriage would be the turning-point in Henry's career. Nevertheless, he feared her judgment. Something in Henry's attitude to-day had made him more apprehensive; it had been impossible to pin him down to a serious consideration of his affairs. Petrie determined to venture a final effort, by enrolling his brother's services to strengthen his admonitions.
"Lord Kerhill," he said. "My brother is also most anxious to see you regarding some stocks you asked his advice about." He touched a bell; a clerk answered from an adjoining room.
"Ask Mr. Malcolm Petrie to come to us. Say that the Earl of Kerhill is here."
Henry chafed under the calm firmness of his solicitor. He had come in answer to an imperative note, and the discussion of his complicated affairs was extremely disagreeable. He was in no mood to continue it further. He moved to the door as Malcolm Petrie entered; a smaller counterpart of his brother, and a silent member of the firm, he took the same personal interest in the Kerhill affairs that his brother did. As he started to speak he was stopped by Henry.
"It's no use. I can wait no longer. A most important engagement demands my leaving at once. Advise me by letter – it will reach me to-morrow." And before either of the men could urge upon him the necessity of being allowed to advise him on certain negotiations, he had reached the outer door of the chambers, mounted the few steps leading to the court, and was in the square where his cab was waiting. He cursed the dreariness of the day as the rain splashed him. For a moment he hesitated. They had detained him far too long, these croaking fogies in their stuffy office. His hand fumbled in his pocket where lay a letter with a message not to be disregarded. On its arrival at his club early in the afternoon the note to Diana had been despatched.
The fury of haste that had made him so eager to escape from his business interview now deserted him. The rain drenched him in warm torrents. The driver on the box was a running stream, and from the horse came clouds of heavy steam.
Then the momentary irresolution passed as he gave his orders to the impassive cabman. He leaned back in his cab, tearing into shreds the mauve letter with its gold monogram as he muttered, "It's for the last time, by God." The hansom started with a jerk. It rattled down an alley. To Henry the damp, dismal court looked more than ever like a graveyard. He was glad when they turned into the vortex of the Strand.
That night at the opera, a new singer was to make her début in "Carmen." In Paris and America this sloe-eyed Italian had made the sensation of the half-century in her creation of the gypsy wanton. The brilliant throng in Covent Garden was alive with anticipation. The royalties were expected; indeed, the queen herself had especially commanded this reception for the gifted woman whom she had honored as her guest on the Riviera, where this singing Rachel had entranced her with the folk-songs and lullabies of her beloved country.
All that the London season could assemble of wit, beauty, and distinction was gathered in the Opera-House. The tiers of boxes were filling unusually early. Near the stage sat the Prime-Minister, a man of strong artistic perceptions and a writer of extraordinary talent. His face, with the marked cleft in the square chin, looked less dreamy than usual to-night, and the large, pale-blue eyes, amusedly surveyed the house. He seemed to have slipped off the yoke of tangled politics as he turned to his secretary, who was pointing out to him the celebrities in the stalls.
"There is the delightful American whom I met last week at Lord Blight's." As he spoke, he bowed to the new American favorite, Mrs. Hobart Chichester Chichester Jones, a radiant figure in scarlet, who found many glasses levelled at her.
"Only an American would dress so originally," the minister replied.
The American wore a gown of clinging scarlet fabric, the decidedly low-cut corsage showing the perfection of the white shoulders and arms. Around her throat she had twisted one long rope of uncut pearls and diamonds that reached below her waist, and in the soft, waving, red-gold hair she had arranged some daring scarlet geraniums. With her pale skin and great green eyes she enchanted London by her unusual type. Near her was the famous story-book Duchess, as the most popular of the younger beauties was called. "Too good to be true," Truth declared her, and indeed she seemed to have been especially created to confirm the mode of the old-fashioned romances extolling the grace and loveliness of an English Duchess. The crowd noticed the famous rubies that shone like tiny flames against the white gown.
Here and there a Dowager gleamed like a shelf in a Bond Street jeweller's shop, so promiscuous was her array of gems. The younger school of beauties with more wisdom employed their jewels differently, using them as an added tone of color or a touch of brilliance to a costume. In the stalls the art world was well represented. Painters and writers with a sprinkling of actors and actresses, who were not playing, were on hand to-night to greet the new-comer. From the gallery rail a crowd of eager, swarthy faces peered, impatiently gesticulating to one another, because of the failure of the curtain to ascend at the given time. It was known that the prima-donna was a capricious creature, often swayed by a mere whim from making her appearance. Once the death of a mocking-bird had postponed her début as Marguerite. Would she really appear?
As the royalties entered the box, the excitement was at fever-heat. Henry with his mother impatiently awaited Diana's arrival.
The overture began its sensuous, stirring appeal, and before the cigarette-girl crossed the bridge in the street scene, every seat and box was occupied.
The singer made the ill-starred Carmen a bewitching and compelling wanton. Who that saw her will ever forget her delicious cajolery as she urged the bewitched Don José to loosen the ropes that bound her? With her Habanera she eclipsed all predecessors and made the role irrevocably hers. The first act ended with a storm of bravas from the gallery and vociferous applause from the rest of the house.
It was not until the tumultuous ovation over the first act had ceased that Diana's presence was noticed by the audience. Accompanied by her father, she had arrived at the close of the overture, and had only time to slip into her place before the curtain arose. The walk in the rain had given her delicate skin a touch of color and heightened the beauty of her tender eyes, "so deeply blue that they were black," as Lord Patrick Illington described them on his first meeting at her presentation at Court. Her bands of straight hair were wound around her head; pale-green draperies encircled her lithesome body, and the gardenia blossoms in her hair gave her a fleeting likeness to the water-sprite Undine. In the horseshoe of fashionable mondaines the fragrance of her beauty was like that of a dew-sprayed rose.
Mrs. Hobart Chichester Chichester Jones, with her usual common-sense of seeing things as they were, leaned towards the man beside her.
"That is a beauty – the real thing; no chic, no gowning, no Paris wisdom of make-up, but a beauty. I'm glad I've seen it." She sank back as though philosophically preparing for a Waterloo.
From his box the Prince noticed the daughter of Sir Charles Marjoribanks whose services in diplomacy in his youth