Sekhet. Irene Miller
in residence at "Mon Bijou."
With the ensuing spring, Morris's restless spirit once more asserted itself, and the summer saw them in London. There he held a social position which led him into circles where no man can introduce a woman who occupies the position Evarne now held. But he saw that plenty of diversions and gaieties of one kind and another came her way. She was still interested in her Art, and, happy in love given and returned, she wasted no sighs over those society gatherings from which she was forever strictly tabooed.
Morris studied appearances to the extent of paying an occasional brief visit to Mrs. Kenyon at their country home; in the autumn, too, he sometimes left Evarne to her own devices in the flat wherein she was mistress, while he joined shooting parties at various country houses. But at the first breath of winter he was quite ready to be coaxed back to the girl's little Paradise on earth, "Mon Bijou."
On their settling down once more at Naples, she was again seen at Florelli's, bent on making up for lost time. Her artistic studies had been of necessity but intermittent. In Morris she beheld her paramount duty; he had been as ardent and jealous as any young lover, lamenting and grudging every minute that Art took her from his service. He laughed at the persistence with which she continued to snatch stray hours for drawing. Her future was his care now, he insisted. He hated to think of those soft, brown eyes squandering their beams upon inanimate objects. Why did she want to waste any of the precious hours of her glorious youth shut up in a crowded, overheated studio, that stank of paint and turpentine and microbes and humanity?
But Evarne had not entirely abandoned the study of Philosophy for that of Love. She told him, with fascinating seriousness, that in order to maintain the mental balance that was described as "Happiness," it was necessary to both cultivate and provide an outlet for the intellectual faculties, as well as for those impulses that were revelling with such joyous abandon amid "the roses and raptures of vice."
Thus she was sadly disappointed when, within a fortnight of settling down once more seriously to work, Morris announced that he was going to Paris for a week or two, and of course expected her to accompany him.
She had just arrived at one of those stages, so delightful to pass through in any study, when a distinct advance in power is felt. The close of each day's efforts left her with the exhilarating feeling of having surpassed herself—of having successfully overstepped her previous highest limit. To abandon her work at this crisis was the last thing she desired.
"Morris, dearest," she pouted in sudden protest, "why do we wander about so very much? It is so delightful here."
"But I must go to Paris now. I have business."
"I thought you never had to do anything you didn't want to? Anyway, dearie, couldn't you live without me for a fortnight? I know how it will be! If you have got me with you we shall end up by roaming all through the winter, but if I am here at 'Mon Bijou,' waiting for you—why, then, you will return quickly."
Morris protested, but in the end Evarne for once took her own way. It was quite unusual for her not immediately and unhesitatingly to set aside her own wishes should they chance to conflict with those of her lover; on the other hand, Morris always duly consulted her respecting the plans and arrangements of their mutual life, and had never realised how entirely it was his will alone that controlled their movements. Now his vanity was wounded—not so much that she should question his arrangements, as that the form the opposition took should actually imply her willingness to bear a separation. It was something fresh and strange in his wide experience, and—to his way of thinking—far from flattering! What he always expected was the necessity of soothing jealous fears and apprehensions arising from periods of absence of his own making.
Thus he went off with a feeling of displeasure against Evarne that was new. He did not comprehend that it was the very knowledge of the strength of her own affection that enabled her to see him leave the arc of her personal magnetism and influence without feeling any anxiety. In London she had been forced to spend days alone while he was in the company of others—women, high-born, beautiful, no doubt—yet she had never feared for his loyalty. Sweet, blind trust!
Shortly after his return from Paris, Morris showed that he had no intention of spending the whole of the winter and spring at Naples, as he had done during the two previous years.
"I've got a bright idea," he announced one evening. "Let us spend the winter in Egypt, voyaging up the Nile with a party of our gayest, jolliest pals. What say you, Evarne? I know of a dahabeah, built for private use, that has lost its income, I suppose, for now it's willing to let itself out on hire. I wrote concerning it, and here's the answer, together with any number of photographs, both of its personal appearance and its internal regions."
He passed over a pile of papers, which the girl studied with keen interest. Morris, Naples and the studio was a triple combination that it had seemed impossible to improve upon; nevertheless, Morris, Egypt and a gay, bright party formed a decidedly alluring prospect if an alternate programme for the winter months was not to be avoided.
"Now, whom would you like to invite? We must resign ourselves beforehand to the idea that it will probably be the grand finale of our acquaintance with all whom we honour by our choice. The best of friends invariably quarrel on long voyages."
"You and I will set them such an example that concord and harmony will reign supreme, won't we? Absit omen."
"I really think we may defy Fate on that point, little sweetheart. Now, to business! We can have eight besides our charming selves. Let's ask the Varesios—see what they gain by being able to speak English. Then there are those rowdy Philmers from London—that's four. Then Giuseppe—he'll keep us lively too; he's like a jolly English boy, isn't he? Not too overwhelmingly polite. Then there's Tom Talling—we must have some more women, mustn't we?"
"I think equal numbers are best."
"Oh, wise young judge! Well, look here, we can transport Talling to heaven as well as Egypt if we like to give him permission to invite that little French girl he's so mad over—Justine Feronnier, she's called. She's a quiet, demure little minx, with curious, flaxen hair. She looks down the side of her nose all the time, as if she had just come out of a convent school. I'm sure you can't dislike her, and I should be glad to do Tom a good turn. Do you mind?"
"Not a bit. Who else?"
"Um-m-m, who? Good gracious, I was forgetting Tony Belmont."
"The man you were with so much in Paris last month?"
"That's it. He must come, and we will tell him to bring Lucinda."
"Is Lucinda another little minx, like Tom's friend?"
"Well, she chooses to describe herself as Mrs. Belmont, and it wouldn't be kind to show undue curiosity concerning the date and place of the wedding ceremony. We've settled upon one too many, haven't we? But Guiseppe is well accustomed to being tucked in as a sort of makeweight, so I declare this parliament prorogued."
"Tell me, what is the dahabeah called?"
"'The Waterfowl' at present, but that's only fit for a houseboat on the Thames. I shall rechristen her 'Evarne the Beautiful,'" and Morris smiled indulgently.
But the girl shook her head, declaring with a touch of coquettish self-confidence that she could not consent to such a name being chosen. One Evarne the Beautiful was quite enough to occupy all his thoughts.
"Then, Lady Vanity, you must exercise your own ingenuity," he answered, and after a moment's solemn hesitation over the rival merits of "The River Queen" and "The Radiant Isis," Evarne decided on the latter name as more appropriate to a craft destined to breast the waters of Old Nile.
Each desired guest accepted the invitation with flattering alacrity, and ere long "The Radiant Isis" was fairly off upon her voyage up the great river of the land of the Pharaohs.
CHAPTER VIII
LUCINDA BELMONT