第88章

Yes, he would be coming; wherever she was, whenever she wanted him!...

His blood on fire, heedless of everything but to rush after happiness, Lennan spent those hours before the dance.He had told Sylvia that he would be dining at his Club--a set of rooms owned by a small coterie of artists in Chelsea.He had taken this precaution, feeling that he could not sit through dinner opposite her and then go out to that dance--and Nell! He had spoken of a guest at the Club, to account for evening dress--another lie, but what did it matter? He was lying all the time, if not in words, in action--must lie, indeed, to save her suffering!

He stopped at the Frenchwoman's flower shop.

"Que desirez-vous, monsieur? Des oeillets rouges--j'en ai de bien beaux, ce soir."Des oeillets rouges? Yes, those to-night! To this address.No green with them; no card!

How strange the feeling--with the die once cast for love--of rushing, of watching his own self being left behind!

In the Brompton Road, outside a little restaurant, a thin musician was playing on a violin.Ah! and he knew this place; he would go in there, not to the Club--and the fiddler should have all he had to spare, for playing those tunes of love.He turned in.He had not been there since the day before that night on the river, twenty years ago.Never since; and yet it was not changed.The same tarnished gilt, and smell of cooking; the same macaroni in the same tomato sauce; the same Chianti flasks; the same staring, light-blue walls wreathed with pink flowers.Only the waiter different--hollow-cheeked, patient, dark of eye.He, too, should be well tipped! And that poor, over-hatted lady, eating her frugal meal--to her, at all events, a look of kindness.For all desperate creatures he must feel, this desperate night! And suddenly he thought of Oliver.Another desperate one! What should he say to Oliver at this dance--he, aged forty-seven, coming there without his wife! Some imbecility, such as: 'Watching the human form divine in motion,' 'Catching sidelights on Nell for the statuette'--some cant; it did not matter! The wine was drawn, and he must drink!

It was still early when he left the restaurant--a dry night, very calm, not cold.When had he danced last? With Olive Cramier, before he knew he loved her.Well, THAT memory could not be broken, for he would not dance to-night! Just watch, sit with the girl a few minutes, feel her hand cling to his, see her eyes turned back to him; and--come away! And then--the future! For the wine was drawn! The leaf of a plane-tree, fluttering down, caught on his sleeve.Autumn would soon be gone, and after Autumn--only Winter! She would have done with him long before he came to Winter.Nature would see to it that Youth called for her, and carried her away.Nature in her courses! But just to cheat Nature for a little while! To cheat Nature--what greater happiness!

Here was the place with red-striped awning, carriages driving away, loiterers watching.He turned in with a beating heart.Was he before her? How would she come to this first dance? With Oliver alone? Or had some chaperon been found? To have come because she--this child so lovely, born 'outside'--might have need of chaperonage, would have been some comfort to dignity, so wistful, so lost as his.But, alas! he knew he was only there because he could not keep away!

Already they were dancing in the hall upstairs; but not she, yet;and he stood leaning against the wall where she must pass.Lonely and out of place he felt; as if everyone must know why he was there.People stared, and he heard a girl ask: "Who's that against the wall with the hair and dark moustache?"--and her partner murmuring his answer, and her voice again: "Yes, he looks as if he were seeing sand and lions." For whom, then, did they take him?

Thank heaven! They were all the usual sort.There would be no one that he knew.Suppose Johnny Dromore himself came with Nell! He was to be back on Saturday! What could he say, then? How meet those doubting, knowing eyes, goggling with the fixed philosophy that a man has but one use for woman? God! and it would be true!

For a moment he was on the point of getting his coat and hat, and sneaking away.That would mean not seeing her till Monday; and he stood his ground.But after to-night there must be no more such risks--their meetings must be wisely planned, must sink underground.And then he saw her at the foot of the stairs in a dress of a shell-pink colour, with one of his flowers in her light-brown hair and the others tied to the handle of a tiny fan.How self-possessed she looked, as if this were indeed her native element--her neck and arms bare, her cheeks a deep soft pink, her eyes quickly turning here and there.She began mounting the stairs, and saw him.Was ever anything so lovely as she looked just then? Behind her he marked Oliver, and a tall girl with red hair, and another young man.He moved deliberately to the top of the stairs on the wall side, so that from behind they should not see her face when she greeted him.She put the little fan with the flowers to her lips; and, holding out her hand, said, quick and low: