Part 6 (1/2)
”I was sure she would, because she told me I had only to ask. She was dying to lend it. She wanted to be able to tell everybody that Aline West and Basil Norman lived in her house for a fortnight in August. It's a great feather in her cap; and Ian Somerled coming to visit us here is something she'll _never_ get over as long as she lives. I marconied her an hour after he'd said that he would come to us after London, and we'd begin our motor tour from Carlisle. 'Twas only taking Time by the forelock to tell him we _had_ been invited. It _was_ bad luck poor Mrs.
Keeling being ill when she got my wire, and she really was a trump to turn out and go to a nursing home.”
”Good heavens, is that what she did? I didn't know----”
”Of course not. But you needn't mind so dreadfully. She's _much_ more comfortable in the nursing home with the best attention than in her own.
And, as a reward, we'll dedicate the book to her.”
Aline said this as a queen might have suggested lending her crown to a loyal servitor. Basil laughed, rather uncomfortably, and his sister looked up hastily into his face, to see if he were making fun of her.
Just then they were drawing near the open windows of the drawing-room, and the lamplight shone out so brightly through the old-fas.h.i.+oned embroidered lace curtains that she could see his profile. Hers too was clearly outlined as she lifted her chin anxiously.
The brother and sister were both good to look at, in ways so different that the two made a striking contrast. Aline knew that in appearance they were a romantic pair of travelling companions. Every one stared at them when they were together, for he was very tall and dark, more like an Italian or a Spaniard than an Englishman, and she was gracefully slender and fair, dressing with a subtle appreciation of herself and all her points. Aline West's and Basil Norman's photographs, taken together or apart, for newspapers and magazines, were extremely effective, and were considered by publishers to help the sale of their books. Norman might have sat for t.i.tian's Portrait of a Gentleman: and there were those who thought Mrs. West not unlike Lady Hamilton. Since the first expression of this opinion in print, she had changed the fas.h.i.+on of her hair, and at fancy-dress b.a.l.l.s, of which she was fond, she generally appeared as the beautiful Emma. Certainly the cast of her features and the cutting of her lips faintly recalled those of Romney's ideal; but Mrs. West's pretty pale face had only two expressions: the one when she smiled--always the same delicate curving of the lips which lit no beam in the deep-set forget-me-not eyes; the one when she was grave and wistfully intellectual. She had a beautiful round white throat which she never hid with a high collar. Her hair was of that sun-in-a-mist gold that eventually fades almost imperceptibly into gray--if left to itself.
But in Aline's case it was improbable that it would be left to itself.
Every morning when dressing she examined it anxiously, even fearfully, to see whether it was becoming thinner or losing its misty glints of gold. Yet she knew that her fears were likely to advance the day she dreaded, and tried to shut them out of her mind.
”Why do you laugh?” she inquired almost irritably, for she was secretly afraid always of missing something that was seen by others to be amusing. She talked constantly of a sense of humour, pitying those not blessed with it, but there were moments when she wondered bleakly if she had it herself. ”Have I said anything funny?”
”Only you seem so sure that the dedication will be a panacea for every wound.”
”So it will be for Mrs. Keeling.”
”I thought you had the idea of dedicating it to Somerled, as he'll be taking us through Scotland in his car.”
”I had. But I feel now it would be a mistake. He couldn't refuse, and one wouldn't be sure he was pleased. He's so horribly important, you know. I don't mean in his own eyes, but in the eyes of the world; so nothing we could do for him would really confer an honour. And the reason he's cynical and bored is because people have fussed over him so sickeningly, more and more every year, since he began to rise to what he is.”
”Yet I don't think he's conceited.”
”Not in the ordinary way. But he can't help knowing that he's some one in particular. He began to like us because we didn't fuss over him, or seem to go out of our way to please him. That's where I've been clever; for oh, Basil, I'd do anything short of disfiguring myself to win him.”
”My poor girl!” Norman exclaimed.
She caught him up hastily. ”Why do you call me 'poor?' Do you think I shan't succeed? Do you think he'll never care?”
”You're a far better judge than I am,” her brother answered evasively.
”Women feel such things. We----”
”You feel things, too. You know you do, Basil.”
”In an abstract way--not when they're just in front of my eyes.”
”He has told me a lot about himself, anyhow.” Aline took up a new line of argument, out of her own thoughts. ”That's a good sign. He is so reserved with almost everybody--and he was even with me till our last evening on s.h.i.+pboard. I was telling him about Jim dying in India and leaving me alone there, almost a girl; and how there was no money; and how I took up writing and made a success. Then from that we drifted into talk about success in general; and he told me his whole story--much more than I'd ever heard from gossip, and a good deal of it quite different.
I took it as the greatest compliment that he should open his heart to me--and a splendid sign.”
”Yes, I suppose it was both,” Norman agreed; and Aline had retired too far within the rose-bower of happy memories to catch a suggestion of doubt in his voice.
”I read once in a newspaper that he'd been a bootblack in Glasgow before he emigrated,” Mrs. West said, as they turned away from the house again in their walk, and set their faces toward the distant gate. ”It wasn't true. His father was a crofter on a little island somewhere near Skye. I think it's called Dhrum. I never heard of it before; and he had to excuse my ignorance, because I'm Canadian! It seems that a branch of the MacDonald family own the whole place and are great people there--lords of the isle. His name was MacDonald too, though his family were only peasants--clan connections, or whatever they call that sort of thing. I don't understand a bit, and I didn't like asking him to explain. It was too delicate a subject, though he appeared to be rather proud of his origin. Scotch peasants are apparently quite different from other peasants. You'll have to study up the differences and make lots of notes for the book. I'm no good at anything with dialect, or character sort of parts. You wouldn't think now, though, that Ian Somerled had ever been a peasant would you? He talked a lot about his father and mother--evidently he adored them. He said they'd be miracles anywhere out of Scotland, but there were many like them there. According to him there was nothing they hadn't read or couldn't quote by the yard, from Burns and Scott back to Shakespeare. That was the way he was brought up, and instead of wanting him to go on crofting like themselves, they were enchanted because he drew pictures on their unpainted doors and their whitewashed walls. They saved all their pennies to have him educated as an artist, and encouraged him--quite different from peasant parents in books. One day the 'meenister' called, and saw the boy's pictures. He thought them something out of the ordinary--pictures of castles and cathedrals they were, with people going in and coming out, and portraits of friends, and historical characters. After that he took a great interest in Ian, and taught him Latin and the few other things his wonderful parents didn't happen to know. When Ian was about thirteen or fourteen, the 'meenister' tried to get help for the little MacDonald from the great MacDonald, a disagreeable, cranky old man with one daughter. They thought they owned the whole world instead of one tiny island, and the man wouldn't do anything for the child. He simply poured contempt on 'clan ties.'”
”That doesn't sound like the great folk of Scotland,” said Basil, who for weeks had been reading little else but Scottish history, Scottish fiction, and Scottish poetry, in order to get himself in the right frame of mind for writing ”the book.” ”I haven't come across a single instance of their being purse-proud or sn.o.bbish.”