Part 51 (1/2)
”Forgive me for a moment,” said Braybrooke. ”Lady Wrackley seems to want me.”
Indeed, the electric-light smile was being turned on and off in the box opposite with unmistakable intention, and, glancing across, Craven noticed that the young men had disappeared, no doubt to smoke cigarettes in the foyer. Lady Wrackley and Mrs. Ackroyde were alone, and, seeing them alone, it was easier to Craven to compare their appearance with Lady Sellingworth's.
Lady Wrackley looked s.h.i.+ningly artificial, seemed to glisten with artificiality, and her certainly remarkable figure suggested to him an advertis.e.m.e.nt for a corset designed by a genius with a view to the concealment of fat. Mrs. Ackroyde was far less artificial, and though her hair was dyed it did not proclaim the fact blatantly. Certainly it was difficult to believe that both those ladies, whom Braybrooke now joined, were much the same age as Lady Sellingworth. And yet, in Craven's opinion, to-night she made them both look ordinary, undistinguished. There was something magnificent in her appearance which they utterly lacked.
Braybrooke sat down in their box, and Craven was sure they were all talking about Lady Sellingworth and him. He saw Braybrooke's broad-fingered hand go to his beard and was almost positive his old friend was on the defensive. He was surely saying, ”No, really, I don't think so! I feel convinced there is nothing in it!” Craven's eyes met Lady Sellingworth's, and it seemed to him at that moment that she and he spoke together without the knowledge of Miss Van Tuyn. But immediately, and as if to get away from their strange and occult privacy, she said:
”What have you been doing lately, Beryl? I hear Miss Cronin has come over. But I thought you were not staying long. Have you changed your mind?”
Miss Van Tuyn said she might stay on for some time, and explained that she was having lessons in painting.
”In London! I didn't know you painted, and surely the best school of painting is in Paris.”
”I don't paint, dearest. But one can take lessons in an art without actually practising the art. And that is what I am doing. I like to know even though I cannot, or don't want to, do. d.i.c.k Garstin is my master.
He has given me the run of his studio in Glebe Place.”
”And you watch him at work?” said Craven.
”Yes.”
She fixed her eyes on him, and added:
”He is painting a living bronze.”
”Somebody very handsome?” said Lady Sellingworth, glancing across the house to the trio in the box opposite.
”Yes, a man called Nicolas Arabian.”
”What a curious name!” said Lady Sellingworth, still looking towards the opposite box. ”Is it an Englishman?”
”No. I don't know his nationality. But he makes a magnificent model.”
”Oh, he's a model!” said Craven, also looking at the box opposite.
”He isn't a professional model. d.i.c.k Garstin doesn't pay him to sit. I only mean that he is a marvellous subject for a portrait and sits well.
d.i.c.k happened to see him and asked him to sit. d.i.c.k paints the people he wants to paint, not those who want to be painted by him. But he's a really big man. You ought to know him.”
She said the last words to Lady Sellingworth, who replied:
”I very seldom make new acquaintances now.”
”You made Mr. Craven's!” said Miss Van Tuyn, smiling.
”But that was by special favour. I owe Mr. Braybrooke that!” said Craven. ”And I shall be eternally grateful to him.”
His eyes met Lady Sellingworth's, and he immediately added, turning to Miss Van Tuyn:
”I have to thank him for two delightful new friends--if I may use that word.”
”Mr. Braybrooke is a great benefactor,” said Miss Van Tuyn. ”I wonder how this play is going to end.”