Part 15 (1/2)

”Oh yes, yes,” wearily; ”but it isn't enough by itself. There is something I have missed, and to-night I feel that it might outweight all the rest - something to do with being young, and careless, and fresh, and just n.o.body.”

Still looking at her with slightly puzzled, very kindly eyes, he answered simply, ”I'm so sorry.”

She seemed to shrink away suddenly into her corner. The very simplicity of his sympathy, and the quiet, natural friendliness in his face, stirred some strange chord in her heart with a swift, unaccountable ache. He looked so big and strong and splendid there in the shadow, with his freshness and his charm; and she felt very brain-f.a.gged and world-weary; and without in the least knowing why, or what led up to the desire, she wanted to feel his arms about her, and his freshness soothing her spirit.

And instead he was not even attempting to make love to her, not even flirting with her. Would any other man she knew have ridden beside her thus after the gentleness she had shown? Was that perhaps the very secret of his attraction? Or was it a physical allurement - the irresistible charm of bigness and strength, independent of anything else, drawing with its time-old sway?

She had no time to probe further, as the brougham stopped at her door.

He handed her out with the deference so often met with in big men, remarking width an old-fas.h.i.+oned air that suited him to perfection:

”I'm afraid we have all tired you very much. It was good of you to come with us. I can't tell you how much we appreciate it.”

”Oh, indeed no; you refreshed me. Good-night. Stevens will run you home. Don't forget Sunday”, and she moved away.

”It must be his bigness,” was her last thought as her head touched the pillow. ”When I am used to it, no doubt the novelty will pa.s.s, and I shall find him merely boyish, and be rather bored.”

”I wonder if it is her dainty smallness,” Dudley was musing, away in his Bloomsbury lodging, feeling still, with a pleasant thrill, the touch of Doris's small hand on his arm, and seeing again the upward, confiding expression in her wide blue eyes. ”Odd that Hal should be so far astray in her judgment, when she is usually so clever; but if she knew her better she would change her mind.”

As for Hal herself, she hastily tumbled into bed, still chuckling in huge enjoyment over her evening.

”Those boys are just dears,” was her thought, ”and I wouldn't have missed Lady Bounce for the world. What a good thing Dudley was taken with paternal affection for that little fool Doris, and I had to have a chaperone. Heigh-ho! what a scene there will be if he hears about it; but what's the odds so long as you're happy? And oh dear! what will Lady Phyllis Fenton say when she finds out”; and once more the even teeth flashed an irresistible smile into the darkness.

CHAPTER X

It was force of habit chiefly that caused Lorraine, as a rule, to sleep long and late on Sunday mornings; and it was greatly to her advantage that for so many months, and even years, no mental anxiety had robbed her of a splendid capacity to rest. She seemed to have a faculty for limiting her worrying hours to the daylight, and being able to lay them aside, like her correspondence, at night.

Yet on the following Sunday morning she found herself early awake, with a brain only too ready to begin probing restlessly, and having little of the calm friendliness she intended it should have towards her guest of the evening.

To add to her unrest, her mother paid her an early visit, of a sort that had been growing too frequent of late. It was not enough that Lorraine paid her rent, and gave her a handsome allowance; when there chanced to be no one else to pay her debts, these came upon Lorraine's shoulders also.

T-day it was a long, rambling tale of a hard-hearted dressmaker who, having had a new frock back for alteration, had taken upon herself to return the skirt, without the bodice, with an intimation that she was retaining the delayed portion until her long account was settled.

Hence Mrs. Vivian found herself with what she called a most important engagement, without the equally important new frock to go in.

Lorraine lay under the bedclothes, with only her head showing, and watched her a little coldly, as she moved restlessly about the room airing her woes. She had promised Madame Luce, over and over again, to settle in a week or two; and who would have believed the odious woman would serve her such a trick?

Never again, if she had to go naked, would she order a garment from her of any description whatever. And the friends she had sent to her as customers! Why, half the woman's trade was owing to her introduction.

”Perhaps the friends don't pay their bills,” Lorraine suggested in a tired voice.

Mrs. Vivian drew herself up a little haughtily.

”I do not think there is any occasion to cast reflections on my friends, even if you do not choose to be sociable to them,” which remark was intended as a dignified hit at Lorraine's invincible determination to maintain friendly relations with her mother, without having anything whatever to do with her mother's friends.

As many previous. .h.i.ts, it fell quite harmlessly; it was doubtful if Lorraine even heard it, half hidden there in the bedclothes with her tired eyes.

”I suppose it isn't any use reminding you that your personal expenditure exceeds mine?” she hinted, ”and that you have already far overstepped the allowance we stipulated?”