Part 32 (1/2)

”I am not old enough--or young enough--to be enamoured of Mrs.

Gareth-Lawless' little daughter,” he said. ”YOU need not be told that. But you have heard that there are those who amuse themselves by choosing to believe that I am.”

”A few light and not too clean-minded fools,” she admitted without flinching.

”No man can do worse for himself than to explain and deny,” he responded with a smile at once hard and fine. ”Let them continue to believe it.”

CHAPTER XX

Sixteen pa.s.sed by with many other things much more disturbing and important to the world than a girl's birthday; seventeen was gone, with pa.s.sing events more complicated still and increasingly significant, but even the owners of the hands hovering over the Chessboard, which was the Map of Europe, did not keep a watch on all of them as close as might have been kept with advantage. Girls in their teens are seldom interested in political and diplomatic conditions, and Robin was not fond of newspapers. She worked well and steadily under Mademoiselle's guidance, and her governess realized that she was not losing sight of her plans for self support. She was made aware of this by an occasional word or so, and also by a certain telepathic union between them. Little as she cared for the papers, the child had a habit of closely examining the advertis.e.m.e.nts every day. She read faithfully the columns devoted to those who ”Want” employment or are ”Wanted” by employers.

”I look at all the paragraphs which begin 'Wanted, a young lady'

or a 'young woman' or a 'young person,' and those which say that 'A young person' or 'a young woman' or 'a young lady' desires a position. I want to find out what is oftenest needed.”

She had ceased to be disturbed by the eyes which followed her, or opened a little as she pa.s.sed. She knew that nothing had come undone or was crooked and that untidiness had nothing to do with the matter. She accepted being looked at as a part of everyday life. A certain friendliness and pleasure in most of the glances she liked and was glad of. Sometimes men of the flushed, middle-aged or elderly type displeased her by a sort of boldness of manner and gaze, bet she thought that they were only silly, giddy, old things who ought to go home to their families and stay with them.

Mademoiselle or Dowie was nearly always with her, but, as she was not a French jemme fille, this was not because it was supposed that she could not be trusted out alone, but because she enjoyed their affectionate companions.h.i.+p.

There was one man, however, whom she greatly disliked, as young girls will occasionally dislike a member of the opposite s.e.x for no special reason they can wholly explain to themselves.

He was an occasional visitor of her mother's--a personable young Prussian officer of high rank and t.i.tle. He was blonde and military and good-looking; he brought his bearing and manner from the Court at Berlin, and the click of his heels as he brought them smartly together, when he made his perfect automatic bow, was one of the things Robin knew she was reasonless in feeling she detested in him.

”It makes me feel as if he was not merely bowing as a a man who is a gentleman does,” she confided to Mademoiselle Valle, ”but as if he had been taught to do it and to call attention to it as if no one had ever known how to do it properly before. It is so flouris.h.i.+ng in its stiff way that it's rather vulgar.”

”That is only personal fancy on your part,” commented Mademoiselle.

”I know it is,” admitted Robin. ”But--” uneasily, ”--but that isn't what I dislike in him most. It's his eyes, I suppose they are handsome eyes. They are blue and full--rather too full. They have a queer, swift stare--as if they plunged into other people's eyes and tried to hold them and say something secret, all in one second. You find yourself getting red and trying to look away.”

”I don't,” said Mademoiselle astutely--because she wanted to hear the rest, without asking too many questions.

Robin laughed just a little.

”You have not seen him do it. I have not seen him do it myself very often. He comes to call on--Mamma”--she never said ”Mother”--”when he is in London. He has been coming for two or three seasons. The first time I saw him I was going out with Dowie and he was just going upstairs. Because the hall is so small, we almost knocked against each other, and he jumped back and made his bow, and he stared so that I felt silly and half frightened. I was only fifteen then.”

”And since then?” Mademoiselle Valle inquired.

”When he is here it seems as if I always meet him somewhere. Twice, when Fraulein Hirsch was with me in the Square Gardens, he came and spoke to us. I think he must know her. He was very grand and condescendingly polite to her, as if he did not forget she was only a German teacher and I was only a little girl whose mamma he knew. But he kept looking at me until I began to hate him.”

”You must not dislike people without reason. You dislike Lord Coombe.”

”They both make me creep. Lord Coombe doesn't plunge his eyes into mine, but he makes me creep with his fishy coldness. I feel as if he were like Satan in his still way.”

”That is childish prejudice and nonsense.”

”Perhaps the other is, too,” said Robin. ”But they both make me creep, nevertheless. I would rather DIE than be obliged to let one of them touch me. That was why I would never shake hands with Lord Coombe when I was a little child.”

”You think Fraulein Hirsch knows the Baron?” Mademoiselle inquired further.

”I am sure she does. Several times, when she has gone out to walk with me, we have met him. Sometimes he only pa.s.ses us and salutes, but sometimes he stops and says a few words in a stiff, magnificent way. But he always bores his eyes into mine, as if he were finding out things about me which I don't know myself. He has pa.s.sed several times when you have been with me, but you may not remember.”

Mademoiselle Valle chanced, however, to recall having observed the salute of a somewhat haughty, masculine person, whose military bearing in itself was sufficient to attract attention, so markedly did it suggest the clanking of spurs and accoutrements, and the high lift of a breast bearing orders.