Part 20 (1/2)

”It isn't only a case of conscience, dear; it's one of common sense.

Conscience has a way of sometimes mistaking the issue, whereas common sense can generally be trusted to be right.”

”Of course, if you're going to talk that way, Miriam, I don't see what's left for me to answer; but it doesn't sound very reverent, I must say. I'm trying to look at things in the highest light, and it doesn't strike me as the highest light to be unkind to Billy when I needn't be. If you think I ought to treat him cruelly you must keep your opinion, but I know you'll excuse me if I keep mine.”

She carried her head loftily as she bore another gown into the adjoining darkness, and Miriam waited patiently till she emerged again.

”Does your other--I hardly know what to call him--does your other fiance know about Billy?”

”Why on earth should he? What good would that do? It will be all over--I mean about Billy--before I announce my second engagement, and as the one to Billy will never be announced at all there's no use in saying anything about it.”

”But suppose Billy himself finds out?”

”Billy won't find out anything whatever until I get ready to let him.”

The finality of this retort reduced Miriam to silence. She allowed some minutes to pa.s.s before saying, with some hesitation:

”I suppose you don't mind my knowing--who it is?”

Evie was prepared for this question and answered it promptly.

”I shan't mind your knowing--by-and-by. I want you to meet him first.

When you've once seen him, I know you'll be more just to me. Till then I'm willing to go on being--misunderstood.”

During the three more weeks that intervened before the family dinner Miriam got no further light on Evie's love-affairs. She purposely asked no questions through fear of seeming to force the girl's confidence, but she obtained some relief from thinking that the rival suitor could be no other than a certain young Graham, of whom she had heard much from Evie during the previous year. His chances then had stood higher than Billy Merrow's; and nothing was more possible than a discovery on Evie's part that she liked him the better of the two. It was a situation that called for sympathy for Billy, but not otherwise for grave anxiety, so that Miriam could wait quietly for further out-pourings of Evie's heart, and give her mind to the mysteries incidental to the girl's social presentation to the world.

Of the ceremonies attendant on this event the ”killing off” of the family was the one Miriam dreaded most. It was when she came within the periphery of this powerful, meritorious, well-to-do circle, representing whatever was most honorable in New York, that she chiefly felt herself an alien.

She could scarcely have explained herself in this respect, since many of the clan had been kind to her, and none had ever shown her incivility. It was when she confronted them in the ma.s.s, when she saw their solidarity, their mutual esteem, their sum total of wealth, talents, and good works, that she grew conscious of the difference of essence between herself and them. Not one of them but had the right to the place he sat in!--a right maintained by himself, but acquired by his fathers before him--not one of them but was living in the strength of some respectable tradition of which he could be proud! Endsleigh Jarrott's father, for example, had been a banker, Reginald Pole's the president of a university, Rupert Colfax's a judge; and it was something like that with them all. In the midst of so much that was cla.s.sified, certified, and regular she was as obviously a foreign element as a fly in amber. She came in as the ward of Philip Wayne, who himself was a new-comer and an intruder, since he entered merely as ”poor Gertrude's second husband,” by a marriage which they all considered a mistake.

With the desire to be as un.o.btrusive as possible, she dressed herself in black, without ornament of any kind, unaware of the fact that with her height of figure, her grace of movement, her ivory tint, and that expression of hers which disconcerted people because it was first appealing and then proud, she would be more than ever conspicuous against the background of brilliant toilets, fine jewels, and a.s.sured manners which the family would produce for the occasion. As a matter of fact, there was a perceptible hush in the hum of talk as she made her entry into the drawing-room, ostensibly led by Philip Wayne, but really leading him.

As she paused near the door, half timid, half bewildered, looking for her hostess, it did not help her to feel at ease to see Mrs. Endsleigh Jarrott--a Rubens _Maria de Medici_ in white satin and pearls--raise her lorgnette and call on a tall young man who stood beside her to take a look. There was no time to distinguish anything further before Miss Jarrott glided up, with mincing graciousness, to shake hands.

”How do you do! How do you do! So glad you've come. I think you must know nearly every one here, so I needn't introduce any one. I hardly ever introduce. It's funny, isn't it? They say it's an English custom not to introduce, but I don't do it just by nature. I wonder why I shouldn't?--but I never do--or almost never. So if you don't happen to know your neighbors at table just speak. It was Evie who arranged where every one was to sit. _I_ don't know. They say that's English, too--just to speak. I believe it's quite a recognized thing in London to say, 'Is this your bread or mine?' and then you know each other. Isn't it funny?

Now I think we're all here. Will you take in Miriam, Mr. Wayne?”

A hasty embrace from Evie--an angelic vision in white--was followed by a few words of greeting from Charles Conquest after which Miriam saw Miss Jarrott take the arm of Bishop Endsleigh, and the procession began to move.

At table Miriam was glad of the dim, rose-colored light. It offered her a seclusion into which she could withdraw, tending her services to Wayne.

She was glad, too, that the family, having so much to say to itself, paid her no special attention. She was sufficiently occupied in aiding the helpless blind man beside her, and repeating for his benefit the names of their fellow-guests. As the large party talked at the top of its lungs, Miriam's quiet voice, with its liquid, almost contralto, quality, reached her companion's ears unheard by others. She began with Bishop Endsleigh who was on Miss Jarrott's right. Then came Mrs. Stephen Colfax; after her Mr. Endsleigh Jarrott, who had on his right Mrs. Reginald Pole. Mrs.

Pole's neighbor was Charles Conquest, whom she shared with Mrs. Rodney Wrenn. Now and then Wayne himself would give proof of that increased acuteness in his hearing of which he had spoken more than once since his blindness had become total. ”Colfax Yorke is here,” he observed at one time. ”I hear his voice. He's sitting on our side of the table.” ”Mrs.

Endsleigh Jarrott is next but one to you,” he said at another time. ”She's airing her plans for the reconstruction of New York society.”

So for a while they kept one another in small talk, affecting the same sort of vivacity that obtained around them. It was not till dinner was half over that he asked in an undertone:

”Who is your neighbor?”

”I don't know,” she managed to whisper back. ”He's so taken up with Mrs.

Endsleigh Jarrott that he hasn't looked this way. I don't think he's any member of the family.”