Part 9 (2/2)
They had an air of having nothing to do, and of being indifferent as to how long they stayed, which was far from welcome to one at least of the workers.
Teresa had planned exactly how the vases were to be arranged, and had antic.i.p.ated a happy half-hour, alone with Dane, free from the observation of curious eyes. She was capable of carrying out her own ideas, and wished for no a.s.sistance. It was Peignton who made the unwelcome suggestion that Ca.s.sandra should remain to help.
”I'm out of this!” he said, shrugging. ”Never arranged flowers in my life, and don't know how to begin. Dragging about palms is more in my line, but that's done now, and I'm no more use. Sorry to be such a broken reed, Miss Teresa! Perhaps Lady Ca.s.sandra--” He looked at Ca.s.sandra, and once again his eyes lightened, as if what they beheld was good in his sight. ”I am sure you know how to arrange flowers!”
”Oh, yes,” Ca.s.sandra said calmly, ”I'm supposed to be quite good. Well, Teresa, I am at your service. You are in command. Issue your instructions! Mrs Beverley, you won't mind waiting a short time?”
”Oh, no,” Grizel said sweetly. ”I'll help too!” She made no motion to take off her gloves, however, but stood watching with a lazy smile while her companion threw off her furs in business-like fas.h.i.+on. The square emerald sparkled against the whiteness of her hand, as she turned over flowers, searching for the most perfect specimens. Once more Dane watched it with fascinated attention, once more looked from it to Teresa's hands, reddened and stained with soil, and hastily averted his eyes. Henceforth he kept them averted. There was no disloyalty in admiring a beautiful thing. The wrong began when one stooped to invidious comparisons.
By degrees it came about that Ca.s.sandra arranged, while the others stood by, and supplied her wants. She was accustomed to the handling of delicate blooms, and possessed little coaxing tricks of propping and supporting, which added greatly to their effect. Of the first two vases completed, hers was so palpably superior, that the obvious course was to invite her to undertake all five. Teresa gave the invitation with a good grace, and stood aside handing sprays of lilies, and disentangling delicate fronds of green.
As she stood she faced a small mirror on the wall, before which the Rev.
Vicar presumably concluded his clerical toilet. At the moment it gave back the reflection of herself and Ca.s.sandra, standing side by side, and the contrast stung. At home, by the same law of contrast, Teresa complacently considered herself next door to a beauty, but seen side by side with Ca.s.sandra Raynor, her image appeared of a sudden coa.r.s.ened and blunted. Moreover, the inferiority was not confined to the body; mentally as well as physically she was at a disadvantage;--her words seemed halting and difficult, compared with the other's delicate ripple of conversation. Teresa's honesty accepted the fact, disagreeable though it was. The little ache at her heart was not caused so much by jealousy, as by regret for the hour which she had longed for, the hour which was not to be. Surrept.i.tiously she watched Peignton to see if he shared her disappointment. His manner was quieter than when they had been alone together. He looked less at his ease, but he was interested, his eyes followed the delicate work with absorbed attention. He was more interested, rather than less. Teresa felt suddenly very tired.
She had hoped he would look disappointed!
Meanwhile Grizel had strolled out of the vestry and stood viewing the scene with lazy, smiling eyes. The workers were so busy that they had not noticed her approach, and she had time to study them unawares. For the most part they worked in pairs, consulting together, the more deft-handed arranging the flowers, the less skilful acting as a.s.sistant, and executing her commands. Quietly though they worked, there was in the air a sense of _camaraderie_; and one divined that these workers were friends who had chosen to work together, and enjoyed the companions.h.i.+p. In the background a solitary black-robed figure stood straining upward from the seat of a pew, engaged in covering the sill of a window with fragments of foliage, and those inferior flowers which had been rejected for more prominent places. Grizel took a short cut through a pew, and approached this worker's side.
”May I help you?” she asked, and Miss Bruce turned her head and stared in bewilderment. She was a middle-aged spinster, who lived in a small villa, with a small servant-girl, a fox-terrier, and a canary in a bra.s.s cage. She possessed exactly two hundred pounds a year, and felt herself rich. It was only in the matter of friends that she was poor, for the taint of trade set her apart from the people whom she wished to know, while as a lady of independent means she, in her turn, despised the cla.s.s from which she had sprung. Mrs Evans considered Miss Bruce a ”useful” worker, and asked her to tea regularly once a year, in addition to a summer garden party. The churchwarden's wife was asked to meet her on these occasions. ”You won't mind, dear, I know,” the Vicar's wife would premise. ”You _are_ so kind, and it gives her such pleasure, poor soul!” But as a matter of fact the tea party gave Miss Bruce no pleasure at all. She was keen enough to realise the exact conditions of her invitation, and instead of feeling flattered was wounded and aggrieved... ”Last week she had nine people there one afternoon, the Mallisons and the Escourts, all that set. Ellen heard about it from the cook. Why couldn't she ask me then?” she would ask herself bitterly.
”Never anyone but Mrs Rose!” Every year she decided to refuse the next invitation, but when it came to the time her courage failed. In the deadly dullness of her life a change was too rare to be lightly foregone. She stepped down from her high perch now, and turned her dull eyes to stare into Grizel Beverley's happy face.
”May I help you a little?”
”Thank you. It's very kind, I'm sure. I shall be much obliged.”
”_That's_ all right!” said Grizel cordially, and promptly seated herself at the end of a pew, and extended an arm along the top of the oaken back, in an att.i.tude of luxurious ease. Exactly what form the ”help”
was to take it was difficult to guess, but Miss Bruce was not thinking of such mundane considerations; her mind was occupied in grasping the astounding fact that the latest celebrity of the countryside, Mrs Martin Beverley, late Miss Grizel Dundas, had chosen to single out her insignificant self, when some of the most important ladies in the parish were present.
”It's--not very interesting over here,” she stammered apologetically.
”Window-sills are so dull. It's impossible to get an effect.”
”They _are_ rather muddly, aren't they?” Grizel agreed cheerfully, casting a roving eye over the branches of greenery, scattered intermittently with daffodils which had had their day. ”But I daresay no one will look... I don't think I know your name, do I? You haven't called on me yet?”
Miss Bruce flushed a deep brick-red. Her lips tightened in remembrance of the old grudge.
”I--don't call!” she said bluntly. ”It would not be--acceptable. I am poor.”
”Oh, so am I! There we can sympathise. Isn't it _dull_?” cried Grizel gaily.
Miss Bruce looked at her in silent disclaimer. No one could look into Grizel's face and doubt the honesty of her words, but Miss Bruce reflected tartly that there were different degrees of poverty! Why, the clothes on the bride's back this morning must have cost a considerable portion of her own year's income! The white coat hung in strange and wonderful folds, the outside was severely plain, just a simple, unadorned cloth garment which an ordinary woman might have worn; but as she sat, the fronts had fallen apart, and the spinster gazed with awe upon a gorgeousness of lining such as it had not entered into her brain to conceive. Ivory brocade, shot through with gold; a band of exquisite embroidery where the two fabrics met, cascades of delicate lace. Miss Bruce was fond of coining phrases to express her meaning. She coined one now, ”m.u.f.fled magnificence!” It seemed an inconceivable thing that any woman could allow such richness to be hidden away beneath a cloth exterior, yet something latent within her applauded the feat. ”m.u.f.fled magnificence,” she repeated to herself, her gloating eyes taking in each perfection of detail. Her lips twisted in grim realisation of the difference in degrees of poverty, but a quality of sincerity and kindliness in Grizel's hazel eyes prompted an unwonted confidence. She heard herself saying quite simply and naturally:
”There is something besides poverty, Mrs Beverley! My father was a plumber. Quite in a big way, of course, but still,--he was in trade.
He was a very good father; he educated me well and left me enough to live on. I'm grateful to him, but,--you can understand--”
Grizel gave a soft little _move_ of appreciation.
”A _good_ plumber.--A plumber with principles... Oh, you _must_ be proud! I've travelled all over the world, but I never heard of such a thing before. All the other plumbers I've heard of have brought misery on everyone who knew them... You must certainly come to see me, and tell me all about him, and I'll call on you too, and see his photograph... Had he a chin beard?”
<script>