Delphi Complete Works of Jerome K. Jerome (Illustrated) (Series Four) (95 page)

At the corner of Queen’s Square a decent-looking woman stopped me to ask the way to the Children’s Hospital at Chelsea, explaining she had made a mistake, thinking it was the one in Great Ormond Street where her child lay. I directed her, then glancing into her face, noticed how tired she looked, and a vista of the weary pavements she would have to tramp flashed before me. I slipped some money into her hand and told her to take a ‘bus. She flushed, then thanked me. I turned a few yards further on; she was starting after me, amazement on her face. I laughed and waved my hand to her. She smiled back in return, and went her way.

A rain began to fall. I paused upon the doorstep for a minute, enjoying the cool drops upon by upturned face, the tonic sharpness of the keen east wind; then slipped my key into the lock and entered.

The door of old Deleglise’s studio on the first floor happened to be open. Hitherto, beyond the usual formal salutations, when by chance we met upon the stairs, I had exchanged but few words with my eccentric landlord; but remembering his kindly face, the desire came upon me to tell him my good fortune. I felt sure his eyes would lighten with delight. By instinct I knew him for a young man’s man.

I tapped lightly; no answer came. Someone was talking; it sounded like a girl’s voice. I pushed the door further open and walked in; such was the custom of the house. It was a large room, built over the yard, lighted by one high window, before which was the engraving desk, shaded under a screen of tissue paper. At the further end of the room stood a large cheval-glass, and in front of this, its back towards me, was a figure that excited my curiosity; so that remaining where I was, partly hidden behind a large easel, I watched it for awhile in silence. Above a heavily flounced blue skirt, which fell in creases on the floor and trailed a couple of yards or so behind, it wore a black low-cut sleeveless bodice — much too big for it — of the fashion early Victorian. A good deal of dark-brown hair, fastened up by hair-pins that stuck out in all directions like quills upon a porcupine, suggesting collapse with every movement, was ornamented by three enormous green feathers, one of which hung limply over the lady’s left ear. Three times, while I watched, unnoticed, the lady propped it into a more befitting attitude, and three times, limp and intoxicated-looking, it fell back into its former foolish position. Her long, thin arms, displaying a pair of brilliantly red elbows, pointed to quite a dangerous degree, terminated in hands so very sunburnt as to convey the impression of a pair of remarkably well-fitting gloves. Her right hand grasped and waved with determination a large lace fan, her left clutched fiercely the front of her skirt. With a sweeping curtsey to herself in the glass, which would have been more effective could she have avoided tying her legs together with her skirt — a
contretemps
necessitating the use of both hands and a succession of jumps before she could disentangle herself — she remarked so soon as she had recovered her balance:

“So sorry I am late. My carriage was unfortunately delayed.”

The excuse, I gathered, was accepted, for with a gracious smile and a vigorous bow, by help of which every hairpin made distinct further advance towards freedom, she turned, and with much dignity and head over the right shoulder took a short walk to the left. At the end of six short steps she stopped and began kicking. For what reason, I, at first, could not comprehend. It dawned upon me after awhile that her object was the adjustment of her train. Finding the manoeuvre too difficult of accomplishment by feet alone, she stooped, and, taking the stuff up in her hands, threw it behind her. Then, facing north, she retraced her steps to the glass, talking to herself, as she walked, in the high-pitched drawl, distinctive, as my stage knowledge told me, of aristocratic society.

“Oh, do you think so — really? Ah, yes; you say that. Certainly not! I shouldn’t think of it.” There followed what I am inclined to believe was intended for a laugh, musical but tantalising. If so, want of practice marred the effort. The performance failed to satisfy even herself. She tried again; it was still only a giggle.

Before the glass she paused, and with a haughty inclination of her head succeeded for the third time in displacing the intoxicated feather.

“Oh, bother the silly thing!” she said in a voice so natural as to be, by contrast with her previous tone, quite startling.

She fixed it again with difficulty, muttering something inarticulate. Then, her left hand resting on an imaginary coat-sleeve, her right holding her skirt sufficiently high to enable her to move, she commenced to majestically gyrate.

Whether, hampered as she was by excess of skirt, handicapped by the natural clumsiness of her age, catastrophe in any case would not sooner or later have overtaken her, I have my doubts. I have since learnt her own view to be that but for catching sight, in turning, of my face, staring at her through the bars of the easel, all would have gone well and gracefully. Avoiding controversy on this point, the facts to be recorded are, that, seeing me, she uttered a sudden exclamation of surprise, dropped her skirt, trod on her train, felt her hair coming down, tried to do two things at once, and sat upon the floor. I ran to her assistance. With flaming face and flashing eyes she sprang to her feet. There was a sound as of the rushing down of avalanches. The blue flounced skirt lay round her on the floor. She stood above its billowy folds, reminiscent of Venus rising from the waves — a gawky, angular Venus in a short serge frock, reaching a little below her knees, black stockings and a pair of prunella boots of a size suggesting she had yet some inches to grow before reaching her full height.

“I hope you haven’t hurt yourself,” I said.

The next moment I didn’t care whether she had or whether she hadn’t. She did not reply to my kindly meant enquiry. Instead, her hand swept through the air in the form of an ample semi-circle. It terminated on my ear. It was not a small hand; it was not a soft hand; it was not that sort of hand. The sound of the contact rang through the room like a pistol shot; I beard it with my other ear. I sprang at her, and catching her before she had recovered her equilibrium, kissed her. I did not kiss her because I wanted to. I kissed her because I could not box her ears back in return, which I should have preferred doing. I kissed her, hoping it would make her mad. It did. If a look could have killed me, such would have been the tragic ending of this story. It did not kill me; it did me good.

“You horrid boy!” she cried. “You horrid, horrid boy!”

There, I admit, she scored. I did not in the least object to her thinking me horrid, but at nineteen one does object to being mistaken for a boy.

“I am not a boy,” I explained.

“Yes, you are,” she retorted; “a beast of a boy!”

“If you do it again,” I warned her — a sudden movement on her part hinting to me the possibility—”I’ll kiss you again! I mean it.”

“Leave the room!” she commanded, pointing with her angular arm towards the door.

I did not wish to remain. I was about to retire with as much dignity as circumstances permitted.

“Boy!” she added.

At that I turned. “Now I won’t go!” I replied. “See if I do.”

We stood glaring at each other.

“What right have you in here?” she demanded.

“I came to see Mr. Deleglise,” I answered. “I suppose you are Miss Deleglise. It doesn’t seem to me that you know how to treat a visitor.”

“Who are you?” she asked.

“Mr. Horace Moncrieff,” I replied. I was using at the period both my names indiscriminately, but for this occasion Horace Moncrieff I judged the more awe-inspiring.

She snorted. “I know. You’re the house-maid. You sweep all the crumbs under the mats.”

Now this was a subject about which at the time I was feeling somewhat sore. “Needs must when the Devil drives;” but as matters were, Dan and I could well have afforded domestic assistance. It rankled in my mind that to fit in with the foolish fad of old Deleglise, I the future Dickens, Thackeray and George Eliot, Kean, Macready and Phelps rolled into one, should be compelled to the performance of menial duties. On this morning of all others, my brilliant literary career just commenced, the anomaly of the thing appeared naturally more glaring.

Besides, how came she to know I swept the crumbs under the mat — that it was my method? Had she and Dan been discussing me, ridiculing me behind my back? What right had Dan to reveal the secrets of our menage to this chit of a school-girl? Had he done so? or had she been prying, poking her tilted nose into matters that did not concern her? Pity it was she had no mother to occasionally spank her, teach her proper behaviour.

“Where I sweep our crumbs is nothing to do with you,” I replied with some spirit. “That I have to sweep them at all is the fault of your father. A sensible girl—”

“How dare you speak against my father!” she interrupted me with blazing eyes.

“We will not discuss the question further,” I answered, with sense and dignity.

“I think you had better not!” she retorted.

Turning her back on me, she commenced to gather up her hairpins — there must have been about a hundred of them. I assisted her to the extent of picking up about twenty, which I handed to her with a bow: it may have been a little stiff, but that was only to be expected. I wished to show her that her bad example had not affected my own manners.

“I am sorry my presence should have annoyed you,” I said. “It was quite an accident. I entered the room thinking your father was here.”

“When you saw he wasn’t, you might have gone out again,” she replied, “instead of hiding yourself behind a picture.”

“I didn’t hide myself,” I explained. “The easel happened to be in the way.”

“And you stopped there and watched me.”

“I couldn’t help it.”

She looked round and our eyes met. They were frank, grey eyes. An expression of merriment shot into them. I laughed.

Then she laughed: it was a delightful laugh, the laugh one would have expected from her.

“You might at least have coughed,” she suggested.

“It was so amusing,” I pleaded.

“I suppose it was,” she agreed, and held out her hand. “Did I hurt you?” she asked.

“Yes, you did,” I answered, taking it.

“Well, it was enough to annoy me, wasn’t it?” she suggested.

“Evidently,” I agreed.

“I am going to a ball next week,” she explained, “a grown-up ball, and I’ve got to wear a skirt. I wanted to see if I could manage a train.”

“Well, to be candid, you can’t,” I assured her.

“It does seem difficult.”

“Shall I show you?” I asked.

“What do you know about it?”

“Well, I see it done every night.”

“Oh, yes; of course, you’re on the stage. Yes, do.”

We readjusted the torn skirt, accommodating it better to her figure by the help of hairpins. I showed her how to hold the train, and, I humming a tune, we commenced to waltz.

“I shouldn’t count my steps,” I suggested to her. “It takes your mind away from the music.”

“I don’t waltz well,” she admitted meekly. “I know I don’t do anything well — except play hockey.”

“And try not to tread on your partner’s feet. That’s a very bad fault.”

“I do try not to,” she explained.

“It comes with practice,” I assured her.

“I’ll get Tom to give me half an hour every evening,” she said. “He dances beautifully.”

“Who’s Tom?”

“Oh, father.”

“Why do you call your father Tom? It doesn’t sound respectful.”

“Oh, he likes it; and it suits him so much better than father. Besides, he isn’t like a real father. He does everything I want him to.”

“Is that good for you?”

“No; it’s very bad for me — everybody says so. When you come to think of it, of course it isn’t the way to bring up a girl. I tell him, but he merely laughs — says it’s the only way he knows. I do hope I turn out all right. Am I doing it better now?”

“A little. Don’t be too anxious about it. Don’t look at your feet.”

“But if I don’t they go all wrong. It was you who trod on mine that time.”

“I know. I’m sorry. It’s a little difficult not to.”

“Am I holding my train all right?”

“Well, there’s no need to grip it as if you were afraid it would run away. It will follow all right. Hold it gracefully.”

“I wish I wasn’t a girl.”

“Oh, you’ll get used to it.” We concluded our dance.

“What do I do — say ‘Thank you’?”

“Yes, prettily.”

“What does he do?”

“Oh, he takes you back to your chaperon, or suggests refreshment, or you sit and talk.”

“I hate talking. I never know what to say.”

“Oh, that’s his duty. He’ll try and amuse you, then you must laugh. You have a nice laugh.”

“But I never know when to laugh. If I laugh when I want to it always offends people. What do you do if somebody asks you to dance and you don’t want to dance with them?”

“Oh, you say your programme is full.”

“But if it isn’t?”

“Well, you tell a lie.”

“Couldn’t I say I don’t dance well, and that I’m sure they’d get on better with somebody else?”

“It would be the truth, but they might not believe it.”

“I hope nobody asks me that I don’t want.”

“Well, he won’t a second time, anyhow.”

“You are rude.”

“You are only a school-girl.”

“I look a woman in my new frock, I really do.”

“I should doubt it.”

“You shall see me, then you’ll be polite. It is because you are a boy you are rude. Men are much nicer.”

“Oh, are they?”

“Yes. You will be, when you are a man.”

The sound of voices rose suddenly in the hall.

“Tom!” cried Miss Deleglise; and collecting her skirt in both hands, bolted down the corkscrew staircase leading to the kitchen, leaving me standing in the centre of the studio.

The door opened and old Deleglise entered, accompanied by a small, slight man with red hair and beard and somewhat watery eyes.

Deleglise himself was a handsome old fellow, then a man of about fifty-five. His massive, mobile face, illuminated by bright, restless eyes, was crowned with a lion-like mane of iron-grey hair. Till a few years ago he had been a painter of considerable note. But in questions of art his temper was short. Pre-Raphaelism had gone out of fashion for the time being; the tendency of the new age was towards impressionism, and in disgust old Deleglise had broken his palette across his knee, and swore never to paint again. Artistic work of some sort being necessary to his temperament, he contented himself now with engraving. At the moment he was engaged upon the reproduction of Memlinc’s Shrine of St. Ursula, with photographs of which he had just returned from Bruges.