The Light Heart (12 page)

Even more than the general flatness produced by the
sweeping
away of the carefully organized and rehearsed festivities, there was a sense of acute personal anxiety. The head of the family was stricken. The big genial man known to his mother as Bertie, known all over the world for his love of sport and good living, his annual cures at Homburg and Marienbad where he went to drink the waters and watch the lawn tennis, his informal stop-overs in Paris and Biarritz, his diplomatic yachting tours in the Mediterranean which, it was said, caused his German nephew some loss of sleep—the man-about-town, the
bon
viveur
with the weak chest who still, by virtue of his kinship and his seniority, held the whip hand over the ambitious German Emperor—the fabulous, naughty, romantic,
pleasure-loving
prince who had lived to be a king at last—was the crown to be snatched from him on the very eve of his anointing?

The strange, uprooted days went by on tiptoe, and July came in, and he was known to be making an almost miraculous recovery, though he had still a long and difficult convalescence before him. The Coronation could take place, it was thought, in the autumn—though naturally there could never again be
gathered together so imposing a list of foreign and Colonial visitors as had been present in London in June, and the King would be unable to undergo a ceremony of the original length and elaboration, which would have lasted several hours. The nation resigned itself with characteristic cheerfulness to a
semi-State
ceremony, much curtailed and simplified, and gave thanks that the King had been spared for that.

Balls and entertainments were still being doggedly given, for everybody had new gowns which had to be paid for and might as well be worn, and it was the Queen’s express wish that the tradespeople should not lose too heavily on their expectations by what was universally known as the national Trouble.

Therefore Virginia proceeded with her plans for a rather exclusive evening revel in aid of her favourite charity, known as the Mabys—the Metropolitan Association for Befriending Young Servants—which dealt with the girls brought up and trained in the workhouses and sent out to service in their early teens. Most of them were, of course, orphans, or had been deserted as unwanted infants, or merely left by drunken or irresponsible relatives to be brought up by public charity. Until a group of young society matrons undertook to see that life was a bit less perilous for these less fortunate creatures they had passed out of the knowledge of the Board of Guardians as soon as they left, voluntarily or by request, their first situation. Since Virginia had been taking an interest in their welfare, all her friends were most liberally supplied with deserving tweenies and under-housemaids, and the girls’ gratitude often amounted to embarrassing Cockney tearfulness.

Instead of the usual bazaar where people had to buy things they didn’t want at outrageous prices, Virginia intended a sort of amateur concert party where everybody paid through the nose for a ticket and could thereafter enjoy themselves. Phoebe, whose brother Fitz wrote musical comedies and had married a music-hall actress, was naturally expected to contribute
something
pretty fancy to the programme. She and Gwen had done
a cakewalk together at one of the amateur Christmas shows in Williamsburg, and she said rather doubtfully that she supposed she could remember her steps, which Gwen had arranged and taught her, and could probably guess at most of Gwen’s if somebody like Rosalind wanted to try. Gwen had worn the trousers and done the man’s part. Rosalind said at once that she would love to wear trousers, and did they think Archie’s would fit her with a little taking in? Phoebe then attempted to draw the costumes she and Gwen had worn, which they had made themselves, with Mammy’s help, and Virginia’s
dressmaker
was consulted. Before long, Archie’s tailor was also involved, and private rehearsals went on every morning in Hill Street in an upstairs room which was furnished as a schoolroom and could be cleared to the dimensions of a small stage.

Archie came home to lunch one day because he thought he was starting a cold, and heard the gramophone playing and wandered upstairs to see where everybody had got to. He paused at the schoolroom door unobserved and beheld a most unusual scene.

Phoebe, with her hair coming down and her skirts pinned up so that her ankles showed, was dancing with Rosalind, who wore a frilly lace blouse above what he at once identified as a pair of his own grey flannel trousers, reefed in at the waist with a pale blue leather belt and turned up at the bottoms and sewed in a wide hem. Rosalind carried his new Ascot topper in her right hand and his gold-headed dress cane which Virginia had given him for Christmas in her left, twirling it like a
bandmaster
with a very accomplished wrist. Both girls were bent backwards at an incredible angle, with their feet kicking very high in front of them, as the infectious beat of
The
Georgia
Campmeeting
blared from the gramophone in one corner, which was tended by Eden and Virginia sitting in wooden
schoolroom
chairs in enthralled attitudes and quite oblivious of his presence.

Back and forth, in and out, pivoting, bowing, strutting, the
two girls danced absorbedly till the record ended and Eden said, “That’s it—you’ve got it!” and they collapsed on each other’s shoulders with breathless laughter.

“What
is
going on
up here?” Archie said then, and they all discovered him, and Rosalind shrieked and got behind Phoebe who spread her shortened skirts to hide the desecrated trousers from their owner.

“Isn’t is going to be
wonderful?
” demanded Virginia. “It’s the cakewalk for my party.
You
know, that new dance
everyone
is doing in Paris—it’s a darky dance to begin with, and Phoebe knows how, Gwen taught her. We’re having costumes specially made and they’re going to wear dark grease paint like Othello and bring down the house.”

Archie said No doubt, but what about his trousers, and Virginia assured him they were only borrowed and not hurt a bit, and his tailor was making the ones Rosalind was going to wear on the night, and he was to let her have the bill.

Just then the luncheon gong went, and the girls flew away to tidy up, and Archie and Virginia descended together to the dining-room.

“I say, does Mam
ma
know about this?” he asked on the stairs.

“Yes, in a way—and Rosalind is going to play some Chopin too, before she puts the make-up on
.
You don’t know what a relief it is to her to do something besides play the piano at one of these charity do’s, and she’s caught on like anything—Phoebe says it might almost be Gwen herself.”

“Mm,” said Archie thoughtfully and sneezed. “Well, for one thing, it ought to put His Highness thoroughly off, I should think. Not sufficiently
fiirstlich
.”

“Darling, are you starting a beastly cold?”

Archie said he thought he might be, and Virginia insisted on his having a good stiff shot of whisky before lunch, and by the time the girls came down decently clothed he was soothed and comforted and at peace, and the cold seemed to be receding.

P
HOEBE
had been enchanted by Rosalind’s fragile beauty and childlike good spirits since the day they first met at the Hall. Rosalind’s eighteen-inch waist, her slender neck supporting a royally poised head loaded with soft dark hair, her soaring brows and fantastic eyelashes, above all her chuckling,
irrepressible
laughter, always made Phoebe feel like a rather staid maiden aunt, though they were nearly of an age. And
Rosalind
, affectionately recognizing both the wordless, humble admiration Phoebe had for her and the amusing contradiction in their temperaments, had taken to calling her Granny, but in such a way that it was somehow a compliment, and Phoebe rather enjoyed playing Conscience to Rosalind, picking up after her, finding the things she had mislaid, reminding her what time it was and what she had promised to do.

Her protective attitude came partly from her growing
conviction
that Rosalind’s mamma was very little good to her, either as a confidante or a standby. Mrs. Norton-Leigh was as shallow as ditch-water, and yet she was pretty in what Virginia called a well-preserved way. Having been widowed, as she was fond of pointing out, ridiculously young, with two great galumphing girls on her hands—Rosalind’s younger sister Evelyn would make her début next year if only Rosalind would get married and out of the way—Mrs. Norton-Leigh always had a string of rather second-rate admirers, most of them younger than she was, or else a great deal older, to occupy her time and attention. A girl who danced less lightly than Rosalind over the thin ice which formed the foundation of that brittle home in one of the Terraces near Regent’s Park, might have found the behaviour of her mamma a trifle
embarrassing
, or might have realized a sobering lack of maternal care and understanding. But Rosalind was used to her life, she had never known any other, and she accepted it
philosophically
and got a certain detached sort of amusement out of Mamma’s affairs. The late Mr. Norton-Leigh, dead of a fall in
the hunting field years ago, had left them comfortably though not lavishly provided for, and the pretty little Regent’s Park house had no strings of debt to it. But Mamma was
extravagant
, and since she could not get at the capital, he had seen to chat, she always found it difficult to make ends meet, especially, she would remark with an acid note in her languid,
discontented
voice, having to dress both herself and Rosalind on
her income, and what it would be like after Evelyn came out too she daren’t think.

Phoebe, who was accustomed to love
and tenderness at home, sometimes yearned over Rosalind’s uncherished state, though she would remind herself sensibly that Rosalind didn’t know what she was missing. Phoebe often felt more maternal than Mamma, and Rosalind went on
being pathetically gay and uncomplex and trustful towards life, which so far had given her no hard knocks, and if only she married the right man, someone kind and thoughtful like Charles Laverham …

“Would Rosalind have to marry just anybody who asked her if he happened to have enough money to suit Mamma?” Phoebe asked one day as she and Virginia were driving back to Hill Street from one of Mrs. Norton-Leigh’s afternoon At Homes.

“It looks that way,” said Virginia darkly. “I’m sorry I took you there, it was a raffish crew this afternoon. That woman gets worse and worse.”

“They looked all right to me,” said Phoebe, “except some of the men were rather odd, I thought.”

“Very odd, indeed! Poor old Mr. Norton-Leigh must be revolving in his grave, Lady Shadwell says he was rather a dear.”

“I didn’t see Charles today. Couldn’t he get off?”

“Charles? He wasn’t even asked! Mam
ma
isn’t taking any chances on a young man without Prospects, that might produce Complications!”

“But if Rosalind were really in love with someone who wasn’t rich—and was
not
in love with someone who
was
—”

“It wouldn’t matter to Mam
ma
.”

“But—that’s
medieval!
”
cried Phoebe in honest horror.

“People like Mam
ma
belong to the Dark Ages,” said Virginia, with a sigh, and they ruminated for the length of Portland Place.

“Charles would be the one, of course,” Virginia said as the carriage reached Oxford Street. “Since it can’t be Oliver, as I’d hoped. You might think Charles is just a thick-headed Guardsman, but he’s great fun, really, when you know him.”

“He does seem just the least bit—well,
stodgy,
compared to Oliver, for instance,” said Phoebe carefully.

“That’s just his Horse Guards face. Charles has a great deal of dash, as a matter of fact, when he lets himself go. Wait till you see him play polo! There is a legend that he once jumped his charger over the mess table laid for a banquet, without disturbing so much as a wine glass.”

“
Really?
” cried Phoebe, entranced, for this was sheer Ouida ism. “Whatever
for?
”

“Some silly wager or forfeit in the mess, I suppose. And he must be cleverer than he lets on, back of those casual ways, because he never seems to get himself involved with some sticky woman, the way so many young officers do. Well, of course, Charles must have had some kind of—romance before now,” Virginia acknowledged broadmindedly. “But nothing anyone can point to, not for several years anyway. Of course there was the war, and that broke things off for a lot of them, but they mostly tripped themselves up the minute they got home. Look at Oliver!”

There was silence, while the carriage worked its way out of Bond Street towards Berkeley Square.

“Is she really so dreadful?” Phoebe asked then.

“Who?” Virginia’s mind had gone ahead to the dinner she was giving that evening, and what she would wear, and whether the flowers had come, and what Archie would say to her afterwards for putting that tiresome Abbot girl next to him, but it had to work out that way, eight was always a
difficult number…. “Who?” asked Virginia, groping for the subject they had left some minutes before.

“Maia.”

“Oh,
that!
” said Virginia. “She’s dreadful, all right! We none of us can imagine what Oliver was thinking of. I’m perfectly certain she took some sort of mean advantage.”

“You’d think Oliver could take care of himself,” Phoebe remarked with deliberate sarcasm. “A great big man like that!”

“You’d think so, wouldn’t you!” Virginia agreed cheerfully. “But he’s so
polite!
And so far as that goes, I used almost to get qualms myself sometimes—if Archie hadn’t
wanted
to marry me, I honestly don’t see how he could have got out of it!”

“But—didn’t he
ask
you?”

“Not really. I sort of asked
him
.”

“Virginia!”
Phoebe stared at her.

“Well, it came to the same thing, I guess. But of course with us it’s all right, I know that now.”