Jimmy Bulstrode

“ Falconer now showed real interest and feeling. "No! how delightful. So she is really off your hands, Jimmy. Well, that is too good to be true. There's one at least whom you don't have to marry, Jimmy!"
"Oh, they grow beautifully less," he agreed.
Mrs. Falconer smiled softly.
"They are narrowing down every year," Jimmy went on; "when I am about sixty the number will be reduced, I dare say, to the proper quantity."
"What a goose you are," she said jestingly. "What a tease and a bother you are, Jimmy Bulstrode; I'll find you a proper wife!" ”

“ The lines and files of soft-footed, impersonal servants, the perfect stilted attention, the silence, and the inhumanness of a man's lonely life, became intolerable to Jimmy Bulstrode. Even though Frances, Duchess of Westboro', had truly said that the castle was a delightful home, Bulstrode began to wonder what that word comprised or meant: certainly nothing like his occupation of another man's house or like any life that is lived alone. ”

“ Why should he suppose Jimmy so unlike the rest of his set? More scrupulous, more sinless than other men—than himself? He couldn't answer his own question, but he did so think of Bulstrode, and since his late house party had believed that Jimmy cared for Mrs. Falconer. The lady at The Dials was certainly not she.
Bulstrode, in the shadow of this delinquence, surrounded certainly in the mind of the Duke by an atmosphere of intrigue, became very human, rather consolingly human. In their mutual intercourse the Duke had felt himself living in a clearer atmosphere than he usually breathed. ”

“ And being nothing but a human man, he threw all his good resolves to the wind, and went down and stayed three days at Fontainebleau.
Out under the sky, where the elastic earth sprang softly beneath her feet and the embowered forests were sifted through with gold, Mary Falconer finally asked him, "And your doll, Jimmy? Have you broken her yet?" Bulstrode felt a guilty twinge, for he had not once thought of the little girl, nor did Mrs. Falconer's mention of her bring the subject near enough for Bulstrode to tell her the pretty story. ”

“ Well, Bulstrode would keep up his end, he had nothing else for the time being to do but to mind other people's business. He put it so to himself. Indeed he could not but believe it was fortunate for more than one person that something could keep him from minding his own.
An undefined discretion kept him from going to the Moated Grange, as to himself he styled the retreat the Duchess had made of The Dials. And, in spite of the absolute freedom now given him to prowl about amongst the books, in spite of his "evenings out" as he called them, Jimmy found the time at Westboro' to drag lamentably. ”

“ I am always marrying other people to some one else, and dressing other people's children!"
He finished with a laugh: "There, No. 5 is up! Aren't you interested in this race?"
Mrs. Falconer and Bulstrode had walked a little from where the young couple chattered indifferent to everything but each other.
"No; I am only interested in what you are saying. What have you planned to do or thought out for them, Jimmy? What do your rebellious phrases imply? Are you really going to make a home for——?"
Bulstrode said stubbornly. "No! I am going to show him how to make one for himself." ”

“ Bulstrode interrupted her impatiently:
"It would be more to the purpose if he were a born bread-winner and she were a dairy-maid!"
"Jimmy, how vulgar you are!"
"Very—" he was wonderfully sarcastic for him—"money is a very vulgar thing, my dear friend; it's as vulgar as air and bread and butter. It is like all other clean, decent vulgarity, it can be abused, but it's necessary to life."
Mrs. Falconer opened her eyes wide on this new Bulstrode.
"Why, what has happened to you?"
He made a comprehensive gesture: "Oh, I am always supporting a family!" ”

“ The Duc had been in the United States—moreover, the Frenchman had plans of his own and he wanted very much to go to Newport and leave his house in the care of Jimmy Bulstrode. Whether the Puritan in him led Bulstrode to excuse to himself his enjoyment of so much luxury, at any rate he apologized, saying that nobody could expect a man with a love of the beautiful, and who had more or less a desire to shut himself up and to shut himself away for a time, to refuse. ”

“ If he did not speak other than in a general way of the rather long visit he had been making to the Duke of Westboro' in Glousceshire, he did tell his friend all about The Dials and dwelt on the fascination that the old place possessed. The Dials was, in point of fact, very agreeably described to Mrs. Falconer, who looked it out on the map of Glousceshire, and Bulstrode's purchase (for he had legally gone in for it, the whole thing) , was made to seem a very jewel of a property.
"It's as lovely as an old print," she said, "as good as a Turner. You're a great artist along your lines, Jimmy. ”

“ Jimmy accepted; and as the door closed after his host, he said, almost aloud: "He thinks, then, there is half a chance that the Duchess will return." And wondering very much how far a woman is willing to sacrifice herself for a man, granted that she loves him, he did not finish his phrase.
The next day Bulstrode, no longer able to resist the beckoning country, went out, as it were, to it as if he said "Here I am—what will you do with me?" ”

“ The Duke swore gently. "Well, what would you have a man do?"
"Why I would have him do that," nodded Jimmy, "by all means. Any man would have done so."
In the half second of interval whilst the Duke was obliged to swallow his friend's sarcasm, Bulstrode had time to think: "Here I am, once more in the heart of an intrigue. Its fetters are all about me and I am wretchedly bound by honor not to do the simple, natural thing." Then he asked boldly: "Well, what do you think about it, Westboro'?" ”

“ There was much of the true woman in this entirely lovely creature, as she stood before her glass and saw herself, the best example of the really beautiful American. Her naturalness gave her a freedom, a frankness, a grace, a certain imperial set of the head.
Bulstrode had once said to the Duchess of Westboro' that a woman should above all "console." Mary Falconer would have known what he meant. That sex she gloriously represented! The sweetness and dearness of her. Well, there were few women no doubt like her. Jimmy hoped so for the sake of the race, for the sake of the hearts of other men. ”

“ As for the rest of it..." she turned away for a second towards the window, and Bulstrode saw how the hot blood had mounted and her eyes had changed when after a moment she came back to him again. She put out towards him a beseeching hand: "You above all men, who are faithful to an ideal, must not give me old platitudes!"
Bulstrode's head reeled. He felt like a man who after a narcotic finds his brain suddenly alight and real things grow strange. He wanted to rub his eyes. She appeared singularly to appreciate his daze. ”

“ As Bulstrode stood in the window of his room at Westboro' Castle, his face turned toward the country, it seemed to beckon him. It called him from the park's end where suave and smooth the curving downs met the preciser contour of the eastern field; from hedges holding snugly in the roadways, the roads themselves running off on pleasant excursions to townships whose names are suggestive of romance, whose gentle beauties have mellowed with the ages which give them value and leave them perfect. ”

“ Falconer said.
Her companion agreed. "They made a great deal, rather more than usual, out of this one." And his tone was so suggestive that his companion looked up at him quickly.
"Who are your mysterious lovers?" she asked, "are they French? Do I know them?"
"They are not in the least mysterious," Bulstrode assured her. "I never saw anything less complex and more simple. They are Americans."
She seemed now to understand that she was to hear of "one of Jimmy's adventures," as she called his dashes in other people's affairs. ”

“ As soon as such a contingent arises, it proves that neither thing is really worth while! When a man loves a woman there can be no choice. My dear friend, when a man"—he paused—"loves—there is nothing in the world but the woman."
The Marquis looked at the fine face of the elder man. Years had, with their gentle history, and kindly records, touched Jimmy Bulstrode lightly. Every experience made him better to look at; "like a good picture," Mrs. Falconer had said, "painted by a master, and only growing more splendid." Nothing of the worldliness of the roué marked his expression. ”

“ Bulstrode, although owning his share of horse-flesh and a proper number of automobiles and keeping, for the best part of the time, a yacht out of commission, was a sport only in a certain sense of the word. The people who liked him best and who were themselves able to judge, said he was a "dead game sport," but Jimmy smiled at this and knew that the human element interested him in life above all, and that he only cared for amusements as they helped others to enjoy. He was backing Falconer's horse, although he felt certain the winnings would go to the Rothschild's gelding. ”

“ Bulstrode had received about half an hour ago a letter whose qualities and suggestions were something disturbing to him:
"There is such a thing, believe me" (Mary Falconer wrote in the pages which Bulstrode opened to read for the twentieth time) , "as the gloom of Christmas, Jimmy. People won't frankly own to it. They're afraid of seeming sour and crabbed. But don't you, who are so exquisitely apt to feelings—to other people's feelings,—at once confess it? ”

“ If I could suddenly master that chap with my fists after months of dissipation——"
Bulstrode finished for him:
"You can master the rest."
"Don't give me any extra money," pleaded the tramp, as if he foresaw his friend's impulse. "Pay my ticket out West, if you will, and write to the man who is there, and I'll start in."
Bulstrode beamed on him.
"You're a man," he assured him—"a man." ”

“ Any morning between eleven and twelve Bulstrode might have been seen in the Bois de Boulogne briskly walking along the Avenue des Acacias, his well-filled chest thrown out, his step light and assured; cane in hand, a boutonnière tinging the lapel of his coat; immaculate and fresh as a rose, he exhaled good-humor, kindliness, and well-being. ”

“ What can have happened to the man who has been with her all this time? Where is the Prince Pollona?"
As Bulstrode turned his head in the direction indicated, through the trees passed along the figure of a slender woman, trailing her thin gown over the pebbles and the grass. She disappeared in the lighted doorway of the Casino.
"You're quite bearish to-night," Mrs. Falconer said reproachfully, "quite a bear. I believe you're angry! Dear Jimmy, you may, I promise, carry out all your philanthropies without my interference; I won't even criticise or tease. ”

“ Falconer had once said to him on an occasion when a word regarding gray hairs had drifted into their conversation. Noticing the smooth reflection of the light along her hair, Bulstrode had spoken of its golden quality, and the lady had suddenly covered the strand with her hand; she knew that there ran a line she did not want him to see.
"No one is old, Jimmy, who has even the least little bit of future towards which he looks! ”

“ Jimmy leaned to her, and Mrs. Falconer could have told that it was his voice of goodness that spoke, the voice "that Jimmy seemed able to call at will from some wonderfully dear part of his nature: it was for people in trouble, for people he was determined to help in spite of themselves."
"Your Majesty has done me great honor," Bulstrode said. "You have said I was the King's friend, I should like instead to be your friend. Women need friends ... even queens. Would it be too vast a presumption if I should from henceforth feel myself to be...." He waited and dared—"Carmen-Magda's friend?" ”

“ Falconer asked quickly:
"And the Marquis, Jimmy? What do you suppose he will say to your Wild West scheme?"
Bulstrode smiled.
"Oh, you women understand us even when we are stupid mysteries to ourselves! Tell me, how will he take this?"
"He will refuse." The lady was quick in her decision. "He cannot in consistence do otherwise. He will consider your plan provincial and Yankee, and he will consider, what you ignore, that it will kill his mother. If he cannot marry Molly with the family consent in proper French fashion he will naturally give her up. ”

“ He was able to say honestly: "Quite the most beautiful house I have ever seen."
"Yes, I think so too," she nodded. "It's not so important as many others but it's more perfect, more like a home."
Bulstrode sat back in his chair and tried to make her forget him. Between the fire and the shadow he wanted to watch her face from which he now saw that the beauty he remembered had not faded but had been transformed. She was beautiful in another way: the brilliant, blooming girl, fully blown at eighteen, with the dazzling charm of health, no longer existed in the Duchess of Westboro'. ”

“ Bulstrode is a lucky devil."
"A chap," Westboro' said to Jimmy in a mild unpretentious mood of philosophy, "is, of course, a husband; more naturally than people give him credit for, a father; but first of all—and that's what so few women take into consideration—he is a man."
The Duke had fallen into the habit of breaking through the silences when each man, following his own thoughts, would forget the other. ”