Lady Locke

“ Lady Phayre looked on, pleased, she could scarcely tell why. These big, earnest men were sometimes like babies—so helpless, if left to themselves. She tended on him now and then in a pretty way without leaving her seat, passed his plate, handed him the little silver jug of cream, and, when the meal was over, fetched from a cupboard a box of cigarettes. Like a man unaccustomed to delicate feminine ministrations, Goddard accepted them rather tongue-tied, with a certain tremulous bashfulness. ”

“ You ought to speak well. Couldn't you persuade them to give the place a better name? Hickney Heath! It hurts the roof of one's mouth. Tiens—would it help the Young England League if you announced my name in the newspapers?"
"Dear Princess, you overwhelm me. But—"
"Now, don't ask me if it is wise." She smiled in mockery. "You print the names of other people who are supporting you. Mr. John Felton, M.P., who will take the chair, Colonel Winwood, M.P., and Miss Winwood, the Dean of Halifax and Lady Harbury, et cetera, et cetera. Why not poor Princess Sophie Zobraska?" ”

“ Do you know that?”
“You were looking so worn out and sad when you came in, that it pained me,” said Lady Phayre, non-committally.
But Goddard’s ear detected a soft note in her voice. He came near to her, sat down on the fender-stool, almost by her knees.
“Why are all women not like you? What a great beautiful world it would be.”
“Any woman would have done the same; given you of her best to cheer you. Besides, I was grieved—you have worked so nobly. Everybody has been talking about you—of nothing else. ”

“ Olivia declared, to the gentle amusement of standers-by. “Human nature won’t allow it. With inequalities of brain and character social equality is impossible.”
“Dear Lady”—she hated the apostrophe as he said it and the lift of the eyebrows which caused an upward ripple that was lost in the far reaches of his bald forehead. “Dear Lady,” said he, “in the Royal Enclosure at Ascot you can find every grade of human intellect, from the inbred young aristocrat who is that much removed”—he flicked a finger nail—“from a congenital idiot to the acute-brained statesman ”

“ An old gentleman came up and spoke to Lady Milmo. Roderick politely yielded him his chair and took possession of a vacant one on the other side of Ella.
“It is your womanly sympathy and courage all through that I have to thank; your cheering in depression, your encouragement in the face of defeat. If the star of success has arisen, it is you who have dispersed the obscuring clouds. A man may set his heart on a thing, but a woman keeps it there.”
He spoke in a low voice, and Ella leaned towards him to listen. Her cheeks flushed. ”

“ CHAPTER IX—SOME PSYCHOLOGICAL MOMENTS Goddard mounted the stairs of Queen’s Court Mansions with a heavy tread. He was physically tired, and his heart was sullenly sore. He had felt himself irresistibly drawn hither, though his pride hated the ordeal of confessing his failure to a woman, especially to Lady Phayre. The old, fierce class feeling was ineradicable. She was above him. Success, brilliance alone could keep him on her level. Failure brought him down. ”

“ I cried, “should you not be a lady? You have the instincts of one. How many of my fair friends in Mayfair and Belgravia would have made their drawing-rooms unspeakable just for the sake of not hurting the feelings of Anastasius Papadopoulos?”
She put aside her work and, leaning over the arm of the chair, her chin in her hands, looked at me gratefully.
“I'm so glad you've said that. Dale can't understand it. He wants me to clear the trash away.”
“Dale,” said I, “is young and impetuous. I am a battered old philosopher with one foot in the grave.” ”

“ The door was thrown open and the Princess appeared, smiling, happy, a black ostrich feather in her hat and a sable stole hanging loose from her shoulders; a great and radiant lady. Behind her came the Colonel and Ursula Winwood. Paul bent over the Princess's, outstretched hand.
"A thousand pardons for keeping you waiting. I did not know you had come. I was engaged with my friends. May I have the honour of presenting them? Princess, this is Mr. Silas Finn, the managing director of Fish Palaces Limited. These are two very dear friends, Miss Seddon—Mr. Simmons. ”

“ She was one of the most gifted, cultivated, and elegant women of her time. The genius and moral worth of Locke are well known to all. Domesticated in the family of Lady Masham for many years before his death, giving her all the advantage of his talents, acquirements, and sympathy, "she returned the obligation with singular benevolence and gratitude, always treating him with the utmost generosity and respect; for she had an inviolable friendship for him." ”

“ Without it I might have been led to destruction by Hendrick.”
“Ah, my dear Lady Phayre—I shall not tell it in Gath; but when are you going to have views of your own?”
“Views? Of course I have views,” said Lady Phayre, comfortably reversing the crossing of her feet, “just like everybody else, only theirs are fixed and mine are—dissolving. It gives greater variety to life. But I think the Goddard view will be lasting.” ”

“ A man does, wants, compels. A woman yields—otherwise—why, well—”
She rose, confused at' her half-confession, and re-examined the hat.
“Otherwise why should I be wanting to meet poor dear Howgate in heaven,” finished Lady Milmo, coming to her assistance with a humorous curl of the lip. “Anyhow,” she continued with some irrelevance, “I'm glad you're going to stay in a decent Christian country, where you can wear your pretty frocks.”
“So am I, auntie—now,” replied Ella. ”

“ When he recovered reason he wiped the great drops of perspiration from his forehead, thrust the letter into his pocket, and rushed from the room.
“Emily! Nurse!” he shouted from the top of the landing; and when they appeared hurriedly from the dining-room, “Come up at once: I think Lizzie is dead.”
The women ran up the stairs.
“Go to her. I will fetch Dr. Carson,” he cried, brushing past them.
He caught up a hat from the hall, and in another moment was out of doors. This pretext for absence and solitude was an inspiration. She was dead. He was free. He had killed her. ”

“ No wonder Gleam was enraptured.
Women who are in the habit of throwing their caps over windmills find it as monotonous as anything else after a time; but for one who has never done it before, the act is accompanied with a rare exhilaration.
Lady Phayre had lived a bright but perfectly exemplary life. No breath of scandal had ever rested upon her name. Sir Ephraim had cloyed her with affection, and hitherto she had regarded amatory offerings with a young confectioner’s serene indifference to puffs. ”

“ One is not a woman of sense for nothing. On the eve of the Festival, which was being held for the purpose of raising funds for the restoration of the old Abbey church, of which the Canon was rector, he gave a consecrating dinner-party.
The Bishop of the diocese, who was staying at the Rectory, was there; Sir Joshua and Lady Santyre, and others of the high and solemn world of Fulminster. Yet the Canon, with a high-bred tact, delicately conveyed the impression that Madame Latour was the guest of the evening. Mrs. Winstanley kept eyes and ears on the alert. ”

“ How had he escaped?
“A providence which looks after idiots caused me to be hurled out of the car at the first bump. I fell into the gorse. I’m not in the least bit hurt. Please don’t worry about me.”
“You must let us drive you home—I’ll call my husband,” said the young woman.
“Thank you very much,” said he, “but I’m perfectly sound and I’d rather walk; but this lady seems to have had a shock and no doubt——”
The young woman, perplexed, turned to Olivia. “You said this—gentleman—” for Alexis stood trim in brass-buttoned and legginged chauffeur’s livery—“you said he was your husband.” ”

“ Goddard stumbled heavily upstairs to his own room, threw himself on the bed, and lay there, holding his burning head in his hands.
And Emily sat in the death-chamber and cried, the only soul on the wide earth who had love for the poor, wrecked creature that was dead, for Sophie, her sister, had never had a word of good to say on Lizzie’s behalf. She alone knew and pitied the miserable tragedy of that poor, futile life. ”

“ It was not often that Lady Phayre did not know her own mind. At last she compromised. She would pay a visit to London, to effect the desired reconciliation, and then return to Ecclesby.
“I don’t like leaving you at all,” she said to Goddard, the evening before her departure. “It seems as if I am deserting you. But I shall make haste back.”
“Ah, do!” said Goddard pleadingly. “The people have grown so fond of you. And you are such a help to me.”
To atone for her defection, she had dismissed the carriage, and allowed him to see her home after the tea at the Salvation Army Barracks. ”

“ Her comfortable attitude, with one hand hanging over the arm of the chair; her costume, a dark fur-edged tea-gown; her expression of wistful meditation—all betokened a relaxation of fibre trying to pamper itself into depression. So the Member laughed, and a smile played round his clean-shaven lips in the silence that followed.
The politician within the esoteric revolutionary ring, who did not know Lady Phayre, was like a Positivist ignorant of Auguste Comte. The analogy halts, however. Lady Phayre was far from being an evangelist; she was not even an apostle. ”

“ I felt so proud I had been working with you in my poor way—and I had set my heart upon your winning.”
“And I have failed miserably,” said Goddard. “Therefore you ought to feel I was unworthy of your trust.”
“You don’t mean that. It hurts me,” she cried quickly, really wounded.
Goddard’s heart came into his eyes. The goddess had come down from the far-off pedestal where he had worshipped her, and was by his side, throbbing woman. He had a strange intoxicating sense of her nearness. He raised his hand and touched the edges of the feather firescreen she was holding in her lap. ”

“ So one day he called on her father, a retired captain of a Thames steamboat, and obtained his consent to the marriage. He was earning good wages, had even a little put by. The old man, whose tastes were not of a domestic order, and who found a daughter an expensive luxury, got solemnly drunk all by himself to celebrate the occasion. Goddard considered him an abandoned old ruffian, as soon as he came to know more about him, and conceiving a tender pity for Lizzie, longed to get her out of his clutches. ”

“ And Oates appears in every respect to have been as much Locke's home as that of its owners. In the whole of his correspondence, there does not appear the slightest trace of those petty piques and annoyances, those small désagréments, which are so apt to grow up among people who live much together, even when, at bottom, they entertain a deep love and admiration for each other. On the side of the Mashams we know that the tide of affection ran equally smooth. Lady Masham and Esther acted as his nurses, and with one or other of them he seems to have shared all his pursuits. ”

“ Women should not be allowed in it—and yet they must work. One feels paralysed before these deadly trades. I saw some women—young and vigorous—who had ‘got the lead,’ as they call it—death written on their faces, one going to have a child; that is one of the horrible parts of it—to be poisoned before one is born.”
“You take it to heart,” said Lady Phayre in a low voice. She was touched by his earnestness.
“I suppose I do,” replied Goddard. “If a man doesn’t, he had better leave Social Reform alone.”
Lady Phayre handed him his tea. ”

“ Miss Francis [A] and I think of reading Locke, as introductory to a course of English metaphysics, and then De Stael on Locke's system. Allow me to introduce this lady to you as a most interesting woman, in my opinion. She is a natural person,—a most rare thing in this age of cant and pretension. Her conversation is charming,—she brings all her powers to bear upon it; her style is varied, and she has a very pleasant and spirited way of thinking. ”

“ A most surprisingly unpleasant old lady.”
“And you learned?”
“I learned that for some reason, Andrew Barham chose to lead a double life. He was part of the time a resident of Fifth Avenue and a society man. Also, part of the time, he was Thomas Locke, artist, of Washington Square.”
“Have you taxed him with this?”
“I have not. I am employed by you—so I come to you with my findings. If you say so, my discovery shall go no further.”
“I don’t know what to say—I am too amazed for words. If any lesser detective than yourself told me this thing I should scoff at it. ”

“ The mother of the girl proposes to give her one hundred thousand francs as the dot. The mother of the son insists that it is not enough, and enlarges upon the perfections of the young man. He is educated, he is polished, he is handsome, he is amiable. He isn’t a brute who would make a wife miserable; not he. Clearly one hundred thousand francs is not enough for such a paragon. The mother of the girl strikes in. The girl is the handsomest in Paris, and has had every advantage. She is a lady, and would make a desirable addition to the house of any man in Paris ”

“ You’re a living angel if ever there was one.”
“You think so, do you, Em?” he answered with a rough laugh, rather touched. “Well, go on thinking so. It won’t do me any harm.”
Only once did Lizzie refer to the night of Lady Phayre’s visit. It was a Sunday evening. Emily had gone to church, and had left the two together in the drawing-room. Daniel was smoking a pipe over a book, and Lizzie was engaged with some needlework—a rare occupation. She had been less fretful that day, had even asked him to sit with her. Gradually, as Daniel read, her efforts with her needle became spasmodic. ”