Mr. Bulstrode

“ This was not the first time that Mr. Bulstrode had begun by admonishing Mr. Vincy, and had ended by seeing a very unsatisfactory reflection of himself in the coarse unflattering mirror which that manufacturer’s mind presented to the subtler lights and shadows of his fellow-men; and perhaps his experience ought to have warned him how the scene would end. But a full-fed fountain will be generous with its waters even in the rain, when they are worse than useless; and a fine fount of admonition is apt to be equally irrepressible. ”

“ I started, almost twitching my arm away from that of the Major's, turning half round, at the same instant, to look him in the face. Bulstrode smiled, but preserved his own self-possession, in the stoical manner common to men of fashion and easy manners, pursuing the discourse.
“I see that my frankness has occasioned you some little surprise,” he added; “but the truth is the truth; and I hold it to be unmanly for a gentleman who has made up his mind to become the suitor of a lady, to make any secret of his intentions;—is not that your own way of thinking, Mr. Littlepage?” ”

“ Centreville is good enough for me."
(Centreville! The horrible environment he was to have snatched her from. Bulstrode smiled softly.)
"But this money," pursued the dogged lover, returning to his grudge. "You've got to take it back, Mr. Bulstrode. No picture on earth is worth a thousand dollars, and certainly not Laura's."
"Oh, Dan!" she exclaimed.
But her friend said firmly: "The portrait is mine. Come, don't be foolish. If Miss Desprey is willing to marry you and go out to Idaho, take the money and buy her some pretty clothes and things." ”

“ One evening, while the sun was still above the horizon and burning in golden lamps among the great walnut boughs, Mr. Bulstrode was pausing on horseback outside the front gate waiting for Caleb Garth, who had met him by appointment to give an opinion on a question of stable drainage, and was now advising the bailiff in the rick-yard.
Mr. Bulstrode was conscious of being in a good spiritual frame and more than usually serene, under the influence of his innocent recreation. He was doctrinally convinced that there was a total absence of merit in himself ”

“ I've worked so hard that money often seems to me everything. Indeed, I thought so to-night when I had not a sou! I shall think so to-morrow when they seize my trunks for the hôtel bill."
"Seize your trunks!" he exclaimed. "Why—you don't mean to say——?"
The actress blushed crimson. "Oh, of course you thought otherwise," she said, throwing up her pretty head. "I pay for my own livelihood, Mr. Bulstrode," she told him proudly, "I pay for everything I have and wear and eat and do. Don't feel badly at misunderstanding," she comforted him sweetly—"You have nothing to apologize for. ”

“ And here without hesitation this young man——" At this moment the salon door opened, and one of the ladies he had been expecting came in, the youngest one, Miss Molly Malines, in a tulle dress, an enormous white hat, a light scarf over her shoulders, and the remains of recent tears on her face.
"Oh, Mr. Bulstrode!" she exclaimed, half putting out her hand and drawing it back again, as she bit her lips: "I thought I should find Mary here; I wanted to see her first to cry with! ”

“ She was weeping and hanging on to the unyielding arm of her cross lover, who glared at the intruding Bulstrode with a youthful jealousy at which the older man smiled while he envied it. He pursued impressively:
"Miss Desprey has been painting my portrait for the past few weeks. I gave her the order at the Art League; other than painter and sitter we have no possible interest in each other—Mr.——"
"Gregs," snapped the stranger, "Daniel Gregs!" ”

“ 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. ”

“ 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. ”

“ 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'. ”

“ The Duchess, who had been working, dropped her bit of muslin and looked, with her cherry lips parted and her great serious eyes, for all the world like a lady in a gift book. Her face was eighteenth century and child-like.
Bulstrode nodded. "Oh, yes, you've got so easily the upper hand, the very least of you, you know, over the best of us. It's such an unfair supremacy. You've got such a clever knowledge of little things, such a sense of the scale of the feelings, and you certainly make the very most of your power over us all. ”

“ You must be protected from yourself; you must have some one with you who will take care of you as I cannot do. You must do this for me. Is Pollona distasteful to you?" he pursued, "do you hate him?"
She made an indifferent shrug of her shoulders.
Bulstrode was watching her face keenly, and after a second said, "No, you do not hate him. You sent for him to come to you here. ”

“ For some reason the eyes of the Englishman had not quitted the butler's face, and Ruggles, with cold insolence, had stared at him in turn. Waring, albeit in another man's clothes, fed and seated before a friendly hearth, and once again within the pale of his own class, had regained something of his natural air and feeling of superiority. He resented the servant's insolence, and his face was angrily flushed as Bulstrode gave his orders, and the man left the room. ”

“ It isn't the fact of where she's gone that counts—that she wanted to go—that she has voluntarily made the separation final and complete."
"Then," persisted the bachelor, "you don't really want to find her?"
"Jove!" the Duke turned on him. "You don't know what it is to love a woman! You've got some imagination—try to use it, can't you? Can't you?"
He met the American's handsome eyes. A flush rose under Bulstrode's cheek. Westboro' put his hand on his friend's shoulder. "I beg your pardon, dear old chap."
"Oh, that's all right, old chap," Bulstrode assured cheerfully. ”

“ She had on a woman's bodice, a long flounced skirt pinned up to keep her from tripping. Her head was adorned by a torn straw hat, also contrived and created for the coquetry of maturity.
"Monsieur is so good," she began in a flute-like voice. "I have come to thank monsieur with all my heart."
Bulstrode looked toward Prosper for enlightenment, but that individual had cleverly disappeared.
"To thank me, my child? But for what?"
"Why, for the eggs and butter and sugar that monsieur was so good as to send me. I have made the cake. It is beautiful! ”

“ She spoke with interest of the races, and with confidence greater than she had hitherto evinced in the fortunes of her husband's racer—indeed she talked horse to Molly's edification, her husband's delight, and Bulstrode's admiration. All this—the sense that the party was, so to speak, with him—put Jack Falconer in the best of spirits, and the unruffled course of the dinner, and, above all, the humor of the elder of the two ladies, quite repaid Jimmy Bulstrode for the sure loss of his stakes.
"Does she really think that I have faith in the horse?" ”

“ These Latin most thoroughly understand the art of living. You scarcely ever see a care-worn face in France. Look at Jack now! Did you ever see such anxiety as he represents? If Bon Jour is beaten I don't know what will become of him. What shall I do with him?"
Bulstrode's interest on this subject was tepid.
"Oh, he'll be all right!" he said indifferently. "Take him to the Dublin Horse Fair."
And then as though she had not capriciously left the other topic, Mrs. Falconer asked:
"Just what is your plan for Molly and her Marquis? May I not know?" ”

“ The Falconers arrived with the usual lot of servants and motors and, moreover, with a racing outfit, for Falconer had decided to enter his English filly, Bonjour, for the events of August. There was also with them a Miss Molly Malines and a young sprig of nobility, the Marquis de Presle-Vaulx, to whom Bulstrode was a trifle paternal.
"He can't, at least, be after Molly's millions," he reflected; "he can't, at any rate, be a fortune hunter, for the girl's face is the only fortune she has!" ”

“ On the dining-room floor, close to the window wide open to the icy night, lay a man's form, and over him bent another man cruelly, with all the animus of a bird of prey.
The under man was Ruggles, Bulstrode's butler, his eyes starting from their sockets, his mouth open, his color livid; he couldn't have called out, for the other man had seized his necktie, twisted it tight as a tourniquet around the man's gullet, and so kneeling with one knee on his chest, Waring held the big man under. ”

“ I am inclined also to think, stubbornly, that it is a question of the quality of the love that one has for the woman. You won't think it impertinent of me, my dear friend,"—and his tone was such that no one could have thought it impertinent—"you won't, I am sure, take it amiss if we talk this over to-morrow, and if I try to show you something that means life, instead of what you plan."
"You know you as good as stood for De Presle-Vaulx."
Bulstrode held Mrs. Falconer's parasol, her fan, as well as a gold bag purse full of louis, a handkerchief and his own cane and field-glass. ”

“ His heart beat high at the fact of his deliverance. His gratitude was sincere—moreover, his thoughts were of an agreeable trend, and he was able to forget everybody else within twelve miles. Secure in his impersonality and in the indifference of his broad unseeing back, the lovers kissed and held hands.
Bulstrode wandered slowly up from the Versailles station to the Hôtel des Reservoirs, crossed the broad square of the Palace Court, found the pink and yellow façade more mellow and perfect than ever, and toward twelve-thirty strolled into the yard of the old hostelry. ”

“ The Frenchman followed the older man, who in contrast to his pallor looked the picture of health and spirits. Bulstrode cheerily led him to a small table in the corner of the restaurant, where they sat opposite one another, and for a little time applied themselves in silence to the light supper served them.
The Marquis drank more than he ate, and Bulstrode dutifully finished the game and toast, quite glad, in truth, to break the fast of a long evening which he had spent in the close rooms: for no other reason than unseen, to befriend—and unasked, to chaperone Molly's lover. ”

“ 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'?" ”

“ From the floors below came the clear, bright sound of the Hungarian music in an American cake-walk and the odor of cigars and wines and the distinct suggestion of good things to eat came tempting their nostrils.
As Bulstrode followed the brilliant woman, a sense of defeat came over him and with less conviction he repeated:
"I am satisfied, but you, my friend, are not."
"Oh," shrugged Mary Falconer desperately, "you know I've no right to think, or feel, or criticise! I never pretend to run people's lives or to act the benefactor or to take the place of Fate." ”

“ And it is no dishonor to love his château and his Paris hôtel, and I'd love his mother, too—if she'd let me. But I adore Maurice as he is, and he's man enough for me!"
The floor seemed to quiver under poor Bulstrode, who could scarcely see distinctly the lovely excited face as he ventured timidly:
"I didn't know all these things, Molly."
She was still unpitying.
"Of course not! Americans never do know. They only judge. You didn't think Maurice would tell you all his good points! He doesn't think they are anything. ”