"It's a mess," he thought disconsolately, "whatever way I look at it.
But after to-night I won't meet Matilda any more while I've got that
statue staying with me, or no one could tell the consequences." However,
when he drew near the appointed spot, and saw the slender form which
awaited him there by the railings, he forgot all but the present joy.
Even the memory of the terrible divinity could not live in the wholesome
presence of the girl he had the sense to truly and honestly love.
Matilda Collum was straight and slim, though not tall; she had a neat
little head of light brown hair, which curled round her temples in soft
rings; her complexion was healthily pale, with the slightest tinge of
delicate pink in it; she had a round but decided chin, and her grey eyes
were large and innocently severe, except on the rare occasions when she
laughed, and then their expression was almost childlike in its gaiety.
Generally, and especially in business hours, her pretty face was calm
and slightly haughty, and rash male customers who attempted to make the
choice of a "button-hole" an excuse for flirtation were not encouraged
to persevere. She was seldom demonstrative to Leander--it was not her
way--but she accepted his effusive affection very contentedly, and,
indeed, returned it more heartily than her principles allowed her to
admit; for she secretly admired his spirit and fluency, and, as is often
the case in her class of life, had no idea that she was essentially her
lover's superior.
After the first greetings, they walked slowly round the square together,
his arm around her waist. Neither said very much for some minutes, but
Leander was wildly, foolishly happy, and there was no severity in
Matilda's eyes when they shone in the lamp-light.
"Well," he said, at last, "and so I've actually got you safe back again,
my dear, darling Tillie! It seems like a long eternity since last we
met. I've been so beastly miserable, Matilda!"
"You do seem to have got thinner in the face, Leander dear," said
Matilda, compassionately. "What _have_ you been doing while I've been
away?"
"Only wishing my dearest girl back, that's all _I've_ been doing."
"What! haven't you given yourself any enjoyment at all--not gone out
anywhere all the time?"
"Not once--leastwise, that is to say----" A guilty memory of Rosherwich
made him bungle here.
"Why, of course I didn't expect you to stop indoors all the time," said
Matilda, noticing the amendment, "so long as you never went where you
wouldn't take me."
Oh, conscience, conscience! But Rosherwich didn't count--it was outside
the radius; and besides, he _hadn't_ enjoyed himself.
"Well," he said, "I did go out one evening, to hear a lecture on
Astronomy at the Town Hall, in the Gray's Inn Road; but then I had the
ticket given me by a customer, and I reely was surprised to find how
regular the stars was in their habits, comets and all. But my 'Tilda is
the only star of the evening for me, to-night. I don't want to talk
about anything else."
The diversion was successful, and Matilda asked no more inconvenient
questions. Presently she happened to cough slightly, and he touched
accusingly the light summer cloak she was wearing.
"You're not dressed warm enough for a night like this," he said, with a
lover's concern. "Haven't you got anything thicker to put on than that?"
"I haven't bought my winter things yet," said Matilda; "it was so mild,
that I thought I'd wait till I could afford it better. But I've chosen
the very thing I mean to buy. You know Mrs. Twilling's, at the top of
the Row, the corner shop? Well, in the window there's a perfectly lovely
long cloak, all lined with squirrel's fur, and with those nice oxidized
silver fastenings. A cloak like that lasts ever so long, and will always
look neat and quiet; and any one can wear it without being stared
after; so I mean to buy it as soon as it turns really cold."
"Ah!" said he, "I can't have you ketching cold, you know; it ain't
summer any longer, and I--I've been thinking we must give up our evening
strolls together for the present."
"When you've just been saying how miserable you've been without them.
Oh, Leander!"
"Without _you_," he amended lamely. "I shall see you at aunt's, of
course; only we'd better suspend the walks while the nights are so raw.
And, oh, Tillie, ere long you will be mine, my little wife! Only to
think of you keeping the books for me with your own pretty little
fingers, and sending out the bills! (not that I give much credit). Ah,
what a blissful dream it sounds! Does it to you, Matilda?"
"I'm not sure that you keep your books the same way as we do," she
replied demurely; "but I dare say"--(and this was a great concession for
Matilda)--"I dare say we shall suit one another."
"Suit one another!" he cried. "Ah! we shall be inseparable as a brush
and comb, Tillie, if you'll excuse so puffessional a stimulus. And what
a future lies before me! If I can only succeed in introducing some of my
inventions to public notice, we may rise, Tilly, 'like an exclamation,'
as the poet says. I believe my new nasal splint has only to be known to
become universally worn; and I've been thinking out a little machine
lately for imparting a patrician arch to the flattest foot, that ought
to have an extensive run. I almost wish you weren't so pretty, Tillie.
I've studied you careful, and I'm bound to say, as it is there really
isn't room for any improvement I could suggest. Nature's beaten me
there, and I'm not too proud to own it."
"Would you rather there _was_ room!" inquired Matilda.
"From a puffessional point of view, it would have inspired me," he said.
"It would have suggested ideers, and I shouldn't have loved you less,
not if you hadn't had a tooth in your mouth nor a hair on your head; you
would still be my beautiful Tillie."
"I would rather be as I am, thank you," said Matilda, to whom this fancy
sketch did not appeal. "And now, let's talk about something else. Do you
know that mamma is coming up to town at the end of the week on purpose
to see you?"
"No," said Leander, "I--I didn't."
"Yes, she's taken the whole of your aunt's first floor for a week. (You
know, she knew Miss Tweddle when she was younger, and that was how I
came to lodge there, and to meet you.) Do you remember that Sunday
afternoon you came to tea, and your aunt invited me in, because she
thought I must be feeling so dull, all alone?"
"Ah, I should think I did! Do you remember I helped to toast the
crumpets? What a halcyon evening that was, Matilda!"
"Was it?" she said. "I don't remember the weather exactly; but it was
nice indoors."
"But, I say, Tillie, my own," he said, somewhat anxiously, "how does
your ma like your being engaged to me?"
"Well, I don't think she does like it quite," said Matilda. "She says
she will reserve her consent till she sees whether you are worthy; but
directly she sees you, Leander, her objections will vanish."
"She has got objections, then? What to?"
"Mother always wanted me to keep my affections out of trade," said
Matilda. "You see, she never can forget what poor papa was."
"And what was your poor papa?" asked Leander.
"Didn't you know? He was a dentist, and that makes mamma so very
particular, you see."
"But, hang it, Matilda! you're employed in a flower-shop, you know."
"Yes, but mamma never really approved of it; only she had to give way
because she couldn't afford to keep me at home, and I scorned to go out
as a governess. Never mind, Leander; when she comes to know you and hear
your conversation, she will relent; her pride will melt."
"But suppose it keeps solid; what will you do, Matilda?"
"I am independent, Leander; and though I would prefer to marry with
mamma's approval, I shouldn't feel bound to wait for it. So long as you
are all I think you are, I shouldn't allow any one to dictate to me."
"Bless you for those words, my angelic girl!" he said, and hugged her
close to his breast. "Now I can beard your ma with a light 'art. Oh,
Matilda! you can form no ideer how I worship you. Nothing shall ever
come betwixt us two, shall it?"
"Nothing, as far as I am concerned, Leander," she replied. "What's the
matter?"
He had given a furtive glance behind him after the last remarks, and his
embrace suddenly relaxed, until his arm was withdrawn altogether.
"Nothing is the matter, Matilda," he said. "Doesn't the moon look red
through the fog?"
"Is that why you took away your arm?" she inquired.
"Yes--that is, no. It occurred to me I was rendering you too
conspicuous; we don't want to go about advertising ourselves, you know."
"But who is there here to notice?" asked Matilda.
"Nobody," he said; "oh, nobody! but we mustn't get into the _way_ of
it;" and he cast another furtive rearward look. In the full flow of his
raptures the miserable hairdresser had seen a sight which had frozen his
very marrow--a tall form, in flowing drapery, gliding up behind with a
tigress-like stealth. The statue had broken out, in spite of all his
precautions! Venus, jealous and exacting, was near enough to overhear
every word, and he could scarcely hope she had escaped seeing the arm he
had thrown round Matilda's waist.
"You were going to tell me how you worshipped me," said Matilda.
"I didn't say _worship_," he protested; "it--it's only images and such
that expect that. But I can tell you there's very few brothers feel to
you as I feel."
"_Brothers_, Leander!" exclaimed Matilda, and walked farther apart from
him.
"Yes," he said. "After all, what tie's closer than a brother? A uncle's
all very well, and similarly a cousin; but they can't feel like a
brother does, for brothers they are not."
"I should have thought there were ties still closer," said Matilda; "you
seemed to think so too, once."
"Oh, ah! _that_!" he said. (Every frigid word gave him a pang to utter;
but it was all for Matilda's sake.) "There's time enough to think of
that, my girl; we mustn't be in a hurry."
"I'm _not_ in a hurry," said Matilda.
"That's the proper way to look at it," said he; "and meanwhile I haven't
got a sister I'm fonder of than I am of you."
"If you've nothing more to say than that, we had better part," she
remarked; and he caught at the suggestion with obvious relief. He had
been in an agony of terror, lest, even in the gathering fog, she should
detect that they were watched; and then, too, it was better to part with
her under a temporary misconception than part with her altogether.
"Well," he said, "I mustn't keep you out any longer, with that cold."
"You are very ready to get rid of me," said poor Matilda.
"The real truth is," he answered, simulating a yawn with a heavy heart;
"I am most uncommon sleepy to-night, and all this standing about is too
much for me. So good-bye, and take care of yourself!"
"I needn't say that to you," she said; "but I won't keep you up a minute
longer. I wonder you troubled to come out at all."
"Oh," he said, carefully keeping as much in front of the statue as he
could, "it's no trouble; but you'll excuse me seeing you to the door
this evening?"
"Oh, certainly," said Matilda, biting her lip. She touched his hand with
the ends of her fingers, and hurried away without turning her head.
When she was out of sight, Leander faced round to the irrepressible
goddess. He was in a white rage; but terror and caution made him
suppress it to some extent.
"So here you are again!" he said.
"Why did you not wait for me?" she answered. "I remained long for you;
you came not, and I followed."
"I see you did," said the aggrieved Leander; "I can't say I like being
spied upon. If you're a goddess, act as such!"
"What! you dare to upbraid me?" she cried. "Beware, or I----"
"I know," said Leander, flinching from her. "Don't do that; I only made
a remark."
"I have the right to follow you; I choose to do so."
"If you must, you must," he groaned; "but it does seem hard that I
mayn't slip out for a few minutes' talk with my only sister."
"You said you were going to run for business, and you told me you had
three sisters."
"So I have; but only one _youngest_ one."
"And why did they not all come to talk with you?"
"I suppose because the other two stayed at home," rejoined Leander,
sulkily.
"I know not why, but I doubt you; that one who came, she is not like
you!"
"No," said Leander, with a great show of candour, "that's what every one
says; all our family are like that; we are like in a way, because we're
all of us so different. You can tell us anywhere just by the difference.
My father and mother were both very unlike: I suppose we take after
them."
The goddess seemed satisfied with this explanation. "And now that I have
regained you, let us return to your abode," she said; and Leander walked
back by her side, a prey to rage and humiliation.
"It is a miserable thing," he was thinking, "for a man in my rank of
life to have a female statue trotting after him like a great dorg. I'm
d----d if I put up with it! Suppose we happen on somebody as knows me!"
[Illustration: "IT IS A MISERABLE THING," HE WAS THINKING, "FOR A MAN
... TO HAVE A FEMALE STATUE TROTTING AFTER HIM LIKE A GREAT DORG."]
Fortunately, at that time of night Bloomsbury Square is not much
frequented; the increasing fog prevented the apparition of a female in
classical garments from attracting the notice to which it might
otherwise have been exposed, and they reached the shop without any
disagreeable encounter.
"She shan't stop in the saloon," he determined; "I've had enough of
that! If you've no objections," he said, with a mixture of deference and
dictation, "I shall be obliged if you'd settle yourself in the little
shrine in the upstairs room before proceeding to evaporate out of your
statue; it would be more agreeable to my feelings."
"Ah!" she said, smiling, "you would have me nearer you? Your stubborn
heart is yielding; a little while, and you will own the power of
Aphrodite!"
"Now, don't you go deceiving yourself with any such ideers," said the
hairdresser, irritably. "I shan't do no such thing, so you needn't think
it. And, to come to the point, how long do you mean to carry on this
little game?"
"Game?" repeated the goddess, absently.
"How long are you going to foller me about in this ridiclous way?"
"Till you submit, and profess your willingness to redeem your promise."
"Oh, and you're coming every evening till then, are you?"
"At nightfall of each day I have power to revisit you."
"Well, come then!" he said, with a fling of impatient anger. "I tell you
beforehand that you won't get anything by it. Not if you was to come and
bring a whole stonemason's yard of sculptures along with you, you
wouldn't! You ought to know better than to come pestering a respectable
tradesman in this bold-faced manner!"
She smiled with a languid contemptuous tolerance, which maddened
Leander.
"Rave on," she said. "Truly, you are a sorry prize for such as I to
stoop to win; yet I will it, nor shall you escape me. There will come a
day when, forsaken by all you hold dear on earth, despised, ruined,
distracted, you will pray eagerly for the haven of refuge to which I
alone can guide you. Take heed, lest your conduct now be remembered
then! I have spoken."
They were indeed her last words that evening, and they impressed the
hairdresser, in spite of himself. Custom habituates the mind to any
marvel, and already he had overcome his first horror at the periodical
awakenings of the statue, and surprise was swallowed up by exasperation;
now, however, he quailed under her dark threats. Could it ever really
come to pass that he would sue to this stone to hide him in the realms
of the supernatural?
"I know this," he told himself, "if it once gets about that there's a
hairdresser to be seen in Bloomsbury chivied about after dark by a
classical statue, I shan't dare to show my face. Yet I don't know how
I'm to prevent her coming out after me, at all events now and then. If
she was only a little more like other people, I shouldn't mind so much;
but it's more than I can bear to have to go about with a _tablow vivant_
or a _pose plastique_ on my arm!"
All at once he started to his feet. "I've got it!" he cried, and went
downstairs to his laboratory, to reappear with some camel-hair brushes,
grease-paints, and a selection from his less important discoveries in
the science of cosmetics; namely, an "eyebrow accentuator," a vase of
"Tweddle's Cream of Carnations" and "Blondinette Bloom," a china box of
"Conserve of Coral" for the lips, and one of his most expensive
_chevelures_.
He was trembling as he arranged them upon his table; not that he was
aware of the enormity of the act he contemplated, but he was afraid the
goddess might revisit the marble while he was engaged upon it.
He furnished the blank eye-sockets with a pair of eyes, which, if not
exactly artistic, at least supplied a want; he pencilled the eyebrows,
laid on several coats of the "Bloom," which he suffused cunningly with a
tinge of carnation, and stained the pouting lips with his "Conserve of
Coral."
So far, perhaps, he had not violated the canons of art, and may even
have restored to the image something of its pristine hues; but his next
addition was one the vandalism of which admits of no possible defence,
and when he deftly fitted the coiffure of light closely-curled hair upon
the noble classical head, even Leander felt dimly that something was
wrong!
"I don't know how it is," he pondered; "she looks more natural, but not
half so respectable. However, when she's got something on to cover the
marble, there won't be anything much to notice about her. I'll buy a
cloak for her the first thing to-morrow morning. Matilda was saying
something about a shop near here where I could get that. And then, if
this Venus must come following me about, she'll look less outlandish at
any rate, and that's something!"
A FURTHER PREDICAMENT
VII.
"So long as the world contains us both,
Me the loving and you the loth,
While the one eludes, must the other pursue."
_Browning._
Immediately after breakfast the next day, Leander went out and paid a
visit to Miss Twilling's, bringing away with him a hooded cloak of the
precise kind he remembered Matilda to have described as unlikely to
render its owner conspicuous. With this garment he succeeded in
disguising the statue to such a degree, that it was far less likely than
before that the goddess's appearance in public would excite any
particular curiosity--a result which somewhat relieved his anxiety as to
her future proceedings.
But all that day his thoughts were busy with Matilda. He must, he
feared, have deeply offended her by his abrupt change on the previous
night; and now he could not expect to meet her again for days, and would
not know how to explain his conduct if he did meet her.
If he could only dare to tell her everything; but from such a course he
shrank. Matilda would not only be extremely indignant (though, in very
truth, he had done nothing positively wrong as yet), but, with her
strict notions and well-regulated principles, she would assuredly
recoil from a lover who had brought himself into a predicament so
hideous. He would tell her all when, or if, he succeeded in extricating
himself.
But he was to learn the nature of Matilda's sentiments sooner than he
expected. It was growing dusk, and he was unpacking a parcel of goods in
his front shop--for his saloon happened to be empty just then--when the
outer door swung back, and a slight girlish figure entered, after a
pause of indecision on the threshold. It was Matilda.
Had she come to break it off--to reproach him? He was prepared for no
less; she had never paid him a visit like this alone before; and some
doubts of the propriety of the thing seemed to be troubling her now, for
she did not speak.
"Matilda," he faltered, "don't tell me you have come in a spirit of
unpleasantness, for I can't bear it."
"Don't you deserve that I should?" she said, but not angrily. "You know,
you were very strange in behaving as you did last night. I couldn't tell
what to make of it."
"I know," he said confusedly; "it was something come over me, all of a
sudden like. I can't understand what made me like that; but, oh, Tillie,
my dearest love, my 'art was busting with adoration all the time! The
circumstances was highly peculiar; but I don't know that I could explain
them."
"You needn't, Leander; I have found you out." She said this with a
strange significance.
"What!" he almost shrieked. "You don't mean it, Matilda! Tell me, quick!
has the discovery changed your feelings towards me? Has it?"
"Yes," she said softly. "I--I think it has; but you ought not to have
done it, Leander."
"I know," he groaned. "I was a fool, Tillie; a fool! But I may get out
of it yet," he added. "I can get her to let me off. I must--I will!"
Matilda opened her eyes. "But, Leander dear, listen; don't be so hasty.
I never said I _wanted_ her to let you off, did I?"
He looked at her in a dazed manner. "I rather thought," he said slowly,
"that it might have put you out a little. I see I was mistook."
"You might have known that I should be more pleased than angry, I should
think," said Matilda.
"More pleased than----I might have known!" exclaimed the bewildered man.
"Oh, you can't reely be taking it as cool as this! Will you kindly
inform me _what_ it is you're alludin' to in this way?"
"What is the use of pretending? You know I know. And it _is_ colder,
much colder, this morning. I felt it directly I got up."
"Quite a change in the weather, I'm sure," he said mechanically; "it
feels like a frost coming on." ("Has Matilda looked in to tell me the
weather's changed?" he was wondering within himself. "Either I'm mad, or
Matilda is.")
"You dear old goose!" said Matilda, with an unusual effusiveness; "you
shan't tease me like this! Do you think I've no eyes and no feelings?
Any girl, I don't care how proud or offended, would come round on such
proof of devotedness as I've had this evening. When I saw it gone, I
felt I must come straight in and thank you, and tell you I shouldn't
think any more of last night. I couldn't stop myself."
"When you saw _what_ gone?" cried the hairdresser, rubbing up his hair.
"The cloak," said Matilda; and then, as she saw his expression, her own
changed. "Leander Tweddle," she asked, in a dry hard voice, "have I been
making a wretched fool of myself? _Didn't_ you buy that cloak?"
He understood at last. He had gone to Miss Twilling's chiefly because he
was in a hurry and it was close by, and he knew nowhere else where he
could be sure of getting what he required. Now, by some supreme stroke
of the ill-luck which seemed to be pursuing him of late, he had
unwittingly purchased the identical garment on which Matilda had fixed
her affections! How was he to notice that they took it out of the window
for him?
All this flashed across him as he replied, "Yes, yes, Tillie, I did buy
a cloak there; but are you sure it was the same you told me about?"
"Do you think a woman doesn't know the look of a thing like that, when
it's taken her fancy?" said Matilda. "Why, I could tell you every clasp
and tassel on that cloak; it wasn't one you'd see every day, and I knew
it was gone the moment I passed the window. It quite upset me, for I'd
set my heart on it so; and I ran in to Miss Twilling, and asked her what
had become of it; and when she said she'd sold it that morning, I
thought I should have fainted. You see, it never struck me that it could
be you; for how could I dream that you'd be clever enough to go and
choose the very one? Leander, it _was_ clever of you!"
"Yes," he said, with a bitter rail against himself. "I'm a clever chap,
I am! But how did you find out?"
"Oh, I made Miss Twilling (I often get little things there), I made her
describe who she sold it to, and she said she thought it was to a
gentleman in the hair-cutting persuasion who lived near; and then, of
course, I guessed who bought it."
"Tillie," gasped Leander, "I--I didn't _mean_ you to guess; the purpose
for which I require that cloak is my secret."
"Oh, you silly man, when I've guessed it! And I take it just as kind of
you as if it was to be all a surprise. I was wishing as I came along I
could afford to buy it at once, it struck so cold coming out of our
place; and you had actually bought it for me all the time! Thank you
ever so much, Leander dear!"
He had only to accept the position; and he did. "I'm glad you're
pleased," he said; "I intended it as a surprise."
"And I am surprised," said Matilda; "because, do you know, last night,
when I went home, I was feeling very cross with you. I kept thinking
that perhaps you didn't care for me any more, and were trying to break
it off; and, oh, all sorts of horrid things I kept thinking! And aunt
gave me a message for you this morning, and I was so out of temper I
wouldn't leave it. And now to find you've been so kind!"
She stretched out her hand to him across the counter, and he took and
held it tight; he had never seen her looking sweeter, nor felt that she
was half so dear to him. After all, his blunder had brought them
together again, and he was grateful to it.
At last Matilda said, "You were quite right about this wrapper, Leander;
it's not half warm enough for a night like this. I'm really afraid to go
home in it."
He knew well enough what she intended him to do; but just then he dared
not appear to understand. "It isn't far, only to Millman Street," he
said; "and you must walk fast, Tillie. I wish I could leave the shop and
come too."
"You want me to ask you downright," she said pouting. "You men can't
even be kind prettily. Don't you want to see how I look in your cloak,
Leander?"
What could he say after that? He must run upstairs, deprive the goddess
of her mantle, and hand it over to Matilda. She had evidently made up
her mind to have that particular cloak, and he must buy the statue
another. It would be expensive; but there was no help for it.
"Certainly," he said, "you shall have it now, dearest, if you'd like to.
I'll run up and fetch it down, if you'll wait."
He rushed upstairs, two steps at a time, and, flinging open the door of
a cupboard, began desperately to uncloak his Aphrodite. She was lifeless
still, which he considered fortunate.
But the goddess seemed to have a natural propensity to retain any form
of portable property. One of her arms was so placed that, tug and
stretch as he would, Leander could not get the cloak from her shoulders,
and his efforts only broke one of the oxidized silver fastenings, and
tore part of the squirrel's-fur lining.
It was useless, and with a damp forehead he came down again to his
expectant _fiancée_.
"Why, you haven't got it, after all!" she cried, her face falling.
"Tillie, my own dear girl," he said, "I'm uncommon sorry, upon my soul I
am, but you can't have that cloak this evening."
"But why, Leander, why?"
"Because one of the clasps is broke. It must be sent back to be
repaired."
"I don't mind that. Let me have it just as it is."
"And the lining's torn. No, Matilda, I shan't make you a present of a
damaged article. I shall send it back. They must change it for me."
("Then," he thought, "I can buy my Matilda another.")
"I don't care for any other but that," she said; "and you can't match
it."
"Oh, lor!" he thought, "and she knows every inch of it. The goddess must
give it up; it'll be all the same to _her_. Very well then, dearest, you
_shall_ have that, but not till it's done up. I must have my way in
this; and as soon as ever I can, I'll bring it round."
"Leander, could you bring it me by Sunday," she said eagerly, "when you
come?"
"Why Sunday?" he asked.
"Because--oh, that was the message your aunt asked me to bring you; it
was in a note, but I've lost it. She told me what was inside though, and
it's this. Will you give her the pleasure of your company at her mid-day
dinner at two o'clock, to be introduced to mamma? And she said you were
to be sure and not forget her ring."
He tottered for a moment. The ring! Yes, there was that to be got off,
too, besides the cloak.
"Haven't you got the ring from Vidler's yet?" she said. "He's had it
such a time."
He had told her where he had left it for alterations. "Yes," he said,
"he has had it a time. It's disgraceful the way that old Vidler potters
and potters. I shall go round and 'urry him up. I won't stand it any
longer."
Here a customer came in, and Matilda slipped away with a hurried
good-bye.
"I've got till Sunday to get straight," the hairdresser thought, as he
attended on the new comer, "the best part of a week; surely I can talk
that Venus over by that time."
When he was alone he went up to see her, without losing a moment. He
must have left the door unlocked in his haste, for she was standing
before the low chimney-glass, regarding herself intently. As he came in
she turned.
[Illustration: SHE WAS STANDING BEFORE THE LOW CHIMNEY-GLASS, REGARDING
HERSELF INTENTLY.]
"Who has done all this?" she demanded. "Tell me, was it you?"
"I did take the liberty, mum," he faltered guiltily.
"You have done well," she said graciously. "With reverent and loving
care have you imparted hues as of life to these cheeks, and decked my
image in robes of costly skins."
"Don't name it, mum," he said.
"But what are these?" she continued, raising a hand to the light
ringlets on her brow. "I like them not--they are unseemly. The waving
lines, parted by the bold chisel of a Grecian sculptor, resemble my
ambrosial tresses more nearly than this abomination."
"You may go all over London," said Leander, "and you won't find a
coiffure, though I say it, to set closer and defy detection more
naturally than the one you've got on; selected from the best imported
foreign hair in the market, I do assure you."
"I accept the offering for the spirit in which it was presented, though
I approve it not otherwise."
"You'll find it wear very comfortable," said Leander; "but that cloak,
now I come to see it on, it reely is most unworthy of you, a very
inferior piece of goods, and, if you'll allow me, I'll change it," and
he gently extended his hand to draw it off.
"Touch it not," said the goddess; "for, having once been placed upon my
effigy, it is consecrated to my service."
"For mercy's sake, let me get another one--one with more style about
it," he entreated; "my credit hangs on it!"
"I am content," she said, "more than content. No more words--I retain
it. And you have pleased me by this conduct, my hairdresser. Unknown it
may be, even to yourself, your heart is warming in the sunshine of my
favour; you are coy and wayward, but you are yielding. Though pent in
this form, carved by a mortal hand, I shall prevail in the end. I shall
have you for my own."
He rumpled his hair wildly, "'Orrid obstinate these goddesses are," he
thought. "What am I to say to Matilda now? If I could only find a way of
getting this statue shut up somewhere where she couldn't come and bother
me, I'd take my chance of the rest. I can't go on with this sort of
thing every evening. I'm sick and tired of it."
Then something occurred to him. "Could I delude her into it?" he asked
himself. "She's soft enough in some things, and, for all she's a
goddess, she don't seem up to our London ways yet. I'll have a try,
anyway."
So he began: "Didn't I understand you to observe, mum, some time back,
that the pidgings and sparrers were your birds?"
"They are mine," she said--"or they were mine in days that are past."
"Well," he said, "there's a place close by, with railings in front of
it, and steps and pillars as you go in, and if you like to go and look
in the yard there you'll find pidgings enough to set you up again. I
shouldn't wonder if they've been keeping them for you all this time."
"They shall not lose by it," she said. "Go thither, and bring me my
birds."
"I think," he said, "it would be better if you'd go yourself; they don't
know me at the British Museum. But if you was to go to the beadle at the
lodge and demand them, I've no doubt you'd be attended to; and you'll
see some parties at the gates in long coats and black cloth 'elmets,
which if you ask them to ketch you a few sparrers, they'll probably be
most happy to oblige."
"My beloved birds!" she said. "I have been absent from them so long.
Yes, I will go. Tell me where."
He got his hat, and went with her to a corner of Bloomsbury Square, from
which they could see the railings fronting the Museum in the
steel-tinted haze of electric light.
"That's the place," he said. "Keeps its own moonshine, you see. Go
straight in, and tell 'em you're come to fetch your doves."
"I will do so," she said, and strode off in imperious majesty.
He looked after her with an irrepressible chuckle.
"If she ain't locked up soon, I don't know myself," he said, and went
back to his establishment.
He had only just dismissed his apprentice and secured the shop for the
night, when he heard the well-known tread up the staircase. "Back again!
I don't have any luck," he muttered; and with reason, for the statue,
wearing an expression of cold displeasure, advanced into his room. He
felt a certain sense of guilt as he saw her.
"Got the birds?" he inquired, with a nervous familiarity, "or couldn't
you bring yourself to ask for them?"
"You have misled me," she said. "My birds are not there. I came to gates
in front of a stately pile--doubtless erected to some god; at the
entrance stood a priest, burly and strong, with gold-embroidered
garments----"
("The beadle, I suppose," commented Leander.)
"I passed him unseen, and roamed unhindered over the courtyard. It was
bare, save for one or two worshippers who crossed it. Presently a winged
thing fluttered down to my feet. But though a dove indeed, it was no
bird of mine--it knew me not. And it was draggled, begrimed, uncleanly,
as never were the doves of Aphrodite. And the sparrows (for these, too,
did I see), they were worse. I motioned them from me with loathing. I
renounced them all. Thus, Leander, have I fared in following your
counsels!"
"Well, it ain't my fault," he said; "it's the London soot makes them
like that. There's some at the Guildhall: perhaps they're cleaner."
"No," she said, vehemently; "I will seek no further. This is a city of
darkness and mire. I am in a land, an age, which know me not: this much
have I learnt already. The world was fairer and brighter of old!"
"You see," said Leander, "if you only go about at night, you can't
expect sunshine! But I'm told there's cleaner and brighter places to be
seen abroad--if you cared to go there?" he insinuated.
"To one place only, to my Cyprian caves, will I go," she declared, "and
with you!"
"We'll talk about that some other time," he answered, soothingly. "Lady
Venus, look here, don't you think you've kept that ring long enough?
I've asked you civilly enough, goodness knows, to 'and it over, times
without number. I ask you once more to act fair. You know it came to you
quite accidental, and yet you want to take advantage of it like this. It
ain't right!"
She met this with her usual scornful smile. "Listen, Leander," she said.
"Once before--how long since I know not--a mortal, in sport or accident,
placed his ring as you have done upon the finger of a statue erected to
me. I claimed fulfilment of the pledge then, as now; but a force I
could not withstand was invoked against me, and I was made to give up
the ring, and with it the power and rights I strove to exert. But I will
not again be thwarted: no force, no being shall snatch you from me; so
be not deceived. Submit, ere you excite my fierce displeasure; submit
now, since in the end submit you must!"
There was a dreadful force in the sonorous tones which made him shiver;
a rigid inflexible will lurked in this form, with all its subtle curves
and feminine grace. If goddesses really retained any power in these
days, there could be no doubt that she would use hers to the full.
Yet he still struggled. "I can't make you give up the ring," he said;
"but no more you can't make me leave my--my establishment, and go away
underground with you. I'm an Englishman, I am, and Englishmen are free,
mum; p'r'aps you wasn't aware of that? I've got a will of my own, and so
you'll find it!"
"Poor worm!" she said pityingly (and the hairdresser hated to be
addressed as a poor worm), "why oppose thy weak will to mine? Why enlist
my pride against thyself; for what hast thou of thine own to render thy
conquest desirable? Thou art bent upon defiance, it seems. I leave thee
to reflect if such a combat can be equal. Farewell; and at my next
coming let me find a change!"
And the spirit of the goddess fled, as before, to the mysterious realms
from which she had been so incautiously evoked, leaving Leander almost
frantic with rage, superstitious terror, and baffled purposes.
"I must get the ring off," he muttered, "_and_ the cloak, somehow. Oh!
if I could only find out how----There was that other chap--_he_ got off;
she said as much. If I could get out how he managed it, why couldn't I
do the same? But who's to tell me? She won't--not if she knows it! I
wonder if it's in any history. Old Freemoult would know it if it
was--he's such a scholar. Why, he gave me a name for that 'airwash
without having to think twice over it! I'll try and pump old Freemoult.
I'll do it to-morrow, too. I'll see if I'm to be domineered over by a
image out of a tea-garden. Eh? I--I don't care if she _did_ hear me!"So Leander went to his troubled pillow, full of this new resolution,which seemed to promise a way of escape. |
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