The Younger Set. Chambers Robert William
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white, or any frock-coated entity in the afternoon, or any flannelled individual at the nets or on the links or cantering about the veranda of club, casino, or cottage, in evident anxiety to be considerate and agreeable.
This one, however, appeared to have individual peculiarities; he differed from his brother Caucasians, who should all resemble one another to any normal girl. For one thing he was subject to illogical moods—apparently not caring whether she noticed them or not. For another, he permitted himself the liberty of long and unreasonable silences whenever he pleased. This she had accepted unquestioningly in the early days when she was a little in awe of him, when the discrepancy of their ages and experiences had not been dissipated by her first presumptuous laughter at his expense.
Now it puzzled her, appearing as a specific trait differentiating him from Man in the abstract.
He had another trick, too, of retiring within himself, even when smiling at her sallies or banteringly evading her challenge to a duel of wits. At such times he no longer looked very young; she had noticed that more than once. He looked old, and ill-tempered.
Perhaps some sorrow—the actuality being vague in her mind; perhaps some hidden suffering—but she learned that he had never been wounded in battle and had never even had measles.
The sudden sullen pallor, the capricious fits of silent reserve, the smiling aloofness, she never attributed to the real source. How could she? The Incomprehensible Thing was a Finality accomplished according to law. And the woman concerned was now another man's wife. Which conclusively proved that there could be no regret arising from the Incomprehensible Finality, and that nobody involved cared, much less suffered. Hence that was certainly not the cause of any erratic or specific phenomena exhibited by this sample of man who differed, as she had noticed, somewhat from the rank and file of his neutral-tinted brothers.
"It's this particular specimen, per se," she concluded; "it's himself, sui generis—just as I happen to have red hair. That is all."
And she rode on quite happily, content, confident of his interest and kindness. For she had never forgotten his warm response to her when she stood on the threshold of her first real dinner party, in her first real dinner gown—a trivial incident, trivial words! But they had meant more to her than any man specimen could understand—including the man who had uttered them; and the violets, which she found later with his card, must remain for her ever after the delicately fragrant symbol of all he had done for her in a solitude, the completeness of which she herself was only vaguely beginning to realise.
Thinking of this now, she thought of her brother—and the old hurt at his absence on that night throbbed again. Forgive? Yes. But how could she forget it?
"I wish you knew Gerald well," she said impulsively; "he is such a dear fellow; and I think you'd be good for him—and besides," she hastened to add, with instinctive loyalty, lest he misconstrue, "Gerald would be good for you. We were a great deal together—at one time."
He nodded, smilingly attentive.
"Of course when he went away to school it was different," she added. "And then he went to Yale; that was four more years, you see."
"I was a Yale man," remarked Selwyn; "did he—" but he broke off abruptly, for he knew quite well that young Erroll could have made no senior society without his hearing of it. And he had not heard of it—not in the cane-brakes of Leyte where, on his sweat-soaked shirt, a small pin of heavy gold had clung through many a hike and many a scout and by many a camp-fire where the talk was of home and of the chances of crews and of quarter-backs.
"What were you going to ask me, Captain Selwyn?"
"Did he row—your brother Gerald?"
"No," she said. She did not add that he had broken training; that was her own sorrow, to be concealed even from Gerald. "No; he played polo sometimes. He rides beautifully, Captain Selwyn, and he is so clever when he cares to be—at the traps, for example—and—oh—anything. He once swam—oh, dear, I forget; was it five or fifteen or fifty miles? Is that too far? Do people swim those distances?"
"Some of those distances," replied Selwyn.
"Well, then, Gerald swam some of those distances—and everybody was amazed. . . . I do wish you knew him well."
"I mean to," he said. "I must look him up at his rooms or his club or—perhaps—at Neergard & Co."
"Will you do this?" she asked, so earnestly that he glanced up surprised.
"Yes," he said; and after a moment: "I'll do it to-day, I think; this afternoon."
"Have you time? You mustn't let me—"
"Time?" he repeated; "I have nothing else, except a watch to help me get rid of it."
"I'm afraid I help you get rid of it, too. I heard Nina warning the children to let you alone occasionally—and I suppose she meant that for me, too. But I only take your mornings, don't I? Nina is unreasonable; I never bother you in the afternoons or evenings; do you know I have not dined at home for nearly a month—except when we've asked people?"
"Are you having a good time?" he asked condescendingly, but without intention.
"Heavenly. How can you ask that?—with every day filled and a chance to decline something every day. If you'd only go to one—just one of the dances and teas and dinners, you'd be able to see for yourself what a good time I am having. . . . I don't know why I should be so delightfully lucky, but everybody asks me to dance, and every man I meet is particularly nice, and nobody has been very horrid to me; perhaps because I like everybody—"
She rode on beside him; they were walking their horses now; and as her silken-coated mount paced forward through the sunshine she sat at ease, straight as a slender Amazon in her habit, ruddy hair glistening at the nape of her neck, the scarlet of her lips always a vivid contrast to that wonderful unblemished skin of snow.
He thought to himself, quite impersonally: "She's a real beauty, that youngster. No wonder they ask her to dance and nobody is horrid. Men are likely enough to go quite mad about her as Nina predicts: probably some of 'em have already—that chuckle-headed youth who was there Tuesday, gulping up the tea—" And, "What was his name?" he asked aloud.
"Whose name?" she inquired, roused by his voice from smiling retrospection.
"That chuckle head—the young man who continued to haunt you so persistently when you poured tea for Nina on Tuesday. Of course they all haunted you," he explained politely, as she shook her head in sign of non-comprehension; "but there was one who—ah—gulped at his cup."
"Please—you are rather dreadful, aren't you?"
"Yes. So was he; I mean the infatuated chinless gentleman whose facial ensemble remotely resembled the features of a pleased and placid lizard of the Reptilian period."
"Oh, George Fane! That is particularly disagreeable of you, Captain Selwyn, because his wife has been very nice to me—Rosamund Fane—and she spoke most cordially of you—"
"Which one was she?"
"The Dresden china one. She looks—she simply cannot look as though she were married. It's most amusing—for people always take her for somebody's youngest sister who will be out next winter. . . . Don't you remember seeing her?"
"No, I don't. But there were dozens coming and going every minute whom I didn't know. Still, I behaved well, didn't I?"
"Pretty badly—to Kathleen Lawn, whom you cornered so that she couldn't escape until her mother made her go without any tea."
"Was that the reason that old lady looked at me so queerly?"
"Probably. I did, too, but you were taking chances, not hints. . . . She is attractive, isn't she?"
"Very fetching," he said, leaning down to examine his stirrup leathers which he had already lengthened twice. "I've got to have Cummins punch these again," he muttered; "or am I growing queer-legged in my old age?"
As he straightened up, Miss Erroll said: "Here comes Mr. Fane now—with a strikingly pretty girl. How beautifully they are mounted"—smilingly returning Fane's salute—"and