That Girl in Black; and, Bronzie Read online

and he laughed lightly. "It was only rather absurd. Ihave seemed haunted by her once or twice lately, and yet nobody knowsanything about her, except that her name is Ford."

  "Ford," said his companion; "that does _not_ tell much. And not pretty,you say?"

  "Pretty, oh, yes. No, not exactly pretty," and a vision of Maisie'sclear cold profile and--yes, there was no denying it--_most_ lovelyeyes, rose before him. "More than pretty," he would have said had henot been afraid of being laughed at. "I don't really know how todescribe her, and it is of less than no consequence. I don't suppose Ishall ever see her again," and he went on to talk of other matters.

  He did see her again, however, and it was, as will have already beensupposed, at Lady Valence's garden-party that he did so. It was a coldday, of course. The weather, with its usual consideration, had changedthat very morning, after having been, for May, really decently mild andagreeable. The wind had veered round to the east, and it seemed notimprobable that the rain would look in, an uninvited guest, in thecourse of the afternoon.

  Lady Valence declared herself in despair, but as nobody could rememberthe weather ever being anything but highly detestable the day of hergarden-party, it is to be hoped that she in reality took it morephilosophically than she allowed, Despard strode about feeling verycold, and wondering why he had come, and why, having come, he stayed.There was a long row of conservatories and ferneries, and glass-housesof every degree of temperature not far from the lawn, where at one endthe band was playing, and at the other some deluded beings were eatingices. Despard shivered; the whole was too ghastly. A door in thecentre house stood invitingly open, and he turned in. Voices near athand, female voices, warned him off at one side, for he was not feelingamiable, and he hastened in the opposite direction. By degrees thepleasant warmth, the extreme beauty of the plants and flowers amidstwhich he found himself, the solitariness, too, soothed and subdued hisirritation.

  "If I could smoke," he began to say to himself, when, looking round witha half-formed idea of so doing, he caught sight amidst the ferns offeminine drapery. Some one was there before him--but a very quiet,mouse-like somebody. A somebody who was standing there motionless,gazing at the tall tropical plants, enjoying, apparently, the warmth andthe quiet like himself.

  "That girl in black, that sphinx of a girl again--by Jove!" murmuredDespard under his breath, and as he did so, she turned and saw him.

  Her first glance was of annoyance; he saw her clearly from where hestood, there was no mistaking the fact. But, so quickly, that it wasdifficult to believe it had been there, the expression of vexationpassed. The sharply contracted brows smoothed; the graceful head bentslightly forward; the lips parted.

  "How do you do, Mr Norreys?" she said. "We are always running againsteach other unexpectedly, are we not?"

  Her tone was perfectly natural, her manner expressed simple pleasure andgratification. She was again the third, the rarest of her threeselves--the personality which Despard, in his heart of hearts, believedto be _herself_.

  He smiled--a slightly amused, _almost_ a slightly condescending smile,but a very pleasant one all the same. He could afford to be pleasantnow. Poor silly little girl--she had given in with a good grace, atruce to her nonsense of regal airs and dignity; a truce, too, to thetimid self-consciousness of her first introduction.

  "She understands better now, I see," he thought. "Understands that alittle country girl is but--ah, well--but a little country girl. Still,I must allow--" and he hesitated as his glance fell on her; it was thefirst time he had seen her by daylight, and the words he had mentallyused did not quite "fit"--"I must allow that she has brains, and somecharacter of her own."

  "I can imagine its seeming so to you," he said aloud. "You have, Ithink you told me, lived always in the country. Of course, in thecountry one's acquaintances stand out distinctly, and one remembersevery day whom one has and has not seen. In town it is quite different.I find myself constantly forgetting people, and doing all sorts ofstupid things, imagining I have seen some one last week when it was sixmonths ago, and so on. But people are really very good-natured."

  She listened attentively.

  "How difficult it must be to remember all the people you know!" shesaid, with the greatest apparent simplicity; indeed, with a tone ofalmost awe-struck reverence.

  "I simply don't attempt it," he replied.

  "How--dear me, I hardly know how to say it--how _very_ good and kind ofyou it is to remember me," she said.

  Mr Norreys glanced at her sharply.

  Was she playing him off? For an instant the appalling suggestion allbut took his breath away, but it was quickly dismissed. Its utterabsurdity was too self-evident; and the expression on her face reassuredhim. She seemed so innocent as she stood there, her eyes hidden for themoment by their well-fringed lids, for she was looking down. A faint,the very faintest, suspicion of a blush coloured her cheeks, there was atiny little trembling about the corners of her mouth. But somehow thesesmall evidences of confusion did not irritate him as they had done whenhe first met her. On the contrary. "Poor little girl," he said tohimself. "I see I must be careful. Still, she will live to get overit, and one cannot be positively brutal."

  For an instant or two he did not speak.

  Then: "I never pay compliments, Miss Ford," he said, "but what I amgoing to say may sound to you like one. However, I trust you will notdislike it."

  And again he unaccountably hesitated--what was the matter with him? Hemeant to be kindly encouraging to the girl, but as she stood beside him,looking up with a half-curious, half-deprecating expression in her eyes,he was conscious of his face slightly flushing; the words he wantedrefused to come, he felt as if he were bewitched.

  "Won't you tell me what you were going to say?" she said at last. "Ishould so like to hear it."

  "It's not worth saying," he blurted out. "Indeed, though I know what Imean, I cannot express it. You--you are quite different from othergirls, Miss Ford. It would be impossible to confuse you with the crowd.That's about the sum of what I was thinking, though--I meant to expressit differently. Certainly, in the way I have said it, no one by anypossibility could take it for a compliment."

  To his surprise she looked up at him with a bright smile, a smile ofpleasure, and--of something else.

  "On the contrary, I do take it as a compliment, as a very distinctcompliment," she said, "considering whom it comes from. Though, afterall, it is scarcely _I_ that should accept it. The--the circumstancesof my life may have made me different--my having been so little in town,for instance. I suppose there are some advantages in everything, evenin apparent disadvantages."

  Her extreme gentleness and deference put him at his ease again.

  "Oh, certainly," he said. "For my part, I often wish I had never beenanywhere or seen anything! Life would, in such a case, seem so muchmore interesting. There would be still things left to dream about."

  He sighed, and there was something genuine in his sigh. "I envy peoplewho have never travelled, sometimes," he added.

  "Have you travelled much?" she asked.

  "Oh, dear, yes--been everywhere--the usual round."

  "But the usual round is just what with me counts for nothing," she saidsharply. "Real travelling means living in other countries, leading thelife of their peoples, not rushing round the capitals of Europe from onecosmopolitan hotel to another."

  He smiled a superior smile. "When you have rushed round the capitals ofEurope you may give an opinion," his smile seemed to say.

  "That sort of thing is impossible, except for Bohemians," he saidlanguidly. "I detest talking about travels."

  "Do you really?" she said, with a very distinct accent of contempt."Then I suppose you have not read--" and she named a book on everybody'stable at the moment.

  Despard's face lighted up.

  "Oh, indeed, yes," he said. "That is not an ordinary book of travels;"and he went on to speak of the volume in question in a manner whichshowed that he had read i
t intelligently, while Miss Fforde, forgettingherself and her companion in the interest of what he said, respondedsympathetically.

  Half unconsciously, as they talked they strolled up and down the wideopen space in front of the ferns. Suddenly voices, apparentlyapproaching them, caught the girl's ear.

  "Oh, dear," she said, "my friends will be wondering what has become ofme! I must go. Good-bye, Mr Norreys," and she held out her hand.There was something simple and perfectly natural in her manner as shedid so, which struck him. It was almost as if she were throwing offimpulsively a part which she was tired of playing.

  He held her hand for a quarter of an