either.
Miss Millicent Chyne was vaguely conscious of success—and such a consciousness is apt to make the best of us a trifle elated. It was certainly one of the best balls of the season, and Miss Chyne's dress was, without doubt, one of the most successful articles of its sort there.
Jack Meredith saw that fact and noted it as soon as he came into the room. Moreover, it gratified him, and he was pleased to reflect that he was no mean critic in such matters. There could be no doubt about it, because he KNEW as well as any woman there. He knew that Millicent Chyne was dressed in the latest fashion—no furbished-up gown from the hands of her maid, but a unique creation from Bond Street.
“Well,” she asked in a low voice, as she handed him her programme, “are you pleased with it?”
“Eminently so.”
She glanced down at her own dress. It was not the nervous glance of the debutante, but the practised flash of experienced eyes which see without appearing to look.
“I am glad,” she murmured.
He handed her back the card with the orthodox smile and bow of gratitude, but there was something more in his eyes.
“Is that what you did it for?” he inquired.
“Of course,” with a glance half coquettish, half humble.
She took the card and allowed it to drop pendent from her fan without looking at it. He had written nothing on it. This was all a form. The dances that were his had been inscribed on the engagement-card long before by smaller fingers than his.
She turned to take her attendant partner's arm with a little flaunt—a little movement of the hips to bring her dress, and possibly herself, more prominently beneath Jack Meredith's notice. His eyes followed her with that incomparably pleasant society smile which he had no doubt inherited from his father. Then he turned and mingled with the well-dressed throng, bowing where he ought to bow—asking with fervour for dances in plain but influential quarters where dances were to be easily obtained.
And all the while his father and Lady Cantourne watched.
“Yes, I THINK,” the lady was saying, “that that is the favoured one.”
“I fear so.”
“I noticed,” observed Lady Cantourne, “that he asked for a dance.”
“And apparently got one—or more.”
“Apparently so, Sir John.”
“Moreover—”
Lady Cantourne turned on him with her usual vivacity.
“Moreover?” she repeated.
“He did not need to write it down on the card; it was written there already.”
She closed her fan with a faint smile
“I sometimes wonder,” she said, “whether, in our young days, you were so preternaturally observant as you are now.”
“No,” he answered, “I was not. I affected scales of the very opaquest description, like the rest of my kind.”
In the meantime this man's son was going about his business with a leisurely savoir-faire which few could rival. Jack Meredith was the beau-ideal of the society man in the best acceptation of the word. One met him wherever the best people congregated, and he invariably seemed to know what to do and how to do it better than his compeers. If it was dancing in the season, Jack Meredith danced, and no man rivalled him. If it was grouse shooting, Jack Meredith held his gun as straight as any man. All the polite accomplishments in their season seemed to come to him without effort; but there was in all the same lack of heart—that utter want of enthusiasm which imparted to his presence a subtle suggestion of boredom. The truth was that he was over-educated. Sir John had taught him how to live and move and have his being with so minute a care, so keen an insight, that existence seemed to be nothing but an habitual observance of set rules.
Sir John called him sarcastically his “bright boy,” his “hopeful offspring,” the “pride of his old age”; but somewhere in his shrivelled old heart there nestled an unbounded love and admiration for his son. Jack had assimilated his teaching with a wonderful aptitude. He had as nearly as possible realised Sir John Meredith's idea of what an English gentleman should be, and the old aristocrat's standard was uncompromisingly high. Public school, University, and two years on the Continent had produced a finished man, educated to the finger-tips, deeply read, clever, bright, and occasionally witty; but Jack Meredith was at this time nothing more than a brilliant conglomerate of possibilities. He had obeyed his father to the letter with a conscientiousness bred of admiration. He had always felt that his father knew best. And now he seemed to be waiting—possibly for further orders. He was suggestive of a perfect piece of mechanism standing idle for want of work delicate enough to be manipulated by its delicate craft. Sir John had impressed upon him the desirability of being independent, and he had promptly cultivated that excellent quality, taking kindly enough to rooms of his own in a fashionable quarter. But upon the principle of taking a horse to the water and being unable to make him drink, Sir John had not hitherto succeeded in making Jack take the initiative. He had turned out such a finished and polished English gentleman as his soul delighted in, and now he waited in cynical silence for Jack Meredith to take his life into his own hands and do something brilliant with it. All that he had done up to now had been to prove that he could attain to a greater social popularity than any other man of his age and station; but this was not exactly the success that Sir John Meredith coveted for his son. He had tasted of this success himself, and knew its thinness of flavour—its fleeting value.
Behind his keen old eyes such thoughts as these were passing, while he watched Jack go up and claim his dance at the hands of Miss Millicent Chyne. He could almost guess what they said; for Jack was grave and she smiled demurely. They began dancing at once, and as soon as the floor became crowded they disappeared.
Jack Meredith was an adept at such matters. He knew a seat at the end of a long passage where they could sit, the beheld of all beholders who happened to pass; but no one could possibly overhear their conversation—no one could surprise them. It was essentially a strategical position.
“Well,” inquired Jack, with a peculiar breathlessness, when they were seated, “have you thought about it?”
She gave a little nod.
They seemed to be taking up some conversation at a point where it had been dropped on a previous occasion.
“And?” he inquired suavely. The society polish was very thickly coated over the man; but his eyes had a hungry look.
By way of reply her gloved hand crept out towards his, which rested on the chair at his side.
“Jack!” she whispered; and that was all.
It was very prettily done, and quite naturally. He was a judge of such matters, and appreciated the girlish simplicity of the action.
He took the small gloved hand and pressed it lovingly. The thoroughness of his social training prevented any further display of affection.
“Thank Heaven!” he murmured.
They were essentially of the nineteenth century—these two. At a previous dance he had asked her to marry him; she had deferred her answer, and now she had given it. These little matters are all a question of taste. We do not kneel nowadays, either physically or morally. If we are a trifle off hand, it is the women who are to blame. They should not write in magazines of a doubtful reputation in language devoid of the benefit of the doubt. They are equal to us. Bien! One does not kneel to an equal. A better writer than any of us says that men serve women kneeling, and when they get to their feet they go away. We are being hauled up to our feet now.
“But—?” began the girl, and went no further.
“But what?”
“There will be difficulties.”
“No doubt,” he answered, with quiet mockery. “There always are. I will see to them. Difficulties are not without a certain advantage. They keep one on the alert.”
“Your father,” said the girl. “Sir John—he will object.”
Jack Meredith reflected for a moment, lazily, with that leisureliness which gave a sense of repose to his presence.
“Possibly,” he admitted gravely.
“He dislikes me,” said the girl. “He is one of my failures.”
“I did not know you had any. Have you tried? I cannot quite admit the possibility of failure.”
Millicent Chyne smiled. He had emphasised the last remark with lover-like glance and tone. She was young enough; her own beauty was new enough to herself to blind her to the possibility mentioned. She had not even got to the stage of classifying as dull all men who did not fall in love with her at first sight. It was her first season, one must remember.
“I have not tried very hard,” she said. “But I don't see why I should not fail.”
“That is easily explained.”
“Why?”
“No looking-glass about.”
She gave a little pout, but she liked it.
The music of the next dance was beginning, and, remembering their social obligations, they both rose. She laid her hand on his arm, and for a moment his fingers pressed hers. He smiled down into her upturned eyes with love, but without passion. He never for a second risked the “gentleman” and showed the “man.” He was suggestive of a forest pool with a smiling rippled surface. There might be depth, but it was yet unpenetrated.
“Shall we go now,” he said, “and say a few words in passing to my redoubtable father? It might be effective.”
“Yes, if you like,” she answered promptly. There is no more confident being on earth than a pretty girl in a successful dress.
They met Sir John at the entrance of the ballroom. He was wandering about, taking in a vast deal of detail.
“Well, young lady,” he said, with an old-world bow, “are you having a successful evening?”
Millicent laughed. She never knew quite how to take Sir John.
“Yes, I think so, thank you,” she answered, with a pretty smile. “I am enjoying myself very much.”
There was just the least suggestion of shyness in her manner, and it is just possible that this softened the old cynic's heart, for his manner was kinder and almost fatherly when he spoke again.
“Ah!” he said, “at your time of life you do not want much—plenty of partners and a few ices. Both easily obtainable.”
The last words were turned into a compliment by the courtly inclination of the head that accompanied them.
The exigencies of the moment forced the young people to go with the stream.
“Jack,” said Sir John, as they passed on, “when you have been deprived of Miss Chyne's society, come and console yourself with a glass of sherry.”
The dutiful son nodded a semi-indifferent acquiescence and disappeared.
“Wonderful thing, sherry!” observed Sir John Meredith for his own edification.
He waited there until Jack returned, and then they set off in search of refreshment. The son seemed to know his whereabouts better than the father.
“This way,” he said, “through the conservatory.”
Amidst the palms and tropical ferns Sir John paused. A great deal of care had been devoted to this conservatory. Half hidden among languorous scented flowers were a thousand tiny lights, while overhead in the gloom towered graceful palms and bananas. A fountain murmured pleasantly amidst a cluster of maidenhairs. The music from the ballroom fell softly over all.
Sir John Meredith and his son stood in silence, looking around them. Finally their eyes met.
“Are you in earnest with that girl?” asked Sir John abruptly.
“I am,” replied Jack. He was smiling pleasantly.
“And you think there is a chance of her marrying you—unless, of course, something better turns up?”
“With all due modesty I do.”
Sir John's hand was at his mouth. He stood up his full six feet two and looked hard at his son, whose eyes were level with his own. They were ideal representatives of their school.
“And what do you propose marrying upon? She, I understand, has about eight hundred a year. I respect you too much to suspect any foolish notions of love in a cottage.”
Jack Meredith made no reply. He was entirely dependent upon his father.
“Of course,” said Sir John, “when I die you will be a baronet, and there will be enough to live on like a gentleman. You had better tell Miss Chyne that. She may not know it. Girls are so innocent. But I am not dead yet, and I shall take especial care to live some time.”
“In order to prevent my marriage?” suggested Jack. He was still smiling, and somehow Sir John felt a little uneasy. He did not understand that smile.
“Precisely so,” he said, rather indistinctly.
“What is your objection?” inquired Jack Meredith, after a little pause.
“I object to the girl.”
“Upon what grounds?”
“I should prefer you to marry a woman of heart.”
“Heart?” repeated Jack, with a suspicion of hereditary cynicism. “I do not think heart is of much consequence. Besides, in this case, surely that is my province! you would not have her wear it on her sleeve?”
“She could not do that: not enough sleeve.”
Sir John Meredith had his own views on ladies' dress.
“But,” he added, “we will not quarrel. Arrange matters with the young lady as best you can. I shall never approve of such a match, and without my approval you cannot well marry.”
“I do not admit that.”
“Indeed?”
“Your approval means money,” explained this dutiful son politely. “I might manage to make the money for myself.”
Sir John moved away.
“You might,” he admitted, looking back. “I should be very glad to see you doing so. It is an excellent thing—money.”
And he walked leisurely away.