CHAPTER III.
It was five years since I'd seen Opal Fawcett—then for the first and last time on that day when I had gone to her house with June.
Then she had gleamed wraithlike in the purple dusk of her purple room, with its purple-shaded lights. Now she stood in full daylight against the frank background of country cottage walls. Yet she was still a mere film of a woman. She seemed to carry her own eerie effect with her, wherever she went, as the heroines of operas are accompanied by their special spotlight and leit motif.
Whether the servant was untrained, or spiteful because a long-standing rule had been broken in my favor, I can't tell. But I'm sure that, if he'd been given half a chance, Robert would have made some excuse not to see Opal. There she was, however, on the threshold, looking like one of those “Dwellers on the Threshold” you read of in psychic books.
As he had no invisible cloak, and couldn't crawl under a sofa, noblesse oblige forced Robert to say pleasantly:
“How do you do?”
He was standing back a little, trying to look about two feet tall instead of five feet ten inches. I watched the greeting closely, to judge from it, if I could, to what extent the old acquaintance had been kept up. But I might have saved myself waste of brain tissue. Robert was anxious to leave no mystery.
“Princess,” he said hastily, when he had taken his guest's slim hand in its gray glove, “princess, I think you must have heard of Miss Opal Fawcett.”
“Oh, yes. And we have met once,” I replied.
Opal's narrow gray eyes turned to me, not without reluctance I thought.
“I remember well,” she murmured, in her purring voice. “I never forget a face. You were Miss Courtenaye then. Lately I've been hearing of you from Miss Arnold, who used to be my secretary, and is now yours.”
I was thankful she didn't bring in June's name!
“Miss Fawcett and I have known each other a good many years,” Robert hurried on. “She was once in a play with me, before she found her real metier. She kindly comes to see me now and then, when she can take a day off.”
“I wanted to bid you good-by, if you are really going out of England,” Opal said.
She had ceased to look at me now, but I went on looking hard at her, She was in what might be a spirit conception of a motor costume: smoke-gray velvet, and yards of long, floating veil shot from gray to mauve. She wore a close toque with two little jutting Mercury wings from behind which those yards of unnecessary chiffon fell, She had a narrow oval face, which nature and—I thought—art combined to make pale as pearl. Her hair, pushed forward by the toque, was so colorless a brown that it looked like thick shadow. She had a beautifully cut, delicate nose, but her lips were thin and the upper one rather long and flat; otherwise she would have been pretty. Even as it was she had a kind of fascination, and I thought her the most graceful, willowy creature I'd ever seen.
“Well,” said Robert, “as it happens I've put off going abroad, through a kind of mental laziness. In the ordinary course of events you'd have come to-day only to find me gone, which would have been a pity. When I answered your letter, I told you”
“Yes, but I felt you'd still be here,” she cut him short. “Apparently the princess had the same premonition.”
“Oh, I just happened to be passing,” I fibbed, “and took my chance. Fortunately I came in time to give Mr. Lorillard a lift to town in my car. It will save him a journey by train.”
“Then I am in the nick of time, too?” said Opal. “If I'd been ten minutes later I might have missed him. I felt that, too! I told my taxi man to drive at least as fast as the legal limit.”
I guessed she was longing to get Robert to herself, and that he was glad there was no chance of it. Was he really going abroad? she wanted to know. Or only just to London for a change?
Robert was restive under her uncanny questionings, but answered that he wasn't quite sure about the future. Traveling in France and Italy seemed to be disagreeable at the moment. Passports, too, were a bother! He'd be more certain of his plans in a few days, and he would let her know.
Opal showed no crude feeling. Yet I was sure that under her restrained manner—soft as a gentle breeze on a summer night—she would have enjoyed stamping her foot and having hysterics. Instead, she asked Robert about a psychic play she wanted him to write—he hadn't written a line of it!—told him a little news concerning people they both knew, and bethought herself that she “mustn't keep us.”
Not more than twenty minutes after she had floated in, Miss Fawcett floated forth again. Robert took her to her taxi, and then could hardly wait to get off in my car. As for me, I'd forgotten all about the duchess! We chose the longer of the two roads to London, hoping to miss Opal. Soon we passed her taxi going at a leisurely pace. The wraith must have had another of her mystic “feelings,” and counted on our choice of that turning!
“She says she has 'helpers' from beyond,” Robert explained, when we were flying on, far ahead. “She asks their advice, and they tell her what to do in daily life. She wanted to provide me with one or two, but I wasn't 'taking any.' Not that I'm a convinced materialist, or that I don't believe the dark veil can ever be lifted. I'm rather inclined the other way around. But I prefer to manage my own affairs without 'helpers' I've never known or seen on earth. Of course, it would be different if—oh, you know what I mean! But even then—well, I should be afraid of being deceived. It's better not to begin anything like that.”
“Did Opal Fawcett ever try to persuade you to—to” courage failed me. But Robert understood only too well what was in my mind.
“Yes, she did,” he admitted. “She wrote me—after—that happened. I hadn't heard from her for a long time until then. I'd almost forgotten her existence. She said in the letter that June had come to her with a message for me.”
“Cheek!” I exclaimed.
“Well, I'm afraid that's rather the way I felt about it, though probably Opal meant well, and a lot of people think she's wonderful. Several friends begged me, in urgent letters, to go to Opal Fawcett. They assured me she'd given them indescribable comfort, put them in touch with those they loved, who'd 'passed on.' But somehow I couldn't be persuaded, princess. A voice inside me always used to say 'why should June want to talk to you through Opal Fawcett? If she can come back, why shouldn't she speak with you directly, instead of through a third person?'”
“That's how I should have argued it out in your place,” I agreed. “And—and June never”
“No. She never came, never made me realize her near presence, never seemed to influence me in favor of Opal, though Opal didn't give up until months had passed. When she first came after writing to say she must see me, it was to beg me to visit her for June's sake. Afterward, when she saw she was making me uncomfortable, she stopped her persuasions, Fairly often when Joyce Arnold was here, she has turned up at the cottage, sometimes just for a friendly chat like an ordinary human being—though I never feel she is one!—sometimes to discuss that 'psychic play,' as she calls it, an idea of hers she wants me to work out for the stage.”
“Is it a good idea?” I wanted to know.
“Yes. Mysterious and dramatic at the same time. Yet I've always made excuses. I don't fancy collaborating with Miss Fawcett, though that may sound ungrateful.”
It didn't, to my ears, especially as Opal's object seemed as transparent as the depths of her own crystal. Of course she was still in love with Robert, and had seized on first one chance, then another, of getting into touch with him. I was rather sorry for her, in a vague, impersonal way; for to love Robert Lorillard and lose him would hurt. I could realize that without the trouble and pain of being seriously in love with him myself.
“It's a good thing,” I thought, “that Joyce Arnold's stopping with me at this time and not with Opal Fawcett! It would be as much as the girl's life's worth to be engaged to Robert in that house!”
Could Opal suspect, I wondered, the truth about the broken love story? Somehow, I thought not. I might be mistaken, but the rather patronizing way in which she'd spoken of Joyce didn't seem like that of a jealous woman. If Joyce and she had “got upon each other's nerves” lately because of Robert, I imagined that suspicion had been on the other side. Joyce would have been more than human if she could go on accepting hospitality from a woman who so plainly showed her love for Robert Lorillard!
We raced back to London, for I feared that Robert's mood might change for the worse, that an autumn chill of remorse might shiver through his veins.
All was well, however, very well. I made him talk to me of Joyce nearly the whole way, and at the end of the journey I had him waiting for her in the drawing-room of my flat before he quite knew what had happened to him.
My secretary was in her own room, writing her own letters as she'd said she would do.
“Back already, princess?” she exclaimed, jumping up when I'd knocked and been told to enter. “Why, you've hardly more than had time to get there and back, it seems, to say nothing of lunch!”
“I haven't had any lunch,” I said,
“No lunch? Poor darling! Why you must be”
“I was too busy,” I broke in. “And I wanted to get back.”
“Only this morning you were longing to go!”
“I know! It does sound chameleon-like. But second thoughts are often better. Come into the drawing-room and you'll see that mine were—much better.”
She came, in all innocence. I opened the door. I thrust her in. I exclaimed, “Bless you, my children!” and shut the two in together.
This was taking it boldly for granted that Joyce was as much in love with Robert as he with her! But why be early Victorian and ignore the lovely, naked truth, instead of late Georgian and save beating round the bush for both of the lovers?
Those words of mine figuratively flung them into each other's arms, where, according to my idea, the sooner they were, the better!
I should think if my word missed fire, their eyes didn't miss, judging from what I'd seen in hers when speaking of him, in his when speaking of her! And certainly the pair of them couldn't have wasted much time in foolish preliminaries, for in about half an hour Joyce appeared in the dining room where I was eating an immense luncheon.
“Oh, princess!” she breathed, hovering just over the threshold, and instantly Robert loomed behind her. “It's too wonderful. It can't be true.”
Robert didn't speak. He merely gazed. Years had rolled off him since morning. He looked an inspired boy, with a dash of silvery powder on his hair. Slipping his arm around Joyce's waist he brought her to me. As I sat at the table, they both knelt down close to my feet, and each earnestly kissed one of my hands! It would have been a beautiful effect if I hadn't choked, trying wildly to bolt a mouthful of something, and had to be slapped on the back. That choke was a disguised blessing, however, for it made us all laugh when I got my breath; and when you're on the top pinnacle of a great emotion, it's a safe outlet to laugh!
My suggestion was that nobody but our three selves should be taken into the secret, and that the wedding—to be hurried on—should be sprung as a surprise upon the public. Robert and Joyce agreed on general principles, but each made one exception.
Robert said that he felt it would be “caddish” to make a bid for happiness without telling the Duchess of Stane what was in his mind. She couldn't reasonably object to his marrying again, and wouldn't object, he argued; but if he didn't confide in her, she'd have a right to think him a coward.
Joyce's one exception—of all people on earth!—was Opal Fawcett. And when I shrieked “Why?” she'd only say that she “owed a debt of gratitude to Opal,” therefore Opal had a right to know before any one else.
The girl didn't add “to Robert Lorillard,” but a flash of intuition like a searchlight showed me the meaning behind her words. Living in the same house with Opal, eating Opal's bread and salt—very little else I dare say!—Joyce had guessed Opal's secret, or had been forced to hear a confidence. That, and nothing else, was the reason why she wouldn't be engaged to Robert behind Opal's back.
Well, I hope I'm not precisely a coward myself, but I didn't envy Joyce Arnold or Robert Lorillard their self-appointed tasks! They were carried out, however, with soldierly promptness the day after the engagement, and nothing terrific happened, or at least, nothing terrific was reported.
“Opal was very sweet,” Joyce announced, vouchsafing no details of the interview.
“The duchess was very sensible,” was Robert's description of what passed between him and his exalted former mother-in-law.
“I suppose you asked them not to tell?” was my one question.
“Oh, Opal won't tell!” exclaimed Joyce; and I believed that she was right. According to Opal's view, telling things only helped them to happen.
“I begged the duchess to say nothing to anybody,” answered Robert. Our eyes met, and we smiled, Robert rather ruefully.
Of course the duchess did the contrary of what she'd been begged to do, and said something to everybody. In less than a week, the world was aware that Robert Lorillard, its lost idol, was coming back to life, that he who had been, for a few months, the husband of wonderful June Dana, the Duchess of Stane's daughter, was engaged to a girl who'd nursed him in the war and been his secretary.
But, after all, the talk mattered very little to the persons most concerned. They were divinely happy, the two who were talked about, though they would have liked to be let alone. I suppose for Robert it was a different kind of happiness from that which the condescension of his goddess had given him, less dazzling perhaps, more like the warm sweetness of early spring and its flowers, compared with a tropical summer of scented magnolias and daturas. June had been a goddess stepping down from her golden pedestal, and Joyce was a loving, adoring, human girl, ready for all that wifehood might mean.
Robert shut up the little place by the river where they planned to live later, and stopped at a hotel in town, though he had never given up or let the flat in St. James' Square, the scene of his engagement to June.
I began helping Joyce choose a trousseau which could be got together in haste—for they were to go to the south of France and Italy for their honeymoon—and one day after shopping the whole morning and part of the afternoon, we were to meet Robert for tea at the Savoy.
You know that soft, amber light in the big foyer of the Savoy at teatime, like the beautiful subdued light in dreams?
There sat Robert, waiting for us. He had taken a table for three, and one of the chairs, I noticed, was a noble one covered with velvet brocade, a chair like a queen's throne.
He rose at sight of us, and I noticed that a little woman at a table close by was looking at him with intense interest. In fact, her interest in Robert gave her a kind of fictitious interest of her own in my eyes.
She was one of those women you'd know to be American, if you met them crawling up the north pole; and as she was in traveling dress, I fancied that it was not long since she had landed.
“She probably saw him act when she was here before, and hasn't been in England since, till now,” I told myself, to be interrupted by Robert himself.
“That armchair's for you, princess,” he said, as I was going to slip into a smaller one and leave the throne for the bride elect.
For an instant we disputed; then I was about to yield, laughing, when the little woman in brown jumped up with a gasp.
“Oh, you can't sit there!” she exclaimed. “Don't you see—there's some one there?”
We all three started and stared, thinking, of course, that the creature was mad. But her face looked sane, and pathetically pleading.
“Do forgive me!” she pleaded. “I forget that every one doesn't see what I see. They are so clear to me always! I'm not insane. But I couldn't let you sit on that chair. You may have heard of me. I am Priscilla Ray Reardon, of Boston. I can't at this moment give you the name of the lovely girl—the lady in the chair—but she would tell me, I think, if I asked her. I must describe her to you, though, she's so beautiful, and she so wants you all—no, not all!—only the gentleman—to recognize her. She has golden-brown hair, in glossy waves, and immense blue eyes, like violet flame. She has a dainty nose; full, drooping red lips, the upper one very short and haughty; a cleft in her chin; wonderful complexion, with rosy cheeks, the color high under the eyes; a long throat; a splendid figure, though slim; and she is dressed in gray, with an ostrich plume trailing over a gray hat which shades her forehead. She has a string of gray pearls around her neck, black pearls she says they are; she wears a chiffon scarf caught with an emerald brooch; and on her hand is a ring with a marvelous square emerald.”
Robert, Joyce, and I were speechless. The description of June was exact, June in a gray dress and hat she had worn the day we went to Robert's rooms, the day they became engaged; the dress he had made her wear when Sargent painted her portrait.