"If Mr. Lorimer does not come to see you, why don't you write and ask him to come? He would not wait to be asked twice, I know! He at least has always been a real friend, and I am sure is devoted to you."
"That is true," said Dora.
"And then he is so merry; it does you good to look at him. He carries gaiety wherever he goes. And he is so kind! Write to him, and I will guarantee that he will rush out here as soon as he gets your letter."
"Yes, Hobbs, you are right, and I will do it to-day."
She immediately took pen and paper and wrote to Lorimer.
"Hobbs, you don't happen to know who the people are that are living in our old house, I suppose?"
"No, ma'am," said Hobbs, rather scared at the question.
"Try to find it out."
"Oh, why, ma'am?"
"It would interest me to know, that is all."
"Some say it is a hermit, a bearish kind of gentleman who sees no one and never goes out."
"Ah," said Dora. "Is he a painter?"
"I think so, ma'am, but I am not sure."
"He has had the house done up like new."
"I have heard that he is going to be married – that he has had the house finely decorated for his future wife."
"Ah, and who told you all these details?"
"The tradespeople," replied Hobbs quickly.
Dora went on writing, and Hobbs, fearing she had said too much, determined to turn a deaf ear to any questions Dora might put to her in future on the subject of 50 Elm Avenue and its new master.
XVII
DORA'S STUDIO
We have every reason to suppose that if Lorimer had not called on Dora in her new quarters, it was because he had not dared to do so. He saw Philip often, and so had news of her nearly every day. He had feared to be importunate, all the more so that Philip had told him how Dora had closed her doors to everyone, and had shut herself up in complete seclusion.
It was in the early part of the month of April 1898 that Lorimer received from Dora a letter in which she said to him, "If you will come, dear friend, I shall be so pleased to see you. I am in very poor lodgings, but I am sure that will not make you pass me by on the other side. Do come soon, I am longing to see a friendly face."
Lorimer lost no time in responding to her call. Hobbs opened the door to him and beamed to see his cheerful face.
"Oh, sir! I am glad to see you, sir," said she.
"Well, my dear Hobbs, and how are things going by this time?" asked Lorimer, in his cheeriest tones.
"You will do mistress such a lot of good, sir! She has not been at all herself lately. She is very weak to-day and has passed a very bad night – she is quite changed since the day she saw our old house was occupied again, and yet she could not have thought that it would remain unlet for ever."
"She does not know who it is that is living there, of course?"
"No, no, sir; but I should dearly love to tell her. I believe it would put her into a better humour."
"Take care that you do not, Hobbs; she must not hear on any account. You will know why later on. You may be sure that Mr. Grantham and I are not idle. We have an idea in our heads, and you shall help us by and by to put it into execution; so, for the present, not one word, you hear?"
"You can rely upon me, sir."
"Yes, I am sure of that. And now, can I have a little talk with Mrs. Grantham?"
"Yes, sir, in a minute or two. She will be so glad to see you, you will do her much good! The doctor is with her for the moment."
"What does he say about her?"
"Nothing – I can't get anything out of him. He shakes his head. It's disheartening. And mistress will not listen to reason; she tears up all the prescriptions, especially lately, for the last week or so – it is very sad. I shall go and tell her you are here."
Lorimer, left alone in the studio, looked around him and took in all its details.
"Why, it's freezing here!" he said to himself. "Heavens! it's no wonder, there is positively no fire. Is she so poor as… Oh no, it can't be so bad as that. What pathos in this room – an exact reproduction of that lovely one in the other house, where we used to have such merry times! Ah, there is the old clock in its place – not going, I see. There is Dora's portrait on Philip's easel, still lacking the finishing touches. There is Philip's jacket, hanging just where it always hung – the two easels and stools – everything in place, nothing wanting but Philip himself. What treasures of tenderness are revealed in this poor counterfeit presentment of the other studio! How happy her life must have been there, that she should want to make an exact imitation of the room, and so revive the past! There are people who break with their happy bygone times, others who cling to them determinedly. A few pounds have transformed this miserable studio into a living souvenir that will kill her. And yet, why do I say will kill her, when it is just this living souvenir that keeps her alive – that will keep her alive, perhaps? Here were two beings who loved each other dearly, and between whom a simple suspicion, a terrible misunderstanding, seems to have erected an insurmountable barrier. Philip wanted to be rich, poor beggar! He has not been long learning that there is but a step from Plutus to Pluto. Most of the old proverbs want re-editing. I know one that ought to run: 'When wealth comes in at the door, love and happiness fly out at the window.' But poor old Philip is cured, radically cured, once and for ever. He talks nonsense still sometimes, but it is the other whom I am most anxious about, and who vows that everything is over. Philip goes in for philosophy, and that is a healthy sign. He has decided that his wife is better off than he is, because she has found consolation in her painting. He would give his whole house for Dora's garret. And the fellow tells us these things in a tone of conviction, as if he were uttering the wisdom of a Solomon or a Socrates. The panegyric of poverty is all bosh; it is an affectation! When I see a book entitled How to Live comfortably on Two Hundred a Year, I take it for granted that the author is a millionaire."
Dr. Templeton came out of Dora's bedroom and surprised Lorimer in the midst of his reflections. He was looking troubled and in a bad temper.
"That woman will exhaust my patience, I know she will. She is the most obstinate, the most … the most … there, I can't find a word for her."
"Don't try, doctor; you have explained yourself admirably."
"Yes, I am getting out of patience at last. I can do nothing with her. She takes no notice of my advice or my prescriptions. If she is bent upon dying – why, she must die, I suppose; she does not want a doctor for that."
"That does not always go without saying," said Lorimer jokingly.
"If we cannot get her out of this place, she has not another month to live. She must have change of air, and change of scene and company, or she is done for. She has not a chance … and that damned picture!" he vociferated, shaking his fist at the easel, "that confounded portrait! the sight of it is killing her by inches. Nothing will induce her to part with it … she was bent on bringing it here… I tell you I have a very good mind to fling it out of the window. Poor woman!" he added, calming down, "it distresses me to see her. The wound is too deep, we can do nothing to cauterise it."
"Listen to me, my dear doctor," said Lorimer, "between ourselves Dora is carrying this thing much too far. I know the story from beginning to end. It is absurdly ridiculous! Philip has, so to speak, nothing to ask forgiveness about, unless it be for having neglected his wife for an invention that absorbed all his thoughts."
"My dear fellow, when a woman of Mrs. Grantham's sort loves her husband, she exaggerates everything. The slightest inattention becomes to her a subject for deep grief, a look of indifference causes her horrible suffering. Little things take on gigantic proportions. A man should surround with the most constant care and affection a woman who loves him as our friend here loved her husband."
"But, after all, a busy man can't pass all his time at the feet of his wife. There is the morning paper, you know, and his correspondence, and a thousand other everyday occupations. Give him a chance! Happy the wife who only has an art or an invention to be jealous of! Isn't it enough for a woman to know that she is loved, by the substantial proofs of affection that are given her?"
"No," replied the doctor; "for us men it suffices to know that we are loved, but with women the case is quite different. They love to have it told them – some of them so much that they could hear it from morning to night and night to morning, without ever growing weary of the tale!"
"Mistress is coming in a moment," said Hobbs to Lorimer.
"Look here, Hobbs," said the doctor, "how does Mrs. Grantham manage to get a living here? How does she keep you and herself? It is perhaps an indiscreet question, but it is important that we should know just how matters stand."
"Don't you trouble about that, doctor," replied Hobbs. "We pay our way and save money. Why! my mistress sold a picture yesterday."
"Really! – and for how much?"
"Well, sir, you are getting a little inquisitive. For twenty-five pounds, if you must know."
"Twenty-five pounds!" said the doctor, winking at Lorimer. "Well, and how much is your rent?"
"Thirty pounds a year. Don't be alarmed about us, we don't spend all the money we make."
"We make! Oh, I see, you work too?"
"I should think I did, sir; I clean the rooms, I do the cooking" …
"And what about your wages?"
"My wages – the affection and kindness of my dear mistress, and I shall never ask or expect any increase. We are all right, doctor; don't make your mind uneasy about us. If only I could see her grow strong, everything else would be all right."
"Devoted woman!" said the doctor to Lorimer; "it does one good to feel that there are hearts like that beating in the world! It isn't such a bad place after all."
Then turning to Hobbs, and pretending to be very angry, he said, "By Jove, I'll go and find the landlord, and get him to raise the rent, and turn you both out, if you don't pay it. As for this portrait, I'll throw it in the fire or pitch it out of the window, do you hear?"
He shook hands with Lorimer and went out.
"What did he say?" exclaimed the frightened Hobbs, when Dr. Templeton was out of hearing.
"He says he will pitch that picture out of the window to begin with, and I will help him do it too."
"No, no, he must not do that," cried Hobbs excitedly. "That picture is the only thing she has got left now. See, she is copying it. I have caught her kneeling before it and kissing it. Sometimes she will sit here in front of it and smile so happily – then she will look at the other stool beside her, and her eyes fill with tears. She believes herself in Elm Avenue. Do you know what she did once? Oh, it's too ridiculous, I ought not to tell you."
"Go on, Hobbs," said Lorimer, mastering his emotion, "tell me all about it, you know how much I am interested in everything that concerns Mrs. Grantham."
"Well, she made me sit on master's stool one day," said Hobbs, in a low confidential voice. "Oh, no, I can't tell you, you will laugh at it – and I could not have you laugh at anything she did," added she, with tears in her eyes.
"Oh, please, Hobbs."
"Well, then," continued Hobbs, "after making me sit down on the stool she threw the old velvet coat on my shoulders – there it is, hanging over there – to make the illusion more complete. She put a palette in my left hand and a brush in my right – then she burst out laughing, and the next minute had thrown herself into my arms sobbing like a child. Throw the picture out of the window," added Hobbs, shaking her fist at the closed door; "throw it in the fire, indeed! let him come and try it! I will obey all the orders he likes to give me, but don't let him dare to come near that picture. Why, sir, it would kill her. Oh, you won't let him do it, you won't, will you? Promise me he shall not touch it."
"No, Hobbs," said Lorimer, profoundly touched. "I promise you that nothing shall happen to it; make your mind easy about that."
And he took the good woman's hands and pressed them with warmth.
"Thank you, sir, thank you," said Hobbs, wiping her eyes – "oh, I hear mistress moving, I will go to her now."
"Dear devoted creature!" said Lorimer to himself when Hobbs had gone out. "The doctor is right, the world is not so bad – I wonder what all this means: the episode of the easel – what can that signify except that Dora loves Philip still, and cannot forget him? Alas, perhaps it is only the Philip of the old days that she tries to keep in her memory. Anyhow, it is a good symptom – my little idea is growing."
Hearing steps in the adjoining room, he drew from his pocket a small packet which Philip had confided to his care. It was the "little family," of which the reader made the acquaintance at the beginning of this story. Philip had said to him, "Carry this letter to Dora and plead for me. If she refuses to listen to you and refuses to read my letter, give her this little packet, it will intercede for me."
Dora came into the studio pale and evidently ill, but walking with a tolerably firm step. She made a kindly gesture to Hobbs and closed the door of the bedroom.
"Ah, my dear friend," she said to Lorimer, "how good of you to come! I have not been very well lately, but I am better, much better … well! what now? Why do you look at me like that?"
"Why do I look at you?"
"Yes."
Lorimer had never seen Dora looking more beautiful than to-day. Her very pallor added a new charm. Her black gown was moulded to the lovely lines of her figure, and her hair was becomingly dressed. Lorimer had taken both her hands in his and was looking at her with eyes that expressed a mingling of sympathy, respect, and admiration.
"Why do I look at you?" he repeated, "well, then, because I should like to give you a good kiss."
"Why then, why don't you?"
Lorimer kissed her on both cheeks, while still holding her hands.
"I should just like," he said, "to take you up in my arms, carry you off and place you in Philip's."
Dora quickly disengaged herself from Lorimer's light hold and repressed an angry gesture. She offered him a chair, and, taking one herself, said, "My dear Gerald, never pronounce that name in my hearing, and we shall be good friends still, as we always have been. Speak to me of yourself. Have you a new piece on hand? I hear that Majella is still drawing crowded houses."
Lorimer saw that he had gone a little too fast at the start. He resolved to be more cautious. A better opening might occur presently, perhaps.
"No," he said, "it is of you we will talk! You are not looking well. Work, solitude, all that sort of thing is not good for you in your present state. Come, Dora, I am an old friend of your childhood, let us talk freely, you and I. You must leave London for the country, you want fresh air. It is the opinion of Dr. Templeton, and it is mine too."
"I am very happy here, I have all that I want; don't be afraid … I have plenty of occupation… I work… I try to forget."
"Ah, yes; you try to forget by surrounding yourself with everything that can help you to remember. It is a strange manner of setting about it. I have come here to fetch you, to beg you to come to my sister's in the country. I will take you there. Come and breathe the pure air in the fields, come and see the apple trees in blossom – it will put new joy into your heart."
"Oh, it would be quite impossible now … later on, perhaps… I do not say no."
The conversation did not take the turn that Lorimer wished.
"Listen," said he, in the tone of a man who has taken a sudden resolution, "I want to speak to you upon a rather delicate subject, but you must not stop me. You have just forbidden me to mention the name of your husband before you. Very well, I will not mention his name, but I am going to make you acquainted with certain facts which you ought no longer to be ignorant of. I do not come here to plead in his favour, and yet, as even the blackest criminal is not executed without a chance of defending himself, I really do not see what there would be outrageous, even in that. Will you listen a few moments?"
"Very well! Go on," said Dora indifferently.
"I saw him yesterday – for that matter, I have seen him almost every day since he came back to London."
"Where has he been?" asked Dora, with but a mild display of interest.
"To Paris."
"He often goes over – I mean he often used to go."
"The last time he went there, an incident happened which it seems to me ought to interest you. He went to seek out General Sabaroff. He found him, tore up before his eyes the paper that he had signed in your house, and threw the pieces in his face."
"Heavens!" said Dora, startled, "and what happened then?"
"The next morning they fought with pistols – in the Bois de Vincennes – your husband lodged a bullet in the General's right shoulder."
Dora did not attempt to hide the feeling of joy and pride that involuntarily rose within her.
"Philip was always a good shot – he himself was not hurt?"
"No – you will allow me now to pronounce your husband's name, since you have used it yourself."
Dora frowned and bit her lips.
"At all events, the contract is torn up!" she cried. "God be praised! I paid dearly enough for that vile piece of paper – I have a right to rejoice that it no longer exists. Philip did well, he did well. And after that?"
"Why, that is all – ah, no, I was forgetting. Philip begged me to hand you this letter – and this packet."
Dora went pale; she put the packet aside, and was going to tear up the letter when Lorimer interrupted —
"What are you going to do?" said he. "Tear up this letter? You will do nothing of the kind: that letter is from Philip, from your husband."
"My dear Gerald, my husband no longer exists for me."
"Dora," rejoined Lorimer, "you are cruel. Your husband loves you, and is overwhelmed with sorrow."
"My husband never loved me. I thought he loved his art and his wife, he only loved his invention and his money."
"Philip has never ceased to love you. He may have lost his head for a little while, when fortune visited him almost without knocking at the door. The other day the faults were on his side, now they are more on yours. You are unjust, cruel to him, cruel to yourself. Your obstinacy, my dear Dora, bids fair to put an end to the pair of you. Yes, that is the point things have come to; now, do you hear what I say? His despair and repentance ought to touch you; what he did in Paris the other day ought to satisfy you. He lives only in the hope of your forgiveness, in the hope of your return."
"Philip did not hesitate to thrust me into the arms of a libertine. If I had yielded to that man's hateful desires, Philip would probably never have destroyed the contract."
"Hold your tongue, Dora!" cried Lorimer; "you are uttering blasphemies. You have allowed a silly idea, an absurd suspicion to gain an entrance into your head, and, like a grain of sand in the eye, it has carried on its irritating work till it has blotted out your vision, and you can see nothing except this molecule that seems to have turned into a mountain. Take care, Dora, or your mountain will crush you as well as blind you. Do you know that by obstinately refusing to listen to reason, a woman cuts herself off from friendly sympathy? People cease to take an interest in her woes. If you wish to alienate the sympathy of your most devoted friends, you are going the right way to work."
"I do not need anyone's sympathy," replied Dora proudly; "and I do not ask for it."
"Once more, Dora, listen to me. Philip may have neglected you, in order to throw himself body and soul into that invention which absorbed him night and day. But, remember, such a piece of work as that is a very exacting, inexorable mistress. You felt his indifference keenly, and it wounded you – the rest exists in your imagination alone. Now the mistress is discarded, cast out completely. Let the artist return again to his easel at your side."
"Never, oh, never!" cried Dora. "Ah, my dear Gerald, if you only knew how I loved that man!"
"And how you still love him," ventured Lorimer.
Dora rose suddenly, the thrust had not miscarried.
"I am sorry if it hurts you, but it is the truth," added Lorimer, with a significant smile.
"What do you mean?" demanded Dora, who thought Lorimer's remark somewhat out of place, and a little over-familiar.
"Come now, sit down here in front of me, your friend. You know I am a bit of a student of human nature, it is my stock-in-trade. My dear Dora, do not attempt to throw dust in your own eyes – you love Philip still; everything in this room testifies aloud to the feeling that you cannot stifle. Oh, do not start, do not deny it. If I am not right, what is the meaning of all this that I see around us?"
"In these surroundings I can evoke the Philip of the past, and that helps me to forget the Philip of the present."
"He is one and the same. He was changed for a few months; but to-day he is what he used to be, and what he will be always – the artist who loves you and longs for you. Dora, what have you to say in reply?"
"My head burns so, dear friend, spare me now. We will talk again … but by and by."
A knock was heard at the door. "Oh, would you mind seeing who that is? – I am not expecting anyone," said Dora.
Dora threw an anxious look towards the door.
Lorimer went and opened it.
The visitor was no other than our old friend, Sir Benjamin Pond, City alderman and patron of arts in his spare moments.
He evidently expected to find himself in a hall or anteroom, instead of straightway standing in a studio in the presence of Dora and Lorimer. He was seized with a little fit of timidity, which he had difficulty in mastering, and which made him awkward in the extreme.
He removed his hat and stood turning it in his hands. Regaining his equilibrium, after a moment, he advanced respectfully towards Dora, without venturing, however, to hold out his hand.
"My dear Mrs. Grantham – Mr. Lorimer, how do you do?"
Dora and Lorimer bowed distantly without speaking, and seemed to wait for him to explain the object of his visit. The worthy man wished himself under the floor.
"I came," he said, stammering, "I came – that is to say, it's just this – I only heard yesterday of your removal here, quite by accident, and I also heard that you had with you the picture that I so much wanted to purchase last year. Ah, there it is, I see. You observe I have not lost all hope of possessing it, that picture which" …
Dora and Lorimer looked at Sir Benjamin without uttering a word, and the poor man grew more and more embarrassed.
"Well," he went on, "I have come to beg you to sell it to me. That is why I came early – to be sure to find you in. I do not, my dear madam, wish to profit by the regrettable circumstances in which you find yourself placed, to offer you a low price, or to bargain for the picture, believe me. No, no, I have too much respect for you, too much admiration for the painter. I wish to behave honourably over the matter, and deal generously, as a gentleman should."
He would have given hundreds of pounds to be leagues away from this studio that he had pushed his way into.
"I will willingly give you," added he, "five hundred pounds for the picture. What do you say to the offer?"
Dora and Lorimer did not open their lips. Their eyes never quitted those of the alderman. Lorimer moved back a little to a more retired post of observation: the scene began to interest him keenly. To Dora five hundred pounds was a small fortune. Would she sell the canvas? By withdrawing a little, he placed her more at her ease, left her free to decide according to the dictates of her heart, while, as I said before, he himself obtained a better view of the little comedy that was being enacted before him.
"Yes," said Sir Benjamin again, "five hundred pounds down. I am ready to draw you a cheque this minute."
"This picture is not for sale, Sir Benjamin," said Dora frigidly, "neither for five hundred nor for five thousand, nor for any other sum that it may please you to offer."
Lorimer would have loved to cry Bravo! "She does love him, then, still – we shall save her," he said to himself.
"You see, my dear Sir Benjamin," said he, "the offer is useless. I suppose you still have the spare thirty-six by fifty to fill up, eh?"
"Ah, ah," laughed the alderman; "yes, that is to say, no; it is a new vacancy on my walls. Everyone has his fads here on earth, has he not? The Queen gives shawls to her friends when they marry, I give pictures to mine. It gives me occasion to purchase new pictures. Well, madam," he added, turning to Dora, "I admire you – I will beg you to excuse me. I thought that, perhaps, you might have been very glad to … I wanted very much," he went on, retiring, nervous and awkward, towards the door, "to have that picture, but I wished also to do you a good turn – to render you a friendly service which could not hurt your susceptibilities… After all, artists try to sell their pictures, don't they?.. And I should have thought that such an offer at such a time" …
The unfortunate man floundered more and more.
"Well, excuse me," said he; "I will wish you good-morning."
His back was now against the door. The next second he was in the street again. The poor fellow mopped the perspiration from his brow.
"The woman is mad – she is a prig!" he said to himself, as he hailed a passing hansom and set out for the City, where he was more in his element.
Dora was choking with anger. Lorimer rubbed his hands with joy.
"Not even a front door of my own to protect me against the importunities of such a fool as that! Oh, the sympathy of such a man! The drop that overbrims the vase! The kick of the jackass! And you can stand there and laugh."
"Ah, my dear Dora, what good you have done me!" exclaimed Lorimer, who could not contain his delight. "You were quite right – not for five hundred, nor for five thousand, nor for a million. That picture is a treasure no gold could pay for – never let it go – Philip will finish it. Oh, how happy you have made me! You love him still! you know you do," he cried.
"You know nothing about it," said Dora, and, taking the little packet that Lorimer had brought her from her husband, she went towards her bedroom.
"I am tiring you," said Lorimer. "I ought not to have stayed so long, but it seemed to me I had so many things to say to you – and I have not got through half of them. Look here, I have a little business in the neighbourhood, my time is my own; may I come at four o'clock to ask you for a cup of tea?"
"Why, of course," said Dora. "How nice of you! Oh, it is good to see a friend who is always the same."
Lorimer took her outstretched hand and respectfully lifted her fingers to his lips. Then he went out. He could have danced for very joy.
The scene he had just witnessed confirmed him in his belief that there was yet hope for Philip.
He had a plan evolved out of his dramatic author's brain, a little coup de théâtre, which he thought had every chance of turning out a success. He had already talked of it to Philip and Dr. Templeton, and both of them had pronounced it an excellent idea. Hobbs also was in the secret. Lorimer judged the time ripe for the execution of this plan. On leaving Dora he jumped into a cab, and went to warn the other conspirators to hold themselves in readiness. The doctor was to make his appearance at Dora's about five o'clock, to see how she was doing. Philip was to wait in the street in readiness for a signal, which should bid him to the scene of action in due time. When everything was decided, and the details well arranged, Lorimer took Philip to his club, where they passed an hour or two in talk before returning to St. John's Wood to proceed to action.