Sinister Street

It was indeed like a scene in a pantomime, and a proscenium was wanted to frame suitably the effect of those fluted pillars that supported the ceiling with their groined arches. The traceries of the latter were gilded, and the s.p.a.ces between were painted with florid groups of nymphs and cornucopias. At either end of the room were large fireplaces fructuated with marble pears and melons, and the floor was a parquet of black and yellow lozenges.

"It's hideous," Maurice exclaimed.

The housekeeper stood aside, watching impersonally.

"Hideous but rather fascinating," Michael said. "Look at the queer melancholy light, and look at the view."

It was, after all, the view which gave the character of romance to the room. Eight French windows, whose shutters one by one the housekeeper had opened while they were talking, admitted a light that was much subdued by the sprays of glossy evergreen outside. Seen through their leaves, the garden appeared to be a green twilight in which the statues and baskets of chipped and discolored stone had an air of overthrown magnificence. The housekeeper opened one of the windows, and they walked out into the wilderness, where ferns were growing on rockeries of slag and old tree-stumps; where the paths were smeared with bright green slime, with moss and sodden vegetation. They came to a wider path running by the bank of the ca.n.a.l, and, pausing here, they pondered the sheet of dead water where two swans were gliding slowly round an islet and where the reflections of the house beyond lay still and deep everywhere along the edge. The distant cries of London floated sharply down the air; s.m.u.ts were falling perpetually; the bitter March air diffused in a dull sparkle tasted of the city's breath: the circling of the swans round their islet made everything else the more immotionable.

"In summer this will be wonderful," Michael predicted.

"On summer nights those swans will be swimming about among the stars,"

Maurice said.

"Except that they'll probably have retired to bed," Michael pointed out.

"I wonder if they build their nests on chimney-tops like storks,"

Maurice laughed.

"Let's ask the housekeeper," Michael said solemnly.

They went back into the drawing-room, and more than ever did it seem exactly the room one would expect to enter after pondering that dead water without.

"Who lives in the other flats?" Michael inquired of the housekeeper.

"There's four others," she began. "Up above there's Colonel and Mrs...."

"I see," Michael interrupted. "Just ordinary people. Do they ever go out? Or do they sit and peer at the water all day from behind strange curtains?"

The housekeeper stared at him.

"They play tennis and croquet a good deal in the summer, sir. The courts is on the other side of the house. Mr. Gartside is the gentleman to see about the flat."

She gave Michael the address, and that afternoon he settled to take Number One, Ararat House.

"It absolutely was made to set her off," he told Maurice. "You wait till I've furnished it as it ought to be furnished."

"And we'll have amazing fetes aqueuses in the summer," Maurice declared.

"We'll buy a barge and--why, of course--the ca.n.a.l flows into the Thames at Grosvenor Road."

"Underground--like the Styx," said Michael, nodding.

"Of course, it's going to be wonderful. We must never visit each other except by water."

"Like splendid dead Venetians," said Michael.

The fortnight of Lily's stay at Hardingham was spent by him and Maurice in a fever of decoration. Michael bought oval mirrors of Venetian gla.s.s; oblong mirrors crowned with gilt griffins and scallops; small round mirrors in frames of porcelain garlanded with flowerbuds; so many mirrors that the room became even more mysteriously vast. The walls were hung with brocades of gold and philamot and pomona green. There were slim settees the color of ivory, with cus.h.i.+ons of primrose and lemon satin, of cinnamon and canary citron and worn russet

"You know," said Maurice seriously, "she'll have to be very beautiful to carry this off."

"She is very beautiful," said Michael. "And there's room for her to walk about here. She'll move about this room as wonderfully as those swans upon the ca.n.a.l."

"Michael, what's happened to you? You're becoming as eccentric as me."

Maurice looked at him rather jealously. "And, I say, do you really want me to come with you to King's Cross to-morrow afternoon?"

Michael nodded.

"After you've helped to gather together this room, you deserve to see the person we've done it for."

"Yes, but look here. Who's going to stay in the flat with her? You can't leave her alone until you're married. As you told me the story, it sounded very romantic; but if she's going to be your wife, you've got to guard her reputation."

Michael had never given Maurice more than a slight elaboration of the tale which had served for Stella; and he thought how much more romantic Maurice would consider the affair if he knew the whole truth. He felt inclined to tell him, but he doubted his ability to keep it to himself.

"I thought of getting hold of some elderly woman," he said.

"That's all very well, but you ought to have been doing it all this time."

"You don't know anybody?"

"I? Great scott, no!"

They were walking toward Chelsea, and presently Maurice had to leave him for an appointment.

"To-morrow afternoon then at King's Cross," he said, and jumped on an omnibus.

Michael walked along in a quandary. Whom on earth could he get to stay with Lily? Would it not be better to marry at once? But that would involve breaking his promise to Stella. If he asked Mrs. Gainsborough, it would mean Sylvia knowing where Lily was. If, on the other hand, he should employ a strange woman, Lily might dislike her. Could he ask Mrs.

Ross to come up to town? No, of course, that was absurd. It looked as if he would have to ask Mrs. Gainsborough. Or why not ask Sylvia herself?

In that case, why establish Lily at Ararat House before they were married? This marriage had seemed so very easy an achievement; but slowly it was turning into an insoluble complex. He might sound Sylvia upon her att.i.tude. It would enormously simplify everything if she would consent; and if she consented she would, he believed, play fair with him. The longer Michael thought about it, the more it seemed the safest course to call in Sylvia's aid. He was almost hailing a hansom to go to Tinderbox Lane, when he realized how foolish it would be not to try to sever Lily completely from the life she had been leading in Sylvia's company. Not even ought he to expose her to the beaming laxity of Mrs.

Gainsborough.

Michael had reached Notting Hill Gate, and, still pondering the problem which had destroyed half the pleasure of the enterprise, he caught sight of a Registry for servants. Why not employ two servants, two of the automatons who simplified life as it was simplified in Cheyne Walk? Then he remembered that he had forgotten to make any attempt to equip the kitchen. Surely Lily would be able to help with that. He entered the Registry and interviewed a severe woman wearing gla.s.ses, who read in a sing-song the virtues of a procession of various automatons seeking situations as cooks and housemaids.

"What wages do you wish to give?"

"Oh, the usual wages," Michael said. "But I rather want these servants to-day."

He made an appointment to interview half a dozen after lunch. He chose the first two that presented themselves, and told them to come round to Ararat House. Here he threw himself on their mercy and begged them to make a list of what was wanted in the kitchen. They gave notice on the spot, and Michael rushed off to the Registry again. To the severe woman in gla.s.ses he explained the outlines of the situation and made her promise to suit him by to-morrow at midday. She suggested a capable housekeeper; and next morning a hard-featured, handsome woman very well dressed in the fas.h.i.+on of about 1892 arrived at Ararat House. She undertook to find someone to help, and also to procure at once the absolute necessities for the kitchen. Miss Harper was a great relief to Michael, though he did not think he liked her very much; and he made up his mind to get rid of her, as soon as some sort of domestic comfort was perceptible. Lily would arrive about four o'clock, and he drove off to King's Cross to meet her. He felt greatly excited by the prospect of introducing her to Maurice, who for a wonder was punctually waiting for him on the platform.

Lily evidently liked Maurice, and Michael was rather disappointed when he said he could not come back with them to a.s.sist at the first entry into Ararat House. Maurice had certainly given him to understand that he was free this afternoon.

"Look in at Grosvenor Road on your way home to-night," said Maurice. "Or will you be very late?"

"Oh, no, I shan't be late," Michael answering, flus.h.i.+ng. He had a notion that Maurice was implying a suspicion of him by his invitation. It seemed as if he were testing his behavior.

Lily liked the rooms; and, although she thought the Carpaccio bedroom was a little bare, it was soon strewn with her clothes, and made thereby inhabitable.

"And of course," said Michael, "you've got to buy lots and lots of clothes this fortnight. How much do you want to spend? Two hundred--three hundred pounds?"

The idea of buying clothes on such a scale of extravagance seemed to delight her, and she kissed him, he thought almost for the first time, in mere affection without a trace of pa.s.sion. Michael felt happy that he had so much money for her to spend, and he was glad that no one had been given authority to interfere with his capital. There flashed through his mind a comparison of himself with the Chevalier des Grieux, and, remembering how soon that money had come to an end, he was glad that Lily would not be exposed to the temptation which had ruined Manon.