The Education of Eric Lane Part 21

"Dear George! You think I'm perfect, don't you?"

"Perfection is meant to be more admired than loved."

"I've nothing but my imperfections to make people love me."

"That's a woman's way of marrying on her debts. . . . You're better, Babs, than when I came to see you in London. I hope you're--happier."

"Ah, if only I could _undo_. . . ."

She broke off, and George looked at her cautiously to see whether she was trying him with the pose of conscience-stricken penitent, already a little out-moded after fourteen months of war.

"You certainly had your share of sc.r.a.pes, but there was nothing discreditable in them. Too much vitality----"

She spread out her hands, white and transparent in the sun-light.

"I'd _done_ everything else! Being with father everywhere. . . . And I was driven into it by opposition. I must have been a mule in a previous incarnation. D'you know, if father says he's coming here by the 4.10, I _have_ to come by the 5.40, however inconvenient it may be to everybody--just to a.s.sert myself?"

"But that wasn't the only reason," George suggested.

"What d'you mean?"

She had ceased to smile, and two faint lines of annoyance were visible between her eye-brows.

"I'm sorry. It was no business of mine," said George apologetically.

"I don't mind _you_. But it was no business of the Deganway creature.

Can't you break his eye-gla.s.s or cut a piece off the end of his nose, George? Did he tell you who I came down with?"

"Deganway is always thorough in his investigations. I'm sorry I mentioned it; I was only teasing you."

"I don't mind _you_," she repeated. "But it does make things so impossible if father and mother go about fancying. . . . Come to lunch!

I'll be in time for one meal," she cried, seizing his arm and hurrying him the length of the echoing refectory.

At luncheon and recurrently through the afternoon Barbara wondered how far Deganway's gossiping tongue had already prejudiced her relations with Eric. If he heard that they were being discussed, he would in all probability strike an att.i.tude and declare that he could not be a party to compromising her any longer. At present he was too novel a distraction for her to spare him easily; already he had become so important to her life that she had forgotten George Oakleigh and the thrill of grat.i.tude and elation which she had felt when he began sluggishly but surely to fall in love with her.

The house-party had dispersed before she came down next day. Breakfast in bed was a dull meal, because she had hoped to find an unsolicited letter from Eric--about anything. She had to wait until the second post, and that only brought her the briefest possible acceptance of her invitation. Not until Tuesday did she receive the long letter which he had written on Sat.u.r.day night. And the intimacy and tenderness of it were half spoiled even then, for Lady Crawleigh followed her maid into the room, enquired affectionately how Barbara was feeling and settled down to read instructive extracts from _The Times_.

Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday. Crawleigh Abbey seemed suddenly very big and deserted. Barbara secured a trunk call to Eric's flat on Monday night; but, after twenty minutes to wonder why she shewed so little pride and whether he would be angry with her, a faint voice answered that Mr. Lane was dining out. Something which she could not a.n.a.lyze told her that she would be taking an unfair risk with his affection, if she tried to communicate with him again. She could hardly understand why she was staying in bed and taking so great care of herself; but it was Eric's wish, and she had felt a leap at the heart when he interested himself in her welfare. If he only knew, it would do her much more good to be with him, to tease him and laugh at him and set him att.i.tudinizing and then to charm a word or gesture of affection from him . . . and then to laugh at him again and see him perplexed and exasperated. She was very grateful to him for bringing a new interest into her life. . . .

Little Val Arden had once said, years before the war, that she would find her greatest emotion on the day when she lost her heart. . . .

But it were useless to fall in love with Eric if she could not make him return her love. . . .

Thursday seemed as far away as the throne of G.o.d in that ghastly nightmare. . . . She wrote Mrs. Sh.e.l.ley a letter which she hoped would not read so transparently false as it seemed to her in writing.

"_Dearest Marion, I feel so rude for never having apologized either for running away myself so early or for dragging Eric Lane away from your delightful party. I was feeling dreadfully tired. I'm in bed now; in fact, I've hardly been out of bed since I came here on Sat.u.r.day, and he put a pistol to my head and insisted on taking me home. I shall be in London for one or two nights next week. Will you shew that you forgive us by inviting us again? Your affectionate Barbara._"

It seemed a pity not to exploit a good idea to the full, and she next wrote to her cousin Amy Loring.

"_You said the other day that you had never met Eric Lane, though he was a great friend of Jim's. He was at Margaret Poynter's the other day when I was there. Would you like me to invite him to dine one night next week (I shall be up in London for two or three days)? Ring me up between tea and dinner on Thursday. . . ._"

There remained Colonel Grayle, who had jerked out, as she left the "Divorce" with George Oakleigh: "Clever play! Rather like to meet the author. Decent feller, I believe." If she met him again, she could offer to bring about a meeting. . . .

It was regrettable that she and Eric knew so few people in common.

3

Before leaving her dentist, Barbara telephoned to remind Eric of his promise to dine with her. His answering voice was almost audibly guilty, for the engagement had been allowed to fade from his mind, though his watchful secretary would have seen to it later that he kept his appointment.

When he arrived, the house was eerily dark and deserted. The door was opened by a girl in a black dress, presumably--from the absence of cap and ap.r.o.n--Barbara's own maid, and he was conducted through a twilit hall where the great chandeliers were draped in dusting-sheets, up a side staircase and over more dusting-sheets to the door of the boudoir.

Here the evidence of desolation ended in vast bowls of autumn roses, a log fire, blazing electric lights and the beginnings of inevitable untidiness--ripped envelopes on the floor, a silk cloak in one chair and gloves in another and, on the hearth-rug, a chinchilla m.u.f.f with a grey Persian kitten asleep half inside it.

Eric knelt down and played with the kitten until the bedroom door opened and Barbara hurried in.

"Glad to see me, Eric?" she whispered.

"I've--noticed you weren't here," he answered. "You're looking better, Babs. And I like your kitten."

"I brought her up to chaperon you," she explained. "Are you going to be bored, dining alone with me? I warned you what it would be like." She pointed doubtfully towards a table set for two. "We put the dirty plates on the floor, and my maid will take them away when she brings coffee.

I've only her and one kitchen-maid to keep me alive. Eric, I've been looking forward to this most enormously. That was a sweet letter you wrote me from Lashmar--I love the name! Lashmar Mill-House--You were very fond of Jack, I could see. Shall we begin?"

Eric looked at the photograph on the mantel-piece before sitting down.

"He was the greatest friend I ever had," he answered wistfully. "An unusual character. If you liked him, he could make you do anything he pleased. . . . Did you see much of him? His sister was surprised to find that you knew him."

Barbara finished her soup without answering. Then, as Eric took away her empty plate, she looked up at him with a slight frown of perplexity.

"Did he never mention me to you?" she asked. "Somehow--I thought you understood, Eric. Didn't any one else tell you? There are so many stories about me----"

"I honestly don't know what you're referring to," said Eric, laying down his knife and fork in perplexity.

She looked at him closely with eyebrows raised.

"When we discussed the photograph, and I asked you to find out anything you could . . . Didn't you see that Jack meant a great deal to me?"

The colour had fled from her cheeks, and she was sitting with head bent forward, deeply preoccupied with the food on her plate. Gazing blankly at her, Eric tried to imagine what kind of intimacy she could have formed with the elusive celibate who never spoke to women or discussed them. . . .

Something was expected of him. . . .

"It never occurred to me," he said lamely. "Of course, Jack never mentioned a word----"

"_He wouldn't_. . . . Jim knew, but _he_ wouldn't either. . . . There was no one else to give me away. . . . I've always been afraid of saying something in my sleep. . . . I want to _forget, forget_. . . ."

The words came out in jerks, with a sobbing struggle for breath between.

Her head was bent so low that she did not see him rise and come round to her side; a startled s.h.i.+ver pa.s.sed through her, as he knelt down and put his arm round her shoulders, drawing her to him until her cheek rested against his.

"Babs, dear! Darling Babs!" he whispered. "Don't----"