Literature · Romance

What Will People Say? A Novel 63

Chapter 63

HughesEnglish

The following afternoon Persis came home from a tango-tea, where she had expected to meet Forbes. Through some misunderstanding he had failed to appear. This left her plans in a decided tangle. He was probably trying to find her by telephone. He would doubtless call up the house. Things were in a mess there, too. An ancient romance in the servants' quarters had resulted in a wedding between the second man and one of the chambermaids. Nichette had been chosen as a bridesmaid and had begged off for the afternoon, as had all of the others that could be spared.

Nichette had long ago been taken into their confidence as a necessary go-between. Persis trembled lest a message from Forbes should fall into inexperienced hands.

To complicate matters Willie had resolved to go to the opera that night and to be on time. He had read an editorial somewhere ridiculing the horseshoe of box-holders for their indifference to overtures and first acts. Willie naturally selected this one evening for his rebuke to the editor. Dinner was to be served an hour earlier than usual.

Harrowed by the multiplex difficulties surrounding an intrigue, Persis was kept waiting at the door a long time in the cold. She was about to rend the tardy footman to pieces when the door was opened by Crofts, the superannuated butler, an heirloom from Enslee's father.

Crofts had long ago reached the age when he was too venerable to wear the Enslee livery. He was an ideal gentleman, respected and loved by all the family and its friends. But as an officer of the household he was deaf, decrepit, and almost useless. Yet he was too much of an institution to discharge, and he simply would not retire.

He was permitted to lag superfluous as a sort of butler emeritus. At large dinners he hovered about in the offing correcting and directing with a marvelous tact and an infallible memory for the encyclopedic lore of nice service. For a guest to be recognized by his watery old eyes and named by his thin lips was in itself a distinction.

To-day he was blissfully happy. The young upstart servants had flocked to the wedding, and he was called to the helm. When Persis saw him at the door her heart melted, but it also sank.

"Did anybody call?" she asked, and asked several times in crescendo.

"Only Mrs. Enslee, ma'am," he whispered, in his dry, cackling, deaf man's voice.

Persis cast her eyes up in despair and hastened to pay her devoirs to her mother-in-law. The elder Mrs. Enslee was looking radiantly beautiful in her white hair and her black eyes and the assisted red of her Spanish lips, with her cascade of furs falling about her.

She smiled at Persis sadly. Her daughter-in-law was beautiful undeniably. What a pity that she was not also good! But she kept back her reproaches, and said in the most delicate of accents, with her tendency to an exquisite lisp:

"Don't worry, my dear. It's only a duty call."

"Won't you stop to dinner?" Persis urged. "We're only going to have a bite. We're dining early and hurrying away to the opera. Willie is determined to hear the overture and the first act. I dote on 'Carmen,' but I've never been in time for the first of it."

"'Carmen!'" Mrs. Enslee sniffed. "That old slander on my race--as if Spanish women were all faithless!"

"But if it's Carmen for Spain," Persis said, "it's Camille for France, and Becky Sharp for England, and--who for America?"

"Hester Prynne, perhaps."

"Oh yes," laughed Persis. "Even the Puritans had their scandals; but she was a grass-widow, and the town was so dull, and the preacher so handsome. Can you blame her?"

"Cynical Persis!" Mrs. Enslee sighed. "Well, I shall be late."

"I wish you'd stay," Persis lied, graciously. "You're a picture. And everybody says you are flirting dreadfully with old General Branscomb."

"I hope you don't believe all you hear."

"Only the worst."

"Then you're on the safe side. But remember, my dear, other people can apply the same rule. I'm not the only one who has been suspected of flirting with an army officer." The doorbell had punctuated their chatter several times. It rang again. "Now, who's that? Expecting anybody?"

"No, and I've got to fling into my opera-gown."

"What are you wearing to-night?"

The rhapsody of description was interrupted by the incursion of Willie. He wore his overcoat and top hat into the room, and his key-chain dangled. He was in one of his most fretful moods. He vouchsafed his mother a casual "Oh, hello, madre mia," then turned to Persis.

"What the devil has happened to the servants? Nobody to answer the bell. Had to let myself in. Deuced nuisance unbuttoning coat, getting keys out, finding right one. What are we coming to? I'll fire that Dobbs."

"You forget, dear, he is getting married this afternoon."

"We all ought to have gone," said Mrs. Enslee; but Willie has no sense of obligation to his employees.

He ignored the suggestion and raged on, "Well, Dobbs isn't our only servant, is he?"

"No," Persis explained; "but, you see, he's marrying the housekeeper's daughter, and the butler is best man, and the maids are bridesmaids--"

"Romance everywhere," Willie sneered, as he laid off his things and threw them on a chair, "except up-stairs. I suppose that's why my man was so surly when I told him he'd have to stay and dress me. He'll probably cut my throat while he shaves me. I wish he would."

"That's cheerful!" said Persis. "What brings you home from the club so early? It's such an unusual honor."

"I heard something I didn't like--gossip."

"Tell us what you heard," Mrs. Enslee asked, hungrily.

"I prefer not to retail club gossip in my home," said Willie.

"Oh, aren't we punctilious?" Persis railed; and Willie answered, curtly:

"One of us ought to be."

Persis was jarred a trifle, but her only comment was: "Why is it that when men are feeling ugly they always come home early?"

Willie threw her a look of wrath and turned to his distressed mother. "Won't you stop to dinner?"

"Not when there's so much war-paint visible, thanks!"

"But hang it all--" Willie began, and checked himself, for Crofts shuffled through the room. Willie rounded on him. "Oh, somebody at last, eh? Why the deuce was no one at the door? I had to let myself in."

Crofts cupped his hand behind his ear, and crackled, "Beg pardon, sir?"

"I had to let myself in, I say."

"Very sorry, sir, but owing to Dobbs' wedding and your early dinner, sir, the servants have a great deal to do."

"But I rang and rang!" Willie stormed, and repeated, wrathfully, "I rang and rang!"

"Very sorry, indeed, sir," Crofts pleaded. "My hearing isn't as good as it was when I entered your father's service."

"Well, I won't have my house turned into a--an infirmary."

Crofts heard that and withered. "Your father never complained of me, sir."

"You heard better then and jumped quicker," Willie shouted.

The old man, at bay, answered with unintended irony: "I meant no offense, sir, by growing old."

"Oh, get out!" Willie snapped.

Crofts bowed and turned on Persis a pitiful look. She gave him a glance of sympathy, then pointed to Enslee's coat and hat. Crofts took them, and, touching the back of his hand to his eyes and swallowing hard, shuffled away.

Willie's mother rebuked him. "You've broken his poor old heart."

And Persis was more severe. "You ought to be ashamed of yourself."

Willie retorted, more sharply: "Oh, we all ought to be ashamed of ourselves--for something or other. Crofts isn't the only man on earth with a broken heart."

As Persis stared in wonderment at his unusual mood Crofts came back. "You are wanted on the telephone, ma'am. The gentleman wouldn't give his name."

Persis flinched at this, and stammered, "You'll excuse me?"

Mrs. Enslee answered with a sudden frigidity, "Of course, but I'll not wait. Good-by."

"Good-by!" said Persis, uneasily, and left the room. The moment she was gone Mrs. Enslee put her hand on Willie's arm and spoke in some confusion.

"Willie, I--it's very hard for me to say it. But I think you allow Persis too much liberty."

Willie snorted. "Gad! a lot of good it does an American husband to try to manage his wife!"

"I know, and Persis is very headstrong," Mrs. Enslee faltered; "but--well, if anything happens, remember I tried to--"

"Enjoying the luxury of an 'I told you so' already, eh?" Willie sneered. "What's up?"

"Oh, nothing--nothing definite--but I--I'm just a little uneasy. It can't hurt to keep your eyes open, can it?"

She had said this much at last. Willie took it solemnly. "What could hurt a man worse than to have to watch his wife?"

"Well, if that's the way you feel, just forget what I've said. I'm a foolish old woman. Good-by!"

Willie let her make her way out unattended. He stood musing till Persis came back, then he wakened with a start, and demanded, "Who was it telephoned you?"

The question took Persis by surprise. "No one that would interest you."

"Are you sure?"

"Since when this sudden concern in my affairs?"

"Aren't your affairs mine?" he pleaded; but she was curt:

"Indeed they're not. I don't nag you with questions."

He answered this with a sorrowful humility. "Sometimes I wish you would take a little more interest."

"You're in a funny mood," she said, more gently.

"It's not very funny to me," he groaned.

"You'll feel better after dinner. Run along and let Brooks dress you."

"What about you?"

"I had my hair done while I was out. I've got to wait for Nichette to get back. I--I'll come up as soon as I--as soon as I write a letter or two."

"All right," he sighed, and went out obediently, but paused to stare at her with a curious craftiness.

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