第24章

The very next morning I met Armour on my way to the office.He was ambling along on the leanest and most ill-groomed of bazaar ponies, and he wore a bowler.In Simla sun hats are admissible, straw hats are presentable, and soft felt hats are superior, but you must not wear a bowler.I might almost say that if one's glance falls upon a bowler, one hardly looks further; the expectation of finding an acquaintance under it is so vain.In this instance, I did look further, fortunately, though in doing so I was compelled to notice that the bowler was not lifted in answer to my salutation.Of no importance in itself, of course, but betraying in Armour a certain lack of observation.I felt the Departmental Head crumble in me, however, as I recognized him, and I pulled the mare up in a manner which she plainly resented.It was my opportunity to do cautiously and delicately what I had omitted the afternoon before; but my recollection is that I was very clumsy.

I said something about the dust, and he said something about the glare, and then I could think of nothing better than to ask him if he wouldn't like to meet a few Simla people.

'Oh, I know lots of people, thanks,' he said.'It's kind of you to think of it, all the same, but I've got any amount of friends here.'

I thought of Mr.Rosario, and stood, or sat confounded.

The mare fidgeted; I knocked a beast of a fly off her, and so gained time.

'This is my second season up here, you know.'

'Your second season!' I exclaimed.'Where on earth have you been hiding?'

'Well, I didn't exhibit last year, you see.I'd heard it was a kind of a toy show, so I thought I wouldn't.I think now that was foolish.But I got to know quite a number of families.'

'But I am sure there are numbers that you haven't met,' I urged,' or I should have heard of it.'

He glanced at me with a slight flush.'If you mean society people,'

he said, 'I don't care about that kind of thing, Mr.Philips.I'm not adapted to it, and I don't want to be.If any one offered to introduce me to the Viceroy, I would ask to be excused.'

'Oh, the Viceroy,' I responded, disrespectfully, 'is neither here nor there.But there are some people, friends of my own, who would like very much to meet you.'

'By the name of Harris?' he asked.I was too amazed to do anything but nod.By the name of Harris! The Secretary of the Government of India in the Legislative Department! The expression, not used as an invocation, was inexcusable.

'I remember you mentioned them yesterday.'

'Yes,' I said, 'there's a father and daughter.Miss Harris is very artistic.'

His face clouded, as well it might, at the word.'Does she paint?'

he asked, so apprehensively that I could not forbear a smile at Dora's expense.I could assure him that she did not paint, that she had not painted, at all events, for years, and presently I found myself in the ridiculous position of using argument to bring a young man to the Harrises.In the end I prevailed, I know, out of sheer good nature on Armour's part; he was as innocent as a baby of any sense of opportunity.

We arranged it for the following Friday, but as luck would have it, His Excellency sent for me at the very hour; we met the messenger.

I felt myself unlucky, but there was nothing for it but that Armour should go alone, which he did, with neither diffidence nor alacrity, but as if it were all in the day's work, and he had no reason to be disobliging.

The files were very heavy during the succeeding fortnight, and the Viceroy quite importunate in his demand for my valuable suggestions.

I was worked off my legs, and two or three times was obliged to deny myself in replying to notes from Dora suggesting Sunday breakfast or afternoon tea.Finally, I shook myself free; it was the day she wrote:

'You must come--I can't keep it to myself any longer.'

I half thought Armour would be there, but he wasn't; that is, he was absent corporeally, but the spirit and expression of him littered every convenient part.Some few things lay about that I had seen in the studio, to call it so, but most of the little wooden panels looked fresh, almost wet, and the air held strongly the fragrance of Armour's north veranda.In one corner there used to be a Madonna on a carved easel; the Madonna stood on the floor, and the easel with working pegs in it held an unfinished canvas.Dora sat in the midst with a distinct flush--she was inclined to be sallow--and made me welcome in terms touched with extravagance.She did not rush, however, upon the matter that was dyeing her cheeks, and I showed myself as little impetuous.She poured out the tea, and we sat there inhaling, as it were, the aroma of the thing, while keeping it consciously in the background.

I imagine there was no moment in the time I describe when we enjoyed Ingersoll Armour so much as at this one, when he lay in his nimbus half known and wholly suppressed, between us.There were later instances, perhaps, of deeper satisfaction, but they were more or less perplexed, and not unobscured by anxiety.That afternoon it was all to know and to be experienced, with just a delicious foretaste.

I said something presently about Lady Pilkey's picnic on the morrow, to which we had both been bidden.

'Shall I call for you?' I asked.'You will ride, of course.'

'Thanks, but I've cried off--I'm going sketching.' Her eyes plainly added, 'with Ingersoll Armour,' but she as obviously shrank from the roughness of pitching him in that unconsidered way before us.For some reason I refrained from taking the cue.I would not lug him in either.

'That is a new accomplishment,' was as much as I felt I could say with dignity, and she responded:

'Yes, isn't it?'

I felt some slight indignation on Lady Pilkey's account.'Do you really think you ought to do things like that at the eleventh hour?'