第55章

The Club was not prepossessed by Captain Drake.He said too little and he implied too much.He had magnificent shoulders, which he bent a great deal over secluded sofas, and a very languid interest in matters over which ordinary men were enthusiastic.He seemed to believe that if he smiled all the way across his face, he would damage a conventionality.His clothes were unexceptionable, and he always did the right thing, though bored by the necessity.He was good-looking in an ugly way, which gave him an air of restrained capacity for melodrama, and made women think him interesting.

Somebody with a knack of disparagement said that he was too much expressed.It rather added to his unpopularity that he was a man whom women usually took with preposterous seriousness--all but Kitty Vesey, who charmed and held him by her outrageous liberties.When Mrs.Vesey chaffed him, he felt picturesque.He was also aware of inspiring entertainment for the lookers-on, with the feeling at such times that he, too, was an amused spectator.This was, of course, their public attitude.In private there was sentiment, and they talked about the tyranny of society, or delivered themselves of ideas suggested by works of fiction which everybody simply HAD to read.

For a week Mrs.Innes looked on, apparently indifferent, rather apparently not observing; and an Assistant Secretary in the Home Department began to fancy that his patience in teaching the three dachshund puppies tricks was really appreciated.He was an on-coming Assistant Secretary, with other conspicuous parts, and hitherto his time had been too valuable to spend upon ladies'

dachshunds.Mrs.Innes had selected him well.There came an evening when, at a dance at the Lieutenant-Governor's, Mrs.Innes was so absorbed in what the Assistant Secretary was saying to her, as she passed on his arm, that she did not see Captain Drake in the corridor at all, although he had carefully broken an engagement to walk with Kitty Vesey that very afternoon, as the beginning of gradual and painless reform in her direction.His unrewarded virtue rose up and surprised him with the distinctness of its resentment;and while his expression was successfully amused, his shoulders and the back of his neck, as well as the hand on his moustache, spoke of discipline which promised to be efficient.Reflection assured him that discipline was after all deserved, and a quarter of an hour later found him wagging his tail, so to speak, over Mrs.Innes's programme in a corner pleasantly isolated.The other chair was occupied by the Assistant Secretary.Captain Drake represented an interruption, and was obliged to take a step towards the nearest lamp to read the card.Three dances were rather ostentatiously left, and Drake initialled them all.He brought back the card with a bow, which spoke of dignity under bitter usage, together with the inflexible intention of courteous self-control, and turned away.

'Oh, if you please, Captain Drake--let me see what you've done.All those? But--'