第28章

"I'm going to tell you," she interrupted him."They mean a sort of girl who likes fresh air, washes her face with yellow soap, sports dogskin gloves, drives in an open cart in preference to a shut brougham, enjoys a cold tub and Whyte Melville's novels, laughs at ghosts and cries over 'Misunderstood,' considers the Bishop of London a deity and the Albert Memorial a gem of art, would wear a neat Royal fringe in her grave, and a straw hat and shirt on the Judgment Day if she were in the country for it--walks with the guns, sings 'Home, Sweet Home' in the evening after dinner to her bald-headed father, thinks the /Daily Mail/ an intellectual paper, the Royal Academy an uplifting institution, the British officer a demi-god with a heart of gold in a body of steel, and the road from Calais to Paris the way to heaven.That's what they mean by a sensible sort of girl, isn't it?""I daresay it is," said the Prophet, endeavouring not to feel as if he were sitting with a dozen or two of very practised stump orators.

"Yes, and that's what they think I am."

"And aren't you?" inquired the Prophet.

Lady Enid drew herself upon the Aberdeen lean-to.

"No," she said decisively, "I'm not.I'm a Miss Minerva Partridge.""Well, but what is that?" asked the Prophet, with all the air of a man inquiring about some savage race.

"That's the secret--"

"Oh, I beg your pardon!"

"That I'm going to tell you now, because I trust you--"Again the pronouns were emphasised, and the Prophet thought how difficult it would be to keep his oath.

"And because I know now that you're silly too."The Prophet jumped, though not for joy.

"I've been Miss Minerva Partridge for--wait a moment, I must look."She got up, went to a writing table, opened a drawer in it, and took out a large red book and turned its leaves.

"My diary," she explained."It's foolish to keep one, isn't it?"Her intonation so obviously called for an affirmative that the Prophet felt constrained to reply,--"Very foolish indeed."

She smiled with pleasure.

"I'm so glad you think so.Ah--exactly a year and a half.""You've been Miss Minerva Partridge?"

"Yes."

"So long as that?"

"Yes, indeed.Mr.Vivian, during that time I have been leading a double life."The Prophet remembered the other double life beside the borders of the River Mouse, and began to wonder if he were acquainted with any human being who led a single one.

"Many people do that," he remarked rather aimlessly.

Lady Enid looked vexed.

"I did not say I had a monopoly of the commodity," she rejoined, evidently wishing that she had.

"Oh, no," said the Prophet, making things worse; "one meets people who live double lives every day, I might almost say every hour."The clock had just struck four, and he had begun to think of five.Lady Enid's pleasant plumpness began rapidly to disappear.

"I can't say I do," she said sharply, feeling that most of the gilt was being stripped off her sin.

She stopped in such obvious dissatisfaction that the Prophet, vaguely aware that he had made some mistake, said,--"Please go on.I am so interested.Why have you led a double life for the last week and a half?""Year and a half, I said."

"I mean year and a half."

He forced his mobile features to assume a fixed expression of greedy, though rather too constant, curiosity.Lady Enid brightened up.

"Mr.Vivian," she said, "many girls are born sensible-looking without wishing it.""Are they really? It never occurred to me.""Such things very seldom do occur to men.Now that places these girls in a very painful position.I was placed in this position as soon as Iwas born, or at least as soon as I began to look like anything at all.

For babies really don't."

"That's very true," assented the Prophet, with more fervour.

"People continually said to me, 'What a nice sensible girl you are';or--'One always feels your Common sense'; or--'There's nothing foolish about you, Enid, thank Heaven!' The Chieftain relied upon me thoroughly.So did the tenants.So did everybody.You can understand that it became very trying?""Of course, of course."

"It's something to do with the shape of my eyebrows, the colour of my hair, the way I smile and that sort of thing.""No doubt it is."

"Mr.Vivian, I'll tell you now, that I've never felt sensible in all my life.""Really!" ejaculated the Prophet, still firmly holding all his features together in an unyielding expression of fixed curiosity.

"Never once, however great the provocation.And in my family, with the Chieftain, the provocation you can understand is exceptionally great."The Marquis of Glome, who was the head of a clan called "The MacArdells," was always named the Chieftain by his relations and friends.

"I felt sure it must be," said the Prophet, decisively.

"Nevertheless it is so extremely difficult, if not impossible, not to try to be what people take you for that I was in a perpetual condition of acting sensibly, against my true nature.""How very trying!" murmured the Prophet, mechanically.

"It was, Mr.Vivian.It often made me fell quite ill.Nobody but you knows how I have suffered.""And why do I know?" inquired the Prophet.

"Because I realised yesterday that you must be almost as silly by nature as I am.""Yesterday--why? When?"

"When you said to Sir Tiglath that you could prophesy."The Prophet stiffened.She laughed almost affectionately.

"So absurd! But I was vexed when you said you'd give it up.You mustn't do that, or you'll be flying in the face of your own folly."She drew the Aberdeen lean-to, which ran easily on Edinburgh castors, a little nearer to him, and continued.

"At least I felt obliged to seek an outlet.I could not stifle my real self for ever, and yet I could not be comfortably silly with those who were absolutely convinced of my permanent good sense.I tried to be several times.

"Didn't you succeed?"

"Not once."

"Tch! Tch!"

"So at last I was driven to the double life.""Then your coachman knows?"