IT was a trifling enough sign, but it had remained in Susy'smind: that first morning in Venice Nick had gone out withoutfirst coming in to see her. She had stayed in bed late,chatting with Clarissa, and expecting to see the door open andher husband appear; and when the child left, and she had jumpedup and looked into Nick's room, she found it empty, and a lineon his dressing table informed her that he had gone out to senda telegram.
It was lover-like, and even boyish, of him to think it necessaryto explain his absence; but why had he not simply come in andtold her! She instinctively connected the little fact with theshade of preoccupation she had noticed on his face the nightbefore, when she had gone to his room and found him absorbed inletter; and while she dressed she had continued to wonder whatwas in the letter, and whether the telegram he had hurried outto send was an answer to it.
She had never found out. When he reappeared, handsome and happyas the morning, he proffered no explanation; and it was part ofher life-long policy not to put uncalled-for questions. It wasnot only that her jealous regard for her own freedom was matchedby an equal respect for that of others; she had steered too longamong the social reefs and shoals not to know how narrow is thepassage that leads to peace of mind, and she was determined tokeep her little craft in mid-channel. But the incident hadlodged itself in her memory, acquiring a sort of symbolicsignificance, as of a turning-point in her relations with herhusband. Not that these were less happy, but that she nowbeheld them, as she had always formerly beheld such joys, as anunstable islet in a sea of storms. Her present bliss was ascomplete as ever, but it was ringed by the perpetual menace ofall she knew she was hiding from Nick, and of all she suspectedhim of hiding from her ....
She was thinking of these things one afternoon about three weeksafter their arrival in Venice. It was near sunset, and she satalone on the balcony, watching the cross-lights on the waterweave their pattern above the flushed reflection of oldpalace-basements. She was almost always alone at that hour.
Nick had taken to writing in the afternoons--he had been as goodas his word, and so, apparently, had the Muse and it was hishabit to join his wife only at sunset, for a late row on thelagoon. She had taken Clarissa, as usual, to the GiardinoPubblico, where that obliging child had politely butindifferently "played"--Clarissa joined in the diversions of herage as if conforming to an obsolete tradition--and had broughther back for a music lesson, echoes of which now drifted downfrom a distant window.
Susy had come to be extremely thankful for Clarissa. But forthe little girl, her pride in her husband's industry might havebeen tinged with a faint sense of being at times left out andforgotten; and as Nick's industry was the completestjustification for their being where they were, and for herhaving done what she had, she was grateful to Clarissa forhelping her to feel less alone. Clarissa, indeed, representedthe other half of her justification: it was as much on thechild's account as on Nick's that Susy had held her tongue,remained in Venice, and slipped out once a week to post one ofEllie's numbered letters. A day's experience of the PalazzoVanderlyn had convinced Susy of the impossibility of desertingClarissa. Long experience had shown her that the most crowdedhouseholds often contain the loneliest nurseries, and that therich child is exposed to evils unknown to less pampered infancy;but hitherto such things had merely been to her one of theuglier bits in the big muddled pattern of life. Now she foundherself feeling where before she had only judged: herprecarious bliss came to her charged with a new weight of pity.
She was thinking of these things, and of the approaching date ofEllie Vanderlyn's return, and of the searching truths she wasstoring up for that lady's private ear, when she noticed agondola turning its prow toward the steps below the balcony.
She leaned over, and a tall gentleman in shabby clothes,glancing up at her as he jumped out, waved a mouldy Panama injoyful greeting.
"Streffy!" she exclaimed as joyfully; and she was half-way downthe stairs when he ran up them followed by his luggage-ladenboatman.
"It's all right, I suppose?--Ellie said I might come," heexplained in a shrill cheerful voice; "and I'm to have my samegreen room with the parrot-panels, because its furniture isalready so frightfully stained with my hair-wash."Susy was beaming on him with the deep sense of satisfactionwhich his presence always produced in his friends. There was noone in the world, they all agreed, half as ugly and untidy anddelightful as Streffy; no one who combined such outspokenselfishness with such imperturbable good humour; no one who knewso well how to make you believe he was being charming to youwhen it was you who were being charming to him.
In addition to these seductions, of which none estimated thevalue more accurately than their possessor, Strefford had forSusy another attraction of which he was probably unconscious.
It was that of being the one rooted and stable being among thefluid and shifting figures that composed her world. Susy hadalways lived among people so denationalized that those one tookfor Russians generally turned out to be American, and those onewas inclined to ascribe to New York proved to have originated inRome or Bucharest. These cosmopolitan people, who, in countriesnot their own, lived in houses as big as hotels, or in hotelswhere the guests were as international as the waiters, hadinter-married, inter-loved and inter-divorced each other overthe whole face of Europe, and according to every code thatattempts to regulate human ties. Strefford, too, had his homein this world, but only one of his homes. The other, the one hespoke of, and probably thought of, least often, was a great dullEnglish country-house in a northern county, where a life asmonotonous and self-contained as his own was chequered anddispersed had gone on for generation after generation; and itwas the sense of that house, and of all it typified even to hisvagrancy and irreverence, which, coming out now and then in histalk, or in his attitude toward something or somebody, gave hima firmer outline and a steadier footing than the othermarionettes in the dance. Superficially so like them all, andso eager to outdo them in detachment and adaptability,ridiculing the prejudices he had shaken off, and the people towhom he belonged, he still kept, under his easy pliancy, theskeleton of old faiths and old fashions. "He talks everylanguage as well as the rest of us," Susy had once said of him,"but at least he talks one language better than the others"; andStrefford, told of the remark, had laughed, called her an idiot,and been pleased.
As he shambled up the stairs with her, arm in arm, she wasthinking of this quality with a new appreciation of its value.
Even she and Lansing, in spite of their unmixed Americanism,their substantial background of old-fashioned cousinships in NewYork and Philadelphia, were as mentally detached, as universallyat home, as touts at an International Exhibition. If they wereusually recognized as Americans it was only because they spokeFrench so well, and because Nick was too fair to be "foreign,"and too sharp-featured to be English. But Charlie Strefford wasEnglish with all the strength of an inveterate habit; andsomething in Susy was slowly waking to a sense of the beauty ofhabit.
Lounging on the balcony, whither he had followed her withoutpausing to remove the stains of travel, Strefford showed himselfimmensely interested in the last chapter of her history, greatlypleased at its having been enacted under his roof, and hugelyand flippantly amused at the firmness with which she refused tolet him see Nick till the latter's daily task was over.
"Writing? Rot! What's he writing? He's breaking you in, mydear; that's what he's doing: establishing an alibi. What'llyou bet he's just sitting there smoking and reading Le Rire?
Let's go and see."But Susy was firm. "He's read me his first chapter: it'swonderful. It's a philosophic romance--rather like Marius, youknow.""Oh, yes--I do!" said Strefford, with a laugh that she thoughtidiotic.
She flushed up like a child. "You're stupid, Streffy. Youforget that Nick and I don't need alibis. We've got rid of allthat hyprocrisy by agreeing that each will give the other a handup when either of us wants a change. We've not married to spyand lie, and nag each other; we've formed a partnership for ourmutual advantage.""I see; that's capital. But how can you be sure that, when Nickwants a change, you'll consider it for his advantage to haveone?"It was the point that had always secretly tormented Susy; sheoften wondered if it equally tormented Nick.
"I hope I shall have enough common sense--" she began.
"Oh, of course: common sense is what you're both bound to baseyour argument on, whichever way you argue."This flash of insight disconcerted her, and she said, a littleirritably: "What should you do then, if you married?--Hush,Streffy! I forbid you to shout like that--all the gondolas arestopping to look!""How can I help it?" He rocked backward and forward in hischair. "'If you marry,' she says: 'Streffy, what have youdecided to do if you suddenly become a raving maniac?'""I said no such thing. If your uncle and your cousin died,you'd marry to-morrow; you know you would.""Oh, now you're talking business." He folded his long arms andleaned over the balcony, looking down at the dusky ripplesstreaked with fire. "In that case I should say: 'Susan, mydear--Susan--now that by the merciful intervention of Providenceyou have become Countess of Altringham in the peerage of GreatBritain, and Baroness Dunsterville and d'Amblay in the peeragesof Ireland and Scotland, I'll thank you to remember that you area member of one of the most ancient houses in the UnitedKingdom--and not to get found out.'"Susy laughed. "We know what those warnings mean! I pity mynamesake."He swung about and gave her a quick look out of his small uglytwinkling eyes. "Is there any other woman in the world namedSusan?""I hope so, if the name's an essential. Even if Nick chucks me,don't count on me to carry out that programme. I've seen it inpractice too often.""Oh, well: as far as I know, everybody's in perfect health atAltringham." He fumbled in his pocket and drew out a fountainpen, a handkerchief over which it had leaked, and a packet ofdishevelled cigarettes. Lighting one, and restoring the otherobjects to his pocket, he continued calmly: "Tell me how didyou manage to smooth things over with the Gillows? Ursula wasrunning amuck when I was in Newport last Summer; it was justwhen people were beginning to say that you were going to marryNick. I was afraid she'd put a spoke in your wheel; and I hearshe put a big cheque in your hand instead."Susy was silent. From the first moment of Strefford'sappearance she had known that in the course of time he wouldput that question. He was as inquisitive as a monkey, and whenhe had made up his mind to find out anything it was useless totry to divert his attention. After a moment's hesitation shesaid: "I flirted with Fred. It was a bore but he was verydecent.""He would be--poor Fred. And you got Ursula thoroughlyfrightened!""Well--enough. And then luckily that young Nerone Altineriturned up from Rome: he went over to New York to look for a jobas an engineer, and Ursula made Fred put him in their ironworks." She paused again, and then added abruptly: "Streffy!
If you knew how I hate that kind of thing. I'd rather have Nickcome in now and tell me frankly, as I know he would, that he'sgoing off with--""With Coral Hicks?" Strefford suggested.
She laughed. "Poor Coral Hicks! What on earth made you thinkof the Hickses?""Because I caught a glimpse of them the other day at Capri.
They're cruising about: they said they were coming in here.""What a nuisance! I do hope they won't find us out. They wereawfully kind to Nick when he went to India with them, andthey're so simple-minded that they would expect him to be gladto see them."Strefford aimed his cigarette-end at a tourist on a puggaree whowas gazing up from his guidebook at the palace. "Ah," hemurmured with satisfaction, seeing the shot take effect; then headded: "Coral Hicks is growing up rather pretty.""Oh, Streff--you're dreaming! That lump of a girl withspectacles and thick ankles! Poor Mrs. Hicks used to say toNick: 'When Mr. Hicks and I had Coral educated we presumedculture was in greater demand in Europe than it appears to be.'""Well, you'll see: that girl's education won't interfere withher, once she's started. So then: if Nick came in and told youhe was going off--""I should be so thankful if it was with a fright like Coral!
But you know," she added with a smile, "we've agreed that it'snot to happen for a year."