A Princess of Thule

CHAPTER X.

FAIRY-LAND

“WELCOME to London – !”

He was about to add “Sheila,” but suddenly stopped. The girl, who had hastily come forward to meet him with a glad look in her eyes and with both hands out-stretched, doubtless perceived the brief embarrassment of the moment, and was perhaps a little amused by it. But she took no notice of it; she merely advanced to him and caught both his hands, and said, “And are you very well?”

It was the old and familiar salutation, uttered in the same odd, gentle, insinuating fashion, and in the same low and sweet voice. Sheila’s stay in Oban and the few days she had already spent in London, had not taught her the difference between “very” and “ferry.”

“It is so strange to hear you speak in London – Mrs. Lavender,” he said, with rather a wry face as he pronounced her full and proper title.

And now it was Sheila’s turn to look a bit embarrassed and color, and appear uncertain whether to be vexed or pleased, when her husband himself broke in in his usual impetuous fashion: “I say, Ingram, don’t be a fool! Of course you must call her Sheila – unless when there are people here, and then you must please yourself. Why, the poor girl has enough of strange things and names about her already. I don’t know how she keeps her head. It would bewilder me, I know; but I can see that, after she has stood at the window for a time, and begun to get dazed by all the wonderful sights and sounds outside, she suddenly withdraws and fixes all her attention on some little domestic duty, just as if she were hanging on to the practical things of life to assure herself it isn’t all a dream. Isn’t that so, Sheila?” he said, putting his hand on her shoulder.

“You ought not to watch me like that,” she said with a smile. “But it is the noise that is most bewildering. There are many places I will know already when I see them, many places and things I have known in pictures; but now the size of them, and the noise of carriages, and the people always passing, always different, always strangers, so that you never see the same people any more. But I am getting very much accustomed to it.”

“You are trying very hard to get accustomed to it, any way, my good girl,” said her husband.

“You need not be in a hurry; you may begin to regret some day that you have not a little of that feeling of wonder left,” said Ingram. “But you have not told me anything of what you think about London, and of how you like it, and how you like your house, and what you have done with Bras, and a thousand other things.”

“I well tell you all that directly, when I have got for you some wine and some biscuits.”

“Sheila, you can ring for them,” said her husband, but she had by that time departed on her mission. Presently she returned, and waited upon Ingram just as if she had been in her father’s house in Borva, with the gentlemen in a hurry to go out to the fishing, and herself the only one who could serve them.

She put a small table close by the French window; she drew back the curtains as far as they would go, to show the sunshine of a bright forenoon in May lighting up the trees in the square and gleaming on the pale and tall fronts of the houses beyond; and she wheeled in three low easy-chairs, so as to front this comparatively cheerful prospect. Somehow or other, it seemed quite natural that Sheila should wheel in those chairs. It was certainly no disrespect on the part of either her husband or her visitor which caused both of them to sit still and give her her own way about such things. Indeed, Lavender had not as yet ever attempted to impress upon Sheila the necessity of cultivating the art of helplessness.

That, with other social graces, would, perhaps, come in good time. She would soon acquire the habits and ways of her friends and acquaintances, without his trying to force upon her a series of affectations, which would only embarrass her and cloud the perfect frankness and spontaneity of her nature. Of one thing he was quite assured – that whatever mistakes Sheila might make in society they would never render her ridiculous. Strangers might not know the absolute sincerity of every word and act, which gave her a courage that had no fear of criticism, but they could at least see the simple grace and dignity of the girl, and that natural ease of manner which is beyond the reach of cultivation, being mainly the result of a thorough consciousness of honesty. To burden her with rules and regulations of conduct would be to produce the very catastrophes he wished to avoid. Where no attempt is made, failure is impossible; and he was meanwhile well content that Sheila should simply appear as Sheila, even although she might draw in a chair for a guest, or so far forget her dignity as to pour out some wine for her husband.

“After all, Sheila,” said Lavender, “hadn’t I better begin and tell Ingram about your surprise and delight when you came near Oban and saw the tall hotels and the trees? It was the trees, I think, that struck you most, because, you know, those in Lewis – well, to tell the truth – the fact is, the trees of Lewis – as I was saying, the trees of Lewis are not just – they cannot be said to be – ”

“You bad boy, to say anything against the Lewis!” exclaimed Sheila; and Ingram held that she was right, and that there were certain sorts of ingratitude more disgraceful than others, and that this was just about the worst.

“Oh, I have brought all the good away from Lewis,” said Lavender with a careless impertinence.

“No,” said Sheila, proudly. “You have not brought away my papa, and there is not any one in this country I have seen as good as he is.”

“My dear, your experience of the thirty millions of folks in these islands is quite convincing. I was wholly in the wrong; and if you forgive me we shall celebrate our reconciliation in a cigarette – that is to say, Ingram and I will perform the rites, and you can look on.”

So Sheila went away to get the cigarettes also.

“You don’t say you smoke in your drawing-room, Lavender?” said Ingram, mindful of the fastidious ways of his friend, even when he had bachelor’s rooms in King street.

“Don’t I, though? I smoke everywhere – all over the place. Don’t you see we have no visitors yet. No one is supposed to know we have come South. Sheila must get all sorts of things before she can be introduced to my friends and my aunt’s friends, and the house must be put to rights, too. You wouldn’t have her go to see my aunt in that sailor’s costume she used to rush about in up in Lewis?”

“That is precisely what I would have,” said Ingram, “She cannot look more handsome in any other dress.”

“Why, my aunt would fancy I had married a savage; I believe she fears something of the sort now.”

“And you haven’t told even her that you are in London?”

“No.”

“Well, Lavender, that is a precious silly performance. Suppose she hears of your being in town, what will you say to her?”

“I should tell her I wanted a few days to get my wife properly dressed before taking her about.”

Ingram shrugged his shoulders: “Perhaps you are right. Perhaps, indeed, it would be better if you waited six months before you introduced Sheila to your friends. At present you seem to be keeping the foot-lights turned down until everything is ready for the first scene, and then Sheila is to burst upon society in a blaze of light and color. Well, that is harmless enough; but look here! You don’t know much about her yet; you will be mainly anxious to hear what the audience, as it were, say of her; and there is just a chance of your adopting their impressions and opinions of Sheila, seeing that you have no very fixed ones of your own. Now, what your social circle may think about her is a difficult thing to decide; and I confess I would rather have seen you remain six months in Lewis before bringing her up here.”

Ingram was at least a candid friend. It was not the first nor the hundredth time that Frank Lavender had to endure small lectures, uttered in a slow, deliberate voice, and yet with an indifference of manner which showed that Ingram cared very little how sharply his words struck home. He rarely even apologized for his bluntness. These were his opinions; Lavender could take them or leave them, as he liked. And the younger man, after finding his face flush a bit on being accused of wishing to make a dramatic impression with Sheila’s entrance into London society, laughed in an embarrassed way, and said, “It is impossible to be angry with you, Ingram, and yet you do talk so absurdly. I wonder who is likely to know more about the character of a girl than her own husband?”

“You may in time; you don’t now,” said Ingram, carefully balancing a biscuit on the point of his finger.

“The fact is,” said Lavender, with good-natured impatience, “you are the most romantic card I know, and there is no pleasing you. You have all sorts of exalted notions about things, about sentiments and duties, and so forth. Well, all that is true enough, and would be right enough if the world were filled with men and women like yourself; but then it isn’t, you see, and one has to give in to conventionalities of dress and living and ceremonies, if one wants to retain one’s friends. Now, I like to see you going about with that wide-awake – it suits your brown complexion and beard – and that stick that would do for herding sheep; and the costume looks well, and is business-like and excellent when you’re off for a walk over the Surrey downs or lying on the river-banks about Henley or Cookham; but it isn’t, you know, the sort of costume for a stroll in the Park.”

“Whenever God withdraws from me my small share of common sense,” said Ingram, slowly, “so far that I shall begin to think of having my clothes made for the purpose of walking in Hyde Park, well – ”

“But don’t you see,” said Lavender, “that one must meet one’s friends, especially when one is married; and when you know that at a certain hour in the forenoon they are all to be found in a particular place, and that a very pleasant place, and that you will do yourself good by having a walk in the fresh air, and so forth, I really don’t see anything very immoral in going down for an hour or so to the Park.”

“Don’t you think the pleasure of seeing one’s friends might be postponed till one had done some sort of good day’s work?”

“There now!” cried Lavender, “that is another of your delusions. You are always against superstitions, and yet you make work a fetish. You do with work just as women do with duty; they carry about with them a convenient little God, and they are always worshiping it with small sacrifices, and complimenting themselves on a series of little martyrdoms that are of no good to anybody. Of course, duty wouldn’t be duty if it wasn’t disagreeable, and when they go nursing the sick – and they could get it better done for fifteen shillings a week by somebody else – they don’t mind coming back to their families with the seeds of typhus about their gowns; and when they crush the affections in order to worship at the shrine of duty, they don’t consider that they may be making martyrs of other folks, who don’t want martyrdom and get no sort of pleasure out of it. Now, what in all the world is the good of work as work? I believe that work is an unmistakable evil, but when it is a necessity I suppose you get some sort of selfish satisfaction in overcoming it; and doubtless if there was any immediate necessity in my case – I don’t deny the necessity may arise, and that I should like nothing better than to work for Sheila’s sake – ”

“Now, you are coming to the point,” said Ingram, who had been listening with his usual patience to his friend’s somewhat chaotic speculations. “Perhaps you may have to work for your wife’s sake and your own; and I confess I am surprised to see you so content with your present circumstances. If your aunt’s property legally reverted to you, if you had any sort of family claim on it, that would make some little difference; but you know that any sudden quarrel between you might leave you penniless to-morrow.”

“In which case I should begin to work to-morrow, and I should come to you for my first commission.”

“And you shouldn’t have it. I would leave you to go and fight the world for yourself; without which a man knows nothing of himself or of his relations with those around him.”

“Frank, dear, here are the cigarettes,” said Sheila, at this point; and as she came and sat down the discussion ceased.

For Sheila began to tell her friend of all the strange adventures that had befallen her since she left the far island of Lewis – how she had seen with fear the great mountains of Skye lit up by the wild glare of a stormy sunrise; how she had seen with astonishment the great fir woods of Armadale; and how green and beautiful were the shores of the Sound of Mull. And then Oban, with its shining houses, its blue bay, and its magnificent trees, all lit up by a fair and still sunshine! She had not imagined there was anywhere in the world so beautiful a place, and could scarcely believe that London itself was more rich and noble and impressive; for there were beautiful ladies walking along the broad pavements, and there were shops with large windows that seemed to contain everything that the mind could desire, and there was a whole fleet of yachts in the bay. But it was the trees, above all, that captivated her; and she asked if they were lords who owned those beautiful houses built up on the hill, and half smothered among lilacs and ash trees and rowan trees and ivy.

“My darling,” Lavender had said to her, “if your papa were to come and live here, he could buy half a dozen of those cottages, gardens and all. They are mostly the property of well-to-do shopkeepers. If this little place takes your fancy, what will you say when you go South – when you see Wimbledon and Richmond and Kew, with their grand old commons and trees? Why, you could hide Oban in a corner of Richmond Park!”

“And my papa has seen all those places!”

“Yes. Don’t you think it strange he should have seen them all, and known he could live in any one of them, and then gone away back to Borva?”

“But what would the poor people have done if he had never gone back?”

“Oh, some one else would have taken his place.”

“And then, if he were living here or in London, he might have got tired, and he might have wished to go back to the Lewis and see all the people he knew; and then he would come among them like a stranger, and have no house to go to.”

Then Lavender said quite gently, “Do you think, Sheila, you will ever tire of living in the South?”

The girl looked up quickly, and said, with a sort of surprised questioning in her eyes, “No, not with you. But then we shall often go to the Lewis?”

“Oh, yes,” her husband said, “as often as we can conveniently. But it will take some time at first, you know, before you get to know all my friends who are to be your friends, and before you get properly fitted into our social circle. That will take you a long time, Sheila, and you may have many annoyances or embarrassments to encounter; but you won’t be very much afraid, my girl?”

Sheila merely looked up to him; there was no fear in the frank, brave eyes.

The first large town she saw struck a cold chill to her heart. On a wet and dismal afternoon they sailed into Greenock. A heavy smoke hung about the black building-yards and the dirty quays; the narrow and squalid streets were filled with mud, and only the poorer sections of the population waded through the mire or hung disconsolately about the corners of the thoroughfares. A gloomier picture could not well be conceived; and Sheila, chilled with the long and wet sail, and bewildered by the noise and bustle of the harbor, was driven to the hotel with a sore heart and a downcast face.

“This is not like London, Frank?” she said, pretty nearly ready to cry with disappointment.

“This? No. Well, it is like a part of London, certainly, but not the part you will live in.”

“But how can we live in the one place without passing the other and being made miserable by it? There was no part of Oban like this.”

“Why, you will live miles away from the docks and quays of London. You might live for a lifetime in London without ever knowing it had a harbor. Don’t you be afraid, Sheila. You will live in a district where there are far finer houses than any you saw in Oban, and far finer trees; and within a few minutes’ walk you will find great gardens and parks, with lakes in them and wild fowls, and you will be able to teach the boys about how to set the helm and the sails when they are launching their small boats.”

“I should like that,” said Sheila, her face brightening.

“Perhaps you would like a boat yourself?”

“Yes,” she said, frankly. “If there were not many people there, we might go out sometimes in the evening – ”

Her husband laughed and took her hand: “You don’t understand, Sheila. The boats the boys have are little things a foot or two long – like the one in your papa’s bedroom in Borva. But many of the boys would be greatly obliged to you if you would teach them how to manage the sails properly, for sometimes dreadful shipwrecks occur.”

“You must bring them to our house. I am very fond of little boys, when they begin to forget to be shy, and let you become acquainted with them.”

“Well,” said Lavender, “I don’t know many of the boys who sail boats in the Serpentine; you will have to make their acquaintance yourself. But I know one boy whom I must bring to the house. He is a German-Jew boy, who is going to be another Mendelssohn, his friends say. He is a pretty boy, with ruddy-brown hair, big black eyes, and a fine forehead, and he really sings and plays delightfully. But you know, Sheila, you must not treat him as a boy; for he is over fourteen, I should think; and if you were to kiss him – ”

“He might be angry,” said Sheila, with perfect simplicity.

“I might,” said Lavender; and then, noticing that she seemed a little surprised, he merely patted her head and bade her go and get ready for dinner.

Then came the great climax of Sheila’s southward journey – her arrival in London. She was all anxiety to see her future home; and, as luck would have it, there was a fair spring morning shining over the city. For a couple of hours before she had sat and looked out of the carriage-window as the train whirled rapidly through the scarcely awakened country, and she had seen the soft and beautiful landscapes of the South lit up by the early sunlight. How the bright little villages shone, with here and there a gilt weathercock glittering on the spire of some small gray church, while as yet in many valleys a pale gray mist lay along the bed of the level streams, or clung to the dense woods on the upland heights! Which was the more beautiful – the sharp, clear picture, with its brilliant colors and its awakening life, or the more mystic landscape over which was still drawn the tender veil of the morning haze? She could not tell. She only knew that England, as she then saw it, seemed a great country that was very beautiful, that had few inhabitants, and that was still and sleepy and bathed in sunshine. How happy must the people be who lived in those quiet green valleys by the side of slow and smooth rivers, and amid great woods and avenues and stately trees, the like of which she had not imagined in her dreams.