A Duet (with an occasional chorus) - Arthur Conan Doyle (best classic books to read TXT) 📗

Again the bright little dining-room, with the morning sun gleaming upon the high silver coffee pot and the electro-plated toast-rack— everything the same, down to the plates which Jemima had once again forgotten to warm. Maude, with the golden light playing upon the fringes of her curls, and throwing two little epaulettes of the daintiest pink across her shoulders, sat in silence, glancing across from time to time with interrogative eyes at her husband. He ate his breakfast moodily, for he was very ill at ease. There was a struggle within him, for his conscience was pulling him one way and his instincts the other. Instincts are a fine old conservative force, while conscience is a thing of yesterday, so it is usually safe to prophesy which will sway the other.

The matter at issue was whether he should tell Maude about Violet Wright. If she were going to carry out her threat, then certainly it would be better to prepare her. But after all, his arguments of yesterday might prevail with her when her first impetuous fit of passion was over. Why should he go half-way to meet danger? If it came, nothing which he could say would ward it off. If it did not come, there was no need for saying anything. Conscience told him that it would be better to be perfectly straight with his wife. Instinct told him that though she would probably be sweet and sympathetic over it, yet it would rankle in her mind and poison her thoughts. And perhaps for once, Instinct may have been better than Conscience. Do not ask too many questions, you young wife! Do not be too free with your reminiscences, you young husband. There are things which can be forgiven, but never, never, can they be forgotten. That highest thing on earth, the heart of a loving woman, is too tender, too sacred, to be bruised by a wanton confidence. You are hers. She is yours. The future lies with both of you. It is wiser to leave the past alone. The couples who boast that they have never had a secret are sometimes happy because the boast is sometimes untrue.

‘You won’t be late to-day, Frank,’ said Maude at last, peeping round the tall coffee-pot.

‘No, dear, I won’t.’

‘You were yesterday, you know.’

‘Yes, I know I was.’

‘Were you kept at the office?’

‘No, I had tea with a friend.’

‘At his house?’

‘No, no, at a restaurant. Where has Jemima put my boots? I wonder if she has cleaned them. I can never tell by looking. Here they are. And my coat? Anything I can get you in town? Well, good-bye, dear, good-bye!’ Maude had never seen him make so hurried an exit.

It is always a mystery to the City man how his wife puts in the seven hours a day of loneliness while the E.C. has claimed him for its own. She cannot explain it to him, for she can hardly explain it to herself. It is frittered away in a thousand little tasks, each trivial in itself, and yet making in their sum the difference between a well-ordered and a neglected household. Under the illustrious guidance of the omniscient Mrs. Beeton there is the usual routine to be gone through. The cook has to be seen, the larder examined, the remains cunningly transformed into new and attractive shapes, the dinner to be ordered (anything will do for lunch), and the new supplies to be got in. The husband accepts the excellent little dinner, the fried sole, the ris de veau en caisse, the lemon pudding, as if they had grown automatically out of the tablecloth. He knows nothing of the care, the judgment, the prevision which ring the changes with every season, which never relax and never mistake. He enjoys the fruits, but he ignores the work which raised them. And yet the work goes cheerfully and uncomplainingly on.

Then when every preparation has been made for the dinner—that solemn climax of the British day, there is plenty for Maude to do. There is the white chiffon to be taken out of the neck of that dress, and the pink to be put in. Amateur dressmaking is always going on at The Lindens, and Frank has become more careful in his caresses since he found one evening that his wife had a row of pins between her lips— which is not a pleasant discovery to make with your own. Then there are drawers to be tidied, and silver to be cleaned, and the leaves of the gutta-percha plant to be washed, and the feather which was damped yesterday to be re-curled before the fire. That leaves just time before lunch to begin the new novel by glancing at the last two pages to see what DID happen, and then the three minutes lunch of a lonely woman. So much for business, now for the more trying social duties. The pink dressing-gown is shed and a trim little walking dress— French grey cloth with white lisse in front and a grey zouave jacket- -takes its place. Visiting strangers is not nearly so hard when you are pleased with your dress, and even entertaining becomes more easy when your costumiere lives in Regent Street. On Tuesdays Maude is at home. Every other day she hunts through her plate of cards, and is overwhelmed by the sense of her rudeness towards her neighbours. But her task is never finished, though day after day she comes back jaded with her exertions. Strangers still call upon her—‘hope it is not too late to do the right thing, and to welcome,’ etc., etc.—and they have to be re-visited. While she is visiting them, other cards appear upon her hall table, and so the foolish and tiresome convention continues to exhaust the time and the energies of its victim.

Those original receptions were really very difficult. Jemima announced a name which might or might not bear some relation to the visitor’s. The lady entered. Her name might perhaps be Mrs. Baker. Maude had no means of knowing who Mrs. Baker might be. The visitor seldom descended to an explanation. Ten minutes of desultory and forced conversation about pinewoods and golf and cremation. A cup of tea and a departure. Then Maude would rush to the card-tray to try to find out whom it was that she had been talking to, and what it was all about.

Maude did not intend to go visiting that particular day, and she had hoped that no one might visit her. The hours of danger were almost past, and it was close upon four o’clock, when there came a brisk pull at the bell.

‘Mrs. White,’ said Jemima, opening the drawing-room door.

‘Wright,’ said the visitor, as she walked in—‘Mrs. Violet Wright.’

Maude rose with her pleasant smile. It was a peculiarly sweet and kindly smile, for it was inspired by a gentle womanly desire to make things pleasant for all who were around her. Amiability was never artificial with her, for she had the true instincts of a lady—those instincts so often spoken of, so seldom, so very seldom seen. Like a gentleman, or a Christian, or any other ideal, it is but a poor approximation which is commonly attained.

But the visitor did not respond to the pretty gesture of welcome, nor did her handsome face return that sympathetic smile. They stood for an instant looking at each other, the one tall, masterful, mature, the other sweet, girlish, and self-distrustful, but each beautiful and engaging in her own way. Lucky Master Frank, whose past and present could take such a form; but luckier still if he could have closed the past when the present opened. The visitor was silent, but her dark eyes looked critically and fixedly