Glasses [13]
all about her; she's a friend of some friends of mine!" At this I remembered wilful Betty and said to myself that I knew some one who would probably prove more wilful still.
CHAPTER VIII
A few days later I again heard Dawling on my stairs, and even before he passed my threshold I knew he had something to tell.
"I've been down to Folkestone--it was necessary I should see her!" I forget whether he had come straight from the station; he was at any rate out of breath with his news, which it took me however a minute to apply.
"You mean that you've been with Mrs. Meldrum?"
"Yes, to ask her what she knows and how she comes to know it. It worked upon me awfully--I mean what you told me." He made a visible effort to seem quieter than he was, and it showed me sufficiently that he had not been reassured. I laid, to comfort him and smiling at a venture, a friendly hand on his arm, and he dropped into my eyes, fixing them an instant, a strange distended look which might have expressed the cold clearness of all that was to come. "I KNOW--now!" he said with an emphasis he rarely used.
"What then did Mrs. Meldrum tell you?"
"Only one thing that signified, for she has no real knowledge. But that one thing was everything."
"What is it then?"
"Why, that she can't bear the sight of her." His pronouns required some arranging, but after I had successfully dealt with them I replied that I was quite aware of Miss Saunt's trick of turning her back on the good lady of Folkestone. Only what did that prove? "Have you never guessed? I guessed as soon as she spoke!" Dawling towered over me in dismal triumph. It was the first time in our acquaintance that, on any ground of understanding this had occurred; but even so remarkable an incident still left me sufficiently at sea to cause him to continue: "Why, the effect of those spectacles!"
I seemed to catch the tail of his idea. "Mrs. Meldrum's?"
"They're so awfully ugly and they add so to the dear woman's ugliness." This remark began to flash a light, and when he quickly added "She sees herself, she sees her own fate!" my response was so immediate that I had almost taken the words out of his mouth. While I tried to fix this sudden image of Flora's face glazed in and cross-barred even as Mrs. Meldrum's was glazed and barred, he went on to assert that only the horror of that image, looming out at herself, could be the reason of her avoiding the person who so forced it home. The fact he had encountered made everything hideously vivid, and more vivid than anything else that just such another pair of goggles was what would have been prescribed to Flora.
"I see--I see," I presently returned. "What would become of Lord Iffield if she were suddenly to come out in them? What indeed would become of every one, what would become of everything?" This was an enquiry that Dawling was evidently unprepared to meet, and I completed it by saying at last: "My dear fellow, for that matter, what would become of YOU?"
Once more he turned on me his good green eyes. "Oh I shouldn't mind!"
The tone of his words somehow made his ugly face beautiful, and I discovered at this moment how much I really liked him. None the less, at the same time, perversely and rudely, I felt the droll side of our discussion of such alternatives. It made me laugh out and say to him while I laughed: "You'd take her even with those things of Mrs. Meldrum's?"
He remained mournfully grave; I could see that he was surprised at my rude mirth. But he summoned back a vision of the lady at Folkestone and conscientiously replied: "Even with those things of Mrs. Meldrum's." I begged him not to resent my laughter, which but exposed the fact that we had built a monstrous castle in the air. Didn't he see on what flimsy ground the structure rested? The evidence was preposterously small. He believed the worst, but we were really uninformed.
"I shall find out the truth," he promptly replied.
"How can you? If you question her you'll simply drive her to perjure herself. Wherein after
CHAPTER VIII
A few days later I again heard Dawling on my stairs, and even before he passed my threshold I knew he had something to tell.
"I've been down to Folkestone--it was necessary I should see her!" I forget whether he had come straight from the station; he was at any rate out of breath with his news, which it took me however a minute to apply.
"You mean that you've been with Mrs. Meldrum?"
"Yes, to ask her what she knows and how she comes to know it. It worked upon me awfully--I mean what you told me." He made a visible effort to seem quieter than he was, and it showed me sufficiently that he had not been reassured. I laid, to comfort him and smiling at a venture, a friendly hand on his arm, and he dropped into my eyes, fixing them an instant, a strange distended look which might have expressed the cold clearness of all that was to come. "I KNOW--now!" he said with an emphasis he rarely used.
"What then did Mrs. Meldrum tell you?"
"Only one thing that signified, for she has no real knowledge. But that one thing was everything."
"What is it then?"
"Why, that she can't bear the sight of her." His pronouns required some arranging, but after I had successfully dealt with them I replied that I was quite aware of Miss Saunt's trick of turning her back on the good lady of Folkestone. Only what did that prove? "Have you never guessed? I guessed as soon as she spoke!" Dawling towered over me in dismal triumph. It was the first time in our acquaintance that, on any ground of understanding this had occurred; but even so remarkable an incident still left me sufficiently at sea to cause him to continue: "Why, the effect of those spectacles!"
I seemed to catch the tail of his idea. "Mrs. Meldrum's?"
"They're so awfully ugly and they add so to the dear woman's ugliness." This remark began to flash a light, and when he quickly added "She sees herself, she sees her own fate!" my response was so immediate that I had almost taken the words out of his mouth. While I tried to fix this sudden image of Flora's face glazed in and cross-barred even as Mrs. Meldrum's was glazed and barred, he went on to assert that only the horror of that image, looming out at herself, could be the reason of her avoiding the person who so forced it home. The fact he had encountered made everything hideously vivid, and more vivid than anything else that just such another pair of goggles was what would have been prescribed to Flora.
"I see--I see," I presently returned. "What would become of Lord Iffield if she were suddenly to come out in them? What indeed would become of every one, what would become of everything?" This was an enquiry that Dawling was evidently unprepared to meet, and I completed it by saying at last: "My dear fellow, for that matter, what would become of YOU?"
Once more he turned on me his good green eyes. "Oh I shouldn't mind!"
The tone of his words somehow made his ugly face beautiful, and I discovered at this moment how much I really liked him. None the less, at the same time, perversely and rudely, I felt the droll side of our discussion of such alternatives. It made me laugh out and say to him while I laughed: "You'd take her even with those things of Mrs. Meldrum's?"
He remained mournfully grave; I could see that he was surprised at my rude mirth. But he summoned back a vision of the lady at Folkestone and conscientiously replied: "Even with those things of Mrs. Meldrum's." I begged him not to resent my laughter, which but exposed the fact that we had built a monstrous castle in the air. Didn't he see on what flimsy ground the structure rested? The evidence was preposterously small. He believed the worst, but we were really uninformed.
"I shall find out the truth," he promptly replied.
"How can you? If you question her you'll simply drive her to perjure herself. Wherein after