A Great Success | Page 7

run--such an excitement!"
"I don't know," said Doris, coolly. "I think I did--sometimes. The
question is how long it will last."
She looked, smiling, at her interrogator.
The gentleman with the whiskers stooped across the table.

"Oh, nothing lasts in this world. But that of course is what makes a
good time so good."
Doris turned towards him--demurring--for the sake of conversation. "I
never could understand how Cinderella enjoyed the ball."
"For thinking of the clock?" laughed Sir Luke. "No, no!--you can't
mean that. It's the expectation of the clock that doubles the pleasure. Of
course you agree, Rachel!"--he turned to her--"else why did you read
me that very doleful poem yesterday, on this very theme?--that it's only
the certainty of death that makes life agreeable? By the way, George
Eliot had said it before!"
"The poem was by a friend of mine," said Lady Dunstable, coldly. "I
read it to you to see how it sounded. But I thought it poor stuff."
"How unkind of you! The man who wrote it says he lives upon your
friendship."
"That, perhaps, is why he's so thin."
Sir Luke laughed again.
"To be sure, I saw the poor man--after you had talked to him the other
night--going to Dunstable to be consoled. Poor George! he's always
healing the wounds you make."
"Of course. That's why I married him. George says all the civil things.
That sets me free to do the rude ones."
"Rachel!" The exclamation came from the plump lady opposite, who
was smiling broadly, and showing some very white teeth. A signal
passed from her eyes to those of Doris, as though to say "Don't be
alarmed!"
But Doris was not at all alarmed. She was eagerly watching Lady
Dunstable, as one watches for the mannerisms of some well-known
performer. Sir Luke perceived it, and immediately began to show off

his hostess by one of the sparring matches that were apparently
frequent between them. They fell to discussing a party of
guests--landowners from a neighbouring estate--who seemed to have
paid a visit to Crosby Ledgers the day before. Lady Dunstable had not
enjoyed them, and her tongue on the subject was sharpness itself,
restrained by none of the ordinary compunctions. "Is this how she talks
about all her guests--on Monday morning?" thought Doris, with
quickened pulse as the biting sentences flew about.
... "Mr. Worthing? Why did he marry her? Oh, because he wanted a
stuffed goose to sit by the fire while he went out and amused himself....
Why did she marry him? Ah, that's more difficult to answer. Is one
obliged to credit Mrs. Worthing with any reasons--on any subject?
However, I like Mr. Worthing--he's what men ought to be."
"And that is--?" Doris ventured to put in.
"Just--men," said Lady Dunstable, shortly.
Sir Luke laughed over his cigarette.
"That you may fool them? Well, Rachel, all the same, you would die of
Worthing's company in a month."
"I shouldn't die," said Lady Dunstable, quietly. "I should murder."
"Hullo, what's my wife talking about?" said a bluff and friendly voice.
Doris looked up to see a handsome man with grizzled hair approaching.
"Mrs. Meadows? How do you do? What a beautiful evening you've
brought! Your husband and I have been having a jolly talk. My
word!--he's a clever chap. Let me congratulate you on the lectures.
Biggest success known in recent days!"
Doris beamed upon her host, well pleased, and he settled down beside
her, doing his kind best to entertain her. In him, all those protective
feelings towards a stranger, in which his wife appeared to be
conspicuously lacking, were to be discerned on first acquaintance.

Doris was practically sure that his inner mind was thinking--"Poor little
thing!--knows nobody here. Rachel's been scaring her. Must look after
her!"
And look after her he did. He was by no means an amusing companion.
Lazy, gentle, and ineffective, Doris quickly perceived that he was
entirely eclipsed by his wife, who, now that she was relieved of Mrs.
Meadows, was soon surrounded by a congenial company--the Home
Secretary, one or two other politicians, the old General, a literary Dean,
Lord Staines, a great racing man, Arthur Meadows, and one or two
more. The talk became almost entirely political--with a dash of
literature. Doris saw at once that Lady Dunstable was the centre of it,
and she was not long in guessing that it was for this kind of talk that
people came to Crosby Ledgers. Lady Dunstable, it seemed, was
capable of talking like a man with men, and like a man of affairs with
the men of affairs. Her political knowledge was astonishing; so,
evidently, was her background of family and tradition, interwoven
throughout with English political history. English statesmen had not
only dandled her, they had taught her, walked with her,