The Parts Men Play | Page 6

became adamant.

Life in the Durwent _ménage_ developed into a thing of laws and
customs dictated by the youthful despot, aided and abetted by his father.
The sacred rites of 'what isn't done' were established, and the mother
gradually found herself in the position of an outsider--a privileged
outsider, it is true, yet little more than the breeder of a thoroughbred,
admitted to the paddock to watch his horse run by its new owner.
She vented her feelings in two or three tearful scenes, but she felt that
they lacked spontaneity, and didn't really put her heart into them.
During these struggles for her place in a Society that was probably
more completely masculine in domination than any in the world (with
the possible exception of that of the Turk), Lady Durwent was only
dimly aware that her daughter was developing a personality which
presented a much greater problem than that of the easily grooved
Malcolm.
The girl's hair was like burnished copper, and her cheeks were lit by
two bits of scarlet that could be seen at a distance before her features
were discernible. Her eyes were of a gray-blue that changed in shade
with her swiftly varying moods. Her lower lip was full and red, the
upper one firm and repressed with the dull crimson of a fading
rose-petal. Her shapely arms and legs were restless, seemingly
impatient to break into some quickly moving dance. She was
extraordinarily alive. Vitality flashed from her with every gesture, and
her mind, a thing of caprice and whim, knew no boundaries but those
of imagination itself.
Puzzled and entirely unable to understand anything so instinctive, Lady
Durwent engaged a governess who was personally recommended by
Lady Chisworth, whose friend the Countess of Oxeter had told her that
the three daughters of the Duchess of Dulworth had all been entrusted
to her care.
In spite of this almost unexampled set of references, the governess was
completely unable to cope with Elise Durwent. She taught her (among
other things) decorum and French. Her pupil was openly irreverent
about the first; and when the governess, after the time-honoured

method, produced an endless vista of exceptions to the rule in French
grammar, the girl balked. She was willing to compromise on Avoir, but
mutinied outright at the ramifications of _Être_.
Seeing that the child was making poor progress, and as it was out of the
question to dismiss a governess who had been entrusted with the three
daughters of the Duchess of Dulworth, Lady Durwent sent for
reinforcement in the person of the organist of their church, and bade
him teach Elise the art of the piano. With the dull lack of vision
belonging to men of his type, he failed to recognise the spirit of music
lying in her breast, merely waiting the call to spring into life. He knew
that her home was one where music was unheard, and his method of
unfolding to the girl the most spiritual and fundamental of all the arts
was to give her SCALES. He was a kindly, well-intentioned fellow,
and would not willingly have hurt a sparrow; but he took a nature
doomed to suffer for lack of self-expression, and succeeded in walling
up the great river of music which might have given her what she lacked.
He hid the edifice and offered her scaffolding--then wondered.
II.
Elise was consistent in few things, but her love for Richard, the
youngest of the family, was of a depth and a mature tenderness that
never varied. Doomed to an insufficient will-power and an easy, plastic
nature that lent itself readily to the abbreviation 'Dick,' he quickly
succumbed to his fiery-tinted sister, and became a willing dupe in all
her escapades.
At her order he turned the hose on the head-gardener; when told to put
mucilage on the rector's chair at dinner, he merely asked for the pot. On
six different occasions she offered him soap, telling him it was toffy,
and each time he bit of it generously and without suspicion. Every one
else in the house represented law and order to him--Elise was the spirit
of outlawry, and he her slave. She taught him a dance of her own
invention entitled 'The Devil and the Maiden' (with a certain
inconsistency casting him as the maiden and herself as the Devil), and
frequently, when ordered to go to bed, they would descend to the
servants' quarters and perform it to the great delight of the family

retainers.
A favourite haunt of theirs was the stables, where they would persuade
the grooms to place them on their father's chargers; and they were
frequent visitors at feeding-time, taking a never-ending delight in the
gourmandism of the whinnying beasts, and finding particular joy in
acquiring the language and the mannerisms of the stablemen, which