The Powers and Maxine | Page 3

felt that I could hate him, as much as I've always hated Di, deep down in my heart. At that minute I should have liked to kill her, and watch his face when he found her lying dead--out of his reach for ever.
"Besides," he hurried on, "I've never asked her yet if she would marry me, because--my prospects weren't very brilliant. She knows of course that I love her--"
"And if you get the consulship, you'll put the important question?" I cut him short, trying to be flippant.
"Yes. But I told you tonight, because I--because you were so kind, I felt I should like to have you know."
Kind! Yes, I had been too kind. But if by putting out my foot I could have crushed every hope of his for the future--every hope, that is, in which my stepsister Diana Forrest had any part--I would have done it, just as I trample on ants in the country sometimes, for the pleasure of feeling that I--even I--have power of life and death.
I swallowed hard, to keep the sobs back. I'm never very strong or well, but now I felt broken, ready to die. I was glad when I heard the music stop in the ballroom.
"There!" I said. "The two dances you asked me to sit out with you are over. I'm sure you're engaged for the next."
"Yes, Imp, I am."
"To Di?"
"No, I have Number 13 with her."
"Thirteen! Unlucky number."
"Any number is lucky that gives me a chance with her. The next one, coming now, is with Mrs. George Allendale."
"Oh, yes, the actor manager's wife. She goes everywhere; and Lord Mountstuart likes theatrical celebrities. This house ought to be very serious and political, but we have every sort of creature--provided it's an amusing, or successful, or good-looking one. By the way, used Maxine de Renzie to come here, when she was acting in London at George Allendale's theatre? That was before Di and I arrived on the scene, you remember."
"I remember. Oh, yes, she came here. It was in this house I met her first, off the stage, I believe."
"What a sweet memory! Wasn't Mrs. George awfully jealous of her husband when he had such a fascinating beauty for his leading lady?"
"I never heard that she was."
"You needn't look cross with me. I'm not saying anything against your gorgeous Maxine."
"Of course not. Nobody could. But you mustn't call Miss de Renzie 'my Maxine,' please, Imp."
"I beg your pardon," I said. "You see, I've heard other people call her that--in joke. And you dedicated your book about Lhassa, that made you such a famous person, to her, didn't you?"
"No. What made you think that?" He was really annoyed now, and I was pleased--if anything could please me, in my despair.
"Why, everybody thinks it. It was dedicated to 'M.R.' as if the name were a secret, so--"
"'Everybody' is very stupid then. 'M.R.' is an old lady, my god-mother, who helped me with money for my expedition to Lhassa, otherwise I couldn't have gone. And she isn't of the kind that likes to see her name in print. Now, where shall I take you, Imp? Because I must go and look for Mrs. Allendale."
"I'll stay where I am, thank you," I said, "and watch you dance--from far off. That's my part in life, you know: watching other people dance from far off."
When he was gone, I leaned back among the cushions, and I wasn't sure that one of my heart attacks would not come on. I felt horribly alone, and deserted; and though I hate Di, and always have hated her, ever since the tiny child and her mother (a beautiful, rich, young Californian widow) came into my father's house in New York, she does know how to manage me better than anyone else, when I am in such moods. I could have screamed for her, as I sat there helplessly looking through the open doors: and then, at last, I saw her, as if my wish had been a call which had reached her ears over the music in the ballroom.
She had stopped dancing, and with her partner (Lord Robert, again) entered the room which lay between our "den" and the ballroom, Probably they would have gone on to the conservatory, which can be reached in that way, but I cried her name as loudly as I could, and she heard. Only a moment she paused--long enough to send Lord Robert away--and then she came straight to me. He must have been furious: but I didn't care for that.
I had been wanting her badly, but when I saw her, so bright and beautiful, looking as if she were the joy of life made incarnate, I should have liked to strike her hard, first on one cheek and then the other, deepening the rose to crimson,