to be reckoned with. But to lose him at the outset by a silly falsehood would be galling. A man who has to live in the world as a married man must not begin by making a mystery of his wife. He felt the social stupidity of what he had done, yet could not find in himself the courage to set it right.
Well, well, let him only make a hit in the Academy, sell his picture, and get some commissions. Then Phoebe should appear, and smile down astonishment. His gaucherie should be lost in his success.
He tossed about that night, sleepless, and thinking of Cuningham's two hundred and fifty pounds—for a picture so cheaply, commonly clever. It filled him with the thirst to arrive. He had more brains, more drawing, more execution—more everything!—than Cuningham. No doubt a certain prudence and tact were wanted—tact in managing yourself and your gifts.
Well!—in spite of Watson's rude remark, what human being knew he was writing those articles in the Mirror? He threw out his challenge to the darkness, and so fell asleep.
CHAPTER IV
Fenwick had never spent a more arduous hour than that which he devoted to the business of dressing for Lord Findon's dinner-party. It was his first acquaintance with dress-clothes. He had, indeed, dined once or twice at the tables of the Westmoreland gentry in the course of his portrait-painting experiences. But there had been no 'party,' and it had been perfectly understood that for the Kendal bookseller's son a black Sunday coat was sufficient. Now, however, he was to meet the great world on its own terms; and though he tried hard to disguise his nervousness from his sponsor, Philip Cuningham, he did not succeed. Cuningham instructed him where to buy a second-hand dress-suit that very nearly fitted him, and he had duly provided himself with gloves and tie. When all was done he put his infinitesimal looking-glass on the floor of his attic, flanked it with two guttering candles, and walked up and down before it in a torment, observing his own demeanour and his coat's, saying 'How d'ye do?' and 'Good-bye' to an imaginary host, or bending affably to address some phantom lady across the table.
When at last he descended the stairs, he felt as though he were just escaped from a wrestling-match. He followed Cuningham into the omnibus with nerves all on edge. He hated the notion, too, of taking an omnibus to go and dine in St. James's Square. But Cuningham's Scotch thriftiness scouted the proposal of a hansom.
On the way Fenwick suddenly asked his companion whether there was a Lady Findon. Cuningham, startled by the ignorance of his protégé, drew out as quickly as he could la carte du pays.
Lady Findon, the second wife, fat, despotic, and rich, rather noisy, and something of a character, a political hostess, a good friend, and a still better hater; two sons, silent, good-looking and clever, one in the brewery that provided his mother with her money, the other in the Hussars; two daughters not long 'introduced'—one pretty—the other bookish and rather plain; so ran the catalogue.
'I believe there is another daughter by the first wife—married—something queer about the husband. But I've never seen her. She doesn't often appear—Hullo—here we are.'
They alighted at the Haymarket, and as they walked down the street Fenwick found himself in the midst of the evening whirl of the West End. The clubs were at their busiest; men passed them in dress-suits and overcoats like themselves, and the street was full of hansoms, whence the faces of well-dressed women, enveloped in soft silks and furs, looked out.
Fenwick felt himself treading a new earth. At such an hour he was generally wending his way to a Bloomsbury eating-house, where he dined for eighteenpence; he was a part of the striving, moneyless student-world.
But here, from this bustling Haymarket with its gay, hurrying figures, there breathed new forces, new passions which bewildered him. As he was looking at the faces in the carriages, the jewels and feathers and shining stuffs, he thought suddenly and sharply of Phoebe sitting alone at her supper in the tiny cottage room. His heart smote him a little. But, after all, was he not on her business as well as his own?
The door of Lord Findon's house opened before them. At sight of the liveried servants within, Fenwick's pride asserted itself. He walked in, head erect, as though the place belonged to him.
Lord Findon came pleasantly to greet them as they entered the drawing-room, and took them up to Lady Findon. Cuningham she already knew, and she gave a careless glance and a touch of the hand to his companion. It was her husband's will to ask these raw, artistic youths to dinner, and she had to put up with it; but really the difficulty of knowing whom to send them in with was enormous.
'I am glad to make your acquaintance,' she said, mechanically, to Fenwick, as he stood awkwardly beside her, while her eyes searched the door for a Cabinet Minister and his wife who were the latest guests.
'Thank you; I too am pleased to make yours,' said Fenwick, nervously pulling at his gloves, and furious with his own malaise.
Lady Findon's eyebrows lifted in amusement. She threw him another glance.
Good-looking!—but really Findon should wait till they were a little décrotté.
'I hear your picture is charming,' she said, distractedly; and then, suddenly perceiving the expected figures, she swept forward to receive them.
'Very sorry, my dear fellow, we have no lady for you; but you will be next my daughter, Madame de Pastourelles,' said Lord Findon, a few minutes later, in his ear, passing him with a nod and a smile. His gay, half-fatherly ways with these rising talents were well known. They made part of his fame with his contemporaries; a picturesque element in his dinner-parties which the world appreciated.
Fenwick found his way rather sulkily to the dining-room. It annoyed him that Cuningham had a lady and he had none. His companion on the road downstairs was the private secretary, who tried good-naturedly to point out the family portraits on the staircase wall. But Fenwick scarcely replied. He stalked on, his great black eyes glancing restlessly from side to side; and the private secretary thought him a boor.
As he was standing bewildered inside the dining-room a servant caught hold of him and piloted him to his seat. A lady in white, who was already seated in the next chair, looked up and smiled.
'My father told me we were to be neighbours. I must introduce myself.'
She held out a small hand, which, in his sudden pleasure, Fenwick grasped more cordially than was necessary. She withdrew it smiling, and he sat down, feeling himself an impulsive ass, intimidated by the lights, the flowers, the multitude of his knives and forks, and most of all, perhaps, by this striking and brilliant creature beside him.
Madame de Pastourelles was of middle height, slenderly built, with pale-brown hair, and a delicately white face, of a very perfect oval. She had large, quiet eyes, darker than her hair; features small, yet of a noble outline—strength in refinement. The proud cutting of the nose and mouth gave delight; it was a pride so unconscious, so masked in sweetness, that it challenged without wounding. The short upper lip was sensitive and gay; the eyes ranged in a smiling freedom; the neck and arms were beautiful. Her dress, according to the Whistlerian phrase just coming into vogue, might have been called an 'arrangement in white.' The basis of it seemed to be white velvet; and breast and hair were powdered with diamonds delicately set in old flower-like shapes.
'You are in the same house with Mr. Cuningham?' she asked, when a dean had said grace and the soup was served. Her voice was soft and courteous; the irritation in Fenwick
