MRS3 The Velvet Hand (12 page)

Full of the liveliest curiosity, I went down in the lift to the grand saloon on F deck. I had picked out my table, on the plan. But when I took my place I saw that table 120 was as yet unoccupied, and for a few minutes I was able to apply myself to my luncheon undistracted. Comical it is, during the first meal aboard ship, to see everybody taking stock of everybody else.

While they were still fifty feet away from their table, I recognized my couple by intuition. Among that shipload of distinguished and expensive-looking people, nearly all heads turned to follow them as they passed through the saloon. What is the mysterious quality in people that causes all heads to turn? Personality, of course. Yet I have noticed that a determination not to be overlooked serves almost as well.

The lady walked first. My rapid first impressions ran: an ugly, attractive woman with a good-humoured smile; some years older than her husband, but sure of her power over him; frankly made up; hard to tell where nature ends and art begins; but made up with the view of accentuating her own personality; beautifully dressed in the extreme of the mode, but without overstepping the bounds of good taste. The sort of woman who has raised dress to the dignity of a fine art. In short, a highly interesting subject.

The man was more ordinary. He was of the type that used to be called the haw-haw Englishman. Very good-looking, to be sure, with curly dark hair, bright blue eyes, and a lazy, athletic frame. But rather sullen-looking. This I realized on closer examination was merely the result of stupidity. He was thick. But an uncommonly handsome animal. Some women ask no more of a man, of course. He was turned out in a masculine style as finished as his wife's in hers. The English have without doubt the best-dressed men in the world.

Their manners were better than those of most of the people in our vicinity. They looked at nobody but took their places without the least self-consciousness, and talked to each other in low tones with light smiles. You cannot be sure about married people on parade, of course; they might have been quarrelling fiercely. Still I gathered that the young man with his expression of haughty disdain (nothing in the world but stupidity) still looked on his wife as rather a wonderful person, and was like putty in her quick, pretty hands. And well he might; I thought her rather wonderful myself.

I was too far away to hear anything of their conversation; so my impressions were confined to the visual. I said she was an ugly woman; I mean her mouth was too wide and her nose too flat. I began to recognize her type, which is a rare one, and monstrously effective. She had the air of flaunting her ugliness; as much as to say: my ugliness is more charming than the insipid beauty of other women. Ah, how clever that is! Such a woman is like a breath of fresh air in a hothouse. Mere beauty is a bit overdone. Indeed, I was so strongly attracted by her, I was finally obliged to pull myself up roundly. Look here, I reminded myself, she's a crook, and this charm of hers is her stock in trade.

The only thing that might possibly have suggested that Mrs. Dartrey was otherwise than as she seemed, was her continual alertness. She was always on the qui vive. But then many perfectly respectable people are like that. In fact, never to be caught napping is the essence of a smart, worldly manner.

When I had learned all that my eyes would tell me, I finished my luncheon and made ready to leave the dining saloon. My way out lay behind Mrs. Dartrey's chair. In the instant of passing I caught these murmured words:

"... cut up rough at this late date ..."

Which was piquant but not very informative.

I telephoned my impressions to Mme Storey when she returned to her cabin. "If you want to look her over you may know her by her costume," I added. "She is wearing a very smart sports dress of Paddy-green silk, with pleated bishop's sleeves caught tightly at the wrists, and a pleated skirt. A rakish little white hat with a tiny green feather stuck in the band."

"The deck steward has placed her chair next to yours on Deck B," said Mme Storey. "I shall have plenty of chances to size her up as I stroll by."

I sought my deck chair. Sure enough, the chair alongside was marked "Mrs. Dartrey" on its little ticket. I sat down prepared to await developments, with a book for camouflage.

But the passing throng was more interesting than the book. After the sultry pavements of the city, the sea air was delightfully invigorating; and it appeared as if nearly everybody on board had the impulse to promenade after lunch. What a throng! Soldier, sailor, tinker, tailor, rich man—and, no doubt, if the truth were known, poor man, beggarman, thief. Not to speak of their ladies. After all, the crowd on board the queen of liners was much the same as the crowd on any liner, only there were more of them. There is a tradition that really distinguished people must keep to the seclusion of their cabins. I suppose it helps keep up the fiction of their exclusiveness, but it must be very dull for them.

After a while I saw my lady coming, her billowing green dress visible from afar. But she had no intention of stopping at her chair. Although we had been but three hours at sea, she already had three admirers: an elegant youth, a very solid business man, and a rather distinguished-looking foreigner. She was walking so fast as to make them all appear slightly ridiculous in their efforts to keep pace with her, and avoid colliding with slower promenaders.

I noticed that she was a little too broad for the pure line of beauty; the pleated dress was subtly designed to minimize it. Not that she seemed to care. She hastened along regardless, her long eyes sparkling, and her carmined mouth at its widest as she flung back a vivacious word now to one, now another of her followers. Every time they passed, I caught a snatch; but this time I did not feel that I was missing much. This sort of rattle is always the same.

After about half a dozen tours of the promenade deck she stopped in front of me and in her downright way plumped into her chair. "Run along now," she said coolly to the men. "I'm going to invite my soul. And perhaps I shall take forty winks. You may wake me up at tea time."

It was odd to see how, the moment they left her, the three men flew apart from each other with indifferent looks.

Mrs. Dartrey instantly turned to me with her attractively and disarming grin. "I adore men," she said; "but suddenly you tire of them, don't you?"

The suddenness of her approach disconcerted me rather, but of course it was quite proper for me to betray a little diffidence. "Well, I don't know," I said.

"Don't you like men?" she asked.

"Yes, but——"

Without waiting for me to finish she rattled on: "I'm so glad the deck-steward didn't put a man next to me, or I shouldn't have been able to escape the creature. Women are much more comfortable as a steady diet."

"Do you think so?"

"Yes. The reason men tire you is because you cannot be honest with them."

"I should have said from what I overheard that you——"

"Oh, I only make believe to be honest with them. They like that. It flatters them. But if you were
really
honest, heavens! they would fly in terror!"

We laughed together.

"But the dear things!" Mrs. Dartrey resumed. "They lend a spice to life, don't they?"

"I have known very few men," I said.

"Really!" she said. "I suppose you're a sensible woman."

"Ah, don't say that! No woman wants to be thought that."

"I wish I had more sense," she said with a sigh. "It's high time. There's nothing in this game, really. But somehow, without a lot of men running in and out, the world would seem very empty to me. Do you remember the old song:

"'Reuben, Reuben, I've been thinking,
What a queer wurruld this would be,
If the men were all transported
Far beyond the Northern sea.'"

"I have heard it," I said.

"You're too young to remember when it was all the rage," said Mrs. Dartrey.

"Too young!" I exclaimed. "I am certainly as old as you."

"Ah, my dear lady, if you knew!" she cried. "But I shan't tell you.... Not that I care much, either. For youth and beauty are not nearly so important as women suppose. I have neither, and I still attract men. I am much more popular than I was as a debutante.... What is important is zest. To be in love with life, to be in love with love! That is the thing. Apparently, when a person is really crazy about living, he or she gives off certain rays—I am no metaphysician and I can't explain it, but apparently it's irresistible. So, although my hair is growing gray under the dye, and my hips are elephantine, I am not worrying, because I cannot feel the slightest falling off in my zest. When I become absolutely raddled with age I shall live in Paris, because Frenchmen do not mind how old a woman is if she still has verve.... Do I shock you?"

"Ah, no! no!" I said quickly. "Please don't say that. One becomes so tired of small talk."

"Yes, and on shipboard it is particularly small," said Mrs. Dartrey. "Effect of the sea air, I suppose. I simply won't stand for it—except perhaps from a handsome man. They rarely have any sense. But not from women. I insist on saying whatever comes into my head, and if it's too strong for the dears, I move on."

"Well, please don't move on from me," I begged. Mindful of the character I was playing, I added: "I have had scarcely any experience of life, and such talk is like an invigorating breath from the great world."

"You have not the look of an inexperienced woman," she ventured.

"I've had a long struggle with myself," I said, "I suppose that makes me look like a veteran."

"Not a veteran, my dear, but a gallant young captain."

This provided me with opportunity to tell my simple tale. How I had been immured in a tiresome Middle West village for years and years, tending my father and mother and watching life slip by. How at length Death had released me, and I was venturing forth to seek experience, too late, I feared.

"Not too late if you have the wherewithal," she said, with rather a vulgar little gesture of counting money. She had many little vulgarities which, somehow, were not offensive in her.

"Oh, I have plenty of money," I said with a grand carelessness. "But I don't know how to—how to get on with people."

She did not rise to my little lure. If she had any scheme for helping me to get rid of my money, she kept it to herself. She merely made sympathetic sounds, and that kitten mind of hers darted off at a tangent.

"I can scarcely wait for evening! I have a duck of a frock to sport to-night. Picked it up yesterday in New York. Little shop on Forty-fifth Street. I prophesy that European women will soon be coming to New York to buy their clothes. It's wonderful. Oh, how I adore pretty clothes! Black net, my dear, over strange bright shades of green and blue. Under the net there is black malines cut in panels which separate when you walk showing the vivid colours," etc., etc.

When I could get a word in, I cast another fly. "Would you advise Paris or London for me?"

"Do you speak French?" she asked.

"Oh, a little book French."

"Then I'd say London. Book French will order you what you want, but you cannot make friends on it. Except, of course, with Americans in Paris. Somehow, I always detest my own countrymen abroad. They're neither fish, flesh, nor good red herring."

In turn she told me a good deal about herself, but nothing very confidential. Much of it I had already heard from Sir Angus. I noticed one discrepancy. Mrs. Dartrey said that she and her husband were obliged to make frequent trips to and fro across the Atlantic, because they lived in England and all her husband's money was invested in America. I knew from Sir Angus that the money was hers. This seemed like unusual delicacy on her part.

We had a long talk. I liked the woman amazingly.

Promptly at four o'clock two of her swains were to be seen approaching from opposite directions. Mrs. Dartrey's eyes sparkled afresh.

"Ah, the dears!" she cried. "Having put them out of my mind for an hour, I am prepared to adore them again.... You and I have had a good time, too, haven't we? It is so stimulating to meet an intelligent woman. We shall see more of each other. Adieu, for the present."

She sprang out of the chair like a girl, and with a swing linked arms with the two men as they came up. They paused for a moment, discussing what they should do. Mrs. Dartrey turned up her ugly nose at the suggestion of tea. The third admirer being seen to approach at that moment, it was decided to go up to the smoking room for a man's drink and a couple of rubbers of bridge.

I gave them ten minutes and then proceeded to make a tour of A deck myself. Through the windows of the smoking room I perceived that they were indeed absorbed in their game. Dartrey was there too, in another game. I decided that they were good for at least an hour and that I might safely venture to visit Mme Storey, who had told me that she would be taking tea in her own suite.

I found her on the enchanting veranda of the Imperial suite, clad in a lovely négligé, and reclining in a chaise longue, looking over the sea. The pleasant-faced girl was reading to her from "Le Mort d'Arthur," but my mistress was almost asleep.

"Ah, Bella, what heavenly comfort!" she murmured. "The sense of the book is lost on me, but the music of the old English charms my soul!"

The girl vanished. Mme Storey raised herself and lighted a cigarette. "What luck?" she asked.

I reported my conversation with Mrs. Dartrey word for word, as nearly as I could remember it. Mme Storey, listening with a half smile, made no comment except to murmur occasionally:

"She is cleverer than I thought!"

When I had done she asked: "What do you think of her?"

"I like her," I said at once. "Who could help doing so? An impulsive, scatter-brained, fascinating woman, full of vim and go. Such a person is like a stove in a cold room. I think Sir Angus must be mistaken. To me she seems perfectly transparent. To imitate that sort of thing would require a cleverness too infernal."

"Nevertheless, I believe she is just as clever as that," said Mme Storey. "She doesn't exactly imitate that honest air. She plays up her own natural self to gain her ends. The honest dishonest people, my dear, are the most subtle deceivers of all. And she's really attractive, of course, or she wouldn't have a soft job on the
Gigantic
."