Chapter SIX

On the night of his arrival in England, Aylmer dined with his friend Peyton at his father’s house in Wimbledon. Peyton senior had an exceedingly flourishing business, and was a man of considerable wealth. If he had been possessed of a pushing temperament, or had married an ambitious woman, he might have forced his way into the select circles of London society. But both he and his wife came from good, sound commercial stock and were content to abide by middle-class ideals. They did not care to expose themselves to the chance of being snubbed by their so-called social superiors, or to purchase a tepid toleration on account of their money-bags and by giving lavish entertainments.

“Some people like that sort of thing, are always straining every nerve to get out of their own sphere,” he would say when he discussed the subject with his friends. “But our inclinations don’t lie that way. Claude will be a rich man some day, and I dare say, if we worked for it, he could marry the daughter of some impecunious peer and be patronized by her relations. That wouldn’t suit me, and I hope he will never have any hankerings in that direction. He’d find more happiness with some nice girl of his own class. And the same applies to the two girls.”

He had brought up his children in these sturdy and independent principles, and, having inherited the sound common sense of their parents, they acquiesced very cheerfully in what some might have called his lack of ambition.

His eldest daughter, Laura, was married to a prosperous manufacturer in the Midlands. The younger, Kate, was engaged to a barrister some ten years her senior, who was fast securing a lucrative practice. Claude, the only son and youngest of the trio, at present, had no desire to settle down. There would be plenty of time for that, and when he did marry he might be reckoned upon to make a sensible choice.

And Mr. Peyton was perfectly happy in his mode of life, and his money gave him every comfort and luxury that he wanted. He was quite content to go to his office every day, to take his annual holiday abroad, to entertain his own particular business friends and be entertained by them, in return.

Certainly, it was a very comfortable house, or rather mansion, that he lived in, and staffed by a capable set of servants. The old gentleman spent his money lavishly and was fond of good living. But, not a year passed that he did not put by a considerable sum out of his big profits. With his sound commercial principles, he could no more have lived up to his income than he could have flown. According to his gospel, it was the duty of every man to work hard and save for his wife and children.

It was quite a family party, the host and hostess, the engaged daughter and her fiancé the rising barrister, and the two young men. Mr. Peyton liked Aylmer very much personally. But, to his son, he always expressed his profound regret that he led such an idle life, that he did not do something.

“I know he has plenty of money,” he would say, “but that ought to be an incentive to him to make more. My father left me a snug little sum, but I didn’t chuck the shop and go and live on the interest of it. I stuck to the business, and I shall stick to it as long as my mental and bodily faculties last. Better wear out than rust out, my dear boy.”

In the main, the young man agreed with his father, although he was not quite such a whole-hearted believer in the gospel of work as the old gentleman. Thanks to a superior education, he had developed more interests in life. The existence of Peyton senior was circumscribed by the area of his office; he cared nothing for art, literature, or music. Even a too long holiday bored him. Truth to tell, he had developed into something of a business machine. Claude had made up his mind that long before his father’s age he would enjoy a well-earned leisure, and amuse himself with distractions that did not appeal to the rigidly bourgeois mind, which has a tendency to hold self-culture at arm’s length as being an unprofitable occupation.

Aylmer was very fond of young Claude, but though he respected the parents exceedingly for many things, he found them a bit stodgy.

The old gentleman could talk only on two subjects, business and politics. On the latter he would discourse with considerable fervor. But, as he was a violent Tory of the die-hard school, and more than a little intolerant of more moderate opinion, it was difficult to listen to him with much satisfaction. Mrs. Peyton was a splendid housekeeper, and ran the establishment like a machine; but, in other respects she was quite a colorless person.

Kate Peyton had inherited the strong common sense of her parents, but she had grafted on to it a few artistic instincts. She liked really good literature and she was a talented musician. It was to be feared that neither her father nor mother enjoyed, to any extent, the classical music she expounded to them. Mrs. Peyton would secretly sigh for the good old waltzes of her girlhood, and her husband had no appreciation of any form of music, gay or severe.

The dinner was a somewhat slow affair. In fact, had it not been for the brilliant efforts of the barrister, a talker by profession, it would have been quite dull. He managed, however, to say enough for the whole party. Claude was a lively enough young fellow on ordinary occasions; but, when in the society of his parents, the stodginess of the atmosphere seemed to weigh him down. His sister was affected in the same way. She was quite an intelligent girl when she found herself in the society of congenial spirits; but she, too, felt the effect of the atmosphere created by these two well-meaning, but very limited, people.

When they all got to the drawing-room after a dinner that left nothing to be desired from the point of view of hospitality--the barrister, who was a great connoisseur of music, begged his fiancée to play for them. Knowing his tastes, she chose some lovely things from Chopin, which gave great pleasure to three people in the room. Poor old Mr. Peyton was observed to nod more than once during the performance, and Aylmer felt pretty sure, by the strained expression on the hostess’s face, that good manners alone prevented her from following the bad example.

After the music was over, they put in an hour in the billiard room, a handsome apartment done up in the choicest style. They played a game of pool, and here Mr. Peyton senior showed to much greater advantage. He was far the best player of the lot, and potted the balls one after another with the most deadly precision.

The barrister returned to town; he had a busy day in the Courts before him. Aylmer had been asked to spend the night, and the two young men went into the smoking room for a final chat and a drink.

“I’m afraid you’ve found it a bit heavy, old man,” remarked Claude to his friend. He had the greatest respect for his parents; but, in common with his sister, he was fully aware of their limitations. “The dear old boy is not cut out for general society, he isn’t giddy enough. Where he shines is when he has a snug little dinner-party of his business friends and can talk shop to his heart’s content. Now, let us have a good powwow. We can stop here as long as we like, for the best thing about him is that he allows his family to do practically what they like, no stupid restrictions or anything of that sort.”

Aylmer politely, if not quite truthfully, disclaimed any impression of “heaviness.” He said some very kind things about the old people, and expressed his pleasure at having met the future son-in-law, whom he considered a most excellent and cultivated fellow.

He thought it time to break to Peyton the news that Quentin had given him an invitation to Hampstead. He was not absolutely certain how Claude would take it, but he was pretty sure there was no paltry jealousy in his composition.

“I rather wonder he didn’t ask you,” he said a little lamely in conclusion. “But I expect you’re a bit too young for him to be quite at his ease with you. I am just the right medium, I suppose.”

When Peyton spoke there was certainly no evidence of pique at the fact that his friend had been preferred to himself. “I’m not at all certain I should have gone if I had been asked,” he said quietly. “Mrs. Quentin gave me to understand at the beginning of our acquaintance that she did not care for very young men, and it may be bad taste on my part, but I never had the slightest inclination to try to arouse her interest. Very charming and all that, but she always struck me as too much of an unknown quantity.

“With regard to the husband, agreeable and plausible as he is, there was something about the man--I can’t in the least define what it was--that failed to attract me. I never had any wish to cultivate a deeper acquaintance. And, of course, you will go? I need not ask that question.”

He looked very searchingly at his friend as he put the query, and Aylmer could not prevent a faint accession of color. “Oh, yes, I shall go,” he answered, assuming as careless a tone as he could with that keen gaze on him. “There is something about the couple that piques my curiosity; I should like to have peep at their home life. When you meet people amongst crowds, there is always something a trifle artificial about them.”

The younger man lowered his glance and made no further comment. But his thoughts were very busy. He had not failed to notice that during the last few days of their stay at Ostend, there had been a certain growth of intimacy in the relations between Eileen and his friend, a certain subtle change of manner in their demeanor towards each other which confirmed his worst fears. Privately, he thought Aylmer was more than foolish in running into obvious peril with a young woman whom he looked upon as a very dangerous siren.

With the calm, practical nature he had inherited from his hard-headed father, there was no chance of his ever involving himself in disastrous entanglements. But Aylmer was of a totally different temperament. That rather quiet manner of his hid a great faculty of romance, a strong tendency to impulse, to act on the spur of the moment. He was just the sort of man to fall an easy victim to the devastating influence of a great passion, to count the world well lost for the sake of love. Claude felt profoundly sorry that his friend ever had come across the Quentins.

And then his thoughts turned upon Quentin himself. He was no fool, this quiet, suave-spoken man. Surely, he must have seen what was so obvious to Peyton himself, that these two were more than ordinarily interested in each other. If he had seen it, why had he gone out of his way to throw them together? Truly, there was something about Quentin he did not fully comprehend.

It was with difficulty he refrained from uttering the words of wisdom which were surging within him, but which, for the best of reasons he forbore. He was well enough acquainted with human nature to know that anything he could say would be useless. A man deeply enamored pays no heed to advice, however sound it may be. Aylmer must know, as well as he did, the danger of the course he was pursuing, and was recklessly stifling his sane judgment. If he was to be saved, nobody could save him but himself.

And, although Aylmer was not as acute in many things as the younger man, he could form a pretty shrewd guess at what was passing in Peyton’s mind, as he sat there very silent, but with a pre-occupied look on his pleasant face. Yes, from his point of view, Peyton was quite right in thinking him a fool. But then, he did not know the real facts of the case, that Eileen was a free woman, free to love without injury to her supposed husband. If she had not made that startling confession to him, he was sure he would have had the strength to decline Quentin’s invitation. He was far too honorable to make love to the wife of another man, however much he adored her in secret.

The next morning, the three men went up to London, father and son to the City offices, Aylmer to his comfortable suite of rooms in Ryder Street, where he was received by his valet, who had taken his own holiday during the time his master was at Ostend.

The young man had a wide circle of friends and acquaintances, not to mention relatives. And he was a popular member of three clubs. Therefore, there was no difficulty in filling up his time, in spite of the fact that he was, in Mr. Peyton’s sense of the word, an idle man. But the days seemed to go very slowly, the real truth being that he was awaiting with feverish anxiety the advent of that important letter from Eileen.

And at last it came. And brief as it was, he read it over half a dozen times, as is the way of ardent lovers. It told him that they had arrived in England four days ago, and she had taken the earliest opportunity of redeeming her promise. She would be waiting outside the Café Mario, the place at which they had appointed to meet, at half-past one.

Needless to say, she did not have to wait; for he took good care to be there before her. His heart beat as he saw the graceful, slender figure coming towards him. And they shook hands warmly, with just a little air of shyness on her side.

The Café Mario was an unpretentious restaurant in the heart of Soho. Of course, he would have preferred to take her to a more palatial establishment; but, when he had suggested the Berkeley or the Savoy, she had said both of those places were too public. He had rather wondered at this, at the time, as he had gathered that she and Quentin knew so few people. But she had been very insistent on the point that they must choose an unfrequented neighborhood.

The café was not very full, and they found a comfortable table at the end of the long narrow room; and, an intelligent waiter, who took them in hand, so to speak, recommended certain dishes in which the establishment excelled.

They were both a little shy at first. But, as the luncheon proceeded, their embarrassment wore off, and they appeared to become more reconciled to the novelty of the situation. But a certain nervousness showed itself in her as fresh patrons entered the place. She had the air of a child doing something which had been forbidden, and is in fear of being found out.

He commented on it at once. “You seem very nervous, dear,” he remarked. It was the first time he had addressed her so intimately, and a swift color came to her cheek. But he was sure she did not resent it. “Why should she?” he asked himself. Having met him in this clandestine fashion was sufficient proof that she cared for him, that she accepted him as a lover.

She smiled a little. “I am not so sure that this is such a safe place. I have heard two or three cronies of Richard’s speak in praise of the Soho restaurants. It would be dreadful if one of them took it into his head to pop in here this particular day.”

He comforted her by declaring that such a coincidence was improbable in the highest degree, and it seemed that she caught some of his confidence. Presently she told him some very interesting news. Quentin, that morning, had spoken of the projected visit to Hampstead, and had intimated his wish that she should write to Aylmer at once, and ask him down to dinner on the Wednesday of the following week. As Hampstead was rather a far cry for such a confirmed Londoner, he was being asked to stay the night.

“I posted that letter as I came along,” she told him in conclusion. “So I expect you will get it by the last post to-night. I suppose we may reckon on your acceptance?”

An eloquent look was his answer. She had got over her nervousness by now, and her manner was more assured. “I am rather glad that we shall have a little time to recover ourselves and get used to the situation. If you had been asked for to-morrow, I think I should have felt dreadfully guilty when we met at Hampstead. As it is, we shall have to keep guard over ourselves, for fear of something slipping out. For instance,” and here she blushed very prettily, “you must not repeat that word you used just now. That would give us away completely.”

“By Jove, it would,” said Aylmer, laughing. “And I shouldn’t know what excuses to make. If I had nieces, I might say I was so accustomed to using the word to them.”

They spent a very happy couple of hours, which she was supposed to have passed in looking at the shops. When they parted, she insisted that she should go out first, and he follow a minute or two later, in case of accidents. If they were not seen together, no tales could be told to Quentin.

Aylmer assented, adding boldly: “But some day we shall have to break the news to him.”

“Ah, some day,” she answered quickly, “but you must wait for me to choose that day. There is just one little thing I want to say to you before we part, a little secret that you ought to know. Richard tells everybody he is not a man of business, but in a certain sense that is untrue. He is very fond of speculation, in which he is not particularly successful. But he has a great belief in his own judgment, and he often invites his friends to join with him. I want you to promise me that if he makes any suggestion of this kind to you, you will firmly decline for any reason you may think fit to invent. Have nothing to do with his schemes, however plausible they may sound. Will you promise me now?”

He did as she asked him, rather marveling at this second confession, which seemed to throw a new light on Quentin’s character. If there was one thing on which he had especially insisted during their brief acquaintance, it was that he had no business aptitude. And yet, according to Eileen’s statement, in a certain sense he was a man of business, though not apparently a very successful one.

By the last post that evening, Eileen’s letter arrived. In it she gave him minute instructions how to find The Laurels, which was situated close to that ancient hostelry Jack Straw’s Castle.

On the appointed day he went to Hampstead by the tube railway as being the quicker way. He knew the neighborhood very well, having often rambled over the Heath and along the various roads that surrounded it, and he soon located the commodious, old-fashioned house standing back from the road in about a couple of acres of well-kept garden.

As he neared the big gate that opened on to a wide carriage drive, he saw a man advancing from the opposite direction. There was something peculiar about this person’s appearance which attracted Aylmer’s attention. He walked with a slight limp, was a little over middle height, and was dressed very shabbily. He was not quite seedy enough to be a tramp, and he was certainly not a workman. But what struck the young man most was the remarkable refinement of his face and figure, at strange variance with his worn and disreputable clothes.

He was nearer the gate by some yards than Aylmer, and on reaching it, he opened it with the air of a man who knew his way. Aylmer followed slowly, and saw him making for the front door. Then, apparently on a second thought, he swung round, and struck into the path leading to the kitchen entrance.

Aylmer rang the bell, wondering what manner of man this strange person could be who so quickly turned from the main entrance, as if the idea had struck him that his shabby attire would convey the idea of an incongruous visitor.