CHAPTER XLI

CONTAINS A REVELATION OF THE ORIGIN OF THE TIGRESS IN DIANA

An afternoon of high summer blazed over London through the City's awning

of smoke, and the three classes of the population, relaxed by the

weariful engagement with what to them was a fruitless heat, were

severally bathing their ideas in dreams of the contrast possible to

embrace: breezy seas or moors, aerial Alps, cool beer. The latter, if

confessedly the lower comfort, is the readier at command; and Thomas

Redworth, whose perspiring frame was directing his inward vision to fly

for solace to a trim new yacht, built on his lines, beckoning from

Southampton Water, had some of the amusement proper to things plucked off

the levels, in the conversation of a couple of journeymen close ahead of

him, as he made his way from a quiet street of brokers' offices to a City

Bank. One asked the other if he had ever tried any of that cold stuff

they were now selling out of barrows, with cream. His companion answered,

that he had not got much opinion of stuff of the sort; and what was it

like?

'Well, it's cheap, it ain't bad; it's cooling. But it ain't refreshing.'

'Just what I reckoned all that newfangle rubbish.'

Without a consultation, the conservatives in beverage filed with a smart

turn about, worthy of veterans at parade on the drill-ground, into a

public-house; and a dialogue chiefly remarkable for absence of point,

furnished matter to the politician's head of the hearer. Provided that

their beer was unadulterated! Beer they would have; and why not, in

weather like this? But how to make the publican honest! And he was not

the only trickster preying on the multitudinous poor copper crowd,

rightly to be protected by the silver and the golden. Revelations of the

arts practised to plump them with raw-earth and minerals in the guise of

nourishment, had recently knocked at the door of the general conscience

and obtained a civil reply from the footman. Repulsive as the thought was

to one still holding to Whiggish Liberalism, though flying various

Radical kites, he was caught by the decisive ultratorrent, and whirled to

amid the necessity for the interference of the State, to stop the

poisoning of the poor. Upper classes have never legislated systematically

in their interests; and quid . . . rabidae tradis ovile lupae? says one

of the multitude. We may be seeing fangs of wolves where fleeces waxed.

The State that makes it a vital principle to concern itself with the

helpless poor, meets instead of waiting for Democracy; which is a

perilous flood but when it is dammed. Or else, in course of time,

luxurious yachting, my friend, will encounter other reefs and breakers

than briny ocean's! Capital, whereat Diana Warwick aimed her superbest

sneer, has its instant duties. She theorized on the side of poverty, and

might do so: he had no right to be theorizing on the side of riches.

Across St. George's Channel, the cry for humanity in Capital was an

agony. He ought to be there, doing, not cogitating. The post of Irish

Secretary must be won by real service founded on absolute local

knowledge. Yes, and sympathy, if you like; but sympathy is for proving,

not prating . . . .

These were the meditations of a man in love; veins, arteries, headpiece

in love, and constantly brooding at a solitary height over the beautiful

coveted object; only too bewildered by her multifarious evanescent

feminine evasions, as of colours on a ruffle water, to think of pouncing

for he could do nothing to soften, nothing that seemed to please her: and

all the while, the motive of her mind impelled him in reflection beyond

practicable limits: even pointing him to apt quotations! Either he

thought within her thoughts, or his own were at her disposal. Nor was it

sufficient for him to be sensible of her influence, to restrain the

impetus he took from her. He had already wedded her morally, and much

that he did, as well as whatever he debated, came of Diana; more than if

they had been coupled, when his downright practical good sense could have

spoken. She held him suspended, swaying him in that posture; and he was

not a whit ashamed of it. The beloved woman was throned on the very

highest of the man.

Furthermore, not being encouraged, he had his peculiar reason for delay,

though now he could offer her wealth. She had once in his hearing derided

the unpleasant hiss of the ungainly English matron's title of Mrs. There

was no harm in the accustomed title, to his taste; but she disliking it,

he did the same, on her special behalf; and the prospect, funereally

draped, of a title sweeter-sounding to her ears, was above his horizon.

Bear in mind, that he underwent the reverse of encouragement. Any small

thing to please her was magnified, and the anticipation of it nerved the

modest hopes of one who deemed himself and any man alive deeply her

inferior.

Such was the mood of the lover condemned to hear another malignant

scandal defiling the name of the woman he worshipped. Sir Lukin Dunstane,

extremely hurried, bumped him on the lower step of the busy Bank, and

said:

'Pardon!' and 'Ha! Redwarth! making money?'

'Why, what are you up to down here?' he was asked, and he answered: 'Down

to the Tower, to an officer quartered there. Not bad quarters, but an

infernal distance. Business.'

Having cloaked his expedition to the distance with the comprehensive

word, he repeated it; by which he feared he had rendered it too

significant, and he said: 'No, no; nothing particular'; and that caused

the secret he contained to swell in his breast rebelliously, informing

the candid creature of the fact of his hating to lie: whereupon thus he

poured himself out, in the quieter bustle of an alley, off the main

thoroughfare. 'You're a friend of hers. I 'm sure you care for her

reputation; you 're an old friend of hers, and she's my wife's dearest

friend; and I'm fond of her too; and I ought to be, and ought to know,

and do know:--pure? Strike off my fist if there's a spot on her

character! And a scoundrel like that fellow Wroxeter! Damnedest rage I

ever was in!--Swears . . . down at Lockton . . . when she was a girl.

Why, Redworth, I can tell you, when Diana Warwick was a girl!'

Redworth stopped him. 'Did he say it in your presence?'

Sir Lukin was drawn-up by the harsh question. 'Well, no; not exactly.' He

tried to hesitate, but he was in the hot vein of a confidence and he

wanted advice. 'The cur said it to a woman--hang the woman! And she hates

Diana Warwick: I can't tell why--a regular snake's hate. By Jove! how

women carp hate!'

'Who is the woman?' said Redworth.

Sir Lukin complained of the mob at his elbows. 'I don't like mentioning

names here.'

A convenient open door of offices invited him to drag his receptacle, and

possible counsellor, into the passage, where immediately he bethought him

of a postponement of the distinct communication; but the vein was too

hot. 'I say, Redworth, I wish you'd dine with me. Let's drive up to my

Club.--Very well, two words. And I warn you, I shall call him out, and

make it appear it 's about another woman, who'll like nothing so much, if

I know the Jezebel. Some women are hussies, let 'em be handsome as

houris. And she's a fire-ship; by heaven, she is! Come, you're a friend

of my wife's, but you're a man of the world and my friend, and you know

how fellows are tempted, Tom Redworth.--Cur though he is, he's likely to

step out and receive a lesson.--Well, he's the favoured cavalier for the

present . . . h'm . . . Fryar-Gannett. Swears he told her,

circumstantially; and it was down at Lockton, when Diana Warwick was a

girl. Swears she'll spit her venom at her, so that Diana Warwick shan't

hold her head up in London Society, what with that cur Wroxeter, Old

Dannisburgh, and Dacier. And it does count a list, doesn't it? confound

the handsome hag! She's jealous of a dark rival. I've been down to

Colonel Hartswood at the Tower, and he thinks Wroxeter deserves

horsewhipping, and we may manage it. I know you 're dead against

duelling; and so am I, on my honour. But you see there are cases where a

lady must be protected; and anything new, left to circulate against a

lady who has been talked of twice--Oh, by Jove! it must be stopped. If

she has a male friend on earth, it must be stopped on the spot.'

Redworth eyed Sir Lukin curiously through his wrath.

'We'll drive up to your Club,' he said.

'Hartswood dines with me this evening, to confer,' rejoined Sir Lukin.

'Will you meet him?'

'I can't,' said Redworth, 'I have to see a lady, whose affairs I have

been attending to in the City; and I 'm engaged for the evening. You

perceive, my good fellow,' he resumed, as they rolled along, 'this is a

delicate business. You have to consider your wife. Mrs. Warwick's, name

won't come up, but another woman's will.'

'I meet Wroxeter at a gambling-house he frequents, and publicly call him

cheat--slap his face, if need be.'

'Sure to!' repeated Redworth. 'No stupid pretext will quash the woman's

name. Now, such a thing as a duel would give pain enough.'

'Of course; I understand,' Sir Lukin nodded his clear comprehension. 'But

what is it you advise, to trounce the scoundrel, and silence him?'

'Leave it to me for a day. Let me have your word that you won't take a

step: positively--neither you nor Colonel Hartswood. I'll see you by

appointment at your Club.' Redworth looked up over the chimneys. 'We 're

going to have a storm and a gale, I can tell you.'

'Gale and storm!' cried Sir Lukin; 'what has that got to do with it?'

'Think of something else for, a time.'

'And that brute of a woman--deuced handsome she is!--if you care for fair

women, Redworth:--she's a Venus, jumped slap out of the waves, and the

Devil for sire--that you learn: running about, sowing her lies. She's a

yellow witch. Oh! but she's a shameless minx. And a black-leg cur like

Wroxeter! Any woman intimate with a fellow like that, stamps herself. I

loathe her. Sort of woman who swears in the morning you're the only man

on earth; and next day--that evening-engaged!--fee to Polly Hopkins--and

it's a gentleman, a nobleman, my lord!--been going on behind your back

half the season!--and she isn't hissed when she abuses a lady, a saint in

comparison! You know the world, old fellow:--Brighton, Richmond, visits

to a friend as deep in the bog. How Fryar-Gunnett--a man, after all--can

stand it! And drives of an afternoon for an airing-by heaven! You're out

of that mess, Redworth: not much taste for the sex; and you're right,

you're lucky. Upon my word, the corruption of society in the present day

is awful; it's appalling.--I rattled at her: and oh! dear me, perks on

her hind heels and defies me to prove: and she's no pretender, but hopes

she's as good as any of my "chaste Dianas." My dear old friend, it's when

you come upon women of that kind you have a sickener. And I'm bound by

the best there is in a man-honour, gratitude, all the' list--to defend

Diana Warwick.'

'So, you see, for your wife's sake, your name can't be hung on a woman of

that kind,' said Redworth. 'I'll call here the day after to-morrow at

three P.M.'

Sir Lukin descended and vainly pressed Redworth to run up into his Club

for refreshment. Said he roguishly:

'Who 's the lady?'

The tone threw Redworth on his frankness.

'The lady I 've been doing business for in the City, is Miss Paynham.'

'I saw her once at Copsley; good-looking. Cleverish?'

'She has ability.'

Entering his Club, Sir Lukin was accosted in the reading-room by a

cavalry officer, a Colonel Launay, an old Harrovian, who stood at the

window and asked him whether it was not Tom Redworth in the cab. Another,

of the same School, standing squared before a sheet of one of the evening

newspapers, heard the name and joined them, saying: 'Tom Redworth is

going to be married, some fellow told me.'

'He'll make a deuced good husband to any woman--if it's true,' said Sir

Lukin, with Miss Paynham ringing in his head. 'He's a cold-blooded old

boy, and likes women for their intellects.'

Colonel Launay hummed in meditative emphasis. He stared at vacancy with a

tranced eye, and turning a similar gaze on Sir Lukin, as if through him,

burst out: 'Oh, by George, I say, what a hugging that woman 'll get!'

The cocking of ears and queries of Sir Lukin put him to the test of his

right to the remark; for it sounded of occult acquaintance with

interesting subterranean facts; and there was a communication, in brief

syllables and the dot language, crudely masculine. Immensely surprised,

Sir Lukin exclaimed: 'Of course! when fellows live quietly and are

careful of themselves. Ah! you may think you know a man for years, and

you don't: you don't know more than an inch or two of him. Why, of

course, Tom Redworth would be uxorious--the very man! And tell us what

has become of the Firefly now? One never sees her. Didn't complain?'

'Very much the contrary.'

Both gentlemen were grave, believing their knowledge in the subterranean

world of a wealthy city to give them a positive cognizance of female

humanity; and the substance of Colonel Launay's communication had its

impressiveness for them.

'Well, it's a turn right-about-face for me,' said Sir Lukin. 'What a

world we live in! I fancy I've hit on the woman he means to marry;--had

an idea of another woman once; but he's one of your friendly fellows with

women. That's how it was I took him for a fish. Great mistake, I admit.

But Tom Redworth 's a man of morals after all; and when those men do

break loose for a plunge--ha! Have you ever boxed with him? Well, he

keeps himself in training, I can tell you.'

Sir Lukin's round of visits drew him at night to Lady Singleby's, where

he sighted the identical young lady of his thoughts, Miss Paynham,

temporarily a guest of the house; and he talked to her of Redworth, and

had the satisfaction to spy a blush, a rageing blush: which avowal

presented her to his view as an exceedingly good-looking girl; so that he

began mentally to praise Redworth for a manly superiority to small

trifles and the world's tattle.

'You saw him to-day,' he said.

She answered: 'Yes. He goes down to Copsley tomorrow.'

'I think not,' said Sir Lukin.'

'I have it from him.' She closed her eyelids in speaking.

'He and I have some rather serious business in town.'

'Serious?'

'Don't be alarmed: not concerning him.'

'Whom, then? You have told me so much--I have a right to know.'

'Not an atom of danger, I assure you?'

'It concerns Mrs. Warwick!' said she.

Sir Lukin thought the guess extraordinary. He preserved an impenetrable

air. But he had spoken enough to set that giddy head spinning.

Nowhere during the night was Mrs. Fryar-Gannett visible. Earlier than

usual, she was riding next day in the Row, alone for perhaps two minutes,

and Sir Lukin passed her, formally saluting. He could not help the look

behind him, she sat so bewitchingly on horseback! He looked, and behold,

her riding-whip was raised erect from the elbow. It was his horse that

wheeled; compulsorily he was borne at a short canter to her side.

'Your commands?'

The handsome Amabel threw him a sombre glance from the corners of her

uplifted eyelids; and snakish he felt it; but her colour and the line of

her face went well with sullenness; and, her arts of fascination cast

aside, she fascinated him more in seeming homelier, girlish. If the trial

of her beauty of a woman in a temper can bear the strain, she has

attractive lures indeed; irresistible to the amorous idler: and when, in

addition, being the guilty person, she plays the injured, her show of

temper on the taking face pitches him into perplexity with his own

emotions, creating a desire to strike and be stricken, howl and set

howling, which is of the happiest augury for tender reconcilement, on the

terms of the gentleman on his kneecap.

'You've been doing a pretty thing!' she said, and briefly she named her

house and half an hour, and flew. Sir Lukin was left to admire the figure

of the horsewoman. Really, her figure had an air of vindicating her

successfully, except for the poison she spat at Diana Warwick. And what

pretty thing had he been doing? He reviewed dozens of speculations until

the impossibility of seizing one determined him to go to Mrs.

Fryar-Gunnett at the end of the half-hour--'Just to see what these women

have to say for themselves.'

Some big advance drops of Redworth's thunderstorm drawing gloomily

overhead, warned him to be quick and get his horse into stables.

Dismounted, the sensational man was irresolute, suspecting a female trap.

But curiosity, combined with the instinctive turning of his nose in the

direction of the lady's house, led him thither, to an accompaniment of

celestial growls, which impressed him, judging by that naughty-girl face

of hers and the woman's tongue she had, as a likely prelude to the scene

to come below.