“And if something happens, Reggie, and I don’t recover, you will be a good boy, won’t you? You will be honest and straightforward and loyal?”
“What do you think?” answered Reggie.
She folded him in her arms, and with a firmness not becoming her appearance, fashioned somewhat in the grand style, let him go with dry eyes and with smiling lips. But Mrs. Bassett had exaggerated a little the perils of her condition; she bore the operation admirably, and after the first two days proceeded without interruption to complete recovery. Reggie wrote with considerable regularity from Brighton, where it appeared the tutor had established himself for the summer, and gave his mother accounts of the work he did; he went into considerable detail, and, indeed, seemed so industrious that Mrs. Bassett was minded to remonstrate with his tutor. After all, it was holiday time, and scarcely fair that Reggie’s goodwill should be thus taken advantage of. Towards the end of the month she was well enough to move back to her own house, and the morning after her return came downstairs in a very contented frame of mind, rejoicing in her new health and in the splendid summer weather. Carelessly she opened her Morning Post, and as usual ran her eye down the announcements of birth, death, and marriage. Suddenly it caught her own name, and she read the following intelligence:
BARLOW-BASSETT—HIGGINS,—On the 30th ult., at St. George’s, Hanover Square, W., Reginald, only son of the late Frederick Barlow-Bassett, to Annie (Lauria Galbraith), second daughter of Jonathan Higgins, of Wimbledon.
For a moment Mrs. Bassett did not understand, and she read the paragraph twice, hopelessly mystified, before she realized that it announced to the world in general the marriage of her son. The date of the occurrence was the day after her operation, and on that very morning Reggie had called at Wimpole Street to inquire after her. The butler was still in the room, and helplessly Mrs. Bassett handed him the paper.
“D’you know what this means?” she asked.
“No, madam.”
Her first thought was that it must be a practical joke; and then, what was the meaning of that second name in parentheses—Lauria Galbraith? She rang for the servant, and told him at once to send a wire, which she directed to Reggie at Brighton, asking for an explanation of the extraordinary announcement; after breakfast she telegraphed to her solicitor and to the tutor’s London address. The tutor’s reply came first, to the effect that he had not seen Reggie since July; and in answer to her second question, he added that himself had been in London all the summer. At length Mrs. Bassett began to understand that something awful had happened. She went into Reggie’s room, and coming upon a locked drawer, had it broken open; she found in it a writing-case, and with horror and indignation turned out a motley collection of bills, pawn-tickets, and letters. She examined them all carefully, and first discovered that accounts for which she had given money were unpaid, and that others, enormous to her economical view, existed of which she knew nothing; then from the pawntickets she learned that Reggie had pledged his father’s watch, all his own trinkets, a dressing-case she had given him, and numberless other things. For an instant she hesitated at the letters, but only for an instant; it seemed her right now to know the worst, and little by little it dawned upon her that hitherto she had lived in a strange fool’s paradise. First there came epistles from duns, polite, supplicatory, menacing; then a couple of writs, smacking inexperienced eye of prison bars and unimagined penalties; letters from women in various writings, most of them ill-spelt, and the cheap stationery betrayed the sender’s rank. With frowning brow she read them, horrified and aghast; some were full of love, others of anger, but all pointed distinctly to Reggie’s polygamous tendency. At length came a bundle whereof the paper was quite different—thick, expensive, scented; and though not at once recognising the hand when she opened the first, Mrs. Bassett cried out; on the left side, at the top, in little letters of gold, surrounded by a scroll, was the name Grace, and though there was no address she knew that they were from Mrs. Castillyon. She read them all, and her dismay tamed to abject shame and anger. It appeared that this woman had given Reggie cheques and bank-notes. One letter said, “I hope you can change the cheque”; another, “So sorry you’re hard up; here’s a fiver to go on with”; a third, “What a pig-dog your mother is to be so mean! What on earth does she spend her money on?” At first they were with passion, but soon began to complain of unkindness or cruelty, and one letter after another was filled with bitter reproaches.
Mrs. Bassett took the whole contents of the writing-case, and locked them in her own cabinet, then hurried to Reggie’s tutor. Here she discovered that what she already suspected was true. She went home again, and called the upper servants. It humiliated her enormously that she must catechize them on the conduct of her son, but now she had no scruples. At first they would say nothing, but by dint of promise and threat she extracted the full story of how Reggie had lived during the last two years. At length, as a final blow, came an epistle from Reggie himself.
“371, Vauxhall Bridge Road.
“MY DEAR MATER,
“You will have seen in this morning’s Post that I was married at the end of last month to Miss Higgins, professionally known as Lauria Galbraith, and we are now staying at the above address. I am sure you will like Lauria, who is the best woman in the world, and has saved me from going to the dogs. You might let us have a line to say when we can come and see you. Lauria is most anxious to make your acquaintance, I should tell you that I have decided to chuck the Bar, and I am going on the stage. Lauria and I have got an engagement for the autumn tour of The Knave of Hearts, and we have come up to town for rehearsals. I am sure this will meet with your approval, because law is a rotten profession, awfully overcrowded, and as Lauria says, on the stage there is always room for talent. I know I shall get on, and Lauria and I hope in a few years to run our own company. I am working very hard, for although I’m only walking on in this drama, (I wouldn’t have accepted the offer, only Lauria has a ripping part, and, of course, as I hadn’t been on the stage before, I had to take what I could get,) I am learning Hamlet. Lauria and I think of giving some recitations of that and Romeo and Juliet in town next spring.
“Your affectionate son,
“REGGIE.
“P.S.—You needn’t worry about the money, because on the stage I can earn far more than I ever should have done at the Bar. An actor-manager simply makes thousands.”
Mrs. Bassett burst into tears, for she had never imagined that Reggie could be so callous, so inanely flippant; but rage succeeded all other emotions in her breast, and she wrote angrily, telling her son never again to show his face at her house, or the servants would throw him into the street—telling him that no farthing of her money should ever be his; then silence seemed more dignified, and she determined merely to leave unanswered that impudent letter. But it was necessary to express her indignation to someone, and she sent an urgent note to Miss Ley, begging her at once to come.
When the good lady, obedient to the summons, arrived, she found Mrs. Bassett in a very hysterical condition, walking up and down the room excitedly; and in the disorder of her majestic manner she reminded her somewhat of a middle-aged bacchante.
“Thank God you’ve come!” she cried. “Reggie’s married an actress, and I’ve disinherited him. I won’t ever see him again, and for all I care he may starve.”
Miss Ley made no movement of surprise, merely noting the fact that herself was a woman of prevision. All she had expected was come about.
“I’ve been utterly deceived in him. He’s not passed a single examination, and the servants have told me that he often came home at night tipsy. He’s lied to me systematically; he’s deceived me in every possible way; and all the time I flattered myself he was a good, honest boy, he’s been leading the life of a rip and a libertine.”
Her words were interrupted by a fit of crying, while Miss Ley watched her reflectively. Presently Mrs. Bassett recovered herself.
“I confess the marriage surprises me,” murmured Miss Ley. “Your daughter-in-law must be a woman of character and tact, Emily; but all the rest has been known to your friends for the last year.”
“D’you mean to say you knew he was a drunken sot, and little better than a thief and a liar?”
“Yes.”
“Why didn’t you tell me?”
“I thought you’d find out quite soon enough; and really, Emily, you’re such a fool you would probably have only made things worse.”
Mrs. Bassett was too much crushed to resent this plain speech.
“But you don’t know everything. I’ve found a lot of letters from women. It’s they who’ve led him astray. And d’you know whose are the worst?”
“Mrs. Castillyon’s?”
“Did you know that, too? Did everyone know my shame, and that my boy was being ruined, and did no one warn me? But I’m going to pay her out. I shall send every one to her husband. It’s she who’s done the mischief.”
She took from a drawer the bundle of letters, and excitedly gave them to Miss Ley.
“Is this all?” she asked.
“Yes.”
Miss Ley had with her a black satin bag, in which she kept her handkerchief and her purse, and swiftly opening it, she put the letters in.
“What are you doing?”
“My dear, don’t be a fool! You’re not going to send these letters to anyone, and as soon as I get home I mean to burn them. Reggie was a dissolute rip before ever he met Grace Castillyon, and the only woman who ruined him is—yourself! You were very angry when I told you once that the greatest misfortune which could befall a man was to have a really affectionate mother, but I assure you, except for your bad influence, Reggie would have been no worse a boy than any other.”
Mrs. Bassett turned livid.
“I think you must be mad, Mary. I’ve done all I could by example and precept to make him a gentleman. I’ve devoted my life to his education, and I’ve sacrificed myself to him absolutely from the day he was born. I can honestly say that I’ve been a good mother.”
“Pardon me,” answered Miss Ley coolly, “you’ve been a very bad mother, a very selfish mother, and you’ve systematically sacrificed him to your own whims and fancies.”
“How can you talk to me like that when I want sympathy and help? Haven’t you any pity for me?”
“None! All that has happened you’ve brought entirely on yourself. You made him a liar by compelling him to tell you his most private affairs, you drove him to deception by expecting from him an impossible purity, you warned him of temptation so as to make it doubly attractive. You never let him have a free will or a natural instinct, but insisted on his acting and feeling like a middle-aged and rather ill-educated woman. You thwarted all inclinations, and forced upon him yours. Good heavens! you couldn’t have been more selfish, cruel, and exacting if you’d detested the boy!”
Mrs. Bassett stared at her, overwhelmed.
“But I only asked common honesty and truthfulness, I only wanted to keep him from spot and stain, and I only expected the morality which religion and everything else enforces upon us.”
“You starved his instincts—the natural desire of a boy for gaiety and amusement, the natural craving of youth for love. You applied to him the standards of a woman of fifty. A wise mother lets her son go his own way, and shuts her eyes to youthful peccadillos; but you made all these peccadillos into deadly sins. After all, moralists talk a deal of nonsense about the frailty of mankind. When you come to close quarters with vice, it’s not really so desperately wicked as all that. A man may be a very good fellow though he does sit up late and occasionally drink more than is discreet, gamble a little and philander with ladies of doubtful fame. All these things are part of human nature, when youth and hot blood are joined together, and for some of them foreign nations, wiser than ourselves, have made provision.”
“I wish I’d never had a son!” cried Mrs. Bassett. “How much luckier you are than I!”
Miss Ley got up, and a curious expression came over her face.
“Oh, my dear, don’t say that! I tell you, that even though I know Reggie to be idle and selfish and dissolute, I would give all I have in the world if he were only mine. There’s not a soul on this wide earth that cares for me—except Frank, because I amuse him—and I’m so dreadfully lonely. I’m growing old. Often I feel so old I wonder how I can continue to live, and I want someone so badly to whom it’s not a matter of absolute indifference if I’m well or ill, dead or alive. Oh, my dear, thank God for your son!”
“I can’t now I know he’s wicked and vicious.”
“But what is vice, and what is wickedness? Are you sure we know? I suppose I have been a virtuous woman. I’ve done nobody any harm; I’ve helped a good many; I’ve done the usual moral things that women do; and when anything was possible that I particularly wanted, I’ve withstood because it was ingrained in me that nice things were naughty. But sometimes I think I’ve wasted my life, and I dare say I should be a better woman if I hadn’t been so virtuous. When I look back now it’s not the temptations I fell to that I regret, but the temptations I resisted. I’m an old woman, and I’ve never known love, and I’m childless and forsaken. Oh, Emily, if I had my time over again I promise you I wouldn’t be so virtuous. I would take all the good that life offered, without thinking too much of propriety. And above all things I would have a child.”
“Mary, what are you saying?”
Miss Ley shrugged her shoulders, and was silent; her voice was broken, and she could not trust herself to speak. But Mrs. Bassett’s thoughts went back to the injury which Reggie had done her, and she gave Miss Ley his letter to read.
“There’s not a word of regret in it. He seems to have no shame and no conscience. He was married on the very day of my operation, when I might have died any moment. He must be absolutely heartless.”
“D’you know what I would do if I were you?” asked Miss Ley, pleased to get away from her own emotions. “I would go to him, and ask forgiveness for all the harm you’ve done him.”
“I? Mary, you must be mad! What need have I for forgiveness?”
“Think it over. I have an idea that presently it will occur to you that you never gave the boy a chance. I’m not sure whether you don’t owe him a good deal of reparation; anyhow, you can’t undo the marriage, and it’s just possible it may be the saving of him.”
“You’re not going to ask me to receive an actress as my daughter-in-law?”
“Fiddledidee! She’ll make your son a much better wife than a duchess.”
When Mrs. Barlow-Bassett showed her friend Reggie’s letter. Miss Ley carefully noted the address, and next day, in the afternoon, proceeded to call upon the new-married couple. They lived in a somewhat shabby lodging-house in the Vauxhall Bridge Road—that long, sordid street—and Miss Ley was shown into an attic which served as sitting-room. It was barely fitted with tawdry furniture, much the worse for wear, but to give a homelike air photographs were pinned on the wall, each with a sprawling flourish for a signature, of persons connected with the stage, but unknown to fame. When Miss Ley entered, Reggie, dressed in a suit of somewhat pronounced pattern, with a Homburg tweed hat on his head, was reading the Era, while his wife stood in front of the glass doing her hair. Notwithstanding the late hour, she still wore a dressing-gown of red satin, covered with inexpensive lace, which was certainly neither very new nor very clean. Miss Ley’s appearance caused some embarrassment, and it was not without awkwardness that Reggie made the necessary introduction.
“Excuse me being in such a state,” said Mrs. Reggie, gathering up her hairpins, “but I was just going to dress.”
She was a little woman, plainly older than her husband, and to Miss Ley’s astonishment, by no means pretty; her eyes were handsome, used with full knowledge of their power, and her black hair very fine; but chiefly noticeable was a singular determination of manner, a shrewishness about the mouth, which suggested that if she did not get her own way someone would suffer. She looked rather suspiciously at Miss Ley, but treated her with sufficient cordiality to indicate a readiness to be friendly if the visitor did not prove hostile.
“I only heard you were married yesterday,” Miss Ley hastened to say as affably as possible, “and I was anxious to make your wife’s acquaintance, Reggie.”
“You’ve not come from the mater?” he asked.
“No.”
“I suppose she’s in a hell of a wax.”
“Reggie, don’t swear; I don’t like it,” said his wife.
Miss Ley shrugged her shoulders and smiled vaguely. Since she was not offered a chair, she looked round for the most comfortable, and sat down. Mrs. Reggie glanced uncertainly from her husband to Miss Ley, and then at her own disarranged dress, hesitating whether to leave the pair alone or to sacrifice her appearance.
“I am untidy,” she said.
“Good heavens! it’s so refreshing to find someone who doesn’t dress till late in the day. When I take off my dressing-gown I put on invariably a sense of responsibility. Do sit down and tell me all about your plans.”
Miss Ley had the art of putting people at their ease, and the bride succumbed at once to the elder woman’s quiet but authoritative way. She glanced at her husband.
“Reggie, take off your hat,” she said peremptorily.
“Oh, I’m sorry. I forgot.”
When he removed this headgear Miss Ley noticed that his hair was very long, worn with a dramatic flamboyance. His speech was deliberate, with a certain declamatory enunciation which vastly amused his old friend; his nails were none too clean, and his boots needed polish.
“What does the mater think of my going on the stage?” he asked, passing his hand with a fine gesture through his raven locks. “It’s the best thing I could do, isn’t it, Lauria? I feel that I’ve found my vocation. Nature intended me for an actor. It’s the only thing I’m fit for—an artistic career. Tell my mother that I will sacrifice everything to my art. I hope you’ll come and see me play.”
“It will give me great pleasure.”
“Not in this piece. I only—walk on, don’t you know. But in the spring Lauria and I are going to give a series of recitations.”
He rose to his feet, and standing in front of the fireplace, stretched out one dramatic hand.
“‘To be, or not to be: that is the question:
Whether ’tis nobler in the mind to suffer
The slings and arrows of outrageous fortune,
Or to take arms against a sea of troubles,
And by opposing end them?’”
He bellowed the words at the top of his voice, uttering each syllable with profound and dramatic emphasis.
“By Jove!” he said, “what a part! They don’t write parts like that now. An actor has no chance in a modern play, where there’s not a speech more than two lines long.”
Miss Ley looked at him with astonishment, for it had never occurred to her that such a development could possibly be his; then, glancing quickly at Lauria, she fancied that a slight ironical smile trembled on her lips.
“I tell you,” said Reggie, beating his chest, “I feel that I shall be a great actor. If I can only get my chance, I shall just stagger creation. I must go and see Basil Kent, and ask him to write a play for us, Lauria.”
“And are you going to stagger creation too?” asked Miss Ley, blandly turning to Mrs. Reggie.
The young woman restrained her merriment no longer, but burst into such a hearty peal of laughter that Miss Ley began to like her.
“Will you stay to tea, Miss Ley?”
“Certainly; that is why I came.”
“That’s fine. I’ll make you some tea in less than no time. Reggie, take the can, and go out and get half a pint of milk.”
“Yes, my dear,” he replied obediently, putting on his tweed hat with a rakish swagger, and taking from a table littered with papers, articles of apparel, and domestic utensils a small milk-can.
“How much money have you got in your pocket?”
He pulled out some coppers and one silver coin.
“One and sevenpence halfpenny.”
“Then, you’ll have one and sixpence halfpenny when you come home. You can buy a packet of straighters for threepence, and mind you’ re back in ten minutes.”
“Yes, dear.”
He walked out meekly, and closed the door behind him. Mrs. Reggie went to the door and looked out.
“His mother brought him up very badly,” she explained, “and he’s not above listening at keyholes.”
Miss Ley, shaking with inward laughter, had listened to the scene with amazement. Lauria continued her apologetic explanations.
“You know, I have to keep a sharp eye on his money because he’s rather inclined to tipple. I’ve got him out of it, but I’m always afraid he’ll drop into a pub if I don’t look out. His mother must be about the biggest fool you’ve met, isn’t she?”
Mrs. Reggie glanced at a box of cigarettes, and the other, noticing the yellow on her forefinger, concluded she was an eager smoker; it was easy to put her in comfort.
“Would you give me a cigarette?”
“Oh, d’you smoke?” cried Lauria, with a bright look of pleasure. “I was simply dying for a fag, but I didn’t want to shock you.”
They lit up, and Miss Ley drew towards her another chair.
“D’you mind if I put my feet up? I always think that only quadrupeds should keep their longer extremities constantly dangling.”
With a faint smile, she essayed to make smoke-rings.
“You’re all right,” said Lauria, with a little nod. “I’m glad you came. I wanted to have a talk with someone who knew Reggie’s mother. I suppose she’s in a fury. I wanted him to tell her beforehand, but he didn’t dare. Besides, he never does a thing straightforwardly if he can do it crooked. And as for lying—well, he’s worse than a woman. You can tell his mother it’ll take me all my time to make a gentleman of her son.”
Miss Ley smiled dryly.
“I have seldom seen a newly-married woman so keenly alive to the defects of her husband’s character.”
“Reggie’s not a bad boy really,” answered his wife, shrugging her shoulders, “but he wants licking into shape.”
“I wonder why you married him?” asked the other, reflectively, knocking off the ash of her cigarette.
Lauria looked at her sharply, hesitating, then made up her mind to speak openly.
“You seem a good sort and a woman of the world; and, after all, I’m married, and you’ll just have to make the best of me. Reggie’s good-looking, isn’t he?” She glanced at a photograph which stood on the chimneypiece. “And I like him. You know, I’ve been on the stage eight years; I went on when I was sixteen. How much does that make me!”
“Twenty-seven, I should say,” answered Miss Ley with deliberation.
Lauria smiled good-naturedly.
“Nasty people say I’m twenty-eight; but, anyhow, I’m sick to death of the stage, and I want to get off it.”
“I thought you were going to play Juliet to Reggie’s Romeo.”
“Yes, I can see myself! For one thing, I’m quite sure Reggie can’t act for nuts, and when they start they all want to play Hamlet. Why, I never knew a super who carried a banner in a panto who didn’t think that if he got his opportunity he’d be another Irving. Oh, I’ve heard it so often! Every girl I know has come to me and said: “Lauria, I feel I’ve got it in me, and I only want a chance.” I’m sick of the whole thing. I don’t want to go traipsing about the province’s, working like a nigger all the week, and travelling on Sundays, living in dingy apartments, and all the rest of it. I just let Reggie gas away, and it keeps him out of mischief to learn plays. I thought it would take his mother three months to come round, and by that time he’ll be sick of it. I like Reggie, and when I’ve had him in hand for a few months I shall make a decent boy of him; but I don’t pretend for a moment I’d have married him if I hadn’t known that his mother had money.”
“You’re a wise woman. In the first place, I can’t think how you got him to marry at all. I never thought he’d do it.”
“My dear Miss Ley, I thought you were a woman of the world. Don’t you know that if a girl of my age makes up her mind to marry a man, he must be awfully cute to save himself?”
“I confess I had often suspected it,” smiled Miss Ley.
“Of course, you have to choose your man. I saw Reggie was gone on me, and I led him a dance. You know, we’ve got a reputation for being wrong uns on the stage, but that’s all rot. We’re no worse than anyone else, only we’ve got more temptation, and when anything happens the papers take it up just because we’re professional. But I’ve known how to take care of myself, and I just let Reggie understand that I wasn’t going to be made a fool of. I played up to him for a fortnight, and then told him I wouldn’t see him any more, and by that time he was fairly stage-struck, and so he asked me to marry him.”
“It sounds very simple. And how did you manage to tame him?”
“I just let him see that if he wanted to have a decent time he’d got to be nice to me, and he very soon tumbled to it. You wouldn’t think it, but I’ve got a nasty temper when I’m roused. He looks up to me like anything, and he knows I don’t mean to stand any nonsense. Oh, he’ll be all right in six months.”
“And what do you want me to tell his mother?”
“Just tell her not to interfere. We’re all right with regard to money, and when she calms down she can make us an allowance. Six hundred a year will do, and we’ll take a house at Bournemouth. I don’t want to live in London till I’m sure of Reggie.”
“Very well,” answered Miss Ley. “I’ll say that, and I’ll say besides that she ought to thank her stars Reggie has found a decent woman. I have no doubt in a little while you’ll make him into quite a respectable member of society.”
“Here he comes with the milk!”
Reggie entered, and together they began to make tea. When Miss Ley departed Lauria sent him downstairs to show her out.
“Ain’t she a ripper?” he exclaimed. “And I tell you what, Miss Ley, she’s a real good sort. Tell the mater that she’s not beneath me at all.”
“Beneath you! My dear boy, she’s worth six of you. And I dare say under her charge you’ll turn into a very passable imitation of a gentleman, after all.”
Reggie looked at her with tragic countenance, flung back his head, and pressed both hands to his manly bosom.
“‘Oh, what a rogue and peasant slave am I!’” he cried.
“For goodness’ sake, hold your tongue!” she interrupted quickly.
She gave him her hand, and while pressing it he leaned forward confidentially and exclaimed:
“‘I’ll have grounds
More relative than this. The play’s the thing
Wherein I’ll catch the conscience of the king.’”