ONE HOUR OF HAPPINESS

Ursula descended from a cab in the full light of the early summer evening, and hurried away into the Van Trossarts’ gloomy hall. Her shoulders blushed as the footman took her wrap. It felt like undressing.

“Juffrouw Rovers,” said the Baroness, beaming like a crimson sun, “I am glad you have come. My niece is—is occupied. Take off your gloves, my dear, and help me to arrange these flowers.”

Ursula had looked round in terror for Gerard. She must dine with him en famille, perhaps sit next to him. There was no help for it. Yet she trembled to think of him. To her simple maidenhood, familiar with sermons on sin in the abstract, he was a sudden incarnation of infamy.

The Baroness buzzed and bubbled over her flower-trays, her fat arms all dimples, her fat cheeks all smiles. She chattered about this evening’s party, which was Helena’s party—“as if anybody in Drum would give a dance in July!”—but Helena was so gay she could never sit still for an hour: a nice dance she would lead her husband if only the husband himself was addicted to pleasure. Well, old people were apt to get dull. No wonder Helena fared farther in search of diversion. And she laughed to herself, and winked to herself (a difficult, but by no means impossible, proceeding) while talking to Ursula in the pragmatical cackle with which hens of all ages surround a new-laid matrimonial egg.

Ursula, who was barely acquainted with the Freule van Trossart, could only display a perfunctory interest in that young lady’s possible prospects. Harriet had told her that, according to rumor, the Freule was “as good as engaged” to a young politician.

“It is a living romance,” the Freule’s clear voice was heard saying on the landing, “and a thousand times more amusing, ma vieille, than all your dressed-up dead ones together.”

She came into the room with her arm through that of her shrivelled governess, Gerard bringing up the rear. The little Frenchwoman looked depressed as she slid away into a corner. The fat Baroness rustled across to her in a perfect crackle of crimson. “My dear Papotier, is it not delightful?” she said, with tears in her eyes.

“Mon Dieu, madame, yes,” replied the governess, “it is the first chapter.” And, to herself, she added, “For me it is the last.”

Ursula shook hands with Gerard, but a thick curtain had fallen between them; she was surprised by the aloofness of his manner, even while she herself stiffened to a cold “good-day.”

How contented and complacent he looked! She watched him as he sat opposite her at table, between the Baroness and the Freule. How prosperous and pleasing! Yes, truly, there was a law for the humble and a license for the high! It was a gloriously simple thing to be born to impurity, like the old Greek gods. What nonsense her good father went preaching about “sin”! The world knew no such thing. It knew only a small hub of pleasure reserved for the rich, and a wide zone all round it of hunger and crime. She felt very bitter; she glanced down with a sensation of physical disgust on the fingers which had touched his, unwilling to break her bread with them.

Her French was rusty, and out of repair; she did not feel up to much conversation with the prim little portrait of the past on her right; the master of the house, on her other side, was sufficiently, but not amply, polite. There is no human insolence such as that indifferent politeness which barely fits—like a glove one size too small.

There were only the six of them; but the fascinating little heiress was a host in herself. Ursula had heard much of her vivacity; she concluded, notwithstanding, that the prospect of the evening’s pleasure must be abnormally augmenting it. Lovely the girl undeniably was, frail, and golden-haired, in a cloud of white over blue, like the sky, and a treble row of pearls. Ursula’s grave brown face looked very quiet compared with the other’s delicate, clear-veined features; you might have said a Madonna of the Annunciation, and an immature Venus Anadyomene.

“Ursula,” thought Gerard, “is just a nice-looking rustic.” As for him, she wondered how he dared to sit beside, and speak to, this white-robed virgin. It seemed as if toads must drop from his full red lips. Well, it was no business of hers. And perhaps—perhaps she was wronging him all the time, this good-natured friend of her childhood! Perhaps he intended to marry Mademoiselle Adeline, if only his parents would let him. He was waiting, perhaps, for an opportunity—who knows?—perhaps—

The thought gave her great comfort. Of the truth of the story she could not harbor a doubt, for the girl before leaving had shown her a photograph, worn by a ribbon round the neck.

She noticed that the atmosphere seemed full of a ripple of merriment: asides, which courtesy only kept just above whispers, innuendos, sudden glances, mots À double entente. She felt even more awkward than she would have done under ordinary circumstances. And soon she felt exceedingly miserable. Perhaps her kind-hearted hostess noticed it.

“Helena, we must drink to your health,” cried the Baroness, her ample bosom swelling under its laces, like a crested wave. “Yes, my dear Gerard, you needn’t look at me like that; see how your neighbor is laughing. As Juffrouw Rovers does us the favor of dining here to-day, she will increase that favor, I feel certain, by keeping a secret—an absolute secret—for forty-eight hours. I cannot let this meal pass as if nothing had happened. You must know, Juffrouw Rovers, that it is my dear niece’s birthday—her first birthday into a new life. In other words, she is engaged to her cousin Gerard, who is an old friend of yours, so I need not praise him. And we are going to drink their healths, and wish them long life and prosperity.”

Afterwards Ursula had a faint recollection of having spilled some champagne on the table-cloth. For the moment her whole strength was concentrated in a wild prayer for outward calm. These people would imagine she cared for Gerard. It was not that—my God, not that!

Fortunately the others were busy lifting their glasses; all during dinner Gerard had scarcely looked her way. She stared round the table in a dazed manner. She felt sick.

“The strawberries are not good this year,” she heard Baron Trossart’s grumpy voice saying. “I am not surprised Miss Rovers doesn’t care to eat them.” She hastily returned to her dessert. “No, I must beg of you. Joris, bring this lady a clean plate.”

It was the strawberries, then, that interested her? So much the better.

“How I envy your father, Gerard,” continued the Baron. “It is two years now since we have been at Trossartshage. The fruit cannot bear the transport; we have tried both water and rail. But the cares of state, you know, the cares of state! A man sacrifices himself for his country, and his country repays him with ingratitude.”

This last sentence was an allusion to a recent article in a small paper which reproached the authorities—in this case Baron Trossart—with not having cleared out a canal before the warm weather came. Nobody ever complained of the ceaseless flow of nephews and brothers-in-law. That, as we all know, is a part of the constitution. Were it not so, the “eminent politician” would be a thing of the past.

“Papa,” interrupted Helena, wilfully, “please don’t be gloomy. I’m engaged.”

“Well, there’s cause enough for gloom in that,” he replied. “I’m as jealous of Gerard as”—he looked round—“as Mademoiselle Papotier.”

“Ah! do not speak of it to me!” cried the Frenchwoman. “I could slaughter Monsieur Gerard if I met him in war.”

“That’s the last place where you’ll meet me,” exclaimed Gerard, laughing. Helena had suddenly blanched.

“War!” she said. “How horrible! No, we will have no fighting. Juffrouw Rovers, would you have the courage to marry a soldier?”

Across Ursula’s brain flashed a vision of a dog-cart filled with uproarious malevolence.

“No, I should not like to marry an officer,” she replied.

Her words—perhaps, still more, her unconscious manner—seemed to sting Gerard. He flushed.

“Juffrouw Rovers is never particularly brave,” he said. “She is too soft-hearted. The last time I saw her, she was showing the white feather, as now.”

The words were a challenge. And, unconsciously, his manner betrayed as much; it was too significant.

Helena looked from one to the other: “What is it?” she asked. “What does it mean, Juffrouw Rovers? Gerard, what is the joke?”

“Joke? None. Ask Juffrouw Rovers.”

“So I have, but she doesn’t tell me.”

“Then you may be sure it is a little secret between Ursula and me, which I shall keep. I am not responsible for what she may do.”

She had the good taste not to press the subject, but she reverted to it as soon as she found herself alone with her lover.

“Gerard, what is this silly secret between you and Miss Rovers?”

“My dear child, how inquisitive you are! I thought you liked secrets.”

“Yes, when one is in them. I told you I should be jealous.”

“Of Ursula! How ridiculous! Utterly absurd! Ursula!”

“Well, I dare say I shall often be absurd. At any rate, Gerard, you would please me by not calling her ‘Ursula.’ She is not a relation of yours.”

“But I have known her all my life. I used to drag her in a go-cart.”

“I know. And it seems to me you behave very strangely for people who have always been intimate. You seem suddenly afraid of each other since this afternoon.”

“I am afraid of—that is, bored by—every girl but one since this afternoon. I am exceedingly bored by the prospect before me to-night. Don’t let’s spoil the one hour of happiness left us.”

“The one hour! How tragic that sounds!” she laughed.

“To-morrow we will go down to the Manor-house; there will be more hours there in the moonlight on the terrace. Say again that you love me, Nellie.”

“Yes, I love you,” she replied; and her voice was some soul-voice, quite different from her usual high-pitched tones. “I have loved you for a long time,” she added; and then, suddenly, with the old every-day ring: “There, I had made up my mind not to tell you that before our golden wedding. Papotier says a girl should never tell it at all, because the confession is ill-advised; and mamma says she certainly shouldn’t, because the feeling, if there, was a thing to be ashamed of.”

“Ashamed of love? But, my dearest?”

“No, I should never be ashamed of loving any one. Not even a footman.”

“Thank you,” sotto voce, from Gerard.

“We must bear the consequences of our virtues. I can’t understand any one’s being ashamed of ‘love.’ Can you?”

“I can’t understand any man’s keeping quiet his love for you. I want to shout out mine on the house-tops! Now that Ursula knows—I mean Juffrouw Rovers—why not proclaim the engagement to-night?”

“And your mother?”

So they whiled away the time on the veranda, looking down into the garden, where a large marquee had been put up for the dancers, with a music-tent and strings of Chinese lanterns. Meanwhile the Baroness lay back dozing in little audible gasps, and Ursula sat looking at photographs of Italy with Mademoiselle Papotier, who had forgotten all the names.

“Yes, that is Pavia,” said Mademoiselle Papotier. “Or perhaps it’s Pisa. I think it must be Pisa, because of the crooked tower.”

“Oh, that’s only the photograph,” replied Ursula, listlessly; “the angle’s wrong.”

“Do you think so? Look at the turtle-doves billing and cooing. Isn’t it sweet?”

Mademoiselle nodded towards the veranda, with keen scrutiny of her companion’s face. Ursula blushed again, that terrible tell-tale blush.

“And this place with all the boats,” she said, “I suppose is Venice?”

The guests began to arrive, and Mevrouw van Trossart pushed her cap across from the right to the left. It was quite a young people’s entertainment, more or less impromptu, and Ursula, already so greatly distressed by her toilet, noticed that many of the girls were more simply dressed than she. The acuteness of annoyance about this deadened, for a time, the sick anxiety at her heart.

She went out into the garden; she had fancied the fÊte would mean music and refreshments and fireworks; she now suddenly saw that the marquee was prepared for dancing. There had been no intimation, that she knew, on her card. She had never learned the art.

“May I have the first valse?” asked Willie van Troyen, who had just been introduced, for that purpose, by the Baroness.

“I don’t dance,” she said, pulling at her gloves. “I didn’t know people were going to.”

“They often do,” said Willie, “don’t they, at a dance?” He laughed heartily; he thought that was rather witty. And he betook himself to some one else.

So Ursula sat in a corner of the tent, or out on a bench, and was a bore.

The Baroness “made” talk with her from time to time in laborious sentences, and one or two other elderly people tried the same experiment. All the time, as she sat there disconsolate, one question was burning at her brain: How must I act regarding Gerard? Must I save this innocent girl or must I not? Sometimes the girl was Adeline, more often Helena, but the question remained the same.

“And this is your first party?” said a good-natured man. “I don’t think you seem to be enjoying yourself.”

“Oh, don’t let Mevrouw hear you say that!” she cried, in alarm. The Baroness happened to be passing. Yes, undoubtedly, Ursula was a drag.

“Come out into the garden,” said Gerard, stopping before her, “it’s tremendously hot here. I’ve kept this dance free for you; we’ll sit it out.” She rose and obeyed him.

Helena came out of the room where her uncle and his cronies were playing whist, with closed windows, her whole figure was a-sparkle with happiness. “Isn’t it beautiful?” she asked of her own Papotier. “The weather is perfect, the garden is perfect, the music is perfect. I don’t think we ever had such a pleasant party before.”

“It is your own joy, ma chÉrie,” said the governess, drawing her pupil to the dark staircase window, where she, Mademoiselle, stood watching the dancers. She pointed to a corner, half-hidden by a willow, in which Gerard and Ursula could be dimly descried. “That is the prologue, my child, to your romance,” she said. “Make haste to get on to the story.”

“Mademoiselle!”

“Hush! I watched her at dinner, when Madame the Baroness spoke. I have watched them since. It is nothing, my dear; it is even delightful—a compliment. But your lover must put a full-stop to the prologue. Perhaps he is doing it now. Creep behind, if you will, and hear what they say.”

“No, indeed!” cried the young Freule, with warmth.

A little later Ursula was again alone on the garden seat. She had exchanged but a few distressful sentences with Gerard. He had reproached her with behavior he hardly cared or dared to analyze, and she had answered hastily, eager to vindicate herself, but still more firmly resolved to screen Harriet’s reputation. Even while she was explaining, lamely, she had understood the incredulous smile on his face. He had come out of the brief conflict as a champion of female modesty, leaving her helplessly, guiltily crushed.

A white figure glided through the dusk and sank down by her side. The evening was gentle as velvet, caressingly warm and soft. Over yonder shone the great yellow glare of the music and the moving shadows; on all sides gay, ghastly paper lanterns went breaking the solemn silence of the trees. This spot of Ursula’s choosing was dark and willow-sheltered, alone beneath the calm blue height of heaven.

“Juffrouw Rovers,” said the Freule, “what is this joke between you and Gerard? You see, I am curious. You must forgive a spoiled child. What did he mean about your showing the white feather?”

“Don’t ask me, Freule, please,” replied Ursula, shortly. “For I can’t tell you.”

“So Gerard says. It must be a very dreadful secret!” This was said laughingly.

Silence. From the tent came the strains of the “Liebchen AdÉ” gallop.

“Great Heaven, it must be a very dreadful secret!” The Freule half rose from her seat; her voice trembled. She caught Ursula’s arm.

“It can only be,” she said, steadying herself, “that Gerard made love to you formerly. That is rather like him. I am sorry. It was wrong. But you have made up your mind to forget him, have you not? He is so charming; no wonder women love him. Poor child, it was cruel of us, in our ignorance, to invite you to behold our happiness.” In a sudden impulse of womanly pity she put an arm round Ursula’s bare neck.

“It isn’t that,” gasped Ursula. “Don’t, please, say I love Gerard. Oh, Freule, it’s a great deal worse.”

She hardly knew what she was saying. She covered her face with her hands.

“A great deal worse!” repeated Helena, drawing away. Ursula started at the hardness which had come into the Freule’s voice. “That can only mean”—Helena got up and stood at the farther end of the seat. “I refuse to say it,” she continued. “I refuse to believe it. You two are mad.”

The dance-music came faster from the lawn. Ursula, her head bowed low upon her lap, felt that in her cup of unmerited bitterness not a drop was left undrunk.

“I want to know the truth,” Helena went on after a moment. “I have a right to know it to-night. If you still feel any love for Gerard, do him a good turn now. We are girls together. No one will hear you but I. Tell me exactly what there is to tell, and I will forgive him.”

“I have nothing to tell,” murmured Ursula.

The Freule stamped her foot.

“You are ruining his life,” she said. “I will never marry him till I know how much you have been to each other. What happens after marriage must be settled after marriage; but what happened before I will know now.”

“We have never been anything to each other,” whispered Ursula. “Oh, Freule, have pity, and let me alone!” But even as she spoke her mood changed. Why should she agonize to save this girl’s selfish happiness at the cost of her own honor, of an innocent victim’s peace? She lifted herself up. “Ask no confessions of me,” she said. “Ask them of your future husband. He is nothing to me. You have no right to assume that he ever was.”

Even in the shade she saw Helena change color. A long silence deepened between them. Somebody in another nook not far distant laughed shrilly. There was a clatter of glasses.

“What happened before I must know,” said Helena, at last. “I will never marry him until I do.”

“You do not mean that,” said Ursula, but the other took no notice.

“I understand,” she continued, “it is some other woman.” She tossed up her head. “I knew I wasn’t marrying a saint,” she said. “He warned me about that himself. But, of course, all you speak of is past.” Then she broke into sudden passion. “How dare you come and talk of such things to me?” she cried, advancing on Ursula. “How dare you do it?”

“But I have talked of nothing!” exclaimed the pastor’s daughter. “It is you who torment me—”

“I know. Never mind,” said the Freule, interrupting; “tell me one thing. This girl that you and Gerard are thinking of was—was—infamous?”

Again the silence which is dissent. The Freule broke into a cry. Fortunately the music drowned it. The “Liebchen AdÉ” gallop was finishing up fast and furious.

“Don’t tell me she was good like—like you and me! Don’t tell me; I don’t want to hear it. I don’t care. I know how the whole story runs; it’s in so many novels. All men do such things. And the girl goes on the stage!”

The music had stopped. The bright dancers were flowing out into the cooler grounds.

“You needn’t tell me anything,” said the Freule, hurriedly but quietly. “I have guessed it all. This girl is good and honest, and she hoped that Gerard would marry her. She hopes so still. You hope it. Of course there is a child—there always is. It is the stalest form of pathetic feuilleton, and, therefore, it comes true in my life. Good-bye, Juffrouw Rovers.”

She sank down on the seat again and waved away her companion, hiding her golden head on her arms against the back. It was very still now in this forgotten corner. Ursula stole off to the house without taking leave of any one, and, having recovered her cloak, went out into the desolate street, alone and on foot, amid the stupefied stares of the domestics.

Several minutes elapsed before Helena lifted her head. She stared from her bench into the night.

“Why not?” she said, half aloud; “I love him. All women do it. There was that creature at the church gate, with her brats, when Henri van Troyen was married.”

She gathered her white laces about her and shivered, as she rose to walk towards the house. On the stairs, at the same post by her dark window, like a spy, still stood the French governess.

“Ma vieille,” began Helena, “will you please tell mamma I have gone to my room with a very bad headache, and want nobody to disturb me—not even her or yourself.”

“But, my dear—”

“The romance is changing to a tragedy,” said Helena. “Good-night.”