CHAPTER SEVEN

Diana had gone straight home after her tableau. As she entered her flat the maid told her that Doctor Franklin had been waiting to see her for ten minutes or so.

The visit was not wholly welcome, for Diana had wished to be alone, had wanted not to speak to anyone this evening. The tableau had had for her a quasi-religious significance. For a moment, she had embodied the semblance of the goddess whose name she bore, and she had felt herself to be the handmaiden of her to whom she had dedicated her life. She had hardly been conscious of all this until that very morning when she had waked in her white bedroom and had beheld the pale wintry sun shining through the window greeting her like a herald from a southern clime. Then, in silence, she had offered up a prayer to her namesake, as if in very truth the huntress were a deity. While driving to the show, her mind had been wholly concerned with practical affairs. She thought of the beautiful way the draperies were to cling to her, of how she would hold Doreville by the collar and constrain him to stillness; and on the homeward journey she had been wondering if perhaps she had not lifted her right heel a trifle too high.

"Are you hungry?" she asked Franklin, unable wholly to hide her irritation. "Mary won't be long now. She is bringing Doreville home."

"How splendidly he behaved."

"Could you see him breathing?"

"When I looked at the tableaux through my glasses it was easy to see that all the figures were breathing, with one exception--you, my child."

"I had lost the knack of holding my breath and have been practising every day for the last week by holding my face under water in my bath."

She took a cigarette from the box and threw herself just as she was, in her dark walking dress, upon a low sofa. She looked pensive and serious.

Franklin was in a mood of contemplation rather than of admiration, and as he looked down on her reclining form he no longer saw her as an individual but as a type. He followed in imagination the course of the development of the eager girl she had been, to the beautiful woman she was now; and, with the injustice habitual to mankind (which is on the whole envious when it sees a beloved being on the way to a fruitful expansion) he asked himself whether her experience of life had not been bought too dear, whether the wandering and aimless existence she led had not hindered the development of her inner self. Only to his artist friends did he acknowledge the cleavage in his own soul, torn as it was between the world of art and the world of practical affairs; and, like all active idealists, he was inclined to be intolerant when other idealists invaded his privacies.

"Is it really necessary," he said with a smile, "to learn diving if one would be a goddess?"

She sat up. All that was combative in her nature was on the alert.

"Is it really necessary," she expostulated, "to visa passports in order to be lord of the land of dreams?"

"One tries to keep the two things separate...."

Diana relaxed, and laid her head back among the cushions.

"For my part, my dear Franklin, I try to combine the two."

"You were very fine, Diana. Even the foot you were not putting your weight on remained perfectly steady. Your breast and hair were in keeping with works of the seventh or sixth century. You seemed to belong to the classical world, for unfortunately you wear your hair short."

"Yet the Sphinx is old. I think she is ages older," she retorted pertly.

"Only the Sphinx happens to be a man, you know," he corrected, her provocative manner have piqued him into assuming the rôle of teacher.

"You are awfully domineering tonight; whereas I feel..." She did not finish her thoughts, but stretched her arms out sideways.

"A younger man's company would suit your mood better, I fancy."

She clasped her hands under her head and looked at him, a challenge in her eyes.

"You seem to take me for an idiot or a cow...."

"Not at all; just a woman."

She became defiant.

"Mm, and yet, barely an hour ago, I was Diana immaculata striding through the woods!"

"A statue which is very active on weekdays!"

"Like certain poets, Franklin."

"Precisely! Do you not realize that I am fighting against myself and not against you, dear child?"

"My father is very different from you," she said, hoping to discourage his paternal airs.

"Your father, like all mysteries, is a precious possession. For that very reason he will never tell you genuine truths."

She did not stir, but put her next question squarely.

"What do you object to in my present way of living?"

He blew the smoke noisily through his lips and rejoined:

"I had hoped..."

At that moment the door opened and Countess Olivia entered, accompanied by the dog.

Of all those who had been spectators at the entertainment and had seen Diana's tableau, Olivia had been the most deeply stirred. Filled with loving envy of Diana's youthful freedom, she had today experienced an almost tragical intensity of delight which had urged her to come and tell Diana of her affectionate gratitude for the pleasure the tableau had given. So great had been her desire to unburden herself that, contrary to her custom, she had hastened hither instantly in spite of the late hour. She had met Mary and the dog as she was waiting for her car and had offered to give them both a lift. The faithful old soul had assured her she would find Diana alone and had again as the car drew up before Diana's door, urgently requested her to drop in for a moment. Now the countess stood motionless and aghast on the threshold. Her hand loosed its hold on the dog's collar, whereupon Doreville precipitated himself upon his mistress, displaying so stormy a delight at finding her again as to prevent her rising to receive her visitor.

Franklin, too, was taken aback by the countess's intrusion, and his chilly aspect added to the lady's discomfiture. Diana's mood, however, was considerably enlivened by the new turn of affairs. She did not speak immediately, but while trying to calm the dog's demonstrations of joy, lay thinking:

"How quickly people are made to suffer when they over-step the conventions. The countess has to pay for it because she comes to visit me at an unusual hour; and Franklin is punished for his contrariety by the inopportune appearance of this blond beauty."

She smiled at Olivia, saying:

"I am so pleased that you should have brought him and not someone else. He did splendidly, didn't he? He has earned his supper, and we'll give him the bone I promised if he were good. Mary! Please bring in tea for us all.--You must be perishing with cold; or did I suffer alone because of my scanty raiment? Huntress goddesses must wear furs here in Prussia if they are to enjoy the chase!--Do take this yellow chair, it goes so well with your dress. That blue reminds me of the southern seas."

"Your tableau was very beautiful," said Olivia gravely. Her velvety voice made Diana think of the lap of the waters among the rocks at the foot of the countess's Dalmatian home, away there in the Adriatic, the ancestral castle of ancient story.

"Thank you," she answered no less gravely, looking affectionately at Olivia. Then, in lighter voice: "You are the first among all those who saw my tableau to tell me that. For the poet here has only had time to criticize my way of wearing my hair. I like long hair in others, but not for myself."

The tea-tray was now brought in. A bone for the dog too, and Doreville was put through his paces before being given his reward for his good behaviour. There were questions of sugar, of cream, of rum, and all the other byplay relating to the comfort of her guests. Yet the atmosphere remained charged, and not one of the three felt at ease.

Diana's thoughts ran: "Why could they not have left me to myself? I wonder whether she came on Sidney's account?"

Olivia mused: "She is more racy than Sidney. I wish I were a man so that I could be her lover. What does that old bachelor want from me?"

Franklin was thinking: "Those two women are a living poem. There they sit opposite one another and I am hard put to it, as I am with Titian's picture, to decide which represents sacred love and which profane."

They simultaneously broke the silence which had encompassed them, and their voices seemed to them to come from infinite distance.

"Was the hall full?"

"Not a free seat to be seen."

"They must have done well for their charity."

But Diana as she spoke was thinking: "I wonder if Franklin is her lover? Their voices go so well together."

And Olivia: "I shall not see Sidney again."

Franklin: "Leopardess and lioness."

Aloud they were saying, and again their voices seemed to be coming from afar:

"Did you have a good place?"

"Yes, about the sixth row."

"One could see well from every part of the hall."

At last they were gone.

"I wonder why my tall prince did not come? A visit from him would have pleased me better," thought Diana as she slipped into bed.

Franklin, in order to prolong the few minutes he would be in the countess's company, had proposed to walk home with her across the park. The arc lamps shone down upon the tree-tops like moons that had come close to the earth. It was a lovely night, clear and fresh as only a winter night can be. They walked along in silence side by side; and the longer the silence lasted, the more freely did they allow their thoughts to range, until Franklin said aloud:

"And yet Diana's beauty is no more than a cloak to protect her liberty."

Olivia's mind had been toying with similar ideas. She looked up suddenly at the tall stranger with the mellow voice, and the poet read in her eyes the meaning of her melancholy. Olivia said:

"And at the same time it is a magic garment which carries her away into the air. Have you known her long?"

"Many years ago I was studying with her father in London. She was my fellow student."

"Is he a professor?"

"He is a sage."

"Does he live alone?"

"As man of the world and crank."

"Is her mother still alive? She never speaks of her."

"She died when giving birth to her son. It is for that reason that the old man cannot bear to have his son near him. Her name was Helena, but he never mentioned her to me. Diana once showed me her picture."

As they emerged from the park, Franklin reflected that he had wasted his few minutes with Olivia in talk about Diana instead of about the countess herself, and he would have liked to remedy matters now. But she turned to him again and asked:

"Do you think she cares for her brother?"

Franklin answered innocently:

"He'll make good yet."

"As an artist?"

"As a man."

Olivia's thoughts took a somewhat cynical turn. Then:

"I may hope for as much in my son's case!"

"You have a son, Countess? A child?"

"Not that, but a boy who is still quite young."

"Like you?"

"He takes after his father."

Franklin suddenly remembered the duel which had put an end to the count's career, he remembered that a love affair had been the cause of the duel, and he saw the woman walking at his side burdened rather than protected by her furs, and for several minutes he climbed the ladder of imagination, up and down, up and down again, giving his fancy full play. Then, very slowly, as if he would have prepared to stop half way in the expression of his thought, he murmured:

"And his father was, so I am told, obliging enough to..."

Ten strides separated her from her hotel. Olivia was thinking:

"They are all alike, these poets, these worthy cits. Ah, if only our own people were less banal, one would give such men the go-by.--Sidney took a room here yesterday. I suppose he's waiting for me in the lobby."

Aloud she said frigidly to the man who had seen her home:

"Thanks. Good night."

But the young man was not awaiting her in the lobby after all.