That Girl in Black; and, Bronzie

Miss Fforde smiled quietly. They were standing in her room, for she was to spend a night or two with her friend.

“I – to tell you the truth, I would much rather not speak about him,” she said. “He is very good looking, and – well, not stupid, I dare say. But I am not used to men, you know, Gertrude – not to men of the day, at least, of which I suppose he is a type. I cannot say that I care to see more of them. I am happier at home with papa.”

She turned away quickly. Gertrude did not see the tears that rose to the girl’s eyes, or the rush of colour that overspread her face at certain recollections of that evening. She was nineteen, but it was her first “real” dance, and she felt as if years had passed since the afternoon only two days ago when she had arrived.

Mrs Englewood looked and felt sadly disappointed. She had been so pleased with her own diplomacy.

“It will be different when you are a little more in the way of it,” she said. “And – I really don’t think your father should insist on your dressing quite so plainly. It will do the very thing he wants to avoid – it will make you remarkable.”

“No, no,” said Maisie, shaking her head. “Papa is quite right. You must allow it had not that effect this evening. No one asked to be introduced to me.”

“There was such a crowd – ” Gertrude began, but this time Maisie’s smile was quite a hearty one as she interrupted her.

“Never mind about that,” she said. “But do tell me one thing. I saw Mr Norreys speaking to you for a moment as he went out. You didn’t say anything about me to him, I hope?”

“No,” said Mrs Englewood, “I did not. I would have liked to do so,” she added honestly, “but somehow he looked queer – not exactly bored, but not encouraging. So I just let him go.”

“That’s right,” said Maisie; “thank you. I am so glad you didn’t. I do hope I shall never see him again,” she added to herself.

Chapter Two

A hope not destined to be fulfilled.

For though Maisie wrote home to “papa” the morning after Mrs Englewood’s dance, earnestly begging for leave to return to the country at once instead of going on to her next visit, and assuring him that she felt she would never be happy in fashionable society, never be happy anywhere, indeed, away from him and everything she cared for, papa was inexorable. It was natural she should be homesick at first, he replied; natural, and indeed unavoidable, that she should feel strange and lonely; and, as she well knew, she could not possibly long more, to be with him again, than he longed to have her; but there were all the reasons she knew full well why she should stay in town as had been arranged; the very reasons which had made him send her now made him say she must remain. Her own good sense would show her the soundness of his motives, and she must behave like his own brave Maisie. And the girl never knew what this letter had cost her invalid father, nor how he shrank from opposing her wishes.

“She set off so cheerfully,” he said to himself, “and she has only been there three days. And she seemed rather to have enjoyed her first dinner-party and the concert, or whatever it was, that Gertrude Englewood took her to. What can have happened at the evening party? She dances well, I know; and she is not the sort of girl to expect or care much about ball-room admiration.”

Poor man! it was, so far, a disappointment to him. He would have liked to get a merry, happy letter that morning as he sat at his solitary breakfast. For he had no fear, no shadow of a fear, that his Maisie’s head ever could be turned.

“I have guarded against any dangers of that kind for her, at least,” he said to himself, “provided I have not gone too far and made her too sober-minded. But no; after all, it is erring on the safe side – considering everything.”

Three or four evenings after Mrs Englewood’s dance Despard found himself at a musical party. He was in his own milieu this time, and proportionately affable – with the cool, condescending affability which was the nearest approach to making himself agreeable that he recognised. He had been smiled at by the beauty of the evening, much enjoying her discomfiture when he did not remain many minutes by her side; he had been all but abjectly entreated by the most important of the dowagers, a very great lady indeed, in every sense of the word, to promise his assistance at her intended theatricals; he had, in short, received the appreciation which was due to him, and was now resting on his oars, comfortably installed in an easy chair, debating within himself whether it was worth while to give Mrs Belmont a fright by engrossing her pretty daughter, and thus causing to retire from her side in the sulks Sir Henry Gayburn, to whom the girl was talking. For Sir Henry was rich, and was known to be looking out for a wife, and Despard had long since been erased from the maternal list of desirable possibilities.

“Shall I?” he was saying to himself as he lay back with a smile, when a voice beside him made him look up. It was that of the son of the house, a friend of his own; the young man seemed annoyed and perplexed.

“Norreys! oh, do me a good turn, will you? I have to look after the lady who has just been singing, and my mother is fussing about a girl who has been sitting all the evening alone. She’s a stranger. Will you be so awfully good as to take her down for an ice or something?”

Despard looked round. He could scarcely refuse a request so couched, but he was far from pleased.

“Where is she? Who is she?” he asked, beginning languidly to show signs of moving.

“There – over by the window – that girl in black,” his friend replied. “Who she is I can’t say. My mother told me her name was Ford. Come along, and I’ll introduce you, that’s a good fellow.”

Despard by this time had risen to his feet.

“Upon my soul!” he ejaculated.

But Mr Leslie was in too great a hurry to notice the unusual emphasis with which he spoke.

And in half a second he found himself standing in front of the girl, who, the last time they met, had aroused in him such unwonted emotions.

“Miss Ford,” murmured young Leslie, “may I introduce Mr Norreys?” and then Mr Leslie turned on his heel and disappeared.

Despard stood there perfectly grave. He would hazard no repulse; he waited for her.

She looked up, but there was no smile on her face – only the calm self-composedness which it seemed to him he knew so well. How was it so? Had he met her before in some former existence? Why did all about her seem at once strange and yet familiar? He had never experienced the like before.

These thoughts – scarcely thoughts indeed – flickered through his brain as he looked at her. They served one purpose at least, they prevented his feeling or looking awkward, could such a state of things have been conceived possible.

Seeing that he was not going to speak, remembering, perhaps, that if he remembered the last words she had honoured him with, he could scarcely be expected to do so, she at last opened her lips.

“That,” she said quietly, slightly inclining her head in the direction where young Leslie had stood, “was, under the circumstances, unnecessary.”

“He did not know,” said Despard.

“I suppose not; though I don’t know. Perhaps you told him you had forgotten my name.”

“No,” he replied, “I did not. It would not have been true.”

She smiled very slightly.

“There is no dancing to-night,” she said. “May I ask – ?” and she hesitated.

“Why I ventured to disturb you?” he interrupted. “I was requested to take you downstairs for an ice or whatever you may prefer to that. The farce did not originate with me, I assure you.”

“Do you mean by that that you will not take me downstairs?” she said, smiling again as she got up from her seat. “I should like an ice very much.”

Despard bowed without speaking, and offered her his arm.

But when he had piloted her through the crowd, and she was standing quietly with her ice, he broke the silence.

“Miss Ford,” he began, “as the fates have again forced me on your notice, I should like to ask you a question.”

She raised her eyes inquiringly. No – he had not exaggerated their beauty.

“I should like to know the meaning of the strange words you honoured me with as I was leaving Mrs Englewood’s the other evening. I do not think you have forgotten them.”

“No,” she replied, “I have not forgotten them, and I meant them, and I still mean them. But I will not talk about them or explain anything I said.”

There was nothing the least flippant in her tone – only quiet determination. But Despard, watching keenly, saw that her lips quivered a little as she spoke.

“As you choose,” he said. “Of course, in the face of such a very uncompromising refusal, I can say nothing more.”

“Then shall we go upstairs again?” proposed Miss Fforde.

Mr Norreys acquiesced. But he had laid his plans, and he was a more diplomatic adversary than Miss Fforde was prepared to cope with.

“I finished reading the book we were speaking of the other evening,” he began in a matter-of-fact voice; “I mean – ” and he named the book. “At least, I fancy it was you I was discussing it with. The last volume falls off greatly.”