The Lady of the Bas.e.m.e.nt Flat.

by Mrs. George de Horne Vaizey.

CHAPTER ONE.

WHY NOT?

At three o'clock this afternoon Evelyn Wastneys died. I am Evelyn Wastneys, and I died, standing at the door of an old country home in Ireland, with my hands full of ridiculous little silver shoes and horseshoes, and a Paris hat on my head, and a trembling treble voice whispering in my ear:--

"Good-bye, Evelyn darling--darling! Thank you--thank you for all you have been to me! Oh, Evelyn, _promise_ you will not be unhappy!"

Then some mysterious hidden muscle, whose existence I had never before suspected, pulled two little strings at the corners of my mouth, and my lips smiled--a marionette smile--and a marionette voice cried jauntily:--

"Unhappy? Never! Why, I am free! I am going to begin to live."

Then I watched a tall bridegroom in tweeds tenderly help a little bride in mole-coloured taffeta and sable furs into the waiting car, the horn blew, the engines whirled, a big hand and a little one flourished handkerchiefs out of the window, a white satin shoe danced ridiculously after the wheels, and Aunt Emmeline cried sensibly:--

"That's over, thank goodness! The wind _is_ sharp! Let's have tea!"

She hurried into the house to give orders, and the old Evelyn Wastneys stood staring after the car, as it sped down the drive, pa.s.sed through the lodge gates, and spun out into the high road. She had the strangest, most curious feeling that it was only the ghost of herself who stood there--a ghost in a Paris hat and gown, with long suede gloves wrinkled up her arms, and a pendant of mingled initials sparkling on her lace waistcoat. The real, true Evelyn--a little, naked, shivering creature--was skurrying after that car, bleating piteously to be taken in.

But the car rolled on quicker and quicker, its occupants too much taken up with themselves to have time to waste on dull other people. In another minute it was out of sight, but the ghost did not come back.

The new Evelyn lingered upon the steps, waiting for it to return. There was such a blank, empty ache in the place where her heart used to be.

It seemed impossible that that skurrying little ghost would not come back, nestle again in its own place, and warm up the empty void. But it never came back. The new Evelyn turned and walked into the house.

"Well, it has all gone off very well! Kathleen looked quite nice, though I always do say that a real lace veil is less becoming than tulle. There was a rose and thistle pattern right across her nose, and personally I think those sheaves of lilies are too large. I hope she'll be happy, I am sure! Mr Anderson seems a nice man; but one never knows. It's always a risk going abroad. A young Canadian proposed to me as a girl. I said to him, 'Do you think you could be nice enough to make up to me for home, and country, and relations and friends, and a.s.sociations and customs, and everything I have valued all my life?' He said it was a matter of opinion. What did _I_ think? I said it was ridiculous nonsense. _No_ man was nice enough! So he married Rosa Bates, and I hear their second boy is a hunchback. You are eating nothing, my dear. Take a scone. Let's hope it's all for the best!"

"Best or worst, it's done now," I said gloomily. Basil Anderson was certainly "nice," and, unlike Aunt Emmeline, my sister Kathleen entertained no doubt that he could fill every gap--home, country, friends, a selection of elderly aunts, and even that only sister who had so far acted as buffer between herself and the storms of life. At this very moment the mole-coloured toque was probably reclining comfortably on the tweed shoulder, and a smile was replacing tears as a big booming voice cried comfortably:--

"Evelyn! Oh, _she'll_ be all right! Don't worry about Evelyn, honey.

Think of _me_!"

Following the line of the least resistance, I took the scone and chewed it vacantly. Figuratively speaking, it tasted of dust and ashes; literally, it tasted of nothing at all, and the tea was just a hot fluid which had to be swallowed at intervals, as medicine is swallowed of necessity.

Aunt Emmeline helped herself systematically from each of the plates in turn, working steadily through courses of bread and b.u.t.ter, sandwiches, scone, _pet.i.ts fours_, and wedding cake. She was a scraggy woman, with the appet.i.te of a giant. Kathie and I used to wonder where the food went! Probably to her tongue!

"Of course," said Aunt Emmeline, continuing her thoughts aloud, as was her disconcerting habit, "Kathleen has money, and that gives a wife a whip hand. I begged her only yesterday to stand up for herself. Those little fair women are so apt to be bullied. I knew a case. Well, mind, we'll hope it mayn't come to _that_! If she is sensible and doesn't expect too much, things may work out all right. Especially for the first years. If anything _does_ go wrong, it will be your fault, Evelyn, for spoiling her as you have done."

"Thanks very much for the cheering thought," I said snappily. Aunt Emmeline helped herself to a sandwich, and blinked with exasperating forbearance.

"Not cheerful, perhaps, but it may be _useful_! If you'd taken my advice. It's never too late to mend, Evelyn."

"Even at twenty-six?"

Aunt Emmeline surveyed me critically. She was taking stock, and considering just how young, how old, how fresh, how damaged those lengthy years had left my physical charms. I looked in a long gla.s.s opposite, and took stock at the same time. A smart young woman--oh, very smart indeed, for as Kathie had argued, if you can't "blow" expense for your only sister's wedding, when on earth are you going to do it?

Light brown hair, "still untouched by grey," hazel eyes with very long, very finely marked eyebrows (secretly they are the joy of my life!) good features, and a sulky expression. The old Evelyn used to be very good-looking--(she's dead now, so I can say so, as much as I like)--this new one is good-looking too, in a disagreeable, unattractive kind of way. If you saw her dining at the next table in an hotel you would say, "Rather a fine-looking girl!" And the man with you would reply, "Think so! Too much of a temper for my fancy. Glad she don't belong to me."

I realised as much as I looked in the gla.s.s, and that made me crosser than ever. If I had been alone, able to cry, or storm, or grizzle, or go to bed just as I liked, I could have borne it better; but fancy losing your home, and your occupation, and the only person in all the world you really loved, all in one day, and coming straight from the wreck to have tea with Aunt Emmeline!

The sandwich was finished before the inspection. A piece of scone followed.

"Of course," said Aunt Emmeline, "you are _not_ in your first bloom.

_That_ we can't expect. Your colour is a little harder and more fixed"

(the figure in the gla.s.s gave a spasmodic jerk. The sulky expression was pierced by a gleam of fear. "_Fixed_!" Good gracious! She might be talking of those old people who have little red lines over their cheek-bones in the place of "bloom". It's _ridiculous_ to say I am "fixed". It is a matter of indifference to me how I look, but I do insist on truth!) "and your air of pride and independence is unbecoming in an unmarried girl. Men like to see a girl sweet, clinging, pliant."

"What men?"

"_All_ men!"

"Oh! And in my case, for instance, to whom would you suggest I should proceed to cling?"

"That," said Aunt Emmeline briskly, "is precisely what I wish to discuss." She lifted the last morsel of scone from the plate, stared at it, and popped it into her mouth. "My dear, has it ever occurred to you to think what you are going to _do_?"

"Aunt Emmeline, for the last months it has rarely occurred to me to think of anything else!"

"Very well then, that's all to the good. As I said to Aunt Eliza, let us leave her alone till Kathleen has gone. Evelyn is obstinate, and if you interfere she will only grow more pig-headed. Let her find things out for herself. Experience, Eliza, will do more than either you or I.

Sooner or later, even Evelyn must realise that you can't run a house, and garden, and stable, in the same way on half the ordinary income.

Now that Kathleen is married, she naturally takes with her her own fortune."

She looked at me expectantly, and I smiled, another stiff, marionette smile--and said:--

"How true! Curiously enough, that fact has already penetrated to my dull brain!"

"Now I do hope and pray, Evelyn, that you are not going to argue with me," cried Aunt Emmeline, with a sudden access of energy which was positively startling. "It's ridiculous saying that because there is only one mistress instead of two, expense will therefore be halved. I have kept house for thirty-three years, and have never once allowed an order at the door, so I may be supposed to know. Nonsense! The rent is the same, I suppose, and the rates, and the taxes. You must sit down to a decent meal even if you are alone, and it takes the same fire to cook four potatoes as eight. Your garden must be kept going, and if you do away with one horse, you still require a groom, I suppose, to look after the rest. Don't talk to me of economising; you'd be up to your neck in debt before a year was over--if you weren't in a lunatic asylum with nervous depression, living alone in that hole-in-a-corner old house, with not a soul but servants to speak to from morning till night. You have a nervous temperament, Evelyn. You may not realise it, but I remember as a child how you used to fidget and dash about. Dear Kathie sat still and sucked her thumb. I said at the time, 'Evelyn is better-looking, but mark my words, Kathie will be married first!' And you see! It's because I love you, my dear, and you are my dear sister's child that I warn you to beware of living alone in that house!"

"Thank you so much," I said nastily. (When people presage a remark by saying that they only say it because they love you, you may lay long odds that it's going to be disagreeable!) "It certainly sounds a gruesome prospect. Not even a choice between bankruptcy and mania, but a certainty of _both_! And within a year, too! Such a short run for one's money! Aunt Eliza had some suggestion to make, then? And you evidently approved. Would you mind telling me exactly what it was?"

"That is what I am trying to do, but you _will_ interrupt. Naturally, your home is with us, your mother's sisters. You shall have the blue room over the porch. If you wish it, we are willing that you should bring your own pictures. The silver and valuables you can send to the bank, and the furniture can be sold. You shall pay us five guineas a week, and we will keep your horse, and house old Bridget if you don't want to part from her. She can attend to your room, and sleep in the third attic. There would be no extras except washing, and a fire in your room. You know how we live; every comfort, but no excess. I disapprove of excess. Eliza and I have often regretted that you and Kathie have such extravagant ways. Early tea, as if you were old women, and bare shoulders for dinner. You may laugh, my dear, but it's no laughing matter. One thing leads to another. You can't wear an evening dress and sit down to a chop. Soup and fish and an _entree_ before you know where you are. We have high tea. You would save money on evening gowns alone. A dressy blouse is all that is required."

Aunt Emmeline paused to draw breath, twitched, jerked, and resolutely braced herself to say a difficult thing.

"And--and we shall welcome you, my dear! We shall be p-pleased to have you!"

Through all her protestation of welcome, through all her effort at warmth, the plain, unflattering truth forced its way out. To entertain a young independent niece beneath their roof might seem to the two aunts a duty, but, most certainly, most obviously, it would _not_ be a pleasure! I was quite convinced that for myself it would be a fiery trial to accept the offer; but it was a shock to realise that the aunts felt the same!

I reviewed the situation from the two points of view, the while Aunt Emmeline feverishly hacked at the hard sugar coating of the cake. For a young, comparatively young woman, to go from the liberty of her own home to share the stuffy, conventional, dull, proper, do-nothing-but-fuss-and-talk-for-ever-about-nothing life of two old ladies in a country town would obviously be a change for the worse; but for the aforesaid old ladies to have their trivial life enriched by the advent of a young, attractive, and (when she is in a good temper!) lively and amusing niece, this should surely be a joy and a gain! But it _wasn't_ a joy. The poor old dears were shuddering at the thought that their peaceful routine might be spoiled. They didn't _want_ "a bright young influence!" They wanted to be free to do as they liked-- sup luxuriously on cocoa and an _egg_, turn up black cashmere skirts over wadded petticoats, and doze before the fire, discuss the servants'

failings by the hour, drink gla.s.ses of hot water, and go to bed at ten o'clock.--As she hacked at the sugar crust, the corners of Aunt Emmeline's lips turned more and more downward. My silence had been taken for consent, and in the recesses of her heart she was saying to herself, "Farewell! a long farewell to all our frowstings!" I felt sorry for the poor old soul, and hastened to put her out of her misery.

"It's very good of you, Aunt Emmeline. And Aunt Eliza. Thank you _very_ much, but I have quite decided to have a home of my own, even though I can't afford to keep on The Clough. I am going to live in London."

Just for one second, uncontrollable relief and joy gleamed from the watching eyes, then the mask fell, and she valiantly tried to look distressed.

"Ah, Evelyn! Obstinate again! Setting yourself up to know better than your elders. There'll be a bitter awakening for you some day, my dear, and when it comes you will be glad enough of your old aunties' help.

Well! the door will never be closed against you. However hard and ungrateful you may be, we shall remember our duty to our sister's child.

Whenever you choose to return--"

"I shall see the candle burning in the cas.e.m.e.nt window!"

She looked so pained, so shocked, that if I had had any heart left I should have put my arms round her neck, and begged her pardon with a kiss; but I had no heart, only something cold, and hard, and tight, which made it impossible to be loving or kind, so I said hastily:--