The Powers and Maxine.

By C.N. and A.M. Williamson.

Author of

"The Princess Virginia," "My Friend the Chauffeur,"

"The Car of Destiny," "The Princess Pa.s.ses,"

"Lady Betty Across the Water," Etc.

CHAPTER I

LISA'S KNIGHT AND LISA'S SISTER

It had come at last, the moment I had been thinking about for days. I was going to have him all to myself, the only person in the world I ever loved.

He had asked me to sit out two dances, and that made me think he really must want to be with me, not just because I'm the "pretty girl's sister," but because I'm myself, Lisa Drummond.

Being what I am,--queer, and plain, I can't bear to think that men like girls for their beauty; yet I can't help liking men better if they are handsome.

I don't know if Ivor Dundas is the handsomest man I ever saw, but he seems so to me. I don't know if he is very good, or really very wonderful, although he's clever and ambitious enough; but he has a way that makes women fond of him; and men admire him, too. He looks straight into your eyes when he talks to you, as if he cared more for you than anyone else in the world: and if I were an artist, painting a picture of a dark young knight starting off for the crusades, I should ask Ivor Dundas to stand as my model.

Perhaps his expression wouldn't be exactly right for the pious young crusader, for it isn't at all saintly, really: still, I have seen just that rapt sort of look on his face. It was generally when he was talking to Di: but I wouldn't let myself believe that it meant anything in particular. He has the reputation of having made lots of women fall in love with him. This was one of the first things I heard when Di and I came over from America to visit Lord and Lady Mountstuart. And of course there was the story about him and Maxine de Renzie. Everyone was talking of it when we first arrived in London.

My heart beat very fast as I guided him into the room which Lady Mountstuart has given Di and me for our special den. It is separated by another larger room from the ballroom; but both doors were open and we could see people dancing.

I told him he might sit by me on the sofa under Di's book shelves, because we could talk better there. Usually, I don't like being in front of a mirror, because--well, because I'm only the "pretty girl's sister."

But to-night I didn't mind. My cheeks were red, and my eyes bright.

Sitting down, you might almost take me for a tall girl, and the way my gown was made didn't show that one shoulder is a little higher than the other. Di designed the dress.

I thought, if I wasn't pretty, I did look interesting, and original. I looked as if I could _think_ of things; and as if I could feel.

And I was feeling. I was wondering why he had been so good to me lately, unless he cared. Of course it might be for Di's sake; but I am not so queer-looking that no man could ever be fascinated by me.

They say pity is akin to love. Perhaps he had begun by pitying me, because Di has everything and I nothing; and then, afterwards, he had found out that I was intelligent and sympathetic.

He sat by me and didn't speak at first. Just then Di pa.s.sed the far-away, open door of the ballroom, dancing with Lord Robert West, the Duke of Glasgow's brother.

"Thank you so much for the book," I said.

(He had sent me a book that morning--one he'd heard me say I wanted.)

He didn't seem to hear, and then he turned suddenly, with one of his nice smiles. I always think he has the nicest smile in the world: and certainly he has the nicest voice. His eyes looked very kind, and a little sad. I willed him hard to love me.

"It made me happy to get it," I went on.

"It made me happy to send it," he said.

"Does it please you to do things for me?" I asked.

"Why, of course."

"You do like poor little me a tiny bit, then?" I couldn't help adding--"Even though I'm different from other girls?"

"Perhaps more for that reason," he said, with his voice as kind as his eyes.

"Oh, what shall I do if you go away!" I burst out, partly because I really meant it, and partly because I hoped it might lead him on to say what I wanted so much to hear. "Suppose you get that consulship at Algiers."

"I hope I may," he said quickly. "A consulship isn't a very great thing--but--it's a beginning. I want it badly."

"I wish I had some influence with the Foreign Secretary," said I, not telling him that the man actually dislikes me, and looks at me as if I were a toad. "Of course, he's Lord Mountstuart's cousin, and brother-in-law as well, and that makes him seem quite in the family, doesn't it? But it isn't as if I were really related to Lady Mountstuart. I was never sorry before that Di and I are only step-sisters--no, not a bit sorry, though her mother had all the money, and brought it to my poor father; but now I wish I were Lady Mountstuart's niece, and that I had some of the coaxing, 'girly' ways Di can put on when she wants to get something out of people. I'd make the Foreign Secretary give you exactly what you wanted, even if it took you far, far from me."

With that, he looked at me suddenly, and his face grew slowly red, under the brown.

"You are a very kind Imp," he said. "Imp" is the name he invented for me. I loved to hear him call me by it.

"Kind!" I echoed. "One isn't kind when one--likes--people."

I saw by his eyes, then, that he knew. But I didn't care. If only I could make him say the words I longed to hear--even because he pitied me, because he had found out how I loved him, and because he had really too much of the dark-young-Crusader-knight in him, to break my heart! I made up my mind that I would take him at his word, quickly, if he gave me the chance; and I would tell Di that he was dreadfully in love with me. That would make her writhe.

I kept my eyes on him, and I let them tell him everything. He saw; there was no doubt of that; but he did not say the words I hoped for. A moment or two he was silent; and then, gazing away towards the door of the ballroom, he spoke very gently, as if I had been a child--though I am older than Di by three or four years.

"Thank you, Imp, for letting me see that you are such a staunch little friend," said he. "Now that I know you really do take an interest in my affairs, I think I may tell you why I want so much to go to Algiers--though very likely you've guessed already--you are such an 'intuitive' girl. And besides, I haven't tried very hard to hide my feelings--not as hard as I ought, perhaps, when I realise how little I have to offer to your sister. Now you understand all, don't you--even if you didn't before? I love her, and if I go to Algiers--"

"Don't say any more," I managed to cut him short. "I can't bear--I mean, I understand. I--did guess before."

It was true. I had guessed, but I wouldn't let myself believe. I hoped against hope. He was so much kinder to me than any other man ever took the trouble to be, in all my wretched, embittered twenty-four years of life.

"Di might have told me," I went gasping on, rather than let there be a long silence between us just then. I had enough pride not to want him to see me cry--though, if it could have made any difference, I would have grovelled at his feet and wet them with my tears. "But she never does tell me anything about herself."

"She's so unselfish and so fond of you, that probably she likes better to talk about you instead," he defended her. And then I felt that I could hate him, as much as I've always hated Di, deep down in my heart.

At that minute I should have liked to kill her, and watch his face when he found her lying dead--out of his reach for ever.

"Besides," he hurried on, "I've never asked her yet if she would marry me, because--my prospects weren't very brilliant. She knows of course that I love her--"

"And if you get the consulship, you'll put the important question?" I cut him short, trying to be flippant.

"Yes. But I told you tonight, because I--because you were so kind, I felt I should like to have you know."

Kind! Yes, I had been too kind. But if by putting out my foot I could have crushed every hope of his for the future--every hope, that is, in which my stepsister Diana Forrest had any part--I would have done it, just as I trample on ants in the country sometimes, for the pleasure of feeling that I--even I--have power of life and death.

I swallowed hard, to keep the sobs back. I'm never very strong or well, but now I felt broken, ready to die. I was glad when I heard the music stop in the ballroom.

"There!" I said. "The two dances you asked me to sit out with you are over. I'm sure you're engaged for the next."

"Yes, Imp, I am."