not care for that,” said Winifred, “but oh, I am so glad she is to sing again alone.”
She did care for the quartette when it came, for Miss Norreys’ voice was far ahead of the others, and then there was the pleasure of seeing her! And the third time she sang, the impression of the first was intensified, for though the song itself was a gayer one, the indescribable pathos of her voice was there too – it was as if a spirit were singing of joys which had once been his, long ago, in some golden age of childhood.
After that, Winifred, though she sat silent and apparently attentive, heard but little of the music.
Then came the little bustle of collecting discarded cloaks and furs, and the interchange of remarks upon the performance, as the “assistants,” in the French sense, most of whom were women, made their way to the door.
“Winifred, my dear, Celia,” said their hostess, when they were waiting with her for the carriage at the entrance, “I want to introduce you to my friend, Lady Campion.”
“You have enjoyed the concert, I think,” said the stranger – the same whose remarks about the Maryon girls had pleased Mrs Balderson.
“Very much, oh, very, very much,” both sisters replied.
Their chaperon gave a little smile of satisfaction as she glanced at Lady Campion.
“There’s some pleasure in having girls like these to take about, isn’t there?” the smile and glance seemed to say, and the answering expression in Lady Campion’s bright eyes showed that she understood.
“It is cold, isn’t it?” said Mrs Balderson, drawing her fur-lined cloak more closely round her, with a slight shiver.
“It looks cold,” replied Lady Campion, as she glanced up and down the street where the incipient fog veiling the dim red still lingering in the sky, and the yellow glare of the just-lighted lamps, gave a curious, half-mysterious effect, not without its charm. “It looks cold,” she repeated, “but I don’t think that it really is so.”
“It was beautifully warm in the concert-room,” said Winifred. “London is so much less chilly than the country just now. It is so delightful to be here.”
“Yet the country is often charming in November: there are days when one longs to sit out sketching,” said Lady Campion, who tried her hand at painting as well as at several other accomplishments. “The hazy colouring is so wonderful sometimes.”
“If I were an artist,” said Celia, who had not yet spoken, “I should like nothing better than to try London effects on a day like this. I never saw anything more curious than the lights just now.”
Lady Campion glanced at her in some surprise. There was a touch of originality in the remark which she had not expected, for she had already in her own mind put down Celia as “the pretty sister,” and Winifred as “the clever one.”
Just then Mrs Balderson’s footman hurried up to announce the carriage.
“Good-bye, so glad to have met you,” said his mistress, as she began to shake hands with her friend. “But – how are you going home?” she added suddenly. “You are driving, of course?”
“No, that is to say I have no carriage here. I am going to get a hansom,” replied the younger woman.
“Then do come with us, and let us drop you. It will not be out of our way at all,” said Mrs Balderson, cordially. “There is plenty of room for us all.”
“Thank you very much. Well, yes, it would be very nice,” replied Lady Campion, who felt rather pleased to see a little more of the two girls. They interested her, and she liked to be interested.
So in another moment or two the four found themselves comfortably ensconced in the landau, which, like everything belonging to Mrs Balderson, gave one a not unpleasing impression of space and plenty – of a rather old-fashioned kind.
“You are not tired, my dear Winifred? You have not got a headache, I hope?” said her hostess. For Miss Maryon was sitting silent with an absent look.
The girl started, then she smiled brightly. Her smile was very pleasant, relieving her face from the heaviness which in repose was its possible defect. And she had beautiful teeth!
“Oh dear, no,” she replied. “I never have headaches. None of us do, except Louise, and that very, very seldom. I was – only thinking.”
“I know,” said Celia. “Mrs Balderson, shall I tell you what it is? Winifred has fallen in love, and at first sight.”
“My dear!” exclaimed Mrs Balderson, rather taken aback, while Lady Campion listened with a quiet smile, her interest and amusement increasing.
“Yes,” Celia went on, unabashed, “and so have I, though not quite so badly, perhaps. It is Miss Norreys – Miss Hertha Norreys, the singer.”
Mrs Balderson’s face cleared.
“She is so – I can’t find a word for her,” said Winifred, half apologetically, but tacitly pleading guilty to her sister’s impeachment. “Isn’t she wonderful, Mrs Balderson? —you think her so, I am sure; don’t you?” she went on, turning to Lady Campion, in whose face she fancied she read quicker sympathy.
“I think she sings charmingly, in her own way,” began the elder woman, who was by no means ignorant of music; “and in herself she is, of course, most – ”
“No, no; I agree with Miss Maryon,” interrupted Lady Campion, but in a pretty eager way peculiar to her, which took away all shadow of offensiveness from the solecism. “Hertha Norreys, take her all together, is wonderful. I know no one the least, the very least like her.”
“You know her, then?” exclaimed Winifred, her eyes sparkling. “You know her privately?”
“Is it her real name?” added Celia, “I thought actors and singers always changed their names, or at least altered them somehow.”
“Not always – more often indeed not now-a-days, when they are of her class and position,” Lady Campion replied. “She is an ‘artist,’ so to say, of the modern school, retaining all the privileges that are hers by birth, except – and that ‘except,’ I fear, means a great deal – that she is, or would be if she did nothing, very poor.”
“If she did nothing?” repeated Winifred, musingly. “What a different,” – then she broke off hurriedly, asking again – “You know her? Privately – personally, I mean?”
Lady Campion nodded her head.
“I have that honour,” she said quaintly. “And an honour it is. But here we are at my own door. A thousand thanks, dear Mrs Balderson; but – now, won’t you do me another kindness? Come in and have tea with me, and I shall be able to tell our young friends a little more about my dear Hertha.”
Mrs Balderson hesitated. Her first impulse was always to do whatever she was asked to do, if such doing, that is to say, promised to give pleasure to the asker or any one else concerned. But, as often happened – for she had learned by experience – there came second thoughts.
“I fear I must not,” she said. “Mr Balderson and Eric are coming home early. Eric has some accompaniments he wants me to try over before dinner. But I should be very glad for you girls to stay half an hour or so with Lady Campion,” she went on, turning to the Maryons. “I cannot send the carriage back again, I fear, for I have had it out so much to-day, but your footman could see them into a hansom; they would be all right?” she added, reverting to Lady Campion.
“Oh, perfectly. I shall be delighted,” she replied; and the “delight,” without any polite figure of speech, shone in Winifred’s eyes, as she eagerly repeated the word “perfectly,” adding – “That will be charming. Celia and I want very much to go about a little alone in hansoms – to learn to manage for ourselves.”
But Celia hesitated.
“Winifred,” she said, “I think one of us should write home. We only sent a postcard of our arrival last night,