The Beetle: a Mystery
Copyright© 2025 by Richard Marsh
Chapter 14: The Duchess’ Ball
That night was the Duchess of Datchet’s ball—the first person I saw as I entered the dancing-room was Dora Grayling.
I went straight up to her.
‘Miss Grayling, I behaved very badly to you last night. I have come to make to you my apologies, —to sue for your forgiveness!’
‘My forgiveness?’ Her head went back, —she has a pretty bird-like trick of cocking it a little on one side. ‘You were not well. Are you better?’
‘Quite.—You forgive me? Then grant me plenary absolution by giving me a dance for the one I lost last night.’
She rose. A man came up, —a stranger to me; she’s one of the best hunted women in England, —there’s a million with her.
‘This is my dance, Miss Grayling.’
She looked at him.
‘You must excuse me. I am afraid I have made a mistake. I had forgotten that I was already engaged.’
I had not thought her capable of it. She took my arm, and away we went, and left him staring.
‘It’s he who’s the sufferer now,’ I whispered, as we went round, —she can waltz!
‘You think so? It was I last night, —I did not mean, if I could help it, to suffer again. To me a dance with you means something.’ She went all red, —adding, as an afterthought, ‘Nowadays so few men really dance. I expect it’s because you dance so well.’
‘Thank you.’
We danced the waltz right through, then we went to an impromptu shelter which had been rigged up on a balcony. And we talked. There’s something sympathetic about Miss Grayling which leads one to talk about one’s self, —before I was half aware of it I was telling her of all my plans and projects, —actually telling her of my latest notion which, ultimately, was to result in the destruction of whole armies as by a flash of lightning. She took an amount of interest in it which was surprising.
‘What really stands in the way of things of this sort is not theory but practice, —one can prove one’s facts on paper, or on a small scale in a room; what is wanted is proof on a large scale, by actual experiment. If, for instance, I could take my plant to one of the forests of South America, where there is plenty of animal life but no human, I could demonstrate the soundness of my position then and there.’
‘Why don’t you?’
‘Think of the money it would cost.’
‘I thought I was a friend of yours.’
‘I had hoped you were.’
‘Then why don’t you let me help you?’
‘Help me?—How?’
‘By letting you have the money for your South American experiment;—it would be an investment on which I should expect to receive good interest.’
I fidgeted.
‘It is very good of you, Miss Grayling, to talk like that.’
She became quite frigid.
‘Please don’t be absurd!—I perceive quite clearly that you are snubbing me, and that you are trying to do it as delicately as you know how.’
‘Miss Grayling!’
‘I understand that it was an impertinence on my part to volunteer assistance which was unasked; you have made that sufficiently plain.’
‘I assure you—’
‘Pray don’t. Of course, if it had been Miss Lindon it would have been different; she would at least have received a civil answer. But we are not all Miss Lindon.’
I was aghast. The outburst was so uncalled for, —I had not the faintest notion what I had said or done to cause it; she was in such a surprising passion—and it suited her!—I thought I had never seen her look prettier, —I could do nothing else but stare. So she went on, —with just as little reason.
‘Here is someone coming to claim this dance, —I can’t throw all my partners over. Have I offended you so irremediably that it will be impossible for you to dance with me again?’
‘Miss Grayling!—I shall be only too delighted.’ She handed me her card. ‘Which may I have?’
‘For your own sake you had better place it as far off as you possibly can.’
‘They all seem taken.’
‘That doesn’t matter; strike off any name you please, anywhere and put your own instead.’
It was giving me an almost embarrassingly free hand. I booked myself for the next waltz but two, —who it was who would have to give way to me I did not trouble to inquire.
‘Mr Atherton!—Is that you?’
It was, —it was also she. It was Marjorie! And so soon as I saw her I knew that there was only one woman in the world for me, —the mere sight of her sent the blood tingling through my veins. Turning to her attendant cavalier, she dismissed him with a bow.
‘Is there an empty chair?’
She seated herself in the one Miss Grayling had just vacated. I sat down beside her. She glanced at me, laughter in her eyes. I was all in a stupid tremblement.
‘You remember that last night I told you that I might require your friendly services in diplomatic intervention?’ I nodded, —I felt that the allusion was unfair. ‘Well, the occasion’s come, —or, at least, it’s very near.’ She was still, —and I said nothing to help her. ‘You know how unreasonable papa can be.’
I did, —never a more pig-headed man in England than Geoffrey Lindon, —or, in a sense, a duller. But, just then, I was not prepared to admit it to his child.
‘You know what an absurd objection he has to—Paul.’
There was an appreciative hesitation before she uttered the fellow’s Christian name, —when it came it was with an accent of tenderness which stung me like a gadfly. To speak to me—of all men, —of the fellow in such a tone was—like a woman.
‘Has Mr Lindon no notion of how things stand between you?’
‘Except what he suspects. That is just where you are to come in, papa thinks so much of you—I want you to sound Paul’s praises in his ear—to prepare him for what must come.’ Was ever rejected lover burdened with such a task? Its enormity kept me still. ‘Sydney, you have always been my friend, —my truest, dearest friend. When I was a little girl you used to come between papa and me, to shield me from his wrath. Now that I am a big girl I want you to be on my side once more, and to shield me still.’
Her voice softened. She laid her hand upon my arm. How, under her touch, I burned.
‘But I don’t understand what cause there has been for secrecy, —why should there have been any secrecy from the first?’
‘It was Paul’s wish that papa should not be told.’
‘Is Mr Lessingham ashamed of you?’
‘Sydney!’
‘Or does he fear your father?’
‘You are unkind. You know perfectly well that papa has been prejudiced against him all along, you know that his political position is just now one of the greatest difficulty, that every nerve and muscle is kept on the continual strain, that it is in the highest degree essential that further complications of every and any sort should be avoided. He is quite aware that his suit will not be approved of by papa, and he simply wishes that nothing shall be said about it till the end of the session, —that is all.’
‘I see! Mr Lessingham is cautious even in love-making, —politician first, and lover afterwards.’
‘Well!—why not?—would you have him injure the cause he has at heart for want of a little patience?’
‘It depends what cause it is he has at heart.’
‘What is the matter with you?—why do you speak to me like that?—it is not like you at all.’ She looked at me shrewdly, with flashing eyes. ‘Is it possible that you are—jealous?—that you were in earnest in what you said last night?—I thought that was the sort of thing you said to every girl.’
I would have given a great deal to take her in my arms, and press her to my bosom then and there, —to think that she should taunt me with having said to her the sort of thing I said to every girl.
‘What do you know of Mr Lessingham?’
‘What all the world knows, —that history will be made by him.’
‘There are kinds of history in the making of which one would not desire to be associated. What do you know of his private life, —it was to that that I was referring.’
‘Really, —you go too far. I know that he is one of the best, just as he is one of the greatest, of men; for me, that is sufficient.’
‘If you do know that, it is sufficient.’
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