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Page 9
We formed ourselves round her in a ring of fire, hoping to frighten
the beast away. But we were miserably, fiercely, anxious, suspicious,
jealous. We were jealous of everything in the shape of a man that came
into any sort of contact with her: of the men who passed her in the
street or rode with her in the omnibus; of the little _employ�s de
commerce_ to whom she gave English lessons; of everybody. I fancy we
were always more or less uneasy in our minds when she was out of our
sight. Who could tell what might be happening? With those lips of
hers, those eyes of hers--oh, we knew how she could love: Chalks had
said it. Who could tell what might already have happened? Who could
tell that the coming man had not already come? She was entirely
capable of concealing him from us. Sometimes, in the evening, she
would seem absent, preoccupied. How could we be sure that she wasn't
thinking of him? Savouring anew the hours she had passed with him that
very day? Or dreaming of those she had promised him for to-morrow? If
she took leave of us--might he not be waiting to join her round the
corner? If she spent an evening away from us....
And she--she only laughed; laughed at our jealousy, our fears, our
precautions, as she laughed at our hankering flame. Not a laugh that
reassured us, though; an inscrutable, enigmatic laugh, that might have
covered a multitude of sins. She had taken to calling us collectively
_Loulou_. 'Ah, le pauv' Loulou--so now he has the pretension to be
jealous.' Then she would be interrupted by a paroxysm of laughter;
after which, 'Oh, qu'il est dr�le,' she would gasp. 'Pourvu qu'il ne
devienne pas g�nant!'
It was all very well to laugh; but some of us, our personal equation
quite apart, could not help feeling that the joke was of a precarious
quality, that the situation held tragic possibilities. A young and
attractive girl, by no means constitutionally insusceptible, and
imbued with heterodox ideas of marriage--alone in the Latin Quarter.
X.
I have heard it maintained that the man has yet to be born, who, in
his heart of hearts, if he comes to think the matter over, won't find
himself at something of a loss to conceive why any given woman should
experience the passion of love for any other man; that a woman's
choice, to all men save the chosen, is, by its very nature, as
incomprehensible as the postulates of Hegel. But, in Nina's case,
even when I regard it from this distance of time, I still feel, as we
all felt then, that the mystery was more than ordinarily obscure. We
had fancied ourselves prepared for anything; the only thing we weren't
prepared for was the thing that befell. We had expected 'him' to be
offensive, and he wasn't. He was, quite simply, insignificant. He was
a South American, a Brazilian, a member of the School of Mines: a
poor, undersized, pale, spiritless, apologetic creature, with rather a
Teutonic-looking name, Ernest Mayer. His father, or uncle, was
Minister of Agriculture, or Commerce, or something, in his native
land; and he himself was attached in some nominal capacity to the
Brazilian Legation, in the Rue de T�h�ran, whence, on state occasions,
he enjoyed the privilege of enveloping his meagre little person in a
very gorgeous diplomatic uniform. He was beardless, with vague
features, timid, light-blue eyes, and a bluish, an�mic skin. In manner
he was nervous, tremulous, deprecatory--perpetually bowing, wriggling,
stepping back to let you pass, waving his hands, palms outward, as if
to protest against giving you trouble. And in speech--upon my word, I
don't think I ever heard him compromise himself by any more dangerous
assertion than that the weather was fine, or he wished you good-day.
For the most part he listened mutely, with a nickering, perfunctory
smile. From time to time, with an air of casting fear behind him and
dashing into the imminent, deadly breach, he would hazard an 'Ah,
oui,' or a 'Pas mal.' For the rest, he played the piano prettily
enough, wrote colourless, correct French verse, and was reputed to be
an industrious if not a brilliant student--what we called _un
s�rieux_.
It was hard to believe that beautiful, sumptuous Nina Childe, with her
wit, her humour, her imagination, loved this neutral little fellow;
yet she made no secret of doing so. We tried to frame a theory that
would account for it. 'It's the maternal instinct,' suggested one.
'It's her chivalry,' said another; 'she's the sort of woman who could
never be very violently interested by a man of her own size. She would
need one she could look up to, or else one she could protect and pat
on the head.' '"God be thanked, the meanest of His creatures boasts
two soul-sides, one to face the world with, one to show a woman when
he loves her,"' quoted a third. 'Perhaps Coco'--we had nicknamed him
Coco--'has luminous qualities that we don't dream of, to which he
gives the rein when they're _� deux_.'
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