Lilian

"Several times I've wanted to speak to you about a certain matter," said Mr. Grig quietly; and paused, gazing at the smoke from his cigarette.

"Oh, yes?" Lilian murmured nervously, and strove to accomplish the demeanour of a young woman of the world. (She much regretted that she had her wristlets on.) As he was not looking at her she could look at his face. And she looked at it as though she had never seen it before, or with fresh-perceiving eyes. A very clever, rather tired face; superior, even haughty, self-sure; fastidious, dissatisfied, the face of one accustomed to choose sardonically between two evils; impatient, bitter; humorous, with hints of benevolence. She thought: "Of course he's never spoken to me because of his sister. Even he has to mind his p's and q's with her. And he's one that hates a fuss. Now she isn't here-"

She could not conceive what might be the "certain matter." She thrilled to learn it; but he would not be hurried. No, he would take his own time, Mr. Grig would. This was the most brilliant moment of her life.

He said, looking straight at her and forcing her to look straight at him:

"You know you've no business in a place like this, a girl like you. You're much too highly strung, for one thing. You aren't like Miss Jackson, for instance. You're simply wasting yourself here. Of course you're terribly independent, but you do try to please. I don't mean try to please merely in your work. You try to please. It's an instinct with you. Now in typing you'd never beat Miss Jackson. Miss Jackson's only alive, really, when she's typing. She types with her whole soul. You type well-I hear-but that's only because you're clever all round. You'd do anything well. You'd milk cows just as well as you'd type. But your business is marriage, and a good marriage! You're beautiful, and, as I say, you have an instinct to please. That's the important thing. You'd make a success of marriage because of that and because you're adaptable and quick at picking up. Most women when they're married forget that their job is to adapt themselves and to please. That's their job. They expect to be kowtowed to and spoilt and humoured and to be free to spend money without having to earn it, and to do nothing in return except just exist-and perhaps manage a household, pretty badly. They seem to forget that there are two sides to a bargain. It's dashed hard work, pleasing is, sometimes. I know that. But it isn't so hard as earning money, believe me! Now you wouldn't be like the majority of women. You'd keep your share of the bargain, and handsomely. If you don't marry, and marry fifty miles above you, you'll be very silly. For you to stop here is an outrage against common-sense. It's merely monstrous. If I wasn't an old man I wouldn't tell you this, naturally. Now you needn't blush. I expect I'm not far off thirty years older than you-and you're young enough to be wise in time."

She was blushing tremendously, and in spite of an effort of courage her gaze dropped from his. At length his gaze shifted, on the pretext of dropping cigarette-ash very carefully into an ash-tray.

He had, then, been thinking about her all those months, differentiating her from the others, summing her up! And how well he had summed her up, and how well he had expressed himself-so romantically (somehow) and yet with such obvious truth! (Of course he had been having a dig at his own wife, who had divorced him! You could see how embittered he was on the subject of wives!) She wondered if he had thought her beautiful for long. Fancy him moving about the office and forming ideas about all of them, and never a sign, never the slightest sign that he could tell one of them from another! And he had chosen that night to reveal his mind to her. She was inexpressibly flattered. Because Mr. Grig was clearly a connoisseur-she had always felt that. If Mr. Grig considered her beautiful…!

And in fact she had an established assurance of beauty. She knew a good deal about herself. Proudly she reflected, amid her blushes, upon the image of her face and hair-the eyes that matched her hair, the perfectly formed ears, the softness of the chin and the firmness of the nose, the unchallengeable complexion, the dazzling teeth. She was simple enough to be somewhat apologetic about the largeness of her mouth, unaware that a man of experience flees from a small rosebud mouth as from the devil, and that a large mouth is the certain sign of goodwill and understanding in a woman. She was apologetic, too, about the scragginess of her neck, and with better reason. But the wrists and the ankles, the legs, the shoulders, the swelling of the hips, the truly astounding high, firm and abundant bosom! Beyond criticism! And she walked beautifully, throwing back her shoulders and so emphasizing the line of the waist at the back. She walked with her legs and hips, and the body swam forward above them. She had observed the effect thousands of times in street mirrors. The girls all admitted that she walked uniquely. Then, further, she had a smile (rarely used) which would intensify in the most extraordinary way the beauty of her face, lighting it, electrifying the eyes, radiating a charm that enraptured. She knew that also. A superlative physical pride rose up out of the subconscious into the conscious, and put her cheap pretty clothes to shame. It occurred to her that Mr. Grig had been talking very strangely, very unusually.

"I don't suppose I shall ever marry," she said plaintively. "How can I?" She meant, and without doubt he understood: "How can I possibly meet a man who is worth marrying?" She thought with destructive disdain of every youth who had ever reacted to her charm. The company at the dance she had missed seemed contemptible. They were still dancing. What a collection of tenth-rate fellows!

She became gloomy, pessimistic, as she saw the totality of her existence and its prospects. The home at Putney had been a prison. She had escaped from it, but only to enter another prison. She saw no outlet. She was trapped on every side. She could not break out of the infernal circle of poverty and of the conventions. Not in ten years could she save enough to keep her for a year. She had to watch every penny. If she was mad enough to go to a West End theatre she had to consider the difference between a half-crown and a three-shilling pit. Thousands of men and women negligently fling themselves into expensive taxis, but a rise in bus fares or Tube fares would seriously unbalance Lilian's budget. She passed most of her spare time in using a needle to set off her beauty, but what a farce was the interminable study and labour! She could not possibly aspire to even the best gloves; and as for the best stockings, or the second best! – the price of such a pair came to more than she could earn in a week. It was all absurd, tragic, pitiful. She had common-sense ample enough to see that her beauty was futile, her ambitions baseless, and her prospects nil. If she had been a vicious girl, she might have broken through the dreadful ring into splendours which she glimpsed and needed. But she was not vicious.

"Pooh!" exclaimed Mr. Grig impatiently. "You could marry anybody you liked if you put your mind to it."

And he spoke so scornfully of her lack of faith, so persuasively, so inspiringly, that she had an amazing and beautiful vision of herself worshipped, respected, alluring, seductive, arousing passion, reciprocating passion, kind, benevolent, eternally young, eternally lovely, eternally exercising for the balm and solace of mankind and a man the functions for which she was created and endowed-in a word, fulfilling herself. And for the moment, in the ecstasy of resolution to achieve the impossible, she was superb and magnificent and the finest thing that a man could ever hope to witness.

And she thought desperately:

"I'm twenty-three already. Time is rushing past me. To-morrow I shall be old."

After a silence Mr. Grig said:

"You're very tired. There's no reason why you shouldn't go home to bed."

"Indeed I shan't go home, Mr. Grig," she answered sharply, with grateful, eager devotion. "I shall stay. Supposing some work came in! It's not twelve o'clock yet."

She surprised quite a youthful look on Mr. Grig's face. Nearly thirty years older than herself? Ridiculous! There was nothing at all in a difference of years. Some men were never old. Back in the clerks' room she got out her vanity bag and carefully arranged her face. And as she looked in the glass she thought:

"After to-night I shall never be quite the same girl again… Did he really call me in to ask me about the work, or did he only do it because he wanted to talk to me?"

IV

The Clubman

Lilian was confused by a momentary magnificent, vague vision of a man framed in the doorway of the small room. The door, drawn backwards from without, hid the vision. Then there was a cough. She realized with alarm that she had been asleep, or at least dozing, over her machine. In the fifth of a second she was wide awake and alert.

"Who's there?" she called, steadying her voice to a matter-of-fact and casual tone.

The door was pushed open, and the man who had been a vision entered.

"I beg your pardon," said he. "I wasn't sure whether it was the proper thing to come in here. I looked into another room, and had a glimpse of a gentleman who seemed to be rather dormant."

"This is the room to come to," said Lilian, with a prim counterfeit of a smile.

"The office is open?"

"Certainly."

As he advanced into the room the man took off the glossy silk hat which he was wearing at the far back of his head. He had an overcoat, but carried it on his left arm. He was tall and broad-something, indeed, in the nature of a giant-with a florid, smooth face; aged perhaps thirty-three. He had a way of pinching his lips together and pressing his lower jaw against his high collar, thus making a false double chin or so; the result was to produce an effect of wise and tolerant good-humour, as of one who knew humanity and who while prepared for surprises was not going to judge us too harshly. He was in full evening-dress, and his clothes were superb. They glistened; they fitted without a crease. The vast curve of the gleaming stiff shirt-front sloped perfect in its contour; the white waistcoat was held round the stupendous form by three topaz buttons; from somewhere beneath the waistcoat a gold chain emerged and vanished somewhere into the hinterland of his person. The stout white kid gloves were thickly ridged on the backs and fitted the broad hands as well as the coat fitted the body-it was inconceivable that they had not been made to measure as everything else must have been made to measure. The man would have been overdressed had he not worn his marvellous and costly garments with absolute naturalness and simplicity.

Lilian thought:

"He must be a man-about-town, a clubman, the genuine article."

She was impressed, secretly flustered, and very anxious to meet him as an equal on his own ground of fine manners. She divined that, having entered the room once and fairly caught her asleep, he had had the good taste to withdraw and cough and make a new entry in order to spare her modesty; and she was softly appreciative, while quite determined to demonstrate by her demeanour that she had not been asleep.

She thought:

"Gertie Jackson wouldn't have known where to look, in my place."

Still, despite her disdain of Gertie Jackson's deportment, she felt herself to be terribly unproficient in the social art.

"Is it anything urgent?" she asked.

"Well, it is a bit urgent."

He had a strong, full, pleasant voice.

"Won't you sit down?"

"Thanks."

He sat down, disposing his hat by the side of her machine, and his overcoat on another chair, and drawing off his gloves.

Lilian waited like a cat to pounce upon the slightest sign of familiarity and kill it; for she had understood that men-about-town regarded girl typists as their quarry and as nothing else. But there was no least lapse from deferential propriety; the clubman might have been in colloquy with his sister's friend-and his sister listening in the next room. He pulled a manuscript from his breast-pocket, and, after a loving glance at it, offered it to her.

"I've only just written it," said he. "And I want to take it round to the Evening Standard office myself in the morning before 8.30. The editor's an acquaintance of mine and I might get it into to-morrow afternoon's paper. In fact, it must be to-morrow or never-because of the financial debate in the House, you see. Topical. I wonder whether you'd be good enough to do it for me."

"Let me see," said Lilian professionally. "About fifteen hundred words, or hardly. Oh, yes! I will do it myself."

"That's very kind of you. Will you mind looking at the writing? Do you think you'll be able to make it out? I was at a bit of a jolly to-night, and my hand's never too legible."

Without glancing further at the manuscript, Lilian answered:

"It's our business to make out writing."

Suddenly she gave him her full smile.

"I suppose it is," he said, also smiling. "Now shall I call for the copy about 8 o'clock?"

"I'm afraid the office won't be open at 8 o'clock," said Lilian. "We close at 6.30 for an hour or two. But what's the address? Is it anywhere near here?"

"6a Jermyn Street. You'll see it all on the back of the last page."

"It could be delivered-dropped into your letter-box-by 6.30 this morning, and you could take it out of the box any time after that." The idea seemed to have spontaneously presented itself to her. She forbore to say that her intention was to deliver the copy herself on her way home.

"But this is most awfully obliging of you!" he exclaimed.

"Not at all. You see, we specialize in urgent things… We charge double for night-work, I ought to tell you-in fact, three shillings a thousand, with a minimum."

"Of course! Of course! I quite understand that. Perhaps you'll put the bill in the envelope." He drew forth a watch that looked like a gold half-crown. "Two o'clock. And I can count on it being in the letter-box at six-thirty."

"Absolutely."

"Well, all I say is, it's very wonderful."

She smiled again: "It's just our business."

He bowed gracefully in departing.

As soon as he was gone she looked at the back of the last page. "Lord Mackworth." Never having heard of such a lord, she consulted the office Who's Who. Yes, he was there. "Mackworth, Lord. See Fermanagh, Earl of." She turned to the F pages. He was the e. s. of the Earl of Fermanagh. E.s. meant eldest son, she assumed. One day he would be an earl. She was thrilled.

Eagerly she read the manuscript before starting to copy it. The subject was the fall in the exchange value of the French franc. "Abstruse," she called it to herself. Frightfully learned! Yet the article was quite amusing to read. In one or two places it was almost funny enough to make her laugh. And Lord Mackworth illustrated his points by the prices of commodities and pleasure at Monte Carlo. Evidently he had just returned from Monte Carlo. What a figure! He had everything-title, blood, wealth, style, a splendid presence, perfect manners; he was intellectual, he was clever, he was political, he wrote for the Press. And withal he was a man of pleasure, for he had been to Monte Carlo, and that very night he had taken part in a "jolly" – whatever a jolly was!

No! He was not married; it was impossible that he should be married. But naturally he must keep mistresses. They always kept mistresses. Though what a man like him could see in that sort of girl passed Lilian. "You could marry anybody you liked if you put your mind to it," Mr. Grig had said. Absurdly, horribly untrue! How, for instance, could she set about to marry Lord Mackworth? She was for ever imprisoned; she could not possibly, by any device, break through the transparent, invisible, adamantine walls that surrounded her. Beautiful, was she? Gifts, had she? Well, she had sat opposite this lord, close to him, in a room secure from interruption, in the middle of the night. She had been obliging. And he had not been sufficiently interested to swerve by a hair's breadth from his finished and nonchalant formal politeness. Her rôle in relation to Lord Mackworth was to tap out his clever article on the old Underwood and to deliver it herself in the chilly darkness of the morning before going exhausted to her miserable lodging! She, lovely! She, burning with ambition! … The visit of the man of title and of parts was like an act of God to teach her the realities of her situation and the dangerous folly of dreams.

She tiptoed out of the room to see if Mr. Grig really was asleep as Lord Mackworth had suggested. She hoped that he was unconscious and that the visit was her secret. Either he was very soundly asleep or the stir of the arrival and departure must have awakened him. If he was awake she would pretend that she wanted to inform him of the job just come in, since he had previously enquired about the course of business. If not, she would say nothing of the affair-merely enter up the job in the night-book, and wait for any inquiries that might be made before opening her mouth.

Through the door ajar Mr. Grig could be seen fast asleep in his padded chair. His lower jaw had fallen, revealing a mouth studded with precious metal. He was generally spry, in his easy-going manner, and often had quite a youthful air, but now there could be no mistake about his age, which according to Lilian's standard of age was advanced. To Lilian forty was oldish, fifty quite old, and sixty venerable. What a contrast between the fresh, brilliant, authentic youth of Lord Mackworth and the imitation juvenility of Mr. Grig even at his spryest! The souvenir of Lord Mackworth's physical individuality made the sight of Mr. Grig almost repellent. She was divided from Mr. Grig by the greatest difference in the world, the difference between one generation and another.

She crept back, resolving to accomplish the finest piece of typescript that had ever been done in the office. Had she not brains to surpass Gertie Jackson at anything if she chose to try? Just as she was entering her own room the outer door of the office opened. More urgent work! It was Lord Mackworth again. She stood stock-still in the doorway, her head thrown back and turned towards him, her body nearly within the room. Agitated by a sudden secret anticipation, by a pleasure utterly unhoped for, she gave him a nervous, welcoming, enquiring smile, a smile without reserve, and full of the confidence due to one who had proved at once his reliability and his attractiveness. She had a feeling towards him as towards an old friend. She knew that her face was betraying her joy, but she did not care, because she trusted him; and, moreover, it would in any case have been impossible for her to hide her joy.

"There's just one thing," began Lord Mackworth in a cautious whisper, though previously he had put no restraint on his powerful voice, and paused.

"Will you come in?" she invited him, also in a whisper, and moved quickly from his line of sight. He followed her, and having entered her room softly shut the door, which at the previous interview had remained half open.

"Will you sit down?"

They both sat down in their original positions. Yes, they were like friends. More, they were like conspirators. Why? What would the next moment disclose? It seemed to her that the next moment must unfold into an unpredictable, beautiful blossom such as nobody had ever seen. She was intensely excited. She desired ardently that he should ask her to help him in some matter in which she alone could help him. She was a touching, wistful spectacle. All her defences had sunk away. He could not but see that he had made a conquest, that the city of loveliness had fallen into his hands.

"It just occurred to me-please tell me if I'm being indiscreet-that perhaps you wouldn't mind doing me a little service. I may oversleep myself in the morning, and I can't get at my man now. Would you mind giving me a ring up on the 'phone about six o'clock? You see, I have the telephone by my bed, and it would be sure to wake me-especially if you told the operator to keep on ringing. It's very necessary I should run along to the newspaper office and see the editor personally as soon as he gets there. Otherwise I might be done in. Of course, I could sit up for the rest of the night-" He laughed shortly.

Nearly opposite the end of Clifford Street, in Bond Street, was a hosier's shop with the royal arms over the entrance and half a dozen pairs of rich blue-and-crimson pyjamas-and nothing else-displayed in the window against a chaste background of panelled acacia wood. Lilian saw a phantasm of her client's lordly chamber, with the bed and the telephone by the bed, and the great form of the man himself recumbent and moveless, gloriously and imperfectly covered in a suit of the blue-and-crimson pyjamas. She heard the telephone bell ring-ring-ring-ring-ring-ring, pertinaciously. The figure did not stir. Ring-ring-ring-ring! At last the figure stirred, turned over, half sat up, seized the telephone, which, pacified, ceased to ring, and the figure listened-to her voice! It was her voice that was heard in the chamber… The most sharply masculine hallucination that she had ever had, perhaps the only one. It moved her to the point of fright. The whole house might have rocked under her-rocked once, and then resumed its firmness. She felt faint, terror-struck, and excruciatingly, inexplicably happy. And she was ashamed; she was shocked by the mystery of herself. Flushing, she bent her face over the desk.

"Perhaps I'd better sit up all night," Lord Mackworth added apologetically.

"What's your number?" she asked in a low voice, not looking up.

"Regent 1067."

"Regent 1067," she repeated the number, even writing it on her note pad.

"You're really awfully kind. I hesitated to suggest it. I do hope you'll forgive me."

She looked up quickly, and into his eyes.

"I shall be delighted to give you a ring," she said, with sweet, smiling eagerness. "It's no trouble at all. None at all, I assure you."

She was the divine embodiment of the human and specially feminine desire to please, to please charmingly, to please completely, to please with the whole force and beauty of her individuality. The poor boy must get a few hours' sleep. A man needed sleep; sleep was important to him. As for her, the woman's task was to watch and work, and when the moment came she would wake the man-the child-who was incapable of waking himself.

"Well, thanks ever so much." He rose.

"I suppose you don't want a carbon of your article as well?" she suggested.

"It's an idea," he agreed. "You never know. I think I will have a carbon."

As he was leaving he said abruptly: "Do you know, I imagine I've seen you before-somewhere."

"I don't think so." She did not quite like this remark of his. It seemed to her to be a commonplace device for prolonging the interview; it shook her faith in his probity.

But he insisted, nodding his head.

"Yes. In Bond Street. I remember you were wearing an exceedingly pretty hat, with some yellow flowers in it."

She was dumbfounded, for she did possess a pretty hat with yellow flowers in it. She had done him an injustice. Fancy him noticing her, admiring, remembering! It was incredible. She must have made a considerable impression on him. She smiled her repentance for having doubted his probity even for a moment.

"You must have a very good memory," she said, in her gaze an exquisite admission of his rightness.

"Oh! I have!"

They shook hands. In holding out her hand she drew back her body. She had absurdly hoped that he would offer to shake hands, not really expecting him to do so. He departed with unimpeachable correctness and composure. What nice discretion he had shown in not referring earlier to the fact that her face was not unknown to him! Most men would have contrived to work it in at the very beginning of the conversation. But he had actually gone away, the first time, without mentioning it.

Lilian was left in such a state of exaltation that she could not immediately start to work. She was ecstatically inspired with a resolution, far transcending all previous yearnings of a similar nature, to fulfil herself, to be herself utterly, to bring her gifts to fruition despite all obstacles and all impossibilities. It was not that she desired to please Lord Mackworth (though she passionately desired to please him), nor to achieve luxury and costliness and elegance and a highly refined way of life. These things, however important and delectable, were merely the necessary incidentals to the supreme end of exploiting her beauty, charm and benevolence so that in old age she would not have to say, "I might have been."