Flowering Wilderness

Pouring some of the shampoo on the centre of that polished black back, Di

“Phew! My back! Sluice him and let the water out. I’ll hold him.”

Wilfrid sluiced, the dog behaving as if not too sorry for his fleas. He shook himself vigorously, and they both jumped back.

“Don’t let him out,” cried Di

“All right. Put your hands round his neck and hold him still.”

Wrapped in a huge bath towel, the dog lifted his face to her; its expression was drooping and forlorn.

“Poor boy, soon over now, and you’ll smell lovely.”

The dog shook himself.

Wilfrid withdrew the towel. “Hold him a minute, I’ll get an old blanket; we’ll make him curl up till he’s dry.”

Alone with the dog, who was now trying to get out of the bath, Di

“There! That’s better!”

They carried the almost inanimate dog to the divan, wrapped in an old Guards’ blanket.

“What shall we call him, Di

“Let’s try him with a few names, we may hit on his real one.”

He answered to none. “Well,” said Di

CHAPTER 18

Feelings at Condaford, after the General’s return, were vexed and uneasy. Di

“He hardly said a word, Liz. Polite and all that, and I must say he doesn’t look like a fellow who’d quit. His record’s very good, too. The thing’s inexplicable.”

“Have you read any of his verse, Con?”

“No. Where is it?”

“Di

“Di

“Poets almost always are.”

“I don’t know who can move Di

“I sometimes think,” murmured Lady Cherrell, “that living here, as we do, we don’t know what will cause clouds and what won’t.”

“There can’t be a question,” said the General, with finality, “among people who count.”

“Who does count, nowadays?”

The General was silent. Then he said shrewdly:

“England’s still aristocratic underneath. All that keeps us going comes from the top. Service and tradition still rule the roost. The socialists can talk as they like.”

Lady Cherrell looked up, astonished at this flow.

“Well,” she said, “what are we to do about Di

The General shrugged.

“Wait till things come to a crisis of some sort. Cut-you-off-with-a-shilling is out of date and out of question—we’re too fond of her. You’ll speak to her, Liz, when you get a chance, of course…”

Between Hubert and Jean discussion of the matter took a rather different line.

“I wish to God, Jean, Di

“Alan’s got over it. I had a letter from him yesterday. He’s at Singapore now. There’s probably somebody out there. I only hope it isn’t a married woman. There are so few girls in the East.”

“I don’t think he’d go for a married woman. Possibly a native; they say Malay girls are often pretty.”

Jean grimaced.

“A Malay girl instead of Di

Presently she murmured: “I’d like to see this Mr. Desert. I think I could give him an idea, Hubert, of what’ll be thought of him if he carries Di

“You must be careful with Di

“If I can have the car I’ll go up tomorrow and talk it over with Fleur. She must know him quite well; he was their best man.”

“I’d choose Michael of the two; but for God’s sake take care, old girl.”

Jean, who was accustomed to carry out her ideas, slid away next day before the world was up and was at South Square, Westminster, by ten o’clock. Michael, it appeared, was down in his constituency.

“The safer his seat,” said Fleur, “the more he thinks he has to see of them. It’s the gratitude complex. What can I do for you?”

Jean slid her long-lashed eyes round from the Fragonard, which she had been contemplating as though it were too French, and Fleur almost jumped. Really, she WAS like a ‘leopardess’!

“It’s about Di

Fleur nodded.

“Then can’t something be done?”

Fleur’s face became watchful. She was twenty-nine, Jean twenty-three; but it was no use coming the elder matron!

“I haven’t seen anything of Wilfrid for a long time.”

“Somebody’s got to tell him pretty sharply what’ll be thought of him if he lugs Di

“I’m by no means sure there’ll be a mess; even if his poem comes out. People like the Ajax touch.”

“You’ve not been in the East.”

“Yes, I have; I’ve been round the world.”

“That’s not the same thing at all.”

“My dear,” said Fleur, “excuse my saying so, but the Cherrells are about thirty years behind the times.”

“I’m not a Cherrell.”

“No, you’re a Tasburgh, and, if anything, that’s a little worse. Country rectories, cavalry, navy, Indian civil—how much d’you suppose all that counts nowadays?”

“It counts with those who belong to it; and he belongs to it, and Di

“No one who’s really in love belongs anywhere,” said Fleur. “Did you care two straws when you married Hubert with a murder charge hanging over his head?”

“That’s different. He’d done nothing to be ashamed of.”

Fleur smiled.

“True to type. Would it surprise you, as they say in the courts, if I told you that there isn’t one in twenty people about town who’d do otherwise than yawn if you asked them to condemn Wilfrid for what he did? And there isn’t one in forty who won’t forget all about it in a fortnight.”

“I don’t believe you,” said Jean flatly.

“You don’t know modern Society, my dear.”

“It’s modern Society,” said Jean, even more flatly, “that doesn’t count.”

“Well, I don’t know that it does much; but then what does?”

“Where does he live?”

Fleur laughed.

“In Cork Street, opposite the Gallery. You’re not thinking of bearding him, are you?”

“I don’t know.”

“Wilfrid can bite.”

“Well,” said Jean, “thanks. I must be going.”

Fleur looked at her with admiration. The girl had flushed, and that pink in her brown cheeks made her look more vivid than ever.

“Well, good-bye, my dear; and do come and tell me about it. I know you’ve the pluck of the devil.”

“I don’t know that I’m going at all,” said Jean. “Good-bye!”

She drove, rather angry, past the House of Commons. Her temperament believed so much in action that Fleur’s worldly wisdom had merely irritated her. Still, it was not so easy as she had thought to go to Wilfrid Desert and say: ‘Stand and deliver me back my sister-inlaw.’ She drove, however, to Pall Mall, parked her car near the Parthenæum, and walked up to Piccadilly. People who saw her, especially men, looked back, because of the admirable grace of her limbs and the colour and light in her face. She had no idea where Cork Street was, except that it was near Bond Street. And, when she reached it, she walked up and down before locating the Gallery. ‘That must be the door, opposite,’ she thought. She was standing uncertainly in front of a door without a name, when a man with a dog on a lead came up the stairs and stood beside her.