The Lifting of a Finger/Chapter 15

BELLAMY came back a fortnight later to find the house in a whirl of gayety. As he entered the hall the sound of a voice singing came from the drawing-room, followed by the clapping of hands and a pleasant babble of talk and laughter. The next moment Margaret appeared in the door-way, her face wearing a happier look than Francis had ever seen upon it.

She came towards him smiling. "Miss Weldon is here," she said. "I have been giving an 'At Home' to introduce her to my friends, and I have asked half a dozen or so of the young people to remain to dinner. Shall you be at home?"

​"Yes, but I will dine in my own room," Bellamy returned somewhat ungraciously.

Before starting for a drive on the following afternoon Francis went into the library to look at a paper, and there came upon his wife and her guest, the latter embroidering, the former seated before the fire with her hands clasped behind her head. As she caught sight of her husband Margaret abandoned this attitude for one more conventional.

Francis noted her look of surprise as he seated himself near Miss Weldon and began talking to her with his sunniest smile and most engaging manner. Presently a servant came to tell Bellamy that his horse was at the door.

"Why not come for a drive with me?" he said as he rose, with a glance ​that included both his listeners. "The day is really too fine to waste in the house."

"Gertrude can go," Margaret replied. "I shall be busy this afternoon."

Margaret's husband glanced at her folded hands before he turned to Miss Weldon, who was about to say that she would be delighted to go, when she remembered an engagement and regretfully told Bellamy that she too must stay at home.

"To-morrow, then?" inquired Francis. "Will you go to-morrow?"

"I shall be very glad," replied Miss Weldon.

A moment before a card had been brought to Margaret, and as Francis went out he passed Harry Hatfield, who, preceded by a servant, was on his way ​to the library. The two men nodded curtly to each other.

Next day at the same hour Miss Weldon came down to the hall, where Bellamy was waiting, wrapped in furs, but Margaret, who was with her, was not dressed for the street.

"My first drive through the streets of New York," cried Gertrude gayly. "Do you envy me?" she added, turning to Margaret, who replied, "No; a horseback ride would be more to my taste than a drive."

"Well, good-by; I wish you were coming." The girl turned to wave a smiling adieu to her hostess as she went out.

At dusk Miss Weldon and Bellamy returned to find Margaret serving tea to Hatfield in the library. The meeting ​between the two men was, considering all things, singularly free from constraint. Always himself self-possessed, Bellamy had power to set others at ease or to render them profoundly uncomfortable. In the present instance he dispelled the awkwardness of the situation by the genial grace of his manner.

Gertrude was in radiant spirits. "Your husband was so kind about pointing out places and people," she told Margaret when Bellamy was out of earshot.

For the next few months the days went by without incident to mark them as days to be remembered. Francis came and went as he pleased, hearing laughter and music on all sides of him, for Margaret was doing everything in her power to make her old school-mate's visit pleasurable, but he entered into ​none of the gayety and saw little of his wife and her guest.

During this time Margaret seemed to her husband to be content, almost happy. And yet there was often in her eyes a look of weariness that contrasted strangely with her smiling lips, and sometimes when Bellamy came suddenly upon her alone the expression of her face caused him to wonder whether some new sorrow was eating her heart out or if she still mourned her faithless lover.

On a bright, blustery day towards the latter end of March Francis chanced to enter the library as a servant came through another door-way with the tea things. He accepted in silence the cup of tea his wife presently offered him.

"Mr. Bellamy," cried Gertrude gayly, "I shall not blame you if you doubt my ​word when I tell you that before you came in your wife and I were deep in a discussion of fashions. It is hard to imagine Madge interested in anything so superficial, isn't it? It always seems to me that her clothes must be designed and fashioned by fairies and brought to her ready to wear. That reminds me: you must be sure to dine at home next Tuesday; Madge and I have a surprise planned for you."

"Gertrude, what do you mean?" Margaret inquired, frowning slightly. The look of annoyance on her face did not escape Francis.

"I have never seen your wife wearing anything but white in the house," Gertrude went on, "and she confessed to me that she has I don't dare to tell you how many white gowns. I explained ​to her that while white is in a way becoming to her, since she is always lovely in it, it makes her more like a statue than a woman. By dint of much argument and my almost superhuman powers of persuasion, I induced her to order a costume of—what color do you think? On second thoughts, I will not tell you; you shall see for yourself. I designed the gown, and I flatter myself that Madge will look her best in it."

"It will be a ridiculous dress, and I may never wear it," Margaret put in coldly.

"Nevertheless, I shall dine at home on Tuesday in the hope of seeing the result of Miss Weldon's good taste," Bellamy said.

"You shall see Galatea come to life," Gertrude promised him.

​Francis entered the drawing-room a few moments before the dinner-hour on Tuesday to find Miss Weldon there alone. When Margaret came into the room a little later she was dressed, from the aigrette in her hair to her satin slippers, in a brilliant yet rich-toned shade of red. Bellamy told himself that he should not have known his wife had he seen her anywhere else, so completely did the warm, vivid coloring of her gown transform her.

"She is not a statue after all," Francis thought; "she's a woman. And what a woman! Somers was a fool." This soliloquy was brought to a close by the entrance of Hatfield, who, it seemed to Francis, was always in the house of late. That evening for the first time since his marriage Bellamy remained at home.

​Hatfield had taken his departure, and Margaret and her guest were bidding the master of the house good-night in the hall when Bellamy said abruptly:

"Margaret, will you wait a moment? I want to speak to you."

Concealing some surprise, and, her husband fancied, a little annoyance, at his request, Margaret said "Good-night" to Gertrude and came back to the fire, the train of her gown a wave of flame upon the marble floor.

For a moment Francis stood looking her over in the mocking, insolent way she knew so well. "Do you think your flirtation with Hatfield in good taste?" he said at last slowly.

Margaret looked at him without replying. She was calm and very quiet, ​but Bellamy was reminded of a panther crouched for a spring.

"Do you think it does the immaculate reputation I know you pride yourself on any good to have your old lover always hanging about the house?" he asked.

Margaret's figure straightened and the hands at her sides clenched. "I think this," she said in the clear tone that always roused Bellamy's wrath; "neither my reputation nor what I do is anything to you. If I choose to have a lover, or twenty lovers, it is not your affair."

Margaret's husband regarded her with a mocking smile. "So?" he said, with a note in his voice that sent all the blood from her face and left it colorless. "You have at last arrived at a common-sense view of the matter. That's right, my dear; have a lover, or twenty if you ​prefer. Perhaps—who knows?—I may myself be one of the number."

Margaret did not speak or move, and for a brief space the two looked at each other, Francis amused and plainly pleased with his gibe, his wife's lovely face ablaze with indignation. Then, suddenly, Margaret's hand was lifted, and in a twinkling Bellamy's cheek smarted and she had turned away.

In a white heat of passion he took a step forward and grasped her arm. "Wait a moment," he cried in a hoarse voice, roughly turning her round so that she faced him. "If I have insulted you, you have repaid me with interest," he muttered between his closed teeth, meanwhile holding her at arm's length, although she seemed to writhe at his touch.

​"I don't know what to do with you," he went on; "whether to kill you or to shake you—ah, I have it: I'll take a kiss,—the one I paid for not getting."

Before his captive had time to struggle Bellamy had drawn her into his arms. Perhaps she knew it would be useless to try to get away; at any rate, she made no effort to free herself as he bent and kissed her lips.

Even then he did not at once loosen his hold, but kept her in his arms and looked into her face. Margaret's eyes were not lowered, but met his defiantly.

"Let me go!" she commanded.

Bellamy released her. "Yes, go," he muttered sullenly, "and next time think twice before you slap a man's face."

Once free, he expected to see her rush away, but instead she merely moved a ​few paces and stood with her face turned away from him and her head bent.

It was Bellamy who mounted the stairs first. On the landing he turned and looked down at her. She was standing where he had left her, a splendid figure in her flaming dress, with the firelight on her beautiful, angry face.

"Good-night, Lady Disdain," he called, but his wife did not look up.

A week afterwards Francis heard two of the servants discussing the engagement of Gertrude Weldon to Hatfield.