Lucifera

by Anthony Hope

Lucifera

By Anthony Hope.

"AND you have just settled in London?" she asked, with an interested air. "What a mental revelation!"

It had never struck me in that light before. I daresay that I looked a little uncomfortable.

"I have tried," she continued, "to throw a little light on the darkness, to show a thread through the labyrinth. You remember that I attack some of the problems in Lucifera?"

I took no notice of this remark; to tell the truth I was wondering how she came to be so pretty. One does not associate prettiness and problems, somehow.

"You have read Lucifera?" she asked, in a sweet cooing voice, yet tinctured with a certain insistence.

"I am glad to say I have not," I returned, looking her in the face—which is, I take it, only good manners when one is conversing.

"Glad!" she cried, clasping her hands in becoming horror. "What a rude thing to say, Mr. Vansittart!"

"It will be much pleasanter to hear about it from you."

She seemed to take this quite seriously.

"Yes, the personality counts," she observed, nodding her head—a head covered (if I may mention it) with the most delightful gleaming brown hair.

"I should rather think it did," I answered; and then looking round the conservatory, I added, "There's no one to interrupt. Fire away, Mrs. Knight."

"Oh, but it's so difficult to explain—at least, unless the listener is sympathetic."

"I'm uncommonly 'sympathetic, Mrs. Knight," I assured her; and indeed I felt so. I don't believe she was thirty—upon my word I don't.

"My gospel,' said she, with a pretty, modest, deprecating smile for the big word, "is perfect naturalness."

"I see," said I. As a matter of fact, I did not see anything except a remarkably taking mouth and chin.

"If you feel sad, be sad; if merry, be merry. What is conventionality, Mr. Vansittart, except a stifling of nature?"

"It's nothing else in the world," I agreed.

"Ah, you men," Mrs. Knight went on, with a swing of her fan through the air. "You men don't know what the deadening weight of it is. It is we women who have to bear the burden of it. We are trammelled and tied at every step."

"It's a burning shame," said I. "Why do you stand it?"

"Well, I have lifted up my voice," said Mrs. Knight. "I have claimed the right for myself and my sisters to do what our feelings—our feelings, which are nature's guide—tell us; as I say in Lucifera, through my heroine's lips."

"Oh, say it through your own," I implored.

"I really do believe that you understand what I mean!" cried Mrs. Knight, in rapture.

"I feel quite sure that I do," said I.

"Ah, sometimes, now and then, when I am alone with somebody who appreciates what I feel, I can speak out—yes, and through my own lips. You are not yet spoilt by the world, Mr. Vansittart."

"I hope not," said I, leaning my arm on the back of the settee, and regarding Mrs. Knight's right ear. I have a liking for a pretty ear.

"Why are my likes and my dislikes to be mapped out for me by leaden rules? Why are 'you must,' and 'you must not,' to meet me at every turn? If I like a—"

"Yes—if you like a man?" I suggested.

"Well, yes—then—a man—" said she, accepting the suggestion with conscious audacity. "If I like a man, why may I not tell him so?"

"And if he likes you," I added, "why in the world should he not mention the fact?"

"If it gives me pleasure to talk to him—"

"And it gives him pleasure to look at you—"

Mrs. Knight suddenly looked down on the floor.

"It's all in Lucifera, you know," said she.

"It would be a pity to let it stay there," aid I.

"I've been trying to explain to you what my heroine thought."

"I have been extremely interested," I remarked, politely.

"Of course, in real life," said Mrs. Knight, opening her fan and shutting it slowly again with a caressing pressure of her hand, "we cannot move so quickly. The ground must be prepared beforehand."

"One must, of course, choose the opportunity," I conceded, with a glance round the empty conservatory.

"Take my own case—" she began.

"It is the best of all to take," I cried.

"Well, or take yours," she amended.

"It comes to just the same thing," said I.

"We must be careful, you know. If we are to preach the gospel, we must not throw away our influence by any indiscretion."

"It would be most unwise," said I, with another look round.

"We should but rivet the chains closer," she urged, earnestly.

"That is very true—in a sense," said I.

"In every sense," urged Mrs. Knight.

"In more than would be wise," I admitted.

"Yet," said she, "we can progress little by little, and every step forward is something gained," and her eyes sparkled with enthusiasm. Perhaps mine were sparkling, too—also with enthusiasm.

"Every step forward," I repeated with conviction, "is a great deal gained."

"Lucifera did something," said Mrs. Knight.

"Ah, now, what did she do?" I asked, much interested.

"I mean the book had some effect."

"Oh, I beg your pardon—of course, of course."

"But we want something more."

"Yes, we do," said I.

"What precisely it is," said Mrs. Knight, knitting her arched brows, "I am not quite sure. What is the next thing to be done, Mr. Vansittart?"

"To put in action," said I, firmly and without a moment's hesitation, "the gospel which you have so nobly preached in Bluesifera.'

"Forgive me—Lucifera, Mr. Vansittart."

"Yes, yes—Lucifera, I said Lucifera didn't I? At any rate, I meant—I say, what are you getting up for, Mrs. Knight?"

"I—I thought," said Mrs. Knight, with a sudden and most unexpected timidity, "that it was time we went back to the other room."

"Do you want to go back to the other room, Mrs. Knight?"

"Oh, well, no, Mr. Vansittart. I didn't exactly want to go. I'm sure I've enjoyed our talk very much. But don't you think that perhaps we ought——"

"Ought!" I echoed, scornfully. "Where is the 'ought' when we neither of us want it?"

Mrs. Knight stood opposite me for a moment, her folded fan dangling from her hand. She smiled doubtfully at me. I rose to my feet—it is rude to sit while a lady stands—and took hold of the other end of the fan. The fan was quite a small one.

"What, under the circumstances," said I, reiterating the gist of my question "is the meaning of 'ought'?"

"Oh, the meaning of 'ought'?" murmured Mrs. Knight.

"What is my 'ought' and what is your 'ought'! What is it, I say? And where is it?"

A smile appeared on Mrs. Knight's face.

"Well, if you ask me, Mr. Vansittart," said she, throwing her lashes up for an instant and letting them droop swiftly again; "I think my 'Ought' is probably looking for me and wondering who I'm sitting out with all this time. At least, that's what he's generally doing at a dance."

"Now, if he would read Lucifera!" said I.

"He approves of it—in theory," said Mrs. Knight. "Ah, you're very hap—I mean—I mean you haven't got an 'Ought,' Mr. Vansittart."

"Oh, yes, I have," said I, nodding.

"What——? Oh, but you're too young! You're, surely, not——?"

"Converted?" I interrupted. "Certainly."

"Oh, converted!" murmured Mrs. Knight with a smile.

"And so," said I, "I have found an 'ought.' Shall I tell you what it is?"

"Yes, please do, Mr. Vansittart."

It was the shortest explanation which I have ever achieved, when one considers, I mean, how absolutely complete it was. It left nothing more to say, unless it were a single syllable, which Mrs. Knight said.

"Oh!" said Mrs. Knight.

"Do you quite understand—or shall I repeat?"

"No," said Mrs. Knight.

At this moment a tall, stout, middle-aged man with black whiskers entered the room and, seeing us, cried in unmistakable satisfaction, "Ah!" and advanced towards us, saying as he came:

"I could not think what had become of you, my dear! I've been looking everywhere!"

"Why, my dear, I've been here all the time," said Mrs. Wnight. "Mr. Vansittart—do let me introduce my husband to you, Mr. Vansittart—and I have been talking about Lucifera. I have been trying to tell him what I meant."

"It is a great book, sir," said the man with whiskers.

"As Mrs. Knight explains it," said I, "it is superb."

"I trust," said he, "that you agree with its position?"

"I have just explained that I do," said I.

Mrs. Knight took his arm and bowed to me. I bowed to Mrs. Knight.

"We shall meet again soon, I hope," said she, "and exchange more——"

"Opinions," said I, for what's in a name, after all?

Next morning I perceived that the thing ought never to have happened. But since it had—oh, well!