登陆注册
15477100000051

第51章 XVII(1)

SUSY had decided to wait for Strefford in London.

The new Lord Altringham was with his family in the north, and though she found a telegram on arriving, saying that he would join her in town the following week, she had still an interval of several days to fill.

London was a desert; the rain fell without ceasing, and alone in the shabby family hotel which, even out of season, was the best she could afford, she sat at last face to face with herself.

>From the moment when Violet Melrose had failed to carry out her plan for the Fulmer children her interest in Susy had visibly waned. Often before, in the old days, Susy Branch had felt the same abrupt change of temperature in the manner of the hostess of the moment; and often--how often--had yielded, and performed the required service, rather than risk the consequences of estrangement. To that, at least, thank heaven, she need never stoop again.

But as she hurriedly packed her trunks at Versailles, scraped together an adequate tip for Mrs. Match, and bade good-bye to Violet (grown suddenly fond and demonstrative as she saw her visitor safely headed for the station)--as Susy went through the old familiar mummery of the enforced leave-taking, there rose in her so deep a disgust for the life of makeshifts and accommodations, that if at that moment Nick had reappeared and held out his arms to her, she was not sure she would have had the courage to return to them.

In her London solitude the thirst for independence grew fiercer.

Independence with ease, of course. Oh, her hateful useless love of beauty ... the curse it had always been to her, the blessing it might have been if only she had had the material means to gratify and to express it! And instead, it only gave her a morbid loathing of that hideous hotel bedroom drowned in yellow rain-light, of the smell of soot and cabbage through the window, the blistered wall-paper, the dusty wax bouquets under glass globes, and the electric lighting so contrived that as you turned on the feeble globe hanging from the middle of the ceiling the feebler one beside the bed went out!

What a sham world she and Nick had lived in during their few months together! What right had either of them to those exquisite settings of the life of leisure: the long white house hidden in camellias and cypresses above the lake, or the great rooms on the Giudecca with the shimmer of the canal always playing over their frescoed ceilings! Yet she had come to imagine that these places really belonged to them, that they would always go on living, fondly and irreproachably, in the frame of other people's wealth .... That, again, was the curse of her love of beauty, the way she always took to it as if it belonged to her!

Well, the awakening was bound to come, and it was perhaps better that it should have come so soon. At any rate there was no use in letting her thoughts wander back to that shattered fool's paradise of theirs. Only, as she sat there and reckoned up the days till Strefford arrived, what else in the world was there to think of?

Her future and his?

But she knew that future by heart already! She had not spent her life among the rich and fashionable without having learned every detail of the trappings of a rich and fashionable marriage. She had calculated long ago just how many dinner- dresses, how many tea-gowns and how much lacy lingerie would go to make up the outfit of the future Countess of Altringham. She had even decided to which dressmaker she would go for her chinchilla cloak-for she meant to have one, and down to her feet, and softer and more voluminous and more extravagantly sumptuous than Violet's or Ursula's ... not to speak of silver foxes and sables ... nor yet of the Altringham jewels.

She knew all this by heart; had always known it. It all belonged to the make-up of the life of elegance: there was nothing new about it. What had been new to her was just that short interval with Nick--a life unreal indeed in its setting, but so real in its essentials: the one reality she had ever known. As she looked back on it she saw how much it had given her besides the golden flush of her happiness, the sudden flowering of sensuous joy in heart and body. Yes--there had been the flowering too, in pain like birth-pangs, of something graver, stronger, fuller of future power, something she had hardly heeded in her first light rapture, but that always came back and possessed her stilled soul when the rapture sank: the deep disquieting sense of something that Nick and love had taught her, but that reached out even beyond love and beyond Nick.

Her nerves were racked by the ceaseless swish, swish of the rain on the dirty panes and the smell of cabbage and coal that came in under the door when she shut the window. This nauseating foretaste of the luncheon she must presently go down to was more than she could bear. It brought with it a vision of the dank coffee-room below, the sooty Smyrna rug, the rain on the sky- light, the listless waitresses handing about food that tasted as if it had been rained on too. There was really no reason why she should let such material miseries add to her depression ....

She sprang up, put on her hat and jacket, and calling for a taxi drove to the London branch of the Nouveau Luxe hotel. It was just one o'clock and she was sure to pick up a luncheon, for though London was empty that great establishment was not. It never was. Along those sultry velvet-carpeted halls, in that great flowered and scented dining-room, there was always a come- and-go of rich aimless people, the busy people who, having nothing to do, perpetually pursue their inexorable task from one end of the earth to the other.

同类推荐
  • 龙门心法

    龙门心法

    本书为公版书,为不受著作权法限制的作家、艺术家及其它人士发布的作品,供广大读者阅读交流。
  • 奉和圣制答张说扈从

    奉和圣制答张说扈从

    本书为公版书,为不受著作权法限制的作家、艺术家及其它人士发布的作品,供广大读者阅读交流。
  • 黄石公三略

    黄石公三略

    本书为公版书,为不受著作权法限制的作家、艺术家及其它人士发布的作品,供广大读者阅读交流。
  • 五蕴皆空经

    五蕴皆空经

    本书为公版书,为不受著作权法限制的作家、艺术家及其它人士发布的作品,供广大读者阅读交流。
  • 涅槃经本有今无偈论

    涅槃经本有今无偈论

    本书为公版书,为不受著作权法限制的作家、艺术家及其它人士发布的作品,供广大读者阅读交流。
热门推荐
  • 复仇公主PK嗜血王子

    复仇公主PK嗜血王子

    她们是有多重身份的千金,他们是能力颜值都爆表的少爷,因为相遇引发了一场美丽的爱情战争,也因此勾出不少事情。战争结束,事情摆平,误会解除,有难就一定能解,最终真的能长相厮守吗?“这辈子我最幸福的事莫过于遇到你,做的最对的事就是能和你在一起。”“为你,做什么我都愿意,只要能和你永远在一起,再危险又怎样?”“我爱你,若是我们不能在一起,你幸福就好,但是没有你,我一辈子都不会好过。”“爱你,我可以放弃一切,什么我都不要,我只要你!”
  • 火澜

    火澜

    当一个现代杀手之王穿越到这个世界。是隐匿,还是崛起。一场血雨腥风的传奇被她改写。一条无上的强者之路被她踏破。修斗气,炼元丹,收兽宠,化神器,大闹皇宫,炸毁学院,打死院长,秒杀狗男女,震惊大陆。无止尽的契约能力,上古神兽,千年魔兽,纷纷前来抱大腿,惊傻世人。她说:在我眼里没有好坏之分,只有强弱之分,只要你能打败我,这世间所有都是你的,打不败我,就从这世间永远消失。她狂,她傲,她的目标只有一个,就是凌驾这世间一切之上。三国皇帝,魔界妖王,冥界之主,仙界至尊。到底谁才是陪着她走到最后的那个?他说:上天入地,我会陪着你,你活着,有我,你死,也一定有我。本文一对一,男强女强,强强联手,不喜勿入。
  • 世外神修

    世外神修

    本书已废!本书已废!本书已废!本书已废!本书已废!本书已废!本书已废!本书已废!本书已废!本书已废!
  • 福妻驾到

    福妻驾到

    现代饭店彪悍老板娘魂穿古代。不分是非的极品婆婆?三年未归生死不明的丈夫?心狠手辣的阴毒亲戚?贪婪而好色的地主老财?吃上顿没下顿的贫困宭境?不怕不怕,神仙相助,一技在手,天下我有!且看现代张悦娘,如何身带福气玩转古代,开面馆、收小弟、左纳财富,右傍美男,共绘幸福生活大好蓝图!!!!快本新书《天媒地聘》已经上架开始销售,只要3.99元即可将整本书抱回家,你还等什么哪,赶紧点击下面的直通车,享受乐乐精心为您准备的美食盛宴吧!)
  • 我滴妖孽男友是校花

    我滴妖孽男友是校花

    你有见过校花吗?校花美丽吗?你有见过男生是校花吗?精彩剧情,笑料不断,让我们一起呐喊:校花,校花,永不掉花~!等到离别季时,他们又该何去何留?
  • 我是异世女王:女人不愁嫁!(完)

    我是异世女王:女人不愁嫁!(完)

    爱就是人类最无用,却又最华丽,最令人降低智商,最可笑的东西。她有一颗冰冷的心,优美、清冷、妖异。宰相,一样戏弄占有。皇帝,一样上下齐手。仙人,不爱要过你一样弃之无回首……默然回首,她的心……润染开、涟漪了吗?幸福就是和你爱的人过着重复的生活。
  • 科学修仙者

    科学修仙者

    修炼无情道的他,为她转有情,与魔界大战,身死道消;她为他,千年沉睡,送一缕灵魂进入地球。他降生之后,空有一部宝典,却因身在地球无法修炼,修仙经书变得不伦不类。于是,一个靠着聪明的大脑,拖着孱弱的身体,学习现代科学知识的科学修仙者,慢慢的生活感悟,慢慢的体验温情,慢慢的朝着目标一步步走去……
  • 普曜经

    普曜经

    本书为公版书,为不受著作权法限制的作家、艺术家及其它人士发布的作品,供广大读者阅读交流。
  • 读了便能高中状元的书

    读了便能高中状元的书

    某日心血来潮买得一本看了便能考取秀才的书,于是举家研读,期待来一个满门科举,称霸京城,却不想....
  • 奥特曼之上古契约

    奥特曼之上古契约

    原本平凡的世界尽然出现了怪兽,他们的命运也因此改变,上古的战争内幕逐渐呈现,宇宙的混战将会再次展开……