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 Seventh Edition

SHERRIS
MEDICAL MICROBIOLOGY

EDITOR

KENNETH J. RYAN, MD

New York  Chicago  San Francisco  Athens  London  Madrid  Mexico City  

Milan  New Delhi  Singapore  Sydney  Toronto

Ryan_FM_pi-xii.indd 1 06/10/17 11:04 AM

Copyright © 2018 by McGraw-Hill Education. All rights reserved. Except as permitted under the United States Copyright Act of 1976,
no part of this publication may be reproduced or distributed in any form or by any means, or stored in a database or retrieval system,
without the prior written permission of the publisher.

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NOTICE
Medicine is an ever-changing science. As new research and clinical experience broaden our knowledge, changes in treatment and drug
therapy are required. The authors and the publisher of this work have checked with sources believed to be reliable in their efforts to
provide information that is complete and generally in accord with the standards accepted at the time of publication. However, in view
of the possibility of human error or changes in medical sciences, neither the authors nor the publisher nor any other party who has been
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plete, and they disclaim all responsibility for any errors or omissions or for the results obtained from use of the information contained in
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 DEDICATION

Founders of Sherris Medical Microbiology

C. George Ray, MD
James J. Plorde, MD
Elizabeth Sherris
Frederick C. Neidhardt, PhD

Between the sixth and this seventh edition we have lost four scholars who significantly
aided founding editor John Sherris in the formation and character of this book now known
as Sherris Medical Microbiology.
George Ray was a founding author, writing on viral diseases, infectious disease syndromes,
and laboratory diagnosis. For the fourth through the sixth editions, he was also coeditor of
the book. Gorge, a national leader in rapid viral diagnosis, was also a decorated teacher
of medical students at three medical schools, the University of Washington, the University
of Arizona, and St. Louis University. At SLU, he finished his career as Chairman of
Pediatrics.
Jim Plorde, also a founding author, wrote on antibiotics, bacterial diseases, parasitic dis-
eases and infectious disease syndromes in the first through the fifth editions. Jim’s Peace
Corps and international experience was reflected in his writing, particularly on parasitic
diseases. In his faculty career at Washington he served as Chief of Infectious Diseases and
Microbiology at the Seattle Veterans Administration Medical Center.
Elizabeth Sherris not only contributed to the organization of the book, she typed the first
draft at a time before computers, copiers, and the Internet. Elizabeth had a keen sense of
language particularly concerning the clear use of medical language which earned her the
respect of the authors and the publisher. She followed later editions closely, remarking espe-
cially on the introduction of full color artwork in the fifth edition.
Fred Neidhardt was recruited as an author for the second edition during a sabbatical at
Washington and continued through the fourth edition. Fred set the standard and style for
the presentation of basic bacteriology to medical students, which continues today. A tower-
ing figure in bacterial physiology highlighted by his two-volume book on Escherichia coli,
Fred held faculty positions at Harvard, Purdue, and Michigan, where he was Chair of
Microbiology.

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 Contents

Contributors ix 14 Herpesviruses 257

Preface xi 15
Viruses of Diarrhea 283

16 Arthropod-Borne and
Other Zoonotic Viruses 295
PART I
17 Rabies 319
Infection 1
L. Barth Reller, Megan E. Reller, and Kenneth J. Ryan 18
Retroviruses: Human T-Lymphotropic Virus,
Human Immunodeficiency Virus,
1 Infection—Basic Concepts 3 and Acquired Immunodeficiency
2 Immune Response to Infection 19 Syndrome 327

3 Sterilization, Disinfection, and 19 Papilloma and Polyoma Viruses 355

Infection Control 43
20
Persistent Viral Infections of the
4 Principles of Laboratory Diagnosis Central Nervous System 369
of Infectious Diseases 55
5 Emerging and Reemerging Infectious
Diseases: Emergence and PART III
Global Spread of Infection 85 Pathogenic Bacteria 379
Paul Pottinger, L. Barth Reller, Kenneth J. Ryan, and
Scott Weissman
PART II
21 Bacteria—Basic Concepts 381
Pathogenic Viruses 95
Nafees Ahmad, W. Lawrence Drew, and Michael Lagunoff 22 Pathogenesis of Bacterial Infections 415
6 Viruses—Basic Concepts 97 23 Antibacterial Agents and Resistance 431
7 Pathogenesis of Viral Infection 129 24 Staphylococci 459
8 Antiviral Agents and Resistance 149 25 Streptococci and Enterococci 473
9 Respiratory Viruses 159 26
Corynebacterium, Listeria,
10
Viruses of Mumps, Measles, Rubella, and Bacillus 501
and Other Childhood Exanthems 187 27 Mycobacteria 519
11 Poxviruses 207 28 537
Actinomyces and Nocardia
12 Enteroviruses 217
29
Clostridium, Bacteroides,
13
Hepatitis Viruses 231 and Other Anaerobes 545

vii

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 viii CONTENTS

30
Neisseria 567 46 The Opportunistic Fungi: Candida,
Aspergillus, the Zygomycetes, and
31
Haemophilus and Bordetella 583 Pneumocystis 771
32 Vibrio, Campylobacter, and Helicobacter 599 47 The Systemic Fungal Pathogens:
33 613
Enterobacteriaceae Cryptococcus, Histoplasma, Blastomyces,
787
Coccidioides, Paracoccidioides
34 645
Legionella and Coxiella

35 Pseudomonas and Other Opportunistic

Gram-negative Bacilli 653 PART V

36
Plague and Other Bacterial
Pathogenic Parasites 803
Zoonotic Diseases 665 Paul Pottinger and Charles R. Sterling

37 Spirochetes 679 48 Parasites—Basic Concepts 805

38 701 49 Pathogenesis and Diagnosis

Mycoplasma
of Parasitic Infection 815
39
Chlamydia 707
50 Antiparasitic Agents and Resistance 821
40
Rickettsia, Ehrlichia, Anaplasma,
and Bartonella 717 51 Apicomplexa and Microsporidia 829
41
Dental and Periodontal 52 Sarcomastigophora—The Amebas 861
Infections 729 53
Sarcomastigophora—The Flagellates 875
54 Intestinal Nematodes 899
PART IV 55 Tissue Nematodes 919
Pathogenic Fungi 737
56 Cestodes 939
J. Andrew Alspaugh
57 Trematodes 955
42 Fungi—Basic Concepts 739
43 Pathogenesis and Diagnosis of Infectious Diseases: Syndromes and Etiologies 971
Fungal Infections 747 Practice Questions In USMLE Format 991
44 Antifungal Agents and Resistance 755 Index 1003
45 The Superficial and
Subcutaneous Fungi: Dermatophytes,
Malassezia, Sporothrix, and
Pigmented Molds 761

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 EDITOR
KENNETH J. RYAN, MD
Professor of Immunobiology
Emeritus Professor of Pathology and
Microbiology
University of Arizona College of Medicine
Tucson, Arizona

AUTHORS
NAFEES AHMAD, PhD L. BARTH RELLER, MD
Professor of Immunobiology Professor of Pathology and Medicine
Director, Immunity and Infection Duke University School of Medicine
University of Arizona College of Medicine Durham, North Carolina
Tucson, Arizona
MEGAN E. RELLER, MD, PhD, MPH
J. ANDREW ALSPAUGH, MD Associate Professor of Medicine
Professor of Medicine, Molecular Genetics Duke University School of Medicine
and Microbiology Durham, North Carolina
Duke University School of Medicine
Durham, North Carolina CHARLES R. STERLING, PhD
Professor Emeritus
W. LAWRENCE DREW, MD, PhD School of Animal and Comparative
Emeritus Professor of Laboratory Biomedical Sciences
Medicine and Medicine University of Arizona
University of California, San Francisco Tucson, Arizona
School of Medicine
Mount Zion Medical Center SCOTT WEISSMAN, MD
San Francisco, California Associate Professor of Pediatrics
University of Washington School of
MICHAEL LAGUNOFF, PhD Medicine
Professor of Microbiology Seattle Children’s
University of Washington School of Seattle, Washington
Medicine
Seattle, Washington

PAUL POTTINGER, MD
Associate Professor of Medicine
Division of Allergy and Infectious Diseases
University of Washington School of
Medicine
Seattle, Washington

STUDENT ADVISORY GROUP

Laura Bricklin, Chair
Matthew Cravens
Kieran Hynes
Eric Lander
Danielle Nahal
Ned Premyodhin
Edwin Telemi

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 Preface

W
ith this seventh edition, Sherris Medical Microbiology will complete its fourth
decade. We are pleased to welcome new authors, Andy Alspaugh (mycology)
and Megan Reller (epidemiology) from Duke and Scott Weissman (bacteriology)
from the University of Washington. Sadly, George Ray a founding author and coeditor of the
last three editions is no longer with us (see Dedication). John Sherris, the founding editor,
continues to act as an inspiration to all of us.

BOOK STRUCTURE
The goal of Sherris Medical Microbiology remains unchanged from that of the first edition
(1984). This book is intended to be the primary text for students of medicine and medical
science who are encountering microbiology and infectious diseases for the first time. Part I
opens with a chapter that explains the nature of infection and the infectious agents at the
level of a general reader. The following four chapters give more detail on the immunologic,
diagnostic, and epidemiologic nature of infection with minimal detail about the agents
themselves. Parts II through V form the core of the text with chapters on the major viral,
bacterial, fungal, and parasitic diseases, and each begins with its own chapters on basic biol-
ogy, pathogenesis, and antimicrobial agents.

CHAPTER STRUCTURE
In the specific organism/disease chapters, the same presentation sequence is maintained
throughout the book. First, features of the Organism (structure, metabolism, genetics, etc.)
are described; then mechanisms of the Disease (epidemiology, pathogenesis, immunity)
the organism causes are explained; the sequence concludes with the Clinical Aspects
(manifestations, diagnosis, treatment, prevention) of these diseases. A clinical Case Study
followed by questions in USMLE format concludes each of these chapters. In Sherris Medi-
cal Microbiology, the emphasis is on the text narrative, which is designed to be read com-
prehensively, not as a reference work. Considerable effort has been made to supplement this
text with other learning aids such as the above-mentioned cases and questions as well as
tables, photographs, and illustrations.

STUDENT-DRIVEN STUDY AIDS

This edition includes a number of new study aids which are the product of a Student
Advisory Group (see Authors page) conceived and lead by Laura Bricklin, then a second-
year medical student. They include a boxed narrative OVERVIEW opening each disease-
oriented chapter or major section, highlighted MARGINAL NOTES judged to be “high
yield” for Step 1 preparation, and bulleted lists of KEY CONCLUSIONS at the end of major
sections. A THINK ➔ APPLY feature randomly inserts thought-provoking questions into
the body of the text, which are answered at the bottom of the page. These new features are
explained in detail and illustrated on pages iv and v.
xi

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 xii PREFACE

The back of the book includes two more review tools. Infectious Diseases: Syndromes
and Etiologies is a set of tables that brings together the infectious agents (viruses, bacteria,
fungi, parasites) discussed separately in Parts II through V as probable causes of the major
infection syndromes (pneumonia, arthritis, diarrhea, etc.). It is hoped these will be of value
when the student prepares for case discussion exercises or sees patients. The 100 Practice
Questions are in USMLE format and in addition to the ones at the end of earlier chapters.
For any textbook, dealing with the onslaught of new information is a major challenge.
In this edition, much new material has been included, but to keep the student from being
overwhelmed, older or less important information has been deleted to keep the size of this
book no larger than of the sixth edition. As a rule of thumb, material on classic microbial
structures, toxins, and the like in the Organism section has been trimmed unless its role is
clearly explained in the Disease section. At the same time, we have tried not to eliminate
detail to the point of becoming synoptic and uninteresting. Genetics is one of the greatest
challenges in this regard. Without doubt this is where major progress is being made in
understanding infectious diseases, but a coherent discussion may require using the names
and abbreviations of genes, their products, and multiple regulators to tell a complete story.
Whenever possible we have tried to tell the story without all the code language. We have
also tried to fully describe the major genetic mechanisms in general chapters and then refer
to them again when that mechanism is deployed by a pathogen. For example, Neisseria
gonorrhoeae is used to explain the genetic mechanisms for antigenic variation in a general
chapter on bacterial pathogenesis (Chapter 22), but how it influences its disease, gonorrhea,
is taken up with its genus Neisseria (Chapter 30).
A saving grace is that our topic is important, dynamic, and fascinating—not just to
us but to the public at large. Newspaper headlines now carry not only the new names of
emerging threats like Zika virus but also the antigenic formulas of more familiar pathogens
like E coli and influenza virus. Resistance to antimicrobial agents and the havoc created by
antivaccine movements are regular topics on the evening news. I1t is not all bad news. We
sense a new optimism that deeper scientific understanding of worldwide scourges like HIV/
AIDS, tuberculosis, and malaria will lead to their control. We are hopeful that the basis for
understanding these changes is clearly laid out in the pages of this book.
Kenneth J. Ryan
Editor

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 PART I
Infection
L. Bar t h R eller • M egan E. R eller • Ke n n e t h J. R ya n

Infection—Basic Concepts C H A P T ER 1
Immune Response to Infection C H A P T ER 2
Sterilization, Disinfection, and Infection Control C H A P T ER 3
Principles of Laboratory Diagnosis of Infectious Diseases C H A P T ER 4
Emerging and Reemerging Infectious Diseases: Emergence and Global Spread of Infection C H A P T ER 5

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Another random document with
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No one else had ever been honoured by the information.
Lydia went upstairs, discreetly taking upon herself to break up the
tête-à-tête, with increased self-satisfaction.
She was less pleased a few days later when she discovered that
everybody in the boarding-house now knew that she wrote stories.
“I’m not a bit surprised,” Miss Forster cried loudly and joyously. “I
always felt we had a lot in common. Why, I should write myself if I
could only find the time.”
She traced rapid scribbles in the air with her forefinger.
“It must be a great hobby for you,” said pale Mr. Bulteel, looking
respectfully at Lydia.
“Perhaps one night you’ll read us one of your stories,” his wife
suggested.
She was not usually gracious to the other women in the house, but
Lydia had always listened sympathetically to her account of the
agony that she suffered from her teeth, now undergoing extensive
structural alterations.
Only little Mrs. Clarence gazed at Lydia with a thoroughly uneasy
eye.
“I must say,” she said with a note of aggression in her habitual
whine, “I do hope you won’t put me into one of your books, Miss
Raymond.”
Lydia enjoyed the attention that was bestowed upon her, even while
she critically told herself that it lacked discernment.
She did not read her stories out loud to the assembled boarders, as
Mrs. Bulteel had suggested, but she submitted several of them to
the inspection of Margoliouth.
“They have merit, and originality,” he told her. “But your English is
not good.”
Lydia held out her hand for the manuscripts without replying.
“Aha, you think that a foreigner cannot criticize English,” he said
acutely, and interpreting her secret thought with perfect correctness.
“But I assure you that I am right. Look! you put ‘alright’ for ‘all right’
and ‘She was very interested’ instead of ‘she was very much
interested.’ And again, you have ‘under the circumstances’ for ‘in the
circumstances.’ All these are common errors. Tell me, what authors
do you read?”
Lydia was vague. Like the majority of readers, she chose books
almost at random, because the title allured her, or because someone
had said that the story was exciting.
The Greek shrugged his shoulders.
“The ideas are there,” he said, “but you must learn to express them
better.”
Lydia felt so much mortified that she could hardly speak. She, the
Head of the School at Miss Glover’s, the owner of the “mathematical
mind” so rarely found in one of her own sex, the responsible and
trusted accountant at Elena’s, to be told that she could not write
English!
At that moment she disliked Margoliouth with all the cordial dislike
accorded to a really candid critic.
Yet it was characteristic of Lydia that, even in the midst of her
vexation, she realized that to display it would be to destroy much of
the Greek’s flattering opinion of her superior intelligence. She drew a
long breath, and gazed at him frankly and steadily.
“Thank you very much,” she said. “I must try and study the really
good writers, and—and I’ll remember what you say, and try and
write better English. I’m sure you’re right.”
It was a little set speech, uttered regardless of the indignation still
burning within her, and it did not fail of its effect.
“Well done!” cried the Greek softly. “Well done, Miss Raymond! It is
very rare to find so much frankness and determination in a lady, if I
may say so—I am the more sure that you will eventually succeed.”
Lydia thanked him and took away her manuscripts.
She was inwardly just as angry at his criticism as she had been on
first hearing it, and just as certain that a foreigner could know
nothing about the correctness or otherwise of her English. But she
congratulated herself on the presence of mind and strength of will
which had enabled her to make so good a show of open-minded
generosity. Quite evidently Margoliouth thought the better of her for
it, and Lydia would not for the world have forfeited his admiration.
It gave her great prestige in the eyes of the other boarders.
Lydia knew that they most of them liked her, Mr. Bulteel because she
was young and pretty, his wife, and whining little Mrs. Clarence,
because she always listened to them sympathetically, all the while
inwardly mindful of Grandpapa’s rule—“Always let the other people
talk about themselves.”
Miss Forster liked her too.
Lydia did not exactly flatter Miss Forster, but she had a tactful way of
introducing the topic of Miss Forster’s great friends, Sir Rupert and
Lady Honoret, and was always ready to hear about the Bridge
parties that Miss Forster frequented at their house in Lexham
Gardens.
Hector Bulteel, the pallid youth whose days were passed in Gower
Street, had at first been too shy even to speak to Lydia, but one day
she asked for his advice on a point of accountancy, and thereafter
they occasionally discussed the higher mathematics or the
distinctions between organic and inorganic chemistry.
Lydia did not really think very highly of Hector’s capabilities, but
criticized him as shrewdly as she did everyone else with whom she
came into contact.
She was always careful, however, to keep her rather caustic
judgments to herself, and she knew that both at Madame Elena’s
and at the boarding-house the reputation that had been hers at
school still prevailed: Lydia Raymond never said an unkind thing
about anyone.
Even old Miss Lillicrap, who seldom uttered a word that was not
either spiteful or complaining, looked at Lydia in a comparatively
friendly silence on the evening that the Greek gentleman first took
her to the Polytechnic.
Lydia wore a new, pale-pink blouse, and her best dark-brown cloth
coat and skirt.
For the first time, she decided that she really was pretty.
The conviction lent exhilaration to the evening’s entertainment,
which on the whole she found rather dull. She was not very much
amused by the cinematograph films displayed, and when, towards
the end of the evening, Mr. Margoliouth fumbled for her hand in the
darkness and held it, Lydia was principally conscious that hers was
still sticky from the chocolates that he had given her, and failed to
derive any thrill from the experience.
 XI
Towards Christmas time, as the evenings became shorter and
shorter, Mr. Margoliouth developed great concern at the idea of
Lydia’s coming back from her work alone.
Might he call for her at Madame Elena’s, and escort her home?
Lydia thanked him very much, and said that one of her fellow-
workers generally came most of the way with her. But she was not
insensible to the flattering vista thus opened.
The girls at Elena’s would be, in their own parlance, thrilled if a
foreign and interesting-looking male should make his appearance
outside the little shop and await there the privilege of accompanying
Miss Raymond across the Park.
Gina Ryott boasted a “gentleman friend” who occasionally paid her
the same compliment, and Lydia, as well as Marguerite Saxon, had
peeped through the closed shutters of the shop window more than
once, in order to watch them depart together.
And not only the girls but the community at the boarding-house
would be full of interest and excitement.
Already Lydia knew perfectly well that Miss Forster and Mrs. Bulteel
exchanged significant glances whilst she and the Greek talked to one
another at meals.
In the trivial monotony of the boarding-house existence, she even
felt certain that Mr. Margoliouth and his increasingly-marked
attentions to herself were the chief subjects of discussion.
She began to enjoy her position very much, and no longer held Mr.
Margoliouth at a distance. She was not at all in love with him, but
his attentions were very agreeable and certainly, Lydia told herself,
he had enough discernment to realize that she was not a person
with whom liberties might be taken.
As a fact, his manner towards her was respectful enough except for
a certain tendency towards patting her wrist, or attracting her
attention by a lingering touch upon her arm or her shoulder.
When they went to a theatre or a cinematograph, he always held
her hand, and a curious sense of fair play in return for his hospitality
induced Lydia to allow this, and even feebly to return an occasional
pressure of her fingers, although she derived no slightest satisfaction
from the contact.
The rapid development of her mentality had so far out-distanced
other, more human attributes of youth, that she frequently debated
within herself whether Mr. Margoliouth was ever likely to try and kiss
her. If so, Lydia reflected with cold self-righteousness, she would
rebuke him in such fashion that he would respect and admire her
more than ever. She was full of instinctive horror at the idea of
“making herself cheap,” and it had been inculcated into her both by
Aunt Beryl and Aunt Evelyn that to do so was to invite disaster of
some unspecified but terrible kind.
When her Christmas holiday was approaching—two days and a half
which she was to spend at Regency Terrace—Lydia began to
mention the Greek occasionally in her weekly letter to Aunt Beryl.
She was not averse from some slight exploitation of her first
conquest, and moreover she thought it quite likely that a hint might
reach Aunt Beryl any day through Miss Nettleship, and she wisely
preferred to secure herself against any charge of secretiveness.
At first Aunt Beryl only wrote back, “Glad you enjoyed yourself at the
Polytechnic, dear; mind and not take cold coming out from those hot
places this bitter weather.” Then later: “This Mr. Margoliouth seems
very attractive. Don’t let him break your little heart, dear!”
The two notes of exclamation denoted Aunt Beryl’s humorous
intention, as Lydia well knew. But one day she wrote more seriously.
“I must say it would be a real pleasure to hear you were properly
engaged, providing it was to some really nice fellow. Don’t be in a
hurry to decide though, dear—you’re very young.”
Lydia herself had hardly contemplated the possibility of an
engagement. But now she began to wonder whether or no any such
idea held a place in Margoliouth’s mind. He had certainly said that he
should like to show her his own country, and told her how much she
would enjoy a sea voyage and how greatly the new experience of
travelling would help her to write.
Meanwhile he continued to take her out two or three times a week,
and to give her expensive boxes of chocolates and occasional books.
The girls at Madame Elena’s became aware of him, and chaffed
Lydia agreeably, and at the boarding-house Miss Forster, always
outspoken, one day asked whether she had ordered her wedding-
dress yet.
Lydia did not like Miss Forster’s blatancy, but her old predilection for
finding herself the heroine of her surroundings was stronger than
ever, and it gratified her to know that they were all watching her and
wondering what would happen to her next.
A less agreeable manifestation of interest was, however, in store for
her.
Miss Nettleship sought her out apologetic but conscientious.
“You know how it is, dear, I know—but really I do feel responsible to
your auntie, just a wee bit—and I feel I really must say something.
They’re all talking about it, you know—not saying anything, I don’t
mean of course, but you know—just talking, like.”
The distinction that Miss Nettleship wished to imply between the
saying of anything and mere talking about it, was perfectly clear to
the resentful and embarrassed Lydia.
True to her instincts, however, she showed none of the resentment
and as little as she could of the embarrassment.
“There really isn’t anything for anyone to talk about. Mr. Margoliouth
is very fond of the theatre, he says, and he hasn’t anyone to go with
him. It’s very kind of him to take me, I think.”
“Once here and there,” said Miss Nettleship distractedly, “but really,
dear, it’s getting more than that, and of course it’s a bit conspicuous
because of his never hardly taking any notice of anyone else. At the
Bridge now, when they play in the evenings, he’s downright uncivil
to poor Mrs. Clarence, and I’ve heard him very rude to Miss Forster
too, though of course she’s well able to hold her own. But it makes it
all the more marked, his going on the way he does with you.”
“I can’t help his liking me,” said Lydia meekly, but inwardly rather
gratified at Miss Nettleship’s artless exposition of the distinction that
she enjoyed.
“Now don’t go thinking I’m blaming you for an instant, dear. I know
very well that your auntie’s brought you up to be careful, and,
besides, I can see for myself you’re steady—not one of those girls I
call regular flirts. But it’s your being so young, and there’s something
else too.”
Miss Nettleship hesitated, her pleasant, anxious-looking face much
discomposed.
“Really I oughtn’t to say anything about it to you, but you do
understand how it is, dear—I feel the responsibility of having you
here, and your auntie being such a friend of mine and everything, I
feel I can’t let it go on and not say anything.”
“I’ve written to Aunt Beryl all about Mr. Margoliouth, you know,” said
Lydia quickly.
She felt the announcement to be a trump card, and was surprised
that Miss Nettleship’s harassed expression did not relax.
“I was sure you would, dear—it isn’t that. You see the fact is, though
I oughtn’t to mention it but I know you can be trusted never to pass
it on,—the fact is that Mr. Margoliouth, as he calls himself, isn’t
altogether sound, and I don’t know that I shan’t have to ask him to
leave.”
“Why?” cried Lydia, astonished.
But Miss Nettleship had her own methods of imparting information,
and was not to be hustled out of them.
“Of course you know how it is in a place like this—one has to be
very particular, and I’ve always asked for references and everything,
and there’s never been any trouble except just once, right at the
start. That was with foreigners, too, a pair of Germans, and called
themselves brother and sister. However, that’s nothing to do with
you, dear, and I had to send them packing very quickly—in fact, the
minute I had any doubts at all. It’s the ruin of a place like this ever
to let it get a name, as you can imagine, and the fright I got then
made me more particular than ever. This fellow Margoliouth gave me
a City reference, and another a clergyman somewhere up in
Yorkshire, and paid his first week in advance. And since then it’s just
been one put off after another.”
“But how—what do you mean, Miss Nettleship?”
“He’s not paying his way,” said the manageress, fixing her brown
eyes compassionately upon Lydia’s face.
“He asked me to let him have his account monthly, as it was more
convenient, and I gave in, although it’s not my rule, and I wouldn’t
have that old Miss Lillicrap—you know what she is, dear, and how
one can’t go against her—I wouldn’t have her hear about it for the
world. Well, it was seven weeks before he paid me the first month,
and I had to ask him for it again and again. He said there was some
difficulty about getting his money from Greece paid into the Bank
here. However, he paid in the end, but since then it’s been nothing
but putting off and putting off—would I let it stand over for a week
because it wasn’t convenient, and so on and so on. I told him he’d
have to get his meals out if it went on, and then he gave me
something on account—but not a third of what he owes me, dear. I
really don’t know what to do about it. He’s so plausible, I half
believe it’s all right when he’s talking to me, but I can’t afford to go
on like this. He’ll have to go if he hasn’t paid in full at the end of this
week. And how I’m to get the money back if he doesn’t pay up I
really don’t know, for a prosecution would be a fearful business for
me, and lose me every boarder in the place.”
“Oh, it would be dreadful!” cried Lydia, sincerely shocked. “But he
must pay. I thought of him as quite rich.”
“So you might, from the way he goes on. And the bills that are
always coming for him, too!” said Miss Nettleship.
“I can’t help seeing them, you know, when I clear the box in the
mornings. However, he says there’s money coming to him from
Greece, and it’s only got to be put into his Bank over here, and he
can promise me a cheque on Saturday at latest. So I’m not saying
any more till then, but after that my mind’s made up. But you’ll
understand, dear, why I felt I had to speak to you about it first.”
Lydia felt that she understood only too well, and she went to
business next morning in so thoughtful a mood that Rosie Graham,
whose observation nothing escaped, made sharp inquiry of her as
they snatched a ten minutes’ tea-interval in the afternoon: “What’s
up that you’re going about with a face as long as a fiddle?”
In the midst of her perfectly real preoccupation, it was not in Lydia
to fail to perceive her opportunity for at last arousing a tardy interest
in Miss Graham.
“I’m worried,” she said frankly.
“Worry won’t mend matters,” quoted Rosie tritely, but Lydia reaped
the advantage of her invariable abstention from the airing of daily
minor grievances such as the other girls brought to their work, in the
instant acceptance of her statement shown by the astute little
Cockney.
“Come round to my place for a yarn this evening,” she suggested.
“My pal’s out and I can find some food, I daresay, though it won’t be
seven courses and a powdered footman behind the chair, like that
place of yours.”
Lydia accepted, and felt flattered. No one else had ever been asked
to Rosie’s place.
They took a Sloane Street omnibus at six o’clock, and got out at
Sloane Square, where Lydia made use of a public telephone to
inform Miss Nettleship that she would not be in to supper, and then
Rosie led her through a very large square, a mews, and into a little
street called Walton Street. They crossed it, and entered Ovington
Street.
“Number ninety-one A,” said Miss Graham, producing a latch-key.
She took Lydia to the top of the house, and Lydia was astounded at
the lightness and airiness of the fair-sized room, with a much smaller
one opening out of it, evidently in use as a dressing-room.
“Not so dusty, is it?” Rosie said complacently. “This sofa turns into a
bed, and there’s another proper bed in the other room. The whole
thing—unfurnished—costs us twenty-two and six a week, and
includes everything except the use of the gas. There’s a penny-in-
the-slot machine for that. We do most of our cooking on the gas-
ring, but the landlady’s very decent about sometimes letting us use
the kitchen fire.”
She gave Lydia a supper of sausage-rolls, bread-and-butter, cocoa
and a variety of sweet cakes and biscuits, and all the time talked
more agreeably and less caustically than Lydia had ever heard her
talk before.
When the little meal was over and the table pushed out of the way,
Rosie made Lydia draw her chair close to the tiny oil-stove.
“There’s a gas-fire,” she said frankly, “but we don’t use it unless the
weather’s simply perishing. It’s rather an expensive luxury. Sure
you’re all right like that?”
“Yes, thank you. What a lot of heat this thing gives out!”
“Doesn’t it? Well, now,” said Miss Graham abruptly, “spit it out.
What’s all the trouble? Is it anything to do with that foreign freak
who stands about waiting for you outside Elena’s of an evening
sometimes?”
Lydia was too well inured to the shop-girl vocabulary to resent this
description of her admirer.
She decided that she would allow herself the luxury of contravening
Grandpapa’s rule, and for once talk about herself, justified in doing
so by her conviction that it was the only short cut to the rousing in
Miss Rosie Graham of that interest which Lydia still desired the more
keenly from the very ease with which she could command it in
others.
She told her story, but omitted all mention of Miss Nettleship’s
confidences.
“My aunt, who brought me up, knows a little about it—I wrote and
told her he was taking me out sometimes—and she said in a letter I
had from her the other day that it would be so nice if I got engaged.
Somehow, you know, I hadn’t really thought of that before. But I’ve
been rather worried since, wondering whether perhaps he means to
ask me. If so, I suppose I oughtn’t to let him go about with me quite
so much unless I make up my mind to say ‘yes.’”
Lydia was aware that she had stated her problem one-sidedly, for
her real preoccupation was whether or no Margoliouth was going to
pay her the compliment of a proposal. But the temptation to
represent herself as merely undecided if she should become
engaged to him or not, was irresistible.
She thought that Rosie looked at her rather curiously as she finished
speaking.
“Of course, if you’re always about with him and let him give you
presents and all the rest of it, the poor Johnnie’s bound to think you
mean business,” she said slowly. “But you’d better be careful, kid.
Are you so sure that he wants to marry you?”
Lydia felt herself colouring hotly, sufficiently understanding the older
girl’s implication to resent it.
“I should think Mr. Margoliouth is too much of a man of the world
not to see for himself the sort of girl I am,” she said haughtily.
“He can see for himself that you’re only a silly kid, if that’s what you
mean,” retorted the outspoken Rosie Graham. “Tell me, where does
this Margoliouth, or whatever he calls himself, come from? He’s as
black as my hat, anyway.”
Lydia began to wish that she had never embarked upon the path of
confidences at all.
“He is Greek,” she said very stiffly.
“That might mean anything,” retorted Miss Graham sweepingly. “I
tell you frankly that’s what I don’t like about the business—his being
such a rum colour. I don’t trust black fellows.”
“You talk as though he were a nigger!” said Lydia, furious.
“I know what I’m talking about. I knew a girl once who took up with
a fellow like that. He wasn’t a bit darker than your Margoliouth, and
he talked awfully good English, and she got herself engaged to him.
He said he was a prince, and frightfully rich, and he gave her all
sorts of presents, and when he had to go back to his own country he
sent her the money for her passage so she could come out next year
and get married to him. Well, she got everything ready—heaps of
clothes and things—and was always talking of how she was going to
be a princess, and he’d promised to meet her at a place called Port
Said with his own carriage and horses and all the rest of it. Some of
us thought she was taking a bit of a risk, but she didn’t care a scrap,
and was just wild to get out there. Well, off she went—and we didn’t
hear anything more about her, or get any of the letters and
photographs and things she’d promised to send. And then three
months later, I met her in the City, where I was matching silks for
old Peroxide, and she’d sneaked back to her old firm and got them
to take her back as typist again.”
“But what had happened?”
“She didn’t tell me, and I didn’t ask her. But she told another girl,
and I heard about it afterwards. She’d gone off on the ship all right,
with all her fine new luggage and the rest of it, and she’d told all the
people on board who she was going out to marry, and most of them
said what a fool she was, and it would be an awful life for an English
girl, and she’d never be allowed to come home again. But there was
one man on board—a parson—who simply wouldn’t let her alone
about it, and said she didn’t know what she was doing, and at last
he got her to promise that she wouldn’t actually marry this chap
until he’d made inquiries about him. And he did the minute they
arrived—although the fellow was there just as he’d said, with a great
carriage and two horses, to take her away. I don’t exactly know
what happened, but this clergyman fellow went straight off to some
British Consul or someone, and they found out all about the man
straight away. He was a sort of prince all right, and quite as rich as
he’d said—though he didn’t live in a palace, but some place right
away from everywhere—but he wasn’t a Christian—and he’d got two
native wives already.”
“Oh!” Lydia gasped involuntarily at the climax of the narrative, which
came upon her inexperience as a complete shock.
“So that was the end of that, as you can imagine,” said Miss
Graham. “The clergyman was awfully good to her, and paid her
passage home again out of his own pocket, because she hadn’t got
a sixpence. Poor kid, she was fearfully cut up, though as a matter of
fact she ought to have been off her head with thankfulness that she
got stopped in time. I don’t suppose she’d ever have got away
again, once he’d taken her off in his carriage and pair.”
“It must have been awful for her, going back to her old job, after
leaving it to get married like that,” said Lydia. She thought with
horror of the humiliation that it would mean for the victim to return,
in such circumstances, to those who had doubtless heard her
triumphant boasts of emancipation on leaving.
“D’you think that would be the worst of it?” queried Miss Graham
sharply.
Lydia, failing to see the drift of the question, answered
unhesitatingly:
“Yes, I think it would. It’s the part I should have minded most.”
A guilty remembrance flashed across her mind of yet another axiom
of Grandpapa’s—“Don’t refer everything back to yourself.”
She wished that she had remembered it earlier, when Rosie looked
at her strangely, and then said:
“I believe you would mind that most—what other people would say
and think about you, I mean. What an inhuman kid you are!”
Lydia felt almost more bewildered than offended.
“Isn’t there anybody you care for beside yourself?” said Rosie
Graham slowly. “I’ve been watching you ever since you came to us.
Of course you’re very clever, and a cut above the rest of us—I know
all that—and you’re awfully sweet and nice to everybody, and never
say cattish things about anyone—but what’s it all for? You don’t care
a damn for anybody that I can see. And then you talk about this
chap who’s going with you—this Margoliouth—and whether he wants
you to be engaged or not. And I don’t believe you’ve once thought
whether you could care for him, or he for you. Why, this girl I was
telling you about was crazy about her fellow. That was what broke
her up—not the having made a fool of herself, and wondering if the
others at her old shop weren’t laughing at her. But that’s simply
beyond you, isn’t it? I don’t believe you know what caring for
anybody means.”
The two girls looked at one another in silence.
Rosie’s accusation not only came as a shock to Lydia, but it carried
with it an inward conviction that was disconcerting in the extreme.
Lydia, no coward, faced the unpalatable truth, and instinctively and
instantly accepted it as such.
She wondered, with the curious analytical detachment characteristic
of the self-centred, that she had never seen it for herself. It vexed
her that it should have been left to little Rosie Graham’s penetration
to enlighten her.
She rallied her forces. Rosie should at least see in her the saving
grace of a courageous candour.
“Perhaps that’s true,” she said slowly. “I’ve been first with one set of
people, and then with another, since I was a small child, and
perhaps I’ve got into a calculating way of just trying to please them,
so that they should be nice to me. I don’t know that I’m really
particularly fond of any of them....”
She passed in mental review as she spoke those with whom her
short life had been most nearly connected.
Her parents.
She could hardly remember her father, and she had certainly never
loved her mother, weak where Lydia, at twelve years old, was
already hard, irrationally impulsive where Lydia was calculating,
sentimental where Lydia was contemptuous. Looking back, she
realized that her mother had done her best to make Lydia as feebly
emotional as she was herself, and that Lydia’s own clear-sightedness
had not only saved her, but had also forced upon her a very
thorough reaction.
Grandpapa—Aunt Beryl—Uncle George—she thought of them all.
Certainly she was fond of them in a way, and Grandpapa she most
sincerely admired and respected, more than anyone she knew.
She was grateful to Aunt Beryl and Uncle George, and anxious to do
them credit, but her interest in their welfare was not excessive. If
she heard of their deaths that evening, Lydia knew very well that her
chief pang would be remorse for a complete absence of acute
sorrow.
There was Nathalie Palmer.
At school, Nathalie had adored her. She still wrote her long, intimate
letters full of personal details which Lydia could not help thinking
rather trivial and unnecessary.
But because one criticized, that did not preclude a certain degree of
affection. Lydia was certainly fond of Nathalie.
She did not for an instant, however, pretend either to herself or to
Rosie Graham, that the latter’s words were unjustified by fact.
“I’m certainly not at all in love with Mr. Margoliouth now,” she said,
“but there’s no reason why I shouldn’t be later on, I suppose. And
because it’s more or less true that I’ve never cared a very great deal
for anybody so far, it doesn’t follow that I never shall. I’m not twenty
yet.”
“I suppose there’s hope for you,” said Rosie Graham grudgingly. “But
I’m very sorry for you when you once do begin to care for somebody
—I don’t mind who it may be.”
Lydia was conscious of feeling rather flattered by the interpretation
she put upon the words.
“I suppose that all one’s eggs in one basket is always a risk,” she
said, not without complacency.
Rosie gave a short, staccato laugh, and again shot one of her
disconcerting glances at her visitor.
“What I mean is that you’ll do it so jolly badly. You’ve never cared
for anybody but yourself, and you won’t even know how to begin.”
“Then you had better be sorry for the person I care for,” said Lydia
drily.
She was in reality very angry, and she rose to go for fear of
betraying it.
“I daresay it’s rather beastly of me to have said that, when I’ve
asked you here to spend the evening,” said Rosie with a certain
compunction in her voice.
“I’m very glad you said what you thought,” Lydia returned calmly.
“Good night, and thanks for having me.”
“Good night. And I say—don’t do anything in a hurry about that
coloured friend of yours.”
Lydia walked downstairs and out of the front door without deigning
any reply to this last, urgent piece of advice.
As she sat in the jolting, nearly empty omnibus that was to take her
as far as Southampton Row, she reviewed Rosie Graham’s speeches
of the evening.
It was quite true, Lydia supposed, that she did not really care for
anybody but herself. She was too clear-sighted to pretend that this
distressed her. On the contrary, she realized the immense
simplification of a life into which no seriously conflicting claims could
enter.
After all it had taken the almost uncanny acumen of a Rosie Graham
to discover the fundamental egotism that underlay all Lydia’s careful
courtesy and studied kindness of word and deed.
She was annoyed that Rosie should have so poor an opinion of her,
but Rosie was only one person; and though in Lydia’s present
surroundings she held rank of high importance, the importance was
merely relative.
The day would come when Rosie Graham, and what Rosie Graham
thought, whether true or otherwise, would matter not at all to Lydia
Raymond.
 XII
Nevertheless, Rosie Graham’s anecdote of the girl who had gone to
Port Said, and her vehement advice to have nothing to do with the
Greek, continued to haunt Lydia’s mind.
Neither had she forgotten Miss Nettleship’s warning, and the sense
that the manageress was watching her with melancholy anxiety
caused her to surmise that Mr. Margoliouth had not yet made good
his assurance of payment.
She refused an invitation to go to the play with him, but was too
anxious that the boarders should continue to look upon her as the
heroine of an exciting love-affair to discourage him altogether,
although she had really made up her mind that she should not care
to be engaged to Margoliouth.
If the first man who had made her acquaintance since she left
school showed so much tendency to make love to her, Lydia
shrewdly told herself, there would certainly be others. She could well
afford to wait, in the certainty of eventually finding a man who
would possess such attractions and advantages as the Greek could
not boast.
Meanwhile, Margoliouth made life interesting, and Lydia a subject of
universal observation and discussion.
She was feeling agreeably conscious of this on the Saturday
following her conversation with the manageress, as she came into
the boarding-house in time for the midday meal.
Miss Nettleship was hovering at the foot of the stairs and failed to
return Lydia’s smile.
“He’ll have to go,” she said without preliminary. “I got his cheque,
and the Bank has returned it. You see how it is, dear—a terrible
business. I don’t know whether I shan’t have to call the police in
even now before I get my money. He’s leaving on Monday, and if
I’ve not had the cash down from him, I don’t know what’ll happen,
I’m sure.”
“Oh, Miss Nettleship, how dreadful! I am sorry for you,” said Lydia,
giving expression to the surface emotion of her mind only, from
habit and instinct alike.
“Don’t you have anything more to do with him, dear,” said Miss
Nettleship distractedly. “That Agnes is letting something burn
downstairs. I can smell it as plain as anything. I’ll have to go. Poor
old Agnes! she means well but you quite understand how it is——”
The manageress hastened down the stairs to the basement.
Lydia could not help glancing at her neighbour in the dining-room
with a good deal of anxiety. He seemed quite imperturbable, and
said nothing about his departure.
Lydia, whose opinion of Miss Nettleship’s mentality was not an
exalted one, began to think that Mr. Margoliouth knew quite well
that he could pay his bills before Monday, and had no intention of
going away at all.
Otherwise, why was he not more uneasy? Far from uneasy,
Margoliouth seemed to be livelier than usual, paid Lydia one or two
small compliments with his usual half-condescending, half-sardonic
expression, and asked her if she would come out to tea with him
that afternoon.
Miss Nettleship was on one of her periodical excursions to the
kitchen, and Miss Forster, Mrs. Clarence, and Mrs. Bulteel were
listening with all their ears, and with as detached an expression as
each could contrive to assume.
“Thank you very much, I should like to,” said Lydia demurely.
They went to a newly-opened corner shop in Piccadilly, where a
small orchestra was playing, and little shaded pink lights stood upon
all the tables. The contrast with the foggy December dusk outside
struck pleasantly upon Lydia’s imagination, and she enjoyed herself,
and was talkative and animated.
Margoliouth stared at her with his unwinking black gaze, and when
they had finished tea he left his chair, and came to sit beside her on
the low plush sofa, that had its back to the wall.
“A girl like you shouldn’t go about London alone,” he suddenly
remarked, with a sort of unctuousness. “At least, not until she knows
something about life.”
“Oh, I can take care of myself,” said Lydia hastily.
“But you don’t know the dangers that a young girl of your attraction
is exposed to,” he persisted. “You don’t know what sort of brutes
men can be, do you?”
“No girl need ever be annoyed—unless she wants to be,” quoted
Lydia primly from Aunt Beryl’s wisdom.
“You think so, do you? Now, I wonder if you’ll still say that in three
years’ time. Do you know that you are the sort of woman to make
either a very good saint or a very good sinner?”
The world-old lure was too potent for Lydia’s youth and her vanity.
“Am I?” she said eagerly. “Sometimes I’ve thought that, too.”
The Greek put his hand upon her, slipping his arm through hers in
his favourite manner.
“Tell me about your little self, won’t you?” he said ingratiatingly.
“Always let the other people talk about themselves.”
Oh, inconvenient and ill-timed recollection of Grandpapa’s high,
decisive old voice! So vividly was it forced upon the ear of Lydia’s
unwilling memory that she could almost have believed herself at
Regency Terrace once more. The illusion checked her eager,
irrepressible grasp at the opportunity held out by the foreigner. The
game was spoilt.
“There’s nothing to tell,” she said abruptly, suddenly grown weary.
Grandpapa had said that long stories about oneself always bored
other people, whether or no they politely affected an appearance of
interest.
No doubt it was true.
Lydia knew that she herself was not apt to take any very real
interest, for instance, in Nathalie Palmer’s long letters about her
home, and the parish, and the new experiment of keeping hens at
the vicarage, nor in the many stories, all of them personal, told by
the girls at Elena’s, nor even in the monotonous recital of Miss
Nettleship’s difficulties with her servants.
Why should the Greek be interested in hearing Lydia’s opinion of
Lydia?
She cynically determined that it would not be worth while to put him
to the test.
“Let’s go home,” she said.
Margoliouth raised his eyebrows.
“I suppose that all women are capricious.”
His use of the word “women,” as applied to her nineteen-year-old
self, always insensibly flattered Lydia.
She let him take her back to the Bloomsbury boarding-house in a
hansom, and remained passive, although unresponsive, when he put
his arm round her, and pressed her against him in the narrow
confinement of the cab.
“Dear little girl!” sighed Margoliouth sentimentally, as he reluctantly
released her from his clasp when the cab stopped.
Lydia ran up the steps, agreeably surprised at the instant opening of
the door, and anxious to exchange the raw and foggy atmosphere
outside for the comparative warmth and light of the hall.
The dining-room door also stood open, and as Lydia came in Miss
Forster rushed out upon her.
“I’ve been waiting for you!” she cried effusively. “Come in here, my
dear, won’t you?”
“Into the dining-room?” said Lydia, amazed. “Why, there’s no fire
there! I’m going upstairs.”
“No, no,” said Miss Forster still more urgently, and laying a tightly-
gloved white-kid hand on Lydia’s arm. “There’s someone up there.”
She pointed mysteriously to the ceiling.
Lydia looked up, bewildered, but only saw Miss Nettleship, the gas-
light shining full on her pale, troubled face, hastening down the
stairs. She passed Lydia and Miss Forster unperceiving, and went
straight up to the Greek, who had just closed the street door behind
him.
“Mr. Margoliouth!” she said, in her usual breathless fashion. “You see
how it is—it’s quite all right, I’m sure ... but your wife has come.
She’s in the drawing-room.”
Margoliouth uttered a stifled exclamation, and then went upstairs
without another word.
Miss Forster almost dragged Lydia into the dining-room.
“There! Of course you didn’t know he was married, did you? Neither
did any of us, and I must say I think he’s behaved abominably.”
“But who is she? When did she come?” asked Lydia, still wholly
bewildered at the suddenness of the revelation.
“Sit down, and I’ll tell you all about it.”
Miss Forster settled her ample person in a chair, with a general
expression of undeniable satisfaction.
“Just about half an hour after you’d left the house, I was just
wondering if I should find dear Lady Honoret at home if I ran round
—you know my great friends, Sir Rupert and Lady Honoret. I’m sure
I’ve often mentioned them; they’re quite well-known people—but I
thought, of course, there wouldn’t be a chance of finding them
disengaged—she’s always somewhere—so Mrs. Bulteel and I were
settling down to a nice, cosy time over the fire. Irene had actually
made up quite a good fire, for once. And then the door opened”—
Miss Forster flung open an invisible portal with characteristic energy
—“and in comes Miss Nettleship—and I remember thinking to myself
at the time, in a sort of flash, you know: Miss Nettleship looks pale—
a sort of startled look—it just flashed through my mind. And this
woman was just behind her.”
“What is she like?”
Lydia was conscious of disappointment and humiliation, but she was
principally aware of extreme curiosity.
“Just what you’d expect,” said Miss Forster, with a decisiveness that
somehow mitigated the extremely cryptic nature of the description.
“The moment I saw her and realized who she was—and I’m bound
to say Miss Nettleship spoke her name at once—that moment I said
to myself that she was just what I should have expected her to be.”
Lydia, less eager for details of Miss Forster’s remarkable prescience
than for further information, still looked at her inquiringly.
“Dark, you know,” said Miss Forster. “Very dark—and stout.”
She described a circle of immense and improbable width. “Older
than he is, I should say—without a doubt. And wearing a white veil,
and one of those foreign-looking black hats tilted right over her eyes
—you know the sort of thing. And boots—buttoned boots. With a
check costume—exactly like a foreigner.”
“I suppose she is a foreigner.”
“I spoke in French at once,” said Miss Forster. “It was most awkward,
of course—and I could see that Mrs. Bulteel was completely taken
aback. Not much savoir faire there, between ourselves, is there? But,
of course, as a woman of the world, I spoke up at once, the moment
Miss Nettleship performed the introduction. ‘Comment vous trouvez-
vous, M’dahme?’ I said. Of course, not shaking hands—simply
bowing.”
“What did she say?” Lydia asked breathlessly, as Miss Forster
straightened herself with a little gasp, after a stiff but profound
inclination of her person from the waist downwards.
“She answered in English. She has an accent, of course—doesn’t
speak nearly as well as he does. Something about us knowing her
husband. ‘Do you mean Mr. Margoliouth?’ I said. Naughty of me,
though, wasn’t it?”
“Yes, very,” said Lydia hastily. “But what did she say?”
“Took it quite seriously,” crowed Miss Forster, suddenly convulsed.
“Really, some people have no sense of the ludicrous. I said it for a
bit of mischief, you know. ‘Do you mean Mr. Margoliouth?’ I said—
and she answered me quite solemnly, ‘Yes, of course.’”
Then it really was Margoliouth’s wife. Lydia began to realize the fact
that until now had carried no sort of conviction to her mind.
Margoliouth, a married man, had been making a fool of her before
all these people. Such was the aspect of her case that flashed across
her with sudden, furious indignation.
She perceived that Miss Forster was looking at her with curiosity.
“I didn’t know that he was married at all,” said Lydia calmly.
“No one could have guessed it for a moment, and he never gave us
a hint,” said Miss Forster indignantly. “You won’t mind me saying,
dear, that I wanted to get you in here and tell you quietly before you
went up and found her there, sitting on the sofa as calm as you
please.”
“Thank you,” said Lydia. “But really, you know, it doesn’t matter to
me if Mr. Margoliouth is married. Only I think he ought to have told
Miss Nettleship, and—and all of us.”
“The cad!” cried Miss Forster energetically, and striking the rather
tight lap of her silk dress with a violence that threatened to split the
white-kid glove. “What we women have to put up with, I always say!
Only a man could behave like that, and what can we do to defend
ourselves? Nothing at all. I was telling Sir Rupert Honoret the other
day—those friends of mine who live in Lexham Gardens, you know—
I was telling him what I thought of the whole sex. Oh, I’ve the
courage of my opinions, I know. Men are brutes—there’s no doubt
about it.”
“I suppose he didn’t expect her here?” said Lydia dreamily, still
referring to the Margoliouth ménage.
Miss Forster understood.
“Not he! You saw what a fool he looked when the manageress told
him she was here. She’s come to fetch him away, that’s what it is.
She as good as said so. But they’ll be here till Monday morning, I’m
afraid—the pair of them. Ugh!——” Miss Forster gave a most realistic
shudder. “I don’t know how I shall sit at table with them. Miss
Nettleship has no business to take in people of that sort—she ought
to have made inquiries about the man in the first place, and I shall
tell her so.”
“Oh, no,” said Lydia gently. “Please don’t. She’ll be so upset at the
whole thing already.”
“Very generous!” Miss Forster declared, her hand pressed heavily on
Lydia’s shoulder. “Of course, it’s you one can’t help thinking of—a
young girl like you. Oh, the cad! If I were a man, I’d horsewhip a
fellow like that.”
She indulged in a vigorous illustrative pantomime.
“I shall be all right,” Lydia said quickly—insensibly adopting the most
dignified attitude at her command.
She moved to the door.
“Have some supper sent up to your room, do,” urged Miss Forster.
“I’m sure Irene would get a tray ready, and I’ll bring it up to you
myself. Then you won’t have to come down to the dining-room.”
“Thank you very much, but I’d rather come down.”
Lydia was speaking literal truth, as, with her usual clear-sightedness,
she soon began to realize.
Not only was her curiosity undeniably strong, both to behold the
recent arrival, and to observe Margoliouth’s behaviour in these new
and undoubtedly disconcerting circumstances—but it was slowly
borne in upon her that she could not afford to relinquish the
opportunity of standing in the lime-light with the attention of her
entire audience undeviatingly fixed upon herself.
Her humiliation could be turned into a triumph.
Lydia set her teeth.
She had been very angry with Margoliouth, and was so still—less
because he had deceived her than because the discovery of his
deceit must destroy all her prestige as the youthful recipient of
exclusive attentions. But after all, she could still be the heroine of
this boarding-house drama.
Lydia reflected grimly that there were more ways than one of being
a heroine.
She looked at herself in the glass. Anger and excitement had given
her a colour, and she did not feel at all inclined to cry. She was, in
fact, perfectly aware that she was really not in the least unhappy.
But the people downstairs would think that she was proudly
concealing a broken heart.
Lydia dressed her thick mass of hair very carefully, thrust the high,
carved comb into one side of the great black twist at just the right
angle, and put on a blouse of soft, dark-red silk that suited her
particularly well.
There was a knock at her door.
Lydia went to open it, and saw Miss Nettleship on the threshold.
“Oh, my dear, I am so sorry, and if you want a tray upstairs for this
once, it’ll be quite all right, and I’ll give the girl the order myself. You
aren’t thinking of coming down to-night, are you?”
“Yes, I am,” said Lydia steadily. “It’s very kind of you, but I’d rather
come down just as usual.”
“It’s as you like, of course,” said the manageress in unhappy
accents. “Miss Forster came to me about you—you know what she
is. But I’m so vexed you should have heard all in a minute like, only
you understand how it was, dear, don’t you? And his wife has paid
up the bills, all in cash, and wants to stay over Sunday.”
“There’s the bell,” said Lydia.
“Then I must go, dear—you know how it is. That old Miss Lillicrap is
such a terror with the vegetables. I do feel so vexed about it all—
and your auntie will be upset, won’t she? Are you ready, dear?”
Lydia saw that the kind woman was waiting to accompany her
downstairs to the dining-room, but she had every intention of
making her entrance unescorted.
“I’m not quite ready,” she said coolly. “Please don’t wait—I know you
want to be downstairs.”
The manageress looked bewildered, and as though she felt herself
to have been rebuffed, but she spoke in her usual rather
incoherently good-natured fashion as she hastened down the stairs.
“Just whatever you like, and it’ll be quite all right. I quite
understand. I wish I could wait, dear, but really I daren’t....”
Lydia was very glad that Miss Nettleship dared not wait.
She herself remained upstairs for another full five minutes, although
her remaining preparations were easily completed in one.
At the end of the five minutes she felt sure that all the boarders
must be assembled. Hardly anyone was ever late for a meal, since
meals for most of the women, at any rate, contributed the principal
variety in the day’s occupation.
Nevertheless, Lydia went downstairs very slowly, until the sound of
clattering plates and dishes, broken by occasional outbreaks of
conversation, told her that dinner was in progress.
Then she quickly opened the dining-room door.
They were all there, and they all looked up as she came in.
Her accustomed seat at the far end of the table, next to the Greek,
was empty, but on Margoliouth’s other side sat a strange woman,
whom Lydia was at no pains to identify, even had Miss Forster’s
description not at once returned to her mind. “Very dark—and stout
—and dressed like a foreigner.”
Mrs. Margoliouth was all that.
Lydia saw the room and everyone in it, in a flash, as she closed the
door behind her.
Miss Lillicrap, clutching her knife and fork, almost as though she
were afraid that her food might be snatched from her plate while
she peered across the room with eager, malevolent curiosity—Miss
Nettleship, suddenly silent in the midst of some babbled triviality,
and evidently undecided whether to get up or to remain seated—
Mrs. Bulteel, her sharp gaze fixed upon Lydia and her pinched mouth
half open—Miss Forster, also staring undisguisedly—Mrs. Clarence,
with her foolish, red-rimmed eyes almost starting from her head—
the youth, Hector Bulteel, his mouth still half-full and a tumbler
arrested in mid-career in his hand—his father’s sallow face turned
towards the door, wrinkled with an evident discomfiture.
Mrs. Margoliouth herself had raised a pair of black, hostile-looking
eyes, set in a heavy, pasty face, to fix them upon Lydia.
Irene had stopped her shuffling progress round the table, and
turned her head over her shoulder.
Only Margoliouth remained with his head bent over his plate,
apparently absorbed in the food that he was sedulously cutting up
into small pieces.
In the momentary silence Lydia advanced. Her heart was beating
very quickly, but she was conscious of distinct exhilaration, and she
remembered to tilt her chin a little upward and to walk slowly.
There was the sudden scraping of a chair, and pale, ugly Mr. Bulteel
had sprung forward, and come down the room to meet her.
The unexpected little act of chivalry, which obviously came as a
surprise to himself as to everybody else, nearly startled Lydia out of
her predetermined composure.
She looked up at him and smiled rather tremulously, and he pulled
out her chair for her, and waited until she was seated before
returning to his own place again.
The meal went on, and the atmosphere was electric. Contrary to her
custom, Miss Nettleship made no attempt at introducing the new-
comer, and Margoliouth did not seek to rectify the omission.
He ate silently, his eyes on his plate. Twice Lydia addressed small,
commonplace remarks to him, each time in the midst of a silence,
wherein her voice sounded very clear and steady. He answered
politely but briefly, and the other women at the table exchanged
glances, and one or two of them looked admiringly at Lydia.
It was this consciousness that kept her outwardly composed, for she
found the position far more of an ordeal than she had expected it to
be. She was even aware that, under the table, a certain nervous
trembling that she could not repress was causing her knees to knock
together.
She felt very glad when the meal was over and old Miss Lillicrap—
who always gave the signal for dispersal—had pushed her chair
back, and said venomously:
“Well, I can’t say, ‘Thank you for my good dinner.’ The fowl was
tough, and I didn’t get my fair share of sauce with the pudding.”
“Are we having a rubber to-night?” Miss Forster inquired loudly of no
one in particular, with the evident intention of silencing Miss Lillicrap.
Lydia saw Mrs. Bulteel frown and shake her head, as though in
warning.
Margoliouth, however, had at last looked up.