AT THE end of the week Dr. Carey ceased his visits, "You won't needme any more," he assured Marie. "Take care of yourself, that isall, and no more bathing this season."
Marie shivered, "No, I promise that."
She was feeling quite herself again, though she got tired easily.She had written to Aunt Madge, making light of her accident, andassuring her that there was no need to worry.
"And I am ever so happy," she wrote, with desolation in her heart"And I like the hotel, and there are nice people here, and everyoneis very kind to me. I will let you know when we are coming home."
Chris came and stood behind her as she was writing and caught sightof the first sentence.
"Is that true?" he asked. He pointed to the words: "I am ever sohappy."
Marie laughed, but she was glad that he could not see her face.
"Of course, it's true," she said. "I have never had such a goodtime in my life."
A more observant man would have heard the flatness of her voice,but Chris only heard what he wanted to hear, and it gave him asense of relief. If she was happy, that was all right. He thoughtthings had arranged themselves admirably. Marriage was not going tobe the tie he had dreaded, after all.
"Mrs. Heriot wants me to play a round of golf with her thisafternoon." he said after a moment. "Do you mind?"
"Of course not. Please go. I shall be all right; I am going to takemy book down on the sands."
"Very well--don't overtire yourself." He laid his hand on hershoulder for a moment and then walked away.
Marie sat staring at the finished letter before her. Would AuntMadge be as blind as Chris, she wondered. She thrust it into anenvelope and took it to the post.
The weather was still holding fine. The days were hot and sunny andthe nights moonlit.
Last night at dinner she had asked Chris to take her for a walk. Itwas the first time she had asked anything of him since theirmarriage, but she had peeped at the moonlit sands and sea from herwindow as she was dressing for dinner and a sudden longing to walkthrough its silvery radiance with Chris had seized upon her.
"Come out with you? Why, of course!" Chris said in quick response."I promised to play Feathers a hundred up at half-past eight, butthat won't take long, and we can go afterwards."
But it had taken over an hour, and afterwards another man who hadwatched the game had challenged Chris to another, and quiteunintentionally Chris had forgotten all about his promise to Marie,and she had crept off to bed at ten o'clock without seeing himagain.
"I shall get used to it, of course I shall," she told herself asshe lay awake with the moonlight pouring through the open window."Other women with husbands like Chris get used to it, and so shallI."
She never shed tears about him; all her tears seemed to have beendried up. Her only longing was that he should be happy, and thatshe should never bore him or prove a tie to his freedom.
She loved him with complete unselfishness--with completefoolishness, too, perhaps an unkind critic might have said.
His was a nature so easily spoilt. If anybody offered him his ownway he took it without demur. He liked things to go smoothly. If hewas having a good time himself he took it for granted thateverybody else was, too.
He went off to his golf quite happily. He told Mrs. Heriot thatMarie had taken a book down to the sands.
"Alone?" Mrs. Heriot laughed. "How queer! Doesn't she find itdull?"
"She loves reading--she'll be quite happy."
And Chris really believed what he was saying.
He did not care a jot for Mrs. Heriot, but she played golfmagnificently, and she was never tired. She could be out on thelinks all day and dance all night, and still look as fresh aspaint--perhaps because she owed most of her freshness to paint andpowder.
As she and Chris were leaving the hotel they encountered Feathers.
Feathers stopped dead in front of his friend, blocking the way.
"Where are you going?" he asked uncompromisingly.
"Where are we going?" Chris echoed with sarcasm. "Where do youthink we are going? Hunting?"
Mrs. Heriot laughed immoderately. She did not like Feathers, andshe knew that he did not like her or approve of her friendship withChris, and it pleased her to read the annoyance in his ugly face.
"We're going golfing, Mr. Dakers," she said. "Don't you recognizethe clubs? I thought you were a golfer."
"He hates me, you know," she explained to Chris as they went ondown the road.
"He doesn't like any women," Chris said easily.
"You really think so?" she asked, raising her brows.
"I am sure of it." He seemed struck by her silence, and turned hishead sharply. "What do you mean?"
"Only that I thought he seemed rather friendly with your littlewife," she explained.
"Oh, with Marie!" Chris laughed. "Yes, I'm glad to say he is. Theyget on very well together. He saved her life, you know."
"Of course! How stupid of me!" She pretended that she hadforgotten, and Chris frowned.
"Why on earth can't the woman be natural?" he was thinkingimpatiently. He had quite missed her venomous little shaft withregard to his wife and Feathers. His was a most unsuspiciousnature, and he cared too little for Marie to feel the slightestjealousy.
He had laughed at Atkins' devotion to her. Atkins was a youngidiot, but he had been pleased that she and Feathers had taken sucha liking to one another. It argued well for a future in which Chriscould see himself wanting to knock about town with Feathers as hehad done before he was married.
They played a round of golf, and Mrs. Heriot beat him.
"What a triumph!" she said mockingly, when they sat down to rest ona grassy slope. "You're not playing well to-day, Chris."
She had always called him by his Christian name. She was one ofthose women who call all men by their Christian names without firstbeing invited to do so.
She was a widow with a large income, and a spiteful nature. She didnot actually wish to re-marry, because if she did so she would losethe money left her by her husband, but all the same, she did notlike to see her men friends monopolized and married by other women.
She was thinking of her husband now, as she sat, chin on hand,staring down at Chris, sprawled beside her on the grass.
Duncan Heriot had died in India while his wife was in England, andhe had died of too much drink and an enlarged liver. As she lookedat Chris, with his handsome face and long, lithe figure, she wasmentally contrasting him with the short, stubby man whom she hadmarried solely for his money.
She liked Chris for the same reason that he liked her. They hadmany tastes in common and seldom bored one another.
She was a year or two older than he, but she was still a youngwoman, and had it not been for the money question she would havedone her best to marry him; but she knew that Chris had no money,and life without money was to Mrs. Heriot very much as a motor-carwould be without its engine. So she had launched the craft of Platobetween them, and comforted herself with the thought that he wasnot a marrying man.
It had been a real shock to her to hear of his wedding. She hadbeen very anxious to meet his wife and find out for herself why hehad so suddenly changed his mind.
Her quick eyes had already discovered that it had not been forlove! She had made a life study of the opposite sex, and she knewwithout any telling that there was another reason for which shemust seek.
"You know," she said, abruptly, "I was ever so surprised to hearthat you were married?"
"Were you?" Christ tilted his hat further over his eyes. "Mostpeople were, I think. Poor old Feathers was absolutely disgusted."
"It was very sudden, wasn't it?" she pursued. "Quite romantic, fromall accounts."
"Oh, I don't know. I've known her all my life--we were brought uptogether."
"Really!" She opened her eyes wide. "Cousins or something?" shehazarded.
"No. Marie's father adopted me."
Chris rose to his feet and yawned. He knew that he was beingpumped.
"Sh
all we play another round?" he asked.
"Of course." She was a little chagrined. She had imagined thattheir friendship was on too secure a basis to permit of such adecided snubbing. She played badly, as she always did when she wasannoyed, and Chris won easily.
"You threw that away deliberately," he challenged her.
She laughed. "Did I? Perhaps I did. You annoyed me."
"In what way?"
"I thought we were friends, and when I ventured to be interested inyour marriage you snubbed me abominably."
Her eyes were plaintive as they met his, and, manlike, Chris feltslightly flattered.
Mrs. Heriot was a much-sought-after woman and he knew that she hadalways shown a distinct preference for his society.
"I did not think you would be interested." he said lamely. "Andthere is nothing to tell if you are looking for a romance."
"That is what you say." she declared. "But that is so like a man--never will admit it when he cares for a woman."
Chris colored a little. He could not imagine what it was she wantedhim to say.
"You've always been such a confirmed bachelor." she went on. "I ambeginning to think that your wife must be a very wonderful woman tohave so completely metamorphosed you."
Chris frowned. He resented this cross-examination even while he washalf inclined to think it unreasonable of him to do so. After all,he had known Mrs. Heriot some considerable time, and, as she said,they had always been good friends.
"I can tell you one thing," he said half seriously. "And that is,that my wife is the only woman in the world for whom I would havegiven up my bachelor freedom! There, will that satisfy you?"
Mrs. Heriot smiled sweetly. She always smiled sweetly when she wasfeeling particularly vixenish.
"How sweet of you! How very sweet!" she murmured. "Of course, Ihave always said what a particularly charming girl she is--sounspoilt, so unsophisticated! I suppose it is just another case oflike attracting unlike."
"I suppose it is," said Chris bluntly. He wished to goodness shewould talk about something else. He was shrewd enough to detect thesting beneath her sugary words, and all his pride, if nothing more,rose in defense of Marie. He thought of her with a little glow ofaffectionate warmth.
"She's the most unselfish child I've ever met." he saidimpulsively.
She was still a child to him. It was odd that he still could notdissociate her in his mind from the little girl with the pigtailand wistful eyes who had waited on him hand and foot all his life.Perhaps if he could have realized that Marie was a woman, at leastin heart and thoughts, there might have been a better understandingbetween them; but as it was--well, everything was all right, andMarie had written to Aunt Madge that she was "ever so happy."
It was just as they reached the hotel again that Mrs. Heriot saidwith a sentimental sigh: "Perfect, perfect weather, isn't it?Glorious days, and--oh, did you notice the moon last night?"
Chris stood quite still. With a shock of guilt he rememberedMarie's little request to him and his own forgetfulness. The angryblood rushed to his face. He hated to feel that perhaps he haddisappointed her.
He left Mrs. Heriot in the lounge and went straight up to hiswife's room. She was not there, but a book which he knew she hadbeen reading was lying open on her dressing-table and a little pairof white shoes stood neatly together on the rug.
Chris rubbed the back of his head with a curiously boyish look ofembarrassment. It seemed odd to think that he and little MarieCeleste were really husband and wife! He cast a furtive look athimself in her mirror. He did not look much like a married man, hethought, and laughed as he took up the book which Marie had beenreading. It was a book of poems, and Chris made a little grimace.He had never read a poem in his life, but his eyes fell now on someof the lines which had been faintly underscored with a pencil:
"What shall I be at fifty,
Should nature keep me alive--
If I find the world so bitter
When I am but twenty-five?"
A Bachelor Husband Page 6