‘Before God, sir,’ he said. ‘Is this true?’
‘Before God, it is,’ said Sebastian.
He brought a chair forward, sat down close by his friend.
‘Vernon, dear old chap – don’t you remember me at all?’
Green stared at him – an anguished stare. Something seemed to stir ever so faintly. How it hurt, this trying to remember. There was something – what was it? He said doubtfully:
‘You – you’ve grown up.’ He stretched out a hand and touched Sebastian’s ear. ‘I seem to remember –’
‘He remembers your ears, Sebastian,’ cried Jane and going over to the mantelpiece she laid her head down upon it and began to laugh.
‘Stop it, Jane.’ Sebastian rose, poured out another drink and took it to her. ‘Some medicine for you.’
She drank it, handed the glass back to him, smiled faintly and said:
‘I’m sorry. I won’t do it again.’
Green was going on with his discoveries.
‘You’re – you’re not a brother, are you? No, you lived next door. That’s it – you lived next door …’
‘That’s right, old chap.’ Sebastian patted him on the shoulder. ‘Don’t worry to think – it’ll come back soon. Take it easy.’
Green looked at Jane. He said timidly and politely:
‘Were you – are you – my sister? I seem to remember something about a sister.’
Jane shook her head, unable to speak. Green flushed.
‘I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have –’
Sebastian interrupted.
‘You didn’t have a sister. There was a cousin who lived with you. Her name was Josephine. We called her Joe.’
Green pondered.
‘Josephine – Joe. Yes, I seem to remember something about that.’ He paused and then reiterated pathetically, ‘Are you sure my name isn’t Green?’
‘Quite sure. Do you still feel it is?’
‘Yes … And you say I make up music – music of my own? Highbrow stuff – not ragtime?’
‘Yes.’
‘It all seems – well, mad. Just that – mad!’
‘You mustn’t worry,’ said Jane gently. ‘I dare say we have been wrong to tell you all this the way we have.’
Green looked from one to the other of them. He felt dazed.
‘What am I to do?’ he asked helplessly.
Sebastian gave an answer with decision.
‘You must stay here with us. You’ve had a great shock, you know. I’ll go and square things with old Bleibner. He’s a very decent chap and he’ll understand.’
‘I shouldn’t like to put him out in any way. He’s been a thundering good boss to me.’
‘He’ll understand. I’ve already told him something.’
‘What about the car? I don’t like to think of another chap driving that car. She’s running now as sweetly –’
He was once again the chauffeur, intent on his charge.
‘I know. I know.’ Sebastian was impatient. ‘But the great thing, my dear fellow, is to get you right as soon as possible. We want to get a first-class doctor on to you.’
‘What’s a doctor got to do with it?’ Green was slightly hostile. ‘I’m perfectly fit.’
‘Perhaps, a doctor ought to see you all the same. Not here – in London. We don’t want any talk down here.’
Something in the tone of the speaker’s voice attracted Green’s attention. The flush came over his face.
‘You mean the deserting business …?’
‘No, no. To tell the truth, I can’t get the hang of that. I mean something quite different.’
Green looked at him inquiringly.
Sebastian thought: ‘Well, I suppose he’s got to know some time.’ Aloud he said:
‘You see – thinking you were dead – your wife has – well – married again.’
He was a little afraid of the effect of those words. But Green seemed to see the matter in a humorous light.
‘That is a bit awkward,’ he said with a grin.
‘It doesn’t upset you in any way?’
‘You can’t be upset by a thing you don’t remember.’ He paused, as though really considering the matter for the first time. ‘Was Mr Deyre – I mean, was I – fond of her?’
‘Well – yes.’
But again the grin came over Green’s face.
‘And I to be so positive I wasn’t married! All the same –’ his face changed – ‘it’s rather frightening – all this!’
He looked suddenly at Jane, as though seeking assurance.
‘Dear Vernon,’ she said, ‘it will be all right.’
She paused, and then said in a quiet casual tone:
‘You drove Mr Bleibner over to Abbots Puissants, you say. Did you – did you see anyone there? Any of the people of the house?’
‘I saw Mr Chetwynd – and I saw a lady in the sunk gardens. I took her to be Mrs Chetwynd, fair-haired and good-looking.’
‘Did – did she see you?’
‘Yes. Seemed – well, scared. Went dead white and bolted like a rabbit.’
‘Oh, God,’ said Jane, and bit off the exclamation almost before it was uttered.
Green was cogitating quietly over the matter.
‘Perhaps she thought she knew me,’ he said. ‘She must have been one of them who knew him – me – in the old days, and it gave her a turn. Yes, that must have been it.’
He was quite happy with his solution.
Suddenly he asked:
‘Had my mother got red hair?’
Jane nodded.
‘Then that was it …’ He looked up apologetically. ‘Sorry. I was just thinking of something.’
‘I’ll go and see Bleibner now,’ said Sebastian. ‘Jane will look after you.’
He left the room. Green leant forward in his chair, his head held between his hands. He felt acutely uncomfortable and miserable – especially with Jane. Clearly he ought to know her – and he didn’t. She had said ‘Dear Vernon’ just now. It was terribly awkward when people knew you and you felt they were strangers. If he spoke to her he supposed he ought to call her Jane – but he couldn’t. She was a stranger. Still he supposed he’d have to get used to it. They’d have to be Sebastian and George and Jane together – no, not George – Vernon. Silly sort of name, Vernon. Probably he’d been a silly sort of chap.
‘I mean,’ he thought, trying desperately to force the realization upon himself, ‘I must have been a silly sort of chap.’
He felt horribly lonely – cut off from reality. He looked up to find Jane watching him, and the pity and understanding in her eyes made him feel a shade less forlorn.
‘It’s rather terrible just at first, isn’t it?’ she said.
He said politely:
‘It is rather difficult. You don’t – you don’t know where you are with things.’
‘I understand.’
She said no more – just sat there quietly beside him. His head jerked forward. He began to doze. In reality he only slept for a few minutes, but it seemed to him hours. Jane had turned all the lamps out but one. He woke with a start. She said quickly:
‘It’s all right.’
He stared at her, his breath coming in gasps. He was still in the nightmare then, he hadn’t woken up. And there was something worse to come – something he didn’t know yet. He was sure of it. That was why they all looked at him so pityingly.
Jane got up suddenly. Wildly, he cried out:
‘Stay with me. Oh! please stay with me.’
He couldn’t understand why her face should suddenly twist with pain. What was there in what he had said to make her look like that? He said again: ‘Don’t leave me. Stay with me.’
She sat down again beside him and took his hand in hers. She said very gently:
‘I won’t go away.’
He felt soothed – reassured. After a minute or two, he dozed again. He woke quietly this time. The room was as before and his hand was still in Jane’s. He spoke
diffidently:
‘You – you aren’t my sister? You were – you are, I mean – a friend of mine?’
‘Yes.’
‘A great friend?’
‘A great friend.’
He paused. Yet the conviction in his mind was growing stronger and stronger. He blurted out suddenly:
‘You’re – you’re my wife, aren’t you?’
He was sure of it.
She drew her hand away. He couldn’t understand the look in her face. It frightened him. She got up.
‘No,’ she said. ‘I’m not your wife.’
‘Oh! I’m sorry. I thought –’
‘It’s all right.’
And at that minute Sebastian came back. His eyes went to Jane. She said, with a little twisted smile:
‘I’m glad you’ve come … I’m – glad you’ve come …’
3
Jane and Sebastian talked long into the night. What was to be done? Who was to be told?
There was Nell and Nell’s position to consider. Presumably Nell should be told first of all. She was the one most vitally concerned.
Jane agreed. ‘If she doesn’t know already.’
‘You think she knows?’
‘Well, evidently she met Vernon that day face to face.’
‘Yes, but she must have thought it just a very strong resemblance.’
Jane was silent.
‘Don’t you think so?’
‘I don’t know.’
‘But hang it all, Jane, if she’d recognized him, she’d have done something – got hold of him or of Bleibner. It’s two days ago now.’
‘I know.’
‘She can’t have recognized him. She just saw Bleibner’s chauffeur and his likeness to Vernon gave her such a shock that she couldn’t stand it and rushed away.’
‘I suppose so.’
‘What’s in your mind, Jane?’
‘We recognized him, Sebastian.’
‘You mean you did. I’d been told by you.’
‘But you would have known him anywhere, wouldn’t you?’
‘Yes, I would … But then I know him so well.’
Jane said in a hard voice: ‘So does Nell …’
Sebastian looked sharply at her and said, ‘What are you getting at, Jane?’
‘I don’t know.’
‘Yes, you do. What do you really think happened?’
Jane paused before speaking.
‘I think Nell came upon him suddenly in the garden and thought it was Vernon. Afterwards she persuaded herself that it had only been a chance resemblance that had upset her so.’
‘Well – that’s very much what I said.’
He was a little surprised when she said meekly:
‘Yes, it is.’
‘What’s the difference?’
‘Practically none, only –’
‘Yes?’
‘You and I would have wanted to believe it was Vernon even if it wasn’t.’
‘Wouldn’t Nell? Surely she hasn’t come to care for George Chetwynd to such an extent –’
‘Nell is very fond of George, but Vernon is the only person she’s ever been in love with.’
‘Then that’s all right. Or is it worse that way? It’s the deuce of a tangle … What about his people? Mrs Deyre and the Bents?’
Jane said decidedly: ‘Nell must be told before they are. Mrs Deyre will broadcast it over England as soon as she knows, and that will be very unfair to both Vernon and Nell.’
‘Yes, I think you’re right. Now my plan is this. To take Vernon up to town tomorrow and go and see a specialist – then be guided by what he advises.’
Jane said Yes, she thought that would be the best plan. She got up to go to bed. On the stairs she paused and said to Sebastian:
‘I wonder if we’re right. Bringing him back, I mean. He looked so happy. Oh, Sebastian, he looked so happy …’
‘As George Green, you mean?’
‘Yes. Are you sure we’re right?’
‘Yes, I’m pretty sure. It can’t be right for anyone to be in that unnatural sort of state.’
‘I suppose it is unnatural. The queer thing is he looked so normal and commonplace. And happy – that’s what I can’t get over, Sebastian – happy … We’re none of us very happy, are we?’
He couldn’t answer that.
Chapter Three
1
Two days later Sebastian came to Abbots Puissants. The butler was not sure that Mrs Chetwynd could see him. She was lying down.
Sebastian gave his name and said he was sure Mrs Chetwynd would see him. He was shown into the drawing-room to wait. The room seemed very empty and silent but unusually luxurious – very different from what it had looked in his childish days. He thought to himself, ‘It was a real house then,’ and wondered what exactly he meant by that. He got it presently. Now it suggested, very faintly, a museum. Everything was beautifully arranged, and harmonized perfectly, every piece that was not perfect had been replaced by one that was. All the carpets and covers and hangings were new.
‘And they must have cost a pretty penny,’ thought Sebastian appreciatively, and priced them with a fair degree of accuracy. He always knew the cost of things.
He was interrupted in this salutary exercise by the door opening. Nell came in, a pink colour in her cheeks and her hand outstretched.
‘Sebastian! What a surprise! I thought you were too busy ever to leave London except at a week-end – and not often then!’
‘I’ve lost just twenty thousand pounds in the last two days,’ said Sebastian gruffly as he took her hand. ‘Simply from gadding about and letting things go anyhow. How are you, Nell?’
‘Oh, I’m feeling splendid.’
She didn’t look very splendid, though, he thought, now that the flush of surprise had died away. Besides, hadn’t the butler said she was lying down, not feeling well? He fancied that her face looked a little strained and haggard.
She went on:
‘Sit down, Sebastian. You look as though you were on the point of going off to catch a train. George is away – in Spain. He had to go on business. He’ll be away a week at least.’
‘Will he?’
That was a good thing anyway. A damned awkward business. Nell had simply no idea …
‘You’re very glum, Sebastian. Is anything the matter?’
She asked the question quite lightly, but he seized upon it eagerly. It was the opening he needed.
‘Yes, Nell,’ he said gravely. ‘As a matter of fact there is.’
He heard her draw in her breath with a sudden catch. Her eyes looked watchful.
‘What is it?’ she said.
Her voice sounded different – hard and suspicious.
‘I’m afraid what I’m going to say will be a great shock to you. It’s about Vernon.’
‘What about Vernon?’
Sebastian waited a minute. Then he said:
‘Vernon – is alive, Nell.’
‘Alive?’ she whispered. Her hand crept up to her heart.
‘Yes.’
She didn’t do any of the things he expected her to do – didn’t faint, or cry out, or ask eager questions. She just stared straight ahead of her. And a sudden quick suspicion came into his shrewd Jewish mind.
‘You knew it?’
‘No, no.’
‘I thought perhaps you saw him – the other day – when he came here?’
‘Then it was Vernon?’
It broke from her like a cry. Sebastian nodded his head. It was as he had thought and said to Jane. She had not trusted her eyes.
‘What did you think – that it was a very close resemblance?’
‘Yes – yes, that’s what I thought. How could I think it was Vernon? He looked at me and didn’t know me.’
‘He’s lost his memory, Nell.’
‘Lost his memory?’
‘Yes.’
He told her the story, giving the details as carefully as possible. She listened but paid less atten
tion than he expected. When he had finished she said: ‘Yes – but what’s to be done about it all? Will he get it back? What are we to do?’
He explained that Vernon was having treatment from a specialist. Already, under hypnosis, part of the lost memory had returned. The whole process would not be long delayed. He did not enter into the technical details, judging rightly that these would have no interest for her.
‘And then he’ll know – everything?’
‘Yes.’
She shrank back in her chair. He felt a sudden rush of pity.
‘He can’t blame you, Nell. You didn’t know – nobody could know. The report of his death was absolutely definite. It’s an almost unique case. I’ve heard of one other. In most cases, of course, a report of death was contradicted almost immediately. Vernon loves you enough to understand and forgive.’
She said nothing but she put up both hands to cover her face.
‘We think – if you agree – that everything had better be kept quiet for the present. You’ll tell Chetwynd, of course. And you and he and Vernon can – well, thrash it out together –’
‘Don’t! Don’t! Don’t go into details. Just let’s leave it for the present – till I’ve seen Vernon.’
‘Do you want to see him at once? Will you come up to town with me?’
‘No – I can’t do that. Let him come here – to see me. Nobody will recognize him. The servants are all new.’
Sebastian said slowly: ‘Very well … I’ll tell him.’
Nell got up.
‘I – I – you must go away now, Sebastian. I can’t bear any more. I can’t indeed. It’s all so dreadful. And only two days ago ‘I was so happy and peaceful …’
‘But, Nell – surely to have Vernon back again.’
‘Oh, yes, I didn’t mean that. You don’t understand. That’s wonderful, of course. Oh! do go, Sebastian. It’s awful of me turning you out like this, but I can’t bear any more. You must go.’
Sebastian went. On the way back to town he wondered a good deal.
2
Left alone, Nell went back to her bedroom and lay down on her bed, pulling the silk eiderdown tightly over her.
So it was true after all. It had been Vernon. She had told herself that it couldn’t be – that she had made a ridiculous mistake. But she’d been uneasy ever since.
What was going to happen? What would George say about it all? Poor George. He’d been so good to her.
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