There was a queer little silence. And then Patricia found herself wondering, with incredibly cool detachment, which of them discovered first that the last statement was a lie.
Not an intentional lie. Just one of those foregone conclusions which remained facts until you put them into words—and then were exposed as the most ridiculous of fallacies.
How had it been possible to assert so positively that she had no wish to be Michael’s wife? How had it been possible even to think it?
Of course she wanted it. Of course anyone would, thought Patricia rather absurdly in that moment.
That was why she had so hated the idea of leaving the pleasant life here—why she had told herself that she so much loved being one of a family again. That was also why she had fought with such personal, angry determination against the idea of anyone being allowed to exploit Michael.
She didn’t want to leave him. She didn’t want him to come to any harm. She loved him. Not for the comfort and kindliness and security with which he surrounded her. But—because he was Michael. Utterly, utterly different from Phil, who had fascinated, intrigued, and faintly shocked her. But just—oh, everything one wanted, in this difficult and sometimes frightening world.
With the uncanny feeling that her self-discovery must be written in her eyes, Patricia turned away and pretended, with ridiculous inappropriateness, to be straightening something on Michael’s desk. She could not possibly have said how long the silence had lasted. Only a few seconds probably, but it seemed like ten minutes—or an hour—or whatever was necessary to discover the whole astonishing truth about oneself.
Then Michael’s wife said dryly:
‘You won’t think me a sceptic if I don’t altogether believe you, will you? But, in any case, what Michael does after I have finished with him is no concern of mine. I’m even willing to wish you luck, as one hard-pressed woman to another. But while he and I are settling the terms on which we should separate, I suggest that you should stand down as gracefully as I intend to when your turn comes.’
Patricia passed her tongue over rather dry lips.
‘I have nothing to do with Michael’s decision on such a matter. Believe me, I—’
She turned sharply as Julia came quietly into the room again.
‘Madam—’ She came over to Patricia and spoke in a low voice. ‘I’m sorry to trouble you, but Mrs. Harnby asked if you could very kindly go to her for a few minutes.’
‘At this moment, Julia? I can’t. I’m—engaged.’
‘I told Mrs. Harnby that, madam, and she said she won’t keep you more than a minute or two, and it seems something she wants right away.’
Patricia gave a distracted glance at herself in the mirror. No, she didn’t look particularly upset, though the thought of facing Mrs. Harnby’s shrewd glance made her throat constrict. Why on earth did she have to choose this moment?
Glancing over at her visitor, Patricia saw that she was faintly amused by the interruption at this point, but had no intention of closing the discussion until she had said all she had come to say.
‘Julia, bring Mrs.—er—some tea, will you?’ She saw Pat’s eyes gleam amusedly at the diplomatic murmur which filled in the space where her name should have come. ‘Will you please excuse me for five minutes?’ She hoped that sounded to Julia’s ears like any conventional excuse to any ordinary visitor.
‘Of course.’ Pat took out her cigarette case, with every appearance of making herself at home until her hostess returned. ‘Please don’t hurry,’ she added, with what might have been politeness or malice. And Patricia went hastily upstairs to see what Mrs. Harnby wanted.
When she came into the room, her mother-in-law (no! Pat’s mother-in-law) was sitting up in bed with an air of energy and anticipation completely at variance with the fact that she was very ill. Whatever it was that had prompted her summons to Patricia, it was nothing unpleasant, evidently.
‘What did you want with me, Mrs. Harnby?’ Patricia smiled at her, in spite of herself—and also a little to cover any signs of agitation that there might be in her manner.
But whatever effort she made was apparently not quite successful, because Mrs. Harnby got no further than, ‘I’m so sorry, Patricia, dear,’ before she broke off and exclaimed:
‘My dear, what is the matter?’
‘Matter?’ Patricia felt herself stiffen. ‘Why nothing.’
‘Dear child, it’s too absurd of you to say that.’ Mrs. Harnby was agreeable but firm. ‘You always say “nothing” when I ask you, and yet quite obviously you aren’t the kind of girl to look worried and agitated about “nothing”.’
Patricia managed to laugh.
‘Do I look worried and agitated?’
‘You do. You look just as worried and agitated as you did when this—charity organiser, or whatever she is, called before. I don’t think requests for charity should trouble you quite so much.’
Patricia looked at her in fascinated astonishment.
‘Now don’t try to look blank or repeat what I say in a convincingly astonished tone.’ Mrs. Harnby was still smiling, but still firm. ‘That’s quite a worn-out device, and never convinces a stage person in any case. We’ve all seen it done well much too often.’
‘But how,’ Patricia said slowly, ‘did you know—she had called again?’
‘Julia told me.’
‘Julia?’ Patricia flushed annoyedly; She had no idea the girl was so little able to mind her own business.
However, Mrs. Harnby apparently interpreted the flush correctly, because she said at once:
‘You mustn’t blame Julia. I told her to let me know if this—person came again.’
‘You did? But—why?’
‘Why?’ Mrs. Harnby opened her manicure case which was lying on the counterpane and thoughtfully selected a buffer for her nails. ‘Because, darling, I don’t like this charity collector of yours.’ She began to polish her nails with considerable calm. ‘It has even occurred to me that she is not a charity collector after all.’
Patricia sat down slowly on the side of the bed, still wordless, still unable to keep from watching Mrs. Harnby’s every movement.
‘I suppose,’ Mrs. Harnby looked up suddenly with an innocently thoughtful air, ‘I suppose she doesn’t happen to be Michael’s wife—putting in an appearance at an awkward moment—does she?’
CHAPTER XI
Patricia could never had said afterwards which was the more astonishing—Mrs. Harnby’s magnificent guess, or her own reaction.
For a moment she stared at Michael’s mother in silence. Then, putting her head down against her, she began to cry.
‘Now, darling,’ Mrs. Harnby patted her head and kissed her. ‘There’s nothing to cry about. I knew you weren’t his wife almost from the beginning. Only the girl he ought to have married.’
‘No,’ sobbed Patricia, ‘I—I’m not that either.’
‘Well, well, I don’t know that you’re necessarily the best judge of that. But I think you had better tell me all about it. I suppose she’s quite unsuitable and that you and Michael met on the boat and fell for each other.’
‘Oh no,’ Patricia explained earnestly. ‘It was nothing like that at all. It—it was because of you.’
‘Because of me! Dear me, what have I to do with this business?’
‘Well, you see, she’d left Michael, and he thought you would be unhappy and horrified at the idea of his married life being an awful failure that it would simply spoil—spoil—’
‘My last hours?’
Patricia hugged her silently.
‘So he acquired a substitute?’
‘Yes.’
‘You must have known each other very well to be able to work out such a risky plan.’
‘No,’ Patricia confessed in a low voice. ‘No, we’d only met that day.’ And once more she gave an account of how she and Michael had come to arrange the deception.
‘Very absurd and melodramatic,’ declared Mrs. Harnby when she had heard the
whole story. But Patricia had an idea that she derived some obscure form of pleasure from it for that very reason.
‘I suppose it was,’ she admitted humbly.
‘Exactly like Michael, of course,’ mused his mother.
‘Perfectly certain that I needed protecting, when all the time he could have done very well with some protection by me. All this ridiculous complication of saving people’s feelings, and no regard for his own. Or yours either, poor child,’ she added after a moment’s thought.
‘Oh—’ Patricia smiled faintly—‘I was all right really, and—’
‘Then why did you cry, as soon as you were found out?’ demanded Mrs. Harnby promptly.
‘Because of the relief, J think,’ Patricia said honestly. ‘And partly the sheerest surprise that you could possibly guess.’
‘Why? Do I look a stupid woman?’
Patricia hugged her again.
‘No. You look and sound and are most adorably wise,’ she said. ‘Only how did you guess?’
‘First because you were not in the smallest, degree like anything I had been led to expect. I know most men describe women badly, and Michael is no exception, but from everything he had written, both directly and indirectly, I knew I should detest his wife. And I liked you on sight.’
Patricia smiled gratefully.
‘Then there was the question of the letters,’ Mrs. Harnby went on.
‘The letters?’
‘Yes, yes. You were not the kind of girl to ignore your husband’s mother entirely. You were so appalled at the idea that you even insisted on inventing a letter which had never reached me. Now I have a great respect for the postal system, Patricia—What, is your name, by the way, child?’
‘It is Patricia. That was what first gave us the idea.’
‘I see. Well, remember, Patricia, that letters very, very seldom go astray. The chances against the one and only important one doing so are infinitesimal. In fiction one may accept that explanation for anything that happens. In real life it very seldom does happen. That, and the fact that you were completely untrue to type nearly all the time, made me suspicious from the first.’
‘I see. I had no idea I did it so badly.’ Patricia was faintly chagrined.
‘You needn’t be sorry about it, my dear. The fact was that you just hadn’t got it in you to be a most unpleasant young woman. And another thing was that Michael regarded you quite differently from the way he regarded the woman he wrote about. At a guess, I should say he didn’t understand her particularly well. He was in some indefinable way awed by her. Whereas with you, not only was he quite unawed, but you were not the kind to inspire awe in anyone. One might love you—in fact, anyone with good taste most certainly would. But no one would ever be scared by you.’
Patricia laughed outright.
‘And do you mean to say that, all the time we were thinking out the best way of keeping you in the dark and protecting you from the unpleasant truth, you were calmly working out the situation for yourself?’
Mrs. Harnby smiled in a way that suddenly reminded Patricia of Susan’s remark that she had something in common with Deborah.
‘I couldn’t force your confidence, Patricia—or Michael’s either. But that was no reason why I shouldn’t indulge in a few mild guesses, on my own. As you see, I was wrong in several details, but in the central fact I was right. And’—she smiled with charming complacence which was quite inoffensive—‘my vanity entirely forbids me to believe that I shouldn’t have guessed it, even if I had been dying. Now you had better tell me about the young woman downstairs.’
‘Oh! I’d forgotten all about her.’ Patricia was horrified.
‘Well, I don’t know that she is of so much importance that you need agitate yourself over that.’ Mrs. Harnby was refreshingly determined to regard Michael’s real wife as a detail. ‘But let us do the poor creature justice. Is she overcome with remorse and trying to persuade Michael to take her back?’
‘No.’ Patricia was glad she could be quite positive about that. ‘No, I don’t think remorse enters into it at all. I’m afraid the real truth is that the—the Marseilles incident proved a great disappointment in some way or another, and so she came back to see what she could get out of Michael. She had arranged to meet Michael. But, in the end, she came here herself. At first she proposed to divorce him on—on account of me and the situation here. But lately she had offered to let Michael divorce her, provided he—he—’
‘Makes it worth her while?’
‘Well, she doesn’t call it that, of course. She talks about having to live on something, and Michael takes the view that he has some sort of’ responsibility towards her.’
‘Ridiculous,’ observed Michael’s mother without passion. ‘She sounds a most unlikeable addition to the family. I think, my dear, you had better bring her up here to me. She is obviously quite beyond the management of you two.’
‘Bring her up here?’ Patricia was horrified. ‘But I couldn’t possibly.’
‘Why not?’ Mrs. Harnby continued to polish her nails in an extremely unruffled manner.
‘Why, you know I can’t. You aren’t supposed to have any exciting scenes or—’
‘Who says I am going to be excited? I assure you I have every intention of remaining calm. Up to now you have been a great deal more excited than I have, if I may say so.’
‘I know.’ Patricia was contrite. ‘I’m awfully sorry to have cried and made a scene. I didn’t mean to. But that’s something quite different from the kind of hateful thing she would stage. You can’t imagine the kind of person she is. She—’
‘I can imagine perfectly well what kind of person she is, darling. And believe me, it would be far from the first time I have had to tackle her type. Now run along and fetch her, there’s a good child.’
‘Michael will be furious,’ pleaded Patricia, as a final resort.
‘Then Michael must learn to have a little more sense,’ declared Michael’s mother firmly. ‘He ought to know by now that when I say I want a thing, I intend to have it.’
There was nothing else that one could argue then, of course. And, vanquished—though hardly reassured— Patricia went slowly out of the room and down the stairs.
She found her visitor waiting for her still, with an air of faintly annoyed boredom. Pat evidently considered that the ‘few minutes’ which Patricia had requested had been extended inexcusably far.
‘Hello.’ She eyed Patricia a little contemptuously. ‘I thought you had run away altogether.’
‘No,’ Patricia said. ‘No, I didn’t feel like running away. Would you come upstairs with me? Michael’s mother would like to meet you.’
‘Michael’s mother? What does she want with me?’ The cold blue eyes narrowed rather, and her air of resentment was not without a certain nervousness.
‘I have no idea,’ Patricia said coolly, and with truth.
‘I suppose she thought she would like to meet her son’s wife.’
‘You mean she—knows who I am?’
‘Oh, certainly.’
‘How did she know?’
‘I told her,’ Patricia said, with an air of composure which was entirely spurious.
‘You—told her?’
It was perfectly obvious that Pat was puzzled and even uneasy at the new turn of events. But she recovered herself with remarkable rapidity—perhaps because her particularly way of life demanded that one should never be nonplussed for long.
‘Very well.’ She stood up, shrugging her beautiful little fur jacket into position. ‘Let’s go and pay this call on my charming mamma-in-law.’
Patricia led the way without a word. And when they reached the bedroom, she took her cue from Mrs. Harnby’s own pleasant and disarming smile of greeting.
‘This is, Pat, Mrs. Harnby. Michael’s wife.’
‘Come in, my dear.’ Mrs. Harnby held out her hand. ‘You’ve been a long time making up your mind to come and see me.’
The girl came forward, ignoring
the outstretched hand.
‘I don’t know that I made up my mind exactly to it even now,’ she said. ‘Why did you send for me?’
‘Don’t you think it’s very natural to want to see you?’
Mrs. Harnby, Patricia saw, was very much more at ease than her visitor.
‘Well—no.’
‘But of course I was interested. Do you know, Michael’s told me almost nothing about the world tour you did together. And it must have been more than interesting. And then Michael’s always so generous. I’m sure he gave you some lovely presents too. That coat, for instance?’
‘Well—’ the girl made no attempt to hide her hostility by now—‘and what of it if he did give me the coat? Why shouldn’t he? If he’s my husband, he must expect—’
‘But,’ Mrs. Harnby said gently, almost regretfully, ‘he is not your husband, is he?’
Patricia gave a gasp. But it was nothing to the way the other girl caught her breath.
‘I suppose,’ Mrs. Harnby went on smoothly, ‘your husband was the man who joined the boat at Port Said or Malta or wherever it was, and insisted on your leaving it with him at Marseilles. It must have been terribly aggravating to have to leave such a good “scoop” as Michael. But then there was your husband’s point of view, and I think, in your way, you are fond of him, aren’t you?’
‘I don’t know what you’re talking about!’ The girl was white and angry, and there was nothing of the usual slow deliberation about her speech.
‘Oh yes, you do.’ Mrs. Harnby’s tone was almost coaxing in its pleasant insistence. ‘You know quite well what I am talking about. What you don’t know is how I found out, isn’t it?’
She raised her eyes suddenly and looked full at Pat. There was nothing smiling or secretive about them now. They were cool and shrewd and exceedingly difficult to meet. For a moment the girl stared at her in brazen defiance. Then her own gaze wavered and fell.
Mrs. Harnby laughed softly, but still very, very agreeably.
‘You see? Now you mustn’t be angry with yourself for giving yourself away. You and your husband have done very well out of Michael—you particularly. One might almost call it legitimate gold-digging. But—’ suddenly her manner was cold, instead of cool—‘when it comes to bigamy and something very much like blackmail, you’re putting yourself in a very, very awkward position. Had you thought of that?’
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