She thought he was simply making difficulties and shrugged impatiently.
“Very well.” She got to her feet, too, then, and held out her hand.
He took both her hands, however, and smiled straight at her.
“Good-bye, Liebling. It’s been—wonderful,” he said, and, bending his head, he kissed first one hand and then the other.
She wished she could have kissed him then, and her fingers curled tightly round his in the effort of keeping herself from doing so. For she had to make that effort. It was too late now for anything like that. The break had already been made, and it would have been madness to ignore it.
“Good-bye.” Hilma spoke very softly in her turn. “I—I hope you’re awfully happy.”
“My dear, hope you are, too.”
She had drawn her hands away and turned from him almost before she knew what she was doing. And she was walking along the path, out of his life.
Only then did she realise why it was he had made her go while he stayed. Not to make difficulties, as she had supposed, but to make things easier for her. For it must be easier, surely, to walk on and on—to do something—than to wait, watching someone walk out of your life and make no protest.
“I could have done it if I’d had to,” Hilma told herself fiercely. But she was glad it had not been her part to wait.
CHAPTER SIX
Long before Hilma reached home again, she had entirely recovered her self-control. She was even slightly surprised at herself for having momentarily lost it. It was not as though she were a girl who had ever been in much doubt about what she wanted—at least not of late years.
Roger had not been the only man who had wanted to marry her—but he had been very much the most desirable match. And, in the ordinary way, it was not even necessary for her to enumerate the advantages to herself. They were self-evident.
Rich, devoted, indulgent and a thoroughly good sort. What more could one ask of any prospective husband?
“And I’m fond of him,” Hilma told herself—firmly and, as a matter of fact, quite truthfully. “I’m fond of him in that sensible, solid, day-to-day fashion which makes such a good basis for marriage. I know quite well, of course, what it is that I feel I’m missing.” She was determinedly honest with herself, because she prided herself on always facing facts. “It’s the lovely, gay, unreasoning romance that one dreams of as a girl.”
But could she really pretend to herself, in the light of cold experience, that such romance often came one’s way? Or if it did, how often did it outlast the more tangible advantages of a “sensible” marriage?
“A pity—but there it is,” reflected Hilma with a rueful little smile, “One of the advantages—or disadvantages—of having a clear-cut outlook is that you can’t trick yourself into enjoying the risks of the unknown instead of feeling the comfort of solid ground beneath your feet,”
And as she turned in at the gate of the indefinably shoddy house where she and her parents now lived, she thought almost fiercely of all the pleasant things which the “solid ground” of her future with Roger implied.
“Is that you, Hilma dear?” her mother called from the drawing-room. “Here is Aunt Mary come to see us.”
The brightness of Mrs. Arnall’s tone might have given the impression that a visit from Aunt Mary was an unexpected pleasure. In actual fact it was merely unexpected. “Aunt Mary” was Hilma’s great-aunt, a fearsome and unlovable old lady whose favourite remark was: “I always let all my relations know that my dear husband left me only a life interest in his money, and that after my death it will go to charity. Then they have no reason to wish me dead.”
It had never, apparently, occurred to her that there might be other—and even more pressing—reasons for such uncharitable thoughts to pass through the minds of her relations.
Towards her great-niece, however, she had been known to unbend occasionally. And, as Hilma came into the room now, she received a bright stare of interest and a rather wintry smile.
“How d’you do, Hilma. Dear me, child, what a colour you’ve got! Anyone can see you’ve been out with your sweetheart,” was her somewhat unfortunate opening.
Mrs. Arnall coughed embarrassedly, but Hilma laughed as she bent to kiss Aunt Mary’s cheek, presented for that purpose.
“You look well, too, Aunt Mary.”
“I’m not at all well,” snapped Aunt Mary. “In fact, I’ve been very poorly indeed, only I don’t make a fuss about it like a lot of people, and so no one bothers to notice. You’ve grown since I last saw you.”
Hilma knew it was useless to point out how extremely improbable this was at twenty-five, so she compromised diplomatically with:
“I expect it’s because I have on higher heels today.”
Aunt Mary inspected her heels and said:
“Possibly. They certainly seem a very ridiculous height to me,” which was the nearest she could bring herself to agreeing with anyone.
Mrs. Arnall appeared to feel that an amiable diversion was necessary, for she remarked with a slightly strained smile:
“Aunt Mary has some very nice news for you, Hilma.”
“Thank you, Cecily,” cut in Aunt Mary sharply. “I’m perfectly capable of explaining myself without your assistance.”
Mrs. Arnall relapsed into silence.
“So you’re getting married quite soon?” Aunt Mary transferred her remarkably bright gaze to Hilma.
“I expect so,” Hilma agreed.
“What do you mean, you expect so? Doesn’t he want you, after all?”
“Oh, yes!” Hilma laughed. “I only meant that we hadn’t fixed the date of the wedding yet.”
“Well, it’s time you did.” Aunt Mary said. “Too long engagements are just as dangerous as too short ones. People get restless. Anyway, I’ve been talking to your mother about your trousseau. She and your father can’t do much about sending you to your husband decently dressed, of course. So I’m going to see about it.”
“Aunt Mary!” Hilma was divided between astonishment at this unusual generosity and resentment at the offensive way of putting it “I—don’t know—what to say.”
“There’s no need to say anything except ‘Thank you.’ I’m not a rich woman,” stated Aunt Mary incorrectly, “but I’m willing to give you a cheque for five hundred pounds. You should be able to buy an adequate trousseau for that.”
“Adequate! Why, Aunt Mary, it’s a fortune! I—”
“It’s nothing of the sort,” retorted Aunt Mary, exceedingly pleased. “But it should suffice.”
“It’s wonderfully generous of you. I can’t possibly thank you enough,” Hilma said earnestly.
“We-ell—” For once Aunt Mary left a statement unchallenged. “I won’t say that I should have done it in all circumstances. But I don’t mind telling you, Hilma, I’m very pleased about this marriage of yours.”
Hilma smiled, wondering just a little why Aunt Mary should be pleased. However, the old lady was not inclined to leave herself unexplained, and she went on at once:
“It’s what I call a really sensible marriage. You’re quite a pretty girl in your way, Hilma, and I dare say a lot of silly young men talk nonsense to you. But I’m glad to see you chose someone in a solid and reliable position, someone who could support you decently. I approve of common sense, and I’m quite willing to show my approval this way. I shouldn’t have given you anything if you had been marrying some penniless young flibbertigibbet just because he looked like your favourite pop star.”
“But, Aunt Mary,” Hilma was genuinely amused, “you could never have supposed I should marry for such a reason.”
“No,” the old lady admitted. “No, I can’t say I really expected you to be so silly, but one never knows with girls. Some silly little flutter of romance—and there they are, ready to throw away goodness knows what for a few cheap thrills.”
Hilma deliberately switched her mind away from certain happenings of the last week or two.
“Exactly. Though I object to clichés.” retorted Aunt Mary tartly.
“Well, as you see”—Hilma spoke just a trifle dryly—“I exercised the common sense you so much admire, Aunt Mary, and chose to marry someone in what you call a solid and reliable position.”
“Quite so. And that’s why I am going to give you your trousseau,” agreed her great-aunt, who was evidently a firm supporter of the view that “to him who hath shall be given.”
“Isn’t it lovely, dear?” Mrs. Arnall smiled at her daughter. Not all the sharpness of Aunt Mary’s conversation could cloud her relief and pleasure at the actual offer.
“Lovely,” Hilma agreed, and felt an unaccustomed lump in her throat. She was not quite sure if it was for her mother or because of something quite vague and inexplicable which had nothing to do with trousseau or Aunt Mary.
Aunt Mary was a woman of decided action. She also had a distinct weakness for drama. So that, before she left the house, she slowly wrote out a cheque for Hilma, repeating carefully, as she did so, “Five hundred pounds.” just in case Hilma or her mother should have failed to appreciate the extraordinary extent of her generosity.
“Thank you, Aunt Mary, very, very much indeed.” Hilma stood there, twisting the little pink slip of paper in her hand. “I do appreciate it you know.”
“Well, I hope so,” Aunt Mary said. “Now don’t run away with the idea that I shall come to your rescue again in every crisis. It won’t be any good running up debts and then coming to me instead of to your husband.”
Hilma could not imagine anything that she was less likely to do, but she murmured submissively, “No, Aunt Mary.”
“And I hope, Hilma, that when you have your first daughter, you will remember the one relation who has been generous to you.”
Hilma managed to make some tactfully noncommittal reply. Then she summoned the taxi which her great-aunt requested, and dutifully saw her into it.
After Aunt Mary’s providential generosity there was, as Mrs. Arnall remarked, no real reason to prolong the engagement much further. She seemed to imagine the whole problem looming much larger in Hilma’s mind than had really been the case.
“Oh, I know how you were feeling, dear,” she assured Hilma sympathetically. “There was always that horrid knowledge that your trousseau did present a very real problem. Not that Roger really minds what you wear, of course,” she added in hasty justice to Roger. “But any girl wants some nice clothes when she gets married. And each time you thought of fixing a date for your wedding you must have wondered what we were going to do about your outfit. Oh, I noticed. I knew you were restless and worried, even though you said nothing.”
Hilma smiled and allowed her mother to retain her own theories. It was impossible to tell her that any restlessness had had nothing whatever to do with anxiety about her trousseau. Nor had Roger entered into it in the slightest degree.
But certainly the munificent cheque did solve a great many problems. And, with a curious feeling that she was thereby erecting some sort of safety barrier round herself, Hilma began to make plans for spending some of the money.
Roger was undisguisedly pleased at these signs of interest on her part.
“I think, Hilma” he said, with an air of having given the matter much consideration, “it would be a good idea to plan our wedding for just after Christmas. And then we might have a Riviera honeymoon and escape the worst of the winter here.”
He was so obviously delighted with the scheme he had thought out that Hilma had to conceal her dismay and her ironical amusement with the utmost care. To think that he should actually have chosen the same honeymoon as—
Oh, well, it was ridiculous to mind, of course. Surely the Riviera was large enough to hold two honeymoon couples without their having to meet. But there was something quite uncanny about the association of ideas.
“Well, Hilma? What do you think of it?” Roger was a very good-tempered man, but he liked the applause to follow pretty quickly when he propounded a good idea.
“It would—be lovely.” Hilma hesitated “But I had rather thought—what about Italy? I should love to go there.”
“I don’t care much for the Italians,” stated Roger, who was somewhat given to these large and quite unqualified statements.
Hilma was sorely tempted for a moment to point out that, as he was an extremely insular person, perhaps he would not like the French any better. However, knowing quite well that his reply would be a tolerant “Well, of course, they’re all foreigners, anyway,” she refrained from pursuing the subject.
“Let’s think it over a bit,” she suggested. And Roger rather reluctantly agreed to this, although he obviously thought that full consideration had been given to the subject already.
Mrs. Arnall, too, was very happy in these days of wedding preparations. Hilma reflected, not without a certain touch of humour, that quite a lot of people were getting more enjoyment out of her approaching marriage than perhaps she was herself.
There was Aunt Mary, with the pleasant certainty that only her cheque had saved the whole thing from being a pretty shabby affair. There was her mother, delighting in spending money quite lavishly for once—even if it was not upon herself. And there was Roger, contentedly aware that the best idea he had ever had was about to be put into actual practice.
Even her father said “Well, my dear, I’m very glad to think you’ll soon be setting up house on your own in such fine style. You’re one of those people to whom money is very becoming, Hilma.”
“Isn’t it becoming to all of us?” asked Hilma with a smile. But her father shook his head.
“No, it’s like a dress suit to some men. They simply shouldn’t wear it. But you—well, you’ll ‘wear’ money very attractively, my dear.”
“Yes, I know what you mean, of course. I suppose that’s why I—why I attach a good deal of importance to the things money can buy. Not just the material, tangible things. Security and freedom to enjoy art and the power to live a gracious existence and—and—oh, all that sort of thing.”
Her father nodded.
“Quite right, my dear. That’s what I look forward to when I make my pile again. And you know, I don’t think that day is so far off, Hilma.” He smiled reflectively into the fire. “Of course I haven’t said anything to your mother yet because she’s a little pessimistic in these matters. But I must say there are some very interesting things happening in the City these days. Things that a man of foresight and knowledge can turn to his own account.”
“I’m sure of it, Father.” Hilma smiled at him rather sadly. But he was quite unaware of that because he was looking into the fire, where he saw reflected golden dreams of the future.
Sometimes Hilma wondered a little if she had dreamt that queer, moving interlude with the man who called her “Liebling.” And then she would find that just the repetition of the word brought him so clearly before her that he could not have been a figure in any dream. She could see him exactly—in the sunlight as he sat mending Richard’s wagon in Richmond Park—in the moonlight that night in the garden as he took off his mask and smiled at her with those faintly cynical eyes—in the flat as he stood in the doorway, grimly watching her rifle his desk.
Besides, he was inextricably mixed up with the death of Charles Martin and the end of that sordid threat of blackmail. There was no dream about that. She was free! Absolutely and blessedly free—to go on with her marriage to Roger.
It was about the middle of November that Hilma received the letter. Not a specially significant-looking letter, but she glanced at the envelope with a certain amount of interest because the writing was quite unknown to her.
Her mother had brought it in, together with a postcard about an appointment for fitting some of Hilma’s dresses. This was of great interest to Mrs. Arnall and occasioned a whole stream of comment and question.
; Hilma slit open the envelope and drew out the single sheet of thick cream notepaper.
“Liebling,” the letter began.
Somehow she concealed the start which she gave—even contrived to answer her mother coherently, while she pretended to glance, idly through the letter. But she knew she must not read it in front of her mother. She must get away somewhere where she could read it alone.
“So you see, dear,” her mother’s voice ran on, “it would be much better for you to make some sort of decision about it now—”
Hilma wondered absently what she was talking about, but she said thoughtfully:
“Yes, you’re quite right, of course. I’ll think it over carefully, and really make up my mind.”
“I should.” Mrs. Arnall looked pleased, and certainly took no notice of the fact that Hilma pushed her letter into the pocket of her suit, practically unread, as she went out of the room.
Upstairs in her bedroom, Hilma sat down on the side of her bed and drew out the letter again.
“Liebling” Even at that moment it amused and half pleased her that he still called her that, although he must know her name now. “As we agreed that I should look at your name and address for only one reason, you will understand why it is that I am writing to you. Evelyn’s very tiresome and somewhat superfluous cousin has returned from America, and seems more than a little inclined to make trouble.
“I shall be having tea at Jerringham’s in New Bond Street about four-thirty to-morrow. Should you happen to come in then, need I say that I shall be delighted to see you? Auf Wiedersehen.”
It was not even signed, and that fact made Hilma smile dryly in spite of everything. Perhaps he thought she was a little too careless with compromising letters to be trusted with his name. She supposed, as she sat there twisting the letter in her hands, that she could hardly blame him.
Dismay was the principal feeling in her heart, she assured herself. Dismay that the ground could have opened under their feet again like this. Oh, why did one indiscretion always lead to another? This wretched cousin could make any amount of trouble—not only with that other magnificent engagement, but with her own! One could never tell how far the repercussions would reach. She had been building so securely during the last few weeks, and now—
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