But it seemed that when the sweet was served the two people at the table behind her, the peer’s son and the French adventuress, abandoned all discretion.
They were still talking quietly, but not so quietly. Miss Plunket could follow their conversation almost word for word. And what she heard dumbfounded her.
“If you give the word,” Gervase was saying, “I’ll resign my commission and marry you by special licence.”
Anna’s reply was softer, more muffled somehow, and Miss Plunket missed it. But the young man’s voice was quite clear again when he spoke next.
“I’d rather do that,” his words came, “than go on as I am. I’m half out of my mind, I tell you. I don’t know what I’m doing most of the time.”
And then the most remarkable passage of all occurred: she heard it too clearly for there to be any possibility of mistake.
“It is no use arguing about it,” she caught Anna saying. “I am grateful, very grateful to you for arranging that I can have Annette. The child is all my life now. But …”
The child! So there was a child. Miss Plunket felt herself swaying at the disclosure: her mind was swimming. Her sister had said nothing about any child, and to Miss Plunket it seemed that at last she had plumbed the nether depths. When she had pulled herself together, she looked around the room and saw to her horror that it had emptied. She and her prey in the corner were the only guests now left in the whole dining-room. Above all things she did not want to make herself conspicuous. Calling the waiter sharply, she pushed forward the odd coppers for a tip, and wrapped her black boa round her shoulders.
It was only on her way out that her resolution broke down and, for a second, she looked. The spectacle that greeted her was a fitting climax, a truly dramatic one, to the whole dark episode.
The Honourable Gervase Yarde was holding his head in his hands and Anna seemed to be in tears.
Chapter XLV
I
Mrs. Merton lost no time in seeing her sister. But even so she could not go at once. Throughout the whole of Saturday, which seemed to linger on like half a century, she kept mentally comparing herself with Anna—when the little adventuress wanted to keep an illicit appointment she invented a school friend; but when Mrs. Merton wanted to go on business no less urgent she sternly disciplined herself into waiting. And when two o’clock on Sunday at last came round, and Mrs. Merton finally set out, she was quite beside herself with excitement. It was the first time she had ever really looked forward to going to see Amelia.
The room in which Miss Plunket lived was at the back of the third floor. It was a sedate respectable-looking house that tried to conceal from its neighbours in Zion Terrace the fact that two of its upper rooms were let off as apartments to single gentleladies. Mrs. Merton was out of breath, completely winded in fact, by the time she reached Amelia’s landing. But she burst in upon her without waiting for her polite tap on the door to be replied to, and sank down in the cane chair beside the fire.
“Tell me everything that happened,” she gasped. “Right from the very moment when you first saw them.”
She let Amelia have her head, and strung the rambling, disjointed sentences together in her own mind to make an intelligible pattern. Only once did she interrupt her and that was when Miss Plunket devoted too much time to her prime revelation about the child. But at the end of the recital, Mrs. Merton leant eagerly forward.
“Amelia,” she said. “You’re going to write that down for me in a letter.”
“Write it down, Louisa?” Amelia asked. She was the simpler of the two sisters and was accustomed to be obedient. But she could not understand why Louisa should want her to make a letter of it.
“That’s what I said,” Mrs. Merton told her.
“But what’s the point of it?”
“You’ll see,” said Mrs. Merton.
Amelia’s hand was already straying in the direction of the kettle that was boiling away on the bright brass trivet: the tea things were arranged invitingly on the little bamboo table at her elbow. But Mrs. Merton caught her eye and stopped her.
“Write the letter first,” she said. “The tea can wait. It needn’t be a long letter. All I want you to say is that you saw Mr. Gervase having lunch with the governess: you’d better mention somewhere that you’d seen her before and recognised her at once. Then put in a bit about the long conversation they were having together. Don’t make too much of it, and then go on about something else. And say that you’re looking forward to seeing me again.”
While Amelia wrote, Mrs. Merton stood over her. And when, at the bottom of the first page, Amelia paused and made vague little motions in the air with the tip of her pen, Mrs. Merton immediately demanded the reason for it.
“You … you don’t think it’s wicked to say that I recognised her, do you?” she asked. “I’d never really seen her before.”
“Go on and do as I say,” her sister told her abruptly. “If I hadn’t known what I was doing, I wouldn’t ever have sent you.”
As soon as she had finished, Amelia handed the letter dutifully to Mrs. Merton.
“There it is,” she said. “You know what’s in it; you saw me writing it.”
But Mrs. Merton pushed the letter away from her.
“That’s no use to me like that,” she said. “Address an envelope for it and post it properly. I want to get it in the morning.”
She paused and looked down her flat bosom at the small silver watch that she wore pinned on to her blouse.
“In fact I think I’ll post it myself,” she corrected herself. “Just you put a stamp on it and make me a cup of tea, and then I’ll get going again. I don’t want to miss the collection.”
II
The letter was there just as Mrs. Merton had intended it should be. She saw it as soon as she went through the post that had been set aside for the staff side of the house. There was a letter, too, from France for Anna. Mrs. Merton smiled as she looked at it.
“Go on, my girl,” she said under her breath. “Go on making your little plans. Nobody has said anything about you yet.”
But Mrs. Merton did not have long to wait. That very afternoon Lady Yarde gave her just the opportunity she had prayed for. She actually brought up Mr. Gervase’s name herself. And Mrs. Merton was able to lead quietly and unobtrusively into the subject.
“My sister saw Mr. Gervase last Thursday, your Ladyship,” she said politely. “Over in Tunbridge Wells. She said he was looking very well.”
Lady Yarde shook her head decidedly.
“She must be mistaken,” she said. “I’m perfectly sure Mr. Gervase wouldn’t be in Tunbridge Wells without coming over to Tilliards. He can scarcely get away from the camp in any case. He’s practically a prisoner there. “She paused.” I wonder what made her think it was Mr. Gervase,” she went on. “He hasn’t got what I’d call an ordinary face.”
Mrs. Merton grew confused.
“Perhaps I shouldn’t have mentioned it,” she said.
“Why ever not?” Lady Yarde demanded. “Anybody can make mistakes. I don’t think any the worse of them for that.”
“But she sounded so sure, your Ladyship,” Mrs. Merton explained. “She said that she recognised both of them.”
“Both of them!” Lady Yarde raised her lorgnette and stared at Mrs. Merton incredulously. She had never known her housekeeper so persistent before, and it slowly dawned on her that the creature was trying to tell her something.
“What on earth do you mean?” she demanded.
Mrs. Merton grew more embarrassed. She took out her handkerchief and pressed it first to one nostril and then to the other. Finally, very reluctantly, she drew the letter itself from the pocket of her skirt.
“I must have misread it, your Ladyship,” she apologised. And, as she spoke, she made as if to put the letter away again.
But Lady Yarde would not hear of it.
“Give that letter to me at once,” she said. “What is all this?”
She spoke as though an
y letter that came into the house was hers automatically, as though Mrs. Merton had done wrong in keeping it from her for so long.
As she took hold of it, an alarming premonition came to her, a foreboding of the worst. It was as though the very notepaper were red hot, and she almost withdrew her hand from it. For no tangible reason, she was trembling, openly trembling, when she finally smoothed out the double rows of creases and began to read. At the end of the page she gave a little gasp and thrust the letter away from her.
“She must be out of her senses,” she said. “They’ve neither of them been near Tunbridge Wells.”
“It was Thursday she thought she saw him, your Ladyship,” Mrs. Merton said meaningly.
“Well?”
“Mademoiselle Anna did mention to me that she was going there that day,” Mrs. Merton replied still in the same meek voice of self-excuse. “I believe it was a school friend that she was visiting. Perhaps she met Mr. Gervase by accident.”
By now Lady Yarde was gasping for breath. Her face had the red, constricted appearance that it wore when she had one of her attacks coming on.
“The whole thing’s absurd,” she said. “I’m perfectly sure that Mr. Gervase would never dream of doing such a thing. I simply can’t believe it. Probably your sister’s got a bad memory for faces … All the same …”
She broke off and turned sharply to Mrs. Merton.
“Send Mademoiselle Anna to me at once,” she demanded.
Mrs. Merton dropped her eyes to the carpet again.
“I’m sorry, your Ladyship,” she said. “But I think she’s still out walking in the park. I saw Captain Webb waiting for her just now. They usually do take a walk together at this time every day …”
But Lady Yarde was no longer listening. The threatened attack had come already, and she was lying back in her chair, her eyes closed. Her bosom was rising and falling so rapidly that her large cameo brooch was clicking against the gold pendant that ordinarily hung beneath it.
“Go away,” she said faintly. “Go away and leave me alone.”
“Shall I get your Ladyship her drops?” Mrs. Merton inquired anxiously.
“No. Go away. I don’t want anything.” Lady Yarde moaned miserably. “I simply want to be left alone.”
“Very good, your Ladyship,” Mrs. Merton replied. “If your Ladyship needs me I shall be in my room.”
She went to pick up the letter. But Lady Yarde stopped her.
“Leave that letter where it is,” she said abruptly. “I haven’t finished with it.”
With the closing of her door, her last relic of self-control went from her. She buried her head in the cushions and began crying. She was not quite sure what it was that she was crying about. There must, she kept telling herself, be some reasonable explanation; she refused to believe in iniquity as black as that. Perhaps she had misread it. Perhaps it was all a horrible mistake.
Even though her head was swimming she struggled up in her chair and reached out for the tainted piece of paper. But what it said was definite enough. There was no possibility of misunderstanding there.
“I saw Mr. Gervase on Thursday,” the letter ran, “How handsome he is looking. He was having lunch with Miss Delia’s pretty French governess—the one you pointed out to me. They were very deep in conversation about something. Somehow they seemed to make such an attractive pair …”
She closed her eyes and whimpered. And her heart, as it always did at such moments, began beating wildly; it was behaving like a machine which had broken its regulator. Her breathing became more spasmodic. Clutching at her poor pounding heart, she collapsed sideways over the arm of the chair. The abominable letter slid out of her grasp and settled, face upwards, on the hearthrug.
It still lay there when Lord Yarde came into the boudoir a little later to complain about Gervase’s extravagances.
Chapter XL VI
I
Whenever Lord Yarde had much business to discuss with his agent, he liked to make a dinner of it. On an average he had Captain Webb up to the house about once a quarter to talk over things.
Sunday lunches, in Lord Yarde’s opinion, did not count. Admittedly, Lady Yarde often used to get Captain Webb along then—sometimes at very short notice so that his own Sunday joint went wasted. But on Sundays there was altogether too much feminine chatter for anything serious to be settled. What Lord Yarde preferred was the easy company of a couple of middle-aged men together. They spoke the same language then, and could talk about timber for a whole evening.
To-night, however, Lord Yarde was unusually silent. He had even thought of cancelling the dinner altogether, simply telling Captain Webb not to come. But on second thoughts he had decided to have him along just the same. He had reflected that it would probably be better to have someone there to take his mind off this other thing. After all, they were old friends—he had known Webb for upwards of twenty years—and at dinner he had actually opened his mouth once or twice to tell him of the unpleasant affair that was preoccupying him. Each time, however, as the servants were still there, he had thought better of it. And in the result he simply sat there glowering and morose.
It was not until they had gone through into the Library and were comfortably buried in the deep leather chairs, with the log fire playing on their legs and glistening on their shirt fronts, that Lord Yarde said anything. He took a slow sip of the brandy, ran it gratefully round his tongue and then put the glass down on the table beside him.
“Queer do we had here to-day,” he said. “Very queer do.”
Captain Webb raised his eyebrows politely: Lord Yarde was not a man generally given to confidences. And even now, having begun, he seemed half reluctant to continue. He raised his brandy glass to his nostrils, inhaled for a moment and then replaced it on the table before he expounded his remark.
“Just discovered,” he said slowly, “that Gervase has been trying to make a damn’ fool of himself.”
“What’s he been up to?”
Captain Webb put the question quite casually. It was not the first time he had heard this kind of confession. And it had been a good dinner. The burgundy had been just right and the jugged hare was perfect. And now with one of Lord Yarde’s best cigars between his fingers Captain Webb was feeling that the warmer side of life had been turned towards him. His blood was running through his veins like honey. But suddenly a chill passed right down his spine, an involuntary shudder that made him remove the cigar from his lips and sit bolt upright.
“What’s he been up to?” he repeated.
Lord Yarde rose and placed himself with his back to the high fireplace.
“Been trying to carry on with the French governess,” he announced.
“Good Lord!” said Captain Webb devoutly. And it was all that he said.
His mind was frantically turning over and over within itself. It had all evidently happened just as he had warned Anna it would do, and his one relief was that her part in the affair was so entirely blameless. For all he knew, it might have been Anna herself who had gone to them asking to be protected from the attentions of this impetuous son of theirs. Then his own part in this little scandal came back to him and he recalled that he was actually at the bottom of it all. It was he who had delivered the first foolish letter that Gervase had written. He remembered how strong his instinct had been at the time to destroy the thing, and he could scarcely forgive himself for not having obeyed the instinct. It made him feel a little ashamed to be sitting there while Lord Yarde told him so confidentially of something that he knew already. He wanted to get up and to make a clean breast of it.
But already Lord Yarde was speaking again.
“Came out only by accident,” he said. “Damn’ lucky coincidence. Otherwise God knows how far it might have gone.”
“Bad business,” said Captain Webb briefly. “What have you done about it?”
“In the first place,” Lord Yarde answered. “I have asked Gervase to come and see me. I don’t believe even now he realises what h
e’s been saved from. If he shows any fight I shall threaten him. I shall stop his allowance. He can see how far he gets on his pay.”
Lord Yarde paused and took another devout sip of his brandy: its smoothness, its really astonishing smoothness, pacified him a little.
“And in the second place,” he added, “we’ve sent the girl packing. She goes out of here first thing in the morning.”
“You’re sending her away?” Captain Webb repeated.
“You could hardly expect that we should want to keep her here, could you?” Lord Yarde inquired sarcastically.
“I … I don’t know,” Captain Webb replied. “She mightn’t be to blame. It may all have been an infatuation on Gervase’s part.”
“It may seem that way,” Lord Yarde said sagely. “But you can depend upon it that she started it. She was evidently pretty anxious to get to him. Told Lady Yarde some cock and bull story about going to see a school friend in Tunbridge Wells. That was what gave everything away. Someone saw them having lunch together.”
“Good Lord,” Captain Webb said for the second time.
“It makes one pretty sick,” Lord Yarde continued, “when one thinks what had been done for the girl. She tried to run away once, and we agreed to overlook it. Actually went to the length of arranging for her to have that child of hers brought over here.” He dropped his voice a little. “It’s my belief,” he said, “that if the truth were known that child is illegitimate. This kind of thing’s probably happened before.”
He pushed the decanter hospitably towards Captain Webb as he said it. So far as he was concerned the evening was only now beginning: they had not yet spoken a single word about timber. But Captain Webb had actually risen. He was standing there with an air of apology about him.
“Have to ask you to excuse me,” he said. “Mind if I get along … I don’t feel too-good.”
Anna Page 52