“Risky?”
“It’s better to know what you’re in for,” Rhoda explained. “The best kind of love—the kind that lasts—begins with friendship. It begins with knowing each other well. At least that’s how it was with James and me. We were children together—almost like brother and sister. Then he was away in Malaya. When he came back—well—he was just the same—only it was different.”
Bel was relieved that the subject had shifted from her own affairs. “So you fell in love and were married,” she suggested.
“It wasn’t quite like that,” replied Rhoda, stepping back and surveying her canvas with screwed-up eyes. “I was terribly keen on painting and I wanted to make it my career, so I swithered. When James asked me to marry him I couldn’t make up my mind and my swithering was almost fatal. I very nearly lost James. He very nearly married somebody else. It was only when I discovered that Holly Douglas was after him that I knew I couldn’t do without him. It sounds awfully dog-in-the-mangerish, but that’s how it was.”
Bel was silent. She was aware that the marriage of James and Rhoda Dering Johnstone was as nearly perfect as any marriage could be, so it was quite alarming to think that it had almost not come off.
“Don’t swither, Bel,” said Rhoda. “For goodness’ sake don’t swither.”
“But—but I don’t love him! At least—not like that.”
“Not like what?”
“Not to—to marry him.”
“I see,” said Rhoda understandingly. “Then it’s no good, of course. You wouldn’t mind a bit if he married somebody else.”
“Oh!” exclaimed Bel. It was an explosive sound—as if someone had hit her violently in the middle of her chest and knocked all the breath out of her body.
“Well, there you are!” said Rhoda. “It’s a good test—the very best test I know. If you’d be quite happy to go to church and listen to ‘The Voice that Breathed O’er Eden’ and watch him being married to another woman then you don’t love him ‘like that’. You’ve moved your hand again,” she added.
As a matter of fact Bel had moved both her hands and was twisting them together in distress.
Rhoda put down her brush and came over and seized the twisting hands in a firm clasp. “It’s all right,” she said earnestly. “It’s absolutely all right—nothing to worry about. Just make up your mind and don’t swither. I’m sorry I gave you such a fright but I had to. You understand, don’t you? I had to give you a fright to bring you to your senses.”
Chapter Twenty-Seven
It was all very well for Rhoda to talk, thought Bel, as she walked up the bank of the river with the basket of sandwiches on her arm. It was all very well for Rhoda to say that she must encourage him and meet him half way. Rhoda was brave—she was absolutely fearless—and Bel was not. So far Bel had not even been able to call him Ellis; he had been “Mr. Brownlee” for so long. She had noticed that he was calling her “Bel” quite naturally; he had addressed her as “My dear Bel” in his letters.
I ought to try, thought Bel. I really must try. I’m not going to be his secretary any more, so there’s no reason why I shouldn’t call him Ellis.
She remembered Rhoda telling her to practise saying, “Rhoda, Rhoda, Rhoda”, twelve times out loud; it had made her laugh at the time but all the same there was something in it. Even Rhoda’s most extravagant flights of fancy contained a good deal of common-sense.
Bel walked along saying, “Ellis, Ellis, Ellis”, and laughing at herself. When she had said it twelve times it was coming fairly easily and quite loudly.
“Hullo, Bel! Here I am!” shouted Ellis Brownlee.
She had expected him to be fishing of course; she had been looking up and down the river for two men wading with rods in their hands; but Ellis had been sitting in the shelter of a rock. He got up and came towards her smiling.
“Oh, Mr. Brownlee!” exclaimed Bel in dismay.
“I like ‘Ellis’ much better.”
“Oh—yes, it’s a nice name,” said Bel in a fluttery voice. “It was your mother’s name before she was married. She told me about it the day I went to see her at Rose Hill.” Bel was aware, even as she spoke, that Rhoda would not have approved of this at all.
“I thought you would be fishing,” Bel added. “Is it too bright or something?”
“No, I don’t think so,” replied Ellis vaguely. “We fished for a bit and then the shepherd came—a fine-looking old chap! He made me think of Elisha or one of those other characters in the Bible.”
“Sutherland,” said Bel, recognising the description.
“Oh, Sutherland is his name! Well, anyhow, he wanted Dering Johnstone to go and look at a sick sheep. So they went away together and after a bit I decided to knock off.”
“Did you catch anything?”
“Two,” he replied. “Come and see.”
The two trout were lying in the shadow of the rock, covered with rushes. Ellis displayed them. One was a reasonable size, probably about half a pound, the other was no larger than Bel’s finger.
“I think you ought to have put it back,” she suggested a trifle diffidently.
“Oh, I know,” agreed Ellis. “I meant to, but by the time I had got the hook out it was pretty far through, poor little brute. As a matter of fact that’s what sickened me off. I’m not really a proper fisherman,” he added apologetically.
It was obvious that he was not. Bel smiled; she said, “You know I think we ought to bury it. I do, really. I mean——”
“Yes, I know what you mean,” said Ellis looking at it doubtfully. “Perhaps you’re right. We had better get rid of the body.”
Together they scraped a hole in the gravel and covered all trace of the murder. It was rather a pleasant little task and it made them feel more companionable.
“Well, that’s that,” said Ellis, wiping his hands on his large white-linen handkerchief. “Nobody will know—unless you give me away of course.”
“I can’t,” she told him. “I’m an accomplice after the fact. Isn’t that what it’s called?”
They looked at each other and smiled.
“Tell me,” said Ellis. “Do you think I ought to go on fishing or doesn’t it matter?”
“It doesn’t matter. They won’t mind a bit.”
“Good,” he said. “Let’s sit down and talk. I didn’t come here to fish. You know what I came for, don’t you?”
“To—to talk,” suggested Bel in her fluttery voice.
“To find you and ask you a question. You know what it is, don’t you? Darling little Bel, please say yes.”
“How can I when—when you haven’t—asked me?”
“Are you going to marry me, Bel?”
She hesitated. She was frightened—not brave like Rhoda—but Rhoda had said . . .
“Bel, darling,” said Ellis earnestly. “I know I’m not asking you properly, but I can’t do without you. I simply can’t do without you—really and truly I can’t. You’re going to marry me, aren’t you?”
“I think so,” said Bel in a very small voice. “I mean if you really want me. I mean I simply couldn’t bear it if you—if you wanted to—to marry anybody else.”
Ellis smiled. He found the answer completely satisfactory.
*
2
The arrangement was that Bel should take lunch to the two fishermen and return to Tassieknowe and have her meal with Rhoda—bread and cheese and salad was sufficient for their needs. Rhoda waited for Bel; she waited and waited but there was no sign of Bel. She had just decided to forage for herself when she heard steps on the gravel outside the back door. A moment later the door opened and James came into the kitchen.
“Is there anything to eat?” asked James.
“James!” exclaimed Rhoda. “I sent your lunch down to the river. Didn’t you see Bel?”
“Oh yes, I saw her all right, but she didn’t see me. Neither of them saw me; they were much too busy.”
“What were they doing?”
“Th
is,” said James. He came over to the table, put his arms round his wife and kissed her. James was rather good at kissing his wife; he enjoyed it and took his time over it.
“M’h’m,” said Rhoda blissfully. “Like that, was it?”
“Not quite like that,” replied James. “He hasn’t had so much practice, but it wasn’t too bad for a first attempt.”
“Good,” said Rhoda, nodding.
“You don’t seem surprised.”
“Not very.”
“I suppose you arranged the whole thing?
“Not the whole thing, exactly.”
“Rhoda, do you realise what you’ve done? Do you realise that we’ll be left, stranded, without anybody to cook our food?”
“I know,” agreed Rhoda. “It is a bit sickening, but we mustn’t be selfish, James. They’re just right for each other They’re both such dears, aren’t they?”
“That’s all very well but——”
“Perhaps they’ll stay on for a time—both of them. He could come to Tassieknowe, couldn’t he?”
“No, he couldn’t,” James declared. “He’s got to go back to London. His partner has gone off his nut.”
“Mr. Wills? Oh good!” exclaimed Rhoda, her eyes lighting up with interest. “That’s splendid news. Did he tell you about it this morning?”
“Yes, he did—and I see nothing splendid about it—and I’m frightfully hungry,” grumbled James. “I’ve had nothing to eat since breakfast and it’s nearly two o’clock.”
“Oh James! Poor darling! We made a lovely picnic lunch for you——”
“I daresay you did.”
“Sausage rolls and scones with honey and tomato sandwiches—and it will all be wasted!”
“They’ll eat it.”
“I don’t think so.”
“No, perhaps you’re right,” agreed James.
Rhoda was now rooting about in the cupboard; she produced a crusty loaf, a Cheddar cheese, a large slab of golden butter and a bowl of salad.
“That’ll do me fine,” declared James, sitting down at the kitchen-table and beginning his meal. “Bread and cheese—and beer, of course. What more does a man want?”
Rhoda thought a man wanted a good deal more but she refrained from saying so. She drew a tankard of beer from the cask in the larder and put it beside James.
“Mrs. Simpson might help,” she said thoughtfully. “She might be able to spare one of her girls now that the season is nearly over.”
“A silk purse or a sow’s ear?” asked James somewhat anxiously.
“Oh, a silk purse—of course! I tell you what,” added Rhoda as she sat down at the table opposite her husband, prepared to share his repast. “I tell you what, James. I’ll get Mamie to ask her. Mrs. Simpson would do anything for Mamie.”
“Hush!” said James in a conspiratorial whisper.
Rhoda hushed obediently and listened. There were steps on the gravel and a murmur of voices.
“Yes, there they are!” whispered Rhoda. She giggled mischievously and added, “Don’t say a word, James. It will be fun to see what excuses they’ll make for their extraordinary behaviour.”
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Bel Lamington Page 21