Lady Ardingly was slightly drier and more staccato than usual, her husband sleepier; Arthur Naseby was shriller, Jack rather more impressively reticent; Andrew Brereton heavier, and his wife louder, larger, and coa.r.s.er. She was flushed with triumph and other causes less metaphysical; to-night she seemed to herself at a bound to have vaulted again into the saddle of that willing animal the world, and a glorious gallop was a.s.suredly hers. And Jack, who was certainly the man of the moment, was again in a comfortable little pannier on the off-side. At length Lady Ardingly rose.

"I should like to stop here till morning," she said, "and play Bridge.

But it is already two, and we must get up to London. To whom can I give a lift? You are staying, I think, Jack. Who else?"

Lady Devereux and Arthur Naseby, it appeared, had already arranged to drive up together in her motor-brougham; the others were all staying in the house. Gradually they drifted there, and on the lawn the lights were extinguished. "Giving the moon a chance at last," as Arthur Naseby observed. As they crossed the lawn Jack saw that Marie's room was still lit. Then the non-residents took their carriages, and the residents their bed-candles. Mildred and Jack were the last to go upstairs.

"There is still a light in Marie's room," he said. "I will just go in and see how she is."

Mildred lingered outside, and he tapped gently, then entered. The draught between door and window blew the flame of the candle about. But inside the electric light burned steadily, only there was no one there.

He came out again.

"She is not there," he said; "nor has she been to bed."

Mildred frowned.

"She, perhaps, is with Maud," she said. "I have not seen Maud all the evening."

The others had dispersed to their rooms, and while Mildred rustled down the pa.s.sage to go to Maud, Jack remained where he was, in the doorway of Marie's room, which communicated with his. Suddenly in the hall below he saw a light, and to his annoyance observed Mildred's husband shuffling along in his slippers. He came to the bottom of the stairs, and slowly began to ascend. Simultaneously he heard the rustle of Mildred's dress returning. He beckoned her silently into Marie's room, and closed the door softly.

"Well?" he said.

"Maud is not there, either," she whispered.

"Are they out, do you think, in the garden?" said he. "Wait; she may be in my room."

He went to the door communicating and opened it. On the table was lying a note addressed to him; he took it up and read it. "Mildred!" he called out, and she appeared in the doorway. "I have found this," he said, and handed it to her.

Then whatever there was of good in the strong and brutal part of the woman came out. She read it without a tremor, and faced him again.

"That is the worst of having scenes out of doors," she said. "What next, Jack?"

He put down his candle; his hand was not so steady as hers.

"What next?" he cried. "It is gone; everything is gone, except you and I."

He took two rapid steps towards her, when both paused. Some one had tapped at his door, and, without speaking, he pointed to the half-open door into Marie's room. Then he flung off his coat and waistcoat. Just then the tap was repeated.

"Come in," he said.

Lord Brereton entered.

"So sorry to disturb you," he said, "but I must tell them what time you want breakfast. You merely said you wished to go early."

"Oh, half-past eight will do for me," said Jack. "I can get up to town by ten, which is all I want."

Lord Brereton advanced very slowly and methodically across to the table.

"My wife's fan," he said, taking it up.

"She is with Marie," said the other, not pausing, "who I am afraid is very unwell. Mildred came in here just now to speak to me; I did not see she had forgotten it."

Even as he spoke he realized the utter futility of lying, when there was in the world the woman who had written that note which he held crumpled up in his hand. But his instinct was merely to gain time, just as a condemned criminal might wish his execution postponed.

"I am sorry to hear that," said Andrew. "I will leave the fan in my wife's dressing-room. Good-night."

He went softly out, and Jack opened the other door. The sweat poured from his forehead, and a deadly sickness came over him. He put his bed-candle into Mildred's hand.

"No, nothing has happened yet," he said. "I told him you were with Marie. You with Marie--there's a grim humour about that, though I didn't see it at the time. My G.o.d! we'll have a fight for it yet!"

Mildred looked at him.

"Jack, you are ill; you look frightful," she said.

"Very possibly." He paused a moment. "Mildred, you woman, you devil!--which are you?" he whispered. "My G.o.d! you have courage. Here am I, trembling; you are as steady as if you were talking to a stranger in a drawing-room full of people!"

She laughed silently, with a horrible gusto of enjoyment, the sense of danger quickening, intoxicating her.

"What does it matter?" she whispered. "What does anything matter?"

CHAPTER XVI

Marie was seated alone next morning on the veranda of her room overlooking the Park. She had breakfasted with Maud, and remembered to have talked sufficiently, at any rate, to avoid any awkward pauses about a thousand indifferent subjects, unable as yet to set her mind to that which inevitably lay in front of her. She had felt it impossible to talk out with a girl what she meant to do; it was impossible with that pale suffering face opposite to her, racked as it was with uncomprehended pain, to speak of that which loomed in both their minds as gigantic as a nightmare. Instead, a commonplace little ent.i.ty, seated in some remote suburb of her brain, dictated commonplace to her tongue, and round her, for the time being, was the calm which is the result of intense emotion, identical in appearance with apathy, and distinguished also by the same fixity and accuracy of observation of trivialities. She had consented last night to take Maud with her, and did not for a moment wish to evade the responsibilities which morally attached to her for that. She would have to think and eventually act for both of them, but she could not even think for herself yet. Soon, she knew, this stunned apathy would leave her; her brain was already growing clearer from the effects of that momentary scene in the garden, which, like some drugged draught, had deprived it of the power of thought, almost of consciousness. At present Maud was not with her, for she had gone round to Grosvenor Square to get clothes which she needed, and Marie was alone.

As yet she was almost incapable of thought; at least, only that commonplace denizen of her brain could think, and he but fed her with trivial impressions. It was he who had read the paper to her; he had even read her the list of the people at Lady Brereton's Sat.u.r.day-till-Monday party. As usual, it was all wrong; she and Jack, for instance, were not included in it, and as a matter of fact they had been there. They had also played a somewhat important part there, but naturally the Daily Advertiser knew nothing of that as yet. Yet she had only been there for one night, not the Sat.u.r.day till Monday; then, she recollected, she had come up, been very drowsy in the train, and on arriving at Park Lane had gone straight to bed and slept dreamlessly.

Once during the night, it is true, she had awoke, still drowsy, and had seen the first tired lift of the eyelids of the dawn through her window.

Then, for no reason as it seemed now, she had suddenly begun to weep, and had wept long and silently till her pillow was wet. At what she had wept she had only now a dream-like recollection; but in some mysterious way Jack and she had been just married, a new life with its endless possibilities was in front of them. But all had been spoiled, and what had happened had happened. During the night that had seemed to her a matter exceedingly pathetic, worthy of sheer childish tears. But now, fully awake, she was again as hard and as cold as a stone. Then another figure intervened--Jim Spencer. He was coming to lunch, and she had not yet put him off. But he, too, stood separated from her by the same blank blind wall of indifference. She felt nothing, she thought nothing; images only presented themselves to her as external as pictures on a magic-lantern sheet.

Maud had not yet been gone half an hour, when a man came in.

"Lady Ardingly is here, my lady," he said, "and wants to know if you can see her."

Marie suddenly woke up. She felt as if she had been dreaming that she was somewhere, and woke to find the dream exactly true.

"Is she alone?" she asked, hardly knowing why she asked it.

The man paused a moment.

"Yes, my lady," he said.

She smiled, knowing she was right.

"I will see her alone," she said. "His lordship will come back later--Lord Alston, I mean."

Lady Ardingly appeared; her face was slightly more impressionist than usual, as the hour was early. Marie stood on the hearth-rug; it occurred to neither of them to shake hands.