"That house in the country! You shared it together? Couldn't you make it your home instead of the flat? It would be more--suitable. This fairy G.o.dmother scheme is possible for a few months, with a home in the background, to which you can return at any moment, but now that you will be alone, you are too young. It does not seem right. Couldn't you"--he looked at me apologetically--"carry on the same work in the country in your own name? Make the house a country resort for lame dogs who need a rest, for example? There would be plenty of applicants."

"It's impossible! I can't explain. I can never return to 'Pastimes'

alone." I spoke shortly. The subject was difficult. So far, I had not thrashed it out even in thought. Mr Thorold shot a quick, keen glance.

Instinctively, I knew where his thoughts were wandering. He was thinking of the bluff country Squire who had been so kind to his own little girls, remembering that he came from the same neighbourhood; that Evelyn Wastneys and he had been friends.

The stupid colour flamed in my cheeks. I made haste to turn the conversation from myself.

"It will make a difference to you, too. You will miss your friend!"

"Yes, but--I have borne the great loss, Miss Wastneys; I can spare him gladly, to _his joy_. When one has known the completeness of a real marriage, and then been left alone, it would be impossible to grudge--My friends urge me to marry again; my girl herself said she wished it. If I had been less completely happy, I might have done it for the children's sake. As it is, I can never put another in her place. But I need a woman in my life. I feel that--but I want a mother, a sister, not a wife. Can't you evolve a _real_ Miss Harding, who will look after me and my poor bairns?"

It was an hour later when the message came summoning us to return to the sitting-room. The two were standing to receive us--glorified beings, exalted above the earth. Oh, I can't write about it! We clung together. They spoke glowing words of love and thanks and appreciation; they looked past us into each other's eyes. It was wonderful, wonderful; but, oh, it made me feel desperately, desperately lonely!

CHAPTER TWENTY SIX.

LOVE'S A NEW LIFE.

Late that night, after the two men had left, Charmion and I sat together over the bedroom fire, and talked and talked. Her lips were opened now, and she could talk without the old restraint. It seemed a relief to her to talk. I asked if "Edward" had ever discovered who was the sender of the fatal letter. "No," she said, "not actually. He is practically certain, but he did not trouble to bring it home. The mischief was done. Anyone who had a heart must have been sufficiently punished by the knowledge of the misery she had caused. He left her to that, but, oh! Evelyn, what a conception of _love_! to try to poison a man's home because he had chosen another woman as his wife! Not that I am much better! I have no right to speak."

Her lips quivered. She confessed to me that, on reading the two letters, she had been overcome with sorrow and remorse, but that Edward had refused to listen to her laments. They had both been wrong; each had an equal need of forgiveness, the suffering in either case had been intense--not another moment must be wasted! Away with bitterness, away with remorse, the future lay ahead, it should not be wasted in vain regrets. Then, blushing and aglow, she told me her plans. "To-morrow-- to-day," she raised her eyes to the clock, and glowed anew, "we are going by train to a sunny bay in Cornwall, to spend a second honeymoon.

Edward's writing engagement could be fulfilled better in the country than in town. He had lingered in London for Thorold's sake, not his own. One month, two months to themselves, they must have, and then"-- she straightened herself as in eager antic.i.p.ation--"America! I must take him back, Evelyn! Back to his old home, and his old friends--to let them all see! Oh! all my life must be spent in making good the shame I have brought upon him, the misery and blame!"

I laid a restraining touch on her arm.

"Remember you are not to grieve! You have promised. That is forbidden ground!"

"Yes--yes, I know, but my heart, Evelyn! My heart will always remember." She turned to me tenderly. "Darling girl! we talked about you--it is through you that this happiness has come. We cannot be parted. When we are settled in our new home we want you to come over, to pay us a long, long visit. You could see your sister, too. You would enjoy that?"

I felt a momentary rising of bitterness, a momentary impulse to say caustically that it would indeed be soothing for a lonely woman to visit two devoted married couples, but there was a wistful tone in her voice which showed that she understood. I made a big effort to laugh naturally, and made a vague promise. This was Charmion's night. I should be a poor thing if I damped her joy!

"And about 'Pastimes,'" she said slowly. "The agreement stands, of course. I pay half expenses for the next three years. Live in it, lend it, rent it as you think best. I should love best to think of you living there, until you come to us. You could find some friend--"

"Oh, yes! I have made enough friends at the 'Mansions' to keep me supplied with visitors for months to come. _If_ I go back. But I'm not sure. This has come upon me with a rush, Charmion. I shall have to sit down, and think quietly. I shall see you again before you sail?"

"Of course." She looked at me with reproach. "You are the dearest person in the world to me, Evelyn--except _one_. Do you suppose I could leave England without seeing you again? We'll arrange a meeting somewhere, and have a week together. You and I, and Mr Thorold, and Edward." She turned a sudden scrutinising glance upon me. "Evelyn, I have a haunting conviction that you are changed; that some man has come into your life. You aren't by any possibility going to marry Wenham Thorold?"

"Indeed I am not. He hasn't the faintest desire to marry me, or I to marry him. We are excellent friends, but nothing more. I honestly believe he regrets Miss Harding. You are growing too personal, my dear.

I shall go to bed."

She laughed, kissed me, but refused to move.

"I'm not tired. I don't want to sleep. Sleep means forgetfulness," she said. "It will rest me more to remember!"

I left her leaning forward, with hands clasped round her knees, gazing into the fire.

Charmion left the next morning, and I prepared, with the strangest reluctance, to turn back into Miss Harding, and return to the bas.e.m.e.nt flat. For the last week I had been living in an atmosphere of romance, which had put me out of tune with ordinary life. Bridget showed her usual understanding. "'Deed, I always _did_ say a wedding was the most upsetting thing in life!" she declared. "A funeral's not in it for upsetting your nerves, and setting you on to grizzle, the same as a wedding. Not that Mrs Fane's--Hallett, I suppose--was a wedding exactly, but it sort of churned you up more than if it was. To see her all a-smiling and a-flushing, and looking so young! Her as always held herself so cold. And now to have to go back to live underground, with you mumping about in a shawl!"

"Cheer up, Bridget dear," I said soothingly. "It won't be for long. I feel myself that I need a change. Perhaps we'll go to Ireland. The Aunts are grumbling because I don't go. Just a few weeks more, while I think things over and make my plans. Make the best of it, there's a good soul!"

She looked at me, more in sorrow than in anger.

"I'll make the best of it, _with_ the best, when there's a call to do it," she said firmly; "but you'll only be young once, my dear. You may throw away things now as you'll pine to get back all the days of your life. When you're thinking things over just remember that!" She stumped from the room, leaving me to digest her words.

The next week pa.s.sed heavily. I saw little of Mr Thorold, and suspected that the revelation of Evelyn would work against further intimacy. It was impossible that he could feel the same freedom and ease; impossible that he should commandeer my help as he had done in days past. There was no blame attached to the position, it was natural and inevitable; but the loss of the easy, pleasant intercourse left a gap in my life.

Mrs Manners had gone with her children to visit her mother; Mrs Travers cut me in the hall. Poor Miss Harding was having a bad time!

n.o.body needed her; her absence had pa.s.sed unnoticed; her return awoke no welcome. Bridget besought me to go out and amuse myself, but I obstinately refused to go, and stayed glued in the flat. Not for worlds would I have acknowledged it to a living creature, but--I was afraid that while I was out some one might call. Ralph Maplestone had said that business would bring him to town. Now that the Merrivales were in Switzerland, and that anxiety was off his hands, he could come when he liked. If he did not come it must be because he did _not_ like!

The reflection did not help to raise my spirits, nor to pa.s.s the long-houred days; but it did give me an insight into my own heart. For the first time I was honest with myself, and acknowledged that I _wanted_ him to come! I faced the possibility that I might wait in vain, and felt suddenly faint and weak. It had come to this, that I _needed_ his strength, that I felt it impossible to face life without him by my side. I determined, if he _did_ come, to show signs of weakness in my resolution; possibly to go so far as to arrange a meeting with my niece.

He came one afternoon when I was darning stockings by the dining-room table, and the disobedient orphan showed him straight in on the domestic scene. I hurriedly hitched round my chair and drew the cas.e.m.e.nt curtains, making an excuse of "too much sun," then folded the shawl round my shoulders, and sat at attention. He said he was pleased to see me. Was I quite well? The weather was very bright. Good news from Switzerland, wasn't it? General Underwood was suffering from gout.

What were Miss Wastneys' plans for the summer?

"She--she doesn't know herself!" I sighed vaguely. "Circ.u.mstances have--er--altered. Her friend Mrs Fane"--(I realised that Escott would have to hear some explanation of Charmion's departure, but was loth to set tongues wagging)--"has decided to return to America. She has spent most of her life there, and has many ties."

He looked supremely uninterested. Mrs Fane might go to Kamtschatka for all he cared!

"And will Miss Wastneys keep on the house alone?"

"Nothing is yet decided; but I think--not!"

He looked unperturbed. Showed none of the agitation I had hoped to see.

"Does she intend to join Mrs Fane in America?"

Now I felt hurt! Obviously, oh, quite obviously, he did not like me so much as he did! It was nothing to him where I lived--nothing to him where I went! A terrible feeling of loneliness overwhelmed me. n.o.body cared! I pressed my lips together to prevent their trembling; behind my spectacles I blinked smarting eyes. A big brown hand stretched out and was laid over mine; a big soft voice asked tenderly:--

"_Evelyn! How long is this tomfoolery to go on_?"

We were standing facing one another across the table. I had darted behind its shelter in that first moment of shock and dismay. His face was lit with a mischievous smile; his hands were thrust into his trouser pockets; his eyes surveyed me with a horrible, twinkling triumph.

"Oh! Oh! Oh! You know!"

"Of course I know!"

"You have known all the time? From the very beginning?"

"Not just at first! I'll give you credit for taking me in for a short time--a very short time! Then you gave yourself away."

"How? How?"

"When you do a thing at all, you ought to do it thoroughly. Your disguise was incomplete."

"Incomplete? But I had lessons. I paid to be taught."

"Then your instructor, whoever he may be, omitted one important item.

The moment I noticed it, the whole thing became plain. I knew I was talking to Evelyn Wastneys, and not to her aunt."