'Much as usual, I think.--Many people at Putney?'

'About a hundred and twenty. Compliments showered on me; I do so wish you could have heard them. Somebody told me that some man asked her how it was he didn't know my name--he took me for a professional violinist.'

'Well, no doubt you are as good as many of them.'

'You really think that?' said Alma, pulling her chair a little nearer to the fire and looking eagerly at him.

'Why shouldn't you be? You have the same opportunities, and make all possible use of them.'

Alma was silent for a few ticks of the clock. Once, and a second time, she stole a glance at Harvey's face; then grasping with each hand the arms of her chair, and seeming to string herself for an effort, she spoke in a half-jesting tone.

'What should you say if I proposed to come out--to _be_ a professional?'

Harvey's eyes turned slowly upon her; he read her face with curiosity, and did not smile.

'Do you mean you have thought of it?'

'To tell you the truth, it is so often put into my head by other people. I am constantly being asked why I'm content to remain an amateur.'

'By professional musicians?'

'All sorts of people.'

'It reminds me of something. You know I don't interfere; I don't pretend to have you in surveillance, and don't wish to begin it. But are you quite sure that you are making friends in the best cla.s.s that is open to you?'

Alma's smile died away. For a moment she recovered the face of years gone by; a look which put Harvey in mind of Mrs. Frothingham's little drawing-room at Swiss Cottage, where more than once Alma had gazed at him with a lofty coldness which concealed resentment. That expression could still make him shrink a little and feel uncomfortable. But it quickly faded, giving place to a look of perfectly amiable protest.

'My dear Harvey, what has caused you to doubt it?'

'I merely asked the question. Perhaps it occurred to me that you were not exactly in your place among people who talk to you in that way.'

'You must allow for my exaggeration,' said Alma softly. 'One or two have said it--just people who know most about music. And there's a _way_ of putting things.'

'Was Mrs. Carnaby there today?'

'No.'

'You don't see her very often now?'

'Perhaps not _quite_ so often. I suppose the reason is that I am more drawn to the people who care about music. Sibyl really isn't musical--though, of course, I like her as much as ever. Then--the truth is, she seems to have grown rather extravagant, and I simply don't understand how she can keep up such a life--if it's true that her husband is only losing money. Last time I was with her I couldn't help thinking that she ought to--to deny herself rather more. It's habit, I suppose.'

Harvey nodded--twice, thrice; and kept a grave countenance.

'And you don't care to see much of Mrs. Abbott?' he rather let fall than spoke.

'Well, you know, dear, I don't mean to be at all disagreeable, but we have so little in common. Isn't it so? I am sure Mrs. Abbott isn't anxious for my society.'

Again Rolfe sat silent, and again Alma stole glances at him.

'Shall I tell you something I have in mind?' he said at length, with deliberation. 'Hughie, you know, is three years old. Pauline does very well with him, but it is time that he had companions--other children.

In half a year or so he might go to a kindergarten, and'--he made an instant's pause--'I know only of one which would be really good for him. I think he will have to go to Mrs. Abbott.'

Their eyes met, and the speaker's were steadily fixed.

'But the distance?' objected Alma.

'Yes. If we want to do that, we must go to Gunnersbury.'

Alma's look fell. She tapped with her foot and meditated, slightly frowning. But, before Harvey spoke again, the muscles of her face relaxed, and she turned to him with a smile, as though some reflection had brought relief.

'You wouldn't mind the bother of moving?'

'What is that compared with Hughie's advantage? And if one lives in London, it's in the nature of things to change houses once a year or so.'

'But we don't live in London!' returned Alma, with a laugh.

'Much the same thing. At Gunnersbury you would be nearer to everything, you know.'

'Then you would send away Pauline?'

Harvey made a restless movement, and gave a husky cough.

'Well, I don't know. You see, Hughie would be with Mrs. Abbott only a few hours each day. Who is to look after the little man at other times?

I suppose I can't very well undertake it myself--though I'm glad to see as much of him as possible; and I won't let him be with a servant.

So----'

Alma was gazing at the fire, and seemed to give only a divided attention to what her husband said. Her eyes grew wide; their vision, certainly, was of nothing that disturbed or disheartened her.

'You have given me two things to think about, Harvey. Will you reflect on the _one_ that I suggested?'

'Then you meant it seriously?'

'I meant that I should like to have your serious opinion about it. Only we won't talk now. I am very tired, and you, I'm sure, oughtn't to sit late with your bad throat. I promise to consider _both_ the things you mentioned.'

She held her hands to him charmingly, and kissed his cheek as she said goodnight.

Harvey lingered for another hour, and--of all people in the world--somehow found himself thinking of Buncombe. Buncombe, his landlord in the big dirty house by Royal Oak. What had become of Buncombe? It would be amusing, some day to look at the old house and see if Buncombe still lived there.

CHAPTER 7

They never talked about money. Alma took it for granted that Harvey would not allow their expenditure to outrun his income, and therewith kept her mind at rest. Rolfe had not thought it necessary to mention that he derived about three hundred pounds from debenture stock which was redeemable, and that the date of redemption fell early in this present year, 1891. He himself had all along scarcely regarded the matter. When the stock became his, 1891 seemed very remote; and on settling in North Wales he felt financially so secure that the question of reinvestment might well be left for consideration till it was pressed upon him.

As now it was. He could no longer disregard percentages; he wanted every penny that his capital would yield. Before marriage he would have paid little heed to the fact that his ca.n.a.l shares (an investment which he had looked upon as part of the eternal order of things) showed an inclination to lose slightly in value; now it troubled him day and night. As for the debenture stock, he might, if he chose, 'convert' it without withdrawal, but that meant a lower dividend, which was hardly to be thought of. Whither should he turn for a security at once sound and remunerative? He began to read the money article in his daily paper, which hitherto he had pa.s.sed over as if it did not exist, or turned from with contemptuous impatience. He picked up financial newspapers at railway bookstalls, and in private struggled to comprehend their jargon, taking care that they never fell under his wife's eyes. At the Metropolitan Club--of which he had resumed membership, after thinking that he would never again enter clubland--he talked with men who were at home in City matters, and indirectly tried to get hints from them. He felt like one who meddles with something forbidden--who pries, shamefaced, into the secrets of an odious vice.

To study the money-market gave him a headache. He had to go for a country walk, to bathe and change his clothes, before he was at ease again.