Part 29 (1/2)

”Well, then, she gives ever so much more than he asks, and gives it willingly with open hands.”

Pamela thought the theory over.

”Yes, I think that is generally true,” she said. ”But, after all, I am giving you very little.”

Warrisden laughed.

”That's true,” he replied. ”But then you are not bored, and I have not done asking.”

Pamela laughed too, and their talk thus ended in a lighter note. They walked towards the house, and as they did so a woman came out on to the lawn.

”This is Millie Stretton,” said Pamela.

”She is staying here?” cried Warrisden.

”Yes,” replied Pamela, ”Before she comes I want to ask you to do something for me. Oh, it is quite a small thing. But I should like you very much to do it. Where do you go to from here?”

”To London,” said Warrisden, ”I have business there.”

The business which called him to town had, indeed, only occurred to him during the last half-hour. It had arisen from their conversation.

It seemed to Warrisden immediate and imperative.

”Will you be in London to-morrow?” asked Pamela.

”Yes.”

”Then I want you to write to me. Just a little letter--nothing much, a line or two. And I want you to post it, not by the country post, but afterwards, so that it will reach me in the evening. Don't write here, for I am going home. And please don't forget.”

Millie Stretton joined them a moment afterwards, and Warrisden was introduced to her.

”I have had an offer for the house in Berkeley Square,” she said to Pamela. ”I think I will take it. I shall be glad to be rid of it.”

They went back into the house. Warrisden wondered at Pamela's request for a letter, and at her urgency that it should arrive at a particular time. He was not discontented with the walk which they had taken under the avenue of elms. It seemed to him that Pamela was coming slowly towards him. There was a great difference between her ”No” of last year and her ”I do not know” of to-day. Even that ”I do not know”

while they talked had become ”perhaps.” Had she not owned even more, since she was afraid the gate would open of itself did she but touch and try? His hopes, therefore, rode high that day, and would have ridden yet higher, could he have guessed why she so desired a few lines in his handwriting in the evening of the day after to-morrow.

The reason was this. Repairs, long needed, had at last been undertaken in the house of Pamela's father, a few miles away; and those repairs involved the rooms reserved for Pamela. There were certain drawers in that room which had not been unlocked for years, and of which Pamela sedulously guarded the keys. They held letters, a few small presents, one or two photographs, and some insignificant trifles which could not be valued, since their value depended only on their a.s.sociations.

There were, for instance, some cheap red beads, and the history of those beads tells all that need be said of the contents of those locked drawers.

Two hundred years before, a great full-rigged s.h.i.+p, bound with a general cargo for the Guinea Coast, sailed down the Channel out of Portsmouth. Amongst the cargo was a great store of these red beads.

The beads were to buy slaves for the plantations. But the great s.h.i.+p got no further on her voyage than Bigbury Bay in Devons.h.i.+re. She damaged her rudder in a storm, and the storm swept her on to the bleak rocks of Bolt Tail, dragged her back again into the welter of the sea, drove her into Bigbury Bay, and flung her up there against the low red cliffs, where all her crew perished. The cargo was spilt amongst the breakers, and the sh.o.r.es of that bay were littered with red beads. You may pick them up to this day amongst the pebbles. There Pamela had picked them upon a hot August morning, very like to that which now dreamed over this green, quiet garden of Leicesters.h.i.+re; and when she had picked them up she had not been alone. The locked cabinets held all the relics which remained to her from those few bright weeks in Devon; and the mere touch of any one, however trifling, would have magic to quicken her memories. Yet now the cabinets must be unlocked, and all that was in them removed. There was a bad hour waiting for Pamela, when she would remove these relics one by one--the faded letters in the handwriting which she would never see again on any envelope; the photograph of the face which could exchange no look with her; the little presents from the hand which could touch hers no more.

It would be a relief, she thought, to come downstairs when that necessary work was done, that bad hour over, and find a letter from Warrisden upon the table. Just a few lines. She needed nothing more.

CHAPTER XX

MR. CHASE DOES NOT ANSWER

Both Pamela and Millie Stretton walked with Warrisden through the hall to the front door. Upon the hall-table letters were lying. Pamela glanced at them as she pa.s.sed, and caught one up rather suddenly. Then she looked at Warrisden, and there was something of appeal in her look. It was as though she turned to a confederate on whom she could surely rely. But she said nothing, since Millie Stretton was at her side. For the letter was in the handwriting of Mr. Mudge, who wrote but rarely, and never without a reason. She read the letter in the garden as soon as Warrisden had ridden off, and the news which it contained was bad news. Callon had lived frugally in South America--by Christmas he would have discharged his debts; and he had announced to Mudge that he intended at that date to resign his appointment. There were still four months, Pamela reflected--nay, counting the journey home, five months; and within that time Tony Stretton might reappear.