Part 32 (1/2)

”You thought it unkind?”

”It was unkind,” said Millie.

”But I wrote to you. I have written often.”

”In no letter have you told me why you went away,” said Millie.

”You missed me when I went, then?”

Millie shrugged her shoulders.

”Well, I had seen a good deal of you. I missed--I missed--something,”

she said. Callon drank his tea and set down his cup.

”I have come to tell you why I went away without a word. I never mentioned the reason in my letters; I meant to tell you it with my lips. I did not _go_ away, I was _sent_ away.”

Millie was perplexed. ”Sent away?” she repeated. ”I understood, from what you wrote, that you accepted a post from Mr. Mudge?”

”I had to accept it,” said Callon. ”It was forced on me. Mudge was only the instrument to get me out of the way.”

”Who sent you away, then?” asked Millie.

”A friend of yours--Miss Pamela Mardale.”

Millie Stretton leaned back in her chair. ”Pamela!” she cried incredulously. ”Pamela sent you away! Why?”

”Because she thought that I was seeing too much of you.”

Callon watched for the effect which his words would produce. He saw the change come in Millie's face. There was a new light in her eyes, her face flushed, she was angry; and anger was just the feeling he had meant to arouse, anger against Pamela, anger which would drive Millie towards him. He had kept his explanation back deliberately until he could speak it himself. From the moment when he had started from England he had nursed his determination to tell it to Millie Stretton.

He had been hoodwinked, outwitted by Pamela and her friend; he had been banished to Chili for two years. Very well. But the game was not over yet. His vanity was hurt as nothing had ever hurt it before. He was stung to a thirst for revenge. He would live frugally, clear off his debts, return to England, and prove to his enemies the futility of their plan. He thought of Pamela Mardale; he imagined her hearing of his departure and dismissing him straightway contemptuously from her thoughts. For eighteen months he nursed his anger, and waited for the moment when he could return. There should be a surprise for Pamela Mardale. She should understand that he was a dangerous fellow to attack. Already, within a day of his landing, he had begun to retaliate. The anger in Millie Stretton's face was of good augury for him.

”Pamela!” cried Millie, clenching her hands together suddenly. ”Yes, it was Pamela.”

She bethought her of that pressing invitation to the south of France, an invitation from Pamela who looked on the s.h.i.+res as the only wintering-place. That was explained now. Mr. Mudge had informed Pamela, no doubt, that Lionel Callon was returning. Millie was furious. She looked on this interference as a gross impertinence.

Callon rose from his chair.

”You can imagine it, was humiliating to me to be tricked and sent away. But I was helpless. I am a poor man; I was in debt. Miss Mardale had an old rich man devoted to her in Mr. Mudge. He bought up my debts, his lawyer demanded an immediate settlement of them all, and I could not immediately settle them. I was threatened with proceedings, with bankruptcy.”

”You should have come to me,” cried Millie.

Callon raised a protesting hand.

”Oh, Lady Stretton, how could I?” he exclaimed in reproach. ”Think for a moment! Oh, you would have offered help at a hint. I know you. You are most kind, most generous. But think, you are a woman. I am a man.

Oh no!”

Callon did not mention that Mr. Mudge had compelled him to accept or refuse the post in Chili with only an hour's deliberation, and that hour between seven and eight in the evening. He had thought of calling upon Millie to suggest in her mind the offer which she had now made, but he had not had the time. He was glad now. His position was thereby so much the stronger.

”I had to accept Mudge's offer. Even the acceptance was made as humiliating as it possibly could be. For Mudge deliberately let me see that his only motive was to get me out of the country. He did not care whether I knew his motive or not. I did not count,” he cried, bitterly. ”I was a mere p.a.w.n upon a chess-board. I had to withdraw from my candidature. My career was spoilt. What did they care--Mr.