Part 75 (1/2)

Perhaps the unexpectedness, perhaps a certain suggestion of coincidence, caused Miss Alicia's side ringlets to appear momentarily tremulous.

”Then perhaps we had better go in to breakfast at once,” she said.

”Is Mr. Temple Barholm down?” he inquired as they seated themselves at the breakfast-table.

”He is not here,” she answered. ”He, too, was called away unexpectedly. He went to London by the midnight train.”

She had never been so aware of her unchristian lack of liking for Captain Palliser as she was when he paused a moment before he made any comment. His pause was as marked as a start, and the smile he indulged in was, she felt, most singularly disagreeable. It was a smile of the order which conceals an unpleasant explanation of itself.

”Oh,” he remarked, ”he has gone first, has he?”

”Yes,” she answered, pouring out his coffee for him. ”He evidently had business of importance.”

They were quite alone, and she was not one of the women one need disturb oneself about. She had been browbeaten into hypersensitive timidity early in life, and did not know how to resent cleverly managed polite bullying. She would always feel herself at fault if she was tempted to criticize any one. She was innocent and nervous enough to betray herself to any extent, because she would feel it rude to refuse to answer questions, howsoever far they exceeded the limits of polite curiosity. He had learned a good deal from her in the past. Why not try what could be startled out of her now? Thus Captain Palliser said:

”I dare say you feel a little anxious at such an extraordinarily sudden departure,” he suggested amiably. ”Bolting off in the middle of the night was sudden, if he did not explain himself.”

”He had no time to explain,” she answered.

”That makes it appear all the more sudden. But no doubt he left you a message. I saw you were reading a note when I joined you on the terrace.”

Lightly casual as he chose to make the words sound, they were an audacity he would have known better than to allow himself with any one but a timid early-Victorian spinster whose politeness was hypersensitive in its quality.

”He particularly desired that I should not be anxious,” she said. ”He is always considerate.”

”He would, of course, have explained everything if he had not been so hurried?”

”Of course, if it had been necessary,” answered Miss Alicia, nervously sipping her tea.

”Naturally,” said Captain Palliser. ”His note no doubt mentioned that he went away on business connected with his friend Mr. Strangeways?”

There was no question of the fact that she was startled.

”He had not time enough,” she said. ”He could only write a few lines.

Mr. Strangeways?”

”We had a long talk about him last night. He told me a remarkable story,” Captain Palliser went on. ”I suppose you are quite familiar with all the details of it?”

”I know how he found him in New York, and I know how generous he has been to him.”

”Have you been told nothing more?”

”There was nothing more to tell. If there was anything, I am sure he had some good reason for not telling me,” said Miss Alicia, loyally.

”His reasons are always good.”

Palliser's air of losing a shade or so of discretion as a result of astonishment was really well done.

”Do you mean to say that he has not even hinted that ever since he arrived at Temple Barholm he has strongly suspected Strangeways'

ident.i.ty--that he has even known who he is?” he exclaimed.

Miss Alicia's small hands clung to the table-cloth.