Part 35 (1/2)

”Phyllis was wondering if I was ever coming back again to my work,”

she said to him abruptly.

”Oh, was she? Rather a nice girl, Phyllis, if she didn't dress so badly,” observed Ted unconsciously. They were at a Wagner concert in the Queen's Hall, and the Siegfried Idyll had just drawn to a close.

It seemed to her an auspicious moment.

”I said I was never coming back,” pursued Katharine, studying his profile critically.

”Of course not,” said Ted, humming the refrain they had just heard.

For once, Katharine felt faintly annoyed with him for his want of proper sentiment.

”I don't believe you care whether I do or not,” she said in a piqued tone.

”Eh, what?” said Ted, staring round at her in blank amazement. ”Ought I to have said anything else? But you settled that long ago, Kit, didn't you? There is nothing more to be said about it, is there?”

”Oh, no, of course not,” said Katharine, in what seemed to him a most unreasonable manner; ”but all the same, I'm not at all sure that I sha'n't go back when the term begins again.”

Ted stared more than ever.

”Oh, rats!” he exclaimed, heartily. ”What's wrong, Kitty? Have you been hit up to-day, or anything? I'm such a rotten a.s.s, I never know.

Of course you're never going to grind any more; what an idea!”

”Why not?” asked Katharine, with uncomfortable persistence. Ted began to make fresh a.s.sertions, but paused in the middle and hesitated. He suddenly realised that there was only one answer to her question, and that he would have to make it now. He looked down and made havoc with his programme, and stammered hopelessly until Katharine took pity on him and came to his a.s.sistance with a laugh.

”It's all right, old man; I am never going back, of course,” she said; and Ted brightened up again when he found that he need not propose to her yet, and was obviously relieved at the establishment of their old relations. She did nothing more to change them, and the only result of her abortive attempt was, that Ted was more attentive to her than before, and constantly made little plans for taking her to some unfrequented museum or picture gallery, evidently with some design in his mind which he had not the courage to carry out.

”Poor old Ted,” she thought to herself, after they had spent a dull and silent afternoon at the Royal Inst.i.tute among the colonial produce; ”I wonder if he will ever get it out!”

Curiously enough, through all the weeks she spent in town, the thought of Paul Wilton rarely crossed her mind; and when it did she felt that it referred to some former life of hers, with which this present calm existence had no connection. Sometimes she wondered idly whether he were married yet, and if so, whether he ever gave a thought to her; but she could think of Marion as his wife without a regret, and she was glad to find that she had no desire whatever to see him again. The impression he seemed to have left in her mind, after all these months, was that of a disturbing element which had brought the greatest unhappiness into her life she had ever been forced to endure. It was inconsequent, perhaps, that, thinking thus, she should have been emphatic in her refusal to go and see the Keeleys; but although she was incapable of explaining why she felt so strongly about such a small matter, she was at least genuine in her belief that he had no further place in her thoughts.

And then, two days before they left town, she met him at last.

It was in Bury Street, late on a foggy afternoon, as she was on her way to the Museum with Ted. She had stopped with an exclamation of delight in front of an old book shop, and the owner, who was talking to an intending purchaser inside, came out good-naturedly and offered to light the gas jet over the tray of dusty volumes. ”I shall have to stop now,” whispered Katharine; ”supposing you go on for daddy and bring him back here?”

The light flared up, and made a bright semicircle in the gloom that was fast closing up round the shop. The customer who was inside concluded his purchase, and came out just as Ted was strolling off.

Apparently they did not see each other, and the fog soon swallowed up the retreating form; but Katharine turned round at this moment from the book she was examining, and met the stranger face to face.

”Ah,” he said, quietly; ”at last!”

”Yes,” she repeated; ”at last!”

It did not strike her until afterwards that it was not at all the mode of address with which she would have greeted him had she been more prepared; but at the time it came quite naturally to her lips. He still held her hand as he went on speaking.

”And Ted? Where have you sent him? Will he be long?”

She resented the implication in his words.

”I have not sent him anywhere. He has gone to fetch my father from the Museum; they will be back directly. Do you mean to say you recognised Ted in that instant?”