Part 29 (1/2)

He bowed politely as she pa.s.sed out of the room. Then he sat down at the table again and rested his head on both his hands. It took long--it took a very long while. She was hard to subdue. Hard it was too to subdue himself--to be always courteous, never more than permissibly ironical, to wait for his victory. Yet not a doubt crossed his mind that he was on the right track, that he must succeed in the end, that plain reason and good sense must win the day. But the fight was very long. His face looked haggard in the light as he sat alone by the table and told himself to persevere.

And Sibylla, confirmed in her despair, bitterly resentful of the terms he had proposed, seeing the hopelessness of her life, fearing to look on the face of her child lest the pain should rend her too pitilessly, sat down and wrote her answer to Walter Blake. The answer was the promise he had asked.

The images had done their work--hers of him and his of her--and young Blake's fancy picture of himself.

CHAPTER XIII

THE DEAD AND ITS DEAD

”Well, have you managed to amuse yourself to-day?” asked Caylesham, throwing himself heavily on a sofa by Tom Courtland, and yawning widely.

He had dropped in at Mrs. Bolton's, after dinner. Tom had spent the day there, and had not managed to amuse himself very much, as the surly grunt with which he answered Caylesham's question sufficiently testified. He had eaten too much lunch, played cards too long and too high, with too many ”drinks” interspersed between the hands; then had eaten a large dinner, accompanied by rather too much champagne; then had played cards again till both his pocket and his temper were the worse.

There had been nothing startling, nothing lurid about his day; it had just been unprofitable, boring, unwholesome. And he did not care about Mrs. Bolton's friends--not about Miss Pattie Henderson, nor about the two quite young men who had made up the card-party. His face was a trifle flushed, and his toothbrushy hair had even more than usual of its suggestion of comical distress.

”Been a bit dull, has it?” Caylesham went on sympathetically. ”Well, it often is. Oh, I like our friend Flora Bolton, you know, so long as she doesn't get a fit of nerves and tell you how different she might have been. People should never do that. At other times she's a good sort, and just as ready to ruin herself as anybody else--nothing of the good old traditional harpy about her. Still perhaps it works out about the same.”

It certainly worked out about the same, as n.o.body knew better than Tom Courtland. He was thinking now that he had paid rather high for a not very lively day. The only person he had won from was Miss Henderson, and he was not sure that she would pay.

”Must spend your time somewhere,” he jerked out forlornly.

”A necessity of life,” Caylesham agreed; ”and it doesn't make so much difference, after all, where you do it. I rather agree with the fellow who said that the only distinction he could see between--well, between one sort of house and the other sort--was that in the latter you could be more certain of finding whisky and soda on the sideboard in the morning; and now I'm hanged if that criterion isn't failing one! Whisky and soda's got so general.”

The card-party at the other end of the room was animated and even a little noisy. Mrs. Bolton was p.r.o.ne to hearty laughter. Miss Henderson had a penetrating voice, and usually gave a little shriek of delight when she won. The two young men were rather excited. Caylesham regarded the whole scene with humorous contempt. Tom Courtland sat in moody silence, doing nothing. He had even smoked till he could smoke no more.

He had not a pleasure left.

Presently Miss Pattie threw down her cards and came across to them. She was a tall ladylike-looking young woman; only the faintest trace of c.o.c.kney accent hung about the voice. She sat down by Caylesham in a friendly way.

”We hardly ever see you now,” she told him. ”Are you all right?”

”All right, but getting old, Pattie. I'm engaged in digging my own grave.”

”Oh, nonsense, you're quite fit still. I say, have you heard about me?”

”Lots of things.”

”No, don't be silly. I mean, that I'm going to be married?”

”No, are you, by Jove? Who's the happy man?”

”Georgie Parmenter. Do you know him? He's awfully nice.”

”I know his father. May I proffer advice? Get that arrangement put down in writing. Then at the worst it'll be worth something to you.”

Miss Pattie was not at all offended. She laughed merrily.

”They always said you were pretty wide-awake, and I believe it!” she observed. ”He'll have ten thousand a year when his father dies.”