Part 31 (1/2)

Wemyss was very indignant, but he was also very desirous of bridge. If Lucy had been waiting for him he would have had to leave off bridge before his desire for it had been anything like sated,--whatever wives one had they shackled one,--and as it was he could play as long as he wanted to and yet at the same time remain justly indignant. Accordingly he wasn't nearly as unhappy as he thought he was; not, at any rate, till the moment came for going solitary to bed. He detested sleeping by himself. Even Vera had always slept with him.

Altogether Wemyss felt that he had had a bad day, what with the disappointment of its beginning, and the extra work at the office, and no decent lunch 'Positively only time to s.n.a.t.c.h a bun and a gla.s.s of milk,' he announced, amazed, to the first acquaintance he met in the club. 'Just fancy, only time to s.n.a.t.c.h----' but the acquaintance had melted away and losing rather heavily at bridge, and going back to Lancaster Gate to find from the message left by Twite that that annoying aunt of Lucy's had cropped up already.

Usually Wemyss was amused by Twite's messages, but nothing about this one amused him. He threw down the wrong number one impatiently,--Twite was really a hopeless imbecile; he would dismiss him; but the other one he read again. 'Wanted to know all about us, did she. Said it was very strange, did she. Like her impertinence,' he thought. She had lost no time in cropping up, he thought. Of how completely Miss Entwhistle had, in fact, cropped he was of course unaware.

Yes, he had had a bad day, and he was going to have a lonely night. He went upstairs feeling deeply hurt, and winding his watch.

But after much solid sleep he felt better; and at breakfast he said to Twite, who always jumped when he addressed him, 'Mrs. Wemyss will be coming up to-day.'

Twite's brain didn't work very fast owing to the way it spent most of its time dormant in a bas.e.m.e.nt, and for a moment he thought--it startled him that his master had forgotten the lady was dead. Ought he to remind him? What a painful dilemma.... However, he remembered the new Mrs.

Wemyss just in time not to remind him, and to say 'Yes sir,' without too perceptible a pause. His mind hadn't room in it to contain much, and it a.s.similated slowly that which it contained. He had only been in Wemyss's service three months before the Mrs. Wemyss he found there died. He was just beginning to a.s.similate her when she ceased to be a.s.similatable, and to him and his wife in their quiet subterraneous existence it had seemed as if not more than a week had pa.s.sed before there was another Mrs. Wemyss. Far was it from him to pa.s.s opinions on the rapid marriages of gentlemen, but he couldn't keep up with these Mrs. Wemysses. His mind, he found, hadn't yet really realised the new one. He knew she was there somewhere, for he had seen her briefly on the Sat.u.r.day morning, and he knew she would presently begin to disturb him by needing meals, but he easily forgot her. He forgot her now, and consequently for a moment had the dreadful thought described above.

'I shall be in to dinner,' said Wemyss.

'Yes sir,' said Twite.

Dinner. There usedn't to be dinner. His master hadn't been in once to dinner since Twite knew him. A tray for the lady, while there was a lady; that was all. Mrs. Twite could just manage a tray. Since the lady had left off coming up to town owing to her accident, there hadn't been anything. Only quiet.

He stood waiting, not having been waved out of the room, and anxiously watching Wemyss's face, for he was a nervous man.

Then the telephone bell rang.

Wemyss, without looking up, waved him out to it and went on with his breakfast; and after a minute, noticing that he neither came back nor could be heard saying anything beyond a faint, propitiatory ''Ullo,'

called out to him.

'What is it?' Wemyss called out.

'I can't hear, sir,' Twite's distressed voice answered from the hall.

'Fool,' said Wemyss, appearing, table-napkin in hand.

'Yes sir,' said Twite.

He took the receiver from him, and then the Twites--Mrs. Twite from the foot of the kitchen stairs and Twite lingering in the background because he hadn't yet been waved away--heard the following:

'Yes yes. Yes, speaking. Hullo. Who is it?'

'What? I can't hear. What?'

'Miss who? En--oh, good-morning, How distant your voice sounds.'

'What? Where? _Where_?'

'Oh really.'

Here the person at the other end talked a great deal.

'Yes. Quite. But then you see she wasn't.'

More prolonged talk from the other end.