Part 25 (1/2)

”Yes, I suppose that _is_ all, but somehow it looks more.”

Laura looked exactly as she always looked, rather paler perhaps than usual, but then Laura was pale. She had that peculiar clear, warm whiteness of skin that is compared by its admirers to a camellia; this morning, her lovely, deep blue eyes looked tired, as if she had been sleeping badly.

”I've really come to ask if you know where G.o.dfrey is? We expected him home on Thursday. Then he sent a telephone message saying that he couldn't be back till yesterday. No time was mentioned, but as he had a lot of appointments at the Bank we of course thought he would be back early. I myself sat up for him last night till after the last train, but now, this morning, I've heard nothing from him--and Mr. Privet has heard nothing.”

”What an odd thing!” exclaimed Katty. She really did think it very odd, for G.o.dfrey was the most precise of men.

She waited a moment, then said truthfully, ”No, I haven't the slightest idea where he is. He wrote me a line late last week about a little investment of mine. I've got the letter somewhere.”

Katty was trying to make up her mind as to whether she should say anything concerning that joint journey to York. At last she decided not to do so. It had nothing to do with G.o.dfrey's absence now.

”Doesn't Mr. Privet know where he is?” she asked. ”That really _is_ very odd, Laura.”

”Of course Mr. Privet knows where G.o.dfrey was up to Thursday morning. He stayed where he always does stay when in London, at the Hungerford Hotel, in Trafalgar Square. He's always stayed there--they know him, and make him very comfortable. But Mr. Privet telephoned through there yesterday--as a matter of fact I've only just heard this--and they told him that G.o.dfrey had left the hotel on Thursday morning. But the extraordinary thing is,” and now Laura really did look somewhat troubled--”that they were expecting him back there to pack, to leave for here--at least so the manager understood him to say. He went out in the morning, and then he didn't come back, as they thought he would do, to luncheon. All his things are still at the Hungerford Hotel.”

Katty began to feel a little uneasy. ”Perhaps he's had an accident,” she said. ”After all, accidents _do_ happen. Have you done anything, Laura?”

Laura shook her head. ”What seems to make the theory of an accident unlikely is that telephone message. You see, he telephoned quite late on Thursday saying that he would stay in town over the night. But he didn't send a similar message to the Bank, as any one knowing G.o.dfrey would certainly have expected him to do, and he didn't let them know at the Hungerford Hotel that he would be away for the night. It's all rather mysterious.”

”Yes, it is,” said Katty.

”I wonder--” Laura grew a little pink--”I wonder,” she said again, ”if you know on what business G.o.dfrey went up to town? Mr. Privet would rather like to know that.”

And then Katty grew a little pink, too. She hesitated. ”No, I don't know what business took him away. You forget that I myself have been away for quite a long time--I only came back on Thursday afternoon.”

”Why, of course!” exclaimed Laura. ”I forgot that. You've been away nearly a fortnight, haven't you?”

”Yes. First I went right down to the south, and then up to Yorks.h.i.+re.”

Somehow she felt impelled to say this.

But Katty's visits were of no interest to Laura at any time, least of all just now. ”Well, I thought I'd come and just ask you on the chance,”

she said.

She got up, and for a moment or two the two young women stood together not far from the bow window of Katty's bedroom.

Suddenly Katty exclaimed, ”Why, there's Oliver Tropenell! What an extraordinary thing! I thought he was abroad.”

”He came back yesterday morning,” said Laura quietly.

Katty gave her visitor a quick, searching look. But there was never anything to see in Laura's face.

”Hadn't I better call out to him? He's evidently on his way to The Chase. Hadn't I better say you're here?”

And, as Laura seemed to hesitate, she threw open the window. ”Mr.

Tropenell?” she called out, in her clear, ringing voice.

The man who was striding past Rosedean, walking very quickly, stopped rather unwillingly. Then he looked up, and when he saw who it was that was standing by Mrs. Winslow, he turned in through the gate, and rang the door-bell.

”Will you go down to him, Laura? I can't come as I am.”