Part 11 (1/2)

”What beauties,” Gabrielle cried.

”Yes, they come from Banbury,” he said. ”I'll get you a pup next term if you'd like one.”

Their evening was crowded with such small wonders. ”I can't show you half the things I want to,” he said. ”It's ridiculous that you should only be here for three days.” He would have gone on for ever, and she had to warn him when the clock in the stables struck seven that they had only just time to dress for dinner. On the way upstairs he showed her his new study, with the bookshelves that he had bought in the last holidays.

”I do all my writing here,” he said, and then suddenly but shyly emboldened: ”it was here that I wrote to you when I sent you the cowslips.”

He had never dared to mention the incident before.

”You didn't answer me,” he went on. ”Why didn't you answer me? I wish you'd tell me.”

”Arthur--I couldn't--you know that I couldn't.”

A panic seized her and she went blus.h.i.+ng to her room.

She was still flushed with excitement or pleasure when she came down to dinner. Mrs. Payne, in a matronly dress of black, sat at the head of the table with Arthur and Gabrielle on either side of her facing each other. The arrangement struck her as a triumph of strategy. From this central position she could see them both and intercept any such glances as had pa.s.sed between them in the church at Lapton. In this she was disappointed, for there was nothing to be seen in the behaviour of either but a transparent happiness. ”They only want encouragement,”

she thought, and settled down deliberately to put them at their ease, a proceeding that was quite unnecessary for the last feeling that could have entered either of their minds was that of guilt.

So the evening pa.s.sed, in the utmost propriety. No look, no sign, no symptom of unusual tenderness appeared. It even seemed that Gabrielle was particularly anxious to make the conversation general. ”Oh, you're artful!” thought Mrs. Payne, ”but I'll have you yet.” They talked of Lapton, of Considine and of the Traceys. Only once did Mrs. Payne surprise a single suspicious circ.u.mstance.

”I showed Mrs. Considine the dogs, mother,” he said. ”She's fallen in love with Boris.”

”Yes, his eyes are like amber,” said Gabrielle.

”So I thought I'd like to write to Banbury to-morrow and get her a puppy.”

”Certainly, dear,” said Mrs. Payne suavely. Bedtime came. Gabrielle and Arthur shook hands in the most ordinary fas.h.i.+on. Mrs. Payne, seeing Gabrielle to her door and submitting, once again, to an uncomfortable kiss, felt that her triumphant plan had already shown itself to be a failure. She went along the pa.s.sage to her own room with a sense of bewilderment and defeat. She could not sleep for thinking. She wondered, desperately, if when all other methods had failed, as she now expected they would, she could possibly approach their secret from another angle, laying aside her watchful inactivity and becoming in defiance of all her principles an ”agent provocateuse.”

If it came to the worst she might be forced to do this, for very little time was left to her. If she remained static she would be powerless.

Next day, she reflected, they had planned a ride over the flat top of Bredon Hill. She could not go with them; she could not even watch them; yet who knew what shames might be perpetrated in that secrecy as they rode through the green lanes of the larch plantations? Never was a better solitude made for lovers. Her imaginings left her tantalised and thwarted, for she was sure now, more than ever, that there was a secret to be surprised.

She lay there sleepless in the dark till the stable clock slowly struck twelve. Then she sighed to herself and decided that she must try to sleep.

XVIII

Lying thus, upon the verge of slumber, Mrs. Payne became aware of a sound of light steps in the corridor outside her room. She opened her eyes and lay with tense muscles listening. The sound was unmistakable, and the steps came from the direction of Arthur's room, the only one on that side of hers that was occupied. The steps came nearer. Pa.s.sing her bedroom door they became tiptoe and cautious, as though the walker, whoever he might be, was anxious not to arouse her attention. The sound pa.s.sed and grew fainter down the length of the corridor, and she knew then that the very worst had happened, for Gabrielle's room lay at the end of the pa.s.sage. Many things she had dreaded, but not this last enormity.

She crept out of bed, neglecting in her anxiety to put on a dressing-gown, and went softly to the door. She wondered how she could open it without making a noise, and if, when she had opened it, she could hear at such a distance.

Very carefully with her hot hand she turned the door handle and opened a small c.h.i.n.k that fortunately allowed her to look along the pa.s.sage towards Gabrielle's room. Through a window halfway down the corridor moonlight cut across it, throwing on the floor the distorted shadow of an Etruscan vase. She remembered that Arthur's father had bought it in Italy on their honeymoon, yet, while this thought went through her mind, her ears were strained to listen. She could do no more, for the further end of the pa.s.sage was plunged by this insulating flood of moonlight into inscrutable darkness.

It was so quiet that she felt that she had missed him; he had already entered her room; but while she considered the awful indignity of surprising him there, the sound of a light tapping on the door's panel relieved her. She thanked G.o.d that she was still in time.

The knock was repeated and evidently answered, for now she heard him speak in a whisper. He called her Mrs. Considine--it was ridiculous!

”Are you awake?” she heard. ”The nightingale--yes, the nightingale.

We could go down into the garden under the trees. If you're game. How splendid of you! ... Yes, I'll wait below .... Outside, under your window.”

Before Mrs. Payne could pull herself together she heard his steps returning. She closed the door fearfully. He came along the pa.s.sage and stopped for a moment just outside her room. There was nothing between them but an oak door, so thin, she felt, that he must surely hear her anxious breath. She dared not breathe, but in a moment he pa.s.sed by.