Part 54 (1/2)
”Hus.h.!.+” she answered. ”It's all right, Harry.”
As the curtain descended at the end of the act she said, ”Let us go now quickly, do you mind? Before the lights are turned up.”
They were, fortunately, near to the end of their row of stalls, and they were able to slip out while the curtain was still ascending and descending upon the lighted stage, and the auditorium still dark.
Rames left Cynthia in the lobby while he went in search of his carriage. When he returned he found her standing with her face carefully turned to the wall in front of a commonplace engraving, which seemed to be demanding from her the most meticulous study.
”Have you found it?” she asked, and she hurried with him across the pavement. ”Let us go home, Harry. It was nothing except nerves. I was stupid. We have been doing a good deal lately, haven't we?”
”That's all right, Cynthia. You poor little girl,” said Rames as he crossed her cloak over her throat. He knew her too well to make the mistake of plying her with questions, and they drove to their home in silence.
”You had better go to bed, Cynthia,” he said. ”I'll send your maid to you.”
”No. I am all right now,” she answered. ”I have something to say, Harry.”
She went forward to his study--that room with the mahogany panels where both had faced the hardest crises of their lives, had known the worst of their sorrows, the sweetest of their joys. Harry followed her, turned on the lights, and closed the door. Cynthia was already standing by the fireplace with a foot upon the fender; and she s.h.i.+vered as though she were cold.
”Yes, it's chilly,” said Rames. ”Ill light the fire.”
He struck a match and set light to the paper. The wood crackled, the flames spurted up. Cynthia threw off her cloak and, crouching before the fire, warmed herself. Harry Rames drew up an arm-chair for her.
”Won't you sit here, Cynthia, and be comfortable?” he asked, and his voice seemed to rouse her from a gloomy contemplation. She stood up and walked over to his bureau.
Harry's eyes followed her movements closely. With a growing consternation he saw her grasp the handles of a locked drawer and try to open it.
”What do you keep in here, Harry?” she asked.
”Oh, some old forgotten things.”
”Your charts?”
”My word, yes. I believe they are there,” he said with an air of surprise.
”Will you show them to me?” Cynthia asked. ”I should like to see them.”
”I don't know where the key is. It's lost.”
”Are you sure?”
”For all the chance I have of finding it, dear, it might just as well be at the bottom of the Serpentine.”
Harry had not moved away from the fireplace. Cynthia, her back toward him, had been playing with the bra.s.s handles of the locked drawer. Now she swung round suddenly. Often she had wondered what errand had taken him from the house at one o'clock of the morning after she had revealed her heart to him in this very room. Now she guessed the truth. It was on that night that he had begun to build up his d.y.k.es against the encroachments of his longings. She faced him; her eyes burned steadily upon his face, thoughtful, but betraying nothing of her thoughts.
”Yes,” she said, ”I suppose it might as well be in the Serpentine.”
She turned again to the drawer.
”A knife will open it easily, Harry.”
Harry Rames moved uncomfortably.
”It had better be left alone, Cynthia,” he said. But she insisted and, opening a blade of his knife, he went reluctantly across the room to her side.