Part 35 (1/2)

”Is it? I don't know. I often take this walk.”

”Because I've just come from calling on Winnie.” He eyed his prospective victim gloatingly. He was like a savage who thinks that he can unload some of his misfortune on to his neighbour by employing the appropriate ceremonies.

”Oh, I--I hope she's all right?”

”Seems blooming. I didn't have much talk with her, though. There was a chap dancing attendance--a Major somebody or other. Oh yes, Merriam--Major Merriam. He came in pretty soon, with a bouquet of flowers as big as your head. Seems that she and Mrs. Lenoir are off abroad to-morrow, and our friend the Major goes too. I don't think you need make yourself unhappy about Winnie, old chap.”

”Who is he? I never heard of him.”

”Well, I didn't suppose you and she were keeping up a correspondence! If you come to that, I should rather doubt if he ever heard of you.” Bob smiled in a fas.h.i.+on less amiable than was his wont.

”Well, I'm in a hurry. Good-bye, old man.”

”Walking my way?” He indicated Piccadilly and eastwards.

It had been G.o.dfrey's way home. ”I've got to go to a shop in Sloane Street,” said G.o.dfrey.

”Ta-ta then! It'll be a relief to you if she settles down all right, won't it?”

G.o.dfrey said nothing more than 'Good-bye.' But his face, as he said it, was very expressive; it quite satisfied Bob Purnett's impulse to hurt somebody. G.o.dfrey Ledstone did not like Major Merriam any more than he himself did! The magical ceremony had worked; some of his misfortune was unloaded.

Well, the two were in the end much in the same case. Winnie had led G.o.dfrey into the great experiment, and through it into the great failure. She had, this afternoon, made Bob Purnett, in his turn, false to his settled plan of life, had sent him away sore and savage because he could not do the one thing which he had always scornfully declared that he would never do. She had left them both--left G.o.dfrey to those proceedings, to the family woe, to Miss Thurseley's immediate repudiation; left Bob to contemplate a lost pleasure, a fruitless heroism, and the Major in Madeira. The two ought to have sympathized with one another. Yet their thoughts about one another were not friendly. ”If I'd known the sort of chap he was, I'd have had a shot at it sooner,” thought Bob. G.o.dfrey's protest went deeper. ”Of course it'll happen, but why in heaven's name need he tell me about it?” For Bob had suppressed all that part of the story which accounted for his telling.

They went their separate ways--artificially separate on this occasion, since there was no shop in Sloane Street at which G.o.dfrey Ledstone desired to call. They went their ways with their thoughts, in whose mirror each saw Winnie smiling on the Major. Precisely what Miss Wilson was doing at the moment! Jealous men see more than happens, but what happens they generally see.

CHAPTER XXI

IS HE A BULLY?

Cyril Maxon's strong-willed and domineering nature registered its own decrees as having the force of law and regarded its own resolutions as accomplished facts. When he had once achieved the requisite modification of his opinions, and had decided that he wanted to many Lady Rosaline in due time, he thought of her in his secret soul as already his--at any rate, as set apart for him--and he found no difficulty in declaring that she had given a tacit consent in their interview in Paris and in the relations of friends.h.i.+p which now existed between her and himself.

But, naturally, the lady did not adopt the same view either of his rights or of her own actions. The 'very most' she had given him was leave to try his fortune, to recommend himself to her during the interval of time which was unavoidable. She was really rather glad of the interval, and observed one day to Mrs. Ladd that it would be no bad thing if everybody were forced to wait eight or nine months before they married. ”Especially if we are to be bound by Mr. Attlebury's opinion!”

she added, laughing.

She liked the idea of the marriage; it was suitable, and she was lonely and not rich. She was not yet sure how much she liked the man as she came to know him more intimately; now and then she saw signs of something which helped her to a better understanding of Mrs. Maxon's att.i.tude. ”Oh, I'm not afraid of fighting,” she would then say to herself; ”but I don't want to have to fight all the time. It's fatiguing, and rather vulgar.” So she temporized, as the situation enabled her to do; for Maxon was still a tied man, however technical the tie had become; he was not in a position to force the pace. This accidental fact helped her to hold her own against his strong will and domineering instincts; for his conscience had granted him relief only on one point (if really on that), and it did not allow him to forget that he was still a married man.

Lady Rosaline's att.i.tude excited, of course, the liveliest curiosity and an abundance of gossip on the part of her friends, Mrs. Ladd and Miss Fortescue. What did Rosaline mean to do? ”Oh, she means to have him,”

exclaimed Miss Fortescue, ”in the end, you know!”

”I think she will, but I believe that quite a little thing might turn her,” was Mrs. Ladd's more cautious verdict. Cyril Maxon would not have received it pleasantly.

The good ladies' great disappointment was that they could not induce their revered pastor to say a word on the subject, accessible and, indeed, chatty as he generally was with his flock. When Maxon had taken the first step in those proceedings which had so maddened poor old Mr.

Ledstone, he had written to his friend a long and highly argumentative letter, justifying his course. Attlebury had replied in kind, and suggested an interview. This Maxon declined as painful to him, and ended with an a.s.severation that his conscience approved the course he was taking.

”If it does, there's not much use in my saying any more; but make sure it does,” was Attlebury's answer. Maxon took some offence at it, as though it impugned his sincerity. There was no open rupture, but the men did not meet any more in intimate friends.h.i.+p; there was a reserve between them. Yet Attlebury had said no more, or very little more, than Lady Rosaline herself; she also had asked that his own conscience should approve. But Attlebury could not, or, at all events, did not, keep the note of authority out of his counsel. Maxon stiffened his neck instinctively. Before the necessary interval had run half its course, this instinct was powerfully seconded by another.

He had gone to tea with Mrs. Ladd one Sunday. They were old acquaintances, and for several years back he had been accustomed to pay her five or six calls in the course of a twelvemonth; on which occasions, since his marriage, Mrs. Ladd had discreetly condoled with him over Winnie's shortcomings. But Winnie had disappeared for good; there was now a topic even more attractive.

”Rosaline and I talk of a little trip abroad together in a month's time.” She smiled at him. ”Will you forgive me if I take her away for three or four weeks?”