Part 36 (2/2)

Why, of course not, if you want to go. But what made you think of it to-night?”

Trix leant back in her chair. ”I had a letter from Miss Tibb.u.t.t,” she said.

Mrs. Arbuthnot laid down her sandwich. She regarded Trix with anxious and almost reproachful eyes.

”Oh, my dearest, nothing wrong I hope? So inconsiderate of me to talk of Bridge. I saw a letter in your hand, but no black edge. Unless there is a black edge, one does not readily imagine bad news. Not like telegrams.

They send my heart to my mouth, and generally nothing but a Bridge postponement. So trivial. But it is the colour of the envelope, and the possibility. Ill news flies apace, and telegrams the quickest mode of communicating it. Except the telephone. And that is expensive at any distance.” Mrs. Arbuthnot paused, and took up her sandwich once more.

”Oh, no,” responded Trix, answering the first sentence of the speech.

Experience, long experience had taught her to seize upon the first half-dozen words of her aunt's discourses, and cling to them, allowing the remainder to float harmlessly into thin air. Later there might be the necessity to clutch at a few more, but generally the first half-dozen sufficed. ”Oh, no; no bad news. But Miss Tibb.u.t.t is not quite satisfied about Pia.”

That was true, at all events.

Mrs. Arbuthnot made a little clicking sound with her tongue, expressive of sympathy.

”Oh, my dearest, I know that term 'not quite satisfied.' So vague. It may mean nothing, or it may mean a good deal. And we always think it means a good deal, when it is probably only influenza. Depressing, but not at all serious if taken in time. And ammoniated quinine the best thing possible.

Not bitter, either, if taken in capsule form. But I quite feel with you, and go-by all means if you wish. And take eucalyptus, with you to avoid catching it yourself. So infectious, they say, but not to be s.h.i.+rked if one is needed. I would never stand in the light of duty. The corporal works of mercy, inconvenient at times, and I have never been to see a prisoner in my life, but perhaps easier than the spiritual, except the three last. You always run the risk of interference with the first of the spiritual, so wiser to leave them entirely to priests. When do you want to go, dearest?”

Trix came to herself with a little start. She had lost the thread of Mrs.

Arbuthnot's discourse.

”The day after to-morrow, I think,” she said, reflectively. ”I can wire to-morrow and get a reply.”

Mrs. Arbuthnot got up.

”Then that's settled. Don't look anxious, dearest, because there is probably no cause for it. Though I know how easy it is to give advice, and how difficult to take it, even when it is oneself. Though perhaps that is really harder, being often half-hearted. And now we will go to bed, and things will look brighter in the morning, especially if it is fine. And the gla.s.s going up as I came through the hall. Quite time it did. I always had sympathy with the boy in the poem--Jane and Anne Taylor, wasn't it?--who smashed the gla.s.s in the holidays because it wouldn't go up. It always seems as if it were its fault. Though I know it's foolish to think so. And there is the clock striking one, and I shall eat more sandwiches if I stay, so let us put out the light, and go to bed.”

CHAPTER x.x.x

A QUESTION OF IMPORTANCE

It had been chance pure and simple which happened to take Doctor Hilary to Woodleigh on the day the d.u.c.h.essa received Trix's telegram, but it cannot be equally said that it was chance which took him to Exeter on the following day, and which made him travel down again to Kingsleigh by the four o'clock train. Also it was certainly not chance which induced him to be on the platform at least a quarter of an hour before the train was due at the station, ready to keep a careful lookout on all the pa.s.sengers in it.

Trix had had an uneasy journey from London. She had re-read Miss Tibb.u.t.t's letter at least a dozen times. At first she had allowed herself to be almost unreasonably depressed by it; afterwards she had been almost more unreasonably depressed because she had allowed herself to be depressed in the first instance. Quite possibly it was all a storm in a tea-cup, and this man had nothing whatever to do with Pia's unhappiness.

Of course the chance meeting and the overheard conversation had fitted in so neatly as to make Miss Tibb.u.t.t think it had, and she had easily communicated the same idea to Trix. But quite probably it had nothing more to do with it than her own surmise regarding Doctor Hilary had had.

And that had proved entirely erroneous, though at the time it had appeared the most sane of conclusions. Also Miss Tibb.u.t.t might quite conceivably be wrong as to Pia's being now unhappy at all, whatever she had seemed to be in the summer.

Trix's visit began to appear to her somewhat in the light of a wild-goose chase. Anyhow she had not given Pia the smallest hint as to why she was coming. Naturally she could not possibly have done that. She had still to invent some tangible excuse for her sudden desire to visit Woodleigh again. Sick of London greyness would be quite good enough, though certainly not entirely true. But possibly a slight deviation from truth would be excusable under the circ.u.mstances. And she _was_ sick of London greyness. The fog yesterday had got on her nerves altogether, though quite probably it would not have done so if it had not been for Miss Tibb.u.t.t's letter, which had made her feel so horribly restless. But then there was no need to say why the fog had got on her nerves.

Yes; the fog would be excuse enough. And it was not an atom of good worrying herself as to whether Miss Tibb.u.t.t had been right or wrong regarding the idea communicated in her letter. If she were right it made Trix unhappy to think about it, and if she were wrong it made Trix cross to think she _had_ thought about it. So the wisest course was not to think about it at all. But the difficulty was not to think about it.

Trix knew perfectly well that absurd little things had this power of depressing her, and she wished they had not. She knew, also, that other quite little things had the power of cheering her in equal proportion, and she wished that one of these other things would happen now. But that was not particularly likely.

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