Part 68 (1/2)

A dreamy smile played over his lips. His eyes--not quite so bloodshot this morning--were drowsed with quiet thought.

As he was about to descend the stairs he turned and glanced towards a closed door at the end of the pa.s.sage.

It was the door of Mary's room and this was his farewell to the wife whose only thought was of him, with whom, in ”The blessed bond of board and bed” he had spent the happy years of his first manhood and success.

A glance at the closed door; an almost complacent smile; after all those years of holy intimacy this was his farewell.

As he descended the stairs, the Murderer was humming a little tune.

The two maid servants were in the hall to see him go. They were fond of him. He was a kind and generous master.

”You're looking much better this morning, sir,” said Phoebe. She was pretty and privileged... .

”I'm feeling very well, Phoebe. This little trip will do me a lot of good, and I shall bring home lots of birds for you to cook. Now mind both you girls look after your Mistress well. I shall expect to see her greatly improved when I return. Give her my love when she wakes up.

Don't forward any letters because I am not certain where I shall be. It will be in the Blackwater neighbourhood, Brightlingsea, or I may make my headquarters at Colchester for the three days. But I can't be quite sure. I shall be back in three days.”

”Good morning, sir. I hope you'll have good sport.”

”Thank you, Phoebe--that's right, Tumpany, put Trust on the seat first and then get up yourself--what's the matter with the dog?--never saw him so shy. No, James, you drive--all right?--Let her go then.”

The impatient mare in the shafts of the cart pawed the gravel and was off. The trap rolled out of the drive as Lothian lit a cigar.

It really was a most perfect early morning, and there was a bloom upon the stubble and Mortland Royal wood like the bloom upon a plum.

The air was keen, the sun bright. The pheasants chuckled in the wood, the mare's feet pounded the hard road merrily.

”What a thoroughly delightful morning!” Lothian said to the groom at his side and his eyes were still dreamy with subtle content.

CHAPTER IX

A STARTLING EXPERIENCE FOR ”WOG”

”The die rang sideways as it fell, Rang cracked and thin, Like a man's laughter heard in h.e.l.l... .”

--_Swinburne._

It was nearly seven o'clock in the evening; a dry, acrid, coughing cold lay over London.

In the little Kensington flat of Rita Wallace and Ethel Harrison, the fire was low and almost out. The ”Lulu bird” drooped on its perch and Wog was crying quietly by the fire.

How desolate the flat seemed to the faithful Wog as she looked round with br.i.m.m.i.n.g eyes.

The state and arrangement of a familiar room often seem organically related to the human mind. Certainly we ourselves give personality to rooms which we have long inhabited; and that personality re-acts upon us at times when event disturbs it.

It was so now with the good and tender-hearted clergyman's daughter.

The floor of the sitting-room was littered with little pieces of paper and odds and ends of string. Upon the piano--it was Wog's piano now, a present from Rita--was a ma.s.sive photograph frame of silver. There was no photograph in it, but some charred remains of a photograph which had been burned still lay in the grate.

Wog had burnt the photograph herself, that morning, early.