It was always too dull to do anything which left room for thought.
Esmé played until morning, then, with the effect of the nerve tonic worn off, went irritably upstairs, knowing that nothing but chloral would give her rest that night.
"Tell Monsieur I am not well, that I must sleep alone. That will do, Marie. You can go."
Marie held the cobwebby nightdress ready to put on, but Esmé sent the maid away.
Marie laid down the scented silken thing and went thoughtfully.
"I fear it is unlikely, Madame. I am very sorry." Dr Legrand put his capable finger-tips together, looked sympathetically at the tall, golden-haired Englishwoman who had come to consult him.
"The child died, then, Madame—that another is so important?" he asked kindly.
Esmé flushed scarlet. "It—yes—I lost it," she said bitterly, her eyes filling with tears. "I lost him. And I am not likely to have another?"
"Frankly, no, Madame. But you are young. Madame is nervous, says she cannot sleep without something. Give the something up, Madame; there is a little death, a little madness, bottled in each innocent dose. Go to the country, live in the open air. Get Madame's nerves well, then perhaps your wish may be realized."
Esmé sat silent, growing sullen, raging at fate. Why should this be? Why had she been treated so cruelly?
If—oh, if! The word which makes our sorrow into madness—that word "if." If she had known, had guessed, what the future would bring.
As she sat there fuming it did not come to her that the great scales of the world weigh and adjust; that for sinning we are punished, either by the bitterness of our own remorse, or by something withheld. Right holds its steady poundage, while wrong flies upwards, light of weight and false.
A mother had sold her child, carelessly, heartlessly, that she might enjoy her life. What did it matter? Children were easy things to find if one wanted them. And now she sat baffled, miserable, the price no use to her, spent before it came, yet did not blame herself, but cruel chance.
"Well"—Esmé got up slowly, putting the great man's fee on the table—"bon jour, Monsieur."
"Adieu, Madame." He took the dry hand kindly. "It was no doubt the loss of the boy which has made Madame nervous, not well. It has preyed on your mind, Madame."
"It has," she rasped out bitterly, "and always will. Well, adieu, Monsieur."
Dr Legrand wrote an entry in his book: "Mrs Eva Smith of West Kensington, London."
"And yet," he said to himself, "she looked more angry than sorrowful."
Pulling down her thick veils, Esmé followed the man-servant across the hall. She had dressed very plainly, hidden her face by thick black gauze and net.
A little dark man was coming on to the steps, whistling cheerily. Seeing him Esmé started and jumped into her waiting taxi.
The little man passed her, went into the doctor's, as one who had an appointment. For a moment he, too, had hurried, but the taxi had sped past him.
"A cher Nonno," he cried, gripping the Frenchman's hand.
"A la bonne heure, Luigi."
"So Milady Blakeney comes to consult you," Luigi said. "She passed me."
"Milady Blakeney? No! A Meeses Smith, of Londres, a handsome creature, but artificial, racked by late hours and chloral."
"It was so like Milady," Luigi said. The doctor's consulting hour was over; the two were at leisure. "I attended her. A fine boy."
"Yes." The Frenchman appeared to be very interested in his finger-nails. "Yes—there were no complications, were there?"
"H'm!" Luigi Frascatelle sighed. "She came through well. But—I did not tell her—there is never likely to be another bambino." He dropped into medical explanation, gave a few details.
"Never," said Luigi. "But why tell her?"
Legrand took up his book. "Mrs Eva Smith, of London," he said thoughtfully. "H'm! She was dark, this milady?"
"Dark? No, but fair as the angels," exclaimed Luigi. "Golden-haired, splendid. Each year the Sposo, Sir Blakeney, sends me a gift from the boy. It is good of them to remember."
"Oh!" The French doctor closed his book. "Then it can't be," he said to himself, "since the boy is alive. But"—he looked again at the entry—"from what you tell me a second child would be a practical impossibility," he said.
"Well, it is so," answered the Italian.
"And, in this case, also. Yet the boy is alive. Come, Luigi, out. I shall be in London next week at the great Conference, but I leave happily my patients to you, mon ami."
Esmé, once again Mrs Carteret, lay sobbing on the high narrow bed in her room at the Meurice. She would never be rich now; her heartache never stilled. Wild schemes went drifting through her brain. Could she do as Denise had done? No, for Denise was rich, and to cheat one must have money. Half-maddened, she buried her hot face in the pillow; then would spring up with clenched hands, railing against the world.
Her boy, her boy! who would have meant so much to her. Her baby, ill-used, neglected!
There is no sorrow so bitter as that of a sin which has failed to succeed; no remorse so biting as that which eats with decayed teeth, which whispers as it grows painfully, "I come from your own fault."
Esmé got up at last, powdered thickly and carelessly, put away her plain gown and got into a blue velvet, pinned on a huge hat, and went down to tea.
She could think no longer. A bunch of pale mauve violets tempted her. With her fair hair, her done-up skin, her brilliant gown, men turned and stared and drew their own conclusions.
Esmé wanted new gowns. Denise owed her money. She drove to her dressmaker's.
But Madame Lilie was cool, unenthusiastic. Madame Carteret's accounts were over-difficult to get in.
"If Madame would pay cash, but certainly. But otherwise money was scarce. English accounts so ver' difficult to get in. For cash there were one or two gowns."
With deft hands Madame showed a model of emerald velvet, bizarre, remarkable, but exquisite in its supple grace. Another of sapphire cloth. An evening gown of chiffon and satin, clinging, opal-hued.
The three could be supplied—they would fit Esmé easily—for one hundred and twenty pounds for cash, with jupons to match thrown in.
Esmé was going to the Holbrooks. She must wear her old clothes; and Dollie Gresham would be there, and Denise.
"You know that I would pay you," Esmé flashed out. "It is nonsense. I could send you half in a month."
Madame grew cold again. After all, the blue was almost sold to a customer, but as Madame had come all the way from Londres, bien! she had showed it.
It was in Esmé's mind to lose her temper, to call the woman insolent and suspicious. But the three models lying together, green and blue and shimmering opal, held her tongue.
She would come back to-morrow, buy the gowns; she had meant to leave next morning, but she would not.
It was dusk outside, and cold; she hurried on to the Ritz.
A stout man, barring her path, swept his hat off to her, murmuring some words.
"Monsieur!" Esmé said haughtily.
"But, Madame"—the man's French halted. "If Madame would come to tea with a humble admirer—"
"Monsieur!" she stormed, hurrying on across the open space in front of the huge hotel. The man followed her, apparently unabashed, into the lounge, his eyes fixed admiringly on her.
With a little gasp of relief Esmé saw a man she knew, Sir Thomas Adaire—a round-faced, jovial youth, with cunning blue beady eyes, and a distorted imagination.
"Don't make a fuss," she said, "but that dreadful person is following me."
The stranger sheered off rapidly, with a smile of understanding more insulting than his pursuit.
Sir Thomas, ordering tea, first called the unknown an impossible bounder, and then let his blue beads rest on Esmé with some surprise in them.
"Don't exactly wonder either," he said. "Dress very fine, ain't it? Hubby over with you?"
"No," Esmé answered, irritably.
"Oh!" A comprehensive pause. "Let me know when to sheer off then. I'm doing nothing. Just over to look round. Lots of things to look at, eh? over here. Same sort look like peaches in the apple-house over in London."
Sir Thomas drank his tea. Esmé knew that in his shrewdly lewd little mind he quite believed that she had come to Paris to meet someone—looked on it as merely natural. Sir Thomas knew one code of life, and love had never come to make him wish he had not believed in it thoroughly.
He talked on lightly; with him no wife was faithful, no man a keeper of his marriage vow. He told of little scandals pleasantly; they were nothing in his eyes.
"She was very nearly caught that time. Dicky Margrave rolled up quite unexpectedly and milady had the forbidden fruit in her boudoir. She told him to turn his back and take off his coat, and clean the windows. 'Horrible mess in here, Dicky,' she said. 'Man's just finishing the windows. Come to the library.' The forbidden one walked out boldly two minutes later."
"But the servants?" said Esmé.
"Oh, if they tell, they go; also, they won't get other places; they keep quiet all right. Betty Margrave told me that herself. She's got Dicky in order now; he's afraid of reprisals about Caromeo."
So from story to story, a male Vivien carelessly blackening reputation.
Esmé told him so, growing impatient.
"Bless you! who's got 'em nowadays? We only treasure visiting lists," he mocked.
After a time Esmé talked herself, found herself enjoying the ever-pleasant task of pulling our friends to pieces, added a new whisper or two for Sir Thomas to elaborate.
"Just left the new Penelope, haven't you?" he said. "Denise Blakeney—she's into the starch bag after several years in hot water. No one but Cyrrie now, and he—well, he was always a gorgon husband. Saw a parson gazing at Denise last month at her big garden-party. 'There is a model of English wifehood, of truth and purity,' he said to something in brown muslin, whom I fancy was his wife."
"And if he knew," flashed Esmé, indignantly, and stopped.
"Knew what?" Sir Thomas grew interested.
"A little secret." Esmé's face grew grave. "Pah! if we all knew each other's secrets. If you knew mine and I yours."
"Haven't got any," he said comfortably. "Secrets are the kind of things you've to keep a flat for and a motor which they drive some other fellow out in. A day's amusement is my sort. But—you—you're a bit of a Penelope yourself, Mrs Carteret."
"Anything else is so stupid," said Esmé, laughing.
Sir Thomas, falling into complete bewilderment, asked Esmé to dinner when he found she was really alone. To forget her misery she was hilariously gay, telling smart little stories, flashing out sharp speeches, amusing the little man immensely.
"Kind of woman you don't know what to make of," grumbled Sir Thomas. "Lets you kiss her ear in the taxi, and gives yours a verbal boxing when you suggest supper in a quiet room. Gets herself up to look like what she's not, and is frightfully offended when she's taken for it. Tires one's eyes, that class of cipher. We'll read plain print again demain, thank the Lord."
Folly would never be Esmé's refuge; she sat in her room, her sleeping draught ready, wondering what life would be like if, for mere amusement, she had been what Sir Thomas took her for. There was not even a pretension of affection, but merely: "We are well met. You are pretty, your skin is soft, your eyes are bright; let us see how much joy we can steal from Time's storehouse."
"There must be crowds of people who are like that or he wouldn't think it so natural," said Esmé. "I believe Dollie wouldn't care—or Denise, once—but I—I could never forget my miseries by becoming a beast."
Then, soothed by the drug, she slept soundly, to wake with a parched mouth and heavy head, and lie tossing feverishly because her tea was late.
There were the three dresses. Fretting for them—more because she wanted to fret than because she really wanted them—Esmé went to the telephone.
"Is that Madame? No? Well, give her a message. Tell her I'll send over a cheque for those dresses from London. To alter and keep them for me—Mrs Carteret."
It was a weary journey back. When thoughts would come crowding in bitter array. If there was never to be a child, then they would never be rich. Only a week before Bertie had told her plainly that they could not go on spending so much. Here again Esmé blamed someone else. If Denise would only pay her regularly, it was all Denise's fault. There was two hundred owing now, since June. The thousand pounds vanished so easily. Dresses, bridge, furs, so many things that Esmé wanted, could not do without. If Bertie knew that besides what he knew to be spent she was using this other money, too.
If Denise would only pay up her debts for her, let her start fair again! Esmé looked sullenly at the calm sea. If not she would threaten to take the boy—she would take him. He would forget it all in time. Then, with a shiver, she thought of the telling, of the scandals, of tongues wagging, of the proving and altering, and, she was not pitiless, of Denise Blakeney's complete undoing.
Denise was still in Scotland. Rashly, pressed by her desire for the dresses, Esmé made up her mind to write.
Bertie met his wife at Charing Cross. With her irritable mood making her observant, Esmé noticed that his light overcoat was shabby, that he lacked smartness.
"Oh! Bertie!" She kissed him, eagerly glad to see him, always hoping to find comfort in his love. Then the barrier which her secret made rose, drearily, between them. They had so little to talk about now, so little in common.
"That coat's shabby, Bert. You must get a new one," she said impatiently.
"Not just now," he answered; "it's all right."
"It's not right." Esmé felt that he was hitting at her extravagances. "You shall get one. I'll buy it for you, Bert."
"Millionaire," he mocked. "Have you got some secret fount of money, Es? You never have enough to buy your own things, child. And—the doctor, Es—Legrand?"
"Says I'm to drink milk and eat turnips and pray," she said bitterly, "and live in the country, and sleep on ozone, and so forth."
"And—if you would?" His voice grew eager. "Oh! Esmé, if you would—just you and I together again."
The tenderness in his voice was forced there, stilling thoughts which would not sleep; he assured himself that with a fresh start, without perpetual extravagance and excitement, he would feel the old passion for his wife wake in him. Fresh air and exercise would banish the memory of the companion whose presence he longed for so much now.
"Come to Cliff End, Butterfly. Try it as a cure, with me as chief physician."
London, huge and splendid, flitted by them as the taxi rushed to the flats; the streets called to Esmé; the restaurants were lighted up, glowing golden behind their portals. She thought of the whimper of the wind, the thunder of the surf against the rocks; the dreariness of the country.
"I couldn't," she said at last; "the man doesn't understand. Town's my life, Bertie; all my pals are here. No, I couldn't."
"It will have to be Town with a difference very soon," he said, sighing.
Economy again—money; he thought of nothing else. She was not back five minutes and he was preaching at her. He could look up what he'd paid for her clothes last year. It wasn't so much. "And I'm better dressed than rich women," stormed Esmé, hysterically. "You might be proud of me instead of grumbling—always grumbling."
The taxi stopped at the door of the tall buildings. There was no home in it to Bertie. The hall porter greeted them. The lift took them upwards to their flat, past other flats, and then into the pretty rooms.
Marie was ready waiting, supplying the petit soins which Bertie had forgotten.
"Pauvre Madame is tired." Marie had a cup of coffee with but just a soupçon of eau de vie. The bath was prepared. She hovered round Esmé, getting a soft wrapper, soothing jangled nerves. Marie was a treasure!
Esmé took up her letters. Bills, invitations, more bills, a scrawl from Dollie asking them to dinner. Esmé had forgotten her ill-humour.
"Bertie, we're dining out—telephone to Dollie. Yes, I said we'd go."
Dollie Gresham's was better than dinner in the restaurant, or brought up by a flat-faced German to their dining-room. Bertie distrusted the tinned soup, the besauced entrées and tasteless meat. He was glad to go out. Esmé had told him nothing; he was hurt and would not show it.
"Ring up the coupé people, Marie. Dollie may be going to a theatre, Bert."
"We must owe them a fortune," was on Bertie's lips, but he stopped. To even ask if a taxi would do might disturb peace.
Dollie wanted them for bridge. Her little dinners surpassed Esmé's now. They were a party of eight, Dollie's bitterly clever tongue keeping away all fears of dullness.
"Cousin May was here to-night, Esmé; she came from Paris to-day also. She saw you there—at the Ritz, having a dinner with blue-eyed Tommy. You heard some pretty tales before that evening was over, Esmé. Let's have them now."
"Am I to undermine the peace of this dinner-table?" Esmé's wit was fairly ready, and she watched with a smile as women flushed and men looked uncomfortable.
"Unsavoury little dustman," said Bertie, sharply.
Esmé had not told him of her dinner. His look at her made the table know it, and gave them something to talk of afterwards.
"Sly Esmé, setting up as such a model too. And Tommy of all men. She was a friend of Jimmie Helmsley's once, too;don'tyou remember he dropped her for the Chauntsey girl?" people whispered. The teeth of Society loves a bone of scandal to crunch.
After dinner Bertie cut in at Dollie's table, and as her partner found himself absent, playing badly, losing tricks carelessly.
"I'm really sorry," he apologized, as their opponents went across for sandwiches. "I'll wake up now."
"You're out of sorts," Dollie said kindly. "What is it?"
"Debts," he said wearily. "We're the old proverbial china crock, Mrs Gresham, trying to swim with the brass one. What does it cost a woman to dress, Mrs Gresham?"
"It costs Esmé about fifteen hundred a year," said Dollie, shrewdly. "Claire is ruinous now. Never an evening frock under sixty, and the etceteras at so much an ounce. Then Esmé's furs are all new. She's a bad little lady going to Claire, and Lilie in Paris."
"Fifteen hundred!" Bertie laughed. "No, about three; and it's far more than I can manage."
"Three—grandmothers!" observed Dollie, blandly. "You see Claire's little bill and tell me then. You're very extravagant children. Esmé paid those electric people fifty pounds before you left London, and taxis are just as good."
"Fifty pounds!" Bertie shuffled the cards silently. He had not given Esmé fifty pounds for the garage. He certainly did not pay Claire's bill. His payments had been to big drapers, and to a tailor.
A sudden sickening doubt was assailing him. Was Esmé getting money he did not know of? Was he one among the hundreds of fooled husbands? He flung the thought away, and turned to the game, and played carefully.
But on the way home the thought returned.
"Esmé, we must pay these people," he said, trying to speak carelessly. "Not let it get too high."
"Oh, I sent them a sop to Cerberus months ago—a big one."
"But—I never gave it to you."
"No." He saw her hand move impatiently. "No, it was bridge winnings, I suppose. Or when Poeticus won the Hunt Cup. I forget."
Suspicion is a seed which, sown, grows, and will not be hoed up. Bertie came into his wife's room as she lay asleep, and looked sadly at her pale face. There was a small room next door, lined with cupboards; he went to it, opened the doors, saw the shimmer of satins and silks, the softness of chiffon and lace, the gleam of rich embroidery—dress upon dress. He had loved to see her well dressed, and not dreamt of the great cost of some of these mere wisps of evening gowns. Sixty pounds! Bertie shut the doors, feeling mean, as if he had spied, but he was not satisfied.
Had Esmé some way of getting money? Instead of sleeping, he did accounts; got up frowning, to go to sleep at last in the grey bleakness of an autumn morning, to wake with the little parasite, suspicion, gnawing at his heart.
He went into his wife's room after his breakfast; she did not come down for hers now. Esmé was up, her golden hair loose, waiting to have some brightening stuff rubbed into it.
She was bending over her jewel-case, choosing a necklace and pendant to wear.
"This clasp is loose, Marie; the clasp of these sapphires"—Esmé held up a thin chain holding together little clusters of sapphires and diamond sparks. "It's—oh! you, Bertie!"
"That's new, isn't it, Esmé?" He took the chain from her.
"New—if a year old is new."
"And this"—he snapped open two or three cases, holding glittering toys. "I didn't give you any of these, did I?"
Esmé moved impatiently. "Paste," she said suddenly. "Parisian! I can't go about always wearing the same old things, so I am foolish, and get these."
"Oh, paste!" He was putting back a pendant when he looked at the setting. Surely paste had a backing, was not set clear.
"They're wonderfully done," he said gravely. The satin lining of the case bore a Bond Street jeweller's name.
"Oh, wonderfully." Esmé snapped the case to. "And I get the cases so as to deceive my friends' maids. Run away, Bertie, you worry me standing there."
He went slowly. Esmé was lying to him. The things were real. Her jewel-box was full of new toys and trifles; he began to realize that her dresses were magnificent.
Her letters lay in a litter on her bureau, some half-opened, all tossed about as if they had worried her. One long slip oozed from its envelope, with a huge total at its foot. It was a bill for new furs. Another thick envelope bore the word "Claire" on the back.
A man has a right to see his wife's bills. Bertie took out the letter.
Madame Claire begged immediately for a cheque on account. She really must have a few—Bertie turned white—a few hundreds. A smaller slip of paper was enclosed. Amount of account furnished, three hundred and ten pounds. Yellow evening gown, lace overdress, seventy pounds. Blue tea gown, forty pounds. The total was for five hundred pounds.
Bertie laid it down with a sick feeling of despair. He could not pay this. It was impossible. Five hundred pounds to a dressmaker. Dollie Gresham had been right in her estimate. He sat looking at the dull blue of the drawing-room carpet, sat thinking hopelessly.
Then Esmé, in dull blue-green, masses of black making a foil to her fair skin, came back. A faint perfume clung about her, nothing emphasized, but the memory of sachets or little pieces of perfumed skin sewn into her dress.
The necklace of small sapphires and diamonds glistened at her throat. She was humming gaily, ready to write to Denise.
"Esmé!" Bertie raised his white face.
"Bertie! Have the Germans taken London, or is Lloyd George made Regent? Or—you're not ill, Bertie?"
"We can't go on, Esmé," he said. "I saw your account on your bureau there. Esmé, I can't pay it, unless we sell everything—go away."
He saw her hand clench, but she did not look at him.
"How dared you pry?" she began, then checked herself. "Paul Pry!" she mocked. "Paul Pry! But I can pay it."
"You? How?" he asked, getting up.
"How? I've won a lot lately," she said, after a pause. "I got some tips. I can pay it, Bertie."
"You've got money to your account, then?" he said, for he knew that she was lying again.
"Not now."
"Bookmakers," said Bertie, "pay on Mondays. Who is your man?"
"Oh!don'tbother, Bertie." Her hands shook as she began to write. "Denise did the bet for me. I'm writing to ask her to send it on now."
"Oh!" he said, more quietly still.
"I backed first one and then another," she said; "got it that way. So don't fret, Boy."
"But if you had not won," he said softly. "The account is not new, Esmé."
"I chanced it! I let the winnings go on to other gees." He could hear the anger rising in her voice. "I chanced it. Don't bother now, I'm writing."
"But I must bother, Esmé. We can't go on like this. We're getting poorer every day. If we had a child things would be different, but as it is Hugh Carteret will leave me Cliff End and what he allows me now—four hundred a year."
"And you'll be Lord De Vinci," she said.
"With a title and two mortgaged places, and every penny left to the girl. Esmé, if you can't pull in we must give up London."
"Not until London gives me up," she flashed out. "Leave me my own affairs, Bertie. If I make a bit it doesn't hurt you. You don't have to pay then."
"You're mad, Butterfly," he answered, "to dream of living by backing horses. Look here! Nothing's ever been the same since I went away that time. Esmé, we're young. Let's start again." He came nearer her.
If he had taken her in his arms she might have fought down the restless demon of anger and resentment which was tearing at her. But he did not touch her.
"Start in a sand castle by the sea," she mocked, "with limpets for friends and neighbours." And then suddenly her self-control gave way. She burst out hysterically and told him he wanted to make her miserable, to imprison her in the country; cried tears of sheer peevish temper; swore that all the world's luck was against her; that she had no pleasure, no real fun; that even a few rags paid for by herself were grudged to her.
After a little Bertie turned away, went out so quietly that she did not hear him go, and left Esmé raving in an empty room, until Marie with a tabloid came to soothe and comfort.
Bertie walked swiftly across London, up through the roar of Piccadilly, with its motor monsters, diving, stopping, rushing, with its endless flight of taxis, its horse vans out of place in the turmoil. It was cold, a thin rain falling; he walked on to narrower streets, and came to the grey, dull square where Estelle lived with her aunt. It was London at its dreariest; smoke-stained old houses, blinking out at a smoke-grimed, railed-in square. A few messengers delivering meat at area doors, a few tradesmen's carts standing about, now and then a taxi gliding through, spurning the thin slime of the quiet street. Decorous, old-fashioned carriages were drawn up at some of the doors, with large horses poking miserably at their bearing reins, and getting their mouths chucked as they did it by obese and self-satisfied coachmen. The self-centred life of a colony of quiet people was making its monotonous way from free lighting to lights out. People who lived next door and never knew each other, who revolved in their own little circles and called it living. Perhaps lived as happily as others, since to each their own life and drawing of breath.
"Was Miss Reynolds in? Yes?"
Estelle was dusting the china in the big, brown-hued drawing-room, an appalling museum of early Victorian atrocities, with efforts of the newer arts which followed the cumbrous solidity; pieces of black and gold, plush monkeys clinging to worked curtains, fret-work brackets and tables covered with velvet sandwiched in here and there.
Estelle dusted an offensive bronze clock with positive loathing. It was a gouty effigy of Time, clinging to his scythe because he must have fallen without it, and mournfully accepting the hour-glass set in his chest, which held a loudly-ticking clock of flighty opinions and habits; evidently, judging by his soured expression, a cross to the holder. Two large vases containing dyed pampas grass guarded each end of the mantelpiece; two others held everlastings.
Estelle had once said that the room inspired her with a deep longing to throw stones there, so as to break some of the monotony.
Mrs Martin, her aunt, padded softly in each morning, moving pieces of furniture back to their exact places if they had been stirred by visitors, patting the muslin antimacassars, pausing every time at the doorway to remark, "Is it not a charming room?" and then padding out again—she wore velvet slippers—to sit in the room at the back and stitch for the poor. Mrs Martin had reduced dullness, skilfully touched up with worthiness, to a fine art.
She gave Estelle complete liberty, because, behind her conventional stupidity, she herself had a mind which imagined no harm, a child's mind, crystal clear of evil thoughts. She had married, been widowed, lived blamelessly. The swirl of London was part of the newspaper world, "which everyone knows, my dear, the compositors make up as they go on," she told Estelle, "except of course the divorce cases, and no doubt half of those are not true."
The most blameless daily which could be procured was taken together with the Athenæum and the Sunday Chronicle.
"Oh, I shall throw them some day," said Estelle aloud to the vases.
"Who is that, Magennis?" said Mrs Martin to the butler. "Captain Carteret! I trust he has come to arrange an outing for Miss Reynolds."
"He does that often, 'e does," said Magennis, as he went back to his pantry. Magennis had not a mind of crystal purity. When he was younger he had been pantry-boy in a large country house.
"Bertie! What is it?" Estelle dropped one of the smaller vases. It crashed on to the silver brightness of the polished fender, making a litter of bright-flowered glass and crackling everlastings.
"It's broken," said Estelle.
"And so am I." Bertie crossed the room and took her hands. "And you cannot ever mend the vase, Estelle, but I wonder if you can mend me."
Estelle turned very white.
"I'm tired," he said drearily. "I feel as if the fates had drubbed me mentally, until my sore mind aches. We'll get another vase, Estelle"—for she was picking up the pieces with shaking fingers. "And I tell you, I have come to you to be mended," he went on, almost pitifully.
"But I—what can I do?" she whispered.
The room faded; she saw the open sea shimmering blue and green and opal; she felt again the love she had hoped she had fought down and put away.
"You can stop pretending," he said. "You can give me a little comfort, Estelle, a little love. I have lost faith in everything except you. And—I love you, Estelle," he added gravely.
The rush of mingled joy and sorrow made the girl gasp.
"But Esmé?" she whispered.
"Esmé was a will-o'-the-wisp—a false light on a marsh. You are the solid world. Estelle, I don't know where I am. Esmé has made a fool of me—and I can never care for her again. Will you help me—or see me go to the dogs alone?"
The cunning of man, turning the mother-love in woman, which he knows is stronger than passion, to his own ends. Man triumphant, merry, full of strength and hope, she may resist; but man broken, pitiful, needing her, is irresistible.
Bertie had sat down on the brown sofa; he was looking at her with dazed eyes.
"I'll help you, Bertie. I'll be all I can ... as your friend ... remember, only as your friend."
"Child, do you take me for a brute?" he said, as he drew her down beside him.
Poor Friendship, lending his cloak once more, standing mournfully as Love flings it over his pink shoulders; knowing so well how the god liked to hide and mock beneath the solid folds.
"Oh! I am so tired, Estelle," said Bertie.
Friends only—the cloak held firmly. But friends' lips do not meet with a thrill of joy; friends do not know the unrestful happiness which came to these two as they sat hand-in-hand—their two years' sham fight over.
"OH, bother!" said Denise Blakeney. "Bother!"
"What is it, Den?"
Sir Cyril sat on his wife's bed; he was up early, out about the place, arranging the day, looking at his horses, his herd of shorthorns, speaking to the keepers. His men feared Sir Cyril, and served him well.
Denise pushed a letter away.
She was pretty and fresh in her lace cap, her rose-pink wrapper.
"Oh, nothing!" she answered. "It's time to get up, isn't it?"
"To-morrow," he said, "it will be time an hour earlier."
"Shooting mornings are so long," yawned Denise.
"But what, or who, worried you, Den? Why did you exclaim?"
An insistent man, he held out his hand for the letter.
"Oh! nothing, Cyrrie. No, you mustn't see it. It's only from Esmé, grumbling. I couldn't show it to you. There are things about herself—her health." Denise talked very fast, growing a little breathless. "And she wants a little loan—and I'm short. She was so good to me that time abroad, you know—she—"
"She's rankly extravagant," said Cyril, equably. The silken quilt had slipped on one side; he saw the figures £200 written plainly. Sir Cyril sat thinking, frowning as he thought. He gave Denise a huge allowance to do as she chose with; but twice in the last year she had asked him for more.
"She's rankly extravagant," he went on, "and she must not worry you, my dear. I'll send her five-and-twenty."
"No, Cyril, not you—it would be a breach of confidence."
"There can be no breaches of confidence between a wife and her husband." His eyes hardened, his big jaw stuck out. "No secrets, Den. I tell you that, and I mean it. If she has asked you before I should have known. I expect to know again."
Stooping, he kissed her lightly, but she knew the meaning in his voice, knew and dreaded him. The folly of her petty sinning had been crossed out, but since then she was his, and he would stand no deceiving.
"You fool! to write to me," almost whimpered Denise.
Esmé had written excitedly. She had raved on at Bertie, stormed, cried, grown calm, and then angry. Money must be found now—must! Two hundred was not enough. Denise must send three, advance the money for January; she must give at least two hundred to the rapacious Claire. So her letter was a flurried one, lacking caution. "I must, Denise," she wrote—"Imusthave money. I could have it of my own if I—if I—upset everything. You know what I mean. So don't refuse me, old girl, for old sake's sake. Send me something to sell if you can't manage coin. I'm really in a corner. Bertie's grumbling, Claire pressing. You know what Hugh has said—that if I had a child he'd leave us money, and so—" then a long blank.
"She is mad," whispered Denise, now white to the lips, shaking from sick fear. "If she told, if it came out. I'd deny it all! She dare not; but—if she did!" She sat up, shivering, and Sir Cyril, looking in, saw her.
"That Carteret girl is worrying Den," he said to himself.
"And I haven't got it," muttered Denise. "I don't think so, and I daren't send off jewels, for that tiresome Studley counts them all, and nothing wants mending."
She must slip into the town, get money and send it off. Cyrrie had been looking over her accounts lately; she had had to draw out money in small sums, and send them on.
Denise was frightened. She was going down when she saw the tell-tale letter lying on her bed. She ran back, tore it up, burnt it in her fire; came to breakfast shaken and looking ill.
Cyril was making his own tea; Denise took coffee; the boys, in their high chairs, were solemnly eating bread and milk, eating fast that they might reach the stage of scrambled eggs, and later, honey or jam.
"Oh, Cyril, how you mess!" Cyril had dropped his spoon. "You shan't have any jam now, or egg—only bread and butter."
"You're hard on him, Den. Any fellow can drop a spoon."
"He can also learn to hold it. Now don't cry, Cyril."
"I never does," said Cyril, quietly. "Never, mumsie."
"No—you sulk." Denise was venting her irritation on the boy.
Big Cyril was thinking. He thought quietly, and, equally quietly, acted. Denise must not be weak enough to go on paying for one winter's kindness.
"Say sorry and mumsie will give us jam," said Sir Cyril.
"Didn't drop it a pupus, dads." The clear baby eyes met Sir Cyril's, filled with the mystical reasoning of childhood. "Not a pupus—the dog joggled me, dad."
Sir Cyril grinned gently; Denise muttered something, and he helped the boys to egg.
Cyril, forgetting the wisdom of silence, wished to know why hens wouldn't lay eggs scrambled, an' save cook's trouble, and Cecil suggested telling the fowl-woman.
"I am going to Insminton, Cyril. I have to get some things."
"Yes. I'll come in with you. No one will be here before one."
Denise flushed; then she must go in the afternoon, and the bank would be shut.
She sat fidgeting, afraid to the bottom of her shallow soul of the big-jawed man she had married.
She had seen him angry—knew the depths of his cold anger, and his ideas of justice. The hard Blakeney pictured faces frowned down upon her from the dining-room walls; a race of human steamrollers, driven by the power of determination; diving aside respectfully for what they realized to be the rightful traffic of the road of life, but coming on mercilessly to grind what needed grinding.
"Coming, Den?" Sir Cyril called from the door.
Denise came reluctantly; she must pretend to have some errands, for she knew she would get no opportunity now of going to the bank. Her husband would do his own work quickly, then drive her about, waiting for her.
The big drapers scored by an order for silk and for table linen.
Mr Holmes, the grocer, rubbing his fat chin, decided that sardines must be about to be used as fish by the great, seeing that he had supplied a dozen boxes the day before and was asked for another dozen now.
"Finished, Den?"
"Yes. I think I've forgotten something, though." Denise was driven home, answering questions, but not speaking, frightened, and too visibly ill at ease.
"H'm!" said Sir Cyril to himself.
He went to his study to write, stayed there until the luncheon gong rang, came out to find the first arrivals in the morning-room, and to see Denise, her colour high, hurrying in.
"I'm so sorry I'm late. I had to run over to the Vicarage to give the vicaress some books for her club. I forgot them this morning."
Denise had been to the bank, extracted two hundred pounds in notes from a beaming manager. She came in a little nervously, looking aside at Sir Cyril. The big man would have made a good detective. His hard eyes narrowed a little, his big chin shot out. Denise was not in the least likely to have remembered the books for the vicar's wife without some other motive. Without the faintest suspicion of Denise in his mind, he summed it all up.
"That Carteret woman's worried the girl; she went to get her the money." After all, the Carteret woman had been once full of devotion; Denise had heaps of money; but it must not go too far. Cyril Blakeney was a man who walked straight to his goal. He meant to ask Denise how much she had sent, to warn her against being bled.
He ate his plainly-cooked luncheon, almost in silence. A thorough Englishman, eating large helpings of roast beef and vegetables, topped up by a steamed pudding and cheese. A mouthful of something highly flavoured had no attractions for Cyril Blakeney.
Denise, picking at a cutlet, watched him, grew brighter as she began to feel certain that she had managed everything so well. She would have her own money soon, send on the advance to Esmé.
Denise pulled out the one foot she had dabbled into the Slough of Despond. She walked gaily again in the sunshine on firm ground.
And yet the cue was on the call-boy's lips; the drama was being played out, and a net she never dreamed of closing about her.
By tea-time the party had nearly assembled; they took it in the big drawing-room, chilled people coming gladly near the blazing fire, drinking hot tea, eating tea-cakes and hot biscuits as if dinner were twenty-four hours away.
Lucy Richmond, a big blonde, married to one of the best shots, came to sit by Denise. She was a dull, stupid woman, deeply impressed by herself. Hostesses were profoundly bored by Mrs Richmond, but she delighted in house-parties and was comfortably certain that Gus, her lean little husband, was only asked for her sake.
"So nice to be here again, dear Lady Blakeney. I do love your big house. And now tell me all about the babies, and how they are."
Denise nibbled a sandwich, and looked for rescue. She was lamentably ignorant as to flannel undervests and patent foods.
"The little one is in knickers now, I expect, isn't he? I hope he wears...."
Denise's appealing eyes raked Sir Thomas from his chair; they called openly for help.
"That he wears really fine wool," said Mrs Richmond, heavily. "No, Sir Thomas, run away; you're not interested in children's clothes."
"In knickerbockers," giggled Denise, faintly.
"Not going to come out with the guns in 'em really, are you?" said Sir Thomas, blandly, ignoring everything except the last words. "Sportin' of you, Mrs Rich—very. Has Raleigh taught you shootin' then?"
Mrs Richmond sniffed angrily.
"Get me some tea," said Denise, "and oh, here's Cyril."
The big man strolled across to his wife, handing her a telegram from a delayed guest.
"Nuisance," he said; "good shot, too."
"Oh! Lady Blakeney, I must show you my new pendant." Lucy Richmond forgot knickerbockers, and turned to a fresh subject. "One of those dear, old-fashioned, heavy things. Raleigh sent me to buy myself a birthday present, and it had just come in to Benhusan's."
Unfastening a clasp, she held the jewel out. Seeing it, Denise felt her colour ebb until she feared her cheeks must be deathly white. It was the pendant she had given to Esmé. Why had the woman chosen this moment?
"It's just like yours, Den"—Sir Cyril took the jewel in his big fingers—"exactly the same."
"I love these dear old-fashioned solid things," babbled Lucy Richmond. "As it was heavy, it wasn't so dear. Benhusan told me he had just bought it, but that they had made it originally themselves."
"Oh!" Sir Cyril sat down. "Yes. Bought it when, did you say?"
A bore is a person stocked with date and detail. Lucy Richmond loved a listener. How interesting she was, she felt, as she re-clasped the ugly pendant. Oh, on such a day—at such an hour.
Close by Denise sat listening, afraid to speak, hoping she was not showing her fear, her heart fluttering.
"Yes. Curiously, my wife has a duplicate of this, one an old aunt gave to her. Wear yours to-night, Denise."
"I hate it, Cyrrie," she faltered.
"Yet wear it," he said very quietly, and strolled away. Sir Cyril never seemed to hurry.
Denise, for the best reasons, could not wear the pendant. Wild thoughts shot through her head. Should she go to Mrs Richmond, borrow the diamonds, make up a story? No, for the gossiping fool would repeat it all over London.
It was late when Denise came to her room; she sent her maid away, sat by the fire. It was so comfortable there; she was surrounded by rich things; her dressing-table gleamed with gold and ivory; her bed was carved white wood, a nest of silken eider-down.
And if Cyril knew.
He came in then, quietly, walked to the fire and stood looking down at her.
Some silences are harder to bear than words. Denise shivered nervously.
"You did not wear the pendant to-night, Denise."
"No," she said miserably.
"Because you could not. Denise, why lie to me?"
"I—I," she crouched down in her big chair, sick, frightened, wondering what lie might serve her best.
"I know Benhusan," he said. "I rang him up at his own house. Den—Esmé Carteret took that pendant, and—you lied to screen her."
The woman cowering in the chair turned as red as she had been pale, felt as some sinking swimmer who suddenly feels ground beneath his feet.
"I saw her standing at your safe, opening and shutting cases. She thought you might never miss this thing, as she knew you hated it. Denise, I don't blame you; but one cannot know a thief. It was that, was it not?"
Stronger people have taken their rescue at the cost of a friend's reputation. Denise was not strong; she was shallow-natured and afraid and shaken.
"Oh, Cyril," she said, beginning to cry. "Oh! don't tell a soul. Oh, promise—promise! She wanted money so badly."
"Money to spend upon herself, upon frocks and furs and entertainment. Den, she must not come to the house again. And this exonerates you from sending her gifts of money."
Sick fear jumped to life again. If there was any difficulty with Esmé's allowance the whole story might come out; she might still be ruined, disgraced.
But reflection brought comfort; there would be heaps of ways of managing the money.
Denise put her arms round Cyril's neck and pleaded for silence for her friend; let the stigma of thief fall on another woman, and wondered why she had found so easy a way out.
"I don't blame you, Den—don't cry." He held his wife closely. "But don't lie to me, girl! Don't! even to save other people. I must have truth. Must—and—will. The past's past; the future's mine, Denise, remember that."
He held her away a little, so that he could see her face. "You took some money out to send this wretched woman to-day. Don't send it now. How much was it?"
"It was not all for her, Cyril; she wanted—fifty," stammered Denise. "I got a lot—I was thinking of buying those ponies and the little trap for the boys as a surprise. You know, Edwardes' pair."
It was a good lie this time; he had no suspicion.
"Well, put your money back," he said kindly. "I'll get that. I'll put it in for you to-morrow ... send it for you."
Denise Blakeney did not sleep that night; and next day, driving into the town, she lost a valuable ring; it was loose, must have slipped off in her glove.
Esmé, opening the parcel, read a letter which surprised her.
"You were mad to write, Esmé, mad! All kinds of things have happened, and I cannot tell you. Take these stones out to sell them. I've said I lost the ring. And don't go to Benhusan's."
Sir Cyril, before he promised silence to his wife, had talked too openly to Amos Benhusan; said more than he had perhaps intended to.
Mr Benhusan had not promised silence; he talked a little, discreetly, but he talked.
Esmé bought her Paris frocks; paid something to Claire. Denise had sent her something valuable; but when the Blakeneys came to London, and she called, the "Not at home" was unmistakable.
"When would her ladyship be in?"
"Could not say, madam."
The door respectfully pushed to. Sir Cyril, meeting her, passed her with a cold bow.
Esmé rang up furiously. What was it? She must know.
"Not here. I can't talk here." Denise's voice was hurried and strained. "Meet me at the club to-morrow—at eleven."
Esmé kept her appointment punctually.
"Down here, Esmé—down in this lounge." Denise hurried to a dim corner, poured out a badly-jointed tale.
It was the letter. Cyril had caught sight of some of it, been furious; Esmé must keep away. It was the only plan. "And never come near the boy, never," wailed Denise, "never. After all, you never wanted him. You mustn't come to the Square. Cyril would suspect."
A passion of anger rent Esmé. Not to see the little son she had sold. Not to spend the half-hours which sent her away yearning and wistful. Not to bring sweets to the unloved child; to try to be his friend.
"Then, if you're not good to him," she stormed out, "by Heaven, Denise! I'll have him back. And for money, I must have my payment, but the boy comes first. Be good to him."
A sneer from Lady Blakeney. It was a little late to prate of mother-love, to assume virtue. Esmé had hated the idea of the baby coming. It was rubbish to suppose that anyone so hard-hearted could want to bother now. "I wouldn't have sold my child," sneered Denise. "No real woman would. Let cant alone, Es."
A pretty quarrel between two well-bred women who, with primitive instinct itching their fingernails, flashed out sharp truth and sharper innuendo.
A couple of women passing in saw the two.
"Hullo! I think that Esmé and Denise are disagreeing." Lady Mary Ploddy peered down the corridor. "They're flaming at each other. Look, Sukey."
Lady Sukey, her sister, looked; she even listened. "Quite interestin'," she drawled languidly. "Quite!"
When Esmé, flushed and furious, had gone out of the club, she flung back a last threat which left Denise raw with fear and anger, so irritated that her words were not quite under her control. She forgot caution, only wanted to hurt.
"Denise, you've been fighting with your Esmé," said Mary Ploddy.
"I was telling her I could not go on being friends and she resented it," said Denise, unsteadily.
"Couldn't? Why?" It was ill-fortune for Esmé that Denise should meet two women who loved a scandal dearly.
"Oh, never mind why. Cyril has forbidden me to. It's something I could not tell; nothing to do with morals."
"Money then?" Lady Mary's eyes were glowing with curiosity. "Only money and morals nowadays in the sin catalogue."
"Oh, never mind—she's impossible," snapped Denise, and, flustered, shaken, went out.
"It's something bad. Scratch the Carteret woman's name off the list of your Bridge Tournament, Sukey. I'll drop a hint to the Rollestones, too, for their dinner and dance."
So a whisper grew. Esmé, going to a big reception that night, caught one or two frigid bows from women who had smiled the day before.
The rooms were crowded, full of notabilities. The reception was in honour of a French diplomatist and his wife; the tripping tongue was as much used in the rooms as English.
"There is one lady whom I wish to see." Dr Legrand looked at the brilliant crowd. "Milady Blakeney."
"So, Monsieur. She is close to us—passing downstairs. There—in grey-blue—with the diamond stars."
"But, non, that is a dark lady." The doctor stared, puzzled.
"My nephew attended milady in Italy; but she is fair."
"No, Monsieur; she was always dark. He's muddled her with Esmé Carteret, who was with her. She is brilliantly fair. She might—yes—there she is, just going out."
Legrand turned, caught a fleeting glimpse of Esmé, started.
"Meeses Carteret," he half whispered. "But surely, it is so like the Mrs Smith of London. I seem to know this Mrs Carteret," he said aloud.
"She is a pretty woman. Oh!"
For Legrand had slipped away, struggled to the far doorway to get to Esmé, caught a glimpse of a fair head on the stairs, but got no nearer.
But that night he drew the strands of fate closer, for he wrote to Luigi:
"I have seen your Lady Blakeney, and she is brown-haired, ordinarily pretty, no fair-haired goddess. If you will join me here for a day—get Cartier to act for me. Thy Nonno."
Luigi arranged to come to London in ten days' time.
As fog spreads, cold and bitter, so a whisper crossed London.
Esmé, restlessly pleased by new dresses, by money to gamble with, went to the Holbrooks. Came, without thought of the scandal which was biting at her name, down to dinner.
The new dinner-gown clung to her long, thin limbs; she was haggardly, dazzlingly handsome.
Lady Mary Ploddy was at the fire.
"How cold it is!" Esmé had played bridge for years with the Ploddy women.
Lady Mary went on talking to Vita St Just as if she had heard nothing.
"How goes bridge, Lady Mary?" Esmé said, carelessly. "Been winning lately? We can play in the mornings here."
Mary Ploddy's powdered profile was slowly turned.
"Oh, you, Mrs Carteret," she said icily. "I am rather off bridge. Vita, shall we sit down?"
The whisper to yet another friend:
"Oh, something. Her old friend, Denise Blakeney, has had to cut her. Sir Cyril insisted. I heard that it was something about a pendant. Amos Benhusan told one or two people—you know, the big jeweller."
The chill deepened. Esmé was left alone at the fire, realizing suddenly that the women had drifted away from her. She looked at them curiously, turned to talk to a couple of men who came in, and forgot it. Something had put out the old Ploddy women, she decided carelessly.
But that evening, next day, Esmé began to realize people were avoiding her. She saw glances as she came into a room; she noticed the sudden hush which told her she was being discussed.
What was it? What could it be? The Holbrooks' party gave her no pleasure. For a time she tried to think it was jealousy, envy of her gowns, but Esmé was not small-minded; the thought had to be put away.
She sat up for Bertie one night, called him in from the small room off hers, where he slept.
"Bertie! these women are avoiding me," she flung out. "What is it? I've done nothing. They keep away from me—are almost rude; there's something, Bertie."
"Lord!" He sat down, staring at his wife. She looked haggard, worn; older than her years. He began to think. People had been curiouslykindto him since he had come. He had been almost fêted by the men; they had "dear old chapped" him, asked him to play bridge and billiards, praised his shooting, offered to lend him horses, with a whispering undernote of pity in it all.
"Lord! It—must be nonsense, Butterfly," he said kindly, with something telling him that it was not. They had got wind, he thought, of Esmé's extravagance, and then he shook his head. What were debts to women who thought it smart to evade them, who paid exorbitant bills because they had been running too long to check them, who all wanted a little more than they had got?
"It must be nonsense," he said gruffly. "Scandal wouldn't offend them, even if you'd ever gone in for it. Want of money is nothing. Perhaps you've won a bit too much off 'em at bridge, or attracted someone's private man-property."
"I haven't," she said irritably. "Well, good-night."
Luke Holbrook, big and good-natured, paddled across his palm-court next day to the stiff room where he knew he would find his wife writing letters.
"Seem to have made another mess of it, my love," he said mildly. "Went to Sukey Ploddy now about what you told me, and she swears it's true. Telephoned to Benhusan. He wouldn't commit himself. Very awkward, my love, having the woman here."
"Too awful," said Mrs Holbrook. "To have stolen a friend's diamonds! That's it, isn't it? Gracious!" said Mrs Holbrook, weakly. "And Daisy Ardeane coming to-day."
"Bad as the dancer, my love." Luke Holbrook stroked his fat chin. "Bad as the dancer. See theMorning Post, my love?"
He picked it up.
"'A marriage has been arranged and will take place immediately between the Marquis of Boredom and Miss Maisie Moover, of Magnificent fame.'"
"The Duchess, my love, is having hysterics at the Hyde Park Hotel. Ploddy informs me that his cousin Trentwell is attending. She cut me dead last week in the Park, my love; and all because we wished to amuse a Cabinet minister."
"That affair," said his wife, "may alter the Boredoms' missing chins. But this is important. I can't have Esmé Carteret here."
Mr Holbrook remarked that actions for libel were unpleasant, and that Carteret was an excellent fellow; then he sighed.
"The woman has been living at a ridiculous pace," snorted Mrs Holbrook. "French frocks, furs, out everywhere and in debt."
"I'm afraid I'm horribly sorry for her; she looks wretched." The big man got up. "Debt's the devil, Maria."
"The reminders generally go to a hot place," said his wife, absently. "Think it over, Luke. Help me."
"I must, my love," said Luke, meekly.
And then chance cut the difficulty in two. Esmé, picking up theMorning Post, saw another paragraph.
"Sir Cyril Blakeney's son and heir was to-day run over by a taxi-cab. Lady Blakeney was with her two children, returning to her house, when the eldest boy stepped off the footpath and was caught by the wheel of a passing cab. Faint hopes are entertained of his recovery."
The paper slipped from Esmé's hands; she grew numb and cold.
"She pushed him," she whispered to herself. "She was angry and pushed him."
Her boy! Her baby! She knew now what she had sold and lost. Panting out his tiny life, dying!
Esmé got up slowly, came numb and white to her hostess.
She had had bad news; she lied dully, carelessly; a cousin was ill; she must leave at once. But if they liked to keep Bertie she was sure he would stay.
"I must be near him; I must be near him," rang the tortured longing of her heart. If he died she must see him buried; stand by his grave.
Something in the stricken face touched Mrs Holbrook. A motor could come round at once; catch the eleven-o'clock train; she was sorry.
"Thank you. My maid can follow. Thank you and good-bye."
"She went herself, my love," said Luke, contentedly.
Oh! crawling slowness of the big car; of the flying express train; biting fear of what might be as she reached London.
Their flat was cold, dusty; Esmé did not notice it; she unhooked the telephone.
"Who is that—Mrs Stanson?" A pause. "Howis the child?"
Swaying, Esmé listened.
"Better—almost out of danger. It was exaggerated; his arm is crushed, but there are no internal injuries we hope. Who am I to say asked?"
The nurse had not recognized the hoarse voice.
"The ... Duchess of Boredom. Thank you ... thank you!"
A great wave of relief swept over Esmé. Her boy would not die. Then, later, fresh waves of depression. He was not out of danger. Children went out in a minute. The hours dragged and she was afraid to ask again. Then, still sitting there, hunched in a cold room, she rang up.
Denise's voice answered. "Who? Oh, it's you, Esmé. I'll shut the door. Now don't get hysterical, don't! The boy's doing well. He was naughty; it was his fault."
"You pushed him," stormed Esmé.
"Who told you?" Denise stopped, her voice grew ill-humoured. "No, you must not come here. I'll let you know. Oh, I promise I will. Don't be absurd."
Esmé sat on, taking no count of passing hours.
"But, oh, my poor Madame," wailed Marie, as she came in, "perished and alone."
Marie, of course, had made up her mind to an intrigue. Madame had not gone for nothing. Marie was disappointed. But she lighted the fire, sympathized, sent for hot tea and toast, flitted about with a world of surmise hidden behind her black eyes.
What was it? What trouble was Madame in? Knowledge was useful to clever people.
The telephone bell whirred; before Esmé could come Marie had snatched up the receiver.
"Is that you, Esmé? Quick! I've no time. The boy is doing well. What? Not Mrs Carteret? Oh, call her—at once."
No necessity to call the woman who came flying in, her eyes wild with anxiety. Esmé listened for a moment, then came back to her tea slowly.
It was Milady Blakeney's voice; Marie knew it.
"There is something then amiss with the little Master Blakeney, Madame?" the maid said softly.
"He is hurt, ill. His mother hates him," Esmé burst out, then checked herself.
"It is sad that Madame who loves so much a bébé should not have a little son," said Marie. "I thought ... when I left Madame...."
Esmé felt the flood of scarlet rushing to her tell-tale cheeks. With a quick movement she dropped her cup and cried out.
"When I left Madame," murmured Marie to herself, "and Madame is now so attached to the little boy Blakeney. I wonder, oh, I wonder!" muttered the Frenchwoman.
Little Cyril mended rapidly. His hand and arm were crushed, might never be used freely again; but there were no fatal injuries.
Deep in her heart, after the first remorse for the angry push which she had given the child, Denise had hoped that he might die. Once dead there would be no more danger of detection. Esmé would give up worrying her.
There was a dance next night given by a newcomer to London, an Italian Marchese.
Denise went to it, for Cyril was out of danger.
Three times Esmé had rung up to know if she might see the child, and Denise had answered: "No, no! Cyril was suspicious. Esmé must not come."
The Marchese had taken a big house in Eaton Place, had spared no expense on her entertainment.
Esmé, with her cheeks too pink, her eyes bright and hard, felt anew the frost which was creeping about her. Friends bowed coldly; she saw nods, shrugged shoulders.
She met Jimmie Gore Helmsley near the ball-room door. He was watching for a new love, a pretty little woman of twenty, married to a dull man who merely adored her and therefore took no pains to show it. The girl turned from gold to tinsel, because tinsel glittered and was more pleasing to the eye.
"Oh, Jimmie, you!" Esmé was glad to see him. "Any news?"
"Heaps!" he said coolly. "Sorry I can't stay to tell it you, fair lady. It's curious news."
Jimmie was paying off a score. He was openly unfriendly. Esmé stood partnerless, hurt by the snub for a time, until she flashed smiles on boys who bored her, simply that she might not be alone.
She saw Denise splendidly dressed, glittering with jewels; saw, too, that Denise backed and tried to slip away to avoid a meeting.
"How is he?" Esmé darted through the crowd. Sir Cyril stood near his wife, his big face set coldly.
"The boy? Oh! much better, thank you. So nice of you to take an interest in him." Denise's voice shook from nervousness.
"May I not come to see him?"
Sir Cyril interrupted quietly. "Impossible," he said, "impossible, Mrs Carteret. The boy is to be kept quiet. Come, Denise."
It was an open snub, given before people who looked on full of malicious curiosity.
Esmé stood, white under her rouge; there was something, and she did not know what it was.
"Come, let us go to supper." She turned, laughing, to her partner. "I'm thirsty."
The lighted room, masses of flowers, gay dresses and bright jewels, swam before her eyes. Then at the door she saw Luigi, and saw him wave and smile to her.