53
“I am sure we are,” Esther said. She really did think so; she had never met any one in the least like June Mason before. She began to feel glad that she had come to this house. It was much more expensive than the Brixton Road, certainly, but it was well worth it, even if only because she had met this quaint little woman.
It was nearly seven o’clock before she thought of going back to her own room, and then it was only the chiming of a clock on the shelf that roused her.
“Nearly seven!” She started up in dismay. “I had no idea it was so late. I am sorry for having stayed so long.”
“There’s nothing to be sorry for,” June declared. “You may go shares with this room if you like. I’m out so much, it isn’t used half the time. Think it over, will you?”
Esther flushed nervously.
“It’s awfully kind of you; I should love to, but I couldn’t afford it. I’m really paying more money now than I ought to. I want to save, too–––”
Miss Mason laughed.
“For the wedding! Lucky girl! I hope you’ll ask me to come and see you married––and I hope he’s very nice,” she added.
“He is,” said Esther eagerly. “And he’s very handsome,” she added shyly.
But Miss Mason was not impressed.
“I don’t care a fig if a man is handsome or not,” she said bluntly. “If he’s just manly and straightforward and kind, that’s all I expect him to be. Now look here––we have dinner at half-past seven in this establishment. It’s only supper really, but we all put on our best blouses––if we’ve got any––and call it dinner. I’ll call for you on the way down and we’ll go in together. I’ll tell Mrs. Elders you are going to share my table, if you like; it’s deadly dull sitting alone.”
“I should like to sit with you very much,” Esther said eagerly. “But I really haven’t got a ‘best’ blouse.” She glanced down at the plain white silk shirt she wore; it54had been washed many times, and had lost its first freshness.
“Come down as you are, then,” Miss Mason urged, “and I will too! I hate changing. This yellow rag is good enough for the old tabbies we get here.”
Esther went half-way down the stairs and came back.
“Charlie––I’ve forgotten Charlie.”
“Charlie can stay where he is till bedtime,” June declared. “You can come up and fetch him then. Hurry, or you’ll be late.”
Esther went down to her room, feeling more light-hearted than she had done for a long time.
As she unpacked her boxes and tidied her hair she could hear June Mason moving about upstairs, singing cheerily.
“I’m going to like her––I’m going to like her awfully,” she told herself. She hurried to be ready in time, but the rather unmelodious dinner-bell had clanged through the house twice before June came to the door.
“You’ve unpacked, then?” she said. She looked round the small room approvingly. “I can see you’re one of the tidy ones,” she said. “I’m not; I wish I were. However, we can’t all be the same. Are you ready?”
She took Esther’s arm and they went downstairs together.
“Every one knows you’re coming,” June said as they neared the dining-room. “Every one always knows everything that goes on here. Don’t take any notice if they stare a lot; they must stare at something, poor darlings. I’ll tell you who they all are and all about them.”
The dining-room was a long, narrow sort of room that looked as if it once had been two rooms recently thrown into one; the floor was covered with slippery green linoleum, and there was a long table running almost the length of the room, with a few smaller ones on either side.
A grey-haired woman with pebble glasses stood at the55head of the long table; Esther recognised her as the proprietress, Mrs. Elders.
She said good-evening to Esther and stared frigidly at June, as if she did not like to see the two girls together. She did not approve of the little face cream lady, though she was careful never to say so, as June was one of her best paying propositions.
Esther was glad when they reached their own table; glad, too, that she was more or less out of the way of curious glances.
The dinner was plain, but infinitely superior to the fare she had had to put up with in the Brixton Road.
“Do you have all your meals here?” she asked June presently.
“No––only breakfast and supper––and not always supper. I go out with friends sometimes. Every one hasn’t given me up just because my family have. But the food is quite good here. They’re rather too fond of rice and stewed apples; but it might be worse. Turn round presently and look at the man behind you with the grey hair. Isn’t he handsome? We call him the colonel, though I don’t believe he’s a colonel at all. He’s a dear, but he always complains about everything. I know he gives notice regularly on Saturday morning and takes it back again on Saturday night. Mrs. Elders would think he wasn’t well if he missed giving her notice.”
She laughed, and turning in her chair spoke to a young man who was sitting alone at one of the smaller tables behind her.
“Is your cough better?” she asked. “I’m going to give you some special stuff to-night for it. No, it isn’t at all nasty.” She turned back to Esther. “May I introduce Mr. Harley––he’s the most interesting person in the whole house. He writes stories and things, Mr. Harley, this is Miss Shepstone––a great friend of mine.”
Harley bowed. He was pale, delicate-looking young man with fine dark eyes.
56
“You never told me that you knew Miss Shepstone,” he said to June.
“I didn’t know her till this afternoon,” she answered promptly; “but I make friends quickly, as you know.”
“You’ll like Harley,” she told Esther presently in an undertone. “He’s very clever, but so delicate, poor boy! He ought to live in the country instead of in London. He’s the sort of person I should love to help if I were rich.”
“It must be wonderful to be rich,” Esther said. There was a little flush in her cheeks; she was really enjoying herself. “It’s the dream of my life to have enough money to be able to do anything I like,” she added earnestly. “Just for a month! If I could be really rich just for one month I wouldn’t mind going back to being poor again.”
Miss Mason said “Rubbish!” briskly. “Money can’t buy happiness, my dear, and don’t you forget it. My people think it can, and lots of other people think the same. It only shows what fools they are. It was the money my people couldn’t get over when I declined to marry Micky Mellowes....” She made a little wry face. “I remember my mother coming into my room one night in her dressing-gown––poor soul!––when she heard I’d told Micky there was nothing doing, and saying tragically: ‘June, you must be mad––stark, staring mad! Why, the man’s as rich as Crœsus!’”
“Rich!” Esther was conscious of an odd little sinking at her heart. “Is Mr. Mellowes rich, then?” she asked constrainedly.
Miss Mason was helping herself to a pat of butter. She held it poised for a moment on the end of her knife while she answered––
“Rich? I should think he is! He’s one of the richest men in London.”
“One of the richest men in London!––but he–––” Esther had been going to add “But he told me that he was poor;” she only just checked the words in time.
June nodded.
57
“He’s the despair of all the match-making mammas,” she said lightly. “Over thirty, he is, and still a bachelor! I’m not sure if he isn’t on the verge of being caught now, but you never can tell! With a little luck he may escape––she isn’t good enough for him, anyway. Have you finished? I’m dying for a cigarette, and we aren’t allowed to smoke here. Come up to my room and I’ll make you some coffee; the stuff they give us here isn’t fit to drink.”
She pushed back her chair and rose, and Esther followed.
She kept her eyes down as she walked the length of the room; the colour rose in her cheeks as she realised how every one was staring at her. The colonel, whom June had declared was not a colonel at all, rose and held the door open for them to pass out.
June chuckled as they went upstairs.
“You’ve made an impression, my dear! It isn’t often he does that for any one.” She slipped an arm through Esther’s. “Why are you frowning so? Have I said anything to annoy you?”
Esther laughed.
“Of course not. I was only thinking.... Do you––do your friends ever come here to see you?”
She was thinking of Micky Mellowes, and wondering if he ever came to the boarding-house, and if so, why he had not told her that he knew somebody living here. After all, if he had deceived her in one instance he would do so in many others––she felt a curious sense of hurt pride; why had he gone out of his way to tell her he was a poor man, when all the time–––?
“To tell you the truth,” June said frankly, “none of my friends know where I am living. Call it false pride if you like, but there you are. I have all my letters, except business ones, sent to my club––I belong to an unpretentious club––I’ll take you there some day––and not even Micky knows that I live here. You see, when I flew in the face of providence, otherwise my noble family,58they stopped my allowance, so as I’m entirely self-supporting, I had to be careful and live inexpensively, so I came here. And I’m very comfortable. If I want to meet any of my friends we meet out somewhere. I think it’s better; it leaves me quite free....”
They were back in her room again now, and Charlie had looked up with one eye from his mauve cushion, and purred, by way of a greeting.
June lit a cigarette and rushed about in pursuit of the coffee-pot. All her movements were quick. She seemed to breathe life and energy.
Esther walked over to the fireplace, and found herself looking at Micky’s photograph.
After all, he was just like all the other men she had ever known; apparently none of them could be simple and sincere; she supposed it had been his way of condescending to her, to pretend that he was poor and in similar circumstances to herself; perhaps he had guessed that she would never have allowed him to pay for her supper or tea, or have talked to her as he had done, if she had known him to be a rich man.
She need never see him again, that was one thing; her heart hardened as she met the frankness of his pictured eyes; he was not as honest as he looked.
She had mistaken condescension for kindness. She bit her lip with mortification as she recalled the confidence she had made to him only that afternoon. He was probably laughing at it now, and no doubt would repeat all she had said to his friends as a good joke.
She went to her own room as soon as she had had the coffee. She made the excuse that she was tired, but when she went upstairs she sat down on the side of the bed and made no effort to undress. A sort of shadow seemed to have fallen on her spirits. She felt mortified that Micky should so deliberately have lied to her; her cheeks burned as she thought of the despair she had been in last night when she met him. She hoped she would never see him again.
59
She looked round the little room with angry eyes. If only Fate had set her feet in sunnier paths. She looked at the plain furniture and cheap carpet; the wallpaper was hideous; there was a frightful oleograph of two Early Victorian women with crinolines and ringlet curls hanging over the mantlepiece. They both looked smug and self-satisfied. There was an enlarged photograph of a bald-headed man wearing a Masonic apron on another wall. He was fat and had his right hand plastered carefully along a chair-back to bring into prominence a large signet ring. Esther looked at him and shivered. She felt utterly alone and cut off from the world. She longed for Raymond Ashton with all her soul. She hated Micky Mellowes because his kindly condescension had made her feel her position more acutely now she knew him to be what he was.
In spite of the new friend she had made in June Mason she felt lonely and unwanted; she began to cry like a child, as she sat there on the side of the iron bedstead; the tears ran down her cheeks and she made no effort to wipe them away.
She wanted to be happy so badly, and it seemed as if she never was to be happy. The elation that had come to her when she read Micky’s letter that morning had faded miserably; after all, what was a letter when it was a real, living personality she wanted, and not mere words?
Downstairs she could hear June Mason moving about and singing; she at least was happy with her little mauve pots and her cheery optimism.
Esther cried all the time she undressed; she crept into bed sobbing miserably, like a child who sleeps at a boarding-school for the first time.
60CHAPTER V
Micky passed three days before he made any attempt to see Esther Shepstone again; days that seemed like a month at least, and during which he lost his appetite and forgot to smoke.
That she did not particularly care if she saw him again or not, he was miserably sure. She had no thoughts for any one but Ashton. He felt as if he could not settle to anything. On the third morning Marie Deland rang him up. He had told her many times that her voice on the telephone cheered him, but to-day it made him frown.
He tried to answer her cheery “That you, Micky?” as cheerily, but he knew it was a failure.
“What’s the matter?” she asked quickly. “Aren’t you well? Or are you cross?”
There was a hint of laughter in her voice. She had never known Micky cross; he was always the cheeriest of mortals.
Micky grabbed at the excuse she offered him.
“I’ve got a brute of a headache,” he said.
“Poor old boy!” The pretty, sympathetic voice irritated him. “Come out for a walk; it will do you good.”
“Thanks––thanks awfully, but I don’t think it would. I’m a perfect bear––you’d hate me. Some other time.”
There was a little pause. Micky could have kicked himself as he remembered on what terms they had parted. It was not her fault that a miracle had happened since then to metamorphose the whole world. He supposed uncomfortably that she was just the same as she had been when he last saw her. He knew she must be wondering why he had stayed away so long. He tried to soften his words.
“I’ll look in to-night, if I may. Sorry to be such a bear.”
61
She answered rather dispiritedly that it was all right, that she was sorry he felt ill. It was a relief when she rang off. He took his hat and went off to call on Esther.
He felt that he could settle to nothing till he had seen her again; there was a curious jealousy in his heart about Ashton; he would have given anything he possessed to be able to disillusion her, but knew it was impossible without hopelessly compromising himself.
It was a bitter disappointment to find that she was out when he reached the boarding-house; his face fell absurdly when he turned and walked away.
He wondered if she really was out, or only out to him.
After a moment he laughed at himself. A few days ago he had not known there was such a person as Esther Shepstone in the world, and yet now here he was, consumed with jealousy because she was not in when he called.
He took a taxicab back to the West End; he walked about for half an hour staring aimlessly into shop windows, then went back to his rooms. He could not understand his extraordinary restlessness; he had only once before felt anything like it in all his life, and that had been the first time he ever backed a horse, and was waiting a wire from the course to say if the brute had won.
He recalled the fever of impatience that had consumed him then, and laughed; after all, it had been nothing compared with this.
Driver came into the room.
“If you please, sir, Miss Mason has been on the ’phone. She said would I ask you to meet her for tea.”
Micky did not look enthusiastic; he liked June awfully, but to-day every one and everything seemed a bore.
“Tea! Where?” he asked vaguely.
“Miss Mason said that you would know, sir; the same place as usual.”
“Oh, all right!”
Micky looked at the clock and sighed. After all, June62was always amusing; he went off almost cheerfully to the unpretentious club of which she had spoken to Esther. He had to wait in the lobby while a boy in buttons fetched June to him. She came downstairs looking very much at home, and smoking the inevitable cigarette. It was one of June Mason’s charms that she always managed to look at home wherever she was.
She had taken off her coat, but she wore a green hat with a gold ornament that suited her to perfection, set on her dark head at rakish angle.
“I began to think you were not coming,” she said.
She gave him her left hand, and Micky squeezed it in friendly fashion. They went upstairs together to a small tea-room, which was just now deserted save for two waitresses who were giggling together over a newspaper.
June walked over to a table in the window, and Micky followed.
He had been here with her scores of times before, and the two waitresses smiled at one another knowingly; they were quite sure that this was romance.
Micky was sitting with an elbow on the table, absently smoothing the back of his head; he was wishing it was Esther sitting opposite to him; he looked up with a little start when June spoke to him.
“What’s up, Micky? I’ve never seen you looking so depressed.”
He roused himself with an effort.
“Oh, nothing, nothing! It’s the beastly weather, I expect.”
She looked at him quizzically with her queer eyes.
“I shouldn’t have thought the weather would depress you,” she said. “However, if you say it does–––”
He shook himself together.
“I’m not depressed any longer,” he declared. “Well, and how are you? And how is the swindle?” It was Micky’s pet joke to call June’s invention the “swindle,” though in his heart he was almost as proud of it as she was.
63
She laughed.
“It’s very well, thank you; but that isn’t what I want to talk to you about to-day. Micky, would you like to come to tea with me one afternoon?”
Micky stared.
“Tea! Haven’t I come to tea with you to-day?”
“Silly! I don’t mean here; I mean where I live. It’s a boarding-house. I dare say you’ll hate it, but it’s really quite a nice place, and beggars can’t be choosers, anyway. I’ve got a very comfortable sitting-room and most of my own furniture, and I can give you a good cup of tea, or anything else, if you prefer it.”
“I shall be delighted,” Micky looked puzzled. “But isn’t this rather a breaking of rules? It’s not so very long ago that you made me swear never to try and find out where you lived. I thought it was all to be a deadly secret.”
“So it was, but I’ve decided to admit you. I know you’re safe, and, Micky, wouldn’t you like to meet the dearest, prettiest, most attractive little girl....”
Micky moved his chair back in mock alarm.
“June! You’re not turning match-maker! If you are, I give you fair warning that our friendship will have to end once and for ever. I’ll put up with a lot from you, but not this––not....”
“Don’t be an idiot!” said June calmly. “There isn’t the slightest fear! And anyway–––” she added, with a half sigh, “she’s engaged, so it wouldn’t be any good. But I want you to help her.... Oh, I know I’m always bringing you foundlings to help and look after, but you’ve got such a big heart––and such a big banking account,” she added audaciously.
“Well, go on–––” he said resignedly. “Who is the foundling this time, and what am I to do?”
Micky laughed.
“She’s a darling,” June said warmly. “I’ve only known her for four days––she lives in the same house. I took a fancy to her from the first moment I saw her.64No, it was before that––it was when I first heard her name....”
Micky raised his brows.
“What a creature of impulse! My dear, you’ll burn your fingers badly some day.”
“And when I do,” said Miss Mason sharply, “I shan’t come crying to you for sympathy; however ... Well, she’s poor! she’s one of those horribly poor, frightfully proud people whom it’s impossible to help. I’ve tried all ways! I asked her to go shares with my sitting-room, and she said she couldn’t afford it; she’ll hardly let me give her a cup of tea or coffee for fear I should think she is sponging on me. She seems most frightfully alone in the world. She says she engaged to a man, but he’s abroad, and I’m sure he’s not nice, anyway. He’s only written to her once since I’ve known her, at all events, and this morning when there wasn’t a letter, I know she went back to her room and cried. I knocked at the door, but she wouldn’t let me in.”
She paused, and looked at Micky for sympathy.
He half smiled; he knew how enthusiastic June always was about everything.
“Well, and what do you want me to do for this damsel in distress?” he asked gently.
“I want you to get her a berth somewhere,” he was told promptly. “No, it’s no use saying you can’t! My dear man, you must know scores of people who’d take her in. She thought she was fixed up all right, but now it appears that the people she was with before haven’t got a vacancy for her, and so that’s knocked on the head. She told me that she’s have to just take the first thing that came along. I don’t believe she’s hardly got a shilling to her name. I offered to take her into partnership with me. I said we’d go travelling together for my beauty cream, but she wouldn’t hear of it.... She’s so proud!”––and here a sound of tears crept into June Mason’s voice. “I ask you, Micky, what can be done with any one like that?”
65
Micky shrugged his shoulders.
“If she’ll take anything that comes along, she ought to get a job pretty soon,” he said laconically. “I’ll speak to a man I know––can she write a decent hand and all that sort of thing?”
“Of course she can! But I want a good berth, mind you! I’ve never been so fond of anybody as I am of her. She’s awfully worried about this horrid man she’s engaged to. She doesn’t say much about him, but this morning she said that there didn’t seem to be anything to live for, and her eyes looked so sad....”
Micky smiled at her serious face.
“You’d make an eloquent appeal in a court of law,” he said. He took a pencil from his pocket and an envelope. “Give me her name and address, and I’ll see what I can do. I don’t promise anything, mind you, but I’ll do what I can....”
“You’re a dear,” said June warmly. “I know you were the one to come to. I’m quite sure when you’ve seen Esther you’ll ... why, what’s the matter, Micky?”
Micky had looked up sharply. His face had paled a little.
“What name did you say?” he asked. He never knew how he managed to control his voice. His heart seemed to be thumping in his throat. “What name did you say?” he asked again, with an effort. “I did not catch it–––”
“It’s Esther,” said June, “Esther Shepstone.”
66CHAPTER VI
Micky’s pencil jerked suddenly, sending an aimless scrawl across the paper; for an instant he stared at his companion with blank eyes. Fortunately June Mason was too intent on the relighting of her cigarette to have any attention to spare for him; she went on talking as she puffed.
“Yes....”––puff––“that’s her name....” Another puff. “Isn’t it a change from your eternal Violets and Dorothys?”... Puff, puff. “Oh, bother!” She threw the cigarette into an empty grate behind her and prepared to give Micky her undivided attention once more. “Well, what do you think about it? You haven’t written her name down. Esther Shepstone, I said.... Write it down,” she commanded.
Micky obeyed at once. He was beginning to recover himself a little.
“I shall be able to help her all right,” he said quickly. “Only, of course, you won’t let her know I’m mixed up in it at all; she’d hate it if she knew, she....”
“How do you know she would?” June demanded with suspicion.
Micky met her eyes squarely.
“Well, you said she was proud or something, didn’t you? And anyway I don’t want to pose as a blessed philanthropist; I’m not one either, but I’ll see what I can do for––for this new friend of yours. You say she’s poor?”
“Horribly poor, I’m afraid,” said June with a sigh. “Micky, it’s rather pathetic––somebody sent her some money––not very much, but still, it was money she evidently didn’t expect. I’ve got a sort of idea that it was from this man she’s supposed to be engaged to–––”
67
“Why do you say ‘supposed’––she is engaged to him, isn’t she?”
June shrugged her shoulders.
“She says so, and she wears a ring, but I’ve a sort of instinctive feeling that there’s something funny behind it. Anyway, I know she’s not happy; but don’t interrupt. About this money––well, it was partly my fault! I persuaded her to go and buy herself some clothes––she had such a few things, poor child! And I even went with her and she bought a frock and a new coat....”
“Yes,” said Micky eagerly; he was glad she had bought a new coat; he remembered how thin hers had been on that memorable night, and how she had shivered in the cold night air.
“She was as pleased as a child with a new toy,” Miss Mason went on. “She brought them all up to my room to show me when they came home, and we both tried them on ... and you’ve no idea how sweet she looked,” she added with enthusiasm. “Of course, I suppose this is boring you horribly,” she said deprecatingly.
“No,” said Micky honestly. “It’s not boring me at all, I promise you.”
“Well, anyway, she got the clothes, and now the place where she was before say they can’t take her back––it’s Eldred’s, the petticoat shop. I don’t suppose you know it, but–––”
“I know it very well,” said Micky.
“Oh, do you?” She laughed. “Well, they either won’t or can’t take her back, and now she feels that she ought not to have spent the money on the new frock and coat, and this morning she told me that she was afraid she would have to leave Elphinstone Road, as it was more than she could afford.” June’s eyes flashed. “Micky, what can one do with people who are poor and proud? It’s a most difficult combination to fight. I blundered in and offended her by offering to lend her some money, and, of course, she wouldn’t hear of it, and there you are!”
68
She sighed, and leaned back in her chair despondently.
“Have a cake,” said Micky absently; he pushed the plate across to her. “The ones with the white sugar are nice.”
Miss Mason ignored him.
“If that’s all the interest you take–––” she said offendedly.
Micky started.
“My dear girl, I’m full of interest––chock full to the brim! But we came here for tea, so we may as well eat something while I try to think of a plan.” He wrinkled his forehead. “Of course,” he ejaculated, “that chap––what did you say his name was?”
“What chap? Oh, the fiancé! I don’t know; she hasn’t even let me see his photograph yet; but she says he writes dreams of letters. I haven’t seen them either, of course.”
“He may send her some more money. After all, you say it’s only four days since she heard from him. That’s not very long; men are always rotten letter writers.”
Miss Mason looked wise.
“Four days is a long time when you’re in love,” she said. “If you were engaged to Esther Shepstone I’ll bet you’d write to her every day. You’re just the kind. Oh, I know what you’re going to say––that you’re cut out for a bachelor, and rubbish like that, but you wait and see, Micky––it’s never too late.”
“I’ve never written a love-letter in my life,” Micky declared indignantly. “And, anyway–––”
June leaned across the table and looked at him with accusing eyes.
“Never? On your word of honour, Micky?”
Micky laughed and coloured.
“Well, perhaps––once!” he admitted. “But that’s beside the point, isn’t it?... I’ll think things over and write to you.”
“Yes, but soon, Micky, soon! It’s not a case where you can sit down with your feet on the mantelpiece and69give yourself a week to turn things over in your mind. I want to know at once, to-morrow––to-night, if possible. I know what Esther is––she’ll be gone before I can turn round, and I should hate her to go. I haven’t got many friends, and I do feel that she and I are going to be real friends––great friends ... I don’t know when I’ve taken such a fancy to anybody–––”
“You don’t know how glad I am to hear you say that,” said Micky. His eyes were shining. Then he realised that he had displayed rather unnecessary warmth and hastened to amend his words. “I always said that what you wanted was a real woman friend,” he added more quietly.
June was drawing on her gloves; she had very white hands and beautifully-kept finger-nails, and she was very proud of them.
“Never mind me,” she said briskly. “You bustle about and find a post for Esther, and I’ll love you for ever. Are we ready?”
She rose and gathered up her various belongings. Micky declared that she was always laden with small, oddly-shaped parcels.
“Samples, my dear man, samples!” she said briskly when Micky asked if he might not be allowed to carry some. “And they’re much too precious to risk you dropping any.”
“There’s just one stipulation,” Micky said as he followed her downstairs again. “You’re not to tell Miss Shepstone anything about me––I’m going to be very strict on this subject. Will you promise?”
“Bless your heart, yes––and if you come to tea one day–––”
“Oh, I don’t think I’ll come to tea,” Micky said hastily. “I should only feel rotten––self-conscious and all the rest of it, even if I was quite sure she didn’t know anything––not that there’s anything to know yet,” he added quickly. “I may not be able to help her.”
Miss Mason laughed.
70
“Oh, you’ll help her right enough,” she said breezily. “I know you.”
She dismissed him when they reached the street. “No, I don’t want you to come with me; I’ve got some business to see to and you’d only be a nuisance.” She gave his hand a squeeze. “Good-bye, and thanks ever so much Micky. You’ll write to me––or wire?”
“As soon as there is anything to report.”
He raised his hat and turned away, and June dived across the road, perilously near to a motor-omnibus, clutching her samples jealously to her heart.
“It’ll be all right now,” she told herself, with a sense of comfort. “Everything’s always all right as soon as Micky gets hold of it.”
A soliloquy which made it seem all the more curious that she should have hesitated to trust herself to him for life. Perhaps, as she had told Esther, she cared too much for him to take the risk for them both. He had told her candidly that he did not care for her as a man should care for the woman he marries.
“And he makes a ripping friend! Ripping!” she told herself as she scurried along to interview another beauty specialist about the “swindle,” as Micky politely called it.
71CHAPTER VII
Micky went straight home when he left June. What he had heard about Esther had disturbed him very much. He loathed to think that she was unhappy.
The question was, how best to help her, and quickly. He was thankful she had made a friend of June. June was one of the best, the loyalest pal a man could ever have.
But, as June had said, Esther was too proud to take help unless it was most tactfully offered. He racked his brains in vain. It was a sickening thought that, with all his wealth, he could give her nothing. Even the few paltry pounds she had unconsciously taken from him would have been indignantly rejected had she known who was the donor.
With sudden impulse he sat down and wrote to her. After all, she had accepted his friendship; there was no reason on earth why he should not write and ask to be allowed to see her again. He wrote most carefully lest she should discover some likeness to the letter he had written to replace Ashton’s.
Might he take her out to dinner one night? Any night would suit him. And did she like theatres? He had a friend who sometimes gave him a couple of seats for a show. He would arrange for any night she liked to mention.
He thought that was a neat stroke of diplomacy––of course, she would not think he could afford to buy seats, and anyway it was true that he had a friend who often gave him boxes and things––he would have to be careful that Phillips did not send along a box this time though.
He ended up by hoping formally that she and Charlie72were quite well and comfortably settled into their new home, and he signed himself: “Yours very sincerely, Micky Mellowes.”
When he had finished the letter, he realised that he had written it on his own heavily embossed writing paper, so he had to dig Driver up and borrow a cheap sheet of unstamped grey paper and write it all out again. Then he went out and posted it himself.
As soon as it had gone he wished he had sent it by hand; it meant such a deuce of a time to wait for a reply; he calculated that he could not possibly hear before to-morrow night.
But in this he was pleasantly disappointed, for his own letter reached the boarding-house in Elphinstone Road that night, and Esther’s reply was waiting for him with the kidney and bacon in the morning.
Micky’s heart began to thump when he saw the letter beside his plate; he had never seen Esther’s handwriting, but he knew by instinct that it was hers. He scanned the first lines eagerly, and his face fell.
“Dear Mr. Mellowes,––Thank you for your letter. I am sorry, but I cannot come out with you, either to dinner or to a theatre.––Yours very truly,Esther Shepstone.”
“Dear Mr. Mellowes,––Thank you for your letter. I am sorry, but I cannot come out with you, either to dinner or to a theatre.––
Yours very truly,Esther Shepstone.”
Micky’s face was pathetic in its disappointment. He read the few curt lines through again and again, vainly trying to find something more behind the unmistakable refusal, but there it was in all its bald decision.
She did not want to go out with him any more; she did not care if she saw him again or not.
Micky left his breakfast, he no longer had any appetite. He had never had such a snub in all his life––out of his disappointment anger was rising steadily; she had no right to snub him like that without a reason.
Driver, coming into the room at that moment, saw the untouched breakfast and halted midway between door and table to stare at his master.
73
Micky stood with his hands deep thrust into his pockets, glowering into the fire. Driver advanced a step.
“Beg pardon, sir––but wasn’t you well?” he asked stoically.
Micky began to swear, then his mood changed and he laughed.
“Yes, I’m all right–––” He hesitated. “Driver, would you like to go to Paris?”
Driver raised wooden eyes.
“Anywhere you wish, sir,” he answered, in his usual expressionless voice. “When were you thinking of starting, sir?”
“I’m not thinking of starting at all,” said Micky. “I want you to go––alone! You’ve been often enough now not to get lost. Do you think you can manage it?”
“Yes, sir, if you think you can manage without me here.”
There was the faintest touch of amazement in the man’s even voice; he knew how helpless Micky was, or pretended to be––knew how he hated being left to do for himself.
But Micky only laughed.
“Oh, I can manage all right. I shall probably go away somewhere myself for a few days. Besides, you won’t be gone long–––” He paused.
“No, sir,” said Driver.
Micky was leaning against the mantelshelf; his eyes were all crinkled up into a laugh as if he had heard some excellent joke which he was about to repeat.
“No, you won’t be gone long,” he said again. “A couple of days, I should think. You can put up at the hotel we stayed at last time; they’ll look after you, and the manager speaks English.”
“Yes, sir–––” Driver hesitated. “And––what were you wanting me to do when I get there, sir?” he asked, after a moment.
Micky clung to his joke for an instant longer, then suddenly he let it go.
74
“I want you to post a letter for me,” he said.
Driver was too well trained to show amazement at Micky’s instructions, but just for a fractional second he forgot to answer with his usual “Yes, sir,” and stood immovable. Then he recovered himself, and said it twice with hurried apology.
“And am I to go at once, sir?”
“To-morrow morning will do,” Micky said. “You can go by the first boat train.” He looked at the man anxiously. He had a sort of uncomfortable feeling that Driver must be thinking he was not quite right in the head. After a moment he dismissed him.
Then Micky went over to his desk and rummaged amongst the many papers and letters there till he found a sheet of paper embossed with the name of an hotel in Paris. It had not been used, and Micky heaved a sigh of relief.
He went to bed late that night. He forgot all about his promise to go round to the Delands. He spent the time writing letters and tearing them up again till the wastepaper basket was full; then he carried it over to the fireplace and burnt every scrap of paper it contained.
There were two finished letters lying on his desk. One was sealed and addressed, but not stamped, and the other was written on a sheet of Driver’s plain notepaper, which Micky folded and unfolded with a sort of nervous dissatisfaction.
Its contents were not very long, but they had taken a good deal of composing.
“Dear Miss Shepstone,––I received your note in reply to my letter and cannot help saying that I feel very hurt at your decided refusal to allow me to take you out. I thought we were to be friends? Have I been so unfortunate as to offend you? If so, I can only assure you that it has been utterly unintentional. Won’t you let me see you, if only for a moment? I will meet you at any time or place.–– Yours sincerely, MICKEY MELLOWES.”
“Dear Miss Shepstone,––I received your note in reply to my letter and cannot help saying that I feel very hurt at your decided refusal to allow me to take you out. I thought we were to be friends? Have I been so unfortunate as to offend you? If so, I can only assure you that it has been utterly unintentional. Won’t you let me see you, if only for a moment? I will meet you at any time or place.–– Yours sincerely, MICKEY MELLOWES.”
He gave a dissatisfied growl as he finished reading it.75Not a very eloquent epistle. There was so much more which he wanted to say, but did not dare to. He folded it again and thrust it into an envelope; then he addressed it and laid it beside that other on his desk, comparing the two handwritings with complacence.
Not in the least alike! Nobody would ever suspect that they had been written by the same person.
He rang for Driver and gave him the unstamped envelope. “This is what I want you to post in Paris. Mind you put enough stamps on. You’d better have it weighed.”
“Yes, sir.” Driver looked at the other letter. “And––is that for the post too, sir?”
Micky put his hand behind him with a guilty gesture.
“No; I’ll post that myself,” he said, and he went out then and there into the cold night and did so.
As it dropped into the letter-box Micky looked up at the stars and sighed.
What the dickens could he have done to make her so distant? At any rate he would let her see that he was not to be so easily snubbed. If she didn’t answer his letter he would go boldly round to Elphinstone Road, and stay there till he saw her.
He was half way to bed before he remembered that he had promised to go to the Delands that evening. He stopped short with his necktie half undone and swore.
What the deuce would they think of him?
Well, he would have to plead that headache still, that was all, and if Marie chose to cut up rough.... Micky felt mean because he rather hoped that she would. He knew that he wanted their friendship to cease, but, man-like, he did not altogether like having to take the initiative. Marie was a nice little girl, and if it hadn’t been for that relative of hers dying on New Year’s Eve––well, he would probably have been engaged to her by this time.
He went to bed feeling miserable.
Driver had just left the house to catch the boat train the following morning when June Mason rang Micky up.