For how long she was never quite sure Lucinda remained rooted in that
moment, unseeing gaze steadfast to that door whose closing had been
synchronous with the opening of another upon her understanding, to let
in light, a revelation blinding and arrestive, upon the mirk of her
distraction--that failure of self-confidence and determination which had
come with realization, for the first time in her history, of inability
to read her own heart and mind and guide her steps by such
self-knowledge.
Thus posed she was found when Fanny, weary of knocking and getting no
response, without more ceremony drifted in, a vision fair of impudent
innocence in dainty organdie, the ravages of "oversleeping" perceptible
in dim blue stains beneath eyes the more alluring for such underscoring;
and with a start and a cry of solicitude perhaps a thought theatrical,
convincing enough for all that, dropped parasol and handbag and ran to
strain Lucinda tenderly to her bosom of an adolescent.
"You poor, dear darling!" she cooed--"no wonder you sounded so troubled
over the telephone--and so sad! I couldn't imagine ... Why didn't you
tell me?"
"How did you hear?" Lucinda evaded, gently extricating herself to
disguise distaste for the sickly-sweet fragrance of Fanny's breath. "Who
told you?"
"The papers, dearest: haven't you seen them?" Lucinda fell back a step,
clasping her hands in sharp dismay: she had never once thought of the
newspapers. "Screaming headlines on every page: one would think Lynn,
poor dear! was the President of the United States lying at point of
death from an assassin's bullet.... But what a frightful experience for
you!"
"It was a shock," Lucinda assented in a murmur. Without conscious
volition she found herself moving away to a window, as if to hide her
emotion. "When I heard...." In private amazement she heard her voice
break; and touching a handkerchief to her lips, said no more.
"Heard! but you were there, weren't you, when it happened?"
Still acting as if in deference to an authority outside herself,
Lucinda, without withdrawing her gaze from the street--now basking in
the calm gold of the belated sun--deliberately shook her head.
"When I found you and Harry weren't coming," she said--"I mean, when
Lynn told me what you had telephoned, I came away. I thought it best,
everything considered."
"Oh, how fortunate!"
But there was in that exclamation an undertone of disbelief clear enough
to untrusting ears. And of a sudden Lucinda, while continuing to view
with astonishment her duplicity, all unpremeditated as it had been, no
more regretted it.
"Fortunate?" she breathed. "I don't know ... perhaps...."
Now too thoroughly enmeshed in tissue of involuntary falsehoods to
extricate herself without confession, she collected her wits to deal
with Fanny's breathlessly vollied questions; and found curious
gratification in matching the texture of fact with strand after strand
of fabrication, till at length the stuff of lies was woven in with and
not to be distinguished from that of the truth. Mixed with which feeling
was a sort of dull and angry wonder at herself, that she should be doing
something so foreign to her every instinct, lying with such shameless
artistry to the one true friend she had saved from the shipwreck of her
old life--and this at the behest of the man who alone had been
responsible for that disaster.
She had no more than reached home (she told Fanny) after refusing to
stop at the bungalow for dinner alone with Summerlad, when Bel
telephoned to tell her what had happened. Suspicious of Nelly's temper
for days, Bel, upon her failure to keep a dinner engagement with him,
had traced her to Beverly Hills, arriving just too late, if in time to
be shot in the arm by Nelly when he tried to prevent her escape.
Determined to see Summerlad--not as yet comprehending the whole truth
concerning his relationship to Nelly--Lucinda had instructed her
chauffeur to leave her car at the side door of the Hollywood; meaning to
drive secretly to Beverly Hills. But this she couldn't do till Bel kept
his promise to call and give her all details. It was while they were
talking that the car had disappeared. Bel had promptly reported the
theft to the police, and that morning had called to tell Lucinda how
sharp work had trailed it north along the Coastal Highway to the scene
of Nelly's death.... Accident or suicide, who could say?...
At the same time Bel had begged her to make sure of Fanny's silence in
respect of the aborted dinner party. It was unnecessary that Lucinda's
name should be dragged into the case in any way, if it were she could
hardly hope to come through with her incognita intact. She felt that she
owed Bel that much consideration; it wasn't his fault she was still his
wife. Not that she herself had any wish to court publicity in connection
with the affair....
"But of course, darling! you know you can depend on me."
"I know; but I had to be sure. You see, you told Mr. Nolan last night I
was due at the bungalow for dinner."
"But Cindy!" Fanny's wide eyes were a child's for candour--"that was
before I knew there was any reason ... Mr. Nolan called up about nine,
said he wanted to talk to Harry; and when I told him Harry was away on
business (that was a lie--tell you presently) he guessed that Harry had
come here to see you, and said he'd try to get in touch with him here.
So I told him I believed you were dining out with Lynn; we'd all been
invited, but Harry found he couldn't make it, at the last moment, so we
begged off. That's how it happened."
"I fancied it was something like that," Lucinda commented,
unsuspiciously enough but in a thoughtful tone open to misconstruction
by an inquiet conscience.
"But surely you don't doubt my word, Cindy!"
"Why should I, dear?" Lucinda asked, smiling; and pausing in her
restless, aimless circling of the room she dropped an affectionate hand
on Fanny's shoulder. "What a silly notion!"
Fanny cuddled the hand to her cheek. "Forgive me, dear: I don't know why
I said that. I suppose it's because I'm as much upset about my own
affairs as you are about yours, Cindy--most of all about this shocking
business, of course, and so sorry for you, dear----"
"Don't be sorry for me." Lucinda's fingers tightened on Fanny's. "Be glad
I've learned a good lesson and had a fortunate escape. I ought to be
glad the hurt's no worse...."
"Poor darling! you were fearfully fond of Lynn, weren't you?"
"Was I? I've been wondering. In love with Lynn, or just in love with
Love: which? I'm afraid the shock of it all is too new for me to be sure
as yet, but.... Oh, I'm sorry for Lynn, of course! but only as one would
be for any acquaintance who was in pain and at death's door. But in the
light of what I know now, of how Lynn lied to me, and how shamefully he
treated that poor creature he married, it seems impossible I could ever
have been in love, actually in love with such a man.... In love with
being loved, yes, I'm afraid I shall never get better of that weakness;
and so absurdly conscious that Lynn Summerlad, the great lover, had
chosen me, I never stopped to consider him in comparison with other men.
But I don't think I was in love with Lynn.... Or am I sincere? is what
I'm saying just sophistry to salve my poor, sore vanity?"
She laughed consciously, then in swift variation of mood added a
pensive, wistful note: "Fanny: Bel loves me...."
The countenance turned up to hers was quick with mirth: Fanny started to
speak, gurgled rapturously, and broke down in laughter so infectious
that Lucinda could not but respond, if ruefully.
"You great goose! if that's news to you, it's news to no one else."
"It is to me." Lucinda sobered. "Daresay I might have guessed if I'd
been a wiser woman, but I wasn't, not till just now, when Bel was going
away, after a wretched little squabble. Then something, I'm sure I don't
know what...."
"I could have told you long ago, sweetest; in fact, I was only awaiting
the right moment. I've been sounding Bel out, you may have noticed.
There isn't anything one can teach him about flirting, Cindy, all the
same there's only one woman in the world Bel can see."
"I'm sure of that," Lucinda agreed ... "just now."
"Cindy!" Fanny insisted, tugging at her hand--"tell me something--"
"Very well, dear. No: I shan't give Bel another chance. I'm not in love
with him at all, and I dare not run the risk of falling in love with him
again, I daren't risk going mad with happiness, as I should if what once
was could be again ... and then having to live through all the misery of
breaking with him another time."
"But surely--if he promised faithfully----"
"The promises men make to win us, Fanny, are not the sort that they
know how to keep. It's always what they can't have they want most. Give
them all they ask today, and tonight they'll lie awake longing for the
things they've forsworn. The only woman who could hold Bel to his good
behaviour would be one who could keep him guessing. I'm not that woman,
I can't pretend, with me it's all or nothing--always!"
"Poor lamb!" Fanny drew her down to sit on the arm of the chair and
nestled her frivolous, fair head upon Lucinda's bosom. "You have such
desperate troubles, I'm ashamed to tell you my own...."
"Your own, Fanny?"
"We're both in the same boat, Cindy," Fanny lamented--"two lorn women
this very day as ever was! Harry has left me ... flat!"
"Fanny!" Lucinda caught the girl's face between tender hands and looked
incredulously into its swimming eyes. "You're not joking?"
"Divvle the joke's in me the day," Fanny declared between gulps,
dabbling her tears with a handkerchief. "I didn't want to tell you, when
you had so much else to worry you, but I'm afraid you've got to know.
Because, you see, you're mixed up in it, too."
"I! what do you mean?"
"Well, Harry and I haven't been happy together for ever so long. Love
with us you know, was rather a flash in the pan. Last night we had a
scene, I mean another scene--forget the serial number. When I went home
I found him trying to drink himself to death. He was half out of his
head, and wouldn't tell me why. But I had a suspicion and wormed it out
of him finally: he's been speculating with the company's money, your
money, Cindy; and, now, with Zinn taking over the production, his
shortage is sure to be found out. I couldn't make him say how much it
was, but there's no question, it will run into a good sum. Well: I
promised to intercede with you, and managed to quiet him down and get
him to bed. Next thing I knew he was in the bathroom, trying to cut his
throat. Then I hid his razors and let him go back to his whiskey, hoping
he'd drink himself asleep. And presently he did. At least, he seemed to.
So I went to bed--about three this morning, that was--worn out. When you
called up, Cindy, I fibbed to you: I'd been awake about half an hour,
howling like a lost child because I knew that Harry had deserted me at
last."
"But how did you know--? Did he leave a note?"
"No, dear--that's how I knew. He didn't leave me a note or much of
anything else except my clothes; everything that was portable and easy
to turn into money he'd taken, all my jewels, everything. So you see,
dear"--the face of an unworldly child quivered with a pitifully sad
smile--"I'm not only an embezzler's wife, I'm a pauper--and a friendless
pauper unless you keep on being my friend!"
The woebegone voice died away in sobs, and with a broken cry of
compassion Lucinda gathered that unhappy little body into her arms.