When Hal entered the sitting-room and met Dudley’s eyes she felt, as
she afterwards described it to Lorraine, that she was in for it. Yet it
was not so very late, barely half-past nine. On the table her supper
was still waiting for her.
“We’ve had a slight accident,” she said, taking the bully by the horns;
“something went wrong with the steering gear, and it delayed us. Have
you had supper?” noticing the table was still laid for two.
“I always have supper at eight on Sundays, because Mrs. White has to
clear it away herself, as you know. Isn’t Dick coming in?”
“No. He’s—” Hall stopped short, considering the advantages of
prevarication.
“I wanted to see him,” testily. “He said he would give me a particular
address tonight. Why is he in such a hurry?”
“It wasn’t Dick who brought me.”
She took off her motor-bonnet and threw it on the sofa, running her
hands through her bright hair, and rubbing her cheeks, which were a
little cold.
“Not Dick?...” Dudley looked up from his book peremptorily. “Who did
bring you?”
Hal took her seat at the table.
“Well, you see, we had a slight accident. We had just stopped to
examine the steering gear, when another car came round a curve and
crashed into us. Dick’s car was damaged, and...” she reached across for
the salad, and helped herself with as unconcerned an air as she could
muster... “Oh!... onions!... how scrumptious!... Mrs. White always
remembers my plebeian tastes, but not my patrician ones.”
“Well!” he suggested coldly. “Dick’s car was damaged, and—”
“Dick had to stay and nurse it.”
“Then did you come home by train?”
“There was no train. There was nothing else.”
“Nothing else than what?”
“Nothing but the car that run into us, or going to an inn for the night
with Dick. I was afraid you wouldn’t like that,” with a mischievous
gleam.
“My likes and dislikes are not, apparently, of the smallest moment to
you, or you would not have been motoring late on Sunday at all.”
“Dick can’t go other days.”
“Who was in this other car?”
“A man.”
Again he glanced up quickly.
“Any one else?”
“No. His chauffeur is down with ‘flu’.”
“Was it some one you knew, then?”
“No. He told me on the way in.”
“Am I to gather that you returned to London alone, in a motor-car, with
a perfect stranger?”
“I’m afraid you are.”
“Why didn’t Dick come with you? Surely if he takes you out for the day
he might at least see you safely home. I never heard of such
proceedings in my life. The man might have been a positive blackguard.
Had you any idea who he was?”
“No, none; but what’s the use of making a fuss! It’s all right now, and
I’m safely at home; which is surely better than being in some weird
village all night, and you wondering what on earth had become of me.”
“That is not the question. It’s the whole circumstance from beginning
to end. I consider Dick’s behaviour most reprehensible.”
“He couldn’t leave his car alone there in the middle of a Kentish high
road. He had to stay somewhere near.”
“I think he should have considered you of more importance than the car.
To let you return alone, at that hour, with a perfect stranger, is the
most unheard of proceeding. I shall certainly tell Dick what I think of
him.”
“It wasn’t Dick’s fault,” loyally. “I just took the matter into my own
hands and came. Dick had nothing to do with it. In fact, I insisted
upon his remaining behind.”
“Oh, of course you would. You only seem to be happy when you are flying
in the face of some convention or other. But Dick is older than you,
and he knows my views on these matters. He owed it to me to see you
safely home.”
“But since I am safely home!...” obstinately.
“You very well might not have been. What the stranger himself must
think of you I don’t know. Have you any idea who he was?”
“Yes. Sir Edwin Crathie?”
“Sir Edwin Crathie! Do you mean the Cabinet Minister?”
“So he said.”
“And did you tell him who you were?”
Again there was a gleam under the lowered lashes.
“I did; but I can’t say he either recognised our historie name or
seemed much impressed. I really don’t believe he had ever heard of me.”
Dudley refused to smile. Instead the frown deepened on his face.
“That is probably just as well. Your actions of late cannot be said to
be entirely to your credit. What is this tale about Thursday night? I
met St. Quintin’s father with Uncle Bruce this morning in the Park. You
told me Quin’s aunt was going to chaperone you. Did she or did she
not?”
“I told you Lady Bounce was going to chaperone me. Lady Bounce _did_
chaperone me.”
“Is Lady Bounce Quin’s aunt?”
“That depends.” Hal pushed away her chair, wishing vaguely that fathers
and uncles would mind their own business. Either incident alone she
could have coped with, but it was a distinct imposition to expect her
to manage both at once, and on Sunday night into the bargain.
“I can only presume you lent yourself to such a vulgar proceeding as
Quin dressing up as a woman and acting chaperone. Is that the truth?”
“Not entirely. You see, he wasn’t an ordinary woman. He went as his
aunt, Lady Phyllis Fenton. His personification was a masterpiece.”
Dudley began to pace the room. His thin lips were compressed into a
straight line, and his whole air distincly worried.
“What you seem quite unable to perceive is the way in which these
incidents reflect upon your good taste and upon my guardianship.”
Hal grew suddenly nettled.
“It is nonsense to talk of guardianship now. I am twenty-five, and I
earn my own living. I am perfectly well able to take care of myself.”
“No; that is just what you are not. You are so rash and inconsequent.”
“Well, anyhow I get a good deal out of my life, while you—”
He remembered his own Thursday evening and intercepted:
“It is possible to get a great deal out of life without outraging every
convention. Do you imagine either Ethel or Doris Hayward would do the
wild things you do?”
“Ethel Hayward is a brick. She couldn’t be straitlaced anyhow, nor
narrow-minded. Doris would do anything under the sun that suited her
own ends.”
She got up, and turned away without perceiving his frown, beginning to
gather up her paraphernalia. He stopped short in his walk.
“If it really was Sir Edwin Crathie who brought you home, I must write
and thank him, I think.”
“I shouldn’t bother; probably it wasn’t him at all; only some
third-rate actor.”
Dudley tried to see her face, not sure if she was serious or not, but
she kept her head averted as she added:
“Quite possibly it was Lord Bounce.”
“You are always treating a serious subject with levity,” he complained.
“What am I to think? Do you or do you not believe your escort was Sir
Edwin Crathie?”
“Well, as he was awfully afraid I might be a militant suffragette, I
think he really was a Cabinet Minister.”
“I hope you entirely undeceived him on that score,” drily.
“Not at all. I told him I was tingling to scratch him and bite him,”
and the ghost of a smile crossed her lips.
Dudley relapsed into silent displeasure, and for a few moments neither
spoke. Then Hal, with her garments on her arm, came round to him with a
frank, affectionate air.
“Dudley, don’t make mountains out of molehills over nothing. I know I
am a little wild. I can’t help it—we seem to have got mixed up somehow.
You’ve got all the decorum and nice, refined feelings of a charming
woman, and I’ve got the enterprise and ‘don’t-care’ spirit of a man. It
isn’t any use fighting against facts. You must take me as I am, and
make the best of it. I can’t change now; and I don’t know that I would
if I could.”
“I don’t suppose you would. You positively glory in the very traits
that I deplore”; but his voice sounded mollified.
“Oh well, old man, you wouldn’t like me to be helpless, and foolish,
and woolly-lambified, would you? It wouldn’t be half so interesting.
Just fancy if you had a sister like Doris Hayward, can you imagine
anything tamer?”
He stiffened again, but she did not notice it.
“As for Thursday night, you never ought to have heard about it, and you
never would have done if Uncle Bruce had not been such an old telltale.
Just wait till I get him alone; that’s all. Anyhow, he didn’t think it
a heinous crime did he? I expect he gave a great laugh that startled
every one within hearing.”
As that was exactly what had happened, Dudley made no comment.
“And Sir Edwin Crathie would only have thought me a fool if I had been
afraid to come back with him. These things will happen occasionally.
They are not worth worrying about. You are too anxious over trifles,
Dudley.” She moved away towards the door. “Well, good-night, don’t
forget to return thanks that anyhow I am not in a hospital, generally
smashed up.”
She left him, and retired to bed, feeling a little depressed. Of course
he had not forgiven her, nor would he see things from her point of
view. She almost wished he did not mind; but all her life she had had
an affection that was almost adoration for her one brother, and it
always depressed her to displease him, however indifferent she might
seem.
She awoke next morning with the sense of depression still lingering,
and set off for the City in far from her usual spirits. The office
seemed dingy and dull, and the routine wearisome. It felt like ages and
ages since she had driven home through the darkness in Sir Edwin’s
beautiful car. She wondered if it was real at all; only what else
should make all the old friends at the office appear so uninteresting
and commonplace.
She speculated a little forlornly as to whether she would ever be
likely to see him again, and decided it was most unlikely, and that
probably he had already forgotten the whole incident.
And just when she had reached that point in her meditations, the
telephone boy came to tell her some one was asking for her. She asked
him dispiritedly who it was, and he replied that the gentleman had
declined to give a name.
Hal shut herself into the case, took down the receiver, and, still
dispiritedly, asked: “Hullo! Are you there?”
“Is that Miss Pritchard?” asked a voice that made her pulses hasten.
“Yes? Who is that?”
“The mere worm,” came back the cheery answer.
“What’s the matter? You sound somewhat funereal. Was Brother Dudley
very angry?”
“Terrible. I am still recovering. He seemed to have grave doubts as to
whether you really were the eminent person you professed to be!”
“Oh, he did, did he? And what did you say?”
“That it was quite possible you were only a third-rate actor all the
time.”
“Thanks. I shall not grow vain on your compliments. Have you any grave
doubts yourself?”
“I don’t mind either way.”
“Thanks again. Well, I am speaking to you from my own private sanctum
at the House of Commons; and if you want to make sure, you can take my
number, and ring up the Exchange and inquire.”
“I’ll take your word for it.”
“Good girl. You don’t sound quite so obstreperous as you were last
night. What’s the matter?”
“I’m only Mondayfied. The office is always boring on a Monday.”
“I’m sorry I can’t suggest a spin this afternoon, but I’m too much
engaged until Wednesday. Will you come on Wednesday? Well?” as Hal,
appeared to be meditating.
“Where do you propose going?” she asked.
“Anywhere you like. I’d better not fetch you from the office though.
I’ll pick you up just casually in St. Jame’s Park. Will you be there at
five, near the Archway?”
“All right, if I can get away. How shall I let you know if I change my
mind?”
“Don’t do anything so childish. The run will do you good after a stuffy
office. I’ll be there to the minute. Good-bye,” and he rang off without
waiting for a reply.
Hal went back to her work, with a pleasurable sensation that instead of
grey stuffiness there was joyful sunshine. She had never imagined for a
moment he would actually carry out his suggestion of a meeting; and
here they were with an actual appointment.
It was so odd, too, that they had not properly seen each other yet;
only having met in the light of street lamps; and she fell to wondering
eagerly what he was like in broad daylight. A voice whispered, “Perhaps
you won’t like him at all, and will wish you had not gone”; but her
love of adventure easily silenced it, and she looked forward to her
outing without any misgivings.
Once she thought she would go an tell Lorraine about it first, but
later decided it would be more enjoyable to do so afterwards, and kept
her own counsel; which perhaps was not entirely wise, seeing how much
more cause Lorraine had to know the world than she had.