WISE JULIA
There is a certain class of woman who loves a fracas of any kind.
The waiting-room at Northampton Park boasted of no attendant, so Regina
was able to sit down by the bare mahogany table and wait until the storm
which possessed her had passed by. Poor Regina! The first thought that
came to her was that after all she had lied to no purpose. It was no
small thing to a woman of her sturdy and open mind that she had spun a
perfect tissue of lies to her own child. She knew that she had lied in a
double sense, for she had not deceived Julia, and she knew now that
others were on the track of Alfred's wrongdoings. She was shaking now,
shaking like a leaf, and as she sat there, her sad eyes roaming over the
customary literature that one finds on the table of a suburban
waiting-room, she wished she had been left in her fool's paradise. She
realized with a great shock the truth of the old saw, "If ignorance is
bliss, 'twere folly to be wise." Yes, she would rather have been left in
her fool's paradise! But there, since the outer world was already
talking of Alfred's doings, it was small wonder that she had lit upon
the truth also.
Her talk with Julia, and the little incident that had caused her to take
refuge in the waiting-room, had made her hopelessly late for her
appointments, but that, Regina felt, could not be helped. She turned,
when she left the waiting-room, and walked across the green into the
Post-Office, where she sent off a couple of telegrams, and then she took
the next train to London and went straight to her club, where she
lunched by herself. I need not go into the details of her day. She kept
her appointments, behaved herself in a perfectly rational manner, and
went home, poor woman, with a heart as heavy as lead. When she got home
a terrible shock was waiting for her. Mr. Whittaker had come home,
inquired for her, and gone off with a portmanteau and left a note for
her on the dining-room mantelshelf.
"The master was so put out," the intelligent parlor-maid declared,
looking quite reproachfully at Regina, "he came in at five o'clock; of
course there wasn't a soul at home. I knew Miss Julia had gone to Mrs.
Marksby's, and I told master so, and he went to the telephone to speak
through to Miss Maudie--I mean Mrs. Marksby, but the young ladies, they
were gone out somewhere or other, and Mr. Harry wasn't in, and I'd no
idea where you was. Master _was_ put out! He had a cup of tea, and
packed his bag and he tramped up and down the road, and then he said to
me, 'Margaret,' said he, 'I must go or I sha'n't catch my train, but
I've written a note to the mistress, and be sure you take care of her
whilst I am away.' Those were his last words, 'be sure you take care of
her whilst I am away!'"
"Well, well," said Regina, who did not believe in giving way in the
presence of servants, "well, well, your master has had to go away on
business, no doubt. His letter will explain everything."
Her exterior was calm, but her heart was beating fast as she turned into
the dining-room and took the letter off the chimney-shelf. She felt that
the fatal moment had come, and that Alfred was gone. Alfred _was_ gone,
but not in the sense in which her doubting heart had feared.
"DEAREST QUEENIE"--the letter ran--"I am dreadfully upset not to
find you at home, as I 'phoned up to you directly I knew that I
should have to go away on most important business. I am just off to
Paris. Just imagine my going to Paris without you, dearest! It
seems preposterous. If I get my business through in a day or two,
perhaps you will join me there? If I don't get my business through,
I may have to go on elsewhere, and I could not drag you about, on
what may be a wild-goose chase, half over Europe. I could have
given you an outline of the story if you had been at home, but I
haven't time to write it. When I think of myself, a respectable
British householder, tearing off on this mad errand, I feel
inclined to pinch myself to make sure that I am awake. Till we
meet.--Your fond and devoted
"ALFRED."
Regina sat down and gasped. What did it mean? Surely the hussy was not
at the bottom of this. Just then Julia came in, having run across the
road to speak to one of the Marksby girls whom she had seen standing at
the gate as they came toward Ye Dene.
"What's this Margaret says about daddy?" she asked.
"Nothing, my dear, nothing," Regina rejoined, quite airily. "Your father
has had to go away on business for a few days."
"Oh, I thought, from Margaret's demeanor, that daddy had gone away for
good and all."
"Julia!"
"Well, Margaret seemed to make such a mouthful of it."
"He came home very much fussed not to find us at home, and I suppose
Margaret imagined that something serious had happened. It's nothing at
all. Here, you can read the letter."
"Paris!" said Julia, when she reached that point of information as she
read her father's good-by note.
"Well--how nice! If you do join him you will have a lovely time--a
little honeymoon trip. Perhaps he will ask me to go, too--that would be
lovely. How silly of Margaret to be so mysterious about it! Well, I'll
go and tidy for dinner."
Mother and daughter were quite cheerful as they discussed the evening
meal. At about nine o'clock there was a sound of electricity, and Julia
lifted her head from her book.
"I believe that's Harry and Maudie; it sounded like their brougham."
Then there was a peal at the bell, and Julia ran out into the hall.
"Maudie, is it you?" she asked.
"Yes, we thought we would come out and see you. How's mother?"
"Oh, all right. I thought you were going to a theatre?"
"Yes, we did think about it, but we changed our minds. Julia, has
anything happened?"
"No--at least, only that daddy has gone to Paris for a few days. We came
home and found he had been here, fussed because mother wasn't in, packed
his own bag, and left a note to say where he has gone and to say
'good-by' and--_voila tout_."
"But it isn't all," cried Maudie, "it's only the beginning of it. My
dear, daddy's gone to Paris with _her_! It was by the merest chance we
know. Harry was coming up the Strand--walking--he came up with a man in
his cab as far as Charing Cross because they wanted to talk business; he
got out at the corner of Villiers Street, and as he crossed over to the
entrance of the station he saw daddy drive up in a cab with a
portmanteau on the top. Immediately after, he saw a four-wheeled cab
with _her_ inside."
"What--you mean the woman we saw at the Trocadero?"
"Yes--he was so struck by the coincidence of their both being at Charing
Cross with luggage at the same time that he just walked quietly in and
saw them both go off together."
"Not together--Maudie!"
"Together--in the same carriage--a reserved compartment. And Harry says
he bought a sheaf of papers and positively threw them at her."
"It's a mystery!" ejaculated Julia, blankly. "His letter to mother was
everything that a letter could be. He laughs at himself ever so for
going away on a mad errand, suggests that she should join him in a few
days' time, and signs himself, 'till we meet, your fond and devoted
Alfred.'"
"I tell you what it is, Ju," said Maudie, dropping her young married
woman air and becoming Maudie Whittaker once more, "I'm sorry to say it
because he's my father, but between you and me, daddy's a regular bad
lot."
"It does seem so," said Julia, "and the curious part of it is that he
looks so respectable. Mother won't believe it, you know. I was talking
to her only to-day, she won't believe a word against him."
"Well, so much the better for her, that's what Harry says, but we came
to tell her--"
"Not to tell her--?"
"Oh no, I wouldn't tell her for the world. Let her go on believing in
him as long as she can; the awakening will come soon enough."
"Then what did you come for?" asked Julia, practical as usual.
"My dear, I thought if daddy had gone off and perhaps left mother a
letter to say that he was never coming back, she would want somebody to
stand by her--and Harry and I are prepared to do that."
"And where do I come in?" asked Julia, a little scornfully.
"Oh, Ju, darling, you are always the practical common-sense one, you are
a tower of strength, and many are the times I have leaned upon you; but
if the worst had happened you might have been too stunned yourself to
help mother very much. I think a woman needs a man at such a crisis of
her life."
"There isn't going to be any crisis," said Julia, quite prosaically,
"there isn't going to be any crisis. But it was nice of you to come, and
I do think you and Harry are two dear things. There's an explanation to
all this. There's nothing of the real bad lot about daddy, and as for
mother--there's no doubt about it, he worships her. Don't tell me that
when a man is tired of a woman he brings home dark sables without so
much as a hint that they will be welcome--it isn't human nature, at all
events it isn't man nature."