"No, you mustn't come in; I'm tired. Besides, I've got someone coming to
tea."
The ready lie slipped easily off Enid Crofton's tongue, as Jack Tosswill
looked down into her face with a strained, pleading look. They were
standing in the deserted road close to the outside door set in the
lichen-covered wall of The Trellis House. It was already getting dusk,
for they had been for a long walk.
"I shall never, never forget to-day!" He gripped her hand hard as he
spoke, and she looked up and down the empty road a little apprehensively.
But no one was coming or going, and the group of little old cottages
opposite The Trellis House held as yet no twinkling lights.
"I shall never forget it, either," she said softly. "But I really _must_
go in now--you know we are meeting this evening?"
"May I come and fetch you?" he asked.
"No, I'd rather you didn't do that--if you don't mind," and then, seeing
his look of deep disappointment, she added, "Perhaps you will walk back
with me after dinner?"
"Of course I will, but I'm afraid Radmore or one of the girls will want
to come too."
As he gazed down into her face there was a look of infinite longing in
his eyes, and even she felt a certain touch of genuine emotion sweep over
her. It is so very, very delicious to be loved.
"Good-bye, darling," he whispered huskily; and, before she had time to
stop him, he had taken her in his arms and kissed her, passionately,
lingeringly. Then, with no other word, he released her and went off
quickly down the road.
* * * * *
After Enid Crofton had shut the heavy door in the wall behind her, she
did not go straight along the path which led to her front door. Instead,
she turned in the gathering darkness to the left, and started walking
round the garden which in daylight looked so different, now that Jack
Tosswill had put in so many hard mornings' work at it.
She felt more surprised and moved by what had happened this afternoon
than she would have thought possible. Poor Jack! Poor, foolish, adoring,
priggish boy!
When he had come in this morning, bringing the note of invitation from
his step-mother, he had seemed excited and ill at ease. She had felt
vexed at his coming so early, as she was anxious to superintend the
jam-making herself. Enid Crofton had a very practical side to her
character, and she was the last person to risk the wasting of good sugar
and good fruit through the stupidity of an inexperienced cook.
While Jack was still there one of her new acquaintances had come in for a
moment, for she had already made herself well liked in the neighbourhood,
and after the visitor had gone, Jack, exclaiming angrily that they were
never left in peace together, had begged her to go for a walk with him
that afternoon. This she had consented to do, after discovering that
Godfrey Radmore had gone up to London for the day.
And then, during their walk, Jack had suddenly made her a pompous offer
of marriage!
No wonder she smiled mischievously to herself, when pacing slowly up and
down the path between a row of espaliered apple trees.
She told herself that in a sense it had been her fault. They were sitting
on a fallen tree trunk, in a lonely little wood, Jack, as he seldom was,
tongue-tied and dull. Piqued, she had twitted him on his silence. And
then, all at once, he had turned and, seizing her roughly, had kissed her
with the pent-up passion of a man in love who till now has never kissed a
woman.
Pacing slowly in her dark garden, Enid Crofton's pulse quickened at
the recollection of those maladroit, hungry kisses. Something--a mere
glancing streak of the great shaft of ecstasy which enveloped Jack
Tosswill's whole being had touched her senses into what had seemed to
him marvellous response.
When at last he had released her, and in words of at once triumphant and
humble adoration, had made her an offer of marriage, she had felt it an
absurd anti-climax to a very delicious and, even in her well-stored
memory, a unique experience.
And now she remembered the last time a man had kissed her. It was quite
a little while ago, on the day she had taken possession of The Trellis
House. Of course Captain Tremaine had tipped the guard so that they
should have a carriage to themselves. But she had been uncomfortably
aware that he was half-ashamed of himself--that he remembered, all the
time, that she was a newly-made widow.
Somehow Jack Tosswill hadn't remembered that. Jack hadn't thought of it.
But oh! how absurd he had been when his first rapture was over. Without
even waiting for an answer to his proposal, he had coolly suggested they
should wait till he had made a start at the Bar! At last she had managed
to make him listen to her plea that, till a year had elapsed, she could
not think of re-marriage. And he had believed her!
All at once she told herself, a little ruefully, that she had perhaps
been foolish; that this affair, slight and altogether unimportant as it
was, might become a tiresome complication. Of course she could keep him
in order, but she was well aware that when a man had kissed her once, he
generally wanted to kiss her again, and very soon.
In principle, she had no objection to Jack Tosswill's kisses. There was
something fresh, alluring, wholly delightful, even to so hardened a flirt
as was Enid Crofton, in being the object of a youth's first love. But she
told herself, almost fiercely, that she must make him understand very,
very clearly that, though they might sometimes kiss, they must never be
caught. Fortunately Jack was curiously cautious for so young a man. That
had been one of the reasons why she had been tempted to--well--to make
him lose his head.
And then another figure, one of far greater importance and moment to
herself than poor Jack Tosswill, came and challenged Enid Crofton to
anxious attention. How did she stand with regard to Godfrey Radmore?
She stopped in her pacing, and stared straight before her. For the first
time in her life she was quite at a loss as to what a man, of whom she
was seeing a great deal, really felt about her.
Rosamund Tosswill was very young, and Enid secretly thought her very
stupid, but there could be no doubt as to her essential truthfulness.
Now, a day or two ago, Rosamund had said: "Isn't it funny of Godfrey? He
told Janet when he first came here that he had made up his mind to remain
a bachelor!"
And yet they two, she, Enid, and Godfrey, had had something tantamount to
an emotional little scene the first time he had come to see her at The
Trellis House. True, it had only lasted two or three seconds, but while
it lasted it had been intense. Had Timmy Tosswill not burst into the room
in that stupid, inopportune way, Radmore would have certainly taken her
in his arms. Though Radmore was no innocent, high-principled boy, even
one kiss between them would have altered their whole attitude, the one to
the other. She would have seen to that. In her heart she had cursed Timmy
for his idiotic intrusion, and now she cursed him again.
Lately she had thought Radmore was becoming aware of Jack Tosswill's
growing absorption in her, and she had suspected, as well as hoped, that
he was a trifle jealous. Now jealousy, as Enid knew well, is a potent
quickener of feeling between a man and a woman. It was unfortunate that
Radmore seemed to regard Jack Tosswill as a mere boy--a rather tiresome,
priggish boy. Still, that had its good side. Jack was only a very slight
complication after all!
Again she cast a fleeting thought to Tremaine. In a sense he was her real
mate, her real soul, and, yes, body mate. If only he wasn't so poor! She
felt for a moment tempted to throw up everything--to do what he had so
urged her to do, what he was always writing and begging her to do. That
was to marry him quickly just before the end of his leave, and go out to
India with him. He wrote to her every day, and his last letter was in the
little silk bag now hanging on her arm.
It was the kind of love-letter that Enid understood, and enjoyed
receiving: full of ardent, if rather commonplace, expressions, and of
comparisons, very pleasant to her vanity, between her pretty self and the
stupid, ugly women he said he was now meeting. He had been with his
people in Cornwall--but for that he would of course have come down to see
how she was getting on. In this particular letter he announced that he
was going to be in London very soon, and might he run down for a day? He
had added a question, chaffingly worded, and yet, as she well knew,
seriously intended. Did she think it would be improper for him to come
and spend two or three days with her? And now she told herself, very
decidedly, that of course she couldn't have him here--in stupid,
old-fashioned Beechfield. It would be a tiresome, useless complication.
But why shouldn't she go up to London for three or four days and have a
good time with him there?
Enid was well aware that absence frequently makes the heart grow fonder,
and that distance does lend enchantment to the view. But she would not
have put it in those exact words.
At last she began walking towards the house, telling herself that she
felt oddly tired, and that it would be very pleasant, for once, to have a
solitary cup of tea. Her house-parlourmaid was shaping very nicely. Thus
the girl had evidently brought the lamps into the sitting-room, though
she had forgotten to draw the curtains.
Enid knocked and rang. She had a theory that the possession of a latchkey
by their mistress makes servants slow to answer the door.
"There's a person waiting for you in the drawing-room, ma'am. She says
she's come down on purpose from London to see you. She came just after
you went out first."
There swept over Enid Crofton a strong, sudden premonition of evil. She
realised that for the last ten days she had been secretly dreading that
this would happen to her. She blamed herself sharply, now that it was too
late, for having done nothing further to help the Pipers; but she had
hoped the five pounds would have kept them quiet.
"I'll go upstairs and take off my things," she said wearily. "Bring me a
cup of tea in my bedroom--I don't want anything to eat--and then I'll
come down and see this person." She forced herself to add, "I suppose
it's a Mrs. Piper?"
The girl answered at once, "She didn't give her name, ma'am. She just
said that she wanted to see you, and that it was urgent. She's not got
very long; she wants to catch the six o'clock train from Telford. She
wouldn't believe at first that you wasn't in."
Enid found some comfort in those words, and she made up her mind that she
would linger upstairs as long as she possibly could, so as to cut short
her coming interview with the tiresome young woman. After all there was
very little to say. She had behaved in a kind and generous manner to her
late husband's servant, and she had already said she would do her best to
help him again.
When she got upstairs she lit the two high brass candlesticks on the
dressing-table, and then, after she had taken off her hat and long black
woollen coat, she sat down in her easy-chair by the wood fire. Soon there
came a familiar rap and a welcome cup of tea.
She was sipping it, luxuriously, when there suddenly came a very
different kind of rap on the door. It was a sharp, insistent knock,
and before she could call out "Come in," the door opened, and a
singular-looking figure advanced into the luxurious-looking,
low-ceilinged bedroom.
"Excuse me coming up like this, Modam. But I'm afraid of losing my
train."
The speaker was small and stout, with a sallow face which might once have
held a certain gipsy-like charm, for, in the candlelight, the luminous
dark eyes were by far its most arresting feature. She wore a small,
old-fashioned-looking, red velvet bonnet perched on her elaborately
dressed hair.
Enid Crofton looked at her odd-looking visitor with astonishment. Who on
earth could this be? Certainly not Piper's wife. A feeling of intense
relief came over her when the strange-looking woman came towards her
with a soft, gliding step, and handed her a card on which was written:
Madame Flora
Ladies' wardrobes, gold teeth, and old jewellery purchased at the
highest prices known in the trade
"I do 'ope you will excuse me coming up like this," she said again, and
her queer Cockney voice sounded quite pleasantly in Enid Crofton's ears.
"I've not got very long, and I've been 'ere since four o'clock."
As she spoke she did not look at the pretty young lady sitting by the
fire. Her dark eyes were glancing furtively round the attractively
furnished bedroom, as if appraising everything that was there, from the
uncommon-looking high brass candlesticks on the dressing-table to the
pink silk covered eiderdown and drawn linen coverlid on the bed.
Perhaps because she was so extraordinarily relieved, Enid Crofton spoke
to this somewhat impudent old-clothes woman very graciously.
"I'm sorry," she began, "but I've nothing in the least suitable for you,
Madame Flora. It's a pity you wasted your time waiting for me. There are
several other people in Beechfield with whom I expect you might have done
business." She smiled as she spoke.
"I wish I'd thought of that, Modam." The woman spoke with a touch of
regret. "But your maids expected you might be back any minute, and I did
want to meet you, for Piper's that down on 'is luck, I sometimes don't
know what to do with 'im! Instead of wanting to employ ex-soldiers, as in
course they ought ter, people seem just to avoid them--"
"Piper?" repeated Enid Crofton in a low, hesitating voice. "Then are you
Mrs. Piper?"
Was it conceivable that this strange-looking old thing was Piper's wife?
"I've been Mrs. Piper eighteen years," replied Madame Flora composedly,
"but I've always kep' on my business, Modam. It's not much of a business
now, worse luck! Ladies won't part with their clothes, not when they're
dropping off them. In old days, if Piper was down, I was up, so we was
all right. But we've both struck a streak of bad luck."
For a few moments neither of them spoke. Mrs. Crofton was staring,
astonished, at her visitor, and through her shallow mind there ran the
new thought of how very, very little any of us know of other people's
lives. After her first shock of dismayed surprise to find that Piper was
married at all, she had imagined Piper's wife as something young and, of
course, in a way, attractive and easily managed.
"Did you ever come down to my house in Essex?" she asked, still trying to
speak pleasantly.
"No, Modam, I never was there. Piper and I 'as always kep' clear of each
other's jobs, and I wouldn't be interfering _now_, but that the matter's
becoming serious. Piper's worse than no good when 'e's idle." She
hesitated, then went on, "If 'e's to keep off 'is failing, 'e must be
working."
There was a pause, and then Enid Crofton spoke, in a low, uncertain tone.
"Believe me, Mrs. Piper, when I say that I really will do all I can for
him. But it's not easy now to hear of good jobs, and Piper doesn't seem
easy to suit."
"You wouldn't care to take my 'usband on again yourself, Modam?"
Again there followed that curious pause which somehow filled Enid with a
vague fear.
"I wish I could," she said at last, "but I can't afford it, Mrs. Piper.
As a matter of fact, I've done a foolish thing in coming here, to
Beechfield, at all. Only the other day one of my husband's relations
advised me to let the house."
"Piper thinks, Modam, as how you might 'elp 'im to a job with Major
Radmore." The name tripped quickly off the speaker's tongue, as if she
was quite used to the sound.
Enid felt a throb of dismay. Did the Pipers know Godfrey Radmore was
back?
"We was wondering," said the woman, "if you would give us the major's
address?"
Then they didn't know he was back--or did they?
"I don't know it."
Enid Crofton was one of those women--there are more than a truthful world
suspects--who actually find it easier to lie than to tell the truth. But
she saw the look of incredulity which flashed over the sallow face of her
unwelcome visitor.
"Mr. Radmore," she went on hastily, "is taking a motor tour. But he'll be
back in London soon, and I'll let you know the moment I know he's settled
down."
"I should 'ave thought," said the woman, "that the Major would 'ave 'ad a
club where Piper could 'ave written."
"If he has, I don't know it."
And then, all at once, Enid Crofton pulled herself together. After all
the interview was going quite smoothly. Nothing--well, disagreeable--had
been said.
She got up from her chair. "I hope you'll forgive me, Mrs. Piper, for
saying that Piper will never keep any job if he behaves as he did with
these last people--I had a very disagreeable letter from the lady."
Mrs. Piper, alias Madame Flora, grew darkly red.
"Piper 'ad a shock this last July," she said, moving a little farther
into the room, and so nearer to Enid Crofton. "The thing's been
a-weighing on 'is mind for a long time. It's something 'e won't exactly
explain. But it's on 'is conscience. Only yesterday 'e says to me, 'e
says, 'If I'm drinking, my dear, it's to drown care; I ought to have
spoken up very differently to what I done at the poor Colonel's inquest."
The terrible little woman again took a step or two forward, and then she
waited, as if she expected the lady to say something. But Enid, though
she opened her lips, found that she could not speak. Hardly knowing what
she was doing, she sat down again. And, after what seemed to the owner of
the attractive, candle-lit room an awful silence, Mrs. Piper went on,
speaking now in quite a different tone--easy, confidential, and with a
touch of wheedling good nature in it.
"Thanks to your late gentleman, Piper knows all about dogs, and all
'e requires, Modam, to set 'im up as a dogfancier, so to speak, is a
moderate bit o' money. As 'e says 'imself, five hundred pound would do it
easy. If I may make so bold, that's what reely brought me 'ere, Mrs.
Crofton. It do seem to us both, that, under the circumstances, you might
feel disposed to find the money?"
Enid looked down as she answered, falteringly: "I told Piper some time
ago that it was quite impossible for me to do anything of the kind."
In her fear and distress she uttered the words more loudly than she was
aware, and the woman looked round at the closed door with an apprehensive
look: "Don't speak so loud. We don't want to tell everyone our business,"
she said sharply.
Now she came quite close up to her victim, for by now Enid Crofton knew
that she was in very truth this woman's victim.
"You think it over," whispered Madame Flora. "We're not in a 'urry to a
day or two. And look here, Modam, I'll be open with you! If you'll do
that for Piper, it'll be in full discharge of anything you owe 'im--d'you
take my meaning?"
Enid Crofton got up slowly from her chair almost as an automaton might
have done. She wanted to say that she did not in the least know what Mrs.
Piper _did_ mean. But somehow her lips refused to form the words. She was
afraid even to shake her head.
"I told you a fib just now"--Mrs. Piper's voice again dropped to a
whisper. "Piper's made a clean breast o' the matter to me, and I do think
as what it's common justice to admit that my 'usband's evidence at that
inquest was worth more than twenty-five pound to you. It wasn't what
Piper said; _it was what 'e didn't say that mattered_, Mrs. Crofton. It's
been on 'is mind awful--I'll take my Bible oath on that. But 'live and
let live,' that's my motter. We don't want to do anything unkind, but
we're in a fix ourselves--"
"I haven't got five hundred pounds," said Enid Crofton desperately;
"that's God's truth, Mrs. Piper."
To that assertion Madame Flora made no direct answer; she only observed,
in a quiet conversational tone, and speaking no longer in a whisper. "The
insurance gent told Piper as what 'e was not entirely satisfied, and 'e
said as 'e'd be pleased to see Piper any time if anything 'appened as
could throw further light on the Colonel's death. 'An extraordinary
occurrence'--that's what the insurance people's gentleman called it, Mrs.
Crofton--'an extraordinary occurrence.'"
And then Enid was stung into saying a very unwise thing. "The Coroner did
not think it an extraordinary occurrence," she said quietly.
"'E says sometimes as what 'e ought to give 'imself up and say what 'e
saw," went on Mrs. Piper with seeming irrelevance.
There was another brief pause: "If you 'aven't got five hundred pounds,
Modam, I take it the insurance money has not yet been paid, for it was a
matter of two thousand pounds--or so Piper understood from that party
what came down to make enquiries."
Enid Crofton looked at her torturer dumbly. She did not know what to
say--what to admit, and what to deny.
"Think it over," said the terrible little woman. "We're not in a 'urry to
a day or two. We'll give you a fortnight to find the money."
She put her hand, fat, yet claw-like, on Mrs. Crofton's shoulder.
"There's nothing to look so frightened about," she said a little gruffly.
"Piper and me aren't blackmailers. But we've got to look out for
ourselves, same as everybody else does. It's Piper's idea--that five
hundred pounds is. 'E says 'twould ease 'is conscience to carry on the
pore old Colonel's dog-breeding. As for me, I'd just as lief 'ave 'im in
a good job--what gentlefolk call 'a cushy job'--with a gentleman like
this Major Radmore seems to be. But there! Piper's just set on them nasty
dogs, and 'e's planned it all out."
"Five hundred pounds is a great deal of money." Enid Crofton spoke in a
dull, preoccupied tone.
"Not so much as it used to be, not by any manner of means," said
Mrs. Piper shrewdly. "Think it over, Mrs. Crofton--and let us know
what you _can_ do. Perhaps it needn't be paid all in one; but best to
write to Piper next time. 'E says 'e'd like to feel you and 'im were
partners-like. I'll tell 'im I arranged for you to 'ave ten days to a
fortnight to think it over."
"Thinking won't make money," said Enid in a low voice.
"Such a beautiful young lady as yourself, Modam, can't find it difficult
to put 'er 'and on five hundred pounds," murmured Mrs. Piper, and as she
said the words there came a leering smile over her small, pursed-up
mouth.
And then, turning, she glided across the candle-lit room, and noiselessly
opening the door, she slid through it.
Enid Crofton sank farther back into her chintz-covered easy-chair. She
was trembling all over, and her hands were shaking. She had not felt so
frightened as she felt now, even during the terrible moments which had
preceded her being put in the witness-box at the inquest held on her
husband's body; and with a feeling of acute, unreasoning terror, she
asked herself how she could cope with this new, dreadful situation.
What, for instance, did that allusion to the insurance company mean? She
had had the two thousand pounds, and she had spent about a quarter of it
paying bills of which her husband had known nothing. Then the settling
in at The Trellis House had cost a great deal more than she had expected.
Of course she had some left, but five hundred pounds would make a hideous
hole in her little store.
What could the Pipers do to her? Could they do anything? The sinister
woman's repetition of Piper's curious remark, "'E says sometimes as what
'e ought to give 'imself up, and say what 'e saw," came back to her with
sickening vividness.
She looked round her, timorously. The candles on her dressing-table gave
such a poor light. How stupid of a village like Beechfield not to have
electric light! She stood up and rang for a hot-water bottle. At any rate
she might as well try to get a little beauty sleep before dressing to go
to the Tosswills.