THE EXPLANATION
The fact that Chetwode was returning more than a week sooner than she
had expected, seemed to Felicity a hopeful sign. She hesitated for about
half an hour as to whether or not she should go and meet him at the
station. Doubt and dignity suggested remaining at home, but impatience
carried the day.
As she was waiting on the platform, the prophecy of Madame Zero occurred
to her, and she thought to herself, with a smile--
"She doesn't seem so bad at prophesying what one's _going_ to do. It's
when she prophesies what one _ought_ to have done that the poor dear
gets out of her depth."
When he had arrived, and they were driving off together, she thought he
looked neither more nor less serene and casual than usual; his actual
presence seemed to radiate calm and dispose of anxiety; her suspicions
began to melt away.
They had dined together, and talked on generalities, and neither had
mentioned the subject. Chetwode's intense dislike to any disturbing
topic infected Felicity; she now felt a desire to let him off even an
explanation. She wished she had never seen the velvet case, or, at any
rate, that she had never mentioned it to any one. He didn't, she
fancied, look as if he were deceiving her in any way. His affection was
not more marked than usual, nor less so. She observed there was no tinge
in his manner of an attempt to make up for anything. Yet the question
had to be asked.
"What did you do most of the time there?" began Felicity.
"Nothing. Played bridge."
"By the way," said Felicity, "you've never told me what _Mrs._
Tregelly's like."
"Of course I haven't. She isn't like anything."
"Isn't she very pretty?"
"Oh, I suppose she's all right--for Tregelly," said Chetwode.
"Then if you don't admire her at all, would you mind telling me why you
have her portrait locked up in a velvet case?" demanded Felicity in a
soft, sweet voice.
"I wonder!" said Chetwode.
"Oh, don't be so irritating. Don't you _know_ you have it?"
"I haven't known it long."
His coolness roused her, and she said angrily--
"Then you ought to have known. I've been fearing that your casual ways
are a very convenient screen for----"
"For what?" he asked, smiling. He was disposed to tease her for having
doubted him.
She did not answer. He came and sat next to her.
"And so you would have cared?"
"Cared? I should think so. I've been miserable!"
"What a shame! I'm very sorry--I mean, very glad. But you might have
spared yourself all this worry, dear, if you'd thought two minutes."
"How? How do you prove that what I imagined isn't true?"
"My dear girl, could you seriously suspect me of wanting to possess a
coloured portrait on porcelain taken from a photograph? Did you think
I'd have such a thing in the house--except inadvertently?"
"It's a pretty face," she said.
"But it's an appalling picture! Don't I _care_ about things? I hope I
haven't got any silly vanity about it, but I don't think I ever have
anything wrong--I mean, artistically."
He looked round the room with the uncontrollable pride of the collector.
"No, my dear," he went on, "you've done me an injustice. From you I'm
really surprised."
"But _anything_, as a souvenir of a person you like very much ..." she
said hesitatingly.
"Oh, all right!" he answered. "Do you suppose if I'd an awful oleograph
of _you_, even--that I'd keep it as a souvenir? Good heavens, Felicity,
one doesn't bring sentiment into _that_ sort of thing! You ought to have
known me better."
She waited a moment.
"Then on those grounds alone I'm to consider I'm utterly wrong?"
"Rather! Suppose you'd found a wonderful early sketch by Whistler or
Burne-Jones, say, of a pretty woman--even then I should never have
believed you'd be such a Philistine as to suppose that the person who
_sat_ for it had any interest for me. But a thing like that!" He laughed
and shrugged his shoulders.
"How did it get there?"
"How did it get there?" he answered. "Last time I stayed with them,
Tregelly sent it up to me for my critical opinion on it as a work of
art." He laughed. "It made me so sick that I locked it up, and dropped
or lost the key, or else I told the man to put it away. As he's an ass,
I suppose he packed it among my things. I suppose Tregelly thought I
gave it to his wife, and she thought I gave it back to him, as I heard
no more about the thing then. But this time, as soon as I arrived," he
smiled, "it was passionately reclaimed by both--and I promised to have a
look."
Felicity clapped her hands.
"Then I'll send it back at once, and--will you have a look?"
"Good God, no! Never let me see the thing again." He took up a paper as
if tired of the subject.
"Did you come back to look for it?" she asked.
"I came back because I received a three-volume novel wire from Savile,
explaining what he called the situation."
"Fancy! Isn't he wonderful?"
"He's the limit," said Chetwode, laughing.
"But you might tell me, dear Chetwode; it isn't really for her that you
go there?"
"Really, Felicity! I hardly ever see her! She's always busy with her
children or rattling her house-keeping keys. Oh, she's all
_right_--suits Tregelly, poor chap! Are we through now?" he asked, with
patience.
"No. Won't you kiss me and forgive me?"
"Presently," he said, turning a page of the paper.
"May I just say that nothing of this sort could ever have happened
if--if you didn't go away just a _little_ too much? From the very first
you know you were always absolutely free. I've the greatest horror of
bothering you, or tyrannising in any way, but don't you think it's gone
a little too far? If we hadn't been rather separated, I couldn't have
made such a mistake about you. Suppose you'd found, privately locked up,
a similar portrait of Bertie Wilton, say, wouldn't _you_ have thought
things?"
"Wilton's an ass," said Chetwode. "But he does _know_. To give him his
due, I couldn't have found a similar portrait of him. He isn't capable
of allowing such a thing to exist."
"Well, say a good portrait," said Felicity. "Do let us be perfectly
frank with each other."
"We will," said Chetwode. "I _am_ rather sick of Wilton."
"He's really an awfully good boy," said Felicity.
"Then let him be a good boy somewhere else. I'm tired of him."
"I'll see less of him," she answered.
"Good!" said Chetwode.
"And--I know it was a very long speech I made just now, but don't you
think I'm right?"
"I didn't hear," he answered. "I was listening to your voice."
"Then must I say it all over again? I _really_ want you to take it in,
Chetwode," she said pleadingly.
"Say it all over again, and as much more as you like, dear."
"And then will you tell me you haven't heard?"
He threw down the newspaper.
"Very likely. I shall have been looking at your lips."