Micky passed three days before he made any attempt to see Esther
Shepstone again; days that seemed like a month at least, and during
which he lost his appetite and forgot to smoke.
That she did not particularly care if she saw him again or not, he was
miserably sure. She had no thoughts for any one but Ashton. He felt as
if he could not settle to anything. On the third morning Marie Deland
rang him up. He had told her many times that her voice on the
telephone cheered him, but to-day it made him frown.
He tried to answer her cheery "That you, Micky?" as cheerily, but he
knew it was a failure.
"What's the matter?" she asked quickly. "Aren't you well? Or are you
cross?"
There was a hint of laughter in her voice. She had never known Micky
cross; he was always the cheeriest of mortals.
Micky grabbed at the excuse she offered him.
"I've got a brute of a headache," he said.
"Poor old boy!" The pretty, sympathetic voice irritated him. "Come out
for a walk; it will do you good."
"Thanks--thanks awfully, but I don't think it would. I'm a perfect
bear--you'd hate me. Some other time."
There was a little pause. Micky could have kicked himself as he
remembered on what terms they had parted. It was not her fault that a
miracle had happened since then to metamorphose the whole world. He
supposed uncomfortably that she was just the same as she had been when
he last saw her. He knew she must be wondering why he had stayed away
so long. He tried to soften his words.
"I'll look in to-night, if I may. Sorry to be such a bear."
She answered rather dispiritedly that it was all right, that she was
sorry he felt ill. It was a relief when she rang off. He took his hat
and went off to call on Esther.
He felt that he could settle to nothing till he had seen her again;
there was a curious jealousy in his heart about Ashton; he would have
given anything he possessed to be able to disillusion her, but knew it
was impossible without hopelessly compromising himself.
It was a bitter disappointment to find that she was out when he
reached the boarding-house; his face fell absurdly when he turned and
walked away.
He wondered if she really was out, or only out to him.
After a moment he laughed at himself. A few days ago he had not known
there was such a person as Esther Shepstone in the world, and yet now
here he was, consumed with jealousy because she was not in when he
called.
He took a taxicab back to the West End; he walked about for half an
hour staring aimlessly into shop windows, then went back to his rooms.
He could not understand his extraordinary restlessness; he had only
once before felt anything like it in all his life, and that had been
the first time he ever backed a horse, and was waiting a wire from the
course to say if the brute had won.
He recalled the fever of impatience that had consumed him then, and
laughed; after all, it had been nothing compared with this.
Driver came into the room.
"If you please, sir, Miss Mason has been on the 'phone. She said would
I ask you to meet her for tea."
Micky did not look enthusiastic; he liked June awfully, but to-day
every one and everything seemed a bore.
"Tea! Where?" he asked vaguely.
"Miss Mason said that you would know, sir; the same place as usual."
"Oh, all right!"
Micky looked at the clock and sighed. After all, June was always
amusing; he went off almost cheerfully to the unpretentious club of
which she had spoken to Esther. He had to wait in the lobby while a
boy in buttons fetched June to him. She came downstairs looking very
much at home, and smoking the inevitable cigarette. It was one of June
Mason's charms that she always managed to look at home wherever she
was.
She had taken off her coat, but she wore a green hat with a gold
ornament that suited her to perfection, set on her dark head at rakish
angle.
"I began to think you were not coming," she said.
She gave him her left hand, and Micky squeezed it in friendly fashion.
They went upstairs together to a small tea-room, which was just now
deserted save for two waitresses who were giggling together over a
newspaper.
June walked over to a table in the window, and Micky followed.
He had been here with her scores of times before, and the two
waitresses smiled at one another knowingly; they were quite sure that
this was romance.
Micky was sitting with an elbow on the table, absently smoothing the
back of his head; he was wishing it was Esther sitting opposite to
him; he looked up with a little start when June spoke to him.
"What's up, Micky? I've never seen you looking so depressed."
He roused himself with an effort.
"Oh, nothing, nothing! It's the beastly weather, I expect."
She looked at him quizzically with her queer eyes.
"I shouldn't have thought the weather would depress you," she said.
"However, if you say it does----"
He shook himself together.
"I'm not depressed any longer," he declared. "Well, and how are you?
And how is the swindle?" It was Micky's pet joke to call June's
invention the "swindle," though in his heart he was almost as proud of
it as she was.
She laughed.
"It's very well, thank you; but that isn't what I want to talk to you
about to-day. Micky, would you like to come to tea with me one
afternoon?"
Micky stared.
"Tea! Haven't I come to tea with you to-day?"
"Silly! I don't mean here; I mean where I live. It's a boarding-house.
I dare say you'll hate it, but it's really quite a nice place, and
beggars can't be choosers, anyway. I've got a very comfortable
sitting-room and most of my own furniture, and I can give you a good
cup of tea, or anything else, if you prefer it."
"I shall be delighted," Micky looked puzzled. "But isn't this rather a
breaking of rules? It's not so very long ago that you made me swear
never to try and find out where you lived. I thought it was all to be
a deadly secret."
"So it was, but I've decided to admit you. I know you're safe, and,
Micky, wouldn't you like to meet the dearest, prettiest, most
attractive little girl...."
Micky moved his chair back in mock alarm.
"June! You're not turning match-maker! If you are, I give you fair
warning that our friendship will have to end once and for ever. I'll
put up with a lot from you, but not this--not...."
"Don't be an idiot!" said June calmly. "There isn't the slightest
fear! And anyway----" she added, with a half sigh, "she's engaged, so
it wouldn't be any good. But I want you to help her.... Oh, I know I'm
always bringing you foundlings to help and look after, but you've got
such a big heart--and such a big banking account," she added
audaciously.
"Well, go on----" he said resignedly. "Who is the foundling this time,
and what am I to do?"
Micky laughed.
"She's a darling," June said warmly. "I've only known her for four
days--she lives in the same house. I took a fancy to her from the
first moment I saw her. No, it was before that--it was when I first
heard her name...."
Micky raised his brows.
"What a creature of impulse! My dear, you'll burn your fingers badly
some day."
"And when I do," said Miss Mason sharply, "I shan't come crying to you
for sympathy; however ... Well, she's poor! she's one of those
horribly poor, frightfully proud people whom it's impossible to help.
I've tried all ways! I asked her to go shares with my sitting-room,
and she said she couldn't afford it; she'll hardly let me give her a
cup of tea or coffee for fear I should think she is sponging on me.
She seems most frightfully alone in the world. She says she engaged to
a man, but he's abroad, and I'm sure he's not nice, anyway. He's only
written to her once since I've known her, at all events, and this
morning when there wasn't a letter, I know she went back to her room
and cried. I knocked at the door, but she wouldn't let me in."
She paused, and looked at Micky for sympathy.
He half smiled; he knew how enthusiastic June always was about
everything.
"Well, and what do you want me to do for this damsel in distress?" he
asked gently.
"I want you to get her a berth somewhere," he was told promptly. "No,
it's no use saying you can't! My dear man, you must know scores of
people who'd take her in. She thought she was fixed up all right, but
now it appears that the people she was with before haven't got a
vacancy for her, and so that's knocked on the head. She told me that
she's have to just take the first thing that came along. I don't
believe she's hardly got a shilling to her name. I offered to take her
into partnership with me. I said we'd go travelling together for my
beauty cream, but she wouldn't hear of it.... She's so proud!"--and
here a sound of tears crept into June Mason's voice. "I ask you,
Micky, what can be done with any one like that?"
Micky shrugged his shoulders.
"If she'll take anything that comes along, she ought to get a job
pretty soon," he said laconically. "I'll speak to a man I know--can
she write a decent hand and all that sort of thing?"
"Of course she can! But I want a good berth, mind you! I've never been
so fond of anybody as I am of her. She's awfully worried about this
horrid man she's engaged to. She doesn't say much about him, but this
morning she said that there didn't seem to be anything to live for,
and her eyes looked so sad...."
Micky smiled at her serious face.
"You'd make an eloquent appeal in a court of law," he said. He took a
pencil from his pocket and an envelope. "Give me her name and address,
and I'll see what I can do. I don't promise anything, mind you, but
I'll do what I can...."
"You're a dear," said June warmly. "I know you were the one to come
to. I'm quite sure when you've seen Esther you'll ... why, what's the
matter, Micky?"
Micky had looked up sharply. His face had paled a little.
"What name did you say?" he asked. He never knew how he managed to
control his voice. His heart seemed to be thumping in his throat.
"What name did you say?" he asked again, with an effort. "I did not
catch it----"
"It's Esther," said June, "Esther Shepstone."