Esther never knew how she got out into the street. She walked along
like some one in a dream; her cheeks were burning hot.
Mrs. Raymond Ashton! Raymond's mother! The woman of whom he had spoken
so often and so bitterly. The woman who had raised such a fierce
objection to her marriage with Raymond.
There was not much resemblance between mother and son; they were both
handsome, but there was a sort of humour in Mrs. Ashton's face which
Raymond's lacked. Esther tried vainly to find some likeness between
them.
She realised how different this woman was to what she had pictured
her, remembered that spontaneously offered hand. Had Mrs. Ashton known
who she was? Oh, surely not, or she would never have appeared so
anxious to engage her.
How angry Raymond would be. Angry that the woman he loved was to go to
his mother as a paid companion. Esther could not help smiling. For her
own sake she would not mind it. At least she would be with his mother
and in his home; but, of course, the thing was impossible--such a
situation would not be tolerable. She would have to write and refuse.
"Good afternoon!" said a voice, and, turning hurriedly, Esther found
Micky Mellowes beside her.
He looked as if he were not quite sure of his reception; but to-day
Esther had other thoughts to occupy her which were more interesting
than he was--and the smile she gave him was almost friendly.
"Good afternoon! Isn't it cold?"
"Very.... Where are you hurrying off to?"
He tried to speak casually, but his heart was beating uncomfortably.
"I'm just going back home," Esther said. "I've been to an agency
looking for a berth."
"A berth!" A frown came between his eyes. "What sort of a berth?" he
asked quickly.
Esther laughed.
"Well, I'm think of taking your advice--and going as companion to an
old lady--not that she's very old," she added doubtfully, with sudden
memory of Raymond's mother.
"You mean that you have decided?"
She hesitated.
"Well, I have the refusal of it." She looked at him with defiant eyes.
"I am only just hesitating--I want to talk to Miss Mason about it--she
is much more worldly wise than I am."
"June is a very sensible woman," he said. "I am glad you like her." He
hesitated. "And the--er--post?" he asked with an effort. "Will it be
in town?"
"Oh yes."
She was obviously not going to tell him any more, but Micky
persevered.
"I wonder if it is likely to be any one I know. I have quite an
extensive acquaintance in London."
"Yes," said Esther. "But I don't suppose you will know these people,
anyway," she added with an unconscious touch of loftiness in her
voice. "The name is Ashton--Mrs. Raymond Ashton."
There was the barest possible silence before Micky answered, a silence
during which the blank dismay and anger that crossed his face would
have been amusing had it not also had something of pathos in it.
"Ashton?" he said. "Oh, yes, I know Raymond Ashton very well." He was
watching her with jealous eyes, and she turned her head sharply and
looked up at him.
Just for a moment a traitorous eagerness crossed her face; he could
almost see the quick question on her lips, then she laughed.
"Really! How funny! But, of course, as you say, you must know a great
many people."
"I have known the Ashtons for years. You will like Mrs. Ashton."
There was a sort of quiet insinuation in the words, and Esther bit her
lip.
"And--the son?" she asked. "I think you said you knew the son."
"Yes, I know him--he is in Paris, I believe."
Micky was conscious of a queer tightening about his throat; it was a
tremendous effort to force himself to speak lightly.
"And shall I like him as well, do you think?" Esther asked deliberately.
Micky did not answer.
"Do you like him?" she persisted.
Micky's restraint broke its bonds; if he had died for it he could not
have checked the words that rushed to his lips.
"I detest the fellow!" he said. "He's a beastly outsider!"
He dared not look at her. He held his breath, waiting for the storm to
break, but if he had lost his self-control she kept hers admirably.
"Really," she said. Her voice was a little breathless, but quite calm.
"What does a man mean when he calls another man--such a name?"
Her face was quite colourless, even to the lips, and her hands were
clenched in the shabbiness of the cheap little muff she carried.
He blunderingly tried to make amends.
"I ought not to have said that, just because he's not the sort of man
I care about," he said stammeringly. "He's quite all right--it all
depends from what point of view you regard him. I hope you will forget
that I said that, Miss Shepstone. It--it was unpardonable."
"It's a matter of complete indifference to me what you say about--Mr.
Ashton," she told him.
She stopped. They had been walking along together.
"Which way are you going?" she asked.
Micky flushed up to his eyes; he knew this was a dismissal.
"I was coming along to see June," he said. "I hoped you would allow me
to walk along with you--if I am not intruding."
Esther forced a smile, but her lips felt stiff.
"Oh, but I am not going back," she said. Her voice sounded as if it
were cut in ice. "So I won't detain you. Good-bye."
She turned and left him, walking quickly away again in the direction
from which she had just come.
Her eyes were smarting with tears that had to be restrained.
"How dare he--oh, how dare he?" she asked herself passionately. "What
does he know about Raymond?"
She could not trust herself to go back home. She walked about in the
cold till she was tired out. She wanted to be sure that Micky would
have left Elphinstone Road before she got there. She wondered if June
knew the Ashtons too. She probably did, as Micky Mellowes knew them.
They were both of Raymond's own world, these two. It was only she, who
loved him best, who was outside the magic circle of his friends.
It was nearly supper time when she got in. She paused for a moment in
the hall and looked anxiously at the rows of coats and hats hanging
there. She thought she would know Micky's if she saw them there. She
forgot that he might have taken them up to June's room. She turned
away with a little sigh.
At the foot of the stairs she met young Harley. He coloured
sensitively when he saw her and stood aside for her to pass.
Esther flushed too. She wondered what he thought of her note refusing
the theatre. With sudden impulse she spoke--
"I hope you are not angry with me, Mr. Harley, but--but perhaps you do
not know that I am engaged to be married, and so ... so I don't think
I should accept invitations from any one else, though--though it was
kind of you to ask me," she added.
"I should have been delighted if you could have come," he said. "But,
of course, if your fiancé would not care about it----" He broke off as
if there was nothing more to be said.
Esther wondered if Raymond really would mind; at first he had been
very jealous, and could not bear her to speak to another man, but
latterly--she hated it, because she could not forget that once he had
told her she could marry a man with money if she only played her cards
carefully--the man who had said that seemed a different personality
altogether from the man whose letters she had only lived for during
the last fortnight.
Was she mean and unforgiving that she continually found herself
remembering the quarrels and scenes they had had? She wanted so
earnestly to forget them; she went up to June's room with dragging
steps.
The door of the room opened before she reached the landing, and June
came out.
"I knew it was you," she said. "Poor soul! how tired you sound.
Another day of miserable failure, I suppose. Never mind, come and sit
down in the warm, and you'll soon forget it."
Esther laughed rather shamefacedly.
"It's been a day of success, strange to relate," she said. "But I'm
tired, dead tired--I must have walked miles." She suddenly remembered
Micky; she looked round with--a quick suspicion. "Have you been alone
all the afternoon?" she asked.
"Yes, quite alone," June laughed. "Who did you expect to find here,
pray?" she demanded.
"Nobody--I only wondered if you had had any visitors."
"I might have known it wasn't the truth that he was coming here," she
told herself vexedly.
"Well, and what about the success?" June asked; she was sitting on the
hearthrug stroking Charlie. "You don't mean to say that the old dear
at the agency really had something to offer you this time?"
Esther nodded.
"Yes, and she's desperately anxious for me to take it, too. It's quite
a good offer, but it means leaving here and living in; and I don't
believe I want to leave here," she added ruefully.
June looked dismayed.
"I shan't let you go," she said promptly. "Just as we are settling
down so cosily." She put her white hands over her ears. "No, I don't
want to hear another thing about it, if that's it," she said. "I
shan't listen--write and refuse it--write and refuse it at once."
Esther laughed; she pulled June's hands down and held them firmly.
"Tell me," she said. "Do you know any people named Ashton?"
She was longing to find out if June did know them; it seemed such a
lifetime since she had seen Raymond or spoken to him, she was hungry
to hear him spoken of, even if only by this woman who probably had
merely known him as an ordinary acquaintance.
"Ashton!" June wrinkled up her nose. "I know some Ashtons who live in
Brayanstone Square," she said at last. "A mother and son. A very
handsome woman she is, with white hair, she has a sort of grande dame
look about her--the sort of woman you can imagine in a powdered wig
and a crinoline, curtsying to the queen." She scrambled up, and,
snatching a paper fan from the shelf, swept Esther a graceful curtsy
to illustrate her meaning.
But Esther was too much in earnest to be amused.
"It must be the same Mrs. Ashton," she said eagerly. "This is her
card--she gave it to me to-day--Mrs. Raymond Ashton."
June glanced at the card and nodded briskly.
"Yes, it's the same. I don't know her frightfully well; she's rather
reserved, too; but I admire her immensely--well, go on."
"She wants me to go to her as a sort of companion--she has offered me
fifty pounds a year."
June whistled.
"Not bad, is it? But you'll refuse, of course?"
"I asked her to let me think it over; I said I should like to talk it
over with you first."
June clasped her hands round her knees and stared into the fire
thoughtfully.
"She's a widow, isn't she?" Esther said hesitatingly. "At least--she
didn't say anything about a husband."
"Yes, she's a widow right enough," June said. "And delighted to be, I
should think," she added bluntly. "I never knew the departed spouse,
but from all accounts he was a perfect terror."
Esther said nothing. Raymond had always spoken of his father as being
a "rare old sport."
After a moment--
"There's a son, too," June said. "A kind of Adonis to look at,
beautiful eyes and all that sort of thing."
"Yes," said Esther. She tried hard to keep the eagerness from her
voice. "Do you--do you know the son too?" she asked nervously.
June gave a queer little laugh.
"Oh yes, I know him. That is to say, I say 'How d'ye do' to him when I
have the misfortune to meet him, but----"
Esther's hands were clasped in her lap.
"Why--why--misfortune?" she asked.
June Mason shrugged her shoulders.
"Oh, I don't know--it's hard to explain--he's never done me any harm,
but there are some people one hates by instinct, and Raymond Ashton is
one of the people I hate." She smoothed a crease in the skirt of her
frock. "He's such a--such an awful outsider," she added, unconsciously
choosing the word Micky Mellowes had used a few hours before.
Esther sat very still. Twice she tried to speak, but no words would
come. She knew that it was unfair to June to sit there and allow her
to go on talking about Raymond, but something in her heart seemed to
have set a seal on her lips.
"He's that insufferable kind of creature who thinks himself
irresistible," June went on. "Micky has often told me the way he brags
about his so-called 'conquests.' Conquests, indeed! What are they but
a few poor ignorant girls hoodwinked by his handsome face and smooth
tongue? Dozens of girls he's had, my dear, literally dozens! Only the
other day some one told me that Mrs. Ashton had to threaten to cut him
off with a shilling if he didn't give up some little person he was
supposed to be going to marry! I don't know how true it is, mind you,
but that's the sort of man he is--I've no time for him at all," she
finished vigorously.
She turned to look at Esther, and gave a little exclamation of alarm.
"How pale you are! Don't you feel well?"
"I'm quite all right--I'm just tired--I don't think I'll go down to
supper to-night. I'll just stay here and be quiet. I wanted to hear
what you had to say about my future employer."
"Future fiddlesticks!" June retorted. "You're not going to her, my
dear; I shan't let you. If Raymond came home while you were there,
you'd never have any peace."
Esther was lying back now with closed eyes. Over and over again in her
mind she was saying to herself--
"I don't believe it--I don't believe a word of it; it's all cruel
lies--first Mr. Mellowes and now June. They both hate him, that's what
it is; but I don't believe a word of what they say." June was bustling
about the room fetching cushions and a light rug which she had laid
over Esther.
"You have a little sleep, and you'll feel heaps better," she said.
She went away, shutting the door quietly; and Esther hid her face in
her hands.
She hardly knew why she was crying, she only knew that she was utterly
miserable.
She took Ashton's last letter from her dress and read it through
again--how could any one, reading it, doubt that he loved her? How
could any one, knowing his careful thought for her, believe that he
was the detestable personality June and Micky had described?
She kissed the signature passionately. Nobody in all the world counted
but this one man.
She got up and went over to June's desk, which both girls used; she
felt that she must write to him and tell him how much she wanted him.
When she had finished writing she looked to the head of the paper on
which she had written for the address, and then she saw a postscript
scribbled in a corner which she had not noticed before.
"Don't write to me here--I shall have left this hotel by the time
you get my letter. I will write again as soon as possible."
It was like a door with iron bars being closed in her face; she could
not write after all! She could have no relief for all her longing and
unhappiness; she must just wait and wait, eating her very soul out,
till he wrote again.
She tore up what she had written and threw it into the fire.
"The phantom lover"--June's half playful, half mocking words came back
to her with foreboding. Was he indeed only a phantom lover? Just a
creation of her own brain and desire? She tried to thrust the thought
from her; she was tired and fanciful; in the morning she would be all
right; it was not fair to him, it was not fair to herself to be so
doubting. She went back to June's couch and curled up amongst the
mauve pillows; life was so hard, so disappointing; it gave so little
of all that one desired; the tears fell again, presently she cried
herself to sleep.
June came back on tiptoe; she stole across the room and looked at
Esther, then she went back to the hearthrug to keep Charlie company.
The fire had died down and she replenished it as quietly as she could,
putting a knob on at a time with her fingers.
As she leaned over to poke them softly together she caught sight of a
scrap of paper lying in the grate. It looked like part of a torn
letter, and without thinking June picked it up--the one word "dearest"
stared up at her in Esther's writing.
June looked at it for a long moment, then she turned her head and
glanced at Esther, still sleeping.
June frowned; she hunched her shoulders impatiently.
"More phantom lover, I suppose," she told herself crossly; she threw
the little scrap of paper into the fire and watched it burn with a
sort of vixenish delight.