The dim light was already struggling in through the curtains before
Lady Henrietta dropped off to sleep, quieted. Susan dared not withdraw
her hand. Her arm grew stiff, ached awhile, and was numb; her head
slid against the pillow, and her eyes shut at last.
She awakened with a start to hear Lady Henrietta's laugh, weak but
natural, and a man's exclamation, sharp and pitiful, above her.
"Take her away, Barnaby, and give her her breakfast," his mother was
ordering. "Didn't you see her? The poor child has been sitting up
holding my hand like that the livelong night. I was clean off my
head.... I might have known you'd behave like this. Oh, I can bear
the sight of you now; don't be nervous; I'm not one of those
sentimental mothers--! But since I've taken to heart attacks I have to
be treated with circumspection"--she desisted a minute in her rapid
effort to disguise emotion:--"Barnaby, I am obliged to you for--for
_her_."
"You're fond of her, are you, mother?" said Barnaby.
Lady Henrietta laughed at him, amused at his queer intonation.
"Fond?" she cried. "I adore her. The first minute I saw her, a little
pale wisp in her widow's weeds, I adored her. She isn't your style at
all, you puzzle. You used to admire a more lavish figure.... I can't
understand it in the least; but I'm thankful. And that reminds me you
must take her up to London immediately, and have her put into proper
clothes."
"Oh, I say----" Barnaby was beginning. She took the words out of his
mouth.
"Yes, it's your business," she said. "We can't have her going about in
black; it denies your existence--! and you look like a battered scamp
yourself. You'll have to go to your tailor. If you want any money
I'll write you a cheque.... They won't honour yours while you're
dead.... Wake her up now, and take her away to breakfast--and take
care of her if you can!"
He bent down and touched her arm, and she lifted her head, still dazed,
and stood up from her cramped position.
"Run away," said Lady Henrietta. "Run away, you two. I am going to
wash my face."
She kissed her hand to them as they went through the door, and, in
spite of herself, her lip quivered. She lay quite still for a minute,
raging at herself.
"Quiet!" she muttered. "Quiet! It's nothing to die about, stupid
heart!"
Downstairs the servants were all hovering, lying in wait, and watching
for a glimpse of the master. Macdonald himself had drawn two
arm-chairs beside a small table by the fire, and unwillingly, but
discreetly, took himself off and closed the door behind him.
"Sit down," said Barnaby gently. "I'll pour out your tea. You must
want it."
She let him do as he would, accepting her cup at his hands, drinking
obediently, trying to eat; patient, but not at all understanding him.
The winter sun streamed in red, shining in her hair, making lights in
its curling darkness; it even lent a fictitious pink to her cheek as
she sat, so soberly, facing the man in whose house she was, whose ring
was on her finger. When she turned her head a little the glimmer died.
Irrelevantly--why should the thing strike him then?--he likened her
paleness to the creamy tint of the hawthorn blossom, warm, and smoother
than the wintry white of the sloe. She had been ill, too; she was very
fragile.
All the while she dared hardly glance at him, though she knew that he
was regarding her, not with the righteous wrath of a swindled Briton
whose house was his castle, but with a strange expression that, less
comprehensible, was little less alarming. The situation seemed to
amuse him.... And it was like a scene in a play; intimate, domestic,
and yet unreal. They were obliged to sit so close at the confidential
little table, with its clinking china, and its neighbouring row of
silver dishes keeping warm in the fender.... She had a wild fancy that
if she thrust her hand in that fire that leapt and crackled so
naturally it would not burn.
"Well," he said suddenly. "What's to be done?"
He had risen and come round to her side; the little delay was over.
They had finished breakfast....
"I don't know," she said. "I am at your mercy."
"Do you mind if I smoke?"
His matter-of-fact politeness, as he waited with the cigarette unlit
between his fingers, provoked in her a fugitive smile.
"There!" he said. "You are beginning to see the funny side of it too,
as I do. A man who has knocked about the world as I have doesn't
bluster like a Pharisee and a brute, unless he is mad,--or angry. What
on earth could I do to you?"
"Are you not--angry?" she asked faintly.
"Not exactly," said Barnaby. "I am rather astonished at your pluck.
Of course, it was frightfully dangerous, and you have got us both into
a hole.--I'm not going to preach at you----"
He hesitated a little.
"You know," he said. "I'm an awfully prudent chap, but once or twice
in my life I have lost my head. When I went to America three years
ago, I was only fit to be clapped into a strait-waistcoat. Of course,
I did the first mad thing that came into my head."
There was a touch of some old bitterness in his voice then, and a sort
of retrospective contempt.
"It's a grim fact, that," he said. "It can't be got over. I don't
know what possessed me;--but there _was_ a marriage."
"She is very beautiful," said Susan, uttering her own wandering
thought. She did not know why.
"Who?" said Barnaby. "Oh,--yes. She was like somebody I knew."
There was silence between them. Then the man laughed.
"It was one of those unaccountable acts of temporary madness," he said.
"We're all guilty of such at times. Did she tell you why we fell out?
How she mistook me for a sort of prince in disguise, and turned on me
afterwards, as furious as I was--disillusioned? Don't let's talk about
that. We have our own problem to consider."
"Yes," said the girl, catching her breath.
"I am afraid," he said gravely, "we must keep it up for a bit."
"I--don't--understand," she said.
"It's the only thing to do," he said. "Look at it fairly. Since the
lady who married me sent you over as her substitute, she can't complain
if I should acknowledge you as my wife. It injures nobody.--Don't
mistake me!"
For the girl had sprung to her feet, and was gazing at him with horror
in her eyes.
"Wait!" he said. "I'm not one of these talking fellows.--Perhaps I'm
not putting it clearly. As far as I can make out, the doctor believes
another shock on the top of this one might possibly kill my mother.
She's not to be worried or contradicted. I can't go to her and tell
her, 'That girl you are so fond of is an impostor. I've turned her out
of the house,' seriously, how could I? And do you imagine she'd be
contented with any excuse I could make to her for your disappearance?
I can't risk it. You wouldn't want me to risk it. Come, you owe her a
little consideration----!"
"Oh--!" she cried. "Yes"--but still she trembled.
Barnaby smiled down on her encouragingly. Apparently,--after that one
quick word that had hushed her outcry,--he was unconscious of
misconstruction.
"Besides," he said, "there will be row enough in the papers over my
reappearance. I couldn't stand them getting hold of this. Good Lord!
It would make us a laughing-stock."
"I am--sorry," she said, in a broken voice. Barnaby dropped his own.
"Don't be sorry," he said. "Be a brave girl, and let's keep it to
ourselves."
Her heart jumped and stood still. She looked at him like some wild
thing caught in a trap, without hope or help, crying its uttermost
defiance.
And the man understood. His eyes looked straight into hers, blue and
earnest, no longer careless.
"If I trust you," he said, "you must trust my honour. Please
understand that I am a gentleman. We'll play our farce to stalls and
the gallery, and when the curtain is down we'll treat each other with
the most profound respect."
She tried to speak and could not. His voice softened.
"There's nothing else to be done," he said. "It won't be so hard on
you;--you're an actress. And we'll find a way out, somehow. Perhaps,
in a month or two, I can manage to have important business in
America----"
She caught at that.
"And take me with you and drop me somewhere--?" she suggested.
"Take you with me and drop you somewhere?" he repeated. "Exactly. We
must think it over."
"I could get killed in a railway accident--anything!" she said, in an
eager, breathless voice.
"How accommodating!" said Barnaby. "There, that's settled. To my
mother, and all outsiders, we'll be the most ordinary couple; but in
private it shall be Sir and Madam. Shake hands on it, and promise me
you'll play up."
He took her hands, the one with his ring on, the other bare. And Susan
looked up at him, and was not afraid any more. She felt safe, and yet
reckless;--almost as if she did not care at all how it ended, as if
nothing were too dangerous, too adventurous for her to promise him.
"Right," he said. "And it's comedy, not tragedy, we're playing. We
mustn't forget that."
"No," she said uncertainly; but she was not so sure.
"And now I'm going round to the stables," he said, changing his tone.
But he turned back again on his way to the door.
"What am I to call you?" he asked. "The other lady had a string of
fine-sounding names. Which of them do you go by?"
She coloured. His question smote her with the strangeness of their
compact.
"Only one," she said, "and that was my own. I asked your mother to
call me Susan."
"Susan," he said to himself. "Susan ... I'll remember."
She took one impetuous step towards him as he was going out.
"How good you are to me," she cried unsteadily. "Oh, how good you are!"
But Barnaby shook his head.
"Poor child," he said briefly. "I hope you'll always think I was good
to you."
And he went out of the house whistling to himself.
* * * * *
"What shocking writing!" said Lady Henrietta, "and how blotted! Who's
your illiterate correspondent?"
Barnaby had stuffed his letter into his breast-pocket as he walked
across the room.
"Julia," he said shortly.
As if upon second thoughts, he felt for it again, pulled it out, and
tossed it into the fire. Its agitated, irregular lines started out
black on the burning pages. Susan, who was sitting on the velvet curb,
turned away her face that she might not read.
Lady Henrietta, frail but indomitable, throned upon her sofa, eyed her
son jealously.
"How did she know so quickly?" she asked.
"She heard it from somebody, I suppose," said Barnaby. "Why, mother,
do you imagine a real live ghost can visit Leicestershire without the
whole county hearing? ... She wants me to go over and show myself."
"You're not going?"--her tone was sharp.
"No," he said. "I'll tell her I am under contract to exhibit myself
exclusively at a music-hall.--And besides, I have to run up to London.
I want to give old Dawson the fright he deserves. He must have been in
a frantic hurry to wipe me out of his books. What on earth made you
choose him to hunt for me?"
"Take Susan with you," said Lady Henrietta. "Go with him, my child,
and don't let him out of your sight."
"I don't think she would like it," said Barnaby, doubtfully, but his
mother was not to be gainsaid. It was almost as if the mention of
Julia had revived a vague apprehension in her, as if she were afraid to
let him go by himself. He submitted, laughing.
"Well," he said, "if you'll lend her your fur coat I'll wrap her in
that and take her. We'll go up in the morning and come down at
five;--and she can amuse herself getting clothes."
He bent down to Susan.
"If you don't mind," he said, half in a whisper; his tone was
apologetic. "I think you had better come."
And so they went up together.
In the train he supplied her with an armful of picture papers, and she
studied them gravely, hidden from him behind their outstretched pages,
till they reached London, when she had to put down her screen. Once
only he interrupted her.
"Look at that," he said.
The train was swinging on, making up time between Kettering and Luton;
the letters danced as he held out his open newspaper, with a finger on
the place. Its heading stared at her--"A LEICESTERSHIRE ROMANCE."
"That," said Barnaby, and his eyes twinkled--he had put away
seriousness--"is all about you and me."
She did not see any more pictures after that, only bits of what she had
read before he took back his paper and, turning over the crackling
sheet, settled into his corner. Whatever she tried to look at, she saw
only the printed column proclaiming the dramatic return of a well-known
sportsman supposed to be dead; and at the bottom, where his thumb had
pressed the paper, a touching reference to the subject's beautiful
American wife....
At St. Pancras he put her carefully into a hansom and got in beside her.
"Now," he said, "this is our dress rehearsal. First, we must see about
your theatrical wardrobe; that's the expression, isn't it? I'm going
to take you to the woman my mother goes to, and while she is rigging
you out I'll cut away to my lawyers, and see my own tailor; and then I
shall fetch you and we'll have lunch. We shall have to get accustomed
to each other."
Driving through the streets with him was curiously exhilarating.
Perhaps her spirit was responsive to a reaction. After all, she was
young.... If Barnaby knew, and did not condemn her, might she not for
a short while dare to be light-hearted--leave the weight of it on his
shoulders?
London had become a city of enchantment. She had passed through in the
care of Lady Henrietta's messenger, at the end of her journey over the
sea; and then she had felt tired and frightened, and she had looked
listlessly out of the cab windows, thinking that if Fate betrayed her,
she might find herself wandering friendless in these very streets. Now
the dark ways were gilded....
"Here we are," said Barnaby, jumping out. "_Melisande_. She's a great
friend of ours, but she ruined herself racing, and started the shop as
a different kind of gamble. Let's go up."
In the show-room upstairs two or three haughty ladies were trailing up
and down, on view. The customers were not allowed to touch them; these
sat round the room on the sun-faded yellow cushions, gazing at the
models as if they were made of wax.
"Melisande is uncommonly sharp," said Barnaby. He had walked in boldly
and given his name to the presiding genius, who had simply glanced and
vanished. "Do you see these creatures sweeping to and fro?"
"Yes," said the girl. "Poor things; they look very cross. I suppose
they are dreadfully ill paid?"
Barnaby smothered an irreverent laugh.
"Paid?" he said. "Not a farthing. She introduces them in the season,
and, in return, they have to act as dummies. They hate it; but she
knows how to drive a bargain. It's a fine advertisement. Half the
world comes to stare at the beauties--it's funnier than a picture
gallery. And, of course, the pull of being taken up by Melisande in
her society capacity is enormous."
"Who are they?" asked Susan, puzzled.
"Oh, heiresses, of sorts, They used to be whisked away in their own
motors at six o'clock. I daresay they are still," said Barnaby. "Here
she is."
An inner door flew open, and a stout woman with dark hair and clever,
tired eyes, artistically blacked, appeared. She ran up to Barnaby and
shook him, then let him go, and inspected him at all angles, with her
head on one side as if he were a Paris model.
"Barnaby!" she screamed. "It is really Barnaby. You lunatic, I
thought you were dead and buried."
"They all thought that," said Barnaby. "It's a bit rough on me."
"Let me pinch you again!" she said. "I can't have you in here if
you're not alive. It's against all my rules, and customers are so
timid. Of course, as a ghost you might be very useful. Make the
brutes pay up!"
"What an eye to business!" he said, enduring her inspection.
"My dear man, I am in the workhouse! My friends insist on patronizing
me, and ordering all kinds of magnificence, and then they go away
imagining they have done me a kindness. I never dine out without
meeting at least one frock that's a bad debt, and you can't be
brilliant when you are being eclipsed by a wretch opposite out of your
own pocket. But what do you want? I can't come out to lunch. I am
rushed to death. There's an awful old Russian princess in there I
can't get rid of. She says she wants to learn the trade, and I daren't
leave her with my designs. I can't make out whether she's only a
Nihilist or a kleptomaniac."
"I want to put my wife in your hands," said Barnaby. "I'll come for
her at two. Can you burn all that crape, and dress her in something
sensible?"
Melisande screamed again, fixing her eyes for the first time on Susan.
"Is it a joke," she said, "or have you been playing fast and loose with
other people?"
"I don't know what you mean," said Barnaby, but his eyes hardened. She
glanced at his face, subduing her voice a little.
"I have never been paid," she said, "for an outfit of the most
expensive mourning. The day after we read of your--departure in the
papers, Julia Kelly came in here and asked what was the proper thing to
wear when you lost your--love. I told her it varied. If the man
hadn't proposed black would look like an affectation. I suggested
mauve as harmlessly sentimental. And she said, 'But if he were
practically your husband?' and I said, of course, practically widow's
mourning, but not a cap. And she wore it...."
He moved restlessly under her detaining hand on his sleeve. "I'm
betraying no confidences," she said. "It's a matter of common
knowledge.--How long, in the name of goodness, have you been married?
Who is she?"
"Two or three years," he said. She was still holding on to his coat.
"Wait," she said. "Wait. Oh, you are as mad as ever. How do you want
her dressed? She looks awfully young, poor child."
But Barnaby had made his escape.
An hour later Susan looked at herself in the long mirrors that were all
round her, and did not know herself any longer, she was so changed.
She had grown used to the deep black garments that seemed a part of her
life. Far off and dimly she remembered the old family lawyer in
shocked consultation with her nurses, his old-fashioned anxiety that
when she was strong enough to travel she should be fittingly attired,
and do honour to her sad estate....
A door opened at the other end of the room, and she saw Barnaby in the
mirror, saw him standing petrified on the threshold till Melisande's
laugh called him to his senses.
"Do you like her?" said she. Susan did not hear what he said. But in
the mirror he came towards her, and she turned round to meet him shyly.
"Take her away, then," said Melisande. "Buy a shilling's-worth of
violets and stick them in her coat; it's all that's lacking. I'll send
down a trunk full of oddments with you to-night.--And give my
compliments to Julia when you see her. 'To account rendered,' you can
murmur in her ear."
Her malicious laugh pursued them a little way down the stairs. They
came out into the street and walked along side by side.
"I went to see Dawson," said Barnaby suddenly. "Burst into his office,
meaning to scare the old jackass out of his wits. He--he turned the
tables on me. Made me feel a brute."
"How?" asked Susan.
He did not explain at once, engaged in making a way for her on the
pavement. Then he answered briefly.
"He told me how he had found you."
His tone, angry as it was, warmed her soul.
"But,--it was not your business," she said, in a low voice. "It had
nothing to do with you."
"I couldn't tell him that," said Barnaby. "Lord, how he went for me,
poor old chap--! Spared me nothing. Said I could never make it up to
you.... It's ridiculous, isn't it? But if you'd heard him attacking
me!--I had to promise him I would try."
He was walking on beside her, so close that his arm brushed hers, his
long strides falling in with her little steps. And he was looking down
on her with a sort of raging kindness.
"You poor little girl!" he said.
They went on for awhile in silence, and then Barnaby stopped in his
absent-minded progress. His good-humour was back, and the joke of this
expedition was again uppermost in his head. He pointed with his stick
at a strange and wonderful work of art in a milliner's window.
"Let's go in here and buy some of these hats," he said.
All her life Susan remembered that day with him. It was all so absurd,
so simple. That strange town, London, was always to her the place
where he and she made acquaintance, playing to ignorant audiences their
game of Let's Pretend. She began to know him;--the way he walked,
swinging his shoulders, stopping short when a sight amused him; his
whimsical earnestness over little things, and the lines that came round
his mouth when he smiled....
There were horses being put into the train when they arrived at St.
Pancras. The grooms in charge of them were leading them gingerly
through the people, past the lighted bookstall, persuading them up the
gangways into their boxes. There was a small commotion as one of them,
snorting, refused to step on the slanting boards. Tugging and shouting
at him made him worse; he began to plunge, scattering the onlookers and
the porters smiting his flanks.
"Hi! you infernal idiots..." said Barnaby. "Back him in."
He went over to the horse himself, and took hold of his bridle, turned
him round, and walked him in like a lamb. Then, as the porters clapped
shut the side of the horse-box, he waited to ask whose hunters were
going down. Susan, lingering a little way apart, saw a big man with a
cigar in his mouth spin round and seize him. Two or three more shot
out of the throng and hurled themselves upon him, wringing his hand.
"It's Barnaby himself," they shouted. "Barnaby himself!"
They crowded him up the platform, a noisy escort, hiding their feelings
under boisterous chaff; Meltonians, old acquaintances.... They passed
by Susan, gossiping hard.
All at once Barnaby broke loose from them, turning back. "Great
Joseph!" he said. "I've lost my wife!"
What if he had? What if she had cut the tangle, had slipped when his
back was turned into one of these moving trains, and passed out of his
life, out of the bustle into the throbbing darkness, like a match that
had been lit and extinguished, leaving no trace?
She watched him hurrying back, looking for her; saw his quick glance
along a glimmering line of carriages passing him on his left, and
guessed his apprehension. Soon he was bearing down on her, charging
through the press, and had pulled her hand through his arm.
"It was too bad, wasn't it?" he said. "I'm awfully sorry,--Susan."
There was a real relief in his voice. She felt it, wondering. Was he
so glad to find her still his prisoner, his accomplice?
"Did you think," she said, and in her own voice laughter struggled with
a strange inclination to tears,--"that I had run away?"
"Come on," he said cheerfully, not replying. "Hold on to me. Those
chaps are looking at us."
He marched her to his friends, who had halted in a body when he dashed
back, and waited, grinning sympathetically, for his return.
"Here is my wife," he said. "I brought her up to town to get rid of
her widow's weeds."
They shook hands with her solemnly, a kind gravity in their manner to
her subduing them for a minute; and then, as Barnaby settled her in the
Melton slip, they hung round the carriage door, and their tongues were
loosened.
"Where did you pick up these horses? Are they part of your baggage
from another world?"
Barnaby laughed.
"They aren't mine," he said. "I brought nothing back with me, not even
a collar-stud. Why, I pawned my watch in the States!"
"Wouldn't the ferryman let you return on tick? But you were mixed up
with them, Barnaby, when I saw you. I'd know your voice anywhere,
shouting Woa!"
"He's bound to get mixed up with horses, alive or dead," said the big
man. "I tried to find out myself whose cattle they are, but the name
is unintelligible. They can't pronounce it down there; not all the
sneezing and snarling in the station can do it. I'll bet its another
of these wild Austrians."
"D'you remember the three counts who set out on a slippery day to ride
to the meet at Scalford;--and were fetched back to the Harboro', the
three of them, half an hour afterwards, in a cart?"
"Broken ribs, wasn't it?" said Barnaby.
"Cracked heads, I fancy. I'll never forget the sight it was; all you
could see of 'em was the three shiny top hats, stove in."
The lights were flickering in the station only the great yellow
clock-face shone unchangeable, with its minute hand creeping up. Down
below on the platforms scurrying passengers went their ways, gathering
in thickening groups and eddying here and there round a pile of
luggage. Everywhere there was restlessness.
Susan leant back in her corner. Their end of the platform was a little
dim, and it was less frequented. She noticed a woman's figure passing
along the train.
Barnaby was loitering, half in, half out of the door, absorbed in
chatter. They were asking him if he were coming out with the Quorn,
offering to lend him a crock to-morrow; relating the current news about
men and horses. Once the big man turned his head casually as the
figure that Susan had noticed passed. His mouth shaped itself in a
whistle, but he made no remark. Only his broad back seemed to block
out a little more of the view.
"It's about time we started," he said.
"What's the matter down there?" asked Barnaby.
"Oh, I fancied I saw a customer," he said promptly. "Did you take your
wife to the grasping Melisande? You might have patronized another old
friend in me. There's a hat in the window I trimmed myself."
"What?" said Barnaby.
The big man chuckled heavily.
"You didn't know I'd gone in for millinery?" he said. "If you had had
your eyes about you you'd have seen my establishment. _There's_ a
business that women never will understand! They haven't got bold
ideas; they are too fond of twisting. It was an accident, really. I
was financing an aunt of mine, Clara Lady Kilgour,--and the thing was
going bankrupt. I strolled into the shop one morning and found Clara
weeping, and the Frenchy who had lured her into it sniffing like a
noxious weed in a bed of artificial roses. Just by way of cheering her
up a bit, I snatched up an affair the serpent was working at--a muddle
of feathers and scraps of lace.--'You'll ruin that!' they wailed. But
hey, presto! I had found my vocation. I kicked out the bailiffs and
took it over. And now I am running it as 'The Earl of Kilgour, late
Fleur-de-lis.'"
The guard came down the train, shutting doors. Barnaby's friends
dropped off, tumbling into the smoker behind. The whistle shrilled.
"Wouldn't you rather get in with them?" said Susan, in sudden shyness.
"What? that would never do," explained Barnaby, pulling up the window.
"The poor dear fellows have left us religiously to ourselves."
He threw a _Westminster_ on her knee and took off his hat.
"What was Kilgour staring at, do you know?" he asked. "He seemed
rather disturbed; didn't want us to notice."
"I don't know," she said.
Barnaby laughed out loud.
"We got on famously," he declared. "We'd pass muster anywhere. But
you are tired out, aren't you? Lean back in your corner and go to
sleep."
The slip carriage was rocking from side to side, and her head ached
from the strain and excitement of the day. The same shyness that had
smitten her as his friends left them made her shut her eyes under his
regard. She rested her head on the stiff padding, listening to the
thrum of the engine, wandering in dreams that could not match the
fantastic unlikeliness of what had befallen; and all the while feeling
his gaze on her.
She was roused by the jar as the train stopped at Bedford. The
carriage door was opened and closed; they were no longer by themselves.
"Barnaby!"
Tears were imminent in the emotional Irish voice.
"How do you do, Julia."--The man's tone was firm and hard.
"I knew you were in the train.... But with these gossiping wretches
all round you!--I could not bear to meet you with them...."
"Don't waken my wife. She's tired."
His warning struck abruptly on her impulsive murmur. She sat down,
rustling, unfastening the furs at her throat. The train had started
again, and was speeding on.
In her far corner Susan stirred. This was the figure she had seen in
the distance, the figure that Barnaby's friend had tried to block out
from his attention. All Barnaby's friends must guess how hard it would
be for him to meet her again, since he had once worshipped her....
Looking straight into the flying darkness, Susan tried not to see his
profile reflected in it, tried not to watch his expression, inscrutable
as it was.
"What fools we were!" sighed Julia.
"Regular fools," he said.
The girl drew a quick breath. She had thought she was beginning to
know him, and still she could not guess if he spoke in irony or
despair. She raised her head; fluttered the paper on her knee.--They
must not think that she was asleep. And Barnaby looked at her.
"This is an old friend of mine, Susan," he said sedately. Julia
presented a pale face and shining eyes.
"Mrs. Hill must be quite accustomed to the enthusiasm of your friends,"
she said. "_I_ have been lingering at St. Pancras since three
o'clock,--somebody told me you had been seen in a restaurant--for the
sake of travelling back with you."
"How good of you," said Barnaby, in the same constrained way. "We
didn't know, did we, Susan, that we had been spotted?"
Julia turned to him again; her speaking eyes hardly left him.--"Not
good," she said, "only human."
The train rocked on, filling the inevitable pause with its throbbing.
Then Barnaby's voice cut into the silence.
"We don't mind indulging your human curiosity, Julia," he said, "but
why stare at us so hard? We, too, are only human, aren't we, Susan?"
"It is so strange," said Julia, "to think of you with a wife."
Barnaby bit his lip. He reddened. Perhaps the sight of her had shaken
him, had hit him deeper than he was willing to betray. Her emotion at
meeting the man whom she had mourned as dead was visible; she made no
attempt to hide it. Perhaps his own was the greater for being stifled
by his determined effort at self-control. He got up, fiddling with the
window-sash.
"Would you like this a bit down?" he said. "How is your headache?"
Did he know that her head ached, or had he addressed her at random?
The girl felt an unreasonable anger at his ostentatious solicitude.
Was he playing her off against his old love? Did such bitterness wait
behind their compact? For the first time, his kindness hurt her. All
a farce, all a blind, and a make-believe....