Regiment Of Women Part 66

To-morrow I am calling on Miss Hartill to fetch Alwynne home. Good-bye, Cousin Elsbeth."

He turned again in the doorway.

"Elsbeth, there's a house at Dene I've got my eye on. There's a turret room. My best roses will clamber right into it. That's to be yours. And Elsbeth! n.o.body but you shall run the nursery."

He had shut the door before she could answer, and she heard him laugh as he ran, two at a time, down the shallow steps.

She went to the window and watched till his strong figure had disappeared in the dusk.

"He is very like his father," said Elsbeth wistfully, glancing across at the faded likeness.

The dusk deepened and the stars began to twinkle.

"He will never be the man his father was," cried Elsbeth, suddenly and defiantly.

Her hands shook as she cleared away the remnants of the meal. She swept up the hearth, picked the coals carefully apart, and tidied the tidy room. Roger's roses still lay in a heap in the basket chair. She gathered them up and carried them into the tiny bathroom, that they might drink their fill all night. Their scent was strong and sweet. Then she lit her candle and prepared for bed.

The sheets were very cold. She tried not to think of Roger's father lying in the grave she had never seen. The old, cruel longing was upon her for the sound of his voice and the sight of his face and the sweetness of his smile. She broke into painful weeping.

The hours wore past.

Of course he would marry Alwynne.... Alwynne would be happy ... there was comfort in that.... Roger would be kind to her.... A good boy ... a dear boy....

"And he might have been my son," cried out Elsbeth to the uncaring night.

CHAPTER XL

Roger never fought his battle-royal with Clare, for at the turn of Friar's Lane he met Alwynne herself, dragging wearily along the cobblestones, weighed down by paper parcels and the heavy folds of the waterproof hanging on her arm. Her hair was roughened by the wind that tugged and strained at her loosened hat; her face was drawn and shadowy; she had an air of exhaustion, of indefinable demoralisation that Roger recognised angrily. He had seen it in the first weeks of her visit to Dene. Her thoughts were evidently far away, and she would have pa.s.sed him without a look if he had not stopped her. She started violently as he spoke--it was like rousing a nightmare-ridden sleeper--then her face grew radiant.

"Roger!" she cried, and beamed at him like a delighted child.

He possessed himself of her parcels and they walked on, Alwynne's questions and exclamations tumbling over each other. Roger at Utterbridge! Why had he come? How long was he staying? How were The Dears and how did Dene spare him? When had he arrived?

Roger dropped his bomb.

"Yesterday. I went to supper with Elsbeth. We had a long talk."

His tone conveyed much. The brightness died out of Alwynne's face. She looked surprised and excessively annoyed.

"She knew you were coming?"

"She did."

"Why on earth didn't she let me know? Why, she doesn't know you! She hasn't seen you since you were a kid! It's extraordinary of Elsbeth."

"I wouldn't let her."

"Wouldn't let her?" Alwynne looked at him blankly. "Roger--I think you're cracked."

"Terse and to the point! Don't you worry. Elsbeth and I understand each other. Besides, we've been corresponding."

"You and Elsbeth?"

"Yes. That's partly why I came. I wanted to get to know her. You see, your description and her letters didn't tally. So I came. We got on jolly well. I burst in on her again at breakfast this morning. She didn't fuss--took it like a lamb. I fancy you underrate our cousin--in more ways than one. She knows it too; she's no fool! I found that out when we talked about you."

"Elsbeth discussed me?--with you?" Alwynne's tone foreboded a bad half-hour to Elsbeth.

"Why not? You're not sacred, are you?" Roger chuckled.

Alwynne felt inclined to box his ears. Here was a new Roger. Roger--her own property--to take such an att.i.tude--to ally himself with Elsbeth--to leave her in the dark! Roger! It was unthinkable.... And she had been so awfully glad to see him ... absurdly glad to see him ... he had made her forget even Clare.... Clare.... She began to occupy her mind once more with the scene of the previous day, recalling what she had said; contrasting it with what she had intended to say; stabbed afresh by Clare's manner; writhing at her own helplessness; when Roger's slow voice brought her thoughts back to the present.

"You've been away from Elsbeth a fortnight," he said accusingly, as they entered the Town Gardens.

She flared anew at his tone.

"Certainly. I've been staying with friends. Have you any objection?"

"A friend," he corrected.

She flushed.

"Clare Hartill is my best friend----"

"Your worst, you mean."

She turned on him.

"How dare you say that? How dare you speak of my friends like that? How dare you speak to me at all?"

He continued, quite unmoved--

"Don't be silly, Alwynne. Your best friend is your Aunt Elsbeth--you ought to know that. You don't treat her well, I think. You've been away a fortnight with that--friend of yours; you stayed on without consulting her----"

"I telephoned," cried Alwynne, in spite of herself.

"Since then you've sent her one post card. She isn't even sure that you're coming back to-day; she's just had to sit tight and wait until it's your--no, I'll give you your due--until it's your friend's pleasure to send you back to her, f.a.gged out, miserable--just like my dog after a thras.h.i.+ng. And Elsbeth's to comfort you, and cosset you, and put you to rights--and then you'll go back to that woman again, to have the strength and the spirit drained out of you afresh--and you walk along talking of your best friend. I call it hard luck on Elsbeth."

Alwynne's careful dignity was forgotten in her anger. She turned on him like a furious schoolgirl.

"Will you stop, please? How dare you speak of Clare? If Elsbeth chooses to complain----What affair is it of yours anyhow? I'll never speak to you again--never--or Elsbeth either." Her voice broke--she was on the verge of tears.

Roger took her by the arm, and drew her to a seat.

"You'd better sit down," he said. "We've heaps to talk over yet, more than you've a notion of. And if we're to have a row, let's get it over in the open--far less dangerous. Never get to cover in a thunderstorm. I know what you want." He had watched her fumbling unavailingly in the bag and pocket and had chuckled. He knew his Alwynne. He produced a clean silk handkerchief and dangled it before her. She clutched at it with undignified haste.