The Limit Part 35

"Why, keep it till he comes. He'll be back to dinner," Romer said.

"Suppose it's something urgent," said Val, seeming a little agitated.

"Don't you think perhaps we ought to open it? He won't mind."

"You can't. It's addressed to Harry," said Romer.

Mrs. Wyburn's quick eyes took in some signs of tension, but she continued giving them advice about the garden. She thought the flowers too florid, and was always a little shocked at the extravagant scent and exuberance of the roses. She seemed to think they should be kept more in their place--not allowed to climb all over the house, and romp or lean about the garden doing just what they liked. She had winced in the drawing-room, relented in the dining-room, and refrained, really, only in the kitchen, that she had insisted upon seeing. It was the only room to the decoration of which she gave whole-hearted praise and approval.

The cooking at the Green Gate she admitted to be perfect, without pretension. In fact, she thought everything in the house a little overdone, except the mutton.

"I can't think who that wire can be from," Val said several times to Daphne when her mother-in-law had gone. She meant that she could think.

"Well, you'll know directly. Harry's arriving."

Harry found it in the hall, and came in with it.

"You open it for me," he said, giving it to Val.

Since his last instructions to Alec he felt perfectly safe.

She read--

"_Thousand thanks awfully bucked at letter at Queens' Hotel Cowes for three days could you join us there wire reply fondest love and kisses._

_Johnson_."

CHAPTER XXIX

GLADYS

On arriving in London, Vaughan found his secretary with the usual heaps of letters. One envelope, addressed in a large and rather infantine hand, was put aside for him. The note ran--

"The Baldfaced Stag, Edgware.

"Dear Mr. Vaughan,

"I eard only yesterday that the play you kindly sent me and mother to was wrote by you, I call it a shame you didn't tell me before, we saw the name on the programme, but never thought it could be the same but yesterday mother saw a piece in the paper about you in the weekly dispatch and she said it was the same, I'm sory I said the people in the play went on silly I beg pardon for calling the play silly I wouldnt have done it if Id known, so hope youre not angry, they seemed to me to go on silly, but I dont reelly know much about those kind of ladies and gentlemen, we saw the piece in the paper only yesterday and mother said it was the same, we hope you will soon come again to tea the calf is better believe me yours truly

"GLADIS ADELAIDE BRILL."

He instantly wrote back--

"Dear Miss Brill,

"I am _so_ relieved and thankful to hear the calf is better, all the more because I had no idea it had been indisposed. I fancied, though, it was looking a little pale the last time I had the pleasure of meeting it in the field. Please don't think again of your criticism. It gave me very great pleasure. You must think me very foolish. You could say nothing that I would not like except to ask me not to come and see you. I am very busy just now and so have little time for afternoon calls, but will come one of these days soon.

"Yours always, "GILBERT HEREFORD VAUGHAN."

He waited a moment, and then added--

"I will turn up to-morrow at four. Try not to forget me till then."

For the rest of the day he was in high spirits. The letter seemed to keep him up through the various little bothers of the day. He had been going to France for the summer. He admitted to himself that this semi-flirtation was keeping him in England. He didn't like the idea of going away very long from the possibility of turning up at the "Bald-faced Stag."

The explanation Harry gave about Johnson's telegram satisfied Valentia for the time, as he declined the invitation to Cowes, but the incident left an uneasy feeling in Val's mind. She could not bear to own to herself that he was deceiving her, and he hadn't the courage to give it away yet, not that he cared so very much about hurting her, but he was happier at the Green Gate than anywhere else. He liked the house, the atmosphere, and Romer; but what kept him most was, of course, that curious charm Valentia had for him, which was perhaps stronger than ever because he knew that the end was not far off. He often thought he was a fool not to have taken the opportunity to break it off on this occasion.

He couldn't stand the idea of not seeing her, just because of the way her hair grew on her forehead! So low, and in such thick waves! Alec Walmer's hair, also fair, was thin and unmeaning. She had a low forehead, and yet the hair began high up. In the evening when it was carefully arranged, and the iron had entered into it, it looked like a stiff transformation, even worse than when left to nature.

But of course, in spite of the reconciliation, a residue of mistrust remained, and on his side a sensation of restlessness which left him irritable; less amiable and pleasant than usual.

They were sitting on the little terrace. He was smoking and reading the paper. He suddenly threw it down and said--

"How quiet you are, Val! Why don't you talk?"

"I don't think I've got anything to say."

"You seem depressed," he said, rather aggressively.

"I feel a little depressed."

Harry gave expression to the usual injustice of the unfaithful.

"What a mistake women make in being gloomy! How foolish it is. Shall I tell you the key of the whole situation between men and women?"

"Do."

"Well, dear, it's just--a _smile_. Never be dull, never be ill, never be depressed. Be gay--always gay. That's what men like--that's the one thing that they go out for and come in for--a smile."

"Your ideal of a woman seems to be a Ches.h.i.+re cat," she answered, looking rather amused. "Your motto is, like the man in _The Arcadians_: Always Merry and Bright. Well, I'm sure there's a good deal in it. But I'm not usually accused of being a dreary person."

"Of course you're not; you're charming, lively, amusing, sympathetic.

That's your great attraction, Val. But the last few days you seem rather to have lost it."

"You can hardly resent my feeling a little down, Harry. One or two little things that have happened lately have made me anxious."

"Never be anxious. You ought to trust, trust--always trust."

"Oh, that's all very well! That wire...."

"Are we going to have that all over again? I thought I'd explained." He a.s.sumed the air of a patient martyr.

"I know you _explained_ all right. Well, I won't think about it any more. Don't be horrid, Harry.... Have you seen this week's _Punch_?

There's something in it simply _too_ heavenly--such a joke! Let me read it to you."