A Bachelor Husband Part 41

"Oh, don't be silly, dear!" she protested.

She went behind Miss Chester's chair and clasped her arms loosely round the old lady's neck, standing so that she could not be seen.

"I've only ever loved one man," she said in a hard voice. "And you know who that is, don't you?"

Miss Chester put her wrinkled hand over Marie's.

"My old eyes see a great many things I am supposed to be unable to see," she said sadly.

There was a little silence; then Marie whispered:

"Yes--I knew that."

"And so that is why I say be careful, dear child," the old lady went on. "But I know you will."

Marie bent and kissed her.

"Poor Mr. Dakers!" she said, with a little grimace. "He would run away forever and ever if he could hear what we have been saying."

Miss Chester did not answer.

Marie slept dreamlessly that night, and for the first time since her marriage woke with the feeling that there was something pleasant to look forward to.

The sun was s.h.i.+ning and there was not a cloud in the sky as she flung the window wide.

Across the rows of houses and crowded chimney-pots she seemed to hear the voice of the country calling to her--seemed to hear the wind in the trees and smell the magic of the hay.

"And they will be making the hay." she told herself delightedly, as she waited for Feathers to come. "I wonder if they will let us help!"

She had almost forgotten that there might be a letter from Chris that morning. It gave her a little shock to see it lying on the breakfast-table. It was as if for a s.p.a.ce she had forgotten how to suffer and grieve, and now the sight of his handwriting had dragged her back to it once again.

Chris had written in a tearing hurry--or so he said. He had packed up to come home, and then a friend of his had asked him to play in a golf tournament, and after a lot of persuasion he had given in, and he was going to play with Dorothy Webber for a partner, so he thought they stood a good chance of carrying off a prize.

Marie read it apathetically. Her heart felt as hard as a stone. The letter told her nothing she had not already guessed. She crushed it into her coat pocket and tried to forget it.

He had put the importance of a stupid golf handicap before her!

Well, if she cried herself blind it would not alter things or change him.

"I suppose Mrs. Heriot didn't turn up in Scotland," she said cynically to Feathers as they drove away.

He kept his eyes steadily before him as he answered:

"If she did I did not see her."

Marie laughed hysterically.

"I thought you might have done so."

There was a little silence, then Feathers said quietly:

"Mrs. Lawless, why do you talk like that? You know quite well you never thought anything of the sort."

She flushed hotly at the rebuke in his words and answered sharply:

"I forgot that you were Chris' friend. Of course, you are bound to defend him. I wonder why men always defend one another?"

Feathers smiled rather grimly.

"Perhaps it's a case of thieves hanging together," he said. "But you do him an injustice if you think that women have the least attraction for him--you do, indeed! And, as to being his friend ..."

he hesitated, "I think, perhaps, I am more your friend than his."

"And yet you hated it when he married me," she said impulsively.

"Perhaps I am still unreconciled to that," he said.

"What do you mean?"

He looked down at her from beneath his s.h.a.ggy brows. "I am going to answer that question by asking another. Why did you take such a violent dislike to me the first night we met?"

The color rushed to her face. The memory of that night was still bitter and unforgettable. Her first impulse was to refuse to tell him. Then suddenly she changed her mind.

Why should she spare Chris, or try any longer to defend him when he was undefendable?

"You said that you would tell me some day," Feathers reminded her.

"I know." But it was some minutes before she told him.

"I was sitting in the lounge that night after dinner, and heard you telling someone that Chris had only married me for my money."

The driving-wheel jerked furiously beneath Feathers' hand, and for an instant the car swerved dangerously. Then he jammed the brakes home and brought it to a standstill at the roadside.

They were in the country now, with hedge-topped banks on either side, and it was all so still and silent that they might have been the only two in the world.

Feathers half-turned in his seat. His face was white and horrified, and for a moment he stared at her, his lips twitching as if he were trying to speak and could find no words.

Marie looked at him with misty eyes, and, seeing the pain and shame in his face, laid her hand gently on his arm.

"Please don't look like that. It hurt at first, but afterwards I was glad that I knew--really glad!"

"No wonder you hated me."

"That was because I did not know you," she said quickly. "I don't hate you now, do I?"

He looked away from her.

"So it's all my fault," he said harshly.

She echoed his words: