“May I look at it? I’ll give it back again. I want to be sure.”
Without any hesitation at all she slipped it off and put it into his hand.
Half turning from her, he held it up for the light to strike upon the inner circle. If it was his mother’s ring her initials would be there, and a date-the date of her engagement to his father. It was her engagement ring. The light struck on a faint M. B. and a date too worn to read. M. B. for Mary Ballantyne. And the date should be June 1910. It was the hardest thing in the world to give back Mary Armitage’s ring to the hand with the scarlet nails. When he had done it he knew that he could do no more. The thing was beyond him. His words, the ring, declared this woman his wife. Heart and flesh denied her. Every instinct slammed the door against the evidence. If there was a marriage, she must prove it. He said so.
“This goes for nothing. You are taking advantage of the fact that I have lost my memory. If there was a marriage, you can jog yours and let my solicitors know where it took place. I don’t believe that there was a marriage, or that you can prove it.”
CHAPTER 17
Meade had scarcely shut the door upon Giles, when Ivy Lord put her head round the kitchen door.
“If you please, Miss Meade, I’d like to go out to the post.”
“All right, Ivy.”
“Will you be going out, miss?”
“No, I don’t think so-not tonight.”
Ivy hesitated.
“Mrs. Underwood said she wouldn’t be back till half past seven. If you wouldn’t mind lighting the gas under the steamer at seven-full till the water’s hot, and then down to a point-”
Meade found a smile. It took exactly five minutes to reach the pillar-box at the corner and return. The post was most undoubtedly a young man. She said,
“Of course I will.”
She went back into the sitting-room to wait for Giles. She heard Ivy come running out of her room in a hurry to be off. The door of the flat opened and shut. She tried to think what sort of young man Ivy would have. She was such a funny little bit of a thing. But something nice about her too-queerness and niceness in layers, like streaky bacon… What a thing to think of. Anything was better than thinking about Giles and Carola Roland. Thoughts didn’t ask whether you wanted them or not, they came in-some of them like visitors tapping at the door, and when you opened it, instead of a friend on the doorstep you found an enemy there; some of them like ghosts tapping at the windows and calling strangely in words which you couldn’t understand; some of them like thieves creeping in to steal; and some breaking in with violence like a plundering army. A shiver went over her. People kept saying how mild the weather was, but she was cold.
She looked at her watch and wondered when Giles would come. It was between twenty and a quarter to seven. She mustn’t forget to light the gas under the steamer, or Ivy would get into trouble. Giles had been gone nearly a quarter of an hour-
The front door bell rang, and she ran. But it wasn’t Giles. It was Agnes Lemming with a big dress-box. She had set it down to ring the bell; now she picked it up and came into the little hall with her head up and a flush on her cheeks. She was in her old purple coat and skirt again, but somehow she looked different-younger, and with something taut and purposeful about her.
“Are you alone? Can I speak to you? I mustn’t stay. I’ve only got a moment.”
With her ears straining for Giles’ return, Meade could only be thankful for this. But it wasn’t in her to be unwelcoming. She said,
“Aunt Mabel is out, and Ivy has gone to the post. What is it? Won’t you come in?”
She had shut the door, but Agnes did not move away from it. She said in a difficult voice,
“I mustn’t stop-my mother will be back at any moment. Will you do something for me? Will you keep this box until the day after tomorrow and not say anything about it to anyone?”
It sounded so strange coming from Agnes Lemming that Meade could not make her voice quite as ordinary as she wanted to. She said,
“Yes, of course I will.”
Agnes faltered a little.
“It must seem-strange to you. I can’t ask anyone else, and you have always been kind-” She paused, and found herself saying what she had not meant to say. “My cousin Julia Mason sent me some very nice clothes. I want to wear them the day after tomorrow. You see, I am going to be married.”
Meade was so much surprised that she very nearly cried out. And then, flooding right over the surprise and blotting it out, came a tide of warmth and kindness. She reached up to put her arms round Agnes’ neck and kiss her.
“Oh, Agnes-how nice! I’m so glad-I’m so very, very glad!”
“You mustn’t tell anyone. Nobody knows-my mother doesn’t know. I can’t tell her until afterwards. I didn’t mean to tell anyone.”
“I won’t tell-you know I won’t. Who is it? And are you very happy?”
Agnes smiled down at her. It was her old nice smile, but with something added. She said in quite a young voice,
“It is Mr. Drake, and I am very happy. We both are. I mustn’t stop.” And with that she kissed Meade on the cheek, and was gone.
Meade was left in the middle of the hall with the dress-box. Of all the extraordinary things-Agnes Lemming and Mr. Drake! But how nice. And he looked as if he would be able to cope with Mrs. Lemming. That was what Agnes wanted-someone to rescue her and bang the door in Mrs. Lemming’s face. Agnes could never have done it by herself, it just wasn’t in her. She put the box away in her wardrobe and had just shut the door on it, when she heard the bell again.
This time it was Giles. He came in, and she said at once,
“Ivy’s out. Oh, Giles-what’s happened? It’s been like years!” But even as she spoke, her heart shrank. There was no comfort in his look-angry eyes, and a face set like a flint. He walked past her into the sitting-room.
“I mustn’t stop. What’s the time? Ten minutes to seven-is that clock right? Your aunt will be coming back. I don’t want to meet her. I’m not fit to meet anyone. I must go back and see if I can get on to Maitland. He’s my solicitor, and if there’s anything in this four hundred a year business, he’ll probably know something about it. I believe he’s moved out to the country, but I expect I can get a line on him. The sooner he’s on to it the better. She needn’t think she’s going to have it all her own way!”
Meade was appalled. He might have been talking to himself- she mightn’t have been there at all. She had never seen him like this-the angry, fighting male who wants to get on with his job and hasn’t any time for women. She was appalled but oddly reassured. If there was no softness for her, there was certainly none for Carola. And he meant to fight.
He hardly looked at her as he put a hand on her shoulder for a moment and said,
“I’ll ring you.”
Then he was gone, and the door well and truly slammed behind him.
CHAPTER 18
From this point onwards the sequence of events becomes of the first importance.
Giles slammed the door of Mrs. Underwood’s flat at five minutes to seven, and at about the same time Mrs. Willard confronted her husband with two pencilled notes and a flood of reproachful tears. The first of the notes has already been in evidence. It ran:
“All right, Willie darling, lunch at one as usual.
Carola.”
The second had been discovered only this afternoon after an exhaustive search of Mr. Willard’s effects. It was very short, but it had brought poor Mrs. Willard to the point of open accusation.
“All right-what about tomorrow night?
C. R.”
The dreadful thing about this note was that it wasn’t dated. Tomorrow night might already have come and gone. It might be this present Wednesday night, or it might really be tomorrow. Mrs. Willard had reached the end of her tether. She had been a mild and submissive wife for twenty years, but this was too much. She looked a good deal like a stout motherly sheep at bay as she produced the note.