Jacob dismissed her with a nod.
“And you, Florence?”
She gave him the same straight, bold look as she had done before.
“Yes. I’ll come. I’d like to see the old place. I’ve a friend that comes in to give me a hand when I’m pressed, and I don’t open Sundays. She’ll manage.”
“And you, Al Miller? Let me see, you’re a railway employee, aren’t you-Ledlington Station-porter?”
“That’s right. I could get off Saturday evening.”
Jacob nodded.
“The inn is only three and a half miles out of Ledlington. You’ve got a bike, I take it. You can come along when you come off duty. That suit you?”
Al Miller thought, “What’s he getting at? A hundred pounds would suit anyone, wouldn’t it?” He jerked his head and said it suited him all right.
Jacob said, “Well, we’re getting along. Marian has already told us that she and Freddy can come. Now what about you, John?”
John Higgins said in his pleasant country voice,
“No, thank you, Cousin Jacob.”
The monkey face screwed itself into a vexed grimace.
“My dear chap, why not?”
“I’ve my reasons, thanking you all the same.”
“Come, come-there’s a hundred pounds just waiting to be picked up.”
The blue eyes rested calmly upon him.
“If I’d a good reason for coming, I’d come. Since I’ve my reasons for staying away, I’ll stay.”
“And the hundred pounds?”
“You’re welcome to it, Cousin Jacob.”
Jane found her hands clapping themselves together softly in her lap. She looked sideways at Jeremy and saw that he was extremely angry. It was all very nicely controlled, but she didn’t trust him a yard. If she didn’t take things into her own hands, he was going to put his foot down, or something stupid like that.
She reflected that men were quite dreadfully Early Victorian. In point of fact she didn’t suppose there had ever been a century in which they didn’t throw right back to the cave man and announce that their will was law. Not really civilized, that was the trouble. She gave him a look and said without waiting to be asked,
“I’d love to come, Cousin Jacob. It’s frightfully nice of you to ask us. I get Saturday afternoon and Sunday off, but I shall have to be back at half past nine on Monday.”
Jeremy had a rush of blood to the head. He experienced some primitive reactions. Bounce him, would she? Well, he would show her. And if she thought-if she thought for one minute that he was going to let her off with this gang and without him to that God-forsaken inn with its shady past and Lord knows what kind of a present, well-
Jacob Taverner was addressing him.
“And you, Jeremy?”
He answered with controlled politeness.
“Thank you, sir. I am on leave-I shall be able to come.”
CHAPTER 5
When they had walked half the length of the street Jane smiled sweetly at an unresponsive profile and said,
“Thank you, darling.”
In a distant voice Captain Jeremy Taverner enquired what she was thanking him for.
“Coming down to the Catherine-Wheel as my chaperon, darling. Having always been accustomed to being wrapped up in cotton wool and sheltered, I do appreciate it. You know that, don’t you?”
There was a fair imitation of a flash of lightning accompanied by a smart clap of thunder.
“Just stop talking nonsense, Jane, and listen to me! You can’t possibly go!”
“Why can’t I possibly go? I am going.”
“You can’t-with that gang.”
“No, darling. With you.”
She distinctly heard Jeremy grit his teeth.
“Jane, you can’t possibly want to get mixed up with that appalling crowd.”
“They’re all the relations we’ve got.”
“Thank the Lord for that! What a crew!”
Jane’s tone warmed a little.
“Jeremy, they’re not! You’re being snob. I love John Higgins- he’s a lamb.”
“And he isn’t going to be there-he’s got too much sense. Do you love Al Miller?”
“Not frightfully.”
“Or Geoffrey-or Mildred?”
“Geoffrey might have possibilities. I wouldn’t mind exploring them.”
The teeth-gritting was repeated. Jane said hastily,
“On the chilly side though, don’t you think? But I rather like Floss-to-my-friends. And Marian-now don’t tell me you don’t think she’s beautiful, because I simply shan’t believe you.”
He made an angry sound.
“I should think she has probably less brain than anything outside a home for the mentally deficient.”
Jane wrinkled her nose.
“Well, I don’t know. I think she’s got a pretty good idea of which side her bread is buttered.”
“That isn’t brains-it’s primitive instinct. I grant you she’s probably got plenty of that.” His voice changed. “Jane, stop playing the fool and tell me why you want to go to this damned place.”
She looked up at him with wide, clear eyes.
“Darling, it’s too easy. I want that hundred pounds.”
“Jane!”
She mimicked him sweetly.
“Jeremy!” Then she laughed, but when she spoke again her voice was serious enough. “Don’t you realize I’ve never had a whole hundred pounds in my life before? It’s the most marvellous thing that’s ever happened.”
“You can’t take it!”
“Watch me!”
“Jane-”
“Don’t be silly, darling! You don’t know what it means. I was ill for six weeks last winter, and I hadn’t a penny saved. The insurance money doesn’t go on for ever-I began to have nightmares. I didn’t know I’d got a relation in the world then. Quite apart from the money, that’s why I’m not prepared to go all snob about them like you when they do turn up. I’m going to make friends with them. And I’m going to have my hundred pounds and put it into the Post Office Savings Bank for a nest-egg. So there!”
He put a hand on her arm.
“Jane-why were you ill?”
She said with a touch of defiance,
“Because I hadn’t proper shoes, or a warm coat, or enough to eat.”
“Why hadn’t you?”
“Because I wasn’t in a regular job-just odd dress shows and things. And I had to keep up my insurance, or I’d have been sunk. I just couldn’t afford another time like that, and I’m not going to have one. I’m going to have all my kind relations-and my Cousin Jacob’s hundred pounds.”
Jeremy said nothing at all. She could feel him withdrawing silently behind his frontiers. That she had heard the last of Jacob Taverner, his invitation, and his hundred pounds was so unlikely that she gave it no consideration at all. That he had retired in order to marshal his forces and would presently march upon her with horse and foot, bombs and flame-throwers, was reasonably certain. He might be intending to wait until he had her alone, or he might just pounce with annihilating effect on the top of a bus. She decided on going home by tube, where the facilities for pouncing would be fewer as long as you kept up with the crowd and avoided being marooned with your adversary in an underground passage.
After one or two light-hearted remarks which were received in complete silence she resigned herself and occupied the train journey in sorting out and polishing her own armoury of weapons. Because two things were quite certain. Whatever Jeremy said or Jeremy did, two things were quite certain. She was going to go down to the Catherine-Wheel, and she was going to have that hundred pounds.
All the way home and all the way upstairs he never said a word. She drew the curtains, she put on the kettle, she laid the table, and got buns out of a tin. Jeremy propped the mantelpiece in abstracted gloom until his right trouser leg began to singe at the gas fire, when he came across to her, took a knife out of her hand, laid it down on the table, and said,