“Why don’t you like Aunt Grace? She’s always very nice to you.”
Lydia ’s eyes were all indignant fire.
“Darling, I adore her-just the same as I adore featherbeds, and bubbly, and pouring myself out in a heart-to-heart talk with someone who makes me feel I’m the only pebble on the beach. I just don’t think it’s frightfully good for one, that’s all. Minute doses and at long intervals, yes, but every day and all day, absolutely and definitely no.”
Phyllida jumped up. She didn’t want to quarrel with Lydia, but if she stayed any longer she would have to quarrel-or agree. She went over to where Irene was telling Miss Paradine all about a spot on little Rena’s chest.
“It only showed this morning, and of course I took her temperature at once, and it was normal. I sent for Doctor Horton and he said he didn’t think it was anything. Of course he hasn’t got children of his own, and I don’t think he takes them seriously enough. I didn’t really want to come tonight. The spot had gone, but of course you never can tell, can you, and I knew you’d understand. But Frank was so dreadfully cross that I thought I had better get dressed after all. You know, I think he’s really unreasonable about the children. He would be the first to complain if I neglected them, but he seems to think that I can go here, there, and everywhere with him just as I used to before we had a nursery. I do wish you’d speak to him.”
Grace Paradine laid an affectionate hand on her arm. She said,
“You’re a very devoted mother, my dear.”
And then Phyllida came up. Irene turned to her.
“Oh, Phyl, I’ve been so worried all day! It was Rena-she had a spot on her chest, and of course I took her temperature at once…”
Grace moved a little away. Frank Ambrose joined her.
“Irene been boring you with the kids’ ailments? She’s always at it. They’re perfectly healthy children, but she worries herself to fiddle-strings over them. If it isn’t one thing it’s another. She’s got a good nurse, and she doesn’t trust her a yard. Look here, Aunt Grace, can’t you put in a word about it? There isn’t anyone else she’d take it from.”
“She’s young,” said Grace Paradine in an indulgent tone.
“She won’t be if she goes on like she’s doing. She can’t do this, and she can’t do that, and she won’t do the other, and it’s always the same excuse-Jimmy’s nose wants blowing, or Rena’s had a sneeze, or a hiccup, or a cough. Why, it was all I could do to get her here tonight.”
Grace Paradine turned a sympathetic look upon him.
“Poor old Frank,” she said.
Lydia, glancing across at them from the other side of the hearth, watched the sulky look fade out of Frank’s face. The heavy lines relaxed. He talked. Miss Paradine listened. Every now and then she smiled.
Lydia shot a sparkling glance at Dicky.
“The best butter-” she murmured.
But when he stared and said “Hullo-what’s that?” she only laughed and said, “ Alice in Wonderland, darling.”
And then the door at the end of the room was opened and three people came in. James Paradine first, very imposing. The black and white of evening dress confers an undue advantage upon those to whom much has already been given. Mr. Paradine stood six-foot-five in his shoes. He carried his height with ease and dignity. His fine head was thickly covered with silver hair, but his eyebrows and the eyes over which they arched were as dark as they had been when he was twenty. The ruby and gold of the room became merely background when he came in. A little behind him on his left was his secretary, Albert Pearson, a bun-faced young man in hornrimmed spectacles and the kind of dress suit which suggests a peg in a bargain basement. On his other side Elliot Wray.
Everyone stopped talking. Everyone looked at Elliot. Mr. Paradine came up to his sister and observed with smiling malice,
“My dear, you will be charmed to know that we have another guest. You were complaining only this morning that ten would not make at all a good table. Well, here is Elliot Wray to make the number up to eleven. We had some business together, and I have prevailed upon him to stay.”
Chapter 3
Elliot Wray, coming into the room, looked down the length of it to the group of black and white figures about the glowing hearth. They were small and far away-black figures and white figures of the women, black-and-white figures of the men, with the dazzle of firelight behind them and a brightness of gilding and shimmering glass overhead. The three black figures were Grace Paradine and Irene and Brenda Ambrose, the two white ones were Lydia Pennington and Phyllida. His mind named them in this order because he held it to the task. He held his eyes to each in turn before he let them rest on Phyllida. She was pale, she had grown thinner. She wore a white dress and Grace Paradine’s pearls. She stood between Mark and Irene, and she was looking up at Mark. Elliot had come more than half way up the room behind James Paradine before she turned and saw him.
It was something in Mark’s face that made her turn. Those gloomy, brooding eyes of his had waked up, become startled, interested. Phyllida turned to know why, and saw her husband. She hadn’t seen him for a year, and she couldn’t believe that she saw him now. The sheer unbelievable shock of it made her put out a hand and clutch at Mark Paradine’s arm. And then, before she had time to think, everything in her raced and sang-her blood, her heart, the thoughts which she could neither understand nor control. Colour and beauty rushed upon her. She had one of those moments which are outside time and reason.
Elliot Wray went past her to his hostess and gave her a formal greeting which was as formally received. He shook hands with Irene and Brenda, found Lydia stretching up on tiptoe to kiss him on the cheek, and came to a standstill before his wife. His brief, “Hullo, Phyllida!” might have been spoken to the merest acquaintance. Then he turned back to Lydia. Lane opened the door and announced that dinner was served. James Paradine offered his arm to Irene, and the others fell in behind them, Phyllida with Mark, Brenda with Elliot, Lydia with Dicky and Albert Pearson, and Grace Paradine with Frank Ambrose.
In the large dining-room more colour, more gilt, more bright unshaded lights. A wallpaper of sealing-wax red was mitigated by a row of gloomy family portraits-three generations of Paradines in black broadcloth, and the wives of two of them in velvet and brocade. All had the appearance of being tolerably uncomfortable in their best clothes and large, expensive frames. They all stared downwards at the company taking their seats.
James Paradine remained standing for a moment at the head of the table. His eye travelled round it. He inclined his head a trifle and said in a conversational voice, “For what we are about to receive may the Lord make us truly thankful.” After which he too sat down, and Lane placed a massive silver soup-tureen before him. In this, as in other matters, Mr. Paradine preferred the elder fashion. He liked to ladle out the soup for his guests, and to carve for them at the head of his own table. He intended to do both tonight. He liked to see the board spread with a snowy damask tablecloth, the naked mahogany reserved ceremonially for the dessert and wine, and what he liked he had.
Elliot found himself on the left of the table between Brenda and Lydia. There was a monstrous silver épergne between him and Phyllida on the other side of the table. The decoration of holly and white chrysanthemums which it supported afforded brief views of her when she turned, now to Mark on her left, and again to Albert on her right. A chance-caught glimpse of dark curling hair, of the turn of a cheek no longer pale but vividly coloured-these came his way, but not much more. In the face of sharp exasperation he told himself that what he was feeling was relief. Why should he want to look at Phyllida? There was more between them than a clutter of vegetation. He turned to Lydia. Her eyes were sparkling up at him.