“Who saw a light in the room? Who came up in her dressing gown and found instead of a burglar… love?”
“What are you saying, Joliffe?”
“You’re in the family now, my Jane. It was my light you saw in the room. What sharp eyes you have and what were you doing awake at that hour when the whole household was supposed to be fast asleep?”
“Joliffe, I don’t understand.”
“Then you are not applying your usual perspicacity. Why do you think I chose that time to pay a visit? Because I knew Uncle Sylvester had the Kuan Yin.”
“How did you get into the room? I was the only one in the house with a key.”
He laughed. “That wasn’t quite true, Jane dear. I had a key.”
“But how? There are three. Uncle Sylvester’s, Ling Fu’s, and mine.”
“There are four as far as I know. Maybe more. I have one too, you see.”
“But… how?”
“My dear Jane I have known Roland’s Croft for years. I have stayed with my uncle. At one time he was training me to work with him.”
“He gave you a key?”
“Let us say I acquired one.”
“How?”
“By seizing my opportunity, taking it from its secret place and getting another cut. Now I have access to his room whenever I wish as long as I choose the opportunity.”
“Oh Joliffe!”
“Now you’re shocked. You have to grow up, Jane, if you are going to be in this business. We are rivals… we must know what goes on in the enemy’s camp; all’s fair in love and war. This is a kind of war.”
“Oh no.”
He drew me to him and kissed me but I did not respond.
“I’m tired of Kuan Yin, Jane.”
“I want to know what happened.”
“Oh darling, haven’t you got it? I came down when my uncle was away. I went by stealth in the dead of night to that room, removed the Kuan Yin, took her to be tested and then brought her back. In the act of replacing her my very inquisitive wife-to-be discovered me and we met by moonlight—no there wasn’t a moon. Pity, it would have been so fitting. Never mind, the starlight had to do and there took place that enchanting, tender interlude which must have made all the gods jealous of me. Jane, I love you.”
“But it was wrong,” I said.
“What do you mean… wrong?”
“To go to that room, like that. It was like stealing.”
“Nonsense. Nothing was removed which was not returned.”
“Why didn’t you come when your uncle was there? Why didn’t you ask him…?”
“There are trade secrets. You have to understand this. For all we know some rival may have the original Kuan Yin. He may be holding it, biding the moment to sell. This is business, Jane.”
“To come there, and go into his private room, and take it away…”
“I knew it was safe. He was away and I knew where he’d gone. I knew there was time to get it out and back again. Oh, enough of this. I’m tired of the subject.”
But I could not get it out of my mind. I felt cheated in some way although it was Mr. Sylvester Milner who had been cheated.
I did not like these methods of business.
It made me see Joliffe differently. I loved him as deeply as ever but it was not the same. Apprehension had crept into my beautiful existence. It was the fear of what I might discover next.
II
A few days later we crossed the Channel.
I was delighted with Joliffe’s house in Kensington. It was tall, rather slender in a terrace of such houses which all displayed the graceful elegance of the period. There were four stories, on each of which were two large rooms, and Annie and Albert, who were waiting to greet us, lived over the stables in the mews which was situated at the back of the terrace. Annie was the topical ex-nanny who doted on Joliffe and now and then forgot that he was a grown man. She called him Master Jo and scolded him in a manner which he loved, for quite clearly she adored him, and Joliffe, I was discovering, looked upon feminine adulation as his due. Albert, pale and wiry, was a handy man who looked after the carriage and horses and had very little to say.
I took to the establishment immediately. Our room was on the third floor. Its windows opened onto a balcony with a view of the tiny garden and the stables. The garden could hardly be called such by Roland’s Croft standards. It was a square of crazy paving with a border of earth in which grew a few evergreen shrubs. There was a solitary pear tree though which gave fruit rather reluctantly—little green hard pears which Annie said were only good for stewing.
From the drawing room on the first floor I could watch the horse cabs clopping by and look across the road to the trees of Kensington Gardens. I was soon delighting in those gardens and often took a morning walk there.
Now that we were in London and our honeymoon was over I saw less of Joliffe. He had an office in the city and he was often there. This left me to my own devices. I would stroll down the flower walk where the nannies sat with their charges and sometimes I sat with them and listened to their discussions about their children’s characteristics and those of their employers. I wandered along by the Serpentine and explored the Orangerie of the Palace with its William and Mary façade; I walked past the windows behind which our Queen had once played with her dolls though it was hard to imagine as a little girl the blackclad widow she had become. I saw the summer flowers replaced by the hardier blooms of autumn in the pond garden and the thick leaves of summer gradually turn russet and drop. I liked to sit by the Round Pond and watch the children with their boats and I would take bread with which to feed the swans and the birds.
It was at the Round Pond that I first noticed the woman. She was in a way not the sort of person one would miss. She was tall—buxom almost and she had abundant red hair which escaped from her hat in ringlets. With her hourglass figure she was beautiful in an over-ripe rather coarse way.
I made a habit of going straight to the pond to feed the swans and I saw her again. It was the third time I saw her that I noticed she was aware of me. I had bent forward to throw a piece of bread to a swan and when I turned my head I saw that she was standing quite close to me. Her eyes were large, very light blue; and there could be no doubt whatever that they were fixed upon me.
I walked quickly towards the palace and went to the pond garden. This was a replica of the one made by Henry VIII at Hampton Court; it was shut in by railings and the path round it was the pleached alley where the trees had been trained to meet overhead—thick and heavy in summer, bare branches in winter. There were gaps in the trees on each side of the garden to enable people to look over the low railings at the flowers and pond.
I went into the alley and after walking a little way, I paused to look at the garden through one of the gaps. At the opening opposite was the red-haired woman.
I stepped backwards and made as though to turn to my left; and when she could no longer see me because of the trees in the alley I made a sharp right turn and walked swiftly out round the alley and out to the avenue of elms. Then I went home.
I told myself I had imagined she had followed me. Why I should have felt so uncomfortable I could not imagine; except that it gives one an uneasy feeling to think oneself followed.
When I arrived home there was a letter from my mother. She was coming up to London to see me. She was longing for a glimpse of me in my home.
I was delighted and when Joliffe came in he shared my pleasure.
“I’ll have to show her what a good husband you have,” he said.
I filled the house with flowers—chrysanthemums, asters, dahlias, and starry Michaelmas daisies. I had consulted with Annie. I wanted a very special luncheon on this day and Annie was determined that this should be a meal my mother would never forget.