I am not a profane woman. At the moment it was really a pity, for it left me simply nothing adequate to say. She nodded slowly, as if I’d asked her a question. “Yes,” she said. “That’s what I did. I believed him-Mr. Brent. How could I help it? He was obviously sincere about the whole thing. He wrote a letter that I wish I’d kept. I didn’t. I burned it. He said that I had wrecked Craig’s chosen career. He said that Craig now wanted to take training as a pilot and that I was-again-the obstacle. He said that he regretted everything he had said to me; he said that he was ready to accept our marriage-that is, our eventual marriage.” She stopped and took a long breath and I saw the picture complete.
It was incredible, of course. Except that women like Drue can be just that incredible.
“So you believed him. You agreed to let bygones be bygones. And you promised to divorce Craig, let him complete his training, and then remarry.”
“That,” said Drue, “was the idea.”
“Good heavens, Drue!”
“I know. But then it seemed right. We had married so quickly, you see. Craig was giving up his job; and his father convinced me that the one thing he wanted was to get into the air force. Mr. Brent was-I can’t tell you how convincing he was. He asked me to forgive him for everything he’d said in anger. He said that he believed at last that Craig and I really loved each other. He said that Craig had set his heart upon becoming a pilot and getting into the army or the navy air force. He said Craig was deeply patriotic-and he is. I knew that. He said that what it-the divorce, I mean-really amounted to was merely a long engagement, and not very long at that. He made it seem so reasonable and so right. He said that Craig would never ask me for it himself and if I loved Craig I would get the divorce. And that as soon as the year of training was up we could remarry.”
It was clear enough; still incredible, if one didn’t know Drue, but clear. What was also pretty clear was dirty work at the crossroads.
“So you got the divorce?”
“Yes. It took six weeks.”
“And Craig got his training?”
“Yes.”
“What happened then?”
“I don’t know.”
“You don’t…”
She shook her head and looked away from me. “He didn’t come back.”
“But didn’t he understand why you did it? Didn’t you see each other and write and…”
She shook her head again. “No. That is, I did write a few times. But he didn’t answer. The divorce went through very quietly and-and so quickly. And that was all.”
After a moment, I said, “And you never tried to see him?”
“No.” Her mouth moved a little wryly. “You see, I had my pride.”
And it had cost her enough. Well, I didn’t say it. I pulled my uniform over my head and struggled through it and glanced at my watch. For all she’d said so much it had been only a few minutes.
“But now,” she said unexpectedly, “it’s different. Pride doesn’t seem to matter so much. I’m older; I’m an adult now and a woman. I know what I want. I was-such a child then.”
She was still a child. I didn’t say it, but took my cap and went to the mirror so as to adjust it to hide the white lock in my rather abundant auburn hair. “And now you’ve come back.”
She sat for a moment in silence. In the mirror I watched a look of determination come slowly into her face. Finally, she said, “Yes, now I’ve come back. I had to.”
Watching her instead of what I was doing, I jabbed a pin into my thumb and muttered. So she’d made up her mind to fight, and she’d given up long ago her best and strongest weapon.
“I can understand your getting too much of Alexia,” I said briefly. “I can understand your leaving the house. I can even understand your-well, believing Pa Brent. And letting Craig go without any effort to keep him. But I cannot understand Craig.”
“Well, neither can I. Now,” she said, in a kind of abject voice which was not at all like her. Except for her flair of defiance with Alexia, she had been in a rather crushed state of mind ever since we started to Balifold, I realized then. This was not, however, her natural and customary reaction to life. She was a perfectly sensible and altogether charming young woman with considerable backbone-which up to then had certainly, however, been held in abeyance to a marked degree. But then love does do very odd things, and obviously she was still heartbreakingly in love with the man whom, nevertheless, she had divorced.
She patted the little dog. “Sarah, it was all so clear then. It’s only now, after I’ve had time to think and time to regret that I see it was all wrong. I believed it then, though. I never suspected.”
“Suspected what?” I said with a rather nervous glance at my watch again. “Suspected whom?”
“Anything. Anybody,” she said.
“And now you do?”
“Now I do. Now I”-she stopped and said in a kind of whisper staring at the rug-“now I’ve got to know what happened.”
That at least was a step in the right direction and one clearly indicated by the foregoing little tale. I said briskly and, I remember, almost gaily, “Good for you. It’s high time. I’m proud of you.”
“It’s not easy,” she said, and gave me a quick and rather diffident glance. “I mean-well, suppose Alexia is right. Suppose Craig doesn’t want to see me. I mean-well, I’ve no reason to think that he does, you see. He had every chance.”
“Look here,” I said, still briskly and full of energy and approval. “Obviously you had two people against you in this house-Pop and Alexia. I don’t know Pop, but I can’t say I took to Alexia. Maybe Craig repented his quick marriage and asked his father to get him out of it. But maybe not. As I see it, you’ll have to brace yourself for whatever comes. I mean, have an understanding with Craig.”
“That’s why I came,” she said in a whisper.
I went on, “You may have to take it on the chin, you know. Craig is free, white and twenty-one; he could have come to you.”
“I know,” she whispered again.
“On the other hand, all sorts of things could have happened. It’s a little difficult and melodramatic to suspect people of that particular kind of finagling-I mean, oh, destroying letters, lying, that kind of thing. Still it could have happened.”
“I’ve got to have it clear,” she said.
“Right. It comes under the heading of unfinished business. It…” I stopped abruptly, for someone knocked. I thought it was Anna and went to the door. But it wasn’t Anna; it was a man, young and slender, whose pointed, rather delicate face was instantly familiar to me, although I couldn’t possibly have seen him before. He was very sleek and very elegant with a wonderful brown and maroon color scheme (brown slacks, checked coat, maroon handkerchief and tie) and he seemed surprised to see me.
“Oh, I beg your pardon! I thought-Alexia said Drue was here.”
There was a quick kind of rustle behind me. I glanced over my shoulder and Drue wasn’t there. Dog, coat and all had vanished.
The word Alexia gave me the clue; he was amazingly like her. This must be the twin brother, Nicky. Hadn’t Drue told me?
He said, “Where is Drue?” and tried to look over my shoulder into the room.
It didn’t look as if Drue wanted to see him. I took my fountain pen and my thermometer. “Sorry,” I said, “I’m just going to my patient.”
He moved aside to permit me to step into the hall. As I turned along it toward the big bedroom where the sick man lay, he dodged along with me as gracefully as a panther and about as welcome. I’m bound to say that I instantly added Nicky Senour to my rapidly growing list of dislikes in the Brent house. He was watching me with a gleam of bright curiosity in his face “I say, you know,” he said, “Drue can’t stay here. She’s got to leave. You must make her leave.”