"Yes, that's true. But how could I write and say that to Stephen? —ask him to hang around waiting until I could get a divorce. Besides...."
"Besides?" he prompted her, as she paused for almost a full minute.
"There was your position, too, Lin," she explained with an effort. "You had just married me—that very day—and been very generous to me. It would have been frightful to go to you and tell you immediately that I wanted to marry someone else. And, equally, I couldn't write to Stephen
t)ehind your back and say I'd get free from you as soon as possible.'*
He looked at her and said slowly, "You were concerned for my—feelings and pride?"
**Well, yes, of course. You had been so good to me. I didn't want to ... to hurt or humiliate you. I don't want to oow, Lin. I wouldn't have said all this, if you hadn't asked me, but-"
"No. I realize that." He looked away from her out of the window. "Will you tell me what you did, then? In what terms did you answer Stephen?"
"I just—refused him—told him I was married to you. I tried to do it as kindly as possible, but I expect it sounded pretty bald and uncomfortmg. It was the only thing I could do though, Lin. Both from his point of view and yours."
"And what about your own point of view?"
"Mine?"
"Yes. There is your point of view, too, you know. Many people would regard it as the most important one." ; Sne considered that for a moment.
I "I don't think it was the most important one at that moment, Lin. It was the least important, I suppose. I had already snatched at what I thought to be the best solution to my troubles." She looked straight at him. "At what I thought to be the only solution to my troubles," she added gravely. "In many ways, I had been extraordinarily lucky. I thought it was better to do what seemed decent and right at the moment, and hope that the future might give me a—another chance."
; "You mean, you hoped the time might come when you could give Stephen a full explanation without hurting my sensitive feelings, and without saddling him with an obligation toward yourself if his feelings had changed?"
"S-something like that."
"Rather a risk, Thea. American girls can be very attractive, and the most faithful and stable of men have been known to do some silly things on the rebound from an unsuccessful love affair."
"I can't help that," she said obstinately. "One must take a risk sometimes."
"Only in a good cause."
"Well, this was a good cause."
"Was it?" For a moment he looked genuinely amused.
"The cause of doing 'the right thing,' eh?"
"No. Not only that. Of seeing that two people who had been good to me, and of whom T was very fona, should not suffer for my mistake and my—ill luck, I suppose you might call it."
"I see. You mean Stephen and his mother, of course?"
"Oh—no." She looted at him in surprise. "I wasn't thinking of Mrs. Dorley at the moment, tnough of course she is indirectly involved. I meant Stephen and—you."
He didn't comment on that. Instead, he thrust his hands into his pockets and walked slowly up the room and back again. And as the silence lengthened, she thought. Now it's my turn. And aloud she said quite coolly and quietly:
"Why did you lie to me, Lin, about the Dorleys' house being shut up?"
"Eh?" He swung around to her sharply, and his thoughtful pacing came to an abrupt stop.
"I went into the country today. I felt sick of town. And in a sort of nostalgic mood, I went down to Stephen's home. I expected it to be shut up, of course, but Emma was there and so was Darry. Then I assumed that I had very fortunately happened to come on the day Emma had chosen to look in, but after we'd talked at cross-purposes for a bit, I found it wasn't that at all. Emma told me she hadn't slept away from, the house one single night. And she also told me, Lin, tha^ she hadn't seen you since the day you and I were then together. One of you is lying and it can't be Emma. Sh hasn't one single reason in the world to do so."
"And you think I have?"
Thea made a little deprecating gesture with her hands.
"I only know that by telling me I couldn't go to Emma you convinced me that I had absolutely no other course bui to marry you. Was that why you did it, Lin?"
"I suppose if I say yes, you 11 imagine that I am dying foi love of you?" he said dryly.
Thea flushed.
"No. I can't say I ever thought of that explanation."
He glanced at her curiously and said, "Did you think oi any explanation?''
"I did. But it wasn't very creditable to you." Thea wouU not have said that so crisply, she felt, if he had not made tha
rather sneering remark about her supposing he was dying for love of her.
"So?" He smiled faintly—not very nicely, she thought— and for a moment she thought she saw a Lin she had not known. '*And what was the discreditable explanation, Thea?"
"It's not one that came to me out of my own ideas, Lin. It was suggested at least twice, by the kind of spiteful, idle people who have little better to do than gossip about a—a marriage like ours."
She hesitated a moment and then she said, almost in Geraldine*s words, "Did you find my lack of sophistication rather—rather new and piquant? And because you knew I was respectable it woulci have to be a legalized affair and might just as well be called marriage since you could get out of it whenever you pleased? Was that it, Lin?"
She spoke quite quietly, and nothing in her manner showed now passionately she wanted him to deny it—to augh at her, to be furious with her that she should think such a thing. Anything so that she might put the idea from her mind and never thmk of Lin in that hateful light again.
But there was no denial, either laughing or angry.
He looked at her, his hands still thrust in his pockets, then he transferred his gaze to the pattern of the carpet, which he thoughtfully traced out with his foot.
"I suppose that's as good a way as any of putting it," he agreed.
"Lin!" Pain as well as furious indignation made a cry of that. "How odious—how disgusting ofyou! You could lie to me, quite coolly and circumstantially, just so that you could have me at a complete disadvantage? You! Why youVe always been at such pains to be kind to me, reassure me. I Ve never thought of you as anything but trustworthy and— and—"
"Yes, I know. Chivalrous. You actually applied the word to me once, my poor httle Thea." He smiled. "I nearly told you then what a fool you were. But that would rather have spoiled things."
"Don't talk like that!" she exclaimed sharply. "I don't know you when you use such expressions."
"But then, you don't really know me at all, do you?" he said softly.
**I begin to think that's true," she agreed bitterly. "I can't imagine even now why you went to all that elaborate trouble to make me feel safe and—and cared for.
"It was no good doing it at all if I didn't do it well," he pointed out, coolly and without a sign of remorse. And there, she thought, spoke the real Lin.
It had been a game to him, an amusing form of pursuit. It had not quite come off, but only because of the sheer bad luck—from his point of view—that had made her go into Surrey that day. In the ordinary way, there had been nothing to take her there, since she believed the Dorleys house to be shut up.
"It must be rather—disappointing for you that things have gone wrong," she heard herself say in a cool, hard Uttle voice. *'I suppose all this questioning about Stephen was meant to clear the way for—for your particular type of lovemaking."
He smiled and inclined his head.
"You read me like a book," he told her mockingly.
"Lin, don't talk like that. You're like a stranger.'
"Well, you see, it's right what I told you—that you don't really know me. Or should I say—that you don't know the real me."
She was silent. And then, because hers was a nature that found it impossible to believe ill of the people she loved, Thea made one last effort.
"Lin, in some way all this r
ings false. When I think of you coming to the station to meet me being sweet to me when I was first ill in hospital, bringing me my engagement ring—" she looked down at her ring and twisted it nervously on her finger "—I can't believe it was all an elaborate pretense, leading up to tricking me into marriage. A marriage of which, incidentally, you don't seem to have taken much advantage," she added with rising color.
"It wasn't all so cut-and-dried as that, Thea. It never is. I met you at the station because of a fairly good-natured whim, I suppose. When I came to see you in hospital— well, you were sweet, and I felt badly about you being ill. My— fancy for you dated from then, probably, if you want to examine the matter so closely. As for taking advantage of the marriage situation—we-ell—" he smiled and shrugged "—I maintain that my timing was good, because you re a
girl who can't be rushed, but my luck was out and you made this unfortunate journey of discovery just a little too soon."
She winced angrily.
"You seem quite cheerful about it."
"IVe aJways prided myself on being a good loser," he assured her.
"Well, you have certainly lost this time." Thea looked weary and disillusioned suddenly, and a good deal older than her age. "I'm leaving you, Lin. I'm not going to stay here any longer with you in this place."
She got up with an air of decision, and he watched her
without attempting to touch her. "I suppose that s
suppose that s understandable," he said. "Where do you propose to go?"
For a moment she simply didn't know the answer to that. And then her conversation with Emma came back in a blessed flood of relief.
"I'm going down to stay with Emma," she said slowly "and I'm going down there this evening."
CHAPTER TEN
He really did seem taken aback by this last decision of hers.
"This evening? Is there so much hurry, Thea? One can't arrange these things at quite short notice, you know."
"I can," Thea said with decision. "Only today, Emma said I could come whenever I liked and for as Jong as I liked."
"Perhaps so, but she would hardly expect you to take hei at her word quite so literally and so soon."
"I don't care what she thinks." Thea spoke with an obstinacy that, had he but known it, was reminiscent ol *poor mummie." "I'm not spending another night alom with you in this flat."
His eyebrows shot up.
"My dear girl, you have my word for it that you'll b( perfectly safe and unmolested here, if that's what you want."
"I don't think so very much of your word just now," Thea said deliberately, and she walked past him and out of the room.
When she reached her own room she found that she was trembling violently. Until then she had remained quite calm, because surprise and disgust had outweighed nervous reaction. But now it was all she could do to keep her hands from shaking or the tears from falling.
Opening drawers and cupboards, she began to pull out things in a haphazard manner and throw them on the bed, ready for packing.
It's like some silly situation in a domestic drama, she
thought bitterly. A conjugal scene, and then the disillusioned wife begins to pack.
Only she didn't feel like a disillusioned wife. She had never been his wife in any real sense of the word, in any case. She just felt like Althea Pendray, who had been agonizingly let down by someone she loved and trusted.
Because I did love him, in a way, she told herself wretchedly, wiping the back of her hand childishly across her eyes before she proceeded to stuff things into her suitcase in no special order and with uncharacteristic lack of care. I really loved him when—
But she saw that it was silly to allow herself to recall the times when Lin had seemed dear and nice and understanding. If she did she would just have to sit down on the bed and cry. And then she would never finish her packing or get away from the flat in time to rejoin Emma at a reasonable hour.
How she was to explain herself when she turned up for the second time in one day, she didn't know. But that seemed the least of her problems and she would deal with it as the occasion arose.
At last she was ready. Or as near ready as it was possible to feel when one couldn't really take in that one was going, or decide whether or not it really mattered what one took.
Only when she went to pick up her case did she remember how handicapped she was by the weakness of one hand, and how impossible it would be to walk a couple of miles from the station at the other end of her journey, carrying her luggage.
Oh, well, she didn't care. She would leave her case at the station for the night. Probably it could be sent over to the house the next day. She thrust a toothbrush and a wisp of a nightdress into her large handbag. And then, picking up her case again, she went out into the hall.
For a moment she wondered helplessly what the right technique for a departing wife might be.
Ought she to go in and say goodbye to Lin, or march out of the apartment without a word? At any rate, thank heaven, it was not necessary to resort to the melodramatic note of explanation pinned to the pincushion.
But before she could malce any decision, he came out of
his room, crossed the hall and took the case from her, whether she liked it or not.
"You can't carry that thing. And what are you going to do at the other end?"
"I'll manage somehow," she said obstinately.
"Nonsense. It's at least two miles from the station. You'd better let me drive you down there."
"Drive me down! You! It's quite impossible. Surely you can see that."
She thought this was the last horrible touch of cynicism that he should obligingly assist her to run away from him.
"It seems to me the most practical arrangement."
His cool tone infuriated her.
"I'd rather walk all the way from the station, carrying the case in my left hand,'' she told him.
"Quite unnecessary and very foolish," was his comment.
"Then I'll leave my case at the station for the night, and it can be brought over to the house tomorrow. They must have a porter or someone who does these things."
She thought for a moment that he was going to argue that point, too. But he said, "All right. I'll bring this down for you and get you a taxi."
"Can't Donkins do it?" she asked coldly.
"I prefer to do it myself," he said shortly, and she saw that for some reason or other, she had got him on the raw.
Perhaps he just couldn't bear the affront to his pride when someone he had hoped to enslave showed suddenly how little she thought of him.
When they reached the hall and just before they went out into the street, Thea stopped.
"Oh, there's something else I'd forgotten."
She took off her gloves and began to tug impatiently at her rings.
"No," he said sharply. "You promised you'd keep that."
"I did? When?"
"When I gave it to you."
"Oh, the—engagement ring, you mean."
"Yes."
"But that was in quite different circumstances."
"You promised, he repeated, and for a moment h< sounded as obstinate as she had.
"It can't—matter to you. Why tag some silly bit of
sentiment onto this hateful business?*' Thea said, but she had left both rings on her finger.
"It's not sentiment. Call it a whim if you like. And you'd better keep the wedding ring, too, for the moment at any rate. You re still Mrs. Lindsay Varlon, however little you like it." He smiled grimly. *'Take it off when the divorce has gone through if you want to, but leave it for the moment. It saves complications."
She wanted to say that the avoidance of complications didn't arise in the case of her engagement ring. But somehow she was reluctant to prolong the discussion. And as he said she had promised.
'*A11 right. I will keep them both—for the moment."
He nodded curtly, as though that was the only possible decision. And then he went out into the ev
ening sunlight and hailed a passing taxi for her.
Even in so small a matter as this, there were appearances I to be kept up. One didn't want the taxi driver—though one would never see him again—to realize that a marriage was being broken up before his eyes.
"Goodbye, Lin," she said quite agreeably, as she stood with one foot on the step. "I'll get a porter at Waterloo, and I'm sure I can arrange aoout my case at the other end."
"Very well. I hope you find everything all right and that Emma will make you comfortable."
She might be any young wife going off for a few days' visit in the country, while her husband was detained by his work in town.
Only, in those circumstances she would kiss him, of course. Did appearances demand that she kiss Lin? Would he understand if she did? No. Better that the taxi driver—if he really mattered at all—should think—
And at that moment Lin kissed her. For the sake of appearances, of course. For appearances only.
But it was a cool, firm kiss, as though he meant it. And suddenly her lips were trembling as she returned the kiss.
Then she got into the taxi rather hastily, and was glad that it was Lin who said "Waterloo" to the driver. She was not quite sure that she could have found sufficient voice to do so.
She didn't look back. Where would have been the point
in doing so? But she carried with her the inescapable impression that he stood looking after the taxi.
At Waterloo she was lucky. A train was going in less than ten minutes, and an elderly and garrulous porter carried the disputed suitcase for her and installed her in a corner seat.
Just before the whistle blew the ridiculous thought came to her. There's time to go back, even now. But common sense reminded her that there was no reason in the world for her to go back. And almost immediately the whistle sounded and the train was sliding out of the station—across the river, away from London and away from her life with Lin.
She never had a very clear recollection of the journey. Not that she spent the time tormenting herself with doubts and questions. There was really nothing to doubt or to question herself about. She had been wrong in her estimate of Lin, and now she had done the only thing possible—made a clean break. There had been only the one course open. Even he himself had said that. "It's quite understandable," Lin had said when she declared she would leave his apartment.
Harlequin Omnibus: Take Me with You, Choose What You Will, Meant for Each Other Page 57
