It hurt to remember it was Tony’s money, but that couldn’t be helped. She would have to have something for her immediate wants—for a night at an hotel and so on.
At that moment a big man sitting beside her got up abruptly, just as a waitress was passing with a laden tray. There was a crash of sliding crockery as his shoulder caught the tray, an hysterical shriek from the harassed waitress, and the next moment a large glass of hot milk was emptied in a stream on the table, most of it pouring down on to Anna’s skirt before she could spring to her feet.
“Oh dear, now, look at that. I’m terribly sorry, but it wasn’t my fault. Oh dear, let me wipe you down with a cloth.” The girl had set down her tray and was scrubbing Anna’s skirt with a hastily snatched cloth.
A superintendent came up, and Anna unwillingly found herself a centre of interest.
“It wasn’t my fault—really it wasn’t,” the girl kept on saying. “It was that gentleman—at least, he’s gone now—cleared off, now he’s made all this trouble, I suppose. But I couldn’t help it.”
“It really was an accident. It doesn’t matter,” Anna said to the superintendent.
“I’m extremely sorry, madam. If you’ll leave your name and address, we’ll arrange to have your suit cleaned.”
“Oh no—no, really. It scarcely shows,” stammered Anna.
Leave her name and address! She would rather have had everything she possessed ruined.
“It’s perfectly simple, madam. No one will be at any loss.” The superintendent glared rather acidly at the waitress. “We have an insurance that covers accidents of this sort.”
Anna felt a sudden impulse to say: “The suit isn’t of any importance. It was only my wedding suit.” But instead she said gently: “I won’t bother, thank you. The mark is almost gone and—and it isn’t a new suit anyway.”
She stooped to retrieve her dropped bag and gloves.
The gloves were there, but the bag was not.
Quickly she glanced at the chair where she had been sitting. It was not there either. She pulled out the next chair. Nothing.
She sat down again quickly, trying to think out this horrible development quietly, staring unseeingly at the marble-topped table.
Of course! The man who had upset the milk—it hadn’t been an accident at all. He had seen the notes in her bag and acted in a second.
Then what was she to do? What on earth could she do? Call back the superintendent?
“If you will leave your name and address madam—”
Insist on sending for a policeman?
“If you will leave your name and address, madam—”
Endless questions—and then no money, of course. She groped in her pocket and found a few coins. That at least would pay for her coffee. And then?
There was not a soul in London to whom she could turn. Or was there? She hastily reviewed her few days there, and suddenly, with immense and ridiculous relief, she remembered Fanchette.
There had been a peculiar kindness in the way the Frenchwoman had looked at her. Surely she would not refuse to lend Anna enough for a night’s lodging? It was awful, of course, to go borrowing like that. But what else could she do? And, somehow, she didn’t think she would have to explain a great deal to Fanchette.
Anna glanced up at the big white face of the clock opposite. Ten minutes to six, She would have to hurry, for of course the shop would close at six, and it was quite a long walk.
She paid for her coffee, which left her only thirty pence. Ten pence of this she spent on taking a bus to save time. Even then, she had to run along the quiet little street where Fanchette had her grey and silver shop.
A pretty, calm faced girl was just going to draw a blind over the window of the door as Anna breathlessly pushed her way in. “I must see Madame Fanchette, please!”
Anna had no idea of the urgency in her voice, or of the weariness and fear in her eyes.
“I am sorry, madam, but Madame Fanchette is not here. Could I do anything for madam? Is it an urgent order?”
“Oh no—no.” Anna bit her lip to keep it from trembling. “I must see her. Could you—would you give me her private address? It’s—it’s quite a private matter.”
The girl looked faintly curious, but still perfectly polite. “I’m very sorry, madam, but Madame Fanchette went to Paris by the afternoon plane. We don’t expect her back this week.”
“Paris,” repeated Anna stupidly, as though she had never heard of the place. “Paris.”
“Yes. Perhaps there is something I could do for madam?”
“No—no, thank you. It doesn’t matter.”
Anna turned slowly away, without another word, and, looking curiously after her for a moment, the girl drew down the blind.
And again Anna walked the streets. Walked and walked and walked.
Presently it began to rain, and she stood for what seemed hours in a shop doorway. Two or three men spoke to her while she stood there, but it was not until one tried to take her by the arm that she fled from her shelter.
She ran through the rain, stumbling a little, her breath coming in little short gasps that were very nearly sobs. Her thin shoes were soaked and her linen suit clung damply to her.
It was getting dark now, and as the light faded so Anna’s terror grew. Only one fact stood out clearly in her mind. She could not—she would not—go back to Eaton Square.
She wondered where she was at the moment, and glanced up at the name written over the doorway.
“Killigrew Mansions,” she read, in the fading light.
For a second she could not remember where she had seen that name before.
And then she remembered. Seven, Killigrew Mansions. And Mario Frayne’s smiling face seemed to dance before her eyes.
Slowly she went into the thickly carpeted hall and found the lift. There was no attendant, but there were very simple instructions printed in the lift for passengers to work it themselves.
Her breath was coming fast now. She was not quite sure if it was with fear or relief. But as she stood outside No. 7, with her finger on the bell-push, she wondered if she would ever find words to explain her presence.
An almost alarmingly discreet-looking Italian manservant opened the door.
“Mr. Frayne—can I see him, please?” Anna’s mouth was dry, and her voice scarcely more than a whisper.
“He is not in, madam. I do not expect him until half-past ten or perhaps eleven.”
“Could I—wait? I’m very tired,” Anna said childishly and very hopelessly.
The man hesitated. She was by no means the first unusual woman visitor to his master’s fiat, but none of them had looked so exhausted and draggled and piteous as this.
Then, because, like most Latins, he could not resist a pretty woman, he stood aside and let her pass into the luxurious sitting room beyond.
“Thank you.” Anna sat down wearily.
“Shall I bring you anything, madam?”
“Oh no, thank you, she said shyly. And after a moment he went away into another room.
It was very, very quiet in the flat; very sheltered and rich and comfortable. Strangely different from the turbulent, rainswept hours through which she had just passed.
She leant back with a little sigh and closed her eyes.
When the manservant looked in half an hour later she was asleep.
He shrugged. It was no business of his, but he wondered a little what that gentle, startled-looking girl had to do with his master.
He was still wondering when Frayne came in about eleven. The servant didn’t sleep at the flat, and he already had on his coat, in readiness to go if his master required nothing further than the light supper which was waiting for him.
“There is a lady to see you, sir,” he told Frayne.
“A lady, eh? Who?” Frayne paused and looked inquiring.
“I do not know her, sir. You were not expecting her?”
“Not unless my memory is failing me, Umberto.” And Frayne gave his manser
vant a brilliant smile.
He went quietly to the door of his sitting-room and looked in.
Anna was still lying there asleep. She had roused herself sufficiently to take off her hat, and it hung now slackly from her hand. Her soft, dark hair was a little tumbled round her thin, weary face, and her crumpled linen suit had dried on her.
Frayne gave a long, quiet whistle as he stood there motionless, his hands in his pockets. Then he glanced back at his servant, who was looking curiously over his shoulder.
“All right, Umberto,” he said slowly. “I shall not need you any more tonight.”
CHAPTER SIX
Slowly Anna opened her eyes and looked round.
She had never seen the room before—At least, there was something vaguely familiar about it ... And then she remembered. She was in Mario Frayne’s flat.
She turned her head sharply, and there he was standing behind her chair, leaning his arms on the back of it and looking down calmly at her.
“Oh,” she began, rather frightenedly. “I’m sorry—I—”
“No, don’t be sorry,” he said, smiling. “I am not in the least sorry to find anything so charming waiting for me in my own home.”
“But I must explain—”
“Why should you?” he said carelessly, straightening up now. “The best things of this life need no explaining.”
“Oh, but really—”
“At least let us have supper first,” he begged amusedly. Explanations are always twice as disagreeable when one is hungry.”
She was silent then, watching him as he moved a small table near to her chair, and stooped to pick up her hat, which had fallen to the ground.
“I’ve left Tony,” she fired at him desperately.
“Yes?” He looked unimpressed. “Believe me, it’s quite usual for ladies to leave their husbands behind when they come to visit me at this time of night.”
“Oh!” Her eyes looked wide and horrified. “You think I—”
“I’m not really thinking about things at all,” he assured her pleasantly. “I haven’t the English passion for explaining. I just take everything as it comes. Tonight I find a charming woman in my flat—and supper ready laid. You must admit that the most reasonable thing is for us to take supper together. Come now, drink this, and see if the world doesn’t seem a different place.” He held out a small glass to her.
“I don’t want it,” she began.
“Drink it,” he said peremptorily.
She took the glass and drank what was in it obediently.
“Feel better?”
She nodded. “I—I don’t feel so cold,” she said, but she shivered a little.
“Cold!” He looked surprised. “It’s very warm in here.” Then he glanced at her crumpled suit. “Were you out in all that rain?” he asked abruptly.
“Yes.”
He frowned. “Well, eat up your supper quickly. The sooner you’re in bed the better.”
She had no idea at all what to make of that, so she slowly tried to eat what he put before her.
“Did you have any dinner?”
She shook her head.
“Then what have you been doing all evening?”
“W-wandering about,” she said, in a whisper.
He was silent for a moment studying her. Then he said calmly: “So it took you two days to find out that those Roones are impossible?”
She laid down her fork with a little clatter.
“Well, I think you showed great tenacity,” he went on. “Two hours would have been enough for me.”
Still she said nothing.
“You see,” he was smiling again, “you don’t have to make the explanations to me after all. I can tell you all about them myself. You thought you might manage Roone’s ghastly family—make them love you, or some such idea. But, when you arrived, you found the father a fool, the sister a cat, and Roone himself so stiff with convention that he talks like a Government Blue Book, and, I suppose makes love in terms of stocks and shares.”
All the Latin in Frayne went into his indulgent contempt for Hamilton’s lovemaking.
“No.” Anna got that out somehow.
“No?” Frayne smiled. “Well, it’s near enough. And then, when you find it was all quite hopeless, like a sensible girl you cut your losses and came to see the only person who had shown a fairly intelligent interest in your—remarkable self.”
“It isn’t really like that,” Anna began, in a husky little voice, so faint that he leaned forward, with his arms on the table, to hear what she was saying. “I know you must think it terrible of me to come to you like this.”
“On the contrary, I think it charming,” he assured her.
She gave a wordless little exclamation at that, and stumbled to her feet.
He got up quickly too.
“Where are you going?”
“I don’t know.” She looked bewildered.
“Not back to Tony?”
“No—oh, no,” she said. “I mustn’t go to Tony. And I mustn’t let him come to me. He said I had only to call and he would come. But I mustn’t call, you see; I mustn’t call.” And suddenly she began to weep.
She made no attempt to cover her face. Just stood there while the tears ran slowly down her cheeks, and the sobs rose in her throat in little sounds of despair.
Frayne stared at her a moment, his eyes a little narrowed. Then, as her sobs choked her, she began to cough breathlessly. And at that he sprang forward and put his arm round her.
“Heavens, don’t do that!” he exclaimed, with a queer little flash of alarm in his eyes. “Be quiet, child; be quiet. I didn’t understand. Here.” He picked her up off the ground and carried her back to the armchair.
He laid her in it, but he kept his arm round her, and held her still until her sobs presently died away, and she leaned against him, exhausted.
“Can you tell me about it now?” he asked at last, and there was no hint of mockery in his tone this time.
“Yes, I think so,” she said, in a whisper. “It’s just that—I didn’t realise until today how terribly I had injured Tony by marrying him.”
“And what has driven you to that painful conclusion now?” Frayne’s voice was strangely gentle.
Anna moved slightly, as though something hurt her, but she said steadily: “It wasn’t only the—the miserable business last night. It was something Katherine and her aunt said which finally showed me.”
“Oh,” Frayne made a gesture of contempt, “you mustn’t listen to what they say. They would have hated anyone they hadn’t chosen themselves.”
“Yes, I know that. And I think I hated them too at first. But I don’t now.”
“Why not?” He looked down at her white face curiously, and thought how terribly she had grown up from the girl who had sung Mignon’s song last night.
“Because I know now that it was their love for Tony which made them resent me. Oh yes”—as Frayne exclaimed impatiently—“they do love him dearly in their way. And they are honestly sure that he could never be anything but wretched with me.”
“But perhaps they don’t know?”
“They’ve known and loved Tony for thirty years,” Anna said slowly. “I’ve known him and loved him for less than three months. Which of us is likely to understand him better?”
Frayne didn’t answer that. He said instead: “But many men have to find a new viewpoint when they marry, I suppose.”
Anna gently touched Frayne’s hand. “You are being very kind. You want so much to reassure me, don’t you?” Frayne nodded. “But it isn’t only what they said, you see. It’s Tony, too. He tries so hard not to see me with their eyes, but I’ve seen him look at me with bewilderment and—I’m nearly sure—a touch of disillusionment.”
“But, good heavens, a man must make some effort to adapt himself,” Frayne said.
“Oh, but he would, he would!” Anna cried. “It isn’t that at all. He would try his hardest never to let me know that he changed. I think he wou
ld die if he knew how much I’ve been—hurt—already.” Her head drooped for a moment.
“I still don’t see why,” began Frayne.
But Anna broke in with sudden fierce pain: “Do you know that his aunt wept—wept this afternoon because he had sunk so low as to marry me!” She bit her lip until a little thin line of scarlet showed.
Frayne gave her a troubled glance. “Perhaps that was specially for your benefit,” he suggested.
“Oh no.” She shook her head wearily. “She didn’t even know I heard her. She and Katherine were talking about it, and—oh, I can’t—” She broke off and gripped her hands together.
“All right my dear.” Frayne put his hand warmly over her clasped ones, and the feel of that steadied her.
“They were discussing whether they could—buy me off,” she said, in a low, unsteady voice, “before I had time to saddle Tony with a—common—baby.”
“Oh, damnation!” exclaimed Frayne.
“You see, I’d been silly enough to suppose that if, later on Tony and I had children—Oh, what is the good?” She stopped suddenly, unable to bear the memory of her pitiful foolish plans that afternoon. Then she said slowly: “It was just a mistake—our marrying. And the only thing you can do about mistakes is to try to undo them.”
“But Tony does love you,” Frayne pointed out earnestly.
“Yes.” Anna looked straight at him.
“But then, in a way, I suppose your father loved your mother.”
Frayne’s eyebrows shot up. “I suppose so. Why?”
“Well, he didn’t marry her.”
“No, but he should have,” was the rather dry retort. “I’ve always had a good deal of respect for my mother and a good deal of contempt for my father, if you want to know.”
“Perhaps so,” said Anna slowly. “But that isn’t really the point, is it? A marriage between them would have been an absolute failure, wouldn’t it?”
There was a short silence. Then he said reluctantly: “Yes, I suppose it would.”
“You see,” she said, and again there was silence for a minute or two.
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