With all this on his mind Mr. Chalk made but a poor breakfast, and his appet.i.te was not improved by his wife"s enthusiastic remarks concerning the voyage. Breakfast over, she dispatched a note to Mrs. Stobell by the housemaid, with instructions to wait for a reply. Altogether six notes pa.s.sed during the morning, and Mr. Chalk, who hazarded a fair notion as to their contents, became correspondingly gloomy.
"We"re to go up there at five," said his wife, after reading the last note. "Mr. Stobell will be at tea at that time, and we"re to drop in as though by accident."
"What for?" inquired Mr. Chalk, affecting surprise. "Go up where?"
"To talk to Mr. Stobell," said his wife, grimly. "Fancy, poor Mrs.
Stobell says that she is sure he won"t let her come. I wish he was my husband, that"s all."
Mr. Chalk muttered something about "doing a little gardening."
"You can do that another time," said Mrs. Chalk, coldly. "I"ve noticed you"ve been very fond of gardening lately."
The allusion was too indirect to contest, but Mr. Chalk reddened despite himself, and his wife, after regarding his confusion with a questioning eye, left him to his own devices and his conscience.
Mr. Stobell and his wife had just sat down to tea when they arrived, and Mrs. Stobell, rising from behind a huge tea-pot, gave a little cry of surprise as her friend entered the room, and kissed her affectionately.
"Well, who would have thought of seeing you?" she cried. "Sit down."
Mrs. Chalk sat down at the large table opposite Mr. Stobell; Mr. Chalk, without glancing in his wife"s direction, seated himself by that gentleman"s side.
"Well, weren"t you surprised?" inquired Mrs. Chalk, loudly, as her hostess pa.s.sed her a cup of tea.
"Surprised?" said Mrs. Stobell, curiously.
"Why, hasn"t Mr. Stobell told you?" exclaimed Mrs. Chalk.
"Told me?" repeated Mrs. Stobell, glancing indignantly at the wide-open eyes of Mr. Chalk. "Told me what?"
It was now Mrs. Chalk"s turn to appear surprised, and she did it so well that Mr. Chalk choked in his tea-cup. "About the yachting trip," she said, with a glance at her husband that made his choking take on a ventriloquial effect of distance.
"He-he didn"t say anything to me about it," said Mrs. Stobell, timidly.
She glanced at her husband, but Mr. Stobell, taking an enormous bite out of a slice of bread and b.u.t.ter, made no sign.
"It"ll do you a world of good," said Mrs. Chalk, affectionately. "It"ll put a little colour in your cheeks."
Mrs. Stobell flushed. She was a faded little woman; faded eyes, faded hair, faded cheeks. It was even whispered that her love for Mr. Stobell was beginning to fade.
"And I don"t suppose you"ll mind the seasickness after you get used to it," said the considerate Mr. Chalk, "and the storms, and the cyclones, and fogs, and collisions, and all that sort of thing."
"If you can stand it, she can," said his wife, angrily.
"But I don"t understand," said Mrs. Stobell, appealingly. "What yachting trip?"
Mrs. Chalk began to explain; Mr. Stobell helped himself to another slice, and, except for a single glance under his heavy brows at Mr.
Chalk, appeared to be oblivious of his surroundings.
"It sounds very nice," said Mrs. Stobell, after her friend had finished her explanation. "Perhaps it might do me good. I have tried a great many things."
"Mr. Stobell ought to have taken you for a voyage long before," said Mrs. Chalk, with conviction. "Still, better late than never."
"The only thing is," said Mr. Chalk, speaking with an air of great benevolence, "that if the sea didn"t suit Mrs. Stobell, she would be unable to get away from it. And, of course, it might upset her very much."
Mr. Stobell wiped some crumbs from his moustache and looked up.
"No, it won"t," he said, briefly.
"Is she a good sailor?" queried Mr. Chalk, somewhat astonished at such a remark from that quarter.
"Don"t know," said Mr. Stobell, pa.s.sing his cup up. "But this trip won"t upset her-she ain"t going."
Mrs. Chalk exclaimed loudly and exchanged glances of consternation with Mrs. Stobell; Mr. Stobell, having explained the position, took some more bread and b.u.t.ter and munched placidly.
"Don"t you think it would do her good?" said Mrs. Chalk, at last.
"Might," said Mr. Stobell, slowly, "and then, again, it mightn"t."
"But there"s no harm in trying," persisted Mrs. Chalk.
Mr. Stobell made no reply. Having reached his fifth slice he was now encouraging his appet.i.te with apricot jam.
"And it"s so cheap," continued Mrs. Chalk.
"That"s the way I look at it. If she shuts up the house and gets rid of the servants, same as I am going to do, it will save a lot of money."
She glanced at Mr. Stobell, whose slowly working jaws and knitted brows appeared to indicate deep thought, and then gave a slight triumphant nod at his wife.
"Servants are so expensive," she murmured. "Really, I shouldn"t be surprised if we saved money on the whole affair. And then think of her health. She has never quite recovered from that attack of bronchitis.
She has never looked the same woman since. Think of your feelings if anything happened to her. Nothing would bring her back to you if once she went."
"Went where?" inquired Mr. Stobell, who was not attending very much.
"If she died, I mean," said Mrs. Chalk, shortly.
"We"ve all got to die some day," said the philosophic Mr. Stobell.
"She"s forty-six."
Mrs. Stobell interposed. "Not till September, Robert," she said, almost firmly.
"It wouldn"t be nice to be buried at sea," remarked Mr. Chalk, contributing his mite to the discussion. "Of course, it"s very impressive; but to be left down there all alone while the ship sails on must be very hard."
Mrs. Stobell"s eyes began to get large. "I"m feeling quite well," she gasped.
"Yes, dear," said Mrs. Chalk, with a threatening glance at her husband.
"Of course, we know that. But a voyage would do you good. You can"t deny that."
Mrs. Stobell, fumbling for her handkerchief, said in a tremulous voice that she had no wish to deny it. Mr. Stobell, appealed to by the energetic Mrs. Chalk, admitted at once that it might do his wife good, but that it wouldn"t him.
"We"re going to be three jolly bachelors," he declared, and, first nudging Mr. Chalk to attract his attention, deliberately winked at him.