"I couldn"t help it. I"m sorry," said Grantley in colourless politeness.
"Well?"
"I really don"t understand your question, Blake. At least, you seem to mean it for a question."
"You do know what I mean. I"m not going to ask any favours of you. I only want to know what you intend to do?"
"About what?"
"About what you saw--and heard too, I suppose?"
Grantley rose from his chair in a leisurely fashion, and stood with his back to the fire. He was looking at young Blake with a slight smile; Blake grew redder under it.
"Oh, I can"t beat about the bush!" Blake went on impatiently. "You might, if you chose, tell Miss Selford what you know."
"Well?" said Grantley in his turn.
"And--and---- Oh, you see what might happen as well as I do. I--I meant to--to explain at my own time; but----"
"I shouldn"t let the time come in a hurry, Blake. It"ll be a very awkward quarter of an hour for both of you, and quite unnecessary."
"Unnecessary?"
There was a ring of hope in Blake"s voice; he liked to be told that any such confession was unnecessary, and would have welcomed such an a.s.surance even from Grantley"s hostile lips.
"Certainly; and equally unnecessary that I should tell Anna anything."
He paused a moment, and then went on. "In a different case I might think I had a different duty--though, being what you might call an interested party, I should consider carefully before I allowed myself to act on that view. But as matters stand, you yourself have made any action on my part superfluous."
"I have?"
"Oh yes! You so far injured the fame of the woman for whom you hadn"t afterwards the pluck to fight, that it"s not necessary for me to tell Selford that you were in love with her a few months before you made love to his daughter, nor that you tried to run away with her, but that in the end you funked the job. I needn"t tell him, because he knows--and his wife knows. You took care of that."
Young Blake said nothing, though he opened his lips as if to speak.
"And I needn"t tell Anna either. That"s unnecessary, for the same reason. She knows just as well as her father and mother know."
"She knows nothing, I tell you. She hasn"t an idea----"
"Did you see her face when she saw that I wasn"t Richards?"
"I tell you---- She was embarra.s.sed, of course---- But----"
"She knows quite well, Blake. Oh, not the details, but the main thing.
She knows that quite well. And she will have made her decision. There"s no duty inc.u.mbent on me."
"You"ll say nothing then?"
"I shall say nothing at all."
Grantley relapsed into silence--a most easy self-possessed silence. His eyes were on young Blake no more, but rested placidly on one of Selford"s best pictures on the opposite wall. Blake cleared his throat, and shifted uneasily from one foot to the other.
"Why do you stay?" asked Grantley mildly. "Wouldn"t it be better to continue your interview with Anna elsewhere? Mrs. Selford"s coming in here, you see."
Blake broke out:
"G.o.d knows, Imason, it"s difficult for me to say a word to you, but----"
Grantley raised his hand a little.
"It"s impossible," he said. "There can be no words between you and me about that. And what does it matter to you what I think? I shall hold my tongue. And you"ll feel sure I"ve no real cause of complaint--quite sure if only I hold my tongue. And I think Anna will hold her tongue. Then you"ll forget she knows, and go on posturing before her with entire satisfaction to yourself." He turned his eyes on him and laughed a little. "As long as you can humbug yourself or anybody else, or even get other people to let you think you"re humbugging them, you"re quite happy, you know."
Blake looked at him once and twice, but his tongue found no words. He turned and walked towards the door.
"Wait in the dining-room," said Grantley.
Blake went out without turning or seeming to hear. After a moment or two Anna"s step came down the stairs.
"Mamma"ll be down directly, Mr. Imason," she called as she reached the door. Then her eyes took in the room. "Mr.--Mr. Blake?" she asked, with a sudden quick rush of colour in her cheeks.
"I think you"ll find him in the dining-room," said Grantley gravely.
She understood--and she did not lack courage. She had enough for two--for herself and for Blake. She met Grantley"s look fair and square, drawing up her trim stylish figure to a stiff rigidity, and setting her lips in a resolute line. Grantley admired her att.i.tude and her open defiance of him. He smiled at her in a confidential mockery.
"Thanks, Mr. Imason, I"ll look for him. You"ll be all right till mamma comes?"
"Oh yes, I shall be all right, thanks, Anna."
He smiled still. Anna gave him another look of defiance.
"I intend to go my own way; I know what I"m about. I don"t care a pin what you think." The glance seemed to Grantley as eloquent as Lord Burghley"s nod. And no more than Lord Burghley did she spoil its effect by words. She gave it to Grantley full and square, then turned on her heel and swung jauntily out of the room.
Grantley"s smile vanished. He screwed up his lips as if he had tasted something rather sour.
CHAPTER XXIII
A THING OF FEAR
Grantley Imason had intended to go down to Milldean that same evening, but a summons from Tom Courtland reached him, couched in such terms that he could not hesitate to obey it. He sought Tom at his club the moment he received the message. Tom had been sent for to his own house in the morning, and had heard what had happened there. He had seen the wounded child and the other two terrified little creatures. Suzette Bligh gave him her account. The doctor told him that Sophy was no longer in danger, but that the matter was a grave one--a very serious shock and severe local injury; the child would recover with care and with quiet, but would always bear a mark of the wound, an ineffaceable scar. That was the conclusion, half good, half bad, reached after a night of doubt whether Sophy would not die from the violence and the shock.
"Did you see your wife?" Grantley asked.
"See her? I should kill her if I saw her," groaned Tom.
"But--but what"s being done?"