The ghost of a smile lit her eyes.
"No, but----"
"Then please come."
There was a moment"s silence.
"Very well," said Christine. Her voice was quite apathetic. He knew that she was absolutely indifferent as to where she went or what she did. She looked so broken--just as if someone had wiped the sunshine out of her life with a ruthless hand.
She went away to dress, and Sangster stood at the window, frowning into the street.
"Infernal young fool!" he said savagely after a moment; but whether he referred to a youth who was just at that moment pa.s.sing, or to Jimmy Challoner, seemed uncertain.
CHAPTER XIII
CHRISTINE HEARS THE TRUTH
Sangster took Christine to a little out-of-the-way restaurant, where he knew there would not be many people.
He carefully avoided referring again to Jimmy; he talked of anything and everything under the sun to try and distract her attention. She had declared that she was not hungry; but, to his delight, she ate quite a good lunch. She liked the restaurant; she had never been in Bohemia before. She was very interested in an old table Sangster showed her, which was carved all over with the signatures of well-known patrons of the house. A little flush crept into her pale cheeks; presently she was smiling.
Sangster was cheered; he told himself that she only needed understanding. He believed that if Jimmy chose, he could convince her that everything was going to be all right in the future; he believed that with a little tact and patience Jimmy could entirely regain her lost confidence. But patience and Jimmy seemed somehow irreconcilable; Jimmy was too young--too selfish. He sighed involuntarily as he looked at Christine.
When they had left the restaurant again, and were walking towards the park, he deliberately began to talk about Jimmy.
"I suppose Jimmy never told you how he and I first met, did he?" he asked.
"No." Her sensitive little face flushed; she looked up at him eagerly.
"It isn"t a bit romantic really," he said. "At least, not from my point of view; but I dare say you would be interested, because it shows what a fine chap Jimmy really is." He took it for granted that she was listening. He went on: "It was some years ago now, of course--five years, I think; and I was broke--broke to the wide, if you know what that means!" He glanced down at her smilingly. "I"m by way of being a struggling journalist, you know," he explained. "More of the struggling than the journalist. I"m not a bit of good at the job, to be quite candid; but it"s a life I like--and lately I"ve managed to sc.r.a.pe along quite decently. Anyhow, at the time I met Jimmy I was down and out . . . Fleet Street would have none of me, and I even had to p.a.w.n my watch."
"Oh!" said Christine with soft sympathy.
Sangster laughed.
"That"s nothing; it"s been p.a.w.ned fifty times since it first came into my possession, I should think. Don"t think I"m asking for sympathy--I"m not. It"s the sort of life that suits me, and I wouldn"t change it for another--even if I had the chance. But the night I ran across Jimmy I was fairly up against it. I hadn"t had a square meal for a week, and I was ill to add to the trouble. Jimmy was coming along Pall Mall in evening-dress. He was smoking a cigar that smelt good, and I wondered as he pa.s.sed me if I dared go up and ask him for a shilling."
"Oh, Mr. Sangster!" He looked down hearing the distress in her voice.
"Don"t look so sorry!" he said very gently. "It"s all in a day"s march for me. I"ve had my good times, and I"ve had my bad; and when I come to write the story of my life--when I"m a bloated millionaire, that is!" he added in laughing parenthesis--"it will make fine reading to know that I was once so hard up that I cadged a shilling off a swell in evening-dress!"
But Christine did not laugh; her eyes were almost tragic as she looked up wonderingly at Sangster"s honest face.
"And--and did you ask him?" she questioned.
"Did I not!" said Sangster heartily. "I went up to him--Jimmy stopped dead, I believe he thought I was going to pinch his watch--and I said, "Will you be a sport and lend me a bob?" Not a bit romantic, you see!"
Christine caught her breath.
"And did he--did he?" she asked eagerly.
Sangster laughed reminiscently.
"You"ll never guess what he said. He asked no questions, he took the cigar from his lips and looked at me, and he said, "I haven"t got a bob in the world till my brother, the Great Horatio, sends my monthly allowance along; but if you"ll come as far as the next street, I know a chap I can borrow a sovereign from." Wasn"t that just Jimmy all over?"
Christine was laughing, too, now.
"Oh, I can just hear him saying it! I can just see him!" she cried.
"And then what did you do?"
"Well, we went along--to this pal of Jimmy"s, and Jimmy borrowed a fiver. He gave me three pounds, and took me along to have a dinner.
And--well, we"ve been pals ever since. A bit of luck for me, wasn"t it?"
"I was thinking," said little Christine very earnestly, "that it was a bit of luck for Jimmy."
Sangster grew furiously red. For a moment he could think of nothing to say; he had only told the story in order to soften her towards Jimmy, and in a measure he had succeeded.
Christine walked beside him without speaking for some time; her brown eyes were very thoughtful.
Sangster talked no more of Jimmy; he was too tactful to overdo things.
Jimmy was not mentioned between them again till he took her back to the hotel. Then:
"I don"t know how to thank you for being so kind to me," she said earnestly. Her brown eyes were lifted confidingly to his face. "But I"ve been happier this afternoon than--than I"ve ever been since my mother died."
Sangster gripped her hand hard for a moment.
"And you will be happy--always--if you"re just a little patient," he said, rather huskily. "Jimmy"s a spoilt boy, and--and--it"s the women who have to show all of us--eh? It"s the women who are our guardian angels; remember that!"
He hated himself for having had to blame her, even mildly, when the fault was so utterly and entirely Jimmy"s. It seemed a monstrous thing that Christine should have to teach Jimmy unselfishness; he hoped he had not said too much.
But Christine was really much happier, had he known it. She went up to her room, and changed her frock for one of the few simple ones she had had new when she was married. She did her hair in a way she thought Jimmy would like; she sent one of the servants out for flowers to brighten the little sitting-room; she timidly ordered what she thought would be an extra nice dinner to please him. The waiter looked at her questioningly.
"For--for two, madam?" he asked hesitatingly.
"Yes, please. Mr. Challoner and I will dine up here this evening."
As a rule, Jimmy dined downstairs alone, and Christine had something sent up to her. She was vaguely beginning to realise now how foolish she had been. The little time she had spent with Sangster had been like the opening of a door in her poor little heart, letting in fresh air and common sense. After all, how could she hope to win Jimmy by tears and recriminations? She had heard the doctrine of "forgive and forget" preached so frequently; surely this was the moment in which to apply it to herself and him.
Her heart beat a little fast at the thought. She spoke again to the waiter as he turned to leave the room.
"And--and will you find out what wine Mr. Challoner has with his dinner, as a rule; and--and serve the same this evening."
The man hesitated, then:
"Mr. Challoner told me he should not be dining in this evening, madam,"
he said reluctantly. "He came in about three o"clock, and went out again; I think there was a message for him. He told me to tell you if you came in." He averted his eyes from Christine"s blanching face as he spoke. "I am sure that is what Mr. Challoner said, madam," he repeated awkwardly.