"Come home and bring the lady. Am fattening the calf.--Your affectionate Father."
"Jerry, I should adore your father," said Diana, as she gave him back the letter. "He must he a perfect gem amongst parents."
"He"s not a bad old chap," acknowledged Jerry, as he replaced the paternal invitation in his pocket-book. "But you see the difficulty? I was going to ask Errington to give me a few days" leave, and I don"t like to bother him now that he has all this worry about Miss de Gervais on his hands."
Diana flushed hotly at Jerry"s tacit acceptance of the fact that Adrienne"s affairs were naturally of so much moment to her husband. It was another pin-p.r.i.c.k in the wound that had been festering for so long.
She ignored it, however, and answered quietly:--
"Yes, I see. Perhaps you had better leave it for a few days. What about Pobs? He"ll have to be consulted in the matter, won"t he?"
"I told him, long ago, that I wanted Joan. Before"--with a grin--"I ever summoned up pluck to tell Joan herself! He was a brick about it, but he thought I ought to make it up with the governor before Joan and I were formally engaged. So I did--and I"m jolly glad of it. And now I want to go down to Crailing, and fetch Joan, and take her with me to Abbotsleigh.
So I should want at least a week off."
"Well, wait till Max comes back," advised Diana, "We shall know more about the matter then. And--and--Jerry!" She stretched out her hand, which immediately disappeared within Jerry"s big, boyish fist. "Good luck, old boy!"
Max returned at about ten o"clock, and Diana proceeded to offer polite inquiries about Miss de Gervais" welfare. She wondered if he would remember how near they had been to each other just for an instant before the news of the attempt upon Adrienne"s life had reached them.
But apparently he had forgotten all about it. His thoughts were entirely concerned with Adrienne, and he was unusually grave and preoccupied.
He ordered a servant to bring him some sandwiches and a gla.s.s of wine, and when he and Diana were once more alone, be announced abruptly:--
"I shall have to leave home for a few days."
"Leave home?" echoed Diana.
"Yes. Adrienne must go out of town, and I"m going to run down to some little country place and find rooms for her and Mrs. Adams."
"Find rooms?" Diana stared at him amazedly. "But surely--won"t they go to Red Gables?"
Max shook his head.
"No. It wouldn"t be safe after this--this affair. The same brute might try to get her again. You see, it"s quite well known that she has a house at Crailing."
"Who is it that is such an enemy of hers?"
Max hesitated a moment.
"It might very well be some former actor, some poor devil of a fellow down on his luck, who has brooded over his fancied wrongs till he was half-mad," he said, at length.
Diana"s eyes flashed. So that item of news intended for the morning papers was also to be handed out for home consumption!
"What steps are you taking to trace the man?"
Again Max paused before replying. To Diana, his hesitation strengthened her conviction that he was, as usual, withholding something from her.
"Well?" she repeated. "What steps are you taking?"
"None," he answered at last reluctantly. "Adrienne doesn"t wish any fuss made over the matter."
And yet, Diana reflected, both her husband and Miss de Gervais knew quite well who the a.s.sailant was! "The taller of the two," Adrienne had said through the telephone. Why, then, with that clue in her hands, did she refuse to prosecute?
Suddenly, into Diana"s mind flashed an answer to the question--to the mult.i.tude of questions which had perplexed, her for so long. She felt as a traveller may who has been journeying along an unknown way in the dark, hurt and bruised by stones and pitfalls he could not see, when suddenly a light shines out, revealing all the dangers of the path.
The explanation of all those perplexities and suspicions of the past was so simple, so obvious, that she marvelled why it had never occurred to her before. Adrienne de Gervais was neither more or less than an adventuress--one of the vampire type of woman who preys upon mankind, drawing them into her net by her beauty and charm, even as she had drawn Max himself! This, this supplied the key to the whole matter--all that had gone before, and all that was now making such a mockery of her married life.
And the "poor devil of a fellow" who had attempted Adrienne"s life had probably figured largely in her past, one of her dupes, and now, understanding at last what kind of woman it was for whom he had very likely sacrificed all that made existence worth while, he was obsessed with a crazy desire for vengeance--vengeance at any price. And Adrienne, of course, in her extremity, had turned to her latest captive, Max himself, for protection!
Oh! it was all quite clear now! The scattered pieces of the puzzle were fitting together and making a definite picture.
Stray remarks of Olga Lermontof"s came back to her--those little pointed arrows wherewith the Russian had skilfully found out the joints in her armour--"Miss de Gervais is not quite what she seems." And again, "I"m perfectly sure Adrienne de Gervais" past is a closed book to you." Proof positive that Olga had known all along what Diana had only just this moment perceived to be the truth.
Diana"s small hands clenched themselves until the nails dug into the soft palms, as she remembered how those same hands had been held out in friendship to this very adventuress--to the woman who had wrecked her happiness, and for whom Max was ready at any time to set her and her wishes upon one side! What a blind, trusting fool she had been! Well, that was all ended now; she knew where she stood. Never again would Max or Adrienne be able to deceive her. The scales had at last fallen from her eyes.
"I"m sorry, Diana"--Max"s cool, quiet tones broke in on the torment of her thoughts. "I"m sorry, but I shall probably have to be away several days."
"Have you forgotten we"re giving a big reception here next Wednesday?"
"Wednesday, is it? And to-day is Sat.u.r.day. I shall find rooms somewhere to-morrow, and take Adrienne and Mrs. Adams down to them the next day. . . No, I can"t possibly be back for Wednesday."
"But you must!"--impetuously.
"It"s impossible. I shall stay with Adrienne and Mrs. Adams until I"m quite sure that the place is safe for them--that that fellow hasn"t traced them and isn"t lurking about in the neighbourhood. You mustn"t expect me back before Sat.u.r.day at the earliest. You and Jerry can manage the reception. I hate those big crowds, as you know."
For a moment Diana sat in stony silence. So he intended to leave her to entertain half London--that half of London that mattered and would talk about it--while he spent a pleasant week philandering down in the country with Adrienne de Gervais, under the aegis of Mrs. Adams" chaperonage!
Very slowly Diana rose to her feet. Her small face was white and set, her little pointed chin thrust out, and her grey eyes were almost black with the intense anger that gripped her.
"Do you mean this?" she asked collectedly.
"Why, of course. Don"t you see that I must, Diana? I can"t let Adrienne run a risk like that."
"But you can subject your wife to an insult like that without thinking twice about it!"--contemptuously. "It hasn"t occurred to you, I suppose, what people will say when they find that I have been left entirely alone to entertain our friends, while my husband pa.s.ses a pleasant week in the country with Miss de Gervais, and her--chaperon? It"s an insult to our guests as well as to me. But I quite understand. I, and my friends, simply _don"t count_ when Adrienne de Gervais wants you."
"I can"t help it," he answered stubbornly, her scorn moving him less than the waves that break in a shower of foam at the foot of a cliff. "You knew you would have to trust me."
"_Trust you_?" cried Diana, shaken out of her composure. "Yes! But I never promised to stand trustingly by while you put another woman in my place. This is the end, Max. I"ve had enough."
A sudden look of apprehension dawned in his eyes.
"What do you mean?" he asked sharply.
"What do I mean?"--bleakly. "Oh, nothing. I never do mean anything, do I? . . . Well, good-bye. I expect you"ll have left the house before I come down to-morrow morning. I hope . . . you"ll enjoy your visit to the country."
She waited a moment, as though expecting some reply; then, as he neither stirred nor spoke, she went quickly out of the room, closing the door behind her.