"Yes, it really is necessary," she answered frankly. "Father"s got much poorer, and everything"s about a hundred times as dear as it was before the War. But you mustn"t think that I mind. I like it in a way--and it won"t last for ever. Some of father"s investments are beginning to recover a little even now, and prices are coming down--"
They had now come back to the garden end of the Long Walk. "I must go now," she said. "Would you like me to send out one of the girls to entertain you?"
He shook his head. "No, I think I"ll stroll about the village for a bit."
They both felt as if the first milestone of their new relationship had been set deep in the earth, and both were glad and relieved that it was so.
Radmore walked about a bit, admiring Janet"s autumnal herbaceous borders, and then he remembered a door that he had known of old which led from the big kitchen garden into the road. If it was open he could step out without walking across the front of the house.
He turned into the walled garden, and walked quickly down a well-kept path past the sun-dial to the door. It was open. He walked through it, and then, with a rather guilty feeling--a feeling he did not care to a.n.a.lyse--he made his way round the lower half of the village till he reached the outside wall of The Trellis House.
There he hesitated for a few moments, but even while he was hesitating he knew that he would go in. Before he could turn the handle the door in the garden wall was opened by Enid Crofton herself. Radmore was surprised to see that she was dressed in a black dress, with the orthodox plain linen collar and cuffs of widowhood. It altered her strangely.
He was at once disappointed and a little relieved also, to find Jack Tosswill in the garden with her. But soon the three went indoors, and then, as had often been Mrs. Crofton"s experience with admirers in the past, each man tried to sit the other out.
At last the hostess had to say playfully:--"I"m afraid I must turn you out now, for I"m expecting my sister-in-law, Miss Crofton."
And then they both, together, took their departure; Radmore feeling that he had wasted an hour which might have been so very much more profitably spent in going to see some of his old friends among the cottagers. As to Jack Tosswill, he felt perplexed, and yes, considerably put out and annoyed. He had been a good deal taken aback to see how close was the acquaintance between Mrs. Crofton and G.o.dfrey Radmore.
CHAPTER XIII
There is nothing like a meal, especially a good meal, for inducing between two people an agreeable sense of intimacy. When Enid Crofton and her elderly sister-in-law pa.s.sed from the dining-room of The Trellis House into the gay-looking little sitting-room, with its old-fashioned, brightly coloured chintz furnishings, and quaint reproductions of eighteenth-century prints, the two ladies were far more at ease the one with the other than before luncheon.
Enid, in the plain black woollen gown, with its white linen collar and cuffs, which she had discarded almost at once after her husband"s funeral, felt that she was producing a pleasant impression. As they sat down, one on each side of the cheerful little wood fire, and began sipping the excellent coffee which the mistress of the house had already taught her very plain cook to make as it should be made, she suddenly exclaimed:--
"I do want to thank you again for the money you sent me when poor Cecil died! It was most awfully good of you, and very useful, too, for the insurance people did not pay me for nearly a month."
These words gave her visitor an opening for which she had waited during the last hour: "I"m glad my present was so opportune," said Miss Crofton in her precise, old-fashioned way. "As we have mentioned money, I should like to know, my dear, how you are situated? I was afraid from something Cecil told me last time he and I met that you would be very poorly left."
She stopped speaking, and there followed a long pause. Enid Crofton was instinctively glad that she was seated with her back to the window. She was afraid lest her face should betray her surprise and discomfiture at the question. And yet, what more natural than that her well-to-do, kind-hearted sister-in-law should wish to know how she, Enid, was now situated?
Cecil Crofton"s widow was not what ordinary people would have called a clever woman, but during the whole of her short life she had studied how to please, cajole, and yes--deceive, the men and women about her.
Unfortunately for her, Alice Crofton was a type of woman with whom she had never before been brought in contact; and something deep within her told her that she had better stick as close to the truth as was reasonably possible with this shrewd spinster who was, in some ways, so disconcertingly like what Enid Crofton"s late husband had been, in the days when he had been a forlorn girl-widow"s protecting friend and ardent admirer.
Yet, even so, she began with a lie: "When my mother died last year she left me a little money. I thought it wise to spend it in getting this house, and in settling down here." She said the words in a very low voice, and as Miss Crofton said nothing for a moment, she added timidly:--"I do hope that you think I did right? I know people think it wrong to use capital, but the War has changed everything, including money, and one simply can"t get along at all without paying out sums which before the War would have seemed dreadful."
"That"s very true," said Miss Crofton finally.
Enid, feeling on sure ground now, went on: "Why, I had to pay a premium of 200 for the lease of this little house. But I"m told I could get that again--even after living for a year or two in it."
Miss Crofton began looking about her with a doubtful air: "I suppose you mean to spend the winter here," she said musingly, "and then let the house each summer?"
"Yes," said Enid, "that is my idea."
As a matter of fact, she had never thought of doing such a thing, though she saw the point of it, now that it was put by her sister-in-law. She hoped, however, that long before next summer her future would be settled on most agreeable lines.
"Then I suppose the balance of what your mother left you forms a little addition to your pension, and to what poor Cecil was able to leave you?"
As the other hesitated, Miss Crofton went on, in a very friendly tone:--"I hope you won"t think it interfering that I should speak as I am doing? I expected to find you much less comfortably circ.u.mstanced, and I was going to propose that I should increase what I had feared would be a very small income, by two hundred a year."
Enid was as much touched by this unexpected generosity as it was in her to be, and it was with an accent of real sincerity that she exclaimed:--"Oh, Alice, you _are_ kind! Of course two hundred a year would be a _great_ help. Nothing remains of what my mother left me. But you must not think that I"m extravagant. I sold a lot of things, and that made it possible for me to take over The Trellis House exactly as you see it. But even during the very few days I have been here I have begun to find how expensive life can be, even in a village like this."
"All right," said Miss Crofton. She got up from her easy chair with a quick movement, for she was still a vigorous woman. "Then that"s settled!
I"ll give you a cheque for 100 to-day--and one every six months as long that is, as you"re a widow." Then she smiled a little satirically, for Enid had made a quick movement of recoil which Alice Crofton thought rather absurd.
"It"s early to think of such a thing, no doubt," she said coolly. "But still, I shall be very much surprised, Enid, if you do not re-make your life. I myself have a dear young friend, very little older than you are, who has been married three times. The War has altered the views and prejudices even of old-fashioned people."
"I want to ask you something," said Enid, "d"you think I ought to tell people that I have already been married twice?"
Miss Crofton told herself quickly that such questions are always put with a definite reason, and that she probably would not be called upon to pay her sister-in-law"s allowance for very long.
"I don"t think you are in the least bound to tell anyone such a fact about yourself, unless"--she hesitated,--"you were seriously thinking of marrying again. In such a case as that I think you would be well advised, Enid, to tell the man in question the fact before you become obliged to reveal it to him."
There was a pause, and then Miss Crofton abruptly changed the subject by saying something which considerably disturbed her young sister-in-law.
"I should be much obliged, my dear, if you would tell me a few details as to my poor brother"s death. Your letter contained no particulars at all,"
and as the other made no immediate answer, Miss Crofton went on:--"I know there was an inquest, for one of my friends in Florence saw a report of it in an English paper. Perhaps you would kindly let me see any newspaper account or cuttings you may have preserved?"
"I have kept _nothing_, Alice!" Enid Crofton uttered the words with a touch of almost angry excitement. Then, perhaps seeing that the other was very much surprised, she said more quietly:--"The inquest was a purely formal affair--the Coroner himself told me that there must always be an inquest when a person died suddenly."
"Oh, but surely the question was raised, and that very seriously, as to whether Cecil took what he did take on purpose, or by accident? I understood from my friend that the account of the inquest she saw in some popular Sunday paper was headed "An Ess.e.x Mystery.""
Enid felt as if all the blood in her body was flowing towards her face.
She congratulated herself that she was sitting with her back to the light. These remarks, these questions made her feel sick and faint. Yet she answered, composedly:--"Both the Coroner and the jury felt _sure_ he had taken it on purpose. Poor Cecil had never been like himself since the unlucky day, for us, that the War ended!" And then to Miss Crofton"s surprise and discomfiture Enid burst into tears.
The older lady got up and put her hand very kindly on the younger one"s shoulder:--"I"m sorry I said anything, my dear," she exclaimed; "I"m afraid you went through a much worse time than you let me know."
"I did! I did!" sobbed Enid. "I cannot tell you how terrible it was, Alice."
Then she made a determined effort over herself, ashamed of her own emotion. Still neither hostess nor guest was sorry when there came a knock at the door, followed a moment later by the entry into the room of a stranger who was announced by the maid as "Miss Pendarth."
Enid Crofton got up, and as she shook hands with the newcomer she tried to remember what it was that G.o.dfrey Radmore had said of her old-fashioned looking visitor. That she was a good friend but a bad enemy? Yes, that had been it. Then she remembered something else--the few kind words scribbled on a visiting card which had been left at The Trellis House a day or two ago.
She turned to her sister-in-law:--"I think Miss Pendarth knew poor Cecil years and years ago," she said softly.
"Are you--you must be Olivia Pendarth?" There was a touch of emotion in Alice Crofton"s level voice.
"Yes, I am Olivia Pendarth."
Enid was surprised--not over pleased by the revelation that these two knew one another.
"I suppose it"s a long time since you met?" she said pleasantly.
"Miss Crofton and I have never met before," said Miss Pendarth quietly.