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That at least was the impression of Margery, a kitchen-maid, whom inquiry showed to have been the source of the first person plural in the narrative of Tom Kettering, the young groom, who had come upon the dog crouched against this door; and, judging him to be in danger in the open Park, had brought him home to the stables for security. How had the collie behaved when brought up to the stable?
I should like to have stayed; but but I have another engagement. I am very sorry." The words were lame enough; nobody believed their excuse. Kettering rose to take his leave. He shook hands with Gladys and Jimmy. He turned to Christine. "I will come and see you off," she said. She followed him into the hall, deliberately closing the door of the drawing-room behind her.
Quarrels, indeed, seemed to be evolved from incredible beginnings, and the evenings bristled with them. Mrs. Kettering was easily drawn into these disagreements and took a leading part in no few of them. Simon and Mark, however, would remain impassive, the first reading his paper and uttering now and again a facetious, mild protest, the second smoking his eternal pipe in unyielding taciturnity.
"You've no need to tell me that," said Mr. Kettering, "I never for a moment doubted you. You know, sir," he added, "you're quite welcome to make my home yours so long as it suits your convenience." Morgan replied that, as Kettering was probably aware, he had no money, but that he was anxious to earn some, however little. Could he not do so by learning to set up type?
There was a little silence. "I see," said Kettering. Only ten days married, and not able to come down. Jimmy had never done an hour's work in his life, so far as Kettering could remember. He knew quite well that he was living on an allowance from his brother; it seemed a curious sort of situation altogether. He took his tea from Christine's hands.
Her sharp eyes had seen from the very first the way things were going with regard to Kettering, and she was afraid of the responsibility. If anything happened if Christine chose to doubly wreck her life afterwards they might all blame her; she knew that. She was fond of Christine, too. And though she had never approved of Jimmy, she would have done a great deal to see them happy together.
More than once in her ride to Chorlton it needed all her courage to crush the impulse to tell Tom Kettering to turn the mare round and drive back to the Towers. It would have been so easy to forge some excuse to save her face, and postpone the embarrassing hour till to-morrow. But to what end?
Kettering, with whom she stayed some time, indulged in expensive amusements, and though she would have listened with good-humor to a plea of poverty, Sylvia declined to make it. She would not have Bland suspect the state of her affairs, and while he remained in the house she took her part in all that went on, which included card-playing for high stakes.
"I thought I should never escape from Kettering; but he's safe for a while, talking guns in the smoking-room," he said. Sylvia thought that they would be safe from interruption for a few minutes, which would serve her purpose. "So you have managed to get here," she said. "Had you any doubt of my succeeding?" Bland asked reproachfully.
Jimmy had never once been mentioned between herself and this man since that first afternoon. Save for the fact that Kettering called her "Mrs. Challoner," Christine might have been unmarried. "Gladys will think we have run away," she told him presently with a little laugh. "I told her we should be only half an hour." "Have we been longer?" he asked surprised. Christine looked at her watch.
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