The Beggar Man Part 30

Peg, coming into the hall, noticed her pallor.

"What's the matter, little 'un?" she asked in concern, but Faith would not answer. She went upstairs to her room, and after a moment Peg followed.

"What's up?" she asked again. "Anything I can do?"

There was a momentary silence, then Faith said, in a queer, cold little voice:

"Yes. Come in; I want to speak to you."

Peg obeyed. There was an amused smile hovering round the corners of her mouth. "I'm all attention," she said. "Fire away."

Faith's hands were trembling and she clasped them together to hide the humiliating fact.

"I've been thinking," she said, with an effort. "I've been thinking that--that though you've been very kind, I...." She could not go on.

Peg looked up, a gleam of fire in her eyes. She knew without further words what it was that Faith was trying to tell her.

"You mean you want me to clear out?" she said bluntly.

Faith wavered for a moment; then she thought of the way in which Forrester had refused her request five minutes ago, though yesterday he had been so easily persuaded by Peg. "You need not put it like that,"

she said hoa.r.s.ely, "but ... yes, that is what I mean."

The crimson blood swept Peg's face and died away again, leaving her as white as marble. It was the last thing of which she had ever dreamed that this child--this baby--would ever turn her out of the house!

Her loyal heart felt as if it must burst with shame and pain, but she shrugged her shoulders with a brave display of indifference.

"Well, I'll see what Mr. Forrester says," she answered coolly. "If he wants me to go--well.... He's master of the house, isn't he? I came here because he asked me to, and so I guess I'll take my marching orders from him."

CHAPTER XII

But in spite of her defiance, Peg was desperately unhappy. Her cheeks burned as she walked out of the room, her head high in the air.

She was torn between her love for Forrester and her desire to secure his happiness and her loyalty to her friend. She knew quite well what Faith must be thinking, and while she was rejoiced that at last she had succeeded in rousing her jealousy, she was bitterly ashamed of the part she had set herself to play.

She went up to her gaudy room and shut the door, standing for a moment leaning against it, her hands in her favourite position, on her hips.

What was she to do now? Would Forrester refuse to have her so summarily turned out of his house? She did not see how he could very well go against his wife's wishes.

For the first time the gaudiness of the room irritated her. It seemed a vivid reminder of the vast difference that lay between her life and Faith's. She caught up one of the peac.o.c.k green cus.h.i.+ons from an armchair and flung it at a particularly offensive looking bird in the wall-paper.

The violent action made her feel better. She opened the window wide and cooled her hot cheeks with the September breeze.

It was still quite early in the morning, and she wondered how she could occupy her time till Forrester came home. That Faith would not speak to her she was sure. She was not at all surprised to hear presently from one of the maids that Faith had gone out with Digby and was not returning to lunch.

Peg made a little grimace. This was throwing down the glove with a vengeance, but she only laughed as she turned away.

"I shan't be in either," she said, though she had no more idea than the dead what she meant to do. But she put on her hat and coat and went out.

It was a lovely morning, sunny and with just a touch of crispness in the air, as if during the night winter had pa.s.sed that way and breathed on the world.

Peg wandered round the West End staring vacantly into shop windows, but her thoughts were far away. It was only when, towards one o'clock, she began to feel hungry the sudden idea came to her that she would go home.

She had only visited her own people twice since she left them at Forrester's request. There was a tingling of excitement in her veins as she climbed on to a city omnibus.

What would they say to her, she wondered. Not that she cared.

Peg had never got on with her mother, who had married again, her second husband being a man named Johnson, employed at Heeler's factory.

There were two small step-brothers, rough, red-haired little boys, too like their father for Peg to care about them. But nevertheless the house in the mean street was the only home she had known, and there was a faintly pleasurable warmth in her heart as she climbed off the bus at the corner of the street and walked the remaining few yards.

The street looked more squalid than usual to-day, she thought, not realizing that the change lay in herself. The door of the house was open, and down the narrow pa.s.sage she could hear her mother's scolding voice and the sound of a well-administered box on the ears, followed by a prolonged howl from one of the boys.

Peg s.h.i.+vered as she walked down the pa.s.sage and pushed open the kitchen door. Had she ever really been happy and contented to live in such surroundings? And fear went through her heart as she realized that before long she might have to return to them again.

The kitchen seemed full of people, though at first she could only distinguish her mother through the mist of steam that was rising from a wash-tub.

"Hullo!" Peg said laconically. She looked round for a chair, but they were all occupied, so she leaned against the door, hands on hips.

The red-haired boy who had had his ears boxed stopped howling to stare at her. Mrs. Johnson deserted the wash-tub and came forward, wiping soapy arms on a not over-clean ap.r.o.n.

"Well, who'd have thought of seeing you?" she said blankly.

Peg nodded carelessly to her stepfather, who had risen awkwardly to offer her a chair.

"Thanks, no--I'll stand; I only looked in for a minute." Then her face changed a little as she recognized a second man who had been lolling in the background against a crowded dresser.

"Hullo, Ben!" she said, and the colour deepened in her cheeks.

She and Ben Travers had once been very good friends. There had been a time when she had seriously contemplated taking him on trial as a sweetheart, but her friends.h.i.+p with Faith had put an end to it all, though Ben had never forgiven her, and Peg knew it well enough.

The last time she had seen him had been the day when Forrester came to admit his defeat and to ask her to live at his flat, and she realized with a faint sense of discomfort that she and he had grown many miles apart since then.

But he only nodded and said, "Hullo, Peg," quite unconcernedly.

There was an awkward silence, broken by Peg's mother.

"Well, you look a fine enough lady now," she said, a shade of envy in her voice. "How long's it going to last?"

"As long as I like," said Peg coolly. She was not going to tell them that already the end of her happiness was in sight.

Mrs. Johnson looked at her daughter uncomfortably.

"You'd best come in the parlour," she said. "You'll get all messed up if you stay here."

But Peg declined to move. She looked at Ben again.