The Monk of Hambleton Part 23

She jumped beneath the lash of that crisp question.

"I don't know--_yet_." Abruptly, she turned on her heel and left the room.

"That's that!" Simon swung back to his desk, a grim smile on his lips.

"It always boils down to the same thing--they don't know what they're going to do about it. Let 'em rant all they please, in the end what I say _goes_!"

He resumed his correspondence, refreshed.

The only aftermath of this latest squall instantly apparent was the message Bates gave him as he announced dinner. Miss Lucy would not be down. She was indisposed.

"Another word for a bad disposition," Simon informed his sister-in-law, as they seated themselves at a table laid for two, indifferent to the fact that he was criticizing his wife within the hearing of a servant.

"She'll have recovered by morning."

"We can't all have your sunny nature, Simon."

"Humph. You've heard about the roekus with Copley, I suppose?"

"Rumors have reached me." Miss Ocky peppered her soup composedly.

"Need we discuss it now?"

"No. There's always the weather, if you prefer that."

The topic did not seem to appeal to her. They did not talk about the weather, nor anything else. A silence that would have been perfect but for the sound of a subdued champing from the head of the table was broken only once during the progress of the meal. Occupied though he was with his food, Varr gradually became conscious of a steady scrutiny that first puzzled, then irritated him. He glared at her angrily.

"What do you keep looking at me like that for?" he demanded.

"Interest, Simon. Pure, unadulterated interest."

"Well, stop it! I don't like it!"

For a wonder, she acceded to his insistence without a word. It cost her no effort to avoid looking at him for the remainder of the time at the table, after which they rose in silence and parted. Simon went inevitably to his study, Miss Ocky in sisterly fas.h.i.+on to Lucy's room to inquire the cause of her _malaise_.

Two hours pa.s.sed before she came down again. Two somewhat trying hours, to judge from the expression on her face, which wore a look as grim as any ever sported by Medusa. Her eyes were cold and hard as she marched promptly to the closed study door and rapped upon it--a gesture of icy politeness.

"Come in! Humph. So it's you, Ocky! Dropped in to take another good look at me?"

"No--to have a rather serious talk with you, Simon." From the effortless way in which she drew a heavy armchair into the position she desired, a shrewd observer might have gleaned a hint of the muscular strength that was her heritage from many a camp and trail. "Hope you don't mind."

"Quite the contrary. By a serious talk I presume you mean a row.

Well--I've gotten so I thrive on 'em!"

"Yes. I pity you just enough, Simon, to wish you weren't so fond of them." Miss Ocky dropped into her chair and lighted a cigarette with pensive deliberation. "I don't know that I can offer you a real row, my idea was to hand you a few straight-from-the-shoulder remarks and then a couple of ultimatums. As for the brutal badinage in which you delight, I'm in no mood for it this evening."

"Let's have your remarks. I guess I can stand 'em."

"First, then--I suppose you know that you have played the cat-and-banjo with Lucy's happiness for the last twenty-odd years?"

"Don't a.s.sume I know anything. Just tell me!"

"Consider yourself told that, to start with. I was literally shocked when I came back and saw the change in Lucy. She's the shadow of her old self, nothing more. It is you who are responsible for that."

"Humph!"

"Now you have started on Copley--made a good start, too, if the boy's manner is any criterion. Possibly I may be doing him an injustice. It might have been consideration for his mother rather than fear of you that has restrained him until now. Anyway, I'm glad he has summoned the courage to defy you at last."

"Indeed. May I ask you one question? How long has it been considered good form for a woman to enter a man's house and interfere with his domestic relations. Eh?"

"It was my father's house first, then Lucy's. I am more at home here this minute than you could ever be."

"Try and prove it in a law-court!"

"Perhaps I shall--some day." She paused to scrutinize her polished finger-nails, brushed a speck from one of them, raised her eyes to his and added dryly, "After all, Simon, you know you only got in here by a trick."

"A _trick_! Now--what do you mean by _that_?"

"Memory gone _phut_, Simon? Perhaps I can refresh it. While I was watching the fire last night a man came up to me and called me by name.

It was--Leslie Sherwood."

"_Ah!_" The exclamation was wrung from him through stiff lips. The color drained from his face as he leaned forward tensely, one hand gripping an arm of his chair like a vise. "G-go on!"

"That shot went home, did it?" asked Miss Ocky coolly, watching the effect of her words. "I've several more in the locker! We had quite a long talk together and he told me many things I didn't know.

Interesting things--very!"

"_What?_" Simon's voice was hoa.r.s.e. "He didn't tell you--he didn't dare tell you--" He stopped, a deadly fear in his eyes.

"Yes. He told me why he quarreled with his father. Why he left home.

Why he has come back now, freed by his father's death. Shall I go on, Simon?"

He sank back in his chair, shaken in all his being. He could not speak until he moistened his lips with his tongue.

"Have you--told Lucy?"

"No. That is Leslie's right, I should say. No doubt he will use it.

As far as I can see, there is only one way by which you can make a decent exit from the mess you're in."

"If--if you're suggesting--suicide--forget it!"

"Suicide? No! Why should I waste my breath proposing an act that requires courage? What I meant was--divorce."

"Divorce!"

"It needn't cost you a penny. Make it easy for her to get--your lawyers will arrange that. You'll have the tannery--and welcome! All you need do is--go! Go from this house!"

"Divorce! Stand aside--hat in hand--bow another man into my place--!"

The rage of a cornered animal swept aside his fear. "I'll see you all in--"

"Don't shout."

"So _that_ is why Sherwood has come back!" He gritted his words through set teeth. "He thinks he is going to make trouble for me, eh?