This Man's Wife Part 74

For, instigated by the latter, Thickens had come up and followed them to Portsmouth.

"It would have about killed her, Mrs Hallam," he said in confidence, as he sat chatting with her aside in the hotel room on the eve of their sailing. "But now a bit of business. I've been trying ever since I came to get a few words with you alone, only Sir Gordon and Mr Bayle were always in the way."

"Business, Mr Thickens?"

"Yes, look here! I'm an actuary, you see, and money adviser, and that sort of thing. Now you are going out there on a long voyage, and you ought to be prepared for any little emergencies that may occur in a land that I find is not so barbarous as I thought, for I see they have a regular banking establishment there, and business regularly carried on in paper and bullion."

Mrs Hallam looked at him wonderingly.

"Ah, I see you don't understand me, so to be short," he continued, "fact is I talked it over with, madam, and we settled it between us."

"Settled what?" said Mrs Hallam, wonderingly.

"Well, the fact is, we've two hundred pounds fallen in. Been out on a good mortgage at five per cent, and just now I can't place it anywhere at more than four, and that won't do, you know, will it?"

"Of course it would not be so advantageous."

"No, to be sure not, so we thought we'd ask you to take it at five.

Money's valuable out there. You could easily send us the dividend once a-year--ten pounds, you know, by credit note, and it would be useful to you, and doing your old friends a good turn. I hate to see money lying idle."

Mrs Hallam glanced across the room to see that little Mrs Thickens was watching them anxiously, and she felt the tears rise in her eyes as she darted a grateful look back, before turning to dry, drab-looking Thickens, who now and then put his hand up to his ear, as if expecting to find a pen there.

"It is very good and very generous of you," she said huskily, "and I can never be grateful enough for all this kindness. Believe me, I shall never forget it."

"That's right. I shall have it all arranged, so that you can draw at the Colonial Bank."

"No, no," cried Mrs Hallam with energy, "it is impossible. Besides, I have a sufficiency for our wants, ample for the present--the remains of my little property. Mr Bayle has managed it so well for me; my furniture brought in a nice little sum, and--"

"Your what?" said Thickens in a puzzled tone.

"My property. You remember what I had when--"

"When you were married? Why, my dear madam, you don't think any of that was left?"

"Mr Thickens!"

"Ah, I see," he cried with a good-humoured smile, for delicacy was not the forte of the bank clerk of the little country town. "Mr Bayle patched up that story. Why, my dear madam, when the crash came you hadn't a halfpenny. Here, quick, my dear! Mrs Hallam has turned faint!"

"No, it is nothing," she cried hastily. "I am better now, Mr Thickens.

Go back to our friends, Julie--to grandma. It is past."

"I--I'm afraid I've spoken too plainly," said Thickens apologetically, as soon as they were alone once more. "I wish I'd held my tongue."

"I am very glad that you spoke, Mr Thickens," said Mrs Hallam in a low voice. "It was better that I should know."

"Then you will let me lend you that money?" eagerly.

"No. It is impossible. I am deeper in obligations than I thought.

Pray spare me by not saying more."

"I want to do everything you wish," said Thickens uneasily.

"Then say no word about what you have told me to any one."

"Pooh! Mrs Hallam, as if I should. Money matters are always sacred with me. That comes of Mr Bayle banking in town. If he had trusted me with his money matters, I should never have spoken like this."

VOLUME THREE, CHAPTER ELEVEN.

MILLICENT HALLAM LEARNS A LITTLE MORE OF THE TRUTH.

It was a painful evening that last. Every one was a.s.suming to be light-hearted, and talking of the voyage as being pleasant, and hinting delicately at the possibility of seeing mother and daughter soon again, but all the while feeling that the farewells must in all probability be final.

Mr and Mrs Thickens retired early, for the latter whispered to her husband that she could bear it no longer.

"I feel, dear, as if it were a funeral, and we were being kept all this while standing by the open grave!"

"Hus.h.!.+" whispered back Thickens; "it's like prophesying evil." And they hurriedly took leave.

Then Sir Gordon rose, saying that it was very late, and he, too, went, leaving mother and daughter exchanging glances, for the old man seemed cool and unruffled in an extraordinary degree.

Bayle remained a little longer, talking to Doctor and Mrs Luttrell, whose favourite att.i.tudes all the evening had been seated on either side of Julia, each holding a hand.

"Good-night," said Bayle at last, rising and shaking hands with Julia in a cheery, pleasant manner. "No sitting up. Take my advice and have a good rest, so as to be prepared for the sea demon. Eleven punctually, you know, to-morrow. Everything ready?"

"Yes, everything is ready," replied Julia, looking at him with her eyes flas.h.i.+ng and a feeling of anger at his cavalier manner forcing its way to the surface. It seemed so Cruel. Just at a time like that, when a few tender words of sympathy would have been like balm to the wounded spirit, he was as cool and indifferent as could be. She was right, she told herself. He really was tired of them.

Bayle evidently read her ingenuous young countenance and smiled, with the result that she darted an indignant glance at him, and then could not keep back her tears.

"Oh, no, no, no," he said, taking her hand and holding it, speaking the while as if she were a child. "Tears, tears? Oh, nonsense! Why, these are not the days of Christopher Columbus. You are not going to sail away upon an unknown sea. It is a mere yachting trip, and every mile of the way is known. Come, come: cheer up. That's nautical, you know, Julie. Good-night, my dear! good-night."

He shook hands far more warmly and affectionately with the Doctor and Mrs Luttrell, hesitating for a moment or two, and even taking poor weeping Mrs Luttrell in his arms, and kissing her tenderly again and again.

"Good-night, good-night, my dear old friend," he said. "You have been almost more than a mother to me. Good-night, good-night."

The old lady sobbed upon his shoulder for some time, the doctor holding Bayle's other hand, while Julia crossed to her mother, who was standing cold and statuesque near the door, and hid her face.

"Good-night and good-bye, my dear boy," said Mrs Luttrell, as she raised her head; and looked up in his face. "And you always have seemed as if you were our son."

Bayle's lip quivered, and his face was for a moment convulsed, but he was calm again in a moment.

"To be sure, doctor," he said. "I shall come down and see you again-- some day. I want some gardening for a change. Good-night, good--"

His last word was inaudible, as he hurried towards the door, where Mrs Hallam was awaiting him.

"Go back to your grandmother, Julie," she said, in a low, stern voice.

"Christie Bayle, I wish to speak to you."

"To me? To-night?" he said hastily. "No: to-morrow. I am not myself now, and you need rest."