The Imaginary Marriage Part 37

"Very good of you, only I'm busy cleaning up."

"Men do make a mess, don't they? Fancy 'is going off like that. I wonder if the letter had anything to do with it?"

"Letter?"

"Yes, the one Miss Joan give our Bob to bring 'im this afternoon."

"Ha!" said Mrs. Bonner. "I shouldn't be surprised."

"Nor should I. I wonder what he is to her, don't you?"

"No, I don't. I ain't bothered my head thinking. It ain't none of my business, Alice Betts."

Alice Betts giggled.

"Well, any'ow he's gone," she said, and Mrs. Bonner did not contradict her. "And gone sudden."

"Very!"

"Depend on it, it was the letter done it. Well, I won't be keeping you."

"No, I ain't got no time for talking," said Mrs. Bonner, and closed the door. "A nosey Parker if ever there was one! Always shoving 'er saller face where she ain't wanted. I can't abide that gel!"

Miss Alice Betts hurried off to the Bettses' cottage in Starden.

"I got a letter to write in a 'urry. Give me a paper and envelope," she demanded.

"MISTER P. SLOTMAN, Dear sir," Alice wrote. "This is to imform you, as agreed, that Mister Alston has gone. Miss Jone writ him a letter, what about cannot say, only as soon as he gets it, he packs up and leaves Starden. I have been to Mrs. Bonner's to make sure and find it is correck, him having packed up and gone to London. So no more at present from yours truely, MISS ALICE BETTS."

And this letter, addressed to Mr. P. Slotman at the new address with which he had furnished her, went out from Starden by the early morning mail.

After Mrs. Bonner's comfortable but restricted cottage, it was good to be back in the s.p.a.cious old rooms of Hurst Dormer. Hugh Alston was a home man. He had wired Mrs. Morrisey, and now he was back. To-night he slept once again in his own bed, the bed he had slept in since boyhood.

The following morning brought a telegram delivered by a shock-headed village urchin.

"I will be with you and so glad to see you on Sat.u.r.day--MARJORIE."

Sat.u.r.day, and he had hurried so that he might see her to-day.

It was not till late Sat.u.r.day afternoon that Marjorie came at last, and Hugh had been fuming up and down, looking for her since early morning.

Yet if he felt any ill-temper at her delay it was gone at a sight of the little face, so white and woebegone, so frankly miserable and unhappy that his heart ached for the child.

"Oh, Hugh, it is so good to see you again."

He kissed her. What else could he do? And then, holding her hand and drawing it through his arm, he led her into the house. He rang the bell for tea, for it was tea-time when she came.

"You are going to have a good tea first, then you are going to tell me all your troubles, and we are going to put them all straight and right.

And then--then, Marjorie, you are going to smile as you used to."

A faint smile came to her lips, her eyes were on his face. "Oh, Hugh, if--if you knew how--how good it is to see you again and hear you speak to me."

He put his hand on her shoulders.

"It is always good to me to see you," he said softly. "You're one of the best things in my world, Marjorie, little maid."

She bent her head, so that her soft cheek touched his hand, and what man could draw his hand away from that caress? Not Hugh Alston.

And now came Phipps with the tea, which he arranged on the small table and retired.

"It's all right between them two," he announced in the kitchen a little later. "She'll be missus here after all, I'll lay ten to one."

"Law bless and save us!" said cook. "I thought it was off, and she was going to marry young Mr. Arundel."

Ordinarily, Marjorie had the sensible appet.i.te of a young country girl.

To-day she ate nothing. She sipped her tea, and looked with great soulful, miserable eyes at Hugh.

"And now, little girl, come, tell me."

"Oh, Hugh, not now. It is so difficult, almost impossible to tell you. I wrote that letter days and days before I posted it, and then I made up my mind all of a sudden to post it, and regretted it the moment after."

"Why?"

She shook her head.

"There is something wrong between you and Tom? Tell me, girlie!"

She was silent for a moment. "There is--everything wrong between Tom and--and me. But it is my--my fault, not his. Oh, Hugh, it is all my fault!"

"How?"

"I--I don't love him!" the girl gasped.

"Eh?" Hugh started. He sat back and stared at her. "Why--you--I--I thought--"

"So did I!" she cried, bursting into tears, "but I was wrong--wrong--all wrong. I didn't understand!" Her breast was heaving, there were sobs in her throat, sobs she fought and struggled against.

The dawn of understanding came to him. He believed he saw. She had fancied herself in love with Tom, and now she knew she was not--how did she know? For the simple reason that she found she was in love with someone else. Now who on earth could it be? he wondered.

"Won't you tell me all about it, dear?"

"I--I can't. Don't ask me--I ought not to have written, I ought not to have come. I wish--I wish I had not. It is my fault, not Tom's; he is good and kind and--and patient with me, and I know I am unkind and cross to him, and I feel ashamed of myself!"

"Marjorie!"

"Yes, Hugh?" She looked up.

"Tell me the truth, dear," he said gravely. "Do you realise that you are not in love with Tom because you know now that you are in love with someone else?"