The Witness on the Roof (17 page)

Evelyn, there could be no doubt, was finding her new home dull—the county had not shown any disposition to welcome the new mistress of Davenant Hall with open arms. The fact that she had been on the music-hall stage had leaked out. There could be no doubt, too, that her appearance and style of dress had not attracted such of her neighbours as she had met hitherto.

Joan's acceptance of her sister seemed to make little difference; people shrugged their shoulders and said that Lady Warchester was pleased to be complaisant. The Trewhistles had openly ranged themselves amongst those who declared Miss Davenant to be impossible, and all Joan's entreaties had not sufficed to get Cynthia Trewhistle even to call at the Hall.

Evelyn, as was only natural, resented this attitude—she had by no means as yet realized its extent among the surrounding families—but she had taken a perverse fancy to Cynthia; it seemed impossible to make her understand that, while Joan was the favourite cousin, she herself would always remain in Cynthia's eyes an intruder, an outsider.

She had driven over to Oldthorpe several times to talk matters over with her cousins, as she phrased it, and only of late it had begun to dawn upon her that it could scarcely be merely a coincidence that Cynthia was never at home. Then her anger was turned upon Joan, who, she was convinced, was the cause of her rebuff.

Warchester had only encountered his new sister-in-law once or twice in the most casual fashion since their first meeting and his interview with her the following morning. She had dined one evening with them at the Towers, but Septimus Lockyer, the old vicar and his wife, and Mr. and Mrs. Hurst had also been of the party, and Warchester had contrived that he saw the very least, compatible with politeness, that was possible of Evelyn.

Their avoidance was not mutual. That conclusion was forced upon Joan. It was perfectly plain to Joan that Evelyn was anxious to see Warchester again, that she had deliberately planned more than once to obtain a conversation with him, only to find herself foiled by Warchester's quiet determination. Joan would have been more than mortal if she had not resented this state of affairs. Her pride would not let her ask from Warchester an explanation which he had evidently determined to withhold, and thus the rift between husband and wife widened.

To-day, however, it seemed to Joan as she took her place beside Warchester in the car and met his smile that there was a change. He looked brighter, more like himself than he had done of late; her spirits rose. If Warchester and Evelyn had met years ago, if they had been lovers, at any rate that was all past and done with. It was her day—Joan's—now. Did it not behove her to let the past bury its dead? 

Warchester had dispensed with a chauffeur; he drove very slowly down the avenue.

“Shall I drop you at the Hall and come back for you after I have been to the Marsh, and heard what this new man thinks of the operation? Say yes, darling! It is a lovely day for a spin!”

“But that will give me so very short a time with Evelyn,” Joan demurred.

“It will give you a nice long time with me,” Warchester urged. “You will come, Joan?”

“I don't know,” Joan hesitated, looked up into the dark face so near hers and gave way. “Yes, I will come. Yes, Paul, I will come!”

Warchester's head bent lower. After all, though the brief madness of the honeymoon was over, though this strange intangible obstacle had reared itself between them, the thought that she was his held a delicious intoxication. He glanced round; there was no one to see, not a living thing in sight save a stray rabbit scuttling over the soft grass by the side of the drive, a deer standing knee-deep amid the bracken. The great benches drooped their branches, making a green interlacing screen to hide them from sight of the house. He laid his lips on the soft curved ones so near his own.

“Oh, my wife, my darling, you would be true to me, you would believe in me always?”

The lingering kiss, the passionate words gave her a pang of pain; but for Joan all that mattered was that for one brief moment the torturing doubts and fears of the past month were forgotten, and that the lover, the husband of that bewildering love-dream on board the yacht was with her once more.

There was no need for words. As they turned into the high road Warchester's hand still held hers beneath the rug; the sense of his nearness, the warm pressure of his body against hers, brought the colour to her cheeks, the soft light to her eyes. But, delightful, entrancing as the moment of reunion was to both, it came to an end all too soon—the drive to the Hall was but a short one, and it was accomplished in something less than a quarter of an hour. At the gate Joan stopped the car.

“I will get out here and walk up. I would rather, Paul, and when you come back from the Marsh I shall be ready for you.”

She sprang out and waved a farewell to him as he waited, watching her slight figure walking up the drive.

Presently he turned to his driving wheel; as he did so, his glances fell upon a stout, reduced woman in black who was looking at him curiously. For an instant he thought she was going to speak to him; then she passed on. Looking back, he saw that she had turned in at the gate.

“I wonder who she is?” he soliloquized as he pursued his way to the Marsh. “Seems to me that I have seen her somewhere, though for the life of me I can't remember where!”

Half-way up the drive Joan heard herself hailed, and Evelyn came hurrying across the grass.

“Here you are! Well, I am glad to see you! I get hipped to death in that great house by myself!”

“It is dull for you,” Joan said gently. “Have you no friend you could ask to stay with you, Evie? I think in your place I should engage a companion—some nice girl who would ride and talk with you and be at hand when you wanted some one to talk to in the house.”

“And bore me to death!” Evelyn burst into a loud laugh. “No thank you, Joan! A girl of that kind would be just about the finishing touch to this house. It is bad enough now, but with her—”

“Evelyn, do you know if I were you, I would send for Amy—the eldest of our stepmother's children,” Joan said gently. “She seemed to me such a nice girl, and, after all, she is our sister. You might get very fond of her, and it would be good for both of you. Come, let us walk across to the fernery and talk it over.”

“No, thanks! I am sick of the fernery and all the rest of the place!” Evelyn answered with a grimace. “If you want to walk—why, we will keep in sight of the drive. If a visitor comes, we shall see him. As for me taking one of Mrs. Spencer's children to live with me, no, thank you! I had enough of their mother. But I tell you what I am going to do—I am going to town next week to look up some of my old friends, and I shall stay at one of the swagger hotels and do some shopping—see about a town house, for I have told Mr. Hurst that I must have one. And when I have got it—well,” with an expressive gesture, “I don't fancy Davenant Hall will see much of me!”

Joan blamed herself for the throb of relief with which she heard this decision. Nevertheless she felt it her duty to combat it.

“It is all so strange to you here, Evelyn. When you get used to it and have your own interests and your friends you will find it very different.”

“I shan't give it the chance!” declared Miss Davenant, twirling her parasol from side to side. “As for Amy—do you know that Mrs. Spencer has written to me wanting me to continue the hundred a year which it seems our grandmother allowed them ever since they gave you up to her?”

“Yes, I know. Mr. Hurst spoke to us about it. What are you going to do? I should like to help the children and Paul is quite willing to do so. But as regards Mrs. Spencer—”

“I told Mr. Hurst to tell her I shouldn't give her a farthing,” Miss Davenant stated decisively, “neither her nor her children. So I have done with that. The vicar and his wife have been up twice, Joan, asking for subscriptions—they want a new organ at the church. They have been my only visitors. There is a woman coming now. I suppose it is only some one for the servants. Well, if you want to go across the fernery, I don't mind.”

They turned off together.

The woman whom Warchester had seen at the gate was panting up the drive towards them; when they crossed the grass she followed them and quickened her steps. Evelyn glanced behind.

“What a singular looking creature, Joan! What does she want, I wonder? She is coming after us.”

Joan turned. Surely there was something familiar about the stout, red-faced woman, who was, so evidently, exerting herself beyond her wont in the endeavour to overtake them. She stopped.

“Why, Evelyn, it is—yes, of course it is! How are you Mrs. Spencer?” as her stepmother came up to them.

“Pretty well, thank you, though very much done up with the heat, my—dear,” responded Mrs. Spencer, resolutely combating an inclination to say “my lady,” and substituting “my dear” instead.

“But who is this?” staring at Evelyn, who was regarding her with amazement.

“Can't you guess?” asked Joan.

Mrs. Spencer looked critically at Evelyn.

“Surely it can't be—it isn't possible that it is Evie?”

“What do you mean? Why do you speak to this person, Joan? Who is she?” Evelyn questioned rapidly.

Mrs. Spencer's face grew crimson.

“Person indeed, miss! I would have you know—”

“Hush! Hush!” Joan interposed gently. “Miss Davenant does not recognize you naturally. Evelyn, this is Mrs. Spencer, our father's widow.”

“So I see!” Miss Davenant returned haughtily. “May I inquire what you want—why you have come here?”

“It is for the sake of my poor children!” Mrs. Spencer burst into tears. “But for their sakes it isn't me that would demean myself.”

“If it is what you wrote to me about”—Evelyn stood a little aside disdainfully—“it is no use. I shall not alter my mind, you and your children have no claim on me.”

Mrs. Spencer's sobs grew more violent.

“I would not have thought it of you! Your own father's children—and me, that has done my best for you all, not so much as asked into your house—talked to out here as if I was a beggar-woman!”

“Evelyn!” Joan went close to her sister. “‘After all, she was our father's wife. I think you ought to let her come into the house to give her a cup of tea. Afterwards I will talk to Paul; I will see what can be done.”

“Well, do as you like!” Evelyn said sulkily. “Only remember that I stick to what I have said.”

“Come in now, Mrs. Spencer.” Joan touched her stepmother's arm. “You shall have some tea and we will talk matters over. I should certainly like to do something for Amy.”

“And the best way to do something for Amy will be to help her mother to keep the home together,” Mrs. Spencer observed as they all turned towards the house. “I could easily get the licence of the Bell transferred to me, and Gregory he would stay in and help manage, and there would be bread for all of us; but it all means money. And we have had a big family and not been able to lay by. And there has been the expenses of the illness and the funeral. I don't know which road to turn, and that is the truth. If you could see your way to keep on the bit your poor grandma allowed us—”

Her eyes were glancing from Joan to Evelyn; even she could see the difference between the two sisters. Not even her mourning had been able to subdue Evelyn's flamboyant air; her great black hat bore an exaggerated number of feathers that swayed and nodded as she walked; her long skirts trailed on the ground; her sleeves were short and ended in long lace ruffles; heavy gold bracelets clasped her powdered arms; her short, rather red fingers were covered with rings.

“A flaunting madam!” Mrs. Spencer called her to herself as she contrasted her garments with Joan's perfectly cut tailor-made costume.

Evelyn walked on a little ahead; Joan followed with Mrs. Spencer.

“I liked Amy, Mrs. Spencer,” she said in her quiet, low tones. “I must talk to my husband about her. If we sent her to school—”

“I don't think so, thank you!” Mrs. Spencer answered defiantly. “I have seen enough of setting girls up, making them think they are above their parents and their home—” She broke off suddenly and looked at Evelyn as they arrived on the terrace.

Miss Davenant stepped into the morning-room and held the curtains aside.

“Come in!” Evelyn said impatiently. “Make haste, Joan, we don't want all the servants gaping at us.”

But Joan found her entrance blocked by Mrs. Spencer's rotund figure. The widow had stopped dead in the window-frame, and was apparently examining the broad gold bracelet on Evelyn's left arm.

“Come in! What are you waiting for?” Miss Davenant's patience was soon exhausted.

Mrs. Spencer raised her head slowly; there was a curious look in her eyes, but it seemed to Joan that some of the woman's florid colour had faded, and she noticed that her lips moved.

Joan caught the muttered words.

“Gregory was right! Gregory was right!”

“What do you mean, Mrs. Spencer?” asked Joan.

“Oh, that don't much matter!” Mrs. Spencer said in a loud, truculent voice. “I ha' got a few words to say to you, Miss Davenant. You called me a person just now, I think. Now it is my turn to call you—” She moved forward quickly and her foot caught in the rug.

Miss Davenant's face changed. She put out her hand.

“Mind how you walk!”

At the same moment there was the sound of a motor in the drive. Joan looked round.

“Oh, Evelyn, here is Paul! He wants me to drive to Market Burnham, but he is back from the Marsh much sooner than I expected. However, we did not know that Mrs. Spencer would be here. I will tell him that I cannot go to-day.”

Mrs. Spencer went up to Miss Davenant, who had not altered her position.

“Send her away!” she ordered in a hoarse whisper.