“I dare say it does, mother,” said the girl, “but what am I to do? What am I to say? There are the facts fairly apparent to you and to me; the necklace is stolen, and it may possibly never be recovered, and I am not going to expose either my loss or your weakness on the remote possibility of getting back an article of jewellery which probably by this time is in the meltingpot and the stones dispersed.”
“You know a great deal about jewels and jewel-robbers,” said her mother with a little sneer. “Has Gilbert been enlarging your education?”
“Curiously enough, he has,” said her daughter calmly; “we discuss many queer things.”
“You must have very pleasant evenings,” said the elder woman dryly. She rose to go, looking at her watch. “I am sorry I cannot stay,” she said, “but I am dining with some people. I suppose you would not like to come along? It is quite an informal affair; as a matter of fact, the invitation included you.”
“And Gilbert?” asked the girl.
The woman smiled.
“No, it did not exactly include Gilbert,” she said. “I have made it pretty clear that invitations to me are acceptable only so long as the party does not include your husband.”
The girl drew herself up stiffly, and the elder woman saw a storm gathering in her eyes.
“I do not quite understand you. Do you mean that you have gone round London talking unkindly about my husband?”
“Of course I have,” said Mrs. Cathcart virtuously. “I do not know about having gone round London, but I have told those people who are intimate friends of mine, and who are naturally interested in my affairs.”
“You have no right to speak,” said the girl angrily, “it is disgraceful of you. You have made your mistake, and you must abide by the consequence. I also have made a mistake, and I cheerfully accept my lot. If it hurts you that I am married to a man who despises me, how much more do you think it hurts me?”
Mrs. Cathcart laughed.
“I assure you,” she smiled, “that though many thoughts disturb my nights, the thought that your husband has no particular love for you is not one of them; what does wake me up with a horrid feeling is the knowledge that so far from being the rich man I thought he was, he is practically penniless. What madness induced him to give up his work at the Foreign Office?”
“You had better ask him,” said the girl with malice, “he will be in in a few moments.”
It needed only this to hasten Mrs. Cathcart’s departure, and Edith was left alone.
Edith dined alone that night.
At first she had welcomed with a sense of infinite relief these solitary dinners. She was a woman of considerable intelligence, and she had faced the future without illusion.
She realised that there might come a time when she and Gilbert would live together in perfect harmony, though without the essential sympathies which husband and wife should mutually possess. She was willing to undergo the years of probation, and it made it all the easier for her if business or pleasure kept them apart during the embarrassing hours between dinner and bedtime.
But tonight, for the first time, she was lonely.
She felt the need of him, the desire for his society, the cheer and the vitality of him.
There were moments when he was bright and happy and flippant, as she had known him at his best. There were other moments too, terrible and depressing moments, when she never saw him, when he shut himself in his study and she only caught a glimpse of his face by accident. She went through her dinner alternately reading and thinking.
A book lay upon the table by her side, but she did not turn one page. The maid was clearing the entrée when Edith Standerton looked up with a start.
“What is it?” she said.
“What, madam?” asked the girl.
Outside the window Edith could hear the sound of music, a gentle, soft cadence of sound, a tiny wail of melodious tragedy.
She rose from the table, walked across to the window and pulled aside the blinds. Outside a girl was playing a violin. In the light which a street lamp afforded Edith recognised the player of the “Melody in F.”
IX
Edith Meets the Player
Edith turned to her waiting maid.
“Go out and bring the girl in at once,” she said quietly.
“Which girl, madam?” asked the startled servant.
“The girl who is playing,” said Edith. “Hurry please, before she goes.”
She was filled with sudden determination to unravel this mystery. She might be acting disloyally to her husband, but she adjusted any fear she may have had on the score with the thought that she might also be helping him. The maid returned in a few minutes and ushered in a girl.
Yes, it was the girl she had seen on her wedding night. She stood now, framed in the doorway, watching her hostess with frank curiosity.
“Won’t you come in?” said Edith. “Have you had any dinner?”
“Thank you very much,” said the girl, “we do not take dinner, but I had a very good tea.”
“Will you sit down for a little while?”
With a graceful inclination of her head the girl accepted the invitation.
Her voice was free from the foreign accent which Edith had expected. She was indubitably English, and there was a refinement in her tone which Edith had not expected to meet.
“I suppose you wonder why I have sent for you?” asked Edith Standerton.
The girl showed two rows of white, even teeth in a smile.
“When people send for me,” she said demurely, “it is either to pay me for my music, or to bribe me to desist!”
There was frank merriment in her eyes, her smile lit up the face and changed its whole aspect.
“I am doing both,” said Edith, “and I also want to ask you something. Do you know my husband?”
“Mr. Standerton,” said the girl, and nodded. “Yes, I
