“Oh?” said George, indifferently.
“And her name, if I remember rightly, was Dubbs or Tubbs or Jubbs or—no, I have it. My memory is better than I supposed. It was May Stubbs. Does it convey anything to you?”
IX
It chanced that as he spoke these light and casual words Hamilton Beamish, glancing down, noted that his shoelace had come untied. Stooping to attend to this he missed seeing George’s face. Nor—for he was a man who concentrated even on the lightest task the full attention of a great mind—did he hear the other’s sudden, whistling gasp of astonishment and horror. A moment later, however, he observed out of the corner of his eye something moving: and, looking, perceived that George’s legs were wobbling strangely.
Hamilton Beamish straightened himself. He was now in a position to see George steadily and see him whole: and the spectacle convinced him at once that something in the message he had just delivered must have got right in among his friend’s ganglions. George Finch’s agreeable features seemed to be picked out in a delicate Nile-green. His eyes were staring. His lower jaw had fallen. Nobody who had ever seen a motion-picture could have had the least doubt as to what he was registering. It was dismay.
“My dear George!” said Hamilton Beamish, concerned.
“Wok. … Wuk. … Wok. …” George swallowed desperately. “Wok name did you say?”
“May Stubbs.” Hamilton Beamish’s expression grew graver, and he looked at his friend with sudden suspicion. “Tell me all, George. It is idle to pretend that the name is strange to you. Obviously it has awakened deep and unpleasant memories. I trust, George, that this is not some poor girl with whose happiness you have toyed in the past, some broken blossom that you have culled and left to perish by the wayside?”
George Finch was staring before him in a sort of stupor.
“All is over!” he said dully.
Hamilton Beamish softened.
“Confide in me. We are friends. I will not judge you harshly, George.”
A sudden fury melted the ice of George’s torpor.
“It’s all that parson’s fault!” he cried vehemently. “I knew all along it meant bad luck. Gosh, what a Paradise this world would be if only clergymen could stand on chairs without spraining their ankles! I’m done for.”
“Who is this May Stubbs?”
“I knew her in East Gilead,” said George hopelessly. “We were sort of engaged.”
Hamilton Beamish pursed his lips.
“Apart from the slovenly English of the phrase, which is perhaps excusable in the circumstances, I cannot see how you can have been ‘sort of’ engaged. A man is either engaged or he is not.”
“Not where I come from. In East Gilead they have what they call understandings.”
“And there was an understanding between you and this Miss Stubbs?”
“Yes. Just one of those boy and girl affairs. You know. You see a girl home once or twice from church, and you take her to one or two picnics, and people kid you about her, and … well, there you are. I suppose she thought we were engaged. And now she’s read in the papers about my wedding, and has come to make herself unpleasant.”
“Did you and this girl quarrel before you separated?”
“No. We sort of drifted apart. I took it for granted that the thing was over and done with. And when I saw Molly. …”
Hamilton Beamish laid a hand upon his arm.
“George,” he said, “I want you to give me your full attention: for we have arrived now at the very core of the matter. Were there any letters?”
“Dozens. And of course she has kept them. She used to sleep with them under her pillow.”
“Bad!” said Hamilton Beamish, shaking his head. “Very bad!”
“And I remember her saying once that she believed in breach of promise suits.”
Hamilton Beamish frowned. He seemed to be deploring the get-rich-quick spirit of the modern girl, who is not content to sit down and wait for her alimony.
“You think it certain that she is coming here with the intention of making trouble?”
“What other reason could she have?”
“Yes, I fancy you are right. I must think. I must think. Let me think.”
And, so saying, Hamilton Beamish turned sharply to the left and began to walk slowly round in a circle, his hands behind his back and his face bent and thoughtful. His eyes searched the ground as if to wrest inspiration from it.
Few sights in this world are more inspiring than that of a great thinker actually engaged in thought: and yet George Finch, watching his friend, chafed. He had a perhaps forgivable craving for quick results: and Hamilton Beamish, though impressive, did not seem to be getting anywhere.
“Have you thought of anything?” he asked, as the other came round for the third time.
Hamilton Beamish held up a hand in silent reproof, and resumed his pacing. Presently he stopped.
“Yes?” said George.
“With regard to this engagement. …”
“It wasn’t an engagement. It was an understanding.”
“With regard to this understanding or engagement, the weak spot in your line of defence is undoubtedly the fact that it was you who broke it off.”
“But I didn’t break it off.”
“I used the wrong expression. I should have said that it was you who took the initiative. You left East Gilead and came to New York. Therefore, technically, you deserted this girl.”
“I wish you wouldn’t say things like that. Can’t you understand that it was just one of those boy and girl affairs which come to an end of themselves?”
“I was looking at the thing from a lawyer’s viewpoint. And may I point out that the affair appears not to have come to an end. What I am trying to make clear is this: that, if you had wished it to come to an end, you should,
