Nobody

She perceived, with a little qualm of contrition, that she had been eager to condemn the man out of sheer unreasonable prejudice, all too ready to do him injustice in her thoughts. Unpleasant though she found his personality, harshly though his crudities grated upon her sensibilities, she owed him gratitude for an intimate service in an emergency when she had been only too glad of his personal intervention; and it were rank ingratitude to wish him ill, just as it was frankly base of her to be eager to think ill of him.

Repentance had got hold of this girl by the nape of her neck; it shook her roughly, if justly. For a little time she cringed in shame of herself and was torn by desire in some way to make amends to this animal of a Trego, whom she so despised because he refused to play up to the snob in her and ape the manners of his putative betters even as she was keen to ape them.

Perhaps it had needed this ugly happening, or something as unsettling, to reveal the girl to herself in a true light-at least a light less flattering than she found pleasant.

Certainly its aftermath in the way of private communion served well to sober and humble Sally in her own esteem. Outside the immediate field of her reverie she was now conscious of the words "sycophant" and "parasite" buzzing like mosquitoes about the head of some frantic wooer of sleep, elusive, pitiless, exasperating, making it just so much more difficult to concentrate upon this importunate problem of her duty.

If she was not to protest her own innocence, what ought she to say upon that card?

Was it consistent with loyalty to Mrs. Gosnold to keep silence about matters that might clear up the mystery and repair the wrong-doing?

But how could she attack another? How bring herself to point the finger of accusation at Lyttleton?

On the terrace outside her window a stringed orchestra tuned and hummed softly in the perfumed night. Rumour of gay voices and light laughter came to her in ever greater volume. Before her distracted gaze swam a view of the formal garden, a-glimmer like a corner of fairy-land with the hundreds of tiny lamps half concealed amid the foliage of its shrubs and hedges.

She knew that she must rouse herself and be seen below; not only must her message take its place with its twenty-odd fellows in the mail-box, but nothing could seem so incriminating as prolonged and deliberate absence from the fete.

Yet she had little desire now for what two hours since had seemed a prospect of bewitching promise. The music rose and fell in magic measure without its erstwhile power to stir her pulses. There was not one in all that company below for whom she cared or who cared for her, none but whose interest in her presence or absence was as slight as hers; and her mood shrank from the thought of such casual and conventional gallantries as the affair would inevitably bring forth. She was in no humour tonight to dance and banter and coquette with an empty and desolate heart.

Thus it was made clear to her that she had never been, and never would be, in such humour; that in just this circumstance resided all her insuperable dissociation from these people of light-hearted lives; that this was why she was and forever must remain, however long and intimate her life among them, an outsider; because what she needed and demanded, the blind and inarticulate impulse which had made her aspire to their society, was not the need of a wide social life, but the need of a narrow and constricting love.

And all the love that she had thus far found in this earthly paradise had proved a delusion, a mockery and a snare.

Presently she stirred with reluctance, sighed, resigned herself to the prospect of a night of hollow, grinning merriment, and turned back to contemplation of that importunate card. And while still she hesitated, pencil poised, with neither knock nor any sort of announcement whatsoever the door flew open, and through it, like a fury in a fairy's dress, flew Mrs. Standish clothed as Columbine.

She shut the door sharply, put her back to it, and keeping her gaze fixed on the amazed girl, turned the key.

Her passion was as evident as it was senseless. Bare of the mask that swung from silken strings caught in her fingers, her face shone bright with the incandescence of seething agitation. Her eyes were hard, her mouth tight-lipped, her temper patently set on a hair-trigger.

Quite automatically, on this interruption, Sally rose and, standing, slipped the card into its envelope, an action which brought from the older woman a curt, imperative gesture.

"What have you written there?" she demanded brusquely.

Before answering Sally carried the envelope to her lips, moistened its flap, and sealed it. Thus she gained time to collect herself and compose her attitude, which turned out unexpectedly to be something cold and critical.

"Why do you ask?" she returned.

"Because I've a right to know. If it concerns me-"

"Why should it?" Sally cut in.

"You know very well that if you breathe a syllable about last night-"

"But what about last night? You came to my room while I was inexplicably out and waited till I returned. I can't see why you should care if that became known."

"Have you written anything about that?" Mrs. Standish demanded insistently.

"And even if I had, and you were merely afraid of being embarrassed, I couldn't very well drag you in without incriminating myself, now could I?"

"I don't care to bandy words with you, young woman. Tell me-"

"You needn't to please me, you know. And I shan't tell you anything."

"Why-?"

"My business," said Sally with all the insolence she knew how to infuse into her tone. "I think we covered that question rather completely last night-or rather this morning. I imagined it was settled. In fact, it was. I don't care to reopen it; but I will say this-or repeat it, if you prefer: I'm not going to permit you to interfere in my private affairs."

"You refuse to tell me what you've written?"

"For the last time-positively."

"See here," Mrs. Standish ventured, after a baffled moment: "be reasonable. There's no sense in making me lose my temper."

"I'm sure I don't wish you to."

"Then tell me-"

"No."

"Must I threaten you?"

Sally elevated supercilious eyebrows. "If you like."

"I have a way to force you to obey me."

"Oh?" There was an accent in this innocent syllable cunningly calculated to madden.

"Very well. If you will have it. Do you recall a certain letter of introduction?"

"Why-no."

"That you brought me from Mrs. Cornwallis English."

"What do you mean?"

"Don't be stupid. You surely are not prepared to deny that you came to me last Wednesday, looking for work, with what purported to be a letter of recommendation from Mrs. English."

"Please go on."

"Well," Mrs. Standish announced triumphantly, "I kept that letter, of course, and now I've had occasion to look closely, I find it's a forgery."

"Please!" Sally faltered.

"I tell you, I have safe in my possession a letter recommending you to me and signed with the forged signature of Mrs. Cornwallis English. If necessary to protect myself, I shall not scruple to exhibit that letter."

"Oh!" With a gasp of incredulity Sally sat down and stared at this impudent intrigante.

"Now will you tell me what you've written? No. I won't trust you to tell me. Give me that envelope. I'll see for myself."