Laid up in Lavender

"What I say," he answered simply. "You see my plate? It is a picture. You have there the manly beef, and the feminine peas, so young, so tender! And the potato! The potato is the confidante. It is insipid. Do you not agree with me?"

"Bravo, Mr. Wibberley! But am I to apply your parable?" she spoke sharply, glancing across the table, with her fork uplifted, and a pea upon it. "Am I to be the potato?"

"The choice is with you," he replied gallantly. "Shall it be the potato? or the peas?"

Mrs. Burton Smith, seeing him absorbed in his companion, was puzzled. Look as she might at Joanna, she saw no sign of jealousy or self-consciousness. Joanna seemed to be getting on perfectly with her partner; to be enjoying herself to the full, and to be as much interested as any one at table. Mrs. Burton Smith sighed. She had the instinct of matchmaking. And she saw clearly now that there was nothing between the two; that if there had been any philandering at Rothley neither of the young people had put out a hand-or a heart-beyond recovery.

But this success of Wibberley's with Mrs. Galantine had its consequences. After the ladies had withdrawn he grew a trifle presumptuous. By ill-luck, the Hon. Vereker May had reached that period of the evening when India-as seen through the glasses of his memory-was accustomed to put on its rosiest tints; and the two facing one another fell to debating on a subject of which the returned Civilian had seen much and thought little, and the private secretary had read more and thought not at all. They were therefore on a par as to information, and what the younger man lacked in obstinacy he made up in readiness. It was in vain the Nabob blustered, asserted, contradicted-finally grew sulky, silent, stertorous. Wibberley pushed his triumph, and soon paid dearly for it.

It happened that he was the last to enter the drawing-room. The evening was chilly, and the ladies had grouped themselves about the fire, protected from assault, by a couple of gipsy-tables bearing shaded lamps. The incomers, one by one, passed through these outworks-all but Wibberley. He cast a glance of comic despair at Joanna, who was by the fireplace in the heart of the citadel; then, resigning himself to separation, he took a low chair by one of the tables, and began to turn over the books which lay on the latter. There were but half a dozen. He scanned them all, and then his eyes fell on a bracelet which lay beside them; a sketchy gold bracelet, with one big boss-Joanna's.

He looked at the party-himself sitting a little aside, as we have said. They were none of them facing his way. They were discussing a photograph on the overmantel, a photograph of children. He extended his hand and covered the bracelet. He would take it for a pattern, and to-morrow Joanna should ransom it. He tried, as his fingers closed on it, to catch her eye. He would fain have seen her face change and her colour rise. It would have added to the charm which the boyish, foolish act had for him, if she had been privy to it-yet unable to prevent it.

But she would not look; and he was obliged to be content with his plunder. He slid the gold trifle deftly under the fringe of the table, and clasped it round his arm-not a lusty arm-thrusting it as high as it would go that no movement of his shirt-cuff might disclose it. He had a keen sense of the ridiculous, and he would not for the world that any besides Joanna should see the act: that doddering old fossil May, for instance, who, however, was safe enough-standing on the rug with his back turned, and his slow mind forming an opinion on the photograph.

Then-or within a few minutes, at any rate-Wibberley began to find the party dull. He saw no chance of a private word with Joanna. Lady Linacre, his nearest neighbour, was prosing on to Mrs. Burton Smith, his next nearest. And he himself, after shining at dinner, had fallen into the background. Hang it, he would go! It was ten o'clock.

He rose, and was stooping across the table, murmuring his excuses to Mrs. Burton Smith, when Lady Linacre uttered an exclamation. He was leaning across her between her head and the lamp, and he fancied he had touched her head-dress. "Pray pardon me, Lady Linacre!" he cried gaily. "I am just going-I have to leave early. So the encroachment will be but for a moment."

"It is not that," the old lady replied. "But where is my bracelet?" She was feeling about the table as she spoke, shifting with her white, podgy hands the volumes that lay on it.

No one on the instant took in the situation. Mrs. Burton Smith had risen, and was listening to Wibberley. The others were talking. But Lady Linacre was used to attention; and when she spoke again her voice was shrill, and almost indecently loud. "Where is my bracelet?" she repeated. "The one with the Agra diamond that I was showing you, Mrs. Burton Smith. It was here a moment ago, and it is gone! It is gone!"

Wibberley was still speaking to his hostess. He heard the old lady's words, but did not at once apply them. He finished his leave-taking at his leisure, and only as he turned recollected himself, and said, with polite solicitude, "What is it, Lady Linacre? Have you dropped something? Can I find it for you?"

He stooped as he spoke; and she drew her skirt aside, and both peered at the floor, while there was a chorus from those sitting nearest of, "What is it, Lady Linacre? Dear Lady Linacre, what have you lost?"

"My Agra diamond!" she replied, her head quivering, her fingers groping about her dress.

"No?" some one said in surprise. "Why, it was here a moment ago. I saw it in your hand."

The old lady held up her wrists. "See!" she said fussily, "I have not got it!"

"But are you sure it is not in your lap?" Burton Smith suggested. Lady Linacre had rather an ample lap. By this time the attention of the whole party had been drawn to the loss, and one or two of the most prudent were looking uncomfortable.

"No," she answered; "I am quite sure that I placed it on the table by my side. I am sure I saw it there. I was going to put it on when the gentlemen came in, and I laid it down for a minute, and-it is gone!"

She was quite clear about it, and looked at Wibberley for confirmation. The table stood between them. She thought he must have seen it; Mrs. Burton Smith being the only other person close to the table.

Burton Smith saw the look. "I say, Wibberley," he said, appealing to him, half in fun, half in earnest, "you have not hidden it for a joke, have you?"

"I? Certainly not!"

To this day Ernest Wibberley wonders when he made the disagreeable discovery of what he had done-that he had taken the wrong bracelet! It was not at once. It was not until the aggrieved owner had twice proclaimed her loss that he felt himself redden, and awoke to the consciousness that the bracelet was on his arm. Even then, if he had had presence of mind, he might have extricated himself. He might have said, "By Jove! I think I slipped it on my wrist in pure absence of mind," or, he might have made some other excuse for his possession of it-an excuse which would have passed muster, though one or two might have thought him odd. But time was everything; and he hesitated. He hated to seem odd, even to one or two; he thought that presently he might find some chance of restoring the bracelet. So he hesitated, peering at the carpet, and the golden opportunity passed. Then each moment made the avowal more difficult, and less ordinary; until, when his host appealed to him-"If you have hidden it for a joke, old fellow, out with it!" – madness overcame him, and he answered as he did.

He looked up, indeed, with well acted surprise, and said his "I? Certainly not!" somewhat peremptorily.

Half a dozen of the guests were peering stupidly about as if they expected to find the lost article in a flower-vase, or within the globe of a lamp. Presently their hostess stayed these explorations. "Wait a moment!" she said abruptly, raising her head. "I have it!"

"Well?"

"John must have moved it when he brought in the tea. That must be it. Ring the bell, James, and we will ask him."

It was done. John came in, and the question was put to him.

"Yes, sir," he said readily; "I saw a bracelet. On the table by the lamp." He indicated the table near Lady Linacre.

"Did you move it?"

"Move it, sir?" the man repeated, surprised by the question, the silence, and the strained faces turned to him. "No, sir; certainly not. I saw it when I was handing the tea to-to Mr. Wibberley, I think it was."

"Ah, very well," his master answered. "That is all. You may go."

It was not possible to doubt the man's face and manner. But when he had left the room, an uncomfortable silence ensued. "It is very strange," Burton Smith said, looking from one to another, and then, for the twentieth time, he groped under the table.

"It is very strange," Wibberley murmured. He felt bound to say something. He could not free himself from an idea that the others, and particularly the Indian Civilian, were casting odd looks at him. He appeared calm enough, but he could not be sure of this. He felt as if he were each instant changing colour, and betraying himself. His very voice sounded forced to his ear as he repeated fussily, "It is very odd-very odd! Where can it be?"

"It cost," Lady Linacre quavered-irrelevantly, but by no means impertinently-"it cost fourteen thousand out there. Indeed it did. And that was before it was set."

A hush as of awe fell upon the room. "Fourteen thousand pounds!" Burton Smith said softly, his hair rising on end.

"No, no," said the old lady, who had not intended to mystify them. "Not pounds; rupees."

"I understand," he replied, rubbing, his head. "But that is a good sum."

"It is over a thousand pounds," the Indian Civilian put in stonily, "at the present rate of exchange."

"But, good gracious, James!" Mrs. Burton Smith said impatiently, "why are you valuing Lady Linacre's jewellery-instead of finding it for her? The question is, 'Where is it?' It must be here. It was on this table fifteen minutes ago. It cannot have been spirited away."

"If any one," her husband began seriously, "is doing this for a joke, I do hope-"

"For a joke!" the hostess cried sharply. "Impossible! No one would be so foolish!"

"I say, my dear," he persisted, "if any one is doing this for a joke, I hope he will own up. It seems to me that it has been carried far enough." There was a chorus of assent, half-indignant, half-exculpatory. But no one owned to the joke. No one produced the bracelet.

"Well!" Mrs. Burton Smith exclaimed. And as the company looked at one another, it seemed as if they also had never known anything quite so extraordinary as this.

"Really, Lady Linacre, I think that it must be somewhere about you," the host said at last. "Would you mind giving yourself a good shake?"

She rose, and was solemnly preparing to agitate her skirts, when a guest interfered. It was the Hon. Vereker May. "You need not trouble yourself, Lady Linacre," he said, with a curious dryness. He was still standing by the fireplace. "It is not about you."

"Then where in the world is it?" retorted Mrs. Galantine. "Do you know?"

"If you do, for goodness' sake speak out," Mrs. Burton Smith added indignantly. Every one turned and stared at the Civilian.

"You had better," he said, "ask Mr. Wibberley!"

That was all. But something in his tone produced an electrical effect. Joanna, in her corner-remote, like the Indian, from the centre of the disturbance-turned red and pale, and flashed angry glances round her. For the rest, they wished themselves away. It was impossible to overlook the insinuation. The words, simple as they were, in a moment put a graver complexion on the matter. Even Mrs. Burton Smith was silent, looking to her husband. He looked furtively at Wibberley.