The Phantom Lover Part 4

Ashton called to him impatiently from the stairs.

"What the deuce are you doing? I shall miss my train."

Micky roused himself with a start, and, dropping the letter into his pocket, went slowly out of the room; he felt as if he could not have hurried had his life depended upon it; there was an absurdly cold sort of feeling round his heart.

It was ridiculous, of course; it was nothing to him if the girl with whom he had dined an hour ago loved Ashton; he had never seen her before. That sounded an absurd truth, too; it seemed impossible that until this evening he and she had never met.

"For heaven's sake, hurry up, man," said Ashton again sharply.

He was at the bottom of the stairs; the face he turned over his shoulder to Micky looked pale and hara.s.sed.

Micky quickened his steps and joined his friend in the porch below; they stood together out on the path waiting for a taxicab.

Micky glanced at Ashton with a curious sense of unreality; he felt as if he had never seen him before; it seemed impossible that this Ashton could know Esther--and Charlie!

A taxicab drew up to the kerb; Ashton banged open the door and got in.

Micky followed, and they drove some way in silence.

"I'll take thundering good care I don't stay away long," Ashton said suddenly, with a sort of growl. "And if the mater thinks it will make me forget Lallie----"

"I thought her name was Esther," said Micky quietly. He was looking out of the window into the starry night.

"So it is--but I always call her Lallie." He looked at his friend with a sort of vague suspicion. "How do you know what her name is?" he asked.

"I saw it on the letter you gave me."

Ashton grunted.

"I think it would be better if you posted it to her yourself and have done with it," Micky said with an effort. "I'm a rotten hand at this sort of thing. It can't do any good if I go and see her."

"You said you would go--you might be a sport and stick to your word,"

Ashton protested. "I'd do the same for you any day."

Micky rather doubted it, but did not like to say so.

"If you knew how sick I am about the whole business," Ashton went on jerkily. "You may not believe me, but I tell you, Micky, that I'd marry that girl to-morrow if only----"

"If only--what?" Micky asked as he paused.

"Oh, you know! What the d.i.c.kens can I do without a bob to my name except what the mater chooses to dole out? I tell you," he went on with a sort of snarl, "it'll be very different when I get the money.

Gad! if only I'd got it now!"

"Money isn't everything," said Micky sententiously. "And if you like the girl, why not marry her and face it out?"

Ashton gave a savage little laugh.

"It's all very fine for you to say that money isn't everything--that's only because you've got it, and are never likely to be without it. You don't know what it feels like to be up to your eyes in debt and not knowing where to turn for a fiver. Bah! what's the good of talking?"

He let down the window with a run, turning his face to the keen night air.

They were nearing their destination, and there was still something he wanted to say to Micky which so far, he had been afraid to put into words.

"Well, I suppose I shan't be seeing you again for a bit," he said, with rather a forced laugh. "You've been a good pal to me, Micky----"

Micky said "Rot!" rather shortly; he frowned in the darkness; Ashton got on his nerves; he rather wished he had not come to see him off.

"Oh, but you have--whether you like me to say so or not," the other man went on obstinately. "And--and there's one last thing I'm going to ask you before I go...."

He waited, but Micky did not speak.

The taxi was turning into the station yard now, moving slowly because of the congested traffic.

"If you could give Lallie some money," Ashton went on with a rush.

"I'd send her some, but I've only just got enough to get out of the way with. I'll pay you back as soon as the mater condescends to send me another cheque...."

Micky's face felt hot.

"Hasn't she--hasn't she got any, then?" he asked with an effort.

"No--at least I promised her some when I saw her this morning.

She--she's left Eldred's. You see"--he drew a hard breath--"you see, I hoped we'd be able to get married, and so--well, there was no sense in her staying on there. She was worked to death, poor kid."

He glanced at Micky, but could not see his face.

"You understand, don't you?" he said, encouraged by his silence. "She owes them a bit at the boarding-house where she is living. I promised to wipe it off for her, but the mater cutting up rough altered everything, and so ... if you could give her a little----"

"I'll see to it," said Micky. He opened the door of the taxi and got out before it was at a standstill. He took off his hat and let the cold air play on his hot forehead. He could hardly trust himself to speak.

He was thankful when Ashton went off to see to his luggage. He walked into the station and found himself aimlessly staring at a notice board. He could not remember when he had felt so furiously angry.

Had Ashton changed? he was asking himself in bewilderment. Or was it merely that he had never seen the man he really was until to-night?

He tried to remember what Ashton had told him about Esther Shepstone in the past. That she had been at Eldred's he knew, and that Eldred's was a place where women bought silk petticoats and things he also knew. He had heard Marie Deland and her friends talking about it lots of times. Marie had once invited him to accompany her there when they had been out together, but he had refused and had waited outside for her. Now he came to think of it, that was about all Ashton had ever told him of Esther Shepstone.

He knew that Ashton had been seen about with her a great deal; knew that he had had to stand a lot of harmless chaff in consequence; he himself had joked about Ashton's "latest" as they had all called her: it seemed a memory to be ashamed of, when he thought of the way he had heard her sobbing in the street that night, of the distress in her eyes, of the hopeless way in which she had spoken.

Ashton rejoined him.

"Buck up! The train's in."

They went along the platform, followed by a porter with Ashton's baggage. Micky looked at it resentfully; Ashton was evidently prepared to enjoy himself; this was no rush after mere solitude and forgetfulness.

He stood stiffly at the carriage door while Ashton stowed his smaller traps on the rack. Presently he came to the window.

"You'll do the best you can, won't you, old man?" There was a real anxiety in his eyes, but Micky was not looking at him; he answered stiffly--

"Yes, I'll do what I can."

"She'll soon get another job," Ashton went on, with forced confidence.

"I'm sorry she left Eldred's, now it's come to this, but how was I to know?" he appealed to Micky, but he might as well have appealed to a brick wall for all response he got.