The Halo Part 18

Years before, when she had, half out of kindness, half out of loneliness, adopted the little new-born girl, she had never meant to marry. And when she did marry, neither she nor her husband wished to get rid of the child. But the result had not been particularly satisfactory, for Pammy had grown to be a very fat, very stolid person, with no nose to speak of and no sense of humour at all, and every day that pa.s.sed seemed to leave her a little more unattractive than she had been the day before.

Now, at seven, she was as tall as most children of ten, immensely fat, with pendulous red cheeks that in spite of cold cream and soft water always looked as though they had just been rubbed with a grater. Her hair, long and fair, was dank, hanging in two emaciated pig-tails nearly to her waist, and her nails--another ineradicable trick--bitten to the deepest depths possible.

"Pammy, dear, what have you been doing?" inquired Pam, gently.

"Looking out the window--and I ate some more plaster." Stolidly, with lack-l.u.s.tre eyes, the culprit gazed at her benefactor.

Pam sighed, but her mouth twitched. "I asked you not to."

"I know. I didn't mean to, but--it looked so good."

"'_Tous les gouts sont dans la nature_,' my dear," quoted Lensky, coming in at the open window, "there are even people who like German bands!"

Looking down at Pammy through his eyegla.s.s, the sun fell full on his head, betraying an incipient bald patch. Otherwise Lensky had aged not at all since his marriage.

"I saw Lady Brigit just now," he said, suddenly, "down in the olive grove. I think something has happened. She looked--queer."

Pam started. "Poor dear--I'll go and speak to her--only, you know, she never says a word to me about her trouble, whatever it is. I wonder----"

"Love story, of course," returned Lensky, briefly. "When a woman looks like that it always _is_ a love story."

"Yes, but--Theo is such a dear! And I know he writes to her."

"Then it isn't Theo. He's not the only man she knows."

Pam frowned thoughtfully. "That's true, but--she _is_ so beautiful."

Lensky smiled at her, and on his strangely white, shrewd, worldly-wise face the smile looked like a sudden flash of sunlight. "Yes, she _is_ without a doubt very beautiful, but----"

"'But'?"

"I think she is taking her trouble the wrong way. She is bearing it without grinning, and the grinning is to my mind the greater half."

"But remember what her surroundings at home are, Jack. She had had no discipline whatever; her mother is horrid----"

Lensky did not answer. Somehow he never cared to hold forth on the subject of mothers to his wife.

And then, thin, erect, light-footed, Pam went out from the house in which her strange childhood had been lived, and turning to her left pa.s.sed down the dangerously mossy marble steps, and into the olive grove.

CHAPTER TWO

Lady Brigit Mead was sitting on the hummocky spa.r.s.e gra.s.s under an ancient olive-tree, looking seawards. She wore a blue frock without any collar, and her face and long, round neck were very sunburnt. Her face had hardened in the last four months, and there was a tense look about her upper lip, yet an artist would have preferred her face as it now was to what it was before she had become engaged. For now the nervous strain she was living under had told on her more material beauties, leaving more room for expression, as it seemed, to the others.

It was not that her face was better, but the suffering in it was less petty than the resentment that had formerly stamped it.

The dominant characteristic in it had hitherto been disdainful bearing of small annoyances; now it showed a grim endurance of a great suffering.

"Bicky, dear," Pam asked suddenly, coming up unheard, "what is it?"

She started. "What is what?"

"Your trouble. Oh, don't tell me if you don't want to, but I can see you are suffering, and--I used to tell the d.u.c.h.ess, long ago, and it always did me good."

"Did you tell the d.u.c.h.ess about--Mr. Peele, Pam?"

The elder woman smiled and sighed. "No, my dear, I didn't. But--he was her son-in-law."

"That wasn't why." Brigit had not moved, and Pam had seen no more than her profile as she sat down.

"No, it wasn't. But then I was particularly lonely, and literally had no one to tell. Whereas," she added with brisk good sense, "you have _me_."

For several minutes there was unbroken silence, and then Brigit said slowly, "I believe you're right. And I'll tell you. It's about--myself, of course; nothing else could upset me to this extent! You know I'm engaged to Theo Joyselle. Well--I love his father."

Her voice was defiant, as if deprecating in advance any cut-and-dried disapproval.

Pam did not answer for a moment. Then "Is his mother--I mean Theo's mother--alive?" she then asked, drawing up her knees and clasping them comfortably.

"Yes."

"That--is a pity."

"A pity! Aren't you shocked and frightened?"

"I'm sure I'm not shocked, and I don't think I am frightened. Brigit, does Theo know?"

Then Brigit turned, her face white under the sunburnt skin. "No. I am--afraid to tell him."

"Afraid?"

"Yes, afraid. If I broke the engagement, Joyselle would be furious, and come and scold me."

"Surely you aren't afraid of being scolded?"

"By him, yes. If we had a row--the whole thing would come out."

"I don't see why."

The girl frowned. "You are you, and I am I. When I lose my temper I lose my head and behave like a lunatic. I'd--let it all out as sure as we both live. And then----" She broke off with a shrug.

"But, Brigit dear, I don't quite understand. What does Theo think of your being here all the winter? And the father, doesn't he think it strange?"

"No. You see, Joyselle went away from England in November, and was detained for two months; his mother was ill. When I left, I told Theo I'd write to him once a week, but that I wanted a long rest before--before I saw him again. I lied, and said I wasn't well.

"Then when Joyselle came back he wrote to me, saying I must come home. I wrote him a disagreeable note, practically telling him to mind his own business. He was angry--and besides, he was working hard, and didn't write again until this morning."

"Oh, I see."