Читать книгу The Way of These Women - E. Phillips Oppenheim - Страница 4

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Jermyn Annerley was, in the parlance of the gossiping journalists of the day, a very interesting figure in Society. He was tall, and he had the good looks which go with clean-cut features a little on the large side, a very sensitive mouth, and deep-set, keen, but rather introspective grey eyes. He had done exceedingly well at college but had distinguished himself chiefly at athletics. Nothing, the sporting critics declared, but a certain lack of enthusiasm had prevented him from becoming one of the most brilliant amateur batsmen of the day. He had actually, however, had the astounding strength of will to give up cricket altogether for two years, which he spent in travelling, and a curious inclination to regard the same as a recreation rather than as an all-engrossing pursuit had more than once mystified the little body of gentlemen who from the neighbourhood of St. John’s Wood controlled the cricket destinies of their country. He had never entered a profession, and although he had gone out to South Africa as a matter of course, the army as a career presented no attractions to him. He had written a novel which was too clever to be successful, a few articles in the reviews which had attracted a great deal of attention, and the most popular Society comedy of the day. He was known to be rich, he was unmarried, charming to all women, but obviously unimpressionable. The worst thing that had been said about him was that he was a prig.

He stood now at the open door, waiting to receive his guests, composed and yet a little eager as his eyes followed the approach of the car. The woman who stood by his side watched him curiously from underneath the lace of the parasol which she held over her head. From the first she had been suspicious of the coming of this girl.

‘Who is Lucille?’ Sybil Cluley asked, as the automobile glided around the last bend of the avenue.

‘Duchesse de Sayers,’ Lord Lakenham replied. ‘She is a sort of cousin of ours—was an Aynesworth, you know. She married a Frenchman who turned out a regular rotter, and divorced him. She hates her name and hates her title, so nearly every one calls her Lucille. Great pal of Jermyn’s.’

The car drew up in front of the house. Jermyn held out both his hands to Sybil as he assisted her to alight.

‘This is delightful!’ he exclaimed. ‘I shall never be able to make sufficient apologies for not having been at the station to receive you, but if there is a greater autocrat in this world than your enemy the call-boy, it is the captain of a county cricket team. Mary, you’ve grown since last week, but you’ve got to kiss me all the same because I’m your host. Glad to see you, Lakenham. We didn’t expect you till the later train. Miss Cluley,’ he went on, ‘I want to present you to my far-away cousin, who is good enough to be hostess for me sometimes—the Duchesse de Sayers.’

‘I am very glad to welcome you to Annerley,’ Lucille said slowly, as she held out her hand. ‘I have been anxious to meet you ever since I saw your wonderful performance in Jermyn’s play.’

‘Miss Cluley and I are much too modest for that sort of thing,’ Jermyn laughed. ‘There is some tea on the other side of the house, in the gardens. I hope that you want yours, Mary, as badly as I do. Come along.’

There was some further interchange of conventional speeches and they all moved slowly together into the great hall. Jermyn led the way across the white stone flags, smooth with age and shining like marble, past the broad staircase, to where at the end of a corridor, through an open door, was a vista of terraced gardens, cool and brilliant.

‘I do hope that you will like it here,’ he whispered in Sybil’s ear. ‘I have been looking forward so much to your visit.’

She raised her eyes to his and he was suddenly struck with the new thing which he saw there. It was the look of a frightened animal, the weak craving protection from the strong.

‘It will be lovely,’ she answered. ‘I am sure that it will be lovely.’

‘You have felt the heat, I am afraid? It must have been a terribly trying journey.’

She shook her head.

‘It was nothing,’ she replied. ‘I had a good many things to see to before I could get away, and travelling generally gives me a headache. Directly I sit down in your garden it will have passed.’

‘My garden,’ he murmured, ‘shall be like the garden of the Eastern sage. When you open the gate and step inside, all manner of evil things shall pass away.’

The corridor was hung with portraits. Right over the door through which they were to pass the face of a man in scarlet uniform frowned down upon them.

‘Who is that?’ she asked a little sharply.

He glanced up carelessly.

‘A great-uncle—the third Marquis of Lakenham—Lakenham’s grandfather, by-the-bye.’

She shivered distinctly. Once more he caught the look in her eyes which had puzzled him.

‘I am afraid,’ he remarked, smiling, ‘that you don’t like the look of my ancestors?’

She glanced cautiously around. The others had paused for a moment while Mary made friends with some dogs.

‘I do not like Lord Lakenham,’ she whispered. ‘No, don’t look so horrified, please. Of course he hasn’t been rude to me, or anything of that sort, but I heard of him once—I didn’t like what I heard. He—somehow he frightens me.’

Jermyn looked genuinely distressed.

‘My dear Sybil,’ he exclaimed, ‘I am so sorry! It is quite a fluke his being here. I had no idea, even, that he was coming until yesterday. He is on his way to Scotland. To-morrow I will give him a hint.’

She shook her head.

‘You mustn’t,’ she begged. ‘He would guess at once. Don’t say anything. This is really quite foolish, you know, and I am very, very sorry,’ she added, a little wistfully.

He drew her arm through his.

‘Come,’ he insisted, ‘let us forget it. I am longing to show you my gardens. Those cedar trees are over five hundred years old. The critics, you amongst them sometimes, tell me often that I am too imaginative. Tell me, if you had been brought up in their shadow, in these gardens, wouldn’t you, too, open your heart to fancies?’

They had passed now through the doorway and she looked around her in mingled amazement and delight. This was really the front of the house, surrounded by a long, stone-flagged walk, bordered on the garden side by a low ivy-grown terrace. Before them were steps leading on to the lawn; shelving gardens, brilliant with colour, dropped to the lake; and beyond the lake, the woods. The lawn upon which they stood was as smooth as velvet, green with the eternal green of age. Beneath the cedar trees were many cushioned chairs and a glittering tea equipage; upon another table jugs of cool drinks and bowls of fruit.

‘It is wonderful,’ she murmured. ‘It is a little Paradise, this, in which you live.’

For one marvellous moment she forgot. The change from her little flat in Kensington, which she had scarcely left for many months of unceasing work and anxiety, was too complete. It was indeed like fairyland to her. Then Lakenham’s voice behind—a loud, strident voice—struck fear once more into her heart.

‘Let’s go and find your sister, Miss Mary. Just like Jermyn to make off with her like this. Come and see fair play. And, Parkes, before you do another thing mix me a large whisky-and-soda with a chunk of ice, please.’

Sybil half closed her eyes. Her fairyland seemed to be crumpling up. Jermyn watched her with a shade of real anxiety upon his face.

‘He isn’t really so bad, dear,’ he whispered, ‘and we’ll escape nearly all the time.’

Once more she looked up at him with that self-same air, the air of the child who seeks protection.

‘Escape!’ she faltered. ‘Yes, we must escape!’