CHAPTER XI—“THE SINS OF THE FATHERS”

A FEW days later, Jean, coming in from a long tramp across country in company with Nick and half a dozen dogs of various breeds, discovered Tormarin lounging in a chair by the fire. He was in riding kit, having just returned from visiting an outlying corner of the estates where his bailiff had suggested that a new plantation might be made, and Jean eyed his long supple figure with secret approval. Like most well-built Englishmen, he looked his best in kit that demanded the donning of breeches and leggings.

A fine rain was falling out of doors, and beads of moisture clung to Jean’s clothes and sparkled in the blown tendrils of russet hair which had escaped from beneath the little turban hat she was wearing. Apparently, however, her appearance did not rouse Tormarin to any reciprocal appreciation, for, after bestowing the briefest of glances upon her as she entered, he averted his eyes, concentrating his attention upon the misty ribands of smoke that drifted upwards from his cigarette.

Jean knelt down on the hearth, and, pulling off her rain-soaked gloves, held out her hands to the fire’s cheerful blaze.

“It’s good-bye to all the skating, I’m afraid,” she said regretfully. “Nick says we’re not likely to have another hard frost like the last, now that the weather has broken so completely.”

“No. It’s April next month—supposedly springtime, you know,” returned Blaise indifferently.

He seemed disinclined to talk, and Jean eyed him contemplatively. His attitude towards her baffled her as much as ever. He was unfailingly courteous and considerate, but he remained, nevertheless, unmistakably aloof, avoiding her whenever it was politely possible, and when it was not, treating her with a cool neutrality of manner that was as complete a contrast to his demeanour when they were together at Montavan as could well be imagined. Indeed, sometimes Jean almost wondered if the events of that day they spent amid the snows had really taken place—they seemed so far away, so entirely unrelated to her present life, notwithstanding the fact that she was in daily contact with the man who had shared them with her.

“It was rather uncomplimentary of you not to come skating with us a solitary once,” she remarked at last, an accent of reproach in her voice. “Was my performance on the rink at Montavan so execrable that you felt you couldn’t risk it again?”

He looked up, his glance meeting hers levelly.

“You’ve phrased it excellently,” he replied briefly. “I felt I couldn’t risk it.”

A sudden flush mounted to Jean’s face. There was no misunderstanding the significance that underlay the curt words, which, as she was vibrantly aware, bore no relation whatever to her skill, or absence of it, on the ice.

Blaise made no endeavour to relieve the awkward silence that ensued. Instead, his eyes rested upon her with a somewhat quizzical expression, as though he were rather entertained than otherwise by her evident confusion. Jean felt her indignation rising.

“It is fortunate that other people are not so—nervous,” she said disdainfully. “Otherwise I should find myself as isolated as a fever hospital.”

“It is fortunate indeed,” he agreed politely.

In the course of the three weeks which had elapsed since her arrival at Staple, Jean had dared several similar passages-at-arms with her host. Woman-like, she was bent on getting behind his guard of reticence, on forcing him into an explanation of his altered attitude towards her—since no woman can be expected to endure that a man should completely change from ill-suppressed ardour to a cool, impersonal detachment of manner, without aching to know the reason why! But in every instance Tormarin had carried off the honours of war, parrying her small thrusts with a lazy insouciance which she found galling in the extreme.

Hitherto she had encountered little difficulty in getting pretty much her own way with the men of her acquaintance; she had sufficient of the temperament and charm of the red-haired type to compass that. But her efforts to elucidate the cause of the change in Blaise Tormarin were about as prolific of result as the efforts of a butterfly at stone-breaking.

Fortunately for the preservation of peace, at this juncture there came the sound of voices, and Lady Anne entered the room, accompanied by a visitor. Her clever, grey eyes flashed quickly from Jean’s flushed face to that of her son, but, if she sensed the electricity in the atmosphere, she made no comment.

“Blaise, my dear, here is Judith,” she said pleasantly. “I found her wandering forlornly in the lanes, so I drove her back here. She has just returned from town, and for some reason her car wasn’t at the station to meet her.”

“I wired home saying what time I should reach Coombe Eavie,” explained the new-comer. “But as I was rather late reaching Waterloo, I rashly entrusted the wire to a small boy to send off for me, and I’m afraid he’s played me false. I should have had to trudge the whole way back to Willow Ferry if Lady Anne hadn’t happened along.”

Lady Anne turned to Jean, and, laying an affectionate hand on her arm, drew her forward.

“Jean, let me introduce you to Mrs. Craig. My new acquisition, Judith, she went on contentedly. A daughter. I always told you I wanted one. Now I’ve borrowed someone else’s.”

Jean found herself shaking hands with a slender, distinctive-looking woman who moved with a slow, languorous grace that was almost snake-like in its peculiar suppleness.

She gave one the impression that she had no bones in her body, or that if she had, they had never hardened properly but still retained the pliability of cartilage.

She was somewhat sallow—the consequence, it transpired later, of long residence in India—with sullen, slate-coloured eyes, appearing almost purple in shadow, and a straight, thin-lipped mouth. Jean decided that she was not in the least pretty, though attractive in an odd, feline way, and that she must be about thirty-two. As a matter of fact, Judith Craig was forty, but no one would have guessed it—and she would certainly not have confided it.

Presently Nick, who had been personally supervising the feeding of his beloved dogs, joined the party, greeting Mrs. Craig with the easy informality of an old friend, and shortly afterwards Baines brought in the tea-things.

“And where is Burke?” enquired Blaise, of Mrs. Craig, as he handed her tea. “Didn’t he come back with you?”

“Geoffrey? Oh, no. He’s not coming down till the end of April. You know he detests Willow Ferry in the winter—‘beastly wet swamp,’ he calls it! He’s dividing his time between London and Leicestershire—London, while that long frost stopped all hunting.”

Mrs. Craig was evidently on a footing of long-established intimacy with the Staple household, and Jean, listening quietly to the interchange of news and of little personal happenings, regarded her with rather critical interest. She was not altogether sure that she liked her, but she was quite sure that, wherever her lot might be cast, Judith Craig would never occupy the position of a nonentity. She had considerable charm of manner, and there was a quite unexpected fascination about her smile—unexpected, because, when in repose, her thin lips lay folded together in a straight and somewhat forbidding line, whereas the moment they relaxed into a smile they assumed the most delightful curves, and two little lines, which should have been dimples but were not, cleft each cheek on either side of the mouth.

All at once Mrs. Craig turned to Jean as though she had made up her mind about something over which she had been hesitating.

“Have I seen you anywhere before?” she asked, her charming smile softening the abruptness of the question. “Your face is so extraordinarily familiar.”

Jean shook her head.

“I don’t think so,” she answered. “I’m sure I should remember you if we had met anywhere. Besides, I’ve lived abroad all my life; this is only my first visit to England.”

“I think I can explain,” said Lady Anne. There was a deliberateness about her manner that suggested she was about to make a statement which she was aware would be of some special interest to at least one of the party. “Jean is Glyn Peterson’s daughter; so of course you see a likeness, Judith.”

Jean, glancing enquiringly across at Mrs. Craig, was startled at the sudden change in her face produced by Lady Anne’s simple announcement. The sallow skin seemed to pale—almost wither, like a cut flower that needs water—and the lips that had been parted in a smile stiffened slowly into their accustomed straight line.

“Of course”—Mrs. Craig’s voice sounded flat and she swallowed once or twice before she spoke—“that must be it. I—knew your father, Miss Peterson.”

To Jean, always sensitive to the emotional quality of the atmosphere, it seemed as though some current of hostility, of malevolence, leapt at her through the innocent-sounding speech. “I knew your father.” It was quite ridiculous, of course, but the words sounded almost like a threat.

She had no answer ready, and a brief silence followed. Then Lady Anne bridged the awkward moment with some commonplace, adroitly steering the conversation into smoother waters, and a few minutes later Mrs. Craig rose to go.

“I’ll see you across the park, Judith,” volunteered Nick, and he and his mother accompanied her out of the room.

In the hall, Lady Anne detained her visitor an instant with a light hand on her arm, while Nick foraged for his own particular headgear, amongst the family assortment of hats and caps.

“Jean is a dear girl, Judith,” she said earnestly. “I want you to be friends with her. Don’t”—pleadingly—“visit the sins of the fathers on the children.”

“Why, no, I shouldn’t,” replied Mrs. Craig, with apparent frankness. “It was only that, for the moment, it was rather a shock to learn that she was—that woman’s—child.”

“Of course it was,” acquiesced Lady Anne. “Good-bye, dear Judith.”

But notwithstanding Mrs. Craig’s assurances, a troubled look lingered in Lady Anne’s grey eyes long after her guest’s departure.