CHAPTER VII AN ULTIMATUM

It had just grown dark when Lily returned to the Palace Hotel, and the hall was quite full of muffled folk, whose arguments upon the events of the day waxed hot and eloquent. Some of these turned their heads as the "pretty little woman" went by; but the many were too interested in their narration of particular exploits to notice her. Upstairs, she found her sitting-room in darkness, but she knew, even before she had switched on the electric light, that it was not untenanted, and presently she discovered her husband, Luton, sitting by the window and smiling a little sardonically while he waited for her to speak.

Eight months had passed since they had met, and time had not been kind to him. He looked very old, she thought, and his red hair was sown with grey. A fine man physically, he had lost flesh, and his clothes bagged upon his arms and chest. One characteristic remained—the evil of a face which had expressed little but evil since his childhood.

"Well," he said—and he had never been famous for his eloquence—"well, Lil, you didn't expect to see me, I suppose. Rather an unpleasant surprise for you, isn't it?"

She took off her furs and laid them upon a chair. The room had become insufferably hot, and she would have opened the window had he not barred the way. But all her instinct forbade her to approach him, and she had need of her courage that he might not see her trembling.

"What do you want of me?" she rejoined in a cold voice—and then: "Why do you come here?"

He liked the idea of it, and leaning back in the chair, laughed as though it were the drollest of notions.

"A man comes to see his wife, and she doesn't offer him the tips of her beautiful fingers! 'Pon my word, Lil, you look splendid when you stand like that—and since you press me, I will take a whisky-and-soda and a cigar just for luck."

She ignored the request and advancing a little nearer to him, repeated the question:

"Why do you come to me? Was it not understood that you should not come; was not that part of the bargain?"

He shrugged his shoulders, but his face flushed none the less.

"Bargain be d——d! I'm in a hole—nine thousand four hundred pounds with Bothand and Co.—you remember them? I bought your emeralds there. Well, they talk of fraud and all that sort of stuff. I'll have to pay them, Lil—it's jail if I don't."

She knew that it would be some story of this kind, and was relieved, it may be, to find it no worse. His exaggerations had ceased to alarm her, and she believed little of what he told her.

"You have had five thousand pounds from me in two years," she said quietly. "I am now making you an allowance of a thousand a year. If there is a duty in the matter, God knows I have done it. More I will not, whatsoever the consequences—you know that I cannot; it is quite impossible."

He nodded his head, and, failing the cigar, took a cigarette from his case and lighted it.

"Why don't you ask the old man?" he retorted. "I tell you, Lil, this is business, and if I don't pay in ten days' time, there'll be mischief. You don't mean to say you'd send me to prison for nine thousand pounds—your beautiful father wouldn't disgrace his daughter for a trifle like that? I've been pretty considerate, I must say. It's nearly a year since I came to you, and then for twopence-halfpenny which I had to beg on my knees. By ——, you're becoming a Jew, my dear, a devilish pretty little Jew—that's what it is."

She turned from him with contempt.

"You have my answer," she said. "I will continue to pay you a thousand a year while you leave me as I am. But I will not pay more, whatever the consequences. That is final and irrevocable. If you come to me at this hotel again, you shall never receive another penny. The understanding was made, and I will have it kept. Have I not suffered enough at your hands; is there to be no end to a woman's patience? You have ceased to be anything to me but a name—take care that I do not forbid you even that right."

He smiled provokingly.

"You dare not do it, my dear; the old man wouldn't have it. Devilish proud old boy, Sir Frederick Kennaird, eh? His hair would turn grey if you talked about the courts—he told me so himself. He'll have to pay Bothand and look pleased. I shall write to him myself if you don't; tell him you're sailing under false colours here, and the men dancing at your heels. Eh, what, wouldn't that be the truth? Why, I saw you on the snow with two of them this morning, and I laughed. This paragon of virtue nods sometimes, eh? Well, I don't complain; I'm meek as a lamb. And I'm going to have nine thousand four hundred inside ten days, or there'll be a story at the New Bailey and you'll figure in it, my dear—for, you see, I used your name and they're not the kind of people to forget it. No, by gad, we'll sink or swim together—so help me Heaven!"

Her anger had been growing while he spoke and now quite mastered her. The gentle lady had become the proud woman, full of courage and resolution.

"You are one of the worst of men," she said in a low voice. "I thought and believed that you had gone from my life; I now see how much I was mistaken. But I shall live now for nothing else. If you come here again, I will appeal to the people of the hotel for protection. You tell me that you have been guilty of fraud, and I can quite believe it. But understand: I will write no letter to my father, take no steps whatever to save you, and if you are punished, I will be the first to rejoice. Go now, and let that be my answer."

He was not at all alarmed.

"Oh," he said, rising jauntily, "I'm going all right; but I'm up at Vermala if you want me. Remember it's nine thousand four hundred, and the old man can pay Bothand and Co. direct if he likes. I pawned the stuff in your name, and they say it's fraud. Well, we shall have the 'tecs out here in a day or two and there'll be some fun. They can extradite the pair of us, and you'd have to go back with me. I say, Lil, that would make the old man sit up, wouldn't it? There'd be a harvest home at Kennaird Court, now wouldn't there? I'd write to him, if I were you—there's a day or two yet; but the game will be up if they get a warrant. Think it over, my sweet love, take the advice of the little bounder in black, who was holding you so tight this morning, if you like. He'll tell you what to do better than I can. A man will know that I wouldn't take it so lightly if the money were coming to me; no, by the Lord, I'd be singing another tune then, and one you'd understand. But these d——d jewellers must have their bit—there's no help for it."

He laughed again at the idea; and repeating the intimation that he was staying at the hotel at Vermala under the name of Faikes, who had been an old valet of his, he held out his hand to her; and when she would not take it, he laughed loudly at the rebuff. But he did not remain with her, and when he had passed out of the hotel, he stood a little while looking up at her window, and his face became grave and wistful. What a beautiful woman she was, and what a mess he had made of his own life! Perchance his hatred against her welled up because of that great gulf between them; the gulf of a woman's will and character, of her pity and patience bestowed upon him once as a priceless gift, but now forever withdrawn. His own future lay in the chasms; he would tread the high paths no more.

Lily, his wife, stood meanwhile just where he had left her. This new story of shame rang in her ears as a knell. No longer doubtful, she knew that it was true, and she believed him when he said that he would drag her also to the abyss. Her father remained their last hope; but what would Sir Frederick Kennaird say to such a letter as she must now write him? What would his answer be?

Assuredly the old baronet would declare that the arrangement entered into with his daughter had been final and that Luton Delayne must answer for his own dishonesty. She believed it would be so; and it seemed to her, as her tears fell upon the page, that the sins of the man lay heavy upon her, and that she must make atonement.