Patricia Wentworth - Beggar’s Choice

“It would have been rather fun to see them together,” thought Corinna, whilst Mr. Carthew produced a large photograph album and proceeded to show her photographs of Annie as a child, with all her hair drawn back like the pictures of Alice in Wonderland, and a frilled apron and white stockings with colored stripes on them. There were also portraits of Annie’s parents, culminating in a terrific one of Annie’s mother in a Victorian widow’s cap and a large black cashmere shawl. Corinna glanced from the photograph to Anna standing over by the far window. She was very like this handsome domineering old lady. She had the same fine, decided arch of the brow, the same abundant hair, the same dark eyes; and when she, too, was a grandmother, one could quite easily picture her with the same hooked nose, bitten-in lips, and air of authority.

Mr. Carthew passed to a water-color sketch of the church in which he had married Annie. It had been painted by Annie’s younger sister Ellen. He began to tell her all about Ellen’s deplorable marriage to a fellow of positively Socialist opinions.

Anna stood at the window and looked across to Linwood Edge. The sky was full of light. The trees showed no sign of turning. The scent of mignonette and heliotrope came in through the open window. The air was summer air, but she shivered a little as it touched her. She wasn’t really seeing the trees, or the sky, or any outside thing at all; she was looking into her own mind and seeing just to what place she had brought herself-and Car.

It was a narrow, difficult place. If she took the next step forward, she could never go back any more. She had planned and schemed to bring herself to this place, but now that she had reached it, her heart beat and her senses shrank. She could still go back. Uncle John was showing photographs. He might go on showing them for half an hour. If he did, that would be half an hour’s respite. But she couldn’t count on it. At any moment he might look up and call to her, “Anna, where are my keys? Bless my soul, what have I done with my keys?” Even then it wouldn’t be too late. There were things that she could say. If her imagination had not always been so ready to furnish her with things to say, she would not have come to this dark, difficult place.

She still had time, but it was slipping away. Every moment seemed to pass slowly, and each new moment might be the moment of decision. It hadn’t ever been like this before. She couldn’t remember any other time when she had stood with a space cleared before her and waited, not knowing for certain what she was going to do. She had always before been pushed-driven, without time to think, so that when she could think again it was too late to go back.

Sometimes it was fear that had driven her. She could not bear not to be praised and admired. The child, covering a fault with a quick lie, had grown into the woman who would ruin a man because he had slighted her.

She had not meant to ruin Car; she had only meant to force him into marrying her. Her wild accusation had not been premeditated. She had seen him look at Isobel, and had rushed from a passionate quarrel with him to his uncle, not caring what she said. Her reputation didn’t matter. Nothing mattered except to damn Car in his uncle’s eyes. Uncle John would make him marry her, or he would drive him from Linwood and from Isobel. After three years, she still did not know just why she had done it. Anger swept you away, and you did things, and then you couldn’t go back. It had been like that ever since. She had said things that she had not meant to say, spoken aloud thoughts that she had played with-dangerously. She had acted, and been carried away by her own acting. But now she had come to a moment in which all the heat of anger, all the glamour and thrill of drama, were stripped away, and there was only fear left. If she went on, Car… She saw him in the dock, in prison. She saw him changed, coarsened, spoilt. She saw herself in the witness-box-a slim, black frock, a small, black hat, a pale profile, her emerald ring, her hands very white; Car looking at her; the judge’s voice sentencing him.

The picture broke at the thrust of a stabbing pain. If she went back-she could still go back. Another picture rose up vivid and clear-Car at the chancel of Linwood church with Isobel’s hand in his, and Car’s voice saying “to have and to hold from this day forward.” The pain stabbed again. Forward-the word stayed with her-Forward. She wasn’t going back whatever happened. You couldn’t really go back. She had been a fool to think of it. What? After all she had done and all she had made Bobby do? With all her plans ready and only one more step to take?

She lifted her head and saw the outer world again-the very blue sky, the green, smooth slopes running down to meet the trees, the sunshine flooding everything with gold. Her color was bright and steady as she turned at Mr. Carthew’s call.

“Anna-where are my keys? I want to open the safe. Bless my soul, what have I done with them?”

Mr. Carthew, having successfully conducted Corinna through a complete photographic record of his married life, had arrived at the next stage of the proceedings.

“People say one oughtn’t to keep jewelry in the house, but I’ve had all my servants for years, and I trust them all just as I’d trust myself. And besides, a safe’s a safe-what? No good having one if it won’t keep a burglar out-that’s what I say. Besides, I shouldn’t like to think of my wife’s things put away in a bank. Some of ’em were my mother’s, and some of ’em were her mother’s, and they’ve always been in this house, and they’ll stay in it as long as I’m here myself.”

“And no one wears them?” said Corinna. “Not ever?”

“No one’s got the right to wear them,” said Mr. Carthew gruffly. He dropped his voice, but he looked at Anna for a moment, and Corinna looked too; but Anna did not know that they were looking at her.

“I love seeing jewelry,” said Corinna quickly. “Is there much?”

Mr. Carthew turned back the leaves of the album.

“She wore my mother’s necklace to go to Court in-you can see it here. And the stars are what I gave her when we were married. But you can’t see the Queen Anne bow, because it is on the other side of the bodice. Stupid of the photographer-what? But I’ll show it to you.”

“What is it?” asked Corinna.

“Aha! It’s an heirloom. You’re American-Americans like old things, don’t they? It’s a bow of diamonds-very fine stones-and a big emerald in the middle of it, with another one hanging down as a drop. Queen Anne gave it to my great-great-great-grandfather. And if you want to know why, I can’t tell you, but it had something to do with some state secret-and if you ask me, I should say it was probably not anything very creditable, because there was a lot of dirty work going on, and the higher up you were, the more dishonest you were. So perhaps it’s just as well we don’t know any more about it. But it’s a handsome piece of jewelry, and the emeralds are worth a lot of money. You shall see it for yourself. Now where are my keys? Anna- where are my keys? I’m going to open the safe.”

Anna turned from the window and came down the room.

“Your keys, Uncle John? Haven’t you got them?”

“Should I ask for ’ em if I ’d got ’em?”

Anna smiled.

“Well, you might. Aren’t they in your pocket? Or-did you put them down under those albums?”

“Why should I do that?”

“I don’t know.” She smiled again, and found the keys under the corner of the largest photograph album.

Mr. Carthew took them, letting them swing and jingle.

“Pull down the blinds and put on the light,” he said.

Corinna found it all very exciting. The library door was locked, the blinds pulled down, and all the electric lights put on. Then Mr. Carthew mounted three steps of a book-ladder, took down the portrait of Mrs.Carthew which hung above the mantel piece, stood it to one side of the black marble shelf, selected a key, and put it into a keyhole which hardly showed on the smooth, dark paneling.