Patricia Wentworth - Beggar’s Choice

“How did you get here?” she said at last.

“On my feet,” I answered; and then, “I’ve got a message for you.”

“You have?”

“Yes-from your husband.”

She walked past me when I said that, until she came to Uncle John’s chair with the high carved back. She took hold of it and leaned there.

I went on giving her the message:

“He told me to tell you you’d have to cross alone. He’s gone on. He said some one would meet you. That’s all.”

I didn’t want to stop there and talk to her, so I turned round and began to walk to the door. I hadn’t gone a yard before she called me back.

“Is that all you’ve got to say to me?”

“Yes, that’s all of it-he didn’t tell me anything more. I’ve given you his message.”

She didn’t ask how he had come to tell me that. She stood holding the chair and looking at me across it. She had a bright color in her cheeks, a very bright color. I wished myself well out of the affair.

“A message!” she said in a deep, scornful sort of way. “Haven’t you anything to say to me from yourself?”

“I don’t know that I have, Anna,” I said.

“Nothing?”

“Or too much,” I said.

She pushed the chair away from her.

“Say it then!” she said violently.

I shrugged my shoulders.

“Why should I? You’d better be thinking about catching your train.”

“There’s time for that,” said Anna-“and there’s time for us to talk.”

I looked at my watch.

“Not so very much, if you’re going to leave Croydon at three.” I didn’t say it to provoke her. She hadn’t even got her hat on, and I thought she’d better not miss that train.

She took offense of course. I don’t know why, because she couldn’t really think I should have anything to say which she would enjoy hearing.

“Yes,” she said, “I’m leaving Croydon at three. I’m going out of England, and I’m going out of your life. But before I go-”

My temper was getting up, and I cut in.

“For heaven’s sake, Anna,” I said, “put on your hat and go to your husband! And cut out all this futile film stuff!”

“Oh, I’m futile?” said Anna. “Futile! That’s what you think of me, is it? I suppose I was futile when I turned you out of here? Futile? I had only to say a word to Uncle John and out you went-out of his house, out of his will, out of his thoughts-out of sight, out of mind. I did that! Was that futile?”

“Don’t you think it was?” I said.

She laughed.

“I picked you up, and I threw you away! No-I haven’t done. I’m going, you know-but before I go I want you to know just how futile I’ve been. You got quite a decent job when you went away from here-didn’t you? Did you ever wonder why you didn’t keep it-and why you didn’t keep the next job, which wasn’t quite such a good one-and the next-and the next-and the next?”

I had often wondered, but I wasn’t going to say so.

“You needn’t wonder any longer. I drove you out of every job you had. When it comes from a man’s own family that he is-unreliable-” She paused. I wondered if she was frightened, for she drew back from me and put the table between us. “I drove you out of here-I drove you out of every job you had! And when I’ve driven you to prison- shall I still be-futile?”

I hadn’t meant too let her make me angry, but the blood began to sing in my ears. I was on one side of the table, and she on the other. Neither of us had heard the door open. The screen masked it. Neither of us saw my uncle and some one else come into the room. Neither of us saw or heard anything but our own anger, until all at once I saw Anna’s face change and I felt my uncle’s hand on my shoulder and heard him say in his very loudest voice,

“What’s all this-what? What’s all this, I say?”

I moved round and faced him. I moved slowly, because the whole thing was such a surprise and my mind seemed to have stuck. I couldn’t get it to work on this being my uncle’s hand on my shoulder. I had a sort of dazed feeling which was probably due to my not having had anything to eat.

After a moment I began to get there. Uncle John was clapping me on the back and saying things in a loud angry voice; but the anger wasn’t for me, it was for Anna.

“I heard what you said-what? You’re very clever at persuading people, but you can’t persuade me out of what I’ve heard with my own ears-what? You can’t do that-not if you were twice as clever as you think you are! I heard what you said to him! Do you hear that-what? I heard you with my own ears, and how you have the face to stand there and look at me, I don’t know!”

Anna was doing just what he said. She stood there, and she looked at him. The tips of her fingers just touched the table. I saw a picture once of the arrest of a Nihilist-I think it was called The Order of Arrest. I saw it when I was about ten, and it made a great impression on me. There was a girl standing behind a table, just touching it. She had big dark eyes, and she was staring out of the picture as if she was looking at something dreadful. Anna was standing and looking just like that. I suppose it was wrong of me, but I couldn’t help wondering whether she remembered the picture too. She didn’t say anything; she just looked.

My uncle turned to me.

“She was trying to make me believe you’d taken the Queen Anne bow. We’ve had a burglary, and it’s gone. She was trying to make me believe you’d taken it.”

“It’s sewn into the corner of my coat,” I said.

He let go of me and stood back. It must have been a bit of a shock. If I hadn’t been feeling so stupid, I might have broken it a bit more gently. He looked at me, and he looked at Anna, and Anna laughed.

My uncle thumped the table.

“And who put it there?” he said.

I didn’t answer him. I went over to the bureau and picked up a penknife. I thought it was time the Queen Anne bow was back in its safe. I cut a stitch, pulled the thread and broke it. The bow was pushed right down into the hem. I took it out and laid it on the table by my uncle’s hand. The setting was tarnished, and the diamonds looked dull, but the two big emeralds were like burning green water.

Anna’s eyes went to them and stayed there. I expect she was thinking they would suit her. I don’t know whether it went through her mind that she wouldn’t ever wear them now.

“Who put it in your coat?” said my uncle. Then, when I didn’t answer, he got angry and banged again. “You don’t sew, do you-what? Some one put it there, and I want to know who!”

Anna laughed and stepped back from the table.

“You are very chivalrous all of a sudden, Car! Don’t you know who sewed the bow in your coat?”

I said, “Yes. Don’t you want to catch that train of yours, Anna?”

“Train?” said my uncle. “What train? Where’s she going?”

The door opened, and William came in. He was trying to look as if he didn’t know that there was something up. I felt sorry for him-it’s his ambition to be the perfect butler, but he hasn’t got a butler’s face.

“The car’s at the door, miss,” he said. Then he tried not to look at us and went out again, fairly boiling with curiosity.

Anna saw her chance of a good exit and took it.

“I’m going to my husband,” she said in her best tragedy voice.

My uncle’s jaw dropped about half a foot.

“Your what?”

“My husband,” said Anna. “I was married to Arbuthnot Markham a fortnight ago.”

My uncle got very red in the face. He began to speak, stopped, and got redder still.

Anna looked at us both, very loftily.

“Good-by,” she said, and she began to move towards the door; but she had only got half-way, when she stopped.