She Came Back (9 page)

For the first time for many years Nellie Collins found herself considered as a person of importance. It went to her head a little. There was quite a bright colour in her cheeks as she said,

“And that’s what I as good as told him. ‘You couldn’t take me in,’ I said—‘not if it was ever so.’ He laughed very pleasantly, I must say, and said, ‘You’re very positive, Miss Collins’—that’s my name, Nellie Collins. And I said ‘Of course I am,’ but I didn’t tell him why. Only it stands to reason when you’ve had a child from five years old, and washed it and dressed it, and done everything, well, if there’s anything to know about it you’d know it—wouldn’t you?”

Miss Silver was in the act of saying “Yes, indeed,” when the train once more drew up. But this time the platform was crowded. Almost before it was really safe the door had been wrenched open and a number of people poured into the compartment, not only filling the seats, but taking up all the standing room.

Miss Silver put away her knitting, and Nellie Collins picked up her newspaper. Further conversation was impossible.

But when they arrived at Waterloo Miss Collins turned back upon the platform to bid Miss Silver a polite good-bye.

“It’s always so pleasant to have company on a journey. Perhaps we shall meet again if you are coming down to see your niece.”

Miss Silver’s small, neat features expressed a polite response. It was exceedingly improbable that she would repeat her visit to Gladys—at least not for a considerable time—but she did not think it necessary to say so.

“I am quite near the station. Anyone would direct you— The Lady’s Workbox—lavender and blue curtains. And my name is Collins—Nellie Collins.”

Miss Silver could do no less than reciprocate, and at once Nellie Collins was opening her bag and finding pencil and paper.

“Do please write it down for me. I am so bad at remembering names.”

Miss Silver wrote her name in a clear, legible hand. After a moment’s thought she added the address—15 Montague Mansions, West Leaham St.

Miss Collins tucked the slip of paper away behind the little mirror which fitted a pocket in the side of her bag. Then she shook hands rather effusively.

“I do hope we shall meet again!”

Miss Silver said nothing. She was frowning a little as she walked down the platform to give up her ticket. Some way ahead of her amongst the crowd she could see the bunch of bright blue flowers in Nellie Collins’ hat. It appeared, disappeared, and reappeared like something bobbing up and down in a choppy sea. Presently she lost sight of it. Really the platform was very crowded—very crowded indeed. So many of those nice American soldiers. Canadians too. French sailors in their very becoming caps—only really more like tam o’ shanters, with the red bobble on the top. And Poles— curious to see their skins, not fair at all against that very fair hair. All most interesting, and quite cosmopolitan. She glanced up at the clock and saw that it was already ten minutes to four. As she dropped her eyes she caught a last glimpse of blue in the crowd. It might have been the bunch of flowers on Nellie Collins’ hat, or it might not. She could never be sure.

Miss Silver continued on her way. Her pleasure in the anticipation of an agreeable tea-party was very slightly tinged by something to which she could hardly have given a name. Miss Nellie Collins had interested her—she had interested her very much. She would have liked to witness her meeting with Lady Jocelyn. That was the worst of not being tall— one’s outlook in a crowd was limited, sadly limited. To no one but herself would Miss Silver have admitted that her lack of inches might be a handicap. In point of fact, a crowd was the only place in which she had ever felt it to be one. In all other circumstances she stood firmly on her dignity and found it a perfectly adequate support.

She entered a room in which three or four people were talking, and was very warmly received by her hostess, Janice Albany, who had not so very long ago been Janice Meade.

“Garth is hopeless for tea, but he asked to be remembered, and he is so sorry to miss you… Mr. and Mrs. Murgatroyd… And this is Lyndall Armitage—she’s a sort of cousin.”

The Murgatroyds were both immense. Mr. Murgatroyd was jovial. He laughed and said,

“What sort of cousin, Mrs. Albany?”

Janice laughed too. Her hair with its close crop of curls caught the light. Her eyes matched the curls exactly.

“The sort you say is a very near relation, if you like them. Lyn is a very near relation.”

Miss Silver shook hands, and began to make polite enquiries about Colonel Albany, about the six-months-old baby who had been christened Michael after the inventor of harschite, and about Colonel Albany’s aunt, Miss Sophy Fell. It appeared that Garth was well, and very busy at the War Office—“Of course he doesn’t get home till all hours”—and that Michael was down at Bourne with Miss Sophy. “Better for him than being in London. And I go up and down. I’ve been lucky enough to get my own old Nanny, so I do a part-time job up here and keep an eye on Garth.”

Two or three more people dropped in. Miss Silver found herself sitting next to Lyndall, and in the most natural way in the world was very soon in possession of the facts that Miss Armitage was in the Wrens, that she had been ill and was at present on sick leave—“but I do so want to get back to work.”

Miss Silver had a penchant for girls. She looked kindly at Lyndall and said,

“But you must make the most of your leave. Time which is being spent pleasantly passes surprisingly fast, does it not?”

“Oh, yes.”

Miss Silver became aware that time was passing neither pleasantly nor quickly for Lyndall Armitage. She was pale, there were shadows under her eyes. Of course she had been ill, but no passing illness gives a young girl’s eyes that patient look. Miss Silver was sorry to see it there. She said,

“You are staying with friends?”

“With a cousin. At least I suppose she isn’t really my cousin, but the aunt who brought me up is her aunt too, because Lilla married her nephew, Perry Jocelyn.” When she had got as far as that she broke off, smiled a little shyly, and said, “It sounds dreadfully complicated, doesn’t it?”

Miss Silver said in a bright voice,

“Family relationships are always difficult to explain to a stranger. Did you say that your cousin’s name was Jocelyn?”

“Yes.”

“Dear me! Do you know that is quite a coincidence. I happened to travel back to town today with a Miss Collins who was going up to meet Lady Jocelyn.”

Lyndall undoubtedly looked surprised and just a little startled.

“Lady Jocelyn?”

Miss Silver gave her slight deprecating cough.

“Is she, perhaps, a relative also?”

“Yes—she is my cousin Philip’s wife.”

It was said with the extreme of simplicity, and not until the words were there floating in the air between her and Miss Silver did it occur to Lyndall that they were not true. Philip was no more her cousin than Perry was, but whereas it was quite simple to explain Perry, she found it impossible to explain Philip. There was no cousinship between them, but take that tie away, and it left too many others. She could not speak his name without feeling them pull at her heart.

Miss Silver, watching her with attention, was aware of something that was hurt and winced away. No one less experienced in observation, less sensitive to atmosphere, would have noticed it at all. It was the slightest, the most momentary thing—not, she thought, because it was evanescent in character, but because there was a strong habit of control.

Almost without any pause at all Lyndall was saying,

“But Anne wouldn’t be meeting anyone today—at least I don’t see how she could. They are just moving into a flat in Tenterden Gardens. She was only coming up from Jocelyn’s Holt this afternoon, after seeing things off from there. Lilla Jocelyn, the cousin I’m staying with, has gone round to help her unpack. I don’t see how she can have been meeting Miss Collins.”

“Miss Collins was certainly expecting to meet Lady Jocelyn—” Miss Silver paused and added, “under the clock at Waterloo.”

Lyndall looked at her rather blankly. She was feeling as if she had missed a step in the dark. Jarred, surprised, not quite knowing where she was—it was just like that. In her mind she was looking at a thin line of light along the edge of a door. The door wasn’t quite shut. The light ran along the edge of it like a fine gold wire. She heard a voice say, “You might just as well let me write to Nellie Collins.” It might have been Anne’s voice, but she wasn’t sure—she couldn’t get nearer to it than that. And a man said, “That is not for you to say.” The inexplicable feeling of fear and shame which had come on her in the passage behind the hairdresser’s shop touched her again. She gave a little quick shiver and said,

“Won’t you have some more tea? Please let me take your cup.”

After that someone else came in. She didn’t have to sit down by Miss Silver again. Mrs. Murgatroyd caught hold of her as she passed. And all Mrs. Murgatroyd ever wanted was someone who would listen whilst she talked about her daughter Edith, and Edith’s truly remarkable baby.

It was to be supposed that Edith also had a husband somewhere, but he never emerged. The endless theme was Edith, and Edith’s complexion, her features, talents, and activities— her marvellous baby, and his features, talents, and activities—what Sir Ponsonby Canning had said about Edith at her first ball—what Captain Wilmot had said when he proposed to her within half an hour of being introduced—what Amory had said when he asked if he might paint her portrait. It went on, and on, and on in a gentle unending flow, and all you had to do was to look appreciative and say “How marvellous!” every now and then. Lyndall had had plenty of practice. She couldn’t, in fact, remember a time when she hadn’t known the Murgatroyds, and Mrs. Murgatroyd had always talked about Edith. The only difference was that as Mr. and Mrs. Murgatroyd became steadily fatter year by year even in war-time, so did Edith’s perfections continually increase.

Lyndall sat with her eyes fixed attentively upon Mrs. Murgatroyd’s face, which was large and round and pale, and sometimes reminded her too much of a crumpet.

Mrs. Murgatroyd thought her a very good listener. She felt affectionately towards Lyndall, and patted her hand in the kindest manner when Pelham Trent presently appeared to take her on to see The Dancing Years.

The flat which the Jocelyns had taken was a furnished one. They settled into it almost as easily as if it had been their own and they were returning to it after a brief absence. Philip, profoundly unhappy and holding his mind relentlessly to a new and very exacting job, yet found himself unable to bar out the thought that three and a half years in a French village had developed in Anne a talent for organization which he certainly hadn’t supposed her to possess. The girl who had dropped her hat, her coat, her scarf, just where she found it convenient to discard them had changed into the woman who with the minimum of household help kept their flat orderly and shining—the girl who probably had boiled a kettle and possibly an egg or a potato into the woman who produced delightful meals from war-time ingredients. When he proposed bringing Mrs. Ramage up to town she wouldn’t hear of it—“She’d be quite dreadfully unhappy. And there’s no need—I can cook.”

“Since when?” said Philip, and got a limpid look from steady blue eyes.

“Since I was in France, darling. Quite a good place to learn, don’t you think?”

The little scene left a flavour behind it—the kind of flavour which is hardly there but lingers on the palate. For the rest, things would go more easily than at Jocelyn’s Holt. They would not have to sit alone together in a horrid travesty of the solitude à deux. There was nearly always work to be finished at home. He could bring a man back with him. Anne could see her friends. She was busy ringing people up, asking one to lunch, another to tea—picking up the threads which had been dropped nearly four years ago. These activities were a great relief to Philip. The fuller Anne’s life was, the less strain was placed on their relationship. The last thing he desired was the concentration of thought and interest upon himself or upon his work. That the latter was highly confidential and could not afford a meeting-ground hardly affected the position, since he would in any case have kept the door locked upon his private affairs.

Unfortunately Anne did not appear to see this. He could imagine her having been brought up on the simple axiom, “Always talk to men about their work—they like it.” From what he had ever heard of her mother, she was just the sort of woman to say just that sort of thing. He was forced at last into a blunt,

“I can’t talk about my job—and anyhow it would bore you stiff.”

She looked a shade reproachful.

“It wouldn’t-—really. But—do you mean—it’s—secret?”

She saw him frown. He controlled his voice to say,

“Most staff work is confidential. Anyhow I’m at it all day— I wouldn’t want to talk about it if it was as public as Hyde Park.”

“I thought men liked to talk about their work.”

He turned a sheet of the Times and made no answer.

That was the first evening in the flat. It was also the evening on which Nellie Collins did not come home.

Mrs. Smithers rang up the police in the morning.

“My landlady, Miss Collins—she hasn’t come home. I really don’t know what to make of it at all.”

In the police station Sergeant Brown, a family man, employed a soothing voice.

“How long has she been gone?”

“Since yesterday afternoon!” said Mrs. Smithers in an angry voice. “Most inconsiderate and uncalled for—leaving me alone in the house like this! And her shop not opened, and not my business to open it of course, nor yet to take in the milk, only being war-time, I couldn’t be expected to let it go to waste!”

Sergeant Brown said, “No.” And then, “Just when did you say Miss Collins left?”

“Early yesterday afternoon. Went off in her best coat and skirt, and told me she was going up to meet a friend. Nothing about not coming back, or hoping it wouldn’t put me out if she stayed in town—nothing like that! And here it’s ten o’clock, and not a word to say where she is or when she’s coming back, and I don’t consider it’s treating me right!”

Mrs. Smithers sounded so much annoyed that Sergeant Brown found himself saying the word “accident.”

“She may have met with an accident.”

“Then why can’t she say so?” said Mrs. Smithers in a tearing temper.

By the time that Sergeant Brown hung up the receiver he was feeling a little sorry for Miss Collins. She was going to need something very substantial in the way of an accident if she wished to placate Mrs. Smithers. He began to ring up the London hospitals. When none of them knew anything about a middle-aged lady in a bright blue coat and skirt and a black hat with a bunch of blue flowers on it, he rang up Scotland Yard.