The Phantom Lover Part 7

Micky was yawning over the paper then; he looked up with an absurdly blank face.

"Oh, I say!--well, I can't go, anyway. What was it for? I'm going out--I've got an important appointment."

Driver never showed surprise at anything if he felt it.

"It was a musical 'At 'Ome,' sir," he answered stolidly. "Shall I ring up and say that you won't be able to come?"

"Yes, ring up," said Micky. He coloured self-consciously beneath the man's stoic eyes and hurriedly buried his head again in the newspaper.

At three o'clock he changed his clothes for an immaculate morning-coat and grey trousers; then, remembering what Esther had said about the very horrid boarding-house, he changed them again for the oldest tweed suit in his possession, and a pair of brown boots that had seen their best days and long since been condemned by Driver.

"How in the world do I get to Brixton?" Micky asked the man when he was ready. "I know I could take a taxicab, but I don't want to. What other ways are there?"

Driver told him.

"There's the train, sir, or a tram."

Micky jumped at the tramcar. He was sure that people who lived in Brixton must all use tramcars.

"How long would a tramcar take?" he asked.

Driver considered. Finally he said that he thought it might be the best part of an hour.

Micky glanced at the clock. It was already a quarter past three. He took up his hat hurriedly and went out into the street.

A taxicab would have to do for to-day anyway. He could dismiss it at the corner of the road and walk the last few yards. A moment later he was being whirled through the streets.

He sat leaning back in the corner with his feet up on the seat opposite, feeling decidedly nervous.

Supposing he did not see Esther--supposing she were not there?

Supposing she had purposely given him the wrong address? Supposing ... oh, supposing a thousand and one things! Micky was full of apprehension when at last the taxicab stopped at the corner of the Brixton Road and the driver came to the door to ask what number.

Micky scrambled out.

"Oh, I'll walk the rest of the way."

He paid the man liberally, and set out along the crowded pathway.

There were so many people about that he thought it must be a market day or something. A word with a policeman elicited the information that he was at quite the wrong end of the street for the number he wanted. Micky was rather glad. He felt that he needed time in which to collect his thoughts, and yet when at last he reached his destination he felt as nervous as a kitten and strongly inclined to go back. But he went on and up the bare strip of garden which led to the front door of the house. It wasn't such a bad-looking house, he thought. Not nearly as bad as he had expected from the girl's description. In fact, once upon a time it must have been rather a palatial residence, but all the windows now were boxed up with cheap, starchy-looking curtains, and there was a sort of third-rate atmosphere about the bas.e.m.e.nt and the cheap knocker on the front door.

Micky looked for a bell, but there wasn't one, so he knocked.

It seemed a long time before anybody came. When at last they did he heard them coming for a long time before the door was opened, heard slipshod steps on shiny linoleum, and a husky sort of breathless cough.

The owner of the cough was young and scared-looking, in shoes several sizes too large for her, and a skirt several inches too short. When Micky asked for Miss Shepstone she stared without answering for a moment, then she turned and slopped back the way she had come, leaving the door on the chain.

Micky chuckled to himself; she evidently did not like the look of him.

He waited patiently; then he heard another step along the shiny linoleumed floor of the hall--a very different step this time--and, turning eagerly, he saw Esther herself in the doorway.

"I didn't really think you would come," she said breathlessly.

For a moment Micky could not find his tongue. If he had thought this girl pretty last night with the tears in her eyes he thought her a thousand times prettier now. She looked as if some magician hand had wiped the distress from her face and convinced her that the sun still shone.

She wore the same clothes she had worn last night, but even they seemed somehow to have changed. There was a bunch of violets pinned in her jacket. Micky wondered if it were the violets that were responsible for the alteration.

"When I make an appointment I always keep it," he said.

He had almost added "with any one like you," but thought better of it.

"And are you going to let me take you out to tea?" he asked.

She hesitated; she glanced back into the dingy hall behind her.

"I am leaving here to-day," she said. "My box has gone already. If you will wait a moment ... I would ask you in, but you'd hate it so."

"I'll wait outside," said Micky.

He went down into the street. For the moment he had quite forgotten all about Ashton and the letter which must by this time be in Esther's possession.

"And what about Charlie?" he asked whimsically when she joined him.

She smiled, shaking her head.

"I sent him on--in a basket. n.o.body wants him here--he only gets badgered about all day long; so I'm taking him with me. Do you think I ought not to?"

"I think Charlie is a most fortunate cat," said Micky.

She did not take him seriously.

"I think he will be happier with me anyway," she said "I'm going to quite a nice boarding-house now. I went out this morning and found it." She looked up at him with a smile. "I don't think even you would mind coming to tea there," she said.

"I thought you were going to say mind coming there to live," Micky told her audaciously. "I've been looking about for fresh diggings; I'm tired of mine." He stopped and glanced behind him. "Can we get a tramcar here?"

"I'm not tired," she said quickly.

"Well, I must admit that I am," Micky answered. He hated walking at the best of times, and he did not like to suggest another taxicab.

"Let's go on top."

They climbed up and found a front seat; there was a working man next to them smoking s.h.a.g in a clay pipe; he looked at Micky and Esther doubtfully, then asked--

"Does your good lady mind smoke, mister?"

Esther flushed.

"I don't mind at all," she said, laughing.

"You got home all right last night, then?" Micky said presently.

"After you had gone I wished I had seen you safely in...."

"It's kind of you, but I was quite all right." There was a note of constraint in her voice. "I should like to thank you for what you did for me last night," she said hesitatingly.