The Wicked Marquis Part 5

"There are times," she confessed, "when I find it better. Of course, I send a great deal of my work out to be typed, but my correspondence grows, and my friends find my handwriting illegible."

"I have never found it difficult," he remarked.

"Well, you've had a good many years to get used to it," she reminded him.

His hand rested for a moment upon her shoulder. He drew her a little towards him. She suddenly laughed, leaned over and kissed him on both cheeks, and jumped up. The trim little parlourmaid was at the door with tea.

"Yes," she went on, "you have learned to read my handwriting, and I have learned how you like your tea. Just one or two more little things like that, and life is made between two people, isn't it? Shall I tell you what I think the most singular thing in the world?" she went on, pausing for a moment in her task. "It is fidelity to purpose--and to people, too, perhaps. In a way there is a quaint sort of distinction about it, and from another point of view it is most horribly constraining."

"I interrupted you this afternoon, I imagine," he observed, "in the construction of some work of fiction."

"Oh, no!" she replied. "What I write isn't fiction. That's why it sells. It's truth, you see, under another garb. But there the fact remains--that I shouldn't know how to make tea for another man in the world, and you wouldn't be able to read the letters of any other woman who wrote as badly as I do."

"The fact," he remarked, "seems to me to be a cause for mutual congratulation."

She stooped down to place a dish of m.u.f.fins on a heater near the fire, graceful yet as a girl, and as brisk.

"I can't imagine," she declared, "why it is that my s.e.x has acquired the reputation for fidelity. I am sure we crave for experience much more than men."

The Marquis helped himself to a m.u.f.fin and considered the point. There were many times when Marcia's conversation troubled him. He was by no means an ill-read or unintellectual man, only his studies of literature had been confined to its polished and cla.s.sical side, the side which deals so much with living and so little with life.

"Are you preparing for a new work of fiction, Marcia," he asked, "or are you developing a fresh standpoint?"

"Dear friend," she declared, lightly and yet with an undernote of earnestness, "how can I tell? I never know what I am going to do in the way of work. I wish I could say the same about life. Now I am going to ask you a great favour. I have to attend a small meeting at my club, at the other end of Piccadilly, at half-past five. Would you take me there?"

"I shall be delighted," he answered, a little stiffly.

She went presently to put on her outdoor clothes. The Marquis was disappointed. He realised how much he had looked forward to that quiet twilight hour, when somehow or other his vanity felt soothed, and that queer weariness which came over him sometimes was banished. He escorted Marcia to the car when she reappeared, however, without complaint.

"I see your name in the papers sometimes, Marcia," he observed as he took his place by her side, "in connection with women's work. Of course, I do not interfere in any way with your energies. I should not, in whatever direction they might chance to lead you. At the same time, I must confess that I have noticed with considerable pleasure that you have never been publicly a.s.sociated with this movement in favour of Woman's Suffrage."

She nodded.

"I should like a vote myself," she admitted simply, "but when I think of the number of other women who would have to have it, and who don't yet look at life seriously at all, I think we are better as we are. Is it my fancy," she went on, a little abruptly, "or are you really troubled about the return of--of Richard Vont?"

"As usual, Marcia," he said, "you show a somewhat extraordinary perception where I am concerned. I am, as you know, not subject to presentiments, and I have no exact apprehension of what the word fear may mean. At the same time, you are right. I do view the return of this man with a feeling which you, as a novelist, might be able to a.n.a.lyse, but which I, as a layman, unused to fresh sentiments, find puzzling. You remember what a famous Frenchman wrote in his memoirs, suddenly, across one blank page of his journal--'To-day I feel that a great change is coming.'"

She smiled rea.s.suringly.

"Personally," she told him, "I believe that it is just the call of England to a man who lived very near the soil--her heart. I think he wants the smell of spring flowers, the stillness of an English autumn, the winds of February in the woods he was brought up in. It is a form of heart-sickness, you know. I have felt it myself so often. It is scarcely possible that after all these years he is still nursing that bitter hatred of us both."

The car had reached the great building in which Marcia's club was situated. The Marquis handed her out.

"I trust that you are right," he remarked. "You will allow me to leave the car for you?"

She shook her head.

"There are so many women here with whom I want to talk," she said. "I may even stay and dine. And would you mind not coming until Wednesday?

To-morrow I must work all day at an article which has to be typed and catch the Wednesday's boat for America."

"Exactly as you wish," he a.s.sented.

She waved her hand to him and ran lightly up the steps. The Marquis threw himself back in his car and hesitated. The footman was waiting for an address, and his august master was suddenly conscious that the skies were very grey, that a slight rain was falling, and that there was nowhere very much he wanted to go.

The man waited with immovable face.

"To--the club."

CHAPTER V

Messrs. Wadham, Son and d.i.c.kson were not habited in luxury. Theirs was one of those old-fashioned suites of offices in Lincoln's Inn, where the pa.s.sages are of stone, the doors of painted deal, and a general air of bareness and discomfort prevails. The Marquis, who was a rare visitor, followed the directions of a hand painted upon the wall and found himself in what was termed, an enquiry office. A small boy tore himself away with apparent regret from the study of a pile of doc.u.ments, and turned a little wearily towards the caller.

"I desire," the Marquis announced, "to see Mr. Wadham, Senior, or to confer at once with any member of the firm who may be disengaged."

The small boy was hugely impressed. He glanced at the long row of black boxes along the wall and a premonition of the truth began to dawn upon him.

"What name, sir?" he enquired.

"The Marquis of Mandeleys."

The office boy swung open a wicket gate and pointed to the hard remains of a horsehair stuffed easy-chair. The Marquis eyed it curiously--and remained standing. His messenger thereupon departed, exhibiting a rare and unlegal haste. He returned breathless, in fact, from his mission, closely followed by Mr. Wadham, Junior.

"This is quite an honour, your lordship," the latter said, hastily withdrawing his hand as he became aware of a certain rigidity in his visitor's demeanour. "My father is disengaged. Let me show you the way to his room."

"I should be obliged," the Marquis a.s.sented.

Mr. Wadham, Senior, was an excellent replica of his son, a little fatter, a little rosier and a little more verbose. He rose from behind his desk and bowed twice as his distinguished client entered. The Marquis indicated to Mr. Wadham, Junior, the chair upon which he proposed to sit, and waited while it was wheeled up to the side of the desk. Then he withdrew his gloves in leisurely fashion and extended his hand to the older man, who clasped it reverently.

"Your lordship pays us a rare honour," Mr. Wadham, Senior, observed.

"I should have preferred," the Marquis said, with some emphasis, "that circ.u.mstances had not rendered my visit to-day necessary."

The head of the firm nodded sympathetically.

"You will bear in mind," he begged, "our advice concerning these recent actions."

"Your advice was, without doubt, legally good," his visitor replied, "but it scarcely took into account circ.u.mstances outside the legal point of view. However, I am not here to discuss those actions, which I understand are now finally disposed of."

"Quite finally, I fear, your lordship."

"I find myself," the Marquis continued sternly, "in the painful position of having to prefer a complaint against your firm."

"I am very sorry--very sorry indeed," Mr. Wadham murmured.

"I discovered yesterday afternoon, entirely by accident, that the allowance which you have my instructions to make to Miss Hannaway has not been paid for the last two quarters."