12

Arthur Burdon spent two or three days in a state of utter uncertainty, but at last the idea he had in mind grew so compelling as to overcome all objections.  He went to the Carlton and asked for Margaret.  He had learnt from the porter that Haddo was gone out and so counted on finding her alone.  A simple device enabled him to avoid sending up his name.  When he was shown into her private room Margaret was sitting down.  She neither read nor worked.

‘You told me I might call upon you,’ said Arthur.

She stood up without answering, and turned deathly pale.

‘May I sit down?’ he asked.

She bowed her head.  For a moment they looked at one another in silence.  Arthur suddenly forgot all he had prepared to say.  His intrusion seemed intolerable.

‘Why have you come?’ she said hoarsely.

They both felt that it was useless to attempt the conventionality of society.  It was impossible to deal with the polite commonplaces that ease an awkward situation.

‘I thought that I might be able to help you,’ he answered gravely.

‘I want no help.  I’m perfectly happy.  I have nothing to say to you.’

She spoke hurriedly, with a certain nervousness, and her eyes were fixed anxiously on the door as though she feared that someone would come in.

‘I feel that we have much to say to one another,’ he insisted.  ’If it is inconvenient for us to talk here, will you not come and see me?’

‘He’d know,’ she cried suddenly, as if the words were dragged out of her.  ‘D’you think anything can be hidden from him?’

Arthur glanced at her.  He was horrified by the terror that was in her eyes.  In the full light of day a change was plain in her expression.  Her face was strangely drawn, and pinched, and there was in it a constant look as of a person cowed.  Arthur turned away.

’I want you to know that I do not blame you in the least for anything you did.  No action of yours can ever lessen my affection for you.’

‘Oh, why did you come here?  Why do you torture me by saying such things?’

She burst on a sudden into a flood of tears, and walked excitedly up and down the room.

’Oh, if you wanted me to be punished for the pain I’ve caused you, you can triumph now.  Susie said she hoped I’d suffer all the agony that I’ve made you suffer.  If she only knew!’

Margaret gave a hysterical laugh.  She flung herself on her knees by Arthur’s side and seized his hands.

’Did you think I didn’t see?  My heart bled when I looked at your poor wan face and your tortured eyes.  Oh, you’ve changed.  I could never have believed that a man could change so much in so few months, and it’s I who’ve caused it all.  Oh, Arthur, Arthur, you must forgive me.  And you must pity me.’

‘But there’s nothing to forgive, darling,’ he cried.

She looked at him steadily.  Her eyes now were shining with a hard brightness.