Nobody Asked Me

CHAPTER VI

IT was Julian who spoke first.He turned to Simon a little stiffly, as though his muscles were tense and it was a physical impossibility to relax them.

‘Thanks for coming straight along. We’ll have to make- some alterations in our plans, of course.’

He spoke slowly, a little jerkily, like someone struggling to retain consciousness. And at that Alison forgot her own distress and fear in her overwhelming pity for him.

‘Julian.’ She came and stood beside him, longing to say something that would comfort him. But she couldn’t think of anything. She just slipped her hand into his and held it very hard.

He glanced at her as though he had forgotten her existence. Then, as her timid smile seemed to reach him, his fingers closed tightly on hers with a sort of bewildered relief.

‘Perhaps it will only mean putting off going for a short while,’ she suggested gently.

But Julian shook his head.

‘No. If Faraday had authority to sign that cable it almost certainly means the big amalgamation which they tried to put through the last year. Don’t you think so, Simon?’

‘I’m afraid so.’ Simon was no longer watching anybody in particular, and she wondered confusedly why she had thought his expression so peculiar a minute ago. ‘Of course, Faraday always wanted that job himself, and if there has been an amalgamation it will mean much more influence for him.’

‘Exactly. He’ll make out a good case for filling the post from that side, and-’ Julian completed the sentence by a significant gesture of one hand, while with the other he still held tightly to Alison’s fingers.

‘It’s rotten luck for you,’ Simon said. ‘You were specially anxious to get out there again, weren’t you?’

‘Yes.’ Julian spoke curtly, but, Alison saw, he was almost completely master of himself again. ‘Still, we can’t tell much until the letter comes. It will probably arrive while we’re on-while we are away. I’ll leave you to open it and deal with it as you think best.’

‘Yes, I will. And the arrangements for to-morrow are to stand, of course?’ Simon’s voice expressed nothing more than the bare query.

There was a second’s pause. Neither Julian nor Alison looked at each other. Then Julian said:

‘Of course.’

Alison had felt her heart stop when Simon asked that question; and then, at Julian’s reply, it went racing on again, thumping against her ribs so that she thought the two men must hear it.

‘Why should you suppose anything else?’ Julian spoke sharply, almost haughtily.

‘No reason at all,’ Simon said lightly. ‘Only, as best man, I naturally want to have everything clear.’

‘Naturally,’ Julian agreed, just a little drily.

‘Well, I won’t keep you two any longer.’ Simon turned to Alison with a smile. ‘Good night, Alison. When I see you to-morrow you mustn’t be looking so pale as this. Don’t have too many regrets for Buenos Aires. We’ll contrive to give you quite a good time in London.’

‘Thank you, Simon.’ Alison managed to smile in return.

The two men exchanged a nod, and Simon went out of the room. They heard him say a word to one of the servants as he crossed the hall. There was the sound of the front door closing. And then-silence.

With an effort, Alison raised her eyes to Julian’s face, and in return she received that sombre, absent look which seemed to take no account of her in his scheme of things.

There were a dozen things she might have said-tactful, well-considered things that would have helped to gloss the moment over.

She said none of them. She merely stated crudely and painfully: ‘You-don’t have to marry me, Julian.’

‘What do you mean?’

The very slightest smile broke the tenseness of his expression.

Alison dropped her eyes, her own expression almost sulky in the effort not to betray her feelings.

‘Well, your reason for the marriage is gone, isn’t it?’ she reminded him doggedly. ‘You were only marrying because it was necessary to have a wife in this South American job. Now that you can’t have the job anyway, you-you don’t need a wife.’

‘But your reason is still there,’ he said gently, and, loosing her hand at last, he put his arm round her. ‘You don’t really suppose I should back out now, do you?’

‘It’s terribly like being-caught, though,’ Alison murmured unhappily. ‘In a way, I rushed us both into this. If you’d taken normal time to think about it-’

But he wouldn’t let her finish.

‘My dear child, it was I who insisted on rushing things. It’s easy enough for us to be wise now and say we should have waited, but I absolutely refuse to have you blaming yourself. In any case, if we were going to do it at all, we had to do it quickly. It’s just bad luck that things haven’t turned out as we expected.’

‘Yes, I know.’ Alison’s voice was very little more than a whisper. ‘Only I-I don’t want to hold you to the bargain. I mean-well, it’s rather awful for you staying here among all the people you know, married to someone for a reason that no longer exists.’

‘Do you propose that I should jilt you?’ he asked quietly.

‘We could just say we had made a mistake.’

‘And what do you suppose it would be like for you, being thrust back on your aunt’s hands?’

Alison moved slightly in the circle of his arm.

‘Well, that’s my affair, isn’t it?’ she said a little sulkily. ‘Not yours.’

‘No, Alison.’ Julian spoke quietly. ‘That’s where you’re wrong. You are my affair now. For good or bad we made that decision four weeks ago. God knows what sort of a muddle we’ve landed ourselves in. You were just as unprepared for this as I, and will probably have some difficult readjusting, too. But at least we’re in it now-and we’ve got to go on.’

‘But I don’t want you making such a sacrifice-’ began Alison desperately.

‘Hush.’ He very lightly put his hand against her startled mouth. ‘There’s no question of sacrifice. Don’t you see that it would be as unpleasant for me as for you if we called everything off now? I simply can’t afford another fiasco after the business with-Rosalie. I’m not exactly sensitive’- (‘That’s not true,’ thought Alison with quick tenderness)-’but I must confess I couldn’t face much more.’

‘Do you really mean that?’ She looked up at him very earnestly.’

‘I do’ He gave his grave smile at her.

‘Then we’ll go on with it,’ she said with a little sigh.

‘Good child.’ He tightened his arm for a moment before he let her go.

Then. glancing at his watch, he gave an exclamation.

‘I had no idea it was so late. I must go. There are several things I shall have to do before to-morrow. For one, I must see about keeping on my flat until we can get something that suite us better.’

‘Yes,’ Alison said. And she was oddly stirred at the mention of their future life together, just as she had been when Jennifer had spoken of their honeymoon.

‘Would you like me to see your aunt and uncle, and explain about our remaining in England?’

‘No, it doesn’t matter.’ Alison smiled faintly at his unconscious assumption that she needed to have things done for her. He would never think of her as entirely grown up. ‘I’ll explain. I’ll just say we’re postponing the trip indefinitely.’

‘Yes, that might be best.’

She went with him into the hall, and he said good night to her kindly but a little absently, his thoughts already on the many things he had to do.

When he had gone, she went slowly upstairs. She hung the wonderful mink coat in the wardrobe beside her wedding-dress. It looked very beautiful there.

‘The bridegroom’s present to the bride was a mink coat.’

But the bride had not been able to kiss him for it. Even that had been denied her. He had forgotten all about that timid suggestion of hers, of course. It was quite natural that he should. But she had remembered. That was natural, too.

She put out her hand and touched the coat wistfully.

Then very quietly she closed the wardrobe door on her wedding-dress and the present from the bridegroom.

She supposed she ought to go downstairs and explain to the others about the change of plans. But for the moment she flinched from the thought of playing her part in front of them all over again-being questioned, perhaps even being laughed at by Rosalie, who had come home from her prolonged visit only that afternoon.

And as she sat there on the side of her bed, trying to get up her courage, there was a knock at the door.

‘Come in.’

Alison looked up as the door opened and Audrey, in her dressing-gown, insinuated herself round it.

‘Why, Audrey, you ought to be in bed and asleep!’

‘Yes, I know.’ Audrey was quite unabashed. ‘But I wanted to see your wedding-dress. I haven’t seen anything interesting-not being allowed to come home from school until to-day, and then being hustled in and out of my own dress and having my hair done, and being sent off to bed early and all that sort of thing. You’d think it was Mother’s own wedding,’ she added bitterly.

Alison laughed.

‘But you’ll see my dress to-morrow,’ she said.

‘That’s not the same thing at all.’ Audrey was firm.

‘All right,’ Alison went over and opened the wardrobe door once more.

‘Ooooh!’ Audrey sucked in her breath on an admiring sigh. ‘You’ll look awfully good in that.’

‘I hope so,’ Alison said, touched by the little girl’s interest.

‘And what a marvellous fur coat!’ Audrey turned her attention to that next.

‘Yes, it’s beautiful, isn’t it?’ Alison felt her own pleasure in the coat revive at Audrey’s enthusiasm ‘That’s Julian’s present to me,’ she added a little shyly.

‘My goodness! I should think Rosalie’ll be sick she lost him when she sees that,’ Audrey remarked with great candour.

‘Audrey! You mustn’t say such things.’ Distress and nervousness sharpened Alison’s voice.

‘Sorry. But it’s true. Rosalie would almost have put up with going to South America to have that. Still, she’d have loathed South America, when it came to the point,’ Audrey added. ‘And I expect you’ll quite enjoy it.’

There was a second or two’s silence, and then Alison said flatly:

‘We’re not going to South America.’

‘Not going?’

‘No.’ Alison went on hastily, because she felt she couldn’t bear too many exclamations and questions. ‘Julian’s firm have just cabled to say they’re making other arrangements.’

‘And so Julian is going to live in England after all?’

‘I suppose so.’

‘My goodness!’ said Audrey, that being her chief exclamation of the moment. ‘Won’t Rosalie be sold!’

‘Audrey!’ Alison said rather faintly, but it failed to stem Audrey’s half-shocked jubilation.

‘Why, she only threw him over because she didn’t want to leave England. She’ll chew her finger-ends off when she hears.’

‘That will do.’ Alison spoke sternly enough to suppress even Audrey. ‘Your sister has nothing to do with this. She’s -she’s happily engaged to Rodney Myrton and it can’t matter to her whether Julian and I live in London or in Buenos Aires. Now go along to bed, or I shall be really angry with you.’

Audrey retreated then, but the last thing Alison heard was a scornful mutter of ‘Happily engaged!’

It frightened her terribly to have Audrey putting her own fears into words.

Was it really true that Rosalie had only thrown Julian over because she couldn’t face living abroad? It couldn’t be the only reason, of course. There must have been some sort of a quarrel, too. But probably that was at the back of it.

Alison pressed her hands against her eyes with a weary little gesture.

It was no good tormenting herself with doubts now. As Julian had said, for good or bad they had made their decision. They would have to stand by it.

It was quite late when Alison woke up, and the pale sunshine of a cold October day was struggling into the room.

Then she realised that Prentiss, her aunt’s maid, was standing beside the bed, holding a breakfast tray, her usually rather frost-bitten expression warmed by a smile.

‘Why, Prentiss, how kind of you.’ Alison leaned up on her elbow and smiled in return.

‘Madam said you were to have your breakfast in bed, miss and then to stay quiet until it’s time for you to dress. I’ll come and see to everything. Help you dress and fix your hair and everything.’

‘Oh. thank you very much,’ Alison said, a little nonplussed at this unwonted attention, and she watched with some amusement while Prentiss went over and pulled the curtains aside.

But as she ate her breakfast she became very serious again.

This morning she was to marry Julian.

It might be a strange marriage It might be scarcely a marriage at all in some senses of the word. But the fact remained. she was to be Julian’s wife; to have some significance in his life unshared by any other woman.

She lay back again, feeling curiously awed and humble.

‘I’ll be good to you, Julian,’ she thought very tenderly. ‘You haven’t found people very kind, but I’ll try never to hurt you as the others have.’

She didn’t name Rosalie even in her own thoughts, because she had an idea that she didn’t want to have any feelings of bitterness and resentment just now. But; in some indefinable way, she felt that it was for her to bridge the gap that had been torn in Julian’s happiness and affections.

It was that thought which kept her very quiet and serious while she was dressing-all the time Prentiss was brushing her shining hair and fastening her into the wedding-dress.

Her aunt came in just as the yards of rosy tulle veil were being adjusted.

‘Yes, very nice,’ she said, inspecting Alison critically. ‘No, no, Prentiss-a little further forward on her head. That’s better. Now don’t forget to hold your head up, Alison, when you are coming out, You can look down and be as shy as you like when you come in. It isn’t important then. But raise your head when you are coming out of the church. Otherwise it doesn’t give the Press photographers a chance, and you’ll look as though you have a double chin.’

‘Very well, Aunt Lydia,’ Alison promised meekly. It amused her a little that, when it came to the point, her aunt had been quite unable to keep up her apparent lack of interest in anything which appealed to her so strongly as a social show.

‘I wish she’d go,’ Alison thought. ‘She makes it all seem so cheap and-and worldly.’

Then she suddenly remembered about the cablegram from Buenos Aires.

‘Oh, Aunt Lydia -’

‘I can’t wait now,’ her aunt said. ‘It’s time I went. If the first arrivals are late it means the whole thing is disorganised. Good-bye, child. Try to make yourself heard, though that isn’t so very important, really. And don’t forget about looking up.’

Aunt Lydia went out, closing the door behind her. Oh, well, it couldn’t be helped. Explanations would have to come after the ceremony.

Alison stood where she was, facing her own reflection in the glass. But she scarcely took in what she saw there. She was listening to the sounds of departure downstairs.

And then a servant knocked on the door.

Mr. Leadburn wanted to know if Miss Alison was ready. It was time they were going.

Alison picked up her great sheaf of deep pink roses, and glanced round her unpretentious little bedroom.

Next time she saw it she would be Alison Tyndrum- Julian’s wife.

Uncle Theodore was waiting in the hall, and he smiled as she came slowly down the stairs.

‘Dear me,’ he observed approvingly, ‘Julian certainly has a very pretty bride.’

‘Thank you, Uncle.’ Alison smiled in return and took his arm affectionately. She was glad it was her uncle with whom she had to go, for his kindly but matter-of-fact air steadied her.

She glanced shyly and a little incredulously at the group of sight-seers as she went out to the car. It was first and last time in her life that she was likely to attract a crowd, she thought with faint amusement.

And then she was driving through the streets beside Uncle Theodore, with the strange, dreamlike knowledge that, somewhere at the end of this journey, Julian was waiting to make her his wife.

‘Feeling nervous?’ Her uncle patted her hand.

‘No, not very,’ Alison said, and it was true. She was not trembling any more, and her heart was beating calmly and regularly again. Only her breathing was shallow and rapid. But that was really more excitement than nervousness.

‘Well, I expect you will have a pretty full programme from now on until you leave.’

That reminded her.

‘Oh, Uncle Theodore, we aren’t going to Buenos Aires after all. There was a cable for Julian last night, postponing our flight indefinitely.’

‘Really?’ Alison wondered if she imagined that her usually immovable uncle looked disturbed. ‘Do you mean you’ll be living here in London?’

‘I suppose so.’

He was silent for a moment, and then said, ‘Well, personally, I’m glad you’re not going to the other side of the world. How do you feel about it yourselves?’

‘I’m afraid Julian is very disappointed,’ she said carefully.

‘And you?’

‘Oh, I-she drew a quick breath-’I don’t really care where I am, so long as Julian is there too.’

‘Ah!’ Her uncle gave a satisfied laugh.

She thought he was going to say something too, but just then the car drew up outside the church, and there was no opportunity.

Organ music was coming from just beyond that doorway, and the indescribable rustle of people moving and whispering.

She took her uncle’s arm and moved slowly forward. Nobody seemed specially distinct-just a vague blur of faces on either side-people who had meant nothing at all in her life, and would mean nothing again. They were just there for her wedding-she didn’t quite know why, except that Aunt Lydia had somehow conjured them there.

Why, there was Jennifer, smiling slightly and looking a miracle of style and smartness. Simon would be with Julian, but she wouldn’t look there yet.

There was Aunt Lydia, right in front, turning her head as far as decorum permitted, to see that her stage-managing had not failed in any particular, while Theo gazed openly- but mostly at Audrey.

And then they all faded away into absolute nothingness, because Rosalie’s blue eyes were staring at her across the width of the aisle-cold, unfriendly, frighteningly bleak in her lovely young face.

Alison gasped faintly, as though someone had struck her, and her eyes dropped before the dislike in Rosalie’s.

Uncle Theodore had stopped. She couldn’t imagine why for a moment, and then, glancing up, she saw. Julian was standing the other side of her, smiling reassuringly down at her.

‘Oh, Julian,’ she said very quietly, and she forgot all about Rosalie.

She used to wonder afterwards whether every girl was just as vague about her own wedding.

It didn’t seem like her own voice saying, ‘I, Alison, take thee, Julian-’

She wondered if he felt equally strange, saying, ‘I, Julian, take thee, Alison-’

Perhaps he felt even stranger because, of course, he didn’t want to take her at all.

But she wouldn’t think of that now. Nor of Rosalie, standing somewhere there behind her, wishing her ill.

It was over at last, and she was with him in the vestry, signing ‘Alison Earlston’ for the last time. And then she was going along the aisle once more, past those rows of indistinguishable people.

But this time it was on Julian’s arm that her hand rested.

Rosalie had not come into the vestry, and Alison didn’t look in her direction now. She didn’t want anything to spoil this wonderful moment. She had forgotten her aunt’s warning, but in any case, she had no need of it to make her raise her head.

The most extraordinary pride and happiness flooded warmly over her. She was Julian’s wife. And for one little, little moment, that was enough.

In the car, Julian turned to her with a laugh.

‘Well, I’m glad that’s over.’

Alison smiled.

‘Were you nervous too?’

‘Petrified,’ Julian assured her, looking exceptionally calm. And at that they laughed together.

‘You look marvellously pretty, Alison.’

His admiration was undoubted, but there was not a single touch of sentiment about it. Nor did he sound in the least possessive. He might have been paying a compliment to any young friend or relation.

She wondered if he had noticed how lovely Rosalie looked, and, if so, how it had affected him. He couldn’t have seen her since that terrible evening when she had thrown him over-until he saw her in church to-day. It must have hurt, however much he had braced himself to meet the moment.

‘Do you like your ring?’ He took her hand and looked at the slender ring with its curiously cut facets.

‘Yes, very much, thank you, Julian.’ It was like thanking him for a casual Christmas present, she thought.

‘I’m glad you chose gold,’ he told her. ‘It’s so much warmer than platinum.’

‘Well. I know it’s old-fashioned of me, but I’ve always vaguely felt that I shouldn’t feel really married with anything but a gold ring,’ she confessed.

He looked at her hand for a moment in silence.

‘So that makes you feel really married, does it?’ he said with a slight smile. But she noticed that the smile didn’t reach his eyes.

She wished she hadn’t said anything so silly and thoughtless then, but it was too late to do anything about it, for they had arrived back at the house.

The next half-hour was crowded with hand-shaking and introductions, with little speeches of welcome and little speeches of thanks. She noticed once or twice how easily and gracefully Simon was carrying off his duties as best man, and she thought, ‘No wonder he is a social success.’

Even Aunt Lydia smiled at him with genuine cordiality, and if Uncle Theodore did think him ‘a bit of an adventurer,’ as he had declared, Simon seemed to please him and charm him just then.

Presently he came up to where she and Julian were standing.

‘You seem to be entering into your role very heartily,’ Julian remarked.

Simon bowed to Alison with a rather wicked smile.

‘I want to feel I am a really deserving case when I claim my privilege as best man.’

‘I see.’ Julian looked amused.

‘Have I your permission?’

‘Mine? You’d better ask Alison, hadn’t you?’ Julian said with a little laugh. ‘She is the one concerned.’

‘Oh, I shan’t ask Alison,’ Simon declared. ‘Always kiss a woman first and ask her afterwards. It’s an excellent rule.’

And, putting his arm lightly round Alison, he kissed her full on her mouth.

It was all very easily and laughingly done, but, as Simon’s lips touched hers, Alison was conscious of the most extraordinary sensation. She didn’t want to be kissed like that. Not by any man-except perhaps Julian. Simon’s laughing remarks might not say much, but Simon’s mouth said a good deal more.

There was something about the whole incident which she resented fiercely-but, most of all, because, in the mirror of Simon’s manner, she saw quite clearly how utterly unemotional and impersonal any caress of Julian’s had always been.

Besides, it came to her with an angry pain that Julian had never actually kissed her at all. And that Simon- Simon-should do it first was hateful!

She turned away, oddly disturbed, and she was still feeling shaken when her aunt came over to tell her it was time for her to slip away and change.

‘And why ever didn’t you tell me about your not going to Buenos Aires after all?’ Aunt Lydia wanted to know. ‘You are an extraordinary girl, Alison.’

‘I did try to tell you this morning,’ said Alison, ‘but you didn’t have time to stay and hear.’

‘But why hadn’t you told us all last night? You knew then, didn’t you?’

‘Yes.’ Alison hesitated. It was so difficult for her to explain. ‘There didn’t seem to be an opportunity,’ she said lamely at last.

‘Really, Alison, I don’t understand you at all. Unless-’ Aunt Lydia stopped, and looked at her niece in a peculiar, not very friendly fashion. ‘Well, perhaps I do. You had better run along and get dressed now.’ And, without another word, she moved off, leaving Alison feeling extraordinarily uncomfortable.

It didn’t take long, with Prentiss’s help, to change from her wedding-dress into the little pink suit, with the wonderful mink coat over it.

When she came downstairs, Julian, too, was ready. The suitcases were outside in the grey Daimler, and Audrey was hopping about, first on one foot and then on the other, a bag of confetti very partially concealed in the hand she was holding behind her.

‘You needn’t be so secretive about that filthy stuff,’ Julian told her. ‘But if you chuck all that at us I’ll run you down with the car.’

‘It’s really only because I’m so pleased,’ Audrey said ingenuously.

‘Pleased? Whose wedding is this-yours of mine?’

‘Yours, of course. But I’m so glad it’s Alison’s too.’

‘Oh, I see.’

Just for a second, Alison saw him glance across to where Rosalie was standing a little aloof from all this. And, as he did so, the light seemed to go out of his face, and she could see a little pulse beating agitatedly in his cheek.

She turned away to say good-bye to her aunt, her heart heavy with apprehension and a strange pity for him, which seemed to blot out her own personal feelings.

Aunt Lydia indulged in a slightly emotional good-bye for the sake of appearances, but Alison knew how much more meaning there was to her uncle’s quiet, ‘Good-bye, child. I hope you will be very happy.’

Then, after a moment’s hesitation, she went over to where Rosalie was standing.

‘Good-bye, Rosalie,’ she said, and, although it cost her an effort, she held out her hand.

But her cousin took no notice of it. She looked steadily back at Alison, her eyes like cold blue stones.

‘You were careful I shouldn’t know about Julian’s staying in England until you had him nice and secure, weren’t you?’ she said in a low, contemptuous voice.

‘Rosalie, that isn’t true.’ Alison, too, kept her voice low, and stood so that Rosalie was hidden from the rest of the people. ‘I never thought of such a thing. You know I didn’t’

‘You needn’t play innocent on top of it all.’ Rosalie twisted her own engagement ring on her finger with a nervous anger which suddenly showed Alison with deadly clearness that it was of no real importance to her. ‘You always meant to get Julian. Well, I suppose, in a way, you have got him now. But he isn’t really yours in any sense that matters. And you know it as well as I do.’

‘Please Rosalie-’ Alison began. But her cousin cut across her words with furious scorn.

‘Oh, don’t bother to say any more. Why don’t you do the same as Julian? He has more sense than to try to come and speak to me.’ She gave a slight laugh, and then added slowly: ‘Unless, of course, it is that he knows he can’t trust himself near me.’

There wasn’t any answer to make to such a speech, and, trembling all over, Alison went back to Julian.

She scarcely took any note of the other good-byes, except for the welcome warmth of Audrey’s kiss.

And even when the car moved clear of the farewell group, and Julian and she were alone together, she could find nothing to say. She leaned back in her seat beside him, pale and with her eyes closed, and for a while he drove in silence.

At last he said: ‘What is it, Alison? Are you very tired?’

‘A little yes,’ she said quickly. And then: ‘Do you mind if I don’t talk at all for a bit?’

‘Not in the least, my child.’ He spoke very quietly and calmingly, ‘I imagine this isn’t exactly an easy day for you.’

‘It can’t be easy for you either, darling,’ she thought impulsively. ‘But you do it all so much better than I.’

They were clear of London and heading for the open country before he spoke again. And then his tone was still blessedly cool and matter-of-fact.

‘I don’t know how much you’ve had to eat to-day, but it probably isn’t any more than I have. Suppose we stop and have a very late lunch somewhere.’

Alison agreed, and, ten minutes later, over a good meal in a country inn, she began to feel better. Even now, it made her feel faintly sick to think of what Rosalie had said, but she must try not to remember her cold, angry face, and her bitter words.

It was terrible to have someone hate you like that. Terrible-and so bewilderingly unfair.

Alison glanced across timidly at Julian and thought:

‘It’s not even as though I had taken him away from her. I could understand her anger if I had done that; But I tried so hard not to do anything unfair so long as he was hers. It was only afterwards-’

But then, of course, what Rosalie had probably wanted was to be able to whistle him back again, chastened and humiliated, if she happened to want him. She had never really meant him to go out of her reach so finally.

And, in that case, would he have come back? Alison wondered. Reluctant and resisting, no doubt, but fascinated into submission.

‘Well, I’m glad I saved him from that, at any rate,’ she told herself grimly. ‘She’s done some awful things to his self-respect, but she hasn’t been able to do that.’ And she gave a sigh, half-triumphant, half-afraid.

‘Eat up your lunch, child, and think out the problems afterwards,’ Julian’s voice said quietly at that moment, and she looked up quickly to find him watching her with a kindly, worried air.

‘I’m sorry.’ She laughed a little, and deliberately cleared the expression of care from her face.

‘That’s better.’ His own expression lightened too at that, and after a moment or two she began to talk to him quite naturally and almost gaily.

By the time they came out again to the car the late afternoon light was beginning to fade. Sudden grey clouds were rolling up from the west, and a strong wind was rising. Even as they moved off, the first big drops of rain came splashing against the windscreen.

‘There’s going to be a heavy storm,’ Julian remarked. ‘You’re not nervous driving in a storm, I suppose?’

‘Not if you’re driving,’ Alison said. Whereat he laughed.

‘You’re very soothing to a man’s vanity, Alison.’

There was something very pleasant about being alone together in the warmth and intimacy of the car, after all the conflicting excitements of the day. And later, when it was quite dark. and the wind was hurling the rain against the windows in great driving gusts, they seemed to be all alone in a safe. cosy little world of their own.

About seven, they passed through a fairly large country town, and Julian asked if she would care to stay there for the night But Alison, more than slightly drowsy by now, had no special wish to face the problems of the outer world just then.

‘I’d rather drive on,’ she said, ‘if you’re not tired.’

‘I’m not tired,’ he assured her with a little smile. ‘But I see you are.’ He reached with one hand for another cushion and put it behind her. ‘You’d better go to sleep for a while.’

‘Oh. no,’ Alison said. But two minutes later it seemed too much trouble to open her eyes again.

When she woke up it was pitch dark outside, with the blackness of the completely open country. She glanced at the little car clock and gave an exclamation.

‘Is it really as late as that, Julian? Quarter-past ten?’

‘Hello. Awake again?’ He smiled at her. ‘Yes, that’s the time.’

‘But hadn’t we better stop somewhere? You must be dead tired, driving all this time.’

‘We will stop, my dear, when we can find somewhere.’ Julian laughed ruefully. ‘To tell you the truth, I don’t know where the deuce we are.’

‘Oh, I see. Well, we’re sure to come on something or somewhere soon,’ Alison said equably.

He cocked a quizzical look at her.

‘How refreshingly philosophical of you. You’re quite at liberty to call me a fool for losing the way, if you like.’

But Alison smiled and shook her head.

‘It can happen to anyone. Especially on a night like this,’ she added, as a tremendous gust of wind and rain seemed to hit the car broadside on.

‘Well, that’s a very charitable point of view. But I certainly think we had better make do with almost any sort of place we can find. Petrol’s getting low and-Aren’t those some lights ahead there on the left?’

Alison peered through the rain-streaked window.

‘Yes.’

‘Good.’

Three minutes later they were running up the one street of a dreary little hamlet. It consisted of about a dozen houses, one shop, and a tiny inn.

‘This looks like our quarters for to-night.’ Julian drew up and looked distastefully at the place. ‘What do you think of it? Shall we drive on and chance hitting something better?’

‘No, I think we’d better try this,’ said Alison. And, climbing stiffly out of the car, they both went in.

A woman came forward, with a surprised and not specially friendly air; and Julian explained that they wanted quarters for the night.

She didn’t seem enthusiastic, and, glancing at Alison’s coat, she said, ‘I don’t know that I’ve got anything that’d suit you. I’ve only one room anyway.’ Then, suddenly fixing her eyes gloomily on the few tell-tale pieces of confetti that had shaken from Alison’s coat, she added, ‘Though perhaps that don’t matter.’

The laborious train of thought was so obvious that Alison had a hysterical, though hastily suppressed, desire to laugh. Perhaps Julian had too, because he bit his lip sharply, and then said, ‘Well, how far are we from a town?’

The woman didn’t seem very good at guessing distances. She murmured something about ‘eight or ten miles, or perhaps twelve.’ And then added, ‘But that’s by the straight road, and that’s flooded. You’d have to go round.’

‘Is there anywhere in the village where I can get petrol?’ Julian asked patiently.

‘Only here, and we’re run out,’ said the woman dispiritedly.

‘I think we’ll have to stay here, Julian,’ Alison said quietly.

‘Do you mind very much?’ He looked troubled.

Alison smiled reassuringly. ‘No. We’ll manage.’

He didn’t say anything, but he gave her an odd glance as he went out to fetch the cases and put away the car. Perhaps, of course, he was wondering how Rosalie would have reacted in similar circumstances.

‘You just been married to-day?’ the woman asked Alison as she led her up the stairs.

‘Y-yes,’ Alison admitted.

‘Ah!’ There was a wealth of meaning in the word, but, as Alison couldn’t decide what meaning, it didn’t help much. ‘I’ve buried three,’ was the startling addition to that.

Alison didn’t know quite what she was expected to make of this cheerful opening, so she just said politely-and rather fatuously, she felt-’Have you really?’

The woman nodded, and led the way into a fairly large, chilly room. But at least it looked clean, and the white ‘honeycomb’ quilts on the two iron bedsteads were spotless.

She seemed pleased when Alison declared it would do very well; and a moment later Julian came in with a couple of suitcases.

‘If you come down right away, you can have a hot supper,’ the woman remarked, and withdrew.

‘What-a cheerful-spot,’ observed Julian, setting down the cases and studying a steel engraving entitled ‘The Young Martyr,’ wherein a very pretty girl appeared to be thoroughly enjoying being drowned slowly.

‘Well, it’s clean-’ Alison began.

‘Alison, you’re an angel,’ he interrupted her. ‘Any other girl would raise hell at starting her honeymoon like this. Now come on and let’s see about this hot supper, or else I shall be making you emotional speeches of thanks, like a popular actor on a last night.’

Alison laughed a good deal, and came down with him to the really excellent meal which had been set for them by a good fire.

She supposed she ought to be feeling thoroughly embarrassed and nervous, but she felt neither. And, when supper was over, she said quite naturally. ‘I think I’ll go up right away. We’d better both get to bed soon if we want to start again fairly early to-morrow.’

This time it was he who didn’t do it quite so well. He nodded with elaborate casualness, however, and said, ‘All right. I shan’t be long.’

Upstairs in the cold bedroom again, Alison undressed rapidly, washing sketchily in the icy water supplied, and climbed into one of the unexpectedly comfortable beds.

When Julian came up half an hour later, she didn’t answer his knock. It would probably be less embarrassing for both of them if she pretended to be asleep.

He seemed to think so too, because she heard him moving about with exaggerated care so as not to wake her.

‘Poor darling!’ she thought. ‘Perhaps it’s even worse for him than for me.’

Or was it? Could anything really be worse than sharing a room with the man you loved, and having him behave like a courteous stranger?

She tried to remember one or two little incidents which had happened that day. The time he had spoken of himself quite naturally as her husband. The time he had called her ‘an angel’. She tried to gather courage from them-but it was hard.

She lay there for a long time, dozing fitfully. Then suddenly she woke to full consciousness. The storm had completely passed, and a clear, rain-washed moon was riding high in the sky and pouring its cold fight into the room.

Turning on her side, she could see Julian quite clearly. He was asleep, his dark hair inclined to fall forward over his forehead. But he evidently slept uneasily, and he had tossed off half the bed-clothes.

‘He’ll catch cold,’ Alison thought, with a sort of possessive tenderness that was very sweet, and she slipped quietly out of bed.

Very carefully and gently she put the clothes round him again. He sighed impatiently, but he didn’t move, and she thought how weary and unrested he looked.

She longed suddenly to kiss him. It didn’t seem very fair to do it without his knowing. But he had said she could yesterday-before Simon had interrupted.

She bent quickly and kissed him.

He did move then.

‘Rosalie,’ he said, half questioningly. Then he turned his cheek against the pillow like a contented child, and she saw that the look of strain had gone.

Alison stood there motionless for a long time, until she became aware of the iciness of the floor against her bare feet.

She crept back to bed, and lay for a while watching the moonlight slowly travelling over Julian. Then presently she pulled the bed-clothes over her head, so that he shouldn’t hear her crying.