“Your room’s along here,” she said. “I’ve spent quite a bit of time telling the housekeeper what to do. Perry relies implicitly on my judgment, you know.”
“I didn’t know.” Moira reflected briefly. “What is it that you don’t understand?” she asked. “You were saying—?”
“Oh, that!” Helen Ransome gave a serious little smile. “I don’t understand what it is that you’ve got and I haven’t. We are alike in appearance, and I’ve tried my level best to get Perry to marry me—but to no avail. Then he chooses you! The only answer I can think of it that you have some kind of hypnotic power. There can’t be any other reason, can there?”
“Except that we love each other,” Moira suggested coolly.
“Doesn’t count for much these days,” Helen said. “Anyway, Perry marrying you shows you can never tell with men—and they say it’s the women who provide the unpredictable element! I shan’t believe that any more. Well, here’s the room you will be using until after the wedding.”
“It’s beautiful,” Moira observed.
“Best room in the house,” Helen sighed. “Of its size, that is. I used to have it when I came over to stay: now I’m pushed into a smaller one. All according to Perry’s special orders. I suppose I can label myself his forgotten woman—”
“Why don’t you go and sharpen your claws on some other tree, Helen?”
Perry’s easy voice inquired, and both women turned to see him lounging in the corridor, shoulder against the door jamb. As he met their gaze he came forward and put a protective aim about Moira’s shoulders. “Helen been baring her fangs at you?” he asked, smiling.
“Well, of course I have,” Helen admitted, raising an eyebrow. “You don’t expect me to accept defeat with gracious charm, do you? In my opinion, the woman who’ll do that isn’t yet born. Well, I think I’ll leave you two to finish the tour by yourselves. See you again, Moira, and don’t think too badly of me. I have the darnedest habit of saying just what I think.”
She turned languidly and ambled down the corridor.
“Very outspoken,” Moira commented.
“I shouldn’t have left you alone with her,” Perry apologized. “It never occurred to me that she might let herself go. Habit she’s got. The rest of us are used to it and shut her up accordingly, but strangers don’t always understand. She’s harmless enough, but a bit piqued, I think, because I’ve never asked her to marry me.”
“You chose me, Perry, and I’m not much different.”
“The difference lies in the fact that I love you and I don’t love her. I don’t have to enlarge on that, do I?”
“No, of course not.” Moira walked over to the window. For a while she studied the wintry grounds. March was a long time shaking off his frosty garments this year. “How about the servants?” she inquired presently. “Did Pearson fix it up?”
“As well as he could under present conditions. All we have is a cook housekeeper and Pearson himself. The best we can do until the agency sends us some maids. We’ll get by. I have an idea, somehow, that you’re the managing sort.”
Moira did not reply. She was gazing beyond the grounds at the dimly rising mists of evening. Perry studied her for a moment, then went over to her. To his surprise there were tears in her eyes as she turned to face him.
“Crying?” he asked, amazed. “What in the world is there to cry about? Something I’ve said—or done?”
“Of course not, Perry.” She made an effort to smile and rested a hand on his arm. “You’re the sweetest, gentlest man I have ever met. I was just thinking how awful it would be if I were to lose all this. There’s such peace and contentment here. I can feel it. It’s like a backwater, secure from the storm.”
“What storm?” he demanded, bewildered; then his voice firmed, suddenly. “Moira, isn’t it about time you put pretence aside and admit you fear something? I haven’t forgotten how you behaved in the cafe that first night.”
She was silent, but her tears ebbed slowly. Perry waited, then shrugged.
“All right, you’re entitled to have your secrets—but I think I should tell you that’s one reason why I decided to marry you so quickly.”
Moira looked at him sharply, puzzled. “Why? How do you mean?”
“I like danger,” he explained, grinning. “To marry an ordinary humdrum woman would be too tame. That’s why I never have married. With you there’s none of that. There’s some mystery about you, and I like it. You’re afraid of somebody—and I think it’s a man in a soft hat—but I like that, too. Because of our marriage I’ll be able to share whatever danger may threaten you, and enjoy it; and I’ll be able to protect you. Money and influence can do a lot.”
CHAPTER FIVE
WEDDING DAY
TO Moira the few intervening days before her marriage passed so swiftly that she hardly noticed them. So the morning of the wedding inevitably came. The organist from Brinhampton village church played the wedding march on the grand piano, Betty Mills and her husband supplied the flowers. After the ceremony came the signing of the register—and the business was all over.
On the great desk in the center of the room were laid the offerings of countless friends from near and far. Helen surveyed them with her dark head on one side.
“I’ve looked through most of them—glanced, that is,” she said “It’s a funny thing but everything seems to be from somebody you know, Perry. As for you, Moira, nobody seems to care whether you’ve married or not. I don’t see a single thing addressed to you personally.”
“As if it mattered,” Perry retorted. “Everything here is intended for both of us, only you naturally would try to read something else into it. It’s just that Moira has very few friends who know her movements.”
“Oh, I see.”
Helen exchanged a glance with Betty Mills. Will Ransome looked at Dick Mills. Moira said nothing. She was studying the various gifts, among which were two heavy cut-glass decanters. Round the neck of one was a card that read: To Perry: Better to have loved and lost. Helen.
“Thanks for the thought Hel,” Perry grinned, as Moira pointed it out to him. “Do you expect me to drink myself to death?”
“Why not?” Helen suggested. “It’s about the best thing I can wish for you since I can’t have you myself”.
“I have the idea,” said Betty Mills, “that Helen doesn’t much care for this marriage. It’s stroked her the wrong way.”
“That I am afraid, is purely her own affair,” Perry replied indifferently. “And I don’t think we need attach all that importance to what she says. We all know Hel: too outspoken for her own good, sometimes. Anyway,” he added, “let’s have the wedding feast and then, my sweet, we’ve got to catch a train and boat for France.”
Moira nodded and accompanied him from the library. As she sat down at the dining table, Perry noticed her expression was curiously waxen and she scarcely noticed him; her thoughts were far away. She hardly heard the toast that Will Ransome proposed to the happy couple. She only seemed to become conscious of her surroundings when Perry placed a glass of champagne before her.
“To ourselves, sweetheart,” he murmured, bending over her. “Didn’t you hear what Will said?”
Moira hesitated, then suddenly jumped up and put a hand to her forehead.
“No, I—I didn’t hear,” she said falteringly. “And—and I won’t drink either!”