But Godfrey went on, still directly addressing Gilbert Baynton, "I can't prevent Laura seeing you, if she insists upon it. She's a grown-up woman, and I can't turn the key on her. But she shan't see you in my house. And, as far as I'm concerned, this is the last time I'll ever set eyes on your face."
"Don't you be so sure of that!" Gillie muttered the words between his teeth. His fair face had turned a deep red-brick colour, his blue eyes were blazing.
Again there fell on the three of them that strange, ominous, sinister silence.
Then Gilbert Baynton turned to his sister. He actually laughed out loud. But even Pavely noticed, with bitter satisfaction, that the laughter sounded very forced.
"Ha! ha! ha! Godfrey's not a bit changed. He's just the same old narrow-minded, sanctimonious prig he always was!"
He took Laura in his arms, and kissed her two or three times very warmly. "Never mind, little girl," he said. "I shan't make trouble between you and Godfrey for long! I shan't be in England for more than a few days. I'm off to Paris next week."
He disengaged himself gently from Laura's clinging arms, went to the door, opened it, then shut it very quietly behind him.
Laura turned away, and stared into the fire.
Godfrey began, awkwardly, conciliatingly, "Now, my dear Laura——"
She put up her hand. "Don't speak to me," she said, in what he felt to be a dreadful voice of aversion and of pain. "I shall never, never forgive you for this!"
He shrugged his shoulders, and went out of the room, into the long corridor. And then he walked quickly through it and so to the hall of the fine old house, of which, try as he might, he never felt himself, in any intimate sense, the master.
The hall was empty. Quietly he opened the front door. Yes, Gillie had kept his word this time! He really had gone. Pavely could see the alert, still young-looking figure of the man whom in his mind he always called "that scoundrel" hurrying down the carriage road which led to the great gates of The Chase.
Chapter X
Katty Winslow stood by her open gate. She had wandered out there feeling restless and excited, though she hardly knew why. During the last fortnight she had spent many lonely hours, more lonely hours than usual, for Godfrey Pavely came much less often to see her than he had done in the old, easygoing days.
And yet, though restless, Katty was on the whole satisfied. She thought that things were going very much as she wished them to go. It was of course annoying to know so little, but she was able to guess a good deal, and she felt quite sure that the leaven was working.
But the suspense and the uncertainty had got on her nerves, and she had made up her mind to leave Rosedean perhaps for as long as a fortnight. Two days ago she had written to various friends who were always glad to see her. That was why, as she stood at the gate, she was able to tell herself that she was waiting for the postman.
She thought it very probable that Godfrey Pavely would be walking past her house about this time. A couple of days ago he had come in for about half an hour, but he had been dull and ill at ease, his mind evidently full of something he was unwilling or ashamed to tell. And she had watched him with an amused, sympathetic curiosity, wondering how long his cautious reticence would endure. If she had put her mind to it, perhaps Katty could have made him speak of that which filled his sore heart, but she felt that the time was not yet ripe for words between herself and Godfrey. She was afraid of jarring him, of making him say something to her which both of them afterwards might regret. No, not any words of love to herself—of that she was not afraid—but some dogmatic pronouncement on divorce, and perchance on re-marriage.
And then, as she stood there, glancing up and down the lonely country road, she suddenly saw a man walking quickly towards her—not from Pewsbury, but from the opposite direction, which led only from The Chase.
Katty's bright brown eyes were very good eyes, and long before the stranger could see her she had, as it were, taken stock of him. Somehow his clothes were not English-looking, and he wore a kind of grey Homburg hat.
He was walking at a great pace, and as he came nearer, some vague feeling of curiosity made Katty step out of the gate, and look straight up the road towards him. All at once she made up her mind that he was American—a well-to-do and, according to his lights, a well-dressed American.
Now Katty Winslow looked very charming, as she stood out there, in her heather-mixture tweed skirt, and pale blue flannel blouse—charming, and also young. And the stranger—to her he seemed entirely a stranger—when he was quite close up to her, suddenly took off his hat and exclaimed, "Why, Miss Fenton! It is Miss Fenton, isn't it?"
He was now smiling broadly into her face, his bold, rather challenging eyes—the blue eyes which were the best feature of his face, and the only feature which recalled his beautiful sister—full of cordial admiration.
"You don't remember me?" he went on. "Well, that's quite natural, for of course you made a much deeper impression on me than I did on you!"
And then all at once it flashed across Katty who this pleasant, bright-eyed wayfarer must be. It must be, it could only be, Gilbert Baynton—the peccant Gillie!
"Mr. Baynton?" she said questioningly, and she also threw a great note of welcome and cordiality into her voice.
"Yes," he said. "Gilbert Baynton—very much at your service——?"
"—Mrs. Winslow," she said hurriedly. "I'm Mrs. Winslow now." She saw that the name conveyed nothing to him. "Do come in," she went on pleasantly, "if only for a moment, Mr. Baynton. Though it's early for tea, perhaps you'll stay and have a cup with me? I had no idea you were in England! I suppose you're staying with Laura, at The Chase?"
He shook his head, the smile faded from his face, and Katty, who was observant, saw that her question was ill-timed.
"It's delightful—seeing an old friend again, and I was feeling so bored—all by myself!"
As he followed her into the house, Gillie told himself that this was distinctly amusing—quite good fun! It would take the horrible taste of his interview with that—that brute—out of his mouth.
He looked round the little hall with quick interest and curiosity. There was no sign of a man about, only a lady's slender walking-stick and a bright red parasol, in the umbrella-stand. Was pretty little Katty a widow? Somehow she did not look like a widow!
She opened a door which gave out of the hall on the left, and called out, "Harber? I should like tea in about five minutes."
Then she shut the door, and led the way down the little hall, and through into her sitting-room.
Gillie again glanced about him with eager appreciation. This was the sort of room he liked—cosy, comfortable, bright and smiling like its attractive mistress.
"Sit down," she exclaimed, "and tell me everything that's happened to you since we last met! Why, it must be, let me see, quite twelve years ago?"
She took up a china box: "Have a cigarette—I'll have one too."
He waved the box aside, took out his own case, and held it out to her. "I think you'll like these," he said. Then he struck a match, and as their fingers touched, the lighting of her cigarette took quite a little while.
"This is jolly!" He sank back into one of Katty's well-cushioned easy chairs. "You've the prettiest room I've been in since I came to England, Mrs. Winslow."
"Oh, then you haven't been into Laura's boudoir?"
"Yes, I've just come from there." Again his face altered as he spoke, and this time there came a look of frowning anger over it. Then, almost as if he read the unspoken question in her mind, he said slowly, "Look here, Mrs.