Captures - Sách nói Miễn phí

II

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In the withdrawing-room of a small house near Kew Gardens, Mrs. Philip Raider was gazing at a piece of pinkish paper in her hand, as if it had been one of those spiders of which she had so constitutional a horror. Opposite her chair her son had risen; and against the wall her daughter had ceased suddenly to play Brahms’ Variations on a theme by Haydn.

“He says to-night!”

The girl dropped her hands from the keys. “To-night? I thought it was next month. Just like father—without a word of warning!”

The son mechanically took out his pipe, and began polishing its bowl. He was fresh-faced, fair, with a small head.

“Why didn’t he tell us to meet him in London? He must know we’ve got to come to an arrangement.”

The daughter, too, got up, leaning against the piano—a slight figure, with bushy, dark, short hair.

“What are we to do, Mother?”

“Jack must go round, and put Mabel and Roderick off for this evening.”

“Yes, and what then, if he’s going to stay here? Does he know that I’m engaged, and Beryl too?”

“I think I told him in my last letter.”

“What are you going to do, Mother?”

“It’s come so suddenly—I don’t know.”

“It’s indecent!” said the boy violently.

His sister picked up the dropped telegram. “‘Earl’s Court, five four.’ He may be here any minute. Jack, do hurry up! Doesn’t he realise that nobody knows, down here?”

Mrs. Raider turned to the fire.

“Your father will only have realised his own feelings.”

“Well, he’s got to begin with others. I’ll have to make him——!”

“Dr. Raider, ma’am.”

Late—299 stood, smiling, in front of the door which the maid had closed behind him.

“Well, Bertha! Ah, Beryl! Well, Jack!”

His daughter alone replied.

“Well, Father, you might have let us know beforehand!”

Late—299 looked from one face to the other.

“Never tell children they’re going to have a powder. How are you all?”

“Perfectly well, thank you. How are you?”

“Never better. Healthy life—prison!”

As if walking in her sleep Mrs. Raider came across the room. She put out her hand with a groping gesture. Late—299 did not take it.

“Rather nice here,” he said. “Can I have a wash?”

“Jack, show your father the lavatory.”

“The bathroom, please.”

The son crossed from the window, glanced at his father’s smiling face, and led the way.

Mrs. Raider, thin, pale, dark, spoke first. “Poor Philip!”

“Oh, Mother! It’s impossible to pity father; it always was. Except for his moustache being gone, I don’t see much change anyway. It’s you I pity. He simply can’t stay here. Why, everybody thinks you’re a widow.”

“People generally know more than they seem to, Beryl.”

“Nobody’s ever given us a hint. Why couldn’t he have consulted us?”

“We must think of him.”

“He didn’t think of us when he did that horrible thing. And it was so gratuitous, unless——! Mother, sometimes I’ve thought he had to do it; that he was her—her lover as well as her doctor!”

Mrs. Raider shook her head.

“If it had been that, he’d have told me. Your father is always justified in his own eyes.”

“What am I to do about Roddy?”

“We must just wait.”

“Here’s Jack! Well?”

“He’s having a bath as hot as he can bear it. All he said was: ‘This is the first thing you do when you go in, and the first thing you do when you come out—symmetrical, isn’t it?’ I’ve got to take him a cup of coffee. It’s really too thick! The servants can’t help knowing that a Dr. Raider who gets into the bath the moment he comes to call must be our father.”

“It’s comic.”

“Is it? He doesn’t show a sign of shame. He’ll call it from the house-tops. I thought, of course, he’d go abroad.”

“We all thought that.”

“If he were down in the mouth, one could feel sorry for him. But he looks as pleased as Punch with himself. And it’s such a beastly sort of crime—how am I to put it to Mabel? If I just say he’s been in prison, she’ll think it’s something even worse. Mother, do insist on his going at once. We can tell the servants he’s an uncle—who’s been in contact with smallpox.”

“You take him the coffee, Mother—oh, you can’t, if he’s to be an uncle! Jack, tell him nobody here knows, and mother can’t stand it; and hurry up! It’s half-past six now.”

The son passed his fingers through his brushed-back hair; his face looked youthful, desperate.

“Shall I?”

Mrs. Raider nodded.

“Tell him, Jack, that I’ll come out to him, wherever he likes to go; that I always expected him to arrange that; that this is—too difficult——” She covered her lips with her hand.

“All right, Mother! I’ll jolly well make him understand. But don’t launch out about it to the servants yet. Suppose it’s we who have to go? It’s his house!”

“Is it, Mother?”

“Yes; I bought it with his money under the power of attorney he left.”

“Oh, isn’t that dreadful?”

“It’s all dreadful, but we must consider him.”

The girl shook back her fuzzy hair.

“It does seem rather a case of ‘coldly received.’ But father’s always been shut up in himself. He can’t expect us suddenly to slobber over him. If he’s had a horrible time, so have we.”

“Well, shall I go?”

“Yes, take him the coffee. Be quick, my dear boy; and be nice to him!”

The son said with youthful grimness: “Oh, I’ll be nice!” and went.

“Mother, don’t look like that!”

“How should I look? Smiling?”

“No, don’t smile—it’s like him. Cry it off your chest.”