It was raining and miserable when Micky arrived in London. The roads were wet and slippery, and every taxi and omnibus splashed pedestrians with mud.

Micky shivered as he stood waiting while a porter lugged his traps down from the rack. He had felt depressed in Paris, but now London seemed a thousand times worse. The sight of Driver waiting on the platform annoyed him. He answered the man’s stolid greeting snappishly. He had wanted to come home, and yet now he was here he wished himself a thousand miles away. He leaned back in a corner of the taxi and shut his eyes.

The last four days had got on his nerves; Esther’s letter in his pocket was like an eternal reproach.

Why had he come back at all? She did not want him––nobody wanted him in the whole forsaken world. The silence of his flat seemed a thing to be dreaded in his present mood. Driver’s inscrutable face would, he felt, drive him mad. With sudden impulse he leaned forward and called to the chauffeur, “Stop––I’ve changed my mind––drive me back to the Savoy....”

There would be life there, at any rate––life and people and music––something to make a man forget the depression that sat like a ton weight on his shoulders.

He felt utterly at a loose end; he stalked moodily into the lounge. There were many people there, girls in pretty dinner frocks, with their attendant cavaliers. Micky glanced at none of them, till suddenly a girl who had been sitting on a couch listening rather listlessly to the conversation of a youth beside her, rose to her feet when she saw Micky, the hot colour flying to her cheeks.

For a moment she hesitated, waiting for him to look 139 at her, to speak––but Micky had stalked by without turning his eyes, and after the barest second she followed and touched his arm.

“Micky....” she said breathlessly, and again “Micky,” with an odd little catch in her voice.

Micky turned as if he had been shot, then stopped dead, colouring up to the roots of his hair, for the girl was Marie Deland.

She smiled tremulously, reading the distress in his eyes.

“I thought I was never going to see you any more,” she said. She tried hard to speak casually, but her voice quivered a little. “Where have you been hiding all this time, Micky?”

Micky stammered out that he really didn’t know––that he’d only just come back from Paris––that he did call to see her one night, but that they told him she wasn’t in. She broke in there impetuously––

“I know; I’m so sorry. It wasn’t my fault. I was there all the time. Mother–––” She stopped, biting her lip, but there was no need to explain further. Micky could well imagine that it was by Mrs. Deland’s orders that the butler had said “Not at home.”

His heart was full of remorse as he looked down at Marie. Such a little while ago he had thought of her as his wife. He had fully meant to marry her.

He broke out again agitatedly––

“I know you must think I’m an awful sweep. I––I––oh, I can’t explain.” He glanced past her to where the rather vapid-looking youth to whom she had been speaking sat tugging at an incipient moustache.

“What are you doing here?” he asked again. “Who are you with?”

She told him that she was with her married sister and some friends.

“We’re going to have dinner here,” she said. She was longing to ask Micky to dine with them, but was obviously afraid to do so.

After a moment––

“I suppose I ought to be going,” she said. “Violet will wonder where I am, Micky.” She looked up at him with abashed eyes. “I––I suppose––you wouldn’t––will you come out to tea with me to-morrow?”

Micky’s face reflected the flush in her own; he looked away in miserable embarrassment. He knew that she felt the same towards him as she had done before that memorable New Year’s Eve, and he knew that whatever happened now he could never feel the same to her any more.

He answered that he would be pleased, very pleased. Where should he meet her––or should he call for her?

“I’ll meet you,” she said quickly. “You know where we always used to go––I’ll be there at four, Micky.”

She put out her hand and Micky was forced to take it; he felt how her fingers shook in his, and he cursed himself for a brute as he turned away and left her.

In a way he was glad they had met. Any other woman would have given him the snubbing which he knew he so richly deserved. Deep down in his heart he wished that she had done so; anything would have been easier to meet than this trembling overture of friendship. He knew that the little abashed expression in Marie’s dark eyes could only mean one thing, that he had cut her to the soul and that she still cared for him.

He left the Savoy without having any dinner; he went back to his rooms, where the imperturbable Driver was brushing and refolding his master’s clothes. It had almost broken Driver’s heart to see the way in which Micky had packed his things; he raised eyes of wooden reproach as Micky entered the room.

There was a pile of letters on the table. Micky flicked them through carelessly; nothing of interest––a few bills and a good many invitations; nothing from Esther––not even a note from June.

He sat down by the fire and proceeded to cut the many envelopes open. He kept thinking of Marie and 141 wondering if it would be kinder not to meet her to-morrow, after all; if he could possibly write her a note that would tactfully explain the situation.

He just glanced at each of the notes as he opened them, and let them drop to the carpet at his feet. They could be answered later; there was nothing of importance, nothing he ... his attention was arrested:––

“Dear Mr. Mellowes,––I wonder if it will be asking too much of you to come round and see me one afternoon for half an hour?––

Yours sincerely, Laura Ashton.”

Micky glanced quickly at the address at the top of the paper––it was from Raymond’s mother.

What in the world could she want with him, he wondered blankly. He looked across at Driver.

“This note––the one that came by hand––when did it come?” he asked.

Driver replied that it had been there for two days. He waited a moment, then went on brushing Micky’s coat.

Micky felt rather disturbed.

Raymond’s mother! What in the wide world could she want with him? Supposing it were anything to do with Esther ...

He wrote a note in reply at once and said he would call the following afternoon; he could just look in early for half an hour and go on afterwards to meet Marie; it was strange how he dreaded both these appointments.

He felt ridiculously nervous when he reached Mrs. Ashton’s house. For the first time it occurred to him that possibly Esther would be here too.

He was kept waiting some minutes in the drawing room––minutes during which he wandered restlessly about staring at the pictures and the photographs.

There were many portraits of Raymond––Raymond at all stages of his chequered career, smiling and handsome. Micky turned his back on them with a feeling of disgust.

The door opened behind him, and, turning sharply, he found himself face to face with Mrs. Ashton.

She came forward with outstretched hand.

“This is kind of you, Mr. Mellowes. I did not know you had been away till I got your note this morning. I was wondering why I had had no reply to mine.”

Micky blurted out that he had been in Paris––that he only came back yesterday evening.

Mrs. Ashton’s face changed a little.

“Paris! Have you been with that son of mine?” she asked sharply.

Micky coloured. “I met him––quite by chance, though. We were not together more than a few minutes.”

She smiled rather ironically.

“Have you got tired of him at last, then?” she asked. She moved over to the fire. She looked back at Micky quizzically. “I have often wondered how you put up with his friendship so long, Mr. Mellowes,” she added rather sadly.

Micky felt embarrassed. He had always liked Mrs. Ashton. He stammered out that he and Raymond had always been very good friends.

She drew her chair a little closer to the fire.

“Very well––then, perhaps, you will be kind enough to answer a question I am going to ask you. Mr. Mellowes, what was the name of that girl at Eldred’s whom Raymond was always about with before Christmas?”

The question was so unexpected that Micky was utterly taken aback. Before he was aware of it he had told a lie.

“I don’t know––at least, he always spoke of her as ‘Lallie.’ I never once saw him with her, Mrs. Ashton––he never introduced me to her.”

She looked rather incredulous.

“And yet you were such friends,” she said.

Micky coloured.

“Our tastes were not always identical,” he said rather stiffly. “I am not very interested in women, and he–––”

“And he is,” she finished for him. “There is no need to tell me that––I know my son. So you cannot tell me the name of this girl? I had hoped that you would be able to do so.”

Micky met her eyes unflinchingly.

“I dare say I could find out,” he said. “If she is still at Eldred’s.”

“She is not there.” Mrs. Ashton looked up at Micky with an anxious line between her handsome eyes. “Mr. Mellowes, I have always prided myself on my sense of justice, and somehow lately I have got an uncomfortable feeling that when I forbade Raymond to have anything more to do with that girl it would have been better if I had advised her to have nothing more to do with him. He is my son, and perhaps it seems strange for me to speak about him like that, but you cannot have been friends with him all these months without finding him out, so I need not apologise. Raymond is just his father over again....” She paused, and a painful little smile curved her lips.

She looked at Micky rather pathetically. “There is no need for me to say any more, is there?” she asked.

Micky did not answer. He had heard many stories about Raymond’s father, all more or less unsavoury, and he knew that from all accounts Mrs. Ashton had been greatly to be pitied during his lifetime.

“So if you can’t help me in this,” she went on presently, “I am afraid I have brought you here for nothing. I want to find out who this girl is, and see her for myself.” She paused, but Micky’s face was inscrutable.

In his heart he was convinced that she did not believe him, but he had no intention of telling her Esther’s name; he longed to know if Esther were in the house, but, of course, it was impossible to ask.

It almost seemed as if Mrs. Ashton could read his thoughts, for she said suddenly––

“Do you know, Mr. Mellowes, that I am going to have a companion?”

Micky echoed her last word vacantly.

“Companion?––I––er....”

“Yes, a girl,” Mrs. Ashton went on; “I have always envied people with daughters; a daughter is so much more to a mother than a son; but as I was not fortunate enough to have one of my own I am going to try having a companion. Raymond will be annoyed, I dare say––he has always pooh-poohed the idea when I have mentioned it to him, but now–––” she shrugged her shoulders and sighed impatiently. “Well, he can no longer object, I think, seeing that he is to be married himself....”

Micky made a little quick movement, almost knocking over a vase of flowers standing at his elbow; he recovered himself with an effort.

“Married?” he said. “Why, I thought....” he broke off. “He did not say anything about it to me when I met him in Paris,” he said lamely.

“No?” Her handsome eyes searched his agitated face critically. “Well, he is to be married all the same,” she said. “I heard from him only this morning. He is engaged to Tom Clare’s widow––Tubby Clare, I believe he was always called.”