But the moment he has said it he realises that she does not believe him. She has heard the crash of his chair beside the telephone: that is what has awakened her; and she has heard him striding up and down the room, and there is no book lying open on the table; there is no chair drawn before the fire, and in the grate only a few dull coals; no whisky on the small table; no cigar smoke; no feature of the usual setting for an evening’s reading, and, after thirty years of marriage, a wife knows her husband’s habits.
“My dear,” she begins. But he will not let her finish. At all events he must protect himself against discovery and against this fatal weakness in himself that would fling him before her on his knees and on her pity. “It’s quite all right,” he says; “I shall be going up in a minute. I just want to settle my mind a bit first. I can’t sleep if I’m at all excited. And you’ll be catching cold, dear, here. You mustn’t stay, really, in that dressing-gown.”
They look each other in the face. She knows that he is lying, and he knows she knows. But she has a dignity that will not descend to the vulgarity of cross-examination. “Very well,” she says, and again turns, leaving him to the sting of his jealousy.
And it is not till nearly four that he hears, at last, the quick, breathless voice; hears its answering “Hullo!” in the casual tone of one who is happy and tired, and cannot be bothered at this late hour.
“What, you!” it says, “at this time. Where have you been gadding round?”
He keeps his dignity; he would not betray to her the secret of his long night’s vigil. The tone of his voice as he replies to her is equally casual, equally pre-occupied. “A long sitting at the House,” he says. “I’ve only just got back. I thought I’d ring up and say good-night.”
“And I’ve only just got in, too.”
“Yes; dancing at Jack’s, a studio affair, a jolly party. Everyone there, Sybil and Ernest, and Marjorie Cooper and Arthur Winston. Oh, and do you know I believe that Forster ménage is coming to an end. She was dancing with another man the whole evening; rather funny, isn’t it, after all we’ve said?”
He agrees that it is funny, and listens for a few moments to the eager flow of talk. “Well, I expect you’re tired,” he says at last. “You’ve got a matinée to-morrow. I mustn’t keep you up. A bientot.” And he hears the click of the receiver at the other end.