"Oh, I see!"
Indeed, Roger saw more than he would have cared to disclose. He felt nearly sure now of what he had at first only dimly suspected, namely, that Thérèse had been supplying Arthur with funds. He could comprehend now his stepmother's rage at being summarily cut down, as clearly as he understood the reasons back of Holliday's projected removal to the Argentine. The conclusions he was coming to appeared to him sordid and humiliating. He hoped his father had no suspicion of the truth.
They had reached the Villa Firenze; the car purred up the gravel drive under the curving branches of the acacias.
"I'm glad you asked me to come," Esther said sincerely as she alighted.
"I feel like another person."
"So do I."
He looked at her gravely and for a longer space than the occasion demanded. Again there was the sense of pleasant confusion within her as she raced up the stairs to her room, a smile played about her lips, her pulse beat quickly. She had forgotten the matter that had been in her thoughts ever since she had entered the doctor's dining-room, but once she had closed her door it came back to her. That cigarette-tip with its scarlet edge uncurled—had her companion associated it with anyone in particular? She wondered. Opening her bag, she shook out the tiny hairpin she had picked up off the floor. So few hairpins were used at all these days of shingled heads … yet she had recently seen one identical with this. It was Lady Clifford who used it to anchor into position her big wavy lock of hair.
"She was there last night, I am sure of it," Esther said to herself as she threw off her hat and coat. "It was quite safe, Jacques was away. I'm the only person who knows, and that by the merest accident…. Well, it's just as well for her it isn't some malicious person. She's all right in my hands."
How odd it seemed to think that she, a stranger, should know more about Lady Clifford than her own family! Or perhaps it wasn't so strange after all. One's family was often the last to know things, its ignorance was proverbial. She felt a sudden wave of pity for the old man, lying ill and unsuspecting.
When she slipped back into Sir Charles's room, she found Miss Clifford in a chair by the window, knitting.
"He's just waked up," she said, rising and coming towards her. "You've had a good nap, haven't you, Charlie?"