"Where is that infant?" Tom demanded. "If I finish it all without her she'll be vexed."
"I can tell you where she ought to be," said Mrs. Orgreave placidly. "She ought to be in bed. No wonder she looks pale, stopping up till this time of night!"
Then there were unusual and startling movements behind the door, accompanied by giggling. And Alicia entered, followed by Charlie--Charlie who was supposed at that precise instant to be in London!
"Hello, mater!" said the curly-headed Charlie, with a sublime affectation of calmness, as though he had slipped out of the next room. He produced an effect fully equal to his desires.
III
In a little while, Charlie, on the sofa, was seated at a small table covered with viands and fruit; the white cloth spread on the table made a curiously charming patch amid the sombre colours of the drawing-room. He had protested that, having consumed much food en route, he was not hungry; but in vain. Mrs. Orgreave demolished such arguments by the power of her notorious theory, which admitted no exceptions, that any person coming off an express train must be in need of sustenance. The odd thing was that all the others discovered mysterious appetites and began to eat and drink with gusto, sitting, standing, or walking about, while Charlie, munching, related how he had miraculously got three days' leave from the hospital, and how he had impulsively 'cabbed it' to Euston, and how, having arrived at Knype, he had also 'cabbed it' from Knype to Bleakridge instead of waiting for the Loop Line train. The blot on his advent, in the eyes of Mrs. Orgreave, was that he had no fresh news of Marian and her children.
"You don't seem very surprised to find Hilda here," said Alicia.
"It's not my business to be surprised at anything, kid," Charlie retorted, smiling at Hilda, who sat beside him on the sofa. "Moreover, don't I get ten columns of news every three days? I know far more about this town than you do, I bet!"
Everybody laughed at Mrs. Orgreave, the great letter-writer and universal disseminator of information.
"Now, Alicia, you must go to bed," said Mrs. Orgreave. And Alicia regretted that she had been so indiscreet as to draw attention to herself.