The Angel of Pain

by E. F. Benson

“Oh, don’t think too well of me,” she said, “and—and go now, or you will be late.”

Then, after he had gone, Madge felt tired as she had never felt tired before. The fact that the tension was over showed her what the tension had been; she had struggled, and while she struggled the need for effort had postponed the effect of weariness which the effort produced. She could go on living her ordinary life, and had not this occurred she could still have gone on, but it was only now, when the need for going on was over, that she knew how utterly weary she was. Yet with the weariness there was given her a draught of wine; it would no longer be “to-morrow and to-morrow and to-morrow,” but to-morrow only. She knew as surely as she knew how tired she was, that to-morrow would see her with him, and the rest she was content to leave; no imagination or picturing of hers was necessary. It would be as it would be.

After Philip had left her, there was still half an hour before she need go to dress, but the thought that her solitude might be disturbed here by anyone who called, or by her mother, who would be returning any minute, caused her to go upstairs to her own room, where, till the advent of her maid at dressing-time, she would be alone.

Thus it was scarcely a minute after her lover had gone that she went upstairs. As she mounted the steps to the storey above, she heard the front-door bell ring, congratulated herself on having just escaped, and went more softly, and closed the door of her bedroom very gently behind her.

The ring at the bell which she had heard was her mother returning. The footman who had taken Madge’s note, who had also just let Philip out, let her in, having laid down the note in question on the hall table, meaning to put a stamp on it, and drop it into the letter-box. Madge’s handwriting was unmistakable; it was brilliantly legible, too, and the address leaped from the envelope.

Now, Lady Ellington, as both her friends and her possible enemies would have at once admitted, was a very thorough woman. She did not, in fact, when she desired or designed anything, neglect any opportunity of furthering that desire or design, or on the other hand, neglect to remove any obstacle which might possibly stand in the way of its realisation. She had excellent eyes, too—eyes not only of good sight, but very quick to observe. Yet even a short-sighted person might easily have involuntarily read the address, so extremely legible was it. And Lady Ellington, with her excellent sight, read it almost before she knew she had read it. The footman in question had meantime just gone out to deliver her order to the chauffeur for the motor this evening, and before he had got back again into the hall, Lady Ellington was half-way upstairs with the note in her hand.

William—the footman—had a week before received a month’s warning on the general grounds of carelessness and inattention. Whether justified or not before they were justified now, for on re-entering he thought no more at all about the note he had to post, but stared at himself in a looking-glass, and hoped the next butler might be more agreeable to a sensitive young fellow, than the one he at present served under. He was a student of the drama, and smiled to himself in the glass, detecting in that image a likeness to Mr. George Alexander. So he smiled again. And as befits so vacant-minded a young man, he vanishes from this tale after a short and inglorious career. His career he himself regarded in a different fashion.

Lady Ellington went into the drawing-room on her way upstairs. Philip, she knew, since she had passed him fifty yards from the house had gone, and Madge, so it appeared, had gone too. But the tea was still there. For herself, she had already had tea, but she took the trouble to rinse out a cup, pour a little boiling water into it, and proceeded to lay the note face upwards over it. Thorough in every way, she took the precaution of sitting close to the table, ready at any moment to snatch the note away and be discovered sipping hot water—a practice to which she was known to be addicted, and to which she attributed much of her superlative health and freedom from all digestive trouble. How well founded that belief was may be judged from the fact that she digested without qualms of any kind what she was doing now. The good purpose that lurked behind assimilated apparently any meanness. In fact, the good purpose was of the nature of the strongest acid; the meanness ceased to exist—it was absorbed, utterly eaten away.

She was in no hurry, for there was still plenty of time before she need dress, and she waited till the flap of the envelope began to curl back of its own accord as the gum that fastened it was made fluid again by the steam. This happened very soon, because it was not yet really dry. Then, taking precaution against the sheet inside being touched by it, she drew it out and read. The clear, neat handwriting—she had taken great pains with Madge’s early tuition in this art—was as intelligible as print, and she only needed to read it through twice before she placed it back again in its envelope, pressed the flap back, and left it to cool and dry. Yet during this very short process her own ideas were also cool and dry, and the reasoning sound and effective. So she put a stamp on the envelope, and went downstairs herself, and dropped it into the letter-box.

That was necessary, since in her note Madge had stated that she would be at the studio at three unless she heard to the contrary. Therefore there was no object to be gained in merely sequestrating the note, since Madge proposed to go there unless stopped. For Lady Ellington knew well that no plan, however well-founded, could be quite certain of success; uncertainty, the possibly adverse action of Fate might work against it, and thus to let this note go—of which she had mastered the contents—was to provoke an accident the less, since, on her present scheme, she had not stopped it. For the fewer dubious things one does on the whole, the less is the risk. It is the unfortunate accident of guilt which in nine cases out of ten hangs a man. So though she had been guilty—in a way—when she wrote to Evelyn, implying Madge’s acquiescence in her letter, she had the more excellent reason now, especially since she had completely mastered the contents of this note, in not taking the more questionable step of stopping it. For she knew for certain, and at the moment did not require to know more, the immediate movements of the enemy; if Madge heard nothing, she would go to the studio to-morrow at three. But no one under any circumstances could prevent her mother making her appearance there too.