Mrs. Belassis looked at the indignant Maud with a smile of cool disdain.
‘As this is your brother’s house, over which you preside, I will condescend to reply, otherwise I should decline to answer such an insolent interrogation. After I left you I made a tour of the gardens and hot-houses, which I am never invited to inspect, of course, owing to the kind politeness of the mistress of Ladywell. After I had enjoyed the sweetness of the flowers and trees for above an hour, I came here to write a note to Philip; but what I wrote did not satisfy me, and I tore up the letter and determined to wait till I could see him personally. Just as I was about to leave the room my niece entered, and here we are now, face to face. Are you satisfied?’
‘I don’t know,’ answered Maud; ‘but I hear what you say. Are you going? Good-bye. If you care to see Aunt Olive she is in the drawing-room. We shall have lunch in an hour.’
‘I will go home, thank you,’ said Mrs. Belassis coldly. ‘Good-bye, my dear.’
Maud watched her cross the hall, a distrustful and angry light in her eyes.
‘She always gets the best of it with me. I can never be politely cutting to Aunt Celia, as Phil is. I am always rude, and she makes me feel like a schoolgirl. How I detest her! I wonder why she came. I know what she said was all lies. What can she have been up to? I wonder what that letter to Phil was that she wrote and destroyed. Did she write a letter at all?’ Maud went forward and carefully looked about for torn fragments of paper, but could find none.
‘If she wrote it she took it away in her pocket,’ said Maud; and then she opened the ink-bottle and saw that it had been washed out that morning and not refilled. Mrs. Belassis had certainly written no letter there that day. What she had done, the girl was at a loss to imagine. All that she could tell was that her aunt’s visit was certain to mean mischief of some kind.
Mrs. Belassis had ample food for reflection on her homeward way, and very earnestly did she strive to form some theory as to the respective position of Phil and his friend, so as to prove, if possible, that the former was acting in a reprehensible manner.
At last an idea was hit upon which seemed to satisfy her; at any rate, it gave a semblance of reality to her suspicions.
‘I believe he has got his friend shut up in a lunatic asylum somewhere—unless he has put him out of the way altogether; and he is playing a double game—sometimes Torwood and sometimes himself. I suppose he was Torwood abroad, whilst he was the rich man; and here he is Debenham; thus reaping the benefits of both characters. Perhaps Mr. Torwood’s mind has been failing of late, so that he has learned to depend upon Philip; yes, that is very likely. And now that he has money of his own, he has just disposed of his friend anyhow—no doubt in a madhouse—and is figuring about here as a great man, and spending his friend’s money as well as his own. Oh, you’re a nice young man, Philip Debenham! No wonder you keep your friend at a distance, and don’t trouble yourself about him. No wonder nobody can get to know anything definite about the “Tor” who was once all your talk. A very nice thing it will be for you when I bring it home to you! Oh yes, you will enjoy that very much; and I wonder what the law will say to these little transactions with Torwood’s money;’ and in this strain Mrs. Belassis kept on, her spirits rising and her confidence in her theory increasing with every step she took. But when she felt in her pocket, and her hand came in contact with the stiff paper it held, her face changed suddenly, and the old look of rage and fear returned.