“But how silly of him. Why is he looking for me in America? It’s such a big place—it would take him years to find me, even if I were there. And I’m not. I wouldn’t have gone to a place where it would be so difficult to be found.”
Stuart looked puzzled: “But he wrote to me a few days after the—um—episode on the Broads, saying he had returned to the house in Chelsea, hoping you were there; that you had been, and gone again, with all your luggage, and left a note for him——”
“‘Good-bye; I am a pilgrim for the land of freedom!’” quoted Aureole readily. “You told me, don’t you remember, that he would certainly follow me, and that we’d have a perfectly lovely scene together, and that he’d never neglect my individual femininity again. And if he has deserted me, and gone to America, then it’s your fault.” She drooped her full crimson lips reproachfully at Stuart; who, disliking this reminder of his disgraceful machinations, made heated reply:
“He did follow you. If you say you are bound for the Land of Freedom, and then come to Bournemouth, I can hardly be blamed, can I?”
“I—I meant freedom of the soul,” murmured Aureole, and her eyes filled slowly with tears. It had been a shock to hear that her husband was so far away.
Then Stuart began to laugh: “If you will be subtle with Nigger, and talk about Pilgrims and Lands of Freedom, naturally his thoughts lumber off on a wild-goose chase in the direction of the ‘Mayflower’ and ‘Hail Columbia.’” Mentally he substituted ‘wild-duck chase,’ but refrained from being unkind aloud, because Aureole was weeping unrestrainedly now, and he felt compelled to cheer her to the best of his ability. “Never mind. I’ll write to him directly he sends some address, and tell him to come home. Meanwhile, you’re quite comfortable in the menag——at the boarding-house, aren’t you? Or why not move to the hotel? you can use me as Oliver’s banker, till he turns up, you know.”
“I can’t move to any hotel,” she flared at him. “It’s my boarding-house. Mine. And it’s in such a horrid m-m-muddle!”
Stuart sat down on a hillock of sand: “D’you mean to tell me that you were responsible for that advertisement?”
“Yes.”