‘For a holiday?’ I ineptly inquired.
‘For keeps,’ said Jack. ‘Mounted Police, with a commission soon, I hope. This country’s gone to the dogs, sir.’
Here was a pretty mess! ‘But look here, Turnbull, Miss Lettice has got it into her head that you’re going there as a lodger. Have you given her any cause to believe such stuff?’
At that the swagger dropped off him. ‘That woman, I’m sorry for her, but she gets on my nerves. She gushes too much for my taste. She wants to mother me, if you ever heard such rot. And I won’t be mothered.’
‘That’s all very well,’ I cut in. ‘But why say this to me? Miss Lettice is the person you should complain to. Are you content to let her go on living in a fool’s paradise?’
Well, you can pretty well guess how the conversation proceeded. We argued for the best part of three hours. Jack was determined not to yield to her devouring maternal affection, but he hadn’t pluck enough to tell her so outright. He preferred to save his own feelings by equivocation. The coward does it with a kiss, you know, the brave man with the sword. But I must do him the justice to admit that, short of brutal explicitness, he did all he could to disabuse her mind of its fond fiction. I was aghast when I realized that the secret of his departure was being kept solely in order that he might slip out of the country without bidding her good-bye. After long battle I wrung from him a reluctant promise that he would spare her that culminating cruelty.
And that is the end of the story. I too was a coward, for I did not dare to visit Miss Lettice until Jack had gone. In point of fact I watched him off the premises and then stepped in, unwillingly enough but hoping to afford the wretched woman some comfort, if only the comfort of distraction. The front door yielded to my push: it was seldom locked. I tapped at the door of the sitting-room. There was no sound from within. Gently I turned the handle and looked in.
‘Good morning, Miss Lettice,’ I said, with a cheerfulness that was idiotic, I dare say, but what was one to do?
Miss Lettice sat staring at the wall in front of her, staring fixedly, motionless. Whether she heard my voice or not I don’t know, but she neither moved nor spoke. I became very anxious and called to her again, offering such dry crumbs of comfort as came to hand. ‘Don’t grieve, my dear Miss Lettice. There’s still Bernard left to you.’ Something of that sort I said to her, but it made no difference at all. She was struck down, struck worse than dead, by the colossal and cruel power of love. And while I continued to stare at her with pity and horror, she slowly turned towards me, as though on a swivel, a face marred out of recognition by a smile....
Saunders winced. His lips had hesitated in releasing those last words. Lifting one hand to his eyes, he turned away from me towards his bookshelves. There, with a book in his hand, he shrugged his shoulders as if to shake off the grip of a memory.