Sherry had gone over to the window, and was standing with his back to his friend. He said curtly over his shoulder: “I did.”
“That’s why I brought Kitten down to my grandmother, and made Ferdy and George keep it from you they knew where she was. Thought if you felt you had lost her, it might make you think a trifle.” He paused, and glanced across at the Viscount. “Wouldn’t have betrayed her in any event, you know. At one time I’d a strong notion it was all going to be for the best. Haven’t been so sure of it lately. Don’t know why you’re setting Sheringham House in order, for one thing.”
Sherry wheeled round. “You fool, for Kitten, if ever I should find her! Do you suppose I have not had time to think as well as you? I see now what I ought to have done! I thought I could continue in the same way, even though I was married: had no notion of settling down! Well, I know now that it’s not possible, and, damn it, I don’t desire it to be! I thought, if I could find Kitten, we would start afresh: try to be more the thing! If I had not thought she might return there, I would have got rid of that curst house in Half Moon Street long since! God knows I have grown to hate it! But how could I do so? Suppose she had come back, only to find the shutters closed, or even strangers living there? I had to stay, though it has been like a tomb to me!”
“I see,” said Mr Ringwood. “Shan’t deny your setting Sheringham House in order looked to me as though you had different ideas in your head. When Severn fell out of the running — Well, couldn’t help wondering a trifle, Sherry!”
“If you mention Bella’s name to me again, Gil, I am likely to do you a mischief!” Sherry warned him. “I never cared the snap of my fingers for that wretched girl, and if you are not assured of that, ask her! Why, God save the mark, she may be a beauty, but give me my Kitten! Bella, with her airs and her graces, and her miffs, and her curst sharp tongue! No, I thank you! What’s more, no man who had lived with Kitten would look twice at the Beauty!”
“Then why the devil did you come to Bath, which we all know you can’t abide, only to be near her?” demanded Mr Ringwood, exasperated.
“To be near her? My God, is that what you think? You must be crazy! Nothing would have induced me to have come here, but one circumstance! When my mother asked me to go with her, I would not listen. Yes, and I told Bella if she thought she had the power to persuade me she was mightily mistaken! But something she said — or I said: I don’t recall precisely what it was — made me remember that it was to Bath that Bagshot woman had the intention of sending Kitten, to become a governess. I made sure I should find her here, in some seminary in Queen’s Square, and that is all the reason I had for coming to a place I never mean to set foot in again if I live to be a hundred!”
Mr Ringwood sat staring at him. “So that is how it was!”
“Of course that is how it was! And I saw Kitten with George almost the very instant I entered the town, and if I could have come up with him then, I’d have murdered him in cold blood! I have been trying ever since to get two words with Kitten alone, but she will not receive me in Camden Place, nor do more than accord me the civility of a stranger when we meet in public!”
“Upon my soul, Sherry, if ever there was a born fool, you are he!” exclaimed Mr Ringwood. “How the deuce was Kitten to know you had come here to search for her? Depend upon it, she believes you came only to be near Miss Milborne, and had not the least expectation of seeing her! I do not wonder that she will not speak to you!”