Then he talked enthusiastically about the time when she and Severn would live idyllically on the slopes of one of those Surrey hills. He, of course, might be working hundreds—perhaps thousands of miles away, but it would be pleasant to think of the two of them in such delightful surroundings. They were lucky to have plenty of money; they could build just where they liked and how they liked. And we—he and I—would perhaps visit them from time to time.
What could I say to him? Could I tell him the fear that was in my mind? Could I warn him that the danger that had existed eight years before was still a danger? ...
Not then.... Not, at any rate, till the danger was more evident, till I had proof as well as surmising. I said merely: "Well, I hope you showed her some good places. She ought to be able to find something or other if money isn't much of a consideration."
And he answered smiling: "Oh, yes, we shall find something. She's coming again next week...."
IV
He was so frank about it. And so was Helen. The house business (despite my first uneasy fear to the contrary) proved to be absolutely genuine. June, it was true, hadn't known about it, but Severn had, for it was he who had actually suggested the Hindhead district. So there was nothing intrinsically curious in her visits of exploration.
The ordinary work-a-day person with limited money and limited leisure has no idea of the extraordinary difficulties that confront people with unlimited quantities of both. This matter of choosing a house, for instance. When you have just so much money to spend and so much time to look round in, the chances are that you solve your housing problem quite expeditiously. Far different is the troubled lot of those whose bank balance is no curb upon the gratification of every whim. They climb to the top of high hills and wonder how a house would look from here, or from there, and whether it would be better to have it facing the sun or the prevailing winds or the river tumbling in the valley below. Then there are abstruse problems about garages and gardens and conservatories and electric light and drains and so on. Finally, there is the question of architecture. Is it to be English or classic—the Elizabethan gable or the slim Ionic pediment? ... It is all a very lengthy business, as you can well imagine.
On that second excursion to Hindhead Helen quite made up her mind that no vacant house in the district was at all suitable, and that, therefore, one would have to be built. And this, of course, meant continuing the search for a site. The site was found, if I remember rightly, on the occasion of her fourth visit, but details of aspect, location, and so on, were not settled till the ninth visit, when an architect and surveyor was in attendance.
It must have been an idyllic quest, during those long lovely days of May and June. At first the two of them walked, but walking takes up a lot of time, and besides, as June had said, Helen hated walking. So one day she came down in the big Daimler car, sent the chauffeur back by train, and taught Terry to drive. She couldn't drive herself, but she knew just enough about it to teach him, and he proved such an apt pupil that he drove her safely back to town that very night. And then the next time that the house business demanded her presence at Hindhead he called for her at the End House and there was no need of a chauffeur.
The whole thing was so frank and open and, above all, so sweetly plausible that there was no chance, even if there had been any reason, to tender warning advice. Fate, like a warm sun at noonday, was blazing down on them from a cloudless sky. Terry couldn't even wonder if her days in the country were unfair to Severn, for it was on his behalf that she was taking them. Severn, it appeared, was keen about the new house, and Helen wasn't so especially, even after Terry's strenuous efforts to make her. And how charming, how subtly reassuring was her resistance to those efforts!