A Bottle in the Smoke: A Tale of Anglo-Indian Life

by Janet Milne Rae

"Surely it was too hurried a step to part with it like that," she faltered, her home ideas being against such raw haste in an important matter.

"How do you know I did it without premeditation? You women always jump to such hasty conclusions! Let me tell you, Hester, it has been at least four days simmering in my mind," returned her husband; then he stopped and bit his lip. To be sure, he thought, he must tell his wife sooner or later some tale about his quarrel with Truelove Brothers. That they were cheating him out of his rights—that was how he would put it—but he would not spoil the first day of his return by such communications. It would surely impress her favourably, for the time being, that he had in this self-sacrificing manner begun by abandoning one of his chief luxuries.

Perceiving that she seemed to regret his self-denial, he set about to make light of it, assuring her that with such a sweet wife he could afford to dispense with bachelor delights. The load of misery which had weighed him down so heavily these last days seemed already to be rolling away as he sat by Hester's side in the drawing-room shut in from the raging wind, and listened to her beautifully modulated tones as she read aloud to him.

Though he laughingly declared he was not an invalid, and did not require to be coddled when she placed her softest cushions under his head, her quick eyes discerned that from whatever cause her husband's holiday had been no gain to his health, but very much the reverse. His cheeks looked hollow and his eyes lustreless, and his step had an uncertain tread which she had never observed before.

Dinner was over, and they had again taken refuge in their sheltered retreat, for as the wind still raged the verandah was impossible. Mr. Rayner began to pace up and down the room as he listened to Hester's playing, which he seemed to appreciate as he had seldom done. In his walk he was suddenly attracted by the ivory box which lay on his wife's writing table.

"Hallo, Hester, where came you by this treasure? What a beauty! This one is real ivory and no mistake. My poor bone fellow must hide its head for ever now. Why this is a genuine work of art! What splendid carving! Did Mrs. Fellowes present this as a supreme proof of her admiration of my wife? Or did you dip deep into your own purse? I shouldn't have thought these things were in the market nowadays. Where did you pick it up?"

"Well, Alfred, I'll tell you," answered Hester slowly, as she wheeled round on the piano-stool to face her husband. "It ought to seem a peace-offering to you, for you once behaved so badly to the dear old man. Mr. Morpeth actually gave it to me the other day when Mrs. Fellowes and I paid him a visit in his most interesting house."

"You got it from him? You paid him a visit? You actually dared to enter that man's house?" panted her husband, growing deadly pale, his eyes flashing, and his lips quivering in uncontrolled passion. "You shall not—you shall not keep it."

As he spoke he lifted the box high above his head and dashed it on the floor, where it lay dismembered. Then with a savage gesture he stamped on the fragments, crushing them to atoms with his foot.

Hester sat staring at him as if spell-bound. She gazed alternately at her husband's face and at the ruins of her priceless box. Ignorant as she was as to the source of his wild emotion, she realised that there was something quite exceptional in his attitude. It seemed nothing less than frenzy. She rose, appalled and trembling from head to foot, her courage for once deserting her. She made a movement to cross the room and escape by the glass door to seek refuge under the dark blue heavens. Then she sank down on her seat again and, covering her face with her trembling hands, bursted into a torrent of tears.