But the depression at the office was growing tormenting, and so was the heat, and Robert Gregory’s nervous irritability was a bit trying, so when Hilda announced her determination to “go home” Tom resigned the affairs of the business cheerfully enough and picked up his hat.
Hilda saw that she could do nothing for her father by “hanging round.” And “hanging round” was an occupation she particularly disliked. And when she learned that her mother had slipped off with Ah Wong without a word, she said, “How shabby!” and prepared to follow suit.
Robert Gregory scarcely noticed his wife’s defalcation—and certainly did not resent it. The business turmoil did not lesson with the lessening day; it increased. His tired, unsteadied hands were overflowing full, and towards dinner-time (another whiskey and soda had taken the place of tea) he deputed Murray to ’phone Mrs. Gregory that he would not be home till very late that night, if at all. Hilda had answered the ’phone, and had said, “All right,” Murray reported. And Gregory grunted an acknowledgment, paying little attention, engrossed in other things.
Florence Gregory was a just and a good-humored mistress, not an indulgent one. And she was in no way of the class of women who court or accept the advice of their servants. Even in the days of her modest Oxford housekeeping, when her own youthfulness and the deficiencies of the vicarage purse would have made most girls so placed peculiarly vulnerable to the insidious encroachment of hireling “I wills,” and “I won’ts,” she had been truly mistress of that manse, adamant towards would-be familiarity. And that natural smooth caste hardness had not softened under the flux of travel or the sunshine of affluence. From their first quarter of an hour together she had commanded distinctly, and Ah Wong, without comment, had obeyed. During the last week Mrs. Gregory had leaned not a little on her amah, sensing in the Chinese woman, who too was a mother, a something of sympathy that even Hilda could not give her, but she had in no way abrogated any of her personal autocracy to Ah Wong or let the space of discipline between them lessen. When Ah Wong had exclaimed, “No, no, madame! Not go!” the first liberty Ah Wong had ever taken, the mistress had scarcely heard and had not heeded; but when, on their return to the Peak, the amah had again urged “Not go!” Mrs. Gregory had checked her sternly, and Ah Wong had known that it was worse than useless to repeat the entreaty. To appeal to any one else, against her mistress—to Missee Hilda, to the master, or even to John Bradley—never occurred to her. And she submitted silently, only venturing a piteous, “Me clome? Madame take Ah Wong?”
“Of course,” Mrs. Gregory said, not unkindly. “He expressly said I should bring you.”
That there could be no question between them as to who “He” was told clearly of how Wu Li Chang had gripped the thought of both these women, and (at least of one) had gripped also the imagination.
At five o’clock—the hotness of the terrific day was scarcely waning yet, and Hilda and Tom in the darkened sitting-room were eating ices with their tea—Mrs. Gregory and Ah Wong went quietly out and took the next car down the Peak. On the level (such level as terraced Victoria City can show) the amah hailed two rickshaws, and they bowled inconspicuously to the water’s edge.
They did not use the ferry. A little boat was waiting for them. Ah Wong had secured it by messenger; and she took care that the jinrickshaw men should hear her tell the boatmen where they were to pole—which they already knew perfectly.
And then she sat down at her mistress’s feet and waited. She had done all she could.
The boat slipped slowly through the gurgling water, the coolies sing-singing droningly as they poled her. Neither of the women spoke until the little vessel grated against the shore. Ah Wong was strangely calm, her very nerves hushed but alert in her lady’s service, and the Englishwoman felt calmer than she had been for days, soothed that she was doing something definite at last, and not a little confident in the promise of Wu Li Chang.