He swore he loved her as dearly as—(I can’t call to mind the simile he employed, though it was masterly and impressive.) I even hinted that the threats I had used in the presence of Mrs. Gunton-Cresswell were not serious. He thanked me, but said I had frightened her to such good purpose that the date would now have to stand. “You will not be surprised to hear,” he added, “that I have called in all my work. I shall want every penny I make. The expenses of an engaged man are hair-raising. I send her a lot of flowers every morning—you’ve no conception how much a few orchids cost. Then, whenever I go to see her I take her some little present—a gold-mounted umbrella, a bicycle lamp, or a patent scent-bottle. I’m indebted to you, Julian, positively indebted to you for cutting short our engagement.”
I now go on to point two: the morning of the twelfth of June.
Hurried footsteps on my staircase. A loud tapping at my door. The church clock chiming twelve. The agitated, weeping figure of Mrs. Gunton-Cresswell approaching my hammock. A telegram thrust into my hand. Mrs. Gunton-Cresswell’s hysterical exclamation, “You infamous monster—you—you are at the bottom of this.”
All very disconcerting. All, fortunately, very unusual.
My eyes were leaden with slumber, but I forced myself to decipher the following message, which had been telegraphed to West Kensington Lane:
Wedding must be postponed.—CLOYSTER.
“I’ve had no hand in this,” I cried; “but,” I added enthusiastically, “it serves Eva jolly well right.”
CHAPTER 22
A CHAT WITH JAMES
(Julian Eversleigh’s narrative continued)
Mrs. Gunton-Cresswell seemed somehow to drift away after that. Apparently I went to sleep again, and she didn’t wait.