But Elizabeth answered David and not her sister.
“No, presently won’t do. It must be at once. It’s really urgent, David, or I wouldn’t ask it. Yes, thank you so much. In my room.”
She put down the receiver, rang off, and turned to Mary.
“He is coming. Had you not better send Edward a message, or he will be coming back here? Ring up, and say that you are staying with me for an hour, and that Markham will walk home with you.”
In Elizabeth’s little brown room the silence weighed and the time lagged. Mary walked up and down, moving perpetually—restlessly—uselessly. There was a small Dutch mirror above the writing-table. Its cut glass border caught the light, and reflected it in diamond points and rainbow flashes. It was the brightest thing in the room. Mary stood for a moment and looked at her own face. She began to arrange her hair with nervous, trembling fingers. She rubbed her cheeks, and straightened the lace at her throat. Then she fell to pacing up and down again.
“The room’s so hot,” she said suddenly. And she went quickly to the window and flung it open. The air came in, cold and mournfully damp. Mary drew half a dozen long breaths. Then she shivered, her teeth chattered. She shut the window with a jerk, and as she did so David Blake came into the room. It was Elizabeth he saw, and it was to Elizabeth that he spoke.
“Is anything the matter? Anything fresh?” Elizabeth moved aside, and all at once he saw Mary Mottisfont.
“Mary wants to speak to you,” said Elizabeth. She made a step towards the door, but Mary called her sharply. “No, Liz—stay!”
And Elizabeth drew back into the shadowed corner by the window, whilst Mary came forward into the light. For a moment there was silence. Mary’s hands were clasped before her, her chin was a little lifted, her eyes were desperately intent.
“David,” she said in a low fluttering voice, “oh, David—I was in here—I heard—I could not help hearing.”