“In the underworld—but is the fellow a king?”
CHAPTER III
Francis Braybrooke was pleased. Young Craven and Beryl were evidently “drawing together” now Adela Sellingworth was happily out of the way. He heard of them dining together at the Bella Napoli, playing golf together at Beaconsfield—or was it Chorley Wood? He was not quite sure. He heard of young Craven being seen at Claridge’s going up in the lift to Miss Van Tuyn’s floor. All this was very encouraging. Braybrooke’s former fears were swept away and his confidence in his social sense was re-established upon its throne. Evidently he had been quite mistaken, and there had been nothing in that odd friendship with Adela Sellingworth. This would teach him not to let himself go to suspicion in the future.
He still did not know where Lady Sellingworth was. Nothing had appeared in the Morning Post about her movements. Nobody seemed to know anything about her. He met various members of the “old guard” and made inquiry, but “Haven’t an idea” was the invariable reply. Even, and this was strangest of all, Seymour Portman did not know where she was. Braybrooke met him one day at the Marlborough and spoke of the matter, and Seymour Portman, with his most self-contained and reserved manner, replied that he believed Lady Sellingworth had gone abroad to “take a rest,” but that he was not sure where she was “at the moment.” She was probably moving about.
Why should she take a rest? She never did anything specially laborious. It really was quite mysterious. One day Braybrooke inquired discreetly in Berkeley Square, alleging a desire to communicate with Lady Sellingworth about a charity bazaar in which he was interested; but the footman did not know where her ladyship was or when she was coming back to town. And still letters were not being forwarded.
Meanwhile Fanny Cronin felt that Paris was drifting quite out of her ken. The autumn was deepening. The first fogs of winter had made a premature appearance, and the spell of the Wallace Collection was evidently as strong as ever on Beryl. But was it the Wallace Collection? Miss Cronin never knew much about what Beryl was doing. Still, she was a woman and had her instincts, rudimentary though they were. Mr. Braybrooke must certainly have received his conge. Mrs. Clem Hodson quite agreed with Miss Cronin on that point. Beryl had probably refused the poor foolish old man that day at the Ritz when there had been that unpleasant dispute about the plum cake. But now there was this Mr. Craven! Miss Cronin had found him once with Beryl in the latter’s sitting-room; she had reason to believe they had played golf together. The young man was certainly handsome. And then Beryl had seemed quite altered just lately. Her temper was decidedly uncertain. She was unusually restless and preoccupied. Twice she had been exceedingly cross about Bourget. And she looked different, too; even Suzanne Hodson had noticed it. There was something in her face—“a sort of look,” Miss Cronin called it, with an apt feeling for the choice of words—which was new and alarming. Mrs. Clem declared that Beryl had the expression of a woman who was crazy about a man.
“It’s the eyes and the cheek-bones that tell the tale, Fanny!” she had observed. “They can’t deceive a woman. Don’t talk to me about the Wallace Collection.”
Poor Miss Cronin was very uneasy. The future looked almost as dark as the London days. As she lay upon the French bed, or reclined upon the sofa, or sat deep in her arm-chair, she envisaged an awful change, when the Avenue Henri Martin would know her no more, when she might have to return to the lair in Philadelphia from which Miss Van Tuyn had summoned her to take charge of Beryl.
One day, when she was almost brooding over the fire, between five and six o’clock in the afternoon, the door opened and Beryl appeared. She had been out since eleven in the morning. But that was nothing new. She went out very often about half-past ten and scarcely ever came back to lunch.