CHAPTER XX
Mrs. Marlow was a good woman. The rector himself had told her so only the week before when she had given him a cheque for twenty guineas in aid of his favourite charity, the Mission to the Moabites. Consequently, the discovery of Jimmy's double life had filled her with both sorrow and loathing; sorrow at the thought that a Grierson should have been so weak and foolish, loathing at the conduct of the woman who led him astray. She was sitting very grim and upright in the client's chair when Jimmy came in; whilst Walter was at the other side of the table, nervously playing with his eyeglasses and wishing inwardly he had telegraphed for his wife, a proposal which May had vetoed.
"Excuse me, Walter, but this is a matter for our father's children only," she had said, and Walter had, as usual, bowed to her ruling. Ever since their mother's death May had been the high priestess of the family fetish, the position of the Griersons.
The two brothers shook hands in silence, but Mrs. Marlow made no move beyond the very slightest nod, which seemed to be merely a recognition of the fact that the culprit had arrived.
Jimmy laid his hat on the table, then went and leaned against the fireplace with an assumption of indifference. "Well, May," he said at last, "what is it?"
His sister turned on him suddenly. "Please don't be a hypocrite any more, Jimmy, if you can help it." Her voice was hard and scornful. "You must know from my wire that we have found out all about your disgraceful conduct. As a matter of fact we knew of it a week ago, and might have sent for you then, but we have had detectives making inquiries into that," she hesitated, "that person's character and antecedents in the hope of being able to open your eyes. Isn't that so, Walter?"
The elder man nodded and gave a little grunt of acquiescence, though it was obvious he did not relish being dragged into the matter at all.
Jimmy, white with sudden passion, took a step forward. "Confound it, May——" he began.
His sister put her hands to her ears. "Please don't make it worse by swearing at me. I am not the Penrose woman. We have the right to speak to you as one of the family, if only to save you from further disgrace, and perhaps prosecution,"—she emphasised the last words, and then repeated them, "yes, from prosecution. Not only has this person been bleeding you, working you to death, and taking your last penny——"
Jimmy, remembering all that Lalage had done for him during the past three months, cut her short savagely. "That's a lie. She's been everything a woman should be to me."