My moment had come. A pulse began its tattoo in my head. To remain helplessly lying there was impossible. I thrust myself on to my feet and, drawing back a pace or two, stood hunched up on the crimson spread of satin beside my wooden bolster. The canvas lifted, and one by one, the little party of "gentry" stooped and filed in.
Chapter Fifty-Two
Mrs Monnerie had paid for elbow room. It was the last "Private View" in this world we were to share together. The sight of her capacious figure with its great bonnet and the broad, dark face beneath, now suddenly become strange and hostile, filled me with a vague sense of desolation. Yet I know she has forgiven me. Had I not pocketed my "pretty little fastidiousness"?
What Fanny had planned to do if Miss M., plain and simple, had occupied the Signorina's table I cannot even guess. For the spectacle of the squat, black, gloating guy she actually found there, she was utterly unprepared. It seemed, as I looked at her, that myself had fainted—had withdrawn out of my body—like the spirit in sleep. Or, maybe, not to be too nice about it, I merely "became" my disguise. With mind emptied of every thought, I sank into an almost lifeless stagnancy, and with a heavy settled stare out of my black and yellow, from under the coarse fringe that brushed my brows, I met her eyes. Out of time and place, in a lightless, vacant solitude, we wrestled for mastery. At length the sneering, incredulous smile slowly faded from the pale, lovely face, leaving it twisted up as if after a nauseous draught of physic. Her gaze faltered, and fell. Her bosom rose; she coughed and turned away.
"Hideous! monstrous!" murmured Mrs Monnerie to the tall, expressionless figure that stood beside her. "The abject evil of the creature!"
Her dark, appraising glance travelled over me—feet, hands, body, lace-draped head. It swept across my eyes as if they were less significant than bits of china stuck in a cocoanut.
"No, Miss Bowater," she turned massively round on her, "you were perfectly right, it seems. As usual—but a dangerous habit, my dear. My little ransoming scheme must wait a bit. Just as well, perhaps, that our patient's dainty nerves should have been spared this particular little initiation——. Could one have imagined it?"
Mr Padgwick-Steggall merely raised his eyebrows. "I shouldn't have cared to try," he drawled. And the lady beside him made a little mouth and laid her gloved hand on his arm.