The Shadow of the East

“Triple idiot!” she reflected wrathfully, as she poured out coffee, “you had better have held your tongue,” and she set herself to charm away the shadow from his face and dispel any suspicion he might have formed of her desire to probe into his affairs. She had an uncommon personality and could talk cleverly and well when she chose. And today she did choose, exerting all her wit to combat the taciturn fit that emphasized so forcibly the change in him. But though he listened with apparent attention his mind was very obviously elsewhere, and he sat staring into the fire, mechanically flicking ash from his cigarette. Conversation languished and at length Miss Craven gave it up, with a wry face, and sat also silent, drumming with her fingers on the arm of the chair. Her thoughts, in quest of his, wandered far away until the sudden ringing of the telephone beside her made her jump violently.

She answered the call, then handed the receiver to Craven.

“Your heathen,” she remarked dryly.

Though the least insular of women she had never grown accustomed to the Japanese valet. He turned from the telephone with a look of mingled embarrassment and relief.

“I sent a message to the convent this morning. Yoshio has just given me the answer. The Mother Superior will see me this afternoon.” He endeavoured to make his voice indifferent, pulling down his waistcoat and picking a minute thread from off his coat sleeve. Miss Craven’s mouth twitched at the evident signs of nervousness while she glanced at him narrowly. Prompt action in the matter of an uncongenial duty had not hitherto been a conspicuous trait in his character.

“You are certainly not letting the grass grow under your feet.”

He jerked his head impatiently.

“Waiting will not make the job more pleasant,” he shrugged. “I will see the child at once and arrange for her removal as soon as possible.”

Miss Craven eyed him from head to foot with a grim smile that changed to a whole-hearted laugh of amusement.

“It’s a pity you have so much money, Barry, you would make your fortune as a model. You are too criminally good looking to go fluttering into convents.”

A ghost of the old smile flickered in his eyes.

“Come and chaperon me, Aunt Caro.”

She shook her head laughingly.

“Thank you—no. There are limits. I draw the line at convents. Go and get it over, and if the child is presentable you can bring her back to tea. I gather that Mary is anticipating a complete failure on our part to sustain the situation and is prepared to deputise. She has already ransacked Au Paradis Des Enfants for suitable bribes wherewith to beguile her infantile affection. I understand that there was a lively scene over the purchase of a doll, the cost of which—clad only in its birthday dress—was reported to me as ‘a fair affront.’ Even after all these years Mary jibs at Continental prices. It is her way of keeping up the prestige of the British Empire, bless her. An overcharge, in her opinion, is a deliberate twist of the lion’s tail.”