Read Online Lonesome Road by Patricia Wentworth - Free Book Online Page B
Authors: Patricia Wentworth
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more steadfast… Whichever it was, it meant pain. It meant that she must brace herself to meet pain, to endure it, to tread it down.
The change in her feelings dazed her. She had found pleasure in Gale Brandon’s society, and in his obvious admiration for herself, but she had never dreamed that she would feel like this because he told her that he loved another woman.
Thomas Enderby came back with an old-fashioned box of Tonbridge ware. He sat down at the table, opened the box, removed a layer of cotton wool, and took out three packages done up in tissue paper. His hands moved in a delicate and leisurely manner as he unfolded the paper. In the end he sat back and contemplated the three ornaments which he had disposed upon the square of black velvet, his eyes no longer hooded and dim, but bright with the discerning admiration of the connoisseur.
Rachel looked too.
The oak spray came out of its wrappings first. She found it hard to take her eyes from it—two diamond oak-leaves and three acorns, the cups shining with brilliants, and each acorn a pearl, two white and one black.
She said, “Oh, how lovely!” and Mr. Thomas Enderby agreed.
“It was my father’s design. It was commissioned by the Duchess of Southshire, but she died before it was completed. Now this chain came to us from abroad—Italian work, made to a Russian order.”
The chain was about twenty-five inches in length. It had pale gold links, most exquisitely fine, between alternate sapphires and emeralds, each stone beautifully cut and set with diamond sparks, the whole effect one of lightness, brilliance, and grace.
“This of course is the finest stone,” said Mr. Enderby. He touched the third ornament caressingly. “There is nothing like a ruby after all, and this is one of the best we have had. Look at the color!”
The ruby burned between two diamond wings—the lifted arch of an eagle’s wings. Between the flash of them the stone seemed alive.
“I am not, unfortunately, at liberty to give you the particular history of this piece,” pursued Thomas Enderby. “My father designed it for a member of a royal house, and it has recently come back to us.” He turned to Gale Brandon. “Those, sir, are our three best pieces.”
Rachel felt rather dazzled. The jewels were most beautiful. They were also most costly. She admired the romance of the gesture which would offer one of these exquisite things as a declaration of love without any certainty of its acceptance. But quick on this came the thought, “It spoils it all to let another woman choose.”
It was at this moment that he leaned to her and said,
“Which do you like best?”
The words struck a spark of resentment from her. She said, a thought quickly,
“But it isn’t what I like. I can’t choose for a woman I don’t know. Pearls are for one sort of woman, rubies for another, and emeralds and sapphires for another still. You’ll have to choose for yourself. I can’t help you.”
Gale Brandon’s eyes danced with a teasing light. He looked most extraordinarily alive in the little dark room.
“Isn’t that too bad!” he said. “But I wasn’t asking you to choose for me. I just felt very interested to know which of Mr. Enderby’s pretty things you liked best. Because, you see, I’ve figured it out this way. Say there’s one that I like best. Well, if you choose it too, then there are two votes for that. Do you see what I mean?”
“But it isn’t my vote that ought to count, because I’m quite in the dark. Why, I don’t even know the color of her hair.”
A smile flickered over his face.
“Well, we’ll all be getting gray hair some day. I hope she’s going to wear it a good long time, so it would be better to choose something that’s going to go on looking good when she’s got those silver threads among the gold.”
So she had golden hair… It didn’t go a good gray as a rule… She said in the friendliest tone she could compass,
“If she is fair, the
The change in her feelings dazed her. She had found pleasure in Gale Brandon’s society, and in his obvious admiration for herself, but she had never dreamed that she would feel like this because he told her that he loved another woman.
Thomas Enderby came back with an old-fashioned box of Tonbridge ware. He sat down at the table, opened the box, removed a layer of cotton wool, and took out three packages done up in tissue paper. His hands moved in a delicate and leisurely manner as he unfolded the paper. In the end he sat back and contemplated the three ornaments which he had disposed upon the square of black velvet, his eyes no longer hooded and dim, but bright with the discerning admiration of the connoisseur.
Rachel looked too.
The oak spray came out of its wrappings first. She found it hard to take her eyes from it—two diamond oak-leaves and three acorns, the cups shining with brilliants, and each acorn a pearl, two white and one black.
She said, “Oh, how lovely!” and Mr. Thomas Enderby agreed.
“It was my father’s design. It was commissioned by the Duchess of Southshire, but she died before it was completed. Now this chain came to us from abroad—Italian work, made to a Russian order.”
The chain was about twenty-five inches in length. It had pale gold links, most exquisitely fine, between alternate sapphires and emeralds, each stone beautifully cut and set with diamond sparks, the whole effect one of lightness, brilliance, and grace.
“This of course is the finest stone,” said Mr. Enderby. He touched the third ornament caressingly. “There is nothing like a ruby after all, and this is one of the best we have had. Look at the color!”
The ruby burned between two diamond wings—the lifted arch of an eagle’s wings. Between the flash of them the stone seemed alive.
“I am not, unfortunately, at liberty to give you the particular history of this piece,” pursued Thomas Enderby. “My father designed it for a member of a royal house, and it has recently come back to us.” He turned to Gale Brandon. “Those, sir, are our three best pieces.”
Rachel felt rather dazzled. The jewels were most beautiful. They were also most costly. She admired the romance of the gesture which would offer one of these exquisite things as a declaration of love without any certainty of its acceptance. But quick on this came the thought, “It spoils it all to let another woman choose.”
It was at this moment that he leaned to her and said,
“Which do you like best?”
The words struck a spark of resentment from her. She said, a thought quickly,
“But it isn’t what I like. I can’t choose for a woman I don’t know. Pearls are for one sort of woman, rubies for another, and emeralds and sapphires for another still. You’ll have to choose for yourself. I can’t help you.”
Gale Brandon’s eyes danced with a teasing light. He looked most extraordinarily alive in the little dark room.
“Isn’t that too bad!” he said. “But I wasn’t asking you to choose for me. I just felt very interested to know which of Mr. Enderby’s pretty things you liked best. Because, you see, I’ve figured it out this way. Say there’s one that I like best. Well, if you choose it too, then there are two votes for that. Do you see what I mean?”
“But it isn’t my vote that ought to count, because I’m quite in the dark. Why, I don’t even know the color of her hair.”
A smile flickered over his face.
“Well, we’ll all be getting gray hair some day. I hope she’s going to wear it a good long time, so it would be better to choose something that’s going to go on looking good when she’s got those silver threads among the gold.”
So she had golden hair… It didn’t go a good gray as a rule… She said in the friendliest tone she could compass,
“If she is fair, the
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