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Authors: Patricia Wentworth
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announced.
“Mr. Gregory Porlock—”
Mrs. Oakley looked up from the book which she hadn’t been reading, to see a big man in brown country tweeds. He had a handkerchief up to his face—a brown silk handkerchief with a green and yellow pattern on it. And then the door shut behind him. His hand with the handkerchief in it dropped to his side, and she saw that it was Glen. She was so frightened that though she opened her mouth to scream, nothing happened, because she hadn’t any breath to scream with. She just sat there staring at him with the whites of her eyes showing and her mouth like a pale stretched O.
Gregory Porlock put his handkerchief away and mentally commended his luck. She might have screamed before the butler was out of earshot. He had just had to chance it. She wouldn’t come to the telephone, and the one maxim of behaviour which he regarded as sacrosanct was, “Never put anything on paper.”
He came and sat in the opposite corner of the sofa, after which he put out his hand and said in a pleasant conversational voice,
“Well, Linnet, I thought it would be you, but I had to make sure. It wouldn’t have done to have you arriving with Martin to dinner on Saturday and staging a great recognition scene right in front of everyone.”
As she continued to gaze at him in frozen horror he took her by the hand.
“My dear girl, pull yourself together! I’m not going to eat you.”
Perhaps it was the warm, virile clasp and the dancing light in the dark eyes, perhaps it was the memories which these evoked. Her gaze wavered. She gave a sort of gasp and said,
“I thought you were dead—oh, Glen!”
Gregory Porlock nodded.
“I don’t look dead—do I? Or feel dead either.”
He had both of her hands by now, and he could feel them quivering and jerking like two little frightened wild things. He kept his hold of them and said,
“Come along, wake up! There’s nothing for you to get into a state about. I don’t want to hurt you, or to dig up the past. Everything suits me well enough the way it is. You wouldn’t have seen hair, hide, or hoof of me if it hadn’t been that Martin and I are in on a business deal together, so I knew we’d be bound to meet, and I thought we’d better get it over in private.”
Even the weakest creature will fight when it has everything to lose. Linnet Oakley freed her hands with a sudden jerk.
“Why did you go away and let me think you were dead?”
“My dear child, what a question! I had a chance and I took it. We were just about down to bedrock bottom, weren’t we? One of the most unpleasant sections of a not uneventful life— there was really nothing to be gained by prolonging it.”
She said, “You didn’t think what might happen to me.”
Gregory Porlock laughed.
“On the contrary, my dear, I was quite sure that my Linnet would find a new perch. And so she did—a much better, firmer, more substantial perch. How does the song go?
She’s a beautiful… something… something,
In a beautiful gilded cage.”
Linnet Oakley hit out like a bird pecking. He laughed again.
“Oh, stop being silly! I know it’s hard for you, but we haven’t got all day. Get this into your head and keep it there. Seven years ago you were seven years younger than you are today, and about ten years prettier. When I faded out and you very sensibly made up your mind to consider me dead, you could be quite sure of that new perch I spoke about. If you do anything silly now and forfeit your present very comfortable position, I don’t quite see what’s going to become of you. Don’t look so frightened—there’s no reason at all why you shouldn’t go on just as you are. I suppose you told Martin that you were a widow?”
She had begun to cry.
“I thought I was—I thought you were dead—”
The dancing eyes laughed into hers.
“I’m afraid the brutal courts in this country rather expect a death certificate. Naturally you hoped that I had perished, because it was going
“Mr. Gregory Porlock—”
Mrs. Oakley looked up from the book which she hadn’t been reading, to see a big man in brown country tweeds. He had a handkerchief up to his face—a brown silk handkerchief with a green and yellow pattern on it. And then the door shut behind him. His hand with the handkerchief in it dropped to his side, and she saw that it was Glen. She was so frightened that though she opened her mouth to scream, nothing happened, because she hadn’t any breath to scream with. She just sat there staring at him with the whites of her eyes showing and her mouth like a pale stretched O.
Gregory Porlock put his handkerchief away and mentally commended his luck. She might have screamed before the butler was out of earshot. He had just had to chance it. She wouldn’t come to the telephone, and the one maxim of behaviour which he regarded as sacrosanct was, “Never put anything on paper.”
He came and sat in the opposite corner of the sofa, after which he put out his hand and said in a pleasant conversational voice,
“Well, Linnet, I thought it would be you, but I had to make sure. It wouldn’t have done to have you arriving with Martin to dinner on Saturday and staging a great recognition scene right in front of everyone.”
As she continued to gaze at him in frozen horror he took her by the hand.
“My dear girl, pull yourself together! I’m not going to eat you.”
Perhaps it was the warm, virile clasp and the dancing light in the dark eyes, perhaps it was the memories which these evoked. Her gaze wavered. She gave a sort of gasp and said,
“I thought you were dead—oh, Glen!”
Gregory Porlock nodded.
“I don’t look dead—do I? Or feel dead either.”
He had both of her hands by now, and he could feel them quivering and jerking like two little frightened wild things. He kept his hold of them and said,
“Come along, wake up! There’s nothing for you to get into a state about. I don’t want to hurt you, or to dig up the past. Everything suits me well enough the way it is. You wouldn’t have seen hair, hide, or hoof of me if it hadn’t been that Martin and I are in on a business deal together, so I knew we’d be bound to meet, and I thought we’d better get it over in private.”
Even the weakest creature will fight when it has everything to lose. Linnet Oakley freed her hands with a sudden jerk.
“Why did you go away and let me think you were dead?”
“My dear child, what a question! I had a chance and I took it. We were just about down to bedrock bottom, weren’t we? One of the most unpleasant sections of a not uneventful life— there was really nothing to be gained by prolonging it.”
She said, “You didn’t think what might happen to me.”
Gregory Porlock laughed.
“On the contrary, my dear, I was quite sure that my Linnet would find a new perch. And so she did—a much better, firmer, more substantial perch. How does the song go?
She’s a beautiful… something… something,
In a beautiful gilded cage.”
Linnet Oakley hit out like a bird pecking. He laughed again.
“Oh, stop being silly! I know it’s hard for you, but we haven’t got all day. Get this into your head and keep it there. Seven years ago you were seven years younger than you are today, and about ten years prettier. When I faded out and you very sensibly made up your mind to consider me dead, you could be quite sure of that new perch I spoke about. If you do anything silly now and forfeit your present very comfortable position, I don’t quite see what’s going to become of you. Don’t look so frightened—there’s no reason at all why you shouldn’t go on just as you are. I suppose you told Martin that you were a widow?”
She had begun to cry.
“I thought I was—I thought you were dead—”
The dancing eyes laughed into hers.
“I’m afraid the brutal courts in this country rather expect a death certificate. Naturally you hoped that I had perished, because it was going
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