The Paying Guest eBook

This eBook from the Gutenberg Project consists of approximately 107 pages of information about The Paying Guest.

The Paying Guest eBook

This eBook from the Gutenberg Project consists of approximately 107 pages of information about The Paying Guest.

Emmeline met him at the door, herself too much flurried to notice anything peculiar in her husband’s aspect.  She repeated the story with which he was already acquainted.

‘And really, after all, I am so glad!’ was her conclusion.  ’I didn’t think she had really gone; all the afternoon I’ve been expecting to see her back again.  But she won’t come now, and it is a good thing to have done with the wretched business.  I only hope she will tell the truth to her people.  She might say that we turned her out of the house.  But I don’t think so; in spite of all her faults, she never seemed deceitful or malicious.’

Mumford was strongly tempted to reveal what had happened at the station, but he saw danger alike in disclosure and in reticence.

When there enters the slightest possibility of jealousy, a man can never be sure that his wife will act as a rational being.  He feared to tell the simple truth lest Emmeline should not believe his innocence of previous plotting with Miss Derrick, or at all events should be irritated by the circumstances into refusing Louise a lodging for the night.  And with no less apprehension he decided at length to keep the secret, which might so easily become known hereafter, and would then have such disagreeable consequences.

’Well, let us have dinner, Emmy; I’m hungry.  Yes, it’s a good thing she has gone; but I wish it hadn’t happened in that way.  What a spitfire she is!’

’I never, never saw the like.  And if you had heard Mrs. Higgins!  Oh, what dreadful people!  Clarence, hear me register a vow—­’

’It was my fault, dear.  I’m awfully sorry I got you in for such horrors.  It was wholly and entirely my fault.’

By due insistence on this, Mumford of course put his wife into an excellent humour, and, after they had dined, she returned to her regret that the girl should have gone so suddenly.  Clarence, declaring that he would allow himself a cigar, instead of the usual pipe, to celebrate the restoration of domestic peace, soon led Emmeline into the garden.

’Heavens! how hot it has been.  Eighty-five in our office at noon—­eighty-five!  Fellows are discarding waistcoats and wearing what they call a cummerbund—­silk sash round the waist.  I think I must follow the fashion.  How should I look, do you think?’

‘You don’t really mind that we lose the money?’ Emmeline asked presently.

‘Pooh!  We shall do well enough.—­Who’s that?’

Someone was entering the garden by the side path.  And in a moment there remained no doubt who the person was.  Louise came forward, her head bent, her features eloquent of fatigue and distress.

‘Mrs. Mumford—­I couldn’t—­without asking you to forgive me—­’

Her voice broke with a sob.  She stood in a humble attitude, and Emmeline, though pierced with vexation, had no choice but to hold out a welcoming hand.

‘Have you come all the way back from London just to say this?’

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Project Gutenberg
The Paying Guest from Project Gutenberg. Public domain.