Dear Trustee (12 page)

“Everything,” said Uncle Algernon. But he looked at her with a good deal of pleasure and added, “That’s a becoming dress. How are your plans for earning your own living, eh?”

Cecile gave him an amusing account of her visit to the business-training college, and explained that she would be starting work there on Monday.

“My great-niece Felicity is here, you know.” He shot a sharp glance at Cecile. “Your rival with Gregory Picton.”

“Uncle, that’s absurd! Cecile doesn’t even
like
Gregory Picton,” declared Maurice—rather officiously Cecile thought, until she remembered that he undoubtedly meant well, and was only slightly out-of-date with his facts.

“We get on quite well now,” she stated sedately. “But I assure you that neither Felicity nor I would regard each other as rivals.”

“No? Well, my information is different,” retorted Uncle
Algernon, which naturally made Cecile intensely curious about his source of information.

But his next words drove everything else from her mind, for what he said was, “And what is this I hear about some letters being found?”

“L-letters?” stammered Cecile. “What letters?”

“I’m asking you,” observed Uncle Algernon with satisfaction.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” she said, looking him straight in the eye. And it came to her that she was doing this much better than she had with Gregory. Or perhaps, as he had said, Gregory was better at detecting untruths than either of the other trustees.

At any rate, the old man stared back at her for a moment, as though he would put her out of countenance some way. Then he remarked, in a disgruntled sort of way, “She seems very cagey about telling anyone much. But Felicity has some letters that would blow the top off
some
story or other. She promised to show them to me sometime.”
Cecile felt a lump of ice slide down her spine. “But she hasn’t done anything about it yet.”

“I expect she has made half of it up,” said Cecile as casually as she could. “And, anyway, you shouldn’t read other people’s letters.”

“Fiddlesticks,” replied Uncle Algernon, who was not going to be done out of a promising piece of scandal. Then he rang the bell for his manservant to help him downstairs to the drawing room for tea. Cecile and Maurice followed at a respectful distance.

When the old man was installed, with some ceremony and a great deal of grumbling, in his armchair downstairs, the familiar well-laden tea-trolley was wheeled into the room. And, at the same moment, Felicity made her appearance through the french windows from the garden.

She seemed momentarily taken aback at seeing Cecile. But she recovered a sort of insolent self-possession, and said, “Hello, Maurice. It’s a long time since I saw you.” And, to Cecile, “Hello. What brings you down here?”

“She has every right here. She is my ward,” observed Uncle Algernon, being argumentative on principle, though he gave Felicity a friendlier glance than any Cecile had seen him bestow upon Maurice.

“Oh yes, of course.” Felicity laughed slightly. “She has all sorts of useful trustees, hasn’t she?”

“Gregory Picton among them.” Uncle Algernon could hardly bring the name in fast enough. “I’ve just been telling her that you and she are rivals there. But she says I am quite wrong, and that she doesn’t even like Gregory.”

“I didn’t say that at all,” exclaimed Cecile quickly, while Felicity gave her a sidelong glance of acute dislike. “I said that I got on quite well with Gregory now, but that neither Felicity nor I would be so silly as to regard each other as rivals in any sense.”

“I’m glad you feel so sure of that,” returned Felicity contemptuously. And conversation naturally languished again.

“She says she doesn’t know anything about any letters, either,” remarked Uncle Algernon to no one in particular. And Cecile began to wonder why she had been so foolish as to come. To try to disentangle a delicate situation in this atmosphere was like playing with gunpowder and lighted matches.

Maurice unexpectedly came to the rescue at this point by asking Felicity about her American trip. And although she went into a good deal of detail which was not especially interesting to Cecile, at least this had the virtue of keeping Uncle Algernon from any more dangerous quips.

This, however, was not his idea of intelligent conversation. And, in spite of Cecile’s questions about his interesting ailments, and a certain amount of astringent sympathy on her part, he presently became either tired or bored and said he would go back to his room.

It was Maurice who offered to escort him there. And suddenly, with a tensing of all her nerves, Cecile realized that her scene with Felicity was very near.

There was silence for a few moments when the two men had gone. Then Cecile said, with all the quiet resolution she could muster:

“This is as good a chance as any for a frank talk, Felicity. Will you tell me now why you came to see Laurie the other day?”

The other girl sprawled gracefully in the chair opposite, apparently much more at ease than Cecile, and she curled her lip contemptuously as she replied.

“Don’t be so naive. I came to tell her I had her letters to Hugh Minniver, of course. Why else should I come?”

Cecile paled. Not because this was a surprise, but because, put in words, the fact had an incredibly ugly sound.

“I gathered that, of course,” she admitted quietly. “But what I don’t understand is why you should
want
to do it. What useful purpose could it serve, to shatter Laurie’s peace of mind with the knowledge that those letters exist?”

For a moment Felicity was silent, and Cecile had the impression that she was feeling her way—trying to decide how much she should say. Then a look of flinty determination came over her face and she asked harshly, “Do you want me to be completely frank?”

“Please. I don’t see what else could be any good now.”

“Very well, then. You were stupid when you told Uncle Algernon that you and I were not rivals where Gregory is concerned. Of course we are rivals. Gregory and I were very close in the days before I went away to America.”

“Well, yes. I realize that,” Cecile said, a little uncomfortably. “But you turned him down, didn’t you? And the whole thing was over by the time you went away.”

“One can make a mistake.” Felicity narrowed her eyes. “I made a mistake. I admit it. When I was away from him, I found out how much he meant to me. That’s why I came back—meaning to put the clock back and to take things up where we had dropped them. Almost the first evening after my return we met again. At first I thought he must have engineered it. Then I found it was a sheer coincidence. And—you were there.”

Cecile swallowed nervously, and suddenly found herself unable to look anywhere but into Felicity’s cold, inimical eyes.

“He is just my trustee,” she said huskily. “You are being quite absurd.”

“Are you telling me that Gregory is nothing to you—or you to him?” asked Felicity ruthlessly.

“No. I’m not telling you anything,” Cecile said firmly. “It’s ridiculous that you should suppose I would. I’m not making any sort of statement about my relationship with Gregory. It has nothing whatever to do with the way he regards you. If he loved you once—” she was half scared by the look which came into Felicity’s face when she used that word “once”, but she went on resolutely, “and if you want to make him love you again, that’s up to you. I have absolutely nothing to do with it, and I refuse to be involved.”

"But you are involved,” replied Felicity, with bitter candour. “He’s more than half in love with you already.”

Cecile caught her breath, and then was completely still. For this, she knew all at once, was not just the jealous vapouring of a dangerous woman. It was the simple, deadly truth.

Felicity’s own intensity of feeling had taken her straight to the heart of the matter. She knew, with the furious certainty of the loser, who it was that had snatched the crown from her, however unwittingly.

“She’s right,” thought Cecile. “Oh, Gregory—she’s right.”

“Well,” said Felicity, in that moment. “What have you to say to that?”

“Nothing.” Cecile tilted up her chin defiantly. “You’re completely fogging the issue. What has all this to do with your going to Laurie and trying to make her wretched by dragging up her unhappy past?”

“Why—everything. Don’t you see?” Felicity stared at her in genuine surprise. “I told you those letters might have a use one day. They have it now. They are the only weapon I have which will stop you from taking Gregory away from me.”

“But—” Cecile stood up suddenly, unable to remain seated before the monstrous truth which was breaking upon her—“what are you saying? You can’t do such a thing. You can’t blackmail me into—into thrusting aside Gregory’s love, by threatening to show him the evidence of Laurie’s guilt.”

“You’re mistaken.” Felicity too had risen to her feet, and she spoke quite ca
l
mly, “I can do just that. If you don’t take your hands off Gregory, I’
ll
show him those letters—and
then
see how anxious he will be to have more to do with you and your mother. But, if you do as I ask, I’ll give you the letters on the day I marry Greg. You can burn them then or do anything else you like with them. They won’t have any value any longer.”

CHAPTER VIII

F
or perhaps five seconds there was complete silence in the room. Then Cecile said quietly, “You can’t do such a thing, you know. You couldn’t be so absolutely horrible. It would injure me and my mother, it’s true. But think what it would do to
you."

Felicity looked oddly shaken for a moment. But then she hardened her mouth—and perhaps her heart.

“I wouldn’t want to do it,” she admitted candidly. “But don’t imagine that any inner reluctance would actually prevent me from carrying out my threat. More than anything else in the world I want Gregory back. I give you fair warning—I’m not going to stop at anything to bring that about.”

“But it isn’t possible to do things that way! You can’t
command
anyone’s love or respect. You must surely know that. You can’t plot to obtain it either. You can only earn it. And whether or not you make Gregory love you again doesn’t depend on me. It depends on you.”

“Your absence from the field would be the first step towards it,” retorted Felicity calmly. “I can’t afford to have a formidable rival at this moment. And we
are
rivals, just as Uncle Algernon said. I choose to see my rival out of the way. Then—I say it quite objectively—I’m confident that I can get Gregory back.”

Cecile was silent, thinking of the calm and final way Gregory had said that Felicity was no longer anything special in his life. But it was impossible to say anything about that without evoking an even more dangerous degree of jealousy.

“Besides,” thought Cecile, “she wouldn’t believe me. And for that at least I don’t think I could blame her.”

She gave a deep sigh and turned back to the othe
r
girl. “What do you expect me to do?” she enquired, with a helpless little gesture of her hands.

“It’s simple enough. There was a time, not so long ago, when you were at loggerheads with Gregory. I’ve heard it from Uncle Algernon and I’ve seen something of it myself. You talk of getting on better with him now. Well, you must reverse that. See that you do
not
get on better with him.”

“I can’t do that!” cried Cecile in sharp protest. “We’ve become so—so friendly and happy. I can’t deliberately spoil it all.” Felicity did not answer, but her expression grew even harder. “I can’t just pick quarrels with him,” Cecile continued. “Besides—” the conviction was born in on her and she spoke it aloud—“nowadays he would insist on making them up again. We understand each other so much better. It’s a perfectly normal and happy ward-trustee relationship. I can’t just break it up to order.”

“Then you must freeze him out—choke him off—however you like to put it,” replied Felicity calmly. “Anyone can d
o
that.”

But Cecile did not think she could. For, as she stood there, there passed rapidly before her mental vision half a dozen pictures of Gregory as she had come to know him. Teasing her, kissing her, making himself pleasant to Laurie for her sake.

She did not see how it was humanly possible that she should reject all that. Suddenly it had become the most precious thing in life.

Except—a lump came into her throat—dared she rank it as more precious than Laurie’s precarious, new-found happiness, which this cold-eyed girl could smash with one blow?

And, in any case, if Gregory once read those letters—saw for himself, in horrid detail, how Laurie had pushed Hugh Minniver towards the action which ended in Anne’s death—could anything ever be dear and warm and normal between them again?

She became aware that Felicity was watching her closely, and she tried to grasp every detail of the situation. Pushing back her hair with a distracted little gesture, she asked suddenly, “Why did you try to bring Laurie herself into this? Why did you think it would strengthen your hand to have her know the situation?”

“I reckoned that she would use all her influence with you to see that the letters were suppressed at all costs. She would, too. Any woman would.”

“No. As a matter of fact, you’re wrong there.” Cecile spoke coldly and positively. “Laurie is the defiant, quixotic type who would refuse to let me sacrifice my happiness for hers. You had better not talk to her about it. I probably have more regard for Laurie’s happiness than she has herself. It is with me that you’ll have to drive any bargain that is made.”

Felicity narrowed her eyes for a moment. Then she said, “Well, perhaps you’re right. Now that the cards are on the table, there is no special need to bring your mother into it. At any rate at present.” Felicity was not going to yield any point permanently. “So it comes to this—What have you to say about it? Do I show Gregory the letters, or do you give me every reason to keep them to myself?”

There was a long silence again, while Cecile felt like a small animal running round and round a trap and trying to find a non-existent way out.

“I can’t promise you,” she said at last, “that I can make Gregory either dislike me or—or feel specially angry with me. I just don’t know how to make him do that—now.” In spite of herself her voice broke very slightly on the word “now.” “But I will undertake to see that he doesn’t—make love to me or—or think it would be welcome to me if he did. In that sense, I will cease to be your rival, if that’s what you want me to say. What you manage to make him do, so far as you are concerned, is up to you. There is nothing more I can say.”

“It will do,” replied Felicity, in a tone of such triumphant satisfaction that Cecile suddenly wanted to fall upon her and beat her, with a primitive rage and despair that she had not known herself capable of feeling.

“At least, it will do for the moment,” went on Felicity coolly. “So long as the coast is kept clear, I will keep those letters away from Gregory. You needn’t worry over that. I’ll play fair about that, if you play fair with me. But I warn you, if you try to double-cross me—to reject him with one hand and beckon him on with the other, I’ll use those letters without a qualm.”

“I don’t doubt it.” Cecile was very pale, and she spoke with a cold scorn which made even Felicity wince. “Whatever we have not done in this conversation, at least we have made ourselves clear to each other.”

“Well, that’s something!” Felicity gave a short laugh. And then, without another word, she turned and went out through the french windows into the garden again, while Cecile dropped down into the nearest chair and covered her face with her hands.

“It doesn’t matter all that much to me,” she tried to tell herself. “It’s horrible to have even to discuss such a monstrous bargain. But it isn’t as though I were engaged to him and had to break that. It’s just that I—that I—Oh, Gregory, why did this have to happen, my dear? Just now. Just as everything was—was flowering so beautifully. Only I do love you—and yet I mustn’t love you. She has spoiled it all, even before I knew what had happened to me.” The tears came into her eyes, but she forced them back, for she heard footsteps approaching, and, a moment later, the door opened and Maurice came into the room.

“Why, hello—all alone?” He looked round in some surprise. “Where’s Felicity?”

“In the garden. We had our talk, Maurice, and it wasn’t exactly pleasant. Don’t ask me about it or I might burst into tears. I’ll get over it in a minute.”

“I say, I’m sorry.” He came over and stood looking down at her kindly. “Is there anything I can do about it? Shall I go and speak to her?”