Duff-Whalley's small keen eyes searched her companion's face, as if suspecting something hidden in her simple statement.
'Very sad,' she said at last. 'It's quite obvious to me that there's been a rupture. I never did think that marriage would prove a success. Too much disparity in every way. Lord Bidborough so aristocratic, and Jean such a plain little thing. Lady Tweedie said to me only the other day, "In these levelling days, when Jack's as good as his master, we old county people must make a stand." It's really deplorable how lax we are becoming. Young men marry beneath them, bring chorus girls to their parents and expect a welcome for them--Ridiculous! . . . And Jean is actually coming back to The Rigs! Why, it's a hovel compared to what she's accustomed to. Dear, dear, I feel quite distressed about it.'
'Oh, but you needn't. You will be glad to know that it is not as you fear. Major Talbot, who is Lord Bidborough's greatest friend--I believe he actually saved his life in the War--has been lying dangerously ill for months and must be out of England for the winter. He has no relations and is sick of hired help, and his old friend felt it his duty to go with him. I'm very sure Jean supported her husband in that. Lord Bidborough wanted Jean to be near his sister and away from the responsibilities of a big house and estate, so home she comes to Priorsford. She wanted to be in The Rigs with the children--sentiment, that,--and they've taken The Neuk--that nice house in the big garden, just behind The Rigs--to overflow into. It is really all very simple.'
Mrs. Duff-Whalley sat silent for a minute--it was obviously a disappointing explanation--then she reared her head, remarking, 'It's very astonishing. . . . Well, I hope everything is all right and that it really is a sick friend that Lord Bidborough has gone off with, but as a woman of the world--Well, well. She has taken The Neuk, you say. My daughter, Mrs. Egerton Thomson, wanted a house for a month or two in the summer and I took the chance to look through several. The Neuk isn't bad, quite decently furnished, and a billiard room: six bedrooms, I think, and fairly large public rooms. But if Lady Bidborough was coming back would it not have been much liker the thing if she had taken a place: there are several nice places in the neighbourhood she could have had. It's not as if money were any object. I wonder how she spends all she has. You know she got a large fortune from that old man--what was he called? Peter Reid. He must have been insane. Was there no one to contest the will?'
Mrs. Duff-Whalley rose to her feet and Miss Hutton asked mildly: 'Why should anyone have contested it? The old man had a perfect right to leave his money as he pleased. . . . Must you go?'
'Indeed I must. . . . Good-bye, Mrs. Strang. Muriel and I mean to call on Mrs. Home one day soon--perhaps Tuesday next. We might see you at the same time if you are free that day.'
'Would you like to lunch with me?' Mirren asked.
'Well, that would be nice, and give us a long afternoon for calling. That's settled then. Tuesday. One-thirty, I suppose?. . . Good-bye, Miss Hutton, you must come and lunch with me some day. I'll ring up.'
Mrs. Duff-Whalley stepped into her car and was whirled away to her residence, The Towers, which stood on the outskirts of Priorsford. A very large, staring villa, with many bow-windows and pepper-pot turrets, it had been built for twenty years; but wind and weather seemed to have no effect on its red and whiteness, and it looked almost as glaringly new as the day it was finished.
Mrs. Duff-Whalley found her daughter Muriel in the morning-room, rather listlessly trying over a new song.
'You're in, Muriel. . . . Evidently there's a tea-party at Glenoliver: odd we weren't invited: they owe us a tea-party. Did no one call this afternoon? . . . I've been to tea with the new people who've bought Archfield. They are still in a great turn-up. I don't think Mrs. Forbes can be much of a manager; there seemed a lack of a head: servants dodging about in each other's way----'
'They wouldn't be keen on a visitor for tea.'
'No, the invitation was rather halting, but it was tea-time, so I stayed. I doubt if they'll be much use in the county. One daughter, married, a son in Kenya or somewhere, and a young son at home. . . . They seem a quiet couple. He likes books and talked away about some coloured prints. . . . Then I went to Miss Hutton's to get the truth about Jean Jardine. She says Lord Bidborough has had to go for a voyage with a sick friend--a very queer story!--and Jean is coming to The Rigs!'
'But surely,' said Muriel, 'that's absurd. The Rigs is a mere cottage: there isn't a decent-sized room in it: where will she put nurses and children?'
'They've taken the house just behind--The Neuk. You remember I looked at it for Minna? . . . I must say it seems to me a very odd arrangement. It's all very well for Janet Hutton to talk about Lord Bidborough having to take a sick friend abroad, but I think he must have been glad of the chance. Men in that station are always rovers, and I never did think Jean would be able to hold him, quiet, dull little thing that she was. Now you, Muriel, have some go in you. If you had had the chance . . .'
Muriel moved impatiently. 'Well, I hadn't. And now I'm thirty-four.'
'You don't look it,' said her mother quickly. 'You don't look a day more than five and twenty.'
'The fact remains. . . . In a year or two I'll be one of the spinsters of Priorsford.'
'Oh, no, Muriel, don't say that. Don't get such a thing into your head. People marry later now; you've lots of time. Why, look at Nancy Burnett; she must be forty if she's a day, and no one thinks of putting her on the shelf. She's always the centre of everything.'
'Nancy Burnett has brains, and can fill her life full of so many things that I don't suppose she even gives marriage a thought. With me it's different. I've only brains for a house, and they're not needed, for you see to everything. It's no pleasure to me to sit on committees: I loathe them. I'm not religious, so I get no comfort from putting flowers in the church and attending early services. I never was taught to read good books and it's too late to acquire the taste, so I only read novels, and I'm sick of them. I'm quite good at games, but there are so many young girls coming up, and--oh, what's the good of talking. . . . And now here comes Jean Jardine, with her title and her children, to remind me how many years I've been hanging round this dead-alive place.'
'Muriel,'--Mrs. Duff-Whalley's face was firm with purpose,--'Muriel, we'll go away for the winter. You've wanted to, often, but I wouldn't stir; but I'll go now. I don't deny it'll be a wrench, for I like winter in Priorsford, but I'll go. We might take a cruise to the West Indies. I see numbers of titled people are doing that. It would be a complete change for you. I can see I've been selfish. I'm so taken up running the house and looking after the servants, and sitting on committees, and keeping things going in Priorsford--they're such an apathetic lot I don't believe they'd ever do anything if some one didn't stir them up--that I never realised that you might be bored. We'll write for information about cruises, and then we can say to Lady Bidborough, "How too bad of you to come just as we are leaving. . . ." Well, I'll get my things off. Why, it's about half-past six!'
As she was going Muriel said:
'It's very good of you, Mother, to be willing to go away, but I think we won't cruise this winter. You'd hate it, and I don't believe I'd like it much. . . . By the way, Madge Williamson telephoned when you were out asking me to dine with them to-night. They are having that Mr. Hamilton who has come to Drykeld, and they want a fourth for bridge.'
Mrs. Duff-Whalley gave a snort. 'The farmer of Drykeld? Dear me, I remember the time when a farmer wouldn't have been asked to dinner.'
'This man's come home from India,' Muriel said, indifferently, 'and wants to sheep-farm. I suppose he must be all right, and after all, in this spinster-haunted place, a man's always a man--especially if he can play bridge.'
