Grey Mask

“I can’t tell you.”

“Why can’t you?”

“I can’t. It’s all over and done with, and dead and buried.” Her rather deep voice sank deeper. “It’s all over.”

“I wonder,” said Charles.

Margaret pushed her latch-key into the lock with a fierce thrust.

“It’s over,” she said.

The door shut between them heavily.

CHAPTER XIII

Margot Standing wrote again to her friend Stephanie at the pension.

Oh, Stephanie, I do wish you were here! I haven’t got anyone to talk to, and it’s so frightfully dull.You can’t call Mr. Hale a person to talk to, because he does all the talking himself, and everything he says is simply deadly. He says I shan’t have any money at all unless there’s a will, or those certificates turn up. And he says he’s sure there isn’t a will because of what poor Papa said to his father. And yesterday he said he was sure there weren’t any certificates, because there was a letter from Papa to say so. And he said not to worry, because perhaps Egbert and I could come to some arrangement, and that that would be much the best thing. But I’ve made up my mind to go out and earn my living. I think it’s rather romantic to earn one’s living and to be a pe

When Miss Standing had finished her letter, she threw a wistful glance at the empty chocolate box and wandered into the drawing-room. She was not prepared to find her cousin Egbert there, and if she had been a shade less bored, she might have retreated unobserved. As it was, even Egbert was someone to talk to, and she was perhaps a little curious as to what he was doing standing in one of the drawing-room chairs and gazing fixedly at the picture farthest from the door.

He turned round when he heard her, but remained standing on the chair.

“It’s no more a Turner than I am!”

“What isn’t?”

“That picture isn’t.” He laughed rather rudely. “My uncle’s geese were all swans. He didn’t know enough to pay the prices he did. Of course he wouldn’t ask me, but I could have told him from the very begi

“It’s awfully ugly anyway,” said Margot.

Egbert gave a snort and jumped down from the chair.

“Ugly? Who cares whether it’s ugly or not? If it was a Turner, it would be worth thousands of pounds. But it isn’t a Turner, and it isn’t worth a thousand pence.”

“Good gracious, Egbert, what does it matter? You’ll have simply piles of money anyhow.”

“It’s not a question of money. Besides-”

“You will have pots-won’t you? I shouldn’t think you’d know what to do with it.”

Egbert looked a

“Nobody ever has too much money,” he said. “Besides there won’t be so much as you seem to think, by the time the death duties are paid and one thing and another.”

“Good gracious!” said Miss Standing again. “You’re frightfully sure you’re going to get it. Suppose I’ve just found a will, or one of those certificates Mr. Hale keeps bothering about-what would you do then?”

Something just flicked across Egbert’s face-fear, and something uglier than fear. Margot, without understanding why, felt her breath come quicker; she wanted to run out of the room and bang the door. Instead she repeated her question:

“What would you do?”

“Have you found anything?” said Egbert in a different voice; and again Margot would have liked to ran away.

“I might have found something. There was an old box that belonged to my mother.”

He came a step nearer.

“Was there? What was in it? What did you find?” Margot went back a step.

“I found some old dresses. They must have been very uncomfortable to wear.”

“What else did you find?”

“I found a desk. Wouldn’t you like to know what was in it?”

“Papers?” said Egbert.

Margot laughed. She couldn’t think why she felt frightened.

“You’re talking nonsense!” said Egbert pettishly. “I don’t believe there were any papers.”

“Perhaps there weren’t.”

“You’d have shown them to Mr. Hale fast enough.”

“Perhaps I should, and perhaps I shouldn’t.”

“Nonsense! Look here, I want to talk to you.”

“You are talking to me.”

“I want to talk to you about something special. You’re only chaffing about that desk, you know. There’s no chance of a will turning up now, and your father’s own letter makes it quite clear that it’s no use your buoying yourself up thinking you’ve got any claim on his money. But, as I said to Mr. Hale, there’s no reason for you to worry, because I’m willing to go shares.”

Margot opened her eyes very wide indeed.

“Shares!”

“Well, that’s just a way of putting it. It wouldn’t really be shares of course, but it would come to just the same thing as far as you were concerned. I mean if a girl’s got plenty of pretty frocks and some pocket-money, and a good home, and a car-I don’t say it wouldn’t run to a car-well, she doesn’t want anything more-does she?”

“She might.”

“She wouldn’t. Why should she?”

“I don’t know. I don’t know what you mean.”

“I mean if we were married,” said Egbert.

Margot gave a little shriek:

“If who was married?”

“We. I said if we were married.”

Margot stared at him.

“Good gracious, Egbert. What a frightful idea!”