Loves Shadow | Page 5

time being kind to Edith Ottley. It can't do any good. She'd better leave them alone.'
'Really, it's a very innocent amusement. I think you're overanxious.'
'It's only that I'm afraid she might get mixed up in--well, some domestic row.'
'Surely it can't be as bad as that! Why--is Mr Ottley in love with her?' he asked, smiling.
'Very much indeed,' said Anne.
'Oh, really, Miss Yeo!--and does Mrs Ottley know it?'
'No, nor Hyacinth either. He doesn't know it himself.'
'Then if nobody knows it, it can't matter very much,' said Sir Charles, feeling vaguely uncomfortable all the same. Before he went he took up a portrait of Hyacinth in an Empire dress with laurel leaves in her hair. It was a beautiful portrait. Anne thought that from the way he looked at it, anyone could have guessed Lady Cannon had tight lips and wore a royal fringe.... They parted with great friendliness.
Anne's wooden, inexpressive countenance was a great comfort to Sir Charles, in some moods. Though she was clever enough, she did not have that superfluity of sympathy and responsiveness that makes one go away regretting one has said so much, and disliking the other person for one's expansion. One never felt that she had understood too accurately, nor that one had given oneself away, nor been indiscreetly curious.... It was like talking to a chair. What a good sort Anne was!

CHAPTER III
Anne Yeo
'Would you like me to play to you a little?' Anne asked, when Hyacinth had returned and was sitting in the carved-oak chimney-corner, looking thoughtful and picturesque.
'Oh no, please don't! Besides, I know you can't'
'No, thank goodness!' exclaimed Anne. 'I know I'm useful and practical, and I don't mind that; but anyhow, I'm not cheerful, musical, and a perfect lady, in exchange for a comfortable home, am I?'
'No, indeed,' said Hyacinth fervently.
'No-one can speak of me as "that pleasant, cultivated creature who lives with Miss Verney," can they?'
'Not, at any rate, if they have any regard for truth,' said Hyacinth.
'I wish you wouldn't make me laugh. Why should I have a sense of humour? I sometimes think that all your friends imagine it's part of my duty to shriek with laughter at their wretched jokes. It wasn't in the contract. If I were pretty, my ambition would have been to be an adventuress; but an adventuress with no adventures would be a little flat. I might have the worst intentions, but I should never have the chance of carrying them out. So I try to be as much as possible like Thackeray's shabby companion in a dyed silk.'
'Is that why you wear a sackcloth blouse trimmed with ashes?' said Hyacinth, with curiosity.
'No, that's merely stinginess. It's my nature to be morbidly economical, though I know I needn't be. If I hadn't had ￡500 a year left me, I should never have been able to come and live here, and drop all my horrid relations. I enjoy appearing dependent and being a spectator, and I've absolutely given up all interest in my own affairs. In fact, I haven't got any. And I take the keenest interest in other people's--romances. Principally, of course, in yours.'
'I'm sure I don't want you to be so vicarious as all that--thanks awfully,' said Hyacinth. 'At any rate, don't dress like a skeleton at the feast tomorrow, if you don't mind. I've asked the little Ottleys to dinner--and, I want Charles to come.'
'Oh, of course, if you expect Cecil Reeve!--I suppose you do, as you haven't mentioned it--I'll put on my real clothes to do you credit.' She looked out of the window. 'Here's poor old Charles again. How he does dislike Lady Cannon!'
'What a shame, Anne! He's angelic to her.'
'That's what I meant,' said Anne, going out quickly.
'Charles, how nice of you to call and return your own visit the same day! It's like Royalty, isn't it? It reminds me of the young man who was asked to call again, and came back in half an hour,' said Hyacinth.
'I didn't quite see my way to waiting till Monday,' he answered. 'We're going away the end of the week. Janet says she needs a change.'
'It would be more of a change if you remained in town alone; at least, without Aunty.'
From the age of ten Hyacinth had resented having to call Lady Cannon by this endearing name. How a perfect stranger, by marrying her cousin, could become her aunt, was a mystery that she refused even to try to solve. It was well meant, no doubt; it was supposed to make her feel more at home--less of an orphan. But though she was obedient on this point, nothing would ever induce her to call her cousin by anything but his Christian name, with no qualification. Instinctively she felt that to call them 'Charles and Aunty', while annoying the intruder,