The Devils Garden | Page 6

world? It's a pretty country--especially the forest side. Lots of artists and photographers come here on purpose to take the views."
For a little while she and Mr. Ridgett chatted gaily together; and Dale observed, not without satisfaction, that the deputy patently admired Mavis. "Yes," he thought, "it must be an eye-opener for him or anybody else to come up those stairs and find a postmaster's wife with all the education and manners of a lady, and as pretty as a bunch of primroses into the bargain."
And indeed little Mr. Ridgett was fully susceptible to Mavis' varied charms. He liked her complexion--so unusually white; he liked her hair--such a lot of it; he liked the mobility of her lips, the fineness and straightness of her nose; and he also greatly liked the broad black ribbon that was tied round her slender neck. The simple decoration seemed curiously in harmony with something childlike pertaining to its wearer. He did not attempt to analyze this characteristic, but he felt it plainly--something that drew its components from voice, expression, gesture, and that as a whole carried to one a message of extreme youth.
And how fond of her husband! The anxiety for his welfare that she had shown just now quite touched a soft spot in Mr. Ridgett's dryly official heart.
"You know," said Dale, interrupting the conversation, and speaking as though the subject that occupied his own mind was still under debate, "they can't pretend but what I warned them. I said it's madness to go and put the instruments anywhere but the place I've marked on the plan. If they'd listened to my words _then_--"
"Ah, there you are again," said Mr. Ridgett. "The personal equation!"
"Where's the personality of it?"
"I'll tell you. London isn't Rodchurch. What you said--how many years ago?--isn't going to govern the judgment of people who never heard you say it."
"It ought to have gone on record. It is on record over at Rodhaven."
"London isn't Rodhaven either."
Then once again the talk became serious; and once again Ridgett saw in Mrs. Dale's white face, trembling fingers, and narrowed eyes, the deadly anxiety that she was suffering. With that face opposite to one, it would have been monstrously cruel not to offer the wisest and best considered advice that one could anyhow produce.
"Here's _verb. sap_," he said solemnly. "_Ultimatum_, and ne plus ultra. I'm giving you Latin for Latin, Mr. Dale. I understand your attitude, and I appreciate its bearing; but I say to you, the best causes sometimes need the best advocates."
"Yes!" Mavis drew in her breath with a little gasp.
"If any of the gentry down here would speak up for you, send you a few testimonials--well, I should get them to do it. You see, from what you tell me of the case, you've your Member of Parliament against you. It would be useful to counteract--"
Then Mavis eagerly explained that the biggest man of the neighborhood had promised to give his support to her husband. This great personage was the Right Honorable Everard Barradine, an ex-Cabinet Minister and a large landed proprietor, who lived over at the Abbey House, on the edge of Manninglea Chase, five miles away. Mr. Barradine had always borne a good heart to her and hers.
"Capital!" said Mr. Ridgett, visibly brightening. "A friend at court--what's the proverb? It's not for me to let fall any remarks about wire-pulling. But naturally there's a freemasonry among the bigwigs. You take my tip, and use Mr. Barradine's interest for all it's worth."
"Well," said Dale, "he has given a promise--of a sort--and I shan't bother him further."
After that the talk became light again. As if the strain of her anxiety was more than Mavis Dale could bear for long at a time, she plunged into frivolous discussion, telling Mr. Ridgett of the splendors and beauties of the Abbey House. It was a show-place. Its gardens surpassed belief; royal persons came hundreds of miles to look at them. And the wild historic woodland of Manninglea Chase was famous, it was said, all over Europe. Talking thus, she seemed as gay and careless as a child of ten.
Mr. Ridgett, puffing his pipe luxuriously, contemplated her animated face with undisguised admiration; and presently Dale felt irritated by the admiring scrutiny.
That was what always happened. At first he felt pleased that people should admire his wife; but if they seemed to admire her the least little shade too much, he became angry. In the lanes, in church, anywhere, he froze too attentive glances of admiring males with a most portentous scowl. It was not that he entertained the faintest doubt of her loyalty and devotion, or of her power to protect herself from improper assiduities; but he loved her so passionately that his blood began to boil at the mere thought of anybody's having the audacity