The Witness for the Defense | Page 5

to us."
The Carruthers were a young couple who, the moment after they had
inherited the larger share in the great firm of Templeton & Carruthers,
Bombay merchants, had found themselves involved in a partnership
suit due to one or two careless phrases in a solicitor's letter. The case
had been the great case of the year in Bombay. The issue had been
doubtful, the stake enormous and Thresk, who three years before had
taken silk, had been fetched by young Carruthers from England to fight
it.
"Yes, we've won," he said. "Judgment was given in our favor this
afternoon."
"You are dining with us to-night, aren't you."
"Thank you, yes," said Thresk. "At half-past eight."
"Yes."
Mrs. Carruthers gave him some tea and chattered pleasantly while he
drank it. She was fair-haired and pretty, a lady of enthusiasms and

uplifted hands, quite without observation or knowledge, yet with power
to astonish. For every now and then some little shrewd wise saying
would gleam out of the placid flow of her trivialities and make whoever
heard it wonder for a moment whether it was her own or whether she
had heard it from another. But it was her own. For she gave no special
importance to it as she would have done had it been a remark she had
thought worth remembering. She just uttered it and slipped on, noticing
no difference in value between what she now said and what she had
said a second ago. To her the whole world was a marvel and all things
in it equally amazing. Besides she had no memory.
"I suppose that now you are free," she said, "you will go up into the
central Provinces and see something of India."
"But I am not free," replied Thresk. "I must get immediately back to
England."
"So soon!" exclaimed Mrs. Carruthers. "Now isn't that a pity! You
ought to see the Taj--oh, you really ought!--by moonlight or in the
morning. I don't know which is best, and the Ridge too!--the Ridge at
Delhi. You really mustn't leave India without seeing the Ridge. Can't
things wait in London?"
"Yes, things can, but people won't," answered Thresk, and Mrs.
Carruthers was genuinely distressed that he should depart from India
without a single journey in a train.
"I can't help it," he said, smiling back into her mournful eyes. "Apart
from my work, Parliament meets early in February."
"Oh, to be sure, you are in Parliament," she exclaimed. "I had
forgotten." She shook her fair head in wonder at the industry of her
visitor. "I can't think how you manage it all. Oh, you must need a
holiday."
Thresk laughed.
"I am thirty-six, so I have a year or two still in front of me before I have

the right to break down. I'll save up my holidays for my old age."
"But you are not married," cried Mrs. Carruthers. "You can't do that.
You can't grow comfortably old unless you're married. You will want
to work then to get through the time. You had better take your holidays
now."
"Very well. I shall have twelve days upon the steamer. When does it
go?" asked Thresk as he rose from his chair.
"On Friday, and this is Monday," said Mrs. Carruthers. "You certainly
haven't much time to go anywhere, have you?"
"No," replied Thresk, and Mrs. Carruthers saw his face quicken
suddenly to surprise. He actually caught his breath; he stared, no longer
aware of her presence in the room. He was looking over her head
towards the grand piano which stood behind her chair; and she began to
run over in her mind the various ornaments which encumbered it. A
piece of Indian drapery covered the top and on the drapery stood a little
group of Dresden China figures, a crystal cigarette-box, some
knick-knacks and half-a-dozen photographs in silver frames. It must be
one of those photographs, she decided, which had caught his eye,
which had done more than catch his eye. For she was looking up at
Thresk's face all this while, and the surprise had gone from it. It seemed
to her that he was moved.
"You have the portrait of a friend of mine there," he said, and he
crossed the room to the piano.
Mrs. Carruthers turned round.
"Oh, Stella Ballantyne!" she cried. "Do you know her, Mr. Thresk?"
"Ballantyne?" said Thresk. For a moment or two he was silent. Then he
asked: "She is married then?"
"Yes, didn't you know? She has been married for a long time."

"It's a long time since I have heard of her," said Thresk. He looked
again at the photograph.
"When was this taken?"
"A few months ago. She sent it to me in October. She is beautiful, don't
you think?"
"Yes."
But it was not the