_ CHAPTER XVI. ENTER MR. BOMFORD!
"I have decided," Edith remarked, stopping the swinging of the hammock with her foot, "to write and ask Mr. Bomford to come and spend the week-end here."
Burton shook his head.
"Please don't think of it," he begged. "It would completely upset me. I should not be able to do another stroke of work."
"You and your work!" Edith murmured, looking down at him. "What about me? What is the use of being engaged if I may not have my fiance come and see me sometimes?"
"You don't want him," Burton declared, confidently.
"But I do," she insisted, "if only to stop your making love to me."
"I do not make love to you," he asserted. "I am in love with you. There is a difference."
"But you ought not to be in love with me--you have a wife," she reminded him.
"A wife who lives at Garden Green does not count," he assured her. "Besides, it was the other fellow who married her. She isn't really my wife at all. It would be most improper of me to pretend that she was."
"You are much too complicated a person to live in the same house with," she sighed. "I shall do as I said. I shall ask Mr. Bomford down for the week-end."
"Then I shall go back to London," he pronounced, firmly.
A shadow fell across the grass.
"What's that--what's that?" the professor demanded, anxiously.
They both looked up quickly. The professor had just put in one of his unexpected appearances. He had a habit of shuffling about in felt slippers which were altogether inaudible.
"Miss Edith was speaking of asking a visitor--a Mr. Bomford--down for the week-end," Burton explained suavely. "I somehow felt that I should not like him. In any case, I have been here for a week and I really ought--"
"Edith will do nothing of the sort," the professor declared, sharply. "Do you hear that, Edith? No one is to be asked here at all. Mr. Burton's convenience is to be consulted before any one's."
She yawned and made a face at Burton.
"Very well, father," she replied meekly, "only I might just as well not be engaged at all."
"Just as well!" the professor snapped. "Such rubbish!"
Edith swung herself upright in the hammock, arranged her skirts, and faced her father indignantly.
"How horrid of you!" she exclaimed. "You know that I only got engaged to please you, because you thought that Mr. Bomford would take more interest in publishing your books. If I can't ever have him here, I shall break it off. He expects to be asked--I am quite sure he does."
The professor frowned impatiently.
"You are a most unreasonable child," he declared. "Mr. Bomford may probably pay us a passing visit at any time, and you must be content with that."
Edith sighed. She contemplated the tips of her shoes for some moments.
"I do seem to be in trouble to-day," she remarked,--"first with Mr. Burton and then with you."
The professor turned unsympathetically away.
"You know perfectly well how to keep out of it," he said, making his way toward the house.
"Between you both," Edith continued, "I really am having rather a hard time. This is the last straw of all. I am deprived of my young man now, just to please you."
"He isn't a young man," Burton contradicted.
Edith clasped her hands behind her head and looked fixedly up at the blue sky.
"Never mind his age," she murmured. "He is really very nice."
"I've seen his photograph in the drawing-room," Burton reminded her.
Edith frowned.
"He is really much better looking than that," she said with emphasis.
"It is perhaps as well," Burton retorted, "especially if he is in the habit of going about unattended."
Edith ignored his last speech altogether. "Mr. Bomford is also," she went on, "extremely pleasant and remarkably well-read. His manners are charming."
"I am sorry you are missing him so much," Burton said.
"A girl," Edith declared, with her head in the air, "naturally misses the small attentions to which she is accustomed from her fiance."
"If there is anything an unworthy substitute can do," Burton began,--
"Nice girls do not accept substitutes for their fiances," Edith interrupted, ruthlessly. "I am a very nice girl indeed. I think that you are very lazy this afternoon. You would be better employed at work than in talking nonsense."
Burton sighed.
"I tried to work this morning," he declared. "I gave up simply because I found myself thinking of you all the time. Genius is so susceptible to diversions. This afternoon I couldn't settle down because I was wondering all the time whether you were wearing blue linen or white muslin. I just looked out of the window to see--you were asleep in the hammock . . . you witch!" he murmured softly. "How could I keep sane and collected! How could I write about anybody or anything in the world except you! The wind was blowing those little strands of hair over your face. Your left arm was hanging down--so; why is an arm such a graceful thing, I wonder? Your left knee was drawn up--you had been supporting a book against it and--"
"I don't want to hear another word," Edith protested quickly.
He sighed.
"It took me about thirty seconds to get down," he murmured. "You hadn't moved."
"Shall we have tea out here or in the study?" Edith asked.
"Anywhere so long as we escape from this," Burton replied, gazing across the lawn. "What is it?"
A man was making his way from the house towards them, a man who certainly presented a somewhat singular appearance. He was wearing a long linen duster, a motor-cap which came over his ears, and a pair of goggles which he was busy removing. Edith swung herself on to her feet. Considering her late laments, the dismay in her tone was a little astonishing.
"It is Mr. Bomford!" she cried.
Burton sighed--with relief.
"I am glad to hear that it is human," he murmured. "I thought that it was a Wells nightmare or that something from underground had been let loose."
She shot an indignant glance at him. Her greeting of Mr. Bomford was almost enough to turn his head. She held out both her hands.
"My dear Mr.--my dear Paul!" she exclaimed. "How glad I am to see you! Have you motored down?"
"Obviously, my dear, obviously," the newcomer remarked, removing further portions of his disguise and revealing a middle-aged man of medium height and unimposing appearance, with slight sandy whiskers and moustache. "A very hot and dusty ride too. Still, after your father's message I did not hesitate for a second. Where is he, Edith? Have you any idea what it is that he wants?"
She shook her head.
"Did he send for you?" she asked.
"Send for me!" Mr. Bomford repeated. "I should rather think he did."
He looked inquiringly towards Burton. Edith introduced them.
"This," she said, "is Mr. Burton, a friend of father's, who is staying with us for a few days. He is writing a book. Perhaps, if you are very polite to him, he will let you publish it. Mr. Bomford--Mr. Burton."
The two men shook hands solemnly. Neither of them expressed any pleasure at the meeting.
"I am sure you would like a drink," Edith suggested. "Let me take you up to the house and we can find father. You won't mind, Mr. Burton?"
"Not in the least," he assured her.
They disappeared into the house. Burton threw himself once more upon the lawn, his hands clasped behind his head, gazing upwards through the leafy boughs to the blue sky. So this was Mr. Bomford! This was the rival of whom he had heard! Not so very formidable a person, not formidable at all save for one thing only--he was free to marry her, free to marry Edith. Burton lay and dreamed in the sunshine. A thrush came out and sang to him. A west wind brought him wafts of perfume from the gardens below. The serenity of the perfect afternoon mocked his disturbed frame of mind. What was the use of it all? The longer he remained here the more abject he became! . . . Suddenly Edith reappeared alone. She came across the lawn to him with a slight frown upon her forehead. He lay there and watched her until the last moment. Then he rose and dragged out a chair for her.
"So the lovers' interview is over!" he ventured to observe. "You do not seem altogether transported with delight."
"I am very much pleased indeed to see Mr. Bomford," she assured him.
"I," he murmured, "am glad that I have seen him."
Edith looked at him covertly.
"I do not think," she said, "that I quite approve of your tone this afternoon."
"I am quite sure," he retorted, "that I do not approve of yours."
She made a little grimace at him.
"Let us agree, then, to be mutually dissatisfied. I do wish," she added softly, "that I knew why father had sent for Mr. Bomford. It is nothing to do with his work, I am sure of that. He knows that Paul hates coming away from the office on week days."
Burton groaned.
"Is his name Paul?"
"Certainly it is," she answered.
"It sounds very familiar."
"It is nothing of the sort; when you are engaged to a person, you naturally call him by his Christian name. I can't think, though, why father didn't tell us that he was coming."
"I have an idea," Burton declared, "that his coming has something to do with me."
"With you?
"Why not? Am I not an interesting subject for speculation? Mr. Bomford, you told me only a few days ago, is a scientist, an Egyptologist, a philosopher. Why should he not be interested in the same things which interest your father?"
"It is quite true," she admitted. "I had not thought of that."
"At the present moment," Burton continued, moving a little on one side, "they are probably in the dining-room drinking Hock and seltzer, and your father is explaining to your fiance the phenomenon of my experiences. I wonder whether he will believe them?"
"Mr. Bomford," she said, "will believe anything that my father tells him."
"Are you very much in love?" Burton asked, irrelevantly.
"You ask such absurd questions," she replied. "Nowadays, one is never in love."
"How little you know of what goes on nowadays!" he sighed. "What about myself? Do I need to tell you that I am hopelessly in love with you?"
"You," she declared, "are a phenomenon. You do not count."
The professor and his guest came through the French window, arm in arm, talking earnestly.
"Look at them!" Burton groaned. "They are talking about me--I can tell it by their furtive manner. Mr. Bomford has heard the whole story. He is a little incredulous but he wishes to be polite to his future father-in-law. What a pity that I could not have a relapse while he is here!"
"Couldn't you?" she exclaimed. "It would be such fun!"
Burton shook his head.
"Nothing but the truth," he declared sadly.
Mr. Bomford, without his motoring outfit, was still an unprepossessing figure. He wore a pince-nez; his manner was fussy and inclined to be a little patronizing. He had the air of an unsuccessful pedagogue. He was obviously regarding Burton with a new interest. During tea-time he conversed chiefly with Edith, who seemed a little nervous, and answered most of his questions with monosyllables. Burton and the professor were silent. Burton was watching Edith and the professor was watching Burton. As soon as the meal was concluded, the professor rose to his feet.
"Edith, my dear," he said, "we wish you to leave us for a minute or two. Mr. Bomford and I have something to say to Mr. Burton."
Edith, with a slight shrug of the shoulders, rose to her feet. She caught a glance from Burton and turned at once to her fiance.
"Am I to be taken for a ride this evening?" she asked.
"A little later on, by all means, my dear Edith," Mr. Bomford declared. "A little later on, certainly. Your father has kindly invited me to stay and dine. It will give me very much pleasure. Perhaps we could go for a short distance in--say three-quarters of an hour's time?"
Edith went slowly back to the house. Burton watched her disappear. The professor and Mr. Bomford drew their chairs a little closer. The professor cleared his throat.
"Mr. Burton," he began, "Mr. Bomford and I have a proposition to lay before you. May I beg for your undivided attention?"
Burton withdrew his eyes from the French window through which Edith had vanished.
"I am quite at your service," he answered quietly. "Please let me hear exactly what it is that you have to say." _