_ CHAPTER VIII
By bringing Peg Fraser to the flat the Beggar Man acknowledged his defeat.
If he had not been so sure of Faith's hatred he might have tried harder to overcome her prejudices, but he felt that hatred was an active force through which success was impossible.
He said as much to Mr. Shawyer.
"I've been a fool, I know! I suppose the whole thing was bound to be a failure from the start, but she seemed to like me...." He shrugged his shoulders. "What's the best thing to do?" he asked.
Mr. Shawyer hesitated. He was disappointed over this marriage himself. He admired Forrester intensely, and had looked to him to carry through successfully a thing which he was sure must have failed dismally in the hands of a weaker man.
"She'll change her mind," he said after a moment. "Women always do if you give them time. Her mother's death was a great shock to her, of course."
"I've made every allowance for that."
"Then taking her sisters away so soon...." said Mr. Shawyer tentatively.
Forrester made an angry gesture.
"I did it for the best. She knows that, and it will prove for the best. How in God's name was she going to look after them and provide for them?"
"I know all that, but perhaps if you had left them with her for a little longer...."
Forrester frowned.
"The longer they had been together the harder the parting would have seemed. However, it's done, and I'm not going to undo it. Have you found out anything yet about this story of her father?"
Mr. Shawyer looked away from his client's anxious eyes as he answered.
"I have. Unfortunately, it's true! You remember that deal, five years ago it was, when a syndicate was formed to knock out the smaller manufacturers who would not sell to Heeler's?"
"Yes."
"Your wife's father was one of the small men who held out against you and was ruined."
Forrester laughed mirthlessly.
"It's the devil's luck; but how was I to know? Women are all unreasonable."
Mr. Shawyer did not answer, and Forrester went on:
"My wife has that Miss Fraser with her now, and mighty uncomfortable it is, too. She's as good as gold, but a rough diamond, and I wanted to get Faith away from the class she's been forced to mix with for the past five years. It looks as if she's going to beat me in that, too," he added, grimly.
"And are you all living at the flat?"
"Yes, for the present. I've taken a house at Hampstead, and we shall move there as soon as it's ready--in a week or two, I hope." He paced the length of the office and back again. "If it didn't look so much like running away, I'd make a settlement on my wife and clear off abroad," he said, shortly.
"I shouldn't do that," said Mr. Shawyer. "She's young. Give her another chance; be patient for a little while."
"Patience was never a virtue of mine," said the Beggar Man, grimly. "And, dash it all! What sort of a life is it for me, do you think? I'm not married at all, except that I'm paying; not that I mind the money."
"Well, wait a little longer," the elder man urged again. "It's early days yet, and you never know what will happen."
"I know what won't happen, though," said Forrester grimly.
He went back to the flat disconsolately. He heard Peg laughing as he let himself in, and the silence that fell as soon as his steps sounded in the passage.
The two girls were together in the sitting-room with which Faith had been so delighted when she first visited it, but it was Peg who greeted him as he entered.
She had made herself quite at home, and, in spite of a certain bluntness and vulgarity of which she would never rid herself as long as she lived, she seemed to have improved.
She was dressed more quietly and her hair was neater, but she still wore the gipsy earrings which Forrester hated so much.
She had been living in the flat a fortnight then--a year it seemed to Forrester. And he wondered, as he looked at his wife, why it was that, with each day, the gulf between them seemed to widen.
He smiled rather pathetically as her eyes met his.
"I've been thinking," he said. "What about a run down to see the twins? I'll take you in the car."
Twenty times a day he made up his mind that he would start all over again to win Faith back to him, but though she was friendly up to a certain point, he could never get beyond that point, or even back to the footing which had promised so happily for the future during the first days of their acquaintance.
Her face brightened wonderfully now at the suggestion and she clasped her hands eagerly.
"Oh, will you? How lovely!"
"We'll go directly after lunch," Forrester said, and looked at Peg. "Will you come, Miss Fraser?"
Peg shrugged her shoulders.
"You don't want me," she said. "Two's company, and three's a crowd. I've got a story to finish, too."
"Another novelette?" Forrester asked, cynically. Most of the rooms in the flat were littered with Peg's paper-backed library, and he hated the sight of them. He had made such different plans for his future. He had meant to introduce Faith to his own friends and gradually initiate her into their mode of living, but so far there had been no opportunity. Peg ruled the flat serenely, and, though she certainly never suggested bringing her own relations or acquaintances there, her mere presence prevented Forrester from doing as he wished.
"I'd much rather you came," Faith said quickly, but Peg only laughed.
"Then I'm not coming, so there's an end of it!"
She stuck to that, and early in the afternoon Faith and her husband drove away together. It was almost the first time they had been out without Peg since they came to live at the flat, and Forrester knew quite well that it was only the desire to see her sisters that had persuaded Faith to accompany him now.
He glanced down at her with a grim smile. She was looking better than he had seen her since her mother's death. There was a flush in her cheeks and her eyes were bright, but her thoughts were far away from him, it seemed, for she started when he spoke to her.
"I've found out about your father," he began curtly. It was not in his nature to be a tactician, and he knew that his blunt reference to the trouble between them hurt her; but he went on doggedly:
"It's true enough. He failed owing to a syndicate formed by me, but, as far as I can remember, I personally never heard his name or saw him." He waited, surprised at himself because he was hoping so desperately for a kind word or a little smile, but Faith only said "Yes," and kept her eyes steadily ahead.
"If you understood business," he went on, "you'd see that I am not to blame at all. Don't think I'm trying to shield myself, but I like fair play."
"Yes," said Faith again. Then she added, with a little nervous tremble in her voice, "I loved my father."
The Beggar Man laughed.
"And you don't love me, you mean! I'm quite aware of that."
She did not say any more, and they drove the rest of the way in silence.
The twins were playing in the school grounds when they reached the house, and Faith paced up and down the drawing-room in a fever of impatience while they were fetched. The head mistress was talking to Forrester. She was sure the children were quite happy, she said. They were certainly very good. "They were always good at home," Faith said, passionately, forgetting how many times a day they had quarrelled and slapped one another, and screamed and cried and nearly worried poor Mrs. Ledley to death. But time had lent a glamour of glory to most things now, and Faith could never think of her life at home without a dreary feeling of heart-sickness.
And then the twins came, and she caught her breath with a cry of wonderment, for she hardly recognized them in the healthy, well-dressed children who came demurely forward, hand in hand.
"Darlings--oh, darlings!" said Faith.
She went down on her knees and put her arms round them, kissing them rapturously.
"You haven't forgotten me? Of course, you haven't forgotten me?"
The twins returned her kisses warmly enough, and then held away a little to ask: "Have you brought us any chocolates?"
Faith's face fell. She had forgotten the chocolates! Oh, how could she have been so selfish?
"I've got some," said Forrester cheerfully, and the twins deserted their sister to fall upon him with rapture.
Afterwards they went round the garden and were introduced to the other children and shown the schoolroom. Then they all had tea together in the drawing-room and then ... Forrester looked at his watch.
"We ought to be getting back, Faith," he said.
Faith looked hurriedly at the twins. She was so sure they would cry and make a scene, and cling to her and beg to be taken away. If the truth must be told, she was hoping that they would. But neither of them seemed to mind in the least.
"When will you come again?" was all they asked, and Faith, nearly choking with disappointment, answered that she would come soon, quite soon.
"And are you happy here, really happy?" she asked them each in turn when for a moment they were alone, and each twin answered like an echo of the other, "It's lovely!"
"They've forgotten me, you see," Faith said bitterly to Forrester as they drove away and a bend in the road hid the last glimpse of the two small figures at the gate. "They don't want me any more. Nobody wants me."
The Beggar Man's hand tightened on the steering-wheel.
"I'm not so small that there's any excuse for you to forget me so completely," he said dryly. "I'm here--waiting to be wanted."
Faith did not answer, but that night when she and Peg were brushing their hair together in Faith's room she repeated his words.
"As if I shall ever want him?" she said scornfully.
Peg dragged a tangle from her thick hair with a little vicious gesture.
"There's plenty worse," she said mechanically.
Faith tried hard to see her friend's face, but it was hidden by the mop of hair hanging about it.
"You've altered your opinion of him then," she said offendedly. "Sometimes I believe you really like him."
"He's been very decent to me, anyway," Peg answered brusquely. "And it's a pretty rotten game for him, paying out for us all the time, and not a ha'porth of thanks, or anything! How'd you like it?"
"I never thought you were a turn-coat," Faith said shortly.
She cried herself to sleep. Everyone was against her. The twins had forgotten her, and now Peg was condemning her ... life was a hateful thing.
Forrester came into the flat a day or two later and found Peg there alone. He was tired and depressed, and answered her cheery greeting shortly.
She knew that his eyes wandered round the room in search of his wife, though he asked no questions, and Peg said:
"Faith's gone out. She'll be in directly." She paused, then added: "I didn't go with her, because I wanted to speak to you--alone!"
The last word was given with dramatic effect, and Forrester smiled faintly.
"Well--what is it?"
Peg was standing over by the window, and she turned round with a swift movement as she said:
"Look here! Do you want me to go?"
"Go?" He was too surprised to do anything but echo her words.
"Yes." The colour deepened in her cheeks, but her eyes met his without flinching. "I know it's been unpleasant for you, all these weeks," she went on deliberately. "I know you'd much rather be alone with Faith, so if you'll say the word I'll go, and no complaints."
There was a little silence, then Forrester said slowly:
"I suppose it hasn't occurred to you that if you go, Miss Fraser, Faith will probably go too."
"Is that what she says?"
"Yes."
Peg laughed.
"Well, don't take any notice of her. She's a silly kid; she says lots of things she doesn't really mean." She came across the room and stood beside him. "Look here; it's partly me who's to blame for her being so unkind to you," she went on bluntly. "I told her you were Ralph Scammel. I told her that you were a selfish brute, and that you made us work as we did to get money for you." For the first time her eyes fell, as she added: "You needn't believe me, but I've often been sick about that--since!"
Forrester laughed.
"You need not be. It's more or less true. I am selfish, and I am Ralph Scammel, and I did work you and hundreds of other girls like you, to make money for me."
"You're not a bit selfish," Peg said almost violently. "Look how good you've been to us! Took us from nothing, as you might say----"
"Oh--please!" Forrester stopped her in embarrassment. "I shall think you're going to ask me a favour if you say such kind things," he protested, half in fun.
"Well, then, I'm not," Peg declared. "But I'm going to ask you a question, all the same."
"What is it?"
"If I wasn't here, would you have your own friends to the flat? Oh, you needn't make excuses! I know I'm not so good as Faith! I knew it the first time I ever saw her! I used to tell her that she'd got no right to be at Heeler's. I know she's got something in her that I can't ever have, because her father was a gentleman, I suppose, and mine wasn't. So if you say the word, I'll pack up right away and be off! I can't say fairer than that, can I?"
There was a little silence. Then suddenly Forrester held out his hand.
"You're a brick--a real brick!" he said. "And--and--I shall be grateful to you if you will stay, Miss Fraser."
Peg gripped his hand hard.
"Oh, I'll stay, if you mean it," she said. She spoke rather loudly in order to hide her real emotion, and turning quickly away began to talk hurriedly on some other subject. But later, when Forrester had gone from the room, she darted across to where he had thrown his coat down on a chair, and snatching it up, pressed her lips to it.
"If you cared for me, as you do for her," she said, in a fierce little whisper, and then bitterly: "Oh, she's a fool--a blind little fool!" _