But he would not consent to remain to dinner. "The wretch is so hopelessly in love with his wife," Lady Rintoul said, flinging a twig of heather at him. It was one of the many trivial things said on that occasion and long remembered; the only person who afterwards professed her inability to remember what Tommy said to her that day, and she to him, was Lady Pippinworth. "And yet you walked back to the castle with him," they reminded her.
"If I had known that anything was to happen," she replied indolently, "I should have taken more note of what was said. But as it was, I think we talked of our chance of finding white heather. We were looking for it, and that is why we fell behind you."
That was not why Tommy and her Ladyship fell behind the others, and it was not of white heather that they talked. "You know why I am here, Alice," he said, as soon as there was no one but her to hear him.
She was in as great tension at that moment as he, but more anxious not to show it. "Why do you call me that?" she replied, with a little laugh.
"Because I want you to know at once," he said, and it was the truth, "that I have no vindictive feelings. You have kept my manuscript from me all this time, but, severe though the punishment has been, I deserved it, yes, every day of it."
Lady Pippinworth smiled.
"You took it from my bag, did you not?" said Tommy.
"Yes."
"Where is it, Alice? Have you got it here?"
"No."
"But you know where it is?"
"Oh, yes," she said graciously, and then it seemed that nothing could ever disturb him again. She enjoyed his boyish glee; she walked by his side listening airily to it.
"Had there been a fire in the room that day I should have burned the thing," she said without emotion.
"It would have been no more than my deserts," Tommy replied cheerfully.
"I did burn it three months afterwards," said she, calmly.
He stopped, but she walked on. He sprang after her. "You don't mean that, Alice!"
"I do mean it."
With a gesture fierce and yet imploring, he compelled her to stop. "Before God, is this true?" he cried.
"Yes," she said, "it is true"; and, indeed, it was the truth about his manuscript at last.
"But you had a copy of it made first. Say you had!"
"I had not."
She seemed to have no fear of him, though his face was rather terrible. "I meant to destroy it from the first," she said coldly, "but I was afraid to. I took it back with me to London. One day I read in a paper that your wife was supposed to have burned it while she was insane. She was insane, was she not? Ah, well, that is not my affair; but I burned it for her that afternoon."
They were moving on again. He stopped her once more.
"Why have you told me this?" he cried. "Was it not enough for you that I should think she did it?"
"No," Lady Pippinworth answered, "that was not enough for me. I always wanted you to know that I had done it."
"And you wrote that letter, you filled me with joy, so that you should gloat over my disappointment?"
"Horrid of me, was it not!" said she.
"Why did you not tell me when we met the other day?"
"I bided my time, as the tragedians say."
"You would not have told me," Tommy said, staring into her face, "if you had thought I cared for you. Had you thought I cared for you a little jot--"
"I should have waited," she confessed, "until you cared for me a great deal, and then I should have told you. That, I admit, was my intention."
She had returned his gaze smilingly, and as she strolled on she gave him another smile over her shoulder; it became a protesting pout almost when she saw that he was not accompanying her. Tommy stood still for some minutes, his hands, his teeth, every bit of him that could close, tight clenched. When he made up on her, the devil was in him. She had been gathering a nosegay of wild flowers. "Pretty, are they not?" she said to him. He took hold of her harshly by both wrists. She let him do it, and stood waiting disdainfully; but she was less unprepared for a blow than for what came.