Pilgrim’s Rest Read Free

sorting. A spark may have jumped out of the fire.”
    Judy said, “Is that all?”
    There was a little scorn in her voice. It got him on the raw. He said more than he had meant to say.
    “Roger doesn’t believe his father’s death was an accident.”
    “Why doesn’t he?”
    Frank’s shoulder jerked.
    “Old Pilgrim went for a ride and never came back. They found him with a broken neck. The mare came home in a lather, and the old groom says there was a thorn under the saddle-but as they’d come down in a brier patch there’s a perfectly believable explanation. Only that makes rather a lot of things to explain, don’t you think? I don’t want you to go there.”
    He saw her frown, but there was no anger in her eyes.
    “It’s not so easy, you know. Everyone says there are millions of jobs, but there aren’t-not with Penny. Even now people don’t want a child in the house-you’d think you were asking if you could bring a tiger. And then a lot of them seem to think I couldn’t have Penny if she wasn’t mine. When I tell them about Nora and John they get a kind of we’ve-heard-that-tale-before look. I was just beginning to think I should have to go round with Nora’s marriage lines and Penny’s birth-certificate and even then they’d have gone on believing the worst, when I saw Miss Pilgrim’s advertisement and answered it. And I liked her, and it’s a nice safe village. And anyhow I couldn’t back out at the last minute. We’re going down there tomorrow. It’s no good, Frank.”
    He found himself accepting that. It laid a burden on his spirits.
    Judy pushed back her chair and got up.
    “Nice of you to care and all that.” Her tone, casual again, indicated that the subject was now closed.
    As they cleared away and washed up together, the sense of pull and strain was gone. Presently she was asking him about the people at Holt St. Agnes-about his cousins, and he was offering to write and tell them she was going to Pilgrim’s Rest. And then,
    “You’ll like Lesley Freyne. She’s right in the village, only a stone’s throw from the Pilgrims. Both the houses are right on the village street. She’s a good sort.”
    “Who is she-one of your cousins?”
    “No-the local heiress. Rather shy and not very young. Pots of money and a big house. She’s got about twenty evacuees there. She was going to marry a cousin of the Pilgrims, but it never came off-”
    He had nearly stumbled into telling her about Henry Clayton, but he caught himself in time. She would only think he was piling it on, and it was, of course, quite irrelevant. He changed the subject abruptly.
    “If by any chance a Miss Silver turns up, either in the house or in the village, I’d like you to know that she’s a very particular friend of mine.”
    Judy gave him a bright smile.
    “How nice. Do tell me all about her. Who is she?”
    Frank was to all appearance himself again. His eye had a quizzical gleam, and his voice its negligent drawl as he replied,
    “She is the one and only. I sit at her feet and adore. You will too, I expect.”
    Judy felt this to be extremely unlikely, but she went on smiling in an interested manner whilst Frank continued his panegyric.
    “Her name is Maud-same as in Tennyson’s poetry, which she fervently admires. If you so far forget yourself as to put an ‘e’ on to it, she will forgive you in time because she has a kind heart and very high principles, but it will take some doing.”
    “What are you talking about?”
    “Maudie. I love her passionately. She used to be a governess, but now she is a private detective. She can’t really be a contemporary of Lord Tennyson’s, but she manages to produce that effect. I’ve told Roger to go and see her, so she may be coming down, and if she does, I shall feel a lot happier. Only you don’t know anything, remember. She may be just an ordinary visitor taking a holiday in the village or anything, so not a word to a soul. But if she’s there, you’ll have