The Dower House Mystery Read Free Page A

wonderful that a man like Ethan Grey should really care for me. They made me wait for six months, and then we were engaged. We were to be married when I was eighteen.” Amabel paused.
    Daphne was leaning forward now and listening eagerly.
    It was difficult to go on. The past began to rise up vividly. The emotions, the hopes of twenty years before, stirred and came alive—the girl of seventeen in a rapture of hero worship; the parents, affectionate and delighted at the honour done their child; and Ethan Grey at the height of his fame, acclaimed by all Europe as the leading man of science of his day.
    Amabel began to speak quickly and steadily:
    â€œHe had to go to Vienna to the big congress there. I went down into the country to pay a visit to a school friend. She was living with a brother and his wife. They were all very kind to me, and there was a lot going on. I had never met many young people, and I enjoyed it all tremendously. Everyone was so young and gay. It was all quite new to me. She paused for a moment, and took a hurried breath. “It was just that, you see, Daffy—they were all so young. And one of them fell in love with me, just in a headlong, young sort of way. It—it carried me off my feet. I can’t think how I came to do it, but I did say that I would break off my engagement; and I went home meaning to do it. We were both very young, Daffy, and it took us off our feet. But when I got home, I found I didn’t have to break off my engagement because your father had broken it off. He—he had just found out that he was going blind—an oculist in Vienna had told him so,—and he went straight to my parents and broke it off.”
    â€œBut—I don’t understand.” Daphne was puzzled, frowning, and certainly interested.
    The colour had rushed into Amabel’s face. Her eyes shone. She looked like a girl—like the girl who had given everything in her generous enthusiasm.
    â€œOh, Daffy, don’t you see?” she cried.
    â€œThey persuaded you?” said Daphne.
    â€œNo, no—of course not. Just think what it meant to him. Oh, Daffy, I was only too thankful that I hadn’t said anything first. It would have been too dreadful.
    â€œI don’t understand a bit,” said Daphne. “Do you mean to say you just gave in?”
    Amabel got up. Daphne’s tone, with its hint of scorn—Daphne’s obvious lack of comprehension—
    She spoke very simply.
    â€œDaffy dear, try and understand. If you remembered him it would be easier. When you love someone, and they are in frightful trouble, there’s no room for anything except the wanting to help, and being so very thankful that one can.”
    Daphne got up too.
    â€œOh, well,” she said, and stretched herself. “You’re the self-sacrificing sort, Mummy: I’m not. It’s a vice, really—all the best modern philosophers say so.” She laughed lightly, and flung an arm about Amabel’s shoulders. “Mummy, let me go to Egypt,” she said.

Chapter II
    Amabel sat up very late that night. She finished the orange-coloured curtains, and then sat quite still, her hands folded on the brilliant stuff, thinking.
    Daphne was her only child—and Daphne was not hers at all. She could love her; but she couldn’t reach her. Why were there such gulfs between people who loved one another? She simply could not reach Daphne at all. Yet the child loved her. Amabel always clung to that—Daphne did love her. When she was at her naughtiest; when she flared with rage, or looked at Amabel with the half-pitying contempt which was harder to bear, there was still that curious, unbroken strand of love linking the two together. Daphne chafed under it, resented it; but it was there.
    Amabel sat very still, while the fire died and the lamplight began to fail. When at last she moved, it was to go to the window, open the shutter, and lean out.
    The rain had ceased.