Oh-h!"
She drooped forward upon her sofa and laid face downward on a
cushion--slim, exquisite in line, lost in despair.
The effect produced was that she gave herself into his hands. He
felt as well as saw it and considered. She had no suggestion to
offer, no reserve. There she was.
"It is an incredible sort of situation," he said in an even,
low-pitched tone rather as if he were thinking aloud, "but it is
baldly real. It is actually simple. In a street in Mayfair a woman
and child might--" He hesitated a second and a wailed word came
forth from the cushion.
"Starve!"
He moved slightly and continued.
"Since their bills have not been paid the trades-people will not
send in food. Servants will not stay in a house where they are
not fed and receive no wages. No landlord will allow a tenant to
occupy his property unless he pays rent. It may sound inhuman--but
it is only human."
The cushion in which Feather's face was buried retained a faint
scent of Robert's cigar smoke and the fragrance brought back to her
things she had heard him say dispassionately about Lord Coombe as
well as about other men. He had not been a puritanic or condemnatory
person. She seemed to see herself groveling again on the floor
of her bedroom and to feel the darkness and silence through which
she had not dared to go to Robin.
Not another night like that! No! No!
"You must go to Jersey to your mother and father," Coombe said.
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