Page:Neith Boyce--The bond.djvu/57

Rh I got a note from Mrs. Perry this morning, saying she's off motoring for a fortnight, so I'm out of a job for to-day."

"Can't, I'm going to a concert with Gerald," she said, and now her narrow eyes, half-closed, sent a knife-like glint at him.

"Well, afterwards. You could come soon after four for an hour."

"No, I shall be too tired."

Basil shrugged his shoulders, and after a moment's pause the talk went back to politics. The Major was a great politician, Gerald was a newspaper man, and Basil was interested in anything that anyone else could talk about. But politics tiered Teresa, and though she seemed to listen she was really absorbed in her own thoughts.

First she rejoiced that Mrs. Perry had disappointed Basil. "That will show him how much she cares about him and his picture," she reflected. "I wonder if he is vexed about her, or about the picture? That was the reason of his flying out at me when I came in. But he shan't be rude to me simply because other women have put him out of temper. I will—I will"

What she would do about it remained vague, dying away in undertones of thought and feeling; but what was perfectly definite in her mind was the intention that Basil should pay for his unkindness.

The lunch, she was glad to see, was good; only