“Well?”
“Both were notorious. For unbridled extravagance, and, I must add, for loose living also.
The duel in which Sangalletti died was fought because of another man.
These people said that when they learned of Ambrose Ashley’s marriage to the countess Sangalletti they were horrified.
They predicted that she would run through his entire fortune within a few months.
Luckily, it was not so.
Ambrose died before it was possible for her to do it.
I am sorry, Philip. But this news has much disturbed me.”
Once again he paced the floor.
“I did not think that you would fall so low as to listen to travelers’ tales,” I said to him.
“Who are these people, anyway?
How dare they have the mischief to repeat gossip of over ten years past?
They would not dare to do so before my cousin Rachel.”
“Never mind that now,” he replied.
“My concern now is with those pearls.
I am sorry, but as your guardian for another three months I must ask you to desire her to return the collar.
I will have it placed in the bank again, with the rest of the jewelry.”
Now it was my turn to pace the floor. I hardly knew what I did.
“Return the collar?” I said.
“But how can I possibly ask her to do that?
I gave it to her, tonight, as a Christmas present.
It is the last thing in the whole world that I could do.”
“Then I must do it for you,” he answered.
I suddenly hated his stiff stubborn face, his rigid way of standing, his stolid indifference to all feeling.
“I’ll be damned if you will,” I said to him.
I wished him a thousand miles away. I wished him dead.
“Come, Philip,” he said, altering his tone, “you are very young, very impressionable, and I quite understand that you wanted to give your cousin some token of esteem.
But family jewels are rather more than that.”
“She has a right to them,” I said.
“God knows if anyone has a right to wear the jewels it is she.”
“Had Ambrose lived, yes,” he answered, “but not now.
Those jewels remain in trust for your wife, Philip, when you marry. And that’s another thing.
That collar has a significance of its own, which some of the older among the tenants at dinner tonight may remark upon.
An Ashley, on his marriage, allows his bride to wear the collar on her wedding day, as sole adornment.
That is the kind of family superstition which the people about here delight in, and, as I have told you, the older among them know the tale.
It is unfortunate, and the sort of thing that causes gossip.
I am sure that Mrs. Ashley, in her situation, is the last person to wish that.”
“The people here tonight,” I said impatiently, “will think, if they were in a state to think at all, that the collar is my cousin’s own possession.
I have never heard such rubbish in my life, that her wearing of it might cause gossip.”
“That,” he said, “is not for me to say. I shall doubtless know only too soon if there is talk.
One thing I must be firm upon, Philip.
And that is, that the collar is returned to the safety of the bank.
It is not yet yours to give, and you had no right whatsoever to go to the bank, without my permission, and bring it from safe custody.
I repeat, if you will not ask Mrs. Ashley to return it, I shall.”
In the intensity of our discussion we had not heard the rustle of the gowns upon the stairs.
Now it was too late.
Rachel, followed by Louise, stood in the doorway.
She stood there, her head turned towards my godfather, who was planted in the center of the drawing room, confronting me.
“I am sorry,” she said, “I could not help but overhear what you have said.
Please, I don’t want either of you to embarrass yourselves on my account.