The Jade God by Alan Sullivan (snow like ashes series txt) 📕

“I cannot make myself speak now, and you can’t go in there alone.”

“Why not?”

“There’s Martin looking at you. He knows what we are talking about.”

“Perhaps he does, and if so he’s more afraid of me than I am of him. At any rate I must go. You keep on toward the village, and I’ll catch you up. If I have to wait I’ll have someone walk home with me. And please, please understand that I’m not afraid, because there’s nothing to fear. I know now why we came this way today for the first time.”

Mrs. Millicent sighed despairingly and turned away. There was a look on the girl’s face she could not meet, and Martin had not moved.

Jean rallied her courage, passed between the white gates, and walked firmly up the drive. Martin saw her coming and stepped back till he was half screened among his roses. His face was working. When she drew level he touched his cap the second time, and for an instant their eyes met. In hers there was a cold recognition; in his a sort of mute and restless petition. Yes, he knew why she had come and what she was about to impart to his new employer. A surge of impotent anger shot through him, and he turned silently lest he should betray it. He had not reckoned on this when in the Burmese jungle there reached him the first of those discomforting promptings that finally brought him halfway round the world, he knew not why. Jean did not look back. Her eyes were fixed on the too familiar door. It opened almost at once, and she met the changeless look of Perkins. Now she could speak, but the sight of the hall, its rugs and pictures, all as though she had never left them, was nearly too much. They were as unchanged as Perkins herself. Suddenly she felt like an intruder or a thief and wanted to leave. At that she remembered Martin.

“Good afternoon, Perkins. Is Mrs. Derrick in?”

“There is no Mrs. Derrick, miss. It’s Mr. Derrick’s sister who is here.”

“Oh, is she in, then?”

“No, miss, but Mr. Derrick is here.”

“Then I’d like to see him for a moment.”

“Will you wait in the living-room, miss? Mr. Derrick is working in the study.”

“Thanks, I’ll wait here.”

Perkins tapped at the study door.

“Miss Millicent, sir.”

Derrick put down his pen. “Miss Millicent,” he repeated puzzled.

“She is waiting in the hall and would like to see you. She asked for Miss Derrick first, but Miss Derrick is out.”

He got up, his pulse beating hard, and came quickly into the hall. They glanced at each other, these two, drawn thus together by the shadow of a crime. Instinctively she held out her hand, feeling for a strange moment almost as though no introduction was necessary.

“How do you do, Miss Millicent? My sister will be very sorry to miss you. Will you come into the living-room or”⁠—he hesitated an instant⁠—“the study?”

“I won’t keep you a moment,” she said a little nervously. “Are you working in the study?”

He nodded, smiling. “I think it’s a wonderful room. Please come in.”

He followed her in, while Perkins, after a lingering glance, closed the door. Jean took a big chair by the fireplace, and for a moment neither spoke. Then she saw the manuscript littering the desk.

“I’m so afraid I’ve interrupted you.”

He shook his head ruefully. “What I was writing, or trying to write, is all the better for being interrupted. And,” he added, “we have been hoping to meet you and your mother.”

Again their eyes met. Derrick noted the smooth oval of her face and the sensitive curve of her lips. Her expression suggested imagination, a mind at once alert and subjective. She was looking now at her father’s portrait, and he saw the resemblance between these two. And, try as he might, he could not guess her thoughts or what brought her there. But something whispered that a Millicent was again in Beech Lodge.

“I did not know I was coming here today,” she said gravely, “not till mother and I came past the gates. Then I knew.”

It was all so strange, and yet so utterly real, that Derrick did not answer at once. Here was Millicent’s daughter in Millicent’s study. That to begin with. And there was about the girl a nameless aura she had brought with her that made the ordinary preliminaries of acquaintance seem pointless and out of place. He did not feel that he had always known her, but that somewhere and somehow they possessed something in common.

“Please tell me,” he said quietly.

“Yes, if I may begin by asking questions.”

“It will be very kind of you.”

“Then, did you know about Beech Lodge when you took it?”

“No; that is, if I understand what you mean. I was looking for a quiet place to work in, found this, and fell in love with it. I went straight to the agent in London and made an offer. He telephoned to Mr. Thursby, and the offer was accepted so quickly that it surprised me⁠—and here we are.”

“It was Perkins who showed you over the house?”

“Yes, she was alone here, and in charge.”

“And the rest?” She glanced at him as though counting on his intuition.

“I discovered that after we moved in.”

“I’m so sorry,” she said involuntarily.

“But why, Miss Millicent?”

“Because I’m sure you would not⁠—”

She stopped abruptly. A whisper came to her that she was saying things of which she was not quite sure. What if Beech Lodge had imparted the edge of its secret, the secret of which she had long been conscious, to its new tenant? His face was that of one who might be able to receive such things.

“You were going to tell me that if I had known what happened here two years ago I would not have taken the house.”

She nodded thankfully. Yes, he did understand.

“Then may I say that I think I realize what it must have meant to you to come in here for that purpose? And, Miss