Joliffe was eager that the dinner should be a success, and when Adam promised to take our guests to Chan Cho Lan’s house afterwards for a dancing display, he was delighted.

“You’ll meet the Langs,” said Adam. “He’s an old friend of mine. His wife died recently and he’s remarried. It’ll be her very first visit to China. She’s said to be rather charming but a little emptyheaded. She’ll be enthralled with everything.”

Toby and his sister were invited and so there would be a certain amount of business talk. I was apprehensive to contemplate that the two men who had hoped to marry me would be there with my husband.

As I dressed for dinner in a green silk gown I looked at myself critically in the mirror and tried to see myself as Joliffe saw me. I was neither bad nor good-looking; I had a certain vitality and a good deal of poise—acquired since my marriage to Sylvester and heightened during my year of widowhood. In the last months I had softened a little; I had become vulnerable, as one always must be when one loves.

I considered this as I studied my reflection. To love was perhaps a mixed blessing. One could not have love without fear because one must always fear for the loved one. If Jason suffered from some childish ailment I suffered agonies in my imagination seeing him dead and following his coffin to the grave. All because I loved. And now Joliffe… I was terrified when he was not at my side. I visualized all sorts of dangers that could befall him in this country. To love was to suffer. I was indeed vulnerable.

And this ordinary-looking… no perhaps that was not fair to myself, perhaps I should say this tolerably attractive though not devastatingly so young woman, had had three suitors—all men of ability and some charm.

I saw the faint turn up of my lips; the flash of cynicism in my eyes. But then I was a woman of great means. I had so much more to offer than myself.

And yet I could not believe that these men were mercenary… not entirely so. Joliffe loved me; he had told me so a hundred times. And Adam and Toby? They told me too in a different way. Adam’s aloof dismay and suppressed anger showed me; Toby’s sad resignation.

It’s strange, I said to myself. I’m sure they have some regard for me but my fortune may tip the balance in my favor.

In such a mood I went down to dinner.

Adam was right about Mrs. Lang’s being a little featherbrained. She was a very pretty woman with fair fluffy hair; and she talked incessantly in disjointed sentences many of which she failed to finish.

Hong Kong was marvelous. She had heard of course… but had not guessed how truly wonderful. Darling Jumbo… that was her husband… had said she would be enchanted and, my dears, she was. All those boats! What a sight! Mind you she wouldn’t want to live on a boat… And the little babies on their mothers’ backs! It was a wonder they didn’t fall off…

She was inclined to dominate the conversation with her insouciant chatter which must have been very trying for those who were interested to talk of more serious matters.

Mrs. Lang had known Joliffe in London and was quite clearly more interested in him than in the other guests. She tried to talk to him all the time across the table.

I was trying to listen to Jumbo who was telling me about a vase he had found. It was of porcelain decorated in green and black enamel and might be of the Ch’ing Dynasty. At the same time Mrs. Lang was saying to Joliffe: “My dear, what a terrible time it was… Poor, poor woman. And all that fuss. So distressing for you…”

Joliffe said: “It’s in the past. It’s best to forget it.”

“You are so right. It’s always best to forget such unpleasant things. And now you have this marvelous wife… But my poor, poor Joliffe… So sorry I was for you. All that in the papers… and people being so unpleasant. They always are, I mean they always want to blame somebody, don’t they? And if it’s a wife… or a husband… the first thing they do is suspect the other one…”

I must have shown clearly that I was not listening to the description of the Ch’ing vase, for Jumbo said: “My dear Lilian, you talk too much.”

“Darling Jumbo, I do, don’t I? But I had to tell Joliffe how desolate I was… That terrible time… It’s past now and he’s happily married and I’m so… so happy for him.”

Joliffe was looking intently at me. I lowered my eyes. I was afraid. There was something I did not know and it was about Bella.

The man called Jumbo must have become accustomed to rectifying his wife’s blunders; he said smoothly: “I was explaining about this Ch’ing vase. I must show it to you sometime, Joliffe. I think I’m going to place it with the Comte de Grasse. He is most interested. Have you seen his collection?”

“Yes,” answered Joliffe. “Magnificent.”

“This will be a fine addition.”

I looked up and met Joliffe’s eyes. He was trying to sooth me. It was an expression I knew well. It meant: I can explain.

I had seen it before.


* * *

There was never such a long party. The guests came back to the house after the dancing display and it seemed hours before the last rickshaw had departed.

In our bedroom I waited for Joliffe. He seemed long in coming.

As soon as he came in I said: “What was that woman implying?”

“That Lang woman. What a stupid featherbrained creature she is! I wonder at Jim Lang’s marrying her. He should know better at his time of life.”

“She was saying something about… Bella.”

“Yes about Bella. What did she say?”

“She said something about your being blamed. Bella is dead, isn’t she?”

“Bella is dead,” he said.

“Joliffe, please tell me what she meant.”

He sighed. “Need we go into this? Bella is dead. That incident in my life is closed forever.”

“Are you sure it’s closed, Joliffe?”

“What do you mean? Of course I’m sure. Look Jane, it’s late. Let’s talk about it another time.”

“I have to know now, Joliffe.”

He came to me and laid his hands on my shoulders, wooing me with his charm. “I’m tired, Jane. Come, Let’s go to bed.”

I stood firm. “I should never sleep. I want to know what she meant.”

He put his arm about me and drew me to the bed. We sat down on it together.

“She was referring to Bella’s death.”

“She died of an incurable disease. It was aggravated by her accident. That’s what you told me. Wasn’t it true?”

“It was true… in a measure.”

“It must either be true or not true. How could it be true in a measure?”

“Bella died because she was the victim of an incurable disease. That’s what I told you.”

“But it was only true in a measure. What does that mean?”

“I didn’t tell you that she took her own life.”

I caught my breath.

“She… committed suicide. Oh, Joliffe, that’s terrible.”

“She had been to a specialist. She knew what was to come. She would get progressively worse and the end would be… painful. So she took her own life.”

“Why didn’t you tell me?”

“I didn’t want to distress you. It wasn’t necessary to tell you. She was dead. I was free. That was all that concerned you.”

I was silent for a while and then I said: “How?”

“She jumped from a window.”

“In the Kensington house?”

He nodded. I could see it clearly. The top room that looked out onto the paved garden with the solitary pear tree.

“Albert and Annie…” I began.

“They were very good… very helpful as you can imagine.”

“What did that woman mean about the blame?”

“There was an inquest. You know how pontifical these coroners can be. It came out that we were not exactly living in harmony. There was a certain amount of censure.”

“You mean you were blamed.”

“Not by anyone who understood. It was just whispering and so on.”

I shuddered.

Joliffe held me against him. “Don’t take this so hard, Jane. It’s over. It’s nearly three years old. There’s no point in raking it all up. I wish to God that woman had never come here.” Gently he undid the fasteners of my dress. “Come,” he went on. “It’s no use brooding on what’s past.”

“I wish you’d told me,” I said. “I hated finding out like that.”

“I would have told you, in time. I didn’t want to spoil things now.”

I had heard him use almost those identical words. He had married Bella and thought her dead in the accident but he had not wanted to tell me, and I had had no notion that she existed until she appeared with her devastating news, just as now I had not known until I was told through the lighthearted conversation of a frivolous guest that Bella had taken her own life.

Joliffe soothed me. He loved me so much. He wanted our happiness to be perfect. Was he going to be blamed all his life for one youthful piece of folly? He had married Bella, thought her dead and married me. We had to forget the ugly tragedies which were behind us. All was well between us now.

He could always calm me; he would always make me see a rosy future. That was his power. He could show me that as long as I had him beside me and could keep him beside me, I would be happy.

So he lulled me to a sense of security. I did not want to look beyond this night with Joliffe’s arms around me.

But later next morning when I was alone in our bedroom I opened my drawer and there was the money sword lying there.

I could hear Lottie’s voice: “A protection against evil… the evil that comes into a house where there has been suicide or violent death.”

Violent death, I thought. That could mean murder. Murder need not be violent. It could be a quiet slipping away.

I saw Sylvester’s face in my mind—the emaciated face, the skin the color of parchment, drawn tightly over prominent bones.

Then I thought of him as he had been when I first saw him in the Treasure Room. He had been different then.

Violent death. Suicide… or murder.

I picked up the money sword. To bring good luck in a house where evil had been.

A talisman.

Someone thought I needed it. Who? And against what?

There was real fear in the house now. It was there like a presence. It was stalking a victim. Who was that victim? Was someone warning me that it was myself?

II

The question of who had put the money sword in my room continued to haunt me. It had become of increasing importance. It was no use asking the servants. I had come to realize the manner in which their minds worked. They wished to please and therefore it was a matter of etiquette with them always to give the answer which the questioner most wanted to hear. Truth was not as important as good breeding. They were docile, mild, and industrious; they wished to live peaceably; if I asked any of them to do something they would agree at once because not to do so would be bad manners. If it was impossible for them to do as they had promised they would smilingly lift their hands and invent some excuse, when they had not intended to do it from the start. To refuse was unthinkable.

It took me quite a long time to grasp this and to realize the difference between our Occidental and their Oriental ways.

I knew that if I asked who put the money sword into my room I should be met by shakings of the head because whoever had put it there would sense that he—or she—had upset me by doing so.

I decided there was nothing I could do, but I could not forget the thing. Whenever I went into my room I would open the drawer to see if it was still there.

As I turned the money sword over in my hand and tried to decipher the date on the coins I was thinking of Bella, standing at that window. What must her thoughts have been? How desperate she must have been! How did people feel when they were about to end their lives?

Poor Bella! She had seemed so truculent when she faced me. Perhaps that very truculence was a mask to hide her misery.

I could see it all so clearly; the small garden with the crazy paving and the solitary pear tree; the windows of the mews cottage which faced the house and in which Albert and Annie lived.

And because of what had happened to her someone had thought I needed protection and had placed a money sword in my room.


* * *

Through the market I went with Lottie beside me. She bargained fiercely with the traders and ordered the goods which were to be sent to the house.