Return To Tremarth

CHAPTER VI

HANNAH declined to allow Charlotte to visit the invalid’s room again that night, and as he seemed so much better, and even enjoyed a little of the specially cooked sole when it was prepared for him – after a sleep of nearly a couple of hours following the departure of his secretary – decided against sitting up with him that night, and simply set the alarm clock in her bedroom to awaken her every few hours.

Charlotte felt a little annoyed because her offer to sit with Richard for a few hours during the night was firmly rejected by her friend, and when Hannah expressed the opinion that young women were not good for Tremarth in his present state very noticeably elevated her eyebrows.

“Young women?” she echoed. “But you’re a young woman yourself, aren’t you?”

Hannah replied loftily:

“You forget that I’m a nurse. And,” she added, “I don’t happen to be particularly glamorous.”

“I’m sure that Dr. Mackay thinks you’ve a kind of glamour all your own,” Charlotte could not refrain from submitting it as her opinion. “As a matter of fact, I think he thinks you’ve a good deal of glamour in that fetching cap and apron you’ve unearthed from your suitcase.” Hannah coloured rosily, and as a result acquired a very definite healthy glamour.

“For all I know Dr. Mackay is a very much married man,” she said, revealing that there had been moments in the course of the past forty-eight hours when she had turned the matter over in her mind. “And in any case, he’s a very hard-headed Scotsman,” she added.

Charlotte smiled, and returned to the task of setting a breakfast tray for Richard Tremarth. Hannah did not neglect to notice that she added a pale pink rose to the tray – a fresh pink bud that would have opened up nicely by the morning. And the container she selected for it was a delicate crystal vase that she had unearthed from a china cabinet in the drawing room, a cabinet which housed only a few extremely costly items of china and glassware.

“You don’t think,” Hannah suggested, “that Mr. Tremarth already has far too many flowers in his room? Or will have when we off-load them all on to him again in the morning! ” Charlotte merely glanced at her but said nothing.

Hannah smiled, and let Waterloo out at the French window as part of the final ritual before settling down for the night.

Charlotte carried Richard’s breakfast tray to him while Hannah was still enjoying a leisurely bath in one of the far from up-to-date bathrooms at Tremarth, following an absolutely undisturbed night during which the patient had slept soundly and peacefully. He was looking so much better – and so very much more like the Richard Tremarth Charlotte had felt strangely antagonised by when he made himself known to her in the bar of the Three Sailors – that she could hardly believe he hadn’t also recovered his memory when she set the tray down on the bedside table, and prepared to swing the table across the bed.

“It’s a wonderful morning,” she declared, giving him quite a radiant smile, “and you look as if you’ve had a good night. Have you?”

“A perfect night. At least – ” he frowned a little as he attempted to recall it – “I must have slept like a log, for I don’t even remember dreaming. And I’ve had some pretty lurid dreams lately.”

“Have you?” She poured him a cup of tea, and held it out to him gently. “That must have been beastly. I hate lurid dreams.”

He smiled at her quizzically.

“To look at you one could only imagine you having the nicest dreams… cool and crisp, like that pink linen dress of yours. And by the way, it doesn’t fight with your hair, does it?”

“Ought it to?”

“Well, it is red hair, isn’t it?” He put his sleek dark head a little on one side and regarded her with undisguised interest. “And although I don’t know much about women’s clothes, and that sort of thing, I’ve always understood that redheads have to be careful when it comes to the choice of colours. After all, red has a habit of clashing with other colours.”

She smiled at him demurely while she tucked a pillow in behind his shoulders.

“I don’t have very much trouble choosing things to suit me,” she told him.

He looked vaguely anxious, noticing for the first time the rose on the tray.

“I haven’t offended you, have I?” he asked.

“Calling you a redhead, I mean _” He lightly touched the stem of the rose, while his black brows bent together. “For some reason your hair fascinates me I’ve a kind of feeling it’s linked up, in a way, with my past – whatever that may have been like!”

“Then you don’t remember anything clearly yet?” she asked, concern immediately entering her tone.

He shook his head. The expression in his strange eyes worried her.

“Not a thing! I wish I could, I – ”

“Yes?”

“You tell me I ought to know you, and yet I don’t. It’s – infuriating!”

“I wouldn’t let it worry you,” she said, in the wonderfully soft, feminine voice she had adopted towards him since his accident – such a contrast to the voice she had used when she declined to sell him Tremarth. “It’s not of any great importance at the moment, and you will remember.”

“Yes; but when?”

“Dr. Mackay says the kind of amnesia you’re suffering from clears itself up quite suddenly.” She was disturbed because she couldn’t give him any more convincing answer than that.

“And is this Dr. Mackay a good doctor? Is he a local doctor?”

“Yes. Hannah thinks he’s quite remarkably good.”

“Hannah?” Once again his brows crinkled painfully. “Oh, yes, the young woman who wears the nurse’s uniform but tells me she’s not properly qualified… But I’d say she’s extremely efficient all the same. I like Hannah,” he concluded in a more abstracted tone, as if it was not important, anyway.

“And what about Miss Brown?” Charlotte asked. “She’s terribly attractive, and surely you must remember her?” This was deliberate probing on her part, and she waited a trifle breathlessly for the answer. But when it came it told her nothing.

“Yes, she is attractive, isn’t she? She tells me she’s been my secretary for the past six months.”

“But you can’t remember working with her?”

“I can’t remember working with anyone… But you tell me I’ve an office in London. Have you been on to it?”

“Yes. They confirm that Miss Brown worked for y ou… B ut she did not add that the capacity in which Claire Brown worked for Richard Tremarth had seemed a trifle vague over the telephone, and the extremely competent young woman who had dealt with the direct question made a little late on the afternoon of the day before had seemed unwilling to commit herself on the subject of the actual duties for which Miss Brown received a salary. Hannah, who had set afoot the enquiries, had done her utmost to elicit more information, but it seemed that, apart from the fact that Miss Brown was at present on holiday, no member of Tremarth’s office staff was willing to describe her usefulness in detail.

If, indeed, she had any particular usefulness… which, from the tone of voice of the young woman on the telephone, seemed doubtful.

“I’m sure you’re looking forward to seeing Miss Brown again this morning?” Charlotte suggested with a blank, unrevealing face, despite the fact that he appeared confused, as she watched him dealing somewhat unenthusiastically with his scrambled eggs. “She’s staying at the Three Sailors, you know.”

“Is she?” But there was neither interest, nor a marked lack of it. He felt his unshaven chin. “Do you think I can deal with this this morning?”

“Of course, if you feel like bothering. You’ve got an electric razor, haven’t you?”

“If all my possessions have been removed from the Three Sailors, then I have.”

Charlotte, who had been moving towards the window to draw back the curtains still further and admit some more of the bright morning sunshine, turned in some surprise.

“Then you do remember that you stayed at the Three Sailors…! Can you also remember that you and I once had quite an important conversation there, and that it was concerned in the main with this house? In fact, if it hadn’t been for this house you would never have been at the Three Sailors! ”

“Oh, really?” He looked at her with polite interest, but if she had thought to catch him out – and she decided almost immediately that the attempt was unworthy – she was doomed to disappointment. He explained in the same rather colourless voice that her friend Hannah had explained all about the local inn, and she had been careful to give him details of the length of time he stayed there and the quantity of his luggage that had been removed from the inn. “I must have been planning to make quite a prolonged stay there,” he mused thoughtfully.

Later that morning the doctor arrived from the village, and after sitting with him for about twenty minutes and giving him a brief physical examination delivered himself of the opinion that the patient’s recovery would be aided by a little fresh air, and certainly by leaving his bed for a few hours.

“I suggest that you sit in a chair in your room to-day, and perhaps to-morrow you’ll feel like walking downstairs and out into the garden. Miss Woodford is fortunate in having such an enchanting garden, and if you like watching the sea then you won’t get a better view of it then you will from her terrace,” he said in an encouraging way. “I wouldn’t mind being an invalid at Tremarth myself if it meant that I could sit and look at the sea.”

But his eyes actually rested upon Hannah as he spoke, and for no other reason than that they were distinctly quizzical she flushed brilliantly.

No sooner had the doctor departed than Tremarth announced his intention of leaving his bed, and getting shaved and dressed. He also said he was going downstairs and into the garden, and not waiting for the following day.

Charlotte instantly looked alarmed and protested that he was not fit, and that the doctor’s advice should be followed to the letter; but her invalid merely requested her politely to leave the room, and suggested that perhaps Hannah would help him to dress. He was not exactly wobbly on his feet, but it would accelerate things if she lent him a hand.

“But there’s no hurry – ” Charlotte protested.

Richard Tremarth began to look slightly like a hunted man.

“There is a good deal of hurry,” he asserted. “When Miss Brown arrives I have no intention whatsoever of entertaining her up here, and outside in the garden she, too, will get the benefit of the sea air.” He grinned sideways, almost boyishly, at Charlotte. “I don’t feel my own man lying in a bed with a girl like Miss Brown sitting feeding me grapes and offering to read extracts from the daily newsprint aloud to me,” he confessed. “Besides, it isn’t fair to her.”

Charlotte couldn’t prevent herself from being awkward.

“Why isn’t it?” she demanded. “Presumably the only reason she’s down here at all is because you’re unwell?”

“Is it?” His white teeth flashed in his thin brown face as Hannah stood ready with his dressing-gown, having already placed his slippers within easy reach of the bed. “You don’t think I’m the fortunate one to be visited by anyone as dazzlingly attractive as Miss Brown, and that in order to show my appreciation I ought to make an effort, at least?” Charlotte looked openly taken aback, and Hannah smiled in an amused fashion which she endeavoured to make secret as she urged that he should take his time over getting out of bed, and asked whether he liked a really hot bath, or whether he preferred it merely tepid.

“I think you’d better leave us now,” she said in an aside to Charlotte, and the latter made no further references to Miss Brown and went downstairs feeling very much as if she had been snubbed, or at any rate put in her rightful place.

She went through to the kitchen to inspect the contents of the larder and plan the meals for the day, and it was while she and Mrs. Ricks, the daily help, were discussing the curious obstinacy of men when they were unwell, having already discussed the rival merits of junket and rice pudding as a sweet for lunch, that the local taxi made its appearance in the drive, and the enchanting Miss Claire Brown was decanted at the foot of the terrace steps.

She was dressed all in blue this morning – a light, azure blue that lent her a slightly angelic appearance, and plainly had the local taxi-driver slightly bemused as he accepted a generous-sized tip for his services so far, and arranged to pick her up in the same somewhat decrepit taxi at about six o’clock that evening.

“By which time our invalid will be feeling a little exhausted, I imagine,” she said as she turned to confront Charlotte, who had emerged from the house to greet her. “By the way, how is he?” she asked. “Much better, I hope?”

“He seems better, and he says that he is very much better,” the mistress of Tremarth informed her a little stiffly – she was afraid there was a smudge of flour on her cheek, and she had most unfortunately forgotten to remove her apron. The taxi-man’s eyes, although they widened with a modest amount of appreciation at sight of her, didn’t glow in the slightly fanatical way that they did as they returned to his fare, all light blue and golden.

“Oh, that’s splendid,” Claire replied, looking really pleased. “I was half afraid I might have exhausted him yesterday.”

She accompanied her hostess into the house.

“I’m a little early, I’m afraid,” she apologised, “but I did say I wanted to spend the whole of the day with him. Can I go straight upstairs to his room?” making for the staircase.

But Charlotte took quite an acute pleasure in preventing her.

“As a matter of fact, you won’t have to go upstairs,” she said. “The doctor suggested Mr. Tremarth should get up for a few hours, and he’s coming downstairs. If you like, you can go and sit in the drawing-room until he comes down, and I’ll bring you some coffee. Or you can wander in the garden… as you please! ”

Miss Brown looked displeased at being prevented from ascending the handsome oak staircase. She said something about doctors doing the most extraordinary things nowadays, and elected to go and sit in the drawing-room, to which Charlotte shortly afterwards carried a tray of coffee and some of her own home-made shortbread biscuits. Miss Brown disdained the biscuits, but accepted a cup of black coffee, and in between smoking a cigarette and sipping her coffee let her eyes rove openly round the room and commented on it as being quite a treasure-house.

“You seem to have quite a collection of antiques,” she remarked, “and although I don’t know much about these things I’d say that some of them are valuable. That rosewood desk over there, for instance – ” nodding at it – “looks like Sheraton to me, and I’d say that’s a very valuable picture in the alcove. If you’re ever hard up you can make money on these things.”

Charlotte studied her.

“Mr. Tremarth wanted to buy them – all of them! ” she emphasised.

Miss Brown looked only partially surprised.

“Yes, I did hear he was interested in making a purchase down here in Cornwall,” she admitted. “After all, he’s Cornish, isn’t he?” as if that explained the slight idiosyncrasy. Her light eyebrows crinkled in a frown. “Personally, I wouldn’t choose to have my headquarters in an out of the way place like this, but if you don’t have to remain tied to it it’s not so bad.” She nodded her charming golden head, as if to give emphasis to her thoughts and to convince herself. “Yes; under the circumstances I think I could put up with it, and after all this is a very attractive house.”

“What circumstances?” Charlotte enquired bluntly.

Miss Brown turned her lovely light blue eyes upon her. And then she smiled – very deliberately, and a little provokingly.

“Oh, come now, Miss Woodford,” she said, “you don’t have to have all your i’s dotted and all your t’s crossed, do you? I rather gathered from Richard that you were terribly shrewd and hard-headed – this was when he met you first of all, of course, and before his accident. When you told me just now that he wanted to buy all this – this conglomeration of good and bad furniture and other odds and ends,” waving a hand to indicate the room’s contents, “I knew that he was interested. I told you so last night, as a matter of fact, and you chose to be coy about his offer to buy. But if you want me to tell you why I'm interested “well, you might as well know that I’m not just Richard’s secretary. In fact, I’m not his secretary at all! ” “Oh, really?” Charlotte exclaimed, staring directly and rather fixedly at her.

Miss Brown inhaled a deep puff of smoke, and then exhaled it very gradually.

“I did work for him once – about a year ago,” she admitted. “I wanted a job, and he found me one. But I’ve known him for several years, and I think you can take it that we’re very good friends. In fact -

But at this stage of her revelations Richard himself chose to make his appearance, having somewhat slowly descended the stairs, and Claire rushed at him and seemed to be quite overcome by the sight of him standing on his own two feet once more.

“Oh, darling!” she exclaimed. “Oh, Richard, how wonderful to see you up and about again! I was so afraid I’d exhausted you yesterday, but I must have been good for you after all.”

Richard seemed very glad to reach a chair on the terrace, and he seemed even more appreciative when Charlotte stuffed a cushion in behind his shoulders and he was able to lie back comfortably, and

Hannah draped a rug across his knees because of the keenness of the morning breeze.

“This is good,” he declared, as his eyes rested contentedly on the line of blue sea. “This is very good indeed!”

Claire drew another of the comfortable terrace chairs up close beside him, and Charlotte accepted the hint and withdrew into the house. Hannah, a little more loath, apparently, to leave her patient alone with his visitor, retreated after lingering for a minute or so longer, and when she joined Charlotte and Mrs. Ricks in the kitchen she confessed that she was not entirely happy that Miss Brown intended to remain for the whole of the day.

“It’s true that she seems to know him very well, but I’m by no means certain that he welcomes her company as much as one might suppose,” she said.

Charlotte drank a half-cold cup of coffee and argued rather peevishly that she was quite sure Richard was delighted to have Miss Brown sitting with him.

“After all, she’s pretty enough to gladden the heart of most men, and even invalids can be responsive when it’s someone they particularly wish to see,” she opined a trifle dourly.

Hannah glanced at her.

“You think Richard was very glad to see Miss Brown? Well, perhaps you and I get entirely opposite impressions – ”

Charlotte banged her coffee cup down on the kitchen table.

“If you want to know the truth,” she said bleakly, “they’re practically engaged to be married. Oh, I haven’t had it officially from either of them, but Miss Brown was about to let a rather interesting cat out of the bag when she and I were in the drawing-room just now – and she’d ceased taking an interest in my furniture! And if Richard hadn’t put in an appearance when he did I’m quite sure it would have proved to be a very interesting cat indeed… Nothing less than that she plans to marry him one day. Possibly quite soon! ”

“Oh!” Hannah declined to appear very much impressed. “What makes you think that?”

“Because she’d got as far as admitting that they were very special friends… and also I’m quite sure she knows all about Richard’s interest in this house. She was trying to make up her mind whether or not she’d enjoy living here.” “Oh! ” Hannah said again.

“And she seems to think it will be all right if she doesn’t have to spend too much of her time in a tucked away place like Tremarth… all right for holidays, that is. She even thinks she might enjoy living with some of the furniture! The rest she’s not so sure about! ”

Hannah went up to her and quite unexpectedly put an arm about her shoulders. As she gave her a hug she said encouragingly:

“You’re letting your imagination work overtime, my dear! And in any case, there are two sides to everything… and Richard at the moment is absolutely convinced she’s more or less a stranger! ” Charlotte actually seemed to brighten.

“Yes, he does, doesn’t he?” she said more hopefully. “And even if he finds out that he’s committed to marry a stranger, he might not take to the notion too enthusiastically. He might even hesitate – at any rate until he’s got his memory back.”

“And that could take weeks or months – if he doesn’t recover in it in the next few days,” Hannah offered it as her purely professional opinion.

Charlotte looked as if she found the notion of their patient being deprived of his memory for' a considerable length of time surprisingly attractive… even wholly desirable.

But later on that morning, when she went out into the garden to pick raspberries, and returned to the house by way of the terrace, she felt as if a slight chill enveloped her comparatively cheerful spirits as she observed the pair sitting watching the sea. They appeared to have fallen into a state of contemplative silence, and despite the fact that Richard was frowning, as if the charms of the prospect were just a little bit wasted on him in his present state of invalidism and mental confusion, Claire Brown had an engaging half-smile on her lips,' and there was no doubt about it she found the prospect – possibly, also, of the future – very satisfactory indeed.

Charlotte halted her footsteps, and decided not to pass behind their chairs in case she disturbed them; but although he didn’t turn his head Tremarth must have heard her footsteps, and he called out sharply as she was about to turn on her heel:

“Is that you, Miss Woodford?”

Charlotte answered by hastening her steps until she stood beside him.

“Yes? Is there something you want?” she enquired with a touch of over-eagerness. Tremarth turned his head towards her, and there was an extraordinary expression in his eyes as they met and held hers.

“As a matter of fact, there is,” he replied quietly. “I’d like to go back to my room…”

“Oh, but____________________”

“The sun isn’t as warm out here as I thought it would be, and the glare of the sea makes my head ache a bit. I’d like to go back at once if you wouldn’t mind accompanying me to my room! ”

Claire stood up protestingly.

“Oh, but, Richard darling!… Only a few minutes ago you said how lovely it was out here! And that you could never have enough of watching the sea! And if you want to return to your room I can help you upstairs and tuck you up in bed if you honestly feel you’d like to go back to bed! ”

“Who said anything about going back to bed?”

He actually snapped at her, and Charlotte was so surprised she couldn’t believe it. Claire flushed, and looked momentarily dismayed.

“I don’t think he’s as well as we thought he was,” she said quietly over his head to Charlotte.

Tremarth burst out impatiently:

“What utter rubbish! Just because I said I’d got a bit of a head____________________” But his eyes were frankly appealing to Charlotte. “Anyway,

Miss Woodford has been looking after me for several days – with the assistance of her efficient friend, of course! – and I’m afraid I’ve got used to having her around as a nurse. Miss Woodford – Charlotte!” He smiled at her a little stiffly, as if the muscles of his face were stiff and slightly painful, and every intensely feminine instinct she possessed was touched by the anxious insistence in his eyes. “I don’t need anyone to help me upstairs, but I’d like you to come with me and I’m not going back to bed. I shall sit in a chair in my room.”

“You’re quite sure you wouldn’t like to sit in a chair in the drawingroom?” Charlotte asked.

“No. My own room, if you please – and I’d like to be left alone there until lunch-time! ”

If he had actually attacked her with violence Claire could not have looked more hurt She gathered up her white handbag and gloves.

“Of course, if you’d rather I didn’t stay with you, Richard, I’ll go,” she offered. “Perhaps you’re not as well as we thought, and it might be better if you have a little more rest. So I’ll come back to-morrow.”

“Do,” Richard begged her, no doubt repenting of his harshness and eager that she should not go away feeling too badly used. “I’ll admit I’m a bit of a bear this morning, but tomorrow afternoon! – I’ll be delighted to see you! ”

Claire accepted her dismissal graciously.

“Then good-bye, Richard darling…She advanced towards him, bent and dropped a light kiss on his brow. “Take some aspirin, or whatever sedative tablets the doctor has prescribed for you, and see what a good long sleep will do for you. Despite what you’ve said to the contrary I don’t believe you slept well last night! ”

Richard muttered something that could have been agreement, or otherwise, and Charlotte removed the rug from his knees and followed him across the floor of the drawing-room towards the hall and the foot of the stairs. Claire stood watching them where they had left her alone on the terrace, and as soon as they started to ascend the stairs she went through the hall to the kitchen and demanded somewhat aggressively to know where the telephone was, and whether Hannah knew the number of the taxi-man who was to have picked her up at six o’clock that evening.

Hannah obligingly found the number for her, and afterwards she stood smiling to herself in the middle of the kitchen, and was not surprised when Charlotte came downstairs and informed her that Richard was feeling rather exhausted.

“I’m by no means amazed,” Hannah said. “I’ve a kind of idea that a little of Miss Claire Brown goes a long way, and that despite her ravishing appearance she is not everything the doctor ordered for our patient. In fact, when she comes again I shall have, I’m afraid, to make it clear to her that for the time being Mr. Tremarth is not nearly strong enough to receive visitors for longer than about ten minutes at a time.” Charlotte went over to the old-fashioned kitchen range and started stirring a saucepan that was simmering on the top of it. She was debating whether or not to take Hannah more fully into her confidence… And suddenly she decided that as Hannah was virtually in charge of

Tremarth and responsible for his recovery she had better know the truth. Especially as it involved Miss Brown, and any visits she might think fit to make to the house.

“As a matter of fact,” she said slowly, stirring the contents of the saucepan, “it isn’t going to be entirely up to us whether or not any visitors are allowed – one visitor, anyway. Upstairs just now, while I was making him comfortable in the big chair near the window, Mr. Tremarth made an admission to me. He says that he and Miss Brown are engaged to be married! ”

The admission she did not make was that the revelation had affected her in rather a curious way, actually having a strange numbing effect on her sensibilities and slowing down her reactions, so that she felt peculiarly clumsy as she stood beside the stove and sought to prevent the brew inside the saucepan from burning as it came to the boil. She stirred mechanically, and mentally reminded herself of all the things she had to do before lunch time, but the will to do them with anything like her normal expertise seemed to have vanished. She felt as if someone had given her a thump on the head and she hadn’t quite recovered from the blow.

“Married?” Hannah moved nearer to her, and sniffed the burning saucepan even while she expressed herself as intrigued. “You mean he actually told you himself that he’s engaged to Miss Brown?”

“Yes.” Charlotte turned empty eyes towards her, and her whole tone was extremely flat. “Of course, I was fairly certain that there was something____________________”

“Yes, I think she rather indicated as much herself, didn’t she?” But Hannah wore the air of one who was really extremely surprised, and even in view of what she had just been told by no means convinced. “Was it,” she asked, “a sudden admission that Richard made to you? I mean, did he seem to want to get it off his chest, or did he kind of take you into his confidence? And above all,” with emphasis, “has he the least idea who she is?”

“What do you mean?” Charlotte stared at her, the emptiness still in her eyes. “Of course he must know who she is if he’s going to marry her – ”

“But only a short while ago we were agreed that he was completely safe from feminine machinations because he’s lost his memory,” Hannah reminded her. “Are you trying to tell me that in addition to announcing his engagement he has also recovered his memory?”

“No. No____________________” Charlotte looked startled, and the contents of the saucepan boiled over and she whipped it hastily off the stove. “At least

– that is… I don’t think so,” she concluded uncertainly.

Hannah shook her head at her.

“You mean to say you accepted it that he’s going to marry a woman who is a complete stranger to him, and as a result, of course, he’s wildly, deliriously happy?”

Charlotte looked completely bewildered, and much more uncertain than before. She also looked as if a faint thread of hope lightened her darkness.

“I didn’t say anything about him being wildly, deliriously happy,” she said huskily. “As a matter of fact – ”

“Yes?”

“I don’t think he’s at all happy! ”

“What a novel state of mind in which to contemplate marriage.”

“But it’s true that he – he thinks he ought to marry her – ”

“You make the whole thing sound more wildly romantic than ever, and I think it’s high time I went up and had a few words with our patient.” She regarded Charlotte in a very alert manner. “Can you recall the exact words Richard used to you when he told you he was going to marry Claire Brown?”

“Yes. He said, ‘I understand I’m engaged to be married, Charlotte!’ Apparently the wedding is all fixed! ”

“That settles it,” Hannah exclaimed, and bustled in a brisk, white-aproned, businesslike way over to the door. “I really shall have to have a few words with Mr. Tremarth!”