She Came Back by Patricia Wentworth Read Free Book Online

she had come back. If she hasn’t, it’s a dreadfully cruel trick. But if she has—if it is really Anne— what are we doing—how are we treating her? I keep thinking of that all the time. To come back home and find that nobody wants you—to find that your own husband doesn’t want you—it’s—it’s the most dreadful thing. I keep thinking about it.”
    Philip stepped away from the door, stepped away from Lyndall.
    “Stop harrowing yourself. She isn’t Anne.”
    CHAPTER 8
    Mr. Codrington’s interview was not going according to plan—at least not to any plan of Philip’s. The offer of the late Miss Theresa Jocelyn’s thirty thousand pounds in return for a receipt signed Annie Joyce had been as lightly and smilingly refused as if it had been a cucumber sandwich.
    “Dear Mr. Codrington—how could I! It wouldn’t be legal— I mean, I couldn’t sign poor Annie’s name—”
    “Philip never intended to keep this money—” He bit his lip. He ought to have said Sir Philip—if he was talking to Annie Joyce he would certainly do so. He found it impossible to believe that he was talking to Annie Joyce. He found it impossible to believe that he was not talking to Anne Jocelyn.
    She sat just across the hearth from him, her long slim legs stretched out to the fire, her head with its bright curls thrown back against a cushion which repeated the blue of her dress— a very pleasant picture, softened by the faint haze of her cigarette. She held it away from her in the hand which rested on the arm of her chair and smiled.
    “No—Philip never meant me to keep it. That’s what we had the row about. You know, I don’t believe he has got over it yet. That’s why he is being so horrid now. We both lost our tempers—said we wished we hadn’t married each other—” she waved the cigarette—“things like that. Of course he was quite right—Cousin Theresa hadn’t any business to leave me the money after practically adopting Annie. And I wouldn’t have taken it, Mr. Codrington—I really wouldn’t—but there was Philip putting down his foot and saying I wasn’t to, and all the rest of it, and naturally I wasn’t going to stand for that. You do like to refuse your own legacies.” She laughed a little. “Philip was very, very tactless, and of course I wasn’t going to give in, so we had our row, and I dashed off to France. And now—well, I’ve got over it, but I don’t think he has. I don’t see how he can really believe that I am Annie Joyce. It’s silly. He’s just being stiff-necked and obstinate. You know what the Jocelyns are like.”
    Mr. Codrington found himself every moment more convinced. The changes which he noticed were those which were only natural in the circumstances. It was just on four years since he had seen her. She was older, she was thinner, she looked as if she had been ill. She had a little more manner, and there were signs that it had been acquired amongst foreigners. Well, she had been living amongst foreigners, hadn’t she? There was nothing in that.
    He said, “What do you want?”
    She had her cigarette at her lips. She drew at it without hurrying herself. The haze between them deepened. Then she said, looking away from him into the fire,
    “I want a reconciliation.”
    “I’m afraid that won’t be easy.”
    “No. But that’s what I want. I don’t think I ought to let our marriage break up without trying to save it. Philip cared for me enough to marry me, and we had some happy times. I have learned a lot since then—I’ve learned to keep my temper, for one thing. I suppose he has put that up to you as one of the reasons why he thinks I’m Annie Joyce. Well, if I hadn’t learned how to keep my temper out there under the Germans I really should have been dead by now. You can tell Philip that.” She leaned towards him, the cigarette in her hand. “Mr. Codrington, do help us. Philip’s angry because I’ve come back. He’s imagining himself in love with Lyndall,