It was on the tip of her tongue to relate the incident of the painted banister. She had even begun: ‘Well, if you promise—’ And then, catching sight of his face with its full pouting mouth and pale eyes, she suddenly changed her mind. ‘It doesn’t matter,’ Troy said; ‘it wouldn’t convince you. Never mind.’

‘Dearest Mrs Alleyn,’ Cedric tittered, pulling at his cloak, ‘you are mysterious. Any one would suppose you didn’t trust me.’

CHAPTER SEVEN

Fiesta

ON FRIDAY, A WEEK AFTER her arrival at Ancreton, Troy dragged her canvas out of the property room, where she now kept it locked up, and stared at it with mixed sensations of which the predominant was one of astonishment. How in the world had she managed it? Another two days would see its completion. Tomorrow night Sir Henry would lead his warring celebrants into the little theatre and she would stand awkwardly in the background while they talked about it. Would they be very disappointed? Would they see at once that the background was not the waste before Forres Castle but a theatrical cloth presenting this, that Troy had painted, not Macbeth himself, but an old actor looking backwards into his realization of the part? Would they see that the mood was one of relinquishment?

Well, the figure was completed. There were some further places she must attend to—a careful balancing stroke here and here. She was filled with a great desire that her husband should see it. It was satisfactory, Troy thought, that of the few people to whom she wished to show her work her husband came first. Perhaps this was because he said so little yet was not embarrassed by his own silence.

As the end of her work drew near her restlessness increased and her fears for their reunion. She remembered phrases spoken by other women: ‘The first relationship is never repeated.’ ‘We were strangers again when we met.’ ‘It wasn’t the same.’ ‘It feels extraordinary. We were shy and had nothing to say to each other.’ Would her reunion also be inarticulate? ‘I’ve no technique,’ Troy thought, ‘to see me through. I’ve no marital technique at all. Any native adroitness I possess has gone into my painting. But perhaps Roderick will know what to say. Shall I tell him at once about the Ancreds?’

She was cleaning her palette when Fenella ran in to say a call had come through for her from London.