Pimpernel and Rosemary

"But he did not say anything yesterday," Rosemary insisted, "about going away again so soon. Or even this morning."

"I don't think he knew yesterday," Elza rejoined. "It seems he had a telephone message half an hour ago. He says he must go."

Anna now appeared to wake out of her trance. Rosemary was standing close to her just then; she took Rosemary's hand gently in hers and said:

"You see, darling, it is like this: one of Peter's cricketers has telephoned to him to say that they have such a lot of trouble about their rooms at Hódmezö. Roumanians are not exactly popular in Hungary," she went on with a wan little smile, "and I suppose that hotel-keepers don't care to put them up. So Peter had to promise to go and put things right for his cricketers."

"He will come back, of course, after the cricket match," Elza concluded placidly. "But it is a great nuisance for him, packing and unpacking all the time."

Rosemary made no further remark. Everything seemed terribly puzzling. That Elza had told the children, had told Maurus, all she knew, was beyond the question. That Peter also knew everything, and that he knew and disapproved of some plan which Elza had made, Rosemary supposed, for the escape of Philip and Anna was, to her mind, equally certain. But even if Peter disapproved, how could he go away at this critical time, and leave Elza to plan and contrive alone, hampered by a half-crazy husband, and surrounded by spies? However, no one apparently meant to say anything more just then, and it was quite a relief when the luncheon-bell sounded and the little party on the veranda broke up and everyone trooped downstairs for luncheon.

Peter was already in the dining-room, waiting for the others. Elza in her kind, gentle way asked him about his packing, and whether she could help him to get ready. But Peter declared that he wanted nothing, only the carriage this evening to take him to Cluj.

He grumbled terribly at having to go away. He hated the idea of missing the ball and all the friends who were coming; but when Elza or Maurus tried to persuade him to stay, he was very firm. "I've got to go, Aunt Elza. You don't know what complications might occur if those Roumanians got to Hódmezö and were not properly treated. Good God!" he added, with mock horror, "it might land you all in another war! And all through my fault!"

Rosemary had never seen Peter so gay or conversational. He appeared entirely unconscious of the undercurrent of tragedy that flowed through Elza's pathetic attempts at conversation, and Maurus's equally tragic silences. He talked incessantly, chiefly about the cricket match and chiefly to Philip, who made desperate efforts to appear interested. Rosemary did her best, too, but she was anxious and puzzled, and frankly she did not believe in the story of the telephone message.

She tried now and then to catch Elza's eye, but in this she never once succeeded. Elza was avoiding her glance. She meant to say nothing about her plan-this mad plan of which Peter disapproved so thoroughly that he preferred to be out of the way. Did these dear, kind people mistrust her then, because of what the gipsy had said? Or was this reticence merely the natural outcome of a sense of supreme danger that mistrusted everything and everybody?

Rosemary felt the mystery deepening around her. She could not understand Peter.

Sometime after luncheon she found Elza and Anna sitting together in the small brick-built summer-house at the farther end of the lake. Rosemary had wandered as far as there with a book, anxious as she was to be out of the way. It was hot, and the air was very still, and the scent of tuberoses and heliotrope was almost too heady. In the perennial border a number of humming-bird moths were busy about a bed of sweet sultan; the soft whirring sound of their wings could be heard quite distinctly in the extreme stillness of this late summer's afternoon. From time to time distant sounds of village life came in quick, short waves to Rosemary's ear, as well as the sharp click of tools wielded by the gardeners at work somewhere in the park. Close beside the summer-house one man was busy hand-weeding the path. As Rosemary drew nearer, he looked up for an instant, and then he shuffled rapidly away. In the long, stooping figure, the dirty rags and the dark skin, Rosemary thought that she recognized the gipsy of the previous night. It was just like Elza, she thought, to give the poor wretch work on the estate.

When Rosemary saw Elza and Anna sitting together in the summer-house, her instinct was to pass discreetly on, with just a hasty, cheery word, but Elza called to her.

"Come and sit here a minute, Rosemary darling," she said. "Anna and I want to tell you everything."