Chapter 11: Hot Water

A hand was raised on the other side of the door and brought smartly against the glass. The whole panel shivered; the blow would only have to be repeated two or three times to destroy it altogether. Whipping the key out of the lock, Isabel hurried up the staircase, slipping it into her pocket as she went. Although she had no fear of an entry being made, she was very far from desirous of being seen. That would involve the discovery of the fraud she had been practising. If Miss Wallace learned that it was not Nannie who had been addressing her in such uncompromising terms, it was scarcely likely, even if driven by force from the house, that she would leave the neighbourhood without effecting her purpose of seeing Cuthbert Grahame. So Isabel, determined that that should not happen, resolved to adopt extreme measures.

When she gained the top of the stairs she could already hear the glass shivering in the door below. Rushing into the bath-room, snatching up a couple of pails which the not too tidy maids had left there, and filling them at the tap, she strode with them to the landing-window which overlooked the entrance. She had filled them at the hot-water tap, and the steam came against her hand.

“It isn’t very hot,” she told herself. “There’s just enough sting in it to make her a little warmer than she is already.”

The window was wide open. She peeped out to see that the girl was immediately below. Balancing both pails on the sill she turned them over together. That the contents had reached the mark was immediately made plain by the cries which ascended from below.

“Nannie! Nannie! you’ve scalded me! you’ve scalded me!”

Isabel replied, still taking care not to allow so much as the tip of her nose to be seen through the window--

“I’ll scald you again in half a minute--you’ll find the water’s boiling next time, I promise you. What’s more, I’ll take Mr. Cuthbert’s gun to you, as he bade me. You shameless hussy! to go breaking his windows because he won’t have you set your foot inside the house that you’ve disgraced!”

This diatribe from the supposititious Nannie was followed by silence below. Isabel, who found the suspense a little trying, was half disposed to venture on a glance to learn what was taking place. Unmistakable sounds, however, arose just as she had made up her mind to run the risk. Margaret Wallace was crying. Presently she exclaimed, in tones which were broken by her sobs--

“I’m going, Nannie. You needn’t trouble to get Mr. Cuthbert’s gun, nor to wait till the water’s boiling. Whatever Mr. Cuthbert’s orders may have been--and I know I’ve used him badly, and deserve anything from him--I never thought you’d have treated me like this. I’ve never done you any harm, and you’ve always pretended that you loved me. I hope you’ll never regret driving me away like this from the house that has always been a home to me! Oh, Nannie! Nannie!”

The girl uttered the last two words in such poignant tones that Isabel thought it extremely possible that they penetrated to the woman to whom they were actually addressed. After a moment’s interval footsteps were audible below. Then, as Isabel drew back behind the curtain, she could see through the loophole that Margaret Wallace was returning whence she came. She moved with a very different step to that which had marked her approach. Her feet seemed to lag, her head hung down, and she kept putting her hand up to her eyes to relieve them of blinding tears. Her attitude was significant of the most extreme despondency. Apparently some remnants of her pride still lingered. It was probably those fragments of her self-respect which prevented her from once looking round to glance at the house from whose precincts she was being so contemptuously dismissed.

Isabel watched the defeated mien which characterised the girl’s whole bearing in the moment of her humiliation with a smile of triumph.