Char suddenly jumped up and Mona saw that her eyes were full of tears.
“I’ve had such a hell of a time,” she said, “and now, just as things looked like being lucky again, you’ve gone and smashed them all up! I believed in you, Mona, I believed that you’d bring me good fortune.”
“I’ve always told you that idea was a fallacy,” Mona replied. “Cheer up Char. Perhaps something really good will happen to you, though not through me at the moment. I’m unlucky to myself and to everyone else.”
“With your looks,” Char said bitterly, “you’ll always be lucky. You don’t know what it is to have to grasp at things, to fight for everything you want, to have to clutch and grab, deceive and lie, to get one single thing you want in this bloody life!
“For you it’s different. You smile and every man within miles would go and fetch you the moon if he thought you’d say ‘thank you’ prettily when he brought it to you. But for me – what chance have I got, or have I ever had with a face like this? I’ve been kicked and sworn at all my life. I’ve had knock after knock, rotten deal after rotten deal – and why? Because God made me a caricature. I’ve never been able to ride roughshod over other people like you can. I’ve had to go down on my knees and be thankful to lick the blacking of their shoes or pick up the crumbs that were left under the table.
“You’re one of the lucky ones, born with a pretty face and a figure that drives men crazy the moment they set eyes on you. Oh, it’s a fair world all right! Don’t speak to me about justice, there isn’t any, at least where I’m concerned.”
The older woman was shaking. Mona moved to her side and putting an arm round her shoulders forced her back into the chair.
“Don’t Char,” she said with quick compunction. “Don’t upset yourself, it doesn’t do any good. Wait, I’ll go and get you a drink.”
She opened the door quietly and went downstairs to the dining room. She found the whisky and soda siphon, and putting one under each arm, hurried upstairs again.
She had seen Char in this sort of mood before. A mood of self-pity usually brought on by too many whiskies or too many gins, and yet the only cure was another drink to drag her out of the despair in which she would wallow as long as anyone would listen to her. But her tears were genuine enough and Mona was half exasperated, half sympathetic with her. If only she would be thorough about something, she thought wearily, thoroughly bad or thoroughly pitiable. But one’s feelings were invariably flexible where Char was concerned, one hated her and yet in that hatred was compassion and a certain measure of understanding.
“Here you are,” Mona exclaimed cheerily as she returned to the bedroom. “Now drink this and you’ll feel better.”
Char was sitting on the edge of the chair, her elbows on her knees, her chin in her hands.
‘She looks like a sick monkey,’ Mona told herself and remembered how once before she had thought the same thing.
That time on the boat came flooding back to her, the misery and the degradation for which Chat was to blame. Life would be insupportable if she had to put up with her any longer. She diffused an atmosphere that was both disturbing and repellent.
She gave Char the glass and said lightly,
“You know you hate the country, old girl, you’ll be much better in London. You go back tomorrow and I’ll try to come up at the end of the week and have luncheon with you.”
It was a sop to Cerberus and Mona hoped that she would swallow it and agree to go. Char took the glass and raised it to her lips.
“If I go,” she said, “you will have to help me. You’ve lost Jarvis Lecker for me. The least you can do is to make up for that.”
There were no tears in Char’s eyes now and her voice had a new shrewish quality. She sat back in the chair and looked up at Mona.
“You can’t be so simple as not to understand my position.”
“I’m sorry,” Mona said. “I may be very stupid, but I honestly don’t know what you are trying to say.”
Char laughed unpleasantly.
“The ‘little innocent’ always was your line,” she sneered. “I remember how evasive you were in Cairo when we tried to find out why you were there and how long you were staying. You did it very cleverly.”
Mona had a sudden sense of impending disaster. She wondered what Char was getting at. The unpleasantness of her tone was obvious.
“I still don’t understand.”
“Then I’ll explain,” Char retorted. “To put it frankly, it would have paid me well for you to have married Jarvis. He would have been both grateful and generous. He’s all right if you handle him the right way – I know his type.
“Get him what he wants and he’ll make it worth your while, but fail and if you were dying on his doorstep he wouldn’t raise a finger to save you. Thanks to you Mona, I’ve failed.”
“It was asking rather a lot of me,” Mona murmured, half-amused, despite a growing sense of apprehension.
“But the point is this,” Char went on. “I’ve got to live. From now on Jarvis Lecker is a washout. Well, he’s served his purpose, I’ve at least lived in comfort for the last three months.”
“And you want me to help you?”
“Exactly, You aren’t always so dumb as you look.”
“But, Char,” Mona said in dismay, “I can’t give you very much. Quite frankly I haven’t got a penny in the bank myself. I’m living on my mother until I find some sort of work to do.”
“You’re lucky to have a mother to live on.’”
“I know that.”
“It’s marvellous to see how fond she is of you. She adores you, doesn’t she! Thinks everything you do is wonderful.”
Mona looked up swiftly. Vaguely she was beginning to understand, to see where this conversation was leading her.
“It would be a pity,” Char went on, and her voice was as smooth and treacherous as the silky movements of a snake on a branch, “if her trust and affection should be turned into horror and … disgust.”
“What exactly do you mean?”
Char took her cigarette holder out of her mouth and flicked the ash into the grate.
“I need at least a thousand pounds.”
