Reflected Glory. John Russell Fearn

a duster. Barbara was watching him. They both looked up as Elsa advanced slowly.

      “How’s he doing?” Barbara asked quickly. “Was it a bad cut?”

      “Bad enough to send him to the doctor,” Elsa answered, her voice stony. “He says his hand won’t work—the hand he paints with,” she added, her grey eyes glinting.

      “I can’t understand what happened,” Terry said worriedly. “The blade works all right now— Look!” He flung the dagger downwards, but instead of it falling flat on the wooden floor the blade jammed again and the weapon swayed back and forth in the boards, transfixed by its point.

      “It’s stuck again!” Barbara exclaimed, startled. “Say, that thing’s dangerous. It doesn’t work every time. The spring must be faulty, or something—”

      “Get out!” Elsa breathed venomously. “Both of you! Go on—get out!”

      Terry stared at her, then at Barbara. Barbara gave a contemptuous smile.

      “I’ll go when I’m ready—”

      “You’ll go now,” Elsa interrupted, her voice harsh. “What kind of a fool do you think I am? This meeting between you and Terry was deliberately arranged! I’m convinced of it. You had Terry bring that knife, fixed the blade somehow, and when Clive played around with it he damaged himself— So he can’t paint! That’s why! You arranged it deliberately to ruin him and to spite me!”

      “Oh, don’t be ridiculous!” Barbara retorted angrily. “The whole thing was an accident. I didn’t do anything to the blade—and Terry only brought the knife here because I asked him to. Just chance, the way it happened—”

      “I don’t believe it. Clear out, the pair of you!”

      “If you think I’m going just because you order it you’re crazy,” Barbara declared. “I’m staying right here until Clive comes back and I hear how he is—”

      Elsa turned to her big handbag on the table. She snapped it open and then swung round, a small automatic in her hand.

      “You’re leaving,” she stated. “Now!”

      Terry whipped the knife from the floor, wrapped it carefully in his handkerchief and put it back in his inside pocket. He said quietly,

      “Well, I’m going anyway. I know which doctor Clive will have gone to. No use staying here, Babs—and that gun’s unhealthy.”

      Barbara’s blue eyes gleamed angrily, but she was aware of the logic of Terry’s words. Neither she nor Terry knew exactly what kind of a person Elsa was. She might, in her present mood of cold fury, fire the gun point blank.

      “All right,” Barbara said curtly. “I’ll dress.”

      “I’ll see that you do,” Elsa snapped, and followed her into the adjoining room.

      Barbara wasted no time. She bundled on her clothes, dragged on her coat, and left. Terry was waiting for her in the passage outside. Elsa moved to the door and watched them go down the stairs, then she wandered moodily back into the studio and returned the automatic to her handbag.

      Wearily she went to the chesterfield and sank upon it. All the malevolent fury had died now from her expression and instead she seemed almost on the verge of tears. She looked at the half-com­pleted portrait of herself on the easel next to the painting of Barbara, then she sighed and shook her head to herself.

      Half an hour passed before Clive returned. His face was grimmer than she had ever seen it, and deathly pale. His right hand had vanished now inside a pile of adding and was supported in a sling.

      “Clive—” Elsa hurried over to him and caught his arm. “What did the doctor say? How bad is it?”

      He did not answer immediately. He sat down heavily on the ches­terfield and passed his tongue over his lips.

      “I feel groggy,” he muttered. “There’s some brandy over there in the cupboard— Pour me some out, will you?”

      Elsa did so as quickly as she could, and under the influence of the spirit Clive seemed to recover somewhat.

      “I—I saw Babs and Terry,” he said. “They were waiting for me outside the doctor’s—”

      “Never mind them. What about you?”

      “They said you ordered them out, with a gun.” Clive looked at the girl queerly. “I’m glad you did,” he finished, his mouth shutting hard.

      “They planned that business deliberately, Clive. I’m convinced of it.”

      “So am I. Spite. Nothing else. I told them so, too. If I hadn’t have cut myself so beautifully I think one or other of them would have ‘accidentally’ done it for me. Anything just as long as they ruined me.”

      Elsa was silent for a moment, absorbing his words. “Ruined you?” she repeated in a whisper. “But...you’ll get better, surely?”

      “I’ve severed one of the main tendons of my hand,” he told her deliberately. “My first and second fingers won’t be any use for painting again. Good as paralyzed. In other words,” he added, speaking into a vast silence, “an artist died this morning, Elsa. I’m washed up. Finished!”

      “But—but your other hand?” Elsa cried. “You can use that?”

      “Don’t see how I can,” he muttered. “I’ve always worked with my right. I could never begin to do it with my left.”

      A slow change came over Elsa’s face, and it was an expression that Clive, studying her with his brows knitted, found impossible to analyze.

      “What will you do then?” she asked, her voice brittle.

      “I dunno. Anything except paint, I suppose.”

      For perhaps half a minute Elsa remained motionless, her eyes fix­ed on him; then without speaking she suddenly wrenched the engage­ment ring from her finger and tossed it with a gentle clink on to the table.

      “Elsa, what on earth—?” Clive sprang to his feet.

      She still said no word. Expressionless, she whipped up her hat and ducked before the wall mirror.

      “Elsa, what’s the idea?” Clive gripped her arm and swung her round, staring at her helplessly. “You’re surely not walking out on me?”

      “What does it look like?” she asked bitterly. “Where’s the sense of keeping up the pretence? You could have given me fame; now it’s gone. There’s nothing else left, is there?”

      “But dearest—”

      “I’m glad,” she interrupted, “that I haven’t yet phoned that estate agent to sell my place up. I’m going back home—where I should have stayed in the first place!”

      She pulled free of Clive’s grip, whipped up her handbag and coat, and left the studio. Dazed, he stood listening to her feet hurrying down the staircase.