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diff --git a/.gitattributes b/.gitattributes new file mode 100644 index 0000000..d7b82bc --- /dev/null +++ b/.gitattributes @@ -0,0 +1,4 @@ +*.txt text eol=lf +*.htm text eol=lf +*.html text eol=lf +*.md text eol=lf diff --git a/LICENSE.txt b/LICENSE.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6312041 --- /dev/null +++ b/LICENSE.txt @@ -0,0 +1,11 @@ +This eBook, including all associated images, markup, improvements, +metadata, and any other content or labor, has been confirmed to be +in the PUBLIC DOMAIN IN THE UNITED STATES. + +Procedures for determining public domain status are described in +the "Copyright How-To" at https://www.gutenberg.org. + +No investigation has been made concerning possible copyrights in +jurisdictions other than the United States. Anyone seeking to utilize +this eBook outside of the United States should confirm copyright +status under the laws that apply to them. diff --git a/README.md b/README.md new file mode 100644 index 0000000..e39041a --- /dev/null +++ b/README.md @@ -0,0 +1,2 @@ +Project Gutenberg (https://www.gutenberg.org) public repository for +eBook #55784 (https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/55784) diff --git a/old/55784-0.txt b/old/55784-0.txt deleted file mode 100644 index ef61bd4..0000000 --- a/old/55784-0.txt +++ /dev/null @@ -1,2957 +0,0 @@ -The Project Gutenberg EBook of Two Strangers, by Margaret Oliphant - -This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with -almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or -re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included -with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org/license - - -Title: Two Strangers - -Author: Margaret Oliphant - -Release Date: October 21, 2017 [EBook #55784] - -Language: English - -Character set encoding: UTF-8 - -*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK TWO STRANGERS *** - - - - -Produced by Chuck Greif and the Online Distributed -Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This book was -produced from scanned images of public domain material -from the Google Books project.) - - - - - - - - - - TWO STRANGERS - - - - - TWO - STRANGERS - - BY - MRS. OLIPHANT - - NEW YORK - R. F. FENNO AND COMPANY - 112 FIFTH AVENUE - - COPYRIGHT, 1895 - R. F. FENNO AND COMPANY - - - - -CHAPTER I. - - -“And who is this young widow of yours whom I hear so much about? I -understand Lucy’s rapture over any stranger; but you, too, mother--” - -“I too--well, there is no particular witchcraft about it; a nice young -woman has as much chance with me as with any one, Ralph--” - -“Oh, if it’s only a nice young woman--” - -“It’s a great deal more,” said Lucy. “Why, Miss Jones at the school is a -nice young woman--don’t you be taken in by mother’s old-fashioned -stilts. She is a darling--she is as nice as nice can be. She’s pretty, -and she’s good, and she’s clever. She has read a lot, and seen a lot, -and been everywhere, and knows heaps and heaps of people, and yet just -as simple and as nice as if she had never been married, never had a -baby, and was just a girl like the rest of us--Mother! there is nothing -wrong in what I said?” Lucy suddenly cried, stopping short and blushing -all over with the innocent alarm of a youthfulness which had not been -trained to modern modes of speech. - -“Nothing wrong, certainly,” said the mother, with a half smile; -“but--there is no need for entering into all these details.” - -“They would have found out immediately, though,” said Lucy, with a -lowered voice, “that there was--Tiny, you know.” - -The scene was a drawing-room in a country house looking out upon what -was at this time of year the rather damp and depressing prospect of a -park, with some fine trees and a great breadth of very green, very -mossy, very wet grass. It was only October, though the end of the month; -and in the middle of the day, in the sunshine, the trees, in all their -varied colors, were a fine sight, cheerful and almost exhilarating, -beguiling the eye; but now the sun was gone, the leaves were falling in -little showers whenever the faintest breath of air arose, and where the -green turf was not veiled by their many colored remnants, it was green -with that emerald hue which means only wet; one knew as one gazed across -it that one’s foot would sink in the spongy surface, and wet, wet would -be the boot, the skirt which touched it; the men in their -knickerbockers, or those carefully turned up trousers--which we hear are -the fashion in the dryest streets of Paris and New York--suffered -comparatively little. The brushwood was all wet, with blobs of moisture -on the long brambles and drooping leaves. The park was considered a -beautiful park, though not a very large one, but it was melancholy -itself to look out for hours together upon that green expanse in such an -evening. It was not a bad evening either. There was no rain; the clouds -hung low, but as yet had given forth no shower. The air was damp but yet -brisk. There was a faint yellow glimmer of what might have been sunset -in the sky. - -The windows in the Wradisley drawing-rooms were large; one of them, a -vast, shallow bow, which seemed to admit the outside into the interior, -rather than to enlighten the interior with the view of what was outside. -Mrs. Wradisley sat within reach of, but not too near, a large, very red -fire--a fire which was like the turf outside, the growth of generations, -or at least had not at all the air of having been lighted to-day or any -recent day. It did not flame, but glowed steadily, adding something to -the color of the room, but not much to the light. Later in the season, -when larger parties assembled, there was tea in the hall for the -sportsmen and the ladies who waited for them; but Mrs. Wradisley thought -the hall draughty, and much preferred the drawing-room, which was -over-furnished after the present mode of drawing-rooms, but at least -warm, and free from draughts. She was working--knitting with white pins, -or else making mysterious chains and bridges in white wool with a -crochet-hook, her eyes being supposed to be not very strong, and this -kind of industry the best adapted for them. As to what Lucy was doing, -that defies description. She was doing everything and nothing. She had -something of a modern young lady’s contempt for every kind of -needlework, and, then, along with that, a great admiration for it as -something still more superior than the superiority of idleness. A needle -is one of the things that has this double effect. It is the scorn of a -great number of highly advanced, very cultured and superior feminine -people; but yet here and there will arise one, still more advanced and -cultured, who loves the old-fashioned weapon, and speaks of it as a -sacred implement of life. Lucy followed first one opinion and then -another. She had half a dozen pieces of work about, begun under the -influence of one class of her friends, abandoned under that of another. -She had a little studio, too, where she painted and carved, and executed -various of the humbler decorative arts, which, perhaps, to tell the -truth, she enjoyed more than art proper; but these details of the young -lady’s life may be left to show themselves where there is no need of -such vanities. Lucy was, at all events, whatever her other qualities -might be, a most enthusiastic friend. - -“Well, I suppose we shall see her, and find out, as Lucy says, for -ourselves--not that it is of much importance,” the brother said, who had -begun this conversation. - -“Oh! but it is of a great deal of importance,” cried Lucy. “Mrs. Nugent -is my chief friend. She is mother’s prime favorite. She is the nicest -person in the neighborhood. She is here constantly, or I am there. If -you mean not to like her, you might as well, without making any fuss -about it, go away.” - -“Lucy!” cried Mrs. Wradisley, moved to indignation, and dropping all the -white fabric of wool on her knees, “your brother--and just come home -after all these years!” - -“What nonsense! Of course I don’t mean that in the least,” Lucy cried. -“Ralph knows--_of course_, I would rather have him than--all the friends -in the world.” - -There was a faltering note, however, in this profession. Why should she -like Ralph better than all the friends in the world? He was her brother, -that was true; but he knew very little of Lucy, and Lucy knew next to -nothing of him; he had been gone since she was almost a child--he came -back now with a big beard and a loud voice and a step which rang through -the house. It was evident he thought her, if not a child, yet the most -unimportant feminine person who did not count; and why should she prefer -him to her own nice friends, who were soft of voice and soft of step, -and made much of her, and thought as she did? It is acknowledged -universally that in certain circumstances, when the man is her lover, a -girl prefers that man to all the rest of the creation; but why, when it -is only your brother Raaf, and it may really be said that you don’t know -him--why should you prefer him to your own beloved friends? Lucy did not -ask herself this question--she said what she knew it was the right thing -to say, though with a faltering in her voice. And Ralph, who fortunately -did not care in the least, took no notice of what Lucy said. He liked -the little girl, his little sister, well enough; but it did not upset -the equilibrium of the world in the very least whether she preferred him -or not--if he had thought on the subject he would probably have said, -“More shame to her, the little insensible thing!” but he did not take -the trouble to give it a passing thought. - -“I’ve got to show Bertram the neighborhood,” he said; “let him see we’re -not all muffs or clowns in the country. He has a kind of notion that is -about what the English aborigines are--and I daresay it’s true, more or -less.” - -“Oh, Raaf!” cried Lucy, raising her little smooth head. - -“Well, it’s natural enough. One doesn’t meet the cream of the cream in -foreign parts; unless you’re nothing but a sportsman, or a great swell -doing it as the right thing, the most of the fellows you meet out there -are loafers or blackguards, more or less.” - -“It is a pity to form an estimate from blackguards,” said Mrs. -Wradisley, with a smile; “but that, I suppose, I may take as an -exaggeration too. We don’t see much of that kind here. Mr. Bertram is -much mistaken if he thinks--” - -“Oh, don’t be too hasty, mother,” said Ralph. “We know the breed; our -respectable family has paid toll to the devil like other folks since it -began life, which is rather a long time ago. After a few hundred years -you get rather proud of your black sheep. I’m something of the kind -myself,” he added, in his big voice. - -Mrs. Wradisley once more let the knitting drop in her lap. “You do -yourself very poor justice, Raaf--no justice at all, in fact. You are -not spotless, perhaps, but I hope that black--” - -“Whitey-brown,” said her son. “I don’t care for the distinction; but one -white flower is perhaps enough in a family that never went in for -exaggerated virtue--eh? Ah, yes--I know.” - -These somewhat incoherent syllables attended the visible direction of -Mrs. Wradisley’s eyes toward the door, with the faintest lifting of her -eyelids. The door had opened and some one had come in. And yet it is -quite inadequate to express the entrance of the master of the house by -such an expression. His foot made very little sound, but this was from -some quality of delicacy and refinement in his tread, not from any want -of dignity or even impressiveness in the man. He was dressed just like -the other men so far as appeared--in a grey morning suit, about which -there was nothing remarkable. Indeed, it would have been against the -perfection of the man had there been anything remarkable in his -dress--but it was a faultless costume, whereas theirs were but common -coats and waistcoats from the tailor’s, lined and creased by wear and -with marks in them of personal habit, such, for instance, as that minute -burnt spot on Raaf’s coat-pocket, which subtly announced, though it was -a mere speck, the thrusting in of a pipe not entirely extinguished, to -that receptacle. Mr. Wradisley, I need not say, did not smoke; he did -not do anything to disturb the perfect outline of an accomplished -gentleman, refined and fastidious, which was his natural aspect. To -smell of tobacco, or indeed of anything, would have put all the fine -machinery of his nature out of gear. He hated emotion as he hated--what -shall I say?--musk or any such villainous smell; he was always _point -devise_, body and soul. It is scarcely necessary to say that he was Mr. -Wradisley and the head of the house. He had indeed a Christian name, by -which he was called by his mother, brother, and sister, but not -conceivably by any one else. Mr. Wradisley was as if you had said Lord, -when used to him--nay, it was a little more, for lord is _tant soit peu_ -vulgar and common as a symbol of rank employed by many other people, -whereas Mr., when thus elevated, is unique; the commonest of addresses, -when thus sublimated and etherealized, is always the grandest of all. He -was followed into the room by a very different person, a person of whom -the Wradisley household did not quite know what to make--a friend of -Ralph’s who had come home with him from the deserts and forests whence -that big sportsman and virtuous prodigal had come. This stranger’s name -was Bertram. He had not the air of the wilds about him as Ralph -Wradisley had. He was said to be a bigger sportsman even than Ralph, and -a more prodigious traveler; but this was only Ralph’s report, who was -always favorable to his friends; and Mr. Bertram looked more like a man -about town than an African traveler, except that he was burnt very brown -by exposure, which made his complexion, once fair, produce a sort of -false effect in contrast with his light hair, which the sun had rather -diminished than increased in color. Almost any man would have looked -noisy and rough who had the disadvantage to come into a room after Mr. -Wradisley; but Bertram bore the comparison better than most. Ralph -Wradisley had something of the aspect of a gamekeeper beside both of -them, though I think the honest fellow would have been the first to whom -a child or injured person would have turned. The ladies made involuntary -mental comments upon them as the three stood together. - -“Oh, if Raaf were only a little less rough!” his mother breathed in her -heart. Lucy, I think, was most critical of Bertram, finding in him, on -the whole, something which neither of her brothers possessed, though he -must have been forty at the very least, and therefore capable of -exciting but little interest in a girl’s heart. - -“I have been showing your friend my treasures,” said Mr. Wradisley, with -a slight turn of his head toward his brother, “and I am delighted to -find we have a great many tastes in common. There is a charm in -sympathy, especially when it is so rare, on these subjects.” - -“You could not expect Raaf to know about your casts and things, -Reginald,” said Mrs. Wradisley, precipitately. “He has been living among -such very different scenes.” - -“Raaf!” said Mr. Wradisley, slightly elevating his eyebrows. “My dear -mother, could you imagine I was referring in any way to Raaf?” - -“Never mind, Reg, I don’t take it amiss,” said the big sportsman, with a -laugh out of his beard. - -There was, however, a faint color on his browned cheeks. It is well that -a woman’s perceptions should be quick, no doubt, but if Mrs. Wradisley -had not been jealous for her younger son this very small household jar -need not have occurred. Mr. Wradisley put it right with his natural -blandness. - -“We all have our pet subjects,” he said; “you too, mother, as much as -the worst of us. Is the time of tea over, or may I have some?” - -“Mr. Wradisley’s casts are magnificent,” cried the stranger. “I should -have known nothing about them but for a wild year or two I spent in -Greece and the islands. A traveler gets a sniff of everything. Don’t you -recollect, Wradisley, the Arabs and their images at--” - -The name was not to be spelt by mere British faculties, and I refrain. - -“Funny lot of notions,” said Raaf, “I remember; pretty little thing or -two, however, I should like to have brought for Lucy--just the things a -girl would like--but Bertram there snapped them all up before I had a -chance--confounded knowing fellow, always got before me. You come down -on him, Lucy; it’s his fault if I have so few pretty things for you.” - -“I am very well contented, Raaf,” said Lucy, prettily. As a matter of -fact the curiosities Ralph had brought home had been chiefly hideous -ivory carvings of truly African type, which Lucy, shuddering, had put -away in a drawer, thanking him effusively, but with averted eyes. - -“There were two or three very pretty little Tanagra figurine among the -notions,” said Bertram. “I am sorry Miss Wradisley had not her share of -them--they’re buried in my collections in some warehouse or other, and -probably will never see the light.” - -“Ah, Tanagra!” said Mr. Wradisley, with a momentary gleam of interest. -He laid his hand not unkindly on his little sister’s shoulder, as she -handed him, exactly as he liked it, his cup of tea. “It is the less -matter, for Lucy would not have appreciated them,” he said. - -“When,” said Mrs. Wradisley, with a little gasp, “do you expect your -friends, Reginald? October is getting on, and the ladies that belong to -them will lie heavy on our hands if we have bad weather.” - -“Oh, the guns,” said Mr. Wradisley. “Don’t call them my friends, -mother--friends of the house, friends of the covers, if you like. Not so -great a nuisance as usual this year, since Raaf is here, but no -intimates of mine.” - -“We needn’t stand upon words, Reginald. They are coming, anyhow, and I -never remember dates.” - -“Useless to attempt it. You should make a memorandum of everything, -which is much more sure. I can tell you at once.” - -He took a note-book from his pocket, unerringly, without the usual -scuffle to discover in which pocket it was, and, drawing a chair near -his mother, began to read out the names of the guests. Then there ensued -a little discussion as to where they were to be placed; to Mrs. -Wradisley proposing the yellow room for one couple who had already, in -Mr. Wradisley’s mind, been settled in the green. It was not a very great -difference, but the master of the house had his way. A similar little -argument, growing fainter and fainter on the mother’s side, was carried -on over the other names. In every case Mr. Wradisley had his way. - -“I am going to run down to the park gates--that is, to the village,--I -mean I am going to see Mrs. Nugent,” said Lucy, “while mother and -Reginald settle all these people. Raaf, will you come?” - -“And I, too?” said Bertram, with a pleasant smile. He had a pleasant -smile, and he was such a gentleman, neither rough like Raaf, nor -over-dainty like Reginald. Lucy was very well content he should come -too. - - - - -CHAPTER II. - - -It was a lingering and pleasant walk with many little pauses in it and -much conversation. Lucy was herself the cause of some of them, for it -was quite necessary that here and there Mr. Bertram should be made to -stop, turn round, and look at the view. I will not pretend that those -views were any very great things. Bertram, who had seen all the most -famous scenes of earth, was not much impressed by that point so dear to -the souls of the Wradisbury people, where the church tower came in, or -that other where the glimmer of the pond under the trees, reflecting all -their red and gold, moved the natives to enthusiasm. It was a pretty, -soft, kindly English landscape, like a good and gentle life, very -reposeful and pleasant to see, but not dramatic or exciting. It was -Ralph, though he was to the manner born, who was, or pretended to be, -the most impatient of these tame but agreeable vistas. “It don’t say -much, your landscape, Lucy,” he said. “Bertram’s seen everything there -is to see. A stagnant pool and a church tower are not so grand to him as -to--” Probably he intended to say us, with a little, after all, of the -native’s proud depreciation of a scene which, though homely, appeals to -himself so much; but he stopped, and wound up with “a little ignoramus -like you.” - -“I am not so fastidious, I suppose. I think it’s delightful,” said -Bertram. “After all the dissipations of fine scenery, there’s nothing -like a home landscape. I’ve seen the day when we would have given all we -possessed for a glimmer of a church tower, or, still better, a bit of -water. In the desert only to think of that would be a good thing.” - -“Oh, in the desert,” said Ralph, with a sort of indulgent acknowledgment -that in some points home did commend itself to the most impartial mind. -But he too stopped and called upon his friend to observe where the -copse spread dark into the sunset sky--the best covert within twenty -miles--about which also Bertram was very civil, and received the -information with great interest. “Plenty of wild duck round the corner -of that hill in the marshy part,” said Ralph. “By Jove! we should have a -heavy bag when we have it all to ourselves.” - -“Capital ground, and great luck to be the first,” said Mr. Bertram. He -was certainly a nice man. He seemed to like to linger, to talk of the -sunset, to enjoy himself in the fresh but slightly chill air of the -October evening. Lucy’s observation of him was minute. A little wonder -whether he might be the man--not necessarily _her_ man, but the ideal -man--blew like a quiet little breeze through her youthful spirit. It was -a breeze which, like the actual breeze of the evening, carried dead -leaves with it, the rags of past reputation and visions, for already -Lucy had asked herself this question in respect to one or two other men -who had not turned out exactly as at first they seemed. To be sure, -this one was old--probably forty or so--and therefore was both better -and worse than her previous studies; for at such an age he must of -course have learnt everything that experience could teach, and on the -other hand did not matter much, having attained to antiquity. Still, it -certainly gave a greater interest to the walk that he was here. - -“After all,” said Ralph, “you gave us no light, Lucy, as to who this -widow was.” - -“You speak as if she were like old Widow Thrapton in the village,” cried -Lucy. “A widow!--she says it’s a term of reproach, as if a woman had -tormented her husband to death.” - -“But she is a widow, for you said so--and who is she?” said the -persistent Ralph. - -“He is like the little boy in ‘Helen’s Babies,’” said Lucy, turning to -her other companion. “He always wants to see the wheels go round, -whatever one may say.” - -“I feel an interest in this mysterious widow, too,” said Bertram, with a -laugh. - -It was all from civility to keep Ralph in countenance, she felt sure. - -“Who is she?” said that obstinate person. - -“I can tell you what she is,” cried Lucy, with indignant warmth. “She -must be older than I am, I suppose, for there’s Tiny, but she doesn’t -look it. She has the most lovely complexion, and eyes like stars, and -brown hair--none of your golden stuff, which always looks artificial -now. Hers might be almost golden if she liked, but she is not one to -show off. And she is the nicest neighbor that ever was--comes up to the -house just when one is dull and wants stirring up, or sends a note or a -book, or to ask for something. She likes to do all sorts of things for -you, and she’s so generous and nice and natural that she likes you to do -things for her, which is so much, much more uncommon! She says, thank -heaven, she is not unselfish; and, though it sounds strange,” said Lucy, -with vehemence, “I know exactly what she means.” - -“Not unselfish?” said Ralph. “By George! that’s a new quality. I thought -it was always the right thing to say of a woman that she was unselfish; -but all that doesn’t throw any light upon the lady. Isn’t she -somebody’s sister or cousin or aunt? Had she a father, had she a -mother?--that sort of thing, you know. A woman doesn’t come and settle -herself in a neighborhood without some credentials--nor a man either, so -far as I know.” - -“I don’t know what you mean by credentials. She was not introduced to us -by any stupid people, if that is what you mean. We just found her out -for ourselves.” - -Ralph gave a little whistle at this, which made Lucy very angry. “When -you go out to Africa or--anywhere,” she cried, “do you take credentials? -And who is to know whether you are what you call yourself? I suppose you -say you’re a Wradisley of Wradisbury. Much the black kings must know -about a little place in Hants!” - -“The black kings don’t stand on that sort of thing,” said Ralph, “but -the mother does, or so I supposed.” - -“I ought to take the unknown lady’s part,” said Mr. Bertram. “You’ve all -been very kind to me, and I’m not a Bertram of--anywhere in particular. -I have not got a pedigree in my pocket. Perhaps I might have some -difficulty in making out my family tree.” - -“Oh, Mr. Bertram!” cried Lucy, in deprecation, as if that were an -impossible thing. - -“I might always call myself of the Ellangowan family, to be sure,” he -said, with a laugh. - -Now Lucy did not at all know what he meant by the Ellangowan family. She -was not so deeply learned in her Scott as I hope every other girl who -reads this page is, and she was not very quick, and perhaps would not -have caught the meaning if she had been ever so familiar with “Guy -Mannering.” She thought Ellangowan a very pretty name, and laid it up in -her memory, and was pleased to think that Mr. Bertram had thus, as it -were, produced his credentials and named his race. I don’t know whether -Ralph also was of the same opinion. At all events they went on without -further remark on this subject. The village lay just outside the park -gates on the right side of a pretty, triangular bit of common, which -was almost like a bit of the park, with little hollows in it filled with -a wild growth of furze and hawthorn and blackberry, the long brambles -arching over and touching the level grass. There was a pretty bit of -greensward good for cricket and football, and of much consequence in the -village history. The stars had come out in the sky, though it was still -twilight when they emerged from the shadow of the trees to this more -open spot; and there were lights in the cottage windows and in the -larger shadow of the rectory, which showed behind the tall, slim spire -of the church. It was a cheerful little knot of human life and interest -under the trees, Nature, kindly but damp, mantling everything with -greenness up to the very steps of the cottage doors, some of which were -on the road itself without any interval of garden; and little irregular -gleams of light indicating the scarcely visible houses. Lucy, however, -did not lead the way toward the village. She went along the other side -of the common toward a house more important than the cottages, which -stood upon a little elevation, with a grassy bank and a few -moderate-sized trees. - -“Oh, she’s in Greenbank, this lady,” said Ralph. “I thought the old -doctor was still there.” - -“He died last year, after Charlie died at sea--didn’t you know? He never -held up his head, Raaf, after Charlie died.” - -“The more fool he; Charlie drained him of every penny, and was no credit -to him in any way. He should have been sent about his business years -ago. So far as concerned him, I always thought the doctor very weak.” - -“Oh, Raaf, he was his only son!” - -“What then? You think it’s only that sort of relationship that counts. -The doctor knew as well as any one what a worthless fellow he was.” - -“But he never held up his head again,” said Lucy, “after Charlie died.” - -“That’s how nature confutes all your philosophy, Wradisley,” said the -other man. “That is the true tragedy of it. Worthy or unworthy, what -does it matter? Affection holds its own.” - -“Oh, I’ve no philosophy,” said Ralph, “only common sense. So they sold -the house! and I suppose the poor old doctor’s library and his -curiosities, and everything he cared for? I never liked Carry. She would -have no feeling for what he liked, poor old fellow. Not worth much, that -museum of his--good things and bad things, all pell-mell. Of course she -sold them all?” - -“The most of them,” Lucy confessed. “What could she do otherwise, Raaf? -They were of no use to her. She could not keep up the house, and she had -no room for them in her own. Poor Carry, he left her very little; and -her husband has a great struggle, and what could she do?” - -“I don’t suppose she wanted to do anything else,” said Ralph, in a surly -tone. “Look here, I sha’n’t go in with you since it’s the doctor’s -house. I had a liking for the old fellow--and Bertram and I are both -smoking. We’ll easy on a bit till the end of the common, and wait for -you coming back.” - -“If you prefer it, Raaf,” Lucy said, with a small tone of resignation. -She stood for a moment in the faint twilight and starlight, holding her -head a little on one side with a wistful, coaxing look. “I did wish you -to see her,” she said. - -“Oh, I’ll see her some time, I suppose. Come, Bertram; see you’re ready, -Lucy, by the time we get back.” - -Lucy still paused a moment as they swung on with the scent of their -cigars sending a little warmth into the damp air. She thought Mr. -Bertram swayed a little before he joined the other, as if he would have -liked to stay. Undeniably he was more genial than Raaf, more ready to -yield to what she wanted. And usually she was alone in her walks, just a -small woman about the road by herself, so that the feeling of leading -two men about with her was pleasant. She regretted they did not come in -to show Mrs. Nugent how she had been accompanied. She went slowly up the -grassy bank alone, thinking of this. She had wanted so much to show Raaf -to Mrs. Nugent, not, she fancied, that it was at all likely they would -take to each other. Nelly Nugent was so quick, she would see through -him in a moment. She would perceive that there was not, perhaps, a great -deal in him. He was not a reader, nor an artist, nor any of the things -Nelly cared for--only a rough fellow, a sportsman, and rather -commonplace in his mind. He was only Raaf, say what you would. Oh! he -was not the one to talk like that of poor Charlie. If Charlie was only -Charlie, Raaf was nothing but Raaf--only a man who belonged to you, not -one to admire independent of that. But whatever Raaf might do it would -never have made any difference, certainly not to his mother, she did not -suppose to any one, any more than it mattered to the poor old doctor -what Charlie did, seeing he was his father’s Charlie; and that nothing -could change. She went along very slowly, thinking this to herself--not -a very profound thought, but yet it filled her mind. The windows were -already shining with firelight and lamplight, looking very bright. The -drawing-room was not at all a large room. It was under the shade of a -veranda and opened to the ground, which made it a better room for summer -than for winter. Lucy woke up from her thoughts and wondered whether in -the winter that was coming Mrs. Nugent would find it cold. - -The two men went on round the common in the soft, damp evening air. - -“That’s one of the things one meets with, when one is long away,” said -Raaf, with a voice half confused in his beard and his cigar. “The old -doctor was a landmark; fine old fellow, and knew a lot; never knew one -like him for all the wild creatures--observing their ways, don’t you -know. He’d bring home as much from a walk as you or I would from a -voyage--more, I daresay. I buy a few hideous things, and poor little -Lucy shudders at them” (he was not so slow to notice as they supposed), -“but I haven’t got the head for much, while he--And all spoiled because -of a fool of a boy not worth a thought.” - -“But his own, I suppose,” said the other. - -“Just that--his own--though why that should make such a difference. Now, -Carry was worth a dozen of Charlie. Oh, I didn’t speak very well of -Carry just now!--true. She married a fellow not worth his salt, when, -perhaps--But there’s no answering for these things. Poor old doctor! -There’s scarcely anybody here except my mother that I couldn’t have -better spared.” - -“Let’s hope it’s a good thing for him,” said Bertram, not knowing what -to say. - -“I can’t think dying’s better than living,” said Raaf. “Oh, you -mean--that? Well, perhaps; though it’s hard to think of him,” he said, -with a sudden laugh, “in his old shiny coat with his brown gaiters -in--what one calls--a better world. No kind of place suited him as well -as here--he was so used to it. Somehow, though, on a quiet night like -this, there’s a kind of a feeling, oh! I can’t describe it in the least, -as if--I say, you’ve been in many queer places, Bertram, and seen a -lot?” - -“That is true.” - -“Did you ever see anything that made you--feel any sort of certainty, -don’t you know? There’s these stars, they say they’re all worlds, -globes, like this, and so forth. Who lives in them? That’s what I’ve -always wanted to know.” - -“Well, men like us can’t live in them, for one thing, according to what -the astronomers say.” - -“Men like us, ah! but then! We’ll not be fellows like us when we’re--the -other thing, don’t you know. There!” said Ralph; “I could have sworn -that was the old man coming along to meet us; cut of his coat, gaiters -and everything.” - -“You can’t be well, old fellow, there is nobody.” - -“I know that as well as you,” said Ralph, with a nervous laugh. “Do you -think I meant I saw anything? Not such a fool; no, dear old man, I -didn’t see him; I wish I could, just to tell him one or two things about -the beasts which he was keen about. I don’t think that old fellow would -be happy, Bertram, in a fluid, a sort of a place like a star, for -instance, where there were no beasts.” - -“There’s no reason to suppose they’re fluid. And for that matter there -may be beasts, as some people think; only I don’t see, if you take in -that, where you are to stop,” said Bertram. “We are drawing it too fine, -Wradisley, don’t you think?” - -“Perhaps we are, it’s not my line of country. I wish you had known that -old man. You’re a fellow that makes out things, Bertram. He was quite -comfortable--lots of books, and that museum which wasn’t much of a -museum, but he knew no better. Besides, there were a few good things in -it. And enough of money to keep him all right. And then to think, Lord, -that because of a fool of a fellow who was never out of hot water, -always getting his father into hot water, never at peace, that good old -man should go and break his heart, as they call it, and die.” - -“It may be very unreasonable, but it happens from time to time,” Bertram -said. - -“By Jove, it is unreasonable! An old man that was really worth coming -back to--and now he’s clean swept away, and some baggage of a woman, -probably no good, in his place, to turn Lucy’s head, and perhaps bring -us all to sixes and sevens, for anything I know.” - -“Why should you suppose so? There seems nothing but good in the lady, -except that she is a stranger. So am I a stranger. You might as well -believe that I should bring you to sixes and sevens. You’re not well -to-night, old fellow. You have got too much nonsense in your head.” - -“I suppose that’s it--a touch of fever,” said the other. “I’ll take some -quinine when I go home to-night.” And with that wise resolution he drew -up, having come back to the point from which they started, to wait for -his sister at Mrs. Nugent’s door. - - - - -CHAPTER III. - - -The door of the little house was standing open when they drew up at the -gate. It was a door at the side round the corner from the veranda, but -with a porch which seemed to continue it. It was full of light from -within, against which Lucy’s figure stood dark. She was so much afraid -to keep the gentlemen waiting that she had come out there to be ready, -and was speaking her last words with her friend in the porch. Their -voices sounded soft, almost musical, through the dusk and the fresh air; -though, indeed, it was chiefly Lucy who was speaking. The men did not -hear what she said, they even smiled a little, at least Bertram did, at -the habit of the women who had always so much to say to each other about -nothing; and who, though they had perhaps met before more than once -that day, had still matter to murmur about down to the very last moment -by the opening of the door. It went on indeed for two or three minutes -while they stood there, notwithstanding that Lucy had cried, “Oh, there -they are! I must go,” at the first appearance of the tall shadows on the -road. She was pleading with her friend to come up to the hall next day, -which was the reason of the delay. - -“Oh, Nelly, do come--to-morrow is an off day--they are not going to -shoot. And I so want you to see Raaf; oh, I know he is not much to -see--that’s him, the tallest one. He has a huge beard. You’ll perhaps -think he’s not very intellectual or that sort of thing; but he’s our -Raaf--he’s mother’s Raaf--and you’re so fond of mother. And if I brought -him to see you he would be shy and gauche. Do come, do come, to-morrow, -Nelly; mother is so anxious you should come in good time.” - -Then the gentlemen, though they did not hear this, were aware of a new -voice breaking in--a small, sweet treble, a child’s voice--crying, “Me -too, me too!” - -“Yes, you too, Tiny; we always want you. Won’t you come when Tiny wishes -it, Nelly? You always give in to Tiny.” - -“Me come now,” shouted Tiny, “see gemplemans; me come now.” - -Then there was a little scuffle and laughing commotion at the open door; -the little voice loud, then others hushing it, and suddenly there came -flying down the bank something white, a little fluttering line of -whiteness upon the dark. The child flew with childish delight making its -escape, while there was first a startled cry from the doorway, and then -Lucy followed in pursuit. But the little thing, shouting and laughing, -with the rush of infantile velocity, short-lived but swift, got to the -bottom of the bank in a rush, and would have tripped herself up in her -speed upon the fastening of the gate had not Bertram, coming a step -forward, quickly caught her in his arms. There was not much light to see -the child by--the little face like a flower; the waving hair and shining -eyes. The little thing was full of laughter and delight in her small -escapade. “Me see gemplemans, me see gemplemans,” she said. Bertram -lifted her up, holding her small waist firm in his two hands. - -And then there came a change over Tiny. She became silent all at once, -though without shrinking from the dark face up to which she was lifted. -She did not twist in his grasp as children do, or struggle to be put -down. She became quite still, drew a long breath, and fixed her eyes -upon him, her little lips apart, her face intent. It was only the effect -of a shyness which from time to time crept over Tiny, who was not -usually shy; but it impressed the man very much who held her, himself -quite silent for a moment, which seemed long to both, though it was -scarcely appreciable in time, until Lucy reached the group, and with a -cry of “Oh, Tiny, you naughty little girl!” restored man and child to -the commonplace. Then the little girl wriggled down out of the -stranger’s grasp, and stole her hand into the more familiar one of -Lucy. She kept her eyes, however, fixed upon her first captor. - -“Oh, Tiny,” cried Lucy, “what will the gentleman think of you--such a -bold little girl--to run away from mamma, and get your death of cold, -and give that kind gentleman the trouble of catching you. Oh, Tiny, -Tiny!” - -“Me go back to mummie now,” Tiny said, turning her back upon them. It -was unusual for this little thing, whom everybody petted, to be so -subdued. - -“You have both beards,” cried Lucy, calling over her shoulder to her -brother and his friend, as she led the child back. “She is frightened of -you; but they are not bad gemplemans, Tiny, they are nice gemplemans. -Oh, nurse, here she is, safe and sound.” - -“Me not frightened,” Tiny said, and she turned round in the grip of the -nurse, who had now seized upon her, and kissed her little hand. -“Dood-night, gemplemans,” Tiny cried. The little voice came shrill and -clear through the night air, tinkling in the smallness of the sound, -yet gracious as a princess; and the small incident was over. It was -nothing at all; the simplest little incident in the world. And then Lucy -took up her little strain, breathless with her rush, laughing and -explaining. - -“Tiny dearly loves a little escapade; she is the liveliest little thing! -She has no other children to play with, and she is not afraid of -anybody. She is always with her mother, you know, and hears us talk of -everything.” - -“Very bad training for a child,” said Ralph, “to hear all your scandal -and gossip over your tea.” - -“Oh, Ralph, how common, how old fashioned you are!” cried Lucy, -indignantly. “Do you think Mrs. Nugent talks scandal over her tea? or -I--? I have been trying to make her promise to come up to lunch -to-morrow, and then you shall see--that is, if she comes; for she was -not at all sure whether she would come. She is not fond of strangers. -She never will come to us when we have people--that is, not chance -people--unless she knows them beforehand. Oh, you, of course, my -brother, that’s a different thing. I am sure I beg your pardon, Mr. -Bertram, for making you wait, and for seeming to imply--and then Tiny -rushing at you in that way.” - -“Tiny made a very sweet little episode in our walk,” said Bertram. -“Please don’t apologize. I am fond of children, and the little thing -gave me a look; children are strange creatures, they’re only half of -this world, I think. She looked--as if somehow she and I had met -before.” - -“Have you, Mr. Bertram? did you perhaps know--her mother?” cried Lucy, -in great surprise. - -“It is very unlikely; I knew some Nugents once, but they were old people -without any children, at least--No, I’ve been too long in the waste -places of the earth ever to have rubbed shoulders with this baby; -besides,” he said, with a laugh, “if there was any recognition, it was -she who recognized me.” - -“You are talking greater nonsense than I was doing, Bertram,” said -Ralph. “We’re both out of sorts, I should think. These damp English -nights take all the starch out of one. Come, let’s get home. You shan’t -bring us out again after sunset, Lucy, I promise you that.” - -“Oh, sunset is not a bad time here,” cried Lucy; “it’s a beautiful time; -it is only in your warm countries that it is bad. Besides, it’s long -after sunset; it’s almost night and no moon for an hour yet. That’s the -chief thing I like going to town for, that it is never dark like this at -night. I love the lamps--don’t you, Mr. Bertram?--there is such company -in them; even the cottage windows are nice, and _that_ ‘Red Lion’--one -wishes that a public-house was not such a very bad thing, for it looks -so ruddy and so warm. I don’t wonder the men like it; I should myself, -if--Oh, take care! there is a very wet corner there, just before you -come to our gates. Why, there is some one coming out. Why--it’s -Reginald, Raaf!” - -They were met, in the act of opening the gate, by Mr. Wradisley’s slim, -unmistakable figure. He had an equally slim umbrella, beautifully -rolled up, in his hand, and walked as if the damp country road were -covered with velvet. - -“Oh, you are coming back,” he said; “it’s a fine night for a walk, don’t -you think so?--well, not after Africa, perhaps; but we are used in -England to like these soft, grey skies and the feeling of--well, of dew -and coolness in the air.” - -“I call it damp and mud,” said Ralph, with an explosion of a laugh which -seemed somehow to be an explosion _manqué_, as if the damp had got into -that too. - -“Ah,” said his brother, reflectively. “Well it is rather a brutal way of -judging, but perhaps you are right. I am going to take a _giro_ round -the common. We shall meet at dinner.” And then he took off his hat to -Lucy, and with a nod to Bertram went on. There was an involuntary pause -among the three to watch him walking along the damp road--in which they -had themselves encountered occasional puddles--as if a carpet had been -spread underneath his dainty feet. - -“Is this Rege’s way?” said Ralph. “It’s an odd thing for him -surely--going out to walk now. He never would wet his feet any more than -a cat. What is he doing out at night in the dark, a damp night, bad for -his throat. Does my mother know?” - -“Oh,” said Lucy, with a curious confusion; “why shouldn’t he go now, if -he likes! It isn’t cold, it’s not so very damp, and Reginald’s an -Englishman, and isn’t afraid of a bit of damp or a wet road. You are so -hard to please. You are finding fault with everybody, Raaf.” - -“Am I?” he said. “Perhaps I am. I’ve grown a brute, being so much away.” - -“Oh, Raaf, I didn’t mean that. Reginald has--his own ways. Don’t you -know, we never ask what he means, mother and I. He always means just -what’s the right thing, don’t you know. It is a very nice time to--to -take a _giro_; look how the sky’s beginning to break there out of the -clouds. I always like an evening walk; so did mother when she was strong -enough. And then Reginald has such a feeling for art. He always says -the village is so pretty with the lights in the windows, and the sweep -of the fresh air on the common--and--and all that.” - -“Just so, Lucy,” said Ralph. - -She gave him a little anxious look, but she could not see the expression -of his face in the darkness, any more than he could see what a wistful -and wondering look was in her eyes. Bertram, looking on, formed his own -conclusions, which were as little right as a stranger’s conclusions upon -a drama of family life suddenly brought before his eyes generally are. -He thought that this correct and immaculate Mr. Wradisley had tastes -known to his family, or at least to the ladies of his family, which were -not so spotless as he appeared to be; or that there was something going -on at this particular moment which contradicted the law of propriety and -good order which was his nature. Was it a village amour? Was it some -secret hanging over the house? There was a little agitation, he thought, -in Lucy, and surprise in the brother, who was a stranger to all the ways -of his own family, and evidently had a half-hostile feeling toward his -elder. But the conversation became more easy as they went along, -emerging from under the shadow of the trees and crossing the openings of -the park. The great house came in sight as they went on, a solid mass -amid all its surrounding of shrubbery and flower gardens, with the -distance stretching clear on one side, and lights in many windows. It -looked a centre of life and substantial, steadfast security, as if it -might last out all the changes of fortune, and could never be affected -by those vicissitudes which pull down one and set up another. Bertram -could fancy that it had stood like a rock while many tempests swept the -country. The individual might come and go, but this habitation was that -of the race. And it was absurd to think that the little surprise of -meeting its master on his way into the village late on an October -evening, could have anything to do with the happiness of the family or -its security. Bertram said to himself that his nerves were a little -shaken to-night, he could not tell how. It was perhaps because of -something visionary in this way of walking about an unknown place in -the dark, and hearing of so many people like shadows moving in a world -undiscovered. The old doctor, for example, whose image was so clear -before his companion, that he could almost think he saw him, so clear -that even to himself, a stranger, that old man had almost appeared; but -more than anything else because of the child who, caught in her most -sportive mood, had suddenly grown quiet in his arms, and given him that -look, with eyes unknown, which he too could have sworn he knew. There -were strange things in his own life that gave him cause to think. Was it -not this that made him conscious of mystery and some disturbing -influence in the family which he did not know, but which had received -him as if he had been an absent brother too? - -To see Mrs. Wradisley was, however, to send any thought of mystery or -family trouble out of any one’s mind. The lamps were lit in the -drawing-room when they all went in, a little dazzled by the -illumination, from the soft dark of the night. She was sitting where -they had left her, in the warmth of the home atmosphere, so softly -lighted, so quietly bright. Her white knitting lay on her knee. She had -the evening paper in her hand, which had just come in; for it was one of -the advantages of Wradisbury that, though so completely in the country, -they were near enough to town to have an evening post. Mrs. Wradisley -liked her evening paper. It was, it is true, not a late edition, perhaps -in point of fact not much later than the _Times_ of the morning--but she -preferred it. It was her little private pleasure in the evening, when -Lucy was perhaps out, or occupied with her friends, and Mr. Wradisley in -his library. She nodded at them over her paper, with a smile, as they -came in. - -“I hope it is a fine night, and that you have had a pleasant walk, Mr. -Bertram,” she said. - -“And is she coming, Lucy?” - -“I could not get her to promise, mother,” Lucy said. - -“Oh, well, we must not press her. If she were not a little willful -perhaps we should not like her so much,” said Mrs. Wradisley, returning -to her journal. And how warm it was! but not too warm. How light it -was! but not too bright. - -“Come and sit here, Raaf. I like to see you and make sure that you are -there; but you need not talk to me unless you wish to,” the mother said. -She was not exacting. There was nothing wrong in the house, no anxiety -nor alarm; nothing but family tranquility and peace. - - - - -CHAPTER IV. - - -The little house called Greenbank was like a hundred other little houses -in the country, the superior houses of the village, the homes of small -people with small incomes, who still are ladies and gentlemen, the -equals of those in the hall, not those in the cottage. The drawing-room -was darkened in the winter days by the veranda, which was very desirable -and pleasant in the summer, and chilled a little by the windows which -opened to the floor on a level with the little terrace on which the -house stood. It looked most comfortable and bright in the evening when -the lamps were lighted and there was a good fire and the curtains were -drawn. Mrs. Nugent was considered to have made a great difference in the -house since the doctor’s time. His heavy, old furniture was still in -the dining-room, and indeed, more or less, throughout the rooms; but -chintz or cretonne and appropriate draperies go a long way, according to -the taste of the time. The new resident had been moderate and had not -overdone it; she had not piled the stuffs and ornaments of Liberty into -the old-fashioned house, but she had brightened the whole in a way which -was less commonplace. Tiny was perhaps the great ornament of all--Tiny -and indeed herself, a young woman not more than thirty, in the fulness -of her best time, with a little dignity, which became her isolated -position and her widowhood, and showed that, as the ladies in the -neighborhood said, she was fully able to take care of herself. He would -have been a bold man indeed who would have been rude or, what was more -dangerous, overkind to Mrs. Nugent. She was one of those women, who, as -it is common to say, keep people in their place. She was very gracious, -very kind; but either she never forgot that she was alone and needed to -be especially circumspect, or else it was her nature always to hold -back a little, to be above impulse. I think this last was the case; for -to be always on one’s guard is painful, and betrays a suspicion of -others or doubt of one’s self, and neither of these was in Mrs. Nugent’s -mind. She liked society, and she did not shut herself out from the kind -people who had adopted her, though she did not bring introductions or -make any appeal to their kindness. There was no reason why she should -shut them out; but she was not one who much frequented her neighbors’ -houses. She was always to be found in her own, with her little girl at -her knee. Tiny was a little spoiled, perhaps, or so the ladies who had -nurseries and many children to regulate, thought. She was only five, yet -she sat up till eight, and had her bread-and-milk when her mother had -her small dinner, at the little round table before the dining-room fire. -Some of the ladies had even said to Mrs. Nugent that this was a -self-indulgence on her part, and bad for the child; but, if so, she did -not mind, but went on with the custom, which it was evident, for the -moment did Tiny no harm. - -The excitement of Tiny’s escapade had been got over, and the child was -sitting on the carpet in the firelight playing with her doll and singing -to herself. She was always singing to herself or to the waxen companion -in her arms, which was pale with much exposure to the heat of the fire. -Tiny had a little tune which was quite different from the little -snatches of song which she picked up from every one--from the butcher’s -boy and the postman and the maids in the kitchen, as well as from her -mother’s performances. The child was all ear, and sang everything, -whatever she heard. But besides all this she had her own little tune, in -which she kept singing sometimes the same words over and over again, -sometimes her dialogues with her doll, sometimes scraps of what she -heard from others, odds and ends of the conversation going on over her -head. It was the prettiest domestic scene, the child sitting in front of -the fire, in the light of the cheerful blaze, undressing her doll, -hushing it in her arms, going through all the baby routine with which -she was so familiar, singing, talking, cooing to the imaginary baby in -her arms, while the pretty young mother sat at the side of the hearth, -with the little table and work-basket overflowing with the fine muslin -and bits of lace, making one of Tiny’s pretty frocks or pinafores, which -was her chief occupation. Sometimes Tiny’s monologue was broken by a -word from her mother; but sewing is a silent occupation when it is -pursued by a woman alone, and generally Mrs. Nugent said nothing more -than a word from time to time, while the child’s little voice ran on. -Was there something wanting to the little bright fireside--the man to -come in from his work, the woman’s husband, the child’s father? But it -was too small, too feminine a place for a man. One could not have said -where he would sit, what he would do--there seemed no place for him, if -such a man there had been. - -Nevertheless a place was made for Mr. Wradisley when he came in, as he -did immediately, announced by the smart little maid, carrying his hat -in his hand. A chair was got for him out of the glow of the firelight, -which affected his eyes. He made a little apology for coming so late. - -“But I have a liking for the twilight; I love the park in the dusk; and -as you have been so good as to let me in once or twice, and in the -confidence that when I am intrusive you will send me away--” - -“If you had come a little sooner,” said Mrs. Nugent, in a frank, full -voice, different from her low tones, “you might have taken care of Lucy, -who ran in to see me.” - -“Lucy was well accompanied,” said her brother; “besides, a walk is no -walk unless one is alone; and the great pleasure of a conversation, if -you will allow me to say so, is doubled when there are but two to talk. -I know all Lucy’s opinions, and she,” he said, pausing with a smile, as -if there was something ridiculous in the idea, “knows, or at least -thinks she knows, mine.” - -“She knows more than she has generally credit for,” said Mrs. Nugent; -“but your brother was with her. It has pleased her so much to have him -back.” - -“Raaf? yes. He has been so long away, it is like a stranger come to the -house. He has forgotten the old shibboleths, and it takes one a little -time to pick up his new ones. He is a man of the desert.” - -“Perhaps he has no shibboleths at all.” - -“Oh, don’t believe that! I have always found the more unconventional a -man is supposed to be, the furthest from our cut-and-dry systems, the -more conventional he really is. We are preserved by the understood -routine, and keep our independence underneath; but those who have to -make new laws for themselves are pervaded by them. The new, uneasy code -is on their very soul.” - -He spoke with a little warmth--unusual to him--almost excitement, his -correct, calm tone quickening. Then he resumed his ordinary note. - -“I hope,” he said, with a keen look at her, “that poor Raaf made a -favorable impression upon you.” - -Her head was bent over her needlework, which she had gone on with, not -interrupting her occupation. - -“I did not see him,” she said. “Lucy ran in by herself; they waited for -her, I believe, at the door.” - -“Me see gemplemans,” sang Tiny, at his feet, making him start. She went -on with her little song, repeating the words, “Dolly, such nice -gemplemans. Give Dolly ride on’s shoulder ’nother time.” - -And then Mrs. Nugent laughed, and told the story of Tiny’s escapade. It -jarred somehow on the visitor. He did not know what to make of Tiny; her -little breaks into the conversation, the chant that could not be taken -for remark or criticism, and yet was so, kept him in a continual fret; -but he tried to smile. - -“My brother,” he said, “is the kind of primitive man who, I believe, -pleases children--and dogs and primitive creatures generally--I--I beg -your pardon, Mrs. Nugent.” - -“No; why should you?” She dropped her work on her knee and looked up at -him with a laugh. “Tiny is quite a primitive creature. She likes what -is kind and big and takes her up with firm hands. That is how I have -always explained the pleasure infants take often in men. They are only -accustomed to us women about them; but they almost invariably turn from -us poor small things and rejoice in the hold of a man--when he’s not -frightened for them,” she added, taking up her work again. - -“As most men are, however,” Mr. Wradisley said. - -“Yes; that is our salvation. It would be too humiliating to think the -little things preferred the look of a man. I have always thought it was -the strength of his grasp.” - -“We shall shortly have to give in to the ladies even in that, they say,” -Mr. Wradisley went on, with relief in the changed subject. “Those tall -girls--while we, it appears, are growing no taller, or perhaps -dwindling--I am sure you, who are so womanly in everything, don’t -approve of that.” - -“Of tall girls? oh, why not? It is not their fault to be tall. It is -very nice for them to be tall. I am delighted with my tall maid; she -can reach things I have to get up on a chair for, and it is not -dignified getting up on a chair. And she even snatches up Tiny before -she has time to struggle or remonstrate.” - -“Tiny,” said Mr. Wradisley, with a little wave of his hand, “is the -be-all and end-all, I know; no one can hope to beguile your thoughts -from that point.” - -Mrs. Nugent looked up at him quickly with surprise, holding her work -suspended in her hand. - -“Do you think it is quite right,” he said, “or just to the rest of the -world? A child is much, but still only a child; and here are you, a -noble, perfect woman, with many greater capabilities. I do not flatter; -you must know that you are not like other women--gossips, triflers, -foolish persons--” - -“Or even as this publican,” said Mrs. Nugent, who had kept her eyes on -him all the time, which had made him nervous, yet gave him a kind of -inspiration. “I give alms of all I possess--I--Mr. Wradisley, do you -really think this is the kind of argument which you would like a woman -whom you profess to respect to adopt?” - -“Oh, you twist what I say. I am conscious of the same thing myself, -though I am, I hope, no Pharisee. To partly give up what was meant for -mankind--will that please you better?--to a mere child--” - -“You must not say such thing over Tiny’s head, Mr. Wradisley. She -understands a great deal. If she were not so intent upon this most -elaborate part of Dolly’s toilet for the night--” - -“Mrs. Nugent, could not that spectator for one moment be removed?--could -not I speak to you--if it were but for a minute--alone?” - -She looked at him again, this time putting down the needle-work with a -disturbed air. - -“I wish to hear nothing, from any one, Mr. Wradisley, which she cannot -hear.” - -“Not if I implored for one moment?” - -His eyes, which were dull by nature, had become hot and shining, his -colorless face was flushed; he was so reticent, so calm, that the -swelling of something new within him took a form that was alarming. He -turned round his hat in his hands as if it were some mystic implement of -fate. She hesitated, and cast a glance round her at all the comfort of -the little room, as if her shelter had suddenly been endangered, and the -walls of her house were going to fall about her ears. Tiny all the time -was very busy with her doll. She had arranged its nightgown, settled -every button, tied every string, and now, holding it against her little -bosom, singing to it, got up to put it to bed. “Mammy’s darling,” said -Tiny, “everything as mammy has--dood dolly, dood dolly. Dolly go to -bed.” - -Both the man and the woman sat watching her as she performed this little -ceremony. Dolly’s bed was on a sofa, carefully arranged with a cushion -and coverlet. Tiny laid the doll down, listened, made as if she heard a -little cry, bent over the mimic baby, soothing and quieting. Then she -turned round to the spectators, holding up a little finger. “Gone to -sleep,” said Tiny in a whisper. “Hush, hush--dolly not well, not twite -well--me go and ask nursie what she sinks.” - -The child went out on tip-toe, making urgent little gesticulations that -the others might keep silence. There was a momentary hush; she had left -the door ajar, but Mr. Wradisley did not think of that. He looked with a -nervous glance at the doll on the sofa, which seemed to him like another -child laid there to watch. - -“Mrs. Nugent,” he said at last, “you must know what I mean. I never -thought this great moment of my life would come thus, as if it were a -boy’s secret, to be kept from a child!--but you know; I have tried to -make it very clear. You are the only woman in the world--I want you to -be my wife.” - -“Mr. Wradisley--God help me--I have tried to make another thing still -more clear, that I can never more be any one’s wife.” - -She clasped her hands and looked at him as if it were she who was the -supplicant. - -He, having delivered himself, became more calm; he regained his -confidence in himself. - -“I am very much in earnest,” he said; “don’t think it is lightly said. -I have known since the first moment I saw you, but I have not yielded to -any impulse. It has grown into my whole being; I accept Tiny and -everything. I don’t offer you any other inducements, for you are above -them. You know a little what I am, but I will change my very nature to -please you. Be my wife.” - -She rose up, the tears came in a flood to her eyes. - -“Be content,” she said; “it is impossible, it is impossible. Don’t ask -me any more, oh, for God’s sake don’t ask me any more, neither you nor -any man. I would thank you if I could, but it is too dreadful. For the -love of heaven, let this be final and go away.” - -“I cannot go away with such an answer. I have startled you, though I -hoped not to do so. You are agitated, you have some false notions, as -women have, of loving only once. Mrs. Nugent--” - -She crossed the room precipitately in front of him as he approached -toward her, and closing the door, stood holding it with her hand. - -“I could explain in a word,” she said, “but do not force me to -explain--it would be too hard; it is impossible, only understand that. -Here is my child coming back, who must not indeed hear this. I will give -you my hand and say farewell, and you will never think of me again.” - -“That is the thing that is impossible,” he said. - -Tiny was singing at the door, beating against it. What an interruption -for a tale--and such a love tale as his! Mr. Wradisley was terribly -jarred in all his nerves. He was more vexed even than disappointed; he -could not acknowledge himself disappointed. It was the child, the -surprise, the shock of admitting for the first time such an idea; he -would not believe it was anything else, not even when she held open the -door for him with what in any other circumstances would have been an -affront, sending him away. The child got between them somehow with her -little song. “Dood-night, dood-night,” said Tiny. “Come again anodder -day,” holding her mother’s dress with one hand, and with the other -waving to him her little farewell, as was her way. - -He made a step or two across the little hall, and then came back. -“Promise me that you will let this make no difference, that you will -come to-morrow, that I shall see you again,” he said. - -“No, no; let it be over, let it be over!” she cried. - -“You will come to-morrow? I will not speak to you if I must not; but -make no difference. Promise that, and I will go away.” - -“I will come to-morrow,” she said. “Good-by.” - -The maid was standing behind him to close the outer door. Did that -account for the softening of her tone? or had she begun already to see -that nothing was impossible--that her foolish, womanish prejudice about -a dead husband could never stand in the way of a love like his? Mr. -Wradisley’s heart was beating in his ears, as he went down the bank, as -it had never done before. He had come in great excitement, but it was -with much greater excitement that he was going away. When the maid came -running after him that laboring heart stood still for an instant. He -thought he was recalled, and that everything was to be as he desired; he -felt even a slight regret in the joy of being recalled so soon. It would -have been even better had she taken longer to think of it. But it was -only his umbrella which he had forgotten. Mr. Wradisley to forget his -umbrella! That showed indeed the pass to which the man had come. - -It was quite dark now, and the one or two rare passers-by that he met on -the way passed him like ghosts, yet turned their heads toward him -suspiciously, wondering who he was. They were villagers unwillingly out -in the night upon business of their own; they divined a gentleman, -though it was too dark to see him, and wondered who the soft-footed, -slim figure could be, no one imagining for a moment who it really was. -And yet he had already made two or three pilgrimages like this to visit -the lady who for the first time in his life had made the sublime Mr. -Wradisley a suitor. He felt, as he opened softly his own gate, that it -was a thing that must not be repeated; but yet that it was in its way -natural and seemly that his suit should not be precisely like that of an -ordinary man. Henceforward it could be conducted in a different way, now -that she was aware of his feelings without the cognizance of any other -person. If it could be possible that her prejudices or caprice should -hold out, nobody need be the wiser. But he did not believe that this -would be the case. She had been startled, let it even be said shocked, -to have discovered that she was loved, and by such a man as himself. -There was even humility--the sweetest womanly quality--in her conviction -that it was impossible, impossible that she, with no first love to give -him, should be sought by him. But this would not stand the reflection of -a propitious night, of a new day. - - - - -CHAPTER V. - - -The dinner was quite a cheerful meal at Wradisbury that night. The -master of the house was exactly as he always was. Punctilious in every -kindness and politeness, perfect in his behavior. To see him take his -mother in as he always did, as if she were the queen, and place her in -her own chair, where she had presided at the head of that table for over -forty years, was in itself a sight. He was the king regnant escorting a -queen dowager--a queen mother, not exactly there by personal right, but -by conscious delegation, yet supreme naturalness and reverence, from -him. He liked to put her in her place. Except on occasions when there -were guests he had always done it since the day of his father’s death, -with a sort of ceremony as showing how he gave her all honor though -this supreme position was no longer her absolute due. He led her in with -special tenderness to-night. It perhaps might not last long, this reign -of hers. Another and a brighter figure was already chosen for that -place, but as long as the mother was in it, the honor shown to her -should be special, above even ordinary respect. I think Ralph was a -little fretted by this show of reverence. Perhaps, with that subtle -understanding of each other which people have in a family, even when -they reach the extreme of personal difference or almost alienation, he -knew what was in his brother’s mind, and resented the consciousness of -conferring honor which moved Reginald. In Ralph’s house (or so he -thought) the mother would rule without any show of derived power. It -would be her own, not a grace conferred; but though he chafed he was -silent, for it was very certain that there was not an exception to be -taken, not a word to say. It is possible that Mrs. Wradisley was aware -of it too, but she liked it, liked her son’s magnanimous giving up to -her of all the privileges which had for so long been hers. Many men -would not have done that. They would have liked their houses to -themselves; but Reginald had always been a model son. She was not in any -way an exacting woman, and when she turned to her second son, come back -in peace after so many wanderings, her heart overflowed with content. -She was the only one in the party who was not aware that the master of -the house had left his library in the darkening. The servants about the -table all knew, and had formed a wonderfully close guess as to what was -“up,” as they said, and Lucy knew with a great commotion and trouble of -her thoughts, wondering, not knowing if she were sorry or glad, looking -very wistfully at her brother to see if he had been fortunate or -otherwise. Was it possible that Nelly Nugent might be her sister, and -sit in her mother’s place? Oh, it would be delightful, it would be -dreadful! For how would mamma take it to be dethroned? And then if Nelly -would not, poor Reginald! Lucy watched him covertly, and could scarcely -contain herself. Ralph and Mr. Bertram, I fear, did not think of Mrs. -Nugent, but of something less creditable to Mr. Wradisley. The mother -was the only one to whom any breach in his usual habits remained -unknown. - -“You really mean to have this garden party to-morrow, mother?” he said. - -“Oh, yes, my dear, it is all arranged--the last, the very last of the -season. Not so much a garden party as a sort of farewell to summer -before your shooting parties arrive. We are so late this year. The -harvest has been so late,” Mrs. Wradisley said, turning toward Bertram. -“St. Swithin, you know, was in full force this year, and some of the -corn was still out when the month began. But the weather lately has been -so fine. There was a little rain this morning, but still the weather has -been quite remarkable. I am glad you came in time for our little -gathering, for Raaf will see a number of old friends, and you, I hope, -some of the nicest people about.” - -“I suspect I must have seen the nicest people already,” said Bertram, -with a laugh and a bow. - -“Oh, that is a very kind thing to say, Mr. Bertram, and, indeed, I am -very glad that Raaf’s friend should like his people. But no, you will -see some very superior people to-morrow. Lord Dulham was once a Cabinet -Minister, and Colonel Knox has seen an immense deal of service in -different parts of the world; not to speak of Mr. Sergeant--Geoffrey -Sergeant, you know, who is so well known in the literary world--but I -don’t know whether you care for people who write,” Mrs. Wradisley said. - -“He writes himself,” said Ralph, out of his beard. “Letters half a mile -long, and leaders, and all sorts of things. If we don’t look out he’ll -have us all in.” - -The other members of the party looked at Bertram with alarm. Mr. -Wradisley with a certain half resentment, half disgust. - -“Indeed,” he said; “I thought I had been so fortunate as to discover for -myself a most intelligent critic--but evidently I ought to have known.” - -“Don’t say that,” said Bertram, “indeed I’m not here on false pretenses. -I’m not a literary man afloat on the world, or making notes. Only a -humble newspaper correspondent, Mrs. Wradisley, and only that when it -happens to suit me, as your son knows.” - -“Oh, I am sure we are very highly honored,” said the lady, disturbed, -“only Raaf, you should have told me, or I might have said something -disagreeable about literary people, and that would have been so very--I -assure you we are all quite proud of Mr. Sergeant, and still more, Mr. -Bertram, to have some one to meet him whom he will--whom he is sure -to--” - -“You might have said he was a queer fish. I think he is,” said Bertram, -“but don’t suppose he knows me, or any of my sort. Raaf is only playing -you a trick. I wrote something about Africa, that’s all. When one is -knocking about the world for years without endless money to spend, -anything to put a penny in one’s purse is good. But I can’t write a -bit--except a report about Africa,” he added, hurriedly. - -“Oh, about Africa,” Mrs. Wradisley said, with an expression of greater -ease, and there was a little relief in the mind of the family generally. -Bertram seized the opportunity to plunge into talk about Africa and the -big game, drawing Ralph subtly into the conversation. It was not easy to -get Ralph set a-going, but when he was so, there was found to be much in -him wanting expression, and the stranger escaped under shelter of -adventures naturally more interesting to the family than any he had to -tell. He laughed a little to himself over it as the talk flowed on, and -left him with not much pride in the literary profession, which he had in -fact only played with, but which had inspired him at moments with a -little content in what he did too. These good folk, who were intelligent -enough, would have been a little afraid of him, not merely gratified by -his acquaintance, had he been really a writer of books. They were much -more at their ease to think him only a sportsman like Ralph, and a -gentleman at large. When they went into the drawing-room afterwards, -the conversation came back to the party of to-morrow, and to the pretty -widow in the cottage, of whom Mrs. Wradisley began to talk, saying they -would leave the flowers till Mrs. Nugent came, who was so great in -decoration. - -“I thought,” said Ralph, “this widow of yours--was not to be here.” - -Mr. Wradisley interposed at this point from where he stood, with his -back to the fire. “Ah,” he said, “oh,” with a clearing of his throat, “I -happened to see Mrs. Nugent in the village to-day, and I certainly -understood from her that she would be here.” - -“You saw her--after I did, Reginald?” said Lucy, in spite of herself. - -“Now, how can you say anything so absurd, Lucy--when you saw her just -before dinner, and Reginald could only have seen her in the morning, for -he never goes out late,” Mrs. Wradisley said. - -Bertram felt that he was a conspirator. He gave a furtive glance at the -others who knew different. He could see that Lucy grew scarlet, but not -a word was said. - -“You are mistaken, mother,” said Mr. Wradisley, with his calm voice, “I -sometimes do take a little _giro_ in the evening.” - -“Oh, a _giro_;” said his mother, as if that altered the matter; -“however,” she added, “there never was any question about the party; -that she fully knew we expected her for; but I wanted her to come for -lunch that she might make Ralph’s acquaintance before the crowd came; -but it doesn’t matter, for no doubt they’ll meet often enough. Only when -you men begin to shoot you’re lost to all ordinary occupations; and so -tired when you come in that you have not a word to throw at--a lady -certainly, if you still may have at a dog.” - -“I am not so bent on meeting this widow, mother, as you seem to think,” -said Ralph. - -“You need not always call her a widow. That’s her misfortune; it’s not -her character,” said Lucy, unconsciously epigrammatic. - -“Oh, well, whatever you please--this beautiful lady--is that better? -The other sounds designing, I allow.” - -“I think,” said Mr. Wradisley, “that we have perhaps discussed Mrs. -Nugent as much as is called for. She is a lady--for whom we all have the -utmost respect.” He spoke as if that closed the question, as indeed it -generally did; and going across the room to what he knew was the most -comfortable chair, possessed himself of the evening paper, and sitting -down, began to read it. Mrs. Wradisley had by no means done with her -evening paper, and that Reginald should thus take it up under her very -eyes filled her soul with astonishment. She looked at him with a gasp, -and then, after a moment, put out her hand for her knitting. Nothing -that could have happened could have given her a more bewildering and -mysterious shock. - -All this, perhaps, was rather like a play to Bertram, who saw everything -with a certain unconscious exercise of that literary faculty which he -had just found so little impressive to the people among whom he found -himself. They were very kind people, and had received him confidingly, -asking no questions, not even wondering, as they might have done, what -queer companion Ralph had picked up. Indeed, he was not at all like -Ralph, though circumstances had made them close comrades. Perhaps if -they could have read his life as he thought he could read theirs, they -might not have opened their doors to him with such perfect trust. He had -(had he?) the ruin of a woman’s happiness on his heart, and the -destruction of many hopes. He had been wandering about the world for a -number of years, never knowing how to make up his mind on this question. -Was it indeed his fault? Was it her fault? Were they both to blame? -Perhaps the last was the truth; but he knew very well he would never get -her, or any one, to confess or to believe that. There are some cases in -which the woman has certainly the best of it; and when the man who has -been the means of bringing a young, fair, blameless creature into great -trouble, even if he never meant it, is hopelessly put in the wrong even -when there may be something to be said for him. He was himself -bewildered now and then when he thought it all over, wondering if -indeed there might be something to be said for him. But if he could not -even satisfy himself of that, how should he ever satisfy the world? He -was a little stirred up and uncomfortable that night, he could scarcely -tell why, for the brewing troubles of the Wradisleys, if it was trouble -that was brewing, was unlikely to affect a stranger. Ralph, indeed, had -been grumbling in his beard with complaints over what was in fact the -blamelessness of his brother, but it did not trouble Bertram that his -host should be too perfect a man. He had quite settled in his own mind -what it was that was going to happen. The widow, no doubt, was some -pretty adventuress who, by means of the mother and sister, had -established a hold over the immaculate one, and meant to marry him and -turn her patronesses adrift--the commonest story, vulgar, even. And the -ladies would really have nothing to complain of, for Wradisley was -certainly old enough to choose for himself, and might have married and -turned off his mother to her jointure house years ago, and no harm -done. It was not this that made Bertram sleepless and nervous, who -really had so little to do with them, and no call to fight their -battles. Perhaps it was the sensation of being in England, and within -the rules of common life again, after long disruption from all ordinary -circumstances of ordinary living. He to plunge into garden parties, and -common encounters of men and women! He might meet some one who knew him, -who would ask him questions, and attempt to piece his life together with -guesses and conjectures. He had a great mind to repack his portmanteau -and sling it over his shoulder, and tramp through the night to the -nearest station. But to what good? For wherever he might go the same -risk would meet him. How tranquil the night was as he looked out of the -window, a great moon shining over the openings of the park, making the -silence and the vacant spaces so doubly solitary! He dared not break the -sanctity of that solitude by going out into it, any more than he dared -disturb the quiet of the fully populated and deeply sleeping house. He -had no right, for any caprice or personal cowardice of his, to disturb -that stillness. And then it gave him a curious contradictory sensation, -half of relief from his own thoughts, half of sympathy, to think that -there were already here the elements of a far greater disturbance than -any he could work, beginning to move within the house itself, working, -perhaps, toward a catastrophe of its own. In the midst of all he -suddenly stopped and laughed to himself, and went to bed at last with -the most curiously subdued and softened sensation. He had remembered the -look of the child whom he had lifted from the ground at the little gate -of Greenbank--how she had suddenly been stilled in her childish -mischief, and fixed him with her big, innocent, startled eyes. Poor -little thing! She was innocent enough, whatever might be the nest from -which she came. This was the thought with which he closed his eyes. - - - - -CHAPTER VI. - - -Mr. Wradisley had never been known to give so much attention to any of -his mother’s entertainments before. Those which were more exclusively -his own, the periodical dinners, the parties of guests occasionally -assembled in the house either for political motives or in discharge of -what he felt to be his duty as an important personage in the county, or -for shooting--which was the least responsible of all, but still the -man’s part in a house of the highest class--he did give a certain solemn -and serious attention to. But it had never been known that he had come -out of himself, or even out of his library, which was in a manner the -outer shell and husk of himself, for anything in the shape of an -occasional entertainment, the lighter occurrences of hospitality. On -this occasion, however, he was about all the morning with a slightly -anxious look about his eyes, in the first place to see that the day -promised well, to examine the horizon all round, and discuss the clouds -with the head gardener, who was a man of much learning and an expert, as -might be said, on the great question of the weather. That great -authority gave it as his opinion that it would keep fine all day. “There -may be showers in the evening, I should not wonder, but the weather will -keep up for to-day,” he said, backing his opinion with many minutiæ -about the shape of the clouds and the indications of the wind. Mr. -Wradisley repeated this at the breakfast table with much seriousness. -“Stevenson says we may trust to having a fine day, though there may be -showers in the evening,” he said; “but that will matter less, mother, as -all your guests will be gone by that time.” - -“Oh, Reginald, do you think Stevenson always knows?” cried Lucy, “He -promised us fine weather the day of the bazaar, and there was a storm -and everything spoiled in the afternoon.” - -“I am of the same opinion as Stevenson,” said Mr. Wradisley, very -quietly, which settled the matter; and, then, to be more wonderful -still, he asked if the house were to be open, and if it was to be -expected that any of the guests would wish to see his collection. “In -that case I should direct Simmons to be in attendance,” he said. - -“Oh, if you would, Reginald!--that would give us great _éclat_,” said -his mother; “but I did not venture to ask. It is so very kind of you to -think of it, of yourself. Of course it will be wished--everybody will -wish it; but I generally put them off, you know, for I know you don’t -like to be worried, and I would not worry you for the world.” - -“You are too good to me, mother. There is no reason why I should be -worried. It is, of course, my affair as much as any one’s,” he said, in -his perfectly gentle yet pointed way, which made the others, even Mrs. -Wradisley herself, feel a little small, as if she had been assuming an -individual responsibility which she had not the right to assume. - -“My show won’t come to much if Rege is going to exhibit, mother,” said -Ralph. “I’d better keep them for another day.” - -“On the contrary,” said Mr. Wradisley, with great suavity, “get out your -savage stores. If the whole country is coming, as appears, there will be -need for everything that we can do.” - -“There were just as many people last time, Reginald, but you wouldn’t do -anything,” said Lucy, half aggrieved, notwithstanding her mother’s -“hush” and deprecating look. - -“Circumstances are not always the same,” her brother said; “and I -understood from my mother that this was to be the last.” - -“For the season, Reginald,” said Mrs. Wradisley, with a certain alarm in -her tone. - -“To be sure. I meant for the season, of course--and in the -circumstances,” he replied. - -Mrs. Wradisley was not at all a nervous nor a timorous woman. She was -very free of fancies, but still she was disturbed a little. She allowed -Lucy to run on with exclamations and conjectures after the master of -the house had retired. “What is the matter with Reginald? What has -happened? What does he mean by it? He never paid any attention to our -garden parties before.” - -Mrs. Wradisley was a very sensible woman, as has been said. After a very -short interval she replied, calmly, “Most likely he does not mean -anything at all, my dear. He has just taken a fancy to have everything -very nice. It is delightful of him to let his collection be seen. That -almost makes us independent of the weather, as there is so much in the -house to see; but I do believe Stevenson is right, and that we are going -to have a most beautiful day.” - -But though she made this statement, a little wonder remained in her -mind. She had not, she remembered, been very well lately. Did Reginald -think she was failing, and that it might really be his mother’s last -entertainment to her neighbors? It was not a very pleasant thought, for -nothing had occurred for a long time to disturb the quiet tenor of Mrs. -Wradisley’s life, and Ralph had come back to her out of the wilds, and -she was contented. She put the thought away, going out to the -housekeeper to talk over anything that was necessary, but it gave her a -little shock in spite of herself. - -Mr. Wradisley, as may well be believed, had no thought at all of his -mother’s health, which he believed to be excellent, but he had begun to -think a little of brighter possibilities, of the substitution of another -feminine head to the house, and entertainments in which, through her, he -would take a warmer interest. But it was only partly this, and partly -nothing at all, as his sensible mother said, only the suppressed -excitement in him and impulse to do something to get through the time -until he should see Mrs. Nugent again and know his fate. He did not feel -very much afraid, notwithstanding all she had said in the shock of the -moment. He could understand that to a young widow, a fanciful young -woman, more or less touched by the new fancies women had taken up, the -idea of replacing her husband by another, of loving a second time, which -all the sentimentalists are against, would be for the moment a great -shock. She might feel the shock all the more if she felt, too, that -there was something in her heart that answered to that alarming -proposal, and might feel that to push off the thought with both hands, -with all her might, was the only thing possible. But the reflections of -the night and of the new morning, which had risen with such splendor of -autumnal sunshine, would, he felt almost sure, make a great difference. -Mrs. Nugent did not wear mourning; it was probably some years since her -husband’s death. She was not very well off, and did not seem to have -many relations who could help her, or she would not have come here so -unfriended, to a district in which nobody knew her. Was it likely that -she should resist all that he had to offer, the love of a good man, the -shelter of a well-known, wealthy, important name and house? It was not -possible that for a mere sentiment a woman so full of sense as she was, -could resist these. The love of a good man--if he had not had a penny in -the world, that would be worth any woman’s while; and she would feel -that. He thought, as he arranged with a zeal he had never felt before, -the means of amusing and occupying his mother’s guests, that he would -have all the more chance of getting her by herself, of finding time and -opportunity to lead her out of the crowd to get her answer. Surely, -surely, the chances were all in favor of a favorable answer. It was not -as if he were a nobody, a chance-comer, a trifling or unimportant -person. He had always been aware that he was an important person, and it -seemed impossible that she should not see it too. - -Ralph Wradisley and his friend Bertram went out for a long walk. They -were both “out of it,” the son as much as the visitor, and both moved -with similar inclinations to run away. “Of course I’ll meet some fellows -I know,” Ralph said. “Shall I though? The fellows of my age are knocking -about somewhere, or married and settled, and that sort of thing. I’ll -meet the women of them, sisters, and so forth, and perhaps some wives. -It’s only the women that are fixtures in a country like this; and what -are the women to you and me?” - -“Well, to me nothing but strangers--but so would the men be too.” - -“Ah, it’s all very well to talk,” said Ralph. “Women have their place in -society, and so forth--wouldn’t be so comfortable without them, I -suppose. But between you and me, Bertram, there ain’t very much in women -for fellows like us. I’m not a marrying man--neither are you, I suppose? -The most of them about here are even past the pretty girl stage, don’t -you know, and I don’t know how to talk to them. Africa plays the deuce -with you for that.” - -“No,” said Bertram, “I am not a marrying man. I am--I feel I ought to -tell you, Wradisley--there never was any need to go into such questions -before, and you may believe I don’t want to carry a placard round my -neck in the circumstances;--well--I am a married man, and that is the -truth.” - -Ralph turned upon him with a long whistle and a lifting of the -eyebrows. “By Jove!” he said. - -“I hope you won’t bear me a grudge for not telling you before. In that -case I’ll be off at once and bother you no more.” - -“Stuff!” cried Ralph; “what difference can it make to me? I have thought -you had something on your mind sometimes; but married or single, we’re -the same two fellows that have walked the desert together, and helped -each other through many a scrape. I’m sorry for you, old chap--that is, -if there’s anything to be sorry for. Of course, I don’t know.” - -“I’ve been afloat on the world ever since,” said Bertram. “It was all my -fault. I was a cursed fool, and trapped when I was a boy. Then I thought -the woman was dead--had all the proofs and everything, and--You say you -know nothing about that sort of thing, Wradisley. Well, I won’t say -anything about it. I fell in love with a lady every way better than -I--she was--perhaps you do know more than you say. I married her--that’s -the short and the long of it; and in a year, when the baby had come, -the other woman, the horrible creature, arrived at my very door.” - -“Good Lord!” cried Ralph softly, in his beard. - -“She was dying, that was one good thing; she died--in my house. And -then--We were married again, my wife and I--she allowed that; but--I -have never seen her since,” said Bertram, turning his head away. - -“By Jove!” said Ralph Wradisley once more, in his beard; and they walked -on in silence for a mile, and said not another word. At last-- - -“Old chap,” said Ralph, touching his friend on the shoulder, “I never -was one to talk; but it’s very hard lines on you, and Mrs. Bertram ought -to be told so, if she were the queen.” - -Bertram shook his head. “I don’t know why I told you,” he said; “don’t -let us talk of it any more. The thing’s done and can’t be undone. I -don’t know if I wish any change. When two paths part in this world, -Wradisley, don’t you know, the longer they go, the wider apart they -get--or at least that’s my experience. They say your whole body changes -every seven years--it doesn’t take so long as that to alter a man’s -thoughts and his soul--and a woman’s, too, I suppose. She’s far enough -from me now, and I from her. I’m not sure I--regret it. In some ways -it--didn’t suit me, so to speak. Perhaps things are best as they are.” - -“Well,” said Ralph, “I’d choose a free life for myself, but not exactly -in that way, Bertram--not if I were you.” - -“Fortunately we are none of us each other,” Bertram said, with a laugh -which had little mirth in it. He added, after a moment: “You’ll use your -own discretion about telling this sorry tale of mine, Wradisley. I felt -I had to tell you. I can’t go about under false pretenses while you’re -responsible for me. Now you know the whole business, and we need not -speak of it any more.” - -“All right, old fellow,” Ralph said; and they quickened their pace, and -put on I don’t know how many miles more before they got back--too late -for lunch, and very muddy about the legs--to eat a great deal of cold -beef at the sideboard, while the servants chafed behind them, intent -upon changing the great dining-room into a bower of chrysanthemums and -temple of tea. They had to change their dress afterwards, which took up -all their time until the roll of carriages began. Bertram, for his part, -being a stranger and not at all on duty, took a long time to put himself -into more presentable clothes. He did not want to have any more of the -garden party than was necessary. And his mind had been considerably -stirred up by his confession, brief as it was. It had been necessary to -do it, and his mind was relieved; but he did not feel that it was -possible to remain long at Wradisbury now that he had disclosed his -mystery, such as it was. What did they care about his mystery? -Nothing--not enough to make a day’s conversation out of it. He knew very -well in what way Ralph would tell his story. He would not announce it as -a discovery--it would drop from his beard like the most casual statement -of fact: “Unlucky beggar, Bertram--got a wife and all that sort of -thing--place down Devonshire way--but he and she don’t hit it off, -somehow.” In such terms the story would be told, without any mystery at -all. But Bertram, who was a proud man, did not feel that he could live -among a set of people who looked at him curiously across the table and -wondered how it was that he did not “hit it off” with his wife. He knew -that he would read that question in Mrs. Wradisley’s face when she bade -him good-morning; and in Lucy’s eyes--Lucy’s eyes, he thought, with a -half smile, would be the most inquisitive--they would ask him a hundred -questions. They would say, with almost a look of anxiety in them, “Oh! -Mr. Bertram--why?” It amused him to think that Lucy would be the most -curious of them all, though why, I could not venture to say. He got -himself ready very slowly, looking out from the corner of his window at -all the smart people of the county gathering upon the lawn. There was -tennis going on somewhere, he could hear, and the less loud but equally -characteristic stroke of the croquet balls. And the band, which was a -famous band from London, had begun to play. If he was to appear at all, -it was time that he should go downstairs; but, as a matter of fact, he -was not really moved to do this, until he saw a little flight across the -green of a small child in white, so swift that some one had to stoop and -pick her up as he picked up Tiny at the gate of Greenbank. The man on -the lawn who caught this little thing lifted her up as Bertram had done. -Would the child be hushed by his grasp, and look into his face as Tiny -had looked at him? Perhaps this was not Tiny--at all events, it gave no -look, but wriggled and struggled out of its captor’s hands. This sight -decided Bertram to present himself in the midst of Mrs. Wradisley’s -guests. He wanted to see Tiny once again. - - - - -CHAPTER VII. - - -Bertram soon lost himself among the crowd on the lawn, among all the -county people and the village people, making his way out and in, in a -solitude which never feels so great as among a crowd. It seemed -wonderful to him, as it is specially to those who have been more or less -in what is called “Society,” that he saw nobody whom he knew. That is a -thing almost impossible to happen for those that are born within that -charmed circle. Whether at the end of the world or in the midst of it, -it is incredible that you should see an assemblage of human creatures -without discovering one who is familiar at least, if not -friendly--unless, indeed, you wander into regions unknown to society; -and Mrs. Wradisley and her guests would all have been indignant indeed -had that been for a moment imagined of them. But yet this is a thing -that does happen now and then, and Bertram traversed the lawns and -flower gardens and conservatories without meeting a single face which he -recognized or being greeted by one voice he had ever heard before. To be -sure, this was partly owing to the fact that the person of whom he was -specially in search was a very small person, to be distinguished at a -very low pitch of stature near to the ground, not at tall on a level with -the other forms. There were a few children among the groups on the lawn, -and he pursued a white frock in various directions, which, when found, -proved to contain some one who was not Tiny; but at last he came to that -little person clinging to Lucy’s skirts as she moved about among her -mother’s guests. Lucy turned round upon Bertram with a little surprise -to find him so near her, and then a little rising glow of color and a -look in her mild eyes of mingled curiosity and compassion, which -penetrated him with sudden consciousness, annoyance, yet amusement. -Already it was evident Ralph had found a moment a tell his tale. “Oh, -Mr. Bertram!” Lucy said. She would have said precisely the same in -whatever circumstances; the whole difference was in the tone. - -Then a small voice was uplifted at her feet. “It is the gemplemans,” -Tiny said. - -“So you remember me, little one? though we only saw each other in the -dark. Will you come for a walk with me, Tiny?” Bertram said. - -The child looked at him with serious eyes. Now that he saw her in -daylight she was not the common model of the angelic child, but dark, -with a little olive tint in her cheeks and dark brown hair waving upon -her shoulders. He scarcely recognized, except by the serious look, the -little runaway of the previous night, yet recognized something in her -for which he was not at all prepared, which he could not explain to -himself. Why did the child look at him so? And he looked at her, not -with the half fantastic, amused liking which had made him seek her out, -but seriously too, infected by her survey of him, which was so -penetrating and so grave. After Tiny had given him this investigating -look, she put her little velvety hand into his, with the absolute -confidence of her age, “’Ess, me go for a walk,” she said. - -“Now, Tiny, talk properly to this gentleman; let him see what a lady you -can be when you please,” said Lucy. “She’s too old to talk like that, -isn’t she, Mr. Bertram? She is nearly five! and she really can talk just -as well as I can, when she likes. Tiny! now remember!” Lucy was very -earnest in her desire that Tiny should do herself justice; but once more -lifted the swift, interrogative look which seemed to say, as he knew she -would, “Oh, Mr. Bertram--why?” - -“Where shall we go for our walk, Tiny?” Bertram said. - -“Take Tiny down to the pond; nobody never take me down to the wasser. -Mamma says Tiny tumble in, but gemplemans twite safe. Come, come, afore -mummie sees and says no.” - -“But, Tiny, if you’re sure your mother would say no--” - -“Qwick, qwick!” cried Tiny. “If mummie says nuffin, no matter; but if -she says no!”--this was uttered with a little stamp of the foot and -raised voice as if in imitation of a familiar prohibition--“then Tiny -tan’t go. Come along, quick, quick.” - -It was clear that Tiny’s obedience was to the letter, not the spirit. - -“But I don’t know the way,” said Bertram, holding a little back. - -“Come, come!” cried the child, dragging him on. “Tiny show you the way.” - -“And what if we both fall in, Tiny?” - -“You’s too old, too big gemplemans to fall into the wasser--too big to -have any mummie.” - -“Alas! that’s true,” he said. - -“Then never mind,” said the little girl. “No mummie, no nursie, nobody -to scold you. You can go in the boat if you like. Come! Oh, Tiny do, do -want to go in the boat; and there’s flowers on the udder side, -fordet-me-nots!--wants to get fordet-me-nots. Come, gemplemans, come!” - -“Would you like to ride on my shoulder? and then we shall go quicker,” -he said. - -She stood still at once, and held out her arms to be lifted up. Now -Bertram was not the kind of man who makes himself into the horse, the -bear, the lion, as occasion demands, for the amusement of children. He -was more surprised to find himself with this little creature seated on -his shoulder, than she was on her elevated seat, where indeed she was -entirely at her ease, guiding him with imperative tugs at the collar of -his coat and beating her small foot against his breast, as if she had -the most perfect right to his attention and devotion. “This way, this -way,” sang Tiny; “that way nasty way, down among the thorns--this way -nice way; get fordet-me-nots for mummie; mummie never say nuffin--Tiny -tan go!” - -He found himself thus hurrying over the park, with the child’s voice -singing its little monologue over his head, flushed with rebellion -against the unconscious mother, much amused at himself. And yet it was -not amusement; it was a curious sensation which Bertram could not -understand. It is not quite an unexampled thing to fall in love with a -child at first sight; but he was not aware that he had ever done it -before, and to be turned so completely by the child into the instrument -of her little rebellions and pleasures was more wonderful still. He -laughed within himself, but his laugh went out of him like the flame of -a candle in the wind. He felt more like to cry, if he had been a subject -for crying. But why he could not tell. Never was man in a more disturbed -and perplexed state of mind. Guided by Tiny’s pullings and beatings, he -got to the pond at last, a pond upon the other side of which there was, -strange to say, visible among the russet foliage, one little clump of -belated forget-me-nots quite out of season. The child’s quick eye had -noted them as she had gone by with her nurse on some recent walk. -Bertram knew a great many things, but it is very doubtful whether he was -aware that it was wonderful to find forget-me-nots so late. And Tiny was -a sight to see when he put her down in the stern of the boat and pulled -across the pond with a few long strokes. Her eyes, which had a golden -light in their darkness, shone with triumph and delight; the brown of -her little sunburnt face glowed transparent as if there was a light -within; her dark curls waved; the piquancy of the complexion so unusual -in a child, the chant of her little voice shouting, “Fordet-me-nots, -fordet-me-nots!” her little rapture of eagerness and pleasure carried -him altogether out of himself. He had loved that complexion in his day; -perhaps it was some recollection, some resemblance, which was at the -bottom of this strange absorption in the little creature of whose very -existence he had not been aware till last night. Now, if he had been -called on to give his very life for Tiny he would have been capable of -it, without knowing why; and, indeed, there would have been a very -likely occasion of giving his life for Tiny, or of sacrificing hers, as -her mother foresaw, if he had not caught her as she stretched herself -out of the boat to reach the flowers. His grip of her was almost -violent--and there was a moment during which Tiny’s little glow -disappeared in a sudden thunder-cloud, changing the character of her -little face, and a small incipient stamp of passion on the planks -betrayed rebellion ready to rise. But Tiny looked at Bertram, who held -her very firmly, fixed him with much the same look as she had given him -at their first meeting, and suddenly changed countenance again. What did -that look mean? He had said laughingly on the previous night that it was -a look of recognition. She suddenly put her two little hands round his -neck, and said, “Tiny will be dood.” And the effect of the little -rebel’s embrace was that tears--actual wet tears, which for a moment -blinded eyes which had looked every kind of wonder and terror in the -face--surprised him before he knew. What did it mean? What did it mean? -It was too wonderful for words. - -The flowers were gathered after this in perfect safety and harmony; Tiny -puddling with her hands in the mud to get the nearest ones “nice and -long,” as she said, while Bertram secured those that were further off. -And then there arose a great difficulty as to how to carry these wet and -rather muddy spoils. Tiny’s pretty frock, which she held out in both -hands to receive them like a ballet dancer, could not be thought of. - -“For what would your mother say if your frock was wet and dirty?” said -Bertram, seriously troubled. - -“Mummie say, ‘Oh, Tiny, Tiny, naughty schild,’” said the little girl, -with a very grave face; “never come no more to garden party.” - -Finally an expedient was devised in the shape of Bertram’s handkerchief -tied together at the corners, and swung upon a switch of willow which -was light enough for Tiny to carry; in which guise the pair set out -again toward the house and the smart people, Tiny once more on Bertram’s -shoulder, with the bundle of flowers bobbing in front of his nose, and, -it need not be said, some trace of the gathering of the flowers and of -the muddy edges of the pool, and the moss-grown planks of the boat -showing on both performers--on Tiny’s frock, which was a little wet, -and on Bertram’s coat, marked by the beating of the little feet, which -had gathered a little mud and greenness too. Tiny began to question him -on the returning way. - -“Gemplemans too big to have got a mummie,” said Tiny; “have you got a -little girl?” - -Not getting any immediate answer to this question, she sang it over him -in her way, repeating it again and again--“Have zoo dot a little -girl?”--her dialect varying according to her caprice, until the small -refrain got into his head. - -The man was utterly confused and troubled; he could not give Tiny any -answer, nor could he answer the wonderful maze of questions and thoughts -which this innocent demand of hers awakened in his breast. When they -came within sight of the lawn and its gay crowd, Bertram bethought him -that it would be better to put his little rider down, and to present her -to perhaps an anxious or angry mother on a level, which would make her -impaired toilet less conspicuous. After all, there was nothing so -wonderful in the fact that a little girl had dirtied her frock. He had -no occasion to feel so guilty and disturbed about it. And this is how it -happened that the adventurers appeared quite humbly, Tiny not half -pleased to descend from her eminence and carrying now over her shoulder, -as Bertram suggested, the stick which supported her packet of flowers, -while he walked rather shamefaced by her, holding her hand, and looking -out with a little trepidation for the mother, who, after all, could not -bring down very condign punishment upon him for running away with her -child. - - - - -CHAPTER VIII. - - -Mrs. Nugent had been very unwilling to fulfill her promise and appear at -Mrs. Wradisley’s party. She had put off her arrival till the last -moment, and as she walked up from the village with her little girl she -had flattered herself that, arriving late under shelter of various other -parties who made much more commotion, she might have escaped -observation. But if Bertram, of whom she knew nothing, had been intent -on finding Tiny, Mr. Wradisley was much more intent on finding Tiny’s -mother. He had been on the watch and had not missed her from the first -moment of her appearance, carefully as she thought she had sheltered it -from observation. And even her appearance, though she had condemned it -herself as excited and sullen, when she gave herself a last look in the -glass before coming away, did not discourage him. Excitement brightens a -woman’s eye and gives additional color to her face, or at least it did -so to Nelly. The gentle carelessness of the ordinary was not in her -aspect at all. She was more erect, carrying her animated head high. -Nobody could call her ordinary at any time. She was so full of life and -action. But on that day every line of her soft, light dress seemed to -have expression. The little curls on her forehead were more crisp, the -shining of her eyes more brilliant. There was a little nervous movement -about her mouth which testified to the agitation in her. “Is there -anything wrong, dear?” asked Mrs. Wradisley, pausing, holding her by the -hand, looking into her face, startled by this unusual look, even in the -midst of her guests. - -“Oh, no--yes. I have had some disturbing news, but nothing to take any -notice of. I will tell you afterwards,” Mrs. Nugent said. Lucy too hung -upon her, eager to know what was the matter. “Only some blunders--about -my affairs,” she had replied, “which I can set right.” - -“Oh, if that is all!” Lucy had cried, running off to salute some other -new-comers and carrying Tiny in her train. “Affairs” meant business to -Lucy, and business, so far as she was aware, touched only the outside, -and could have nothing to do with any one’s happiness. Besides, her mind -was in a turmoil for the moment with that strange story of Mrs. Bertram -which her mother had just told her by way of precaution, filtered from -Ralph. “Mr. Bertram is married, it appears; but he and his wife don’t -get on,” was what Mr. Wradisley had said. Lucy’s imagination had, as we -are aware, been busy about Bertram, and she was startled by this strange -and sudden conclusion to her self-inquiry whether by any chance he might -be the Ideal man. - -It was thus that Mrs. Nugent had been suddenly left without even the -protection of her child, and though she had managed for some time to -hide herself, as she supposed (though his watchful gaze in reality -followed her everywhere), from her host amid the crowd of other people -assembled, there came the inevitable moment when she could keep herself -from him no longer. He came up to her while the people who surrounded -dispersed to examine his collection or to go in for tea. - -“But I have seen your collection, Mr. Wradisley,” she said; “you were so -kind as to show me everything.” - -“It is not my collection,” he said; “it is--a flower I want to show you. -The new orchid--the new--Let me take you into the conservatory. I must,” -he said, in a lower tone. “You must be merciful and let me speak to -you.” - -“Mr. Wradisley,” she cried, almost under her breath, “do not, for pity’s -sake, say any more.” - -“I must,” he said, impetuously. “I must know.” And then he added in his -usual tone, “Stevenson is very proud of it. It is a very rare kind, you -know, and the finest specimen, he says.” - -“Oh, what is that, Mr. Wradisley?--an orchid? May I come too?” said -another guest, without discrimination. - -“Certainly,” he said; “but all in its order. Simmons comes first, -Stevenson afterwards. You have not seen my Etruscan collection.” Mrs. -Nugent was aware that he had caught a floating ribbon of the light cloak -she carried on her arm, and held it fast while he directed with his -usual grave propriety the other lady by her side. “Now,” he said, -looking up to her. If it was the only thing that could be done, then -perhaps it was better that it should be done at once. He led her through -the lines of gleaming glass, the fruit, and the flowers, for Wradisbury -was famous for its vineries and its conservatories--meeting a few -wanderers by the way, whom it was difficult to prevent from -following--till at last they got to the inner sanctuary of all, where a -great fantastic blossom, a flower, but counterfeiting something that was -not a flower, blazed aloft in the ruddy afternoon light, which of itself -could never have produced that unnatural tropical blossom. Neither the -man nor the woman looked at the orchid. She said to him eagerly before -he could speak: “This is all dreadful to me. You ought to let me go. You -ought to be satisfied with my word. Should I speak as I have done if I -had not meant it? Mr. Wradisley, for God’s sake, accept what I have -already said to you and let me go.” - -“No,” he said. She stood beside the flower, her brown beauty shining -against the long leaves and strong stem of the beautiful monster, and he -planted himself in front of her as if to prevent her escape. “You think -I am tyrannical,” he said; “so I am. You are shocked and startled by -what I have said to you. It is because I understand that that I am so -pressing, so arbitrary now. Mrs. Nugent, you can’t bear that a man -should speak to you of love. You think that love only comes once, that -your heart should be buried with your husband; that is folly, it is -fancy, it is prejudice, it is not a real feeling. That is why I force -you almost to hear me. Pause a moment, and hear me.” - -“Not a moment, not a moment!” she cried. “It is more than that. Take my -word for it, and let me go and say no more.” - -“A widow,” he said, “you make up an idea to yourself that it’s something -sacred. You are never to love, never to think of any one again. But all -that is fiction--don’t interrupt me--it is mere fiction. You are living, -and he is dead.” - -“You force me,” she cried, “to betray myself. You force me--to tell you -my secrets. You have no right to force my secret from me. Mr. Wradisley, -every word you say to me is an offense. It is my own fault; but a man -ought surely to be generous and take a woman’s word without compelling -her in self defense--” - -“I know by heart all that you can say in self-defense,” he cried, -vehemently, “and you ought to be told that these are all -fictions--sentimentalisms--never to be weighed against a true -affection--a man’s love--and home and protection--both for yourself and -your child.” - -The young woman’s high spirit was aroused. “I will have no more of -this,” she said. “I am quite able to protect myself and my child. Let -me go--I will go, Mr. Wradisley. I do not call this love. I call it -persecution. Not a word more.” - -Mr. Wradisley was more astonished than words could say. He fell back, -and allowed her to pass. He had thought, with a high hand, in the -exercise of that superior position and judgment which everybody allowed -him, to bring her to reason. Was it possible that she was not to be -brought to reason? “I think,” he said, “Mrs. Nugent, that when you are -calm and consider everything at your leisure you will feel--that I am -justified.” - -“You can never be justified in assuming that you know--another person’s -position and feelings; which you don’t, and can’t know.” - -“I argue from the general,” said Mr. Wradisley, with an air almost of -meekness, “and when you think--when you take time to consider--” - -“No time would make any difference,” she said, quickly; and then, for -she was now free and going back again toward the lawn, her heart smote -her. “Don’t bear me any malice,” she said. “I respect you very much; any -woman might be proud--of your love”--her face gave a little twitch, -whether toward laughing or crying it was difficult to tell--“but I -couldn’t have given you mine in any circumstances, not if I had -been--entirely free.” - -“Which you are--from everything but false sentiment,” he said, doggedly. - -But what did it matter?--he was following her out, her face was turned -from him, her ears were deaf to his impressive words, as her eyes were -turned from his looks, which were more impressive still. Mr. Wradisley -had failed, and it was the first time for many years that he had done -so; he had even forgotten that such a thing was possible. When they -came, thus walking solemnly one behind the other, to the outer house -where some of the other guests were lingering, Mrs. Nugent stopped to -speak to some of them, to describe the new orchid. “It is the most -uncanny thing I ever saw,” she said. And then Lady Dulham, the great -lady of that side of the county, the person whom he most disliked, -appealed to Mr. Wradisley to show her too the new wonder. It was perhaps -on the whole the best way he could have got out of this false position. -He offered the old lady his arm with a deeply wounded, hotly offended -heart. - -Mrs. Nugent lingered a little with the others in the great relief and -ease of mind which, though it was only momentary, was great. She had not -after all been obliged to reveal any of her secrets, whatever they might -be. If he had been less peremptory, more reasonable, she would have been -obliged to explain to him; and that she had very little mind to do. -After the first relief, however, she began to feel what a blow had been -struck at her temporary comfort in this place by so untoward an -accident. His mother and sister were her chief friends; they had -received her so generously, so kindly, with such confidence. Her secret -was no guilty one, but still it had made her uncomfortable, it had been -the subject of various annoyances; but none of these kind people had -asked her any questions; they had received her for herself, never -doubting. And now it seemed that she had only appeared among them to do -harm. She was a pretty and attractive young woman, and not altogether -unaware that people liked her on that account; but yet she never had -been one of those women with whom everybody is acquainted, in novels, at -least, before whom every man falls down. She had had her share, but she -had not been persecuted by inopportune lovers. And she had not -entertained any alarm in respect to Mr. Wradisley. She hoped now that -his pride would help him through it, and that nobody would be the wiser; -but still she could not continue here under the very wing of the family -after so humiliating its head, either meeting him, or compelling him to -avoid her. She went on turning over this question in her mind, pausing -to talk to this one and that one, to do her duty to Mrs. Wradisley still -by amusing and occupying her guests, putting on her smiles as if they -had been ribbons to conceal some little spot or rent beneath. Indeed, -it was no rent. She had not been very long at Wradisbury. It would be no -dreadful business to go away. She was neither without friends nor -protectors, and London was always a ready and natural refuge, where it -would be so simple to go. But this fiasco, as she called it to herself, -vexed her. She wanted to get away as soon as possible, to think it over -at leisure, to find Tiny, who no doubt was hanging on Lucy Wradisley’s -skirts somewhere, or else playing with the other children, and to steal -home as soon as there was any pretext for departure. She felt that she -would prefer not to meet his mother’s eye. - -She was beginning to get very impatient of waiting when at last she -caught sight of Tiny being set down on the ground from somebody’s -shoulders. She did not pay any attention for the moment to the man. Tiny -had so many friends; for the child was not shy; she had no objection to -trust herself to any one who pleased her, though it was not every one -who had this advantage and pleased Tiny. The mother saw at once that -Tiny’s best frock had suffered, and a momentary alarm about the pond, -which was one of her favorite panics, seized her. But the child was -evidently quite right, which settled that question. She went to meet -Tiny with a word of playful reproof for her disheveled condition on her -lips. The child and her guardian were coming round a clump of trees -which hid them for a moment, and toward which Mrs. Nugent turned her -steps. She heard the small voice running on in its usual little -sing-song of monologue. - -“Have zoo dot a little girl? Have zoo dot a little girl?” - -What an odd question for Tiny to ask! The child must really be trained -to be a little more like other children, not to push her little -inquiries so far, not to ask questions. Mrs. Nugent could not help -smiling a little at the sound of her small daughter’s voice, especially -as there was no reply made to it. The man had a big beard, that was all -she had observed of him; perhaps it was the other son, the brother Raaf, -the adventurer, or perhaps prodigal, who had newly come home. - -These were her thoughts as she turned round the great bole of that big -tree of which the Wradisleys were so proud. Bertram was coming on the -other side, half smiling, too, at Tiny’s little song; while she, spying -some children in the distance, swayed backward from his hold to call to -them, and then detaching herself from his hand altogether, ran back a -few paces to show them her treasures. His face half averted for a moment -looking after her thus, gave Mrs. Nugent one breath of preparation, but -none to him, who turned round again half conscious of some one coming to -meet him, with still that half smile and the tender expression in his -eyes. He stood still, he wavered for a moment as if, strong man as he -was, he would have fallen. - -“My God--Nelly!” he cried. - - - - -CHAPTER IX. - - -After the most successful party, even if it is only a garden party, a -flatness is apt to fall upon the family of the entertainers who have -been so nobly doing their best to amuse their friends. Besides the -grateful sense of success, and of the fact that the trouble is well -over, comes a flagging of both physical and mental powers. The dinner at -Wradisbury was heavy after the great success of the afternoon; there was -a little conversation about that, and about how everybody looked, and on -Ralph’s part, who was decidedly the least dull of the party, on the -changes that time had made, especially upon the women whom he remembered -as little girls, and who were now, as he said, “elderly,” some of them -with little girls of their own; but neither Mr. Wradisley nor Mr. -Bertram were at all amused, and Lucy was tired, and agreeing with Ralph -completely in his estimation of the old young ladies, was not -exhilarated by it as she might have been. The master of the house did -not indeed betray fatigue or ill-humor, he was too well bred for that. -But he was a little cross to the butler, and dissatisfied with the -dinner, which was an unusual thing; he even said something to his mother -about “_your_ cook,” as if he thought the sins of that important person -resulted from the fact that she was Mrs. Wradisley’s cook, and had -received bad advice from her mistress. When he was pleased he said “my -cook,” and on ordinary occasions “the cook,” impersonally and -impartially. Bertram on the other hand, had the air of a man who had -fallen from a great height, and had not been able to pick himself up--he -was pale, his face was drawn. He scarcely heard when he was spoken to. -When he perceived that he was being addressed he woke up with an effort. -All this Lucy perceived keenly and put down to what was in fact its -real reason, though with a difference. She said to herself: - -“Nelly Nugent must have known him. She must have known his wife and all -about him, and how it was they didn’t get on. I’ll make her tell me,” -Lucy said to herself, and she addressed herself very particularly to Mr. -Bertram’s solace and entertainment, partly because she was romantically -interested and very sorry for him, and partly to show her mother, who -had told her with a certain air that Mr. Bertram was married, that his -marriage made not the slightest difference to her. She tried to draw him -out about Tiny, who was the first and most natural subject. - -“Isn’t she a delightful little thing? I am sure she made a slave of you, -Mr. Bertram, and got you to do everything she wanted. She always does. -She is a little witch,” Lucy said. - -“Oh, Tiny,” said Bertram, with a slight change of color. “Yes--I had not -been thinking. What is her--real name?” - -“I believe it is Agnes, and another name too--an old-fashioned name; do -you remember, mother?” - -“Laetitia. I don’t know what you mean by an old-fashioned name. I had -once a great friend whose name was Laetitia. It means light-heartedness, -doesn’t it?--joy. And a very nice meaning, too. It would just suit Tiny. -They can call her Letty when she gets a little older. But the worst of -these baby names is that there is no getting rid of them; and Tiny is so -absurd for a big girl.” - -During this rather long speech Bertram sat with a strange look, as if he -could have cried, Lucy thought, which, however, must have been absurd, -for what he did do was to laugh. “Yes, they do stick; and the more -absurd they are the longer they last.” - -“Tiny, however, is not absurd in the least; and isn’t she a delightful -little thing?” Lucy repeated. She was not, perhaps, though so very good -a girl, very rapid in her perceptions, and besides, it would have been -entirely idiotic to imagine the existence of any reason why Bertram -should not discuss freely the little characteristics of Mrs. Nugent’s -child. - -“Poor little Tiny!” he said, quite inappropriately, with a sort of -stifled sigh. - -“Oh! do you mean because her father is dead?” said Lucy, with a -countenance of dismay. She blamed herself immediately for having thought -so little of that misfortune. Perhaps the thing was that Mr. Bertram had -been a friend of Tiny’s father, and it was this that made him so grave. -She added, “I am sure I am very sorry for poor Mr. Nugent; but then I -never knew him, or knew anybody that knew him. Yes, to be sure, poor -little Tiny! But, Mr. Bertram, she has such a very nice mother. Don’t -you think for a girl the most important thing is to have a nice mother?” - -“No doubt,” Bertram said very gravely, and again he sighed. - -Lucy was full of compunction, but scarcely knew how to express it. He -must have been a very great friend of poor Mr. Nugent, and perhaps he -had felt, seeing Nelly quite out of mourning, and looking on the whole -so bright, that his friend had been forgotten. But no! Lucy was ready to -go to the stake for it, that Mrs. Nugent had not forgotten her -husband--more at least than it was inevitable and kind to her other -friends to forget. - -And then Mr. Wradisley, having finished his complaints about “your -cook,” told his mother across the table that it was quite possible he -might have to go to town in a few days. “Perhaps to-morrow,” he said. -The dealer in antiquities, through whose hands he spent a great deal of -money, had some quite unique examples which it would be sinful to let -slip by. - -Mrs. Wradisley exclaimed against this suggestion. “I thought, Reginald, -you were to be at home with us all the winter; and Ralph just come, -too,” she said. - -“Oh, don’t mind me,” said Ralph. - -“Ralph may be sure, mother,” said Mr. Wradisley, with his usual dignity, -“that I mind him very much. Still there are opportunities that occur but -once in a lifetime. But nothing,” he added, “need be settled till -to-morrow.” - -What did Reginald expect to-morrow? Mr. Bertram looked up too with a -sort of involuntary movement, as if he were about to say something -concerning to-morrow; but then changed his mind and did not speak. This -was Lucy’s observation, who was uneasy, watching them all, and feeling -commotion, though she knew not whence it came, in the air. - -In the morning there was still the same commotion in the air to Lucy’s -consciousness, who perhaps, however, was the only person who was aware -of it. But any vague sensation of that sort was speedily dispersed by -the exclamation of Mrs. Wradisley, after she had poured out the tea and -coffee (which was an office she retained in her own hands, to Lucy’s -indignation). While she did this she glanced at the outside of the -letters which lay by the side of her plate; for they retained the bad -habit in Wradisbury of giving you your letters at breakfast, instead of -sending them up to your room as soon as they arrived; so that you -received your tailor’s bill or your lover’s letter before the curious -eyes of all the world, so to speak. Mrs. Wradisley looked askance at her -letters as she poured out the tea, and said, half to herself, “Ah! Mrs. -Nugent. Now what can she be writing to me about? I saw her last night, -and I shall probably see her to-day.” - -“It will be about those cuttings for the garden, mother,” said Lucy. -“May I open it and see?” - -Mrs. Wradisley put her hand for a moment on the little pile. “I prefer -to open my letters myself. No one has ever done that for me yet.” - -“Nor made the tea either, mother,” said Ralph. - -“Nor made the tea either, Raaf, though Lucy would like to put me out, I -know,” said Mrs. Wradisley, with a little nod of her head; and then, -having finished that piece of business like one who felt her very life -attacked by any who should question her powers of doing it, she -proceeded to open her letters--one or two others before that on which -she had remarked. - -Lucy was so much interested herself that she did not see how still her -elder brother sat behind his paper, or how uneasy Bertram was, cutting -his roll into small pieces on his plate. Then Mrs. Wradisley gave a -little scream, and gave them all an excuse for looking up at her, and -Mr. Wradisley for demanding, “What is the matter, mother?” in his quiet -tones. - -“Dear me! I beg your pardon, Reginald, for crying out; how very absurd -of me. Mrs. Nugent has gone away! I was so startled I could not help it. -She’s gone away! This is to tell me--and she was here all the afternoon -yesterday, and never said a word.” - -“Oh, that’s the little widow,” said Ralph; “and a very good thing too, I -should say, mother. Nothing so dangerous as little widows about.” - -Again I am sorry that Lucy was so much absorbed in her own emotions as -not to be capable of general observation, or she would have seen that -both her brother Reginald and Mr. Bertram looked at Raaf as if they -would like to cut his throat. - -“She says she did tell me yesterday,” said Mrs. Wradisley, reading her -letter. “‘I mentioned that I had news that disturbed me a little.’ Yes, -now I recollect she did. I thought she wasn’t looking herself, and of -course I asked what was the matter. But I had forgotten all about it, -and I never thought it was serious. ‘And now I find that I must go. You -have all been so kind to me, and I am so sorry to leave. Tiny, too, will -break her little heart; only a child always believes she is coming back -again to-morrow; and the worst of it is I don’t know when I may be able -to get back.’” - -“But, mother, she can’t have gone yet; there will be time to run and say -good-by by the ten o’clock train,” said Lucy, getting up hurriedly. - -Once more Mrs. Wradisley raised a restraining hand, “Listen,” she said, -“you’ve not heard the end. ‘To-night I am going up to town by the eight -o’clock train. I have not quite settled what my movements will be -afterwards; but you shall hear when I know myself.’ That’s all,” said -the mother, “and very unsatisfactory I call it; but you see you will do -no manner of good, Lucy, jumping up and disturbing everybody at -breakfast on account of the ten o’clock train.” - -“Well,” said Lucy, drawing a long breath, “that is something at -least--if she will really let us know as soon as she knows herself.” - -“Gammon,” said Ralph. “My belief is you will never hear of your pretty -widow again. She’s seen somebody that is up to her tricks, or she’s -broken down in some little game, or--” - -“Raaf!” cried mother and sister together. - -But that was not all. Mr. Wradisley put down his newspaper; his -countenance appeared from behind it a little white and drawn, with his -eyebrows lowering. “I am sorry, indeed,” he said, “to hear a man of my -name speak of a lady he knows nothing about as perhaps--a cad might -speak, but not a gentleman.” - -“Reginald!” the ladies cried now in chorus, with tones of agitation and -dismay. - -Meanwhile Bertram had got up from the table with a disregard of good -manners of which in the tumult of his feelings he was quite unconscious, -and stalked away, going out of the room and the house, his head thrust -forward as if he did not quite realize where he was going. The ladies -afterwards, when they discussed this incident, and had got over their -terror lest hot words should ensue between the brothers, as for the -moment seemed likely--gave Bertram credit for the greatest tact and -delicacy; since it was evident that he too thought a crisis was coming, -and would not risk the chance of being a spectator of a scene which no -stranger to the family ought to see. - -But none of these fine sentiments were in Bertram’s mind. He went out, -stumbling as he went, because a high tide of personal emotion had surged -up in him, swelling to his very brain. That may not be a right way to -describe it, because they say all feeling comes from the brain--but that -was how he felt. He scarcely heard the jabberings of these Wradisley -people, who knew nothing about it. He who was the only man who had -anything to say in the matter, to defend her or to assail her--he would -have liked to knock down that fellow Ralph; but he would have liked -still more to kick Ralph’s brother out of the way, who had taken upon -him to interfere and stand up for her, forsooth, as if he knew anything -about her, whereas it was he, only he, Frank Bertram, who knew. He went -staggering out of the house, but shook himself up when he got into the -open air, and pulled himself together. There had been such a strong -impulse upon him to go after her last night and seize hold upon her, to -tell her all this was folly and nonsense, and couldn’t be. Why had he -not done it? He couldn’t tell. To think that was his own child that he -had carried about, and that after all she had been called Laetitia, -after his mother, though _her_ mother had cut him off and banished him -for no immediate fault of his. It was his fault, but it was the fault of -ignorance, not of intention. He had believed what he had so intently -wished to be true, but he had no more meant to harm Nelly or her child -than to sully the sunshine or the skies. And now, when chance or -providence, or whatever you chose to call it, had brought them within -sight of each other again, that he should not have had the heart to -follow that meeting out at once, and insist upon his rights! Perhaps she -would not have denied him--he had thought for a moment that there had -been something in her eyes--and then, like the dolt he was, like the -coward he was, he had let her go, and had gone in to dinner, and had sat -through the evening and listened to their talk and their music, and had -gone to bed and tossed and dreamed all night, and let her go. There had -been impulses in him against all these things. He had thought of -excusing himself from dinner. He had thought of pretending a headache, -and stealing out later; but he had not done it. He had stuck there in -their infernal routine, and let her go. Oh, what a dolt and coward slave -am I! He would not put forth a hand to hold her, to clutch her, not a -finger! But began to bestir himself as soon as she was out of his reach -and had got clear away. - -He went straight on toward the gate and the village, not much thinking -where he was going, nor meaning anything in particular by it; but -before he was aware found himself at Greenbank, where he had stopped -once in the darkness, all unaware who was within, and listened to Ralph -Wradisley (the cad! his brother was right) bringing forth his foolish -rubbish about the pretty widow, confound him! And some one had asked him -if perhaps he knew the Nugents, and he had said, Yes; but they were old -people. Yes, he knew some Nugents, he had said. They had only been her -grandparents, that was all. It was her mother’s name she had taken, but -he never guessed it, never divined it, though Tiny had divined it when -she suddenly grew silent in his hands and gave him that look. Tiny had -recognized him, like a shot! Though she had never seen him, though she -was only five weeks old when--But he had not known her, had not known -anything, nor how to behave himself when Providence placed such an -unlooked for chance in his hands. - -He went up to the house, the door of which stood wide open, and went in. -All the doors were open with a visible emptiness, and that look of mute -disorder and almost complaint which a deserted house bears when its -inmates have gone away. A woman came out of the back regions on hearing -his step, and explained that she had acted as Mrs. Nugent’s cook, but -was the caretaker put in by the landlord, and let or not with the house -as might suit the inmate. Mrs. Nugent had behaved very handsome to her, -she said, with wages and board wages, and to Lizzie too, the housemaid, -who had gone back to her mother’s, and refused to stay and help to clean -out the house. It was out of order, as Mrs. Nugent only went last night; -but if the gentleman would like to see over it--Bertram behaved handsome -to her also, bidding her not trouble herself, and then was permitted to -wander through the house at his will. There was nothing to be seen -anywhere which had any association either to soothe or hurt his excited -mind--a broken doll, an old yellow novel, a chair turned over in one -room, the white coverlet in another twisted as if packing of some sort -had been performed upon it--nothing but the merest vulgar traces of a -sudden going away. In the little drawing-room there were some violets in -water in a china cup--he remembered that she had worn them -yesterday--and by their side and on the carpet beneath two or three of -the forget-me-nots he had gathered for Tiny. He had almost thought of -taking some of the violets (which was folly) away with him. But when he -saw the forget-me-nots he changed his mind, and left them as he found -them. His flowers had not found favor in her sight, it appeared! It was -astonishing how much bitterness that trivial circumstance added to his -feelings. He went out by the open window, relieved to get into the open -air again, and went round and round the little garden, finding here and -there play places of Tiny, where a broken toy or two, and some daisies -threaded for a chain, betrayed her. And then it suddenly occurred to him -that there were but two or three forget-me-nots, which might easily have -fallen from Tiny’s hot little hand, whereas there had been a large -number gathered. What had been done with the rest? Had they by any -possibility been carried away? The thought came with a certain balm to -his heart. He said Folly! to himself, but yet there was a consolation in -the thought. - -He was seated on the rude little bench where Tiny had played, looking at -her daisies, when he heard a step; and, looking through the hedge of -lilac bushes which enclosed him, he saw to his great surprise Mr. -Wradisley walking along the little terrace upon which the drawing-room -windows opened. Mr. Wradisley could not be stealthy, that was -impossible, but his step was subdued; and if anything could have made -his look furtive, as if he were afraid of being seen, that would have -been his aspect. He walked up and down the little terrace once or twice, -and then he went in softly by the open window. In another moment he -reappeared. He was carefully straightening out in his hands the limp -forget-me-nots which had fallen from the table to the carpet out (no -doubt) of Tiny’s little hot hands. Mr. Wradisley took out a delicate -pocket-book bound in morocco, and edged with silver, and with the -greatest care, as if they had been the most rare specimens, arranged in -it the very limp and faded flowers. Then he placed the book in his -breast-pocket, and turned away. Bertram, in the little damp arbor, laid -himself upon the bench to suppress the tempest of laughter which tore -him in two. It was more like a convulsion than a fit of merriment, for -laughter is a tragic expression sometimes, and it came to an end very -abruptly in something not unlike a groan. Mr. Wradisley was already at -some distance, but he stopped involuntarily at the sound of this groan, -and looked back, but seeing nothing to account for it, walked on again -at his usual dignified pace, carrying Tiny’s little muddy, draggled -forget-me-nots over his heart. - -It was not till some time after that Bertram followed him up to the -hall. He had neither taken Nelly’s violets nor Tiny’s daisies, though he -had looked at them both with feelings which half longed for and half -despised such poor tokens of the two who had fled from him. The thought -of poor Mr. Wradisley’s mistake gave him again and again a spasm of -inaudible laughter as he went along the winding ways after him. After -all, was it not a willful mistake, a piece of false sentiment -altogether? for the man might have remembered, he said to himself, that -Nelly wore violets, autumn violets, and not forget-me-nots. When he got -to the house, Bertram found, as he had expected, a telegram summoning -him to instant departure. He had taken means to have it sent when he -passed through the village. And the same afternoon went away, offering -many regrets for the shortness of his visit. - -“Three days--a poor sort of Saturday to Monday affair,” said Mrs. -Wradisley. “You must come again and give us the rest that is owing to -us.” - -“It is just my beastly luck,” Bertram said. - -As for Lucy, she tried to throw a great deal of meaning into her eyes as -she bade him good-by; but Bertram did not in the least understand what -the meaning was. He had an uncomfortable feeling for the moment, as if -it might be that Lucy’s heart had been touched, unluckily, as her -brother’s had been; but grew hot all over with shame, looking again at -her innocent, intent face though what was in it, it was not given to him -to read. What Lucy would have said had she dared would have been, “Oh, -Mr. Bertram, go home to your wife and live happy ever after!” but this -of course she had no right to say. Ralph, however, the downright, whom -no one suspected of tact or delicacy, said something like it as he -walked with his friend to the station. Or rather it was at the very last -moment as he shook hands through the window of the railway carriage. - -“Good-by, Bertram,” he said; “I’d hunt up Mrs. Bertram and make it up, -if I were you. Things like that can’t go on forever, don’t you know.” - -“There’s something in what you say, Wradisley,” Bertram replied. - - -THE END. - - - - - -End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Two Strangers, by Margaret Oliphant - -*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK TWO STRANGERS *** - -***** This file should be named 55784-0.txt or 55784-0.zip ***** -This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: - http://www.gutenberg.org/5/5/7/8/55784/ - -Produced by Chuck Greif and the Online Distributed -Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This book was -produced from scanned images of public domain material -from the Google Books project.) - - -Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions -will be renamed. - -Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no -one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation -(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without -permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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You may copy it, give it away or -re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included -with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org/license - - -Title: Two Strangers - -Author: Margaret Oliphant - -Release Date: October 21, 2017 [EBook #55784] - -Language: English - -Character set encoding: UTF-8 - -*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK TWO STRANGERS *** - - - - -Produced by Chuck Greif and the Online Distributed -Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This book was -produced from scanned images of public domain material -from the Google Books project.) - - - - - - -</pre> - -<hr class="full" /> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="page_003" id="page_003"></a>{3}</span></p> - -<p class="cb">TWO STRANGERS</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="page_004" id="page_004"></a>{4}</span> </p> - -<p class="c"> -<img src="images/cover.jpg" width="337" height="500" alt="" title="" /> -</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="page_005" id="page_005"></a>{5}</span> </p> - -<h1> -<img src="images/twostrangers.png" -alt="TWO -STRANGERS" -/> -</h1> - -<p class="c">BY<br /> -MRS. OLIPHANT<br /> -<br /><br /> -<small>NEW YORK</small><br /> -R. F. FENNO AND COMPANY<br /> -<small>112 FIFTH AVENUE</small><br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_006" id="page_006"></a>{6}</span><br /> -<small><span class="smcap">Copyright</span>, 1895<br /> -R. F. FENNO AND COMPANY</small> -</p> - -<table border="0" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" summary="" -style="border:3px outset gray;padding:.75em;"> -<tr><td><a href="#CHAPTER_I">CHAPTER I., </a> -<a href="#CHAPTER_II">II., </a> -<a href="#CHAPTER_III">III., </a> -<a href="#CHAPTER_IV">IV., </a> -<a href="#CHAPTER_V">V., </a> -<a href="#CHAPTER_VI">VI., </a> -<a href="#CHAPTER_VII">VII., </a> -<a href="#CHAPTER_VIII">VIII., </a> -<a href="#CHAPTER_IX">IX.</a></td></tr> -</table> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="page_007" id="page_007"></a>{7}</span></p> - -<h2><a name="CHAPTER_I" id="CHAPTER_I"></a>CHAPTER I.</h2> - -<p>“<span class="smcap">And</span> who is this young widow of yours whom I hear so much about? I -understand Lucy’s rapture over any stranger; but you, too, mother—”</p> - -<p>“I too—well, there is no particular witchcraft about it; a nice young -woman has as much chance with me as with any one, Ralph—”</p> - -<p>“Oh, if it’s only a nice young woman—”</p> - -<p>“It’s a great deal more,” said Lucy. “Why, Miss Jones at the school is a -nice young woman—don’t you be taken in by mother’s old-fashioned -stilts. She is a darling—she is as nice as nice can be. She’s pretty, -and she’s good, and she’s clever. She has read a lot, and seen a lot, -and been everywhere, and knows heaps and heaps of people, and yet just -as simple and as nice as if she had<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_008" id="page_008"></a>{8}</span> never been married, never had a -baby, and was just a girl like the rest of us—Mother! there is nothing -wrong in what I said?” Lucy suddenly cried, stopping short and blushing -all over with the innocent alarm of a youthfulness which had not been -trained to modern modes of speech.</p> - -<p>“Nothing wrong, certainly,” said the mother, with a half smile; -“but—there is no need for entering into all these details.”</p> - -<p>“They would have found out immediately, though,” said Lucy, with a -lowered voice, “that there was—Tiny, you know.”</p> - -<p>The scene was a drawing-room in a country house looking out upon what -was at this time of year the rather damp and depressing prospect of a -park, with some fine trees and a great breadth of very green, very -mossy, very wet grass. It was only October, though the end of the month; -and in the middle of the day, in the sunshine, the trees, in all their -varied colors, were a fine sight, cheerful and almost exhilarating, -beguiling the eye; but now the sun was gone, the leaves were falling in -little showers whenever the faintest breath<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_009" id="page_009"></a>{9}</span> of air arose, and where the -green turf was not veiled by their many colored remnants, it was green -with that emerald hue which means only wet; one knew as one gazed across -it that one’s foot would sink in the spongy surface, and wet, wet would -be the boot, the skirt which touched it; the men in their -knickerbockers, or those carefully turned up trousers—which we hear are -the fashion in the dryest streets of Paris and New York—suffered -comparatively little. The brushwood was all wet, with blobs of moisture -on the long brambles and drooping leaves. The park was considered a -beautiful park, though not a very large one, but it was melancholy -itself to look out for hours together upon that green expanse in such an -evening. It was not a bad evening either. There was no rain; the clouds -hung low, but as yet had given forth no shower. The air was damp but yet -brisk. There was a faint yellow glimmer of what might have been sunset -in the sky.</p> - -<p>The windows in the Wradisley drawing-rooms were large; one of them, a -vast, shallow<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_010" id="page_010"></a>{10}</span> bow, which seemed to admit the outside into the interior, -rather than to enlighten the interior with the view of what was outside. -Mrs. Wradisley sat within reach of, but not too near, a large, very red -fire—a fire which was like the turf outside, the growth of generations, -or at least had not at all the air of having been lighted to-day or any -recent day. It did not flame, but glowed steadily, adding something to -the color of the room, but not much to the light. Later in the season, -when larger parties assembled, there was tea in the hall for the -sportsmen and the ladies who waited for them; but Mrs. Wradisley thought -the hall draughty, and much preferred the drawing-room, which was -over-furnished after the present mode of drawing-rooms, but at least -warm, and free from draughts. She was working—knitting with white pins, -or else making mysterious chains and bridges in white wool with a -crochet-hook, her eyes being supposed to be not very strong, and this -kind of industry the best adapted for them. As to what Lucy was doing, -that defies description. She was doing everything<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_011" id="page_011"></a>{11}</span> and nothing. She had -something of a modern young lady’s contempt for every kind of -needlework, and, then, along with that, a great admiration for it as -something still more superior than the superiority of idleness. A needle -is one of the things that has this double effect. It is the scorn of a -great number of highly advanced, very cultured and superior feminine -people; but yet here and there will arise one, still more advanced and -cultured, who loves the old-fashioned weapon, and speaks of it as a -sacred implement of life. Lucy followed first one opinion and then -another. She had half a dozen pieces of work about, begun under the -influence of one class of her friends, abandoned under that of another. -She had a little studio, too, where she painted and carved, and executed -various of the humbler decorative arts, which, perhaps, to tell the -truth, she enjoyed more than art proper; but these details of the young -lady’s life may be left to show themselves where there is no need of -such vanities. Lucy was, at all events, whatever her other qualities -might be, a most enthusiastic friend.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_012" id="page_012"></a>{12}</span></p> - -<p>“Well, I suppose we shall see her, and find out, as Lucy says, for -ourselves—not that it is of much importance,” the brother said, who had -begun this conversation.</p> - -<p>“Oh! but it is of a great deal of importance,” cried Lucy. “Mrs. Nugent -is my chief friend. She is mother’s prime favorite. She is the nicest -person in the neighborhood. She is here constantly, or I am there. If -you mean not to like her, you might as well, without making any fuss -about it, go away.”</p> - -<p>“Lucy!” cried Mrs. Wradisley, moved to indignation, and dropping all the -white fabric of wool on her knees, “your brother—and just come home -after all these years!”</p> - -<p>“What nonsense! Of course I don’t mean that in the least,” Lucy cried. -“Ralph knows—<i>of course</i>, I would rather have him than—all the friends -in the world.”</p> - -<p>There was a faltering note, however, in this profession. Why should she -like Ralph better than all the friends in the world? He was her brother, -that was true; but he knew very little of Lucy, and Lucy knew next to -nothing of him; he had been gone since she was almost<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_013" id="page_013"></a>{13}</span> a child—he came -back now with a big beard and a loud voice and a step which rang through -the house. It was evident he thought her, if not a child, yet the most -unimportant feminine person who did not count; and why should she prefer -him to her own nice friends, who were soft of voice and soft of step, -and made much of her, and thought as she did? It is acknowledged -universally that in certain circumstances, when the man is her lover, a -girl prefers that man to all the rest of the creation; but why, when it -is only your brother Raaf, and it may really be said that you don’t know -him—why should you prefer him to your own beloved friends? Lucy did not -ask herself this question—she said what she knew it was the right thing -to say, though with a faltering in her voice. And Ralph, who fortunately -did not care in the least, took no notice of what Lucy said. He liked -the little girl, his little sister, well enough; but it did not upset -the equilibrium of the world in the very least whether she preferred him -or not—if he had thought on the subject he would probably have said, -“More shame to<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_014" id="page_014"></a>{14}</span> her, the little insensible thing!” but he did not take -the trouble to give it a passing thought.</p> - -<p>“I’ve got to show Bertram the neighborhood,” he said; “let him see we’re -not all muffs or clowns in the country. He has a kind of notion that is -about what the English aborigines are—and I daresay it’s true, more or -less.”</p> - -<p>“Oh, Raaf!” cried Lucy, raising her little smooth head.</p> - -<p>“Well, it’s natural enough. One doesn’t meet the cream of the cream in -foreign parts; unless you’re nothing but a sportsman, or a great swell -doing it as the right thing, the most of the fellows you meet out there -are loafers or blackguards, more or less.”</p> - -<p>“It is a pity to form an estimate from blackguards,” said Mrs. -Wradisley, with a smile; “but that, I suppose, I may take as an -exaggeration too. We don’t see much of that kind here. Mr. Bertram is -much mistaken if he thinks—”</p> - -<p>“Oh, don’t be too hasty, mother,” said Ralph. “We know the breed; our -respectable family has paid toll to the devil like<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_015" id="page_015"></a>{15}</span> other folks since it -began life, which is rather a long time ago. After a few hundred years -you get rather proud of your black sheep. I’m something of the kind -myself,” he added, in his big voice.</p> - -<p>Mrs. Wradisley once more let the knitting drop in her lap. “You do -yourself very poor justice, Raaf—no justice at all, in fact. You are -not spotless, perhaps, but I hope that black—”</p> - -<p>“Whitey-brown,” said her son. “I don’t care for the distinction; but one -white flower is perhaps enough in a family that never went in for -exaggerated virtue—eh? Ah, yes—I know.”</p> - -<p>These somewhat incoherent syllables attended the visible direction of -Mrs. Wradisley’s eyes toward the door, with the faintest lifting of her -eyelids. The door had opened and some one had come in. And yet it is -quite inadequate to express the entrance of the master of the house by -such an expression. His foot made very little sound, but this was from -some quality of delicacy and refinement in his tread, not from any want -of dignity or<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_016" id="page_016"></a>{16}</span> even impressiveness in the man. He was dressed just like -the other men so far as appeared—in a grey morning suit, about which -there was nothing remarkable. Indeed, it would have been against the -perfection of the man had there been anything remarkable in his -dress—but it was a faultless costume, whereas theirs were but common -coats and waistcoats from the tailor’s, lined and creased by wear and -with marks in them of personal habit, such, for instance, as that minute -burnt spot on Raaf’s coat-pocket, which subtly announced, though it was -a mere speck, the thrusting in of a pipe not entirely extinguished, to -that receptacle. Mr. Wradisley, I need not say, did not smoke; he did -not do anything to disturb the perfect outline of an accomplished -gentleman, refined and fastidious, which was his natural aspect. To -smell of tobacco, or indeed of anything, would have put all the fine -machinery of his nature out of gear. He hated emotion as he hated—what -shall I say?—musk or any such villainous smell; he was always <i>point -devise</i>, body and soul. It is scarcely necessary to say that he<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_017" id="page_017"></a>{17}</span> was Mr. -Wradisley and the head of the house. He had indeed a Christian name, by -which he was called by his mother, brother, and sister, but not -conceivably by any one else. Mr. Wradisley was as if you had said Lord, -when used to him—nay, it was a little more, for lord is <i>tant soit peu</i> -vulgar and common as a symbol of rank employed by many other people, -whereas Mr., when thus elevated, is unique; the commonest of addresses, -when thus sublimated and etherealized, is always the grandest of all. He -was followed into the room by a very different person, a person of whom -the Wradisley household did not quite know what to make—a friend of -Ralph’s who had come home with him from the deserts and forests whence -that big sportsman and virtuous prodigal had come. This stranger’s name -was Bertram. He had not the air of the wilds about him as Ralph -Wradisley had. He was said to be a bigger sportsman even than Ralph, and -a more prodigious traveler; but this was only Ralph’s report, who was -always favorable to his friends; and Mr. Bertram looked more like a man<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_018" id="page_018"></a>{18}</span> -about town than an African traveler, except that he was burnt very brown -by exposure, which made his complexion, once fair, produce a sort of -false effect in contrast with his light hair, which the sun had rather -diminished than increased in color. Almost any man would have looked -noisy and rough who had the disadvantage to come into a room after Mr. -Wradisley; but Bertram bore the comparison better than most. Ralph -Wradisley had something of the aspect of a gamekeeper beside both of -them, though I think the honest fellow would have been the first to whom -a child or injured person would have turned. The ladies made involuntary -mental comments upon them as the three stood together.</p> - -<p>“Oh, if Raaf were only a little less rough!” his mother breathed in her -heart. Lucy, I think, was most critical of Bertram, finding in him, on -the whole, something which neither of her brothers possessed, though he -must have been forty at the very least, and therefore capable of -exciting but little interest in a girl’s heart.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_019" id="page_019"></a>{19}</span></p> - -<p>“I have been showing your friend my treasures,” said Mr. Wradisley, with -a slight turn of his head toward his brother, “and I am delighted to -find we have a great many tastes in common. There is a charm in -sympathy, especially when it is so rare, on these subjects.”</p> - -<p>“You could not expect Raaf to know about your casts and things, -Reginald,” said Mrs. Wradisley, precipitately. “He has been living among -such very different scenes.”</p> - -<p>“Raaf!” said Mr. Wradisley, slightly elevating his eyebrows. “My dear -mother, could you imagine I was referring in any way to Raaf?”</p> - -<p>“Never mind, Reg, I don’t take it amiss,” said the big sportsman, with a -laugh out of his beard.</p> - -<p>There was, however, a faint color on his browned cheeks. It is well that -a woman’s perceptions should be quick, no doubt, but if Mrs. Wradisley -had not been jealous for her younger son this very small household jar -need not have occurred. Mr. Wradisley put it right with his natural -blandness.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_020" id="page_020"></a>{20}</span></p> - -<p>“We all have our pet subjects,” he said; “you too, mother, as much as -the worst of us. Is the time of tea over, or may I have some?”</p> - -<p>“Mr. Wradisley’s casts are magnificent,” cried the stranger. “I should -have known nothing about them but for a wild year or two I spent in -Greece and the islands. A traveler gets a sniff of everything. Don’t you -recollect, Wradisley, the Arabs and their images at—”</p> - -<p>The name was not to be spelt by mere British faculties, and I refrain.</p> - -<p>“Funny lot of notions,” said Raaf, “I remember; pretty little thing or -two, however, I should like to have brought for Lucy—just the things a -girl would like—but Bertram there snapped them all up before I had a -chance—confounded knowing fellow, always got before me. You come down -on him, Lucy; it’s his fault if I have so few pretty things for you.”</p> - -<p>“I am very well contented, Raaf,” said Lucy, prettily. As a matter of -fact the curiosities Ralph had brought home had been chiefly hideous -ivory carvings of truly African type,<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_021" id="page_021"></a>{21}</span> which Lucy, shuddering, had put -away in a drawer, thanking him effusively, but with averted eyes.</p> - -<p>“There were two or three very pretty little Tanagra figurine among the -notions,” said Bertram. “I am sorry Miss Wradisley had not her share of -them—they’re buried in my collections in some warehouse or other, and -probably will never see the light.”</p> - -<p>“Ah, Tanagra!” said Mr. Wradisley, with a momentary gleam of interest. -He laid his hand not unkindly on his little sister’s shoulder, as she -handed him, exactly as he liked it, his cup of tea. “It is the less -matter, for Lucy would not have appreciated them,” he said.</p> - -<p>“When,” said Mrs. Wradisley, with a little gasp, “do you expect your -friends, Reginald? October is getting on, and the ladies that belong to -them will lie heavy on our hands if we have bad weather.”</p> - -<p>“Oh, the guns,” said Mr. Wradisley. “Don’t call them my friends, -mother—friends of the house, friends of the covers, if you like. Not so -great a nuisance as usual this year,<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_022" id="page_022"></a>{22}</span> since Raaf is here, but no -intimates of mine.”</p> - -<p>“We needn’t stand upon words, Reginald. They are coming, anyhow, and I -never remember dates.”</p> - -<p>“Useless to attempt it. You should make a memorandum of everything, -which is much more sure. I can tell you at once.”</p> - -<p>He took a note-book from his pocket, unerringly, without the usual -scuffle to discover in which pocket it was, and, drawing a chair near -his mother, began to read out the names of the guests. Then there ensued -a little discussion as to where they were to be placed; to Mrs. -Wradisley proposing the yellow room for one couple who had already, in -Mr. Wradisley’s mind, been settled in the green. It was not a very great -difference, but the master of the house had his way. A similar little -argument, growing fainter and fainter on the mother’s side, was carried -on over the other names. In every case Mr. Wradisley had his way.</p> - -<p>“I am going to run down to the park gates—that is, to the village,—I -mean I am going to see Mrs. Nugent,” said Lucy, “while<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_023" id="page_023"></a>{23}</span> mother and -Reginald settle all these people. Raaf, will you come?”</p> - -<p>“And I, too?” said Bertram, with a pleasant smile. He had a pleasant -smile, and he was such a gentleman, neither rough like Raaf, nor -over-dainty like Reginald. Lucy was very well content he should come -too.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_024" id="page_024"></a>{24}</span></p> - -<h2><a name="CHAPTER_II" id="CHAPTER_II"></a>CHAPTER II.</h2> - -<p><span class="smcap">It</span> was a lingering and pleasant walk with many little pauses in it and -much conversation. Lucy was herself the cause of some of them, for it -was quite necessary that here and there Mr. Bertram should be made to -stop, turn round, and look at the view. I will not pretend that those -views were any very great things. Bertram, who had seen all the most -famous scenes of earth, was not much impressed by that point so dear to -the souls of the Wradisbury people, where the church tower came in, or -that other where the glimmer of the pond under the trees, reflecting all -their red and gold, moved the natives to enthusiasm. It was a pretty, -soft, kindly English landscape, like a good and gentle life, very -reposeful and pleasant to<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_025" id="page_025"></a>{25}</span> see, but not dramatic or exciting. It was -Ralph, though he was to the manner born, who was, or pretended to be, -the most impatient of these tame but agreeable vistas. “It don’t say -much, your landscape, Lucy,” he said. “Bertram’s seen everything there -is to see. A stagnant pool and a church tower are not so grand to him as -to—” Probably he intended to say us, with a little, after all, of the -native’s proud depreciation of a scene which, though homely, appeals to -himself so much; but he stopped, and wound up with “a little ignoramus -like you.”</p> - -<p>“I am not so fastidious, I suppose. I think it’s delightful,” said -Bertram. “After all the dissipations of fine scenery, there’s nothing -like a home landscape. I’ve seen the day when we would have given all we -possessed for a glimmer of a church tower, or, still better, a bit of -water. In the desert only to think of that would be a good thing.”</p> - -<p>“Oh, in the desert,” said Ralph, with a sort of indulgent acknowledgment -that in some points home did commend itself to the most impartial mind. -But he too stopped and<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_026" id="page_026"></a>{26}</span> called upon his friend to observe where the -copse spread dark into the sunset sky—the best covert within twenty -miles—about which also Bertram was very civil, and received the -information with great interest. “Plenty of wild duck round the corner -of that hill in the marshy part,” said Ralph. “By Jove! we should have a -heavy bag when we have it all to ourselves.”</p> - -<p>“Capital ground, and great luck to be the first,” said Mr. Bertram. He -was certainly a nice man. He seemed to like to linger, to talk of the -sunset, to enjoy himself in the fresh but slightly chill air of the -October evening. Lucy’s observation of him was minute. A little wonder -whether he might be the man—not necessarily <i>her</i> man, but the ideal -man—blew like a quiet little breeze through her youthful spirit. It was -a breeze which, like the actual breeze of the evening, carried dead -leaves with it, the rags of past reputation and visions, for already -Lucy had asked herself this question in respect to one or two other men -who had not turned out exactly as at first they seemed. To be sure,<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_027" id="page_027"></a>{27}</span> -this one was old—probably forty or so—and therefore was both better -and worse than her previous studies; for at such an age he must of -course have learnt everything that experience could teach, and on the -other hand did not matter much, having attained to antiquity. Still, it -certainly gave a greater interest to the walk that he was here.</p> - -<p>“After all,” said Ralph, “you gave us no light, Lucy, as to who this -widow was.”</p> - -<p>“You speak as if she were like old Widow Thrapton in the village,” cried -Lucy. “A widow!—she says it’s a term of reproach, as if a woman had -tormented her husband to death.”</p> - -<p>“But she is a widow, for you said so—and who is she?” said the -persistent Ralph.</p> - -<p>“He is like the little boy in ‘Helen’s Babies,’<span class="lftspc">”</span> said Lucy, turning to -her other companion. “He always wants to see the wheels go round, -whatever one may say.”</p> - -<p>“I feel an interest in this mysterious widow, too,” said Bertram, with a -laugh.</p> - -<p>It was all from civility to keep Ralph in countenance, she felt sure.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_028" id="page_028"></a>{28}</span></p> - -<p>“Who is she?” said that obstinate person.</p> - -<p>“I can tell you what she is,” cried Lucy, with indignant warmth. “She -must be older than I am, I suppose, for there’s Tiny, but she doesn’t -look it. She has the most lovely complexion, and eyes like stars, and -brown hair—none of your golden stuff, which always looks artificial -now. Hers might be almost golden if she liked, but she is not one to -show off. And she is the nicest neighbor that ever was—comes up to the -house just when one is dull and wants stirring up, or sends a note or a -book, or to ask for something. She likes to do all sorts of things for -you, and she’s so generous and nice and natural that she likes you to do -things for her, which is so much, much more uncommon! She says, thank -heaven, she is not unselfish; and, though it sounds strange,” said Lucy, -with vehemence, “I know exactly what she means.”</p> - -<p>“Not unselfish?” said Ralph. “By George! that’s a new quality. I thought -it was always the right thing to say of a woman that she was unselfish; -but all that doesn<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_029" id="page_029"></a>{29}</span>’t throw any light upon the lady. Isn’t she -somebody’s sister or cousin or aunt? Had she a father, had she a -mother?—that sort of thing, you know. A woman doesn’t come and settle -herself in a neighborhood without some credentials—nor a man either, so -far as I know.”</p> - -<p>“I don’t know what you mean by credentials. She was not introduced to us -by any stupid people, if that is what you mean. We just found her out -for ourselves.”</p> - -<p>Ralph gave a little whistle at this, which made Lucy very angry. “When -you go out to Africa or—anywhere,” she cried, “do you take credentials? -And who is to know whether you are what you call yourself? I suppose you -say you’re a Wradisley of Wradisbury. Much the black kings must know -about a little place in Hants!”</p> - -<p>“The black kings don’t stand on that sort of thing,” said Ralph, “but -the mother does, or so I supposed.”</p> - -<p>“I ought to take the unknown lady’s part,” said Mr. Bertram. “You’ve all -been very kind to me, and I’m not a Bertram of—<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_030" id="page_030"></a>{30}</span>anywhere in particular. -I have not got a pedigree in my pocket. Perhaps I might have some -difficulty in making out my family tree.”</p> - -<p>“Oh, Mr. Bertram!” cried Lucy, in deprecation, as if that were an -impossible thing.</p> - -<p>“I might always call myself of the Ellangowan family, to be sure,” he -said, with a laugh.</p> - -<p>Now Lucy did not at all know what he meant by the Ellangowan family. She -was not so deeply learned in her Scott as I hope every other girl who -reads this page is, and she was not very quick, and perhaps would not -have caught the meaning if she had been ever so familiar with “Guy -Mannering.” She thought Ellangowan a very pretty name, and laid it up in -her memory, and was pleased to think that Mr. Bertram had thus, as it -were, produced his credentials and named his race. I don’t know whether -Ralph also was of the same opinion. At all events they went on without -further remark on this subject. The village lay just outside the park -gates on the right side of a pretty, triangular bit of common,<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_031" id="page_031"></a>{31}</span> which -was almost like a bit of the park, with little hollows in it filled with -a wild growth of furze and hawthorn and blackberry, the long brambles -arching over and touching the level grass. There was a pretty bit of -greensward good for cricket and football, and of much consequence in the -village history. The stars had come out in the sky, though it was still -twilight when they emerged from the shadow of the trees to this more -open spot; and there were lights in the cottage windows and in the -larger shadow of the rectory, which showed behind the tall, slim spire -of the church. It was a cheerful little knot of human life and interest -under the trees, Nature, kindly but damp, mantling everything with -greenness up to the very steps of the cottage doors, some of which were -on the road itself without any interval of garden; and little irregular -gleams of light indicating the scarcely visible houses. Lucy, however, -did not lead the way toward the village. She went along the other side -of the common toward a house more important than the cottages, which -stood upon a little<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_032" id="page_032"></a>{32}</span> elevation, with a grassy bank and a few -moderate-sized trees.</p> - -<p>“Oh, she’s in Greenbank, this lady,” said Ralph. “I thought the old -doctor was still there.”</p> - -<p>“He died last year, after Charlie died at sea—didn’t you know? He never -held up his head, Raaf, after Charlie died.”</p> - -<p>“The more fool he; Charlie drained him of every penny, and was no credit -to him in any way. He should have been sent about his business years -ago. So far as concerned him, I always thought the doctor very weak.”</p> - -<p>“Oh, Raaf, he was his only son!”</p> - -<p>“What then? You think it’s only that sort of relationship that counts. -The doctor knew as well as any one what a worthless fellow he was.”</p> - -<p>“But he never held up his head again,” said Lucy, “after Charlie died.”</p> - -<p>“That’s how nature confutes all your philosophy, Wradisley,” said the -other man. “That is the true tragedy of it. Worthy or unworthy, what -does it matter? Affection holds its own.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_033" id="page_033"></a>{33}</span>”</p> - -<p>“Oh, I’ve no philosophy,” said Ralph, “only common sense. So they sold -the house! and I suppose the poor old doctor’s library and his -curiosities, and everything he cared for? I never liked Carry. She would -have no feeling for what he liked, poor old fellow. Not worth much, that -museum of his—good things and bad things, all pell-mell. Of course she -sold them all?”</p> - -<p>“The most of them,” Lucy confessed. “What could she do otherwise, Raaf? -They were of no use to her. She could not keep up the house, and she had -no room for them in her own. Poor Carry, he left her very little; and -her husband has a great struggle, and what could she do?”</p> - -<p>“I don’t suppose she wanted to do anything else,” said Ralph, in a surly -tone. “Look here, I sha’n’t go in with you since it’s the doctor’s -house. I had a liking for the old fellow—and Bertram and I are both -smoking. We’ll easy on a bit till the end of the common, and wait for -you coming back.”</p> - -<p>“If you prefer it, Raaf,” Lucy said, with a small tone of resignation. -She stood for a<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_034" id="page_034"></a>{34}</span> moment in the faint twilight and starlight, holding her -head a little on one side with a wistful, coaxing look. “I did wish you -to see her,” she said.</p> - -<p>“Oh, I’ll see her some time, I suppose. Come, Bertram; see you’re ready, -Lucy, by the time we get back.”</p> - -<p>Lucy still paused a moment as they swung on with the scent of their -cigars sending a little warmth into the damp air. She thought Mr. -Bertram swayed a little before he joined the other, as if he would have -liked to stay. Undeniably he was more genial than Raaf, more ready to -yield to what she wanted. And usually she was alone in her walks, just a -small woman about the road by herself, so that the feeling of leading -two men about with her was pleasant. She regretted they did not come in -to show Mrs. Nugent how she had been accompanied. She went slowly up the -grassy bank alone, thinking of this. She had wanted so much to show Raaf -to Mrs. Nugent, not, she fancied, that it was at all likely they would -take to each other. Nelly Nugent was so quick, she would see through<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_035" id="page_035"></a>{35}</span> -him in a moment. She would perceive that there was not, perhaps, a great -deal in him. He was not a reader, nor an artist, nor any of the things -Nelly cared for—only a rough fellow, a sportsman, and rather -commonplace in his mind. He was only Raaf, say what you would. Oh! he -was not the one to talk like that of poor Charlie. If Charlie was only -Charlie, Raaf was nothing but Raaf—only a man who belonged to you, not -one to admire independent of that. But whatever Raaf might do it would -never have made any difference, certainly not to his mother, she did not -suppose to any one, any more than it mattered to the poor old doctor -what Charlie did, seeing he was his father’s Charlie; and that nothing -could change. She went along very slowly, thinking this to herself—not -a very profound thought, but yet it filled her mind. The windows were -already shining with firelight and lamplight, looking very bright. The -drawing-room was not at all a large room. It was under the shade of a -veranda and opened to the ground, which made it a better room for summer -than for<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_036" id="page_036"></a>{36}</span> winter. Lucy woke up from her thoughts and wondered whether in -the winter that was coming Mrs. Nugent would find it cold.</p> - -<p>The two men went on round the common in the soft, damp evening air.</p> - -<p>“That’s one of the things one meets with, when one is long away,” said -Raaf, with a voice half confused in his beard and his cigar. “The old -doctor was a landmark; fine old fellow, and knew a lot; never knew one -like him for all the wild creatures—observing their ways, don’t you -know. He’d bring home as much from a walk as you or I would from a -voyage—more, I daresay. I buy a few hideous things, and poor little -Lucy shudders at them” (he was not so slow to notice as they supposed), -“but I haven’t got the head for much, while he—And all spoiled because -of a fool of a boy not worth a thought.”</p> - -<p>“But his own, I suppose,” said the other.</p> - -<p>“Just that—his own—though why that should make such a difference. Now, -Carry was worth a dozen of Charlie. Oh, I didn’t speak very well of -Carry just now!—true.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_037" id="page_037"></a>{37}</span> She married a fellow not worth his salt, when, -perhaps—But there’s no answering for these things. Poor old doctor! -There’s scarcely anybody here except my mother that I couldn’t have -better spared.”</p> - -<p>“Let’s hope it’s a good thing for him,” said Bertram, not knowing what -to say.</p> - -<p>“I can’t think dying’s better than living,” said Raaf. “Oh, you -mean—that? Well, perhaps; though it’s hard to think of him,” he said, -with a sudden laugh, “in his old shiny coat with his brown gaiters -in—what one calls—a better world. No kind of place suited him as well -as here—he was so used to it. Somehow, though, on a quiet night like -this, there’s a kind of a feeling, oh! I can’t describe it in the least, -as if—I say, you’ve been in many queer places, Bertram, and seen a -lot?”</p> - -<p>“That is true.”</p> - -<p>“Did you ever see anything that made you—feel any sort of certainty, -don’t you know? There’s these stars, they say they’re all worlds, -globes, like this, and so forth. Who<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_038" id="page_038"></a>{38}</span> lives in them? That’s what I’ve -always wanted to know.”</p> - -<p>“Well, men like us can’t live in them, for one thing, according to what -the astronomers say.”</p> - -<p>“Men like us, ah! but then! We’ll not be fellows like us when we’re—the -other thing, don’t you know. There!” said Ralph; “I could have sworn -that was the old man coming along to meet us; cut of his coat, gaiters -and everything.”</p> - -<p>“You can’t be well, old fellow, there is nobody.”</p> - -<p>“I know that as well as you,” said Ralph, with a nervous laugh. “Do you -think I meant I saw anything? Not such a fool; no, dear old man, I -didn’t see him; I wish I could, just to tell him one or two things about -the beasts which he was keen about. I don’t think that old fellow would -be happy, Bertram, in a fluid, a sort of a place like a star, for -instance, where there were no beasts.”</p> - -<p>“There’s no reason to suppose they’re fluid. And for that matter there -may be beasts, as some people think; only I don’t see, if you<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_039" id="page_039"></a>{39}</span> take in -that, where you are to stop,” said Bertram. “We are drawing it too fine, -Wradisley, don’t you think?”</p> - -<p>“Perhaps we are, it’s not my line of country. I wish you had known that -old man. You’re a fellow that makes out things, Bertram. He was quite -comfortable—lots of books, and that museum which wasn’t much of a -museum, but he knew no better. Besides, there were a few good things in -it. And enough of money to keep him all right. And then to think, Lord, -that because of a fool of a fellow who was never out of hot water, -always getting his father into hot water, never at peace, that good old -man should go and break his heart, as they call it, and die.”</p> - -<p>“It may be very unreasonable, but it happens from time to time,” Bertram -said.</p> - -<p>“By Jove, it is unreasonable! An old man that was really worth coming -back to—and now he’s clean swept away, and some baggage of a woman, -probably no good, in his place, to turn Lucy’s head, and perhaps<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_040" id="page_040"></a>{40}</span> bring -us all to sixes and sevens, for anything I know.”</p> - -<p>“Why should you suppose so? There seems nothing but good in the lady, -except that she is a stranger. So am I a stranger. You might as well -believe that I should bring you to sixes and sevens. You’re not well -to-night, old fellow. You have got too much nonsense in your head.”</p> - -<p>“I suppose that’s it—a touch of fever,” said the other. “I’ll take some -quinine when I go home to-night.” And with that wise resolution he drew -up, having come back to the point from which they started, to wait for -his sister at Mrs. Nugent’s door.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_041" id="page_041"></a>{41}</span></p> - -<h2><a name="CHAPTER_III" id="CHAPTER_III"></a>CHAPTER III.</h2> - -<p><span class="smcap">The</span> door of the little house was standing open when they drew up at the -gate. It was a door at the side round the corner from the veranda, but -with a porch which seemed to continue it. It was full of light from -within, against which Lucy’s figure stood dark. She was so much afraid -to keep the gentlemen waiting that she had come out there to be ready, -and was speaking her last words with her friend in the porch. Their -voices sounded soft, almost musical, through the dusk and the fresh air; -though, indeed, it was chiefly Lucy who was speaking. The men did not -hear what she said, they even smiled a little, at least Bertram did, at -the habit of the women who had always so much to say to each other about -nothing; and who,<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_042" id="page_042"></a>{42}</span> though they had perhaps met before more than once -that day, had still matter to murmur about down to the very last moment -by the opening of the door. It went on indeed for two or three minutes -while they stood there, notwithstanding that Lucy had cried, “Oh, there -they are! I must go,” at the first appearance of the tall shadows on the -road. She was pleading with her friend to come up to the hall next day, -which was the reason of the delay.</p> - -<p>“Oh, Nelly, do come—to-morrow is an off day—they are not going to -shoot. And I so want you to see Raaf; oh, I know he is not much to -see—that’s him, the tallest one. He has a huge beard. You’ll perhaps -think he’s not very intellectual or that sort of thing; but he’s our -Raaf—he’s mother’s Raaf—and you’re so fond of mother. And if I brought -him to see you he would be shy and gauche. Do come, do come, to-morrow, -Nelly; mother is so anxious you should come in good time.”</p> - -<p>Then the gentlemen, though they did not hear this, were aware of a new -voice breaking<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_043" id="page_043"></a>{43}</span> in—a small, sweet treble, a child’s voice—crying, “Me -too, me too!”</p> - -<p>“Yes, you too, Tiny; we always want you. Won’t you come when Tiny wishes -it, Nelly? You always give in to Tiny.”</p> - -<p>“Me come now,” shouted Tiny, “see gemplemans; me come now.”</p> - -<p>Then there was a little scuffle and laughing commotion at the open door; -the little voice loud, then others hushing it, and suddenly there came -flying down the bank something white, a little fluttering line of -whiteness upon the dark. The child flew with childish delight making its -escape, while there was first a startled cry from the doorway, and then -Lucy followed in pursuit. But the little thing, shouting and laughing, -with the rush of infantile velocity, short-lived but swift, got to the -bottom of the bank in a rush, and would have tripped herself up in her -speed upon the fastening of the gate had not Bertram, coming a step -forward, quickly caught her in his arms. There was not much light to see -the child by—the little face like a flower; the waving hair and shining -eyes.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_044" id="page_044"></a>{44}</span> The little thing was full of laughter and delight in her small -escapade. “Me see gemplemans, me see gemplemans,” she said. Bertram -lifted her up, holding her small waist firm in his two hands.</p> - -<p>And then there came a change over Tiny. She became silent all at once, -though without shrinking from the dark face up to which she was lifted. -She did not twist in his grasp as children do, or struggle to be put -down. She became quite still, drew a long breath, and fixed her eyes -upon him, her little lips apart, her face intent. It was only the effect -of a shyness which from time to time crept over Tiny, who was not -usually shy; but it impressed the man very much who held her, himself -quite silent for a moment, which seemed long to both, though it was -scarcely appreciable in time, until Lucy reached the group, and with a -cry of “Oh, Tiny, you naughty little girl!” restored man and child to -the commonplace. Then the little girl wriggled down out of the -stranger’s grasp, and stole her hand into the more familiar one<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_045" id="page_045"></a>{45}</span> of -Lucy. She kept her eyes, however, fixed upon her first captor.</p> - -<p>“Oh, Tiny,” cried Lucy, “what will the gentleman think of you—such a -bold little girl—to run away from mamma, and get your death of cold, -and give that kind gentleman the trouble of catching you. Oh, Tiny, -Tiny!”</p> - -<p>“Me go back to mummie now,” Tiny said, turning her back upon them. It -was unusual for this little thing, whom everybody petted, to be so -subdued.</p> - -<p>“You have both beards,” cried Lucy, calling over her shoulder to her -brother and his friend, as she led the child back. “She is frightened of -you; but they are not bad gemplemans, Tiny, they are nice gemplemans. -Oh, nurse, here she is, safe and sound.”</p> - -<p>“Me not frightened,” Tiny said, and she turned round in the grip of the -nurse, who had now seized upon her, and kissed her little hand. -“Dood-night, gemplemans,” Tiny cried. The little voice came shrill and -clear through the night air, tinkling in the<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_046" id="page_046"></a>{46}</span> smallness of the sound, -yet gracious as a princess; and the small incident was over. It was -nothing at all; the simplest little incident in the world. And then Lucy -took up her little strain, breathless with her rush, laughing and -explaining.</p> - -<p>“Tiny dearly loves a little escapade; she is the liveliest little thing! -She has no other children to play with, and she is not afraid of -anybody. She is always with her mother, you know, and hears us talk of -everything.”</p> - -<p>“Very bad training for a child,” said Ralph, “to hear all your scandal -and gossip over your tea.”</p> - -<p>“Oh, Ralph, how common, how old fashioned you are!” cried Lucy, -indignantly. “Do you think Mrs. Nugent talks scandal over her tea? or -I—? I have been trying to make her promise to come up to lunch -to-morrow, and then you shall see—that is, if she comes; for she was -not at all sure whether she would come. She is not fond of strangers. -She never will come to us when we have people—that is, not chance -people—unless she knows them beforehand.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_047" id="page_047"></a>{47}</span> Oh, you, of course, my -brother, that’s a different thing. I am sure I beg your pardon, Mr. -Bertram, for making you wait, and for seeming to imply—and then Tiny -rushing at you in that way.”</p> - -<p>“Tiny made a very sweet little episode in our walk,” said Bertram. -“Please don’t apologize. I am fond of children, and the little thing -gave me a look; children are strange creatures, they’re only half of -this world, I think. She looked—as if somehow she and I had met -before.”</p> - -<p>“Have you, Mr. Bertram? did you perhaps know—her mother?” cried Lucy, -in great surprise.</p> - -<p>“It is very unlikely; I knew some Nugents once, but they were old people -without any children, at least—No, I’ve been too long in the waste -places of the earth ever to have rubbed shoulders with this baby; -besides,” he said, with a laugh, “if there was any recognition, it was -she who recognized me.”</p> - -<p>“You are talking greater nonsense than I was doing, Bertram,” said -Ralph. “We’re<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_048" id="page_048"></a>{48}</span> both out of sorts, I should think. These damp English -nights take all the starch out of one. Come, let’s get home. You shan’t -bring us out again after sunset, Lucy, I promise you that.”</p> - -<p>“Oh, sunset is not a bad time here,” cried Lucy; “it’s a beautiful time; -it is only in your warm countries that it is bad. Besides, it’s long -after sunset; it’s almost night and no moon for an hour yet. That’s the -chief thing I like going to town for, that it is never dark like this at -night. I love the lamps—don’t you, Mr. Bertram?—there is such company -in them; even the cottage windows are nice, and <i>that</i> ‘Red Lion’—one -wishes that a public-house was not such a very bad thing, for it looks -so ruddy and so warm. I don’t wonder the men like it; I should myself, -if—Oh, take care! there is a very wet corner there, just before you -come to our gates. Why, there is some one coming out. Why—it’s -Reginald, Raaf!”</p> - -<p>They were met, in the act of opening the gate, by Mr. Wradisley’s slim, -unmistakable figure. He had an equally slim umbrella,<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_049" id="page_049"></a>{49}</span> beautifully -rolled up, in his hand, and walked as if the damp country road were -covered with velvet.</p> - -<p>“Oh, you are coming back,” he said; “it’s a fine night for a walk, don’t -you think so?—well, not after Africa, perhaps; but we are used in -England to like these soft, grey skies and the feeling of—well, of dew -and coolness in the air.”</p> - -<p>“I call it damp and mud,” said Ralph, with an explosion of a laugh which -seemed somehow to be an explosion <i>manqué</i>, as if the damp had got into -that too.</p> - -<p>“Ah,” said his brother, reflectively. “Well it is rather a brutal way of -judging, but perhaps you are right. I am going to take a <i>giro</i> round -the common. We shall meet at dinner.” And then he took off his hat to -Lucy, and with a nod to Bertram went on. There was an involuntary pause -among the three to watch him walking along the damp road—in which they -had themselves encountered occasional puddles—as if a carpet had been -spread underneath his dainty feet.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_050" id="page_050"></a>{50}</span></p> - -<p>“Is this Rege’s way?” said Ralph. “It’s an odd thing for him -surely—going out to walk now. He never would wet his feet any more than -a cat. What is he doing out at night in the dark, a damp night, bad for -his throat. Does my mother know?”</p> - -<p>“Oh,” said Lucy, with a curious confusion; “why shouldn’t he go now, if -he likes! It isn’t cold, it’s not so very damp, and Reginald’s an -Englishman, and isn’t afraid of a bit of damp or a wet road. You are so -hard to please. You are finding fault with everybody, Raaf.”</p> - -<p>“Am I?” he said. “Perhaps I am. I’ve grown a brute, being so much away.”</p> - -<p>“Oh, Raaf, I didn’t mean that. Reginald has—his own ways. Don’t you -know, we never ask what he means, mother and I. He always means just -what’s the right thing, don’t you know. It is a very nice time to—to -take a <i>giro</i>; look how the sky’s beginning to break there out of the -clouds. I always like an evening walk; so did mother when she was strong -enough. And then Reginald has such a feeling for art. He always says<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_051" id="page_051"></a>{51}</span> -the village is so pretty with the lights in the windows, and the sweep -of the fresh air on the common—and—and all that.”</p> - -<p>“Just so, Lucy,” said Ralph.</p> - -<p>She gave him a little anxious look, but she could not see the expression -of his face in the darkness, any more than he could see what a wistful -and wondering look was in her eyes. Bertram, looking on, formed his own -conclusions, which were as little right as a stranger’s conclusions upon -a drama of family life suddenly brought before his eyes generally are. -He thought that this correct and immaculate Mr. Wradisley had tastes -known to his family, or at least to the ladies of his family, which were -not so spotless as he appeared to be; or that there was something going -on at this particular moment which contradicted the law of propriety and -good order which was his nature. Was it a village amour? Was it some -secret hanging over the house? There was a little agitation, he thought, -in Lucy, and surprise in the brother, who was a stranger to all the ways -of his own family, and evidently had a half-hostile feeling<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_052" id="page_052"></a>{52}</span> toward his -elder. But the conversation became more easy as they went along, -emerging from under the shadow of the trees and crossing the openings of -the park. The great house came in sight as they went on, a solid mass -amid all its surrounding of shrubbery and flower gardens, with the -distance stretching clear on one side, and lights in many windows. It -looked a centre of life and substantial, steadfast security, as if it -might last out all the changes of fortune, and could never be affected -by those vicissitudes which pull down one and set up another. Bertram -could fancy that it had stood like a rock while many tempests swept the -country. The individual might come and go, but this habitation was that -of the race. And it was absurd to think that the little surprise of -meeting its master on his way into the village late on an October -evening, could have anything to do with the happiness of the family or -its security. Bertram said to himself that his nerves were a little -shaken to-night, he could not tell how. It was perhaps because of -something visionary in this way of walking about<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_053" id="page_053"></a>{53}</span> an unknown place in -the dark, and hearing of so many people like shadows moving in a world -undiscovered. The old doctor, for example, whose image was so clear -before his companion, that he could almost think he saw him, so clear -that even to himself, a stranger, that old man had almost appeared; but -more than anything else because of the child who, caught in her most -sportive mood, had suddenly grown quiet in his arms, and given him that -look, with eyes unknown, which he too could have sworn he knew. There -were strange things in his own life that gave him cause to think. Was it -not this that made him conscious of mystery and some disturbing -influence in the family which he did not know, but which had received -him as if he had been an absent brother too?</p> - -<p>To see Mrs. Wradisley was, however, to send any thought of mystery or -family trouble out of any one’s mind. The lamps were lit in the -drawing-room when they all went in, a little dazzled by the -illumination, from the soft dark of the night. She was sitting where -they had left her, in the warmth<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_054" id="page_054"></a>{54}</span> of the home atmosphere, so softly -lighted, so quietly bright. Her white knitting lay on her knee. She had -the evening paper in her hand, which had just come in; for it was one of -the advantages of Wradisbury that, though so completely in the country, -they were near enough to town to have an evening post. Mrs. Wradisley -liked her evening paper. It was, it is true, not a late edition, perhaps -in point of fact not much later than the <i>Times</i> of the morning—but she -preferred it. It was her little private pleasure in the evening, when -Lucy was perhaps out, or occupied with her friends, and Mr. Wradisley in -his library. She nodded at them over her paper, with a smile, as they -came in.</p> - -<p>“I hope it is a fine night, and that you have had a pleasant walk, Mr. -Bertram,” she said.</p> - -<p>“And is she coming, Lucy?”</p> - -<p>“I could not get her to promise, mother,” Lucy said.</p> - -<p>“Oh, well, we must not press her. If she were not a little willful -perhaps we should not like her so much,” said Mrs. Wradisley, returning -to her journal. And how warm it<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_055" id="page_055"></a>{55}</span> was! but not too warm. How light it -was! but not too bright.</p> - -<p>“Come and sit here, Raaf. I like to see you and make sure that you are -there; but you need not talk to me unless you wish to,” the mother said. -She was not exacting. There was nothing wrong in the house, no anxiety -nor alarm; nothing but family tranquility and peace.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_056" id="page_056"></a>{56}</span></p> - -<h2><a name="CHAPTER_IV" id="CHAPTER_IV"></a>CHAPTER IV.</h2> - -<p><span class="smcap">The</span> little house called Greenbank was like a hundred other little houses -in the country, the superior houses of the village, the homes of small -people with small incomes, who still are ladies and gentlemen, the -equals of those in the hall, not those in the cottage. The drawing-room -was darkened in the winter days by the veranda, which was very desirable -and pleasant in the summer, and chilled a little by the windows which -opened to the floor on a level with the little terrace on which the -house stood. It looked most comfortable and bright in the evening when -the lamps were lighted and there was a good fire and the curtains were -drawn. Mrs. Nugent was considered to have made a great difference in the -house since the doctor’s time.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_057" id="page_057"></a>{57}</span> His heavy, old furniture was still in -the dining-room, and indeed, more or less, throughout the rooms; but -chintz or cretonne and appropriate draperies go a long way, according to -the taste of the time. The new resident had been moderate and had not -overdone it; she had not piled the stuffs and ornaments of Liberty into -the old-fashioned house, but she had brightened the whole in a way which -was less commonplace. Tiny was perhaps the great ornament of all—Tiny -and indeed herself, a young woman not more than thirty, in the fulness -of her best time, with a little dignity, which became her isolated -position and her widowhood, and showed that, as the ladies in the -neighborhood said, she was fully able to take care of herself. He would -have been a bold man indeed who would have been rude or, what was more -dangerous, overkind to Mrs. Nugent. She was one of those women, who, as -it is common to say, keep people in their place. She was very gracious, -very kind; but either she never forgot that she was alone and needed to -be especially circumspect, or else it was her<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_058" id="page_058"></a>{58}</span> nature always to hold -back a little, to be above impulse. I think this last was the case; for -to be always on one’s guard is painful, and betrays a suspicion of -others or doubt of one’s self, and neither of these was in Mrs. Nugent’s -mind. She liked society, and she did not shut herself out from the kind -people who had adopted her, though she did not bring introductions or -make any appeal to their kindness. There was no reason why she should -shut them out; but she was not one who much frequented her neighbors’ -houses. She was always to be found in her own, with her little girl at -her knee. Tiny was a little spoiled, perhaps, or so the ladies who had -nurseries and many children to regulate, thought. She was only five, yet -she sat up till eight, and had her bread-and-milk when her mother had -her small dinner, at the little round table before the dining-room fire. -Some of the ladies had even said to Mrs. Nugent that this was a -self-indulgence on her part, and bad for the child; but, if so, she did -not mind, but went<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_059" id="page_059"></a>{59}</span> on with the custom, which it was evident, for the -moment did Tiny no harm.</p> - -<p>The excitement of Tiny’s escapade had been got over, and the child was -sitting on the carpet in the firelight playing with her doll and singing -to herself. She was always singing to herself or to the waxen companion -in her arms, which was pale with much exposure to the heat of the fire. -Tiny had a little tune which was quite different from the little -snatches of song which she picked up from every one—from the butcher’s -boy and the postman and the maids in the kitchen, as well as from her -mother’s performances. The child was all ear, and sang everything, -whatever she heard. But besides all this she had her own little tune, in -which she kept singing sometimes the same words over and over again, -sometimes her dialogues with her doll, sometimes scraps of what she -heard from others, odds and ends of the conversation going on over her -head. It was the prettiest domestic scene, the child sitting in front of -the fire, in the light of the cheerful blaze, undressing her doll, -hushing it in her<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_060" id="page_060"></a>{60}</span> arms, going through all the baby routine with which -she was so familiar, singing, talking, cooing to the imaginary baby in -her arms, while the pretty young mother sat at the side of the hearth, -with the little table and work-basket overflowing with the fine muslin -and bits of lace, making one of Tiny’s pretty frocks or pinafores, which -was her chief occupation. Sometimes Tiny’s monologue was broken by a -word from her mother; but sewing is a silent occupation when it is -pursued by a woman alone, and generally Mrs. Nugent said nothing more -than a word from time to time, while the child’s little voice ran on. -Was there something wanting to the little bright fireside—the man to -come in from his work, the woman’s husband, the child’s father? But it -was too small, too feminine a place for a man. One could not have said -where he would sit, what he would do—there seemed no place for him, if -such a man there had been.</p> - -<p>Nevertheless a place was made for Mr. Wradisley when he came in, as he -did immediately, announced by the smart little<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_061" id="page_061"></a>{61}</span> maid, carrying his hat -in his hand. A chair was got for him out of the glow of the firelight, -which affected his eyes. He made a little apology for coming so late.</p> - -<p>“But I have a liking for the twilight; I love the park in the dusk; and -as you have been so good as to let me in once or twice, and in the -confidence that when I am intrusive you will send me away—”</p> - -<p>“If you had come a little sooner,” said Mrs. Nugent, in a frank, full -voice, different from her low tones, “you might have taken care of Lucy, -who ran in to see me.”</p> - -<p>“Lucy was well accompanied,” said her brother; “besides, a walk is no -walk unless one is alone; and the great pleasure of a conversation, if -you will allow me to say so, is doubled when there are but two to talk. -I know all Lucy’s opinions, and she,” he said, pausing with a smile, as -if there was something ridiculous in the idea, “knows, or at least -thinks she knows, mine.”</p> - -<p>“She knows more than she has generally credit for,” said Mrs. Nugent; -“but your<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_062" id="page_062"></a>{62}</span> brother was with her. It has pleased her so much to have him -back.”</p> - -<p>“Raaf? yes. He has been so long away, it is like a stranger come to the -house. He has forgotten the old shibboleths, and it takes one a little -time to pick up his new ones. He is a man of the desert.”</p> - -<p>“Perhaps he has no shibboleths at all.”</p> - -<p>“Oh, don’t believe that! I have always found the more unconventional a -man is supposed to be, the furthest from our cut-and-dry systems, the -more conventional he really is. We are preserved by the understood -routine, and keep our independence underneath; but those who have to -make new laws for themselves are pervaded by them. The new, uneasy code -is on their very soul.”</p> - -<p>He spoke with a little warmth—unusual to him—almost excitement, his -correct, calm tone quickening. Then he resumed his ordinary note.</p> - -<p>“I hope,” he said, with a keen look at her, “that poor Raaf made a -favorable impression upon you.”</p> - -<p>Her head was bent over her needlework,<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_063" id="page_063"></a>{63}</span> which she had gone on with, not -interrupting her occupation.</p> - -<p>“I did not see him,” she said. “Lucy ran in by herself; they waited for -her, I believe, at the door.”</p> - -<p>“Me see gemplemans,” sang Tiny, at his feet, making him start. She went -on with her little song, repeating the words, “Dolly, such nice -gemplemans. Give Dolly ride on’s shoulder ’nother time.”</p> - -<p>And then Mrs. Nugent laughed, and told the story of Tiny’s escapade. It -jarred somehow on the visitor. He did not know what to make of Tiny; her -little breaks into the conversation, the chant that could not be taken -for remark or criticism, and yet was so, kept him in a continual fret; -but he tried to smile.</p> - -<p>“My brother,” he said, “is the kind of primitive man who, I believe, -pleases children—and dogs and primitive creatures generally—I—I beg -your pardon, Mrs. Nugent.”</p> - -<p>“No; why should you?” She dropped her work on her knee and looked up at -him with a laugh. “Tiny is quite a primitive<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_064" id="page_064"></a>{64}</span> creature. She likes what -is kind and big and takes her up with firm hands. That is how I have -always explained the pleasure infants take often in men. They are only -accustomed to us women about them; but they almost invariably turn from -us poor small things and rejoice in the hold of a man—when he’s not -frightened for them,” she added, taking up her work again.</p> - -<p>“As most men are, however,” Mr. Wradisley said.</p> - -<p>“Yes; that is our salvation. It would be too humiliating to think the -little things preferred the look of a man. I have always thought it was -the strength of his grasp.”</p> - -<p>“We shall shortly have to give in to the ladies even in that, they say,” -Mr. Wradisley went on, with relief in the changed subject. “Those tall -girls—while we, it appears, are growing no taller, or perhaps -dwindling—I am sure you, who are so womanly in everything, don’t -approve of that.”</p> - -<p>“Of tall girls? oh, why not? It is not their fault to be tall. It is -very nice for them to be tall. I am delighted with my tall<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_065" id="page_065"></a>{65}</span> maid; she -can reach things I have to get up on a chair for, and it is not -dignified getting up on a chair. And she even snatches up Tiny before -she has time to struggle or remonstrate.”</p> - -<p>“Tiny,” said Mr. Wradisley, with a little wave of his hand, “is the -be-all and end-all, I know; no one can hope to beguile your thoughts -from that point.”</p> - -<p>Mrs. Nugent looked up at him quickly with surprise, holding her work -suspended in her hand.</p> - -<p>“Do you think it is quite right,” he said, “or just to the rest of the -world? A child is much, but still only a child; and here are you, a -noble, perfect woman, with many greater capabilities. I do not flatter; -you must know that you are not like other women—gossips, triflers, -foolish persons—”</p> - -<p>“Or even as this publican,” said Mrs. Nugent, who had kept her eyes on -him all the time, which had made him nervous, yet gave him a kind of -inspiration. “I give alms of all I possess—I—Mr. Wradisley, do you -really think this is the kind of<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_066" id="page_066"></a>{66}</span> argument which you would like a woman -whom you profess to respect to adopt?”</p> - -<p>“Oh, you twist what I say. I am conscious of the same thing myself, -though I am, I hope, no Pharisee. To partly give up what was meant for -mankind—will that please you better?—to a mere child—”</p> - -<p>“You must not say such thing over Tiny’s head, Mr. Wradisley. She -understands a great deal. If she were not so intent upon this most -elaborate part of Dolly’s toilet for the night—”</p> - -<p>“Mrs. Nugent, could not that spectator for one moment be removed?—could -not I speak to you—if it were but for a minute—alone?”</p> - -<p>She looked at him again, this time putting down the needle-work with a -disturbed air.</p> - -<p>“I wish to hear nothing, from any one, Mr. Wradisley, which she cannot -hear.”</p> - -<p>“Not if I implored for one moment?”</p> - -<p>His eyes, which were dull by nature, had become hot and shining, his -colorless face was flushed; he was so reticent, so calm, that the -swelling of something new within him<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_067" id="page_067"></a>{67}</span> took a form that was alarming. He -turned round his hat in his hands as if it were some mystic implement of -fate. She hesitated, and cast a glance round her at all the comfort of -the little room, as if her shelter had suddenly been endangered, and the -walls of her house were going to fall about her ears. Tiny all the time -was very busy with her doll. She had arranged its nightgown, settled -every button, tied every string, and now, holding it against her little -bosom, singing to it, got up to put it to bed. “Mammy’s darling,” said -Tiny, “everything as mammy has—dood dolly, dood dolly. Dolly go to -bed.”</p> - -<p>Both the man and the woman sat watching her as she performed this little -ceremony. Dolly’s bed was on a sofa, carefully arranged with a cushion -and coverlet. Tiny laid the doll down, listened, made as if she heard a -little cry, bent over the mimic baby, soothing and quieting. Then she -turned round to the spectators, holding up a little finger. “Gone to -sleep,” said Tiny in a whisper. “Hush,<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_068" id="page_068"></a>{68}</span> hush—dolly not well, not twite -well—me go and ask nursie what she sinks.”</p> - -<p>The child went out on tip-toe, making urgent little gesticulations that -the others might keep silence. There was a momentary hush; she had left -the door ajar, but Mr. Wradisley did not think of that. He looked with a -nervous glance at the doll on the sofa, which seemed to him like another -child laid there to watch.</p> - -<p>“Mrs. Nugent,” he said at last, “you must know what I mean. I never -thought this great moment of my life would come thus, as if it were a -boy’s secret, to be kept from a child!—but you know; I have tried to -make it very clear. You are the only woman in the world—I want you to -be my wife.”</p> - -<p>“Mr. Wradisley—God help me—I have tried to make another thing still -more clear, that I can never more be any one’s wife.”</p> - -<p>She clasped her hands and looked at him as if it were she who was the -supplicant.</p> - -<p>He, having delivered himself, became more calm; he regained his -confidence in himself.</p> - -<p>“I am very much in earnest,” he said;<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_069" id="page_069"></a>{69}</span> “don’t think it is lightly said. -I have known since the first moment I saw you, but I have not yielded to -any impulse. It has grown into my whole being; I accept Tiny and -everything. I don’t offer you any other inducements, for you are above -them. You know a little what I am, but I will change my very nature to -please you. Be my wife.”</p> - -<p>She rose up, the tears came in a flood to her eyes.</p> - -<p>“Be content,” she said; “it is impossible, it is impossible. Don’t ask -me any more, oh, for God’s sake don’t ask me any more, neither you nor -any man. I would thank you if I could, but it is too dreadful. For the -love of heaven, let this be final and go away.”</p> - -<p>“I cannot go away with such an answer. I have startled you, though I -hoped not to do so. You are agitated, you have some false notions, as -women have, of loving only once. Mrs. Nugent—”</p> - -<p>She crossed the room precipitately in front of him as he approached -toward her, and closing the door, stood holding it with her hand.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_070" id="page_070"></a>{70}</span></p> - -<p>“I could explain in a word,” she said, “but do not force me to -explain—it would be too hard; it is impossible, only understand that. -Here is my child coming back, who must not indeed hear this. I will give -you my hand and say farewell, and you will never think of me again.”</p> - -<p>“That is the thing that is impossible,” he said.</p> - -<p>Tiny was singing at the door, beating against it. What an interruption -for a tale—and such a love tale as his! Mr. Wradisley was terribly -jarred in all his nerves. He was more vexed even than disappointed; he -could not acknowledge himself disappointed. It was the child, the -surprise, the shock of admitting for the first time such an idea; he -would not believe it was anything else, not even when she held open the -door for him with what in any other circumstances would have been an -affront, sending him away. The child got between them somehow with her -little song. “Dood-night, dood-night,” said Tiny. “Come again anodder -day,” holding her mother’s dress with one hand, and<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_071" id="page_071"></a>{71}</span> with the other -waving to him her little farewell, as was her way.</p> - -<p>He made a step or two across the little hall, and then came back. -“Promise me that you will let this make no difference, that you will -come to-morrow, that I shall see you again,” he said.</p> - -<p>“No, no; let it be over, let it be over!” she cried.</p> - -<p>“You will come to-morrow? I will not speak to you if I must not; but -make no difference. Promise that, and I will go away.”</p> - -<p>“I will come to-morrow,” she said. “Good-by.”</p> - -<p>The maid was standing behind him to close the outer door. Did that -account for the softening of her tone? or had she begun already to see -that nothing was impossible—that her foolish, womanish prejudice about -a dead husband could never stand in the way of a love like his? Mr. -Wradisley’s heart was beating in his ears, as he went down the bank, as -it had never done before. He had come in great excitement, but it was -with much greater excitement that he was going<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_072" id="page_072"></a>{72}</span> away. When the maid came -running after him that laboring heart stood still for an instant. He -thought he was recalled, and that everything was to be as he desired; he -felt even a slight regret in the joy of being recalled so soon. It would -have been even better had she taken longer to think of it. But it was -only his umbrella which he had forgotten. Mr. Wradisley to forget his -umbrella! That showed indeed the pass to which the man had come.</p> - -<p>It was quite dark now, and the one or two rare passers-by that he met on -the way passed him like ghosts, yet turned their heads toward him -suspiciously, wondering who he was. They were villagers unwillingly out -in the night upon business of their own; they divined a gentleman, -though it was too dark to see him, and wondered who the soft-footed, -slim figure could be, no one imagining for a moment who it really was. -And yet he had already made two or three pilgrimages like this to visit -the lady who for the first time in his life had made the sublime Mr. -Wradisley a suitor. He felt, as he<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_073" id="page_073"></a>{73}</span> opened softly his own gate, that it -was a thing that must not be repeated; but yet that it was in its way -natural and seemly that his suit should not be precisely like that of an -ordinary man. Henceforward it could be conducted in a different way, now -that she was aware of his feelings without the cognizance of any other -person. If it could be possible that her prejudices or caprice should -hold out, nobody need be the wiser. But he did not believe that this -would be the case. She had been startled, let it even be said shocked, -to have discovered that she was loved, and by such a man as himself. -There was even humility—the sweetest womanly quality—in her conviction -that it was impossible, impossible that she, with no first love to give -him, should be sought by him. But this would not stand the reflection of -a propitious night, of a new day.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_074" id="page_074"></a>{74}</span></p> - -<h2><a name="CHAPTER_V" id="CHAPTER_V"></a>CHAPTER V.</h2> - -<p><span class="smcap">The</span> dinner was quite a cheerful meal at Wradisbury that night. The -master of the house was exactly as he always was. Punctilious in every -kindness and politeness, perfect in his behavior. To see him take his -mother in as he always did, as if she were the queen, and place her in -her own chair, where she had presided at the head of that table for over -forty years, was in itself a sight. He was the king regnant escorting a -queen dowager—a queen mother, not exactly there by personal right, but -by conscious delegation, yet supreme naturalness and reverence, from -him. He liked to put her in her place. Except on occasions when there -were guests he had always done it since the day of his father’s death, -with a sort of<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_075" id="page_075"></a>{75}</span> ceremony as showing how he gave her all honor though -this supreme position was no longer her absolute due. He led her in with -special tenderness to-night. It perhaps might not last long, this reign -of hers. Another and a brighter figure was already chosen for that -place, but as long as the mother was in it, the honor shown to her -should be special, above even ordinary respect. I think Ralph was a -little fretted by this show of reverence. Perhaps, with that subtle -understanding of each other which people have in a family, even when -they reach the extreme of personal difference or almost alienation, he -knew what was in his brother’s mind, and resented the consciousness of -conferring honor which moved Reginald. In Ralph’s house (or so he -thought) the mother would rule without any show of derived power. It -would be her own, not a grace conferred; but though he chafed he was -silent, for it was very certain that there was not an exception to be -taken, not a word to say. It is possible that Mrs. Wradisley was aware -of it too, but she liked<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_076" id="page_076"></a>{76}</span> it, liked her son’s magnanimous giving up to -her of all the privileges which had for so long been hers. Many men -would not have done that. They would have liked their houses to -themselves; but Reginald had always been a model son. She was not in any -way an exacting woman, and when she turned to her second son, come back -in peace after so many wanderings, her heart overflowed with content. -She was the only one in the party who was not aware that the master of -the house had left his library in the darkening. The servants about the -table all knew, and had formed a wonderfully close guess as to what was -“up,” as they said, and Lucy knew with a great commotion and trouble of -her thoughts, wondering, not knowing if she were sorry or glad, looking -very wistfully at her brother to see if he had been fortunate or -otherwise. Was it possible that Nelly Nugent might be her sister, and -sit in her mother’s place? Oh, it would be delightful, it would be -dreadful! For how would mamma take it to be dethroned? And then if Nelly -would not, poor Reginald! Lucy watched him<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_077" id="page_077"></a>{77}</span> covertly, and could scarcely -contain herself. Ralph and Mr. Bertram, I fear, did not think of Mrs. -Nugent, but of something less creditable to Mr. Wradisley. The mother -was the only one to whom any breach in his usual habits remained -unknown.</p> - -<p>“You really mean to have this garden party to-morrow, mother?” he said.</p> - -<p>“Oh, yes, my dear, it is all arranged—the last, the very last of the -season. Not so much a garden party as a sort of farewell to summer -before your shooting parties arrive. We are so late this year. The -harvest has been so late,” Mrs. Wradisley said, turning toward Bertram. -“St. Swithin, you know, was in full force this year, and some of the -corn was still out when the month began. But the weather lately has been -so fine. There was a little rain this morning, but still the weather has -been quite remarkable. I am glad you came in time for our little -gathering, for Raaf will see a number of old friends, and you, I hope, -some of the nicest people about.”</p> - -<p>“I suspect I must have seen the nicest<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_078" id="page_078"></a>{78}</span> people already,” said Bertram, -with a laugh and a bow.</p> - -<p>“Oh, that is a very kind thing to say, Mr. Bertram, and, indeed, I am -very glad that Raaf’s friend should like his people. But no, you will -see some very superior people to-morrow. Lord Dulham was once a Cabinet -Minister, and Colonel Knox has seen an immense deal of service in -different parts of the world; not to speak of Mr. Sergeant—Geoffrey -Sergeant, you know, who is so well known in the literary world—but I -don’t know whether you care for people who write,” Mrs. Wradisley said.</p> - -<p>“He writes himself,” said Ralph, out of his beard. “Letters half a mile -long, and leaders, and all sorts of things. If we don’t look out he’ll -have us all in.”</p> - -<p>The other members of the party looked at Bertram with alarm. Mr. -Wradisley with a certain half resentment, half disgust.</p> - -<p>“Indeed,” he said; “I thought I had been so fortunate as to discover for -myself a most intelligent critic—but evidently I ought to have known.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_079" id="page_079"></a>{79}</span>”</p> - -<p>“Don’t say that,” said Bertram, “indeed I’m not here on false pretenses. -I’m not a literary man afloat on the world, or making notes. Only a -humble newspaper correspondent, Mrs. Wradisley, and only that when it -happens to suit me, as your son knows.”</p> - -<p>“Oh, I am sure we are very highly honored,” said the lady, disturbed, -“only Raaf, you should have told me, or I might have said something -disagreeable about literary people, and that would have been so very—I -assure you we are all quite proud of Mr. Sergeant, and still more, Mr. -Bertram, to have some one to meet him whom he will—whom he is sure -to—”</p> - -<p>“You might have said he was a queer fish. I think he is,” said Bertram, -“but don’t suppose he knows me, or any of my sort. Raaf is only playing -you a trick. I wrote something about Africa, that’s all. When one is -knocking about the world for years without endless money to spend, -anything to put a penny in one’s purse is good. But I can<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_080" id="page_080"></a>{80}</span>’t write a -bit—except a report about Africa,” he added, hurriedly.</p> - -<p>“Oh, about Africa,” Mrs. Wradisley said, with an expression of greater -ease, and there was a little relief in the mind of the family generally. -Bertram seized the opportunity to plunge into talk about Africa and the -big game, drawing Ralph subtly into the conversation. It was not easy to -get Ralph set a-going, but when he was so, there was found to be much in -him wanting expression, and the stranger escaped under shelter of -adventures naturally more interesting to the family than any he had to -tell. He laughed a little to himself over it as the talk flowed on, and -left him with not much pride in the literary profession, which he had in -fact only played with, but which had inspired him at moments with a -little content in what he did too. These good folk, who were intelligent -enough, would have been a little afraid of him, not merely gratified by -his acquaintance, had he been really a writer of books. They were much -more at their ease to think him only a sportsman like Ralph, and a -gentleman<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_081" id="page_081"></a>{81}</span> at large. When they went into the drawing-room afterwards, -the conversation came back to the party of to-morrow, and to the pretty -widow in the cottage, of whom Mrs. Wradisley began to talk, saying they -would leave the flowers till Mrs. Nugent came, who was so great in -decoration.</p> - -<p>“I thought,” said Ralph, “this widow of yours—was not to be here.”</p> - -<p>Mr. Wradisley interposed at this point from where he stood, with his -back to the fire. “Ah,” he said, “oh,” with a clearing of his throat, “I -happened to see Mrs. Nugent in the village to-day, and I certainly -understood from her that she would be here.”</p> - -<p>“You saw her—after I did, Reginald?” said Lucy, in spite of herself.</p> - -<p>“Now, how can you say anything so absurd, Lucy—when you saw her just -before dinner, and Reginald could only have seen her in the morning, for -he never goes out late,” Mrs. Wradisley said.</p> - -<p>Bertram felt that he was a conspirator. He gave a furtive glance at the -others who<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_082" id="page_082"></a>{82}</span> knew different. He could see that Lucy grew scarlet, but not -a word was said.</p> - -<p>“You are mistaken, mother,” said Mr. Wradisley, with his calm voice, “I -sometimes do take a little <i>giro</i> in the evening.”</p> - -<p>“Oh, a <i>giro</i>;” said his mother, as if that altered the matter; -“however,” she added, “there never was any question about the party; -that she fully knew we expected her for; but I wanted her to come for -lunch that she might make Ralph’s acquaintance before the crowd came; -but it doesn’t matter, for no doubt they’ll meet often enough. Only when -you men begin to shoot you’re lost to all ordinary occupations; and so -tired when you come in that you have not a word to throw at—a lady -certainly, if you still may have at a dog.”</p> - -<p>“I am not so bent on meeting this widow, mother, as you seem to think,” -said Ralph.</p> - -<p>“You need not always call her a widow. That’s her misfortune; it’s not -her character,” said Lucy, unconsciously epigrammatic.</p> - -<p>“Oh, well, whatever you please—this beautiful<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_083" id="page_083"></a>{83}</span> lady—is that better? -The other sounds designing, I allow.”</p> - -<p>“I think,” said Mr. Wradisley, “that we have perhaps discussed Mrs. -Nugent as much as is called for. She is a lady—for whom we all have the -utmost respect.” He spoke as if that closed the question, as indeed it -generally did; and going across the room to what he knew was the most -comfortable chair, possessed himself of the evening paper, and sitting -down, began to read it. Mrs. Wradisley had by no means done with her -evening paper, and that Reginald should thus take it up under her very -eyes filled her soul with astonishment. She looked at him with a gasp, -and then, after a moment, put out her hand for her knitting. Nothing -that could have happened could have given her a more bewildering and -mysterious shock.</p> - -<p>All this, perhaps, was rather like a play to Bertram, who saw everything -with a certain unconscious exercise of that literary faculty which he -had just found so little impressive to the people among whom he found -himself. They were very kind people, and had received<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_084" id="page_084"></a>{84}</span> him confidingly, -asking no questions, not even wondering, as they might have done, what -queer companion Ralph had picked up. Indeed, he was not at all like -Ralph, though circumstances had made them close comrades. Perhaps if -they could have read his life as he thought he could read theirs, they -might not have opened their doors to him with such perfect trust. He had -(had he?) the ruin of a woman’s happiness on his heart, and the -destruction of many hopes. He had been wandering about the world for a -number of years, never knowing how to make up his mind on this question. -Was it indeed his fault? Was it her fault? Were they both to blame? -Perhaps the last was the truth; but he knew very well he would never get -her, or any one, to confess or to believe that. There are some cases in -which the woman has certainly the best of it; and when the man who has -been the means of bringing a young, fair, blameless creature into great -trouble, even if he never meant it, is hopelessly put in the wrong even -when there may be something to be said for him. He was himself -bewildered<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_085" id="page_085"></a>{85}</span> now and then when he thought it all over, wondering if -indeed there might be something to be said for him. But if he could not -even satisfy himself of that, how should he ever satisfy the world? He -was a little stirred up and uncomfortable that night, he could scarcely -tell why, for the brewing troubles of the Wradisleys, if it was trouble -that was brewing, was unlikely to affect a stranger. Ralph, indeed, had -been grumbling in his beard with complaints over what was in fact the -blamelessness of his brother, but it did not trouble Bertram that his -host should be too perfect a man. He had quite settled in his own mind -what it was that was going to happen. The widow, no doubt, was some -pretty adventuress who, by means of the mother and sister, had -established a hold over the immaculate one, and meant to marry him and -turn her patronesses adrift—the commonest story, vulgar, even. And the -ladies would really have nothing to complain of, for Wradisley was -certainly old enough to choose for himself, and might have married and -turned off his mother to her jointure house<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_086" id="page_086"></a>{86}</span> years ago, and no harm -done. It was not this that made Bertram sleepless and nervous, who -really had so little to do with them, and no call to fight their -battles. Perhaps it was the sensation of being in England, and within -the rules of common life again, after long disruption from all ordinary -circumstances of ordinary living. He to plunge into garden parties, and -common encounters of men and women! He might meet some one who knew him, -who would ask him questions, and attempt to piece his life together with -guesses and conjectures. He had a great mind to repack his portmanteau -and sling it over his shoulder, and tramp through the night to the -nearest station. But to what good? For wherever he might go the same -risk would meet him. How tranquil the night was as he looked out of the -window, a great moon shining over the openings of the park, making the -silence and the vacant spaces so doubly solitary! He dared not break the -sanctity of that solitude by going out into it, any more than he dared -disturb the quiet of the fully populated and deeply sleeping house. He<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_087" id="page_087"></a>{87}</span> -had no right, for any caprice or personal cowardice of his, to disturb -that stillness. And then it gave him a curious contradictory sensation, -half of relief from his own thoughts, half of sympathy, to think that -there were already here the elements of a far greater disturbance than -any he could work, beginning to move within the house itself, working, -perhaps, toward a catastrophe of its own. In the midst of all he -suddenly stopped and laughed to himself, and went to bed at last with -the most curiously subdued and softened sensation. He had remembered the -look of the child whom he had lifted from the ground at the little gate -of Greenbank—how she had suddenly been stilled in her childish -mischief, and fixed him with her big, innocent, startled eyes. Poor -little thing! She was innocent enough, whatever might be the nest from -which she came. This was the thought with which he closed his eyes.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_088" id="page_088"></a>{88}</span></p> - -<h2><a name="CHAPTER_VI" id="CHAPTER_VI"></a>CHAPTER VI.</h2> - -<p><span class="smcap">Mr. Wradisley</span> had never been known to give so much attention to any of -his mother’s entertainments before. Those which were more exclusively -his own, the periodical dinners, the parties of guests occasionally -assembled in the house either for political motives or in discharge of -what he felt to be his duty as an important personage in the county, or -for shooting—which was the least responsible of all, but still the -man’s part in a house of the highest class—he did give a certain solemn -and serious attention to. But it had never been known that he had come -out of himself, or even out of his library, which was in a manner the -outer shell and husk of himself, for anything in the shape of an -occasional entertainment,<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_089" id="page_089"></a>{89}</span> the lighter occurrences of hospitality. On -this occasion, however, he was about all the morning with a slightly -anxious look about his eyes, in the first place to see that the day -promised well, to examine the horizon all round, and discuss the clouds -with the head gardener, who was a man of much learning and an expert, as -might be said, on the great question of the weather. That great -authority gave it as his opinion that it would keep fine all day. “There -may be showers in the evening, I should not wonder, but the weather will -keep up for to-day,” he said, backing his opinion with many minutiæ -about the shape of the clouds and the indications of the wind. Mr. -Wradisley repeated this at the breakfast table with much seriousness. -“Stevenson says we may trust to having a fine day, though there may be -showers in the evening,” he said; “but that will matter less, mother, as -all your guests will be gone by that time.”</p> - -<p>“Oh, Reginald, do you think Stevenson always knows?” cried Lucy, “He -promised<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_090" id="page_090"></a>{90}</span> us fine weather the day of the bazaar, and there was a storm -and everything spoiled in the afternoon.”</p> - -<p>“I am of the same opinion as Stevenson,” said Mr. Wradisley, very -quietly, which settled the matter; and, then, to be more wonderful -still, he asked if the house were to be open, and if it was to be -expected that any of the guests would wish to see his collection. “In -that case I should direct Simmons to be in attendance,” he said.</p> - -<p>“Oh, if you would, Reginald!—that would give us great <i>éclat</i>,” said -his mother; “but I did not venture to ask. It is so very kind of you to -think of it, of yourself. Of course it will be wished—everybody will -wish it; but I generally put them off, you know, for I know you don’t -like to be worried, and I would not worry you for the world.”</p> - -<p>“You are too good to me, mother. There is no reason why I should be -worried. It is, of course, my affair as much as any one’s,” he said, in -his perfectly gentle yet pointed way, which made the others, even Mrs. -Wradisley herself, feel a little small, as if she had been<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_091" id="page_091"></a>{91}</span> assuming an -individual responsibility which she had not the right to assume.</p> - -<p>“My show won’t come to much if Rege is going to exhibit, mother,” said -Ralph. “I’d better keep them for another day.”</p> - -<p>“On the contrary,” said Mr. Wradisley, with great suavity, “get out your -savage stores. If the whole country is coming, as appears, there will be -need for everything that we can do.”</p> - -<p>“There were just as many people last time, Reginald, but you wouldn’t do -anything,” said Lucy, half aggrieved, notwithstanding her mother’s -“hush” and deprecating look.</p> - -<p>“Circumstances are not always the same,” her brother said; “and I -understood from my mother that this was to be the last.”</p> - -<p>“For the season, Reginald,” said Mrs. Wradisley, with a certain alarm in -her tone.</p> - -<p>“To be sure. I meant for the season, of course—and in the -circumstances,” he replied.</p> - -<p>Mrs. Wradisley was not at all a nervous nor a timorous woman. She was -very free of fancies, but still she was disturbed a little. She allowed -Lucy to run on with exclamations<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_092" id="page_092"></a>{92}</span> and conjectures after the master of -the house had retired. “What is the matter with Reginald? What has -happened? What does he mean by it? He never paid any attention to our -garden parties before.”</p> - -<p>Mrs. Wradisley was a very sensible woman, as has been said. After a very -short interval she replied, calmly, “Most likely he does not mean -anything at all, my dear. He has just taken a fancy to have everything -very nice. It is delightful of him to let his collection be seen. That -almost makes us independent of the weather, as there is so much in the -house to see; but I do believe Stevenson is right, and that we are going -to have a most beautiful day.”</p> - -<p>But though she made this statement, a little wonder remained in her -mind. She had not, she remembered, been very well lately. Did Reginald -think she was failing, and that it might really be his mother’s last -entertainment to her neighbors? It was not a very pleasant thought, for -nothing had occurred for a long time to disturb the quiet tenor of Mrs. -Wradisley’s life, and Ralph had come<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_093" id="page_093"></a>{93}</span> back to her out of the wilds, and -she was contented. She put the thought away, going out to the -housekeeper to talk over anything that was necessary, but it gave her a -little shock in spite of herself.</p> - -<p>Mr. Wradisley, as may well be believed, had no thought at all of his -mother’s health, which he believed to be excellent, but he had begun to -think a little of brighter possibilities, of the substitution of another -feminine head to the house, and entertainments in which, through her, he -would take a warmer interest. But it was only partly this, and partly -nothing at all, as his sensible mother said, only the suppressed -excitement in him and impulse to do something to get through the time -until he should see Mrs. Nugent again and know his fate. He did not feel -very much afraid, notwithstanding all she had said in the shock of the -moment. He could understand that to a young widow, a fanciful young -woman, more or less touched by the new fancies women had taken up, the -idea of replacing her husband by another, of loving a second time, which -all the sentimentalists<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_094" id="page_094"></a>{94}</span> are against, would be for the moment a great -shock. She might feel the shock all the more if she felt, too, that -there was something in her heart that answered to that alarming -proposal, and might feel that to push off the thought with both hands, -with all her might, was the only thing possible. But the reflections of -the night and of the new morning, which had risen with such splendor of -autumnal sunshine, would, he felt almost sure, make a great difference. -Mrs. Nugent did not wear mourning; it was probably some years since her -husband’s death. She was not very well off, and did not seem to have -many relations who could help her, or she would not have come here so -unfriended, to a district in which nobody knew her. Was it likely that -she should resist all that he had to offer, the love of a good man, the -shelter of a well-known, wealthy, important name and house? It was not -possible that for a mere sentiment a woman so full of sense as she was, -could resist these. The love of a good man—if he had not had a penny in -the world, that would be worth any<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_095" id="page_095"></a>{95}</span> woman’s while; and she would feel -that. He thought, as he arranged with a zeal he had never felt before, -the means of amusing and occupying his mother’s guests, that he would -have all the more chance of getting her by herself, of finding time and -opportunity to lead her out of the crowd to get her answer. Surely, -surely, the chances were all in favor of a favorable answer. It was not -as if he were a nobody, a chance-comer, a trifling or unimportant -person. He had always been aware that he was an important person, and it -seemed impossible that she should not see it too.</p> - -<p>Ralph Wradisley and his friend Bertram went out for a long walk. They -were both “out of it,” the son as much as the visitor, and both moved -with similar inclinations to run away. “Of course I’ll meet some fellows -I know,” Ralph said. “Shall I though? The fellows of my age are knocking -about somewhere, or married and settled, and that sort of thing. I’ll -meet the women of them, sisters, and so forth, and perhaps some wives. -It’s only the women that are fixtures in a<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_096" id="page_096"></a>{96}</span> country like this; and what -are the women to you and me?”</p> - -<p>“Well, to me nothing but strangers—but so would the men be too.”</p> - -<p>“Ah, it’s all very well to talk,” said Ralph. “Women have their place in -society, and so forth—wouldn’t be so comfortable without them, I -suppose. But between you and me, Bertram, there ain’t very much in women -for fellows like us. I’m not a marrying man—neither are you, I suppose? -The most of them about here are even past the pretty girl stage, don’t -you know, and I don’t know how to talk to them. Africa plays the deuce -with you for that.”</p> - -<p>“No,” said Bertram, “I am not a marrying man. I am—I feel I ought to -tell you, Wradisley—there never was any need to go into such questions -before, and you may believe I don’t want to carry a placard round my -neck in the circumstances;—well—I am a married man, and that is the -truth.”</p> - -<p>Ralph turned upon him with a long whistle<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_097" id="page_097"></a>{97}</span> and a lifting of the -eyebrows. “By Jove!” he said.</p> - -<p>“I hope you won’t bear me a grudge for not telling you before. In that -case I’ll be off at once and bother you no more.”</p> - -<p>“Stuff!” cried Ralph; “what difference can it make to me? I have thought -you had something on your mind sometimes; but married or single, we’re -the same two fellows that have walked the desert together, and helped -each other through many a scrape. I’m sorry for you, old chap—that is, -if there’s anything to be sorry for. Of course, I don’t know.”</p> - -<p>“I’ve been afloat on the world ever since,” said Bertram. “It was all my -fault. I was a cursed fool, and trapped when I was a boy. Then I thought -the woman was dead—had all the proofs and everything, and—You say you -know nothing about that sort of thing, Wradisley. Well, I won’t say -anything about it. I fell in love with a lady every way better than -I—she was—perhaps you do know more than you say. I married her—that’s -the short and the long of it; and<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_098" id="page_098"></a>{98}</span> in a year, when the baby had come, -the other woman, the horrible creature, arrived at my very door.”</p> - -<p>“Good Lord!” cried Ralph softly, in his beard.</p> - -<p>“She was dying, that was one good thing; she died—in my house. And -then—We were married again, my wife and I—she allowed that; but—I -have never seen her since,” said Bertram, turning his head away.</p> - -<p>“By Jove!” said Ralph Wradisley once more, in his beard; and they walked -on in silence for a mile, and said not another word. At last—</p> - -<p>“Old chap,” said Ralph, touching his friend on the shoulder, “I never -was one to talk; but it’s very hard lines on you, and Mrs. Bertram ought -to be told so, if she were the queen.”</p> - -<p>Bertram shook his head. “I don’t know why I told you,” he said; “don’t -let us talk of it any more. The thing’s done and can’t be undone. I -don’t know if I wish any change. When two paths part in this world, -Wradisley, don’t you know, the longer they<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_099" id="page_099"></a>{99}</span> go, the wider apart they -get—or at least that’s my experience. They say your whole body changes -every seven years—it doesn’t take so long as that to alter a man’s -thoughts and his soul—and a woman’s, too, I suppose. She’s far enough -from me now, and I from her. I’m not sure I—regret it. In some ways -it—didn’t suit me, so to speak. Perhaps things are best as they are.”</p> - -<p>“Well,” said Ralph, “I’d choose a free life for myself, but not exactly -in that way, Bertram—not if I were you.”</p> - -<p>“Fortunately we are none of us each other,” Bertram said, with a laugh -which had little mirth in it. He added, after a moment: “You’ll use your -own discretion about telling this sorry tale of mine, Wradisley. I felt -I had to tell you. I can’t go about under false pretenses while you’re -responsible for me. Now you know the whole business, and we need not -speak of it any more.”</p> - -<p>“All right, old fellow,” Ralph said; and they quickened their pace, and -put on I don’t know how many miles more before they got back—too late -for lunch, and very muddy<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_100" id="page_100"></a>{100}</span> about the legs—to eat a great deal of cold -beef at the sideboard, while the servants chafed behind them, intent -upon changing the great dining-room into a bower of chrysanthemums and -temple of tea. They had to change their dress afterwards, which took up -all their time until the roll of carriages began. Bertram, for his part, -being a stranger and not at all on duty, took a long time to put himself -into more presentable clothes. He did not want to have any more of the -garden party than was necessary. And his mind had been considerably -stirred up by his confession, brief as it was. It had been necessary to -do it, and his mind was relieved; but he did not feel that it was -possible to remain long at Wradisbury now that he had disclosed his -mystery, such as it was. What did they care about his mystery? -Nothing—not enough to make a day’s conversation out of it. He knew very -well in what way Ralph would tell his story. He would not announce it as -a discovery—it would drop from his beard like the most casual statement -of fact: “Unlucky beggar, Bertram—got a wife and<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_101" id="page_101"></a>{101}</span> all that sort of -thing—place down Devonshire way—but he and she don’t hit it off, -somehow.” In such terms the story would be told, without any mystery at -all. But Bertram, who was a proud man, did not feel that he could live -among a set of people who looked at him curiously across the table and -wondered how it was that he did not “hit it off” with his wife. He knew -that he would read that question in Mrs. Wradisley’s face when she bade -him good-morning; and in Lucy’s eyes—Lucy’s eyes, he thought, with a -half smile, would be the most inquisitive—they would ask him a hundred -questions. They would say, with almost a look of anxiety in them, “Oh! -Mr. Bertram—why?” It amused him to think that Lucy would be the most -curious of them all, though why, I could not venture to say. He got -himself ready very slowly, looking out from the corner of his window at -all the smart people of the county gathering upon the lawn. There was -tennis going on somewhere, he could hear, and the less loud but equally -characteristic stroke of the croquet balls. And the band,<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_102" id="page_102"></a>{102}</span> which was a -famous band from London, had begun to play. If he was to appear at all, -it was time that he should go downstairs; but, as a matter of fact, he -was not really moved to do this, until he saw a little flight across the -green of a small child in white, so swift that some one had to stoop and -pick her up as he picked up Tiny at the gate of Greenbank. The man on -the lawn who caught this little thing lifted her up as Bertram had done. -Would the child be hushed by his grasp, and look into his face as Tiny -had looked at him? Perhaps this was not Tiny—at all events, it gave no -look, but wriggled and struggled out of its captor’s hands. This sight -decided Bertram to present himself in the midst of Mrs. Wradisley’s -guests. He wanted to see Tiny once again.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_103" id="page_103"></a>{103}</span></p> - -<h2><a name="CHAPTER_VII" id="CHAPTER_VII"></a>CHAPTER VII.</h2> - -<p><span class="smcap">Bertram</span> soon lost himself among the crowd on the lawn, among all the -county people and the village people, making his way out and in, in a -solitude which never feels so great as among a crowd. It seemed -wonderful to him, as it is specially to those who have been more or less -in what is called “Society,” that he saw nobody whom he knew. That is a -thing almost impossible to happen for those that are born within that -charmed circle. Whether at the end of the world or in the midst of it, -it is incredible that you should see an assemblage of human creatures -without discovering one who is familiar at least, if not -friendly—unless, indeed, you wander into regions unknown to society; -and Mrs. Wradisley and her guests would<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_104" id="page_104"></a>{104}</span> all have been indignant indeed -had that been for a moment imagined of them. But yet this is a thing -that does happen now and then, and Bertram traversed the lawns and -flower gardens and conservatories without meeting a single face which he -recognized or being greeted by one voice he had ever heard before. To be -sure, this was partly owing to the fact that the person of whom he was -specially in search was a very small person, to be distinguished at a -very low pitch of stature near to the ground, not at tall on a level with -the other forms. There were a few children among the groups on the lawn, -and he pursued a white frock in various directions, which, when found, -proved to contain some one who was not Tiny; but at last he came to that -little person clinging to Lucy’s skirts as she moved about among her -mother’s guests. Lucy turned round upon Bertram with a little surprise -to find him so near her, and then a little rising glow of color and a -look in her mild eyes of mingled curiosity and compassion, which -penetrated him with sudden consciousness, annoyance,<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_105" id="page_105"></a>{105}</span> yet amusement. -Already it was evident Ralph had found a moment a tell his tale. “Oh, -Mr. Bertram!” Lucy said. She would have said precisely the same in -whatever circumstances; the whole difference was in the tone.</p> - -<p>Then a small voice was uplifted at her feet. “It is the gemplemans,” -Tiny said.</p> - -<p>“So you remember me, little one? though we only saw each other in the -dark. Will you come for a walk with me, Tiny?” Bertram said.</p> - -<p>The child looked at him with serious eyes. Now that he saw her in -daylight she was not the common model of the angelic child, but dark, -with a little olive tint in her cheeks and dark brown hair waving upon -her shoulders. He scarcely recognized, except by the serious look, the -little runaway of the previous night, yet recognized something in her -for which he was not at all prepared, which he could not explain to -himself. Why did the child look at him so? And he looked at her, not -with the half fantastic, amused liking which had made him seek her out, -but seriously<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_106" id="page_106"></a>{106}</span> too, infected by her survey of him, which was so -penetrating and so grave. After Tiny had given him this investigating -look, she put her little velvety hand into his, with the absolute -confidence of her age, “<span class="lftspc">’</span>Ess, me go for a walk,” she said.</p> - -<p>“Now, Tiny, talk properly to this gentleman; let him see what a lady you -can be when you please,” said Lucy. “She’s too old to talk like that, -isn’t she, Mr. Bertram? She is nearly five! and she really can talk just -as well as I can, when she likes. Tiny! now remember!” Lucy was very -earnest in her desire that Tiny should do herself justice; but once more -lifted the swift, interrogative look which seemed to say, as he knew she -would, “Oh, Mr. Bertram—why?”</p> - -<p>“Where shall we go for our walk, Tiny?” Bertram said.</p> - -<p>“Take Tiny down to the pond; nobody never take me down to the wasser. -Mamma says Tiny tumble in, but gemplemans twite safe. Come, come, afore -mummie sees and says no.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_107" id="page_107"></a>{107}</span>”</p> - -<p>“But, Tiny, if you’re sure your mother would say no—”</p> - -<p>“Qwick, qwick!” cried Tiny. “If mummie says nuffin, no matter; but if -she says no!”—this was uttered with a little stamp of the foot and -raised voice as if in imitation of a familiar prohibition—“then Tiny -tan’t go. Come along, quick, quick.”</p> - -<p>It was clear that Tiny’s obedience was to the letter, not the spirit.</p> - -<p>“But I don’t know the way,” said Bertram, holding a little back.</p> - -<p>“Come, come!” cried the child, dragging him on. “Tiny show you the way.”</p> - -<p>“And what if we both fall in, Tiny?”</p> - -<p>“You’s too old, too big gemplemans to fall into the wasser—too big to -have any mummie.”</p> - -<p>“Alas! that’s true,” he said.</p> - -<p>“Then never mind,” said the little girl. “No mummie, no nursie, nobody -to scold you. You can go in the boat if you like. Come! Oh, Tiny do, do -want to go in the boat; and there’s flowers on the udder side,<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_108" id="page_108"></a>{108}</span> -fordet-me-nots!—wants to get fordet-me-nots. Come, gemplemans, come!”</p> - -<p>“Would you like to ride on my shoulder? and then we shall go quicker,” -he said.</p> - -<p>She stood still at once, and held out her arms to be lifted up. Now -Bertram was not the kind of man who makes himself into the horse, the -bear, the lion, as occasion demands, for the amusement of children. He -was more surprised to find himself with this little creature seated on -his shoulder, than she was on her elevated seat, where indeed she was -entirely at her ease, guiding him with imperative tugs at the collar of -his coat and beating her small foot against his breast, as if she had -the most perfect right to his attention and devotion. “This way, this -way,” sang Tiny; “that way nasty way, down among the thorns—this way -nice way; get fordet-me-nots for mummie; mummie never say nuffin—Tiny -tan go!”</p> - -<p>He found himself thus hurrying over the park, with the child’s voice -singing its little monologue over his head, flushed with rebellion -against the unconscious mother, much amused at himself. And yet it was -not<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_109" id="page_109"></a>{109}</span> amusement; it was a curious sensation which Bertram could not -understand. It is not quite an unexampled thing to fall in love with a -child at first sight; but he was not aware that he had ever done it -before, and to be turned so completely by the child into the instrument -of her little rebellions and pleasures was more wonderful still. He -laughed within himself, but his laugh went out of him like the flame of -a candle in the wind. He felt more like to cry, if he had been a subject -for crying. But why he could not tell. Never was man in a more disturbed -and perplexed state of mind. Guided by Tiny’s pullings and beatings, he -got to the pond at last, a pond upon the other side of which there was, -strange to say, visible among the russet foliage, one little clump of -belated forget-me-nots quite out of season. The child’s quick eye had -noted them as she had gone by with her nurse on some recent walk. -Bertram knew a great many things, but it is very doubtful whether he was -aware that it was wonderful to find forget-me-nots so late. And Tiny was -a sight to<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_110" id="page_110"></a>{110}</span> see when he put her down in the stern of the boat and pulled -across the pond with a few long strokes. Her eyes, which had a golden -light in their darkness, shone with triumph and delight; the brown of -her little sunburnt face glowed transparent as if there was a light -within; her dark curls waved; the piquancy of the complexion so unusual -in a child, the chant of her little voice shouting, “Fordet-me-nots, -fordet-me-nots!” her little rapture of eagerness and pleasure carried -him altogether out of himself. He had loved that complexion in his day; -perhaps it was some recollection, some resemblance, which was at the -bottom of this strange absorption in the little creature of whose very -existence he had not been aware till last night. Now, if he had been -called on to give his very life for Tiny he would have been capable of -it, without knowing why; and, indeed, there would have been a very -likely occasion of giving his life for Tiny, or of sacrificing hers, as -her mother foresaw, if he had not caught her as she stretched herself -out of the boat to reach the flowers. His grip<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_111" id="page_111"></a>{111}</span> of her was almost -violent—and there was a moment during which Tiny’s little glow -disappeared in a sudden thunder-cloud, changing the character of her -little face, and a small incipient stamp of passion on the planks -betrayed rebellion ready to rise. But Tiny looked at Bertram, who held -her very firmly, fixed him with much the same look as she had given him -at their first meeting, and suddenly changed countenance again. What did -that look mean? He had said laughingly on the previous night that it was -a look of recognition. She suddenly put her two little hands round his -neck, and said, “Tiny will be dood.” And the effect of the little -rebel’s embrace was that tears—actual wet tears, which for a moment -blinded eyes which had looked every kind of wonder and terror in the -face—surprised him before he knew. What did it mean? What did it mean? -It was too wonderful for words.</p> - -<p>The flowers were gathered after this in perfect safety and harmony; Tiny -puddling with her hands in the mud to get the nearest ones “nice and -long,” as she said, while Bertram<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_112" id="page_112"></a>{112}</span> secured those that were further off. -And then there arose a great difficulty as to how to carry these wet and -rather muddy spoils. Tiny’s pretty frock, which she held out in both -hands to receive them like a ballet dancer, could not be thought of.</p> - -<p>“For what would your mother say if your frock was wet and dirty?” said -Bertram, seriously troubled.</p> - -<p>“Mummie say, ‘Oh, Tiny, Tiny, naughty schild,’<span class="lftspc">”</span> said the little girl, -with a very grave face; “never come no more to garden party.”</p> - -<p>Finally an expedient was devised in the shape of Bertram’s handkerchief -tied together at the corners, and swung upon a switch of willow which -was light enough for Tiny to carry; in which guise the pair set out -again toward the house and the smart people, Tiny once more on Bertram’s -shoulder, with the bundle of flowers bobbing in front of his nose, and, -it need not be said, some trace of the gathering of the flowers and of -the muddy edges of the pool, and the moss-grown planks of the boat -showing on both performers—on<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_113" id="page_113"></a>{113}</span> Tiny’s frock, which was a little wet, -and on Bertram’s coat, marked by the beating of the little feet, which -had gathered a little mud and greenness too. Tiny began to question him -on the returning way.</p> - -<p>“Gemplemans too big to have got a mummie,” said Tiny; “have you got a -little girl?”</p> - -<p>Not getting any immediate answer to this question, she sang it over him -in her way, repeating it again and again—“Have zoo dot a little -girl?”—her dialect varying according to her caprice, until the small -refrain got into his head.</p> - -<p>The man was utterly confused and troubled; he could not give Tiny any -answer, nor could he answer the wonderful maze of questions and thoughts -which this innocent demand of hers awakened in his breast. When they -came within sight of the lawn and its gay crowd, Bertram bethought him -that it would be better to put his little rider down, and to present her -to perhaps an anxious or angry mother on a level, which would make her -impaired toilet less conspicuous.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_114" id="page_114"></a>{114}</span> After all, there was nothing so -wonderful in the fact that a little girl had dirtied her frock. He had -no occasion to feel so guilty and disturbed about it. And this is how it -happened that the adventurers appeared quite humbly, Tiny not half -pleased to descend from her eminence and carrying now over her shoulder, -as Bertram suggested, the stick which supported her packet of flowers, -while he walked rather shamefaced by her, holding her hand, and looking -out with a little trepidation for the mother, who, after all, could not -bring down very condign punishment upon him for running away with her -child.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_115" id="page_115"></a>{115}</span></p> - -<h2><a name="CHAPTER_VIII" id="CHAPTER_VIII"></a>CHAPTER VIII.</h2> - -<p><span class="smcap">Mrs. Nugent</span> had been very unwilling to fulfill her promise and appear at -Mrs. Wradisley’s party. She had put off her arrival till the last -moment, and as she walked up from the village with her little girl she -had flattered herself that, arriving late under shelter of various other -parties who made much more commotion, she might have escaped -observation. But if Bertram, of whom she knew nothing, had been intent -on finding Tiny, Mr. Wradisley was much more intent on finding Tiny’s -mother. He had been on the watch and had not missed her from the first -moment of her appearance, carefully as she thought she had sheltered it -from observation. And even her appearance, though she had condemned it -herself as<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_116" id="page_116"></a>{116}</span> excited and sullen, when she gave herself a last look in the -glass before coming away, did not discourage him. Excitement brightens a -woman’s eye and gives additional color to her face, or at least it did -so to Nelly. The gentle carelessness of the ordinary was not in her -aspect at all. She was more erect, carrying her animated head high. -Nobody could call her ordinary at any time. She was so full of life and -action. But on that day every line of her soft, light dress seemed to -have expression. The little curls on her forehead were more crisp, the -shining of her eyes more brilliant. There was a little nervous movement -about her mouth which testified to the agitation in her. “Is there -anything wrong, dear?” asked Mrs. Wradisley, pausing, holding her by the -hand, looking into her face, startled by this unusual look, even in the -midst of her guests.</p> - -<p>“Oh, no—yes. I have had some disturbing news, but nothing to take any -notice of. I will tell you afterwards,” Mrs. Nugent said. Lucy too hung -upon her, eager to know what was the matter. “Only some blunders<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_117" id="page_117"></a>{117}</span>—about -my affairs,” she had replied, “which I can set right.”</p> - -<p>“Oh, if that is all!” Lucy had cried, running off to salute some other -new-comers and carrying Tiny in her train. “Affairs” meant business to -Lucy, and business, so far as she was aware, touched only the outside, -and could have nothing to do with any one’s happiness. Besides, her mind -was in a turmoil for the moment with that strange story of Mrs. Bertram -which her mother had just told her by way of precaution, filtered from -Ralph. “Mr. Bertram is married, it appears; but he and his wife don’t -get on,” was what Mr. Wradisley had said. Lucy’s imagination had, as we -are aware, been busy about Bertram, and she was startled by this strange -and sudden conclusion to her self-inquiry whether by any chance he might -be the Ideal man.</p> - -<p>It was thus that Mrs. Nugent had been suddenly left without even the -protection of her child, and though she had managed for some time to -hide herself, as she supposed (though his watchful gaze in reality -followed<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_118" id="page_118"></a>{118}</span> her everywhere), from her host amid the crowd of other people -assembled, there came the inevitable moment when she could keep herself -from him no longer. He came up to her while the people who surrounded -dispersed to examine his collection or to go in for tea.</p> - -<p>“But I have seen your collection, Mr. Wradisley,” she said; “you were so -kind as to show me everything.”</p> - -<p>“It is not my collection,” he said; “it is—a flower I want to show you. -The new orchid—the new—Let me take you into the conservatory. I must,” -he said, in a lower tone. “You must be merciful and let me speak to -you.”</p> - -<p>“Mr. Wradisley,” she cried, almost under her breath, “do not, for pity’s -sake, say any more.”</p> - -<p>“I must,” he said, impetuously. “I must know.” And then he added in his -usual tone, “Stevenson is very proud of it. It is a very rare kind, you -know, and the finest specimen, he says.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_119" id="page_119"></a>{119}</span>”</p> - -<p>“Oh, what is that, Mr. Wradisley?—an orchid? May I come too?” said -another guest, without discrimination.</p> - -<p>“Certainly,” he said; “but all in its order. Simmons comes first, -Stevenson afterwards. You have not seen my Etruscan collection.” Mrs. -Nugent was aware that he had caught a floating ribbon of the light cloak -she carried on her arm, and held it fast while he directed with his -usual grave propriety the other lady by her side. “Now,” he said, -looking up to her. If it was the only thing that could be done, then -perhaps it was better that it should be done at once. He led her through -the lines of gleaming glass, the fruit, and the flowers, for Wradisbury -was famous for its vineries and its conservatories—meeting a few -wanderers by the way, whom it was difficult to prevent from -following—till at last they got to the inner sanctuary of all, where a -great fantastic blossom, a flower, but counterfeiting something that was -not a flower, blazed aloft in the ruddy afternoon light, which of itself -could never have produced that unnatural tropical blossom. Neither the -man nor the woman looked at the orchid.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_120" id="page_120"></a>{120}</span> She said to him eagerly before -he could speak: “This is all dreadful to me. You ought to let me go. You -ought to be satisfied with my word. Should I speak as I have done if I -had not meant it? Mr. Wradisley, for God’s sake, accept what I have -already said to you and let me go.”</p> - -<p>“No,” he said. She stood beside the flower, her brown beauty shining -against the long leaves and strong stem of the beautiful monster, and he -planted himself in front of her as if to prevent her escape. “You think -I am tyrannical,” he said; “so I am. You are shocked and startled by -what I have said to you. It is because I understand that that I am so -pressing, so arbitrary now. Mrs. Nugent, you can’t bear that a man -should speak to you of love. You think that love only comes once, that -your heart should be buried with your husband; that is folly, it is -fancy, it is prejudice, it is not a real feeling. That is why I force -you almost to hear me. Pause a moment, and hear me.”</p> - -<p>“Not a moment, not a moment!” she cried.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_121" id="page_121"></a>{121}</span> “It is more than that. Take my -word for it, and let me go and say no more.”</p> - -<p>“A widow,” he said, “you make up an idea to yourself that it’s something -sacred. You are never to love, never to think of any one again. But all -that is fiction—don’t interrupt me—it is mere fiction. You are living, -and he is dead.”</p> - -<p>“You force me,” she cried, “to betray myself. You force me—to tell you -my secrets. You have no right to force my secret from me. Mr. Wradisley, -every word you say to me is an offense. It is my own fault; but a man -ought surely to be generous and take a woman’s word without compelling -her in self defense—”</p> - -<p>“I know by heart all that you can say in self-defense,” he cried, -vehemently, “and you ought to be told that these are all -fictions—sentimentalisms—never to be weighed against a true -affection—a man’s love—and home and protection—both for yourself and -your child.”</p> - -<p>The young woman’s high spirit was aroused. “I will have no more of -this,” she<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_122" id="page_122"></a>{122}</span> said. “I am quite able to protect myself and my child. Let -me go—I will go, Mr. Wradisley. I do not call this love. I call it -persecution. Not a word more.”</p> - -<p>Mr. Wradisley was more astonished than words could say. He fell back, -and allowed her to pass. He had thought, with a high hand, in the -exercise of that superior position and judgment which everybody allowed -him, to bring her to reason. Was it possible that she was not to be -brought to reason? “I think,” he said, “Mrs. Nugent, that when you are -calm and consider everything at your leisure you will feel—that I am -justified.”</p> - -<p>“You can never be justified in assuming that you know—another person’s -position and feelings; which you don’t, and can’t know.”</p> - -<p>“I argue from the general,” said Mr. Wradisley, with an air almost of -meekness, “and when you think—when you take time to consider—”</p> - -<p>“No time would make any difference,” she said, quickly; and then, for -she was now free<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_123" id="page_123"></a>{123}</span> and going back again toward the lawn, her heart smote -her. “Don’t bear me any malice,” she said. “I respect you very much; any -woman might be proud—of your love”—her face gave a little twitch, -whether toward laughing or crying it was difficult to tell—“but I -couldn’t have given you mine in any circumstances, not if I had -been—entirely free.”</p> - -<p>“Which you are—from everything but false sentiment,” he said, doggedly.</p> - -<p>But what did it matter?—he was following her out, her face was turned -from him, her ears were deaf to his impressive words, as her eyes were -turned from his looks, which were more impressive still. Mr. Wradisley -had failed, and it was the first time for many years that he had done -so; he had even forgotten that such a thing was possible. When they -came, thus walking solemnly one behind the other, to the outer house -where some of the other guests were lingering, Mrs. Nugent stopped to -speak to some of them, to describe the new orchid. “It is the most -uncanny thing I ever saw,” she said. And then<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_124" id="page_124"></a>{124}</span> Lady Dulham, the great -lady of that side of the county, the person whom he most disliked, -appealed to Mr. Wradisley to show her too the new wonder. It was perhaps -on the whole the best way he could have got out of this false position. -He offered the old lady his arm with a deeply wounded, hotly offended -heart.</p> - -<p>Mrs. Nugent lingered a little with the others in the great relief and -ease of mind which, though it was only momentary, was great. She had not -after all been obliged to reveal any of her secrets, whatever they might -be. If he had been less peremptory, more reasonable, she would have been -obliged to explain to him; and that she had very little mind to do. -After the first relief, however, she began to feel what a blow had been -struck at her temporary comfort in this place by so untoward an -accident. His mother and sister were her chief friends; they had -received her so generously, so kindly, with such confidence. Her secret -was no guilty one, but still it had made her uncomfortable, it had been -the subject of various annoyances; but<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_125" id="page_125"></a>{125}</span> none of these kind people had -asked her any questions; they had received her for herself, never -doubting. And now it seemed that she had only appeared among them to do -harm. She was a pretty and attractive young woman, and not altogether -unaware that people liked her on that account; but yet she never had -been one of those women with whom everybody is acquainted, in novels, at -least, before whom every man falls down. She had had her share, but she -had not been persecuted by inopportune lovers. And she had not -entertained any alarm in respect to Mr. Wradisley. She hoped now that -his pride would help him through it, and that nobody would be the wiser; -but still she could not continue here under the very wing of the family -after so humiliating its head, either meeting him, or compelling him to -avoid her. She went on turning over this question in her mind, pausing -to talk to this one and that one, to do her duty to Mrs. Wradisley still -by amusing and occupying her guests, putting on her smiles as if they -had been ribbons to conceal some little spot<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_126" id="page_126"></a>{126}</span> or rent beneath. Indeed, -it was no rent. She had not been very long at Wradisbury. It would be no -dreadful business to go away. She was neither without friends nor -protectors, and London was always a ready and natural refuge, where it -would be so simple to go. But this fiasco, as she called it to herself, -vexed her. She wanted to get away as soon as possible, to think it over -at leisure, to find Tiny, who no doubt was hanging on Lucy Wradisley’s -skirts somewhere, or else playing with the other children, and to steal -home as soon as there was any pretext for departure. She felt that she -would prefer not to meet his mother’s eye.</p> - -<p>She was beginning to get very impatient of waiting when at last she -caught sight of Tiny being set down on the ground from somebody’s -shoulders. She did not pay any attention for the moment to the man. Tiny -had so many friends; for the child was not shy; she had no objection to -trust herself to any one who pleased her, though it was not every one -who had this advantage and pleased Tiny. The mother saw at once that -Tiny<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_127" id="page_127"></a>{127}</span>’s best frock had suffered, and a momentary alarm about the pond, -which was one of her favorite panics, seized her. But the child was -evidently quite right, which settled that question. She went to meet -Tiny with a word of playful reproof for her disheveled condition on her -lips. The child and her guardian were coming round a clump of trees -which hid them for a moment, and toward which Mrs. Nugent turned her -steps. She heard the small voice running on in its usual little -sing-song of monologue.</p> - -<p>“Have zoo dot a little girl? Have zoo dot a little girl?”</p> - -<p>What an odd question for Tiny to ask! The child must really be trained -to be a little more like other children, not to push her little -inquiries so far, not to ask questions. Mrs. Nugent could not help -smiling a little at the sound of her small daughter’s voice, especially -as there was no reply made to it. The man had a big beard, that was all -she had observed of him; perhaps it was the other son, the brother Raaf, -the adventurer,<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_128" id="page_128"></a>{128}</span> or perhaps prodigal, who had newly come home.</p> - -<p>These were her thoughts as she turned round the great bole of that big -tree of which the Wradisleys were so proud. Bertram was coming on the -other side, half smiling, too, at Tiny’s little song; while she, spying -some children in the distance, swayed backward from his hold to call to -them, and then detaching herself from his hand altogether, ran back a -few paces to show them her treasures. His face half averted for a moment -looking after her thus, gave Mrs. Nugent one breath of preparation, but -none to him, who turned round again half conscious of some one coming to -meet him, with still that half smile and the tender expression in his -eyes. He stood still, he wavered for a moment as if, strong man as he -was, he would have fallen.</p> - -<p>“My God—Nelly!” he cried.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_129" id="page_129"></a>{129}</span></p> - -<h2><a name="CHAPTER_IX" id="CHAPTER_IX"></a>CHAPTER IX.</h2> - -<p><span class="smcap">After</span> the most successful party, even if it is only a garden party, a -flatness is apt to fall upon the family of the entertainers who have -been so nobly doing their best to amuse their friends. Besides the -grateful sense of success, and of the fact that the trouble is well -over, comes a flagging of both physical and mental powers. The dinner at -Wradisbury was heavy after the great success of the afternoon; there was -a little conversation about that, and about how everybody looked, and on -Ralph’s part, who was decidedly the least dull of the party, on the -changes that time had made, especially upon the women whom he remembered -as little girls, and who were now, as he said, “elderly,” some of them -with little girls of their own; but<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_130" id="page_130"></a>{130}</span> neither Mr. Wradisley nor Mr. -Bertram were at all amused, and Lucy was tired, and agreeing with Ralph -completely in his estimation of the old young ladies, was not -exhilarated by it as she might have been. The master of the house did -not indeed betray fatigue or ill-humor, he was too well bred for that. -But he was a little cross to the butler, and dissatisfied with the -dinner, which was an unusual thing; he even said something to his mother -about “<i>your</i> cook,” as if he thought the sins of that important person -resulted from the fact that she was Mrs. Wradisley’s cook, and had -received bad advice from her mistress. When he was pleased he said “my -cook,” and on ordinary occasions “the cook,” impersonally and -impartially. Bertram on the other hand, had the air of a man who had -fallen from a great height, and had not been able to pick himself up—he -was pale, his face was drawn. He scarcely heard when he was spoken to. -When he perceived that he was being addressed he woke up with an effort. -All this Lucy perceived keenly and put down<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_131" id="page_131"></a>{131}</span> to what was in fact its -real reason, though with a difference. She said to herself:</p> - -<p>“Nelly Nugent must have known him. She must have known his wife and all -about him, and how it was they didn’t get on. I’ll make her tell me,” -Lucy said to herself, and she addressed herself very particularly to Mr. -Bertram’s solace and entertainment, partly because she was romantically -interested and very sorry for him, and partly to show her mother, who -had told her with a certain air that Mr. Bertram was married, that his -marriage made not the slightest difference to her. She tried to draw him -out about Tiny, who was the first and most natural subject.</p> - -<p>“Isn’t she a delightful little thing? I am sure she made a slave of you, -Mr. Bertram, and got you to do everything she wanted. She always does. -She is a little witch,” Lucy said.</p> - -<p>“Oh, Tiny,” said Bertram, with a slight change of color. “Yes—I had not -been thinking. What is her—real name?”</p> - -<p>“I believe it is Agnes, and another name<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_132" id="page_132"></a>{132}</span> too—an old-fashioned name; do -you remember, mother?”</p> - -<p>“Laetitia. I don’t know what you mean by an old-fashioned name. I had -once a great friend whose name was Laetitia. It means light-heartedness, -doesn’t it?—joy. And a very nice meaning, too. It would just suit Tiny. -They can call her Letty when she gets a little older. But the worst of -these baby names is that there is no getting rid of them; and Tiny is so -absurd for a big girl.”</p> - -<p>During this rather long speech Bertram sat with a strange look, as if he -could have cried, Lucy thought, which, however, must have been absurd, -for what he did do was to laugh. “Yes, they do stick; and the more -absurd they are the longer they last.”</p> - -<p>“Tiny, however, is not absurd in the least; and isn’t she a delightful -little thing?” Lucy repeated. She was not, perhaps, though so very good -a girl, very rapid in her perceptions, and besides, it would have been -entirely idiotic to imagine the existence of any reason why Bertram -should not discuss freely the little characteristics of Mrs. Nugent’s -child.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_133" id="page_133"></a>{133}</span></p> - -<p>“Poor little Tiny!” he said, quite inappropriately, with a sort of -stifled sigh.</p> - -<p>“Oh! do you mean because her father is dead?” said Lucy, with a -countenance of dismay. She blamed herself immediately for having thought -so little of that misfortune. Perhaps the thing was that Mr. Bertram had -been a friend of Tiny’s father, and it was this that made him so grave. -She added, “I am sure I am very sorry for poor Mr. Nugent; but then I -never knew him, or knew anybody that knew him. Yes, to be sure, poor -little Tiny! But, Mr. Bertram, she has such a very nice mother. Don’t -you think for a girl the most important thing is to have a nice mother?”</p> - -<p>“No doubt,” Bertram said very gravely, and again he sighed.</p> - -<p>Lucy was full of compunction, but scarcely knew how to express it. He -must have been a very great friend of poor Mr. Nugent, and perhaps he -had felt, seeing Nelly quite out of mourning, and looking on the whole -so bright, that his friend had been forgotten. But no! Lucy was ready to -go to the stake<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_134" id="page_134"></a>{134}</span> for it, that Mrs. Nugent had not forgotten her -husband—more at least than it was inevitable and kind to her other -friends to forget.</p> - -<p>And then Mr. Wradisley, having finished his complaints about “your -cook,” told his mother across the table that it was quite possible he -might have to go to town in a few days. “Perhaps to-morrow,” he said. -The dealer in antiquities, through whose hands he spent a great deal of -money, had some quite unique examples which it would be sinful to let -slip by.</p> - -<p>Mrs. Wradisley exclaimed against this suggestion. “I thought, Reginald, -you were to be at home with us all the winter; and Ralph just come, -too,” she said.</p> - -<p>“Oh, don’t mind me,” said Ralph.</p> - -<p>“Ralph may be sure, mother,” said Mr. Wradisley, with his usual dignity, -“that I mind him very much. Still there are opportunities that occur but -once in a lifetime. But nothing,” he added, “need be settled till -to-morrow.”</p> - -<p>What did Reginald expect to-morrow? Mr. Bertram looked up too with a -sort of<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_135" id="page_135"></a>{135}</span> involuntary movement, as if he were about to say something -concerning to-morrow; but then changed his mind and did not speak. This -was Lucy’s observation, who was uneasy, watching them all, and feeling -commotion, though she knew not whence it came, in the air.</p> - -<p>In the morning there was still the same commotion in the air to Lucy’s -consciousness, who perhaps, however, was the only person who was aware -of it. But any vague sensation of that sort was speedily dispersed by -the exclamation of Mrs. Wradisley, after she had poured out the tea and -coffee (which was an office she retained in her own hands, to Lucy’s -indignation). While she did this she glanced at the outside of the -letters which lay by the side of her plate; for they retained the bad -habit in Wradisbury of giving you your letters at breakfast, instead of -sending them up to your room as soon as they arrived; so that you -received your tailor’s bill or your lover’s letter before the curious -eyes of all the world, so to speak. Mrs. Wradisley looked askance at her -letters as<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_136" id="page_136"></a>{136}</span> she poured out the tea, and said, half to herself, “Ah! Mrs. -Nugent. Now what can she be writing to me about? I saw her last night, -and I shall probably see her to-day.”</p> - -<p>“It will be about those cuttings for the garden, mother,” said Lucy. -“May I open it and see?”</p> - -<p>Mrs. Wradisley put her hand for a moment on the little pile. “I prefer -to open my letters myself. No one has ever done that for me yet.”</p> - -<p>“Nor made the tea either, mother,” said Ralph.</p> - -<p>“Nor made the tea either, Raaf, though Lucy would like to put me out, I -know,” said Mrs. Wradisley, with a little nod of her head; and then, -having finished that piece of business like one who felt her very life -attacked by any who should question her powers of doing it, she -proceeded to open her letters—one or two others before that on which -she had remarked.</p> - -<p>Lucy was so much interested herself that she did not see how still her -elder brother sat behind his paper, or how uneasy Bertram<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_137" id="page_137"></a>{137}</span> was, cutting -his roll into small pieces on his plate. Then Mrs. Wradisley gave a -little scream, and gave them all an excuse for looking up at her, and -Mr. Wradisley for demanding, “What is the matter, mother?” in his quiet -tones.</p> - -<p>“Dear me! I beg your pardon, Reginald, for crying out; how very absurd -of me. Mrs. Nugent has gone away! I was so startled I could not help it. -She’s gone away! This is to tell me—and she was here all the afternoon -yesterday, and never said a word.”</p> - -<p>“Oh, that’s the little widow,” said Ralph; “and a very good thing too, I -should say, mother. Nothing so dangerous as little widows about.”</p> - -<p>Again I am sorry that Lucy was so much absorbed in her own emotions as -not to be capable of general observation, or she would have seen that -both her brother Reginald and Mr. Bertram looked at Raaf as if they -would like to cut his throat.</p> - -<p>“She says she did tell me yesterday,” said Mrs. Wradisley, reading her -letter. “<span class="lftspc">‘</span>I<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_138" id="page_138"></a>{138}</span> mentioned that I had news that disturbed me a little.’ Yes, -now I recollect she did. I thought she wasn’t looking herself, and of -course I asked what was the matter. But I had forgotten all about it, -and I never thought it was serious. ‘And now I find that I must go. You -have all been so kind to me, and I am so sorry to leave. Tiny, too, will -break her little heart; only a child always believes she is coming back -again to-morrow; and the worst of it is I don’t know when I may be able -to get back.’<span class="lftspc">”</span></p> - -<p>“But, mother, she can’t have gone yet; there will be time to run and say -good-by by the ten o’clock train,” said Lucy, getting up hurriedly.</p> - -<p>Once more Mrs. Wradisley raised a restraining hand, “Listen,” she said, -“you’ve not heard the end. ‘To-night I am going up to town by the eight -o’clock train. I have not quite settled what my movements will be -afterwards; but you shall hear when I know myself.’ That’s all,” said -the mother, “and very unsatisfactory I call it; but you see you will do -no manner of good, Lucy, jumping<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_139" id="page_139"></a>{139}</span> up and disturbing everybody at -breakfast on account of the ten o’clock train.”</p> - -<p>“Well,” said Lucy, drawing a long breath, “that is something at -least—if she will really let us know as soon as she knows herself.”</p> - -<p>“Gammon,” said Ralph. “My belief is you will never hear of your pretty -widow again. She’s seen somebody that is up to her tricks, or she’s -broken down in some little game, or—”</p> - -<p>“Raaf!” cried mother and sister together.</p> - -<p>But that was not all. Mr. Wradisley put down his newspaper; his -countenance appeared from behind it a little white and drawn, with his -eyebrows lowering. “I am sorry, indeed,” he said, “to hear a man of my -name speak of a lady he knows nothing about as perhaps—a cad might -speak, but not a gentleman.”</p> - -<p>“Reginald!” the ladies cried now in chorus, with tones of agitation and -dismay.</p> - -<p>Meanwhile Bertram had got up from the table with a disregard of good -manners of which in the tumult of his feelings he was quite unconscious, -and stalked away, going<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_140" id="page_140"></a>{140}</span> out of the room and the house, his head thrust -forward as if he did not quite realize where he was going. The ladies -afterwards, when they discussed this incident, and had got over their -terror lest hot words should ensue between the brothers, as for the -moment seemed likely—gave Bertram credit for the greatest tact and -delicacy; since it was evident that he too thought a crisis was coming, -and would not risk the chance of being a spectator of a scene which no -stranger to the family ought to see.</p> - -<p>But none of these fine sentiments were in Bertram’s mind. He went out, -stumbling as he went, because a high tide of personal emotion had surged -up in him, swelling to his very brain. That may not be a right way to -describe it, because they say all feeling comes from the brain—but that -was how he felt. He scarcely heard the jabberings of these Wradisley -people, who knew nothing about it. He who was the only man who had -anything to say in the matter, to defend her or to assail her—he would -have liked to knock down that fellow Ralph; but he would have<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_141" id="page_141"></a>{141}</span> liked -still more to kick Ralph’s brother out of the way, who had taken upon -him to interfere and stand up for her, forsooth, as if he knew anything -about her, whereas it was he, only he, Frank Bertram, who knew. He went -staggering out of the house, but shook himself up when he got into the -open air, and pulled himself together. There had been such a strong -impulse upon him to go after her last night and seize hold upon her, to -tell her all this was folly and nonsense, and couldn’t be. Why had he -not done it? He couldn’t tell. To think that was his own child that he -had carried about, and that after all she had been called Laetitia, -after his mother, though <i>her</i> mother had cut him off and banished him -for no immediate fault of his. It was his fault, but it was the fault of -ignorance, not of intention. He had believed what he had so intently -wished to be true, but he had no more meant to harm Nelly or her child -than to sully the sunshine or the skies. And now, when chance or -providence, or whatever you chose to call it, had brought them within -sight of each other<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_142" id="page_142"></a>{142}</span> again, that he should not have had the heart to -follow that meeting out at once, and insist upon his rights! Perhaps she -would not have denied him—he had thought for a moment that there had -been something in her eyes—and then, like the dolt he was, like the -coward he was, he had let her go, and had gone in to dinner, and had sat -through the evening and listened to their talk and their music, and had -gone to bed and tossed and dreamed all night, and let her go. There had -been impulses in him against all these things. He had thought of -excusing himself from dinner. He had thought of pretending a headache, -and stealing out later; but he had not done it. He had stuck there in -their infernal routine, and let her go. Oh, what a dolt and coward slave -am I! He would not put forth a hand to hold her, to clutch her, not a -finger! But began to bestir himself as soon as she was out of his reach -and had got clear away.</p> - -<p>He went straight on toward the gate and the village, not much thinking -where he was going, nor meaning anything in particular by<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_143" id="page_143"></a>{143}</span> it; but -before he was aware found himself at Greenbank, where he had stopped -once in the darkness, all unaware who was within, and listened to Ralph -Wradisley (the cad! his brother was right) bringing forth his foolish -rubbish about the pretty widow, confound him! And some one had asked him -if perhaps he knew the Nugents, and he had said, Yes; but they were old -people. Yes, he knew some Nugents, he had said. They had only been her -grandparents, that was all. It was her mother’s name she had taken, but -he never guessed it, never divined it, though Tiny had divined it when -she suddenly grew silent in his hands and gave him that look. Tiny had -recognized him, like a shot! Though she had never seen him, though she -was only five weeks old when—But he had not known her, had not known -anything, nor how to behave himself when Providence placed such an -unlooked for chance in his hands.</p> - -<p>He went up to the house, the door of which stood wide open, and went in. -All the doors were open with a visible emptiness, and that<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_144" id="page_144"></a>{144}</span> look of mute -disorder and almost complaint which a deserted house bears when its -inmates have gone away. A woman came out of the back regions on hearing -his step, and explained that she had acted as Mrs. Nugent’s cook, but -was the caretaker put in by the landlord, and let or not with the house -as might suit the inmate. Mrs. Nugent had behaved very handsome to her, -she said, with wages and board wages, and to Lizzie too, the housemaid, -who had gone back to her mother’s, and refused to stay and help to clean -out the house. It was out of order, as Mrs. Nugent only went last night; -but if the gentleman would like to see over it—Bertram behaved handsome -to her also, bidding her not trouble herself, and then was permitted to -wander through the house at his will. There was nothing to be seen -anywhere which had any association either to soothe or hurt his excited -mind—a broken doll, an old yellow novel, a chair turned over in one -room, the white coverlet in another twisted as if packing of some sort -had been performed upon it—nothing but the merest vulgar<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_145" id="page_145"></a>{145}</span> traces of a -sudden going away. In the little drawing-room there were some violets in -water in a china cup—he remembered that she had worn them -yesterday—and by their side and on the carpet beneath two or three of -the forget-me-nots he had gathered for Tiny. He had almost thought of -taking some of the violets (which was folly) away with him. But when he -saw the forget-me-nots he changed his mind, and left them as he found -them. His flowers had not found favor in her sight, it appeared! It was -astonishing how much bitterness that trivial circumstance added to his -feelings. He went out by the open window, relieved to get into the open -air again, and went round and round the little garden, finding here and -there play places of Tiny, where a broken toy or two, and some daisies -threaded for a chain, betrayed her. And then it suddenly occurred to him -that there were but two or three forget-me-nots, which might easily have -fallen from Tiny’s hot little hand, whereas there had been a large -number gathered. What had been done with the rest? Had<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_146" id="page_146"></a>{146}</span> they by any -possibility been carried away? The thought came with a certain balm to -his heart. He said Folly! to himself, but yet there was a consolation in -the thought.</p> - -<p>He was seated on the rude little bench where Tiny had played, looking at -her daisies, when he heard a step; and, looking through the hedge of -lilac bushes which enclosed him, he saw to his great surprise Mr. -Wradisley walking along the little terrace upon which the drawing-room -windows opened. Mr. Wradisley could not be stealthy, that was -impossible, but his step was subdued; and if anything could have made -his look furtive, as if he were afraid of being seen, that would have -been his aspect. He walked up and down the little terrace once or twice, -and then he went in softly by the open window. In another moment he -reappeared. He was carefully straightening out in his hands the limp -forget-me-nots which had fallen from the table to the carpet out (no -doubt) of Tiny’s little hot hands. Mr. Wradisley took out a delicate -pocket-book bound in morocco, and edged with silver, and with the -greatest<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_147" id="page_147"></a>{147}</span> care, as if they had been the most rare specimens, arranged in -it the very limp and faded flowers. Then he placed the book in his -breast-pocket, and turned away. Bertram, in the little damp arbor, laid -himself upon the bench to suppress the tempest of laughter which tore -him in two. It was more like a convulsion than a fit of merriment, for -laughter is a tragic expression sometimes, and it came to an end very -abruptly in something not unlike a groan. Mr. Wradisley was already at -some distance, but he stopped involuntarily at the sound of this groan, -and looked back, but seeing nothing to account for it, walked on again -at his usual dignified pace, carrying Tiny’s little muddy, draggled -forget-me-nots over his heart.</p> - -<p>It was not till some time after that Bertram followed him up to the -hall. He had neither taken Nelly’s violets nor Tiny’s daisies, though he -had looked at them both with feelings which half longed for and half -despised such poor tokens of the two who had fled from him. The thought -of poor Mr. Wradisley’s mistake gave him again and again<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_148" id="page_148"></a>{148}</span> a spasm of -inaudible laughter as he went along the winding ways after him. After -all, was it not a willful mistake, a piece of false sentiment -altogether? for the man might have remembered, he said to himself, that -Nelly wore violets, autumn violets, and not forget-me-nots. When he got -to the house, Bertram found, as he had expected, a telegram summoning -him to instant departure. He had taken means to have it sent when he -passed through the village. And the same afternoon went away, offering -many regrets for the shortness of his visit.</p> - -<p>“Three days—a poor sort of Saturday to Monday affair,” said Mrs. -Wradisley. “You must come again and give us the rest that is owing to -us.”</p> - -<p>“It is just my beastly luck,” Bertram said.</p> - -<p>As for Lucy, she tried to throw a great deal of meaning into her eyes as -she bade him good-by; but Bertram did not in the least understand what -the meaning was. He had an uncomfortable feeling for the moment, as if -it might be that Lucy’s heart had been<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_149" id="page_149"></a>{149}</span> touched, unluckily, as her -brother’s had been; but grew hot all over with shame, looking again at -her innocent, intent face though what was in it, it was not given to him -to read. What Lucy would have said had she dared would have been, “Oh, -Mr. Bertram, go home to your wife and live happy ever after!” but this -of course she had no right to say. Ralph, however, the downright, whom -no one suspected of tact or delicacy, said something like it as he -walked with his friend to the station. Or rather it was at the very last -moment as he shook hands through the window of the railway carriage.</p> - -<p>“Good-by, Bertram,” he said; “I’d hunt up Mrs. Bertram and make it up, -if I were you. Things like that can’t go on forever, don’t you know.”</p> - -<p>“There’s something in what you say, Wradisley,” Bertram replied.</p> - -<p class="c">THE END.</p> - -<hr class="full" /> - - - - - - - -<pre> - - - - - -End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Two Strangers, by Margaret Oliphant - -*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK TWO STRANGERS *** - -***** This file should be named 55784-h.htm or 55784-h.zip ***** -This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: - http://www.gutenberg.org/5/5/7/8/55784/ - -Produced by Chuck Greif and the Online Distributed -Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This book was -produced from scanned images of public domain material -from the Google Books project.) - - -Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions -will be renamed. - -Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no -one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation -(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without -permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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