"She'sclever enough for two though, ain't she?" opined he,—and on this point it was the neighbourhood who endorsed his opinion.
The pair were an unfailing source of interest and amusement. Mrs. Purcell's latest word and Val's latest deed invariably went the round, and to their house as a centre every fresh topic made its way.
It was there, we may observe, that the doctor's wife had met the Boldero girls and heard about Leonore, and it might be added that it was there also the Reverend Eustace Custance gained the like intelligence. Let us hear how it was taken by the Purcells themselves.
Val, as usual, grinned from ear to ear, and had nothing to say—but his grandmother had plenty, and directly her guests had departed she summoned the young man to her side.
"What is this I hear about the Bolderos?"
This was Mrs. Purcell's little way of finding out what others had heard. It is true that she was slightly deaf as she was partially blind,—but she heard a great deal more and saw a vast deal further than most of her neighbours, and Val was never in the least taken in by a parade of infirmities. On the present occasion he simply waited for the speaker to proceed.
"Did those girls say their sister was coming back to live with them? I thought they did—but you know how badly I hear, especially if there is a hubbub going on. Were they expecting her to-day? And had their father gone to meet her, and was that why they had to hurry off, so as to be back at home before the carriage returned? I thought so, but those girls gabble like ducks. Eh? I was right then? And this is the end of poor little Leonore's great marriage? At twenty-one she is left a widow, with too much money to know what to do with—what? What did you say?"
"Didn't say anything, ma'am."
"But itisso, is it not? I am sure I heard Maud telling you——?" and Mrs. Purcell paused and peered sharply.
"Ididn't, then. But I knew you would tell me afterwards if there was anything to tell."
"Humph!" The old lady paused again, and twisted her cap strings. Val was gazing stupidly out of the window, but whatever the expression of his face might be no one could deny that the face itself was worthy of notice. It was an almost perfect outline which was now cut sharp against the light, the unusually bright light of an autumn sun, setting in a cloudless sky.
Val was looking at the sun, and wondering if a slight haze surrounding it portended rain. He was learned in weather lore and most of his life was passed out of doors,—so that it was important to him to ascertain if he could, the forecast of each day. It meant whether he might expect a hunting, or a shooting, or a fishing day. This was infinitely more interesting than the conversation, though he was always ready for conversation if nothing better offered.
"Humph!" muttered his grandmother a second time, and stole a glance, a long, furtive, appraising glance—not at the sunset, but at the profile which it threw into such bold relief.
Apparently it satisfied her, for her own features relaxed, and her eyes sought the floor in meditation.
("She might be caught by his looks, why not? The other two are always glad to talk to Val, and Heaven knows it is not for anything he says. He contrives to make them laugh—he has a kind of oddity that goes down—but if he were an ugly fellow they would not trouble their heads about that. Now, if Leonore——she is but a child still, and as she could marry a man called Stubbs to begin with, she can't be particular. Anyhow it is worth trying for.")
"Val?"—suddenly the peremptory old voice rang out.
Val yawned and turned round.
"I am so sorry for dear little Leonore, I can't get her out of my head."
"Well, I'm sorry too." With an effort Val recalled what he had to be sorry for, but that done, he assumed a solemn air that did him credit—and indeed we are wrong in using the word "assumed," since directly he remembered or reflected upon the woes of others, Valentine Purcell's kind heart was touched.
"I'm awfully sorry," he reiterated now, shaking his head.
"It is so sad for her, is it not?"
"Awfully sad; I say, do you think she'd join the hunt?" Suddenly his eyes lit up, and he started to attention. "We do want some more subscribers jolly badly. If Leonore——"
"Not just at present, my dear,—but, yes, certainly, by-and-by, when she has settled down here, and left off her weeds."
"Her what?" he stared.
"Her widow's weeds, dear boy. The poor child must wear them, you know. White collars and cuffs, and that kind of thing. Happily she need not disfigure her sweet face by a frightful cap asIhad to do."
"Oh, Lor! Do you mean Leo will have to turn out in a thing like that?"
"My dear, I just said she wouldnot."
"But she might, he-he-he!" he chuckled, but the next moment was again preternaturally grave. "I had no idea. Poor Leo!"
This was better. The old lady sighed sympathetically. "Yes, indeed. Poor Leo! You always liked Leo, Val?"
"Rather. I can't imagine her in a beastly widow's cap, he-he-he! It's a beastly shame, but I can't help laughing."
"It does seem incongruous. I don't wonder that you can hardly picture that bright little sunbeam of a face with those golden curls hanging round it——"
"She's not as good-looking as Maud, you know."
"Indeed I think she is a great deal better looking," said Mrs. Purcell, shortly.
But she knew better than to argue the point, and resorted to one more likely to yield a favourable result.
"You were talking about Leonore's joining the hunt; and I fancy if you are content to wait a little and approach the matter delicately, she is quite likely to be persuaded. Every one knows that it is only stinginess on General Boldero's part which stands in the way of his daughters' hunting.Thatneed not affect Leonore, who will now be quite independent, and can keep as many horses as she chooses."
"You don't say so? Yoicks! I'll be at her like a shot."
"And you can offer to pilot her, you know. She will be nervous at first."
"Oh, I'll pilot her. But she can ride all right, for we used to have great larks when they were out on their ponies, and Leo was always the best of the bunch. It will be fun if I can get her to follow hounds, and the hunt will be awfully obliged to me."
"Don't let any one else—it is your idea, and you ought to have the benefit of it."
"Trust me for that, ma'am," looking very wise. "I've never brought them a subscriber yet, and it would be jolly mean of any one to try to cut me out."
"If it is suggested, you must pooh-pooh the notion."
"How can I though, when I'm thinking of it all the time myself?"
"Leonore might be prevailed upon byyou, by an old friend for whom she has a kindly feeling, and on whose judgment she could rely," replied Mrs. Purcell, softly; "while at the same time she would not think nor dream of such a thing if left to herself. And certainly she would resent being approached on the subject by strangers. Therefore it would be quite correct, absolutely correct, to say that no such approach would have a chance of success. You see that, my dear boy?"
He was further instructed that, in order to prepare the ground for his future mission, he was to take an early opportunity of calling at the Abbey, and of being especially respectful and sympathetic in his manner towards poor dear little Leo.
He was to show that as an old friend and playmate he felt for her; and he might, if he saw his way to it, intimate delicately that though he might grieve on her account at her return to dwell among them, he could not do so on his own.
"Well, I can say that, you know," Val brightened up. He did not much like being on the respectful and sympathetic lay, he told himself; he was pretty sure to make a mess of it there;—but if it came to saying he was glad——
"You can'tsaysuch a thing, my dear, you can only infer it. You can look it; look kind and—and tender."
"And jolly well show old Maud she needn't book me too sure as her man, eh?"
At last he seemed to have caught up what she was struggling against heavy odds to inculcate. It was up-hill work teaching Val anything, especially anything requiringfinesse—but occasionally he would startle his mentor. He would emit a flash of intelligence when such was least expected, and there was now such a humorous light in his grey eyes that the old lady laughed in her heart. Dear, dear—how naughty he was! So he had the vanity to suppose that Maud Boldero reckoned him an admirer?
Whereat Val complacently knew she did.
By degrees he was led to reveal all his artless thoughts upon the subject, and somehow found it more engrossing than he had ever done before.
In truth, his grandmother had never encouraged mention of it before. She had ignored the Boldero girls when she could, and bracketed them together in faint, damning praise when to ignore was impossible. She knew exactly how to treat Val. An incipient flame could be warmed, cooled, or blown out by her breath—and as hitherto she had had no intention of receiving a daughter-in-law out of Boldero Abbey, she had simply never permitted a spark to be lit.
Here, in justice to the old lady, a solitary fact must be stated. Her grandson was not her heir, and the Claymount estate, of which she had a life rent, was strictly entailed; wherefore Val must be provided for otherwise.
A woman of another sort would have attained this end by saving out of her income, or by insuring her life—but Mrs. Purcell argued that she had so much to keep up, and Valentine's requirements were so manifold and costly that she could neither put by anything worth having, nor afford the heavy premiums an Insurance Office would demand at her age. She had not taken the matter into consideration till too late.
And the boy had been bred to no profession—indeed his grandmother secretly doubted his ability to pursue one—and she had been only too glad of the excuse to have him as her companion at Claymount. He had a pittance of his own, derived from his parents who were both dead,—but he had nothing further to look to, as his uncle, who in the course of time would succeed to the estate, openly flouted him for a "loafer," and made no secret of his opinion that the money spent on his hunters and keepers would have been better bestowed upon almost anything else.
What then was to become of Val—Val, who was the apple of her eye, whose very childishness and helplessness were dear to her, whose beauty of face and form—stop, she had it, she laughed as she told herself she had it. And how often she strained those dim old eyes of hers to see more clearly when her darling's step was heard, and how fondly they rested on the approaching figure and strove to appraise at its exact value the curiously beautiful face, no one but herself knew.
It was a face without a soul—and she was pathetically aware of this, but what then? Val would make a good husband—he would certainly make a good husband. Husbands were not required to be clever; and it was quite on the cards that even an intelligent girl might fall in love with a man who had only a kind heart and an amiable disposition to recommend him, provided his exterior were to her fancy.
But of course the girl must be rich; and now we come to the crux of the whole little scene above narrated—Leonore Stubbs, the wealthy young widow, with no ties, no drawbacks, and not too much discrimination (or she could not have married as she did in the first instance), was the very first person to solve the problem. In her own mind Mrs. Purcell decided that her grandson should call at Boldero Abbey the very first moment that decency permitted.
There is no need to multiply instances, it will now be perceived that in no quarter was the real secret of the unfortunate Leonore's return to the home of her childhood so much as suspected.
She was a pauper—but she was received as a princess. She had hardly a penny of her own—but she was marked down as a benefactress. She was bereft, denuded, bewildered, humiliated—but she was hailed with acclaim by the shrewdest woman in the neighbourhood on the look-out for an heiress.
To her surprise, Leonore slept soon and soundly on her first night in the vast, gloomy bedchamber wherein it was her father's pleasure that she should be installed.
She had not expected to do so.
The room was known as the "Blue Room"; but years had faded the blue, which now only stood out with any clearness in creases of the curtains, or remote patches of carpet on which the light never fell. Otherwise a dull grey prevailed.
Nevertheless Leo had been fond of the "Blue Room" in early days; revelling in its mysterious depths, hiding in its capacious hiding-holes, and, finest fun of all, making hay in its huge four-poster with some little friend of her own age. It was an apartment so seldom used, and its furniture was so shabby and out-of-date, that Sue would readily accede to the little girls' petition to be despatched thither—only exacting a promise that there should be no climbing of window-sills, which promise had been broken, and confessed honourably—whereupon Sue, who was herself a woman of honour, never once mentioned window-sills again. The windows, deepset and high up in the wall, with broad sills inviting to perch upon, only existed as roofs for the cupboards beneath, once Leo had succumbed to temptation and gone unpunished. "No, dear, there is no need for any more punishment," Sue had said in her kindest accents,—and when Sue spoke like that, the little saucy upstart Leonore, whom usually nothing could repress, would be good for days.
Consequently the apartment had its associations; and under other circumstances its new occupant would have found it pleasant enough to look upon it as her own. But weary and dejected, with all the world in shadow around her, it is scarcely to be wondered at that she should shrink into herself, and look piteously up into Sue's face, as Sue turned the handle of the door.
"Am I—am I to be here, Sue?"
"Father says so, dear."
"But, Sue, couldn't I—some little room—?"
"Oh, I think you will be very comfortable here, Leo; you will have plenty of space for your belongings," she glanced at the array of trunks,—"and you can always remain in undisturbed possession," summed up Sue cheerfully. "The other spare rooms——"
"I never thought ofthem. My own little old room——" faltered Leo.
She had settled this with herself beforehand. Although it was on the top storey, and in a somewhat despised quarter, she had loved her small domain because it was hers and she might pull it about as she chose,—most girls feel the same, and Leo was a very girl, and youthful instincts were warm within her.
Sue, however, had received her orders on the point, and though they were distasteful, she recognised in them an element of reasonableness.
"I am sorry, dear, but that would never do. You know what father's wishes are. That you should be given a dignified position in the family; and—and I think he explained why. He had thought the matter carefully out before he fixed on this room for you. He does not like to be argued with, Leo."
Leo resigned herself. She knew the tone of old, it conveyed, "I am sorry, but I shall be firm"—it was the formal, precise, elder sister, the general's mouthpiece, not the good, old, motherly Sue, who spoke. Further resistance would be useless.
And now, alone, sitting on the great square sofa, with great square chairs and massive receptacles on every side, the forlorn little figure gazed about her with a heart that sank lower and lower. She was to occupy a "dignified position in the family"? Did that mean that she was still to be treated ceremoniously as in Godfrey's life-time? That she was still to have that uneasy sense of beingcompanywhich had then haunted her? Sue alone had led the way to her new abode—Maud and Sybil having vanished elsewhere—and this in itself forboded ill. She sat motionless, pondering.
In childhood the gap between herself and her elders had always been too wide to be bridged even at its nearest point, which was Sybil—but she had looked to her marriage hopefully. Then somehow, she could never quite tell how, but although she could manage to play the hostess to her sisters on apparently equal terms at Deeside, the old position remained intact at Boldero Abbey. For all her gay outward bearing, Leo was of a sensitive nature, and the girls—to herself she always called them "the girls"—had only to take a matter for granted, for her to follow their lead.
So that while it would have been joy untold to perceive the barriers withdrawn, and to have been allowed to run in and out of Maud's room and Sybil's room—she did not covet Sue's—in dressing-gown and slippers, to have brushed her hair of nights along with them and talked the talk that goes with that time-honoured procedure, Mrs. Godfrey Stubbs had no more been accorded this privilege, for which she had hungered ever since she could remember, than the little out-cast Leonore had been. Indeed, she was kept even more steadily at bay—and we will for a moment lift the veil for our readers and disclose why.
"Itisn'tunkind," quoth Maud, on one occasion. "I wouldn't be unkind for worlds, but it simply can't be done. Leo is no longer one of us; she belongs to the Stubby people among whom she lives,—and if we were to begin talking about them, we couldn't help letting out what we think—at least, perhaps I could, but you couldn't." It was to Syb she spoke, and Syb lifted her eyebrows.
"I daresay; I can't see any harm if I did. I should rather like to hear about the Stubby people and their queerities."
"Not from Leo's point of view. She would not see what you call their 'queerities'. She takes them allau serieux."
"Are you sure she does? She must see they are different from the people here, at all events; and——"
"How is she to see?" interrupted Maud quickly. "She never went anywhere before her marriage. She had only been to one ball, and a few cricket matches. Actually she had never once dined at a house in the neighbourhood."
"If she had, she might not have been so ready to take Godfrey. I couldn't have stood Godfrey as a husband myself, though I really don't mind him as a brother-in-law; and I think it a little hard that Leo should be tabooed."
"I tell you she isn't tabooed. It is for her own sake that it would be a pity her eyes should be opened. She has got to mix in inferior society, and why make her discontented with it?"
"All right, you needn't be excited. I am only rather sorry sometimes when the child looks disappointed.—I say, I do think father ought not to have been in such a hurry to marry her off," cried Sybil, with sudden energy. "Idothink it. What good did it do? She's rich, and that's all—for I don't count Godfrey. I don't believe she cares for him more than she would for any other tolerably nice man who went for her as he did. I don't believe——"
"Bother what you believe!" Maud arrested the flow; "the thing is that we can't talk familiarly with Leo, as Leo now is. We can't let ourselves go. You must see this for yourself? Why, only to-night when she and Godfrey were so elated over the civility of their new 'Chairman,' and seemed to expect us all to be astonished and impressed, because he is such a bigwig and it was such a terrific condescension, I didn't dare to look at father. I knew the unutterable contempt that filled his soul. Condescension from an absolute nobody to one of us!"
"That's it. When you are at Deeside you are breathing a weird atmosphere, and Leo thrives in it. She knows all her neighbours, and expects you to know them. She took me once to an enormous reception at the opening of some building or other and it was beyond words—the most appalling women in the most appalling clothes—I told you about them—don't you remember the apple-green satin hat with six feathers? Well, I could hardly contain myself, but Leo saw nothing to laugh at. She ran about all over the place, chattering to everybody, and could hardly be got away, she was enjoying herself so much."
"I don't blame her," said Maud indulgently. "I really don't blame her. How should she know any better, poor child?"
At the close of the discussion Leo's doom was sealed.
True, it was now reopened, and Maud conceded that by-and-by, perhaps, when by degrees the recalcitrant had been weaned from her ways, and taught to tread the paths of righteousness according to Boldero ideas, her case might be reconsidered,—but as, for decency's sake, the teaching could not be begun just yet, it was agreed that Leo should receive her lighted candle and good-night kiss in the hall, as before.
It was due to accident, however, not to design, that the sisters for whose fellowship our poor little heroine yearned, permitted her to be escorted by Sue only to take possession of her new domain. A milliner's box had arrived from London, and been brought up with Mrs. Stubbs' luggage. Leo could not compete with that box. It was all important that the new assortment of hats despatched by the Maison du Cram should be smarter and more becoming than the first batch which had been uncompromisingly rejected; and Maud, slipping out by one door, was quickly followed by Sybil through the other—whereupon Sue also rose, and said, "Come, Leo".
Here then was Leo, small, white-faced, black-robed, the most pitiable little object, almost a parody on the name of widow, dumped down in the "Blue Room" to rattle like a pea in a pod in its capacious depths.
She was indeed accustomed to a luxurious bedchamber, but then it was a different kind of bedchamber. At Deeside the morning sun poured in through large, single-paned windows, lightly curtained; and its rays were reflected by white woodwork clamped by shining brass, and wallpaper that glistened.
Into her new abode neither sun could enter, nor would have met with any response had it done so. She looked dolorously round and round, and tears stood in her eyes. Poor little girl, tears were never very far off in those days.
And she must have thus sat for some time, and perhaps dozed off for a minute or two, for a brisk tap at the door, and the bustling entrance of a housemaid, admitted also the sound of the dressing gong, and both seemed to follow close upon Sue's departing heels.
Dressing was an easy matter when there was no choice of attire and adornments, and Leo's curly hair only needed to be combed through to look as though it had been freshly arranged—so that though she had to open her trunks, and had a moment's flurry before she could be certain into which of these her solitary evening robe had been packed, she was ready and downstairs before any one else.
The evening was got through somehow, and then there was the return march through the long dim corridor to the antiquated apartment, and the conviction that she should never be able to sleep in it, and then—? No sooner had the weary little figure sunk down among the pillows and drawn up the coverlid, than the sound, sweet slumber of youth and innocence prevailed; and the mists were off the land and melting in the blue October sky, long before Leo unclosed her eyes. Eventually she was roused by the stable-clock striking eight beneath her window, and woke to find the night was gone.
Have we said that Leo had a happy disposition? She had not merely that, but a buoyant, recuperative, physical nature, which threw off every adverse circumstance as a foreign element.
Even an ailment could not make her ill, even misfortune could not make her miserable.
Experiencing either the one or the other she bent before it, but there was a fount of bubbling vitality within, which it was impossible wholly to repress.
So that when the little girl sat up in bed, and blinked her drowsy eyes—still drowsy for all the long hours of dreamless, healthy slumber—and when next she yawned and caught back a yawn in sudden recognition of a familiar object unobserved before—and when again she shook across her shoulders the thick plaits of hair on either side, and pulled out the crumpled lace upon her nightgown cuffs, and finally jumped up and ran to look what the day was like, it was perhaps as well that nobody was there to spy upon the newly-made widow.
She actually laughed the next moment. Yes, she laughed as she sprang upon the erst forbidden window-sill, and out of pure daring sat there. Albeit a little creature, she was tall enough to have seen out without even rising on tip-toe,—it was the sheer pleasure of doing what no one could now stop her doing which prompted the action.
And then again she sighed. The immediate past rose before her, frowning, though the old past tittered. She hung her head, ashamed of her levity—and next her reflection in an opposite mirror kindled it afresh. How comical she looked perched aloft with bare feet hanging down, like a small white bird upon a rail! What a nice roost she had found—and it would be nicer still if she sat sideways, with her back to the shutters,—so, and her feet against the opposite shutters—so! The broad, smooth seat would be an ideal reading place for summer evenings, when the sun crept round to that side of the house, and began to descend, as she could remember it did, over the ridge of beech trees which belted the park below.
She could lock her door, of course. The room was her own, and even Sue could not expect to dominate over what went on within her own room. Besides—besides, she had almost forgotten that she was no longer under Sue's thrall, and that yesterday Sue had observed a gentle deference towards her.
That might pass—she hoped it would. If only she could be on the old terms,—and yet not on the old terms! If only she might be Leo, and yet not Leo! She tried to puzzle out the situation.
She knew indeed what she did not want, but could not define with any exactitude what she did. Three years of affluence and independence had to a certain extent left their mark, and she could not but own that it would be unpalateable to find herself again in leading-strings. At Deeside when a matter came under discussion, as often as not, Godfrey would say, "Please yourself, little wife,"—or, if not, the little wife was sure to be charmed with his decision. He was so much older and wiser, that whatever he decreed was safe to be satisfactory in the long run.
But her father and sisters would most certainly not make her pleasure their chief aim and object; consequently it was as well perhaps—a sigh of relief—that she could not be ordered about and have the law laid down to her as of yore.
And yet, even this would be better, infinitely better, than to be kept at arm's-length, and made to feel that she had neither part nor lot in the home life she had returned to share. For instance, if she were late for breakfast——What? What was that? The clock below was striking the half-hour, and precisely at nine the breakfast gong would sound—what had she been thinking of?
"I hope, Leonore, you will be more punctual in future," said General Boldero, as his youngest daughter took her seat at the table, and having thus delivered himself, he did not again address her throughout the remainder of the meal.
It might have been that he was taken up with his letters, of which he always made the most—handling the envelope even of an advertisement as though it were of importance—but Leo, sitting silent beside him, wished her place were a little farther off. She was conscious of a chill, and she had forgotten what a chill was like.
Her sisters talked among themselves, obviously indifferent to anything but their own concerns; and since it was apparent that the present social atmosphere was its normal one, she tried to think it had no reference to herself, and not to draw comparisons between it and that she had been of late accustomed to.
She and Godfrey had always enjoyed their breakfast-hour. It had often had to be hurried through, and the good things set before them unceremoniously bolted—but cheerfulness and good-humour made even that drawback endurable,—and after seeing her husband drive away from the door, Leo would return to fill her cup afresh, with a smile on her lips. She peeped round the table now, to see if there were a smile anywhere.
Sue looked worried and prim—the worst Sue. Miss Boldero never gave way to temper, indeed she had a creditably equable temper—but when things were not well with her she stiffened; she remained upon an altitude; she addressed her sisters by their full Christian names. Leo, who had been "Leo" on the previous evening, was now "Leonore".
"The girls" also had merely nodded as the small creature, looking almost irritatingly young and childish in her widow's garb, took her seat among them. Neither Maud nor Sybil looked young for their years, and perhaps unconsciously resented Leo's doing so, as accentuating a gap already wide enough.
Further, Leo looked her best in the clear morning light, while her sisters' complexions suffered. They would not have slept as profoundly as she, nor risen with such a spring of elasticity in their veins. They would not have the appetite for breakfast that made everything taste good. They were inclined to be "Chippy" with each other.
For Leo a new-born day was a day full of pleasant possibilities, and the less she knew about it the better. She rather preferred to have nothing arranged for; it left so much the more margin for something nice to happen. As for dullness, she did not know what the word meant.
For though our heroine's abilities were not of a high order, there were plenty of things she could do, and do well; and being by nature industrious and creative, she took much delight in small achievements. "Busy little woman!" Godfrey would exclaim, when one of these was submitted for his approval; and if his praise were at times lacking in discrimination, he was humble enough to satisfy any one's vanity when this was pointed out.
Now, though there was no longer the untrammelled freedom to fill her days as she chose, no longer the allurement of adorning a home according to her own unfettered fancies, no longer, alas! Godfrey to surprise and delight—there was yet, on this first morning of her new life, a little new pulsation throbbing within poor Leo's breast.
She had been unhappy for three whole weeks, and sorrow was unnatural to her; so that although, as we have said, tears still lay near the surface, and there would be the quick sigh and swell of the heart at a chance recollection, there was also a tiny troublesome spark beginning to flicker afresh within, of which the poor little thing, a widow, and a pauper, and all that ought to have been crushed to earth, was desperately ashamed.
She looked around at the long solemn faces, and strove to bring hers into line with them. She fixed her eyes upon her plate, and was shocked to find it empty. How fast she must have eaten! How greedy and unfeeling she must have appeared! Her cheeks burned; and thereafter it was "No, thank you" to everything, though she could very well have done with another slice of toast and something sweet.
Jam and marmalade were both on the well-laden, old-fashioned board, but though Maud was helping herself to the latter, Leo resolutely declined. She was sure she was being watched; perhaps it was thought surprising that she could swallow food at all? Her hand trembled, and the spoon fell from the saucer of her cup. General Boldero looked up quickly, and the look was like a missile flung at her.
"No, I haven't seen her yet."
Obedient to command, Valentine Purcell had called three times at Boldero Abbey during the month succeeding Leonore's arrival. Val had quite entered into the spirit of the thing. He was fond of making calls at all times, and only needed the slightest hint to betake himself to any house in the neighbourhood.
It is true that the veriest trifle would also throw him off the track; a fieldmouse in the path was a lion,—but given no fieldmouse, he might be trusted to reach his destination, and when reached, the only difficulty was to get him away from it. Wherever he was, there would he take root; and having no claims elsewhere, it did not occur to him that other people's time was more precious than his own.
Accordingly he had spent, satisfactorily to himself, the best part of three afternoons with the Boldero girls, and though Mrs. Stubbs had been invisible on each occasion, he had got on quite well without her—indeed rather chuckled at the reflection that it would in consequence be necessary for him to turn up again ere long at the Abbey.
Mrs. Purcell was not so complacent, however. "Dear me, how extraordinary, Val."
"Very extraordinary, ma'am." Val shook his head wisely, and looked for more. His grandmother was so clever she would be sure to think of something more to say, some explanation of the strangeness.
"They spoke of her, of course?"—she threw out, after a meditative pause. "You gathered that she was there, and——"
"Oh, aye, they spoke of her. That's to say I heard old Sue say something about 'Leonore,' and when Maud came in—she wasn't there at first—the others asked where she had been, and she said, 'We went somewhere or other'. 'We' couldn't have been any one else, you know; they never go out with the general. Besides—stop a bit—why, of course, the footman took away her tea on a tray."
"Three distinct and indisputable testimonies," observed Mrs. Purcell drily.
She was vexed, and had it been any other narrator who pieced his materials together in such a fashion, would have let loose a more palpable sarcasm.
Why could he not have asked directly after Leonore, upon the mention of her name? Why did he even wait for that? It would have been so simple, so natural, to have hoped she was well or hoped she was not ill—hoped something, anything, when the tea was openly sent her elsewhere. The opportunity was obvious; and as obviously the tiresome boy had missed it. She contented herself, however, with a grim smile.
"I expect Leo was somewhere out of sight." After a minute's reflection, Val advanced the above as its result. "They couldn't take her her tea if she wasn't there, you know."
"It seems improbable, certainly." Mrs. Purcell's lips twitched again.
"Improbable, ma'am?" He was flustered on the instant. "Why, ma'am, where would have been the sense of it? Unless there was some one to take tea to—bless me, grandmother—why should Sue have sent the poor footy off on a fool's errand? She rang for him, too," he summed up conclusively.
"Listen, Val; if you are not going to see Leonore when you call at her father's house, if she is to be kept in the background there, you must meet her elsewhere."
"But I don't think she goes elsewhere. Nobody's seen her, for I've asked."
"Oh, you have asked?" She looked pleased; she had not expected so much of him.
"Asked?—I've asked wherever I go, and not a soul has set eyes on her. I'll tell you how I do it. I say in an easy kind of way, not as if I cared, you know, but just like this, 'Any one seen Mrs. Stubbs yet?'—I call her 'Mrs. Stubbs' not to seem too familiar—and, what do you think? they laughed—Jimmy Tod and Merivale laughed—and Jimmy poked me with his whip, and said: 'Ifyouhaven't, old fellow, no one has'. Of course they know I'm intimate with the Bolderos,"—and he drew up his collar with an air.
"Why did you not mention this before, Val?"
Val looked foolish. For the life of him he could not think why, the truth being that he had forgotten, but never supposed he could forget.
"Well, never mind," pursued his grandmother; "what I mean is that you must meet your old playfellow out-of-doors, on her walks, or in the woods, or wherever she goes. She must go out: she must take the air somewhere,—and if you had had your wits about you, my dear boy, you could have found out where to-day."
"You ought to have told me if you meant me to do that."
"Then you must stop her—don't let her pass without speaking—and ask leave to join her—or them, if there are two,—but it would be better if you could catch Leonore alone. Somehow I feel sure the poor little thing is being kept away from us all," murmured the old lady pensively. "They are masterful people, the Bolderos. And Leo is so sweet and gentle——"
"She's a Boldero though," struck in he. "And though she's sweet enough, hang me if Leo can't stand up for herself! I used to die of laughing when she tackled old Sue. Sue was afraid of her. You bet she hasn't forgotten the time they all thought Leo lost, and she was found hiding in a ditch."
"Leonore? Hiding in a ditch?"
"With her face blacked, and prepared to run away to the gipsies—ha—ha—ha!"
"I never heard a word of it, Val."
"Not likely, ma'am; we were all sworn to secrecy. I believe it was even kept dark from the general, for Sue's a good sort really, and Leo was such a little thing. Though she tried to brave it out she couldn't; and when she blubbed, the tears and the muck—you never saw such a little goblin face in your life."
"And you were in her confidence? Talk about old days to her now."
"Trust me. I always wanted to talk about them, but—I say, why were we never invited to meet the Stubbses when they came to the Abbey? We never were. Never once."
"General Boldero was not proud of his son-in-law. No one was ever invited to meet him."
"They say it was he who made the match, though."
It certainly was difficult to keep Val to the point. The marriage now dissolved was nothing to him nor to any one, but since it kept Leonore as a topic of conversation, and since by means of the past the old lady could gradually work her way back to the present, she did not cut short her grandson's curiosity, and upon subsequent reflection was not displeased that he had evinced it.
A fine day coming soon after this, Val prepared for action.
First of all he prepared his mind; had he anything else he wished to do? Was there anything tempting in the way of sport to be had? He considered and shook his head. His grandmother's shooting was limited, and he had strained its capacity rather fully of late. The river was too full for fishing. The hounds were not running that day. Accordingly, hey! for the Abbey, and for what might come of it.
Thus much decided, what should he wear? No girl in her teens, no dandy in his first London season was more serious over the great affair of his clothes than this country fellow when occasion warranted. Worn and frayed and weather-stained his daily homespun might be, but he had a bill at the best tailor's in Bond Street which he never thought of paying, and which his grandmother never thought of grudging. She quietly annexed the bill, and Val heard no more of it.
He was thus well provided for emergencies like the present. He had thick and thin suits, dark and light, loose and slightly shaped—he had just received one of the last, of a delightful tawny brown colour, which he had not yet worn. It had arrived a few hours after his last call on the Bolderos, and the moment his eye fell upon it now, his mind was made up.
But though so prompt and decided on this, the most important point, there remained the question of the tie,—and how many ties were selected, tried, and found wanting before the first, which had been contemptuously discarded as lacking in dash and originality, was reconsidered, and eventually decided upon, it boots not to say.
Val had taste; and left to himself was nearly sure to come forth triumphant from an ordeal in which taste and a desire to be in the first fashion struggled for the mastery. Crimson and green and blue were famous colours, but a quiet beech-brown of a darker shade than the suit finished it off so harmoniously that he sighed consent, and stuck in a fox-head pin without further ado. Gloves, hat, and stick were below, and equipped with these he presented himself before his grandmother.
"Any commands, ma'am?"
"Commands?" said Mrs. Purcell, absently. "Commands, my dear?"
She would not make the mistake of appearing to understand too soon; if bothered, poor Val was so apt to tire of a subject, and turn rusty on its reiteration.
"I thought I might as well see what turns up," rejoined he, vaguely, "take the dogs for a run, you know; and as it's a nice morning, perhaps, I may meet people. I have made myself decent"—and he looked down complacently, and advanced within her line of vision.
"A new suit, Val? Turn round, and let me see you. Hum—quite nice. Are you going to the post-office? I have run out of stamps."
"Iwasgoing the other way, but—oh, I'll get them;" Val brightened. "I'll get them at Sutley" (Sutley was the Bolderos' village)—"and if any of those girls are about, I'll—I'll see what turns up."
"I shall know where you are if you don't come back for luncheon, then."
Now, in ninety-nine cases out of a hundred, an expedition planned on such hazy outlines would have come to grief, but strange as it may seem, no sooner did Mr. Valentine Purcell, swinging along at a high rate of speed—for he always walked as though furies were at his heels—enter the main street of Sutley village, than he espied a solitary, small, black figure advancing from the other end, and almost ere he could believe his eyes, Leonore herself was smiling into them. "Why, Val?" exclaimed she, "I am so glad to see you, Val."
"Well, you might have seen me before now." Suddenly Val felt aggrieved; it was a way he had; "I'm sure I've called often enough!"—and he shook hands rather coldly; not to be won over too soon.
"I am not supposed to be at home to people at present," said Leo, simply. "They think I ought not,—but I was sorry when I heard it was you the other day."
"Were you in the house?"—demanded he.
"Oh, yes; in the old schoolroom. I have my tea there when we are not by ourselves. I—I don't dislike it." But her face told another tale. Val, who had quite a brute instinct of sympathy, knew that she did dislike it very much.
Tea was the only really pleasant meal at the Abbey; it was relieved of the general's presence, and often of Sue's also—and during the last month Leo had learnt to look forward to it.
A little quiver of the lips accompanied the above assertion, for of late callers had been rather rife, and she had been banished so often that she had come to dread the sound of the door-bell.
"I do think I needn't be classed as 'people';" pursued her old playmate, but without the asperity of his former accents. "I've known you ever since you were so high,"—indicating—"and—and I'm awfully sorry about it all, you know."
It was only Val, Val whom nobody minded, but Leo, taken aback, flushed to her brow.
"Oh, I say, ought I not to have said that? I'm such a rotter, I blurt out with whatever comes first," stammered he, discomfited in his turn. "Leo, you know I didn't mean it. There now, I suppose I oughtn't to call you 'Leo'——" floundering afresh.
"Indeed you may, Val; and I know you meant nothing but what was kind; only I—I am so unaccustomed to hearing—they never talk about me, and I wish they would, oh, Iwishthey would," her voice broke, but she continued nevertheless: "Val, you don't know how hard it is—oh, what am I saying?"—she stopped confused and panting, terrified at what she had been led into.
"Look here," said Val, slowly, "you don't mind me, do you? You don't need to care what you say before me?—Ishan't tell, of course I shan't. They always used to be down upon you at home, and I suppose they go on the same? Just you get it out to me, Leo," and he nodded encouragingly.
By the end of half-an-hour, during which the two had wandered away from the village street and the eyes of spectators, Leo had "got it out," and if the truth were told, pretty thoroughly. Recollect how young, and naturally frank, and in a sense absolutely friendless she was. And then it was only Val—she felt almost as though she were speaking to a dog.
Certainly there was, as we said before, an element of canine sympathy in the silent, solemn, appreciative air with which her companion listened. He never interrupted. When he spoke, it was to utter a brief ejaculation or to put a question, a leading question, one which gently turned the lock a little more on the opening side. Sometimes he merely said, "Well?"—but how comforting was that "Well"!
"You see Godfrey was so very good to me, and I do miss him so," sighed the speaker at last.
It was perhaps hardly the way in which a devoted wife would have spoken of a husband only six weeks dead, but it exactly expressed the truth. Godfrey Stubbs had never been idealised, but he had been readily accepted as a lover by a barely emancipated schoolgirl who did not know what love was; and three serene, unimaginative years had been contentedly passed under his fostering care.
Had he lived, and had children been born to the pair, it is easy to conjecture the sort of woman Leonore would have developed into; as it was, she had grown more mentally and spiritually in the past six weeks than in the whole course of her previous existence.
And then came the passionate desire for expression, the helpless sense of an inner burden too heavy to be borne alone. It was lucky it was Valentine Purcell who came in Leo's way: the dam must have burst somewhere.
"You won't tell any one, Val?"
"Rather not. I should think not. I should just say not, Leo." Fervour gathered with each assurance.
"They wouldn't understand, would they?" faltered she.
"Of course they wouldn't. People never do," asseverated he.
"And you mustn't be vexed if I am still shut up when you come to see us, because I know Sue means this to go on for ever so long. Sue thinks it only proper, you know. She is not in the least unkind, she believes she is doing just what I would wish, and she would be awfully ashamed of me if I wished anything else," continued Leo, jumping across a puddle with a freer and lighter step than she had come out with, or indeed trod with, since coming back to the Abbey. "Up the bank, Val. Go first, and I'll follow. Oh, no, we won't turn back; it is only here that the water lies; I often come along this path, and it is quite dry directly you are round the corner."
"You often come here? When? Do you come in the mornings, or afternoons?"—he threw over his shoulder, still leading the way.
"I don't know. Whenever it's fine. Stop a moment; I'm caught;" and she disengaged a sprawling bramble. "It's a pity I put on this skirt," continued Leo ruefully, examining an ugly cross-tear. "It's too good. I only meant to go to the village."
"Well, but if I don't know when you come, how can I meet you here?" persevered he, pursuing his own line of thought. "I can't hang about all the time."
"Meet me? Oh!" She pondered, for it was a new idea. "I wonder, I suppose you might meet me; but if they knew we had agreed beforehand——"
"Of course they're not to know. Sue would put a stopper on it at once."
Leo was silent.
"That needn't prevent us," continued her companion, holding out a hand for her to spring into the path again. "If I'm not to see you anywhere else, it's only fair——I say, you're a married woman, you can do as you please."
"If I did it, I shoulddoit—but I shouldn'thideit. I'll never do anything I don't mean to tell about." It was a once familiar voice which rang the words out, and the speaker shook back a flying curl and tucked it in with a gesture of determination so absolutely that of the old Leo that Val burst out laughing.
"Oh, you funny little girl!"
Leo however was upon her dignity at this.
"I don't think you ought to speak to me like that," said she, "although you are to be my friend,"—for this had been agreed upon—"you must not call me a 'little girl,' and, Val, only the minute before, you reminded me that I was a married woman."
"You are such a queer mixture, Leo."
"I know. I can't help it." She was off her pedestal as fast as she had hopped on. "I do try to remember, and at Deeside it was quite easy; nobody thought of me as 'funny' or a 'girl' there—but here I seem to be back again just as I was when I left! All the places are the same, the places where we had our accidents and our happenings, and Ican'tfeel different. Only, Val——" she hesitated.
"Well?" said he.
"There's Godfrey. I would not for worlds, not forworlds—it would be horrible to seem to forget Godfrey. I don't forget him, you know; I don't really. It is just that my spirits get up on a morning like this, what with meeting you, and talking, and all,"—she stumbled on incoherently,—"and you are so kind, and seem just to know what it is like. Only you mustn't take advantage, Val,"—and she shook her head at him with an air of gentle exhortation, "you mustn't encroach. And I don't think I can meet you out-of-doors—no I can't"—(as he emitted an expostulatory "Oh, I say!") "I have made up my mind. You always called me your tyrant, don't you remember? Well, it's no use fighting against your tyrant now."
"All right." A happy idea occurred, and Val made shift to acquiesce indifferently. "Very glad to have had the pleasure of meeting you to-day, and so forth; and now I must go back to grandmother, and I daresay we shan't see each other again for months."
"Not—for—months?"
"Perhaps not this winter. I may be going away from home. I daresay I shall. It's beastly dull at our place, and there's nothing going on anywhere hereabouts."
"But, Val?"—the shot had told; she was plainly disconcerted. "Going away?"—she faltered.
"Very likely I shall. I haven't made up my mind where, but——"
"But you never do go. What should you go for now?"
"A fellow must have change. Many fellows go abroad regularly. I know a fellow who is going to hunt in Spain."
"What on earth should you do hunting in Spain, Val?"
She could not help it, she laughed outright at the idea. Val in Spain? Val, who knew no country, no sport, no language but his own? A glimmering of the truth dawned on Leo.
"I should think Spain was a very nice place to go to," observed she, regaining her composure, "a very nice place indeed."
But their eyes met, and the farce could be kept up no longer.
"You want to make me feel that I should miss you, and Ishouldmiss you," cried Leo, finding her tongue first. "I should be very, very sorry, now that we've met and met as old friends, and understand each other so well, to think that all through the long winter months you were to be far away,—so don't think of it, Val; you can't, you simply mustn't. And though I can't and won't do anything secret, I shall tell them at home straight out that I met you to-day—accidentally, for it was accidentally—and that we had a talk—they can't be angry with me for that,—and then, whether any one looks at me or not, I'll say boldly: 'So in future there will be no need for me to get out of Val Purcell's way'. There, that's settled. Here's your short cut, and I'll run home across these fields. Good-bye, and—and thank you, Val."
She was off, and though for a moment he thought of running after her, a glance at his watch stopped him.
It was already past one o'clock and though for himself he had nothing to fear if late for luncheon, since his grandmother was accustomed to unpunctuality, and would be only too ready to pardon it on the present occasion, with Leo it was different.
Luckily she was nearer home than he was. Flying along as she was doing, she might get in by a side door before the general stalked into the dining-room, and he sincerely hoped she would. He watched till she was out of sight. There was no one on earth whom Val disliked and feared as much as Leo's father.
The latter could not indeed snub him and snap at him, as when he was a boy—but it was almost worse to be looked at as though he were an offensive object, and to be heard in sneering silence if he ventured upon a remark. For all his witlessness Val, poor fellow, knew when he was happy and comfortable and when he was not, and he did not need his grandmother to tell him that he was no favourite with General Boldero.
"I only hope the old beast doesn't bully Leo," he muttered, as at last he turned into the short cut, and all the way home he was sunk in thought.
But he burst into Mrs. Purcell's presence hilariously. "I've had a jolly good time, ma'am. Sorry to be late, but I was walking with Leonore."
"With Leonore? You really did?—how odd that you should happen to meet!" The old lady, who had begun excitedly, checked herself, and assumed a cheerful, every-day air. "You fell in with the sisters on the road, I suppose?"
"Not the sisters. Only Leo. I ran into her in the middle of the village, and she was awfully nice and friendly; so then we went off for a walk together."
"How nice! Just the morning for a pleasant walk."
"Beastly wet and dirty underfoot though. Look at my boots"—and he looked himself. "We got into a regular bog once."
"You left the high road? You should not have done that." (Delighted that he had.)
"Went along the lane to Prickett's Green, and got into the woods there," said he, helping himself to cold pheasant, and looking about for adjuncts. "I knew you wanted me to do the civil, so I told her I had nothing else on hand, and we might as well have a good tramp. But we didn't really get very far, though we pottered on and on, and she had to skurry at the last to be home in time."
"Did you—did she—does Leo seem changed? Or did you find your old playmate what she always was?"
"Should never have known she had been away. She doesn't look a day older."
"But altered otherwise, perhaps? Marriage does sometimes—" and she paused suggestively.
"Oh, hang it, yes; Leo's quite the married woman," supplied he, decidedly. He knew it was a lie, but told himself he meant to say it. "I suppose they're always a bit pompous, aren't they?"
"Pompous? Do you mean that that dear little innocent-faced thing has grown pompous? Impossible, Val."
"It's the correct thing, I suppose, ma'am. Once when she thought I was rather presuming—I'm sure I meant no harm—she regularly jumped upon me!"
"Be careful, my dear, if Leo is like that. Being left rich and independent while yet so young, may have turned her head a little. Did she—ahem! talk about her affairs at all?"
"Affairs?" ("Now, what the deuce does she mean by 'affairs'?" thought he.)
"Did she speak of what she meant to do? Is she thinking of remaining in these parts? Or has she any other plans?"
"If she has, she didn't tell them me." Val considered and shook his head. "No, I don't believe she said a word of the kind. Besides what plans could she have, poor little——"
"Not 'poor'". Mrs. Purcell smiled significantly. "You don't seem to understand, my dear. Leonore Stubbs is a very rich widow, and will be immensely sought after. It would be a great pity if she could not settle in the neighbourhood, and—and join the hunt, as you said yourself."
"Aye, to be sure. I forgot about that; but you told me not to spring it upon her too soon."
"True. But you might have discovered if she was—however, apparently she has no immediate intention of flying away."
Reassured on the point, Mrs. Purcell let well alone. She had no conception that anything could be hid from her, and thought she divined that while all had gone well, even beyond her hopes so far, the two whom she would fain have seen made one, had restricted theirtête-à-têteto the discussion of conventional and superficial topics. Val had even called Leonore "pompous". That meant the young lady was aware of her own value, and if so——?
There remained however this comfort; in her present situation the youthful widow could not go into society, and Val, being first in the field, might, to borrow his own phraseology, catch the hare before the other hounds were on the scent.
Val on his part chuckled likewise. Secretive as the grave could Val be when he chose; and one thing was clear to him: Leonore was trying to play the part required of her by her family and the world, and he alone knew that it was a part.
He would not betray her. Not all his grandmother's wiles should draw from him a picture of that confiding little face—sorrowful enough at times certainly, and yet not sorrowful in the approved fashion, not hopeless, not utterly cast down. "Just looking as if she needed some one to be kind to her," ruminated he; "and when she laughed—" he paused and wagged his head, "Lord, it was a good thing nobody but me heard Leo laugh!"
"I think—" said Miss Boldero one day about a fortnight after this—"it appears to me that Leonore might now be permitted to see the rector?"—and she looked round to take the opinion of her sisters. Their father was not present.
Perhaps the speaker had awaited such an opportunity, possibly what appeared to be a very simple suggestion cost her an effort,—at any rate, something of constraint in her air and accents arrested the attention of the person most concerned, and Leo, wondering what so formal a preamble portended, was so taken aback by the climax that she did what she alone of the Bolderos ever did, she giggled.
"I can't help it, Sue; I really can't. Oh, dear—oh, dear!"
Permitted to see the rector? Had she not been almost daily seeing—and dodging—the worthy Custance for weeks past? It had seemed to her that she could not set foot outside the Abbey domain without catching a glimpse of his long, thin figure somewhere or other on the road outside,—and she had actually taken to spying out the land through a chink of the park palings in order to let the figure, if there, vanish, before venturing forth. Again she quavered apologetically, "Oh, dear—oh, dear!"
But naturally no one joined in the mirth; Maud looked contemptuous, Sybil indifferent—while a more than ordinary indignation suffused the whole countenance of their half-sister. "Really, Leo!" Sue drew herself up to her full height, and could enunciate no more.
"I mean no harm," protested Leo, stoutly. "You needn't look at me like that, all of you,"—for now she too was vexed and bit her lip. "Why mayn't I laugh when a thing is funny? And it is funny, Sue's saying that."
"Indeed? We don't happen to see it so." Maud was seldom in sympathy with jesting, and it must be owned that to a person with no sense of humour Leo's childishness was at times incomprehensible. Leo, however, had learned not to heed this.
"Well, I'll tell you," cried she, recovering. "Then you'll understand. Poor dear Euty, with his long back and hanging head—what? Oh, Sue, hehas. He has the very longest back and thinnest neck—and his head regularly wiggle-waggles over his shoulder,—it will drop off some fine day,—well, I won't then, I'll to the point, as the books say. If Sue will only look a little, little bit relenting?"
"You are wounding Sue in her tenderest point," said Sybil, at length aroused to take part in the conversation. "Don't you know that, by now? Sue is a pillar of the church——"
"It is absurd to make game of Mr. Custance, at any rate," interposed Maud authoritatively. "He is a very good parish clergyman, and much more of agentlemanthan any of those you were accustomed to at Deeside," and she threw an immeasurable contempt into her tone. "I never saw one with either decent manners or appearance at your table."
"That's a nasty one," muttered Sybil. Then aloud: "Now we've all had our whack at each other, and Leo has next innings; what is it you want to say, Leo? Never mind Maud; you tell Sue and me your little joke, and let us pronounce upon it."
"No, I think we have had enough;" Sue rose from her seat in offended dignity. "Leo has got to learn that a friend's name should not be bandied about, a mark for insults——"
"But I wasn't—but I didn't;" the momentary mortification Leo had undergone was forgotten in an instant, and all haste and incoherence she sprang after her sister's retreating figure, and caught it. "Sue, dear Sue, you know I never thought of such a thing. Insults? Oh, Sue!"
"They sounded like insults, Leo."
"Then they had no business to. I never would insult anybody, least of all a nice good creature like Euty—there now, you are vexed again. But do let me just say why I laughed about being 'permitted' to see him. It is because he regularly haunts my steps when I'm alone. He does, indeed he does, the dear good man. No doubt he has his reasons, but when you spoke with bated breath——"
"I don't know what you can possibly mean, Leo."
"Oh, yes, you do. You think it a blessed privilege——"
"Itisa privilege."
"Not to me. I am hard put to it sometimes to scuttle out of his way."
"To scuttle out of his way!"—for sheer amazement Sue paused to listen.
"It's true, it's perfectly true." Leo nodded at her with mischievous pertinacity. "I am forever running across old Euty—Mr. Custance, then,—because, of course, he does tramp round his parish like a gallant old soul, and I'm sure I honour him for it,—but I have nowhere else to go either. It has been so awfully wet of late, the woods are sopping, so I must take to the roads, and on the roads there is Euty—Mr. Custance. And Euty—Mr. Custance—hankers after me; and you know you said I wasn't to hanker after him, not until you gave me leave——"
"I never said such a word."
"You said I was to have no dealings with anybody—except Val; and Val doesn't count. But of course Euty doesn't know that, and he thinks I'm a poor little soul, and might be glad to pass the time of day with anybody. Whereas I—I like the dear good man very well in church; but outside it, I don't pine and crave for his society. I can exist without it. You needn't stretch a point to grant it me——"
"Is that child going on forever?" struck in Maud, impatiently. "Why do you let her pour out this flood of nonsense, Sue? She simply wants to hear her own tongue, and give no one else a chance."
Apparently, however, Sue thought otherwise. Disregarding the interruption, she maintained a serious and puzzled air.
"Am I to understand that you suppose yourself an object of interest to Mr. Custance, Leo?"
"If not, why does he hunt me about the roads? Why does he come galloping after me——"
"Leo!"
"He does—he did yesterday. I was on ahead near Betty Farmiloe's cottage, and out he popped and saw me. I walked on as fast as ever I could, but his long legs took him over the ground like a racer, and he would have caught me up as sure as fate——"
"You misinterpret a very ordinary civility,——" but the speaker was not allowed to proceed.
"For goodness sake let her 'misinterpret' then," cried Sybil, diverted by the recital, "go on, Leo. Did he catch you, or did he not?"
"A cow came along, so I pretended it was a bull, and dashed into a field. Luckily there was a gate handy."
"'Pretended it was a bull'? How?" rejoined Sybil, still enjoying herself. "You really are a joke, Leo."
"I threw up my arms madly—like this. Then I made furious passes with my umbrella at the cow supposed to be bull. Finally I leaped at the gate and clambered over, unable to see in my desperation that it would have opened if I had only drawn back the bolt. Tableau. The baffled Euty sadly pursues his way, while the trembling and agitated Leo flies over the fields home."
"And never says a word about it?"—from Sybil.
"Not I. Catch me. Sue would have been cross, as she is now," with a roguish glance; "she would have thought I wanted to rob her of her beloved rector—oh, we know how she adores her Euty——"
"What?" It was a new voice that spoke. "What?" repeated General Boldero, stepping forward into their midst. "Do my ears deceive me? Leonore," he paused and gasped. "Wretched child!"—but pomposity prevailed. "May I inquire in all politeness what is the meaning of that most extraordinary, most preposterous accusation? You are silent. You may well be. Your most disgraceful language—again I demand what is the meaning of it?"
He seized her arm, as though she were not already nailed to the spot. "The meaning, girl—the meaning?"
"The—the meaning?"
"I repeat, the meaning. I am coming along the passage, and I hear you shouting at the pitch of your voice——"
"At the pitch of my voice?" echoed Leo, mechanically. Her eye was not upon her father, and she only half heard his thunderous charge,—it was something else which petrified her senses and made her head swim.
Sue? What had come to Sue?
White as death Sue had fallen into a chair, every feature distorted by such a mute agony of terror that—oh, there was no mistaking it, no concealing it, and yet,—Leo looked round.
She was between her unfortunate sister and the rest of the party, Sue having cowered down behind her where she stood,—while Maud and Sybil, to avoid being implicated, had precipitately retreated to a window-recess, the former with a shrug of her shoulders, the latter with the intention of slipping off as soon as might be.
But Sue? Was it possible?—yet nothing else was possible. Nothing else could account for a collapse so sudden and complete. Oh, poor Sue—poor, prim, stately Sue. At another moment,—but Leo must not stop to think what she would have done at another moment; her one aim now must be to shield the defenceless creature, exposed through her. So far, the parent who made poor Sue's life a burden, and yet whom she believed in, loved, and served to the best of her humble power, had concentrated his attention on herself as chief delinquent, but at any moment his infuriated eyes might turn to that shrinking, trembling form, and then?
With the air of a combatant delighted to welcome an unexpected ally, "Iamso glad you came in, father," said she.
Glad? The general stepped back as though she had hit him. Glad?
"They are all so down upon me about that stupid old parson of ours," continued Leonore, glibly. "They won't listen to anything I say against him, but I knowyouwill believe me. He really does follow me about the roads, you know; and of course any one might guess what for. He's a money-grabber, that's what he is. Not a 'money-grubber'! I know that kind; we had it in plenty at Deeside, but a 'grabber,' and a 'grabber' of the worst type. He thinks of nothing else but getting money out of you for his poor people. Well, I daresay theyarepoor, but then so am I, and as I can't tell him so—for you know you forbade me yourself—all I can do is to flee. Yet they laugh me to scorn when I say I flee, and he pursues."
She paused for breath, and moved a little more in front of Sue.
"Humph!" said the general, twirling his moustache. He was arrested, but by no means appeased. She set to work again.
"I know you would not wish me to be mulcted, father, and itisso difficult to say 'no' when a good sort like Mr. Custance——"
"You didn't call him that just now," burst forth the general.
"Oh, I always call him 'Euty' to myself," said Leo, serenely. "Girls do, you know. We always give people nicknames,—and though he is a parson, there's no harm in it, is there? Sue thinks it dreadful, and that there ought to be a sort of halo round the clerical head; and that's why I was teasing her just now——"
"You used most ridiculous, I may say most offensive terms;" he bristled up again.
"Just to have a little rise out of Sue. For Sue was so very positive that the saintly Euty never chased me on the road, supposing me to be rich and generous and likely to give him oceans of money for his poor people, that I had to go at her back. Butyouknow it's true, don't you, father?"
"True enough." He rose to the fly at once. "Why, aye, if this is the case, it certainly—hum, ha—certainly it alters the case. You are a tolerably sharp little piece of goods, Leo, and have discovered what your numskulls of sisters never could. That man would have us all in the workhouse, if he had his way. Directly he crosses this threshold out comes a subscription list, or note-book, or something. It's sheer robbery, that's what it is. Often and often I have to skulk down a back lane, or go into a door I never meant to enter, because I see him coming. I know if once he buttonholes me, I'm done for."