"Nay, it is I who should say that. You here? And you leave me to find it out by chance from Sir Douglas?"
"It did not occur to me that you would be interested," and she fanned herself very gracefully, but very unnecessarily, with her programme.
"Little coquette!" thought Lady Munro. But Lucy looked so charming at the moment, that not even a woman could blame her.
"How is Cannes looking?"
"Oh, lovely—lovelier than ever. Some awfully nice people have come."
"So you don't miss any of those who have gone?"
"Not in the least."
"And you would not care to see any old friend back again for a day or two?"
There was a moment's pause.
"I don't think there would be room; the hotel seems full——"
With a sudden burst of harmony the music began, and there was no more conversation till the next pause.
"Have you ever walked up to the chapel on the hill again?"
"Oh, lots of times!"
"You have been energetic. Have you chanced to see the Maritime Alps in the strange mystical light we saw that day?"
"Yes. They always look like that."
"Curious! Then I suppose the walk has no longer any associations——"
"Oh, but it has—bitter associations! We left the path to get some asparagus, and my gown caught in a bramble-bush, and a dog barked——"
The first soft notes of the violins checked the tragic sequel of her tale, and the music swelled into a pathetic wailing waltz, which brought the first part of the programme to an end.
Sir Douglas came during the interval to take them away, and Mr Monteith walked down with them to the station.
"I am sorry there is no room for me at the hotel," he said, as he stood with Lucy on the platform.
"Pray, don't take my word for it. I don't 'run the shanty.' Perhaps you could get a bed."
"What is the use, if people would be sorry to see an old acquaintance?"
"How can you say such things?" said Lucy, looking up at him cordially. "I am sure there are some old ladies in the hotel who would be delighted to see you."
"But no young ones?"
"I can't answer for them."
"You can for yourself."
"Oh yes."
"And you don't care one way or the other?"
"No;" she shook her head slowly and regretfully.
"Not at all?"
"Not at all."
"Not the least bit in the world?"
Lucy lifted her eyes again demurely. "When one comes to deal with such very small quantities, Mr Monteith," she said, "it is difficult to speak with scientific accuracy. If you really care to know——"
"Yes?"
"Where are the Munros?"
"In the next carriage. Do finish your sentence."
"I don't remember what I was going to say," said Lucy calmly. "A sure proof, my old nurse used to tell me, that it was better unsaid."
She sprang lightly up the high step of the carriage, and then turned to say good-bye. The colour in her cheeks was very bright.
Ten minutes later she seemed to have forgotten everything except the wonderful afterglow, which reddened the rocks and trees, and converted the whole surface of the sea into one blazing ruby shield.
Sir Douglas was nodding over his newspaper. Lucy laid her hand on Lady Munro's soft fur.
"You have been very good to me," she said. "I don't know how to thank you. I really think you have opened the gates of Paradise to me."
The words suggested a meaning that Lady Munro did not altogether like, but she answered lightly,—
"It has been a great pleasure to all of us to have you, dear; but you know we don't mean to let you go on Thursday."
Lucy smiled. "I must," she said sadly. "A week hence it will all seem like a beautiful dream—a dream that will last me all my life."
"Well, I am glad to think the roses in your cheeks are no dream, and I hope they will last you all your life, too."
And then the careless words re-echoed through her mind with a deeper significance, and she wished Sir Douglas would wake up and talk, even if it were only to grumble.
That night there were two private conversations.
Evelyn had gone into Lucy's room to brush her hair in company.
"What a touching sight!" said Lucy, laughing suddenly, as, by the dancing firelight, she caught sight of the two fair young figures in the mirror—their loosened hair falling all about their shoulders. "Come on with your confidences! Now is the time. At least so they say in books."
"Unfortunately I have not got any confidences."
"Nor have I—thank heaven!" She bent low over the glowing wood-fire. "What slavery love must be!"
Evelyn watched her with interest, but Lucy's next words were somewhat disappointing.
"Evelyn," she said, "how is it Mona has contrived to charm your father so? I need not tell you what I think about her, but, broadly speaking, she is not a man's woman, and I should not have fancied she was the sort of girl to fetch Sir Douglas at all."
"I don't think it strange," said Evelyn languidly. "I have often thought about it. You see, she is very like what my mother must have been at her age, though not nearly so charming to mere acquaintances; and then just where the dear old Mater stops short, the real Mona begins. It must be such a surprise to Father!"
"That is ingenious, certainly. How Mr Monteith admires your mother!"
"Does he?"
"I wonder what he would think of Mona!"
"I can't guess."
"Have you known him long?"
"Father and Mother have known his father long."
"Do you think he is honest?"
"Which?"
"The son, of course."
"He never stole anything from me."
"Don't be a goose! Do you think he means what he says?"
Evelyn paused before replying.
"You don't?" said Lucy quickly.
"I was trying to remember anything he did say," Evelyn answered very deliberately. "The only remark I can remember addressed to myself was, 'Brute of a day, isn't it?' I think he meant that. He certainly looked as if he did."
"Douglas," said Lady Munro, "would Colonel Monteith allow his son to marry Lucy Reynolds?"
"Nonsense! what ideas you do take into your head!"
"Because, if he would not, things have gone quite far enough. George said something to me about coming back to Cannes for a day or two. Of course that child is the attraction. If you think it will end in nothing, he must not come."
"So that is what her vocation amounts to!"
"My dear Douglas! what does she know of life? She is a child——"
"Precisely, and her father is another. God bless my soul! Monteith's son must marry an heiress."
Lady Munro did not pursue the subject; she had something else to talk of. She rose presently, and walked across the room.
"Douglas," she said, stopping idly before the glass, "I wish you would give me your recipe for looking youthful. You will soon look younger than your wife."
"Nonsense," he said gruffly, but he smiled. His wife did not often make pretty speeches now-a-days. As it happened she was looking particularly young that night, too. Perhaps that fact had struck her, and had suggested the remark.
For half an hour they chatted together, as they might have done in the old, old days, and then——
And then Lady Munro broached the subject of the boy at Monte Carlo.
It seems gratuitously cruel to take my readers back to bleak old Borrowness in this dreary month of December: away from the roses and the sunshine, and the wonderful matchless blue, to the mud, and the mist, and the barren fields, and the cold, grey sea.
Princely, luxurious Cannes! Home of the wealth of nations! stretched out at ease like a beautiful woman, along the miles of wooded hill that embrace the bay. Homely, work-a-day Borrowness! stooping down all unseen, shrouded in northern mists, to gather its daily bread. Do you indeed belong to the same world? feel the same needs? share the same curse? Do the children play on the graves in the one as in the other? in both do man and maid touch hands and blush and wonder? Is there canker at the core of the luscious glowing fruit? is there living sap in the heart of the gnarled and stunted tree? Beautiful Cannes! resting, expanding, enjoying, smiling! Brave little Borrowness! frowning and panting and sighing, and wiping with weary hand the sweat from a workworn brow!
Christmas was drawing near, but it had been heralded by no fairy frost, only by rain and fog and dull grey skies. Mona's life had been unmarked by any event that had distinguished one day from another. The last entry in the unwritten diary of her life was some three weeks old, and consisted of one word in red letters—Stradivarius. And yet the days had been so full, that, in order to redeem her promise to Mr Reynolds, she had often found herself constrained, when bedtime came, to rake together the embers of the fire, and spend an hour over the mechanics of the circulation, or the phenomena of isomerism. "Don't talk to me of the terpenes or the recent work on the sugars," she wrote to a friend in London, who had offered to send her some papers. "I have little time to read at all; and when I do, I have sworn to keep to the beaten track. Well-thumbed, jog-trot text-books for me; no nice damp Transactions! Wae is me! wae is me! You must send your entrancing fairy tales to some one else!"
Trade had continued very brisk in the little shop; indeed its character and reputation had completely changed. A few interesting boxes had arrived from the Stores, and the local traveller no longer had amusing tales to relate of the way in which Miss Simpson kept shop. In fact, had it not been for his prospects in life, and for his desire to spare the feelings of his family, he would have been strongly tempted to offer his heart and hand to Miss Simpson's bright and capable assistant. It would be an advantage in many ways to have a wife who understood the business; and, poor thing, she would not readily find a husband in Borrowness. She was thrown away at present—there was no doubt of that. Why, with her quick head at figures, and her fine lady manners, she could get a situation anywhere.
Mona, fortunately, was all unaware of the tempting fruit that dangled just above her head. She had, it is true, some difficulty in keeping the traveller to the point, when she had dealings with him; but her limited intercourse with the other sex had not taught her to regard this as peculiarly surprising.
What rejoiced her heart, far more even than the success of the shop, was the number of women and girls who had got into the way of consulting her about all sorts of things. "I exist here now," she wrote to Doris, "in the dual capacity of assistant to Miss Simpson, and of general referee on the choice of new goods and the modification of old ones. 'Goods' is a vague term, and is to be interpreted very liberally. It includes not only dresses and bonnets and furniture, but also husbands."
Rachel did not at all approve of this large and unremunerativeclientèle. If there had been any question of "honesty and religion like," it would have been different; but she considered that the "hussies wasted a deal of Mona's time, when she might have been better employed."
To Matilda Cookson, of course, she objected less; but she never could sufficiently express her wonder at Mona's inconsistency in this respect.
"As soon as the Cooksons begin to notice you, you just bow down like all the rest, for all your fine talk," she said one day, in a moment of irritation.
Mona strove to find a gentle reply in vain, so, contrary to all her principles, she was constrained to receive the remark in irritating silence.
Matilda Cookson had remained very true to her allegiance, and would at this time have proved an interesting study to any psychologist whose path she had chanced to cross. Almost at a glance he could have divided all the opinions she uttered into two classes—those that were her own, and those that were Mona's. The former were expressed with timid deference; the latter were flung in the face of her acquaintances, with a dogmatic air of finality that was none the less irritating because the opinions themselves were occasionally novel and striking. Matilda glowed with pride when she repeated a bold and original remark; she stammered and blushed when one of her own poor fledgelings stole into the light. It was on the former that a rapidly developing reputation for "cleverness" was insecurely based; it was the latter that delighted Mona's heart, and made her intercourse with the girl a source of never-ceasing interest. It is so easy to heap fuel on another mind; but to apply the first spark, to watch it flicker, and glow, and catch hold—that is one of the things that is worth living for.
To one of Mona'sprotégéesRachel never even referred, and that was the girl who had fainted at thesoirée. Mona had taken an interest in her patient, had prescribed a course of arsenic and green vegetables; and the improvement in the girl's appearance had seemed almost miraculous.
"She usedna tae be able tae gang up the stair wi'oot sittin' doon tae get her breath," said her grandmother to Miss Simpson one day; "an' noo, my word! she's awa' like a cat up a tree."
Rachel carefully refrained from repeating this remark to Mona. She was afraid that so surprising a result might encourage her cousin to persevere in a work which Rachel fondly hoped had been relinquished for ever. The good soul had been much depressed on chancing to see the prescription which Mona had written for the girl. Why, it was a real prescription—like one of Dr Burns'! When a woman had got the length of writingthat, what was the use of telling her she would never make a doctor? What more, when you came to think of it, did doctors do? There was nothing for it but to encourage Mr Brown, and Rachel forthwith determined to invite him and his sisters to tea.
The study of theMusci,Algæ, andFungihad not proved a striking success hitherto. There had been one delightful ramble among the rocks and pools, but since then the pursuit had somewhat flagged. Several excursions had been arranged, but all had fallen through. On one occasion Miss Brown had been confined to the house; on another she had been obliged to visit an aunt who was ill; and on a third the weather had been unpropitious.
"My dear," said Rachel one day, after the formation of the bold resolution above recorded, "if you are going in to Kirkstoun, you might stop at Donald's on the Shore, and order some cookies and shortbread. To-morrow's the day the cart comes round, and I'm expecting Mr Brown and his sisters to tea."
Mona nearly dropped the box of tape she was holding.
"Dear cousin," she said, "the sisters have never called on you, have they?"
"No," replied Rachel frankly, "but one must make a beginning. They offered us tea the day we were there."
"I promised Mrs Ewing that I would play the organ for the choir practice to-morrow evening."
"Well, I'm sure I never heard the like! She just takes her use of you."
"You must not forget that she allows me to practise on the organ whenever I like. It is an infinite treat to me."
"And what's the use of it, I wonder? You can't take an organ about with you when you go out to tea."
"That's perfectly true," said Mona, laughing; "it is a selfish pleasure, no doubt."
"It all comes of your going to the English chapel in the evening. If you'd taken my advice, you'd never have darkened its doors. They say so much about Mr Ewing being a gentleman, but I do think it was a queer-like thing their asking you to lunch, and never saying a word about me. Mr Stuart doesn't set himself up for anything great, but he did ask you to tea along with me."
"The Ewings have not been introduced to you, dear."
"And whose doing is that, I'd like to know? We've met them often enough in the town."
Mona sighed. She considered that lunch at the Ewings' the great mistake of her life at Borrowness. She had resolved so heroically that Rachel's friends were to be her friends; but the invitation had been given suddenly, and she had accepted it. She had not stopped to think of infant baptism, or the relations of Church and State; or the propriety of a clergyman eking out his scanty stipend by raising prize poultry, or of allowing himself to be "taken up" by the people at the Towers; she had had a momentary mental vision of silky damask and of sparkling crystal, of intelligent conversation and of cultured voices, and the temptation had proved irresistible. The meek man lives in history by his hasty word, the truthful man's lie echoes on throughout the ages; the sin that is in opposition to our character, and to the resolutions of a lifetime, stands out before all the world with hideous distinctness. So in the very nature of things, if Mona had gone to Borrowness, as she might have done, armed with introductions to all the county families in the neighbourhood, Rachel would have felt herself less injured than by that single lunch at the Ewings'.
"Well, I will order the things at Donald's," said Mona, after an awkward silence.
"Yes; tell him I'll take the shortbread in any case, but I'll only take the cookies if my visitors come."
"Oh, then they have not accepted yet?"
"No."
"Then I need not have distressed myself," thought Mona, "for they certainly won't come." But she was annoyed all the same that Rachel should have subjected herself to the unnecessary snub of a refusal.
The refusal arrived that evening. It was worded with bare civility. They "regretted that they were unable," but they did not think it necessary to explain why they were unable.
Rachel was very cross about the slight to herself, but she was not at all disheartened about her plan. One trump-card was thrown away, but she still held the king and the ace; the king was Mona's "tocher," and the ace was Mr Brown himself. The original damp box of plants had been followed by a number of others, and these had latterly been hailed by Rachel with much keener delight than they had afforded to Mona. Mr Brown was all right; there could be no shadow of doubt about that; and Rachel would not allow herself to fancy for a moment that Mona might be so blind to a sense of her own interests as to side with the Misses Brown.
The bazaar as an institution is played out. There can certainly be no two opinions about that. It has lived through a youth of humble usefulness, a middle life of gorgeous magnificence, and it is now far gone in an old age of decrepitude and shams. It has attained the elaboration and complexity which are incompatible with farther existence, and it must die. The cup of its abuses and iniquities is full. It has had its day; let it follow many things better than itself—great kingdoms, mighty systems—into the region of the things that have been and are not.
Yet even where the bazaar is already dead, we all seem to combine, sorely against our will, to keep the old mummy on its feet. Nor is the reason for our inconsistency far to seek. The bazaarknows its world; there is scarcely a human weakness—a weakness either for good or for evil—to which it does not appeal; so it dies hard, and, in spite of ourselves, we cherish it to the last.
How we hate it! How the very appearance of its name in print fills our minds with reminiscences of nerve-strain, and boredom, and shameless persecution!
This being so, it is a matter of profound regret to me that a bazaar should appear at all in the pages of my story; but it is bound up inextricably with the course of events, so I must beg my readers to bear up as best they may.
"My dear," said Rachel, coming into the shop one day, eager and breathless, "I have got a piece of news for you to-day. The Miss Bonthrons want you to help them with their stall at the bazaar! It seems they have been quite taken with your manner in the shop, and they think you'll be far more use than one of those dressed-up fusionless things that only want to amuse themselves, and don't know what's left if you take three-and-sixpence from the pound. Of course they are very glad, too, that you should have the ploy. I told them I was sure you would be only too delighted. They were asking if there was no word of your being baptised and joining the church yet."
Mona bent low over her account-book, and it was a full minute before she replied. Her first impulse was to refuse the engagement altogether; her second was to accept with an indignant protest; her third and last was to accept without a word. If she had been doomed to spend a lifetime with Rachel, things would have been different; as it was, there were not three more months of the appointed time to run. For those months she must do her very utmost to avoid all cause of offence.
"I think a bazaar is the very last thing I am fitted for," she said quietly; "but, if you have settled it with the Bonthrons, I suppose there is nothing more to be said."
"Oh, you'll manage fine, I'm sure. There's no doubt you've a gift for that kind of thing. I can tell you there's many a one would be glad to stand in your shoes. You'll see you'll get all your meals in the refreshment-room for nothing, and a ticket for the ball as well."
"I don't mean to go to the ball."
"Hoots, lassie, you'll never stay away when the ticket costs you nothing! I am thinking I might go myself, perhaps, to take care of you, like. It'll be a grand sight, they say, and it's not often I get the chance of wearing my green silk."
Again the infinite pathos of this woman, with all her vulgar, disappointed little ambitions, took Mona's heart by storm, as it had done on the night of her arrival at Borrowness; and a gentle answer came unbidden to her lips.
That afternoon, however, she considered herself fully entitled to set off and drink tea with Auntie Bell, and Rachel raised no objection when she suggested the idea.
"I would be glad if you would do a little business for me, as you pass through Kilwinnie," she said.
"I will, with pleasure."
"Just go into Mr Brown's," she said, "and ask him if he still has green ribbon like what he sold me for my bonnet last year. The strings are quite worn out. I think a yard and a half should do. I'll give you a pattern."
Mona fervently wished that the bit of business could have been transacted in any other shop, but it would not do to draw back from her promise now.
As she passed along the high street of Kilwinnie, she saw Miss Brown's face at the window above the shop, and she bowed as she crossed the street. Mr Brown was engaged with another customer, so Mona went up to the young man at the opposite counter, thankful to escape so easily. But it was no use. In the most barefaced way Mr Brown effected an exchange of customers, and came up to her, his solemn face all radiant with sudden pleasure. His eyes, like those of a faithful dog, more than atoned at times for his inability to speak.
"How is Miss Simpson?" he asked. This was his one idea of making a beginning.
"She is very well, thank you," and Mona proceeded at once with the business in hand.
They had just settled the question, when, to Mona's infinite relief, Miss Brown tripped down the stair leading into the shop.
"Won't you come up-stairs and rest for ten minutes, Miss Maclean?" she said. "We are having an early cup of tea. No, no, Philip, we don't want you. Gentlemen have no business with afternoon tea."
Mona could not have told what induced her to accept the invitation. She certainly did not wish to do it. Perhaps she was glad to escape on any terms from those pathetic brown eyes.
Mr Brown's face fell, then brightened again.
"Perhaps while you are talking, you will arrange for another walk," he said.
Mona followed Miss Brown up the dark little stair into the house, and they entered the pleasant sitting-room. The ladies of the house received their visitor cordially, and proceeded to entertain her with conversation, which seemed to be friendly, if it was neitherspirituelnor very profound. Presently it turned on the subject of husband-hunting.
"Now, Miss Maclean," said one, "would you call my brother an attractive man?"
Mona was somewhat taken aback by the directness of the question.
"I never thought of him in that connection," she answered honestly.
"Well, you know, he is not a marrying man at all. Anybody can see that; and yet you would not believe me if I were to tell you the number of women who have set their caps at him. Any other man would have his head turned completely; but he never seems to see it. We get the laugh all to ourselves."
"Clever as he is," put in another sister, "he is a regular simpleton where women are concerned. He treats them just as if they were men, and of course they take advantage of it, and get him talked about and laughed at."
"We tell him it really is too silly," said the third, "that, after all his experience, he should not know how to take care of himself."
Mona turned very pale, but she answered thoughtfully.
"When you asked me whether I considered if Mr Brown an attractive man, I was inclined at first to say no; but what you say of him crystallises my ideas somewhat. I think his great attraction lies in the fact that he can meet women on common ground, without regard to sex. He realises, perhaps, that a woman may care for knowledge, and even for friendship, as well as for a husband. I should not try to change him, if I were you. His views may be peculiar here, but they are not altogether uncommon among cultured people."
She said the last words gently, with a pleasant smile, and then proceeded to put on her furs with an air of quiet dignity that would not have discredited Lady Munro herself, and that seemed to throw the Browns to an infinite distance.
It was some moments before any of them found voice.
"Must you go?" said the eldest at last, somewhat feebly. "Won't you take another cup of tea?"
"Thank you very much, but I am on my way to drink tea with Mrs Easson."
"Queer homely body, isn't she?" said the second sister, recovering herself. "She is your cousin, is she not?"
"I am proud to say she is."
"Oh, we've never arranged about the walk," said the youngest. "Any day next week that will suit you, will suit me."
"Oh, thank you; I am afraid this wonderful bazaar is going to absorb all our energies for some time to come. I fear the walk will have to be postponed indefinitely."
She shook hands graciously with her hostesses, and went slowly down by the stair that opened on the street.
"If I were five years younger," she said to her herself, "I should be tempted to encourage Mr Brown, just the least little bit in the world, and then——"
But not even when Mona was a girl could she have been tempted, for more than a moment, to avenge a petty wrong at the expense of those great, sad eyes.
Mr Brown had been looking out, and he came forward to meet her, nervous, eager.
"Have you arranged a day?" he asked.
"No; I fear I am going to be very busy for the next few weeks. It is very kind of you to suggest another walk. Good-bye."
She was unconscious that her whole manner and bearing had changed in the last quarter of an hour, but he felt it keenly, and guessed something of what had happened.
"Miss Maclean," he said hoarsely, grasping the hand she tried to withdraw, "what do we want with one of them in our walks? Come with me. Come up-stairs with me now, and we'll tell them——"
"I have stayed too long already," said Mona hastily; "good-bye." And without trusting herself to look at him again, she hurried away.
Her cheeks were very bright, and her eyes suffused with tears, as she continued her walk.
"How disgraceful!" she kept repeating; "how disgraceful! I must have been horribly to blame, or it never would have come to this."
But, as usual, before long her sense of the comic came to her rescue.
"Verily, my dear," she said, with a heavy sigh, "the study of theAlgæandFungiis a large one, and leads us further than we anticipated."
Auntie Bell would not have been the shrewd woman she was, if she had not seen at a glance that something was wrong with her darling; but she showed her sympathy by hastily "masking the tea," and cutting great slices from a home-made cake.
"Eh, but ye're a sicht for sair een!" she said, as she bustled in and out of the sitting-room. "I declare ye're bonnier than iver i' that fur thing. Weel, hoo's a' wi' ye?"
"Oh, I am blooming, as you see. Rachel is well, too."
"An' what w'y suld she no' be weel? She's no' i' the w'y o' daein' onything that's like to mak' her ill, I fancy, eh? Hae ye been efter the butterflies again wi' Maister Broon?"
The unexpected question brought the tell-tale colour to Mona's cheek.
"No," she said, "I am not going any more. It is not the weather for that sort of thing."
"Na," said Auntie Bell tersely; "nor he isna the mon for that sort o' thing. He's a guid mon, nae doot, an' a cliver, they say, for a' he's sae quite an' sae canny, an' sae ta'en up wi's beasts and things; but he's no' the mon for the like o' you. Ye wadna tak' him, Mona?"
"Dear Auntie Bell," said Mona abashed, "such a thing never even occurred to me——"
She did not add "until," but her honest face said it for her.
"He's no' been askin' ye?"
"No, no," said Mona warmly, "and he never will. Can a man and woman not go 'after the butterflies,' as you call it, without thinking of love and marriage?"
Auntie Bell's face was worth looking at.
"I nae ken," she said grimly; "I hae ma doots."
"Well, I assure you Mr Brown has not even mentioned such a thing to me."
Auntie Bell eyed her keenly through the gold spectacles, but Mona did not flinch.
"Then his sisters have," thought the old woman shrewdly. "I'll gie them a piece o' ma mind the neist time I'm doun the toun."
Mona's visits were necessarily very short on these winter afternoons, and as soon as tea was over she rose to go.
"Are ye aye minded tae gang hame come Mairch?" said Auntie Bell.
"Oh yes, I cannot possibly stay longer."
"What's to come o' the shop?"
"I will look out for an intelligent young person to fill my place."
"Ay, ye may luik! Weel, I'll no' lift a finger tae gar ye bide. Yon's no' the place for ye. But I nae ken hoo I'm tae thole wi'oot the sicht o' yer bonny bricht een."
"Dear Auntie Bell," said Mona affectionately, "you are coming to see me, you know."
"Me! hoot awa', lassie! It's a far cry tae Lunnon, an' I'm ower auld tae traivel ma lane."
They were standing by the open door, and the moonlight fell full on the worn, eager face.
"Then come with me when I go. I can't tell you how pleased and proud I should be to have you."
The old woman's face beamed. "Ay? My word! an' ye'd tak' me in a first-cless cairriage, and treat me like a queen, I'll be boun'. Mrs Dodds o' the neist fairm is aye speirin' at me if I'll no' gang wi' the cheap trip tae Edinbury for the New Year. I'll tell her I could gang a' the w'y tae Lunnon, like a leddy, an' no' be the puirer for the ootin' by ae bawbee."
She executed a characteristic war-dance in the moonlight. "Aweel," she resumed, with sudden gravity, "ye'll mind me tae Rachel, and tell her auld Auntie Bell's as daft as iver!"
"Well, you promised to dance at my wedding, you know," and, waving her hand, Mona set off with a light, quick step.
Her thoughts were very busy as she hastened along, but her decision was made before she reached home. "I will write a short note to Mr Brown to-night," she said, "and tell him I find life too short for the study of theAlgæandFungi."
It was the first day of the bazaar.
The weather was mild and bright, and the whole town wore an aspect of excitement. The interior of the hall was not perhaps a vision of artistic harmony; the carping critic might have seen in it a striking resemblance to the brilliant, old-fashioned patchwork quilt which some good woman had sent as her contribution, and which was now being subjected to a fire of small wit and adverse criticism, in the process of being raffled; but, to the inhabitants of the place, such a sight was worth crossing the county to behold, and indeed, at the worst, it was a bright and festive scene with its brave bunting and festoons of evergreens.
"Let Kirkstoun flourish!" was inscribed in letters of holly along the front of the gallery, in which a very fair brass band, accustomed apparently to performing in the open air, was pouring forth jaunty and dashing national music, which fell with much acceptance on well-balanced nerves.
The bazaar had formally been declared open by the great local patron, Sir Roderick Allison of Balnamora, and already the crowd was so great that movement was becoming difficult. Whatever Mona's feelings had been before the "function" came on, she was throwing herself into it now with heart and soul. All the day before she had been hard at work, draping, arranging, vainly attempting to classify; and the Bonthrons had many times found occasion to congratulate themselves on their choice of an assistant. The good ladies had very shyly offered to provide her with a dress for the occasion,—"something a little brighter, you know, than that you have on; not but what that's very nice and useful."
"Thank you very much," Mona had replied frankly. "I should be very glad to accept your kind offer, but I have something in London which I think will be suitable. I will ask a friend to send it."
So now she was looking radiant, in a gown that was quiet enough too in its way, but which was so obviously a creation that it excited the attention of every one who knew her.
"Shedoeslook a lady!" said the Miss Bonthron with the eyeglass.
"Well, my dear," replied the one with the curls, "she might havebeena lady, if her father had lived. They say he was quite a remarkable man, like his father before him. Where would we be ourselves if Father had not laid by a little property? I suppose it is all ordained for the best."
"I call it simply ridiculous for a shop-girl to dress like that," said Clarinda Cookson to her sister. "It is frightfully bad taste. Anybody can see that she never had on a dress like that in her life before. She means to make the most of this bazaar. It is a great chance for her."
Matilda bit her lip, and did not answer. By dint of long effort, silence was becoming easier to her.
And now none of the stall-holders had any leisure to think of dress, for this was the time of day when the people come who are really prepared to buy, independently of the chance of a bargain; and money was pouring in. Mona was hard at work, making calculations for her patronesses, hunting for "something that would do for a gentleman," sympathising with the people who were strongly attracted by a few, and a few things only, on her stall, and those the articles that were ticketed "sold,"—striving, in short, for the moment, to be all things to all men.
She felt that day as if she had received a fresh lease of youth. Nothing came amiss to her. She was the life and soul of her corner of the hall, much to the delight of Doris, who, fair, serene, and sweet, was watching her friend in every spare moment from the adjoining stall. Perhaps the main cause conducing to Mona's good spirits was the fact that Rachel was confined to the house with a cold. Mona was honestly and truly sorry for her cousin's disappointment; she would gladly have borne the cold and confinement vicariously; but as that was impossible—well, it was pleasant for a day or two to be responsible only for her bright young self.
In a surprisingly short time the ante-prandial rush was over, and there was a comparative lull, during which stall-holders could compare triumphant notes, or even steal away to the refreshment-room. But now there was a sudden stir and bustle at the door.
"Well, I declare," exclaimed Miss Bonthron eagerly, "if this is not the party from the Towers!"
The two great local magnates of the neighbourhood were Sir Roderick Allison of Balnamora and Lord Kirkhope of the Towers. Sir Roderick, in his capacity of member for the eastern part of the county, took an interest in all that went on in the place; and although his presence at public gatherings was always considered a great honour, it was treated very much as a matter of course. The Kirkhopes, on the other hand, lived a frivolous, fashionable, irresponsible life; acknowledged no duties to their social inferiors, and were content to show their public spirit by permitting an occasional flower-show in their grounds; so, if on any occasion they did go out of their way to grace a local festivity, their presence was considered an infinitely greater triumph than was that of good bluff Sir Roderick. The parable of the prodigal son is of very wide application; and, where humanity only is concerned, its interpretation is sometimes a very sinister one.
Lady Kirkhope had filled her house with a large party of people for the Christmas holidays; and some sudden freak had induced her to bring a number of them in to the Kirkstoun Bazaar, just as a few months earlier she had taken her guests to the fair at St Rules, to see the fat woman and the girl with two heads. "Anything for a lark!" she used to say, and it might have been well if all the amusements with which she sought to while away her sojourn in the country had been as rational as these. As it was, good, staid country-people found it a little difficult sometimes to see exactly wherein the "lark" consisted. Even this fact, however, tended rather to increase than to diminish the excitement with which the great lady's arrival was greeted at the bazaar.
Mona, not being a native, was but little interested in the new-comers, save from a money-making point of view; and she was leaning idly against the wall, half-smiling at the commotion the event had caused, when all at once her heart gave a leap, and the blood rushed madly over her face. Within twenty yards of her, in Lady Kirkhope's party, chatting and laughing, as he used to do in the good old days, stood the Sahib. There was no doubt about it. A correct morning dress had taken the place of the easy tweeds and the old straw hat, but the round, brotherly, boyish face was the same as ever. The very sight of it called up in Mona's mind a flood of happy reminiscences, as did the friendly face of the moon above the chimney-pots to the home-sick author ofBilderbuch.
Oh, it was good to see him again! For one moment Mona revelled in the thought of all they would have to say to each other, and then——
"My dear," said Miss Bonthron, "I think you have some little haberdashery-cases like this in your shop. How much do you think we might ask for it?"
Like the "knocking at the door inMacbeth," the words brought Mona back to a world of prose realities. With swift relentless force the recollection rushed upon her mind that the Sahib had come with the "county people" to honour the bazaar with his presence; while she was a poor little shop-girl, who had been asked to assist, partly as a great treat, and partly because of her skill in subtracting three-and-sixpence from the pound.
"Half-a-crown we price them. I think you might say three shillings here," she said, smiling; but deep down in her mind she was thinking, "Oh, I hope, I hope he won't notice me! Doris is bad enough, but picture the Sahib in the shop!" She broke into a little laugh that was half a sob, and her eyes looked suspiciously bright.
"Mona," said Doris, coming up to her suddenly, "somebody is looking very charming to-day, do you know?"
"Yes," said Mona boldly, flashing back the compliment in an admiring glance; "I have been thinking so all morning, whenever intervening crowds allowed me to catch a glimpse of her."
"I have been longing so to say to all the room, 'Do you see that bright young thing? She is a medical student!'"
"Pray don't!" said Mona, horrified. "My cousin would never forgive you—nor, indeed, for the matter of that, should I. How are you getting on?"
"My dear," was the reply, "I have sold more rubbish this morning than I ever even saw before. After all, the secret of success at bazaars lies solely in the fact that there is no accounting for taste!"
At this moment a customer claimed Mona's attention, and, when she looked up again, Doris was in earnest conversation with an elderly gentleman. Mona overheard something about "women's power."
"Women," was the reply, delivered with a courteous bow, "have no power, they have only influence."
Doris flushed, then said serenely, "We won't dispute it. Influence is the soul, of which power is the outward form."
How sweet she looked as she stood there, her flower-like face uplifted, her dimpled chin in air, shy yet defiant! Mona thought she had never seen her friend look so charming, so utterly unlike everybody else. A moment later she perceived that she was not alone in her admiration. Unconscious that he was observed, a man stood a few yards off, listening to the conversation with a comical expression of amused, admiring interest; and that man was the Sahib.
Take your eyes off him, Mona, Mona, if you do not wish to be recognised! Too late! A wave of sunlight rushed across his face, kindling his homely features into a glow that gladdened Mona's heart, and swept away all her hesitation. Verily she could trust this man, whom all women looked upon as a brother.
He resolutely dismissed the sunshine from his face, however, as he came up and shook hands. He could not deny that he was glad to see her, but nothing could alter the fact that she had treated him very badly.
"I called on you in London," he said in an injured tone, after their first greetings had been exchanged, "but it was a case of 'Gone; no address.'"
"Oh, I am sorry," said Mona. "It never occurred to me that you would call."
He looked at her sharply. Her regret was so manifest that he could not doubt her sincerity; and yet it was difficult sometimes to believe that she was not playing fast and loose. It was not as if she were an ordinary girl, ready to flirt with any man she met. Was it likely, after all they had said to each other in Norway, that he would let her slip out of his life without a protest? Was it possible that the idea of his calling upon her in London had never crossed her mind?
Mona was very far from guessing his thoughts. Strong in the conviction that she was not a "man's woman," she expected little from men, and counted little on what they appeared to give. She had a feeling of warm personal friendship for the Sahib, but it had never occurred to her to wonder what his feeling might be for her. Had they met after a separation of ten years, she would have welcomed with pleasure the cordial grasp of his hand; but that in the meantime he should go out of his way to see her, simply, as she said, never crossed her mind.
"Who would have thought of meeting you at a bazaar?" he said.
"It is I who should have said that. But, in truth, I am not here by any wish of my own. The arrangement was made for me. I should have looked forward to it with more pleasure if I had known I was to meet you."
His face brightened. "It is my turn now to protest that it is I who should have said that! My hostess brought a party of us. I am helping to spend Christmas in the old style at the Towers. Where are you staying, or have you just come over for the function?"
Mona's heart sank. "No; I am visiting a cousin in the neighbourhood."
"Then I hope I may give myself the pleasure of calling. Have you had lunch?"
"Not yet."
"That is right. I am sure you can be spared for the next quarter of an hour."
Mona introduced him to Miss Bonthron as a "family friend," and then took his arm. Now that they had met, no ridiculous notions of propriety should prevent their seeing something of each other.
"Do you know Lady Kirkhope?" he asked, as he piloted the way through the hall.
"No. I had better tell you at once that I am not in the least likely to know her; I——"
"Lady Kirkhope," said the Sahib suddenly, stopping in front of a vivacious dame, "I am sure you will be glad to make the acquaintance of Miss Maclean. She is the daughter of Gordon Maclean, of whom we were talking last evening."
"Then I am proud to shake hands with her," said the lady graciously. "There are very few men, Miss Maclean, whom I admire as I did your father."
A few friendly words followed, and then the Sahib and Mona continued their way.
"Oh, Mr Dickinson," said Mona, when they had reached the large refreshment-room, and were seated in a deserted corner, "whathaveyou done?"
"Well, what have I done!" said the Sahib, in good-humoured mystification. "I ought to have asked your permission before introducing you in a place like this; but Lady Kirkhope is not at all particular in that sort of way, and we met her soà propos. I am sure you would not mind if you knew how she spoke of your father."
"It is not that." Mona drew a long breath. "It is not your fault in the least, but I don't think any human being was ever placed in such a false position as I am." She hesitated. When she had first seen the glad friendly smile on the Sahib's face, she had fancied it would be so easy to tell him the whole story; but now the situation seemed so absurd, so grotesque, so impossible, that she could not find words.
"Mr Dickinson," she said at last, "Lady Munro really is my aunt."
"She appears to be under a strong impression to that effect."
"And Gordon Maclean was my father."
"So I have heard."
"And my mother, Miss Lennox, was a lady whom any one would have been glad to know."
"That I can answer for!"
"But I never told you all that? I never traded on my relatives or even spoke of them?"
"I scarcely need to answer that question. Your exordium is striking, but don't keep me in suspense longer than you can help."
Mona did not join in his smile.
"All that," she said with a great effort, "is true; and it is equally true that at the present moment I am living with a cousin who keeps a small shop at Borrowness. I have been asked to sell at this bazaar simply because—c'est mon mètier, à moi. I ought to do it well. Now you know why I did not wish to be introduced to Lady Kirkhope."
It was a full minute before the Sahib spoke, and then his answer was characteristic.
"What on earth," he asked, "do you do it for?"
Mona was herself again in a moment.
"Why do I do it?" she said proudly. "Why should I not do it? My cousin has as much claim on me as the Munros have, and she needs me a great deal more. If I must stand or fall by my relatives, I choose to fall with Rachel Simpson rather than to stand with Lady Munro."
She rose to go, but he caught her hand.
"You said once that you had no wish to measure your strength against mine," he said, in a low voice. "I don't mean to let you go, so perhaps you had better sit down. It would be a pity to have a scene."
"Let my hand go in any case."
"Honest Injun?"
She yielded unwillingly with a laugh.
"Honest Injun," she said. "As we are here, I will stay for ten minutes," and she laid her watch on the table.
"That is right. I never knew any difficulty that was made easier by refusing to eat one's lunch."
"I don't admit that I am in any difficulty, and your way, too, is clear." She made a movement of her head in the direction of the door. "I am only sorry that you did not give me a chance to tell you all this before you introduced me to Lady Kirkhope. If I had known you were coming, I should have given you a hint to avoid me."
"Miss Maclean," he said, "will you allow me to say that you are a little bit morbid?"
She met his eyes with a frank full glance from her own.
"That is true," she said, with sudden conviction.
"And for a woman like you to see that you are morbid is to cease to be morbid."
"I am sure I don't want to be; but indeed it is so difficult to see what is simple and right. I have often smiled to think how I told you in summer, that the 'great, puzzling subject of compromise' had never come into my life."
"You said on the same occasion, if I remember rightly, that my life was infinitely franker and more straightforward than yours. I presume you don't say so still?"
"I do, with all my heart."
"H'm. Do you think it likely that I would go routing up poor relations for the pleasure of devoting myself exclusively to their society?"
Mona's face flushed. "Mr Dickinson," she said, "I ought to tell you that I arranged to come to my cousin before I met the Munros. I don't say that I should not have done it in any case, but I made the arrangement at a time when, with many friends, I was practically alone in the world. And also,"—she thought of Colonel Lawrence's story,—"even apart from the Munros, if I had known all that I know now, about circumstances in the past, I am not sure that I should have come at all. That is all my heroics are worth."
"You are a magnificently honest woman."
"I am not quite sure that I am not the greatest humbug that ever lived. Two minutes more. Do you bear in mind that Lady Kirkhope said she would call on me?"
"I will see to that. Am I forgiven for introducing you to her?"
Mona smiled. "I shall take my revenge by introducing you to a much greater woman, my friend Doris Colquhoun."
"When am I to meet you again? May I call?"
"No."
"How do you get home to-night?"
"Miss Bonthron sends me in a cab."
"Shall you be at the ball?"
"No."
"You can easily get a good chaperon?"
"Oh yes."
"Will you go to the ball if I ask it as a personal favour to me?"
Mona reflected. "I don't see why I should not," she said simply.
"Thank you. And in the meantime, Miss Maclean, don't be in too great a hurry to stand or fall with anybody. You have not only yourself to think of, you know; we are all members one of another. And now behold your prey! Take me to your stall, and I will buy whatever you like."
The Sahib was not the only victim who yielded himself up unreservedly to Mona's tender mercies that day. Mr Brown came to the bazaar in the afternoon with a five-pound note in his pocket, and something more than four pound ten was spent at Miss Bonthron's stall.
A spacious hall with a well-waxed floor; a profusion of coloured lights and hothouse plants; a small string-band capable of posing any healthy, human thing under twenty-three with the reiterated query, "Where are the joys like dancing?"—all these things may be had on occasion, even in an old-world fishing town on the bleak east coast.
For youth is youth, thank heaven! over all the great wide world; and the sturdy, sonsy northern girl, in her spreading gauzy folds of white or blue, is as desirable in the eyes of the shy young clerk, in unaccustomed swallow-tails, as is the languid, dark-eyed daughter of the South to her picturesque impassioned lover. Nay, the awkward sheepish youth himself, he too is young, and, for some blue-eyed girl, his voice may have the irresistible cadence, his touch the magnetic thrill, that Romeo's had for Juliet.
So do not, I pray you, despise my provincial ball, because the dancing falls short alike in the grace of constant habit and in the charm of absolutenaïveté. The room is all aglow with youth and life and excitement. One must be a cynic indeed not to take pleasure in that. There is something beautiful too, surely, even in the proud self-consciousness with which the "Provost's lady" steps out to head the first quadrille with good Sir Roderick, and in the shy delight with which portly dames, at the bidding of grey-haired sires, forget the burden of years, and renew the days of their youth.
At Doris's earnest request, Mona had come to the ball with her party, for of course the Bonthrons disapproved of the whole proceeding. Rachel had insisted on going to the bazaar on the last day, to see the show and pick up a few bargains; and, as the hall was overheated, and nothing would induce her to remove her magnificent fur-lined cloak, she had caught more cold on returning to the open air. Mona had offered very cordially to stay at home with her on the night of the ball; but Rachel had been sufficiently ill to read two sermons in the course of the day; and, in the fit of magnanimity naturally consequent on such occupation, she had stoutly and kindly refused to listen to a proposal which seemed to her more generous than it really was.
It was after ten when the party from the Towers entered the brilliant, resounding, whirling room. The Sahib had half expected that Lady Kirkhope, in her pursuit of a "lark," would accompany them; but she "drew the line," she said, "at dancing with the grocer," so a few of the gentlemen went alone. There was a good deal of amusement among them as they drove down in the waggonette, on the subject of the partners they might reasonably expect; and it was with no small pride that the Sahib introduced them to Doris and Mona.
Mona wore the gown in which Lucy had said she looked like an empress. It was not suitable for dancing, but she did not mean to dance; and certainly she in her rich velvet, and Doris in her shimmering silk, were a wondrous contrast to most of the showily dressed matrons and gauzy girls.
Doris as usual was very soon the quiet little centre of an admiring group; and even Mona, who had come solely to look on, and to enjoy a short chat with the Sahib, received an amount of attention that positively startled her when she thought of her "false position."
Of course she was pleased. It seemed like a fairy tale, that almost within a mile of the shop she should be received so naturally as a lady and a woman of the world; but, in point of fact, the Cooksons and Mrs Ewing were the only people who knew that she was Miss Simpson's assistant. Her regularclientèlewas of too humble a class socially to be represented at the ball; her acquaintances in the neighbourhood were limited almost entirely to Rachel's friends and the members of the Baptist Chapel,—two sections of the community which were not at all likely to give support to such a festivity; and even people who had seen her repeatedly in her everyday surroundings, failed to recognise her in this handsome woman who had come to the ball with a very select party from St Rules.
Matilda glowed with triumph as she watched her friend move in a sphere altogether above her own; she longed to proclaim to every one how she had known all the time that Miss Maclean was a princess in disguise. How aghast Clarinda would be at her own stupidity, and with what shame she would recall her pointless sarcasms—Clarinda, who that very evening had said, she at least gave the shop-girl the credit of believing that the lace was imitation and the pearls false.
The night was wearing on, and Mona was sitting out a galop with Captain Steele, a handsome middle-aged man, whom the Sahib had introduced to her. They were conversing in a gay, frivolous strain, and Mona was reflecting how much easier it is to be entertaining in the evening if one has not been studying hard all day.
"Are you expecting any one?" asked the Captain suddenly.
"No; why do you ask?"
"You look up so eagerly whenever a new arrival is ushered in."
"Do I? It must be automatic. I scarcely know any one here."
But she coloured slightly as she spoke. His question made her conscious for the first time of a wish away down in the depths of her heart—a wish that Dr Dudley would come and see her small success. He had seen her under such very different conditions; he might arrive now any day in Borrowness for the Christmas holidays; why should he not be here to-night? It was surely an innocent little wish as wishes go; but on discovery it was treated ignominiously with speedy and relentless eviction; and Mona gave all the attention she could spare from the Captain's discourse to watching Doris and the Sahib.
Poor little wish! Take a regret along with you. You were futile and vain, for Dudley had a sufficiently just estimate of his capabilities to abstain at all times from dancing; and at that moment, with fur cap over his eyes, he was sleeping fitfully in the night express; and yet perhaps you were a wise little wish, and how different things might have been if you could have been realised!
The wish was gone, however, and Mona was watching her friends. A woman must be plain indeed if she is not to look pretty in becoming evening dress; and Doris, in her soft grey silk, looked like a Christmas rose in the mists of winter. She was talking brightly and eagerly, and the Sahib was listening with a smile that made his homely face altogether delightful. Mona wondered whether in all his honest life he had ever looked at any other woman with just that light in his eyes. "What a lucky man he will be who wins my Doris!" she said to herself; and close upon that thought came another. "They say matchmakers are apt to defeat their own ends, but if one praises the woman to the man, and abuses the man to the woman, one must at least be working in the right direction."
With a burst of harmony the band began a new waltz.
"Our dance, Miss Maclean," said the Sahib, coming up to her. "We are going to wander off to some far-away committee-room and swop confidences."
"It sounds nice, but my confidences are depressing."
"So are mine rather. Do you like this part of the world?"
"Do I like myself, in other words? Not much."
"Don't be philosophical. When all is said, there is nothing like gossip. I don't like this part of the world; in fact, I don't know myself in it; it is a fast, frivolous, imbecile world!"
"Socially speaking, I presume, not geographically. At least, those are not strictly the adjectives I should apply to my surroundings. How come you to be in such a world?"
"Oh, I met Kirkhope a few years ago. He was indulging in a fashionable run across India, and he ran up against me. I was able to put him up to a thing or two, and last month when I met him in Edinburgh, he invited me down. In a weak moment I accepted his invitation, and now you see Fortune has been kinder to me than I deserve."
"I saw you in Edinburgh as I went through one day," said Mona, and she told him she had been disappointed not to be able to speak to him at the station.
"How very disgusting!" he said. "Yes, Edinburgh is my home—my father's, at least."
"And had you never met Doris before I introduced you to her?"
The Sahib did not answer for a moment.
"I had not been introduced. I had seen her. Hers is not a face that one forgets."
"And yet it only gives a hint of all that lies behind it. You might travel from Dan to Beersheba without finding such a gloriously unselfish woman, and such a perfect child of Nature."
"She is delightfully natural and unaffected. I think that is her great charm. What sort of man is Colquhoun? Of course every one knows him by name."
"Yes; he is very near the top of the tree in his profession. He is a scientist, too, but in that capacity he is a trifle—pathetic. Shall you call when you go back?"
"I have obtained permission to do so."
"You would do me a personal favour if you would enter into his scientific fads a little. Dear lovable old man! You will have to laugh in your sleeve pretty audibly before he suspects that you are doing it."
"I don't think I shall feel at all inclined to. Is Miss Colquhoun a scientist too?"
"She is something better. She loves a dog because it is a dog, a worm because it is a worm. Science must stand cap in hand before such genuine inborn love of Nature as hers."
Again there was a pause before the Sahib answered. Then he roused himself suddenly.
"It seems to me, Miss Maclean, that you are shirking your part of the bargain. I have confided to you how it is I come to be here. It is your innings now."
Mona sighed.
"When I last saw you, you were a burning and shining medical light. Wherefore the bushel?"
"That is right. Strike hard at the root of myamour propre. It is good for me, though I wince. I am here, Sahib, mainly because I failed twice in my Intermediate Medicine examination."
Another of the Sahib's characteristic pauses.
"How on earth did you contrive to do it?" he asked at last. "When one sees the duffers of men that pass——"
The colour on Mona's cheek deepened. "I don't think a very large proportion of duffers pass the London University medical examinations," she said. "Of course one makes excuses for one's self. One began hospital work too soon; one's knowledge was on a plane altogether above the level of the examination papers, &c. It is only in moments of rare and exceptional honesty that one says, as I say to you now, 'I failed because I was a duffer, and did not know my work.'"
"Nay, you don't catch me with chaff. That is not the truth, and you don't think it is. I don't call that honesty!"
But although the Sahib spoke harshly, his heart was beating very warmly towards her just then. He had always considered Mona a clever and charming girl—a little too independent, perhaps, but her habitual independence made it the more delightful to see her submitting like a child to his questions, holding herself bound apparently for the moment to answer honestly without fencing, however much the effort might cost her.
"It is the truth, and nothing but the truth." she said. "I venture sometimes to think it is not the whole truth."
"Shall you go in again?"
"Yes."
"When?"
"July."
"Do you think you will pass?"
"No."
"Then why do you do it?"
"I have promised."
Another long pause, and then it came unpremeditatedly with a rush.
"Look here, Miss Maclean,—chuck the whole thing, and come back to India with me!"
It was so absolutely unexpected, that for a moment Mona thought it was a joke. "That would be a delightfully simple way of cutting the knot of the difficulty," she said gaily, but before her sentence was finished she saw what he meant. She tried not to see it, not to show that she saw it, but the blood rushed over her face and betrayed her.
"Do come," he said. "Will you? I never cared for any woman as I care for you."
"Oh, Sahib," said Mona, "we cared for each other, but not in that way. You have taught me all I have missed in not having a brother."
She was not sorry for him; she was intensely annoyed at his stupidity. Not for a moment did it occur to her that he might really love her. He liked her, of course, admired her, sympathised with her, at the present moment pitied her; but did he really suppose that a woman might not gladly accept his friendship, admiration, sympathy, even his pity, without wishing to have it all translated into the vulgar tangible coin of an offer of marriage? Was marriage for a woman, like money for a beggar, the sole standard by which all good feeling was to be tried?
She was not altogether at fault in her reading of his mind. The Sahib's sister Lena was engaged to be married, and he had started on his furlough with a vague general idea that if he could fall in love and take a wife back with him to India, it would be a very desirable thing. Such an idea is as good a preventive to falling in love as any that could be devised.
Among the girls he had met, Miss Maclean was undoubtedlyfacile princeps. In many respects she was cut out for the position; she was one of those women who acquire a lighter hand in conversation as they grow older, and who go on mellowing to a rich matronly maturity. In Anglo-Indian society she would be something entirely new, and three months in her own drawing-room would make a brilliant woman of her.
During all the autumn months, while he was shooting in Scotland, the Sahib had delighted in the thought that he was deliberately keeping away from her, and had delighted still more in the prospect of going "all by himself" to call upon her in London, to see whether the old impressions would be renewed in their full force. He had been bitterly angry and disappointed when he failed to find her at Gower Street, but the failure had gone very far to convince him that he really did love her.
And now had come this curious unexpected meeting at Kirkstoun. "Do you see that—person in the fur cloak?" Mona had said to him when he had dropped in for half an hour on the third day of the bazaar. "Don't be alarmed; I don't mean to introduce you; but that is my cousin. Now you know all that I can tell you." His momentary start and look of incredulity had not been lost upon her; but he had recovered himself in an instant, and had shown sufficient sense not to attempt any remark. And in truth, although he had been surprised and shocked, he had not been greatly distressed. "After all," he had said, "anybody could rake up a disreputable forty-second cousin from some ash-heap or other;" and the existence of such a person, together with Mona's breakdown in her medical career, gave him a pleasant, though unacknowledged, sense of being the knight in the fairy tale who is to deliver the captive princess from all her woes. Moreover, Mona's peculiar circumstances had brought about an intimacy between them that might otherwise have been impossible. He had been admitted into one of the less frequented chambers of her nature, and he said to himself that it was a goodly chamber. It was pleasant to see the colour rise into her cheeks, to hear her breath come quick while she talked to him; and to-night—to-night she looked very beautiful, and no shade of doubt was left on his mind that he loved her.