Mr. Bramble presently walked to the farther end of the launch, and Malcolm disappeared behind the funnel. Nigel was talking to Mrs. Duncan, Annibel, and Daisy, beyond hearing. Only Anice and Rose remained near where Fulvia sat. Fulvia had lost the joke after all.
"What were you laughing at just now?" she asked.
"Oh, just something Mr. Elvey said," Rose answered. "What was it, Anice? I couldn't quite understand, only everybody laughed, and so—"
"And so you did too!" Fulvia spoke with a touch of disdain. She counted Rose an inane specimen of giggling young ladyhood.
"Well, of course, I couldn't keep out of it," explained Rose. "It looks so stupid to sit with a solemn face when other people are laughing."
"Why didn't you ask?"
"Oh!—Ask for a joke to be explained! That is more stupid still. Baldwyn always says a joke never bears being repeated. Besides, one looks so silly, not to understand at once."
"I wonder whether 'to be' or 'to look' is the worst," murmured Fulvia.
Rose's density was proof against this, or she might have been offended. "Anice can tell you," she said.
No, Anice could not. Anice, like Rose, had laughed because others laughed, not because she divined the joke. Fulvia shrugged her shoulders, and was mute.
Some seconds, or some two or three minutes, might have passed—Fulvia could not afterwards recall which—when she became conscious of a peculiar odour, not only the scent of the cigar but a distinct smell of burning. Then she was vaguely aware of a blue smoke. She had gone back in thought to Nigel's future, and was cogitating deeply, so deeply that though physical consciousness was awake, her mind did not at once respond.
An impulse to escape from the girls' chatter came over her, and she stood up, moving a few steps away from her sheltered seat, into the breeze; the very worst thing she could have done, had she only known it.
Strange, this idea of Mr. Browning's about Nigel! Could his affairs really be under serious embarrassment? If it were so—Well, in any case, Fulvia would have ample means of her own. A sense of joy shot through her, at the thought of becoming a family benefactor. Would Nigel be willing? Yes, surely—if he still viewed her as sister! What more natural? Besides, he need not know. She would find out from "padre" the real state of affairs, and would insist upon putting everything straight. She had, or at least in a few weeks she would have, both the power and the right. Nobody then might say her nay, if she chose to give away any part of her possessions. Nothing should or must stand in the way of Nigel's going to college. She knew how he was bent upon it. Of course—that was why he looked so sad. Not Ethel; only this. So what she had said about Ethel did not matter. This was the real trouble; and how delightful to think that her hand might remove it!
"Fulvie! Fulvie!! O Fulvie!—Your dress is on fire!! Oh!!"
Anice's shriek reached slowly her absorbed mind at first bringing bewilderment. Then she was aware of smoke, smell, heat, and she sprang forward to get some woollen wrap; but the movement brought her yet more fully into the fresh breeze. In the tenth of a second the fanned flame ran greedily up her skirt, and swept round her, licking with fierce touch the bare skin of her hand, and rising to scorch her face.
Fulvia's scream was agonising. She had been always known as a girl of much presence of mind, by no means given to crying out; but she was taken by surprise, and unnerved. Anice and Rose fled at once, in fear for themselves, calling to others to help. Fulvia never forgot that moment, the brief yet prolonged horror, the anguish of isolation. It was as if everybody had forsaken her; none would dare to approach; and she was left face to face with awful peril, face to face with death.
"Nigel!" was the one word which broke from her in hoarse appeal. She could not think, could not recall what ought to be done. She could only rush forward, throwing out her hands in agony. And then, instantly, she saw Nigel's face close at hand.
Shouts and cries were sounding. "A shawl! A rug! I say—throw her down! Have her flat!"
Malcolm was flying along the deck. But Nigel had reached her before the first hoarse shriek of his name came to an end; and he did not hesitate. As he sprang forward, he grasped Fulvia firmly, dragged her to the side of the vessel, and with one clear leap went over, Fulvia in his arms. There was a flash of red flame, followed by a heavy splash, and the two sank out of sight.
WHISPERINGS
"For ebbing resolution ne'er returns,But falls still further from its former shore."—HORNE.
"STOP! Stop! Put her about! Stop, I say!" roared Mr. Carden-Cox in a state of desperation which rendered him almost incapable of speech. He strode wildly about, while Anice and Rose continued to shriek, Daisy seemed turned to stone, and Malcolm flung off his coat.
But the two heads almost instantly rose, and Nigel shouted, "All right."
"I'm coming," cried Malcolm.
"No, no—only a rope!"
"A rope—a rope—hoy! Hey!—A rope, I say!—Put her about—stop—a rope!" spluttered Mr. Carden-Cox, seizing Malcolm's arm, and holding on like a vice, not in the least aware of what he did.
"I say! Let me go," expostulated Malcolm; "She'll be too much for him."
In response to which Mr. Carden-Cox tightened his grasp, reiterating—
"A rope! A rope!—Hoy!—A rope, I say! Put her about! Stop!"
The engines had been at once reversed, but the boat was going up stream, and some seconds had to elapse before actual movement in the opposite direction could begin. The current was pretty strong, carrying Nigel and his charge downward, despite his best efforts. Nigel was not a little impeded by his clothes. He had not waited even to throw off his coat; and Fulvia hung as a dead weight, seeming to be stunned by the double shock.
Then sense returned, and in a moment she was clinging to him with a convulsive grasp which threatened to sink them both.
"Let go, Fulvia!" He spoke in a sharp, clear voice. "Don't hold me! I'll take care of you."
Fulvia gasped for breath. They were almost under water; and though for an instant she obeyed, her hands clutched at him wildly again.
"Fulvie dear, you must not! Let go! You will drown us both. Keep still, and trust me."
He had done the business now. She clenched her hands together, and left herself to him like a log. That "Fulvie dear" settled the matter; yet the words meant nothing. Nigel hardly even knew what he had said. It was merely the instinctive recurrence at a critical moment to the old childish terms. Fulvia had always been his sister, "every inch as much as Anice or Daisy," he would have said. Nigel had never thought of her in any other light. But Fulvia could not realise this; for she did not think of Nigel as of a brother.
Nigel could keep himself afloat now, and hold up Fulvia, till the boat steamed near, and a rope was flung. The open loop fell upon them, and in another minute both were hauled in, and helped upward.
Fulvia; again scarcely conscious, was laid flat on the deck, streaming with water, her face white, her hair loose in heavy dripping masses. It had been much singed, and part of her skirt was reduced almost to tinder, yet her skin had escaped marvellously. One hand and arm only were scorched to any painful degree.
Her first words were a murmured, "It smarts so!" but the next moment she added, "Never mind. I'm not really hurt."
"Thanks to this dear brave boy," Mr. Carden-Cox said huskily. "I declare, I never saw anything finer."
"It was the natural thing to do," Nigel asserted.
A hurried consultation took place. They were more than two hours distant by boat from Newton Bury; the steamer contained no change of clothes; and the minute cabin afforded no facilities for drying. Five minutes lower down the river lay a village, large enough to own a good landing-place and a respectable inn; and Mrs. Duncan counselled a stoppage there. Two or three hours in wet clothes on a November afternoon were not to be thought of.
The suggestion was speedily carried out. Anice, crying helplessly still, was left on board with the Brambles and Annibel; but Mrs. Duncan and Mr. Carden-Cox, Daisy and Malcolm, accompanied the soaked pair. Fulvia had by this time so far rallied that she insisted on walking from the river-bank to the inn, a matter of two hundred yards; and she even achieved two or three hysterical laughs by the way at her own deplorable appearance. Nigel looked rather white round the lips, as if chilled by his bath; but he seemed to have sprung suddenly into a fit of high spirits, saying the most ridiculous things he could think of, and sending Daisy into convulsions of laughter.
The inn reached, rooms were secured, big fires were ordered, and the sympathies of the portly landlady, Mrs. Brice, were enlisted.
The good woman could only hold up her plump hands at first, with dismayed utterances of—"My!" and "I never did!" But orders for hot water and big fires received speedy attention.
Mrs. Brice's own clothes would, as Daisy said, have "folded twice round Fulvia, with something to spare." She had, however, a daughter, and a neat brown dress belonging to the latter was speedily produced, not more than three inches too large at the waist.
Nigel fared equally well at the hands of the landlady's son. And while these changes of apparel were taking place, Mr. Carden-Cox found consolation in ordering a solid afternoon tea, inclusive of eggs and meat.
"For they'll need to be warmed up after their ducking," he said, as Daisy bounced in. "Everybody will be the better for something hot. Well, child, how is Fulvie?"
"She is getting on—only feels shivery and queer; but I should think a cup of coffee would put her right. Isn't it strange?—A lot of Fulvie's hair is all frizzled up with the fire, and yet her face isn't touched; not even the eyelashes burnt."
"Can't think how on earth the thing happened."
"Oh, it was Mr. Bramble, I know. I saw his cigar-end drop there, when he threw it away; and then I forgot all about it, we were having such a lot of fun. I wish I hadn't!"
Mr. Carden-Cox shook his head mutely. If any one but his favourite Daisy had been speaking, he would have read her a homily on thoughtlessness.
"Yes, I know—it was dreadfully stupid," Daisy said, her eyes filling. "I can't think how I could. But when Mr. Bramble tried to make out that it was a spark from the engine, I had to bite my lips not to speak. Wasn't it horrid of him not to help, but only to stand staring? Of course everybody couldn't jump into the river—needn't, at least—but he might have wanted to help. Malcolm was only one second behind Nigel; and he would have been in too, if you hadn't kept him back."
"I keep him back! Tut, tut, child! He didn't go in because it was not necessary."
Daisy's brown eyes opened to their widest extent. "Oh, I say, how unfair! Poor Malcolm! When you tugged at him with all your might and main, and wouldn't let go."
A dim recollection of facts came across Mr. Carden-Cox. "Well, well—it doesn't matter now," he said. "Malcolm would have acted if Nigel had not."
"And Anice and Rose ran away. I think that was so cowardly," said Daisy, with the stern condemnation of sixteen. "If I had been near, I would have made Fulvie lie down, and have tried to put out the fire. But the first thing I knew was the screaming, and then I saw the blaze, and Nigel going across with such a leap. And I felt so odd—as if somehow I couldn't stir for Just a moment—and then it was all done. Shall I tell Fulvie to come before the tea gets cold?"
Mr. Carden-Cox offered no objection.
And outside the door Daisy was met by a subdued—"I say!"
"Nigel, how comical you do look!"
"Narrow as to the shoulders, and baggy as to the waist. Not quite a perfect fit—but I'm glad to be dry again. I say, Daisy—"
"Fulvia's better, and we're all going to have lots of tea, and to be jolly."
"So I hear. We ought to be back on the boat soon. It will get awfully cold on the river for Anice. I say, Daisy—just listen one moment. I want you to do something for me."
"Oh, what?"
"If I am asked to cut bread or carve meat, will you act the energetic younger sister and do it instead? Mr. Carden-Cox means us to go in for substantials."
"Yes, of course. But why? What do you mean? Are you tired?"
"No—only I managed to scorch my hands. Nothing of consequence—I'll see to them by-and-by, but I don't want a fuss now. It would upset Fulvie—don't you see?"
"Oh,—do show me!"
"No, nonsense—hands off, Daisy!" as she pulled in vain at his coat-sleeve. "Don't!" and he spoke with unwonted sharpness, catching his breath.
Daisy stared. "Did I hurt? Was it that?"
"Never mind—it is nothing to signify. I won't have a word said; only I just want your help, like a good child, about the cutting and carving. Malcolm knows; and you and he, between you, can keep it from Fulvie."
"I'll be sure," Daisy answered, a sound like a gulp accompanying the words.
"That's right. You've been as plucky as possible, not giving in. Yes, I saw, of course—didn't you think I should? It's so much more sensible to take things cheerfully. What earthly good would it do, if we all sat down and howled?"
Daisy gave his arm a great squeeze of assent, delighted to find her efforts appreciated. She did not know what the squeeze meant to him, and he forbore even to wince.
Somewhat later, Fulvia sat dreamily in an arm-chair, close to the parlour fender. She could not get warm, despite a roaring fire and a thick shawl. Icy chills chased one another persistently through her frame, even to the extent of chattering teeth; and she was overpowered by weakness. She could not for a moment shake off the remembrance of that terrible tongue of flame wrapping itself round her, followed by the plunge into cold water, the struggle for breath, the deadly fright; then Nigel's face, as it had first come to her in the moment of hopeless horror, and Nigel's voice as it had spoken a minute later, "Fulvie dear! Fulvie dear!" Memory refused to carry her beyond those two words.
Fulvia made an effort to lift her weighted eyelids that she might glance towards Nigel. How sunshiny he looked, seated between Daisy and Malcolm, merrily avowing himself "lazy," and letting Daisy cut supplies of bread-and-butter for everybody, himself included! Was he so bright because he had saved her life? Anybody might rejoice to save any follow-creature from a terrible death; but was she no more than "any fellow-creature" to him? And Ethel was not present. He had not seen Ethel for hours. That look could not mean "Ethel"!
What had made him speak so in the water? "Fulvie dear" was not his usual style. As a little boy he had been addicted to the mode of address; but for years she had not heard the expression. Could it be that the sudden peril to her had drawn his deeper feeling to the surface?
Fulvia hardly shaped these questions into words. She felt them, rather than said them even to herself, as she sat by the fire, apart from the rest, silent and unable to enter into all that went on. The shock of that moment's horror was on her still; and her faculties were benumbed. She drank some hot tea, but could not eat; and she was unaware how anxiously others watched.
Drowsiness presently had her in its grasp; not growing into actual sleep, at least for a while, but slowly enchaining her as with weights of lead. The sound of voices lessened till she could only hear an occasional whisper. There was a barricade like a stone wall between her and the outer world. Thought went on dimly within, uncontrollable by any effort of her own; and more dimly still she was aware of movements and utterances on the other side of the wall. Now and again a few words were clear.
"I told you so! It is exhaustion. She must have her sleep out, poor girl!"
Fulvia knew Mrs. Duncan's tones, and could have smiled to think that she was not asleep, had not the exertion of a smile been too great. She was capable only of passive endurance.
"Ethel—Nigel—my resolution." A voice within the enclosing walls said this.
"Oh no—no—no!" sighed Fulvia; but the very sigh was internal. Outwardly she seemed to be in profound slumber; and soon the seeming became reality.
* * * * * * *
"Plucky! Yes." The words stole in upon Fulvia with a subtle power; and she divined at once of whom they were spoken. "Never should have guessed anything was wrong."
"But Daisy had found it out."
"No, he asked her to cut the loaf at tea—didn't want Fulvia to know. Thoughtful of the lad! She was upset enough already, poor thing. I say, Mrs. Duncan—" Mr. Carden-Cox lowered his voice to almost a whisper—"I say, Mrs. Duncan, what do you think? Anything likely in that quarter?"
Fulvia heard a little snap of his fingers. The idea that she ought not to listen never occurred to her. She was hardly out of dreamland yet; and body and mind were so stupefied that movement seemed impossible.
"Nigel and Fulvia! No!"
"Why not?—eh?" with a sound of disappointment. "Why should they?"
"Why should they like one another? Nothing more natural. Always together from childhood."
"That's the very thing! Intimacy doesn't end as a rule in a real attachment. People get to know each other too well. Half the marriages that take place never would take place if the husband and wife were better acquainted beforehand. A hazy uncertainty is more favourable to love-making."
"Nonsense!"
"It's sense, I am afraid. Intimacy is apt to do away with the poetical glamour."
"Poetical rubbish!" in a whisper of high disdain. "I beg your pardon, but really—! The fact is, his father wants this, and I want it. First time Browning and I have ever wished the same thing. Couldn't be anything more suitable from every point of view."
"Unless from Nigel's own. He will choose for himself, you may be sure? If you had said 'Nigel and Ethel!'"
"Ethel Elvey! No, no. That won't do. Good girl, and immense favourite of mine, but not a penny will come to her. No—no, that won't do at all."
"Nigel will hardly marry for money."
"Nobody ever does. He may chance to fall in love with the girl who has money."
"I doubt it."
"Well, all I have to say is that Nigel will not marry Ethel Elvey!"
"Nobody can tell yet."
"He will not, my good lady!" Mr. Carden-Cox was always strengthened in his opinion by opposition. "You mark my words! He may or may not marry Fulvia. He will not marry Ethel."
Fulvia was wide awake now; stupefied no longer; her head burning, her blood coursing wildly. She knew she ought to speak, but how could she?—How betray that she had heard so much?
"However," pursued Mr. Carden-Cox, as if dismissing the subject, "however, I was telling you about Nigel's hurts."
"Much burnt, you say?"
"Right palm a mass of blisters, chafed by the rope. Couldn't think what made him sit through tea-time, doing nothing! Not like Nigel! Daisy wouldn't have told—little monkey—but he betrayed himself getting on board. Stumbled and grasped at something, and I saw his face. I should never have guessed otherwise. Anice wailed, of course; and Daisy was most womanful—actually had had the sense to take with her some rag and linseed oil. She did up the hand as nattily as could be. There's some stuff in that girl, I do believe. Hallo!"
For Fulvia sat up, asking, "Is Nigel hurt?"
"My dear, are you just awake?" said Mrs. Duncan, coming near. "Better for the rest, I hope. You need not worry yourself about Nigel. He scorched his hand; that is all. They have gone home in the boat, and we are to follow in a fly as soon as you can start. Would you like to get ready now?"
"The sooner the better! How lazy I have been!"
TOM'S SPECIMENS
"The languages, especially the dead,The sciences, and most of all the abstruse,The arts, at least all such as could be saidTo be the most remote from common use."
"VERY pretty," said Ethel, gaping furtively behind one hand, as she gazed upon the open page of Tom Elvey's beloved companion, a neat herbarium of dried flowers and leaves. The cover of the volume was dark brown, the pages were light brown, and most of the gummed-down specimens were of a more or less dirty brown. Tom handled his treasure affectionately, and Ethel viewed each new page with outward politeness and inward wonder. That anybody should care for dead brown leaves, when living green ones were to be had, was a mystery to her.
"Yes, very pretty," she repeated, smothering a second yawn, as Tom waited for appreciation. What would Nigel be doing just then? Ah, coming homeward, of course, for the afternoon was growing old.
"At least, I mean that it must have been pretty once," continued truthful Ethel. "What is that on the next page? Edelweiss—is it really? I like the edelweiss. Yes, that does bear drying. How nice!"
"It is a first-rate specimen," said Tom.
"Did you gather it yourself?"
"On the Matterhorn—no, I mean on the Jungfrau. I never put any specimen into this herbarium which I have not procured with my own hands."
"I see—so it becomes a sort of record of your wanderings," said Ethel. "And you really are a mountain-climber?"
"Not to any perilous extent. I went for this specimen."
"And turned back as soon as you had got it!"
Tom's "yes" was innocent. He did not understand Ethel's tone.
"Of course I could have bought a specimen; but that would not have been the same thing."
"Like bagging partridges," suggested Ethel, wanting a flash of some sort to relieve the dead level of talk.
But though Tom could sometimes originate slow fun, he never could respond to anybody else's fun; and his look of blank inquiry made it needful for her to explain.
"I mean, you would only count the partridges which you had shot yourself; not what—But perhaps you don't shoot."
"I have been after kangaroos—once," said Tom.
Ethel gave a private glance towards the clock, taking care that Tom should not see. She was bent upon making this a pleasant visit to him, not letting him see how very much she would have preferred to be somewhere else. Some girls would have been glum and flat under the circumstances; but Ethel was not. She exerted herself to be bright, made Tom tell her all about the one kangaroo hunt which had been a leading event in his existence, and when he came back to the inevitable herbarium she submitted without a sigh to be lectured upon "the Australian flora."
Tom was quite a botanist in a small way; and he dearly liked to air his knowledge before a good listener. Ethel loved flowers intensely, yet she was no botanist. She made friends of her plants, studied their ways, and was delighted to know how they grow, how they bore flowers, what manner of soil suited them, whether they preferred heat or cold, sunshine or shade. But she detested classifications and Latin names, and would have nought to do with what Lance irreverently termed "Tom's genuses and specieses." She cared not one rap whether a blossom had stamens which adhered to the corolla or sprang from the calyx; whether the anthers opened inwards or outwards; whether the petals were in multiples of twos or of threes.
The Elveys were not as a family scientifically inclined, and Ethel's tastes had never been cultivated in that direction. Tom, on the other hand, delighted in rolling off his tongue this or that lengthy Linnean "—andria," or Natural History "—aceæ"; and Ethel submitted with the utmost sweetness.
Tom was charmed. He thought Ethel one of the most agreeable girls he had ever seen. She was immensely improved, he thought—"really quite intelligent, and capable of growing into a well-informed young woman, with proper supervision." Who so fitted to give the needed supervision as Tom himself? He began to think that a long visit at the Rectory would be no bad plan. Something had been said about it. Yes, he would accept the invitation; and then he could take Ethel's higher education in hand. Mr. Elvey was a very able man, no doubt, a man indeed of considerable attainments, but "classical—merely classical": Tom decided pityingly. Ethel would never gain any scientific bias from her father.
So it was full time that Tom should step forward and bestir himself, with perhaps a view to future possibilities. Who could tell what might come of it? Tom was young still, under thirty, and not bad-looking, though of awkward make. He would be a well-to-do man out in Australia one of these days. Even now he could afford to enjoy life, and to indulge himself in an occasional bout of sight-seeing—more correctly, of specimen-hunting.
In due time he would require a wife to look after him, to sew on his buttons, to pour out his tea, to attend generally to his needs. Tom had come to England with the vague idea of finding a wife before he went back. He began to wonder whether Ethel might not do. Those dainty little fingers of hers would be invaluable for arranging dried flowers upon the pages of his herbariums. Tom's own fingers being thick, and by no means dainty in action, there was the more need that he should choose a wife to supply his own deficiencies.
Thus a new thought grow into existence, as the afternoon waned—a short afternoon to Tom, though a long one to Ethel. But Tom's mental processes were always slow; and he gave no sign of what was brewing.
Mrs. Elvey made her appearance downstairs for a space, and Tom regaled her with sumptuous descriptions of the eucalyptus. Mrs. Elvey sighed, and said "How nice!" to everything.
By-and-by she vanished, and again Ethel found it difficult to hide her recurring yawns. Mr. Elvey had a succession of engagements all day, therefore he could not give help; and the boys always fled from Tom, in dread of Tom's perpetual outpour of "information."
So Ethel had nothing in the way of assistance from others, and talk began to flag irresistibly. They had gone through the herbarium from end to end. They had done any amount of Australian kangaroos and plants. Ethel had shown Tom everything in the house worth seeing. She had taken him round the garden for a stroll, and had proposed "a good ramble," which Tom to her disappointment had declined. His bodily action was like his mental action, somewhat slow; and though he could walk any amount with an object—in search of a "specimen," for instance—he scorned exercise for the sake of exercise. Ethel loved it, and she thought it would be so much easier to get on out-of-doors than indoors; if only Tom would have consented. Would the afternoon never end? Was Malcolm ever coming back?
A step at last! Ethel sprang up, with a word of excuse, and flew to the front door.
No, not Malcolm, but her father! Mr. Elvey looked, down with a stirred expression, and said, "Well—" a long breath following. "Have you heard?"
"No, what? O father—not an accident!"
"Nothing serious, though it might have been. Why, Ethel—child—I did not mean to frighten you. They are all right—safe at home—and Malcolm will be here presently. Fulvia's dress caught fire, and she would have been badly burnt but for Nigel. He was splendidly prompt—caught Fulvia in his arms, and went straight over into the river. Mr. Carden-Cox says it was the finest thing he ever saw. Capital fellow, isn't he?"
The light of pride shone through Ethel's eyes, even while they were brimming with tears. "Not hurt?" she managed to say.
"Fulvia hardly at all, only shaken and scorched. Nigel's right hand has suffered a good deal. Duncan says he will have to wear a sling for some days. Nobody knew a word about it for ever so long: he didn't want to distress Fulvia. I'm not sure that he did not show greater pluck there than in saving her. Difference of doing a thing when one is under excitement, and when one is cool, you know. We shall have to make much of him after this. Why, child!—"
Ethel's face dropped against the shoulder of his greatcoat.
"Father—if he had been—"
"Had been badly hurt? But he was not, nor she either—thank God! Come, cheer up."
He patted her arm, and Ethel clung to him more closely. Somebody was passing through the garden, and Mr. Elvey smiled but said nothing till the somebody came close; then only, "It is about you. Never mind. She'll be herself in a minute."
"I thought I would call, for fear of any exaggerated story getting round," said Nigel, his voice brighter than usual, as he stood with his arm in a sling, looking at Ethel. She lifted a pair of wet cheeks.
"I'm going in to see Tom. You can reassure her yourself," cheerily observed Mr. Elvey, who, being the most innocent of men, never suspected anybody of growing up or wishing to marry. Ethel and Nigel were "the children" to him still. But as he turned away, his grasp fell upon the young man's shoulder, and "God bless you!" went with it.
"I'm not the worse, really. It is nothing—not worth your caring about," Nigel said to Ethel, though the fact of her so caring was worth a great deal to him. "Come here for a minute—won't you?" and he opened the dining-room door. "It was a shock, I dare say, to hear about Fulvia. Things might have been serious if we had not had the river so near; but I don't think she will suffer, after a good night's rest."
"Yes—Fulvia. Oh yes," murmured Ethel, trying to recover herself. "Yes—but it must have been danger—"
"Would have been, without the river—for Fulvia, I mean. Not for me. In the water—no. I am a good swimmer. Even if she had pulled me under, there were plenty at hand to help. Malcolm was wild for a bath."
"I wish I had been there."
"It's a good thing you were not. That was the first moment I could be glad we had left you at home. I shouldn't have liked you to be looking on. You might not have been so discreet as Anice and her friend."
"Why, what did they do?"
"The better part of valour! Most wise, others being at hand to help. I'm not sure that you would have been sensible enough to run away."
"Nobody can tell till the moment comes; I think I should have seen that you were hurt."
"Yes—you always see everything. But one didn't want Fulvia to be more upset than she was. How have you got on at home—with—?"
"Oh, very well. We've done lots of botany." Ethel's face lighted up with fun, and Nigel thought it was with a recollection of enjoyment. He suddenly remembered Tom Elvey, and Fulvia's words about Tom.
Then, before the two could arrive at an understanding, Lance dashed in, shouting a string of inquiries about the day's adventure; and the little tête-à-tête was over.
"THE WORLD FORGETTING"
"'Tis pleasant, through the loopholes of retreat,To peep at such a world; to see the stirOf the great Babel, and not feel the crowd;To hear the roar she sends through all her gates,At a safe distance, where the dying soundFalls, a soft murmur, on the uninjured ear.Thus sitting, and surveying thus at easeThe globe and its concerns, I seem advancedTo some secure and more than mortal height,That liberates and exempts me from them all."—COWPER.
AT the mouth of the river upon which Newton Bury was built, and an hour or more distant by train from Newton Bury, was a certain small town, Burrside by name, the pet watering-place of the Newton Bury people. In summer, Burrside was gay with brass bands, and well-dressed promenaders; in summer therefore it was contemptuously eschewed by Mr. Carden-Cox. But in winter, when nobody went to Burrside, when it was transformed into an Arabia Deserta of empty lodgings and unfrequented streets, then Mr. Carden-Cox was given to betaking himself thither for a week or a fortnight of blissful quiet—"the world forgetting, by the world forgot."
It is not at all disagreeable to be forgotten by the world for a few days, just when one happens to be in the right mood. Not that Mr. Carden-Cox ever did forget the world of human beings to which he belonged, or ever really believed that the said world forgot him; but he thought he did, which came to much the same thing.
On such occasions, he found it agreeable to hug his solitude, to muse over the peculiarities of his own nature, to admire his own individuality of taste in thus fleeing the world, and to picture what friends might be saying about his absence. A curious mode of "forgetting the world"; but few people carry out their theories consistently.
One or two weeks ended, Mr. Carden-Cox's gregarious side was wont to come uppermost. By that time he had usually had enough of solitude, and was glad to return to his circle of acquaintances, finding a new pleasure in relating to them his Burrside experiences. Some of the said acquaintances privately called this return "coming out of his sulks," and nothing could persuade those unreasonable people that he had not fled in a huff. But nobody ever ventured to hint to himself that such an interpretation of his lofty communing with Nature was a possibility.
Just before the steam-boat excursion, and indeed before the day of Nigel's arrival was known, Mr. Carden-Cox had decided on a trip to Burrside. He and one of the Churchwardens had had a "tiff" on the subject of certain Church funds, and Mr. Carden-Cox had come off worst in the encounter. The said Churchwarden was a good man, albeit somewhat blunt; and Mr. Carden-Cox was not always in the right; but as an immediate result of the affair, he grew tired of the Newton Bury world, and resolved to flee.
Nigel's arrival altered the complexion of things, and slew his desire for solitude. However, Mr. Carden-Cox disliked to change his plans; it looked "unsettled" to do so, and he counted "unsettledness" tantamount to weakness. So he merely deferred the trip for a few days, and then vanished. Nobody saw him later than the morning after the steam-yacht excursion.
Once at Burrside, he liked the change, as usual, after a fashion. Banishment from the conventional round of commonplaces was in theory agreeable to him; and the Burrside natives, if commonplace, were not conventional. Mr. Carden-Cox found their simplicity delightful. He never grew weary of the old sailor on the shore, who knew Nigel and could talk of Nigel by the hour together; and his landlady from the same cause was a perpetual pleasure. The landlady, a highly respectable woman, looked upon him with a touch of compassionate interest, as "not quite all right there!" But this he could not guess, and she did her best for his comfort.
Mr. Carden-Cox was a man greatly addicted to letter-writing. He had not much to do besides, except to take care of himself, and to sit in judgment upon others—an employment in which he was a proficient. Idleness was abhorrent to him, and enforced work hardly less so, while letter-writing exactly suited his nervous nature and dilettante tastes. He could begin and leave off when he liked, could write as much or as little on any one subject as he chose, could be secure against interruption and opposition, at least till he had said his say; could expatiate to any extent on his own feelings; and above all, could indulge in a comfortable belief in the overcrowded state of his time. Let him write as many letters as he would, there were always more which might be written; and until Mr. Carden-Cox should achieve the impossible horizon-chase of "no further demands" in the correspondence line, he was enough pressed with business to be able to grumble. What true Englishman could want more?
"My letters are legion—legion!" he groaned complacently, surveying the pile beside his breakfast-plate, three mornings after his arrival at Burrside.
"Legion!" he repeated, looking at his landlady for sympathy, as she placed a covered dish upon the table; for even in the enjoyment of solitude somebody to be appealed to is necessary, and he had nobody else.
Mrs. Simmons was commonplace enough, being of no particular age, and having no particular features; but she was not, for all that, without her own individuality.
"Legion!" reiterated Mr. Carden-Cox. "How would you like to have all these to answer?" He lifted the pile as he spoke, weighing it in both hands, with a deprecating and mournful smile. He would by no means have liked not "to have all these to answer"; but none the less, he pitied himself.
Mrs. Simmons smoothed down a corner of the tablecloth, which had "got rucked up," as she expressed it. "I'm sure I don't know how ever I should get through 'em, sir, what with the dusting and cooking," she said.
"Cooking! Ah!—" Mr. Carden-Cox answered with mild benignity.
He knew enough about cooking to believe that a joint would "do" itself, if left before the fire, and that a pudding could be tossed together in five minutes. It seemed absurd to think that dusting or cooking could hinder correspondence, though he would not hurt Mrs. Simmons's feelings by suggesting that she over-estimated her vocation.
"Ah!—" he repeated. "Yes. No doubt. But the Penny Post is a great burden, a great burden. You and I can hardly be thankful enough that in our young days no Penny Post existed. We were spared that trouble."
Mrs. Simmons might be of no particular age, but she was not so old as Mr. Carden-Cox; and naturally she resented being placed on his level.
"Indeed, sir, I don't pretend to be able to go back to them days," she said with emphasis. "And I don't say but what the Penny Post has got its good points; not but what it's got its bad points too. As my father was used to say; for he did live in the times when there wasn't none."
"Everything in life has its advantages and its disadvantages," Mr. Carden-Cox said, looking at her with his bright eyes, as he weighed the postal delivery still. "The question in any particular case is—which overbalances the other? Do the advantages more than compensate for the disadvantages, or vice versa? You perceive? Sometimes there seems to be a complete balance of forces—an equilibrium—the scale will not incline either way."
"No, sir," assented Mrs. Simmons, anxious to escape before she should find herself in a mental quagmire.
"Nothing then remains but to hold one's opinion in abeyance, till one side or the other sinks. You understand?"
"To be sure, sir!" Mrs. Simmons answered, with a heartiness which might almost have meant comprehension. "Poor gentleman!" she was saying to herself. "No, he isn't quite all right there; but I've got to humour him."
"You are a sensible woman; a very sensible woman, Mrs. Simmons," Mr. Carden-Cox stated approvingly. "It is a relief to find one of your sex who can listen to logic, without argumentative opposition."
Mrs. Simmons liked this. "My mother was a sensible woman, sir," she averred, delaying her flight.
"Probably. Like mother, like daughter. But about the Penny Post—that would be a case in point." Mrs. Simmons backed. "The advantages and disadvantages being about equal, one could neither wish to have it done away, nor—" Mr. Carden-Cox paused to examine the handwriting of the uppermost envelope, "nor—I was about to say—"
Mrs. Simmons was gone, and Mr. Carden-Cox never finished his sentence.
He sighed, sat down, enjoyed a cutlet and a cup of coffee, then applied himself slowly to the day's business. As a rule, he delved from top to bottom of the pile with exemplary orderliness; but this morning his weighing process had shaken out a thick envelope, addressed in Daisy's childish handwriting, which proved irresistible. Mr. Carden-Cox drew out the sheet, propped it against the toast-rack, and began to read his favourite's effusion.
"MY DEAR MR. CARDEN-COX,—Fulvie wants me to answer your note, and to tell you all about everybody, as she isn't well enough. She's not ill, I suppose, but she is awfully seedy somehow—hasn't been out of her room since the boat day. Cousin Jamie says it is the chill and the shock. And mother is worried, and father is depressed, and Nigel's hand doesn't get on; so we are in a sort of hospital state."Fulvia and Nigel want padre very much to consult cousin Jamie about himself, and he won't. At least he says 'some day, perhaps,' and he keeps putting it off. He is talking again about going abroad, and I can't think what for. It is such a stupid time of the year for going abroad—nothing to see or do. We think he wants to escape Fulvie's birthday, but why should he? Of course we must give up making a fuss, if he isn't well and doesn't like it. At least Fulvie says so."I slept in Fulvie's room last night, because she seemed to need somebody, and she did nothing but talk and ramble about all sorts of nonsense, and call out to Nigel to help her. I suppose she fancied she was burning or drowning, by the things she said."I believe she thinks herself worse than she really is; for last night she seized hold of me, and said, 'Daisy, if I die, tell Nigel—' and then she went off into a mutter. I said, 'You're not going to die; nonsense, Fulvie, it is just a cold!' But she did not hear me, and began again, 'Tell Nigel, he and Ethel—he and Ethel—' and then she burst out crying, and she did cry so! I asked her what she meant about Nigel and Ethel, and Fulvie said, 'Oh, when he marries Ethel—and when I'm dead!' I couldn't get her to say anything more that was rational, except, 'Nobody knows—nobody must know,' and she sobbed herself off into a sort of stupid state, not like sleep."This morning I told her what she had said, and she wouldn't believe me. She was angry, and she asked how I could be so ridiculous. Then she said I had been dreaming, and she made me promise not to tell madre, or Nigel, or cousin Jamie. Of course we don't tell anything to padre, and Anice is no good; but I'm sure somebody ought to know the sort of state she is in, and so I thought I would tell you, because we always tell you nearly everything in our house. Only please don't let out that I have said so much."I wonder if Nigel ever will marry Ethel. Don't you? I like Ethel very much. He is always going there, and trying to see her; but Ethel has so much to do that I don't believe he very often succeeds, and then he looks melancholy. And mother is so unhappy whenever he goes. I do wish mother didn't mind everything so much. I mean to give up minding things, and to take everything just as it comes. And I don't mean ever to worry mother by caring too much for anybody. But I don't think Nigel notices how she feels, exactly as he used to do."I meant to tell you lots more, but there is no time, and I must stop. Mother wants me for something.—Ever yours affectionately,"DAISY BROWNING."
Mr. Carden-Cox sat for ten minutes in a brown study. Then he rang for the removal of the breakfast things, and turned over the pile of letters remaining. Among them, he found a short note from Nigel, written with the left hand, and a few lines from Ethel.
"DEAR MR. CARDEN-COX,—Can you give me the name of that law-book which you mentioned on the boat? I want to read it. Excuse this scrawl."Fulvia seems poorly still—cannot leave her room.—Ever yours,"N. B."
"DEAR MR. CARDEN-COX,—Could you possibly let my father have your magic-lantern next week? It is asking a great deal at short notice, but he wants to get up the Infants' Treat earlier than was intended, and we have so little time to arrange anything."We are very sorry Fulvia is so ill. Of course you hear all about everything, or else I would tell you more. Nigel seems rather anxious about her, but I do not know that anybody else is. His hand is bad still.—Believe me, yours sincerely,"ETHEL ELVEY."
In answer to these Mr. Carden-Cox wrote, with great deliberation, three letters, and also a fourth to Fulvia. By inserting a good deal of chit-chat, he managed to fill up exactly one sheet to each, signing his name at the bottom of the fourth page.
Then he fell into a state of flurry, and scribbled four postscripts on four additional half-sheets. His state of mind was shown by the fact that, instead of writing P.S. at the top of each half-sheet, he wrote N.B., not discovering his own blunder. After all, the one was as good as the other, though unusual. He thrust the postscripts into the four stamped and addressed envelopes, paying small heed to the addresses, and hurried to the post-box round a near corner. Not unnaturally, each postscript went to a wrong destination.
NOTA BENE!
"It is sometimes a very trifle from whence great temptations proceed. And whilst I think myself somewhat safe, when I least expect it, I find myself sometimes overcome with a small blast."—THOMAS À KEMPIS.
THESE were the postscripts, indited by Mr. Carden-Cox upon four half-sheets, in his state of mental flurry, and thrust into the wrong envelopes.
To Nigel: sent by mistake to Fulvia.
"N.B.—One line more. My dear fellow, you do not really mean to go in for law before Christmas!—just home from your world-tour. Most exemplary, of course; but is it necessary? I do not wish to act the part of an old hinderer in suggesting delay, still—nobody has seen you yet, and everybody wants to hear everything that you have done. After Christmas you will be going, no doubt, to Oxford; and later on will come the crucial question as to your career—the Bar or no! I say yes; but your father says no; and after all the decision must rest with him. Happily there is time enough. Meanwhile we have to think of Fulvia's twenty-first birthday. I want to make something of that affair, if your father will let us. He seems strangely averse."Are you sure that your mind is free at this moment for law studies? Well, well, I must not inquire too closely. But I can tell you, if that comes about, the dearest hopes of your father and of myself will be fulfilled. I have set my heart upon it, ever since you and the little Fulvia trotted about hand-in-hand, in your frocks and knickerbockers. You two always suited each other. And not to speak of Fulvia's money, which is a consideration, for undoubtedly your father's embarrassments have increased—not to speak of that, for you are not one to marry for money, Fulvia will be a good wife, true and unselfish. I shall not soon forget your leap into the river, with Fulvia in your arms. It seemed to me a happy augury for the future. Was it not so to you? One knows well enough how you feel—how you must feel—for the good girl whom you rescued—but not all young fellows have such an opportunity of putting their feelings into action. She is a good girl, and you are a good boy; and I wish you both happiness, with all my heart—you and her together."
To Daisy: sent by mistake to Ethel.
"N.B.—One word more. As for what you say about Nigel, that is all nonsense. Don't trouble your little head; what do you know of such matters? He will marry no doubt some day, but not in that direction. So Fulvia is very poorly, and rambles at night. Yes, I dare say; it was a shock to her, of course. Mind, Nigel must not know how she calls for him. Won't do to hinder matters by pressing them on. Young men like to be let alone, and not interfered with. But you are a sensible and womanly girl, and I don't mind saying to you that that is what his father and I most want for him. I have the greatest esteem for the other good girl; and she is an uncommonly good girl; but all the same it wouldn't do. Wouldn't do for a moment. Nigel will never marry her, unless in direct opposition to his father; and he is not that sort, you know. Nor does he really wish it, though there may once have been a passing fancy. Fulvia is made for him. Mind—all this in strict confidence. Not a word to any one; least of all to E. E. You are a good little Daisy, and I trust you."
To Ethel: sent by mistake to Daisy.
"N.B.—I am sorry, by-the-bye, to hear such poor accounts of Fulvia. But I hope she will soon pick up again. She must feel gratified by the manner of her rescue. Devotion could scarcely have been more plainly shown. She and that boy have always been much one to another. I have often hoped that the 'much' would grow into more. In fact, his father and I quite agree on that point—about the only point, between ourselves, on which Browning and I ever did agree. This in confidence. You are enough of a friend to Nigel to be able to rejoice in the prospect of his happy future. Tell Mr. Elvey I am delighted that he should use my magic-lantern as often as he likes."
To Fulvia: sent by mistake to Nigel.
"N.B.—One word more to my dear Fulvia. I am sorry to hear that your faithful knight has not yet regained the use of his hand. But never mind! He will count it worth his while. What brave knight ever yet shrank from fire or water for the sake of his faire ladye? Well, I must not joke you; but it is easy to guess how he feels—good boy!"
The four letters with their ill-fitting postscripts reached Newton Bury that same evening, being faithfully delivered according to their several addresses; three at the Grange, one at the Rectory.
"A perfect cartload from Mr. Carden-Cox," Nigel remarked. He read his own sheet quickly through, wondering how any sensible and intellectual man could manage to say so little, in so many words. If it had been a woman, or even a brainless man—but Mr. Carden-Cox was not a woman, nor was he brainless. Nigel then turned to the postscript, with a preliminary laugh at the N.B., and a final pause at the sixth word.
"Hallo! This is not for me? Here, Daisy," folding the half-sheet and tossing it towards her, "it is Fulvia's, not mine!"
Daisy was screwing up her big childish forehead in perplexity. "How funny!" she commented aloud, over her half-sheet. "He doesn't write like that to me generally. Why, I declare—if it isn't to Ethel!"
"What?"
"Mr. Carden-Cox has sent me a wrong piece. It's to Ethel, not to me. A sort of postscript. How stupid!—And I never guessed till I got to the end. Yes, I read it, of course. How could I tell? It might have been all in answer to my letter, only it's not exactly how he always writes. Speaking of padre as 'Browning' and—"
"Stop you've no business to repeat a word. It was not meant for your eyes."
"No; to be sure. Well, we must send it on to Ethel, I suppose."
"Put it up in an envelope. I'll take it at once, and explain."
Daisy obeyed with promptitude. Nobody else was present to remonstrate. Mr. and Mrs. Browning were in the study, and Anice was with Fulvia. Dinner would not be until eight o'clock; and it was now only a few minutes after seven.
"That is Fulvia's. You had better carry it upstairs. Don't forget," Nigel said, indicating the folded half-sheet, as Daisy handed to him a closed envelope, addressed "Miss Elvey."
"Yes, I will—I mean, I won't forget. Tell Ethel I'm very sorry I read hers. How odd of Mr. Carden-Cox! Why didn't he take more care? Perhaps there's a half-sheet to you, sent to Fulvia by mistake."
"No; Anice would have brought it down by this time."
Nigel was pulling on his greatcoat, when the study door opened, and Mrs. Browning glided out. "It is raining fast. Where are you going?" she asked.
"To rectify a blunder."
"Mother—Mr. Carden-Cox has made such a mistake," exclaimed Daisy, hanging over the balusters. "He has sent part of a letter to me which ought to have gone to Ethel, and another part to Nigel which is meant for Fulvia. Isn't it queer? Just as if he had got all the letters mixed up in a jumble. I'm taking Fulvia hers, and Nigel is taking Ethel's."
A shadow fell upon Mrs. Browning's face. "Always the Rectory!" she said.
"I shall not be long, mother."
She retreated into the study, and Nigel went off—something of the shadow falling on him; he could hardly have defined how or why.
Fulvia's letter had gone straight to her, on its first arrival. She was seated in her bedroom, by the fire, wearing a pale blue dressing-gown. The reddish hair, knotted lightly behind, fell low in masses. Though not ill enough to stay in bed all day, she was by no means well enough to be about the house. She looked thin and flushed.
Anice was leaving the room to get a book, at the moment of the maid's entry with the letter, and Fulvia said, "Don't hurry, I am all right."
"I don't mean to be long," Anice replied.
But Fulvia was alone when she opened the envelope. Out of it dropped the sheet and also the half-sheet, both closely covered by Mr. Carden-Cox's minute and precise handwriting.
Some impulse made Fulvia turn first to the half-sheet; and in a moment she saw that it was not intended for herself. She glanced at the sheet—yes, that began all right, "My dear Fulvia;" but this had "My dear fellow."
Fulvia read on, notwithstanding. A kind of fascination seemed to hold her eyes to the page. It was fascination which might have been, and ought to have been, resisted. Conscience cried loudly, yet she did not resist. She read on straight and fast to the end.
A gleam came to her eyes, and a glow to her cheeks. For some seconds she had only one distinct sense—that of an overwhelming joy. Nothing else could matter now—now—if Nigel and she were to be one! The wish of his father!—The wish of Mr. Carden-Cox!—The desire of Nigel himself!—What then could hinder?
But upon this came a rush of yet more overwhelming shame at her own action, seen in imagination with Nigel's eyes. The shame bowed her forward, till her face rested upon her knees, and the flush of joy deepened into a fixed burning of brow and cheeks. What had she done? What had she been about? Nigel's letter!—But she could not let Nigel have it! He must never know that her eyes had read those words—Oh, never! Cold chills shot through her at the very thought.
Anice was coming back. Fulvia heard the approaching steps, and dire need brought composure. She thrust the half-sheet deep into a pocket of her dressing-gown, pushed away the candle that her face might be in shade, and began quietly to read her own letter.
"From Mr. Carden-Cox?" asked Anice, recognising the cramped hand. "Anything particular?"
"Nothing much. Just chit-chat! He seems getting tired of Burrside already."
"He always does in a day or two."
"Or a week or two."
Unobservant Anice noticed nothing unusual in Fulvia's shaking hands or crimson face; but the next moment Daisy rushed in.
"Oh, did I make a noise? I'm sorry. I quite forgot. Why, Fulvie—what a colour you are! As red as beetroot! Cousin Jamie would say you were feverish."
"Nonsense. What have you there?"
"Only a postscript from Mr. Carden-Cox for you. It went to Nigel by mistake. I can't imagine what Mr. Carden-Cox has been about. He sent another to me instead of to Ethel. You haven't one too, I suppose, meant for somebody else? Only that sheet—" as Fulvia pointed to the one lying on her knee. "Fulvie! I say! I'm sure you are not so well this evening. What is the matter? Anything Mr. Carden-Cox has said? I shall have to call madre. Why, your hands are like fire, and beating as if they were alive. I can feel them."
Fulvia snatched the said hands petulantly away.
"Nonsense! Don't. I wish you would not tease. I will not have a word said to madre, and I only want to be quiet. There is such an amount of talk and bustle, and my head is wild."
Daisy grew gentle. "I'm sorry. We won't talk any more," she said in a penitent voice. "Fulvie, if you just get into bed, I'll only help you and not say a word. Please do."
Fulvia leant back, and shut her eyes.
"I can't yet. I have to finish my letter—and I want a little peace. Go and dress for dinner first—both of you."
"And then—" Daisy said.
"Yes, then perhaps. I'll see. Only go now, and don't say a word to worry madre."
The girls took her at her word, retiring softly, and Fulvia found herself alone; safe for a while, she knew, since neither Anice nor Daisy could ever dress in less than half-an-hour, the one from innate slowness, the other from lack of method.
Fulvia's hands beating! She could have told Daisy that she was beating all over; the clang of a hard pulsation echoing through every nerve and fibre of her body. "Am I going to be ill? I feel like it," she asked of herself; and then aloud, with a laugh—"Nonsense! There are nerves enough in the family already. I'll not sport them!"
Then she glanced through Mr. Carden-Cox's chit-chat sheet, only to find nothing in it worth attention, and read her own postscript. Thereupon came again the thrill of joy, followed by shame.
"What would Nigel think? How could I? Tell him!—Oh, I can never confess! He must never know! To read it—all the time knowing it was not meant for me. I! Why I have always prided myself on never stooping to anything mean—and now, this! What could have come over me that moment? I must have been demented. How I could! Yes, it was temptation of course—but why did I give way?"
Yet she drew the half-sheet from her pocket, and her eyes fell upon it anew. "No harm now! I have read the whole—I can't help having read it," she murmured. Then, with a renewed rush of self-contempt, she caught her glance away, crumpled up the piece of paper, and actually flung it upon the fire. At the last instant she recoiled, and as the little crushed ball of paper fell upon a surface of unburnt black coal, her fingers snatched it off. Impossible yet to destroy those words, so full of light and hope for her. She would not read them again, but she would keep them; just for a few days.
Fulvia crossed the room with trembling steps, smoothing the crumpled half-sheet as she went. She unlocked her dressing-box, slipped the paper behind the little looking-glass which had its nest within the lid, and re-locked the box.
Once more in her easy-chair, she could only lean back and think, with a mixture of delight and despondency. As minutes went on, the latter predominated.
If Nigel should ever know—should over guess what she had done! Fulvia felt that she could sink into the earth with shame. She could picture so well his look, could foretell what he would think and say. Suppose Mr. Carden-Cox were to recall that he had sent the postscript to Fulvia? Suppose she should be questioned. What would she say, and how might she shield herself?
"I will not speak untruths, and I will not tell!" she resolved aloud, clasping her hands. The two resolves might prove incompatible,—but she would not face that possibility.
Why had she not, when Anice was returning, dropped the half-sheet on the floor, then picked it up as a discovery and sent it straight to Nigel by Anice? This suggestion came up; Fulvia's brow was dyed anew at the idea of such deception. Yet—she almost regretted that she had not thought of it in time!
By the half-hour's end, when Daisy returned, it was as much as Fulvia could do to creep into bed. No wonder that the night following was one of feverish unrest. Daisy had little sleep, though not easily kept awake, for Fulvia rambled incessantly in a half-awake, half-unconscious style.
Strange to say, she kept sealed lips throughout as to the crumpled half-sheet locked up in her dressing-case. Once there was a passionate cry, "O Nigel, forgive me!"
And Daisy sat up in bed, staring with round eyes of astonishment. But no more followed, and Fulvia seemed to be asleep, so Daisy lay down again.
"I'm glad I told Mr. Carden-Cox, though," commented Daisy. "Somebody ought to know how she goes on, most certainly!"
"WILL NEVER MARRY HER!"
"He jests at scars that never felt a wound."—SHAKESPEARE.
"ETHEL, just look at that blind. It hangs all crookedly."
"Yes, mother."
"Now you have pulled it too much the other way. You do things in such a hurry."
Ethel gave a slow pull this time, cheerily, though her mother's tone was depressing. Mrs. Elvey could not be called ill-tempered, but she was given to complaining moods, and such moods were trying to those about her.
"Something must be wrong with the oil we are using now. The lamp has a most disagreeable smell."
"Father noticed it yesterday evening. I'll go to the shop and speak about it to-morrow."
"Yes, do; it is enough to make one positively ill."
"Shall I take away the lamp and light candles?"
"Oh no, that would be extravagant; I must just bear it. What has become of everybody this evening? The house seems so dull."
"Father is writing in the study, and the boys are at their prep. still. Lance wants me to help him presently."
"Then, pray, go; don't mind about me. Lance must not lose his place in his classes on any account. Do go at once, Ethel."
Mrs. Elvey spoke in an injured tone, as if it were unkind of Ethel to leave her; but this was so usual a state of things that Ethel hardly noticed the manner. She folded up her work, and sped into the hall just as the postman dropped a letter into the box.
"For me," she said, taking it out. "From Mr. Carden-Cox. About the magic-lantern, of course. I am glad he has answered quickly. Well, Lance," as the boy ran past, "do you want me?"
"Not for five minutes," Lance answered.
The boys did their "prep." in the little old schoolroom. Ethel turned into the dining-room to read her letter, standing under the gas, which had been left alight. The remains of the evening meal, a dinner-tea, were on the table still. Post arrived at the Rectory somewhat later than at the Grange, Church Square coming at the end of a certain "beat."
She went through the sheet first, amused at the amount of talk about nothing; then came to the postscript, with a little laugh at the "N.B." Puzzlement followed quickly. "What did I say about Nigel? I can't remember. What does he mean? 'Not to trouble my head'—well, but I don't. 'Such matters!'—I can't understand. 'Nigel to marry some day'—yes, very likely; anybody might suppose that."
A pink spot found its way to her cheek. Did Mr. Carden-Cox imagine that she was running after Nigel, and wish to administer a friendly warning? Impossible, surely!—and yet—"He is so odd! He might mean it," faltered Ethel, glad that nobody was present to remark her looks. "But I should not have expected it from him."
She read on slowly, bewildered still. "Fulvia calling for Nigel at night—" quite natural after the shock she had had. But could Mr. Carden-Cox really suppose that she, Ethel, would tell Nigel, even if she had known the fact? What was it that Mr. Browning and Mr. Carden-Cox wanted for Nigel? And who was this "other good girl"?
"Fulvia, no doubt," thought Ethel. "'It wouldn't do!' What wouldn't do? 'Nigel marry in opposition to his father!'—No, indeed; nothing less likely." But what had made Mr. Carden-Cox write all this to Ethel? Was he demented?
Suddenly, at the end, understanding came in a flood. One moment she was smiling under the gas-burner in amused perplexity; the next instant she saw the whole as with a flash of lightning.
This postscript was to Daisy Browning, not to herself. She, Ethel Elvey, and not Fulvia Rolfe, was "the other girl," whom Nigel might never marry—whom, indeed, he had no wish to marry.
Ethel did not give the sheet another glance. There was no need, for she knew it all by heart. More especially those words, "Nigel will never marry her!" were stamped upon her memory. They seemed to settle the matter finally.
She stood quietly; her eyes fixed on the opposite wall; but she could not see or think. No tears came, only a numb sensation, reaching down to her finger-tips; and, indeed, those little fingers were all at once strangely cold.
"I say, Ethel—Eth-el!" called Lance imperiously.
"Coming!" cried Ethel.
She folded the half-sheet, and thrust it into her pocket, absolutely forgetting at the moment that it was not her own. "O Nigel, Nigel!" a voice within her heart was wailing sadly; and as she crossed the hall towards the schoolroom, he entered by the front door.
"Ethel, I'm just come to bring—"
He paused a moment to pull off his glove, and grasp her hand. Ethel's fingers lay in his, not returning the pressure. He looked so bright, so pleased to be there. For one moment she could have believed it all a bad dream. But those words were with her still—he would never marry her! He did not really wish it! Not really! No; why should he? He was only her old kind affectionate playfellow; and she had to be the same to him, expecting nothing beyond, and taking care that nobody should think she could expect anything beyond. That last item was the difficulty—how to guard her own position, and yet not to give him pain. At the present moment such a line of conduct was not even possible. She had to give him pain; and at the very moment that her fingers touched his, the grave shadow which she so well know, and which she never could see without a heartache, crept over his eyes.
"I'm come to bring part of your letter from Mr. Carden-Cox, posted to Daisy. He scorns to have been in a state of confusion. There was a postscript for Fulvia sent to me, and Daisy received this, which she says is yours. Daisy read it before she discovered the blunder, and she wants me to apologise."
"Thanks," Ethel replied, taking the envelope. She did not look straight at him, after her wont, but leant against the wall, pale, and even a little breathless, as if she had been running uphill. It flashed across her mind that, if she followed Daisy's example, she would send to Daisy by Nigel the postscript which she had herself received. "But I cannot—cannot!" she cried to herself. "Impossible! I will send it back to Mr. Carden-Cox."
Nigel stood gazing at Ethel, with a face of grieved surprise. He could not make her out.
"You don't mind, I hope. Daisy did not find that it was meant for you till the end. Of course she will tell nobody what she has read."
"Mind! Oh no! Mr. Carden-Cox's letters are not so very important—commonly."
"It is not half-past seven yet. May I come in for a few minutes? We don't dine till eight," said Nigel, sorely chilled by her manner, yet hoping against hope that it might mean nothing.
"Yes, of course. My mother is in the drawing-room."
"And you will come too?"
"I can't. Lance wants me; and I have to write a note for the post."
"Just for a minute! The post doesn't go till eight."
"Our pillar is emptied a quarter before; and Lance—"
"Can't Lance wait?"
"No; I have to help with his lessons."
Dead silence for a moment.
"Is anything wrong?" Nigel asked.
Ethel lifted her eyes, giving him a calm return glance. She would not for the world have betrayed herself. "I ought to go to Lance."