"I'd rather you did," Tiny said at once. "There's nothing to hide. But—you can be a dear, good boy when you like, Herbs!"
"Can I? Then you can be offended if you like—but he's on the job now if he never was in his life before!"
"I won't say I hope he isn't," Tiny whispered.
So she was not offended.
Such was Christina's first meeting with Lord Manister in his own county. It occurred while his mother's invitation was exhilarating so many homes, and on the day when the Mundham mail bag would not hold the first draught of prompt replies. Until the garden party itself, however, no one at the rectory saw any more of Lord Manister, who had gone for a few days to the Marquis of Wymondham's place in Scotland, where he shot dreadfully on the Twelfth and was otherwise in queer form, considering that Miss Garth was also one of the guests. But under all the circumstances it is not difficult to imagine Manister worried and unhappy during this interval; which, on the other hand, remained in the minds of the people at the rectory, Christina included, as the pleasantest part of their month there.
Not that they suspected this at the time. Mrs. Erskine especially found these days alittle slow. Having knowledge of Lord Manister's whereabouts, she was impatient for his return, and the more so because Christina seemed to have forgotten his existence. Christina was indeed puzzling, and on one embarrassing occasion, which with some girls would have led to a scene, she puzzled Ruth more than ever. Ruth tried to follow her presumptive example, and to put aside the thought of Lord Manister for the time being. Her consolation meanwhile was the livelycamaraderiebetween Christina and Erskine, wherein Erskine's wife took a delight for which we may forgive her much.
"How well you two get on!" she would say gladly to each of them.
"He's a man and a brother," Tiny would reply.
To which Ruth was sure to say tenderly: "It's sweet of you, dear, to look upon him as a brother.
"Ah, but don't you forget that he's a man, and not my brother really, but just the very best of pals!" Tiny said once. "That's the beauty of him. He's the only man who ever talked sense to me right through from the beginning, so he's something new. He's theonly man I ever liked without having the least desire to flirt with him, if you particularly want to know! And I don't believe his being my brother-in-law has anything to do with that," added the girl reflectively; "it would have been the same in any case. What's better still, he's the only man who ever understood me, my dear."
"He's very clever, you see," observed Ruth slyly, but also in all seriousness.
"That's the worst of him; he makes you feel your ignorance."
"I assure you, Tiny, he thinksyouvery clever."
"So you're crackin'!" laughed Tiny; and as the old bush slang filled her mouth unbidden, the smell of a hot wind at Wallandoon came into her nostrils; and there seemed no more to be said.
But that last assurance of Ruth's was still ringing in her ears when her thoughts got back from the bush. She did not believe a word of it. Yet it was more or less true. Nor was Erskine far wrong in any opinion he had expressed to his wife concerning Christina, of whom, perhaps, he had said even less than he thought.
She was not, indeed, to be called an intellectual girl, in these days least of all. That was her misfortune, or otherwise, as you happen to think. Intellectual possibilities, however, she possessed: raw brain with which much might have been done. Not much can be done by a governess on a station in the back-blocks. Merely in curing the girls of the twang of Australia, more successfully than of its slang, and in teaching Tiny to sing rather nicely, the governess at Wallandoon had done wonders. But gifts that were of more use to Christina were natural, such as the quick perception, the long memory, and the ready tongue with which she defended the doors of her mind, so that few might guess the poverty of the store within. Nor had the governess been able to add much to that store. The liking for books had not come to Christina at Wallandoon; but in Melbourne she had taken to reading, and had reveled in a deal of trash; and now in England she read whatever Erskine put in her hands, and honestly enjoyed most of it, with the additional relish of being proud of her enjoyment. Erskine thought her discriminating, too; but converts to good booksare apt to flatter the saviors of their taste, and perhaps her brother-in-law was a poor judge of the girl's judgment. He liked her for findingColonel Newcome'slife more touching than his death, and for placing theColonelsecond toDr. Primrosein the order of her gods after reading "The Vicar of Wakefield." He was delighted with her confession that she should "love to be loved by Clive Newcome," while her defense ofMiss Ethel, which was vigorous enough to betray a fellow-feeling, was interesting at the time, and more so later, when there was occasion to remember it. Similar interest attached to another confession, that she had long enviedŒnoneandElaine"because they were really in love." She seemed to have mixed some good poetry with the bad novels that had contented her in Melbourne. Two more books which she learned to love now were "Sesame and Lilies" and "Virginibus Puerisque." It was Erskine Holland's privilege to put each into her hands for the first time, and perhaps she never pleased him quite so much as when she said: "It makes me think less of myself; it has made me horribly unhappy; but if they were going to hang mein the morning I would sit up all night to read it again!" That was her grace after "Sesame and Lilies."
"Why don't you make Ruth read too?" she asked him once, quite idly, when they had been talking about books.
"She has a good deal to think about," Erskine replied after a little hesitation. "She's too busy to read."
"Or too happy," suggested Tiny.
Mr. Holland made a longer pause, looking gratefully at the girl, as though she had given him a new idea, which he would gladly entertain if he could. "I wonder whether that's possible?" he said at last.
"I'm sure it is. Ruth is so happy that books can do nothing for her; the happy ones show her no happiness so great as her own, and she thinks the sad ones stupid. The other day, when I insisted on reading her my favorite thing in 'Virginibus——'"
"What is your favorite thing?" interrupted Erskine.
"'El Dorado'—it's the most beautiful thing you have put me on to yet, of its size. I could hardly see my way through the last page—I can't tell you why—only because it was sobeautiful, I think, and so awfully true! But Ruth saw nothing to cry over; I'm not sure that she saw much to admire; and that's all because you have gone and made her so happy."
For some minutes Erskine looked grim. Then he smiled.
"But aren't you happy too, Tiny?"
"I'm as happy as I deserve to be. That's good enough, isn't it?"
"Quite. You must be as happy as you're pleased to think Ruth."
"Well, then, I'm not. I should like to be some good in the world, and I'm no good at all!"
"I am sorry to see it take you like that," said Erskine gravely. "I wouldn't have thought this of you, Tiny!"
"Ah, there are many things you wouldn't think of me," remarked Tiny. She spoke a little sadly, and she said no more. And this time her sudden silence came from no vision of the bush, but from what she loved much less—a glimpse of herself in the mirror of her own heart.
There was one thing, certainly, that none of them would have thought of her; for she never told them of her little quiet meddlings in thevillage. But I could tell you. Pleasant it would be to write of what she did for Mrs. Clapperton (who certainly seemed to have been unfairly treated) and of the memories that lived after her in more cottages than one. But you are to see her as they did who saw most of her, and to remember that nothing is more delightful than being kind to the grateful poor, especially when one is privately depressed. Little was ever known of the liberties taken by Christina's generosity, and nothing shall be recorded here. She must stand or fall without that, as in the eyes of her friends. Suffice it that she did amuse herself in this way on the sly, and found it good for restoring her vanity, which was suffering secretly all this time. She would have been the last to take credit for any good she may have done in Essingham. She knew that it wiped out nothing, and also that it made her happier than she would have been otherwise. For though a worse time came later, even now she was not comfortable in her heart. And she had by no means forgotten the existence of Lord Manister, as someone feared.
Ruth, however, put her own conversation under studious restraint during these days,many of which passed without any mention of Lord Minister's name at the rectory. The distracting proximity of his stately home was apparently forgotten in this peaceful spot. But the wife of one clerical neighbor, a Mrs. Willoughby, who accompanied her husband when he came to play lawn tennis with Mr. Holland, and indeed wherever the poor man went, cherished a grudge against the young nobleman's family, of which she made no secret. It was only natural that this lady should air her grievance on the lawn at Essingham, whence there was a distant prospect of lodge and gates to goad her tongue. Yet, when she did so, it was as though the sun had come out suddenly and thrown the shadow of the hall across the rectory garden.
"As for this garden party," cried Mrs. Willoughby, as it seemed for the benefit of the gentlemen, who had put on their coats, and were handing teacups under the trees, "I consider it an insult to the county. It comes too late in the day to be regarded as anything else. Why didn't they do something when first they came here? They have had the place a year. Why didn't they give a ball in the winter, or a set of dinner parties if they preferred that? Shall I tell you why, Mr. Holland? It was because the general election was further off then, and it hadn't occurred to them to put up Lord Manister for the division."
"They haven't been here a year, my dear, by any means," observed Mrs. Willoughby's husband; "and as for dinner parties, we, at any rate, have dined with them."
"Well, I wouldn't boast about it," answered Mrs. Willoughby, who had a sharp manner in conversation, and a specially staccato note for her husband. "We dined with them, it is true; I suppose they thought they must do the civil to a neighboring rector or two. But as their footman had the insolence to tell our coachman, Mrs. Holland, they considered things had reached a pretty pass when it came to dining the country clergy!'"
"Their footman considered," murmured Mr. Willoughby.
"He was repeating what he had heard at table," the lady affirmed, as though she had heard it herself. "They had made a joke of it—before their servants. So they don't catch me at their garden party, which is to satisfy our social cravings and secure our votes. I don't visit with snobs, Mrs. Holland, for alltheir coronets and Norman blood—of which, let me tell you, they haven't one drop between them. Who was the present earl's great-grandfather, I should like to know? He never had one; they are not only snobs but upstarts, the Dromards."
"At any rate," Mr. Holland said mildly, "they can't gain anything by being civil tous. We don't represent a single vote. We are here for one calendar month."
"Ah, it is wise to be disinterested here and there," rejoined Mrs. Willoughby, whose sharpness was not merely vocal; "it supplies an instance, and that's worth a hundred arguments. Now I shouldn't wonder, Mr. Holland, if they didn't go out of their way to be quite nice to you. I shouldn't wonder a bit. It would advertise their disinterestedness. But wait till you meet them in Piccadilly."
"Mrs. Willoughby is a cynic," laughed Erskine, turning to the clergyman, whose wife swallowed her tea complacently with this compliment to sweeten it. To so many minds a charge of cynicism would seem to imply that intellectual superiority which is cheap at the price of a moral defect.
Now Erskine had a lawn tennis player staying with him for the inside of this week; and the lawn tennis player was a fallen cricketer, who had played against the Eton eleven when young Manister was in it; and he ventured to suggest that the division might find a worse candidate. "He was a nice enough boy then," said he, "and I recollect he made runs; he's a good fellow still, from all accounts."
"From allmyaccounts," retorted Mrs. Willoughby, refreshed by her tea, "he's a very fast one!"
Erskine's friend had never heard that, though he understood that Manister had fallen off in his cricket; he had not seen the young fellow for years, nor did he think any more about him at the moment, being drawn by Herbert into cricket talk, which stopped his ears to the general conversation just as this became really interesting.
"That reminds me," Mrs. Willoughby exclaimed, turning to Ruth. "Was Lord Manister out in Australia in your time?"
Ruth said "No," rather nervously, for Mrs. Willoughby's manner alarmed her. "I was married just before he came out," she added; "as a matter of fact, our steamers crossed in the canal."
"Well, you know what a short time he stayed there, for a governor's aid-de-camp?"
"Only a few months, I have heard. Do let me give you another cup of tea, Mrs. Willoughby!"
"Now I wonder if you know," pursued this lady, having cursorily declined more tea, "how he came to leave so suddenly?"
Poor Mrs. Holland shook her head, which was inwardly besieged with impossible tenders for a change of subject. No one helped her: Tiny had perhaps already lost her presence of mind; Erskine did not understand; the other two were not listening. Ruth could think of no better expedient than a third cup for Christina; as she passed it her own hand trembled, but venturing to glance at her sister's face, she was amazed to find it not only free from all sign of self-consciousness or of anxiety, but filled with unaffected interest. For this was the occasion on which Christina's coolness quite baffled Ruth, who for her part was preparing for a scene.
"Shall I tell you?" asked Mrs. Willoughby.
"Do," said Christina, to whom the well-informed lady at once turned.
"He formed an attachment out there, MissLuttrell! He could only get out of it by fleeing the country; so he fled. You look as though you knew all about it," she added (making Ruth shudder), for the girl had smiled knowingly.
"About which?" asked Tiny.
"What! Were there more affairs than one?"
"Some people said so."
Mrs. Willoughby glanced around her with a glittering eye, and was sorry to notice that two of her hearers were not listening. "That is just what I expected," she informed the other four. "If you tell me that Melbourne became too hot to hold him I shall not be surprised."
"Melbourne made rather a fuss about him," replied Christina in an excusing tone that pierced Ruth's embarrassment and pricked to life her darling hopes. "He was not greatly to blame."
"But he broke the poor girl's heart. I should blame him for that, to say the least of it."
"You surprise me," said Christina gravely; "I thought that people at home never blamed each other for anything they did in the colonies? Over here you are particular, I know; but I thought it was correct not to be too particular when out there. Your writers come out: we treat them like lords, and then they do nothing but abuse us; your lords come out: we treat them like princes, and, you see, they break our hearts. Of course they do! We expect it of them. It's all we look for in the colonies."
"You are not serious, Miss Luttrell," said Mrs. Willoughby in some displeasure. "To my mind it is a serious thing. It seems a sad thing, too, to me. But I may be old-fashioned; the present generation would crack jokes across an open grave, as I am well aware. Yet there isn't much joke in a young girl having her heart broken by such as Lord Manister, is there? And that's what literally happened, for my friend Mrs. Foster-Simpson knows all about it. She knows all about the Dromards—to her cost!"
"Ah, we know the Foster-Simpsons; they called on us last year," remarked Erskine, who devoutly trusted that they would not call again. His amusement at Christina hardly balanced his weariness of Mrs. Willoughby, and he took off his coat as he spoke.
"Does your friend know the poor girl's name, Mrs. Willoughby?" Tiny asked when the men had gone back to the court; and her tone was now as sympathetic as could possibly be desired.
"I'm sorry to say she does not; it's the one thing she has been unable to find out," said Mrs. Willoughby naïvely. "Perhaps you could tell me, Miss Luttrell?"
"Perhaps I could," said Christina, smiling, as she rose to seek a ball which had been hit into the churchyard. "Only, you see, I don't know which of them it was. It wouldn't be fair to give you a list of names to guess from, would it?"
Fortunately Mrs. Willoughby put no further questions to Ruth, who was intensely thankful. "For," as she told Christina afterward, "Iwas on pins and needles the whole time. I never did know anyone like you for keeping cool under fire!"
"It depends on the fire," Tiny said. "Mrs. Willoughby went off by accident, and luckily she was not pointing at anybody."
"And I'm glad she did, now it's over!" exclaimed Ruth. "Don't you see that I was quite right about your name? So now youneed have no more qualms about the garden party."
"Perhaps I've had no qualms for some time; perhaps I've known you were right."
"Since when? Since—since you saw Lord Manister?"
Tiny nodded.
"Do you mean to say you talked about it?" Ruth whispered in delicious awe.
"I mustn't tell you whathetalked about. He was as nice as he could be—though I should have preferred to find him less beautifully dressed in the country; but I always felt that about him. I am sure, however, of one thing: he was no more to blame than—I was. I have always felt this about him, too."
"Tiny, dear, if only I could understand you!"
"If only you could! Then you might help me to understand myself."
The hall gates were plain enough from the rectory lawn, but plainer still from the steps whence, on the afternoon of the garden party, Mr. Holland watched them from under the brim of the first hard hat he had worn for a fortnight. He was ready, while the ladies were traditionally late, but he did not lose patience; he was too much entertained in watching the hall gates and the hedgerow that hid the road leading up to them. Vehicles were filing along this road in a procession which for the moment was continuous. Erskine could see them over the hedge, and it was difficult to do so without sharing some opinions which Mrs. Willoughby had expressed regarding the comprehensive character of the social measure taken not before it was time by the noble family within those gates. There were county clergymen driving themselves inill-balanced dogcarts, and county townspeople in carriages manifestly hired, and county bigwigs—as big as the Dromards themselves—in splendid equipages, with splendid coachmen and horseflesh the most magnificent. Greater processional versatility might scarcely be seen in southwestern suburbs on Derby Day; and the low phaeton which he himself was about to contribute to the medley made Erskine laugh.
"We should follow the next really swagger turnout—we should run behind it," he suggested to the girls when at length they appeared; and Ruth took him seriously.
"No, get in front of them," said Herbert, who was lounging on the steps, in dirty flannels which Erskine envied him. "Get in front of them and slow down. That'd be the sporting thing to do! They couldn't pass you in the drive. It would do 'em good."
However, the procession was not without gaps, and to Ruth's satisfaction they found themselves in rather a wide one. As they drove through those august gates a parson's dogcart was rounding a curve some distance ahead, but nothing was in sight behind. Ruth sat beside her husband, who drove. Shelooked rather demure, but very charming in her little matronly bonnet; her costume was otherwise somewhat noticeably sober, and certainly she had never felt more sensibly the married sister than now, as she glanced at Christina with furtive anxiety, but open admiration. Tiny was neatly dressed in white, and her hat was white also. "Do you know why I wear a white hat?" she asked Erskine on the way; but her question proved merely to be an impudent adaptation of a very disreputable old riddle, and beyond this she was unusually silent during the short drive. Yet she seemed not only self-possessed, but inwardly at her ease. She sat on the little seat in front, often turning round to gaze ahead, and her curiosity and interest were very frank and natural. So were her admiration of the park, her anxiety to see the house itself, and even her wonder at the great length of the drive, which ran alongside the cricket field, and then bent steadily to the left. When at last the low red-brick pile became visible, Gallow Hill was seen immediately behind it, which surprised Christina; the lawn in front was alive with people, which put her on her mettle; and the inspiriting outburst of a military band at that momentforced from her an admission of the pleasure and excitement which had been growing upon her for some minutes.
"I like this!" she exclaimed. "This is first-rate England!"
Countess Dromard stood on the edge of the lawn at the front of the house, and apparently the carriages were unloading at this side of the drive. Ruth whispered hurriedly that she was sure they were, but she was not so sure in reality, and she now saw the disadvantage of arriving in a wide gap, which deprives the inexperienced of their lawful cue. She was quite right, however, and when some minutes elapsed before the arrival of another carriage to interrupt the charming little conversation Ruth had with Lady Dromard, the good of the gap became triumphantly apparent. The countess was very kind indeed. She was a tall, fine woman, with whom the shadows of life had scarce begun to lengthen to the eye; her face was not only handsome, but wonderfully fresh, and she had a trick of lowering it as she chatted with Ruth, bending over her in a way which was comfortable and almost motherly from the first. She had heard of Mrs. Holland, whom she was glad to meet at last,and of whom she now hoped to see something more. Ruth observed that they had the rectory only till September; she was sorry her time was so short. Lady Dromard very flatteringly echoed her sorrow, and also professed an envious admiration for the rectory, which she described as idyllic. That was practically all. What was said of the weather hardly counted; and a repetition of her ladyship's hopes of seeing something more of Mrs. Holland and her party was not worth remembering, according to Erskine, who declared that this meant nothing at all.
Ruth, however, was not likely to forget it; though she treasured just as much the memory of a certain glance which she had caught the countess leveling at her sister. She thought that other eyes also were attracted by the white-robed Tiny, and the smooth-shaven turf was air to Ruth's tread as she marched off with her husband and that cynosure. Nor was her satisfaction decreased when the first person they came across chanced to be no other than Mrs. Willoughby. This meeting was literally the unexpected treat that Ruth pronounced it to be, for the clergyman's wife was smiling in a manner which showed thatshe had witnessed the countess' singular civility to her friend.
"Yes, I'm here after all," said Mrs. Willoughby grimly. "Henry made me very angry by insisting on coming, but of course I wasn't going to let him come alone. I hope you think he looks happy now he's here!" (Mr. Willoughby and a brother rector might have been hatching dark designs against their bishop, who was himself present, judging by their looks.) "Icall him the picture of misery. Well, Mrs. Holland, I hope you are gratified at your reception! Oh, it was quite gushing, I assure you; we have all been watching. But wait till you meet them in Piccadilly, my dear Mrs. Holland."
Mrs. Holland left the reply to her husband, who, however, contented himself with promising Mrs. Willoughby a telegraphic report of the proceedings at that meeting, if it ever took place.
"Ah, there won't be much to report," said that redoubtable woman; "they won't look at you. But I shouldn't be surprised to see them make a deal of you in the country, if you let them."
It did not seem conducive to the enjoymentof the afternoon to prolong the conversation with Mrs. Willoughby. The party of three wandered toward the band, admiring the scarlet coats of the bandsmen against the dark green of the shrubbery, and their bright brass instruments flaming in the sun. The music also was of much spirit and gayety, and it was agreed that a band was an immense improvement to a rite of this sort. Then these three, who, after all, knew very few people present, followed the example of others, and made a circuit of the house, in high good humor. But Tiny found herself between two conversational fires, for Ruth would compel her to express admiration for the premises, which might have been taken for granted, while Erskine called her attention to the people, who were much more entertaining to watch. As they passed a table devoted to refreshments, at which a large lady was being waited upon very politely by a small boy in a broad collar, they overheard one of those scraps of conversation which amuse at the moment.
"So you're a Dromard boy, are you?" the lady was saying. "I've never seen you before. What Dromard boy areyou, pray?"
"My name's Douglas."
"Oh! So you're the Honorable Douglas Dromard, are you?"
The boy handed her an ice without answering as the three passed on.
"I said you'd see and hear some queer things," whispered Mr. Holland; "but you won't hear anything much finer than that. The woman is Mrs. Foster-Simpson; her husband's a solicitor, and may be the Conservative agent, if his wife doesn't disqualify him. She professes to know all about the Dromards, as you heard the other day. You can guess the kind of knowledge. Even the boy snubs her. Yet mark him. The mixture of politeness and contempt was worth noticing in a small boy like that. There's a little nobleman for you!"
"No, a little Englishman," said Tiny. "Now that's a thing I do envy you—your schoolboys, your little gentlemen! We don't grow them so little in the colonies; we don't know how."
They were walking on a majestic terrace in the shadow of the red-brick house, their figures mirrored in each mullioned window as they passed it.
"I call Lord Manister the luckiest young man in England," Ruth exclaimed during a pause between the other two. "To think that all this will be his!"
"It rather reminds me of Hampton Court on this side," remarked Tiny indifferently.
"And it's by no means their only place, you know; there are others they never use, are there not, Erskine?—to say nothing of all those squares and streets in town!"
But Erskine sounded the thick sibilant of silence as they passed a shabby looking person with a slouching walk and a fair beard.
"I wonder howhegot here?" Tiny murmured next moment.
"He has a better right than most of us."
"What do you mean, Erskine?"
"Well, it's the earl."
"Earl Dromard? I should have guessed his gardener!"
"No, that's the earl. Old clothes are his special fancy in the country. It's his particular form of side, so they say."
"Well," said Tiny, "I prefer it to his son's, which has always appeared to me to be the other extreme."
"I am sure Lord Manister is not over-dressed," remonstrated Ruth, with her usual alacrity in defense of his lordship.
"No, that's the worst of him," answered her sister. "There is nothing to find fault with, ever; that's what makes one think he employs his intellect on the study of his appearance."
They had seen Lord Manister in the distance. Presumably he had not seen them, but he might have done so; and Ruth supposed it was the doubt that made her sister speak of him more captiously than usual. But the criticism was not utterly unfair, as Ruth might presently have seen for herself; for as they came back to the front of the house, Lord Manister detached himself from a group, and approached them with the suave smile and the slight flourish of the hat which were two of his tricks. Christina asked afterward if the flourish was not dreadfully continental, but she was told that it was merely up to date, like the hat itself. At the time, however, she introduced Lord Manister to her sister Mrs. Erskine Holland, and to Mr. Holland, taking this liberty with charming grace and tact, yet with a becoming amount of natural shyness. Manister, for one, was pleased with the introductionon all grounds. From the first, however, he addressed himself to the married lady, speaking partly of the surrounding country, for which Ruth could not say too much, and partly of Melbourne, which enabled him to return her compliments. His manner was eminently friendly and polite. Discovering that they had not yet been in the house for tea, he led the way thither, and through a throng of people in the hall, and so into the dining room. Here he saved the situation from embarrassment by making himself equally attentive to another party. To Ruth, however, Lord Manister's civility was still sufficiently marked, while he asked her husband whether he was a cricketer; and this reminded him of Herbert, for whom he gave Miss Luttrell a message. He said they had just arranged some cricket for the last week of the month; he thought they would be glad of Miss Luttrell's brother in one or two of the matches. But he seemed to fear that most of the teams were made up; his young brother was arranging everything. Christina gathered that in any case they would be glad to see Herbert at the nets any afternoon of the following week, more especially on the Monday. Lord Manister made a point of the message, and also of the cricket week, "when," he said, "you must all turn up if it's fine." And those were his last words to them.
"I see you know my son," said the countess in her kindliest manner as Ruth thanked her for a charming afternoon.
"My sister met him the other day at Lady Almeric's," replied Ruth, "and before that in Australia."
"I knew Lord Manister in Melbourne," added Tiny with freedom.
"Do you mean to tell me you are Australians?" said Lady Dromard in a tone that complimented the girls at the expense of their country. "Then you must certainly come and see me," she added cordially, though her surprise was still upon her. "I am greatly interested in Australia since my son was there. I feel I have a welcome for all Australians—you welcomed him, you know!"
Christina afterward expressed the firm opinion that Lady Dromard had said this rather strangely, which Ruth as firmly denied. Tiny was accused of an imaginative self-consciousness, and the accusation provoked a blush, which Ruth took care to remember. Certainly, if the countess had spoken queerly, thequeerness had escaped the one person who was not on the lookout for something of the kind; Erskine Holland had perceived nothing but her ladyship's condescension, which had been indeed remarkable, though Erskine still told his wife to expect no further notice from that quarter.
"And I'm selfish enough to hope you'll get none, my dears," he said to the girls that evening as they sauntered through the kitchen garden after dinner; "because for my part I'd much rather not be noticed by them. We were not intended to take seriously anything that was said this afternoon; honey was the order of the day for all comers—and can't you imagine them wiping their foreheads when we were all gone? I only hope they wiped us out of their heads! We're much happier as we are. I'm not rabid, like Mrs. Willoughby; but she prophesied a very possible experience, when all's said and done, confound her! I have visions of Piccadilly myself. And seriously, Ruth, you wouldn't like it if you became friendly with these people here and they cut you in town; no more should I. I think you can't be too careful with people of that sort; and if they ask usagain I vote we don't go; but they won't ask us any more, you may depend upon it."
"I don't depend upon it, all the same," replied Ruth, with some spirit. "Lady Dromard was most kind; and as for Lord Manister,Iwas enchanted with him."
"Were you?" Tiny said, feeling vaguely that she was challenged.
"I was; I thought him unaffected and friendly, and even simple. I am sure he is simple-minded! I am also sure that you won't find another young man in his position who is better natured or better hearted——"
"Or better mannered—or better dressed! You are quite right; he is nearly perfect. He is rather too perfect for me in his manners and appearance; I should like to untidy him; I should like to put him in a temper. Lord Manister was never in a temper in his life; he's nicer than most people—but he's too nice altogether for me!"
"You knew him rather well in Melbourne?" said Erskine, eyeing his sister-in-law curiously; her face was toward the moon, and her expression was set and scornful.
"Very well indeed," she answered with her erratic candor.
"I might have guessed as much that time in town. I say, if we meethimin Piccadilly we may score off Mrs. Willoughby yet! Wait till we get back——"
"All right; only don't let us wait out here," Ruth interrupted—"or Tiny and I may have to go back in our coffins!"
A clever man is not necessarily an infallible prophet; and the clever man who is married may well preserve an intellectual luster in the eyes of his admirer by never prophesying at all. But should he take pleasure in predicting the thing that is openly deprecated at the other side of the hearth, let him see to it that his prediction comes true, for otherwise he has whetted a blade for his own breast, from whose justifiable use only an angel could abstain. There was no angel in the family which had been brought up on Wallandoon Station, New South Wales. When, within the next three days, Ruth received a note from Lady Dromard inviting them all to dinner at a very early date, she did not fail to prod Erskine as he deserved. But her thrust was not malignant; nor did she give vexatious vent to her own triumph, which was considerable.
"You are a very clever man," she merelytold him, and with the relish of a wife who can say this from her heart; "but you see, you're wrong for once. Lady Dromarddidmean what she said. She wants us all to dine there on Friday evening, when, as it happens, we have no other engagement; and really I don't see how we can refuse."
"You mean that you would like to get out of it if you could?" her husband said.
"You don't need to be sarcastic," remarked Ruth with a slight flush. "Who wants to get out of it?"
"I thought perhaps you did, my dear; to tell you the truth, I rather hoped so."
"You don't want to go!"
"I can't say I jump."
Ruth colored afresh.
"I have no patience with you, Erskine! Nobody is dying to go; but I own I can't see any reason against going, nor any excuse for stopping away; and considering what you yourself said about going to the garden party, dear, I must say I think you're rather inconsistent."
Holland gazed down into the flushed, frowning face, that frowned so seldom, and flushed so prettily. Always an undemonstrative husband, very properly he had been more so than ever since others had been staying in the house. But neither of those others was present now, and rather suddenly he stooped and kissed his wife.
"There is no reason, and there would be no excuse; so you are quite right," he said kindly. "It's only that one has a constitutional dislike to being taken up—and dropped. I have visions of all that. I'm afraid Mrs. Willoughby has poisoned my mind; we will go, and let us hope it'll prove an antidote."
They went, and that dinner party was not the formidable affair it might have been; as Lady Dromard herself said, most graciously, it was not a dinner party at all. Ten, however, sat down, of whom four came from the rectory; for Herbert had been over to practice at the nets, and was fairly satisfied with his treatment on that occasion, which accounted for his presence on this. The only other guests were an inevitable divine and his wife. The earl was absent. As if to conserve Christina's impression of the old clothes in which, as the natives said, his lordship "liked himself," Earl Dromard had left for London rather suddenly that morning. Lord Manisterfilled his place impeccably, with Ruth at her best on his right. Herbert was less happy with Lady Mary Dromard, a very proud person, who could also be very rude in the most elegant manner. But Christina fell to the jolliest scion of the house, Mr. Stanley Dromard; and this pair mutually enjoyed themselves.
Young in every way was the Honorable Stanley Dromard. He had just left Eton, where he had been in the eleven, like his brother before him; he was to go into residence at Trinity in October. With a quantum of gentlemanly interest he heard that Miss Luttrell's brother was also going up to Cambridge next term; but not to Trinity. Said Mr. Dromard, "Your brother's a bit of a cricketer, too; he came over for a knock the other day; he means to play for us next week, if we're short, doesn't he?" Christina fancied so. Mr. Dromard said "Good!" with some emphasis, and Herbert's name dropped out of the conversation. This became Anglo-Australian, as it was sure to, and led to some of those bold comparisons for which Christina was generally to be trusted; but the bolder they were, the more Mr. Dromard enjoyed them, for the girl glitteredin his eyes. He was a delightfully appreciative youth, if easily amused, and his laughter sharpened Tiny's wits. She shone consciously, but yet calmly, and made a really remarkable impression upon her companion, without once meeting Lord Manister's glance, which rested on her sometimes for a second.
So the flattering attentions of young Dromard were not terminated, but merely interrupted, by the flight of the ladies. When the men followed them to the drawing room the younger son shot to Miss Luttrell's side with the fine regardlessness of nineteen, and furthered their friendship by divulging the Mundham plans for the following week. The cricket was to begin on the Tuesday. The men were coming the day before: half the Eton eleven, Tiny understood, and some older young fellows of Manister's standing. The first two were to be two-day matches against the county and a Marylebone team. The Saturday's match would be between Mundham Hall and another scratch eleven, "and that's when we may want your brother, Miss Luttrell," added Mr. Dromard, "though wemightwant him before. Our team has been made up some time, but somebody issure to have some other fixture for Saturday."
"I think he may like to play," said Christina.
Mr. Dromard seemed a little surprised.
"It's a jolly ground," he remarked, "and there will be some first-rate players."
"I am sure he would like a game on your ground," Christina went so far as to say.
"Do you dance, Miss Luttrell?" asked the young man, after a pause.
"When I get the chance," said Christina.
He gazed at her a moment, and could imagine her dancing—with him.
"Suppose we were to do something of the kind here one evening between the matches; would you come?"
"If I got the chance," said Christina.
Dromard considered what he was saying. "We ought to have a dance," he added in a doubtful tone, as though the need were greater than the chance; "we really ought. But I don't suppose we shall; nothing is arranged, you see."
"You needn't hedge, Mr. Dromard," said the girl, smiling.
"Eh?"
"I shan't expect an invitation!"
She nodded knowingly as he blushed; but he had the great merit of being easily amused, and with another word she made him merry and at ease again. Not unreasonably, perhaps, a casual spectator might have suspected these two of a mild but immediate flirtation. Stanley, however, was at a safe and privileged age, and no eye was on him but his brother's. Lord Manister gave the impression of being a rather dignified person in his own home, but he was doing his gracious duty by the guests, none of whom seemed especially to occupy his attention, while he was reasonably polite to all. It was he, too, who at length suggested to Lady Dromard that Miss Luttrell would probably sing something if she were asked.
So Christina sang something—it hardly matters what. Her song was not a classic, neither was it grossly popular. It was a pleasant song, pleasantly sung, and the entire absence of pretentiousness and of affectation in the song and the singing was more noticeable than the positive excellence of either. The girl had no greater voice than one would have expected of so small a person, but what she had was in keeping. Lady Dromard,however, had a more sensitive appreciation of good taste than of good music, and she asked for more. Christina sang successively something of Lassen's, and then "Last Night," taking the English words in each case. She played her own accompaniments, and felt little nervousness until her last song was finished, when it certainly startled her to find Lady Dromard standing at her side.
"Thank you!" said the countess with considerable enthusiasm. "You sing delightfully, and you sing delightful songs. You must have been very well taught."
"Mostly in the bush," said Christina truthfully.
"You come from the bush?"
"But you had some lessons in Melbourne," put in Ruth, who was visibly delighted.
"Oh, yes, a few," Tiny said, smiling; "as many as I was worth."
"Ah, you shall tell me about Melbourne one day soon," said Lady Dromard to the young girl. "Your sister has promised to come over and watch the cricket. I do hope you will come with her."
Christina expressed her pleasure at the prospect, and, taking the nearest seat, foundLord Manister leaning over the end of the piano and looking down upon her with a rather sardonic smile.
"You haven't looked at me this evening," he said to her under cover of the general conversation, which was now renewed. "May I ask what I have done?"
"Certainly you may ask, Lord Manister," answered the girl with immense simplicity; "but I can't tell you, because I am not aware that you have done anything beyond making us all very happy and at home."
"Well, I'm glad to hear that," said Manister, whose quasi-humorous tone lacked the lightness to deceive; "I was afraid I had offended you."
"Offended me!" cried Christina, with widening eyes and a puzzled look. "When have you seen me to offend me! I haven't seen you since your garden party, and you certainly didn't offend me then—you were awfully nice to us all!"
"Ah, that wasn't seeing you," Lord Manister murmured. "I don't reckon that I've seen you since—the photographs. I had to go to Scotland; I meant to tell you."
"It wouldn't have interested me," saidChristina, with a shrug. "It might have interested me if you had said—you werenotgoing," she added next moment. Her tone had dropped. She looked at him and smiled.
Her smile stayed with him after she was gone; but from his face you would not have guessed that he was nursing a kind look. She had given him one smile, which made up for many things. But you would have thought, with his people, that he had been suffering the whole evening from acute boredom: you might well have fancied, with Lady Mary, that a remark disparaging Australian women would have met with a grateful response from him. The response it did meet with was anything but grateful to Lady Mary Dromard. It drove her from the room, in which Manister and his mother were presently left alone.
"I think you were just," the countess said critically. "They are pleasant people, and quite all right. The young man is their weak point."
"They always are," her son remarked, rather savagely still. "They're larrikins!"
"The young girl was especially nice, and sang like a lady."
"Ah, you approve of her," said Lord Manister dryly.
"Entirely, I think. Evidently you don't. I only saw you speak to her once, toward the end. Yet she has met you in Australia; I should have recognized that, I think. Now her people," Lady Dromard added tentatively, "will be rather superior, I suppose, as colonials go?"
"Well, they're rich; I suppose that's how colonials go."
For one moment Lady Dromard fancied that the sneer was for the colonials, and it surprised her; the next, she took it to herself, and very meekly for so proud a heart.
"My dear boy!" she murmured indulgently. "Apart from their people, these girls—for the married one is as young as she has any right to be—strike one as fresh, and free, and pleasing. And they are ladies. Am I to believe that the majority out there are like them?"
Manister shrugged his shoulders.
"That's as you please, my dear mother. These people didn't strike me as the only decent ones in Melbourne. I did meet others."
The countess tapped her foot upon the fender, and took counsel with her own reflection in the mirror, for she was standing before the fireplace while her son wandered about the room—her son with the reputation for a childlike devotion to his mother. There had been little of that sort of devotion since his return from Australia. Nothing between them was as it had been before. This bitter coldness had been his domestic manner—his manner with her, of all people—longer than the mother could bear. She knew the reason; she had tried to tell him so; she had tried to speak freely to him of the whole matter—even penitently, if he would. But he had never spoken freely to her; and once he had refused to speak at all, thence or thenceforth. Lady Dromard had made a resolve then which she remembered now.
"Really, Harry, I can't make you out," she said lightly at length. "You knock down the colonials with one hand, and you set them up with the other, as though they were so many ninepins. I am puzzled to know what you really mean, and what you mean satirically. You never used to be satirical, Harry! I should like to know whether you reallyapprove of these people, or whether you don't."
"I do approve of them," said Lord Manister, halting on the rug before his mother. "I won't put it more strongly. But I am glad that you should have seen there are such things as ladies in Australia!"
Their eyes met, and the mother forgot her resolve; for he had raised the subject himself, and for the first time.
"You think of her still!" whispered Lady Dromard.
"Of course I do," returned Manister, roughly; and again he was striding about the room.
Never in her life, perhaps, had the countess received a sharper hurt; for he had refused to see the hand she had reached out to him involuntarily. Yet assuredly Lady Dromard had never spoken in a more ordinary tone than that of her next words, a minute later.
"It occurred to me, Harry, that if we really think of dancing one evening during the cricket week, we might do worse than ask these people from the rectory. You must have girls to dance with. Still, if you think better not, you have only to say so."
"I think it's for you to decide; but, if you ask me, I don't see the least objection to it," said Lord Manister, with a smooth ceremony that had a sharper edge than his rough words. "I'm not sure, however, that they will come every time you ask them."
"Pourquoi?"
"Because they're the most independent people in the world, the Australians."
"It would scarcely touch their independence," said Lady Dromard with careless contempt; "but we can really do without them, and I am glad of your hint, because now I shall not think of asking them."
"Now, my dear mother," cried Lord Manister, no longer either hot or cold, but his old self for once in his anxiety—"you misunderstand me entirely! I'm not great on a dance at all, but if we're to have one we must, as you say, have somebody to dance with; and Iwantyou to ask these people."
"I like a dance where you can dance," said Herbert, who was looking at himself in a glass and wondering how long his white tie had been on one side. "It was worth fifty of the swell show you took us to in town, Ruth."
"I am glad you two have enjoyed it so," returned Ruth, with her eye, however, upon her husband. "Of course there's a great difference between a big dance in town and a little one in the country."
Tiny seemed busy. She was tearing her programme into small pieces, and dropping them at her feet, so that when she had gone up to bed it was as though a paper chase had passed through the rectory study, where they had all gathered for a few moments on their return from the dance. Christina, however, was not too preoccupied to chime in on her own note:
"It's like the difference between Riverina and Victoria—there were acres to the sheep instead of sheep to the acre."
Now there was no merit in this speech, but to those who understood it the comparison was apt, and Erskine knew enough of Australia to understand. Moreover, he had taught Tiny to listen for his laugh. So when he made neither sound nor sign the girl felt injured, but remembered that he had been extremely silent on the way home. And he was the first to go upstairs.
"It has bored him," observed Christina.
"He don't like dancing," said Herbert. "He's no sportsman."
"I am afraid he cares for nothing but lawn tennis when he's here," sighed Ruth, who looked a little troubled. "I am afraid he dislikes going out in the country."
They were silent for some minutes before Tiny exclaimed with conviction:
"No; it's the Dromards he dislikes."
And presently they made a move from the room. But on the stairs they met Erskine coming down, having changed his dress suit for flannels; and Ruth followed him back to the study, eying the change with dismay.
"Surely you're not going to sit up at this hour?"
Ruth had raised her glance from his flannels to his face, which troubled her more.
"I'm afraid the fine weather's at an end," Erskine answered crookedly; "it's most awfully close, at any rate. And I want a pipe."
He proceeded to fill one with his back to her.
"Erskine!"
"Well, dear?"
"I won't be 'dear' to you when you're cross with me. I want to know what I have done to vex you."
He had struck a match, and he lit his pipe before answering. Then he said gently enough:
"If you think I'm cross with you I should run away to bed; I certainly don't mean to be."
But he had not turned round.
"You succeed, at any rate! As you seem to wish it, I shall take your advice."
Erskine heard her on the stairs with a twinge in his heart. He went to the door to call her down and be frank with her, but theshutting of her own door checked him. Setting this one ajar, he threw up the window, and stood frowning at the opaque pall that seemed to have been let down behind it like an outer blind. So he remained for some minutes before remembering the easy-chair. No one knew better than Erskine that he had just been unkind to his wife. He was not pleased with her, but he had refused to explain his displeasure when she invited him to do so. There was this difficulty in explaining it—that he knew it to be unreasonable, since the person who had vexed him most was not Ruth, but Christina. And not more reasonable was his disappointment in Christina, as he also knew. Yet the one thing in life not disappointing to him at the moment was his pipe; even the fine weather was most surely at an end.
He was tired of the rectory, which, wet or fair, had no longer either light or shadow of its own, for both were now absorbed in the deepening shadow of the hall. A week ago they had all dined there, now they had been dancing there, and meanwhile the girls had watched one of the matches, and were going to another. Erskine had been opposed tothe dance, but the wife had prevailed; he was against their going to another match, but doubtless Ruth would have her way again, for she had shown a tenacity of purpose that surprised him in her, while he was crippled by a conscious lack of logic in his objections. He was not an arbitrary person, and it seemed that Ruth would stop for nothing less than a command where her heart was set; and her sister was with her. The whole trouble was, where their hearts were set.
He tried hard not to think the worst of Tiny, or rather the worst as it seemed to him. To make it easier, he called to mind various things she had said to him at various times concerning Lord Manister, of whom she had seldom failed to make fun. It amused and consoled Erskine to remember the fun; there must be hope for her still. Then he recalled common gossip about Lord Manister and his affairs; and there was hope on that side too. In less than a week the danger would be past, and those two would never see each other again. Consideration of the danger he had in mind,quádanger, provoked a smile. Tiny herself would have enjoyed the humor of that, she was so quick to see and to enjoy. Butshe could appreciate more than a joke, or did she only pretend to like those books? And the soul that shone sometimes in her eyes, did it lie much deeper? She interested Erskine the more because he could not be sure. She was a fascinating study to him, whatever she did or was trying to do. In any case, there was much good in her that he had fathomed, and more was suggested; and the finer the nature, the stronger the contrasts. Now as to contrasts—yet he had never seen that in Australia.
"A penny for your thoughts!"
Ten thousand pounds would not have bought them. It was his wife on the threshold, in a pale pink wrapper.
"My dear! I pictured you asleep hours ago."
"Were you picturing me when I spoke?" Ruth said, with a smile. "I'm not sleepy—and I want to talk to you. May I sit down? An hour more or less makes no difference at this time of the morning."
Erskine rose from the easy-chair in which he had been smoking, and settled his wife in it against her will, and drew the curtains across the open window.
"I'm glad you've come down, Ruth, for I want to speak to you, too. I was a brute to you when I sent you away just now."
"Well, I really think you were; but I know you must have had some reason; so I've come down to have it out and be done with it."
"My dear Ruth!" said Mr. Holland uncomfortably; for was there any call to be frank with her at all? It would hurt; and could it do any good?
"I suppose," pursued Ruth in a tone not perfectly free from defiance, "it's all because we went to this horrid dance! And I'll say I'm sorry we did go, if you like; though why you should have such a down on the Dromards I can't for the life of me imagine."
"My dear girl," said Erskine, smiling now that he had determined not to say everything, "I really have no down on them at all. They're the most amiable family I know, considering who they are. They have a charming place, and they treat you delightfully while you're there. Considering whoweare, and that we have no root in this soil, I grant you they're particularly kind to us; but don't you think their kindness is just a little trying? Ido, though I have nothing against them, personally or otherwise. I am not even a political opponent; if I had a vote for the division young Manister should have it. But I'm not keen on so much notice from them; I've said so before; there's no sense in it!"
"Ah, well, if only you would show me the harm in it!"
"Harm? Heaven forbid there should be any. One finds it a bore, that's all. It's a selfish reason, but it's the truth—I should have had a better time this last week if the Dromards had been far enough!"
"And we should have had a worse—Tiny and I. No, Erskine, I know you better than you think. You're not so selfish as all that; there's some other reason."
Erskine turned away with a shrug, to avoid her glance.
"Something has annoyed you to-night. One of us has behaved badly. Was it Tiny or was it——"
"You?" said Erskine, with a smile. "From what I saw of your behavior, my dear, it was entirely creditable to you as a chaperon. Your face was seventeen, but your air was a frank fifty!"
"Then it was Tiny. I suppose she danced too much with those boys they have staying in the house. I should have thought there was respectability in numbers; I really don't see howtheycould matter."
"They seemed to matter to Manister," remarked Erskine dryly.
Ruth winced, but he had wondered whether she would, or he would never have noticed it.
"Surely you don't think Lord Manister cares who dances with our Tiny?"
The amusement in her tone and manner was cleverly feigned, but instead of deceiving Erskine it spurred him to speak out, after all.
"I hardly like to tell you what I think about Tiny and Lord Manister," he said gravely.
"What on earth do you mean, Erskine?" cried Ruth, reddening. "Now youmusttell me!"
Erskine temporized, already regretting that he had said so much. "It would hurt your feelings," he warned her grimly.
"Not so much as your silence."
"I wouldn't say it if I didn't look on her as my own sister by this time, and if I didn't think her the best little girl in the world—but one."
Now he spoke tenderly.
"Say it, in any case," said Ruth, who had been uncommonly calm.
"Then I am afraid she is making up to him, if you must know."
"Which is absurd," said Ruth lightly; but in her anxiety to remain cool she forgot to seem surprised; and that was a mistake.
"I wonder if you really think so?" said her husband very quietly. "If you do I can't agree with you; I wish I could."
"You must!" cried Ruth desperately. "Do you know how many dances she gave him to-night?"
Erskine knew only of one; his eyes rested on the remains of her programme lying on the floor in many fragments.
"Well, that one was the lot!" he was informed severely. "And pray did you count how many times she spoke to him the other evening when we dined at the hall?"
"Not often, I grant you; I noticed that."
"Yet you think she is making up to him!"
"It's a strong way of putting it, I know," said Erskine reluctantly; "but really I can't think of any other. I wonder you don't realize that there are more ways of making up to aman than the dead-set method. Can't you see that a far more effective method is a little judicious snubbing and avoiding, which is coquetry? You take my word for it, that's the touch for a man like Manister, who is probably accustomed to everything but being snubbed and avoided. Then you speak of the one dance she gave him. Now I happen to know that they didn't dance it at all; they spent the time under the stars, for it was my misfortune to see them and their misfortune not to see me."
"Well?" whispered Ruth; and though she had never been so dark until now, that whisper would have drawn his lantern to her real hopes and fears.
"I only saw them for an instant: I bolted; so I may easily be wrong; but it struck me that our Tiny was making up for her snubbing and avoiding. It has since occurred to me that they must have known each other rather well in Melbourne—rather better, at any rate, than you have ever led me to suppose."
As a woman's last resource, Ruth aimed a stone at his temper.
"So that's it!" she exclaimed viciously.
"That's what?"
"The secret of your bad temper."
"Well, to be kept in the dark doesn't sweeten a man, certainly," Erskine answered, in a tone, however, that was far from bitter. "Then one can't help feeling disappointed with Tiny; and in this matter—to be frank with you at last—I am just a little disappointed in you too, my dear."
"I always knew you would be," said Ruth dolefully. For her stone had missed, and there was no more fight in her.
"Now don't be a goose. It's only in this one matter, in which—I can't help telling you—I don't think you've been perfectly straight with me."
"Oh, indeed!" cried Ruth, as her spirit made one spurt more. It was the last. The next moment she was weeping.
It annoys most men to make a woman cry. Those who do not become annoyed make impetuous atonement, partly, no doubt, to drown the hooting in their own heart. But Erskine could not feel himself to blame, and though he spoke very kindly, his kindness was too nearly paternal, and he spoke with his elbow on the chimney-piece. He told Ruth not to do that. He pointed out to her that there was no crime in her want of candor concerning her sister's affairs, which were certainly no business of his. Only, if there really had been something between Christina and Lord Manister in Melbourne—if, for instance, Mrs. Willoughby had gossiped unwittingly to Christina about none other than Christina herself—Erskine put it to his wife that she might have done more wisely to place him in a position silently to appreciate such capital jokes. He would have said nothing; but as it was he might easily have said much to imperil the situation; in fact, he had been in a false position all along, more especially at the hall. But that was all. There was really nothing to cry about. Perhaps to give her the fairest opportunity to compose herself, Erskine crossed the room and drew back the curtains to let in the gray morning; for the birds had long been twittering.
But Ruth had been waiting for the touch of his hand, and he had only given her kind words. She looked up, and saw through her tears his form against the gray window, as he shut down the sash. The lamp burnt faintly, and in the two wan lights it was a chamber of misery, in which one could not sit alone. Ruth rose and ran to Erskine, and laid her hands upon his arm.
"It is raining," he said, without looking at her tears. "I knew we were in for a break up of the fine weather."
"Never mind the rain!" Ruth cried piteously, with her face upon his coat. "Will you forgive me now if I tell you everything that I know—everything? It isn't much, because Tiny has been almost as close with me as I have been with you."
"My dear," he said, patting her head at last, and with his arms around her lightly, "you both had a perfect right to be close."
"But suppose I've been at the bottom of the whole thing? Suppose I turn out a horrid little intriguer—what then?"
She waited eagerly, and the pause seemed long.
"Well, you won't have been intriguing for yourself," sighed Erskine—so that her face rose on his breast, as on a wave.