Part 1, Chapter IX.

Part 1, Chapter IX.“Go Back, My Lord, Across the Moor.”“Cousin Susan,” said Guy, a few days after he had been left behind at Ingleby, “I promised Miss Vyner that she and her friends should see the mills. If it suits you, I should like to ride over to Moorhead, and ask them to come down next Thursday, and have luncheon here. Then I would take them round.”“Yes, my dear Guy; yes, certainly. I think it would be most proper, under the circumstances; and with my being here, there can be no objection. I’m glad you’ve given me the hint, my dear Guy.”Guy thought his very straightforward request had been something more than a hint. He had made it partly because he was extremely dull, and wanted a little variety, and partly because he did not choose to acquiesce in the idea that he was out of favour. Most of Guy’s actions at this time were marked by a certain note of defiance.He set off on a fresh breezy afternoon, when great clouds flung great shadows over the open moor, and the dark green of the bilberry and the purple of the heather were in full glory of contrast. He rode slowly uphill, over wide roads with low grey walls on either side, behind which grew oats and turnips, past strong-looking stone villages, all white and grey and wind swept, till the land grew poorer and more open, and turf, mixed with furze and heather, began to appear, and at length he turned over the top, and came out upon the great rolling moors, here clear and sunny, there veiled in the smoke and fog of distant centres of human life.As he drew near the end of his ride, he saw a figure sitting on some rough ground by the roadside, and looking up and away at a broken hillock of rock and heather, which, owing to the falling away of the ground behind, was relieved against the sky.By the pose of her head and the lines of her figure he at once recognised Florella Vyner, and as he came near she saw him, and rising, answered his greeting with a smile as he dismounted beside her.“I have ridden over,” said Guy, “with a message from Mrs Joshua Palmer, to ask if your sister still cares to show Ingleby Mills to her friends. My aunt and my brother are at Waynflete, but I have been left behind. And I hope, too, that Moorhead is satisfactory?”“Oh yes,” said Florella, “we are delighted with it. It suits us quite. The others are all very near by. Would you like to take your horse to the farm, and then come and join us? You will see them a few steps further on.”“There’s Bill Shipley,” said Guy, looking up the road. “I’ll ask him to take Stella.”He came back after giving his horse to the boy, with a brighter and sweeter look on his face than it often wore. “May I look first at the drawing? What have you found out about the moor flowers?”“Oh, they are so difficult—look at those harebells on the top of the road, swinging about in the wind—blue against blue. It is such heavenly colour. But I can’t paint them! I haven’t begun to try. I’m seeing them!”“I see,” said Guy. “Yes, the sky seems to show through. But what do they say? Your pictures all say something. Are they moor spirits?”“Well,” she said, “I don’t think I quite know. But what I want to say is ‘living blue,’—you know the hymn?—”‘Sweet fields beyond the swelling floodAll dressed in living green.’“That gives one such a feeling of spring.”“Yes,” said Guy, “things growing. And ‘living blue’?”“Well,” said Florella, looking up at the harebells, “I think it must mean thoughts—spirit, soul, growing and springing, perhaps. They are so very ethereal!”Florella had much of Constancy’s self-possession. In her it showed in a calm simplicity of manner, absolutely without effort or constraint. Guy forgot himself also, for him a rare pleasure.“I see,” he said, “I hope you’ll get them done.”“But theyshineso,” she said; “one can’t make them glisten. And the heather is very difficult, too. But that I have tried.”She showed her sketch-book, containing more flower studies and a few landscapes.“I should like to sketch,” said Guy, as he looked, and made a few comments.“But you could, I think, because you can see. And it is very interesting. It is impossible to think of anything in the world but the thing you are drawing. That is all I have. My sister and all of them are just behind the harebell rock—shall we come?”Guy followed, and in a few minutes they were looking down on a cheery group gathered in a hollow of the ground—five skirts and hats among the heather. One or two little puffs of steam showed where the sophisticated “Etnas” were boiling the water, and in the midst Constancy, in a red blouse and brown cap, was evidently concluding an argument.“Very likely we might like it as well as they did, if we had the same opportunities.”“Cosy! you’re a traitor. As if we want young men to come and interrupt us, like those dreadful girls in—”“Mr Waynflete,” said Florella, descending upon the party.Violet Staunton, who was the last speaker, sank into the heather with a gasp, and a sensation ran through the party. Constancy stood up and held out her hand.“Mr Waynflete, we are abusing Miss Austen’s heroines for liking visitors. But, you know, we promised to give you some tea.”Guy coloured and smiled. He felt a little shy, but much as if he had stepped into a fairy-ring. Away from his own people and his perplexities, he was like another person, bright and gay, and was soon giving his invitation, and asking if Cuthbert Staunton had made his holiday plans, or if he could come to Ingleby for a bit, while he helped to hand round the tea and the tea-cakes, for the merits of which he had vouched in London. Thus, at his ease, he had a gentle, friendly manner and a pleasant face, as he dealt with the eccentricities of an “Etna” which refused to boil. Florella felt as if her short, childish intercourse with him had been longer and more recent.“There!” he said, in a low, half-shy voice, as he glanced at Constancy, “I’m sure Mr Elton could not have made himself more useful.”“It is humiliating,” said Constancy; “but that ‘Etna’ beat us! Would it if we had the franchise?”Constancy did most of the talking. Florella sat silent and looked, as she mostly did, happy. The other girls thought that Cosy need not have made it so evident that she was amused by the intruding visitor. Presently a trap was seen coming along the rough, narrow road. One man only was in it, and as the sound of the wheels attracted his attention, Guy looked up and said, in a tone of surprise—“That’s Godfrey!”Another moment or two, and they saw the dog-cart stop at the farm; the driver dismounted, picked a long and hairy object off the seat beside him, together with a large basket, and came over the heather with long striding steps. In a minute Godfrey and Rawdon Crawley appeared at the top of the hollow.“My aunt has sent me,” he began, but at sight of Guy a cloud fell upon his handsome, joyous face, his air of happy expectation faded entirely, and he paused in his speech. Constancy again came to the rescue. She introduced him all round, remarked with cool amusement on the odd chance that had sent both brothers to see them at once, and as Godfrey refused her tea, offered it to Rawdie, who had greeted first her and then Guy with simple cordiality. Guy fell silent, and watched his brother with slightly lifted brows, as if a new idea had struck him. He was quite cool, and not at all put out.“Has Aunt Margaret asked the ladies to Waynflete?” he said.“Yes, on Tuesday. She thought the Miss Vyners would like to see it again.”“Immensely,” said Constancy. “She promised me to ask us.”Guy, still looking slightly amused, got up and said that he had the longer ride, and must get back, and would expect to see them all on Thursday at Ingleby.“Tell my aunt I’ll come over to Waynflete on Tuesday by the first train in the morning,” he said as he made his farewells, and went to get his horse.Godfrey was desperate. He hated all the other ladies who surrounded Cosy. He hated Guy, who had, he thought, come with the same object as himself. He could hardly bring himself to refer to the basket which he had filled that morning with all the fruits and flowers which he had thought Constancy might recollect seeing at Waynflete. When he did bring it forward, he muttered, that his aunt had sent it, which was not true.Cosy dived into it.“White raspberries!” she exclaimed. “Now, didn’t they grow just by the gate into the stables? I hope that lovely garden is as untidy as ever.”“It’s worse, I think,” said Godfrey, more amiably; “but there are plenty of raspberries ready for you to pick.”“Delightful!” said Cosy, and Godfrey’s brows smoothed till he looked as friendly as Rawdie.Presently they all walked back to the house together, and Constancy showed him the long, low sitting-room, full of their books and writing-materials. She took his visit to herself, and entertained him in the most cheerful fashion. But she expressed great pleasure at Guy’s invitation to Ingleby, and finally sent Godfrey away when his cart was ready, with a perplexed and appealing look in his grey eyes, and a puzzled wrinkle on his brows, even while she lifted Rawdie into the cart and kissed his nose tenderly, telling him to look out for her on Tuesday morning at Waynflete.“Constancy,” cried Violet, “you abominable girl! You behaved worse than any of the Miss Bennets, or Emma Woodhouse either. I’m sure those young men must have thought you were delighted to see them.”“Well, I didn’t mind them. I could not summon the daughters of the plough and bind them in chains, could I? You are all so narrow minded.”“Narrow minded?”“Yes; you should take everything as it comes. The Miss Bennets couldn’t exist without morning callers; but if we can’t stand half an hour of them, we make them of equal importance. And besides, you know, they represent a side of life which exists. We must ignore nothing.”“It’s a most contemptible side,” said Violet. “And besides, if Cuthbert knows, hewilllaugh at us. I do want him to see we mean business.”“I mean business,” said Cosy; “if by business you mean reading; but I like to study life all round.”“Yes,” said the elder Miss Staunton, “just as you like to study opinions all round, and consider smiling, views which, if they were true, would send one out into a moral and spiritual wilderness. You see the force of nothing.”“If so, there must be an awfully stupid piece in me,” said Constancy, as if rather struck.“But, after all, you know, whatever is true, the world has got along somehow hitherto, and I suppose it will continue to do so; so why worry.”“Look here,” said Florella, “if we quarrel over the young men, we shall be more like the Miss Bennets than ever. We belong, you know, a little to the Waynfletes through Aunt Connie, and we knew them long ago. I am going back to my harebells. Violet, will you come?”A great many young women aspired to the friendship of Constancy Vyner, and courted her, as girls do court each other. Florella’s friends did not make her of so much importance; but they told her all their troubles.

“Cousin Susan,” said Guy, a few days after he had been left behind at Ingleby, “I promised Miss Vyner that she and her friends should see the mills. If it suits you, I should like to ride over to Moorhead, and ask them to come down next Thursday, and have luncheon here. Then I would take them round.”

“Yes, my dear Guy; yes, certainly. I think it would be most proper, under the circumstances; and with my being here, there can be no objection. I’m glad you’ve given me the hint, my dear Guy.”

Guy thought his very straightforward request had been something more than a hint. He had made it partly because he was extremely dull, and wanted a little variety, and partly because he did not choose to acquiesce in the idea that he was out of favour. Most of Guy’s actions at this time were marked by a certain note of defiance.

He set off on a fresh breezy afternoon, when great clouds flung great shadows over the open moor, and the dark green of the bilberry and the purple of the heather were in full glory of contrast. He rode slowly uphill, over wide roads with low grey walls on either side, behind which grew oats and turnips, past strong-looking stone villages, all white and grey and wind swept, till the land grew poorer and more open, and turf, mixed with furze and heather, began to appear, and at length he turned over the top, and came out upon the great rolling moors, here clear and sunny, there veiled in the smoke and fog of distant centres of human life.

As he drew near the end of his ride, he saw a figure sitting on some rough ground by the roadside, and looking up and away at a broken hillock of rock and heather, which, owing to the falling away of the ground behind, was relieved against the sky.

By the pose of her head and the lines of her figure he at once recognised Florella Vyner, and as he came near she saw him, and rising, answered his greeting with a smile as he dismounted beside her.

“I have ridden over,” said Guy, “with a message from Mrs Joshua Palmer, to ask if your sister still cares to show Ingleby Mills to her friends. My aunt and my brother are at Waynflete, but I have been left behind. And I hope, too, that Moorhead is satisfactory?”

“Oh yes,” said Florella, “we are delighted with it. It suits us quite. The others are all very near by. Would you like to take your horse to the farm, and then come and join us? You will see them a few steps further on.”

“There’s Bill Shipley,” said Guy, looking up the road. “I’ll ask him to take Stella.”

He came back after giving his horse to the boy, with a brighter and sweeter look on his face than it often wore. “May I look first at the drawing? What have you found out about the moor flowers?”

“Oh, they are so difficult—look at those harebells on the top of the road, swinging about in the wind—blue against blue. It is such heavenly colour. But I can’t paint them! I haven’t begun to try. I’m seeing them!”

“I see,” said Guy. “Yes, the sky seems to show through. But what do they say? Your pictures all say something. Are they moor spirits?”

“Well,” she said, “I don’t think I quite know. But what I want to say is ‘living blue,’—you know the hymn?—

”‘Sweet fields beyond the swelling floodAll dressed in living green.’

”‘Sweet fields beyond the swelling floodAll dressed in living green.’

“That gives one such a feeling of spring.”

“Yes,” said Guy, “things growing. And ‘living blue’?”

“Well,” said Florella, looking up at the harebells, “I think it must mean thoughts—spirit, soul, growing and springing, perhaps. They are so very ethereal!”

Florella had much of Constancy’s self-possession. In her it showed in a calm simplicity of manner, absolutely without effort or constraint. Guy forgot himself also, for him a rare pleasure.

“I see,” he said, “I hope you’ll get them done.”

“But theyshineso,” she said; “one can’t make them glisten. And the heather is very difficult, too. But that I have tried.”

She showed her sketch-book, containing more flower studies and a few landscapes.

“I should like to sketch,” said Guy, as he looked, and made a few comments.

“But you could, I think, because you can see. And it is very interesting. It is impossible to think of anything in the world but the thing you are drawing. That is all I have. My sister and all of them are just behind the harebell rock—shall we come?”

Guy followed, and in a few minutes they were looking down on a cheery group gathered in a hollow of the ground—five skirts and hats among the heather. One or two little puffs of steam showed where the sophisticated “Etnas” were boiling the water, and in the midst Constancy, in a red blouse and brown cap, was evidently concluding an argument.

“Very likely we might like it as well as they did, if we had the same opportunities.”

“Cosy! you’re a traitor. As if we want young men to come and interrupt us, like those dreadful girls in—”

“Mr Waynflete,” said Florella, descending upon the party.

Violet Staunton, who was the last speaker, sank into the heather with a gasp, and a sensation ran through the party. Constancy stood up and held out her hand.

“Mr Waynflete, we are abusing Miss Austen’s heroines for liking visitors. But, you know, we promised to give you some tea.”

Guy coloured and smiled. He felt a little shy, but much as if he had stepped into a fairy-ring. Away from his own people and his perplexities, he was like another person, bright and gay, and was soon giving his invitation, and asking if Cuthbert Staunton had made his holiday plans, or if he could come to Ingleby for a bit, while he helped to hand round the tea and the tea-cakes, for the merits of which he had vouched in London. Thus, at his ease, he had a gentle, friendly manner and a pleasant face, as he dealt with the eccentricities of an “Etna” which refused to boil. Florella felt as if her short, childish intercourse with him had been longer and more recent.

“There!” he said, in a low, half-shy voice, as he glanced at Constancy, “I’m sure Mr Elton could not have made himself more useful.”

“It is humiliating,” said Constancy; “but that ‘Etna’ beat us! Would it if we had the franchise?”

Constancy did most of the talking. Florella sat silent and looked, as she mostly did, happy. The other girls thought that Cosy need not have made it so evident that she was amused by the intruding visitor. Presently a trap was seen coming along the rough, narrow road. One man only was in it, and as the sound of the wheels attracted his attention, Guy looked up and said, in a tone of surprise—

“That’s Godfrey!”

Another moment or two, and they saw the dog-cart stop at the farm; the driver dismounted, picked a long and hairy object off the seat beside him, together with a large basket, and came over the heather with long striding steps. In a minute Godfrey and Rawdon Crawley appeared at the top of the hollow.

“My aunt has sent me,” he began, but at sight of Guy a cloud fell upon his handsome, joyous face, his air of happy expectation faded entirely, and he paused in his speech. Constancy again came to the rescue. She introduced him all round, remarked with cool amusement on the odd chance that had sent both brothers to see them at once, and as Godfrey refused her tea, offered it to Rawdie, who had greeted first her and then Guy with simple cordiality. Guy fell silent, and watched his brother with slightly lifted brows, as if a new idea had struck him. He was quite cool, and not at all put out.

“Has Aunt Margaret asked the ladies to Waynflete?” he said.

“Yes, on Tuesday. She thought the Miss Vyners would like to see it again.”

“Immensely,” said Constancy. “She promised me to ask us.”

Guy, still looking slightly amused, got up and said that he had the longer ride, and must get back, and would expect to see them all on Thursday at Ingleby.

“Tell my aunt I’ll come over to Waynflete on Tuesday by the first train in the morning,” he said as he made his farewells, and went to get his horse.

Godfrey was desperate. He hated all the other ladies who surrounded Cosy. He hated Guy, who had, he thought, come with the same object as himself. He could hardly bring himself to refer to the basket which he had filled that morning with all the fruits and flowers which he had thought Constancy might recollect seeing at Waynflete. When he did bring it forward, he muttered, that his aunt had sent it, which was not true.

Cosy dived into it.

“White raspberries!” she exclaimed. “Now, didn’t they grow just by the gate into the stables? I hope that lovely garden is as untidy as ever.”

“It’s worse, I think,” said Godfrey, more amiably; “but there are plenty of raspberries ready for you to pick.”

“Delightful!” said Cosy, and Godfrey’s brows smoothed till he looked as friendly as Rawdie.

Presently they all walked back to the house together, and Constancy showed him the long, low sitting-room, full of their books and writing-materials. She took his visit to herself, and entertained him in the most cheerful fashion. But she expressed great pleasure at Guy’s invitation to Ingleby, and finally sent Godfrey away when his cart was ready, with a perplexed and appealing look in his grey eyes, and a puzzled wrinkle on his brows, even while she lifted Rawdie into the cart and kissed his nose tenderly, telling him to look out for her on Tuesday morning at Waynflete.

“Constancy,” cried Violet, “you abominable girl! You behaved worse than any of the Miss Bennets, or Emma Woodhouse either. I’m sure those young men must have thought you were delighted to see them.”

“Well, I didn’t mind them. I could not summon the daughters of the plough and bind them in chains, could I? You are all so narrow minded.”

“Narrow minded?”

“Yes; you should take everything as it comes. The Miss Bennets couldn’t exist without morning callers; but if we can’t stand half an hour of them, we make them of equal importance. And besides, you know, they represent a side of life which exists. We must ignore nothing.”

“It’s a most contemptible side,” said Violet. “And besides, if Cuthbert knows, hewilllaugh at us. I do want him to see we mean business.”

“I mean business,” said Cosy; “if by business you mean reading; but I like to study life all round.”

“Yes,” said the elder Miss Staunton, “just as you like to study opinions all round, and consider smiling, views which, if they were true, would send one out into a moral and spiritual wilderness. You see the force of nothing.”

“If so, there must be an awfully stupid piece in me,” said Constancy, as if rather struck.

“But, after all, you know, whatever is true, the world has got along somehow hitherto, and I suppose it will continue to do so; so why worry.”

“Look here,” said Florella, “if we quarrel over the young men, we shall be more like the Miss Bennets than ever. We belong, you know, a little to the Waynfletes through Aunt Connie, and we knew them long ago. I am going back to my harebells. Violet, will you come?”

A great many young women aspired to the friendship of Constancy Vyner, and courted her, as girls do court each other. Florella’s friends did not make her of so much importance; but they told her all their troubles.

Part 1, Chapter X.“The One Maid for Me.”When old Margaret Waynflete drove up to the door of Waynflete Hall in the Rilston fly—for the old stables were not calculated for the accommodation of valuable horses—she never thought of herself in a picturesque light, nor felt, as Godfrey and even Jeanie in a measure did, for her, that this was the moment for which she had lived.But she looked round her with the most lively curiosity. When she sat down in the low, crowded, old-fashioned drawing-room, she did not admire it, nor feel comfortable as she drank her cup of tea and looked about her. She scolded Godfrey and Jeanie for expressing anxiety as to the effect upon her of the unwonted journey; for she felt quite strong and vigorous, even while she repeated to herself that it was right for her to see Waynflete before she died. And see it she did, for she inspected the old house from attic to cellar. She went over the gardens and outbuildings, she had herself driven up and down the steep sides of the Flete Valley and through the shabby village, she attended service in the picturesque old church, where a newly arrived young vicar, himself aghast at the condition of his church and parish, only struck her as an unpleasing contrast to the old rector of Ingleby. She liked none of it very much. Shewasan old woman, and she could not take to new surroundings. Ingleby was home. Waynflete was for the next generation. All the neighbourhood called upon her, and paid attention to her and her nephew.Godfrey was well aware that his position, as apparent master of the house, was an awkward one. He would also have preferred Jeanie’s absence; the new neighbourhood would draw conclusions, which his downright old aunt would never have anticipated. He meant, when the visit of the Moorhead party was safely over, to write to Guy and to offer to change places with him; but, when he found him at Moorhead before him, inviting Constancy to Ingleby, and proposing to come to Waynflete to meet her, all other thoughts were swallowed up in angry jealousy. All places were the same to him where she was not, and he could only think of keeping his chance of seeing her some time without Guy’s interference. Guy appeared early on the appointed Tuesday. He could only, he said, stay one night, as Staunton was coming to him on the next day.“As you kindly allowed me to ask him, Aunt Margaret,” he said, punctiliously.“I’ve no objection to Mr Staunton, you can bring him over,” said Mrs Waynflete. But whatever her own feelings as to the new home were, she watched keenly for Guy’s impressions of it.He said no word to gratify her; but in that perfect summer day, he, in his turn, noted every detail.The old house, with the deep and varied tinting of its lichen-covered tiles and bushy creepers, seemed to him, as he stood in the garden, and looked at it intently, to be full of character and individuality.In his secret heart, he thought, as he had thought before, that the place had a charm altogether its own. How he should like its quaintness and its beauty if it ever was his own, and if— Nay, how he did like it now, and how oddly he felt himself to be a son of its soil—to be, somehow, akin to it. Guy was in all ways sensitive and impressionable, open to the influences that surrounded him, to every change of scene and atmosphere. He wandered round the flower-beds, and looked for the quaint “old” flowers of which Florella had spoken. Could he find any to show her? Yes; there were columbines of odd, dull, artistic tints, roses of sorts unheeded by the horticulturist, and sundry blossoms, somewhat belated in the keen northern air, of which the ignorant Guy knew nothing.As he looked, Rawdon Crawley began to bark; the sound of wheels was heard, and a waggonette, full of straw hats and bright dresses, drove up the rough ill-kept road that led to the house. Guy, half-smiling, held a little back, as he saw his brother press forward eagerly; he was amused at the idea of Godfrey in love, not having ceased to regard him as a schoolboy. He was not in love himself; but even for him, as he came forward, it was Constancy who held the stage, looking handsome and happy, a concentration of life.“I am perfectly convinced,” she said, looking round, after the greetings were over, “that this place breathes out a story. It quitetalkswith characteristicness!”“I should like to think that you had to do with the story of it,” said Godfrey, feeling his ears hot with the sense of self-committal.Constancy looked at him, and at that moment there entered into her a particularly charming and engaging little demon, who recommended himself to her in a form which disguised his old and well-known features, and made him come out quite new. Godfrey was betraying himself in every word and look; but to Constancy, whose even pulses had never yet beat quicker for any emotion whatever, his boyish passion did not present itself in a serious light. She might study this side of life a little, it would be amusing and instructive. It has been amusing, ever since Cleopatra angled for fishes.The result of her study was that Godfrey spent a day of chequered but tumultuous bliss, and that the story of the old house mingled itself inextricably with her own.For Guy the hours passed so pleasantly that he forgot his dread of the coming night. Not being in any way conscious, he asked Florella to come and look for subjects among the flowers, quite easily. And she came, remembering them much better than he did, looking for old favourites, and showing him which she had formerly tried to paint.“I cannot do the harebells,” she said. “I have drawn them; but the colour and the light is altogether impossible, and I have had to come down to a little bunch in the rock—quite earthly—but they just recall the others. Perhaps some day, when I have practised a great deal, I may be able to paint the heavenly ones.”“You made meseethem,” said Guy.“That’s something, isn’t it?” she said. “But that’s why drawing is so good. It teaches one to see.”There was plenty of general chatter, and the whole party strolled about, ate fruit, and picked flowers together.A tall fair young man was rather feebly sweeping the garden path. He touched his cap as the party passed him, and said, in a cracked, but cordial voice, “There’s rasps down yonder, sir, for t’yoong leddies.”Guy recognised him, with a start of distaste, as the “soft” lad he had seen in the churchyard.“Thank you, Jem,” said Godfrey, “we’ll look for them. This way, isn’t it, Jeanie?”Jeanie was very shy, and very much afraid of these “clever girls;” she secretly disliked the thought of them. But it was pleasing to find how open they were to raspberries and Morelia cherries, and, in the afternoon she felt a pride in showing them over the house, and pointing out the pictures and other curiosities.Guy avoided this part of the entertainment, on the excuse of making arrangements about the time of return, and as he came back from interviewing the driver of the waggonette, he found that Florella was in the garden, sketching a bit of snap-dragon on the top of the low wall that divided it from the fruit-garden. Guy made for her pretty blue dress, which reminded him of her blue harebells.“Do you like the flowers better than the house?” he said.“I did not much want to go over the house,” she answered; “and if you please, Mr Waynflete, I think I should like to tell you why.”“Why, have you any reason?” said Guy, startled.“Yes,” she answered. “Of course it is a very silly thing, and my sister never thought of it but as the merest joke; but I have always felt it was more wrong than we knew. When we were here, we used to hide and make odd noises, to see whether we could make people think it was the ghost.”“What?” exclaimed Guy. “What did you do?”“Why—nothing very much,” said Florella, “after all. But we rustled about when we thought the maids would hear us, and stamped along the passages to make footsteps, and hid when any one was coming, and Constancy pretended to sob and cry, and then we watched to see how people would take it; we never dressed up, you know, it was only noises. Of course there was a notion that therewerenoises, or no one would have noticed.”“And didn’t—did no one find you out?”“No. I don’t think that really we frightened any one very much. Of course, I always knew it was naughty, and that Aunt Connie would be angry if she knew. But, as we went on doing it, I got to have a feeling of what it would have been like if it had been true; perhaps I frightened myself, for we didn’t make all the noises that we heard. And I don’t know, Cosy did it quite simply; but I got to feel as if there was somethingprofanein playing tricks with things one could not understand, and it has always been on my conscience. So, as you were here when we did it, and as you belong to the place, I thought I would confess, for really I have always felt it more wrong than many things I’ve been punished for.”“Why do you think that?” said Guy, quickly.“Why, I suppose taking false and silly views of great subjects is one of the chief things that prevent people from being really good. Then youcan’tsee.”“If you don’t mind,” said Guy, “will you come with me and look at that picture?”He could hardly tell what prompted the request; but he felt that he could better bear the sight of the picture with her than alone.Florella agreed, though a little surprised, and they followed the rest of the party into the house and upstairs. They heard their voices as they made the round, but the little octagon room was empty.“Look at him,” said Guy, “and tell mejustwhat you see in his face. Yes,” as she glanced at him, “I know he is like me. But if you were drawing that face—like a flower—what should you try to show?”“He looks very unhappy,” said Florella. “He wanted some one to help him.”“He had no one. He was a victim to himself or his fate. Don’t you think he looks rather a despicable fellow?”“No; but he looks as if he did so need to be helped. Yes; he does look like a person who might fail in a desperate crisis.”“As he did,” said Guy. “A man with that face must, you know. Isn’t that what you see?”“I suppose,” said Florella, suddenly and simply, “that if he had really realised the presence of God, he could have borne—even the ghost.”“Why?” said Guy, abruptly.“It would be a spiritual power, great enough to conquer the spiritual fear,” she answered.“I wish I could have masses said for his soul,” said Guy. “If we were Roman Catholics, I’d ask you to pray for him.”“Well, I will,” she answered. “He is living, somewhere, and I am sure it is right to pray for him.”“Thank you,” said Guy, earnestly.There was a call, and they hurried away to join the others. They had forgotten both themselves and each other. It was only afterwards that Florella realised that she had said unusual things, or Guy that he had heard them. But strange to each other they never could be again.Constancy and Godfrey had thought of each other, and of the effect they were producing on each other, all day long. Nevertheless, they parted as “Strangers yet.”

When old Margaret Waynflete drove up to the door of Waynflete Hall in the Rilston fly—for the old stables were not calculated for the accommodation of valuable horses—she never thought of herself in a picturesque light, nor felt, as Godfrey and even Jeanie in a measure did, for her, that this was the moment for which she had lived.

But she looked round her with the most lively curiosity. When she sat down in the low, crowded, old-fashioned drawing-room, she did not admire it, nor feel comfortable as she drank her cup of tea and looked about her. She scolded Godfrey and Jeanie for expressing anxiety as to the effect upon her of the unwonted journey; for she felt quite strong and vigorous, even while she repeated to herself that it was right for her to see Waynflete before she died. And see it she did, for she inspected the old house from attic to cellar. She went over the gardens and outbuildings, she had herself driven up and down the steep sides of the Flete Valley and through the shabby village, she attended service in the picturesque old church, where a newly arrived young vicar, himself aghast at the condition of his church and parish, only struck her as an unpleasing contrast to the old rector of Ingleby. She liked none of it very much. Shewasan old woman, and she could not take to new surroundings. Ingleby was home. Waynflete was for the next generation. All the neighbourhood called upon her, and paid attention to her and her nephew.

Godfrey was well aware that his position, as apparent master of the house, was an awkward one. He would also have preferred Jeanie’s absence; the new neighbourhood would draw conclusions, which his downright old aunt would never have anticipated. He meant, when the visit of the Moorhead party was safely over, to write to Guy and to offer to change places with him; but, when he found him at Moorhead before him, inviting Constancy to Ingleby, and proposing to come to Waynflete to meet her, all other thoughts were swallowed up in angry jealousy. All places were the same to him where she was not, and he could only think of keeping his chance of seeing her some time without Guy’s interference. Guy appeared early on the appointed Tuesday. He could only, he said, stay one night, as Staunton was coming to him on the next day.

“As you kindly allowed me to ask him, Aunt Margaret,” he said, punctiliously.

“I’ve no objection to Mr Staunton, you can bring him over,” said Mrs Waynflete. But whatever her own feelings as to the new home were, she watched keenly for Guy’s impressions of it.

He said no word to gratify her; but in that perfect summer day, he, in his turn, noted every detail.

The old house, with the deep and varied tinting of its lichen-covered tiles and bushy creepers, seemed to him, as he stood in the garden, and looked at it intently, to be full of character and individuality.

In his secret heart, he thought, as he had thought before, that the place had a charm altogether its own. How he should like its quaintness and its beauty if it ever was his own, and if— Nay, how he did like it now, and how oddly he felt himself to be a son of its soil—to be, somehow, akin to it. Guy was in all ways sensitive and impressionable, open to the influences that surrounded him, to every change of scene and atmosphere. He wandered round the flower-beds, and looked for the quaint “old” flowers of which Florella had spoken. Could he find any to show her? Yes; there were columbines of odd, dull, artistic tints, roses of sorts unheeded by the horticulturist, and sundry blossoms, somewhat belated in the keen northern air, of which the ignorant Guy knew nothing.

As he looked, Rawdon Crawley began to bark; the sound of wheels was heard, and a waggonette, full of straw hats and bright dresses, drove up the rough ill-kept road that led to the house. Guy, half-smiling, held a little back, as he saw his brother press forward eagerly; he was amused at the idea of Godfrey in love, not having ceased to regard him as a schoolboy. He was not in love himself; but even for him, as he came forward, it was Constancy who held the stage, looking handsome and happy, a concentration of life.

“I am perfectly convinced,” she said, looking round, after the greetings were over, “that this place breathes out a story. It quitetalkswith characteristicness!”

“I should like to think that you had to do with the story of it,” said Godfrey, feeling his ears hot with the sense of self-committal.

Constancy looked at him, and at that moment there entered into her a particularly charming and engaging little demon, who recommended himself to her in a form which disguised his old and well-known features, and made him come out quite new. Godfrey was betraying himself in every word and look; but to Constancy, whose even pulses had never yet beat quicker for any emotion whatever, his boyish passion did not present itself in a serious light. She might study this side of life a little, it would be amusing and instructive. It has been amusing, ever since Cleopatra angled for fishes.

The result of her study was that Godfrey spent a day of chequered but tumultuous bliss, and that the story of the old house mingled itself inextricably with her own.

For Guy the hours passed so pleasantly that he forgot his dread of the coming night. Not being in any way conscious, he asked Florella to come and look for subjects among the flowers, quite easily. And she came, remembering them much better than he did, looking for old favourites, and showing him which she had formerly tried to paint.

“I cannot do the harebells,” she said. “I have drawn them; but the colour and the light is altogether impossible, and I have had to come down to a little bunch in the rock—quite earthly—but they just recall the others. Perhaps some day, when I have practised a great deal, I may be able to paint the heavenly ones.”

“You made meseethem,” said Guy.

“That’s something, isn’t it?” she said. “But that’s why drawing is so good. It teaches one to see.”

There was plenty of general chatter, and the whole party strolled about, ate fruit, and picked flowers together.

A tall fair young man was rather feebly sweeping the garden path. He touched his cap as the party passed him, and said, in a cracked, but cordial voice, “There’s rasps down yonder, sir, for t’yoong leddies.”

Guy recognised him, with a start of distaste, as the “soft” lad he had seen in the churchyard.

“Thank you, Jem,” said Godfrey, “we’ll look for them. This way, isn’t it, Jeanie?”

Jeanie was very shy, and very much afraid of these “clever girls;” she secretly disliked the thought of them. But it was pleasing to find how open they were to raspberries and Morelia cherries, and, in the afternoon she felt a pride in showing them over the house, and pointing out the pictures and other curiosities.

Guy avoided this part of the entertainment, on the excuse of making arrangements about the time of return, and as he came back from interviewing the driver of the waggonette, he found that Florella was in the garden, sketching a bit of snap-dragon on the top of the low wall that divided it from the fruit-garden. Guy made for her pretty blue dress, which reminded him of her blue harebells.

“Do you like the flowers better than the house?” he said.

“I did not much want to go over the house,” she answered; “and if you please, Mr Waynflete, I think I should like to tell you why.”

“Why, have you any reason?” said Guy, startled.

“Yes,” she answered. “Of course it is a very silly thing, and my sister never thought of it but as the merest joke; but I have always felt it was more wrong than we knew. When we were here, we used to hide and make odd noises, to see whether we could make people think it was the ghost.”

“What?” exclaimed Guy. “What did you do?”

“Why—nothing very much,” said Florella, “after all. But we rustled about when we thought the maids would hear us, and stamped along the passages to make footsteps, and hid when any one was coming, and Constancy pretended to sob and cry, and then we watched to see how people would take it; we never dressed up, you know, it was only noises. Of course there was a notion that therewerenoises, or no one would have noticed.”

“And didn’t—did no one find you out?”

“No. I don’t think that really we frightened any one very much. Of course, I always knew it was naughty, and that Aunt Connie would be angry if she knew. But, as we went on doing it, I got to have a feeling of what it would have been like if it had been true; perhaps I frightened myself, for we didn’t make all the noises that we heard. And I don’t know, Cosy did it quite simply; but I got to feel as if there was somethingprofanein playing tricks with things one could not understand, and it has always been on my conscience. So, as you were here when we did it, and as you belong to the place, I thought I would confess, for really I have always felt it more wrong than many things I’ve been punished for.”

“Why do you think that?” said Guy, quickly.

“Why, I suppose taking false and silly views of great subjects is one of the chief things that prevent people from being really good. Then youcan’tsee.”

“If you don’t mind,” said Guy, “will you come with me and look at that picture?”

He could hardly tell what prompted the request; but he felt that he could better bear the sight of the picture with her than alone.

Florella agreed, though a little surprised, and they followed the rest of the party into the house and upstairs. They heard their voices as they made the round, but the little octagon room was empty.

“Look at him,” said Guy, “and tell mejustwhat you see in his face. Yes,” as she glanced at him, “I know he is like me. But if you were drawing that face—like a flower—what should you try to show?”

“He looks very unhappy,” said Florella. “He wanted some one to help him.”

“He had no one. He was a victim to himself or his fate. Don’t you think he looks rather a despicable fellow?”

“No; but he looks as if he did so need to be helped. Yes; he does look like a person who might fail in a desperate crisis.”

“As he did,” said Guy. “A man with that face must, you know. Isn’t that what you see?”

“I suppose,” said Florella, suddenly and simply, “that if he had really realised the presence of God, he could have borne—even the ghost.”

“Why?” said Guy, abruptly.

“It would be a spiritual power, great enough to conquer the spiritual fear,” she answered.

“I wish I could have masses said for his soul,” said Guy. “If we were Roman Catholics, I’d ask you to pray for him.”

“Well, I will,” she answered. “He is living, somewhere, and I am sure it is right to pray for him.”

“Thank you,” said Guy, earnestly.

There was a call, and they hurried away to join the others. They had forgotten both themselves and each other. It was only afterwards that Florella realised that she had said unusual things, or Guy that he had heard them. But strange to each other they never could be again.

Constancy and Godfrey had thought of each other, and of the effect they were producing on each other, all day long. Nevertheless, they parted as “Strangers yet.”

Part 1, Chapter XI.“Striving for Dear Existence.”In the soft interrupted stillness of the summer night Godfrey Waynflete leant out of his window, and lived over again the hours of the day. The country stillness was constantly broken by the whirr of a bat, the twitter of a disturbed sparrow, or by the homely sounds of cattle and poultry in the farm and fields close by. But Godfrey neither heard nor heeded. He was deaf to the sounds within the house, the occasional strain and creak of the old boards and panels, the patter of rats and mice, which constantly disturbed the slumbers of Rawdie, who slept on a mat in his master’s room. His blood was all on fire; sleep was impossible to him. He could think of nothing but that in two days he would meet Constancy again at Ingleby. It did not seem possible to Godfrey that so intense a desire should fail to work its own fulfilment. No one and nothing should stand in the way of this demand of his spirit for the thing it craved. The whole world was widened, transformed, glorified. Constancy—Cosy. How the name suited her! The memories of that old boyish visit started into life, till the old house seemed to thrill with her presence.“Talk of haunting,” thought Godfrey, laughing to himself. Constancy was the presence that filled Waynflete through and through. There was no room there for any ghosts! Then suddenly, without warning, there fell upon him a doubt, a fear, a presentiment of disappointment, a change of spirit so complete that it was almost as if a sudden change of atmosphere had swept through the room, and chilled him. A moment before his joy had had hardly a misgiving, now he suddenly felt utterly without hope.He started upright, and pulled the casement to, for the night-air felt all at once chilly. He shook himself together, and began to pull off his coat, when Rawdie sat up in the moonlight, and began to howl as if he thought his last hour had come.“Confound you, Rawdie, hold your tongue!” cried Godfrey, himself reviving, when the door leading into the next room opened, and Guy stood there, fully dressed.“What, the deuce is the matter with Rawdie?” he said, sharply.“It’s the moon, I suppose,” said Godfrey, pulling vainly at the curtain. “He’s got the nightmare this time, instead of you! I never knew him howl at the moon before. Here Rawdie, Rawdie! Hold your noise! Shut up!”Rawdie jumped into his master’s arms, his howls subsiding into whines and whimpers.Guy stood leaning against the door, watching them. He set his teeth hard, as, in the broad white streak of moonlight, the Presence which he feared took, as it seemed to him, visible shape. It was not now a face flashing into his own, but a shadowy figure, with averted head, moving across the room, as if in hurried, timorous flight. Guy’s pulses stood still, but this time his nerves held their own. He waited, and the figure, theimpression, passed him quickly by, through the doorway, into the room he had just left. Guy shut the door suddenly upon Godfrey and Rawdie, and stood with his back against it—looking. Then the figure turned the never-to-be-forgotten face full upon him, and it was to him as if his own eyes looked back on him, with malicious scorn of himself; as if this scared and hunted creature were an aspect of himself. He crouched and cowered against the wall, and gazed back at the spectre, but he felt that the sight, if sight it were, was as nothing to the inward experience of the soul of which it was the expression, the despair, the degradation of irresistible fear.Whether it was a second or an hour before the moonlight had gone from the room, and with it the impression, Guy could not tell; but he knew at once when it was gone, and stumbling towards the bed, threw himself down on it.There was a candle burning, but the room swam and darkened before his eyes, he was deadly faint, and as the life came back to him a little, the panic which was wont to come upon him, overwhelmed him, and he trembled and hid his face. It passed sooner than usual, much sooner than usual self-command came back, though the throbbing of his heart forced him to be quite still, and took all his strength away. As the power of thought slowly came back to him, the memory of Florella’s words came back also. The Presence of the Divine Spirit! Could that become real to the soul?Guy knew what one spiritual experience was, and he did not deceive himself into thinking that he had ever known this other. If the door of his soul was open to the unseen, no such messenger had ever sought entrance; indeed, he had done his best to bar the way.But now, over his bewildered spirit there swept another vision, new and fair, the vision of a human sympathy that might make the weak strong. If this wise girl could know—couldsee? Before the hope of her helpfulness, his foolish pride would give way. He could nerve himself to confession. The next moment he knew that to lay his burden on the innocent soul of another, to seek a love which must suffer in his suffering, would be of all cowardly methods of escape the most contemptible. He must try to think more clearly. He managed to stand up, and to find the brandy, which, with most pitiful foresight, he had brought with him. He had drunk it before he suddenly felt how significant was the eagerness with which he took it. It was another terror, indeed, and he threw himself down again on the bed and lay half dozing, till with the daylight and the singing of the birds, he started awake, with his nerves all ajar, and without energy enough to undress and go to bed properly.He managed, however, to make his appearance downstairs, where Rawdie’s cheerful bark recalled the poor little dog’s terror of the night before. Guy picked him up, and looked into his cairn-gorm coloured eyes, but no change had come into them. Godfrey, too, was eating his breakfast, and making Jeanie talk about Constancy.Guy played with his tea-cup, and made critical remarks on the young ladies, till the trap that he had ordered to take him to the station appeared, when he cut short his farewells, and went off hastily, without giving his aunt time to say that she wished him to come back again shortly.As he grew calmer with the increasing distance, he took a resolution, which was the first beginning of a struggle against his fate.Cuthbert Staunton arrived in due time, in a holiday humour, and having plenty of conversation, he occupied Mrs Palmer’s attention until the hour came for the two young men to wish her good night, and betake themselves to a room devoted to the use of Guy and Godfrey, where they could talk and smoke at their leisure.“Yours is a charming climate,” said the visitor, “where any one may light a fire in August with a clear conscience. Short of southern moonlight, etc, there is nothing so delightful.”“Sit down in front of it,” said Guy; “we’re generally glad of one here, and it looks cheerful. Now, I’m expecting you to put me up to all the newest lights—one gets rusty down here. About the spooks, for instance, the Miss Vyners were talking of in London. I want to examine into them a bit. Did you ever come across a fellow who had seen one—by any chance?”“No,” said Staunton. “I should like to come across a first-hand one, very much.”“Well, here’s your chance, then. I have—twice.”“Seen a man who has seen one?”“No, better than that, seen the genuine article, myself. I—I want to know how to manage him. It seems the correct thing, nowadays, to entertain ghosts and imps of all kinds.”“I don’t know any, personally,” said Cuthbert, purposely echoing Guy’s bantering tone, though he noticed the matches he struck in vain, and the suppressed excitement of his manner. “But I should like to hear your experiences very much.”“He paid me a visit last night,” said Guy.“And what is he like?”Guy left off trying to light his pipe, and leant back in a corner of the big chair in which he was lounging. The plunge was made. He was shaken to pieces with the effort, but he still endeavoured to maintain a tone of indifference.“I think I’ll have to tell you a little family history,” he said; “if it won’t bore you.”“Not at all. Tell me just as you can—as you like.”“Well, but you know, I believe, about the old traitor who drank himself to death from remorse, and naturally, haunted his descendants. Some of them drank, and, in fact, there was always an inclination to an occasional good-for-nought. Well, then came the Guy who was too late—my namesake—so, by the way, was the traitor—that story you know, too. I don’t believe my father, or grandfather, were quite all my aunt could have wished. They died young, you know; but I’m not aware that they ever saw the ghost. But, five years ago, when we went to Waynflete, to see Mrs John Palmer, I did.”“You saw the ghost of your ancestor?”“Well! I had seen Guy’s picture; I was full of it, and full of seeing the place for the first time, and the face flashed upon me just like the picture. The picture’slike me, you know; absurdly so. I saw him—plain as I see you. Well, that once wouldn’t have mattered, it would only have been a queer thing. But—”“But that was not the only time?” said Cuthbert.“I neversawhim again till last night, but—I—feelhim. I wake up half mad with fear. I have dreamed of him. I don’t know what it is, the fit seizes me, and when I’ve scourged the folly out of me, I faint, or my heart gets bad. I haven’t quite been able to hide that; but no one knows why. No one knows that I am afraid of my own shadow!”“Gently, my dear boy,” said Staunton, kindly. “Keep quiet for a minute. It’s hard work telling me; makes your heart beat now, doesn’t it?”“Let me get through it. These fits have come and knocked me up, over and over—muffed my exam—for my degree—made a fool of me, times out of number. But, last night—he was there—the whole of him,myselfin that queer old dress, as one might look when one’s chance was over, and one wanted others to share one’s disgrace. I saw him; but, oh, my God, Cuthbert! It’s not theseeing; but no other Presence is ever so real—so close! So, I’m catching at a rope. He’ll have me; I shall have to follow him—but—I’m trying to fight.”Guy had dropped all his pretence at indifference; he spoke in short, stifled whispers, his eyes dilated with fear.Cuthbert laid his hand on the fingers that were clutching the arm of the chair, and said gently, “I am very glad you have told me. You’ll feel better soon. It is very bad for you to suffer without any help.”Guy clung to the warm, human clasp, it was unexpectedly comforting. Then he whispered, “I don’t drink, you know,yet. But he’ll drive me to it. He’s ruining my life!”Cuthbert did not speak for some moments. Then he said, “Of course, there is more than one view to be taken of these things.”“Oh yes, I might be mad—or lying.”“Well, I don’t feel driven to those conclusions. Do you mind being questioned a little?”“No; I think I should like it. I’ve felt so much alone.”“Yes. You feel more afraid of the terror that seizes on you unexpectedly, than of the—thing itself?”“Yes,” said Guy, hesitating; “at least, I mindfeelinghe is there, more than seeing him. That’s a detail.”“Try to tell me what you mean byfeeling.”“I can’t. It’s another sense.”“And do you feel nothing else with this sense?”“No,” said Guy, decidedly. “Nothing. And, many things that I could like—”“Yes. Try and tell me. I think I shall understand.”“Yes; oh, you’re so kind. I’ve always felt he never would come where you were. Some people fret me, even in the next room. But, music now—that might lift one away from him, but he stops it; he always stops what I care most for. I could bear it, but my body won’t; that betrays me.”“Yes, that wants careful looking to. Now, my boy, try and tell me what your own view of the matter is. What you think most likely to be true about it.”Guy looked up with pitiful puzzled eyes.“Ask me more questions,” he said.“Ever read up the subject?”“No, I began; but I daren’t—”“You feel sure it is something besides your own nerves?”“Yes.”“Something or somebody outside yourself?”“Outside myself? I don’t know that.”Guy suddenly caught Cuthbert’s hand again and pressed it hard against his forehead, as if to steady his brain. Then he spoke more clearly.“I don’t know if what comes over me is my ancestor himself, or the fiend that tempted him, or my own worst self. As for the vision, I’m not so much afraid ofthat.”“Then what you want is to be able to resist this influence?”“Yes, before it ruins me, body and soul.”“Well, you must let me think it over. Depend upon it, I’ll not leave you alone to fight the battle. Now, you’ll sleep to-night?”“Oh yes, I am not frightened now,” said Guy, simply.“Well then, we’ll go to bed, and talk it over again to-morrow. But you must come up to town with me and see a doctor, you need only tell him that your nerves have had a shock. But I wouldn’t avoid the general subject. Such experiences are not altogether exceptional.”“Nervous affections, in fact,” said Guy, dryly.“Well, sometimes, you know. Anyway, there are safer remedies than brandy, if your heart gives you trouble. And mind, come to me at any time, or send for me. Bring it into the light of day.”Guy felt soothed by the kindness, and he knew that the advice was good. But, all the same, he knew that it was Florella who had touched the heart of his trouble.“You’re awfully kind,” he said, gratefully.“I know the look of trouble,” answered Cuthbert; “and fate hasn’t left me many anxieties. I’m quite free to worry about you.”Guy’s eloquent eyes softened. The fellow-feeling was better than the reasoning. But as he got up to go to bed, he said in his usual self-contained voice, “You know, Rawdie saw him too, and had palpitations.”

In the soft interrupted stillness of the summer night Godfrey Waynflete leant out of his window, and lived over again the hours of the day. The country stillness was constantly broken by the whirr of a bat, the twitter of a disturbed sparrow, or by the homely sounds of cattle and poultry in the farm and fields close by. But Godfrey neither heard nor heeded. He was deaf to the sounds within the house, the occasional strain and creak of the old boards and panels, the patter of rats and mice, which constantly disturbed the slumbers of Rawdie, who slept on a mat in his master’s room. His blood was all on fire; sleep was impossible to him. He could think of nothing but that in two days he would meet Constancy again at Ingleby. It did not seem possible to Godfrey that so intense a desire should fail to work its own fulfilment. No one and nothing should stand in the way of this demand of his spirit for the thing it craved. The whole world was widened, transformed, glorified. Constancy—Cosy. How the name suited her! The memories of that old boyish visit started into life, till the old house seemed to thrill with her presence.

“Talk of haunting,” thought Godfrey, laughing to himself. Constancy was the presence that filled Waynflete through and through. There was no room there for any ghosts! Then suddenly, without warning, there fell upon him a doubt, a fear, a presentiment of disappointment, a change of spirit so complete that it was almost as if a sudden change of atmosphere had swept through the room, and chilled him. A moment before his joy had had hardly a misgiving, now he suddenly felt utterly without hope.

He started upright, and pulled the casement to, for the night-air felt all at once chilly. He shook himself together, and began to pull off his coat, when Rawdie sat up in the moonlight, and began to howl as if he thought his last hour had come.

“Confound you, Rawdie, hold your tongue!” cried Godfrey, himself reviving, when the door leading into the next room opened, and Guy stood there, fully dressed.

“What, the deuce is the matter with Rawdie?” he said, sharply.

“It’s the moon, I suppose,” said Godfrey, pulling vainly at the curtain. “He’s got the nightmare this time, instead of you! I never knew him howl at the moon before. Here Rawdie, Rawdie! Hold your noise! Shut up!”

Rawdie jumped into his master’s arms, his howls subsiding into whines and whimpers.

Guy stood leaning against the door, watching them. He set his teeth hard, as, in the broad white streak of moonlight, the Presence which he feared took, as it seemed to him, visible shape. It was not now a face flashing into his own, but a shadowy figure, with averted head, moving across the room, as if in hurried, timorous flight. Guy’s pulses stood still, but this time his nerves held their own. He waited, and the figure, theimpression, passed him quickly by, through the doorway, into the room he had just left. Guy shut the door suddenly upon Godfrey and Rawdie, and stood with his back against it—looking. Then the figure turned the never-to-be-forgotten face full upon him, and it was to him as if his own eyes looked back on him, with malicious scorn of himself; as if this scared and hunted creature were an aspect of himself. He crouched and cowered against the wall, and gazed back at the spectre, but he felt that the sight, if sight it were, was as nothing to the inward experience of the soul of which it was the expression, the despair, the degradation of irresistible fear.

Whether it was a second or an hour before the moonlight had gone from the room, and with it the impression, Guy could not tell; but he knew at once when it was gone, and stumbling towards the bed, threw himself down on it.

There was a candle burning, but the room swam and darkened before his eyes, he was deadly faint, and as the life came back to him a little, the panic which was wont to come upon him, overwhelmed him, and he trembled and hid his face. It passed sooner than usual, much sooner than usual self-command came back, though the throbbing of his heart forced him to be quite still, and took all his strength away. As the power of thought slowly came back to him, the memory of Florella’s words came back also. The Presence of the Divine Spirit! Could that become real to the soul?

Guy knew what one spiritual experience was, and he did not deceive himself into thinking that he had ever known this other. If the door of his soul was open to the unseen, no such messenger had ever sought entrance; indeed, he had done his best to bar the way.

But now, over his bewildered spirit there swept another vision, new and fair, the vision of a human sympathy that might make the weak strong. If this wise girl could know—couldsee? Before the hope of her helpfulness, his foolish pride would give way. He could nerve himself to confession. The next moment he knew that to lay his burden on the innocent soul of another, to seek a love which must suffer in his suffering, would be of all cowardly methods of escape the most contemptible. He must try to think more clearly. He managed to stand up, and to find the brandy, which, with most pitiful foresight, he had brought with him. He had drunk it before he suddenly felt how significant was the eagerness with which he took it. It was another terror, indeed, and he threw himself down again on the bed and lay half dozing, till with the daylight and the singing of the birds, he started awake, with his nerves all ajar, and without energy enough to undress and go to bed properly.

He managed, however, to make his appearance downstairs, where Rawdie’s cheerful bark recalled the poor little dog’s terror of the night before. Guy picked him up, and looked into his cairn-gorm coloured eyes, but no change had come into them. Godfrey, too, was eating his breakfast, and making Jeanie talk about Constancy.

Guy played with his tea-cup, and made critical remarks on the young ladies, till the trap that he had ordered to take him to the station appeared, when he cut short his farewells, and went off hastily, without giving his aunt time to say that she wished him to come back again shortly.

As he grew calmer with the increasing distance, he took a resolution, which was the first beginning of a struggle against his fate.

Cuthbert Staunton arrived in due time, in a holiday humour, and having plenty of conversation, he occupied Mrs Palmer’s attention until the hour came for the two young men to wish her good night, and betake themselves to a room devoted to the use of Guy and Godfrey, where they could talk and smoke at their leisure.

“Yours is a charming climate,” said the visitor, “where any one may light a fire in August with a clear conscience. Short of southern moonlight, etc, there is nothing so delightful.”

“Sit down in front of it,” said Guy; “we’re generally glad of one here, and it looks cheerful. Now, I’m expecting you to put me up to all the newest lights—one gets rusty down here. About the spooks, for instance, the Miss Vyners were talking of in London. I want to examine into them a bit. Did you ever come across a fellow who had seen one—by any chance?”

“No,” said Staunton. “I should like to come across a first-hand one, very much.”

“Well, here’s your chance, then. I have—twice.”

“Seen a man who has seen one?”

“No, better than that, seen the genuine article, myself. I—I want to know how to manage him. It seems the correct thing, nowadays, to entertain ghosts and imps of all kinds.”

“I don’t know any, personally,” said Cuthbert, purposely echoing Guy’s bantering tone, though he noticed the matches he struck in vain, and the suppressed excitement of his manner. “But I should like to hear your experiences very much.”

“He paid me a visit last night,” said Guy.

“And what is he like?”

Guy left off trying to light his pipe, and leant back in a corner of the big chair in which he was lounging. The plunge was made. He was shaken to pieces with the effort, but he still endeavoured to maintain a tone of indifference.

“I think I’ll have to tell you a little family history,” he said; “if it won’t bore you.”

“Not at all. Tell me just as you can—as you like.”

“Well, but you know, I believe, about the old traitor who drank himself to death from remorse, and naturally, haunted his descendants. Some of them drank, and, in fact, there was always an inclination to an occasional good-for-nought. Well, then came the Guy who was too late—my namesake—so, by the way, was the traitor—that story you know, too. I don’t believe my father, or grandfather, were quite all my aunt could have wished. They died young, you know; but I’m not aware that they ever saw the ghost. But, five years ago, when we went to Waynflete, to see Mrs John Palmer, I did.”

“You saw the ghost of your ancestor?”

“Well! I had seen Guy’s picture; I was full of it, and full of seeing the place for the first time, and the face flashed upon me just like the picture. The picture’slike me, you know; absurdly so. I saw him—plain as I see you. Well, that once wouldn’t have mattered, it would only have been a queer thing. But—”

“But that was not the only time?” said Cuthbert.

“I neversawhim again till last night, but—I—feelhim. I wake up half mad with fear. I have dreamed of him. I don’t know what it is, the fit seizes me, and when I’ve scourged the folly out of me, I faint, or my heart gets bad. I haven’t quite been able to hide that; but no one knows why. No one knows that I am afraid of my own shadow!”

“Gently, my dear boy,” said Staunton, kindly. “Keep quiet for a minute. It’s hard work telling me; makes your heart beat now, doesn’t it?”

“Let me get through it. These fits have come and knocked me up, over and over—muffed my exam—for my degree—made a fool of me, times out of number. But, last night—he was there—the whole of him,myselfin that queer old dress, as one might look when one’s chance was over, and one wanted others to share one’s disgrace. I saw him; but, oh, my God, Cuthbert! It’s not theseeing; but no other Presence is ever so real—so close! So, I’m catching at a rope. He’ll have me; I shall have to follow him—but—I’m trying to fight.”

Guy had dropped all his pretence at indifference; he spoke in short, stifled whispers, his eyes dilated with fear.

Cuthbert laid his hand on the fingers that were clutching the arm of the chair, and said gently, “I am very glad you have told me. You’ll feel better soon. It is very bad for you to suffer without any help.”

Guy clung to the warm, human clasp, it was unexpectedly comforting. Then he whispered, “I don’t drink, you know,yet. But he’ll drive me to it. He’s ruining my life!”

Cuthbert did not speak for some moments. Then he said, “Of course, there is more than one view to be taken of these things.”

“Oh yes, I might be mad—or lying.”

“Well, I don’t feel driven to those conclusions. Do you mind being questioned a little?”

“No; I think I should like it. I’ve felt so much alone.”

“Yes. You feel more afraid of the terror that seizes on you unexpectedly, than of the—thing itself?”

“Yes,” said Guy, hesitating; “at least, I mindfeelinghe is there, more than seeing him. That’s a detail.”

“Try to tell me what you mean byfeeling.”

“I can’t. It’s another sense.”

“And do you feel nothing else with this sense?”

“No,” said Guy, decidedly. “Nothing. And, many things that I could like—”

“Yes. Try and tell me. I think I shall understand.”

“Yes; oh, you’re so kind. I’ve always felt he never would come where you were. Some people fret me, even in the next room. But, music now—that might lift one away from him, but he stops it; he always stops what I care most for. I could bear it, but my body won’t; that betrays me.”

“Yes, that wants careful looking to. Now, my boy, try and tell me what your own view of the matter is. What you think most likely to be true about it.”

Guy looked up with pitiful puzzled eyes.

“Ask me more questions,” he said.

“Ever read up the subject?”

“No, I began; but I daren’t—”

“You feel sure it is something besides your own nerves?”

“Yes.”

“Something or somebody outside yourself?”

“Outside myself? I don’t know that.”

Guy suddenly caught Cuthbert’s hand again and pressed it hard against his forehead, as if to steady his brain. Then he spoke more clearly.

“I don’t know if what comes over me is my ancestor himself, or the fiend that tempted him, or my own worst self. As for the vision, I’m not so much afraid ofthat.”

“Then what you want is to be able to resist this influence?”

“Yes, before it ruins me, body and soul.”

“Well, you must let me think it over. Depend upon it, I’ll not leave you alone to fight the battle. Now, you’ll sleep to-night?”

“Oh yes, I am not frightened now,” said Guy, simply.

“Well then, we’ll go to bed, and talk it over again to-morrow. But you must come up to town with me and see a doctor, you need only tell him that your nerves have had a shock. But I wouldn’t avoid the general subject. Such experiences are not altogether exceptional.”

“Nervous affections, in fact,” said Guy, dryly.

“Well, sometimes, you know. Anyway, there are safer remedies than brandy, if your heart gives you trouble. And mind, come to me at any time, or send for me. Bring it into the light of day.”

Guy felt soothed by the kindness, and he knew that the advice was good. But, all the same, he knew that it was Florella who had touched the heart of his trouble.

“You’re awfully kind,” he said, gratefully.

“I know the look of trouble,” answered Cuthbert; “and fate hasn’t left me many anxieties. I’m quite free to worry about you.”

Guy’s eloquent eyes softened. The fellow-feeling was better than the reasoning. But as he got up to go to bed, he said in his usual self-contained voice, “You know, Rawdie saw him too, and had palpitations.”

Part 2, Chapter I.A Big Situation.Florella Vyner lay awake in the cool misty light of a moorland morning, and thought, not for the first time, of her conversation with Guy Waynflete. She had the power of intense and steady contemplation, that was the faculty that enabled her to “see,” and when she woke to the sense of the unusualness of what had passed, she felt quite certain that the circumstances were also unusual enough to justify the words which she had spoken. They had surprised herself; and now, on the day when she would see Guy again she divined that he had been speaking of himself. It was he who suffered spiritual fear, he whose soul was in danger, and needed prayers to help it. A sense of awe came upon her. Guy believed that she saw; but she felt herself to have been hitherto blind. She had entered into a spiritual conflict, and, suddenly, she knew that it was a real one. “Pray for his soul.” What a tremendous thing she had promised! And oh! how tremendous must be the Power whom she had invoked.There came upon Florella a moment when “this earth we hold by seemed not earth,” a moment when she did indeed “see.”Her sister’s voice startled her.“It’s not going to be a fine day. Never mind, wet mist is characteristic of Ingleby.” Constancy was sitting up in bed. Her abundant hair fell over her shoulders in thick vigorous waves, her hands were clasped round her knees.“Cosy,” said Florella, with sisterly straightforwardness, “I hope you’re going to behave better than you did at Waynflete.”“I haven’t done any harm,” said Cosy, with entire good humour. “Why should you all grumble? I haven’t read an hour the less, nor given up a discussion, nor got a bit tired of being here. But I won’t be only one sort of girl. People who have brains can manage a situation.”“I should have thought their brains ought to tell them when a situation was too big for them to manage.”“Really, Flo! You do say extremely clever things sometimes. Yes, so they ought. But this isn’t a big situation, though Godfrey Waynflete is averybig young man.”“No, it isn’t,” said Florella, beginning to get up. “You’re simply flirting, and talking fine about it. But, I don’t think Godfrey Waynfleteisflirting, and you may find that the situation grows.”“Well! I’ll see if I can grow up to it,” said Constancy. “But you know, in these days a girl like me is much more likely to flirt too little than too much.”Godfrey appeared at the carriage door as they drove up to the Mill House, full of hearty greetings, big, bright and boyish as ever, but with a certain glow in face and manner which was unmistakable as Constancy sprang out, and lifting Rawdie, kissed him between his eyes.Guy stood behind, looking on with repressed amusement, for he had not yet perceived that it was a “big situation.” He acted host, and showman to the mill. He was pale, but so self-contained and like himself that Cuthbert could have thought the agitated confidence of the night before had been a dream. But Florella felt quite sure of her surmise regarding him, though he said no word to recall it to her.Constancy had no intention but of spending another pleasant day in studying the “other side of life,” and in teasing her companions; but she did not know with whom she had to deal. If Godfrey had been either old enough to understand her, or timid enough to hesitate and lose his chance, she might have appeared to “manage the situation.” But he began the day with a definite purpose, and laid his plans to suit it. The wet weather was much against him, as he could not offer himself to her, either when walking round the mill, or when sitting in the drawing-room, with Cousin Susan acting hostess. He did not, however, mean to be baffled, and while the whole party were listening to Guy’s explanation of the looms, as well as the noise they made permitted, he said to her, with decision—“I want you to come and see this,” and as she complied, he led her quickly out of the long, many-windowed room, where the hands were working, into another where the great bales of wool were stored ready for use.The windows were wide open, with the wet air blowing through, there was a strong smell of oily wool; but Godfrey, with a soft, persistent step, led her round the piled-up bales, into a little open space between them. The window looked across miles of misty, smoky country, and the ceaseless roar of the machinery was softened by distance, so that they could hear themselves speak.“I don’t see anything to look at here,” said Constancy, “and I want to understand how the weaving is done.”“There is nothing to see,” said Godfrey. “I brought you here on purpose to tell you something. I—I love you. I mean to work with all there is of me to be worthy of you. I’ve only that one object in life, and I shall never have another. I—I’ve thought you liked me a little. You do—Constancy, don’t you? You will, won’t you? You know that I care for nothing else in the world but you.”He came close to her, taking her hands and looking down at her, with eyes to which his eagerness lent a sort of fierce determination.Constancy’s heart gave a great throb as the blood rushed to her face, but startled as she was, she held her own.“Now you are spoiling everything that is so extremely pleasant. You know quite well I never thought of anything of that sort. We have had such a very good time. Now, don’t say any more. I never meant—”“You must have meant it at Waynflete; you meant me to believe it.”“Now, you are making a great deal too much of things. Why, you know, I have my work at college—”“If you care a bit for me, what does that matter?”Godfrey’s face darkened, and filled with passionate desire.“You don’t care for me?” he said, hoarsely.“Well, no,” she said, “not in that way. I’m not sentimental; and you—we—are much too young to think of such nonsense. Let us find the others.”Godfrey stood in her path for a moment. He was smarting, not only under her refusal, but under her deliberate ignoring of his depth of feeling.“Iamyoung,” he said, “young enough to wait, and I willmakeyou care. The love I offer you is worth a great deal more than you pretend to think. I’ll—I’ll make you see that yet. Allow me—to show you the way back to the others.”He stood aside and pointed the way, forcing his manner into rigid politeness, but his face white, and his eyes fixing hers. His whole nature rose against defeat, though, as he fell behind her, he felt so miserable that, boy as he was, his throat ached, and unshed tears stung his eyelids.Constancy felt strange thrills.She dashed into the midst of the others, as they came out, and breathlessly remarked on the beauty of the bridge they were crossing, “So picturesque,” she said.“If the stream was clean,” said Guy.“Well, you often call a dirty child picturesque; why not a dirty river, with a tree and a barn, or whatever it is? I think it’s beautiful.”“Beauty that is marred,” said Guy.“Then it has more human interest,” said Constancy. “It is another aspect of what I said about the summeriness of London.”She dashed into the discussion, and talked brilliantly, rousing both Guy and Cuthbert Staunton to talk too, while Godfrey hung behind, angered more than ever. He was obliged occasionally to speak, and even to hand tea-cups and open doors for the ladies. Such is the power of civilisation. As she talked and smiled and managed, into her complex mind there flashed new ideas, and new knowledge. She had learned ever so much by that queer little interview. All kinds of new “mind stuff” had come into her head. She had conceived her part of the scene very badly—but certainly—it was an experience, and as they drove home through the rainy mist, the experience translated itself into all sorts of forms. Godfrey had held the door of the waggonette for her; had given her her wraps, had offered all politeness, but he had neither spoken to her, nor touched her hand.“Yes,” she thought, as she laid her head on her pillow, “I can’t be sorry for any experience. It’s quite different from reading about it.”Then suddenly, as she lay in the darkness, she not only knew, but felt; something new and strange did indeed sweep over her, an overwhelmingmight be. Her spirit fell before it, and she hid her face, and cried.“Cosy, did you find the situation bigger than you expected?” said Florella.Constancy was silent till she could trust her voice, then said, abruptly—“Yes; I wasn’t skilful. Never mind, I’ll manage better another time. I think it was inevitable—really.”“And you don’t—”“Don’t reciprocate? No! It would upset all my ideas to marry before I’m twenty-five. And oh—you know, Flo, the Waynfletes are a fine type, and so on; but, dear me, one belongs to another century, another world, another universe. I don’t know where the dividing line is exactly; but there’s a mighty deep one somewhere.”“Perhaps he’ll cross it—now.”“He did beat the record for the wide jump at his college!” said Cosy. “But he’s just like his great-aunt. Howcouldone marry a person who thinks it signifies so dreadfullywhatone thinks about everything. It’s not that such as we think differently; but we don’t think it matters much what we think, and they do.”“Poor Godfrey Waynflete!” said Florella. “He certainly thinks it matters what you think about him.”“Good night,” said Cosy, ending the conversation.

Florella Vyner lay awake in the cool misty light of a moorland morning, and thought, not for the first time, of her conversation with Guy Waynflete. She had the power of intense and steady contemplation, that was the faculty that enabled her to “see,” and when she woke to the sense of the unusualness of what had passed, she felt quite certain that the circumstances were also unusual enough to justify the words which she had spoken. They had surprised herself; and now, on the day when she would see Guy again she divined that he had been speaking of himself. It was he who suffered spiritual fear, he whose soul was in danger, and needed prayers to help it. A sense of awe came upon her. Guy believed that she saw; but she felt herself to have been hitherto blind. She had entered into a spiritual conflict, and, suddenly, she knew that it was a real one. “Pray for his soul.” What a tremendous thing she had promised! And oh! how tremendous must be the Power whom she had invoked.

There came upon Florella a moment when “this earth we hold by seemed not earth,” a moment when she did indeed “see.”

Her sister’s voice startled her.

“It’s not going to be a fine day. Never mind, wet mist is characteristic of Ingleby.” Constancy was sitting up in bed. Her abundant hair fell over her shoulders in thick vigorous waves, her hands were clasped round her knees.

“Cosy,” said Florella, with sisterly straightforwardness, “I hope you’re going to behave better than you did at Waynflete.”

“I haven’t done any harm,” said Cosy, with entire good humour. “Why should you all grumble? I haven’t read an hour the less, nor given up a discussion, nor got a bit tired of being here. But I won’t be only one sort of girl. People who have brains can manage a situation.”

“I should have thought their brains ought to tell them when a situation was too big for them to manage.”

“Really, Flo! You do say extremely clever things sometimes. Yes, so they ought. But this isn’t a big situation, though Godfrey Waynflete is averybig young man.”

“No, it isn’t,” said Florella, beginning to get up. “You’re simply flirting, and talking fine about it. But, I don’t think Godfrey Waynfleteisflirting, and you may find that the situation grows.”

“Well! I’ll see if I can grow up to it,” said Constancy. “But you know, in these days a girl like me is much more likely to flirt too little than too much.”

Godfrey appeared at the carriage door as they drove up to the Mill House, full of hearty greetings, big, bright and boyish as ever, but with a certain glow in face and manner which was unmistakable as Constancy sprang out, and lifting Rawdie, kissed him between his eyes.

Guy stood behind, looking on with repressed amusement, for he had not yet perceived that it was a “big situation.” He acted host, and showman to the mill. He was pale, but so self-contained and like himself that Cuthbert could have thought the agitated confidence of the night before had been a dream. But Florella felt quite sure of her surmise regarding him, though he said no word to recall it to her.

Constancy had no intention but of spending another pleasant day in studying the “other side of life,” and in teasing her companions; but she did not know with whom she had to deal. If Godfrey had been either old enough to understand her, or timid enough to hesitate and lose his chance, she might have appeared to “manage the situation.” But he began the day with a definite purpose, and laid his plans to suit it. The wet weather was much against him, as he could not offer himself to her, either when walking round the mill, or when sitting in the drawing-room, with Cousin Susan acting hostess. He did not, however, mean to be baffled, and while the whole party were listening to Guy’s explanation of the looms, as well as the noise they made permitted, he said to her, with decision—

“I want you to come and see this,” and as she complied, he led her quickly out of the long, many-windowed room, where the hands were working, into another where the great bales of wool were stored ready for use.

The windows were wide open, with the wet air blowing through, there was a strong smell of oily wool; but Godfrey, with a soft, persistent step, led her round the piled-up bales, into a little open space between them. The window looked across miles of misty, smoky country, and the ceaseless roar of the machinery was softened by distance, so that they could hear themselves speak.

“I don’t see anything to look at here,” said Constancy, “and I want to understand how the weaving is done.”

“There is nothing to see,” said Godfrey. “I brought you here on purpose to tell you something. I—I love you. I mean to work with all there is of me to be worthy of you. I’ve only that one object in life, and I shall never have another. I—I’ve thought you liked me a little. You do—Constancy, don’t you? You will, won’t you? You know that I care for nothing else in the world but you.”

He came close to her, taking her hands and looking down at her, with eyes to which his eagerness lent a sort of fierce determination.

Constancy’s heart gave a great throb as the blood rushed to her face, but startled as she was, she held her own.

“Now you are spoiling everything that is so extremely pleasant. You know quite well I never thought of anything of that sort. We have had such a very good time. Now, don’t say any more. I never meant—”

“You must have meant it at Waynflete; you meant me to believe it.”

“Now, you are making a great deal too much of things. Why, you know, I have my work at college—”

“If you care a bit for me, what does that matter?”

Godfrey’s face darkened, and filled with passionate desire.

“You don’t care for me?” he said, hoarsely.

“Well, no,” she said, “not in that way. I’m not sentimental; and you—we—are much too young to think of such nonsense. Let us find the others.”

Godfrey stood in her path for a moment. He was smarting, not only under her refusal, but under her deliberate ignoring of his depth of feeling.

“Iamyoung,” he said, “young enough to wait, and I willmakeyou care. The love I offer you is worth a great deal more than you pretend to think. I’ll—I’ll make you see that yet. Allow me—to show you the way back to the others.”

He stood aside and pointed the way, forcing his manner into rigid politeness, but his face white, and his eyes fixing hers. His whole nature rose against defeat, though, as he fell behind her, he felt so miserable that, boy as he was, his throat ached, and unshed tears stung his eyelids.

Constancy felt strange thrills.

She dashed into the midst of the others, as they came out, and breathlessly remarked on the beauty of the bridge they were crossing, “So picturesque,” she said.

“If the stream was clean,” said Guy.

“Well, you often call a dirty child picturesque; why not a dirty river, with a tree and a barn, or whatever it is? I think it’s beautiful.”

“Beauty that is marred,” said Guy.

“Then it has more human interest,” said Constancy. “It is another aspect of what I said about the summeriness of London.”

She dashed into the discussion, and talked brilliantly, rousing both Guy and Cuthbert Staunton to talk too, while Godfrey hung behind, angered more than ever. He was obliged occasionally to speak, and even to hand tea-cups and open doors for the ladies. Such is the power of civilisation. As she talked and smiled and managed, into her complex mind there flashed new ideas, and new knowledge. She had learned ever so much by that queer little interview. All kinds of new “mind stuff” had come into her head. She had conceived her part of the scene very badly—but certainly—it was an experience, and as they drove home through the rainy mist, the experience translated itself into all sorts of forms. Godfrey had held the door of the waggonette for her; had given her her wraps, had offered all politeness, but he had neither spoken to her, nor touched her hand.

“Yes,” she thought, as she laid her head on her pillow, “I can’t be sorry for any experience. It’s quite different from reading about it.”

Then suddenly, as she lay in the darkness, she not only knew, but felt; something new and strange did indeed sweep over her, an overwhelmingmight be. Her spirit fell before it, and she hid her face, and cried.

“Cosy, did you find the situation bigger than you expected?” said Florella.

Constancy was silent till she could trust her voice, then said, abruptly—

“Yes; I wasn’t skilful. Never mind, I’ll manage better another time. I think it was inevitable—really.”

“And you don’t—”

“Don’t reciprocate? No! It would upset all my ideas to marry before I’m twenty-five. And oh—you know, Flo, the Waynfletes are a fine type, and so on; but, dear me, one belongs to another century, another world, another universe. I don’t know where the dividing line is exactly; but there’s a mighty deep one somewhere.”

“Perhaps he’ll cross it—now.”

“He did beat the record for the wide jump at his college!” said Cosy. “But he’s just like his great-aunt. Howcouldone marry a person who thinks it signifies so dreadfullywhatone thinks about everything. It’s not that such as we think differently; but we don’t think it matters much what we think, and they do.”

“Poor Godfrey Waynflete!” said Florella. “He certainly thinks it matters what you think about him.”

“Good night,” said Cosy, ending the conversation.

Back to IndexNext