The Project Gutenberg EBook of At Love's Cost, by Charles Garvice

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Title: At Love's Cost

Author: Charles Garvice

Release Date: December 4, 2003 [EBook #10379]

Language: English

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AT LOVE'S COST

By CHARLES GARVICE



AT LOVE'S COST



CHAPTER 1

"Until this moment I have never fully realised how great an ass a man
can be. When I think that this morning I scurried through what might
have been a decent breakfast, left my comfortable diggings, and was
cooped up in a train for seven hours, that I am now driving in a
pelting rain through, so far as I can see for the mist, what appears to
be a howling wilderness, I ask myself if I am still in possession of my
senses. I ask myself why I should commit such lurid folly. Last night I
was sitting over the fire with a book--for it was cold, though not so
cold as this," the speaker shivered and dragged the collar of his
overcoat still higher--"at peace with all the world, with Omar purring
placidly by my side, and my soul wrapped in that serenity which belongs
to a man who has long since rid himself of that inconvenient
appendage--a conscience, and has hit upon the right brand of
cigarettes, and now--"

He paused to sigh, to groan indeed, and shifted himself uneasily in the
well-padded seat of the luxurious mail-phaeton.

"When Williams brought me your note, vilely written--were you sober,
Stafford?--blandly asking me to join you in this mad business, I smiled
to myself as I pitched the note on the fire. Omar smiled too, the very
cigarette smiled. I said to myself I would see you blowed first; that
nothing would induce me to join you, that I'd read about the lakes too
much and too often to venture upon them in the early part of June; in
fact, had no desire to see the lakes at any time or under any
conditions. I told Omar that I would see you in the lowest pit of
Tophet before I would go with you to--whatever the name of this place
is. And yet, here I am."

The speaker paused in his complaint to empty a pool water from his
mackintosh, and succeeded--in turning it over his own leg.

He groaned again, and continued.

"And yet, here I am. My dear Stafford, I do not wish to upbraid you; I
am simply making to myself a confession of weakness which would be
pitiable in a stray dog, but which in a man of my years, with my
experience of the world and reputation for common sense, is simply
criminal. I do not wish to reproach you; I am quite aware that no
reproach, not even the spectacle of my present misery would touch your
callous and, permit me to frankly add, your abominably selfish nature;
but I do want to ask quite calmly and without any display of temper:
what the blazes you wanted to come this way round, and why you wanted
me with you?"

The speaker, a slightly built man, just beyond the vague line of
"young," glanced up with his dark, somewhat sombre and yet softly
cynical eyes at the face of his companion who was driving. This
companion was unmistakably young, and there was not a trace of cynicism
in his grey-blue eyes which looked out upon the rain and mist with
pleasant cheerfulness. He was neither particularly fair nor dark; but
there was a touch of brighter colour than usual in his short, crisp
hair; and no woman had yet found fault with the moustache or the lips
beneath. And yet, though Stafford Orme's face was rather too handsome
than otherwise, the signs of weakness which one sees in so many
good-looking faces did not mar it; indeed, there was a hint of
strength, not to say sternness, in the well-cut lips, a glint of power
and masterfulness in the grey eyes and the brows above them which
impressed one at first sight; though when one came to know him the
impression was soon lost, effaced by the charm for which Stafford was
famous, and which was perpetually recruiting his army of friends.

No doubt it is easy to be charming when the gods have made you good to
look upon, and have filled your pockets with gold into the bargain.
Life was a pageant of pleasure to Stafford Orme: no wonder he sang and
smiled upon the way and had no lack of companions.

Even this man beside him, Edmund Howard, whose name was a by-word for
cynicism, who had never, until he had met Stafford Orme, gone an inch
out of his self-contained way to please or benefit a fellow-man, was
the slave of the young fellow's imperious will, and though he made
burlesque complaint of his bondage, did not in his heart rebel against
it.

Stafford laughed shortly as he looked at the rain-swept hills round
which the two good horses were taking the well-appointed phaeton.

"Oh, I knew you would come," he said. "It was just this way. You know
the governor wrote and asked me to come down to this new place of his
at Bryndermere--"

"Pardon me, Stafford; you forget that I have been down South--where I
wish to Heaven I had remained!--and that I only returned yesterday
afternoon, and that I know nothing of these sudden alarums and
excursions of your esteemed parent."

"Ah, no; so you don't!" assented Stafford; "thought I'd told you: shall
have to tell you now; I'll cut it as short as possible." He paused for
a moment and gently drew the lash of the whip over the wet backs of the
two horses who were listening intently to the voice of their beloved
master. "Well, three days ago I got a letter from my father; it was a
long one; I think it's the first long letter I ever received from him.
He informed me that for some time past he has been building a little
place on the east side of Bryndermere Lake, that he thought it would be
ready by the ninth of this month; and would I go down--or is it
up?--there and meet him, as he was coming to England and would go
straight there from Liverpool. Of course there was not time for me to
reply, and equally, of course, I prepared to obey. I meant going
straight down to Bryndermere; and I should have done so, but two days
ago I received a telegram telling me that the place would not be ready,
and that he would not be there until the eleventh, and asking me to
fill up the interval by sending down some horses and carriages. It
occurred to me, with one of those brilliant flashes of genius which you
have so often remarked in me, my dear Howard, that I would drive down,
at any rate, part of the way; so I sent some of the traps direct and
got this turn-out as far as Preston with me. With another of those
remarkable flashes of genius, it also occurred to me that I should be
devilish lonely with only Pottinger here," he jerked his head towards
the groom, who sat in damp and stolid silence behind. "And so I wrote
and asked you to come. Kind of me, wasn't it?"

"Most infernally kind," said Howard, with a sigh of a ton weight. "Had
you any idea that your father was building this little place? By the
way, I can't imagine Sir Stephen building anything that could be
described as 'little'.

"You are right," assented Stafford, with a nod. "I heard coming down
that it was a perfect palace of a place, a kind of palace of art
and--and that sort of thing. You know the governor's style?" His brows
were slightly knit for just a second, then he threw, as it were, the
frown off, with a smile. "No, I knew nothing about it; I knew as little
about it as I do of the governor himself and his affairs."

Howard nodded.

"When you come to think of it, Howard, isn't it strange that father and
son should know so little of each other? I have not seen the governor
for I forget how many years. He has been out of England for the last
fourteen or fifteen, with the exception of a few flying visits; and on
the occasion of those visits I was either at school on the Continent or
tramping about with a gun or a rod, and so we never met. I've a kind of
uneasy suspicion that my revered parent had no particular desire to
renew his acquaintance with his dutiful offspring; anyway, if he had,
he would have arranged a meeting. Seems rather peculiar; for in every
other respect his conduct as a parent has been above reproach."

"Those are scarcely the terms by which I should designate a liberality
which can only be described as criminally lavish, and an indifference
to your moral progress which might more properly belong to an
unregenerate Turk than to an English baronet. Considering the
opportunities of evil afforded you by the possession of a practically
unlimited allowance, and a brazen cheek which can only be described as
colossal, the fact that you have not long since gone headlong to the
devil fills me with perpetual and ever-freshening wonder."

Stafford yawned and shrugged his shoulders with cheerful acquiescence.

"Should have gone a mucker ever so many times, old man, if it hadn't
been for you," he said; "but you've always been at hand just at the
critical moment to point out to me that I was playing the giddy goat
and going to smash. That's why I like to have you with me as a kind of
guide, monitor, and friend, you know."

Howard groaned and attempted to get rid of another miniature pool of
water, and succeeded--as before.

"I know," he assented. "My virtue has been its own reward--and
punishment. If I had allowed you to go your way to the proverbial dogs,
after whose society gilded youths like yourself appear to be always
hankering, I should not be sitting here with cold water running down my
back and surrounded by Nature in her gloomiest and dampest aspects.
Only once have I deviated from the life of consistent selfishness at
which every sensible man should aim, and see how I am punished! I do
not wish to be unduly inquisitive, but I should like to know where the
blazes we are going, and why we do not make for a decent hotel--if
there is such a thing in these desolate wilds."

Stafford handed him the reins so that he himself might get out his
cigar-case, and with some little difficulty, and assisted by
Pottinger's soaked hat, the two gentlemen got their cigars alight.

"There isn't a decent hotel for miles," explained Stafford. "There is
only a small inn at a little place called Carysford. I looked it out on
the map. I thought we'd drive there today, put up for the night to give
the horses a rest, and go on to this place of my governor's the next
day. It's on the opposite side of the lake."

He jerked his whip to the right.

"Which side, what lake?" asked Howard, hopelessly. "I see nothing of
the lake, nothing but mist and sodden hills. No wonder the word 'poet'
instinctively arouses one's animosity. When I think of the number of
well-meaning and inspired idiots who have written reams of poetry about
this place, I feel at this present moment as if I could cheerfully rend
even a Wordsworth, a Southey, or a Coleridge; and I look back with
remorse upon the hours, the throbs of admiration, I have expended upon
what I once deemed their inspired pages. If I remember rightly, most of
the lake poets went off their heads; when I gaze around me I must admit
that I am not surprised."

Stafford laughed absently; he was quite accustomed to Howard's cynical
vein.

"They're all right enough," he said. "That is, I suppose they are, for
I never read any of 'em since I left school. Oh, yes, they're right
enough about the beauty of the place; you should see it on a fine day."

"Has anyone seen it on a fine day?" inquired Howard, with the innocent
air of one simply seeking information. "I asked a countryman in the
train if it always rained here, and he replied, 'No; it sometimes
snows.'"

"That's a chestnut," remarked Stafford, with a laugh. "But it's all
nonsense about its always being wet here; they tell me it's fine for
weeks together; that you can never tell any instant whether it's going
to clear up or not; that the weather will change like a woman--Good
heavens, look at that!"

He nodded to the east as he spoke.

Unnoticed by them, the sky had been clearing gradually, the mists
sweeping, dissolving, away; a breath of wind now wafted them, like a
veil thrown aside, from hill and valley and lake, and a scene of
unparalleled beauty lay revealed beneath them. The great lake shone
like a sapphire; meadows of emerald, woods of darker green, hills of
purple and grey, silver and gold, rose from the bosom and the edge of
the great liquid jewel; the hills towering tier on tier into the
heavens of azure blue swept by clouds like drifting snow.

The two men gazed in silence; even Pottinger, to whom his 'osses
generally represented all that was beautiful in nature, gaped with
wide-open mouth.

"How's that for lofty, you unbeliever?" demanded Stafford. "Ever seen
anything like that before?"

Howard had been considerably startled, but, of course, he concealed his
amazed admiration behind a mask of cynicism.

"Rather a crib from Val Prinsep, isn't it, with a suggestion of a Drury
Lane pantomime about it? Good heavens! And there's the Fairy Palace all
complete," he added, as, the mists still rising, was discovered on the
slope of the other side a long and extremely ornate building, the pure
whiteness of which was reflected in the marvellous blue and opal of the
lake. "Can that be Sir Stephen's 'little place'?"

"I'm afraid it is," said Stafford. "It looks like the governor," he
added, with a touch of gravity.

"Well, it's very big, or, rather, long; and it's very white, but one's
bound to admit that it doesn't spoil the landscape," said Howard; "in
fact, standing there amidst the dark-green trees, with its pinnacles
and terraces, it's rather an ornament than otherwise. I suppose there
are flowers on those velvety lawns; and the interior, I'll wager my
life, matches the exterior. Fortunate youth to possess a Croesus for a
father:"

"Yes; I suppose the governor must be tremendously oafish," said
Stafford.

"The man who can build such a palace as that, and have the cool cheek
to call it 'a little place,' must in common decency be a
multi-millionaire."

Stafford nodded and smoked thoughtfully for a minute as Pottinger left
the horses' heads and climbed into his seat behind, and the
mail-phaeton moved along the road, which began to dip down at this
point.

"I know so little about my father," he said again.

"And yet the world knows so much," remarked Howard, throwing open his
waterproof and basking in the sun which shone as warmly and
unreservedly as if it had never heard of such a thing as rain. "One
can't take up the paper without seeing some mention of Sir Stephen
Orme's great name. One day he is in Paris negotiating a state loan;
another you read he is annexing, appropriating, or whatever you call
it, a vast tract in Africa or Asia; on the third you are informed with
all solemnity that he has become director of a new bank, insurance
company, or one of those vast concerns in which only Rothschilds and
Barings can disport themselves. Now and again you are informed that Sir
Stephen Orme has been requested to stand for an important constituency,
but that he was compelled to decline because of the pressure of his
numerous affairs. There may be a more famous and important individual
in the world than your father, my dear Stafford, but I can't call him
to mind at this moment."

"Chaff away," said Stafford, good-humouredly. "At any rate, he has been
a jolly liberal father to me. Did I tell you that just before he came
home be placed a largish sum at his bank for me; I mean over and above
my allowance?"

"You didn't tell me, but I'm not at all surprised," responded Howard.
"A truly wonderful father, and a model to all other parents. Would that
I possessed such a one. You don't remember your mother, Stafford?"

The young fellow's handsome face softened for an instant; and his voice
was low and grave as he replied:

"No--and yet sometimes I fancy that I do; though, seeing that she died
when I was quite a kid, it must be only fancy. I wish she'd lived," his
voice became still lower; "I wish I had a brother, or a sister,
especially a sister--By George! that's a fine stream! Did you see that
fish jump, Howard?"

"No, I was too much occupied in jumping myself. I thought by your
exclamation that something had happened to the carriage or the horses,
and that we were on the verge of a smash-up. Let it jump if it amuses
it."

"So it may--if I don't catch it," said Stafford, pulling up the horses
near the bank of the stream.

"Do you mean to tell me that you are going to fish?" demanded Howard,
with a groan. "My dear Stafford, I know that being that abominable
thing--a sportsman--you are consequently mad; but you might have the
decency to curb your insanity out of consideration for the wretched man
who has the misfortune to be your companion, and who plainly sees that
this period of sunshine is a gilded fraud, and that presently it will
rain again like cats and dogs."

Stafford laughed. He had got down and dragged out a rod and a
fishing-basket.

"Sorry, old chap," he said, "but no fisherman could lose such a chance
as this, even to save his best friend from rheumatic fever. I thought
we should come across a stream or two, and I put on these togs
accordingly." He wore a Norfolk suit of that wonderful Harris tweed
which, strange to say, keeps out the rain, the heat, and the cold; and
flies were stuck in his cap of the same material. "But, look here,
there's no need for me to keep you; Pottinger will drive you to this
place, Carysford, where we stay the night--I've engaged rooms--and you
can have a warm bath and get into the dress-clothes after which you are
hankering. When I've caught a fish or two I'll come on after you. Don't
argue, now!"

"My dear Stafford, I haven't the least intention of doing so; I'm
simply dying for a bath, a change, and a huge fire; and when you arrive
you'll find me sitting over the latter humbly thanking God that I'm not
a sportsman."

Stafford nodded, with his eyes on the stream.

"I should give the nags some gruel, Pottinger, and put an extra coat on
them: it'll be cold to-night. Ta, ta, Howard! Tell 'em to get a nice
dinner; I'll be there in time for 'em to cook the fish; but don't wait
if I should be late--say half past seven."

"I promise you I won't," retorted Howard, fervently. "And I am one of
those men who never break a promise--unless it's inconvenient."

The phaeton drove on, Stafford went down to the stream, put up his rod,
chose a fly as carefully as if the fate of a kingdom depended on it,
and began to fish.

There is this great advantage in the art of fly-fishing: that while you
are engaged in it you can think of nothing else: it is as absorbing as
love or scarlet fever. Stafford worked his fly steadily and
systematically, with a light and long "cast" which had made him famous
with the brethren of the craft, and presently he landed a glittering
trout, which, though only a pound in weight, was valued by Stafford at
many a pound in gold. The fish began to rise freely, and he was so
engrossed in the sport that he did not notice that Howard's prophecy
had come true, that the mist had swept over the landscape again, and
that it was raining, if not exactly cats and dogs, yet hard enough to
make even the opposite bank a blur in his vision.

But Stafford was utterly indifferent to rain and mist while the trout
were rising, and his basket was half full before he looked around him.
It is wonderful, when you are fishing, how great a distance you can
walk without noticing it. He had followed the winding course of the
stream until it had left the road far behind and struck into a valley,
the wildness, the remoteness of which was almost awe-inspiring; and he
stood still for a moment and looked up at the sky into which the tall,
sharp peaks of the hills lost themselves. The stream, broken by huge
boulders, rumbled with a soft roar which was the only sound that broke
the stillness. It was the silence, a profound stillness, which makes
one feel as if one has wandered into an unknown world newly made and as
yet untouched by the foot of man, unsullied by his presence.

Stafford could not have quoted a verse of poetry to save his life; it
wasn't in his line; he could ride straight, was a first-rate shot,
waltzed like an angel, and so far his dictionary did not contain the
word "fear;" but he knew nothing of poetry or art, and only liked some
kinds of music, amongst which, it is to be feared, "Soldiers of the
Queen," and the now much-abused chorus from "Faust," ranked high in his
estimation. He was just simply a healthy young Englishman, clean-limbed
and clean-minded, with a tremendous appetite for pleasure, a
magnificent frame, and a heart as light and buoyant as a cork;
therefore, though an artist or a poet would have been thrilled to the
marrow by the wild grandeur of the secluded valley and the grimly
towering hills, and would have longed to put them on canvas or into
verse, Stafford only felt suddenly grave, and as if it were playing it
low down to throw an artificial fly, even of the best make, in such a
spot.

But in a moment or two the sportsman's instinct woke in him; a fish
stirred in a pool under a boulder, and pulling himself together he
threw a fly over the rise. As he did so, the brooding silence was
broken by the deep musical bark of a collie, followed by the sharp yap,
yap of a fox-terrier. The sudden sound almost startled Stafford; at any
rate, caused him to miss his fish; he looked up with a little frown of
annoyance, and saw on the break of the opposite hill some of the
mountain sheep which had stared at him with haughty curiosity running
down towards the green bottom of the valley followed by the two dogs.

A moment afterwards a horse and rider were silhouetted on the extreme
top of the high hill. The horse was large whereby the rider looked
small; and for a moment the pair were motionless, reminding Stafford of
a bronze statue. The hill was fearfully steep, even the dogs ran with a
certain amount of caution, and Stafford wondered whether the rider--he
couldn't see if it was man or boy--would venture down the almost
precipitous slope. While he was wondering, the small figure on the
horse sent up a cry that rang like the note of a bell and echoed in
sweet shrillness down the hill and along the valley. The collie stopped
as if shot, and the fox-terrier looked round, prepared to go back to
the rider. It looked for a moment as if the rider were going down the
other side of the hill again; then suddenly, as if he detected
something wrong in the valley below, he turned the horse and came down
the hill-side at a pace which made Stafford, hard and fearless rider as
he was, open his eyes.

It seemed to him impossible that the horse could avoid a false step or
a slip, and such a false step he knew would send steed and rider
hurtling down to something that could be very little short of instant
death. He forgot all about the big trout in the pool, and stood with
his fly drifting aimlessly in the water, watching with something like
breathless interest this, the most daring piece of horsemanship he had
ever witnessed; and he had ridden side by side with the best
steeplechaser of the day, and had watched a crack Hungarian cavalry
corps at its manoeuvres; which last is about the top notch of the
horse-riding business.

But the big horse did not falter for a moment; down it came at a hard
gallop, and Stafford's admiration was swallowed up in amazement when he
saw that the rider was a young girl, that she was riding with about
half an ounce on the reins, and that, apparently, she was as much at
ease and unconscious of danger as if she were trotting on a tame hack
in Rotten Row.

As she came nearer, admiration romped in ahead of amazement, for the
girl was a young one--she looked like the average school-girl--and had
one of the most beautiful faces Stafford had ever seen. She was dark,
but the cheek that was swept by the long lashes was colourless with
that exquisite and healthy pallor which one sees in the women of
Northern Spain. Her hair was black but soft and silky, and the wind
blew it in soft tendrils, now across her brow and now in dazzling
strands about the soft felt hat which sat in graceful negligence upon
the small and stately head. She wore a habit stained by use and
weather, and so short that it was little better than a skirt, and left
her almost as absolute a freedom as that enjoyed by the opposite sex.
Her hands were covered by well-worn gauntlets, and she held a stout and
workman-like crop with a long huntsman's thong.

A poet would instantly have thought that it was a vision of the Spirit
of the Mountains; Stafford only thought it was the most lovely piece of
girlhood he had ever looked at. She did not see him for a moment, all
her attention being engrossed by the sheep which were now wandering up
the valley; then suddenly, as if she felt his presence rather than saw
it, her dark eyes flashed round upon him and she pulled up the big
horse on its haunches with a suddenness which ought to have sent her
from the saddle like a stone from a catapult; but she sat back as firm
as a rock and gazed at him steadily, with a calmness which fascinated
Stafford and kept him staring back at her as if he were the veriest
plough-boy.

And to put it frankly, it was something like fascination. She had come
upon him so suddenly, her feat of horsemanship had been so audacious,
her beauty was so marvellous that Stafford, perhaps for the first time
in his life, found himself unable to utter a word in the presence of
one of the opposite sex. It was only for a moment or two, of course,
that he lost his presence of mind; then he pulled himself together and
raised his cap. She gave him the very slightest of bows. It was the
faintest indication only of response to his salute; her eyes rested on
his face with a strange, ungirlish calm, then wandered to the last
trout which lay on the bank.

Stafford felt that something had to be said, but for the life of him,
for the first time in his experience, he couldn't hit upon the thing to
say. "Good-afternoon" seemed to him too banal, commonplace; and he
could think of nothing else for a moment. However, it came at last.

"Will you be so good as to tell me if I am far from Carysford?" he
asked.

"Four miles and three-quarters by the road, three miles over the hill,"
she replied, slowly, as calmly as she had looked at him, and in a voice
low and sweet, and with a ring, a tone, in it which in some indefinable
way harmonised with her appearance. It was quite unlike the
conventional girl's voice; there rang in it the freedom of the lonely
valley, the towering hills, the freedom and unconventionality of the
girl's own figure and face and wind-tossed hair; and in it was a note
of dignity, of independence, and of a pride which was too proud for
defiance. In its way the voice was as remarkable as the beauty of the
face, the soft fire of the dark eyes.

"I had no idea it was so far," said Stafford; "I must have wandered
away from the place. I started fishing on the road down below, and
haven't noticed the distance. Will you tell me the name of this place?"

"Herondale," she replied.

"Thank you," said Stafford. "It's a grand valley and a splendid
stream." She leant forward with her elbow on the saddle and her chin in
the small gauntletted hand, looked up the valley absently and then back
at him, with a frank speculation in her eyes which was too frank and
calm to be flattering, and was, indeed, somewhat embarrassing.

"I suppose she takes me for a tourist, or a cheap tripper," thought
Stafford, with an uncomfortable kind of amusement; uncomfortable,
because he knew that this girl who was acting as shepherd in an old
weather-stained habit and a battered hat, was a lady.

She broke the silence again.

"Have you caught many fish?" she asked.

Up to now they had been separated by the stream; Stafford seized the
opportunity, waded across in a fairly shallow place, and, opening the
lid of his basket, showed her the contents.

"Yes, you have done fairly well," she said; "but the trout run larger
higher up the valley. By the way," her brows came together slightly,
though the very faintest of smiles for an instant curved the delicately
cut lips, "do you know that you are poaching?"

This would have been a staggerer coming from a mere keeper, but from
this exquisitely beautiful, this calm statue of a girl, it was simply
devastating. Stafford stared at her.

"Doesn't this river belong to Sir Joseph Avory?" he asked.

"No," she replied, uncompromisingly. "Sir Joseph Avory's river is
called the Lesset water, and runs on the other side of that hill."

She raised her hunting-crop and pointed with an exquisite movement, as
graceful as that of a Diana, to the hill behind her.

"I am very sorry," said Stafford. "I thought this was his river. I met
him in London and got permission from him. Do you know to whom this
water belongs?"

"To Mr. Heron, of Herondale," she replied.

"I beg Mr. Heron's pardon," said Stafford. "Of course I'll put up my
rod at once; and I will take the first opportunity of apologising for
my crime; for poaching is a crime, isn't it?"

"Yes," she assented, laconically.

"Can you tell me where he lives--where his house is?"

She raised her whip again and pointed to an opening on the left of the
valley, an opening lined on either side by a wild growth of magnificent
firs.

"It is up there. You cannot see it from here," she said. As she spoke,
she took her chin from her hand and sat upright, gathered up her reins,
and, with another of the faint inclinations of her head, by way of
adieu, rode on up the valley.

Stafford stood with his cap in his hand looking after her for a moment,
in a brown study; and, still watching the back of the slight figure
that sat the big horse with the grace of an Indian maiden, he began to
take down his rod, and, having packed it in his case and fastened his
basket, he followed her along the broken bank of the stream. Presently,
when she had gone some little distance, he heard the dogs start barking
again, the crack of her whip rang like a pistol-shot, and her bell-like
voice echoed amongst the hills, joined with the troubled baaing of the
sheep. Stafford stopped and watched her: there was evidently something
wrong; for the dogs had become excited, the sheep were running wildly;
but the girl's exquisite voice was as clear and calm as ever, and the
big horse cantered over the broken ground, taking a big boulder now and
again with lilting jump, as if he were going by his own volition and
was well up in all the points of the game. After a time the dogs got
the sheep into a heap, and the young girl rode round them; but
something still seemed to be wrong, for she got down, and, leaving the
horse quite free, made her way into the flock.

At that moment Stafford saw a sheep and a lamb break from the mob and
make for the stream; the sheep jumped to a boulder with the agility of
a goat, the lamb attempted to follow, but missed the boulder and fell
into the stream. The water was wild here and the pools deep; and as the
lamb was swept down toward Stafford he saw that it was struggling in an
ineffectual way, and that it looked like a case of drowning.

Of course he went for it at once, and wading in made a grab at it; he
got hold of it easily enough, but the lamb--a good sized
one--struggled, and in the effort to retain his hold Stafford's feet
slipped and he went headfirst into a deep pool. He was submerged for a
second only, and when he came up he had the satisfaction of feeling
that he had still got the lamb; and gripping the struggling thing
tightly in his arms, he made for the opposite bank. And looking up, saw
the girl standing waiting for him, her face alive, alight, dancing with
delight and amusement! The laughter shone in her eyes like dazzling
sunlight and quivered on the firm but delicate lips. But it was only
for a moment; before Stafford had fully taken it in and had responded
to it with one of his own short laughs, her face was grave and calm
again. "Thank you." she said, with a gravity matching her face, and
very much as one is thanked for passing the salt. "It would have
drowned if you had not been there. It is lame and couldn't swim. I saw,
from the top of the hill, that it was lame, and I was afraid something
would happen to it."

As she spoke, she took the lamb, which was bleating like mad, laid it
on the ground and holding it still, firmly but gently, with her knee,
examined it with all the confidence and coolness of a vet.

"You'll make yourself most frightfully wet," said Stafford.

She glanced up at him with only faint surprise.

"You are a Londoner," she said, "or you would know that here, in these
parts, we are so often more wet than dry that it makes no matter. Yes,
I thought so; there was a thorn in its foot. May I trouble you to hold
him a minute?"

Stafford held the lamb, which was tolerably quiet now; and she slowly
took off her gauntlets, produced a little leather wallet from the
saddle--the horse coming at her call as if he were a dog--took out a
serviceable pair of tweezers, and, with professional neatness,
extracted an extremely ugly thorn. Stafford stood and watched her; the
collie and the fox-terrier upright on their haunches watching her also;
the collie gave an approving bark as, with a pat she liberated the
lamb, which went bleating on its way to join its distracted mother, the
fox-terrier leapt round her with yaps of excited admiration; and there
was admiration in Stafford's eyes also. The whole thing had been done
with a calm, almost savage grace and self-possession, and she seemed to
be absolutely unconscious of his presence, and only remembered it when
the lamb and its mother had joined the flock.

"Thank you again," she said. "It was very kind of you. I am afraid you
are wet."

As Stafford had gone completely under the water, this was a fact he
could not deny, but he said with a laugh:

"Though I am a Londoner, in a sense, I don't mind a wetting--in a good
cause; and I shall be dry, or as good as dry, before I get to the inn.
You must have eyes like a hawk to have seen, from the top of the hill,
that that lamb was lame," he added, rather with the desire to keep her
than to express his admiration for her sight.

"I have good eyes," she said, indifferently. "One has to have. But I
saw that the lamb was lame from the way it kept beside its mother and
the fuss she made over it: and I knew, too, by Donald's bark, that
something was wrong. I am sorry you are wet. Will you--" She glanced
towards the opening in the hills, paused, and for the first time seemed
slightly embarrassed; Stafford fancied that a faint touch of colour
came to the clear pallor of the lovely young face. She did not finish
the sentence, but with another "Thank you," and "I should not have
liked to have lost the lamb," went towards her horse.

Stafford advanced to put her in the saddle; but, with a little shake of
the head and a "Don't trouble," she sprang into her place and rode off.

Stafford looked after her, as he had done before; then he said, "Well,
I'm d-----d!"

He felt for his pouch, filled his pipe and lit it, and in doing so his
eyes fell upon the little wallet from which she had taken her tweezers.
He picked it up and quickly shouted to her; but the dogs were barking
with furious delight, she was cracking her whip, and she had ridden too
far for her to hear him through the noise. It would have been sheer
folly to have run after her; so, with a shrug of his shoulders,
Stafford put the little wallet in his pocket, waded the stream and,
after a moment or two of consideration, made for the inn by the nearest
way, to wit, across the hill.

The girl rode along the strip of level moorland beside the river until
she came to a narrow and not particularly well--kept road which led
through the opening of the hills towards which she had motioned her
whip. Once or twice a smile crossed her face, and once she laughed as
she thought of the comical picture which the young man had made as he
struggled to dry land with the wet lamb in his arms; and the smile and
her laugh made her face seem strangely girlish, because it was usually
so calm, so gravely self-reliant. Some girls would have been quick to
detect the romantic side of the incident, and would have dwelt with a
certain sense of satisfaction upon the fact that the young man was tall
and handsome and distinguished looking. But this girl had scarcely
noticed it; at any rate, it had not affected her in any way. She had
too much to do; there was too much upon her well-formed and graceful
shoulders to permit her to indulge in romance: Diana herself was not
more free from sentiment than this young girl who rode her horse just
like a Mexican, who was vet enough to perform a surgical operation on a
lamb, and who knew how many bushels of wheat should run to an acre, and
the best dressing for permanent pastures. It did occur to her that she
might, at any rate after he had rescued the lamb, have given him
permission to go on fishing; but she was not very sorry for having
failed to do so, for after all, he had been poaching, and, as she had
said, poaching was in her eyes a crime.

She went down the road at a swift trot, and presently it was blocked by
a pair of wrought-iron gates, so exquisite in their antique
conscientiousness that many a mushroom peer would have given almost
their weight in gold to place them at the beginning of his newly made
park; but no one came to open them, they were closed by a heavily
padlocked chain, and the lodge beside them was empty and dilapidated;
and the girl rode beside the lichen-covered wall in which they stood
until she came to an opening leading to an old arch which faced a broad
and spacious court-yard. As she rode beneath the arch a number of dogs
yelped a welcome from kennels or behind stable half-doors, and a bent
old man, dressed like something between a stableman and a butler, came
forward, touching his forehead, to take her horse. She slipped from the
saddle, patted the horse, and murmured a word or two of endearment; but
her bright eyes flashed round the court-yard with a glance of
responsibility.

"Have you brought the colt in, Jason?" she asked.

Jason touched his forehead again.

"Yes, Miss Ida. It took me three-quarters of an hour; it won't come to
me like it does to you. It's in a loose stall."

"Saddle it to-morrow morning," she said, "and I will come and try it.
The brindle cow has got into the corn, and the fence wants mending down
by the pool; you must get William to help you, and do it at once. He
has taken the steers to market, I suppose? I didn't see them in the
three acre. Oh, and, Jason, I found someone fishing in the dale; you
must get a notice board and put it up where the road runs near the
river; the tourists' time is coming on, and though they don't often
come this side of the lake, some of them may, and we can't afford to
have the river poached. And, Jason, look to Ruppert's off-hind shoe; I
think it's loose; and--" She stopped with a short laugh. "But that's
enough for one time, isn't it? Oh, Jason, if I were only a man, how
much better it would be!"

"Yes, miss," assented Jason, simply, with another touch of his
forehead.

She sighed and laughed again, and gathering up her habit--she hadn't to
raise it much--she went through an open door-way into a wild, but
pretty garden, and so to the back of one of the most picturesque houses
in this land of the picturesque. It was built of grey stone which age
had coloured with a tender and an appreciative hand; a rich growth of
ivy and clematis clung lovingly over a greater portion of it so that
the mullioned windows were framed by the dark leaves and the purple
flower. The house was long and rambling and had once been flourishing
and important, but it was now eloquent of decay and pathetic with the
signs of "better times" that had vanished long ago. A flight of worn
steps led to a broad glass door, and opening the latter, the girl
passed under a curved wooden gallery into a broad hall. It was dimly
lit by an oriel window of stained glass, over which the ivy and
clematis had been allowed to fall; there was that faint odour which
emanates from old wood and leather and damask; the furniture was
antique and of the neutral tint which comes from age; the weapons and
the ornaments of brass, the gilding of the great pictures, were all dim
and lack-lustre for want of the cleaning and polishing which require
many servants. In the huge fire-place some big logs were burning, and
Donald and Bess threw themselves down before it with a sigh of
satisfaction. The girl looked round her, just as she had looked round
the stable-yard; then, tossing her soft hat and whip on the old oak
table, she went to one of the large heavy doors, and knocking, said in
her clear voice:

"Father, are you there?"

Inside the room an old man sat at a table. It was littered with books,
some of them open as if he had been consulting them; but before him lay
an open deed, and at his elbow were several others lying on an open
deed-box. He was thin and as faded-looking and as worn with age as the
house and the room, lined with dusty volumes and yellow,
surface-cracked maps and pictures. He wore a long dressing-gown which
was huddled round him as if he were cold, though a fire of logs almost
as large as the one in the hall was burning in the open fire-place.

At the sound of the knock he raised his head, an expression, which was
a mixture of fear and senile cunning came into his lined and pallid
face, his dull eyes peered from under their lids with a flash of sudden
alertness, and with one motion of his long hands he hurriedly folded
the deed before him, crammed it, with the others, into the box, locked
it with a hurried and trembling hand, and placed it in a cupboard,
which he also locked; then he drew one of the large books into the
place were the deed had been, and with a cautious glance round the
room, shuffled to the door, and opened it.

As the girl entered, one would have noticed the resemblance between her
and the old man, and have seen that they were father and daughter; for
Godfrey Heron had been one of the handsomest men of his time, and
though she had got her dark eyes and the firm, delicate lips from her
mother, the clear oval of her face and its expression of aristocratic
pride had come from the Herons.

"Are you here still, father?" she said. "It is nearly dinner-time, and
you are not dressed. You promised me that you would go out: how wicked
of you not to have done so!"

He shuffled back to the table and made a great business of closing the
book.

"I've been busy--reading, Ida," he said. "I did not know it was so
late. You have been out, I see; I hope you have enjoyed your ride. Have
you met anyone?"

"No," she replied; then she smiled, as she added: "Only a poacher."

The old man raised his head, a faint flush came on his face and his
eyes flashed with haughty resentment.

"A poacher! What are the keepers about! Ah, I forgot; there are no
keepers now; any vagrant is free to trespass and poach on Herondale!"

"I'm sorry, father!" she said, laying her hand on his arm soothingly.
"It was not an ordinary poacher, only a gentleman who had mistaken the
Heron water for the Avory's. Come now, father, you have barely time to
dress."

"Yes, yes, I will come in a moment--a moment," he said.

But after she had left the room, he still lingered, and when at last he
got to the door, he closed it and went back to the cupboard and tried
it, to see if it were locked, muttering, suspiciously:

"Did she hear me? She might have heard the rustle of the parchment, the
turn of the lock. Sometimes I think she suspects--But, no, no, she's a
child still, and she'd say something, speak out. No, no; it's all
right. Yes, yes, I'm coming, Ida!" he said aloud, as the girl called to
him on her way up the stairs.




CHAPTER II.

As Stafford climbed the hill steadily, he wondered who the girl was. It
did not occur to him that she might be the daughter of the Mr. Heron to
whom the stream belonged and from whose family name the whole dale had
taken its own; for, though she had looked and spoken like a lady, the
habit, the gauntlets, the soft felt hat were old and weather-stained:
and her familiarity with the proper treatment of a sheep in difficulty
indicated rather the farmer's daughter than that of the squire.

She was not by any means the first pretty girl Stafford had seen--he
had a very large acquaintance in London, and one or two women whose
beauty had been blazoned by the world were more than friendly
with the popular Stafford Orme--but he thought as he went up
the hill, which seemed to have no end, that he had never seen a more
beautiful face than this girl's; certainly he had never seen one which
had impressed him more deeply. Perhaps it was the character of the
loveliness which haunted him so persistently: it was so unlike the
conventional drawing-room type with which he was so familiar.

As he thought of her it seemed to him that she was like a wild and
graceful deer--one of the deer which he had seen coming down to a
mountain stream to drink on his father's Scotch moor; hers was a wild,
almost savage loveliness--and yet not savage, for there had been the
refinement, the dignity of high race in the exquisite grey eyes, the
curve of the finely cut lips. Her manner, also, prevented him from
forgetting her.

He had never met with anything like it, she had been as calm and
self-possessed as a woman of forty; and yet her attitude as she leant
forward in the saddle, her directness of speech, all her movements, had
the _abandon_ of an unconscious child; indeed, the absence of
self-consciousness, her absolute freedom from anything like shyness,
combined with a dignity, a touch of hauteur and pride, struck him as
extraordinary, almost weird.

Stafford was not one of your susceptible young men; in fact, there was
a touch of coldness, of indifference to the other sex which often
troubled his women-friends; and he was rather surprised at himself for
the interest which the girl had aroused in him. He wondered if he
should meet her again, and was conscious of a strong, almost a very
strong, desire to do so which, he admitted to himself, was strange: for
he did not at that moment remember any girl whom, at his first meeting
with her, he had hankered to see again.

He got to the top of the hill at last and began to drop down; there was
nothing but a wandering sheep-path here and there, and the mountain was
by no means as easy to descend as the classic Avernus; so that when he
got to the bottom and came in sight of the little inn nestling in a
crook of the valley he was both tired and hungry. Howard, beautiful in
evening-dress, came sauntering to the door with his long white hands in
his pocket and a plaintive reproach on his Vandyke face.

"I was just about to send off the search party, my dear Stafford," he
said. "Is it possible that you have just come down that hill? Good
heavens! What follies are committed in thy name, O Sport! And of course
there are no fish--there never are! The water is always too thin or too
thick, the sky too bright or too dull, the wind too high or too low.
Excuses are the badge of all the angling tribe."

Stafford took his basket from his shoulder and made a pretence of
slinging it at Howard's head; then tossed it to the landlord, who stood
by, smiling obsequiously.

"Cook some of 'em as soon as you can," he said; then he followed the
neat and also smiling chamber-maid up to his room, where, for all his
pretended indolence and cynicism, Howard had caused his friend's things
to be laid out in readiness for him. Stafford dressed slowly, smoking a
cigarette during the operation, and still thinking of the strange
"farmer's daughter." And then he went down and joined Howard in the
room he had ordered.

Lake hotels may lack the splendour to which we are all growing
accustomed, and of which, alas! we are also growing rather wearied, but
they are most of them extremely comfortable and cosy; and The Woodman
at Carysford was no exception to the rule. Stafford looked round the
low-pitched room, with its old-fashioned furniture, its white
dinner-cloth gleaming softly in the sunset and the fire-light, and
sighed with a nod of satisfaction.

"This is something like, eh, old man?" he said; and even Howard deigned
to nod approvingly.

"Yes," he said. "If anything could compensate one for the miseries of
travel, especially that awful drive, this should do so. I confess I had
looked forward to a crowning discomfort in the shape of a cold and
draughty and smelly room, fried chops or a gory leg of mutton and a
heel of the cheese made by Noah in the Ark. I fancy that we are going
to have a decent dinner; and I trust I may not be disappointed, for it
is about the only thing that will save my life. Are you dry yet? You
looked as if you had been walking through a river instead of beside
it."

"That's just what I have been doing," said Stafford, with a laugh.
"I've had an adventure--"

"I know," interrupted Howard, with a sigh. "You are going to tell me
how you hooked a trout six foot in length, how it dragged you a mile
and a half up the river, how you got it up to the bank, and how, just
as you were landing it, it broke away and was lost. Every man who has
been fishing has that adventure."

Stafford laughed with his usual appreciation of his friend's amusing
cynicism; but he did not correct him; for at that moment, the neat
maid-servant brought in the trout, which proved to be piping hot and of
a golden-brown; and the two men commenced a dinner which, as compared
with the famous, or infamous one, of the London restaurant, was
Olympian. The landlord himself brought in a bottle of claret, which
actually was sound, and another of port, in a wicker cradle, which even
Howard deigned to approve of; and the two men, after they had lingered
over their dinner, got into easy-chairs beside the fire and smoked
their cigars with that sweet contentment which only tobacco can
produce, and only then when it follows a really good meal.

"Do you know how long you are going to stay in your father's little
place?" Howard asked, after a long and dreary silence.

Stafford shrugged his shoulders slightly.

"'Pon my word, I don't know," he answered. "I'm like the school-boy: 'I
don't know nothink.' I suppose I shall stay as long as the governor
does; and, come to that, I suppose he doesn't know how long that will
be. I've got to regard him as a kind of stormy petrel; here to-day and
gone to-morrow, always on the wing, and never resting anywhere for any
time. I'm never surprised when I hear that, though his last letter was
dated Africa, he has flown back to Europe or has run over to
Australia."

"Y-es," said Howard, musingly, "there is an atmosphere of mystery and
romance about your esteemed parent, Sir Stephen Orme, which smacks of
the Arabian Nights, my dear Stafford. Man of the world as I am, I must
confess that I regard him with a kind of wondering awe; and that I
follow his erratic movements very much as one would follow the
celestial progress of a particularly splendacious comet. He never
ceases to be an object of wonderment to me; and I love to read of his
gigantic projects, his vast wealth, his brilliant successes; and I tell
you frankly that I am looking forward to seeing him with a mixture of
fear and curiosity. Do not be surprised, if, at my introduction, I fall
on my hands and knees in Oriental abasement. I have admired him so much
and so long at a distance that he has assumed in my eyes an almost
regal, not to say imperial, importance." "I hope you will like him,"
said Stafford, with a touch of that simplicity which all his friends
liked.

"If he resembles his son, I am sure to do so," said Howard. "Indeed, in
any case I am pretty sure to do so. For how often have I read of his
wonderful charm of manner, his winning smile and brilliant
conversational powers? When do we get to this fairy palace?"

"I suppose if we get there before dinner, it will be time enough,"
replied Stafford. "By the way, I'd better ask how far it is. Don't
ring. I want to go up for some more cigars."

He went up to his room, and in getting them from his bag, saw the
little instrument case which he had thrown into his bag when he was
changing. Back came the vision of the strange girl with the beautiful
face.

He slipped the wallet in his pocket, and when he reached the hall he
turned to the open door of the little room which served as the
landlord's office, or bar-room.

The landlord was enjoying a cigar and a glass of whiskey and water, and
he opened the door still wider and gave a respectful smile of welcome.

"You have a very comfortable hotel here, Mr. Groves," said Stafford, by
way of opening the conversation. "We have had a capital dinner, and
have enjoyed it tremendously; was that '72 port you gave us?"

"Yes, sir," replied Mr. Groves, much gratified. For you go straight to
a landlord's heart when you guess a good vintage and appreciate it. "I
am glad you like it, sir; there's more of it at your service. Will you
take a seat, sir, and may I offer you a glass of whiskey? It is as good
as the port, if I may say so."

Stafford accepted, and presented his cigar case. He asked the distance
to the new house on the other side of the lake, and having been
informed, spoke of the fishing.

"You did very well to-day, sir." said Mr. Groves. "You were fishing in
the Heron water, I suppose?"

This was what Stafford wanted.

"Yes," he said. "I was poaching. I mistook it for the Lesset water. I
must go over and apologise to Mr. Heron. By the way, I was told I was
poaching by a young lady who rode down to the stream while I was
fishing. I had some little conversation with her, but I did not learn
her name. She was a young lady with dark hair, rode a big horse, and
had a couple of dogs with her--a collie and a fox-terrier." The
landlord had nodded assentingly at each item of the description.

"That must have been Miss Ida--Miss Heron, the squire's daughter, sir,"
he said.

Stafford's brows went up.

"No wonder she stared at me," he said, almost to himself. "But are you
sure? The young lady I saw was not dressed, well--like a squire's
daughter, and she was looking after some sheep like--like a farmer's
girl."

The landlord nodded again.

"That was Miss Ida, right enough, sir," he said, with a touch of
respect, and something like pride in his tone. "Indeed, it couldn't be
anyone else. No doubt Miss Ida had come down to look after the sheep in
the valley; and there's no farmer's daughter in the vale that could do
it better, or half so well, as she. There isn't a girl in the county,
or, for that matter, a man, either, who can ride like Miss Ida, or
knows more about the points of a horse or a dog--yes, and you may say a
cow--than the squire's daughter. And as to her being poorly
dressed--well, there's a reason for that, sir. The family's poor--very
poor."

"Yet the dale seems to be called after them?" Stafford remarked.

"It is, sir!" assented the landlord. "At one time they owned more land
than any other of the big families here; miles and miles of it, with
some of the best farms. But that was before my time, though I've heard
my father tell of it; there's not very much left now beyond the dale
and the home meadows." He sighed as he spoke and looked sadly at the
costly cigar which he was smoking. The feudal spirit still exists in
the hearts of the men who were born in these remote dales and towering
hills, and the landlord of the little inn was as proud of the antiquity
of the Heron family, and as sorry for its broken fortune as any
_villein_ of the middle ages could have been for the misfortunes of his
feudal baron.

"Heron Hall used to be a fine place at one time, sir. I can remember my
father describing what it was in his and his father's days; how there
used to be scores of servants, and as many as fifty horses in the
stables; with the great place filled with guests summer and winter,
spring and autumn. The Squire Heron of that time never rode behind less
than four horses, and once, when he was high sheriff, he rode to meet
the judges with six. It was open house to every poor man in the place,
and no wanderer was ever turned from the door. The squire of my
father's time was the county member, and the day he was elected there
were two hogsheads of port and two of brandy broached on the lawn in
front of the terrace; and for a week afterwards there was scarcely a
sober man in the town for miles round. He was master of the hounds, and
the hunt breakfasts and the hunt balls were more splendid than anything
else of that kind in the kingdom; in fact, people used to come from all
parts of the kingdom to attend them. Yes, the Herons made Herondale
famous, as you may say, sir."

He paused and shook his head, and Stafford remained silent: he was too
wise to break in upon the narrative. The landlord sighed and looked
lovingly at his cigar, then went on:

"They offered that squire--Miss Ida's grandfather--a peerage; the
Herons had often been offered a baronetcy; but they'd always refused,
and the squire declined the peerage. He said that no man could wish to
be higher than Heron, of Herondale; that better men than he had been
contented with it, and he was quite satisfied with the rank which had
satisfied his forefathers. When he died, the followers at the funeral
made a procession a mile and a quarter long."

"How did the family lose its money, drop its greatness?" Stafford
asked.

The landlord screwed up his eyes thoughtfully.

"Well, it's hard to tell, sir," he replied. "Of course there was always
a tremendous drain going on; for it was not only down here that the
squire spent the money freely; but it was just the same or worse when
he was in London; he had a big house there, and entertained as
splendidly, perhaps more so, than he did at the Hall. In those days,
too, sir, there was as much gaming and betting as there is now, perhaps
more--though I'm told that great folks are more given nowadays to
gambling on the Stock Exchange than at cards or race-horses; begging
your pardon, sir!"

"I'm afraid you're right," assented Stafford, with his short laugh. "I
prefer the old way myself."

"Just so, sir," said the landlord, with an approving nod. "Well, what
with the money going here and there and everywhere, they found when the
present squire's father died that there was very little left; and worse
than all, that some of the land was sold, and what remained was heavily
mortgaged. It's what often happens to old families, sir, more's the
pity!"

"Yes," said Stafford. "And is the present squire like his father?"

"No, sir, not a bit," replied the landlord, with a thoughtful and
somewhat puzzled frown. "Quite the reverse. His father was free and
easy with everybody, and had a pleasant word and shake of the hand for
everyone he met; but the present squire was always shy and quiet as a
boy; kind of reserved and stand-offish, if you know what I mean, sir.
When he came into the property, he became more reserved than ever,
avoided all his father's old friends and shut himself up at the Hall
and kept himself to himself. He was a college gentleman and fond of
books, and he spent all his time alone in his library like a--a hermit.
He went abroad for a time, to Italy, they thought, and he came back
with a wife; but she didn't make things more lively, for she died soon
after Miss Ida was born. Miss Ida was the only child. She was sent away
for some time to be taken care of by one of the relatives, and she's
only been back for a couple of years."

"Poor girl," said Stafford, involuntarily.

"Well, yes, you may say that, sir," said the landlord, but doubtfully,
"though it don't seem as if Miss Ida was in need of much pity; she is
so bright and--and high-spirited, as you may say; though it's a wonder
she can be so, seeing the life she leads, alone in that great place
with her father, who never goes beyond the garden, and who shuts
himself up with his books all day. Yes, it's a wonder, when you come to
think of it, that she can smile and laugh and be as cheerful as she is.
I often hear her singing when she's riding through the dale or along
the road here. Miss Ida's wonderfully liked by all the people, sir; in
fact, you might say that they worship her."

"I can understand it," said Stafford, almost to himself.

"It must have been great change to her," continued the landlord,
"coming down here from London to such a wild, out-of-the-way place;
many young ladies would have lost heart and pined and fretted; but
she's a true Heron, is Miss Ida, and she faced the thing fairly and
buckled to, as you may say. She took the whole thing on her shoulders,
and though she couldn't coax the squire out of his shell, she takes
care of him and runs the whole place as if she were a man. Yes, sir,
though she's only a girl, as you saw yourself, she manages the house
and the farm as if she were a woman of forty. It's wonderful how she's
picked it up. I honestly believe there isn't a man in the place as
knows more about horses, as I said, than she does; but that's in the
blood, sir, and she can ride--well, you saw for yourself."

"And has she no society, no amusements; doesn't she go out, have
friends, I mean?"

The landlord shook his head.

"No, sir; she just lives there with the squire, and they see no one,
receive no visits and pay none. You see, sir, the Herons are proud;
they're got cause to be, and I've heard it told that the squire is too
proud to let the old family friends see the poverty of the house, and
that he hates the new people who bought land and built houses in the
place--I'm sure I beg your pardon, sir--I was forgetting for the moment
that your father, Sir Stephen, had just built that beautiful place the
other side of the lake."

Stafford smiled.

"That's all right, Mr. Groves," he said. "I can quite understand Mr.
Heron thinking it confounded cheek of a stranger to come here and stick
up a great white place which no one can fail to see five miles off. I
suppose you think if I were to present myself at the Hall, I should get
a very cold reception, eh?"

"I'm afraid you wouldn't get any reception at all, sir," replied
Groves, with respectful candour. "I am afraid neither Mr. Heron nor
Miss Ida would see you. The old butler would just say: 'Not at home,'
as he says to the county people when they try and call there,
especially if they knew who you were, sir. If I remember rightly, the
part of the land Sir Stephen bought belonged to the Herons."

"I see," said Stafford. "It strikes me it is rather a sad story, Mr.
Groves; it's a case of the children paying for the sins of their
fathers."

"That's it, sir," assented the landlord. "It takes ages to build up a
house and a family like the Herons; but one man can knock it down, so
to speak. It's hard lines for Miss Ida, who is as well-born as any of
the titled people in the county, and far better than most. They say
that she's been wonderful well educated, too; though, of course, she
hasn't seen anything of the world, having come straight from some small
place in foreign parts to be shut up in the dale. And it's quite out of
the world here, sir, especially in the winter when the snow lies so
thick that we're almost imprisoned. But wet or fine, hot or cold, Miss
Ida can always be seen riding or driving or walking; she's a regular
Westmoreland lass for that; no weather frights her."

At this juncture Howard sauntered out of the sitting-room, and he and
Stafford went to the open door and looked out on the exquisite view
which was now bathed in the soft light of a newly risen moon.

"It still has a smack of Drury Lane, hasn't it?" said Howard. "Strange
that whenever we see anything beautiful in the way of a landscape we at
once compare it with a stage 'set.' The fact of it is, my dear
Stafford, we have become absolutely artificial; we pretend to admire
Nature, but we are thinking of a theatre all the time; we throw up our
eyes ecstatically when we hear a nightingale, but we much prefer a
comic singer at the Tivoli. We talk sentiment, at feast, some of us,
but we have ceased to feel it; we don't really know what it means. I
believe some of the minor poets still write about what they call Love,
but in my private opinion the thing itself has become instinct. Who
knows anything about it? Take yourself, for instance; you've never been
in love, you've everything that you can desire, you're clad in purple
and fine linen, you fare sumptuously every day, you flirt six days in
the week, and rest not on the seventh--but love! You don't know what it
means; and if you do, you're far too wise in your generation to go in
for such an uncomfortable emotion."

Stafford smiled rather absently; he was scarcely listening; he was so
accustomed to Howard's cynical diatribes that more often than not they
made no more impression on him than water on a duck's back. Besides, he
was thinking of Ida Heron, the girl whose strange history he had just
been listening to.

There was silence for a minute or two, and while they stood leaning
against the door-way two men came out of another door in the inn and
stood talking. They were commercial travellers, and they were enjoying
their pipes--of extremely strong tobacco--after a hard day's work.
Presently one of them said:

"Seen that place of Sir Stephen Orme's on the hill? Splendacious, isn't
it? Must have cost a small fortune. I wonder what the old man's game
is."

The other man shook his head, and laughed.

"Of course he's up to some game. He wouldn't lay out all that money for
nothing, millionaire as he is. He's always got something up his sleeve.
Perhaps he's going to entertain some big swell he wants to get into his
net, or some of the foreign princes he's hand-in-glove with. You never
know what Sir Stephen Orme's up to. Perhaps he's going to stand for the
county; if so, he's bound to get in. He always succeeds, or, if he
don't, you don't hear of his failures. He's the sort of man Disraeli
used to write about in his novels. One of the chaps who'd go through
fire and water to get their ends; yes, and blood too, if it's
necessary. There's been some queer stories told about him; they say he
sticks at nothing. Look at that last Turkish concession."

The speaker and his companion sauntered down the road. Stafford and
Howard had heard every word; but Stafford looked straight before him,
and made no sign, and Howard yawned as if he had not heard a syllable.


"Do you raise any objection to my going to my little bed, Stafford?" he
asked. "I suppose, having done nothing more than clamber about a river,
get wet through, and tramp a dozen miles over hills, you do not feel
tired."

"No," said Stafford, "I don't feel like turning in just yet.
Good-night, old man."

When Howard had gone Stafford exchanged his dress-coat for a
shooting-jacket, and with the little wallet in his pocket and his pipe
in his mouth, he strode up the road. As he said, he did not feel
tired--it was difficult for Stafford, with his athletic frame and
perfect muscular system, to get tired under any circumstances--the
night was one of the loveliest he had ever seen, and it seemed wicked
to waste it by going to bed, so he walked on, all unconsciously going
in the direction of Heron Hall. The remarks about his father which had
fallen from the bagman, stuck to him for a time like a burr: it isn't
pleasant to hear your father described as a kind of charlatan and
trickster, and Stafford would have liked to have collared the man and
knocked an apology out of him; but there are certain disadvantages
attached to the position of gentlemen, and one of them is that you have
to pretend to be deaf to speeches that were not intended for your ears;
so Stafford could not bash the bagman for having spoken disrespectfully
of the great Sir Stephen Orme.

But presently, almost suddenly, Stafford came in sight of the
magnificent iron gates, and he forgot his father and the talkative
commercial traveller, and his interest in the girl of the dale flashed
back upon him with full force. He saw that the gates were chained and
locked, and, with a natural curiosity, he followed the road beside the
wall. It stopped almost abruptly and gave place to a low railing which
divided the lawn in front of the house from the park beyond; and the
long irregular facade of the old building was suddenly revealed.


CHAPTER III.

Stafford looked at it with admiration mingled with pity. In the light
of the story the landlord had told him he realised the full pathos of
its antique grandeur. It was not a ruin by any means: but it was grim
with the air of neglect, of desolation, of solitude. In two only, of
the many windows, was there any light; there was no sound of life about
the vast place; and the moonlight showed up with cruel distinctness the
ravages made in stone-work and wood-work by the clawlike hand of Time.
A capital of one of the pillars of the still handsome portico had
crumbled, several of the pillars were broken and askew; the great door
was blistered and cracked by the sun; evidently no paint had touched
the place for years. The stone balustrade of the broad terrace had
several gaps in it, and the coping and the pillars were lying where
they had fallen; the steps of the terrace had grass growing in the
interstices of the stones; one of the lions which had flanked the steps
had disappeared, and the remaining one was short of a front leg. The
grass on the lawn was long and unkempt, the flower beds weedy and
straggly, and the flowers themselves growing wild and untrained.

But for the smoke which ascended from two or three of the many chimneys
the place might well have seemed deserted and uninhabited, and Stafford
with this feeling upon him stood and gazed at the place unrestrainedly.
It was difficult for him to realise that only a few hours ago he had
left London, that only last night he had dined at his club and gone to
the big Merrivale dance; it was as if he were standing in some scene of
the middle ages; he would not have been greatly surprised if the
grass-grown terrace had suddenly become crowded by old-world forms in
patches and powder, hoops and ruffles.

"Good Lord, what would some of the people I know give to belong to--to
own this place!" he said to himself. "To think of that girl living
alone here with her father!"

He was turning away when he heard a slight sound, the great door opened
slowly, and "that girl" came out on to the terrace. She stood for a
moment on the great marble door sill, then she crossed the terrace, and
leaning on the balustrade, looked dreamily at the moonlit view which
lay before her. She could not see Stafford's tall figure, which was
concealed by the shadow of one of the trees; and she thought herself
alone, as usual. Her solitude did not sadden her, she was accustomed to
it; and presently, as if moved by the exquisite beauty of the night,
her lips parted and she half sang, half hummed the jewel song from
"Faust." She had looked beautiful enough in her old riding-habit and
hat, but she seemed a vision of loveliness as she stood in the
moonlight with the old house for a background. There was something
bewitchingly virginal in the rapt and dreamy face with its dark eyes
and long lashes, in the soft, delicately cut lips, the pure ivory
pallor; at the same time something equally bewitching in the modernness
of her dress, which was of soft cream cashmere, made rather long and in
accord with the present fashion; she had placed a rose in the bosom of
her dress and it stood out redly, richly from the soft cream. Her hair
was no longer rough and touzled by the wind, but brushed in rippling
smoothness and coiled in dainty neatness in the nape of her graceful
neck. No wonder Stafford caught his breath, held it, as it were, as he
gazed at the exquisite picture, which formed so striking a contrast to
her surroundings.

She leant her chin on her hand and looked before her as she sung
softly; and at that moment her thoughts strayed from the question of
what she should do to keep the cows from the lawn, to the young man who
had rescued her lamb for her. She did not think of him with anything
like interest or curiosity, but she was recalling the ludicrous picture
he made as he struggled to the bank with the lamb in his arms, and a
faint smile crossed her face. At this moment Donald and Bess strolled
out to join her. They would much have preferred to have remained
roasting themselves in front of the Hall fire, but, ridiculous as it
was for their mistress to leave the warm house for the comparatively
cold terrace, they felt themselves in duty bound to join her.
Perhaps they might catch sight of a rabbit to repay them for
their exertions. Donald walked with stately steps toward his
mistress, and Bess was following, with a shiver of reluctance
and a backward glance towards the fire-light which shone through
the open door, when suddenly she sniffed the presence of a
stranger, and, with a sharp yap, hurled herself down the broad steps
and towards the spot where Stafford still stood. Donald, with a loud
bay, followed with his long stride, and Ida, startled from her reverie,
followed as far as the top of the steps, and waited.

"I might have expected the faithful watch-dog," said Stafford to
himself. "Now, what on earth am I to do? I suppose they'll spring on
me--the collie, at any rate. It's no use running; I've got to stop and
face it. What a confounded nuisance! nuisance! But it serves me right.
I've no business to be loafing about the place."

As the dogs came up, he put on that air of conciliation which we all
know, and murmuring "Good dog! All right, old chap!" tried to pacify
Donald and Bess. But they were not accustomed to intruders, especially
at that time of night, and they were legitimately furious. Dancing
round him, and displaying dazzling teeth threateningly, they drew
nearer and nearer, and they would certainly have sprung upon him; but
the girl came, not running, but quickly, down the steps and straight
across the dewy grass towards them, calling to the dogs as she came in
her clear, low voice, which had not a trace of fear in it. Their loud
barking changed to sullen growls as she approached; and, motioning them
to be still, she stopped and gazed at Stafford, who stepped out into
the moonlight.

She said not a word, but, as she recognised him, a faint colour came
into the ivory pallor of her cheek and an expression of surprise in the
dark, fearless eyes.

Stafford raised his cap.

"I am very sorry!" he said. "I am afraid you must think me a great
nuisance; this is the second time I have been guilty of trespass."

She was silent for a moment, not with shyness, but as if she were
noticing the change in his dress, and wondering how he came to be in
evening-clothes, and where he had come from. The expression was one of
simple girlish curiosity, which softened in a delicious way the general
pride and hauteur of her face.

"You are not trespassing," she said, and the voice sounded very sweet
and musical after the din of the dogs. "There is public right of way
along this road."

"I am immensely relieved," said Stafford. "It looks so unfrequented,
that I was afraid it was private, and that I had made another blunder;
all the same, I am very sorry that I should have disturbed you and made
the dogs kick up such a row. I would have gone on or gone back if I had
known you were coming out; but the place looked so quiet--"

"It does not matter," she said; "they bark at the slightest noise, and
we are used to it. The place is so quiet because only my father and I
live here, and there are only a few servants, and the place is so big."

All this was said not repiningly, but softly and a little dreamily. By
this time Donald and Bess had recovered their tempers, and after a
close inspection of the intruder had come to the conclusion that he was
of the right sort, and Donald was sitting close on his launches beside
Stafford, and thrusting his nose against Stafford's hand invitingly.
The girl's beauty seemed to Stafford almost bewildering, and yet softly
and sweetly a part of the beauty of the night; he was conscious of a
fear, that was actually a dread, that she would bow, call the dogs and
leave him; so, before she could do so, he made haste to say:

"Now I am here, will you allow me to apologise for my trespass of this
afternoon?"

She inclined her head slightly.

"It does not matter," she said; "you were very kind in helping me with
the lamb; and I ought to have told you that my father would be very
glad if you would fish in the Heron; you will find some better trout
higher up the valley."

"Thank you very much," said Stafford.

Calling the dogs, she turned away; then, fortunately, Stafford
remembered the case of instruments.

"Oh, I beg your pardon!" he said; "I forgot this wallet. I found it by
the stream after you had gone."

"Oh, my wallet!" she cried. "I am so glad you have found it. I don't
know what I should have done if you had not; I should have had to send
to Preston or to London; and, besides, it was a present from the old
veterinary surgeon; he left it to me. There were some beautiful
instruments in it."

Still smiling, she opened it, as if to show him. Stafford drew near, so
near as to become conscious of the perfume of the rose in her bosom, of
the still fainter but more exquisite perfume of her hair. He bent over
the case in silence, and while they were looking a cloud sailed across
the moon.

The sudden disappearance of the light roused her, as it were, to a
sense of his presence.

"Thank you for bringing it to me," she said; "it was very good of you."

"Oh, I hadn't to bring it far," said Stafford. "I am staying at The
Woodman Inn, at Carysford."

"Oh," she said; "you are a tourist--you are fishing?"

Stafford could not bring himself to say that he was the son of the man
who had built the great white house, which, no doubt, her father and
she resented.

"You have a very beautiful place here," he said, after a pause.

She turned and looked at the house in the dim light, with a touch of
pride in her dreamy eyes.

"Yes," she said, as if it were useless to deny the fact.

"It is very old, and I ma very fond--"

She stopped suddenly, her lips apart, her eyes fixed on the farther end
of the terrace; for while she had been speaking a figure, only just
perceptible in the semi-darkness, had moved slowly across the end of
the terrace, paused for a moment at the head of the flight of steps,
and then slowly descended.

Stafford also saw it, and glancing at her he saw that she was startled,
if not frightened. She scarcely seemed to breathe, and she turned her
large, dark eyes upon him questioningly, somewhat appealingly.

"What is that?" she said, in a whisper, more to herself than to him.

"Someone--a man has gone down the steps from the house," he said.
"Don't you know who it is?"

"No," she replied in as low a voice. "It is not Jason--there is no one
else--who can it be? I will go and see."

She moved towards the terrace, and Stafford said:

"I will come with you; you will let me?"

She did not refuse; indeed, she appeared to have forgotten his
presence: together they crossed the lawn and reached the corner of the
house near which the figure had disappeared. It struck Stafford as
strange that the dogs did not bark. In profound silence they went in
the direction the figure had taken, and Stafford presently saw a ruined
building, which had evidently been a chapel. As they approached it the
figure came out of it and towards them. As it passed them, so close
that they instinctively drew back, Stafford saw that it was an old man
in a dressing-gown; his head was bare, his hair touched the collar of
the gown. His eyes were wide open, and gazing straight in front of him.

Stafford was about to step forward and arrest his progress, when
suddenly the girl's hand seized his and gripped it.

"Hush!" she whispered, with subdued terror. "It is my father. He--yes,
he is asleep! Oh, see, he is asleep! He will fall--hurt himself--"

She, in her turn, was about to spring forward, but Stafford caught her
arm.

"No, no, you must not!" he said, in a hurried whisper. "I think it
would be dangerous. I think he is all right if you let him alone. He is
walking in his sleep. Don't speak--don't cry out."

"No, no," she breathed. "But it is dreadful."

Instinctively, unconsciously, she drew closer to Stafford, almost clung
to him, watching her father over her shoulder until the figure, with
its ghastly, mechanical movement and vacant stare, had passed into the
house; then, with a long breath, and with her hands clasping her
throat, as if she were stifling, she broke from Stafford and sprang
quickly and noiselessly up the steps and disappeared also. Wondering
whether he was awake or dreaming, Stafford waited for over an hour to
see if she would appear again; and he was turning away at last, when
her figure appeared in the open door-way, like that of a wraith. She
waved her hand to him, then disappeared, and the door closed.

Still asking himself if he were not in a land of dreams, but tingling
with the touch of her small hand, with the haunting perfume of the soft
black hair, Stafford gained the road and walked towards the inn.




CHAPTER IV.


Ida had followed her father across the terrace, across the hall, lit
weirdly by the glow of the sinking fire and the pale moonlight, up the
broad stairs, along the corridor to the open door of his room. He had
walked slowly but steadily with his usual gait, and his head bent
slightly; though his eyes were wide open, he seemed to see nothing, yet
he did not stumble or even hesitate. Ida followed behind him with
absolute noiselessness. They were both ghostlike in their movements,
and the dogs stood and watched them intently, ears erect, and with that
gravity in their eyes which dogs wear when they are puzzled.

The old man closed his door softly, still without any hesitation, and
Ida, grasping the broad rail of the staircase, waited breathlessly. She
heard him moving about, as leisurely and precisely as before; then all
was still. She stole to the door and opened it; the light was streaming
into the room and fell athwart the bed in which he was lying, his eyes
closed, his face calm and peaceful; she went on tiptoe to the bed and
bent over him, and found that he was in a deep, profound sleep. With a
long breath of relief, she left him, and sat on the stairs and waited;
for it was just possible that he might rise again and resume the
dreadful walk--that motion of death in life.

She waited for an hour, so absorbed in her anxiety that she did not
remember the man she had left outside. After another quarter of an hour
she went to her father's room, and found that he was still sleeping.
Then she remembered Stafford, remembered him with a start of discomfort
and embarrassment. Was he waiting there still? She went down-stairs,
and from the open door-way she saw dimly his figure under the trees.
There was something in the attitude of the erect figure that reminded
her of a soldier on guard, a sentinel standing faithful at his post;
and when she had waved her hand in dismissal she did not quite close
the door, but watched him through the narrow opening as he paced slowly
down the road, looking back at the house now and again as if to see if
she wanted him.

Then she closed the door, signed to the dogs to be down before the
fire, and went up to her room, after pausing beside her father's door
and listening to his regular breathing. Her room was a large
one--nearly all the rooms in the place were large; and as she undressed
herself slowly she looked round it with a novel sense of loneliness.
The tall shadows of her graceful yet girlish figure were cast
grotesquely on the wall by the candles beside her glass. She had never
felt lonely before, though her life ever since she had arrived at the
Hall might be called one almost of solitude.

She had been so absorbed in the duties which had so suddenly fallen
upon her young shoulders that there had been no time in which to feel
the want of companionship. There had always been something to think of,
something to do; her father demanded so much attention; the house, the
land, the farm--she had to look after them all; there had not been time
to think even of herself; and it had never occurred to her that she was
leading a life so different to that led by most girls. But to-night the
silence of the great house, large enough to hold fifty people, but
sheltering only five persons--her father and herself and the three
servants--weighed upon her.

That sense of loneliness had come upon her suddenly as she had watched
the young man's retreating figure. She could not help thinking of him
even when her mind was oppressed with anxiety on her father's account.
In a vague way she remembered how kind this stranger had been; how
quietly, and with what an air of protection, he had stood by her and
restrained her from crying out and alarming her father. As vaguely, she
remembered that in the moment of her terror she had clung to him, had
forgotten under the great strain that he was a stranger--and a man.
Even now she did not know his name, knew nothing of him except that he
was staying at The Woodman Inn.

Kind and considerate as he had been she thought of him with something
like resentment; it was as if he had stepped into her life, had
intruded upon its quiet uneventfulness. He had no right to be there, no
right, to have seen her father in that terrible condition, that death
in life. And she had behaved like a frightened servant-maid; had not
only clung to him--had she clung to him, or was it only fancy?--but had
left him without a word of thanks, had allowed him to wait there, and
then had waved her hand to him just as she had seen Jessie, the maid,
wave her hand to her "young man" after they had parted, and she was
going into the house.

She bit her lip softly and a faint flush rose to the clear pallor of
the lovely, girlish face reflected in the glass. Yes, she had behaved
just like a servant-maid, she who in her heart of hearts knew that she
prided herself upon her dignity and the good manners which should
belong to a Heron of Herondale. It was characteristic of her that while
she thought of his conduct and what she considered her bad behaviour,
she gave no thought to the fact that the stranger who had so "intruded"
was singularly handsome and possessed of that strange quality which at
once impresses women. Most girls would have remembered the fact, but
Ida was different to the general run of her sex. She had been brought
up in an out-of-the-way place in which the modern novel, the
fashionable pastime of flirtation, were not known; and her secluded
life in the lonely dale had deepened that sense of aloofness from the
world, that indifference to the sentiment which lurks in most girls'
bosoms. This tall, handsome man who had stepped into her life and
shared the secret of her father's strange affliction, weakness, was
nothing more to her than one of the other tourists whom she sometimes
chanced to see on her lonely rides and walks.

When she had undressed she went again to her father's door and listened
to his deep and regular breathing; then, at last, she went to bed; but
the sense of loneliness was so intense that she lay awake for hours
thinking of that bent figure walking in its sleep from the shadows of
the ruined chapel. For the future she would have to watch her father
closely, would perhaps have to lock the door of his room. Why had he
gone to the chapel? So far as she knew he was not in the habit of going
there; indeed, she did not remember having seen him go there in his
waking moments. She knew nothing of somnambulism; but she imagined that
he had gone in that direction by mere chance, that if he had happened
to find any impediment in his way he might as easily have gone in
another direction.

She fell asleep at last and slept an hour beyond her usual time, and so
deeply that Jessie had filled the cold bath without waking her beloved
young mistress. Ida dressed quickly, all the incidents of the preceding
night rushing through her mind, and hurried to her father's room; the
door was open, the room empty, and, with a sudden fear, she ran down
the stairs and found him in his usual seat in the library. She drew a
long breath and went and kissed him, wishing him good-morning as
casually as she could.

"You are up early this morning, father," she said, trying to keep her
tone free from any anxiety.

He glanced at the clock calmly.

"No, you are later," he said.

His eyes met hers with their usual expression of absentminded serenity.

"I--I was a little tired and overslept myself," she said. "Are--are you
quite well this morning, father?"

"Yes, quite well. Why not?" he replied, with slight surprise.

She drew a breath of relief: it was quite evident that he knew nothing
of that weird walk, and that it had not affected him injuriously.

"Nothing," she said, forcing a smile.

As she spoke, Jason, in his in-door livery, which, in some strange way,
looked as if it had shrunken with the figure which had worn, it so
long, came to the door, and in his husky voice said that breakfast was
ready; and Ida, taking her father's arm, led him into the dining-room
in which all their meals were served.

As she went to her place she glanced through the window, from which she
could see the steps at the corner of the terrace and a small part of
the ruined chapel, and she shuddered.

When she had poured out her father's coffee, she took it round to him
and let her hand rest on his shoulder lovingly; but Jason had brought
in the post-bag and Mr. Heron was unlocking it and taking out the few
letters and papers, and seemed unconscious of the little anxious
caress.

"Are there any for me, father?" she asked, lingering beside him, and
she stretched out her hand to turn the envelopes on their right side;
but he stopped her quickly and swept them together, covering them with
his long hand--the shapely Heron hand.

"No, no," he said, almost sharply; "they are all for me; they are
business letters, booksellers' catalogues, sale catalogues--nothing of
importance."

She went back to her place and he waited until she had done so before
he began to open the letters. He merely glanced at some of them, but
presently he came to one which, after a sharp, quick look at her, he
read attentively; then he returned it to its envelope and, with a
secretive movement, slipped it into the pocket of his dressing-gown.
"Yes, nothing but catalogues and bills; you'd better take them, Ida;
the bills, at any rate."

And he threw them across to her.

When she had first come home to be mistress of the Hall the bills had
overwhelmed her; they had been so many and the money to meet them had
been so inadequate; but she had soon learnt how to "finance" them, and
come to know which account must be paid at once, and which might be
allowed to stand over.

She took them now and glanced at them, and the old man watched her
covertly, with a curious expression on his face.

"I'm sure I don't know how you will pay them," he said, as if she alone
were responsible.

"I can't pay all of them at once," she replied, cheerfully. "But I can
some, and the rest must wait. I can send four--perhaps five--of the
steers to the monthly market, and then there are the sheep--Oh, father,
I did not tell; you about the gentleman I saw fishing in the dale--"

She stopped, for she saw that he was not listening. He had opened a
local paper and was reading it intently, and presently he looked up
with an eager flush on his face and a sudden lightening of the dull
eyes.

"Have you seen this--this house--they call it a palace--which that man
has built on the lake side?" he asked, his thin voice quavering with
resentment.

"Do you mean the big white house by Brae Wood?"

"Yes. Judging by the description of it here, it must be a kind of
gim-crack villa like those one sees in Italy, built by men resembling
this--this _parvenu_."

"It is a large place," said Ida; "but I don't think it is gim-crack,
father. It looks very solid though it is white and, yes, Continental.
It is something between a tremendous villa and a palace. Why are you so
angry? I know you don't like to have new houses built in Bryndermere;
but this is some distance from us--we cannot see it from here, or from
any part of the grounds, excepting the piece by the lake."

"It is built on our land," he said, more quietly, but with the flush
still on his face, the angry light in his eyes. "It was bought by
fraud, obtained under false pretences. I sold it to one of the farmers,
thinking he wanted it and would only use it for grazing. I did not know
until the deeds were signed that he was only the jackal for this other
man."

"What other man, father?"

"This Stephen Orme. He's _Sir_ Stephen Orme now. They knighted him.
They knight every successful tradesman and schemer; and this man is a
prince of his tribe; a low-born adventurer, a _parvenu_ of the worst
type."

"I think I have read something about him in the newspapers," said Ida,
thoughtfully.

Mr. Heron emitted a low snarl.

"No doubt; he is one whom the world delights to honour; it bows before
the successful charlatan, and cringes to his ill-gotten wealth. I'm
told that such a man is received, yes, and welcomed by society.
Society! The word is a misnomer. In my time a man of that class was
kept at arm's-length, was relegated to his proper place--the back hall;
but now"--he gazed angrily at the paper--"here is a whole column
describing Sir Stephen Orme's new 'palatial villa,' and giving an
account of his achievements, the success of his great undertakings. And
this man has chosen to build his eyesore on Heron lands, within sight
of the house which--which he would not have been permitted to enter. If
I had known, I would not have sold the land."

"But you wanted the money, father," she said, gently.

He looked at her swiftly, and a change came over his face, a look of
caution, almost of cunning.

"Eh? Yes, yes, of course I wanted it. But he knew I should not have
sold it for building on; that is why he got Bowden, the farmer, to buy
it. It was like him: only such a man can be capable of such an
underhand act. And now I suppose he will be welcomed by his neighbours,
and the Vaynes and the Bannerdales, and made much of. They'll eat his
dinners, and their women will go to his balls and concerts--they whose
fathers would have refused to sit at the same table with him. But there
is one house at which he will not be welcome; one man who will not
acknowledge him, who will not cross the threshold of Sir Stephen Orme's
brand-new palace, or invite him to enter his own. He shall not darken
the doors of Heron Hall."

He rose as he spoke and left the room with a quicker step than usual.
But half an hour later when Ida went into the library she found him
absorbed in his books as usual, and he only glanced up at her with
absent, unseeing eyes, as she stood beside him putting on her gloves,
her habit skirt caught up under her elbow, the old felt hat just a
little askew on the soft, silky hair.

"Do you want anything before I go out, father?" she asked.

"No, no!" he replied abstractedly, and bending over his book again as
he answered. Ida crossed the hall in the sunlight, which lit up her
beauty and made it seem a more striking contrast than usual to the dull
and grim surroundings of the dark oak, the faded hangings and the
lack-lustre armour, and Donald and Bess bounded, barking, before her
down the terrace at which Jason was holding thy big chestnut. The horse
pricked up its ears and turned its head for her morning caress, the
touch of the small, soft, but firm hand which it had come to regard as
its due, and Ida sprang lightly from the last step into the saddle. It
was an informal way of mounting which few girls could have accomplished
gracefully; but Ida did it as naturally and as easily as a circus
rider, for the trick was a necessity to her who had so often to
dismount and mount alone.

The lovely face was rather grave and thoughtful for some time after she
had started, for the remembrance of last night weighed upon her, and
her father's unusual display of anger at breakfast troubled her
vaguely; but, presently, after she had cleared a hedge and one of the
broken rails, her spirits rose: the sky was so blue, the sun so bright;
it was hard to be depressed on such a morning.

She rode to a distant part of the dale where, in a rough meadow the
steers were grazing; she surveyed them critically, chose those that
should go to market, then turned, and leaping a bank, gained an
ill-kept road. A little farther on she came to an opening on the verge
of the lake, and she pulled up, arrested by the great white house on
the other side, which was literally glittering in the brilliant
sunlight. It certainly did not detract from the beauty of the view; in
fact, it made the English lake look, for the moment, like an Italian
one.

She regarded it thoughtfully for a moment, then returned to the road,
and as she did so she saw a tall figure coming towards her.

For an instant the colour rose to her face, but for an instant only,
and before Stafford had reached her, she was as pale, as calm as usual.
She noticed that he was dressed in a serge suit, noticed vaguely how
well it sat upon him, that his gait had a peculiar ease and grace which
the men of the dale lacked, that his handsome face flushed lightly as
he saw her; but she gave no sign of these quick apprehensions, and sat
cold and sphinx-like waiting for him.

Strafford's heart leapt at sight of her with a sudden pleasure which
puzzled him; for he would not have admitted to himself that he had
walked in this direction in the hope, on the chance, of meeting her.

"Good-morning," he said, in his direct fashion, raising his cap. "I am
very fortunate to meet you. I hope Mr. Heron is no worse for--is not
ill?"

"No," she said in her low, clear voice. "My father is quite well; he is
just as he usually is this morning."

"I am very glad," said Stafford. He stood close beside the horse and
looked up at her; and for the first time in his life he was trying to
keep the expression of admiration out of his eyes; the expression which
he knew most women welcomed, but which, somehow or other, he felt this
strange girl would resent. "I was afraid he would be upset. I am afraid
you were frightened last night--it was enough to alarm, to startle
anyone. What a splendid morning!" he went on, quickly, as if he did not
want to remind her of the affair. "What a libel it is to say that it is
always raining here! I've never seen so brilliant a sunshine or such
colours: don't wonder that the artists rave about the place and are
never tired of painting it."

She waited until he had finished, her eyes downcast, as if she knew why
he had turned from the subject, then she raised them and looked at him
with her direct gaze.

"I am glad I have met you," she said. "I wanted to thank you for your
kindness last night--"

"Oh, but--" Stafford tried to break in, but she went on slowly, as if
he had not spoken.

--"I was--frightened: it was sudden, so unexpected. My father had never
done it before--that I know of--and he looked"--her voice broke for a
moment--"so strange, so ghost-like. I thought at first that it was the
Heron ghost which, they say, haunts the dale, though I have never seen
it."

A faint smile curved her lips and shone in her eyes, and Stafford was
so fascinated by the sudden gleam of girlishness that he had to bend
and pat Bess, who was planting dusty impression on his trousers in her
frantic efforts to gain his attention.

"I did nothing; in fact, as I walked away I was fuming because I
couldn't help you--couldn't do more."

"You did help me," she said, gravely; then she looked across the lake
to Sir Stephen's "little place." "I was admiring that new house. Don't
you think it is very beautiful, rising so white and gracefully above
the lake?"

"Ye-es," said Stafford, "Rather--conspicuous, though, isn't it?"

She laughed suddenly, and Stafford asked, with surprise: "Why did you
laugh?"

"Oh, I was thinking of my father," she said, with a delicious
frankness; "he was quite angry about it this morning. It seems that it
is built on our land--or what was ours--and he dislikes the idea of
anyone building at Bryndermere."

"So should I," said Stafford, laconically.

"And besides," she went on, her eyes fixed on the great white building,
so that she did not see his embarrassment, "my father does not like the
man who built it. He thinks that he got the land unfairly; and he--my
father--calls him all sorts of hard names."

Stafford bit his lips, and his face wore the expression which came into
it when he was facing an ugly jump. He would have shirked this one if
he could, but it had to be faced, so he rushed it.

"I'm sorry," he said. "My father built it."

She did not start, but she turned her head and looked at him, with a
sudden coldness in the glorious eyes.

"Your father--Sir Stephen Orme? Then you are--"

"I am his son, yes; my name is Stafford Orme."

She gathered her reins up, as if no comment, no remark were necessary,
but Stafford could not let her go, could not part from her like that.

"I'm sorry to hear that Mr. Heron has some cause of complaint, some
grievance against my father. I can understand his not liking the house;
to tell you the truth, I don't care for it much myself. Yes; I can
understand Mr. Heron's annoyance; I suppose he can see it from your
house?"

"No," she said, simply. "This is the only part of our land from which
it can be seen, and my father never comes here: never leaves the
grounds, the garden." She paused a moment. "I don't know why you should
mind--except that I said that the land was got unfairly--I wish I had
not said that."

Stafford coloured.

"So do I," he said; "but I hope it isn't true. There may be some
mistake. I don't know anything about my father's affairs--I haven't
seen him for years; I am almost a stranger to him."

She listened with a grave face, then she touched the big chestnut; but
Stafford, almost unconsciously, laid his hand on the rein nearest him.
His mouth and chin expressed the determination which now and again
surprised even his most intimate friends.

"Miss Heron, I'm afraid--" He paused, and she waited, her eyes downcast
and fixed on the horse's ears.

"I scarcely know how to put what I want to say," he said. "I'm rather
bad at explaining myself; but I--well, I hope you won't feel angry with
me because of the house, because of anything that has passed between
your father and mine--Of course I stand by him; but--well, _I_ didn't
build the confounded place--I beg your pardon! but I think it's rather
hard that you should cut me--oh, I can see by your face that you mean
to do it!--that you should regard me as a kind of enemy because--"

The usually fluent Stafford stopped helplessly as the beautiful eyes
turned slowly upon him with a slight look of wonder in them.

"Why should you mind?" she said, with almost childish innocence. "You
do not know me; we only met yesterday--we are not friends--Oh I am not
forgetting your kindness last night; oh, no!--but what can it matter to
you?"

In another woman Stafford would have suspected the question of
coquetry, of a desire to fish for the inevitable response; but looking
in those clear, guileless eyes, he could not entertain any such
suspicion.

"I beg your pardon; but it does matter very much," he retorted. "In the
first place, a man does not like being cut by a lady; and in the next,
we shall be neighbours--I'm going to stay there--" he nodded grimly at
the beautiful "little place."

"Neighbours?" she said, half absently. "It is farther off than you
think; and, besides, we know no one. We have no neighbours in that
sense--or friends. My father does not like to see anyone; we live quite
alone--"

"So I've heard--" He stopped and bit his lip; but she did not seem to
have noticed his interruption.

--"So that even if my father did not object to the house or--or--"

"My father," said Stafford with a smile.

A smile answered his candour.

"It would be all the same. And why should it matter to you? You have a
great many friends, no doubt--and we should not be likely to meet."

"Oh, yes, we should!" he said, with the dogged kind of insistence which
also sometimes surprised his friends. "I was going to avail myself of
your permission, and fish the stream--but, of course, I can't do that
now."

"No--I suppose not," she assented. "But we should be sure to meet on
the road--I should be riding--walking."

"But not on this side often," she argued.

A faint, very faint colour had stolen into the clear pallor of her
cheek, her eyes were downcast. She was honestly surprised, and, yes, a
little pleased that he should protest against the close of their
acquaintance; pleased, though why, she could not have told; for it did
not seem to matter.

"Oh, yes, I should," he retorted. "It's very pretty this side, and--See
here, Miss Heron." He drew a little nearer and looked up at her with
something like a frown in his eagerness. "Of course I shall speak to my
father about--well, about the way the land was bought, and I'm hoping,
I'm sure, that he will be able to explain it satisfactorily; and I want
to tell you that it is a mistake. I don't know much of my father, but I
can't believe that he would do anything underhand." He stopped suddenly
as the bagman's remarks flashed across his memory. "If your father's
grievance against him is just, why--ah, well, you'll have to cut me
when we meet; but I don't think it is; and I don't think it would be
fair to treat me as if _I_'d done something wrong."

Her brows came together, and she looked at him as if she were puzzled.

"I don't know why it matters," she said.

"Well, I can't tell you," he said, helplessly. "I only know that I
don't want to part from you this morning, knowing that the next time we
meet we should meet as strangers. I wanted to come to the Hall, to
enquire after Mr. Heron."

Her face flushed.

"Do not," she said in a low voice.

"I won't, of course," he responded, quickly. "It would only make
matters worse; your father would naturally dislike me, refuse to see
me; but--well, it's very hard on me."

She looked at him again, gravely, thoughtfully, as if she were still
puzzled by his persistence. Her eyes wandered to the dogs. Bess was
still standing up against him, and Donald had thrown himself down
beside him, and was regarding Ida with an air that said, quite plainly,
"This new friend of yours is all right."

"You have made friends with the dogs," she said, with a slight smile.

Stafford laughed.

"Oh, yes. There must be some good in dumb animals, for most of 'em take
to me at first sight."

She laughed at this not very brilliant display of wit. "I assure you
they wouldn't cut me next time we met. You can't be less charitable
than the dogs, Miss Heron!"

She gave a slight shrug to her straight, square shoulders. The gesture
seemed charming to Stafford, in its girlish Frenchiness.

"Ah, well," she said, with a pretty air of resignation, as if she were
tired of arguing.

Stafford's face lit up, and he laughed--the laugh of the man who wins;
but it died away rather suddenly, as she said gravely:

"But I do not think we shall meet often. I do not often go to the other
side of the lake: very seldom indeed; and you will not, you say, fish
the Heron; so that--Oh, there is the colt loose," she broke off. "How
can it have got out? I meant to ride it to-day, and Jason, thinking I
had changed my mind, must have turned it out."

The colt came waltzing joyously along the road, and catching sight of
the chestnut, whinnied delightedly, and the chestnut responded with one
short whinny of reproof. Ida rode forward and headed the colt, and
Stafford quietly slid along by the hedge and got behind it.

"Take care!" said Ida; "it is very strong. What are you going to do?"

Stafford did not reply, but stole up to the truant step by step
cautiously, and gradually approached near enough to lay his hand on its
shoulder; from its shoulder he worked to its neck and wound his arms
round it.

Ida laughed.

"Oh, you can't hold it!" she said as the colt plunged.

But Stafford hung on tightly and yet, so to speak, gently, soothing the
animal with the "horse language" with which every man who loves them is
acquainted.

Ida sat for an instant, looking round with a puzzled frown; then she
slipped down, took the bridle off the chestnut and slipped it on the
colt, the chestnut, who evidently understood the business, standing
stock still.

"Now I'll hold it--it will be quieter with me--if you will please
change the saddle."

Unthinkingly, Stafford obeyed, and got the saddle on the jigging and
dancing youngster. As unthinkingly, he put Ida up; and it was not until
the colt rose on its hind legs that he remembered to ask her if the
horse were broken.

"Scarcely," she said with a laugh; "but it will be all right.
Good-morning--and thank you!" And calling to the chestnut she turned
the colt and tore off, the chestnut and the dogs scampering after her.

Stafford's face grew hot for a moment with fear for her, then it grew
hotter with admiration as he watched her skimming across the moor in
the direction of the Hall. Once, just before she vanished from his
sight, she turned and waved her hand to him as if to assure him that
she was safe. The gesture reminded him of the white figure standing in
the doorway last night, and something stirred in his heart and sent a
warm thrill through him. In all his life he had never seen anyone like
her!


CHAPTER V.

"You look rather serious, oh, my prince!" said Howard, as, some few
hours later, he leisurely climbed into the phaeton beside Stafford. "I
have noticed with inward satisfaction that as we approach the moment of
meeting with your puissant parent, the Sultan, an air of gravity and
soberness has clouded that confoundedly careless, devil-may-care
countenance of yours. I say with inward satisfaction, because, with my
usual candour, I don't mind admitting that I am shivering in my shoes.
The shadow of the august presence is already falling on me, and as the
hour draws near I feel my littleness, my utter insignificance, with an
acuteness which almost compels me to ask you to let me get down and
make my way back to London as best I can."

"Don't be an ass," retorted Stafford, rather absently.

"You ask an impossibility of me, my dear fellow; but I will try and
conceal my asininity as best I can. May I ask, to change the subject,
where you were wandering all the morning?"

Stafford coloured slightly and bestowed minute attention to the off
horse.

"Oh, just prowling round," he replied, leisurely.

"You tempt me to finish the quotation. Did you find anyone to devour?
Apropos, has his majesty, the Sultan, ever mentioned matrimony to you,
Staff?"

Stafford looked round at him for an instant.

"No," he said, curtly. "What the devil made you ask?"

"Merely my incessant speculation as to your future, my dear fellow,"
replied Howard, blandly. "Most fathers are ambitious for their sons,
and I should imagine that Sir Stephen would be extremely so. When a man
is simply a plain 'Mr.,' he longs for the 'Sir;' when he gets the
'Sir,' he wants the 'my Lord' for himself, or for his son and heir.
That is the worst of ambition: you can't satisfy it. I have no doubt in
my mind that at this very moment Sir Stephen is making for a peerage
for himself--or you. He can possibly gain his; but you, having no
brains to speak of--the fact that good-looking men are always deficient
in that respect is a continual and blessed consolation to us plain
ones, Staff--will have to make what the world calls a 'good marriage.'
Doubtless your father already has the future bride in his eye; the
daughter of a peer--high in the government, perhaps in the
cabinet--probably. Probably that is why he has asked you to meet him
here. I hope, for your sake, that she is good-looking. I
fancy"--musingly--"that you would be rather particular. If rumour does
you no injustice, you always have been."

Stafford laughed shortly.

"I've never thought about marrying," he said, rather absently.

"No one does, my dear fellow. It comes, like measles and other
unpleasant things, without thought; and when it comes, it is generally
as unpleasant. Aren't we going at a tremendous rate, Stafford? Don't
think I am nervous; I have ridden beside you too often for that. You
destroyed what nerve I possessed long ago."

"We are late, and it's farther round than I thought," said Stafford.
"The horses are fresh."

"I daresay; very probably Pottinger has given them a double feed; he
would naturally like them to dash up in fine style. But if it's all the
same to you"--as the horses broke into a gallop--"I should prefer to
arrive at your father's 'little place' in a more dignified fashion than
on a stretcher."

Stafford smiled and checked the high-spirited pair.

"You talk of women as if they were a--a kind of plague; you were never
in love, Howard?" he asked.

"Never, thank Heaven!" responded Howard, devoutly. "When I think of it,
I acknowledge that I have much to be thankful for. I was once: she was
a girl with dark eyes--but I will spare you a minute description. I met
her in a country rectory--_is_ that horse, I think you call it the near
one--going to jump over the bank? And one remarkably fine evening--it
was moonlight, I remember--I was on the point of declaring my love; and
then the gods saved me. The thought flashed upon me that, if she said
'yes,' I should have to sit opposite her at dinner for the rest of one
of our lives. It saved me. I said that I thought it was chilly, and
went in and up to bed, grateful for my escape. Why don't you laugh?"

Stafford only smiled in a perfunctory fashion. He was thinking of the
girl he had watched riding off on the unbroken colt; of what it would
seem like if she were seated opposite him, with the candle-light
falling on her soft white dress, with diamonds gleaming in it, diamonds
outshone by the splendour of those dark, violet-grey eyes; of what it
would seem like if he could rise from his seat and go to her and take
her in his arms and look into those dark grey eyes, and say, "You are
mine, mine!" with no one to say him nay.

"It was a lucky escape for her," he said, dreamily.

"It was," assented Howard, solemnly. "Not one man in a thousand can
love one woman all his life; and I've the strongest conviction that I
am not that one. In less than six months I should have grown tired of
her--in less than a year I should have flown from the joys of
matrimony--or killed the partner of those joys. Has Pottinger a wife
and family, my dear Stafford? If so, is it wise to risk his life in
this fashion? I don't care for myself--though still young, I am not
afraid to die, and I would as soon meet it hurled from a phaeton as
not--but may I beg of you to think of Pottinger?"

Stafford laughed.

"The horses are all right," he said. "They are only fresh, and want to
go."

He could not have driven slowly, for his mind, dwelling on the girl in
the well-worn habit, was electric.

"I have spared you, hitherto, any laudation of the scenery, my dear
Staff," said Howard, pleasantly, "but permit me to remark that it
really is very beautiful. Trust the great and powerful Sir Stephen to
choose the best nature and art can produce! What is this?"

"This" proved to be a newly built lodge which appeared on the left of
the road. Stafford slowed up, and a lodgekeeper came and flung open the
new and elaborately wrought iron gates.

"This the way to--to Sir Stephen's house?" asked Stafford.

The man touched his hat reverentially.

"Yes, sir," he replied. "Sir Stephen's arrived. Came an hour ago."

Stafford nodded, and drove on.

The road was certainly a new one, but it was lined with rhododendrons
and costly shrubs, and it wound and wound serpentine fashion through
shrubberies and miniature plantations which indicated not only
remarkably good taste, but vast expenditure. At intervals the trees had
been felled to permit a view of the lake, lying below, like a sapphire
glowing in the sunlight.

Presently they came in sight of the house. It was larger than it had
looked in the distance; a veritable palace. An architect had received
_carte-blanche_, and disporting himself right royally, had designed a
façade which it would be hard to beat: at any rate, in England.

Stafford eyed it rather grumpily. Most Englishmen dislike ostentation
and display; and to Stafford the place seemed garish and "loud." Howard
surveyed it with cynical admiration.

"A dream of Kubla Kahn--don't know whether I've got the name right:
poem of Coleridge's, you know--but of course you don't know; you don't
go in for poetry. Well I'm bound to admit that it's striking, not to
say beautiful," he went on, as the horses sprang up the last ascent and
rattled on in an impatient, high-spirited trot along the level road to
the terrace fronting the entrance.

As Stafford pulled up, a couple of grooms came forward; the hall
door--enamelled in peacock blue--opened and a butler and two footmen in
rich maroon livery appeared. They came down the white marble steps in
stately fashion and ranged themselves as if the ceremony were of vast
importance, and as Howard and Stafford got down they bowed with the air
of attendants receiving royalty.

As Stafford, flinging the reins to one of the grooms, got down, he
caught sight of a line of liveried servants in the hall, and he frowned
slightly.

Like most young Englishmen, he hated ostentation, which he designated
as "fuss."

"Rub 'em down well, Pottinger," he said, and he leisurely patted the
horses while the gorgeous footmen watched with solemn impressiveness.

"We've brought 'em along pretty well," he said, turning to Howard, who
stood beside him with a fine and cynical smile; then he went up the
white marble steps slowly, carefully ignoring the footmen who had drawn
themselves into a line as if they were a guard of honour, specially
drilled to receive him.

Followed by Howard, his cynical smile still lingering about his thin
lips, Stafford entered the hall.

It was Oriental in shape and design, with a marble fountain in the
centre, and carved arches before the various passages. The principal
staircase was also of white marble with an Indian carpet of vivid
crimson. Palms reared their tall and graceful heads at intervals,
shading statuary in the prevailing white marble. Hangings of rose
colour broke the sameness and accentuated the purity of the predominate
whiteness.

Howard looked round with an admiration which obliterated his usual
cynicism.

"Beautiful!" he murmured.

But Stafford frowned. The luxury, the richness of the place, though
chaste, jarred on him; why, he could not have told.

Suddenly, as they were making their way through the lines of richly
liveried servants, a curtain at one of the openings was thrown aside,
and a gentleman came out to meet them.

He was rather a tall man, with white hair, but with eyebrows and
moustache of jet-black. His eyes were brilliant but sharp, and he moved
with the ease and alertness of youth.

There was something in his face, in its expression, which indicated
strength and power; something in his manner, in his smile, peculiarly
electric and sympathetic.

Howard stopped and drew back, but Stafford advanced, and Sir Stephen
caught him by the hand and held it.

"My dear Stafford, my dear boy!" he said, in a deep but musical voice.
"I expected you hours ago; I have been waiting! But better late than
never. Who is this? Your friend, Mr. Howard? Certainly! How do you do,
Mr. Howard! Welcome to our little villa on the lake!"




CHAPTER VI


Stafford's heart warmed at his father's greeting; indeed it would have
been a very callous heart if it had not; for the emotion of genuine
affection shone in Sir Stephen's brilliant eyes, and rang in his
musical voice. Stafford was all the more impressed and touched, because
the emotion was unusual, or rather, the expression of it.

This is a "casual" age, in which a man parts from or meets his
relations and friends with the real or assumed indifference which is
ordained by fashion. It is bad form to display one's affection, even
for the woman one loves, excepting in extreme seclusion and privacy. If
you meet your dearest chum who has just come out of the Transvaal War
by the skin of his teeth, it is not permitted you to say more than:
"Ah--er--how d'ye do. Got back, then, old man?" and at parting from
one's nearest relative, perhaps for the remainder of his life, one must
hide the grief that racks the heart, with an enquiry as to whether he
has got a comfortable berth and has remembered his umbrella.

But Sir Stephen was evidently not ashamed of his pleasure and delight
at the sight of his son, and he wrung his hand and looked him up and
down with an affectionate and proud scrutiny.

"You're looking fit, Stafford, very fit! By George, I--I believe you've
grown! And you've got--uglier than ever!"

Then, still holding Stafford's hand, he turned with a smile to Howard.

"You must forgive me, Mr. Howard! I've not seen this boy of mine for a
devil of a time, and I've been looking forward to this meeting very
keenly. The fond parent, you know, eh? But now let me say again how
pleased I am to see you. Stafford has often mentioned you, his closest
chum, and I was almost as anxious to see you as I was to see him."

"You are very kind, Sir Stephen," said Howard--his slow drawl unusually
quickened--for he, too, was touched, though he would have died rather
than have admitted it, by the warmth of Sir Stephen's reception of his
son. "I was afraid that I should be rather _de trop_, if not absolutely
intrusive--"

"Not at all--not at all!" Sir Stephen broke in. "My boy's friends are
mine, especially his own particular pal. You are David and Jonathan,
you two, I know; and Heaven forbid that I should part you! If you'll
consider yourself one of the family, free to come and go just as you
choose, I shall feel grateful to you; yes, that's the word--grateful!"

All this was said in the heartiest way, with the crowd of servants
looking on and listening--though, like well-trained servants, they
appeared both deaf and blind for all the expression that could be seen
in their faces--then Sir Stephen led the way into the drawing-room.

"You've just time to dress," he said, consulting his watch; "your man
Measom has turned up, Stafford. Mr. Howard will permit me to offer him
the services of my valet--I don't trouble him much. And now I'll show
you your rooms. Like this?" he added, as he paused at the door and
looked round. "It's one of the smaller rooms; the ladies can keep it
for themselves if they like."

"Charming!" said Howard; and the word was appropriate enough to the
dainty apartment with its chaste decorations of crushed strawberry and
gold, with hangings and furniture to match; with its grand piano in
carved white wood and its series of water colours by some of the best
of the Institute men.

"I'm glad!" responded Sir Stephen. "But I mustn't keep you. We'll go
over the place after dinner--or some other time. To-night we are alone;
the party doesn't come up till to-morrow. I wanted to have you,
Stafford--and your friend--to myself before the crowd arrived."

They followed him up the broad stairs, which by low and easy steps led
up to the exquisite corridor, harmonising perfectly with the eastern
hall, on to which it looked through arches shaped and fitted in
Oriental fashion.

"Here is your room. Ah, Measom! here is Mr. Stafford, Got everything
ready for him, I hope?--and here, next door almost, is Mr. Howard's.
This is a snuggery in between--keep your books and guns and
fishing-rods in it, don't you know. Mr. Howard, you play, I think?
There's a piano, Hope you'll like the view. Full south, with nothing
between you and the lake. I'm not far off. See? Just opposite, You may
find the rooms too hot, Stafford--Mr. Howard--and we'll change 'em, of
course. Don't hurry: hope you'll find everything you want!"

He laid his hand on Stafford's shoulder and nodded at him with frank
affection, before he went, and as he closed the door they heard him say
to some one below:

"Don't serve the dinner till Mr. Stafford comes down!"

Stafford went to the window, and Howard stood in silence beside him for
a moment, then he said--Measom had left the room:

"I congratulate you, Staff! In sackcloth and ashes, I confess I thought
that kind of father only existed in women's books and emotional plays."

Stafford nodded.

"He's--he's kindness itself," he said, in a very low voice and not
turning his head. "I didn't know that he was like--this. I didn't know
he cared--"

"It's evident he cares very much!" said Howard, gravely. "If you were
the Prodigal Son he couldn't have felt it more."

"And yet they say--that bagman said--" muttered Stafford with
smouldering rage and indignation.

"There are few things in my life that I regret, my dear Staff; but till
my dying day I shall regret that I did not turn and rend that bagman!
He's a splendid fellow--splendid! Now I've seen him I don't wonder at
his success. Envy is not one of my numerous vices, Staff; but frankly I
envy you your father! Wake up, old man! We mustn't keep him waiting!
What quarters!" He looked round the room as he moved to go. "Fit for a
prince! But you _are_ a prince! Why, dash it, I feel like a prince
myself! How are you, Measom? Got down all right, then?--I'll give you a
knock when I'm ready, Stafford!"

Stafford dressed quickly, thinking all the while of his father; of his
good looks, his deep, pleasant voice, his affectionate welcome; and
thrusting from him the unfavourable impression which the ornate
splendour of the place had made.

Howard knocked presently and the two men went down. Sir Stephen was
waiting in the hall; and Stafford, with a little thrill of pride,
noticed that he looked still more distinguished in his evening-dress,
which was strikingly plain; a single pearl--but it was priceless
one--was its only ornament.

"By George, you have been quick!" said Sir Stephen, with his genial
smile.

"That's one for yourself, sir," said Stafford.

"Oh, I? I can dress in five minutes," responded Sir Stephen, linking
his arm in Stafford's. "I'm almost as good as a 'quick-change artist.'"

He drew aside to let Howard follow the butler between the two footmen
drawn up beside the door, and they entered the dining-room.

It was of choice American walnut, and lit by rose-shaded electric
lights, in which the plate and the glass, the flowers and the napery
glowed softly: an ideal room which must have filled the famous
decorator who had designed it with just pride and elation. The table
had been reduced to a small oval; and the servants proceeded to serve a
dinner which told Howard that Sir Stephen had become possessed of a
_chef_ who was a _cordon bleu_. The wines were as choice as the _menu_;
but Sir Stephen watered his Chateau claret, and ate but little,
excusing himself in the middle of a sentence with:

"I'm setting you a bad example. But there's always a skeleton at my
feast--a rather common one nowadays; they call him Gout. And so you
drove down? That must have been pleasant! It's a pretty country--so I'm
told. I didn't see much of it from the train. But the lake--ah, well,
it's indescribable, isn't it! After all one sees, one is bound to admit
that there is nothing to beat English scenery; of course I include
Irish. We've a strain of Irish blood in us, Mr. Howard, and I always
stand up for the ould counthry. Things are looking up there lately;
we're beginning to appreciated. Give us a year or two, and we'll have
all the world and his wife scampering over it. I've a little Irish
scheme of my own--but I mustn't bore you the first night. Mr. Howard,
if that wine is too thin--"

Howard clutched his glass with dramatic intensity.

"Chateau Legrange, if I'm not mistaken, sir," he said; "but let it be
what it may, it's simply perfect."

"I'm glad. See here, now, it's understood between us that if there's
anything you want, anything you'd like altered, you'll say so, eh,
Stafford?" he said, with an affectionate anxiety. "I'm a
rough-and-ready kind of man, and anything pleases me; but you--ah,
well, you two have the right to be particular; and I'll ask you to ask
for just what you want--and be sure you get it."

Stafford glanced round the room with its costly appointments, and Sir
Stephen caught the glance, and smiled.

"You're thinking--ah, well, no matter. Mr. Howard, try those
strawberries. I don't think they're forced. They tell me that they get
them on the slope even earlier than this. This port--now see how nice
the people in these parts are! this port came from the landlord of
the--the--yes, The Woodman Inn. He sent it with his respectful
compliments, saying you did him the honour to praise it last night. You
stayed there, I suppose? Surprisingly kind: quite a Spanish bit of
courtesy. I wrote Mr.--yes, Mr. Groves a note thanking him on your
behalf, and I sent him some dry sherry which Stenson here"--he smiled
at the butler--"tells me is rather good, eh, Stenson?"

The solemn gravity of Stenson's face did not relax in the slightest, as
he murmured:

"Count de Meza's '84, sir."

"Right! So long as it was the best we had. You approve, Stafford, eh?"

Stafford nodded with something more than approval.

"Thank you, sir," he said, simply. "We admired Mr. Groves's port."

"He's a good fellow. I hope he'll enjoy the sherry. I shall take the
first opportunity of calling and expressing my sense of his
kindness--No more? Shall we have the coffee with the cigars in the
billiard room?"

The footmen escorted them through the billiard-room to the
smoking-room, only divided from it by a screen of Eastern fret-work
draped by costly hangings. There were inlaid tables and couches of
exquisite workmanship, and a Moresque cabinet, which the butler
unlocked and from which he took cigars and cigarettes.

Sir Stephen waved them to seats, and sank into a low chair with a sigh
of satisfaction and enjoyment. The footmen placed the exquisite
coffee-service of Limoges enamel on one of the tables, and, as they
left the room, Howard, as if he could not help himself, said:

"This is a veritable Aladdin's Palace, Sir Stephen! Though I can
imagine that fabulous erection cannot have been as comfortable as
this."

"I'm glad you like it," he said. "But do you like it?" he put in, with
a shrewd gleam in his eyes, which could be keen as well as brilliant
and genial. "I fancy you think it _too_ fine--eh, Stafford?" He laid
his hand on Stafford's knee with a somewhat appealing gesture and
glance. "I've seen a doubt on your face once or twice--and, by George!
you haven't seen half the place yet. Yes, Mr. Howard, I'll admit that
it is rather luxurious; that's the result of giving these new men
_carte-blanche_. They take you at your word, sir. I'll own up I was a
little surprised to-day; for I told them to build me a villa--but then
I wanted thirty or forty bedrooms, so I suppose they had to make it
rather large. It seemed to me that as it overlooks the lake it ought to
be after the style of those places one sees in Italy, and I hinted that
for the interior an Oriental style might be suitable; but I left them a
free hand, and if they've overdone it they ought to have known better.
I employed the men who were recommended to me."

There was a pause for a moment. Stafford tried to find some phrase
which would conceal his lack of appreciation; and his father, as if he
saw what was passing through Stafford's mind, went on quickly but
smoothly:

"Yes, I see. It _is_ too fine and ornamental. But I don't think you'll
find that the people who are coming here tomorrow will agree with you.
I may not know much about art and taste, but I know my world.
Stafford--Mr. Howard--I'll make a clean breast of it. I built this
place with an object. My dear sir, you won't think me guilty of
sticking it up to please Stafford here. I know his taste too well;
something like mine, I expect--a cosy room with a clean cloth and a
well-cooked chop and potato. I've cooked 'em myself before now--the
former on a shovel, the latter in an empty meat-tin. Of course I know
that Stafford and you, Mr. Howard, have lived very different lives to
mine. Of course. You have been accustomed to every refinement and a
great deal of luxury over since you left the cradle. Quite right! I'm
delighted that it should be so. Nothing is too good for Stafford
here--and his chum--nothing!"

Stafford's handsome face flushed.

"You've been very generous to me, sir," he said, in his brief way, but
with a glance at his father which expressed more than the words.

Sir Stephen threw his head back and laughed.

"That's all right, Staff," he said. "It's been a pleasure to me. I just
wanted to see you happy--'see you' is rather inappropriate, though,
isn't it, considering how very little I have seen you? But there were
reasons--We won't go into that. Where was I?"

"You were telling us your reasons for building this place, sir," Howard
reminded him quietly.

Sir Stephen shot a glance at him, a cautious glance.

"Was I? By George! then I am more communicative than usual. My friends
in the city and elsewhere would tell you that I never give any reasons.
But what I was saying was this: that I've learnt that the world likes
tinsel and glitter--just as the Sioux Indians are caught by glass beads
and lengths of Turkey red calico. And I give the world what it wants.
See?"

He laughed, a laugh which was as cynical as Howard's.

"The world is not so much an oyster which you've got to open with a
sword, as the old proverb has it, but a wild beast. Yes, a wild beast:
and you've got to fight him at first, fight him tooth and claw. When
you've beaten him, ah! then you've got to feed him."

"You have beaten your wild beast, Sir Stephen," remarked Howard.

"Well--yes, more or less; anyhow, he seemed ready to come to my hand
for the tit-bits I can give him. The world likes to be _fêted_, likes
good dinners and high-class balls; but above all it likes to be amused.
I'm going to give it what it wants."

Stafford looked up. This declaration coming from his father jarred upon
Stafford, whose heart he had won.

"Why should you trouble, sir?" he said, quietly. "I should have thought
you would have been satisfied."

"Because I want something more from it; something in return," said Sir
Stephen, with a smile. "Satisfied? No man is satisfied. I've an
ambition yet ungratified, and I mean to gratify it. You think I'm
vaunting, Mr. Howard?" "No, I think you are simply stating a fact,"
responded Howard, gravely.

"I thank you, sir," said Sir Stephen, as gravely. "I speak so
confidently because I see my way clearly before me. I generally do.
When I don't, I back out and lie low."

Stafford found this too painful. He rose to get a light and sauntered
into the billiard-room and tried the table.

Sir Stephen looked after him musingly, and seemed to forget Howard's
presence; then suddenly his face flushed and his eyes shone with a
curious mixture of pride and tenderness and the indomitable resolution
which had helped him to fight his "wild beast." He leant forward and
touched Howard's knee.

"Don't you understand!" he said, earnestly, and in a low voice which
the click of the billiard balls prevented Stafford from hearing. "It is
for him! For my boy, Mr. Howard! It's for him that I have been working,
am still working. For myself--I am satisfied--as he said; but not for
him. I want to see him still higher up the ladder than I have climbed.
I have done fairly well--heaven and earth! if anyone had told me twenty
years ago that I should be where and what I am to-day--well, I'd have
sold my chances for a bottle of ale. You smile. Mr. Howard, it was
anything but beer and skittles for me then. I want to leave my boy
a--title. Smile again, Mr. Howard; I don't mind."

"I haven't a smile about me, sir," said Howard.

"Ah, you understand. You see my mind. I don't know why I've told you,
excepting that it is because you are Staff's friend. But I've told you
now. And am I not right? Isn't it a laudable ambition? Can you say that
he will not wear it well, however high the title may be? Where is there
such another young fellow? Proud--pride is too poor a word for what I
feel for him!"

He paused and sank back, but leant forward again.

"Though I've kept apart from him, Mr. Howard, I have watched him--but
in no unworthy sense. No, I haven't spied upon him."

"There was no need, sir," said Howard, very quietly.

"I know it. Stafford is as straight as a dart, as true as steel. Oh,
I've heard of him. I know there isn't a more popular man in
England--forgive me if I say I don't think there's a handsomer."

Howard nodded prompt assent.

"I read of him, in society, at Hurlingham. Everywhere he goes he holds
his own. And I know why. Do you believe in birth, Mr. Howard?" he
asked, abruptly.

"Of course," replied Howard.

"So do I, though I can't lay claim to any. But there's a good strain in
Stafford and it shows itself. There's something in his face, a certain
look in his eyes, in his voice, and the way he moves; that quiet yet
frank manner--oh, I can't explain!" he broke off, impatiently.

"I think you have done it very well," said Howard. "I don't like the
word--it is so often misapplied--but I can't think of any better:
distinguished is the word that describes Stafford."

Sir Stephen nodded eagerly.

"You are right. Some men are made, born to wear the purple. My boy is
one of them--and he shall! He shall take his place amongst the noblest
and the best in the land. He shall marry with the highest. Nature has
cast him in a noble mould, and he shall step into his proper place."

He drew a long breath, and his brilliant eyes flashed as if he were
looking into the future, looking into the hour of triumph.

"Yes; I agree with you," said Howard; "but I am afraid Stafford will
scarcely share your ambition."

He was sorry he had spoken as he saw the change which his words had
caused in Sir Stephen.

"What?" he said, almost fiercely. "Why do you say that? Why should he
not be ambitious?" He stopped and laid his hand on Howard's shoulder,
gripping it tightly, and his voice sank to a stern whisper. "You don't
know of anything--there is no woman--no entanglement?"

"No, no!" said Howard. "Make your mind easy on that point. There is no
one. Stafford is singularly free in that respect. In fact--well, he is
rather cold. There is no one, I am sure. I should have known it, if
there had been."

Sir Stephen's grip relaxed, and the stern, almost savage expression was
smoothed out by a smile.

"Right," he said, still in a whisper. "Then there is no obstacle in my
way. I shall win what I am fighting for. Though it will not be an easy
fight. No, sir. But easy or difficult, I mean winning."

He rose and stood erect--a striking figure looking over Howard's head
with an abstracted gaze; then suddenly his eyelids quivered, his face
grew deathly pale, and his hand went to his heart.

Howard sprang to his feet with an exclamation of alarm; but Sir Stephen
held up his hand warningly, moved slowly to one of the tables, poured
out a glass of _liqueur_ and drank it. Then he turned to Howard, who
stood watching him, uncertain what to do or say, and said, with an air
of command:

"Not a word. It is nothing."

Then he linked his arm in Howard's and led him into the billiard-room.

"Table all right, Stafford?"

"First-rate, sir," replied Stafford. "You and Mr. Howard play a
hundred."

"No, no," said Sir Stephen. "You and Howard. I should enjoy looking
on."

"We'll have a pool," said Stafford, taking the balls from the cabinet.
Howard watched Sir Stephen as he played his first shot: his hand was
perfectly steady, and he soon showed that he was a first-rate player.

"That was a good shot," said Stafford, with a touch of pride in his
voice. "I don't know that I've seen a better. You play a good game,
sir."

Sir Stephen's face flushed at his son's praise, as a girl's might have
done; but he laughed it off.

"Only so, so, Staff. I don't play half as good a game as you and Mr.
Howard. How should I?--Mr. Howard, there is the spirit-stand. You'll
help yourself? Servants are a nuisance in a billiard-room."

Not once for the rest of the evening did he show any sign of the
weakness which had so startled Howard, and as they went up the stairs
he told them a story with admirable verve and with evident enjoyment.

"Sorry our evening has come to an end," he said as they stood outside
his door. "It is the last we shall have to ourselves. Pity. But it
can't be helped."

Unconsciously he opened the door as he spoke, and Stafford said:

"Is this your room, sir?"

"Yes; walk in, my boy," replied Sir Stephen.

Stafford walked in and stood stock-still with amazement. The room was
as plainly furnished as a servant's--more plainly, probably, than the
servants who were housed under his roof. Saving for a square of carpet
by the bed and dressing-table the floor was bare; the bed was a common
one of iron, narrow and without drapery, the furniture was of painted
deal. The only picture was a portrait of Stafford enlarged from a
photograph, and it hung over the mantel-piece so that Sir Stephen could
see it from the bed. Of course neither Stafford nor Howard made any
remark.

"Remember that portrait, Stafford?" asked Sir Stephen, with a smile. "I
carry it about with me wherever I go. Foolish and fond old father, eh,
Mr. Howard? It's a good portrait, don't you think?"

Stafford held out his hand.

"Good-night, sir," he said in a very low voice.

"Good-night, my boy! Sure you've got everything you want? And you, Mr.
Howard? Don't let me disturb you in the morning. I've got a stupid
habit of getting up early--got it years ago, and it clings, like other
habits. Hope you'll sleep well. If you don't, change your rooms before
the crowd comes. Good-night."

"Did you see the room?" asked Stafford, huskily, when he and Howard had
got into Stafford's.

Howard nodded.

"I feel as if I could pitch all this"--Stafford looked at the
surrounding luxuries--"out of the window! I don't understand him. Great
Heaven! he makes me feel the most selfish, pampered wretch on the face
of the earth. He's--he's--"

"He is a man!" said Howard, with an earnestness which was strange in
him.

"You are right," said Stafford. "There never was such a father. And
yet--yet--I don't understand him. He is such a mixture. How such a man
could talk as he did--no I don't understand it."

"I do," said Howard.

But then Sir Stephen had given him the key to the enigma.


CHAPTER VII

Stafford slept well, and was awake before Measom came to call him. It
was a warm and lovely morning, and Stafford's first thoughts flew to a
bath. He got into flannels, and found his way to the lake, and as he
expected, there was an elaborate and picturesque bathing-shed beside
the Swiss-looking boat-house, in which were an electric launch and
boats of all descriptions. There also was a boatman in attendance, with
huge towels on his arm.

"Did you expect me?" asked Stafford, as the man touched his hat and
opened the bathing-shed.

"Yes, sir; Sir Stephen sent down last night to say that you might come
down."

Stafford nodded. His father forgot nothing! The boatman rowed him out
into the lake and Stafford had a delightful swim. It reminded him of
Geneva, for the lake this morning was almost as clear and as vivid in
colouring: and that is saying a great deal.

The boatman, who watched his young master admiringly--for Stafford was
like a fish in the water--informed him that the launch would be ready
in a moment's notice, or the sailing boat either, for the matter of
that, if he should require them.

"I've another launch, a steamer, and larger than this, coming
to-morrow; and Sir Stephen told me to get some Canadian canoes, in case
you or any of the company that's coming should fancy them, sir."

As Stafford went up to the house in the exquisite "after-bath" frame of
mind, he met his father. The expression of Sir Stephen's face, which a
moment earlier, before he had turned the corner of the winding path,
had been grave and keen, and somewhat hard, softened, and his eyes lit
up with a smile which had no little of the boatman's admiration in it.

"Had a swim, my boy? Found everything right, I hope? I was just going
down to see."

"Yes, everything," replied Stafford. "I can't think how you have
managed to get it done in so short a time," he added, looking round at
the well-grown shrubs, the smooth paths and the plush-like lawns, which
all looked as if they had been in cultivation for years.

Sir Stephen shrugged his shoulders.

"It is all a question of money--and the right men," he said. "I always
work on the plan, and ask the questions: 'How soon, how much?' Then I
add ten per cent. to the contract price on condition that the time is
kept. I find 'time' penalties are no use: it breaks the contractor's
back; but the extra ten per cent. makes them hustle, as they say on the
'other side.' Have you seen the stables yet? But of course you haven't,
or I should have seen you there. I go down there every morning; not
because I understand much about horses, but because I'm fond of them.
That will be your department, my dear Stafford."

At each turn of their way Stafford found something to admire, and his
wonderment at the settled and established "Oh, I stipulated that there
shouldn't be any newness--any 'smell of paint,' so to speak. Here are
the stables; I had them put as far from the house as possible, and yet
get-at-able. Most men like to stroll about them. I hope you'll like
them. Mr. Pawson, the trainer, designed them."

Stafford nodded with warm approval.

"They seem perfect," he said as, after surveying the exterior, he
entered and looked down the long reach of stalls and loose boxes, many
of which were occupied, as he saw at a glance, by valuable animals.
"They are a fine lot, sir," he said, gravely, as he went down the long
line. "A remarkably fine lot! I have never seen a better show. This
fellow--why, isn't he Lord Winstay's bay, Adonis?"

"Yes," said Sir Stephen. "I thought you'd like him."

"Good heavens!" exclaimed Stafford. "You don't mean that you have
bought him for me, sir! I know that Winstay refused eight hundred
guineas for him."

"I daresay," replied Sir Stephen. "Why shouldn't I buy him for you, my
boy? There's another one in the box next that one; a little stiffer.
I'm told he's up to your weight and--"

Stafford went into the box and looked at the horse. It was a
magnificent, light-weight hunter--the kind of horse that makes a
riding-man's heart jump.

"I should say that there are not two better horses of their sort in the
county," Stafford said, solemnly, and with a flush of his handsome
face.

Sir Stephen's eyes gleamed.

"That's all right: they can't be too good, Stafford."

The head groom, Davis by name, stood, with Pottinger and some
underlings, at a little distance in attendance, and the men exchanged
glances and nods.

"Have you seen these, Pottinger?" asked Stafford, turning to him, and
speaking in the tone which servants love.

Pottinger touched his forehead.

"Yes, sir; they're first rate, and no mistake. I've just been telling
Mr. Davis he's got a splendid lot, sir--splendid!"

"Not but what your own pair 'ud be hard to beat, sir," said Davis,
respectfully. "There's a mare here, Sir Stephen, I should like to show
Mr. Stafford."

The mare was taken out into the yard, and Stafford examined her and
praised her with a judgment and enthusiasm which filled Davis's heart
with pride.

"Your young guv'nor's the right sort, Pottinger," he remarked as
Stafford at last reluctantly tore himself away from the stables. "Give
me a master as understands a horse and I don't mind working for him."

Pottinger nodded and turned the straw in his mouth.

"If you're alludin' to Mr. Stafford, then you'll enjoy your work, Mr.
Davis; for you've got what you want. What my guv'nor don't know about a
'oss isn't worth knowing."

"So I should say," assented Davis, emphatically. "I do hate to have a
juggins about the place. Barker, _is_ that a spot o' rust on that
pillar-chain, or is my eyesight deceiving me? No, my men, if there's
the slightest thing askew when Mr. Stafford walks round, I shall break
my heart--and sack the man who's responsible for it. Pottinger, if
you'd like that pair o' yours moved, if you think they ain't
comfortable, you say so, and moved they shall be."

As Sir Stephen and Stafford strolled back to the house the former
paused now and again to point out something he wished Stafford to see,
always appealing for his approval.

"Everything is perfect, sir," Stafford said at last. "And, above all,
the situation," he added as he looked at the magnificent view, the opal
lake mirroring the distant mountains, flecked by the sunlight and the
drifting clouds.

"Yes, I was fortunate in getting it," remarked Sir Stephen.

Instantly there flashed across Stafford's mind--and not for the first
time that morning--the words Ida Heron had spoken respecting the way in
which Sir Stephen had obtained the land. Looking straight before him,
he asked:

"How did you get it, sir? I have heard that it was difficult to buy
land here for building purposes."

"Yes, I fancy it is," replied Sir Stephen, quite easily. "Now you speak
of it, I remember my agent said there was some hitch at first; but he
must have got over it in some way or other. He bought it of a farmer."
Stafford drew a breath of relief. "This is the Italian garden; the
tennis and croquet lawns are below this terrace--there's not time to go
down. But you haven't seen half of it yet. There's the breakfast-bell.
Don't trouble to change: I like you in those flannels." He laid his
hand on Stafford's broad, straight shoulder. "You have the knack of
wearing your clothes as if they grew on you, Staff."

Stafford laughed.

"I ought to hand that compliment on to Measom, sir," he said; "he's the
responsible person and deserves the credit, if there is any." He looked
at his father's upright, well-dressed and graceful figure. "But he
would hand it back to you, I think, sir."

There was a pause, then Stafford said:

"Do you know any of your neighbours--any of the people round about?"

"No; I was never here until yesterday, excepting for an hour or two.
But we shall know them, I suppose; they'll call in a little while, and
we will ask them to dinner, and so on. There should be some nice
people--Ah, Mr. Howard, we've stolen a march on you!"

"I'm not surprised, sir," said Howard, as he came up in his slow and
languid way. "I am sorry to say that Stafford has an extremely bad
habit of getting up at unreasonable hours. I wait until I am dragged
out of bed by a fellow-creature or the pangs of hunger. Of course you
have been bathing, Staff? Early rising and an inordinate love of cold
water--externally--at all seasons are two of his ineradicable vices,
Sir Stephen. I have done my best to cure them, but--alas!"

They went in to breakfast, which was served in a room with bay windows
opening on to the terrace overlooking the lake. Exactly opposite
Stafford's chair was the little opening on the other side from which he
and the girl from Heron Hall had gazed at the villa. He looked at it
and grew silent.

A large dispatch-box stood beside Sir Stephen's plate. He did not open
it, but sent it to his room.

"I never read my letters before breakfast," he remarked. "They spoil
one's digestion. I'm afraid the mail's heavy this morning, judging by
the weight of the box; so that I shall be busy. You two gentlemen will,
I trust, amuse yourselves in your own way. Mr. Howard, the groom will
await your orders."

"Thanks," said Howard; "but I propose to sit quite still on a chair
which I have carried out on to the terrace. I have had enough of
driving to last me for a week;" and he shuddered.

Stafford laughed.

"Howard's easily disposed of, sir," he said. "Give him a hammock or an
easy-chair in the shade, and he can always amuse himself by going to
sleep."

"True; and if half the men I know spent their time in a similar fashion
this would be a brighter and a better world. What you will do, my dear
Stafford, I know by bitter experience. He will go and wade through a
river or ride at a break-neck pace down some of those hills. Stafford
is never happy unless he is trying to lay up rheumatism for his old age
or endeavouring to break his limbs."

Sir Stephen looked across the table at the stalwart, graceful frame;
but he said nothing: there was no need, for his eyes were eloquent of
love and admiration.

Stafford changed into riding things soon after breakfast, went down to
the stables and had Adonis saddled. Davis superintended the operation
and the stablemen edged round to watch. Davis expressed his approval as
Stafford mounted and went off on a splendid creature, remarking as he
started:

"Beautiful mouth, Davis!"

"Yes, Pottinger," said Davis, succinctly, "he's worthy of him. That's
what I call 'hands' now. Dash my aunt if you'd find it easy to match
the pair of 'em! There's a class about both that you don't often see.
If you'll step inside my little place, Mr. Pottinger, we'll drink your
guv'nor's health. I like his shape, I like his style; and I'm counted a
bit of a judge. He's a gentleman, and a high-bred 'n at that."

Stafford rode down the winding drive at which the gardeners were at
work on borders and shrubberies, and on to the road. The air was like
champagne. The slight breeze just ruffled the lake on which the sun was
glittering; Stafford was conscious of a strange feeling of eagerness,
of quickly thrilling vitality which was new to him. He put it down to
the glorious morning, to the discovery of the affection of his father,
to the good horse that stepped as lightly as an Arab, and carried him
as if he were a feather; and yet all the while he knew that these did
not altogether account for the electric eagerness, the "joy of living"
which possessed him.

He pulled up for a moment at The Woodman Inn to thank Mr. Groves for
the port, and that gentleman came out, as glad to see him as if he were
an old friend.

"Don't mention it, sir," he said. "I thought a long time before I sent
it, because I wasn't sure that Sir Stephen and you might think it a
liberty; but I needn't have done so, I know now. And it was kind of Sir
Stephen to send me a note with the sherry. It was like a gentleman, if
you'll excuse me saying so, sir."

Stafford rode over the hill and along the road by the stream, and as he
rode he looked round him eagerly and keenly. In fact, as if he were
scouting. But that for which he was looking so intently did not appear;
his spirits fell--though the sun was still shining--and he sighed
impatiently, and putting Adonis through the stream, cantered over the
moor at the foot of the hills. Suddenly he heard the bark of a dog, and
looking eagerly in the direction of the sound, he saw Ida Heron walking
quickly round the hill, with Donald and Bess scampering in front of
her.

The gloom vanished from Stafford's face, and he checked Adonis into a
walk. The dogs were the first to see him, and they tore towards him
barking a welcome. Ida looked up--she had been walking with her eyes
bent on the ground--the colour rose to her face, and she stopped for an
instant. Then she came on slowly, and by the time they had met there
was no trace of the transitory blush.

Stafford raised his hat and dismounted, and tried to speak in a casual
tone; but it was difficult to conceal the subtle delight which sprang
up within him at the sight of her; and he looked at the beautiful face
and the slim, graceful figure in its tailor-made gown--which, well worn
as it was, seemed to him to sit upon her as no other dress had ever sat
upon any other woman--he had hard work to keep the admiration from his
eyes.

"I begin to count myself a very lucky man, Miss Heron," he said.

"Why?" she asked, her grave eyes resting on him calmly.

"Because I have chanced to meet you again."

"It is not strange," she said. "I am nearly always out-of-doors. What a
beautiful horse!"

"Isn't it!" he said, grateful for her praise. "It is a new one--a
present from my father this morning."

"A very valuable present! It ought to be able to jump."

"It is. I put it at a bank just now, and it cleared it like a bird. I
am very glad I have met you. I wanted to tell you something."

She raised her eyes from the horse and waited, with the quietude, the
self-possession and dignity which seemed so strange in one so young,
and which, by its strangeness, fascinated him. "I--spoke to my father
about the land: he is innocent in the matter. It was bought through his
agent, and my father knows nothing of anything--underhand. I can't tell
you how glad I am that this is so. So glad that--I'll make a clean
breast of it--I rode over this morning in the hope of meeting you and
telling you."

She made a little gesture of acceptance.

"I am glad, too. Though it does not matter...."

"Ah, but it does!" he broke in. "I should have been wretched if you had
been right, and my father had been guilty of anything of the kind. But,
as a matter of fact, he isn't capable of it--as you'd say if you knew
him. Now, there's no reason why we shouldn't be friends, is there?" he
added, with a suppressed eagerness.

"Oh, no," she responded. She glanced up at the sky. Unnoticed by him a
cloud had drifted over the Langdale pikes, as the range of high
mountain is called. "It is going to rain, and heavily."

"And you have no umbrella, waterproof!" exclaimed Stafford.

She laughed with girlish amusement.

"Umbrella? I don't think I have such a thing; and this cloth is nearly
waterproof; besides, I never notice the rain--here it comes!"

It came with a vengeance; it was as if the heavens had opened and let
down the bottom of a reservoir.

Stafford mechanically took off his coat.

"Put this on," he said. "That jacket is quite light; you'll get wet
through."

Her face crimsoned, and she laughed a little constrainedly.

"Please put your coat on!" she said, gravely and earnestly. "_You_ will
be wet through, and you are not used to it. There is a shed round the
corner; ride there as quickly as you can."

Stafford stared at her, then burst into a laugh which echoed hers.

"And leave you here! Is it likely?"

"Well, let us both go," she said, as if amused by his obstinacy.

"Is it far?" he asked. "See if you can manage to balance on the
saddle--I would run beside you. It's all very well to talk of not
minding the rain, but this is a deluge."

She glanced at the horse.

"I couldn't get up--I could if he were barebacked, or if it were a
lady's saddle--it doesn't matter. Look, Donald and Bess are laughing at
you for making a fuss about a shower."

"Will you try--let me help you?" he pleaded. "I could lift you quite
easily--Oh, forgive me, but I'm not used to standing by and seeing a
girl get soaked."

"You are walking--not standing," she reminded him, solemnly.

Perhaps her smile gave him courage: he took her just below the
shoulders and lifted her on to the saddle, saying as he did so, and in
as matter-of-fact a voice as he could:

"If you'll just put your hand on my shoulder, you'll find that you can
ride quite safely--though I expect you could do it without that--I've
seen you ride, you know."

He kept his eyes from her, so that he did not see the hot blush which
mantled in the clear ivory of her face, or the sudden tightening of the
lips, as if she were struggling against some feeling, and fighting for
her usual self-possession.

She succeeded in a moment or two, and when he looked up the blush had
gone and something like amusement was sharing the sweet girlish
confusion in her grey eyes.

"This is absurd!" she said. "It is to be hoped Jason or none of the men
will see me; they would think I had gone mad; and I should never hear
the last of it. The shed is by that tree."

"I see it--just across the road. Please keep a tight hold of my
shoulder; I should never forgive myself if you slipped."

"I am not in the least likely to slip," she said.

Then suddenly, just as they were on the edge of the road, she uttered
an exclamation of surprise rather than embarrassment, for a carriage
and pair came round the corner and almost upon them.

Stafford stopped Adonis to let the carriage pass, but the coachman
pulled up in response to a signal from someone inside, and a man thrust
his head out of the window and regarded them at first with surprise and
then with keen scrutiny.

He was an elderly man, with a face which would have been coarse but for
its expression of acuteness and a certain strength which revealed
itself in the heavy features.

"Can you tell me the way to Sir Stephen Orme's place?" he asked in a
rough, harsh voice.

Ida was about to slip down, but she reflected that the mischief, if
there were any, was done now; and to Stafford's admiration, she sat
quite still under the gaze of the man's keen, sarcastic eyes.

"Yes; keep straight on and round by The Woodman: you will see the house
by that time," said Stafford.

"Thanks! Drive on, coachman," said the man; and he drew in his head
with a grim smile, and something like a sneer on his thick lips that
made Stafford's eyes flash.




CHAPTER VIII.

Stafford and Ida remained, unconscious of the rain, looking after the
carriage for a moment or two.

The sneer on the man's heavy yet acutely sharp face, still incensed
Stafford. He had the usual desire of the strong man--to dash after the
rapidly disappearing vehicle, lug the fellow out and ask him what he
was sneering at.

Ida was the first to speak.

"What a strange-looking man," she said.

Stafford started slightly, awaking to the fact that it was still
pouring.

"I--I beg your pardon. I'm keeping you out in the rain."

He put Adonis, not at all unwillingly, to a trot, and they gained the
rough cattle-shed, and he would have lifted the girl down, but she was
too quick for him, and slipped gracefully and easily from the saddle.

Stafford, leading the horse, followed her into the shed. Bess sat on
the extreme end of her haunches shivering and blinking, and all too
plainly cursing the British climate; but Donald threw himself down
outside as if he regarded the deluge as a cheap shower-bath.

Stafford looked at Ida anxiously.

"You are fearfully wet," he said. "I think I could wipe off the worst
of it, if you'll let me."

He took out his pocket handkerchief as he spoke and wiped the rain from
her straight, beautifully moulded shoulders. She drew back a little and
opened her lips to protest at first, but with a slight shrug she
resigned herself, her eyes downcast, a faint colour in her face.

"I must be quite dry now," she said at last.

"I'm afraid not," said Stafford. "I wish I had something bigger--a
towel."

She laughed, the sweet girlish laugh which seemed to him the most
musical sound he had ever heard.

"A towel? Fancying carrying a towel to wipe oneself with when it
rained! It is evident you don't know our country. There are weeks
sometimes in which it never ceases to rain. And you must be wet through
yourself," she added, glancing at him.

He was on his knees at the moment carefully wiping the old habit skirt
with his saturated handkerchief as if the former were something
precious; and her woman's eye noted his short crisp hair, the shapely
head and the straight broad back.

"I'm afraid that's all I can do!" he said, regretfully, as he rose and
looked at her gravely. "Do you mean to say that you habitually ride out
in such weather as this?"

"Why, yes!" she replied, lightly. "Why not? I am too substantial to
melt, and I never catch cold. Besides, I have to go out in all weathers
to see to the cattle and the sheep."

He leant against one of the posts which supported the shed, and gazed
at her with more intense interest than any other woman had ever aroused
in him.

"Isn't there a foreman, a bailiff, whatever you call him, in these
parts?"

She shook her head.

"No; we cannot afford one; so I do his work. And very pleasant work it
is, especially in fine weather."

"And you are happy?" he asked, almost unconsciously.

Her frank eyes met his with a smile of amusement.

"Yes, quite happy," she answered. "Why? Does it seem so unlikely, so
unreasonable?"

"Well, it does," he replied, as if her frankness were contagious. "Of
course, I could understand it if you did it occasionally, if you did it
because you liked riding; but to be obliged, to have to go out in all
weathers, it isn't right!"

She looked at him thoughtfully.

"Yes, I suppose it seems strange to you. I suppose most of the ladies
you know are rich, and only ride to amuse themselves, and never go out
when they do not want to do so. Sir Stephen Orme--you--are very rich,
are you not? We, my father and I, are poor, very poor. And if I did not
look after things, if I were not my own bailiff--Oh, well, I don't know
what would happen."

Stafford gnawed at his moustache as he gazed at her. The exquisitely
colourless face, in which the violet eyes glowed like two twin flowers,
the delicately cut lips, soft and red, the dark hair clustering at the
ivory temples in wet rings, set his heart beating with a heavy
pulsation that was an agony of admiration and longing--a longing that
was vague and indistinct.

"Yes, I suppose it must seem strange to you," she said, as if she were
following out the lines of her own thoughts. "You must be accustomed to
girls who are so different."

"Yes, they're different," he admitted. "Most of the women I know would
be frightened to death if they were caught in such a rain as this;
would be more than frightened to death if they had to ride down that
hill most of 'em think they've done wonder if they get in at the end of
a run over a fairly easy country; and none of 'em could doctor a sick
sheep to save their lives."

"Yes," she said, dreamily. "I've seen them, but only at a distance. But
I didn't know anything about farming until I came home."

"And do you never go away from here, go to London for a change and get
a dance, and--and all that?" he asked.

She shook her head indifferently.

"No, I never leave the dale. I cannot. My father could not spare me.
Has it left off raining yet?"

She went to the front of the shed and looked out.

"No, it is still pelting; please come back; it is pouring off the roof;
your hair is quite wet again."

She laughed, but she obeyed.

"I suppose that gentleman, the man in the carriage, was a friend of Sir
Stephen's, as he asked the way to your house?"

"I don't know," replied Stafford. "I don't know any of my father's
friends. I knew very little of him until last night."

She looked at him with frank, girlish interest.

"Did you find the new house very beautiful?" she asked.

Stafford nodded.

"Yes," he said, absently. "It is a kind of--of palace. It's beautiful
enough--perhaps a little too--too rich," he admitted.

She smiled.

"But then, you are rich. And is it true that a number of visitors are
coming down? I heard it from Jessie."

"Who is Jessie?" he asked, for he was more interested in the smallest
detail of this strange, bewilderingly lovely girl's life than his
father's affairs.

"Jessie is my maid. I call her mine, because she is very much attached
to me; but she is really our house-maid, parlour-maid. We have very few
servants: I suppose you have a great many up at the new house?"

He nodded.

"Oh, yes," he said, half apologetically. "Too many by far. I wish you
could, see it," he added.

She laughed softly.

"Thank you; but that is not likely. I think it is not raining so hard
now, and that I can go."

"It is simply pouring still," he said, earnestly and emphatically. "You
would get drenched if you ventured out."

"But I can't stay here all day," she remarked, with a laugh. "I have a
great deal to do: I have to see that the sheep have not strayed, and
that the cows are in the meadows; the fences are bad in places, and the
stupid creatures are always straying. It is wonderful how quickly a cow
finds a weak place in a fence."

Stafford's face grew red, a brick-dust red.

"It's not fit work for you," he said. "You--you are only a girl; you
can't be strong enough to face such weather, to do such work."

The beautiful eyes grew wide and gazed at him with girlish amusement,
and something of indignation.

"I'm older than you think. I'm not a girl!" she retorted. "And I am as
strong as a horse." She drew herself up and threw her head back. "I am
never tired--or scarcely ever. One day I rode to Keswick and back, and
when I got home Jason met me at the gate and told me that the steers
had 'broken' and had got on the Bryndermere road. I started after them,
but missed them for a time, and only came up with them at Landal
Water--ah, you don't know where that is; well, it is a great many
miles. Of course I had a rest coming back, as I could only drive them
slowly."

Something in his eyes--the pity, the indignation, the wonder that this
exquisitely refined specimen of maidenhood should be bent to such base
uses--shone in them and stopped her. The colour rose to her face and
her eyes grew faintly troubled, then a proud light flashed in them.

"Ah, I see; you are thinking that it is--is not ladylike, that none of
your lady-friends would do it if even if they were strong enough?"

Stafford would have scorned himself if he had been tempted to evade
those beautiful eyes, that sweet, and now rather haughty voice;
besides, he was not given to evasion with man or woman.

"I wasn't thinking quite that," he said. "But I'll tell you what I was
thinking, if you'll promise not to be offended."

She considered for a moment, then she said:

"I do not think you will offend me. What was it?"

"Well, I was thinking that--see here, now, Miss Heron, I've got your
promise!--it is not worthy of you--such work, I mean."

"Because I'm a girl?" she said, her lip curving with a smile.

"No," he said, gravely; "because you are a lady; because you are so--so
refined, so graceful, so"--he dared not say "beautiful," and
consequently he floundered and broke down. "If you were a farmer's
daughter, clumsy and rough and awkward, it would not seem to
inappropriate for you to be herding cattle and counting sheep; but--now
your promise!--when I come to think that ever since I met you,
whenever I think of you I think of--of--a beautiful flower--that now I
have seen you in evening-dress, I realise how wrong it is that you
should do such work. Oh, dash it! I know it's like my cheek to talk to
you like this," he wound up, abruptly and desperately.

While he had been speaking, the effect of his words had expressed
itself in her eyes and in the alternating colour and pallor of her
face. It was the first time in her life any man had told her that she
was refined and graceful and flower-like; that she was, so to speak,
wasting her sweetness on the desert air, and the speech was both
pleasant and painful to her. The long dark lashes swept her cheek; her
lips set tightly to repress the quiver which threatened them; but when
he had completely broken down, she raised her eyes to his with a look
so grave, so sweet, so girlish, that Stafford's heart leapt, not for
the first time that morning, and there flashed through him the
unexpected thought:

"What would not a man give to have those eyes turned upon him with love
shining in their depths!"

"I'm not offended," she said. "I know what you mean. None of your
lady-friends would do it because they are ladies. I'm sorry. But they
are not placed as I am. Do you think I could sit with my hands before
me, or do fancy-work, while things went to ruin? My father is old and
feeble--you saw him the other night--I have no brother--no one to help
me, and--so you see how it is!"

The eyes rested on his with a proud smile, as if she were challenging
him, then she went on:

"And it does not matter. I live quite alone; I see no one, no other
lady; there is no one to be ashamed of me."

Stafford reddened.

"That's rather a hard hit for me!" he said. "Ashamed! By Heaven! if you
knew how I admired--how amazed I am at your pluck and goodness--"

Her eyes dropped before his glowing ones.

"And there is no need to pity me: I am quite happy, quite; happier than
I should be if I were playing the piano or paying visits all day. It
has quite left off now."

Half unconsciously he put his hand on her arm pleadingly, and with the
firm, masterful touch of the man.

"Will you wait one more moment?" he said, in his deep, musical voice.
She paused and looked at him enquiringly. "You said just now that you
had no brother, no one to help you. Will you let me help you? will you
let me stand in the place of a friend, of a brother?"

She looked at him with frank surprise; and most men would have been
embarrassed and confused by the steady, astonished regard of the violet
eyes; but Stafford was too eager to get her consent to care for the
amusement that was mixed with the expression of surprise.

"Why--how could you help me?" she said at last; "even if--"

--"You'd let me," he finished for her. "Well, I'm not particularly
clever, but I've got sense enough to count sheep and drive cows; and I
can break in colts, train dogs, and, if I'm obliged, I daresay I could
drive a plough."

Her eyes wandered thoughtfully, abstractedly down the dale; but she was
listening and thinking.

"Of course I should have a lot to learn, but I'm rather quick at
picking up things, and--"

"Are you joking, Mr. Orme?" she broke in.

"Joking? I was never more serious in my life," he said, eagerly, and
yet with an attempt to conceal his earnestness. "I am asking it as a
favour, I am indeed! I shall be here for weeks, months, perhaps, and I
should be bored to death--"

"With your father's house full of visitors?" she put in, softly, and
with a smile breaking through her gravity.

"Oh, they'll amuse themselves," he said. "At any rate, I sha'n't be
with them all day; and I'd ever so much rather help you than dance
attendance on them."

She pushed the short silky curls from her temples, and shook her head.

"Of course it's ridiculous," she said, with a girlish laugh; "and it's
impossible, too."

"Oh, is it?" he retorted. "I've never yet found anything I wanted to do
impossible."

"You always have your own way?" she asked.

"By hook or by crook," he replied.

"But why do you want to--help me?" she asked. "Do you think you would
find it amusing? You wouldn't." The laughter shone in her eyes again.
"You would soon grow tired of it. It is not like hunting or fishing or
golfing; it's work that tries the temper--I never knew what a fiendish
temper I had got about me until the first time I had to drive a cow and
calf."

"My temper couldn't be worse," he remarked, calmly. "Howard says that
sometimes I could give points to the man possessed with seven devils."

"Who is Mr. Howard?" she asked.

"My own particular chum," he said. "He came down with me and is up at
the house now. But never mind Howard; are you going to let me help you
as if I were an old friend or a--brother? Or are you going to be unkind
enough to refuse?"

She began to feel driven, and her brows knit as she said:

"I think you are very--obstinate, Mr. Orme."

"That describes me exactly," he said, cheerfully. "I'm a perfect mule
when I like, and I'm liking it all I know at this moment."

"It's absurd--it's ridiculous, as I said," she murmured, half angrily,
half laughingly, "and I can't think why you offered, why you want
to--to help me!"

"Never mind!" said Stafford, his heart beating with anticipatory
triumph; for he knew that the woman who hesitates is gained. "Perhaps I
want to get some lessons in farming on the cheap, or--"

--"Perhaps you really want to help the poor girl who, though she is a
lady, has to do the work of a farmer's daughter," she said, in a low
voice. "Oh, it is very kind of you, but--"

"Then I'll come over to-morrow an hour earlier than this, and you shall
show me how to count the sheep, or whatever you do with them," he put
in, quickly.

"But I was going to refuse--very gratefully, of course--but to
refuse!"

"You couldn't; you couldn't be so unkind! I'll ride a hunter I've got;
he's rather stiffer than Adonis, and better up to rough work. I will
come to the stream where we first met and wait for you--shall I?"

He said all this as if the matter were settled; and with the sensation
of being driven still more strongly upon her, she raised her eyes to
his with a yielding expression in them, with that touch of imploration
which lurks in a woman's eyes and about the corners of her lips when
for the first time she surrenders her will to a man.

"I do not know what to say. It is absurd--it is--wrong. I don't
understand why--. Ah, well," she sighed with an air of relief, "you
will tire of it very quickly--after a few hours--"

"All right. We'll leave it at that," he said, with an exasperating air
of cheerful confidence. "It is a bargain, Miss Heron. Shall we shake
hands on it?"

He held out his hand with the smile which few men, and still fewer
women, could resist; and she tried to smile in response; but as his
strong hand closed over her small one, a faint look of doubt, almost of
trouble, was palpable in her violet eyes and on her lips. She drew her
hand away--and it had to be drawn, for he released it only slowly and
reluctantly--and without a word she left the shed.

Stafford watched her as she went lightly and quickly up the road
towards the Hall, Bess and Donald leaping round her; then, with a sharp
feeling of elation, a feeling that was as novel as it was confusing, he
sprang on his horse, and putting him to a gallop, rode for home, with
one thought standing clearly out: that before many hours--the next
morning--he should see her again.

Once he shifted his whip to his left hand, and stretching out his right
hand, looked at it curiously: it seemed to be still thrilling with the
contact of her small, warm palm.

As he came up to The Woodman Inn he remembered, what he had forgotten
in the morning, that he had left his cigar-case on the dining-room
mantel-shelf. He pulled up, and giving Adonis to the hostler, who
rushed forward promptly, he went into the inn. There was no one in the
hall, and knowing that he should be late for luncheon, he opened the
dining-room door and walked in, and straight up to the fireplace.

The cigar-case was where he had left it, and he turned to go out. Then
he saw that he was not the only occupant of the room, for a lady was
sitting in the broad bay-window. He snatched off his cap and murmured
an apology.

"I beg your pardon! I did not know anyone was in the room," he said.

The lady was young and handsome, with a beauty which owed a great deal
to colour. Her hair was a rich auburn, her complexion of the delicate
purity which sometimes goes with that coloured hair--"milk and roses,"
it used to be called. Her eyes were of china blue, and her lips rather
full, but of the richest carmine. She was exquisitely dressed, her
travelling costume evidently of Redfern's build, and one hand, from
which she had removed the glove, was loaded with costly rings; diamonds
and emeralds as large as nuts, and of the first water.

But it was not her undeniable beauty, or her dress and costly
jewellery, which impressed Stafford so much as the proud, scornfully
listless air with which she regarded him as she leant back
indolently--and a little insolently--tapping the edge of the table with
her glove.

"Pray don't apologise," she said, languidly. "This is a public room, I
suppose!"

"Yes, I think so," said Stafford, in his pleasant, frank way; "but one
doesn't rush into a public room with one's hat on if he has reason to
suppose that a lady is present. I thought there was no one here--the
curtain concealed you: I am sorry."

She shrugged her shoulders and gave him the faintest and most
condescending of bows; then, as he reached the door, she said:

"Do you think it will be moonlight to-night?"

Stafford naturally looked rather surprised at this point-blank
meteorological question.

"I shouldn't be surprised if it were," he said. "You see, this is a
very changeable climate, and as it is raining now it will probably
clear up before the evening."

"Thanks!" she said. "I am much obliged--"

"Oh, my opinion isn't worth much," he put in parenthetically, but she
went on as if he had not spoken.

--"I should be still further obliged if you would be so kind as to tell
my father--he is outside with the carriage somewhere--that I am tired
and that I would rather not go on until the cool of the evening."

"Certainly," said Stafford.

He waited a moment to see if she had any other requests, or rather
orders, and then went out and found the gentleman with the strongly
marked countenance, in the stable-yard beside the carriage to which the
hostler and the help were putting fresh horses.

Stafford raised his hat slightly.

"I am the bearer of a message from the young lady in the dining-room,
sir," he said. "She wishes me to tell you that she would prefer to
remain here until the evening."

The man swung round upon him with an alert and curious manner, half
startled, half resentful.

"What the devil--I beg your pardon! Prefers to remain here! Well!" He
muttered something that sounded extremely like an oath, then, with a
shrug of his shoulders, told the hostler to take the horses out. "Thank
you!" he said to Stafford, grudgingly. "I suppose my daughter is tired:
very kind of you."

"Not at all," responded Stafford, politely; and he got on
to Adonis, which Mr. Groves himself had led out, and rode away.

The gentleman looked after him with knitted brows.

"What is the name of that young fellow?" he asked of Groves.

"That is Mr. Stafford Orme, Sir Stephen's son, sir," replied Groves.

The gentleman was walking towards the house, but he pulled up short,
his eyes narrowed themselves to slits and his thick lips closed
tightly.

"A fine young fellow, sir!" said Groves, with respectful enthusiasm. "A
splendid specimen of an English gentleman!"

The gentleman grunted and went on to the dining-room.

"What whim is this, Maude?" he asked, irritably.

She yawned behind her beringed hand.

"I am tired. I can't face that stuffy carriage again just yet. Let us
dine here and go on afterwards in the cool."

"Oh, just as you like," he said. "It makes no difference to me!"

"I know," she assented. Then, in an indolently casual way, she asked:

"Who was that gentleman who rode by just now?"

Her father glanced at her suspiciously as he took off his overcoat.

"Now, how on earth should I know, my dear Maude!" he replied, with a
short, harsh laugh. "Some young farmer or cattle dealer, I imagine."

"I said _gentleman_," she retorted, with something approaching
insolence. "You will permit _me_ to know the difference."

Her father coloured angrily, as if she had stung him.

"You'd better go upstairs and take off your things while I order
dinner," he said.




CHAPTER IX.


As Stafford rode homewards he wondered whom the strange pair could be.
It was evident they were not going to stay at the Villa, or they would
have driven straight there; but it was also evident that the gentleman
had heard of Sir Stephen's "little place," or he would not have asked
where it was; but, as Stafford reflected, rather ruefully, it would be
difficult for any traveller passing through the neighbourhood not to
see the new, great white house, or to hear something, perhaps a very
great deal, of the man who had built it.

Howard sauntered down the hall to meet him.

"Good heavens, how wet you look, and, needless to add, how happy. If
there is anything in the doctrine of the transmigration of souls, my
dear Stafford, your future embodiment will be that of a Newfoundland
dog. Such an extremely strong passion for cold water is
almost--er--indecent. I've had a lovely morning in the library; and
your father is still at work with his correspondence. I asked him what
he thought of Lord Palmerston's aphorism: that if you left your letters
unanswered long enough they answered themselves; and he admitted it was
true, and that he had sometimes adopted the plan successfully. There is
a secretary with him--a dark and silent man named Murray, who appears
to have an automatic, double-action brain; anyway he can write a letter
and answer questions at the same time. And he watches your father's
lips as if he--the secretary, not Sir Stephen--were a dog waiting for a
stone to be thrown. It is interesting to watch--for a time; then it
gets on one's nerves. May I ask where you have been?"

"Oh, just for a ride; been trying the new horse: he's a clinker! The
governor couldn't have got hold of a better if he'd searched all
Arabia, and Hungary to boot. I'll just change and get some lunch. I
hope you haven't waited?"

"Your hope is not in vain, young man," replied Howard, suavely; "but I
will come and sit beside you while you stoke."

With Measom's aid Stafford was soon into dry clothes and seated at
lunch, and, as he had promised, Howard drew a chair to the table, and
contemplated him with vicarious enjoyment.

"What an appetite you have!" he drawled, admiringly. "I imagine it
would stand by you, even if you were in love. As a specimen of the
perfectly healthy animal you stand preeminent, my dear Stafford. By the
way, shall I spoil your lunch if I read you out a list of the guests
whom we are expecting this afternoon? Sir Stephen was good enough to
furnish me with it, with the amiable wish that I might find some friend
on it. What do you say to Lord and Lady Fitzharford; the Countess of
Clansford; the Baron Wirsch; the Right Honourable Henry Efford; Sir
William and Lady Plaistow--"

Stafford looked up and smiled.

"Any more?"

"Oh, yes. There are the two Beltons and George Levinson, to say nothing
of Mr. Griffinberg, the railroad king."

Stafford stared at his claret glass.

"I wonder why the governor has asked such a crowd?" he said, musingly.

"A perfectly arranged symphony in colours, I call it," said Howard.
"Fashion is represented by the Fitzharfords and old Lady Clansford;
politics by Efford and the Beltons, and finance by Plaistow and Wirsch.
That Griffinberg is coming is a proof that Sir Stephen has got 'a
little railway' in his mind; there are several others who seem to have
been thrown in, not to increase weight, but to lighten it. It will be
rather amusing--a kind of menagerie which, under less skilful guidance
than Sir Stephen's, might be sure to disagree and fight."

Stafford sighed.

"Oh, you'll be all right," he said; "but I don't quite see where I
shall come in."

Howard laughed.

"My dear Stafford, there are some extremely pretty girls with whom you
can flirt, and I've no doubt some of the men will join you in your
eccentric attempts to drown yourself or break your neck. _Is_ that the
sun coming out, and is it going to clear?"

"I hope so," said Stafford, laughing. "For I prophesied a fine evening,
and a lady was weak enough to take my word for it. Let us go and rake
my father out of the library, and get him into the garden with a
cigar."

"You may venture upon such an audacity, but not I," said Howard, with
simulated fear. "I'll wait for you on the terrace."

Sir Stephen looked up with a frown as Stafford entered, and the
dark-faced secretary stared aghast at the intrusion; but Sir Stephen's
face cleared as he saw who it was.

"Back, Stafford?" he said. "What? Come into the garden--cigar?
Certainly! You can finish up, can't you, Murray? Thanks!" He looked at
his watch as they went through the hall. "I suppose some of the people
will be here before long. Did Mr. Howard show you the list? Do you know
any of them. Stafford?"

"Yes, I've met Lady Clansford and the Fitzharfords, of course; but most
of them are too great and lofty. I mean that they are celebrated
personages, out of my small track. One doesn't often meet Sir William
Plaistow and Mr. Griffinberg at at homes and afternoon teas." Sir
Stephen laughed.

"Oh, well, you mustn't let them bore you, you know, my boy. You must
consider yourself quite free to cut off and amuse yourself some other
way whenever you get tired of them."

"And leave it all to you, sir!" said Stafford, with a smile; but as he
spoke he drew a breath of relief; he should be free to help the
beautiful, lovely girl of Herondale.

A few hours later the visitors arrived, and before dinner the superb
drawing-room was, if not crowded, sufficiently well filled with the
brilliant company.

Nearly all the guests were extremely wealthy, most of them were
powerful, either in the region of politics or finance; and the
fashionable world was represented by some beautiful women with dresses
and diamonds above reproach, and some young men whose names stood high
at Hurlingham and Prinses.

Stafford stood beside his father as Sir Stephen went from group to
group, greeting one and another in his frank and genial yet polished
manner, which grew warm and marked by scarcely repressed pride, as he
introduced Stafford.

"My son, Lady Fitzharford. I think he has had the pleasure of meeting
you? I scarcely know who are his friends: we have been separated so
long! But we are restored to each other at last, I am happy to say!
Lady Clansford, you know my boy? Ah, he has had the advantage of me all
these years; he has not had to rush all over Europe, but has been able
to bask in the sunshine of grace and beauty. Griffinberg, I want my son
to know you. You and I are such old friends that you won't mind me
showing that I am proud of him, eh?" and he laid his hand on Stafford's
shoulder with an air of pride and affection.

"What a lovely place Sir Stephen has made of this, Mr. Orme," said Lady
Clansford; "we were quite startled as we drove up, and simply
bewildered when we got inside. This room is really--oh well, I'm
beggared for adjectives!"

Stafford went about, listening to the encomiums on his father or the
house, and making appropriate responses; but he was rather relieved
when the butler announced dinner.

The dining-room received its meed of praise from the guests, and the
elaborate _menu_ caused some of the men to beam with inward
satisfaction. It was a superb dinner, served with a stateliness which
could not have been exceeded if royalty had been amongst the guests.
The plate was magnificent, the flowers arranged by an artist's hand, in
rich and yet chaste abundance. Stafford, as he looked from the bottom
of the table to Sir Stephen at the head, felt with a thrill of pride
that his father was the most distinguished-looking man of them all; and
he noticed that in the tone of both the men and the women who addressed
him there was that subtle note which indicates respect and the
consideration which men and women of the world pay to one who has
achieved greatness.

And yet, he noticed also, that not one of them was more perfectly at
his ease than Sir Stephen, who laughed and talked as if his only aim
was that of enjoyment, and as if he had never "planned a plan or
schemed a scheme." Every now and then Stafford caught his father's eye,
and each time he did so, Sir Stephen smiled at him with that air of
pride and affection which he made no attempt to conceal or check. Once
or twice Howard, too, caught his eye and smiled significantly as if he
were saying, "How is this for a successful party?"

The dinner went swimmingly, and when the ladies had retired Sir Stephen
begged the men to close up, and passed the wine freely. The talk was of
everything but politics or business--Stafford remarked that not a word
was said of either topic; and Sir Stephen told one or two stories
admirably and set the laughter going.

"What sort of a night is it, Stafford?" he asked, presently.

Stafford drew the curtain from the open French window, and the
moonlight streamed in to fight with the electric lamps.

"Shall we go out on to the terrace?" said Sir Stephen. "Quite warm
enough, isn't it?"

They went out; servants brought coffee and cigars, and some of the
gentlemen sauntered up and down the terrace, and others went down into
the garden. Sir Stephen linked his arm in Stafford's, and they walked a
little apart along one of the smooth paths.

"Not bored, I hope, my boy?" he asked.

"Good gracious, no, sir!" replied Stafford. "I don't think I remember a
more successful dinner. Why should I be bored?"

"That's all right!" said Sir Stephen, pressing his arm. "I was afraid
you might be. They are not a bad set--the men, I mean--if you keep them
off their hobbies; and we managed to do that, I think."

"Yes, I noticed you managed them very well, sir," said Stafford. "What
a lovely night." They had reached a gate opening on to the road, and
they stood and looked at the view in silence for a moment, listening to
a nightingale, whose clear notes joined with the voices and laughter of
the guests.

Suddenly another sound came upon the night air; a clatter of horses'
hoofs and the rattle of wheels.

"Someone driving down the road," said Sir Stephen.

"And coming at a deuce of a pace!" said Stafford. He opened the gate
and looked up the road; then he uttered an ejaculation.

"By George! they've bolted!" he said, in his quiet way.

"What?" asked Sir Stephen, as he, too, came out. The carriage was
tearing down the hill towards them in the moonlight, and Stafford saw
that the horses were rushing along with lowered heads and that the
driver had lost all control of them.

As they came towards the two men, Stafford set off running towards
them. Sir Stephen called him; Stafford took no heed, and as the horses
came up to him he sprang at the head of the nearer one. There was a
scramble, a scuffing of hoofs, and a loud, shrill shriek from the
interior of the carriage; then the horses were forced on to their
haunches, and Stafford scrambled to his feet from the road into which
he had been hustled.

The driver jumped down and ran to the horses' heads, the carriage door
was flung open and the gentleman of the inn leapt out. Leapt out almost
on to Sir Stephen, who ran up breathless with apprehension on
Stafford's account. The two men stood and looked at each other in the
moonlight, at first with a confused and bewildered gaze, then Sir
Stephen started back with a cry, a strange cry, which brought Stafford
to his side.

At the same moment, the girl he had seen in the sitting-room at the
inn, slipped out of the carriage.

"Are we safe?" she asked faintly. "How did we stop? Who--"

She stopped abruptly, and both she and Stafford stared at the two men
who were standing confronting each other. Sir Stephen was as white as a
ghost, and there was a look of absolute terror in his dark eyes. On the
face of the other man was an enigmatical smile, which was more bitter
than a sneer.

"You are all right?" said Stafford; "but I am afraid you were very much
frightened!"

The girl turned to him. "You!" she said, recognising him. "Did you stop
them?"

"Yes; it was easy: they had had almost enough," he said.

While they were speaking, the two elder men drew apart as if
instinctively.

"_You_, Falconer?" murmured Sir Stephen, with ashy lips.

"Yes," assented the other, drily; "yes, I am here right enough. Which
is it to be--friend or foe?"

Sir Stephen stood gnawing his lip for a moment, then he turned to
Stafford.

"Stafford, this--most extraordinary--this is an old friend of mine.
Falconer, this is my boy, my son Stafford!"




CHAPTER X.


"A very old friend of your father!" said Mr. Falconer, and his keen
eyes looked into Stafford's as he held out his hand. Then he turned to
Sir Stephen, whose face had resumed its usual serenity, and was fixed
in the smile appropriate to the occasion. "Mr. Stafford Orme and I have
met before to-day--"

Sir Stephen shot an enquiring glance from one to the other.

--"At the inn at the other side of the lake. My daughter, Maude, and I
have been resting there for a few hours. Maude," he said to that young
lady, who was standing looking on at the group generally, but more
particularly, under her lids, at Stafford's tall figure; "this is a
very strange meeting between old friends. Sir Stephen Orme and I
haven't met for--how long ago is it, Orme?"

Sir Stephen shook his head, and raised his thick, dark brows.

"Too long for us to go back--especially in the presence of these young
people, whom we are always trying to persuade that we are not old. I am
delighted to see you, my dear young lady, and I am devoured by
curiosity to know how it is that you are here."

"Well, we owe it to your son, Mr. Orme here, I should imagine, Sir
Stephen," she replied. She had fully recovered her self-possession, and
her manner and voice had all the tone of pride and indolence which
Stafford had noticed when he met her at the inn. "If he had not stopped
the horses, I suppose we should have either been killed or on the way
to the nearest hospital. By the way, have you thanked Mr. Orme yet,
father?"

"Not yet; and I shall find it difficult to do so," said Mr. Falconer.
"Thanks are poor return for one's life, Mr. Orme. I hope you were not
hurt." He glanced at Stafford's usually immaculate dress-clothes, which
were covered with dust on one side, and displayed a rent in the sleeve
of the coat.

"Oh, that's all right, sir," returned Stafford, with all an
Englishman's dread of a fuss. "They stopped short the moment I got hold
of them, and I only slipped, and got up directly.

"You are not hurt, then, Stafford?" said Sir Stephen. "As I came up I
thought, was afraid that you were smashed up--and I daresay I showed my
fear: it's my only boy, Falconer."

He looked at his old friend meaningly, and Falconer promptly backed him
up.

"Well, yes, you looked fairly startled and scared," he said. "But now,
if the horses are all right, we may as well get on. We have given you
quite trouble enough."

"The horses are all right, sir," said the driver. "I've managed to take
up the broken trace; it was that that startled them, sir, and they'll
be quiet enough now."

"Oh, but where are you going?" said Sir Stephen, with hospitable
eagerness. "Were you not coming to us, to the Villa?"

"No; we were going to Keswick," said Mr. Falconer. "My daughter had a
fancy for seeing the lake district, and we are making a kind of tour."

"You have no other engagement? I am delighted to hear it," said Sir
Stephen. "Oh, I'll take no denial! What! Do you think I shall part with
an old friend so quickly--and after such a--er--sudden and unexpected
meeting! Miss Falconer, let me beg you to plead with your father for
me!"

Mr. Falconer regarded Sir Stephen for a moment curiously, then looked
towards his daughter. Her fine eyes rested on Stafford's face, and he
could do not less than repeat his father's invitation.

"I hope you'll consent, Miss Falconer," he said. "You have no doubt
been a little upset by the accident, and it is rather late to go on.
Pray stay with us!"

"Thanks. I shall be delighted." she said, with her indolent, regal air.

By this time, as they went towards the gate, some of the men who had
been walking in the garden came up, and Howard's voice called out:

"Hallo, Stafford! Anything the matter?" "No; nothing whatever," said
Stafford, promptly; and Sir Stephen seized the opportunity to steer the
Falconers through the group. "Some old friends of mine, Mr. Howard;
their carriage broke down--fortunately at our very door--this way,
Falconer. Stafford, will you give Miss Maude your arm?"

"Strange, our meeting again so soon, and under such circumstances," she
said. "You must have stopped those horses very pluckily. I thought that
kind of thing was out of date now, and that gentlemen only called the
police on such occasions. You are sure you are not hurt? I thought from
your father's face you must be. He must be very fond of you to look so
scared. He was as white as a ghost."

"He is fond of me, I hope and think," said Stafford. "Candidly, I did
not think he would be so alarmed--but I don't know him very well
yet--we have been living apart until just recently."

"Why, that is my case," she said. "My father and I were strangers until
the other day, when he came from abroad--What a beautiful house! It is
like a miniature palace."

She looked at the Villa and then at Stafford with renewed interest.

"I suppose your father is _the_ Sir Stephen Orme of whom one has heard
so much? I did not think of it until this moment."

Stafford was giving instructions that the Falconers' carriage should be
seen to, and so was spared a reply. She stood in the hall looking round
with a kind of indolent admiration and surprise, and perfectly
self-possessed, though the hall was rapidly filling with the men from
the garden.

"You would like to go to your rooms at once," said Sir Stephen, in his
serene and courtly voice. "If you should be too tired to come down
again to-night I will have some dinner sent up to you--but I hope you
won't be. It would be a great disappointment."

"Oh, I am not at all tired," said Miss Falconer, as she followed the
housekeeper and the two demure maids up the exquisite staircase.

Sir Stephen looked after them with a bland smile, then he turned to
Stafford and caught his arm.

"Not hurt, my boy?" he said, in a tone of strained anxiety.

Stafford was beginning to get tired of the question, and answered
rather impatiently: "Not in the least sir--why should I be! I'll change
my things and be down in five minutes!"

"Yes, yes!" Sir Stephen still eyed him with barely concealed anxiety.
"Strange coincidence, Stafford! I--I haven't seen Ralph Falconer
for--for--ever so many years! And he is thrown at my very gate! And
they say there is no such thing as Fate--"

"Hadn't you better go into the drawing-room, sir," Stafford reminded
him. "They'll think something has happened."

"Eh? Yes, yes, of course!" said Sir Stephen, with a little start as if
he had been lost in thought; but he waited until he saw Stafford walk
up the stairs, without any sign of a limp, before he followed his son's
advice.

The butler, who was too sharp to need any instructions, quickly served
a choice little dinner for the unexpected guests, and Stafford, who had
waited in the hall, accompanied them into the dining-room. Miss
Falconer had changed her travelling-dress for a rich evening-frock, and
the jewels Stafford had noticed were supplemented by some remarkably
fine diamonds.

"I wish you had come in time for dinner!" he said, as he conducted her
to her seat.

"So do I!" she returned, serenely. "We are giving a great deal of
trouble; and we are keeping you from your guests. The maid who waited
on me told me that you had a large house party."

"Yes," said Stafford. "It is a kind of house-warming. My father intends
settling in England for some time, I think," he added. "And he has
built this place."

Mr. Falconer looked up from his plate in his alert, watchful way.

"Sir Stephen's plans rather uncertain?" he said. "I remember he always
used to be rather erratic. Well, if he means settling, he's made
himself a very cosy nest." He looked round the magnificent room with a
curious smile. "A wonderful man, your father, Mr. Orme!"

"Yes?" said Stafford, with a non-committal smile.

"Yes; of course, I've heard of his great doings--who hasn't! Did you
ever hear him speak of me--we were great friends one time?"

"No, I don't think I have," replied Stafford. "But as I was telling
Miss Falconer, I have not seen very much of him." "Ah, yes, just so,"
assented Mr. Falconer, and he went on with his dinner.

Stafford had taken a seat at the table and poured out a glass of wine
so that they might not hurry; but he felt that he need not have been
anxious on that account, for the girl ate her dinner in a most
leisurely manner, talking to him in her soft, slow voice and looking at
him from under her half-closed lids. She talked of the scenery, of the
quaint inns and hotels they had put up at, of the various
inconveniences which she had suffered on the way; then suddenly she
raised her lids and looked at him fully and steadily.

"I suppose the young lady we saw with you this morning is your sister?"

With all his natural simplicity, Stafford was a man of the world, and
he did not redden or look embarrassed by the suddenness of the question
and the direct gaze of the luminous eyes.

"No," he said. "I have neither sister nor brother--only my father. She
was a friend."

"Oh," she said; then after a pause: "She was very pretty."

Stafford nodded. Like a flash floated before him the exquisite
loveliness of Ida Heron.

"Do you think so?" he said, with affected indifference.

"Why, yes; don't you?" she retorted.

"Oh, yes," he assented; "but I didn't know whether you would; men and
women so very seldom agree upon the question of looks. I find that most
of the women I think pretty are considered next door to plain by my
lady-friends."

"Well, there can't be any doubt as to your friend's good looks," she
said. "She made rather a striking, not to say startling figure perched
sideways on that horse, in the pelting rain. I suppose she is one of
your neighbours?"

"Yes," replied Stafford, as easily and casually as he could, for the
face still floated before him--"yes; but not a very near one. Let me
give you some more wine."

"No, thanks. Father, haven't you nearly finished? Mr. Orme has kept us
company so nicely that we've been tempted to forget that we are keeping
him from his guests."

She rose, and with a peculiarly sinuous movement threw out the train of
her dress, and swept languidly to the door Stafford offered her his arm
and they entered the drawing-room.

Her appearance naturally caused a little sensation, for some of the men
had learnt and told of the story of Stafford's plucky arrest of the
bolting horses, and the people were curious to see the father and
daughter who had been rescued, and who had proved to be friends of Sir
Stephen.

By a sort of tacit understanding, Lady Clausford, who was a
good-natured individual, was playing the part of hostess and general
chaperon, and Stafford led Miss Falconer up to her.

Before a quarter of an hour had passed Miss Falconer seemed to be quite
at home in her novel surroundings; and leaning back in her chair, and
slowly fanning herself, received with perfect self-possession the
attentions which her beauty, her costly dress, and her still more
costly jewels merited. Presently Stafford heard Lady Clansford ask her
to sing; and he went to conduct her to the piano.

"My music is upstairs in my box--but it does not matter: I will try and
remember something," she said. "I wonder what you like?" She raised her
eyes to his, as her fingers touched the keys. "The simple ballad would
be rather out of place, wouldn't it? Do you know this thing of
Wagner's?"

As she began to sing the talking died down and gradually ceased; and
every eye was fixed upon her; for it was evident that she not only had
an exquisite voice, but knew how to use it. She sang like an artist,
and apparently without the least effort, the liquid notes flowing from
her red lips like the water of a mountain rill.

Stafford was surprised, almost startled, but as he stood beside her, he
was thinking, strangely enough, not so much of the singer as of the
girl he was going to meet on the morrow. When she had finished, there
was a general murmur of applause, and Lady Clansford glided to the
piano and asked her to sing again.

"You have a really wonderful voice, Miss Falconer. I don't think Melba
ever sang that better."

"Melba's register is ever so much greater than mine," remarked Miss
Falconer, calmly. "No, thanks; I won't sing again. I think I am a
little tired."

She went back to her seat slowly, her fan moving languidly, as if she
were too conscious of the worth of her voice to be affected by the
murmurs of applause and admiration; and Stafford, as his eyes followed
her, thought she resembled a superb tropical flower of rich and subtle
colouring and soft and languorous grace.

None of the women would venture to sing after this exhibition, and one
of the young men went to the piano and dashed off a semi-comic song
which believed the tension produced by Miss Falconer's magnificent
voice and style. Then the woman began to glance at the clock and rise
and stand about preparatory to going to bed, and presently they went
off, lingering, talking, and laughing, in the hall and in the
corridors.

The men drifted into the billiard and smoking-room, and Sir Stephen
started a pool. He had been at his very best in the drawing-room,
moving about amongst the brilliant crowd, with a word for each and all,
and pleased smile on his handsome face, and a happy, genial brightness
in his voice. Once or twice Sir Stephen approached Mr. Falconer, who
leant against the wall looking on with the alert, watchful eyes half
screened behind his lids, which, like his daughter's had a trick of
drooping, though with a very different expression.

"Your daughter has a magnificent voice, Falconer," Sir Stephen had said
in a congratulatory voice; and Falconer had nodded.

"Yes. She's been well taught, I believe," he had responded,
laconically; and Sir Stephen had nodded emphatically, and moved away.

"Will you play, Falconer?" he asked, as Stafford gave out the balls.
"You used to play a good game."

Falconer shrugged his shoulders.

"Haven't played for years: rather look on," he said.

"Let me give you a cigar. Try these; they are all right, Stafford
says."

Falconer seated himself in one of the lounges and looked at the players
and round the handsome room in contemplative silence. Sir Stephen's eye
wandered covertly towards him now and again, and once he said to
Stafford:

"See if Mr. Falconer has some whiskey, my boy?"

As Stafford went up to Mr. Falconer's corner he saw that Mr.
Griffinberg and Baron Wirsch had joined him. The three men were talking
in the low confidential tone characteristic of city men when they are
discussing the sacred subject of money, and Stafford caught the
words--"Sir Stephen"--"South African Railway."

Mr. Falconer looked round sharply as Stafford stood at his elbow.

"Eh? Whiskey? Oh, yes, thanks, I have some," he said.

As Stafford returned to the billiard-room, Falconer nodded after him.

"Is the son in this?" he asked, sharply.

"Oh, no," replied the baron, with a smile. "He knows nothing; he ees
too young, too--vat do you say?--too vashionable, frivolous. No, Sir
Stephen doesn't bring him in at all. You understand? He is ze
ornamental, shleeping' pardner, eh?" And he chuckled.

Falconer nodded, and leaning forward, continued the conversation in a
low voice. The men went off to bed one by one, and presently only Sir
Stephen, Stafford and Falconer remained; and as the latter rose as if
to retire, Sir Stephen laid a hand on his shoulder.

"Don't go yet! I should like to have a little chat with you--about old
times."

Falconer sank into his seat again and took a fresh cigar, and Stafford
left them.




CHAPTER XI.


Sir Stephen closed the door after him, then went back to the
smoking-room and stood looking down at Falconer, who leant back in his
chair with his cigar in his mouth and eyed Sir Stephen under
half-closed lids with an expression which had something of mastery and
power in it.

Sir Stephen bit at the end of his moustache, his thick black brows
lowered, as if he scarcely knew how to begin the "chat," and Falconer
waited without any offer of assistance. At last Sir Stephen said:

"You asked me outside just now, Falconer, if it was to be 'friend or
foe?' I'm thinking the question ought to have come from me."

"Yes," assented Falconer, his eyes growing still narrower. "Yes, I
suppose it ought."

"Would your answer have been the same as mine--'friends'?" asked Sir
Stephen in a low voice.

Falconer was silent for a moment, then he said:

"It oughtn't to have been. If ever a man had cause to regard another as
an enemy, I've had cause to regard you as one, Orme!"

Sir Stephen flushed, then went pale again.

"There is no use in raking up the past," he muttered.

"Oh, I've no need to rake it up; it's here right enough, without
raking," retorted Falconer, and he touched his breast with his thick
forefinger. "I'm not likely to forget the trick you played me; not
likely to forget the man who turned on me and robbed me--"

"Robbed!" echoed Sir Stephen, with a dark frown.

Falconer turned his cigar in his mouth and bit at it.

"Yes, robbed. You seem to have forgotten: my memory is a better one
than yours, and I'm not likely to forget the day I tramped back to the
claim in that God-forsaken Australian hole to find that you'd
discovered the gold while I'd been on the trail to raise food and
money--discovered it and sold out--and cleared out!"

His eyes flashed redly and his mouth twitched as his teeth almost met
in the choice Havana.

Sir Stephen threw out his hand.

"I heard you were dead," he said, hoarsely. "I heard that you had died
in a street row--in Melbourne."

Falconer's heavy face was distorted by a sneer.

"Yes? Of course, I don't believe you: who would?"

"As Heaven is my witness--!" exclaimed Sir Stephen; but Falconer went
on:

"You didn't wait to see if it were true or not; you cleared out before
I'd time to get back, and you took precious good care not to make
enquiries. No; directly your partner's back was turned you--sold him;
got the price and levanted."

Sir Stephen paced up and done, his hands clenched behind him; his fine
leonine head bent; then he stopped in front of the chair, and frowned
down into the scowling face.

"Falconer, you wrong me--it was not so bad, so black as it looked. It's
true I sold the claim; but I swear that I intended saving half for you.
But news was brought in that you were dead--a man said that he had seen
you fall, that you were dead and buried. I had to leave the camp the
night the money was paid: it would not have been safe to remain: you
know what the place was, and that the man who was known to have money
carried his life in his hand. I left the camp and tramped south. Before
a month had passed, the money had gone; if I had had any doubts of your
death, it was too late to enquire; it would have been useless; as I
tell you, the money was gone. But I hadn't any doubts; in simple truth,
I thought you were dead."

Falconer looked round the luxurious room.

"You lost the money? But you appear to have picked it up again; you
seem to be pretty flourishing, my friend; when you got on your feet
again and made your pile, why didn't you find out whether your old pal
was alive or dead?"

Sir Stephen was silent for a space, then he raised his head and met the
other's accusing gaze unflinchingly.

"I'll tell you--I'll tell you the whole truth, Falconer; and if you can
make excuse for me, if you can put yourself in my place--"

He drew his hand across his brow as if the sweat had broken out upon
it. "The luck was dead against me for a time, the old luck that had
haunted you and me; then it swung round completely--as it generally
does when it changes at all. I was out in Africa, on the tramp, picking
up a day's work now and again at the farms--you know the life! One day
I saw a Kaffir boy playing with some rough stones--"

Falconer nodded.

"Diamonds. I fancy I've read an account of the great Sir Stephen Orme's
first beginnings," he put in with a touch of sarcasm.

Sir Stephen reddened.

"I daresay. It was the start, the commencement of the luck. From the
evening I took those stones in my hands--great Heaven! I can see the
place now, the sunset on the hill; the dirty brat playing in the
dust!--the luck has stood by me. Everything I touched turned out right.
I left the diamond business and went in for land: wherever I bought
land towns sprang up and the land increased in value a thousandfold.
Then I stood in with the natives: you've heard of the treaty--"

Falconer nodded.

"The treaty that enabled you to hand over so many thousand square miles
to the government in exchange for a knighthood."

"No," said Sir Stephen, simply. "I got that for another business; but I
daresay the other thing helped. It doesn't matter. Then I--I married. I
married the daughter of a man of position, a girl who--who loved and
trusted me; who knew nothing of the past you and I know; and as I would
rather have died than that she should have known anything of it, I--"

"Conveniently and decently buried it," put in Falconer. "Oh, yes, I can
see the whole thing! You had blossomed out from Black Steve--"

Sir Stephen rose and took a step towards the door, then remembered that
he had shut it and sank down again, his face white as ashes, his lips
quivering.

--"To Sir Stephen Orme, the African millionaire, the high and lofty
English gentleman with his head full of state secrets, and his safe
full of foreign loans; Sir Stephen Orme, the pioneer, the empire
maker--Oh, yes, I can understand how naturally you would bury the
past--as you had buried your old pal and partner. The dainty and
delicate Lady Orme was to hear nothing--" Sir Stephen rose and
stretched out his hand half warningly half imploringly.

"She's dead, Falconer!" he said, hoarsely. "Don't--don't speak of her!
Leave her out, for God's sake!"

Falconer shrugged his shoulders.

"And this boy of yours--he's as ignorant as her ladyship was, of
course?"

Sir Stephen inclined his head.

"Yes," he said, huskily. "He--he knows nothing. He thinks me--what the
world sees me, what all the world, saving you, Falconer, thinks me: one
who has risen from humble but honest poverty to--what I am. You have
seen him, you can understand what I feel; that I'd rather die than that
he should know--that he should think badly of me. Falconer, I have made
a clean breast of it--I'm in your hands. I'm--I'm at your mercy. I
appeal to you"--he stretched out his white, shapely hands--"you have a
child of your own: she's as dear to you as mine is to me--I've watched
you to-night, and I've seen you look at her as she moved about and
talked and sang, with the look that my eyes wear when they rest on my
boy. I am at your mercy--not only mine, but my son's future--"

He wiped the sweat from his forehead and drew a long breath.

Falconer leant back and smoked contemplatively, with a coolness, an
indifference to the other's emotion which Sir Stephen found well-nigh
maddening.

"Yes," said Falconer, after a pause, "I suppose your house of cards
would come down with a crash if I opened my mouth say, at breakfast
to-morrow morning, and told--well, all I know of the great Sir Stephen
Orme when he bore the name of Black Steve. Even you, with all you
colossal assurance, could not face it or outlive it. And as for the
boy--it would settle his hash now and forever. A word from me would do
it, eh, Orme? And upon my soul I don't know why I shouldn't say it!
I've had it in my mind, I've kept it as a sweet morsel for a good many
years. Yes, I've been looking forward to it. I've been waiting for the
'physiological moment,' as I think they call it; and it strikes me that
it has arrived."

Sir Stephen's face grew strained, and a curious expression crept into
it.

"If you ask me why you should not, I can give you no reason," he said.
"If you were poor I should offer you money--more, a great deal more
than I received for the old claim; but I can see that that would not
tempt you to forego your revenge. Falconer, you are not poor; your
daughter wears diamonds--"

Falconer shrugged his shoulders.

"No, I'm not in want of money. You're not the only man who has had a
change of luck. No, you can't bribe me; even if I were hard up instead
of rather flush, as I am, I wouldn't take a hundred thousand pounds for
my revenge."

Sir Stephen rose. There was an ominous change in his manner. His
nervousness and apprehension seemed to have suddenly left him, and in
its place was a terrible, stony calmness, an air of inflexible
determination.

"Good!" he said; and his voice had changed also, changed from its
faltering tone of appeal to one of steadfast resolution, the steadiness
of desperation. "I have made my appeal to you, Falconer, and I gather
that I have failed to move you; that you intend to exact your revenge
by--denouncing me!"

Falconer nodded coolly.

"And you think that I could endure to live under such a threat, to walk
about with the sword of Damocles over my head? You ought to know me
better, Falconer. I will not live to endure the shame you can inflict
on me, I will not live to tempt you by the sight of me to take your
revenge. I shall die to-night."

Falconer eyed him intently, and carefully selected a fresh cigar. When
he had as carefully lit it, he said callously:

"That's your business, of course. I shouldn't venture to interfere with
any plan of that kind. So you'd sneak out of it, eh, Orme? Sneak out of
it, and leave that young fellow to bear the brunt? Well, I'm sorry for
him! He seems the right sort--deuced good-looking and high-class--yes,
I'm d----d sorry for him!"

Once again Sir Stephen's lips twitched and the big drops of sweat stood
on his brow. He stood for a minute looking from right to left like a
hunted animal at bay--then with something between a groan and a cry of
savagery, he spring towards Falconer with his hands outstretched and
making for his tormentor's throat.

Before he could sweep the table aside and get at him, Falconer whipped
a revolver from his pocket and aimed it at Sir Stephen.

"You fool!" he said in his harsh, grating voice, "did you think I was
such an idiot as to trust myself alone with you unarmed? Did you think
I'd forgotten what sort of man you were, or imagined that you'd so
changed that I could trust you? Bah! Sit down! Stand back, or, by
Heaven, I'll shoot you as I would a dog!"

Sir Stephen shrank back, his hand to his heart, his eyes distended, his
face livid as if he were choking and sank into a chair. Falconer
returned the revolver into his pocket, and with his foot pushed the
inlaid Oriental table towards his host and victim.

"There! Take some brandy! You're too old to play these tricks! That
heart of yours was never worth much in the old days, and I daresay it's
still more groggy. Besides, we're not in a mining camp or the backwoods
now." He sneered. "We're in Sir Stephen Orme's palatial villa on Lake
Bryndermere."

Sir Stephen stretched out his hand and felt for the decanter, as if he
were suddenly blind and could not see it, and poured himself out some
brandy. Falconer watched him narrowly, critically.

"Better? Look here, Orme, take my advice and keep a guard on your
emotions: you can't afford to have any with a heart like that."

He paused and waited until Sir Stephen's ashy face had resumed a less
deathly pallor.

"And now I'll answer your appeal--I don't intend to denounce you!"

Sir Stephen turned to him with a gesture of incredulity.

"Sounds strange, doesn't it? Humph! Doesn't it strike you that I've had
my revenge already? If there is a sweeter one than to see the man who
has sold you grovelling at your feet, and praying for mercy, than I
don't know it! The great Sir Stephen Orme, too!" He laughed sneeringly.
"No, if I'd meant to give you away, Orme, I should have done it
to-night in your swell drawing-room, with all your swell guests round
you, with your son--ay, and my daughter--to hear the story--the story
of Black Steve! But I didn't mean it, and I don't--"

Sir Stephen drew a long breath of relief, and drank some more brandy.

"Thank God!" he murmured. "What can I say--what can I do to--to express
my gratitude--my sense of your forbearance, Falconer?"

Falconer, with his eyes narrowed to slits, looked at him keenly.

"Oh, I'll dispense with your gratitude, Orme. We'll agree to forgive
and--forget. This is the last word we'll say about it."

Sir Stephen, as if he could scarcely believe his ears, gazed at his
magnanimous foe in silence.

"No half measures with me--you remember me of old," said Falconer. "The
subject's done with," he moved his thick hand as he were sweeping it
away. "Pass the whiskey. Thanks. Now, let's have the chat you kept me
up for."

Sir Stephen wiped his lips and forced a smile.

"Tell me about yourself; what you have been doing since we--er--all
this long time."

Falconer shrugged his shoulders. "Oh, it isn't as interesting a story
as yours," he said. "I've just rubbed along with bad and good luck in
streaks; fortunately for me, the good ones were thicker and more
frequent than the bad ones. Lake yourself I married; like yourself, I'm
a widower. I've one child--Maude. She's been at school and under the
care of some people on the Continent, while I've been at work; and I've
come to England now to settle down. That tells enough of my story. I
know yours, as the rest of the world does. You're famous, you see."

There was a pause; then he looked over his glass, and said:

"What's you little game at the present moment, Orme?"

Sir Stephen looked at him interrogatively, as if he were still rather
confused by the terrible scene which they had gone through.

"Why have you built this place and got all these people here?" said
Falconer. "I know enough of Wirsch and Griffinberg and the Beltons to
be aware chat they wouldn't come down to the lakes at this time of the
year unless there was something worth coming for, something--and a
pretty good sum--to be made."

Sir Stephen looked down at the floor for a moment, as if he were
considering; then he leant forward.

"I'll tell you," he said, with an air of decision, and with a return of
his usual coolness and aplomb. A dash of colour rose to his face, his
fine eyes grew bright; he was the "man of affairs," the great financier
again. "It's Africa this time," he said, in a low voice, and with a
glance at the door. "I've another treaty--"

Falconer nodded.

"I am making for a concession--a charter from the government."
Falconer nodded again.

"And I want a railway from Danville to Bualbec." His voice almost sank
to a whisper. "Griffinberg, Wirsch, and the rest are with me--or nearly
so--I have got them down to clench the matter. There are millions in
it--if I can bring it off; there is what is worth more than millions to
me--"

Falconer nodded.

--"A peerage for Sir Stephen Orme," said Falconer, with a grim smile.

"For Sir Stephen Orme's boy!" said Sir Stephen, with a flush, and a
flash of the dark eyes. "It is for his sake that I am making this last
throw; for my boy's, Falconer. For myself I am content--why shouldn't I
be? But for him--ah, well, you've seen him! You'll understand!"

Falconer leant back and smoked in silence.

"Plaistow is working the Colonial Office, the Beltons are feeling their
way in the city; Wirsch--but you know how the thing is done! I've got
them down here that they may work it quietly, that I may have them
under my eye--"

"And the lords and ladies--they're to have a finger in the pie because,
though they can't help you in the African business, they can in the
matter of the peerage?"

Sir Stephen smiled. "You'll stand in with us, Falconer? Don't refuse
me! Let me make some reparation--some atonement for the past!" He rose
and stood smiling, an imposing figure with his white hair and brilliant
eyes. Falconer got up slowly and stiffly.

"Thanks. I'll think it over. It's a big thing, as you say, and it will
either make you--"

--"Or break me!" said Sir Stephen, but he laughed confidently.

Falconer nodded.

"I'll go up now," he said.

Sir Stephen went to the door with him, and held out his hand.

"Good-night, Falconer!" he said. "Thank you--for my boy's sake!"

Falconer took the warm hand in his cold one and held it for a moment,
then dropped it.

"Good-night!" he said, with a nod and a sidelong glance.

Sir Stephen went back and poured himself out another _liqueur_ glass of
brandy and heaved a sigh of relief. But it would have been one of
apprehension if he could have seen the cruel smile which distorted
Falconer's face as he went through the exquisitely beautiful hall and
corridors to the luxurious room which had been allotted to him.

There was in the smile and the cold glitter of the eyes the kind of
look which the cat wears when it plays with a mouse.




CHAPTER XII.

Ida walked home through the rain very thoughtfully: but not sadly; for
though it was still pelting in the uncompromising lake fashion, she was
half conscious of a strange lightness of the heart, a strange
brightness in herself, and even in the rain-swept view, which vaguely
surprised and puzzled her. The feeling was not vivid enough to be
happiness, but it was the nearest thing to it.

And without realising it, she thought, all the way home, of Stafford
Orme. Her life had been so secluded, so solitary and friendless, that
he had come into it as a sudden and unexpected flash of sunlight in a
drear November day. It seemed to her extraordinary that she should have
met him so often, still more extraordinary the offer he had made that
morning. She asked herself, as she went with quick, light step along
the hills, why he had done it; why he, who was rich and had so many
friends--no doubt the Villa would be full of them--should find any
pleasure in learning to herd cattle and count sheep, to ride about the
dale with only a young girl for company.

If anyone had whispered, "It is because he prefers that young girl's
society to any other's; it is because he wants to be with you, not from
any desire to learn farming," she would have been more than surprised,
would have received this offer of a solution of the mystery with a
smile of incredulity; for there had been no candid friend to tell her
that she possessed the fatal gift of beauty; that she was one of those
upon whom the eyes of man cannot look without a stirring of the heart,
and a quickening of the pulse. Vanity is a strong plant, and it
flourishes in every soil; but it had found no root in Ida's nature. She
was too absorbed in the round of her daily tasks, in the care of her
father and her efforts to keep the great place from going to rack and
ruin, to think of herself; and if her glass had ever whispered that she
was one of the loveliest of the daughters of Eve, she had turned a deaf
ear to it.

No; she assured herself that it was just a whim of Mr. Orme's, a
passing fancy and caprice which would soon be satisfied, and that he
would tire of it after a few days, perhaps hours. Of course, she was
wrong to humour the whim; but it had been hard to refuse him, hard to
seem churlish and obstinate after he had been so kind on the night her
father had frightened her by his sleep-walking; and it had been still
harder because she had been conscious of a certain pleasure in the
thought that she should see him again.

For the first time, as she went into the great silent house, she
realised how lonely her life was, how drear and uneventful. Now and
again, while cantering along the roads on the big chestnut, she had met
other girls riding and driving: the Vaynes, the Avorys, and the
Bannerdales; had heard them talking and laughing merrily and happily,
but it had never occurred to her to envy them, to reflect that she was
different to other girls who had friends and companions and girlish
amusements. She had been quite content--until now. And even now she was
not discontented; but this acquaintanceship which had sprung up so
strangely between her and Mr. Orme was like the touch of a warm hand
stretched out from the great world, and its sudden warmth awoke her to
the coldness, the dreariness of her life.

As she entered the hall, Jessie came in by the back door with her apron
full of eggs.

"I saw you come in, Miss Ida, so I thought I'd just bring you these to
show you; they're laying finely now, ain't they?"

Ida looked round, from where she stood going through the form of drying
her thick but small boots against the huge log that glowed on the wide
dog-iron.

"Yes: that is a splendid lot, Jessie!" she said, with a smile. "You
will have some to send to market for the first time this season."

"Yes, miss," said Jessie, deftly rolling the eggs into a basket. "But
I'm thinking there won't be any need to send them to Bryndermere
market. Jason's just been telling me that the new folks up at Brae Wood
have been sending all round the place for eggs and butter and cream and
fowls, and Jason says that he can get so much better prices from them
than from Bryndermere. He was thinking that he'd put aside all the
cream he could spare and kill half a dozen of the pullets--if you don't
object, Miss Ida?"

Ida's face flushed, and she looked fixedly at the fire. Something
within her protested against the idea of selling the dairy produce to
the new people at Brae Wood; but she struggled against the feeling.

"Oh yes; why not, Jessie?" she said; though she knew well enough.

"Well, miss," replied Jessie, hesitatingly, and with a questioning
glance at her young mistress's averted face, "Jason didn't know at
first; he said that selling the things at the new house was different
to sending 'em to market, and that you mightn't like it; that you might
think it was not becoming."

Ida laughed.

"That's pride on Jason's part; wicked pride, Jessie," she said. "If you
sell your butter and eggs, it can't very much matter whether you sell
them at the market or direct. Oh, yes: tell Jason he can let them have
anything we can spare."

Jessie's face cleared and broke into a smile: she came of a race that
looks after the pennies and loves a good "deal."

"Thank you, miss!" she said, as if Ida had conferred a personal favour.
"And they'll take all we can let 'em have, for they've a mortal sight
of folk up there at Brae Wood. William says that there's nigh upon
fifty bedrooms, and that they'll all be full. His sister is one of the
kitchen-maids--there's a cook from London, quite the gentleman, miss,
with, rings on his fingers and a piano in his own room--and Susie says
that the place is all one mass of ivory and gold, and that some of the
rooms is like heaven--or the queen's own rooms in Windsor Castle."

Ida laughed.

"Susie appears to have an enviable acquaintance with the celestial
regions and the abode of royalty, Jessie."

"Yes, miss; of course, it's only what she've read about 'em. And she
says that Sir Stephen--that's the gentleman as owns it all--is a kind
of king, with his own body servant and a--a--I forget what they call
him; it's a word like a book-case."

"A secretary," suggested Ida.

"Yes, that's it, miss! But that he's quite simple and pleasant-like,
and that he's as easily pleased as if he were a mere nobody. And Susie
says that she runs out after dinner and peeps into the stables, and
that it's full of horses and that there's a dozen carriages, some of
'em grand enough for the Lord Mayor of London; and that there's a head
coachman and eight or nine men and boys under him. I'm thinking, Miss
Ida, that the Court"--the Court was the Vaynes' place--"or Bannerdale
Grange ain't half so grand."

"I daresay," said Ida. "Is the lunch nearly ready, Jessie?"

"Yes, miss; I was only waiting for you to come in. And Suzie's seen the
young Mr. Orme, Sir Stephen's son, and she says that he's the
handsomest gentleman she ever saw; and she heard Mr. Davis tell one of
the new hands that Mr. Stafford was a very great gentleman amongst the
fashionable people in London; and that very likely he'd marry one of
the great ladies that is coming down. Mr. Davis says that a duchess
wouldn't be too fine for him, he stands so high; and yet, Susie says,
he's just as pleasant and easy as Sir Stephen, and that he says 'thank
you' quite like a common person. But there, how foolish of me! I'm
standing here chattering while you're wet through. Do ye run up and
change while I put the lunch on, Miss Ida, dear!"

When Ida came down her father was already at the table with his book
open at his elbow, and he scarcely looked up as she went to her place.

Now, as a rule, she gave him an account of her rides and walks, and
told him about the cattle and the progress of the farm generally, of
how she had seen a kingfisher or noticed that the trout were rising, or
that she had startled a covey of partridges in the young wheat; to all
of which he seemed scarcely ever to listen, nodding his head now and
again and returning often to his book before she had finished speaking;
but to-day she could not tell him of her morning walk and her meeting
with Stafford Orme.

She would have liked to have assured him that he had done Sir Stephen
an injustice in thinking him guilty of buying the Brae Wood land in an
underhand way, but she knew it would be of no use to do so; for once an
idea had got into Mr. Heron's head it was difficult to destroy it. For
the first time in her life, too, she was concealing something from him.
Once or twice she tried to say:

"Father, the gentleman who was fishing on the river was Sir Stephen
Orme's son; I have met him two or three times since, and he has asked
me to meet him to-morrow;" but she could not.

She knew he would fly into one of the half-childish passions in which
he could not be persuaded to listen to reason, and that he would insist
upon the breaking off of her acquaintance with Mr. Orme; and there was
so much pain in the mere thought of it that her courage failed her. If
she were not to meet him, or if she met him, and told him that she
could not remain with him, must not speak to him again, it would be
tantamount to telling him that she did not believe his father was
innocent; and she did believe it. Though she knew so little of Mr.
Orme, she felt that she could trust him.

So she sat almost silent, thinking of what Jessie had told her, and
wondering why Stafford Orme should leave the gay party at the Villa to
ride with her. Once only in the course of the meal did her father
speak. He looked up suddenly, with a quick, almost cunning, glance, and
said:

"Can you let me have some money, Ida? I want to order some books.
There's a copy of the Percy 'Reliques' in the catalogue I should like
to buy."

"How much is it, father?" she asked.

"Oh, five pounds will do," he said, vaguely. "There are one or two
other books."

She made a hasty calculation: five pounds was a large sum to her; but
she smiled as she said:

"You are very extravagant, dear. There is already a copy of the
'Reliques' in the library."

He looked confused for a moment, then he said:

"But not with these notes--not with these notes! They're valuable, and
the book is cheap."

"Very well, dear," she responded; and she went to the antique bureau
and, unlocking it, took a five-pound note from a cedar box.

He watched her covertly, with a painful eagerness.

"I suppose you have a large nest egg there, eh, Ida?" he remarked, with
a quavering laugh.

"No: a very little one," she responded. "'Not nearly enough to pay the
quarterly bills. But never mind, dear; there it is. You must show me
the books when they come; I never saw the last you ordered, you know!"

He took the note with an assumption of indifference but with a gleam of
satisfaction in his sunken eyes.

"Didn't you?" he said. "I must have forgotten. You're always so busy;
but I'll show you these, if you'll remind me. You must be careful of
the money, Ida; you must keep down the expenses. We're poor, very poor,
you know; and the cost of living and servants is very great--very
great."

He wandered off to the library, muttering to himself, with his book
under his arm, and the five-pound note gripped tightly in the hand
which he had thrust into the pocket of his dressing-gown; and Ida, as
she put on her habit and went into the stable-yard to have the colt
saddled, sighed as she thought that it would be nice to have just, for
once, enough money to meet all the bills and buy all the books her
father coveted.

But her melancholy was not of long duration. The colt was in high
spirits, and the task of impressing him with the fact that he had now
reached a responsible age and must behave like a horse, with something
else before him in life than kicking up his heels in the paddock, soon
drove the thought of their poverty from her mind and sent the blood
leaping warmly and wildly in her veins.

She spent the afternoon in breaking in the colt, and succeeded in
keeping Stafford Orme out of her thoughts; but he slid into them again
as she sat by the drawing-room fire after dinner--the nights are often
cool in the dales all through early summer--and recalled the
earnestness in his handsome face when he pleaded to be allowed to "help
her."

She sat up for some little time after her father had gone to bed, and
as usual, she paused outside his door and listened. All was quiet then;
but as she was brushing her hair she thought she heard his door open.

She laid down the brush and stood battling with the sudden fear which
possessed her; then she stole out on to the corridor. The old man was
standing at the head of the stairs as if about to descend; and though
she could not see his face she knew that he was asleep.

She glided to him noiselessly and put her hand upon his arm softly. He
turned his sightless eyes upon her, evidently without seeing her, and,
fighting against the desire to cry out, she led him gently back to his
room.

He woke as they crossed the threshold, woke and looked at her in a
stupefied fashion.

"Are you ill, father? Is there anything you want?" she asked, as calmly
as she could.

"No," he replied. "I am quite well; I do not want anything. I was going
to bed--why have you called me?"

She remained with him for a few minutes, then left the room, turning
the key in the door. When she had gone he stood listening with his head
on one side; then he opened his hand and looked with a cunning smile at
the five-pound note which had been tightly grasped in it.

"She didn't see it; no, she didn't see it!" he muttered; and he went
stealthily to the bed and thrust it under the pillow.



CHAPTER XIII.


The morning broke with that exquisite clearness which distinguishes the
lakes when a fine day follows a wet one; and, despite her anxiety on
her father's account, Ida, as she went down-stairs, was conscious of
that sense of happiness which comes from anticipation. She made her
morning tour of inspection of the stables and the dairy, and ordered
the big chestnut to be saddled directly after breakfast.

When her father came down she was relieved to find that he seemed to be
in his usual health; and in answer to her question whether he had slept
well, he replied in the affirmative, and was mildly surprised that she
should enquire. Directly he had gone off to the library she ran
upstairs to put on her habit.

For the first time she was struck by its shabbiness; she had never
given a thought to it before. Her evening-dresses, though plain and
inexpensive, were always dainty and fresh, but she wore her habit as
long as it would hold together, and cared nothing for the fact that her
hat was stained by the rain: they were her "working clothes," and
strictly considered as such. But this morning she surveyed the skirt
ruefully, and thought of the trim and apparently always new habits
which the Bannerdale girls wore; and she brushed it with a care which
it had never yet received. As a rule she wore a black scarf, or none at
all; but as she looked at herself in the glass she was not satisfied,
and she found a scarlet tie which she had bought in a fit of
extravagance, and put it on. The touch of colour heightened the beauty
of her clear ivory face and brightened up the old habit; but she looked
at herself in the glass with something like shamefacedness: why was she
so anxious about her appearance this morning of all the mornings? For
an instant she was tempted to snatch off the tie; but in the end she
let it remain; and she brushed the soft tendrils of her hair at her
forehead with unusual care before she fastened on her hat.

Her father was walking up and down the terrace slowly as she came out,
and he raised his head and looked at her absently.

"I shall probably ride into Bryndermere, father," she said. "Shall I
post your letters? I know you will be anxious for that one to the
book-sellers to go," she added, with a smile.

His eyes dropped and he seemed disconcerted for a minute, then he said:

"No, no; I'll send it by Jason; I've not written it yet;" and he turned
away from her and resumed his pacing to and fro.

Ida went to the stable-yard and got on to Rupert by the aid of the
stone "mounting block" from which Charles the Second had climbed,
laughingly, to the white horse which figures in so many pictures of the
Merry Monarch, and rode out of the court-yard, watched with pride by
Jason. Before she had gone far he ran after her.

"If you're riding by West Hill, Miss Ida, perhaps you'd look at the
cattle-shed there. Williams says that the roof's falling in."

"Very well," she called back in her clear voice.

"Oh, and, Miss Ida, there's a big stone washed out of the weir; I'm
thinking it ought to be put back or we'll have the meadows above
flooded this winter."

She laughed and nodded and put Rupert to a trot, for she knew that
while she was within hearing Jason would bombard her with similar tales
of woe. Not a slate slid from the old roof of the Hall, or a sheep fell
lame, but the matter was referred to her.

She rode down the road in the sunlight, the big chestnut moving under
her as if he were on springs and she were a feather, and, half
unconsciously, she began to hum an air--not one of those modern ones
one hears in many drawing-rooms, but an old-fashioned melody which she
had found in an ancient music-book in the antique cabinet beside the
grand piano. She left the road where it touched the wild moorland of
the valley, and Rupert broke into a canter, Donald and Bess, settling
into the stride with which they managed to keep up with the big horse.

She had resolved that she would not ride straight to the stream, and
she kept up the hill-side, but her eyes wandered to the road
expectantly now and again; but there was no sign of a horseman, and
after half an hour had passed a sense of disappointment rose within
her. It was quite possible that he had forgotten the engagement;
perhaps on reflection he had seen that she was quite right in her
objections to his strange proposal, and he would not come. A faint
flush rose to her face, and she turned Rupert and rode up and over the
hill where she could not see the road. But she had no sooner got on top
than she remembered that no time had been mentioned, or, if it had,
that she had forgotten it. She turned and rode up the hill again, and
looking down, saw Stafford riding along the valley in desperate haste,
and yet looking about him uncertainly. Her heart beat with a quickened
pulse, sending the delicate colour into her face, and she pulled up,
and, leaning forward with her chin in her hand, watched him dreamily.

He rode a heavier horse than Adonis; and he had made a change in his
dress; in place of the riding-suit, which had smacked of London and
Hyde Park, he wore a rough but light coat, thick cord breeches, and
brown leather gaiters. She smiled as she knew that he had tried to make
himself look as much like a farmer as possible; but no farmer in the
dales had that peculiar air of birth and breeding which distinguished
Stafford Orme; the air which his father had been so quick to detect and
to be proud of.

She noticed how well he sat the great horse, with what ease and "hands"
he rode over the rough and treacherous ground. Suddenly he turned his
head and saw her, and with a wave of his hand came galloping up to her,
with a smile of relief and gladness on his handsome face, as he spoke
to the dogs, who clamoured round him.

"I was so afraid I had missed you," he said. "I am late, am I not? Some
people kept me after breakfast."

"You are not late; I don't think any time was mentioned," she
responded, quickly, though her heart was beating with a strange and
novel sensation of pleasure in his presence. "I scarcely expected you."

He looked at her reproachfully.

"Not expect me! But why?"

"I thought you might change your mind," she said.

He checked a quick response, and said instead:

"And now, where do we go first? You see I have got a bit heavier horse.
He's a present, also, from my father. What do you think of him?"

She eyed him gravely and critically.

"He's nice-looking," she said, "but I don't like him so well as the one
you rode yesterday. Didn't I see him slip just now, coming up the
hill?"

"Did he?" said Stafford. "I didn't notice. To tell you the truth, I was
so delighted at seeing you that I don't think I should have noticed if
he had tumbled on his nose."

"Oh, it wasn't much of a slip," she said, quickly, to cover her slight
confusion at his candid confession. "Shall we go down to the sheep
first?"

"Anywhere you like," he assented, brightly. "Remember, I'm your pupil."

She glanced at him and smiled.

"A very big pupil."

"But a very humble one," he said. "I'm afraid you'll add, 'a very
stupid one,' before long."

As they rode down hill, Stafford stole a look at her unobserved. Ever
since he had left her yesterday her face had haunted him, even while
Maude Falconer, in all her war paint and sparkling with jewels, had
been singing, even in the silent watches of the night, when--strange
thing for him!--he had awakened from a dream of her; he had recalled
the exquisitely lovely face with its grave yet girlish eyes, and he
felt now, with a thrill, that she was even more lovely than she had
been in his thoughts and his dreams; that the nameless charm which had
haunted him was stronger, more subtle, than even his fancy had painted
it. He noticed the touch of colour just below her white slender column
of a neck, and wondered why no other woman had ever thought of wearing
a crimson tie with her habit.

"What a grand morning," he said. "I don't think I ever saw a morning
like this, so clear and bright; those hills there look as though they
were quite near."

"It's the rain," she explained. "It seems to wash the atmosphere. My
father says there is only one other place which has this particular
clearness and brightness after rain: and that's Ireland. There are the
sheep. Now," she smiled, "do you know how to count them?"

He stared at her.

"You begin at number one, I suppose," he said.

She smiled.

"But where is number one?"

She spoke to Donald in a low voice, then the collie began to work the
sheep up into a heap; Bess assisting with her sharp yap.

"Now they're ready," said Ida. "You must be quick."

Stafford began to count, but the sheep moved and the ones he had
counted got mixed up with the others, and he began again and yet again,
until he turned with a puzzled and furrowed brow.

"I can't count them," he said. "They won't keep still for a single
moment."

She turned to him with a smile.

"There are fifty-two," she said.

"Do you mean to say that you've counted them already?" he exclaimed.

"Yes; I could have counted them twice over by this time. Now, begin
again, and begin from the farthest row; and remember when you come to a
black one. Keep your eye on that one and start again front him. It's
quite easy when you know how." He began again.

"I make it forty-eight."

She shook her head and laughed.

"That would be four missing, and we should have to hunt for them. But
they are all there. Try again." He tried--and made it fifty-six.

"Didn't I tell you that I was an idiot!" he said, in despair.

"Oh, you can't expect to learn the first time," she said, consolingly.
"It was weeks before I could do it; and I almost cried the first few
times I tried: they would move just as I was finishing."

"Oh, well, then I can hope to get it in time," he said. "Did it ever
strike you that though we think ourselves jolly clever, that there are
heaps of things which a workingman--the men we look down upon--can do
which we couldn't accomplish if it were to save our lives. For
instance, I couldn't make a horseshoe if my existence depended upon it,
and yet it looks as easy as--"

--"Counting sheep," she finished, with a twinkle in her grey-blue
eyes.

"Just so," he said, with a laugh. "Shall I have another try?"

"Oh, no; you'd be here all day; and we've got to see if the others are
all right; but first I think we'd better go and look at the weir; Jason
says that a stone has got washed down, and that means that when the
autumn rains come the meadows would be flooded."


"All right: I'm ready," he said, with bright alacrity. "I'm enjoying
this. I know now why you look so happy and contented. You're of some
use in the world, and I--the rest of us--That's the weir?" he broke off
to enquire, as they came in sight of a rude barrier of stones which
partially checked the stream.

"That is it," she said. "And Jason is right. Some of the big stones
have been washed down. What a nuisance! We shall have to get some men
from Bryndermere to put them up again."

Stafford rode up to the weir and looked at it critically.

"Thank Heaven I haven't got to count the stones!" he said. "If you'll
kindly hold my horse--he's not so well trained as yours, and would
bolt, I'm afraid." He slipped from the saddle as he spoke, and she
caught the reins.

"What are you going to do? she asked.

"I don't know yet," Stafford called back, as he waded into the river.

She held the horse and sat reposeful in the saddle and watched him with
a smile upon her face. But it grew suddenly grave as she saw Stafford
stoop and put his arms round one of the fallen stones; and she cried to
him:

"Oh, you can't lift them; it's no use trying!"

Stafford apparently did not hear her, for, exerting all his strength,
he lifted the big stone and gradually slid and hoisted it into its
place. Then he attacked the other two, and with a still greater effort
raised them into a line with their fellows.

Ida watched him as--well, as one watches some "strong man" going
through his performance.

It was a well-nigh incredible feat, and she held her breath as one
stone followed the other. It seemed to her incredible and impossible,
because Stafford's figure was slight and graceful, and he performed the
feat with the apparent ease which he had learnt in the 'varsity
athletic sports.

The colour rose to her face and her heart beat quickly. There is one
thing left for women to worship; and they worship it readily--and that
is strength. Stafford could not count sheep--any woman could do
that--but he could do what no woman could do: lift those great stones
into their places.

So that, as he waded out of the river, she smiled _on_ him instead of
_at_ him--which is a very different thing--as she said:

"How strong you must be! I should have thought it would have required
two or three men to lift those stones."

"Oh, it's easy enough, as easy as--counting sheep when you know how."

She laughed.

"But you must be very wet," she said, glancing at the water as it
dripped from his clothes.

"Oh, it's all in the day's work," he said, cheerfully, more than
cheerfully, happily. "Now for the steers."

"They're in the dale," she said; and she looked at him as she spoke
with a new interest, with the interest a woman feels in the presence of
her master, of the man who can move mountains.

He shook the water from him and rode at her side more cheerfully than
he had done hitherto, for he had, so to speak, proved his helpfulness.
He might be an idiot, but he could lift weir stones into their place.

"There they are," she said. "And, oh, dear! One of them has got loose.
There ought to be fourteen and there are only thirteen!"

"Good heavens! You must have eyes like a hawk's"

She laughed. "Oh, no; I'm used to it, that is all. Now, where can it
be? I thought all the fences were mended. I must find it!"

"Stop!" he said. "At any rate, I can find a cow--bullock--steer. Let me
go. You wait here."

He rode off as he spoke, and she pulled up the big chestnut and looked
after him. Once more the question rose to perplex her: why had he come,
why was he riding about the dale with her, counting sheep, wading in
the stream, lifting weir stones, and herding cattle? It seemed to be so
strange, so inexplicable. And as she followed him with her eyes, his
grace and strength were impressed upon her, and she dwelt upon them
dreamily. Were there many such men in the world of which she knew so
little, or was he one alone, and unique? And how good, how pleasant it
was to have him with her, to talk to her, to help her! She had often
longed for a brother, and had pictured one like this, strong and
handsome, with frank eyes and smiling lips--someone upon whom she could
lean, to whom she could go when she was in trouble.

A shout awoke her from her reverie; and looking up she saw the missing
steer forcing its way through a hedge on top of a bank. Stafford was
riding after it at an easy canter and coming straight for the bank. The
steer plunged through the hedge and floundered through the wide ditch,
and Ida headed it and drove it towards the rest of the herd. Then she
turned in her saddle to warn Stafford of the ditch; but as she turned
he was close upon the bank, and she saw the big hunter rise for the
leap.

A doubt as to how he would land rose in her mind, and she swung Rupert
round; and as she did so, she saw the hunter crash through the hedge,
stumble at the ditch, and fall, lurching forward, on its edge.

No man alive could have kept his seat, and Stafford came off like a
stone thrown from a catapult, and lay, face downwards, in the long, wet
grass.

Something like a hot iron shot through Ida's heart, and sent her face
white, and she rode up to him and flung herself from Rupert and knelt
beside the prostrate form.

He lay quite still; and she knew quite well what had happened: that he
had fallen on his head and stunned himself.

She remembered, at that moment, that she herself had once so fallen;
but the remembrance did nothing to soften her present anxiety. She
knelt beside him and lifted his head on her knee, and his white face
smote her accusingly. He was still, motionless so long that she began
to fear--was he dead? She asked herself the question with a heavy
pulsation of the heart, with a sense of irrevocable loss. If he was
dead, then--then--what had she lost!

Trembling in every limb, she laid her hand upon his heart. It beat, but
slowly, reluctantly. She looked round her with a sense of helplessness.
She had never been placed in such a position before. Not far from her
was a mountain rill, and she ran to it with unsteady steps and soaked
her handkerchief in it, and bathed the white, smooth forehead.

Even at that moment she noticed, half unconsciously, the clear-cut,
patrician features, the delicate lines of the handsome face.

He had come to this mishap in his attempt to help her. He was dying,
perhaps, in her service. A thrill ran through her, a thrill that moved
her as by an uncontrollable impulse to bend still lower over him so
that her lips almost touched his unconscious ones. Their nearness, the
intent gaze of her eyes, now dark as violets, seemed to make themselves
felt by him, seemed by some mysterious power to call him back from the
shadow-land of unconsciousness. He moved and opened his eyes.

She started, and the colour flooded her face as if her lips had quite
touched his, and her eyes grew heavy as, breathing painfully, she
waited for him to entirely recover his intelligence and to speak.

"The steer!" he said at last, feebly.

She moistened her lips, and looked away from him as if she were afraid
lest he should see what was in her eyes. "The steer is all right;
but--but you!"

He forced a laugh. "Oh, I'm all right, too," he said. He looked around
hazily. "I must have come a smasher over that bank!"

Then he saw that he was lying with his head upon her knee, and with a
hot flush, the man's shame for his weakness in the presence of a woman,
he struggled into a sitting posture and looked at her, looked at her
with the forced cheerfulness of a man who has come an unforeseen,
unexpected cropper of the first magnitude.

"It was my fault. You--you were right about the horse: he ought not to
have slipped--Where's my hat? Oh here it is. The horse isn't lame, I
hope?"

"No," she said, setting her teeth in her great effort to appear calm
and unmoved. "He is standing beside Rupert--" She had got thus far when
her voice broke, and she turned her face away quickly; but not so
quickly that he did not see her exceeding pallor, the heavy droop of
the lids, the sweep of the dark lashes on her white cheek.

"Why--what's the matter, Miss Heron?" he asked, anxiously, and with all
a man's obtuseness. "_You_ didn't happen to come to grief in any way? I
didn't fall on you?--or anything? I--"

She tried to laugh, tried to laugh scornfully; for indeed she was
filled with scorn for this sudden inexplicable weakness, a weakness
which had never assailed her before in all her life, a weakness which
filled her breast with rage; but from under the closed lids two tears
crept and rolled down her cheek; and against her will she made
confession of this same foolish weakness.

"It is nothing: I am very foolish--but I--I thought you were badly
hurt--for the moment that you might even be--killed!"

He staggered to his feet and caught her hand and held it, looking at
her with that look in a man's eyes which is stronger and fiercer than
fire, and yet softer than water; the look which goes straight to a
woman's heart.

"And you cared--cared so much?" he said, in a voice so low that she
could scarcely hear it, hushed by the awe and wonder of passion.

She tried to withdraw her hand, biting her lips, setting them tightly,
in her battle for calmness and her old _hauteur_ and indifference; but
he held the small hand firmly, felt it quiver and tremble, saw the
violet eyes raised to his with a troubled wonder in them; and her name
sprang to his lips:

"Ida!" he breathed.




CHAPTER XIV.

"Ida!" The name had sprung from his lips, from his heart, almost
unconsciously; it did not seem strange to him, for he knew, as he spoke
it, that he had called her so in his thoughts, that it had hovered on
his lips ever since he had heard it. But to her--Who shall describe the
subtle emotion which thrills through a girl's heart when she hears, for
the first time from a strange man's lips, the name whose use hitherto
has been reserved for her kith and kin?

She stood erect, but with her head bent, her eyes fixed on the ground,
the name, his voice, ringing in her ears; her heart was beating almost
painfully, as if with weight of a novel kind of fear, that yet was not
altogether fear. Stafford looked at her with the man's, the lover's
eagerness, but her face told him nothing. She was so ignorant of the
very A B C of love that there was no start of surprise, no word or
movement which might guide him; but his instant thought was that she
was offended, angry.

"Forgive me!" he said. "You are angry because I called you--Ida! It was
wrong and presumptuous; but I have learned to think of you by your
name--and it slipped out. Are you very angry? Ah, you knew why I called
you so? Don't you know that--I love you!"

She raised her eyes for a moment but did not look at him; they were
fixed dreamily on the great hills in the distance, then drooped again,
and her brows came together, her lips straightened with a still more
marked expression of trouble, doubt, and wonder.

"I love you," he said, with the deep note of a man's passion in his
voice. "I didn't mean to tell you, to speak--I didn't know until just
now how it was with me: you see I am telling you everything, the whole
truth! You will listen to me?"

For she had made a movement of turning away, a slow, heavy gesture as
if she were encumbered by chains, as if she were under some spell from
which she could not wake.

"I will tell you everything, at the risk of making you angry, at the
risk of your--sending me away."

He paused for a moment, as if he were choosing his words with a care
that sprang from his fear lest he should indeed rouse her anger
and--lose her.

"The first day I saw you--you remember?"

As if she could forget! She knew as he asked the question that no
trifling detail of that first meeting was forgotten, that every word
was engraven on her memory.

"When I saw you riding down the hill, I thought I had never seen any
girl so beautiful, so lovely--"

The colour rose slowly to her face, but died away again: the least vain
of women is moved when a man tells her she is beautiful--in his eyes,
at any rate.

"And when you spoke to me I thought I had never heard so sweet a voice;
and if I had, that there had never been one that I so longed to hear
again. You were not with me long, only a few minutes, but when I left
you and trumped over the hill to the inn I could not get you out of my
mind. I wondered who you were, and whether I should see you again." The
horses moved, and instinctively she looked over her shoulder towards
them.

"They will not go: they are quite quiet," he said. "Wait--ah, wait for
a few minutes! I have a feeling that if I let you go I shall not see
you again; and that would--that would be more than I could bear. That
night at the inn the landlord told me about you. Of course he had
nothing but praise and admiration for you--who would have any other?
But he told me of the lonely life you led, of the care you took of your
father, of your devotion and goodness; and the picture of you living at
the great, silent house, without friends or companions--well, it
haunted me! I could see it all so plainly--I, who am not usually quick
at seeing things. As a rule, I'm not impressed by women--Howard says I
am cold and bored--perhaps he's right; but I could not get you out of
my mind. I felt that I wanted to see you again."

He paused again, as if the state of mind he was describing was a puzzle
to himself--paused and frowned.

"I left the inn and started up the road--I suppose I wanted to get a
glimpse of the house in which you lived. Yes; that must have been it.
And then, all at once, I saw you. I remember the frock you wore that
night--you looked like an angel, a spirit standing there in the
moonlight, the most beautiful woman I have ever seen. Are you angry
with me for saying so? Don't be; for I've got to tell you everything,
and--and--it's difficult!"

He was silent a moment. Her head was still down-bent, her small white
hand hung at her side; she was quite motionless but for the slow,
rhythmic rise and fall of her bosom.

"When you came to me, when you spoke to me, my heart leapt as if--well,
as if something good had happened to me--something that had never
happened before. When I went away the picture of you standing at the
door, waving your hand, went with me, and--stayed with me. I could not
get you out of my mind--could think of nothing else. Even in the
meeting with my father, whom I hadn't seen for so long, the thought of
you kept with me. I tried to get rid of it--to forget you, but it was
of no use: sleeping and waking, you--_you were with me!_"

His voice grew almost harsh in its intensity, and the hand that had
hung so stilly beside her closed on the skirt of her dress in her
effort to keep the hot blush from her face.

"When I rode out the next day it was only with the hope of seeing you.
It seemed to me there was only one thing I wanted: to see you again; to
look into your eyes, to hear you speak. All that I had heard about
you--well, I dwelt upon it, and I felt that I must help you. It seemed
as if Fate--Chance--oh, I don't know what to call it!--had _sent_ me to
help you. And when I saw you--ah, well, I can't expect you to
understand what I felt!"

He stopped again, as if he himself were trying to understand it.

"The feeling that fate had something to do with it--you see, it was
quite by chance I started fishing that afternoon, that I saw you at the
house--gave me courage to ask you to let me help you. It sounded
ridiculous to you--of course it did!--but if you only knew how much it
meant to me! It meant that I should see you again; perhaps every day
for--for a long time: ah, well, it meant just life and death to me. And
now--!"

His breath came fast, his eyes dwelt upon her with passionate
eagerness; but he forced himself to speak calmly than he might not
frighten her from his side, might not lose her.

--"Now the truth has come upon me, quite suddenly. It was just now when
I saw that you cared what had happened to me, cared if I were
hurt!--Oh, I know, it was just because you were frightened, it was just
a woman's pity for a fellow that had come to harm, the fear lest I had
broken any bones; but--ah, it showed me my heart, it told me how much I
loved you! Yes; I love you! You are all the world to me: nothing else
matters, _nothing!_"

Her lips quivered, but she did not speak, and the look of trouble, of
doubt, did not leave her face. He waited, his eyes seeking hers,
seeking them for some sign which might still the passion of fear and
suspense with which he was battling, then he said in a low voice that
thrilled with the tempest of emotion which raged under his forced calm:

"Will you not speak to me? Are you angry?"

She raised her head and looked at him--a strange look from so young a
girl. It was as if she were fighting against the subtle spell of his
words, the demand for her love which shone in his eyes.

"No, I am not angry," she said at last; and her voice, though very low,
was calm and unshaken.

He made a movement towards her, but she shrank back, only a little, but
perceptibly, and he checked the movement, the desire to take her in his
arms.

"You are not angry? Then--Ida--I may call you so?--you don't mind my
loving you? Dearest, will you love me just a little in return? Wait!"
for she had shrunk again, this time more plainly. "Don't--don't answer
without thinking! I know I have startled you, that I ought not to have
spoken so soon, while you only know so little of me--you'd naturally
say 'no,' and send me away. But if you think you can like me--learn to
love me--"

He took her hand, hanging so temptingly near his own; but she drew it
away.

"No; don't touch me!" she said, with a little catch in her voice. "I
want to think--to understand." She paused for a moment, her eyes still
seeking the distant hills, as if in their mysterious heights she might
find something that should explain this great mystery, this wonderful
thing that had happened to her. At last, with a singular gesture, so
girlish, so graceful that it made him long still more intensely to take
her in his arms, she said in a low voice:

"I do not know--No! I do not want you to touch me, please!" His hand
fell to his side. "I can't answer you. It is so--so sudden! No one has
ever spoken to me as you have done--"

He laughed from mere excess of joy, for her pure innocence, her
unlikeness, in her ignorance of love and all pertaining to it, to the
women he knew, made the charm of her well-nigh maddening. To think that
he should be the first man to speak of love to her!

"I am not angry--ought I to be? Yes, I suppose so. We are almost
strangers--have seen so little of each other."

"They say that love, all true love, comes at first sight," he said in
his deep voice. "I used to laugh at the idea; but now I know it is
true. I loved you the first time I met you, Ida!"

Her lip quivered and her brows knit.

"It seems so wonderful," she said, musingly, "I do not understand it.
The first time! We scarcely spoke--and I was almost angry with you for
fishing in the Heron. And I did--did not think of you--"

He made a gesture, repudiating the mere idea.

"Is it likely! Why should you?" he said. "I was just an ordinary man,
crossing your path for the first and perhaps the only time. Good
heavens! there was no reason why you should give a thought to me, why I
should linger in your mind for half a moment after I was out of your
sight. But for me--Haven't I told you how beautiful you are, Ida! You
are the loveliest, the sweetest.--But, even if you had not been--I mean
it is not because you are so beautiful that I love you--" She looked at
him with a puzzled, troubled look.

"No! I can't explain. See, now, there's not a look of yours, not a
feature that I don't know by heart as if I'd learnt it. When I am away
from you I can see you--see the way your hair clusters in soft little
curls at your forehead, the long lashes sweeping your cheek, the--the
trick your eyes have of turning from grey to violet--oh, I know your
face by heart, and I _love_ it for its beauty; but if you were to lose
it all, if you were not the loveliest creature God had ever made, it
would make no difference. You would still be _you_: and it is you I
want. Ida--give yourself to me--trust me! Oh, dearest, you don't know
what love is! Let me teach you!"

Once again he got hold of her hand; and she let it remain in his grasp;
but her quiescence did not mean yielding, and he knew it.

"No," she said, with a deep breath. "It is true that I do not know. And
I am--afraid." A wan little smile that was more piteous than tears
curved her lips: for "afraid" seemed strange coming from her, the
fearless child of the hills and dales. "If--if I said 'yes'--Ah, but I
do not!" she broke off as he made to draw her to him, and she shrank
back. "I do not! I said 'if,' it would not be true; it would not be
fair. For I do not know. I might be--sorry, after--after you had gone.
And it would be too late then."

"You're right," he assented, grimly. "Once I got you, no power on earth
should make me let you go again."

Her lips quivered and her eyes drooped before his. How strange a thing
this love was, that it should change a man so!

"I don't want to force you to answer," he said, after a pause. "Yes, I
do! I'd give half the remainder of my life to hear you say the one
word, 'yes.' But I won't. It's too--too precious. Ah, don't you
understand! I want your love, your love, Ida!"

"Yes, I understand," she murmured. "And--and I would say it if--if I
were sure. But I--yes, I am all confused. It is like a dream. I want to
think, to ask myself if--if I can do what you want."

She put up her hand to her lips with a slight gesture, as if to keep
them from trembling.

"I want to be alone to think of all--all you have told me."

Her gauntlet slipped from her hand, and he knelt on one knee and picked
it up, and still kneeling, took both her hands in his. It did not occur
to him to remember that the woman who hesitates is won; something in
her girlish innocence, in her exquisitely sweet candour, filled him
with awe.

"Dearest!" he said, in so low a voice that, the note of the curlew
flying above them sounded loud and shrill by contrast. "Dearest!--for
you are that to me!--I will not press you. I will be content to wait.
God knows you are right to hesitate! Your love is too great, too
precious a thing to be given to me without thought. I'm not worthy to
touch you--but I love you! I will wait. You shall think of all I have
said; and, let your answer be what it may, I won't complain!
But--Ida--you mustn't forget that I love you with all my heart and
soul!"

She looked down at his handsome face, the face over which her lips had
hovered only a short time since, and her lips moved.

"You--you are good to me," she said, in a faintly troubled voice. "Yes,
I know, I feel that. Perhaps I ought to say 'no!'"

"Don't!" he said, almost fiercely. "Wait! Let me see you again--you
scarcely know me. Ah, Ida, what can I do, how can I win your love?"

She drew her hands from his with a deep breath.

"I--I will go now," she said. "Will you let me go--alone?"

He rose and went towards the horses. His own raised its head and seemed
inclined to start, but stood uncertain and eventually remained quiet
beside the chestnut. Stafford brought them to where Ida still stood,
her eyes downcast, her face pale.

With his own bridle over his arm he put her into the saddle, resisting
even in that supreme moment the almost irresistible desire to take her
in his arms.

She murmured a "Thank you," as she slowly put on her left gauntlet. He
drew the other from her, and as she looked at him questioningly, he put
it to his lips and thrust it under his waistcoat, over his heart.

The colour flooded her face, but the blush was followed by the old look
of trouble and doubt. She held out her ungloved right hand and he took
it and held it for a moment, then raised it to his lips; but he did not
kiss it.

"No!" he said, with stern repression. "I will take nothing--until you
give it me."

She inclined her head the very slightest, as if she understood, as if
she were grateful; then letting her eyes rest on his with an
inscrutable look, she spoke softly to the horse and rode away, with
Donald and Bess clamouring joyously after her, as if they had found the
proceedings extremely trying.

Stafford flung his arm across his horse, and leaning against it, looked
after her, his eyes fixed wistfully on the slight, graceful figure,
until it was out of sight; then he gazed round him as if he were
suddenly returning from a new, mysterious region to the old familiar
world. Passion's marvellous spell still held him, he was still
throbbing with a half-painful ecstasy of her nearness, of the touch of
her hand, the magic of her voice.

For the first time he was in love. In love with the most exquisite, the
most wonderful of God's divine creatures. He knew, as he had said, that
her answer meant life or death to him, the life of infinite, nameless
joy, the death of life in death.

Was he going to lose her?

The very question set him trembling. He held out his quivering hand and
looked at it, and set his teeth. Heaven and earth, how strange it was!
This girl had taken possession of him body and soul; every fibre of his
being clamoured for her. To be near her, just to be able to see her,
hear her, meant happiness; to be torn from her--

The sweat broke out on his forehead and he laughed grimly.

"And this is love!" he said, between his teeth. "Yes--and it's the
only love of my life. God help me if you say 'no,' dearest! But you
must not--you must not!"




CHAPTER XV.

Quite an hour after Stafford had started to meet Ida, Miss Falconer
made her appearance, coming slowly down the stairs in the daintiest of
morning frocks, with her auburn hair shining like old gold in the
sunlight, and an expression of languor in her beautiful face which
would have done credit to a hot-house lily.

She had slept the sleep of the just--the maid who had gone to wake her
with her early cup of tea had been almost startled by the
statuesqueness of her beauty, as she lay with her head pillowed on her
snow-white arm and her wonderful hair streaming over the pillow--had
suffered herself to be dressed with imperial patience, and looked--as
Howard, who stood at the bottom of the stairs--said to himself, "like a
queen of the Incas descending to her throne-room."

"Good-morning, Miss Falconer," he greeted her. "It's a lovely morning;
you'll find it nicely aired." She smiled languidly.

"That means that I am late." she said, her eyes resting languidly on
his cynically smiling face.

"Good heavens, no!" he responded. "You can't be late or early in this
magic palace. Whenever you 'arrive' you will find things--'things' in
the most comprehensive sense--ready for you. Breakfast at Brae Wood is
the most moveable of feasts. I've proved that, for I'm a late bird
myself; and to my joy I have learned that this is the only house with
which I am acquainted that you can get red-hot bacon and kidneys at any
hour from eight to twelve; that lunch runs plenteously from one to
three, and that you can get tea and toast--my great and only weakness,
Miss Falconer--whenever you like to ring for it. You will find Lady
Clansford presiding at the breakfast-table: I believe she has been
sitting there--amiable martyr as she is--since the early dawn."

She smiled at him with languid approval, as if he were some paid
jester, and went into the breakfast-room. There were others there
beside Lady Clansford--most of them the young people--it is, alas! only
the young who can sleep through the bright hours of a summer's
morn--and a discussion on the programme of the day was being carried on
with a babel of voices and much laughter.

"You shall decide for us, Miss Falconer!" exclaimed one of the young
men, whose only name appeared to be Bertie, for he was always addressed
as and spoken of by it. "It's a toss-up between a drive and a turn on
the lake in the electric launch. _I_ proposed a sail, but there seemed
to be a confirmed and general scepticism as to my yachting capacities,
and Lady Plaistow says she doesn't want to be drowned before the end of
the season. What would you like to do?"

"Sit somewhere in the shade with a book," she replied, promptly but
slowly.

There was a shout of laughter.

"That is just what Mr. Howard replied," said Bertie, complainingly.

"Oh, Mr. Howard! Everyone knows that he is the laziest man in the whole
world," remarked Lady Clansford, plaintively. "What is Mr. Orme going
to do? Where is he? Does anyone know?"

There was a general shaking of heads and a chorus of "Noes."

"I had a swim with him this morning, but I've not seen him since," said
Bertie. "It's no use waiting for Orme; he mightn't turn up till
dinner-time. Miss Falconer, if I promise not to drown you, will make
one for the yacht? The man told me it would be all ready."

She shook her head as she helped herself to a couple of strawberries.

"No, thanks," she said, with her musical drawl. "I know what that
means. You drift into the middle of the lake or the river, the wind
drops, and you sit in a scorching sun and get a headache. Please leave
me out. I shall stick to my original proposal. Perhaps, if you don't
drown anyone this time, I may venture with you another day."

She leant back and smiled at them under her lids, as the discussion
flowed and ebbed round her, with an air of placid contempt and wonder
at their excitement; and presently, murmuring something to Lady
Clansford, who, as chaperone and deputy hostess was trying to coax them
into some decision, she rose and went out to the terrace.

There, lying back in a deck-chair, in a corner screened from any
possible draught by the glass verandah, was Mr. Howard with one of Sir
Stephen's priceless Havanas between his lips, a French novel in his
hand, and a morning paper across his knees. He rose as she approached,
and checking a sigh of resignation, offered her his chair.

"Oh, no," she said, with a smile which showed that she knew what the
effort of politeness cost him. "You'd hate me if I took your chair, I
know; and though, of course, I don't in the least care whether you hate
me or not, I shouldn't like putting you to the trouble of so exhaustive
an emotion."

Howard smiled at her with frank admiration.

"Let's compromise it," he said. "I'll drag that chair up here--it's out
of the sun, you know--so, and arrange these cushions so, and put up the
end for your feet so, and--how is that, Miss Falconer?"

"Thanks," she murmured, sinking into the soft nest he had made.

"Do you object to my cigar? Say so, if you do, and--"

"You'll go off to some other nook," she put in. "No, I like it."

His eye shone with keen appreciation: this girl was not only a
beauty--which is almost common nowadays--but witty, which is rare.

"Thanks! Would you like the paper? Don't hesitate if you would; I'm not
reading it; I never do. I keep it there so that I can put it over my
face if I feel like sleeping--which I generally do."

She declined the paper with a gesture of her white hand. "No, I'd
rather talk; which means that you are to talk and I'm to listen: will
it exhaust you too much to tell me where the rest of the people are? I
left a party in the breakfast-room squabbling over the problem how to
kill time; but where are the others? My father, for instance?"

"He is in the library with Baron Wirsch, Mr. Griffenberg, and the other
financiers. They are doubtless engaged in some mystic rites connected
with the worship of the Golden Calf, rites in which the words 'shares,'
'stocks,' 'diamonds,' 'concessions,' appear at frequent intervals. I
suppose your father, having joined them, is a member of the
all-powerful sect of money-worshippers."

She shrugged her shoulders.

"I suppose so. And Mr. Orme--is he one of them?" she asked, with
elaborate indifference.

Howard smiled cynically.

"Stafford! No; all that he knows about money is the art of spending it;
and what he doesn't know about that isn't worth knowing. It slips
through his fingers like water through a sieve; and one of those
mysteries which burden my existence is, how he always manages to have
some for a friend up a tree."

"Is he so generous, then?" she asked, with a delicate yawn behind her
hand.

Howard nodded, and was silent for a moment, then he said musingly:

"You've got on my favorite subject--Stafford--Miss Falconer. And I warn
you that if I go on I shall bore you."

"Well, I can get up and go away," she said, languidly. "He is a friend
of yours, I suppose? By the way, did you know that he stopped those
ridiculous horses last night and probably saved my life?"

"For goodness sake don't let him hear you say that, or even guess that
you think it," he said, with an affectation of alarm. "Stafford would
be inexpressibly annoyed. He hates a fuss even more than most
Englishmen, and would take it very unkindly if you didn't let a little
thing like that pass unnoticed. Oh, yes, I am his greatest friend. I
don't think"--slowly and contemplatively--"that there is anything he
wouldn't do for me or anything I wouldn't do for him--excepting get up
early--go out in the rain--Oh, it isn't true! I'm only bragging," he
broke off, with a groan. "I've done both and shall do them whenever he
wants me to. I'm a poor creature, Miss Falconer." "A martyr on the
altar of friendship," she said. "Mr. Orme must be very irresistible."

"He is," he assented, with an air of profound melancholy. "Stafford has
the extremely unpleasant knack of getting everybody to do what he
wants. It's very disgusting, but it's true. That is why he is so
general a favourite. Why, if you walk into any drawing-room and asked
who was the most popular man in London, the immediate and unanimous
reply would be 'Stafford Orme.'"

She settled the cushions a little more comfortably.

"You mean amongst men?" she said.

Howard smiled and eyed her questioningly.

"Well--I didn't," he replied, drily.

She laughed a little scornfully.

"Oh, I know the sort of man he is," she said. "I've read and heard
about them. The sort of man who falls in love with every woman he meet.
'A servant of dames'!"

Howard leant back and laughed with cynical enjoyment.

"You never were further out," he said. "He flirts--oh, my aunt, how he
flirts!--but as to falling in love--Did you ever see an iceberg, Miss
Falconer?"

She shook her head.

"Well, it's one of the biggest, the most beautiful frauds in the world.
When you meet one sailing along in the Atlantic, you think it one of
the nicest, sweetest things you ever saw: it's so dazzlingly bright,
with its thousand and one colours glittering in the sunlight. You quite
fall in love with it, and it looks so harmless, so enticing, that
you're tempted to get quite close to it; which no doubt is amusing to
the iceberg, but is slightly embarrassing for you; for the iceberg is
on you before you know it, and--and there isn't enough left of you for
a decent funeral. That's Stafford all the way. He's so pleasant, so
frank, so lovable, that you think him quite harmless; but while you're
admiring his confounded ingratiating ways, while you're growing
enthusiastic about his engaging tricks--he's the best rider, the best
dancer, the best shot--oh, but you must have heard of him!--he is
bearing down upon you; your heart goes under, and he--ah, well, he just
sails over you smiling, quite unconscious of having brought you to
everlasting smash."

"You are indeed a friend," she said with languid irony.

"Oh, you think I'm giving him away?" he said. "My dear Miss Falconer,
everybody knows him. Every ball-room every tennis-court, is strewed
with his wrecks. And all the time he doesn't know it; but goes his way
crowned with a modesty which is the marvel and the wonder of this most
marvellous of ages."

"It sounds like a hero out of one of 'Ouida's' novels," she remarked,
as listlessly as before.

But behind her lowered lids her eyes were shining with a singular
brightness.

Howard turned to her delightedly.

"My dear Miss Falconer, if you were a man I should ask to shake hands
with you. It so exactly describes him. That's just what he is. As
handsome as the dew--I beg your pardon!--as frank as a boy, as gentle
as a woman, as staunch, as a bull-dog, as brave--he would have stopped
a drayman's team just as readily as yours last night--and as
invulnerable as that marble statue."

He pointed to a statue of Adonis which stood whitely on the edge of the
lawn, and she raised her eyes and looked at it dreamily.

"I could break that thing if I had a big hammer," she said.

"I daresay," he said. "But can't break Stafford. Honestly "--he looked
at her--"I wish you could!"

"Why?" she asked, turning her eyes on him for the first time.

Howard was silent for a moment, then he looked at her with a curious
gravity.

"Because it would be good for him: because I am afraid for him."

"Afraid?" she echoed.

"Yes," he said, with a nod. "Some day he will run against something
that will bring him to smash. Some woman--But I beg your pardon. Do you
know, Miss Falconer, that you have a dangerous way of leading one to
speak the truth--which one should never--or very rarely--do. Why, on
earth am I telling you all this about Stafford Orme?"

She shrugged her shoulders.

"You were saying 'some woman,'" she said.

He gave a sigh of resignation.

"You are irresistible! Some woman who will be quite unworthy of him.
It's always the case. The block of ice you can not smash with your
biggest hammer is broken into smithereens by a needle. That's the peril
before Stafford--but let us hope he will prove the exception to the
rule and escape. He's safe at present, at any rate."

She though of the scene she had witnessed, the girl sitting sideways on
Stafford Orme's horse, and her face flushed for an instant.

"Are you sure?" she said.

"Quite!" he responded, confidently. "I know all Stafford's flirtations,
great and small: if there was anything serious he would tell me; and as
he hasn't--there isn't."

She laughed; the slow, soft laugh which made Howard think suddenly,
strangely, of a sleepy tigress he had once watched in a rajah's zoo, as
she lay basking in the sun: a thing of softness and beauty and--death.

"We've had a most amusing conversation, Mr. Howard," she said. "I don't
know when I've been so interested--or so tempted."

"Tempted?" He looked at her with a slow, expectant smile.

"Oh, yes," she murmured, turning her eyes upon him with a half-mocking
light in them. "You have forgotten that you have been talking to a
woman."

"I don't deny it," he said. "It's the finest compliment I could pay
you. But--after?"

"And that to a woman your account of your hero-friend is--a
challenge."

He nodded and paused, with his cigar half-way to his lips.

"I'm greatly tempted to accept it, do you know!" she said.

He laughed.

"Don't: you'll be vanquished. Is that too candid, too--brutal?" he
said.

"So brutal that I _will_ accept it," she said. "Is that ring of yours a
favorite?"

"I've had it ever since I can remember. It was my mother's," he said,
rather gravely.

She held out her hand, upon which the costly gems glittered in the
sunlight.


"Choose one to set against it," she said quite quietly.

Howard, roused for once from his sleepy cynicism, met her gaze with
something like astonishment.

"You mean--?" he said, in a low voice.

"I mean that I am going to try to meet your iceberg. You will play
fair, Mr. Howard? You will stand and look on and--be silent?"

He smiled and leant back as if he had considered her strange, audacious
proposal, and felt confident.

"On my honour," he said, with a laugh. "You shall have fair play!" She
laughed softly. "You have not chosen my stake," she said meaningly.

"Ah, no. Pardon! Let me see." He took her hand and examined the rings.
"This--I think it's the most valuable."

"It does not matter," she said. "You will not win it. May I look at
yours?"

He extended his hand with an amused laugh; but without a smile, she
said:

"Yes, it is a quaint ring; I like quaint things. I shall wear it on my
little finger."

She dropped his hand quickly, for at that moment Stafford rode round
the bend of the drive. His face was grave and almost stern in its
preoccupation, but he caught sight of them, and raised his hat, then
turned his horse and rode up to the terrace.

"Good-morning, Stafford," exclaimed Howard. "Where have you been?
Hallo! Anything happened? You're coated all over with mud: had a fall?"

He nodded carelessly as he turned to the beautiful girl, lying back now
and looking up at his handsome face with an air of languid
indifference.

"What a lovely day, Miss Falconer! Where are all the others? Are you
not going for a drive, on the lake, somewhere?"

"I have just been asking Mr. Howard to take me for a row," she said,
"but he has refused."

Stafford laughed and glanced at his watch.

"I can quite believe it: he's the laziest wretch in existence. If
you'll transfer the offer to me, we'll go after lunch. By George,
there's the bell!"

"Thanks!" she murmured, and she rose with her slow grace. "I'd better
get into an appropriate costume. Mr. Howard, what will you bet me that
it does not rain before we start. But you never bet, you tell me!"

"Not unless I am sure of winning, Miss Falconer," he said,
significantly.

She looked after Stafford as he rode away to the stable.

"Nor I," she retorted, with a smile. "As you will see."




CHAPTER XVI.

When Stafford and Maude Falconer went down to the lake after luncheon,
they found a party from the Villa just embarking on board one of the
launches; the air was filled with laughter and chatter, and the little
quay was bright with the white flannels of the men and the gay frocks
of the women. The party greeted the two with an exuberant welcome, and
Bertie called out to ask them if they were coming on board.

"Perhaps you would rather go on the launch, Miss Falconer?" said
Stafford; but she shook her head.

"No, thanks," she said, languidly. "I hate crowds of that kind. I'd
rather stick to our original proposition; it will bore me less. But
perhaps you'd rather join them?"

"Is it likely?" said Stafford, with a smile, as he signed to the man to
bring up a skiff. "Now, let me make you as comfortable as I can. We
ought to have had a gondola," he added, as he handed her to the seat in
the stern.

She leant back with her sunshade over her shoulder, and Stafford, as he
slipped off his blazer and rowed out towards the centre of the lake,
looked at her with unconscious admiration. She was simply, perfectly
dressed in a yachting costume of white and pale-blue, which set off to
the fullest advantage her exquisite complexion and her red-gold hair.
But it was admiration of the coldest kind, for even at that moment he
was thinking of the girl in the well-worn habit, the girl he loved with
a passion that made his slightest thought of her a psalm of worship.

And Maude, though she appeared half asleep, like a beautiful wild
animal basking in the warmth of the sun, glanced at him now and again
and noted the strength and grace of his figure, the almost Grecian
contour of the handsome face. She had made her wager with Howard on the
spur of the moment, prompted by the vanity of a woman piqued by the
story of Stafford's indifference to her sex; but as she looked at him
she wondered how a woman would feel if she fell in love with him. But
she had no fears for herself; there was a coldness in her nature which
had hitherto guarded her from the fever which men call love, and she
thought herself quite secure. There would be amusement, triumph, in
making him love her, in winning her wager with that cynical Mr. Howard,
who boasted of his friend's invulnerability; and when she had
conquered, and gratified her vanity--Ah, well, it would be easy to step
aside and bring the curtain down upon her triumph and Stafford's
discomfiture. She would wear that Mr. Howard's ring, and every time she
looked at it, it should remind her of her conquest.

Stafford rowed on in silence for some minutes. His beautiful companion
did not seem to want him to talk and certainly showed no desire to talk
herself; so he gave himself up to thinking of Ida--and wishing that it
was she who was sitting opposite him there, instead of this girl with
the face of a Grecian goddess, with the lustrous hair of an houri. At
last, feeling that he ought to say something, he remarked, as he gazed
at the marvellous view:

"Very beautiful, isn't it?"

She raised her eyes and let them wander from the glittering water to
the glorious hills.

"Yes, I suppose it is. I'm afraid I don't appreciate scenery as much as
other people do. Perhaps it is because one is always expected to fall
into raptures over it. Does that shock you? I'm afraid I shock most
people. The fact is, I have been brought up in a circle which has
taught me to loathe sentiment. They were always gushing about their
feelings, but the only thing they cared for was money!"

"That ought to have made you loathe money," said Stafford, with a
smile, and a certain kind of interest; indeed, it was difficult not to
feel interested in this beautiful girl, with the face and the form of a
goddess, and, apparently, as small a capacity of emotion.

"Oh, no," she said, languidly; "on the contrary, it showed me the value
of money. I saw that if I had not been rich, the daughter of a rich
man, I should have been of no account in their eyes. They were always
professing to love me, but I was quite aware that it was because I was
rich enough to be able to buy pleasure for them."

"Unpleasant kind of people," remarked Stafford.

"No; just the average," she said, coolly. "Nearly all men and women are
alike--worldly, selfish, self-seeking. Look at my father," she went on,
as coolly as before. "He thinks of nothing but money; he has spent his
life fighting, scrambling, struggling for it; and look at yours--"

"Oh, hold on!" said Stafford, laughing, but reddening a little. "You're
very much mistaken if you think my father is that kind of man."

She smiled.

"Why, everybody has some story of his--what shall I call
it?--acuteness, sharpness; and of the wonderful way in which he has
always got what he wanted. I don't want to be offensive, Mr. Orme, but
I'm afraid both our fathers are in the same category. And that both
would sacrifice anything or anyone to gain their ends."

Stafford laughed again.

"You're altogether wrong, Miss Falconer," he said. "I happen to know
that my governor is one of the most generous and tender-hearted of men
and that whatever he has gained it is by fair means, and by no
sacrifice of others."

She shrugged her shoulders.

"I envy your faith in him. But then you are a very enviable man, I'm
told."

"As how?" asked Stafford. "Pretty here, isn't it? Here's one of those
beastly steamers coming: they spoil the lake, but they're very
convenient, I suppose."

She glanced at the big steamer puffing towards them obtrusively and
sending a trail of smoke across the green and violet of the hills.

"Oh, I'm told you are the most popular man in London; that you have the
world at your feet, that you are only waiting to see which duchess you
prefer to throw your handkerchief to--"

Stafford coloured.

"What rot!--I beg your pardon, Miss Falconer. Of course, I know you are
only chaffing me."

"Isn't it true--about the duchess, I mean?" she asked, so coolly, so
indifferently, that Stafford was compelled to take her seriously.

"Nary a word," he said, brightly; then, with a sudden gravity: "If you
happen to hear such nonsense again, Miss Falconer, you can, if you care
to, contradict it flatly. I am not in the least likely to marry a
duchess; indeed, I wouldn't marry the highest and greatest of them, if
she'd have me, which is highly improbable."

"Do you mean to say that you have no ambition, that you would marry
for--love?" she asked.

Stafford stopped rowing for a moment and looked at her grimly.

"What on earth else should I marry for?" he asked. "Wouldn't you?"

Before she could answer, the steamer came abreast of them, and so close
that the swell from its screw set the slight, narrow skiff dancing and
plunging on the waves.

Maude uttered a faint cry and leant forward, and Stafford, fearing she
was going to rise, stretched out his hand, and touching her knee,
forced her into her seat again, and kept her there until the swell had
subsided.

The colour flooded her face at the pressure of his strong hand, which
was like a steel weight, and she caught her breath. Then, as he took
his hand away and resumed rowing, he said: "I beg your pardon! I was
afraid you were going to get up--a girl I once had in a boat did so and
we upset."

"The boat is very small," she said, in a low voice, almost one of
apology.

"Oh, it's all right, so long as you sit still, and keep your head," he
said. "It could ride over twice as big a swell as this."

She looked at him from under her lowered lids with a new expression in
her face, a faint tremor on her lips; and, as if she could not meet his
eyes, she glanced back with an affectation of interest at the steamer.
As she did so, something dropped from it into the lake.

"What was that?" she said. "Something fell overboard."

"Eh? A man, do you mean?" he asked, stopping.

"Oh, no; something small."

"A parcel, somebody's lunch, perhaps," he said; and he rowed on.

She leant back, her eyes downcast; she still seemed to feel that
strong, irresistible pressure of his hand under which she had been
unable to move.

"There ought to be an echo somewhere here," he said, as they came
opposite one of the hills, and he gave the Australian "coo-ee!" in a
clear, ringing voice, which the echo sent back in a musical imitation.

"How true it was!" she said, and she opened her lips and sang a bar or
two of the "Elsie" song.

Stafford listened to the echo, which was almost as soft and sweet as
the girl's notes.

"What a wonderful voice you have!" he said, almost unconsciously. "I
never heard a sweeter. What was that you sang?"

"That thing of Wagner's," she replied; and quite naturally she began
the air and sang it through.

Stafford let the boat drift and leant upon the oars, his eyes fixed on
her face, a rapt and very eloquent admiration in his own.

"Ah--beautiful!" he said in a low voice. "What a delight it must be to
you to be able to sing like that! I can understand a whole theatre
crying over that song sung as you sing it!"

She glanced at him with an affectation of languid amusement; but she
was watching him intently.

"That's not the best in the opera," she said. "I like this better;" and
she sang the "Swan" song; sang it so low that he leant forward to catch
the notes which flowed like silver from her soft, red lips; and when
she finished it he drew a long breath and still leant forward looking
at her.

"Thank you, thank you!" he said, with so much of admiration and
gratitude in his voice, that, as if to apologise for it, he said: "I'm
fond of music. But I'm forgetting your tea! Shall we pull back to the
Ferry Hotel and get some?"

"I'm in your hands," she replied, languidly.

He turned-the boat and pulled back along the centre of the lake in
silence. Suddenly she bent forward.

"There is something in the water," she said; "something alive."

"It's a--yes, it's a dog," he said. "That is what you saw drop over the
steamer. By George! the poor little chap looks in distress: seems as if
he were nearly done. Can you steer?" he asked, sharply.

"Oh, yes," she replied, languidly. "Why?"

"Because I'm going for him, and it will help me if you can steer
straight for him. He looks nearly played out."

"Why should you trouble--it's a long way off; it will be drowned before
you can get to it," she said.

"I'll have to go for it anyway," he said, cheerfully; and he began to
row hard.

Distance is deceptive on a lake, and the dog was farther off than they
thought; but Stafford put his back into it as hard as he had done in
his racing days, and Maude Falconer leant back and watched him with
interest, and something even stronger than interest, in her masked
eyes. He had turned up the sleeves of his flannel shirt, and the
muscles on his arms were standing out under the strain, his lips were
set tightly, and there was the man's frown of determination on his
brow.

"It has gone down: it's no use," she said. "You may as well stop and
rest."

He looked over his shoulder.

"No! He has come up again!" he exclaimed: it was noticeable that he
called the dog "he," while she spoke of it as "it." "We shall get him
in time. Keep the boat straight!"

The words were uttered in a tone of command, and they moved her as the
touch of his hand had done; and she set her mind upon the task as she
had never before set it upon anything.

Reaching well forward, pulling with the long, steady stroke of the
practised oarsman, Stafford sent the boat along like an arrow, and
presently he drove it up to the spot where the dog strove in its death
straggle.

It was a tiny black-and-tan terrier, and Stafford, as he looked over
his shoulder, saw the great eyes turned to him with a piteous entreaty
that made his heart ache.

"Turn the boat--quick!" he cried; and as the skiff slid alongside the
dog, he swooped it up.

The mite gave a little gasping cry like a child, and closing its eyes
sank into Stafford's arms with a shudder.

"Is it dead?" asked Maude Falconer, looking not at the dog but at
Stafford, for his face, which had been red with exertion a moment ago,
had become suddenly pale.

"I don't know--no!" he said, absently, all his thoughts centered on the
dog.

He wiped it as dry as he could with his blazer, then turning aside, he
opened his shirt and put the cold morsel in his bosom.

"Poor little beggar, he's like ice!" he said, in a low voice. "He would
never have got to the shore; he's so small. If I'd some brandy! We'll
get some at the ferry. Can you row?"

"No," she said. "Yes; I mean, I'll try."

He held out his hand.

"Mind how you cross. Take off your gloves first, or you'll blister your
hands."

She obeyed, her eyes downcast. They exchanged places and he showed her
how to hold the sculls.

"You'll do very well. You can row as slowly as you like. He's alive; I
can feel him move! Poor little chap! Sorry to trouble you, Miss
Falconer, but the only chance of saving him is to keep him warm."

She was silent far a moment, then she glanced at him.

"You're fond of dogs?"

"Why, of course," he answered. "Aren't you?"

"Y-es; but I don't think I'd risk pneumonia for one. You were
feverishly hot just now, and that little beast must be stone cold;
you'll get bronchitis or something, Mr. Orme."

"Not I!" he laughed, almost scornfully. "He's pulling round, poor
little beast! Here we are."

He reached for his coat and wrapped the terrier in it, and quite
unconscious of the girl's watchful eyes, held the little black-and-tan
head to his face for a moment.

"All right now?" he murmured. "You've had a narrow squeak for it, old
chappie!" With the dog under his arm, he helped Maude Falconer ashore
and led the way to the hotel.

"Tea," he said to the waiter; "but bring me some brandy and milk
first--and look sharp."

Maude sank on to one of the benches in the beautiful garden in the
centre of the lake and looked straight before her; and Stafford cuddled
the dog up to him and looked impatiently for the waiter, greeting him
when he came with:

"What an infernal time you're been!"

Then he poured a little of the brandy down the dog's throat, and
bending over him repeated the close three or four times; and presently
the mite stirred and moved its head, and opening its eyes looked up
into Stafford's, and weakly putting out its tongue, licked his hand.

Stafford laughed--for the well-known reason.

"Plucky little chap, isn't he?" he said, with a moved man's affectation
of levity. "He's made a splendid fight for it and won through. He's a
pretty little morsel--a well-bred 'un: wonder whom he belongs to?"

"To you--at least his life does," said Maude Falconer. "You couldn't
have fought harder for it if it had been a human being."

"Oh, a dog's the next thing, you know," he said, apologetically. "I'm
afraid it's been an awful nuisance and trouble for you. You haven't
blistered your hands, I hope? Let me see!"

She stretched out her hands, palm upwards, and he took them and
examined them.

"No. That's all right! 'All's well that ends well.' You want a few
lessons with the sculls, Miss Falconer, and you'd make a splendid
boat-woman. Perhaps you'd let me give you one or two?"

"Thank you; yes," she said; and to his surprise with less of her usual
half-scornful languor.

"Here's the tea. Any particular kind of cake you fancy?"

She said that the cakes would do, and poured out the tea; but he put
some milk into his saucer and gave some to the terrier, slowly,
methodically, and with a tenderness and gentleness which was not lost
upon the girl who watched him covertly before paying any attention to
his own tea.

"I wonder whether you could stand, my little man," he said, and he put
the terrier on the ground.

It stood upright and shivering for a moment, then it put its tiny paws
on Stafford's knee and looked up into his face appealingly. "Not up to
your usual form just yet, eh?" said Stafford, and he picked it up
gently and put it on his knee.

Maude Falconer looked at him.

"Give it to me," she said. "Men have no lap. He'll be more comfortable
with me."

"But he's wet still," he said. "He'll spoil that pretty dress of
yours."

"My pretty dress was made to be spoiled," she said, "Give it to me,
please, and get your tea."

"Do you mean it?" he asked, with a surprise which made her flush with
resentment, and something like shame.

For reply, she bent forward, took the dog from him, and tried to settle
it on her lap; but the mite looked piteously at Stafford and whined,
its big eyes imploring him to let it come back.

But Stafford stroked it and bade it sit still, and presently it curled
itself up.

"It has gone to sleep," said Maude. "It has soon forgotten its
trouble."

"It's a way dogs have," said Stafford. "May I smoke? George! what a
lovely afternoon!"

She glanced at him as he leant back in his chair, his long legs
stretched out and crossed before him.

"You look happy," she said, with a faint smile.

"Oh, I am," he said, with a sudden flush and a start; for now the dog
was off his mind, it had instantly swung back to Ida.

"It's the reward of a generous action," she said, and again, the
mocking note was absent from her voice.

Stafford laughed.

"That's putting it rather high," he said.

They sat on in silence: Stafford thinking of Ida, Maude looking down at
the sleeping dog, and thinking that only a few minutes ago it had been
lying in the bosom of the man who sat beside her: the man whom she had
backed herself to fool; but for whom a strange sensation of
admiration--and was it a subtle fear?--was stirring within her.

"By George! we must be going!" he said, suddenly.

When they got to the boat he proposed to roll the terrier in his coat,
but Maude shook her head.

"I'll nurse it going home," she said.

"You will? That's very good of you!" he said, quite gratefully.

"He's a lucky little beggar!" he remarked, after awhile, as he looked
at the black little morsel curled up on the pretty dress. "Supposing he
isn't claimed, would you care to have him, Miss Falconer?"

She looked down at the dog.

"Thank you," she said. "But what shall I give you in return. It's
unlucky to give an animal without some consideration."

"Oh, give me another song," he replied. "There is nobody about."

She opened her lips, then checked herself.

"No, I can't sing again," she said, in a low voice.

"Oh, all right. It isn't good for you to sing too much in the open air.
I'll wait till this evening, if you'll be good enough to sing for us
then."

They landed and walked up to the house. As they reached the bend
leading to the entrance path, she stopped and held out the dog, which
had been staring at Stafford and whining at intervals.

"Take it, please. It is fretting for you, and I'd rather not keep it."

"Really?" he said, and she saw his face brighten suddenly. "All right,
if you'd rather. Come here, little man! What's your name, I wonder?
What shall we call him while we've got him?"

"Call him 'Tiny;' he's small enough," she said, with a shrug of her
shoulders.

"Tiny it is!" he assented, brightly. "He'll answer to it in a day or
two, you'll see. I hope you haven't quite spoilt your dress, Miss
Falconer, and won't regret your row!"

She looked at her dress, but there was a sudden significance in her
slow, lingering response.

"I--don't--know!"

As she went up the stairs she looked over the rail and saw Stafford's
tall figure striding down the hall. He was softly pulling the terrier's
ears and talking to it in the language dogs understand and love; and
when she sank into a chair in her room, his face with its manly
tenderness was still before her, his deep musical voice, with its note
of protection and succour, still rang in her ears.

She sat quite motionless for a minute or two, then she rose and went to
the glass and looked at herself; a long, intent look.

"Yes, I am beautiful," she murmured, not with the self-satisfaction of
vanity, but with a calculating note in her voice. "Am I--am I beautiful
enough?"

Then she swung away from the glass with the motion which reminded
Howard of a tigress, and, setting her teeth hard, laughed with
self-scorn; but with something, also, of fear in the laugh.

"I am a fool!" she muttered. "It can't be true. So soon! So suddenly!
Oh, I can't be such a fool!"




CHAPTER XVII.


If everybody was not enjoying himself at the Villa it certainly was not
the fault of the host, Sir Stephen Orme. Howard, as he drew his chair
up beside Stafford, when the ladies had left the room after dinner, and
the gentlemen had begun to glance longingly at the rare Chateau claret
and the Windermere port, made a remark to this effect:

"Upon my word, Staff, it is the most brilliant house-party which I have
ever joined; and as to your father in his character of host--Well,
words fail to express my admiration."

Stafford glanced at his father at the head of the table and nodded. Sir
Stephen had been the life and soul and spring of the dinner; talking
fashionable gossip to Lady Fitzharford on one side of him, and a "giddy
girl of twenty" on the other; exchanging badinage with "Bertie," and
telling deeply interesting stories to the men; and he was now dragging
reluctant laughter from the grim Baron Wirsch and the almost grimmer
Griffenberg, as he saw with one eye that the wine was circulating, and
with the other that no one was being overlooked or allowed to drop into
dullness.

"A most marvellous man! Nearly all the morning he was closeted with the
financiers; in the afternoon he went for a ride with Lady Clansford; he
was in attendance at the solemn function of afternoon tea; he played
croquet--and played it well--at half-past five; at six I saw him
walking round the grounds with the Effords and the Fitzharfords, and
now he is laughing and talking with the _abandon_ of a boy of
five-and-twenty, while the boy of five-and-twenty sits here as grave
and silent as if he had been working like a horse--or a Sir Stephen
Orme--instead of fooling about the lake with the most beautiful woman
in the party."


"And his friend has spent the day in a deck-chair on the terrace,"
retorted Stafford.

"At any rate, I have been out of mischief," said Howard. Then he
remembered his wager with Maude Falconer, and added, rather
remorsefully: "At least I hope so. By the way, don't you echo my
expression of opinion that Miss Falconer is the most beautiful woman
here--or elsewhere?"

Stafford woke from the reverie into which he nearly always dropped when
Howard was talking, and nodded indifferently.

"Oh, yes; she is lovely, of course."

"How good of you, how kind and gracious!" retorted Howard, ironically.
"So my prince deigns to approve of her? And you also condescended to
admit that she is--er--rather clever?"

"I daresay," said Stafford. "I've seen so little of her. She seems to
me rather _blasé_ and cold."

Howard nodded.

"Yes; but the worst of it is, you can't count upon that kind of girl:
they are apt to warm up sometimes, and quite unexpectedly: and when
they do they--well, they boil like a geyser or a volcano. And
then--well, then it is wise to get out of reach. I once knew a woman
who was considered to be as cold as charity--or a rich relation--but
who caught fire one day and burnt up the man who ignited her. Of course
this is my delicate way of saying: 'Beware, oh, my prince!'"

Stafford smiled. Miss Falconer's nature was a matter of profound
indifference to him. There was only one woman on whom he could bestow a
thought, and he was thinking of her now, wondering when he should see
her, whether he might dare to tell her of his love again, to ask her
for her answer.

Once or twice his father looked across at him, and nodded and smiled as
if he loved to see him, and wanted to speak to him; and Stafford smiled
and nodded back, as if he understood.

When the men rose to go to the drawing-room, Sir Stephen caught him up
at the door, and laid a hand upon his arm.

"Happy, dear boy?" he asked in a low voice, full of affection. "I've
seen scarcely anything of you. No, no, I'm not complaining! It was
understood that you were to have a free hand--but--but I've missed you!
Never mind; this crowd will have gone presently, and then--ah, then
we'll have a jolly time to ourselves! Things are going well," he added,
with a significant smile, as he glanced at Wirsch and Griffenberg, who,
well-fed and comfortable, were in front of them.

"I'm glad, sir," said Stafford.

Sir Stephen smiled, but checked a sigh and a shrug of the shoulders.

"Yes, my little schemes are flourishing; but"--he looked at the
financiers again--"they are rather a hard team to drive!"

As Stafford entered the drawing-room, he heard Lady Clansford enquiring
for Miss Falconer.

"We want her to sing, Mr. Orme, and I cannot find her."

"I think she is on the terrace," said Bertie, who always seemed to know
where everybody was.

Stafford went out by one of the windows, and saw Maude Falconer pacing
up and down at the end of the terrace. She was superbly dressed, and as
he looked at her, he involuntarily admired the grace of her movements.
Mr. Falconer was walking with bent head and hands behind his back; but
now and again he looked at her sideways with his sharp eyes. Stafford
did not like to interrupt them, and withdrew to the other end of the
terrace, with a cigarette, to wait till they joined him.

"Young Orme has come out to look for you," said Mr. Falconer, without
turning his head.

"I know," she said, though she also had not turned. "They want me to
sing. I will go in directly. You have not answered my question, father.
Is Sir Stephen very rich, or is all this only sham? I have heard you
say so often that display very often only covers poverty."

Falconer eyed her curiously.

"Why do you want to know? What does it matter to you?"

She shrugged her shoulders impatiently, resentfully, and he went on:

"Yes, he's rich; confoundedly so. But he is playing a big game, in
which he is running some risks; and he'll want all his money to help
him win it."

"And are you joining him in the game?" she asked.

He looked at her with surprise. There was a note in her voice which he
had never heard before, a note which conveyed to him the fact that she
was no longer a girl, but a woman.

"Upon my soul, I don't know why you ask! Well, well!"--she had
repeated the impatient gesture. "I haven't made up my mind yet. He
wants me to join him. I could be of service to him; on the other hand,
I could--yes, get in his way; for I know some of the points of the game
he is playing. Yes, I could help him--or spoil him."

"And which are you going to do?" she asked, in a low voice, her eyes
veiled, her lips drawn straight.

Falconer laughed grimly. "I don't know. It all depends. Which would you
do?" he asked, half sarcastically.

She was silent for a moment, then she said: "You knew Sir Stephen some
time ago--years ago, father?"

Falconer nodded. "I did," he said, shortly.

"And you were friends, and you quarrelled?"

He looked at her with an air of surprise.

"I saw you both when you stood opposite each other after the carriage
accident," she said, coolly. "I am not blind, and I am not particularly
stupid. It didn't strike me at the time that there had been anything
wrong between you, but I have since seen you look at Sir Stephen,
and--you have an expressive face sometimes, oh, my father!"

He grinned grimly.

"You appear to keep your eyes open, Maude. Yes; there was a row between
us, and there was a grudge--"

--"Which you mean to pay off?" she said, as impassively as if they
were speaking of the merest trivialities.

"Which I could pay off--gratify, if I liked," he admitted.

"How?" she asked.

He did not reply, but glanced at her sideways and bit at the cigar
which he had stopped to light.

"Shall I tell you, if I were a man and I wanted revenge upon such a man
as Sir Stephen Orme, what I should do, father?" she asked, in a low
voice, and looking straight before her as if she were meditating.

"You can if you like. What would you do?" he replied, with a touch of
sarcastic amusement.

She looked round her and over her shoulder. The windows near them were
closed, Stafford with his cigarette was too far off to overhear them.

"If I were a man, rich and powerful as you are, and I owed another a
grudge, I would not rest night or day until I had got him into my
power. Whether I meant to exact my revenge or not, I would wait and
work, and scheme and plot until I had him at my mercy so that I could
say, 'See now you got the better of me once, you played me false once,
but it is my turn now.' He should sue for mercy, and I would grant
it--or refuse it--as it pleased me; but he should feel that he was in
my power; that my hand was finer than his, my strength greater!" He
shot a glance at her, and his great rugged face grew lined and stern.

"Where did you get those ideas? Why do you talk to me like this?" he
muttered, with surprise and some suspicion.

"I am not a child," she said, languidly. "And I have been living with
you for some time now. Sir Stephen Orme is a great man, is surrounded
by great and famous people, while you, with all your money, are"--she
shrugged her shoulders--"well, just nobody."

His face grew dark. She was playing on him as a musician plays on an
instrument with which he is completely familiar.

"What the devil do you mean?" he muttered.

"If I were a man, in your place, I would have the great Sir Stephen at
my feet, to make or to break as I pleased. I would never rest until I
could be able to say: 'You're a great man in the world's eyes, but I am
your master; you are my puppet, and you have to dance to my music,
whether the tune be a dead march or a jig.' That is what I should do if
I were a man; but I am only a girl, and it seems to me nowadays that
men have more of the woman in them than we have."

He stopped and stared at her in the moonlight, a dark frown on his
face, his eyes heavy with doubt and suspicion.

"Look here, my girl," he said, "you are showing up in a new light
to-night. You are talking as your mother used to talk. And you aren't
doing it without a purpose. What is it? What grudge can you, a mere
girl who has only known him for a couple of days, have against Sir
Stephen?"

She smiled.

"Let us say that I am only concerned for my father's wounded pride and
honour," she said. "Or let us say that I _have_ a game of my own to
play, and that I am asking you to help me while you gratify your own
desire for revenge. Will you help me?"

"Tell me--tell me what your game is. Good Lord!"--with a scowl. "Fancy
you having a game: it's--it's ridiculous!"

"Almost as ridiculous as calling me a girl and expecting to see me
playing with a doll or a hoop," she returned, calmly. "But you needn't
reply. I can see you mean to do it, like a good and indulgent father;
and some day, perhaps soon, I will, like a good and dutiful daughter,
tell you why I wanted you to do it. Is that you, Mr. Orme? Will I come
and sing? Oh, yes, if you wish it. Where is the little dog?" she asked,
looking up at him with a new expression in her languorous eyes, as she
glided beside him.

"Asleep on my bed," replied Stafford, with a laugh. "My man has turned
him off and made him a luxurious couch with cushions three or four
times, but he would persist on getting on again, so he'll have to stay,
I suppose?"

"Are you always so good-natured?" she asked, in a low voice. "Or do you
reserve all your tenderness of heart for dogs and horses--as Mr. Howard
declares?"

"Mr. Howard is too often an ass," remarked Stafford, with a smile.

"You shall choose your song, as a reward for your exertions this
afternoon," she said, as he led her to the piano.

Most of the men in the crowd waiting eagerly for the exquisite voice
would have been moved to the heart's core by her tone and the
expression in her usually cold eyes, but Stafford was clothed in the
armour of his great love, and only inclined his head.

"Thanks: anything you like," he said, with the proper amount of
gratitude.

She shot a glance at him and sank into the music-seat languidly. But a
moment afterwards, as if she could not help herself, she was singing a
Tuscan love-song with a subdued passion which thrilled even the _blasé_
audience clustered round her. It thrilled Stafford; but only with the
desire to be near Ida. A desire that became irresistible; and when she
had finished he left the room, caught up his hat and overcoat and went
out of the house.

As he did so, Mr. Falconer walked past him into the smoking-room. Mr.
Griffenberg was alone there, seated in a big arm-chair with a cigar as
black as a hat and as long as a penholder.

Falconer wheeled a chair up to him, and, in his blunt fashion, said:

"You are in this railway scheme of Orme's, Griffenberg?" Mr.
Griffenberg nodded.

"And you?"

"Yes," said Falconer, succinctly. "I am joining. I suppose it's all
right; Orme will be able to carry it through?"

Griffenberg emitted a thick cloud of smoke.

"It will try him a bit. It's a question of capital--ready capital. I'm
helping him: got his Oriental shares as cover. A bit awkward for me,
for I'm rather pushed just now--that estate loan, you know."

Falconer nodded. "I know. See here: I'll take those shares from you, if
you like, and if you'll say nothing about it."

Mr. Griffenberg eyed his companion's rugged face keenly.

"What for?" he asked.

Mr. Falconer smiled.

"That's my business," he said. "The only thing that matters to you is,
that by taking the shares off your hands I shall be doing you a
service."

"That's true: you shall have 'em," said Mr. Griffenberg; "but I warn
you it's a heavy lot."

"You shall have a cheque to-morrow," said Mr. Falconer. "Where did you
get that cigar: it takes my fancy?"

Mr. Griffenberg produced his cigar case with alacrity: he liked Mr.
Falconer's way of doing business.

At the moment Stafford left the Villa, Ida was standing by the window
in the drawing-room of Heron Hall. On the table beside her lay a book
which she had thrown down with a gesture of impatience. She was too
restless to read, or to work; and the intense quietude of the great
house weighed upon her with the weight of a tomb.

All day, since she had left Stafford, his words of passionate love had
haunted her. They sang in her ears even as she spoke to her father or
Jessie, or the dogs who followed her about with wistful eyes as if they
were asking her what ailed her, and as if they would help her.

He loved her! She had said it to herself a thousand times all through
the long afternoon, the dragging evening. He loved her. It was so
strange, so incredible. They had only met three or four times; they had
said so little to each other. Why, she could remember almost every
word. He loved her, had knelt to her, he had told her so in passionate
words, with looks which made her heart tremble, her breath come fast as
she recalled them. That is, he wanted her to be his wife, to _give
herself_ to him, to be with him always, never to leave him.

The strangeness, the suddenness of the thing overwhelmed her so that
she could not think of it calmly. He had asked her to think of it, to
decide, to give him an answer. Why could she not? She had always,
hitherto, known her own mind. If anyone had asked her a question about
the estate, about the farm, she had known what to answer, important as
the question might have been. But now she seemed as if her mind were
paralyzed, as if she could not decide. Was it because she had never
thought of love; because she had never dreamt that anyone would love
her so much as to want to have her by his side for all his life?

As she looked through the window at the moonlight on the lawn, she
thought of him; called up the vision of his tall, graceful figure and
handsome face--yes; he was handsome, she knew. But she had scarcely
given a thought to his face; and only felt that it was good to have him
near her, to hear him talk in his deep voice, broken sometimes by the
short laugh which sounded almost boyish. It had been good to have him
near her--But then, she had been so lonely, had seen so few
men--scarcely any at all--Suppose when she met him next she said "No,"
told him that she could not love him, and he went away, leaving her
forever; would she be sorry?

She turned away from the window suddenly, nearly stumbling over Donald,
who was lying at her feet, his nose on his paws, his great eyes fixed
sadly and speculatively on her face, and caught up the book. But _his_
face came between her and the page, and she put the book down and went
into the hall.

Her father was in the library, there was no sound in the house to drown
the voice, the passionately pleading voice which rang in her ears.

"I must go out," she said, "I shall be able to think in the air, shall
be able to decide."

She caught up a shawl and flung it carelessly over her head, quite
unconscious that the fleecy, rose-coloured wool made an exquisite frame
for the girlish loveliness of her face, and opening the door, went
slowly down the broken, lichen-covered steps, the two dogs following at
her heels.

She drew in the keen but balmy air with a long breath, and looked up at
the moon, now a yellow crescent in the starry sky; and something in the
beauty of the night, something subtly novel thrilled her with a strange
sense of throbbing, pulsing joy and happiness, underneath which lurked
as subtle a fear and dread, the fear and dread of those who stand upon
the threshold of the unknown; who, in passing that threshold, enter a
world of strange things which they never more may leave.


Love: what was it? Did she feel it? Oh, if she could only tell! What
should she say to him when she met him; and when should she meet him?
Perhaps he had come to regret his avowal to her, had been wearied and
disappointed by her coldness, and would not come again! At the thought
her heart contracted as if at the touch of an icy hand. But the next
moment it leapt with a suffocating sense of mystery, of half-fearful
joy, for she saw him coming across the lawn to her, and heard her name,
spoken as it had never yet been spoken excepting by him; and she stood,
still as a statue, as he held out his hand and, looking into her eyes,
murmured her name again.

"Ida!"




CHAPTER XVIII.


"Ida!"

It was the lover's cry of appeal, the prayer for love uttered by the
heart that loves; and it went straight to her own heart.

She put out her hand, and he took it and held it in both his.

"I have come for your answer," he said in the low voice that thrills;
the voice which says so much more than the mere words. "I could not
wait--I tried to keep away from you until to-morrow; but it was of no
use. I am here, you see, and I want your answer. Don't tell me it is
'No!' Trust me, Ida--trust to my love for you. I will devote my life to
trying to make you happy. Ah, but you know! What is your answer? Have
you thought--you promised me you would think?"

"I have thought," she said, at last. "I have thought of nothing else--I
wanted to tell you the truth--to tell you truly as I would to
myself--but it is so hard to know--Sometimes when I think that you may
go away, and that I may not see you again, my heart sinks, and I feel,
oh! so wretched."

He waited for no more, but caught her to him, and as she lay in his
arms only slightly struggling, her face upturned, he bent his own,
almost white with passion, and kissed her on the lips, and not once
only.

The blood rushed to her face, her bosom rose and fell, and, her face
grown pale again, her eyes gazed up into his half fiercely, half
appealingly; then suddenly they grew moist, as if with tears, her lips
quivered, and from them came, as if involuntarily, the words of
surrender, the maiden confession:

"I love you!"

He uttered a low, sharp cry, the expression of his heart's delight, his
soul's triumph.

"You love me! Ida! How--how do you know--when?" She shook her head and
sighed, as she pressed her cheek against his breast.

"I don't know. It was just now--the moment when you kissed me. Then it
came to me suddenly--the knowledge--the truth. It was as if a flash of
light had revealed it to me. Oh, yes, I love you. I wish--almost I wish
that I did not, for--it hurts me!"

She pressed her hand to her heart, and gazed up at him with the wonder
of a child who is meeting its first experience of the strange
commingling of pain and joy.

He raised her in his arms until her face was against his.

"I know--dearest," he said, almost in a whisper. "It is love--it is
always so, I think. My heart is aching with longing for you, and yet I
am happy--my God, how happy! And you? Tell me, Ida?"

"Yes, I am happy," she breathed, with a deep sigh, as she nestled still
closer to him. "It is all so strange--so unreal!"

"Not unreal, dearest," he said, as they walked under the trees, her
head against his shoulder, his arm round her waist and supporting her.
"It is real enough, this love of mine--which will last me till my
death, I know; and yours?"

She gazed straight before her dreamily.

"There can be no heaven without you, without your love," she answered,
with a solemn note in her sweet voice.

He pressed her to him.

"And you have thought it all out. You have realised that you will be my
wife--my very own?"

"Yes," she said. "I know now. I know that I am giving you myself, that
I am placing all my life in your hands."

"God help me to guard it and make it happy!" he said; then he laughed.
"I have no fear! I will make you happy, Ida! I--I feel that I shall. Do
you understand what I mean? I feel as if I had been set apart, chosen
from all the millions of men, to love you and cherish you and make you
happy! And you, Ida?"

She looked up at him with the same far-away, dreamy expression in her
wonderful eyes.

"Now at this moment I felt that I, too, have been set apart for you: is
it because you have just said the same? No, because I felt it when you
kissed me just now. Ah, I am glad you did it! If you had not I might
not have known that I loved you, I might have let you go forever,
thinking that I did not care. It was your kiss that opened my heart to
me and showed me--."

He bent over her until his lips nearly touched hers. "Kiss me in
return--of your own accord, Ida! But once, if you will; but kiss me!"

Without a blush, solemnly as if it were a sacrament, she raised her
head and kissed him on the lips.

There fell a silence. The world around them, in the soft shimmer of the
crescent moon, became an enchanted region, the land that never was on
earth or sea, the land of love, in which all that dwell therein move in
the glamour of the sacred Fire of Love.

Stafford broke it at last. It is the man who cannot be contented with
silence; he thirsts for his mistress's voice.

"Dearest, what shall I do? You must tell me," he said, as if he had
been thinking. "I will do whatever you wish, whatever you think best.
I've a strong suspicion that you're the cleverest of us; that you've
got more brains in this sweet little finger of yours than I've got in
my clumsy head--"

She laughed softly and looked at the head which he had libelled, the
shapely head with its close-cut hair, which, sliding her hand up, she
touched caressingly.

"Shall I come to your father to-morrow, Ida? I will ride over after
breakfast--before, if you like: if I had my way I'd patrol up and down
here all night until it was a decent time to call upon him."

She nestled a little closer to him, and her brows came level with
sudden gravity and doubt.

"My father! I had not thought of him--of what he would say--do. But I
know! He--he will be very angry," she said, in a low voice.

"Will he? Why?" Stafford asked. "Of course I know I'm not worthy of
you, Ida; no living man is!"

"Not worthy!"

She smiled at him with the woman's worship already dawning in her deep
grey eyes.

"It is I who am not worthy. Why, think! I am only an inexperienced
girl--living the life of a farmer's daughter. We are very poor--oh, you
do not know how poor! We are almost as poor as the smallest tenant,
though we live in this big house, and are still regarded as great
people--the Herons of Herondale."

"That's one of the things I have been thinking of," said Stafford.
"What lovely hair you have, Ida! It is not often that dark hair is so
soft, is it?"

He bent down and drew a look, which his caresses had released, across
her lips, and kissed her through it.

"You are lords of the soil, people of importance and rank here, while
we are--well, just ordinary folk. I can quite understand your father
objecting. Dearest, you are worthy of a duke, a prince--"

She put her hand up to his lips to silence the lover's extravagant
flattery.

"It is not that--the difference--which is all to your advantage," she
said. "My father may think of it," she went on with innocent candour.
"But it would be the same if you were of the highest rank. He does not
want me to leave him."

"And if he were less anxious to keep you he would not give you to me,
who am, in his opinion, and rightly, so much your inferior," said
Stafford. "But I ought to go to him, dearest. I ought to go to-morrow."

She trembled a little as she nestled against him. "And--and--your
father, Sir Stephen Orme?" she said. "What will he say?"

Stafford laughed slowly and confidently.

"Oh, my father? He will be delighted. He's the best of fathers, a
perfect model for parents. Ever since I can remember he has been good
to me, a precious sight better, more liberal and generous, than I
deserved; but lately, since I've known him--Ah, well, I can only say,
dearest, that he will be delighted to hear that I have chosen a wife;
and when he sees you--"

He stopped and held her at arm's length for a moment and looked down
into the lovely face upturned to his with its sweet, girlish gravity.

--"Why, he will fall in love with you right out of hand! I think you
will like my father, Ida. He--well, he's a taking sort of fellow;
everybody likes him who knows him--really knows him--and speaks well of
him. Yes, I'm proud of him, and I feel as safe as if he were here to
say, in his hearty, earnest way: 'I wish you good luck, Stafford! And
may God bless you, my dear!'"

He flushed and laughed as if a little ashamed of his emotional way of
putting it.

"He's full of--of the milk of human kindness, is my father," he said,
with a touch of simplicity which was one of the thousand and fifteen
reasons why Ida loved him.

She gazed up at him thoughtfully and sighed.

"I hope he will like me," she said, all the pride which usually
characterized her melted by her love. "I am sure that I shall like
him--for loving you."

"You will see," said Stafford, confidently. "He will be as proud as a
duke about you. You won't mind if he shows it a little plainly and
makes a little fuss, Ida? He's--well, he's used to making the most of a
good thing when he has it--it's the life he has led which has rather
got him into the way of blowing a trumpet, you know--and he'll want a
whole orchestra to announce you. But about your father, dearest? Shall
I come to-morrow and ask for his consent?"

She looked up at him with doubt and a faint trouble in her beautiful
eyes, and he heard her sigh regretfully.

"I am afraid," she said, in a low voice.

"Afraid?" He looked at her with a smile of surprise. "If anyone were to
tell me that it was possible for you to be afraid, I shouldn't believe
them," he said. "Fear and you haven't made acquaintance yet, Ida!"

She shook her head.

"I am so happy, so intensely happy, that I am afraid lest the gods
should be jealous and snatch my happiness from me. I am afraid that if
you come to-morrow, my father will say 'No,' will--"

--"Will have me shown out," said Stafford, gravely. "I see. I shouldn't
be surprised."

"And--and then I should not be able to see you again."

He laughed at the idea.

"My dearest, if all the fathers in the world said 'No,' it wouldn't
make any difference to me," he said, with that air of masterfulness,
that flash of the eye which a woman loves in a man. "Do you think I
should give you up, that I should be content to say, 'I'm very sorry,
sir,' and go off--leave you--keep away from you!" He laughed again,
and she nestled a little closer, and her small hand closed a little more
tightly on his arm. "And you wouldn't give me up, refuse to see me,
even if your father withheld his consent, would you, Ida?" he asked.

She looked straight before her dreamily. Then raised her eyes to his
gravely.

"No; I could not. It is just that. I could not. Somehow I feel as if I
had given you the right to myself and that nothing could alter it,
nothing could take me away from you!"

How was it possible for him to refrain from lifting her in his arms and
kissing the sweet, soft lips which made such a confession.

They walked on for a minute or two in silence, when she went on, as if
she had been still considering the matter:

"No, you must not come, Stafford. My father is not strong,
and--and--ah! well, you know, you saw him that other night--the first
night we met--do you remember? And he was walking in his sleep again
the other evening. If you were to come--if I were to tell him
that--that you had asked me to be your wife, he might fly into a
passion; it might do him harm. Some time ago, when he was ill, the
doctor told me that he must be kept quite quiet, and that nothing must
be allowed to excite or irritate him. He is very old and leads so
secluded a life--he sees no one now but myself. Oh, how I would like
you to come; how good it would be if--if he would give me to you as
other fathers give their daughters! But I are not risk it! I cannot!
Stafford"--she put her hands on his breast and looked up at him--"am I
wrong to tell you all this--to let you see how much I love you? Is
it--unmaidenly of me? Tell me if it is, and I will not do so for the
future. I will hide my heart a little better than I am doing at
present. Ah, see, it is on my sleeve!"

He took her arm and kissed the sleeve where her heart was supposed to
be.

"I've read that men only love while they are not sure of a woman's
love; that with every two persons it is one who loves and the other who
permits himself or herself to be loved. Is that true, Stafford? If so,
then it is I who love--alas! poor me!"

He drew her to him and looked into her eyes with a passionate
intensity.

"It's not true," he said, almost fiercely. "For God's sake don't say
such things. They--they hurt, and hurt badly; they leave a bitter taste
in the mouth, a nasty pang behind. And if it were true--but it isn't,
Ida!--it is I who love. Good Lord! don't you know how beautiful you
are? Haven't you a looking-glass in your room? don't you know that no
girl that ever was born had such wonderful eyes, such beautiful hair?
Oh, my heart's love, don't you know how perfect you are?"

They had stopped under some trees near the ruined chapel, and she leant
against one of them and looked up at him with a strange, dreamy,
far-away look in her eyes which were dark as the purple amethyst.

"I never thought about it. Am I--do you think I am pretty? I am glad;
yes I am glad!"

"Pretty!" he laughed. "Dearest, when I take you away from here, into
the world, as my wife--my wife--the thought sends my blood coursing
through my veins--you will create so great a sensation that I shall be
half wild with pride; I shall want to go about calling aloud: 'She is
my wife; my very own! You may admire--worship her, but she is
mine--belongs to me--to unworthy Stafford Orme!'"

"Yes?" she murmured, her voice thrilling. "You will be proud of me? Of
me, the poor little country girl who rode about the dales in a shabby
habit and an old hat? Stafford, Jessie was telling me that there is a
very beautiful girl staying at the Villa at Brae Wood--one of the
visitors. Jessie said she was lovely, and that all the men-servants,
and the maids, too, were talking about her. She must be more beautiful
than I am."

"Which of the women do you mean?" he said, indifferently, with the
supreme indifference which the man who is madly in love feels for every
other woman than the one of his heart.

"She is a fair girl, with blue eyes and the most wonderful hair;
'chestnut-red with gold in it,' as Jessie described it to me. And she
says that this girl wears the most beautiful diamonds--I am still
quoting Jessie--and other precious stones, and that she is very 'high
and mighty,' and more haughty than any of the other ladies. Who is it?"

"I think she must mean Miss Falconer--Miss Maude Falconer," said
Stafford, as indifferently as before, as he smoothed one of the silken
tresses on her brow, and kissed it as it lay on his finger. "It is just
the way a slave would describe her."

"And is she very beautiful?" asked Ida.

"Yes, I suppose she is," he said.

"You suppose!" she echoed, arching her brows, but with a frank smile
about her lips, the smile of contentment at his indifference. "Don't
you know?"

"Well, yes, she is," he admitted. "I've scarcely noticed her. Oh, but
yes, she is; and she sings very well. Yes, I can understand her making
a sensation in the servants' hall--she makes one in the drawing-room.
But she's not my style of beauty. See here, dearest: it doesn't sound
nice, but though I've spent some hours with Miss Falconer and listened
to her singing, I have only just noticed that she is good-looking, and
that she has a wonderful voice: they say up at the Villa that there's
nothing like it on the stage--excepting Patti's and Melba's; but all
the time she has been there I have had another face, another voice, in
my mind. Ever since I saw you, down there by the river, I have had no
eyes for any other woman's face, however beautiful, no ears for any
other woman's voice, however sweet." She was silent a moment, as she
clasped her hands and laid them against his cheek.

"How strange it sounds! But if you had chanced to see her
first--perhaps you would not have fallen in love with me? How could you
have done so? She is so very lovely--I can see she is, by Jessie's
description."

He laughed.

"Even if I had not seen you, there was no chance of my falling in love
with Miss Falconer, dearest," he said, smiling at her gravity and
earnestness. "She is very beautiful, lovely in her way, if you like;
but it is not my way. She is like a statue at most times; at others,
just now and again, like a--well, a sleek tigress in her movements and
the way she turns her head. Oh, there wasn't the least danger of my
falling in love with her, even if I hadn't seen the sweetest and
loveliest girl in all the wide world."

"And you will feel like that, feel so sure, so certain that you love
me, even though you have seen and will see so many women who are far
more beautiful than I am?" she said, dreamily.

"Sure and certain," he responded, with a long sigh. "If I were as sure
of your love as I am of mine for you--Forgive me, dearest!" for she had
raised her eyes to his with an earnestness that was almost solemn.

"You may be sure," she said, slowly. "I shall love you as long as I
live. I know it! I do not know why. I only--feel it. Perhaps we may be
parted--"

He laughed--but his hand closed on hers, and gripped them tightly.

--"But I shall always love you. Something has gone out of me--is it my
heart?--and I can never take it back from you. Perhaps you may grow
tired of me--it may be. I have read and heard of such things happening
to women--you may see someone more beautiful than Miss Falconer,
someone who will lead you to forget the little girl who rode through
the rain in Herondale. If so, there will be no need to tell me; no need
to make excuses, or ask for forgiveness. There would be no need to tell
me, for something here"--she drew her hand from his and touched her
bosom--"would tell me. You would only have to keep away from me--that
is all. And I--ah well I should be silent, quite silent."

"Dearest!" he murmured, reproachfully, and with something like awe, for
her brows were knit, her face was pale as ivory, and her eyes glowed.
"Why do you say this now, just as--as we have confessed our love for
each other? Do you think I shall be faithless? I could almost laugh! As
if any man you deigned to love could ever forget you, ever care a straw
for any other woman!"

She turned to him with a shudder, a little cry that was tragic in its
intensity, turned to him and clenched her small hands on his breast.

"Swear to me!" she panted; then, as if ashamed of the passion that
racked her, her eyes dropped and the swift red flooded her face. "No!
you shall not swear to me, Stafford. I--I will believe you love me as I
shall love you forever and forever! But if--if the time should come
when some other girl shall win you from me, promise me that you will
not tell me, that you will just keep away from me! I could bear it
if--if I did not see you; but if I saw you--Oh!"--something like a moan
escaped her quivering lips, and she flung herself upon his breast with
the _abandon_, the unself-consciousness of a child.

Stafford was moved to his inmost heart, and for a moment, as he held
her within the embrace of his strong arms, he could not command his
voice sufficiently for speech. At last he murmured, his lips seeking
hers:

"Ida! I swear that I will love you forever and forever!"

"But--but--if you break your vow, you promise that you will not come to
me--tell me? I shall know. Promise, ah, promise!"

"Will nothing less content you? Must I?" he said, almost desperate at
her persistence. "Then I promise, Ida!"




CHAPTER XIX.


There is something solemn and awe-inspiring in perfect happiness.

How many times in the day did Ida pull up Rupert and gaze into the
distance with vacant, unseeing eyes, pause in the middle of some common
task, look up from the book she was trying to read, to ask herself
whether she was indeed the same girl who had lived her lonely life at
Herondale, or whether she had changed places with some other
personality, with some girl singularly blessed amongst women.

Jessie and Jason, even the bovine William, who was reputed the
stupidest man in the dale, noticed the change in her, noticed the touch
of colour that was so quick to mount to the ivory cheek, the novel
brightness and tenderness in the deep grey eyes, the new note, the low,
sweet tone of happiness in the clear voice. Her father only remained
unobservant of the subtle change, but he was like a mole burrowing
amongst his book and gloating secretly over the box which he concealed
at the approach of footsteps, the opening of a door, and the sound of a
voice in a distant part of the house.

But though the servants remarked the change in their beloved mistress,
they did not guess at its cause; for, by chance rather than design,
none of them had seen Ida and Stafford together. And yet they met
daily. Sometimes Stafford would ride over from Brae Wood and meet her
by the river. There was a hollow there, so deep that it hid not only
themselves but the horses, and here they would sit, hand in hand, or
more often with his arm round her and her small, shapely head with its
soft, but roughened hair, upon his breast. Sometimes he would row
across the lake and they would walk side by side along the bank, and
screened by the trees in which the linnet and the thrush sang the songs
which make a lover's litany; at others--and these were the sweetest
meeting of all, for they came in the soft and stilly night when all
nature was hushed as if under the spell of the one great passion--he
would ride or walk over after dinner, and they would sit in the ruined
archway of the old chapel and talk of their blank past, the magic
present, and the future which was to hold nothing but happiness.

Love grows fast under such conditions, and the love of these two
mortals grew to gigantic proportions, absorbing the lives of both of
them. To Stafford, all the hours that were not spent with this girl of
his heart were so much dreary waste.

To Ida--ah, well, who shall measure the intensity of a girl's first
passion? She only lived in the expectation of seeing him, in his
presence and the whispered words and caresses of his love; and, in his
absence, in the memory of them. For her life meant just this man who
had come and taken the heart from her bosom and enthroned his own in
its place.

They told each other everything. Stafford knew the whole of her life
before they met, all the little details of the daily routine of the
Hall, and her management of the farm; and she learnt from him all that
was going on at the great, splendid palace which in his modesty Sir
Stephen Orme had called the Villa. She liked to nestle against him and
hear the small details of his life, as he liked to hear hers; and she
seemed to know all the visitors at the Villa, and their peculiarities,
as well as if she were personally acquainted with them.

"You ought not to leave them so much, Stafford." she said, with mock
reproof, as they sat one afternoon in the ballow by the river. "Don't
you think they notice your absence and wonder where you are?"

"Shouldn't think so," he replied. "Besides, I don't care if they do.
All my worry is that I can't come to you oftener. Every time I leave
you I count up the hours that must pass before I see you again. But I
expect most, if not all, of the visitors will be off presently. Most of
'em have been there the regulation fortnight; a good many come
backwards and forwards; they're the city men, the money men. My father
is closeted with them for hours every day--that big scheme of his seems
to be coming off satisfactorily. It's a railway to some place in
Africa, and all these fellows--the Griffenbergs, and Beltons, that fat
German baron, Wirsch, and the rest of them, are in it. Heaven knows why
my father wants to worry about it for. I heard one of them say that he
calculated to make a million and a half out of it. As if he weren't
rich enough!"

"A million and a half," she said. "What a large sum it seems. What one
could do with a half, a quarter, a tenth of it!"

"What would you do, dearest?" he asked.

She laughed softly.

"I think that I would first buy you a present. And then I'd have the
Hall repainted. No, I'd get the terrace rails and the portico mended;
and yet, perhaps, it would be better to have the inside of the house
painted and papered. You see, there are so many things I could do with
it, that it's difficult to choose."

"You shall do 'em all," he said, putting his arm round her. "See here,
Ida, I've been thinking about ourselves--"

"Do you ever think of anything else? I don't," she said, half
unconsciously.

--"And I've made up my mind to take the bull by the horns--"

"Is that meant for my father or yours?"

"Both," he replied. "We've been so happy this last fortnight--is it a
fortnight ago since I got you to tell me that you cared for me? Lord!
it seems a year sometimes, and at others it only seems a minute!--that
we haven't cared to think of how we stand; but it can't like this
forever, Ida. You see, I want you--I want you all to myself, for every
hour of the day and night instead of for just the few minutes I've the
good luck to snatch. Directly this affair of my governor's is finished
I shall go to him and tell him I'm the happiest, the luckiest man in
the world; I shall tell him everything exactly how we stand--and ask
him to help us with your father."

Ida sighed and looked grave.

"I know, dearest," he said, answering the look. "But your father has to
be faced some time, and I--Ida, I am impatient. I want you. Now, as I
daresay you have discovered, I am rather an idiot than otherwise, and
the worst man in the world to carry out anything diplomatically; but my
father--" He laughed rather ruefully. "Well, they say he can coax a
concession out of even the Sultan of Turkey; that there is no one who
can resist him; and I know I shall be doing the right thing by telling
him how we stand."

She leant her elbows on her knees and her chin in the palms of her
hands.

"It shall be as you say, my lord and master," she said; "and when you
tell him that you have been so foolish as to fall in love with a little
Miss Nobody, who lives in a ruined tumble-down house, and is as poor
and friendless as a church mouse, do you think he will be
delighted--that the great and all-powerful Sir Stephen Orme will throw
up his hat for joy and consider that you have been very wise?"

"I think when he sees you--What is that?" he broke off.

"That" was a lady riding across the moor behind them. She was mounted
on one of the Orme horses, was habited by Redfern, who had done justice
to her superb and supple figure, and the sunlight which poured from
between the clouds fully revealed the statuesque beauty of her face.

"I know," said Ida, quietly, as she looked at the graceful horsewoman,
at the lithe, full figure, the cold perfection of the Grecian face.
"That is Miss Falconer: it is, is it not?"

He nodded indifferently.

"And she has seen us," said Ida.

"It doesn't matter in the least," said Stafford. "Why shouldn't she?
But I don't think she has; she did not turn her head as she rode by."

"That is why," said Ida, with her woman's acuteness. "She saw us from
the top of the hill--see, the groom is just riding down."

She was silent a moment or two, watching Maude Falconer as she cantered
away, then she shivered as if with cold.

"What is the matter, dearest?" he asked, drawing her to him. "Why did
you shudder?"

She tried to laugh, but her eyes were grave and almost solemn. "I don't
know. It was as if someone had walked over my grave; as if I felt the
presentiment of some coming evil. I never felt like it before--Yes: she
is very beautiful, Stafford. She is like a picture, a statue--no, that
is not fair; for no picture had ever such magnificent hair, no statue
was ever so full of life and--Oh, I want a word--power. Yes; she is
like a tigress--a tigress asleep and in a good temper just for the
present; but--"

Stafford laughed, the strong and healthy man's laugh of good-natured
tolerance for the fancies of the woman he loves.

"My dear Ida, I assure you Miss Falconer is quite an ordinary young
woman with nothing mysterious or uncanny about her. And if she has seen
us, I am rather glad. I--well, I want to take you by the hand and
exclaim aloud to the whole world: 'Behold the treasure I have found!
Look upon her--but shade your eyes lest her beauty dazzle you--and
worship at her feet.' Only a day or two more and I'll tell my father
and have him on our side."

She made a gesture of consent.

"It shall be as you will," she murmured again. "But go now, dearest; I
shall have to ride fast to reach home in time to give my father his
tea."

Maude Falconer cantered easily until she had turned the corner of the
hill and was out of sight of Stafford and Ida, then she pulled up the
high-bred horse who fretted under her steel-like hands and tossed the
foam from his champing lips, pulled up and looked straight before her,
while the colour came and went on her smooth cheek; a sombre fire
gleamed in the usually coldly calm eyes, and her bosom heaved under the
perfect moulding of the riding-habit. She sat and looked before her for
a moment or two as if she were battling with an emotion which
threatened to master her and to find expression in some violent
outburst; but she conquered, and presently rode on to the Villa; and
half an hour later Stafford, coming up the steps, found her lying back
in her favourite chair with a cup of tea in her hand.

"You are just in time," she said, looking up at him, and he looked back
at her rather vacantly; for Ida had been in his arms too recently, for
his mind, his whole being, to be sufficiently clear of her to permit
him to take any interest in anything else "for tea," she said. "Here it
comes. Shall I pour it out for you? Have you been riding far?"

"Not very far," he said. "You have been riding, too. Is it a wonder we
did not meet."

"Yes," she assented, languidly. "I met no one, saw no one, while I was
out. Here comes your shadow," she added, as Tiny, having heard his
beloved master's voice, came helter-skelter, head over heels, and leapt
on Stafford's lap. "How fond he is of you."

Stafford nodded.

"Yes; I'm jolly glad no one answered the advertisement for its owner."

She bent over and stroked the terrier, who always seemed uneasy under
her caress, and her hand touched Stafford's. She glanced at him as it
did so, but the white hand so soft and warm might have been a piece of
senseless wood for all its effect upon him whose soul was still
thrilling with Ida Heron's touch; and with a tightening of the lips,
she took her hand away and leant back, but her eyes still clung to him,
as, all unconscious, he bent over the dog.

At that moment a carriage drove up, and Mr. Falconer alighted. He came
up the steps, his heavy face grave and yet alert; and his keen eyes
glanced at the pair as they sat side by side. Stafford looked up and
nodded.

"Glad to see you back, Mr. Falconer," he said, pleasantly. "Stands
London where it did?"

"Pretty much so, yes," responded Mr. Falconer, grimly. "Yes, plenty of
other thing change, have their day and cease to be, but the little
village keeps its end up and sees things--and men--come and go, flare
up, flicker and fizzle out. No, thanks; I'll have some tea in my room."

"And like a dutiful daughter, I will go and pour it out for him," said
Maude.

She rose--Tiny rose also, and barked at her--followed her father to his
room and stood watching him as he took off his frock-coat--he had no
valet--and slowly put on a loose jacket.


"Well?" she said, at last.

He sank into a chair and looked up at her with a sardonic smile on his
face.

"Yes, I'm back," he said. "I hurried back because Sir Stephen is going
to sign the articles to-night, going to bring the thing to a
conclusion."

She nodded, her eyes fixed on his hawk-like ones with a calm but keen
watchfulness.

"And you? Have you--"

He leant forward, and held out one claw-like hand, open.

"Yes, I've got him fast and tight." His hand closed, and his eyes shot
a swift, lurid gleam from under their half-lowered lids. "I've got him
as in a vice; I've only to turn the screw and--I squeeze him as flat
and dry as a lemon." She drew a long breath of satisfaction, of relief.

"You are clever!" she said. "And in one fortnight."

He smiled grimly.

"Yes; it is sharp work; and it has taken some doing--and some money.
But I've worked it. Black Steve--I mean Sir Stephen Orme, the great Sir
Stephen--is under my thumb. To-night, the night of his triumph, I am
going to crack him like an egg."

"You will ruin him?" she said.

"That is it," he said, with a nod. "I shall ruin him!"

"Is there no escape?" she asked in a low voice.

"None," he replied, grimly. "I tell you that nothing can save him."

"Excepting one thing," she said in so low a voice that it sounded as if
she were speaking to herself.

"Eh?" he said, as if he had not caught the words. "What is it you mean:
what can save him, what is this one thing?"

His heavy brows came done, and he frowned at her.

She raised her eyes, cold and glittering like steel, and met his frown
unflinchingly.

"The marriage of his son Stafford with your daughter," she said,
slowly, calmly.




CHAPTER XX.


Mr. Falconer started and stared at her, his heavy face growing a
dust-red, his eyes distended with amazement and anger.

"Are you out of your mind?" he said at last, and frowning at her in a
kind of perplexity. "'Pon my soul, Maude, I'm never quite certain
whether you are in jest or earnest! If this is intended for a joke,
permit me to tell you I consider it in vilely bad taste."

"I am not jesting," she said, very quietly, her chin in her hand, her
blue eyes fixed on his unblushingly. "I am in the most sober, the most
serious earnest, I assure you."

He rose, then sank into the chair again, and sighed impatiently.

"Do you mean to say that you--that he--Confound it If ever there was a
man to be pitied, it is the one who has the honour to be your father,
Maude."

"Why?" she asked, calmly. "Have I not been a dutiful daughter? Have I
ever given you any trouble, deceived you? Am I not perfectly frank with
you at this moment?" He rose and paced to the mantel-shelf, and leaning
against it, looked down upon her, the frown still on his heavy face,
his hands thrust deeply in his pockets.

"You've always been a puzzle to me," he said, more to himself than to
her. "Ever since you were born I've felt uncertain about you--you're
like your mother. But never mind that. What game is this you're
carrying on?"

"One in which I mean to win," she replied, slowly, meditatively. "Have
you not seen--How slow to perceive, even you, a reputedly clever man,
can be! I don't suppose there is a woman in the house who has not
detected the fact that I am in love with Stafford Orme, though I have
tried to hide it from them--and you will admit that I am not a bad
actress."

"In love with Stafford Orme!" His face darkened. "No, I did not know
it. Why---what the devil does he mean by not coming to me!" he broke
out angrily, harshly.

She smiled.

"He hasn't come to ask you for me, because--well, he doesn't want me,"
she said in a low voice.

"What!" he exclaimed below his breath. "Do you mean to tell me
that--that--Why, you can't have the shamelessness to care for the man
without--until--"

She broke in upon his burst of indignation with a low, clear laugh, and
there was no shame in her voice or eyes, as she said:

"Would it be so shameful if I have? My dear father, you and I should
differ on that point. We are told that we are made for love and to be
loved, that it is our proper and natural destiny. Why, then, should we
be ashamed of it. None of us are in reality; we only pretend to be. It
is part of the world's system of hypocrisy to assume an incapacity for
loving a man until he has asked you; to pretend an utter indifference
until he has said the magic words, 'I love you.' As if love could wait,
ever did wait, ever will! Anyway, mine did not! And I am no different
to other women--only more candid."

"By Heaven, you make me feel--mad!" he said, with suppressed anger.
"You tell me unblushingly, to my face, that you have fallen in love
with the son of my old enemy, that you want to marry him--you ask me to
help you, to--to forego my just revenge, to use my hold over him as a
lever, to induce him, force him--Good God! have you no sense of right
or wrong, are you utterly devoid of--of modesty, of womanly pride!"

He glowered down upon her with flushed face and angry eyes; but she was
quite unmoved by his outburst, and still met his gaze steadily, almost
reflectingly.

"A fortnight ago I should have asked myself that question--and as
angrily as you; but I can't now. It has gone too far."

"Gone too far! You mean--"

"That I have grown to love him so much, so dearly, that life without
him--"

"By God! you will have to live without him, for I'll not help you to
get him," he said, fiercely. "Stafford Orme, Stephen Orme's boy! No!
Put the thing out of your mind, Maude! See here--I don't want to be
angry; I'll take back all I said: you--well, you surprised me, and
shocked me, too, I'll admit--you're a strange girl, and say things that
you don't mean, and in a cold-blooded way that gives me fits. Say no
more about it; put the idea out of your head."

She laughed, and rose, and gliding to him, put her hand on his arm.

"My dear father," she said in a low voice, but with a strange and
subtle vibration in it, as if the passion with which she was struggling
threatened to burst forth, "you don't know what you ask; you don't know
what love is--and you don't know what I am! I didn't know myself until
the last few days; until a gradual light shone on the truth and showed
me my heart, the heart I once thought would never grow warm with love!
Oh, I was a fool! I played with fire, and I have been burned. I am
burning still!" She pressed her hand against her bosom, and for an
instant the passion within her darted from her eyes and twisted the
red, perfectly formed lips. Her hand tightened on his arm, her breath
came pantingly, now quickly, now slowly. "Father I have come to you.
Most girls go to their mother. I have none. I come to you because
I--must! You ask me to put the--the idea out of my head." She laughed a
low laugh of self-scorn and bitterness. "Do you think I have not tried
to steel, to harden, my heart against this feeling which has been
creeping insidiously over me, creeping, stealing gliding like a cloud
until it has enveloped me? I have fought against it as never woman
fought against the approach of love. The first day--it was the day he
took me on the lake--ah, you don't remember, but I--Shall I ever forget
it!--the first day my heart went out to him I tried to call it back, to
laugh at my weakness, to call myself a fool! And I thought I had
succeeded in driving the insidious feeling away. But I was wrong. It
was there in my heart already, and day by day, as I saw him, as I heard
him speak, the thing grew until I could not see him cross the lawn,
hear him speak to the dog, without thrilling, without shivering,
shuddering! Father, have pity on me! No, I won't ask for pity! I won't
have it! But I ask, I demand, sympathy, your help! Father," she drew
nearer to him and looked into his eyes with an awful look of
desperation, of broken pride, of the aching craving of love, "you must
help me. I love him, I must be his wife--I cannot live without him, I
will not!"

He paled and gnawed at his thick lip.

"You talk like a madwoman," he said, hoarsely.

She nodded.

"Yes, I am mad; I know it; I know it! But I shall never be sane again.
All my days and all my nights are consumed in this madness. I think of
him--I call up his face--ah!" She flung her hands before her face and
swayed to and fro as if she were half dazed, half giddy with passion.
"And all day I have to fight against the risk, the peril of discovery.
To feel the women's eyes on me when he comes near, to feel that their
ears are strained to catch the note in my voice which will give me
away, place me under their scorn--and to know that, try as I will, my
voice, my eyes will grow tender as they rest on him, as I speak to him!
To have to hide, to conceal, to crush down my heart while it is aching,
throbbing with the torture of my love for him!"

He strode from her, then came back. The sight of the storm within her
had moved him: for, after all, this strange girl was his daughter,
flesh of his flesh, bone of his bone. He swore under his breath and
struggled for speech.

"And--and the man Stafford?" he said. "He--he has not said--D--n it!
you don't mean to tell me that he is absolutely indifferent, that
he--he doesn't care?"

"I'll tell you the truth," she said. "I swore to myself that I would.
There is too much at stake for me to conceal anything. He
does--not--care for me."

Ralph Falconer uttered a sharp snarl of shame and resentment.

"He doesn't? and yet you--you want to marry him!"

She made a gesture with her hands which was more eloquent than words.

"Perhaps--perhaps there is someone else? Someone of the other women
here?" he suggested, moodily.

"Yes, there is someone else," she said, with the same calm decision.
"No, it is not one of the women here; it is a girl in the place; a
farmer's daughter, I think. It is only a _liaison_, a vulgar
intrigue--"

He uttered an exclamation.

"And yet _that_ doesn't cure you!"

She shook her head and smiled.

"No; my case is incurable. Father, if he were engaged to anyone of the
women here, to someone his equal, I should still love him and want him;
yes, and move heaven and earth to get him. But this is only a
flirtation with some country girl--she meets him on the hill-side by
the river--anywhere. I have seen them, at a distance, once or twice.
She is of no importance. She has caught his fancy, and will soon fail
to hold it."

She waved her hand as if she were moving the obstacle aside. Her father
stared at her in a kind of stupefaction.

"My girl, don't you know what you are asking for? A life of
wretchedness and misery; the hell of being married to a man who doesn't
love you."

She laughed and drew herself up, her eyes flashing, a warm glow on her
cheeks.

"Who doesn't love me! Not now, perhaps; but do you think I should not
teach him to love me, make him love me? Look at me, father!"

He looked at her reluctantly, in a kind of dazed admiration and
resentment.

"Do you think any man could resist me if I set my mind upon winning
him? No! Oh, it's not the language of hysterical vanity! I know my
power; every woman knows how far her power will go. Let me have him to
myself for one week, and--" She caught her breath. "Love! Yes, he shall
return mine tenfold! I will teach him!" She caught her breath again and
pressed her hands to her bosom. "Don't be afraid, father, I will take
care of the future. Help me in the present; help me as I have asked
you!"

"By God, you ask too much!" he said, sternly, fiercely.

She stood and looked at him. The colour slowly left her face until it
was white as death, the light faded from her eyes until they were dull
and lifeless, the red of her lips paled and the lips themselves relaxed
and drooped, and as he looked at her a ghastly fear smote his heart and
a question shot into and a question shot into his eyes. She inclined
her head as if he had put the question in words.

"Yes," she said. "I shall die. You remember my mother? I shall follow
her--"

He uttered a low, hoarse cry, and caught her hands and held them; then
he flung them from him, and standing with his back to her, said,
thickly, as if every word were forced from him:

"You shall have your way! You always have had, like your mother before
you--you always will. But mark my words: you'll live to curse the hour
you forced me to do this!"

She drew a long breath--it was almost a sigh--of relief, and she laid
her hands on his arms and kissed him on the forehead.

"I'll risk that," she said, with a tremulous laugh.

There was a silence for a moment, then she said, calmly:

"You will play your part carefully, father? You will let Sir Stephen
think that Stafford desires it: you will be careful?"

He turned upon her with an oath.

"You'd best leave it to me," he said, savagely. "I'll try and save you
from shame all I can. For God's sake go and leave me alone!"




CHAPTER XXI.

While Stafford was dressing for dinner that night, and wondering
whether even if he should get an opportunity of speaking to his father,
it would be wise to tell him of Ida, Howard knocked at the door.
Stafford told him to come in, and sent Measom away, and Howard, who was
already dressed, sank into an easy-chair and surveyed his friend with
bland approval.

"A white tie to-night, Staff? Anything on?"

"Yes; there is a dance," replied Stafford, rather absently. What would
his father say and do? Would he go over to Heron Hall the next morning?
Yes, that is what he would do!

"A dance? Is that all? From the undercurrent of suppressed excitement
animating most of the guests I should think it was something more
important. Have you noticed the air of suspense, of fluctuating hope
and doubt, triumph and despair which has characterized our noble band
of financiers during the last few days?"

Stafford shook his head.

"No; I haven't noticed 'em particularly. In fact, I scarcely see them,
or do more than exchange the usual greetings. They seem to me to move
and look and speak just about as usual." Howard smiled.

"To be young and happy and free from care is to be blind: puppies, for
instance, are blind!"

Stafford grinned.

"That's complimentary, anyhow. What do you think is up?"

"I think Sir Stephen is going to pull off his great event, to make his
grand _coup_," said Howard. "So you find a black-and-tan terrier
improves a dress-coat by lying on it?"

Tiny had coiled himself up on that garment, which Measom had laid ready
on the chair, and was lying apparently asleep, but with his large eyes
fixed on his beloved master.

"Oh, he's a peculiar little beast, and is always getting where he
shouldn't be. Hi! young man, get off my coat!"

He picked the terrier up and threw him softly on the bed, but Tiny got
down at once and curled himself up on the fur mat by Stafford's feet.

"Seems to be fond of you: strange dog!" said Howard. "Yes, I think Sir
Stephen's 'little scheme'--as if any scheme of his could be
'little'!--has worked out successfully, and I shouldn't be surprised if
the financiers had a meeting to-night and the floating of the company
was announced."

"Oh," said Stafford, as he got into his coat. "Yes, I daresay it's all
right. The governor seems always to pull it off."

Howard smiled.

"You talk as if an affair of thousands of thousands, perhaps millions,
were quite a bagatelle," he said. "My dear boy, don't you understand,
realise, the importance of this business? It's nothing less than a
railway from--"

Stafford nodded. "Oh, yes, you told me about it. It's a very big
thing, I daresay, but what puzzles me is why the governor should care
to worry about it. He has money enough--"

"No man has money enough," said Howard, solemnly. "But no matter. It is
a waste of time to discuss philosophy with a man who has no mind above
fox-hunting, fishing, pheasant-shooting, and dancing. By the way, how
many times do you intend to dance with the Grecian goddess?"

"Meaning--" said Stafford.

"Miss Falconer, of course. Grecian goddesses are not so common, my dear
Stafford, as to permit of more than one in a house-party."

"I'm sure I don't know," replied Stafford, eyeing him with faint
surprise. "What the devil made you ask me that?"

Howard eyed the handsome face with cynical amusement.

"Pardon, if I was impertinent; but I assure you the question is being
asked amongst themselves by all the women in the house--"

Stafford stared at him and began to frown with perplexity rather than
anger.

"My dear Stafford, I know that you are not possessed of a particularly
brilliant intellect, but you surely possess sufficient intelligence to
see that your attentions to Miss Falconer are somewhat obvious."

"What?" said Stafford. "My attentions to Miss Falconer--Are you
chaffing, Howard?"

"Not in the least: it's usually too great a waste of time with you, my
dear boy: you don't listen, and when you do, half the time you don't
understand. No, I'm quite serious; but perhaps I ought to have said her
attentions to you; it would have been more correct."

Stafford coloured.

"Look here, old man," he said. "If you think--Oh, dash it all, what
nonsense it is! Miss Falconer and I are very good friends; and of
course I like to talk to her--she's so sharp, almost as smart and
clever as you are, when she likes to take the trouble; and of course I
like to hear her sing--Why, my dear Howard, it's like listening to one
of the big operatic swells; but--but to suggest that there is
anything--that--there is any reason to warn me--Oh, dash it! come off
it, old man, you're chaffing?"

"Not in the least. But I didn't intend any warning: in fact, I am in
honour bound to refrain from anything of the kind--"

"In honour bound?" said Stafford.

Howard almost blushed.

"Oh, it's nothing; only a silly wager," he said. "I can't tell you, so
don't enquire. But all the same--well, there, I won't say more if you
are sure there is nothing between you."

"I have the best of reasons for saying so," said Stafford, carelessly,
and with a touch of colour in his face. "But it's all dashed nonsense!
The women always think there's something serious going on if you dance
twice with a girl, or sit and talk to her for half an hour."

"Right!" said Howard, rising. "There's the bell!"

As Howard had said, there was an air of suppressed excitement about the
people; and it was not confined to the financiers who clustered
together in the hall and discussed and talked in undertones, every now
and then glancing up the stairs down which Sir Stephen would presently
descend. Most of the other guests, though they had no direct and
personal interest in the great scheme, more or less had heard rumours
and come within reflective radius of the excitement; as for the rest,
who knew nothing or cared less for Sir Stephen's railway, they were in
a pleasant condition of excitement over the coming dance.

Stafford, as he stood in the hall talking about the night's programme
to Bertie--who had been elected, by common and tacit consent, master of
the ceremonies--saw Maude Falconer descending the stairs. She was even
more exquisitely dressed than usual; and Stafford heard some of the
women and men murmur admiringly and enviously as she swept across the
hall in her magnificent ball-dress; her diamonds, for which she was
famous, glittering in her hair, on her white throat, and on her slender
wrists. The dress was a mixture of grey and black, which would have
looked _bizarre_ on anyone else less beautiful; but its strange tints
harmonised with her superb and classic class of beauty, and she looked
like a vision of loveliness which might well dazzle the eyes of the
beholders.

She paused in her progress--it might almost be called a triumphant one,
for the other women's looks were eloquent of dismay--and looked at
Stafford with the slow, half-dreamy smile which had come into her face
of late when she spoke to him.

"Have you seen my father? Has he come down, Mr. Orme?" she asked.

"No," said Stafford. He looked at her, as a man does when he admires a
woman's dress, and forgetting Howard's words of warning, said: "What a
splendacious frock, Miss Falconer!"

"Do you like it? I am glad," she said. "I had my doubts, but now--"

Her eyes rested on his for a moment, then she passed on.

"I shouldn't like to have to pay Miss Falconer's dress bill," remarked
a young married woman, looking after her. "That 'frock' as you call it,
in your masculine ignorance, must have cost a small fortune."

Stafford laughed.

"We men always put our foot in it when we talk about a woman's dress,"
he said.

A moment after, the dinner was announced, and Sir Stephen, who had come
down at the last moment, as he went up to take in Lady Clansford,
nodded to Stafford, and smiled significantly. He was as carefully
dressed as usual, but on his face, and in his eyes particularly, was an
expression of satisfaction and anticipatory triumph which was too
obvious to escape the notice of but very few. He was not "loud" at
dinner, but talked even more fluently than usual, and once or twice his
fine eyes swept the long table with a victorious, masterful glance.

Directly the ladies had gone, the little knot of financiers drew up
nearer to their host, and Griffenberg raised his eyebrows
interrogatively.

Sir Stephen nodded.

"Yes," he said, in an undertone. "It's all right! I heard this morning.
My man will be down, with the final decision, by a special train which
ought to land him about midnight. We'll meet in the library, say at
half past twelve, and get the thing finished, eh, baron?"

Wirsch grunted approval.

"Vare goot, Sare Stephen; dee sooner a ting ees congluded, de bedder.
'Arf bast dwelve!"

There was but a short stay made in the drawing-room, and before ten
o'clock the guests streamed into the magnificent ball-room.

There were a number of the neighbouring gentry who were making their
acquaintance with the Villa for the first time, and they regarded the
splendour around them with an amazement which was not without reason;
for to-night the artistically designed and shaded electric lamps, the
beautiful rooms with their chaste yet effective decorations, on which
money had been lavished like water, were seen to their greatest
advantage; and the Vaynes, the Bannerdales, and the local gentry
generally exchanged glances and murmured exclamations of surprise and
admiration, and wondered whether there could be any end to the wealth
of a man who could raise such a palace in so short a time.

From the gallery of white-and-gold the famous band, every man of which
was a musician, presently began to send forth the sweet strains of a
Waldteufel waltz, and Stafford found Lady Clansford for the first
dance. Though he had paid little attention to Howard's remarks about
Maude Falconer, he remembered them, and he did not ask her for a dance
until the ball had been running about an hour; then he went up to where
she was standing talking to Lord Bunnerdale, her last partner. His
lordship and Stafford had already met, and Lord Bannerdale, who admired
and liked Stafford, nodded pleasantly.

"I was just saying to Miss Falconer that I wish Fate had made me a
great financier instead of a country squire, Orme! By Jove! this place
is a perfect--er--dream; and, when I think of my damp old house--"

"What frightful language!" said Stafford.

Lord Bannerdale laughed.

"If Miss Falconer had not been present, I might just as well have used
the other word. I say I can't help envying your father that magician's
wand with which he manages to raise such marvels. I'm going to find him
and tell him so!"

"A dance?" said Maude, as Stafford proffered his request. "Yes, I have
one, only one; it is this."

He put his arm round her, and as he did so her eyes half closed and her
lip quivered at his touch. Stafford waltzed well, and Maude was far and
away the best dancer in the room; they moved as one body in the slow
and graceful modern waltz, and Stafford, in the enjoyment of this
perfect poetry of motion, forgot everything, even his partner; but he
came back from his reverie as she suddenly paused.

"Are you tired?" he asked. "By George! how perfectly you waltz! I've
never enjoyed a dance more."

A faint colour rose to her face--it had been very pale a moment
before--and she looked at him with an earnestness which rather puzzled
him.

"They say that to agree in waltzing is an unfortunate thing for those
who wish to be friends."

"Do they?" he said, with a smile. "I wonder who it is says all those
silly things? Now, what nonsense this one is, for instance! To enjoy a
dance as I've just enjoyed this, puts a man in a good temper with
himself and his partner; and, of course, makes him feel more friendly.
I'm not a good logician, but that sounds all right, doesn't it?"

"Yes," she said in a low voice. "No, I won't dance any more. I--I am a
little tired to-night and disinclined for dancing."

"All right," he said. "I'm sorry--both that you won't dance and the
cause. You have been doing too much to-day--too long a ride, I expect.
These hills are rather trying to those who are not used to them. Shall
we go and sit in that recess? I'll bring you some wine--"

"No, thanks," she said, quickly; she could not bear him to leave her.

He led her to one of the recesses leading on to the fernery, and found
her a seat near a softly plashing fountain. The lights were shaded with
rose-coloured silk and threw a soft, warm glow upon her face and snowy
neck.

For the hundredth time, as he looked at her, he thought how beautiful
she was, and for the hundredth time compared her to Ida, of course to
his sweetheart's advantage. She leant back in the luxurious lounge with
her eyes bent on her jewelled fan, and seemed lost in thought. Then
suddenly she said:

"Do you know how long we have been here, Mr. Orme? It is a tremendous
time. I told my father to-night that we must take our departure."

"Oh, no!" he said. "Pray don't think of it--if you care to stay, if you
are happy. You would be a very serious loss to us."

"If I care--if I am happy!" She laughed a low, strange laugh and raised
her eyes to his for an instant. "Do you think I have not been happy?"

"Oh, I hope so," he said. "My father would be awfully cut up if he
thought you had not: if he thought there had been anything to prevent
your being happy he would remove it even if it--it were one of those
mountains outside," he added, with a laugh.

"You admire your father?" she said. "You--are fond of him?"

Stafford nodded. It seemed an unnecessary question.

"Rather!" he said. "There never was such a father as mine!"

"And Sir Stephen thinks there never was such a son as his," she said in
a low voice. "I suppose you are both quite willing to make sacrifices
for each other. Would you do--would you give up much for your father,
Mr. Orme?"

She raised her eyes again, and let them rest on his.

Stafford tried to smile, but his face grew grave.

"Just my life, if it were any use to him," he said.

Her lips moved.

"That is so little!" she said. "We can all die for those we love, but
few of us can live for them--go on living a life which has to be
moulded to a plan, bent on another's will--Could you do that?"

"Yes," he said, after a pause. "There is no sacrifice I would not make
for my father's sake; but"--he laughed and cleared the gravity from his
brow--"all the sacrifice seems to be on his side. He has worked for me
all his life, is working still, I'm afraid--Here is _your_ father, Miss
Falconer; and looking for you, I'm afraid."

Ralph Falconer stood in the doorway looking round, his heavy face
seeming heavier than usual, his thick lips drooping. As he saw the two
young people, his lips straightened and he went over to them slowly.

"I hope you are not going to take Miss Falconer away, sir?" said
Stafford.

Ralph Falconer shook his head, and, avoiding his daughter's eye, said:

"Sir Stephen wants to see you in the library, Mr. Orme, and wishes me
to accompany you."

"Certainly, if Miss Falconer will excuse me."

He rose, and he fancied her hand trembled slightly as it rested almost
as lightly as a feather on his arm.

"I'll take you to Lady Clansford--"

"There is no need: here is my next partner," she said, as the
"beautiful, bountiful Bertie" came up smiling and buoyant.

"Anything the matter, sir?" asked Stafford, as he and Falconer made
their way round the room through which was floating the last thing in
waltzes, a soft and sensuous melody which sang the soul to rest.

"I think not. A matter of business, I think," said Ralph Falconer. "His
secretary, Mr. Murray, has just come from London: it may be something
to do with the papers he had brought."

Stafford nodded, though the explanation seemed unsatisfactory: for what
concern had Stafford with the "papers"? As they went through the hall
they saw the financiers clustered together with an expectant air, as if
they were waiting for the result of the arrival of the man by the
special train; and they stared at Falconer and exchanged glances as he
and Stafford passed them and went to the library door.

Sir Stephen's voice came cheerily in response to Stafford's knock, and
Stafford entered; Falconer following him with bent head and the same
heavy look.

Sir Stephen was sitting at the table before a despatch box, and he held
out his hand and uttered a little cry of pleasure as he saw who it was.

"Stafford, my boy! You could not have come at a better moment--Don't
go, Falconer! I'd like you to hear me tell him the good news. I've got
it here!"

He patted the despatch case. "This is Pandora's box, Staff! With
something better than Hope at the bottom: Certainty!"

He laughed quietly, confidently, and his bright eyes flashed under
their dark brows from one to the other.

"Murray has just arrived, Falconer, with the good news!" he took out
the gold chain to which the key of the despatch box was fastened, and
inserted it in the lock. "The good news, Staff! I haven't bothered and
bored you with details; but you know, my dear boy, that I have had a
big scheme on hand for some time past--a very big scheme. It has been
rather a touch-and-go business, but I think I have managed to pull it
off--eh, Falconer? The last day or two has been one of suspense--great
suspense--but success has come. You don't care for money, Staff, I
know. Nor do I. Honestly, no! Not for the mere money, but for what it
can buy and bring. But even you will have some respect for a million
and a half, Staff."

He laughed.

"A large sum, and this means more than money. There ought to be
something in the way of an honour--"

Falconer nodded.

"_If_ the scheme is successful, your father will be a peer of the
realm, Mr. Stafford," he said drily, with an emphasis on the "if."

"_If!_" echoed Sir Stephen, laughing and nodding. Stafford could see by
the brilliance of his eyes, the flush on his face, that he was excited
and was struggling with excitement. "If!"

Falconer nodded at the despatch-case, and, with another bantering
laugh, Sir Stephen opened it and took out a large envelope. He held
this for a moment poised between finger and thumb, then he tore it open
and took out a sheet of paper, and turned his flashing eyes from the
two men to the document.

He rose for a moment with the smile still on his face; then they saw it
fade, saw the flush slowly disappear, and in its place a dull grey
steal over the face.

Stafford, startled, went round to him and laid a hand on his shoulder.

"What is the matter, sir?" he asked. "Bad news?"

Sir Stephen looked at him as if he did not see him, then turned his
eyes upon Falconer, who stood regarding him with a fixed, sardonic
gaze.

"Hast thou found me, oh, mine enemy?" came at last from Sir Stephen's
white lips.

Stafford looked from one to the other.

"What--what on earth is the matter? What do you mean?" he said.

Sir Stephen raised his hand and pointed to Ralph Falconer.

"This--this man!" he gasped; then he shook his head impatiently, as if
he were fighting against his weakness. "This man Falconer has betrayed
me!"

Stafford drew himself up, as he stood by his father's side, and eyed
Falconer sternly.

"Will you explain, Mr. Falconer?" he said.

"Certainly," said Falconer, with a grim calmness. "Your father uses
unwarrantably strong language, Mr. Orme, for an action of mine which is
quite a common one amongst business men."

"No!" gasped Sir Stephen, as he sank back into the chair. "Treachery is
not common--"

"Treachery is the wrong word," said Falconer, as coldly as before.
"Better let me explain to Mr. Stafford. I can do so in a few words, Mr.
Orme. The fact is, your father and I have been, quite unknown, to each
other, engaged in the same scheme. It is nothing more nor less than the
acquisition of certain land and rights which carry with them the
privilege of constructing a railway in the most promising part of South
Africa--"

Sir Stephen leant forward, his head on his hands, his eyes fixed on the
heavy, stolid face of the speaker, the face which the keen, hawk-like
eyes flashed under the lowered lids with a gleam of power and triumph.

--"Your father had reason to hope that he would acquire those lands and
rights; he did not know that I had been waiting for some years past to
obtain them. If knowledge is power and money, ignorance is impotence
and ruin. My knowledge against your father's ignorance has given me the
victory. Last night I gained my point: the news to that effect is no
doubt contained in that document. It was a question of price--it always
is. I knew your father's bid, and--I went a few thousands higher and
got the prize. That's the story in a nutshell. Of course there are a
number of complications and details, but I spare you them; in fact, I
don't suppose you understand them. It is a mere matter of business"

"No, of revenge!" said Sir Stephen's hollow voice. "Stafford, years ago
I did this man a wrong. I--I have repented; I would have made
atonement, reparation; but he put the offer aside. Here, in this house,
he professed to have forgiven and forgotten--professed friendship. It
was a piece of treachery and deceit; under that specious mask, behind
that screen, he has worked my ruin!"

"Ruin!" said Stafford, in a low voice. "Surely you exaggerate, father!
You mean that you will lose a lot of money--Oh, I can understand that,
of course. But not ruin!"

"Yes, _ruin!_" said Sir Stephen, hoarsely. "If you doubt it, look at
him!"

Falconer was standing with a sardonic smile in his eyes.

Stafford started.

"Is this true, Mr. Falconer?"

Falconer was silent for a moment, then he said, slowly, grimly:

"In a sense--yes. Your father's fate lies in my hands."

"In your hands!" echoed Stafford, with amazement.

Sir Stephen groaned and rose, supporting himself by the arm of the
chair.

"It is true, Stafford. He--he has planned it with the skill of a
general, a Napoleon! I see it all now, it is all plain to me. You held
my shares and securities, of course, Falconer?"

Falconer nodded.

"Of course!" he said, drily.

"And you have run them down to meet this scheme of yours."

"Yes, of course!" said Falconer, again. "My dear Steve--Sir
Stephen--pardon!--your fate, as I have said, is in my hands. It is
simply a matter of tit-for-tat. You had your turn some years ago out
there"--he waved his hand. "It is my turn now. You can't complain. Do
you admit the justice of the thing?"

Sir Stephen sank into a chair and covered his face with his hands for a
moment, then he looked up at Stafford.

"He's right. It was his turn. He has taken it--and with it every penny
I possess. It means ruin--complete ruin! Worse even than the loss of
every penny; for--for--I--God help me!--can't afford to go into court
and have the past raked up--And he knows it--he knows it, Stafford!"

The sight of the old man's anguish almost drove Stafford mad.

"Have you no mercy, sir?" he said to Falconer. "Grant that my father
had injured you--isn't this rather too awful a revenge to exact?
I--I--I--don't understand all that I have heard; but--but"--an oath
broke from his hot lips--"will nothing less than the ruin of my father
satisfy you?"

Falconer looked from one to the other and moistened his lips, while his
hands gripped each other behind his back.

"I think you have misunderstood me," he said, in a dry, harsh voice; "I
have no intention of ruining your father or of depriving him of his
good name. Mind! if I did I should only be taking my pound of flesh:
and I may tell you that before I entered this house this afternoon I
had resolved to have it. But I heard something that induced me to
change my mind."

Sir Stephen leant forward, his eyes fixed eagerly on the speaker, and
Stafford in his anxiety held his breath and pressed his father's
shoulder encouragingly.

"You heard something, sir?" Stafford asked, as calmly as he could.

Mr. Falconer was silent for a moment, then he said:

"Yes. I heard that you were desirous of marrying my daughter, Maude,
Mr. Orme; and I need not say that a man does not ruin his son-in-law!"

There was an intense silence. Stafford stood as if he were turned to
stone, as if he were trying to persuade himself that he had
misunderstood the meaning of Falconer's words. Marry Maude
Falconer--he! Was he dreaming, or was this man, who stood regarding him
with cold, glittering eyes, mad!




CHAPTER XXII.


We do not, nowadays, strike attitudes, or ejaculate and swear when we
are startled or shocked; Stafford stood perfectly still, still as a
piece of Stonehenge, and gazed with an expressionless countenance at
Mr. Falconer. That the man was indeed and in truth mad, occurred to him
for a moment; then he thought there must be some mistake, that Mr.
Falconer had made a blunder in the name, and that it was a case of
mistaking his man.

But as the moments fled, and the two elder men gazed at him, as if
expecting him to speak, he remembered Howard's warning. The colour
rushed to his face and his eyes dropped. Merciful Heaven! was the man
speaking the truth when he said that he, Stafford, was in love with
Maude Falconer? His face was hot and scarlet for a moment, then it grew
pale under the shame of the thought that he should have to correct the
impression; decline, so to speak, the implied honour.

Sir Stephen was the first to speak. He had sunk back in his chair, but
was now leaning forward again, his hands gripping the table.
"Stafford!" he said, still thickly, but with the beginning of a note of
relief in his voice. "I did not know this--you did not tell me!"

Stafford turned to him helplessly. What could he say--before Falconer,
the girl's father?

"You did not tell me. But I don't complain, my boy," said Sir Stephen."
You were right to choose your own time--young people like to keep their
secret to themselves as long as possible."

Falconer looked from one to the other with an impassive countenance.

"I feel that I am rather _de trop_," he said; "that I have spoken
rather prematurely; but my hand was forced, Orme. I wanted to set your
mind at rest, to show you that even if I hankered after revenge, it was
impossible under the circumstances." He glanced at Stafford. "It's not
the first time in history that the young people have played the part of
peace-makers. This is a kind of Romeo and Juliet business, isn't it?
I'll leave you and Mr. Stafford to talk it over!"

He moved to the door, but, with his hand upon it, paused and looked
round at them again.

"I ought to aid that, like most modern fathers, I am entirely in the
hands of my daughter. I can't go so far as to say, Orme, that if I had
been permitted to choose, I should have chosen a son of yours for my
son-in-law, but, you see, Maude doesn't give me the option. The young
people have taken the bit between their teeth and bolted, and it seems
to me that the only thing we have to do is to sit tight and look as
cheerful as possible. Oh, one word more," he added, in a business-like
tone. "Of course I make over this concession to you, Orme; just taking
the share I should have received if you had won the game and I had only
stood in as proposed. That is to say, you will be in exactly the same
position as if you had won all along the line--as you thought you had."
And with a nod, which included father and son, he went out.

Stafford unconsciously drew back a little, so that he was almost behind
Sir Stephen, who had covered his eyes with his hands and sat perfectly
motionless, like a half-stunned man looking back at some terrible
danger from which he had only escaped by the skin of his teeth. Then he
dropped his hands from his face and drew a long breath, the kind of
breath a man draws who has been battling with the waves and finds
himself on the shore, exhausted but still alive.

Stafford laid a hand on his shoulder, and Sir Stephen started and
looked up at him as if he had forgotten his presence. A flush, as if of
shame, came upon the great financier's face, and he frowned at the
papers lying before him, where they had dropped from his hand.

"What an escape, Stafford!" he said, his voice still rather thick and
with a tremour of excitement and even exhaustion in its usually clear
and steady tone. "I am ashamed, my boy, that you should have been a
witness to my defeat: it humiliates, mortifies me!"

"Don't let that worry you, father," said Stafford, scarcely knowing
what he said, for the tumult in his brain, the dread at his heart.

"It is not the first defeat I have suffered in my life; like other
successful men, I have known what it is to fall; and I have laughed and
got up and shaken the dust off myself, so to speak, and gone at the
fight again, all the harder and more determined because of the reverse.
But this--this would have crushed me utterly and forever."

"Do you mean that it would have ruined you completely, father?" said
Stafford.

"Completely!" replied Sir Stephen in a low voice, his head drooping. "I
had staked everything on this venture, had staked even more than I
possessed. I cannot explain all the details, the ramifications, of the
scheme which I have been working. You could not understand them if I
were to talk to you for a week. Suffice it, that if I had failed to get
this concession, I should have been an utterly ruined man, should have
had to go through the bankruptcy court, should have been left without a
penny. And not only that: I should have dragged a great many of the
men, of the friends who had trusted to my ability, who have believed in
me, into the same pit; not only such men as Griffenberg and Wirsch and
the Beltons, but the Plaistows, the Clansdales, and the Fitzharfords.
They would have suffered with me, would have, considered themselves
betrayed."

Stafford drew a long breath. There seemed to him still a chance of
saving himself, the girl he loved, above all--his honour.

"But even if it were so, father," he said; "other men have failed,
other men have been defeated, ruined, and left penniless, and yet have
risen and shaken the dust from them and fought their way again to the
heights. You're not an old man, you are strong and clever, and you are
not alone." he said, in a lower voice. "I'm not much use, I know. But
I'll try and help you all I can. I've often felt ashamed of myself for
living such an idle, useless life; often felt that I ought to do
something to justify my existence. There's a chance now; at any rate,
there's an occasion, a necessity for my waking up and stepping into the
ring to do a little fighting on my own account. We may be beaten by Mr.
Falconer; but don't say we're utterly crushed. That doesn't sound like
you, sir; and I don't understand why you should chuck up the sponge so
quickly."

Sir Stephen raised his head and looked at Stafford with a curious
expression of mingled surprise and apprehension.

"What is it you are saying, Stafford?" he asked. "What is it you mean?
I don't understand. We're not beaten; Ralph Falconer has offered to
make the concession over to me; and no one need know that I have
failed, that he had stolen the march on me. You heard what he said:
that you were in love with his daughter Maude, and that of course he
could not injure his future son-in-law. Stafford!" He sprang to his
feet and began to pace up and down the room. "I know that this has
touched your pride--I can give a pretty good guess as to how proud you
are--but, for God's sake! don't let your pride stand in the way of this
arrangement."

"But--" Stafford began; for he felt that he could not longer keep back
the truth, that his father must be told not only that there was nothing
between Maude and himself, but that he loved Ida Heron.

But before he could utter another word Sir Stephen stopped before him,
and with hands thrown out appealingly, and with a look of terror and
agony in his face, cried in broken accents:

"If you going to raise any obstacle, Stafford, prompted by your pride,
for God's sake, don't say the word! You don't know, you don't
understand! You speak of ruin as if it meant only the loss of money,
the loss of every penny." He laughed almost hysterically, and his lips
twitched. "Do you think I should care for that, except for your sake?
No, a thousand times, no! I'm young still, I could begin the world
again! Yes, and conquer it as I have done before; but"--his voice sank,
and he look round the room with a stealthy glance which shocked and
startled Stafford--"the ruin Ralph Falconer threatens me with means
more than the loss of money. It means the loss of everything! Of
friends, of good name--of hope!"

Stafford started, and his face grew a trifle hard; and Sir Stephen saw
it and made a despairing, appealing gesture with his hand.

"For God's sake don't turn away from me, my boy; don't judge me
harshly. You can't judge me fairly from your standpoint; your life has
been a totally different one from mine, has been lived under different
circumstances. You have never known the temptations to which I have
been subjected. Your life has been an easy one surrounded by honour,
while mine has been spent half the time grubbing in the dust and the
mire for gold, and the rest fighting--sometimes with one hand tied
behind me!--against the men who would have robbed me of it. I have had
to fight them with their own weapons--sometimes they haven't been
clean--sometimes it has been necessary to do--to do things!--God!
Stafford, don't turn away from me! I would have kept this from you if I
could, but I am obliged to tell you now. Ralph Falconer knows all the
details of my past, he knows of things which--which, if they were known
to the world, would stain the name I have raised to honour, would make
it necessary for me to hide my head in a suicide's grave."

A low cry burst from Stafford's lips, and he sank into a chair, and
bowed his head upon his hands.

Sir Stephen stood a little way off and looked at him for a minute, then
he advanced slowly, half timidly and ashamedly, and laid a trembling
hand on Stafford's shoulder.

"Forgive me, Stafford!" he said, in a low, broken voice. "I was obliged
to tell you. I'd have kept it from you--you would never have known--but
Falconer has forced my hand; I was bound to show you how necessary it
was that we should have him as friend instead of foe. You are
not--ashamed of me, my boy; you won't go back on me?"

In the stress and strain of his emotion the old digger's slang came
readily to his lips.

Stafford took one hand from his face and held it out, and his father
grasped it, clinging to it as a drowning man clings to a rock.

"God bless you, my boy!" he said. "I might have known you wouldn't turn
your back upon me; I might have known that you'd remember that I wasn't
fighting for myself only, but for the son I'm so proud of."

"I know, I know, sir," said Stafford, almost inaudibly.

Sir Stephen hung his hand, released it, and paced up and down the room
again, fighting for composure, and facing the situation after the
manner of his kind. Like all successful adventurers, he was always
ready to look on the bright side. He came back to Stafford and patted
him gently on the shoulder.

"Try and forget what I said, about--about the past, Stafford," he said.
"Let us look at the future--your future. After all, we're not beaten!
It's a compromise, it's an alliance!" His voice grew more cheerful, his
eyes began to brighten with something of their wonted fire. "And it's a
bright future, Staff! You've chosen a beautiful girl, a singularly
beautiful and distinguished-looking girl--it's true she's only Ralph
Falconer's daughter, and that I'd loftier ideas for you, but let that
pass! Maude is a young lady who can hold her own against the best and
the highest. Falconer must be rich, or he would not have been able to
have managed this thing, would not have been able to beat me. With your
money and hers, you can go as far as you please!"

He took a turn up and down the room again, a flush on the face that had
been pallid only a minute or two ago, his finely shaped head thrown
back.

"Yes, Stafford, I should like you to have married into the nobility. In
my eyes, there is no one too high in rank for you. But no matter! The
title will come. They cannot do less than offer me a peerage. This
railway will be of too much service to the government for them to pass
me over. The peerage must come; there is no chance of my losing it.
Why, yes! The future is as bright as the sunlight on a June morning!
You will have the girl you love, I shall have the peerage to leave to
you. I shall have not lived and struggled and fought in vain. I shall
have left a name unstained, unsullied, to the son I love!"

There was a catch in his voice, and it broke as he turned suddenly with
outstretched hand.

"Why, God forgive me, Stafford, my boy! I'm talking of what I've done
for you and what I'm meaning to do as if I were forgetting what you are
doing for me! Stafford, a father often finds that he has worked for his
children only to meet with ingratitude and to be repaid by
indifference; but you have returned my affection--Oh, I've seen it,
felt it, my boy! And now, as fate would have it, you are actually
saving my honour, shielding my good name, coming between me and utter
ruin! God bless you, Stafford! God bless you and send you all the
happiness you deserve and I wish you!"

A silence fell. Into the room there floated the soft, languorous
strains of a waltz, the murmur of voices, the laughter of some of the
people in the conservatory. Stafford sat, his head still upon his
hands, as if her were half stupefied. And indeed he was. He felt like a
man who has been seized by the tentacles of an octopus, unable to
struggle, unable to move, dumb-stricken, and incapable even of protest.
Sir Stephen had spoken of fate: Fate held Stafford under its iron heel,
and the mockery of Fate's laughter mingled with the strains of the
waltz, the murmur of voices. Unconsciously he rose and looked round as
if half dazed, and Sir Stephen came to him and laid both hands on his
shoulders.

"I must not keep you any longer, my dear boy!" he said, with a fond,
proud look. "I must not forget I am keeping you from--her! She will be
missing you--wanting you. You have kept your secret well,
Stafford--though once or twice I have fancied, when I have seen you
together--but it was only a fancy!--Are you going to announce the
engagement tonight? It is rather a good opportunity, isn't it? It will
make the night memorable."

The music danced madly through Stafford's brain as his father waited,
looking at him smilingly. What should he say?

"Not to-night, sir!" he answered. "I should like to speak to Miss
Falconer first."

Sir Stephen nodded and smiled.

"I understand, my boy," he said. "This kind of thing is not done now as
it was in my time. We used to take the girl of our choice by the hand
and throw back our heads, and announce the fact that we have secured
the prize, with all the pride imaginable. But that's all altered now. I
suppose the new way is more delicate--more refined. At any rate, you
belong to the new age and have a right to follow its manners and
customs; so you shall say nothing to-night, unless you like. And, if I
am asked why I look so happy, so free from care, I must say that it is
because the great Railway Scheme is settled and that I have won all
along the line."

As he said the last words there came a knock at the door, and Murray
entered with an injured look.

"Mr. Griffenberg and Baron Wirsch, would like to see you, Sir Stephen,"
he said, significantly.

Sir Stephen sprang to the table almost with the alertness of a boy, and
caught up the papers lying on his desk.

"All right, Murray!" he cried. "Sorry I'm late! Been having a talk with
Mr. Stafford. Come on!"

With a nod, a smile, a tender look of love and gratitude to Stafford,
the brilliant adventurer, once more thrown by the buoyant wave upon the
shore of safety and success, went out to communicate that success to
his coadjutors.

Stafford sank into his father's chair, and with his hands thrust deep
in his pockets, and his chin upon his chest, tried to clear his brain,
to free his mind from all side issues, and to face the fact that he had
tacitly agreed, that by his silence he had consented to marry Maude
Falconer.

But, oh, how hard it was to think clearly, with the vision of that
girlish face floating before him! the exquisitely beautiful face with
its violet eyes now arched and merry, now soft and pleading, now tender
with the tenderness of a girl's first, true, divinely trusting love. He
was looking at the book-case before him, but a mist rose between it and
his eyes, and he saw the mountain-side and the darling of his heart
riding down it, the sunlight on her face, the soft tendrils of hair
blown rough by the wind, the red lips apart with a smile--the little
grave smile which he had kissed away into deeper, still sweeter
seriousness.

And he had lost her! Oh, God, how he loved her! And he had lost her
forever! There was no hope for him. He must save his father--not his
father's money. That counted for nothing--but his father's honour--his
father's good name.

And even if he were not bound to make this sacrifice, to marry Maude
Falconer, how could he go to Heron Hall and ask Godfrey Heron, the man
of ancient lineage, of unsullied name, to give his daughter to the son
of a man whose past was so black that his character was at the mercy of
Ralph Falconer? Stafford rose and stretched out his arms as if to
thrust from him a weight too grievous to be borne, a cup too bitten to
be drained; then his arms fell to his sides and, with a hardening of
the face, a tightening of the lips which made him look strangely like
his father, he left the library, and crossing the hall, made his way to
the ball-room.




CHAPTER XXIII.


The ball was at its height. Even the coldest and most _blasé_ of the
guests had warmed up and caught fire at the blaze of excitement and
enjoyment. The ball-room was dazzling in the beauty of its decorations
and the soft effulgence of the shaded electric light, in which the
magnificent jewels of the titled and wealthy women seemed to glow with
a subdued and chastened fire. A dance was in progress, and Stafford, as
he stood by the doorway and looked mechanically and dully at the
whirling crowd, the kaleidoscope of colour formed by the rich dresses,
the fluttering fans, and the dashes of black represented by the men's
clothes, thought vaguely that he had never seen anything more
magnificent, more elegant of wealth and success. But through it all,
weird and ghost-like shone Ida's girlish face, with its love-lit eyes
and sweetly curving lips.

He looked round, and presently he saw Maude Falconer in her strange and
striking dress. She was dancing with Lord Fitzharford. There was not a
touch of colour in her face, her lips were pensive, her lids lowered;
she looked like an exquisite statue, exquisitely clothed, moving with
the exquisite poetry of motion, but quite devoid of feeling. Suddenly,
as if she felt his presence, she raised her eyes and looked at him. A
light shot into them, glowed for a moment, her lips curved with the
faintest of smiles, and a warm tint stole to her face.

It was an eloquent look, one that could not be mistaken by the least
vain of men, and it went straight through Stafford's heart; for it
forced him to realise that which he had not even yet quite
realised--that he had tacitly pledged himself to her. Under other
circumstances, the thought might have set his heart beating and sent
the blood coursing hotly through his veins; but with his heart aching
with love for Ida, and despair at the loss of her, Maude Falconer's
love-glance only chilled him and made him shudder with apprehension of
the future, with the thought of the cost of the sacrifice which he had
taken upon himself. The music sounded like a funeral march in his ears,
the glitter, the heat, the movement, seemed unendurable; and he
threaded his way round the room to an ante-room which had been fitted
up as a buffet.

"Give me some wine, please," he said to the butler, trying to speak in
his ordinary tone; but he knew that his voice was harsh and strained,
knew that the butler noticed it, though the well-trained servant did
not move an eyelid, but opened a bottle of champagne with solemn
alacrity and poured out a glass. Stafford signed to him to place the
bottle near and drank a couple of glasses.

It pulled him together a bit, and he was going back to the ball-room
when several men entered. They were Griffenberg, Baron Wirsch, the
Beltons and the other financiers; they were all talking together and
laughing, and their faces were flushed with triumph. Close behind them,
but grave and taciturn as usual, came Mr. Falconer.

At sight of Stafford, Mr. Griffenberg turned from the man to whom he
was talking and exclaimed, gleefully:

"Here is Mr. Orme! You have herd the good news, I suppose, Mr. Orme?
Splendid isn't it? Wonderful man, you father, truly wonderful! He can
give us all points, can't he, baron?" The baron nodded and smiled.

"Shir Stephen ish a goot man of pishness. You have a very glever fader,
Mr. Orme!" he said, emphatically.

Efford caught Stafford's arm as he was passing on with a mechanical
smile and an inclination of the head.

"We've come in for a drink, Orme," he said. "We're going to drink luck
to the biggest thing Sir Stephen has ever done; you'll join us? Oh,
come, we can't take a refusal! Dash it all! You're in the swim, Orme,
if you haven't taken any active part in it."

Stafford glanced at Mr. Falconer, and noticed a grim smile pass over
his face. If these exultant and flushed money-spinners only guessed how
active a part he had taken, how amazed they would be! A wave of
bitterness swept over him. At such a moment men, especially young men,
become reckless; the strain is too great, and they fly to the nearest
thing for relief.

He turned back to the buffet, and the butler and the couple of footmen
opened several bottles of champagne--none of the men knew or cared how
many; several others of the financial group joined the party; the wine
went round rapidly; they were all talking and laughing except Stafford,
who remained silent and grave and moody for some little time; then he
too began to talk and laugh with the others, and his face grew flushed
and his manner excited.

Falconer, who stood a little apart, apparently drinking with the
others, but really with care and moderation, watched him under
half-lowered lids; and presently he moved round to where Stafford leant
against the table with his champagne-glass in his hand, and touching
him on the arm, said:

"I hear them enquiring for you in the ball-room, Stafford."

It was the first time he had called Stafford by his Christian name, and
it struck home, as Falconer had intended it should. Stafford set his
glass down and looked round as a man does when the wine is creeping up
to his head, and he is startled by an unexpected voice.

"All right--thanks!" he said.

He made his way through the group, who were too engrossed and excited
to notice his desertion and went into the ball-room. As he did so, his
father entered by an opposite door, and seeing him, came round to him,
and taking Stafford's hand that hung at his side, pressed it
significantly.

"I have told them!" he said. "They are almost off their heads with
delight--you see, it's such a big thing, even for them, Staff! You have
saved us all, my boy; but it is only I and Falconer who know it, only I
who can show my gratitude!"

His voice was low and tremulous, his face flushed, like those of the
men whom Stafford had just left, and his dark eyes flashing and
restless.

"Where are they all?" he asked; and Stafford nodded over his shoulder
towards the buffet.

Sir Stephen looked round the room with a smile of triumph, and his
glance rested on Maude Falconer, standing by a marble column, her eyes
downcast, her fan moving to and fro in front of her white bosom.

"She is beautiful, Staff!" he whispered. "The loveliest woman in the
room! I am not surprised that you should have fallen in love with her."

Stafford laughed under his breath, a strangely wild and bitter laugh,
which Sir Stephen could not have failed to notice if the music had not
commenced a new waltz at that moment.

Stafford went straight across the room to Maude Falconer. She did not
raise her eyes at his approach, but the colour flickered in her cheeks.

"This is our dance, I think," he said.

She looked up with a little air of surprise, and consulted her
programme.

"No; I think this is mine, Miss Falconer," said the man at her side.

"No," she said, calmly; "the next is yours, Lord Bannerdale; this is
Mr. Orme's."

Though he knew she was wrong, of course Lord Bannerdale acquiesced with
a bow and a smile, and Stafford led Maude away.

Wine has a trick of getting into some men's feet and promptly giving
them away; but Stafford, though he was usually one of the most moderate
of men, could drink a fairly large quantity and remain as steady as a
rock. No one, watching him dance, would have known that he had drunk
far too many glasses of champagne and that his head was burning, his
heart thumping furiously; but though his step was as faultless as usual
and he steered her dexterously through this crowd. Maude knew by his
silence, by his flushed face and restless eyes, that something had
happened, and that he was under the influence of some deep emotion. He
was dancing quite perfectly, but mechanically, like a man in a dream,
and though he must have heard the music, he did not hear her when she
spoke to him, but looked straight before him as if he were entirely
absorbed in some thought.

When they came, in the course of the dance, to one of the doors, she
stopped suddenly.

"Do you mind? It is so hot," she murmured.

"N--o," he said, as if awaking suddenly. "Let us go outside."

He caught up a fur cloak that was lying on a bench, and disregarding
her laughing remonstrance that the thing did not belong to her, he put
it round her and led her on to the terrace. She looked up at him just
as they were passing out of the stream of light, saw how set and hard
his face was, how straight the lips and sombre the eyes, and her hand,
as it rested lightly on his arm, quivered like a leaf in autumn. When
they had got into the open air, he threw back his head and drew a long
breath.

"Yes; it was hot in there," he said.

They walked slowly up and down for a minute, passing and repassing
similar couples; then suddenly, as if the presence of others, the sound
of their voices and laughter, jarred upon him, Stafford said:

"Shall we go into the garden? It is quiet there--and I want to speak to
you."

"If you like," she said, in a low voice, which she tried to make as
languid as usual; but her heart began to beat fiercely and her lips
trembled, and he might have heard her breath coming quickly had he not
been absorbed in his own reflections.

They went down the steps and into the semi-darkness of the beautiful
garden. The silence was broken by the hum of the distant voices and the
splashing of a fountain which reflected the electric light as the spray
rose and fell with rhythmic regularity. Stafford stopped at this and
looked at the reflection of the stars in the shallow water. Something
in its simplicitude and the quiet, coming after the glitter and the
noise of the ball-room, called up the remembrance of Herondale, and the
quiet, love-laden hours he had spent there with Ida. The thought went
through him with a sharp pain, and he thrust it away from him as one
thrusts away a threatening weakness.

"What is it you wanted to say to me?" asked Maude, not coldly or
indifferently as she would have asked the question of another man, but
softly, dreamily.

He walked on with her a few paces, looking straight before him as if he
were trying to find words suitable for the answer; then he turned his
face to her and looked at her steadily, though his head was burning and
the plash of the fountain sounded like the roar of the sea in his ears.

"I wonder whether you could guess?" he said, as he thought of her
father's words, his assertion that Stafford was to be his son-in-law.
"I suppose you must."

Her gaze was as steady as his, but her lips quivered slightly.

"I would rather you should tell me than that I should I guess," she
said in a low voice. "I might be wrong."

He was not in a condition to notice the significance of her last words,
and he went on with a kind of desperation.

"I brought you here into the garden, Miss Falconer, to ask you if you'd
be my wife."

They had stopped just within the radius of an electric light, held
aloft by a grinning satyr, and Stafford saw her face grow paler and
paler in the seconds that followed the momentous question. He could see
her bosom heaving under the half-open fur cloak, felt her hand close
for an instant on his arm.

"Do you wish me to say 'Yes'?" she asked in a low voice.

The red flooded Stafford's face for a moment, and his eyes fell under
her fixed regard.

"What answer does one generally hope for when one puts such a
question?" he said, trying to smile. "I want you to be my wife, and I
hope, with all my heart, that you will say 'Yes.'"

"'With all your heart,'" she echoed, slowly, almost inaudibly. "'With
all your heart.' With all mine, I answer 'Yes.'"

As she murmured the words--and, like that of most cold women when they
are intensely moved, her voice could be exquisitely sweet with its
thrill of passion, all the sweeter for its rarity--she insensibly drew
nearer to him and her hand stole to his shoulder. Her eyes were lifted
to his, and they shone with the love that was coursing through her
veins, almost stopping the beating of her heart. Love radiated from her
as the light radiated from the lamp the mocking satyr held above them.
Stafford was at his best and worst, a man and not a block of stone and
wood, and touched, almost fired, by the passion so close to him, he put
his arm round her waist and bent his head until his lips nearly touched
hers.

Her eyes closed and she was surrendering herself to the kiss, when
suddenly she drew her head back, and, keeping him from her, looked up
at him. "Is it with all your heart?" she whispered. "You have never
spoken to me of--love before. Is it with all your heart?"

His brow contracted in a frown, he set his teeth hard. If he were to
lie, 'twere better that he lied thoroughly and well; better that his
sacrifice should be complete and effectual. Scarcely knowing what he
said, what he did, with the fumes of the champagne confusing his brain,
the misery of his lost love racking his heart, he said, hoarsely:

"I did not know--till to-night. You can trust me. I ask you to be my
wife--I will be true to you--it is with all my heart!"

If Jove laughs at lovers' perjuries, the angels must weep at such false
oaths as this. Even as he spoke the words, Stafford remembered the "I
love you?" he had cried to Ida as he knelt at her feet, and he
shuddered as Maude drew his head down and his lips met hers.

      *       *       *       *       *

Half an hour later they went slowly up the steps again. Stafford's head
was still burning, he still felt confused, like a man moving in a
dream. Since he had kissed her he had said very little; and the
silences had been broken more often by Maude than by him. She had told
him in a low voice, tremulous with love, and hesitating now and again,
how she had fallen in love with him the day he had rowed her on the
lake; how she had struggled and striven against the feeling, and how it
had conquered her. How miserable she had been, though she had tried to
hide her misery, lest he should never come to care for her, and she
should have to suffer that most merciless of all miseries--unrequited
love. She seemed as if she scarcely wanted him to speak, as if she took
it for granted that he had spoken the truth, and that he loved her; and
as if it were a joy to her to bare her heart, that he might see how
devotedly it throbbed for him and for him alone. Every now and then
Stafford spoke a few words in response. He scarcely knew what he said,
he could not have told what they were ten minutes after they were said;
he sat with his arm round her like a man playing a part mechanically.

In the same condition he moved beside her now as arm and arm they
entered the house, he looking straight before him with a set face, a
forced smile, she with now raised, now drooping eyes glowing with
triumph, a flush on her usually pale face, her lips apart and
tremulous. The ball was breaking up, some of the women had already gone
to the drawing-room or their own apartments; a stream of men were
making their way to the billiard-room from which came the popping of
champagne-corks and the hissing of syphons.

As they entered the hall, Howard came lounging out, in his leisurely
way, from the drawing-room, and at sight of him Stafford seemed to
awake, to realise what he had done and how he stood. He looked from
Howard to Maude, then, he said:

"Howard, I want you to congratulate me. Miss Falconer--Maude--has
promised to be my wife."

Howard did not start, but he stared in silence for an instant, then his
eyelids flickered, and forcing the astonishment from his face, he took
Stafford's left hand and shook it, and bowed to Maude.

"I do congratulate you with all my heart, my dear Stafford, and I hope
you'll both be as happy as the happiest pair in a fairy story."

She drew her arm from Stafford's.

"I will go up now," she said. "Good-night!"

Stafford stood until she had got as far as the bend of the stairs; then
Howard, who had discreetly gone on, turned to go back to him. But as he
came up with a word of wonder and repeated congratulations, he saw
Stafford put his hand to his forehead, and, as it seemed to Howard,
almost stagger.

There are moments when the part of even one's best friend is silence,
blindness. Howard turned aside, and Stafford went on slowly, with a
kind of enforced steadiness, to the billiard-room. While Howard, with
dismay and apprehension, was looking after him, he heard "Mr. Howard!"
called softly, mockingly, from the stairs, and looking up, saw Maude
Falconer leaning over, with her arm extended, her hand open.

He understood in a moment, and, removing his ring as he ran up the
stairs, put it in the soft, pink palm. She gave a little triumphant,
mocking laugh, her hand closed over the ring, and then she glided away
from him.

The smoking-room was crowded as Stafford made his way in. Through the
clouds of smoke he saw his father standing at one end, surrounded by
the money-spinning crew, Falconer seated in a chair near him with a
black cigar between his lips. The group were laughing and talking
loudly, and all had glasses in their hands. Some of the younger men,
who had just come from the hall-room, were adding their laughter and
chatter to the noise. Dazed and confused, half mad with rage and
despair, with a sense that Fate was joining her mocking laughter with
that of the men round him. Stafford took a glass of wine from the
butler who advanced with it, and drinking it off, held it out to be
refilled. The man refilled it twice, and Stafford, his eyes aflame,
almost pushed his way through the various groups to where his father
stood.

"I have come for your congratulation, sir," he said, in a voice which,
though not loud, was so clear as to break through the row. "Miss
Falconer has promised to be my wife!"

A silence, so sudden as to be startling, fell upon the hot and crowded
room; then, as Sir Stephen grasped his son's hand, a din of voices
arose, an excited buzz of congratulations and good wishes. Stafford
faced them all, his face pale and set, his lips curved with a forced
smile, his eyes flashing, but lit with a sombre fire. There was a smile
on his lips, a false amiability in his eyes, but there was so much of
madness in his heart that he was afraid lest at any moment he should
dash the glass to the ground and break out into cursing.

An hour later he found himself in his room, and waving Measom away from
him, he went to the window and flung it wide open, and stood there with
his hands against his throbbing brow; and though no word came from his
parched lips, his heart cried:

"Ida! Ida!" with all the agony of despair.




CHAPTER XXIV.

The hours dragged along as Stafford faced the tragedy of his life. As
he paced the room or flung himself into a chair, with his head bowed in
his hands, the effects of the wine he had taken, the suppressed
excitement under which he had laboured, passed away, and in the
reaction his brain cleared and he began to realise the terrible import
of the step he had taken, the extent of the sacrifice he had made. His
own life was wrecked and ruined irreparably; not only his own, but that
of the girl he loved.

The step he had taken was not only irreparable but irrevocable; he
could not go back. He had asked Maude Falconer to be his wife, he had
spoken words which must have sounded to her as words of love, he had
kissed her lips. In a word, he was pledged to her, and the pledge could
not be broken.

And Ida! What should he do in regard to her? He had promised that if
his feelings underwent any change towards her he would not go and tell
her. And at that moment, he felt that the promise had not been a vain
one; for he knew that he could not go to her, that at sight of her his
resolution would melt like snow in the sun, that his love for her would
sweep him away on a torrent of passion, and that he would be as false
to Maude Falconer as he had been to Ida.

And yet he could not leave her, desert her--yes, that was the
word!--without making some sign, without speaking one word, not of
excuse, but of farewell. What could he say to her? He could not tell
her the truth; for his father's sake that must never be divulged; he
could give her no explanation, must permit her to think him base and
faithless and dishonorable. There was only one thing he could do, and
that was to write to her. But what could he say?

He went to his writing-table and took up a pen. His hand was cold as
ice and shaking, and he held it before him until it grew steadier. At
the best of times, Stafford was not much of a letter-writer; one does
not learn the epistolatory art either at public schools or the
'varsities, and hitherto Stafford's letter-writing had been confined to
the sending or accepting of invitations, a short note about some meet,
or horse dealing. How was he to address her? She was his dearest still,
the only woman in the world he had loved or ever would love, but he
dared not call her so, dared not tell her so. He wrote her name, but
the sweet word seemed to look up at him reproachfully, accusingly; and
though he had written only that name, he tore up several sheets of
paper, and at last, in desperation, scarcely knowing what he was
writing, he wrote, quickly, hurriedly and without pausing, the
following lines:

"I am writing this because you made me promise that if anything
happened, let it be what it might, to separate us, I would not come and
tell you. Something has happened. I have discovered that I am not only
unworthy of calling you mine as any man in the world, even the best,
would be, but that I am unworthy in the sense that would justify you in
the eyes of your father, of everybody belonging to you, in sending me
adrift. If I could tell you what it is you would understand and see how
great a gulf yawns between us. You would not marry me, I can never be
anything to you but a painful memory. Though you know how much I loved
you, you will never guess what it costs me to relinquish all claim to
you, to tear myself away from you. But I must do so--and forever. There
is no hope, none whatever, for me. I do not ask you to forgive me--if I
had known what I know now I would rather have died than have told you
that I loved you, but I do ask you to forget me; or, if you remember
me, to think of me as the most wretched and ill-fated of men; as one
who is bound hand and foot, and compelled, driven, along a path against
his will. I dare not say any more, dare not tell you what this
sacrifice costs me. Whether you forget or remember me, I shall never
forget you for a single instant, shall never cease to look back upon my
lost happiness, as a man looks back upon a lost heaven.

"STAFFORD."

He read it over a dozen--twenty times, and every time it seemed weaker,
meaner, less inexplicable; but he knew that if he destroyed it he could
write nothing better, nothing that could satisfy him, though it seemed
to him that his heart would have expressed itself more fully it he had
written only, "Good-bye! Forget me!"

At last, and reluctantly he put it in an envelope and addressed it, and
turned it face downwards on his table, so that he might not see the
name which had such power to torture his heart.

By the time he had succeeded in writing the letter the dawn was
creeping over the hills and casting a pearly light upon the lake; he
drew the curtains, and in the weird light caught sight of his face in
the mirror: a white and haggard face, which might well have belonged to
a man ten years his senior; such a face as would not fail to attract
attention and provoke comment by its appearance at the breakfast-table.
He flung himself on the bed, not to sleep, for he knew that that would
be impossible, but to get some rest; but rest was as impossible as
sleep. When he closed his eyes Ida's face was near him, her voice was
in his ears, inextricably mixed with the slow and languorous tones of
Maude Falconer. He undressed and got into his flannels before Measom
came, and went down to the lake for a bath.

He was, as a rule, so moderate in drinking that the wine he had taken,
supplemented by his misery, made him feel physically ill. He shuddered
with cold as he dived into the water, and as he swam out he felt, for
the first time in his life, a slight twinge of cramp. At another time
he would have been somewhat alarmed, for the strongest swimmer is
absolutely helpless under an attack of cramp, but this morning he was
indifferent, and the thought struck him that it would be well for him
if he flung up his arms and went down to the bottom of the lake on the
shores of which he had experienced such exquisite joy, such unutterable
misery. He met no one on his way back to the house, and went straight
to his room. The swim had removed some of the traces of last night's
work, but he still looked haggard and worn, and there was that
expression in his eyes which a man's wear when he has been battling
with a great grief or struggling against an overwhelming fate.

As Measom was dressing him he asked himself how he should get the
letter to Ida--the only letter he had ever written her, the only letter
he would probably ever write to her. He decided that he would send it
over by Pottinger, whom he knew he could trust not only to deliver the
letter, but to refrain from telling anyone that he had been sent with
it. He put it in the pocket of his shooting-coat and went downstairs,
intending to go straight to the stables to find Pottinger; but as he
went through the hall, Murray, the secretary, came out of the library,
and Sir Stephen caught sight of Stafford through the open door, and
called to him. Stafford went in, and his father rose from the table on
which was already piled a heap of letters and papers, and taking
Stafford's hand, laid a hand on his shoulder.

"You are early, my boy," he said. "I did not expect to see you for
hours yet; couldn't you sleep? You look rather tired, Stafford; you
were late last night, and--ah, well! there was some excuse for a little
excitement and exaltation."

He smiled whimsically, as a father does at a son who has for once gone
beyond the strict bounds of moderation and looked upon the wine cup too
often.

"Yes, I've rather a head on this morning, sir," said Stafford, quietly,
accepting the suggestion as an excuse for his ill-looks. "I drank and
smoked, last night, more than I usually do. You look as fresh as usual,
sir," he added, with unconscious irony.

Sir Stephen threw up his head with a short laugh.

"Oh, my work wasn't finished last night, my dear boy!" he said. "And
Murray and I have been at it since seven o'clock. I want to put some of
these papers straight before Griffenberg and the rest leave to-day."

"They are going to-day?" said Stafford.

"Oh, yes; there will be a general exodus. A great many of the people
were only staying on until we could be sure we had pulled this railway
scheme through. Falconer and his daughter--I beg your pardon, my dear
Stafford, I mean Maude!--talk of going to-day. But I persuaded them to
stay until to-morrow. I thought you would like to go to London with
them."

He smiled as a father smiles when he is planning a pleasure for his
son.

"Yes, I should like it," said Stafford, quietly. "But could I leave you
here?"

"Oh, yes," said Sir Stephen. "They'll entertain themselves. Besides, it
was an understood thing you should be free to go and come as you
pleased. Of course, you would like to go with Maude."

"Of course," echoed Stafford, his eyes on the ground. As he was leaving
the room his father took a letter from the table, held it up and
dropped it.

"You'll be wanting to buy a little present for your lady-love,
Stafford," he said. "I am placing a thousand pounds to your credit at
your bank, I don't know whether you'll think that is enough--"

"Quite enough," said Stafford, in a low voice. "Thank you! You are very
generous--"

Sir Stephen winced and held up his hand.

"What is mine is yours from this moment, my dear Stafford," he said.

Stafford went out by the door at the other end of the hall, and made
his way to the stables. Just as he was crossing the lawn the temptation
to ride over to Heron Hall and leave the note himself assailed him
strongly. He took the letter from his pocket and looked at it
wistfully. But he knew that he dared not ran the risk of meeting Ida,
and with a sigh he went on towards the stables, carrying the note in
his hand. And as he turned away Maude Falconer let fall the curtain
which she had raised at her window so that she might watch him.

She stood for a moment with her costly dressing-gown held together with
one white hand, her lids half closed.

"He has written to her," she said to herself. "Has he broken with her
for good, or will he try and keep her? I would give something to see
that letter, to know exactly how he stands. And how I stand! I wonder
how he will send it? He is taking it to the stables." She thought a
moment, then she smiled. "Pottinger!" she murmured.

Stafford found Pottinger giving the last loving touches with a silk
handkerchief to Adonis. His coat and waistcoat were off, his shirt open
at the neck and his sleeves turned up. He touched his forehead with a
respectful and welcoming greeting, and without any surprise; for
Stafford very often paid an early visit to the stable, and had more
than once lent a hand in grooming a favourite horse.

"Looks well, sir, don't he?" said Pottinger, passing a hand over the
glossy black and finishing up with a loving smack. "I'm rather late
this morning, sir." He smiled and looked a little sheepish. "We had a
little bit of jollification in the servants' hall, on our own account,
sir, and were enjoying ourselves like our betters."

"That's right," said Stafford. Something in his voice caused Pottinger
to glance at him with surprise and apprehension; but, of course, he
could not say anything, and he dropped his eyes respectfully after the
one glance at Stafford's haggard face.

"I want you take a letter for me this morning, Pottinger," said
Stafford. "You can take Adonis; it will exercise him, as I shall not
ride him to-day. Here is the letter. Heron Hall lies on the other side
of the river. I want the letter taken there early this morning."

Pottinger touched his forehead. "I know the Hall, sir; I've ridden
over there with messages from the housekeeper and from Mr. Davis."

"There will be no answer," said Stafford. "Simply leave it."

"Yes, sir," said Pottinger. "Would you mind putting it in my
saddle-wallet, sir? I won't touch it till my hands are clean."

Stafford put the letter in the wallet, said a few words to Adonis and
some of the other horses, and then left the stable. He heard voices on
the terrace, and, to avoid meeting anyone until he was compelled, he
went down the slope of the lawn, and, seating himself on a bank, lit a
cigarette.

From her window, Maude Falconer, now attired in a simple but
exquisitely effective morning frock, could see him. After watching him
for a minute or two, she went to her writing-table and wrote two or
three notes quickly, and, with these in her pocket, went down-stairs
and through the hall to the stable court-yard. Pottinger was still
finishing off Adonis, and he drew himself up and saluted as she entered
the stables. As a rule her manner to the servants and her inferiors was
cold and haughty, but, as Stafford had discovered last night, she could
be soft and gentle when she chose, and she smiled now at Pottinger and
the horse in a fashion that almost dazzled that ingenuous youth. At the
same time her eye had noted Pottinger's coat and waistcoat which hung
on a hook at the stall-post with the saddle-wallet slung over them. The
coat was an old one with gaping pockets, and there was no sign of a
letter in them, or in the waistcoat. Instinctively, she knew that it
was in the wallet.

"What splendid condition that horse is in, Pottinger," she said. "His
coat is like satin. I suppose you were in the army?"

Of course Pottinger was flattered, and answered in the negative very
reluctantly.

"Not but what Mr. Stafford, miss, isn't as particular as any army gent
could be. I should be sorry to turn out a badly groomed 'oss for Mr.
Stafford's eyes to rest on, miss. He's as kind-hearted a master as a
man could desire to have, but that's about the one thing Mr. Stafford
wouldn't stand, miss."

"I suppose not," she said. "Are you going to ride into Bryndermere this
morning, Pottinger? If so, I should be glad if you would take these
notes to the linen draper's and the chemist's, and bring me back the
things I have written for."

"Certainly, miss," said Pottinger; then he remembered Stafford's order,
and looked anything but certain. "Would it do late in the morning,
miss? I have to go somewhere first."

"Oh, yes," she replied, "where shall I put the letters--in this wallet?"

Pottinger answered in the affirmative and thanked her, and she
unfastened the wallet, talking to him as she did so. "Is that a
swelling on that near fore leg, Pottinger?" she said, suddenly,
pointing to Adonis.

Pottinger started and regarded her with a look of horror, and, of
course, instantly knelt down to examine the suspected member. Long
before he had come up again with a breath of relief and a smiling "No,
miss, there is nothing the matter with it," she had looked into the
wallet and seen Stafford's letter.

"Oh, I thought there was," she said. "Have you finished your horses?"

"No, miss," he replied. "I have the master's hunter and the mare you
ride to do yet."

She nodded and went out of the stable, humming one of her songs; but
she did not go very far. In five minutes she back again.

"Oh, Pottinger, don't trouble about those letters. I will ride into
Bryndermere myself."

Pottinger was in the mare's stall, and Mause stopped him as he was
coming forward, by saying:

"Don't trouble; I'll take the letters from the wallet."

With Stafford's letter amongst her own in her pocket, she went quickly,
and yet without apparent hurry, to her own room, sent away her maid on
an errand, and slipped the bolt in the door. Rapidly she lit her silver
spirit-lamp and heated the water almost to boiling-point, and held the
envelope of Stafford's letter over it until the gum was melted and the
flap came open. Then she took out the letter, and, throwing herself
back in an easy-chair, read it slowly.

At first, as she read, her face burned, then it grew pale, and still
paler; every word of the bitter farewell, of the renunciation, written
as if with a man's heart's blood, stabbed her and tortured her with the
pangs of jealousy. Once she started to her feet, her hands clenched,
her head thrown back her eyes flashing; a superb figure--the tigress
aroused. At that instant she was minded to take the letter and fling it
in Stafford's face, and with it fling back the pledge which he had
given her the night before; then she collapsed, as it were, and sank
into a chair, dropping the letter and covering her face with her hands.
She could not. The strength of her love made her weak as water where
that love was concerned. Though her pride called upon her to surrender
Stafford, she could not respond to it.

Swaying to and fro, with her eyes covered as if to hide her shame, she
tried to tell herself that Stafford's was only a transient fancy for
this girl, that it was mere flirtation, a vulgar _liaison_ that she
would teach him to forget.

"He shall, he shall!" she cried behind her hands, as if the words were
wrung from her in her anguish of wounded pride and rejected love. "I
will teach him! There is no art that woman ever used that I will not
use--they say I am beautiful: if I am, my beauty shall minister to him
as no woman's beauty has ever ministered before. Cold to all the rest
of the world, I will be to him a fire which shall warm his life and
make it a heaven--It is only because he saw her first: if he had seen
me--Oh, curse her, curse her! Last night, while he was talking to me,
even while he was kissing me, he was thinking of her. But she shall not
have him! She has lost and I have won and I will keep him!"

She dashed her hand across her eyes, though there were no tears in
them, and stood upright, holding herself tensely as if she were
battling for calm; then she replaced the poignant note in its envelope,
and went back to the stables. Again she met no one, for those who were
down were in at breakfast.

"I have changed my mind, Pottinger," she said; "and will be glad if you
will take the notes, please. See, I have pat them back in the wallet."

"Certainly, miss!" said Pottinger, and he touched his forehead two or
three times, and coloured and smiled awkwardly and looked at her with a
new and vivid interest. One of the maids had run into the stable,
during Maud's absence, and had told him the news that his master was
engaged to Miss Maude Falconer; for the servants, who are so quick to
discover all our little secrets, had already learnt this one, and the
servants' hall was buzzing with it.




CHAPTER XXV.

That morning Ida came down-stairs singing, not loudly, but in the soft
undertone which a girl uses when she is supremely happy and she has
hopes of seeing the cause of her happiness very soon. All through
breakfast, while Mr. Heron read his letters, opening them and reading
them stealthily as usual, her heart was singing its love-song to her,
and she was wondering whether she would meet Stafford by the stream or
among the hills. That she should meet him she felt quite sure, for he
had never failed to leave the gay party at the Villa to come over to
her every day.

Perhaps he had spoken to his father, and, in the wonderful way men
have, had swept aside all the obstacles which stood against their
union. He was so strong, so self-reliant, so masterful--though so
gentle with her--that surely no obstacles could stand against him. She
was so absorbed in her thoughts that she almost started when Jason
appeared and, looking from her to Mr. Heron, announced that Mr.
Wordley, the family lawyer, was in the library.

Mr. Heron flushed and scrambled his letters and papers together as he
rose.

"Won't Mr. Wordley come in and have some breakfast?" suggested Ida. But
her father, shaking his head impatiently, said that Mr. Wordley was
sure to have had his breakfast, and shuffled out of the room.

A few minutes after he had gone, Jessie came in for the day's orders,
and Ida dragged her thoughts away from the all-absorbing subject and
plunged into housekeeping. It was not a lengthy or a very elaborate
business, alas! but when it was over Jessie lingered and began
collecting the breakfast things, glancing shyly at Ida, as she always
did when she wanted to gossip.

"There was fine doings up at the Villa last night, Miss Ida!" she
began, rather timidly, for Ida seldom encouraged her chatter. "There
was a ball there. Such a tremendous grand affair! There hasn't been
anything like it ever known in this country. Williams was up there this
morning, and Susie told him that it was like fairyland, what with the
beautiful rooms and the music and the ladies' rich dresses and jewels.
She got a peep through one of the open doors, and she says it quite
took her breath away."

Ida smiled. She was not envious; for would not Stafford come over
presently and tell her all about it: who was there, with whom he had
danced, and how all the time he had been longing to be by her side?

"Susie says that the ladies was beautiful, Miss Ida, and that the most
beautiful of them all was Miss Falconer. Susie says she had the most
lovely dress, like a cloud of smoke, with diamonds sparkling all over
it like stars."

"That sounds very pretty and poetical, Jessie," said Ida.

What would he care for a dress like a cloud, or the diamonds that shone
like stars on it? Did she not know that he loved the little rain-washed
habit which a certain rustic country girl wore, better than the
choicest production of Worth?

"Yes, miss," Jessie went on, "and Susie says that Mr. Stafford, the
lord's son"--the simple dale folk as often called Sir Stephen "my lord"
as "sir"--"danced ever so many times with her, and the servants was
saying that he was making love to her, and that they shouldn't be
surprised to hear that Mr. Stafford was going to marry Miss Falconer."

Ida could not prevent the colour rising to her face, but she laughed
unforcedly, and with no misgiving; for she had looked into Stafford's
eyes and read his soul through them. He was hers, let all the women in
the world be beautiful and decked in silks and satins.

She ran upstairs to put on her habit, leaving Jessie rather
disappointed at the effect of her news, and she sang while she tied the
little scarlet sailor's knot, and presently came down the stairs with a
step as light as her heart. As she was mounting and talking to Jason
about the last lot of steers, Mr. Wordley came out of the house to get
his horse, and hurried to her, bare-headed, in the good old way.

"No, I can't stay," he said in answer to her invitation. "I have to be
back at the office; but I'll ride a little way with you, if I may. It
isn't often I get the chance of riding with the prettiest girl in the
county. There now, I've made you blush, as I used to when you sat upon
my knee, and I told you that little girls had no right to stars for
eyes."

Ida laughed.

"But I'm a big girl now," she said, "and too old for compliments;
besides, lawyers should always speak the truth."

"For goodness sake! don't spread that theory, my dear, or we shall all
have to put our shutters up," he retorted, with mock alarm.

He got on his old red-roan rather stiffly, and they rode out of the
court-yard and on to the road, where, be sure, Ida's "star-like" eyes
swept the hills and the valleys lest perchance a young man should be
riding there. They rode in silence for a few minutes, during which the
old lawyer seemed very thoughtful, and glanced at her sideways, as if
he were trying to make up his mind about something. At last he said,
with an affectation of casualness:

"Father been pretty well of late, my dear?"

Ida hesitated for a moment. She could not bring herself to tell even
Mr. Wordley of her father's painful habit of walking in his sleep.

"Yes," she said, "fairly well. Sometimes he is rather restless and
irritable as if he were worried. Has he anything to worry him, Mr.
Wordley--I mean anything more than usual?"

He did not answer, and she looked at him as if waiting for his reply.

"I was thinking of what you just said: that you were a big girl. So you
are, though you always seem to me like the little child I used to
nurse. But the world rolls on and you have grown into a woman and I
ought to tell you the truth," he said, at last.

"The truth!" she echoed, with a quick glance.

"Yes," he said, nodding gravely. "Does your father ever talk to you of
business, my dear? I know that you manage the house and the farm; ay,
and manage them well, but I don't know whether he ever tells you
anything about the business of the estate. I ask because I am in rather
an awkward position. When your father dismissed his steward I thought
he would consult me on the matters which the steward used to manage;
but he has not done so, and I am really more ignorant about his affairs
than anyone would credit, seeing that I have been the Herons' family
lawyer--I and mine--since, well, say, since the Flood." "No; my father
tells me nothing," said Ida. "Is there anything the matter, is there
anything I should know?"

He looked at her gravely, compassionately.

"My dear, I think there is," he said. "If you had a brother or any
relative near you I would not worry you, would not tell you. But you
have none, you are quite alone, you see."

"Quite alone," she echoed. And then she blushed, as she remembered
Stafford, and that she was no longer alone in the world.

"And so I think you ought to be told that your father's affairs
are--are not as satisfactory as they should be."

"I know that we are very poor," said Ida in a low voice.

"Ah, yes," he said. "And so are a great many of the landed gentry
nowadays; but they still struggle on, and I had hope that by some
stroke of good luck I might have helped your father to struggle on and
perhaps save something, make some provision, for you. But, my dear--See
now! I am going to treat you as if you were indeed a woman; and you
will be brave, I know, for you are a Heron, and a Heron--it sounds like
a paradox!--has never shown the white feather--your father's affairs
have been growing worse lately, I am afraid. You know that the estate
is encumbered, that the entail was cut off so that you might inherit;
but advantage has been taken of the cutting off the entail to raise
fresh loans since the steward was dismissed and I have been ignorant of
your father's business matters. I came to-day to tell him that the
interest of the heaviest mortgage was long overdue, and that the
mortgagee, who says that he has applied several times, is threatening
foreclosure. I felt quite sure that I should get the money from your
father this morning, but he has put me off and makes some difficulty.
He made a rambling statement, almost incoherent, which I did not
understand, though, to be sure, I listened very intently, and from a
word or two he incautiously let drop, I am afraid that--"

He stopped and frowned and puckered his lips as if reluctant to
continue. Ida looked at him steadily with her deep grey eyes.

"Go on." she said. "Do not be afraid to tell me the truth. I can bear
it. I would rather know the worst, know what I have to face. For some
time past I have feared my father was in trouble. Do you think I am
afraid? Please tell me all."

"In a word, then, my dear," said the old lawyer, with a sigh, "I am
afraid your father has been speculating, and, like ninety-nine out of a
hundred that do so, has been losing. It is like playing against the
bank at Monte Carlo; one man may break it, but the advantage is on the
bank's side, and for the one who wins thousands lose. Can you tell me
if there are any grounds for my apprehension?"

Ida was silent for a moment as she recalled her father's manner of
late, his habit of shutting himself up in the library, of keeping his
letters from her, of secreting papers, and, above all, the furtive
glances which she had now and again seen him cast at her.

"I am afraid that it is only too true," she said. "My poor father! What
is to be done, Mr. Wordley? Can I do anything?"

The old man shook his head. He knew too well that once a man has really
taken to gambling, whether it be on the Stock Exchange, or at a green
table, or on the turf, there is very little hope of saving him.

"I fear you can do nothing," he replied, sadly. "A Heron never yet
brooked interference even by his nearest and dearest. No, you must say
nothing about it. Even I must be careful how I approach him; for this
morning he was testy and irritable and resented the few questions I
ventured to put to him. Don't make yourself unhappy about it. I will
try and arrange about the mortgage, and I will come over again as soon
as possible and try and persuade your father to confide in me as he
used to do. Now, come, remember! You are not to worry yourself, my
dear, but to leave it entirely to me. Things are rarely as bad as they
seem, and there is always a gleam of light in the darkest sky. Perhaps,
some day, we shall see Heron Hall and the good old family in all its
old glory; and when that day comes, my little girl with the star eyes
will queen it in the dale like one of the Heron ladies of the past."

He patted her hand as he held it, patted and stroked it and looked at
her with a tender and encouraging smile, which made Ida's eyes grow
moist.

She rode down the dale gravely and sadly for some minutes: then the
thought flashed through her mind, warming her heart, that she was not
alone, but there was one who loved her and to whom she could by for
consolation and encouragement. Yes, it was only right that she should
tell Stafford all; there should be no concealment from him.

She rode down the dale looking for him, but he was nowhere to be seen.
When she came to the opening by the lake she saw the large, white Villa
gleaming in the sunlight; a launch was patting off from the
landing-place with men and women on board, and the could almost fancy
that she heard the sound of laughter. The contrast of the prosperity
typified by the great white place and the poverty of Heron Hall smote
her sharply. She was poorer even than she had thought: what would the
great, the rich Sir Stephen say to such a daughter-in-law? She watched
the launch dreamily as it shot across the lake, and wondered whether
Stafford was on board, laughing and talking perhaps with the beautiful
Miss Falconer. In this moment of her trouble the thought was not
pleasant, but there was no jealousy in it, for in her assurance of his
love he was free to talk and jest with whom he pleased. She turned, and
after making her usual circuit, rode home-wards. As she reached the
cross-road she heard the sound of a horse coming from the Hall, and she
pulled up, her heart beating fast; then it sank with disappointment,
for the horseman came round the bend and she saw that it was a groom.
He touched his hat as he passed, and rode on at a sharp trot in the
direction of Bryndremere. Ida wondered why he had been to the Hall, but
concluded that he had gone there with some message about the farm
produce.

When she rode into the stable-yard, she saw Jessie and Jason standing
by the small hall door and talking eagerly, and Jessie came forward,
and taking a letter from under her apron, held it out with a smile.

"It's just come from the Villa, Miss Ida," she said. "And oh, miss,
what I told you this morning--it's quite true. It was Mr. Stafford's
own groom as brought the note, and he says that his master is engaged
to Miss Falconer, and that the whole place is in excitement over it. He
was as proud as Punch, Miss Ida; for he says that his new mistress is
terrible rich as well as beautiful, and that there'll be the grandest
of grand doings up there."

The blood rushed to Ida's face for a moment, then faded, and she
slipped the note into the pocket of her habit and laughed. For it
sounded too ridiculous, too incredible to cause her even a shadow of
annoyance. She gave one or two orders to Jason, then went into the
hall, took the note from her pocket and looked at the address lovingly,
lingeringly: for instinctively she knew whose hand had written it. It
was the first letter she had received from him; what would it say to
her? No doubt it was to tell her why he had not been able to meet her
that morning, to ask her to meet him later in the day. With a blush of
maidenly shame she lifted the envelope to her lips and kissed each
written word.

Then she opened it, slowly, as lingeringly as she had looked at it,
spinning out the pleasure, the delight which lay before her in the
perusal of her first love-letter. With her foot upon the old-fashioned
fender, her head drooping as if there was someone present to see her
blushes, she read the letter; and it is not too much to say that at
first she failed utterly to grasp its meaning. With knit brows and
quaking heart, she read it again and again, until its significance was,
so to speak, forced upon her; then the letter dropped from her hand,
her arms fell limply to her sides, and she looked straight before her
in a dazed, benumbed fashion, every word burning itself upon her brain
and searing her heart.

The blow had fallen so suddenly, so unexpectedly, like a bolt from the
blue, smiting the happiness of her young life as a sapling is smitten
by summer lightning, that for the moment she felt no pain, nothing but
the benumbing of all her faculties; so that she did not see the
portrait of the dead and gone Heron upon which her eyes rested, did not
hear her father's voice calling to her from the library, was conscious
of nothing but those terrible words which were dinning through her
brain like the booming of a great bell. Presently she uttered a low cry
and clasped her head with her hand, as if to shut out the sound of the
words that tortured her.

It could not be true--it could not be true! Stafford had not written
it. It was some cruel jest, a very cruel jest, perpetrated by someone
who hated them both, and who wantonly inflicted pain. Yes; that was it!
That could be the only explanation. Someone had written in his name; it
was a forgery; she would meet Stafford presently, and they would laugh
at it together. He would be very angry, would want to punish the person
who had done it; but he and she would laugh together, and he would take
her in his arms and kiss her in one of the many ways in which he had
made a kiss an ecstasy of delight, and they would laugh together as he
whispered that nothing should ever separate them.

She laughed now as she pictured the scene that would be enacted. But
suddenly the laugh died on her lips, as there flashed across her mind
the words Jessie had said. Stafford was engaged to Maude Falconer, the
girl up at the Villa, whose beauty and grace and wealth all the dale
was talking of.

Oh, God! Was there any truth in it, was there any truth in it? Had
Stafford, indeed, written that cruel letter? Had he left her forever,
forever, forever? Should she never see him again, never again hear him
tell her that he loved her, would always love her?

The room spun round with her, she suddenly felt sick and faint, and,
reeling, caught at the carved mantel-shelf to prevent herself from
falling. Then gradually the death-like faintness passed, and she became
conscious that her father's voice was calling to her, and she clasped
her head again and swept the hair from her forehead, and clenched her
hands in the effort to gain her presence of mind and self-command.

She picked up the letter, and, with a shudder, thrust it in her bosom,
as Cleopatra might have thrust the asp which was to destroy her; then
with leaden feet, she crossed the hall and opened the library door, and
saw her father standing by the table clutching some papers in one hand,
and gesticulating wildly with the other. Dizzily, for there seemed to
be a mist before her eyes, she went to him and laid a hand upon his
arm.

"What is it, father?" she said, "Are you ill? What is the matter?"

He gazed at her vacantly and struck his hand on the table, after the
manner of a child in a senseless passion.

"Lost! Lost! All lost!" he mumbled, jumbling the words together almost
incoherently.

"What is lost, father?" she asked.

"Everything, everything!" he cried, in the same manner. "I can't
remember, can't remember! It's ruin, utter ruin! My head--I can't
think, can't remember! Lost, lost!"

In her terror, she put her young arm round him as a mother encircles
her child in the delirium of fever.

"Try and tell me, father!" she implored him. "Try and be calm, dearest!
Tell me, and I will help you. What is lost?"

He tried to struggle from her arms, tried to push her from him.

"You know!" he mumbled. "You've watched me--you know the truth!
Everything is lost! I am ruined! The mortgage! Herondale will pass
away! I am a poor man, a very poor man! Have pity on me, have pity on
me!"

He slipped, by their weight, from her arms and fell into the chair. She
sank on to her knees, her arms still round him, and stroked and
caressed his withered hand that twitched and shook; and to her horror
his stony eyes grew more vacant, his jaw dropped, and he sank still
lower in the chair. "Jessie! Jason!" she called, and they rushed in.
For a space they stood aghast and unhelpful from fright, then Jason
tried to lift his master from the heap into which he had collapsed. The
old man's eyes closed, he straggled for breath, and when he had gained
it, he looked from one to the other with a smile, a senile smile, which
added to Ida's grief and terror.

"It's all right!" he whispered, huskily, pantingly. "It's all right;
they don't know. They don't guess!" Then his manner changed to one of
intense alarm and dismay. "Lost! Lost!" he gasped. "I'm ruined, rained!
Herondale has gone, gone--all is gone! My poor child--Ida!"

"Father!" broke from Ida's white lips. "Father, I am here. Look at me,
speak to me. I am here--everything is not lost. I am here, and all is
well."

His lips twisted into a smile, a smile of cunning, almost of glee; then
he groaned, and the cry rose again:

"I can't remember--all is lost! Ruined! My poor child! Have pity on my
child!"

As she clung to him, supporting him as she clung, she felt a shudder
run through him, and he fell a lifeless heap upon her shoulder.

The minutes--were they minutes or years?--passed, and were broken into
fragments by a cry from Jessie.

"Miss Ida! Miss Ida! He's--the master's dead!'"


Ida raised her father's head from her shoulder and looked into his
face, and knew that the girl had spoken the truth.

He was dead. She had lost both father and lover in one day!




CHAPTER XXVI.


Ida sat in the library on the morning of the funeral. A pelting rain
beat upon the windows, over which the blinds had been drawn; the great
silence which reigned in the chamber above, in which the dead master of
Heron lay, brooded over the whole house, and seemed in no part of it
more intense than in this great, book-lined room, in which Godfrey
Heron had spent so much of his life.

Ida lay back in the great arm-chair in which he had sat, her small
brown hands lying limply in her lap, her eyes fixed absently upon the
open book which lay on the table as he had left it. The pallor of her
face, increased by her sorrow, was accentuated by the black dress,
almost as plainly made as that which the red-eyed Jessie wore in her
kitchen. Though nearly a week had elapsed since her father had died in
her young arms, and notwithstanding her capacity for self-reliance, Ida
had not yet recovered from the stupor of the shock.

She was scarcely thinking as she lay back in his chair and looked at
the table over which he had bent for so many monotonous years; she
scarcely realised that he had passed out of her life, and that she was
alone in the world; and she was only vaguely conscious that her sorrow
had, so to speak, a double edge; that she had lost not only her father,
but the man to whom she had given her heart, the man who should have
been standing beside her now, shielding her with his strong arms,
comforting her with words of pity and love. The double blow had fallen
so suddenly, so unexpectedly, that the pain of it had been dulled and
blunted. The capacity of human nature for suffering is, after all not
unlimited. God says to physical pain and mental anguish, "Thus far and
no farther;" and this limitation saved Ida from utter collapse.

Then, again, she was not free to indulge in idle grief, in the luxury
of woe; the great house had still to be run, she had to bury her
beloved dead, the mourning which seems such a hopeless mockery when the
heart is racked with misery, had to be seen to; and she did it, and
went through it all, with outward calm, sustained by that Heron spirit
which may be described as the religion of her class--_noblesse oblige_.
Jessie had wept loudly through the house ever since the death, and
could weep as loudly now; but if Ida shed any tears she wept in the
silence and darkness of her own room, and no one heard her utter a
moan. "To suffer in silence and be strong" was the badge of all her
tribe, and she wore it with quiet stoicism.

Godfrey Heron's death had happened so suddenly that the news of it
scarcely got beyond the radius of the estate before the following
morning, and Stafford had gone to London in ignorance of this second
blow with which Fate had followed up the one he had dealt Ida: and when
the neighbours--the Vaynes, the Bannerdales, and the Avorys--came
quickly and readily enough to offer their sympathy and help, they could
do nothing. The girl solitary and lonely in her grief as she had been
solitary and lonely through her life, would see no one but the doctor
and Mr. Wordley, and the people who had once been warm and intimate
friends of the family left reluctantly and sully, to talk over the
melancholy circumstance, and to wonder what would become of the
daughter of the eccentric man who had lived the life of a recluse. Mr.
Wordley would have liked to have persuaded her to see some of the women
who had hastened to comfort her; but he knew that any attempt at
persuasion would have been in vain, that he would not have been able to
break down the barrier of reserve which the girl had instinctively and
reservedly erected between her suffering soul and the world. His heart
ached for her, and he did all that a man could do to lighten the burden
of her trouble; but there was very little that he could do beyond
superintending the necessary arrangements for the funeral.

His first thought was of the relatives; but, somewhat to his own
dismay, he found that the only one whom he could trace was a certain
cousin, a more than middle-aged man who, though he bore the name of
Heron, was quite unknown to Ida, and, so far as Mr. Wordley was aware,
had not crossed the threshold of the Hall for many years. He was a
certain John Heron, a retired barrister, who had gone in for religion,
not in the form of either of the Established Churches, but of that of
one of the least known sects, the members of which called themselves
some kind of brothers, were supposed to be very strict observers of the
Scriptural law, and were considered by those who did not belong to them
both narrow-minded and uncharitable.

Mr. John Heron was a prominent member of this little sect, and was
famous in its small circles for his extreme sanctity and his eloquence
as a lay preacher. Mr. Wordley, with much misgiving, had invited this,
the only relative he could find, to the funeral, and Ida was now
awaiting this gentleman's arrival.

The stealthy footsteps which belong to those who minister to the dead
passed up and down the great house, Jason was setting out the simple
"funeral baked meats" which are considered appropriate to the occasion,
and Mr. Wordley paced up and down the hall with his hands behind his
back, listening to the undertaker's men upstairs, and glancing through
the window in expectation of the carriage which had been sent for Mr.
John Heron. Presently he saw it rounding a bend of the drive, and went
into the library to prepare Ida.

She raised her head but not her eyes as he entered, and looked at him
with that dull apathy which denotes the benumbed heart, the mind
crushed under its heavy weight of sorrow.

"I came in to tell you, my dear, that Mr. John Heron is coming," he
said. "The carriage is just turning the bend of the drive." "I will
come," she said, rising and supporting herself by the heavy, carved arm
of the great chair.

"No, no" he said. "Sit down and wait here." He did not want her to hear
the stealthy tread of the undertaker's men, to meet the coffin which
they were going to bring downstairs and place in the hall. "I will
bring him in here. Is there anything you would like me to say to him,
my dear?" he asked, and spoke with a certain hesitancy; for as yet he
had not spoken of her future, feeling that her grief was too recent,
too sacred, to permit of the obtrusion of material and worldly matters.

"To say to him?" she repeated, in a low, dull voice, as if she did not
understand.

"Yes," he said. "I did not know whether you had formed any plan,
whether"--he hesitated again, "you had thought of going--of paying a
visit--to these relations of yours. He lives in the north of London,
and has a wife and son and daughter, as you know."

Ida passed her hand across her brow, trying to remember.

"Ah, yes," she said at last, "I remember you told me about them. I
never heard of them before--until now. Why should I go to them? Do they
want me? Have they asked me?"

Mr. Wordley coughed discreetly. They certainly had not asked her, but
he felt quite assured that an individual whose reputation for sanctity
stood so high could not be so deficient in charity as to refuse a home
to his orphan cousin.

"They have not sent you any definite invitation yet, but they will be
sure to want you to go and stay with them, for a time, at any rate; and
I think you ought to go."

"I do not think I should like it," said Ida, but indifferently, as if
the question were of no moment. "I would rather stay here"

Mr. Wordley polished his glasses very intently.

"I am afraid you'd find it very lonely at the Hall, my dear," he said.
"In fact, I don't think you could remain here by yourself," he added,
evading the direct gaze of the great, sad eyes.

"I should feel lonely anywhere," she said. "More lonely with people I
don't know, probably, than I should feel here, with Jessie and
Jason--and--and the dogs."

"Well, well, we can't discuss the question now, and will endeavour to
act for the best, my dear," said the old man, still intent upon his
glasses. "I hear the carriage. I will bring Mr. John in." He returned
in a minute or two, accompanied by a tall and gaunt individual, who, in
his black clothes and white necktie, looked a cross between a superior
undertaker and a Methodist preacher. His features were strongly marked,
and the expression of his countenance was both severe and melancholy,
and, judging by his expression and his voice, which was harsh and
lachrymose, his particular form of religion did not appear to afford
him either amusement or consolation.

"This is your cousin, Mr. John Heron," said poor Mr. Wordley, who was
evidently suffering from the effects of his few minutes' conversation
with that gentleman.

Mr. John Heron surveyed the slight figure and white face with its sad,
star-like eyes--surveyed it with a grim kind of severity, which was
probably intended for sympathy, and extending a cold, damp hand, which
resembled an extremely bony shoulder of mutton, said, in a rasping,
melancholy voice:

"How do you do, Ida? I trust you are bearing your burden as becomes a
Christian. We are born to sorrow. The train was three-quarters of an
hour late."

"I am sorry," said Ida in her low voice, leaving him to judge whether
she expressed regret for our birthright of misery or the lateness of
the train. "Will you have some lunch--some wine?" she asked, a dull,
vague wonder rising in her mind that this grim, middle-class man should
be of kith and kin with her dead father.

"Thank you; no. I had an abernethy biscuit at the station." He drew
back from, and waved away, the tray of wine which Jason at this moment
brought in. "I never touch wine. I, and all mine, are total abstainers.
Those who fly to the wine-cup in moments of tribulation and grief rely
on a broken reed which shall pierce their hand. I trust you do not
drink, Cousin Ida?"

"No--yes; sometimes; not much," she replied, vaguely, and regarding him
with a dull wonder; for she had never seen this kind of man before.

Mr. Wordley poured out a glass of wine, and, in silent indignation,
handed it to her; and, unconscious of the heavy scowl with which Mr.
John Heron regarded her, she put her lips to it.

"A glass of wine is not a bad thing at any time," said the old lawyer;
"especially when one is weakened and prostrated by trouble. Try and
drink a little more, my dear."

"It is a matter of opinion, of conviction, of principle," said Mr. John
Heron, grimly, as if he were in the pulpit. "We must be guided by the
light of our consciences; we must not yield to the seductive in
fineness of creature comfort. We are told that strong drink is
raging--" This was rather more than Mr. Wordley could stand, and, very
red in the face, he invited Mr. John Heron to go up to the room which
had been prepared for him.

When that gentleman had stalked out, the old lawyer looked at Ida with
a mixture of dismay and commiseration.

"Not a--er--particularly cheerful and genial person, my dear; but no
doubt Mr. John Heron is extremely conscientious and--er--good-hearted."

"I daresay," assented Ida, apathetically. "It does not matter. It was
very kind of him to come so far to--to the funeral," she added. "He
might have stayed away, for I don't think my father knew him, and I
never heard of him. Is it not time yet?" she asked, in a low voice.

As she spoke, Jessie came in and took her upstairs to her room to put
on the thick black cloak, the bonnet with its long crape veil, in which
Ida was to follow her father to the grave; for in spite of Mr.
Wordley's remonstrances, she had remained firm in her resolve to go to
the church-yard.

Presently the procession started. Only a few carriages followed the
hearse which bore Godfrey Heron to his last resting-place; but when the
vehicles cradled beyond the boundary of the grounds, across which the
dead man had not set foot for thirty years, the cavalcade was swelled
by a number of tenants, labourers, and dalesmen who had come to pay
their last respects to Heron of Herondale; and marching in threes,
which appears to be the regulation number for a funeral, they made a
long and winding tail to the crawling coaches, quite filled the little
church, and stood, a black-garbed crowd, in the pelting rain round the
oblong hole which would suffice for the last bed of this one of the
last of the lords of the dale.

But though all were present to show respect to the deceased squire, the
attention of every man and woman was fixed upon the slight, girlish
figure standing by the side of the grave, her head bent, her great
mournful eye fixed upon the coffin, her hands clenched tightly as they
held together the thick mourning cloak. She looked so young, so almost
child-like in the desolation of her solitude, that many of the women
cried silently, and the rough men set their lips hard and looked
sternly and grimly at the ground.

The old clergyman who had christened her and every Sunday had cast
glances of interest and affection at her as she sat in the great "loose
box" of a pew, found it very difficult to read the solemn service
without breaking down, and his old thin voice quavered as he spoke the
words of hope and consolation which the storm of wind and rain caught
up and swept across the narrow church-yard and down the dale of which
the Herons had been so long masters.

Mr. John Heron stood grim and gaunt opposite Ida, as if he were a
figure carved out of wood, and showed no sign of animation until the
end of the service, when he looked round with a sudden eagerness, and
opened his large square lips as if he were going to "improve the
occasion" by an address; but Mr. Wordley, who suspected him of such
intention, nipped it in the bud by saying:

"Will you give your arm to Miss Ida, Mr. Heron? I want to get her back
to the Hall as soon as possible."

Ida was led to the carriage, passing through a lane of sympathisers
amongst whom were representatives of all the great dale families; and
all bent their heads with a respectful pity and sympathy as the young
girl made her way down the narrow path. About half a dozen persons had
been asked to go to the Hall for the funeral lunch, at which Mr. John
Heron, as representative of the family, presided. It was a melancholy
meal; for most of those present were thinking of the orphan girl in her
room above. They spoke in lowered voices of the dead man and of the
great family from which he had sprung, and recalled stories of the
wealth and lavishness of past Herons; and when the meal was over, there
suddenly fell a silence, and all eyes were turned upon Mr. Wordley; for
the moment had arrived for the reading and expounding of the will.

Mr. Wordley rose, coughed, and wiped his eye-glasses, and looked round
gravely.

"As the legal adviser of my late client, Mr. Godfrey Heron, I have to
inform you, gentlemen, that there is no will. My client died
intestate."

The listeners exchanged glances, and looked grave and concerned.

"No will?" said Lord Bannerdale, anxiously; then his kindly face
cleared. "But of course everything goes to his daughter; the estate is
not entailed?"

Mr. Wordley inclined his head.

"The estate is not entailed, as you observed, Lord Bannerdale; and my
client, Miss Ida Heron, inherits everything."

They drew a breath of relief, and nodded assentingly; and presently
they made a general movement of departure. Lord Bannerdale lingered
behind the others. "I won't ask the poor child to see me, Mr. Wordley,"
he said. "Will you therefore be good enough to give her Lady
Bannerdale's love, and to tell her that, as Lady Bannerdale has written
to her, we shall be more than pleased if she will come to us at the
Court. She is to consider it her home for just as long as she should
please; and we shall feel it a pleasure and an honour to have her
amongst us as one of our own. Of course she cannot remain alone here,
in this great place."

The old lawyer bowed.

"I will give her your kind message, for which I thank you on her
behalf, Lord Bannerdale. I do not know what she will do, or where she
will go; at present she is not in a condition to discuss any plans for
her future, though to-day she expressed a desire to remain at the
Hall." He paused for a moment before he added: "I do not know whether
she can do so."

"My cousin is young, and a mere child, and she must follow the advice
of her elders and her guardian. The future of even the sparrow is in
higher hands than ours, and we know not what a day may bring forth,"
said Mr. John Heron, grimly, and with an uplifting of his heavy brows.

"Quite so," said Lord Bannerdale, who had taken a great dislike for the
sanctimonious speaker, and who could scarcely repress a shudder as he
shook Mr. John Heron's cold and clammy hand.

When they had all gone, Mr. Wordley said:

"We had better go into the library and talk matters over. I will send
for Miss Ida. It seems cruel to disturb her at such a moment, but there
is no help for it."

"You speak as if you had bad tidings, Mr. Wordley, to give us," said
John Heron.

"I am afraid I have," responded the old lawyer, shaking his grey head
sadly.




CHAPTER XXVII.


When Ida came down, he led her to a chair beside the fire which he had
ordered to be lit, and laid his hand gently and tenderly on her
shoulder by way of preparation and encouragement.

"Your cousin and I want to talk to you about the future, Ida," he said.
"You will have to be told some time or other exactly how your father's
affairs stood, and I have come to the conclusion that it is better you
should know at once than that you should be permitted to remain in
ignorance of the gravity of the situation. I have gone over your
father's papers and looked into his affairs very carefully and closely,
and I am sorry to say that they are in a very unsatisfactory condition.
As I told you the other day, the estate has been encumbered and very
seriously embarrassed for some time past, and the encumbrance has been
increased of late, notwithstanding the admirable way in which you have
managed the estate and the household affairs."

Ida raised her eyes to his and tried to regard him calmly and bravely,
but her lips quivered and she checked a sigh.

Mr. Wordley coughed and frowned, as a man does when he is engaged in a
disagreeable and painful task.

"The principal mortgagee has given me notice of foreclosure, and the
amount of the debt is so large that I am afraid--it would be cruel and
useless to conceal the truth from you--I _know_ that the property sold
would not be sufficient to meet it. Of ready money there appears to be
none--"

Mr. John Heron groaned and raised his melancholy eyes to the ceiling
with an expression of reprobation. Ida appeared unconscious of his
presence and kept her sad eyes steadily fixed on the lawyer's kind and
mournful face.

--"In a word, my dear child, your poor father appears to have left
absolutely no effects behind him."

Ida drew a long breath and was silent for a moment, as she tried to
realise the significance of his words.

"Do you mean that I am quite penniless?" she said, in a low voice.

Mr. Wordley blew his nose and coughed two or three times, as if he
found it difficult to reply; at last he said, in a voice almost as low
as hers:

"Put shortly, I am afraid, my dear, that is what I must tell you. I had
no idea that the position was so grave. I thought that there would be
something left; sufficient, at any rate, to render you independent;
but, as I told you, I have been kept in ignorance of your father's
affairs for some years past, and I did not know how things were going.
I am surprised as well as grieved, deeply grieved; and I must confess
that I can only account for the deplorable confusion and loss by the
theory that I suggested to you the other day. I cannot but think that
your poor father must have engaged in some disastrous speculation."

Mr. Heron groaned again, and shook his head.

"The prevailing vice of this most wicked of ages," he said. "The love
of money, the gambling on the race-course and the Stock Exchange, are
the root of all evil."

Ida seemed not to hear him, and Mr. Wordley ignored the comment.

"It now remains for you, my dear child, to decide what to do. I do not
think you could possibly live on here; you have not the means to do so,
though you should be as economical as you have been in the past; the
house must pass away from you in six months' time or little more, and
there would be nothing gained by your lingering hopelessly here for
that period."

"I must go, then," said Ida, as if there were a stab in every word.

Mr. Wordley bent his head, and laid his hand on her shoulder.

"Yes, I fear you must go," he assented. "But, thank God, you are not
without friends, many friends. Lord Bannerdale charges me to tell you
what his good wife has already written you--that a home awaits you at
the Court, where you will be received gladly and lovingly; and I am
quite sure that the door of every house in the dale is wide open for
you."

Ida shrank in her chair. Clothe the offer as kindly as he might, it
spelt Charity, not cold charity, but charity still: and what Heron had
ever tamely accepted charity from mere friends and strangers? Mr.
Wordley saw the shrinking, the little shudder, and understood.

"I understand, my dear!" he said, in a low voice. "But there is another
offer, another home which you can accept without humiliation or
compunction. Your cousin, Mr. John Heron here, will, I am sure, be only
too glad, too delighted to--to--"

He waited and glanced at Mr. Heron impatiently, and at last that
gentleman rose, but not too eagerly, to the occasion.

"I need scarcely say," he said, slowly and solemnly, "that I should not
approve of my cousin's accepting these offers of charity, which, though
no doubt kindly meant, appear to me somewhat--er--obtrusive. I am not a
wealthy man; my simple home cannot compare in size and grandeur with
Heron Hall and the estate which my late unfortunate cousin appears to
have squandered, but such as it is, Ida will be welcome in it. I am not
one to turn a deaf ear to the cry of the orphan and fatherless."

Mr. Wordley frowned and reddened, and cut in before Mr. John Heron
could finish his sentence even more offensively, and so rouse Ida's
spirit, and render his offer impossible of acceptance.

"Quite so, quite so, my dear sir," he said. "I am quite sure you will
feel only too delighted and honoured at the prospect of taking this
dear child into your family."

"Yes," said Mr. Heron, unctuously, "we will take her in as a lamb
gathered into the fold, as a brand is plucked from the burning."

Ida looked at him half stupefied, and it is to be feared some doubts of
his sanity arose in her mind.

"Quite so, quite so," interrupted Mr. Wordley again. "Then I think the
sooner Miss Ida joins you the better; and I would suggest that she goes
with you to-morrow. I will close the house and leave Jessie, the
maid-servant, and Jason in charge. You and Miss Ida can depend on my
guarding her interests as jealously as if they were my own. I will have
a sale of the stock and other things which we are free to sell, and,
meanwhile, Miss Ida must permit me to advance her some money on account
of the proceeds."

He handed her an envelope in which he had already placed some
bank-notes; but Ida looked at him and slowly shook her head.

"No, no, my dear!" he said. "I should not be guilty of such
presumption. Though you are leaving Heron Hall, though it may be
passing away from you forever, you are still, in my eyes, Miss Heron of
Herondale, and I should not presume to offer you--" His voice broke,
and his eyes filled with tears. "The money is yours, and you can take
it without any loss of the pride which is your rightful heritage. If I
have not offered you a home where you would indeed be an honoured
guest, it is because I know that it would not be fitting for me to
offer it, or you to accept it. Mr. John Heron is your natural guardian;
but though that is so, I will ask you to remember that I claim the
privilege of being your father's friend and yours, and that in any
trouble you will be but honouring that privilege when you come to me
for advice and assistance."

His voice was almost inaudible before he had finished, and Ida, down
whose cheek tears were running for the first time, extended both hands
in mute but eloquent gratitude. They had both forgotten Mr. John
Heron's presence but were reminded of it by something between a cough
and a sniff from him; and at a glance from Mr. Wordley, Ida turned to
the gaunt figure and held out her hand.

"Thank you," she said in a low voice, "I will come with you and stay
with you until--until--I can find something to do, something at which I
can earn my own living. Surely there must be something I can do?" She
turned to Mr. Wordley with a little anxious, eager gesture. "I am
strong--very strong; I have managed Herondale--I can ride, and--and
understand a farm. I am never tired. Surely there is something I can
do!"

Her voice broke, she began to tremble, and the tears started to her
eyes again.

"Yes, yes; no doubt, no doubt, my child!" said Mr. Wordley, whose own
eyes were moist. "We will think about all that later on. You must go
now and rest; you are tired."

He drew her arm within his, and patting her hand tenderly and
encouragingly, led her out of the room; and stood in the hall watching
her as she slowly went up the great stairs; such a girlish, mournful
figure in her plain black dress.

Ida lay awake that night listening to the wind and the rain. She was
familiar enough with the dale storms, but never had their wild music
wailed so mournful an accompaniment to her own thoughts. Compared with
her other losses, that of her home, dearly as she loved it, weighed but
little; it was but, an added pang to the anguish of her bereavement;
and behind that, the principal cause of her grief, loomed the desertion
of her lover. She tried not to think of Stafford; for every thought
bestowed on him seemed to rob her dead father and to be disloyal to his
memory; but, alas! the human heart is despotic; and as she lay awake
and listened to the wailing of the wind and the rain as it drove
against the window, Stafford's voice penetrated that of the storm; and,
scarcely consciously, her lips were forming some of the passionate
words of endearment which he had whispered to her by the stream and on
the hill-side. Though she knew every word by heart of the letter he had
written her, she did not yet understand or comprehend why he had broken
his solemn engagement to her. She understood that something had risen
between them, something had happened which had separated them, but she
could form no idea as to what it was. He had spoken of "unworthiness,"
of something which he had discovered that had rendered him unfit to be
her husband; but she could not guess what it was; but confused and
bewildered as she was, there was at present, at any rate, no resentment
in her heart.

The lover had been taken from her just as her father and her home had
been. There was no help for it, there was no appeal from the decrees of
Fate. Fate had decreed that she should love Stafford and lose him; and
she could only go on living her grey and dreary life, made all the
greyer and drearier by her short spell of joy and happiness. Sorrow's
crown of sorrow is still the remembrance of happier things; and she
would have to wear that crown in place of the crown of his love, wear
it through all her days; for, young as she was, she knew that she had
given her heart once and for all, that though she might never see
Stafford again, she would love him to the end.

A mist hung over the dale on this, the day of her departure from the
Hall, and all the hills over which she had so loved to ride and walk
were shrouded as if in tears.

She stood and looked at them from the hall window with vacant eyes, as
if she did not yet realise that she was leaving them, perhaps forever;
but she had not long for gazing, for Mr. Heron and she were going by an
early train, and the moment for farewell came swiftly upon her.

With Donald and Bess close at her heels, as if they were aware of their
coming loss, she went round to say good-bye. She crossed the lawn and
went to the spot under the tree where she had met Stafford that
never-to-be-forgotten night, and from thence walked to the corner of
the terrace where they had stood and watched her father coming, in his
sleep, from the ruined chapel. Then she went to the stable to say
good-bye to Rupert, who whinnied as he heard her approaching footstep,
and thrust his soft, velvety nose into her neck. She had to fight hard
against the tears at this point, and she hid her face against that of
the big horse, with her arms thrown round his neck, as she murmured her
last good-bye.

But the tears would not be kept back when it came to saying farewell to
the two faithful souls, Jessie and Jason, with whom she had grown up
from a girl all legs and wings, and whom she had learnt to regard
rather as devoted friends than servants. Jason broke down completely
and hurried away, his old and feeble frame shaking like an autumn leaf;
and Jessie, her arms thrown round her young mistress, and with sobs and
ejaculations, implored her to take her faithful Jessie with her.

Perhaps the parting with the two dogs was as bitter as any, for, as if
they knew quite well that she was going, they clung closely to her, and
when she hugged them and kissed them on the forehead, they had to be
dragged off by Jason, and locked up in the stables lest they should
follow the carriage which was to bear their beloved mistress away.

That carriage came all too soon, though Mr. John Heron had awaited its
arrival impatiently and with watch in hand. He seemed grimmer and
gaunter than ever that morning, and as he looked around the great Hall,
he shook his head at its faded grandeur reprehensively, as if he could,
if time permitted, deliver a sermon on the prodigality, the wicked
wastefulness, which had brought ruin on the house, and rendered it
necessary for him to extend his charity to the penniless orphan.

Mr. Wordley was there to say good-bye to Ida and put her into the
carriage; but it proved a difficult good-bye to say, and for once the
usually fluent old lawyer was bereft of the power of speech as he held
Ida's small hand, and looked through tear-dimmed eyes at the white and
sorrowful face. He had intended to say all sorts of kind and
encouraging things, but he could only manage the two words, "Good-bye;"
and they were almost inaudible.

She sank back into the carriage as it drove away from the Hall, and
closed her eyes that she might not see the familiar trees in the
avenue, the cattle, everyone of which she knew by name, grazing in the
meadow, the pale and woe-begone faces of the servants who stood by the
steps to catch the last glimpse of their beloved; and for some time her
eyes remained closed; but they opened as she came to the clearing by
the lake, from which one could see the long stretching façade of Sir
Stephen Orme's white villa. She opened them then and looked at the
house, wondering whether Stafford was there, wondering why he had not
come to her, despite the promise she had exacted from him; wondering
whether he knew that her father was dead, and that she was left
penniless.

She was not capable of any more tears, and a dull apathy crushed down
upon her, so that she did not notice that at the station Mr. John Heron
improved the occasion, as he would have put it, by distributing tracts
to the station-master and porters. The journey to London passed as if
it were made in a dream; and wearied in mind and body and soul, she
found herself, late in the evening, standing in the centre of the
Heron's dreary drawing-room, awaiting her reception by the Heron
family.

She had been told by her cousin, as they drove in a four-wheeled cab
through the depressing streets of a London suburb, that the family
consisted of his wife and a son and a daughter; that the son's name was
Joseph and the daughter's Isabel; that Joseph was a clerk in the city,
and that Isabel was about the same age as Ida.

"We are a very quiet family," Mr. Heron had said, "and you will no
doubt miss the space and grandeur of Heron Hall, but I trust we are
contented and happy, and that though our means are limited, our sphere
of usefulness is wider than that of some wealthier people. My wife is,
unfortunately, an invalid, and requires constant care and attention;
but I have no doubt she will find strength to bear any fresh burden
which Providence may see fit to put upon her. Though our circumstances
are comfortable, we are not surrounded by the luxuries which so often
prove a stumbling-block to weaker brethren. I trust you may be happy in
our humble home, and that you may find some opportunity of usefulness
in this new state of life to which you are called."

Ida tried to remember all this as she stood in the centre of the
drawing-room and looked round upon the modern but heavy and ugly
objects with which it was furnished.

The room was seedy and shabby, but with a different seediness and
shabbiness from that of Heron Hall; for there was an attempt to conceal
its loss of freshness with antimacassars, large in size and hideous of
pattern. A grim and ugly portrait of Mr. John Heron occupied a great
portion of one of the walls, and was confronted by a portrait, of a
similar size, of his wife, a middle-class woman of faded aspect and
languishing expression. The other pictures were of the type that one
usually sees in such houses; engravings printed from wornout plates,
and third-class lithographs. There was a large sofa covered with dirty
cretonne, and with a hollow in the middle showing that the spring had
"gone;" the centre-table was adorned by several well-known religious
books arranged at regular intervals. A cage containing a canary hung
between the curtains in the window, and the bird, a wretched-looking
animal--it was moulting--woke up at their entrance and shrilled in the
hateful manner peculiar to canaries. This depressing room was lit by
one gas-burner, which only permitted Ida to take in all that had been
described but vaguely and dimly.

She looked round aghast and with a sinking of the heart. She had never
been in any room like this before, and its lack of comfort, its
vulgarity, struck upon her strained nerves like a loud discordant note
in music; but its owner looked round complacently and turned the gas a
little higher, as he said:

"I will go and fetch your cousin. Won't you sit down?"

As he spoke, the door opened and the original of the portrait on the
wall entered, followed by her daughter Isabel. Ida rose from the bumpy
sofa and saw a thin, harassed-looking woman, more faded even than the
portrait, and a tall and rather a good-looking girl whose face and
figure resembled, in a vague, indefinite way, those of both her father
and mother; but though she was not bad-looking, there was a touch of
vulgarity in her widely opened eyes, with a curious stare for the
newcomer, and in her rather coarse mouth, which appalled and repelled
poor Ida; and she stood looking from one to the other, trying to keep
her surprise and wonder and disapproval from revealing themselves
through her eyes. She did not know that these two ladies, being the
wife and daughter of a professional man, considered themselves very
much the superior of their friends and neighbours, who were mostly
retired trades-people or "something in the city;" and that Mrs. Heron
was extremely proud of her husband's connection with the Herons of
Herondale, and was firmly convinced that she and her family possessed
all the taste and refinement which belong to "the aristocracy."

A simpler and a homelier woman would have put her arm round the girl's
neck and drawn her towards her with a few loving words of greeting and
welcome; but Mrs. Heron only extended a hand, held at the latest
fashionable angle, and murmured in a languid and lackadaisical voice:

"So you have come at last, my dear Miss Heron! Your train must have
been very late, John; we have been expecting you for the last hour, and
I am afraid the dinner is quite spoilt. But anyway, I am glad to see
you."

"Thank you," said poor Ida.

It was Isabel's turn, and she now came forward with a smile that
extended her mouth from ear to ear, and in a gushing manner said, in
staccato sentences:

"Yes, we are so glad to see you! How tired you must be! One always
feels so dirty and tumbled after a long journey. You'll be glad of a
wash, Miss Heron. But there! I mustn't call you that; it sounds so cold
and formal! I must call you Ida, mustn't I? 'Ida!' It sounds such an
_odd_ name; but I suppose I shall get used to it in time."

"I hope so," said poor Ida, trying to smile and speak cheerfully and
amiably, as Miss Isabel's rather large hand enclosed round hers; but
she looked from one to the other with an appalling sensation of
strangeness and aloofness, and a lump rose in her throat which rendered
the smile and any further speech on her part impossible; and as she
looked from the simpering, lackadaisical mother to the vulgar daughter
with meaningless smile, she asked herself whether she was really awake,
whether this room was indeed to be her future home, and these strange
people her daily companions, or whether she was only asleep and
dreaming, and would wake to find the honest face of Jessie bending over
her, and to see the familiar objects of her own room at Heron Hall.




CHAPTER XXVIII.

When Ida went upstairs for the wash, the need for which Miss Isabel had
so kindly informed her of, she found that her room was clean and fairly
comfortable, though its appearance seemed strange after the huge and
old-fashioned one at the Hall. The furniture was cheap and
unsubstantial, the towels were small and thin; in place of pictures,
aggressively illuminated texts scarred the walls like freshly made
wounds, and the place had a bare, homeless look which made Ida shudder.

The dining-room, when she went down to it, did not impress her any more
favourably; for here, too, the furniture was new and shiny with a
sticky kind of shininess, as if the treacly varnish had not yet dried;
there was not a comfortable chair in the room; the pictures were the
most gruesome ones of Doré's, and there was a text over the
mantel-piece as aggressive and as hideous in colouring as those in he