WAS IT A RECOGNITION?
While Mabin was still talking to Rudolph in the road between “The
Towers” and “Stone House,” a tall parlormaid, in snow-white French cap
and ends, passed them, on her way from the former to the latter house,
bearing a letter in her hand.
And when Mabin reached home, she found that the Powers had already
received Mrs. Dale’s invitation to Mabin.
In truth it had put both husband and wife into a position of some
difficulty. For while, on the one hand, they were delighted at this
opportunity of getting “the one too many” off their hands for a time,
yet there were the opinions of their neighbors to be considered; and
the tide of public feeling had set in strongly against the lady in
black.
If her hair had been dark instead of fair, it would have made all the
difference. The beauty which goes with brown hair and a more or less
dark complexion is not so startling, not so sensational, as the
loveliness of pink and white and gold which made Mrs. Dale so
conspicuous. If again, she had not been in mourning, and such pretty
mourning, they would have been readier to make allowance for her
eccentricities. But the knowing ones had begun to discover that there
were discrepancies in her attire, that her mourning was either too
deep for diamond rings to be permissible, or not deep enough for the
heavy black veil she wore.
So that, in short, it was now almost universally admitted that this
person with the too showy carriage and horses, and the dangerously
pretty face, was an individual to be avoided, and it was decided that
her reluctance to enter the best society of the place, when that
society had held out its uninviting arms to her, arose from a
wholesome fear that the wise women of the place would “find her out.”
Mr. Rose read Mrs. Dale’s note twice through, very slowly, as if
trying to discover hidden meanings in its simple words. Then he looked
at his wife, who was watching him rather anxiously.
“Well, my dear, and what do you think?” asked he.
It pleased him to ask her opinion thus on most things, not that he
ever had any intention of heeding her wishes in preference to his own,
but in the hope that she would express some modest inclination one way
or the other, to give him an impetus in the opposite direction.
“I think, dear, that it would hardly do,” murmured the lady, hoping
that for once her husband would fall in with her views. “You must have
heard the way in which people talk about this Mrs. Dale, so that it
would be thought very strange if we let Mabin stay with her. Don’t you
think it was rather underhand of her to get hold of the child this
afternoon?”
“Underhand! Certainly not,” replied Mr. Rose with decision. “The most
natural thing in the world, considering how kind she was to the girl
at the time of her accident. And as for the talk of the place, why, if
you listened to all the old women say you would never go outside your
door for fear your neighbors should think you were going to steal
their hens!”
There was a pause. She would not irritate him by another remark. So he
presently went on:
“I suppose you think the Vicar’s wife would scold you?”
“Not scold, of course, but I am sure she would disapprove,” said Mrs.
Rose meekly.
“Ah! I thought so. Well, I will give the old lady something to talk
about then. Mabin shall stay with Mrs. Dale if she wishes.”
Mrs. Rose sighed heavily.
“She will wish it, of course. Girls always wish to do the very things
which are not proper for them.”
“You may be quite satisfied, Emily, that what I allow my daughter to
do is quite proper,” said Mr. Rose severely, as he left the room.
Mrs. Rose sighed. She had not told him, because it would have been of
no use, that she had to be more particular than he about Mabin,
because, being the girl’s step-mother only, she was the more exposed
to the gossip of the neighborhood--a force she dreaded--than her
husband was. But she vented her ill-humor on Mabin herself, whom she
informed very acidly that if she chose to go to “this Mrs. Dale,” and
was not comfortable with her, the fault was hers and her father’s.
Mabin received these remarks meekly, rejoicing in the approaching
holiday. She had nothing very serious to complain of in her treatment
under her father’s roof, but the snubs of her father, the tacit
dislike of her step-mother, and the fact that the difference in age
between her half-sisters and herself left her much alone, all combined
to make her welcome the change.
Emily and Ethel, who were fourteen and twelve years of age, insipid
and spiritless young persons with little brown eyes and little brown
pigtails, teased her with questions about her visit of the afternoon.
“Is it true that her hair’s dyed?” asked Emily, getting Mabin into a
corner after tea.
“No, of course it’s not,” was the indignant answer.
“Oh, well, you needn’t be so angry. Miss Bradley said she was sure it
was, and that she knew the very stuff she used.”
“Miss Bradley had better try the stuff on her own wisp then,” retorted
Mabin angrily.
“What is the house like inside, Mabin?” asked Ethel, who, though only
twelve, was quite as great a gossip as there was in the parish.
“Why, there were chairs and tables in it, just as there are in every
other house. What do you suppose it was like?”
“Mabin, don’t snub the children. Their interest is very natural,” said
Mr. Rose peevishly from the other end of the room.
“Horsehair and mahogany, red moreen curtains, and a black marble clock
on the mantelpiece,” said Mabin laconically.
“Why, that doesn’t sound very nice, that you should be in such a hurry
to go there!” objected Ethel. “But perhaps the other rooms are
better.”
“Very likely,” said Mabin.
But Mabin was really just a little bit alarmed at her own good fortune
in getting her father’s consent so easily. She had a superstitious
feeling, in spite of her reputed strength of mind, that anything worth
having ought to be rather difficult to get. In spite of all her
loyalty to her heroine, too, she thought more often than she wished
about Rudolph’s ridiculous fancy that Mrs. Dale was watched. And
although she always dismissed the thought by saying to herself that
Rudolph was in love with the lovely widow, and therefore “fancied
things,” she was anxious to meet him again and to learn whether he
still thought that the fair tenant of “The Towers” was being watched.
In the mean time great confusion reigned at “Stone House.”
Everybody was immersed in the horrors of “packing up,” and it was
impossible to go upstairs without encountering people staggering under
the burden of a heap of things which would have been better left
behind. Even the authority of Mr. Rose, who disliked the daily routine
to be disturbed, failed to get any meal eaten at the proper time, or
without unnecessary hurry.
Even the fact that Mr. Rose’s old friend Mrs. Haybrow was expected on
a short visit before the migration, failed to check the fury of the
packers. It was unfortunate that she should come at such a time,
certainly. But Mrs. Rose reckoned on inflaming her friend’s mind with
her own zeal, and inwardly proposed orgies of competitive
trunk-filling to while away the visitor’s time.
Mrs. Rose secretly hoped, too, that Mrs. Haybrow, through her
connections at Todcaster, would be able to furnish her husband with
proofs that Mrs. Dale was not a person to be encouraged. It was not
yet too late to put off Mrs. Dale, although Mr. Rose had called upon
that person to thank her for the invitation to his daughter and to
accept it.
It was the day of Mrs. Haybrow’s expected arrival, and Mr. and Mrs.
Rose had driven to the station to meet her. Mabin, wondering whether
the visitor, whom she had not seen since she was a child, would be
“nice,” was hobbling along the garden path, rather painfully indeed,
but at last without a crutch, when she heard a great rustling of the
branches of the lilac bushes which grew close under the wall.
And then, above the wall, she saw the face of Rudolph.
“Oh!” cried Mabin, with a little fluttering of the heart. “I--I
thought you had gone back to your ship!”
“Why, so I had,” replied Rudolph, raising himself so that she had a
view of his shoulders as well as of his head. “But I’ve come back
again, you see.”
“I can guess what brought you!” said Mabin, wishing the next moment
that she had not uttered the words.
Rudolph took her up quickly.
“Can you? Well then, what was it?”
Mabin blushed scarlet. Of course the thought that was in her mind that
the charms of the fascinating widow had drawn him to Stone. And just
the least little twinge of nascent jealousy had given a sting of pique
to her tone. But she would not for the world have owned to this; and
the mere thought that he might have guessed it was misery. As she did
not answer, Rudolph shook his head.
“I don’t think you are quite as clever as you suppose,” he said. “And
I don’t choose to tell you what brought me back. But I may just warn
you that you are likely to get tired of the sight of me before I do go
away altogether, as I can get as much leave as I like while my ship is
at Portsmouth. Rather alarming prospect, isn’t it?”
“You will get tired of being on shore, won’t you?” asked Mabin, not
feeling equal to answering him in his own tone, which was what her
parents and the Vicarage people would have called “flippant.”
“That depends,” said Rudolph, looking down with interest at the
dried-up blossoms of the lilac trees.
Mabin glanced at him, and began to hope nervously that she might not
see too much of him. She had never seen a man whom she considered so
handsome as this brown-faced young lieutenant with the merry black
eyes, who made her feel so ridiculously shy and stiff. And the very
attraction he had for her seemed to the simple young girl alarming,
since she raised him in her maiden fancy to a pinnacle from which such
a peerless creature could never descend to her.
In spite of herself her tone sounded cold and constrained, therefore,
as she cut short the pause in the conversation by asking if they were
all well at the Vicarage.
“Quite well, thank you,” answered Rudolph demurely. “I suppose that
kind inquiry is meant for a snub, isn’t it? And intended to imply that
I ought not to have addressed you in this informal manner over the
wall, but that I ought to have called in the proper manner at the
other side of the house?”
“It wasn’t meant to imply that,” replied Mabin with solemn
straightforwardness. “Only I wanted to say something, and I had
nothing better to say. I must tell you that everybody says that I have
no conversation.”
“People allow you very few good points, according to your account.”
“Quite as many as I have, though!”
“Well, at least, then you have one merit of unusual modesty.”
Mabin looked up at him steadily and frankly.
“It’s rather difficult for me to talk to you, because I can never tell
whether you are serious or only laughing at me. Don’t you
rather--rather _puzzle_ Mrs. Bonnington?”
“Well, I am afraid I rather--rather shock her too.”
“We must all seem, down here, very antediluvian to you. There is only
one person about here you can speak to in your own way.”
“Mrs. Dale?”
To Mabin’s fanciful and rather jealous eyes it seemed that Rudolph’s
color grew a little deeper as he uttered the name.
“Yes.”
“Ah! You will have an opportunity of learning the art, if you are
going to stay with her.”
“But it is an art which will be entirely useless when I get back here
again. Papa and mamma would think it rather shocking. Do you know, if
they knew how lively Mrs. Dale is in her ordinary talk they wouldn’t
let me go to her?”
“Then I shouldn’t tell them, if I were you. You will find a use for
the art of conversation some day, you know, when you come across other
frivolous and good-for-nothing young persons, like Mrs. Dale and me.”
Mabin would rather he had not coupled his name with that of the lovely
widow.
“Were Mr. and Mrs. Bonnington interested to hear you had been to see
her?” asked Mabin, feeling as she spoke that this was another
indiscretion.
But Rudolph began to laugh mischievously.
“They would have been extremely ‘interested,’ I am sure, if they had
heard of it,” said he. “But I have too much consideration for my
parents to impart to them any information which would ‘interest’ them
too deeply to be good for their digestions. I suppose you think that
shocking, don’t you?”
But Mabin was cautious. There was more than one gulf, she felt,
between her and the merry young sailor, and she was not going to make
them any wider.
“I’m sure you do what is best,” she said modestly.
“I’ve got something to tell you,” said he. “But it’s rather a
confidential communication, and these lilac bushes extend a long way.
Will you come nearer to the wall? Or may I get over it?”
“You may get over if you like,” said Mabin, coming as she spoke a
little nearer to the bushes.
Rudolph availed himself of the permission in the twinkling of an eye,
and stood beside her on the grass path under the limes, looking down
at the pretty nape of the girlish neck, which showed between the soft
brown hair and the plain, wide turn-down collar of pale blue linen
which she wore with her fresh Holland frock.
“The man--I told you about the man I saw watching ‘The Towers,’ well,
he has disappeared,” said Rudolph, not sorry to have an excuse for
whispering into such a pretty little pink ear.
“Oh! I am glad!”
“So I hope we shall see no more of him.”
“And do you still think--surely you can’t still think--that he was
watching Mrs. Dale?”
“Oh, well, don’t _know_, of course. And at any rate the slight
objection I had to your going to ‘The Towers’ has disappeared.”
Mabin felt a strange pleasure at the interest implied in this concern
for her. There was a pause, broken by Mabin, who suddenly started, as
if waking from a dream.
“The carriage!” cried she. “They have come back. I must go in.
Good-by.”
She held out her hand. He took it, and detained it a moment.
“I may come and see you sometimes, when you are at ‘The Towers,’
mayn’t I? For old acquaintance’ sake?”
“Or--for Mrs. Dale’s!” said Mabin quickly, as she snatched away her
hand and ran into the house.
She was not so silly as not to know where the attraction of ‘The
Towers’ lay!
Mrs. Rose’s lumbering old landau, which made such a contrast to Mrs.
Dale’s smart victoria, had returned from the station, and as it drove
slowly along the road past ‘The Towers,’ Mrs. Rose was just finishing
to Mrs. Haybrow a long recital of her difficulties in connection with
the doubtful new resident.
Mr. Rose had chosen to come back on foot, so his wife could pour out
her tale without interruption or contradiction.
“There,” she cried below her breath, as they came close to the gates
of ‘The Towers,’ “you will be able to see her. She is standing just
inside the garden, calling to her little dog. Don’t you think that a
little dog always looks rather--rather _odd_?”
Mrs. Haybrow thought that this was somewhat severe judgment, but she
did not say so. She got a good view of the mysterious lady in black;
for Mrs. Dale raised her golden head as the carriage passed, and she
and Mrs. Rose exchanged a rather cool bow.
To the great surprise of her companion, Mrs. Haybrow fell suddenly
into a state of intense excitement.
“Why, it’s Dolly Leatham, little Dolly Leatham!” she cried with
evident delight. “The idea of my meeting her down here! I haven’t seen
the child for years.”
“You know her then?” asked Mrs. Rose, in a tone which in relief was
mingled with disappointment at the collapse of her own suspicions.
“I used to know her very well. She was the belle of that part of
Yorkshire. The last I heard of her was that she was engaged to be
married to some man who had a lot of money; and they said she was
being hurried into it by her people rather against her will.”
“Well, she has managed to get rid of him,” said Mrs. Rose coldly. “You
see she is in widow’s dress now.”
“Yes, so I see. Poor Dolly! It seems rather strange to find her here,
so far from all her friends! And the things you have told me.”
After a pause Mrs. Haybrow said decidedly: “I must call upon her
to-morrow--No, I’ll go and see her at once. There will be plenty of
time before dinner, won’t there? There’s something mysterious about
this, and I must find out what it is.”
So, when she had had a cup of tea, Mrs. Haybrow went straight to “The
Towers.”
She remained there a long time, so long that Mrs. Rose wondered what
the ladies could have to say to each other. And when at last Mabin,
who was watching at the drawing-room window for her return, called out
that she was coming up the garden, the girl added: “Oh, mamma, how
pale she looks!”
“She is tired, no doubt,” said Mrs. Rose, as she left the room to meet
her friend as the latter came in.
But she also was surprised to see how white Mrs. Haybrow had grown.
“You should have waited until after dinner. You look quite worn out,”
she said. “Well, and what had your friend got to say to you?”
Mrs. Haybrow paused, as if too much exhausted to answer at once. Then
she said quietly:
“I was mistaken. She was not my friend after all.”
“Not your friend! Dear me! You were so long gone that we were quite
sure she was.”
“No. She is very nice, though, quite a charming woman.”
“Ah!” exclaimed Mrs. Rose suspiciously. “But what do you think about
her having Mabin?”
There was another slight pause before Mrs. Haybrow answered: “I am
sure you may be quite satisfied about that.”
But when dinner was over, Mrs. Haybrow got Mabin to take her to see
the new ducks that Mr. Rose was so proud of; and on the way back she
asked the girl whether she was very anxious for her visit to “The
Towers.” And finding that she was, Mrs. Haybrow added:
“And of course, dear, if anything were to happen while you were there,
which seemed to you rather strange or unusual, you would write or
telegraph to papa and mamma, at once, wouldn’t you?”
“Of course. I see,” went on Mabin, smiling, “that mamma has managed to
infect you already with her own suspicions of poor Mrs. Dale.”
“No, dear, she seemed to me a very nice woman indeed, and very anxious
to have you. But I am getting old, and I am nervous about girls away
from their homes. That is all.”
And she turned the conversation to another subject.