Marion Atherstone sat sewing in the cottage garden. Uncertain weather had
left the grass wet, and she had carried her work-table into the shelter of
a small summer-house, whence the whole plain, drawn in purple and blue on
the pale grounding of its chalk soil, could be seen--east, west, and north.
Serried ranks, line above line, of purplish cloud girded the horizon, each
circle of the great amphitheater rising from its shadowy foundations into
pearly white and shining gray, while the topmost series of all soared in
snowy majesty upon a sea of blue, above the far-spread woods and fields.
From these hills, the Dane in his high clearings had looked out upon the
unbroken forests below, and John Hampden had ridden down with his yeomen to
find death at Chalgrove Field.
Marion was an Englishwoman to the core; and not ill-read. From this post
of hers, she knew a hundred landmarks, churches, towns, hills, which spoke
significantly of Englishmen and their doings. But one white patch, in
particular, on an upland not three miles from the base of the hills, drew
back her eyes and thoughts perpetually.
The patch was Knatchett, and she was thinking of Lord Coryston. She had not
seen him for a fortnight; though a stout packet of his letters lay within,
in a drawer reserved to things she valued; but she was much afraid that, as
usual, he had been the center of stormy scenes in the north, and had come
back embittered in spirit. And now, since he had returned, there had been
this defiance of Lady Coryston, and this planting of the Baptist flag under
the very tower of the old church of Coryston Major. Marion Atherstone shook
her head over it, in spite of the humorous account of the defeat of Lady
Coryston which her father had given to the Chancellor, at their little
dinner of the night before; and those deep laughs which had shaken the
ample girth of Glenwilliam.
... Ah!--the blind was going up. Marion had her eyes on a particular window
in the little house to her right. It was the window of Enid Glenwilliam's
room. Though the church clock below had struck eleven, and the bell for
morning service had ceased to ring, Miss Glenwilliam was not yet out
of bed. Marion had stayed at home from church that she might enjoy her
friend's society, and the friend had only just been called. Well, it was
Enid's way; and after all, who could wonder? The excitement of that huge
meeting of the night before was still tingling even in Marion's quiet
Conservative veins. She had not been carried away by Glenwilliam's
eloquence at all; she had thought him a wonderful, tawdry, false man of
genius, not unlikely to bring himself and England to ruin. All the same, he
must be an exhausting man for a daughter to live with; and a daughter who
adored him. She did not grudge Enid her rest.
Ah, there was the little gate opening! Somehow she had expected the
opener--though he had disappeared abruptly from the meeting the night
before, and had given no promise that he would come.
Coryston walked up the garden path, looking about him suspiciously. At
sight of Marion he took off his cap; she gave him her hand, and he sat down
beside her.
"Nobody else about? What a blessing!"
She looked at him with mild reproach.
"My father and the Chancellor are gone for a walk. Enid is not yet down."
"Why? She is perfectly well. If she were a workman's wife and had to get up
at six o'clock, get his breakfast and wash the children, it would do her a
world of good."
"How do you know? You are always judging people, and it helps nothing."
"Yes, it does. One must form opinions--or burst. I can tell you, I judged
Glenwilliam last night, as I sat listening to him."
"Father thought it hardly one of his best speeches," said Marion,
cautiously.
"Sheer wallowing claptrap, wasn't it! I was ashamed of him, and sick of
Liberalism, as I sat there. I'll go and join the Primrose League."
Marion lifted her blue eyes and laughed--with her finger on her lip.
"Hush! She might hear." She pointed to the half-open window on the first
floor.
"And a good thing too," growled Coryston. "She adores him--and makes
him worse. Why can't he _work_ at these things--or why can't his
secretaries prime him decently! He makes blunders that would disgrace an
undergraduate--and doesn't care a rap--so long as a hall-full of fools
cheer him."
"You usen't to talk like this!"
"No--because I had illusions," was the sharp reply. "Glenwilliam was one of
them. Land!--what does he know about land?--what does a miner--who won't
learn!--know about farming? Why, that man--that fellow, John Betts"--he
pointed to the Hoddon Grey woods on the edge of the plain--"whom the
Newburys are driving out of his job, because he picked a woman out of the
dirt--just like these Christians!--John Betts knows more about land in his
little finger than Glenwilliam's whole body! Yet, if you saw them together,
you'd see Glenwilliam patronizing and browbeating him, and Betts not
allowed a look in. I'm sick of it! I'm off to Canada with Betts."
Marion looked up.
"I thought it was to be the Primrose League."
"You like catching me out," said Coryston, grimly. "But I assure you I'm
pretty downhearted."
"You expect too much," said Marion, softly, distressed as she spoke, to
notice his frayed collar and cuffs, and the tear in his coat pocket. "And,"
she added, firmly, "you should make Mrs. Potifer mend your coat."
"She's another disillusion. She's idle and dirty. And Potifer never does
a stroke of work if he can help it. Moral--don't bother your head about
martyrs. There's generally some excellent reason for martyrizing them."
He broke off--looking at her with a clouded brow.
"Marion!"
She turned with a start, the color flooding her plain, pleasant face.
"Yes, Lord Coryston!"
"If you're so critical of my clothes, why don't you come and look after
them and me?"
She gasped--then recovered herself.
"I've never been asked," she said, quietly.
"Asked! Haven't you been scolding and advising me for weeks? Is there a
detail of my private or public life that you don't meddle with--as it
pleases you? Half a dozen times a day when I'm with you, you make me
feel myself a fool or a brute. And then I go home and write you abject
letters--and apologize--and explain. Do you think I'd do it for any other
woman in the world? Do you dare to say you don't know what it means?"
He brought his threatening face closer to hers, his blue eyes one fiery
accusation. Marion resumed her work, her lip twitching.
"I didn't know I was both a busybody--and a Pharisee!"
"Hypocrite!" he said, with energy. His hand leaped out and captured hers.
But she withdrew it.
"My dear friend--if you wish to resume this conversation--it must be at
another time. I haven't been able to tell you before, I didn't know
it myself till late last night, when Enid told me. Your mother--Lady
Coryston--will be here in half an hour--to see Enid."
He stared.
"My mother! So _that's_ what she's been up to!"
"She seems to have asked Enid some days ago for an interview. My father's
taken Mr. Glenwilliam out of the way, and I shall disappear shortly."
"And what the deuce is going to happen?"
Marion replied that she had no idea. Enid had certainly been seeing a great
deal of Arthur Coryston; London, her father reported, was full of talk; and
Miss Atherstone thought that from his manner the Chancellor knew very well
what was going on.
"And can't stick it?" cried Coryston, his eyes shining. "Glenwilliam has
his faults, but I don't believe he'll want Arthur for a son-in-law--even
with the estates. And of course he has no chance of getting both Arthur and
the estates."
"Because of your mother?"
Coryston nodded. "So there's another strong man--a real big
'un!--dependent, like Arthur and me--on the whim of a woman. It'll do
Glenwilliam nothing but good. He belongs to a class that's too fond of
beating its wives. Well, well--so my mother's coming!" He glanced round the
little house and garden. "Look here!" He bent forward peremptorily. "You'll
see that Miss Glenwilliam treats her decently?"
Marion's expression showed a certain bewilderment.
"I wouldn't trust that girl!" Coryston went on, with vehemence. "She's got
something cruel in her eyes."
"Cruel! Why, Lady Coryston's coming--"
"To trample on her? Of course. I know that. But any fool can see that the
game will be Miss Glenwilliam's. She'll have my mother in a cleft stick.
I'm not sure I oughtn't to be somewhere about. Well, well. I'll march. When
shall we 'resume the conversation,' as you put it?"
He looked at her, smiling. Marion colored again, and her nervous movement
upset the work-basket; balls of cotton and wool rolled upon the grass.
"Oh!" She bent to pick them up.
"Don't touch them!" cried Coryston. She obeyed instantly, while, on hands
and knees, he gathered them up and placed them in her hand.
"Would you like to upset them again? Do, if you like. I'll pick them up."
His eyes mocked her tenderly, and before she could reply he had seized her
disengaged hand and kissed it. Then he stood up.
"Now I'm going. Good-by."
"How much mischief will you get into to-day?" she asked, in a rather
stifled voice.
"It's Sunday--so there isn't so much chance as usual. First item." He
checked them on his fingers. "Go to Redcross Farm, see Betts, and--if
necessary--have a jolly row with Edward Newbury--or his papa. Second,
Blow up Price--my domestic blacksmith--you know!--the socialist apostle
I rescued from my mother's clutches and set up at Patchett, forge and
all--blow him up sky-high, for evicting a widow woman in a cottage left him
by his brother, with every circumstance of barbarity. There's a parable
called, I believe, 'The Unjust Servant,' which I intend to rub into him.
Item, No. 3, Pitch into the gentleman who turned out the man who voted for
Arthur--the Radical miller--Martover gent--who's coming to see me at three
this afternoon, to ask what the deuce I mean by spreading reports about
him. Shall have a ripping time with him!"
"Why, he's one of the Baptists who were on the platform with you
yesterday." Marion pointed to the local paper lying on the grass.
"Don't care. Don't like Baptists, except when they're downtrodden." A
vicious kick given to a stone on the lawn emphasized the remark. "Well,
good-by. Shall look in at Coryston this afternoon to see if there's
anything left of my mother."
And off he went whistling. As he did so, the head and profile of a young
lady richly adorned with red-gold hair might have been seen in the upper
window. The owner of it was looking after Coryston.
"Why didn't you make him stay?" said Enid Glenwilliam, composedly, as
she came out upon the lawn and took a seat on the grass in front of the
summer-house.
"On the contrary, I sent him away."
"By telling him whom we were expecting? Was it news to him?"
"Entirely. He hoped you would treat Lady Coryston kindly." Then, with
a sudden movement, Marion looked up from her mending, and her
eyes--challenging, a little stern,--struck full on her companion.
Enid laughed, and, settling herself into the garden chair, she straightened
and smoothed the folds of her dress, which was of a pale-blue crape and
suited her tall fairness and brilliance to perfection.
"That's good! I shouldn't have minded his staying at all."
"You promised to see Lady Coryston alone--and she has a right to it," said
Marion, with emphasis.
"Has she? I wonder if she has a right to anything?" said Enid Glenwilliam,
absently, and lifting a stalk of grass, she began to chew it in silence
while her gaze wandered over the view.
"Have you at all made up your mind, Enid, what you are going to say?"
"How can I, till I know what _she's_ going to say?" laughed Miss
Glenwilliam, teasingly.
"But of course you know perfectly well."
"Is it so plain that no Conservative mother could endure me? But I admit
it's not very likely Lady Coryston could. She is the living, distilled
essence of Conservative mothers. The question is, mightn't she have to put
up with me?"
"I do not believe you care for Arthur Coryston," said Marion, with slow
decision, "and if you don't care for him you ought not to marry him."
"Oh, but you forget a lot of things!" was the cool reply. "You simplify a
deal too much."
"Are you any nearer caring for him--really--than you were six weeks ago?"
"He's a very--nice--dear fellow." The girl's face softened. "And it would
be even sweeter to dish the pack of fortune-hunting mothers who are after
him, now, than it was six weeks ago."
"Enid!"
"Can't help it, dear. I'm made like that. I see all the ugly shabby little
sides of it--the 'scores' I should make, the snubs I should have to put up
with, the tricks Lady Coryston would certainly play on us. How I should
love fighting her! In six months Arthur would be my father's private
secretary."
"You would despise him if he were!"
"Yes, I suppose I should. But it would be I who would write his speeches
for him then--and they'd make Lady Coryston sit up! Ah! didn't you hear
something?"
A distant humming on the hill leading to the house became audible.
Marion Atherstone rose.
"It sounds like a motor. You'll have the garden quite to yourselves. I'll
see that nobody interrupts you."
Enid nodded. But before Marion had gone half across the lawn she came
quickly back again.
"Remember, Enid," her voice pleaded, "his mother's devoted to him. Don't
make a quarrel between them--unless you must." Enid smiled, and lightly
kissed the face bending over her.
"Did Lord Coryston tell you to say that?"
Marion departed, silenced.
Enid Glenwilliam waited. While the humming noise drew nearer she lifted
the local paper from the ground and looked eagerly at the account of the
Martover meeting. The paper was a Radical paper, and it had blossomed
into its biggest head-lines for the Chancellor. "Chancellor goes for
the Landlords," "Crushing attack," "Tories writhe under it," "Frantic
applause."
She put it down, half contemptuous, half pleased. She had grown accustomed
to the mouthings of party politics, and could not do without them. But
her brain was not taken in by them. "Father was not so good as usual last
night," she said to herself. "But nobody else would have been half so
good!" she added, with a fierce protectiveness.
And in that spirit she rose to meet the stately lady in black, whom the
Atherstones' maid-servant was showing across the garden.
"Miss Glenwilliam, I believe?"
Lady Coryston paused and put up her eyeglass. Enid Glenwilliam advanced,
holding out her hand.
"How do you do, Lady Coryston?"
The tone was gay, even amused. Lady Coryston realized at once she was being
scanned by a very sharp pair of eyes, and that their owner was, or seemed
to be, in no sort of embarrassment. The first advantage, indeed, had been
gained by the younger woman. Lady Coryston had approached her with the
formality of a stranger. Enid Glenwilliam's easy greetings suggested that
they had already met in many drawing-rooms.
Miss Glenwilliam offered a seat.
"Are you afraid of the grass? We could easily go indoors."
"Thank you. This does very well. It was very kind of you to say you would
see me."
"I was delighted--of course."
There was a moment's pause. The two women observed each other. Lady
Coryston had taken Marion's chair, and sat erect upon it. Her face, with
its large and still handsome features, its prominent eyes and determined
mouth, was well framed in a black hat, of which the lace strings were tied
under her chin. Her flowing dress and scarf of some thin black material,
delicately embroidered with jet, were arranged, as usual, with a view to
the only effect she ever cared to make--the effect of the great lady, in
command--clearly--of all possible resources, while far too well bred to
indulge in display or ostentation.
Enid Glenwilliam's blood had quickened, in spite of her apparent ease. She
had taken up an ostrich-feather fan--a traditional weapon of the sex--and
waved it slowly to and fro, while she waited for her visitor to speak.
"Miss Glenwilliam," began Lady Coryston, "you must no doubt have thought it
a strange step that I should ask you for this conversation?"
The tone of this sentence was slightly interrogative, and the girl on the
grass nodded gravely.
"But I confess it seemed to me the best and most straightforward thing to
do. I am accustomed to go to the point, when a matter has become serious;
and I hate shilly-shallying. You, we all know, are very clever, and have
much experience of the world. You will, I am sure, prefer that I should be
frank."
"Certainly," smiled Enid, "if I only knew what the matter was!"
Lady Coryston's tone became a trifle colder.
"That I should have thought was obvious. You have been seeing a great deal
of my son, Miss Glenwilliam; your--your friendship with him has been very
conspicuous of late; and I have it from himself that he is in love with
you, and either has asked you, or will ask you, to marry him."
"He has asked me several times," said the girl, quietly. Then, suddenly,
she laughed. "I came away with my father this week-end, that I might, if
possible, prevent his asking me again."
"Then you have refused him?" The voice was indiscreetly eager.
"So far."
"So far? May I ask--does that mean that you yourself are still undecided?"
"I have as yet said nothing final to him."
Lady Coryston paused a few seconds, to consider the look presented to her,
and then said, with emphasis:
"If that is so, it is fortunate that we are able to have this talk--at this
moment. For I wish, before you take any final decision, to lay before you
what the view of my son's family must inevitably be of such a marriage."
"The view of Lord Coryston and yourself?" said Miss Glenwilliam, in her
most girlish voice.
"My son Coryston and I have at present no interests in common," was Lady
Coryston's slightly tart reply. "That, I should have thought, considering
his public utterances, and the part which I have always taken in politics,
was sufficiently evident."
Her companion, without speaking, bent over the sticks of the fan, which her
long fingers were engaged in straightening.
"No! When I speak of the family," resumed Lady Coryston, "I must for the
present, unfortunately, look upon myself as the only sure guardian of its
traditions; but that I intend to be--while I live. And I can only regard
a marriage between my son and yourself as undesirable--not only for my
son--but first and foremost, Miss Glenwilliam, for yourself."
"And why?"
Laying down the fan upon her knee, the young lady now applied her nimble
fingers to smoothing the white and curling tips of the feathers.
The color rushed into Lady Coryston's lightly wrinkled cheeks.
"Because it rarely or never answers that persons from such different
worlds, holding such different opinions, and with such different
antecedents, should marry," she said, firmly. "Because I could not welcome
you as a daughter--and because a marriage with you would disastrously
affect the prospects of my son."
"I wonder what you mean by 'such different worlds,'" said Miss Glenwilliam,
with what seemed an innocent astonishment. "Arthur and I always go to the
same dances."
Lady Coryston's flush deepened angrily. She had some difficulty in keeping
her voice in order.
"I think you understand what I mean. I don't wish to be the least rude."
"Of course not. But--is it my birth, or my poverty, that you most dislike?"
"Poverty has nothing to do with it--nothing at all. I have never considered
money in connection with Arthur's marriage, and never shall."
"Because you have so much of it?" Lifting her broad, white brow from the
fan on her knee, Enid turned the astonishing eyes beneath it on the lady
in black sitting beside her. And for the first time the lady in black was
conscious of the malice lurking in the soft voice of the speaker.
"That, perhaps, would be your way of explaining it. In any case, I repeat,
money has nothing to do with the present case. But, Miss Glenwilliam, my
son belongs to a family that has fought for its convictions."
At this the younger lady shot a satiric glance at the elder, which for the
moment interrupted a carefully prepared sentence.
Enid was thinking of a casual remark of her father's made that morning at
breakfast: "Oh yes, the Corystons are an old family. They were Whigs as
long as there were any bones to pick on that side. Then Pitt bought the
first Lord Coryston--in his earliest batch of peers--with the title and a
fat post--something to do with the navy. That was the foundation of their
money--then came the Welsh coal--et cetera."
But she kept her recollections to herself. Lady Coryston went on:
"We have stood for generations for certain principles. We are proud of
them. My husband died in them. I have devoted my life to them. They are
the principles of the Conservative party. Our eldest son, as of course you
know, departed from them. My dear husband did not flinch; and instead of
leaving the estates to Coryston, he left them to me--as trustee for the
political faith he believed in; that faith of which your father has
been--excuse my frankness, it is really best for us both--and is now--the
principal enemy! I then had to decide, when I was left a widow, to whom the
estates were to go on my death. Painful as it was, I decided that my trust
did not allow me to leave them to Coryston. I made Arthur my heir three
months ago."
"How very interesting!" said the listener, behind the fan. Lady Coryston
could not see her face.
"But it is only fair to him and to you," Arthur's mother continued, with
increased deliberation, "that I should say frankly, now that this crisis
has arisen, that if you and Arthur marry, it is impossible that Arthur
should inherit his father's estates. A fresh disposition of them will have
to be made."
Enid Glenwilliam dropped the fan and looked up. Her color had gone.
"Because--Lady Coryston--I am my father's daughter?"
"Because you would bring into our family principles wholly at variance with
our traditions--and I should be false to my trust if I allowed it." The
conscious dignity of pose and voice fitted the solemnity of these final
words.
There was a slight pause.
"Then--if Arthur married me--he would be a pauper?" said the girl, bending
forward.
"He has a thousand a year."
"That's very disturbing! I shall have to consider everything again."
Lady Coryston moved nervously.
"I don't understand you."
"What I _couldn't_ have done, Lady Coryston--would have been to come
into Arthur's family as in any way dependent on his mother!"
The girl's eyes shone. Lady Coryston had also paled.
"I couldn't of course expect that you would have any friendly feeling
toward me," she said, after a moment.
"No--you couldn't--you couldn't indeed!"
Enid Glenwilliam sprang up, entered the summer-house, and stood over her
visitor, lightly leaning forward, her hands supporting her on a rustic
table that stood between them, her breath fluttering.
"Yes--perhaps now I could marry him--perhaps now I could!" she repeated.
"So long as I wasn't your dependent--so long as we had a free life of our
own--and knew exactly where we stood, with nothing to fear or to hope--the
situation might be faced. We might hope, too--father and I--to bring
_our_ ideas and _our_ principles to bear upon Arthur. I believe
he would adopt them. He has never had any ideas of his own. You have made
him take yours! But of course it seems inconceivable to you that we should
set any store by _our_ principles. You think all I want is money.
Well, I am like anybody else. I know the value of money. I like money and
luxury, and pretty things. I have been sorely tempted to let Arthur marry
me as he has once or twice proposed, at the nearest registry office, and
present you next day with the _fait accompli_--to take or leave. I
believe you would have surrendered to the _fait accompli_--yes, I
believe you would! Arthur was convinced that, after sulking a little, you
would forgive him. Well, but then--I looked forward--to the months--or
years--in which I should be courting--flattering--propitiating you--giving
up my own ideas, perhaps, to take yours--turning my back on my father--on
my old friends--on my party--for _money_! Oh yes, I should be quite
capable of it. At least, I dare say I should. And I just funked it! I had
the grace--the conscience--to funk it. I apologize for the slang--I can't
express it any other way. And now you come and say: 'Engage yourself to
him--and I'll disinherit him _at once_. That makes the thing look
clean and square!--that tempts the devil in one, or the angel--I don't
know which. I like Arthur. I should get a great many social advantages by
marrying him, whatever you may do or say; and a thousand a year to me looks
a great deal more than it does to you. But then, you see, my father began
life as a pit-boy--Yes, I think it might be done!"
The speaker raised herself to her full height, and stood with her hands
behind her, gazing at Lady Coryston.
In the eyes of that poor lady the Chancellor's daughter had suddenly
assumed the aspect of some glittering, avenging fate. At last Lady Coryston
understood something of the power, the spell, there was in this girl
for whom her son had deserted her; at last she perceived, despairingly
perceived, her strange beauty. The long thin mouth, now breathing scorn,
the short chin, and prominent cheekbones denied Enid Glenwilliam any
conventional right indeed to that great word. But the loveliness of the
eyes and hair, of the dark brows, sustaining the broad and delicate
forehead, the pale rose and white of the skin, the setting of the head, her
wonderful tallness and slenderness, these, instinct as the whole woman
was, at the moment, with a passion of defiance, made of her a dazzling and
formidable creature. Lady Coryston beheld her father in her; she seemed to
feel the touch, the terror of Glenwilliam.
Bewilderment and unaccustomed weakness overtook Lady Coryston. It was some
moments before, under the girl's threatening eyes, she could speak at all.
Then she said, with difficulty:
"You may marry my son, Miss Glenwilliam--but you do not love him! That is
perfectly plain. You are prepared none the less, apparently, to wreck his
happiness and mine, in order--"
"I don't love him? Ah! that's another story altogether! Do I love him? I
don't know. Honestly, I don't know. I don't believe I am as capable of
falling in love as other girls are--or say they are. I like him, and get on
with him--and I might marry him; I might--have--married him," she repeated,
slowly, "partly to have the sweetness, Lady Coryston, of punishing you for
the slight you offered my father!--and partly for other things. But you
see--now I come to think of it--there is some one else to be considered--"
The girl dropped into a chair, and looked across the table at her visitor,
with a sudden change of mood and voice.
"You say you won't have it, Lady Coryston. Well, that doesn't decide it for
me--and it wouldn't decide it for Arthur. But there's some one else won't
have it."
A pause. Miss Glenwilliam took up the fan again and played with
it--considering.
"My father came to my room last night," she said, at last, "in order to
speak to me about it. 'Enid,' he said, 'don't marry that man! He's a good
enough fellow--but he'll drive a wedge into our life. We can't find a use
for him--you and I. He'll divide us, my girl--and it isn't worth it--you
don't love him!' And we had a long talk--and at last I told him--I
wouldn't--I _wouldn't_! So you see, Lady Coryston, if I don't marry
your son, it's not because you object--but because my father--whom you
insulted--doesn't wish me to enter your family--doesn't approve of a
marriage with your son--and has persuaded me against it."
Lady Coryston stared into the face of the speaker, and quailed before the
flash of something primitive and savage in the eyes that met her own. Under
the sting of it, however, she found a first natural and moving word, as she
slowly rose from her seat.
"You love your father, Miss Glenwilliam. You might remember that I, too,
love my son--and there was never a rough word between us till he knew you."
She wavered a little, gathering up her dress. And the girl perceived that
she had grown deadly white, and was suddenly ashamed of her own vehemence.
She too rose.
"I'm sorry, Lady Coryston. I've been a brute. But when I think of my
father, and those who hate him, I see red. I had no business to say some of
the things I have said. But it's no good apologizing. Let me, however, just
say this: Please be careful, Lady Coryston, about your son. He's in love
with me--and I'm very, _very_ sorry for him. Let me write to him
first--before you speak to him. I'll write--as kindly as I can. But I warn
you--it'll hurt him--and he may visit it on you--for all I can say. When
will he be at Coryston?"
"To-night."
"I will send a letter over to-morrow morning. Is your car waiting?"
They moved across the lawn together, not speaking a word. Lady Coryston
entered the car. Enid Glenwilliam made her a low bow, almost a curtsey,
which the elder lady acknowledged; and the car started.
Enid came back to the summer-house, sat down by the table, and buried her
face in her hands.
After a little while a hurried step was heard approaching the summer-house.
She looked up and saw her father. The Chancellor's burly form filled up the
door of the little house. His dark, gipsy face looked down with amusement
upon his daughter.
"Well, Enid, how did you get through? Did she trample on you--did she
scratch and spit? I wager she got as good as she gave? Why, what's the
matter, my girl? Are you upset?"
Enid got up, struggling for composure.
"I--I behaved like a perfect fiend."
"Did you?" The Chancellor's laughter filled the summer-house. "The old
harridan! At last somebody has told her the truth. The idea of her breaking
in upon you here!--to threaten you, I suppose, with all sorts of pains and
penalties, if you married her precious son. You gave her what for. Why,
Enid, what's the matter--don't be a fool, my dear! You don't regret him?"
"No." He put his arm tenderly round her, and she leaned against him.
Suddenly she drew herself up and kissed him.
"I shall never marry, father. It's you and I, isn't it, against the world?"
"Half the world," said Glenwilliam, laughing. "There's a jolly big half on
our side, my dear, and lots of good fellows in it for you to marry." He
looked at her with proud affection.
She shook her head, slipped her hand in his, and they walked back to the
house together.