Transcriber's note: Unusual and inconsistent spelling is as printed.
[Illustration: HER LISSOM FIGURE SWAYED WITH EASY GRACE.]
THE DOINGS OF DORIS
BY
AGNES GIBERNE
Author of "Sun, Moon and Stars," "Life's Little Stage,"
"Stories of the Abbey Precincts," "This Wonder-World,"
etc., etc.
"A MAID IN HER EARLY BLOOM."
— J. Whyte-Melville.
LONDON
THE RELIGIOUS TRACT SOCIETY
4 Bouverie Street and 65 St. Paul's Churchyard E.C.
CONTENTS
CHAPTER
I. THE OWNER OF CLOVER COTTAGE
II. BAITING THE GROUND
III. DORIS REBELS
IV. THE MORRIS'S
V. A SECRET AGREEMENT
VI. DORIS LETS HERSELF GO
VII. THE CYCLE RIDE
VIII. MRS. BRUTT SUGGESTS
IX. SUDDEN SILENCE
X. A SURPRISE VISIT
XI. THE PORTRAIT
XII. A LITTLE PLOT
XIII. HAVE I DONE WRONG?
XIV. THE STRANGER
XV. R. R. MAURICE
XVI. THE CRY FROM THE CHÂLET
XVII. A GREAT EFFORT
XVIII. ON THE MOUNTAIN
XIX. A ROTTEN PIECE OF ROCK
XX. ONLY A GIRL!
XXI. A SUPERB RESCUE
XXII. TWO HEARTS DRAWING NEARER
XXIII. ALMOST OVER
XXIV. "BUT I'M AFRAID"
XXV. THE SQUIRE'S ADVICE
XXVI. NOT HER HUSBAND
XXVII. THE EAVESDROPPER
XXVIII. WHAT MRS. BRUTT HEARD
XXIX. WHAT NEXT?
XXX. THE SQUIRE IS MYSTERIOUS
XXXI. THE SQUIRE'S DARK HOUR
XXXII. "YOU DON'T KNOW DICK"
XXXIII. "HOW WILL HE TAKE IT?"
XXXIV. FOILED!
XXXV. WOULD HAMILTON DO?
XXXVI. A SURPRISE MEETING
XXXVII. THE MISCHIEF-MAKER AGAIN
XXXVIII. "WHO WAS MY FATHER?"
XXXIX. "THAT WAS WELL DONE!"
THE DOINGS OF DORIS
CHAPTER I
The Owner of Clover Cottage
"A DELIGHTFUL man!" Mrs. Brutt declared. "Absolutely charming!
Handsome—accomplished—clever—fascinating!" She hung impressively
upon each adjective in turn. "Fortune has showered her gifts upon
him. Has simply showered them."
Mrs. Brutt viewed her present companion as the reverse of charming.
But to one who hated solitude, anybody was better than nobody; and
she had seized a chance to inveigle him indoors, much against his
will.
"Showered—gifts—" he repeated vaguely, his one thought being how to
escape from durance vile.
"Ah, your masculine mind is occupied with weightier matters!" —and
she rippled into laughter. She had a habit, not agreeable to all
hearers, of interlarding her speech with ripples.
"I was speaking of the Squire. As I say—a most attractive character.
So good of him to come and take tea with me in my humble cot!
Overwhelmed as he must be with engagements! I assure you,
I appreciate the compliment."
Mr. Winton's grunt might or might not have spelt acquiescence.
"And his niece—such an attractive woman! So distinguée! That word
does just exactly describe her. Not that I have seen so much of her
as of her uncle." She had met Mr. Stirling three times, and Miss
Stirling once. "But enough to realise what a perfectly unusual
character hers is."
The Rector grunted anew. He never discussed one parishioner with
another; and he hated gossip with a deadly hatred.
"So touching to see his devotion to her—really quite beautiful! I am
told that she has been everything to him since his poor wife's death—
ten years ago, wasn't it? A great sufferer she must have been—and
such a sweet woman. Everybody says so. And now he just leans on his
dear niece. So touching, isn't it?"
No reply. Grim silence.
"Then, too, there is Mr. Hamilton Stirling—a most interesting man.
So full of information. Really, it is a privilege to come across a
mind like his. Do tell me—is it true that he is the heir to all this
property—supposing, of course, that the Squire never marries again?"
She rippled anew. "First-cousin once removed, isn't he?"
"Yes," was the least that the Rector could say.
Mrs. Brutt understood that she would get nothing out of him, and she
resented the fact. Her eyes surveyed with veiled criticism
his ungainly figure, broad and heavy in make, thrown as a blur
against a background of dainty colouring. He wore a rough workaday
apron, suggestive of carpentering, over an ancient coat; both being,
under supposition, never seen outside his shed. But when pressed
for time, he would steal across for a word with his friend the
carpenter; and more than once Mrs. Brutt had captured him en route
in this unclerical guise. He had begun ruefully to see his own lost
liberty, now that a talkative lady, with leisure for everybody's
concerns, had chosen to plant herself within a stone's throw of the
Rectory back-garden gate.
Hitherto the back lane had been little frequented, and he could do as
he chose, with small fear of detection. Though Lynnbrooke had become
a town, its growth had been mainly towards other points of the
compass, leaving the old parish church and the original village
almost untouched.
But Mrs. Brutt, coming for a week's change to the Inn, took a fancy
to a couple of low-rented cottages, standing empty, and decided
to make them her home. She had them transformed into a cosy dwelling,
sent for her furniture, and settled down therein, with much flourish
of trumpets.
For a while she was too busy to give heed to aught beyond the process
of settling in. That ended, she found herself with superabundant time
at her disposal, and during the last two months her presence had been
in the Rector's eyes a standing grievance. He never could pass down
the lane without a risk of being waylaid. Whatever else Mrs. Brutt
might be doing, she seemed to have one eye permanently glued to her
front window.
Capture on Monday afternoon was an aggravated offence. He counted
Monday his own, free for the dear delights of his carpentering shed.
So, though he came in because she insisted, he chafed under the
necessity. Where she put him he remained, watching for the first
chance to get away. Deep-set eyes under shaggy eyebrows rebelled;
and the solid cogitative nose, broad at the tip with a dent in the
middle, twitched impatiently. When she made a pause, he heaved
himself to his feet, capsizing a fragile table.
"Sorry! I hope nothing is damaged." He picked it up gingerly.
"I can't stay longer, I'm afraid. Sermon to write."
"Ah, were you going home to write your next Sunday's sermon?"
The dulcet tones held a sting of unbelief, and naturally, since his
face had been turned the other way. "You don't leave your choice of a
subject till the last moment. So wise of you!"
A twinkle in the deep-set eyes showed appreciation of this. She stood
up slowly.
"And your daughter, Mr. Winton,—the sweet Doris. Do tell me about
her. We have not met for days. I am so interested in that dear girl.
She is so unusual—so charming—so clever and bewitching!"
It was hardly in father-nature not to respond to this,—even though
he did not believe that she meant what she said. He and she had been
antagonistic from the moment of their first meeting. None the less,
he paused in his retreat, that he might hear more.
"I assure you, she has quite taken hold of me. Quite fascinated me.
Such a charming face—hers! I adore hazel eyes, and hers are true
hazel—positive orbs of light." The Rector uttered a silent "Bosh!"
to this. "Now that I am unpacked and arranged, I hope to see a great
deal of that dear child. Tell her so, please, with my love. We are
such near neighbours—" "Much too near!" silently commented the
Rector— "that I hope she will be always in and out. Tell Doris—may I
call her so?—that it will be a real charity, if she will come as
often as possible to my little cot."
Why couldn't she say "cottage" like a sensible being? Mr. Winton
hated being humbugged, and he abhorred gush. Praise of his Doris
was sweet; but he could not quite swallow all this.
Mrs. Brutt studied through draped curtains his swinging stride down
the little pathway.
"Of all uncouth beings! The contrast!" murmured she, setting
alongside a mental picture of the Squire.
"And his wife. Not so uncouth, certainly, but really more
unendurable. The girl's life, under such a regime, must be no joke.
I wonder how she stands it, for my part."
Mrs. Brutt strolled round the room, which was crowded with furniture,
with pictures, and with bric-a-brac ornaments, many of them old and
valuable. She altered the position of one or two, thinking still
about Doris Winton.
"A pretty girl," she murmured,—"and with pretty ways. She might make
a sensation, away from this poky place. I wonder whether, some day,
I could bring her forward. Not an impossible plan. What if I were
to offer to take her abroad? I doubt if the Rector would approve.
He likes me as little as I like him. But if I can get hold of the
girl somehow—" She clapped her hands and laughed aloud. "I have it!
I'll suggest the idea to the Squire. That will do. He simply rules
the neighbourhood."
A ring at the front door took her by surprise. She glided to the
window, just in time for a glimpse. Actually!—it was the Squire
himself. Again—already! The impression she had made on him must have
been agreeable. This flashed through her mind as she fled to the
mantelpiece and anxiously surveyed herself. Although past forty,
she knew that no grey lines had begun to appear in her well-dressed
dark hair; and while she was a plain woman, so far as features were
concerned, she also knew that her figure was good, and that she could
carry herself with the air of being a somebody.
"Mr. Stirling" was announced. He found the lady engrossed in a book,
which she put aside with a dreamy air, before beaming into a
surprised welcome.
"This is a pleasure indeed. A most unexpected pleasure. How kind—how
very kind! Pray sit down."
The Squire had called in passing, to leave a small volume on
architecture which she had said she wished to read. He came in only
to point out a passage bearing on the structure of the parish church;
and he had not meant to stay. But protests proved useless. He, like
the Rector, found that once inside Clover Cottage, it was not easy
to get away.