Two days later, Lady Vera, amusing herself under the broad oaks of the
park with Lady Clive's children, is secretly drawn aside by Hal, the
eldest, with a look of importance on his handsome face.
"Come with me, Vera, away from the nurse and children," he says, with a
confidential air. "I have something for you."
Always indulgent to children, Lady Vera follows the clasp of the small
hand, and is led away to a small summer-house out of range of the keen
eyes of Mark and Dot.
"Now you may sit down, Vera," announces eight-year-old Hal, with owlish
gravity. "I have something to tell you before I give you what I said I
had for you."
Countess Vera sits down obediently. It is a bird's nest, or a
blue-bird's egg, or some such treasure of the summer wood, she thinks
to herself, with a smile, as the little brown hand goes into his jacket
pocket.
"This morning, Vera, I went for a walk with Mark and Dot, and the
nurse," he begins. "We went down into the wood a little way, it was so
cool and green, and the birds sang so sweetly."
"It is surely a bird's egg," Vera says to herself now, keenly approving
her own penetration.
But between the boyish fingers now appears the small corner of a yellow
envelope, which somewhat quickens her curiosity.
"I went off to some distance by myself, and climbed a tree to look
into a bird's nest. Bessie scolded, but I am too old to be bossed by a
nurse, papa says, and so I gave her to understand. Don't you think I am
getting too tall to mind what Bessie says, Lady Vera?" throwing back
his curly head with dignity.
"Much too tall," Lady Vera admits with demure earnestness. "I should
say that you would reach quite to her shoulder."
"Oh, quite," says Hal, in an aggrieved tone. "So, as I was telling you,
Vera, I told Bess to mind her own business. Then I climbed into a great
tree to look into a bird's nest."
"I hope you did not rob the nest and bring me the spoils, Hal," she
begins, reproachfully.
"No, indeed," laughed the lad. "You would not have admired them very
much if I had. The nest was pretty, but the five little naked birds
in it were quite disgusting, I can tell you. Not a feather had grown
on them yet, and their gaping mouths seemed as if they would swallow
one. I came down pretty quick, and almost landed on the head of an old
woman."
"An old woman," Vera repeats, in surprise.
"Yes, a wrinkled, stooping old hag, gathering sticks in the wood. I
gave her a pretty start, I can tell you," cries the boy, laughing at
the remembrance.
"Ah, then, it is a _souvenir_ of the old witch you have brought me,"
says the countess, smiling.
"You have guessed it, Vera. You must be a witch yourself," cries Hal,
in high glee with himself and her. "Here it is, a letter with an
elegant yellow cover--a begging letter, of course," he adds, with a
ludicrous assumption of wisdom.
A start of repulsion goes over Vera as she takes the coarse envelope in
her hand.
She holds it unopened in her hand a moment, wondering at her own
nervousness.
"Are you afraid to open it, Vera?" laughs the boy. "Let me do it for
you, then. The old hag was very mysterious over it, I can tell you. She
bade me tell no one of the letter, not even papa and mamma. You see how
clever I was, getting you away from Bessie and the children."
Lady Vera has torn the coarse envelope open by this time. A half sheet
of paper falls out into her hand. On it is clearly and plainly written
these lines:
"If Lady Fairvale would gain possession of the lost memorandum-book,
let her come down beyond the lodge-gates, half a mile along the road
at dusk this evening. Let her come alone and unwatched, or she will
accomplish nothing. One will be in waiting who will restore the
memorandum-book, and claim the reward."
Thus it ends. Hal looks curiously at her pale, grave face.
"It was a begging letter, wasn't it?" he inquires.
"She certainly wants something of me. I am not sure if she will get it
or not. Hal, promise me not to speak of this to-day to anyone--will
you, dear?"
"Mum's the word. I can keep a secret, you bet," answers the eldest-born
of the Clives, with dreadful slang, acquired, no doubt, in the stables
which he visits daily with his father.
"Thank you, dear, that's a good boy. Now let us go back to Mark and
Dot," says Lady Vera, putting her yellow-covered letter in her pocket.