"Nothing is more pleasant to the eye," said Lord Bacon, "than
green grass nicely shorn." And truly his quaint Lordship would
have been pleased had he been able to look upon Mrs. Poynter's
grass to-day. It was shorn and shaven as close as the priest of
old who was so unkind as to marry the pretty maid forlorn to that
dreadfully tattered old man we have all known in our story books.
For summer was gone to sleep, and lay prone upon the earth
covered with her dead rose-leaves--only to wake again hereafter.
And now Autumn reigned. The dahlias in the long borders were
shining like coloured stars, and the asters and sunflowers still
upheld their heads. In the smaller beds the good begonias, who
never crave for rest until dread frost compels them, shed great
splendour where they lay. But they are frail things, and drop
from their stems in a night when harsh winds assail them.
June, July, August, all have gone. And with them every thought of
the poor woman who had been done to death so strangely, only
three months ago! One never talked of Mrs. Darkham now, though
every one said a good deal about, Dr. Darkham, who had come back
three weeks ago from that sad trip he had taken to shake off his
grief.
His grief appeared excellently well shaken off, they all said. He
seemed quite to ignore it, indeed, when he returned, looking pale
and thin certainly, but more interested in social surroundings.
He was more full of life than he had ever been before.
Mr. Sparks, a young man staying with the Poynters, who during the
last year had contracted an unfortunate passion for photographing
his friends, was now standing out on the lawn, with his
instrument of torture before him, and his head buried in a dirty
velveteen cloth. He "meant well," as they say, but he never did
it. He was abnormally tall and thin, and his hair fell over his
forehead; the atrocities that he had committed no doubt preyed
upon his conscience. To add to his other misfortunes, he was a
friend of Dicky Browne, who to-day was taking great joy out of
him.
"We'll be taken in a group," decided Mr. Browne, after a long
discussion; "we can be taken separately afterwards, if we have
the courage."
He looked at Mrs. Poynter, who had been most eager to get a
sitting all to herself. She was pretty, and she knew it, and why
shouldn't others know it? She was unaware of Mr. Sparks's
peculiar talent, certainly, or perhaps she would not have been so
desirous of seeing herself or her children--two lovely little
beings of six and eight--once again on paper.
"Now I'm ready, if you are!" roared Mr. Sparks from the centre of
the lawn.
"One minute!" shouted back Dicky Browne.
He was settling everybody, and pulling out their skirts. This
made all the women mad.
"Are you ready?" roared out Sparks again, who was suffocating
from his incessant visits beneath the velveteen cloth. It was a
very warm day.
"One moment." Dr. Dillwyn had just come in, and where was he to
be placed? He made straight for Agatha, and Dicky could not fail
to see the significance of the smile with which she greeted him.
"Is there room for me here?" That was his whisper.
"Yes, yes," she said softly, gently. So he laid his hand on the
arm of her chair, and stood erect.
There was a moment of awful tension. All were putting on their
worst smiles and the most fatally imbecile expression, and Mr.
Sparks was about to withdraw the cap, when a lively crash was
heard and a smothered shriek.
They all sprang to their feet, and the tableau was spoiled. It
was Dicky, of course. As usual, he had chosen the frailest seat
in the place as a support for his rather stout frame--this time
a milking-stool of delicate proportions; and one of the legs had
come off, and now Dicky and it were floundering together on the
floor of the veranda, buried in one common ruin.
The party in the veranda broke up and went here and there through
the gardens, or else back to the tennis-courts. Tea was going on
in a large tent on the lawn, and presently Elfrida, who had
seated herself in a garden-chair outside the tent, and had sent
Lord Ambert for some coffee, saw Mr. Blount standing near her.
Elfrida looked up at him. She was quite alone--a singular
occurrence so far as she was concerned--and for the first time,
therefore, she was able to look at Blount with a critical eye. It
struck her first that he was the youngest-looking man she had
ever seen, and then, for she was fond of analysis, she told
herself she regarded him like that simply because Lord Ambert was
so very far from young.
Presently Blount looked round and saw her, and such a light of
gladness grew upon his face as could not be mistaken.
"Can't I do something for you?" asked he.
"You can indeed; you can sit here beside me and amuse me, and
tell me things."
"Tell you things?" He laughed at this; he was feeling
extraordinarily happy. "What can I tell you that could interest
you?"
"Well, one thing," said this finished coquette, "your Christian
name. When one likes a person, one always wants to know how those
who love him call him."
She smiled at him divinely, bending here pretty head towards him.
She looked very lovely in her exquisite gown--a delicate petunia
shade, clouded with lace--and the curate, looking at her, lost
his head a little. He looked back at her, with all the passionate
and very real love he felt for her showing now openly within his
honest young eyes.
Blount woke from his mad dream, and to a most unpleasant reality.
The Rev. Thomas Blount was a name that could be seen very often
on cards for soirees, or placards for temperance meetings, or
invitations to tea for girls' friendly societies. It hurt him in
some strange way that she had never noticed those cards and
placards. If she had even liked him, she would have felt some
such small interest in him.
"I'll tell you, of course," said he. Yet he hesitated. _Thomas!_
How could he tell her his name was Thomas? It was, indeed, one of
his greatest griefs that he had to sign himself so when he came
to this parish. Thomas was such a respectable name!
"Ah, I know now!" cried Elfrida, as he hesitated. "It is Thomas.
I saw it in a---"
"Oh, really, you know, it is _not_ my name," said Blount. "I'm
always called Tom by my friends."
"Yes?" Elfrida turned and gave him a wonderful little look from
under her hat--a charming hat all covered with violets. "Am _I_
your friend?" asked she.
"My friend?" he stammered, and then stopped. Something in her
face, her eyes, that were looking over her shoulder at some one
approaching, checked another word. He, too, looked hastily
backwards, to see Ambert coming out of the tent and approaching
them, a cup in his hand and a scowl upon his brow. Mrs. Greatorex
and Miss Firs-Robinson were behind him.