She was preparing even to welcome with politeness that young Jesuit who had neglected his dying mother, against whom--on the stories she had heard--her whole inner nature cried out....
The sound of a horse approaching. Up sprang the dogs, and she with them.
Helbeck waved his hand to her as he came over the bridge. Then at the gate he dismounted, seeing Wilson in the drive, and gave his horse to the old bailiff.
"Cross the bridge with me," he said, as he joined her, "and let us walk home the other side of the river. Is it too far?"
His eyes searched her face--with the eagerness of one who has found absence a burden. She shook her head and smiled. The little frown that had been marring the youth of her pretty brow smoothed itself away. She tripped beside him, feeling the contagion of his joy--inwardly repentant--and very happy.
But he was tired and disappointed by the day"s result. The contract was not signed. His solicitor had been summoned in haste to make the will of a neighbouring magnate; some of the last formalities of his own business had been left uncompleted; and in short the matter was postponed for at least a day or two.
"I wish it was done," he said, sighing--and Laura could only feel that the responsibilities and anxieties weighing upon him seemed to press with unusual strength.
A rosy evening stole upon them as they walked along the Greet.--The glow caught the grey walls of the house on the further bank--lit up the reaches of the stream--and the bare branch work of a great ruined tree in front of them. Long lines of heavy wood closed the horizon on either hand, shutting in the house, the river, and their two figures.
"How solitary we are here!" he said, suddenly looking round him. "Oh!
Laura, can you be happy--with poverty--and me?"
"Well, I shan"t read my prayer-book along the river!--and I shan"t embroider curtains for the best bedroom--alack! Perhaps a new piano might keep me quiet--I don"t know!"
He looked at her, then quickly withdrew his eyes, as though they offended. Through his mind had run the sacred thought, "Her children will fill her life--and mine!"
"When am I to teach you Latin?" he said, laughing.
She raised her shoulders.
"I wouldn"t learn it if I could do without it! But you Catholics are bred upon it."
"We are the children of the Church," he said gently. "And it is her tongue."
She made no answer, and he talked of something else immediately. As they crossed the little footbridge he drew her attention to the deep pool on the further side, above which was built the wooden platform, where Laura had held her May tryst with Mason.
"Did I ever tell you the story of my great-grandfather drowning in that pool?"
"What, the drinking and gambling gentleman?"
"Yes, poor wretch! He had half killed his wife, and ruined the property--so it was time. He was otter hunting--there is an otter hole still, half-way down that bank. Somehow or other he came to the top of the crag alone, probably not sober. The river was in flood; and his poor wife, sitting on one of those rock seats with her needlework and her books, heard the shouts of the huntsmen--helped to draw him out and to carry him home. Do you see that little beach?"--he pointed to a break in the rocky bank. "It was there--so tradition says--that he lay upon her knee, she wailing over him. And in three months she too was gone."
Laura turned away.
"I won"t think of it," she said obstinately. "I will only think of her as she is in the picture."
On the little platform she paused, with her hand on the railing, the dark water eddying below her, the crag above her.
"I could--tell _you_ something about this place," she said slowly. "Do you want to hear?"
She bent over the water. He stood beside her. The solitude of the spot, the deep shadow of the crag, gave love freedom.
He drew her to him.
"Dear!--confess!"
She too whispered:
"It was here--I saw Hubert Mason--that night."
"Culprit! Repeat every word--and I will determine the penance."
"As if there had not been already too much! Oh! what a lecture you read me--and you have never apologised yet! Begin--_begin_--at once!"
He raised her hand and kissed it.
"So? Now--courage!"
And with some difficulty--half laughing--she described the scene with Hubert, her rush home, her meeting with old Scarsbrook.
"I tell you," she insisted at the end, "there is good in that boy somewhere--there _is_!"
Helbeck said nothing.
"But you always saw the worst," she added, looking up.
"I am afraid I only saw what there was," he said dryly. "Dear, it gets cold, and that white frock is very thin."
They walked on. In truth, he could hardly bear that she should take Mason"s name upon her lips at all. The thoughts and comments of ill-natured persons, of some of his own friends--the sort of misgiving that had found expression in the Bishop"s talk with his sister--he was perfectly aware of them all, impossible as it would have been for Augustina or anyone else to say a word to him on the subject. The dignity no less than the pa.s.sion of a strong man was deeply concerned. He repented and humbled himself every day for his own pa.s.sing doubts; but his resolution only stiffened the more. There was no room, there should never be any room in Laura"s future life, for any further contact with the Mason family.
And, indeed, the Mason family itself seemed to have arrived at very similar conclusions! All that Helbeck knew of them since the Froswick day might have been summed up in a few sentences. On the Sunday morning Mason, in a wild state, with wet clothes and bloodshot eyes, had presented himself at the Wilsons" cottage, asking for news of Miss Fountain. They told him that she was safely at home, and he departed. As far as Helbeck knew, he had spent the rest of the Sunday drinking heavily at Marsland. Since then Laura had received one insolent letter from him, reiterating his own pa.s.sion for her, attacking Helbeck in the fiercest terms, and prophesying that she would soon be tired of her lover and her bargain. Laura had placed the letter in Helbeck"s hands, and Helbeck had replied by a curt note through his solicitor, to the effect that if any further annoyance were offered to Miss Fountain he would know how to protect her.
Mrs. Mason also had written. Madwoman! She forbade her cousin to visit the farm again, or to hold any communication with Polly or herself. A girl, born of a decent stock, who was capable of such an act as marrying a Papist and idolater was not fit to cross the threshold of Christian people. Mrs. Mason left her to the mercy of her offended G.o.d.
And in this matter of her cousins Laura was not unwilling to be governed.
It was as though she liked to feel the curb.
And to-night as they strolled homewards, hand locked in hand, all her secret reserves and suspicions dropped away--silenced or soothed. Her charming head drooped a little; her whole small self seemed to shrink towards him as though she felt the spell of that mere physical maturity and strength that moved beside her youth. Their walk was all sweetness; and both would have prolonged it but that Augustina had been left too long alone.
She was no longer in the garden, however, and they went in by the chapel entrance, seeking for her.
"Let me just get my letters," said Helbeck, and Laura followed him to his study.
The afternoon post lay upon his writing-table. He opened the first, read it, and handed it with a look of hesitation to Laura.
"Dear, Mr. Williams comes to-morrow. They have given him a fortnight"s holiday. He has had a sharp attack of illness and depression, and wants change. Will you feel it too long?"
Involuntarily her look darkened. She put down the letter without reading it.
"Why--I want to see him! I--I shall make a study of him," she said with some constraint.