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Mrs. Lancaster’s Rival

Chapter V. Up the River

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Chapter V. Up the River.

Kate Northcote was a woman of a very hopeful nature, and when she walked down that afternoon with her nephew to the quay, she had dismissed all troublesome fears, and thought of nothing but the pleasure of having him with her again.

All was quiet in the hot afternoon: the fishwomen were sitting in the shadow of their houses: the tide, nearly full, was plashing gently against the great stones and the rusty chains. A blue hot stillness lay on the scarcely-moving water; the air was very clear, and every touch of colour shone out brilliantly. The boatmen had not forgotten Dick; they came down one by one to speak to him. They all knew his aunt, too, and had a rough sort of bow and a smile for her. The waterside people counted Miss Northcote among their few friends. She was not afraid of speaking to them, and they knew that what she said was always true. Several boats were at Dick’s service, and he chose one belonging to Matthew Fenner, a son of the old man in the lane, a fine quiet-looking young fellow, who had married the wrong woman, and thus had made life a harder struggle than it need have been. Sometimes his wife was too much for Matthew, and drove him to spend a day or two in the public-house; after these experiences he would sneak down any back alley to avoid meeting Miss Northcote, and hearing what she thought of him. To-day he came forward frankly enough, smiling quietly when he met her eyes, and carefully arranged a cushion for her in the stern of his boat. Dick took his place there too, page 38 thinking it would be hot work pulling, and he might as well arrive at Pensand cool. Matthew took the oars, the most picturesque of boatmen, with his long black beard, round straw hat pushed back, and dark blue jersey, and with a few strong strokes brought them out into the river. Away from the quay, the first thing they passed was St. Denys Combe, wild, romantic, and lonely, though so near the town. One or two rocky paths and a narrow lane led down into it, and old trees grew picturesquely on its steep banks, hanging over the rocks where St. Denys people loved to sit on summer evenings, when the tide was full. From the upper windows of Miss Northcote’s house, and of several other houses on the brow of the hill, one could see right down into the combe, and people who went there to read Tennyson or otherwise pass their time were apt to forget this.

Then the boat passed along the shore, under the cliff, till it swung round to the right, into the Penyr, a stiff bit of rowing, as Dick remembered very well. Pulling up the stream of the Penyr, with its strong current, was also hard work. They advanced slowly, even with Matthew’s strength of arm, but Miss Northcote was quite satisfied. She had not rowed up here for years, and the beauty of the banks was a delight to her. On the left bank were wild steep cliffs, sometimes thickly clustered over with trees, sometimes shelving down with stony faces to the water. Over the wildest of them ivy hung and trailed gracefully, and here and there they were broken into small red fields, or a cottage with its bright garden was couched among the ledges. On the right bank, thick shady woods crept down to the beach, with sunny breaks which gave a glimpse of green park sward. Kate loved the left bank best, her St. Denys side, the purple rocks with their embroidery of springing wild flowers.

Some way up the river they came to the mouth of page 39 Pensand Combe, and had to pass carefully in between the sandbanks. There were a few gray scattered houses at the mouth of the combe, built along a narrow lane which skirted it. There was the mill, of which Anthony Strange had told Mabel, a mass of rough stone building, clothed with the ivy and moss of years. Under its rugged wall the great black wheel was working, and sending out a rush of green and yellow water into the stream.

Then the combe grew narrower, and the trees came down and hung over it, while the Castle above seemed quite close; then the boat had glided on, right up into Pensand, where the fishing-boats were pulled up on the beach, and the children were playing in and out of them, and another rushing mass of water came pouring out of the low arch under the second mill. Matthew Fenner ran the boat ashore a little below this; his passengers got out, and set off to walk up to the Castle. When they reached it, Miss Northcote rather tired with toiling up the hill, they found the drawing-room empty. But Dick, looking out of the window, was aware of somebody in a low chair not far off, in a shady corner of the lawn. The butler, apparently, did not know she was there, and was gone away in some other direction to look for her. Dick pointed her out to his aunt.

‘Rest yourself,’ he said. ‘These chairs look promising. I’ll go out and fetch her.’

Mabel was sitting turned away from them, with her face to the view, and a book in her hand, which she had taken out of the small drawing-room. She was a little tired, after the morning’s walking and clambering, and was inclined to be quite happy. It seemed as if life in such a beautiful place could never be wearisome. It seemed too as if from morning till night she would have nothing to do but to please herself. Dick’s step on the grass, a very different one from the General’s, disturbed page 40 her suddenly from her enjoyment of book and view. She looked round, and saw him standing close to her. Poor little Mabel! It was so unexpected, and her heart gave a jump of joy. Then she remembered how bad he was, how much she ought to dislike him, and that first glad feeling changed itself into a cold shiver.

Dick, not the most penetrating of mortals, was only aware that she started up, dropped her book, picked it up again before he had time to interfere, lifted her eyelids slowly, and looked at him with nothing but surprise.

‘I did not know any one was there,’ she said. ‘How do you do?’ and she put out a stiff passive little hand.

Dick wondered how he could have mistaken her for a schoolgirl of fifteen or sixteen. Miss Ashley, small and helpless as she looked, was certainly grown up. He was piqued by her manner, and wondered what it meant.

‘I was so anxious to know how you were after the journey,’ he said, ‘that I brought my aunt up at once to see you. She is in the drawing-room. You are enjoying Pensand?’

‘Yes, thank you,’ said Mabel. ‘It is very good of Miss Northcote. General Hawke said she would come and see me.’

She went at once towards the window, a little in advance of Dick, who followed her in anything but a pleasant state of mind. He was not a person to be looked down upon, and treated as nobody. What did she mean by it, and where was all the friendliness of yesterday flown to? She certainly could not know what she was doing—making herself quite at home with a man one day, and treating him the next as if she had never seen him before. Or rather, as if she had some reason for being angry with him, and keeping him at a distance.

‘Well, she need not be afraid,’ said Dick to himself. ‘I shall not persecute her.’

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Miss Northcote saw at once that something was wrong, but could not make out what it was. She was amused, however, at the pity Dick had expressed for this girl, who seemed to her quite contented, quite self-contained, and capable of fighting her own battles. If there was a shade of restless unhappiness, now and then, in Mabel’s look, it vanished, to Miss Northcote’s further amusement, when General Hawke came into the room, and began to talk to Dick. He and his ward were evidently on the best of terms.

Miss Northcote and Dick were equal to the occasion, which was that of finding themselves not quite so welcome as they expected. She felt a little angry with the General, and he with Mabel; but in her, good temper and good manners alike kept any sign of this from being shown, and as to Dick, he was only a little more talkative than usual. General Hawke, remembering him a rather dreamy boy, was surprised at the liveliness with which he described his station life, and laughed heartily at some of his anecdotes. Kate exerted herself at intervals to talk to Mabel, who had not very much to say in return. Her visitor did not take any fancy to her, and thought her an odd-mannered little thing. Once or twice she caught her eyes fixed upon her rather curiously. Kate’s beauty was not of a kind to strike a girl who could be much impressed by Mrs. Lancaster’s: it perhaps needed an educated mind to understand her air, her unconscious grace, the perfection of all the lines about her. Kate was the modern expression of an old race, which had been distinguished in courts and wars for many hundred years. Flora Lancaster was a lovely animal. I speak of their looks, not of their minds, for I do not wish to be hard on Flora without good cause.

General Hawke, as I said before, had a very strong admiration for Miss Northcote. His eyes wandered towards her many times as he listened to Dick, and page 42 when tea came in, and was set down near Mabel, he got up, crossed the room, and took his place beside her.

Dick got up too, and came forward to make himself useful at the tea-table. His wish to have it out with Mabel had been growing all this time, till it was stronger than his discretion. The General was a little deaf, and he and Miss Northcote seemed quite occupied with each other. Dick, as he stooped to take his aunt’s cup from Mabel, gave her a look that the stupidest girl could not have misunderstood, but the like of which she certainly had never received before. Dick had very good expressive eyes; they were the best feature in his face. They asked Mabel very plainly what he had done to offend her; what was the change from yesterday; and a good deal of reproach and sadness, more, perhaps, than he quite meant, added to the effect of the question. Mabel only answered it by blushing crimson, drooping her eyelids very low, and putting a lump of sugar into the cream-jug instead of the General’s cup. This was not unsatisfactory to Dick, and confirmed him in his resolution to know all about it. At any rate it was not mere indifference. Having handed the cups, he came back and sat down near Mabel, and said something about their journey the day before.

‘What has become of your chaperon?

‘O, I don’t know; she is somewhere,’ said Mabel. ‘She is going back to-morrow morning.’

‘Then you will be left alone?’

‘I shall be with the General,’ said Mabel.

‘To be sure.’ Dick was silent for a moment or two; then he went on: ‘You must get the General to take you down the river in his boat. You have no idea how jolly it is. Make him land under those woods I was telling you about yesterday.’

‘Has he a boat?’

‘Of course he has. It is kept down in the combe.

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These summer evenings, after dinner, the best thing he could do.’

‘I don’t know whether he would like it.’

‘Certain to like it, isn’t he, if you ask him?’

Mabel shook her head and smiled. Dick was pleased at having softened the grave little face at last.

‘This is a charming old place, isn’t it?’ he said.

‘Yes; and I believe it really was built by the Britons; for Mr. Strange was here this morning, and said so.’

‘Of course. He told me all I know about it. So you have made acquaintance with Anthony! Isn’t he an odd fellow?’

‘I don’t know. I think he is wonderfully nice.’

‘So he is. There is not a better fellow on this side of the world. I am very glad you like him. You will like Mrs. Strange too, and Carweston perhaps better than either of them, if you like places better than people.’

‘But I don’t.’

‘Are you sure about that?’

‘I don’t know what you mean,’ said Mabel rather coldly.

She was determined not to enter into any jokes with Dick, or to let him be in any way intimate. He had no business to trouble himself about what she liked or did not like. She meant him to see, at any rate, that she disapproved of him. It was rather hard, with his easy manners, and those laughing dark blue eyes watching her all the time. It seemed to become harder every minute, for General Hawke was inconsiderate enough to take Miss Northcote out on the lawn to show her a rose, before Dick and Mabel had finished their tea. It would perhaps have been unreasonable to expect a New Zealander not to seize this opportunity.

‘May I hope that you have forgiven me?’ he said, as soon as the others had stepped out of the window.

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‘I have nothing to forgive you,’ said poor Mabel, in a low voice. She tried to be cold and stiff, but her distress was very evident.

‘O, I thought you seemed vexed when I appeared, and unwilling to talk to me. I thought I must have offended you, though I could not imagine how. But I suppose I was dreaming,’ said Dick.

‘Yes, you must have been,’ said Mabel, looking away towards the window.

‘There is something, though,’ said Dick, half to himself. ‘Miss Ashley, when we parted at the station yesterday we were very good friends. Have I done anything since?’

‘Nothing—of course not. Don’t say any more about it, please.’

Mabel felt as if she could bear this no longer. She would not look at him. She got up suddenly and followed the others out on the lawn. Dick waited a moment, and then walked after her. He did not address her again; and when, a little later, his aunt said it was time to go, he wished her good-bye in a manner as grave and restrained as her own.

‘Your little fellow-traveller seems quite at home, Dick,’ said Miss Northcote, as they walked down the shady avenue.

‘I can’t make her out at all,’ said Dick hopelessly. ‘Is it affectation, do you think? She is not the same girl who was in the train yesterday, telling me all her troubles. She has dressed herself in buckram. There is something in it that don’t satisfy me at all.’

‘I daresay the General has something to do with it,’ said Kate. ‘He has been telling her that a girl in her position must not make friends with stray young men.’

‘What position, pray?’

‘The position of seventy thousand pounds.’

‘You don’t say so! It never occurred to me till this page 45 moment that she had anything at all. What an unworldly fellow I must be! O, well, if she is a stuck-up little heiress, that explains everything. The General need not be afraid; I never would hang up my hat in my wife’s hall. I only hope he won’t marry her to Randal.’

‘Excuse me, Dick,’ said Miss Northcote, beginning to laugh; ‘but I had no idea it was so serious. I thought it was all pity for an unhappy child of about fifteen.’

‘She is quite grown up; you were right there,’ said Dick rather bitterly. ‘Well, she doesn’t want us, and we won’t think about her. If the General is good to her it is all right.’

‘Very well. So much for Miss Ashley. I only envy her one thing—living at Pensand. What glorious ferns!’

‘You should see them in New Zealand,’ said Dick.

‘Come, I won’t have the old country cried down. I never saw anything much lovelier than St. Denys. I won’t have my illusions destroyed by you.’

‘It was only size I meant.’

Dick was hardly in his usual good spirits. His aunt was rather glad when they reached the boat to see him pull off his coat and take up Fenner’s extra pair of sculls. He rowed with great energy, and the boat flew through the water. They were not long in pulling round to St. Denys.

None of them spoke much. Miss Northcote, as she sat in the stern, would have enjoyed a much longer row. It was very pleasant to hear the water splashing gently, to see the birds dipping into it, and the colours deepening and brightening as evening came on. Dick, too, as his strong frame bent to the oar, as he tossed back the hair that fell over his brown forehead, was not—cross as he might be—a bad object for the eyes to rest upon.