page break

Chapter XVII. On the Lawn.

Mabel had not the vexation of hearing General Hawke say that same evening to the butler, ‘If Mrs. Lancaster calls again, Stevens, Miss Ashley is not at home.’

This unkind precaution was not needed, for Flora did not dream of going to Pensand again.

Anthony Strange appeared several times in the next two or three weeks, and, with the good manners which came naturally from his good heart, made himself so pleasant that Mabel was able to forget that unfortunate afternoon, and to talk to him as she did at first, openly and happily. The one drawback to his visits was his dislike to Fluffy. Anthony had a constitutional hatred of cats, and it was a very strong mark of his affection for Mabel that he could bear to sit quietly and talk to her, while the kitten was lying in her lap or playing about at their feet.

One beautiful evening Anthony had stayed rather later than usual. There was a sort of golden solemnity brooding over the world, floating down from under great purple clouds, which gathered as the afternoon waned. For a long time Pensand itself was in the shadow of these clouds, and the landscape it overlooked, the masses of distant wood, the meeting of the waters,—all glowed in that golden light, with beautiful deep burnished colours, like a glorious picture of some other world. Anthony had been talking about Paradise, as it was imagined by different poets and painters in the varying spirit of their age; and suddenly discovering how late it was, he left Mabel with solemnised thoughts, to go on page 156 fancying for herself as she sat at the edge of the lawn, with the great magnolia still in flower on the terrace-wall below.

Presently the little dark figure in the shady hat was spied by somebody else from the windows, and he came across the lawn, walking lightly, so that she did not hear him till he was close to her. Then she looked round suddenly, and saw Randal standing behind her.

‘O Randal!’ she said.

He found it very pleasant to be welcomed back by such a bright smile, and had the satisfaction of feeling sure that Mabel was anything but a plain girl. Her eyes were quite beautiful, he decided; her features were not at all bad, and her expression, especially when she looked at him, was wonderfully pretty. Somehow she had lost the pinched distressed look which she had brought from the uncongenial atmosphere of school.

Randal lay down on the grass with a contented air, played with Fluffy, and looked up smiling at Mabel.

‘Here I am at last,’ he said. ‘If you only knew how the thought of this pulled me through those hot tiring days!’

‘Yes; this is a contrast to London,’ said Mabel, her eyes wandering away again to the golden distance. ‘How can anybody wish to live in London, when there is this to look at always!’

‘That’s all very well, Mabel, but it rains sometimes. And in London rain makes no difference.’

‘We shall never agree about that.’

‘Well, at any rate, there will always be Pensand,’ said Randal. He saw she did not follow his thoughts at all, and went on after a moment: ‘What have you been doing all this time? Have you finished the books?’

Mabel blushed violently. ‘No,’ she said, under her breath. Then venturing a glance at Randal, she saw such a curious smile on his face that she could not help page 157 staring at him. At first she thought it was not at all pleasant; then she could not feel sure, and wondered what he meant; he certainly did not look angry with her. Then she seemed suddenly to know all about it.

‘You met Mr. Strange just now,’ she said, ‘and he told you.’

‘Mabel, you are a witch. How do you know that?

‘Something in your face told me.’

I must keep better guard over my face,’ said Randal. ‘I cannot have my thoughts read in spite of me. But you are right, you know. Let me observe that Anthony Strange is a most extraordinary fellow.’

‘I hope you are not very angry with him,’ said Mabel.

‘We parted in peace. Do you know the origin of the word “silly”? It was not always opprobrious. Seely, selig, which means blessed. People born without their full share of wits were supposed in old times to have something heavenly about them—why, I don’t know, as they are generally mischievous—to be under special protection. The idea lingers in the term “innocent.” “A poor innocent,” the country people say, when they wish to describe an idiot.’

‘That is very funny,’ said Mabel quietly, and colouring a little. ‘But what has it to do with your meeting Mr. Strange?’

‘Nothing, unless you like. But you asked me if I was angry with him, and those remarks occurred to me at the moment. We won’t go further into that just now.’

‘But you said the other day he was a genius,’ said Mabel, rather inclined to be angry for Anthony.

‘An extraordinary genius; a remarkable fellow altogether. But I was telling you about our meeting; it was on the hill there, not many minutes ago. He began by looking rather stiff, and I thought he was not going to speak to me. But he changed his mind, and without page 158 any preparatory remarks whatever went into those books. He wished to spare you the trouble of telling me what had happened to them. I don’t know when I have admired Anthony so much. It is not every man, even if he is a clergyman, who has the spirit to insult another man without being sure that there is a good reason for it. He asked me how I dared to give you such books to read. After I had heard his opinion of them, I ventured to observe that I had not read them myself. Then dear old Anthony saw he had gone a little too far. “If you had read them,” he said, “you never would have brought them to her.” “From what you say of them, most probably not,” I answered him. “But I only knew they were universally admired.” This set Anthony off on the wickedness of the age. He soon talked himself into a better temper, and was inclined to apologise for his violence towards the books and me. As it was Anthony, of course there was nothing more to be said. We parted in peace, as I told you. Now I daresay the books were rubbish, and deserved to be torn up—most books do. But Anthony was not justified in taking the law into his own hands. A bad precedent, making yourself judge and executioner of another person’s property. What do you think? It must have vexed you very much at the time.’

‘Yes, it did,’ Mabel confessed.

‘A childish proceeding altogether,’ said Randal. ‘If he had said to you in his patriarchal way, “My dear young friend, these books are not fit for you to read,” your dutiful nature would have led you to put them away on a shelf. But this tearing-up business was foolish, unworthy of Anthony, one would say, if one did not know him pretty well. I owe you an apology, however, for bringing you into anything so disagreeable. That is all I care about. Will you forgive me, and believe in my good intentions?’

‘Yes, indeed I will,’ said Mabel earnestly.

page 159

‘Thank you. Then we are forgiven all round—Anthony, the books, and me. Now let us talk about something pleasanter.’

Mabel wondered a little whether Randal would have dismissed the subject from his mind so easily, if he had known all that followed on that tearing-up scene. But it was altogether a sad and uncomfortable recollection, and she had no wish to keep it uppermost in her thoughts. And Randal began talking of such delightful things that she soon forgot all about it.

‘It is a shame,’ he said, ‘that you have never been on the water down there. One of these days we will have the boat out, and row up the river a little way. Would you like that?’

‘More than anything I can imagine at this moment,’ said Mabel. ‘I wish we were there now, down in that golden glow where that little boat is sailing. How lovely it would be!’

‘I am far too contented here to wish myself anywhere else,’ said Randal.

‘O Randal,’ exclaimed Mabel, ‘I have something to tell you! Mrs. Lancaster came one day.’

‘Did she?’ said Randal.

His face was bent down and he was studying some little flower in the grass.

‘I suppose,’ said Mabel, ‘as she heard nothing from us, she thought the General would not object. And he really did not seem to mind much. He saw her, and was quite polite and kind.’

‘Let me observe,’ said Randal, in his sleepiest voice, ‘that my father has his faults, like other old men; but is not absolutely an ogre or a Giant Despair. Did you expect him to treat Mrs. Lancaster with any personal rudeness?’

‘O no, of course not,’ said Mabel rather hastily. ‘Did you think she would come, Randal?’

page 160

‘No, not much. And yet I ought to have considered that you were the attraction.’

‘I am not much of an attraction,’ said Mabel. ‘She is very sweet and charming; but I don’t think she can be very happy, poor thing. There is something uneasy about her.’

‘Yes; I know what you mean,’ said Randal. ‘She is not quite sure of her position—nor of Dick. I don’t wonder, for he is about as slippery a fish as swims in the Mora.’

‘I hate to hear of those things,’ said Mabel, getting up. ‘Do you know that it is nearly dinner-time?’

‘Pray don’t hate; it is spasmodic, and like Anthony Strange,’ said Randal.

Mabel gave him a rather impatient glance; she did not like that indifferent cynical manner of his. But he answered her with a smile that made her little anger seem ridiculous, and they two and Fluffy walked very happily together across the lawn.