It was five o'clock in the morning. The low sun shone athwart the cool, green sward of the park, leaving the dells and leafy retreats of the deer in shadow. In the window recess of the hall, whence the eye had that view, and could drink in the freshness of the early morning, the small oak table was laid for breakfast. Old plate that had escaped the melting-pot and the direful year of the new coinage, dragon china imported when Queen Anne was young, linen, white as sun and dew or D'Oyley could make it, gave back the pure light of early morning, and bade welcome a guest as dainty as themselves. Yet Lady Betty, for whom the table was prepared, and who stood beside it in an attitude of expectation, tapped the floor with her foot and looked but half pleased. "Is Lady Coke not coming?" she asked at last.

"No, my lady," Mrs. Stokes answered. "Her ladyship is taking her meal in her room."

"Oh!" Lady Betty rejoined drily. "She's not ailing, I hope?"

"No, my lady. She bade me say that the chariot would be at the door at half after five."

Betty grimaced, but took her seat in silence, and kept one eye on the clock. Had her messenger played her false? Or was Coke incredulous? Or what kept him? Even if he did not come before they set out, he might meet them on the hither side of Lewes; but that was a slender thread to which to trust, and Lady Betty had no mind to be packed home in error. As the finger of the clock in the corner moved slowly downwards, as the sun drank up the dew on leaf and bracken, and the day hardened, she listened, and more intently listened for the foot that was overdue. It wanted but five minutes of the half hour now! Now it wanted but three minutes! Two minutes! Now the rustle of my lady's skirts was on the stairs, the door was opened for her to enter and--and then at last, Betty caught the ring of spurred heels on the pavement of the terrace.

"He's come!" she cried, springing from her seat, and forgetting everything else in her relief. "He's come!"

Sophia from the inner threshold stared coldly. "Who?" she asked. It was the first time the two had met in the morning and had not kissed; but there are bounds to the generosity of woman, and Sophia could not stoop to kiss her rival. "Who?" she repeated, standing stiffly aloof, near the door by which she had entered.

"You will see!" Betty cried, with a bubble of laughter. "You will see."

The next moment Sir Hervey's figure darkened the open doorway, and Sophia saw him and understood. For an instant surprise drove the blood from her cheeks; then, as astonishment gave place to indignation, and to all the feelings which a wife--though a wife in name only--might be expected to experience in such a position, the tide returned in double volume. She, did not speak, she did not move; but she saw that they understood one another, she felt that this sudden return was concerted between them; and her eyes sparkled, her bosom rose. If she had never been beautiful before, Sophia was beautiful at that moment.

Sir Hervey smiled, as he looked at her. "Good morning, my dear," he said cheerily. "I'm of the earliest, or thought I was. But you had nearly stolen a march on me."

She did not answer him. "Lady Betty," she said, without turning her head or looking at the girl, "you had better leave us."

"Yes, Betty, away with you!" he cried, good humouredly. "You'll find Tom outside." And as Betty whisked away through the open door, "You'll pardon me, my dear," he continued quietly, but with dignity, "I have countermanded the carriage. When you have heard what I have to say you will agree with me, I am sure, that there is no necessity for our guest to leave us to-day." He laid his whip aside, as he spoke, and turned to the table from which Lady Betty had lately risen. "I have not broken my fast," he said. "Give me some tea, child."

A wild look, as of a creature caged and beating vain wings against bars, darkened Sophia's eyes. She was trembling with agitation, panting to resist, outraged in her pride if not in her love; and he asked for tea! Yet words did not come at once, his easy manner had its effect; as if she acknowledged that he had still a right to her service, she sat down at the little table in the window bay. He passed his legs over the bench on the other side, and sat waiting, the width of the table only--and it was narrow--between them. As she washed Betty's cup in the basin the china tinkled, and betrayed her agitation; but she managed to make his tea and pass it to him.

"Thank you," he said quietly. "And now for what I was saying. Lady Betty sent me a note last night, stating that she was to go to-day, unless I interceded for her. It was that brought me back this morning."

Sophia's eyes burned, but she forced herself to speak with calmness. "Did she tell you," she asked, "why she was to go?"

Sir Hervey shrugged his shoulders. "Well," he said, with a smile, "she hinted at the reason."

"Did she tell you what I had said to her?"

"I am afraid not," he said politely. "Probably space----"

"Or shame!" Sophia cried; and the next moment could have bitten her tongue. "Pardon me," she said in an altered tone, "I had no right to say that. But if she has not told you, 'tis I must tell you, myself. And it is more fitting. I am aware that you have discovered--all too soon, Sir Hervey--that our marriage, if it could be called a marriage, was a mistake. I cannot--I cannot," Sophia continued, trembling from head to foot, "take all the blame of that to myself, though I know that the first cause was my fault, and that it was I led you to commit the error. But I cannot take all the blame," she repeated, "I cannot! For you knew the world, you should have known yourself, and what was likely, what was certain to come of it! What has come of it!"

Sir Hervey drummed on the table with his fingers, and when he spoke, it was in a tone of apology. "The future is hard to read," he said. "It is easy, child, to be wise after the event."

Her next words seemed strangely ill-directed to the issue. "You never told me that you had been betrothed before," she said, "and that she died. If you had told me, and if I had seen her face--I should have been wiser. I should have foreseen what would happen. I do not wonder that such a face seen again has"--she paused, stammering and pale, "has recalled old times and your youth. I have no right to blame you. I do not blame you. At least, I--I try not to blame you," she repeated, her voice sinking lower and lower. "I have told her, and it is true, that if I could bear all the consequences of our error I would bear them. That if I could release you and set you free to marry the--the woman you have learned to love--I would, sir, willingly. That, at any rate, I would not raise a finger to prevent such a marriage."

"And did you--mean that," he asked in a low voice, his face averted.

"As God sees me, I did."

"You are in earnest, Sophia?" For an instant he turned his head and looked at her.

"I am."

"Yet--you were for sending her away," he said. "This morning? Before I could return? That I might not see her again."

She looked at him with astonishment, with indignation. "Cannot you understand," she cried, "that that was not on my account, but on hers?"

"It seems to have been rather on my account," he muttered doggedly, his fingers toying with the teaspoon, his eyes on the table. He seemed strangely changed. He did not seem to be himself.

She shuddered. "At any rate, it was not on my account," she said.

"And you are still fixed that she must go?"

"Yes."

"Then I'll tell you what it is," he answered with sudden determination, "I'll take you at your word!" He raised his cup, which was half full, and held it in front of his lips, looking at her across it as he spoke. "You said just now that if there was a way to--to give me the woman I loved--you would take it."

She started. For a moment she did not answer.

He waited. At last: "You didn't mean it?" he said, his tone cold.

The room, the high window with its stained escutcheons, the dark oak walls, the dark oak table, the leafage reflected cool and green in the tall mirror opposite the door, went round with her; she swallowed something that rose in her throat, and set her teeth hard, and at length she found her voice. "Yes," she said, "I meant it."

"Well, there is a way," he answered; and he rose from the table, and, moving to the door which led to the main hall and the staircase, he closed it. "There is a way of doing it. But it is not quite easy to explain it to you in a moment. 'Twas a hurried marriage, as you know, and informal, and a marriage only in name. And something has happened since then."

He paused there; she asked in a low tone, "What?"

"Well, it is what took me to Lewes yesterday," he answered. "I should have told you of it then, but I was in doubt how you would take it. And Betty persuaded me not to tell it. The man Hawkesworth----"

He paused, as she rose stiffly from the table. "Have they taken him?" she exclaimed.

"Yes," he said gently. "They took him in hiding near Chichester. But he was ill, dying, it was thought, when they surprised him."

She had a strange prevision. "Of the smallpox?" she asked.

"Yes," he answered. And then, "He died last night," he continued softly. "My dear, let me get you a little cordial."

"No, no! Did you see him?"

"I did. And I did what I could for him. I was with him when he died."

She sat down at the table, hiding her face in her hands. Presently she shuddered. "Heaven forgive him!" she whispered. "Heaven forgive him, as I do!" And again she was silent for some minutes, while he stood watching her. At last, "Was it about him," she asked in a low voice, "that Lady Betty was talking to you on the terrace yesterday?"

"Yes. I asked her advice. I did not know what you might do, if you knew. And I did not wish you to see him."

"But she had another reason," Sophia murmured, behind her hands. "There was another motive, which she urged for keeping it from me. What was it?"

He did not answer.

"What was it?" she repeated, and lowered her hands and looked at him, her lips parted.

He walked up the hall and back again under her eyes. "Well," he said, in a tone elaborately easy, "she is but a child, you know, and does not understand things. She knew a little of the circumstances of our marriage, and she thought she knew more. She fancied that a little jealousy might foster love; and so it may, perhaps, where a spark exists. But not otherwise. That was her mistake."

"But--but I do not understand!" Sophia cried, her hands shaking, her face bewildered. "You said--you told her that you were perfectly indifferent to me."

"Oh, pardon me," Sir Hervey answered lightly. "Never, I am sure. I said, perhaps, that I had done everything to show that I was indifferent to you. That was part of her foolish plan. But there is a distinction, you see?"

"Yes," Sophia faltered, her face growing slowly scarlet. "There is a distinction, I see."

She wanted to cry, and she wanted to think; and she wanted to hide her face from his eyes, but had not the will to do it while he looked at her. Her head was going round. If she had misinterpreted Betty's words on the terrace, and it seemed certain now that she had, what had she done? Or, rather, what had she not done? She had fallen into Betty's trap; she had proclaimed her own folly; she had misjudged her--and him! She had done them foul, dreadful wrong; she had insulted them horribly, horribly insulted them by her suspicions! She had proved the meanness and lowness of her mind! While he had been thinking of her, and for her, still shielding her, as he had shielded her from the beginning--she had been slandering him, accusing him, wronging him, and along with him this young girl, her guest, her friend, living under her roof! It was infamous! Infamous! What had so warped her?

And then, as she sat overwhelmed by shame, a ray of light pierced the darkness. She looked at him, feeling on a sudden cold and weak. "But you--you have not yet explained!" she muttered.

"What?"

"How I can help you to--to----" Her voice failed her.

She could not finish.

"To Betty," he said, seeing her stuck in a quagmire of perplexities. "I do not want Betty."

"Then what did you mean?" she stammered.

"I never said I wanted Betty," he answered, smiling.

"But you said----"

"I said that there was a way by which you could help me to the woman I loved. And there is a way. Betty, in her note to me, will have it that you can do it at slight cost to yourself. That is for you to decide. Only remember, Sophia," Sir Hervey continued gravely, "you are free, free as air. I have kept my word to the letter. I shall continue to keep it. If there is to be a change, if we are to come nearer to one another, it must come from you, not from me."

She turned to the window; and waiting for her answer--which did not come quickly--he saw that she was shaking. "You don't help me," she whispered at last.

"What, child?"

"You don't help me. You don't make it easy for me." And then she turned abruptly to him and he saw that the tears were running down her face. "Don't you know what you ought to do?" she cried, holding out her hands and lifting her face to him. "You ought to beat me, you ought to shake me, you ought to lock me in a dark room! You ought to tell me every hour of the day how mean, how ungrateful, how poor and despicable a thing I am--to take all and give nothing!"

"And that would help you?" he said. "'Tis a new way of making love, sweet."

"'Tis an old one," she cried impetuously. "You are too good to me. But if you will take me, such as I am--and--and I suppose you have not much choice," she continued, with an odd, shy laugh, "I shall be very much obliged to you, sir. And--and I shall thank you all my life."

He would have taken her in his arms, but she dropped, as she spoke, on the bench beside the table, and hiding her face in her hands, began to weep softly--in the same posture, and in the same place, in which she had sat the day before, but with feelings how different! Ah, how different!

Sir Hervey stood over her a moment, watching her. Her riding-cap had fallen off and lay on the table beside her. Her hair, clubbed for the journey, hung undressed and without powder on her neck. He touched it gently, almost reverently with his hand. It was the first caress he had ever given her.

p342
HER HAIR ... HUNG UNDRESSED ON HER NECK. HE TOUCHED IT
GENTLY ... IT WAS THE FIRST CARESS HE HAD EVER GIVEN HER

"Child," he whispered, "you are not unhappy?"

"Oh, no, no," she cried. "I am thankful, I am so thankful!"

* * * * *

"I said I would let you kiss me?" Lady Betty exclaimed with indignation. And her eyes scorched poor Tom. "It's quite sure, sir, I said nothing of the kind."

"But you said," Tom stammered, "that if I didn't do what you wanted, you wouldn't! And that meant that if I did, you would. Now, didn't it?"

Lady Betty shrugged her shoulders in utter disdain of such reasoning. "Oh, la, sir, you are too clever for me!" she cried. "I wasn't at college." And she turned from him contemptuously.

They were at the horseblock under the oak, whither Tom had followed her, with thoughts bent on bold emprise. And at the first he had put a good face on it; but the lesson of the day before, and of the day before that, had not been lost. The spirit had gone out of him. The pout of her lips silenced him, a glance from her eyes--if they were cold or distant, harsh or contemptuous--sent his heart into his boots. He grovelled before her; it may be that he was of a nature to benefit by the experience.

Having snubbed him, she was silent awhile, that the iron might enter into his soul. Then she looked to see if he was sullen; she found that he was not. He was only heartbroken, and her majesty relented. "I said, it is true," she continued, "that--that you might earn your pardon. Well, you are pardoned, sir; and we are where we were."

"May I call you Betty, then?"

Lady Betty's eyes fell modestly on her fan. "Well, you may," she said. "I think that is part of your pardon, if it gives you any pleasure to call me by my name. It seems vastly foolish to me."

He was foolish. "Betty!" he cried softly. "Betty! Betty! It'll be the only name for me as long as I live. Betty! Betty! Betty!"

"What nonsense!" Lady Betty answered; but her gaze fell before his.

"Do you remember," he ventured, "what it was I said of your eyes?"

"Of my eyes?" she cried, recovering herself. "No; of the maid's eyes, if you please. There was some nonsense said of them, I remember."

"It was all true of your eyes!" Tom said, gathering courage and fluency. "It's true of them now! And all I said to the maid, I say to you. And I wish, oh, I wish you were the maid again!"

"That you might be rude to me, I suppose?" she answered, tracing a figure with her fan on the horseblock.

"No," Tom cried. "That I might show you how much I love you. That I might get nothing by you but yourself. Oh, Betty, give me a little hope! Say that--that some day I shall--I shall kiss you again."

Betty, blushing and but half disdainful, studied the ground with a gravity that was not natural to her.

"Well, perhaps--in a year," she faltered. "Always supposing that you kiss no one in the meantime, sir."

"A year, a whole year, Betty!" Tom protested.

"Yes, a year, not a day less," she answered firmly. "You are only a boy. You don't know your own mind. I don't know yet whether you would treat me well. And for waiting, I'll have no one kiss me," Betty continued, steadfastly, "that cannot wait and wait, and doesn't think me worth the waiting. So, sir, if you wish to show that you are a man, you must show it by waiting."

"A year!" Tom moaned. "It's an age!"

"So it is to a boy," she retorted. "To a man it's a year. And as you don't wish to wait----"

"I will wait! I will indeed!" Tom cried.

"Remember you must kiss no one in the meantime," Betty continued, drawing patterns on the block, "nor write, nor speak, nor look a word of love. You will be on your honour, and--and you will wait till this day twelvemonth, sir."

"I will," Tom cried. "I will, and thankfully, if you on your side, Betty----"

She sprang up. "What?" she cried, on fire in an instant. "You would make terms with me, would you?"

Tom, the bold, the bully, cringed. "No," he said. "No, of course not. I beg your pardon, Betty."

She was silent for a full half minute, and he thought her hopelessly offended. But when she spoke again it was hurriedly, and in a tone of strange, new shyness. "Still, I--I don't ask what I won't give," she said. "You've kissed me, and you are not the same to me as--as others. I don't mind telling you that. And--and what is law for you shall be law for me. I suppose you understand," she added, her face naming more and more. And in her growing bashfulness she glanced at him angrily. "I never--I never have flirted, of course," she continued, despairing of making him understand; "but I--I won't flirt this year if you are in earnest."

Somehow Tom had got her hand, and was kissing it. And the two formed a pretty picture. But the time allowed them was short. Tom's ecstasy was interrupted by the sound of approaching footsteps. Sir Hervey and Sophia had descended the steps of the terrace followed by the old vicar, who looked little the worse for his fainting-fit. He bore on his arm a new gown, the gift of his patron, and the token of his own favour, if not of his wife's forgiveness. The three were so closely engaged in talk that until they came face to face with the other pair they were not conscious of their presence. Then for a moment Sophia faltered and hung back, shamed and conscience-stricken, reminded of the things she had said, and the worse things she had thought, of her friend. But in a breath the two girls were in one another's arms.

Tom looked and groaned. "Oh, Lord!" he said. "A year! A whole year!"