"Mr. Wayne!" exclaimed Jamie's protectress, in her silvery voice. "We were to have met at Rushbrook last October, and you didn't come. I was staying with your cousins the Danforths. I am Mrs. Verdon."

"I'm delighted to meet you at last," he said cordially. "Mary and Lily were always talking about you. Isn't all this extraordinary? There never was anything like it in a three-volume novel!"

Then they both laughed with a comfortable air of old acquaintanceship, and Elsie suddenly had a sense of being left out in the cold.

CHAPTER X

_LONELINESS_

"While I! I sat alone and watched; My lot in life, to live alone, In mine own world of interests, Much felt, but little shown."

--CHRISTINA ROSSETTI.

Yes; Elsie felt as if she were left out in the cold, and she looked as if she felt it.

There are women to whom nature has granted the gift of silent emotion.

They have mobile faces, changeful eyes, soft lips, which express joy or desolation naturally, and with the charm of perfect simplicity and truth. These women keep their youth a long time; every experience of life comes to them with the freshness of a first feeling; they retain the capacity to rejoice and suffer to the very end of their days. Men like them, because they find them real, and because these impressionable characters have the attraction of varying often. Anything is more tolerable than monotony.

Arnold Wayne looked from Mrs. Verdon to Elsie, and read a pathetic story in her brown eyes.

"May I introduce myself, Miss Kilner?" he said. "I have heard of you so often from Mr. Lennard."

This was a fib. For years he had not seen or heard anything of the rector; but it was a fib which slipped from him unawares. He had wished for an introduction to Elsie when he had seen her at the picture gallery with the old clergyman, and he had secretly anathematised Mr. Lennard's obtuseness. He was not going to lose a second chance, he said to himself.

"I have known the Lennards all my life," Elsie answered. "They belong to my old home. It is a great pleasure to see the rector when he comes to town."

Mrs. Verdon regarded the speaker quietly, with the practised glance of a woman of the world; and she listened to the refined voice and accent with critical ears. It would be safe, she decided, to notice this stranger.

"Will you come and see Jamie some day?" she said, addressing Elsie in her silvery voice, which could be very sweet when she wished to please.

"I am a widow without children, myself, and I want to know how you came to take such an interest in him. Go and kiss that lady, Jamie; you must learn to know her quite well."

The boy obeyed without reluctance. He had listened attentively to all that had been said, and, being an intelligent child, had come to the conclusion that no one wanted to take him away from Mrs. Verdon.

Elsie kissed the blooming face uplifted to hers, and pressed him in her arms for a moment. He was the child of her dreams, presented to her now in substantial form; but he was not meant for her. She could never have him for her own.

But it was the little lad's good, and not her own pleasure, which she had been seeking. Meta's prayers were answered; somebody was kind to Jamie.

Only, why had the vanished hand pointed out the path which she must follow? Why was she sent to search for a child who was sheltered and safe?

There seemed to be a sort of mockery in this phantom guidance. She had been led to the very place where Jamie was to be found, only to be shown that he had no need of her at all. Every want of his was abundantly supplied; the fair lady had won his little heart; and the kiss which he vouchsafed to Elsie was merely bestowed at Mrs. Verdon's request. When Elsie released him he returned with alacrity to his adopted mother's side, and slid his hand into hers again.

Yet she had found him, and all suspense and anxiety were at an end. She thanked Mrs. Verdon for her courtesy, learned that Jamie's home was in Portman Square, and then gave her own address in return, and went quietly away with her two companions.

Arnold Wayne was left with Mrs. Verdon, who had recovered her courage, and was easily persuaded to re-enter her carriage. The horses had never bolted before; the coachman was not likely to fail in vigilance again; there was really no danger in taking the homeward drive. But she was a little nervous still, and it would be so very kind if Mr. Wayne would accompany her.

He was quite willing to accompany her.

It was a perfect summer evening, balmy and still; the air was full of delicate, dewy perfumes; a rich rose-colour burned in the west, and touched the silver gleam of the river with the last glow of the day. The carriage rolled easily along; Jamie, with sleepy blue eyes, half-open, enjoyed the motion in silent content. Mrs. Verdon, with gentle animation, talked to Mr. Wayne.

Elsie, walking slowly down the hill, caught a glimpse of the carriage and its occupants, and noted the dainty bonnet bending towards the dark head. A sense of loneliness, of aloofness, seemed to possess her that evening. The scent of flowers had something sad in its sweetness (as flower-scents often have); the sunset light suggested solemn thoughts.

Mrs. Beaton remarked that she looked languid and pale.

"All this excitement has been too much for you, Miss Kilner," she said.

"What a day we have had! How little we realised what was in store for us when we started this morning! But I shall sleep soundly to-night, knowing that Jamie is safe."

"It is a splendid thing for the boy," Elsie remarked. "What a beautiful child he is!"

"Yes; his beauty attracted Mrs. Verdon at first; but I think she loves him for his own sake. She is a charming lady, Miss Kilner."

"Very charming," Elsie admitted at once.

"And you'll go to see her, and tell us how Jamie goes on," Mrs. Beaton continued. "Mr. Wayne, too, will look after him; he won't lack friends."

"Supposing that Mrs. Verdon should marry again, what would she do with Jamie?" asked Mrs. Penn in a dismal voice. "Mr. Wayne seemed very attentive to her, I thought."

"It would be a very good thing for Jamie if she married Mr. Wayne, his uncle's old friend," Mrs. Beaton replied. "But I daresay she has a score of lovers. However, you may be sure that she will never neglect the boy."

"He's as haughty as a young lord," said Mrs. Penn. "Did you see how he tossed his head at me, and waved his hand to send me away?"

"Well, Mrs. Penn, he is a sensible child, and he remembers the treatment at Lee," answered Mrs. Beaton candidly. "We will let bygones be bygones; but a child's memory keeps things shut up in it like a book. Andrew often astonished me when he was Jamie's age. He never would forget anything, especially if you wanted anything to be forgotten."

As the train sped homeward, Elsie looked from the window upon the shifting landscape, but observed nothing. All seemed a blank.

Her mind, so long intent on one object, was new deprived of its centre of thought. She recurred again and again to the old theme, only to say to herself a hundred times, "Jamie is safe." Had she lived so much upon this child that the secret of her interest had been self-forgetfulness?

Her search was ended, and she was left alone--quite alone with herself.

She reached All Saints' Street between eight and nine o'clock. It was a clear night; the streets were full of carriages and people, and the lights of the lamps and shops had never been brighter. But an aspect of unreality pervaded everything, and she seemed to move through all these lights and sounds as if she were in a city of dreams.

When she had answered Miss Saxon's questions, and told her all that had happened in as few words as possible, she went upstairs to her sitting-room; and then she sank into a chair, leaning her head upon its back, and looking up at the stars above the roof.

Why was it that she was so melancholy to-night? She could have found it in her heart to have envied that fair woman who had gone away with the beautiful child by her side. Was Mrs. Verdon to have everything--wealth, position, Jamie's love, and----

She sprang up suddenly from her chair in an agony of self-contempt and self-reproach. It is always a hard thing for a proud woman to learn the lesson of human weakness. Never before had Elsie suspected herself of anything so mean as jealousy. "Oh, Meta," she said, half-aloud, "your hand has pointed to a hard, lonely road, stretching out before me like a desert! Show me the rest--the home--that lies beyond the waste! It seems to-night as if, on earth or in heaven, there would never more be any home for me."

CHAPTER XI

_MRS. VERDON_

"We know too much of Love ere we love. We can trace Nothing new, unexpected, or strange in his face When we see it at last. 'Tis the same little Cupid, With the same dimpled cheek and the smile almost stupid, We have seen in our pictures and stuck on our shelves, And copied, a hundred times over, ourselves."

--OWEN MEREDITH.