I remembered all I had seen and all I had suspected, and I could not bring myself to believe implicitly in Milly's stepmother. There was a shadowy fear, a vague distrust in my mind, not to be put away.

As I have said, she was always with us, entering into all our simple amus.e.m.e.nts with an appearance of girlish pleasure. Our picnics, our sketching expeditions, our afternoon tea-parties at the Priory, our croquet-matches with the Rector's daughters, seemed all alike agreeable to her. I noticed that her toilet was always perfect on these occasions, and that she neglected no art which could add to her attractiveness; but she never in any way attempted to absorb Mr.

Egerton's attention--she never ignored his position as Milly's accepted suitor.

For a long time I was deceived by her manner--almost convinced that if she had ever cared for Angus Egerton in the past, it was a pa.s.sion that had died out of her heart. But there came a day when one look of hers betrayed the real state of the case, and showed me that all this newly-awakened regard for Milly, and pleasant partic.i.p.ation in her happiness, had been only a careful piece of acting. It was nothing but a look--one earnest, despairing, pa.s.sionate look--that told me this, but it was a look that betrayed the secret of a life. From that moment I never again trusted Augusta Darrell.

With the beginning of autumn the weather changed, and there came a dull rainy season. Trouble came to us with the change of the weather. There was a good deal of low fever about Thornleigh, and Milly caught it. She had never neglected her visit amongst the poor, even in favour of those pleasant engagements with Angus Egerton; and there is no doubt she had taken the fever from some of the cottagers.

She was not alarmingly ill, nor was the fever supposed to be contagious, except under certain conditions. Mr. Hale, the Thornleigh doctor, made very light of the business, and a.s.sured us that his patient would be as well as ever in a week's time. But in the mean while my dear girl kept her room, and I nursed her, with the a.s.sistance of her devoted little maid.

Mr. Egerton came every day, generally twice a day, to inquire about the invalid's progress, and would stay for half an hour, or longer, talking to Mrs. Darrell or to me. He was very much depressed by this illness, and impatient for his betrothed's recovery. He had been strictly forbidden to see her, as perfect repose was an essential condition to her well-being.

The week was nearly over, and Milly had improved considerably. She was now able to sit up for an hour or two every day, and the doctor promised Mr. Egerton that she should be in the drawing-room early in the following week. The weather had been incessantly wet during this time--dull, hopeless, perpetual rain day after day, without a break in the leaden sky. But at last there came a fine evening, and I went down to the terrace to take a solitary walk after my long imprisonment. It was between six and seven o'clock; Milly was asleep, and there was no probability of my being wanted in the sick-room for half an hour or so.

I left ample instructions with my handy little a.s.sistant, and went down for my const.i.tutional, m.u.f.fled in a warm shawl.

It was dusk when I went out, and everything was unusually quiet, not a leaf was stirring in the stagnant atmosphere. Late as it was, the evening was almost oppressively warm, and I was glad to throw off my shawl. I walked up and down the terrace in front of the Hall for about ten minutes, and then went round towards the drawing-room windows.

Before I had quite reached the first of these, I was arrested by a sound so strange that I stopped involuntarily to listen. Throughout all that followed, I had no time to consider whether I was doing right or wrong in hearing what I did hear; but I believe if I had had ample leisure for deliberation, it would have come to the same thing--I should have listened. What I heard was of such vital consequence to the girl I loved, that I think loyalty to her outweighed any treachery against the speaker.

The strange sound that brought me to a standstill close to the wide-open window was the sound of a woman's pa.s.sionate sobbing--such a storm of weeping as one does not hear many times in a life. I have never heard anything like it until that night.

Angus Egerton's sonorous voice broke in upon those tempestuous sobs almost angrily:

'Augusta, this is supreme folly.'

The sobs went on for some minutes longer unchecked. I heard his step sounding heavily as he walked up and down the room.

'I am waiting to hear the meaning of all this,' he said by and by. 'I suppose there is some meaning.'

'O Angus, is it so easy for you to forget the past?'

'It was forgotten long ago,' he answered, 'by both of us, I should think. When my mother bribed you to leave Ilfracombe, you bartered my love and my happiness for the petty price she was able to pay. I was a weak fool in those days, and I took the business to heart bitterly enough, G.o.d knows; but the lesson was a useful one, and it served its turn. I have never trusted myself to love any woman since that day, till I met the pure young creature who is to be my wife. Her truth is above all doubt; she will not sell her birthright for a mess of pottage.'

'The mess of pottage was not for me, Angus. It was my father's bargain, not mine. I was told that you had done with me--that you had never meant to marry me. Yes, Angus, your mother told me that with her own lips--told me that she interfered to save me from misery and dishonour.

And then I was hurried off to a cheap French convent, to learn to provide for myself. A couple of years' schooling was the price I received for my broken heart. That was what your mother called making me a lady. I think I should have gone mad in those two dreary years, if it had not been for my pa.s.sionate love of music. I gave myself up to that with my whole soul; my heart was dead; and they told me I made more progress in two years than other girls made in six. I had nothing else to live for.'

'Except the hope of a rich husband,' said Mr. Egerton, with a sneer.

'O G.o.d, how cruel a man can to be a woman he has once loved!' cried Mrs. Darrell pa.s.sionately. 'Yes, I did marry a rich man, Angus; but I never schemed or tried to win him. The chance came to me without a hope or a thought of mine. It was the chance of rescue from the dreariest life of drudgery that a poor dependent creature ever lived, and I took it. But I have never forgotten you, Angus Egerton, not for one hour of my life.'

'I am sorry you should have taken the trouble to remember me,' he answered very coldly. 'For some years of my life I made it my chief business to forget you, and all the pain connected with our acquaintance; and having succeeded in doing that, it seems a pity that we should disturb the stagnant waters of that dead lake which men call the past.'

'Would to G.o.d that we had never met again!' she said.

'I can quite echo that aspiration, if we are likely to have many such scenes as this.'

'Cruel--cruel!' she muttered. 'O Angus, I have been so patient! I have clung to hope in the face of despair. When my husband died I fancied your old love would reawaken. How can such things die? I thought it was to me you would come back--to me, whom you once loved so pa.s.sionately--not to that girl. You came back to her, and still I was patient. I set myself against her, to win back your love. Yes, Angus, I hoped to do that till very lately. And then I began to see that it was all useless. She is younger and handsomer than I.'

'She is better than you, Augusta. It was not her beauty that won me, but something n.o.bler and rarer than beauty: it was her perfect nature.

The more faulty we are ourselves, the more fondly we cling to a good woman. But I don't want to say hard things, Augusta. Pray let us put all this folly aside at once and for ever. You took your course in the past, and it has landed you in a very prosperous position. Let me take mine in the present, and let us be friends, if possible.'

'You know that it is not possible. We must be all the world to each other, or the bitterest enemies.'

'I shall never be your enemy, Mrs. Darrell.'

'But I am yours; yes, I am yours from this night, and hers. You think I can look on tamely, and see you devoted to that girl! I have only been playing a part. I thought it was in my power to win you back.'

All this was said with a kind of pa.s.sionate recklessness, as if the speaker, having suddenly thrown off her mask, scarcely cared how utterly she degraded herself.

'Good-night, Mrs. Darrell. You will think of these things more wisely to-morrow. Let us be civil to each other, at least, while circ.u.mstances bring us together; and for G.o.d's sake be kind to your stepdaughter! Do not think of her as a rival; my love for you had died long before I saw her. You need bear no malice against her on that account. Good-night.'

'Good-night.'

I heard the drawing-room door open and shut, and knew that he was gone.

I walked on past the open windows, not caring if Mrs. Darrell saw me.

It might be better for Milly, perhaps, that she should know I had heard her secret, and had been put upon my guard. But I do not think she saw me.

It was about a quarter of an hour later when I went in, and it was quite dark by that time. In the hall I met Mrs. Darrell, dressed for walking.

'I am going round the shrubberies, Miss Crofton,' she said.

'Insupportably close to-night, is it not? I think we shall all have the fever if this weather lasts.'

She did not wait for my answer, but pa.s.sed out quickly. I went back to Milly's room, and found her still sleeping peacefully. Ten minutes afterwards I heard the rain beating against the windows, and knew that it had set in for a wet night.

'Mrs. Darrell will not be able to go far,' I thought.

I sat by the bedside for some time thinking of what I had heard. It was something to have had so strong a proof of Angus Egerton's loyalty to my dear girl; and a.s.sured of that, I did not fear Mrs. Darrell's malice. Yet I could not help wishing that the marriage had been appointed for an earlier date, and that the time which stepmother and daughter were to spend together had been shorter.

Milly woke, and sat up for about half an hour, supported by pillows, to take a cup of tea, while I talked to her a little about the pleasantest subjects I could think of. She asked if Mr. Egerton had been at Thornleigh that evening.

'Yes, dear, he has been.'

'Did you see him, Mary?'

'No; I did not see him.'

She gave a little disappointed sigh. It was her delight to hear me repeat his messages to her, word for word, ever so many times over.

'Then you have nothing to tell me about him, dear?'

'Nothing; except that I know he loves you.'

'Ah, Mary, there was a time when you doubted him.'

'That time is quite past and gone, dear.'

She kissed me as she gave me back her cup and saucer, and promised to go to sleep again, while I went to my room to write a long letter home.

I was occupied in this way for more than an hour; and then, having sealed my letter, went down with it to the hall, to put it on a table where all letters intended to be taken to the post in the morning were placed over-night.