Mrs. Bridget also rose with a troubled air; but Irene laid a restraining hand upon her nurse's arm.

"You won't tell anybody, you'll let us talk to each other a little while?" she pleaded; and then in her most caressing manner, "you can hear all we say. I have no secrets from you, dear old Bridget."

"I'll warrant Mrs. Bridget would hardly swear so much on her side," said Herrick, with a lurking significance in his tone. "When people come to your nurse's age, Irene, they are apt to have a secret or two, be they ever so honest."

"Nay, I'll vouch for it, my Bridget has no secrets from me," protested the girl, hanging on her nurse's ample shoulder.

The nurse turned and kissed her darling, but answered not a word.

"And so you knew me at once, Irene; what an eagle eye you have!"

"If you had come as a blackamoor, I should have known you just as easily," she answered gaily; "and to change your voice too, and speak in those queer gruff tones, and think to cheat me! What a foolish person you must be!"

They seated themselves side by side on a rustic bench, while Bridget resumed her stool and her knitting at a discreet distance.

"What has become of your governess?" asked Herrick.

"She had letters to write to her relations in France--a married sister, and half a dozen nephews and nieces, who live in the south and whom she dearly loves, though she has not seen them for ages. So I made her stay indoors to write her letters, and brought Bridget for my companion. My father has given strict orders that I am to be looked after, lest you should find your way to me. But of all people, Bridget is the one I can trust most confidently. She would cut off her head if she could make me happy by losing it. And now, tell me everything about yourself, more even than your dearest letters can tell. Remember how long it is since we last met."

"Do I ever forget, love? ever cease to count the days and hours that we are doomed to live apart?"

And then he told her his successes, his dreams and hopes, the ever-strengthening hope of independence, Sir Robert's favour and friendship, the world's growing esteem.

"In two years, at most, Irene, I count upon being able to offer you a home; but it will be a very poor home compared with this, and you will sacrifice a great fortune if you become my wife."

"I have told you before that I do not value fortune."

"Yes; but shall not I be ungenerous to accept so vast a sacrifice?"

"It will be no sacrifice. I tasted all that wealth can give last winter in London, and I found no pleasure in fine clothes or fine company, dances and dinners, except when you were near. I know what the great world is like, and can renounce it without a sigh. But I should like to wander with you in that wide beautiful world of mountains, and lakes, and strange foreign cities, which so few people seem to care about. All the people I met last winter used to talk as if there were no world beyond Leicester Fields and St. James's Park--nothing worth living for but cards and fine company."

"Foolish people, Irene, in whom all natural impulses are stifled by the close atmosphere of a Court. Yes, we will travel, dearest, when you are my wife. I will show you some of the loveliest spots on this earth; yet we will not be mere vagabonds, love; we will not spend our lives in exile. This little island of ours is worth living in, and worth working for. We will have our cottage at Chelsea, or our lodgings in London, as you shall decide; and it shall be your task to fan the flame of ambition and stimulate your husband to perseverance and earnestness. For the man who is ambitious and persevering there can be no such thing as failure."

"Let us live in London," said Irene, delighted with a discussion which seemed to bring their future union nearer. "For in London we need be seldom parted. I shall hate even the House of Commons if it takes you from me too often or too long at a time."

"Then we will have a lodging in Spring Gardens, where I can run backwards and forwards, and spend my life between the senate and my home."

Childish talk, when union was still so far off; but it was a kind of talk which made Herrick intensely happy, for it gave him the a.s.surance of winning his sweetheart for a wife, even though Parson Keith had to wed them. She who was so willing to fling away fortune for his sake would not let him languish for ever under her father's ban. The day must come when she would be ready to forsake that stern father for her lover's sake. It was for him to make their union easy, by the a.s.surance of a modest competence.

When they had fully discussed their future dwelling, even to the style of the furniture and the prospect from the windows, Herrick began to question Irene about the companion of her infancy, the waif from whom death had parted her so early.

"I can remember very little," she said. "It is mostly dim, like a dream.

Yet there are hours that I can recall. I have but to close my eyes, and her face comes back to me, smiling lovingly, so gentle, so sweet. She must have been fairer than I--I remember a face like alabaster, with rosebud lips, and hair like pale gold. I have seen just such a face in pictures of angels. I remember playing with her under yonder cedar. It was one of our favourite spots. And I remember hide-and-seek in the old stables the day we both caught the fever. How happy we were that day!

and it is the last I can remember of our play or our happiness. Perhaps I should remember much more if I had not had that terrible fever; for my cousins have told me how vividly they can recall their childhood. Mine seems like a picture half rubbed out, with distinct patches left here and there upon the canvas."

"Mrs. Bridget must remember your little companion," said Herrick, glancing at the nurse. "Will you call her here, Rena? I should like to ask her a few questions."

Irene beckoned, and Bridget came over to the bench.

"I have been talking of the little girl who died, Mrs. Bridget," began Herrick, with a friendly air. "It has happened to me very curiously within the last few days to come upon traces of that infant's father, and of the first year of her life. Now, I know you were very fond of her, and that you must be interested in anything that relates to her."

Without a moment's warning nurse Bridget began to cry. Rena made her sit down between them, and dried her tears, and soothed her with sweetest caresses.

"Why should you be so broken-hearted about her, you poor old dear soul?"

she said; "you were never unkind to her, I am sure."

"No, I was never unkind to her--I have not that upon my conscience,"

sobbed Bridget; "but I have never forgotten her pretty face and her sweet little ways, and how loving she was to me, dear soul. And to hear of her suddenly--O sir, what did you discover about the poor man who was found dead on Flamestead Common?" she asked, recovering herself with an effort.

"I heard that he was a man of good birth, by name Chumleigh. I heard some particulars of his youth and his marriage, and I mean to find out more. Having got so far upon the traces of his history it will hardly be difficult to learn the rest."

"But what good will it do to any one, sir," asked Bridget, "since the child has been dead so many years? There is n.o.body to profit by your knowledge."

"Who can say as much as that, Mrs. Bridget? Knowledge is power. I should like to know the history of Mrs. Bosworth's little companion. It pleases me to think that she was something better than a beggar's brat--a child of good birth, and, for all I know, ent.i.tled on the mother's side to a large fortune."

Bridget became suddenly alert and interested.

"A fortune did you say, sir?" she exclaimed. "Do you mean that my darling had a right to a fortune?"

"I have reason to believe the child's mother had at least the expectation of wealth; but it was contingent upon the caprice of a rich father: just like your mistress's fortune, which she may lose if she disobey the Squire."

"They all said he was a gentleman," remarked Bridget musingly. "I have heard Farmer Bowman talk about him many a time--he was thin and wasted with hunger, the farmer said; but he had been a handsome young man, and his clothes were a gentleman's clothes, though they were worn almost to rags."

"Were there any papers found upon him?"

"Yes, the Squire brought home a parcel of papers; but there was nothing among them all to show who he was. I have heard my master say as much."

"Well, it will be my business to find out Mr. Chumleigh's relatives, and from them I may hear all about his marriage. I have seen the woman who had care of his motherless baby till within a fortnight of the time she was brought into this house."

"Indeed, sir! That is very strange."

"Strange indeed, Mrs. Bridget; but this world of ours is a much smaller place than we think."

"The mother was dead then, sir?"

"Yes, the mother died directly after the child's birth."

"And had the woman been good to her, do you think?"

"Fairly good, I take it; but her first nurse, the woman who took her from her dying mother's breast, was a careless unworthy wretch."

"As how, sir?"

"An accident of which I was told would prove as much."

Bridget was thoughtful, but did not inquire the nature or the history of this accident. The recollection of her lost charge seemed to be full of trouble to her.

Herrick said no more about Mr. Chumleigh or his child. He had said all he intended to say, and had keenly watched the effect of his revelations upon nurse Bridget. And now it was time for him to leave this paradise, lest some servant should pa.s.s that way and take note of his presence, or lest Mademoiselle should come in quest of her pupil. Rena had been glancing uneasily towards the house, momently expecting the apparition of her _gouvernante_.