says Rodney. "I shall leave this country as soon as I can. Tell Nicholas to keep the t.i.tle with the rest. I shall never use it. And now," growing very pale, "it only remains to say good-by."

"Good-by," says Mona, softly, giving him her hand. He keeps it fast in both his own. Just at this moment it dawns upon her for the first time that this man loves her with a love surpa.s.sing that of most. The knowledge does not raise within her breast--as of course it should do--feelings of virtuous indignation: indeed, I regret to say that my heroine feels nothing but a deep and earnest pity, that betrays itself in her expressive face.

"Last night you called me Paul. Do you remember? Call me it again, for the last time," he entreats, in a low tone. "I shall never forget what I felt then. If ever in the future you hear good of me, believe it was through you it sprung to life. Till my dying day your image will remain with me. Say now, 'Good-by, Paul,' before I go."

"Good by, dear Paul," says Mona, very gently, impressed by his evident grief and earnestness.

"Good-by, my--my beloved--cousin," he says, in a choked voice. I think the last word is an afterthought. He is tearing himself from all he holds most sacred upon earth, and the strain is terrible. He moves resolutely a a few yards away from her, as though determined to put s.p.a.ce between him and her; yet then he pauses, and, as though powerless to withdraw from her presence, returns again, and, flinging himself on his knees before her, presses a fold of her gown to his lips with pa.s.sionate despair.

"It is forever!" he says, incoherently. "Oh, Mona, at least--_at least_ promise you will always think kindly of me."

"Always--indeed, always!" says Mona, with tears in her eyes; after which, with a last miserable glance, he strides away, and is lost to sight among the trees.

Then Mrs. Geoffrey turns quickly, and runs home at the top of her speed.

She is half sad, yet half exultant, being filled to the very heart with the knowledge that life, joy, and emanc.i.p.ation from present evil lie in her pocket. This thought crowns all others.

As she comes to the gravel walk that leads from the shrubberies to the sweep before the hall door, she encounters the disgraced Ridgway, doing something or other to one of the shrubs that has come to grief during the late bad weather.

He touches his hat to her, and bids her a respectful "good afternoon,"

but for once she is blind to his salutation. Nevertheless, she stops before him, and, in a clear voice, says, coldly,--

"For the future your services will not be required here. Your new master, Mr. Paul Rodney, whom you have chosen to obey in preference to those in whose employ you have been, will give you your commands from this day. Go to him, and after this try to be faithful."

The boy--he is little more--cowers beneath her glance. He changes color, and drops the branch he holds. No excuse rises to his lips. To attempt a lie with those clear eyes upon him would be worse than useless. He turns abruptly away, and is dead to the Towers from this moment.

CHAPTER x.x.xIII.

HOW CONVERSATION GROWS RIFE AT THE TOWERS--AND HOW MONA a.s.sERTS HERSELF--AND HOW LADY RODNEY LICKS THE DUST.

"Where can Mona be?" says Doatie, suddenly.

We must go back one hour. Lady Lilias Eaton has come and gone. It is now a quarter to five, and Violet is pouring out tea in the library.

"Yes; where is Mona?" says Jack, looking up from the cup she has just given him.

"I expect I know more than most about her," says Nolly, who is enjoying himself immensely among the sponge, and the plum-cakes. "I told her the sthetic was likely to call this afternoon, and advised her strongly to make her escape while she could."

"She evidently took your advice," says Nicholas.

"Well, I went rather minutely into it, you know. I explained to her how Lady Lilias was probably going to discuss the new curfew-bell in all its bearings; and I hinted gloomily at the 'Domesday Book.' _That_ fetched her. She vamoosed on the spot."

"Nothing makes me so hungry as Lady Lilias," says Doatie, comfortably.

She is lying back in a huge arm-chair that is capable of holding three like her, and is devouring bread and b.u.t.ter like a dainty but starved little fairy. Nicholas, sitting beside her, is holding her tea-cup, her own special tea-cup of gaudy Svres. "She is very trying, isn't she, Nicholas? What a dazzling skin she has!--the very whitest I ever saw."

"Well, that is in her favor, I really think," says Violet, in her most unprejudiced manner. "If she were to leave off her rococo toilettes, and take to Elise or Worth like other people, and give up posing, and try to behave like a rational being, she might almost be called handsome."

No one seconds this rash opinion. There is a profound silence. Miss Mansergh looks mildly round for support, and, meeting Jack's eyes, stops there.

"Well, really, you know, yes. I think there _is_ something special about her," he says, feeling himself in duty bound to say something.

"So there is; something specially awful," responds Nolly, pensively.

"She frightens me to death. She has an 'eye like a gimlet.' When I call to mind the day my father inveigled me into the library and sort of told me I couldn't do better than go in for Lilias, my knees give way beneath me and smite each other with fear. I shudder to think what part in her medival programme would have been allotted to me."

"You would have been her henchman,--is that right, Nicholas?--or her _varlet_," says Dorothy, with conviction, "And you would have had to stain your skin, and go round with a cross-bow, and with your mouth widened from ear to ear to give you the correct look. All sthetic people have wide mouths, have they not, Nicholas?"

"Bless me, what an enthralling picture!" says Mr. Darling. "You make me regret all I have lost. But perhaps it is not yet too late. I say, Dolly, you are eating nothing. Have some more bread-and-b.u.t.ter or cake, old girl. You don't half take care of yourself."

"Well, do you know, I think I will take another bit of cake," says Doatie, totally unabashed. "And--cut it thick. After all, Noll, I don't believe Lilias would ever marry you, or any other man: she wouldn't know what to do with you."

"It is very good of you to say that," says Nolly, meekly but gratefully.

"It gives me great support. You honestly believe, then, that I may escape?"

"Just fancy the sthetic with a husband, and a baby on her knee."

"Like 'Loraine Loraine Loree,'" says Violet, laughing.

"Did she have both together on her knee?" asks Dorothy, vaguely. "She must have found it heavy."

"Oh, one at a time," says Nolly. "She couldn't do it all at once. Such a stretch of fancy requires thought."

At this moment, Geoffrey--who has been absent--saunters into the room, and, after a careless glance around, says, lightly, as if missing something,--

"Where is Mona?"

"Well, we thought you would know," says Lady Rodney, speaking for the first time.

"Yes. Where is she?" says Doatie: "that is just what we all want to know.

She won't get any tea if she doesn't come presently, because Nolly is bent on finishing it. Nolly," with plaintive protest, "don't be greedy."

"We thought she was with you," says Captain Rodney, idly.

"She is out," says Lady Rodney, in a compressed tone.

"Is she? It is too late for her to be out," returns Geoffrey, thinking of the chill evening air.

"Quite too late," acquiesces his mother, meaningly. "It is, to say the least of it, very strange, very unseemly. Out at this hour, and alone,--if, indeed, she is alone!"

Her tone is so unpleasant and so significant that silence falls upon the room. Geoffrey says nothing. Perhaps he alone among them fails to understand the meaning of her words. He seems lost in thought. So lost, that the others, watching him, wonder secretly what the end of his meditations will bring forth: yet, one and all, they mistake him: no doubt of Mona ever has, or ever will, I think, cross his mind.

Lady Rodney regards him curiously, trying to read his downcast face. Has the foolish boy at last been brought to see a flaw in his idol of clay?

Nicholas is looking angry. Jack, sinking into a chair near Violet, says, in a whisper, that "it is a beastly shame his mother cannot let Mona alone. She seems, by Jove! bent on turning Geoffrey against her."

"It is cruel," says Violet, with suppressed but ardent ire.