Five o'clock struck, and Ida was sitting alone in the drawing-room, waiting to receive her friend, just as if she were the daughter of the house, instead of a salaried dependent. The pretty carved Indian tea-table--a gem in Bombay blackwood--was wheeled in front of the fire-place, which was old, as regarded the high wooden mantel-piece and capacious breadth of the hearth, but essentially new in its glittering tiles and dainty bra.s.s fire-irons.

The clock had hardly finished striking when Bessie bounced into the room, rosy and smiling, in sealskin jacket and toque.

'Oh, you darling! isn't this lovely?' she exclaimed, hugging Ida. 'You are to live here for ever and ever, and never, never, never to leave us again, and never to marry, unless you marry one of the Brians. Don't shudder like that, pet, they are both nice! And I'm sure you like Brian Walford, though, perhaps, not quite so much as he liked you. You do like him now, don't you, darling?' urged Bess.

Ida had withdrawn from her embrace, and was seated before the low Bombay table, occupied with the tea pot. There was no light but the fire and one shaded lamp on a distant table. The curtains were not yet drawn, and white mists were rising in the garden outside, like a sea.

'Bessie,' Ida began, gravely, as her old schoolfellow sat on a low stool in front of the fire, 'how could you deceive me like that? What could put such a thing in your head--_you_, so frank, so open?'

'I am sure I hardly know,' answered Bess, innocently. 'It was my birthday, don't you know, and we were all wild. Perhaps the champagne had something to do with it, though I didn't take any. But that sort of excitement communicates itself; and running up and down hill gets into one's head. We all thought it would be such fun to pa.s.s off penniless B.

W. for his wealthy cousin--and just to see how you liked him, with that extra advantage. But there was no harm in it, was there, dear? Of course, he told you afterwards, when you saw him at Mauleverer?

'Yes, he told me--afterwards.'

'Naturally; and having begun to like him as the rich Brian, you didn't leave off liking him because of his poverty--did you, darling? The man himself was the same.'

Ida was silent, remembering how, with the revelation of the fraud that had been practised upon her, the very man himself had seemed to undergo a transformation--as if a disguise, altering his every characteristic, had been suddenly flung aside.

She did not answer Bessie's question, but, looking down at her with grave, searching eyes, she said,--'Dear Bessie, it was a very foolish jest. I know it is not in your nature to mean unkindly to anyone, least of all to me, to whom you have been an angel of light; but all practical jokes of that kind are liable to inflict pain and humiliation upon the victim--however innocently meant. Whose idea was it, Bess? Not yours, I think?'

'No; it was Urania who proposed it. She said it would be such fun.'

'Miss Rylance is not usually so--funny.'

'No; but she was particularly jolly that day, don't you remember? in positively boisterous spirits--for her.'

'And the outcome of her amiability was this suggestion?'

'Yes, darling. She had noticed that you had a kind of romantic fancy about Brian of the Abbey--that you had idealised his image, as it were--and set him up as a kind of demi-G.o.d. Not because of his wealth, darling--don't suppose that we supposed that--but on account of that dear old Abbey and its romantic a.s.sociations, which gave a charm to the owner.

And so she said what fun it would be to pa.s.s off Brian Walford as his cousin, and see if you fell in love with him. 'I know she is ready to lay her heart at the feet of the owner of the Abbey,' Urania said; and I thought it would be too delicious if you were to fall in love with Brian Walford, who could not help falling in love with you, for of course it would end in your marrying him, and his getting on splendidly at the Bar; for, with his talents, he must do well. He only wants a motive for industry. And then you would be our very own cousin! I hope it wasn't a very wicked idea, Ida, and that you will find it in your heart to forgive me,' pleaded Bess, kneeling by her friend's chair, with clasped bands upon Ida's knees, and sweet, half-tearful face looking up, 'My darling, I have never been angry with you,' answered Ida, clasping the girl to her heart, with a stifled sob. 'But I don't think Miss Rylance meant so kindly. Her idea sprang from a malevolent heart. She wanted to humiliate me--to drag my most sordid characteristics into the light of day--to make me more abject than poverty had made me already. That was the motive of her joke.'

'Never mind her motive, dear. All I am interested in is your opinion of Brian. I hope he behaved nicely at Mauleverer.'

'Very nicely.'

'Cobb says that Fraulein positively raves about him--declares he is quite the most gentlemanly young man she ever saw--a G.o.dly young man she called him, in her funny English. And, she says, that he was madly in love with you. Of course he made you an offer?'

'How could he do that when I was always with the Fraulein?'

'Oh, nonsense. Brian is not the kind of young man to be kept at bay by a mild nonent.i.ty like the Fraulein. He told me before he left that he was desperately in love with you, and that he meant to win you for his wife.

I asked him how he intended to keep a wife, and he said he should write for the magazines, and do theatrical criticisms for the newspapers, till briefs began to drop in. He was determined to win you if you were to be won. So I feel sure that he made you an offer, unless, indeed, that horrid old Pew spoiled all by her venomous conduct.'

'That is it, dear. Miss Pew brought matters to an abrupt close.'

'And you are not engaged to Brian?' said Bess, dolefully.

'No.'

'And he didn't follow you to Dieppe?'

'No.'

'Then he is not half so fine a fellow as I thought him.'

'Suppose, Bessie, that after a little mild flirtation, with Fraulein Wolf for an audience, we both discovered that our liking for each other was of the very coolest order, and that it was wiser to let the acquaintance end?'

'You might feel that; but I would never believe it of Brian. Why, he raved about you; he was pa.s.sionately in love. He told me there was no sacrifice he would not make to call you his wife.'

'He had so much to sacrifice,' said Ida, with a cynical air.

'Don't be unkind, Ida. Of course I know that he has his fortune to make; but he is so thoroughly nice--so full of fun.'

'Did you ever know him do anything good or great, anything worth being remembered--anything that proved the depth and n.o.bility of his nature?'

asked Ida, earnestly.

'Good gracious! no, not that I can remember. He is always nice, and amusing. He doesn't like carrying a basket, or skates, and things; but of course, where there are younger boys one couldn't expect him to do that; and he hates plain girls and old women; but I suppose that is natural, for even father does it, in his secret soul, though he is always so utterly sweet to the poor things. But I am sure Brian Walford has a tender heart, because he is so fond of kittens.'

'I didn't mean to insinuate that he was a modern Domitian,' answered Ida, smiling at Bessie's childish earnestness. 'What I mean is that there is no depth in his nature, no n.o.bility in his character. He is shallow, and, I fear, selfish. But, Bessie, my pet, I am going to ask you a favour.'

'Ask away,' cried Bessie, cheerfully; 'I can't give you the moon, but anything which I really do possess is yours this instant.'

'Don't let us ever talk of Brian Walford. I can never get over the feeling of humiliation which Miss Rylance's practical joke caused me; and my only chance of forgetting it is to forget your cousin's existence.'

'Oh, but he will come to The Knoll, I hope, at Christmas, and then you will think better of him.'

'If he should come I--I hope I shall not see him.'

'Has he offended you so deeply?'

'Don't let us talk about him, Bess. Tell me all about your Bournemouth triumphs. I hear you were the belle of the place.'

'Then you have heard a most egregious fib. There were dozens of girls with nineteen-inch waists, before whom I felt myself a monster of dumpiness. But I got on pretty well. I don't pretend to be a good dancer, but I can generally adapt myself to the badness of other people's steps, and that goes for something.'

And now having got away from all painful subjects, Bessie rattled on at a tremendous pace, describing girls and gowns, and partners, and tennis tournaments, and yachting excursions, all in a breath, as she sat in front of the fire sipping her tea, and devouring a particular kind of b.u.t.tered bun for which Miss Wendover's cook was famous.

'Aunt Betsy's tea is always nicer than any one else's; and so are her buns and her b.u.t.ter; in fact everything in this house is nicer than it is anywhere else,' said Bessie, pausing in her reminiscences. 'You are in clover here, Ida.'

'Thanks to your goodness, Bess.'

'To mine? But I have positively nothing to do with it.'

'Yes, you have. It is from the wish to please her warm-hearted little niece that Miss Wendover has been so good to me.'

'But if you had been plain or stupid she would have only been kind to you at a distance. Aunt Betsy has her idiosyncrasies, and one of them is a liking for beauty in individuals, as well as in chairs and tables and cups and saucers. You will see that all her servants are pretty. She picks them for their good looks, I believe, and trains them afterwards.

She would not have so much as a bad-looking stable boy.'

'Hard upon ugliness to be shut out of this paradise,' said Ida.

'Oh, but she finds places for the ugly boys and girls, with people whose teeth are not so easily set on edge, she says herself. And now I must be off, to change my frock for dinner. You know the back way to The Knoll--across the fields to the little door in the kitchen-garden. You will always come that way, of course. When are you coming to see us?