"Dear me," said the vicar's wife acidly. "What cla.s.s does the girl spring from? I always thought it was only servants or shop-girls who ate things of that sort--with vinegar--for tea!"

"Well, we have Mrs. Rose's own word for it that her cousin is a.s.sistant in a shop." Lady Martin laughed disagreeably. "I have no doubt Mrs. Rose was employed in the same manner before her marriage. It is really remarkable what matches these pert shop girls make nowadays. Men seem to prefer them to our daughters, though it is hard to understand."

"Hard? Impossible!" The Vicar's wife, thinking of her own plain and middle-aged daughters, spoke snappily. "As you say, no doubt Mrs. Rose was some little shop-a.s.sistant----"

"Ah, no! I remember now!" Lady Martin spoke mysteriously, and Mrs.

Madgwick looked up sharply. "Mrs. Rose was not in a shop. It was not there that Mr. Rose met her. As a matter of fact she was his typist."

"His typist! Ah!" Toni, listening breathlessly, could not fathom the significance of the lady's tone.

"Of course he would never have married her if he had not been so sore about Miss Rees." Lady Martin spoke fluently. "I had the whole story of that affair from a friend of my daughter's who was intimately acquainted with Miss Rees."

"But--who is--or was--Miss Rees?" The speaker little knew how Toni blessed her for putting the question.

"The girl he should have married--the Earl of Paulton's niece." Lady Martin paused a moment to brush away an inquisitive gnat. "It was quite a romantic affair, at first. Mr. Rose was devoted, positively devoted to her, and she is really a charming girl, handsome, accomplished, in every way a contrast to the poor little creature he has married."

"But why, if he were so devoted----"

"Didn't he marry her? Well, it seems he had a motor smash, knocked himself up and had to go away for a time; and whether, as I have been told, she was glad of the excuse to break her promise, or whether there was some other reason, I don't know, but anyhow she threw him over and married Lord Saxonby without telling her first _fiance_ a word about it."

"And he took it to heart?" Mrs. Madgwick felt exhilarated by this authentic peep into the lives of the great ones of the earth. "Of course it must be galling to be thrown over for another man--though when it is a Lord----"

"Well, a Lord's no worse than another man," said Lady Martin rather ambiguously. "But they say there was a terrible scene--Mr. Rose reproaching the girl and threatening to kill Lord Saxonby, and making all sorts of wild threats. My daughter's friend had a maid who had been with Lady Saxonby, and she told her all this."

"Ah, then of course it's true." Mrs. Madgwick, having a mind which delighted in gossip, did not quarrel with the source of information.

"But I don't yet see why Mr. Rose married this girl. Surely there must have been plenty of ladies he could have had."

"Ah, but they all knew he'd been jilted," said Lady Martin wisely.

"Besides they say he had sworn to marry the first woman who would have him, to get even with Miss Rees, you know, and I haven't a shadow of doubt this girl threw herself at his head."

"Very likely," agreed the Vicar's wife charitably. "Girls of that cla.s.s are so pushing. But as a wife for Mr. Rose and the mistress of Greenriver she is eminently unsuitable."

"Dreadfully so," sighed Lady Martin. "I feel so sorry for the poor man tied to a common, empty-headed little thing like that. They tell me she is an absolute fool--and really in these days of evening cla.s.ses and polytechnics there is no excuse for such lamentable ignorance as she displays. I hear that when they go out to dinner she sits as dumb as a fish--or else commits such shocking solecisms that her poor husband blushes for her."

"Really? I have had very little conversation with her," said the other woman judicially. "And beyond noting her deplorable unsoundness on religious matters I have had few opportunities of probing her mind."

"Her mind? She hasn't one," snapped Lady Martin. "She is one of those mindless, soulless women who are simply parasites, clinging to men for what they can get--a home, money, position--and give nothing in return because they have nothing to give."

"It is indeed sad for Mr. Rose," said Mrs. Madgwick compa.s.sionately. "So dreadfully boring for a clever man to be hampered with a silly wife--and one with such unpresentable relations, too. What was her cousin like?

Quite--quite, I suppose."

"Oh, quite," agreed Lady Martin. "A red-faced, blowsy young woman with a large bust and a pinched-in waist. Just the sort of girl you'd expect to find in a draper's shop in Brixton. But now, I really feel quite rested.

Suppose we return to the Bazaar? I have one or two little purchases to make, and possibly by now the things will be reduced in price."

The Vicar's wife rose with alacrity, and the two ladies moved away, discussing the probable financial result of the Bazaar, and Toni was left alone with her new knowledge.

CHAPTER XIV

At half-past five on that same afternoon Jim Herrick and his dog were strolling across the meadows leading from the river to the village of Willowhurst.

The sky, which had been brilliantly blue all day, was beginning to be overcast, causing the energetic helpers at the Vicarage Bazaar to throw anxious glances towards the gathering clouds, and Herrick, who was a fair weather-prophet, foresaw a storm before sunset.

As he threw his leg over the stile leading into the last meadow, he paused suddenly.

Approaching him was Owen Rose's wife; and something in her mode of progress struck him as peculiar. She was coming along at a sort of fast walk, breaking now and then into a few running steps, stumbling occasionally and even stopping dead for a second before resuming her hurrying advance.

Her eyes were downcast; and she was quite close to him before she realized his presence. When she did look up he saw that she was crying, openly, sobbingly, as a child cries, the tears running in little channels over her cheeks and dropping unheeded where they would.

Even when she saw that she was not alone, Toni could not check those treacherous tears; and something told Herrick that she was craving for sympathy, that here was no sophisticated woman of the world, to whom the encounter would spell annoyance, but a forlorn and solitary child crying out its heart over some real or fancied tribulation, to whom a kindly word, a friendly greeting would bring only comfort.

He jumped off the stile and approached her, hat in hand.

"Mrs. Rose? You're in trouble over something? Will you tell me what's wrong--perhaps I can help you somehow?"

To his relief he saw that his impression had been correct. She turned to him desperately, like a child seeking consolation.

"Mr. Herrick"--she sobbed out the words--"I'm so miserable--I don't know what to do!"

"Come, that's bad!" He spoke kindly. "Well, suppose you rest here a moment and dry your eyes?"

She fumbled blindly in the front of her gown and then gave up the search with a childish wail.

"I've not got a handkerchief--I've lost it somewhere!"

"Never mind, I have one." He drew out a large silk square as yet unfolded, and pressed it into her hand. "There, use that--and then we'll have a talk."

She dried her eyes obediently, though fresh tears threatened to make her obedience futile; and then, still clinging to his handkerchief, she leaned against the stile and tried to regain her self-control.

"Well?" His tone, with its gentle sympathy, was balm to poor Toni's sore heart. "Come, little lady, what's the trouble? Let's see if we can't find a way out of it together."

She turned her eyes on him as he spoke, and he was almost startled at what he read there; for surely there was a hint of almost womanly suffering in their usually childish depths; and he knew intuitively that this was not the thoughtless, light-hearted girl he had previously known as Toni Rose.

"Mr. Herrick"--she spoke in a low voice, which in spite of all her efforts shook a little--"just now at the Vicarage Bazaar I heard Lady Martin and Mrs. Madgwick talking about me; and they said such terrible things that I think my heart will break!"

"Oh, come, Mrs. Rose!" His tone had, as he intended, a bracing effect.

"Hearts don't break so easily as that! Whatever those two chatterers may have said, you must not let it affect you so seriously."

"They said I was common--and ill-bred--and ignorant." The words startled her hearer, though she spoke them with a kind of dreary quietness which was not without pathos. "They said Owen only married me because some girl--an earl's niece--had thrown him over and he wanted to get his own back--they said he was ashamed of me, that he blushed for me when we went out to dinner, and everyone pitied him for having such a common, empty-headed wife."

"My dear Mrs. Rose----" For a moment Herrick's wits deserted him beneath this recapitulation; and before he could hit on the right words, Toni had begun again.

"They said it was a pity for a clever man to be tied to an ignorant wife, that I bored him to death; and Lady Martin said I was a parasite, clinging to him for money and food, and that I had spoilt his life and ruined his career----"

"Oh, that is nonsense!" Herrick shook off the mental paralysis which had held him tongue-tied, and spoke vigorously. "No man's life was ever spoilt by the possession of a pretty, loving wife--like you."