"I am sure there's nothing like change and amus.e.m.e.nt for one growing convalescent," said Charlotte.

"Will you let us contribute in some little way to it?" asked Mrs.

Hastings of George. "If a few hours' sojourn in our quiet house would be agreeable to you, you know that we should only be too happy for you to try it."

"I should like it of all things," cried George, impulsively, "I cannot walk far yet without resting, and it is pleasant to sit a few hours at my walk's end, before I begin to start back again. I shall soon extend my journeys to Prior's Ash."

"Then come to us the first day that you feel able to get as far. You will always find some of us at home. We will dine at any hour you like, and you shall choose your own dinner."

"A bargain," said George.

They rose to pursue their way to Ashlydyat. Mrs. Hastings offered her arm to George, and he took it with thanks. "He would not take mine!"

thought Charlotte, and she flashed an angry glance at him.

The fact was, that for some considerable time Charlotte Pain had put Maria Hastings almost out of her head, as regarded her relations to George G.o.dolphin. Whatever reason she may have seen at Broomhead to believe he was attached to Maria, the impression had since faded away.

In the spring, before his illness, George had been much more with her than with Maria. This was not entirely George's fault: the Rectory did not court him: Charlotte Pain and the Folly did. A week had now pa.s.sed since Mr. Verrall's departure for town, when George and his sticks appeared at the Folly for the first time after his illness; and, not a day of that week since but George and Charlotte had met. Altogether, her hopes of winning the prize had gone up to enthusiastic heat; and Charlotte believed the greatest prize in the world--taking all his advantages collectively--to be George G.o.dolphin. George went at once to his sister Janet's chamber. She was in it, dressing for dinner, after bringing her aged guest, Mrs. Briscow, from the station. He knocked at the door with his stick, and was told to enter.

Janet was before the gla.s.s in her black silk dress, trimmed heavily with c.r.a.pe still. She was putting on her sober cap, a white one, with black ribbons. Janet G.o.dolphin had taken to wear caps at thirty years of age: her hair, like Thomas's, was thin; and she was not troubled with cares of making herself appear younger than she was.

"Come in, George," she said, turning to him without any appearance of surprise.

"See how good I am, Janet!" he cried, throwing himself wearily into a chair. "I have come back to dine with you."

"I saw you from the window. You have been walking too far!"

"Only to the Folly and back. But I sauntered about, looking at the flowers, and that tires one far worse than bearing on steadily."

"Ay. Lay yourself down on that couch at full length, lad. Mrs. Hastings is here, I see. And--was that other Charlotte Pain?"

"Yes," replied George, disregarding the injunction to lie down.

"Did she come from the Folly in that guise?--Nothing on her head but those flowers? I could see no bonnet even in her hand."

"It is to be sent after her. Janet"--pa.s.sing quickly from the other matter--"she has come to dine with us."

Miss G.o.dolphin turned in amazement, and fixed her eyes reproachfully on George. "To dine with us?--to-day? Have you been asking her?"

"Janet, I could not well help myself. When I got to Lady G.o.dolphin's Folly, I found Charlotte alone: Mrs. Verrall has departed for town. To break through my engagement there, I proposed that Charlotte should come here."

"Nay," said Janet, "your engagement was already broken, if Mrs. Verrall was away."

"Not so. Charlotte expected me to remain."

"Herself your sole entertainer?"

"I suppose so."

A severe expression arose to Miss G.o.dolphin's lips, and remained there.

"It is most unsuitable, Charlotte Pain's being here to-day," she resumed. "The changes which have taken place render our meeting with Mrs. Briscow a sad one; no stranger ought to be at table. Least of all, Charlotte Pain. Her conversation is at times unfeminine."

"How can you say so, Janet?" he involuntarily exclaimed.

"Should she launch into some of her favourite topics, her horses and her dogs, it will sound unfeminine to Mrs. Briscow's ears. In her young days--in _my_ days also, George, for the matter of that--these subjects were deemed more suitable to men's lips than to young women's. George, had your mother lived, it would have been a sore day to her, the one that brought the news that you had fixed your mind on Charlotte Pain."

"It was not so to my father, at any rate," George could not help saying.

"And was it possible that you did not see how Charlotte Pain played her cards before your father?" resumed Janet. "Not a word, that could offend his prejudices as a refined gentleman, did she ever suffer herself to utter. I saw; if you did not."

"You manage to see a great deal that the rest of us don't see, Janet. Or you fancy that you do."

"It is no fancy, lad. I would not like to discourage a thing that you have set your heart upon; I would rather go a mile out of my way than do it: but I stand next door to a mother to you, and I can but warn you that you will repent it, if you ever suffer Charlotte Pain to be more to you than she now is."

George rose. "Set your mind at rest, Janet. It has never been my intention to marry Charlotte Pain: and--so far as I believe at present--it never will be."

The dinner went off pleasantly. Mrs. Briscow was a charming old lady, although she was of the "antediluvian" school, and Charlotte was on her best behaviour, and half fascinated Mrs. Briscow. George, like a trespa.s.sing child, received several hints from Janet that bed might be desirable for him, but he ingeniously ignored them, and sat on.

Charlotte's bonnet and an attendant arrived, and Thomas G.o.dolphin put on his hat to see her to the Folly.

"I need not trouble you, Mr. G.o.dolphin. I shall not be run away with."

"I think it will be as well that I should see you do not," said he, smiling.

It was scarcely dark. The clock had not struck ten, and the night was starlight. Thomas G.o.dolphin gave her his arm, and the maid walked behind them. Arrived at Ashlydyat, he left her. Charlotte stood for a few moments, then turned on her heel and entered the hall. The first thing that caught her notice was a hat; next a travelling coat. They had not been there when she left in the afternoon.

"Then Verrall's back!" she mentally exclaimed.

Hastening into the dining-room, she saw, seated at a table, drinking brandy and water, not Mr. Verrall, but Rodolf Pain.

"Good gracious!" exclaimed Charlotte, with more surprise in her tone than satisfaction, "have _you_ come?"

"Come to find an empty house," rejoined Mr. Pain. "Where's Mrs. Verrall?

They tell me she is gone to London."

"She is," replied Charlotte. "Verrall neither came back nor wrote; she had a restless fit upon her, and started off this morning to him."

"Verrall won't thank her," observed Mr. Pain. "He is up to his eyes in business."

"Good or bad business?" asked Charlotte.

"Both. We have got into a mess, and Verrall's not yet out of it."

"Through what? Through whom?" she questioned.

Rodolf Pain gave his shoulders a jerk, as if he had been a Frenchman.

"It need not trouble you, Charlotte."

"Some one came down here from London a week ago; a Mr. Appleby. Is it through him? Verrall seemed strangely put out at his coming."

Mr. Pain nodded his head. "They were such idiots in the office as to give Appleby the address here. I have seen Verrall in a tolerable pa.s.sion once or twice in my life, but I never saw him in such a one as he went into when he came up. They'll not forget it in a hurry. He lays the blame on me, remotely; says I must have left a letter about with the address on it. I know I have done nothing of the sort."