She had the note in her hand when she finally joined Lady Ba.s.sett upon the verandah.

Lady Ba.s.sett, though ever-gracious, was seldom at her best in the morning. She greeted the girl with a faint, wry smile, and proffered her nearest cheek to be kissed.

"Quite an early bird, dear child!" was her comment. "I should imagine Captain Ratcliffe's visitation awakened the whole neighbourhood. I think you must not go out again with him before sunrise. I should not have advised it this morning if you had consulted me."

Muriel flushed at the softly-conveyed reproof. "It is not the first time," she said, in her deep voice that was always deepest when indignation moved her. "We have seen the sun rise together and the moon rise too, before to-day."

Lady Ba.s.sett sighed gently. "I am sure, dearest," she said, "that you do not mean to be uncouth or unmannerly, far less--that most odious of all propensities in a young girl--forward. But though my authority over you were to be regarded as so slight as to be quite negligible, I should still feel it my duty to remonstrate when I saw you committing a breach of the conventions which might be grievously misconstrued. I trust, dear Muriel, that you will bear my protest in mind and regulate your actions by it in the future. Will you take coffee?"

Muriel had seated herself at the other side of the table, and was regarding her with wide, dark eyes that were neither angry nor ashamed, only quite involuntarily disdainful.

After a distinct pause she decided to let the matter drop, reflecting that Lady Ba.s.sett's subtleties were never worth pursuing.

"I am going to see a friend of Nick's this afternoon," she said presently. "I expect you know her--Mrs. Musgrave."

Lady Ba.s.sett's forehead puckered a little. It could hardly be called a frown. "Have you ever met Mrs. Musgrave?" she asked.

"No, never. But she is Nick's friend, and of course I know her cousin, Captain Grange, quite well."

Lady Ba.s.sett made no comment upon this. "Of course, dear," she said, "you are old enough to please yourself, but it is not usual, you know, to plunge into social pleasures after so recent a bereavement as yours."

The sudden silence that followed this gentle reminder had in it something that was pa.s.sionate. Muriel's face turned vividly crimson, and then gradually whitened to a startling pallor.

"It is the last thing I should wish to do," she said, in a stifled voice.

Lady Ba.s.sett continued, softly suggestive. "I say nothing of your marriage, dear child. For that, I am aware, is practically a matter of necessity. But I do think that under the circ.u.mstances you can scarcely be too careful in what you do. Society is not charitably inclined towards those who even involuntarily transgress its rules.

And you most emphatically are not in a position to do so wilfully."

She paused, for Muriel had risen unexpectedly to her feet. Her eyes were blazing in her white face.

"Why should you call my marriage a matter of necessity?" she demanded.

"Sir Reginald told me that my father had provided for me."

"Of course, of course, dear." Lady Ba.s.sett uttered a faint, artificial laugh. "It is not a question of means at all. But, there, since you are so childishly unsophisticated, I need not open your eyes. It is enough for you to know that there is a sufficiently urgent reason for your marriage, and the sooner it can take place, the better. But in the meantime, let me counsel you to be as prudent as possible in all that you do. I a.s.sure you, dear, it is very necessary."

Muriel received this little homily in silence. She did not in the least understand to what these veiled allusions referred, and she decided impatiently that they were unworthy of her serious consideration. It was ridiculous to let herself be angry with Lady Ba.s.sett. As if it mattered in the least what she said or thought! She determined to pay her projected visit notwithstanding, and quietly said so, as she turned at length from the table.

Lady Ba.s.sett raised no further remonstrance beyond a faint, eloquent lift of the shoulders. And Muriel went away into the shady compound, her step firmer and her dark head decidedly higher than usual. She felt for Nick's gift as she went, with a little secret sensation of pleasure. After all, why had she been afraid? All girls wore rings when they became engaged to be married.

Reaching her favourite corner, she drew it forth from its hiding-place, a quiver of excitement running through her.

She was sitting in the hammock under the pines as she unwrapped it.

The hot sunshine, glinting through the dark boughs overhead, flashed upon precious stones and dazzled her as the wisp of tissue-paper fell from her hand.

And in a moment she was looking at an old marquise ring of rubies in a setting of finely-wrought gold. Her heart gave a throb of sheer delight at the beauty of the thing. She slipped it impetuously on to her finger, and held it up to the sunlight.

The rubies shone with a deep l.u.s.tre--red, red as heart's blood, ardent as flame. She gazed and gazed with sparkling, fascinated eyes.

Suddenly his words flashed into her mind. A message inside it! She had been so caught by the splendour of the stones that she had not looked inside. She drew the ring from her finger, and examined it closely, with burning cheeks.

Yes, there was the message--three words engraved in minute, old-fashioned characters inside the gold band. They were so tiny that it took her a long time to puzzle them out. With difficulty at length she deciphered the quaint letters, but even then it was some time before she grasped the meaning that they spelt.

It flashed upon her finally, as though a voice had spoken into her ear. The words were: OMNIA VINCIT AMOR. And the ring in her hand was no longer the outward visible sign of her compact. It was a love-token, given to her by a man who had spoken no word of love.

CHAPTER XIII

THE VOICE OF A FRIEND

"So you didn't bring Nick after all. That was nice of you," said Daisy Musgrave, with a little, whimsical smile. "I wanted to have you all to myself. The nicest of men can be horribly in the way sometimes."

She smiled upon her visitor whom she had placed in the easiest chair and in the pleasantest corner of her drawing-room. Her pretty face was aglow with friendliness. No words of welcome were needed.

Muriel was already feeling happier than she had felt for many, many weary weeks. It had been an effort to come, but she was glad that she had made it.

"It was kind of you to ask me," she said, "though of course I know that you did it for Nick's sake."

"You are quite wrong," Daisy answered instantly. "He told me about you, I admit. But after that, I wanted you for your own. And now I have got you, Muriel, I am not going to stand on ceremony the least bit in the world. And you mustn't either; but I can see you won't.

Your eyes are telling me things already. I don't get on with stiff people somehow. Lady Ba.s.sett calls me effusive. And I think myself there must have been something meteoric about my birth star. Doubtless that is why I agree so well with Nick. He's meteoric, too." She slipped cosily down upon a stool by Muriel's side. "He's a nice boy, isn't he?" she said sympathetically. "And is that his ring? Ah, let me look at it! I think I have seen it before. No, don't take it off!

That's unlucky."

But Muriel had already drawn it from her finger. "It's beautiful," she said warmly. "Do you know anything about it? It looks as if it had a history."

"It has," said Daisy. "I remember now. He showed it to me once when I was staying at his brother's house in England. I know the Ratcliffes well. My husband used to live with them as a boy. It came from the old maiden aunt who left him all his money. She gave it to him before she died, I believe, and told him to keep it for the woman he was sure to love some day. Nick was an immense favourite of hers."

"But the ring?" urged Muriel.

Daisy was frowning over the inscription within it, but she was fully aware of the soft colour that had flooded the girl's face at her words.

"OMNIA VINCIT AMOR," she read slowly. "That is it, isn't it? Ah, yes, and the history of it. It's rather sad. Do you mind?"

"I am used to sad things," Muriel reminded her, with her face turned away toward the mountains.

Daisy pressed her hand gently. "It is a French ring," she said. "It belonged to an aristocrat who was murdered in the Reign of Terror.

He sent it by his servant to the girl he loved from the steps of the guillotine. I don't know their names. Nick didn't tell me that. But she was English."

Muriel had turned quickly back. Her interest was aroused. "Yes," she said eagerly, as Daisy paused. "And she?"

"She!" Daisy's voice had a sudden hard ring in it. "She remained faithful to him for just six months. And then she married an Englishman. It was said that she did it against her will. Still she did it. Luckily for her, perhaps, she died within the year--when her child was born."

Daisy rose abruptly and moved across the room. "That was more than a hundred years ago," she said, "and women are as great fools still. If they can't marry the man they love--they'll marry--anything."

Muriel was silent. She felt as if she had caught sight of something that she had not been intended to see.

But in a moment Daisy came back, and, kneeling beside her, slipped the ring on to her finger again. "Yet love conquers all the same, dear,"

she said, pa.s.sing her arm about the girl. "And yours is going to be a happy love story. The ring came finally into the possession of the lady's grandson, and it was he who gave it to Nick's aunt--the maiden aunt. It was her engagement ring. She never wore any other, and she only gave it to Nick when her fingers were too rheumatic to wear it any longer. Her lover, poor boy, was killed in the Crimea. There!