"Gracious goodness me!" exclaimed Miss Phoebe, receiving it at once as gospel. "How do you know?"

"By putting two and two together. Didn't you notice how red Molly went, and then pale, and how she said she knew for a fact that Mr.

Preston and Cynthia Kirkpatrick were not engaged?"

"Perhaps not engaged; but Mrs. Goodenough saw them loitering together, all by their own two selves--"

"Mrs. Goodenough only crossed Heath Lane at the Shire Oak, as she was riding in her phaeton," said Miss Browning sententiously. "We all know what a coward she is in a carriage, so that most likely she had only half her wits about her, and her eyes are none of the best when she is standing steady on the ground. Molly and Cynthia have got their new plaid shawls just alike, and they trim their bonnets alike, and Molly is grown as tall as Cynthia since Christmas. I was always afraid she'd be short and stumpy, but she's now as tall and slender as anyone need be. I'll answer for it, Mrs. Goodenough saw Molly, and took her for Cynthia."

When Miss Browning "answered for it" Miss Phoebe gave up doubting.

She sate some time in silence revolving her thoughts. Then she said:

"It wouldn't be such a very bad match after all, sister." She spoke very meekly, awaiting her sister's sanction to her opinion.

"Phoebe, it would be a bad match for Mary Pearson's daughter. If I had known what I know now we'd never have had him to tea last September."

"Why, what do you know?" asked Miss Phoebe.

"Miss Hornblower told me many things; some that I don't think you ought to hear, Phoebe. He was engaged to a very pretty Miss Gregson, at Henwick, where he comes from; and her father made inquiries, and heard so much that was bad about him that he made his daughter break off the match, and she's dead since!"

"How shocking!" said Miss Phoebe, duly impressed.

"Besides, he plays at billiards, and he bets at races, and some people do say he keeps race-horses."

"But isn't it strange that the earl keeps him on as his agent?"

"No! perhaps not. He's very clever about land, and very sharp in all law affairs; and my lord isn't bound to take notice--if indeed he knows--of the manner in which Mr. Preston talks when he has taken too much wine."

"Taken too much wine! Oh, sister, is he a drunkard? and we have had him to tea!"

"I didn't say he was a drunkard, Phoebe," said Miss Browning, pettishly. "A man may take too much wine occasionally, without being a drunkard. Don't let me hear you using such coa.r.s.e words, Phoebe!"

Miss Phoebe was silent for a time after this rebuke.

Presently she said, "I do hope it wasn't Molly Gibson."

"You may hope as much as you like, but I'm pretty sure it was.

However, we'd better say nothing about it to Mrs. Goodenough; she has got Cynthia into her head, and there let her rest. Time enough to set reports afloat about Molly when we know there's some truth in them.

Mr. Preston might do for Cynthia, who's been brought up in France, though she has such pretty manners; but it may have made her not particular. He must not, and he shall not, have Molly, if I go into church and forbid the banns myself; but I'm afraid--I'm afraid there's something between her and him. We must keep on the look-out, Phoebe. I'll be her guardian angel, in spite of herself."

CHAPTER XLI.

GATHERING CLOUDS.

[Ill.u.s.tration (unt.i.tled)]

Mrs. Gibson came back full of rose-coloured accounts of London. Lady c.u.mnor had been gracious and affectionate, "so touched by my going up to see her so soon after her return to England," Lady Harriet charming and devoted to her old governess, Lord c.u.mnor "just like his dear usual hearty self;" and as for the Kirkpatricks, no Lord Chancellor's house was ever grander than theirs, and the silk gown of the Q.C. had floated over housemaids and footmen. Cynthia, too, was so much admired; and as for her dress, Mrs. Kirkpatrick had showered down ball-dresses and wreaths, and pretty bonnets and mantles, like a fairy G.o.dmother. Mr. Gibson's poor present of ten pounds shrank into very small dimensions compared with all this munificence.

"And they're so fond of her, I don't know when we shall have her back," was Mrs. Gibson's winding-up sentence. "And now, Molly, what have you and papa been doing? Very gay, you sounded in your letter.

I had not time to read it in London; so I put it in my pocket, and read it in the coach coming home. But, my dear child, you do look so old-fashioned with your gown made all tight, and your hair all tumbling about in curls. Curls are quite gone out. We must do your hair differently," she continued, trying to smooth Molly's black waves into straightness.

"I sent Cynthia an African letter," said Molly, timidly. "Did you hear anything of what was in it?"

"Oh, yes, poor child! It made her very uneasy, I think; she said she did not feel inclined to go to Mr. Rawson's ball, which was on that night, and for which Mrs. Kirkpatrick had given her the ball-dress.

But there was really nothing for her to fidget herself about. Roger only said he had had another touch of fever, but was better when he wrote. He says every European has to be acclimatized by fever in that part of Abyssinia where he is."

"And did she go?" asked Molly.

"Yes, to be sure. It is not an engagement; and if it were, it is not acknowledged. Fancy her going and saying, 'A young man that I know has been ill for a few days in Africa, two months ago, therefore I don't want to go to the ball to-night.' It would have seemed like affectation of sentiment; and if there's one thing I hate it is that."

"She would hardly enjoy herself," said Molly.

"Oh, yes, but she did. Her dress was white gauze, trimmed with lilacs, and she really did look--a mother may be allowed a little natural partiality--most lovely. And she danced every dance, although she was quite a stranger. I am sure she enjoyed herself, from her manner of talking about it next morning."

"I wonder if the Squire knows."

"Knows what? Oh, yes, to be sure--you mean about Roger. I daresay he doesn't, and there's no need to tell him, for I've no doubt it is all right now." And she went out of the room to finish her unpacking.

Molly let her work fall, and sighed. "It will be a year the day after to-morrow since he came here to propose our going to Hurst Wood, and mamma was so vexed at his calling before lunch. I wonder if Cynthia remembers it as well as I do. And now, perhaps-- Oh! Roger, Roger! I wish--I pray that you were safe home again! How could we all bear it, if--"

She covered her face with her hands, and tried to stop thinking.

Suddenly she got up, as if stung by a venomous fancy.

"I don't believe she loves him as she ought, or she could not--could not have gone and danced. What shall I do if she does not? What shall I do? I can bear anything but that."

But she found the long suspense as to his health hard enough to endure. They were not likely to hear from him for a month at least, and before that time had elapsed Cynthia would be at home again.

Molly learnt to long for her return before a fortnight of her absence was over. She had had no idea that perpetual tete-a-tetes with Mrs.

Gibson could, by any possibility, be so tiresome as she found them.

Perhaps Molly's state of delicate health, consequent upon her rapid growth during the last few months, made her irritable; but really often she had to get up and leave the room to calm herself down after listening to a long series of words, more frequently plaintive or discontented in tone than cheerful, and which at the end conveyed no distinct impression of either the speaker's thought or feeling.

Whenever anything had gone wrong, whenever Mr. Gibson had coolly persevered in anything to which she had objected; whenever the cook had made a mistake about the dinner, or the housemaid broken any little frangible article; whenever Molly's hair was not done to her liking, or her dress did not become her, or the smell of dinner pervaded the house, or the wrong callers came, or the right callers did not come--in fact, whenever anything went wrong, poor Mr.

Kirkpatrick was regretted and mourned over, nay, almost blamed, as if, had he only given himself the trouble of living, he could have helped it.

"When I look back to those happy days, it seems to me as if I had never valued them as I ought. To be sure--youth, love,--what did we care for poverty! I remember dear Mr. Kirkpatrick walking five miles into Stratford to buy me a m.u.f.fin because I had such a fancy for one after Cynthia was born. I don't mean to complain of dear papa--but I don't think--but, perhaps I ought not to say it to you. If Mr.

Kirkpatrick had but taken care of that cough of his; but he was so obstinate! Men always are, I think. And it really was selfish of him. Only I daresay he did not consider the forlorn state in which I should be left. It came harder upon me than upon most people, because I always was of such an affectionate sensitive nature. I remember a little poem of Mr. Kirkpatrick's, in which he compared my heart to a harpstring, vibrating to the slightest breeze."

"I thought harpstrings required a pretty strong finger to make them sound," said Molly.

"My dear child, you've no more poetry in you than your father. And as for your hair! it's worse than ever. Can't you drench it in water to take those untidy twists and twirls out of it?"

"It only makes it curl more and more when it gets dry," said Molly, sudden tears coming into her eyes as a recollection came before her like a picture seen long ago and forgotten for years--a young mother washing and dressing her little girl; placing the half-naked darling on her knee, and twining the wet rings of dark hair fondly round her fingers, and then, in an ecstasy of fondness, kissing the little curly head.

The receipt of Cynthia's letters made very agreeable events. She did not write often, but her letters were tolerably long when they did come, and very sprightly in tone. There was constant mention made of many new names, which conveyed no idea to Molly, though Mrs.

Gibson would try and enlighten her by running commentaries like the following:--

"Mrs. Green! ah, that's Mr. Jones's pretty cousin, who lives in Russell Square with the fat husband. They keep their carriage; but I'm not sure if it is not Mr. Green who is Mrs. Jones's cousin. We can ask Cynthia when she comes home. Mr. Henderson! to be sure--a young man with black whiskers, a pupil of Mr. Kirkpatrick's formerly,--or was he a pupil of Mr. Murray's? I know they said he had read law with somebody. Ah, yes! they are the people who called the day after Mr. Rawson's ball, and who admired Cynthia so much, without knowing I was her mother. She was very handsomely dressed indeed, in black satin; and the son had a gla.s.s eye, but he was a young man of good property. Coleman! yes, that was the name."