"Only Eighteen" (continued 2)

“Rex is excelling himself,” said Florence, with a touch of sarcasm in her tone.

“How very kind-hearted he is!” said Mrs Wyngate, simply and warmly. “For a girl of that age is scarcely an interesting companion to a man of his standing, at least, not to a man like him, entirely above flirting or nonsense of that kind.”

“Yes,” Oliver agreed, “you’re about right. It’s all his good-nature. For though she’s pretty, she’s rather heavy—a bit spoilt too, I fancy.”

“By her adoring mamma,” added Florence.

“However, she’s our guest, and we must look after her, heavy or not. Don’t you think Rex must be beginning to have had about enough of it by this time? We had better overtake them; we are close to the caves too.”

Rex was beginning to feel his self-imposed task a little wearisome by this time, and he was not sorry when a shout from Oliver called to him to stop.

“Oh, what a bother!” said Imogen. “I did so want to hear the rest of that story, Major Winchester. Need we walk with them?”

“It would scarcely be civil to walk on,” he said smiling. “I will tell you the rest another time, Miss Wentworth.”

She looked almost brilliantly pretty, but a trifle resentful when the others came up. Florence, not unnaturally, felt slightly indignant, and even Mrs Wyngate decided that the girl must be silly as well as spoilt. For Imogen took no trouble to conceal her annoyance.

“Can she really be so foolish as to imagine Major Winchester finds her society interesting?” thought the matron of the party, while Florence mentally decided that Imogen’s innocence and timidity were not of a kind to “last.”

“She will soon develop into a self-conceited little flirt,” reflected the elder girl; “all the more danger if she falls into bad hands. I foresee no sinecure if I am to look after her.” But she exerted herself to be amusing and agreeable, and to keep the party together. “Poor Rex!” she thought, “I daresay it’s almost as hard upon him to look cheerful as it is upon me. I mustn’t be selfish, either.”

The caves were not bad caves in their way, and child as she really was, Imogen soon forgot her vexation in the fun of exploring their dark recesses. She ran on laughingly, declaring that she must go to “the very end,” and Rex, who knew every nook and cranny, contented himself with a “Don’t let her do anything foolish,” to Oliver, who was doing the honours to Mrs Wyngate, and then returned to the entrance, where it was rather a refreshment to him to find Florence, and to walk up and down with her, with the liberty of talking or not as they felt inclined.

Chapter Six.

The Plot Thickens.

“You’re not cold, I hope, Florence,” he said suddenly, waking up out of a brown study.

“Oh no, it is never very cold just here; the rocks shelter us,” she said. “Besides, I am well used to it, and well wrapped up. I only hope your protégée won’t catch cold,” she added, somewhat uneasily. “I should get into a scrape both with her mother and my own.”

“She’s right enough,” he replied, with the slightest possible accent of impatience, which did not altogether displease his companion.

“There’s really less risk of catching cold in caves in winter than in summer, when it’s hot outside.”

Then he relapsed into silence.

After a minute or two Florence spoke again.

“Rex,” she began, half timidly, “I didn’t like to ask you before—indeed, I’ve hardly seen you to-day, but, at breakfast, I saw when you got your letters. Was there anything new, anything worse?”

Major Winchester sighed.

“You’re very quick, Florry dear,” he said. “Yes. There wasn’t anything exactly new, but worse—yes, it was all worse. That was partly why I went out with Paddy. I wanted to battle off my—misery.” He gave a short laugh. “No, that is a womanish word; my disappointment, let us say. And that was how I came to pick up the Wentworths, you see. I had to call at the station.”

“But what is the disappointment—specially, I mean,” Florence asked.

“Only that there is no chance of her, of Eva’s coming home,” he said. “The doctors won’t hear of it. She is to go straight to Algiers from Ireland. And last week, when I left her, there did seem a lightening in the clouds. They won’t even allow her to pass through London on her way.”

“And everything—what you told me about—it is all put off again indefinitely?”

“More than indefinitely—most definitely, I fear,” he said. “Heaven only knows.” But here he broke off.

“Oh, Rex, I am so sorry for you,” said his cousin impulsively. “And you are so unselfish. When I compare myself with you, I do feel so ashamed. Just to think of your bothering yourself with that silly little goose of a child.”

“Poor little girl!” he said. “Under good influence there is the making of a nice woman in her, I think. I’m sure Eva would have been good to her. Perhaps it’s partly that,” he went on simply. “If ever I try to—to do any little thing for others, it seems to bring her nearer me.”

The tears rose to Florence’s eyes—assuredly she was not a thorough-going Helmont.

“It is beautiful to feel like that,” she said.

“I can’t altogether pity you and Eva, Rex. The sympathy between you is so perfect; it would be worth living for to feel like that for an hour of one’s life.”

Major Winchester smiled.

“Yes,” he said, “I do feel it in that way sometimes. And the best of it is, that when you do feel sympathy and union of that kind, you feel that it is independent of circumstances—that it is, so to speak, immortal. Nothing that could happen could altogether shipwreck us.”

Florence sighed deeply.

“I understand,” she said; “or, at least, I understand that I don’t understand; and there is a certain satisfaction, almost exhilaration, in realising that there are things, good and beautiful things, which one can’t understand.”

Major Winchester smiled again, a kindly but somewhat rallying smile.

“Florence,” he said, “you are getting on. I’m not a clever man, and I’m not a prophet. All the same, I believe, some day you will say good-bye to scepticism and cynicism, and all the rest of them.”

“It will be thanks to you and Eva if ever I do,” she said softly. Then, with her usual dislike to any approach to sentiment or emotion, she hastened to change the subject. “How is Angey?” she said. “Mamma or somebody spoke as if there had been news of her.”

“I heard from, or of her, too, this morning,” her cousin replied. “Just the old thing, waiting till her eyes are ready for the operation. They are trying to be hopeful. Her husband is very unselfish, I must say; nevertheless, I cannot understand what made her marry him. My letter was from Arthur. He says—” But a sudden sound of voices just behind where they were standing, or walking, made him stop.

“Who in the world?” he began; then added quickly, “We are unlucky, Florence. Here are Trixie and her double, and that offensive boy, Calthorp. I wish we had not let them know we were coming this way, and I wish I had not let Miss Wentworth go exploring. They have all been in there together.”

He looked and felt really annoyed. Florence cared less, but in her softened mood she was inclined to sympathise with him, as the noisy party emerged from the caves laughing and talking loudly. Miss Forsyth was the first to greet them.

“I can’t congratulate you on the way you do your duty as a cicerone, Florry,” she said. (Florence especially detested Miss Forsyth using her pet name.) “We ran across Miss Wentworth all by herself in the cave. She might have been lost and never heard of any more.”

Major Winchester tamed to Imogen. She was looking rather pale; truth to tell, she was tired and very cold, and rather cross.

“What was Oliver about?” he said. “He promised to look after you. You weren’t really frightened, were you?” he added in a lower tone.

“No, not exactly. But I don’t think any one would like to be all alone in a dark care where they’ve never been before,” said Imogen, childishly but resentfully. “Mr Oliver Helmont and Mrs Wyngate went another way. I don’t know where.”

“It was all right, I assure you,” said Oliver, who was just behind. “Mrs Wyngate wanted to see the large stalactites, and when we turned round, Miss Wentworth had disappeared.—It was you, I think, who went another way, not we,” he added good-naturedly.

And so it was, for Imogen, annoyed at finding that Major Winchester was not following, and that she was to be left to the semi-guardianship of Oliver, had turned, with the intention of retracing her steps to the outer world; and not till she had proceeded some little distance did she discover that she was diving farther into the dim, almost black recesses of the cavern. Then she got frightened, and welcomed effusively the apparition of Trixie and her satellites.

“I don’t see how you can say it was all right,” said Imogen coldly. “People have been lost in caves, as Miss Forsyth says.”

“Not in Tor Cave,” said Oliver. “It’s not really deep a bit. I’ll show you a plan of it when we get home. You couldn’t have helped coming out again in a minute or two.”

“But I can quite understand your having been frightened, and I only hope you have not caught cold,” said Rex with real concern in his voice. “I should say the best thing to be done under the circumstances is to walk home as briskly as possible. A cup of hot tea will be an excellent preventive of harm, as soon as we get in.”

“We shall not be satisfied with walking, thank you,” said Trixie. “We’ve got the dogs Gunner and Plunger with us, tied to a gate over there,” and she nodded her head in a direction behind where they stood, “and we mean to have a good race with them.—Won’t you come with us, Imogen?”

Then she got frightened, and welcomed effusively the apparition of Trixie and her satellites.

“Oh do,” said Mabella, insinuatingly. “I’ll take one hand and Mr Calthorp the other, as Trixie will have enough to do with the beasts. So you shan’t come to grief even when we go at full-speed down Grey Bray.—Noll, won’t you come?”

“Many thanks, no,” said Oliver, dryly. Something in his tone made Imogen hesitate in the acceptance of the invitation she had been on the point of. She glanced half longingly towards Beatrix; but before she had time to speak, before Florence had time to break in with what, though well-meant, would probably have been an entirely ineffectual remonstrance, Major Winchester took the matter in his own hands.

“Miss Wentworth has had fatigue enough,” he said. “I know what your ‘good races’ are, Trixie. Besides which, I promised Mrs Wentworth to bring her daughter safely home.”

“Looks like it,” murmured Trixie, who had drawn near him, “when you left her all to herself in the cave.” No one but Rex himself heard the words, and he went on, without apparently taking any notice of the impertinence, “And I mean to do so.”

Imogen’s face flushed with mingled feelings, but she did not speak.

“You will stay with us—with Florence and me,” said Major Winchester, turning to her, and speaking very gently. The pink on the girl’s fair face grew into crimson.

“Very well,” she said, not too generously, though with an undertone of submission which pleased Rex, who at heart, it must be confessed, was a bit of a martinet.

The group divided. Miss Forsyth, Beatrix, and their attendant turning off to the right in the direction of a low wall of loose stones which they proceeded to clamber over.

“You might have cleared it, surely, Mr Calthorp,” said Trixie, contemptuously.

“I’ll do it now: what’ll you bet?” said the young man. He proceeded to execute his boast, thereby, as the girl had foreseen, giving her and her friend a few moments to themselves.

“What a donkey he is, to be sure!” said Mabella. “What do you want to say, Trix?”

“Only this—didn’t I do it splendidly? Nothing pulls the strings for Rex like contradiction. He will be devoted to her all the rest of the afternoon, and she will imagine it’s all the result of her fascinations. Really, it’s the best joke I’ve had for ever so long.”

“Provided Florry doesn’t step in and spoil it all,” said Mab.

“Florry!” ejaculated Beatrix. “She’s more than half stupefied still. She sees nothing but what is forced upon her. It’s really extraordinary how hard she’s been hit. I couldn’t have half believed it of one of us.” She ended with a light laugh.

“Nor could I,” said her companion. “To do you justice, there’s uncommonly little heart among you.”

“Now don’t be rude,” said Beatrix. “What do you know? Don’t you begin setting up to be as good as Florry, my dear, or—”

They were on the verge of one of the quarrels which frequently relieved the monotony of their friendship. But Mabella thought better of it. Her spite had found an ample field in which to disport itself for the present, and she felt it wise to concentrate her forces.

“Don’t be silly!” she said calmly. “Here comes that boy—bravo, Mr Calthorp! Now listen, Trix, let’s get in before them, and you be sure to back up any remark I may make. I think I may have a chance of insinuating something already. But leave it to me—you’re too clumsy—for remember I shall not say one word that could be brought up against us, should it go great lengths, and you would.”

“And if it does go great lengths, what will happen?” inquired Beatrix, slightly aghast.

“A nice mess for Major Rex; that’s all I care about,” answered Mabella. “Goodness, how those dogs are pulling. They’d have strangled themselves or torn the gate-post down if we’d kept them waiting much longer. Thank you, Mr Calthorp, I think we had better leave them to Trixie. They know her more intimately than they do us. Discretion is sometimes the better part of valour.” And she stood by coolly, while Beatrix struggled to loosen Gunner and Plunger, nearly knocking Mr Calthorp down in their first rush of freedom.

“You would have been safer beside me after all,” said Trixie contemptuously to her two “discreet” companions.

The other party, meanwhile, were wending their way home in a more decorous manner.

Oliver, somewhat disillusioned by Imogen’s unfair reproach, had re-attached himself to Mrs Wyngate. Florence, satisfied that Rex had undertaken for the time the “personal conduct” of his self-imposed protégée, walked on silently between the two couples, apparently one of the group, in reality thinking her own thoughts, though feeling a degree less entirely sad and hopeless than usual, thanks to the glimmer of reflected light she had been conscious of in her conversation with her cousin.

And Major Winchester, too, felt a little cheered. He began to have hopes of Florence, and he realised, though by no means for the first time, that his own sorrows were not without their brighter side. Then he was touched, even gratified, by Imogen’s confidence in him, and he felt that she deserved some return. So he devoted himself to her anew, and this time their talk called for less effort on his part—they seemed to grow rather more on a level, as half unconsciously the conversation became of a somewhat personal kind.

“I’m sure Mrs Wentworth will say I did right in preventing your going over to the enemy in that traitorous fashion; don’t you think so?” Major Winchester began. He spoke in a light half-rallying tone, for at first Imogen preserved her dignified silence, and he felt uncertain as to how the ground lay.

The girl gave her head the very slightest possible toss, as she replied:

“Mamma trusts me to look after myself. Indeed, she asks my advice more often than I do hers. Mamma hasn’t a very decided character, and I’m afraid I have.”

Rex was silent.

“Are you shocked?” said Imogen with a touch of apology, or at least timidity. And she glanced up at him from under her long eyelashes, like a naughty but repentant child.

”‘Shocked?’ no. That tone about one’s elders is too common nowadays to shock,” he said quietly. “But I own it would disappoint me in you if I thought you really meant it. It was your tenderness to your mother that—that first”—“made me feel an interest in you,” he was going to have said, but the words struck him as priggish and patronising. Imogen blushed, but he did not see her blush, and he went on speaking:

“It reminded me a little of my own sister,” he said. “She was my elder sister, and my mother was an invalid for many years. One of my clearest remembrances since early boyhood is of Angey’s unfailing care and tenderness about our mother.”

He seemed to be “thinking back,” as I have heard a child express it. Imogen, glancing up again, caught the look in his face and respected it.

“You say ‘was.’ But your sister is not dead?” she hazarded after a little.

“Oh no,” he replied, recollecting himself with a little start, “she is living. But I am in great anxiety about her just now. She is soon to undergo a very serious—very, very serious operation on her eyes. And we shall not know for months if it is successful. I am very foolish, I daresay, but I can scarcely bear to speak of it. I had a letter this morning—my poor Angey.”

“I am so sorry,” said Imogen softly. “What is her name?” she added. “I should like to think of her by it. Is it Angela?”

“Not quite. It is even more fantastic. It is Evangeline. Eva some people call her, but her home name has always been Angey. Evangeline is too much of a good thing in the way of names.”

“It is very pretty. And ‘Eva’ is very pretty,” said Imogen, simply.

Major Winchester smiled.

“Yes, ‘Eva’ is very nice,” he said. “Of course, it is the diminutive of other names as well as my sister’s.” Then he seemed to wish to change the subject. “Don’t think me impertinent, Miss Wentworth, apropos of what you were saying about having a ‘decided character.’ Young people—very young people especially,” and here he gave a slightly deprecating smile—“often make a mistake between impulsiveness and self-will and decision of character, much in the same way that obstinacy and firmness are often confused.”

“I am not so very young, Major Winchester,” Imogen returned, much more irate, evidently, at the reflection on her youth than at the other suggestion. “I am eighteen past, and I don’t think I am particularly self-willed; at least, I don’t mean to be. Mamma and I generally wish the same things. And when you live with a person who can’t make up their mind, and you have to decide, that isn’t being impulsive.”

“No, certainly not,” he agreed.

“Besides,” she went on, “sometimes I have to give in very much against my own will. As about coming here,” and she related the history of the “breaking the journey,” which had led to such uncomfortable results.

Rex listened with considerable amusement.

“But after all,” he said, “it’s an ill wind, you know. But for the little episode in question, I might never have had the pleasure of getting to know you so well.”

“No,” said Imogen, with the sort of bluntness of manner which was, somehow, one of her charms, “that’s true.” Then there fell a little silence.

“Major Winchester,” said Imogen after a moment or two.

“Miss Wentworth?” he replied.

“You mustn’t mind my saying so,” she began, “but do you know I can’t help thinking you are all a little hard upon Trixie.”

His face darkened at once.

“How so?” he said.

Imogen hesitated.

“It’s very difficult to answer when you’re asked like that,” she said, pouting a little. But her companion seemed to have lost his playfulness. He did not speak.

“I mean—I mean,” she went on, “that because she’s spoilt, perhaps, and rather noisy, and—and what you call loud or fast sometimes, you all, you and her sister, and even her brother,”—with a glance round to make sure that Florence was not within earshot—“seem to think there’s no good in her.”

“Heaven forbid!” Major Winchester ejaculated; “Heaven forbid that I should say such a thing of anybody!”

“Well, well, you know what I mean,” Imogen went on; “you don’t think there’s much, anyway. Now she was really very kind to me when we arrived, much kinder than anybody; except you, of course,” she added naïvely.

Rex’s tone softened.

“I am far from saying there is no good in Trixie,” he repeated. “If we could get her away from other influences, if she could really be made to feel, if—if— But it’s no use discussing her. And, excuse me, my dear child,”—he was scarcely aware that he used the expression—“but can you judge in so very short a time as to whether we are hard on her or not?”

“N-no,” said Imogen, consideringly. “Only sometimes one seems to see thing’s at first better than afterwards.”

“Or one fancies so,” he remarked. “But don’t begin thinking Trixie a martyr. She is nothing of the kind, I assure you. I am glad—if she has been really kind to you, I should be glad. Still, I cannot help hoping that you will make more of a friend of Florence.”

Imogen made a little moue.

“I will if I can,” she said, adding: “It’s Miss Forsyth you think the bad influence, I can see. I’m afraid you don’t think there’s much good in her.”

“No,” said Major Winchester, gravely; “I’m afraid I do not.”

“I don’t like her,” continued the girl, “but mamma does. Miss Forsyth’s so nice to her. You’d better warn mamma. Major Winchester,” she added, rather flippantly.

“You know perfectly well I could not do anything so impertinent,” he said, with a touch of asperity. Imogen reddened. “Forgive me,” he went on, “I do not mean to speak harshly. But one thing—do promise me, Miss Wentworth, that if you are in any real trouble or dilemma here—anything in which your mother, as a stranger herself, might not be able to help you—you will not be afraid of applying to me.”

“Yes,” said Imogen, “I promise you.”

They were close to the house by this tune. As they entered the hall they came upon the two who had preceded them, warming themselves at the fire. Major Winchester stalked across and disappeared through a doorway without speaking. He had gone to look after some hot tea for Imogen, for she was blue with cold.

“What’s the matter now?” said Miss Forsyth.

“Have you offended his majesty, Miss Wentworth?”

“I don’t know what you mean,” said Imogen.

“How silly you are, Mab!” said Trixie.

“Don’t you see, Imogen, she—like the rest of us—is so flabbergasted that she doesn’t know how to take it?”

“Well, no wonder,” Mabella replied, lightly.

“Did any one ever before see Major Winchester devote himself like that to anything in the shape of a young lady? How have you done it, Miss Wentworth?”

“I don’t know what you mean,” said Imogen again. She turned to go up-stairs as she spoke, and she spoke coolly. All the same the shot had taken effect.

Chapter Seven.

Acting and not Acting.

Some guests had left The Fells that afternoon, but others had arrived. There were further goings and comings during the next few days, but more of the latter than the former. The Helmonts were in their glory, but to Imogen and her mother, fresh from their uneventful monotonous life à deux, the effect was almost as confusing as that of a kaleidoscope too rapidly turned. It became a relief when the party settled down as it were, for a little, into the chosen guests especially selected for the private theatricals which had been for some time under discussion, and at which the “assistance” of the Wentworths had not been desired.

But Imogen was undoubtedly pretty; every one, even Miss Forsyth, allowed it. And her face was a novelty. She proved to have more spirit, or “go,” as Trixie called it, in her, than had seemed probable; on the whole, she bid fair to be a very creditable success. Her inexperience and shyness were amusing, not tiresome. Her mother watched her with enchantment, ready and eager to swallow any amount of even the most thinly disguised flattery on Imogen’s account from the astute Mabella.

“She is really turning everybody’s head. I never saw anything like it,” said the young lady in question over and over again, whenever she got a chance of Mrs Wentworth to herself. “Noll is grateful for a glance; and Fred”—Fred was Captain Helmont—“who is considered a tremendous critic, admires her out and out, only, of course, his admiration is due elsewhere.” He was shortly to be married to a girl not at that time one of the party at The Fells. “I don’t know what Lady Lucy would say to it if she were here.”

Mrs Wentworth smiled. Captain Helmont had been one of her dreams for Imogen before they came.

“Lady Lucy is very pretty herself, some one said,” she remarked politely.

“Not a patch on Imogen, if I may call her so,” Miss Forsyth continued. “But the marvel,” and here she dropped her voice discreetly, “is Major Winchester! A man who never knows if a woman has a nose on her face or not—who stalks about the world like the great Mogul. Of course, we all admire him and respect him—oh, immensely!—but we look upon him as a being quite apart. And there he is—perfectly devoted—taking the greatest interest in these theatricals, which as a rule he would have thought beneath contempt, and all, I am sure, for your daughter’s sake. Trixie and I can’t get over it.”

Mrs Wentworth’s smile was positively beaming.

“My dear Miss Forsyth, you are too kind, too partial,” she said. “I quite appreciate all you say, but—I must not have Imogen spoilt. She is so young. Major Winchester, for instance—I am sure he considers her a perfect child.”

“But she is not—not in some ways,” Mabella went on, insidiously. “She has been so well brought up,”—and here she sighed deeply—“so well educated. I heard Rex saying to some one that he could see she had excellent abilities. It will be such a good thing for my poor Trixie if a girl like that takes to her—her influence would be everything. Much better than mine,” here she sighed again. “I can do my friends no good, I can only love them. I was not well brought up—far from it, as I daresay you can see for yourself.”

“Poor dear!” said Mrs Wentworth, too ingenuous herself to doubt another, and too candid to express any civil disagreement. She gently stroked Mabella’s hand, while the ready tears rose to her eyes. “You had no mother, perhaps?”

“Yes, my mother is still living, but—she never understood me,” said Miss Forsyth, vaguely. And Mrs Wentworth, suspecting some painful family history behind the words, forbore to question further. She would have been not a little amazed had she heard the true side of the story. A father and mother, simple-minded and devoted to their daughter, erring only in their too great unselfishness, to be repaid by contempt and scorn, when, by dint of a certain unscrupulous cleverness, Mabella made her way into a higher social sphere. She and Trixie had met accidentally, and the elder girl at once laid herself out to obtain an ascendency over the spoilt Helmont “baby,” in which she succeeded only too well.

“No,” Mabella repeated. “I was never understood, and—I was not naturally patient and docile, I fear; and now, though I see it all, I am too old to change, I suppose.”

“Too old!” repeated Imogen’s mother. “Nonsense, dear Miss Forsyth. You can’t be more than seven or eight and twenty?”

“I am three-and-twenty,” said the girl, which was true. She was furious, but she hid it. “Will you take me in hand, dear Mrs Wentworth,” she went on, “if you don’t think me too old! You can’t be many years older yourself,” she added, sweetly.

“I shall be thirty-eight next month,” Imogen’s mother replied. “That is dreadfully old, is it not?”

“I shall count you my elder sister then, and you must tell me when you see me doing anything you don’t like, and dear Imogen will look after Trixie. Shall that be a compact? Who knows how much good you may not do me in a fortnight! Even Major Winchester himself would not give me up as incorrigible, if he heard of it.”

And under Mabella’s direction, hints, though less broad, were not wanting on Trixie’s part to Imogen herself. They were seed for which circumstances, including her own inexperience and vanity, her mother’s blind devotion and Rex Winchester’s well-intended kindness, were steadily preparing a congenial soil.

Everybody knows the atmosphere of excitement, general fuss, anxiety, and eager anticipation which seizes upon a house—a country-house especially—where “private theatricals” are in question. And to those fortunate people who have never themselves had personal experience of it, it has been too often described to need more than an allusion. It is a grand test—almost as good as a sea voyage—of temper and unselfishness. So far, perhaps, we may consider it salutary. But no doubt such a state of things has its undesirable side. To the inexperienced, especially, it brings with it a curious sense of unreality, a throwing off of one’s actual self and responsibilities which call for peculiar good-sense and self-control.

“I don’t feel as if I knew who I was,” said Imogen, looking up at Major Winchester somewhat wistfully one day, about ten days after her arrival at The Fells, when a long rehearsal had tried everybody’s patience and good-humour to the utmost. “I don’t think I am the least good at acting, and yet I feel as if I weren’t myself. I seem more than half ‘Valesca.’ Yet I shall never be able to do it the way Mr Villars tells me.”

“He is rather inexorable, certainly,” Rex agreed; “but then he wouldn’t be fit to be stage-manager if he were not. I think you will do very well, quite well enough.”

He did not add the truth—that though she was quite without dramatic power of the mildest kind, she looked the part so charmingly that no one would be inclined to be critical.

“That is faint praise,” said Imogen with one of her little pouts. “Of course I know it is a most unimportant character; still I would like to manage it decently well. How capitally Trixie and Miss Forsyth act, Major Winchester!”

He glanced at her sharply.

“Then I hope no one I care for will ever act capitally,” he said.

Imogen reddened.

“You are very severe on them,” she said. “I don’t mind what you think of Miss Forsyth, for I don’t like her; but I am, sometimes, at least”—and here, for some unexplained reason, she grew still redder—“very fond of Trixie. She is very kind to me generally;” for candour compelled her to qualify the statement. Trixie not being so case-hardened in diplomacy as her ally, was not always able to keep her temper or to hide her growing jealousy of Imogen’s universally acknowledged beauty. “And I think she would like to be more—more like what your sister must have been. I think you can scarcely judge of Trixie, Major Winchester. She shows to disadvantage to you because she is so frightened of you.”

Rex laughed; he could not help it.

“My dear child, you really must not be so desperately confiding,” he said. “Trixie is frightened of no one—man or woman.”

But Imogen’s advocacy touched him and increased his favourable opinion of her character. An opinion to a great extent deserved, for below some superficial selfishness and vanity, there was in her real sweetness and generosity—material, in wise hands, for much good. The generosity in this instance was conspicuous, for Rex had himself been witness to some far from amiable conduct on Beatrix’s part towards the young guest.

“How is it,” he went on, “that you seem to see so little of Florence?”

“I don’t know,” Imogen replied. “I have tried to make friends with her, because I knew you wished it,” she added naïvely. “But I’m afraid she does not care for me. And she is always so busy. I think she does a great deal to help her mother.”

“Yes, Florrie’s a good girl,” said he approvingly. “I wish you could know her better.”

It was as Imogen said. Florence did not care for her. Yet, when taxed by her cousin with her disregard of his protégée, it was difficult to prove her to blame.

“I really did what I could,” she assured him. “But she threw herself into Trixie’s arms from the very first, and unless I actually speak against my own sister, I cannot help it.”

“No ‘speaking against’ any one would have the desired effect with Miss Wentworth; rather the other way,” said Major Winchester. “There is a strong strain of chivalry in her composition.”

“What a high opinion you seem to have of her!” said Florence, half pettishly. “To me she is just a pretty, shallow child—with something ingenuous and sweet about her—yes, that I must allow. But really, I know little more of her than on the day she came. I have had to give up taking any part in the theatricals, you know, Rex, and it is the one thing I could have thrown myself into, and—forgotten myself a little. But Alicia took it into her head to act, and mother would have been left all to herself really. Besides which I couldn’t have kept my temper with Trixie and that Mab of hers,” she concluded, honestly.

“I am sorry you had to give it up. But I am sure you did it for the best. It makes me still more anxious about that child, however,” said Rex. “And I am afraid her mother is—well, very silly.”

“You will have to look after her doubly,” said Florence. “She couldn’t have a better guardian. It may distract your thoughts a little—poor Rex. What is your last news, by the bye?”

“No better, except that she has stood the journey so far pretty well,” he replied.

The same question was asked him again that afternoon in the interval of one of the daily or twice-a-day rehearsals. Imogen, blushing as she did so, asked gently what news he had.

“No better, thank you,” he said half absently, “except that the crossing has been accomplished pretty successfully.”

“The crossing?” Imogen repeated. “Then is she—is your sister to undergo the operation abroad? Or is it over?”

Rex recollected himself.

“Oh no,” he said quickly. “I was confusing—no, no—Angey, my sister, is pretty well in herself. Nothing can be done about her eyes for some time yet.” He gave a half sigh and hesitated. “I was thinking of—”

But Imogen would not let him finish.

“I am so sorry,” she said, “for speaking of it. It was very thoughtless of me, for I know it must be very painful to you.”

She really felt guilty, for only the day before Mrs Wentworth had told her that Miss Forsyth had warned her never to allude to Major Winchester’s anxieties; he “could not bear them spoken of to him.”

“All the kinder of him,” Imogen had said to herself with a little thrill of pride, “to have confided in me about them,” though she had not expressed this to her mother.

There were times when Imogen’s confidence in Beatrix received a shake. Trixie was too unused to self-control of any kind to keep it up for long, even in a bad cause. And Miss Wentworth’s acting often gave opportunity for ridicule, it must be allowed. Then Mr Villars was severe and enthusiastic, and Imogen’s perfect fitness in appearance for the part assigned to her made him doubly provoked at her absolute incapacity to carry out his directions. More than once the close of a rehearsal found the poor girl all but in tears, and the sympathy she met with was often but scant.

“You do look so absurd when Mr Villars scolds you,” said Trixie, one day after one of these scenes. “If you talk in that brokenhearted voice I shall not be able to keep from laughing, I warn you, on the grand night itself.”

“You are very unkind,” said Imogen, flashing out. “I never wanted to act, and I never said I could. I have a good mind to—” But here her voice failed her. She turned away abruptly and left the room.

“She has gone to complain to her mother. You are a fool, Trixie,” said Miss Forsyth, elegantly.

“Not a bit of it. Her mother would put a stop to it, and Miss Imogen doesn’t in her heart wish that, by any means,” said Trixie.

“What a pity Rex isn’t here; it would be a part of the play for him to go to comfort her.”

“Hush!” said Mabella hastily, as Florence at that moment came in.

“What is the matter with that child?” Florence asked sternly. “I was writing in the library just now, and she came rushing in. She pretended she was looking for a book when she saw me, but I am almost sure she was crying.”

“She is such an idiot—” began Trixie, but a warning glance from Mab stopped her.

“Do you wish Florence to take her up and spoil all?” she said afterwards.

“I mean,” Beatrix went on, “she takes things up so. I couldn’t help laughing at the way Mr Villars scolded her.”

“You don’t want to frighten her out of it now at the last?” said Florence. “It would be very awkward, and might get you into hot water, I warn you.”

She had an additional motive for not desiring such a catastrophe. No one, she knew, failing Miss Wentworth, could take the “Valesca” but herself, and this, Florence was by no means inclined to do. It was the part which faintly shadowed her own story—the devotion of a girl to an unworthy object. So with these words of remonstrance to Trixie, Florence went her way.

Her way was to seek for Rex, and enlist his help. She found him writing in her brother’s smoking-room.

“Rex,” she said abruptly, “I’m afraid you are not looking after your Miss Wentworth after all. She’s in a sea of troubles about her acting, and I cannot meddle. For one thing I can’t and won’t take ‘Valesca,’ if she throws it up,” and she crimsoned as she said it.

“Nobody could propose such a thing,” he said.

“Wouldn’t they? I would rather not risk it. But you know something about acting; quite as much as Mr Villars, I believe, only you are not so exaggerated and affected; couldn’t you coach Miss Wentworth a little? You see I don’t hide that my motives in seeking you are half, or more than half, selfish ones.”

“They are very natural,” he replied kindly. “And, of course, though I am interested in this little girl—she is very sweet—I can’t but be far more interested in you, dear Florrie, and I believe you are more unselfish than you allow.”

Florence looked and felt pleased. A little praise from Rex went a long way with her.

“Then you’ll see what you can do,” she said, persuasively. “You would find her in the library at the present moment; better catch her red-handed, or red-eyed rather, and then she cannot deny her troubles.”

Poor Major Winchester! He had been promising himself a peaceful half-hour to finish his letter to Eva; but after all it was too late for to-day’s post. “It wouldn’t really go any sooner,” he reflected, “so I suppose I may as well.”

Still, it was not without an effort that he went off to the library on his benevolent quest.

Yes; Imogen was there, busily reading or making believe to do so, in a corner. The Fells library was a large and imposing room, filled with books, the most valuable of which seldom left their shelves except to be dusted. But everything about the house was well kept and well managed. Not being of a literary turn himself, nor possessing children with strongly developed intellectual tastes, was no reason, said the Squire, why there should not be a good library. And he had engaged the services of a properly qualified person to look after it, so that the volumes were clean and well arranged, and from time to time added to.

This, however, was not one of the librarian’s days, so Imogen had it all to herself. A gallery ran all round, to which there were two means of access—a stair at one end of the room itself, and a door from an upper passage in the house; for originally the library had been a ballroom, with a musicians’ balcony, since discarded. Rex glanced round once or twice before he discovered Miss Wentworth, half-hidden in a big leather arm-chair by the fire. He smiled as he saw her.

“She is not so very upset after all,” he thought. “Ten to one she is very happy over a novel, and won’t thank me for disturbing her.”

But it was not so. Imogen was both angry and unhappy, and she was only pretending to read. She glanced up quickly at the sound of Major Winchester’s approaching footsteps, and a gleam of pleasure came over her face, to be, however, almost instantly replaced by a flush of shame and mortification as she became conscious of her swollen eyes and tear-stained face.

“What are you studying?” said Rex, as he sat down beside her. “Oh, Great Expectations. Why, you must have read that long ago!”

“No, I haven’t,” said Imogen, “but I don’t think I care for it.”

“Not just now, I daresay,” he said kindly, “for you are vexed and upset, I know.”

“How do you know?” she asked, some laggard tears rising slowly as she spoke.

“Never mind. I was told I should find you here, and so I have. I know what it’s about too,” for Major Winchester was great at going to the point. “It isn’t a very big trouble after all, but then at seventeen—”

“I’m eighteen—eighteen past,” interrupted Imogen, so indignantly that the tears hid themselves in a fright, which her friend was not sorry to see. He smiled.

“Well—even at eighteen. I was once eighteen myself,” (Imogen could not help smiling a little); “and I can understand that, as you have to do this thing, you would rather do it well than badly. I can understand, too, that Trixie is probably not the most delicate and tactful person to have to do with in the circumstances.”

“I hate being laughed at,” said Imogen frankly.

“Naturally. Villars is really not a bad fellow, but he thinks he’s bound to keep his hobby always at full-speed. Now—have you got your part?”

“Yes,” she replied, extracting some rather dilapidated-looking pages from her pocket, “here it is. This is the worst bit,” she went on, “the little dialogue with Hubert. ‘Oh, to think how I trusted you,’ it begins.”

Chapter Eight.

“Valesca.”

”‘Oh, to think how I trusted you,’” repeated Major Winchester, “hum, hum,” and he read on a few sentences to himself consideringly.

“Yes,” said Imogen, “and ‘Hubert’, you know, is Mr Calthorp. Just fancy! If only I were going to do it with you now, Major Winchester, I—”

She stopped short. The sound of a door softly shutting startled her. “What was that?” she said.

“Oh, nothing; some unfortunate actor seeking the solitude of the library to study his part in,” said Rex.

He went on reading for a minute or two. Neither he nor Imogen heard a door overhead open, even more softly than the other one had closed.

“Fancy,” Imogen repeated, “Mr Calthorp, Major Winchester. Now, if you were it, I am sure I could do it better.”

“For your sake I wish I were, though the character is scarcely one which recommends itself to me,” he said. “But now, look here, my dear child;” and he leant forward towards her a little, while he pointed out a passage on the page; “when you come to—” And he proceeded to emphasise a line or two.

The door above closed very, very gently, and two ladies slipped quietly back into the up-stairs passage from which it opened. They were Mrs Wentworth and Miss Forsyth. Imogen’s mother was smiling with a slightly self-conscious, slightly alarmed expression; Mabella was whispering eagerly.

“There now,” she said; “I am so glad you have seen for yourself. Wasn’t I clever?” Mrs Wentworth spoke half nervously.

“I hope you don’t think any one else has seen them?” she said. “I am so afraid of any gossip. You see, I have scarcely realised that Imogen is more than a child—a mere child. I am afraid I am not a very efficient chaperon as yet.”

“Oh, it’s all right. Major Winchester is discretion itself. I only wanted to give you ocular demonstration of his devotion. It is not to be wondered at; she did look irresistible when she glanced up at him just now, did she not? But you know he is usually so unimpressionable and high and mighty. Only be sure you never tell anybody that I made you peep. You promise, don’t you, dear Mrs Wentworth? I always feel as if you were a girl like myself, you know. I cannot take in that you are really the mother of a grown-up daughter.”

Mrs Wentworth beamed.

“Of course I will never betray you,” she said. “But she is so very young. I do feel so at a loss.”

“There is nothing to feel at a loss about,” said Mabella quickly. It would not have suited her at all for Mrs Wentworth to take others into her confidence. “Imogen is quite charming. You must just make up your mind that every man she comes across will be at her feet; she will have any number to choose from, and she can afford to be difficile.”

“Are you not too partial, dear Miss—?”

“You naughty woman,” said the girl, playfully laying her fingers on Mrs Wentworth’s lips, “what was it you promised? Miss Forsyth indeed!”

“Well then, dear Mabella, if you really wish it,” said Imogen’s mother; “are you not too partial?”

“You are so incredulous; other mothers would not be nearly so difficult to convince,” said Mab. “That’s why I wanted you to see his high mightiness’s devotion with your own eyes; not that it’s of any consequence in itself. Imogen will do far better than that; it’s only to convince you of her fascination.”

Mrs Wentworth gave a gentle little sigh.

“I suppose I must not hope to keep her very long,” she said, “hard as it will be to part with her. But if it is for her happiness, that is all I think about. I would not ask or expect any extraordinarily brilliant marriage for her. I should be quite content to give her to some really good man, whom I could trust her to.”

“Oh yes, of course, of course,” said Miss Forsyth, with an undertone of slightly contemptuous incredulity, which Mrs Wentworth was too simple to perceive. “All the same, you must not be too unworldly—too easily pleased, you know. It is not every day one sees a girl like Imogen, so well brought up too.”

“Dear Mabella, you are too partial,” Mrs Wentworth repeated.

“It is true that when I take to any one I can see no fault in them,” said Miss Forsyth. “I think I may say of myself that I am a very thorough-going friend—and,” she added to herself, “a very thorough-going enemy.”

Half an hour or so later Imogen was up-stairs.

“Mamma,” she said, as she glanced in at her mother, “I’m going out for a few minutes’ blow before luncheon. I won’t be long.”

“No, don’t be late, darling,” her mother replied; “the Squire does like people to be punctual. It’s one of the few things he is strict about. But come in for half a second, my pet. I have not seen you all the morning. How bright and well you are looking!”

Imogen stooped to kiss her mother.

“Don’t keep me, mamsey dear,” she said, “Major Winchester is waiting for me. I only ran up for my hat and jacket. You wouldn’t have said I was looking bright and well if you had seen me half an hour or so ago. I was in the depths of despair about my part. Indeed, I was almost making up my mind to throw it all up.”

“And are you in better spirits now, dearest? I am sure they would all be dreadfully disappointed if you gave it up. You will certainly be the central figure in it, by what I hear.”

“Oh, mamsey dear, you mustn’t believe such nonsense,” said Imogen. “I truly can’t act a bit, and—I’m not at all sure but that some people would be glad if I give it up. However, I think it will go a little better now. Major Winchester has been so kind, so painstaking and patient with me about it—he has been coaching me for ever so long down in the library.”

“Indeed, dear. I am very glad you have got him to help you. He has really been your good fairy here ever since we came.”

“Yes, truly he has,” said Imogen. “And he is so nice. I had no idea he was such a hero, mamma. You should hear the stories Trixie was telling me of the wonderfully brave things he has done. And Trixie, you know, is by no means one of his admirers in a general way. But I mustn’t keep him waiting. Good-bye, mamsey darling,” and off she flew, a perfect picture of sunny brightness.

“Dear child!” thought her mother. “She seems as happy as possible. It is really wonderful—such a child as she is to have made a conquest of a man like him. He does seem rather old for her, but yet—if she is content; and of course it is not a connection one could in any way ever feel ashamed of. Still, I hope he will not think of precipitating matters: it would be almost more honourable if he were to wait till she has seen a little more of the world. If I could manage to give her a London season next year; but I hardly see how I can. Mrs Helmont has her hands quite full with her own daughters, and she says their London house is too small for visitors. I wonder if there is any one else I could look up; or if we let our Eastbourne house, and could take a little one temporarily in London, as Imogen wishes.”

Whereupon her mind set off on an interesting journey of practical details, ways, and means.

“The nicest of all,” she decided, reverting to the original subject of her meditations, “would be if Major Winchester were to speak to me in the first place. If there were an understanding between him and me, it would all be so much easier; perhaps he will speak to me. Of course, I may have to allow an engagement almost at once. Dear, dear! how astonished everybody will be; it is not often nowadays that a girl so young— But really I must get my letters written and not waste time.”

The said letters contained more than one hint of coming events, for Mrs Wentworth found it impossible altogether to repress her sense of maternal exultation.

And several times during the next few days her heart beat faster, and she was conscious of a flutter of pleasurable expectation, when Rex happened to approach her or seemed to be seeking her society.

“I must give him all the opportunities I can,” she reflected. But she was not clever enough to do so with the real adroitness and apparent nonchalance such tactics require. Miss Forsyth saw through the little manoeuvres, and enjoyed them with strange, almost impish acuteness, though her pleasure could not be shared, as she had too small faith in Trixie’s powers of discretion to draw her attention to them.

But Major Winchester himself, though the least suspicious or self-conscious of human beings, was uncomfortably aware of a certain change in Mrs Wentworth’s manner.

“What can it be?” he asked himself. “She is a nice woman, though not a very wise one. Surely she is not a silly old coquette at bottom. I should be very sorry to think so, for that child’s sake.”

But the very suggestion of such a misgiving tinged his manner in turn with a faint constraint, which gave colour to Mrs Wentworth’s prepossessions.

The very evening before that of the grand representation a little scene of this kind occurred. The full-dress rehearsal, for the benefit of the upper servants and some of the out-of-doors retainers and neighbouring small tenants on the estate, had just taken place; and while the actors were changing their dresses Major Winchester, who had good-naturedly volunteered to be prompter, strolled into the drawing-room in search of Florence. She was not there; but Imogen’s mother was standing by the fire. He was moving away, when Mrs Wentworth recalled him.

“No; Florence is not here,” she said, in answer to a word or two that he had let fall; “but she will be back directly. She went to say something or other about the lights, I think. She was speaking to Mr Villars about them.”

“Ah, yes, that is all right then; it was that I wanted her for. They must be changed.” And out of a sort of reluctance to seem abrupt or discourteous, he lingered for a moment.

“Do stay a little and talk about the acting. It seemed to me so successful. You are all so busy I never see any of you. Of course, I don’t pretend to be anything of a judge; but it really is very good now, is it not?”

She spoke simply, and Major Winchester, who was really interested in the play, sat down and replied with his ordinary natural and simple cordiality.

“Yes, things have improved wonderfully these last few days,” he said. “I think it often is so in these cases. Amateurs warm to the work, and a sense of desperation makes even the weaker members forget themselves at the last, which, after all, is half the battle.”

He smiled as he spoke, for there flitted across his mind’s eye several amusing episodes in the recent struggles after dramatic art.

“Your daughter,” he went on, “has really improved surprisingly. I own I was rather nervous about her till quite at the end. But it went so very fairly to-night that I think we need have no misgivings. Besides, after all, there is no terribly critical audience to fear; every one will, I hope, wish to be pleased.”

Mrs Wentworth’s expression took a touch of offence at Major Winchester’s tone about Imogen.

“I heard several people saying that ‘Valesca’ was the gem of it all,” she said, and Rex, glancing at her, detected his mistake. “She really is too silly,” he reflected; “she cannot imagine that child, pretty as she is, to be a Mrs Siddons in embryo.” But his quick kind-heartedness made him add aloud: “I can well believe that, as far as appearance goes, that opinion will be pretty general. The dress, too, is remarkably becoming to Im— to Miss Wentworth. Still, dramatic power, even in a small degree, is a distinct gift, like talent for music, sculpture, or any art. It cannot be acquired, though it may be developed.”

He was already rather beyond his hearer’s range, though his words were intended as an explanation. But they had the effect of smoothing down her ruffled plumage—or rather, perhaps, his manner did so.

“Of course, he does not want me to imagine for an instant that he could say anything derogatory to Imogen,” she reflected. “And after all, unless he felt quite a peculiar interest in her, he would not speak so frankly,” and her tone was quite itself again as she replied.

“I am sure Imogen should be, and is, most grateful to you, Major Winchester. She has said ever so many times that she never could have managed it but for your help. I think she acted beautifully to-night,”—and the simplicity with which she said this pleased Rex—“but then I am not nearly clever enough to be a judge.”

“I myself did really think it very—extremely pretty,” he said. “And it has been a great pleasure to me to help her, I need scarcely assure you.”

“You have been our good angel ever since our first arrival here,” said Mrs Wentworth. “Dear Imogen was saying so only yesterday. Altogether, when I remember our distress that wet morning at the station, and your appearing just at the right moment—it was quite romantic.” She hesitated a little. “Now is his time,” she thought. But Major Winchester did not seem on the alert, and he again detected the slight tendency to “gush” in her tone, which had before this disappointed him in Imogen’s mother. “I am always so, I fear, really, foolishly anxious about my darling child,” she went on. “My only one, and—alone as we are.”

“But after all, it ended all right, did it not?” he said. “Miss Wentworth did not take the least cold, nor did you yourself, I think.”

“Oh no,” she replied, “none whatever. I was not only thinking of cold and such things. I—of course, I am always anxious about her. And this visit here—a sort of ‘coming out’ it really was—and among comparative strangers—”

“Still, after all, it has turned out all right,” he repeated, still with that vague instinct of annoyance. “At least,” he went on, as his own misgivings and anxiety concerning Imogen’s friendship with Beatrix occurred to his mind—“at least, I hope so. I—I have done what I could,” but here he hesitated. It scarcely came within the lines of loyalty to his hosts to discuss them with an outsider, and an outsider concerning whose discretion his doubts were grave.

“I am sure of that. Oh yes, indeed,” said Mrs Wentworth, with a recurrence of gush in her tone. “As Miss Forsyth was saying only yesterday, Imogen is really a most—”

“Excuse me,” said Rex, much more stiffly than he had yet spoken, “one thing I must ask of you, Mrs Wentworth, and that is not to repeat to me any of Miss Forsyth’s remarks on any subject whatsoever. As regards Miss Wentworth, so far as you are good enough to allow me to advise, I was going to say I wish she had made, I wish still she could make, more of a friend of Florence. Believe me, I am not influenced by prejudice or anything of that sort in saying so. For the future, too—”

Unconsciously to himself the stiffness had melted away again as he spoke. Mrs Wentworth’s perceptions were not of the quickest; still she could not but hear the contempt in his voice when he spoke of Mabella. Against this, however, she was, so to say, forearmed by Miss Forsyth’s own plausible regrets that Major Winchester, a man for whom she had the profoundest respect, should dislike her so.

“It may have been partly my own fault,” she had said, with a sigh. “I know I have been wild and foolish; but some one has made mischief too, I feel sure.”

So Mab’s new friend did not resent his rather imperious request as she might otherwise have done, and the vague, uncompleted sentence at the end of his speech—“for the future,”—aroused in her all sorts of pleasant surmises.

“You are so kind, so very kind, dear Major Winchester, to take so much interest in my Imogen,” she murmured. “Yes, I wish she knew more of Florence, as I see you think highly of her. Of course she is a good deal older—”

“Florence cannot be older than that other girl,” said Rex, rather gruffly. “And her age does not seem to be any objection to her as a friend.”

“Imogen is not a particular friend of Mabella’s,” said Mrs Wentworth, quietly. “In fact she—I think she has rather taken a dislike to the poor girl. I like her, I confess, very much. I am sorry for her; she seems to me much misunderstood; and of course, if a little friendly, elder-sisterly sympathy can do her any good, or be any help to her—”

Major Winchester could not help smiling. Mrs Wentworth’s simplicity was sublime.

“My dear lady,” he said, “you are years—centuries younger than Miss Forsyth. I cannot agree with you about her, I am sorry to say; but that does not signify. I am only uncommonly glad to hear that Miss Wentworth is rather of my way of thinking than yours in this matter.”

He rose as he spoke, but Mrs Wentworth was reluctant to let him go. “How stupid men are!” she thought to herself. “When could he have a better opportunity of taking me into his confidence?”

“Thank you so much, Major Winchester,” she said. “You may indeed trust me. I shall consider all you have said as quite, quite between ourselves.”

Rex almost started. He looked and felt bewildered. He had had no intention whatever of establishing any private understanding with the amiable lady; it was about the very last thing he desired.

“I must go,” he said. “Florence will be looking for me elsewhere. It really doesn’t matter in the least if you repeat anything I have said. Do not feel any constraint about it, I beg of you.”

But Mrs Wentworth chose to take it her own way.

“I see where Imogen has learnt her dislike to Mabella,” she thought to herself. “Ah, well—it really does not signify. But how oddly Major Winchester expresses himself sometimes.”

The theatricals were pronounced a great success. Nothing of any consequence went wrong, and the audience, composed of all the society to be got together within a reasonable radius of The Fells, professed itself delighted. This was the festive and sociable season in the north country, of course; several of the large neighbouring houses were nearly as full of guests as Grey Fells Hall itself, and their respective hosts were most ready to be grateful for this entertainment on a large scale. So the unfavourable criticisms, if there were any, were not made in public, and congratulations and compliments were the order of the day.

“It wasn’t half so dreadful, after all, as I expected,” said Imogen, throwing herself down on a couch standing in a passage just outside the temporary green-room. “Now it is over, I almost feel as if I should like to do it again.”

She was speaking to Major Winchester. He could not help laughing at her exceedingly untechnical way of expressing herself.

“I am afraid there is nothing of the ‘born actress’ in you, Miss Wentworth,” he said. ”‘Do it again,’ oh dear!”

“Well, ‘act it,’ ‘play it’—what should I say?” she replied childishly. “Oh dear, I am so hot. And we are going to dance; did you know?”

“For your sake I am glad to hear it, if you are fond of dancing,” he said.

“I have only danced at school with the other girls,” Imogen replied dubiously. “But even that was very nice. Only this dress is so heavy. And it’s fixed that we are to keep our dresses on for the rest of the evening.”

“It is heavy, and hot, too, I daresay. But il faut souffrir pour être belle, you know,” he added lightly, “and it certainly is very pretty and becoming.”

He touched, as he spoke, some of the richly-coloured draperies of the fantastic costume. Imogen flushed with pleasure.

“Do you really think so?” she said. “I am so pleased. Do you know, Major Winchester,” she added, half shyly, “I believe that is the very first compliment you have ever paid me!” Rex looked at her kindly. She was very sweet, very lovely just then.

“What a dear child she is!” he thought to himself. For the best of men are but men, and he was keenly sensitive to beauty. He stroked the little hand that lay on the couch beside him, and Imogen’s colour deepened still more.

“And after all,” he said, “I fear my compliment, such as it was, was more for ‘Valesca’ than for Imogen.”

“Never mind,” said she, her voice trembling a little, “Imogen thought it very nice.”

“Imogen is very sweet and—” he replied, but suddenly started up, exclaiming, with a complete change of voice:

“Robin, my boy! Where have you dropped from? I had no idea you were in the neighbourhood.”

Chapter Nine.

Robin.

Imogen looked up, not without a feeling of irritation at the interruption, to see whom Major Winchester was thus greeting. The new-comer was a tall, good-looking young fellow, of four or five and twenty at the most, with pleasant eyes, and a likeness—rather strong at first, but fading even as she looked at him—to some one she knew.

“Whom is he like?” thought the girl. Then as her glance fell on Major Winchester she could not help smiling at her own dullness. Of course, it was Rex himself the younger man resembled! But as they stood together talking, she lost it; when she came to know Robin Winchester’s face better, she found it was much more a resemblance of expression than of feature or colouring.

“I didn’t expect to be here to-night, or I would have written,” she heard the stranger reply. “I’m staying at Wood Cross for three days’ shooting. We drove over, a large party. But I say, Rex, have you heard from Angey the last day or two? I had a letter from Arthur that rather startled me.”

“No; I have heard nothing for a week or more,” said Rex, hastily, his face clouding over with anxiety. “Is it—is it anything new?”

“No, no; you would have heard, of course, if it had been anything exactly critical. Perhaps I should not have told you of it. Arthur says he would write to you if it got worse. I have his letter in my pocket. Here it is. You can read it afterwards;” and he held out an envelope. “Your not having heard is a good sign, you see. I’ve made a muddle of it, and frightened you for nothing. Angey didn’t want you told, if it could be helped. She—she said you had enough on your mind already, just now.”

The last few words were spoken in a lower tone, so low that Imogen scarcely caught them, and they were accompanied by a glance in her direction which made the colour rise to her cheeks. There was a sort of questioning in the glance as well as undisguised, but entirely respectful, admiration. She got up from her seat and touched Major Winchester very slightly on the arm. He turned at once with a quick gesture of apology. But before he had time to speak, she forestalled him.

“I think I will go into the drawing-room. Mother, or some of them, are sure to be there,” she said, gently.

“Forgive me,” he said, quickly. “Wait one moment. You must not go alone. The dancing is beginning. Robin—Miss Wentworth, may I introduce my brother, Mr Robert Winchester? My little brother,” with a smile, though the anxiety was still visible in his face. “And, Robin, will you take care of Miss Wentworth for a few minutes while I read this? Then you will find me here again; and—I hope I shall still have my dance with you—Valesca?” he said, and the smile was brighter now.

Imogen brightened up too.

“If—if you are not disinclined for it,” she replied.

“No, no; it will do me good.”

“Don’t you think, Miss Wentworth,” said Robert Winchester, as he offered Imogen his arm and they walked away, “that I can best take care of you by replacing Rex as your partner. You were dancing with, him, were you not?”

“I don’t think we had settled anything about it,” Imogen answered, simply. “But I should like to dance very much. Only first—I could not help overhearing a little—I am so sorry. Is it about your sister, Mrs Bertrand?”

“Yes,” and Robin glanced at her. “He has told you, I see. Poor Rex! he’s lucky to have your sympathy. He—I wish a few less troubles would fall to his share. I wish I could see him really happy at last.” And again he glanced at her, half inquiringly.

“He told me,” she said, hesitating a little, out of a sort of shyness, “he told me of his anxiety about Mrs Bertrand; but that must be an anxiety to you, too, Mr Winchester.”

“Yes, of course. I’m awfully fond of Angey—we both are. But Rex has so much upon him just now, so many different things. Of course, it’s not all anxiety; there’s the bright side, the hopeful side to it too. I don’t know that I’ve any right to talk to you like this though, Miss Wentworth, but somehow I feel as if I’d known you before. I hope you don’t mind.”

“Oh no,” said Imogen, wondering a little at his manner, nevertheless, and conscious of looking slightly awkward—why, she scarcely knew. “It’s—it’s very kind of you. I do trust Mrs Bertrand will be all right again soon. I am so sorry for Major Winchester. He—he has been so kind to me.”

“I am so delighted to see you understand—appreciate him,” said the young fellow boyishly, and Imogen felt herself growing red as he looked at her. She was half pleased, half puzzled by his manner. “I think him—well, perfection—the most splendid fellow going,” he went on, laughing a little at his own enthusiasm. “But all the same everybody doesn’t take to him. Some people think him so cold and stand-off.”

“He has never—never from the first seemed so to me,” she replied, impulsively. “I couldn’t tell you what a difference his being here and—and his goodness has made to me. I feel as if I could tell him anything—he understands so;” then she stopped, feeling ashamed of her little outburst, and very conscious of her glowing cheeks. “I hope he won’t think me gushing, or anything like that,” she thought. “I couldn’t bear his talking of me that way to Major Winchester; I know he hates gushing.”

For she felt that Robin was looking at her with an expression she was at a loss to understand. There was admiration in it undoubtedly—admiration as respectful as it was genuine; but there was something of questioning, of slight misgiving in the eyes that now and then looked so like his brother’s.

“You are right,” he said quietly; “there’s no one like him.”

They were in the dancing-room by this time. Imogen began to feel nervous in another sense.

“I hope you don’t dance very well, Mr Winchester,” she began. “No—I don’t mean that, for it would make it worse. I mean I hope you are not very—difficult to please. For I have had very little practice. Oh yes,” as she noticed the surprised expression on her companion’s face—“I can dance; of course I have learnt, but I haven’t danced properly—among other people, you know—at balls.”

“I’m sure we’ll get on all right,” he replied; “you look as if you would dance well. Don’t be nervous.”

He proved a true prophet; after a moment or two’s slight hesitation, Imogen found herself quite at home.

“Oh,” she said, when at last they stopped, “I had no idea it could be so nice; ever so much easier, too, than dancing when it’s a dancing-lesson, you know.”

Mr Winchester could scarcely help laughing, but he was pleased too.

“You really dance beautifully,” he said. “So if your only experience has been dancing-lessons, as you say, you have certainly profited by them. But you should dance with Rex.”

“Does he dance so well?” asked the girl, with interest.

“Splendidly: his worst enemy can’t deny that,” answered Robin with emphasis.

“Who is his worst enemy? I shouldn’t have thought he had any,” said Imogen, half thoughtlessly, but with a spice of curiosity too.

Robin glanced round the room, but suddenly checked himself.

“No,” he said, “I won’t make mischief. Never mind, Miss Wentworth; it’s a shame to spoil a jolly good dance by talking of disagreeable things. Shall we have another turn?”

His spirits seemed to rise as the dance went on, and so did Imogen’s. Truth to tell, she had never enjoyed herself so much in her life.

Robin was really much nearer her in every way than his elder brother. For kind as Major Winchester was to her, Imogen was conscious of a certain strain in talking to him, and her pleasure in his society was largely composed of gratified vanity at the attentions of a man of his age and position; vanity only too cleverly and steadily fed by the two conspirators—directly by Beatrix, with her irresistible appearance of candour and bonhommie; more astutely by Miss Forsyth’s remarks to Mrs Wentworth all of which sooner or later were sure to find their way to the girl herself.

The first dance had become the second, before the two happy young people separated. Just as the latter was coming to a close, Imogen caught sight of Major Winchester dancing with Florence. Her face clouded.

“Why,” she said, “I thought your brother was reading his letters. He promised me his first dance.”

“Never mind,” said Robin. “It’s a pleasure to see those two dancing together; they’re worth watching, I assure you. And how could Rex dance with you, when you were already dancing?”

“He should have come and asked me. I only danced with you to—to—because he was busy,” said Imogen, bluntly, and with evident pique.

“Thank you, Miss Wentworth,” Robin replied. He could not help laughing a little. “It will be all right after this dance, I have no doubt,” he went on. But he looked at her as he spoke with the same expression of inquiry, almost concern, in his eyes, which she had before been conscious of without understanding it.

He was not offended, however; his tone was as hearty, his whole bearing as kindly as before.

“He is very nice,” thought Imogen, “and—I don’t think he’s quite as clever and grand as his brother;” and in the reflection there was a certain unacknowledged sensation of relief. But the sight of Florence and Major Winchester, who just then came in view, brought the cloud back to her face.

“Don’t they dance splendidly?” said Robin. “You see they’ve been used to each other’s paces for so long—ever since Florry grew up.”

“Yea, that is a good while ago,” said Imogen, with a faint touch of spite.

“She is a year older than I, and I am twenty-four,” Mr Winchester replied, simply. “I am fourteen years younger than my brother. Why, he is almost old enough to be your father.”

“Nonsense!” said the girl, sharply. “I am eighteen—eighteen past; that only makes—”

She stopped and looked confused.

“Twenty years,” said Robin, calmly. “Practically a generation. Still, as Wordsworth says—what is it he says about ‘a pair of friends?’ One was—I forget how old or how young, but Matthew was seventy-two, I’m sure.”

“I don’t know,” Imogen replied. “I don’t know Wordsworth well, except ‘We are Seven,’ and I can’t bear it. I had to learn it when I was seven, and I always thought her such a stupid little girl. After all,” she went on, “twenty years don’t seem so much. When Major Winchester is seventy-two I shall be fifty-two, and I’m sure once a woman is fifty-two she might as well be a hundred.”

“Perhaps you won’t think so when the time comes,” said Robin. “Shall we take one other turn, Miss Wentworth? We shall not have time for more.”

The music stopped before they had got well round the room. Then Imogen, espying her mother in a corner not far from where Florence and her partner were standing, made Mr Winchester pilot her thither. But she did not volunteer to introduce him, though he lingered in the neighbourhood for a moment or two.

“The mother is a sweet-looking woman,” he thought. For he had noticed the adoring smile with which the girl was greeted. “But she never can have been as charming as the girl. She has much more character, I should say, than her mother. But she is very, very young. I wonder if—I hope;” then his thoughts became less defined, as he went off in another direction to claim the dance which Alicia, his eldest cousin, had promised. Still they had brought a somewhat anxious expression to his usually unclouded face, and more than once during his waltz with her, Miss Helmont reproached him with being nearly as solemn and “absent” as Rex himself.

And there was some reason for her remarks. Robin’s misgivings intensified, as the first turn round the room brought into full view his late partner, glancing up in his brother’s face with what looked to him like not-to-be-concealed delight, as Major Winchester appeared to claim the dance he had been somewhat tardy of remembering.

“She has forgiven him already,” thought the younger man. “I never saw that look in her face all the time she was dancing with me,” and he gave a little sigh. “Rex should be—”

“Robin, what is the matter? Are you in love? You are sighing ‘like a furnace,’ or an old man with asthma?” said Alicia. And the young man had to smile and excuse himself.

His interpretation of Imogen’s face was not quite correct, but it would have required much deeper discernment than his—than Imogen’s own indeed—to eliminate the elements of gratified vanity and girlish triumph from the nobler feelings with which they were intermingled.

Major Winchester almost never danced, Trixie had taken care to tell her, “except with one of us, or some very great friend. He says he is too old and grave. But, indeed, he scarcely ever speaks to girls at all; of course every one sees you are quite an exception, Imogen.”

The evening was pronounced on all hands to have gone off excellently.

“You have really enjoyed it thoroughly, my darling, have you not?” said Mrs Wentworth, fondly, when she looked in to Imogen’s room to bid her good-night—or good-morning, rather, for midnight was well past.

“Yes, mamsey, very much indeed,” was the reply, “only I’m dreadfully sleepy. I think I enjoyed the first part the most, before I got at all tired, you know, and Mr Winchester just suits me for dancing.”

“Mr Winchester?” her mother repeated, inquiringly.

“Yes; didn’t you see? A tall man, though not as tall as his brother, but just a little like him, only much younger. He came over with the Penmores—I think that’s the name. He’s staying there for shooting. Didn’t you know? He’s so nice looking.”

Mrs Wentworth looked slightly discomfited.

“Oh yes,” she said, “I think I did see you dancing with a young man whom I did not know—a mere boy.”

“No,” Imogen replied, rather hotly, “he’s not a mere boy; he’s twenty-four or twenty-five; and he’s very nice.”

“But it was Major Winchester you were dancing with at the end?”

“Yes, he’s rather too tall for me, and he is very old, mamsey,” and Imogen glanced up with a curious, somewhat perplexed expression.

“Old!” repeated Mrs Wentworth with a little laugh. “What ridiculous ideas girls have! I was just thinking you and he looked so—no, I mustn’t say what I thought when I saw you dancing together.”

“Mother!” exclaimed Imogen, and her cheeks grew scarlet.

“And what was that I heard him whispering as he said good-night just now?” Mrs Wentworth went on. “Something about ‘forgive’ or ‘forgiven?’”

“Oh, nothing,” said the girl, “only that he hadn’t come for the first dance he had asked me for. He danced it with Florence.”

“Poor Florence!” said Imogen’s mother, patronisingly. “She does not get too much attention. You should try to be kind to her, dear.”

“I!” Imogen exclaimed. “Nonsense, mamsey: She would not care for that sort of thing at all. I am only too flattered when she notices me. I don’t take to her much, but of course I admire her. Indeed, I’m rather frightened of her. Me be kind to Florence! Oh, mamsey, Florence could have any amount of attention if she cared for it.”

“My dear little modest darling,” said Mrs Wentworth. “Well, some day my pet will have to learn to take more upon her, I daresay. In the meantime no one loves her the less for her humility.”

“It isn’t humility; it’s common-sense,” said the girl. “But, oh, I’m so sleepy!”

“Off with you, then. There’s no beauty-sleep for you to-night; but you must not think of getting up early. I know more than one person who would not be pleased to see you pale and wearied-looking.”

Mrs Wentworth’s dreams that night were roseate-hued. She had been well primed in the course of the evening by Mabella Forsyth with her clever hints and suggestions, so clever that when told over in simple language they sounded but natural and ingenuous little kindly compliments.

Imogen slept the sleep of her eighteen years, untroubled by dreams, for she was really tired, but with a pleasant undercurrent of gratification and vague anticipation which her mother’s words had greatly tended to strengthen.

And while the little conversation I have repeated was taking place between Mrs Wentworth and her daughter, another was passing between the two brothers. Down-stairs in the smoking-room—for it had been arranged that he was to stay the night at The Fells—Robin Winchester was sitting, more silent than his wont, while his cousins and their friends kept up a rather noisy chatter, unrestrained by the awe-inspiring presence of Major Rex.

“It’s hardly worth while to go to bed,” said Robin at last. His brother got up and went over to him.

“Oh yes, it is: you can have four or five hours’ sleep; nobody will be very early here. What have you been about, Robin? You seem done up.”

Robin started slightly.

“I’m all right. Perhaps I was thinking about Angey,” he said. “There may be a letter for you in the morning, Rex. That was one reason I was glad to stay. That girl—Miss Wentworth—was so sympathising about it.”

“Yes,” said Major Winchester. “She has a kind little heart. She’s a nice child; a great deal of good in her. And isn’t she pretty? Last night she looked really charming. But, Robin, about Angey. I almost think I should go.”

This point was discussed for a moment or two. Then Robin again managed to bring in Imogen’s name. Rex answered carelessly; he was thinking of something else. “Miss Wentworth, did you say? Oh yes, that was her mother. Then, Robin, if you hear anything,”—and so on about arrangements and plans in connection with Mrs Bertrand.

It was no use. Robin could not manage to bring the talk round deftly, as he had hoped. He must plunge in boldly.

“Rex,” he said abruptly, though in a low voice. He glanced round; they were practically alone, for the room was large and the Helmonts and their friends were still making a good deal of noise at the other end. “Rex, does Miss Wentworth know, about you?”

“Know about me!” Major Winchester repeated. “How do you mean?”

“About your—about you and Eva?”

Rex looked a little surprised, but in no way startled or even interested.

“I don’t know, I’m sure,” he said. “Yes, I daresay she does. Everybody who knows either of us knows it. But she’s too young to understand that kind of thing. I don’t think I have ever talked about it to her. It would have seemed so—I don’t know how, exactly—so incongruous. And I have not felt inclined to talk about Eva lately—you can understand.”

“No, of course not,” Robin agreed. “But I think Miss Wentworth is more of a woman than you imagine, Rex. She was very sympathising about Angey.”

“Yes. Well, I may tell her about Eva some day, if you think it would please her to have her sympathy sought. I am going to warn her to-morrow again about Trixie, now this acting is over. But she is such a child, I like to see her enjoying herself; knowledge of troubles comes soon enough. Well, good-night, Robin. I am rather sleepy, I confess. So glad you came over, old fellow.”

But Robin, though he shook hands and half moved to go, still lingered.

“What is it, Robin? You’ve nothing on your mind, have you, my dear boy?” asked the elder brother, half anxiously. “You’re not quite like yourself, somehow.”

“I’m afraid of annoying you, Rex, that’s the fact of the matter,” said Mr Winchester, and his colour deepened a little. “But I can’t help telling you. I think Miss Wentworth should know, and I feel sure she doesn’t. She’s—”

And he hesitated, then repeated his former phrase, “she’s more of a woman than you think, Rex.”

It was now Major Winchester’s turn to hesitate: he did so from his utter and complete astonishment.

“My dear good boy,” he exclaimed at last, “you are too absurd. That little childish creature! Why, she looks upon me as a sort of father. She does, I can assure you.”

And he laughed, sincerely and without constraint.

But Robin did not give in. On the contrary, his grave face grew graver.

“I might have known you would take it so,” he said, half provoked and half admiringly. “I wish, Rex, you were just a little more—conceited; I don’t know what word to use. But I can quite believe it might have been as you say—all quite simple and natural, with a genuine innocent-minded girl such as she is, had you known her elsewhere; but here— There can be nothing simple and refined where Trixie and that odious Forsyth girl are. And Miss Wentworth rather stands up for Trixie.”

“I know she does, out of a kind of misplaced chivalry,” said Rex, speaking more seriously now. “I am afraid, though I have done what I could, that Trixie has got some influence over her. But I don’t see how she can make mischief in this case.”

Robin shook his head.

“I wouldn’t answer for her,” he said. “Well, anyway, Rex, it can do no harm for you to talk to Miss Wentworth a little about Eva. Dear Eva,” he added, with a sigh. “How I wish—”

“Don’t,” said Rex, almost sharply. “I—I can scarcely bear the sound of her name sometimes. I daresay that has made me avoid alluding to her in my talks with little Imogen. For I told her about poor Angey. But I will see about it; though, remember, I do not in the very least agree with your reason for thinking it advisable. Of all things I hate that style of thing, imagining one’s self an attractive young fellow like you, Robin, when one’s hair is growing grey.”

He turned it off lightly. Still, his brother’s words had their effect.

“I had no idea little Robin was so worldly-wise; no, that’s not the word,” Major Winchester said to himself when his companion had gone. “He means it for the best, but it must be nonsense. Still, the mother is silly enough for anything. I must think it over.”

Chapter Ten.

Mabella Pulls the Strings.

Imogen slept late the next morning, later than she had ever done in her life; for she was new to gay doings, and when at last she opened her eyes, it was but to close them again with a sleepy smile as she gradually recalled the scenes of the night before.

“How nice it was! I wonder if all girls enjoy their first real grown-up party as much,” she thought. “I wonder if Major Winchester will manage the skating.” (For a hard frost had set in somewhat prematurely.) “What fun it would be, only I’m afraid I shall tumble about dreadfully. I wonder,” as another recollection suddenly returned to her mind, “what he meant when he said he wanted to have a little talk with me to-day—to tell me something; it must be something particular, for he whispered ‘Remember about our talk to-morrow,’ last thing. Mother noticed it, but I wasn’t going to tell her all he said; she is so—so fanciful!”

The colour deepened on the girl’s cheeks, alone though she was, as she reached this point in her cogitations. Was it all “fancy” of her mother’s? Could it be that Major Winchester really was?—and remarks of Trixie’s as to the astonishingness of his “making such friends” with a girl of her age, “he who never scarcely speaks to a girl,” returned to her memory in full force. Imogen’s heart beat faster with a sensation of mingled gratification and vague fear. Was “it,” the great “it” of her girl life, really coming to her already? Did all girls feel as she did when such things drew near? It was not what she had expected, somehow: she liked him, liked and respected and trusted him thoroughly, but he seemed so old in comparison with her. And—oh, after all, perhaps it was all nonsense—mamsey was silly about her; all mothers fancy their daughters something wonderful—very likely there was nothing in it; and with a sigh, half of relief, half of disappointment, Imogen threw herself back on her pillows. Would she be glad or sorry if it were all nonsense? she asked herself. And it was not easy to answer.

Her meditations were interrupted by a tap, the gentlest of taps, at the door, and in reply to her “Come in,” Mrs Wentworth appeared. She was all dressed and ready to go down-stairs. Imogen started up.

“Oh, mamsey,” she exclaimed, “I am so ashamed of myself! I had no idea it was so late. Why hasn’t Colman wakened me?”

“I would not let her,” her mother replied, kissing her tenderly as she spoke. “She said you were sleeping so sweetly an hour ago. I tapped very softly, not to wake you in case you were still asleep.”

“But I must jump up now and be as quick as possible,” said Imogen.

“There is really no hurry,” Mrs Wentworth replied. “Indeed, Colman and I were wondering if you would not like your breakfast brought up. I am sure it will be a most irregular meal this morning.”

“Breakfast in bed, and I quite well! Oh dear, no,” said Imogen, laughing. “I will be ready in twenty minutes, at most.”

“But first,” said Mrs Wentworth, “here are two letters for you; at least, a letter and a note,” and she held them out. Imogen seized the former.

“From Dora,” she said. “How nice! Now, when I answer it, I shall have all about last night to tell her. And a note.” She took it and examined it doubtfully. “I don’t know the writing—at least, I’m not sure. I fancy I’ve seen it before—oh yes; I believe it’s Major Winchester’s. What can he have to write to me about, when he’s just going to see me at breakfast?”

“I don’t know about that,” said Mrs Wentworth, who was dying of curiosity, mingled, it must be allowed, with a worthier feeling. “I have heard some news already this morning. Major Winchester has been called away. He and his brother breakfasted early, and started off to catch the ten o’clock express.”

Imogen’s face fell.

“Oh dear, how dreadfully vexing!” she exclaimed. “Just when we had planned such a nice day. I’m afraid there must be something wrong; bad news about his sister, probably. And this note will be to explain about it.”

She looked up questioningly in her mother’s face, toying idly with the letter in her fingers as she did so.

“Very likely; it is pretty sure to be so,” said Mrs Wentworth. “But why in the world don’t you open it, my dear, and then you would see?” There was a touch of impatience in her tone; but she controlled herself and turned away, as Imogen began to tear the envelope, feeling that the girl might prefer to read it unobserved. But scarcely a moment seemed to have passed before she heard herself called back to Imogen’s bedside. She started as she caught the sound of her child’s voice. It seemed choked and gasping, and Imogen herself was lying back, almost as white as the pillow.

“My darling,” Mrs Wentworth exclaimed, “what is the matter? Are you fainting?”

“No, no. Read that. Oh, mamma!” said the girl, incoherently, and she thrust the sheet of paper into her mother’s hand. These were the words on which fell Mrs Wentworth’s bewildered gaze:

My Dearest,— I am just off—and Robin, too—summoned to poor Angey by this morning’s letters. The operation is to take place at once. God grant it may be successful. You will feel for us, I know. Though I have scarcely a moment, I could not go without one word to you to explain my movements, though I hope to be back at The Fells in a day or two. I have so much to tell you, and to lay before you all that I have been thinking of, and I had planned for an uninterrupted hour or two to-day. I know you will not have misunderstood my recent silence, and when we meet, a few minutes will be better than pages of writing. Ever yours,— Rex. P.S.—Say nothing of this at present to any one.

Imogen’s mother read and re-read. Gradually her bewilderment gave place to delight—though delight strongly mixed with astonishment. She looked up at last. A little colour had by this time returned to the girl’s cheeks.

“Mamsey,” she said, anxiously, “what does it mean?”

“Darling,” Mrs Wentworth replied, “it is rather for you to tell me; I had no idea, my pet, that things had gone so far.”

But though her tone was playful, it failed to raise any smile on Imogen’s face.

“I don’t know how you mean. I had no idea that—” But here she stopped short.

Imogen was really truthful, and the remembrance of her morning’s cogitations just then returned inconveniently to her mind. Mrs Wentworth smiled.

“I see,” she said; “you do well to stop short, my pet. Well, well, poor old mothers must expect to be treated with reserve at such times, I suppose.”

Imogen raised herself on her elbow.

“Mamma,” she said, very gravely, “I am telling you the literal truth when I say that I did not in the least expect anything like this. Nothing that Major Winchester has said or done has led me to think that—that it was anything more than that he just liked me, and, in time, possibly—when I was older—”

“You have been too unconscious, too simple and ingenuous to see it, my sweet. Thank God we have had to do with a good and honourable man, who has not taken advantage of your innocence,” said Mrs Wentworth with a burst of real feeling. “But others have seen it, if you have not.”