CHAPTER II.
"I have never been so happy before in all my life!" Alice said.
All around her was the common, seldom-heeded loveliness of an English lane in August.
A long colonnade of oaks barred the way with shadows. The bindweed hung its garlands of little leafy hearts across the hedges. The bramble showed an abundance of green fruit which would swell and turn black by-and-by; and among the ground-ivy and strawberry leaves a few poison-berries shone out brightly, like witches' jewels. This was the grassy road leading to Swallow's Nest, and Alice had loved it from the very first day when she came here with her luggage, just a fortnight ago.
The farmhouse was very old, and no one could ever remember a summer when the swallows had not built there. It was a place that did not change as other places do. The birds always knew that they should find a convenient shelter just under the roof of the ample porch. No matter how far they had flown, no matter what fairer scenes they had visited, they never failed to come back to this quiet English home.
Not only in the porch did they build, but under the eaves, in little nooks about the roof, in every place which would hold their funny nests, made of little lumps of clay artistically massed together. The house was haunted by shrill notes and glancing wings. You could not pass through the door without sending a swallow flying out into the sunlight.
They were not content merely with the outside of the old dwelling. Very often they flashed in through an open window and flew in circles round the room, chattering as they flew. Alice sometimes wished that she could understand that rapid bird-language, so full of hidden meanings and quick changes of expression. What a companion a swallow might be, if we could but interpret the wisdom that he brings!
Alice and her pupils were already getting plenty of work to do. She had dropped down, quite happily, into the middle of a very pleasant family who were all pulling one way—and that was a good way. But it took all her own good sense, and the judicious hints of Mrs. Bower, to reconcile her to making up the hideous materials brought by the surrounding neighbours. The crude reds and greens, the staring blues and yellows, filled her with disgust. And as she sauntered through the lane on a golden afternoon, she wondered why people did not study colour in the hedges.
Here was the delicate lilac of the wild geranium; here were the beautiful shades of olive and brown and buff so dear to an artist's eyes. Alice enjoyed them all; and drew in deep breaths of sweet-scented air, with a pitying remembrance of those who lived in the sickening atmosphere of heated London.
So the peaceful days went and came. Miss Harper's services became more and more in request, and by the time that the blackberries were ripe, she was employed by the "best families" in the neighbourhood.
One day a young lady trundled up to the gate in a pretty little pony-cart; and Ethel Bower, catching a glimpse of her through the open window, said in a low tone that it was Mrs. Monteagle.
"Our squire's wife," she added, as she went to the door. Alice, sitting among silks and cashmeres and tweeds, did not feel any special interest in the new-comer. But at the first sight of Mrs. Monteagle's pretty, piquant little face, she had a flash of remembrance.
The lady made just the slightest pause before speaking. Miss Harper, however, met her with grave politeness and an impassive face. So Mrs. Monteagle plunged into business at once, and explained that she wanted a really pretty tea-gown.
She had brought a parcel of soft rich silk, and plenty of delicate lace. Miss Harper examined and approved, and promised to execute the order in a week.
"Letty Foster always had good taste," she thought, as the cart trundled away, "And so she has married 'our squire.' Well, she will find that I, at any rate, can be utterly oblivious of our meetings elsewhere. It is quite a pleasure to make up such lovely silk as this; and I am really very much obliged to Mrs. Letty."
On the evening of the same day "Mrs. Letty" went to the door of her husband's dressing-room, just before dinner, and told him that she had made a discovery.
"Well, what have you discovered?" asked he. "Upon my word, I wish it was a pot of gold."
"It's not a pot of gold. It's a former acquaintance under the guise of a dressmaker!" cried Mrs. Monteagle gleefully. "It's Alice Harper, who used to live in Park Lane—Alice Harper, the daughter of that old company man who blew out his brains. Isn't it funny?"
"It doesn't strike me that it's funny when a man blows out his brains," said the squire. "I wish he hadn't done it. If he had lived I might have made him useful."
"What could he have done for you, Gerald?" asked Mrs. Monteagle, opening her eyes.
They stood fronting each other alone for a minute or two. She noticed that he had some deep lines on his face, and looked worn.
"Well, he could have got some money for me," said he simply. "I say, Letty, I don't want to bother you, but we must contrive to pull in a bit. Cardigan is coming here to-morrow. If I can, I shall get him to buy Swallow's Nest."
"Oh, the charming old farm! That's where Miss Harper is living," said his wife. "I am sorry that you must part with it. Yes, I will be very economical, dear. Mr. Cardigan is awfully rich, they say."
Robert Cardigan alighted at the little rural station in rather a gloomy mood. It is a truism that rich men are by no means the most cheerful; and Robert, perhaps, was feeling the embarrassment of wealth.
The squire's dog-cart was waiting, and, as he drove through the autumn lanes, the beauty of the country stole over him like a charm. He wished all at once that he could be a boy again, and go a-nutting in the deep woods. Monteagle, he thought, was a lucky man to own these acres of woodland, and these beautiful fields stretching away to ranges of quiet hills. It was the kind of country that he liked; neither wild nor grand, but just simply pastoral and sweet.
He hoped that he should not find a big house-party. Miss de Vigny had called him refreshingly natural, and it was certain that vanity was not his principal fault. But a man with many thousands a year is never left long in ignorance of his own importance. Cardigan had been hunted from pillar to post, pelted with showers of invitations, courted discreetly and indiscreetly, until he was weary of a life so over-sweet. What would he not have given for a true friend?
There was a certain face which rose up often in his memory; a girl's face, calm, and a little proud, with serious grey eyes. That girl had been always devising impossible plans for doing good to others. He had smiled while he listened to her earnest talk, and wondered how such notions could have got into the head of Harper's daughter.
He did not know what had become of her. Mary de Vigny seemed to know, but had not been disposed to say much. He wished now that he had plied the little maiden lady with questions. He would call on her, he thought, when he returned to town, and plainly ask her to tell him all about that girl.
To his relief he found that there were only a few people at Courland Hall.
The squire had been married only twelve months. He had chosen for a wife a thoughtless good-natured girl, with very little money. Letty had always been accustomed to rely to a great extent on her own brains when she was in want of a little extra finery. She had contrived to make a charming appearance on a small allowance. To marry Gerald Monteagle was, to her fancy, like coming into the possession of a gold mine.
She had begun by spending freely. Those few words, spoken in the dressing-room, had been the first hint of tightening the purse-strings. They had sobered her spirit, and brought her closer to her husband than she had ever been before.
No wedded pair can ever be perfectly united until they have passed out of the sunshine into the shade. When the sun goes down behind a bank of clouds, and a chill wind sighs across the roses, then the bride becomes the wife in real earnest, and creeps nearer to her husband's side. It is then that he discovers what a deep well of tenderness lies in the heart of the girl who was perhaps lightly wooed and easily won.
Letty's gaiety was just tinged with gravity, and Cardigan, who had thought to find her a mere trifler, liked her better than he had expected, and was ready to be a friend to the young couple. He went into the woods with the squire, and the two men grew intimate.
"I wouldn't part with a foot of my land if it could be helped," Monteagle confessed. "But times are bad, and I must let Swallows' Nest go."
"It's a beautiful country," said Cardigan.
"Swallows' Nest is one of our prettiest bits," the squire said. "Just come and have a look at it. You can get a good view from the top of that field."
The old farm-house was bathed in the mellow light of the October afternoon. A few late roses still lingered in the front garden, and clambered up the rough flint walls; and there were geraniums blooming on the ledges inside the porch. It was not a big house, by any means, and the latticed windows were small and mean. Looking down upon this dwelling, Cardigan only thought that it was not pretty enough to be set in such a lovely spot. It never occurred to him just then that it was a home.
"WITH A SAD HEART SHE WENT TO HER LATTICED WINDOW AND LEANED OUT INTO THE SOFT DARKNESS OF THE AUTUMN NIGHT."
"Upon my word, Monteagle," said he suddenly, "I'm half inclined to buy the place myself. It would be easy enough to pull down that ugly little barn, and put up something really picturesque."
"Quite easy," said the squire.
"I know exactly the sort of thing I should like to build there," Cardigan went on. "Nothing showy, you understand, but something that would harmonise with the surroundings. Well, Monteagle, we must talk the matter over."
And the matter was talked over, and settled after dinner that very evening. Cardigan was not the man to worry about the price. The squire went up to his room that night with a lightened heart.
"I am sorry that the Bowers will have to turn out; that's the worst part of it," he said to his wife.
"Mrs. Bower and the girls are so nice," Letty answered. "And, oh, Alice Harper lives there, I was forgetting that! But they will easily find a place somewhere else, darling. It is such a relief to me to see that you have cheered up."
"The money will just set me straight, Letty," said he.
Ill news generally flies apace. The Monteagles' butler was one of Bower's old friends. A few days after the arrangement was made the farmer came in one evening with a downcast face.
"I couldn't have thought the squire would have done such a thing!" he cried. "He's sold the old place right over our heads! My father lived here, and my grandfather, and my great-grandfather. And now its going to be pulled down, and a new place'll be stuck up to please a chap who comes from nobody knows where!"
Little Milly was listening with all her ears. She burst out crying, and ran at once into the next room to tell the doleful tidings to her sisters and Miss Harper.
Ethel Bower lifted her fair Madonna face from her work, and stared at the child in surprise. Ada, dark-eyed and pretty, tossed her head and said she didn't believe a word of it. And Alice Harper, putting the finishing touches to Mrs. Monteagle's tea-gown, said very earnestly that she hoped it was not true. But before she went to bed that night she learnt that it was really true.
With a sad heart she went to her latticed window and leaned out into the soft darkness of the autumn night. The air was full of those sweet earthy scents that breathed of home and rest. Under this peaceful roof she had found a safe refuge from the storms of life. A refuge, and something more. True hearts that turned to her for helpful love; young spirits trusting to her stronger spirit for that uplifting that she could give them. Simple souls, clinging in human fashion to the old walls that had sheltered them so long—must they be driven out to seek a new dwelling at a rich man's will?
Then Alice knelt down and prayed with all her strength, lifting up her face to the eternal stars above her. She prayed that she, who had come a stranger to this dear old house, might bring a blessing under its protecting roof. Lonely and sad, with a scanty purse and a tired body, she had come to dwell with these people, to work with them, and share their life. And He who had led her there would surely help her to assist them in their hour of sorrow and need.
She rose early next morning, and went downstairs to see sad faces at the breakfast-table. Just before the farmer went out to his daily tasks, it came into her head to ask him a question.
"Mr. Bower," she said, "did you hear the name of the person who has bought your farm?"
"Yes," he answered; "but it is a name not known to any of us. It's Cardigan. He's a young man, I'm told, who has come into a lot of money. The squire asked him to stay at the Hall, and it seems that he's taking a mighty fancy to the neighbourhood."
Alice's heart began to throb fast. If Robert Cardigan were the man that Mary de Vigny thought him, it might be very easy to move his heart. But when, and in what manner, could this be done?
Her brain was still busy with these thoughts while she was carefully folding up the tea-gown and packing it into a box to send it up to the Hall. It was carried to the house that very morning, and Mrs. Monteagle, when she took it out, was quite charmed with her new dressmaker's skill.
When the men came in from the covers that afternoon, the squire's eyes took note of the pretty gown.
"Why, Letty," said he, "where did you get that original-looking thing."
He spoke in an undertone, standing near her little tea-table, and looking at her with an amused smile. Cardigan came up at the moment to have his cup refilled, and caught her reply.
"Alice Harper made it. A wonderful woman, isn't she?"
Had Alice Harper taken to dressmaking? Miss de Vigny had told him that she was working for herself. Later, he contrived to lead the conversation back to that tragedy which had been enacted, nearly three years ago, in Park Lane.
"I have often wondered," he said, "what became of poor Harper's daughter."
(To be concluded.)
[THREE GIRL-CHUMS, AND THEIR LIFE IN LONDON ROOMS.]
By FLORENCE SOPHIE DAVSON.