"But what can have caused it? She was all right when she went to Adelonga. Something must have happened while she was there. She is not merely fretting after Lucilla and the baby—oh, no, it is a deeper matter than that. I am afraid—I really am seriously afraid, by the look of things—that it has something to do with Mr. Kingston." Her mother, though silent, was so obtrusively conscious and uneasy that she felt assured, the moment that she looked at her, of the correctness of her surmise. "Oh, do tell me what has happened!" she continued, eagerly. "Something has, I know. It is what I have been dreading all along—with these tiresome delays! They ought to have been married out of hand, and then there would have been no trouble."
"If there is anything wrong between them," Mrs. Hardy reluctantly admitted, "it is—I must say that for Rachel, though she is very trying with her silly childishness—it is Mr. Kingston's doings."
"Of course," assented Mrs. Reade, promptly.
"It was on the night of the ball. He rather neglected Rachel—the first time I ever knew him to do it—and he flirted in that foolish way of his—with Minnie Hale. You know Minnie Hale?—a great, fat, giggling creature—quite a common, vulgar sort of girl—not in the least his sort, one would have imagined. I don't wonder that Rachel was offended; I was extremely vexed with him myself, for he did it so openly—everybody noticed it. It was so bad, really, that the man that horrid girl was engaged to, Mr. Lessel, broke off with her on account of it. That will show you. She was a great deal worse than he was, of course. But he went great lengths. Perhaps he had been taking too much wine," she sighed, plaintively.
"No," said Mrs. Reade. "He has plenty of faults, but that is not one of them."
"Rachel was deeply hurt and shocked," Mrs. Hardy proceeded. "Naturally, for it was not a thing she had been used to, poor child. She took it very much to heart—so much that she wanted, like Mr. Lessel, to break off her engagement there and then." Here Mrs. Hardy went into details of poor Rachel's unsuccessful struggle for deliverance. "But of course I reasoned with the foolish child," she added conclusively; "I talked her out of that."
Mrs. Reade sat very still, tracing patterns on the floor with the point of her parasol.
"And did they have a quarrel?" she asked, vaguely. She was evidently thinking of something else.
"No. There was a coolness, of course, but—oh, no, I am sure they did not quarrel. He has seemed anxious to make up for it, and she has not shown any temper or resentment. But things have been uncomfortable if you can understand—very unsatisfactory and uncomfortable—ever since. I think she was disappointed in him, and cannot get over it. I have been hoping that it was all right, and that she was only unsettled and dispirited about leaving Adelonga. But now you mention it—yes, now I think of it—I'm afraid she is brooding over that other trouble still. Foolish child! she lives in a world of romantic ideals, I suppose."
"Why did Mr. Kingston flirt with Minnie Hale?" asked Mrs. Reade, looking up at her mother impressively.