[CHAPTER XXII.]
THE QUESTION OF GOING.
HARRY FITZALAN walked home by his father's side in absolute silence, and Mr. Fitzalan was too wise to break it. On reaching the Rectory they separated, still without a word as to what they had witnessed.
"Poor boy!" the Rector murmured audibly in his own study, thinking of the dazed look in those grey eyes, and the troubled set of the lips.
He said nothing to Marjory when she presently came in. It was not Mr. Fitzalan's way to speak of another's wrong-doing unless there were a needs-be: and there could be no doubt that Harry exchanged no confidences with his sister. Marjory's unconscious talk about Hermione in the evening showed this conclusively.
It was not till the afternoon of the following day that Harry would leave. He was very restless and irritable meantime. Since he "had not seen much" of Hermione the previous day—for he confessed to this— Marjory suggested going with him to the Hall before lunch, and she received a sharp snubbing for her pains. Marjory bore the snubbing meekly, and made no further proposals. Harry betook himself to a book, and seemed to be reading diligently, though he never turned a page. He thought he had no wish to see Hermione again, not the slightest. His idol had fallen from its pedestal with a crash. That crimsoned face, blazing with anger, rose up as an impassable barrier between him and the fair girl who had been lately the centre of his thoughts.
No; he did not want to see her. He had done with Hermione. It was time to shake off all that nonsense. She was not the being he had imagined her.
Yet somehow he could not make up his mind to leave the house that morning. If he wished to avoid Hermione he ought to have done so, for at any moment she might look in; but he stayed resolutely at home. Perhaps there was a half-unconscious hope that if she came she might appear in a mood of gentle penitence, which should do away with a little of yesterday's cruel impression.
Hermione did not come, however, and Harry went off with a look of fixed care upon his features. He would carry that vision of wrath with him all through his next term of college life.
"Father, what has happened?" Marjory asked quietly, an hour later, when Mr. Fitzalan entered. She was lying on the couch for one of her short periodical rests.