'It's over now—at least, the worst is over,' he said, 'and the artisans are at work again. It's the poor little shop-keepers I pity, they have lost everything—health, savings, customers—they are quite done up. However, I have a friend in the neighbourhood to whom I go, and Lady Sarah heard of my letter to The Times and sent me fifty pounds for them the other day. Dolly brought it herself. I was sorry to see her looking worn, poor dear. I think it is a pity that Mrs. Palmer takes so very desponding a view of her daughter's prospects. Dolly seemed disinclined to speak on the subject, so I did not press her, and we all know,' said the curate, in a constrained sort of voice, 'that Henley is a high-minded man, his good judgment, and sense of....'
'His own merit,' said Raban, testily. 'What a thing it is to have a sense of one's own virtue. He will get on in India, he will get on in every quarter of the world, he will go to heaven and be made an archangel. He has won a prize already that he does not know how to value at its worth, and never will as long as he lives.'
John Morgan looked very much disturbed. 'I am very sorry to hear you say this. Tell me as a friend, when Mrs. Palmer declares the engagement is broken off, do you really think there is any fear of....'
Frank jumped up suddenly.
'Broken off!' he cried, trying to hide his face of supreme satisfaction, and he began walking up and down the room. 'Does she say so?'
The dismal little room seemed suddenly illumined; the smoky court, the smutty-tree, the brown opposite foggy houses were radiant. Frank could not speak. His one thought was to see Dolly, to find out the truth; he hardly heard the rest of the curate's sentence. 'I have been so busy,' he was saying, 'that I have scarcely had one minute to think about it all; but I love Dolly dearly, she is a noble creature, and I should heartily grieve to hear that anything bad occurred to trouble her. Are you going already?'
There is a little well of fresh water in Kensington Gardens, sparkling among the trees, and dripping into a stone basin. A few stone steps lead down to the lion's head, from whence the slender stream drips drop by drop into the basin; the children and the birds, too, come and drink there. Somewhere near this well a fairy Prince was once supposed to hold his court. The glade is lovely in summer, and pleasant in autumn, especially late in the day, when the shadows are growing long, and the stems of the murmurous elm-trees shine with western gold.
Frank Raban was crossing from the high-road towards the Palace gate, and he was walking with a long shadow of his own, when he chanced to see a nymph standing by the railing and waiting while the stream trickled into the cup below. As he passed she looked up, their eyes met, and Frank stopped short, for the nymph was that one of which he had been thinking as he came along—Dorothea of the pale face and waving bronze hair.
As he stopped Eliza came up the steps of the well, bringing her young mistress the glass; it was still very wet with the spray of the water, and Dolly, smiling, held it out to Raban, who took it with a bow from her hand. It was more than he had ever hoped, to meet her thus alone at the moment when he wanted to see her, to be greeted so kindly, so silently. No frowning Robert was in the background, only Eliza waiting with her rosy face, while Dolly stood placid in the sloping light, in the sunset, and the autumn. Her broad feathered hat was pushed back, her eyes were alight.