And Mervyn, encouraging her to talk, was furtively watching her. The animation which lit up her face, bringing with it a tinge of colour, the gleam of the golden hair in the lamplight, the movement of the long, white, artistic fingers—there was no point in the entrancing picture that escaped him. Indeed, he had been lucky beyond compare, he decided, when Violet Clinock’s letter had found him; and again and again as he looked at Melian, he made up his mind that she was there for good, unless she got tired of it and of him and insisted on leaving. But he would not think of that to-night.
They got up at last, and Mervyn drew two big chairs to the fire. Then he lighted his pipe. The kitten in the most matter of course way jumped upon Melian’s lap and curled up there.
“There you are,” laughed her uncle. “My nose is out of joint the first thing. It used to prefer me for a couch, but I don’t quarrel with its taste.”
So they sat on and chatted cosily. At last, bedtime came. Then Melian remarked on the circumstance that the table hadn’t been cleared.
“No. It won’t be, till to-morrow morning,” was the reply. “Old Judy has taken herself off long ago. I told you you’d have to rough it—eh? You see she and old Joe are the only people I can get to do my outlying work, and they hang out in a cottage the other side of the hill—beyond the first pond we passed. The young ones won’t stay on the place—find it too lonely, they say. So there you are.”
“Yes. I’m going to turn to and do things,” answered Melian decisively.
“Well, never mind about beginning now,” he said, lighting her candle and preceding her to her room. “Look, here’s a handbell. If you want anything, or are feeling lonely or ‘nervy’ in the night, ring it like the mischief—and I’ll be there. Good-night, dear.”
“Good-night, Uncle Seward,” and she kissed him affectionately.
Mervyn returned to the living-room and re-lighted his pipe. His gaze wandered to the shadowy door in the corner. Was its tradition really and completely upset? That strange manifestation, as to which he was hardly yet prepared to swear to as entirely an optical delusion—had presaged good to somebody, in that by keeping him awake he had been able to save the life of the stranger. But then the stranger had died immediately afterwards, under mysterious circumstances, and had this not befallen why then he, John Seward Mervyn would never have become aware of the existence or propinquity of his niece. And what a find that was—a young, bright, beautiful presence to irradiate the shadows of this gloomy old haunted grange. No room for any melancholic, fanciful imaginings with that about.
And yet—and yet—it may be that he was not quite easy in his mind. Not for nothing had he shown her that clearly ringing handbell, and laid emphasis on the unhesitating use of it.