"Well, but, Mrs. Easton—" objected Walter.
Mrs. Easton stood up in the carriage. "Man alive!" she screamed, "you know nothing, and I know a deal; begone, or you are no friend of mine: you'll make me curse the hour that I interfered."
"Go, darling," said Mary, kindly, and so decidedly that he turned his horse directly, gave her one look of love and disappointment, and galloped away.
Mary looked pale and angry, and drove on in sullen silence.
Mrs. Easton was too agitated to mind her angry looks. She kept wiping the perspiration from her brow with her handkerchief, and speaking in broken sentences: "If we could only get there first—fool not to teach my sister her lesson before we went, she's such a simpleton!—can't you drive faster?"
"Why, nurse," said Mary, "don't be so afraid of Mr. Hope. It's not him
I'm afraid of; it's papa."
"Yon don't know what you're talking about, child. Mr. Bartley is easily blinded; I won't tell you why. It isn't so with Mr. Hope. Oh, if I could only get in to have one word with my simple sister before he turns her inside out!"
This question was soon decided. Hope drove up to the door whilst Mary and Mrs. Eastern were still some distance off and hidden by a turn in the road. When they emerged again into sight of the farm they just caught sight of Hope's back, and Mrs. Gilbert curtseying to him and ushering him into the house.
"Drive into the stable-yard," said Mrs. Easton, faintly. "He mustn't see your travelling basket, anyway."
She told the servant to put the horse into the stable immediately, and the basket into the brew-house. Then she hurried Mary up the back stairs to her room, and went with a beating heart to find Mr. Hope and her sister.