She said nothing about it in the drawing-room; but when they went up stairs, she told Caroline not to reckon upon her, for she should be in mourning, and could not wear a fancy dress. Caroline looked much vexed. "It was a great pity," she said, "and Julia Faulkner wished it to be all their own set. Besides, would not Marian shoot,—she who did it so well?"
"O, no, no, I could do no such thing with all those people staring."
"Not even for a silver arrow? You would be sure to win it."
"I should be ashamed of the very sight of it ever after. O no! I should like—at least I should not mind seeing it all as a spectator, but as to making a part of the show, never, never, Caroline!"
"Well, I know it is of no use to try to persuade you!" said Caroline, with a little annoyance in her tone. "Good night."
Lady Julia, with her son and daughter, came to call the next day. Marian thought herself fortunate in not being in the drawing-room. She put on her bonnet, slipped out at the garden door, and walked away with a book in her hand, to the remotest regions of the park, where she sat down under a thorn-tree, and read Schiller's Thirty Years' War with a sort of exemplary diligence and philosophy, till it was so late that she thought herself perfectly secure of the Faulkners' being gone. Yet she only just missed them, for their carriage was driving off at one door, as she reached the other.
"Where have you been, Marian?" was the first greeting.
"I have been walking to the old thorn."
"O, have you? We hunted for you everywhere in the house: we would hardly believe Fanny when she said you were gone out, for I knew you meant to walk with us."
"I thought you would be engaged so long that it was not worth while to wait for you."