Betty sat directly behind Mr. Baxter at the other side of the car from Bob, and, though she could study him unobserved, she had, after the first shock of meeting, avoided looking at him. She had wanted to be alone—quite, quite alone. She wanted to think it all over, to reconstruct herself, as it were, to adjust herself to this new, this totally unexpected edition of her old playmate. So she had welcomed the distraction of this intoxicating beauty that swam past her in the golden midsummer haze.
If it did not leave her to herself, at least it took her away from this Bob, this disturbing giant, with his broad shoulders bent forward easily in the business of steering, and who now, at last, held her eyes and would not let them go. Not even the wild roses could drag her glance away, and they continued their mad backward race with the foxgloves and ferns and harebells and honeysuckle, all unobserved by Miss Betty Thompson.
And presently she found herself waiting for the moment when he would turn again to speak to his father, when she would once more see his profile. Something Hiram Baxter had just said caused Bob to laugh as he lifted his head, and Betty laughed aloud for sheer sympathy. A moment before Bob had been frowning and, with the heavy Baxter eyebrows and pugnacious jaw, unrelieved by the regularly modeled features of his handsome father, Bob's face in repose only just missed being plain, just missed it, Betty thought, by that miss that is as good as a mile. And now when he laughed every feature, every line of his honest face seemed to collaborate in the expression of irresistible mirth.
They were turning in at the park gate of Ipping House. For a moment the car came to a standstill, chuttering impatiently while a small, apple-faced child, a little girl with reddish hair and wondering eyes, who had watched their approach from the steps of the lodge, swung the iron gate slowly open.
As the car lunged forward again Betty gave a backward look along the shaded roadway. The figure of a young woman in a scarlet cloak, slim, dark, foreign looking, a gypsy, perhaps, was standing in the shadow at a turn of the road watching them intently. The next instant she had disappeared among the trees. It happened so quickly that, as the iron gate clanged behind them, the scarlet of the girl's cloak was all that Betty's mind retained of the instantaneous picture. It was a peculiar shade of scarlet. Where had she seen it before?
CHAPTER V
THE REVEREND HORATIO MERLE
In order to make it clear how Hester of the scarlet cloak (for it was she) happened to be waiting at the lodge gate on the evening of Betty Thompson's arrival, we must go back a little and consider the activities of the Reverend Horatio Merle during the previous twenty-four hours.
It was on the morning of the day preceding Hiram Baxter's return and the curate and his wife were lingering over their matutinal repast in the sunny breakfast room of Ipping House. A nice little clerical man, a pink and puffy little woman; he with finely drawn features and thin side whiskers, she with alert, almost domineering, eyes.
"Good gracious!" cried Mrs. Merle, looking up from the newspaper. "Just listen to this, Horatio!"