The little station looked innocent enough, with its solitary platform and single line, its flower-borders and toy buildings;—innocent and sleepy, awaiting a tardy train, but to Deborah it was a veritable pillory as she stood by herself at its farthest extremity, looking westward to the sea.
Market-day in Witham was drawing its usual votaries in their various degrees, and for all Deborah was an object of interest as she turned an obstinate blue-serge shoulder upon whisper and stare alike.
She knew quite well that they were talking about her. Each little knot of folk had something to say on the subject of her late engagement. It had been such an unexpected triumph, followed by an equally unexpected downfall. The peripety had been so abrupt, so recent, that the district was still gasping. Barely had it learned to look upon Deborah with a new respect when it found her dumped back into her old obscurity, though reflecting, perhaps, a more subtle interest, lent by the atmosphere of scandal surrounding the whole affair.
There had been a Saturday, not so very long ago, when her progress along the platform had been a painful pageant of success. She scarcely knew which had hurt her most, the ill-concealed surprise or the terrible obsequiousness. Well, to-day, at least, no one troubled her. They left her alone, avoided her eyes, gathered in little groups and talked of her in whispers.
She could guess what they were saying—hear the pity and the blame so subtly intermingled. Stanley’s death alone might have earned her commiseration; his marriage along with it had branded her. It was all so “queer!” The dead man might have earned the intangible stigma of the foolish word, but the living girl was left to carry it.
Dixon of Dockerneuk drove up slowly, and sauntered on to the platform. There was interest in his reception, also, for it was well known that he had never married because of a certain horse-dealer’s daughter in Witham. He looked much the same, thought the curious—the big, slow-moving man with the quiet voice and the cloak of patient and pathetic dignity which is the hallmark of the true-bred dalesman. He could not have taken it much to heart, after all. It was only when he reached the railing overlooking the sea that he allowed the new hurt look to creep back into his eyes.
He exchanged a brief good-day with Deborah, and the spectators looked curiously at the two who had suffered so similarly under the same upheaval, whose lives had been altered by the same act of deliberate deceit. Deborah was acutely conscious of the isolation in which they stood, yet she drew a little comfort from the presence of a fellow-sufferer. She made some remark about the crops, and he answered cheerfully; and presently the leisurely train drifted in, almost as if washed up accidentally by the tide. Dixon opened a door, touched his hat, and moved on to another carriage; and her heart warmed to him, recognising his tact.
There were strangers with her by some happy accident, unaware of her personal tragedy; but in the next carriage, and all up the train, Deborah Lyndesay’s name had plenty of play.
A silver-haired, dapper little man, being rather sad at heart on the subject, had of course several sharp things to say about it.
“So tiresome!” he observed to the compartment at large. “So really tiresome of people to do these things! It placed their friends in such an awkward position. Did one bow or did one not bow? Was it kinder to pretend that they were not there? Or did one walk up, smiling, and talk about the Insurance Act?”