“That's right! I wouldn't do it upon any account,” said Eulalie, with not the kindest of laughs. “I wouldn't be sent for like a school-girl. Let Nathanael come himself and fetch you. What a rude fellow he is!”
“Eulalie!—You forget you are speaking of your brother and my husband. I will be ready in five minutes, Mr. Dugdale.”
Duke lifted his placid but observant eyes, and smiled. “That's good. Come along, my child.”
He had never spoken so kindly to her before. It was as if he read her trouble. Her anger faded—she was near bursting in tears. In a little while she had taken the good man's arm—which Eulalie pointedly informed her was not the fashion at Kingcombe—and was walking with him to meet her husband.
Marmaduke talked but little; marching on leisurely in a meditative mood, and leaving his young sister-in-law to follow his example. Once or twice she felt stealing down upon her one of his kindly, paternal glances, and heard him saying to himself his usual winding-up of every mental difficulty:
“Eh!—We know nothing! Nobody knows anything. But everything always comes clear sometime.”
At the verge of the town, apparently coming to meet them, she saw Nathanael—saw him a long way off. Her heart leaped at the first vision of the tall slender figure and light hair; but when he approached she was walking steadfastly along. Her eyes lowered, and her mouth firm set. He came up, silently gave her his arm, and she took it as silently.
Mr. Dugdale and her husband immediately began to talk, so there was no need for Agatha to do anything but walk on, trying to remember where she was, and what course of conduct she had to pursue; trying above all to repress these alternate storms of anger and lulls of despair, and deport herself not like a passionate child, but a reasonable woman—a woman who, after all, might have been heavily wronged.
Sometimes she essayed to consider this—to recall, as is so difficult always, the original cause of difference, the little cloud which had produced this tempest—but everything was in an inextricable maze.
Ere long, Nathanael's silence warned her that they two were alone, Mr. Dugdale having made himself absent, and being seen afar off, diving into a knot of market-politicians. Arm-in-arm the husband and wife passed on through the street. Agatha pulled her veil down, and caught more steadfast hold of her husband's arm—he was her husband, and she would maintain their honour in the world's sight. She felt how many curious eyes were watching them from windows—how many gossiping tongues would be passing comment on the looks and demeanour of Mr. and Mrs. Locke Harper.