‘They begin with making falsehood appear like truth, and end with making truth appear like falsehood.’
Mrs. Prior knocks gently at the front-gate of the Cottage, not the little green gate so well known to the Barrys; and after a little delay Mrs. Denis’s martial strides can be heard behind it, and her voice pierces the woodwork.
‘Who’s there?’
‘It is I, Mrs. Prior.’ Mrs. Prior’s tones are soft and suave and persuasive. ‘That is you, I think, Mrs. Denis. I recognise your voice as that of an old friend. I have been here before, you know, several times, and I quite remember you. My nephew—your master, Mr. Wyndham, has at last let me know about his tenant, and I have come’—very softly this—‘to call on her.’
That she is lying horribly and with set purpose is beyond doubt. To herself she excuses herself with the old, sad, detestable fallacy, that her words are true, whatever the spirit of them may be.
Mrs. Denis, astute matron and alert Cerberus as she is (a rather comical combination), is completely taken in. She is the more ready to be deceived, in that she is at her heart, good soul! so unfeignedly glad to think that now, after all this time, her master’s people are coming forward to recognise, and no doubt make much of, the ‘purty darlin’’ under her care. Her care. Never for a moment has she admitted Miss Manning’s right to chaperon Ella, though now on excellent terms with that most excellent lady.
She does not answer Mrs. Prior immediately, but strokes her beard behind the gate, and smiles languidly to herself. Hah! He’s tould ’em! He’s found out for himself that he loves her! The crathure! An’ why not! Fegs, there isn’t her aqual between this and the Injies! An’, of course, it is a mark of honour designed by him to his young lady, that his aunt should come an’ pay her respects to her.
For all this, she is still cautious, and now opens the gate to Mrs. Prior by only an inch or so at a time. Mrs. Prior, on this, calmly and with the leisurely manner that belongs to her, moves forward a step or two, a step that places her parasol and her arm inside the gateway.
‘You are, I can see, a most faithful guardian,’ says she pleasantly, and with the distinctly approving tones of the superior to the efficient inferior. ‘I shall take care to tell Mr. Wyndham my opinion of you.’ The little sinister meaning in her speech is clouded in smiles. She takes another step forward that brings not only her arm and parasol, but herself, inside the gate; thus mistress of the situation, she smiles again—this time a little differently, but still with the utmost suavity.
‘This young lady?’ asks she. ‘She is in the house, no doubt? If you could let me see her without any formal introduction, it would be so much more friendly, it seems to me.’