"I think he is anxious to get rid of us now, at any price," replied Gabrielle, without turning her head.
"Well, yes," said the Baroness, suavely. "He must see that R---- is not a very agreeable place of sojourn just now, especially for ladies. I had something of this in my mind when I mentioned the Countess's invitation to him. I half hoped he would assent to it; but he then preserved an obstinate silence, so I did not venture to pursue the subject. How I long to see the capital again, and to renew my old connections there! Say what you will, this R---- is provincial, after all, in spite of the grand city-airs which the town gives itself. But now, in the first place, we must look over what we have to wear. Come, child, and let us consider what has to be done."
"Spare me that, mamma!" prayed the young girl, in a low, weary tone. "I am not in the humour for it now. Decide what you think best. I shall be quite satisfied with anything you do."
The Baroness looked at her daughter in unmitigated astonishment; such indifference passed the bounds of all belief.
"Not in the humour for it? Gabrielle, what has come to you? I noticed the change in you some time ago, when we were staying in the country; but now, during the last few days, you have grown so strange, I really can hardly recognise my own daughter. Something must have passed between you and your uncle during that drive home, I am afraid--something you are keeping back from me. He is evidently angry with you; he scarcely looked at you just now. When will you learn to show him the necessary respect and consideration?"
"You hear, he is sending us away," said Gabrielle, with a great, bitter rush of feeling. "He wishes to be alone if a danger threatens, if a misfortune overtakes him--quite, quite alone!"
"I do not understand you," declared her mother, pettishly. "What should threaten your uncle? He has put down the attempts at revolt with a strong hand, and there will be an end of them, I fancy; but if things should come to the worst, he has the troops to protect him."
Gabrielle was silent. She had not thought of any specific danger, but, inexperienced as she was in all the serious affairs of life, she divined that an open attack, such as Winterfeld's, would not pass by without leaving its mark, and felt, as it were, a prescience of some coming storm. She and her mother were to be sheltered from it, evidently. In no plainer language could the Baron have told her that all was really over between them. Was he not sending her to the capital, where George now lived, where a meeting with him could easily be managed? The harshness and violence with which Raven had formerly opposed this union had caused the girl far less pain than this voluntary withdrawal of all resistance on his part. He was showing her that he had ceased to protest, that he left her free to act as she pleased; and she knew him too well to cherish any hope that he would soften towards and pardon the woman whom he believed to have betrayed him. Perhaps Gabrielle might have sought to convince him of his error, to show him what injustice his cruel suspicions did her; but his icy look and manner scared her from him. That look told her that her words would find no credence, and at this thought her proud spirit rose in arms. Was she again to endure the degradation of finding her defence unheard, herself repulsed, as had happened once before? Never! never!
The Baroness was very far from divining her daughter's train of thought; she did not even remember that Assessor Winterfeld was living in the metropolis, still less that he had been sent thither expressly to prevent any intercourse between him and the Governor's heiress. The lady had weightier matters to occupy her just now. Finding Gabrielle insensible to the claims of the great "toilette" question, she rang for her maid, and at once engaged with her in a long and elaborate consultation. It was notable what a vivifying effect the prospect of this journey had on the Baroness's system. Her illness and languor seemed suddenly to have disappeared. She gave the necessary instructions with an eagerness and animation which already augured the best results from the prescribed "change of air."
On leaving his sister-in-law, the Baron had himself at once driven over to Colonel Wilten's quarters. He had always been on friendly terms with the commandant of the garrison, and latterly there had been an increase of cordiality, on the Wiltens' part at least, for the family were bent on securing an alliance between the eldest hope of their house and the young Baroness Harder.