“Come in and have some tea while they are putting in Ranger,” said Lady Tresidder, kindly. “Sir John thinks you ought to be at the Rectory when your guardian arrives, and Mab will like a drive with you.”
Ralph grew grave at the thought of a return to the desolate Rectory with its darkened windows and awful stillness; he sighed as he followed comfortable motherly Lady Tresidder into the drawing-room where flowers and well-used books and a cosy tea-table, and some needle work, just put aside, gave a curiously homelike air to the whole place.
“Come and sit by me,” said his hostess in that friendly voice which more than anything helped him to forget his troubles. And perhaps it was the thought of the hard future confronting him which made Lady Tresidder glance so often at the little fellow who had outgrown the stage for petting, and who in spite of his smallness was really thirteen, innocent and ignorant of the world, and with a touch of the chivalrous gentleness of manner that had characterised his father, but in other respects just a high spirited, enthusiastic, hungry boy.
His honest brown eyes grew less wistful as he waded blissfully through the huge slice of Buzzard cake with which Mabel had provided him, but he found the goodbyes hard to say, all the harder because of the kindness he received. It was only afterwards, as they drove up the steep hill in the park, and turned for a last look at the river, that he could remember without a choking in his throat, Lady Tresidder’s motherly kiss, and Sir John’s kindly farewell and cheery words about future visits, and the half sovereign with which he had “tipped” him.
There had been no particular reason why the Tresidders should have been so good to him. Sir John was not the Squire of Whinhaven, indeed Westbrook Hall was not even in his father’s parish: but they had been practically Ralph’s only friends ever since he could remember and some of his happiest hours had been spent with Mab, who being many years his senior and a country girl of the best sort, had been able to teach him to ride and drive, to fish, to row, and to care for animals as devotedly as she herself did.
Mab had a frank, hail fellow well met manner which contrasted rather curiously with her beautiful womanly face and delicately chiselled features; the world in general considered her somewhat off-hand and brusque, but she had in her the makings of a very noble woman, and the boy owed much to her companionship. They were very silent as they drove through the park, but it was the comfortable silence of friends who have perfect confidence in each other. Ralph seemed to be looking with wistful eyes at every familiar turn of the road; his eyes rested lingeringly on the grey walls of the house down below, and the gleaming silvery river, and the old hawthorn bushes, and the fine old chestnut trees.
“Mab,” he said at length, “may we stop for a minute, and just see the bullfinches? Look, there is one of them out of the nest and trying to fly; the cat will get hold of it.”
“Why, to be sure,” said Mab. “Will you care to take it with you to London? It is fledged and I think you could rear it. Would you like it?”
“Rather!” said Ralph emphatically. “And I have a cage at home that would do for it.”
So the young bullfinch was carefully placed in a covered basket, and half an hour later Mabel Tresidder put down the two forlorn young things at the door of Whinhaven Rectory wondering how they would prosper in life.