"I would not be Aldyth Lorraine for anything," continued Miss Dawtrey, still uneasy beneath Mr. Glynne's gaze. "I should feel odious, taking everything like that. And in many ways it must be hateful to be an heiress. I should feel sure that every man who asked me to marry him only wanted me for my money. But the man who marries Aldyth will find that he cannot do as he likes with her money; old Stephen has tied it up tightly. But she ought to have married her cousin. I shall always say that. Every one expected it of her."
"Is a young lady bound to fulfil the expectations other people have formed concerning her?" asked Mr. Glynne, with a slight smile.
"Not at all," said Clara, readily; "for my part, I make a point of doing the reverse; there is nothing I enjoy more than astonishing people. But Aldyth has always been so good and proper."
John Glynne lifted his hat and moved on without saying more, though he wondered at the idea of goodness suggested by Miss Dawtrey's words.
The next minute he was passing Myrtle Cottage, which, with its closely-drawn blinds, had a deserted air. Even the little housemaid looked forlorn as she stood in the front garden, watering the geraniums. The memory of pleasant evenings spent within those walls came to him with a painful reminder that the pleasure was not likely to be renewed. Aldyth would never return to make her home in the cottage. The vision of her, rich, courted, removed to a distance from himself, rose before his mind. The wealth she had inherited would be an impassable barrier dividing them.
The news had come as a blow to him; but he rallied himself to bear it bravely. Till this moment he had hardly been aware how strong were the new hopes that had sprung up in his heart from the hour when he knew that Guy Lorraine had chosen another bride. They must be crushed now.
"It is well that I know in time," he said to himself. "Well that she can have no idea of all that she is to me; for it would be preposterous for a poor tutor to approach as a suitor the heiress of Wyndham."
But it was impossible to resist the suggestion which came with the memory of her last glance as she drove from the station, that possibly under other circumstances he might have won her love. John paused, and, with his arms folded on the top of a gate, and his unseeing eyes gazing across the fields, pictured to himself in imagination what this change might mean for Aldyth. He could not imagine her elated by this sudden dower of wealth. It was easier to think of her as shrinking from its burden, and fearful of herself, lest she should fail to discharge aright the new responsibility.
Would it make her happier? Hardly, for she was not one to prize material prosperity. Her tastes were simple; she had a childlike enjoyment of the common things of life. He thought her one of the least worldly of women. Was there any real danger of her giving herself to a worthless fortune-hunter? He could not think it. Her pure, strong face rising before his mental vision seemed to declare the idea absurd. The man who won her must be worthy of her love and confidence.
"God bless her!" Glynne said within his heart. "Ay, and He will bless her, for she is as pure and good and unselfish as an angel, and, whatever her lot may be, she will make others better and happier."