CHAPTER IX
PARTED
"And trust me not at all or all in all."—TENNYSON.
John had never walked so fast in his life. Almost before Mr. Bland had politely lifted off the kettle and filled the teapot under Mrs. Randal's directions, he was half-way up the narrow muddy lane that led to Alfrick's farm. There he found Mrs. Alfrick, with a worried countenance and every sign of a recent fit of crying, leaning over the garden gate.
"Well! So you've got the child back! Where did Mr. Bland pick her up, I wonder?" she began at once. "And I hope you don't bear no more malice, John!"
"How did you know?" said John gruffly; but he went on without waiting for her answer. "Look here, don't talk about me bearing malice, Mrs. Alfrick, but just tell me the truth about this affair, for I mean to know it. You ain't going to deny that you took Lily to the fair—and Mary—she had no more to do with it than my mother herself."
"If you know so much, what's the good of asking?" said Mrs. Alfrick, with a slightly hysterical laugh. "Well, you'd have been made of stone yourself, John Randal, if you'd resisted that child's face when she said she wanted to go. Yes, it was me as took her, and thinking no harm, you may be sure, in giving her a bit of amusement like my own children. But if I'd known all this row and fuss was to come of it, I'd have locked Miss Lily in the house sooner than take her with me. Why, there was my Lizzie, she nearly got lost too—and Polly—nothing would satisfy her but racing after us to fetch that precious child back—and so naturally you took it into your stupid head it was her that lost her, while all the time it was nobody's fault but the child's own. If she'd kept by me, she'd have been safe enough. I'll never be bothered with her again, that's positive. What did become of her, after all?"
"That doesn't matter," said John. "Some people stole her and took her off to Moreton, and Mr. Bland found her at the station."
"Well, that was queer." Mrs. Alfrick would have asked a great many more questions, but another subject was occupying her mind, as well as John's. Standing outside the gate, he was looking up over the low garden wall at the front of the house, his eyes wandering wistfully from window to window. If only Mary would look out at one of them!
The woman at the gate, though foolish, selfish, spiteful and small-minded, was not altogether bad and barbarous. She was now really sorry for the misunderstanding between John Randal and her stepdaughter, and not altogether because its consequences seemed likely to fall upon herself, and had already brought her a scolding from her husband. There is a corner of romance, of sympathy with true love, in most women's hearts, and Mrs. Alfrick's heart was not without it. She had always abused John, but she could not help respecting him; she had always complained of Mary, but she valued her none the less for that.
"Polly ain't in," she said, "so it's no use you looking for her. She went down to the Vicarage half-an-hour ago."