"What wickedness!" murmured Lesbia, as Canning moved towards his boat.
"Oh, such doings are classed under the head of business by people like Tait. But I must get away before my brother or your father sees me;" and Canning loosened the painter, slipped into the boat, and took the oars, not without an anxious glance at the cottage.
"Thank you for what you have done," cried Lesbia softly, remaining, for obvious reasons, behind the tree-trunk.
"Not at all. I have only repaid my debt--that is, if such a debt can ever be paid. Au revoir, Miss Hale!" and raising his shabby cap with all the good breeding of a gentleman, Canning pulled away with an easy, clean stroke, which could only have been learned at a public school.
[CHAPTER XII]
A COUNTERPLOT
Captain Sargent was somewhat disheartened by Lesbia's steady opposition to his wooing. He was not virile enough to take her heart by storm, and his usual tactics did not seem to succeed with this cool, quiet, observant girl, who looked at him so straight. Also his threats of harming George Walker and Mr. Hale proved to be but blunt weapons and could not penetrate the shield of Lesbia's composure. Sargent retreated from the field of battle thoroughly beaten, and he must have confessed as much to Hale, for that gentleman took his daughter to task when she returned to the cottage after her secret interview with Canning. The unsuccessful lover had already departed, and Lesbia listened for ten minutes to her father's denunciations of what he was pleased to style her wickedness.
"You ought to be flattered that so rich and handsome a man loves you," raged Mr. Hale, who for once in his life lost his self-control. "You seem to forget that if I died to-morrow--and I might as my heart is affected--you would be left penniless."
Lesbia raised her eyebrows. "I understood you to say that you could leave me two thousand a year," she observed quietly.
"If you marry as I wish," cried her father furiously, "not otherwise. Failing your becoming the wife of my dear friend, Sargent, I shall leave the money to Lord Charvington."