These things all came to him before the soft spring days which Alicia Vernon, her father and Sir Percy Carlyon spent at his country place. Senator March had particularly desired Lucy Armytage's company. He had been fond of her from childhood, and she was one of the few young girls who did not worry him with the insistencies of youth, but Lucy, after having accepted the first suggestion of the visit with enthusiasm, was not now able to come. Senator March explained why at dinner the first evening of his house-party, which was as large as his modest house could accommodate, and numbered two ladies besides Alicia Vernon.
"I regret very much that my young friend, Miss Armytage, is not one of us, but she found herself obliged to go out to Kentucky for a fortnight's visit to some relatives," he said. "I believe that in Kentucky people are in bondage to their relations. However, I shall hope to have Miss Armytage at our next reunion, for we must come here often. Congress promises to sit into the summer and we must take refuge in the country as often as we can."
Alicia Vernon, sitting on Senator March's right hand, with Sir Percy Carlyon on her left, turned towards him with a look which held a meaning. It was Sir Percy who would not let Lucy stay under the same roof with her, Alicia Vernon. No repulse he had ever given her stung like this. For the first time she felt an impulse of fury towards him and a desire to make him suffer. She lay awake in her bed that night, hot and cold with rage.
The next day was Sunday, and in the afternoon the usual Sunday walk along the mountains was proposed. Senator March was too accomplished a host to devote himself to any lady of the party, and as there were not enough to pair off all the gentlemen, he attached himself to General Talbott for the afternoon. A little clever management on Alicia's part, in the presence of her father, secured Sir Percy Carlyon as her escort. Sir Percy made no effort to escape. He knew that strange liking which women have for opening the grave of a dead passion and dragging the bones of it into life, weeping and wringing their hands over it and crying aloud to it, commanding it to live again.
They walked together in the April afternoon through the budding woods, looking down upon the wide, peaceful valley before them, with the blue peaks cutting the edge of the clear horizon. It was the same walk which Sir Percy had taken Lucy Armytage two months before on the Sunday afternoon, and the recollection of it, and the strangeness of Alicia Vernon being his companion now, almost bewildered him. When they came to a sunny spot on the hillside, where a grey, flat rock afforded a resting-place under the pine-trees, Alicia would have stopped, but Sir Percy said to her almost roughly:
"Not here; we must go on farther."
"Why not?" asked Alicia. "Was it because you and Lucy Armytage once rested here and therefore I am not worthy to stop for a moment in this place?"
It was a chance shot, but it went home. Sir Percy turned his back, and Alicia, with a feeling of triumph, seated herself upon the flat stone where Lucy had first heard the words of love from Sir Percy Carlyon. When he turned round she saw in his face, dark and displeased, that she had scored against him.
"I wish I could forget you," she said, "and not care whether I can hurt you or not, but I can't. You see, there are some parts of a woman's life which she can live only once, and the memory is always tormenting her. This is the first walk we have taken together since--since that time in India. It was a hilly country somewhat like this."
Sir Percy made no answer; the rage in his heart against Alicia Vernon had received an accession in the last fortnight.