“Oh, but this is to India, this must be a long letter. Dear Miss Dalrymple, I am so sorry, but I am afraid I must go back!”
“Yes, I see. Well, we will all turn.”
“No, no, I should never forgive myself; please go on, please don’t think of it! See, it is nothing for me to go so far by myself.”
“You are sure?”
“Certain.”
“Well, what do you say, Mr Wareham? Will you put up with but one companion? I confess your wood attracts me.”
He exclaimed—
“Don’t let us miss it,” and then felt a grip of terror at his heart. He had been content to go to the brink of a precipice and lean over, trusting to a barrier; here was the barrier withdrawn, and he left, dizzily attracted by his danger, and already making a step nearer. It seemed, indeed, as if he were two men, the one pushing, urging towards it, with taunt of cowardice, the other stiffening into resistance, and stammering—“Unless Miss Tempest would like us to return with her?”
Anne glanced at him. This second thought did not please her, though she knew enough to be assured that there would be no hesitation with Mary, who hurried shy protestations and fled. The others walked on. Anne was sensitive, and marked a change in Wareham’s manner; he talked of books and impersonal matters, she listened unheedingly, occupied in reflecting why, with Mary’s presence withdrawn, he ceased to be expansive. “He is afraid,” she said to herself, and set womanly wits to find out the why. It was possible that he believed her to intend to accept Lord Milborough. Some remarks on the beauty of the park set her inveighing against overgrown places.
“I can understand Alexander’s sigh for worlds to conquer,” she said, “but not the joy of possession. Persons may be found, I suppose, who look at Lord Milborough with veneration because he is lord of half a county. That is inconceivable to me.”