She certainly did not hear it from Mr. Durdan, even if she was acquainted with him, which was doubtful; for Mr. Durdan was discreet. Besides, Mr. Durdan was rarely eloquent on any social subject. He was the sort of man who makes a tour on the Continent and returns to tell you of nothing except a flea at Bellaggio.
Was it possible that some of the fishing men had been taking notes unknown to any of their fellow guests, for the benefit of Mrs. Mowbray?
Harold did not think so.
After some time he ceased to trouble himself with these vain speculations. The fact—he believed it to be a fact—remained the same: someone who had been at Castle Innisfail had given Mrs. Mowbray a highly circumstantial account of certain occurrences in the neighbourhood of the Castle; and if Mrs. Mowbray had received such an account, why might not anyone else be equally favoured?
Thus it was that he strayed into new regions of speculation, where he could not possibly find any profit. What did it matter to him if everyone in London knew that Edmund Airey had plotted with Helen Craven, to prevent an impecunious man from marrying a penniless girl? All that remained for him to do was to go to the girl, and tell her that he had made a mistake—that he would be asking her to make too great a sacrifice, were he to hold her to her promise to love him and him only.
It was somewhat curious that his resolution in this matter should be strengthened by the fact of his having learned that Edmund Airey had not been in earnest, in what was generally regarded at Castle Innisfail as an attitude of serious, and not merely autumn, love-making, in respect of Beatrice.
He did not feel at all annoyed to learn that, if he were to withdraw from the side of Beatrice, his place would not be taken by that wealthy and distinguished man, Edmund Airey. When he had at first made up his mind to go to Beatrice and ask her to forget that he had ever told her that he loved her, he had had an uneasy feeling that his friend might show even a greater interest than he had done on the evening of the tableaux at the Castle, in the future movements of Beatrice.
At that time his resolution had not been overwhelming in its force. But now that Mrs. Mowbray had made that strange communication—it almost amounted to a revelation—to him, he felt almost impatient at the delay that he knew there must be before he could see the girl and make his confession to her.
He had two more days to think over his resolution, in addition to his sleepless night after receiving Mrs. Mowbray’s confidences; and the result of keeping his thoughts in the one direction was, that at last he had almost convinced himself that he was glad that the opportunity had arrived for him to present himself to the girl, in order to tell her that he would no longer stand in the way of her loving someone else.
When he found himself in her presence, however, his convictions on this particular point were scarcely so strong as they might have been.