"You are a very woman," he said at length. "With your pride and your coldness there are the same impulses and passions common to yourself and the meanest of us. As to this pride of yours, I regard it as a hateful thing. What is a Dashwood living on a fortune that none of you have ever earned, compared with the man or woman who has risen superior to circumstances and made an honoured name in the world? The girl who goes out and gets her own living, or to support a widowed mother, is far superior to you. But I say these things loving you with my whole heart and soul and being, and hope that some day I shall call you my wife. I want to see all that harshness and coldness of yours cast to the wind, I want to see your face sweet in sympathy with poor humanity. But you are not going the lonely way as you seem to imagine. I am going to look after you; I will not be far away. For the present my work is finished here, and there are powerful calls that take me to London also in a day or two. You will let me see you, Mary; you will let me bring you and my young artist friend together?"
"I shall be glad indeed to see you," Mary cried, holding out her hand with an impulse that she would have found it hard to account for. "Oh, I am not so strong and self-reliant that I need nobody to confide in. The more my mind dwells on the future, the more I seem to dread it. And you have been so good and kind to me, I owe so much to you. I begin to see that there are gentlemen in the world, though they boast of no pedigree, and----"
"Well, that is a good lesson learned," Ralph smiled. "Let me walk with you as far as the Hall, for I have a telegram to send from the village. And then, if you will allow me, I will return to the dower house with you. There are one or two things that I have to say before you go."
Mary smiled through her tears; for a second her soul seemed to show in her eyes.
[CHAPTER XXXV.]
A FRIEND IN NEED
It was a long telegram that Ralph despatched from the village, for he only received a few pence out of the half-sovereign that he placed on the counter. The operator sighed at the prodigious task before him. Then Ralph went off in the direction of the Hall to wait for Mary in the park. It was some time before she came; the children of the villagers passed on their way from school, and presently Slight came along, with something like a frown on his rosy, wrinkled little face. He eyed Ralph with marked disfavour.
"What's this about Miss Mary, Sir Ralph?" he asked. "Perhaps I shouldn't have called you by that name. But Miss Mary has been up to the Hall to say goodbye. She says she is going to London for good, and that she is not coming back again. Going to try to get her own living, or some such foolishness."
"Your manner is not respectful, Slight," Ralph said coldly.
"I can't help it, sir," Slight replied. "Really, I can't. I love Miss Mary as if she had been a child of my own. I taught her to ride, I taught her--but there! If you only knew what a heart of gold she has! And now to go and soil those pretty hands with work. And you could prevent it by holding up your little finger. Thank God, there is no occasion for me to stay at the Hall, for I've saved enough for my old age, though I don't deny that it will be a wrench. And tomorrow the whole lot of us are going to hand in our resignation in a body."