It was all like a dream. The Major kept on talking, and Clive took the cheque given to him and placed it dreamily in his pocket, wondering the while whether his brother would try to depreciate the mine in his new friend’s eyes.
And all the time he was listening for voices in the garden, and suffering agony at his brother’s presence near Dinah, till, making a savage effort over self, he forced himself to finish the business, and mastered the intense desire to go and watch the pair.
“From what?” he asked himself. “Her father can protect her, and she is nothing to me.”
Then he was seated, as if in a continuance of his dream, at the pleasant evening meal, noting his brother’s conversation as he tried to make himself agreeable, Dinah listening the while. But she met his eyes from time to time with a sweet, pleasant look of innocency; and it was only after making a fresh effort that he said good-night, and then suffered from a fresh pang. For the Major said he would walk half a mile with him, and did.
“Dinah alone with my brother!” thought Clive, as he tried to grasp what the Major said, but did not comprehend a word.
Then at parting—
“I have been very rude to your brother,” said the Major. “Let me have my shares as soon as you can.”
“Yes; he shall have his shares, and they shall double his income,” thought Clive.
Walking as swiftly as he could, he soon reached the mine, and found Sturgess standing by the new cottage he occupied in his capacity of foreman and guardian of the place.
The man seemed to be scowling savagely at him, or else it was the shadow cast by the porch as he stood listening to his chief’s words, nodding from time to time.