“I’ll try and act like a man, Frank, hard as it will be. But you’ve set me a bitter task.”
“Then you shall have some sweet to take with it,” said Pratt to himself. Then aloud, “Ah, how nice this old lane looks. I never saw the ferns brighter or richer. How the sun shines through the trees. What a lovely morning, Dick! I say,” he gabbled on in a hasty way, “look at that tiny waterfall. What a change, Dick, from Fountain Court, Temple.”
“Why did you come this way?” groaned Richard, as he strove hard to fight down the emotion caused by the recollections that pervaded his memory.
That lane was hallowed to him: but a quarter of a mile farther was the old woman’s cottage where he had encountered the sisters; there was the place where he had walked one evening with Tiny; there—oh, there was a happy memory clinging to every tree and mossy block of granite; and but for the strong effort he made, he could have wandered out of the path, thrown himself down amongst the ferns, and cried like a child.
Meanwhile, Pratt chatted excitedly.
“Bless the dear old place. Why, Dick, that’s where I saw my little Fin looking so disdainfully at me, coming round the sharp turn there; and, look here, that’s my old perch, where I’ve had many a jolly pipe.”
He caught his friend suddenly by the arm, in a strangely-excited fashion, and turned him round, as he pointed to the grey, lichen-covered monolith of granite.
“Dick, old man, I could smoke a pipe there now, and sit and whistle like a bird. I say, Dick, how comical a fellow would look up there in his wig and gown, and—thank goodness!”
He said those last two words to himself with a sigh of relief, as, turning round, there, timed to a moment by his vile machinations and those of Fin, the sisters came, basket and fern trowel in hand, from amongst the trees, just as if time had been standing still, and no troubles had intervened.
To two of the party the surprise was complete. Richard stopped short, rigid and firm; while Tiny, as soon as her eyes rested upon him, turned pale, her basket fell to the ground, and uttering a faint cry of pain, she pressed her hand to her side and tottered back.