He came at last face to face with a high stone wall, the pretensions and obvious antiquity of which told him at once that he had returned to the vicinity of the castle. Sure enough, there were discernible at a considerable distance down to the right some of the turrets and roofs of Caermere, and he turned his course in that direction. It seemed to him a long way that he walked by the side of this great wall, marveling as he did so at its size and at the ambitious views of the persons who built it. The reflection that they were ancestors of his own came to his mind, and expanded therein. He also would build like a great nobleman in his time! What was there so grand as building?—he mused as he looked about him—unless it might be the heath and the brownish-purple hills beyond, and these also one intuitively thought of as having been built.
Presently a small doorway appeared in the massive wall, and Christian, finding it unlocked, passed through it into a vast garden. The inner and sunny side of the wall, as far as he could see in either direction, was veined with the regularly espaliered branches of dwarf trees flattened against it, from which still depended here and there belated specimens of choice fruit. On the other side of the path following close this wall, down which he proceeded, were endless rows of small trees and staked clumps of canes, all now bereft of their season’s produce. The spectacle did not fit with what had been mentioned to him of the poverty of Caermere. Farther on, a tall hedge stretching at right angles from the wall separated this orchard from what he saw now, by glimpses through an open arch, to a be a flower garden. He quickened his pace at the sight, for flowers were very near his heart.
At first there was not much to move his admiration. The sunlit profusion of his boyhood’s home had given him standards of size and glowing color which were barely approached, and nowhere equaled, here. Suddenly he came upon something, however, before which he perforce stopped. It was the beginning of a long row of dahlias, rounded flowers on the one side of him, pointed and twisted cactus varieties on the other, and he had imagined nothing like this before in his life. Apparently no two of the tall plants, held upright to the height of his breast by thick stakes, were alike, and he knew not upon which to expend the greater delight, the beauty of their individual blossoms or the perfection of skill exhibited in the color-arrangement of the line.
He moved slowly along, examining the more notable flowers in detail with such ardor that a young lady in a black gown, but with a broad hat of light straw on her pale hair, advanced up the path, paused, and stood quite near him for some moments before he perceived her presence. Then with a little start, he took off his hat, and held it in his hands while he made a stiff bow.
“You are fond of flowers?” Lady Cressage said, more as a remark than an inquiry. She observed him meanwhile with politely calm interest.
“These dahlias are extraordinary!” he exclaimed, very earnestly. “I have never seen such flowers, and such variety. It surprises me a great deal. It is a spécialité in England, n’est ce pas?”
“I think I have heard that we have carried the dahlia further than other countries have done,” responded the lady, courteously giving the name the broad-voweled sound he had used. She added with a pleasant softening of eyes and lips: “But you ought not to begrudge us one little triumph like this—you who come from the very paradise of flowers.”
The implication in her words caused him to straighten himself, and to regard her with a surprised new scrutiny. He saw now that she was very beautiful, and he strove to recall the few casual remarks Lord Julius had dropped, concerning the two ladies at the castle, as a clue to her identity. One had been an actress, he remembered—and this lady’s graceful equanimity had, perhaps, something histrionic in it. But if she happened not to be the actress, then it would no doubt anger her very much to be taken for one. He knew so little of women—and then his own part in the small drama occurred to him.
“It is evident that you understand who I am,” he said, with another bow. The further thought that in either case she was related to him, was a part of the family of which he would soon be the head, came to give him fresh confidence. “It is not only dahlias that are carried to unrivaled heights of beauty in England,” he added, and bowed once more.
She smiled outright at this. “That is somewhat too—what shall I say?—continental for these latitudes,” she remarked. “Men don’t say such glowing things in England. We haven’t sun enough, you know, properly to ripen rose-hips—or compliments. I should like to introduce myself, if I may—I am Edith Cressage—and Lord Julius has told me the wonderful story about you.”