‘ ’Tis fine to be alive and young,’ he said; ‘and the birds sing like the angels of Paradise!’
‘I think to have heard the sparrows in the Green Park——’ Anne began to say, almost as if she were speaking to herself—then she broke off in the middle of her sentence and turned away. A moment later she added—
‘You do speak rarely clear, Dick—for all the world like a flute’s note. I like to hearken to your voice better than them birds by far.’
Meadowes was charmed with this pretty speech; he flung his arm round Anne’s waist and kissed her. She looked up at him with her brown eyes full of tears; but they may have been tears of mirth, for all she said was, ‘Good sakes! but men be mortal vain,’ and with that she drew herself away from his embrace.
‘Why should she cry over the sparrows in the Green Park?’ Meadowes wondered; how should he know how often Anne had walked there with Sebastian Shepley?
Time wore on, summer merged into autumn, and still Anne had never spoken once to Meadowes about Sebastian Shepley; they were the best of friends, Anne welcomed his coming and mourned at his going, but without a trace of sentiment, as Meadowes found himself forced to admit. Men do not like a want of sentiment in women: they may condone it in their own sex, it is considered an essential in ours; so Meadowes, who had never blamed himself for lacking this quality, found it in his heart to be surprised and a little indignant with Anne for doing so. ‘She should be beginning to care more for me by now,’ he thought; he had been a very devoted husband.
It was devotion indeed, which urged him to ride out from London one cruel night of wind and rain. The miles seemed as though they would never be got over; yet Meadowes rode on and on, out into the deep country, his head bowed before the lashing of the rain and the onslaught of the wind. At the Cross Roads Inn he dismounted, and leaving his horse there, strode on through the darkness to Anne’s cottage.
‘Good sakes, Dick, is it you!’ cried Anne at sound of his knock. She flung open the door and he passed in, into the warmth and stillness of the cottage kitchen, where he stood laughing and breathless, the water dripping from his drenched clothes on to the sanded floor. Anne, exclamatory and sympathetic, stood beside him.
‘ ’Tis wetted through and through you are, Dick,’ she said, wringing the flap of his riding-coat. ‘For the love of heaven go and cast these wet clothes from off you, while I do heat up some ale for you on the fire. There be naught like hot ale for chills. Good lack! to think of mortal man riding from London this night!’
Meadowes laughed. ‘I shall be none the worse, Anne. But not hot ale—mulled claret for me, my girl.’