During these months Michael had never even seen her, and he took it for granted, without thinking very much about it, that he was not to see her any more, nor hold any intercourse with her. Then, one day, a messenger came in haste from Balder Hall, to Dr. Rowntree, to say that Miss Strangforth was very ill, and he was to go to her immediately. But Dr. Rowntree was not in Bradstane at the moment. Michael was, and of course there could be no question of hesitating or debating. He went to Balder Hall; was ushered straight into Miss Strangforth’s room, where the first object he saw was Magdalen Wynter’s face, pale and anxious, raised to look at him as he came in. Michael had just time to feel that all that he had been sure he would experience on first meeting her, was conspicuous by its absence—all that he would have thought it least likely that he should feel, he felt. It was she who showed the more agitation of the two. Her eyes fell, her lips fluttered—she could not meet Michael’s gaze. She spoke in a low voice, timidly, deprecatingly. From that moment he felt master of the situation, and of her. It did not give him a more kindly feeling towards life in general, or towards Magdalen in particular, but it made him conscious he was a free man. It was he who from this day took the lead in the intercourse between Magdalen and himself—chose how far it should go, laid down the terms on which they should meet. Magdalen had said to Eleanor, ‘We have been friends ever since.’ Perhaps Michael would not have contradicted her, even had she asserted this before his face. But none could know better than Magdalen herself what Michael in reality felt for her now—none was better acquainted than herself with the nature of those ashes left after the edifice of his faith in her had been so entirely consumed and demolished. She knew that she was powerless now to move him in any way—that he was stronger than she was, and that, instead of crushing him, she had exposed herself to the possibility of being crushed by him. He despised her—she knew it: he esteemed her no higher than his brother Gilbert, if he did not choose to visit his contempt upon her in the same way. She was his ‘friend,’ not because he could not tear himself away from her presence, but because she had now become to him a thing of so little consequence that it was not worth his while to avoid her. He had never said so to her, but she knew it, and it was more convenient to say to Eleanor Askam, ‘We are friends,’ than it would have been to explain to her the nature of the friendship.
And thus it can be understood how Michael this night thought more of Eleanor Askam, and felt more interest in her—of a purely speculative kind—than in the woman he had known and loved for so many years. He had cut himself off entirely from the Askam clan, as it were—Gilbert was mixed up with them; Magdalen and Otho were friends, and Otho was a man whom he disliked inevitably, from his very nature. The vision of this bright and beautiful girl, suddenly appearing in a quarter to which he was accustomed to consider himself a perfect stranger, had struck him, and he felt interested in her, as we feel interested in amusing or curious things with which we do not expect or desire to have any intimacy. And while he was waiting for Roger to come in to dinner, and ostensibly reading, he found himself half-dreaming, for he was sleepy, and ever the vision before his mental eyes was Magdalen’s scented, warm parlour, with its ruddy glow of firelight cheering the dull afternoon, and the sudden appearance upon the scene of that bright and beautiful girl, with her open gaze, and her abundant life and fire.
At last Roger came in, apologising for being late.
‘I went to meet Ada, and it is a good half-hour’s walk from Balder Hall.’
‘Oh, I’ve been at Balder Hall this afternoon, too. Who do you think I saw there?’
‘Miss Askam—I’ve heard.’
‘Otho Askam’s sister. That is the light in which I saw her, I must confess.’
Roger shrugged his shoulders. They were as broad—he was as big, as clumsy, as saturnine as ever.
‘Ada says she is very handsome.’
‘Ay, she is! Handsome enough to make a sensation here, I can tell you.’