Lifting his hat he left her, and went down the river walk.
Adamson, the gardener, found his young mistress strangely distraite and forgetful—a phenomenon which puzzled him, for he was wont to bear admiring testimony to her clearness of head, and readiness of comprehension, saying: ‘Eh, but hoo’s a rare sharp un, is Miss Bolton. Hoo’s a chip of the ’owd block in more ways nor one, hoo is.’
Wellfield, meanwhile, had taken his way down the river walk, the entrance to which was in the village street, close beside the ancient stone bridge. On the other side of this bridge, a stony, steep, wood-shaded walk led invitingly up a hill, then bent round to the left, leaving the rest of that enticing way to conjecture. This path, as Jerome remembered, took one to the top of a hill called Wellfield Nab or Neb, or simply ‘the Nab.’ He remembered climbing it sixteen years ago, with his tutor and John Leyburn; and the glorious view of the surrounding country which it commanded, he remembered too.
At the foot of the Nab, almost out of sight from the bridge, he could just catch a glimpse of a couple of gables, belonging to the Abbot’s Knoll house—Leyburn’s dwelling. John rode every morning to his mill, which was some two miles distant, on the road to Burnham.
Down the quaint paved street Jerome walked towards the church, that ancient ‘white church under the hill,’ which had weathered so many storms and troubles. A sleepy place, Wellfield—a place which seemed forgotten of all men save the few who lived in it.
Monk’s Gate was only a very few minutes’ walk from the church, the clock of which struck eleven as Jerome opened the gate of the garden.
He unlocked the door, and went into the house again, but did not remain there long. He felt that he really did require Nita’s assistance, and must wait until she arrived.
The quiet and sunshine of the old-fashioned, untidy garden were congenial to him. He wandered about it, inhaling the scent of roses and carnations, and the rich, spicy odours of picotees and the old-fashioned white pink. The sun shone pleasantly upon everything, doing his best towards ripening the young pears and apples on the trees, and bringing the flowers into more ample bloom. Where is the charm that can compete with that which pervades an old-fashioned English garden?—the flavour of grace and quaintness, and the suggestions of a ‘gentle life’ which hang about such a garden are to be found nowhere else.
Wellfield had turned his back to the gate, and was looking at the great, blunt, boulder-shaped head of Penhull, and observing the purple mist of heather which clothed its mighty sides, when a voice behind him said: