I was much annoyed. It seemed probable that he would meet Miss Pomeroy again there, though possible that among twenty-five thousand women he might fail to recognise her. I think Cecilia and I must take a day or two at Torquay on our way home. It would soothe me after this mountain air and the desolation of Grey Tor, and I could get some fresh bead trimming for my velvet mantle, which has been much destroyed by all that I have come through in this place. Our packing will be very easily done. Poor Mr. MacGill used always to say, in his playful manner, that he could stand anything except a woman's luggage, which is the reason that I always try to travel with as little as possible. So there will be only our two large boxes and the holdall and my black bag and the split cane basket and the Holland umbrella-case, with two straps of rugs and the small brown box, and the two hat-boxes, and a basket with some food. Miss Pomeroy's boxes were like arks. I'm sure if she succeeds in her design, I pity the man that has to take them back to Scotland; they would never go in the motor. I think Greytoria and the pony chaise will manage all our little things quite nicely. She seems the quietest animal in the stables, so I must just trust myself in it once more.
There goes Cecilia again, walking on the gravel at the door with that Mr. Willoughby. We must certainly leave to-morrow morning.
One affair such as that of Miss Pomeroy and Sir Archibald is enough for me to endure without being witness of another.
One would suppose common modesty would prevent a young gentleman and lady from indulging in a love-affair whilst inhabiting an ordinary country inn; but there is no limit to the boldness of these Americans. I sometimes think it is a pity that they were discovered, for they have been a bad example to more retiring and respectable nations.
SIR ARCHIBALD MAXWELL MACKENZIE
Torquay
That dreary week of uncertainty in London seemed more foolish than ever, when Johnson and I struck the familiar road from Stoke Babbage to the moor. What a silly ass I was, I thought, to kick my heels at the Carleton all those tiresome days when I might have been with Virginia!
It all looked exactly the same as we came up the hill from the little town,—the bare walls of the hotel, Grey Tor with a row of tourists on the top, moor ponies feeding all over the place, with their tiny foals running after them. It was a lovely, cloudless day, with 'blue distances' enough to please all the artists in creation, and the hot air quivered over the heath as I've seen it do at home on an August afternoon. I seemed to hear Virginia's voice already, to see her standing on the step in one of her pretty new frocks, and my spirits went up with a bound. But when I got to the door there was no one there. I went into the dining-room; the tables were changed; the one at which we all used to sit together in the window was pushed into the middle of the room. At a small table on the side were seated Mrs. MacGill and Miss Evesham, while the Exeter artist was at another one not far off. Miss Evesham and he seemed to be having a pretty lively conversation, while Mrs. MacGill looked thoroughly out of it and decidedly sulky.
'What!' cried Miss Evesham, seeing me, 'you are back, Sir Archibald! Had London no attractions?'