"I think not. Frances called through the door this morning that no one was to go near her before twelve o'clock. I'd wait till then, if I were you."
And Clodagh nodded comprehendingly and left the room.
Half an hour later, she rode down a long avenue of chestnuts, mounted on a splendid bay horse of Lady Diana's, and emerged upon the road that skirted the park wall.
Tuffnell Place was situated in one of the richest corners of Buckinghamshire; and as she drew rein for a moment outside the large gates and surveyed the surrounding country, it seemed to her that, as far as the eye could reach, the land stretched away in one great tract of prosperous, well-tilled fields and sweeping meadow-land, broken by high hedges and low wooded hills.
The day was one to revel in; the scene one to bring complete repose. And as she gathered up her reins and allowed the bay horse to sweep down the gently sloping road into this land of plenty, she permitted the atmosphere to take full possession of her. For the moment, the thought of London, of her fellow-beings, even of herself, fell away from her conscious consideration; and she dreamed—as an Irishwoman can always dream—with her eyes open and her senses alert to her horse's slightest movement; yet wrapped in a world of her own, created from the warm blue haze of summer that lay over the rich country—from the summer sun that warmed her blood—from the close, instinctive comprehension of nature, that no artificiality has power to eradicate.
It was more than three hours later when she rode back to the gates of Tuffnell, having covered many miles of country, and revelled for a long delicious stretch of time in her own musings. The air and the hot sun had warmed her face to a splendid healthy colour, her lips were parted eagerly, and across her saddle she was carrying a spray of honeysuckle, plucked from the tall hedgerows. Her mood was generous, pliable, brimming with high impulses; if, in that moment, one loving hand had been stretched forth to hers—one honest soul come out of the sunlight to meet her own, many things might have been different. But the moment came—and the moment passed.
Riding quickly up the avenue, she drew rein at the hall door; and at the same instant Lady Frances Hope crossed the wide sunny hall.
Clodagh saw her at once, and a shade of disappointment touched her face. Lady Frances was so intensely suggestive of the world she had been trying to forget. Her impulses of a minute ago shrank instinctively; the habit of indifference came back to her by suggestion. She suddenly felt ashamed of her sunburned face and of the spray of honeysuckle.
But Lady Frances came forward to the hall door, and at the same moment a groom hurried round from the stables.
Clodagh slipped easily from her horse; took her flowers from the saddle; and then turned to greet her friend.