"Didn't say anything, ma'am."
"But it is so, is it not? I am sure I heard Maud telling you——?" and Mrs. Purcell paused and peered sharply.
"I didn't, then. But I knew you would tell me afterwards if there was anything to tell."
"Humph!" The old lady paused again, and twisted her cap strings. Val was gazing stupidly out of the window, but whatever the expression of his face might be no one could deny that the face itself was worthy of notice. It was an almost perfect outline which was now cut sharp against the light, the unusually bright light of an autumn sun, setting in a cloudless sky.
Val was looking at the sun, and wondering if a slight haze surrounding it portended rain. He was learned in weather lore and most of his life was passed out of doors,—so that it was important to him to ascertain if he could, the forecast of each day. It meant whether he might expect a hunting, or a shooting, or a fishing day. This was infinitely more interesting than the conversation, though he was always ready for conversation if nothing better offered.
"Humph!" muttered his grandmother a second time, and stole a glance, a long, furtive, appraising glance—not at the sunset, but at the profile which it threw into such bold relief.
Apparently it satisfied her, for her own features relaxed, and her eyes sought the floor in meditation.
("She might be caught by his looks, why not? The other two are always glad to talk to Val, and Heaven knows it is not for anything he says. He contrives to make them laugh—he has a kind of oddity that goes down—but if he were an ugly fellow they would not trouble their heads about that. Now, if Leonore——she is but a child still, and as she could marry a man called Stubbs to begin with, she can't be particular. Anyhow it is worth trying for.")
"Val?"—suddenly the peremptory old voice rang out.
Val yawned and turned round.