"No, it is a thing one cannot help, can one? But it must have been so unpleasant for you. Ah, here is one of the gardeners," as a man came hurrying towards her, with a scared countenance. "There is nothing the matter, Henry. I am quite well now, Mr. Carew, and I can walk back to the house. And so your father's original name was Beresford. Does he call himself Beresford-Carew?"
"Yes, in all important documents; but he is a man too careless of forms to trouble himself much about the first name; and it has fallen into disuse for the most part, Carew being the name of honour in our county. He is known at Fendyke and in the neighbourhood simply as Squire Carew. I sign myself Beresford-Carew sometimes, when I want to distinguish myself from the numerous clan of Carews in Devonshire and elsewhere. Will you take my arm to go back to the house?"
"Yes"—timidly and faintly—"I shall be very glad of your support."
She put her hand through his arm, and walked slowly and silently by his side. Returning consciousness had brought back very little colour to her face. It had still an almost unearthly pallor. She walked the whole distance without uttering a word. A faint sigh fluttered her lips two or three times during that slow promenade, and on her drooping lashes Allan saw the glitter of a tear. For some reason or other she was deeply moved; or it might be that her fainting-fits always took this emotional form. He saw her safely seated on her own sofa, with footman and maid in attendance upon her, before he took a brief adieu.
"You'll come and see me again, I hope," she said, with a faint smile, as she gave him her hand at parting.
"I shall be most happy," he murmured, doubtful within himself whether he would ever hazard a repetition of this agitating finale to an afternoon call.
To be interrogated about himself and his surroundings, with an eager curiosity which was certainly startling, and then to find himself tête-à-tête with an unconscious fellow-creature was an ordeal that few young men would care to repeat.
When he described his visit next day to Mrs. Mornington, she only shrugged her shoulders and said decisively, "Hysteria! Too much money, too much leisure, and no respectable connections. If there is one woman I pity more than another that woman is Mrs. Wornock."
"If ever I call on her again it must be with you or with my mother," said Allan. "I won't face her alone."
Although he came to this decision about the lady, he found himself not the less disposed to dwell upon her image during the days and weeks that followed his afternoon at Discombe; and more than once he asked himself whether there might not be some more cogent reason for her fainting-fit than the sun's warmth or the sun's glare—whether that deep interest which she had evinced in all he could tell her of home and parents might not be founded on something more serious than an idle woman's idle curiosity.