But on one occasion Mrs. Mawley, the housekeeper, in a particularly communicative mood, showed her the suite of rooms in which Mr. Wendover lived when he was alone; and here, in the study where he read, and wrote, and smoked, and brooded in the long quiet days, she saw those personal belongings which gave at least some clue to the character of the man. Here, on shelves which lined the room from floor to ceiling, she saw the books which Brian Wendover had collected for his own especial pleasure, and the neatness of their arrangement and classification told her that the master of Wendover Abbey was a man of calm temper and orderly habits.
'You'll never see a book out of place when he leaves the room,' said Mrs. Mawley. 'I've seen him take down fifty volumes of a morning, when he's at his studies. I've seen the table covered with books, and books piled up on the carpet at each side of his chair, but they'd all be back on their shelves, as neat as a new pin, when I went to tidy up the room after him. I never allow no butter-fingered girls in this room, except to sweep or scrub, under my own eye. There's not many ornaments, but what there is is precious, and the apple of master's eye.'
It was a lovely room, with a panelled oak ceiling, and a fine old oak mantel-piece, on which were three or four pieces of Oriental crackle. The large oak writing-table was neatly arranged with crimson leather blotting-book, despatch-box, old silver inkstand, and a pair of exquisite bronze statuettes of Apollo and Mercury, which seemed the presiding geniuses of the place.
'I don't believe Mr. Wendover could get on with his studies if those two figures weren't there,' said Mrs. Mawley.
The rooms were kept always aired and ready—no one knew at what hour the master might return. He was a good master, honoured and beloved by the old servants, who had known him from his infancy; and his lightest whim was respected. The fact that he should have given the best part of his life since he left Oxford to roving about foreign countries was lamented; but this roving temper was regarded as only an eccentric manner of sowing those wild oats which youth must in some wise scatter; and it was hoped that with ripening years he would settle down and spend his days in the home of his ancestors. He might come home at any time, he had informed Mrs. Mawley in his last letter, received six weeks ago.
That glimpse of the room in which he lived gave Ida a vivid idea of the man—the calm, orderly student who had won high honours at the University, and was never happier than when absorbed in books that took him back to the past—to that very past which was presided over by the two pagan gods on the writing-table. She noted that the wide block of books nearest Mr. Wendover's chair were all Greek and Latin; and straying round the room she found Homers and Horaces, Greek playwrights and historians, repeating themselves many times, in various quaint costly editions. A scholar evidently—perhaps pragmatical and priggish. Bessie's coolness about her cousin implied that he was not altogether agreeable.
'Perhaps I should have liked him no better than the false Brian,' she said to herself to-day, as she stood musing before the old brown books in the library, thinking of that more individual collection which she had been allowed to inspect on her last visit.
She shuddered at the image of that other Brian, remembering but too vividly how she had last seen him, kneeling to her, claiming her as his own. God! could he so claim her? Was she verily his, to summon at his will?—his by the law of heaven and earth, and only enjoying her liberty by his sufferance?
The thought was horrible. She snatched a book from the shelf—anything to distract her mind. Happily, the book was Shakespeare, and she was soon lost in Lear's woes, wilder, deeper than any sorrow she had ever tasted.
She read for an hour, the soft air fanning her, the sun shining upon her, the scent of roses and lilies breathing gently round her as she sat in the deep oak window-seat. Then the clock struck three, and it was time to think of leaving this enchanted castle, where no prince or princess of fairy tale ever came.