"Yes; I have walked from the village—my practice always when the roads are such that no time can be gained by riding."
As he spoke, he placed in Gertrude's hand, without looking at her, or seeming conscious what he was doing, a bouquet of rich laurel blossoms. She would have thanked him, but his absent manner was such that it afforded her no opportunity, especially as he went on talking with the doctor, as if she had not been present.
All three resumed their walk. Mr. Phillips and Dr. Jeremy conversed in an animated manner, and Gertrude, content to be a listener, soon perceived that she was not the only person to whom the stranger had power to render himself agreeable. Dr. Jeremy engaged him upon a variety of subjects, upon all of which he appeared equally well informed; and Gertrude smiled to see her old friend rub his hands together—his mode of expressing satisfaction.
Gertrude thought their new acquaintance must be a botanist by profession, so versed was he in everything relating to that science. Again, she was sure that geology must have been with him an absorbed study, so intimate seemed his acquaintance with mother earth; and both of these impressions were in turn dispelled when he talked of the ocean like a sailor, of the counting-house like a merchant, of Paris like a man of fashion and the world. In the meantime she walked beside him, silent but not unnoticed; for, as they approached a rough and steep ascent, he offered his arm, and expressed a fear lest she should become fatigued. Dr. Jeremy declared his belief that Gerty could outwalk them both; and, thus satisfied, Mr. Phillips resumed the broken thread of their discourse, into which Gertrude was drawn almost unawares.
Mr. Phillips no longer seemed in Gertrude's eyes a stranger—he was a mystery, but not a forbidding one. She longed to learn the history of a life which many an incident of his own narrating proved to have been made up of strange and mingled experience; especially did her sympathetic nature desire to fathom the cause of that deep-seated melancholy which shadowed and darkened his noble countenance, and made his very smile a sorrowful thing. Dr. Jeremy, who shared her curiosity, asked a few questions, in hopes to obtain some clue to his new friend's history; but in vain. Mr. Phillips' lips were sealed on the subject.
The doctor now felt very weary, and seating themselves by the roadside, they awaited the arrival of the coach. There had been a short silence, when the doctor, looking at Gertrude, remarked, "There will be no church for us to-morrow, Gerty."
"No church," exclaimed Gerty, gazing about her with a look of reverence; "how can you say so?"
Mr. Phillips smiled, and said in a peculiar tone, "There is no Sunday here, Miss Flint; it doesn't come up so high."
He spoke lightly—too lightly, Gertrude thought—and she replied with some seriousness and much sweetness, "I have often rejoiced that the Sabbath has been sent down into the lower earth; the higher we go the nearer we come, I trust, to the eternal Sabbath."
Mr. Phillips bit his lip, and turned away without replying. There was an expression about his mouth which Gertrude did not like; but she could not find it in her heart to reproach him for the slight sneer which his manner, rather than his look, implied; for as he gazed a moment or two into vacancy there was in his absent countenance such a look of sorrow that she could only pity and wonder. The coaches now came up, and, as he placed her in her former seat, he resumed his wonted serene and kind expression, and she felt convinced that it was only doing justice to his frank and open face to believe that nothing was hid behind it that would not do honour to the man.