Ruth remembered seeing the Danvers omnibus at the station, and suddenly remembered, too, a certain request which she had once made of Charles.
"Where can it have been?" she said, with a great show of curiosity.
"You will never guess," said Mrs. Alwynn, in high glee. "I shall have to help you. You remember my sprained ankle? There! Now I have as good as told you."
But Ruth would not spoil her aunt's pleasure; and after numerous guesses, Mrs. Alwynn had the delight of taking her completely by surprise, when at last she leaned forward and said, with a rustle of pride, emphasizing each word with a pat on Ruth's knee:
"I've been to Stoke Moreton."
"How delightful!" ejaculated Ruth. "How astonished I am! Stoke Moreton!"
"You may well say that," said Mrs. Alwynn, nodding to her. "Mrs. Thursby would not believe it at first, and afterwards she said she was afraid there would not be any party; but there was, Ruth. There was a married couple, very nice people, of the name of Reynolds. I dare say, being London people, you may have known them. She had quite the London look about her, though not dressed low of an evening; and he was a clergyman, who had overworked himself, and had come down to Stoke Moreton to rest, and had soup at luncheon. And there was another person besides, a Colonel Middleton, a very clever man, who wrote a book that was printed, and had been in India, and was altogether most superior. We were three gentlemen and two ladies, but we had ices each night, Ruth, two kinds of ices; and the second night I wore my ruby satin, and the clergyman at Stoke Moreton, that nice young Mr. Brown, who comes to your uncle's chapter meetings, dined, with his sister, a very pleasing person indeed, Ruth, in black. In fact, it was a very pleasant little gathering, so nice and informal, and the footman did not wait at luncheon, just put the pudding and the hot plates down to the fire; and Sir Charles so chatty and so full of his jokes, and I always liked to hear him, though my scent of humor is not quite the same as his. Sir Charles has a feeling heart, Ruth. You should have heard Mr. Reynolds talk about him. But he looked very thin and pale, my dear, and he seemed to be always so tired, but still as pleasant as could be. And I told him he wanted a wife to look after him, and I advised him to have an egg beaten up in ever such a little drop of brandy at eleven o'clock, and he said he would think about it, he did indeed, Ruth; so I just went quietly to the house-keeper and asked her to see to it, and a very sensible person she was, Ruth, been in the family twenty years, and thinks all the world of Sir Charles, and showed me the damask table-cloths that were used for the prince's visit, and the white satin coverlet, embroidered with gold thistles, quite an heirloom, which had been worked by the ladies of the house when James I. slept there. Think of that, my dear!"
And so Mrs. Alwynn rambled on, recounting how Charles had shown her all the pictures himself, and the piazza where the orange and myrtle trees were, and how she and Mrs. Reynolds had gone for a drive together, "in a beautiful landau," etc., till they reached home.
As a rule Ruth rather shrank from travelling with Mrs. Alwynn, who always journeyed in her best clothes, "because you never know whom you may not meet." To stand on a platform with her was to be made conspicuous, and Ruth generally found herself unconsciously going into half mourning for the day, when she went anywhere by rail with her aunt. To-day Mrs. Alwynn was more gayly dressed than ever, but as Ruth looked at her beaming face she felt nothing but a strange pleasure in the fact that Charles had not forgotten the little request which later events had completely effaced from her own memory. He, it seemed, had remembered, and, in spite of what had passed, had done what she asked him. She wished that she could have told him she was grateful. Alas! there were other things that she wished she could have told him; that she was sorry she had misjudged him; that she understood him better now. But what did it matter? What did it matter? She was going to marry Dare, and he was the person whom she must try to understand for the remainder of her natural life. She thought a little wearily that she could understand him without trying.