CHAPTER IV. TOM AND RHODA MEET.
On the day of the Joachim concert Tom and Rose went up to London soon after breakfast. Tom was not going to the concert. After taking Rose to Cadogan Mansions he meant to hurry back.
He was anxious about his aunt. She had been so unlike herself during the last few days, he feared she must be ill. And he felt sure he must have offended her in some way, for she had seemed anxious to avoid him, and he had hardly spoken to her since she came back from London.
Did she think he was taking too much on himself? He had got into the habit lately of settling matters of minor importance without consulting her, so as to save her trouble. Perhaps he had annoyed her by doing so. At any rate, he would ask her if this was so. Tom’s nature was so simple and straightforward that this was the natural course for him to take. He believed half the difficulties of life arose from the want of a little plain speaking.
Miss Merivale had said little about her journey to town. She left Tom and Rose under the impression that she had called at the lawyer’s, and it was not till the next day that she casually mentioned her visit to Mrs. M’Alister.
“I have asked Miss Sampson to come and see me,” she added, after telling them that Rhoda was to do some typewriting for her. “I am interested in her, Rose. Did you know that poor Lydia’s second husband was named Sampson? It is not at all certain that this girl is of the same family, as she comes from quite a different part of Australia. But I should like to see her.”
Miss Merivale had had this speech carefully prepared ever since she came home, and she uttered it so carelessly that neither Rose nor Tom suspected how her heart beat as she said it. Their cousin Lydia was a faint, shadowy figure to them, and the suggestion that Miss Sampson might prove to be related to her husband aroused no interest in their minds. Tom never thought of it again till Rose mentioned Miss Sampson as they were travelling up to Victoria.
“I wish Aunt Lucy hadn’t taken her up like this,” she said impatiently. “Pauline will be vexed, for she advised Aunt Lucy to have nothing to do with her.”