"There are."
Meynell passed on, his countenance showing a sternness, a contempt even, that was rare with him. He and Norham passed through the next drawing-room, and met various acquaintances at the farther door. Maurice Barron stood watching them. The persons invading the room had come intending to see the coins. But meeting the Home Secretary they turned back with him, and Meynell followed them, eager to disengage himself from them. At the door some impulse made him turn and look back. He saw Maurice Barron disappearing into the green drawing-room.
* * * * *
The night was soft and warm. Catharine and Mary had come prepared to walk home, Catharine eagerly resuming, now that her health allowed it, the Spartan habits of their normal life. Flaxman was drawn by the beauty of the moonlight and the park to offer to escort them to the lower lodge. Hester declared that she too would walk, and carelessly accepted Stephen's escort. Meynell stepped out from the house with them, and in the natural sequence of things he found himself with Mary.
Flaxman and Catharine, who led the way, hardly spoke to each other. They walked, pensive and depressed. Each knew what the other was thinking of, and each felt that nothing was to be gained for the moment by any fresh talk about it. Just behind them they could hear Hester laughing and sparring with Stephen; and when Catharine looked back she could see Meynell and Mary far away, in the distance of the avenue they were following.
* * * * *
The great lime-trees on either side threw long shadows on grass covered with the fresh fallen leaf, which gleamed, a pale orange, through the dusk. The sky was dappled with white cloud, and the lime-boughs overhead broke it into patterns of delight. The sharp scent of the fallen leaves was in the air; and the night for all its mildness prophesied winter. Meynell seemed to himself to be moving on enchanted ground, beneath enchanted trees. The tension of his long talk with Norham, the cares of his leadership—the voices of a natural ambition, dropped away. Mary in a blue cloak, a white scarf wound about her head, summed up for him the pure beauty of nature and the night. For the first time he did not attempt to check the thrill in his veins; he began to hope. It was impossible to ignore the change in Mrs. Elsmere's attitude toward him. He had no idea what had caused it; but he felt it. And he realized also that through unseen and inexplicable gradations Mary had come mysteriously near to him. He dared not have spoken a word of love to her; but such feeling as theirs, however restrained, penetrates speech and gesture, and irresistibly makes all things new.
They spoke of the most trivial matters, and hardly noticed what they said. He all the time was thinking: "Beyond this tumult there will be rest some day—then I may speak. We could live hardly and simply—neither of us wants luxury. But now it would be unjust—it would bring too great a burden on her—and her poor mother. I must wait! But we shall see each other—we shall understand each other!"
Meanwhile she, on her side, would perhaps have given the world to share the struggle from which he debarred her.
Nevertheless, for both, it was an hour of happiness and hope.