"Knows, of course, nothing whatever about it," said Flaxman hastily. "Now will you give us your orders? A strong denial of the truth of the story, and a refusal to discuss it at all—with any one—that I think is what you wish?"
Meynell assented.
"In the village, I shall deal with it at the Reform meeting on Thursday night." Then he rose. "Are you going to Forkéd Pond?"
"I was on my way there."
"I will go with you. If Mrs. Elsmere is free, I should like to have some conversation with her."
They started together through a dripping world on which the skies had but just ceased to rain. On his way through the park Meynell took off his hat and walked bareheaded through the mist, evidently feeling it a physical relief to let the chill, moist air beat freely on brow and temples. Flaxman could not help watching him occasionally—the forehead with its deep vertical furrow, the rugged face, stamped and lined everywhere by travail of mind and body, and the nobility of the large grizzled head. In the voluminous cloak—of an antiquity against which Anne protested in vain—which was his favourite garb on wet days, he might have been a friar of the early time, bound on a preaching tour. The spiritual, evangelic note in the personality became—so Flaxman thought—ever more conspicuous. And yet he walked to-day in very evident trouble, without, however, allowing to this trouble any spoken expression whatever.
As they neared the Forkéd Pond enclosure, Meynell suddenly paused.
"I had forgotten—I must go first to Sandford—where indeed I am expected."
"Sandford? I trust there is no fresh anxiety?"
"There is anxiety," said Meynell briefly.