“Here there was but sorry going, for the way was very wearisome.”
PILGRIMS PROGRESS.
THE autumn days were already beginning to draw in, and it was growing late in the afternoon when Marion and her guardian entered Miss Tremlett’s presence; so the light was dim; and at first it was difficult to distinguish the owner of the sharp, somewhat querulous voice which greeted them from the opposite corner or the room.
“So you have got here at last, Miss Vere, Marion, I suppose I may still say? Excuse my rising. At this hour I always am obliged to rest the sofa till tea time. How did you get here? Oh,” as she for the first time perceived her niece’s companion. “So you’re there, Geoffrey Baldwin! Quite unnecessary. My niece could perfectly have walked up from the station alone.” And with the last few words the voice increased in acrimony.
Instinctively Marion crept a little closer to the tall form beside her. He felt her shiver slightly and—instinctively too—groped with his great strong hand for the little cold one hidden under her cloak, and gave it a reassuring pressure. She took it quite naturally, and for a moment or so allowed her hand to remain in his grasp. But she could not brace herself up to reply to her aunt’s greeting. Geoffrey did so for her, ignoring altogether the latter part of the speech.
“Yes,” he replied cheerfully, “here we are, Miss Tremlett, Miss Vere, I am sure is glad to be at her journey’s end. But it is so dark, I can hardly see. Take care, Miss Vere,” as Marion made a movement in the direction of the sofa, “there’s a footstool in the way. Perhaps Miss Tremlett will allow me to lights?”
“I never have lights between my afternoon luncheon and tea time, Geoffrey Baldwin. I am sure you might know that by now,” replied the old lady snappishly. “My head would never stand it However for once in a way—Oh, Martha is that you? You certainly need not have brought the lamp till I did ring.”
But Martha deposited the lamp and quietly retired. Now, Marion could see her aunt plainly. There was not very much to see. A withered face with some remains of former good looks, but none of the more lasting loveliness of sweet expression; or the rare but unsurpassed beauty of a tender, loving old age. A graceful figure had in her young days been one of Miss Tremlett’s attractions, and this she still imagined that she possessed. In consequence of which somewhat mistaken notion, for the former sylph-like slightness was now rather to be described as scragginess and angularity, she was fussy to a degree about the make and fit of her dresses. A wrinkle drove her frantic, and though her days were principally spent on the sofa, the slightest crease or rumple in her attire altogether upset her never-very-firmly-established equanimity. She wore a light brown “front” surmounted by a cap of marvellous construction, so precise and stiff in its appearance that till you touched it you could hardly believe it to consist of anything so soft and ethereal as lace. Miss Tremlett had one art in perfection altogether peculiar to herself that of lying on a sofa without the slightest appearance of ease or repose: she made you feel somehow as if, all the time instead of reclining on a couch, she was sitting bolt upright on the stiffest of high backed chairs.
As Marion drew near her, she held out her hand, and permitted, rather than invited, her to kiss her cheek. Geoffrey wished he could have bitten her, instead.
“Your cloak is not damp, I hope?” she exclaimed; and as Marion was about to express her thanks for the unexpected anxiety on her behalf, she went on, “if it is the least damp, you had better not stand so near me, I am so sensitive to the slightest damp or cold.” On which Marion timidly suggested that perhaps she had better change it at once, if Miss Tremlett would be so good as tell her which was to be her room.