Eira obeyed without a word, feeling, in point of fact, rather small; so no signs of agitation were discernible in the little group as the door was thrown open more widely to admit of Mr Morion ushering in his guests, the stranger naturally first.
“I have persuaded Mr Littlewood to join us for a few moments,” said the master of the house, as he introduced him to his wife. “Frances, another cup of tea, if you please.” And Betty quietly rang the bell as he spoke, returning immediately to her seat near the large table, on which was placed a lamp.
Mr Littlewood glanced at her, and then at her sisters, without appearing to do so.
“Milne has not much power of description,” he thought to himself; “if they were decently dressed they would not be bad-looking girls; indeed,”—and for a moment his glance reverted to Betty.
He would have been quite ready to open a conversation with her or with any of them, but, humiliating as it is to confess it, both the younger girls were by this time consumed by an agony of shyness. It was to Frances as she handed him some tea that he addressed his first observation—some triviality about the weather, to which she replied with perfect self-possession, taking the first opportunity of drawing her mother into the conversation, for such a thing as independent action on the part of even the eldest daughter would certainly have been treated by her parents as a most heinous offence.
By degrees Betty and Eira gained courage enough to glance at the stranger, now that his attention was taken up by their mother and sister.
He was young and—yes—he was decidedly good-looking. Rather fair than dark, with something winning and ingratiating about his whole manner and bearing, in spite of the decided tone and air of complete self-possession, if not self-confidence—almost amounting to lordly indifference to the effect he might produce on others.
As in duty bound, Mr Littlewood responded at once to Lady Emma’s first remark—some commonplace inquiry as to whether this was his first visit to that part of the country.
“Yes,” he replied, “practically so, though my mother informs me that as children we spent some months in this neighbourhood, but I don’t remember it. That’s to say, I remember nothing of the country, though I do recollect the house and garden, which seemed to me all that was charming and beautiful—and mysterious too. The garden was skirted by a wood, fascinating yet alarming. Children’s memories are queer things.”
“Do you think it was near here?” said Frances, “anywhere about Craig Bay? If so, it would be interesting to revisit it.”