“But I do mind it, though in a different way,” said Winifred; “it irritates me more than I can express. I really can hardly tell you how I detest any allusion to that old story.”
“Really?” said Hertha, airily. “I think you should be above such feelings. It is inconsistent with your—well—your attitude to things in general. Here we are—let us show our defiance of such old wives’ tales by marching boldly up and down in the White Weeper’s own hunting-ground while we have our talk out.”
Winifred laughed a little, but constrainedly. Matter-of-fact as she was, she did not quite understand her friend this morning.
“Of course, I don’t really mind,” she said, “if you truly like this side best. And now will you tell me exactly what you have been vexed with me for, and in what way you have come to think less well of me than you used to do?”
Hertha felt somewhat surprised. After all, Winifred was not so dense as appeared. And “to be quite fair on her,” thought Miss Norreys, “she might have resented my changing to her without giving her my reasons and a chance of justifying herself to some extent.”
This reflection came at a good moment. It softened her tone to Winifred.
“Yes,” she said, “I will be entirely frank with you, and put before you the whole story of our acquaintance, and what I did to help you, from my point of view, which is likely, I much fear, to be that of others; and I certainly will not exaggerate things. For,”—and here a generous impulse made her add warmly—“I do trust you, Winifred. I trust your good intentions and your honesty of purpose, though I believe you deceive yourself; and self-deception is terribly insidious.”
She paused a moment, but the girl did not speak. Hertha glanced round her as if to gather strength and breath for what she had to say. How fair and charming a prospect it was! There was something almost unreal in the vivid clearness of the spring beauty all about—unreconcilable with the troubles and anxieties which yet one knew must be there behind it all.
But as Hertha’s gaze wandered farther, over to where, on the other side of some rising ground, the old church spire rose up into the blue, and the lazily curling smoke of the surrounding homesteads told of the human lives and interests close at hand, different thoughts arose in her mind. What infatuation was over the girl, or woman, beside her? Who could desire a more distinct field of usefulness than Winifred Maryon was deliberately rejecting? The awful problems relating to the poor of our overcrowded great cities must not be shirked by such as are wise enough to grasp them, but how thankful should be those whose duties in smaller spheres are clear and defined, lying among more normal conditions and along less conflicting paths!
She turned to her companion abruptly.