When Kenneth left her at the garden gate, he went back to the inn feeling more hopeful about the future. If she was determined to face it so bravely and happily, surely he could do the same. Perhaps, after all, there were brighter days in store in that future which he had so much dreaded, and which had seemed such a long vista of darkness opening out before him.
After luncheon, he was sitting over the fire in the coffee-room, looking at a paper two days old, and wondering how he should get through the long solitary evening, when the waiter came in and handed him a letter. It was from Mrs. Douglas, inviting him to spend the evening at Fernbank, and assuring him that he would be conferring a favour upon them by doing so, as in winter they were so shut out front the world beyond the valley that they seldom had the pleasure of meeting any one outside their own little circle of friends in Borrowdale. The invitation was so gracefully worded, as if the obligation were entirely on his side, that the Captain felt he could only send an affirmative answer, nor, if the truth were told, did he desire to send any other.
So at five o'clock, he once more crossed the bridge and climbed the hill to Fernbank.
He was shown into a small drawing-room, plainly furnished, but bearing unmistakable marks of taste and care. A china bowl of fern-like moss stood on the table, in which were snowdrops arranged singly, as if they were growing in it. A flower-stand filled with hyacinths of various colours stood in the window; in one corner of the room ivy was growing in a large flower-pot, and was climbing over the chimney-piece, and hanging in graceful festoons from the over-mantle; whilst a vase filled with Pyrus japonica and yellow jessamine stood on the shelf below, and was reflected in the glass.
They all gave him a welcome, and made him feel that they were glad to see him. There was no allusion made during the evening to what he had told them the day before. The bird of ill omen was treated as if he had been the harbinger of good news. Kenneth had been to many costly entertainments of various kinds, but he thought that the cosiness of that Cumberland tea eclipsed them all. The snow-white cloth, the bright, well-trimmed lamp, the early violets and snowdrops tastefully arranged on a pretty table-centre, the freshly baked scones, the girdle-cakes—a speciality of the Lake district—the crisp oat cake, the honey from the hive in the garden, the new-laid eggs from their own poultry yard—all these combined to make the meal an inviting one, and long afterwards, and when in far different surroundings, Kenneth Fortescue was wont to recall it with pleasure, and to wonder if he would ever again see a like picture of home comfort.
"You look sleepy, Phyllis," said Marjorie, as they sat down to tea. "You ought to have come with me to Seatoller; it was lovely out to-day."
"What's the good of going out when there's nowhere to go? Besides, I was reading. I wanted to finish that book Louis brought. I never can stop when I'm in the middle of a story."
Mrs. Douglas laughed. "Phyllis is afflicted with deafness at times, Captain Fortescue," she said; "if she is reading, she is stone-deaf the whole time."
Leila had joined them at the table, and little Carl, a pretty boy of three, with fair hair and blue eyes, was seated on a high chair by her side. She looked ill and depressed and spoke very little, but the child was full of life, and amused them all with his baby talk.
After tea they had games and music. Phyllis was very clever at the latter and sang well. She was not at all like her sister, very much prettier most people said, but it was beauty of feature rather than of expression. Kenneth thought she had rather a discontented face, and she moved wearily, when she was asked to do anything by her mother, as though every exertion, however small, cost her an effort.