“Yes,” he said, with a smile, “to-night. I suppose you can do it? You do not want much preparation for pleasure at your age.”
Then poor Powys suddenly turned very pale. Out of the first glow of delight he sank into despondency. “I don’t know, sir—if you may have forgotten—what I once said to you—about—about my folly,” faltered the young man, not daring to look into his employer’s face.
“About—?” said Mr. Brownlow; and then he made as though he suddenly recollected, and laughed. “Oh, yes, I remember,” he said. “I suppose all young men are fools sometimes in that respect. But I don’t see it is any business of mine. You can settle it between you. Be ready for me at six o’clock.”
And thus it was all arranged. Powys went out to get his things, not knowing whether he walked or flew, in such a sudden amaze of delight as few men ever experience; and when he was gone Mr. Brownlow put down his ashy face into his clasped hands. Heaven! had it come to this? At the last moment, when the shore was so near, the tempest well-nigh spent, deliverance at hand, was there no resource but this, no escape? All his precautions vain, his wiles, his struggle of conscience! His face was like that of a dead man as he sat by himself and realized what had happened. Why could not he fly to the end of earth, and escape the Nemesis? Was there nothing for it but, like that other wretched father, to sacrifice his spotless child?
CHAPTER XXXIII.
ONLY MR. BROWNLOW’S CLERK.
There was a pleasant bustle about the house that evening when the dog-cart drove up. The sportsmen had been late of getting in, and nobody as yet had gone to dress; the door was open, and in the hall and about the broad door-steps pretty groups were lingering. Sara and her friends on their way up stairs had encountered the gentlemen, fresh from their sport, some of whom had no doubt strayed to the sideboard, which was visible through the open door of the dining-room; but the younger ones were about the hall in their shooting-dresses talking to the girls and giving an account of themselves. There was about them all that sense of being too late, and having no right to be there, which gives a zest to such stolen moments. The men were tired with their day’s work, and, for that matter, the ladies too, who, after the monotony of the afternoon and their cup of tea, wanted a little amusement; and there was a sound of talk and of laughter and pleasant voices, which could be heard half-way down the avenue. They had all been living under the same roof for some days at least, and people get to know each other intimately under such circumstances. This was the scene upon which young Powys, still bewildered with delight, alighted suddenly, feeling as if he had fallen from the clouds. He jumped down with a light heart into the bright reflection of the lamp which fell over the steps, but somehow his heart turned like a piece of lead within his heart the moment his foot touched the flags. It grew like a stone within him without any reason, and he did not know why. Nobody knew him, it is true; but he was not a shy boy to be distressed by that. He jumped down, and his position was changed. Between him and Mr. Brownlow, who was so kind to him, and Jack, who was so hostile yet sympathetic, and Sara, whom he loved, there were unquestionable relations. But when he heard the momentary pause that marked his appearance, the quick resuming of the talk with a certain interrogative tone, “Who is he?” the glance at him askance, the sudden conviction rushed into his mind that all the better-informed were saying, “It is only his clerk”—and it suddenly occurred to Powys that there existed no link of possible connection between himself and all those people. He knew nobody—he had no right to know any body among them. He was there only by Mr. Brownlow’s indiscreet favoritism, taken out of his own sphere. And thus he fell flat out of his foolish elysium. Mr. Brownlow, too, felt it as he stepped out into the midst of them all; but his mind was preoccupied, and though it irritated, it did not move him. He looked round upon his guests, and he said, with a smile which was not of the most agreeable kind, “You will be late for dinner, young people, and I am as hungry as an ogre. I shan’t give you any grace. Sara, don’t you see Powys? Willis, send Mr. Powys’s things up to the green room beside mine. Come along, and I’ll show you the way.”
To say Sara was not much startled would be untrue; but she too had been aware of the uncomfortable moment of surprise and dismay among the assembled guests, and a certain fine instinct of natural courtesy which she possessed came to her aid. She made a step forward, though her cheeks were scarlet, and her heart beating loud, and held out her hand to the new visitor: “I am very glad to see you,” she said. Not because she was really glad, so much as because these were the first words that occurred to her. It was but a moment, and then Powys followed Mr. Brownlow up stairs. But when Sara turned round to her friends again she was unquestionably agitated, and it appeared to her that every body perceived she was so. “How cross your papa looks,” said one of them; “is he angry?—what have we done?” And then the clock struck seven. “Oh, what a shame to be so late! we ought all to have been ready. No wonder Mr. Brownlow is cross,” said another; and they all fluttered away like a flock of doves, flying up the staircase. Then the young men marched off too, and the pretty scene was suddenly obliterated, and nothing left but the bare walls, and Willis the butler gravely superintending his subordinates as they gave the finishing touches to the dinner-table. The greater part of the company forgot all about this little scene before five minutes had elapsed, but there were two or three who did not forget. These were Powys, first of all, who was tingling to the ends of his fingers with Sara’s words and the momentary touch of her little hand. It was but natural, remembering how they parted, that he should find a special meaning in what she said, and he had no way of knowing that his arrival was totally unexpected, and that she was taken by surprise. And as for Sara herself, her heart fluttered strangely under the pretty white dress which was being put on. Madlle. Angelique could not make out what it was that made her mistress so hard to manage. She would not keep still as a lady ought when she is getting dressed. She made such abrupt movements as to snatch her long bright locks out of Angelique’s hands, and quite interfere with the management of her ribbons. She too had begun to recollect what were the last words Powys had addressed to her. And she to say she was glad to see him! Mr. Brownlow had himself inducted his clerk into the green room, next door to his own, which was one of the best rooms in the house; and his thoughts would not bear talking of. They were inarticulate, though their name was legion; they seemed to buzz about him as he made his rapid toilette, so that he almost thought they must make themselves heard through the wall. Things had come to a desperate pass, and there was no time to be biased by thoughts. He had dressed in a few minutes, and then he went to his daughter. Sara at the best of times was not so rapid. She was still in her dressing-gown at that moment with her hair in Angelique’s hands, and it was too late to send the maid away.
“Sara,” said Mr. Brownlow, very tersely, “you will take care that young Powys is not neglected at dinner. Mind that you arrange it so—”
“Shall he take me in?” said Sara, with a sudden little outbreak of indignation which did her good. “I suppose you do not mean that?”