She was flattered and dazzled, and yet something of the same laughter with which she listened to Phyllis and Doris was in her eyes. Did he mean it all? or what did he mean? Was he making conversation like his sisters, saying things that he meant to be pretty? Effie, though she was so simple, so inexperienced, in comparison with those clever young people, wondered, yet kept her balance, steadied by that native instinct of humour, and not carried away by any of these fine things.
CHAPTER VIII.
“We were seeing young Mr. Dirom a little bit on his way. He is so kind walking home with Effie that it was the least we could do. I never met with a more civil young man.”
“It appears to me that young Dirom is never out of your house. You’ll have to be thinking what will come of it.”
“What should come of it,” said Mrs. Ogilvie with a laugh, and a look of too conscious innocence, “but civility, as I say? though they are new people, they have kind, neighbour-like ways.”
“I’ve no confidence,” said Miss Dempster, “in that kind of neighbours. If he were to walk home with Beenie or me, that are about the oldest friends they have in the district—Oh yes, their oldest friends: for I sent my card and a request to know if a call would be agreeable as soon as they came: it may be old-fashioned, but it’s my way; and I find it to answer. And as I’m saying, if he had made an offer to walk home with me or my sister, that would have been neighbour-like; but Effie is just quite a different question. I hope if you let it go on, that you’re facing the position, and not letting yourself be taken unawares.”
“Well,” said Mrs. Ogilvie, “that’s a thing that seldom happens, though I say it myself. I can generally see as far as most folk. But whatever you do, say nothing of this to Effie. We must just respect her innocence. Experienced people see a great deal that should never be spoken of before the young. I will leave her in your charge and Miss Beenie’s, for I am going to Summerlaw, and she has had a long walk.”
“Your stepmother is a very grand general, Effie,” said Miss Dempster, as they watched Mrs. Ogilvie’s figure disappearing between the high laurel hedges.
It was a warm afternoon, though September had begun. Miss Beenie was seated on the garden seat in front of the drawing-room window, which afforded so commanding a prospect of the doctor’s sitting-room, with her work-basket beside her, and her spectacles upon her nose. But Miss Dempster, who thought it was never safe, except perhaps for a day or two in July, to sit out, kept walking about, now nipping off a withered leaf, now gathering a sprig of heliotrope, or the scented verbena, promenading up and down with a shawl upon her shoulders. She had taken Effie’s arm with an instant perception of the advantages of an animated walking-staff.
The little platform of fine gravel before the door was edged by the green of the sloping lawn in front, but on either side ended in deep borders filled with every kind of old-fashioned and sweet-smelling flower. The sloping drive had well-clipped hedges of shining laurel which surrounded the entrance; but nothing interrupted the view from this little height, which commanded not only the doctor’s mansion but all the village. No scene could have been more peaceful in the sunny afternoon. There were few people stirring below, there was nobody to be seen at the doctor’s windows.