It was not till the verger, much bewildered by a stillness of attitude to which he was quite unused, came to ask whether the young lady would like to see the chapter-house, or the crypt, or any of the special sights of the Minster, that the girl was roused. She rose then, always acquiescent, smiling upon the old man. But as she turned round, Innocent’s eye caught a figure much more interesting to her than the verger’s. It was Frederick, who turned round at the same moment, and came forward to her, holding out both his hands. “Ah, Innocent, at last!” he cried. There was real pleasure in his face.
“Miss Vane has left me here to wait for her,” said Innocent, “but, oh, I am so glad to see you!” It seemed to her that she had found him again—that all the intermediate time had glided away, that she was in the church of the Spina, and he, her new-discovered only guardian and protector again.
“I am glad that you are glad,” said Frederick. “I thought you might have forgotten all about us among the Vanes. How is it that they neglect you like this? I suppose you are the poor relation there, Innocent, eh? You never were so at The Elms.”
“I do not know what you mean,” said Innocent; but she put her hand within his arm, with her old use and wont, looking up at him brightly with her soft smile. The verger looking on, felt that, perhaps, it was his duty to interfere, but had not the heart to do it.
“You’ll find me in the porch, Miss, if you want me,” he said. If the young lady had met with some one as she liked better than them Papistical nunnery-folks at the High Lodge, was it his business? He went away heavily, dragging his feet upon the pavement, as ecclesiastical attendants for ages and ages have dragged them, with stooped shoulders and shuffling gait; and the two, whom he thought lovers, were left alone.
They were not lovers, far from that; but Innocent clung to the arm of the first man whom she had ever identified and felt any warm personal regard for, and Frederick looked down upon her with a complacency which half arose from a vain belief that she loved him, and partly from a real kindness for his little cousin, and partly from a sensation of thankfulness to have some one belonging to him to look at and speak to—some one not of the terrible Batty tribe, to which he was bound until Monday morning. This was Saturday, and he had been imperatively summoned to visit his wife, who was still ill. He could not get back until Monday morning, and the thought that this terrible moment of duty might be softened by the presence of Innocent, who adored him, was sweet. He told her that Amanda was ill in bed, not able to come out with him, or to be his companion. “I cannot spend my whole time with her,” said Frederick, “and her father is more odious than I can tell you. You must come to see her; you must stay with me, Innocent, till I go back.”
“If Miss Vane will let me,” said Innocent, brightly.
“You would like it? You were always a dear girl. When I take you home with me, Innocent,” said Frederick solemnly, “you will learn a lesson which I have learnt too late, that it is a fatal thing to connect one’s self with people of a different class from one’s own, who cannot understand one, whose life is a contradiction to all one feels and wishes. I don’t speak, of course, of my wife; that is my own affair; whatever I may have to put up with I say nothing on that score to any one. But, Innocent, a man of honour has many things to bear which women never know.”
These fine sentiments were wasted upon Innocent, who looked up at him wondering, and received what he said docilely, but made no attempt to understand. I don’t know why Frederick, knowing her well enough to be aware of this, should have thought it necessary to make so solemn a statement. He did it, perhaps, from the habit he had acquired of posing as a victim to honour. He led her about the Minster, and showed her many things which Innocent looked at with her usual docility, pleased to be with him, if not much excited by anything else. She had been happy at the High Lodge, but after all Frederick was her first friend, her discovery, and to be thus alone with him, cared for by him, no one else interfering, carried her back to the first startled awakening of her torpid youth. He was always kind to her when she was thus thrown upon his care, and Innocent was happy, with her hand clinging to his arm. When Miss Vane came to recall her to the present, she looked with perhaps a warmer personal wish than had ever been seen in her eyes before at her temporary guardian, pleading for the granting of the request which Frederick made, with his very finest Charles I. look, and melancholy gentlemanlike grace. Miss Vane, a busy woman, had partially forgotten her brother’s warning about Mrs. Frederick. She knew the young man before her had made a very foolish marriage, but still he was an Eastwood, of prepossessing appearance, and a compunction crossed her mind as to her want of civility in not “calling on” the daughter-in-law of Innocent’s good aunt. A woman takes rank from her husband, not from her father, Miss Vane reflected, and if this poor fellow had found out, as might be guessed from his resigned manner, that he had made a terrible mistake, it was only right that a connexion should stand by him as far as was practicable. After a few difficulties, therefore, as to Innocent’s dress, &c., she consented, promising to send the gardener with her bag, and to drive in for her on Monday morning, “when I will take the opportunity of leaving a card for Mrs. Eastwood. I am sorry to hear she is so poorly,” said Miss Vane in her most gracious manner. Innocent could scarcely believe it when she saw her energetic relation drive away, and found herself left in Frederick’s charge. “I am to stay, then?” she said, with a smile which lighted up her whole face; then added, with a faint shadow stealing over it, “but with you, Frederick? I do not like—your wife——”
“You shall be with me,” said Frederick; “but, Innocent, you must not say such things. It is imprudent—you might be misunderstood. I know very well what you mean, and that, of course, it is impossible you should feel towards poor Amanda as you do to me; but you must not forget what I have told you so often, that a woman’s best policy is always to make friends with her own sex. You are coming now, you understand, to visit my wife, who is far from well; but I shall take care to have you a great deal with me.”