About a week after the arrival of the visitors from The Willows, an arrival of a very different kind happened at Renton;—and yet it could not be called an arrival. There had been no further news, and the Manor was still in the same state of pleasant confusion and preparation,—the maids sitting and chatting over their work in the west wing, and a roomful of seamstresses working at the new carpets and curtains for ‘the boys’ rooms,’—when one morning Mary was mysteriously called out from Mrs. Renton’s room, where she was reading the newspaper, her usual morning occupation. ‘It was a lady who wanted to see her,’ the maid said; and was stolid, and refused all further particulars. ‘A lady,—any one who has been here lately?’ Mary asked, stiffening into sudden offence. It could be nobody but Millicent, she thought, though Millicent had been at the house repeatedly since her first visit, and was already known. ‘I never saw her before, miss,—not at Renton,’ was the reply; and Mary, annoyed, went to see for herself who the unknown visitor was. She had been set on edge by the events of the last few days. ‘Wheresoever the carrion is, there will the eagles be gathered together,’ she said to herself, with a kind of spiteful misery. So long as nothing was going to happen in the family, no mysterious visitors, neither men nor women, came near Renton; and now here was the second in a week! Perhaps some other syren to put herself in Ben’s way; perhaps somebody who possessed Laurie’s secret, whatever that might be. As for Frank, he was a married man, and had his wife to take care of him, and, heaven be praised! could have no secrets,—at least, none in which Mary could be compelled to interfere.
She went to the drawing-room door discontented, with no comfortable expectation. But when she had opened it, the most unexpected scene burst upon her eyes. The first thing she saw was a Hindoo ayah holding in her arms one of those milk-white, blue-veined children whose delicacy of tint contrasts so strangely with the dusky arms that carry them,—the kind of child of which one says involuntarily that it is an Indian child. Her first glance was at that pearly, blue-eyed creature, and then she turned round with a start and cry of joy upon a lady who stood by smiling.
‘Is it Alice?’ she cried. The comfort it was to her, the relief and satisfaction and sense of strength it gave her, would be difficult to describe. Mary was not given to enthusiasm, but she clasped her arms about the new-comer with a warmth which brought tears to her eyes. ‘I thought it was some one disagreeable, and it is you!’ she cried in her delight. She had been looking for an enemy, and here was a natural assistant and ally.
And then ensued a flutter of explanation and welcome, as was natural. It was Alice who had thus come unaccompanied and unexpected,—or, rather, it was Mrs. Frank Renton, a young matron of six years’ standing, with one wistful, bright-eyed, wondering little girl by her side, and the child on the nurse’s knee.
‘We came to give mamma a surprise,’ said Alice; ‘not to keep her anxious till the last moment, thinking everything impossible must have happened to us. I know how she watches every day and thinks. And this was such a good opportunity for coming! We came when she had not the least expectation of us, and saved her all that. It was Frank’s idea,’ said the young wife, with a happy smile.
‘And where is Frank?’
‘Coming next mail. Yes, that is the worst of it; but, as he said, we could not have everything; and I came with Lady Sinclair, the Governor-General’s wife, you know. Think what an honour it is! And she was so kind to us. She has quite taken a fancy to us, which is odd. I don’t mean it is odd that they should all be fond of Frank, for everybody is. Don’t you think baby is like him? Come and look at baby. I am sure you have not had a good look at him yet. Mamma has done nothing but carry him about in her arms. It is so funny to see my baby in mamma’s arms,’ cried Alice, with a sudden gush of bright tears; ‘and, oh! so nice! I love him the more for it. She thinks he is rather pale. Well, perhaps he is a little pale. I suppose Indian babies generally are,—and then the journey, you know. Renton is not a bit changed. I stood just now, when you came in, on the very same pattern of the carpet that I stood on when Frank brought me here first; and I was so dreadfully frightened; and then you came and put your arms round my neck——’
‘You were such a child,’ said Mary; and the two kissed each other once more.
‘It was so good of you to put your arms round my neck. Not just a regulation kiss, as Frank says. I put myself on the very same square this time to see what you would do.’
‘Why you are a child still!’ said Mary, looking at her with that curious mixture of amusement and wonder and respect with which an unmarried woman looks upon the matron who is younger than herself. How many experiences Alice had gone through of which the home-dwelling girl knew nothing! And yet she was a child still!