Lilias pressed very close against Mary’s side. Her heart was beating loudly in her brave little bosom. Her sense of crime had not been lightened by the postponement of the punishment which must, she thought, be coming. But it was not in her to fly as her brother had done. She took a furtive hold of Mary’s gown. No hope of any forgiveness was in her serious soul; yet to whom could she cling in earth and heaven but only to this inflictor of stern justice? She kept her eyes fixed on Mary’s face, that she might see the fearful doom which was coming—that would always be a help in bearing it—and kept close to her, pressing against her. “Aie-tu peur de moi? cache-toi dans mes bras”—this was the child’s impulse in her penitence and terror.
Mary forgot her vellum and its stains. She put her arm round the child, whose eyes opened a little wider thinking the judgment was coming, but who never shrank. “You will not do it again,” she said. Lilias could not understand that it was over. She bent back a little the better to see Mary’s face.
“Will you not punish me?” said the child. Between the fear and the wonder she was breathless. This was the most wonderful of all.
“No, dear—you will never do it again.”
“Nor Nello?” She put her arms round Mary’s arm, with that soft clinging which is irresistible in a child, and leant her head against her, and began to sob as if her heart would break. Then Nello, seeing the worst was over, came out from his shelter, venturing a few steps, then a few more. Forgiveness did not touch him, as punishment would have done. He came slowly, ready to turn and fly at any hostile demonstration. Nello had, as it were, an army at his back, his ships to take refuge in; but still it was with great caution that he made his advance. This little exhibition of character, however, soon melted in a more agreeable sentiment. As soon as the contingency was over, both the children, restored to a tremulous ease of mind, were seized with a common impulse of curiosity and interest. They forgot their own culpability in watching the obliteration of the damage they had done. Fortunately the discovery had been made in time, and the process of reparation, if not so exciting, was almost as interesting to them as the delicious frenzy of mischief in which they had wrought this harm. They pressed upon Mary as she worked, one at each side. When the last trace had disappeared they gave a cry of joy. How clever Mary was! She could do everything. As for Nello, he was unmoved morally by the spectacle; it had been amusing all through, all but the moment of fear, which fortunately came to nothing. But Lilias never forgot this scene, and still less did Mary forget it, whose heart seemed to be learning a hundred sweet and subtle lessons, and to whom the child, even in her naughtiness, was like an angel, leading her to depths unsounded, nay, unthought of till now.
But when they had gone away, joyous as usual, to their “tea,” which was a meal much scorned and wondered at by Martuccia, Mary went to the other table where lay the draught of the more important document upon which Lilias had been employed when she came into the hall. At this she smiled and shuddered, with a curious mixture of feelings. The little girl’s mischief had taken a symbolical form. The blank shield which represented her mother was blurred and blood-red, and a stroke like blood ran across her father’s name; and that of her father’s father, from the little pool of red in the daubed shield. Lilias knew nothing of the lives from which her little life had sprung. It was accident, caprice, a child’s fancy for bright colour—yet it made Mary shudder even when she smiled.
Another incident, which she paid less attention to—indeed, did not think of at all—happened this same evening. She went to the door where Martuccia had been seated, her own favourite place, though now in great part given up to the children and their attendant, to look out upon the evening before she left the hall. When she had looked at the sky where the early wintry sunset was just over, leaving deep gorgeous tints of red and yellow upon a blue which was deepened by coming frost, Mary’s look came back, carelessly enough, by the lower level of the long brown road. And it was with a momentary start that she found herself almost face to face with an unthought-of spectator, who was standing at the foot of the little slope, gazing intently up to the hall door. Mary was puzzled to see that though the woman’s appearance was like that of many of the older women about, she did not know her; and at the same time she was equally perplexed by a consciousness that the face looking up at her thus eagerly was not that of a stranger. She could not associate it with any name, yet she seemed acquainted with the features, which were fine, and of an unusual cast. The stranger’s look was so intense that it struck Miss Musgrave like an audible petition. “Did you want anything?” she said with natural courtesy, making a step towards her. The woman turned sharp round on her heels with a hasty wave of her hand, and went hurriedly away towards the village without further reply. Who could she be? Mary asked herself lightly, and went in and forgot all about her. The people are independent in their ways, and not grateful for a casual address, in the north.
CHAPTER XII.
VISITORS.
“My Lord Stanton, ma’am,” said Eastwood, with a certain expansion in the throat and fulness of voice, like that swell and gurgle which accompanies in a bird the fullest tide of song. Who has not heard that roll in the voice of the man who mouths a title like a succulent morsel? A butler who loves his family, and who has the honour of announcing to them the visit of the greatest potentate about, is a happy man. And this was what Eastwood felt, as he uttered with a nightingale trill and swell of satisfaction this honoured name.
“Lord—whom——?” Mary rose to her feet so much startled that she did not know what she said.