XXXV
Tom Carringford went straight to Great College Street the next morning. Margaret, of course, was not there; but Louise Hunstan had arrived, and from her and Mrs. Gilman together he heard of Mrs. Lakeman's visit; of Margaret's assertion that her engagement was broken off; of how Sir George Stringer and Dawson Farley had been to see her, and of Margaret's hurried departure to Chidhurst.
"Well," said Miss Hunstan when they were alone, and the little twang Tom always liked had come into her voice, "I think this is a matter that requires some investigation; you know it's my opinion that Lena Lakeman is just a little snake, and that her mother doesn't always know what she's about—still, they're amusing people if you don't see too much of them."
"Oh, they're all right, if you don't take them too seriously," he answered, incapable of thinking ill of any one. He was not in the least alarmed at Margaret's statement to Mrs. Gilman. He knew that Margaret loved him, and that, if any mischief had been made, why, it would soon be explained away. The thing that astonished him was Mrs. Lakeman's visit. "I can't think how she could have been shut up in her room with neuralgia and in London at the same time," he said to himself. "She is certainly mad! However, that doesn't matter. I shall go to Chidhurst this afternoon. I might be of some use, and I want to see Margaret." He knew that, if her mother were ill, she would be unhappy and want him, and, like the kind boy he was, he began casting about in his mind for things he could take Mrs. Vincent. There were heaps of flowers in the Dutch garden, of course; but she might like a box of roses, all the same, and Margaret would remember the first one they had bought together—and peaches and grapes; he didn't remember seeing any glass at Woodside Farm; perhaps they hadn't any. "I'm awfully fond of Margey," he said to Louise Hunstan, glad to put it into words, "and we shall have a splendid time together. You'll often see us here, you know."
"Of course I shall," she answered; "I am just looking forward to it."
He stopped at Sir George Stringer's house as he drove through Whitehall, but only to find that he had gone to Chidhurst. "Good," he said, absently, to himself, "I'll telegraph to him, and he'll put me up."
Tom remembered all his life the drive from Haslemere to Chidhurst that evening. He enjoyed every yard of it; up the hill and past the cottages, along the road beyond; beside the moor covered with ling, and through Chidhurst village, till he came in sight of the church, and the gates of Sir George Stringer's house just opposite the little gate that led across the fields to the farm. He looked at the box of roses and the basket of peaches and grapes on the driver's seat. "I hope my mother-in-law is better," he thought, with a happy laugh in his eyes. "I believe I shall be fond of her, and Vincent is a brick."
"You know there's a death at the farm, sir?" the driver said, as he got down. "Mrs. Vincent was took last night after two days' illness—she hadn't been herself for some time."