“You certainly will not be to blame for anything that happens, Mrs. Sartwell.”
“Ah, if I could only be sure of that!” said the patient woman, mournfully shaking her head. “But blame is so easily bestowed, and it shifts responsibility from shoulders certainly more fitted to bear it, and perhaps more deserving. No later ago than yesterday, Mr. Barnard Hope came here, and was surprised to find Edna gone. He told me he came to see me, but he could not help noticing how still and peaceful the house was. When he asked where Edna was, I replied to him as I reply to you. Her father is the proper person to answer that question. Yet Mr. Hope is the son of my best friend, a noble woman, whose benefactions shower blessings far and near. Well, good-by, and I’m sorry not to be able to assist you; but I shall remember you in my petitions, and will trust that your feet may be guided aright.”
“Thank you, Mrs. Sartwell, and good-by.”
As the young man walked away he kept repeating to himself, “High Cliff School, Eastbourne”; and when he got a sufficient distance from the house he wrote the name down on a slip of paper.
CHAPTER XXIII.
On reaching the railway station Marsten’s first regret was that he had not taken all the money offered him on the day of his discharge. He had no idea that his quest would lead him to a fashionable and expensive sea-side resort. Prudence proposed to him that he should defer his visit to Eastbourne until he had more money; but, he said to himself, if he did not go at once, Sartwell would be certain to learn from his wife of the visit to Wimbledon, and there might be increased difficulties in getting to see Edna at Eastbourne. As it was, he had no idea how the meeting he wished for was to be brought about, for doubtless Sartwell, when sending his daughter to the school, had given the lady into whose care Edna was entrusted, a hint of his object in placing her there. Marsten stepped out of the South Western carriage at Clapham Junction, and found he had but half an hour to wait for the Eastbourne train. He smiled when he remembered the care and thought he was giving to the Union, after having so frequently asserted that he was willing to devote his life to the work. It was a blessing that all the Union needed at the moment was to be let alone.
When he arrived at Eastbourne, he immediately set out in search of High Cliff School, thinking it well to reconnoitre the situation, hoping the sight of it might suggest some plan that was practical. He would have one thing in his favour, which was that Sartwell would not have warned his daughter against seeing him, fearing to arouse her curiosity or suspicions. If, then, he got one word with Edna alone, he had no fear but that he could arrange for a longer interview. He found High Cliff to be a large house, situated in extensive grounds, with a view of the sea, but with a wall that was even more discouraging than the glass-topped barrier at Wimbledon.
Marsten saw there was going to be more difficulty in getting an interview with his sweetheart than he had at first imagined. He thought for a moment of applying boldly at the front door for permission to see the young student, but quickly dismissed the plan as impracticable. He was certain that so shrewd a man as Sartwell would have more foresight than to leave arrangements at such loose ends that the first person who called to see his daughter would be admitted, even if the ordinary rules of the school allowed such a thing, which was most improbable. He realized that the place was not to be taken by assault, but rather by slow and patient siege; so, wandering down by the shore, he sat on the shingle, within sound of the soothing waves, and gave his whole attention to the problem.