Mrs. Carlyon did not feel much more comfortable than Dorothy in the lonely old house on the Norfolk coast. Ever since the night of the Squire's funeral she had wished to get away from it to a more cheerful place; but she could not yet attempt to leave Ella.
It was when the bright summer weather began to give place to a suspicion of autumn, that Mrs. Carlyon found she must really go; matters in London at her own home needed her. She told Ella that she could not leave her alone, and proposed a chaperon. Ella, who had independent opinions of her own, demurred: she was quite old enough to take care of herself, and quite capable of doing it. But her aunt was inflexible; the proprieties and usages of society must on no account be ignored. Ella perforce yielded, and a suitable lady was sought for.
It was just at this time that Mr. Conroy once more made his appearance at Heron Dyke. After the reading of the Squire's will, Mr. Daventry, the Nullington lawyer, had despatched a letter to the office of the "Illustrated Globe," apprising Mr. Conroy of the legacy bequeathed him. For some cause or other the young man had not been able to attend to it until now. He came to Nullington, saw Mr. Daventry, and thence walked to Heron Dyke to pay his respects to its mistress.
It was well that Mrs. Carlyon chanced to be looking out of the window when the servant announced Conroy's name. Had she seen Ella's face at that moment, it is probable that a certain vague suspicion, which some time ago had taken root in her mind, would have been turned into a certainty. As it happened, she saw nothing.
Conroy stayed but an hour with them; the ladies were engaged out for the latter part of the day. They invited him to spend the morrow at the Hall.
He came accordingly, in time for luncheon. Afterwards the carriage was brought round, and they started to visit the ruins of a certain famous castle some dozen miles away. Hubert Stone, looking from his office window, himself unseen, watched them set out. A raging fever of jealousy and unrest was burning in his veins. This Conroy was the one man whom he feared and hated; and yet, if he had been asked to state his reasons for feeling thus towards him, he would have found it difficult to do so. He could only have said that he had dreaded and disliked him from the first. It was Hubert's white face and jealous eyes that Conroy had seen peering from behind the yews into the Squire's sitting-room that first evening he spent at the Hall. It was Hubert himself, peering in, whom the Squire had more than once taken for a spy. Jealousy often lends insight to love, pricking it on to finer issues than it would ever attain to without such stimulus, and this it was that had enabled Hubert Stone to divine that these two people loved each other almost before they were themselves conscious of it. Yes, he hated and feared Edward Conroy. No sooner had the carriage started to-day than he put away his books and papers and wandered out into the park, a moody and miserable man. He strolled about for some hours, neither knowing nor caring whither. At length the sound of a distant clock, striking five, warned him that the party from the Hall might be expected back before long. He knew by which road they would return, and he made his way to an overhanging bank, screened by trees and a thick hedge, close to which they must pass. He wanted to see them again, although he knew well that the sight would only add to his wretchedness.
At length the landau appeared in sight. Hubert parted the boughs carefully and peered through his leafy screen. Miss Winter and Mrs. Carlyon sat together, with Conroy on the opposite seat. Hubert's eyes devoured them. Conroy was leaning forward and talking to Ella, on whose face rested a brightness and animation such as Hubert had not seen there since her uncle's death. A minute later, and a turn of the road hid them from view. Hubert paced about in his rage, and at length walked back to the Hall, a still more miserable man than he had left it. His heart was a prey to the direst thoughts. Love, hatred, jealousy, and despair swayed him by turns, one mood alternating swiftly with another. Had it been a moonless midnight instead of an August evening, and had Edward Conroy and he met by chance in some lonely spot, one of the two would never have left that spot alive.
Lights blazed from the windows of one of the smaller drawing-rooms now generally made use of, which had been re-furnished. It was yet empty, dinner not being over. Two gentlemen had been invited to meet Mr. Conroy--the Vicar and Philip Cleeve.
Into this lighted drawing-room went Hubert: he knew not why. He felt like a man who was being urged forward by some unseen power towards a goal of which as yet he was but dimly conscious, but from which no exercise of his own will could turn his footsteps aside.
Lost in a reverie, he did not hear the ladies approach until it was too late to escape. On the impulse of the moment he hid himself behind the folds of the heavy velvet curtains that shrouded the deep embrasures of the windows. The guests soon followed them. Mrs. Carlyon and the Vicar settled down to a game of backgammon, Philip amused himself with a book of photographs and a magnifying glass, and Ella, at Conroy's request, sat down at the piano, he hovering round her the while and turning over her music.