It was cruel; perhaps the speaker did not realize how cruel. But, then, she knew that the Colonel was thoroughly padded with vanity and that it must be a very skilful thrust, and a very vigorous one, that could wound him fatally.
"Faith," he began after a pause, "you have never been abroad, you have not observed as I have done, you—." He was gaining importance and impressiveness of tone as he went on; it was a pity that the sound of wheels and of horses' hoofs in the avenue interrupted what would have been one of his best presentations of the subject and have put him into an impregnable position. As it was, he had but to imagine himself there and forget his wife's opinion, which he did not find any difficulty in doing. The wheels were those of Colonel Pepperell's carriage; put together with English thoroughness, it had all the weight and unwieldiness of vehicles of that time. Lady Dacre, Elizabeth, and Mrs. Eveleigh descended from it; they had been spending the morning together. Sir Temple, Edmonson, Bulchester, and their host, on horseback, came galloping up as the carriage stopped. They had taken a longer and pleasanter road and had arrived on the moment. Sir Temple alighted with his face beaming with pleasure, for he had enjoyed the exercise. Lady Dacre had never looked better, and she had seen something more of provincial life and ways. He meant to travel over the world sometime; he liked to see new things. After dinner, when the guests were in the garden, he joined his wife for a moment, and told her what had amused him by the way. "We went by one of those little houses so numerous about here," he said, "and an old man was mending his fence. It needed it badly enough. Archdale, as he went by, nodded to him pleasantly and called out an encouragement of his improvements. The old man looked up hammer in hand, and I expected to see something like what I should have had, you know, from the tenants at Alderly. But, Flo, he was so occupied, staring at Edmonson, whom he looked at first, that I had no chance at all with him, and poor Archdale didn't get even a nod. He just dropped his hammer and stood there agape. I think Archdale was annoyed at the exhibition of ill manners, for he talked very little the rest of the way here. Edmonson was so amused he could scarcely help chuckling over it. He asked our host if the old man was one of his tenants, and if he had been long on the place, and Archdale said 'yes.' Then Edmonson chuckled all the more."
As Sir Temple said, Stephen Archdale had been moody during the remainder of the ride. The old butler's behavior, so at variance with his usual deference, disturbed him. It was evident that Edmonson had come upon the man like an apparition. But why? Stephen intuitively connected this in some way with the conversation between the father and the son which he had overheard that winter's day in the woods. Glancing at his companion, he saw that Edmonson was aware of the startling effect he had produced, and that the answer was in his face, which was jubilant. Indeed, he could hardly restrain himself. Wheeling about in his saddle as they rode, he broke out into a few notes of some rollicking song, asking Sir Temple if he remembered it. To him this effect that he had produced meant that the first stroke of the hour, his hour, had sounded; to Archdale it meant that some mystery was here, some catastrophe impending. He could readily connect calamity with Edmonson.
At the door he dismounted like one lost in thought, and with difficulty threw off his moodiness; while Edmonson sprang to the ground and ran lightly up the steps into the house, his eyes sparkling and his face aglow with a beauty that Elizabeth was beginning to analyze. Before half an hour his wit was being quoted over the room. Other arrivals followed this first. There was reason enough why Elizabeth should have dreaded this dinner, for the guests in the drawing-room now had nearly all of them been present at that wedding scene seven months before. She knew when Katie Archdale came in. It was almost at the last. She was leaning on her father's arm, her mother on his other. Both friends felt that every eye in the room would watch their meeting. There was an involuntary pause in the conversation; then it was taken up again here and there, languidly, to cover the attention that must not be marked. Katie had been into company very little since her attempted wedding; her presence was almost a new sensation. As usual, she behaved admirably. After greeting her aunt she slipped away from her father, and walked slowly forward, on the way speaking to those she passed. Her tones were mellowed a little by her suffering, but sweet and clear as ever, At last she came to Elizabeth. They had not been face to face since that December day in Mr. Archdale's library when Katie had turned away her head from Elizabeth's pleading. She did nothing of the kind now, she came forward with a chastened tenderness and said, "Elizabeth," and kissed her. It was Elizabeth, who the night before had been sobbing over Katie's hard lot and praying that happiness might come to her, and who was looking at her now with a heart full of contrition and admiration, who seemed to those watching to greet the girl coldly, to be indifferent to her beauty and her disappointment. Strangely enough, however, Stephen did not think so; he remembered the scene in the library, and it was possible that in the few times that he had met Elizabeth he had learned to understand her a little. He was quick of apprehension where his prejudices were not concerned, and he certainly had had no opportunity to be prejudiced against Elizabeth as one wanting to lay claim to him. And he knew better than any one else did how she hated the very thought of the yoke that might be laid upon her. His thoughts did not dwell upon her, however, for he saw that Katie was like her old affectionate self, that her unjust resentment had been only momentary; it would have been unnatural not to have felt so on that day, he reasoned. Now she was lovelier than ever, softened; by her suffering, the suffering he was sharing. He sighed, turned away, looking out of the window doggedly, turned back, and walked quickly up to her.
"How do you do?" he said, holding out his hand.
"How do you do, Stephen," she answered him, and laying her hand in his, looked into his face a moment, dropped her eyes and stood before him gravely, her color rising a little. A few trivial questions, a few remarks, a few answers simply given, and he bowed and moved away as her mother brought Edmonson up to her. He did not see her often now-a-days; there was suffering to them both in meeting, and although he was still her lover in name as well as in heart, it was always with a dread lest the wall should be built up between them, and love be stifled in duty. He was ashamed of himself for his jealous fears when he saw other men paying her attentions; he never used to have these, but then he was strong to woo her; he could defy his rivals in fair field, and, as it had proved, could win the day. But now he was maimed in purpose, perhaps his hope was lost, his conscience was not clear in the matter as before, and he felt that in some way he had lost influence. The strong will that had won Katie was not at present matched by the srong hand that had made her admiring. The sense of being obliged to wait upon other's movements galled him; he was impatient, restless, a man who could not find in himself the comfort he sought, but who watched for news from a source that he felt was as ready to bring him death as life.
Elizabeth heard his greeting of Katie, though she was speaking to some one else when he came forward. She could not tell how it was that in some way she felt through it to its meaning.
"Sir Temple," she said a moment afterward, "allow me to introduce Major Vaughan; he has been a friend of Colonel Pepperell's a long time, and though I cannot claim such an acquaintance, I do claim a share in the regard in which all his friends hold him."
"And he holds it one of the white days of his life on which he first met this fair lady," gallantly responded Vaughan sweeping around the bow which acknowledged the introduction so that it included the presenter. Elizabeth smiled her thanks. She knew that the speech was not meant in sarcasm, although that any one should call it a white day on which he first met her seemed so; it had been a very black day to Stephen Archdale, she remembered.