Nell, of Shorne Mills Part 16

She looked at him doubtfully, hesitatingly.

"You will take the _Seagull_ south?" he said. "Be good enough to ask your father to wire me as to her whereabouts. I may need her. But don't hurry. I'm only too glad that you are sailing her. Good-by."

She murmured "Good-by," and went down the steps slowly; and Drake, Viscount Selbie, refilled his pipe. Then he rose quickly and overtook her. She stopped and turned, and if he had expected to see signs of emotion in her beautiful face, he was doomed to disappointment; indeed, the look of apprehension with which she heard his voice had been followed by one of relief.

"One moment," he said. "I want to ask you not to mention that you have seen me here."

She opened her soft hazel eyes with some surprise and a great deal of curiosity.

"Not say that I have seen you?" she said. "Of course, if you wish it; but why?"

"The reason will seem to you inadequate, I am afraid," he said coldly; "but the fact is, I am staying here under another name--my own is being bandied about so much, you see," bitterly, "that I am a little tired of it."

"I see," she said. "Then I am not to tell father. How will he know how to address the wire about the yacht?"

"Send it to Sparling," he said. "I am sorry to have stopped you.

Good-by."

She inclined her head and murmured "Good-by" for the second time, and went on again; but a few steps lower she stopped and pondered his strange request.

"Curious," she murmured. "I wonder whether there is any other reason?

One knows what men are; and poor Drake is no better than the rest. Ah, well, it does not matter to me--now. Thank goodness it is over! Though one can always count upon Drake; he is too thorough a gentleman to make a scene or bully a woman. Heaven knows I am sorry to break with him, and I wish that old stupid hadn't made such a fool of himself; for Drake and I would have got on very well. But as things are----As father says, it's impossible. I wonder whether they are coming back; I am simply dying for tea."

Before she got down to the jetty, her fellow voyagers caught her up.

They were in the best of spirits, and hilarious over the fact that Sir Archie had slipped on one of the gra.s.sy slopes and stained his white flannel suit with green; and Lady Lucille joined in the merriment.

"I'm sorry I didn't come, after all," she said. "It was rather boring waiting there all alone; but perhaps Sir Archie will kindly fall down again for my special benefit," and she laughed with the innocent, careless laughter, of a child.

CHAPTER VII.

The laugh floated up to Drake as he sat and finished his pipe, waiting until the party should get clear away, and his lips tightened grimly.

Then he sighed and shrugged his shoulders, as he rose and went slowly up the hill.

After all, Lucille had only acted as he had expected. As he had said, she had engaged herself to Viscount Selbie, the heir to Angleford--not to Viscount Selbie, whose nose had been put out of joint by his uncle's marriage. He could not have expected a Lady Lucille Turfleigh to be faithful to her troth under such changed circ.u.mstances. But her desertion made him sore, if not actually unhappy. Indeed, he was rather surprised to find that he was more wounded in pride than heart. It is rather hurtful to one's vanity and self-esteem to be told by the woman whom you thought loved you, that she finds it "impossible" to marry you because you have lost your fortune or your once roseate prospects; and though Drake was the least conceited of men, he was smarting under the realization of his antic.i.p.ations.

"She never loved me," he said bitterly. "Not one word of regret--real regret. She would have felt and shown more if she had been parting with a favorite horse or dog. G.o.d! what women this world makes of them! They are all alike! There's not one of them can love for love's sake, who cares for the man instead of the money. Not one, from the dairymaid to the d.u.c.h.ess! Thank Heaven! my disillusionment has come before, instead of after, marriage. Yes, I've done with them. There is no girl alive, or to be born, who can make me feel another pang."

As he spoke, he heard a voice calling him: "Mr. Vernon! Mr. Vernon!" And there, in the garden, which stood out on the hill like a little terrace, was Nell. She had taken off her hat, and the faint breeze was stirring the soft tendrils on her forehead, and her eyes smiled joyously down at him.

"Tea is ready!" she said, her voice full and round, and coming down to him like the note of a thrush. "Where have you been? Mamma is quite anxious about you, and I have had the greatest difficulty in convincing her that there has not been an accident, and that I had not left you at the bottom of the bay."

He smiled up at her, but his smile came through the darkness of a cloud, and she noticed it.

"Has--has anything happened?" she asked, as she opened the gate for him; and her guileless eyes were raised to his with a sudden anxiety. "Are you ill--or--or overtired? Ah, yes! that must be it. I am so sorry!"

He frowned, and replied, almost harshly:

"Thanks. I am not in the least tired. How should I be? Why do you think so?"

Nell shrank a little.

"I--I thought you looked pale and tired," she said, in a voice so low and sweet that he was smitten with shame.

"Perhaps I am a bit played out," he said apologetically, and pa.s.sing his hand over his brow as if to erase the lines which the scene with Lady Lucille had etched. "Your convalescent invalid is a trying kind of animal, Miss Nell, and--and you must forgive it for snapping."

"There is nothing to forgive," she said quietly. "It was thoughtless of me to let you stay out so long, and I deserve the lecture mamma has been giving me. Please come in to tea at once, or it will be repeated--the lecture, I mean."

They went into the drawing-room, where Mrs. Lorton sat with due state and dignity before her tea table; and, having got him into the easy-chair, the good lady began at once:

"So thoughtless of Eleanor to keep you out so long! You must be exhausted, I am sure. I know how trying the first days of recovery from illness are, and how even a little exertion will produce absolute collapse. Now, will you have a little brandy in your tea, Mr. Vernon? A teaspoonful will sometimes produce a magical effect," she added, as if she were recommending a peculiarly startling firework. "No? You are quite sure? And what is this Richard is telling me about two horses? He came rus.h.i.+ng in just now with some story of horses that he had brought from Shallop."

Drake looked up with a casual air.

"Yes; they're mine. I was obliged to have them sent down. They were spoiling for want of exercise. I must turn them out in some of the fields here, or get some one to ride them, unless d.i.c.k and Miss Nell will be good-natured enough to exercise them."

Nell laughed softly.

"That is one way of putting it, isn't it, mamma? But I tell Mr. Vernon that I really must not, ought not, to take advantage of his good nature.

It's all very well for d.i.c.k to----"

"What's all very well for d.i.c.k? And don't you take my name in vain quite so freely, young party," remarked that individual, entering the room and making for the tea table. "Don't you be taken in by all this pretended reluctance, Mr. Vernon. It's the old game of Richard III. refusing the crown. See English history book. Nell will be on that mare to-morrow morning safe enough, won't you, Nellikins? And I say, sir, you must get your arm right and ride with her. Perhaps she would not be too proud to take lessons from a stranger--from you, I mean--though she does turn up her nose at her brother's kindly meant hints, an operation which, as I am perpetually telling her, is quite superfluous, for it's turned up quite sufficiently as it is."

Nell glanced at Mrs. Lorton, who smiled with the air of a society lady settling a point of etiquette.

"If Mr. Vernon has really been so kind as to offer to lend you a horse, it would be ungrateful and churlish to refuse, Eleanor," she said.

"That's all right," said d.i.c.k. "Though you might say 'Thank you,' Nell.

But, there; you'll never learn manners, though you may, after some long years, learn to ride. Did you see that yacht, sir?" he asked, turning to Drake.

Drake nodded carelessly.

"A spanker, wasn't she?" continued d.i.c.k. "Now, that's what I call a yacht. And hadn't she some swells on board! I met some of them coming up the hill. Talk about stylish togs!"

"No one talks of 'stylish togs' but savages in the wilds of London, and vulgar boys," remarked Nell.

d.i.c.k regarded her wistfully, and raised the last piece of the crust of his slice of bread and b.u.t.ter to throw at her, then refrained, with a reluctant sigh.

"I never saw anything like it out of a fas.h.i.+on plate. You ought to have been there, mamma," he put in, parenthetically. "You'd have appreciated them, no doubt, whereas I wasn't capable of anything but staring. They were swells--real swells, too; for I spoke to one of the crew who had Strolled up from the boat. The yacht's that racer, the _Seagull_. Do you know her, Mr. Vernon?"

"I've heard of her," said Drake.

"I forget the name of her owner; though the man told me; but he's a n.o.bleman of sorts. There were no end of t.i.tled and fas.h.i.+onable people on board. A Sir--Sir Archie something; and a Lord and Lady Turfleigh, father and daughter--perhaps you know them?"

Drake looked at him through half-closed eyes.