A Crooked Path Part 49

"Will you come with me, though I _am_ like the wicked uncle?"

"Yes, if auntie may come too."

"If she begs very hard she may. Well, good-morning, Miss Liddell. I'll not forget Sandbourne, _via_ Southwestern Railway." So saying, De Burgh shook hands and departed.

The next day Miss Payne escorted her suddenly increased party to their marine retreat, returning the following afternoon to attend to the details of letting her house, for which she had had a good offer.

Then came a breathing s.p.a.ce of welcome repose to Katherine. The interest--nay, the trouble--of the children drew her out of herself, and dwarfed the past with the more urgent demands of the present. Cliff Cottage was a pretty, pleasant abode. The living rooms, which were of a good size, two of them opening with bay-windows on the pleasure-ground which surrounded the house on three sides, were, with the bedrooms over them, additions to a very small abode.

These Katherine succeeded in making pretty and comfortable. To wake in the morning and hear the pleasant murmur of the waves; to open her window to the soft sweet briny air, and look out on the waters glittering in the early golden light; to listen to the laughter and shrill cries of Cis and Charlie chasing each other in the garden, and feel that they were her charge--all this contributed to restore her to a healthy state of mind, to strengthen and to cheer her.

Cecil, to his dismay at first, was dispatched every morning to school, where he soon made friends and began to feel at home. Charlie Katherine taught herself, as he was still delicate. Then a pony was added to the establishment, and old Francois, ex-courier and factotum, used to take the young gentlemen for long excursions each riding turn about on the quiet, sensible little Shetland.

The pale cheeks which helped to make Charlie so dear to his aunt began to show something of a healthy color before the end of May, and Katherine sometimes laughed to find herself boasting of Cecil's parts and progress to Miss Payne. But the metamorphosis wrought by the young magicians in this important personage was the most remarkable of the effects they produced. Had Miss Liddell been less pleasant and profitable, it is doubtful if Miss Payne would have consented to allow children--boys--to desecrate the precincts of her spotless dwelling; they were in her estimation extremely objectionable. Katherine was, however, a prime favorite; she had touched Miss Payne as none of her former inmates ever did.

Years of battling with the world had coated her heart with a tolerably hard husk; but there was a heart beneath the stony sheath, and by some occult sympathy Katherine had pierced to the hidden fount of feeling, and her chaperon found there was more flavor and warmth in life than she once thought.

When, therefore, she had completed her business in London and was settled at Cliff Cottage, she was surprised to find that the boys did _not_ worry her; nay, when they came racing to meet her in wild delight to show a tangled dripping ma.s.s of sh.e.l.ls and sea-weed which they had collected in their wading, scrambling wanderings on the sh.o.r.e and among the rocks, she found herself unbending, almost involuntarily, and examining their treasures with unfeigned interest. Then Cecil's very fluent descriptions of his experiences at school, his escapades, his torn garments, the occasional quarrels between the two boys, their appropriation of Francois, and their breakages--all seemed to grow natural and pardonable when the young culprits ran to take her by the hand, and looked in her face with their innocent, trusting eyes. On the whole, Miss Payne had never been so happy before, and Katherine forgot the shifting sands on which she was uprearing the graceful fabric of her tranquil life.

Sometimes they lured Bertie to spend a couple of days with them--days which were always marked with a white stone. What arguments and rambles Katherine enjoyed with him, and what goodly checks she drew to further his numerous undertakings!

De Burgh did not fail to carry out his threat of inspecting Sandbourne.

He found a valid excuse in a commission from Colonel Ormonde to advise Miss Liddell respecting a pair of ponies she had asked him to buy for her.

His visit was not altogether displeasing. No woman is quite indifferent to a man who admires her in the hearty, wholesale way which De Burgh did not try to conceal. Katherine was much too feminine not to like the incense of his devotion, especially when he kept it within certain limits. She did not credit him with any deep feeling; but in spite of her strong conviction that he was attracted by her money, she recognized a certain sincerity in his liking for herself. She enjoyed the idea of humbling his immense a.s.surance, believing that any pain she might inflict would be short-lived, while he was amazed to find how swiftly the hours flew past when he allowed himself to spend a couple of days at Sandbourne--surprised to feel so little of the contemptuous bitterness with which he generally regarded his fellow-creatures, and sometimes wondered if it were possible that something more simple than even his boyish self had come back to him.

Still, Bertie Payne was a more welcome guest than De Burgh, in spite of his unspoken but evident devotion. With Bertie she could speak openly of matters on which she would not touch when with the other. To Bertie she could talk of the mysteries of life, and argue on questions of belief.

She was touched by the eagerness he showed to convert her to his own extremely evangelical views, and though differing from him on many points, she deeply respected the sincerity of his convictions.

The degree of favor shown by her to "that psalm-singing Puritan," as De Burgh termed him, was gall and wormwood to the latter, and indeed so irritated his spirit that he was driven to speak of the annoyance it caused him to Mrs. Ormonde, of whose discretion and judgment he had but a poor opinion.

Meantime no one heard or saw anything of Errington, who was supposed to be deep in the settlement of his father's affairs, and winding up the estate, as the well-known house of Errington ceased to exist when the head and founder was no more. Lady Alice had gone to stay with her brother and sister-in-law, who lived abroad, as it was impossible for her to enter into the gayeties of the season under existing circ.u.mstances, and the marriage was postponed until the end of July.

In short, a lull had stilled the actors in this little drama. The stream of events had entered one of the quiet pools which here and there hold the most rapid current tranquil for a time.

With Mrs. Ormonde all went well. She had the newest and most charming gowns and bonnets, mantles and hats. She found herself very well received by society, and quite a favorite with Lady Mary Vincent, who was a very popular person. So much occupied was the pretty little woman that May was nearly over before she could find time to accept her sister-in-law's repeated invitation to Cliff Cottage.

"I am going down to Sandbourne on Friday," she said to De Burgh one evening as she was waiting for her carriage after a musical party at Lady Mary Vincent's.

"Indeed! I thought you were going last Monday."

"Oh, I could not go on Monday. But if I don't go on Friday I do not think I shall manage my visit at all. Tell me, what does Katherine find to keep her down there? Is it Bertie Payne?"

"How can I tell? She seems contented enough. For that matter, she might find my society equally attractive. Payne does not go down as often as I do."

"No?--but then Katherine has a leaning to sanct.i.ty, and you are no saint."

"True. By-the-way, talking of saints, there is a report that old Errington's affairs were not left in as flourishing a condition as was expected."

"Oh, nonsense! It is some mere ill-natured gossip."

"I hope so. I think I will come down on Sat.u.r.day and escort you back to town."

"Pray do; it will enliven us a little." A shout of "Mrs. Ormonde's carriage!" cut short the conversation, and Mrs. Ormonde did not see De Burgh again until they met at Cliff Cottage.

Mrs. Ormonde's visit, long antic.i.p.ated, did not prove an unmixed pleasure. She objected to what she considered the terribly long drive of some five miles from the railway station to Katherine's secluded residence; she turned up her pretty little nose at the smallness of the cottage and its general homeliness; she evinced an unfriendly spirit toward Miss Payne, who was perfectly unmoved thereby; and when the boys, well washed and spruced up, approached her, not too eagerly, she scarcely noticed them. This, of course, reacted on the little fellows, who showed a decided inclination to avoid her.

She was tired after a warm journey and previous late hours, and dreadfully afraid that sea air and sun together would have a ruinous effect on her complexion. When, however, she had had tea and made a fresh toilette, she took a less gloomy view of life at Sandbourne, and having recovered her temper, she remembered it would be wiser not to chafe her sister-in-law.

"To be sure," thought the astute little woman, "the boys' settlement is out of her power to revoke; but it would be rather good if she came to live with us, instead of filling the pockets of this prim, presumptuous, self-satisfied old maid. I am sure she is awfully selfish, and I do hate selfishness."

So reflecting, she descended serene and smiling. Half an hour after, she had so completely recovered herself as to declare she had never seen the boys look so well, that they were quite grown, etc., etc.

After dinner Cecil displayed his exercise and copy books, and received a due meed of praise, not unmixed with a little sarcastic remark or two respecting the wonderful effect of his aunt's influence, which did not escape the notice of her son, who felt, though he did not understand why, that she was not quite so well pleased as she affected to be.

"And don't you feel dreadfully dull here?" asked Mrs. Ormonde, as the sisters-in-law strolled along the beach under the shelter of the east cliff, which hid them from the bright morning sunlight.

"No, not as yet. I should not like to live here always; but at present I like the place. You must confess it is very pretty."

"Yes, just now, when the weather is fine. When you have rain and a gale, it must be fearfully dreary."

"We have had some rough days, but the bay has a beauty of its own even in a storm, and we shall not be here in the winter."

"De Burgh runs down to see you pretty often?" asked Mrs. Ormonde, after a short pause. The old regimental habit of calling men by their surnames still returned when she was off guard.

"Yes," replied Katherine, calmly; "he seems to enjoy a day by the sea-side."

Mrs. Ormonde laughed--a hard laugh. "I dare say _you_ enjoy it too."

"Mr. De Burgh is not particularly sympathetic to me, but I like him better than I did."

"Oh, I dare say he makes himself very pleasant to you, and I never knew him show attention to an unmarried woman before, nor to many married women either. Of course it would be absurd to suppose that if you had not a good fortune you would see quite so much of him."

"Naturally," returned Katherine. "I fancy my money would be of great use to him; so it would to most men. That does not affect me. If it is an incentive to make them agreeable and useful, why, so be it."

"I did not expect to hear _you_ talk like that. Now I hate and despise mercenary men."

"Well, you see, the man or the woman _must_ have money or there can be no marriage."

"How worldly you have grown, Kate!" cried Mrs. Ormonde, in a superior tone. She did not perceive anything but sober seriousness in her sister-in-law's tone, and was infinitely annoyed at her taking the insinuations against De Burgh's disinterestedness with such indifference. "I suppose you think it would be a very fine thing to be Baroness De Burgh, and go to court with all the family jewels on."

"I shall certainly not go as Katherine Liddell."

"Pray, why not? Ah, yes; it would all be very fine! But I am too deeply interested in you, dear, not to warn you that De Burgh would make a very bad husband; he has such a horrid, sneering way sometimes; and as to being faithful--constancy is a thing unknown to him."

"What would Colonel Ormonde say if he knew you gave his favorite kinsman so bad a character?"

"Oh, my dear Katherine, you must not betray me! Duke would be furious.

But of course your happiness is my first consideration."