A Dog with a Bad Name Part 56

"Nonsense!" said he; "you know I am delighted to be detained so pleasantly. Won't you come farther under the trees?"

"No, I must be home, thank you. I don't want to be late."

But just then the rain came down in such a deluge that she had nothing for it but to give in and stand up for shelter.

"It seems ages since we met," began Scarfe.

Raby had a vivid enough recollection of that evening in the conservatory, but did not contradict him.

"I called at Clarges Street last month, hoping to see you, but you were away."

"Yes, we were abroad--all but Percy."

"I saw Percy. Poor fellow, he did not seem himself at all. Miss Atherton, you must not blame me if I remind you of something we were talking about when I last saw you--"

"Please don't, Mr Scarfe; I have no wish to refer to it."

"But I must. Do you know, Raby, I have thought of no one but you ever since?"

Raby said nothing, and wished the rain would stop.

"Is it too much to ask whether, perhaps once or twice, you have thought of me?"

Raby began to get angry. Was it not cowardly to get her here at a disadvantage and begin to talk to her about what she had no wish to hear?

"Yes--I have thought once or twice of you," she said.

"How good of you, Raby!" said he, trying to take her hand. "May I hope it was with something more than indifference--with love?"

"Certainly not," said she, drawing back her hand, and, in spite of the rain, starting to walk.

Bitterly crestfallen, he walked at her side and held his umbrella over her.

"You are harsh with me," said he reproachfully.

"I am sorry. You should not have provoked me. I asked you not to talk about it."

"I am afraid, Miss Atherton," said he, "some one has been prejudicing you against me. Percy, perhaps, has been talking about me."

Raby walked on without replying.

"Percy is very angry with me for doing what it was only my duty to do as his friend--and yours. He misunderstands me, and, I fear, so do you."

"I do not misunderstand you at all," said Raby boldly.

"But I am afraid you do not thank me."

"No. I have nothing to thank you for."

"I did my duty, at any rate. I stated the truth, and nothing more, and should have been wrong to allow things to go on without at least trying, for the sake of those for whom I cared, and still care, Miss Atherton, to set them right. Do I understand you blame me for that?"

"Mr Scarfe, you have done a cruel thing to one who never did you harm-- and I see nothing to admire in it."

Scarfe sneered.

"Jeffreys is fortunate in his champion. Perhaps, at least, Miss Atherton, you will do me the credit of remembering that on one occasion your hero owed his life to me. I hope that, too, was not cowardly or cruel."

"If he had known the ruin you had in store for him, he would not have thanked you."

Raby spoke with downcast eyes, and neither she nor Scarfe perceived the poor tramp on the path, who, as they brushed past him, glanced wistfully round at their faces.

"He never thanked me," said Scarfe.

They walked on some distance in silence. Then Scarfe said, "Miss Atherton, you are unfair to me now. You think I acted out of spite, instead of out of affection--for you."

"It is a kind of affection I don't appreciate, Mr Scarfe; and as the rain has nearly stopped I need not trouble you any more. Thank you for the shelter, and good-bye."

"You really mean that you reject me--that you do not care for me?"

"I do not. I am sorry to say so--good-bye."

And she left him there, bewildered certainly, but in no manner of doubt that she had done with him.

She told her father all about it that evening, and was a good deal rea.s.sured by his hearty approval of her conduct.

"The kindest thing you could have done, instead of letting him dangle after you indefinitely. Rough on him, perhaps; but that sort of fellow doesn't deserve much letting down."

The reader has heard already how in the course of her visits of mercy Raby happened to find Jonah Trimble very near his end, and how she was able to cheer and lighten his dying hours. Little dreamed she, as she sat by the death-bed that morning, and wrote those few dying words, into whose hands her little letter would fall, or what a spell they would work on the life of him who received them. From the other neighbours she heard not a little about "John," and sometimes wished she might chance to see him. But he was away from early morning till late at night, and they never met. Mrs Pratt in the room below, and her little dying daughter, had many a tale of kindness and devotion to tell about him; and when presently the little life fled, she heard with grateful tears of his act of mercy to the poor overwrought mother, and thanked G.o.d for it.

The time pa.s.sed on, and one day early in December, when she returned home, she found her father in an unwonted state of excitement.

"There's a clue, Raby, at last!" he said.

"A clue, father--you mean about young Forrester?"

"About both. It's the most mixed-up affair I was ever in. Who do you suppose has written in answer to our advertis.e.m.e.nt about Forrester?"

"Has he replied himself?" asked Raby disingenuously; for she guessed the truth.

"Not a bit of it. The letter's from Jeffreys. He doesn't sign his name, of course; but he writes to say that he was at Bolsover, and was responsible for the accident, and repeats what Rimbolt knows already about his trying to hear of them in his native place. There's nothing very fresh about Forrester; but it may lead to our finding Jeffreys."

"Of course," said Raby, finding it hard to conceal her emotion, "he has written to the lawyers. Does he give an address, then?"

"No--only a coffee-house in Drury Lane. He's evidently on his guard against a trap. He writes private and confidential; but you can see he is ready to do anything to find Forrester."

"What shall you do?"

"Well, Rimbolt says leave it to the lawyers. Of course we've no right to trap him, and Rimbolt thinks Wilkins & Wilkins had better not mention our names, but let him know they are acting for Forrester's executors.