Lady Rose's Daughter Part 66

No, no, _no_! It was all over, and she and Jacob would still make a fine thing of their life together. Why not?

And all the time there were burning hot tears in her eyes; and as the leaves of Saint-Simon pa.s.sed idly through her fingers, the tears blotted out the meadows and the flowers, and blurred the figure of a young girl who was slowly mounting the long slope of road that led from the village of Brent towards the seat on which Julie was sitting.

Gradually the figure approached. The mist cleared from Julie's eyes.

Suddenly she found herself giving a close and pa.s.sionate attention to the girl upon the road.

Her form was slight and small; under her shady hat there was a gleam of fair hair arranged in smooth, shining ma.s.ses about her neck and temples.

As she approached Julie she raised her eyes absently, and Julie saw a face of singular and delicate beauty, marred, however, by the suggestion of physical fragility, even sickliness, which is carried with it. One might have thought it a face blanched by a tropical climate, and for the moment touched into faint color by the keen Alpine air. The eyes, indeed, were full of life; they were no sooner seen but they defined and enforced a personality. Eager, intent, a little fretful, they expressed a nervous energy out of all proportion to their owner's slender physique. In this, other bodily signs concurred. As she perceived Julie on the bench, for instance, the girl's slight, habitual frown sharply deepened; she looked at the stranger with keen observation, both glance and gesture betraying a quick and restless sensibility.

As for Julie, she half rose as the girl neared her. Her cheeks were flushed, her lips parted; she had the air of one about to speak. The girl looked at her in a little surprise and pa.s.sed on.

She carried a book under her arm, into which were thrust a few just-opened letters. She had scarcely pa.s.sed the bench when an envelope fell out of the book and lay unnoticed on the road.

Julie drew a long breath. She picked up the envelope. It lay in her hand, and the name she had expected to see was written upon it.

For a moment she hesitated. Then she ran after the owner of the letter.

"You dropped this on the road."

The girl turned hastily.

"Thank you very much. I am sorry to have given you the trouble--"

Then she paused, arrested evidently by the manner in which Julie stood regarding her.

"Did--did you wish to speak to me?" she said, uncertainly.

"You are Miss Moffatt?"

"Yes. That is my name. But, excuse me. I am afraid I don't remember you." The words were spoken with a charming sweetness and timidity.

"I am Mrs. Delafield."

The girl started violently.

"Are you? I--I beg your pardon!"

She stood in a flushed bewilderment, staring at the lady who had addressed her, a troubled consciousness possessing itself of her face and manner more and more plainly with every moment.

Julie asked herself, hurriedly: "How much does she know? What has she heard?" But aloud she gently said: "I thought you must have heard of me.

Lord Uredale told me he had written--his father wished it--to Lady Blanche. Your mother and mine were sisters."

The girl shyly withdrew her eyes.

"Yes, mother told me."

There was a moment's silence. The mingled fear and recklessness which had accompanied Julie's action disappeared from her mind. In the girl's manner there was neither jealousy nor hatred, only a young shrinking and reserve.

"May I walk with you a little?"

"Please do. Are you staying at Montreux?"

"No; we are at Charnex--and you?"

"We came up two days ago to a little _pension_ at Brent. I wanted to be among the fields, now the narcissuses are out. If it were warm weather we should stay, but mother is afraid of the cold for me. I have been ill."

"I heard that," said Julie, in a voice gravely kind and winning. "That was why your mother could not come home."

The girl's eyes suddenly filled with tears.

"No; poor mother! I wanted her to go--we had a good nurse--but she would not leave me, though she was devoted to my grandfather. She--"

"She is always anxious about you?"

"Yes. My health has been a trouble lately, and since father died--"

"She has only you."

They walked on a few paces in silence. Then the girl looked up eagerly.

"You saw grandfather at the last? Do tell me about it, please. My uncles write so little."

Julie obeyed with difficulty. She had not realized how hard it would be for her to talk of Lord Lackington. But she described the old man's gallant dying as best she could; while Aileen Moffatt listened with that manner at once timid and rich in feeling which seemed to be her characteristic.

As they neared the top of the hill where the road begins to incline towards Charnex, Julie noticed signs of fatigue in her companion.

"You have been an invalid," she said. "You ought not to go farther. May I take you home? Would your mother dislike to see me?"

The girl paused perceptibly. "Ah, there she is!"

They had turned towards Brent, and Julie saw coming towards them, with somewhat rapid steps, a small, elderly lady, gray-haired, her features partly hidden by her country hat.

A thrill pa.s.sed through Julie. This was the sister whose name her mother had mentioned in her last hour. It was as though something of her mother, something that must throw light upon that mother's life and being, were approaching her along this Swiss road.

But the lady in question, as she neared them, looked with surprise, not unmingled with hauteur, upon her daughter and the stranger beside her.

"Aileen, why did you go so far? You promised me only to be a quarter of an hour."

"I am not tired, mother. Mother, this is Mrs. Delafield. You remember, Uncle Uredale wrote--"

Lady Blanche Moffatt stood still. Once more a fear swept through Julie's mind, and this time it stayed. After an evident hesitation, a hand was coldly extended.

"How do you do? I heard from my brothers of your marriage, but they said you were in Italy."

"We have just come from there."

"And your husband?"