Part 8 (2/2)

Miss Kilner was slight of figure and light of foot, and eagerness seemed to lend her wings. She was still getting over the ground at a rapid rate, when she saw the dust-cloud vanish, and perceived that the carriage had come to a stand-still. Was the danger, then, over? Her heart gave a throb of pa.s.sionate thankfulness as she pressed on, longing to a.s.sure herself that Jamie was safe, and to hold him, for one brief moment even, in her arms.

One or two watermen had come up and gathered round the panting horses.

The coachman, white and shaky, was talking and gesticulating; his mistress, looking very fair in her faintness, had been helped out of the carriage by a tall man with a brown face.

Elsie, as she came up breathless to this group, took in two facts at once. Jamie was safe and unhurt, and the brown-faced man was Mr.

Lennard's friend Ronald. He looked every inch a knight, as he stood there in his suit of fresh, white flannels, his bronzed face with a summer glow in it, and the dark hair cropped close to his head. The lady, in a silvery voice that faltered once or twice, was pouring out her thanks. Elsie comprehended it all in a moment; it was Ronald who had stopped the horses, and saved, perhaps, two lives.

”I cannot trust them again,” the lady said, glancing at the handsome chestnuts with a shudder. ”We had better go home in the train.”

The boy was holding her hand, and pressing close to the folds of her dainty gown. Elsie came up to them, very pale, with a light in her eyes.

Her glance rested on the little lad, and she stretched out her hand to him with an impulsive gesture. ”Oh,” she said, ”it is Jamie Waring, and I have been trying to find him for weeks and weeks! I have no right to claim him, I know; but I have wanted him for such a long, long time. To see him safe and well, after such a weary search----”

She broke off abruptly. The brown man was standing in front of her with his eyes fixed on her face; he was gazing at her so earnestly, sincerely, and wistfully that for an instant she almost lost herself.

Jamie's gaze was less sympathetic; he looked puzzled, and kept very close to his protectress.

”I found Jamie with some organ-grinders,” said the lady, recovering her composure, and speaking in rather a cold voice. ”The organ-woman was beating him, and I stopped my carriage to interfere. They were in a quiet road near Lee, and of course there was no policeman to be seen. I asked the child if he belonged to these people, and he cried, 'No, no!'

and clung to me. I saw that he was not dirty and neglected; his clothes were rather poor, but there was nothing of the tramp about him. To make a long story short, I fell in love with you--didn't I, Jamie?--and so I took you home with me and waited for you to be claimed, but no one ever claimed you.”

Her fair face softened as she looked down at the child, and her voice grew tender when she spoke to him. He still stood clasping her hand and resting his head against her dress.

”He has no relations,” Elsie said. ”No one has any right to take him from you.”

Mrs. Penn, flushed and half-sobbing, came up at this moment, and she, too, extended her arms to the boy. But at the sight of her he drew himself up to his full height and waved his hand with the majesty of a little king. ”Go away!” he said. ”Go away home!”

”Oh, Jamie!” she cried; ”aren't you glad to see me again?”

”No!” he answered, with another wave of the dimpled hand. ”I don't love you a bit! You let Maria beat me. I hate Maria. I won't come with you!”

For a moment no one spoke. The brown man was evidently much amused by the little scene, and looked at the boy with undisguised approval.

”Was this child left in your charge?” the lady asked, addressing Mrs.

Penn with cold severity.

”There was no one to take him, madam,” the crestfallen woman replied.

”He was living with Miss Neale, who was a lodger of mine, and she died, quite suddenly, in my house. His father----”

”His father had deserted him.” It was Mrs. Beaton who spoke. She had reached the little group, and having but a poor opinion of her friend's eloquence, she took up the tale herself. ”But Jamie Waring is well connected, madam; his uncle was our clergyman, the Reverend Harold Waring, curate of St. Lucy's, in Berwick Street, and----”

”Harold Waring! Why, he was a dear old friend of mine!” Mrs. Beaton was interrupted in her turn, and it was the man in flannels who cut her story short. ”If I had only known that Waring had left a nephew alone in the world I should have claimed him,” he went on, with a ring of determination in his voice. ”My name is Wayne--Arnold Wayne--you may have heard Mr. Waring speak of me?”

”Yes, sir, we have,” Mrs. Beaton replied. ”Here is Miss Kilner, who found your name in poor Miss Neale's ma.n.u.script. Miss Neale, sir, was engaged to be married to Mr. Waring.”

”He wrote to tell me of his engagement,” said Arnold Wayne, looking at Elsie. ”What a complicated business this is! It seems that we each have an interest in this young gentleman,” he added, with a smile at the fair lady.

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