Part 5 (1/2)
”Miss Chesney?” he asks, with hesitation, being mindful of his late defeat.
”Yes,” smiling. ”It _is_ for me, then, you are looking? Oh,”--with a thankful sigh,--”I am so glad! I have wanted to ask you the question for two minutes, but I was afraid you might be the wrong person.”
”I wish you had spoken,” laughing: ”you would have saved me from much ignominy. I fancied you something altogether different from what you are,” with a glance full of kindly admiration,--”and I fear I made rather a fool of myself in consequence. I beg your pardon for having kept you so long in suspense, and especially for having in my ignorance mistaken you for that black-browed lady.” Here he smiles down on the fair sweet little face that is smiling up at him.
”Was it that tall young lady you called a 'beast'?” asks Miss Lilian, demurely. ”If so, it wasn't very polite of you, was it?”
”Oh,”--with a laugh,--”did you hear me? I doubt I have begun our acquaintance badly. No, notwithstanding the provocation I received (you saw the withering glance she bestowed upon me?), I refrained from evil language as far as she was concerned, and consoled myself by expending my rage upon her companion,--the man who was seeing after her. Are you tired?--Your journey has not been very unpleasant, I hope?”
”Not unpleasant at all. It was quite fine the entire time, and there was no dust.”
”Your trunks are labeled?”
”Yes.”
”Then perhaps you had better come with me. One of the men will see to your luggage, and will drive your maid home. She is with you?”
”Yes. That is, my nurse is; I have never had any other maid. This is Tipping,” says Miss Chesney, moving back a step or two, and drawing forward with an affectionate gesture, a pleasant-faced, elderly woman of about fifty-five.
”I am glad to see you, Mrs. Tipping,” says Cyril, genially, who does not think it necessary, like some folk, to treat the lower cla.s.ses with studied coldness, as though they were a thing apart. ”Perhaps you will tell the groom about your mistress's things, while I take her out of this draughty station.”
Lilian follows him to the carriage, wondering as she goes. There is an air of command about this new acquaintance that puzzles her. Is he Sir Guy? Is it her guardian in _propria persona_ who has come to meet her?
And could a guardian be so--so--likable? Inwardly she hopes it may be so, being rather impressed by Cyril's manner and handsome face.
When they are about half-way to Chetwoode she plucks up courage to say, although the saying of it costs her a brilliant blush, ”Are you my guardian?”
”I call that a most unkind question,” says Cyril. ”Have I fallen short in any way, that the thought suggests itself? Do you mean to insinuate that I am not guarding you properly now? Am I not taking sufficiently good care of you?”
”You _are_ my guardian then?” says Lilian, with such unmistakable hope in her tones that Cyril laughs outright.
”No, I am not,” he says; ”I wish I were; though for your own sake it is better as it is. Your guardian is no end a better fellow than I am. He would have come to meet you to-day, but he was obliged to go some miles away on business.”
”Business!” thinks Miss Chesney, disdainfully. ”Of course it would never do for the goody-goody to neglect his business. Oh, dear! I know we shall not get on at all.”
”I am very glad he did not put himself out for me,” she says, glancing at Cyril from under her long curling lashes. ”It would have been a pity, as I have not missed him at all.”
”I feel intensely grateful to you for that speech,” says Cyril. ”When Guy cuts me out later on,--as he always does,--I shall still have the memory of it to fall back upon.”
”Is this Chetwoode?” Lilian asks, five minutes later, as they pa.s.s through the entrance gate. ”What a charming avenue!”--putting her head out of the window, ”and so dark. I like it dark; it reminds me of”--she pauses, and two large tears come slowly, slowly into her blue eyes and tremble there--”my home,” she says in a low tone.
”You must try to be happy with us,” Cyril says, kindly, taking one of her hands and pressing it gently, to enforce his sympathy; and then the horses draw up at the hall door, and he helps her to alight, and presently she finds herself within the doors of Chetwoode.
CHAPTER IV.
”Ye scenes of my childhood, whose loved recollection Embitters the present, compared with the past.”--BYRON.
When Lady Chetwoode, who is sitting in the drawing-room, hears the carriage draw up to the door, she straightens herself in her chair, smoothes down the folds of her black velvet gown with rather nervous fingers, and prepares for an unpleasant surprise. She hears Cyril's voice in the hall inquiring where his mother is, and, rising to her feet, she makes ready to receive her new ward.