Part 55 (2/2)

He shakes hands formally with Mrs. Arlington, and smiles in a somewhat restrained fas.h.i.+on upon Lilian. In truth he is much troubled at the latter's evident familiarity with the place and its inmate.

Lilian, jumping down from her high elevation, says to Cecilia:

”If you two are going to talk business, I shall go into the next room.

The very thought of anything connected with the bugbear 'Law' depresses me to death. You can call me, Cecilia, when you have quite done.”

”Don't be frightened,” says Guy, pleasantly, though inwardly he frowns as he notes Lilian's unceremonious usage of his tenant's Christian name.

”I shan't detain Mrs. Arlington two minutes.”

Then he addresses himself exclusively to Cecilia, and says what he has to say in a perfectly courteous, perfectly respectful, perfectly freezing tone,--to all of which Cecilia responds with a similar though rather exaggerated amount of coldness that deadens the natural sweetness of her behavior, and makes Lilian tell herself she has never yet seen Cecilia to such disadvantage, which is provoking, as she has set her heart above all things on making Guy like her lovely friend.

Then Sir Guy, with a distant salutation, withdraws; and both women feel, silently, as though an icicle had melted from their midst.

”I wonder why your guardian so dislikes me,” says Mrs. Arlington, in a somewhat hurt tone. ”He is ever most ungenerous in his treatment of me.”

”Ungenerous!” hastily, ”oh, no! he is not that. He is the most generous-minded man alive. But--but----”

”Quite so, dear,”--with a faint smile that yet has in it a tinge of bitterness. ”You see there is a 'but.' I have never wronged him, yet he hates me.”

”Never mind who hates you,” says Lilian, impulsively. ”Cyril loves you, and so do I.”

”I can readily excuse the rest,” says Mrs. Arlington, with a bright smile, kissing her pretty consoler with grateful warmth.

An hour after Lilian's return to Chetwoode on this momentous day, Guy, having screwed his courage to the sticking-point, enters his mother's boudoir, where he knows she and Lilian are sitting alone.

Lady Chetwoode is writing at a distant table; Miss Chesney, on a sofa close to the fire, is surrept.i.tiously ruining--or, as she fondly but erroneously believes, is knitting away bravely at--the gray sock her ladys.h.i.+p has just laid down. Lilian's pretty lips are pursed up, her brow is puckered, her soft color has risen as she bends in strong hope over her work. The certain charm that belongs to this scene fails to impress Sir Guy, who is too full of agitated determination to leave room for minor interests.

”Lilian,” he says, bluntly, with all the execrable want of tact that characterizes the very gentlest of men, ”I wish you would not cultivate an acquaintance with Mrs. Arlington.”

”Eh?” says Lilian, looking up in somewhat dazed amazement from her knitting, which is gradually getting into a more and more hopeless mess, ”what is it, then, Sir Guy?”

”I wish you would not seek an intimacy with Mrs. Arlington,” repeats Chetwoode, speaking all the more sternly in that he feels his courage ebbing.

The sternness, however, proves a mistake; Miss Chesney resents it, and, scenting battle afar off, encases herself in steel, and calmly, nay, eagerly, awaits the onslaught.

”What has put you out?” she says, speaking in a tone eminently calculated to incense the listener. ”You seem disturbed. Has Heskett been poaching again? or has that new pointer turned out a _disappointer_? What has poor Mrs. Arlington done to you, that you must send her to Coventry?”

”Nothing, only----”

”Nothing! Oh, Sir Guy, surely you must have some substantial reason for tabooing her so entirely.”

”Perhaps I have. At all events, I ask you most particularly to give up visiting at The Cottage.”

”I am very sorry, indeed, to seem disobliging, but I shall not give up a friend without sufficient reason for so doing.”

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