Part 31 (1/2)
”Won't you, since you _are_ here, Mr Bulstrode, come in and have a cup of tea?”
She at once followed theirhere, you will adiven the part of the country it is, no one has a better right!”
”Oh, I'll adhed, ”if you'll only admit us You see we are two”
The lady caave him her hand and she really smiled beautifully Then she put her hand on the nose of the horse, with the touch one has for fas
”She's a perfect dear, isn't she--a dear So you are riding her then?
Well, you'll find her easy to tie, she stands well There's nothing she can spoil, that's the charm of such an old, tumble-down place”
As Bulstrode followed after the trailing dress just touching the gravel with a rustling sound, he had the feeling of being suddenly, willy-nilly, taken and put into the heart of a story book He sot to go on in the book, I suppose, whether I want to be here or not, to the end”
”I thought I was e of discovery,” he told her as they sat in the low room before a fire and before her table and tea cups ”I fancied I was the only person within ht to be so bold, but I really didn't dream the place was lived in, as, of course, you know”
”Drink your tea,” she bade, ”and eat your toast before I er”
”And if I have?”
It was delicious tea, and the Alish luxury, the American in him fully appreciated The liquid in the blue-and-white cups was pale as saffron and the toast was a feather
”At five o'clock there's nothing like it in the world,” he breathed
”I didn't hope for this to-day I had recklessly thrown five o'clock over, for I'm alone at the castle” He drank his tea, finished, and with a sigh Then he said: ”I can actually venture to ask you for another cup, for I aer or envoy, my dear, nobody's
I'm just an indiscreet, huly rewarded for an intrusion You sawon things”
The duchess tacitly accepted, it is to be supposed, for she made him a second cup of tea, slowly
”You don't know that I've been thinking about you all day,” he said, ”and I can frankly say that I've beena very different picture of you indeed”
She took no notice whatsoever of his personality
”You are in England, then,” she said rather for here I always think of A in the States, lish atruous toabout in this soft language It's horrid of ory
But as you stood there, with Banshee's nose over your shoulder you fitted quite beautifully in with everything I don't believe I should mind you, ever, anywhere, and yet I more naturally think of you at Newport, don't you see?”
Her coland, and you can't alter the fact, at least if you can, please don't; for Newport on the fifteenth of December, and with no such tea or fire----”
”Oh,” she permitted, ”you may stay I said you fitted--only----”
Bulstrode interposed: ”Don't at least for a few moments entertain any 'buts' and 'onlys'--they are nearly as bad as thosetrunks that would transport me to the United States It is so--let ht remain I don't knohy you are here or hoularly perfect to have found you”
His hostess had left her seat behind the table, and taking a chair by the fireside where Bulstrode was sitting, undid the ribbons of her garden hat and let the basket-like object fall on the floor
”You must promise me, first of all, that you will not say you have seen me Otherwise I shall leave here to-ain knohere I aht conflict as in his ht not to do so