Part 12 (1/2)

”I don't think I understand you, dear,” said Lucy sweetly.

”Oh! you can't be such a stupid as that,” said the boy; ”you understand right enough. What did he mean by talking it over with Sir Tom? He thought Sir Tom would put a stop to it, Lucy.”

”If Mr. Rushton forms such false ideas, dear, what does it matter? That is not of any consequence either to you or me.”

”I wish you would give me a plain answer,” said Jock, impatiently. ”I ask you one thing, and you say another; you never give me any satisfaction.”

She smiled upon him with a look which, clever as Jock was, he did not understand. ”Isn't that conversation?” she said.

”Conversation!” The boy repeated the word almost with a shriek of disdain: ”You don't know very much about that, down here in the country, Lucy. You should hear MTutor; when he's got two or three fellows from Cambridge with him, and they go at it! That's something like talk.”

”It is very nice for you, Jock, that you get on so well with Mr.

Derwent.w.a.ter,” said Lucy, catching with some eagerness at this way of escape from embarra.s.sing questions. ”I hope he will come and see us at Easter, as he promised.”

”He may,” said Jock, with great gravity, ”but the thing is, everybody wants to have him; and then, you see, whenever he has an opportunity he likes to go abroad. He says it freshens one up more than anything. After working his brain all the half, as he does, and taking the interest he does in everything, he has got to pay attention, you know, and not to overdo it; he must have change, and he must have rest.”

Lucy was much impressed by this, as she was by all she heard of MTutor.

She was quite satisfied that such immense intellectual exertions as his did indeed merit compensation. She said, ”I am sure he would get rest with us, Jock. There would be nothing to tire him, and whatever I could do for him, dear, or Sir Tom either, we should be glad, as he is so good to you.”

”I don't know that he's what you call fond of the country--I mean the English country. Of course it is different abroad,” said Jock doubtfully. Then he came back to the original subject with a bound, scattering all Lucy's hopes. ”But we didn't begin about MTutor. It was the other business we were talking of. Is it true that Sir Tom----”

”Jock,” said Lucy seriously. Her mild eyes got a look he had never seen in them before. It was a sort of dilation of unshed tears, and yet they were not wet. ”If you know any time when Sir Tom was ever unkind or untrue, I don't know it. He has always, always been good. I don't think he will change now. I have always done what he told me, and I always will. But he never told me anything. He knows a great deal better than all of us put together. Of course, to obey him, that is my first duty.

And I always shall. But he never asks it--he is too good. What is his will, is my will,” she said. She fixed her eyes very seriously on Jock, all the time she spoke, and he followed every movement of her lips with a sort of astonished confusion, which it is difficult to describe. When she had ceased Jock drew a long breath, and seemed to come to the surface again, after much tossing in darker waters.

”I think that it must be true,” he said slowly, after a pause, ”as people say--that women are very queer, Lucy. I didn't understand one word you said.”

”Didn't you, then?” she said, with a smile of gentle benignity; ”but what does it matter, when it will all come right in the end? Is that our omnibus, Jock, that is going along with all that luggage? How curious that is, for n.o.body was coming to-day that I know of. Don't you see it just turning in to the avenue? Now that is very strange indeed,” said Lucy, raising herself very erect upon her cus.h.i.+ons with a little quickened and eager look. An arrival is always exciting in the country, and an arrival which was quite unexpected, and of which she could form no surmise as to who it could be, stirred up all her faculties. ”I wonder if Mrs. Freshwater will know what rooms are best?” she said, ”and if Sir Tom will be at home to receive them; or perhaps it may be some friends of Aunt Randolph's, or perhaps--I wonder very much who it can be.”

Jock's countenance covered itself quickly with a tinge of gloom.

”Whoever it is, I know it will be disgusting,” cried the boy. ”Just when we have got so much to talk about! and now I shall never see you any more. Lady Randolph was bad enough, and now here's more of them! I should just as soon go back to school at once,” he said, with premature indignation. The servants on the box perceived the other carriage in advance with equal curiosity and excitement. They were still more startled, perhaps, for a profound wonder as to what horses had been sent out, and who was driving them, agitated their minds. The horses, solicited by a private token between them and their driver which both understood, quickened their pace with a slight dash, and the carriage swept along as if in pursuit of the larger and heavier vehicle, which, however, had so much the advance of them, that it had deposited its pa.s.sengers, and turned round to the servants' entrance with the luggage, before Lady Randolph could reach the door. Williams the butler wore a startled look upon his dignified countenance, as he came out on the steps to receive his mistress.

”Some one has arrived,” said Lucy with a little eagerness. ”We saw the omnibus.”

”Yes, my lady. A telegram came for Sir Thomas soon after your ladys.h.i.+p left; there was just time to put in the horses----”

”But who is it, Williams?”

Williams had a curious apologetic air. ”I heard say, my lady, that it was some of the party that were invited before Mr. Randolph fell ill.

There had been a mistake about the letters, and the lady has come all the same--a lady with a foreign t.i.tle, my lady----”

”Oh!” said Lucy, with English brevity. She stood startled, in the hall, lingering a little, changing colour, not with any of the deep emotions which Williams from his own superior knowledge suspected, but with shyness and excitement. ”It will be the lady from Italy, the Contessa---- Oh, I hope they have attended to her properly! Was Sir Thomas at home when she came?”

”Sir Thomas, my lady, went to meet them at the station,” Williams said.

”Oh, that is all right,” cried Lucy, relieved. ”I am so glad she did not arrive and find n.o.body. And I hope Mrs. Freshwater----”

”Mrs. Freshwater put the party into the east wing, my lady. There are two ladies besides the man and the maid. We thought it would be the warmest for them, as they came from the South.”