CHAPTER XI
"Funny old poop!" said Compton. "And that is your Rector, Nell. I shall tell Dick there's rare fun to be had in that house: but not for me. I know what I shall be thinking of all the time I'm there. Odious little Nell! to interfere like this with a fellow's fun. But I say, who's that woman who knows me or my family? – much good may it do her, as I said before. Tell me, Nell, did she speak ill of me?"
"Oh, Phil, how could you ask? or what would it matter if she spoke ever so ill?"
"She did then," he said with a graver face. "Somebody was bound to do it. And what did she say?"
"Oh, what does it matter, Phil? I don't remember; nothing of any consequence. We paid no attention, of course, neither mamma nor I."
"That was plucky of the old girl," said Compton. "I didn't suppose you would give ear, my Nell. Ain't so sure about her. If I'd been your father, my pet, I should never have given you to Phil Compton. And that's the fact: I wonder if the old lady would like to reconsider the situation now."
"Phil!" said Elinor, clinging to his arm.
"Perhaps it would be best for you if you were to do so, Nell, or if she were to insist upon it. Eh! You don't know me, my darling, that's the fact. You're too good to understand us. We're all the same, from the old governor downwards – a bad lot. I feel a kind of remorseful over you, child, to-day. That rosy old bloke, though he's a snob, makes a man think of innocence somehow. I do believe you oughtn't to marry me, Nell."
"Oh, Phil! what do you mean? You cannot mean what you say."
"I suppose I don't, or I shouldn't say it, Nell. I shouldn't certainly, if I thought you were likely to take my advice. It's a kind of luxury to tell you we're a bad lot, and bid you throw me over, when I know all along you won't."
"I should think not indeed," she said, clinging to him and looking up in his face. "Do you know what my cous – I mean a friend, said to me on that subject?"
"You mean your cousin John, whom you are always quoting. Let's hear what the fellow said."
"He said – that I wasn't a girl to put up with much, Phil. That I wasn't one of the patient kind, that I would not bear – I don't know what it was I would not bear; but you see you must consider my defects, which you can understand well enough, whether I can understand yours or not."
"That you could not put up with – that you could not bear? that meant me, Nell. He had been talking to you on the same subject, me and my faults. Why didn't you listen to him? I suppose he wanted you to have him instead of me."
"Phil! how dare you even think of such a thing? It is not true."
"Wasn't it? Then he is a greater fool than I took him for, and his opinion's no good. So you're a spitfire, are you? Can't put up with anything that doesn't suit you? I don't know that I should have found that out."
"I am afraid though that it is true," she said, half-laughingly looking up at him. "Perhaps you will want to reconsider too."
"If you don't want it any more than I want it, Nell – What's that?" he cried hastily, changing his expression and attitude in a moment. "Is that one of your neighbours at the gate?"
Elinor looked round, starting away a little from his side, and saw some one – a man she had never seen before – approaching along the path. She was just about to say she did not know who it was when Phil, to her astonishment, stepped past her, advancing to meet the newcomer. But as he did so he put out his hand and caught her as he passed, leading her along with him.
"Mind what I said, and stick to me," he said, in a whisper; then —
"Stanfield!" he cried with an air of perfect ease and cordiality, yet astonishment. "I thought it looked like you, but I could not believe my eyes."
"Mr. Compton!" said the other. "So you are here. I have been hunting after you all over the place. I heard only this morning this was a likely spot."
"A very likely spot!" said Phil. "I suppose you know the good reason I have for being in these parts. Elinor, this is Mr. Stanfield, who has to do with our company, don't you know. But I say, Stanfield, what's all this row in the papers? Is it true that Brown's bolted? I should have taken the first train to see if I could help; but my private affairs are most urgent just at this moment, as I suppose you know."
"I wish you had come," said the other; "it would have looked well, and pleased the rest of the directors. There has been some queer business – some of the books abstracted or destroyed, we can't tell which, and no means of knowing how we stand."
"Good Heavens!" said Phil, "to cover that fellow's retreat."
"It you mean Brown, it was not he. They were all there safe enough after he was gone; somebody must have got in by night and made off with them, some one that knew all about the place; the watchman saw a light, but that's all. It's supposed there must have been something compromising others besides Brown. He could not have cheated the company to such an extent by himself."
"Good Heavens!" cried Phil again in natural horror; "I wish I had followed my impulse and gone up to town straight: but it was very vague what was in the papers; I hoped it might not have been our place at all. And I say, Stanfield – who's the fellow they suspect?" Elinor had disengaged herself from Compton's arm; she perceived vaguely that the stranger paused before he replied, and that Phil, facing him with a certain square attitude of opposition which affected her imagination vaguely, though she did not understand why – was waiting with keen attention for his reply. She said, a little oppressed by the situation, "Phil, perhaps I had better go."
"Don't go," he said; "there's nothing secret to say. If there's anyone suspected it must very soon be known."
"It's difficult to say who is suspected," said the stranger, confused. "I don't know that there's much evidence. You've been in Scotland?"
"Yes, till the other day, when I came down here to see – " He paused and turned upon Elinor a look which gave the girl the most curious incomprehensible pang. It was a look of love; but, oh! heaven, was it a look called up that the other man might see? He took her hand in his, and said lightly yet tenderly, "Let's see, what day was it? the sixth, wasn't it the sixth, Nell?"
A flood of conflicting thoughts poured through Elinor's mind. What did it mean? It was yesterday, she was about to say, but something stopped her, something in Phil's eye – in the touch of his hand. There was something warning, almost threatening, in his eye. Stand by me; mind you don't contradict me; say what I say. All these things which he had repeated again and again were said once more in the look he gave her. "Yes," she said timidly, with a hesitation very unlike Elinor, "it was the sixth." She seemed to see suddenly as she said the words that calendar with the date hanging in the hall: the big 6 seemed to hang suspended in the air. It was true, though she could not tell how it could be so.
"Oh," said Stanfield, in a tone which betrayed a little surprise, and something like disappointment, "the sixth? I knew you had left Scotland, but we did not know where you had gone."
"That's not to be wondered at," said Phil, with a laugh, "for I should have gone to Ireland, to tell the truth; I ought to have been there now. I'm going to-morrow, ain't I, Nell? I had not a bit of business to be here. Winding up affairs in the bachelor line, don't you know; but I had to come on my way west to see this young lady first. It plays the deuce and all with one's plans when there's such a temptation in the way."
"You could have gone from Scotland to Ireland," said Stanfield, gravely, "without coming to town at all."
"Very true, old man. You speak like a book. But, as you perceive, I have not gone to Ireland at all; I am here. Depends upon your motive, I suppose, which way you go."
"It is a good way roundabout," said the other, without relaxing the intent look on his face.
"Well," said Phil, "that's as one feels. I go by Holyhead wherever I may be – even if I had nowhere else to go to on the way."
"And