"Well, why do I receive no answer? Who did it?" demands papa, in a voice of suppressed thunder, still with his eye on me.
"I threw some out this evening," I acknowledge, in a faint tone, "but never before—I—"
"Oh! it was you, was it?" says papa, with a glare. "I need scarcely have inquired; I might have known the one most likely to commit a disreputable action. Is that an established habit of yours? Are there no servants to do your bidding? It was the most monstrous proceeding I ever in my life witnessed."
"It was only—" I begin timidly.
"'It was only' that it is an utterly impossible thing for you ever to be a lady," interrupted papa, bitterly. "You are a downright disgrace to your family. At times I find it a difficult matter to believe you a Vernon."
Having delivered this withering speech, he leans back in his chair, with a snort that would not have done discredit to a war-horse, which signifies that the scene is at an end. Two large tears gather in my eyes and roll heavily down my cheeks. They look like tears of penitence, but in reality are tears of relief. Oh, if that tell-tale water had but fallen on the breast of his shirt, or on his stainless cuffs, where would the inquiries have terminated?
Billy—who, I feel instinctively, has been suffering tortures during the past five minutes—now, through the intensity of his joy at my escape, so far forgets himself as to commence a brilliant fantasia on the tablecloth with a dessert-fork. It lasts a full minute without interruption: I am too depressed to give him a warning glance. At length—
"Billy, when you have quite done making that horrid noise, perhaps you will ring the bell," says Dora, smoothly, with a view to comfort. Certainly the tattoo is irritating.
"When I have quite done I will," returns Billy, calmly, and continues his odious occupation, with now an addition to it in the form of an unearthly scraping noise, caused by his nails, that makes one's flesh creep.
Papa, deep in the perusal of the Times, hears and sees nothing. Mother is absent.
"Papa," cries Dora, whose delicate nerves are all unstrung, "will you send Billy out of the room, or else induce him to stop his present employment?"
"William," says papa, severely, "cease that noise directly." And William, casting a vindictive glance at Dora, lays down the dessert-fork and succumbs.
CHAPTER V.
I have wandered down to the river side and under the shady trees. As yet, October is so young and mild the leaves refuse to offer tribute, and still quiver and rustle gayly on their branches.
It is a week since my adventure in the wood—five days since Mr. Carrington's last visit. On that occasion having failed to obtain one minute with him alone, the handkerchief still remains in my possession, and proves a very skeleton in my closet, the initials M. J. C.—that stand for Marmaduke John Carrington, as all the world knows—staring out boldly from their corner, and threatening at any moment to betray me: so that, through fear and dread of discovery, I carry it about with me, and sleep with it beneath my pillow. Looking back upon it all now, I wonder how I could have been so foolish, so wanting in invention. I feel with what ease I could now dispose of anything tangible and obnoxious.
There is a slight chill in the air, in spite of the pleasant sun; and I half make up my mind to go for a brisk walk, instead of sauntering idly, as I am at present doing, when somebody calls to me from the adjoining field. It is Mr. Carrington. He climbs the wall that separates us, and drops into my territory, a little scrambling Irish terrier at his heels.
"Is this a favorite retreat of yours?" he asks, as our hands meet.
"Sometimes. Oh, Mr. Carrington, I am so glad to see you to-day."
"Are you, really? That is better news than I hoped to hear when I left home this morning."
"Because I want to return you your handkerchief. I have had it so long, and am so anxious to get rid of it. It—it would probably look nicer," I say, with hesitation, slowly withdrawing the article in question from my pocket, "if anybody else had washed it; but I did not want any one to find out about—that day: so I had to do it myself."
Lingering, cautiously, I bring it to light and hold it out to him. Oh, how dreadfully pink and uncleanly it appears in the broad light of the open air! To me it seems doubly hideous—the very last thing a fastidious gentleman would dream of putting to his nose.
Mr. Carrington accepts it almost tenderly. There is not the shadow of a smile upon his face. It would be impossible for me to say how grateful I feel to him for this.
"Is it possible you took all that trouble," he says, a certain gentle light, with which I am growing familiar, coming into his eyes as they rest upon my anxious face. "My dear child, why? Did you not understand I was only jesting when I expressed a desire to have it again? Why did you not put it in the fire, or rid yourself of it in some other fashion long ago? So"—after a pause—"you really washed it with your own hands for me?"
"One might guess that by looking at it," I answer, with a rather awkward laugh: "still, I think it would not look quite so badly, but that I kept it in my pocket ever since, and that gives it its crumpled appearance."
"Ever since? so near to you for five long days? What a weight it must have been on your tender conscience! Well, at all events no other washerwoman"—with a smile—"shall ever touch it. I promise you that." He places it carefully in an inside pocket as he speaks.
"Oh, please do not say that!" I cry, dismayed: "you must not keep it as a specimen of my handiwork. Once properly washed, you will forget all about it: but if you keep it before your eyes in its present state— Mr. Carrington, do put it in your clothes-basket the moment you go home."
He only laughs at this pathetic entreaty, and throws a pebble into the tiny river that runs at our feet.
"Why are you alone?" he asks, presently. "Why is not the indefatigable Billy with you?"
"He reads with a tutor three times a week. That leaves me very often lonely. I came here to-day just to pass the time until he can join me. He don't seem to care much about Greek and Latin," I admit, ingenuously; "and, as he never looks at his lessons until five minutes before Mr. Caldwood comes, you see he don't get over them very quickly."
"And so leaves you disconsolate longer than he need. Your sister, Miss Vernon—does she never go for a walk with you?"
Ah! now he is coming to Dora.
"Dora? Oh, never. She is not fond of walking; it does not agree with her, she says. You may have noticed she is not very robust, she looks so fragile, so different from me in every respect."
"Very different."
"Yes, we all see that," I answer, rather disconcerted by his ready acquiescence in this home view. "And so pretty as she is, too! Don't you think her very pretty, Mr. Carrington?"
"Extremely so. Even more than merely pretty. Her complexion, I take it, must be quite unrivaled. She is positively lovely—in her own style."
"I am very glad you admire her; but indeed you would be singular if you did not do so," I say, with enthusiasm. "Her golden hair and blue eyes make her quite a picture. I think she has the prettiest face I ever saw: don't you?"
"No; not the prettiest. I know another that, to me at least, is far more beautiful."
He is looking straight before him, apparently at nothing, and to my attentive ear there is something hidden in his tone that renders me uneasy for the brilliant future I have mapped out for my sister.
"You have been so much in the world," I say, with some dejection, "and of course in London and Paris and all the large