The moment she was out of their sight she increased her pace almost to a run. The day was too warm for rapid movement, and she soon stopped and listened. There were the usual woodland sounds; leaves rustling, grasshoppers chirping, and birds singing; but not a human voice or footstep. She began to think that the godlike figure was only the Hermes of Praxiteles, suggested to her by Goethe’s classical Sabbat, and changed by a daydream into the semblance of a living reality. The groom must have been one of those incongruities characteristic of dreams — probably a reminiscence of Lucian’s statement that the tenant of the Warren Lodge had a single male attendant. It was impossible that this glorious vision of manly strength and beauty could be substantially a student broken down by excessive study. That irrational glow of delight, too, was one of the absurdities of dreamland; otherwise she should have been ashamed of it.
Lydia made her way back to the castle in some alarm as to the state of her nerves, but dwelling on her vision with a pleasure that she would not have ventured to indulge had it concerned a creature of flesh and blood. Once or twice it recurred to her so vividly that she asked herself whether it could have been real. But a little reasoning convinced her that it must have been an hallucination.
“If you please, madam,” said one of her staff of domestics, a native of Wiltstoken, who stood in deep awe of the lady of the castle, “Miss Goff is waiting for you in the drawingroom.”
The drawingroom of the castle was a circular apartment, with a dome-shaped ceiling broken into gilt ornaments resembling thick bamboos, which projected vertically downward like stalagmites. The heavy chandeliers were loaded with flattened brass balls, magnified facsimiles of which crowned the uprights of the low, broad, massively-framed chairs, which were covered in leather stamped with Japanese dragon designs in copper-colored metal. Near the fireplace was a great bronze bell of Chinese shape, mounted like a mortar on a black wooden carriage for use as a coal-scuttle. The wall was decorated with large gold crescents on a ground of light blue.
In this barbaric rotunda Miss Carew found awaiting her a young lady of twenty-three, with a well-developed, resilient figure, and a clear complexion, porcelain surfaced, and with a fine red in the cheeks. The lofty pose of her head expressed an habitual sense of her own consequence given her by the admiration of the youth of the neighborhood, which was also, perhaps, the cause of the neatness of her inexpensive black dress, and of her irreproachable gloves, boots, and hat. She had been waiting to introduce herself to the lady of the castle for ten minutes in a state of nervousness that culminated as Lydia entered.
“How do you do, Miss Goff, Have I kept you waiting? I was out.”
“Not at all,” said Miss Goff, with a confused impression that red hair was aristocratic, and dark brown (the color of her own) vulgar. She had risen to shake hands, and now, after hesitating a moment to consider what etiquette required her to do next, resumed her seat. Miss Carew sat down too, and gazed thoughtfully at her visitor, who held herself rigidly erect, and, striving to mask her nervousness, unintentionally looked disdainful.
“Miss Goff,” said Lydia, after a silence that made her speech impressive, “will you come to me on a long visit? In this lonely place I am greatly in want of a friend and companion of my own age and position. I think you must be equally so.”
Alice Goff was very young, and very determined to accept no credit that she did not deserve. With the unconscious vanity and conscious honesty of youth, she proceeded to set Miss Carew right as to her social position, not considering that the lady of the castle probably understood it better than she did herself, and indeed thinking it quite natural that she should be mistaken.
“You are very kind,” she replied, stiffly; “but our positions are quite different, Miss Carew. The fact is that I cannot afford to live an idle life. We are very poor, and my mother is partly dependent on my exertions.”
“I think you will be able to exert yourself to good purpose if you come to me,” said Lydia, unimpressed. “It is true that I shall give you very expensive habits; but I will of course enable you to support them.”
“I do not wish to contract expensive habits,” said Alice, reproachfully. “I shall have to content myself with frugal ones throughout my life.”
“Not necessarily. Tell me, frankly: how had you proposed to exert yourself? As a teacher, was it not?”
Alice flushed, but assented.
“You are not at all fitted for it; and you will end by marrying. As a teacher you could not marry well. As an idle lady, with expensive habits, you will marry very well indeed. It is quite an art to know how to be rich — an indispensable art, if you mean to marry a rich man.”
“I have no intention of marrying,” said Alice, loftily. She thought it time to check this cool aristocrat. “If I come at all I shall come without any ulterior object.”
“That is just what I had hoped. Come without condition, or second thought of any kind.”
“But—” began Alice, and stopped, bewildered by the pace at which the negotiation was proceeding. She murmured a few words, and waited for Lydia to proceed. But Lydia had said her say, and evidently expected a reply, though she seemed assured of having her own way, whatever Alice’s views might be.
“I do not quite understand, Miss Carew. What duties? — what would you expect of me?”
“A great deal,” said Lydia, gravely. “Much more than I should from a mere professional companion.”
“But I am a professional companion,” protested Alice.
“Whose?”
Alice flushed again, angrily this time. “I did not mean to say—”
“You do not mean to say that you will have nothing to do with me,” said Lydia, stopping her quietly. “Why are you so scrupulous, Miss Goff? You will be close to your home, and can return to it at any moment if you become dissatisfied with your position here.”
Fearful that she had disgraced herself by ill manners; loath to be taken possession of as if her wishes were of no consequence when a rich lady’s whim was to be gratified; suspicious — since she had often heard gossiping tales of the dishonesty of people in high positions — lest she should be cheated out of the salary she had come resolved to demand; and withal unable to defend herself against Miss Carew, Alice caught at the first excuse that occurred to her.
“I should like a little time to consider,” she said.
“Time to accustom yourself to me, is it not? You can have as long as you plea-”
“Oh, I can let you know tomorrow,” interrupted Alice, officiously.
“Thank you. I will send a note to Mrs. Goff to say that she need not expect you back until tomorrow.”
“But I did not mean — I am not prepared to stay,” remonstrated Alice, feeling that she was being entangled in a snare.
“We shall take a walk after dinner, then, and call at your house, where you can make your preparations. But I think I can supply you with all you will require.”
Alice dared make no further objection. “I am afraid,” she stammered, “you will think me horribly rude; but I am so useless, and you are so sure to be disappointed, that — that—”
“You are not rude, Miss Goff; but I find you very shy. You want to run away and hide from new faces and new surroundings.” Alice, who was self-possessed and even overbearing in Wiltstoken society, felt that she was misunderstood, but did not know how to vindicate herself. Lydia resumed, “I have formed my habits in the course of my travels, and so live without ceremony. We dine early — at six.”
Alice