"She would hardly have been happy with me," he said, in the dry,

unimpassioned voice under which he hid his feelings. "I was not well

enough educated: too rough, in short. I couldn't have surrounded her

with the refinements she looked for, anyhow, at all."

"Nonsense--you are quite wrong there," said the unwise old man,

doggedly. "She told me only this day that she hates refinements and

such like. All that my trouble and money bought for her in that way is

thrown away upon her quite. She'd fain be like Marty South--think o'

that! That's the top of her ambition! Perhaps she's right. Giles, she

loved you--under the rind; and, what's more, she loves ye still--worse

Advertisement..

luck for the poor maid!"

If Melbury only had known what fires he was recklessly stirring up he

might have held his peace. Winterborne was silent a long time. The

darkness had closed in round them, and the monotonous drip of the fog

from the branches quickened as it turned to fine rain.

"Oh, she never cared much for me," Giles managed to say, as he stirred

the embers with a brand.

"She did, and does, I tell ye," said the other, obstinately. "However,

all that's vain talking now. What I come to ask you about is a more

practical matter--how to make the best of things as they are. I am

thinking of a desperate step--of calling on the woman Charmond. I am

going to appeal to her, since Grace will not. 'Tis she who holds the

balance in her hands--not he. While she's got the will to lead him

astray he will follow--poor, unpractical, lofty-notioned dreamer--and

how long she'll do it depends upon her whim. Did ye ever hear anything

about her character before she came to Hintock?"

"She's been a bit of a charmer in her time, I believe," replied Giles,

with the same level quietude, as he regarded the red coals. "One who

has smiled where she has not loved and loved where she has not married.

Before Mr. Charmond made her his wife she was a play-actress."

"Hey? But how close you have kept all this, Giles! What besides?"

"Mr. Charmond was a rich man, engaged in the iron trade in the north,

twenty or thirty years older than she. He married her and retired, and

came down here and bought this property, as they do nowadays."

"Yes, yes--I know all about that; but the other I did not know. I fear

it bodes no good. For how can I go and appeal to the forbearance of a

woman in this matter who has made cross-loves and crooked entanglements

her trade for years? I thank ye, Giles, for finding it out; but it

makes my plan the harder that she should have belonged to that unstable

tribe."




Most Popular