Tristram of Blent Part 69

"And it's half-past seven now. Just time to wash our hands. No dress to-night, you know."

"I'll go to my room," said Cecily. "Will you come with me, Mina?"

A glance from Harry made the Imp excuse herself. "I'll keep Mr Neeld company," she said.

Cecily turned to her husband. She smiled and blushed a little.

"I'll take you as far as your room," said he.

Mina and Neeld watched them go upstairs; then each dropped into a chair in the hall. Mason pa.s.sed by, chuckling to himself; Neeld looked harmless, and he dared to speak to him.

"Well, this is the next best thing to Mr Harry coming back to his own, sir," said he.

That was it. That was the feeling. Mason had got it!

"I'm glad of it after all," Neeld confessed to Mina.

"Wait, wait!" she urged, sitting straight in her chair, apparently listening for any sound. Her obvious anxiety extended its contagion to him; he understood better how nice the issue was.

"Will you come in the garden with me after dinner?" asked Harry, as Cecily and he went upstairs.

"Of course--when they've gone."

"No, directly. I want to say a word to you."

"We must escape then!" she laughed. "Oh, well, they'll expect that, I suppose." Her delight in her love bubbled over in her laugh.

They came to the door of her room, and she stopped.

"Here?" asked Harry. "Yes, it was my mother's room. You reign now in my mother's stead."

His voice had a ring of triumph in it. He kissed her hand. "Dinner as soon as you're ready," said he.

She laughed again and blushed as she opened the door and stood holding the handle.

"Won't you come in--just for a minute, Harry? I--I haven't changed this room at all."

"All is yours to change or to keep unchanged," said he.

"Oh, I've no reason for changing anything now. Everything's to be put back in the Long Gallery!" She paused, and then said again, "Won't you come in for just a minute, Harry?"

"I must go back to our friends downstairs," he answered.

The pretext was threadbare. What did the guests matter? They would do well enough. It had cost her something to ask--a little effort--since the request still seemed so strange, since its pleasure had a fear in it. And now she was refused.

"I ask you," she said, with a sudden haughtiness.

He stood looking at her a moment. There was a brisk step along the corridor.

"Oh, I beg your Ladys.h.i.+p's pardon. I didn't know your Ladys.h.i.+p had come upstairs." It was Cecily's maid.

"In about twenty minutes," said Harry with a nod. Slowly Cecily followed the maid inside.

After he had washed his hands Harry rejoined his friends. They were still sitting in the hall with an air of expectancy.

"You've told her?" cried Mina. "Oh, yes, Mr Neeld has told me everything."

"Well, I've mentioned the bare fact----" Neeld began.

"Yes, yes, that's the only thing that matters. You've told her, Harry?"

The last two days made him "Harry" and her "Mina."

"No, I had a chance and I--funked it," said Harry, slow in speech and slow in smile. "She asked me into her room. Well, I wouldn't go."

He laughed as he spoke, laughed rather scornfully.

"It's rather absurd. I shall be all right after dinner," he added, laughing still. "Or would you like to do the job for me, Mina?"

The Imp shook her head with immense determination. "I'll throw myself into the Blent if you like," she said.

"What about you, Mr Neeld?"

"My dear friend, oh, my dear friend!" Undisguised panic took possession of Mr Neeld. He tried to cover it by saying sternly, "This--er--preposterous position is entirely your own fault, you know.

You have acted----"

"Yes, I know," nodded Harry, not impatiently but with a sombre a.s.sent.

He roused himself the next moment, saying, "Well, somebody's got to bell the cat, you know."

"Really it's not my business," protested Neeld and Mina in one breath, both laughing nervously.

"You like the fun, but you don't want any of the work," remarked Harry.

That was true, true to their disgrace. They both felt the reproach. How were they better than the rest of the neighborhood, who were content to gossip and gape and take the fortunes of the Tristrams as mere matter for their own entertainment?

"I've made you look ashamed of yourselves now," he laughed. "Well, I must do the thing myself, I suppose. What a pity Miss Swinkerton isn't here!"

Cecily came down. She pa.s.sed Harry with a rather distant air and took Neeld's arm.

"They say dinner's ready," said she. "Mina, will you come with Harry?"

Harry sank into the chair opposite Cecily--and opposite the picture of Addie Tristram on the wall. "Well, somehow I've managed to get back here," said he.

The shadow had pa.s.sed from Cecily's face. She looked at him, blus.h.i.+ng and laughing.

"At a terrible price, poor Harry?" she said.

"At a big price," he answered.

She looked round at the three. Harry was composed, but there was no mistaking the perturbation of the Imp and Mr Neeld.