At Love's Cost Part 6

When she had first come home to be mistress of the Hall the bills had overwhelmed her; they had been so many and the money to meet them had been so inadequate; but she had soon learnt how to "finance" them, and come to know which account must be paid at once, and which might be allowed to stand over.

She took them now and glanced at them, and the old man watched her covertly, with a curious expression on his face.

"I'm sure I don't know how you will pay them," he said, as if she alone were responsible.

"I can't pay all of them at once," she replied, cheerfully. "But I can some, and the rest must wait. I can send four--perhaps five--of the steers to the monthly market, and then there are the sheep--Oh, father, I did not tell; you about the gentleman I saw fis.h.i.+ng in the dale--"

She stopped, for she saw that he was not listening. He had opened a local paper and was reading it intently, and presently he looked up with an eager flush on his face and a sudden lightening of the dull eyes.

"Have you seen this--this house--they call it a palace--which that man has built on the lake side?" he asked, his thin voice quavering with resentment.

"Do you mean the big white house by Brae Wood?"

"Yes. Judging by the description of it here, it must be a kind of gim-crack villa like those one sees in Italy, built by men resembling this--this _parvenu_."

"It is a large place," said Ida; "but I don't think it is gim-crack, father. It looks very solid though it is white and, yes, Continental.

It is something between a tremendous villa and a palace. Why are you so angry? I know you don't like to have new houses built in Bryndermere; but this is some distance from us--we cannot see it from here, or from any part of the grounds, excepting the piece by the lake."

"It is built on our land," he said, more quietly, but with the flush still on his face, the angry light in his eyes. "It was bought by fraud, obtained under false pretences. I sold it to one of the farmers, thinking he wanted it and would only use it for grazing. I did not know until the deeds were signed that he was only the jackal for this other man."

"What other man, father?"

"This Stephen Orme. He's _Sir_ Stephen Orme now. They knighted him.

They knight every successful tradesman and schemer; and this man is a prince of his tribe; a low-born adventurer, a _parvenu_ of the worst type."

"I think I have read something about him in the newspapers," said Ida, thoughtfully.

Mr. Heron emitted a low snarl.

"No doubt; he is one whom the world delights to honour; it bows before the successful charlatan, and cringes to his ill-gotten wealth. I'm told that such a man is received, yes, and welcomed by society.

Society! The word is a misnomer. In my time a man of that cla.s.s was kept at arm's-length, was relegated to his proper place--the back hall; but now"--he gazed angrily at the paper--"here is a whole column describing Sir Stephen Orme's new 'palatial villa,' and giving an account of his achievements, the success of his great undertakings. And this man has chosen to build his eyesore on Heron lands, within sight of the house which--which he would not have been permitted to enter. If I had known, I would not have sold the land."

"But you wanted the money, father," she said, gently.

He looked at her swiftly, and a change came over his face, a look of caution, almost of cunning.

"Eh? Yes, yes, of course I wanted it. But he knew I should not have sold it for building on; that is why he got Bowden, the farmer, to buy it. It was like him: only such a man can be capable of such an underhand act. And now I suppose he will be welcomed by his neighbours, and the Vaynes and the Bannerdales, and made much of. They'll eat his dinners, and their women will go to his b.a.l.l.s and concerts--they whose fathers would have refused to sit at the same table with him. But there is one house at which he will not be welcome; one man who will not acknowledge him, who will not cross the threshold of Sir Stephen Orme's brand-new palace, or invite him to enter his own. He shall not darken the doors of Heron Hall."

He rose as he spoke and left the room with a quicker step than usual.

But half an hour later when Ida went into the library she found him absorbed in his books as usual, and he only glanced up at her with absent, unseeing eyes, as she stood beside him putting on her gloves, her habit skirt caught up under her elbow, the old felt hat just a little askew on the soft, silky hair.

"Do you want anything before I go out, father?" she asked.

"No, no!" he replied abstractedly, and bending over his book again as he answered. Ida crossed the hall in the sunlight, which lit up her beauty and made it seem a more striking contrast than usual to the dull and grim surroundings of the dark oak, the faded hangings and the lack-l.u.s.tre armour, and Donald and Bess bounded, barking, before her down the terrace at which Jason was holding thy big chestnut. The horse p.r.i.c.ked up its ears and turned its head for her morning caress, the touch of the small, soft, but firm hand which it had come to regard as its due, and Ida sprang lightly from the last step into the saddle. It was an informal way of mounting which few girls could have accomplished gracefully; but Ida did it as naturally and as easily as a circus rider, for the trick was a necessity to her who had so often to dismount and mount alone.

The lovely face was rather grave and thoughtful for some time after she had started, for the remembrance of last night weighed upon her, and her father's unusual display of anger at breakfast troubled her vaguely; but, presently, after she had cleared a hedge and one of the broken rails, her spirits rose: the sky was so blue, the sun so bright; it was hard to be depressed on such a morning.

She rode to a distant part of the dale where, in a rough meadow the steers were grazing; she surveyed them critically, chose those that should go to market, then turned, and leaping a bank, gained an ill-kept road. A little farther on she came to an opening on the verge of the lake, and she pulled up, arrested by the great white house on the other side, which was literally glittering in the brilliant sunlight. It certainly did not detract from the beauty of the view; in fact, it made the English lake look, for the moment, like an Italian one.

She regarded it thoughtfully for a moment, then returned to the road, and as she did so she saw a tall figure coming towards her.

For an instant the colour rose to her face, but for an instant only, and before Stafford had reached her, she was as pale, as calm as usual.

She noticed that he was dressed in a serge suit, noticed vaguely how well it sat upon him, that his gait had a peculiar ease and grace which the men of the dale lacked, that his handsome face flushed lightly as he saw her; but she gave no sign of these quick apprehensions, and sat cold and sphinx-like waiting for him.

Strafford's heart leapt at sight of her with a sudden pleasure which puzzled him; for he would not have admitted to himself that he had walked in this direction in the hope, on the chance, of meeting her.

"Good-morning," he said, in his direct fas.h.i.+on, raising his cap. "I am very fortunate to meet you. I hope Mr. Heron is no worse for--is not ill?"

"No," she said in her low, clear voice. "My father is quite well; he is just as he usually is this morning."

"I am very glad," said Stafford. He stood close beside the horse and looked up at her; and for the first time in his life he was trying to keep the expression of admiration out of his eyes; the expression which he knew most women welcomed, but which, somehow or other, he felt this strange girl would resent. "I was afraid he would be upset. I am afraid you were frightened last night--it was enough to alarm, to startle anyone. What a splendid morning!" he went on, quickly, as if he did not want to remind her of the affair. "What a libel it is to say that it is always raining here! I've never seen so brilliant a suns.h.i.+ne or such colours: don't wonder that the artists rave about the place and are never tired of painting it."

She waited until he had finished, her eyes downcast, as if she knew why he had turned from the subject, then she raised them and looked at him with her direct gaze.

"I am glad I have met you," she said. "I wanted to thank you for your kindness last night--"

"Oh, but--" Stafford tried to break in, but she went on slowly, as if he had not spoken.

--"I was--frightened: it was sudden, so unexpected. My father had never done it before--that I know of--and he looked"--her voice broke for a moment--"so strange, so ghost-like. I thought at first that it was the Heron ghost which, they say, haunts the dale, though I have never seen it."

A faint smile curved her lips and shone in her eyes, and Stafford was so fascinated by the sudden gleam of girlishness that he had to bend and pat Bess, who was planting dusty impression on his trousers in her frantic efforts to gain his attention.

"I did nothing; in fact, as I walked away I was fuming because I couldn't help you--couldn't do more."

"You did help me," she said, gravely; then she looked across the lake to Sir Stephen's "little place." "I was admiring that new house. Don't you think it is very beautiful, rising so white and gracefully above the lake?"

"Ye-es," said Stafford, "Rather--conspicuous, though, isn't it?"

She laughed suddenly, and Stafford asked, with surprise: "Why did you laugh?"

"Oh, I was thinking of my father," she said, with a delicious frankness; "he was quite angry about it this morning. It seems that it is built on our land--or what was ours--and he dislikes the idea of anyone building at Bryndermere."

"So should I," said Stafford, laconically.

"And besides," she went on, her eyes fixed on the great white building, so that she did not see his embarra.s.sment, "my father does not like the man who built it. He thinks that he got the land unfairly; and he--my father--calls him all sorts of hard names."

Stafford bit his lips, and his face wore the expression which came into it when he was facing an ugly jump. He would have s.h.i.+rked this one if he could, but it had to be faced, so he rushed it.

"I'm sorry," he said. "My father built it."

She did not start, but she turned her head and looked at him, with a sudden coldness in the glorious eyes.

"Your father--Sir Stephen Orme? Then you are--"

"I am his son, yes; my name is Stafford Orme."

She gathered her reins up, as if no comment, no remark were necessary, but Stafford could not let her go, could not part from her like that.

"I'm sorry to hear that Mr. Heron has some cause of complaint, some grievance against my father. I can understand his not liking the house; to tell you the truth, I don't care for it much myself. Yes; I can understand Mr. Heron's annoyance; I suppose he can see it from your house?"