VI

Enid was away again, staying for a few days with some friends or friends of the Salters; and during her absence her mother suffered from an unusual depression of spirits. In the shop it was noticed that Mrs.

Thompson seemed, if not irritable, at least rather difficult to please; but all understood that she felt lonely while deprived of the young woman's society, and all sympathised with her. a.s.sistants, who happened to meet her after closing time, taking a solitary walk outside the boundaries of the town, were especially sympathetic, and perhaps ventured to think that fashionable Miss Enid left her too much alone.

One evening after a blazing airless day, d.i.c.k Marsden, very carefully dressed in his neat blue serge, with his straw hat jauntily c.o.c.ked, came swaggering through St. Saviour's Court, and attracted, as he pa.s.sed, many feminine glances of admiration. The pretty housemaid from Adelaide Crescent ogled and languished; but he merely bowed and pa.s.sed by. He could not waste his time with her to-night. There was bigger game on foot.

At the bottom of Frederick Street he hurried down the walled pa.s.sage that leads to the railway embankment; thence through the vaultlike tunnel under the line, past the gas-works; over the iron bridge that spans the black water of the ca.n.a.l, and out into the open meadows.

These meadows, a broad flat between the ca.n.a.l and the river, belonged to the railway company; and almost every gate and post reminded one of their legal owners. Notices in metal frames somewhat churlishly announced that, "This gate will be closed and locked on one day in each year"; "There is no right of way here"; "The public, who are only admitted as visitors, will kindly act as visitors and refrain from damage, or the privilege will be withdrawn." The public, enjoying the privilege freely but not arrogantly, ranged about the pleasant fields, played foot-ball in winter, picked b.u.t.tercups and daisies in spring, and even provided themselves with Corporation seats--to be removed at a moment's notice if the Corporation should be bidden to remove them. On warm summer evenings like this, the public were princ.i.p.ally represented by lovers strolling in linked pairs, looking into each other's eyes, and making of the railway fields a road through dreamland to paradise.

Marsden walked swiftly across the parched gra.s.s, moving with strong light tread, and gazing here and there with clear keen vision. As he moved thus lightly and swiftly, looking so strong and yet so agile, he seemed a personification of masculine youth and vigour, the coa.r.s.e male animal in its pride of brutal health. Or, if one merely noticed the catlike tread, so springy and easy in its muscular power, he might suggest the graceful yet fierce beast of prey who paces through failing sunlight and falling shadows in search of the inoffensive creature that he will surely destroy.

A solitary figure moving slowly between the trees by the river--Mr.

Marsden hurried on.

"Good evening, Mrs. Thompson."--He took off his hat, and bowed very respectfully.

"Oh! Good evening, Mr. Marsden."

"You don't often come this way?"

"Oh, yes, I do," said Mrs. Thompson rather stiffly. "It is a favourite walk of mine."

"I venture to applaud your taste." And he pointed in the direction of the town. "Old Mallingbridge looks quite romantic from along here....

But the gas-works spoil the picture, don't they?"

The town looked pretty enough in the mellow evening glow. Beyond the railway embankment, where signal lamps began to show as spots of faint red and green, the cl.u.s.tered roofs mingled into solid sharp-edged ma.s.ses, and the two church towers appeared strangely high and ponderous against the infinitely pure depths of a cloudless sky. Soon a soft greyness would rise from the horizon; indistinctness, vagueness, mystery would creep over the town and the fields, blotting out the ugly gas-works, hiding the common works of men, giving the world back to nature; but there would be no real night. In these, the longest days of the year, the light never quite died.

The colour of her blue dress and of the pink roses in her toque was clearly visible, as Mrs. Thompson and the young man walked on side by side. For a minute she politely made conversation.

"I have often wondered," she said, with brisk business-like tones, "what use the railway company will eventually make of all this land."

"Ah! I wonder."

"They would not have bought it unless they had some remote object in view; and they would not have held it if the object had vanished.

Sensible people don't keep two hundred acres of land lying idle unless they have a purpose."

"No."

"It has often occurred to me--from what I have heard--that they will one day convert it into some sort of depot. There is nothing in the levels to prevent their doing so. The embankment is no height."

"I should think you have made a very shrewd guess."

"If that were to happen, the question would arise, Will it prove an injury or a benefit to the town?"

Then Mrs. Thompson ceased to make conversation; her manner became very dignified and reserved; and she carried herself stiffly--perhaps wishing to indicate by the slight change of deportment that the interview was now at an end.

But Marsden did not take the hint. He walked by her side, and soon began to talk about himself. An effort was made to check him when he entered on the subject of the great benefits that a kind hand had showered upon him, but presently Mrs. Thompson was listening without remonstrance to his voice. And her own voice, when in turn she spoke, was curiously soft and gentle.

"As this chance has come," he said humbly, "I avail myself of it. Though I could never thank you sufficiently, I have been longing for an opportunity to thank you _somehow_ for the confidence you have reposed in me."

"I'm sure you'll justify it, Mr. Marsden."

"I don't know. I'm afraid you'll think not--when you hear the dreadful confession that I have to make."

Mrs. Thompson drew in her breath, and stopped short on the footpath.

"Mr. Marsden"--she spoke quite gently and kindly--"You really must not tell me about your private affairs. Unless your confession concerns business matters--something to do with the shop--I cannot listen to it."

"Oh, it only amounts to this--but I know it will sound ungrateful ...

Mrs. Thompson, in spite of everything, of all you have done for me, I am not very happy down here."

"Indeed?" She had drawn in her breath again, and she walked on while she spoke. "Does that mean that you are thinking of leaving us?"

"Yes, I sometimes think of that."

"To better yourself?"

"Oh, no--I should never find such another situation."

"Then why are you discontented in this one?"

With the permission conveyed by her question, he described at length his queer state of mind--a man on whom fortune had smiled, a man with work that he liked, yet feeling restless and unhappy, feeling alone in the midst of a crowd, longing for sympathy, yearning for companionship.

"That's how I feel," he said sadly, after a long explanation.

Mrs. Thompson had been looking away from him, staring across the river.

She held herself rigidly erect, and she spoke now in another voice, with a tone of hardness and coldness.

"I think I recognize the symptoms, Mr. Marsden. When a young man talks like this, the riddle is easy to guess."

"Then guess it."

"Well," she said coldly, "you force me to the only supposition. You are telling me that you have fallen in love."

"Yes."

She winced almost as if he had struck her; and then the parted lips closed, her whole face a.s.sumed a stonelike dignity.

"Tell me all about it, Mr. Marsden--since you seem to wish to."

"Love is a great crisis in a man's life. It generally makes him or breaks him forever."

"I hope that fate will read kindly--in your case."

"He either fears his fate too much or his deserts are small--But, Mrs.