"Will you go, Dr. Gregg?" she cried pa.s.sionately, pointing to the door. His taunts were torture to her. "Will you go, or do you wish to stay and insult me further?"

"I wish to say one thing, and I am going to say it," he replied, nodding triumphantly. "You are pretty proud of your capture, but you need not be. He will not be much of a match when we have stripped him of the living he has no right to, and shown him the detected swindler he is! Wait! Wait a little, Miss Bonamy, and when your parson is ruined, as he will be before three months are out, high as he holds his head now, perhaps you will be sorry that you did not take my offer. Why," he added scornfully, "I should say you are the only person in the parish who does not know he has no more right where he is than I have."

"Go!" she said, pointing to the door. Her face was white now.

"So I will when I have said one more word----"

"You won't say it!" cried a sharp voice behind him. "You will go now!" He shot round, and there was Daintry with her hand on the door. Her hair was in disorder, her cheeks were flushed, her greenish-gray eyes were aglow with anger. He saw that she had overheard something of what had pa.s.sed, and he began to tremble. He had said more than he intended. "You will go now, as Kate tells you," she cried, "I will not have----"

"Leave the room, child!" he snarled, stamping his foot.

"I shan't!" she retorted fiercely. "And if you do not go before I count three I will fetch the dogs."

Dr. Gregg made a movement as if he would have put her out of the room. But her presence had a little sobered him, and he stopped. "Look here," he said.

"One!" cried Daintry, who knew well that the doctor had a particular dislike for Snorum, and that the dog's presence was at any time enough to drive him from the house.

He turned and looked at Kate. She had gone to the window and was gazing out, her back to him, her figure proud and scornful. "Miss Bonamy," he said.

"Two!" cried Daintry. "Are you going, or shall I fetch Snorum?"

With a muttered oath he took up his hat and went down the stairs and out into the street. There at the door he stood a moment, grinding his teeth, as the full sense of the calamity which had befallen him came home to him. He had stooped and been rejected--had been rejected by Bonamy's daughter. He walked away, and still his anger did not decrease, but all the same he began to be a little thankful that the child had interrupted him. Had he gone on he might have said too much. As it was, he had an idea that perhaps he had said more than was quite prudent. And this had presently a wonderful effect in the way of sobering him.

CHAPTER XII.

THE RECTOR IS UNGRATEFUL.

It was tea-time at Mr. Bonamy's; five-thirty, that is, for the lawyer knew nothing of four o'clock tea. He would have stared had he been invited into the drawing-room to take it, or had his daughters produced one of those dainty afternoon tea-tables which were in use at the Town House, and asked him to support his cup and saucer on his knee. Compromises found no favor with him. Tea was a meal--he had always so considered it; and he liked to have the dining-room table laid for it. Possibly Kate, had she enjoyed more of her own way, would have altered this, as she would certainly have reformed the drawing-room. But Mr. Bonamy, who was in many things an indulgent father, was conservative in some. Four o'clock tea, and a daily use of the drawing-room, were refinements which he had always regarded as peculiar to a certain set; and in his pride he would not appear to ape its ways or affect to belong to it.

Almost to the moment he came into the room, which was as bright and cheerful as gaslight and firelight could make it. Laying some letters under a weight on the mantel-shelf, he turned round and stood with his back to the fire-place. "How is the child?" he asked. "Has she gone to bed?"

"Yes," Kate answered, lifting the lid of the teapot and looking in; "I think she will be all right after a night's rest."

"You do not look very bright yourself, Kate," he remarked, as he sat down.

Her cheek flushing, she made the old old woman's excuse. "I have a little headache," she said. "It will be better when I have had my tea."

He took a piece of toast and b.u.t.tered it deliberately. "Gregg came and saw her?" he asked.

"Yes. He said it was only a sick headache, and would pa.s.s off."

The lawyer made no comment at the moment, but went on eating his toast. But presently he looked up. "What is the matter, Kitty?" he said, not unkindly.

Her face burning, she peered again quite unnecessarily into the teapot. Then she said hurriedly, "I have something I think I ought to tell you, father. Dr. Gregg has asked me to marry him!"

"The deuce he has!" Mr. Bonamy answered in unmistakable surprise. For a moment he did not know what to say, or how to feel about it. If any one had informed the Claversham people that the lawyer's moroseness was not natural to the man, but the product of many slights, the informant would have lost his pains. Yet in a great measure this was so; and first among the things which of late years had exercised Mr. Bonamy a keen anxiety for his daughters' happiness had place. He had never made any move toward procuring them the society of their equals; nay, he had done many things in his pride calculated rather to prolong their exclusion. Yet all the time he had bitterly resented it, and had spent many a wakeful night in pondering gloomily over the dull lives to which they were condemned. Now--strange that he had never thought of it before--as far as Kate was concerned, he saw a way of escape opening. Gregg had a fair practice, some private means, a good house, a tolerable position in the town. In a word, he was perfectly eligible. Yet Mr. Bonamy was not altogether pleased. He had no fastidious objection to the doctor. It did not occur to him that the doctor was not a gentleman. But he did know that he did not like him.

So the lawyer, after one exclamation of surprise, was for a moment silent. Then he asked, "Well Kate, and what did you say?"

"I said No," Kate answered in a low voice.

"He is a well-to-do man," Mr. Bonamy said, slowly stirring his tea. "Not that you need think of that only. But you are not likely to know many people who could make you more comfortable. I believe he is skilful in his profession. It is a chance, girl, not to be lightly thrown away."

"I could not--I could not marry him," Kate stammered, her agitation now very apparent. "I do not like him. You would not have me----"

"I would not have you marry any one you do not like!" Mr. Bonamy replied, almost sternly. "But are you sure that you know your own mind?"

"Quite," Kate said, with a shudder.

"Hum! Well, well; there is no more to be said, then," he answered. "Don't cry, girl."

Kate managed to obey him. And in a moment, bravely steadying her voice, she asked, "What is this about Mr. Lindo, father? I heard that he had turned the sheep out of the churchyard."

The lawyer thought she asked the question in order to change the subject; and he answered briskly, with less reserve perhaps than he might have exercised at another time. "It is quite true," he said. "He is making a fool of himself, as I expected. You cannot put old heads on young shoulders. However, what has happened has convinced me of one thing."

"What is that?" she asked in a low voice.

"That he does not know himself that he has no right here."

"But has he none?" she murmured, in the same tone. He noticed that her manner was conscious and embarra.s.sed; but naturally he set this down to the former topic. He thought she was trying to avoid a scene, and he admired her for it.

"Well, I doubt if he has," he answered, "though I am not quite sure that people have not lit upon a mare's nest. It is the talk of the town that there was some mistake in his presentation, and there is a disreputable fellow hanging on his heels, and apparently living on him, who is said to be in the secret, and to be making the most of it. I do not believe that now, however," the lawyer continued, falling into a brown study and speaking as much to himself as to her. "If he knew he were insecure he would live more quietly than he does. All the same, he is likely to learn a lesson he will not forget."

"How?" she asked, her spoon tinkling tremulously against the side of the cup, and her head bent low over it, as though she saw something interesting in the lees.

Mr. Bonamy laughed in his out-of-door manner. "How?" he said grimly. "Well, if there be any mistake he is going the right way to suffer by it. If he kept quiet, and went softly, and made no enemies, very little might be said and nothing done when the mistake came out. But as it is--well, he has made a good many enemies, and the chances are that he will lose the best berth he will ever get into. It will be bad for him, but the better for the parish."

"Don't you think," said Kate very gently, "that he means well?"

Mr. Bonamy grunted. "Perhaps so; but he does not go the right way to do it," he rejoined. "His good fortune has turned his head, and he has put himself in the hands of the Hammond set, and that does not do at Claversham." The lawyer ended with a harsh laugh, which said more plainly than any words, that it never would do while John Bonamy was church warden at Claversham.

"It seems a pity," Kate said, almost under her breath. She had never raised her eyes from the tea-tray since the subject was introduced, and if her father had looked closely he would have seen that her very ears were scarlet. "Could you not give him a word of warning?"

"I!" said the lawyer, with asperity. "Certainly not; why should I?"

Kate did not say, and her father, with another impatient word or two, rose from the table, and presently went out. She rang the bell mechanically and had the table cleared, and in the same mood turned to the fire and, putting her feet on the fender, began to brood over the coals, which were burning red and low in the grate.

Five time's--five times only, counting the Oxford escapade as one, she had spoken to him; and they--"they" meant Claversham, for it was her chief misery to believe that the whole town was talking of her--had made this of it! They had noticed his attentions, and had seen them scornfully withdrawn when he learned who she was. Oh, it was cowardly of him--cowardly! And yet--and yet--so her thoughts ran, taking a fresh turn--had he ever said a word or cast a glance at her which meant anything--which all the world might not have heard and seen? No, never. And, with that, her anger changed its course and ran against Gregg. Him she would never forgive. It was his evil imagination, his base suspicions, which had built it all up; and Mr. Lindo was no more to blame--though she a little despised him for his weakness and conventionality--than she was herself.

It seemed most sad that he should be ruined because no one would say a word to warn him. Brooding over the fire, she felt a girl's pity for the young man's ill-fortune. She forgot the last month, during which she had spoken to him but once--and then he had seemed embarra.s.sed and anxious to be gone--and remembered only how frank and gay he had been in the first blush of his hopes at Oxford, how pleasantly he had smiled, how well and yet how quaintly his new dignity had sat upon him, and how navely he had shaken it off at times and shown himself a boy, with a boy's love of fun and mischief. Or, again, she remembered how thoughtful he had been for them, how considerate, how much at home in scenes new to them, with how lordly an air he had provided for their comfort. Oh, it was a pity--a grievous pity, that his hopes should end in such a disaster as Mr. Bonamy foretold! And all because no one would say a friendly word to him!

The next day (Tuesday) was a wet day--a sleety, bl.u.s.terous winter day, and she did not go out. But on the Wednesday, as the rector crossed the churchyard after reading the Litany, he saw Miss Bonamy pa.s.sing his door. He fancied, with a little astonishment--for she had constantly evinced the same avoidance of intimacy with him which had at first piqued him--that she slightly checked her pace so as to meet him. And, to tell the truth, the rector was half pleased and half annoyed. He had hardened his heart and set his face to crush Mr. Bonamy.

He had in his pocket a letter from the lawyer, warning him that, unless he altered his course, a writ would be served upon him. And a dozen times to-day he had in his mind called the church warden hard names. But yet he was not absolutely ill-pleased to see Miss Bonamy. He felt a certain excitement in the rencontre under the circ.u.mstances. He would meet her magnanimously, and of course she would ignore the quarrel. He hated Mr. Bonamy for a puritanical old pettifogger; but that was no reason why he should be rude to his daughter.

Lindo saw, when he was a few paces from her and had raised his hat, that her face expressed much more emotion, if not embarra.s.sment, than seemed to be called for by the occasion. And naturally this communicated itself to him. "I have not seen you for a long time," he said, as he shook hands. Perhaps the worst thing he could have said under the circ.u.mstances.

She a.s.sented, however. "No," she said, sloping her umbrella behind her so as to keep off the wind and a half-frozen drizzle with which it was laden. And, as she did this, her eyes met his gallantly. "But I am glad, Mr. Lindo," she continued, "that I have met you to-day, because I have something I want to say to you."

On the instant he vowed within himself that it would be in bad taste, in the worst taste, if she referred to the quarrel or to parish matters. And he answered very frigidly. "What is that, Miss Bonamy?" he said. "Pray speak on."

She detected the change of tone, and for a second her gray eyes flashed. But she had come to say something. She had counted the cost, and nothing he could do should prevent her saying it. She had been awake all night, torturing herself with imagining the things he would think of her. But she was not to be deterred by the reality. "Do you know, Mr. Lindo," she said steadily, "what is being said of you in the town?"

"A good many hard things." he answered half lightly and half bitterly. "So I have reason to believe. But I do not think that they will affect me one way or the other, Miss Bonamy."

"And so," she answered, with spirit, "you will not thank any one for telling you of them? That is what you mean, is it not?"

He was very sore, and her interference annoyed him excessively--possibly because he valued her good opinion. He would not deny the feeling she imputed to him. "Possibly I do mean something of that kind," he said. "Where ignorance is bliss--you know."

"Yet there is one thing," she replied, "being said of you in the town, which I think you should be told, Mr. Lindo. Your friends probably will not hear it, or, if they do, they will not venture to tell you of it."

"Indeed," he answered. "You pique my curiosity."

"It is being commonly said," she rejoined, looking down for the first time, "that you have no right to the living, and were appointed by some mistake, or--or fraud."

He did not answer her at once. He was so completely taken by surprise that he stood looking at her with his mouth open. His first and better impulse was to laugh heartily. But what he did was to say in a very quiet way, "Indeed. That is being said, is it? It is quite true I had not heard it. May I ask, Miss Bonamy, if you had it from your father?"

If his tone had been cold before, it was freezing now. But she was not to be daunted, and she answered with considerable presence of mind, "I heard from my father that that was the report in the town, but I also heard him express his disbelief in the greater part of it."

"I am much obliged to him," said the rector through his closed teeth. "He did not think I had been guilty of fraud, then?"

"No, he did not," Kate muttered, her voice faltering for the first time.

"Indeed. I am much obliged to him."

He had received it even worse than she had expected. It was terrible to go on in the face of such scorn and incredulity. But to stop there was to have done only evil, as Kate knew, and she persevered. "I have one more thing I wish to say, if you will permit me," she continued steadying her voice and striving to speak in as indifferent a manner as possible.

He bowed, his face hard and contemptuous.

The wind had shifted slightly, and, to protect herself from the small rain which was falling, she changed her position, so as to face the churchyard. He saw only her profile. If he looked proud, involuntarily he remarked how proud she looked also--how pure and cold was the line of her features, softened only by the roundness of her chin. "I am told," she said in a low voice, "that the fewer enemies you make, and the more quietly you proceed, the greater will be the chance of your remaining when the mistake is found out. Pray," she said more sharply, for he had raised his hand, as if to interrupt, "have patience for a moment, Mr. Lindo. I shall not trouble you again. I only wish you to know that those who have cause to dislike you--I do not mean my father, there are others--are congratulating themselves that you are playing into their hands, and consider that every disagreement between you and any part of the parish is a weapon given them, to be used when the crisis comes."

"When the mistake is found out?" he said, grimly repeating her words. "Or the fraud? But I forgot--Mr. Bonamy does not believe in that!"

"You understand me, I think," she said, ignoring the latter part of his speech.

"And may I ask," he continued, his eyes on her face, "who my ill-wishers are?"

"I do not think that matters," she replied.

"Then, at least, why am I indebted to you for this warning?"

His tone as he asked the question was as contemptuous as before. And yet Kate felt that this she must answer. To refuse to answer it, or to evade it, would be to lay herself open to surmises of all kinds.

"I thought it a pity that you should fall into a trap unwarned," she answered, looking away at the yew-trees. "And it seemed to me that, for several reasons, your friends were not likely to warn you."

"There, I quite agree with you," he retorted quickly. "My friends would not have believed in the trap."

"Perhaps not," she said, outwardly unmoved.

"I am astonished that you did; I am astonished that you should have believed anything so absurd, Miss Bonamy!" he said severely. At that moment, as it happened, two people came round the flank of the church. The one was the curate; the other was Dr. Gregg. Kate looked at them, and her face flamed. The rector looked, and felt only relief. They would afford him an excuse to be gone. "Ah, there is Mr. Clode," he said indifferently. "I was just looking for him. I think, if you will excuse me, Miss Bonamy, I will seize the opportunity of speaking to him now." And raising his hat, with a formality which one of the men took to be a pretence and a sham, he left her and walked across to them.

CHAPTER XIII.

LAURA'S PROVISO.

When a mine has been laid, and the fuse lit, and the tiny thread of smoke has begun to curl upward, it is apt to seem a long time--so I am told by those who have stood and watched such things--before the earth flies into the air. So it seemed to Stephen Clode. The curate looked to see an explosion follow immediately upon the rector taking the decisive step of turning out the sheep. But week after week elapsed, until Christmas was some time gone, and nothing happened. Mr. Bonamy, with a lawyer's prudence, wrote another letter, and for a time, perhaps out of regard to the season, held his hand. There was talk of Lord Dynmore's return, but no sign of it as yet. And Dr. Gregg snapped and snarled among his intimates, but in public was pretty quiet.

It was noticeable, however, that the rector was invited to none of the whist-parties which were a feature of the town life at this season; and to those who looked closely into things and listened to the gossip of the place it was plain that the breach between him and the bulk of his parishioners was growing wider. The rector was much with the Hammonds, and carried his head high--higher than ever, one of his parishioners thought since a talk she had had with him in the churchyard. The habit of looking down upon a certain section of the town, because they were not quite so refined as himself, because they were narrow in their opinions, or because the Hammonds looked down upon them, was growing upon him. And he yielded to it none the less because he was all the time dissatisfied with himself. He was conscious that he was not acting up to the standard he had set himself on coming to the town. He was not living the life he had hoped to live. He visited his poor and gave almost too largely in the hard weather, and was diligent at services and sermon-writing. But there was a flaw in his life, and he knew it; and yet he had not the strength to set it right.

All this Mr. Clode might have observed--he was sagacious enough; but for the time his judgment was clouded by his jealousy, and in his impatience he fancied that the rector's troubles were pa.s.sing away. Each visit Lindo paid to the Town House, each time his name was coupled with Laura Hammond's, as people were beginning to couple it, chafed the curate's sore afresh and kept it raw. So that even Stephen Clode's self-restraint and command of temper began to fail him, and more than once he said sharp things to his commanding-officer, which made Lindo open his eyes in unaffected surprise.

Clode began to feel indeed that the position was becoming intolerable; and though he had long ago determined that the waiting-game was the one he ought to play, he presently--in the first week of the new year--changed his mind.

Lindo had announced his intention of devoting the afternoon--it was Wednesday--to his district; and, taking advantage of this, the curate thought he might indulge himself in a call at the Town House without fear of unpleasant interruption. He would not admit that he had any other motive in going there than just to pay a visit--which he certainly owed. But in truth he was in a dangerous humor. And, alas! when he had been ushered along the thickly carpeted pa.s.sage and entered the drawing-room, there, comfortably seated in the half-light before the fire, the tea-things gleaming beside them, were Laura and the rector!

The curate's face grew dark. He almost felt that Lindo, who had really been driven in by the rain, had betrayed him; and he shook hands with Laura and sat down in complete silence, unable to trust himself to answer the rector's cheery greeting by so much as a word. It was all he could do to answer "Thank you," when Miss Hammond asked him if he would take tea. She, of course, saw that something was amiss, and felt not a little awkward between her two friends; but luckily the rector remained ignorant and at his ease--he saw nothing, and went on talking. It was the best thing he could have done, only, unfortunately, he had to do with a man whom nothing in his present mood could please.

"I am glad you have turned up at this particular moment," Lindo said. "Let me have your opinion. Miss Hammond says that I am pauperizing the town by giving too much away."

"If you are half as generous at our bazaar on the 10th," she retorted, "you will do twice as much good."

"Or half as much evil!" he said lightly.

"Have it that way, if you like," she answered laughing.

The curate set his teeth together in impotent rage. They were so easy, so unconstrained, on such excellent terms with one another. When Laura, who was secretly quaking, held out the toast to him and let her eyes dwell for an instant on his, he looked away stubbornly. "Were you asking my opinion?" he said in a voice he vainly strove to render cold and dispa.s.sionate.

"To be sure," said the rector, stirring his tea and enjoying himself. "Miss Hammond is not impartial. She is bia.s.sed by her bazaar."

If he had known the strong pa.s.sions that were at work on the other side of the tea-table! But the curate had his back to the shaded lamp, and only a fitful gleam of fire-light betrayed even to Laura's suspicious eyes that he was not himself. Yet, when he spoke, Lindo involuntarily started, so thinly veiled was the sneer in his tone. "Well, there is one pensioner, I think, you would do well to strike off your list," he said. "He does not do you much credit."

"Who is that? Old Martin at the Gas House?"