Meg Hawkes, that is — is put there to stop us going through; for I often spied the smoke beyond the windmill,” observed Milly.
Cousin Monica listened with interest, and nodded silently,
I was very much shocked. It seemed to me quite incredible. I think Lady Knollys read my amazement and my exalted estimate of the heinousness of the procedure in my face, for she said —
“You know we can’t quite condemn Silas till we have heard what he has to say. He may have done it in ignorance; or, it is just possible, he may have the right.”
“Quite true. He may have the right to cut down trees at Bartram–Haugh. At all events, I am sure he thinks he has,” I echoed.
The fact was, that I would not avow to myself a suspicion of Uncle Silas. Any falsehood there opened an abyss beneath my feet into which I dared not look.
“And now, dear girls, good-night. You must be tired. We breakfast at a quarter past nine — not too early for you, I know.”
And so saying, she kissed us, smiling, and was gone.
I was so unpleasantly occupied, for some time after her departure, with the knaveries said to be practised among the dense cover of the Windmill Wood, that I did not immediately recollect that we had omitted to ask her any particulars about her guests.
“Who can Mary be?” asked Milly.
“Cousin Monica says she’s engaged to be married, and I think I heard the Doctor call her Lady Mary, and I intended asking her ever so much about her; but what she told us about cutting down the trees, and all that, quite put it out of my head. We shall have time enough to-morrow, however, to ask questions. I like her very much, I know.”
“And I think,” said Milly, “it is to Mr. Carysbroke she’s to be married.”
“Do you?” said I, remembering that he had sat beside her for more than a quarter of an hour after tea in very close and low-toned conversation; “and have you any particular reason?” I asked.
“Well, I heard her once or twice call him ‘dear,’ and she called him his Christian name, just like Lady Knollys did — Ilbury, I think — and I saw him gi’ her a sly kiss as she was going up-stairs.”
I laughed.
“Well, Milly,” I said, “I remarked something myself, I thought, like confidential relations; but if you really saw them kiss on the staircase, the question is pretty well settled.”
“Ay, lass.”
“You’re not to say lass.”
“Well, Maud, then. I did see them with the corner of my eye, and my back turned, when they did not think I could spy anything, as plain as I see you now.”
I laughed again; but I felt an odd pang — something of mortification — something of regret; but I smiled very gaily, as I stood before the glass, un-making my toilet preparatory to bed.
“Maud — Maud — fickle Maud! — What, Captain Oakley already superseded! and Mr. Carysbroke — oh! humiliation — engaged,” So I smiled on, very much vexed; and being afraid lest I had listened with too apparent an interest to this impostor, I sang a verse of a gay little chanson, and tried to think of Captain Oakley, who somehow had become rather silly.
Chapter 43.
News at Bartram Gate
MILLY AND I, thanks to our early Bartram hours, were first down next morning; and so soon as Cousin Monica appeared we attacked her.
“So Lady Mary is the fiancée of Mr. Carysbroke,” said I, very cleverly; “and I think it was very wicked of you to try and involve me in a flirtation with him yesterday.”
“And who told you that, pray?” asked Lady Knollys, with a pleasant little laugh.
“Milly and I discovered it, simple as we stand here,” I answered.
“But you did not flirt with Mr. Carysbroke, Maud, did you?” she asked.
“No, certainly not; but that was not your doing, wicked woman, but my discretion. And now that we know your secret, you must tell lus all about her, and all about him; and int the first place, what is her name — Lady Mary what?” I demanded.
“Who would have thought you so cunning? Two country misses — two little nuns from the cloisters of Bartram! Well, I suppose I must answer. It is vain trying to hide anything from you; but how on earth did you find it out?”
“We’ll tell you that presently, but you shall first tell us who she is,” I persisted.
“Well, that I will, of course, without compulsion. She is Lady Mary Carysbroke,” said Lady Knollys.
“A relation of Mr. Carysbroke’s,” I asserted.
“Yes, a relation; but who told you he was Mr. Carysbroke?” asked Cousin Monica.
“Milly told me, when we say him in the Windmill Wood.”
“And who told you, Milly?”
“It was L’Amour,” answered Milly, with her blue eyes very wide open.
“What does the child mean? L’Amour! You don’t mean love?” exclaimed Lady Knollys, puzzled in her turn.
“I mean old Wyat; she told me and the Governor.”
“You’re not to say that,” I interposed.
“You mean your father?” suggested Lady Knollys.
“Well, yes; father told her, and so I knew him.”
“What could he mean?” exclaimed Lady Knollys, laughing, as it were, in soliloquy; “and I did not mention his name, I recollect now. He recognised you, and you him, when you came into the room yesterday; and now you must tell me how you discovered that he and Lady Mary were to be married.”
So Milly restated her evidence, and Lady Knollys laughed unaccountably heartily; and she said —
“They will be so confounded! but they deserve it; and, remember, I did not say so.”
“Oh! we acquit you.”
“All I say is, such a deceitful, dangerous pair of girls — all things considered — I never heard of before,” exclaimed Lady Knollys. “There’s no such thing as conspiring in your presence.”
“Good morning. I hope you slept well.” She was addressing the lady and gentleman who were just entering the room fro the conservatory. “You’ll hardly sleep so well to-night, when you have learned what eyes are upon you. Here are two very pretty detectives who have found out your secret, and entirely by your imprudence and their own cleverness have discovered that you are a pair of betrothed lovers, about to ratify your vows at the hymeneal alter. I assure you I did not tell of you; you betrayed yourselves. If you will talk in that confidential way on sofas, and cal one another stealthily by your Christian names, and actually kiss at the foot of the stairs, while a clever detective is scaling them, apparently with her back toward you, you must only take the consequences, and be known prematurely as the hero and heroine of the forthcoming paragraph in the ‘Morning Post.’”
Milly and I were horribly confounded, but Cousin Monica was resolved to place us all upon the least formal terms possible, and I believe she had set about it in the right way.
“And now, girls, I am going to make a counter-discovery, which, I fear, a little conflicts with yours. This Mr. Carysbroke is Lord Ilbury, brother of this Lady Mary; and it is all my fault for not having done my honours better; but you see what clever match-making little creatures they are.”
“You can’t think how flattered I am at being made the subject of a theory, even a mistaken