“I don’t know, Oliver. I’m frightened. I’m sure it isn’t right, and yet I don’t know why.”
Maggie’s answer sounded piteous, yet somehow Frances knew that her arms were clinging about her lover’s neck.
There came a pause, then Oliver’s cheery voice. “There now! Don’t you fret yourself! You may take it from me, it is right. And I’m going in to Fordestown to-morrow to get it settled. Mind, I shan’t say another word to you till everything is ready. You won’t back out? Promise!”
Broken sounds came from Maggie that brought Frances to an abrupt realization of her position. She straightened herself and got up. Her knees were still trembling, but she forced them into action. She tottered down the passage to the nearest door and out on to the brick path that led to the garden.
The sun was going down. She passed between tall hollyhocks and sunflowers into the kitchen-garden. The lawn lay beyond. It was further than she had thought, and her strength was failing her. She came upon a rough bench set against the wall out of sight of the house and dropped down upon it with a feeling that she could go no further.
How long she had sat there she could not have said, for she was very near to fainting, when there came the sound of a man’s feet on the path beside her, and, looking up, she saw Arthur in his shirt-sleeves, a spade on his shoulder.
He stopped beside her, and drove his spade into the ground.
“Miss Thorold!” he said. “What are they all thinking of? How did you come here?”
She tried to smile in answer, but her lips felt very cold and numb. “Oh, I just—walked,” she said.
“You—walked!” Amazement and displeasure sounded in his voice. “Where is everyone?” he said. “Where is Maggie?”
He swung on his heel as if he would go in search of her, but Frances put forth an urgent hand to detain him.
“Don’t go! It—really doesn’t matter. Maggie is busy—getting the tea. I—I didn’t like to interrupt her. I give too much trouble as it is.”
Arthur growled something very deeply into his chest, but he checked his first impulse at her behest.
“Well, but what are you doing here? Why did you come out?” he asked, after a moment.
She hesitated to answer him. Then: “I dropped a letter,” she said. “It is under the cedar-tree. I just thought I would fetch it.”