The Greatest Works of Marie Belloc Lowndes. Marie Belloc Lowndes
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far as a Spaniard, and a Roman Catholic, can be like Laura, she was like Laura."
Even as he spoke he had risen to his feet, and during their short walk, from the bench where they had been sitting through the trees and across the lawn, neither spoke to the other. But, as he opened the house door, he said, "Good-night. I'm not coming in now; I'm going for a walk. I haven't walked all day." He hesitated a moment: "Don't be worried—I won't say don't be frightened, for I don't believe, mother, that anything could ever frighten you—if you hear me coming in rather late. I've got to think out a rather difficult problem—something connected with my business."
"I hope Gillie hasn't been getting into any scrape since you've come home?"
But she only spoke by way of falling in with his humour. Nothing mattered to her, or to him, just now, except—Laura.
He said hastily, "Oh no, things have been going very well out there. You must remember, mother, that Baynton's scrapes never affect his work."
He spoke absently, and she realised that he wanted to be away, by himself, to think over some of the things she had said to him, and so she turned and went slowly up the staircase, and passed through into her own bedroom without turning up the light.
Walking over to her window, she gazed down into the moonlit space beneath. But she could see no moving shadow, hear no sound. Oliver had padded away across the grass, making for the lonely downs which encircled, on three sides, the house.
Before turning away from her window, Mrs. Tropenell covered her face with her hands; she was fearfully moved, shaken to the depths of her heart. For the first time Oliver had bared his soul before her. She thrilled with pride in the passionate, wayward, in a measure nobly selfless and generous human being whom she had created.
How strange, how amazing that Laura made no response to that ardent, exalted passion! But if amazing, then also, from what ought to be every point of view, how fortunate! And yet, unreasonable though it was, Mrs. Tropenell felt sharply angered with Laura, irritated by that enigmatic, self-absorbed, coldness of hers. What a poor maimed creature, to be so blind, so imperceptive, to the greatest thing in the world! Dislike, a physical distaste for the unlucky Godfrey which seemed sometimes to amount to horror, were this beautiful woman's nearest approach to passion.
Chapter VI
At Rosedean, the small, mid-Victorian house which every one going to and fro between Freshley Manor and Lawford Chase was bound to pass by, Mrs. Winslow sat in her drawing-room waiting for Godfrey Pavely.
He was coming in to see her on his way home from Pewsbury, where, at the Bank, he spent each day at least six of his waking hours.
All the summer, up to to-day, Mrs. Winslow had always had tea in the garden, but there was now a freshness in the air, and she thought they would find it more comfortable indoors than out. Still, she had opened wide the long French window, and the wind blew in, laden with pungent autumnal scents.
Katty—the old childish name still clung to her—was a very clever woman. She possessed the power of getting the utmost out of the people round her, whether they were friends, acquaintances, or servants. Her little garden was exquisitely kept, and there was no month of the year when it did not look charming. Her little house, so far as was possible on very limited means, was perfectly ordered.
Perhaps one secret of her success lay in the fact that she was able to do everything herself that she asked others to do for her. Katty was a good gardener, an excellent cook, and an exceptionally clever dressmaker. Yet she was the last woman to make the mistake so many clever people make—of keeping a dog and doing the barking oneself. Katty was willing to show those she employed exactly how she wanted a thing done, but she expected them to learn how to do it quickly and intelligently. She had no use for the idle or the stupid.
Katty Winslow was thirty-one, but she looked much younger. She was an exceedingly pretty woman, with brown eyes, a delicately clear, white and pink complexion, and curling chestnut hair. She took great pains with her appearance, and with her health. Thus she ate and drank to rule, and almost walked to rule.
Early this last summer a bit of cruel bad luck had befallen Mrs. Winslow. She had caught scarlet fever while on a visit, and for some days had been very ill. But, perhaps as a result of the long, dull convalescence, she now looked even prettier, and yes, younger, than she had done before.
The only daughter of a well-connected but exceedingly poor half-pay officer, Katherine Fenton, during a girlhood which lasted till she was four-and-twenty, had been undisputed belle of Pewsbury, and of a country-side stretching far beyond the confines of that fine old county town. Like all beauties, she had had her triumphs and her disappointments; and then, rather suddenly, she had made what had seemed the irretrievable mistake of an unhappy marriage.
Bob Winslow had been weak, vain, ill-tempered, and, to a certain extent, vicious. Thus his relations had welcomed his marriage to a clever, capable young woman, who it was supposed would make, and keep, him straight. The fact that she had no fortune had been regarded as unimportant—indeed, Bob Winslow had made on his bride what was regarded in the Pewsbury world as the splendid marriage settlement of twelve thousand pounds.
Four and a half per cent, on that sum was now Mrs. Winslow's only income, and out of that income there were still being paid off heavy divorce costs, for Bob Winslow, when it had come to the point, had put up a great fight for his Katty. Not only had he defended the case, but he had brought on his side vague counter-charges. The Judge, rather unkindly, had observed that the petitioner had been "somewhat imprudent," but even so Katty had come out of the painful ordeal very well—so much was universally allowed, even by the few people in Pewsbury who had always disliked her, and who did not think she had treated her husband well.
Godfrey and Laura Pavely had both been very kind to Katty over the matter of the divorce—indeed, Mrs. Winslow had actually stayed at Lawford Chase for many weeks during that troubled time, and Laura's countenance had been of great value to her. This was now three years ago, and, though they had nothing in common, the two women remained good friends, as well as what is sometimes less usual, good neighbours.
In nothing had Katty shown herself cleverer than in her management of Laura. In Laura Pavely's imagination Katty Winslow had her fixed place as a friend of Godfrey's childhood, and that though he was nine years older. Mrs. Pavely regarded Mrs. Winslow much as she would have done a pleasant-natured sister-in-law, and she had been glad to do all that she could for her. When some one had suggested that Katty should become Godfrey Pavely's tenant at Rosedean, Laura had thought it an excellent idea.
It was the fashion to call Rosedean ugly. The house had been built in the 'sixties, by a retired butcher and grazier, and was of red brick with white facings. But it was well built, and had far more real distinction of appearance than the Queen Anne villas which now surrounded Pewsbury. Also, Rosedean had been built on the site of an old farmhouse, and Katty's lawn was fringed with some fine old trees, while a grand old holly hedge concealed a well-stocked kitchen garden. On the other side of the house were stabling for two horses, a coach-house, and a paddock.
Katty had devoted a great deal of successful thought to the arrangement of her dwelling. She knew she could neither compete with the stately beauty of Laura's Tudor mansion, nor with the old-fashioned eighteenth-century charm of Mrs. Tropenell's house, so she wisely made up her mind that her surroundings should be simply bright, pretty and cosy. Her drawing-room was in its way a delightful room, and those walking through into it, from the rather dark, early Victorian hall, gained an instant impression of coolness in summer, of warmth in winter, of cheerfulness and comfort at all times.
No one but Katty herself knew the trouble to which she had been to get the exact pattern of calendered chintz which she had made up her mind to obtain. Katty also kept to herself the amount which she had spent, out of her small reserve, on the thoroughly good, comfortable easy-chairs, of varying shape, height, and depth, which played such an important, if unobtrusive, part