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You know Manorwater, don't you, George?" said the lady to her husband, with the boldness which comes from the use of a peer's name without the handle. "Oh yes, I know him well. I have met him at the Liberal Club dinners, and I was his chairman once when he spoke on Irish affairs. A delightful man!" "I suppose they would have a pleasant house-party when you were here, my dear?" asked the lady.
He has the same endearing manners and irresponsible mind. I had to fish him out of several rock-pools after you left." Alice laughed, and Lady Manorwater said in wonder, "I didn't know you had met Lewie before, Alice." "Miss Wishart and I forgathered accidentally at the Midburn yesterday," said the man. "Oh, you went there," cried the aggrieved Arthur, "and you never told me!
She had never travelled; the world of men and things was merely a name to her, and a girlhood, lonely and brightened chiefly by the companionship of books, had not given her self-confidence. She had casually met Lady Manorwater at some political meeting in her father's house, and the elder woman had taken a strong liking to the quiet, abstracted child.
"What can he know about such things? A wandering dilettante, the worst type of the pseudo-culture of our universities. He must see all things through the spectacles of his upbringing." Fortunately he spoke in a low voice, but Lord Manorwater caught the name. "You are talking about Lewie," he said; and then to the table at large, "do you know that Lewie is home? I saw him to-day."
Lady Manorwater was all she had pictured her a dear, whimsical, untidy creature, with odd shreds of cleverness and a heart of gold. She liked the boy Arthur, and the spectacled people seemed harmless. Bertha she was prepared to adore, for behind the languor and wit she saw a very kindly and capable young woman fashioned after her own heart. But of all she liked Lord Manorwater best.
George, Lady Manorwater, and the two Miss Afflints sought diligently for a camping-ground, which they finally found by a clear spring of water on the skirts of a great grey rock. Meanwhile, Alice Wishart and Lewis, having an inordinate love of high places, set out for the ridge summit, and reached it to find a wind blowing from the far Gled valley and cooling the hot air.
Lord Manorwater took in Miss Afflint, and Alice fell to the dark man with the monosyllabic name. He had a way of bowing over his hand which slightly repelled the girl, who had no taste for elaborate manners. His first question, too, displeased her. He asked her if she was one of the Wisharts of some unpronounceable place. She replied briefly that she did not know.
Wratislaw's presence at first cast a certain awe on the assembly. His name was so painfully familiar, so consistently abused, that it was hard to refrain from curiosity. Lady Manorwater, an ancient ally, greeted him effusively, and Alice cast shy glances at this strong man with the kind smile and awkward manners. The truth is that Wratislaw was acutely nervous. With Mr.
Lewis had forgotten his misfortunes, she told herself, and in the easy way of the half-hearted found in bodily fatigue a drug for a mind but little in need of it. One afternoon Lady Manorwater came over the lawn waving a letter. "Do you want to go and picnic to-morrow, Alice?" she cried.
Lady Manorwater, accustomed to the vagaries of her nephew, led the guests over the place and found to her horror that it seemed undwelt in. The hall was in order, and the tart and rosy lairds of Etterick looked down from their Raeburn canvases on certain signs of habitation; but the drawing-rooms were dingy with coverings and all the large rooms were in the same tidy disarray.
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