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Hugh moved slowly to the window, and leaned his throbbing forehead against the stone mullion. He was still weak, and the encounter with Lady Newhaven had shaken him. "What did he mean?" he said to himself, bewildered and suspicious. "'Perhaps I should be staying at Westhope later on! But, of course, I shall never go there again. He knows that as well as I do. What did he mean?"
She had been unable to believe that if Lord Newhaven had drawn the short lighter he would remain quietly here over the dreadful morrow, under the same roof as Teddy and Pauly. Oh, surely nothing horrible could happen so near them! Yet he seemed to have no intention of leaving Westhope. Then, perhaps, he had not drawn the short lighter, after all.
He rose slowly to his feet, and stood motionless. "He hates her," said Lord Newhaven to himself. And he removed his glance and came forward. "You were looking for me, Violet?" he remarked. "I have no doubt you are wishing to return home. We will go at once." He threw away his cigarette. "Well, good-bye, Scarlett, in case we don't meet again. I dare say you will pay Westhope a visit later on.
"While you are under this roof it seems almost impossible to see you, unless we are close to it," and she touched the sloping ceiling with her hand. "And yet I came to Westhope, and I am going on to Wilderleigh, partly in order to be near you." Hester shook her head.
"Having noticed that a mother I mean a young mother is never really happy in the absence of her children, and that their affection makes up for the carelessness of their father, may I ask, Violet, what day you wish to return to Westhope?" he said one morning at breakfast. "Any day," she replied. "I am as miserable in one place as in another."
The temperance meeting was to take place at seven o'clock, and possibly Rachel may have been biassed in favor of that entertainment by the hope of a quiet half-hour with Hester in her own room. At any rate, she secured it. When they were alone Rachel produced Lady Newhaven's note. "Do come to Westhope," she said.
Rachel left Westhope Abbey the day after Lord Newhaven's funeral, and returned to London. And the day after that Hugh came to see her, and proposed, and was accepted. He had gone over in his mind a hundred times all that he should say to her on that occasion.
But sometimes things depend on others besides me. Then I may be beaten." They were passing Westhope Abbey, wrapped in a glory of sunset and mist. "Did you know Miss West was there?" Dick said, suddenly. "No," said Hester, surprised. "I thought she was in London." "She came down last night to be with Lady Newhaven who is not well. Miss West is a great friend of yours, isn't she?" "Yes."
These expeditions to Westhope were a great event. At two o'clock exactly the three children rushed down-stairs, Regie bearing in his hand his tin money-box, in which a single coin could be heard to leap. Hester produced a bright threepenny-piece for each child, one of which was irretrievably buried in Regie's money-box, and the other two immediately lost in the mat in the pony-carriage.
On his bicycle on the smooth-shaven lawn was Dick, wheeling slowly in and out among the stone-edged flower-beds, an apricot in each broad palm, while he discoursed in a dispassionate manner to the two excited little boys who were making futile rushes for the apricots. The governess and Rachel were looking on. Rachel had arrived at Westhope the day before from Southminster.
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