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Who could have supposed that this shabby old person, whom he had endeavoured to snub, was the great Lady Tintern? "She didn't find me," said the old lady. "I was in bed long before Sarah came back. I presume this young gentleman escorted her home?" "I always send a servant across for Sarah whenever she stays at all late at Barracombe, and always have," said Mrs. Hewel, in hurried self-defence.
"I hope you sent the carriage round to the stables?" said Sir Timothy. "No, no; we mustn't stop a minute. But I couldn't help just popping in so very long since I've seen you and all this happening at once," said Mrs. Hewel. She was a large, stout woman, with breathless manner and plaintive voice.
"Colonel Hewel wouldn't give in to that," said Peter. "He's rather a one-idea'd man," John agreed. "But if you asked him whether he'd sacrifice all the sport he's ever likely to enjoy, for one chance to distinguish himself in action why, you're a soldier, and you know best what he'd say." Peter's brow cleared.
Hewel and Sarah, repented himself for a moment that he had come at all when he beheld this stranger, who regarded him with a pair of dark eyes that seemed several times too large for her small, wrinkled face, and who merely nodded her head in response to his awkward salutation. "Ah!" said the old lady, rather as though she were talking to herself, "so this is the returned hero, no doubt.
"She is to come out this very season; that is why I took her to the Gilberts', to prepare her for the great plunge," said Mrs. Hewel, not intending to be funny. "It will be a change for Sarah, such a hoyden as she has always been. But my aunt won't wait once she has got a fancy into her head; though the child is only seventeen."
Hewel feared her outspokenness would offend Lady Mary, but she could perceive only pleasure and amusement in the face of her hostess, between whom and the worldly old woman there sprang up a friendliness that was almost instantaneous. "And you are like a Cosway miniature yourself, my dear," said Lady Tintern, peering out of her dark eyes at Lady Mary's delicate white face.
It's full early, I know, but it's such a chance for Sarah that's partly what I came about. After the trouble she's been all her life to me, and all just going to that excellent school in Germany here's my aunt wanting to adopt her, or as good as adopt her Lady Tintern, you know." Everybody who knew Mrs. Hewel knew also that Lady Tintern was her aunt; and Lady Tintern was a very great lady indeed.
"Oh, Sarah, will you cease chattering?" cried her mother. "I hope you have good news of your sons in South Africa, Mrs. Hewel," said the canon, briskly advancing to the rescue. Mrs. Hewel's voice changed. "Thank you, canon; they were all right when we heard last. Tom is in Natal, so I feel happier about him; but Willie, of course, is in the thick of it all and the news to-day isn't reassuring."
She is supposed to be going to do so much for Sarah, but if she takes it into her head to oppose the marriage, I can do nothing with her. I never could." "I am very far from minding," said Lady Mary. "But it is Sarah on whom everything depends. What does she say, I wonder? What does she want?" "It's no use asking me what Sarah wants," said Mrs. Hewel, plaintively.
Hewel, turning to Lady Mary as soon as her aunt was out of hearing. "What Mr. Crewys must think of her, I cannot guess. She always says she had to exercise so much reticence as an ambassadress, that she has given her tongue a holiday ever since. But there is only one possible subject they can have to talk about. And how can we be sure her interference won't spoil everything?
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