where ancient brick has disappeared beneath the thronged faces, diversely dazzling, of the brown, orange, tawny and sulphur nasturtiums; the retired seat beneath the tulip-tree. All, all are empty. Nothing remains but the kiosk, and Peggy feels sure that Prue is not in the kiosk.
Thither, however, they bend their steps; but before they reach it a turn of the walk reveals to them two seated figures. One is certainly the Prue whom they seek; Prue sitting upon an uncomfortable garden bench, on which nobody ever sits – on which she herself has never sat before. But is it conceivable that, since dinner, Freddy can have doubled in size, can have lost all the hair off the top of his head, and have exchanged his cambric shirt-front and his diamond and turquoise studs for a double-breasted waistcoat buttoned to the chin?
With a feeling akin to stupefaction Peggy realises that it is Mr. Evans, and not Freddy, who is Prue's companion. As they approach he rises reluctantly. He had much rather that they had not come. Prue never wants to talk to him. She lets him sit and silently ruminate and dream beside her; a cigarette between his lips, and a blessed oblivion of dissenters, boys' schooling, girls' ugly faces, rickety baby, Christmas bills, invading his lulled brain. Prue neither rises nor changes her position. Her arms lie listlessly on her lap, and she is staring up at Cassiopeia, the one constellation for ever exalted above its fellows by having had Freddy Ducane for its exhibitor.
'Do you think you are quite wise to sit out here, with nothing over your shoulders?' asks Margaret, stooping over her sister, and speaking in a tone of such exceeding gentleness as positively to astound Talbot, who had not calculated upon the existence of such tones in a voice which has conscientiously employed only its harsher keys for his benefit.
'I am not cold,' replies Prue dully.
'How long have you been here? Long?'
'I do not know.'
'We were too comfortable to take note of time, were not we, Miss Prue?' says Mr. Evans, with a sigh for his lost peace. 'A southern moon, is not it?' to Talbot.
'Quite long enough, I am sure,' rejoined Peggy, putting her hand persuasively on her sister's shoulder. 'Come with us! come!'
Talbot cannot help hearing that 'Come!' even while exchanging original remarks upon the stars of the southern hemisphere with the vicar; nor can he further help speculating as to whether, if that 'Come!' were addressed to himself, and were inviting him to follow it to Lapland, to Hong Kong, or to some yet hotter place, he should have the force of mind to decline. But at all events Prue has.
'I had rather stay here,' replies she, sotto voce, with an accent of miserable irritation. 'Why should I come? Nobody wants me; nobody misses me! Please leave me alone.'
There is nothing for it but to comply. With a heavier heart than that with which she reached it, Margaret leaves the bench and its ill-sorted occupants. She takes little heed as to the direction of her steps until she finds herself and her companion approaching the kiosk, whence is plainly audible the sound of voices, which, as they advance nearer to it, grows hushed. It is too dark to see into the interior, as above the little gimcrack temple, memorial of the bad taste of fifty years ago, rises a brotherhood of tall, spruce firs that project their shade over and before it.
Just in front of it Talbot stops her to point out to her a shooting-star that is darting its trail of glory through the immensities of space. Has he not heard those voices – he must have been deaf if he did not – nor observed that marked succeeding silence? He shows no sign of uneasiness or curiosity. His eye is resting apparently, with a calmer enjoyment than she can bring to it, on the gold mist rolling its gauzy-billows in the hollows of the park.
It is only to those who come to her with a tranquil and disengaged mind that the great mother gives the real key of her treasure-houses; and Peggy's mind to-night is too ruffled to give her any claim to the great endowment.
They are standing silently side by side, when a noise, proceeding from the inside of the kiosk, makes itself audible – a noise apparently intended to counterfeit the mewing of a cat, followed by the crowing of a most improbable cock.
Talbot does not even turn his head.
'We are not at all frightened, and not much amused,' he says, in a clear matter-of-fact voice.
'You had not an idea that we were here, had you?' cries Lady Betty, springing out of the temple, followed by Freddy Ducane. 'Did not I mew well? and did not Freddy crow badly? Freddy, you have no more idea of crowing than a carp.'
'I can do better than that,' replies Freddy, in self-defence. 'I am not in voice to-night.'
'But you had not a notion that we were here, had you?' repeats Lady Betty pertinaciously.
'As we had heard you talking at the top of your voices for half a mile before we came up to you, we had some slight inkling of it.'
Peggy wonders whether the cold dryness of his tone is as patent to the person to whom it is addressed as it is to herself. She supposes that it is, since she instantly takes possession of him; and, under the pretext of showing him a plant which can scarcely be distinguishable from its neighbours under the colourless moonlight, walks him off into a dusky alley.
Margaret remains alone with Freddy.
'"Why so dull and mute, young sinner?
Prithee, why so mute?"'
says he familiarly, approaching her.
She looks him fully and gravely in the face. Most people find it difficult to look at Freddy Ducane without smiling. Peggy feels no such inclination. Between her and this image of youth and sunshine there rises another image – a poor little image, to whom this gay weather-cock gives its weather – a little image that expands or shrinks as this all-kissing zephyr blows warm or cold upon it.
'Because I have nothing to say, I suppose,' replies she shortly.
'Come with me to the walled garden' – in a wheedling voice – 'and show me the stars.'
'Thank you, I can see them quite well here.'
'"My pretty Peg, my pretty Peg,
Ah, never look so shy!"'
cries he, breaking into a laugh, which she does not echo.
'I am not your pretty Peg; and I have told you several times that I will not be called "Peg."'
'Peggy, then. Personally, I prefer Peg; but it is a matter of opinion. Peggy, are you aware that you have been poaching?'
'I do not know what you mean.' But she does.
'Her ladyship did not much like it, I can tell you,' continues he delightedly. 'She manifested distinct signs of uneasiness. I could not keep her quiet, though I went through all my little tricks for her. She would make those ridiculous noises; and she whipped him off pretty quickly, did not she? Ah, Peggy' – tenderly – 'you would have done better to have kept to me! I would not have left you in the lurch.'
To this she deigns no answer.
'Where is Prue?' asks he, a moment later, with an easy change of topic. 'What have you done with Prue?'
'I have done nothing with her,' rather sadly.
'You have sent her home with her nurse to bed, I suppose?' suggests he reproachfully. 'I sometimes think that you are a little hard upon Prue.'
Hard upon Prue! She, whose one thought,
