so has everybody in the parish. Ha! you see, I’m not the only one with whose name this everybody has been busy; the difference being, that about me they’ve been mistaken, while concerning yourself they haven’t; instead, speaking pretty near the truth. Come, now, confess! Am I not right? Don’t have any fear, you can trust me.”
She does confess; though not in words. Her silence is equally eloquent; drooping eyelids, and blushing cheeks, making that eloquence emphatic. She loves Mr Musgrave.
“Enough!” says Gwendoline, taking it in this sense; “and, since you’ve been candid with me, I’ll repay you in the same coin. But mind you; it mustn’t go further.”
“Oh! certainly not,” assents the other, in her restored confidence about the curate, willing to promise anything in the world.
“As I’ve said,” proceeds Miss Wynn, “there are worse men in the world than George Shenstone, and but few better. Certainly none behind hounds, and I’m told he’s the crack shot of the county, and the best billiard player of his club. All accomplishments that have weight with us women – some of us. More still; he’s deemed good-looking, and is, as you say; known to be of good family and fortune. For all, he lacks one thing that’s wanted by – ”
She stays her speech till dipping the oars – their splash, simultaneous with, and half-drowning, the words, “Gwen Wynn.”
“What is it?” asks Ellen, referring to the deficiency thus hinted at.
“On my word, I can’t tell – for the life of me I cannot. It’s something undefinable; which one feels without seeing or being able to explain – just as ether, or electricity. Possibly it is the last. At all events, it’s the thing that makes us women fall in love; as no doubt you’ve found when your fingers were – were – well, so near being pricked by that holly. Ha, ha, ha!”
With a merry peal she once more sets to rowing; and for a time no speech passes between them – the only sounds heard being the songs of the birds, in sweet symphony with the rush of the water along the boat’s sides, and the rumbling of the oars in their rowlocks.
But for a brief interval is there silence between them; Miss Wynn again breaking it by a startled exclamation: – “See!”
“Where? where?”
“Up yonder! We’ve been talking of kites and magpies. Behold, two birds of worse augury than either!”
They are passing the mouth of a little influent stream, up which at some distance are seen two men, one of them seated in a small boat, the other standing on the bank, talking down to him. He in the boat is a stout, thick-set fellow in velveteens and coarse fur cap, the one above a spare thin man, habited in a suit of black – of clerical, or rather sacerdotal, cut. Though both are partially screened by the foliage, the little stream running between wooded banks, Miss Wynn has recognised them. So, too, does the companion; who rejoins, as if speaking to herself —
“One’s the French priest who has a chapel up the river, on the opposite side; the other’s that fellow who’s said to be such an incorrigible poacher.”
“Priest and poacher it is! An oddly-assorted pair; though in a sense not so ill-matched either. I wonder what they’re about up there, with their heads so close together. They appeared as if not wishing we should see them! Didn’t it strike you so, Nelly?”
The men are now out of sight; the boat having passed the rivulet’s mouth.
“Indeed, yes,” answered Miss Lees; “the priest, at all events. He drew back among the bushes on seeing us.”
“I’m sure his reverence is welcome. I’ve no desire ever to set eyes on him – quite the contrary.”
“I often meet him on the roads.”
“I too – and off them. He seems to be about everywhere skulking and prying into people’s affairs. I noticed him, the last day of our hunting, among the rabble – on foot, of course. He was close to my horse, and kept watching me out of his owlish eyes, all the time; so impertinently I could have laid the whip over his shoulders. There’s something repulsive about the man; I can’t bear the sight of him.”
“He’s said to be a great friend and very intimate associate of your worthy cousin, Mr – ”
“Don’t name him, Nell! I’d rather not think, much less talk of him. Almost the last words my father ever spoke – never to let Lewin Murdock cross the threshold of Llangorren. No doubt, he had his reasons. My word! this day with all its sunny brightness seems to abound in dark omens. Birds of prey, priests, and poachers! It’s enough to bring on one of my fear fits. I now rather regret leaving Joseph behind. Well; we must make haste, and get home again.”
“Shall I turn the boat back?” asks the steerer.
“No; not just yet. I don’t wish to repass those two uncanny creatures. Better leave them awhile, so that on returning we mayn’t see them, to disturb the priest’s equanimity – more like his conscience.”
The reason is not exactly as assigned; but Miss Lees, accepting it without suspicion, holds the tiller-cords so as to keep the course on down stream.
Volume One – Chapter Five
Dangers Ahead
For another half mile, or so, the Gwendoline is propelled onward, though not running trimly; the fault being in her at the oars. With thoughts still preoccupied, she now and then forgets her stroke, or gives it unequally – so that the boat zig-zags from side to side, and, but for a more careful hand at the tiller, would bring up against the bank.
Observing her abstraction, as also her frequent turning to look down the river – but without suspicion of what is causing it – Miss Lees at length inquires, —
“What’s the matter with you, Gwen?”
“Oh, nothing,” she evasively answers, bringing back her eyes to the boat, and once more giving attention to the oars.
“But why are you looking so often below? I’ve noticed you do so at least a score of times.”
If the questioner could but divine the thoughts at that moment in the other’s mind, she would have no need thus to interrogate, but would know that below there is another boat with a man in it, who possesses that unseen something, like ether or electricity, and to catch sight of whom Miss Wynn has been so oft straining her eyes. She has not given all her confidence to the companion.
Not receiving immediate answer, Ellen again asks —
“Is there any danger you fear?”
“None that I know of – at least, for a long way down. Then there are some rough places.”
“But you are pulling so unsteadily! It takes all my strength to keep in the middle of the river.”
“Then you pull, and let me do the steering,” returns Miss Wynn, pretending to be in a pout; as she speaks starting up from the thwart, and leaving the oars in their thole pins.
Of course, the other does not object; and soon they have changed places.
But Gwen in the stern behaves no better, than when seated amidships. The boat still keeps going astray, the fault now in the steerer.
Soon something
