not to Mr Cheviott’s taste. The “turn” came from another direction. A tall, thin boy of sixteen, or thereabouts, a boy with a somewhat anxious and almost girlishly sweet expression of face, came softly and half timidly across the room in Mrs Brabazon’s direction.
“Aunt,” he said, hesitatingly, “I think it is getting rather late – that is to say, if you are still thinking of a drive.”
“I was just thinking so myself, Anselm. Just you find out, my dear boy, if the carriage has come; it was to follow us here, you know, and I shall be ready in a moment.”
The boy turned away to do as she asked.
“That is my other nephew – Anselm Brooke,” she explained to Mr Cheviott. “Basil you know?”
“Oh, yes,” said Alys’s brother, with evident interest. “How is he, poor fellow? I was just going to ask you. Better, I hope?”
Mrs Brabazon shook her head, and the tears filled her eyes.
“There will be no real ‘better’ for him, I feel sure,” she said, sadly. “Yet my brother will not believe it, or rather persists in saying he does not. I can understand it; I remember how obstinately incredulous I was when Colonel Brabazon’s illness became hopeless. But it is sad, is it not? You remember what a fine young fellow Basil was only last year?”
“Yes,” said Mr Cheviott, kindly. “It is very sad.”
“And poor Anselm, it is really piteous to see his devotion to Basil. He has always looked up to him as to a sort of superior being, and indeed Basil has been treated as such by us all. Anselm has always been so delicate and backward – a frail staff to lean upon, but my mind misgives me that before long his father will have no other.”
“Do the doctors think as you do?”
“They do not say so, but I feel sure they think so.”
“I should like to see Basil again before I leave. May I call, do you think?”
“By all means; it would please him very much. Are you going straight home when you leave Paris – to Meadshire, I mean, for that is ‘home’ now to you, I suppose.”
“Yes,” replied Mr Cheviott, “we go straight to Romary. You must come and see us there some time or other, Mrs Brabazon.”
“Thank you,” she said, with a sigh, “I must make no plans just now. My time belongs entirely to my brother and the boys. But talking of Meadshire reminds me – is it anywhere near Withenden that you live?”
“Very near – within a mile or two.”
“Have you ever heard of a place called Hathercourt near there?” inquired Mrs Brabazon, with interest. “You don’t happen to know anything of the clergyman of Hathercourt, or rather of his family? West, I think, is the name.”
“Western,” interrupted Alys close by. “Oh, yes, they are such pretty girls. I am sure they are nice.”
“How can you possibly judge, Alys?” said her brother, coldly. “You only saw them once in your life, and just for a mere instant.”
But Alys’s eager, flushed face, and warmly-expressed admiration of the Western sisters, had absorbed Mrs Brabazon’s attention; she hardly heard what Mr Cheviott said, or, if she did, she gave no heed to it.
“So you know them, then, Miss Cheviott?” she said, cordially, smiling at Alys as she spoke. “Do tell me all you know about them. ‘Girls,’ you say – are they all girls, then – no sons?”
“Oh, yes,” said Alys, “I think there are sons – indeed, I feel sure there are. But it was the girls I noticed, one was so pretty.”
The eagerness died out of her voice, for the expression of her brother’s face told her that again she had managed to displease him.
“How unlucky I am to-day,” she said to herself, and the change in her manner was so complete that Mr Cheviott was afraid Mrs Brabazon would notice it.
“It is a case of ‘all kinds’ in the Western household,” he said, with a slight laugh. “Alys and I only saw them once in church – there seemed to be girls and boys, of every size, down to little mites – a regular poor parson’s family.”
“But what sort of people are they?” asked Mrs Brabazon. “Being such near neighbours, you must hear something about them.”
“They are not such very near neighbours of ours. Withenden is the nearest railway station to Hathercourt, and we are only three miles from Withenden, but Hathercourt again is four miles the other way. Of course I take some interest in Hathercourt now, on Arthur Beverley’s account. You heard of his romantic legacy?”
“Oh! yes,” said Mrs Brabazon. “He wrote all about it to Basil. But I wish you would tell me anything you do know or have heard about these Westerns.”
“Which is very little. They are not in any sort of society.”
“How could they be, if they are so very poor?”
Mr Cheviott slightly shrugged his shoulders.
“I did not say they could be,” he answered, with a smile. “I was only, at your bidding, telling the very little I know about them. They are not in any society, not only because they are very poor, but because people know nothing about them. The father is not a man who has distinguished himself in any way, and I believe he married beneath him – a poor governess, or something of that kind – so what can you expect?”
Mrs Brabazon gave a curious smile.
“Oh! indeed,” she said, dryly. “So the on dit of Meadshire is that the Rector, or Vicar – which is he? – of Hathercourt married beneath him. Thank you; I am glad to know it. Here comes Anselm, I must go! You said these Western girls were pretty, did you not, Miss Cheviott?” she went on, turning to Alys. “Their beauty must be of the dairy-maid order, I suppose?”
Alys felt that her brother’s eyes were fixed upon her, but she answered sturdily nevertheless.
“On the contrary, they are particularly refined-looking girls. The eldest one especially has the sort of look that – that – ” she hesitated.
“That a princess of the blood royal might have,” suggested Mrs Brabazon, laughingly.
Alys smiled, and so, to her relief, did her brother. Then Mrs Brabazon and the boy Anselm took their departure, and not long after, Madame de Briancourt having overwhelmed them with her pretty regrets and desolations at their leaving Paris so abruptly, the brother and sister bade their hostess farewell, and drove off again on their round of calls.
“Laurence Cheviott is evidently prejudiced against these Westerns. I wonder why, for I think him a reasonable sort of man, on the whole,” said Mrs Brabazon to herself. “Can it be possible that he has fallen in love with this very magnificent Miss Western, whom his sister admires so much, and that she has snubbed him? That I can quite believe he would find it hard to forgive. But, oh! no, that is quite impossible. I remember he said he had only seen them once. I think I shall get Basil, poor fellow, to write to Arthur Beverley; he may know something of them. I would like to see them, and it would be a satisfaction to Basil too.”
“What possible reason can Mrs Brabazon have for wanting
