were the country people from the near neighbourhood. The women, plain-looking save for their brilliant eyes, weather-beaten and prematurely aged through hard work and exposure, their brown leather-like skin showing harder and browner from the contrast with the light-coloured silk kerchiefs skilfully knotted round their heads, yet as a rule seemingly contented and cheerful enough as they chattered and chaffered round the great ancient fountain, the centre of the “Place.” The men, far less numerous and far less energetic, handsome fellows many of them, though less so than the gaudily attired Spanish mountaineers lured to Esparto by the work sometimes to be had there in plenty, while yet looking as if labour or exertion of any kind was completely beneath their lordly selves. And here and there, recognisable at once by those acquainted with their peculiar type, Basques, descendants of that mysterious race whose origin and language have so long puzzled the learned in such subjects. Nor were there wanting specimens of still more remote nationalities. Two or three negro servants were bargaining and purchasing for their masters; and some little fair-haired English children, who had coaxed their maids to get up extra early before it was hot, to see the fun and bustle in the market-place; while a Russian nurse, gorgeous in scarlet and gold embroidery, indolently surveyed the scene from a balcony opposite.
It was picturesque in the extreme, and amusing. But after a while, staring out of the window being a diversion he most rarely indulged in, Mr Auriol tired of it, and after his modest breakfast of coffee and a roll, finding it was barely nine o’clock, he strolled out for a walk, though his ideas were of the vaguest as to what direction he should take.
“I have nearly an hour before they will expect me at the Villa Martine,” he said to himself. “I have no wish to rub Mistress Lettice the wrong way by turning up too soon. It strikes me she would look upon that as almost worse than being too late. Where shall I go?”
He was turning the corner of the street, or Place, rather, as he asked himself this question, and before he had time to answer it he almost knocked against a young man who was hurrying in his direction.
“Pardon,” was on the lips of both, when both exchanged it for a more friendly greeting.
“Dexter!” – “Auriol!” they respectively exclaimed, and then the new-comer added —
“I was just going to the hotel to ask if you had come, or were coming. Arthur Morison told me some days ago that you were expected. I met him accidentally.”
“They did not expect me till to-day, and I came yesterday, so there has not been time for them to tell you. You see them sometimes, do you not?”
“You mean, do I visit them? Scarcely. I used to go there sometimes before Mrs Morison got so very ill. She was always kindness and cordiality itself to me. You know I had got to know the second Miss Morison very well a year ago in England, when she was staying with some neighbours of ours.”
“Yes, I remember,” said Mr Auriol. But he spoke absently.
“And it is all that horrid family feud. When they – at least I don’t know why I should say ‘they;’ I believe it is only Lettice – found out my connections, the difference was most marked, though before then they had been quite friendly, and I had hoped to introduce them and my sister to each other. Those sorts of things are really too bad, carrying them down to the younger generation.”
Godfrey bent his head in acquiescence, but did not speak.
“Do you,” Philip went on again after a moment’s pause, and with some little embarrassment – “do you think her as pretty as you had been told?”
“Far more so. ‘Pretty!’ – pretty is not at all the word for her. I think her distinctly beautiful,” Mr Auriol replied, with a sort of burst of enthusiasm which somehow seemed rather to disconcert Philip.
“I thought you would. That fair hair with such dark eyes is so very uncommon,” he replied quietly. And instantly it flashed upon Mr Auriol that they were speaking at cross purposes. He smiled to himself, but for reasons of his own, and being perfectly unaware of the impression his words had made upon his companion, he decided not to explain his mistake.
“Your sister, Mrs Leyland, is much better, I was glad to hear?” he said courteously, thinking it just as well to change the subject.
“Oh, much better, thank you; quite well, indeed. We shall be leaving immediately. In fact, we should have left already, but, to tell you the truth, when it became evident that Mrs Morison was sinking I persuaded Anna to stay on a little, just to see if perhaps we could be of some service to those poor children. They seemed so lonely.”
“It was very good of you,” said Godfrey warmly.
“I – I thought my uncle and aunt would have wished it, and Anna thought so too,” said Philip.
“But it was no use. I believe Lettice would rather have applied to any utter stranger than to us.”
“Really,” said Godfrey, surprised, and even a little shocked. “I had no idea they still felt so strongly. Perhaps it’s just as well you told me, for I see I shall have some rather ticklish business to manage. But forewarned is forearmed. I may call on Mrs Leyland some evening, I hope? I shall have very few here.”
“Oh, certainly,” said Philip. “She will be delighted to see you.”
Then the conversation drifted into general matters. Philip escorted Mr Auriol to one or two points of interest in the little town, and at ten o’clock precisely the latter found himself at the gate of the Villa Martine.
Chapter Three.
The Tug of War
“Your courage much more than your prudence you showed.”
Lettice received her cousin in the drawing-room. She was, of course, expecting him, but there was not a touch of nervousness in her manner as she quietly shook hands with him, and in a friendly, perhaps slightly patronising tone, as if to put him quite at his ease, hoped that he found the hotel comfortable, that he had slept well, was not too tired with his journey, and so on, to all of which Mr Auriol replied with equal composure. But he was eyeing the young lady all the time, taking measure of her much more closely than she had any idea of. He observed her, too, with a certain curiosity as to her appearance. The night before he had seen her in a subdued light – almost, indeed, in shadow, as the consciousness of her recent tears had made her avoid coming forward conspicuously, and he wondered if he should find her as lovely as she had then appeared.
“She is, and she is not,” he decided. “Her features are all that I pictured them, but the soft sweet expression is gone. Yes, this morning I can believe her to be both prejudiced and self-willed.”
And his glance rested with pleasure on the somewhat anxious but thoroughly womanly and gentle expression of Nina’s fair face, as she just then entered the room, followed by Arthur.
Mr Auriol looked round him inquiringly.
“Have you any other room at liberty,” he said, “where there is perhaps a large table? There are a number of papers I wish to show you;” and he touched a packet which he held under his arm.
“We can go into the dining-room,” said Lettice, opening a door which led into it as she spoke; “though, really, Mr Auriol, you need not give yourself so much trouble. We are perfectly satisfied that our money is in good hands. Mamma often told me that my father had given himself immense trouble to place it safely, so that at his death there should be no trouble; in short, that our trustees would have nothing
