She gave a little gasp; she felt herself growing pale. Something made her look up. Instead of the expression of surprise which she had unconsciously expected to meet in his face, her quick instincts perceived a slight stiffening, a sort of indescribable drawing-back instead of eager protest that nothing she could say would alter his longing for her to hear him out.

And could she have seen into her companion’s mind at that moment, she would scarcely have believed the reflections she would there have read.

“She has something to tell,” he was thinking to himself. “I have not been too cautious.”

And aloud he said, quietly:

“As you wish, of course, Miss Raynsworth.”

She plunged into it.

“You may remember,” she began, “a little incident at Cannes which annoyed you at the time – naturally so – and annoyed you still more, I imagine, afterwards, when I refused to let you resent the impertinence I had been subjected to. I could not have done otherwise, as you will hear. I had promised my mother before leaving home to tell no one what I am now going to tell you, without her leave.”

As she spoke there was an imperceptible lightening of Mr Gresham’s expression.

“Your mother knew!” he ejaculated.

“Of course,” she exclaimed, too bent upon her recital to feel surprise at his words. “This was how it all happened.” And forcing herself to speak with perfect calmness, she began at the beginning of the story and told it all, simply and without comment, only omitting the names of any not immediately concerned in the little drama – such as those of Michael Gresham and Mrs Shepton – and carefully exonerating from all shadow of blame in the matter her sister and her parents.

When she had finished there fell a dead silence. With all her self-control Philippa could not bring herself to raise her eyes – the conflicting feelings in her mind made her almost physically giddy.

Then as the silence continued, a new element began to make itself felt. Her pride awoke and she reared her head half defiantly.

“Does he think I am going tamely to await his judgment upon me?” she thought to herself. “If so, he shall – ”

But at that moment Mr Gresham’s voice at last made itself heard.

“I have to thank you, Miss Raynsworth,” he said, gently, “for giving me your confidence. You will find it has not been misplaced. You have done the best thing possible in telling me what you have done. Though – ” he hesitated, “it is best to be perfectly candid,” he went on, “I cannot but own that it is – a terrible disappointment to me to have to associate anything of so extraordinary a kind with one whom – ”

Philippa turned upon him abruptly, her face crimsoning. Something in his measured tone, more than in his actual words, began slowly to insinuate into her a strange, chill misgiving. And why at that moment did there recur to her memory, in advantageous contrast to Mr Gresham’s carefully considered and gently expressed disapproval, his cousin Michael’s stern, almost rough censure of what she had done?

Before she had time to open her lips, her companion began again.

“Excuse me,” he said, “for interrupting you – I think you were going to speak. I must ask you to listen to me first. I will be perfectly frank. I was not wholly unprepared for this strange disclosure. The incident at Cannes never quite left my memory, and it was followed up by certain remarks or hints as to something peculiar in which you had been mixed up, which came to my ears more recently.”

“How? and where?” demanded Philippa. For one half instant the thought crossed her brain – could Michael Gresham have been faithless to his trust? – but it was as quickly dismissed. Rough and rugged he might be, but true, she felt certain he was.

“I scarcely know that I have any right to reply to your question,” said Mr Gresham, “and no purpose would be fulfilled by my doing so. All that was said to me was very vague, so vague that I have allowed myself to be buoyed up by hopes – now alas! shattered – that the warn – hints I should say, rested on no real foundation. But do not mistake me, Miss Raynsworth,” as Philippa again seemed on the point of speaking.

“Your confidence, I repeat, has not been misplaced. I do not think – no, deliberately speaking – I do not think any lasting annoyance or ill-results need be anticipated – especially when – ” But here even his self-assurance shrank from completing the sentence. “I want to say,” he went on, “that notwithstanding all the pain and regret which I cannot deny I am feeling, my attitude towards you is not radically shaken. In time, I trust and believe, the whole miserable episode will be forgotten – not only by the few outsiders who may have suspected any mystery, but by myself.”

He glanced at Philippa as he spoke, expecting to detect a flush of grateful relief on her face. What he did see there, was less easy to interpret. She was no longer red, though, on the other hand, but slightly paler than usual, and she turned her eyes fully upon him without uttering a word.

“I must express myself still more plainly,” he said, almost as if addressing a child, “as my wife, there will, I feel sure, be nothing, comparatively speaking, to dread in the future. Your candour has disarmed my scruples, for I know I can trust that never, under any conceivable circumstances, could you again be tempted so to set propriety and – and dignity at nought.”

Still she did not speak.

“Miss Raynsworth,” he said at last, “Miss Raynsworth – Philippa,” he exclaimed. “Do you not understand me?” and for the first time a very shadowy apprehension that possibly, just possibly he had appeared too sure of his ground suggested itself. “I – the circumstances have been so exceptional – I have had no opportunity so far of assuring you of the depth and sincerity of my feelings towards you – of my devotion. You must allow they have been well tested. And they have stood the test! I ask you now to be my wife – my happiness is in your hands.”

“And I, Mr Gresham,” Philippa said at last, her dark eyes turned full upon him, “decline, distinctly and definitely decline, the honour you have done me.” He grew scarlet.

“What do you mean?” he said, for once almost rudely. “What has all this conversation been about, if this was what you intended? What was your motive for telling me all you have done? Have I offended you, and how? Your pride has taken fire in some unreasonable way. How can I assure you that the thing will not weigh further with me – that – that – I shall do my best to forget it? Where would you be so protected as in the position of my wife?”

“I understand you perfectly, Mr Gresham,” Philippa replied in a calm even voice, “though at the same time I confess that previously to this conversation I had lamentably failed to do so. On my side, I thank you for your candour, and I repeat, as decidedly as words can convey my meaning, that I decline the proposal you have made me.”

He still seemed unable to believe her.

“Have you been playing with me all this time?” he said, harshly. “It is inconceivable. But what can be your reason for changing so suddenly? I have a right to ask, and a right to know.”

“Yes,” she said, “perhaps you have, though I do not know that my reason will much enlighten you. It is simply this. I am entirely convinced that we are utterly unsuited to each other, and that in marrying you I should be entering upon what would prove a tremendous mistake. You do not, and never would, understand me; surely that should suffice.”

He smiled, bitterly enough. Something in her manner carried conviction home to him, through all the thick folds of his self-esteem.

“And may I inquire further,” he said, “what has thus magically caused the scales to fall from your eyes as regards my poor desserts? For you allow, you could not indeed do otherwise, that the change, however complete, is a very sudden one?”

She turned and looked at him. There was a strange wistfulness in her expression.

“No,” she said, sadly; “I am sorry if I have caused you any pain, but I cannot explain anything more. You would not understand. I am very tired,” she continued, “I do not want to go farther. Would you mind walking back to meet my brother-in-law and tell him I have gone straight home to Palden? I can find my way from here.”

He bowed without speaking and turned away, too absorbed by his own intense mortification to give much heed to her last words, or to feel any compassion for the suffering too plainly betrayed by her white face and faltering voice.

The sound of his retreating footsteps on the crisp, dry path died rapidly away, and Philippa was alone.

Chapter Twenty Three
Ended

For a few moments the withdrawal of the intense restraint she had put upon herself caused all other feelings to be merged in that of relief. Philippa glanced round her, and seeing a moss-covered tree stump a few paces off, she made her way to it and sat down.

Then slowly, but all too surely, crept up, one by one, the reflections she could not but face.

It seemed to her that years had passed since Evelyn and her husband had turned back, leaving her and her late companion by themselves.

Yes, indeed, to use his own words; “the scales had fallen from her eyes,” and yet how almost intangible it all seemed! How little some people would understand the terrible and complete revulsion of feeling which had overwhelmed her!

“Nothing,” she thought, “nothing can be quite so horrible as to find that one has been worshipping an idol of clay; a thing which did not exist except in my own imagination. I have no right to feel resentful. Taking him for what he is, he did not behave badly. He evidently meant to be generous and chivalrous. But the pain of it to me is none the less. It is far, far worse, at least so it seems to me just now, than to have found out that he did not care for me as I did for him, and yet to have kept my ideal. ‘Disillusionment’ is horrible.”

The tears slowly welled up into her eyes. She brushed them away indignantly.

“What a weak fool I am!” she thought. “If I had any strength of character, I should be, I suppose, glad to have found it out in time.”

For bitterly as she was suffering, she was spared the misery of any wavering as to the necessity of her decision. It was done, once for all, done! But other considerations could not be altogether stifled, and Philippa was still very young.

“It is so disappointing,” she said, half audibly, “in smaller ways, too. Poor Evey, I know how she has been wishing for it, and, I am afraid, mamma! I am only thankful not to have let myself go further, even in fancy. I shall soon be able to pull myself together,” and a sort of wave of courage and even relief seemed to sweep over her, to her own surprise.

How was it that she was not more crushed? After all, she asked herself in the clearer light of her present vision, was the “disillusionment” so entirely unexpected? Had she, unconsciously, blinded herself, and refused to admit the possibility of the “something wanting” in Bernard Gresham’s character? If not, whence had arisen her constant self-questionings as to how her confession would be received? Why the doubts that were there all the time? often as she had repeated to herself that after all she had done nothing wrong, nothing really calling for shame or self-abasement.

But her mind was growing too wearied and confused to think out this new suggestion. She shivered slightly.

“Oh, how I wish I were at home,” she thought, “and could tell mamma everything! She would understand better than I do myself. It is just as if a door had shut in front of me and all was blank!”

It was really growing cold, for the evenings were still chilly, with the chilliness of early spring, and the sun had gone down some time before. Philippa got up. How long she had sat there she could not tell, and confidently as she had spoken of knowing her way to Palden, she was really slightly at a loss, though familiar with the general direction she should keep to. She retraced her steps for some little distance till she came to a point whence another path should lead to the high-road. She came upon this side-path more quickly than she had expected, but turned into it without misgiving, and satisfied that she would come out at the right place, she walked on, allowing her thoughts to re-absorb her. In spite of herself her imagination persisted in re-enacting, mistily yet painfully, the events of the afternoon, till she almost felt that she could bear it no longer. But there came a diversion. Suddenly it struck her that the distance to the high-road was strangely long. She stopped short and looked about her. There was no sign of the wood coming to an end; on the contrary, the trees seemed thicker than before.

“I must have taken the wrong path,” she thought, drearily. “Indeed, this is scarcely like a path at all. I had better go back again, I suppose; I may come across the other.”

She turned and went on, looking about her attentively. Some twenty yards or so farther back, the footpath she was on joined another.

“I must have gone wrong here,” she said, and, though with some little hesitation, she turned again.

But it was no use; she only seemed to plunge deeper into the wood, though she tried more than one intercepting path. She was growing very tired, and a feeling of irritation at herself added to her discomfort.

“I really need not have brought this upon myself,” she thought, “If I don’t find my way home soon, there will be a hue and cry after me; nothing could be more odious.”

It was with a feeling of relief that at last she heard the sound of some one approaching. Scarcely of footsteps; it was more a rustle among the still thickly strewn dead leaves of the previous autumn, which by degrees grew into a patter of little feet.

“Solomon!” she exclaimed, as the dog rushed at her in effusive greeting.

But Solomon’s appearance meant that of his master as well.

“I must make the best of it,” thought Philippa, as she realised this. “He will at any rate be able to show me the way to Palden, and if he has not met his cousin he need not suspect anything. I will just tell him I have lost my way.”

A second or two later, Michael Gresham came within view. He started in astonishment as he caught sight of the girl.

“Miss Raynsworth!” he exclaimed, naturally quite forgetful of the fact that this was the first time he had met her in her own character. “How – why – are you alone?”

She looked up at him. It was evident, to her relief, that his first sensation at seeing her was that of pure surprise. But as his glance fell on her white, almost drawn face, and her unmistakable look of exhaustion, his expression warmed into one of deep concern.

“Something has happened,” he thought to himself. “That mean-spirited fellow. Can I have made mischief when I meant to shield her? His clumsy vanity has done it, no doubt.”

But it was with matter-of-fact kindliness only that he went on to speak to her.

“You are looking so dreadfully tired,” he said. “Where are the others? I thought you all started together. Have you lost your way?”

“Yes,” said Philippa, with a kind of gasp. “Evelyn, my sister, got tired, and they turned back. I – I thought I could find the road to Palden by myself.”

The very incoherence of her explanation enlightened him.

“Get off, Solomon,” he exclaimed, in a gruffer tone than the dachshund, still leaping and jumping about Philippa, was accustomed to. “He has not forgotten you, you see,” Michael went on, eager to say something or anything to hide his own suspicion of the situation. Then the colour rose quickly to his face as he realised the awkwardness of the allusion.

“I should say – ” he began again, but Philippa, oblivious of any cause for embarrassment in his words, answered, quietly:

“No, the dear dog, and I have never forgotten him. But will you put me on my road home? I am very tired,” she added, faintly, though trying to smile.

It seemed to Michael that her white face grew still whiter as she spoke. He half started forward fearing she was going to fall, but she pulled herself together again with a strong effort, and he, instinctively divining that she was just the sort of girl to detest anything approaching to a “scene,” drew back quickly and went on speaking as if he had not noticed the passing weakness which had come over her.

“You have not wandered so very far after all,” he said. “Every turn in these woods has been familiar to me since I was a child, so I can soon set you right. But,” – and here he was forced to allude to her exhausted condition – “do you think you can possibly walk back all the way to Palden?”

He did not in the least allude to her returning to Merle, there to join her friends, as would have seemed natural under the circumstances. At the moment Philippa scarcely realised the tact which prompted this omission, or rather in some unconscious way she took it for granted, as indeed, on looking back afterwards, she saw that she had accepted with tacit confidence the strong and kind support of his presence.

A few minutes dexterous steering among the trees brought them out on to the path she had originally meant to follow, which led directly to the high-road.

Arrived there, Michael stopped short and looked at her consideringly. A little colour, he was glad to see, had returned to her cheeks; there was no longer the ghastly pallor which had made her look as if on the point of fainting.

“She is a strong girl,” he thought to himself, “physically and morally, but she has been through a bad bit of experience. Disillusionment, if it has been that, goes hard with such as she.”

And disillusionment he had reason to suspect it had been.

“Bernard would never have left her alone in this way, selfish as he is, unless he had been made to feel himself very small. As things are, I must risk annoying her by my officiousness; she is not fit to walk farther alone.”

Philippa was unconscious of his scrutiny. She was gazing up and down the road half vaguely.

“Which way – ” she was beginning, but Michael interrupted her.

“Miss Raynsworth,” he said, “you mustn’t mind my saying that I really can’t let you go all the way home alone. It is getting dusk, and you own to being very tired.”

“Very well,” said Philippa, simply. “I mean – I should say ‘thank you,’” and again she smiled, and to Michael there was something more pathetic in her smile than if there had been tears in her eyes. “How far is it to Palden? Somehow I am really not as tired as when you first met me.”

“If you don’t mind cross-cuts and skirting one or two ploughed fields,” he said, more lightly, “it need not be more than a mile and a half.”

“I should like to get back as soon as my sister, if possible,” said Philippa. “I don’t want them to be frightened about me.”

She made no attempt at any explanation of the complications she had risked. She felt now a curious but satisfactory indifference to what her companion thought of the whole affair, rather perhaps an unacknowledged reliance on the kindliness of his judgment. And when he left her within fifty yards or so of the entrance to the Grange, and she had said good-bye, with a word of thanks, she felt amazed at herself.

“What am I made of?” she thought. “An hour ago I felt as if everything worth living for had gone from me – as if I could never trust any one again, or dare to believe in happiness. Is this a phase I must pass through? Will that terrible mortification and disappointment come back again blacker than ever?” She shivered as she thought of it. “Or,” as she stood still for a moment and looked after the sturdy figure of Michael Gresham striding away with little Solomon at his heels, “or am I only extraordinarily superficial and impressionable, or” – yet another “or” – “is there something invigorating about that man? He does feel so true.”

From whatever source her new-found strength had been derived, it stood her in good stead that evening.

Five minutes later the Merle dog-cart drove up, and Duke and Evelyn got down with disturbed faces, which scarcely cleared when they caught sight of her at the hall door, where she had purposely stationed herself to meet them.

“I am so glad I got home first,” she said. “I was afraid you might be uneasy about me. I have only just come in.”

“Uneasy,” repeated Evelyn in a peculiar tone of voice, as she came into the house, Captain Headfort remaining behind to say something to the groom who had accompanied them from Merle, after a furtive and somewhat self-conscious glance in his sister-in-law’s direction. ”‘Uneasy!’ that’s scarcely the word to use, Philippa, under the circumstances. You must know better than that surely.”

“What do you mean?” said Philippa, quietly, already scenting war. “Come into the drawing-room, there’s a good fire there, and I daresay you are feeling cold.”

She had felt uncertain how to meet Evelyn; a word of tenderness or sympathy would have disarmed her, and she would probably have given her sister the fullness of confidence she had been longing to pour out to her mother. But Mrs Headfort’s tone braced her to composure and dignity. For the moment, perhaps, she did not allow herself to do justice to the latter’s natural and by no means altogether selfish disappointment and anxiety.

“It is better,” Philippa thought quickly, “as some explanation is inevitable, to have it out at once, and done with, as far as Evey is concerned. Poor Evey!” she went on to herself, with a sudden revulsion of sympathy towards her sister, as her glance fell on the lines of distress which never seemed natural on Evelyn’s soft, childlike face. But to this sort of feeling she felt she must not yield, “Why are you annoyed with me, Evelyn?” she said, directly, “for of course I know you are so. It is better to speak plainly.”

“It is not candid of you to try to turn the tables in that way,” said Evelyn, hotly. “You know perfectly why I am angry with you. You have behaved – you must have behaved in the most extraordinary way to Mr Gresham, after – encouraging him as you have done.”

Philippa bit her lips to keep back an indignant reply, “What has he said to you?” she asked, composedly. “Very little,” said Evelyn. “Very few men would have behaved as well as he has done. He only told me that you had insisted on going home alone, and that he was completely at a loss to understand you. Of course I knew what he meant – that you had refused him.” Then, with a sudden change of tone, “Is it too late, Philippa?” she added, almost in entreaty, “Can I do nothing to put things right?”

Her eagerness touched Philippa.

“Listen, Evey,” she said, almost solemnly, “and then never let us allude to this matter again. I cannot go into all the details of what passed between Mr Gresham and me. It would be no use. I doubt if any one, except perhaps mamma, would quite enter into what I feel. But I must just tell you this. I am as convinced as if I had thought it over for years that he and I are entirely, radically unsuited to each other, and so there is an end of it. Do believe that I absolutely mean what I say, and know what I mean.” Evelyn’s eyes filled with tears. Something in her sister’s manner carried conviction with it.

“Oh, Phil,” she said, “you are a far stronger character than I, I know, and I must, I suppose, give in to you; you must know best. But it does seem such a pity – such an awful pity! And what can have changed your opinion of him so suddenly?”

“Was it suddenly?” said Philippa, dreamily. “Some things seem to have nothing to do with time, and, after all, was it not,” – but here she stopped abruptly – “was it not,” finishing the sentence in her own mind, “lurking there already, the doubt of him? the suspicion of there not being any real sympathy between us?”

“Don’t misunderstand me, Evey!” she went on aloud. “I am terribly sorry to have been the cause of anything,” – she hesitated – “mortifying or disappointing to him, though I daresay it will not last long,” with a little smile. “I do him full justice, and I hope he will marry some one who will make him far happier than I could have done,” she ended, earnestly, and the complete absence of bitterness in her tone was more convincing to her sister than anything else could have been that her castle in the air was doomed to no tangible existence.

Of all those concerned in the little drama which had that day been enacted at Merle-in-the-Wold, perhaps the one the least painfully affected, full of sympathy though he had been for the girl whom he seemed fated to meet under such curious circumstances, was Michael Gresham.