Dido sighed and was on the point of giving as good an account of the evening as she could, when her brother saved her the exertion by making a sudden announcement from behind his newspaper.
‘I have had a letter from my friend Lomax,’ he said. ‘He is coming here again on Friday.’
Dido laid down her knife and stared across the bread and butter and the tea-things of the breakfast table, to the window sill where a tray of windfall plums had been laid to ripen in the sun; she noticed the deepening marks of bruises upon one, the small wasp holes in another … But, though she would not look at her, she knew that Margaret’s lips were thinning as she set down the teapot and swept a few invisible crumbs from the tablecloth.
‘And how long,’ said Margaret in her most gentle tones, ‘how long do you think Mr Lomax will remain with us, my love?’
Alerted by the extreme softness of her voice, Francis lowered his paper an inch or two; a bushy grey eyebrow and a very wary eye appeared. ‘About a week, perhaps?’ he hazarded, his voice rising into a question.
Margaret closed her eyes and sighed.
Francis retreated behind his newspaper. ‘He is on his way to somewhere else – perhaps he will only stay five days – or four. I daresay it will not be so very long.’
Margaret looked once more as if she were bound for the pagan arena, but, as wives all over the country discover every day, it is peculiarly difficult to argue with the back of a newspaper. And Dido was soon wishing that she could employ such a protection herself.
For the expectation of a visitor threw Margaret into a frenzy of activity. She was determined that curtains must be washed and beds aired – though the motive seemed to be rather less the comfort of her guest than the discomfort of her husband. And through it all she had a great deal to say about the inconvenience and expense of visitors and also her surprise that Francis should take such extraordinary pleasure in the company of a man who was, after all, not much more than the steward of his daughter’s husband.
It was a very great relief to escape at last for another walk to Madderstone.
By then it was so late that Margaret very much doubted there would be time to reach the abbey and return before dark, and she thought that if Dido was wanting air and exercise she had much better walk out into the kitchen garden and watch over Robert digging the potatoes, for the fellow was so lazy he had left half of them in the ground last time.
But Dido held out. She would walk fast, and not stay long, and the necessary business of ‘finding out how Penelope goes on’ provided a very convenient excuse for the visit.
By the time she left the vicarage, the sunshine of the early morning was all over, the clouds were gathering and there was a threat of rain in the breeze. But still she was determined to go. Madderstone and its mysteries intrigued her more and more, and besides, the two miles between Badleigh and the abbey provided a little peace, a break between one society and another in which she might indulge her own thoughts.
And she found that today, as she walked, even thoughts of ghosts and governesses must give a little ground to thoughts of Mr William Lomax …
His proposed visit must discompose, though it did not surprise, her. Unlike Margaret, she found it very easy to understand why her bookish brother should value the friendship of another clever, well-informed man. She had not forgotten to anticipate, when her living at the vicarage was first proposed, that the move must throw her more into Mr Lomax’s way.
But did she wish to meet him again, or not? It was a difficult point which two whole miles of brisk walking could not quite decide.
It was now nearly four months since Mr Lomax had made her an offer of marriage – and been refused. There had been, at that time, such a serious difference of opinion between them as had convinced her they could not be happy together – despite her considerable affection for him. He had objected to that part of her which was particularly dear to her – her curiosity. They had argued; but still he had made his offer. He had even been so foolhardy as to pin his hopes for their future happiness upon a change in her character. She might, he had suggested, be so influenced by the advice of a husband as to adopt his opinions rather than arguing against them.
It was, she thought, a strong proof of his regard that such a sensible man should wilfully blind himself to the evidence around him: evidence which must cry out against finding happiness in marriage through so momentous a change. Was there a couple in the world who had ever succeeded in it? And even if it were possible, she doubted she would find it desirable. Her own opinions were very precious to her: she did not wish to give them up.
All in all, she had felt it incumbent upon her to save them both from his dangerous optimism. She had spoken her ‘No’ as firmly as she knew how. And if the matter had only rested there, there would be sufficient embarrassment in this recontre. But there was more.
She had given her answer and walked away – and he had followed her. He had, in point of fact, run after her and called upon her to stop.
This last memory brought a little flutter of pleasure. At nineteen she would have been affected by this evidence of passion; at six and thirty she was quite delighted to find that she had such power over a man.
She remembered him, there in the lime walk at Richmond, bareheaded in the sunlight that twinkled through the leaves, earnestly pleading his cause. For she had, of course, done as he requested and stopped – just before reaching the end of the avenue.
‘Miss Kent,’ he said breathlessly, ‘forgive me … I know that I am not acting the part of a gentleman … to force myself upon you in this way when your answer is already given. Please, do not think I would be such a brute as to distress you by asking you to reconsider your decision now … But I cannot help … I must just beg one favour.’
‘I am sure …’ she began, but her voice was unsteady and she paused. Exertion was absolutely necessary. If this was to be their last interview, she would not wish him to remember her stammering. ‘I am sure I would do anything in my power to prove my friendship.’
‘Then may I be allowed to ask you again … Not now, but in the future …’ He too was forced to break off. ‘As you know – as I have explained,’ he began again more calmly, ‘the burden of debt which my son has laid upon me makes an immediate marriage impossible. In two, three years at the most, I shall be free. Do I have your permission to ask then – if, of course, you are still unmarried – to ask you again to be my wife?’
Dido remembered staring down at the trodden earth of the lime walk; she remembered very clearly how the interlacing roots of the trees had stood out like veins on the back of an aging hand. Her mind had been in turmoil, flattered, confused … and yet, suspecting him. ‘I do not think such an arrangement would be wise,’ she said quietly. ‘I would not wish you to feel bound to make an offer which – three years hence – you may no longer wish to make.’
He shook his head very seriously. ‘My dear Miss Kent, I am bound to you. It cannot be helped, though it is very kind of you to attempt to grant a liberty I do not even desire.’
She bent her head lower so that he could not see her smile. ‘I cannot suppose,’ she insisted, ‘that time will change my reply.’
‘But we cannot any of us predict the future,’ he argued eagerly. ‘Three years … two, even one year may encompass any amount of change. I beg you: allow me to hope.’
The indecision had been dreadfuclass="underline" her heart had been all for giving way and consenting immediately, while her head … Her head had been calmly noting the inconstancy of his argument. The passage of time was to produce no change in him – his feelings were not to alter, and yet it was to be supposed that hers might undergo a very material change. He was no doubt thinking that she would soon regret her answer – and decide that she must give up her opinions, cease to argue with him, and become all that he required in a wife … In fact, his request was intolerable presumption …