Dorrien of Cranston

“You think so, do you? Wait till you get to my age, and you’ll be still more of that opinion. At least, if you’re not it’ll be for no want of telling.”

They chatted for a few minutes longer, and then the rector rose.

“I hope you’ll come and dine with us some evening,” he said in his easy genial way. “There’ll be only ourselves, and we shall be delighted to see you. Let me see – why not come to-night – that is, if you have nothing better to do?”

“Nothing will give me greater pleasure.”

“Very good. Then this evening at seven. Now I must say good-bye, for I have to rush about all the morning. So glad to make the acquaintance of a friend of Venn’s.”

When the rector had gone, Roland was so preoccupied with recalling the strong family likeness existing between his companion on the beach and his departing visitor, that he quite overlooked the fact that the latter had made no reference whatever to Cranston; rather a strange thing, under the circumstances.

“Well, sir, and our rector’s a nice pleasant gentleman, isn’t he?” remarked the landlady, while laying the cloth an hour later.

“He is indeed, Mrs Jenkins. Been here long?”

“Nigh upon sixteen years. Miss Margaret and Miss Olive were little then, and Miss Sophie were a baby. They do say as Dr Ingelow was dreadful cut up when he lost his poor lady.”

“Oh, he’s a widower then?”

“Yes, sir. His lady died shortly before he came here, I’ve heard tell. But law bless you, sir, Miss Margaret, she did for all the younger ones as though she was a grown-up young lady.”

“How many of them are there – daughters, I mean?”

“Three, sir. You must have seen them in church, in the front seat of all. Not on the side of the heagle – the other side.”

“Oh!”

“Yes, and they’re that good – although the two younger ones, leastways, are merry and fond of a bit of mischief. Why when Jenkins broke his leg” – and the good woman launched out into a dissertation after the manner of her kind, straying far away from the goodness of the parson’s daughters, which Jenkins’ broken leg was hauled in to illustrate – far away even from that fractured, but once more useful, member itself into a great cloud of reminiscence, wherein the speaker’s uncle’s deceased wife’s sister’s third cousin once removed and a certain tom-cat endowed with marvellous properties largely figured.

Her auditor gave a weary sigh. In the hope of finding out more about his new acquaintance, he had let the woman’s tongue run on, and found, like the ingenious Oriental who invented a steamboat, that having once set it going he was unable to stop it.

Roland ate his luncheon in a brown study. His landlady’s gossip had told him what he wanted to know. The girl by whose side he had sat and walked yesterday morning – the girl who had so strangely attracted him in the parish church, was the daughter of his late visitor – and to-night he was to dine at the Rectory. Things couldn’t have turned out better. Yet all this was in the highest degree absurd. What could it matter to him who she was – or indeed if he never saw her again! But that morning on the beach! Bosh! He had not fallen in love with her – not he. He knew better than that. Yet Roland Dorrien, gloomy of temperament and entertaining no spark of affection for any living soul, was obliged to admit to himself that he had thought and was still thinking a good deal about that oval-faced girl with the dark expressive eyes.

And here a new idea struck him. That assumed name had been all very well up to a certain point, but now that he had accepted the rector’s invitation it had an ugly look of entering a man’s family circle under false colours. He wished now he had never adopted it, but then his plan of staying in Wandsborough incog, would have fallen through, and that he did not wish at all. Well, he would let it alone for the present. Perhaps during the evening he would find an opportunity of explaining matters to his host: at any rate to-morrow he would run up to Town for a day or two, and return to Cranston in ordinary and conventional style. That would put matters right.

Chapter Seven.

“I Told You We Should Meet Again.”

When Roland Dorrien was marshalled into the Rectory drawing-room, he found himself, somewhat to his surprise, its sole occupant.

A glance around told him that it was a pleasant room to be in. The elegant furniture, the pictures on the walls, the innumerable knick-knacks bestowed about, were all in the most perfect taste. There was that about the room which made it unmistakably clear that its presiding goddesses were refined and well-bred women. It was a bright room withal, as well as a tasteful one. Wide French windows opened upon the garden, and a strong aroma of roses both from without and within hung heavily upon the air.

Suddenly Olive came in. With a start of astonishment she stopped short.

“You!” she exclaimed.

“My fortunate self,” he replied, advancing to meet her. “I told you we should be sure to meet again, but I little thought how soon.”

“To think of it being you,” she went on, her face beaming with merriment over the fun of the situation, which, the first surprise past, she began thoroughly to enjoy. “Margaret told us father had asked someone to dinner, and we thought it was some clerical friend of his.”

“I am afraid you must get over the situation, Miss Olive, and put up with only me.”

“In that case, seeing that you have the advantage of me, and that there’s no one here to introduce us en règle– you might – er – ”

Voices in the hall, and the shutting of doors proclaiming the arrival of somebody, interrupted her.

“Well, how are you again, Mr Rowlands?” cried the rector cheerily. “I’m disgracefully late. This is Mr Turner, one of my colleagues,” he went on, introducing a broad-shouldered young man, shaven of countenance, and in clerical attire, who had come in with him.

The conversation at table was brisk and lively, and what especially struck the guest was the spontaneity and utter absence of constraint with which the girls chatted away – now keeping up a running fire of chaff among themselves or with their father, now poking fun at this or that local character. Then they would parenthesise an explanation for his benefit, endeavouring to sweep him into the fun: and succeeding – as though he were no stranger at all. It was delightful, he decided; and then, oh, horror! – a thought struck him which spoiled all. What if they were to turn the fire of their wit on to his own family, to start poking fun at the members of the same, in total ignorance of his own identity? He must really throw off this infernal pseudonym at the very earliest opportunity.

“How do you like Wandsborough, Mr Rowlands?” asked Margaret Ingelow, when they were seated at table.

“Oh, it seems a nice little place. One can go about as one likes, independently of everybody.”

Sophie spluttered at this.

“Why it’s the most gossipy place on earth, Mr Rowlands,” she said.

“I suppose so. Most small places are. But the coast scenery is very fine.”

“Isn’t it? And the beach, too. Have you been to the beach yet?”

Fortunately Turner was not at that moment talking to Olive, or he would have met with random replies. She was thinking, “Oh, if Margaret should ever come to know of yesterday morning!”

Roland answered in the affirmative and then Turner struck in.

“By the bye, Mr Rowlands, that must have been you I saw down there yesterday. I was envying the owner of that splendid dog.”

Olive was on thorns. Her accomplice, however, was equal to the occasion. Noting her uneasiness, he took up the subject at once, and the narrative of his acquisition of the faithful Roy soon directed the conversation to the wilds of the Far West, where the rector himself had gone through some stirring experiences in his younger days. During the reminiscences involved, Roland caught a rapid grateful glance from the bright eyes of his vis-à-vis. Then he began to study Turner’s face, whose owner was listening attentively to his host’s anecdote, and came to the conclusion that he did not like it. Moreover he was not sure how much concealed intent lurked beneath Turner’s innocent remark. Turner was bumptious – most curates were. No, he did not like Turner. Confound the fellow! what did he mean by looking at and talking to Olive in that familiar and appropriating way – as if she belonged to him, or soon would? But if she should, what the deuce was it to him – Roland Dorrien? Nothing – only these young parsons put on far too much side. Clearly Turner wanted taking down.

“I think you were in church on Sunday, were you not, Mr Rowlands?” said Margaret, dispelling his brown study.

“Er – Yes. Yes – I was. Very fine ceremony and music too. I never came across anything of the kind before.”

The approval implied in this answer atoned for its absent-mindedness and brought a gratified smile to Margaret’s face. The speaker had quite won her heart.

Then the conversation became general, and there was a vast deal of laughter and banter, and Roland found himself frequently appealed to, to act as umpire in some ridiculous point of debate, and in fact treated as an intimate friend rather than as a stranger who had not been two hours in their midst, and as he caught the bright, mischievous retort which Olive threw at him over her shoulder as the girls withdrew, he blessed the luck which had thrown him by the merest chance into such a delightful circle. Nor could he help contrasting the probable scene at Cranston at this moment, and a sort of mental shiver ran through him as he did so.

“Circulate the intoxicants, Turner – or, in plainer and more decorous English, pass the bottle,” cried the rector, as the door closed on his daughters, leaving the men to themselves. “Fill up, Mr Rowlands. And now I want you to tell me about your travels. I was a good deal in the States as a young man. When I was out West, the Plains tribes were not exuberantly friendly. That was even before you were in long clothes, I fancy, ha! ha! but yet we had two or three grand buffalo hunts with them. There’s a head upstairs in my boy’s smoking den – where we’ll go and have a cigar by and by – whose owner I turned over on one of those occasions. Splendid head, and well set up too.”

Then these two – the old traveller and the younger one – plunged into a flood of reminiscence in all the delightful abandon of a common and welcome topic. At last the rector started to his feet.

“Hallo?” he cried. “This won’t do. We mustn’t sit too long, or we shall meet with a warm reception in the other room. As it is we shall, so let’s face our troubles like men.”

His prediction was verified.

“Father, what a long time you’ve been!” cried Sophie, as they entered the drawing-room.