Imogen: or, Only Eighteen

“I wish Trixie had come with us,” she said to Oliver.

Oliver stared.

“Do you, really?” he said. “Well, no, I can’t agree with you. I’d rather have Florence – no, she’s talking, she can’t hear, and no matter if she does – ten times over. If Trixie’s in a good-humour she’s sure to be up to mischief, and when she’s sulky she’s worse.”

“I think you’re all very hard on her,” said Imogen, rather sharply.

Oliver looked still further taken aback. His admiration for his new friend slightly diminished. Could she have a bad temper? Oliver had no liking for bad-tempered girls.

“Well,” he said, “to tell you the truth, I think it’s rather the other way. Every one’s been so uncommonly easy with her, that she’s got to think she can do as she pleases.”

“That’s very unfair,” said Imogen, still sharply. “People spoil their children, and then when they find the poor things are spoilt, they turn round upon them and abuse them.”

“There’s something in that, perhaps,” said Oliver, good-naturedly. His good-nature disarmed Miss Wentworth a little.

“I shouldn’t have spoken that way,” she said, after a pause. “It wasn’t my place to say it.”

“It’s all right,” Oliver replied. “You needn’t mind what you say to me.”

But a little constraint had come between the two. One or two subjects were started which fell flat, and Imogen plodded on, hating the wet stony path, wishing devoutly she had not come out, and tantalised by overhearing the snatches of bright, interested conversation ahead of her, feeling as if her companions had completely forgotten her existence. It was not so, however. Then came a break in the path, which widened to emerge on a stretch of moorland; and Major Winchester, who had noticed the silence of the two youngest members of the party, turned to look for Imogen.

“One can’t be very sociable in our recent circumstances,” he said laughingly. “It is better now. Don’t you admire this great bare spread of country, Miss Wentworth? I hope the air isn’t too keen for you?”

Imogen shivered slightly, but still she brightened up.

“It is rather cold,” she replied; “but I like it. If only it wasn’t so wet under foot.”

“But you have strong boots on,” said he encouragingly, “and out here in the open it’s never really wet for long. We shall not have any more walking as bad as the bit we’ve had. We cross a corner of the moor to those fells you see over there – the Tor Rocks they are called, where there are some very respectable caves.”

“In summer they are charming places for picnics,” said Florence. She meant to be genial to the young stranger, and with Rex at hand it was more easy to be so.

“Especially the smugglers’ cave,” said Oliver.

“Is there a real smugglers’ cave?” said Mrs Wyngate, eagerly. “How nice! Can we explore it like that place – Poole’s Cavern, don’t they call it – in Derbyshire?”

“It’s a very small thing in caves compared to that,” said Oliver. But Mrs Wyngate went on to ask questions, and her cheery interest attracted him. Gradually the little party separated again into two sets, Rex and Imogen in front, Oliver and Mrs Wyngate behind, followed by Florence, who, seeing with a sigh of satisfaction that her cousin was himself taking charge of his protégée, thought she might feel herself off duty in the meantime.

How different everything became to Imogen!

The still cloudy sky seemed only pleasantly grey, the bare moorland broke out into patches of contrasting colour; her boots grew into a merry joke as she confided to Major Winchester that her feet felt as if they could walk about inside them, and, when at his suggestion the unnecessary waterproof was discarded and relegated to his arm, she felt herself like a chrysalis emerging into a butterfly.

And her brightness reacted on her companion. His grave, quiet face lightened up with pleasure at the success of his endeavours, and encouraged him to redouble them. They cost him something, for he had to the full as absorbing matter for his own reflections as Florence; indeed, in some sense, more so, and he would have hailed with relief the prospect of a solitary stroll this afternoon, or if that were impossible, the companionship and distraction of intelligent and matured minds. Even Mrs Wyngate, who was well read and cultivated, and Florence herself, who was not without thoughtfulness and originality, would have been more congenial by far than this little schoolgirl, sweet and ingenuous though she was. But Major Winchester was never one to shirk a task savouring of duty or kindliness on account of its cost. He racked his brains to amuse his young companion, recalling reminiscences of his eventful and adventurous life, going back to his school-boy days even, till Imogen’s ringing laughter sounded back to the three in the rear.

“Rex is excelling himself,” said Florence, with a touch of sarcasm in her tone.

“How very kind-hearted he is!” said Mrs Wyngate, simply and warmly. “For a girl of that age is scarcely an interesting companion to a man of his standing, at least, not to a man like him, entirely above flirting or nonsense of that kind.”

“Yes,” Oliver agreed, “you’re about right. It’s all his good-nature. For though she’s pretty, she’s rather heavy – a bit spoilt too, I fancy.”

“By her adoring mamma,” added Florence.

“However, she’s our guest, and we must look after her, heavy or not. Don’t you think Rex must be beginning to have had about enough of it by this time? We had better overtake them; we are close to the caves too.”

Rex was beginning to feel his self-imposed task a little wearisome by this time, and he was not sorry when a shout from Oliver called to him to stop.

“Oh, what a bother!” said Imogen. “I did so want to hear the rest of that story, Major Winchester. Need we walk with them?”

“It would scarcely be civil to walk on,” he said smiling. “I will tell you the rest another time, Miss Wentworth.”

She looked almost brilliantly pretty, but a trifle resentful when the others came up. Florence, not unnaturally, felt slightly indignant, and even Mrs Wyngate decided that the girl must be silly as well as spoilt. For Imogen took no trouble to conceal her annoyance.

“Can she really be so foolish as to imagine Major Winchester finds her society interesting?” thought the matron of the party, while Florence mentally decided that Imogen’s innocence and timidity were not of a kind to “last.”

“She will soon develop into a self-conceited little flirt,” reflected the elder girl; “all the more danger if she falls into bad hands. I foresee no sinecure if I am to look after her.” But she exerted herself to be amusing and agreeable, and to keep the party together. “Poor Rex!” she thought, “I daresay it’s almost as hard upon him to look cheerful as it is upon me. I mustn’t be selfish, either.”

The caves were not bad caves in their way, and child as she really was, Imogen soon forgot her vexation in the fun of exploring their dark recesses. She ran on laughingly, declaring that she must go to “the very end,” and Rex, who knew every nook and cranny, contented himself with a “Don’t let her do anything foolish,” to Oliver, who was doing the honours to Mrs Wyngate, and then returned to the entrance, where it was rather a refreshment to him to find Florence, and to walk up and down with her, with the liberty of talking or not as they felt inclined.

Chapter Six

The Plot Thickens

“You’re not cold, I hope, Florence,” he said suddenly, waking up out of a brown study.

“Oh no, it is never very cold just here; the rocks shelter us,” she said. “Besides, I am well used to it, and well wrapped up. I only hope your protégée won’t catch cold,” she added, somewhat uneasily. “I should get into a scrape both with her mother and my own.”

“She’s right enough,” he replied, with the slightest possible accent of impatience, which did not altogether displease his companion.

“There’s really less risk of catching cold in caves in winter than in summer, when it’s hot outside.”

Then he relapsed into silence.

After a minute or two Florence spoke again.

“Rex,” she began, half timidly, “I didn’t like to ask you before – indeed, I’ve hardly seen you to-day, but, at breakfast, I saw when you got your letters. Was there anything new, anything worse?”

Major Winchester sighed.

“You’re very quick, Florry dear,” he said. “Yes. There wasn’t anything exactly new, but worse – yes, it was all worse. That was partly why I went out with Paddy. I wanted to battle off my – misery.” He gave a short laugh. “No, that is a womanish word; my disappointment, let us say. And that was how I came to pick up the Wentworths, you see. I had to call at the station.”

“But what is the disappointment – specially, I mean,” Florence asked.

“Only that there is no chance of her, of Eva’s coming home,” he said. “The doctors won’t hear of it. She is to go straight to Algiers from Ireland. And last week, when I left her, there did seem a lightening in the clouds. They won’t even allow her to pass through London on her way.”

“And everything – what you told me about – it is all put off again indefinitely?”

“More than indefinitely – most definitely, I fear,” he said. “Heaven only knows.” But here he broke off.

“Oh, Rex, I am so sorry for you,” said his cousin impulsively. “And you are so unselfish. When I compare myself with you, I do feel so ashamed. Just to think of your bothering yourself with that silly little goose of a child.”