Marion Fay: A Novel

"Exactly that; – come along." And so they started, more than an hour before the time at which Marion Fay would return from church. "The man who annoyed me so out hunting was an intimate friend of yours."

"I have not an intimate friend in the world except yourself."

"Not Marion Fay?"

"I meant among men. I do not suppose that Marion Fay was out hunting in Cumberland."

"I should not have ran away from her, I think, if she had. It was Mr. Crocker, of the General Post Office."

"Crocker in Cumberland?"

"Certainly he was in Cumberland, – unless some one personated him. I met him dining at Castle Hautboy, when he was kind enough to make himself known to me, and again out hunting, – when he did more than make himself known to me."

"I am surprised."

"Is he not away on leave?"

"Oh, yes; – he is away on leave. I do not doubt that it was he."

"Why should he not be in Cumberland, – when, as it happens, his father is land-steward or something of that sort to my uncle Persiflage?"

"Because I did not know that he had any connection with Cumberland. Why not Cumberland, or Westmoreland, or Northumberland, you may say? Why not? – or Yorkshire, or Lincolnshire, or Norfolk? I certainly did not suppose that a Post Office clerk out on his holidays would be found hunting in any county."

"You have never heard of his flea-bitten horse?"

"Not a word. I didn't know that he had ever sat upon a horse. And now will you let me know why you have called him my friend?"

"Is he not so?"

"By no means."

"Does he not sit at the same desk with you?"

"Certainly he does."

"I think I should be friends with a man if I sat at the same desk with him."

"With Crocker even?" asked Roden.

"Well; he might be an exception."

"But if an exception to you, why not also an exception to me? As it happens, Crocker has made himself disagreeable to me. Instead of being my friend, he is, – I will not say my enemy, because I should be making too much of him; but nearer to being so than any one I know. Now, what is the meaning of all this? Why did he trouble you especially down in Cumberland? Why do you call him my friend? And why do you wish to speak to me about him?"

"He introduced himself to me, and told me that he was your special friend."

"Then he lied."

"I should not have cared about that; – but he did more."

"What more did he do?"

"I would have been courteous to him, – if only because he sat at the same desk with you; – but – "

"But what?"

"There are things which are difficult to be told."

"If they have to be told, they had better be told," said Roden, almost angrily.

"Whether friend or not, he knew of – your engagement with my sister."

"Impossible!"

"He told me of it," said Lord Hampstead impetuously, his tongue now at length loosed. "Told me of it! He spoke of it again and again to my extreme disgust. Though the thing had been fixed as Fate, he should not have mentioned it."

"Certainly not."

"But he did nothing but tell me of your happiness, and good luck, and the rest of it. It was impossible to stop him, so that I had to ride away from him. I bade him be silent, – as plainly as I could without mentioning Fanny's name. But it was of no use."

"How did he know it?"

"You told him!"

"I!"

"So he said." This was not strictly the case. Crocker had so introduced the subject as to have avoided the palpable lie of declaring that the tidings had been absolutely given by Roden to himself. But he had not the less falsely intended to convey that impression to Hampstead, and had conveyed it. "He gave me to understand that you were speaking about it continually at your office." Roden turned round and looked at the other man, white with rage – as though he could not allow himself to utter a word. "It was as I tell you. He began it at the Castle, and afterwards continued it whenever he could get near me when hunting."

"And you believed him?"

"When he repeated his story so often what was I to do?"

"Knock him off his horse."

"And so be forced to speak of my sister to every one in the hunt and in the county? You do not feel how much is due to a girl's name."

"I think I do. I think that of all men I am the most likely to feel what is due to the name of Lady Frances Trafford. Of course I never mentioned it to any one at the Post Office."

"From whom had he heard it?"

"How can I answer that? Probably through some of your own family. It has made its way through Lady Kingsbury to Castle Hautboy, and has then been talked about. I am not responsible for that."

"Not for that certainly, – if it be so."

"Nor because such a one as he has lied. You should not have believed it of me."

"I was bound to ask you."

"You were bound to tell me, but should not have asked me. There are things which do not require asking. What must I do with him?"