Chapter 1

ALICE MAYBELL.

In the small breakfast parlour of Oulton, a pretty girl, Miss Alice
Maybell, with her furs and wrappers about her, and a journey of forty
miles before her--not by rail--to Wyvern, had stood up to hug and kiss
her old aunt, and bid her good-bye.

“Now, do sit down again; you need not be in such a hurry--you’re not
to go for ten minutes or more,” said the old lady; “do, there’s a
darling.”

“If I’m not home before the sun goes down, aunt, Mr. Fairfield will be
so angry,” said the girl, laying a hand on each shoulder of kind old
Lady Wyndale, and looking fondly, but also sadly, into her face.

“Which Mr. Fairfield, dear--the old or the young one?”

“Old Mr. Fairfield, the Squire, as we call him at Wyvern. He’ll really
be angry, and I’m a little bit afraid of him, and I would not vex him
for the world--he has always been so kind.”

As she answered, the young lady blushed a beautiful crimson, and the
old lady, not observing it, said--

“Indeed, I don’t know why I said young--young Mr. Fairfield is old
enough, I think, to be your father; but I want to know how you liked
Lord Tremaine. I told you how much he liked you. I’m a great believer
in first impressions. He was so charmed with you, when he saw you in
Wyvern Church. Of course he ought to have been thinking of something
better; but no matter--the fact was so, and now he is, I really think,
in love--very much--and who knows? He’s such a charming person, and
there is everything to make it--I don’t know what word to use--but you
know Tremaine is quite a beautiful place, and he does not owe a
guinea.”

“You dear old auntie,” said the girl, kissing her again on the cheek,
“wicked old darling--always making great matches for me. If you had
remained in India, you’d have married me, I’m sure, to a native
prince.”

“Native fiddlestick; of course I could if I had liked, but you never
should have married a Mahomedan with my consent. Never mind though;
you’re sure to do well; marriages are made in heaven, and I really
believe there is no use in plotting and planning. There was your
darling mamma, when we were both girls together, I said I should never
consent to marry a soldier or live out of England, and I did marry a
soldier, and lived twelve years of my life in India; and she, poor
darling, said again and again, she did not care who her husband might
be, provided he was not a clergyman, nor a person living all the year
round in the country--_that_ no power could induce her to consent to,
and yet she did consent, and to both one and the other, and married a
clergyman, and a poor one, and lived and died in the country. So,
after all, there’s not much use in planning beforehand.”

“Very true, auntie; none in the world, I believe.”

The girl was looking partly over her shoulder, out of the window,
upward towards the clouds, and she sighed heavily; and recollecting
herself, looked again in her aunt’s face and smiled.

“I wish you could have stayed a little longer here,” said her aunt.

“I wish I could,” she answered slowly, “I was thinking of talking over
a great many things with you--that is, of telling you all my long
stories; but while those people were staying here I could not, and now
there is not time.”

“What long stories, my dear?”

“Stupid stories, I should have said,” answered Alice.

“Well come, is there anything to tell?” demanded the old lady, looking
in her large, dark eyes.

“Nothing worth telling--nothing that is--” and she paused for the
continuation of her sentence.

“That is what?” asked her aunt.

“I was going to talk to you, darling,” answered the girl, “but I could
not in so short a time--so short a time as remains now,” and she
looked at her watch--a gift of old Squire Fairfield’s. “I should not
know how to make myself understood, I have so many hundred things, and
all jumbled up in my head, and should not know how to begin.”

“Well, I’ll begin for you. Come--have any visitors looked in at Wyvern
lately?” said her aunt.

“Not one,” she answered.

“No new faces?”

“No, indeed.”

“Are there any new neighbours?” persisted the old lady.

“Not one. No, aunt, it isn’t that.”

“And where are these elderly young gentlemen, the two Mr. Fairfields?”
asked the old lady.

The girl laughed, and shook her head.

“Wandering at present. Captain Fairfield is in London.”

“And his charming younger brother--where is he?” asked Lady Wyndale.

“At some fair, I suppose, or horse-race; or, goodness knows where,”
answered the girl.

“I was going to ask you whether there was an affair of the heart,”
said her aunt. “But there does not seem much material; and what was
the subject? Though I can’t hear it all, you may tell me what it was
to be about.”

“About fifty things, or nothings. There’s no one on earth, auntie,
darling, but you I can talk anything over with; and I’ll write, or, if
you let me, come again for a day or two, very soon--may I?”

“Of course, _no_,” said her aunt gaily. “But we are not to be quite
alone, all the time, mind. There are people who would not forgive me
if I were to do anything so selfish, but I promise you ample time to
talk--you and I to ourselves; and now that I think, I should like to
hear by the post, if you will write and say anything you like. You may
be quite sure nobody shall hear a word about it.”

By this time they had got to the hall-door.

“I’m sure of that, darling,” and she kissed the kind old lady.

“And are you _quite_ sure you would not like a servant to travel with
you; he could sit beside the driver?”

“No, dear auntie, my trusty old Dulcibella sits inside to take care of
me.”

“Well, dear, are you quite sure? I should not miss him the least.”

“Quite, dear aunt, I assure you.”

“And you know you told me you were quite happy at Wyvern,” said Lady
Wyndale, returning her farewell caress, and speaking low, for a
servant stood at the chaise-door.

“Did I? Well, I shouldn’t have said that, for--I’m _not_ happy,”
whispered Alice Maybell, and the tears sprang to her eyes as she
kissed her old kinswoman; and then, with her arms still about her
neck, there was a brief look from her large, brimming eyes, while her
lip trembled; and suddenly she turned, and before Lady Wyndale had
recovered from that little shock, her pretty guest was seated in the
chaise, the door shut, and she drove away.

“What can it be, poor little thing?” thought Lady Wyndale, as her eyes
anxiously followed the carriage in its flight down the avenue.

“They have shot her pet-pigeon, or the dog has killed her guinea-pig,
or old Fairfield won’t allow her to sit up till twelve o’clock at
night, reading her novel. Some childish misery, I dare say, poor
little soul!”

But for all that she was not satisfied, and her poor, pale, troubled
look haunted her.