The Last of the Mortimers. Маргарет Олифант

you?—or no, sit still, Sara. I’ll take a peep out at the great gate myself.”

      Saying which, I hurried past Carson, brushing against her, as she did not keep out of my way, and snatched a cloak out of the hall, and ran to the gate. It was only twilight out of doors, though we had our lamp lighted. A nice night, grey, a little frosty, but rather pleasant, with the lights twinkling out of the windows. I said to myself, “Nothing I should like better than a brisk walk down to the village; but Sarah, you know—Sarah’s different.” What could keep her out so late? I can’t say I was alarmed, but I did get a little uneasy, especially as I saw Ellis making his way up one road from the gate of the courtyard, and the houseboy running down another. It was Carson’s doings, no doubt; well, well! I ought to be thankful my sister had a maid that was so fond of her; but taking things out of my hands in this way, not only made me angry, as was natural, but flurried me as well.

      As I stood there, however, watching, and thinking I surely heard a sound of wheels somewhere in the distance, somebody went past me very suddenly. I could not see where he sprang from, he appeared in such a sudden unexplainable way. I got quite a fright, and, except that he was a gentleman, and probably a young one, I could tell nothing more about the figure that shot across my eyes. Very odd; could he have been hiding in the bushes? What could he want? Who could it be? I certainly hear the carriage now, and there comes the houseboy up the road waving his arms about; but instead of looking for my sister, I looked after this figure that had passed me. It passed Ellis too, and looked in his face, making him start, as it appeared to me, and so went straight on, till the road turned and I could see it no longer. I felt quite as if I had met with an adventure. Could it be some lover of little Sara’s that had followed her out here?—or, dear, dear! could it have anything to do with delaying Sarah’s drive? Just then the carriage came in sight, and I ran back to the house-door to receive my sister and ask what had detained her. She stepped out of the carriage, looking paler than her ordinary, and with that nervous shake in her hands and head, and looked as if she could quite have clutched hold of Carson, who of course was there to receive her.

      “Sarah,” cried I, “what in all the world has kept you so long? We were at our wits’ end, thinking something had happened.”

      “You’ll be glad to see nothing has happened,” said Sarah, in her whisper, trying hard to be quite composed and like herself as she took hold of Carson’s arm. “The beauty of the evening, you know, drew me a little further than I generally go.”

      This she said looking into my face, nay, into my eyes all the time, as if to defy any suspicions or doubt I might have. Her very determination to show that there was no other reason, made it quite evident that there had been something, whatever it was.

      I said nothing of course. I had not the least idea what my own suspicions pointed at, nor what they were. So it was not likely I should make any scene, or put it into the servants’ heads to wonder. So I stood still and asked no more questions, while Sarah passed before me, leaning on Carson’s arm, to go upstairs. It was the most simple and reasonable thing in the world; why should she not have gone further than she intended one night in her life? But she did not, that is all.

      When I went back to the library, little Sara, extraordinary to relate, was sitting exactly where I left her, busy about the papers. The wilful creature did not seem to have moved during my absence. She was as busy and absorbed as if there was nothing else to do or think of in the world. And while we had been all of a flutter looking for Sarah, she, sitting quiet and undisturbed, had got the greater part of her work finished.

      “Sara, you unfeeling child,” said I, “were you not anxious about your godmamma?”

      “No,” said Sara, very simply. “Godmamma Sarah, and coachman Jacob, and those two fat old horses could surely all take care of each other. I wasn’t frightened, godmamma. I never heard of any accidents happening to big old stout carriages and horses like yours. I’ve nearly got my work done while you’ve been away.”

      This was all the sympathy I got from little Sara. Of course I could no more have told her the puzzle my mind was in than I could have told the servants; but still, you know, an intelligent young person might have guessed by my looks and been a little sympathetic;—though to be sure there is no use pretending with one’s self. I do believe I liked Sara twenty times better for taking no notice;—and then, how cleverly the little kitten had got through her work!

      We saw nothing more of Sarah that night. When it was time for tea, Carson came down again with missus’s compliments, and she was tired with her long drive, and would have tea in her own room. I said nothing at all, but handed her the Times. I don’t doubt Sarah had her tea very snug in her nice cosy dressing-room, with Carson purring round her and watching every move she made. I never could manage that sort of thing for my part. Little Sara and I, however, though her godmamma deserted us, were very comfortable, on the whole, downstairs.

      Chapter IX

      WE had both been reading almost all the evening. Sara had her novel, and I had the Times Supplement, which I am free to confess I like as well as any other part of the paper. I will not deny that I finished the third volume before I began to the newspaper; but, to be sure, a novel, after you are done with it, is an unsatisfactory piece of work; especially if the evening is only half over, and you have nothing else to begin to. I sat leaning back in my chair, wandering over the advertisements, and very ready for a talk. That is just the time, to be sure, when one wants somebody to talk to. If I had ever been used to the luxury of a favourite maid when I was young, as Sarah was, I do believe I should have been in my own cosy room now as well as Sarah, talking everything over with my Carson. But that is not the way I was brought up, you see. To be sure, as there was ten years of difference between us, nobody had ever looked for me, and Sarah had got quite settled in her heiress ways before I was born. When I was young, I used to think it a sad pity for everybody’s sake that I ever was born, especially after my mother died; however, I changed my views upon that subject a good many years ago. Yet here I sat looking all over the advertisements, and keeping an eye on Sara to see if there was any hope of getting a little conversation out of her. Alas! she was all lapped up and lost in her novel. She thought no more of me than of Sarah’s empty chair. Ah! novels are novels when people are young. I looked at the poor dear child, and admired and smiled at her over the top of the newspaper. If I had been a cabbage, Sara could not have taken less notice of me.

      At last she suddenly exclaimed out loud—at something she was reading, of course—“I declare!” as if she had made a discovery, and then stopped short and looked up at me with a sort of challenge, as if defying me to guess what she was thinking of. Then, seeing how puzzled I looked, Sara laughed, but reddened a little as well, to my amazement; and finally, not without the least little touch of confusion, explained herself. To be sure it was quite voluntary, and yet a little unwilling too.

      “There’s something here exactly like the Italian gentleman; he that people talk so much about in Chester, you know.”

      “I never knew there was an Italian gentleman in Chester. What a piece of news! and you never told me,” said I.

      “He only came about a fortnight ago,” said Sara. “It looks quite romantic, you know, godmamma, which is the only reason I have heard anything about it. He came quite in great style to the Angel, and said he was coming to see some friends, and asked all about whether anybody knew where the Countess Sermoneta lived. You may be quite sure nobody had ever heard of such a name in Chester. I heard it all from Lucy Wilde, who had heard it from her brother, who is always playing billiards and things at the Angel—Harry Wilde–”

      “That is the poor young man who–”

      “Oh, dear godmamma, don’t bother! let one go on with one’s story. Harry Wilde says the Italian came down among them, asking everybody about this Countess Sermoneta, and looking quite bewildered when he found that nobody knew her; but still he was quite lively, and thought it must be some mistake, and laughed, and made sure that this was really Chestare he had come to, and not any other place. But next day, people say, he sent for the landlord and asked all about the families in the neighbourhood, and all of a sudden grew quite grave and serious, and soon after took lodgings in Watergate, and has been seen going about the streets and the walls so much