“For suppose!”—­she turned gayly to her daughters for sympathy—­“suppose she were to marry Mr. Faversham!  And then Mr. Melrose can have a stroke, and everything will come right!”

Lydia and Susy smiled dutifully.  Victoria sat silent.  Her silence checked Mrs. Penfold’s flow, and brought her back, bewildered to realities; to the sad remembrance of Lydia’s astonishing and inscrutable behaviour.  Whereupon her manner and conversation became so dishevelled, in her effort to propitiate Lady Tatham without betraying either herself or Lydia, that the situation grew quickly unbearable.

“May I see your garden?” said Victoria abruptly to Lydia.  Lydia rose with alacrity, opened the glass door into the garden, and by a motion of the lips only visible to Susy appealed to her to keep their mother indoors.

A misty October sun reigned over the garden.  The river ran sparkling through the valley, and on the farther side the slopes and jutting crags of the Helvellyn range showed ghostly through the sunlit haze.’

A few absent-minded praises were given to the phloxes and the begonias.  Then Victoria said, turning a penetrating eye on Lydia: 

“You heard from Harry of the Melroses’ arrival?”

“Yes—­this morning.”

Bright colour rushed into Lydia’s cheeks.  Tatham’s letter of that morning, the longest perhaps ever written by a man who detested letter-writing, had touched her profoundly, caused her an agonized searching of conscience.  Did Lady Tatham blame and detest her?  Her manner was certainly cool.  The girl’s heart swelled as she walked along beside her guest.

“Everything depends on Mr. Faversham,” said Victoria.  “You are a friend of his?” She took the garden chair that Lydia offered her.

“Yes; we have all come to know him pretty well.”

Lydia’s face, as she sat on the grass at Lady Tatham’s feet, looking toward the fells, was scarcely visible to her companion.  Victoria could only admire the beauty of the girl’s hair, as the wind played with it, and the grace of her young form.

“I am afraid he is disappointing all his friends,” she said gravely.

“Is it his fault?” exclaimed Lydia.  “Mr. Melrose must be mad!”

“I wonder if that excuses Mr. Faversham?”

“It’s horrible for him!” said Lydia in a low, smothered voice.  “He wants to put things right?”

It was on the tip of Victoria’s tongue to say, “Does he too write to you every day?” but she refrained.

“If he really wants to put things right, why has he done nothing all these seven weeks?” she asked severely.  “I saw Colonel Barton this morning.  He and Mr. Andover are in despair.  They felt such confidence in Mr. Faversham.  The state of the Mainstairs village is too terrible!  Everybody is crying out.  The Carlisle papers this week are full of it.  But there are scores of other things almost as bad.  Mr. Faversham rushes about—­here, there, and everywhere—­but with no result, they tell us, as far as any of the real grievances are concerned.  Mr. Melrose seems to be infatuated about him personally; will give him everything he wants; and pays no attention whatever to his advice.  And you know the latest report?”