Florence Warden

“ Then, with a hopeless glance at his face, as if she despaired of her words having any effect, she added, “You are too suspicious. You are so shrewd that you think you can’t make a mistake. But for all your cleverness, my belief in the friend I know and trust is just as likely to be right as your belief to the contrary.”
“Well, well. I hope it may be. Don’t think I have any ill-feeling towards this Vernon Brander as a man; it is the betrayer of my sister that I’m after, and if Vernon Brander isn’t the guilty party, why, he’ll have nothing to fear from me. Good-afternoon, Miss Denison.” ”

“ Denison’s cold, pale, plump face grew every moment more forbidding.
“The place is not so overrun with admirers of Olivia Denison as you seem to imagine,” said she, acidly. “There is nothing the matter with the girl’s face; on the other hand, we are not accustomed to consider it anything to rave about. We Londoners like beauty of a more delicate type.”
“If by delicate you mean puny and pale,” said Vernon, with rash honesty, “you certainly won’t get us up here to agree with you. But if you mean refined, I can’t imagine a face more ideally satisfying in that respect than Miss Denison’s.” ”

“ The blood rushed to Olivia’s face. The touch of Mr. Brander’s hand had not offended her; the knowledge that it had been unconscious did. And a most acute pang shot through her heart, as she realized that it was because his mind was full of another woman’s treatment that he was oblivious of her. She was jealous. In such an impulsive, energetic girl as she was, vivid feeling found vent in hasty action. ”

“ He passed quite near to her on his way to the Vicarage gate. She raised her head with a smile and a heightened color, ready to give him her prettiest greeting; but he looked away with a persistency which she could no longer doubt was intentional, and it was with a blush of the deepest mortification that Olivia, whose burning eyes no longer saw inscriptions, or tombstones, or anything but a particularly tactless and unobservant clergyman, whose conduct in not allowing her to lessen her obligation to him by an expression of her gratitude was, Olivia felt, highly reprehensible. ”

“ Olivia shuddered. It was quite true; such an incident in a man’s life was not one that you could forget. She let the subject drop without further comment, but it haunted her for the rest of the evening as she sat brooding over the fire. Lucy, who was of an industrious frame of mind, got out her darning and mended away busily. But she had a healthy appetite, and she had had nothing more satisfying than biscuits and a sandwich throughout the day. Gradually her longing glances fell more and more frequently on the despised supper basket which Mr. Brander had given her. ”

“ Mr. Brander smiled. He seemed already to have quite recovered from any shock her alarming information might have been supposed to cause him.
“That was generous of you—and like you,” he said. “But it was very unwise. Do you want to set all the old women’s tongues wagging?”
“I don’t care,” murmured Olivia defiantly, though she cast down her eyes; “besides, I didn’t stop to think.”
“But you ought to stop to think. You haven’t always some one at your elbow to do it for you, as I verily believe a woman ought to have.” ”

“ When she woke up she could not resist an exclamation of horror, for she saw confronting her, in the dim firelight, an ugly, grinning face, the owner of which broke into a peal of hoarse laughter in enjoyment of the shock his presence caused her. Starting to her feet, Olivia woke up to the full consciousness that the ill-favored intruder was no other than her persecutor of two nights before. While she was gathering up her forces for a withering speech, Mr. Williams gave her a smile and a nod of friendly greeting. ”

“ Brander raised his head and prevented her.
“Don’t!” he said, huskily. “Why should you? What is there to be ashamed of in your kindness to me? Do I get too much from anybody?”
Olivia did not answer. She felt as if a new acquaintance had suddenly been sprung upon her. This mood was so different from any she had seen Mr. Brander in before. The half-cynical self-reliance, the bright, somewhat bitter humor had disappeared, and given place to a humility so touching, so gentle, that she felt constrained to remain where she was rather than risk hurting his feelings by rising abruptly. ”

“ The girl, drawing a long, sobbing breath, retreated a step without speaking.
Vernon stopped and looked into her face almost with the boldness of a lover.
“Why not?” he asked, in a voice little above a whisper.
“Why not, indeed, Mr. Brander!” she said, coldly, but without succeeding in hiding a break in her voice; “if the friends you can’t trust are of more value than those you can.”
“It is not a question of that, Miss Denison.”
“Isn’t it?” she broke in, quickly. “I think it is. You will go in all cold indignation, and come out all hot remorse and repentance. ”

“ You lead a life—voluntarily, mind, else there would be no grandeur, no dignity, in it—so full of austerity and self-sacrifice that you are winning yourself almost the reputation of a saint. You have shown an example of courage and endurance such as few men would have the steadfastness to follow—not I, for one, I admit. You are loved by your parishioners. And it is scarcely too much to say that by your own family—Evelyn, myself, and the little ones—you are adored.”
The Vicar of Rishton watched his brother’s face closely as he pronounced these words in full tones of deep feeling. ”

“ Brander’s invitations to him to dine at the Vicarage, or to play a game of chess with him in the evenings.
“I’m sure you must find it dull alone in the cottage at night,” the vicar would say to him cheerily; “for one can see with half an eye that you’ve been used to an active life, with lots of movement and all sorts of society. Why don’t you let yourself be persuaded into sitting by a warm hearth instead of a cold one, with a woman and children about you? All globe-trotters love the atmosphere of women and children.” ”

“ Olivia laughed with some constraint. If her father, who already had a prejudice against the clergy, should hear the rumors about poor Mr. Brander, nothing, short of entreaties which she would be ashamed to use, would induce him to allow her to exchange another word with the vicar of St. Cuthbert’s. And, in a neighborhood where the social attractions were so few as at Rishton, the loss of an acquaintance capable of intelligent conversation was a serious one. She grew silent, and beginning to feel conscious of the cold, shivered. Her father instantly opened the door and led her into the house. ”

“ Olivia Denison was indeed an unchallenged beauty, and had occupied that proud position almost ever since, twenty years ago, she had been pronounced to be “a lovely baby.” She was tall—of that cruel height which forces short admirers, on pain of looking ridiculous, to keep their distance; of figure rather massive than slender, with a fair skin, a fresh color, dark hair, blue eyes, and a winning expression of energy and honesty which gave to the whole face its greatest charm. For the moment, however, the rose color had left her cheeks, too, and her lips were drawn tightly together. ”

“ As this brief scene passed between father and son, a man in a short frieze coat, knickerbockers, gaiters, and deer-stalker cap, who had quickened his pace down the hill into a run on seeing the accident, looked full into the faces of both men with a keen, shrewd expression as he dashed by.
“It’s parson Brander, o’ S’ Cuthbert’s, feyther. He heeard thee,” said the young man in a husky, awed whisper.
“An’ wha not? Ah’d loike to see sik as him say a word to me!” said the farmer, in a loud voice of boastful contempt. ”

“ As she spoke her eyes brightened, for at the end of the long barn she descried in the dusk the figure of the gentleman who had come to their aid that afternoon and then left them with such unaccountable suddenness. Lucy saw him too, and being more demonstrative than her mistress, she gave vent to her delight in words.
“No, Mrs. Wall, ma’am; you needn’t go for to put yourself out, for there’s better folks than you coming along, that are a deal more obliging than ever you’d be, and that have some Christian kindness in them, which is more than can be said for you. Ugh, you grumpy old woman, you!” ”

“ Again Vernon tried to speak: again he failed. With a hasty side glance at his sister-in-law, full of a plaintive, dumb sort of gratitude and entreaty, he crossed the room rapidly, with almost a staggering gait, opened the door with clammy fingers, and hurried out.
Husband and wife, thus left face to face, said not a word, but each gave a strange look of searching inquiry into the face of the other.
“Poor fellow!” said the vicar, gently.
Mrs. Brander did not answer. With a woman’s keener sympathy, she was listening to her brother-in-law’s footsteps in the hall outside. ”

“ Olivia felt rather frightened when she saw how discolored and distorted with rage his little weasel’s face had become. But she bore a brave front, and only said, for all reply to his threats—
“Won’t you find it more convenient to stand on the ground, Mr. Williams? To walk about among eggs without accident requires a great deal of skill and experience.”
But when, with an impatient exclamation, he left the poultry yard, Olivia’s heart gave way, and she began to reproach herself bitterly for not having kept a bridle upon her tongue. ”

“ She was not very young or very pretty; she was dressed with great simplicity in a dark costume and a long seal-skin jacket; and the word by which a stranger would have described her was “lady-like.” It was impossible to help contrasting her with the two fidgety women behind; and Olivia was growing more and more sure that she should like to know her when, to her surprise, she suddenly heard a loud, hoarse whisper, “Here, gee up, Soosan,” and looking round, she saw the quiet-looking lady move up the pew at the behest of the odious Frederick Williams. ”

“ She was debating whether it would not be wiser to make the best of her way home at once, in spite of the snow, before the short day began to draw in, when she heard the key turn in the lock of the gate, and, peeping between the stones, saw the Reverend Vernon Brander enter, and, leaving the gate open behind him, disappear round the west end of the church. From his grave, stern, absorbed expression, Olivia guessed that he was unaware of the presence of another human being. ”

“ Suddenly a breath of air seemed to pass over every one, and the stirring of a more active life was felt. It was a voice at the gate of the churchyard which broke the hushed silence, and made every eye look up, while the women and children curtseyed, and the workmen touched their caps. The Vicar of Rishton, cheerful and smiling and bland, had worked the change by his appearance alone. ”

“ Being at heart a man of peace, and unable to retain displeasure with any one for long, Mr. Denison had subsided into an uneasy and conscience-pricked silence on the subject, when Olivia’s footsteps, bounding through the hall with the agility of youth and high spirits, startled both husband and wife. ”

“ Olivia turned round to look down upon him with the most earnest gravity.
“I shall take the liberty of asking you the same question when Regie gets caressed for his vivacity in cutting a slit in your umbrella, and when you see Beatrice consoled with an orange for some impertinence for which she ought to have her ears boxed.”
“And it’s all the fault of the step-mother?”
“Yes, all.”
“Poor lady; I am beginning to feel the deepest interest in her. No doubt she was a perfectly amiable and harmless person before this unhappy metamorphosis.” ”

“ At any rate, even a murderer was better than a milksop. So he made light of his wife’s deep-voiced harangue, and pronounced his opinion that Mrs. Meredith Brander might find something better to do than to spread these foolish stories concerning her brother-in-law.
“Then you mean to take no steps, in the face of what I have told you, to prevent your own hearth from being polluted by the presence of a murderous libertine?” inquired Mrs. Denison, who had the liking of a narrow and half-educated mind, in moments of excitement, for language equal to the occasion. ”

“ Denison, after ten years of his second marriage, was by no means so absorbed by marital devotion as to ignore the descent he had made in taking for his second wife a woman scarcely refined enough to have been maid to his first. Being a man of affectionate temperament, fond of home, and sensitively grateful for kindness real or supposed, it was natural that in his keen sorrow at his first wife’s death, he should fall a prey to the first woman, near at hand, who should find it worth her while to capture him. This, in the natural course of things, proved to be his daughter’s governess. ”

“ The dark forms of cumbrous, old-fashioned furniture were discernible in the dusk; the heavy hangings of a huge four-post mahogany bedstead shook, as a rat, disturbed by the unwonted intrusion, slid down the curtain and scurried across the floor. As she stepped slowly forward on the carpet, which was damp to the tread, and peered to the right and left in the gloom, Olivia could see strange relics of the room’s last occupant ”