第45章

THEN you might think it your duty to tell Mrs.Leath."She laid the case before him with a cold lucidity."Ishould, in your place, I believe," she ended with a little laugh.

"I shouldn't feel justified in telling her, behind your back, if I thought you unsuited for the place; but I should certainly feel justified," he rejoined after a pause, "in telling YOU if I thought the place unsuited to you.""And that's what you're trying to tell me now?""Yes; but not for the reasons you imagine.""What, then, are your reasons, if you please?""I've already implied them in advising you not to give up all idea of the theatre.You're too various, too gifted, too personal, to tie yourself down, at your age, to the dismal drudgery of teaching.""And is THAT what you've told Mrs.Leath?"She rushed the question out at him as if she expected to trip him up over it.He was moved by the simplicity of the stratagem.

"I've told her exactly nothing," he replied.

"And what--exactly--do you mean by 'nothing'? You and she were talking about me when I came into her sitting-room yesterday."Darrow felt his blood rise at the thrust.

"I've told her, simply, that I'd seen you once or twice at Mrs.Murrett's.""And not that you've ever seen me since?""And not that I've ever seen you since...""And she believes you--she completely believes you?"He uttered a protesting exclamation, and his flush reflected itself in the girl's cheek.

"Oh, I beg your pardon! I didn't mean to ask you that." She halted, and again cast a rapid glance behind and ahead of her.Then she held out her hand."Well, then, thank you--and let me relieve your fears.I sha'n't be Effie's governess much longer."At the announcement, Darrow tried to merge his look of relief into the expression of friendly interest with which he grasped her hand."You really do agree with me, then?

And you'll give me a chance to talk things over with you?"She shook her head with a faint smile."I'm not thinking of the stage.I've had another offer: that's all."The relief was hardly less great.After all, his personal responsibility ceased with her departure from Givre.

"You'll tell me about that, then--won't you?"Her smile flickered up."Oh, you'll hear about it soon...Imust catch Effie now and drag her back to the blackboard."She walked on for a few yards, and then paused again and confronted him."I've been odious to you--and not quite honest," she broke out suddenly.

"Not quite honest?" he repeated, caught in a fresh wave of wonder.

"I mean, in seeming not to trust you.It's come over me again as we talked that, at heart, I've always KNOWN Icould..."

Her colour rose in a bright wave, and her eyes clung to his for a swift instant of reminder and appeal.For the same space of time the past surged up in him confusedly; then a veil dropped between them.

"Here's Effie now!" she exclaimed.

He turned and saw the little girl trotting back to them, her hand in Owen Leath's.

Even through the stir of his subsiding excitement Darrow was at once aware of the change effected by the young man's approach.For a moment Sophy Viner's cheeks burned redder;then they faded to the paleness of white petals.She lost, however, nothing of the bright bravery which it was her way to turn on the unexpected.Perhaps no one less familiar with her face than Darrow would have discerned the tension of the smile she transferred from himself to Owen Leath, or have remarked that her eyes had hardened from misty grey to a shining darkness.But her observer was less struck by this than by the corresponding change in Owen Leath.The latter, when he came in sight, had been laughing and talking unconcernedly with Effie; but as his eye fell on Miss Viner his expression altered as suddenly as hers.

The change, for Darrow, was less definable; but, perhaps for that reason, it struck him as more sharply significant.

Only--just what did it signify? Owen, like Sophy Viner, had the kind of face which seems less the stage on which emotions move than the very stuff they work in.In moments of excitement his odd irregular features seemed to grow fluid, to unmake and remake themselves like the shadows of clouds on a stream.Darrow, through the rapid flight of the shadows, could not seize on any specific indication of feeling: he merely perceived that the young man was unaccountably surprised at finding him with Miss Viner, and that the extent of his surprise might cover all manner of implications.

Darrow's first idea was that Owen, if he suspected that the conversation was not the result of an accidental encounter, might wonder at his step-mother's suitor being engaged, at such an hour, in private talk with her little girl's governess.The thought was so disturbing that, as the three turned back to the house, he was on the point of saying to Owen: "I came out to look for your mother." But, in the contingency he feared, even so simple a phrase might seem like an awkward attempt at explanation; and he walked on in silence at Miss Viner's side.Presently he was struck by the fact that Owen Leath and the girl were silent also; and this gave a new turn to his thoughts.Silence may be as variously shaded as speech; and that which enfolded Darrow and his two companions seemed to his watchful perceptions to be quivering with cross-threads of communication.At first he was aware only of those that centred in his own troubled consciousness; then it occurred to him that an equal activity of intercourse was going on outside of it.

Something was in fact passing mutely and rapidly between young Leath and Sophy Viner; but what it was, and whither it tended, Darrow, when they reached the house, was but just beginning to divine...

XVIII

Anna Leath, from the terrace, watched the return of the little group.