It had not, during the years which certainly had given time for change, altered in the least.The station master had grown stouter and more rosy, and came forward with his respectful, hospitable air, to attend to the unusual-looking young lady, who was the only first-class passenger.He thought she must be a visitor expected at some country house, but none of the carriages, whose coachmen were his familiar acquaintances, were in waiting.That such a fine young lady should be paying a visit at any house whose owners did not send an equipage to attend her coming, struck him as unusual.
The brougham from the "Crown," though a decent country town vehicle, seemed inadequate.Yet, there it stood drawn up outside the station, and she went to it with the manner of a young lady who had ordered its attendance and knew it would be there.
Wells felt a good deal of interest.Among the many young ladies who descended from the first-class compartments and passed through the little waiting-room on their way to the carriages of the gentry they were going to visit, he did not know when a young lady had "caught his eye," so to speak, as this one did.She was not exactly the kind of young lady one would immediately class mentally as "a foreigner," but the blue of her eyes was so deep.and her hair and eyelashes so dark, that these things, combining themselves with a certain "way" she had, made him feel her to be of a type unfamiliar to the region, at least.
He was struck, also, by the fact that the young lady had no maid with her.The truth was that Bettina had purposely left her maid in town.If awkward things occurred, the presence of an attendant would be a sort of complication.It was better, on the first approach, to be wholly unencumbered.
"How far are we from Stornham Court?" she inquired.
"Five miles, my lady," he answered, touching his cap.She expressed something which to the rural and ingenuous, whose standards were defined, demanded a recognition of probable rank.
"I'd like to know," was his comment to his wife when he went home to dinner, "who has gone to Stornham Court to-day.
There's few enough visitors go there, and none such as her, for certain.She don't live anywhere on the line above here, either, for I've never seen her face before.She was a tall, handsome one--she was, but it isn't just that made you look after her.
She was a clever one with a spirit, I'll be bound.I was wondering what her ladyship would have to say to her.""Perhaps she was one of HIS fine ladies?" suggestively.
"That she wasn't, either.And, as for that, I wonder what he'd have to say to such as she is."There was complexity of element enough in the thing she was on her way to do, Bettina was thinking, as she was driven over the white ribbon of country road that unrolled over rise and hollow, between the sheep-dotted greenness of fields and the scented hedges.The soft beauty enclosing her was a little shut out from her by her mental attitude.She brought forward for her own decisions upon suitable action a number of possible situations she might find herself called upon to confront.The one thing necessary was that she should be prepared for anything whatever, even for Rosy's not being pleased to see her, or for finding Sir Nigel a thoroughly reformed and amiable character"It is the thing which seemingly CANNOT happen which one is most likely to find one's self face to face with.It will be a little awkward to arrange, if he has developed every domestic virtue, and is delighted to see me."Under such rather confusing conditions her plan would be to present to them, as an affectionate surprise, the unheralded visit, which might appear a trifle uncalled for.She felt happily sure of herself under any circumstances not partaking of the nature of collisions at sea.Yet she had not behaved absolutely ill at the time of the threatened catastrophe in the Meridiana.Her remembrance, an oddly sudden one, of the definite manner of the red-haired second-class passenger, assured her of that.He had certainly had all his senses about him, and he had spoken to her as a person to be counted on.
Her pulse beat a little more hurriedly as the brougham entered Stornham village.It was picturesque, but struck her as looking neglected.Many of the cottages had an air of dilapidation.There were many broken windows and unmended garden palings.A suggested lack of whitewash in several cases was not cheerful.
"I know nothing of the duties of English landlords," she said, looking through her carriage window, "but I should do it myself, if I were Rosy."She saw, as she was taken through the park gateway, that that structure was out of order, and that damaged diamond panes peered out from under the thickness of the ivy massing itself over the lodge.
"Ah!" was her thought, "it does not promise as it should.
