Milly Darrell

by M. E. Braddon

duller here than I have found it inplaces that people call gay.'

  'I can't fancy any one growing tired of such a place as the Priory,'said Milly.

  '"Stone walls do not a prison make, nor iron bars a cage." "'Tis inourselves that we are thus or thus." Cannot you fancy a man gettingutterly tired of himself and his own thoughts--knowing himself byheart, and finding the lesson a dreary one? Perhaps not. A girl's lifeseems all brightness. What should such happy young creatures know ofthat arid waste of years that lies beyond a man's thirtieth birthday,when his youth has not been a fortunate one? Ah, there is a break inthe sky yonder; the rain will be over presently.'

  The rain did cease, as he had prophesied. The dog-cart was broughtround to the door by a clumsy-looking man in corduroy, who seemed halfgroom, half gardener; and Mr. Egerton drove us home; Milly sitting nexthim, I at the back. His horse was very good one, and the drive onlylasted a quarter of an hour, during which time our new acquaintancetalked very pleasantly to both of us.

  I could not forget that Mr. Darrell had called him a bad man; but inspite of that sweeping condemnation I could not bring myself to thinkof him without a certain interest.

  Of course Milly and I discussed Mr. Egerton as we sat over our snuglittle _tete-a-tete_ dinner, and we were both inclined to speak of hisblighted life in a pitying kind of way, and to blame his mother'sconduct, little as we knew of the details of the story. Our existenceswere so quiet that this little incident made quite an event, and wewere apt to date things from that afternoon for some time afterwards.

  CHAPTER VII.

  A LITTLE MATCH-MAKING.

  We heard nothing of Mr. Egerton for about three weeks, at the end ofwhich time we were invited to dine at the Rectory. The first person wesaw on going into the long, low, old-fashioned drawing-room was themaster of Cumber Priory leaning against the mantelpiece in hisfavourite attitude. The Rector was not in the room when we arrived, andAngus Egerton was talking to Mrs. Collingwood, who sat in a low chairnear the fire.

  'Mr. Egerton has been telling me about your adventure in the wood,Milly,' Mrs. Collingwood said, as she rose to receive us. 'I hope itwill be a warning to you to be more careful in future. I think thatCumber Wood is altogether too dangerous a place for two young ladieslike you and Miss Crofton.'

  'The safest place in the world,' cried Angus Egerton. 'I shall alwaysbe at hand to come to the ladies' assistance, and shall pray for thetimely appearance of an infuriated bull, in order that I maydistinguish myself by something novel in the way of a rescue. I hearthat you are a very charming artist, Miss Darrell, and that you havedone some of our oaks and beeches the honour to immortalise them.'

  There is no need for me to record all the airy empty talk of thatevening. It was a very pleasant evening. Angus Egerton had received hisfirst lessons in the classics from the kind old Rector, and had beenalmost a son of the house in the past, the girls told me. He hadresumed his old place upon his return, and seemed really fond of thesefriends, whom he had found ready to welcome him warmly in spite of allrumours to his disadvantage that had floated to Thornleigh during theyears of his absence.

  He was very clever, and seemed to have been everywhere, and to haveseen everything worth seeing that the world contained. He had read agreat deal too, in spite of his wandering life; and the fruit of hisreading cropped up pleasantly now and then in his conversation.

  There were no other guests, except an old country squire, who talked ofnothing but his farming. Milly sat next Angus Egerton; and from myplace on the other side of the table I could see how much she wasinterested in his talk. He did not stop long in the dining-room afterwe had left, but joined us as we sat round the fire in thedrawing-room, talking over the poor people with Mrs. Collingwood andher two daughters, who were great authorities upon the question, andheld a Dorcas society once a week, of which Milly and I were members.

  There was the usual music--a little playing and a little singing fromthe younger ladies of the company, myself included. Milly sang anEnglish ballad very sweetly, and Angus Egerton stood by the pianolooking down at her while she sang.

  Did he fall in love with her upon this first happy evening that thosetwo spent together? I cannot tell; but it is certain that after thatevening, he seemed to haunt us in our walks, and, go where we would, wewere always meeting him, in company with a Scottish deerhound calledNestor, of which Milly became very fond. When we met in thishalf-accidental way he used to join us in our walk for a mile or two,very often bearing us company till we were within a few paces ofThornleigh.

  These meetings, utterly accidental as they always were on our side,were a source of some perplexity to me. I was not quite certain whetherI was right in sanctioning so close an acquaintance between EmilyDarrell and the master of Cumber Priory. I knew that her father thoughtbadly of him. Yet, what could I do? I was not old enough to pretend toany authority over my darling, nor had her father invested me with any;and I knew that her noble nature was worthy of all confidence. Beyondthis, I liked Angus Egerton, and was inclined to trust him. So the timeslipped away very pleasantly for all of us, and the friendship among usall three became closer day by day.

  We met Mr. Egerton very often at the Rectory, and sometimes at otherhouses where we visited. He was much liked by the Thornleigh people,who had, most of them, known him in his boyhood; and it was consideredby his old friends, that, whatever his career abroad might have been,he had begun, and was steadily pursuing, a reformed course of life. Hismeans did not enable him to do much, but he was doing a little towardsthe improvement of Cumber Priory; and his existence there was as simpleas that of the Master of Ravenswood.

  I had noticed that Mrs. Collingwood did all in her power to encouragethe friendship between Milly and Mr. Egerton, and one day in thespring, after they had met a great many times at her house, she spoketo me of her hopes quite openly.

  It was a bright afternoon, and we were all strolling in the garden,after a game of croquet--the Rector's wife and I side by side, Millyand Angus a little way in front of us.

  'I think she likes him,' Mrs. Collingwood said thoughtfully.

  'Everybody seems to like Mr. Egerton,' I answered.

  'O yes, I know that; but I mean something more than the ordinaryliking. I am so anxious that he should marry--and marry wisely. I thinkI am almost as fond of him as if he were my son; and I should be sopleased if I could be the means of bringing about a match between them.Milly is just the girl to make a man happy, and her fortune wouldrestore Cumber Priory to all its old glory.'

  Her fortune! The word jarred upon me. Was it her money, after all, thatAngus Egerton was thinking of when he took such pains to pursue mydarling?

  'I should be sorry for her to marry any one who cared for her money,' Isaid.

  'Of course, my dear Miss Crofton; and so should I be sorry to see herthrow herself away upon any one with whom her money was a paramountconsideration. But one cannot put these things quite out of thequestion. I know that Angus admired her very much the first day he sawher, and I fancy his admiration has grown into a warmer feeling sincethen. He has said nothing to me upon the subject, nor I to him; for youknow how silent he always is about himself. But I cannot help wishingthat such a thing might come to pass. He has one of the best names inthe North Riding, and a first-rate position as the owner of CumberPriory. He only wants money.'

  I was too young and inexperienced to take a worldly view of things, andfrom this moment felt disposed to distrust Mr. Egerton. I rememberedthe story of his early attachment, and told myself that a man who hadloved once like that had in all probability worn out his powers ofloving.

  'I don't think Mr. Darrell would approve of, or even permit, such amarriage,' I said presently. 'I know he has a very bad opinion of Mr.Egerton.'

  'On what account?'

  'On account of his conduct to his mother.'

  'No one knows the secret of that affair except Angus himself,' answeredMrs. Collingwood. 'I don't think any one has a right to think badly ofhim upon that ground. I knew Mrs. Egerton
very well. She was a proudhard woman, capable of almost anything in order to accomplish any setpurpose of her own. Up to the time when he went to Oxford Angus hadbeen an excellent son.'

  'Was it at Oxford he met the girl he wanted to marry?'

  'No; it was somewhere in the west of England, where he went on awalking tour during the long vacation.'

  'He must have loved her very much, to act as he did. I should doubt hispower ever to love any one else.'

  'That is quite a girl's way of thinking, my dear Miss Crofton. Dependupon it, after that kind of stormy first love, there generally comes abetter and truer feeling. Angus was little more than a boy then. He isin the prime of manhood now, able to judge wisely, and not easily to becaught, or he would have married in all those years abroad.'

  This seemed reasonable enough; but I