was quite decided.
"We've hammered all that out before," she said. "Look, your uncle hasfinished his siesta. Here he comes."
The two girls had been picking wild flowers and had wandered away fromthe spot where they had been picnicking on sandwiches and ginger-beer--and something stronger for the only male of the party. It was a lovelyspot, an intermingling of heath and woodland, and the white stems ofbirches supporting their new feathery foliage, stood out in relief froma background of dark firs. Just glimpsed in the distance beyond stood avenerable wooden windmill raised on piles--one of its sails missing andanother falling in half through sheer old age, like teeth. The wholemade for that combination of charm and the picturesque so characteristicof, if not unique, as a sample of English rural scenery.
"Well," said Mervyn, knocking the ashes out of his pipe as he joinedthem, and looking very placid and contented. "Isn't it time to saddleup? We've come a precious long way, remember, and you have to allow amargin for punctures."
But Melian overruled him.
"We needn't hurry, you know, dear," she urged. "And it's Violet's lastday."
"I know it is, worse luck," he answered, kindly, "I wish it needn't be.Then again, we must also allow for that inspection of `old stones' youthreatened to deflect us from our way to go and adore."
"Oh, Chiltingford? You must see that, Violet. And there's a rippingold pair of stocks too. By Jove, but that's good enough!"
"Don't know whether the misdemeanants who were clamped up in themthought them good enough?" said her uncle with a laugh, and lighting afresh pipe. "Well, you shall both do just what you like to-day."
And they did; and the long, bright golden afternoon went all too quicklyby, as they skimmed along the well-kept roads, skirting greenwoodsresonant with thrush voices; down long hills between spangled meadows;past cottages nestling in trees--every one a picture in itself--and snugfarms bulging with the suggestion of solid comfort; old grey churchtowers, at which Melian looked wistfully and had to be reminded that thecultus of every pile of "old stones" they saw would not come within thecompass of their time limit--and here and there one of those old countryseats whose exact counterpart is to be found in no other country in theworld. Yes, it was one of those days that would stand out, to elderlyand young alike, of those comprising that trio. To two of them at leastit might be that it would come back with all the more marked contrast--perchance of deadly peril and fear--but that was within thepotentialities of the Future.
The stars were already bright in the summer sky as they descended thelast steep and stony hill, the quality of the latter calling forth morethan one half stifled malediction from the elderly unit of the trioaforesaid. But to another unit of the said trio, the darkness, thespot, conjured up a recollection, albeit the "tang-tang" of a jubilantnightingale sounded from the dark and now leafy depths of "Broceliande,"and the little brown owls, hawking over the adjoining fields, weresending forth their harsh, fierce cries. Here was where she hadaccidentally met Helston Varne for the last time, and they had not metsince. She was wondering again whether they ever would. And yet--itwas of no use to keep on dwelling upon it, she decided.
CHAPTER TWENTY.
THE INFLUENCE.
It was a glowing, beautiful summer, and as each radiant day succeededanother, it seemed to Melian a difficult thing to realise her formerlife, so completely had that passed away. It seemed to have been thelife of somebody else. She thought of Violet Clinock with pity and realconcern--stewed up in horrible dusty streets, in all the roar and bustleof them--while she herself was revelling in the glory of the uncloudedsunlight, and the dim holiness of leafy wood-depths, or the roll of openchampaign stretching away softened into far distance; a fresh vista ofjoy whichever way the eye might turn; breathing the free and fragrantair of Heaven itself. Yet her concern was to a certain extent wasted,so differently are humans constituted; for, as a matter of fact, thoughthoroughly enjoying every moment of the few days which constituted hervisit, the same number of months would have bored Violet Clinock todeath. She was temperamentally of the stirring, bustling order, and thevery elements of the town life, which to Melian, looking back upon,gained in repulsion, were to her without knowing it, part of theessentials of well being.
For the misgivings which had beset Melian as to whether she was notwasting her life had lulled, if not died, as the joyous spring rushed oninto glorious summer, and she noted and appreciated every shade andharmony of such change; the deepening of the leafage, and the bloomingof this or that new variety of wild flower life; the song chorus ofinnumerable thrushes, in all its varying liquid notes, from early morntill late eve; and the "tang-tang" of nightingales through the fastshortening hours of darkness. And then, when the dawn pearled upon theawakening world, what a carolling of sweetness as countless larks sprangupwards and soared higher and higher into the liquid blue.
And then those delightful rambles, whether short or long, by field pathsor along leafy hedges where the honeysuckle was beginning to hang itscreamy petals, or in shaded woods, the sunlight networking here andthere on the feathery tops of the green bracken, a rest at some quaintlittle roadside inn for tea, then home again in the dewiness of richmeadows, where young lambs skipped and shrilly bleated. Or again, along round on the bicycle, exploring this or that old ruin, or massiveand picturesque ancient church. By this time she knew the wholecountryside by heart. And it is doubtful whether this brought moreenjoyment to her than to her uncle--her invariable companion on suchwanderings.
As for Mervyn himself, it is safe to say perhaps that he had never beenso happy in his life. All that appealed to the girl here, appealed tohim, but he had not been capable of enjoying it in solitude. Now thiswas all changed, and at every moment of the day he found himselfrevelling in her happiness, whether it was watching her gathering wildflowers in a sunbath of greenery and radiance, or seated smoking thepipe of placidity and peace upon some churchyard wall what time she wasassimilating the interior of the mouldering structure, to come forthpresently, with animated eyes to descant upon the wondrous fret of somegrisly old Norman arch which it comprised. And he revelled in it withthe deeper intensity because, with the experience of age, he knew thatit was not destined to last.
And then, indeed, as though to bear out the soundness of this reasoning,there came a change--a cloud, a shadow--but of this he divined nothingas yet. As the summer drew near its zenith something seemed to comeover Melian. Throughout the radiancy of the glowing summer day--or evenwhen clouds from seaward brought some hours of soft warm rain to keepthe full sapped leafage from succumbing to a too long unbroken glow ofsun heat, she rejoiced with the joy of living. But at night, in thesolitude of her room, all her elation would leave her. An influenceseemed to creep over her, substituting depression; not depressionmerely, but conveying a suspicion of fear--of dread. Of dread she knewnot of what. Yet it was there. Happy, joyous, in the long hours oflight and open, yet when the night shut down, this feeling would comeover her--and come over her suddenly--directly she found herself in thesolitude of her own room. And it grew upon her more and more until shebegan to dread the time of retiring for the night--for the life of hershe could not have told why. Yet she kept it to herself. It seemedabsurd to worry her uncle over what after all was a mere fancy. Itwould pass. For months now, nothing had occurred to alarm her, as onthat other night--and surely in this paradise of a country there couldbe no room for depression or haunting imaginings. But at such times herthoughts flew unaccountably to Helston Varne.
For by this time she had arrived at the conviction that some influence,sinister and terrifying, was really hanging about Heath Hover. She hadeven tried drawing old Joe Sayers on the subject again, but that astuterustic, remembering his former slip, had shut up like an oyster. Withold Judy she met no better success.
"We be wold folks," had answered that ancient, when deftly sounded as towhy they should not take up their quarters altogether at Heath Hover onthe ground of convenience to her--Melian. "We lik
es our own chimbleycorner o' nights,--Miss Melun. The master, he's allus been middlin'cumferble o' nights without we. And now you'm here and he's morecumferble nor ever--sure-lye."
This, with the deft invocation of "the master," was unanswerable, as oldJudy had intended. That these two were not to be drawn was obvious, andMelian had no idea in the world of looking for information outside. Heruncle too, had distinctly discouraged her taking any interest in thesurrounding cottages, and there were few enough of these. She began tothink she saw through the reason.
But, after all, here she was, and life was happy, she would tellherself; and she had found it so after some experience of it of whichthis by no means held good. She must make the best of it, and, afterall, the best, even by force of contrast, was