第79章

"And today I cannot hit a bird. I shall take to writing a book and leave the severer pursuit of sport to more enterprising persons."Then suddenly turning round he said to Ayala, "Are you good-natured enough to come and take a walk with me in the shrubbery?"Ayala, taken somewhat by surprise at the request, looked up into Lady Albury's face. "Go with him, my dear, if you are not tired,"said Lady Albury. "He deserves consolation after all his good deeds to you." Ayala still doubted. Though she was on terms of pleasant friendship with the man, yet she felt almost awestruck at this sudden request that she should walk alone with him. But not to do so, especially after Lady Albury's injunction, would have been peculiar. She certainly was not tired and had such a walk come naturally it would have been an additional pleasure to her; but now, though she went she hesitated, and showed her hesitation.

"Are you afraid to come with me?" he said, as soon as they were out on the gravel together.

"Afraid! Oh, dear no, I should not be afraid to go anywhere with you, I think; only it seems odd that you did not ask Nina too.""Shall I tell you why?"

"Why was it?"

"Because I have something to say to you which I do not wish Nina to hear just at this moment. And then I thought that we were such friends that you would not mind coming with me.""Of course we are," said Ayala.

"I don't know why it should be so, but I seem to have known you years instead of days.""Perhaps that is because you knew papa."

"More likely because I have learnt to know your papa's daughter.""Do you mean Lucy?"

"I mean Ayala."

"That is saying the same thing twice over. You know me because you know me.""Just that. How long do you suppose I have known that Mrs Gregory, who sat opposite to us yesterday?""How can I tell?"

"Just fifteen years. I was going to Harrow when she came as a young girl to stay with my mother. Her people and my people had known each other for the last fifty years. Since that I have seen her constantly, and of course we are very intimate.""I suppose so."

"I know as much about her after all that as if we had lived in two different hemispheres and couldn't speak a word of each other's language. There isn't a thought or a feeling in common between us. I ask after her husband and her children, and then tell her it's going to rain. She says something about the old General's health, and then there is an end of everything between us. When next we meet we do it all over again.""How very uninteresting!" said Ayala.

"Very uninteresting. It is because there are so many Mrs Gregorys about that I like to go down to Drumcaller and live by myself.

Perhaps you're a Mrs Gregory to somebody.""Why should I be a Mrs Gregory? I don't think I am at all like Mrs Gregory.""Not to me, Ayala." Now she heard the "Ayala", and felt something of what it meant. There had been moments at which she had almost disliked to hear him call her Miss Dormer; but now -- now she wished that he had not called her Ayala. She strove to assume a serious expression of face, but having done so she could not dare to turn it up towards him. The glance of her little anger, if there was any, fell only upon the ground. "It is because you are to me a creature so essentially different from Mrs Gregory that I seem to know you so well. I never want to go to Drumcaller if you are near me -- or, if I think of Drumcaller, it is that I might be there with you.""I am sure the place is very pretty, but I don't suppose I shall ever see it.""Do you know about your sister and Mr Hamel?""Yes," said Ayala, surprised. "She has told me all about it.

How do you know?"

"He was staying at Drumcaller -- he and I together with no one else -- when he went over to ask her. I never saw a man so happy as when he came back from Glenbogie. He had got all that he wanted in the world.""I do so love him because he loves her."

"And I love her -- because she loves you.""It is not the same, you know," said Ayala, trying to think it all out.

"May I not love her?

"He is to be my brother. That's why I love him. She can't be your sister." The poor girl, though she had tried to think it all out, had not thought very far.

"Can she not?" he said.

"Of course not. Lucy is to marry Mr Hamel.""And whom am I to marry?" Then she saw it all. "Ayala -- Ayala -- who is to be my wife?""I do not know," she said -- speaking with a gruff voice, but still in a whisper, with a manner altogether different -- thinking how well it would be that she should be taken at once back into the house.

"Do you know whom I would fain have as my wife?" Then he felt that it behoved him to speak out plainly. He was already sure that she would not at once tell him that it should be as he would have it -- that she would not instantly throw herself into his arms. But he must speak plainly to her, and then fight his cause as best he might. "Ayala, I have asked you to come out with me that I might ask you to be my wife. It is that that I did not wish Nina to hear at once. If you will put out your hand and say that it shall be so, Nina and all the world shall know it.