Clay’s first meeting with his father took place that evening, after dinner, in the presence of the rest of the family. Upon setting eyes on his youngest son, Penhallow at once demanded to be told why he had not presented himself several hours earlier, shooting this question at Clay in such a fierce way that the boy changed colour, and stammered out a rather incoherent reply, which was to the effect that he hadn’t known that Penhallow wanted to see him particularly. This had the effect of making Penhallow scarify him soundly for his lack of filial respect; and as he addressed most of his diatribe to him in a thunderous tone, and ended by asking him what he had to say for himself, Clay was speedily reduced to a state of pallid terror, and was only able to say, in shaken accents, that he was sorry, and hadn’t meant to offend anyone. Such supine behaviour roused all the worst in Penhallow, who set about bullying him in good earnest, insisting on receiving answers to quite impossible questions, and saying everything he could to goad him into making a hot retort. Faith, perilously near tears, tried to come to Clay’s support, and succeeded, in as much as Penhallow’s ire was instantly diverted, and fell upon her luckless head. Clay slid into the background, and tried to look as though he did not mind having been roared at, and was not in the least upset by the interlude. Conrad, who had seen Bart kissing Loveday in the orchard, and was in a smouldering temper in consequence, began to bait him, with so much ill nature that Bart came to his rescue, telling his twin to lay off the kid, for God’s sake! Bart was quite capable of inflicting physical hurt on anyone who roused his wrath, but he was never spiteful. But since he could not understand that his good-natured intervention increased Conrad’s ill-humour, Conrad’s jealous temperament being unable to brook his twin’s siding with another member of the family against himself, he did Clay very little service. Raymond, who had scarcely been on speaking terms with Penhallow since their quarrel over Jimmy, took no part in the general turmoil, but sat scowling into the fire, and occasionally exchanging a brief word or two with his aunt. He glanced contemptuously at Clay, when that unfortunate young man withdrew to a chair in a secluded corner, and seemed slightly amused by Conrad’s baiting of him.
Having worked off his rage, Penhallow was ready to discuss the affairs of the estate, the stables, the farm, and the neighbouring countryside with his sons. Clay, bearing as little part in this animated conversation as his mother, sat with clenched teeth, wondering with sick distaste whether it was worse to be berated by Penhallow than to be obliged to sit through an evening of such talk as this. When Reuben and Jimmy brought in the usual refreshments, he had to help the twins dispense these. He carried a glass of whisky-and-soda to Vivian, and told her in an undertone that he couldn’t stand this sort of thing.
She shrugged her shoulders. “You say that, but you will stand it. I know you!”
He coloured, and asserted more loudly than he meant to: “Well, I shan’t. I’m not a child any longer, and the sooner everyone realises that, the better it will be for — for them!”
Conrad overheard this, and said at once: “Listen to this, all of you! Dear little Clay isn’t a child any longer! Isn’t it wonderful what a Varsity education will do for one? What did they teach you at Cambridge, Clay? We never managed to teach you anything — not even to throw your heart over!”
“Or to stop pulling his horse right into a fence,” said Raymond dryly. “If you are going to stay at home, Clay, I suppose you will have to be mounted.”
Clay dared not assert that he was not going to stay at home, although every minute spent in the company of his family made him the more determined by hook or by crook to escape from Trevellin; but he showed so little interest in the question of what horses he could ride during the coming season that even Eugene roused himself to remark dispassionately that no one would take him for a Penhallow. Fortunately, Penhallow was too much absorbed in what Bart was telling him about the Demon colt to pay any heed to this interchange; and as any mention of the Demon colt had the invariable effect of drawing nearly every member of the family into the discussion, Clay was presently able to slip out of the room without attracting attention. His mother soon followed him, and they went upstairs together to her bedroom, where Clay at once unburdened his mind to her, pacing about the room as he did so, and fidgeting with whatever came in the way of his unquiet hands. Faith’s attention was thus divided between what he had to say, and what he was doing, and she found herself impelled to interrupt him several times, to beg him not to twirl the lid of her powder-bowl round; to take care of that chair, because one leg was broken; and please not to swing the blind-cord to and fro, because it made her giddy.
“I don’t believe,” said Clay gloomily, “that you have the least idea how desperate it all is!”
“Oh, darling, how can you say that to me?” Faith reproached him.
“I suppose you’re used to it,” pursued Clay, disregarding this interpolation. “You simply don’t realise how ghastly it is here! But I’ve been away from it, and you just can’t imagine how it strikes one, after having lived in civilised surroundings, amongst cultured people! I couldn’t bear it, Mother. It’s no use expecting me to. I mean, I should simply cut my throat. There’s nothing I wouldn’t rather do!”
Correctly assuming that this sweeping assertion excepted any form of manual toil, or office drudgery. Faith said: “Yes, but what can we do about it? I’ve tried my best to make your father see reason, but you know what he is. If only you’d done better in your First Part I think there might have been some hope, but...”
“Of course, anyone who imagines that one goes to the Varsity merely to swot, and pass examinations, just doesn’t understand the first thing about it,” said Clay loftily. “And, what’s more, I never heard that Eugene did so damned well up at Oxford, or Aubrey either, if it comes to that!”
“I know,” she said quickly. “That’s what’s so unfair! You were much too young to know anything about it at the time, but actually Eugene cost your father a great deal of money, when he was up, besides getting into the sort of scrapes I should have thought any father would have However, that’s his affair! Only, I believe the awful thing is that your father wouldn’t have minded, if you’d disgraced yourself at Cambridge, and got entangled with dreadful girls, and been sent down for sheer hooliganism!”
Clay stared at her. “Of course, he’s mad!” he said, with conviction. “Absolutely batty!”
She shook her head, but said, as though she feared to be overheard: “He’s got very strange lately. Not mad, but very — very eccentric. More than that, really. He has been doing some outrageous things, and he seems to me to be drinking more than he used to. I’m very worried about him.”
Clay accepted this conventional statement. He himself disliked his father, but he would have been rather shocked had Faith admitted that she too disliked him. He said: “He looks all right. I didn’t notice any change.”
“Dr Lifton says he can’t possibly go on as he is doing. You’ve no idea what unsuitable things he eats, and the amount he drinks, and the way he’s been rushing about the country.”
“I suppose his inside is pretty well accustomed to strong drink,” said Clay, with a slight laugh.
“Yes, but, really, darling, there are limits! I don’t mean that he gets drunk, actually, but I have seen him — well, in that reckless state which always means he’s been drinking steadily. You saw the whisky Con measured into his glass tonight. Well, that’s nothing. I mean, it isn’t only what he drinks when we’re all there, but I know from Loveday that Martha has orders to leave the whisky decanter beside his bed when he settles down for the night, and if you ever saw the drink bills you’d realise what an appalling amount he must dispose of.”
“Can’t you stop him?” inquired Clay, without much interest.
“No. He wouldn’t listen to anything I said. Reuben does what he can, by seeing to it that there’s only a certain amount of whisky left in the decanter each night, but you never know when your father will put a stop to that. No one can do anything with him once he’s determined on getting his own way.”
“Well,” said Clay, sticking out his chin, “I can’t say I care two hoots how much he drinks, but he’s not going to get his own way as far as my affairs are concerned. I’m damned well not going to be jockeyed into Cliff’s office to suit his convenience!”
“Oh, darling, I’m quite heartbroken about that, but what can you do?”
“Why can’t he make me an allowance, and let me do what I want to do?” demanded Clay. “He lets Aubrey please himself, hang it all!”
“Yes, but he says he isn’t going to any longer,” sighed Faith. “He’s got a sort of mania for keeping you all at home. I’m sure I don’t know why, because he doesn’t do anything but quarrel with you. He even went for Bart the other night, and Bart’s his favourite.”
“I shouldn’t have thought,” said Clay, in an ill-used voice, “that it was much to expect, that I should be allowed to choose my own profession!”
“If only I had the means to help you!” sighed Faith.
A gentle tap on the door was immediately followed by Loveday’s entrance, bearing the hot-water bag without which Faith never, summer or winter, went to bed. She smiled warmly upon her mistress, and, as she slipped the bag between the sheets, let her eyes flicker over Clay. Clay, who had not noticed her much on his previous vacations, was conscious of a strong attraction, and was enough a Penhallow to return the glance with a kind of invitation in his own eyes. In his mother’s presence he was debarred from making any further overtures, but when, next morning, he encountered Loveday in the hall, he slid an arm round her waist, and said clumsily: “I say, Loveday, you might welcome a fellow home!”
Her smile, though it was indulgent, excited him. He wondered how it came about that he had never till now realised how beautiful she was, and said so, stammering a little.
“I expect you’re growing up, Mr Clay,” she replied demurely. “Give over now, my dear, do!”
“Give me a kiss, Loveday!” he said, grasping her more securely.
She shook her head. “Leave me go,” she replied. “You’re getting to be too big a boy now for these games, Mr Clay!”
He coloured, for he hated to be laughed at, and would probably have pulled her into his arms had he not heard the door of Eugene’s room open. He looked round in quick alarm; Loveday slipped away, in no way discomposed, and went gracefully down the stairs.
Eugene’s face showed that he fully appreciated the situation. He said, in his light languid way: “So the puppy’s growing into a hound, is he, Benjamin? Well, I am sure that is all very edifying, but if you think my advice worth taking I can give you a piece of it which may save you from future unpleasantness.”
“Oh, shut up!” said Clay. “I don’t know what you’re talking about!”
“I wonder,” said Eugene amiably, “from where you get your instinctive love of prevarication? Keep your paws off Loveday Trewithian, little brother. She’s Bart’s meat!”
“Good lord, I was only fooling with her!” Clay said.
“I’m sure!” Eugene retorted. “The point, thickhead, being that Bart isn’t.”
“What on earth do you mean? You can’t mean that Bart’s serious about her?”
“Can’t I? Well, you trespass on his preserves, and you’ll find out,” said Eugene.
Clay looked very much astonished, but as Jimmy the Bastard came up the backstairs at that moment, with an armful of boots, he questioned Eugene no further.
Jimmy, whose ears were extremely sharp, had heard every word of the brief conversation. It confirmed his own suspicions, and he was pleased, seeing a way of revenge on Bart. His countenance, however, betrayed no emotion whatsoever, and he met Eugene’s narrowed eyes without blanching. Clay went off, whistling, but Eugene lingered to say: “You have quite a genius for turning up where you are least expected, haven’t you. Jimmy?”
Jimmy looked sullenly at him. He recognised an intelligence superior to his own, and resented it. The other Penhallows despised him, and generally ignored him, so that he was able to spy upon their doings pretty well as he chose; but Eugene, he knew, was fully alive to his activities, and, therefore, rather dangerous. He said defensively: “I was bringing your shoes up.”
“Kind of you,” said Eugene. “Do you know, Jimmy, that if I were you I’d be very careful how I trod? Somehow I feel that one of these days, when your natural protector is removed, an evil fate may befall you.”
“I haven’t done any of you any harm,” Jimmy muttered, turning away. But he knew that Eugene was right, and that if Penhallow were suddenly to die he would be kicked out of the house without ceremony or compunction; and he began to think that he would do well to make provision against an uncertain future. He thought he would rather like to go to America. His knowledge of that vast country having been culled solely from the more lurid films dealing with the underworld of bootleggers and racketeers, he was strongly attracted to a land where it seemed that his own buccaneering talents would find ample scope. His only day-dream consisted of an agreeable vision of himself as the chief of a gang, living in an opulent apartment with one of those glamorous blondes who apparently abounded in gangster circles. But he was a practical youth, and he knew that the achievement of his ambition depended largely on his amassing some initial capital. He wondered whether Penhallow would leave him any money in his will, but was inclined to doubt it. Penhallow, he knew quite well, encouraged him partly because it amused him to do so, and partly to annoy his family, and was not in the least likely to leave his money away from his legitimate offspring.
He placed the boots he had brought upstairs in their respective owners’ rooms, and went slowly back to the kitchen, where, since Sybilla was baking, he thought he would pick up one of her saffron cakes. But before he had traversed more than half the length of the stone passage, Martha came out of the still-room, and informed him that Master was shouting for him, and he had better go to him at once, or he would learn what was what.
Penhallow was sitting up in bed, with the fat spaniel sprawling beside him, and a blotter on his knees. As Jimmy came into the room he was licking the flap of an envelope. He remarked genially that he had a job for Jimmy to do. Jimmy saw at once that one of his restless, energetic moods was upon him, and reflected coldly that if he didn’t quieten down again there was no knowing when he mightn’t be took off sudden.
“I shall get up today,” Penhallow announced. “It’s time I saw something of my dear family. We’ll have a tea party. I’ve got a fancy to see that old fool Phineas again. I’ve told Con to fetch him and his sister out to tea in that flibberty-gibbett of a car of his; and you can take yourself to Liskeard, you lazy young dog, and give this letter to my nevvy. I’ll have him and his stuck-up wife out here too. And on your way back, stop at the Vicarage, and give my compliments to Venngreen, and tell him I find myself good and clever today, and I’ll be happy to see, him and his good lady to tea at five o’clock.”
“She won’t come,” observed Jimmy dispassionately.
Penhallow gave a chuckle. “I don’t care whether she comes or not. You tell her you won’t be there, and maybe she will. But Cliff will come, and what’s more he’ll bring his wife, because he knows better than to offend me. He can take a look at Clay while he’s here, and settle when the whelp’s to start work with him.”
Jimmy put the letter he had been given into his pocket, and removed the blotter and the inkstand from Penhallow’s knees. “I see Mr Clay hugging Loveday Trewithian upstairs just now,” he said, casting a sidelong look at his parent.
“The young dog!” exclaimed Penhallow, warming towards Clay. “So there is some red blood in him, is there? She’s a damned fine girl, that one.”
“Ah! Maybe there’s others as thinks as much,” said Jimmy darkly. “There’ll be trouble and to spare if Mr Bart was to hear of it, that’s all I know.”
A smile curled Penhallow’s mouth; he looked across at Jimmy with a little interest and some amusement narrowing his eyes. “One of Bart’s fancies, is she? Young rascal! If I were only ten years younger, I’m damned if I wouldn’t cut him out with the girl! All the same, I’ll tell him to be careful: Reuben wouldn’t like it if his niece got herself into trouble, and I don’t want any fuss and nonsense out of him.”
“You don’t have to worry about that,” Jimmy said, with a fair assumption of innocence. “Mr Bart’s going to marry her.”
“Going to what?” demanded Penhallow, his brows beginning to lower.
“Well, that’s what I heard Mr Eugene say,” Jimmy muttered, carrying the inkstand over to the refectory table, and setting it down there.
“You’re a fool!” Penhallow said irascibly. “Marry her! That’s a good one!”
“I didn’t ought to have spoken of it,” Jimmy said. “Mr Bart would very likely murder me if he knew I’d let it out. Don’t let on I told you, sir.”
Penhallow’s brow was by this time as black as thunder. “What cock-and-bull story have you got hold of?” he shot at Jimmy.
“Loveday said to me herself as how she would be Mrs Bart Penhallow.”
“Oh, she did, did she? Well, you may tell Loveday that she’s flying too high when she thinks to trap one of my boys into marrying her!”
“She’d tell Mr Bart on me if ever I said a word to her she didn’t like,” Jimmy said. “They’re only waiting till you set Mr Bart up at Trellick, Master, and that’s the truth, for all nobody dares to tell it to you.”
An alarmingly high colour suffused Penhallow’s cheeks, and his eyes glared at Jimmy under their beetling brows, as though they would drag the whole truth out of him, but he said nothing for some moments. Then he barked: “Get off with you to Mr Cliff’s, you damned little mischief-maker! I don’t believe a word of it. Trying to pay Mr Bart back for having twisted your arm, eh? I’d do well to send you packing! Get out!”
Jimmy departed, satisfied with his morning’s work, since he knew his father well enough to be sure that the information he had imparted would rankle.
Penhallow lay thinking it over for some time. The spaniel sat up, and began to scratch herself. He cursed her, and she sat on her haunches, lolling her tongue at him, and wagging her stump of a tail. “Old fool!” Penhallow said, and pushed her off the bed, and tugged at the bell-pull.
Martha answered its summons, and came in scolding.
“The devil’s in you, surely!” she said. “Ring, ring, ring, and Jimmy gone off to Liskeard, as well you know! If it’s whisky you want, I’ll not give it to you, my dear, not at this hour of the day I won’t!”
“Shut up! You cackle like a hen!” Penhallow replied roughly. “Where’s Eugene?”
“Where would un be, but keeping himself out of the draughts, and driving everyone that can be bothered to listen to un silly with his talk of neuralgia in un’s head?” retorted Martha. “There never was one of them, not even Clay, and it was not me had him to nurse, I thank my stars! That was a more troublesome child than Eugene, and un’s no better, nor never will be! What do you want with un, my dear?”
He pinched the patchwork quilt between his fingers, regarding her in a brooding way for some moments. “What’s between young Bart and Loveday Trewithian?” he asked abruptly.
She gave a dry chuckle. “Eh, you’re a nice one to ask!” she said. “What do you expect of a son of yourn, when you put a ripe plum in his reach? Why should you worry your head?”
"Jimmy’s got hold of a damned queer story,” he growled. “He’s been telling me Bart means to marry the girl.”
"Jimmy!” she ejaculated scornfully. “I reckon Jimmy would be glad to do un a mischief if he could!”
“Maybe.” He went on pleating the quilt, still looking at her under his brows. “Seems to me Con’s none so friendly with Bart these days.”
There was a question in his voice, but she merely tossed her head, and said: “Chuck-full of crotchets, Con be and always will! Marry Loveday Trewithian! Please the pigs, her bain’t come to that!”
“What’s the girl like?” he asked.
She sniffed. “As bold as yer mind to! Sech airs! I never did see!”
“You send my sister in to me!” he ordered. “You’re nothing but a doddering old idiot, Martha!”
She grinned. “Iss, sure, but I was a fine woman in my day, Maister!”
“You were that,” he agreed.
“When I was in my twenty,” she nodded. “That Loveday warn’t nothing to me, but I never took and thought to marry above my station, as well you knaw, my dear! I don’t knaw where the world’s a-going!”
“Get out of this, you old wind-bag, and send my sister to me!” he said impatiently.
She went off, chuckling to herself; and some minutes later Clara came into the room, with her hands grimed with earth-mould, a trowel in one of them, and a fern in the other. She left a clod of mud from one of her shoes on the carpet, and had evidently caught her heel in the hem of her skirt again, since it sagged unevenly and showed a frayed edge.
“You’re a sight, Clara,” Penhallow told her frankly. “What’s that miserable thing you’ve got hold of?”
“Nothin’ much. One of the film-ferns,” she replied. “You wouldn’t know.”
“No, nor care. Sit down, old girl: I want to talk to you.”
She obeyed, choosing the chair nearest to her, as though she had little intention of remaining long. “They tell me you’ve been settin’ the house by the ears again,” she remarked.
“My house, ain’t it? I’m going to get up."
“You’ll get up once too often one of these days, Adam.”
“You leave me to know what’s best for me! That wasn’t what I wanted you for. I’ve been hearing things about Bart.”
She did not speak, but he was watching her closely, and he thought that she stiffened.
“Oh!” he said dangerously. “So you know something, do you, Clara? Didn’t think to tell me, did you?”
“I don’t know anythin’ at all, Adam,” she replied. “It’s none of my business.”
““That girl, Loveday Trewithian!” he said, stabbing a finger at her. “What’s she up to? Come on, out with it!”
She rubbed the tip of her nose, leaving a smear on it from her grimy finger. “I don’t know, but I don’t like the gal.”
“Bart said anything to you?”
“No.”
“I’ll have to look into this,” he decided. “Buffle-headed, that’s what he is! Jimmy says Eugene spoke of Bart’s wanting to marry her.”
“I don’t want to hear anythin’ Jimmy said, Adam,” Clara replied severely. “And Eugene’s got a wicked tongue, which he uses to make trouble with. I wouldn’t set any store by what he says either.”
“By God, I believe you’re all of you in league to keep me in the dark!” he swore, suddenly angry. “I’ll know the truth of this business! Think I’m helpless, do you? You’ll find I can still govern this family!”
“There’s no sense in losin’ your temper with me,” she said.
“If you’d the sense of a flea you’d know what’s apparently been going on under your long nose!”
“I don’t go pokin’ it into what’s none of my business. Well for you I don’t, and never did!” she replied, rather grimly.
“Oh, get to hell out of this!” he shouted. “A fat lot of use you are! You and your ferns! I’ll have that garden of yours dug up, damned if I won’t!”
“You’ll do as you please,” she said, rising. “You always have.”
He picked up a copy of the Field, and hurled it after her retreating form. It struck the closing door, and fell in a flutter of crumpled pages to the floor. He was rather pleased with himself for having still enough strength to throw an unhandy missile so far and so accurately; but the effort made him pant, and for some time he lay back against the welter of pillows and cushions, raging at his infirmity. When he had recovered his breath, and his heart had ceased to thud so sickeningly in his chest, he reached out a hand for the whisky decanter. He splashed a liberal amount into a club-tumbler, and drank it neat. He felt better after that, but bent on pursuing his inquiries into Bart’s activities. He was shrewd enough to guess that he would get little satisfaction out of his sons, and presently sent for Loveday herself.
He looked her over critically when she came into the room, appreciating her graceful carriage as much as the beauty of her face. She betrayed no alarm at having been summoned unexpectedly to his room. Her dark eyes met his with a look of submissive inquiry; she came to a halt beside his bed, and folded her hands over her apron. “Sir?”
His lips began to curl at the corners. He didn’t blame Bart for making a fool of himself over this girl: he would, in fact, have thought him a poor-spirited young man to have overlooked charms so obvious. He addressed her with a suddenness calculated to throw her off balance. “They tell me my son Bart’s been making love to you, Loveday, my girl.”
Her eyelids did not flicker; her deep bosom rose and fell easily to her calm breathing; she smiled slowly, and after meeting his gaze for a limpid moment, cast down her eyes, and murmured: “Young gentleman do be high-spirited, sir.”
He was very nearly satisfied with this answer. He let out one of his short cracks of laughter, and reached out a hand to grasp her arm above the elbow. “Damme, if I were only ten years younger— !” he said, drawing her closer. “You’re a cosy armful, Loveday, aren’t you? Eh?”
She cast him a sidelong glance, provocative and alluring. “There be them as has said so, sir. You’re very good.” Her smile broadened, and became a little saucy. “I try to give satisfaction, sir,” she said demurely.
He roared with laughter at this, slid his hand down her arm, and began to fondle one of her hands. “You little baggage!” he said. “I’ll swear you’re as sly as a sackful of monkeys! I’d do well to get rid of you.”
She raised her eyes. “Have I done wrong, sir?”
“That’s between you and Bart, my lass!” he retorted. “You should know better than I what’s between the pair of you. Well, you’re no innocent! I know your kind: you’re well able to take care of yourself. Have your fun: who am I to object? But don’t think to inveigle my boy into marrying you, Loveday Trewithian! Understand me?”
She achieved a look of wide-eyed innocence. “To marry me?” she repeated. “Why, who said such a thing? It’s nothing but a bit of a flirtation! I can look after myself.”
He pulled her down, so that she almost lost her balance, and took her throat in his large hand, holding her so that she was obliged to look into his face. “I’ve got a strong notion you’re maybe better able to take care of yourself than any of us guess,” he said. “Answer me now! How far’s it gone?”
Her heart beat a little faster, and her colour deepened to a lovely rose. “Indeed, I’m a good girl, sir,” she said.
“You’re a damned little liar!” he returned. “I don’t trust you, not an inch! What’s more, I don’t doubt Bart’s no match for you in wits. But I am, my girl! Don’t you make any mistake about that: I am! I’m warning you now! Don’t you make any plans to marry a Penhallow! I’d hound you into the gutter, you and all your family with you, before I’d allow Bart to take you to church! There! Give me a kiss, and be off with you!”
She made no objection to his kissing her, and stroking her smooth throat where he had grasped it, but she said, as she disengaged herself: “There’s no call for you to take on, sir. If it’s Jimmy that’s been trying to set you against me, I know well he has a spite against me.”
“And why?” he demanded. “What have you been up to give him a spite against you, I’d like to know?”
She withdrew to the door, and bent to pick up the Field. She laid this down on a table, and replied with one of her saucy smiles: “Indeed, I wouldn’t know, sir, unless it might be he’s jealous of me for being born the right side o’ the blanket.”
He slapped his thigh with a shout of laughter. “That’s one for me! You impudent hussy!”
She dropped him a mock curtsy and left him still laughing.
Outside his room, she lifted a hand to her breast, as though to feel the beating of her heart. She was profoundly disturbed, little though she had shown it; and she felt as if she had been running a great distance. She thought that she and Bart now stood in a position of danger, liable at any moment to be torn apart, for she was sure that once Penhallow suspected the truth he would be on the watch for confirmation of his suspicion. She was prepared to fight for possession of Bart; she thought that if it came to it she would fight the whole world by his side; but she had been brought up in poverty, and, unlike him, she did not minimise the hardships and the difficulties that must lie ahead of them if Penhallow disowned his son. Her most instant need was to find Bart, and to warn him not to own his intention of marrying her. She hoped she could induce him to behave prudently, but she was doubtful, knowing that he was innately honest, scornful of the tricks and shifts which were second nature to her. He did not condemn the little lies and deceits she used to protect herself; he laughed at them, believing that all women lied, and were not to be blamed for it. It was a feminine weakness, but a weakness to which he, rampantly male, was not subject. She would need all her art to persuade him to dissimulate to his father; and she became all at once frettingly anxious to find him before he could have time to go to his father’s room. He had gone off to a distant part of the estate, and had taken his lunch with him. She feared that he would only reach the house again in time to join the tea-party Penhallow was arranging, and she knew she would have no chance then of speaking to him, since she would be expected to help Reuben in the drawing-room.
Her mistress came into the hall, carrying a bowl of flowers which she had been replenishing, and exclaimed at finding her there standing with her back to Penhallow’s door. She took refuge instinctively in one of her lies. “I’ve been making up the Master’s fire, ma’am,” she said easily. “Let me take that from you!”
“I wish you would help me to do the vases in the Long drawing-room,” Faith said, with a suggestion of complaint in her voice. “Mr Penhallow has invited all sorts of’ people to tea, and someone must attend to the flowers. I have one of my bad heads.”
“You leave it all to me, and go and have a good lie down,” Loveday said coaxingly. "Deed, you look fit to drop, ma’am!”
“I don’t know what I should do without you, Loveday!” Faith sighed.