Chapter XIX: "strictly in Confidence"

LUNCH over, the two Dorotheas hastened away to dress. Dolly would not permit the loss of a moment. Expeditious as Dorothea always was, she found Dolly in the hall, ready dressed, charming in her dark furs and golden hair. Both pallor and limpness were gone, but Dorothea did not quite like the sharp contrasts of pink and white in the small face.

"Are you sure you ought to go to-day?" she asked in a low tone, when they were off, the two Colonels bringing up the rear, arm-in-arm.

"Ought to go. Oh, why?" and the pink became crimson.

"I don't fancy you are quite well."

"Is that all? I fancied you meant—at least, I didn't know what you meant. I'm only awfully tired," said Dolly, with a forced laugh. "If it wasn't for the skating, I should like to lie on the sofa and cry. But that would be so stupid."

"Only, if you are not fit to go—"

"I am fit, and I mean to go." Dolly spoke with a touch of pettishness. "It would be absurd to give in. Just laziness."

The frozen pond lay near the centre of a large meadow, behind the Park garden. A good many people were already assembled there when the Woodlands party arrived. Dolly passed among them, nodding, smiling, shaking hands, but scarcely pausing for an instant until the edge of the pond was reached.

"How do you do, Dolly?" Mervyn said, coming up. "Why!"—and his tone showed great surprise—"Miss Tracy!"

"Didn't you know Miss Tracy was with us?" asked Dolly.

"I really did not. Nobody has had the grace to tell me."

Dorothea could not but be aware of the pleasure in Mervyn's face, and the warmth of his hand-clasp. Her heart beat rather fast: yet the next moment, he was looking with evident admiration at Dolly.

"And I must not hinder that! I must do nothing to hinder that!" she told herself.

"So you are actually staying at Woodlands?" said Mervyn.

"Yes; we came yesterday. Colonel Erskine proved to be my father's old friend."

"Ah, I remember,—you were questioning me in the Park. I must renew acquaintance with Colonel Tracy presently. There's Emmeline calling me to a sense of my duties. I hope yonder portly dame doesn't mean to adventure herself on the ice. She'll drown the whole bevy of us. Arctic frost wouldn't sustain her weight. Have you skates, Miss Tracy? I'll be back in a minute. Here, Edred, can you see to these ladies?"

Edred's response to the appeal was not too cordial. He shook hands with Dolly, but hardly met her eyes; and then he bent his attention to the fastening of Dorothea's skates. When they both looked up, Dolly was gone.

"Where can she be?" Dorothea asked. "Yes, I see! Your brother has her on the ice."

A shadow crossed Edred's face, marked enough to be unmistakable. "Yes," he said briefly. "Now, will you let me help you?"

Dorothea was not a very experienced skater, and some little assistance was welcome. Edred attached himself to her side for a considerable time.

"Poor man! it is hard upon him!" thought Dorothea, "when he is longing to be with Dolly. But—if she has what she wants, I must not interfere."

Neither Dorothea, nor Edred wore capable of difficult evolutions. They went solemnly round and round the pond, doing their best to avoid collisions. Dorothea tried in vain to get up any manner of conversation on everyday topics. She took refuge at last in Edred's London work, mentioned the Parish, and started him in a lengthy dissertation upon the duties of churchwardens. Whether she or he thought much about what he said may be doubted; but the gravity of the two faces gave them every appearance of intent interest.

Dolly flashed past now and then, holding Mervyn's hand. The two were executing intricate curves, with equal ease and grace. Dorothea felt certain that at all events Dolly was enjoying herself.

"Pretty creature!" she murmured, half-aloud.

"I beg your pardon?" said Edred, interrupted in his disquisition.

"I was only thinking how sweet Dolly looks to-day."

"She is—" and a cold pause. "She can be—attractive."

"I should think she could! Attractive! I call her lovely!"

Thou Dorothea remembered that perhaps Dolly did not render herself attractive to Edred.

"I have seen her look lovely—as you say."

Dorothea gave him an eager glance, trying to read further. Did he really feel no more than he showed? At the same moment Mervyn and Dolly swept past again, nearer and more slowly than before. Dolly lifted her blue eyes, and gazed full at Dorothea, with a heart-sick reproachful gaze. Dorothea was startled, even confounded, by it. The look was such as she might have received from one whom she had deeply injured. But how could she have injured Dolly? Was she not studiously keeping aloof from Mervyn, for Dolly's sake, forbearing to give him a needless smile?

Edred seemed not to have noticed the little interlude. He went on without a break: "If one wanted mere prettiness, and nothing more—"

"Oh!" cried Dorothea indignantly. "You don't mean Dolly! You are not speaking of Dolly!"

Edred made no answer. Dorothea was hurrying forward, under the strength of her own feelings.

"You have known her so many years, and I only two days,—but to think of accusing Dolly of mere prettiness! You can't know Dolly really. You can't have seen her in her home, with her father and mother and her sisters. And I fancied that you—"

Dorothea paused, and Edred's usually impassive face was aglow. "Thanks," he said abruptly. "Yes, I—I think I do know her. Forget what I said just now," and his voice showed agitation. "Forget everything, except that she—that no one in the world can ever be to me what Dolly is."

"I thought so," murmured Dorothea. "But why—?"

"Why do I not seek her? What is the use? Cannot you see for yourself. Have I a grain of hope to work upon?"

Dorothea could not say that he had. She could only say,—"If I were a man, I would not give in so easily."

"If you were a man, I suppose you would do as a man does," he observed drily. "I don't know what has made me say so much to you, Miss Tracy. Pray consider it to be strictly in confidence—and pray forget the whole."

"I shall not forget; and I shall not repeat it," said Dorothea. "But I still think that if I were you, I would try to win her."

Both Dorothea and Edred were too deeply interested in their subject to pay much attention to what went on around. Edred's eyes were bent downward, and Dorothea's were occupied in studying him. They were skating round a tiny islet which lay at one end of the pond, carelessly keeping to the left of the narrow ice-belt, and calmly oblivious of the fact that other people might choose to round the islet from the opposite direction.

"Hallo!" A warning shout from Mervyn recalled their wandering minds to the present. But the shout came too late. Mervyn and Dolly, skimming lightly one way, met Edred and Dorothea in full career. The four went down together, and Dolly was underneath.

The two young men were up instantly; and almost before Dorothea knew what had happened, she found herself again on her feet, helped up by Mervyn's strong hands. Dolly alone lay white and still on the hard ice.

"You are not hurt? You are sure you are not hurt?" Mervyn was saying anxiously to Dorothea, while Edred was endeavouring to lift Dolly. "You are quite sure?"

A keen throb of joy passed through Dorothea. She could not but see that Mervyn's first thought was of her; his chief solicitude was for her. Then she thrust the joy fiercely aside.

"O no, no; not in the least. But Dolly,—poor Dolly! Don't think of me! Only think of Dolly," she implored.