Kitabı oku: «The Star-Gazers», sayfa 22

“Yes, yes; a fair number,” he said, as if he were addressing one who was a comparative stranger, but towards whom he wished to behave with the greatest deference. “They are very small, though – very small; not like those they dig in France. May I send you a few, my – Miss Alleyne?”

Lucy shook her head, for her emotion mastered her this time. That alteration from what was to have been “my dear” to “Miss Alleyne” was too much for her, and she bowed hastily and hurried away.

But the major hastened after her, and overtook her in the lane.

“Miss Alleyne – Lucy,” he cried. “One moment, please.”

“Major Day!” she cried, in surprise.

“And your very good old friend, my dear. Since I saw you last I have been thinking a great deal, and many things which troubled me before we left home have gradually assumed an entirely fresh aspect. I was hasty, and, to be frank, I used to think ill of you, and my conscience is so full of reproach that I – if you’ll excuse me – I – I must beg your pardon.”

“Beg my pardon, Major Day?” said Lucy, and she turned red and white by turns as she began to tremble.

“Yes, my dear, and ask you to forgive me.”

“Forgive you, Major Day?”

“Yes, my dear, I fear I was too ready to believe you were weak and foolish, and did not give you credit for being what you are, and – there, there, my dear, I surrender at discretion, I leave it to your generosity to let me march off with colours flying.”

“Dear Major Day! I didn’t deserve that you should think so ill of me,” sobbed Lucy passionately, and laying her hands in the old man’s she made no resistance as he drew her towards him, and kissed her forehead, just when, according to his unlucky custom, Oldroyd came into sight.

At the moment when the major bent down and pressed his lips on little Lucy’s white forehead, the pony’s head was directed straight towards them; the next instant he had sprung round like a weather-cock, and his head was directed towards home, but only for a few moments, before it was dragged round again, and the doctor come slowly ambling towards them, looking indignant and fierce.

“Then we are to be the best of friends again, eh, my dear, and I am quite forgiven?”

“Oh, yes, dear Major Day,” said Lucy; “but please don’t think so ill of me again.”

“I’m a dreadful old scoundrel ever to have thought ill of you at all,” cried the major. “There, we must forget all the past. Ah, doctor, how are you? When are you coming up to the hall? My brother will be glad to see you, I’m sure.”

“I hope Sir John is not unwell?” said Oldroyd, trying to wither Lucy with a look, and bringing back upon himself such an indignant flash that he metaphorically curled up, as he muttered something to himself about the daring impudence some women could display.

“Unwell? dear me, no,” said the major. “A little pulled down by too much inaction abroad; nothing hurts him though much. I mean come as a visitor. How is the health of the neighbourhood, eh?”

“Excellent, Major Day, that is, excepting Mr Alleyne’s.”

“What! Mr Alleyne ill? Bless my soul! you did not say anything about it, my dear.”

“My dear! my dear!” muttered Oldroyd between his teeth; “always my dear. Surely the old idiot is not going to marry the wicked little flirt.”

“I had not had time, Major Day,” said Lucy eagerly, “but I don’t think dear Moray is any worse than usual.”

“Worse than usual? Then he has been unwell?”

“He is ill,” replied Lucy, “but it has been coming on so slowly that I am afraid we do not notice it so much as we should.”

“But is he confined to his bed?”

“Oh, no!” cried Lucy. “He is going on with his studies just as usual.”

“I’ll come over and see him. I meant to come, but I – er – I hesitated, my dear. Do you think he would be pleased if I called?”

“I’m sure he would, Major Day,” cried Lucy. “Pray come soon.”

“Indeed, I will, perhaps to-morrow. Are you going my way?”

“No, major, I am going back to The Firs. I do not like to be away when Mr Oldroyd is going to see my brother.”

The major shook hands warmly, and went his way, saying to himself, —

“What did she mean? She did not like to be away when Mr Oldroyd visited her brother? What she said, of course. Ah, how prone men are to put a second meaning to other people’s words. How ready I was to think ill of the little lassie and her brother; and I am as ready now to own that she is innocence itself. I used to think, though, that she cared for Oldroyd.”

Meanwhile, Lucy was walking straight along by the side of the road, back towards The Firs, with Oldroyd, on his disreputable-looking steed, a yard or two upon her left.

By quitting the road and cutting across the open boggy land, amidst the furze and whortleberry scrub Lucy could have saved a quarter-of-a-mile, and left her companion behind; or even if he had elected to follow her, the softness of the soil and the constant recurrence of swampy patches about, which one on foot could easily avoid, would have necessitated so much care that he would have been left far behind.

But Lucy trudged steadily on with her pretty little face trying to look stern and hard, but failing dis – no, not dismally, for hers was a type of countenance from which the prettiness could not be eliminated try how one would.

Oldroyd was angry – bitterly angry. But he was in love. Once more jealous fear had attacked him. For had not he plainly seen Lucy’s face held up in the most matter-of-fact manner for the major to bend down and kiss? Certainly he was an old man, old enough to be her grandfather, and the kiss had been given when he who witnessed it was two or three hundred yards away; but there was the fact and Oldroyd felt furious.

All this time had passed since he had felt that he was growing very fond of Lucy, and his affection had been nipped and blackened like the top of a spring potato, by an unkindly frost, consequent upon the Rolph affair, while still like the spring potato, though the first shoots had been nipped, it was only for more and stronger ones to form and grow faster and faster than before. But Lucy had made no sign.

And so they went on towards The Firs on that delicious spring day, when the larks were singing overhead, the young growth of the pines shed a sweet odour of lemon to be wafted across the road, and at every step, Lucy’s little feet crushed down a daisy, but the bright-eyed flower lifted its head again as soon as she had passed and did not seem to be trampled in the least. Oldroyd did as Lucy did – stared straight before him, letting the reins – a much mended pair – rest on the pony’s neck; while Peter hung his head in a sleepy, contemplative way, and sometimes walked, sometimes slowly ambled on, as if moved by his spirit to keep abreast of Lucy.

Oldroyd’s brow knit closely as he mentally wrote out a prescription to meet his new case, and then mentally tore it up again, ending by at last turning quite fiercely towards Lucy, giving the pony’s ribs a couple of kicks as he snatched up the reins to force it forward, and then, as she started half frightened by his near approach, he said to her in a reproachful voice, —

“How can you behave so cruelly to me, Lucy?” According to all canons the rule in such a case was for Lucy to start, open her eyes a little more widely, stare, and say, —

“Mr Oldroyd, I don’t know what you mean!” But this was out on a common, and not in a west-end drawing-room. Her heart was full, and she was not disposed just then to fence and screen herself with maidenly conventionalities. She knew well enough that Philip Oldroyd loved her very dearly, almost as dearly, she owned in her heart of hearts, as she loved him, and that he was alluding broadly to her conduct with Rolph, her long display of resentment, and also to her having given the major a kiss that day. He was very angry and jealous, but that did not annoy her in the least. It gave her pleasure. He spoke very sharply to her just then – viciously and bitterly; but she did not mind that either. It was piquant. It gave her a pleasant little thrill. There was a masterly sound about it, and she felt as if it was pleasant to be mastered just then, when she was in the most wilful and angry of moods.

“You know what I mean,” he said, quickly, “you know how I love you.”

“Oh!” said Lucy to herself very softly; but though every nerve tingled with pleasure, not a muscle stirred, and she kept her face averted.

“You know,” continued Oldroyd, “how long I have loved you; but you take delight in trampling upon my best feelings. I suppose,” he added bitterly, “it is because I am so poor.”

“Indeed it is not!” cried Lucy with spirit, as she kept her back to him; “how can you think me so pitiful and mean!”

“Well, then, why do you treat me so badly?”

“I don’t treat you badly.”

This was very commonplace, and Lucy’s continuous stare straight before her did not give it dignity.

“You do treat me badly – cruelly – worse,” exclaimed Oldroyd, kicking his pony’s ribs so viciously, that the poor brute resented it by shaking his head, and wagging his tail.

“You have treated me shamefully, Mr Oldroyd,” cried Lucy.

It was getting terribly commonplace now.

“Indeed I have not,” he replied. “How could I help feeling hurt when I saw you as I did with that horse-jockey foot-racing animal?”

“You might have known that I had a reason for it, and that I was behaving so on behalf of my friend,” said Lucy.

“How was I to be able to analyse the secrets of your heart?” said Oldroyd, romantically.

“Then you looked insultingly at me just now, when dear old grandfatherly Major Day spoke to me, and behaved to me as he did. Why – oh, I haven’t patience with myself for speaking about it all as I do. It is degrading and weak; and what right, sir,” she panted, “have you to ask me for such explanations?”

“I do it in all humbleness, Lucy,” he whispered, with his voice softening. “I have nothing to say in my defence, only that I love you so dearly that it cuts me to the heart to think that – that – oh, my darling, look at me like that again.”

It was all in a moment. Lucy’s eyes had ceased to flash, and had darted out such a confession of forgiveness, and love, and tenderness, all mingled, as made Oldroyd forget all about the laws of equitation, and fall off his pony on the wrong side, to catch Lucy’s hand in his and draw it tightly through his arm.

Peter began to nibble placidly at shoots, and everything was more commonplace than ever, for they walked slowly along by the roadside, with their heads down, perfectly silent; while the pony browsed along, with his head down, and the rein dragging on the ground, till after a bit he trod upon it, gave his head a snatch at the check, and broke it, making it very little worse than it was before.

And so they went on, with the larks singing overhead, the grass and daisies springing beneath their feet, and the world looking more beautiful than it ever did before; what time Glynne was sitting, pale, large-eyed, and thin, in her own room, reading hard – some heavy work, which she jealously placed aside whenever she had finished perusing; and Moray Alleyne was alone in his observatory, gaunt, grey, and strange, busy over the calculations respecting the star he had been watching for nights past, that bright particular star that seemed somehow connected with the woman he had ventured to love.

“Are you very angry, Mrs Alleyne?” said Oldroyd, as he took Lucy’s hand in his and walked with her to where the mistress of The Firs was seated, busily stitching, in the very perfection of neatness, the pleats of a new garment for her son.

“Angry?” said Mrs Alleyne, starting and flushing, and then turning pale as she dropped her work, and her hands began to tremble. “Does this mean – does this mean – ?”

“That we love each other?” replied Oldroyd, glancing sidewise at Lucy. “Yes, madam, it does, and I feel dread and shame, I scarcely know what, when I speak to you like this, for I am so poor, and my prospects so extremely wanting in brightness.”

“We are used to being poor, Mr Oldroyd,” said Mrs Alleyne, sadly.

“Then you do not object?”

“Why should I?” said Mrs Alleyne. “It is natural that my child should some day form an attachment. She has, I presume, done so?”

“Oh, yes, yes, yes, mamma,” cried Lucy, “a long time now.”

“Then, knowing as I do, that the attachment is to a man of sterling worth,” said Mrs Alleyne softly, as she held out her hand, “what more could I wish?”

Oldroyd caught the hand in his and kissed it, hesitated a moment, and then bent down and kissed Mrs Alleyne’s thin pinched lips.

“It has given me the stimulus I wanted,” he said, proudly. “Mrs Alleyne, Lucy shall not be a poor man’s wife, but – Ah, Alleyne.”

“Ah, Oldroyd,” said the astronomer, in his soft, deep voice, and he smiled sadly; “come to prescribe for me again. And I’m better than ever now – but – is anything wrong?”

For the positions of the three occupants of the room he had entered struck him as being singular.

“Yes,” cried Oldroyd, “very wrong. I, being a poor surgeon and general practitioner, have been asking your mother’s consent to Lucy’s becoming my wife.”

“And Lucy?” said Alleyne softly.

“Oh, yes, Moray, dear Moray,” she cried, hiding her face in his breast.

“I am very glad, Oldroyd,” said Alleyne, quietly. “I have thought of it sometimes, and wondered whether it would come to this, and – and I am very very glad.”

He held out his hand and grasped the young doctor’s very warmly, before kissing his sister, after which she escaped to her room, where she stayed for quite an hour before coming down shyly, and with a very happy look in her eyes.

Oldroyd was not gone. It was not likely. He had been staying with Alleyne in the observatory – watching his case as he told himself, but not succeeding in his self-deceit, and some kind of natural attraction led him back into the dining-room just as Lucy entered from the other door.

It must have been a further charge of natural attraction that led them straight into each other’s arms, for the first long embrace and kiss, from which Lucy started back at last, all shame-faced, rosy-red, and with the sensation that she had just been guilty of something very wicked indeed.

“Are you happy, Lucy?” said Oldroyd.

“No,” she said, looking at him earnestly, “and I shall not be till others are happy too.”

Volume Three – Chapter Thirteen.
As Through a Glass

“Love rules the court, the camp, the grove,” says the poet; and there he stops, leaving the rest of the places under the pink little god’s régime to our imagination.

He was busy as ever at Brackley, with people in a humbler walk in life and there was an attraction there for a person who plays no prominent part in this narrative, to wit, Thompson, private dragoon in Her Majesty’s service, and valet and confidential man to Captain Rolph.

He had long fixed his affections possibly in military temporary fashion upon Mason, Glynne’s maid. These affections had glowed during the many visits to Warren and Hall, cooled down during the activities of service – rubbing down his master as he would a horse, and helping him to train – sinking for a year and a half or so after “the upset” at Brackley, and turning up again when the captain came back to The Warren to be hitched on again, as he termed it. For, truth to tell, it was known that Mason had one hundred and fourteen pounds deposited in consols with a certain old lady in Threadneedle Street.

Thompson felt glad then, when one day the captain said to him, —

“All packed up, isn’t it?” and he replied that the luggage was ready. Whereupon the captain told him that he would not want him for a month.

“And, by the way, go down to The Warren before my mother returns, and get my guns, a few books in my room, and the knick-knacks and clothes, and the rest.”

“Won’t you want ’em, sir, next time you’re going down?”

“Mind your own business, fool, and get the things.”

Thompson stood at attention, winked to himself, and thought of how near he would be to Brackley, and how, in spite of the past he would be sure of a welcome in the servants’ hall. A month would be long enough to “pull that off;” and though he did not put it in words, to pull Mason’s savings out of the great British bank.

But then there was Sinkins, the village carpenter and parish clerk, who often did jobs at the Hall, a man with whom he had come in contact more than a year before, over the preparations for Glynne’s wedding, and had seen talking to Mason more than once, and whom he held in utter contempt.

It is of no use to disguise the truth, for no matter whether Matthew Sinkins was in his Sunday best, or in his regular carpenter’s fustian, he always exhaled a peculiar odour of glue. Certainly it was often dashed with sawdust, suggestive of cellars and wine, or the fragrant resinous scent of newly cut satin shavings; but the glue overbore the rest, and maintained itself so persistently that, even during the week when Sinkins had the French polishing job at Brackley, and the naphtha and shellac clung to his clothes, there, making itself perceptible, was the regular good old carpenter’s shop smell of glue.

Thompson said to Mason that it was disgusting, but she told him frankly that it was a good, clean, wholesome smell, and far preferable to that of the stables.

This, with toss of the head soon after Thompson’s arrival, for, in spite of bygones he found on getting himself driven over from The Warren, quite a warm welcome from old friends, one and all being eager to talk over the past and learn everything that could be pumped out of Thompson respecting his master’s doings since that terrible night.

Thompson was in the stable-yard smoking a cigar – a very excellent cigar, that had cost somewhere about a shilling – rather an extravagance for a young man in his position of life, but as it was one out of his master’s box, the expense did not fall upon him; and had any one suggested that it was not honest for him to smoke the captain’s cigars he would have looked at him with astonishment, and asked whether he knew the meaning of the word perquisites.

It was a very excellent cigar, and being so it might have been supposed to have a soothing effect; but whatever may have been its sedative qualities they were not apparent, for Thompson’s face was gloomy, consequent upon his having seen Matthew Sinkins go up to the side door with his basket of tools hanging from his shoulder, and kept in that position by the hammer being thrust through one of the handles, that handle being passed through its fellow.

“Him here, again?” exclaimed Thompson. “He’s always hanging about the place. Well, it’s as free for me as for him, I suppose. I shall go and see.”

Thompson who was a smart, dapper-looking swarthy man, with closely cut hair, very small mutton chop whiskers, and dark beady eyes, threw away the half-smoked cigar, gave a touch to his carefully-tied white cravat, glanced down at his brightly polished boots, and let his eyes rest upon his very closely fitting Bedford cord trousers before crossing the yard, whistling in a nonchalant manner, and walking into the servants’ hall, where Matthew Sinkins was waiting with his tool basket on the floor by his side.

“Hallo, chips!” said Thompson, condescendingly, “how’s trade?”

“Pretty tidy, Mr Thompson,” said the carpenter, slowly, and taking out the two-foot rule which dwelt in a long narrow pocket down one leg of his trousers, but sheathing it again directly, as if it were a weapon which he did not at present need.

“Glad of it,” said Thompson. “Haven’t they asked you to have a horn of ale?”

“Yes, Mr Thompson; oh, yes. Miss Mason has gone to get one for me from Mr Morris.”

“Oh! has she?” said Thompson; and this news was of so discomforting a nature that he was taken a little aback. “Job on?”

“Yes, Mr Thompson, I’m wanted. You’re here again, then. Thought you was going abroad.”

“No,” said Thompson, thrusting his hands into his pockets, and see-sawing himself to and fro, from toe to heel and back. “No, we’re not gone yet, Mr Sinkins; and if it’s any pleasure to you to know it, I don’t see any likelihood of our going for some time to come. What have you got to say to that?”

Mr Sinkin’s big hand went deliberately down the leg of his trousers, and he half drew out the rule again, as if he meant to measure the captain’s attendant, but he allowed the narrow strip of boxwood to glide back into its place and breathed hard.

“I say, what have you got to say to that, Mr Sinkins?” said Thompson, nodding his head a good deal, and unconsciously making himself wonderfully like a pugnacious bantam cock ruffling himself in the presence of a heavy, stolid, barn-door fowl.

“Got to say to it?” replied Sinkins, calmly.

“Yes, sir, got to say to it, sir,” cried Thompson, with an irritating air of superiority that appeared to suggest that he had got the carpenter in a corner now, from which he did not mean to let him escape until he had answered the question put to him so sharply.

Sinkins seemed to feel that his rule was necessary once again, but the boxwood was allowed to slip back as its master shook his head, and said in a slow serious way, —

“I haven’t got anything to say to it, Mr Thompson, sir.”

“Oh, you haven’t.”

“No, sir,” replied the carpenter stolidly. “If I was to say a lot to it, I don’t see as it would make any difference one way or the other.”

“No, sir, I should think it wouldn’t,” cried Thompson; and just then Miss Mason, the brisk-looking, dark-eyed, ale-bearing Hebe of two-and-twenty, came in, looking as if she were wearing an altered silk dress that had once been the property of Glynne Day.

“Oh, you are here, Mr Thompson, are you?” she said with a voice full of acidity.

“Yes, ma’am, I am here,” said Thompson, sharply.

“Perhaps you’ll come up as soon as you’ve drunk your ale, Mr Sinkins,” said Miss Mason, sweetly. “I’ll show you which room.”

Matthew placed the horn at his lips, and removed it so reluctantly that it ceased to be a horn of plenty, and he set it back upon the table with a sigh. He stooped then and took the handle of his hammer, lifting the tool basket, so that chisels and screws, and drivers, gimlets, saws, and planes, all jumbled up together, as they were swung round upon the strong man’s shoulder, but only to be swung off again and carried in the hand, as being more suitable in so grand a place as Brackley Hall.

“Are you quite ready, Mr Sinkins,” said Miss Mason, in a tone of voice that seemed quite affectionate.

“Yes, miss, I’m quite ready.”

“Come along, then, Mr Sinkins,” said Mason; and with what was meant for a haughty look at the captain’s man, she led the way through the door opening on to the back staircase, sending the said door back with unnecessary violence as Mr Thompson essayed to follow, but only essayed for fear of being ordered back.

“There’s something up,” he said. “That fellow’s seen something about master, and been tale-bearing. And so he’s to go up there all alone, easing and repairing doors as the old major’s ’most banged off the hinges in his passions, and she’s to stand by a-giving of him instructions, and all to aggravate and annoy me.”

He took a turn up and down the hall, screwing his doubled-up fist in his left hand, and grinding his teeth with rage.

“Yes; that’s what it’s for, just to aggravate and annoy me, and him smelling that awful of glue! Bah! It’s disgusting. A low, common, heavy-looking country bumpkin of a carpenter, as has never been hardly outside his village, and can only just sign his name with a square pencil, pointed up with a chisel. I say it’s disgusting.”

Thompson took another turn or two up and down the hall, to ease his wounded pride, and then went on again talking to himself till he caught sight of the empty, unoffending horn, which he smote with his doubled fist, striking out at it scientifically from the shoulder, and sent it flying to the other end of the hall.

“Here, what I want to know,” said Thompson, is this – “Am I going to pull this here off, or am I not?”

There was no answer to the question, so the man sat down astride of a form, as if it had been a horse, folded his arms exceedingly tight, and scowled at the door that had been shut against him, devoured by jealously, and picturing in his mind other matters beside the easing of doors and tightening of hinges, for he was measuring other people’s conduct, not by Mr Sinkins’ footrule, but by his own bushel.

“I can’t stand it,” he muttered at last. “I must have a quiet pipe.”

Striding out of the hall as if he were on duty, he marched right out across the park and into the lane, from whence he struck into the first opening in the fir woods where the shade seemed to calm him; and, taking out a pipe-case, he extracted a very black bruyère root pipe, filled it, stuck it in his mouth, and then, seeking for a match in his vest pocket, he lit it deftly by giving it a rub on the leg of his trousers, puffed his tobacco into incandescence, and then threw the glowing vesta, like a hand grenade, over his left shoulder.

There was a sharp ejaculation, and then, – “Confound your insolence, fellow!” Thompson started round, and found himself facing the major, trowel in one hand, malacca cane in the other.

“That light hit me in the face, sir. Do you know, sir, that you may set the woods on fire, sir?” cried the major. “What! Thompson! ’Tention! What the devil are you doing here?”

The man gave a sharp look to left and right, and then, from old habit, obeyed the imperious military order, and drew himself upright, staring straight before him – “eyes front.”

“You scoundrel!” cried the major, seizing him by the collar, and holding his cane threateningly, as the idea of some peril to his niece flashed across his mind. “You’ve brought a note or some message to the Hall.”

“No, sir! really, sir, I haven’t, sir.”

“Don’t dare to lie to me, you dog!” cried the major, with the stick moving up and down, and Thompson’s eyes following it, in the full belief that at any moment it might fall upon his shoulders.

“It’s gospel truth, sir,” he cried. “I haven’t got no note. How could I have?”

“Where’s your master?”

“Off, sir.”

“Off? What do you mean? Isn’t he at The Warren?”

“No, sir; he only sent me down to fetch his things.”

“Ah!” cried the major; “and here with some message.”

“No, sir, that he didn’t, sir. I come over here of my own self.”

“What do you mean by ‘off’?” cried the major. “You don’t go from here till you confess the truth. After what happened how dare you set foot on these grounds! I say, where is your master?”

“Gone abroad, sir.”

“Is that the truth? – Here, I was a bit hasty. – A sovereign, my lad. – Now, then, tell me. Your master sent you down here?”

“Only to The Warren, sir, to fetch his things, because he wasn’t coming down again.”

The major looked at him searchingly.

“Let me see,” he said, sharply; “he was to be married the other day, wasn’t he?”

“Yes, sir,” said Thompson, with a peculiar look as he held the sovereign in his pocket, and ran a finger nail round the milled edge.

“What do you mean by that, sir?” cried the major suspiciously, and the stick was raised again. “Wasn’t he married?”

“Well, he may have been since, sir, but that other didn’t come off.”

“What?”

“Well, sir, the fact is, master was going to be, but there was a little trouble, sir, about another lady who lived in these parts, and when it come out about the wedding as was to be very quiet in London, there was a bit of a fuss.”

“Humph! well, that is nothing to me, my man. I made a mistake, and I ask your pardon.”

“It’s all right, sir, and thank you kindly,” said Thompson. “It was Ben Hayle’s daughter, sir, Miss Judith, who used to be at The Warren before they were sent away.”

The major had turned his back to go, but the man’s words arrested him, and, in spite of himself, he listened.

“Ben Hayle come to Long’s, sir, in Bond Street, where we was staying, and got to see master. I was packing up, because master was going on the Continong next day, and there was a tremenjus row, all in whispers like, because I was in the next room, but Ben Hayle got louder and louder, and I couldn’t help hearing all the last of it.”

“There, that will do. I don’t want to hear any more.”

“No, sir, certainly not,” said Thompson; “but master didn’t go to the church with Miss Emlin, sir, and from what I heered he went abroad next night, sir.”

“Alone?”

“No, sir,” said Thompson, smiling.

“Poor Glynne!” muttered the major as he turned away. “The man is a disgrace to the service. An utter scoundrel. Gone abroad. No, he would not go alone.”

Thompson, left in the wood, took out and looked at the sovereign, and concluded that he would not go to the Hall again.