John Ward, Preacher Part 46

But Mrs. Dale was not satisfied. "Oh, yes, you'd better go. You've neglected the flowers dreadfully, I don't know how long it is since your father has had any fresh roses in the library."

"I'll get the garden scissors," Gifford pleaded; "it won't take long just to cut some roses."

"Well," Lois said languidly.

Gifford went through the wide cool hall for the shears and the basket of scented gra.s.s for the posies; he knew the rectory as well as his own home. Mrs. Dale had followed him, and in the shadowy back hall she gave him a significant look.

"That's right, cheer her up. Of course she feels their going very much.

I must say, it does not show much consideration on the part of the young man to leave her at such a time,--I don't care what the business is that calls him away! Still, I can't say that I'm surprised. I never did like that d.i.c.k, and I have always been afraid Lois would care for him."

"I think it is a great misfortune," Gifford said gravely.

"Oh, well, I don't know," demurred Mrs. Dale. "It is an excellent match; and his carelessness now--well, it is only to be expected from a young man who would carry his mother off from--from our care, to be looked after by a hired nurse. He thought," said Mrs. Dale, bridling her head and pursing up her lips, "that a lot of 'fussy old women' couldn't take care of her. Still, it will be a good marriage for Lois. I'm bound to say that, though I have never liked him."

The young people did not talk much as they went down into the garden.

Lois pointed out what roses Gifford might cut, and, taking them from him, put them into the little basket on her arm.

"How I miss Helen!" she said at last.

"Yes, of course," he answered, "but think how soon you'll see her in Lockhaven;" and then he tried to make her talk of the lumber town, and the people, and John Ward. But he had the conversation quite to himself.

At last, with a desperate desire to find something in which she would be interested, he said, "You must miss your friends very much. I'm sorry they are gone."

"My friends?"

"Yes, Mr. Forsythe--and his mother."

"Oh, no!" she answered quickly.

"No?" Gifford said, wondering if she were afraid he had discovered her secret, and hastening to help her conceal it. "Oh, of course you feel that the change will be good for Mrs. Forsythe?"

"Oh, I hope it will!" cried Lois, fear trembling in the earnestness of her voice.

Gifford had stepped over the low box border to a stately bunch of milk-white phlox. "Let's have some of this," he said, beginning to cut the long stems close to the roots; "it always looks so well in the blue jug."

His back was toward her, and perhaps that gave him the courage to say, with a suddenness that surprised himself, "Ah--does Mrs. Forsythe go abroad with her son?"

Even as he spoke he wondered why he had said it; certainly it was from no interest in the sick lady. Was it because he hoped to betray Lois into some expression of opinion concerning Mr. Forsythe's departure? He despised himself if it were a test, but he did not stop to follow the windings of his own motives.

"Abroad?" Lois said, in a quick, breathless way. "Does he go abroad?"

Gifford felt her excitement and suspense without seeing it, and he began to clip the phlox with a recklessness which would have wrung Dr. Howe's soul.

"I--I believe so. I supposed you knew it."

"How do you know it?" she demanded.

"He told me," Gifford admitted.

"Are you sure?" she said in a quavering voice.

Gifford had turned, and was stepping carefully back among the plants, sinking at every step into the soft fresh earth. He did not look at her, as he reached the path.

"Are you sure?" she said again.

"Yes," he answered reluctantly, "yes, he is going; I don't know about his mother."

Here, to his dismay, he saw the color come and go on Lois's sad little face, and her lip tremble, and her eyes fill, and then, dropping her roses, she began to cry heartily.

"Oh, Lois!" he exclaimed, aghast, and was at her side in a moment. But she turned away, and, throwing her arm about an old locust-tree in the path, laid her cheek against the rough bark, and hid her eyes.

"Oh, don't cry, Lois," he besought her. "What a brute I was to have told you in that abrupt way! Don't cry."

"Oh, no," she said, "no, no, no! you must not say that--you--you do not understand"--

"Don't," he said tenderly, "don't--Lois!"

Lois put one hand softly on his arm, but she kept her face covered.

Gifford was greatly distressed.

"I ought not to have told you in that way,"--Lois shook her head,--"and--and I have no doubt he--they'll come to Ashurst and tell you of their plans before they start."

Lois seemed to listen.

"Yes," Gifford continued, gaining conviction from his desire to help her, "of course he will return."

Lois had ceased to cry. "Do--do you think so?"

"I'm sure of it," Gifford answered firmly; and even as he spoke, he had a mental vision, in which he saw himself bringing d.i.c.k Forsythe back to Ashurst, and planting him forcibly at Lois's feet. "I ought to have considered," he went on, looking at her anxiously, "that in your exhausted state it would be a shock to hear that your friends were going so far away; though Europe isn't so very far, Lois. Of course they'll come and tell you all about it before they go; probably they had their own reasons for not doing it before they left Ashurst,--your health, perhaps. But no doubt, no possible doubt, that Mr. Forsythe, at least, will come back here to make any arrangements there may be about his house, you know."

This last was a very lame reason, and Gifford felt it, for the house had been closed and the rent paid, and there was nothing more to do; but he must say something to comfort her.

Lois had quite regained her composure; even the old hopeless look had returned.

"I beg your pardon," she said. "I am very--foolish. I don't know why I am so weak--I--I am still anxious about Mrs. Forsythe, you know; the long journey for her"--

"Of course," he a.s.sured her. "I know how it startled you."

She turned to go into the house, and Gifford followed her, first picking up the neglected roses at her feet.

"I do not know what you think of me," she said tremulously.

"I only think you are not very strong," he answered tenderly, yet keeping his eyes from her averted face; he felt that he had seen more than he had a right to, already. His first thought was to protect her from herself; she must not think she had betrayed herself, and fancy that Gifford had guessed her engagement. He still hoped that, for the sake of their old friends.h.i.+p, she would freely choose to tell him. But most of all, she should not feel that she had shown despairing love for a man who neglected and slighted her, and that her companion pitied her. He even refused to let his thought turn to it.

"You must not mind me, Lois. I quite understand--the suddenness of hearing even the most--indifferent thing is enough to upset one when one is so tired out with nursing, and all that. Don't mind me."

"You are so good, Gifford," she said, with a sudden shy look from under her wet lashes, and a little lightening of her heavy eyes.

It was at least a joy to feel that he could comfort her, even though it cut his own heart to do so, and the pain of it made him silent for a few minutes.