Ida walked home through the rain very thoughtfully: but not sadly; for
though it was still pelting in the uncompromising lake fashion, she was
half conscious of a strange lightness of the heart, a strange
brightness in herself, and even in the rain-swept view, which vaguely
surprised and puzzled her. The feeling was not vivid enough to be
happiness, but it was the nearest thing to it.
And without realising it, she thought, all the way home, of Stafford
Orme. Her life had been so secluded, so solitary and friendless, that
he had come into it as a sudden and unexpected flash of sunlight in a
drear November day. It seemed to her extraordinary that she should have
met him so often, still more extraordinary the offer he had made that
morning. She asked herself, as she went with quick, light step along
the hills, why he had done it; why he, who was rich and had so many
friends--no doubt the Villa would be full of them--should find any
pleasure in learning to herd cattle and count sheep, to ride about the
dale with only a young girl for company.
If anyone had whispered, "It is because he prefers that young girl's
society to any other's; it is because he wants to be with you, not from
any desire to learn farming," she would have been more than surprised,
would have received this offer of a solution of the mystery with a
smile of incredulity; for there had been no candid friend to tell her
that she possessed the fatal gift of beauty; that she was one of those
upon whom the eyes of man cannot look without a stirring of the heart,
and a quickening of the pulse. Vanity is a strong plant, and it
flourishes in every soil; but it had found no root in Ida's nature. She
was too absorbed in the round of her daily tasks, in the care of her
father and her efforts to keep the great place from going to rack and
ruin, to think of herself; and if her glass had ever whispered that she
was one of the loveliest of the daughters of Eve, she had turned a deaf
ear to it.
No; she assured herself that it was just a whim of Mr. Orme's, a
passing fancy and caprice which would soon be satisfied, and that he
would tire of it after a few days, perhaps hours. Of course, she was
wrong to humour the whim; but it had been hard to refuse him, hard to
seem churlish and obstinate after he had been so kind on the night her
father had frightened her by his sleep-walking; and it had been still
harder because she had been conscious of a certain pleasure in the
thought that she should see him again.