"I must. It's not in me to resist you, miss," said Susie, with a little
gesture of yielding. "But, mind me! the people hereabouts, the grand
folk up at the Hall, will take offence----"
"Let them!" said Celia. "But I don't think they will. They are all very
kind, even the Marquess."
Susie looked up swiftly.
"Is--is he here, at the Hall?" she asked.
"Yes," said Celia. "He came last night. I saw him; he is very kind,
though a very sad, melancholy man. You shall have the baby now. It's
cruel of me to have kept him so long. But I must hurry back; for I have
so much work to do. I shall come again as soon as I can; and I'll speak
to Lady Gridborough about the christening, and arrange everything."
Susie went out to the gate with her, and was saying the last good-bye,
when the stillness was broken by the humming of a motor-car. In a cloud
of dust, an automobile came up the road; it was upon them almost in an
instant.
"That's the big car from the Hall," said Celia. "Why, it must have come
from the station, and that must be----"
As she spoke the car came abreast of them. In it were seated a fair,
good-looking man, with prominent eyes and loose lips, and beside him an
extremely pretty woman, clad daintily in a fashionable and expensive
travelling costume.
"----Yes, that must be Lord and Lady Heyton," finished Celia; and her
attention was so engrossed by the occupants of the car that she did not
see the sudden pallor which had fallen on the face of the girl beside
her, nor the swift gesture with which she drew the shawl over the
child's face and pressed it to her bosom, as if to hide it. She uttered
no cry, but a look of something like terror transformed her face; and,
with a quick movement, she turned and fled into the cottage. Celia
opened the garden gate and went on her way, half-suffocated by the dust
of the rapidly disappearing car.
As Celia entered the Hall, she was met by the odour of an Egyptian
cigarette. There was something unpleasantly pungent about it, and,
coming out of the fresh air, she, unconsciously, resented the too
obtrusive perfume; it recalled to her the atmosphere of a cheap Soho
restaurant, and shady foreigners with shifty glances. Such an atmosphere
was singularly inappropriate in that great hall, with its air of
refinement and dignity. She was making her way to the stairs, when the
man she had seen in the car came out of one of the rooms. The
objectionable cigarette was between his lips, his hands were thrust in
his pockets, there was a kind of swagger in his walk. He looked like a
gentleman, but one of the wrong kind, the sort of man one meets in the
lowest stratum of the Fast Set. Celia noted all this, without appearing
to look at him; it is a way women have, that swift, sideways glance
under their lashes, the glance that takes in so much while seeming quite
casual and uninterested.