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Gibson, very

timidly.

 

‘Oh, dear, yes,’ said Arabella.

 

‘I’m afraid there’s something of the kind,’ said Camilla. ‘I’ve heard

that there is, and I’ve heard his name.’ Then she whispered very

closely into the ear of Mr Gibson the words, ‘Colonel Osborne,’ as

though her lips were far too pure to mention aloud any sound so full of

iniquity.

 

‘Indeed!’ said Mr Gibson.

 

‘But he’s quite an old man,’ said Dorothy, ‘and knew her father

intimately before she was born. And, as far as I can understand, her

husband does not suspect her in the least. And it’s only because

there’s a misunderstanding between them, and not at all because of the

gentleman.’

 

‘Oh!’ exclaimed Camilla.

 

‘Ah!’ exclaimed Arabella.

 

‘That would make a difference,’ said Mr Gibson.

 

‘But for a married woman to have her name mentioned at all with a

gentleman it is so bad; is it not, Mr Gibson?’ And then Arabella also

had her whisper into the clergyman’s ear very closely. ‘I’m afraid

there’s not a doubt about the Colonel. I’m afraid not. I am indeed.’

 

‘Two by honours and the odd, and it’s my deal,’ said Miss Stanbury,

briskly, and the sharp click with which she put the markers down upon

the table was heard all through the room. ‘I don’t want anybody to tell

me,’ she said, ‘that when a young woman is parted from her husband, the

chances are ten to one that she has been very foolish.’

 

‘But what’s a woman to do, if her husband beats her?’ said Mrs Crumbie.

 

‘Beat him again,’ said Mrs MacHugh.

 

‘And the husband will be sure to have the worst of it,’ said Mr

Crumbie. ‘Well, I declare, if you haven’t turned up an honour again,

Miss Stanbury!’

 

‘It was your wife that cut it to me, Mr Crumbie.’ Then they were again

at once immersed in the play, and the name neither of Trevelyan nor

Osborne was heard till Miss Stanbury was marking her double under the

candlestick; but during all the pauses in the game the conversation

went back to the same topic, and when the rubber was over they who had

been playing it lost themselves for ten minutes in the allurements of

the interesting subject. It was so singular a coincidence that the lady

should have gone to Nuncombe Putney of all villages in England, and to

the house of Mrs Stanbury of all ladies in England. And then was she

innocent, or was she guilty; and if guilty, in what degree? That she

had been allowed to bring her baby with her was considered to be a

great point in her favour. Mr Crumbie’s opinion was that it was ‘only a

few words’. Mrs Crumbie was afraid that she had been a little light.

Mrs MacHugh said that there was never fire without smoke. And Miss

Stanbury, as she took her departure, declared that the young women of

the present day didn’t know what they were after. ‘They think that the

world should be all frolic and dancing, and they have no more idea of

doing their duty and earning their bread than a boy home for the

holidays has of doing lessons.’

 

Then, as she went home with Dorothy across the Close, she spoke a word

which she intended to be very serious. ‘I don’t mean to say anything

against your mother for what she has done as yet. Somebody must take

the woman in, and perhaps it was natural. But if that Colonel

what’s-his-name makes his way down to Nuncombe Putney, your mother must

send her packing, if she has any respect either for herself or for

Priscilla.’

CHAPTER XVI

DARTMOOR

 

The well-weighed decision of Miss Stanbury respecting the Stanbury

Trevelyan arrangement at Nuncombe Putney had been communicated to

Dorothy as the two walked home at night across the Close from Mrs

MacHugh’s house, and it was accepted by Dorothy as being wise and

proper. It amounted to this. If Mrs Trevelyan should behave herself

with propriety in her retirement at the Clock House, no further blame

in the matter should be attributed to Mrs Stanbury for receiving her at

any rate in Dorothy’s hearing. The existing scheme, whether wise or

foolish, should be regarded as an accepted scheme. But if Mrs Trevelyan

should be indiscreet if, for instance, Colonel Osborne should show

himself at Nuncombe Putney then, for the sake of the family, Miss

Stanbury would speak out, and would speak out very loudly. All this

Dorothy understood, and she could perceive that her aunt had strong

suspicion that there would be indiscretion.

 

‘I never knew one like her,’ said Miss Stanbury, ‘who, when she’d got

away from one man, didn’t want to have another dangling after her.’

 

A week had hardly passed after the party at Mrs MacHugh’s, and Mrs

Trevelyan had hardly been three weeks at Nuncombe Putney, before the

tidings which Miss Stanbury almost expected reached her ears.

 

‘The Colonel’s been at the Clock House, ma’am,’ said Martha.

 

Now, it was quite understood in the Close by this time that ‘the

Colonel’ meant Colonel Osborne.

 

‘No!’

 

‘I’m told he has though, ma’am, for sure and certain.’

 

‘Who says so?’

 

‘Giles Hickbody was down at Lessboro’, and see’d him hisself a portly,

middle-aged man not one of your young scampish-like lovers.’

 

‘That’s the man.’

 

‘Oh, yes. He went over to Nuncombe Putney, as sure as anything hired

Mrs Clegg’s chaise and pair, and asked for Mrs Trevelyan’s house as

open as anything. When Giles asked in the yard, they told him as how

that was the married lady’s young man.’

 

‘I’d like to be at his tail so I would with a mop-handle,’ said Miss

Stanbury, whose hatred for those sins by which the comfort and

respectability of the world are destroyed, was not only sincere, but

intense. ‘Well; and what then?’

 

‘He came back and slept at Mrs Clegg’s that night at least, that was

what he said he should do.’

 

Miss Stanbury, however, was not so precipitate or uncharitable as to

act strongly upon information such as this. Before she even said a word

to Dorothy, she made further inquiry. She made very minute inquiry,

writing even to her very old and intimate friend Mrs Ellison, of

Lessboro’ writing to that lady a most cautious and guarded letter. At

last it became a fact proved to her mind that Colonel Osborne had been

at the Clock House, had been received there, and had remained there for

hours had been allowed access to Mrs Trevelyan, and had slept the night

at the inn at Lessboro’. The thing was so terrible to Miss Stanbury’s

mind, that even false hair, Dr Colenso, and penny newspapers did not

account for it.

 

‘I shall begin to believe that the Evil One has been allowed to come

among us in person because of our sins,’ she said to Martha and she

meant it.

 

In the meantime, Mrs Trevelyan, as may be remembered, had hired Mrs

Crocket’s open carriage, and the three young women, Mrs Trevelyan,

Nora, and Priscilla, made a little excursion to Princetown, somewhat

after the fashion of a picnic. At Princetown, in the middle of

Dartmoor, about nine miles from Nuncombe Putney, is the prison

establishment at which are kept convicts undergoing penal servitude. It

is regarded by all the country round with great interest, chiefly

because the prisoners now and again escape, and then there comes a

period of interesting excitement until the escaped felon shall have

been again taken. How can you tell where he may be, or whether it may

not suit him to find his rest in your own cupboard, or under your own

bed? And then, as escape without notice will of course be the felon’s

object, to attain that he will probably cut your throat, and the throat

of everybody belonging to you. All which considerations give an

interest to Princetown, and excite in the hearts of the Devonians of

these parts a strong affection for the Dartmoor prison. Of those who

visit Princetown comparatively few effect an entrance within the walls

of the gaol. They look at the gloomy place with a mysterious interest,

feeling something akin to envy for the prisoners who have enjoyed the

privilege of solving the mysteries of prison life, and who know how men

feel when they have their hair cut short, and are free from moral

responsibility for their own conduct, and are moved about in gangs, and

treated like wild beasts.

 

But the journey to Princetown, from whatever side it is approached, has

the charm of wild and beautiful scenery. The spot itself is ugly

enough; but you can go not thither without breathing the sweetest,

freshest air, and encountering that delightful sense of romance which

moorland scenery always produces. The idea of our three friends was to

see the Moor rather than the prison, to learn something of the country

around, and to enjoy the excitement of eating a sandwich sitting on a

hillock, in exchange for the ordinary comforts of a good dinner with

chairs and tables. A bottle of sherry and water and a paper of

sandwiches contained their whole banquet; for ladies, though they like

good things at picnics, and, indeed, at other times, almost as well as

men like them, very seldom prepare dainties for themselves alone. Men

are wiser and more thoughtful, and are careful to have the good things,

even if they are to be enjoyed without companionship.

 

Mrs Crocket’s boy, though he was only about three feet high, was a

miracle of skill and discretion. He used the machine, as the patent

drag is called, in going down the hills with the utmost care. He never

forced the beast beyond a walk if there was the slightest rise in the

ground; and as there was always a rise, the journey was slow. But the

three ladies enjoyed it thoroughly, and Mrs Trevelyan was in better

spirits than she herself had thought to be possible for her in her

present condition. Most of us have recognised the fact that a dram of

spirits will create, that a so-called nip of brandy will create

hilarity, or, at least, alacrity, and that a glass of sherry will often

‘pick up’ and set in order the prostrate animal and mental faculties of

the drinker. But we are not sufficiently alive to the fact that copious

draughts of fresh air—of air fresh and unaccustomed—will have precisely

the same effect. We do know that now and again it is very essential to

‘change the air’; but we generally consider that to do that with any

chance of advantage, it is necessary to go far afield; and we think

also that such change of the air is only needful when sickness of the

body has come upon us, or when it threatens to come. We are seldom

aware that we may imbibe long potations of pleasure and healthy

excitement without perhaps going out of our own county; that such

potations are within a day’s journey of most of us; and that they are

to be had for half-a-crown a head, all expenses told. Mrs Trevelyan

probably did not know that the cloud was lifted off her mind, and the

load of her sorrow made light to her, by the special vigour of the air

of the Moor; but she did know that she was enjoying herself, and that

the world was pleasanter to her than it had been for months past.

 

When they had sat upon their hillocks, and eaten their sandwiches

regretting that the basket of provisions had not been bigger and had

drunk their sherry and water out of the little horn mug which Mrs

Crocket had lent them, Nora started off across the moorland

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