I had far rather been stabbed than have heard it.”
“A fearful sum, truly, to be doled out of your coffers!” cried Sibylla, sarcastically. “You’ll never recover it, I should think!”
“Not that, not that,” was the reply of Lionel, his tone one of pain. “Sibylla! have you no sense of the fitness of things? Is it seemly for the mistress of Verner’s Pride to keep a poor woman, as Mrs. Duff is, out of her money; a humble shopkeeper who has to pay her way as she goes on?”
“I wish Fred had lived! He would never have taken me to task, as you do.”
“I wish he had!” was the retort in Lionel’s heart: but he bit his lips to silence: exchanging the words after a few minutes’ pause for others.
“You would have found Frederick Massingbird a less indulgent husband to you than I have been,” he firmly said. “But these remarks are profitless, and will add to the comfort of neither you nor me. Sibylla, I shall send, in your name, to pay this bill of Mrs. Duff’s. Will you give it me?”
“I daresay Benoite can find it, if you choose to ask her.”
“And, my dear, let me beg of you not to contract these paltry debts. There have been others, as you know. I do not like that Mrs. Verner’s name should be thus bandied in the village. What you buy in the village, pay for at once.”
“How can I pay while you stint me?”
“Stint you!” repeated Lionel in amazement. Stint you!”
“It’s nothing but stinting—going on at me as you do!” she sullenly answered. “You would like to deprive me of the horses I have set my mind upon! You know you would!”
“The horses you cannot have, Sibylla,” he answered, his tone a decisive one. “I have already said it.”
It aroused her anger.
“If you don’t let me have the horses, and everything else I want, I’ll go where I can have them.”
What did she mean? Lionel’s cheek turned white with the taunt the words might be supposed to imply. He held her two hands in his, pressing them nervously.
“You shall not force me to quarrel with you, Sibylla,” he continued with emotion. “I have almost registered a vow that no offensive word or conduct on your part shall make me forget myself for a moment; or render me other than an ever considerate, tender husband. It may be that our marriage was a mistake for both of us: but we shall do well to make the best of it. It is the only course remaining.”
He spoke in a strangely earnest tone: one of deep agitation. Sibylla was aroused. She had believed that Lionel blindly loved her. Otherwise she might have been more careful to retain his love: there’s no knowing.
“How do you mean that our marriage was a mistake for both of us?” she hastily cried.
“You do your best to remind me continually that it must be so,” was his reply.
“Psha!” returned Sibylla. And Lionel, without another word, quitted her and walked away. In these moments, above all others, would the image of Lucy Tempest rise up before his sight. Beat it down as he would, it was ever present to him. A mistake in his marriage? Ay; none, save Lionel, knew how fatal a one.
He passed on direct to the terrace, avoiding the lawn, traversed it, and went out at the large gates. Thence he made his way to Poynton’s, the veterinary surgeon, who also dealt in horses. At least, dealt in them so far as that he would buy and sell when employed to do so.
The man was in his yard, watching a horse go through his paces. He came forward to meet Lionel.
“Mrs. Verner has been talking to you about some ponies, she tells me,” began Lionel. “What are they?”
“A very handsome pair, sir. Just the thing for a lady to drive. They are to be sold for a hundred and fifty pounds. It’s under their value.”
“Spirited?”
“Yes. They have their mettle about them. Good horses always have, you know, sir. Mrs. Verner has given me the commission.”
“Which I am come to rescind,” replied Lionel, calling up a light smile to his face. “I cannot have my wife’s neck risked by her attempting to drive spirited ponies, Poynton. She knows nothing of driving, is constitutionally timid, and—in short, I do not wish the order executed.”
“Very well, sir,” was the man’s reply. “There’s no harm done. I was at Verner’s Pride with that horse that’s ill, and Mrs. Verner spoke to me about some ponies. It was only to-day I heard these were in the market, and I mentioned them to her. But for all I know, they may be already sold.”
Lionel turned to walk out of the yard.
“After Mrs. Verner shall have learnt to drive, then we shall see: perhaps we may buy a pair,” he remarked. “My opinion is that she will not learn: after a trial or two she will give it up.”
“All right, sir.”
Jan was coming up the road from Deerham as Lionel departed, coming along with his long strides. Lionel advanced leisurely to meet him.
“One would think you were walking for a wager, Jan!”
“Ay,” said Jan. “This is my first round today. Bitterworths’ have sent for me in desperate haste. Folks always get ill at the wrong time.”
“Why don’t you ride?” asked Lionel, turning with Jan, and stepping out at the same pace.
“There was no time to get the horse ready. I can walk it nearly as fast. I have had no breakfast yet.”
“No breakfast!” echoed Lionel.
“I dived into the kitchen and caught up a piece of bread out of the basket. Half my patients must do without me to-day. I have only just got away from Hook’s.”
“How is the girl?”
“In great danger,” replied Jan.
“She is ill, then?”
“So ill that I don’t think she’ll last the day out. The child’s dead. I must cut across the
