"I shouldn't like to be a poor relation of Mrs. Merrick's," Geoffrey observed. "An ugly woman," he went on, adding, "The niece doesn't look provincial."
"No; oddly she doesn't; not physically; but provincial in soul I should think. A curious little face, Geoffrey; ignorant, empty of all but a shallow joy in life. It hasn't suffered, isn't capable of much suffering. She looks like a soulless, sylvan creature; mocking, elusive, alluring."
Geoffrey passed over the question of soul and body, reflecting that it was natural that Angela should show this funny spite. Maurice was clearly allured.
"Her dress isn't provincial either," he said; "its simplicity is extremely sophisticated. The dryad has found a dressmaker in her woods. She is a young lady who knows, at all events, how to dress."
"And how to eat," mused Angela. "Dear child, it's really delightful to see such frank enjoyment of opportunity. That is her fourth sandwich."
"While I automatically count her sandwiches he meditates making a sketch of her."
Again there was silence between them, and it was Angela who broke it with, "Why did you come here, Geoffrey?"
"Because Maurice came; I was glad of the chance of being with him in a quiet place where one can rest."
Geoffrey responded promptly. "To see you--in a quiet place where he _can_ see you."
She let the assertion pass, forestalling a possible retort with--
"And I came for you and for Maurice and for Mrs. Merrick. I am fond of Mrs. Merrick."
"Really indeed. My likings are not founded on alluring faces or sophisticated gowns. I saw a good deal of her in London. She is interested in many of my objects. She is trying to grow."
"And you are down here to help her. I hope that your efforts will bring something out. I confess that to me the plant looks dry and thorny."
"Ah! that is because she is in such an arid soil. I can help her. She made me feel that, and I never refuse help."
Her smile braved ironic retorts, but his answering smile was purely playful.
"Pray let me believe that you came solely for old friendship's sake," he said, "rather than for Mrs. Merrick's." And Angela was unable to repress an assenting though superficial lightness.
Geoffrey and Angela had a common ancestor from whom her father and his mother were descended. This person, in the reign of George III, was an obscure country solicitor, who, through a combination of happy inheritances, was able to aspire to and attain a marriage with an heiress of good family. Their wealth, his eagerness for advancement, her greater intelligence and more wily ambitions, signified power, and under the wife's guidance they rose rapidly. He bought an old country estate, a seat in Parliament, and, since his vote was unvaryingly at the Government's disposal, an Irish peerage soon rewarded him. He cringed and bullied his way to success; his wife schemed, coaxed and coquetted in the extremest forms of the latter term, if contemporary scandals were at all veracious.