“Oh, we could not wish for either one thing or another,” she said. “I shall be sorry when it is altered, and I shall be glad. Naturally it is Walter that feels it most.”
“He _was_ the heir, Mr. Rochford. I feel for him. He has to change all his ways of thinking, all that he was looking forward to. But why should we talk of this? I ought not to talk of it to any stranger. It is because you have so much to do with it, because you--”
“Because I am mixed up with it from the beginning,” he said, regretfully. “How kind you are to receive me at all, when it was I whose fate it was to introduce so painful a subject. But one never knows,” he went on, in a lower tone, “when one drives up to a door that has never been opened to one’s steps before, what one may find there; perhaps the most commonplace, perhaps”--he turned his head away a little, but not enough to make the last two words, uttered in a lowered but distinct voice, inaudible to Ally--“perhaps one’s fate.”
The girl heard them, wondered at them, felt herself grow pale, then red. There is something in words that mean so much, which convey a sort of secondary thrill of comprehension without revealing their meaning all out. Ally, who was unprepared for the real revelation, felt that there was something here which was not usual to be said, which concerned her somehow, which made it impossible for her to continue the conversation calmly. She turned away to examine some moss on the trunk of the nearest tree. Did he mean her to hear that? Did he mean her not to hear? And what did it mean? His fate--that must mean something, something more than people generally said to each other while taking a turn round the garden, whether it might be to see the roses or to examine the flood-marks.
At this moment the most fortunate thing occurred--a thing which ended the interview without embarrassment, without any appearance of running away upon Ally’s part. Mrs. Penton suddenly appeared in the porch, which was within sight, holding a letter in one hand and beckoning with the other. She called, not Ally, but “Alice!” which in itself was enough to mark that something had occurred out of the common. Her voice thrilled through the still damp air almost with impatience; its usual calm was gone; it was full of life, and haste, and impetuosity--more like the quick voice of Anne than that of the mother. And then little Horry came running out, delighted to escape out-of-doors in his pinafore, without cap or great-coat, or any wrap, his red stockings making a broken line of color as he ran along the damp path, his curls of fair hair blowing back from his forehead.