'All the same, William mustn't set his heart--'
'And Hester--dear old thing!--mustn't preach!' said Cicely laughing, and pinching her cousin's arm. 'What's the good of saying that, about a man like William, who knows what he wants? Of course he's set his heart, and will go on setting it. But he'll _wait_--as long as she likes.'
'All right! They're neither of them Methuselahs yet. Heavens!--What are they at now? _Ambrine_!--_she's_ talking to _him_'
But some deep mingled instinct, at once of sympathy with Nelly and pity for Farrell, made Hester unwilling to discuss the subject any more. George's death was too recent; peace and a happy future too remote. So she turned on Cicely.
'And please, what have you done with Herbert? I was promised a bridegroom.'
'Business!' said Cicely, sighing. 'We had hardly arrived for our week's leave, when the wretched War Office wired him to come back. He went this morning, and I wanted to go too, but--I'm not to racket just now.'
Cicely blushed, and Hester, smiling, pressed her hand.
'Certainly I am! But one has to give occasional sops to the domestic tyrant.'
They sauntered back to tea in Hester's garden by the river, and there the talk of her three guests was more equal and unfettered, more of a real interchange, than Hester ever remembered it. Of old, Farrell had been the guardian and teacher, indoctrinating Nelly with his own views on art, reading to her from his favourite poets, or surrounding her in a hundred small matters with a playful and devoted homage. But now in the long wrestle with her grief and remorse, she had thought, as well as felt. She was as humble and simple as ever, but her companions realised that she was standing on her own feet. And this something new in her--which was nothing but a strengthened play of intelligence and will--had a curious effect on Farrell. It seemed to bring him out, also; so that the nobler aspects of his life, and the nobler proportions of his character shewed themselves, unconsciously. Hester, with anxious joy, guessed at the beginnings of a new moral relation, a true comradeship, between himself and Nelly, such as there had never yet been--which might go far. It masked the depths in both of them; or rather it was a first bridge thrown over the chasm between them. What would come of it?