HERE was bright sunshine at Bonavista when Nasmyth, who had been told at the station that Acton had arrived from Victoria the day before, limped out from the shadow of the surrounding Bush, and stood still a moment or two, glancing across the trim lawn and terrace towards the wooden house. The spacious dwelling, gay with its brightly painted lattice shutters, dainty scroll-work, and colonnades of wooden pillars, rose against the sombre woods, and he wondered with some anxiety whether Mrs. Acton had many guests in it. He had no desire to fall in with any strangers, for he was worn out and aching, and he still wore the old duck clothing in which he had left the cañon. It might, he fancied, be possible to slip into the house and change before he presented himself to Mrs. Acton, though he was by no means sure that the garments in the valise he carried in his hand were dry. He could see nobody on the terrace, and moved forward hastily until he stopped in consternation as he crossed one of the verandas. The sunlight streamed in, and Mrs. Acton and Violet Hamilton sat upon the seat which ran along the back of it. The girl started when she saw him, and Nasmyth stood looking down on her, worn in face and heavy-eyed, with his workman's garb clinging, tight and mire-stained, about his limbs. There was, however, a certain grimness in his smile. He had seen the girl's start and her momentary shrinking, and it occurred to him that there was a significance in the fact that it had not greatly hurt him.
"I must make my excuses for turning up in this condition," he apologized. "I had to start for the railroad at a moment's notice, and it rained all the way, while, when I reached it, the train was in the depôt. You see, my business is rather urgent."
Mrs. Acton laughed. "Evidently," she said. "I think we were both a trifle startled when we saw you. I should be sorry to hear that anything had gone seriously wrong, but you remind one of the man who brought the news of Flodden."
Nasmyth made a quick gesture of denial. "Well," he announced bravely, "our standard is flying yet, and I almost think we can make another rally or two. Still, I have come for reinforcements. Mr. Acton is in?"
"He is. As it happened, he came up from Victoria yesterday. I believe he is discussing some repairs to the steamer with George just now. I'll send you out a plate of something and a glass of wine. You can't have had any lunch."
Mrs. Acton rose, and Nasmyth, who sat down, looked at Violet with a smile. She was evidently not quite at ease.
"You really haven't welcomed me very effusively," he remarked.
The girl flushed. "I don't think I could be blamed for that," she returned. "I was startled."
"And perhaps just a little annoyed?"
The colour grew plainer in Violet's cheeks. "Well," she averred, "that isn't so very unnatural. After all, I don't mind admitting that I wish you hadn't come like this."
Nasmyth glanced down at his attire, and nodded gravely. "It's certainly not altogether becoming," he admitted. "I made that hole drilling, but I fancied I had mended the thing. Still, you see, I had to start on the moment, and I rode most of twenty-four hours in the rain. I suppose"—and he hesitated while he studied her face—"I might have tidied myself at the depôt, but, as it happened, I didn't think of it, which was, no doubt, very wrong of me."
"It was, at least, a little inconsiderate."
Nasmyth laughed good-humouredly, though he recognized that neither his weariness nor the fact that it must manifestly be business of some consequence that had brought him there in that guise had any weight with her. He had, after all, a wide toleration, and he acknowledged to himself that her resentment was not unreasonable.
"I've no doubt that I was inconsiderate," he said. "Still, you see, I was worried about our affairs in the cañon."
"The cañon!" repeated Violet reproachfully. "It is always the cañon. I wonder if you remember that it is at least a month since you have written a line to me."
Nasmyth was disconcerted, for a moment's reflection convinced him that the accusation was true.
"Well," he confessed, "I have certainly been shamefully remiss. Of course, I was busy from dawn to sunset, but, after all, I'm afraid that is really no excuse."
The girl frowned. "No," she said, "it isn't."
It was a slight relief to Nasmyth that a maid appeared just then, and he took a glass of wine from the tray she laid upon a little table.
"To the brightest eyes in this Province!" he said, when the servant had gone, and, emptying the glass, he fell upon the food voraciously.