Swaying to and fro, with her eyes covered as if to hide her shame, she tried to tell herself that Stafford’s was only a transient fancy for this girl, that it was mere flirtation, a vulgar liaison that she would teach him to forget.

“He shall, he shall!” she cried behind her hands, as if the words were wrung from her in her anguish of wounded pride and rejected love.  “I will teach him!  There is no art that woman ever used that I will not use—­they say I am beautiful:  if I am, my beauty shall minister to him as no woman’s beauty has ever ministered before.  Cold to all the rest of the world, I will be to him a fire which shall warm his life and make it a heaven—­It is only because he saw her first:  if he had seen me—­Oh, curse her, curse her!  Last night, while he was talking to me, even while he was kissing me, he was thinking of her.  But she shall not have him!  She has lost and I have won and I will keep him!”

She dashed her hand across her eyes, though there were no tears in them, and stood upright, holding herself tensely as if she were battling for calm; then she replaced the poignant note in its envelope, and went back to the stables.  Again she met no one, for those who were down were in at breakfast.

“I have changed my mind, Pottinger,” she said; “and will be glad if you will take the notes, please.  See, I have pat them back in the wallet.”

“Certainly, miss!” said Pottinger, and he touched his forehead two or three times, and coloured and smiled awkwardly and looked at her with a new and vivid interest.  One of the maids had run into the stable, during Maud’s absence, and had told him the news that his master was engaged to Miss Maude Falconer; for the servants, who are so quick to discover all our little secrets, had already learnt this one, and the servants’ hall was buzzing with it.

CHAPTER XXV.

That morning Ida came down-stairs singing, not loudly, but in the soft undertone which a girl uses when she is supremely happy and she has hopes of seeing the cause of her happiness very soon.  All through breakfast, while Mr. Heron read his letters, opening them and reading them stealthily as usual, her heart was singing its love-song to her, and she was wondering whether she would meet Stafford by the stream or among the hills.  That she should meet him she felt quite sure, for he had never failed to leave the gay party at the Villa to come over to her every day.

Perhaps he had spoken to his father, and, in the wonderful way men have, had swept aside all the obstacles which stood against their union.  He was so strong, so self-reliant, so masterful—­though so gentle with her—­that surely no obstacles could stand against him.  She was so absorbed in her thoughts that she almost started when Jason appeared and, looking from her to Mr. Heron, announced that Mr. Wordley, the family lawyer, was in the library.