[Illustration]

CHAPTER XVI.

FAREWELL.

The carriage was at the door, and they stood face to face, the young man and the maiden, in the little office up-stairs, to say farewell.

‘I am quite ready, Walter,’ Gladys said in a still, quiet voice.  ’I am going away.’

‘Are you?  Well, good-bye.’

He held out his hand.  His face was pale, but his mouth was set like iron, and these apparently indifferent words seemed to force themselves from between his teeth.  Sign of emotion or sorrow he exhibited none, but the maiden, who understood and who loved him,—­yes, who loved him,—­was not in the least deceived.

’Have you nothing else to say than that, Walter?  It is very little when I am going away,’ she said wistfully.

‘No,’ he replied in the same steady, even tone, ’nothing.  You had better not keep them waiting, these grand people, any longer.  They are not used to it, and they don’t like it.’

‘Let them wait, and if they don’t like it they can go away,’ she answered, with unwonted sharpness.  ’I want to say, Walter, that if I could have stayed here, I would.  I would rather be here than anywhere.  It once seemed very dreadful to me, but now I love it.  But though I am going away, I will come to see you very often, very often indeed.’

‘Don’t come,’ he answered sharply.  ‘Don’t come at all.’

A vague terror gathered in her eyes, and her mouth trembled.

’Now you are unkind, Walter, unkind and unreasonable.  But men are often unreasonable, so I will forgive you.  If I may not come here, will you promise to come to Bellairs Crescent and see me?’

Then Walter flung up his head and laughed, that laugh which always stabbed Gladys.

’To have the door slammed in my face by a footman or a smart servant?  No, thank you.’

’Very well.  Good-bye.  If you cast me off, Walter, I can’t help it.  Good-bye, and God bless you.  I hope I shall see you sometimes, and if not, I shall try to bear it, only it is very hard.’

She was a woman in keenness of feeling, a very child in guilelessness.  She could not hide her pain.

Then Walter, feeling it all so keenly, and hating himself with a mortal hatred for his savage candour, condescended to make an explanation.

‘In a week,’ he began, ’you will view everything in a different light.  You are going away to be a great lady, and you’ll soon find that you want nothing so badly in this world as to forget that you ever knew this place, or me.  It will be far better to understand and make up my mind to it at the very beginning.  Perhaps some day it will be different, but in the meantime I know I am right, and you’ll soon be convinced of it too, and perhaps thank me for it.’

’If that is what you think of me, Walter, it will indeed be better as you say.  Good-bye.’