“MOLLY DEXTER.”

CHAPTER VIII

AT GROOMBRIDGE CASTLE

Mrs. Delaport Green counted it as a large asset in Molly’s favour that Sir Edmund Grosse was so attentive.  Adela did not seriously mind Sir Edmund’s indifference to herself if he were only a constant visitor at her house, but she was far from understanding the motives that drew him there to see Molly.  In fact, having decided, on the basis of his own theory of the conduct of Madame Danterre, that Molly had no right to any of the luxuries she enjoyed, he had been prepared to think of her as an unscrupulous and designing young woman.  Somehow, from the moment he first saw her he felt all his prejudices to be confirmed.  There was something in Molly which appeared to him to be a guilty consciousness that the wealth she enjoyed was ill-gotten.  Miss Dexter, he thought, had by no means the bearing of a fresh ingenuous child who was innocently benefiting by the wickedness of another.  The poor girl was, in fact, constantly wondering whether the people she met were hot partisans of Lady Rose Bright, or whether they knew of Madame Danterre’s existence, and if so, whether they had the further knowledge that Miss Molly Dexter was that lady’s daughter.  They might, for either of these reasons, have some secret objection to herself.  But she was skilful enough to hide the symptoms of these fears and suspicions from the men and women she usually came across in society, who only thought her reserve pride, and her occasional hesitations a little mysterious.  From Sir Edmund she concealed less because she liked him much more, and he kindly interpreted her feelings of anxiety and discomfort to be those of guilt in a girl too young to be happy in criminal deceit.  With his experience of life, and with his usually just perceptions, he ought to have known better; but there is some quality in a few men or women, intangible and yet unmistakable, which makes us instinctively suspect present, or foretell future, moral evil; and poor Molly was one of these.  What it was, on the other hand, which made her trust Sir Edmund and drew her to him, it would need a subtle analysis of natural affinities to decide.  No doubt it was greatly because he sought her that Molly liked him, but it was not only on that account.  Nor was this only because Edmund was worldly wise, successful, and very gentle.  There was a quality in the attraction that drew Molly to Edmund that cannot be put into words.  It is the quality without which there has never been real tragedy in the relations of a woman to a man.  In the first weeks in London this attraction hardly reached beyond the merest liking, and was a pleasant, sunny thing of innocent appearance.

Mrs. Delaport Green was, for a short time, of opinion that the problem of whether to prolong Molly’s visit or not would be settled for her by a quite new development.  Then she doubted, and watched, and was puzzled.