The Real Charlotte - Edith Somerville [180]
It was at Mrs. Waller’s house that she first met Hawkins after her encounter with him at Gurthnamuckla. He came into the room when it was almost time for her to face the dreadful ordeal of leave-taking, and she presently found herself talking to him with considerably less agitation than she had felt in talking about Paris to Miss Waller. The memory of their last meeting kept her eyes from his, but it made the ground firm under her feet, and in the five minutes before she went away she felt that she had effectually shown him the place she intended him to occupy, and that he thoroughly understood that conversation with her was a grace, and not a right. The touch of deference and anxiety in his self-assured manner were as sweet to her as the flowers strewed before a conqueror, and laid themselves like balm on the wound of her husband’s taunt. Some day Roddy would see for himself the sort of way things were between her and Mr. Hawkins, she thought, as she drove down the avenue, and unconsciously held her head so high and looked so brilliant, that Charlotte, with that new-born amiability that Francie was becoming accustomed to, complimented her upon her colour, and declared that, after Major Waller’s attentions, she would have to write to Roderick and decline further responsibility as a chaperone.
They drove to Bruff two or three days afterwards, to return the state visit paid by Pamela on her mother’s behalf, and, during some preliminary marketing in Lismoyle, they came upon Hawkins walking through the town in the Rosemount direction, with an air of smartness and purpose about him that bespoke an afternoon call.
“I was just going to see you,” he said, looking rather blank.
“We’re on our way to Bruff,” replied Francie, too resolved on upholding her dignity to condescend to any conventional regrets.
Mr. Hawkins looked more cheerful, and observing that as he also owed a visit at Bruff this would be a good day to pay it, was turning back to the barracks for his trap when Miss Mullen intervened with almost childlike impulsiveness.
“I declare now, it vexes my righteous soul to think of your getting out a horse and trap, with two seats, going a-begging here. It’s not my carriage, Mr. Hawkins, or I promise you you should have one of them.”
Hawkins looked gratefully at her, and then uncertainly at Francie.
“He’s welcome to come if he likes,” said Francie frigidly, thinking with a mixture of alarm and satisfaction of what Roddy would say if he heard of it.
Hawkins waited for no further invitation, and got into the waggonette. A trait of character as old as humanity was at this time asserting itself, with singular freshness and force, in the bosom of Mr. Gerald Hawkins. He had lightly taken Francie’s heart in his hand, and as lightly thrown it away, without plot or premeditation; but now that another man had picked it up and kept it for his own, he began to see it as a thing of surpassing value. He could have borne with a not uninteresting regret the idea of Francie languishing somewhere in the suburbs of Dublin, and would even, had the chance come in his way, have flirted with her in a kind and consolatory manner. But to see her here, prosperous, prettier than ever, and possessing the supreme attraction of having found favour in someone else’s eyes, was a very different affair. The old glamour took him again, but with tenfold force, and, while he sat in the waggonette and talked to his ancient foe, Miss Mullen, with a novel friendliness, he gnawed the ends of his moustache in the bitterness of his soul because of the coldness of the eyes that were fascinating him.
It was a bright and blowy afternoon, with dazzling masses of white cloud moving fast across the blue, and there was a shifting glimmer of young leaves in the Bruff avenue, and a gusty warmth of fragrance from lilacs and laurel blossoms on either side. As this strangely compounded party of visitors drove up to the hall door they caught sight of Christopher going down the lawn towards