The Abbey no longer stood for Catherine's ideal of the Gothic romantic. The furniture was too modern, the walls were papered, the windows were not long and Gothic, and there were no secret passages in her room to speak of – let alone a haunted region in the house. The place had no mysteries whatever, and she had no evidence proving the General's short temper and the resulting ill treatment of his wife and daughter. Walking along the same glove of old oaks each morning, she grew tired of the woods and the shrubbery. Nothing distracted her, and the Abbey was now like any other house that she had been in, both too real and too confining.
That morning her walk was interrupted, and made altogether unbearable by the abrupt appearance of Henry Slater, who was plodding along the slushy footpath from Kinney Hall to the Abbey. He caught sight of her the instant she did, which afforded her no opportunity of ducking behind a tree in the object of avoiding him. It is to be understood that she had a prudent girl's dread of awkward situations where gentlemen were concerned.
"Miss Crane," he said grimly as he came within hearing reach of her. "Lovely morning?"
"Yes, sir," she bowed, deciding to look upon this encounter as a test of her self-restraint. If she could but keep her countenance in his presence, her forbearance was not for naught.
"Do you make it a habit of promenading every morning after breakfast?" he enquired in a languid tone with his fists in his pockets.
"Yes, sir," she murmured, shooting him a furtive glance, not wanting to offend him by observing him with undisguised contempt.
"And do you make it a habit of murmuring to strangers?" he asked, his expression at once condescending and listlessly amused.
"No, sir," she replied, frowning.
"Miss Crane, won't you say more than 'yes' or 'no', like a damned domestic?" he asked with the placidity of a born and bred gentleman, yet the crass tongue of a rustic.
"No, sir," she sighed in discomfort, quickening her pace. "Not to you."
"Harryo," he breathed, likewise quickening his pace. "Harryo swore to me that you were not a difficult young woman. I will have to scold her for lying to me. Miss Crane, do slow down. Don't you want to take in the crisp mid October air?"
"No, sir," she replied with a frustrated scoff, panting as she clutched her skirts and trudged on with a look of intense displeasure.
"Here we are within reach of the Abbey. Why don't you take another turn with me, Miss Crane?" he asked in an imposing tone. There was something so horribly nonfictional about him that she in no way knew how to react to him. Certainly, she had never encountered such a character in any of her novels, and that is all the life experience she could boast of having had.
"No, sir," she turned abruptly to face him, glaring at him with a girlish pout that made one believe her dislike of him did not extend to detestation. "Not for the world. Good morning, sir."
"You are fatigued, Miss Crane," he exclaimed, coming after her. "Be so obliging as to take my arm. I daresay you are in need of it." Catherine was fatigued, but she did not like having to appear fragile before such a man who, knowing her fragility, would doubtless take advantage of it as he did now. Be that as it may, her side ached, and she accepted his arm with reluctant gratefulness. He seemed pleased in his own way, but the expression about his eyes and mouth made her feel uncomfortable.
"There, Miss Crane," he checked his step at the front door, freeing her with a triumphant smile. "I daresay you look devilish stiff, as if I had rattled you, but I am not one to dwell on women's sufferings, for they are all of them a result of mere folly. Is your mind full of nonsense, Miss Crane?"
"No, sir," she replied, wondering what to follow this with.
"Yes, I suppose you have that pastoral innocence about you," he shrugged, moving closer to her. She stepped back instinctively. "No doubt you were reared in the simplest way. Your heart cannot be controlled by nonsense. However, there is innocence and there is ignorance. Ignorance is corrupted innocence, you know, Miss Crane, and someone like you might be either or. It is often difficult to tell."
"Good morning, sir," she curtsied with mechanical politeness, turning and walking briskly into the house, her expression so untouched by her heart's emotions that it made one applaud her self-possession, which indeed proved to be impenetrable.
*
As Catherine lingered in the drawing-room near the piano, too bashful and polite to approach it without the owner's invitation, the owner herself appeared from behind the heavily lacquered doors with an air of untaught dignity.
Henrietta was always an engrossing subject for observation, for each new time of day brought with its variance of hour a new outfit, as if fished out of a bottomless wardrobe. All of her hair was curled; it parted in the middle, and was pulled loosely to the back in arranged ringlets. She greeted Catherine with an expression of stifled exultation that made one believe she had something of extreme excitement to convey. Catherine said nothing, and let her vent whatever needed to be vented.
"Papa is gone to London!" she gushed, her eyes twinkling as the words broke from her lips.
"Goodness gracious, is this really so?" she gasped with a pretty expression of incredulity, for her eyes widened and her lips parted a little. She immediately recalled these words; 'Wives in their husbands' absences grow subtler, and daughters sometimes run off with the butler'.
"Indeed!" she laughed, throwing her head of curls back with genuine merriment. "Ha! Ha! How funny you look! Come, my child, let us put on our best walking-dresses and skip along to James's place." Catherine, observant friend that she was, could not help noticing the change in Henrietta's disposition. She had not given up her fashionable air of dignity, for it would surely have spoiled the force of her aspect, but she was less artificially animated and conscientious of what she said.
"I will go," Catherine replied serenely. "Provided that your mother accompanies us."
"As you wish," Henrietta shrugged, drifting to the window with her arms swaying loosely at her sides. "Do not you wish that we had our likenesses painted by a handsome artist?"
"Why need he be handsome?"
"Because," Henrietta said with an arch look, "then he might in addition to painting our likenesses make love to us."
"Henrietta," she frowned, "To fancy such things! In any case – if he were enamoured, then he could have but one of us."
"Yes, and I do wonder which of us he'd fix on," she mused with an affectedly thoughtful expression, as if meaning to be admired by her friend. Alas, Catherine was as taken by the romantic idea as Henrietta was – the both of them being terribly sentimental – despite its obvious absurdity, and resumed the area under discussion without being quite aware of their sisterly folly.
"You, I'm sure, for you are the prettiest," conceded Catherine.
"There now," she glanced at her, rather amused. "What a funny expression you wear. Are you jealous, my dear?"
"Jealous?" she started, fixing her eyes on her in mild disorientation. "You have caught me quite unawares. Indeed, I am not jealous of you. You are pining for compliments, and I shall not on any account satisfy you with one. As I have said to you before, I cannot admire such recklessness of manner in girls our age."
"Yes, but a matron can do as she pleases," she cut in with an injured look, her face colouring thickly.
"Look," said Catherine, in an attempt to console her. "Our youth must not be wasted on the follies that come with our young age. Let us be cautious and save the madness for when we are older, when less harm can be done. Don't you agree that it should be so?"
"Why of course not!" she cried with a rather bitter laugh, "If we do not make mistakes because we are so odiously cautious, we'll not learn anything from life and be sillier in old age than we were in youth." Catherine felt that Henrietta was in the right, and did not endeavour to oppose her, for she was beginning to apprehend her own faults of perception as the interchange went on.
"Catherine, do play something on the piano," Henrietta ordered rather brusquely, and this with a slight sneer; for all that, Catherine thought she meant well, and forgave her sharpness with a faint hope that she was too good-natured to have real feelings of hostility towards her. She went to the piano with a small smile, cheered by the prospect of playing again, and began a light tune imprinted upon her heart with as much spirit and genuine merriment as she had been used to playing it for her father.
The tune was Mozart's Sonata No. 16 in C Major, K. 545, her late father's second favourite jingle. Henrietta frowned and fidgeted during the whole of the tune, but as Catherine struck the last key, she assumed an air of false admiration and forced cheerfulness, kissing and flattering her beyond reason. Catherine was not used to receiving compliments, and, much like the General's she did not know when they were meant in earnest and when they were empty, so her reaction was a succession of faltering "thank you"s and bashful smiles.
*
She was staring absently at a blank sheet of paper before her, the light of day flooding the drawing-room with its crisp rays and giving her face a cheerless glow, when a firm hand weighed upon her shoulder and caused her to start, turning to face the person with unsettled nerves.
"Good afternoon, Miss Crane," said the mild, eloquent voice that she had not heard for almost a month.
"Mr. Musgrave!" she gasped with new-sprung regard for his person, the unexpected encounter inspiring a feeling of warmth within her – warmth that seemed so instinctive to her. He smiled with restrain, and then kissed her hand, bowing before her with natural elegance. This was a healthy change from the General, who often overpowered her with his melodramatic mien – half sincere, and half affected. Albert Musgrave was excessively pleased with this cordial reception, yet he could not but question her unusual elation in seeing him. There was something almost suspicious about it. He addressed the matter only after some civil small talk, for it had dawned on him, after reading her letter over, that she was hiding something from him, and that it was generally thought easier to conceal one's truth in written word than in person. He did not wish to overwhelm her, so he spoke in his gentlest tones and his least pressing manner.
"Miss Crane... I am come because I am insistent on keeping a watch on the inmates of this house. Until my deductions of these are up to par, I cannot think of being comfortable at home – entirely oblivious to your probable anxiety. I hope my suspicions will not trouble you, but I am of a mind to mistrust General Slater."
"Now then," said Catherine, giving him a dark look. "Is that why you are come? To monitor and lecture me? I thought I had escaped that in leaving Lydbrook."
"I am grieved, Miss Crane – grieved to upset you; but it must come out," he explained as best he could, trying not to dismay her. She listened patiently, wary of his words. "I know something disquieting of General Fitzwilliam Slater, and it is my belief that you, being his charge, ought also to know it." There was some bitterness in his tone, but he masked it well with his dignified gravity. "I will not wait for your leave to speak of it, but be direct, for these sorts of matters should never be dragged out. Your guardian happens to have a long-lasting case of bipolar illness, which he has learnt to control, but has never completely cured himself of. I have done some extensive research –"
"I beg your pardon, Mr. Musgrave," she cut his speech short, glowing with indignation, "but these are most unwelcome accusations, and unless you produce evidence to justify them, I cannot think of receiving your opinion openly. May I ask, sir, what you mean by keeping a watch on my caretakers?"
"Catherine," he sighed, rising and leaning with his arm against the mantelpiece. He was flushed and seemed to be having a hard time smoothing his disquietude. It was one of those uneasy moments when Catherine thought he was more different than anyone else she knew, and that he was on the verge of breaking his strong hold on gentility. "It would not be right for me to leave you in such a man's hands... in short; I have come to restore some sense into you. Forget these people – they are spoiling you! Doesn't your good sense tell you that being loved and respected by sensible people is infinitely better than being overindulged and flattered by silly ones?" Lifting his eyes from the carpet, he watched her white, extinguished face. Pure, cold, and neat. Her dark and handsome eyes were fixed absently on his shoes. He shifted them a little, and this was enough to bring her back to the present.
"Mr. Musgrave, I beg you to leave," she breathed, in too heartfelt a humiliation to meet his eyes. He stood perplexed at her unwavering poise.
"If I have offended you in any way," he cleared his throat.
"Give my regards to Philip," she spoke quietly with a determined frigidity that hurt him.
"Very well," he answered in scornful sternness, feeling rather marred by her austere manner. How could she be so outwardly cold, when she was so inwardly warm? "I will deliver him your steely salute. Good day, madam," and with those bitter words he turned on his heel and marched out of the house with disorderly suspicions and an injured sense of pride. It was as if Catherine had chosen sides, and was not on his. She had always been on his.