Nor was Lady Ongar much more comfortable in the Isle of Wight than she had been in London. The old poet told us how Black Care sits behind the horseman, and some modern poet will some day describe to us that terrible goddess as she takes her place with the stoker close to the fire of the locomotive engine. Sitting with Sophie opposite to her, Lady Ongar was not happy, even though her eye rested on the lines of that magnificent coast. Once indeed, on the evening of their first day, Sophie left her, and she was alone for nearly an hour. Ah, how happy could she have been if Harry Clavering might have been there with her. Perhaps a day might come in which Harry might bring her there. In such a case Atra Cura would be left behind, and then she might be altogether happy. She sat dreaming of this for above an hour, and Sophie was still away. When Sophie returned, which she did all too soon, she explained that she had been in her bedroom. She had been very busy, and now had come down to make herself comfortable.
On the next evening Lady Ongar declared her intention of going up on the downs by herself. They had dined at five, so that she might have a long evening, and soon after six she started. “If I do not break down I will get as far as the Needles,” she said. Sophie, who had heard that the distance was three miles, lifted up her hands in despair. “If you are not back before nine I shall send the people after you.” Consenting to this with a laugh, Lady Ongar made her way up to the downs, and walked steadily on towards the extreme point of the island. To the Needles themselves she did not make her way. These rocks are now approached, as all the stay-at-home travellers know, through a fort, and down to the fort she did not go. But turning a little from the highest point of the hill towards the cliffs on her left hand, she descended till she reached a spot from which she could look down on the pebbly beach lying some three hundred feet below her, and on the soft shining ripple of the quiet waters as they moved themselves with a pleasant sound on the long strand which lay stretched in a line from the spot beneath her out to the point of the island. The evening was warm, and almost transparent in its clearness, and very quiet. There was no sound even of a breeze. When she seated herself close upon the margin of the cliff, she heard the small waves moving the stones which they washed, and the sound was as the sound of little children’s voices, very distant. Looking down, she could see through the wonderful transparency of the water, and the pebbles below it were bright as diamonds, and the sands were burnished like gold. And each tiny silent wavelet as it moved up towards the shore and lost itself at last in its own effort, stretched itself the whole length of the strand. Such brightness on the seashore she had never seen before, nor had she ever listened as now she listened to that infantine babble of the baby waves. She sat there close upon the margin, on a seat of chalk which the winds had made, looking, listening, and forgetting for a while that she was Lady Ongar whom people did not know, who lived alone in the world with Sophie Gordeloup for her friend—and whose lover was betrothed to another woman. She had been there perhaps half-an-hour, and had learned to be at home on her perch, sitting there in comfort, with no desire to move, when a voice which she well knew at the first sound startled her, and she rose quickly to her feet. “Lady Ongar,” said the voice, “are you not rather near the edge?” As she turned round there was Count Pateroff with his hand already upon her dress, so that no danger might be produced by the suddenness of his speech.
“There is nothing to fear,” she said, stepping back from her seat. As she did so, he dropped his hand from her dress, and, raising it to his head, lifted his hat from his forehead. “You will excuse me, I hope, Lady Ongar,” he said, “for having taken this mode of speaking to you.”
“I certainly shall not excuse you; nor, further than I can help it, shall I listen to you.”
“There are a few words which I must say.”
“Count Pateroff, I beg that you will leave me. This is treacherous and unmanly—and can do you no good. By what right do you follow me here?”
“I follow you for your own good, Lady Ongar; I do it that you may hear me say a few words that are necessary for you to hear.”
“I will hear no words from you—that is, none willingly. By this time you ought to know me and to understand me.” She had begun to walk up the hill very rapidly, and for a moment or two he had thought that she would escape him; but her breath had soon failed her, and she found herself compelled to stand while he regained his place beside her. This he had not done without an effort, and for some minutes they were both silent. “It is very beautiful,” at last he said, pointing away over the sea.
“Yes;—it is very
