All this had passed some time before the day of the return, and John was convinced at heart that the purpose of his letter had been accomplished; that Beaufort had understood him, and intended rather to sacrifice his prospects than to make his appearance in a false position. John was satisfied, and yet he was wounded to think that he had been the means of wounding his friend. This, however, and all connected with it—all the painful part of his life and of theirs, so far as he was acquainted with it—passed out of his mind in the excitement and elation of the consciousness that this day he should see “them” again. John spent the morning in a kind of suppressed ecstasy, altogether out of reason. He did not even ask himself what their return was to him. What it was to him! a change of heaven and earth, a filling up of the veins of life and quickening of every faculty. He did all he had to do in the morning, with the consciousness of this coming event running through everything, filling up every moment with that altogether foolish elation and rapture. For this it was: a kind of subtle penetration of every thought by something which was nothing—by an air, a breath, as from the celestial fields. They were to arrive about three o’clock, and John’s foolish ecstasy lasted till about the moment when, if he were going to meet them, it was time to set off for the station. He had taken his hat in his hand, with a vague smile about the corners of his mouth, a light in his eyes, and was just about to step forth for this happy purpose, when there suddenly struck him, like a blow, this question—“What right have you to go to meet them?” He was so entirely taken aback by it, that he retreated a step as if someone in actual bodily presence had put the question to him, and opposed his exit. He gazed round him once, appalled, to see where it came from; but, alas! it came from nowhere—from a monitor more intimate than any intruder could be—from his own judgment, which seemed to have been lying dormant while his imagination and heart were at work. What right had he to go to meet them? Was he a relative, a retainer, a member of the family in any way? What was he to the Lindores, or they to him? Everything, but nothing: a neighbour in the county, a friend that they were so good as to be very kind to; but this gave him nothing as a right—only the position of gratitude—no more.
He stood in a confusion of doubt and pain for ten minutes in his own hall. There seemed an invisible barrier before his feet, something which prevented him from moving. His smile turned to a sort of deprecating, appealing gaze—to whom? to nobody—to himself; for was it not indeed he, and only he, that stopped his own steps? At last he stepped out boldly, flinging scruples to the winds. Why should he say to anyone, even himself, that he was going to meet them? Nobody could prevent him walking along the highroad where everybody walked; and if they came that way, and he by chance encountered them?—The smile returned to John’s mouth, lurking behind his soft, young, silky moustache. In that case it would be ludicrous to think that there could be anything wrong. Saying which to himself he hurried down the avenue, feeling that the ten minutes’ delay was enough to have made him late. He walked on quickly, like a man with a serious object, his heart beating, his pulse going at full speed. For a long way off he watched a white plume of steam floating across the landscape. He could see it creeping along for miles, stopping now and then, taking little runs as if to amuse itself. No, that was not the train, but only one of those stray locomotives which torment expectant spectators by wandering wildly up and down like spirits of mischief. Before he reached the station, Lady Caroline’s carriage drove past, and she bent forward to smile and wave her hand to John. But this encouraging gesture brought back all his personal doubts: she was going by right of nature. And even Torrance had a right to come, though he had no affection for any of them, nor they for him. Once more John lingered and delayed. He knew very well they would be pleased to see him, and if an extreme desire to see them and welcome them justified his going, then surely he had that right. But the Earl would look politely surprised; and Rintoul, if Rintoul was there, would look broadly at him with that stony British stare which petrifies an intruder. John did not at all like the idea of Rintoul. If there is a natural sense of opposition (as people say) between women who may be considered rival beauties, the sentiment is so natural a one that it is shared by that sex which is so much the nobler; and as a woman sees through a woman’s wiles, so does a man see through the instincts of another man. John felt that Rintoul would see through him—that he would set up an instant opposition and hostility—that he would let him perceive that where Edith was, a small country squire, a little Scotch laird, had no business to push himself in. Rintoul, when John knew him, had been an innocent little lieutenant—as innocent as a lieutenant could be expected to be; yet he knew very well by instinct that this was what
