CHAPTER VI.

DINING AT THE MOUNT.

When another day dawned upon Trennach, and still Josiah Bell had not returned, his wife's exasperation gave place to real anxiety. She could not even guess what had become of him, or where he could be. Suspicion was unable to turn upon any particular quarter; not a shadow of foundation appeared for it anywhere. Had the man taken refuge in one of the miners' houses, as she had supposed, there he would still be; but there he was not. Had he stretched himself on the Bare Plain to sleep off the stupidity arising from drinking, as suggested by Mr. Pine, there he would have been found. No: the miners' dwellings and the Plain were alike guiltless of harbouring him; and Mrs. Bell was puzzled nearly out of her wits.

It cannot be said that as yet fear of any fatal accident or issue assailed her. The mystery as to where her husband could be was a great mystery, at present utterly unaccountable; but she never supposed that it would not be solved by his reappearance sooner or later. And she would have been quite ready to put down any hint of the kind, as she had put down Mr. Pellet's hint the previous day. Mrs. Bell fully believed that this day would not pass without bringing him home: and she was up with the lark, and down before Rosaline, in anticipation of it.

The miners had returned to their work this morning, and to their usual habits of sobriety: all things were quiet out of doors. The world was going on in its old groove; just as though, but for the absence of Bell, no ill-omened flock of Whistlers had come to raise a commotion in it.

This had been another night of sleeplessness for Rosaline, another prolonged interval of remorse and terror. She had undressed the previous night, and got into bed; and there she lay until morning, living through her fits of despondency, and striving to plan out the future. To stay at Trennach would, she felt, be simply impossible; if she did, she should die of it; she firmly believed that only to pass the Bottomless Shaft again, and look at it, would kill her. Discovery must come, she supposed, sooner or later; but she dared not stay in the place to face it.

Mrs. Bell was a native of Warwickshire. Her sister had married a Cornish man, who kept a shop in Falmouth. His name was John Pellet, and he was cousin to Blase Pellet's father. So that in point of fact there was no relationship between the Bells and Blase, although Blase enlarged upon their "cousinship," and Rosaline admitted it. They were merely connections. Mrs. Pellet had a small business as a milliner: she had no children, and could well attend to it. She and her husband, what with his trade and her work, were very comfortably off. She was fond of Rosaline, and frequently had her at Falmouth. It was to this refuge that Rosaline's thoughts now turned. She determined to go to it without delay. But so many neighbours came in during breakfast, inquiring after Bell, that she found no opportunity to speak of it then.

"Mother," she said, coming into the kitchen after attending to the upstairs rooms, Mrs. Bell having this morning undertaken to put away the breakfast-things: "mother, I think I shall go to Falmouth.

"Go where?" cried Dame Bell, in surprise.

"To Aunt Pellet's."

"Why, what on earth has put that into your head, Rose?" demanded Mrs. Bell, after a prolonged pause of amazement.

Rosaline did not answer immediately. She had caught up the brass ladle, that chanced to lie on the table, and a piece of wash-leather from the knife-box, and was rubbing away at the ladle.

"Aunt will be glad to see me, mother. She always is."

"Glad to see you? What of that? Why do you want to go just now? And what are you polishing up that ladle for?" went on Mrs. Bell, uniting the grievances. "The brasses and tins had a regular cleaning last Saturday, for I gave it 'em myself."

Again Rosaline did not speak. As Mrs. Bell glanced at her, waiting for some rejoinder, she was struck with the girl's extreme pallor, her look of utter misery. Rosaline burst into tears.

"Oh, mother, don't hinder me!" she cried imploringly, dropping the ladle, and raising her hands in supplication. "I _can't_ stay here. I must go away."

"You are afraid of hearing the Seven Whistlers again!"

"Let me go, mother; let me go!" piteously sobbed Rosaline. And her mother thought she had never seen any one in so deplorable a state of agitation before.

"Well, well, child, we'll see," said the dame, too much concerned to oppose her. "I wish the Whistlers had been somewhere. It is most unreasonable to let them take hold of your nerves in this way. A bit of an absence will put you all right again, and drive the thought out of your head. You shall go for a week, child, as soon as your father comes home."

"I must go to-day," said Rosaline.

"To-day!"

"Don't keep me, mother," besought Rosaline. "You don't know what it is for me here. These past two nights! have never closed my eyes; no, not for a moment. Let me start at once, mother! Oh, let me go! I shall have brain-fever if I remain."

"Well, I never!" cried Mrs. Bell, other words failing her to express her astonishment. "I never did think you could have put yourself into this unseemly fantigue, child; no, not for all the Whistlers in the air. As to starting off to Falmouth to-day, why, you could not have your things ready."

"They can be ready in half-an-hour," returned Rosaline, eagerly, her lips feverish with excitement. "I have already put them together."

"Well, I'm sure!--taking French leave, in that way, before you knew whether you might go or not! There, there; don't begin to cry and shake again. There's an afternoon train. And--and perhaps your father will be in before that."

"It is the best train I could go by," said Rosaline, turning to hang up the ladle on its hook by the dresser.

"It's not the best; it's the worst," contradicted Dame Bell. "Not but what it may be as well if you do go. I'm ashamed of the neighbours seeing you can be so silly and superstitious. The train does not get into Falmouth till night-time."

"Oh yes, it does," said Rosaline, anxiously: "it gets in quite early enough. Why, mother, I shall be at Aunt Pellet's soon after dark." And she crossed the kitchen with a quicker step than had been seen since that past miserable Tuesday night, and opened the staircase-door.

"And suppose your father does _not_ come home first?" debated Mrs. Bell, not quite pleased with the tacit leave she had given. "How will you reconcile yourself to going away in the uncertainty, Rose?"

Rose did not answer. She only ran up the stairs, shutting the door behind her. "What in the world does ail the child?" exclaimed Dame Bell, considerably put out. "It's my belief the fright has turned her head. Until now she has always laughed at such things."

But Mrs. Bell made no further opposition to the journey. A discerning woman in most kinds of illness, she recognized the fact that change of some sort might be necessary for Rosaline. Still Bell did not return, and still the day went on.

In the afternoon Rosaline was ready to start, with a bandbox and handbag. Nancy Tomson had volunteered to accompany her to the station.

"I might perhaps have managed the walk to the train; I don't know; it's a goodish step there and back," said Dame Bell, as Rosaline stood before her, to say good-bye. "But you see, child, I want to wait in for your father. I shouldn't like him to find an empty house on his return."

Rosaline burst into a fit of sobbing, and laid hold of her mother as if seeking protection from some visible terror. And once again Mrs. Bell was puzzled, and could not make her out at all.

"Oh, mother dear, take care of yourself! And forgive me for all the ill I have ever done. Forgive, forgive me!"

"Goodness bless me, child, there's nothing to forgive that I know of!" testily cried Dame Bell, not accustomed to this sort of sensational leave-taking. "I shall take care of myself; never fear. Mind you take care of _your_self, Rose: those steam railways are risky things to travel by: and give my love to your aunt and my respects to Pellet."

"And we hed better be going," put in Nancy Tomson, who had put on her Sunday cloak and bonnet for the occasion. "They trains don't wait for nobody."

They were in ample time for this one: perhaps Rosaline had taken care of that: arriving, in fact, twenty minutes too soon. Rosaline entered it when it came up, and was steamed away.

In returning, Nancy Tomson saw Frank Raynor. He was on horseback; riding along very leisurely.

"Good-day," said he, nodding to her in passing. "Been out gallivanting?" he added in his light way.

"I heve been a-seeing Rosaline Bell off by one o' they trains, sir," answered the woman. And Frank checked his horse as he heard it and sat as still as a statue.

"Where has she gone to?"

"Off on a maggot to Falmouth. They Whistlers went and give her a prime fright, sir: she heve hardly done shaking yet, and looks as gashly as you please. She heve gone to her aunt's to forget it."

"Oh, to be sure," carelessly assented Frank: and rode on.

A few minutes afterwards, when near Trennach, he met Mrs. St. Clare's carriage; herself, two ladies, and Lydia seated within it. The coachman pulled up by orders. Of course Frank had to do the same.

"Have you been to The Mount, Mr. Raynor?"

"No, I have been across to Pendon," he answered, keeping his hat off; and the breeze took advantage of that to stir the waves of his bright hair.

"This makes two days that we have seen nothing of you," said Mrs. St. Clare. "You have not been near us since Tuesday night."

A faint flush passed over his face. He murmured something about having been very busy himself--concluded they were occupied: but he spoke rather confusedly, not at all with the usual ready manner of Frank Raynor.

"Well, we shall see you this evening, Mr. Raynor. You are coming to dine with us."

Very hastily he declined the invitation. "I cannot come, thank you," he said. "I shall have patients to see, and must stay at home."

"But you must come; you are to come," rejoined Mrs. St. Clare. "I have seen Dr. Raynor, and he has promised that you shall. Finally, Mr. Raynor, you will very much oblige me by doing so."

What further objection could Frank make? None. He gave the required assent, together with a sweeping bow, as the carriage drove on.

"What a bright-looking, handsome man!" exclaimed one of the ladies to Mrs. St. Clare. "I really do not remember, though, to have seen him the night of the ball, as you say I did."

"Oh, he stuck himself in a corner all the night," put in Lydia. "I don't believe he came out of it once, or danced at all."

"He is too good-looking for a doctor. I should tremble for my daughters' hearts."

"_Being_ a doctor, there is, I hope, no cause for me to tremble for the hearts of mine," haughtily rejoined Mrs. St. Clare. "Not but that he is of fairly good family and expectations: the eldest son of Major Raynor and the heir to Eagles' Nest."

Mrs. St. Clare, unconsciously to herself, was not altogether correct in this statement. But it may pass for the present.

Frank rode home. Dr. Raynor was out; and he went into the parlour to Edina. She sat in the bow window, prosily darning stockings.

"Why did Uncle Hugh promise Mrs. St. Clare that I should dine at The Mount to-night? Do you know, Edina?"

"Because she invited you, I suppose. I saw the carriage at the door and papa standing at it as he talked to them. Don't you care to go?"

"Not this evening--particularly."

"Papa just looked in here afterwards and said would I tell you that you were to dine at The Mount. I thought you were fond of dining there, Frank."

"So I am sometimes. Where is Uncle Hugh?"

"He has been sent for to the parsonage. Mr. Pine is not well."

Again Frank Raynor--and this time sorely against his will--sat at Mrs. St. Clare's brilliant dinner-table. He could see why she had made so great a point of his coming: only one gentleman was present besides himself. In fact, there was only Frank in all Trennach to fall back upon. Dr. Raynor never dined out: the Rector pleaded ill-health. Most of the guests who had been staying in the house had left it this morning after their two nights' sojourn: those remaining--General Sir Arthur Beauchamp, Lady and Miss Beauchamp, and a young married woman, Mrs. Fox--were to leave on the morrow. It fell to Frank's lot to take in Lady Beauchamp: she it was who had expressed doubts as to the stability of young ladies' hearts, if exposed to the attractions of Mr. Raynor. Margaret, as it chanced, sat on Frank's left hand; and Margaret, for the time being, was supremely happy.

"Are you better than you were on Tuesday night, Mr. Raynor?" she took occasion to ask him in a whisper, when a buzz of conversation was going on.

"Better? I was not----" not ill, Frank was about to respond in surprise, and then recollected himself. "Oh, thank you, yes, Margaret. I was rather out of sorts that night."

"Mr. Raynor, what is this story about some man being lost?" asked Mrs. St. Clare, from the head of the table. "One of the miners, we hear, has mysteriously disappeared and cannot be found."

Frank's face flushed hotly, and he would have given the world to avoid the subject. But he could not: and he related the particulars.

"But where is it supposed that he can be, this Josiah Bell?" asked the general. "Where should _you_ think he is, Mr. Raynor?"

Perhaps no one at the table, with the exception of Margaret, noticed that the young surgeon was somewhat agitated by the topic: that his breath seemed a little laboured as he answered the repeated questions, and that his complexion changed from red to pale. Margaret silently wondered why the disappearance of a miner should so affect him.

"Are there any old pits, used out and abandoned, that the man could have fallen into?" asked the sensible general.

A strangely-vivid flush now on Frank Raynor's face. A marked hesitation in his voice, as he replied.

"Not--not any--that are easy of access, I fancy, Sir Arthur."

"Well, the man must be somewhere, dead or alive. You say it is not at all thought that he would run away."

"Oh no; his friends say he would not be likely to do that."

"He has a very beautiful daughter, has he not?" spoke Lydia to Frank, from the opposite side of the table.

"Yes, she is nice-looking."

"Nice-looking is not the word for it, Mr. Raynor--as we are told," persisted Lydia. "We hear she is strictly, faultlessly beautiful. Fancy that, for the daughter of a common miner!"

Miss St. Clare's tone seemed to savour of mockery--as her tones often