ian had started a letter to aline some time before, using the parchment with the holes. this he finished and carefully wrapped it up with the buckle, the testament and the chatelaine.
in the morning he found walter and drew him aside. “she may have a letter to send back,” he said, “so try and give her an opportunity. keep your eyes and ears open too, and find out and tell me everything that you can.”
walter margrove put the packet inside his doublet, and, after settling the girths of his horses, shook hands warmly with ian, mounted and rode away down english street to the south gate, leaving ian looking after him, as he gradually drew away.
he had a long journey before him and his thoughts were full of the man he had left behind. he had heard ian menstrie speak at an open air meeting in northampton, and at first had been struck by the fiery eloquence of the young scot and had then been arrested by his message. he had always longed to meet him again; and here he was, actually able to do him a small service. then his thoughts turned to holwick and the beautiful irresistible child that had so strangely fascinated him, in spite of himself, in the few minutes that he had seen227 her. he had not liked to question master menstrie, but he wondered what could be the connection between the two; what could the child, obviously a lady, have to do with menstrie, a common carpenter? truly it was a remarkable world.
he reached haltwhistle that evening and did a little business there on the following day and called at a number of outlying houses on the way to hexham. business was good and it was nearly three weeks before he found himself turning his horses’ heads over middleton bridge to reach the hamlet that has a way in but no way out. “no wonder they say, ‘do as they do in holwick,’” he muttered,—the local proverb for “doing without,” as his horse stumbled in the thick muddy track.
somehow he felt full of forebodings as he approached the hall.
fortune favoured him in one respect, however, as he met aline herself a few hundred yards from the gate. she smiled brightly when she saw him, and held up her hand. he took the little hand and then dismounted and led the horse. “i am so glad to have you come,” she said; “i have been looking for you for a long time. you look tired. i wonder if elspeth could get you something nice before you have to undo your pack. i’ll run on and ask her.”
before he could stop her she had run on, and he had to mount his horse and trot after her and call;—“not so fast, mistress aline, i have something to say to you and we may not get another opportunity. here is a small packet from master menstrie. hide it in your dress.” aline’s eyes shone with sudden pleasure; but228 as walter looked at her he thought she was not looking well.
“how did you find him? do you know him? where is he? how is he? what is he doing?” said aline, all in a breath.
“softly, softly, fair and softly; one question at a time,” said walter. “i found him in carlisle, and by accident i mentioned holwick and he sent this to you.”
“but how is he and what is he doing?” asked aline.
“he seems fairly well and is working as a carpenter.”
aline looked surprised. “i did not know he was a carpenter,” she said. ian had not spoken much about his past life. she remembered him saying something about working on hinges, but she had thought of him in that connexion as a master artist, and so humble an occupation to one of her birth and surroundings was a little bit of a shock; but she checked it instantaneously and added, “but i expect he is a very good carpenter.”
walter margrove was puzzled. aline then apparently did not know a great deal about ian menstrie and he did not know how much to say and how much to leave unsaid.
“i am afraid i do not know very much about him,” walter deemed the safest reply; “but he seemed to be getting on all right.”
aline too felt something of the same sort, while walter thought it best to change the subject, and added,—“but i have something else for you, mistress aline.” he produced another small packet, which he undid, and took out a beautiful carved ivory comb. “this,” he said, “is from andrew woolridge. you can let the others see it if you like, but perhaps it would be wiser not.” walter229 was thinking that it would be best not to call the attention of people to the fact that he was in any way a means of communication between aline and others. “andrew cannot write, like master menstrie, but he bade me tell you that he wished you well and that he hoped some day to show himself worthy of your forgiveness, but that meantime he would say nothing more.”
aline was quite overcome for a moment. “i am afraid i judged him too harshly, and he has already sent something to master mowbray.”
“yes,” said walter, “i think the man has turned over a new leaf. but we are near the house and i want also to give you a little thing from myself; it is only a length of fine linen, but it may be as useful as trinkets. i have it here in my holster. if you do not care to be seen with it, i daresay old elspeth will manage it for us.”
“but you must not give me things,” said aline. “why should you?”
“well, mistress aline, i know of something in master menstrie’s package, as he bought it from me, and i fear me that you will meet with trouble. pray god the way may be smooth to you; but it is not so for many who have dared to read the scriptures for themselves. i am of the reformed faith myself and he has dealt mercifully with me; for i know i am a weak vessel. but remember you have only to call on walter margrove and if ever he can help you he will do it.”
“good day to you, walter,” said the voice of master mowbray. they were approaching the drawbridge and there was no opportunity for further conversation.
master mowbray was coming out, but he turned back230 when he saw them approaching. “so you have fetched the packman and all his fine wares,” he said to aline. “are you trying to buy up the best things before we get a chance, lassie?”
the thud of the hoofs on the drawbridge and their clatter on the stones within, had already drawn forth heads from the windows and in a moment a crowd of persons was gathering round walter and asking him a hundred questions.
walter answered the questions as well as he could and made his way to the great hall, where mistress mowbray had the first chance of inspecting his stock.
she was in a more affable mood than usual and laid in a good supply of materials, amongst others some very fine kersey, which she said should be used to make a cote-hardie for each of the children, and a piece of applied embroidery for orphreys.[20] audry was standing with her arm round aline, next to walter, and, as mistress mowbray turned aside to examine some silk nearer the light, he slipped the parcel of linen into her hand and whispered that it was for aline.
20 broad bands of applied embroidery.
it was somewhat late in the day when walter arrived, so that he decided that it was necessary to stay the night. his horses were stabled at the hall and he himself lodged at the house of janet arnside.
walter knew that she had recently come over to the new faith and he sought an opportunity for a meeting with two or three others in her house. they came very quietly, but their coming was not likely to arouse suspicion, as the packman was considered good company wherever he went.
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after they had all gone walter began to talk about aline, her strange power of fascination and her unique, almost unearthly beauty. “i wonder if the child can be happy up there,” he said.
“i doubt if she is,” said janet; “she comes in here often and john and i have many times noticed a far-away wistful look in those deep blue eyes of hers, bright and cheerful as she always is.”
“i wish, mother, she could hold our faith,” said john. “i am sure it would make her happier. life has been a great deal more to me since these things first came my way.”
walter sat and said nothing; he thought that on the whole it was far safer for little aline if no one knew. “poor little soul,” he said to himself, “it is a different matter for these people who can confide in each other, with no one else in the house; but for her, sweet innocent, it is indeed a case of the dove in the eagle’s nest.”
john watched walter’s thoughtful face and then said, “is there anything we could do for her?”
“not that i can see,” said walter; “but look you, there might be; the child, as we know, is not exactly among friends and none can say what a day may bring forth. she has had a narrow escape already. you keep a careful look-out, my lad, and if ever you can get a chance you can let walter margrove know all that goes on. by my halidame, i would not have any harm come to the bairn. i do not know why she has got such a hold on me, but so it is.”
“that will i do,” said john, “she has the same hold on all of us. there can hardly be a man or woman in the parish that would not die for that child. they just232 worship her. those of the old faith are sure she is a saint. i should not be surprised but that they say prayers to her, and she is sweetly unconscious of it all. you know old benjamin darley? well, i was passing his house the other day, and mistress aline was seated near the door with her feet on a little wooden stool. she rose up when she saw me and said good-bye, as she wanted to come and see my mother; but ran across into peter’s cottage to fetch something. old benjamin did not see me, as i stood there waiting, but i saw him pick up the stool and kiss it reverently and put it away on the shelf, while the tears stood in his eyes.”
“i guess, lad, you have done the same,” said walter.
“and what about yourself, walter?” said john, evading the question.
“maybe i do not get such opportunities; are you coming up to the hall with me to-morrow to see me off?”
“no, i must be off to work, but good luck to you.”
so the next day walter said good-bye to janet and went up to the hall. he met elspeth in the courtyard. “good morning, neighbour, how is all with you and how is your bonnie little mistress?”
“i am doing as well as can be expected, and mistress audry is not ailing.”
“i meant mistress aline, not that mistress audry is not as bonnie a child as one would meet in a nine days’ march.”
“ay and a good hearted one too, neighbour,” said elspeth. “it’s not every child who would take kindly to ranking second after they had always been reckoned the bonniest in the whole countryside. but there, mistress aline might give herself airs, and yet one really233 could not tell that she knew she was pretty; so i do not think it has ever occurred to mistress audry to mind and she just enjoys looking at her. they are fine bairns both of them.”
“ay, they are that,” said walter.
“i just pray,” continued elspeth, “that i may live to see them well settled. my mother served in the hall and my grandmother and her father and his father again, and so it is. as long as there is a mowbray i hope there will be some of our blood to serve them and mistress gillespie is a mowbray, mind you that, and some say,” she went on in a whisper, “that she should be the mistress of holwick. it was a new place when the old man built it, the old mowbray property is down middleton way and is now let. maybe, if there’s anything in it, that’s partly why mistress mowbray does not love the child. but there, it is all gossip, and i must be moving.”
walter settled his packs and took as long over it as he could in the hope of catching sight of aline. in this he was successful, for a few minutes afterwards he saw the children, who were really looking for him. aline handed him a letter for ian and asked how soon he expected to be able to deliver it.
“i wish we could see him,” said audry involuntarily.
aline looked at her and audry subsided.
but walter, who spent his life studying human nature, saw the glance and began to puzzle it out. “so ian menstrie does know both the children then and it was not a mere matter of courtesy to send the chatelaine for audry. but this is very curious,” he reasoned. “janet arnside has not mentioned him nor have any234 others of the reformed faith. strange how he could be in holwick and not see them. and i mind too, that he said he had never seen richard mowbray. truly it is mystifying.”
another thing that perplexed him was janet and john’s desire that mistress aline should hear of the faith. obviously, she knew of it and yet they were unaware of the fact. he began to see daylight;—somehow the children must have found menstrie in some hiding place. walter was too cautious a man to mention anything that he discovered in his journeys that might conceivably bring mischief, and too honourable a man to try and discover a secret that clearly did not concern him.
the children seemed to cling to walter as though loth to let him go and even after he had mounted his horse they accompanied him a long way down the road; then, fearing, if they went too far, it might give rise to questionings they bade good-bye and after waiting to wave a last farewell as he reached the next bend they turned reluctantly back.
“you should not have said that just now,” observed aline.
“said what, dear?”
“said that you wanted to see ian. of course margrove may really know ian and his affairs but he may be doing this as a kindness to a stranger and probably he did not know that ian had ever been here, he might simply have met my family in scotland.”
“well, all this suspicion and concealment is not like you, aline,” said audry.
“oh, dear,” aline answered, “yes, i do not like it; life is really too hard.”
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the children had reached the hall and went up to their own room to undo the package. aline opened it and within were the smaller packets marked respectively,—“for audry” and “for aline.”
both uttered a cry of delight as they beheld their treasure.
“i am afraid you will hardly be able to wear the chatelaine,” said aline, as she bent affectionately over her cousin. “i am so sorry.”
“not just now perhaps, and you will not be able to wear the buckle, but isn’t it beautiful and was it not good of him to remember that that was what i asked for; and after new year’s day, when i have had other presents, i do not think it would be noticed. i have always wanted a chatelaine so badly.”
aline’s long hair had fallen forward as she stooped; she tossed it over her shoulder with the back of her hand and rose and held out the buckle to catch the light. it was far the finest thing she had ever possessed. fortune was not so unkind after all. here was a treasure indeed!
“now we must see how the chatelaine looks,” she said, dropping to her knees and sitting back on her heels, while she attached the chatelaine to audry’s belt. then a thought struck her. “let us also see the effect of the buckle,” she went on with a laugh, and the sensitive fingers deftly adjusted the buckle to seem as if it were fastened to the belt.
“oh, they do go well together! audry, they look charming!” would ian mind, she wondered to herself; no, he would like her to be generous. so, stifling a touch of regret, she said aloud, “they look so nice that you236 must keep the buckle”; and she pulled audry down to the floor and smothered her objections with kisses.
then she sat up somewhat dishevelled and reached over for the testament. “you wanted a chatelaine and i wanted a greek testament. isn’t it a lovely book?” and she fastened and unfastened the chastely designed clasps. “with the help of the latin i shall soon be able to read it. i am so glad i can read latin easily. i must keep it in the secret room, i suppose. it would have been safe in the library; but ian has written my name in it.”
“master menstrie is not as cautious as he might be,” observed audry, “but i must not stay here, mother and elspeth want me, to go over my clothes. then there are those people coming to-morrow about that newbiggin matter and she may want me to have some special gown. good-bye.”
aline was left alone. so to-morrow was actually the day they were coming! she had gathered her information, but she had not laid her plans. somehow or other those people at newbiggin must not be unjustly treated. mistress mowbray must not have her own way in the matter if she could prevent it.
she found herself, therefore, definitely setting out to fight mistress mowbray. she had never before quite realised that it was an actual contest of wills; but, when she came to think about it, mistress mowbray had been making so aggressive a display of her power lately that aline did not altogether shrink from a trial of strength, as though she had been challenged; in fact she rather enjoyed it. the problem was, how was it to be carried through?
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it was certainly not likely that she would be invited to the discussion. if she came in, as it were by accident, she would undoubtedly be turned out. she must get master gower on her side beforehand anyway. after that there were several possible plans of campaign. they were certain to have a meal first and one plan would be to raise the subject herself and get it discussed at the table, another would be privily to interview every guest, if opportunity offered.
she decided that she would go and see master gower alone and set out on foot to middleton. she crossed the bridge and turned up to the left bank of the river till she came to pawlaw tower. it was a small pele with a barmkin.[21]
21 a small tower with a little enclosure or courtyard.
after being admitted at the gate, she asked to see the master, and was conducted up a narrow wooden stairway to the hall, which was on the first floor.
“what would you have with me, little maid?” said hugh gower, as the child came in.
aline had been very nervous, but his kindly manner reassured her. “i want to talk about the people of newbiggin,” she said.
“the people of newbiggin! and a sorry set of loons, too!” and his face clouded a little. “what have you to say about them, fair child!”
“i want to speak to you that they be not all dispossessed.”
“by all accounts,” he replied, “the sooner there standeth not stone upon stone, nor one stick by another of all that place, the better will it be for the country-side.”
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“not so,” she said, looking fearlessly at him, “it would be a right sore thing that the innocent should suffer.” aline was no sentimentalist and was quite willing that the wicked should suffer their deserts according to the stern measures of the day; but this proposal of indiscriminate chastisement had roused the mettle of the high spirited child.
“how now, mistress aline gillespie; but you are too young to understand these things. children’s hearts are too soft and if we hearkened to what they said, there would be an end to all order.”
“marry, no,” she answered boldly, drawing herself up, “it is order i want to see and not disorder. punish the guilty and spare the innocent. wanton destruction is not order, and that indeed liketh me not.”
“it is a nest of scoundrels, little maid, and all your pretty haughtiness cannot save them.”
“some of them are scoundrels, i know, harry them as ye may, but some are god-fearing folk that never did harm to you or other. i know one carline there, whose like would be hard to find by all tees-side.”
her mien was irresistible. “come sit and talk,” he said. so aline pleaded for the better folk, while she spared no condemnation of the worse.
she not only gained her point, but she gained a staunch ally as well. master hugh fell under her witchery and nothing would content him, but that he should find her a horse and ride back with her to holwick.
“it’s a fine old place, this home of yours,” he said, as he looked up at the gateway-tower, with the arms of the mowbrays over the entrance archway;—“a meet abode for so fair a princess,” he added gallantly;239 then helping her to alight and bowing low over her hand, like a courtier, with a gravity half playful, half serious, he kissed it, mounted his horse and rode away.
aline had tried also to get hold of lord middleton’s reeve, but was unsuccessful; her plans, however, were favoured next day by the representative of the duke of alston arriving an hour too soon.
mistress mowbray was busy in preparations and, little knowing what she was doing, caught sight of aline and called,—“hither, wench, come you and take master latour into the pleasaunce and entertain him as ye may.”
ralph latour was a tall stern man and aline’s first thought was that she would fail, but she soon found that, though hard and in a measure unsympathetic, he had a strict and judicial mind, and was quite ready to accept her standpoint, although entirely without warmth or show of feeling.
the child, however, fascinated him also, like the rest. yet it was in a somewhat different way from her hold on other people. he was a man of considerable learning and taste, who had travelled widely, and in his cold critical way was absorbed in the subtlety of her beauty. aline thought she had never met any one so awe-inspiring as he made her walk in front of him or sat her down opposite to him, in order that he might look at her.
they discussed the subject thoroughly and he concluded by saying,—“mistress gillespie,—you are mistress gillespie, i understand?”
“mistress aline,” she corrected.
“i am told that you have neither brothers nor uncles and that the line ends in you, does it not?”
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“true,” she said.
“mistress gillespie, then, i repeat, you have shown considerable acumen and you may take it that there is a coincidence of view between us. yes,” he added, absent-mindedly speaking aloud, as he looked at her little foot, “the external malleolus has exactly the right emphasis, neither too much nor too little, and i observe the same at the wrist in the styloid process of the ulna. i crave pardon,” he added hastily, “it is time that we joined the others.”
they found that master bowman, lord middleton’s reeve, had just arrived with his lady, and the company proceeded to the hall.
aline had thought best not to mention the matter to cousin richard, as he might discuss it with his wife and her plans be frustrated. she felt sure, however, that he would take her part if any were on her side at all.
“these be troublesome days, madam,” said david bowman, addressing mistress mowbray. “it looks as though all authority were to go by the board and every man go his own way. mother church is like to have her house overturned by these pestilent heretics.”
“ay, and a man will not be master in his own house soon either, methinks, neighbour,” said richard mowbray.
“how now, mistress mowbray, what think you?” bowman resumed. “shall we not at least keep our kail better in future, when we have cleared the rabbit-warren?”
“what rabbit-warren?” said audry innocently.
“the rabbit-warren of newbiggin, child,” replied bowman; “only these rabbits are fonder of sheep and241 chickens and folks’ corn and money than of kail, but we’ll have them all stewed shortly.”
“in the pot, with the lid on,” chimed in eleanor mowbray, “and it shall be hot broth too.”
“i hardly think your broth would be very tasty,” observed master richard.
“tasty,” echoed his wife; “it would be the tastiest dish served to the master of holwick this many a long day.”
“master richard’s imagination is too literal,” said bowman; “he’s thinking of the old leather hide of william lonsdale, and tough bony morsels like jane mallet; but we could peel them and take out the pips.”
“your humour is a trifle broad, neighbour,” remarked master gower; “the little ladies might appreciate something finer.”
“finer indeed—what, and get as thin as your humour, master gower, that we must needs go looking for it with a candle. but humour or no humour, what are we to do with these knaves? how counsel you, mistress mowbray?”
“turn them out and burn their houses,” she answered, “and let them shift for themselves.”
“i think we should give them something to help them to get elsewhere,” said master richard.
“ay, their corpses might be an unpleasant sight, lying round here,” dryly put in ralph latour.
“but why turn them out at all?” asked aline at last. “it’s only one or two that have done any harm, why be so hard on the others?”
“nonsense, child, where there’s a plague spot, the whole body is sick,” cried mistress mowbray. “the242 plague spot will always spread, and they are all involved already, i’ll warrant; away with them all i say. and what do you mean, child, advising your betters and thrusting yourself into wise folks’ counsels?”
“it liketh me to hear a child’s views, if the bairn be not too forward,” said latour gravely. “there is a freshness and simplicity about them that we are apt to miss after our long travailing in the world.”
“‘simplicity,’ indeed,” rejoined mistress mowbray, “simpleton is the kind of word you want. in my young days we were taught our place; ‘freshness,’ forsooth! we want no fresh raw wenches to open their mouths in this place, anyway.”
latour took no notice of his hostess’ rudeness, but turned to aline saying,—“but do you not think, child, that a severe example would be a terror to evil-doers far and wide, and mistress mowbray is doubtless right, they will all be infected, even if the evil in every case does not show itself. all through the world’s story the innocent have suffered with the guilty; moreover, it will quicken in them a responsibility for their associates. besides, if, as master mowbray suggests, we help them on their way there will be no hardship done, it is only a change of abode. come now, aline, is that not so?”
mistress mowbray watched exultantly. she was not sure that these calm measured phrases were not more crushing than her own invective. “now, child, you see how little you understand things,” she observed patronisingly.
master latour, however, was not acting as a partisan; he was merely putting the case, partly to show all sides243 and partly because it interested him to test aline’s powers.
“master latour is a just man,” said aline with some hesitation, “and i think he will understand when i say that i really know that these people are not all bad,—that the disease, as you call it, has not spread so far but that it may be checked.” she paused for a moment from nervousness, and looked a little confused.
“take your time;—festina lente,[22]—develop your argument at your convenience,” said latour not unkindly.
22 make haste slowly.
“with regard then to the question of example,” aline went on, recovering herself and catching something of latour’s manner of speaking, “with regard to the question of example, you all know that this ‘change of abode’ will only stir up bitterness and that that will spread tenfold and may wreck us altogether. a punishment that the others feel to be just is a lesson; a punishment that is felt to be unjust is a flame for kindling a revolutionary fire.
“you say i am a child and i do not know; but, please, i do know more about these people than any of you. i have spoken to every one of them. i know them all; and about some of them i know a great deal. i do not suppose there is any one here, except myself, who even knows their names, beyond those of his own tenants. marry, now, is that not so?”
aline having flung down her challenge looked around with flashing eyes.
latour had been watching her with his cold aesthetic appreciation, admiring her instinctively beautiful gestures,244 but this time, he too felt a real touch of the child’s magic as she glanced scornfully round.
“i do not pretend to be old enough to know what is the right thing to do,” aline went on, “but surely, surely,” she said in earnest pleading tones, “people who want to be just should carefully find out everything first. is that not so?” she asked, turning round quickly to mistress mowbray;—“do you not think so yourself?”
eleanor mowbray was so astonished at the child daring to cross-examine her like that, that she was struck dumb with astonishment.
“yes, of course you think so,” aline said, giving her no time to recover herself. “mistress mowbray entirely agrees,” she went on, “as every just person would agree. that is so, is it not, master gower?” master gower bowed assent. “and there is no need to ask you, cousin richard.”
“yes, dear, you are right,” he said.
aline had swept swiftly round in the order in which she was most sure of adherents, so as to carry away the rest.
“master latour,” she continued, “i am sure you will not disagree with them and will say that a proper examination must be held first, and that everything must be done that will stop bitterness and revolt while keeping honesty and order.”
“that is entirely my view,” said latour, captivated by the child’s skill and the gentle modesty which, in spite of her earnestness, marked every tone and gesture. “who would have thought,” he said to himself, “that anything so gentle and modest and yet so princess-like withal could be in one combination at the same time?”
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aline was least sure of bowman, but while looking at him she concluded;—“then i take it that you all think the same, master bowman.”
she had not exactly asked him his own view, and he was sure that if left to himself he would have taken a different line. he was by no means certain that he was not literally spell-bound as he answered;—“surely, mistress aline, we are all of one mind, including my wife, i think i may say.” the lady smiled her complete acquiescence.
“oh, i am so glad,” aline said, and slipping from her seat she went up to master richard and, in her most irresistible way, put her arm around him, saying:—“and you will let me help you to find out things, won’t you, even though i am only a little girl?”
“yes, if it is any gratification to you, sweet child,” he answered, kissing her.
“that is all settled then,” she said, “and when the ladies retire, you can examine me as the first witness.”
“a very good idea; you seem to know every one’s tenants,” said master latour, much amused at aline’s triumph and adroitness, and determined that she should secure the fruits of her victory. as he was the strongest man there, both in himself and as representing the largest and most powerful owner, the others at once concurred. part of the secret of aline’s extraordinary power was her entire selflessness. in her most queenly moods there was never the least suggestion of self, it was the royalty of love. aline might use the very words that in other children’s mouths would have been conceited and opinionated; yet from her they were more like a passionate appeal. this, associated with a quiet246 dignity of manner, generally produced a feeling of “noblesse oblige” in the hearer. the basest men will hesitate to use foul language and discuss foul things before a child. in aline’s presence the same occurred in an infinitely greater degree. it was for most people, men or women, impossible to be anything but their best selves before her; to do anything less would mean to be utterly ashamed.
aline’s conquest was complete and mistress mowbray saw that she would only expose herself to further defeat if she attempted now to open the question again. it was made the more galling as aline’s last thrust had practically shut her out of the council altogether. why did that fool bowman bring his wife with him? it would be too undignified for her to insist on coming after they had accepted aline’s proposition, unless she forbade aline to be there; and that aline had made impossible. so there was nothing left but to accept the situation with the best grace that she could and bide her time.
