Thyrza | Page 5

the
housekeeper, would ordinarily have sat down to study in the morning
room. She laid open a book on the table, but then lingered between that
and the windows. At length she took a volume of a lighter kind--in both
senses--and, finding her garden hat in the hall, went forth.
She was something less than twenty, and bore herself with grace
perchance a little too sober for her years. Her head was wont to droop

thoughtfully, and her step measured itself to the grave music of a mind
which knew the influence of mountain solitude. But her health was
complete; she could row for long stretches, and on occasion fatigued
her father in rambles over moor and fell. Face and figure were matched
in mature beauty; she had dark hair, braided above the forehead on each
side, and large dark eyes which regarded you with a pure intelligence,
disconcerting if your word uttered less than sincerity.
When her mother died Annabel was sixteen. Three months after that
event Mr. Newthorpe left London for his country house, which neither
he nor his daughter had since quitted. He had views of his own on the
subject of London life as it affects young ladies. By nature a student, he
had wedded a woman who became something not far removed from a
fashionable beauty. It was a passionate attachment on both sides at first,
and to the end he loved his wife with the love which can deny nothing.
The consequence was that the years of his prime were wasted, and the
intellectual promise of his youth found no fulfilment. Another year and
Annabel would have entered the social mill; she had beauty enough to
achieve distinction, and the means of the family were ample to enshrine
her. But she never 'came out.' No one would at first believe that Mr.
Newthorpe's retreat was final; no one save a close friend or two who
understood what his life had been, and how he dreaded for his daughter
the temptations which had warped her mother's womanhood. 'In any
case,' wrote Mrs. Tyrrell, his sister-in-law, when a year and a half had
gone by, 'you will of course let me have Annabel shortly. I pray you to
remember that she is turned seventeen. You surely won't deprive her of
every pleasure and every advantage?' And the recluse made answer: 'If
bolts and shackles were needful I would use them mercilessly rather
than allow my girl to enter your Middlesex pandemonium. Happily, the
fetters of her reason suffice. She is growing into a woman, and by the
blessing of the gods her soul shall be blown through and through with
the free air of heaven whilst yet the elements in her are blending to
their final shape.' Mrs. Tyrrell raised her eyebrows, and shook her head,
and talked sadly of 'poor Annabel,' who was buried alive.
She walked down to a familiar spot by the lake, where a rustic bench
was set under shadowing leafage; in front two skiffs were moored on
the strand. The sky was billowy with slow-travelling shapes of
whiteness; a warm wind broke murmuring wavelets along the pebbly

margin. The opposite slopes glassed themselves in the deep dark
water--Swarth Fell, Hallin Fell, Place Fell--one after the other; above
the southern bend of the lake rose noble summits, softly touched with
mist which the sun was fast dispelling. The sweetness of summer was
in the air. So quiet was it that every wing-rustle in the brake, every
whisper of leaf to leaf, made a distinct small voice; a sheep-dog barking
over at Howtown seemed close at hand.
This morning Annabel had no inclination to read, yet her face was not
expressive of the calm reflection which was her habit. She opened the
book upon her lap and glanced down a page or two, but without interest.
At length external things were wholly lost to her, and she gazed across
the water with continuance of solemn vision. Her face was almost
austere in this mood which had come upon her.
Someone was descending the path which led from the high road; it was
a step too heavy for Paula's, too rapid to be Mr. Newthorpe's. Annabel
turned her head and saw a young man, perhaps of seven-and-twenty,
dressed in a light walking-suit, with a small wallet hanging from his
shoulder and a stick in his hand. At sight of her he took off his cap and
approached her bare-headed.
'I saw from a quarter of a mile away,' he said, 'that someone was sitting
here, and I came down on the chance that it might be you.'
She rose with a very slight show of surprise, and returned his greeting
with calm friendliness.
'We were speaking of you at breakfast. My cousin couldn't tell us for