mother in
Dudley's company.

Skepsey's face was just sufferable by light of day, if one pitied
reflecting on his honest intentions; it ceased to discolour another. He
dropped a few particulars of his hero in action; but the heroine
eclipsed. He was heavier than ever with his Matilda Pridden. At the hour
for departure, Perrin had a conveyance at the door. Nesta sent off
Skepsey with a complimentary message to Captain Dartrey. Her maid Mary
begged her to finish her breakfast; Manton suggested the waiting a
further two or three minutes. 'We must not be late,' Nesta said; and when
the minute-hand of the clock marked ample time for the drive to the
station, she took her seat and started, keeping her face resolutely set
seaward, having at her ears the ring of a cry that was to come from
Manton. But Manton was dumb; she spied no one on the pavement who
signalled to stop them. And no one was at the station to greet them. They
stepped into a carriage where they were alone. Dudley with his dreaded
generosity melted out of Nesta's thoughts, like the vanishing
steam-wreath on the dip between the line and the downs.

She passed into music, as she always did under motion of carriages and
trains, whether in happiness or sadness: and the day being one that had a
sky, the scenic of music swung her up to soar. None of her heavy burdens
enchained, though she knew the weight of them, with those of other
painful souls. The pipeing at her breast gave wings to large and small of
the visible; and along the downs went stateliest of flowing dances; a
copse lengthened to forest; a pool of cattle-water caught grey for
flights through enchantment. Cottage-children, wherever seen in groups,
she wreathed above with angels to watch them. Her mind all the while was
busy upon earth, embracing her mother, eyeing her father. Imagination and
our earthly met midway, and still she flew, until she was brought to the
ground by a shot. She struggled to rise, uplifting Judith Marsett: a
woman not so very much older than her own teens, in the count of years,
and ages older; and the world pulling at her heels to keep her low. That
unhappiest had no one but a sisterly girl to help her: and how she clung
to the slender help! Who else was there?

The good and the bad in the woman struck separate blows upon the girl's
resonant nature. She perceived the good, and took it into her
reflections. The bad she divined: it approached like some threat of
inflammation. Natur