When she had put two other little toys that remained in her pockets into the pouch, she drew the mouth of it tight, passed the loops of the loose thongs that fastened it, over one of her arms, and then, rising to her feet, pointed to it, and looked at Mat with a very significant nod. The action expressed the idea she wished to communicate, plainly enough:—"See," it seemed to say, "see what a pretty work-bag I can make of your tobacco-pouch!"
But Mat, to all appearance, was not able to find out the meaning of one of her gestures, easy as they were to interpret. His senses seemed to grow more and more perturbed the longer he looked at her. As she curtseyed to him again, and moved away in despair, he stepped forward a little, and suddenly and awkwardly held out his hand. "The big man seems to be getting a little less afraid of me," thought Madonna, turning directly, and meeting his clumsy advance towards her, with a smile. But the instant he took her hand, her lips closed, and she shivered through her whole body as if dead fingers had touched her. "Oh!" she thought now, "how cold his hand is! how cold his hand is!"
"If I hadn't felt her warm to touch, I should have been dreaming to-night that I'd seen Mary's ghost." This was the grim fancy which darkly troubled Mat's mind, at the very same moment when Madonna was thinking how cold his hand was. He turned away impatiently from some wine offered to him just then by Zack; and, looking vacantly into the fire, drew his coat-cuff several times over his eyes and forehead.
The chill from the strange man's hand still lingered icily about Madonna's fingers, and made her anxious, though she hardly knew why, to leave the room. She advanced hastily to Valentine, and made the sign which indicated Mrs. Blyth, by laying her hand on her heart; she then pointed up-stairs. Valentine, understanding what she wanted, gave her leave directly to return to his wife's room. Before Zack could make even a gesture to detain her, she had slipped out of the studio, after not having remained in it much longer than five minutes.
"Zack," whispered Mr. Blyth, as the door closed, "I am anything but pleased with you for bringing Madonna down-stairs. You have broken through all rule in doing so; and, besides that, you have confused your friend by introducing her to him without any warning or preparation."
"Oh, that doesn't matter," interrupted young Thorpe. "He's not the sort of man to want warning about anything. I apologize for breaking rules; but as for Mat—why, hang it, Blyth, it's plain enough what has been wrong with him since supper came in! He's fairly knocked up with doing Hercules for you. You have kept the poor old Guy for near two hours standing in one position, without a rag on his back; and then you wonder—"
"Bless my soul! that never occurred to me. I'm afraid you're right," exclaimed Valentine. "Do let us make him take something hot and comfortable! Dear, dear me! how ought one to mix grog?"
Mr. Blyth had been for some little time past trying his best to compound a species of fiery and potential Squaw's Mixture for Mat. He had begun the attempt some minutes before Madonna left the studio; having found it useless to offer any explanations to his inattentive guest of the meaning of the girl's signs and gestures with the slate and tobacco-pouch. He had persevered in his hospitable endeavor all through the whispered dialogue which had just passed between Zack and himself; and he had now filled the glass nearly to the brim, when it suddenly occurred to him that he had put sherry in at the top of the tumbler, after having begun with brandy at the bottom; also that he had altogether forgotten some important ingredient which he was, just then, perfectly incapable of calling to mind.
"Here, Mat!" cried Zack. "Come and mix yourself something hot. Blyth's been trying to do it for you, and can't."
Mat, who had been staring more and more vacantly into the fire all this time, turned round again at last towards his friends at the supper table. He started a little when he saw that Madonna was no longer in the room—then looked aside from the door by which she had departed, to the bureau. He had been pretty obstinately determined to get possession of the Hair Bracelet from the first: but he was doubly and trebly determined now.
"It's no use looking about for the young lady," said Zack; "you behaved so clumsily and queerly, that you frightened her out of the room."
"No! no! nothing of the sort," interposed Valentine, good-naturedly. "Pray take something to warm you. I am quite ashamed of my want of consideration in keeping you standing so long, when I ought to have remembered that you were not used to being a painter's model. I hope I have not given you cold—"
"Given me cold?" repeated Mat, amazedly. He seemed about to add a sufficiently indignant assertion of his superiority to any such civilized bodily weakness, as a liability to catch cold—but just as the words were on his lips, he looked fixedly at Mr. Blyth, and checked himself.
"I am afraid you must be tired with the long sitting you have so kindly given me," added Valentine.
"No," answered Mat, after a moment's consideration; "not tired. Only sleepy. I'd best go home. What's o'clock?"
A reference to young Thorpe's watch showed that it was ten minutes past ten. Mat held out his hand directly to take leave; but Valentine positively refused to let him depart until he had helped himself to something from the supper-table. Hearing this, he poured out a glass of brandy and drank it off; then held out his hand once more, and said good night.
"Well, I won't press you to stay against your will," said Mr. Blyth, rather mournfully. "I will only thank you most heartily for your kindness in sitting to me, and say that I hope to see you again when I return from the country. Good bye, Zack. I shall start in the morning by an early train. Pray, my dear boy, be steady, and remember your mother and your promises, and call on Mr. Strather in good time to-morrow, and stick to your work, Zack—for all our sakes, stick to your work!"
As they left the studio, Mat cast one parting glance at the garden door. Would the servant, who had most likely bolted and locked it early in the evening, go near it again, before she went to bed? Would Mr. Blyth walk to the bottom of the room to see that the door was safe, after he had raked the fire out? Important questions these, which only the events of the night could answer.
A little way down Kirk Street, at the end by which Zack and his friend entered it on returning from Mr. Blyth's, stood the local theater—all ablaze with dazzling gas, and all astir with loitering blackguards. Young Thorpe stopped, as he and his companion passed under the portico, on the way to their lodgings further up the street.
"It's only half-past ten, now," he said. "I shall drop in here, and see the last scenes of the pantomime. Won't you come too?"
"No," said Mat; "I'm too sleepy. I shall go on home."
They separated. While Zack entered the theater, Mat proceeded steadily in the direction of the tobacco shop. As soon, however, as he was well out of the glare of gas from the theater door, he crossed the street; and, returning quickly by the opposite side of the way, took the road that led him back to Valentine's house.
CHAPTER XII. THE HAIR BRACELET.
Mr. Blyth's spirits sank apace, as he bolted and locked the front door, when his guests had left him. He actually sighed as he now took a turn or two alone, up and down the studio.
Three times did he approach close to the garden door, as he walked slowly from end to end of the room. But he never once looked up at it. His thoughts were wandering after Zack, and Zack's friend; and his attention was keeping them company. "Whoever this mysterious Mat may be," mused Valentine, stopping at the fourth turn, and walking up to the fireplace; "I don't believe there's anything bad about him; and so I shall tell Mrs. Thorpe the next time I see her."