Chapter 11 - Page 2

and kissed it, and then kissed again the beautiful mother; and calling
happily backward, "Good-by, my love; God keep you, love; good-by!" he
gave Mephisto his own wild will, and was soon lost to sight among the
trees of the park.

[Illustration: Katherine stood with her child in her arms]

Katherine stood with her child in her arms, listening to the ever faint
and fainter beat of Mephisto's hoofs. Her husband had gone back to duty,
his furlough had expired, and their long, and leisurely honeymoon was
over. But she was neither fearful nor unhappy. Hyde's friends had
procured his exchange into a court regiment. He was only going to
London, and he was still her lover. She looked forward with clear eyes
as she said gratefully over to herself, "So happy am I! So good is my
husband! So dear is my child! So fair and sweet is my home!"

And though to many minds Hyde Manor might seem neither fair nor sweet,
Katherine really liked it. Perhaps she had some inherited taste for low
lands, with their shimmer of water and patches of green; or perhaps the
gentle beauty of the landscape specially fitted her temperament. But, at
any rate, the wide brown stretches, dotted with lonely windmills and low
farmhouses, pleased her. So also did the marshes, fringed with yellow
and purple flags; and the great ditches, white with water-lilies; and
the high belts of natural turf; and the summer sunshine, which over this
level land had a white brilliancy to which other sunshine seemed shadow.
Hyde had never before found the country endurable, except during the
season when the marshes were full of birds; or when, at the Christmas
holidays, the ice was firm as marble and smooth as glass, and the wind
blowing fair from behind. Then he had liked well a race with the famous
fen-skaters.

The Manor House was neither handsome nor picturesque, though its
dark-red bricks made telling contrasts among the ivy and the few large
trees surrounding it. It contained a great number of rooms, but none
were of large proportions. The ceilings were low, and often crossed with
heavy oak beams; while the floors, though of polished oak, were very
uneven. Hyde had refurnished a few of the rooms; and the showy paperings
and chintzes, the fine satin and gilding, looked oddly at variance with
the black oak wainscots, the Elizabethan fireplaces, and the other
internal decorations.

Katherine, however, had no sense of any incongruity. She was charmed
with her home, from its big garrets to the great wine-bins in its
underground cellars; and while Hyde wandered about the fens with his
fishing-rod or gun, or went into the little town of Hyde to meet over a
market dinner the neighbouring squires, she was busy arranging every