As he turned and closed the door--in the instant when he lost sight of
her--his disinclination to be associated with the private theatricals
revived. At the foot of the house-steps he stopped again; plucked a
twig from a plant near him; broke it in his hand; and looked about him
uneasily, on this side and on that. The path to the left led back to his
father's cottage--the way of escape lay open. Why not take it?
While he still hesitated, Mr. Vanstone and his daughter reached the
top of the steps. Once more, Magdalen looked round--looked with her
resistless beauty, with her all-conquering smile. She beckoned again;
and again he followed her--up the steps, and over the threshold. The
door closed on them.
So, with a trifling gesture of invitation on one side, with a trifling
act of compliance on the other: so--with no knowledge in his mind, with
no thought in hers, of the secret still hidden under the journey to
London--they took the way which led to that secret's discovery, through
many a darker winding that was yet to come.
CHAPTER V.
MR. VANSTONE'S inquiries into the proposed theatrical entertainment at
Evergreen Lodge were answered by a narrative of dramatic disasters; of
which Miss Marrable impersonated the innocent cause, and in which her
father and mother played the parts of chief victims.
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