The Dust of Conflict by Harold Bindloss

NETTIE HARDING had spent at least six weeks at Low Wood when she sat one afternoon on the lawn, gazing before her reflectively, with a book turned upside-down upon her knee. She had at one time wondered why she lingered there, though she found the company of Hester Earle congenial, and Hester's father had pressed her to extend her visit, while other reasons that appeared more or less convincing had not been wanting. The Northrop valley was very pretty, and the quiet, well-ordered life her English friends led pleasant, as a change from the turmoil of commercial enterprise and the fierce activity of the search for pleasure she had been accustomed to in America. The tranquillity of the green, peaceful country appealed to her, and she found interesting the quietly spoken men and women who so decorously directed what was done in it, partly because the type was new to her.

That, however, was at the beginning, for by and by she was willing to admit that Northrop might grow wearisome if she saw too much of it, and she could no longer hide from herself the fact that she had a more cogent reason for dallying there. She felt, though as yet it appeared quite likely that she might be mistaken, she was picking up the threads of a drama, the plot of which had been imperfectly revealed to her. This in itself was interesting, for she had at least as much inquisitiveness as most of her sex, and she was sensible of a little thrill of pleasurable excitement when the scent grew hotter. Still, she never asked an indiscreet question, and waited with a patience that is not usually a characteristic of the women of her nation until she was certain.