Produced by Daniel Fromont <daniel.fromont@cnc.fr>
April 2005
2005 is the 150th anniversary of Mrs. Hungerford's birthday.
Mrs. Hungerford (Margaret Wolfe Hamilton) (1855?-1897)
The Hoyden (1894)
Tauchnitz edition
_The Hoyden_ reviewed in the _Scotsman_ :
"A clever, sprightly story... Fresh, sunshiny, and delightful"
COLLECTION
OF
BRITISH AUTHORS
TAUCHNITZ EDITION.
VOL. 2956.
THE HOYDEN.
BY MRS. HUNGERFORD.
IN TWO VOLUMES.
VOL. I.
TAUCHNITZ EDITION.
By the same Author.
MOLLY BAWN 2 vols.
MRS. GEOFFREY 2 vols.
FAITH AND UNFAITH 2 vols.
PORTIA 2 vols.
LOYS, LORD BERRESFORD, ETC. 1 vol.
HER FIRST APPEARANCE, ETC. 1 vol.
PHYLLIS 2 vols.
ROSSMOYNE 2 vols.
DORIS 2 vols.
A MAIDEN ALL FORLORN, ETC. 1 vol.
A PASSIVE CRIME, ETC. 1 vol.
GREEN PLEASURE AND GREY GRIEF 2 vols.
A MENTAL STRUGGLE 2 vols.
HER WEEK'S AMUSEMENT, ETC. 1 vol.
LADY BRANKSMERE 2 vols.
LADY VALWORTH'S DIAMONDS 1 vol.
A MODERN CIRCE 2 vols.
MARVEL 2 vols.
THE HON. MRS. VEREKER 1 vol.
UNDER-CURRENTS 2 vols.
IN DURANCE VILE, ETC. 1 vol.
A TROUBLESOME GIRL, ETC. 1 vol.
A LIFE'S REMORSE 2 vols.
A BORN COQUETTE 2 vols.
THE DUCHESS 1 vol.
LADY VERNER'S FLIGHT 1 vol.
A CONQUERING HEROINE, ETC. 1 vol.
NORA CREINA 2 vols.
A MAD PRANK, ETC. 1 vol.
THE HOYDEN
A NOVEL
BY MRS. HUNGERFORD
AUTHOR OF
"MOLLY BAWN," "PHYLLIS," "A CONQUERING
HEROINE,"
ETC. ETC.
_COPYRIGHT EDITION._
IN TWO VOLUMES.
VOL. I.
LEIPZIG
BERNHARD TAUCHNITZ
1894.
CONTENTS
OF VOLUME I.
CHAPTER I.
How Diamond cut Diamond, and how the Sparks flew
CHAPTER II.
How Margaret pleads for the little Hoyden, and with what Ill-success
CHAPTER III.
How Lady Rylton says a few Things that would have been better left
unsaid. How "The Scheme" is laid before Sir Maurice, and how he
refuses to have anything to do with it
CHAPTER IV.
How the Heart of Maurice grew hot within him, and how he put the
Question to the Touch, and how he neither lost nor won
CHAPTER V.
Showing how, when People do congregate together much Knowledge may
be found, and how the little Hoyden has some kind Things said about
her
CHAPTER VI.
How Games were played, "of Sorts"; and how Tita was much harried,
but how she bore herself valiantly, and, how, not knowing of her
Victories, she won all through
CHAPTER VII.
How the Argument grows higher; and how Marian loses her Temper, and
how Margaret objects to the Ruin of one young Life
CHAPTER VIII.
How a Storm raged; and how, when a Man and Woman met Face to Face,
the Victory--for a Wonder--went to the Man
CHAPTER IX.
How Maurice places his Life in the Hands of the Hoyden, and how she
tells him many Things, and desires many Things of him
CHAPTER X.
How Maurice gives Way to Temper, and how Lady Rylton plants a Shaft
or two. And how Margaret says a Word in Season, and how in return
Colonel Neilson says a Word to her
CHAPTER XI.
How the last Day comes, and how some strange Words are said before
the Marriage is accomplished; and how Marion Bethune scores a Point
CHAPTER XII.
How Tita comes back from her Honeymoon, and how her Husband's Mother
tells her of certain Things that should have been left untold
CHAPTER XIII.
How a young and lovely Nature takes a Shock most cruelly
administered. And how a Dowager takes a new Name as a direct Insult.
And how Tita declines to promise anything
CHAPTER XIV.
How Tita comes to Oakdean, and is glad. And how Maurice calls to
her, and she performs an Acrobatic Feat. And how a Discussion arises
CHAPTER XV.
How Tita tells of two strange Dreams, and of how they moved her. And
how Maurice sets his Soul on asking a Guest to Oakdean; and how he
gains his Desire
CHAPTER XVI.
How a dull Morning gives Birth to a strange Afternoon. And how
Rylton's Eyes are widened by a Friend
CHAPTER XVII.
How Tita suggests a Game of Blind Man's Buff, and what comes of it
CHAPTER XVIII.
How Tita gets a Scolding, and how she rebels and accuses Sir Maurice
of Breach of Contract
CHAPTER XIX.
How Rylton's Heart condemns him. And how, as he walks, a Serpent
stings him. And how he is recovered of his Wound. And how the little
Rift is mended--but with too fine Thread
CHAPTER XX.
How Tita takes high Ground, and how she brings her Husband, of all
People, to her Feet
CHAPTER XXI.
How everyone goes to Lady Warbeck's Dance, and helps to make it a
Success; and how many curious Things are said and done there
CHAPTER XXII.
How Rylton asks his Wife to tread a Measure with him, and how the
Fates weave a little Mesh for Tita's pretty Feet
CHAPTER XXIII.
How Marian fights for Mastery; and how the Battle goes; and how
Chance befriends the Enemy
CHAPTER XXIV.
How Rylton makes a most dishonourable Bet, and how he repents of it;
and how, though he would have withdrawn from it, he finds he cannot
CHAPTER XXV.
How Tita told a Secret to Tom Hescott in the Moonlight; and how he
sought to discover many Things, and how he was most innocently
baffled
CHAPTER XXVI.
How Tita looks at herself in the Glass, and wonders; and how she
does her Hair in quite a new Style, and goes to ask Sir Maurice what
he thinks of it; and how he answers her
CHAPTER XXVII.
How Sir Maurice feels uneasy; and how Tita, for once, shows herself
implacable, and refuses to accept the Overtures of Peace. And how a
little Gossip warms the Air
THE HOYDEN.
CHAPTER I.
HOW DIAMOND CUT DIAMOND, AND HOW THE SPARKS FLEW.
The windows are all wide open, and through them the warm, lazy
summer wind is stealing languidly. The perfume of the seringas from
the shrubbery beyond, mingled with all the lesser but more delicate
delights of the garden beneath, comes with the wind, and fills the
drawing-room of The Place with a vague, almost drowsy sense of
sweetness.
Mrs. Bethune, with a face that smiles always, though now her very
soul is in revolt, leans back against the cushions of her lounging
chair, her fine red hair making a rich contrast with the pale-blue
satin behind it.
"You think he will marry her, then?"
"Think, think!" says Lady Rylton pettishly. "I can't afford to
_think_ about it. I tell you he _must_ marry her. It has come to the
very last ebb with us now, and unless Maurice consents to this
arrangement----"
She spreads her beautiful little hands abroad, as if in eloquent
description of an end to her sentence.
Mrs. Bethune bursts out laughing. She can always laugh at pleasure.
"It sounds like the old Bible story," says she; "you have an only
son, and you must sacrifice him!"
"Don't study to be absurd!" says Lady Rylton, with a click of her
fan that always means mischief.
She throws herself back in her chair, and a tiny frown settles upon
her brow. She is such a small creation of Nature's that only a frown
of the slightest dimensions _could_ settle itself comfortably
between her eyes. Still, as a frown, it is worth a good deal! It has
cowed a good many people in its day, and had, indeed, helped to make
her a widow at an early age. Very few people stood up against Lady
Rylton's tempers, and those who did never came off quite unscathed.
"Absurd! Have I been absurd?" asks Mrs. Bethune. "My dear
Tessie"--she is Lady Rylton's niece, but Lady Rylton objects to
being called aunt--"such a sin has seldom been laid to my charge."
"Well, _I_ lay it," says Lady Rylton with some emphasis.
She leans back in her chair, and, once again unfurling the huge
black fan she carries, waves it to and fro.
Marian Bethune leans back in her chair too, and regards her aunt
with a gaze that never wavers. The two poses are in their way
perfect, but it must be confessed that the palm goes to the younger
woman.
It might well have been otherwise, as Lady Rylton is still, even at
forty-six, a very graceful woman. Small--very small--a sort of
pocket Venus as it were, but so carefully preserved that at
forty-six she might easily be called thirty-five. If it were not for
her one child, the present Sir Maurice Rylton, this fallacy might
have been carried through. But, unfortunately, Sir Maurice is now
twenty-eight by the church register. Lady Rylton hates church
registers; they tell so much; and truth is always so rude!
She is very fair. Her blue eyes have still retained their azure
tint--a strange thing at her age. Her little hands and feet are as
tiny now as when years ago they called all London town to look at
them on her presentation to her Majesty. She has indeed a charming
face, a slight figure, and a temper that would shame the devil.
It isn't a quick temper--one can forgive that. It is a temper that
remembers--remembers always, and that in a mild, ladylike sort of
way destroys the one it fastens upon. Yet she is a dainty creature;
fragile, fair, and pretty, even now. It is generally in these
dainty, pretty, soulless creatures that the bitterest venom of all
is to be found.
Her companion is different. Marian Bethune is a tall woman, with a
face not perhaps strictly handsome, but yet full of a beautiful
_diablerie_ that raises it above mere comeliness. Her hair is red--a
rich red--magnificent red hair that coils itself round her shapely
head, and adds another lustre to the exquisite purity of her skin.
Her eyes have a good deal of red in them, too, mixed with a warm
brown--wonderful eyes that hold you when they catch you, and are
difficult to forget. Some women are born with strange charms; Marian
Bethune is one of them. To go through the world with such charms is
a risk, for it must mean ruin or salvation, joy or desolation to
many. Most of all is it a risk to the possessor of those charms.
There have been some who have denied the right of Marian to the
title beautiful. But for the most part they have been women, and
with regard to those others--the male minority--well, Mrs. Bethune
could sometimes prove unkind, and there are men who do not readily
forgive. Her mouth is curious, large and full, but not easily to be
understood. Her eyes may speak, but her mouth is a sphinx. Yet it is
a lovely mouth, and the little teeth behind it shine like pearls.
For the rest, she is a widow. She married very badly; went abroad
with her husband; buried him in Montreal; and came home again. Her
purse is as slender as her figure, and not half so well worth
possessing. She says she is twenty-eight, and to her praise be it
acknowledged that she speaks the truth. Even _good_ women sometimes
stammer over this question!
"My sin, my sin?" demands she now gaily, smiling at Lady Rylton.
She flings up her lovely arms, and fastens them behind her head. Her
smile is full of mockery.
"Of course, my dear Marian, you cannot suppose that I have been
blind to the fact that you and Maurice have--for the past
year--been--er----"
"Philandering?" suggests Mrs. Bethune lightly.
She leans a little forward, her soft curved chin coming in
recognition.
"I beg, Marian, you won't be vulgar," says Lady Rylton, fanning
herself petulantly. "It's worse than being immoral."
"Far, _far_ worse!" Mrs. Bethune leans back in her chair, and laughs
aloud. "Well, I'm not immoral," says she.
Her laughter rings through the room. The hot sun behind her is
lighting the splendid masses of her red hair, and the disdainful
gleam that dwells in her handsome eyes.
"Of course not," says Lady Rylton, a little stiffly; "even to
_mention_ such a thing seems to be--er--a little----"
"_Only_ a little?" says Mrs. Bethune, arching her brows. "Oh,
Tessie!" She pauses, and then with an eloquent gesture goes on
again. "After all, why shouldn't I be immoral?" says she. Once again
she flings her arms above her head so that her fingers grow clasped
behind it. "It pays! It certainly pays. It is only the goody-goodies
who go to the wall."
"My _dear_ Marian!" says Lady Rylton, with a delicate pretence at
horror; she puts up her hands, but after a second or so bursts out
laughing. "I always say you are the one creature who amuses me,"
cries she, leaning back, and giving full play to her mirth. "I never
get _at_ you, somehow. I am never _quite_ sure whether you are very
good or very--well, very much the other thing. That is your charm."
The stupid, pretty little woman has reached a truth in spite of
herself--that _is_ Mrs. Bethune's charm.
A quick change passes over the latter's face. There is extreme
hatred in it. It is gone, however, as soon as born, and remains for
ever a secret to her companion.
"Does that amuse you?" says she airily. "I dare say a perpetual
riddle _is_ interesting. One can never guess it."
"As for that, I can read you easily enough," says Lady Rylton, with
a superior air. "You are original, but--yes--I can read you." She
could as easily have read a page of Sanscrit. "It is your
originality I like. I have never, in spite of many things, been in
the least sorry that I gave you a home on the death of
your--er--rather disreputable husband."
Mrs. Bethune looks sweetly at her.
"And _such_ a home!" says she.
"Not a word, not a word," entreats Lady Rylton graciously. "But to
return to Maurice. I shall expect you to help me in this matter,
Marian."
"Naturally."
"I have quite understood your relations with Maurice during the past
year. One, as a matter of course," with a shrug of her dainty
shoulders, "lets the nearest man make love to one---- But Maurice
must marry for money, and so must you."
"You are all wisdom," says Marian, showing her lovely teeth. "And
this girl? She has been here a week now, but as yet you have told me
nothing about her."
"I picked her up!" says Lady Rylton. She lays down her fan--looks
round her in a little mysterious fashion, as though to make doubly
sure of the apparent fact that there is no one in the room but her
niece and herself. "It was the most providential thing," she says;
"I was staying at the Warburtons' last month, and one day when
driving their abominable ponies along the road, suddenly the little
beasts took fright and bolted. You know the Warburtons, don't you?
They haven't an ounce of manners between them--themselves, or their
ponies, or anything else belonging to them. Well! They tore along as
if possessed----"
"The Warburtons?"
"No, the ponies; don't be silly?"
"_Such_ a relief!"
"And I really think they would have taken me over a precipice. You
can see"--holding out her exquisite little hands--"how inadequate
these would be to deal with the Warburton ponies. But for the timely
help of an elderly gentleman and a young girl--she looked a mere
child----"
"This Miss Bolton?"
"Yes. The old gentleman caught the ponies' heads--so did the girl.
You know my slender wrists--they were almost powerless from the
strain, but that _girl!_ her wrists seemed made of iron. She held
and held, until the little wretches gave way and returned to a sense
of decency."
"Perhaps they _are_ made of iron. Her people are in trade, you say?
It is iron, or buttons, or what?"
"I don't know, I'm sure, but at all events she is an heiress to
quite a tremendous extent. Two hundred thousand pounds, the
Warburtons told me afterwards; even allowing for exaggeration,
still, she must be worth a good deal, and poor dear Maurice, what is
_he_ worth?"
"Is it another riddle?" asks Mrs. Bethune.
"No, no, indeed! The answer is plain to all the world. The
Warburtons didn't know these people, these Boltons (so silly of
them, with a third son still unmarried), but when I heard of her
money I made inquiries. It appeared that she lived with her uncle.
Her father had died early, when she was quite young. Her mother was
dead too; this last was a _great_ comfort. And the uncle had kept
her in seclusion all her life. They are nobodies, dear Marian!
Nobodies at all, but that girl has two hundred thousand pounds, and
can redeem the property of all its mortgages--if only Maurice will
let her do it."
"But how did you ask her here?"
"How? What is simpler? The moment the Warburtons told me of the
wealth that would be that girl's on her marriage (I was careful to
make sure of the marriage point), I felt that an overpowering sense
of gratitude compelled me to go and call on her. She and her uncle
were new-comers in that county, and--it is very exclusive--so that
when I _did_ arrive, I was received with open arms. I was charming
to the old uncle, a frosty sort of person, but not objectionable in
any way, and I at once asked the niece to pay me a visit. They were
flattered, the uncle especially so; I expect he had been wanting to
get into Society--and as for the girl, she seemed overcome with
delight! A very second-class little creature I thought her. No
style! No suppression of her real feelings! She said at once how
glad she would be to come to me; she gave me the impression that she
would be glad to get away from her uncle! No idea of _hiding_
anything! So strange!"
"Strange enough to be almost a fresh fashion. Fancy her saying she
would be glad to come to _you!_ No wonder you were startled!"
"Well, she's here," says Lady Rylton, furling her fan. Mrs.
Bethune's little sarcasm has been lost upon her. "And now, how to
_use_ her? Maurice, though I have thrust the idea upon him, seems
averse to it."
"The idea?"
"Of marrying her, of course, and so redeeming himself. She is not
what I would have chosen for him, I admit that; but all things must
give way before the ruin that threatens us."
"Yes; true--all things," says Mrs. Bethune in a low tone.
"You see that. But how to bring Maurice to the point? He is so very
difficult. _You,_ Marian--you have influence with him----"
"I?"
Mrs. Bethune rises in the slow, beautiful fashion that is hers
always; she moves towards the window. There is no hurry, no undue
haste, to betray the disquietude of her soul.
"You--you, of course," says Lady Rylton peevishly. "I always rely
upon you."
"I have no influence!"
"You mean, of course, that you will not use it," says Lady Rylton
angrily. "You still think that you will marry him yourself, that
perhaps his uncle will die and leave him once more a rich man--the
master of The Place, as the old Place's master should be; but that
is a distant prospect, Marian."
Mrs. Bethune has swung around, her beautiful figure is drawn up to
its most stately height.
"Not another word!" says she imperiously. "What have I to do with
your son? Let him marry--let him marry----" She pauses as if
choking, but goes on again: "I tell you I have no influence--_none!_
Appeal to Margaret, she may help you!"
"She--no!"
"Hush! here she is. Yes; ask her," says Mrs. Bethune, as if desirous
of letting Lady Rylton hear the opinion of the new-comer on this
extraordinary subject.
CHAPTER II.
HOW MARGARET PLEADS FOR THE LITTLE HOYDEN, AND WITH WHAT
ILL-SUCCESS.
Margaret Knollys, entering the room and seeing the signs of
agitation in the two faces before her, stops on the threshold.
"I am disturbing you. I can come again," says she, in her clear,
calm voice.
"No," says Mrs. Bethune abruptly.
She makes a gesture as if to keep her.
"Not at all. Not at all, dear Margaret. Pray stay, and give me a
little help," says Lady Rylton plaintively.
She pulls forward a little chair near her, as if to show Margaret
that she must say, and Miss Knollys comes quickly to her. Marian
Bethune is Lady Rylton's real niece. Margaret is her niece by
marriage.
A niece to be proud of, in spite of the fact that she is thirty
years of age and still unmarried. Her features, taken separately,
would debar her for ever from being called either pretty or
beautiful; yet there have been many in her life-time who admired
her, and three, at all events, who would have gladly given their all
to call her theirs. Of these one is dead, and one is married, and
one--still hopes.
There had been a fourth. Margaret loved him! Yet he was the only one
whom Margaret should not have loved. He was unworthy in all points.
Yet, when he went abroad, breaking cruelly and indifferently all
ties with her (they had been engaged), Margaret still clung to him,
and ever since has refused all comers for his sake. Her face is long
and utterly devoid of colour; her nose is too large; her mouth a
trifle too firm for beauty; her eyes, dark and earnest, have,
however, a singular fascination of their own, and when she smiles
one feels that one _must_ love her. She is a very tall woman, and
slight, and gracious in her ways. She is, too, a great heiress, and
a woman of business, having been left to manage a huge property at
the age of twenty-two. Her management up to this has been faultless.
"Now, how can I help you?" asks she, looking at Lady Rylton. "What
is distressing you?"
"Oh! you know," says Mrs. Bethune, breaking impatiently into the
conversation. "About Maurice and this girl! This new girl! There,"
contemptuously, "have been so many of them!"
"You mean Miss Bolton," says Margaret, in her quiet way. "Do you
seriously mean," addressing Lady Rylton, "that you desire this
marriage?"
_ "Desire_ it? No. It is a necessity!" says Lady Rylton. "Who could
desire a daughter-in-law of no lineage, and with the most
objectionable tastes? But she has money! That throws a cloak over
all defects."
"I don't think that poor child has so many defects as you fancy,"
says Miss Knollys. "But for all that I should not regard her as a
suitable wife for Maurice."
Mrs. Bethune leans back in her chair and laughs.
"A suitable wife for Maurice!" repeats she. "Where is _she_ to be
found?"
"Here! In this girl!" declares Lady Rylton solemnly. "Margaret, you
know how we are situated. You know how low we have fallen--_you_ can
understand that in this marriage lies our last hope. If Maurice can
be induced to marry Miss Bolton----"
A sound of merry laughter interrupts her here. There comes the sound
of steps upon the terrace--running steps. Instinctively the three
women within the room grow silent and draw back a little. Barely in
time; a tiny, vivacious figure springs into view, followed by a
young man of rather stout proportions.
"No, no, no!" cries the little figure, "you couldn't beat me. I bet
you anything you like you couldn't. You may play me again if you
will, and then," smiling and shaking her head at him, "we shall
see!"
The windows are open and every word can be heard.
"Your future daughter-in-law," says Mrs. Bethune, in a low voice,
nodding her beautiful head at Lady Rylton.
"Oh, it is detestable! A hoyden--a mere _hoyden_," says Lady Rylton
pettishly. "Look at her hair!"
And, indeed, it must be confessed that the hoyden's hair is not all
it ought to be. It is in effect "all over the place"--it is straight
here, and wandering there; but perhaps its wildness helps to make
more charming the naughty childish little face that peeps out of it.
"She has no manners--_none!"_ says Lady Rylton. "She----"
"Ah, is that you, Lady Rylton?" cries the small creature on the
terrace, having caught a glimpse of her hostess through the window.
"Yes, come in--come in!" cries Lady Rylton, changing her tone at
once, and smiling and beckoning to the girl with long fingers. "I
hope you have not been fatiguing yourself on the tennis-courts, you
dearest child!"
Her tones are cooing.
"I have won, at all events!" says Tita, jumping in over the
window-sill. "Though Mr. Gower," glancing back at her companion,
"won't acknowledge it."
"Why should I acknowledge it?" says the stout young man. "It's folly
to acknowledge anything."
"But the truth is the truth!" says the girl, facing him.
"Oh, no; on the contrary, it's generally a lie," says he.
"You ought to be ashamed of yourself," says Miss Bolton, turning her
back on him, which proceeding seems to fill the stout young man's
soul with delight.
"Do come and sit down, dear child; you look exhausted," says Lady
Rylton, still cooing.
"I'm not," says Tita, shaking her head. "Tennis is not so very
exhausting--is it, Mrs. Bethune?"
"I don't know, I'm sure. It seems to have exhausted your hair, at
all events," says Mrs. Bethune, with her quick smile. "I think you
had better go upstairs and settle it; it is very untidy."
"Is it? Is it?" says Tita.
She runs her little fingers through her pretty short locks, and
gazes round. Her eyes meet Margaret's.
"No, no," says the latter, laughing. "It looks like the hair of a
little girl. You," smiling, _"are_ a little girl. Go away and finish
your fight with Mr. Gower."
"Yes. Come! Miss Knollys is on my side. She knows I shall win," says
the stout young man; and, whilst disputing with him at every step,
Tita disappears.
"What a girl! No style, no manners," says Lady Rylton; "and yet I
must receive her as a daughter. Fancy living with that girl! A silly
child, with her hair always untidy, and a laugh that one can hear a
mile off. Yet it must be done."
"After all, it is Maurice who will have to live with her," says Mrs.
Bethune.
"Oh, I hope not," says Margaret quickly.
"Why?" asks Lady Rylton, turning to her with sharp inquiry.
"It would never do," says Margaret with decision. "They are not
suited to each other. Maurice! and that _baby!_ It is absurd! I
should certainly not counsel Maurice to take such a step as that!"
"Why not? Good heavens, Margaret, I hope you are not in love with
him, too!" says Lady Rylton.
"Too?"
Margaret looks blank.
"She means me," says Mrs. Bethune, with a slight, insolent smile.
"You know, don't you, how desperately in love with Maurice I am?"
"I know nothing," says Miss Knollys, a little curtly.
"Ah, you will!" says Mrs. Bethune, with her queer smile.
"The fact is, Margaret," says Lady Rylton, with some agitation,
"that if Maurice doesn't marry this girl, there--there will be an
end of us all. He _must_ marry her."
"But he doesn't love--he barely knows her--and a marriage without
love----"
"Is the safest thing known."
"Under given circumstances! I grant you that if two people well on
in life, old enough to know their own minds, and what they are
doing, were to marry, it might be different. They might risk a few
years of mere friendship together, and be glad of the venture later
on. But for two _young_ people to set out on life's journey with
nothing to steer by--that would be madness!"
"Ah! yes. Margaret speaks like a book," says Mrs. Bethune, with an
amused air; "Maurice, you see, is _so_ young, _so_
inexperienced----"
"At all events, Tita is only a child."
"Tita! Is that her name?"
"A pet name, I fancy. Short for Titania; she is such a little
thing."
"Titania--Queen of the Fairies; I wonder if the original Titania's
father dealt in buttons! Is it buttons, or soap, or tar? You didn't
say," says Mrs. Bethune, turning to Lady Rylton.
"I really don't know--and as it _has_ to be trade, I can't see that
it matters," says Lady Rylton, frowning.
"Nothing matters, if you come to think of it," says Mrs. Bethune.
"Go on, Margaret--you were in the middle of a sermon; I dare say we
shall endure to the end."
"I was saying that Miss Bolton is only a child."
"She is seventeen. She told us about it last night at dinner. Gave
us month and day. It was very clever of her. We _ought_ to give her
birthday-gifts, don't you think? And yet you call her a child!"
"At seventeen, what else?"
"Don't be ridiculous, Margaret," says Lady Rylton pettishly; "and,
above all things, don't be old-fashioned. There is no such product
nowadays as a child of seventeen. There isn't _time_ for it. It has
gone out! The idea is entirely exploded. Perhaps there were children
aged seventeen long ago--one reads of them, I admit, but it is too
long ago for one to remember. Why, I was only eighteen when I
married your uncle."
"Pour uncle!" says Mrs. Bethune; her tone is full of feeling.
Lady Rylton accepts the feeling as grief for the uncle's death; but
Margaret, casting a swift glance at Mrs. Bethune, wonders if it was
meant for grief for the uncle's life--_with_ Lady Rylton.
"He was the ugliest man I ever saw, without exception," says Lady
Rylton placidly; "and I was never for a moment blind to the fact,
but he was well off at that time, and, of course, I married him. I
wasn't in love with him." She pauses, and makes a little apologetic
gesture with her fan and shoulders. "Horrid expression, isn't it?"
says she. "In love! So terribly _bourgeois_. It ought to be done
away with. However, to go on, you see how admirably my marriage
turned out. Not a hitch anywhere. Your poor dear uncle and I never
had a quarrel. I had only to express a wish, and it was gratified."
"Poor dear uncle was so clever," says Mrs. Bethune, with lowered
lids.
Again Margaret looks at her, but is hardly sure whether sarcasm is
really meant.
"Clever? Hardly, perhaps," says Lady Rylton meditatively. "Clever is
scarcely the word."
"No, wise--wise is the word," says Mrs. Bethune.
Her eyes are still downcast. It seems to Margaret that she is
inwardly convulsed with laughter.
"Well, wise or not, we lived in harmony," says Lady Rylton with a
sigh and a prolonged sniff at her scent-bottle. "With us it was
peace to the end."
"Certainly; it was peace _at_ the end," says Mrs. Bethune solemnly.
It was, indeed, a notorious thing that the late Sir Maurice had
lived in hourly fear of his wife, and had never dared to contradict
her on any subject, though he was a man of many inches, and she one
of the smallest creatures on record.
"True! true! _You_ knew him so well!" says Lady Rylton, hiding her
eyes behind the web of a handkerchief she is holding. One tear would
have reduced it to pulp. "And when he was----" She pauses.
"Was dead?" says Margaret kindly, softly.
"Oh, _don't,_ dear Margaret, _don't!"_ says Lady Rylton, with a
tragical start. "That dreadful word! One should never mention death!
It is so rude! He, your poor uncle--he _left_ us with the sweetest
resignation on the 18th of February, 1887."
"I never _saw_ such resignation," says Mrs. Bethune, with deep
emphasis.
She casts a glance at Margaret, who, however, refuses to have
anything to do with it. But, for all that, Mrs. Bethune is clearly
enjoying herself. She can never, indeed, refrain from sarcasm, even
when her audience is unsympathetic.
"Yes, yes; he was resigned," says Lady Rylton, pressing her
handkerchief to her nose.
"So much so, that one might almost think he was _glad_ to go," says
Mrs. Bethune, nodding her head with beautiful sympathy.
She is now shaking with suppressed laughter.
"Yes; glad. It is such a comfort to dwell on it," says Lady Rylton,
still dabbing her eyes. "He was happy--quite happy when he left me."
"I never saw anyone so happy," says Mrs. Bethune.
Her voice sounds choking; no doubt it is emotion. She rises and goes
to the window. The emotion seems to have got into her shoulders.
"All which proves," goes on Lady Rylton, turning to Margaret, "that
a marriage based on friendship, even between two young people, is
often successful."
"But surely in your case there was love on one side," says Miss
Knollys, a little impatiently. "My uncle----"
"Oh, he _adored_ me!" cries she ecstatically, throwing up her pretty
hands, her vanity so far overcoming her argument that she grows
inconsistent. "You know," with a little simper, "I was a belle in my
day."
"I have heard it," says Margaret hastily, who, indeed, has heard it
_ad nauseam_. "But with regard to this marriage, Tessie, I don't
believe you will get Maurice to even think of it."
"If I don't, then he is ruined!" Lady Rylton gets up from her chair,
and takes a step or two towards Margaret. "This house-party that I
have arranged, with this girl in it, is a last effort," says she in
a low voice, but rather hysterically. She clasps her hands together.
"He must--he _must_ marry her. If he refuses----"
"But she may refuse him," says Margaret gently; "you should think of
that."
"She--she refuse? You are mad!" says Lady Rylton. "A girl--a girl
called _Bolton."_
"It is certainly an ugly name," says Margaret in a conciliatory way.
"And yet you blame me because I desire to give her Rylton instead, a
name as old as England itself. I tell you, Margaret," with a little
delicate burst of passion, "that it goes to my very soul to accept
this girl as a daughter. She--she is _hateful_ to me, not only
because of her birth, but in every way. She is antagonistic to me.
She--would you believe it?--she has had the audacity to argue with
me about little things, as if she--_she,"_ imperiously, "should have
an opinion when I was present."
"My dear Tessie, we all have opinions, and you know you said
yourself that at seventeen nowadays one is no longer a child."
"I wish, Margaret, you would cure yourself of that detestable habit
of repeating one's self _to_ one's self," says Lady Rylton
resentfully. "There," sinking back in her chair, and saturating her
handkerchief with some delicate essence from a little Louis Quatorze
bottle beside her, "it isn't worth so much worry. But to say that
she would refuse Maurice----"
"Why should she not? She looks to me like a girl who would not care
to risk all her future life for mere position. I mean," says
Margaret a little sadly, "that she looks to me as if she would be
like that when she is older, and understands."
"Then she must look to you like a fool," says Lady Rylton
petulantly.
"Hardly that. Like a girl, rather, with sense, and with a heart."
"My dear girl, we know how romantic you are, we know that old story
of yours," says Lady Rylton, who can be singularly nasty at times.
"Such an _old_ story, too. I think you might try to forget it."
"Does one ever forget?" says Margaret coldly. A swift flush has dyed
her pale face. "And story or no story, I shall always think that the
woman who marries a man without caring for him is a far greater fool
than the woman who marries a man for whom she does care."
"After all, I am not thinking of a woman," says Lady Rylton with a
shrug. "I am thinking of Maurice. This girl has money; and, of
course, she will accept him if I can only induce him to ask her."
"It is not altogether of course!"
_"I_ think it is," says Lady Rylton obstinately.
Miss Knollys shrugs her shoulders.
All at once Mrs. Bethune turns from the window and advances towards
Margaret. There is a sudden fury in her eyes.
"What do you mean?" says she, stopping short before Miss Knollys,
and speaking with ill-suppressed rage. "Who is _she_, that she
should refuse him? That little, contemptible child! That nobody! I
tell you, she would not dare refuse him if she asked her! It would
be too great an honour for her."
She stops. Her fingers tighten on her gown. Then, as suddenly as it
grew, her ungovernable fit of anger seems to die checked, killed by
her own will. She sinks into the chair behind her, and looks
deliberately at Margaret with an air that, if not altogether
smiling, is certainly altogether calm. It must have cost her a good
deal to do it.
"It is beyond argument," says she; "he will not ask her."
"He _shall,"_ says Lady Rylton in a low tone.
Margaret rises, and moves slowly towards one of the open windows;
she pauses there a moment, then steps out on to the balcony, and so
escapes. These incessant discussions are abhorrent to her, and just
now her heart is sad for the poor child who has been brought down
here ostensibly for amusement, in reality for business. Of course,
Maurice will not marry her--she knows Maurice, he is far above all
that sort of thing; but the very attempt at the marriage seems to
cover the poor child with insult. And she is such a pretty child.
At this moment the pretty child, with Randal Gower, comes round the
corner; she has her skirt caught up at one side, and Miss Knollys
can see it is full of broken biscuits. The pulling up of the skirt
conduces a good deal to the showing of a lovely little foot and
ankle, and Margaret, who has the word "hoyden" still ringing in her
ears, and can see Lady Rylton's cold, aristocratic, disdainful face,
wishes the girl had had the biscuit in a basket.
"Oh, here is Miss Knollys!" cries Tita, running to her. "We are going
to feed the swans" (she looks back at her companion). "He has got
some more biscuits in his pockets."
"It's quite true," says Mr. Gower; "I'm nothing but biscuits. Every
pocket's full of 'em, and they've gone to dust. I tried to blow my
nose a moment ago, but I couldn't. One can't blow one's nose in
biscuit."
"Come with us, Miss Knollys--do," says Tita coaxingly.
"I can't. Not now. I can't," says Margaret, who is a little troubled
at heart. "Go, dear child, and feed the swans, and take care of her,
Randy--take care of her."
"I'll do my best," says Mr. Gower, with much solemnity; "but it's
small--very small. As a rule, Miss Bolton takes care of me."
Margaret gives him a last admonitory glance and turns away. In
truth, Mr. Gower is but a broken reed to lean upon.
CHAPTER III.
HOW LADY RYLTON SAYS A FEW THINGS THAT WOULD HAVE BEEN BETTER LEFT
UNSAID. HOW "THE SCHEME" IS LAID BEFORE SIR MAURICE, AND HOW HE
REFUSES TO HAVE ANYTHING TO DO WITH IT.
In the meantime the conversation in the drawing-room has been going
on.
"Of course, if you think you can persuade him," says Mrs. Bethune
presently.
"I know I shall. One can always persuade a man where his interests
lie. Besides, I have great weight with him. I tell you I shall
manage him. I could always manage his father."
A curious expression crosses Mrs. Bethune's face. The present
Baronet may not prove so easy of management as his father!
"Well, I can only wish you success," says she, with a shrug. "By the
way, Margaret did not back you up in this scheme as cordially as I
deemed possible."
"Margaret is troublesome," says Lady Rylton. "Just when you expect
her to sympathize with you, she starts off at a tangent on some
other absurd idea. She is full of fads. After all, it would be rash
to depend on her. But _you_, Marian--you owe me much."
"How much? My life's blood?"
Mrs. Bethune lets her hands fall clasped upon her knees, and,
leaning over them, looks at her aunt--such a wonderfully young aunt,
with her yellow hair and her sparkling eyes! Marian's lips have
taken a cynical turn; her smile now is unpleasant.
"What a hideous expression!" says Lady Rylton, shuddering. "You
spoil yourself, Marian; you do indeed. You will never make a good
marriage if you talk like that. 'Life's blood'!--_detestable!"_
"I don't desire a good marriage, as _you_ regard it."
Lady Rylton sits suddenly quite upright.
"If you mean marriage with Maurice," says she, "put that out of your
head. You must be mad to cherish such a hope. You are both paupers,
for one thing, and for the rest, I assure you, my dear, Maurice is
not as infatuated about you as you are about him!"
Mrs. Bethune makes a sudden movement; it is slight. Her face
darkens. One reading between the lines might at this moment see that
she could have killed Lady Rylton with a wondrous joy. Killing has
its consequences, however, and she only stands quite quiet, looking
at her foe. What a look it is!
"It is you who are mad," says she calmly. "What I meant was that I
should probably marry some rich nobody for the sake of his wealth.
It would be quite in my line. I should arrange him, form him, bring
him into Society, even against Society's will! There is a certain
excitement in the adventure. As for Maurice, he is no doubt in your
eyes a demigod--in mine," with infinite contempt, "he is a man."
"Well, I hope you will keep to all that," says Lady Rylton, who is
shrewd as she is cruel, "and that you will not interfere with this
marriage I have arranged for Maurice."
"Why would I interfere?"
"Because you interfere always. You can't bear to see any man love
any woman but yourself."
Mrs. Bethune smiles. "A common fault. It belongs to most women. But
this girl--you like her?"
"On the contrary, as I have told you, I detest her. Once Maurice has
her money safely in his hands, I shall know how to deal with her. A
little, ignorant, detestable child! I tell you, Marian, that the
time will come when I shall pay her out for her silly insolence
towards me."
"She is evidently going to have a good time if Maurice proposes to
her."
"He _shall_ propose. Why----" She breaks off suddenly. "Not another
word," says she, putting up her hand. "Here is Maurice. I shall
speak to him now."
"Shall I stay and help you?"
"No, thank you," says Lady Rylton, with a little knowing grimace.
Seeing it, Marian's detestation grows apace. She rises--and calmly,
yet swiftly, leaves the room. Sir Maurice is only crossing the lawn
now, and by running through the hall outside, and getting on to the
veranda outside the dining-room window, she can see him before he
enters the drawing-room.
Gaining the veranda, she leans over the railings and makes a signal
to him; it is an old signal. Rylton responds to it, and in a second
is by her side.
"Oh no, you must not stay; your mother is waiting for you in the
south drawing-room. She saw you coming; she wants you."
"Well, but about what?" asks Rylton, naturally bewildered.
"Nothing--only--she is going to advise you for your good. Shall I,"
smiling at him in her beautiful way, and laying one hand upon his
breast--"shall I advise you, too?"
"Yes, yes," says Rylton; he takes the hand lying on his breast and
lifts it to his lips. "Advise me."
"Ah, no!" She pauses, a most eloquent pause, filled with a long deep
glance from her dark eyes. _"There, go!"_ she says, suddenly pushing
him from her.
"But your advice?" asks he, holding her.
"Pouf! as if that was worth anything." She looks up at him from
under her lowered lids. "Well, take it. My advice to you is to come
to the rose-garden as soon as possible, and see the roses before
they fade out of all recognition! _I_ am going there now. You know
how I love that rose-garden; I almost live there nowadays."
"I wish I could live there too," says Rylton, laughing.
He lifts her hand again and presses it fondly to his lips.
Something, however, in his air, though it had breathed devotion,
troubles Mrs. Bethune; she frowns as he leaves her, and, turning
into a side-path the leads to the rose-garden, gives herself up a
prey to thought.
* * * * *
Rylton, with a shrug, goes toward the room where Marian had told him
his mother was awaiting him. He could very readily (as Lady Rylton
had not formally requested his presence) have stayed away, but long
experience has driven into him the knowledge that when his mother
wants anything, all the delays and subterfuges and evasions in the
world will not prevent her having it. To get it over, then, as soon
as possible is the chief thing. And, after all, he is so far happy
in that he knows what the immediate interview is to be about. That
little ridiculous girl--not half a bad little girl--but----
It is with quite a resigned air that he seats himself on the lounge,
and agrees with himself to make his mother happy by letting her talk
to him uninterruptedly for ten minutes.
"Women like to talk," says Sir Maurice to himself, as he sits on the
lounge where Marian had just now sat. He finds consolation in his
mother's poodle, who climbs on his knees, giving herself up a
willing prey to his teasing.
"Maurice, you are not attending," says Lady Rylton at last, with a
touch of serious anger.
"I am indeed--I am, I assure you," says Maurice, looking up. "If I'm
not, it's your poodle's fault; she is such a fascinating creature."
As he says this he makes a little attack on the poodle, who snaps
back at him, barking vigorously, and evidently enjoying herself
immensely.
"I want a decisive answer from you," says his mother.
"A decisive answer! How can I give that?"
He is still laughing, but even as he laughs a sound from without
checks him. It is another laugh--happy, young, joyous. Instinctively
both he and Lady Rylton look towards the open window. There below,
still attended by Mr. Gower, and coming back from her charitable
visit to the swans, is Tita, her little head upheld, her bright eyes
smiling, her lips parted. There is a sense of picturesque youth
about the child that catches Rylton's attention, and holds it for
the moment.
"There she is," says he at last, looking back over his shoulder at
his mother. "Is _that_ the wife you have meted out for me--that
baby?"
"Be serious about it, Maurice; it is a serious latter, I assure
you."
"Fancy being serious with a baby! She's too young, my dear mother.
She couldn't know her duty to her neighbours yet, to say nothing of
her duty to her husband."
"You could teach her."
"I doubt it. They have taken that duty off nowadays, haven't they?"
He is still looking at Tita through the window; her gay little laugh
comes up to him again. "Do you know, she is very pretty," says he
dispassionately; "and what a little thing! She always makes me think
of a bird, or a mouse, or a----"
"Think of her as a girl," says his mother impatiently.
"Certainly. After all, it would be impossible to think of her as a
boy; she's too small."
"I don't know about that," said Lady Rylton, shrugging her
shoulders. "She's much more a boy than a girl, where her manners are
concerned."
"Poor little hoyden! That's what you call her, isn't it--a hoyden?"
"Did Marian tell you that?"
"Marian? Certainly not!" says Sir Maurice, telling his lie
beautifully. "Marian thinks her beneath notion. So would you,
if----" He pauses. "If she hadn't a penny you wouldn't know her," he
says presently; "and you admit she has no manners, yet you ask me to
marry her. Now, if I did marry her, what should I do with her?"
"Educate her! Control her! Says his mother, a little viciously.
"I confess I am not equal to the occasion. I could not manage a
baby. The situation doesn't suit me."
"Maurice--it _must!"_ Lady Rylton rises, and, standing near him with
her hand on the table, looks at him with a pale face. "You find
fault with her; so do I, and frankly admit she is the last woman in
the world I should have chosen for you if I could help it, but she
is one of the richest girls in England. And after all, though I
detest the very sound of it, Trade is now our master. You object to
the girl's youth; that, however, is in her favour. You can mould her
to your own designs, and"--she casts a bitter glance at him that
will not be suppressed--"all women cannot be widows. Then, as for
her being so little a creature, she is surely quite as tall as I am,
and your father--you know, Maurice, how devoted he was to me."
"Oh yes, poor old Dad!" says Maurice, with a movement that might
mean pain. He seldom speaks of his father--_never_ to his mother. He
had certainly loved his father. He moves quickly to the further end
of the room.
"You will think of this girl, Maurice?"
"Oh, if that's all," laughing shortly, "you have arranged for that.
One can't help thinking of the thing that is thrust under one's eyes
morning, noon, and night. I shall think of her certainly until she
goes away." He stops, and then says abruptly, "When is she going?"
"When her engagement to you is an accomplished fact."
"My dear mother, how absurd it all is! Poor little girl, and what a
shame too! She doesn't even like me! We shouldn't be taking her name
in vain like this. By-the-bye, what queer eyes she has!--have you
noticed?"
"She has two hundred thousand pounds," says Lady Rylton solemnly.
"That is of far greater consequence. You know how it is with us,
Maurice. We can hold on very little longer. If you persist in
refusing this last chance, the old home will have to go. We shall be
beggars!" She sinks back in her chair, and sobs softly but bitterly.
"Don't go on like that--don't!" says Rylton, coming over to her and
patting her shoulder tenderly. "There must be some other way out of
it. I know we are in a hole more or less, but----"
"How lightly you speak of it! Who is to pay your debts? You know how
your gambling on the turf has ruined us--brought us to the very
verge of disgrace and penury, and now, when you _can _help to set
the old name straight again, you refuse--refuse!" She stops as if
choking.
"I don't think my gambling debts are the actual cause of our
worries," says her son, rather coldly. "If I have wasted a few
hundred on a race here and there, it is all I have done. When the
property came into my hands it was dipped very deeply."
"You would accuse your father----" begins she hotly.
Rylton pauses. "No; not my father," says he distinctly, if gently.
"You mean, then, that you accuse _me!"_ cries she, flashing round at
him.
All at once her singularly youthful face grows as old as it ought to
be--a vindictive curve round the mouth makes that usually charming
feature almost repulsive.
"My dear mother, let us avoid a scene," says her son sternly. "To
tell you the truth, I have had too many of them of late."
Something in his manner warns her to go no farther in the late
direction. If she is to win the cause so close to her heart, she had
better refrain from recrimination--from an accusation of any sort.
"Dearest Maurice," says she, going to him and taking his hand in
hers, "you know it is for your sake only I press this dreadful
matter. She is so rich, and you--we--are so poor! She has a house in
Surrey, and one in the North--delightful places, I have been
told--and, of course, she would like you to keep up your own house
in town. As for me, all I ask is this old house--bare and
uncomfortable as it is."
"Nonsense, mother," letting her hand go and turning away
impatiently. "You speak as if it were all settled."
"Why should it _not_ be settled?"
"You talk without thinking!" He is frowning now, and his tone is
growing angry. "Am I the only one to be consulted?"
"Oh! as for her--that child! Of course you can influence her."
"I don't want to," wearily.
"You can do more than that. You are very good-looking, Maurice. You
can----" She hesitates.
"Can what?" coldly.
"Fascinate her."
"I shall certainly not even try to do that. Good heavens! what do
you mean?" says her son, colouring a dark red with very shame. "Are
you asking me to make love to this girl--to pretend an admiration
for her that I do not feel? To--to--_lie_ to her?"
"I am only asking you to be sensible," says his mother sullenly. She
has gone back to her chair, and now, with lowered lids and
compressed lips, is fanning herself angrily.
"I shan't be sensible in that way," says her son, very hotly. "Put
it out of your head. To me Miss Bolton (it is really ridiculous to
call her Miss anything; she ought to be Betty, or Lizzie, or Lily,
or whatever her name is, to everyone at her age)--to me she seems
nothing but a baby--and--I _hate_ babies!"
"Marian has taught you!" Says his mother, with a sneer. "_She_
certainly is not a baby, whatever else she may be. But I tell you
this, Maurice, that you will hate far more being left a beggar in
the world, without enough money to keep yourself alive."
"I am sure I can keep myself alive."
"Yes, but how? _You_, who have been petted and pampered all your
life?"
"Oh, _don't_ speak to me as if I were in the cradle!" says Maurice,
with a shrug.
"Do you never think?"
"Sometimes".
"Oh yes, of Marian. That designing woman! Do you believe _I_ haven't
read her, if you are still blind? She will hold you on and on and
on. And if your uncle _should_ chance to die, why, then she will
marry you; but if in the meantime she meets anyone with money who
will marry her, why, good-bye to _you_. But you must not marry! Mind
that! You must be held in chains whilst she goes free. Really,
Maurice," rising and regarding him with extreme contempt, "your
folly is so great over this absurd infatuation for Marian, that
sometimes I wonder if you can be my own son."
"I am my father's son also," says Maurice. "He, I believe, did
sometimes believe in somebody. He believed in you."
He turns away abruptly, and an inward laugh troubles him. Was that
last gibe not an argument against himself, his judgment? Like his
father; _is_ he like his father? Can he, too, see only gold where
dross lies deep? Sometimes, of late he has doubted. The laughter
dies away, he sighs heavily.
"He was wise," says Lady Rylton coolly. "He had no cause to regret
his belief. But you, you sit in a corner, as it were, and see
nothing but Marian smiling. You never see Marian frowning. Your
corner suits you. It would trouble you too much to come out into the
middle of the room and look around Marian. And in the end what will
it all come to? _Nothing!"_
"Then why make yourself so unhappy about nothing?"
"Because----"
"My dear mother," turning rather fiercely on her, "let us have an
end of this. Marian would not marry me. She has refused me many
times."
"I am quite aware of that," says Lady Rylton calmly. "She has taken
care to tell me so. She will never marry you unless you get your
uncle's money (and he is as likely to live to be a Methuselah as
anyone I ever saw; the scandalous way in which he takes care of his
health is really a byword!), but she will hold you on until----"
"I asked you not to go on with this," says Rylton, interrupting he
again. "If you have nothing better to say to me than the abuse of
Marian, I----"
"But I have. What is Marian, what is _anything_ to me except your
marriage with Tita Bolton? Maurice, think of it. Promise me you will
think of it. Maurice, don't go."
She runs to him, lays her hand on his arm, and tries to hold him.
"I must." He lifts her hand from his arm, presses it, and drops it
deliberately. "My dear mother, I can't; I can't, really," says he.
She stands quite still. As he reaches the door, he looks back. She
is evidently crying. A pang shoots through his heart. But it is all
so utterly impossible. To marry that absurd child! It is out of
question. Still, her tears trouble him. He can see her crying as he
crosses the hall, and then her words begin to trouble him even more.
What was it she had said about Marian? It was a hint, a very broad
one. It meant that Marian might love him if he were a poor man, but
could love him much more if he were a rich one. As a fact, she would
marry him if he had money, but not if he were penniless. After all,
why not? She, Marian, had often said all that to him, or at least
some of it. But that other word, of her marrying some other man
should he appear----
CHAPTER IV.
HOW THE HEART OF MAURICE GREW HOT WITHIN HIM, AND HOW HE PUT THE
QUESTION TO THE TOUCH, AND HOW HE NEITHER LOST NOR WON.
Mrs. Bethune, sauntering slowly between the bushes laden with
exquisite blooms, all white and red and yellow, looks up as he
approaches her with a charming start.
"You!" she says, smiling, and holding out her hand--a large hand but
beautiful. "It is my favourite spot. But that _you_ should have come
here too!"
"You knew I should come!" returns he gravely. Something in her
charming air of surprise jars upon him at this moment. Why should
she pretend?--and to him!
"I knew?"
"You told me you were coming here."
"Ah, what a lovely answer!" says she, with a glance from under her
long lashes, that--whatever her answer may be--certainly _is_
lovely.
Rylton regards her moodily. If she really loved him, would she
coquet with him like this--would she so pretend? All in a second, as
he stands looking at her, the whole of the past year comes back to
him. A strange year, fraught with gladness and deep pain--with fears
and joys intense! What had it all meant? If anything, it had meant
devotion to her--to his cousin, who, widowed, all but penniless, had
been flung by the adverse winds of Fate into his home.
She was the only daughter of Lady Rylton's only brother, and the
latter had taken her in, and in a measure adopted her. It was a
strange step for her to take--for one so little led by kindly
impulses, or rather for one who had so few kindly impulses to be led
by; but everyone has a soft spot somewhere in his heart, and Lady
Rylton had loved her brother, good-for-nothing as he was. There
might have been a touch of remorse, too, in her charity; she had
made Marian's marriage!
Grudgingly, coldly, she opened her son's doors to her niece, but
still she opened them. She was quite at liberty to do this, as
Maurice was seldom at home, and gave her always _carte blanche_ to
do as she would with all that belonged to him. She made Marian
Bethune's life for the first few months a burden to her, and then
Marian Bethune, who had waited, took the reins in a measure; at all
events, she made herself so useful to Lady Rylton that the latter
could hardly get on without her.
Maurice had fallen in love with her almost at once; insensibly but
thoroughly. There had been an hour in which he had flung himself,
metaphorically, at her feet (one never does the real thing now,
because it spoils one's trousers so), and offered his heart, and all
the fortune still left to him after his mother's reign; and Marian
had refused it all, very tenderly, very sympathetically, very
regretfully--to tell the truth--but she _had_ refused it.
She had sweetened the refusal by declaring that, as she could not
marry him--as she could not to be so selfish as to ruin his
prospects--she would never marry at all. She had looked lovely in
the light of the dying sunset as she said all this to him, and
Maurice had believed in her a thousand times more than before, and
had loved her a thousand times deeper. And in a sense his belief was
justified. She did love him, as she had never loved before, but not
well enough to risk poverty again. She had seen enough of that in
her first marriage, and in her degradation and misery had sworn a
bitter oath to herself never again to marry, unless marriage should
sweep her into the broad river of luxury and content. Had Maurice's
financial affairs been all they ought to have been but for his
mother's extravagances, she undoubtedly would have chosen him before
all the world; but Maurice's fortunes were (and are) at a low ebb,
and she would risk nothing. His uncle _might_ die, and then Maurice,
who was his heir, would be a rich man; but his uncle was only
sixty-five, and he might marry again, and---- No, she would refuse!
Rylton had pressed his suit many times, but she had never yielded.
It was always the same argument, she would not ruin _him_. But one
day--only the other day, indeed--she had said something that made
him know she sometimes counted on his uncle's death. She would marry
him then! She would not marry a poor man, however much she loved
him. The thought that she was waiting for his uncle's death revolted
him at the moment, and though he forgave her afterwards, still the
thought rankled.
It hurt him, in a sense, that she could _desire_ death--the death of
another--to create her own content.
His mother had hinted at it only just now! Marian feared, she
said--feared to step aboard his sinking ship. Where, then, was her
love, that perfect love that casteth out all fear?
A wave of anger rushes over him as he looks at her now--smiling,
fair, with large, deep, gleaming eyes. He tells himself he will know
at once what it is she means--what is the worth of her love.
She is leaning towards him, a soft red rosebud crushed against her
lips.
"Ah, yes! It is true. I _did_ know you were coming," says she
tenderly.
She gives a hasty, an almost imperceptible glance around. Lady
Rylton is often a little--just a _little_--prone to
prying--especially of late; ever since the arrival of that small
impossible heiress, for example; and then very softly she slips her
hand into his.
"What an evening!" says she with delicate fervour. "How sweet, how
perfect, Maurice!"
"Well?" in a rather cold, uncompromising way.
Mrs. Bethune gives him a quick glance.
"What a tone!" says she; "you frighten me!"
She laughs softly, sweetly. She draws closer to him--closer
still;--and, laying her cheek against his arm, rubs it lightly,
caressingly, up and down.
"Look here!" says he quickly, catching her by both arms, and holding
her a little away from him; "I have a question to ask you."
"There is always a question," says she, smiling still, "between
friends and foes, then why not between--_lovers?"_
She lingers over the word, and, stooping her graceful head, runs her
lips lightly across the hand that is holding her right arm.
A shiver runs through Rylton. Is she true or false? But, however it
goes, how exquisite she is!
"And now your question," says she; "how slow you are to ask it. Now
_what_ is it?--what--what?"
"Shall I ask it, Marian? I have asked it too often before."
He is holding her arms very tightly now, and his eyes are bent on
hers. Once again he is under the spell of her beauty.
"Ask--ask what you will!" cries she. She laughs gaily, and throws
back her head. The last rays of the sunlight catch her hair, and
lift it to a very glory round her beautiful face. "Go on, go on,"
she says lightly. There is, perhaps, some defiance in her tone, but,
if so, it only strengthens her for the fight. "I am your captive!"
She gives a little expressive downward glance at his hands, as he
holds her arms. "Speak, my lord! and your slave answers." She has
thrown some mockery into her tone.
"I am not your lord," says Rylton. He drops her arms, and lets her
go, and stands well back from her. "That is the last part assigned
to me."
Mrs. Bethune's gaze grows concentrated. It is fixed on him. What
does he mean? What is the object of this flat rebellion--this
receding from her authority? Strength is hers, as well as charm, and
she comes to the front bravely.
"Now what _is_ it?" asks she, creeping up to him again, and now
slipping her arm around his neck. "How have I vexed you? Who has
been saying nasty little things about me? The dear mother, eh?"
"I want no one to tell me anything, but you."
"Speak, then; did I not tell you I should answer?"
"I want an answer to one question, and one only," says Rylton
slowly.
"That is modesty itself."
"Will you marry me?"
"Marry you?" She repeats his words almost in a whisper, her eyes on
the ground, then suddenly she uplifts her graceful form, and, lazily
clasping her arms behind her head, looks at him. "Surely we have
been through this before," says she, with a touch of reproach.
"Many times!" His lips have grown into a rather straight line.
"Still I repeat my question."
"Am I so selfish as this in your eyes?" asks she. "Is it thus you
regard me?" Her large eyes have grown quite full of tears. "Is my
own happiness so much to me that for the sake of it I would
deliberately ruin yours?"
"It would not ruin mine! Marry me, Marian, if--you love me!"
"You know I love you." Her voice is tremulous now and her face very
pale. "But _how_ can we marry? I am a beggar, and you----"
"The same!" returns he shortly. "We are in the same boat."
"Still, one must think."
"And you are the one. Do you know, Marian"--he pauses, and then goes
on deliberately--"I have been thinking, too, and I have come to the
conclusion that when one truly loves, one never calculates."
"Not even for the one beloved?"
"For no one!"
"Is love, then, only selfishness incarnate?"
"I cannot answer that. It is a great mixture; but, whatever it is,
it rules the world, or should rule it. It rules _me_. You tell
me--you are for ever telling me--that marriage with you, who are
penniless, would be my ruin, and yet I would marry you. Is _that
_selfishness?"
"No; it is only folly," says she in a low, curious tone.
Maurice regards her curiously.
"Marian," says he quickly, impulsively, "there are other places. If
you would come abroad with me, I could carve out a fresh life for
us--I could work for you, live for you, endure all things for you.
Come! come!"
He holds out his hands to her.
"But why--why not wait?" exclaims she with deep agitation. "Your
uncle--he _cannot_ live for ever."
"I detest dead men's shoes," returns he coldly. Her last words have
chilled him to his heart's core. "And besides, my uncle has as good
a life as my own."
To this she makes no answer; her eyes are downbent. Rylton's face is
growing hard and cold.
"You refuse, then?" says he at last.
"I refuse nothing, but----" She breaks off. "Maurice," cries she
passionately, "why do you talk to me like this? What has changed
you? Your mother? Ah, I know it! She has set her heart on your
marriage with this--this little _nobody_, and she is poisoning your
mind against me. But you--_you_--you will not forsake me for her!"
"It is you who are forsaking me," returns he violently. "Am I
nothing to you, except as a medium by which you may acquire all the
luxuries that women seem ready to sell their very souls for? Come,
Marian, rose above it all. I am a poor man, but I am young, and I
can work. Marry me as I am, and for what I am in your sight, and
seek a new life with me abroad."
"It is madness," says she, in a voice so low as to be almost
inaudible. For a short, _short_ minute the plan held out to her had
tempted her, but something stronger than her love prevailed. She
could wait--she _would;_ and she is so sure of him. He is her own,
her special property. Yes! she can afford to wait. Something must
occur shortly to change the state of his affairs, and even if things
come to the very worst--there are others. "I tell you," says she,
"that I will not spoil your life. Your uncle--he would be furious if
you married me, and----"
Rylton put her somewhat roughly from him.
"I am tired of that old excuse," says he, his tone even rougher than
his gesture. He turns away.
"Maurice!" says she sharply--there is real anguish in her tone, her
face has grown white as death--"Maurice, come back." She holds out
her arms to him. "Oh--darling, do not let your mother come between
us! That girl--she will _make_ you marry that girl. She has money,
whereas I--what am I? A mere castaway on life's sea! Yes, yes." She
covers her face with her hands in a little paroxysm of despair.
"Yes," faintly, "you will marry that girl."
"Well, why not?" sullenly. He is as white as she is--his face is
stern. "If she will deign to accept me. I have not so far," with a
bitter laugh, "been very successful in love affairs."
"Oh! _How_ can you say that--and to me?"
She bursts into tears, and in a moment he has her in his arms. His
beautiful darling! He soothes her, caresses her, lets her weave the
bands of her fascination over him all fresh again.
It is only afterwards he remembers that through all her grief and
love she had never so forgotten herself as to promise to exile
herself for his sake in a foreign land.
CHAPTER V.
SHOWING HOW, WHEN PEOPLE DO CONGREGATE TOGETHER, MUCH KNOWLEDGE MAY
BE FOUND, AND HOW THE LITTLE HOYDEN HAD SOME KIND THINGS SAID ABOUT
HER.
"Game and set," cries Tita at the top of her young voice, from the
other end the court. It would be useless to pretend she doesn't
_shout_ it. She is elated--happy. She has won. She tears off the
little soft round cap that, defiant of the sun, she wears, and
flings it sky-high, catching it deftly as it descends upon the top
of her dainty head, a _little_ sideways. Her pretty, soft, fluffy
hair, cut short, and curled all over her head by Mother Nature, is
flying a little wildly across her brows, her large gray eyes (that
sometimes are so nearly black) are brilliant. Altogether she is just
a little, a _very_ little, pronounced in her behaviour. Her
opponents, people who have come over to The Place for the day,
whisper something to each other, and laugh a little. After all, they
have lost--perhaps they are somewhat spiteful. Lady Rylton, sitting
on the terrace above, bites her lips. What an impossible girl! and
yet how rich! Things must be wrong somewhere, when Fate showers
money on such a little ill-bred creature.
"How funny she is!" says Mrs. Chichester, who is sitting near Lady
Rylton, a guest at The Place in this house-party, this last big
entertainment, that is to make or mar its master. Lady Rylton had
organized it, and Sir Maurice, who never contradicted her, and who
had not the slightest idea of the real meaning of it, had shrugged
his shoulders. After all, let her have her own way to the last.
There would be enough to pay the debts and a little over for her;
and for him, poverty, a new life, and emancipation. He is tired of
his mother's rule. "And how small!" goes on Mrs. Chichester, a tall
young woman with light hair and queer eyes, whose husband is abroad
with his regiment. "Like a doll. I love dolls; don't you, Captain
Marryatt?"
"Are _you_ a doll?" asks Captain Marryatt, who is leaning over her.
He is always leaning over her!
"I never know what I am," says Mrs. Chichester frankly, her queer
eyes growing a little queerer. "But Miss Bolton, how delightful she
is! so natural, and Nature is always so--so----"
"Natural!" supplies Mr. Gower, who is lying on a rug watching the
game below.
"Oh, get out!" says Mrs. Chichester, whose manners are not her
strong point.
She is sitting on a garden chair behind him, and she gives him a
little dig in the back with her foot as she speaks.
"Don't! I'm bad there!" says he.
"I believe you are bad everywhere," says she, with a pout.
"Then you believe wrong! My heart is a heart of gold," says Mr.
Gower ecstatically.
"I'd like to see it," says Mrs. Chichester, who is not above a
flirtation with a man whom she knows is beyond temptation; and truly
Randal Gower is hard to get at!
"Does that mean that you would gladly see me dead?" asks he. "Oh,
cruel woman!"
"I'm tired of seeing you as you are, any way," says she, tilting her
chin. "Why don't you fall in love with somebody, for goodness'
sake?"
"Well, I'm trying," says Mr. Gower, "I'm trying hard; but," looking
at her, "I don't seem to get on. You don't encourage me, you know,
and I'm very shy!"
"There, don't be stupid," says Mrs. Chichester, seeing that Marryatt
is growing a little enraged. "We were talking of Miss Bolton. We
were saying----"
"That she was Nature's child."
"Give me Nature!" says Captain Marryatt, breaking into the
_tête-à-tête_ a little sulkily. "Nothing like it."
"Is that a proposal?" demands Mr. Gower, raising himself on his
elbow, and addressing him with deep interest. "It cannot be _Mrs._
Bolton you refer to, as she is unfortunately dead. Nature's child,
however, is still among us. Shall I convey your offer to her?"
"Yes, shall he?" asks Mrs. Chichester.
She casts a teasing glance at her admirer; a little amused light has
come into her green-gray eyes.
"I should think _you,_ Randal, would be the fitting person to
propose to her, considering how you haunt her footsteps day and
night," says a strange voice.
It comes from a tall, gaunt old lady, who, with ringlets flying,
advances towards the group. She is a cousin of the late Sir Maurice,
and an aunt of Gower's, from whom much is to be expected by the
latter at her death. There is therefore, as you see, a cousinship
between the Gowers and the Ryltons.
"My dear aunt, is that you?" says Mr. Gower with enthusiasm. "Come
and sit here; _do,_ just here _beside_ me!"
He pats the rug on which he is reclining as he speaks, beckoning her
warmly to it, knowing as he well does that her bones would break if
she tried to bring them to so low a level.
"Thank you, Randal, I prefer a more elevated position," replies she
austerely.
"Ah, you would! you would!" says Randal, who really ought to be
ashamed of himself. "You were meant for high places."
He sighs loudly, and goes back on his rug.
"Miss Gower is right," says Mrs. Bethune gaily, who has just
arrived. "Why don't _you_ go in for Miss Bolton?"
"She wouldn't have me!" says Gower tragically. "I've hinted all
sorts of lovely things to her during the past week, but she has been
apparently blind to the brilliant prospects opened to her. It has
been my unhappy lot to learn that she prefers lollipops to lovers."
"You tried her?" asks Mrs. Chichester.
"Well, I believe I _did_ do a good deal in the chocolate-cream
business," says Mr. Gower mildly.
"And she preferred the creams?"
"Oh! much, _much!"_ says Gower.
"So artless of her," says Mrs. Bethune, with a shrug. "I do love the
nineteenth-century child!"
"If you mean Miss Bolton, so do I," says a young man who has been
listening to them, and laughing here and there--a man from the
Cavalry Barracks at Ashbridge. "She's quite out-of-the-way
charming."
Mrs. Bethune looks at him--he is only a boy and easily to be
subdued, and she is glad of the opportunity of giving some little
play to the jealous anger that is raging within her.
"She has a hundred thousand charming ways," says she, smiling, but
very unpleasantly. "An heiress is always charming."
"Oh no! I didn't look at it in that way at all," says the boy,
reddening furiously. "One wouldn't, you know--when looking at
_her."_
"Wouldn't one?" says Mrs. Bethune. She is smiling at him always; but
it is a fixed smile now, and even more bitter. "And yet one might,"
says she.
She speaks almost without knowing it. She is thinking of
Rylton--might _he?_
"I think not," says the boy, stammering.
It is his first lesson in the book that tells one that to praise a
woman to a woman is to bring one to confusion. It is the worst
manners possible.
"I agree with you, Woodleigh," says Gower, who is case-hardened and
doesn't care about his manners, and who rather dislikes Mrs.
Bethune. "She's got lovely little ways. Have _you_ noticed them?"
He looks direct at Marian.
"No," says she, shaking her head, but very sweetly. "But, then, I'm
so dull."
"Well, she has," says Gower, in quite a universally conversational
tone, looking round him. He turns himself on his rug, pulls a
cushion towards him, and lies down again. "And they're all her own,
too."
"What a comfort!" says Mrs. Bethune, rather nastily.
Gower looks at her.
"Yes, you're right," says he. "To be original--honestly original--is
the thing nowadays. Have you noticed when she laughs? Those little
slender shoulders of hers actually shake."
"My _dear_ Mr. Gower," says Mrs. Bethune, "do spare us! I'm sure you
must be portraying Miss Bolton wrongly. Emotion--to betray
emotion--how vulgar!"
"I like emotion," says Mr. Gower calmly; "I'm a perfect mass of it
myself. Have you noticed Miss Bolton's laugh, Rylton?" to Sir
Maurice, who had come up a moment ago, and had been listening to
Mrs. Bethune's last remark. "It seems to run all through her. Not an
inch that doesn't seem to enjoy it."
"Well, there aren't _many _inches," says Sir Maurice, with am amused
air.
"And the laugh itself--so gay."
"You are en enthusiast," says Sir Maurice, who is standing near Mrs.
Bethune.
"My dear fellow, who wouldn't be, in such a cause?" says the young
cavalryman, with a rather conscious laugh.
"Here she is," says Mrs. Chichester, who is one of those people whom
Nature has supplied with eyes behind and before.
Tita running up the slope at this moment like a young deer--a steep
embankment that would have puzzled a good many people--puts an
effectual end to the conversation. Mr. Gower graciously deigning to
give her half of his rug, she sinks upon it gladly. She likes Gower.
Lady Rylton calls to her.
"Not on the grass, Tita dearest," cries she, in her little shrill,
old-young voice. "Come here to me, darling. Next to me on this seat.
Marian," to Mrs. Bethune, who has been sitting on the garden-chair
with her, "you can make a little room, eh?"
"A great deal," says Marian.
She rises.
"Oh no! don't stir. Not for me," says Tita, making a little gesture
to her to reseat herself. "No, thank you, Lady Rylton; I shall stay
here. I'm quite happy here. I like sitting on the grass."
She makes herself a little more comfortable where she is, regardless
of the honour Lady Rylton would have done her--regardless, too, of
the frown with which her hostess now regards her.
Mr. Gower turns upon her a beaming countenance.
"What you really mean is," says he, "that you like sitting near
_me."_
"Indeed I do not," says Tita indignantly.
"My dear girl, _think_. Am I to understand, then, that you don't
like sitting near me?"
"Ah, that's a different thing," says Tita, with a little side-glance
at him that shows a disposition to laughter.
"You see! you see!" says Mr. Gower triumphantly--he has a talent for
teasing. "Then you do wish to sit beside me! And why not?" He
expands his hands amiably. "Could you be beside a more delightful
person?"
"Maybe I could," says Tita, with another glance.
Rylton, who is listening, laughs.
His laugh seems to sting Mrs. Bethune to her heart. She turns to
him, and lets her dark eyes rest on his.
"What a little flirt!" says she contemptuously.
"Oh no! a mere child," returns he.
"Miss Bolton! What an answer!" Gower is now at the height of his
enjoyment. "And after last night, too; you _must_ remember what you
said to me last night."
"Last night?" She is staring at him with a small surprised face--a
delightful little face, as sweet as early spring. "What did I say to
you last night?"
"And have you forgotten?" Mr. Gower has thrown tragedy into his
voice. _"Already?_ Do you mean to tell me that you don't recollect
saying to me that you preferred me to all the rest of my sex?"
"I _never_ said that!" says Tita, with emphasis; "never! never! Why
should I say that?"
She looks at Gower as if demanding an answer.
"I'm not good at conundrums," says he. "Ask me another."
"No; I won't," says she_. "Why?"_
Upon this Mr. Gower rolls himself over in the rug, and covers his
head. It is plain that answers are not to be got out of _him_.
"Did I say that?" says Tita, appealing to Sir Maurice.
"I hope not," returns he, laughing. "Certainly I did not hear it."
"And certainly he didn't either," says Tita with decision.
"After that," says Gower, unrolling himself, "I shall retire from
public life; I shall give myself up to"--he pauses and looks round;
a favourite ladies' paper is lying on the ground near him--"to
literature."
He turns over on his side, and apparently becomes engrosses in it.
"Have you been playing, Maurice?" asks Mrs. Bethune presently.
Her tone is cold. That little speech of his to Tita, uttered some
time ago, "I hope not," had angered her.
"No," returns he as coldly.
He is on one of his uncertain moods with regard to her. Distrust,
disbelief, a sense of hopelessness--all are troubling him.
"What a shame, Sir Maurice!" says Mrs. Chichester, leaning forward.
As I have hinted, she would have flirted with a broomstick. "And
you, who are our champion player."
"I'll play now if you will play with me," says Sir Maurice
gallantly.
"A safe answer," looking at him with a pout, and through half-closed
lids. She finds that sort of glance effective sometimes. "You know I
don't play."
"Not _that_ game," says Mr. Gower, who never can resist a thrust.
"I thought you were reading your paper," says Mrs. Chichester
sharply. "Come, what's in it? I don't believe," scornfully, "you are
reading it at all."
"I am, however," says Mr. Gower. "These ladies' papers are so full
of information. I'm quite enthralled just now. I've got on to the
Exchange and Mart business, and it's too exciting for _words_. Just
listen to this: 'Two dozen old tooth-brushes (in _good_
preservation) would be exchanged for a gold bangle (_unscratched_).
Would not be sent on approval (mind, it must not be set _scratched!_
good old toothbrushes!) without deposit of ten shillings. Address,
'Chizzler, office of this paper.'"
"It isn't true. I don't believe a word of it," says Tita, making a
snatch at the paper.
"My dear girl, why not? Two dozen old toothbrushes. _Old_
toothbrushes, you notice. Everything old now goes for a large sum,
except," thoughtfully, "aunts."
He casts a lingering glance round, but providentially Miss Gower has
disappeared.
"But toothbrushes! Show me that paper."
"Do you, then, disbelieve in my word?"
"Nobody could want a toothbrush."
"Some people want them awfully," says Mr. Gower. "Haven't you
noticed?"
But here Sir Maurice sees it his duty to interfere.
"Miss Bolton, will you play this next set with me?" says he, coming
up to Tita.
"Oh, I should _love_ it!" cries she. "You are so good a player. Do
get us some decent people to play against, though; I hate a weak
game."
"Well, come, we'll try and manage it," says he, amused at her
enthusiasm.
They move away together.
CHAPTER VI.
HOW GAMES WERE PLAYED, "OF SORTS"; AND HOW TITA WAS MUCH HARRIED,
BUT HOW SHE BORE HERSELF VALIANTLY, AND HOW, NOT KNOWING OF HER
VICTORIES, SHE WON ALL THROUGH.
There had been no question about it; it had been a walk-over. Even
Lord Eshurst and Miss Staines, who are considered quite crack people
at tennis in this part of the county, had not had a chance. Tita had
been everywhere; she seemed to fly. Every ball caught, and every
ball so well planted. Rylton had scarcely been in it, though a good
player. That little thing was here and there and everywhere, yet
Rylton could not say she poached. Whatever she did, however, she
_won_.
She does not throw up her cap this time--perhaps she had seen a
little of that laughter before--but she claps her hands joyfully,
and pats Rylton's arm afterwards in a _bon camarade_ fashion that
seems to amuse him. And is she tired? There is no sense of fatigue,
certainly, in the way she runs up the slope again, and flings
herself gracefully upon the rug beside Mr. Gower. Mr. Gower has not
stirred from that rug since. He seldom stirs. Perhaps he would not
be quite so stout if he did.
"You won your game?" says Margaret Knollys, bending towards Tita,
with a smile.
Old Lady Eshurst is smiling at her, too.
"Oh yes; how could I help it? Sir Maurice"--with a glance at the
latter as he climbs the slope in turn--"plays like an angel."
"Oh no; it is you who do that," says he, laughing.
"Are you an angel, Miss Bolton?" asks Mrs. Bethune, who is standing
next Rylton.
He had gone straight to her, but she had not forgiven his playing
with the girl at all, and a sense of hatred towards Tita is warming
her breast.
"I don't know," says Tita, with a slight grimace. It is not the
answer expected. Marian had expected to see her shy, confused; Tita,
on the contrary, is looking at her with calm, inquiring eyes. "Do
you?" asks she.
"I have not gone into it," says Mrs. Bethune, with as distinct a
sneer as she can allow herself.
Mr. Gower laughs.
"You're good at games," says he to Tita.
He might have meant her powers at tennis, he might have meant
_anything_.
"That last game you are thinking of?"
"Decidedly, the last game," says Gower, who laughs again
immoderately.
"I don't see what there is to laugh at," says Miss Bolton, with some
indignation. "'They laugh who win,' is an old proverb. But _you_
didn't win; you weren't in it."
"I expect I never shall be," says Gower. "Yet lookers-on have their
advantage ascribed to them by a pitiful Providence. They see most of
the game."
"It is I who should laugh," says Tita, who has not been following
him. _"I_ won--we"--looking, with an honest desire to be just to all
people, at Sir Maurice--_"we_ won."
"No, no; leave it in the singular," says Maurice, making her a
little gesture of self-depreciation.
"You seem very active," says Margaret kindly. "I watched you at golf
yesterday. You liked it?"
"Yes; there is so little else to like," says Tita, looking at her,
"except my horses and my dogs."
"A horse is the best companion of all," says Mr. Woodleigh, his eyes
bent on her charming little face.
"I'm not sure, the dogs are so kind, so affectionate; they _want_
one so," says Tita. "And yet a horse--oh, I _do_ love my last
mount--a brown mare! She's lying up now."
"You ride, then?" says Sir Maurice.
"Ride! you bet!" says Tita. She rolls over on the rug, and, resting
on her elbows, looks up at him; Lady Rylton watching, shudders.
"I've been in the saddle all my life. Just before I came here I had
a real good run--my uncle's groom had one horse, I had the other; it
was over the downs. _I_ won."
She rests her chin upon her hands.
Lady Rylton's face pales with horror. A race with a groom!
"Your uncle must give you good mounts," says Mr. Woodleigh.
"It is all he _does_ give me," says the girl, with a pout. "Yes; I
may ride, but that is all. I never _see_ anybody--there is nobody to
see; my uncle knows nobody."
Lady Rylton makes an effort. It is growing _too_ dreadful. She turns
to Mrs. Chichester.
"Why don't you play?" asks she.
"Tennis? I hate it; it destroys one's clothes so," says Mrs.
Chichester. "And those shoes, they are terrible. If I knew any
girls--I never do know them, as a rule--I should beg of them not to
play tennis; it is destruction so far as feet go."
"Fancy riding so much as that!" says Mr. Woodleigh, who, with Sir
Maurice and the others, has been listening to Tita's stories of
hunts and rides gone and done. "Why, how _long_ have you been
hunting?"
"Ever since I was thirteen," says Tita.
"Why, that is about your age now, isn't it?" says Gower.
"We lived at Oakdean then," goes on Tita, taking, very properly, no
notice of him, "and my father liked me to ride. My cousin was with
us there, and he taught me. I rode a great deal before"--she pauses,
and her lips quiver; she is evidently thinking of some grief that
has entered into her young life and saddened it--"before I went to
live with my uncle."
"It was your cousin who taught you to ride, then? Is he a son of
the--the uncle with whom you now live?" asks Sir Maurice, who is
rather ashamed of exhibiting such interest in her.
"No, no, indeed! He is a son of my aunt's--my father's sister. She
married a man in Birmingham--a sugar merchant. I did love Uncle
Joe," says Tita warmly.
"No wonder!" says Mrs. Bethune. "I wish _I_ had an uncle a sugar
merchant. It does sound sweet."
"I'm not sure that _you _would think my uncle Joe sweet!" says Miss
Bolton thoughtfully. "He wasn't good to look at. He had the biggest
mouth that ever _I_ saw, and his nose was little and turned up, but
I loved him. I love him now, even when he is gone. And one _does_
forget, you know! He said such good things to people, and"--covering
her little face with her hands, and bursting into an irrepressible
laugh--"he told such funny stories!"
Lady Rylton makes a sudden movement.
"Dear Lady Eshurst, wouldn't you like to come and see the houses?"
asks she.
"I am afraid I must be going home," says old Lady Eshurst. "It is
very late; you must forgive my staying so long, but your little
friend--by-the-bye, is she a friend or relation?"
"A friend!" says Lady Rylton sharply.
"Well, she is so entertaining that I could not bear to go away
sooner."
"Yes--yes; she is very charming," says Lady Rylton, as she hurries
Lady Eshurst down the steps that lead to the path below.
Good heavens! If she should hear some of Uncle Joe's funny stories!
She takes Lady Eshurst visibly in tow, and walks her out of hearing.
"What a good seat you must have!" says Mr. Woodleigh presently, who
has been dwelling on what Tita has said about her riding.
"Oh, pretty well! Everyone should ride," says Tita indifferently. "I
despise a man who can't conquer a horse. I," laughing, "never saw
the horse that _I_ couldn't conquer."
"You? Look at your hands!" says Gower, laughing.
"Well, what's the matter with them?" says she. "My cousin, when he
was riding, used to say they were made of iron."
"Of velvet, rather."
"No. He said my heart was made of that." She laughs gaily, and
suddenly looking up at Rylton, who is looking down at her, she fixes
her eyes on his. She spreads her little hands abroad, brown as
berries though they are with exposure to all sorts of weather. They
are small brown hands, and very delicately shaped. "They are not so
bad after all, are they?" says she.
"They are very pretty," smiles Rylton, returning her gaze.
Suddenly for the first time it occurs to him that she has a beauty
that is all her own.
"Oh no! there is nothing pretty about me," says Tita.
She gives a sudden shrug of her shoulders. She is still lying on the
rug, her face resting on the palms of her hands. Again she lifts her
eyes slowly to Rylton; it is an entirely inconsequent glance--a
purely idle glance--and yet it suddenly occurs to Mrs. Bethune,
watching her narrowly, that there is coquetry in it; undeveloped,
certainly, but _there_. She is now a child; but later on?
Maurice is smiling back at the child as if amused. Mrs. Bethune lays
her hands upon his arm--Lady Rylton has gone away with old Lady
Eshurst.
"Maurice! there will be just time for a walk before tea," says she
in a whisper, her beautiful face uplifted very near to his. Her eyes
are full of promise.
He turns with her.
"Sir Maurice! Sir Maurice!" cries Tita; "remember our match at golf
to-morrow!" Sir Maurice looks back. "Mr. Gower and I, against you
and Mrs. Bethune. You _do_ remember?"
"Yes, and we shall win," says Mrs. Bethune, with a cold smile.
"Oh no! don't think it. We shall beat you into a cocked hat!" cries
Tita gaily.
"Good heavens! how vulgar she is!" says Mrs. Bethune.
CHAPTER VII.
HOW THE ARGUMENT GROWS HIGHER; AND HOW MARIAN LOSES HER TEMPER, AND
HOW MARGARET OBJECTS TO THE RUIN OF ONE YOUNG LIFE.
"She is insufferable--intolerable!" says Lady Rylton, almost
hysterically. She is sitting in the drawing-room with Margaret and
Mrs. Bethune, near one of the windows that overlook the tennis
court. The guests of the afternoon have gone; only the house-party
remains, and still, in the dying daylight, the tennis balls are
being tossed to and fro. Tita's little form may be seen darting from
side to side; she is playing again with Sir Maurice.
"She is a very young girl, who has been brought up without a
mother's care," says Miss Knollys, who has taken a fancy to the poor
hoyden, and would defend her.
"Her manners this afternoon!--her actions--her fatal admissions!"
says Lady Rylton, who has not forgiven that word or two about the
sugar merchant.
"She spoke only naturally. _She_ saw no reason why she should not
speak of----"
"Don't be absurd, Margaret!" Sharply. "You know, as well as I do,
that she is detestable."
"I am quite glad you have formed that idea of her," says Miss
Knollys, "as it leads me to hope you do not now desire to marry her
to Maurice."
After all, there are, perhaps, moments when Margaret is not as
perfect as one believes her. She can't, for example, resist this
thrust.
"Decidedly I don't _desire _to marry her to Maurice," says Lady
Rylton angrily. "I have told you that often enough, I think; but for
all that Maurice must marry her. It is his last chance!"
"Tessie," says Margaret sharply, "if you persist in this matter, and
bring it to the conclusion you have in view, do you know what will
happen? You will make your only child miserable! I warn you of
that." Miss Knollys' voice is almost solemn.
"You talk as if Maurice was the only person in the world to be made
miserable," says Lady Rylton, leaning back in her chair and bursting
into tears--at all events, it must be supposed it is tears that are
going on behind the little lace fragment pressed to her eyes. "Am
not I ten times more miserable? I, who have to give my only son--as"
(sobbing) "you most admirably describe it, Margaret--to such a girl
as that! Good heavens! What can his sufferings be to mine?" She
wipes her eyes daintily, and sits up again. "You hurt me so, dear
Margaret," she says plaintively, "but I'm _sure_ you do not mean
it."
"No, no, of course," says Miss Knollys, as civilly as she can. She
is feeling a little disgusted.
"And as for this affair--objectionable as the girl is, still one
must give and take a little when one's fortunes are at the ebb. And
I will save my dearest Maurice at all risks if I can, no matter what
grief it costs _me_. Who am I"--with a picturesque sigh--"that I
should interfere with the prospects of my child? And this girl! If
Maurice can be persuaded to have her----"
"My dear Tessie, what a word!" says Margaret, rising, with a
distinct frown. "Has he _only_ to ask, then, and have?"
"Beyond doubt," says Lady Rylton insolently, waving her fan to and
fro, "if he does it in the right way. In all my experience, my dear
Margaret, I have never known a woman to frown upon a man who was as
handsome, as well-born, as _chic_ as Maurice! Even though the man
might be a--well"--smiling and lifting her shoulders--"it's a rude
word, but--well, a very devil!"
She looks deliberately at Margaret over her fan, who really appears
in this dull light _nearly_ as young as she is. The look is a cruel
one, hideously cruel. Even Marian Bethune, whose bowels of
compassion are extraordinary small, changes colour, and lets her
red-brown eyes rest on the small woman lounging in the deep chair
with a rather murderous gaze.
Yet Lady Rylton smiles on, enjoying the changes in Margaret's face.
It is a terrible smile, coming from so fragile a creature.
Margaret's face has grown white, but she answers coldly and with
deliberation. All that past horrible time--her lover, his
unworthiness, his desertion--all her young, _young_ life lies once
more massacred before her.
"The women who give in to such fascination, such mere outward
charms, are fools!" says she with a strength that adorns her.
"Oh, come! Come now, dearest Margaret," says her aunt, with the
gayest of little laughs, "would you call _yourself_ a fool? Why,
remember, your own dear Harold was----"
"Pray spare me!" says Miss Knollys, in so cold, so haughty, so
commanding a tone, that even Lady Rylton sinks beneath it. She makes
an effort to sustain her position and laughs lightly, but for all
that she lets her last sentence remain a fragment.
"You think Maurice will propose to this Miss Bolton?" says Marian
Bethune, leaning forward. There is something sarcastic in her smile.
"He must. It is detestable, of course. One would like a girl in his
own rank, but there are so few of them with money, and when there is
one, her people want her to marry a Duke or a foreign Prince--so
tiresome of them!"
"It is all such folly," says Margaret, knitting her brows.
"Utter folly," says Lady Rylton. "That is what makes it so wise! It
would be folly to marry a satyr--satyrs are horrid--but if the satyr
had _millions!_ Oh, the wisdom of it!"
"You go too far!" says Margaret. "Money is not everything."
"And Maurice is not a satyr," says Mrs. Bethune, a trifle unwisely.
She has been watching the players on the ground below. Lady Rylton
looks at her.
"Of course _you_ object to it," says she.
"I!" says Marian. "Why should I object to it? I talk of marriage
only in the abstract."
"I am glad of that!" Lady Rylton's eyes are still fixed on hers.
"This will be a veritable marriage, I assure you; I have set my mind
on it. It is terrible to contemplate, but one must give way
sometimes; yet the thought of throwing that girl into the arms of
darling Maurice----"
She breaks off, evidently overcome, yet behind the cobweb she
presses to her cheeks she has an eye on Marian.
"I don't think Maurice's arms could hold her," says Mrs. Bethune,
with a low laugh. It is a strange laugh. Lady Rylton's glance grows
keener. "Such a mere doll of a thing. A mite!" She laughs again, but
this time (having caught Lady Rylton's concentrated gaze) in a very
ordinary manner--the passion, the anger has died out of it.
"Yes, she's a mere mite," says Lady Rylton. "She is positively
trivial! She is in effect a perfect idiot in some ways. You know I
have tried to impress her--to show her that she is not altogether
below our level--as she certainly _is_--but she has refused to see
my kindness. She--she's very fatiguing," says Lady Rylton, with a
long-suffering sigh. "But one gets accustomed to grievances. This
girl, just because she is hateful to me, is the one I must take into
my bosom. She is going to give her fortune to Maurice!"
"And Maurice?" asks Margaret.
"Is going to take it," returns his mother airily. "And is going to
give her, what she has never had--_a name!"_
"A cruel compact," says Margaret slowly, but with decision. "I think
this marriage should not be so much as thought of! That child! and
Maurice, who cares nothing for her. Marian"--Miss Knollys turns
suddenly to Marian, who has withdrawn behind the curtains, as if
determined to have nothing to say further to the discussion--
"Marian, come here. Say you think Maurice should not marry this
silly child--this baby."
"Oh! as for me," says Mrs. Bethune, coming out from behind the
curtains, her face a little pale, "what is my weight in this matter?
Nothing! nothing! Let Maurice marry as he will."
_"As he will!"_ Lady Rylton repeats her words, and, rising, comes
towards her. "Why don't you answer?" says she. "We want your answer.
Give it!"
"I have no answer," says Mrs. Bethune slowly. "Why should he not
marry Miss Bolton?--and again, why should he? Marriage, as we have
been told all our lives, is but a lottery--they should have said a
mockery," with a little bitter smile. "One could have understood
that."
"Then you advise Maurice to marry this girl?" asks Lady Rylton
eagerly.
"Oh, no, no! I advise nothing," says Marian, with a little wave of
her arms.
"But why?" demands Lady Rylton angrily.
She had depended upon Marian to support her against Margaret.
"Simply because I won't," says Mrs. Bethune, her strange eyes
beginning to blaze.
"Because you daren't?" questions Lady Rylton, with a sneer.
"I don't understand you," says Marian coldly.
"Don't you?" Lady Rylton's soft, little, fair face grows diabolical.
"Then let me explain." Margaret makes a movement towards her, but
she waves her back. "Pray let me explain, Margaret. Our dear Marian
is so intensely dull that she wants a word in season. We all know
why she objects to a marriage of any sort. She made a fiasco of her
own first marriage, and now hopes----"
She would have continued her cruel speech but that Mrs. Bethune, who
has risen, breaks into it. She comes forward in a wild, tempestuous
fashion, her eyes afire, her nostrils dilated! Her beautiful red
hair seems alight as she descends upon Lady Rylton.
"And that marriage!" says she, in a suffocating tone. "Who made it?
_Who?"_ She looks like a fury. There is hatred, an almost murderous
hatred, in the glance she casts at the little, languid, pretty woman
before her, who looks back at her with uplifted shoulders, and an
all-round air of surprise and disapprobation. _"You_ to taunt me!"
says she, in a low, condensed tone. _"You_, who hurried, who
_forced_ me into a marriage with a man I detested! You, who gave me
to understand, when I resisted, that I had no place on this big
earth except a pauper's place--a place in a workhouse!"
She stands tall, grave, magnificent, in her fury before Lady Rylton,
who, in spite of the courage born of want of feeling, now shrinks
from her as if affrighted.
"If you persist in going on like this," says she, pressing her
smelling-bottle to her nose, "I must ask you to go away--to go at
once. I hate scenes. You _must_ go!"
"I went away once," says Mrs. Bethune, standing pale and cold before
her, "at your command--I went to the home of the man you selected
for me. What devil's life I led with him you may guess at. _You_
knew him, I did not. I was seventeen then." She pauses; the breath
she draws seems to rive her body in twain. "I came back----" she
says presently.
"A widow?"
"A widow--_thank God!"_
A silence follows; something of tragedy seems to have fallen into
the air--with that young lovely creature standing there, upright,
passionate, her arms clasped behind her head, as the heroine of it.
The sunlight from the dying day lights up the red, rich beauty of
her hair, the deadly pallor of her skin. Through it all the sound of
the tennis-balls from below, as they hurry to and fro through the
hair, can be heard. Perhaps it reaches her. She flings herself
suddenly into a chair, and bursts out laughing.
"Let us come back to common-sense," cries she. "What were we talking
of? The marriage of Maurice to this little plebeian--this little
female Croesus. Well, what of the argument--what?"
Her manner is a little excited.
"I, for one, object to the marriage," says Margaret distinctly. "The
child is too young and too rich! She should be given a chance; she
should not be coerced and drawn into a mesh, as it were, without her
knowledge."
"A mesh? Do you call a marriage with my son a mesh?" asks Lady
Rylton angrily. "He of one of the oldest families in England, and
she a nobody!"
"There is no such thing as a nobody," says Miss Knollys calmly.
"This girl has intellect, mind, a _soul!_ She has even money! She
_must_ be considered."
"She has no birth!" says Lady Rylton. "If you are going in for
Socialistic principles, Margaret, pray do not expect _me_ to follow
you. I despise folly of that sort."
"I am not a Socialist," says Margaret slowly, "and yet why cannot
this child be accepted as one of ourselves? Where is the great
difference? You object to her marrying your son, yet you _want_ to
marry her to your son. How do you reconcile it? Surely you are more
of Socialist than I am. You would put the son of a baronet and the
daughter of heaven knows who on an equality."
"Never!" says Lady Rylton. "You don't understand. She will always be
just as she is, and Maurice----"
"And their children?" asks Margaret.
Here Mrs. Bethune springs to her feet.
"Good heavens! Margaret, have you not gone far enough?" says she. If
her face had been pale before, it is livid now. "Why, this
marriage--this marriage"--she beats her hand upon a table near
her--"one would think it was a fact accomplished!"
"I was only saying," says Miss Knollys, looking with a gentle glance
at Marian, "that if Maurice _were_ to marry this girl----"
"It would be an honour to her," interrupts Lady Rylton hotly.
"It would be a degradation to him," says Margaret coldly. "He does
not love her."
She might have said more, but that suddenly Marian Bethune stops
her. The latter, who is leaning against the curtains of the window,
breaks into a wild little laugh.
"Love--what is love?" cries she. "Oh, foolish Margaret! Do not
listen to her, Tessie, do not listen."
She folds the soft silken curtains round her slender figure, and,
hidden therein, still laughs aloud with a wild passion of mirth.
"It is you who are foolish," cries Margaret, with some agitation.
"I?" She lets the curtains go; they fall in a sweep behind her. She
looks out at Margaret, still laughing. Her face is like ashes. "You
speak too strongly," says she.
"Do _you_ think I could speak too strongly?" asks Margaret, looking
intently at her. It is a questioning glance. "You! Do _you_ think
Maurice ought to ask this poor, ignorant girl to marry him? Do _you_
advise him to take this step?"
"Why, it appears he must take some step," says Marian. "Why not
this?"
Margaret goes close to her and speaks in so low a tone that Lady
Rylton cannot hear her.
"His honour, is that nothing to you?" says she.
"To me? What have I got to do with his honour?" says Mrs. Bethune,
with a little expressive gesture.
"Oh, Marian!" says Miss Knollys.
She half turns away as if in disgust, but Marian follows her and
catches her sleeve.
"You mean----" says she.
"Must I explain? With his heart full of you, do you think he should
marry this girl?"
"Oh, _his_ heart!" says Mrs. Bethune. "Has he a heart? Dear
Margaret, don't be an enthusiast; be like everybody else. It is so
much more comfortable."
"You can put it off like this," says Miss Knollys in a low tone. "It
is very simple; but you should think. I have always thought you--you
liked Maurice, but you were a--a friend of his. Save him from this.
Don't let him marry this child."
"I don't think he will marry a child!" says Mrs. Bethune, laughing.
"You mean----"
"I mean nothing at all--nothing, really," says Marian. "But that
baby! My dear Margaret, how impossible!"
CHAPTER VIII.
HOW A STORM RAGED; AND HOW, WHEN A MAN AND WOMAN MET FACE TO FACE,
THE VICTORY--FOR A WONDER--WENT TO THE MAN.
There has been a second scene between Lady Rylton and Sir
Maurice--this time a terrible scene. She had sent for him directly
after dinner, and had almost commanded him to marry Miss Bolton. She
had been very bitter in her anger, and had said strange things of
Marian. Sir Maurice had come off triumphant, certainly, if greatly
injured, and with his heart on fire. He had, at all events, sworn he
would not marry the little Bolton girl. Those perpetual
insinuations! What had his mother meant by saying that Marian was
laying herself out to catch Lord Dunkerton, an old baron in the
neighbourhood, with some money and a damaged reputation? That could
not be true--he would not believe it. That old beast! Marian would
not so much as look at him. And yet--had she not been very civil to
him at that ball last week?
Coming out from his mother's boudoir, a perfect storm of fury in his
heart, he finds himself face to face with Marian. Something in his
face warns her. She would have gone by him with a light word or two,
but, catching her by the wrist, he draws her into a room on his
left.
"You have had another quarrel with your mother," says she
sympathetically, ignoring the anger blazing in his eyes. "About that
silly girl?"
"No. About you!"
His tone is short--almost violent.
"About me?"
She changes colour.
"Yes, you. She accuses you of encouraging that wretched old man,
Dunkerton. Do you _hear?_ Speak! Is it true?"
"This is madness!" says Marian, throwing out her hands. "How _could_
you believe such folly? That old man! Why will you give ear to such
gossip?"
"Put an end to it, then," says he savagely.
"I? How can I put an end to it?"
"By marrying _me!"_
He stands opposite to her, almost compelling her gaze in return.
Mrs. Bethune gives it fearlessly.
"Maurice dearest, you are excited now. Your mother--she is _so_
irritating. I know her. Marriage, as we now stand, would mean quite
dreadful things. Do be reasonable!"
"You talk of reason," says he passionately. "Does love reason? No! I
will hear your last word now."
"Are you condemning me, then, to death?" asks she, smiling
delicately, and laying two large but delicate hands upon his arms.
He shakes her off.
"Answer me. Will you marry me, or will you not?"
"This is too sudden, Maurice!"
A little fire is kindling in her own eyes; she had objected to that
last repulsion.
"Sudden! After all these months!" He pauses. "Is it to be Dunkerton
or me?" asks he violently.
"Please do not bring Lord Dunkerton into this discussion," says she
coldly.
"I certainly shall."
"You mean that I----"
"Have encouraged him. So I hear, at all events, and--there are
things I remember."
"For the matter of that," says she, throwing up her beautiful head,
"there are things I remember too! You--you dare to come here and
accuse _me_ of falsity when I have watched you all day making steady
court to that wretched little plebeian, playing tennis with her all
the day long, and far into the evening! No! I may have said half a
dozen words to Lord Dunkerton, but you--how many half-dozen words
have you said to Miss Bolton? Come, answer me that, as we seem bent
on riddles."
"All this is as nothing," says Rylton. "You know, as well as I do,
that Miss Bolton has not a thought of mine! I want only one thing,
the assurance that you love me, and I put it at marriage. Will you
link your fate with mine, low down though it is at present? If you
will, Marian"--he comes closer to her and lays his hands upon her
shoulders, and gazes at her with eyes full filled with honest
love--"I shall work for you to the last day of my life. If you will
not----"
He pauses--he looks at her--he waits. But no answer comes from her.
"Marian, take courage," says he softly--very softly. "My darling, is
money everything?"
She suddenly leans back from him, and looks fair in his eyes.
"It is, it is," says she hoarsely. "I _can't_ again go through what
I suffered before. Wait, _do_ wait--something--something will
happen----"
"You refuse me?" says he, in a lifeless tone.
"Not that. Don't speak like that. Don't leave me, Maurice."
"It is our last hour," says he deliberately. "Be sure of that. If
money is so much to you--if money counts so far beyond all that a
man can give you of his heart and soul--then take it."
"And you," says she, "are you not seeking money, too? This girl,
this little _fool;_ your mother has led you to think of her. You
will marry her!"
"I will marry you," says he coldly, "if you will marry me."
"I have told you that it is impossible"--she draws a deep
breath--"at present."
"You will not trust me, then, to make a fortune for you?"
"A fortune! It takes so _long_ to make; and," smiling, and drawing
nearer to him, and suddenly flinging her arms around his neck, "are
we not happy as we are?"
"No." He loosens her arms lightly, and, still holding them, looks at
her. How fair she is, how desirable! "Marian," says he hoarsely,
"think! It is indeed my last word. Will you trust yourself to me as
things are, or will you reject me? Marian, say you will marry me as
I now am--poor, ruined."
He holds her, gazing at her despairingly. She would have spoken,
perhaps, but no words come to her; no words to soften her grim
determination. She _will_ not marry him poor--and yet she loves him.
Rylton, with a stifled oath, pushes her from him.
"This is the end," says he.
He goes to the door.
"Maurice!" says she faintly.
He turns.
"Well, will you marry me to-morrow?" asks he mockingly.
"No. But----"
"There is no time for 'buts,'" says he.
He opens the door and closes it sharply behind him.
Mrs. Bethune flings herself back into a chair, and presses her
handkerchief to her face.
"Oh, it is nothing, nothing," says she presently. She gets up, and,
standing before a glass, arranges her hair and presses her eyebrows
into shape. "He gets impatient, that is all. He will never be able
to live without me. As for that absurd child, Maurice would not look
at _her_. No, I am sure of him, quite, quite sure; to-morrow he will
come back to me, repentant."
CHAPTER IX.
HOW MAURICE PLACES HIS LIFE IN THE HANDS OF THE HOYDEN, AND HOW SHE
TELLS HIM MANY THINGS, AND DESIRES MANY THINGS OF HIM.
Maurice had said it was his last word. He goes straight from Marian
Bethune to one of the reception-rooms, called the lesser ballroom,
where some dancing is going on. His face is a little white, but
beyond that he betrays no emotion whatever. He feels even surprised
at himself. Has he lost all feeling? Passing Randal Gower he
whispers a gay word or two to him. He feels in brilliant spirits.
Tita Bolton is dancing, but when her dance comes to an end he goes
to her and asks her for the next. Yes; he can have it. She dances
like a little fairy, and when the waltz is at an end he goes with
her, half mechanically, towards the conservatory at the end of the
room.
His is calm now, quite calm; the chatter of the child has soothed
him. It had been a pleasure to dance with her, to laugh when she
laughed, to listen to her nonsense. As he walks with her towards the
flowers, he tells himself he is not in the least unhappy, though
always quite close to him, at his side, someone seems to be
whispering:
"It is all over! it is all over!"
Well, so much the better. She has fooled him too long.
The conservatory at the end of the lesser ballroom leads on to the
balcony outside, and at the end of that is another and larger
conservatory, connected with the drawing-room. Towards this he would
have led her, but Tita, in the middle of the balcony, stops short.
"But I want to dance," says she.
That far-off house, full of flowers, seems very much removed from
the music.
"You have been playing tennis all day," says Rylton. "You must be
tired. It is bad for you to fatigue yourself so much. You have had
enough dancing for awhile. Come and sit with me. I, too, am tired."
"Well, for awhile," says she reluctantly.
It is with evident regret that she takes every step that leads her
away from the dancing-room.
The larger conservatory is but dimly lit with lamps covered with
pale pink shades. The soft musical tinkling of a fountain, hidden
somewhere amongst the flowering shrubs, adds a delicious sense of
coolness to the air. The delicate perfume of heliotrope mingles with
the breath of the roses, yellow and red and amber, that, standing in
their pots, nod their heads drowsily. The begonias, too, seem half
dead with sleep. The drawing-room beyond is deserted.
"Now, is not this worth a moment's contemplation?" says Rylton,
pressing her gently into a deep lounging chair that seems to swallow
up her little figure. "It has its own charm, hasn't it?"
He has flung himself into another chair beside her, and is beginning
to wonder if he might have a cigarette. He might almost have
believed himself content, but for that hateful monotonous voice at
his ear.
"Oh, it _is_ pretty," says Tita, glancing round her. "It is lovely.
It reminds me of Oakdean."
"Oakdean?"
"My old home," says she softly--"where I lived with my father."
"Ah, tell me something of your life," says Rylton kindly.
No idea of making himself charming to her is in his thoughts. He
has, indeed, but one idea, and that is to encourage her to talk, so
that he himself may enjoy the bliss of silence.
"There is nothing," says she quickly. "It has been a stupid life. I
was very happy at Oakdean, when," hesitating, "papa was alive; but
now I have to live at Rickfort, with Uncle George, and," simply,
"I'm not happy."
"What's the matter with Rickfort?"
"Nothing. It's Uncle George that there is something the matter with.
Rickfort is my house, too, but I hate it; it is so gloomy. I'm
sure," with a shrug of her shoulders, "Uncle George might have it,
and welcome, if only he wouldn't ask _me_ to live there with him."
"Uncle George seems to make a poor show," says Rylton.
"He's horrid!" says Miss Bolton, without reservation. "He's a
_beast!_ He hates me, and I hate him."
"Oh, no!" says Rylton, roused a little.
The child's face is so earnest. He feels a little amused, and
somewhat surprised. She seems the last person in the world capable
of hatred.
"Yes, I do," says she, nodding her delightful little head, "and he
knows it. People say a lot about family resemblances, but it seems
wicked to think Uncle George is papa's brother. For my part,"
recklessly, "I don't believe it."
"Perhaps he's a changeling," says Sir Maurice.
"Oh, don't be silly," says Miss Bolton. "Now, listen to this." She
leans forward, her elbows on her knees, her eyes glistening with
wrath. "I had a terrier, a _lovely_ one, and she had six puppies,
and, would you believe it! he drowned every one of them--said they
were ill-bred, or something. And they weren't, they _couldn't_ have
been; they were perfectly beautiful, and my darling Scrub fretted
herself nearly to death after them. I begged almost on my knees that
he would leave her _one_, and he wouldn't." Her eyes are now full of
tears. "He is a beast!" says she. This last word seems almost comic,
coming from her pretty childish lips.
"Well, but you see," says Rylton, "some men pride themselves on the
pedigree of their dogs, and perhaps your uncle----"
"Oh, if you are going to defend him!" says she, rising with a stiff
little air.
"I'm not--I'm not, indeed," says Rylton. "Nothing could excuse his
refusing you that one puppy. But in other ways he is not unkind to
you?"
"Yes, he is; he won't let me go anywhere."
"He has let you come here."
"Just because your mother is _Lady_ Rylton!" says the girl, with
infinite scorn. She looks straight at him. "My uncle is ashamed
because we are nobodies--because his father earned his money by
trade. He hates everyone because of that. My father," proudly, "was
above it all."
"I think I should like to have known your father," says Rylton,
admiring the pride in her gray eyes.
"It would have done you good," returns she thoughtfully. She pauses,
as if still thinking, and then, "As for me, I have not been good at
all since I lost him."
"One can see that," says Rylton. "Crime sits rampant in your eyes."
At this she laughs too; but presently she stops short, and turns to
him.
"It is all very well for you to laugh!" says she ruefully. "You have
not to go home next week to live again with Uncle George!"
"I begin to hate Uncle George!" says Rylton. "You see how you are
demoralizing me! But, surely, if you cannot live in peace with him,
there must be others--other relations--who would be glad to
chaperone you!"
"No," says the girl, shaking her head sadly. "For one thing, I have
_no_ relations--at least, none who could look after me; and, for
another, by my father's will, I must stay with Uncle George until my
marriage."
"Until your marriage!" Sir Maurice laughs. "Forgive me! I should not
have laughed," says he, "especially as your emancipation seems a
long way off."
Really, looking at her in the subdued lights of those pink lamps,
she seems a mere baby.
"I don't see why it _should_ be so far off," says Tita, evidently
affronted. "Lots of girls get married at seventeen; I've heard of
people who were married at sixteen! But _they_ must have been fools.
No? I don't want to be married, though, if I did, I should be able
to get rid of Uncle George. But what I should like to do would be to
run away!"
"Where?" asks Rylton, rather abominably, it must be confessed.
"Oh, I don't know," confusedly. "I haven't thought it out."
"Well, _don't,"_ says he kindly.
"That is what everyone would say," impatiently. "In the meantime, I
_cannot go_ on living with my uncle. No; I can't." She leans back,
and, flinging her arms behind her neck, looks with a little laughing
pout at Rylton. "Some day I shall do something dreadful," says she.
She is charming, posing so. Rylton looks at her. How pretty she is!
How guileless! How far removed from worldly considerations! His
affair with Marian is at an end. Never to be renewed! That is
settled. He had given her a last word, and she had spurned it.
After all, why should he _not _marry this charming child? The
marriage would please his mother, and restore the old name to
something of its ancient grandeur. And as for himself--why, it
matters nothing to him.
"It is all over. It is all over."
Again that teasing voice in his ear.
Well, if it _is_ all over, so much to the good. But as for this girl
sitting near him, if he must take her to be his wife, it shall be at
least in good faith. She shall know all. Probably she will refuse
him. For one thing, because he is ten years older than she is--a
century in the eyes of a child of seventeen; and, for another,
because she may not like him at all. For all he knows, she may hate
him as she hates her uncle George, in certain ways.
However it is, he will tell her that he has no love for her. It
shall be all fair and above-board between them. He can give her a
title. She can give him money, without which the title would be
useless.
On the instant he makes up his mind to risk the proposal. In all
probability she will say "No" to it. But if not--if she accepts
him--he swears to himself he will be true to her.
"The most dreadful thing you could do," says he, "would be to marry
a man who did not love you."
"Eh?" says she.
She seems surprised.
"To marry a man, then, with whom you weren't in love!"
"Oh, _that_, that's nothing," says she grandly. "I'd do a great deal
more than _that_ to get away from my uncle. But"--sorrowfully--
"nobody's asked me."
She says it so innocently, so sweetly, that Rylton's heart grows
cold within him. To ask her! To tempt this child----
"But," says he, looking away from her religiously, "would you marry
a man who was not in love with _you?"_
"Not in love with me?"
"No. Not actually in love, but who admired--liked you?"
"But a man who wasn't in love with me wouldn't want to marry me,"
says Tita. "At least, that's what the novels say."
"He might," says Rylton deliberately. He leans forward. "Will you
marry _me?"_
He almost laughs aloud as he makes his extraordinary proposal. If it
fails, as it certainly _must_, he will throw up the remnant of his
life here and go abroad. And, at all events, he can so far satisfy
his mother as to assure her that he had placed his all at this
little heiress's feet.
"You! You!" says she.
She stares at him.
"Even me! You said a moment ago that no man would ask you to marry
him for any reason less than love; but I--I am not in love with you,
and yet I ask you to marry me."
He pauses here, shocked at his own words, his brutal audacity.
"But why?" asks the girl slowly.
She is looking at him, deep inquiry and wonder in her great gray
eyes.
"Because I am poor and you are rich," says he honestly. "Your money
could redeem this old place, and I could give you a title--a small
thing, no doubt."
"You could take me away from my uncle," says the girl thoughtfully.
There is silence for awhile, and then--"I should be able to do as I
liked," says she, as if communing with herself.
"That certainly," says Rylton, who feels as if all things should be
allowed her at this juncture, considering how little it is in his
power to allow.
"And you?" She looks up at him. _"You_ could do as you liked, too!"
"Thank you!" says Rylton.
He smiles in spite of himself, but the girl continues very grave.
"You say you have nothing," says she, "but this house?"
"It is useless arguing about it," returns Rylton; "this house will
go shortly with all the rest. For myself, I don't care much really,
but my mother--she would feel it. That's why I say you can help us,
if you will."
"I should like to help _you!"_ says Tita, still very slowly.
She lays a stress upon the word "you."
"Well, will you trust yourself to me?"
"Trust myself!"
"Will you marry me? Consider how it is. I lay it all before you. I
am not in love with you, and I have not a penny in the world.
Literally, I have nothing."
"You have a mother," says Tita. "I," pathetically, "have nothing."
It is plain to him that she had set great store by her dead father.
"I have nothing, really. But you say this house must go?"
"Not if you will help me to keep it."
"I should not like to live here," says Tita, with some haste. And
then in a low tone, "Your mother would live here?"
"Yes, certainly."
"Well, and I--I have been very unhappy with Uncle George," says she.
Her air is so naïve that Rylton bursts out laughing. After all, the
last thing he would desire either would be to live here with his
mother.
"You would not have to make this place your home," says he. It had
never been a home to him since his father's death. "You shall
command me in this matter; I shall live at Oakdean if that is your
desire." Indeed, it seems to him it would be a great relief to get
away from the Hall, from his mother, from----
"To live at Oakdean!" The girl's face grows transfigured. She stares
at him as if hardly seeing him, however; her thoughts have carried
her back to past delights in which he has had no part. "To live
there again!" She sighs quickly, excitedly. "You haven't seen it,
you don't _know,"_ says she. "But it is the most beautiful place on
earth." She puts out her hand and lays it on his. "If I marry you,
will you promise that I shall live at Oakdean?"
"If you will do me the honour to marry me, you shall live just where
you like," returns he. Indeed, to him it is now a matter of
indifference where life may be dragged out to its weary end. But
Tita fails to see the apathy in his manner.
"Then, it is settled," cries she joyfully. She clasps her hands.
"Oh, how _good_ of you!" says she. "What a blessing I came here!
Fancy getting rid of Uncle George and getting back to Oakdean all in
one stroke!" Suddenly she looks round at him; there is almost terror
in her gaze. "You are sure you _mean_ it?" says she.
"I mean it. But, Tita,"--he takes one of her hands and holds it
between his own, and regards her with some anxiety--"have you
thought it all out? I have told you the truth, you know. I have told
you that I am not in love with you."
"In love with me! I'm sure I hope not," says Tita with a disgusted
air. "Don't put yourself out about that. I should hate you if you
were in love with me. Fancy a person following me about always, and
saying silly things to me, and perhaps wanting to kiss me! You,"
anxiously looking at him with searching eyes, "you wouldn't want to
kiss me, would you?"
She looks so pretty as she puts this startling question, that Rylton
loses himself a little.
"I don't know."
"Then you had _better_ know, and at _once,"_ says Miss Bolton, with
decision.
The whole affair seems to be trembling in the balance. A sense of
amusement has most unfortunately seized on Rylton, and is shaking
him to his very heart's core. To marry a girl who even objected to a
kiss! It sounds like a French play. He subdues his untimely mirth by
an effort, and says gravely, "How can I promise you that I shall
never want to kiss you? I may grow very fond of you in time, and
you--but, of course, that is far more improbable--may grow fond of
me."
"Even so," begins she hotly. She pauses, however, as if some thought
had struck her. "Well, let it stay so," says she. "If ever I do grow
to like you as much as you fancy, why, then you may kiss
me--sometimes."
"That's a bargain," says he.
Again he suppresses a desire to laugh. It seems to him that she is
intensely interesting in some way.
"In the meantime," says he, with quite a polite air, "may I not kiss
you now?"
"No!" says she. It is the lightest monosyllable, but fraught with
much energy. She tilts the shoulder nearest to him, and peeps at him
over it, with a half-merry little air.
She sets Rylton's mind at work. Is she only a silly charming child,
or an embryo flirt of the first water? Whatever she is, at all
events, she is very new, very fresh--an innovation! He continues to
look at her.
"Really no?" questions he.
She nods her head.
"And yet you have said 'Yes' to everything else?"
She nods her head again. She nods it even twice.
"Yes, I shall marry you," says she.
"I may tell my mother?"
Miss Bolton sits up. A little troubled expression grows within her
eyes.
"Oh! must you?" cried she. "She _will_ be mad. She won't let you
marry me--I know she won't. She--hates me."
"My dear child, why?" Rylton's tone is shocked. The very truth in
her declaration makes it the more shocking. And how does she know?
His mother has been sweetness itself to her _before_ the curtain.
"Never mind, I know," says Tita. "I feel things. They come to me. I
don't blame her. I'm sure I'm often horrid. I know that, when I look
at other people. When I look at----"
She pauses.
"Look at whom?"
"At your cousin."
"My cousin!"
"Yes! You love her, don't you?"
"Love her!" He has turned suddenly as pale as death. "What do you
mean?" asks he in a low voice.
"I love her, any way," says Tita. "I think Miss Knollys is the
nicest person in all the world."
"Oh, Margaret?" says he. He says it involuntarily. The relief is so
great that it compels him to give himself away.
"Why, who else?" says Tita. "Who did _you_ think I meant?"
"Who _could_ I think?" says he, recovering. "Even now I am
surprised. Margaret, though very superior in most ways, is not
always beloved."
"But you love her?"
"Oh yes, _I_ do!"
"I am glad of that," says Tita. "Because I love her more than anyone
I know. And I have been thinking"--she looks at him quickly--"I have
been thinking that"--nervously--"that when I marry you, Miss Knollys
will be my cousin, too, in a sort of way, and that perhaps she will
let me call her by her name. Do you," anxiously, "think she will?"
"I know she will." His answer is terse. He has barely yet recovered
from the shock she had innocently given him.
"And your mother?" asks she, going back to the first question. "Do
you think she will like you to marry me? Oh, do persuade her!"
"Make no mistake about my mother, Tita; she will receive you with
open arms." He feels as if he were lying when he says this, yet is
it not the truth? "She will be glad to receive you as a daughter."
"Will she? She doesn't look like it," says Tita, "not sometimes
when I--_look back at her!"_
She rises, and makes a step towards the door of the conservatory
that will lead her to the balcony, and so back to the dancing-room.
"Tita? Bear with my mother," says he gently, and in a low voice.
The girl turns to him, her whole young, generous heart in her voice.
"Oh, I shall! I shall indeed!"
They traverse the long balcony in silence. The moon is flooding it
with brilliant light. Here and there are groups in twos or
threes--the twos are most popular. Just as they come to the entrance
to the dancing-room, an alcove now deserted, Tita stops short and
looks at him.
"You have promised to be kind to me!" says she, her voice trembling.
For the first time the solemnity of this marriage arrangement of
hers seems to have dawned upon her.
"I have," says Rylton earnestly.
"I am often very troublesome," says the poor child. "Uncle George
says so. But you----" She hesitates, looking at him always. Her gaze
is intense. He feels as if she is watching him, taking his mental
temperature, as it were.
"Be kind to me in turn, Tita," says he. "Don't mistrust me. Try to
_know_ that I like you."
"I wish," says she, a little forlornly, "that you could be fond of
me. I'm--you don't know it--nobody knows it--but I'm often very
lonely. I've been lonely all the time since pappy died."
"You shall never be lonely again," says Rylton. "I'm your friend
from this hour--your friend for ever." He is touched to his very
heart by her words and her small face. He stoops over her, and in
spite of all that has been said against kissing, presses his lips to
her soft cheek!
"Ah! You are kind. I _do_ like you," says she, gazing at him with
earnest eyes. "Yes, I know I shall be happy with you." She is
evidently comparing him most favourably with Uncle George. "And you
will be fond of me, won't you? You will be good to me?"
"I will, so help me God!" says Rylton very solemnly.
To her it seems an oath of allegiance--kindly, tender, reassuring.
To him it is a solemn abjuration of all his devotion to--the other.
CHAPTER X.
HOW MAURICE GIVES WAY TO TEMPER, AND HOW LADY RYLTON PLANTS A SHAFT
OR TWO. AND HOW MARGARET SAYS A WORD IN SEASON, AND HOW IN RETURN
COLONEL NEILSON SAYS A WORD TO HER.
Maurice goes straight to his mother's room, not from a sense of
duty, but a desire to clinch the matter finally. Lady Rylton would
be the last person to permit backsliding where her own interests
were concerned, and perhaps---- He does not exactly say it to
himself in so many words, but he feels a certain dread of the moment
when he shall be alone--a prey to thought. What if he should regret
the move he had taken, to the extent of wanting it undone? His step
grows quicker as he approaches his mother's room. His interview with
her is of the slightest--a bare declaration of the fact. She would
have fallen upon his neck in the exuberance of her triumph and her
satisfaction, but he coldly repulses her.
"My dear mother, why such enthusiasm over my engagement to a girl of
whom you distinctly disapprove?"
"Disapprove! Of Tita! Dearest Maurice, what an idea!"
"We won't go into it," says Maurice, with a gesture of
ill-suppressed disgust. "I know your opinion of her. I beg to say,
however, I do not share it. Badly as I shall come out of this
transaction, I should like you to remember that I both admire and
like Miss Bolton."
"I know, dearest boy, I know," says Lady Rylton, in the tone one
would use to an acute sufferer. "It is very noble of you, Maurice.
It is a sacrifice. I felt sometimes I had no right to demand----"
"The sacrifice is hers," says he shortly, gloomily.
His eyes are bent upon the ground.
"Hers! That little upst---- that poor unsophisticated child! My dear
Maurice, why run away with things? Of course she was charmed,
enchanted, _flattered_, in that you admired her so much as to ask
her to be your wife."
"She was not," says Maurice flatly.
"Exactly what I should have expected from such a----" Lady Rylton
checks herself in her fury. "From such an innocent creature,"
substitutes she. "But for all that, I shall consider how great is
the sacrifice you have made, Maurice--how you have given up the
happiness of your life to preserve the old name."
"I am beginning to get tired of the old name," says Maurice slowly.
"Its nobility seems to me to be on the decline."
"Oh, not now," says Lady Rylton, who does not understand him, who
could not, if she tried, fathom the depths of self-contempt that he
endures, when he thinks of this evening's work, of his permitting
this child to marry him, and give him her wealth--for
nothing--nothing! What _can_ he give her in return? An old name. She
had not seemed to care for that--to know the importance of it. "Now
it will rise again, and at all events, Maurice, you have saved the
old home!"
"True!" says he. "For you."
"For _me?_ Oh, dearest boy, what _can_ you mean?"
"Yes, for you only. She refuses to live here with you."
The very disquietude of his soul has driven him into this mad
avowal. Looking at her with dull eyes and lowering brows, he tells
himself--in this, one of the saddest hours of his life--that he
hates the mother who bore him. Her delight in his engagement is
odious to him; it seems to fan his rage against her. What has she
ever done for him, what sympathy has she ever shown? She has
embittered the life of the woman he loves; she has insulted the
woman he is to marry. What consideration does she deserve at his
hands?
"She refuses to live here with _me?"_ says Lady Rylton. "And why,
may I ask?"
Her small, pale face flushes angrily.
"I don't know, really; you should be the one to know."
His tone is so cold, so uncompromising, that she decides on coming
to terms for the present. Afterwards, when that girl has married
him, she will remember to some purpose, so far as _she_ is
concerned. There is a little tale that she can tell her.
"Dearest Maurice, how could I? I always fancied I treated her with
the utmost kindness. But why should we worry about it? No doubt it
was a mere girlish fancy, a distaste," playfully, "to the terrible
mamma-in-law of fiction. Such monsters do not exist now. She will
learn that by degrees. You will bring her to stay with me for awhile
on your return from your honeymoon?"
"If you desire it."
"Of course I shall desire it; then she and I will become great
friends. You are going? My love to your little _fiancée_, and say I
am so charmed, so delighted! And tell her I should like her to come
to me for a quiet little talk in the morning about eleven; I shall
have no one with me then but Marian."
"She shall not come to you, then," says Rylton. A dark red mounts to
his brow. What a diabolical thought--to receive those two together!
"Do you _hear?"_ says he imperiously.
"Good heavens, yes!" says his mother, pretending prettily to cower
before him. "What a tone! What a look! What have I done, then?"
"What devilish cruelty is in your heart I don't know," says he, his
passion carrying him beyond all bounds; "but understand at once, I
will not have Tita tortured."
Lady Rylton leans back in her chair and laughs.
"You would have made a good tragic actor," she says. "If this little
plebeian throws you over after all, you should think of it. You
remind me of your father when he was in his most amusing moods.
There, go; kiss Tita for me." Rylton turns to the door, his very
soul on fire with rage. Just as he goes out, she calls to him, with
a little soft musical ripple of laughter. "By-the-bye, take care you
do not kiss Marian instead," says she.
* * * * * *
He meets Margaret on his way downstairs. He had walked up and down
the passages above, in the dim light, with a view to bringing
himself back into a state of control, with so much success that,
when he comes face to face with Miss Knollys, he seems to her as
self-possessed as usual. He had seen her talking to Tita in the hall
below, in a somewhat earnest manner, and had taken it for granted
that Tita had told her of their engagement.
"Well," says he, stopping her.
"Well?" returns she, smiling.
"You have heard?"
"Of what? Anything new?" curiously. The very best women are curious.
"Of my engagement; surely she has told you?"
"She? Who? _Marian!"_
"No--_no!"_
Then the truth comes to her.
"Tita?" she says faintly.
He nods his head; words fail him.
"She told me nothing," says Margaret, recovering herself.
"Yet I saw you talking together just now."
"You did indeed."
"And she said nothing?"
"Nothing."
"Then what _were_ you talking about?"
"I was advising her to marry no man who did not love her."
"What an extraordinary piece of advice to give to a girl who, as far
as you knew, was not going to be married at all! What led up to it?"
"Not Tita, certainly. It was I who led up to it."
"And why?"
"Do you think I have been blind and deaf, Maurice, during the past
fortnight?" Miss Knollys almost compels his gaze. "If you are going
to marry this young girl, _this child,_ I hope, I"--almost
passionately--_"hope_ it will be for her good and yours."
"Margaret! What a tone! You mean something!"
"I do." Margaret's strong face lights up with honest anxiety. "I
mean this!" She takes a step nearer him. "How is it between you and
Marian?"
"Why, how has it been?" asks he, with affected lightness; but a
change passes over his face.
"Oh, Maurice, take care!" says his cousin, laying her hand upon his
arm.
"Well, if you must have it," says he, frowning, "all that is over."
He breaks away from her, frowning still.
It is quite plain to her that she has offended him. But even as he
leaves her he looks back; a sort of grim smile illumines his face.
"I note that in your 'hoping' you have put Miss Bolton before me;
that is as it should be. She is a sworn admirer of yours. Did you
know it?"
"No. But she appeals to me--I don't know why--but I feel that I
could love her," says Margaret, in short sentences as if thinking,
and as if a little surprised at herself. Suddenly she breaks into a
more immediate feeling. "Oh, Maurice, love her too! Try, _try_ to
love her; she is so young. Her very _soul_ is in your keeping. Be
good to her; she is a mere baby. If you neglect her, forget her----"
Maurice casts a queer look at her.
"'Is thy servant a dog?'" quotes he.
* * * * *
Margaret moves slowly away. She had, when Maurice met her, been bent
on going upstairs to her books and her thoughts; but now she turns
backward. She feels as if she wants something. Perhaps she finds
it--unconsciously, however--when she stops before a tall,
soldierly-looking man, who, seeing her, comes to meet her with
evident pleasure.
"You look disturbed!" says Colonel Neilson.
He is, as I have said, a tall man, with a kindly face, and deep eyes
of a dark colour. There is nothing very special about him; he is
not, strictly speaking, handsome, yet he was, last season, one of
the most popular men in town.
"Yes, and no," says Margaret. "My cousin has confided a sort of
secret to me."
"A secret! I may not hear it, then?"
"Well, I don't know. It is, as I have hinted, a _sort_ of secret,
not very much to be kept."
"I may hear it, then?"
"I suppose so. At all events," with a laugh, soft and silk, "I
should like you to hear it, because I want your opinion. You will
give it?"
"You know I will give you everything I have," says he.
"Oh no! you must not talk like that," says she. "Put all that on one
side, and let me have you for my friend. I want one now--not for
myself, but for another; for two others, in fact. You know how fond
I am of Maurice, and lately I have contracted quite a romantic, for
_me"_--she pauses and laughs--"well, quite a romantic affection, for
a little girl staying here with my aunt. You know who I mean--Tita
Bolton."
"A charming child?"
"I am so glad you like her! But, as you say, she is a mere child;
and Maurice has proposed to her, and she has accepted him, and I am
curious about her future."
"Hers only?"
"Oh no! His, too!"
"It will be a risk, certainly," says Colonel Neilson. "I thought--I
imagined--I had heard that Rylton was engaged to his cousin, Mrs.
Bethune--a very beautiful woman."
"How can you think so!" says Margaret. "Well, yes, no doubt she _is_
beautiful, but I should not like Maurice to marry her."
"You would prefer his marrying the 'charming child'?"
"I don't know what I prefer," says Miss Knollys. She casts a
reproachful glance at him that certainly is not deserved. Has he not
served her late and early for the past six years? "I thought you
would help me!"
"You know I shall do that, however things may turn."
"Well, help me here. What _ought_ Maurice to do? I am so dreadfully
unhappy about this projected marriage of his."
"It seems to me you are unhappy about all things except those that
concern yourself. Your own future seems a blank to you; is it not
so?"
Miss Knollys makes a little movement.
"Why should it be always a blank?" says he. "Margaret," in a low
tone, "let me fill it!"
Margaret rises impatiently.
"After all, you can't help me," says she, turning abruptly away.
"Margaret, hear me!"
"No, no, no! What is the use?"
She goes slowly down the hall.
CHAPTER XI.
HOW THE LAST DAY COMES, AND HOW SOME STRANGE WORDS ARE SAID BEFORE
THE MARRIAGE IS ACCOMPLISHED; AND HOW MARION BETHUNE SCORES A POINT.
The dawn of the wedding-day has broken. Everything has been hurried
over as much as possible; with no unseemly haste--just in the most
ordinary, kindly way--however. But Lady Rylton's hand was at the
helm, and she guided her barque to a safe anchor with all speed. She
had kept Tita with her--under her eye, as it were--until the final
accomplishment should have taken place.
The wedding, she declared, should be from her house, from The Place,
seeing that the poor darling child was motherless! She made herself
all things to Tita in those days, although great anger stung her
within. She had been bitterly incensed by Maurice's avowal that Tita
had declined to live with her at The Place, but she had been
mightily pleased, for all that, in the thought that therefore The
Place would be left to her without a division of authority.
Sir Maurice has gone to Rickfort to interview "Uncle George" of
unpleasant fame. He had found him a rather strange-looking man, but
not so impossible as Tita had led him to imagine. He made no
objection of any sort to the marriage, and, indeed, through his cold
exterior Maurice could see that the merchant blood in him was
flattered at his niece's alliance with some of the oldest blood in
England.
He was quite reasonable, too, about his niece's fortune. So much was
to go to redeeming the more immediate debts on the property; for the
rest, Sir Maurice declared he would have nothing to do with it. The
money should be settled on his wife entirely. It was hers; he had no
claim to it. He would have something off his own property, a small
thing, but sufficient for his requirements. He gave his word to quit
the turf finally. He had no desire to amuse himself in that sort of
way again--or, indeed, in other ways. He wished to settle down, etc.
It occurred to old Bolton, who was a shrewd man, that Sir Maurice
looked like one whose interest in life and its joys was at an end.
Still, he was a baronet, and of very ancient lineage, and it was a
triumph for the Boltons. He refused to acknowledge to _himself_ that
he was sacrificing his niece. It was not a sacrifice; it was an
honour!
For one thing the old man stipulated, or rather bargained. He had
managed his niece's affairs so far with great success; some of her
money was in land, in Oakdean and Rickfort, for example; the rest he
had invested securely, as he hoped and believed. If he might still
be acknowledged as her guardian?
Sir Maurice, of course, gave in. Thoroughly ashamed and humiliated
by the whole affair--he, the man, without a penny; she, the woman,
possessed of all things in that line--it gave him genuine relief to
tell her uncle that he would be actually thankful if he would still
continue to be the head of her affairs, and manage her money
matters, as he had managed them hitherto--and always with such happy
results.
Mr. Bolton had bowed to him over his spectacles; his curious gray
eyes caught a little addition of light, as it were. He was honoured
by Sir Maurice's confidence, but, if he might suggest it, he thought
that whilst Sir Maurice's affairs were righting themselves, he ought
to allow himself a certain income out of his wife's money.
But Rylton would not hear of it. He had, as he had already told Mr.
Bolton, a small yearly income that he might with honesty call his
own. It was specially small on account of his mother's jointure
having to be paid out of the estate also. Of course he could not
curtail that, nor would he desire to do so. And, seeing how deeply
dipped the estates were, he could, of course, only take as much as
he could reasonably desire. With his future wife's help, however, he
felt the old property could be brought back in time to its former
splendid position--to a position that he would be proud to see her
the mistress of, etc.
There is always a good deal of humbug talked on these occasions.
Maurice, perhaps, talked very considerably less than most people;
and, indeed, when he said he would gladly see her mistress of all he
ought to have, he spoke something very near the truth. He was
grateful to her beyond all words, and he had sworn to himself to be
loyal to her.
Lady Rylton was distinctly annoyed when she heard of the
arrangements come to. She would have liked Maurice to have had
entire control of his wife's fortune. And, oddly enough, Tita was
annoyed too.
"Oh, I _wish_ you had broken away entirely from Uncle George," she
had said to Maurice, when he had come down on one of his flying
visits to The Place between his engagement and his marriage.
"But why? He seemed to me quite a nice old gentleman."
She could not explain why, however, but only clung to her belief
that they would be better without Uncle George. She hated him. That
seemed to be the sum total of her objection.
Maurice had left The Place the morning after his engagement. He had
had time to have an interview with his little _fiancée_, who seemed
surprised that he wanted it in private, and who, to his great
relief, insisted on making very cool adieux to him in the public
hall, where everyone was passing to and fro, and where Mr. Gower was
making a nuisance of himself by playing ball against the library
door. Naturally it was impossible to have an affecting parting
there.
Marian had not come down to breakfast. And Sir Maurice was conscious
of a passionate sense of relief. She had heard. He knew--he felt
that! His mother would not spare her; and even if she had not cared
as _he_ had cared, still, unless she was the greatest fiend on
earth, she must have had some small love for him--how _terribly_
small he knows! He assures himself of that all day long in the
living torture he is enduring, as if by it he can reconcile himself
to his marriage with this child, whose money is so hateful, and
whose presence is such a bore.
There are a few things, however, always to be thankful for. Tita, in
the frankest fashion in all their interviews, has told him that she
doesn't care a fig about him, that she was marrying him _only_ to
escape from Uncle George!
All their interviews have been but few. Sir Maurice had run down
from here, and there, and everywhere, just for a night at a time,
arriving barely in time for dinner, and going away before breakfast.
Once, and once only, he had seen Mrs. Bethune. Those other times she
had been confined to her room with neuralgia (what should we all do
without neuralgia?), or with letters to write, or something,
_any_thing else.
That one time she came out of the library at the very moment he had
arrived. They met in the hall, and it was quite impossible to avoid
seeing him. She came forward with a charming air.
"Is it you? How long since we have met!" said she. Her tone was
evenness itself; she was smiling brightly. If she was pale, he could
not see it in the darkening twilight. "How troublesome these
elections are! I see you have been staying with the Montgomerys; I
do hope he will get in. But Conservatives are nowhere nowadays.
Truth lies buried in a well. That's a good old saying." She nodded
to him and went up a step or two of the stairs, then looked back.
"Don't stay away from The Place on my account," said she, with
rather an amused smile. "I like to have you here. And see how badly
you are behaving to the beloved one!"
She smiled again, with even more amusement than before, and
continued her graceful way up the stairs. He had turned away sore at
heart. She had not even thought it worth her while to make an appeal
to him. If she had! He told himself that even then, if she had said
but one word, he would have thrown up everything, even his _honour_,
and gone with her to the ends of the earth. But she had not said
that word--she had not cared--_sufficiently_.
* * * *
And now it is indeed all over! They have come back from the
church--Tita just as she is every day, without a cloud on her brow,
and laughing with everybody, and telling everybody, without the
least disguisement, that she is so _glad_ she is married, because
now Uncle George can never claim her again. She seems to have no
thought but this. She treats her newly-made husband in a merry,
perfectly unembarrassed, rather _boyish_ style, and is, in effect,
quite delighted with her new move.
Sir Maurice has gone through it all without a flaw. At the breakfast
he had made quite a finished little speech (he could never have told
you afterwards what it was about), and when the bride was upstairs
changing her wedding garments he had gone about amongst his guests
with an air that left nothing to be desired. He looks quite an ideal
bridegroom. A mad longing for solitude drags him presently, however,
into a small anteroom, opening off a larger room beyond. The
carriage that is to convey him to the station is at the door, and he
almost swears at the delay that arises from Tita's non-appearance.
Yet here--here is rest. Here there is no one to breathe detestable
congratulations into his ear--_no_ one.
A tall, slight figure rises from a couch that is half hidden by a
Chinese screen. She comes forward a step or two. Her face is pale.
It is Marian Bethune.
"You!" says she in a low, strange voice. "Have _you _come here, too,
to _think?"_ She speaks with difficulty. Then all at once she makes
a stray movement with her hands, and brings herself to her senses by
a passionate effort. "You are like me, you want quiet," says she,
with a very ordinary little laugh; "so you came here. Well, shall I
leave you?"
She is looking very beautiful. Her pallor, the violet shades beneath
her eyes, all tend to make her lovely.
"It is you who have left me."
"I? Oh no! Oh, think!" says she, laughing still.
Rylton draws a long breath.
"After all, it could never have come to anything," says he, in a
dull sort of way.
"Never, never," smiling.
"I don't believe you care," says he bitterly.
She looks at him. It is a curious look.
"Why should I? Do _you_ care?"
He turns away.
"Don't let us part bad friends," says she, going to him, and twining
one of her hands round his arm. "What have I done to you, or you to
me? How have we been enemies? It is fate, it is poverty that has
been our common enemy, Maurice, remember what we _have_ been to each
other."
"It is what I dare not remember," says he hoarsely.
His face is resolutely turned from hers.
"Well, well, forget, then, _if you can_. As for me, remembrance will
be my sole joy."
"It is madness, Marian, to talk to me like this. What is to be
gained by it?"
"Why, nothing, nothing, and so let us forget; let us begin again as
true friends only."
"There is no hope of that," says he.
His voice is a mere whisper.
"Oh yes, there is--there," eagerly, _"must_ be. What! Would you
throw me over altogether, Maurice? Oh, that I _could_ not bear! Why
should we not be as brother and sister to each other? Yes, yes,"
vehemently; "tell me it shall be so. You will ask me to your new
house, Maurice, won't you?"
She is looking up into his face, her hand still pressing his arm.
"My wife's house."
"Your wife's house is yours, is it not? You owe yourself something
from this marriage. You will ask me there now and then?"
"She will ask her own guests, I suppose."
"She will ask whom _you_ choose. Pah! what is she but a child in
your hands?"
"Tita is not the cipher you describe her," says Rylton coldly.
"No, no; I spoke wrongly--I am always wrong, it seems to me," says
she, with such sweet contrition that she disarms him again. "I
cannot live if I cannot see you sometimes, and, besides, you _know_
what my life is here, and how few are the houses I can go to,
and"--she slips her arms suddenly round his neck--"you _will_ ask me
sometimes, Maurice?"
"Yes."
"You promise that?"
"I promise that, as far as it lies in my power, I will always
befriend you."
"Ah, that is not enough," says she, laughing and sobbing in the same
breath. "I am losing you for ever. Give me something to dwell upon,
to hope for. Swear you will make me your guest sometimes."
"I swear it," says he huskily.
He removes her arms from his neck, and holds her from him. His face
is gray.
"It is for the sake of our old _friendship_ that I plead," says she.
The tears are running down her cheeks.
"Our friendship," repeats he, with a groan.
He makes a movement as if to fling her from him, then suddenly
catches her to his heart, and presses his lips passionately to hers.
* * * * *
"Maurice! Maurice!" calls somebody.
Marian sinks upon a couch near her, and buries her face in her
hands. Sir Maurice goes into the hall to meet his bride.
The partings are very brief. Tita, who is in the gayest spirits,
says good-bye to everybody with a light heart. Has not her freedom
been accomplished? She receives Lady Rylton's effusive embrace
calmly. There are some, indeed, who say that the little bride did
not return her kiss. Just at the very last, with her foot almost on
the carriage step, Tita looks back, and seeing Margaret at a little
distance, runs to her, and flings herself into her embrace.
"You are mine now, my own cousin!" whispers she joyfully.
"God bless you, Tita," says Margaret in a whisper, too, but very
earnestly, "and preserve to you your happy heart!"
"Oh, I shall always be happy," says Tita; "and I shall hurry back to
see _you,"_ giving her another hug.
Then somebody puts her into the carriage, and, still smiling and
waving her hands, she is driven away.
"Really, Margaret, you should be flattered," says Lady Rylton, with
a sneer. "She seems to think more of you than of her husband."
"I hope her husband will think of her," returns Margaret coldly. "As
I told you before, I consider this marriage ill done."
CHAPTER XII.
HOW TITA COMES BACK FROM HER HONEYMOON, AND HOW HER HUSBAND'S MOTHER
TELLS HER OF CERTAIN THINGS THAT SHOULD HAVE BEEN LEFT UNTOLD.
"And the weather--the weather was the most marvellous thing!" says
Tita, with enthusiasm. "Perpetual sunshine! Here, in September, it
often pelts rain all day long!"
_ "Pelts!_ My dear Tita, _what_ a word!" says Lady Rylton.
She sinks back in her chair as if overcome, and presses her perfumed
handkerchief to her face.
"What's the matter with it?" asks Tita, a little smartly, perhaps.
"It's a right-down good word, in my opinion. I've heard lots of
people use it."
"No doubt _you_ have," says her mother-in-law.
"Well, so have you, I dare say!" says Tita.
"I expect we all have," says Margaret Knollys, laughing. "Still, you
know, Tita, it's not a pretty word."
"Very good; I shan't say it again," says Tita, the mutinous little
face of a moment ago now lovely with love.
She has come back from her honeymoon quite as fond of Margaret as
when she started.
It is now the middle of September; outside on the lawn the shadows
are wandering merrily from tree to tree. The sun is high, but little
clouds running across it now and again speak of sharp rains to come.
"The air so soft, the pines whispering so low,
The dragon-flies, like fairy spears of steel,
Darting or poised."
All these speak of the glad heat that still remains, though summer
itself is but a dream that is gone.
Tita's honeymoon is at an end. It had seemed to her delightful. She
had taken but a child's view of it. Maurice had been so kind, so
good, so different from that nasty old uncle. He had been so good,
indeed, that when he asked her to come first to see his mother (Lady
Rylton had made quite a point of this in her letters to him; the
county might think it so odd if the young wife did not appear
anxious to fly into her arms on her return), she had said "Yes"
quite willingly, and with a grateful little glance. He had done so
much for her, she must do something for him. But she hated going
back to The Place, for all that. She wanted to go straight to her
own old home, her beautiful Oakdean, without a single stop.
She has been at The Place now for a week. Margaret Knollys and
Randal Gower are the only two guests, Mrs. Bethune being on a visit
to some friends in Scotland. The shooting here is excellent, and Sir
Maurice has enjoyed himself immensely. Sir Maurice's wife has,
perhaps, not enjoyed herself quite so much. But nothing, so far, has
occurred to render her in the very least unhappy. If the clouds be
black, she has not seen them. Her young soul has uplifted itself,
and is soaring gaily amongst the stars. In her ignorance she tells
herself she is quite, quite happy; it is only when we love that we
doubt of happiness, and thus sometimes (because of our modesty,
perhaps) we gain it. Tita has never known what love means.
There has been a little fret, a little jar to-day, between her and
Lady Rylton. The latter's memory is good, and she has never
forgotten what Maurice--in a moment's folly--had said of Tita's
determination not to live with her at The Place. It is Lady Rylton's
_rôle_ to return to all, in extra good measure, such injuries as she
may judge herself to have received.
Tita naturally, in this small warfare, is at a disadvantage. She has
forgotten her words, but even if she remembered them, would not for
a moment suspect Maurice of having repeated them. And, indeed,
Maurice, as we all know, had done it in a heated moment with best
intent towards his small betrothed; besides, Tita at this time--so
heartwhole and so _débonnaire--_gives no thinking to anything save
the getting out into the fresh air in these uncertain days, and the
breaking in of a young horse that Maurice has made her a present of.
Danger walks behind her, but she never turns her head; what has she
to fear?
"Youth, that knows no dread
Of any horrors lurking far ahead,
Across the sunny flowered fields of life."
carries her safely right into the enemy's camp. Cruel youth!
"Won't you come out with me and have a stroll in the gardens before
tea?" asks Margaret, rising. It seems to her that the social air is
growing a little too sultry. "Come, Tita; it will do you good."
"Oh, I should love it!" says Tita, starting to her feet.
"Dear Margaret, you forget that, though Tita has been here for a
week, this is the very first quiet moment I have had with her! Do
not tempt her from me!"
"Certainly not, Tessie, if you wish to have her with you," says
Margaret, reseating herself.
Now, more than ever, she feels there is danger in the air.
"Don't let me keep _you,"_ says Lady Rylton, with deliberation. "Go,
dear Margaret, and get some of the sweet evening air--it may be of
use to your complexion; it is the tiniest bit yellow of late. And
when one is twenty-five--it _is_ twenty-five?"
She knows Margaret's truthful nature.
"Thirty," says Margaret, who knows her, too, to the very ground.
"Ah, impossible!" says Lady Rylton sweetly. "Twenty-five,
Margaret--not a day more! But, still, your complexion---- There, go
away and refresh it; and come back when I have had my little chat
with my dearest Tita."
Margaret casts a swift glance at the girl sitting there, apparently
quite unconscious of the coming storm, and with her hands twined
behind her head. She has her legs crossed--another sin--and is
waving one little foot up and down in a rather too careless fashion.
Tita looks back at her.
"Don't be long," says she inaudibly.
Margaret gives her a nod, and goes out through the window.
"My dearest child," says Lady Rylton, nestling cosily into her
chair, and smiling delicately at Tita over the top of her fan, "you
may have noticed that I gave dear Margaret her _congé_ with intent?"
"I saw that you wanted to get rid of her," says Tita.
"I fear, my dear, your training has been somewhat defective," says
Lady Rylton, biting her lips. "We never--we in society, I
mean--never 'get rid' of people. There are better ways of doing
things, that----"
"It must cause you a lot of trouble," says Tita. "It looks to me
like walking half a dozen times round your bath on a frosty morning,
knowing all along you will have to get into it."
"Sh!" says Lady Rylton. "My dear, you should not mention your _bath_
before people."
"Why not? When one loves a thing, one speaks of it. Don't _you_ love
your bath?" asks Tita.
Lady Rylton sits glaring at her, as if too horrified to go on. Tita
continues:
"If you don't, you ought, you know," says she.
"You must be out of your mind to talk to me like this," says Lady
Rylton at last. Something in the girl's air tells her that there is
some little touch of devilment in it, some anger, some hatred. "But,
naturally, I make allowances for you. Your birth, your surroundings,
your bringing up, all preclude the idea that you should know how to
manage yourself in the world into which you have been thrown by your
marriage with my son."
"As for my birth," says Tita slowly, "I did not choose it; and you
should be the last to throw it in my teeth. If you disapproved of it
_before_ my marriage with your son, why did you not say so?"
"There were many reasons," says Lady Rylton slowly, deliberately.
"For one, as you know, your money was a necessity to Maurice; and
for another----" She breaks off, and scans the girl's face with an
air of question. "Dare I go on?" asks she.
"Why should you not dare?" says Tita.
A quick light has come into her eyes.
"Ah, that is it! I have something to say to you that I think,
perhaps, should be said, yet I fear the saying of it."
"For you, or for me?" asks Tita.
She has her small brown hands clasped tightly together in her lap
now. There is something nervous in the tension of them. Where,
_where_ is Margaret? For all that, she looks back at her
mother-in-law with a clear and fearless glance.
"For you," says Lady Rylton--"for you only! But before I begin--I am
a very nervous person, you know, and scenes," again pressing her
handkerchief to her face, "upset me so--tell me, _do_ tell me, if
you have a good temper!"
"I don't know," says Tita. "Why?"
"Well, a reasonable temper! I know Maurice would try
anything--_less_ than that."
"Has it to do with Maurice? Yes? I am _very_ reasonable," says Tita,
laughing. She shows all her pretty teeth. "Now for the other reason
for deigning to accept me as your son's wife!"
She laughs again. She seems to turn Lady Rylton into a sort of mild
ridicule.
"I don't think I should laugh about it if I were _you,"_ returns
Lady Rylton calmly, and with the subdued air that tells her
intimates when she is in one of her vilest moods. "I feel very sorry
for you, my poor child; and I would have warned you of this thing
long ago, but I dreaded the anger of Maurice."
"Why, what _is_ it?" cries Tita vehemently. "Has Maurice murdered
somebody, or defrauded somebody, or run away with somebody?"
"Oh no! He did not run _away_ with her," says lady Rylton slowly.
"You mean--you mean----"
The girl is now leaning forward, her small face rather white.
"I mean that he has been in love with his cousin for the past two
years."
"His cousin!" Tita's thoughts run to Margaret. "Margaret?"
"Nonsense!" says Lady Rylton; the idea strikes her as ludicrous. The
surprise, the strange awakening to the young bride, who, if not in
love with her husband, has at all events expected loyalty from him,
has affected her not at all; but this suggestion of Margaret as a
possible lover of Maurice's convulses her with amusement. "Margaret!
_No!"_
"Who, then?" asks Tita.
"Marian--Marian Bethune."
"Mrs. Bethune!"
"Did you never guess? I fancied perhaps you had heard nothing, so I
felt it my duty to let you into a _little_ of the secret--to _warn_
you. Marian might want to stay with you, for example--and
Maurice----"
"Mrs. Bethune may stay with me with pleasure," says Tita. "Why not?"
"Why _not?"_ Lady Rylton pauses as if choking. She had thought to
lower this girl into the very dust, and revenge herself on Maurice
at the same time by her shameful revelation. "You do not care,
then?" says she, bitterly disappointed.
Tita does not answer her. Suddenly her young thoughts have gone
backwards, and all at once she remembers many things. The poison has
entered into her. In a moment, as it were, she is back in that dim
conservatory where Maurice (he has never been "he" or "him" to her,
as happier girls, who love more and are more beloved, would have
styled him)--where Maurice had asked her to marry him.
Now, in some strange fashion, her memory grows alive and compels her
to remember how he looked and spoke that night--that night of his
proposal to her, when she had asked him if he loved his cousin.
There had been a queer, indescribable change in his face--a sudden
pallor, a start! She had thought nothing of it then, but now it
comes back to her. She _had_ meant Margaret--Margaret whom she
loves; but he--who had _he_ meant?
Really it doesn't matter so much after all, this story of Lady
Rylton's. Maurice can go his way and she hers--that was arranged!
But, for all that, it _does_ seem rather mean that he should have
married her, telling her nothing of this.
"Care! why should I care?" says she suddenly, Lady Rylton's last
words clinging to her brain, in spite of all its swift wanderings
during the last sixty seconds.
"Such an admirable indifference would almost lead me to believe that
you had been born of good parentage," says Lady Rylton, cold with
disappointed revenge.
"I was born of excellent parentage----" Tita is beginning, when the
sound of footsteps slowly mounting the stairs of the veranda outside
comes to them.
A second later Mrs. Gower shows himself.
CHAPTER XIII.
HOW A YOUNG AND LOVELY NATURE TAKES A SHOCK MOST CRUELLY
ADMINISTERED. AND HOW A DOWAGER TAKES A NEW NAME AS A DIRECT INSULT.
AND HOW TITA DECLINES TO PROMISE ANYTHING.
He stands at the open window looking in. All at once Tita knows and
_feels_ that Margaret sent him to rescue her from captivity.
"Lady Rylton," calls he, "won't you come out? The evening is a
perfect dream--a boon and a blessing to men, like those pens, you
know."
The elder Lady Rylton answers him. She leans forward, a charming
smile on her wonderfully youthful features.
"No. No, thanks." She shakes her pretty, fair head at Gower in a
delightfully coquettish fashion. Dear boy! How sweet is it of him to
come and fetch her for a little stroll among the hollyhocks. "I
can't go out now. Not _to-night_, Randal!"
"Oh! er--so sorry! But----" He looks at Tita. It is impossible not
to understand that the Lady Rylton he had intended to take for a
little stroll in the calm, delightful evening, had been the younger
Lady Rylton. "Well, if your--er--mother--won't come, won't _you?"_
asks he, now addressing Tita distinctly.
"I am not going out either," says she, smiling gently at him. To go
now will be to betray fear, and she--no, she will not give in, any
way, she will never show the white feather. She will finish this
hour with Lady Rylton, whatever it may cost her.
"Really?" asks Gower. He looks as if he would have persuaded her to
come with him, but something in her manner convinces him of the
folly of persistence.
"Yes, really," returns she, after which he goes down the steps
again. They can hear him going, slowly this time, as if reluctantly,
and step by step. There doesn't seem to be a run left in him.
"How absurd it is, this confusion of titles!" says Lady Rylton, as
the last unsatisfactory step is lost to them in the distance. "Lady
Rylton here and Lady Rylton there. Absurd, _I_ call it." She makes a
pretence at laughter, but it is a sorry one--her laugh is only
angry.
"I suppose it can't be helped," says Tita indifferently. Her eyes
are still downcast, her young mouth a little scornful.
"But if you are to be Lady Rylton as well as I, how are we to
distinguish? What am _I_ to be?"
"The dowager, I suppose," says Tita, with a little flash of malice.
She has been rubbed the wrong way a trifle too much for _one_
afternoon.
_"The dowager!"_ Lady Rylton springs to her feet. "I--do you think
that _I_ shall follow _you_ out of a room?"
"Follow me! I'd hate you to follow me anywhere!" says Tita, who does
not certainly follow her as to her meaning.
"That is meant to be a smart speech, I presume," says Lady Rylton,
sinking back into her seat once more. "But do not for a moment
imagine that I dread you. You know very little of Society if you
think you will be tolerated _there."_
"I know nothing of Society," returns Tita, now very pale, "and
perhaps you will understand me when I say that I never want to know
anything. If Society means people who tell hateful, unkind stories
of a husband to his wife, I think I am very well out of it."
"That is a little censure upon poor me, I suppose," says Lady Rylton
with a difficult smile. She looks at Tita. Evidently she expects
Tita to sink into the ground beneath that austere regard, but Tita
comes up smiling.
"Well, yes. After all, I suppose so," says she slowly, thoughtfully.
"You shouldn't have told me that story about Maurice and----" She
stops.
"I shall not permit you to dictate to me what I should or should not
do," interrupts Lady Rylton coldly. "You forget yourself! You forget
what is due to the head of the house."
"I do not, indeed; Maurice will tell you so!"
"Maurice! What has he to do with it?"
"Why, he _is_ the head," slowly.
"True, you are right so far," says Lady Rylton bitterly. "But I was
not alluding to the _actual_ head; I was alluding to the--the
_mistress_ of this house." She pauses, and looks with open hatred at
the little girl before her. Tita could have answered her, have told
her that her authority was at an end for ever, but by a violent
effort she restrains herself. Tita's naturally warm temper is now at
boiling-point. Still, she puts a restraint upon herself.
"You will understand for the future, I hope," says Lady Rylton, who
has lost all control over _her_ temper; "you will, for the future,
at all events, I trust, bear yourself with respect towards the
mistress of this house."
Her manner is so insolent, so unbearable, that Tita's short-lived
calm gives way.
"Maurice says I am the mistress here," says she distinctly, clearly.
"You! _you----"_ Lady Rylton advances towards her with a movement
that is almost threatening.
"Don't be uneasy about it," says Tita, with a scornful little laugh,
and a gesture that destroys the meaning of Lady Rylton's. "I don't
want to be the mistress here. I dislike the place. I shall be
delighted if you will live here--_instead of me."_
"You are too good!" says Lady Rylton, in a choking tone. She looks
as if she could kill this girl, whom she has driven to so fierce an
anger.
"I think it dismal," goes on Tita. "I like light and gay places."
There is a little clutch at her heart, though why, she hardly knows.
What she _does_ know is that she hates this pretty, fair, patrician
woman before her--this woman with a well-bred face, and the
vulgarest of all vulgar natures. This woman who has betrayed her
son's secret. Even to so young a girl, and one who is not in love
with her husband, the idea of the husband being in love with
somebody else is distinctly distasteful.
"Besides, remember," says Tita, "Mrs. Bethune lives here. After all
you have told me of her, and--Maurice--you," breaking into a gay
little laugh, "could hardly expect me to make this place my home."
"You certainly seem to take it very lightly," says Lady Rylton.
"Maurice must be congratulated on having secured so _compliant_ a
wife."
"Why should I care?" asks Tita, turning a bright face to her. "We
made a bargain before our marriage--Maurice and I. He was to do as
he liked."
"And you?"
"I was to follow suit."
_ "Outrageous!"_ says Lady Rylton. "I shall speak to Maurice about
it. I shall warn you. I shall tell him how I disapprove of you, and
he----"
"He will do nothing," interrupts Tita. She stands up, and looks at
the older woman as if defying her. Her small face is all alight, her
eyes are burning.
"I dare say not, after all," says Lady Rylton, with a cruel smile.
"He knew what he was about when he made that arrangement. It leaves
him delightfully free to renew his love-affair with Marian Bethune."
"If he desires such freedom it is his." Tita gathers up her fan, and
the long suède gloves lying on the chair near her, and walks towards
the door.
"Stay, Tita!" cries Lady Rylton hurriedly. "You will say nothing of
this to Maurice. It was in strict confidence I spoke, and for your
good and his. You will say nothing to him?"
"I! what should I say?" She looks back at Lady Rylton, superb
disdain in her glance.
"You might mention, for example, that it was I who told you."
"Well, why shouldn't I?" asked Tita. "Are you ashamed of what you
have said?"
"I have always told you that I spoke only through a sense of duty,
to protect you and him in your married life. You will give me your
word that you will not betray me."
"I shall give you my word about nothing," coldly. "I shall tell
Maurice, or I shall not tell him, just as it suits me."
CHAPTER XIV.
HOW TITA COMES TO OAKDEAN, AND IS GLAD. AND HOW MAURICE CALLS TO
HER, AND SHE PERFORMS AN ACROBATIC FEAT. AND HOW A DISCUSSION
ARISES.
What a day it is! Golden light everywhere; and the sounds of singing
birds, and the perfume of the late mignonette and stocks. Who shall
say summer is gone? Tita, flitting gaily through the gardens and
pleasure-grounds of her old dear home, her beloved Oakdean, tells
herself that it is summer _here _at all events, whatever it may be
in other stupid homes.
Oakdean to-day is at its best, and that is saying a great deal. The
grand old lawn, studded here and there with giant beeches, seems
sleeping solemnly in the warm light, and to their left the lake
lies, sleeping too, rocking upon its breast the lily leaves, whose
flowers are now all gone. Over there the hills are purple with
flowering heather, and beyond them, yet not so far away but that the
soft murmuring of it can be heard, dwells the sea, spreading itself
out, grand, immense, until it seems to touch the pale blue heavens.
Tita, stopping with her hands full of lowers, stands upright, and as
a little breeze comes to her, draws in a long breath, as if catching
the salt from the great ocean that it brings her. Oh, what a
day--what a day!
Her lovely old home! Here she is in it once more--parted for ever
from the detested uncle, mistress of this one place that holds for
her the only happy memories of her youth. Here she and her father
had lived--she a young, _young _child, and he an old one--a most
happy couple; and here, too, she had grown to girlhood. And now here
she is again, free to roam, to order, to direct, with no single
hitch anywhere to mar her happiness.
The lovely new horse that Maurice has got for her leaves nothing to
be desired; she has had a gallop on him this morning. And all her
dear dogs have been sent to Oakdean, so that her hands are full of
favourites. As for Maurice himself, he is delightful. He doesn't
even _know_ how to scold. And it will always to be like
this--always. As for that story of Lady Rylton's about Marian
Bethune--why, Marian is quite an old thing! And besides--well,
besides, it doesn't matter. Maurice is here now, and he can't see
her, and even if he did--well, even if he did, what harm? Neither
she nor Maurice even _pretends _to be in love with the other, and if
he should be in love--as the idiots call it--with Mrs. Bethune, why,
he _can_ be! _She_ won't prevent it, only she hopes poor Maurice
won't make himself unhappy over that dreadful red-headed creature.
But there is certainly one thing; he might have told her.
But what does anything matter? Here she is in her old home, with all
her dear delights around her! She glances backwards and forwards, a
happy smile upon her lips. From one of the Scotch firs over there,
the graceful blossoms of the hop-plant droop prettily. And beyond
them on the hillside, far, far away, she can see mushrooms gleaming
in the fields, for all the world like little sheep dotted here and
there. She laughs to herself as she notes the resemblance. And all
is hers--all. And she is in her own home, and happy.
What a blessing she hadn't said "No" when Maurice asked her. If she
had, she would have been living at Rickfort now with Uncle George.
"Tita!" cries Maurice.
He has thrown up the window of his smoking-room, and is calling to
her.
"Yes?"
She turns to him, her arms full of flowers, her vivacious little
face, just like another sort of flower, peeping over them.
"Can you come in for a moment?"
"Why can't you come out? _Do_, it is lovely here!"
"I can if you like, but it will mean hauling out pencils and paper,
and----"
"Oh well, I'll come."
She runs to him across the green, sweet grass, and, standing beneath
the window, holds out her hands to him.
"You can't come in this way," says he.
"Can't I? I wish I had a penny for every time I _did_ get in this
way," says she. "Here, give me your hands."
He stoops to her, and catches her small brown hands in a close grip.
The new Lady Rylton plants a very shapely little foot against an
excrescence in the wall, and in a second has her knee on the
window-sill.
"After all, my mother was right," says Rylton, laughing. "You are a
hoyden."
He takes the slight girlish figure in his arms, and swings her into
the room. She stands for a second looking at him with a rather
thoughtful air. Then--
"You mother may call me names if she likes," says she. "But _you_
mustn't!"
"No?" laughing again. She amuses him with her little air of
authority. "Very good. I shan't! I suppose I may call you wife, any
way."
"Oh, that!" She stops. "Did you bring me in to ask me that
question?"
At this they laugh together.
"No. I confess so much."
"What, then?"
"Well, we ought to decide at once who we are going to ask for the
rest of the shooting. The preserves are splendid, and it seems quite
a sin to let them go to waste. Of course I know a lot of men I could
ask, but there should be a few women, too, for you."
"Why for me? I like men a great deal better," says Tita audaciously.
"Well, you shouldn't! And, besides, you have some friends of your
won to be asked."
"Your friends will do very well."
"Nonsense!" with a touch of impatience. "It is you and _your_
friends who are first to be considered; afterwards we can think of
mine."
"I have no friends," says Tita carelessly.
"You have your uncle, at all events; he might like----"
"Oh, don't be an ass," says Lady Rylton.
She delivers this excellent advice with a promptitude and vigour
that does her honour. Rylton stares at her for a moment, and then
gives way to amusement.
"I shan't be if I can help it," says he; "but there are often so
many difficulties in the way." He hesitates as if uncertain, and
then goes on. "By the way, Tita, you shouldn't give yourself the
habit of saying things like that."
"Like what?"
"Well, telling a fellow not to be an ass, you know. It doesn't
matter to me, of course, but I heard you say something like that to
old Lady Warbeck yesterday, and she seemed quite startled."
"Did she? Do her good!" says Tita, making a charming little face at
him. "Nothing like electricity nowadays. It'll quite set her up
again. Add _years_ to her life."
"Still, she wouldn't like it, perhaps."
"Having years added to her life?"
"No; your slang."
"She likes _me_, any way," says Tita nonchalantly, "so it doesn't
matter about the slang. The last word she mumbled at me through her
old false teeth was that she hoped I'd come over and see her every
Tuesday that I had at my command (I'm not going to have _many_),
because I reminded her of some granddaughter who was now in heaven,
or at the Antipodes--it's all the same."
She pauses to catch a fly--dexterously, and with amazing swiftness,
in the palm of her hand--that has been buzzing aimlessly against the
window-pane. Having looked at it between her fingers, she flings it
into the warm air outside.
"So you see," continues she triumphantly, "it's a good thing to
startle people. They fall in love with you at once."
Here, as if some gay little thought has occurred to her, she lowers
her head and looks at her dainty finger-nails, then up at Rylton
from under half-closed lids.
"What a good thing I didn't try to startle _you!"_ says she. _"You_
might have fallen in love with me, too."
She waits for a second as it were, just time enough to let her see
the nervous movement of his brows, and then--she laughs.
"I've escaped that bore," says she, nodding her head. She throws
herself into a big chair. "And now, as the parsons say, 'to
continue'; you were advising me to ask----"
"Your uncle."
All the brightness has died out of Rylton's voice; he looks dull,
uninterested. That small remark of hers--what memories it has
awakened! And yet--_would_ he go back?
"Chut! What a suggestion!" says Tita, shrugging her shoulders.
"Don't you know that my one thought is to enjoy myself?"
"A great one," says he, smiling strangely.
She cares for nothing, he tells himself: _nothing!_ He has married a
mere butterfly; yet how pretty the butterfly is, lying back there in
that huge armchair, her picturesque little figure flung carelessly
into artistic curves, her soft, velvety head rubbing itself
restlessly amongst the amber cushions. The cushions had been in one
of the drawing-rooms, but she had declared he was frightfully
uncomfortable in his horrid old den, and has insisted on making him
a handsome present of them. She seems to him the very incarnation of
exquisite idleness, the idleness that knows no thought.
"Very good," says he at last. "If you refuse to make up a list of
_your_ friends, help me to make up a list of mine. You know you said
you would like to fill the house."
"Ye--es," says she, as if meditating.
"Of course, if you don't want any people here----"
"But I do. I do really. I _hate_ being alone!" cries she, springing
into sudden life and leaning forward with her hands clasped on her
knees.
"How few rings you have!" says he suddenly.
CHAPTER XV.
HOW TITA TELLS OF TWO STRANGE DREAMS, AND OF HOW THEY MOVED HER. AND
HOW MAURICE SETS HIS SOUL ON ASKING A GUEST TO OAKDEAN; AND HOW HE
GAINS HIS DESIRE.
"Not one, except this," touching her engagement ring. "That you have
given me."
"You don't care for them, then?"
"Yes I do. I love them, but there was nobody to give them to me.
I was very young, you see, when poor daddy died."
She stops; her mouth takes a mournful curve; the large gray eyes
look with a sort of intensity through the windows to
something--_something_ beyond--but something that Rylton cannot see.
After all, _is_ she so trivial? She cares, at all events, for the
memory of that dead father. Rylton regards her with interest.
_ "He_ would have given me rings," she says.
It is so childish, so absurd, that Rylton wonders why he doesn't
want to laugh. But the little sad face, with the gray eyes filled
with tears, checks any mirth he might have felt. A sudden longing to
give her another ring, when next he goes to town, fills his heart.
"Well! what about our guests?"
Her tone startles him. He looks up. All the tears, the grief are
gone; she is the gay, laughing Tita that he _thinks_ he knows.
"Well, what?" His tone is a little cold. She _is_ superficial,
certainly. "If you decline to ask your friends----"
"I don't decline. It is only that I _have_ no friends," declares
she.
There is something too deliberate in her manner to be quite natural,
and Rylton looks at her. She returns his glance with something of
mockery in hers.
"It isn't nice to be married to a mere nobody, is it?" says she,
showing her pretty teeth in a rather malicious little laugh.
"I suppose not," says Rylton steadily. "I haven't tried it."
A gleam--a tiny gleam of pleasure comes into her eyes, bus she
wilfully repulses it.
"Oh, you--if anybody. However, you knew _before_ you married me,
that is one comfort."
"Why do you speak to me like that, Tita?" A frown has settled on
Rylton's forehead. It is all such abominably bad form. "You know
how--how----"
"Ill-bred it is," supplies she quietly, gaily.
"It is intolerable," vehemently, turning away and walking towards
the door.
"Ah, come back! Don't go--don't go!" cries she eagerly. She jumps
out of her big chair and runs after him. She slips her hand through
his arm, and swinging her little _svelte_ body round, smiles up into
his face mischievously. "What's the matter with you?" asks she.
"It is in such bad taste," says Rylton, mollified, however, in a
measure in spite of himself. "You should consider how it hurts me.
You should remember you are my wife."
"I do. That is why I think I can say to you what I can't say to
anybody else," says Tita quietly. "However, never mind; sit down
again and let us settle the question about our guests. Here's a
sheet of paper," pushing it into his hands. "And here's a pencil--an
awfully bad one, any way, but if you keep sticking it into your
mouth it'll write. _I'm _tired of licking that pencil."
She is evidently hopeless! Rylton, after that first crushing
thought, gives way, and, leaning back in his chair, roars with
laughter.
"And am I to lick it now!" asks he.
"No, certainly not,". She is now evidently in high dudgeon. She puts
the pencil back in her pocket, and stands staring at him with her
angry little head somewhat lowered. "After all, you are right; I'm
horrid!" says she.
_"I'm_ right! By what authority do you say that! Come now, Tita!"
"By my own."
"The very worst in the world, then. Give me back that pencil."
"Not likely," says Tita, tilting her chin. "Here's one belonging to
yourself," taking one off the writing-table near. "This can't offend
you, I hope. After all, I'm a poor sort," says Tita, with a
disconsolate sigh that is struggling hard with a smile to gain the
mastery. "It's awfully hard to offend me. I've no dignity--that's
what your mother says. And after all, too," brightening up, and
smiling now with delightful gaiety, "I don't want to have any. One
hates to be hated!"
"What an involved speech! Well, if you won't give me your pencil,
let us get on with this. Now, to begin, surely you _have_ someone
you would like to ask here, in spite of all you have said."
"Well--perhaps." She pauses. "I want to see Margaret," says she,
hurriedly, tremulously, as if tears might be in her eyes.
He cannot be sure of that, however, as her lids are lowered. But her
tone--is there a note of unhappiness in it? The very thought gives
him a shock; and of late has she not been a little uncertain in her
moods?
_"I_ was going to name her," says Rylton.
"Then you see we have one thought in common," says Tita.
She has knelt down beside him to look at his list, and suddenly he
lays his palm under her chin, and so lifts her face that he can see
it.
"What is it, Tita?" says he. "Is anything troubling you? Last night
you were so silent; to-day you talk. It is bad to be unequal."
His tone is grave.
"The night before last I had a bad dream," says Tita solemnly,
turning her head a little to one side, and giving him a slight
glance that lasts for the tiniest fraction of a second.
It occurs to Rylton that there is a little touch of wickedness in
it. At all events, he grows interested.
"A bad dream?"
"Yes, the worst!" She nods her small head reproachfully at him. "I
dreamt you were married to a princess!"
"Well, so I am," says Rylton, smiling.
His smile is a failure, however; something in her air has
disconcerted him.
"Oh no! No, she was not like me; she was a tall princess, and she
was beautiful, and her hair was like a glory round her head. She was
a very dream in herself; whereas I---- Naturally , that puts me out
of sorts!" She shrugs her shoulders pathetically. "But last
night"--she stops, clasps her hands, and sits back on her heels. "Oh
no! I shan't tell you what I dreamt last night," says she. She
shakes her head at him. "No, no! indeed, not if you asked me _for
ever!"_
"Oh, but you must!" says he, laughing.
He catches her hands and draws her up gently into a kneeling
position once more--a position that brings her slender body resting
against his knees.
"Must I?" She pauses as if in amused thought, and then, leaning
confidentially across his knees, says, "Well, then, I dreamt that
you were madly in love with _me!_ And, oh, the joy of it!"
She breaks off, and gives way to irrepressible laughter. Covering
her face with her hands, she peeps at him through her fingers as a
child might who is bent on mischief.
"Is all that true?" asks Maurice, colouring.
"What, the first dream or the second?"
"I presume one is as true as the other," somewhat stiffly.
"You are a prophet," says Tita, with a little grimace. "Well now, go
on, do. We have arranged for Margaret." She pauses, and then says
very softly, _"Darling_ Margaret! Do you know, I believe she is the
only friend I have in the world?"
Her words cut him to the heart.
"And I, Tita, do I not count?" asks he.
"You! No!" She gives him a little shake, taking his arms, as she
kneels beside him. "You represent Society, don't you? And Society
forbids all that. No man's wife is his friend nowadays."
"True," says Rylton bitterly. "Most men's wives are their enemies
nowadays."
"Oh, I shan't be yours!" says Tita. "And you mustn't be mine either,
remember! Well, go on--we have put down Margaret," peeping at the
paper in his hand, "and no one else. Now, someone to meet her.
Colonel Neilson?"
"Yes, of course; and Captain Marryatt?"
"And Mrs. Chichester to meet _him!"_
"My dear Tita, Mrs. Chichester has a husband somewhere!"
"So she told me," says Tita. "But, then, he is so _very_ far off,
and in your Society distance counts."
Rylton regards her with some surprise. Is she satirical?--this silly
_child!_
"You will have to correct your ideas about Society," says he coldly.
"By all means ask Mrs. Chichester here, too; I, for one, prefer not
to believe in scandals."
"One must believe in something," says Tita. "I suppose," pencil
poised in hand, "you would like to ask Mr. Gower?"
"Certainly."
"And his aunt?"
"Certainly _not."_
"Oh, but _I_ should," says Tita; "she amuses me. Do let us ask old
Miss Gower!"
"I begin to think you are a wicked child," says Rylton, laughing,
whereon Miss Gower's name is scrawled down on the list. "There are
the men from the barracks in Merriton; they can always be asked
over," goes on Maurice. "And now, who else?"
"The Marchmonts!"
"Of course." He pauses. "And then--there is Mrs. Bethune!"
"Your cousin! Yes!"
"Shall we ask her?"
"Why should we _not_ ask her?" She lifts one small, delicate, brown
hand, and, laying it on his cheek, turns his face to hers. "Don't
look out of the window; look at _me_. Why should we not ask her?"
"My dear girl, there is no answer to such a question as that."
"No!" She scribbles Mrs. Bethune's name on her list, and then, "You
particularly _wish_ her to be asked?"
"Not particularly. Certainly not at all if you object to it."
"Object! Why should I object? She is amusing--she will keep us all
alive; she will help you to entertain your people."
"I should hope you, Tita, would help me to do that."
"Oh, I have not the air--the manner! I shall feel like a guest
myself," says Tita. She has sprung to her feet, and is now blowing a
little feather she had found upon her frock up into the air. It
eludes her, however; she follows it round the small table, but all
in vain--it sinks to the ground. "What a _beast_ of a feather!" says
she.
"I don't like you to say that," says Rylton. "A _guest _in your own
house!"
"You don't like me to say anything," says Tita petulantly. "I _told_
you I was horrid. Well, I'll be mistress in my own house, if that
will please you. But," prophetically, "it won't. Do you know,
Maurice," looking straight at him with a defiant little mien, "I'm
more glad that I can tell you that I don't care a ha'penny about
you, because if I did you would break my heart."
"You have a high opinion of me!" says Maurice. "That I acknowledge.
But, regarding me as you do, I wonder you ever had the courage to
marry me!"
"Well, even _you_ are better than Uncle George," says she. "Now, go
on; is there anyone else? The Heriots! Who are they? I heard you
speak of them."
"Ordinary people; but he shoots. He is a first-class shot."
"Heriot! It reminds me----" Tita grows silent a moment, and now a
little flood of colour warms her face. "I have someone I want to
ask, after all," cries she. "A cousin--Tom Hescott."
"A cousin?"
"Yes. And he has a sister--Minnie Hescott. I should like to ask them
both." She looks at him. "They are quite presentable," says she
whimsically.
"Your cousins should be, naturally," says he.
Yet his heart sinks. What sort of people are these Hescotts?
"I have not seen them for years," says Tita--"never since I lived
with my father. Tom used to be with us always then, but he went
abroad."
"To Australia?"
"Oh no--to Rome! To Rome first, at all events; he was going to India
after that."
"For----"
"Nothing--nothing at all. Just to see the world!"
"He must have had a good deal of money!"
"More than was good for him, I often heard. But I _did_ like Tom;
and I heard he was in town last week, and Minnie with him, and I
should like very much indeed to ask them here."
"Well, scribble down their names."
"I dare say they won't come," says Tita, writing.
"Why?"
"Oh, because they know such lots of people. However, I'll try them,
any way." She flings down her pencil. "There, that's done; and now I
shall go and have a ride before luncheon."
"You have been riding all the morning!"
"Yes."
"Do you never get tired?"
"Never! Come and see if I do."
"Well, I'll come," says Rylton.
_"Really!"_ cries Tita; her eyes grow very bright. "You mean it?"
"Certainly I do. It is my place, you know, to see that you don't
overdo it."
"Oh, how delightful!" says she, clasping her hands. "I hate riding
alone. We'll go right over the downs, and back of Scart Hill, and so
home. Come on--come on," running out of the room; "don't be a minute
dressing."
CHAPTER XVI.
HOW A DULL MORNING GIVES BIRTH TO A STRANGE AFTERNOON. AND HOW
RYLTON'S EYES ARE WIDENED BY A FRIEND.
"Good old day!" says Mrs. Chichester disgustedly. She is sitting
near the window in the small drawing-room at Oakdean, watching the
raindrops race each other down the panes.
"What's the matter with it?" asks Mr. Gower, who is standing beside
her, much to the annoyance of Captain Marryatt, who is anxious to
engage her for some waltzes at the dance old Lady Warbeck is giving
in the near future.
"What _isn't_ the matter with it?" asks Mrs. Chichester, turning her
thin shoulders, that always have some queer sort of fascination in
them, on Gower. She gives him a glance out of her blue-green eyes.
She is enjoying herself immensely, in spite of the day, being quite
alive to the fact that Captain Marryatt is growing desperate, and
that old Miss Gower, whom Tita has insisted on asking to her house
party, is thinking dark things of her from the ottoman over there.
"What's it good for, any way?"
"For the ducks," says Mr. Gower, who is always there. An answer to
any question under the sun comes as naturally to him as sighing to
the sad.
"Oh, well, I'm not a duck," says she prettily; whereupon Mr. Gower
whispers something to her that makes her laugh, and drives Captain
Marryatt to frenzy.
He comes forward.
"Lady Rylton is talking of getting up something to pass the time;"
says he, regarding Mrs. Chichester with a frowning brow--a
contortion that fills that frivolous young woman's breast with pure
joy.
"May the heavens be her bed!" says Mr. Gower, who has spent some
years in Ireland, and has succeeded in studying the lower orders
with immense advantage to himself, but not very much to others. He
has, at all events, carried off from them a good deal of the
pleasant small-talk, whereas they had only carried off from him a
wild wonder as to what he was and where born, and whether he ought
or ought not to be inside a lunatic asylum. They had carried off
also, I am bound to add, a considerable amount of shillings. "Lady
Rylton!" to Tita, who has just come up, "is this a reality or a mere
snare? Did you say you thought you could put us successfully through
this afternoon without reducing us to the necessity of coming to
bloodshed?" Here he looks, first at Captain Marryatt, who
providentially does not see the glance, and then at Mrs. Chichester,
who laughs.
"I'm not sure. I haven't quite thought it out," says Tita. "What
would _you_ suggest, Margaret?" to Miss Knollys. "Or you, Tom?" to a
tall young man who has followed in her quick little progress across
the room.
He is her cousin, Tom Hescott. He is so very much taller than she
is, that she has to look up at him--the top of her head coming
barely to a level with his shoulder. She smiles as she asks her
question, and the cousin smiles back at her. It suddenly occurs to
Sir Maurice, who has strolled into the room (and in answer to a
glance from Mrs. Bethune is going to where she stands), that Tom
Hescott is extraordinarily handsome.
And not handsome in any common way, either. If his father had been a
duke, he could not have shown more breeding in look and gesture and
voice. The fact that "Uncle Joe," the sugar merchant, _was_ his
actual father, does not do away with his charm; and his sister,
Minnie Hescott, is almost as handsome as he is! All at once Rylton
seems to remember what his wife had said to him a few weeks ago,
when they were discussing the question of their guests. She had told
him he need not be afraid of her relations; they were presentable
enough, or something like that. Looking at Tom Hescott at this
moment, Sir Maurice tells himself, with a grim smile, that he is,
perhaps, a little _too_ presentable--a sort of man that women always
smile upon. His grim smile fades into a distinct frown as he watches
Tita smiling now on the too presentable cousin.
"What is it?" asks Mrs. Bethune, making room for him in the recess
of the window that is so cosily cushioned. "The cousin?"
"What cousin?" demands Sir Maurice, making a bad fight, however; his
glance is still concentrated on the upper part of the room.
"Why, _her_ cousin," says Mrs. Bethune, laughing. She is looking
younger than ever and radiant. She is looking, indeed, beautiful.
There is not a woman in the room to compare with her; and few in all
England outside it.
The past week has opened out to her a little path that she feels she
may tread with light feet. The cousin, the handsome, the admirable
cousin! What a chance he affords for--vengeance! vengeance on that
little fool over there, who has _dared_ to step in and rob
her--Marian Bethune--of her prey!
"Haven't you noticed?" says she, laughing lightly, and bending so
close to Rylton as almost to touch his ear with her lips. "No? Oh,
silly boy!"
"What do you mean?" asks Rylton a little warmly.
"And after so many days! Why, we _all_ have guessed it long ago."
"I'm not good at conundrums," coldly.
"But this is such an easy one. Why, the handsome cousin is in love
with the charming little wife, that is all."
"You say everyone has been talking about it," says Rylton. His
manner is so strange, so unpleasant, that Marian takes warning.
"Ah! That was an exaggeration. One _does_ talk much folly, you know.
No--no! It was I only who said it--at least"--hesitating--"I think
so." She pauses to let her hesitation sink in, and to be as fatal as
it can be. "But you know I have always your interests at heart, and
so I see things that, perhaps, others do not see."
"One may see more than----"
"True--true; and of course I am wrong. No doubt I imagined it all.
But, even if it should be so," laughing and patting his arm softly,
"who need wonder? Your wife is so pretty--those little things often
_are_ pretty--and he is her cousin--they grew up together, in a
sense."
"No, I think not."
"At all events, they were much together when she was growing from
child to girl. And old associations--they----" She stops as if some
dart has struck her. Rylton looks at her.
"Are you ill?" says he sharply. "You look pale."
"Nothing, nothing." She recovers herself and smiles at him, but her
face is still white. "A thought, a mere thought--it cannot be only
Tita and her cousin who have old associations, who
have--_memories."_
Her eyes are full of tears. She leans toward him. This time her lips
_do_ touch him--softly her lips touch his cheek. The curtains hide
them.
"Have _you_ no memories?" says she.
"Marian! This is madness," says Rylton, turning suddenly to her. In
a sense, though without a gesture, he repulses her. She looks back
at him; rage is in her heart at first, but, seeing him as he is,
rage gives place to triumph. He is actually livid. She has moved
him, then. She still has power over him. Oh for time, time only! And
he will be hers again, soul and body, and that small supplanter
shall be lowered to the very dust!
* * * * *
"Oh, how delightful! The very thing," says Mrs. Chichester, clapping
her hands.
The conversation at the other end of the room is growing merrier;
Tita, in the midst of a small group, has evidently been suggesting
something in a most animated fashion.
"We should have to put all the things back," says Minnie Hescott,
glancing round her at the small chairs and tables that abound.
"Not at all--not at all," says Tita gaily; "we could go into the
smaller dancing-room and have it there."
"Oh, of course! Splendid idea!" says Minnie.
She is a tall, handsome young creature, standing fully five feet
five in her dainty little black silk stockings. Her eyes are dark
and almond-shaped like her brother's, and there is a little droop at
the far corners of the lids that adds singularly to their beauty; it
gives them softness. Perhaps this softness had not been altogether
meant, for Mother Nature had certainly not added gentleness to the
many gifts she had given Miss Hescott at her birth. Not that the
girl is of a nature to be detested; it is only that she is strong,
intolerant, and self-satisfied. She grates a little. Her yea is
always yea, and her nay, nay. She would always prefer the oppressed
to the oppressor, unless, perhaps, the oppressor might chance to be
useful to herself. She likes useful people. Yet, with all this, she
is of a merry nature, and very popular with most of her
acquaintances. Friends, in the strictest sense, she has none. She
doesn't permit herself such luxuries.
She had been at once attracted by Tita. Naturally Tita _would_ be
useful to her, so she has adopted her on the spot. Baronets' wives
are few and far between upon her visiting list, and to have an
actual cousin for one of them sounds promising. Tita will probably
be the means of getting her into the Society for which she longs;
therefore Tita is to be cultivated. She had told Tom that he must be
_very_ specially delightful to Tita; Tom, so far, has seemed to find
no difficulty in obeying her. To him, indeed, Tita is once more the
little merry, tiny girl whom he had taught to ride and drive in
those old, good, past, sweet days, when he used to spend all his
vacations with his uncle.
"Will you come and help us?" says Tita, turning to Gower.
That young man spreads his arms abroad as if in protestation.
"What a question from you to me!" says he reproachfully.
"'Call, and I follow; I follow, _though_ I die!'"
"You're too silly for anything," returns she most ungratefully,
turning her back upon him.
"'Twas ever thus,'" says Mr. Gower, who seems to be in a poetical
mood. "Yet what have I done?"
"Oh, nothing--nothing!" cries Tita petulantly. "It is only the day!
Surely it would depress anyone!"
Her eyes wandered down the room, and are now fixed upon the curtains
that hide the window where Mrs. Bethune and her husband are
conversing.
"Anyone but _me!"_ says Mr. Gower, with an exalted air. "I was up
early this morning to----"
"Up early! I like that! When _were_ you up?" asks Mrs. Chichester,
between whom and Randal there is always a living feud. "Why, you
can't get up even on Sundays, I hear, to be in time for service!"
"What it is to be clever!" says Mr. Gower, looking at her with
enthusiastic admiration. "One hears _so much"_--pause--"that isn't
true!"
"That's a mere put off," says she. "When were you up this morning?
Come now--honour bright!"
"At shriek of day," says Gower with dignity. "Were _you_ ever up at
that time?"
"Never!" says Mrs. Chichester, laughing.
She has evidently that best of all things--a sense of humour; she
gives in.
"Well, I was. I wish I hadn't been," says Mr. Gower. "When I opened
my window the rain beat upon me so hard that I felt it was a sort of
second edition kind of thing when I took my bath later on."
"I'm so sorry the weather is turning out so horrid," says Tita.
"I don't see why you should ever be sorry about anything," says Tom
Hescott, in his slow, musical voice.
"Don't you?" She turns to him in a little quick way--a way that
brings her back to that hateful window down below there. "You are
right," she laughs gaily. It seems as if she had really cast that
window and its occupants behind her for ever. "Well, I _won't_ be.
By-the-by, I told you all that we are to go to a dance at Lady
Warbeck's on Thursday week? Thursday!--yes. Thursday week."
"I remember! How delightful!" cries Mrs. Chichester.
"Lady Warbeck! I know her," says Gower; "she has a son!"
"Yes--a son."
"Oh, _do_ go on! Lady Rylton, do tell us about him," says Mrs.
Chichester, who is ever in search of fresh fields and pastures new.
CHAPTER XVII.
HOW TITA SUGGESTS A GAME OF BLIND MAN'S BUFF, AND WHAT COMES OF IT.
"Well, I hardly can," says Tita, struggling with her memory. "He
seems a big man, with--_airs_, you know, and--and----"
"Trousers!" puts in Mr. Gower. "I assure you," looking confidently
around him, "the checks on his trousers are so loud, that one can
hear him _rattle_ as he walks."
"Oh! is that the Mr. Warbeck?" says Minnie. "I know; I met him in
town last July."
"You met a hero of romance, then," says Gower. "That is, a thing out
of the common."
"I know him too," says Mrs. Chichester, who has been thinking. "A
big man, a sort of giant?"
"A horrid man!" says Tita.
Mrs. Chichester looks at her as if amused.
"Why horrid?" asks she.
"Oh, I don't know," says Tita, shrugging her shoulders. "I didn't
like him, anyway."
"I'm sure I'm not surprised," says Tom Hescott.
He takes a step closer to Tita, as if to protect her. It seems
hideous to him that she should have to discuss--that she should even
have known him.
"Well, neither am I," says Mrs. Chichester. "He _is _horrid, and as
ugly as the----" She had the grace to stop here, and change her
sentence. "As ugly can be."
It is a lame conclusion, but she is consoled for it by the fact that
some of her audience understand what the natural end of that
sentence would have been.
"And what manners!" says she. "After all," with a pretty little
shake of her head, "what can you expect of a man with hair as red as
a carrot?"
"Decency, at all events," says Tom Hescott coldly.
"Oh! That--last of all," says Mrs. Chichester.
"Lady Warbeck is a very charming old lady," says Margaret Knollys,
breaking into the conversation with a view to changing it.
"Yes," says Mrs. Chichester. She laughs mischievously. "And such a
delightful contrast to her son! She is so good."
"She's funny, isn't she?" says Tita, throwing back her lovely little
head, and laughing as if at some late remembrance.
"No; good--_good!"_ insists Mrs. Chichester. "Captain Marryatt, were
you with me when she called that day in town? No? Oh! _well,"_ with
a little glance meant for him alone--a glance that restores him at
once to good humour, and his position as her slave once more--"you
ought to have been."
"What did she say, then?" asks Minnie Hescott.
"Nothing to signify, really. But as a contrast to her son, she is
perhaps, as Lady Rylton has just said, 'funny.' It was about a
book--a book we are all reading nowadays; and she said she couldn't
recommend it to me, as it _bordered_ on impropriety! I was so
enchanted."
"I know the book you mean," says Mrs. Bethune, who has just
sauntered up to them in her slow, graceful fashion.
"Well, of course," says Mrs. Chichester. "Such nonsense condemning
it! As if anybody worried about impropriety nowadays. Why, it has
gone out of fashion. It is an exploded essence. Nobody gives it a
thought."
"That is _fatally true,"_ says old Miss Gower in a sepulchral tone.
She has been sitting in a corner near them, knitting sedulously
until now. But now she uplifts her voice. She uplifts her eyes, too,
and fixes them on Mrs. Chichester the frivolous. "Do your own words
never make you shiver?" asks she austerely.
"Never," gaily; "I often wish they would in warm weather."
Miss Gower uprears herself.
"Be careful, woman! be careful!" says she gloomily. "There is a
warmer climate in store for some of us than has been ever known on
earth!"
She turns aside abruptly, and strides from the room.
Randal Gower gives way to mirth, and so do most of the others. Mrs.
Chichester, it is true, laughs a little, but Tita can see that the
laughter is somewhat forced.
She goes quickly up to her and slips her hand into hers.
"Don't mind her," says she. "As if a little word here and there
would count, when one has a good heart, and I know you have one. We
shall all go to heaven, I think, don't you? Don't mind what she
hinted about--about that other place, you know."
"Eh?" says Mrs. Chichester, staring at her as if astonished.
"I _saw_ you didn't like it," says Tita.
"Well, I didn't," says Mrs. Chichester, pouting.
"No, of course, one wouldn't."
"One wouldn't what?"
"Like to be told that one would have to go to--_you_ know."
"Oh, I see," says Mrs. Chichester, with some disgust. "Is that what
you mean? Oh, I shouldn't care a fig about that!"
"About what, then?" asks Tita anxiously.
"Well, I didn't like to be called _a woman!"_ says Mrs. Chichester,
frowning.
"Oh!" says Tita.
"Lady Rylton, where are you? You said you were going to get up blind
man's buff," cries someone at this moment.
"Yes, yes, indeed. Maurice, will you come and help us?" says Tita,
seeing her husband, and going to him gladly, as a means of getting
out of her ridiculous interview with Mrs. Chichester, which has
begun to border on burlesque.
"Certainly," says Sir Maurice; he speaks rapidly, eagerly, as if
desirous of showing himself devoted to any project of hers.
"Well, then, come on--come on," cries she, gaily beckoning to her
guests right and left, and carrying them off, a merry train, to the
ball-room.
"Now, who'll be blinded first?" asks Mr. Gower, who has evidently
constituted himself Master of the Ceremonies.
"You!" cries Miss Hescott.
"Not at all. There is only one fair way of arranging that," says
Tita. "I'll show you. Now," turning to her husband, "make them all
catch hands, Maurice--all in a ring, don't you know--and I'll show
you."
They all catch hands; there is a slight tussle between Captain
Marryatt and Mr. Gower (who is nothing if not a born nuisance
wherever he goes), as to which of them is to take Mrs. Chichester's
right hand. This, providentially, is arranged by Mr. Gower's giving
in, and consenting on a grimace from her to take her _left_ hand.
Not that he wants it. Tom Hescott has shown himself desirous of
taking Tita's small fingers into his possession for the time being,
at all events--a fact pointed out to Rylton by Mrs. Bethune with a
low, amused little laugh; but Tita had told him to go away, as she
couldn't give her hand to _anybody_ for a moment, as she was going
to have the conduct of the affair.
"Now, are you all ready?" asks she, and seeing them standing in a
circle, hands entwined, she runs suddenly to Maurice, disengages his
hand from Mrs. Bethune's with a little airy grace, gives her right
hand to the latter, and the left to Maurice, and, having so joined
the broken ring again, leans forward.
"Now," cries she gaily, her lovely little face lit up with
excitement, "who ever the _last_ word comes to, he or she will have
to hunt us! See?"
She takes her right hand from Mrs. Bethune's, that she may point her
little forefinger at each one in succession, and begins her
incantation with Mr. Gower, who is directly opposite to her, nodding
her head at each mystic word; and, indeed, so far as the beginning
of it goes, this strange chant of hers mystifies everybody--everybody
except Tom Hescott, who has played this game with her before, in the not
so very distant past--Tom Hescott, who is now gazing at her with a most
profound regard, all his soul in his eyes, oblivious of the fact that
two pairs of eyes, at all events, are regarding _him _very curiously.
"Hena, Dena, Dina, Dus."
"Good heavens!" interrupts Mr. Gower, with extravagant admiration.
"What command of language! I"--to miss Hescott--"didn't know she was
a linguist, did you?"
"Calto, Wheela, Kila, Kus."
"Oh, I say!" murmurs Mr. Gower faintly. "It can't be right, can it,
to say 'cuss words' at us like that? Oh, really, Rylton, _would _you
mind if I retired?"
"Hot pan, Mustard, Jan,
Tiddledum, taddledum, twenty-one,
You raise up the latch, and walk straight out."
The last word falls on Tom Hescott. "Out" comes to him.
"There, Tom! You must be blindfolded," says Tita delightfully.
"Who's got a _big_ handkerchief?"
"I wouldn't stand that, Hescott, if I were you," says Colonel
Neilson, laughing.
"What is it?" asks Tom, who is a little abstracted.
"Nothing much," says Mrs. Chichester mischievously. "Except that
Lady Rylton says your head is so big that she has sent to the
housekeeper for a young sheet to tie it up in."
Hescott smiles. He can well afford his smile, his head being
wonderfully handsome, not too small, but slender and beautifully
formed.
"Give me yours," says Tita, thrusting her hand into her husband's
pocket and pulling out his handkerchief.
The little familiar action sends a sharp pang through Mrs. Bethune's
heart.
"Now, Tom, come and be decorated," cries Tita. Hescott advances to
her, and stops as if waiting. "Ah!" cries she, "do you imagine I
could ever get up there!"
She raises both her arms to their fullest height, which hardly
brings her pretty hands even to a level with his forehead. She
stands so for a moment, laughing at him through the gracefully
uplifted arms. It is a coquettish gesture, though certainly
innocent, and nobody, perhaps, would have thought anything of it but
for the quick, bright light that springs into Hescott's eyes. So she
might stand if she were about to fling her arms around his neck.
"Down on your knees," cries Tita, giving herself the airs of a
little queen.
Hescott drops silently on to them. He has never once removed his
gaze from hers. Such a strange gaze! One or two of the men present
grow amused, all the women interested. Margaret Knollys makes an
involuntary step forward, and then checks herself.
"There!" says Tita, who has now bound the handkerchief over
Hescott's eager eyes. "Now are you sure you can't see? Not a blink?"
She turns up his chin, and examines him carefully. "I'm _certain_
you can see out of this one," says she, and pulls the handkerchief a
little farther over the offending eye. "Now, get up. 'How many
horses in your father's stable?'"
This is an embarrassing question, or ought to be, as Mr. Hescott's
father is dead; but he seems quite up to it. Indeed, it now occurs
to Sir Maurice that this cannot be the first time he has played
blind man's buff with his cousin.
"'Three white and three gray.'"
"An excellent stud!" says Mr. Gower.
But Tita is not thinking of frivolities. Like Elia's old lady, the
"rigour of game" is all she cares for. She gives Tom Hescott one or
two little turns.
"'Then turn about, and turn about,'" says she, suiting the action
to the word, "'And you don't catch _me_ till May-day.'"
With this, she gives him a delicate little shove, and, picking up
the train of her gown, springs lightly backwards to the wall behind
her.
And now the fun grows fast and furious. Hescott, who, I regret to
say, must have disarranged that handkerchief once for all, is making
great running with the lady guests. As Mr. Gower remarks, it is
perfectly wonderful how well he and Marryatt and the other men can
elude him. There is no difficulty at all about it! Whereas Mrs.
Chichester is in danger of her life any moment, and Mrs. Bethune has
had several narrow escapes. Tita, who is singularly nimble (fairies
usually are), has been able to dart to and fro with comparative
ease; but Margaret Knollys, who, to everybody's immense surprise, is
enjoying herself down to the ground, was very nearly caught once.
"That was a near shave," says Colonel Neilson, who happens to be
near her when she runs, flushed and laughing, to the doorway. And
then--"How you are enjoying yourself!"
"Yes. Isn't it foolish of me," says she; but she laughs still.
"It is the essence of wisdom," says Neilson.
Here a little giggle from Mrs. Chichester tells of _her_ having been
nearly caught. And now, now there is a skirmish down there, and
presently they can see Hescott drawing Tita reluctantly forward.
Tita is making frantic signs to Mr. Gower.
"It's not a fair capture unless you can guess the name of your
captive," says Gower, in answer to that frantic if silent appeal.
Hescott raises his right hand, pretends to feel blindly in the air
for a moment, then his hand falls on Tita's sunny little head. It
wanders on her short curls--it is a very slow wandering.
Mrs. Bethune looks up at Rylton, who is standing beside her.
"Do you still doubt?" asks she, in a low whisper.
"Doubt! I am a past master at it," says he bitterly. "I should be!
_You_ taught me!"
"I! Oh, Maurice!"
"Yes--you! Yesterday, as it seems to me, I believed in everyone.
To-day I doubt every soul I meet."
At this point Hescott's "doubts," at all events, seem to be set at
rest. His hand has ceased to wander over the pretty head, and in a
low tone he says:
"Titania!"
This word is meant for Tita alone. A second later he calls aloud:
"Lady Rylton!"
But Maurice and Mrs. Bethune, who had been standing just behind him,
had heard that whispered first word.
"Oh, you rare right," says Tita petulantly. "But you would never
have known me but for my hair. And I _hate_ being blindfolded, too.
Maurice, will you take it for me?" holding out to him the
handkerchief.
"No!" says Rylton quietly, but decisively--so decisively that Mrs.
Chichester suddenly hides her face behind her fan.
"What a No!" says she to Captain Marryatt. "Did you hear it? What's
the matter with him?"
"He's jealous, perhaps," says Captain Marryatt.
Mrs. Chichester gives way to wild, if suppressed, mirth.
"Heavens! Fancy being jealous of one's own wife!" says she. "Now, if
it had been anyone else's----"
"Yes, there would be reason in that!" says Captain Marryatt, so
gloomily that her mirth breaks forth afresh.
He is always a joy to her, this absurd young man, who, in spite of
barbs and shafts, follows at her chariot wheels with a determination
worthy of a better cause.
Gower, who also had heard that quiet "No," had come instantly
forward, and entreated Tita to blindfold him. And once more the fun
is at its height. Hescott, as compared with Randal Gower, is not
even _in_ it in this game. The latter simulates the swallow, and
even outdoes that wily bird in his swift dartings to and fro. Great
is his surprise, and greater still his courage--this last is
acknowledged by _all_--when, on a final swoop round the room with
arms extended, he suddenly closes them round the bony form of Miss
Gower, who had returned five minutes ago, and who, silent and
solitary, is standing in a distant corner breathing anathemas upon
the game.
Everyone stops dead short--everyone looks at the ceiling; surely it
_must_ fall! There had been a general, if unvoiced, opinion up to
this that Mr. Gower could _see_; but now he is at once exonerated,
and may leave the dock at any moment without a stain upon his
character.
"Come away! come away!" whisper two or three behind his back.
Mrs. Chichester pulls frantically at his coat-tails; but Mr. Gower
holds on. He passes his hand over Miss Gower's gray head.
"It is--it is--it _must_ be!" cries he, in a positive tone.
"It"--here his hand flies swiftly down her warlike nose--"it is
Colonel Neilson!" declares he, with a shout of triumph.
"Unhand me, sir!" cries Miss Gower.
She had not spoken up to this--but to compare her to a man! She
moves majestically forward. Gower unhands her, and, lifting one side
of his would-be blind, regards her fixedly.
"It was the nose!" He looks round reproachfully at Neilson. "Just
see what you've let me in for!" says he.
"Don't talk to me, sir!" cries his aunt indignantly. "Make no
excuses--none need be made! When one plays demoralizing games in
daylight, one should be prepared for anything;" and with this she
once more leaves the room.
"Ah, we should have played demoralizing games at _midnight,"_ says
Mr. Gower, who doesn't look half as much ashamed of himself as he
ought, "then we should have been all right."
Here somebody who is standing at one of the windows says suddenly:
"It is clearing!"
"Is it?" cries Tita. "Then I suppose we ought to go out! But what a
pity we couldn't have another game first!"
She looks very sorry.
"You certainly seemed to enjoy it," says Sir Maurice with a cold
smile, as he passes her.
CHAPTER XVIII.
HOW TITA GETS A SCOLDING, AND HOW SHE REBELS AND ACCUSES SIR MAURICE
OF BREACH OF CONTRACT.
"Can I come in?"
Rylton's voice is a little curt as he knocks at his wife's door. It
is not the door opening into the corridor outside, but the inner
door that leads from her room to his, and to the dressing-room
beyond.
"Yes, of course," cries Tita pleasantly.
She is just on the point of dismissing her maid for the night--the
maid who has so little to do; no long hair to brush, only the soft
little curly locks that cover her mistress's head. She has taken off
Tita's evening gown, and, now that the little locks have been
carefully seen to, has taken off her dressing-gown also. It occurs
to Tita that she might as well take _herself_ off as well, and as
soon as possible.
This thought makes her laugh.
"You can go now, Sarah," says she to the maid, who loves her; "and
don't bring me my tea before eight to-morrow, because I'm as sleepy
as sleepy can be."
She nods kindly to the dismissed maid, and, going to the door where
Rylton is presumably standing, lets him in.
"How early you are!" says she, thinking of the glories of the
smoking-room below.
"How late you are!" returns he. "I half fancied you would have been
asleep by this time!"
"Oh, well, I soon shall be!" says she. "I was just going to say my
prayers as you came in; after that it won't take me a minute to get
out of my clothes, and," with a little laugh, "into my bed."
Her clothes, as she stands at present, are so becoming that it seems
quite a pity that she should ever get out of them. Her neck and
arms--soft and fair and round as a little child's--are shining in
the lamplight, and beneath them the exquisite lace petticoat she
wears gives her the air of one who is just going to a fancy ball. It
is short enough to show the perfect little feet and the slender
ankles beneath it.
"How inhospitable of you to desert your friends so soon!" says she.
"Why, you never come up till two, do you?--at least, so you tell
me."
"You will catch cold if you stay like that," says he.
It is a somewhat irrelevant remark; but, for the first time in all
his knowledge of her, the tender charm that is her own becomes clear
to him. It seems to him that she is a new being--one he has never
seen before; and, with this fresh knowledge, his anger towards her
grows stronger.
"I!--in this weather! Why, it is hardly chilly even yet, in spite of
the rain; and, besides, I have this fire!" She catches his hand, and
draws him towards the hearthrug. "I am sure you have something to
say to me," says she. "Come and sit by the fire, and tell me all
about it."
"It is nothing, really," says Rylton, resisting her pretty efforts
to push him into a luxurious lounging chair. "It is only a question
about your cousin."
He leans his elbow on the chimney-piece, and looks down at her--a
dainty fairy lying now in the bosom of some soft pink cushions, with
her legs crossed and her toes towards the fire. She has clasped her
arms behind her head.
"About Minnie?"
"No."
His heart hardens again. Is this duplicity on her part? How small,
how innocent, how girlish, how--reluctantly this--beautiful she
looks! and yet----
"About Tom, then?"
"About Mr. Hescott"--coldly--"yes."
"What! you don't like him?" questions Tita, abandoning her lounging
attitude, and leaning towards him.
"So far as he is concerned," with increasing coldness, "I am quite
indifferent to him; it is of you I think."
"Of me! And why of me? Why should you think of me?"
"I hardly know," somewhat bitterly; "except that it is perhaps
better that _I_ should criticise your conduct than--other people."
"I don't know what you mean!" says Tita slowly.
Her charming face loses suddenly all its vivacity; she looks a
little sad, a little forlorn.
"There is very little to know," says Rylton hurriedly, touched by
her expression.
"But you said--you spoke of my _conduct!"_
"Well, and is there nothing to be said of that? This cousin----" He
stops, and then goes on abruptly: "Why does he call you Titania?"
"Oh, it is an old name for me!" She looks at him, and, leaning back
again in her chair, bursts out laughing. She has flung her arms over
her head again, and now looks at him from under one of them with a
mischievous smile. "Is _that_ the whole?" says she. "He used to call
me that years ago. He used to say I was like a fairy queen."
"Used he?"
Rylton's face is untranslatable.
"Yes. I was the smallest child alive, I do believe." She springs to
her feet, and goes up to Rylton in a swaying, graceful little
fashion. "I'm not so very big even _now_, am I?" says she.
Rylton turns his eyes from hers with open determination; he steels
his heart against her.
"About this cousin," he says icily. "He is the one who used to say
you had hands like iron, and a heart like velvet?"
"Yes. _Fancy_ you remembering that!" says Tita, a sudden, quick
gleam of pleasure dyeing her pretty cheeks quite red.
"I always remember," returns Rylton distantly.
His tone is a repulse. The lovely colour fades from her face.
"I'm tired," says she suddenly, petulantly. She moves to the other
end of the room, and, opening a wardrobe, pretends to make some
rearrangements with its contents. "If you have nothing more to
say"--with perhaps more honesty than politeness--"I wish you would
go away."
"I _have_ something more to say." The very nervousness he is feeling
makes his tone unnecessarily harsh. "I object to your extreme
intimacy with your cousin."
Tita drops the dress she has just taken from the wardrobe, and comes
back once more into the full light of the lamp. Her barer and
slender arms are now hanging straight before her, her fingers
interlaced; she looks up at him.
"With _Tom?"_
"With Mr. Hescott."
"I have known Tom all my life," defiantly.
"I don't care about that. One may know people all one's life, and
yet have very unpleasant things said about one."
_ "Can_ one----" She stops suddenly, facing him, her eyes fixed on
his; her lips part, her slight little frame quivers as if with
eagerness. It grows quite plain that there is something she desires
passionately to say to him--something terrible-- but all at once she
controls herself; she makes a little gesture with her right hand, as
if throwing something from her, and goes on quickly, excitedly:
"What do you mean? Who has been talking about me?"
"I didn't say anyone had been talking about you."
"Yes, you did! You hinted it, at all events. Go on. Tell me who it
was."
"Even if I knew I should not tell you," says Rylton, who is now
white with anger.
He had understood her hesitation of a moment since. He had known
exactly what she wanted to say to him, and unfortunately the
pricking of is conscience had only served to add fuel to the fire of
his discontent towards her.
"Well, _I'll_ tell _you,"_ says Tita, coming a step closer to him,
her eyes blazing. "It was Mrs. Bethune. I know that she is no friend
of mine. And I may as well say at once that I detest her. _You_ may
like her, but I don't, and I never shall. She's a _beast!"_
"Tita!"
Her husband stares at her aghast. The small form seems transfigured.
Has she grown?
"Yes--a _beast!_ I don't care what you think. I'm not afraid of
you--remember that! I was not even afraid of Uncle George. I shall
never be afraid of anyone in all this wide, wide world!"
Suddenly her passion breaks down. Her arms fall to her sides, and
she leans back against the end of her bed like a broken lily.
"Tita--if you would let me explain," says Rylton, who is overcome by
her forlorn attitude, "I----"
"No." He would have laid his hands gently upon her pretty bare
shoulders, but she repulses him. "I want no explanation; there
_isn't_ one."
Then, to his surprise and misery, she covers her face with both her
hands and bursts into tears.
"You are unkind," sobs she wildly. "And you are not _true_. You
don't tell the truth. You said--you _said,"_ passionately, "that you
would be good to me. That you would let me do as I liked--that I
should be happy! That was why I married you! That I might be happy!
And now--now----"
"But to do as you liked! Tita, be reasonable."
"Oh, _reasonable!_ Uncle George used to talk to me like that. _He_
was a reasonable person, I suppose; and so are you. And he--hated
me!" She grows silent as one might when some dreadful thought
assails one. "Perhaps," says the poor child, in a quick, frightened
sort of way, "you hate me too. Perhaps everyone hates me. There are
people whom everyone hates, aren't there?"
"Are there?" asks Rylton drearily.
At this moment, at all events, he feels himself to be hateful. What
a pitiful little face he is looking at!
"Yes, my uncle detested me," says Tita slowly, as if remembering
things. "He said I ought not to have had all that money. That if I
had not been born, he would have had it. But one can't help being
born. One isn't asked about it! If"--she pauses, and the tears well
up into her eyes again--"if _I_ had been asked, I should have said
no, _no_, NO!"
"Don't talk like that," says Rylton.
There is a sensation of chokiness about his throat. How young she
is--how small--and to be _already_ sorry that ever she was born!
What a slender little hand! Just now it is lying crushed against her
breast. And those clear eyes. Oh, if only he could have felt
differently towards her--if he could have loved her! All this passes
through his mind in an instant. He is even thinking of making her
some kindly speech that shall heal the present breach between them,
when she makes a sudden answer to his last remark.
"If you weren't here, I shouldn't have to talk at all," says she.
"True," he returns, feeling a little discomfited. "Well, good-night,
Tita."
"Good-night."
She refuses to see his proffered hand.
"Of course," says Rylton, who now feels _he_ is in the wrong, "I am
very sorry that I--that I----"
"Yes, so am I," with a saucy little tilting of her chin.
"Sorry," continues Rylton, with dignity, "that I felt it my duty
to--to----"
"Make a fool of yourself? _So am I!"_ says Lady Rylton.
After this astounding speech there is silence for a moment or two.
Then Rylton, in spite of himself, laughs. And after a faint struggle
with _her_self, Tita joins in his mirth. Emboldened by this
departure, and really anxious to make it up with her, Rylton bids
her good-night again, and this time would have added a kiss to his
adieu. But Tita pushed him away.
"Kiss you? Not likely!" says she scornfully; "I shall never want to
kiss you again in all my life!"
CHAPTER XIX.
HOW RYLTON'S HEART CONDEMNS HIM. AND HOW, AS HE WALKS, A SERPENT
STINGS HIM. AND HOW HE IS RECOVERED OF HIS WOUND. AND HOW THE LITTLE
RIFT IS MENDED--BUT WITH TOO FINE THREAD.
Rylton had gone to his own room in a strange frame of mind. He
called it aggrieved, but, _au fond_, there were some grains of
remorse at the bottom of it. He had married her, and in spite of all
things was bound to protect her. That sad little touch of hers,
"Perhaps everyone hates me," had gone to his heart.
There were other things that had gone home too. Little things, but
bitter to the senses of one highly cultured; and of course the
Ryltons had been accustomed to the best of things always. Tita's
phrases grated a good deal. That "make a fool of yourself" had sunk
deep, and there were so many other extraordinary expressions. The
women of his own world very often used them in fun, but Tita used
them in earnest: that made all the difference.
And yet--he was sorry that he had vexed her. It kept him sleepless
an hour almost, dwelling upon this, and even in the morning, when he
awoke, it was the first thought that assailed him.
* * * * *
It is in truth a lovely morning. Sweet as June, and fresh as "Fresh
May."
Rylton, whilst dressing, tells himself he wishes to goodness he had
been clever enough to make it up with his wife before going to bed
last night. Nothing so horrid as little coldnesses, little
bickerings before one's guests--and Tita is so untutored that
probably she will make it rather unbearable for him during
breakfast.
He has underrated Tita, however. She is almost the first down, and
gets through the morning salutations to her guests in the gayest
style, and takes possession of the teapot and the huge old urn quite
calmly. She has delivered up the coffee to Margaret, to whom she
always look as a sure ally. So calm, so pretty in her demeanour,
that Rylton, taking heart of grace, throws to her a word or two--to
his utter chagrin!
Not that the words are not responded to; not one of them, indeed,
but is answered, yet Tita's eyes had not gone with her words. They
had been downcast; busied, presumably, with the tea-cup now, or a
smile to her neighbour on her left, or a chiding to the fox-terrier
at her knee. She gives Rylton the impression, at all events, that
she will be civil to him in the future, but that she regrets the
fact that she has to be.
When the hateful meal is over he rises, telling himself that he must
make it up with her, and as soon as possible. That child! to have a
living feud with _her_. It is out of the question! And, besides,
before one's guests! How bad it will look. A disagreement is not
allowed between a host and hostess--when one is staying in their
house, at all events. It is quite simple to get all the quarrelling
over beforehand, to so arrange as to look like winged angels when
one's house-party is here to see.
He refuses to have anything to do with a swift glance from Mrs.
Bethune as he leaves the breakfast-room. He gets quickly past her,
disturbed at heart, and going through the hall, turns abruptly
towards the stables.
The day is lovely. A sort of Indian summer reigns. And presently
most of those staying in the house turn their steps towards the
pleasure grounds. The tennis courts have been kept marked, in spite
of the fact that the regular tennis season is at an end, and Mr.
Gower, who is an indefatigable player, has called on Miss Hescott to
get up a double with him.
The idea has evidently caught on, for now everyone seems to be
swarming tennis-wards, rackets in hand, and tennis shoes on feet.
Rylton, turning back from the stables an hour later, and with a mind
still much upset, finds all the courts occupied, and everyone very
much alive. Standing on the top of the stone steps that lead down to
one of the courts, he glances sharply round him. No! Tita is not
here. Tita, who is a perfect devotee where tennis is concerned.
Where is she, then? A second time his glance sweeps the tennis
courts, and now his brow grows dark; Hescott is not here, either.
He draws in his breath a little sharply, and without descending the
steps, goes round the courts nearest him to where an opening in the
wood will lead him beyond fear of conversation.
As he reaches this opening, a voice behind him cries gaily, "Whither
away, Sir Maurice?"
He turns and manages to smile pleasantly at Minnie Hescott, who,
with Mrs. Bethune, is close behind him. A fancy that Marian has
brought Miss Hescott here to say something occurs to him, and he
curses himself for the thought. Is he growing suspicious of
_everyone?_
"I was going down to one of the lower farms," says he in a light
tone. He had not been going there, but the evasion seems impossible
to avoid.
"You won't find anything _there,"_ says Mrs. Bethune, smiling at
him. She is dressed entirely in black, and from under the huge black
hat that shades her face her eyes gleam up at him in a sort of
mockery--sad, yet beseeching. She is looking beautiful! Her pale
face, so refined; the masses of her rich, red hair shining
gorgeously in the clear sunlight.
"No? I shall find old Wicks and his wife, at all events."
"Oh, that? Yes."
"Why, what did you think I was looking for?"
"I really hardly know;" she smiles, and then says quietly, "Why,
amusement, of course."
At this moment Minnie Hescott, who detests being left out of
anything, determines on boring a way into the _tête-à-tête_ before
her.
"Where is Tita?" asks she. "We wanted her for tennis, she is such a
good player; but no one could find her."
"Not even your brother?" asks Mrs. Bethune.
"Not even Tom; she disappeared somewhere after breakfast."
"Why, so did he!" and Mrs. Bethune lifts her brows in a very amused
fashion.
"Oh no, he didn't," says Minnie Hescott, casting a sudden shrewd
glance at her. "He was in the library writing letters till an hour
ago. I know that, because I was with him."
"What an excellent sister you are!" says Mrs. Bethune, with a slight
laugh.
"Why?" asks Miss Hescott slowly. "Because I was with him?" Her tone
is a little dangerous.
"Naturally," says Mrs. Bethune, saving herself promptly. "To be
always with one's brother shows devotion indeed; but you forget your
_rôle_, don't you? Where has he been for the past hour? You haven't
told us that! Surely you have not forsaken him now, when it may be
the hour of his extremity." Her tone is jesting, but all through it
Rylton can read between the lines.
"He is with Colonel Neilson, at the kennels," replies Miss Hescott
promptly.
"Ah, I told you you were a good sister," says Mrs. Bethune.
"Because I said Tom was with Colonel Neilson? Do you think he
_isn't_ with him?" asks Minnie, looking at her fixedly.
"My _dear_ girl! What a _bêtise!_ No! Because you take such care to
know what he is doing. And so he is now with Colonel Neilson?"
"Yes," shortly.
"I'm afraid I must go," says Sir Maurice; "if I don't catch those
Wickses at this hour I shall never catch them at all." He nods to
Minnie. For a second his eyes meet Marian's. There is something in
them that so satisfies her, that on way back with Minnie she makes
herself thoroughly agreeable to that astute damsel. What _was_ there
in his eye?--rage, hatred, revenge!
In truth, Rylton's mind is full of evil thoughts as he strides
onward into the recesses of the wood. The falling autumn leaves
crackle beneath his swift tread, and through the trees the sky shows
signs of storm. But what storm in all Nature can be compared with
the rage that stirs the heart of man?
Marian Bethune's coverts hints, added to his own suspicions, have
set his heart on fire! And that girl's attempts at evasion, her
hiding of her brother's faults--all that, too, had been laid bare to
him by Marian!
Just now it seems to him as true as life itself that Tita and Tom
Hescott have gone for a walk together; somewhere--anywhere beyond
the ken of those of her own household. To think that he should have
sacrificed his whole life--that he should have married this child,
who is less to him that thistledown, to be cast aside by her, and to
let her bring down his good name with ignominy to the dust.
He is striding onwards, lost in miserable thought, when suddenly
footsteps, coming quickly towards him, rouse him. Someone is
laughing. The laughter strikes to his very soul. When people laugh
seldom, one always knows their laugh. Before Tom Hescott turns the
corner Rylton knows it is his. But his companion!
"Why, there you are, Rylton!" says Colonel Neilson at the top of his
voice. "By Jove! well met! We've been disputing about a point in the
tenant right down here, and you can set us straight!"
Rylton can hardly account to himself for the terrible revulsion of
feeling he endures at this moment. Is it joy? _Can_ it be joy? What
is she to him or he to her? Yet positively it is a most thankful joy
he feels as he sees these two men approaching him together. After
all, Minnie Hescott had been right. It is perhaps worthy of notice
that he does not say to himself that Marian Bethune had been wrong!
He sets Colonel Neilson straight on a point or two, and then goes on
again, striking now, however, into a pathway that leads him very far
from the farm he had proposed to visit. It opens out into a pleasant
little green sward dotted with trees, through which the sun glints
delicately. One of these trees is a gnarled old oak.
As Rylton steps into this open glade the oak attracts him. He looks
at it--first carelessly, and then with sharp interest. What strange
fruit is that hanging on it? A foot!--an exquisite little slipper!
He stands still, and looks higher; and there he sees Tita embedded
amongst the leaves, half reclining on a giant bough and reading. The
book is on her knees, her eyes upon her book.
CHAPTER XX.
HOW TITA TAKES HIGH GROUND, AND HOW SHE BRINGS HER HUSBAND, OF ALL
PEOPLE, TO HER FEET.
She looks like a little elf. All at once the pretty beauty of her
breaks upon Rylton. The reaction from such extreme doubt of her to a
clear certainty has made his appreciation of her kinder--has,
perhaps, opened his eyes to the perfections she possesses. However
this may be, there is, beyond question, a great deal of remorse in
his soul as he walks towards the tree in which she sits enshrined.
How will she receive him? Not a word, save those much-begrudged ones
at breakfast, has passed between them since last night; and this
hurrying away from the others, does it not mean a dislike to meet
_him?_
"You have mounted very high in the world!" says he, stopping beneath
the tree and addressing her.
He has come towards her very softly on the grass--so softly that she
has not heard his coming. And now, as he speaks, she starts
violently, and looks down at him as if surprised out of all measure.
In a second, however, she recovers herself.
"True!" says she; "I have married you!"
It is to be still war, then! Rylton bites his lips, but controls
himself. It is plain he is not forgiven. But, after all, she has had
something to forgive, and more--_far_ more than she even knows. That
last suspicion of her was base.
"That is an unkind little speech!" says he gently. "It reminds me
that it was you who set _me_ up in the world."
This shaft tells.
Tita colours warmly; her generous soul shrinks from such an
accusation.
"I didn't mean that," says she; "you know very well I didn't. I
wish," petulantly, "you would go away; I want to read."
"Well, I'm going," says Rylton. As a means of carrying out this
promise, he props himself up with a branch of the tree on which she
is sitting--a branch on a level with her dainty little silk-clad
feet. He has leant both his arms on it, and now involuntarily his
eyes rest upon her shoes. "What beautiful feet you have!" says he
slowly.
It is a perfectly Machiavellian speech. Tita's feet are beyond
argument, and there is not a woman in _this_ world, any way, who has
beautiful feet, who doesn't want everyone to tell her all about
them.
"No, no; they're nothing," says she, making a pretence of tucking up
the much-maligned feet in question under her frock, which basely
fails to help her.
But even as she says this she smiles--reluctantly, no doubt; but,
still, she _does_ smile--and casts a glance at Rylton from under her
long lashes. It is a delightful look--half pleased, half defiant,
wholly sweet.
"Forgive me, Tita!" says her husband quickly.
"I don't want you to talk to me like that," says she, with a frown.
"But I must say that. Well, will you?"
"I don't know." She stops, and again casts that pretty glance at
him. "At all events, you will have to promise me one thing."
"Anything."
"No; I'm in earnest."
"So am I."
He ventures now to take one of the charming feet so close to him
into one of his hands, and strokes the instep softly with the other.
"Oh no! you are never in earnest with me," says the girl. "But what
I want you to say is, that you won't do it again."
"Do what?"
"Scold me."
"Never--never!" says Rylton.
"That's a promise, mind."
"I shall mind it."
"Very well--I forgive you."
"Let me bring you back to Mother Earth, then," says Rylton.
"No, thank you; I can take myself down."
"That's being unkind to yourself. Take down your friends if you
like, but spare yourself."
"I should like to take _you_ down," says she maliciously.
"Am _I_ your friend, then?"
"No--no, indeed!"
"Well----"
He pauses and looks at her. All at once it seems to him that perhaps
he _is_ her friend--a friend--a mere friend! But could a man who
loved another woman be an honest friend to his wife?
"Are you?" asks Tita.
"Yes. Didn't I want to take you down just now?"
At this she gives in and laughs a little. He laughs too.
"You are too clever for me," says she.
"And you--what are you? Too good for me, perhaps."
"I don't think you ought to say things you don't mean," says Tita.
"But as you have made that promise--why, you _may_ take me down
now."
She leans towards him, holding out her arms. He takes her into his,
and brings her slowly, carefully to the grass beside him. Even when
safely landed here he still holds her.
"We _are_ friends?" asks he.
His tone is a question.
"Yes, yes, of course," impatiently. "Are they playing tennis? Do you
think they want me?"
It is impossible for him to misunderstand her meaning. A longing to
get back to the others to play, and win at her favourite game of
tennis, has been in part the cause of her ready forgiveness.
"Certainly they want you," says he, surprised at himself for the
touch of chagrin he feels. "But," still holding her, "you have quite
made it up with me, haven't you?"
"Quite--quite."
"But what a way to make it up!" says Rylton reproachfully.
He is smiling all through, however.
"What's the matter with it?" asks Tita.
"Don't you know? Must I tell you? Last night, Tita, you told me you
would never want to kiss me again."
"Well, kissing's a bore," says Tita, with a little grimace. "I never
want to kiss anyone really, except----"
She hesitates.
"Except?" asks Rylton, his grasp tighter on her arms.
"Except Margaret."
Rylton bursts out laughing; for the moment he believes her,
afterwards--
"What a baby you are!" says he; "and what a cruel baby! Tita, I
shan't believe you have forgiven me unless you----"
"I think it is _you_ who are the baby," says she, with a shrug.
"What on earth _do_ you want to kiss me for? Well, there," holding
up to him the coolest, freshest cheek in the world, "you can kiss me
if you like."
"Is that all?" says Rylton, somewhat piqued.
"Yes--all," with decision. "I can't bear people to kiss me on my
mouth."
"Perhaps you would prefer that people would not kiss you at all?"
"Well, yes, I should," says she. "But," quickly, "of course, you are
not quite like other people. You may kiss my cheek if you like."
"Thank you," says Rylton. "I appreciate the difference."
He kisses her cheek discreetly, but would have liked to shake her as
he does so.
CHAPTER XXI.
HOW EVERYONE GOES TO LADY WARBECK'S DANCE, AND HELPS TO MAKE IT A
SUCCESS; AND HOW MANY CURIOUS THINGS ARE SAID AND DONE THERE.
Everyone has come now, and old Lady Warbeck, resplendent in pearls
and brocade, has dropped into a chair that some charitable person
has placed behind her.
It is indeed close upon midnight, and dancing it at its height.
Flowers are everywhere, and a band from town has been secured. This
latter is quite a flight on the part of Lady Warbeck, who, as a
rule, trusts the music to the local geniuses. Altogether everyone
acknowledges it is very well done. Very well done _indeed_, and a
good deal more than one would expect from the Warbecks!
Old Sir Thomas is marching round, paying senile compliments to all
the prettiest girls; his son Gillam, with a diamond stud that you
could see a mile off, is beaming on Mrs. Bethune, who is openly
encouraging him. Indeed, "The Everlasting," as he is called by his
friends (it is always one's friends who give one a bad name), is
careering round and about Mrs. Bethune with a vigour hardly to be
expected of him. He is looking even younger than usual. Though fully
forty-five, he still looks only thirty--the reason of his nickname!
Everyone is a little surprised at Mrs. Bethune's civility to him,
she having been studiously cold to all men save her cousin Sir
Maurice during the past year; but Mrs. Bethune herself is quite
aware of what she is doing. Of late--it seems difficult of
belief--but of late she has fancied Maurice has avoided her. He was
always a little highflown with regard to morals, dear Maurice, but
she will reform him! A touch, just a _touch_ of jealousy will put an
end to the moral question!
She has thrown aside the dark colours she usually affects, and is
to-night all in white. So is Tita. So is Mrs. Chichester, for the
matter of that. The latter is all smiles, and is now surrounded by a
little court of admirers at the top of the room, Captain Marryatt,
fatuous as ever, by her side, and the others encircling her.
"Quite refreshing to see so many men all together," says she in a
loud voice, addressing everybody at once. She likes an audience. "As
a rule, when one gets into the country, one sticks a glass in one's
eye, and ask, 'Where's the MAN?'"
"I never heard anything so unkind in my life," says Mr. Gower, with
a deep reproach. "I'm sure ever since _you_ have been in the country
you have had a regiment round you, waiting on your lightest word."
"Oh! you git!" says Mrs. Chichester, who is as vulgar as she is
well-born. Her glance roams down the room. "Just look at Mrs.
Bethune and 'The Everlasting,'" says she. _"Aren't_ they going it?
And for once the fair Bethune is well-gowned."
"Yet I hear she is very hard up at present," says a woman near her.
"What eyes she has!"
"I was told she made her own gowns," says another, laughing.
"Pouf!" says Mrs. Chichester. "That's going a trifle too far. One
may make the garment that covers one--I'm sure I don't know, but
I've heard it--but no one ever made a _gown_ except a regular
clothes woman--a modiste."
"And, for the matter of that, hers is beautiful. Do you see how the
catch at the side of the dress is? It shows the bit of satin lining
admirably."
"Well, but how did she get such a charming gown if she is as you
say--well, 'hard up'?"
"Ah! To go into a thing like that! How _rude!"_ says Mrs.
Chichester, going off into a little convulsion of laughter behind
her fan.
"Talking of clothes," says Captain Marryatt at the moment, "did you
ever see anything like Gillam's get up?"
"Gillam? Is that Mrs. Bethune's partner?"
"Yes. Just look at his trousers, his diamonds! How _can_ Mrs.
Bethune stand it all?"
"Perhaps she admires it--the diamonds at all events."
"'My love in his attire doth show his wit!'" quotes Marryatt, who
likes to pose as a man of letters.
"'When the age is in the wit is out,'" quotes Gower in his turn,
who can never resist the longing to take the wind out of somebody's
sails; "and, after all, The Everlasting is not a youth! No doubt his
intellect is on the wane."
"He's a cad, poor fellow!" says one the cavalry men from the
barracks at Merriton.
"Nonsense!" says the girl with him, a tall, heavy creature. "Why,
his father is a baronet."
The cavalry man regards her with pity. How _little_ she knows!
"A cad is not always the son of a sweep," says he, giving his
information gently; "sometimes--he is the son of a prince."
"Ah! now you are being very funny," says the girl, who thinks he is
trying to be clever.
"Yes, really, isn't he?" says Mrs. Chichester, who knows them both;
she is a sort of person who always knows everybody. Give her three
days in any neighbourhood whatsoever, and she'll post you up in all
the affairs of the residents there as well as if she had dwelt
amongst them since the beginning of time. _You,_ who have lived with
them for a hundred years, will be nowhere; she'll always be able to
tell you something about them you never heard before.
"Isn't he?" says she; she is now regarding the heavy girl with
suppressed, but keen, amusement. "And to be funny in this serious
age is unpardonable. Don't do it again, Captain Warrender, as you
value your life."
"I shan't!" says he. "A second attempt might be fatal!"
"How well Mr. Hescott dances!" goes on Mrs. Chichester, who admires
Tom Hescott.
"True. The very worst of us, you see, have _one_ good point," says
Gower.
"I don't consider Mr. Hescott the worst of you, by a long way,"
returns she.
"Oh no, neither do I," says a pretty little woman next to her, a
bride of a few weeks, who, with her husband, has just come up.
"I have you on my side then, Lady Selton?" says Mrs. Chichester.
Lady Selton nods her reply. She is panting, and fanning herself
audibly. Without the slightest ear for music, she has been plunging
round the room with her husband, who is still so far infatuated as
to half believe she can dance. She is an extremely pretty woman, so
one can condone his idiocy.
At this moment Hescott appears. He goes straight to the bride. He
has been sent, indeed, by Lady Warbeck.
"Will you give me the pleasure of this dance, Lady Selton?" asks he.
"It? What is it?" nervously.
"A waltz."
He is smiling at her. She has a charming figure. Of course she can
dance. Tom Hescott would not have asked the loveliest woman in the
land to waltz with him, if he knew her to be a bad dancer.
"I can't waltz at all," says the bride. But her husband comes to the
rescue.
"Oh, nonsense!" says he, smilingly. "Hescott dances so well that he
will teach you. Go, go with him." He gives her a playful little push
towards Hescott, who is looking very blank. "You'll get into it in
no time."
"Get into it."
The disgust that is writ so large on Hescott's face, as he leads her
away, makes Mrs. Chichester shake with laughter.
"He'll find it a slight difference after Lady Rylton's waltzing,"
says she to Marryatt.
"He'll find a difference in every way. Lady Selton is devoted to her
husband----"
"And Lady Rylton----"
_"Well!"_ He hesitates.
"How vague! But I know, I know! By-the-bye," with a swift change of
tone that quite deceives him, "which do you admire most?"
"Oh, Lady Rylton, of course. Lady Selton is pretty--in a
way--but----"
"Then you prefer the woman who is _not_ devoted to her husband?"
"I don't see how that argument comes in," says he quickly. "Some
husbands are--are----"
"Quite true. They are indeed," interrupts Mrs. Chichester, who seems
to be enjoying herself. "But what an aspersion on poor Sir Maurice."
"I wasn't thinking of him," says Marryatt hurriedly.
"Of whom then?"
She fixes her eyes full on his--eyes merry with mischief.
"Oh, I don't know," says he confusedly.
"Of _my_ husband?"
"Mrs. Chichester, I don't think----"
"That's right," says she, rising and slipping her arm into his.
"Never think; it's about the most foolish thing anyone can do. _I
_never think. I only wait; waiting is full of promise."
CHAPTER XXII.
HOW RYLTON ASKS HIS WIFE TO TREAD A MEASURE WITH HIM, AND HOW THE
FATES WEAVE A LITTLE MESH FOR TITA'S PRETTY FEET.
"Will you give me this dance, Tita?" asks Sir Maurice, going up to
his wife.
Tita is standing in a recess near the window. The window is wide
open, and filled at each corner with giant ferns in pots.
"Ye--es," says Tita, with hesitation.
"Of course, if you are engaged----"
"That's it, I'm not quite sure."
Rylton laughs unpleasantly.
"Oh, if you want to give it to somebody else----"
"I don't," returns Tita calmly. "You dance better than anyone here,
except Tom."
"Perhaps, then, you wish to reserve it for Tom? I see you have
already danced a good deal with Tom."
"It is such a pleasure to dance with him," says she
enthusiastically.
"One can see how you regard it."
"What do you mean?" looking at him. "Have I danced too much with him?
If you imagine----"
"I shouldn't presume to imagine. But this dance, why can't I have
it?"
"Well, to tell you the truth, I've lost my card. I can't think what
I have done with it."
"Dropped it, perhaps."
"No; I _fancy"_--frowning as if trying to remember--"that I gave it
to somebody to keep for me."
"Tom, perhaps," dryly.
"I think not."
"Well, your partner for this dance, whoever he is, doesn't seem to
be in a hurry to claim you," says Rylton, making his rude speech
very suavely. "You may as well give it to me."
At this moment Hescott, looking rather out of breath, comes up to
them, pushing the curtain near him aside.
"What a place to hide yourself!" says he to Tita. "I have been
hunting for you everywhere." Here he catches sight of Rylton. "Oh,
you, Rylton! Tita is in good company, at all events."
"She is always in good company, of course," returns Rylton, smiling.
"Why, is it _you,_ then, who is my partner?" says Tita, quickly
looking at Tom. "Maurice wants me to dance this with him. I told him
I should be delighted to, but----"
"Did you tell me that?" interrupts Sir Maurice, always smiling.
"Well, if I didn't say it, I meant it," with a shrug. "But, you see,
I had lost my card, so I wasn't sure whether I was engaged to
somebody else or not."
"Why----" begins Hescott.
He stops dead short. Suddenly it occurs to him that perhaps she
doesn't wish her husband to _know!_ He curses himself for this
thought afterwards. She--_she_ to descend to duplicity of any sort!
"It is you who have my card!" cries Tita suddenly, as if just
remembering, and with a merry laugh. "Of course! How could I have
forgotten!"
"How, indeed!" says her husband pleasantly; his mouth is looking a
little hard, however.
"Give it to me," says Tita.
Hescott gives her the car in silence. If she is ignorant, he, at all
events, is quite aware that there is thunder in the atmosphere.
Tita runs her eye down the card.
"Yes, this dance is yours," says she, looking up at Tom.
"If you would prefer to dance it with Sir Maurice----" begins he.
He is looking at her. His heart feels on fire. _Will_ she elect to
dance with this husband, who, as report goes, so openly prefers
another?
"No, no, no!" cries Tita gaily; "I have promised you. Maurice can
ask me for another later on."
"Certainly," says Sir Maurice courteously.
He nods and smiles at them as they leave the recess, but once past
his view, his expression changes; his brow grows black as night.
What does it all mean? Is she as innocent as heaven itself, or as
false as hell? All things point the latter way.
First she had said---- What was it she had said? That she didn't
know whether she were engaged to this dance or not. A clear putting
off--a plan to gain time. She had lost her card; she couldn't
imagine how and where. Then comes the inevitable cousin _with_ the
card. And his hesitation--that was fatal. He surely was clever
enough to have avoided that. _She_ had known what to do, however;
she had taken the bull by the horns. She had given "Tom," as she
calls him, a safe lead.
And yet--and yet! Her face comes back to him. Could he accuse that
face of falsehood? And another thing: If she and that cousin of hers
were in collusion, would they have so openly defied him, as it were?
No; it is out of the question. So far as she goes, at all events,
there is nothing to complain of. That she is indifferent to him--her
husband--is, of course, beyond question. He himself had arranged all
that beforehand--before his marriage. Both he and she were to have
a loose rein, and there was to be no call for affection on either
side.
His mind runs back to those early days when he had asked Tita to
marry him. He had been altogether satisfied with the arrangements
then made--arrangements that left him as free as air, and his wife
too. He had thought with boredom of this marriage, and had grasped
at any alleviation of the martyrdom. And now it is just as he had
ordained it. And yet----
Tita has disappeared. Once or twice he had caught a glimpse of her
floating round the room with her cousin, but for the past five
minutes she has not been _en évidence_ at all. Sir Maurice, moving
out of the recess, is touched by a hand from behind. He turns.
Marian Bethune, beautiful, more animated than usual, and with her
eyes sparkling, smiles up at him.
"How dull you look!" cries she gaily. "Come out here on the balcony
and enjoy the moonlight for awhile."
She had been standing out there in the shadow, and had heard and
seen what had occurred between Tita and her husband, and later on
with Tom Hescott. Rylton follows her. The soft chill of the air
outside attracts him. It seems to check all at once the bitter anger
that is raging in his heart. It surprises himself that he should be
so angry. After all, what is Tita to him? A mere name. And yet----
Outside here the night looks exquisite. Star after star one sees
decking the heavens with beauty.
"Many a night I saw the Pleiads, rising through the mellow shade,
Glitter like a swarm of fire-flies tangled in a silver braid."
Such a night is this, delicate, tender, its charms heightened by a
soft low wind that sweeps over the gardens and sends a sigh or two
to the balconies above.
"Well!" says Mrs. Bethune.
She had led him to the far end of the balcony, where no seats are,
and where, therefore, one may be sure of seclusion--for the moment,
at all events. She looks up at him. Some pale pink lamps from behind
throw a slight radiance on her--not too deep a radiance. They are
too far behind for that, but yet enough to soften her, to idealize
her, and to render even more delicate the exquisite flesh tints of
her face.
She has waited for her answer some time, but is well satisfied that
no answer has been forthcoming. Rylton's eyes are resting upon hers,
as if surprised at this new fairness of hers. His glance is full of
admiration, yet there is something of sadness--of anger in it, too,
that annoys her, in spite of her exultation. For whom is the
anger--for that little fool he has married? It seems to her an
absurd thing that he should cast a thought, even an angry one, upon
his wife when she--Marian--is here.
She has been leaning upon the rails of the balcony, and now draws
closer to him.
"Why waste a thought on her?" says she in a low tone that is almost
a whisper.
"On her! Who?" asks he quickly, and with an evident start.
"Oh!" with a shrug. "If you don't wish to go into it."
"But into what?"
He frowns. He is feeling very irritable still, in spite of his
admiration of her beauty.
She makes a little gesture of contempt.
"If you will not acknowledge me as even your friend."
"You!" says he sharply. "You! _Are_ you my friend?"
There is a pause. She looks away from him. And then----
"Oh, _more_ than that!" cries she in a low but passionate tone.
_"Far_ more!"
She lays her hand upon her throat, and looks up to heaven. The
moonlight, striking upon her as she so stands, makes her fairness
even greater.
"Marian! You mean----"
The past rushes in upon him. He has turned to her.
"No! no! It is nothing," says she, with a little laugh that is full
of pain. She makes a movement that almost repulses him. "But I am
your friend, if nothing else; and the world--the world is beginning
to talk about you, Maurice!"
"About me!"
He has drawn back with a sharp pang. She sees that this new idea
that touches him, or that little fool (as she has designated Tita in
her mind), has destroyed his interest in her for the moment.
"Yes! Be warned in time."
"Who is daring to talk about me?"
"Not about you directly; but about Lady Rylton."
Some strange feeling compels him to put a fresh question for her,
though he knows what the answer will be.
"My mother?"
"This is unworthy of you," says Marian slowly. "No; I meant Tita!"
CHAPTER XXIII.
HOW MARIAN FIGHTS FOR MASTERY; AND HOW THE BATTLE GOES; AND HOW
CHANCE BEFRIENDS THE ENEMY.
"Tita! You wrong her!" says he. "Why speak of her? You should not;
you always disliked her."
"True." She is silent for a moment, looking down into the silent
garden. Then she lifts her head, and gazes straight at him. "You
know why I disliked her. You must! You--you only. Some instinct from
the very first warned me against her. I knew. I _knew_ she would rob
me of all that life had left me. I knew"--with a quick, long
sob--"she would take _you_ from me!"
Rylton, who has been leaning on the railings beside her, raises
himself, and stands staring at her, a terrible anguish in his eyes.
"Marian--think," says he hoarsely.
"Oh, _why_ did you marry her?" cries she, smiting her hands together
as if half distracted. "There was always so much time--time!"
"There was none."
"There is always time!" She is silent for a moment, and then, with
an increase of passion in her tone, repeats her question: "Why did
you marry her?"
_"You_--to ask me that!" exclaims he fiercely.
"It was not like you," says she, interrupting him in a measure, as
though unable to keep back the words, the accusations, that are
rushing to her lips. "I have known you so long--so long. Ah! I
thought I knew you. I believed you faithful. I believed you many
things. But, at all events"--with a sad and desolate reproach--"I
never believed you fond of money."
"Marian!" She has laid her hand upon his arm, and now he flings it
from him. "That _you_ should accuse _me!_ Money! What was money to
me in comparison with your love? But you--you----"
He does not go on: it is so hard to condemn her. He is looking at
her in the tender light with eyes that seek to read her heart, and
he is very pale. She can see that, in spite of the warm, pink glow
of the lamps behind them.
"Well--and I?" questions she, with deep agitation.
How handsome he is! how lovable! Oh for the good sweet past she has
so madly flung aside!
"You refused me," says he slowly, "you, on whom my soul was set."
"For your own good," in a stifled voice.
"Don't repeat that wretched formula," exclaims he vehemently. "It
means nothing. It was not for my good. It was for my damnation, I
think. You see how things are going."
He stops abruptly here, as if thinking of something, and she knows
and resents the knowledge that his mind has gone back to
Tita--resents it, though his thought has been condemnatory of his
wife. Why can't he forget her altogether?
"Yes I meant it for your good," says she, in a whisper.
Her heart is beating wildly.
"You refused me," persists he, in a dull tone. "That is all I
remember. You refused me--how many times?"
She turns away from him.
"Once too often, at all events," replies she, in a low, wretched
voice.
She makes a movement as if to go back to the lighted rooms beyond,
but he catches her and compels her to stay with him.
"What do you mean?" demands he sternly. "To say _that_ to me--and
now--now, when it is too late."
"Too late, indeed!" echoes she.
Her voice sounds like the voice of one dying. She covers her face
with her hands. He knows that she is crying. Very gently he takes
down one of the hands and holds it between both his own, and presses
it to his lips. How dear she has always been to him! He realizes in
this moment how dear she still _is._
"Marian, have pity on me," says he hoarsely. "I have suffered a
great deal. And your tears----"
"My tears! They will avail me nothing," says she bitterly. "When
_you_ have forsaken me, what is left?"
_ "Have_ I forsaken you?" He pauses, as if to control the agitation
that is threatening to overcome him. "When all I cared for was lost
to me," he goes on presently, his eyes upon the ground, "when you
had told me that marriage between us was impossible, then one thing
remained, and one only--ambition. The old place had been ours for
two centuries--it had its claim on me. If love was not to be my
portion, I felt I might as well do all I could for the old name--the
old place."
"And your wife? Was that honourable towards _her?"_ She smiles, but
her smile is a sneer. "After all, she would not care," says she.
"She carried her point! She has compelled you to raise her from the
mud to the sky!"
Rylton draws back suddenly. All at once recollection comes to him.
His wife! Yes, Tita _is_ his wife, and honour binds him to her. He
drops Mrs. Bethune's hand.
"I have been quite honourable," says he coldly. "I arranged matters
with her. She knows--she is content to know--that----"
"What?" Mrs. Bethune has felt the change in his manner ever since
she mentioned Tita's name. "That you once loved me!"
"No," frowning, "I have not told her that."
"Ah!" cries she, with a sort of passionate relief, "I thank you for
that, even though your love for me may now be dead. I thank you for
that; and as for your wife, what is she to you?"
"She is my _wife!"_ returns he gloomily. "I shall remember
that--always!"
"Ah! she will _make_ you remember it," cries Marian, with a queer
laugh. "I warn you of _that!"_
"You warn me!"
"Yes--yes." She throws out her arms in the moonlight, and laughs
again, with a great but cruel delight. "You will see. You don't care
for her, she doesn't care for you, and you will see----"
"Marian, take care! I can hear nothing said against my wife, even by
you."
"You prefer to hear it, then, from others?" says Mrs. Bethune,
leaning back against the railings that overlook the gardens beneath,
with a strange smile upon her lips.
"I prefer to believe that there is nothing to hear"--haughtily.
"You can prefer what you like," says she, with a sudden burst of
rage; "but hear you shall!"
She takes a step nearer him.
"I shall not," says Rylton firmly, if gently. "She is my wife. I
have made her that! I shall remember it."
"And she," says Marian furiously, "what does _she_ remember? You may
forget all old ties, if you will; but she--does _she_ forget?"
"Forget what?"
Mrs. Bethune laughs softly, sweetly, wildly.
"Are you blind? Are you _mad?_ Can you see _nothing?"_ cries she,
her soft, musical voice now a little harsh and strained. "That
cousin--have you seen nothing there?"
"You are alluding to Hescott?"
"Yes--to him, and--Tita!"
"Tita?" His brow darkens. "What are you going to say of her?"
"What you"--deliberately--"do not dare to say, although you know
it--that she is absolutely depraved!"
_"Depraved!"_
"There--stand back!" She laughs, a strange laugh. She has shaken
herself free from him. "Fancy your taking it like that!" says she.
She is laughing still, but panting; the pressure of his hands on her
arms is still fresh. "And have you not seen for yourself, then? Is
it not open to all the world to see? Is no one talking but _me?_
Why, her flirtation with her cousin is common talk."
"Depraved, you said!" He has recovered out of that first wild
passion of his, and is now gazing at her with a certain degree of
composure. "Depraved! I will not have that word used. She is
young--thoughtless--foolish, if you will, but not depraved!"
"You can delude yourself just as long as you like," returns she,
shrugging her shoulders, "but, all the same, I warn you. I----"
She stops suddenly; voices and steps, coming nearer, check her
words. She draws a little away from Rylton, and, lifting her fan,
waves it indolently to and fro. The voice belongs to Minnie Hescott,
who, with her partner, has come out to the balcony, and now moves
down the steps to the lighted gardens below. Mrs. Bethune would have
been glad at the thought that Miss Hescott had not seen her; but
there had been one moment when she knew the girl's eyes had
penetrated through the dusk where she stood, and had known her.
Not that it mattered much. The Hescott girl was of little
consequence at any time. Yet sharp, too! Perhaps, after all, she
_is_ of consequence. She has gone, however--and it is a mere
question whether she had seen her with Sir Maurice or not. Of
course, the girl would be on her brother's side, and if the brother
is really in love with that little silly fool--and if a divorce was
to be thought of--the girl might make herself troublesome.
Mrs. Bethune, leaning over the railings lost in such thoughts,
suddenly sees something. She raises herself, and peers more keenly
into the soft light below. Yes--yes, _surely!_
But Minnie Hescott, who has gone down the steps into the garden, has
seen something too--that fair, fierce face leaning over the balcony!
The eyes are following Tita and her brother, Tom Hescott.
CHAPTER XXIV.
HOW RYLTON MAKES A MOST DISHONOURABLE BET, AND HOW HE REPENTS OF IT;
AND HOW, THOUGH HE WOULD HAVE WITHDRAWN FROM IT, HE FINDS HE CANNOT.
"You have said," says Rylton, when the steps have ceased, "that you
would warn me about my wife. Of what?"
She shrugs her shoulders.
"Ah, you are so violent--you take things so very unpleasantly--that
one is quite afraid to speak."
"You mean something"--sternly. "I apologize to you if I was rough a
moment since. I--it was so sudden--I forgot myself, I think."
"To be able to forget is a most excellent thing--at _times,"_ says
she, with a curious smile, her eyes hidden. "If I were you I should
cultivate it."
"It?"
"The power to forget--_at times!"_
"Speak," says he. "It is not a moment for sneers. Of what would you
warn me?"
"I have told you before, but you took it badly."
"Words--words," says he, frowning.
"Would you have deeds?" She breaks into a low laugh. "Oh, how
foolish you are! Why don't you let things go?"
"What did you mean?" persists he icily.
"What a tragic tone!" Her manner is all changed; she is laughing
now. "Well, what _did_ I mean? That your wife---- Stay!" with a
little comic uplifting of her beautiful shoulders and an exaggerated
show of fear, "do not assault me again. That your wife has shown the
bad taste to prefer her cousin--her old lover--to you!"
"As I said, words, mere words," returns he, with a forced smile.
"Because she speaks to him, dances with him, is civil to him, as she
is civil to all guests----"
"Is she _just as_ civil to all her guests?"
"I think so. It is my part to do her justice," says he coldly, "and,
I confess, I think her a perfect hostess, if----"
"If?"
"If wanting in a few social matters. As to her cousin, Mr.
Hescott--being one of her few relations, she is naturally attentive
to him."
_"Very!"_
"And she is----"
"Always with him!" Mrs. Bethune laughs again--always that low,
sweet, cruel laughter. _"Could_ attention farther go?"
"Always? Surely that is an exaggeration."
Rylton speaks with comparative calmness. It is plain that his one
outbreak of passion has horrified himself, and he is determined not
to give way to another whatever provocation may lie in his path.
"Is it?" tauntingly. "Come"--gaily--"I will make a bet with you--a
fair one, certainly. Of course, I know as little of your wife's
movements at present as you do. I could not possibly know more, as I
have been here with you all this time."
"Well--your bet?" darkly.
"That she is now with her old--with Mr. Hescott."
"I take it," says he coldly.
Something in his air that is full of anger, of suppressed fury,
gives her pause for thought. Her heart sinks. Is she to win or lose
in this great game, the game of her life? Why should he look like
that, when only the honour of that little upstart is in question?
"Come, then," says she.
She moves impulsively towards the stairs that lead to the garden--an
impulsive step that costs her dear.
"But why this way?" asks Rylton. "Why not here?" pointing towards
the ballroom. "Or _here?"_ contemptuously pointing to a window
further on that leads to a conservatory.
For a moment Mrs. Bethune loses herself--only for a moment, however.
That first foolish movement that betrayed her knowledge of where
Tita really is has to be overcome.
"The dance is over," says she, "and the gardens are exquisitely lit.
Lady Warbeck has great taste. After all, Maurice," slipping her hand
into his arm, "our bet is a purely imaginary one. We know nothing.
And perhaps I have been a little severe; but as it _is_ a bet, I am
willing to lose it to you. Let us take one turn down this walk that
leads to the dahlias, and after that----"
"After that----"
"Why, _you_ win, perhaps."
"As you will," says he listlessly.
His heart is still on fire. Not a word passes his lips as they go
down the path. His eyes feel strained, hurt; they are
staring--staring always towards the end of this path, where a seat
is, so hedged round with creepers that one can scarcely see it. Will
she be there? He turns abruptly to his companion.
"I am sick of this," says he; "I shall go no farther."
"But your bet?"
"It is a damnable bet!" exclaims he fiercely. "I ought to be ashamed
of myself for having made it. You win it, of course, in a sense, as
I decline to go on with it; but, still, I believe that _I_ win it in
fact."
"You are afraid," says she, with a daring that astonishes even
herself.
"I am afraid of forgetting that once I was a gentleman," says he
curtly.
"You are afraid of what is in that arbour," returns she mercilessly.
Rylton hesitates. To draw back is to betray disbelief in his wife;
to go on is to join in a conspiracy against her. He had started on
that conspiracy in a moment of intense passion, but now his very
soul revolts from it. And yet if he draws back it will show. . . .
It will give this woman beside him the victory over the woman he has
married. And then a sudden thought comes to him. Why not go on? Why
not put it to be proof? Why not win his wager? Tita is thoughtless;
but it would be madness in anyone to think her vile. It was madness
in _him_ a moment since to dream of her being alone in that small,
isolated arbour with Hescott. Much as he may revolt--as he does
revolt--from this abominable wager he has entered into, surely it is
better to go on with it and bring it to a satisfactory end for Tita
than to "cry off," and subject her to scoffs and jeers from her
adversary.
"Let us go on," says he quietly. "I shall win my bet. But that is
nothing! What really matters is, that I should have entered into
such a wager with you or anyone. That is a debt I shall never be
able to repay--Lady Rylton."
His tone is bitterly self-condemnatory, but Marian has scarcely
caught that. The "Lady Rylton" has struck upon her ears, and hurt
her to her heart's core! Oh, that she could destroy--blot out that
small usurper!
"You have regained your courage? Come, then," says she, in a low
tone that is full of a strange mirth.
He follows her along the grassy path--a path noiseless--until
presently, having skirted a few low bushes, he finds himself, with
Marian beside him, at the southern side of the arbour.
Marian, laying her hand silently upon his arm, points through the
evergreens that veil the seat within; a mocking, triumphant smile is
on her lips.
There is no need for any indication on her part, however--Rylton can
see for himself. On the low, rustic seat within the arbour is
Tita--with Hescott beside her. The two young heads are close
together. Tita is whispering to Hescott--something very secret,
undoubtedly. Her small face is upturned to his, and very earnest.
_His_ face.
Rylton never forgets his face!
Tita is speaking--she is smiling--she leans toward her companion;
her voice is full of a delicious confidence.
"Well, remember it is a secret--a secret between us."
Rylton draws back as if stabbed. He would have given his soul to
hear the end of this terrible beginning--this beginning that, at all
events, sounds so terrible to _him;_ but the fact that he _is_
longing to hear, that he has been listening, makes him cold from
head to heel.
He moves away silently. Mrs. Bethune, catching his arm, says
quickly:
"You heard--a secret--a secret between those two--_you heard!"_
There is something delirious in her tone--something that speaks of
revenge perfected, that through all his agitation is understood by
him. He flings her hand aside, and goes swiftly onwards alone into
the dense darkness of the trees beyond, damning himself as he goes.
A very rage of hatred, of horror of his own conduct, is the first
misery that assails him, and after that----
After that he sees only Tita sitting there with Hescott beside
her--he whispering to her, and she to him.
He stops in his rapid walk, and pulls himself together: he must have
time--time to think, to control himself, to work it all out.
Things seem to come back to him with a strange clearness. He
remembers how Tita had once said to him that she never cared to kiss
anyone except--Margaret. Her hesitation returns to him now; was
Margaret the name she would have said had not fear, mixed with
prudence, prompted her words? He remembers, too, that she had once
refused to let _him_ kiss her lips--him, her husband! Why? He
trembles with rage as he asks himself this question. Was it to keep
them sacred for someone else--for that "old lover" of hers, for
example?
Who had called him that? Marian, was it not? Old lover!
He had laughed at the name then. That child to have a lover! Why, he
had believed she did not know the meaning of the word "love." What a
baby she had always seemed to him--a careless, troublesome baby. And
now!
Great heavens! Who is to be trusted? Is anyone to be trusted? He had
put his faith in Tita; he had thought her wild, perhaps a little
unmanageable, but--yes, he had thought her lovable; there had been
moments when----
And now it had all come to this, that she had deceived him--is
wilfully deceiving him.
He does not even in this, his angry hour, accuse her of more than a
well-developed flirtation with her cousin; but that is the beginning
of an end that he will put a stop to at once, and for ever. He will
show her who is her master. If she cannot respect herself, he will,
at all events, take care that she respects his name; she shall not
disgrace _that_.
He has hardly known where his feet have taken him, but now he finds
himself on a lighted path, with two or three couples coming towards
him; evidently they have just left the dancing-room. He has
therefore described a circle, and come back to the place from which
he started. One of the men passing him looks into his face.
That quick, curious glance brings Rylton to himself. He cannot stay
here any longer. He must go back into the house. It will be madness
to absent himself. And, after all, is not the whole thing madness?
What is this girl to him? A mere name; nothing more.
He mounts the steps leading to the conservatory, and, meeting Minnie
Hescott, asks her to dance.
"This is only a supper dance," says she. "I'm engaged for all the
rest. But, if you like, I'll take one turn with you. After that you
must get me something to eat; I never felt so hungry in all my
life."
CHAPTER XXV.
HOW TITA TOLD A SECRET TO TOM HESCOTT IN THE MOONLIGHT; AND HOW HE
SOUGHT TO DISCOVER MANY THINGS, AND HOW HE WAS MOST INNOCENTLY
BAFFLED.
"Of course, I shall understand that it is a secret," says Tom
Hescott.
Both he and Tita are quite unaware of the fact that Rylton and Mrs.
Bethune had just been standing behind them. Tita, who had been
dancing with Hescott, had led the way to this spot when they came
out into the garden.
"Still," says Tita, hesitating, "perhaps I ought not to speak. A
secret _is_ a secret, you know."
"Yes; everyone knows that," says Hescott.
"Knows what?" sharply.
"About a secret."
"If you're going to be nasty, you shan't know it at all," says Tita.
"I understand you very well. You think no woman can keep a secret."
"Ah! but a man can. Tell me yours."
"Nonsense! A woman is _twice_ as good at keeping a secret as a man
is. And I can tell you this"--with a little emphatic shake of her
charming head--"that I should not tell _you_ anything of this
secret, only that you are always calling her names."
"Her? Who?"
"Oh, you know very well."
"Who do I know very well? Not a soul here except you; and, after
all, I don't think I know _you_ very well."
"Well, if you don't you ought."
"Ought what? Know the mysterious 'her' or you?"
_"Me!"_
Hescott looks at her keenly in the dim light. _Is_ she a born
coquette, or is she only a sweet child--the sweetest child that
earth ever gave forth? Somehow it would have hurt him to find her a
coquette.
"Ah! I _don't_ know you."
"Tom!" There is a little reproach in her tone. Suddenly she puts out
her little slim hand and slips it into his. "As if we weren't
brought up together," says she, "just like a brother and sister. You
remember the old days, don't you, Tom? when we used to go fishing
together, and the cricket----"
"Is it wise to remember?" says Hescott in a low tone.
His heart is beating; his fingers now close on hers.
"I don't know--yes. Yes, I think I like to," says Tita. "Darling
pappy! Sometimes it all comes back to me. How happy I was then!"
"And now, Tita, _now!_--are you happy now?" asks he.
His tone is almost violent. The pressure of his hand on hers grows
hurtful. Involuntarily she gives a little cry.
"Nonsense! Of course I am happy!" says she petulantly, pulling her
hand out of his. "How rough you are, Tom!"
"Did I hurt you?" exclaims he passionately. "Tita, forgive me. To
hurt you----"
"There, don't be a fool!" says Tita, laughing. "My fingers are not
broken, if that's what you mean. But you certainly _are _rough: and,
after all"--mischievously--"I don't think I shall tell you that
secret now."
"You must. I shan't sleep if I don't know it. You said I knew the
heroine of it."
"Yes, you do indeed," laughing.
"And that I was always calling her names?"
"True; and I can't bear that, because"--gently--"I love her." She
pauses, and goes on again very earnestly: "I love her with all my
heart."
"I envy her," says Hescott. "I'm glad this mysterious stranger is a
she."
"Why?"
"Oh, no matter; go on. Tell me more. What evil names have I called
her?"
"The worst of all. You have called her an old maid--there!"
"Good heavens! what an atrocity! Surely--surely you malign me."
"No, I don't; I heard you. And it was to me, too, you said it."
"What! I called you an old maid!"
"Pouf! No!" laughing gaily. "That's out of your power."
"It is indeed," says Hescott slowly.
He is looking at her, the little, pretty, sweet, lovely thing! If
she were a maid to-day, some chance--some small chance--might have
been his.
"Well, I'll tell you about it," says she. She looks round her
cautiously, in the funniest little way, as if expecting enemies in
the bushes near her. Then she hesitates. "After all, I won't," says
she, with the most delightful inconsistency. "It wouldn't be a
secret if I did."
"Oh, go on," says Hescott, seeing she is dying to speak. "A secret
told to me is as lost as though you had dropped it down a well."
"You must remember first, then, that I should never have told you,
only that you seemed to think she _couldn't_ get married.
It"--hesitating--"it's about Margaret!"
"Miss Knollys!" Hescott stares. "What has she been up to?"
"She has been refusing Colonel Neilson for _years!"_ solemnly. "Only
this very night she has refused him again; and all because of a
silly old attachment to a man she knew when she was quite a girl."
"That must have been some time ago," says Hescott irreverently and
unwisely.
"A very _few_ years ago," severely. She rises. She is evidently
disgusted with him. "Come back to the house," says she. "I am
engaged for the next."
"A word," says Tom, rising and following her. He lays a detaining
hand upon her soft, little, bare arm. "You blame her--Miss
Knollys--for being faithful to an old attachment?"
"Y-es," says Tita slowly, as if thinking, and then again, "Yes!"
with decision. "When the old attachment if of no use any longer, and
when there is someone else."
"But if there was an old attachment, and"--Hescott's face is a
little pale in the moonlight--"and practically--no one else--how
then?"
"Eh?"
"I mean, if"--he comes closer to her--"Tita, if _you _had known a
man who loved you before you were married, and if when you did
marry--"
"But she didn't marry him at all," interrupts Tita. "He died--or
something--I forget what."
"Yes; but think."
"There is nothing to think about. He died--so _stupid_ of him; and
now she is making one of the nicest men I know miserable, all
because she has made up her mind to be wretched for ever! So stupid
of _her!"_
"Has it ever occurred to you that there is such a thing as love?"
asks Hescott, looking at her with a sudden frown.
"Oh, I've heard of it," with a little shrug of her pretty shoulders;
"but I don't believe in it. It's a myth! a fable!"
"And yet"--with an anger that he can hardly hide, seeing her
standing there so young, so fair, so debonnair before him--so
insensible to the passion for her that is stirring within his
heart--"and yet your friend, Miss Knollys, is giving up her life,
you say, to the consecration of this myth."
Tita nods.
"Yes; isn't she silly! I _told_ you she was very foolish."
"You assure me honestly that you don't believe in love?"
"Not a bit," says Tita. "It's all nonsense! Now come in--I want to
dance. And remember--remember, Tom, you have promised not to breathe
a word about what I have told you."
"I promise," says Hescott in a slow sort of way; he is thinking.
When they reach the dancing-room they find it, comparatively
speaking, empty, save for a few enthusiastic couples who are still
careering round it.
"Supper must be on," says Hescott. "Come and have something."
* * * * *
As they enter the supper-room several people look at them. To
Rylton, who is standing near Mrs. Bethune, these glances seem full
of impertinent inquiry. In reality they mean nothing, except
admiration of his wife. To-night Lady Rylton has been pronounced by
most of those present the prettiest woman in the room. Hescott
pilots his charming companion to a low lounge in a corner of the
room, a place at any of the tables being impossible to get. But
Rylton decides that he has taken her to that secluded spot to make
more conspicuous his flirtation with her; and she--she seems only
too ready to help him in his plan.
The fact that he is frowning heavily is conveyed to him by a voice
at his elbow.
_ "Don't_ look so intense--so like a thirteenth-century
conspirator!" says Mrs. Bethune. Her eyes are full of laughter and
mischief--there is something of triumph in them too. "What does it
matter, after all?"
"True." He gives her a brilliant smile in return for her rather
mocking one. "Nothing matters--except the present moment. Let us
consider it. Are you engaged for this dance?"
"Yes; but I can manage to forget my partner."
"That means?"
"You know very well what it means--what it always meant--in the old
days."
Her lips part over her beautiful teeth; now there is no mockery in
her smile, only love, and a most exquisite delight.
"Ah, Marian!" says he, in a low tone.
He leads her from the room. Her hand tightens on his arm; he feels
the pressure, and now in the ball-room his arm goes round her.
She--the woman he had loved for so long--is in his arms; he forgets
everything. He has sworn to himself in the last minute or two that
he _will_ forget. Why, indeed, should he remember?
For the rest of the evening he gives himself up to Marian--devoting
himself to her; telling himself he is knowing the old sweet
happiness again, but always with a strange unaccountable sting at
his heart.
CHAPTER XXVI.
HOW TITA LOOKS AT HERSELF IN THE GLASS AND WONDERS; AND HOW SHE DOES
HER HAIR IN QUITE A NEW STYLE, AND GOES TO ASK SIR MAURICE WHAT HE
THINKS OF IT; AND HOW HE ANSWERS HER.
"You can go to bed, Sarah; I shan't want you. And any other night
when I am out so late you must not stop up for me. Do you hear?"
"Oh! But, my lady----"
"Yes, yes, yes; I know," interrupting her gaily. "But I won't have
it. Do you think I can't take off my own frocks? You will lose your
beauty sleep, and I shall be responsible for it. There, go; I'm all
right now."
Tita waves her gaily out of the room. She is indeed in the merriest
mood, having enjoyed her evening immensely, and danced to the very
last minute. She had been thoroughly sorry when Sir Maurice had told
her that she ought to say "Good-night" to her hostess and come home.
She had not noticed the coldness of his manner at all, being so
disappointed at his suggestion; but she had said "Good-night" at
once to old Lady Warbeck, who would have liked her to stay on,
having taken a great fancy to her; and as she had come back in a
brougham with Margaret and Colonel Neilson and Minnie Hescott, she
had not seen her husband since.
Having at last dismissed her maid, who had insisted on waiting to
take off her evening dress, Tita sits down before the glass to look
at herself (all women like looking at themselves), and to think over
her evening.
How well the men danced, especially Tom!--though, after all, not so
well as Maurice. What a pity she could not have had that _one_ dance
with him he had asked her for.
She leans forward, and pulling some hairpins out of her short, curly
hair, pushes it into another shape, a little lower down on the neck,
to see if that would suit her better. No, it wouldn't.
After all, Maurice _might_ have asked her again. He danced a great
deal with Mrs. Bethune towards the end of the evening, and how
charming he looked when dancing!
She rests her arms--soft, naked arms, round and white as a
child's--upon the dressing-table and wonders. Wonders if that old
story--the story her mother-in-law had told her of Maurice and Mrs.
Bethune--was really true. Maurice did not look like that--like a man
who would be dishonest. Oh no! It is not true--that horrid story!
Her eyes light up again; she goes back again to her hair, the
arrangement of which, on account of its length, is difficult. She
piles it now far up on her head, and sticks little diamond pins into
it. She almost laughs aloud. She looks like a Japanese young woman.
And it's very pretty, too--she _does_ look nice in this way. What a
pity nobody can see her! And with this little new white
dressing-gown, too! Such a little dream of a thing!
Where's Maurice? Surely he must have come up by this time. Some of
the men had gone into the smoking-room on their return; but it is so
late--with the dawn breaking; perhaps Maurice _has_ come up.
She crosses a little passage and goes to the door leading into his
room, and knocks lightly; no answer. She knocks again, more
impatiently this time, and as still only silence follows her
attempt, she opens the door and steps on tiptoe into the room.
It is lit by two or more lamps, and at the end of it, close to a
hanging curtain, stands Maurice in his trousers and shirt, having
evidently just flung off his evening coat.
"Oh, here you are!" cries she with open delight. "I was afraid you
hadn't come up yet, and I wanted to show myself to you. Look at my
hair!" She pulls out the skirts of her dainty loose gown and dances
merrily up to him. "Don't I look lovely?" cries she, laughing.
Rylton has turned; he is looking at her; his eyes seem to devour
her--more with anger than delight, however. And yet the beauty of
her, in spite of him, enters into his heart. How sweet she is,
standing there with her loose gown in her pretty uplifted hands, and
the lace flounces of her petticoat showing in front! She had not
fastened this new delight in robes across her neck, and now the
whiteness of her throat and neck vies with the purity of the gown
itself.
"He looked on her and found her fair,
For all he had been told."
Yet a very rage of anger against her still grows within his heart.
"What brought you here?" asks he sharply, brutally.
She drops her pretty gown. She looks at him as if astonished.
"Why--because"--she is moving backwards towards the door, her large
eyes fixed on him--"because I wanted you to look at me--to see how
nice I am."
"Others have looked too," says he. "There, go. Do you think I am a
fool?"
At that Tita's old spirit returns to her. She stands still and gives
him a quick glance.
"Well, I never thought so till now," says she. She nods at him.
"Good-night."
"No, stop!" says Rylton. "I will have this out with you. You pretend
to misunderstand me; but I shall make it clear. Do you think I have
not seen your conduct of this evening?"
"Mine?"
"Yes, with your cousin--with Hescott." He draws nearer to her. His
eyes are on fire, his face white. "Do you think I saw nothing?"
"I don't know what you saw," says she slowly.
All her lovely mirth has died away, as if killed by a cruel death.
"Don't you?" tauntingly. "Then I will tell you. I saw you"--he
pauses as if to watch the changes of her face, to see when fear
arises, but none does--"in the arbour"--he pauses again, but again
no fear arises--"with your cousin."
He grows silent, studying her with eager eyes, as if expecting
something; but nothing comes of all his scrutiny, except surprise.
Surprise, indeed, marks all her charming features.
"Well?" says she, as he stops, as if expecting more.
She waits, indeed, as one at a loss.
"Well?" He repeats the word with a wild mockery. Could there be
under heaven another woman so dead to all honesty? Does she dare to
think she can deceive him to the end? In what a lovely form the evil
can dwell! "Well!" He brings down his hand with a little crash upon
the table near her. "I was there--near that arbour. I heard--I heard
all."
"Well, I'm sorry," says Tita slowly, colouring faintly.
"Sorry! Is that all? Do you know what it means--what I can do?"
"I don't see that you can do anything," says she, thinking of her
revelation to Hescott about Margaret. "It is Colonel Neilson who
might do something."
"Neilson?"
"Yes, Colonel Neilson."
"Are you mad?" says Sir Maurice, in a low tone, "to think you can
thus deceive me over and over again?"
He draws back from her. Disgust is in his heart. Does she dream that
she can pass off Neilson as her lover, instead of Hescott? He draws
a sharp breath. How she must love Hescott, to seek thus to shield
him, when ruin is waiting for herself!
"I am not mad," says Tita, throwing up her head. "And as to
deceiving you--Of course I can see that you are very angry with me
for betraying Margaret's secret to Tom; but, then, Tom is a great
friend, and when he said something about Margaret's being an old
maid, I couldn't bear it any longer. You _know_ how I love
Margaret!--and I told him all about Colonel Neilson's love for her,
and that she _needn't_ be an old maid unless she liked. But as to
deceiving you----"
Rylton, standing staring at her, feels that it is the truth--the
truth only--to which he is listening. Not for a moment does he
disbelieve her. Who could, gazing on that small, earnest face? And
yet his silence breathes of disbelief to her. She steps backwards,
and raises her little hand--a little hand very tightly clenched.
"What! Do you not believe me?" asks she, her eyes blazing.
"I believe you? Yes," returns her quickly. "But there is this----"
"There is this, too," interrupting him passionately. "You accuse me
of deception most wrongfully, and I--I accuse you of the worst thing
of all, of listening behind my back--of listening deliberately to
what was never meant for you to hear."
"I did not listen," says Rylton, who is now very white. "It so
chanced that I stood near the arbour; but I heard only one word, and
it was about some secret. I came away then. I did not stay."
Tita turns to him with a vehemence that arrests him.
"Who brought you to the arbour?" asks she.
"Brought me?"
"Yes. Who brought you?"
"What do you mean?" asks Rylton, calmly enough, but with a change of
colour.
"Ah! you will not betray her, but I know. It was Mrs. Bethune.
Now"--she goes nearer to him, her pretty, childish face transformed
by grief and anger--"now, confess, it _was!"_ She draws back again.
"No," says she, sighing disconsolately. "No, of course you would not
tell. But I," looking back at him reproachfully, _"I_--told
_you--_things."
"Many things," returns he coldly--unreasonably angry with her
because of her allusion to Mrs. Bethune; "and hardly to your credit.
Why should you tell Mr. Hescott your secrets? Why is he to be your
confidant?"
"I have known Tom all my life."
"Nevertheless, I object to him as a special friend for you. I don't
think married women should have special friends of the other sex. I
object to your confiding in him secrets that you never told to me.
You said nothing to me of Margaret's love affairs, although she is
my cousin."
"You forget, Maurice. I spoke to you several times, but you never
seemed to care. And I should not have told Tom, only he called her
an old maid, and that _hurt_ me, and I wanted to show him how it
was. I love Margaret, and I--I am fond of Tom, and----"
The hesitation, though unmeant, is fatal. Rylton turns upon her
furiously.
"It is of no consequence to me whom you love or whom you--_care_
for," says he, imitating her hesitation, with a sneer. "What _is_ of
consequence to me, is your conduct as my wife, and that I object to
altogether!"
There is a long pause, and then--
_"My_ conduct?" says she slowly. She lifts her hands and runs them
softly though her loose hair, and looks at him all the time; so
standing, few could vie with her in beauty. She pauses. "And yours?"
asks she.
"Mine?"
"Yes, yours! I don't know what you mean about my conduct. But you,
you have been dancing all the night with that horrid Mrs. Bethune.
Yes!"--letting her hands fall, and coming towards him with a face
like a little angry angel--"you may say what you like, but you
_have_ been dancing all night with her. And she _is_ horrid."
This is carrying the war into the enemy's camp with a vengeance.
There is something in her tone that startles Rylton. Has she heard
of that old attachment? His heart grows sick within him. Has it come
to this, then? Is there to be concealment--deception on _his_ part?
Before his marriage he had thought nothing of his love for Marian in
so far as it could touch his wife, but now--now, if she knows! But
how can she know? And besides----
Here his wrath grows warm again. Even if she does know, how does
that affect her own behaviour? Her sin is of her own making. _His_
sin---- Was it ever a sin? Was it not a true, a loyal love? And when
hope of its fulfilment was denied him, when he placed a barrier
between it and him, had he not been true to that barrier? Only
to-night--to-night when, maddened by the folly of this girl before
him--he had let his heart stir again--had given way to the love that
had swayed him for two long years and more.
"You forget yourself," says he coldly.
"Oh no, I don't," says Tita, to whom this answer sounds rather
overbearing. "Why should I?" She glances at him mischievously from
under her long lashes. "I should be the most unselfish person alive
if I did that." She hesitates for a moment, and then, "Do you ever
forget yourself?" asks she saucily.
She laughs--her little saucy air suits her. She is delighted with
herself for having called Mrs. Bethune "horrid," and given him such
a delicious tit-for-tat. She looks full of fun and mischief. There
is no longer an atom of rancour about her. Rylton, in spite of
himself, acknowledges her charm; but what does she mean by this
sudden sweetness--this sudden sauciness? Is she holding out the
olive-branch to him? If so, he will accept it. After all, he may
have wronged her in many ways; and at all events, her faults--her
very worst fault--must fall short of crime.
"Sometimes," replies he. He smiles. "I forgot myself just now,
perhaps. But you must admit I had provocation. You----"
"Oh, don't begin it all over again," cries she, with delightful
_verve_. "Why should you scold me, or I scold you? Scolding is very
nasty, like medicine." She makes a little face. "And, you know,
before we married we arranged everything."
"Before?"
"Yes, before, of course. Well--good-night!"
"No; don't go. Tell me what it was we arranged before our marriage?"
Rylton has drawn a chair for her towards the fire that is lighting
in his grate, and now sinks into another.
"It's awfully late, isn't it?" says Tita, with a yawn, "but I'll
stay a minute or two. Why, what we arranged was, that we should be
friends, you and I--eh?"
"Well?"
"Well--that's all. Poke up the fire, and let me see a blaze. Fancy
your having a fire so early!"
"Haven't you one?"
"Yes. But then I'm a woman. However, when I see one I want it poked.
I want it blazing."
At this Sir Maurice pokes the fire, until it flames well up the
chimney.
"Ah! I like that," says Tita. She slips from her chair to the
hearthrug--a beautiful white soft Persian one--and sits upon it, as
it were, one snowflake on another. "How nice it is!" says she,
staring at the sparks roaring up the chimney; "such a companion!"
She leans back and rests her head against Rylton's knees. "Now, go
on," she says comfortably.
"Go on?"
"Yes. We were saying something about friends. That _we_ should be
friends all our lives. So we shall be. Eh?"
"I don't know." Rylton bends over her, and, suddenly laying his hand
under her chin, lifts her face so that he can see it. "You mean that
I shall be your friend, and you mine."
"Yes. Yes, of course."
"You have other friends, however. And I don't like that."
"What! Is one to have only one friend?" She wriggles her face out of
his hands, and moving her body as she reclines upon the white rug,
so turns herself that she comes face to face with him. "Only one!"
says she, smiling. She flings her arms across his knees, and looks
up at him.
"Is not one enough?" He is looking at her very earnestly. How lovely
she is! What a strange charm lies in her deep eyes! And her smile--
"The smile that rests to play
Upon her lip, foretells
That musical array
Tricks her sweet syllables."
"Oh, it would be a poor world with only one friend," says she,
shaking he head.
"You want two?" His brow is darkening again.
"More than that. I want you, and Margaret, and----"
"Hescott?"
It is not so much that she has hesitated as he has not given her
time to speak.
"Well, yes--Tom," says she. "He _is_ my friend!"
"The best of all?" She is not looking at him now, so does not see
the expression in his eyes. He is listening breathlessly for her
answer, but she knows nothing. She is gazing idly, happily into the
fire.
"At present," says she slowly. Then once again she leans across his
knees, and looks up at him. "You know Tom is very fond of me--he
loves me, I think."
Here Rylton lays his hands upon her wrists, grasping them hard.
"He loves you. He has told you so?"
"No. Why should he?" He lets her hands go. "I know it. He has loved
me so many years; and perhaps--in many years"--she comes closer to
him, and putting up one soft little hand, lays it on his cheek, and
tries to turn his face to hers--_"you_ will love me too!"
Sir Maurice springs to his feet, and, catching her hands, lifts her
forcibly to hers.
"There, go," says he, as if choking. "Is that how you speak to
_him?"_
"To him?"
She stands back from him--not trembling, but with a terrible wonder
in her eyes.
"To Hescott---- There--go."
"You think----" says she.
"I think you what you are, a finished coquette." He almost pushes
her from him.
Tita puts up her hands as if to warn him off.
"I am sorry I ever came here," says she at last. "I am sorry I ever
married you. I shall never forgive this--never!"
"And I," says Rylton. "Have _I_ nothing to forgive?"
"Nothing, nothing," passionately. "I came here to-night because I
was lonely, and wanted to talk to somebody. I came here to show you
my pretty new frock; and how have you received me? You have been
_hateful _to me. And yet you wonder that I didn't think you my best
friend! You are not a friend at all. You can't bear me! If I had
gone to Tom, instead of you--to show _him_ my frock--do you think he
would have treated me like this? No, he----"
"Be silent!" says Sir Maurice. "How _dare_ you talk to me like
this!" A dark flush has risen to his brow, his nostrils are dilated.
Is she mad--to say such things to him? "Go!" says he, pointing
imperiously to the door.
"You have said that twice!" returns she in a low tone. A moment her
eyes rest on his, in another moment she is gone.
All that is left him is the memory of a little lovely creature, clad
in a white gown, who had come to him with merry, happy eyes, and a
smile upon her lips--a smile that he had killed!
CHAPTER XXVII.
HOW SIR MAURICE FEELS UNEASY; AND HOW TITA, FOR ONCE, SHOWS HERSELF
IMPLACABLE, AND REFUSES TO ACCEPT THE OVERTURES OF PEACE. AND HOW A
LITTLE GOSSIP WARMS THE AIR.
It is the next day, and luncheon is well over, a somewhat
badly-attended meal. But now all have managed to scramble
downstairs, and the terrace is full of people who are saying
"Good-morning" to each other at four o'clock in the afternoon.
"I never felt so tired in my life," says Mrs. Chichester, subsiding
into a lounge chair, and trying to look as if her tea-gown isn't
quite new. She has selected this evening in especial to spring it
upon her women friends. As a rule people look dowdy after being up
all night. Mrs. Chichester is determined _she_ won't. She appears as
fresh as the proverbial lark, in an exquisite arrangement of white
silk and lace, and a heavenly temper. Her eyes are a little greener
than usual.
"You don't look it," says Sir Maurice, who is standing near. He is
wondering if Tita will come down. Tita has not put in an appearance
all day. There had been no necessity to send an apology about her
absence from breakfast, as almost every one of the women had taken
that meal in her own room, but she _had_ sent a word or two of
regret about her inability to appear at luncheon, and, somehow, it
has got into Sir Maurice's mind that perhaps she has made up her
mind to stay in her own rooms all day. The thought makes him uneasy;
but at this moment an end is put to it.
There is a little stir on his left, and, looking up, he sees Tita
coming towards him down the terrace, stopping at every step to say a
word to somebody. Now she stops as she comes to Margaret, and,
laying her hands upon her shoulders, kisses her. She is dressed in
the simplest little white frock in the world--a frock that makes her
look even younger than usual. Her pretty short air is curling all
over her head, and her dark gray eyes are _very_ dark to-day. Do
shadows lie in them, or has she been crying? It is Rylton who,
watching her, asks himself this question, and as he asks it a
strange pang shoots through his heart. Good heavens! why had he
married her? To make her unhappy? He must have been possessed of the
devil when he did that deed.
"How pretty you look, Tita!" Margaret whispers to her--Margaret, who
has the gift of knowing how to soothe and please. She, too, has her
misgivings about those lovely eyes; but all girls like to be told
they are pretty, and Tita at once brightens.
"Am I? You are a goose, Madge!" But she presses Margaret's hands
fondly for all that as she leaves her.
"Lady Rylton, come and sit here," cries Mrs. Chichester. "I have a
lovely chair here for you. It's as soft as----" She cannot find a
simile.
"As what?" asks Gower, who delights in annoying Mrs. Chichester.
"As you!" returns she, with a contemptuous glance that fills him
with joy.
"Come," says Mrs. Chichester, calling again to Tita, and patting the
chair in question. "You look tired. This is a perfect lounge."
"She looks as if she had been crying," says old Miss Gower, frowning
at Tita over her glasses.
Again that strange pang contracts Rylton's heart. _Has_ she been
crying--and because of him?
"Looks! What are looks?" cries Mrs. Chichester gaily. "Looks always
belie one."
"Certainly Lady Rylton's must belie _her,"_ says Mrs. Bethune, with
a slow smile. "What cause has she for tears?"
"Not one!" declares Mrs. Chichester with decision. "It would be 'a
sinner above all the Galileans' who would make Lady Rylton cry."
Her queer green eyes smile at Tita, who smiles back at her in her
little sweet way, and then all at once bursts out laughing. It is a
charming laugh, apparently full of mirth. There are only two present
who do not quite believe in it, Margaret and Tom Hescott--but these
two love her.
As for Rylton, some instinct causes him at this moment to look at
Hescott. Tita's cousin is staring at her, his brows met, his lips
somewhat compressed. He has forgotten that people may be staring at
him in return, maybe measuring his thoughts on this or that. He has
forgotten everything, indeed, except Tita's pale, laughing face and
dancing, tear-stained eyes.
"Do you see a ghost?" whispers Mrs. Bethune to him, who has been
watching him with cruel amusement.
"I don't know," he answers, hardly hearing her. Is not Tita to-day a
ghost of her sweet self? And those words, "A sinner above all the
Galileans!" _Is_ there such a sinner?--and if so, surely it is----
Hescott lifts his eyes to meet those of Rylton. For a moment the two
men regard each other steadily, and in that moment know that each
hates the other with an undying intensity. Mrs. Bethune, who alone
sees the working of the little tragedy, leans back in her chair, and
lets her lids fall over her eyes. So still she lies that one might
think her sleeping, but she is only battling with a fierce joy that
threatens every moment to break its bonds, and declare her secret to
the world!
During all this, conversation has been going on. Last night's
sayings and doings are on the _tapis,_ and everyone is giving his
and her experiences. Just now the rather disreputable wife of a
decidedly disreputable neighbour is lying on the social dissecting
board.
"She gives herself away a good deal, I must say," says Mrs.
Chichester, who loves to hear her own voice, and who certainly
cannot be called ungenerous on her own account. "The way she dances!
And her frock! Good heavens!"
"I hear she makes all her own clothes," says Margaret, who perhaps
hopes that this may be one small point in her favour.
Minnie Hescott makes a little _moue_.
"She may possibly make the things that cover her----"
"That _what?"_ questions Mr. Gower, resting innocent eyes on hers,
but Miss Hescott very properly refuses to hear him.
"It must be a matter for regret to all well-minded people," says
Miss Gower, shaking her head until all her ringlets are set flying,
"that when making that hideous dress, she did not add a yard or two,
to----" She pauses.
"The what?" asks Mrs. Chichester, leaning forward.
"The _bodice!"_ replies Miss Gower severely.
"Oh, auntie!" says her nephew, falling back in his chair and
covering his face with his hands. "You shouldn't! You really
shouldn't! It's--it's not delicate!"
"What do you mean, Randal?" demands his aunt, with a snort that
would have done credit to a war-horse. "To whom are you addressing
your remarks? Are you calling _me_ indelicate?"
"Oh no--not for worlds!" says Mrs. Chichester, who is choking with
laughter, and who only emerges from behind her fan to say this, and
go back again. "Who could? But we feared--we thought you were going
to say her _skirt."_
"It is my opinion that you fear nothing," says Miss Gower, with a
withering glance at the fan. "And let me tell you that there are
_other_ people,"--with awful emphasis--"besides Mrs. Tyneway who
would do well to put a tucker round their----"
"Ankles!" puts in Mrs. Chichester sweetly.
"No; their----"
"What was her dress made of?" breaks in Margaret hurriedly, who is
afraid of their going too far with the irascible old lady.
"Goodness knows! She was all black and blue, at all events!"
"No! You don't say so?" exclaims Mr. Gower, with a tragic gesture.
"So her husband has been at it again!"
At this they all roar, as people will, at _anything,_ when they have
nothing else to do. Even Tita, who, though smiling always, is
looking rather depressed, gives way to a merry little laugh. Hearing
her, Margaret blesses Randal for his silly old joke.
"Oh, Randal! you are too stupid for anything," says Tita, showing
all her pretty teeth.
"You have for once lighted on a solemn truth," puts in Randal's aunt
grimly. "Let us hope you are getting sense."
"Or a wise tooth," says Colonel Neilson, with a friendly smile at
Tita. "Lady Rylton is very _nearly_ old enough to be thinking of
that now."
"As for that wretched Mrs. Tyneway," says Miss Gower, taking no
notice of him, "if her husband did so far take the law into his own
hands as to make her black and blue, I, for one, should not blame
him."
"That's funny!" says Mrs. Chichester, giving her a saucy little
smile.
"What is funny, may I ask?"
"To hear you defend a man. I thought you despised them in a body."
"I have my own views about them," says Miss Gower, with a sniff.
"But I admit they have rights of their own."
"Fancy allowing a man to have rights nowadays!" cries Mrs.
Chichester, uplifting her long arms as if in amazement. "Good
heavens! What a wife you would have made! Rights?" She looks up
suddenly at Captain Marryatt, who is, as usual, hanging over the
back of her chair. "Do you think a man has any rights?"
"If you don't, I don't," returns that warrior, with much abasement
and perhaps more sense than one would have expected from him.
"Good boy," says she, patting his hand with her fan.
"I suppose husbands have some rights, at all events?" says Sir
Maurice.
He says it quite lightly--quite debonnairly, yet he hardly knows why
he says it. He had been looking at Tita, and suddenly she had looked
back at him. There was something in the cold expression of her face,
something defiant, that had driven him to make this foolish speech.
"Husbands? Pouf! They least of all," says Mrs. Chichester, who loves
to shock her audience, and now finds Miss Gower ready to her hand.
"Where is your husband now, Mrs. Chichester?" asks Colonel Neilson,
quite without _malice prepense_.
Margaret gives him a warning glance, just a little too late. Though
indeed, after all, what is there to warn about Mrs. Chichester? She
is only one of a thousand flighty young women one meets every day,
and though Captain Marryatt's infatuation for her is beyond dispute,
still, her infatuation for him has yet to be proved. Margaret had
objected to her, in her own mind, as a companion for Tita--Tita, who
seems too young to judge for herself in the matter of friendships.
"I don't know, I'm sure," returns Mrs. Chichester, lifting her
shoulders. "Miss Gower will tell you; she knows everything. Miss
Gower," raising her voice slightly, and compelling that terrible old
woman to look at her, "will you tell Colonel Neilson where my
husband is now?"
_Poor_ Colonel Neilson! who is beginning to wish that the earth
would open and swallow him up.
"It argues ill for you that you should be obliged to ask such a
question," says Miss Gower, with a lowering eye.
"Does it? How dreadful!" says Mrs. Chichester. She looks immensely
amused. "Do you know I heard the other day that he was married
again! It can't be true--can it?"
She appeals once again to Colonel Neilson, as if enjoying his
discomfiture, and being willing to add to it through pure mischief.
However, she is disappointed this time. Colonel Neilson does not
know what to do with her appeal to him, and remains discreetly
silent. He can see she is not in earnest.
"At all events, _if_ true," says Mrs. Chichester, looking now at
Miss Gower, and speaking in a confidential tone, "I am sure John
will let me know about it."
"John" is Major Chichester.
Marryatt is leaning now so far over her that he is whispering in her
ear.
"Is this--_is_ this true?" questions he, in low but vehement tones.
"It--it may be. Who can tell?" returns she, with beautiful
hesitation.
She subsides once again behind the invaluable fan. To him she seems
to be trembling. To Margaret, who is watching her angrily, she seems
to be laughing.
"You have evidently great faith in your husband," says Miss Gower,
with what she fondly believes to be the most artful sarcasm.
"Oh, I have--I have!" says Mrs. Chichester, clasping her hands in an
enthusiastic fashion.
"And he in you, doubtless?"
"Oh, _such_ faith!" with a considerable increase in the enthusiasm.
Miss Gower looks at her over her spectacles. It is an awful look.
"I shall pray for you to-night!" says she, in a piously vindictive
tone.
"Oh, thanks! Thanks! How _kind_ of you!" says Mrs. Chichester, with
extreme pathos.
There is an explosion on her left. Mrs. Chichester looks mournfully
in that direction to see the cause of it. There is only Mr. Gower to
be seen! He, as usual, is misconducting himself to quite a
remarkable degree. He is now, in fact, laughing so hard but so
silently that the tears are running down his cheeks. To laugh out
loud with his aunt listening, might mean the loss of seven hundred a
year to him.
"What's the matter with you? Aren't you well?" asks Mrs. Chichester,
in a loud voice, calculated to draw attention to him.
She feels that here is an opportunity given her to pay off old
scores.
"Oh, don't," gasps Gower, frantically struggling still with his
laughter. "If she hears you, she'll be down on me like a shot. As
you are strong, be merciful!"
"Very well; remember you are in my debt," says she, who _au fond_ is
not ill-natured. At this moment Tita passes down the balcony to
where her husband is standing on the top of the steps that lead to
the gardens beneath.
As she draws closer to him, he fixes his eyes upon her as if to
compel a glance from her in return; but Tita, who is accompanied by
Minnie Hescott, does not so much as once let her gaze wander in his
direction. She comes nearer--ever nearer, laughing and talking
gaily, and passes him, still without recognition of any sort. As her
skirt sweeps against him, he speaks.
"Are you going out, Tita?"
It is the first word that has passed between them since last
night--since she left his room. A sudden angry determination to
_make_ her speak to him, induces him now to get before her, and bar
her passage to the steps.
"Yes," returns she coldly, graciously, briefly.
She leans back a little, as if to catch up the tail of her white
gown--in reality, to avoid looking at him.
"Just here there is shelter," says Rylton, speaking hurriedly, as if
to gain time, and keep her from gliding past him. "But outside----
And you have a very thin frock on. Shall I get you a shawl?"
"No, thank you."
Her manner is still perfectly gracious, but still she refuses to
look at him. The gathering up of her frock is evidently causing her
a great deal of trouble.
"Shall I take you out some cushions, then?"
"No, thank you."
She has conquered the frock now, but still she does not look at him.
In fact, she turns to Minnie, and, as though forgetful of his
presence, murmurs some little thing or other to her.
"If you are going to the gardens," says Rylton, with Heaven knows
what intention--perhaps a desire to show her how little he cares for
her childish anger, perhaps to bring matters to their worst--to know
what she means--"may I come with you?"
Tita gives him a glance--the fleetest; a smile--the briefest.
_"No,_ thank you," says she, a faint emphasis upon the "No" being
the only change in her even tone.
As she speaks she goes down the steps, Minnie Hescott following her.
END OF VOL. I.
COLLECTION
OF
BRITISH AUTHORS
TAUCHNITZ EDITION.
VOL. 2957.
THE HOYDEN. BY MRS. HUNGERFORD.
IN TWO VOLUMES.
VOL. II.
THE HOYDEN
A NOVEL
BY MRS. HUNGERFORD
AUTHOR OF
"MOLLY BAWN," "PHYLLIS," "A CONQUERING HEROINE,"
ETC. ETC.
_COPYRIGHT EDITION._
IN TWO VOLUMES.
VOL. II.
LEIPZIG
BERNHARD TAUCHNITZ
1894.
CONTENTS
OF VOLUME II.
CHAPTER I.
How Minnie Hescott gives Tita a Hint; and learns that Hints may be
thrown away; and how Margaret's Soul is grieved
CHAPTER II.
How Tita commits a great Folly, though little is the Sin that lies
therein. And how Margaret tries to make Peace, and what comes of it
CHAPTER III.
How Mr. Gower grows darkly mysterious; and how Tita hears of the
Arrival of another Guest
CHAPTER IV.
How Tita's Soul at last is stirred; and how her Happiness is
threatened and herself set at naught; and how Minnie Hescott speaks
CHAPTER V.
How Miss Gower goes for a pleasant Row upon the Lake with her
Nephew; and how she admires the Sky and Water; and how presently
Fear falls on her; and how Death threatens her; and how by a mere
Scratch of a Pen she regains Shore and Life
CHAPTER VI.
How all the House Party at Oakdean grow frivolous in the Absence of
the Lord and Master; and how Mrs. Bethune encourages a Game of
Hide-and-seek; and how, after many Escapes, Tita is caught at last
CHAPTER VII.
How Tita is "caught," but by one whom she did not expect; and how
she played with Fire for a little Bit; and how finally she ran away
CHAPTER VIII.
How Tita, having been repulsed, grows angry; and how a very pretty
Battle is fought out; and how Tita gains a Present; and how Sir
Maurice loses his Temper
CHAPTER IX.
How Mrs. Bethune is brought before the Bar; and how she gives her
Evidence against Tita; and how Maurice's Mother desires an Interview
with Maurice's Wife
CHAPTER X.
How "that Girl" was "seen" by the Dowager Lady Rylton; and how Tita
held her small Head very high, and fought a good Fight with the
Enemy
CHAPTER XI.
How Tita goes for a Walk with two sad Companions--Anger and Despair;
and how she meets Sir Maurice; and how she introduces him to Anger
CHAPTER XII.
How Tita, running from the Enemy, suddenly finds herself Face to
Face with another Foe; and how she fights a second Battle, and comes
off victorious
CHAPTER XIII.
How a little Sparring is done amongst the Guests at Oakdean; and how
Tom Hescott tells a Story
CHAPTER XIV.
How Tita flings herself upon Margaret's Breast; and how Margaret
comforts her; and how Tita promises to be good; and how she has a
Meeting "by Lamplight alone"
CHAPTER XV.
How Jealousy runs Riot in Oakdean; and how Margaret tries to throw
Oil upon the Waters; and how a great Crash comes, with many Words
and one Surprise
CHAPTER XVI.
How Maurice tells his Mother of the great Fiasco; and how she
receives the News
CHAPTER XVII.
How Matters come to a Climax; and how Tita tells Maurice many Things
that sting him sharply; and how he lays Hands upon her; and how the
last Adieux are said
CHAPTER XVIII.
How Margaret steps into the Breach, and learns that all Peacemakers
are not blessed
CHAPTER XIX.
How Margaret and Tita tread many Paths; and how Fortune, having
turned her Back on Tita, shows a smiling Front to Maurice
CHAPTER XX.
How Margaret starts as a special Pleader, and is much worsted in her
Argument; and how a simple Knock at the Hall Door scatters one Being
who delights in War
CHAPTER XXI.
How Margaret makes a fearful Discovery; how she rushes to the
Rescue, but is far from well received; and how Tita gives herself
away, not once, but twice
CHAPTER XXII.
How Maurice smokes a Cigar, and muses on many Things; how he laments
his Solitude; and how an unexpected Visitor comes to him
CHAPTER XXIII.
How Rylton's evil Genius comes to him and speaks sweet Treacheries
within his Ear; and how he renounces her and all her Deeds
CHAPTER XXIV.
How Tita pleads her Cause with Margaret; and how Margaret rebukes
her; and how Steps are heard, and Tita seeks Seclusion behind a
Japanese Screen; and what comes of it
CHAPTER XXV.
How Tita wages War with Margaret and Maurice; and how Margaret
suffers ignominious Treatment on both Hands; and how Maurice at the
last gains one small Victory
CHAPTER XXVI.
How some old Friends reappear again; and how some News is told; and
how Maurice makes another Effort to win his Cause
CHAPTER XXVII.
How Maurice gains another Point; and how Tita consents to think
about it; and how Margaret tells a Lie
CHAPTER XXVIII.
How Tita receives a Basket of Flowers and an Entreaty; and how she
ceases to fight against her destiny
CHAPTER XXIX.
How a Journey is begun as the Day dies down; and how that Journey
ends; and how a great Secret is discovered--the Secret of Tita's
Heart
THE HOYDEN.
CHAPTER I.
HOW MINNIE HESCOTT GIVES TITA A HINT; AND LEARNS THAT HINTS MAY BE
THROWN AWAY; AND HOW MARGARET'S SOUL IS GRIEVED.
Minnie Hescott, during the time it takes her to go down the terrace
steps behind Tita, comes to a resolution. _She will give Tita a
hint!_ It will be a gift of no mean order, and whether it be well
received or not, will always be a gift to be remembered, perhaps
with gratitude.
And Minnie, who is strictly practical if nothing else, sees a fair
hope of return in her present plan. She likes Tita in her way--likes
her perhaps better than she likes most people, and Tita may be
useful to her as Sir Maurice Rylton's _wife_. But Tita, dismantled
of her honours, would be no help at all, and therefore to keep Tita
enthroned is now a very special object with her astute cousin.
In and between all this is Minnie's detestation of Mrs. Bethune, who
has occasionally been rude to her in the small ways that make up the
sum of life.
Minnie, who is not sensitive, takes the bull by the horns.
"Mrs. Bethune," says she, as they go by a bed of hollyhocks now
hastening to their death, "is a friend of yours?"
It is a question.
"Mrs. Bethune!" says Tita, stopping and looking at her as if
wondering.
What does she mean?
"Yes," says Minnie pleasantly. "A friend. An old friend!"
"Not an _old_ friend," says Tita quietly. "She is a cousin of
Maurice's."
"Yes. But not a friend of yours?"
"No," coldly.
"I'm glad of that," says Minnie, with hilarity. "I _hate_ old
friends, don't you? They always cost one such a lot. They tell one
such horrid news about one's self. They do such nasty things. Give
me a stranger for choice. And as for Mrs. Bethune, now you have told
me she is not a friend of yours, I suppose I may speak freely. Do
you know, Tita, I'd keep my eye on her if I were you. You have given
me a free hand, so I can tell you what is in my mind. That
woman--she means----"
"What?" asks Tita, turning upon her with some haughtiness.
_ "Business!"_ says Minnie Hescott, with an emphatic nod. "Mischief
all through. She's up to mischief of some sort. I tell you what,"
says Minnie, with her old young look, "you've _got_ to keep your eye
on her."
"I could never keep my eye on anyone," says Tita, with a sudden,
irrepressible little laugh. "And why should I keep my eye on Mrs.
Bethune? To tell you a solemn truth, Minnie, I can't bear to look at
her. She's beautiful, so they say, but to me she is hideous.
Therefore, why should I keep my eye on her? It," with a whimsical
little glance, "would hurt me so."
"Nevertheless, you _should!"_ says Minnie solemnly. "She's a viper!"
"Vipers are ugly."
"And dangerous."
"Then why look at them?"
"To avoid them--lest they sting you," says Minnie, feeling quite
pleased with herself for this flight of fancy.
"You think," says Tita, stopping and looking at her, "that Mrs.
Bethune will sting me?"
"I think nothing," says Minnie Hescott, throwing out her hands in an
airy fashion; "only, get rid of her--get rid of her, Tita, as soon
as ever you can!"
"To get rid of a guest! _No,"_ says Tita. "She may stay here, and I
shall make her welcome for ever----" She pauses and looks full at
her cousin. There is great courage and great pride in her look. "For
ever!" repeats she.
"There is always a fool somewhere!" says Minnie Hescott, with a
sigh. "Well," abandoning the discussion for the present, "let us go
for our walk round the garden."
As they pass beneath the balcony, Margaret, who is leaning over it,
with Colonel Neilson beside her, makes a little irrepressible
movement.
"What is it now?" asks he, who knows every mood of hers.
"Nothing. I was only thinking about Tita."
"A charming subject."
"Oh! _too_ charming," says Margaret, with a sigh. "That child
troubles me."
"But why? She seems to be getting on all right, in spite of your
evil prognostications before her marriage. She and Rylton seem on
very good terms."
"Not to-day, at all events," shaking her head.
"No? I confess I did think there was a little rift somewhere."
"Oh yes! There is something," says Margaret somewhat impatiently.
"Did you see the poor child's eyes, and her whole air? Her pretty
little attempts at unconcern?"
"I thought Rylton looked rather put out, too."
"I didn't look at him. I have no patience with him. It is a mad
marriage for any man to make." She pauses. "I am afraid there was
some disagreeableness last night." She hesitates again. Though quite
determined never to marry Colonel Neilson or any other man, she
permits herself the luxury of retaining Neilson as a confidential
friend. "I wish her cousin, Mr. Hescott, was not quite so attentive
to her. She is very young, of course, but I don't think she ought to
have danced so much with him last night."
"And what of Rylton?" asks the Colonel, pulling the glass out of his
eye and sticking it in again in an angry fashion. "Who did _he_
dance with?"
"Yes. I saw," sadly.
"Well, why should he complain, then?" says Neilson, who can see the
right and the wrong so _much_ better because it is not his own case.
"To tell you the truth, Margaret, I think Mrs. Bethune should not be
here."
"I think that, too. But it appears it was Tita who invited her."
"My dear girl, who else? But there is such a thing as coercion."
"It was the prettiest, the most cordial letter. I read it."
"Then you think she knows nothing of that old affair?"
"Old?" She looks quickly at Neilson. "Do you think it is old--worn
out, I mean?"
"No, I don't," says Neilson promptly. "And in my opinion, the sooner
Mrs. Bethune terminates her visit the better for everyone."
"What an unhappy marriage!" says Margaret, with a sigh. "All
marriages are unhappy, I think."
"Not a bit of it. Most of the married people we know would not
separate even were the power given them to do so."
"That is merely because they have grown necessary to each other."
"Well, what is love?" says Neilson, who is always defending his
great cause against Margaret's attacks. "Was there ever a lover yet,
who did not think the woman he loved necessary to him?"
"It is not the higher form of love," says Margaret, who still dreams
of an ideal, born of her first attachment--an ideal that never in
this practical world could have been realized, and if it _could,_
would have been condemned at once as tiresome to the last degree.
"It is high enough for most people," says Neilson. "Don't grow
pessimistic, Margaret. There is a great deal of light and joy and
laughter in the world, and I know _no_ one so framed to enjoy it as
yourself, if only you would give yourself full sway. You condemn
marriage, yet how can you speak of it with authority--you who have
not tried it?"
"Oh, do, _do_ stop," says Margaret, lifting her hand. "You are
getting on that--that wretched old tack again."
"So I am. I know it. I shall be on that tack to the end of my life.
And I think it so unfair of you to condemn anybody without even a
hearing."
"Why, I must," says she, laughing in spite of herself.
"No, you needn't. Marry me, and then give judgment!"
"I shall never marry," says Margaret, with cold decision; then, as
if ashamed of her tone, she looks up at him. It is rather a shy
look, and makes her even more admirable in the eyes of the man
watching her. _"Why_ will you persist?" asks she.
"I must. I must."
"It sounds like a doom," says she lightly, though tears are
gathering in her eyes. "Don't waste your life. _Don't!"_
"I am not wasting it. I am spending it on you," says the Colonel,
who is really a delightful lover.
"Ah! but that is so dreadful--for me!"
"Do I worry you, then?"
"No! no! A thousand times no!" cries she eagerly. "It is only that I
must always reproach myself?"
"Why always? Give in, Margaret, and let me change my place from
lover to husband."
"It is often a fatal change."
"You mistrust me?"
"You! No, indeed! You least of all. I believe in you from my very
soul! Don't think that, Harry. But," impatiently, "why go over it
again and again?"
Colonel Neilson turns a solemn face to hers.
"Margaret!" says he. "Are you bent on dying an old maid?"
Miss Knollys flushes; she turns aside.
"What an odious word!" says she.
She walks deliberately into the drawing-room behind her. Neilson
still stands leaning over the balcony--a slow and distinctly
satisfied smile crosses his features.