In the rich glow of the autumn evening we sat together for some time,
our hearts too full of grief for words. The future of both of us was
filled with blank despair. My presence there brought back to her all
the sweet recollections of those long-past days when she was free, and
when to save her father from ruin she had so nobly sacrificed her love.
Presently the whirr of the motor-car announced Mr Murray's return, and
rising we went into the house to greet him. He welcomed me, but none
too warmly I noticed. Probably he did not approve of my calling upon
Ella now that she was engaged to marry the man who had so firmly
established himself in his confidence.
Nevertheless, he asked me to remain to dinner, which I did gladly. He
was a slow-speaking gentlemanly man, dark-eyed and dark-bearded, whom I
had always liked.
From him I learned that Ella's marriage was to take place in the village
church of Wichenford in the first week in October, and that the
honeymoon was to be spent in St Petersburg. His words cut me like a
knife.
"Gordon-Wright is down at his country place just now," he remarked an
hour later, as we all three sat at table in the great old panelled
dining-room with the wax candles burning in the antique Sheffield
candelabra. "We go to town next week, and he meets us there. He's a
good fellow. Do you know him?"
"I met him quite casually once," I replied, glancing across at my
well-beloved who had now exchanged her white dress for a black lace
dinner gown, in the corsage of which was a single red rose--her
favourite flower.
Ah! as I looked at her my heart was aflame. I loved her better than my
life. Alas! She could never now be mine--never.
I left early and drove back to Worcester through the pelting rain--with
her rose that she had slipped into my hand at parting, a silent pledge
that spoke volumes to me.
"Good-bye, dear heart!" she whispered. "We shall perhaps meet again in
London."
"Yes," I said earnestly. "We must meet once again before your marriage.
Promise me you will--promise?"
"I'll try. But you know how very difficult it is to see you when I'm at
Porchester Terrace. Aunt Henrietta is such an impossible person."
"You must," I whispered. And I would have clasped her to my heart and
kissed her in adieu had not the statuesque man-servant stood by to hand
me the mackintosh which Murray had lent me.
"Adieu!" she said again, and then touching her hand I mounted into the
cart and went forth into the rain and darkness--into the night that was
so like my own life.
After my return to Shepherd's Bush ten weary days passed--each day
bringing my love nearer that odious union. One morning I received an
unexpected note from Lucie Miller, saying that she and her aunt were in
London again, at the Hotel Russell, in order to see her late father's
lawyers.