at Selwoode is panelled in very dark oak, and the doors and windows
are screened with crimson hangings--her parti-coloured red-and-yellow
gown might have been a scrap of afterglow left over from an unusually
fine sunset. In a word, Miss Hugonin was a very quaint and colourful
and delectable figure as she came a little further into the room. Her
eyes shone like blue stars, and her hair shone--there must be pounds
of it, Billy thought--and her very shoulders, plump, flawless,
ineffable, shone with the glow of an errant cloud-tatter that is just
past the track of dawn, and is therefore neither pink nor white, but
manages somehow to combine the best points of both colours.
"Ah, indeed?" said Miss Hugonin. Her tone imparted a surprising degree
of chilliness to this simple remark.
"No," she went on, very formally, "this is not a private room; you owe
me no apology for being here. Indeed, I am rather obliged to you, Mr.
Woods, for none of us knew of these secret drawers. Here is the key to
the central compartment, if you will be kind enough to point out the
other one. Dear, dear!" Margaret concluded, languidly, "all this is
quite like a third-rate melodrama. I haven't the least doubt you will
discover a will in there in your favour, and be reinstated as the
long-lost heir and all that sort of thing. How tiresome that will be
for me, though."
She was in a mood to be cruel to-night. She held out the keys to
him, in a disinterested fashion, and dropped them daintily into his
outstretched palm, just as she might have given a coin to an unusually
grimy mendicant. But the tips of her fingers grazed his hand.
That did the mischief. Her least touch was enough to set every nerve
in his body a-tingle. "Peggy!" he said hoarsely, as the keys jangled
to the floor. Then Mr. Woods drew a little nearer to her and said
"Peggy, Peggy!" in a voice that trembled curiously, and appeared to
have no intention of saying anything further.
Indeed, words would have seemed mere tautology to any one who could
have seen his eyes. Margaret looked into them for a minute, and her
own eyes fell before their blaze, and her heart--very foolishly--stood
still for a breathing-space. Subsequently she recalled the fact
that he was a fortune-hunter, and that she despised him, and also
observed--to her surprise and indignation--that he was holding her
hand and had apparently been doing so for some time. You may believe
it, that she withdrew that pink-and-white trifle angrily enough.
"Pray don't be absurd, Mr. Woods," said she.
Billy caught up the word. "Absurd!" he echoed--"yes, that describes
what I've been pretty well, doesn't it, Peggy? I _was_ absurd when I
let you send me to the right-about four years ago. I realised that
to-day the moment I saw you. I should have held on like the very
grimmest death; I should have bullied you into marrying me, if
necessary, and in spite of fifty Anstruthers. Oh, yes, I know that
now. But I was only a boy then, Peggy, and so I let a boy's pride come
between us. I know now there isn't any question of pride where you
are concerned--not any question of pride nor of any silly
misunderstandings, nor of any uncle's wishes, nor of anything but just
you, Peggy. It's just you that I care for now--just you."
"Ah!" Margaret cried, with a swift intake of the breath that was
almost a sob. He had dared, after all; oh, it was shameless, sordid!
And yet (she thought dimly), how dear that little quiver in his voice
had been were it unplanned!--and how she could have loved this big,
eager boy were he not the hypocrite she knew him!
_She'd_ show him! But somehow--though it was manifestly what he
deserved--she found she couldn't look him in the face while she did
it.
So she dropped her eyes to the floor and waited for a moment of tense
silence. Then, "Am I to consider this a proposal, Mr. Woods?" she
asked, in muffled tones.
Billy stared. "Yes," said he, very gravely, after an interval.
"You see," she explained, still in the same dull voice, "you phrased
it so vaguely I couldn't well be certain. You don't propose very well,
Mr. Woods. I--I've had opportunities to become an authority on such
matters, you see, since I've been rich. That makes a difference,
doesn't it? A great many men are willing to marry me now who wouldn't
have thought of such a thing, say--say, four years ago. So I've had
some experience. Oh, yes, three--three _persons_ have offered to marry
me for my money earlier in this very evening--before you did, Mr.
Woods. And, really, I can't compliment you on your methods, Mr. Woods;
they are a little vague, a little abrupt, a little transparent, don't
you think?"
"Peggy!" he cried, in a frightened whisper. He could not believe, you
see, that it was the woman he loved who was speaking.
And for my part, I admit frankly that at this very point, if ever in
her life, Margaret deserved a thorough shaking.
"Dear me," she airily observed, "I'm sure I've said nothing out of the
way. I think it speaks very well for you that you're so fond of your
old home--so anxious to regain it at _any_ cost. It's quite touching,
Mr. Woods."
She raised her eyes toward his. I dare say she was suffering as much
as he. But women consider it a point of honour to smile when they
stab; Margaret smiled with an innocence that would have seemed
overdone in an angel.
Then, in an instant, she had the grace to be abjectly ashamed of
herself. Billy's face had gone white. His mouth was set, mask-like,
and his breathing was a little perfunctory. It stung her, though, that
he was not angry. He was sorry.
"I--I see," he said, very carefully. "You think I--want the money.
Yes--I see."
"And why not?" she queried, pleasantly. "Dear me, money's a very
sensible thing to want, I'm sure. It makes a great difference, you
know."
He looked down into her face for a moment. One might have sworn this
detected fortune-hunter pitied her.
"Yes," he assented, slowly, "it makes a difference--not a difference
for the better, I'm afraid, Peggy."
Ensued a silence.
Then Margaret tossed her head. She was fast losing her composure.
She would have given the world to retract what she had said, and
accordingly she resolved to brazen it out.
"You needn't look at me as if I were a convicted criminal," she said,
sharply. "I won't marry you, and there's an end of it."
"It isn't that I'm thinking of," said Mr. Woods, with a grave smile.
"You see, it takes me a little time to realise your honest opinion
of me. I believe I understand now. You think me a very hopeless
cad--that's about your real opinion, isn't it, Peggy? I didn't know
that, you see. I thought you knew me better than that. You did once,
Peggy--once, a long time ago, and--and I hoped you hadn't quite
forgotten that time."
The allusion was ill chosen.
"Oh, oh, _oh!_" she cried, gasping. "_You_ to remind me of that
time!--you of all men. Haven't you a vestige of shame? Haven't you
a rag of honour left? Oh, I didn't know there were such men in the
world! And to think--to think--" Margaret's glorious voice broke, and
she wrung her hands helplessly.
Then, after a little, she raised her eyes to his, and spoke without
a trace of emotion. "To think," she said, and her voice was toneless
now, "to think that I loved you! It's that that hurts, you know. For I
loved you very dearly, Billy Woods--yes, I think I loved you quite as
much as any woman can ever love a man. You were the first, you see,
and girls--girls are very foolish about such things. I thought you
were brave, and strong, and clean, and honest, and beautiful, and
dear--oh, quite the best and dearest man in the world, I thought you,
Billy Woods! That--that was queer, wasn't it?" she asked, with a
listless little shiver. "Yes, it was very queer. You didn't think of
me in quite that way, did you? No, you--you thought I was well enough
to amuse you for a while. I was well enough for a summer flirtation,
wasn't I, Billy? But marriage--ah, no, you never thought of marriage
then. You ran away when Uncle Fred suggested that. You refused
point-blank--refused in this very room--didn't you, Billy? Ah,
that--that hurt," Margaret ended, with a faint smile. "Yes, it--hurt."
Billy Woods raised a protesting hand, as though to speak, but
afterward he drew a deep, tremulous breath and bit his lip and was
silent.
She had spoken very quietly, very simply, very like a tired child;
now her voice lifted. "But you've hurt me more to-night," she said,
equably--"to-night, when you've come cringing back to me--to me, whom
you'd have none of when I was poor. I'm rich now, though. That makes
a difference, doesn't it, Billy? You're willing to whistle back the
girl's love you flung away once--yes, quite willing. But can't you
understand how much it must hurt me to think I ever loved you?"
Margaret asked, very gently.
She wanted him to understand. She wanted him to be ashamed. She prayed
God that he might be just a little, little bit ashamed, so that she
might be able to forgive him.
But he stood silent, bending puzzled brows toward her.
"Can't you understand, Billy?" she pleaded, softly. "I can't help
seeing what a cur you are. I must hate you, Billy--of course, I must,"
she insisted, very gently, as though arguing the matter with herself;
then suddenly she sobbed and wrung her hands in anguish. "Oh, I can't,
I can't!" she wailed. "God help me, I can't hate you, even though I
know you for what you are!"
His arms lifted a little; and in a flash Margaret knew that what she
most wanted in all the world was to have them close about her, and
then to lay her head upon his shoulder and cry contentedly.
Oh, she did want to forgive him! If he had lost all sense of shame,
why could he not lie to her? Surely, he could at least lie? And,
oh, how gladly she would believe!--only the tiniest, the flimsiest
fiction, her eyes craved of him.
But he merely said "I see--I see," very slowly, and then smiled.
"We'll put the money aside just now," he said. "Perhaps, after a
little, we--we'll came back to that. I think you've forgotten, though,
that when--when Uncle Fred and I had our difference you had just
thrown me over--had just ordered me never to speak to you again?
I couldn't very well ask you to marry me, could I, under those
circumstances?"
"I spoke in a moment of irritation," a very dignified Margaret pointed
out; "you would have paid no attention whatever to it if you had
really--cared."
Billy laughed, rather sadly. "Oh, I cared right enough," he said. "I
still care. The question is--do you?"
"No," said Margaret, with decision, "I don't--not in the _least_."
"Peggy," Mr. Woods commanded, "look at me!"
"You have had your answer, I think," Miss Hugonin indifferently
observed.
Billy caught her chin in his hand and turned her face to his. "Peggy,
do you--care?" he asked, softly.
And Margaret looked into his honest-seeming eyes and, in a panic, knew
that her traitor lips were forming "yes."
"That would be rather unfortunate, wouldn't it?" she asked, with a
smile. "You see, it was only an hour ago I promised to marry Mr.
Kennaston."
"Kennaston!" Billy gasped. "You--you don't mean that you care for
_him_, Peggy?"
"I really can't see why it should concern you," said Margaret,
sweetly, "but since you ask--I do. You couldn't expect me to remain
inconsolable forever, you know."
Then the room blurred before her eyes. She stood rigid, defiant.
She was dimly aware that Billy was speaking, speaking from a great
distance, it seemed, and then after a century or two his face came
back to her out of the whirl of things. And, though she did not know
it, they were smiling bravely at one another.
"--and so," Mr. Woods was stating, "I've been an even greater ass than
usual, and I hope you'll be very, very happy."
[Illustration: "Billy unfolded it slowly, with a puzzled look growing
in his countenance."]
"Thank you," she returned, mechanically, "I--I hope so."
After an interval, "Good-night, Peggy," said Mr. Woods.
"Oh--? Good-night," said she, with a start.
He turned to go. Then, "By Jove!" said he, grimly, "I've been so busy
making an ass of myself I'd forgotten all about more--more important
things."
Mr. Woods picked up the keys and, going to the desk, unlocked the
centre compartment with a jerk. Afterward he gave a sharp exclamation.
He had found a paper in the secret drawer at the back which appeared
to startle him.
Billy unfolded it slowly, with a puzzled look growing in his
countenance. Then for a moment Margaret's golden head drew close to
his yellow curls and they read it through together. And in the most
melodramatic and improbable fashion in the world they found it to be
the last will and testament of Frederick R. Woods.
"But--but I don't understand," was Miss Hugonin's awed comment. "It's
exactly like the other will, only--why, it's dated the seventeenth
of June, the day before he died! And it's witnessed by Hodges and
Burton--the butler and the first footman, you know--and they've never
said anything about such a paper. And, then, why should he have made
another will just like the first?"
Billy pondered.
By and bye, "I think I can explain that," he said, in a rather
peculiar voice. "You see, Hodges and Burton witnessed all his papers,
half the time without knowing what they were about. They would hardly
have thought of this particular one after his death. And it isn't
quite the same will as the other; it leaves you practically
everything, but it doesn't appoint any trustees, as the other did,
because this will was drawn up after you were of age. Moreover, it
contains these four bequests to colleges, to establish a Woods chair
of ethnology, which the other will didn't provide for. Of course, it
would have been simpler merely to add a codicil to the first will,
but Uncle Fred was always very methodical. I--I think he was probably
going through the desk the night he died, destroying various papers.
He must have taken the other will out to destroy it just--just before
he died. Perhaps--perhaps--" Billy paused for a little and then
laughed, unmirthfully. "It scarcely matters," said he. "Here is the
will. It is undoubtedly genuine and undoubtedly the last he made.
You'll have to have it probated, Peggy, and settle with the colleges.
It--it won't make much of a hole in the Woods millions."
There was a half-humorous bitterness in his voice that Margaret noted
silently. So (she thought) he had hoped for a moment that at the last
Frederick R. Woods had relented toward him. It grieved her, in a dull
fashion, to see him so mercenary. It grieved her--though she would
have denied it emphatically--to see him so disappointed. Since he
wanted the money so much, she would have liked for him to have had it,
worthless as he was, for the sake of the boy he had been.
"Thank you," she said, coldly, as she took the paper; "I will give it
to my father. He will do what is necessary. Good-night, Mr. Woods."
Then she locked up the desk in a businesslike fashion and turned to
him, and held out her hand.
"Good-night, Billy," said this perfectly inconsistent young woman.
"For a moment I thought Uncle Fred had altered his will in your
favour. I almost wish he had."
Billy smiled a little.
"That would never have done," he said, gravely, as he shook
hands; "you forget what a sordid, and heartless, and generally
good-for-nothing chap I am, Peggy. It's much better as it is."
Only the tiniest, the flimsiest fiction, her eyes craved of him. Even
now, at the eleventh hour, lie to me, Billy Woods, and, oh, how gladly
I will believe!
But he merely said "Good-night, Peggy," and went out of the room. His
broad shoulders had a pathetic droop, a listlessness.
Margaret was glad. Of course, she was glad. At last, she had told him
exactly what she thought of him. Why shouldn't she be glad? She was
delighted.
So, by way of expressing this delight, she sat down at the desk and
began to cry very softly.
XIII
Having duly considered the emptiness of existence, the unworthiness of
men, the dreary future that awaited her--though this did not trouble
her greatly, as she confidently expected to die soon--and many other
such dolorous topics, Miss Hugonin decided to retire for the night.
She rose, filled with speculations as to the paltriness of life and
the probability of her eyes being red in the morning.
"It will be all his fault if they are," she consoled herself.
"Doubtless he'll be very much pleased. After robbing me of all faith
in humanity, I dare say the one thing needed to complete his happiness
is to make me look like a fright. I hate him! After making me
miserable, now, I suppose he'll go off and make some other woman
miserable. Oh, of course, he'll make love to the first woman he meets
who has any money. I'm sure she's welcome to him. I only pity any
woman who has to put up with _him_. No, I don't," Margaret decided,
after reflection; "I hate her, too!"
Miss Hugonin went to the door leading to the hallway and paused.
Then--I grieve to relate it--she shook a little pink-tipped fist in
the air.
"I detest you!" she commented, between her teeth; "oh, how _dare_ you
make me feel so ashamed of the way I've treated you!"
The query--as possibly you may have divined--was addressed to Mr.
Woods. He was standing by the fireplace in the hallway, and his tall
figure was outlined sharply against the flame of the gas-logs that
burned there. His shoulders had a pathetic droop, a listlessness.
Billy was reading a paper of some kind by the firelight, and the black
outline of his face smiled grimly over it. Then he laughed and threw
it into the fire.
"Billy!" a voice observed--a voice that was honey and gold and velvet
and all that is most sweet and rich and soft in the world.
Mr. Woods was aware of a light step, a swishing, sibilant, delightful
rustling--the caress of sound is the rustling of a well-groomed
woman's skirts--and of an afterthought of violets, of a mere
reminiscence of orris, all of which came toward him through the
dimness of the hall. He started, noticeably.
"Billy," Miss Hugonin stated, "I'm sorry for what I said to you. I'm
not sure it isn't true, you know, but I'm sorry I said it."
"Bless your heart!" said Billy; "don't you worry over that, Peggy.
That's all right. Incidentally, the things you've said to me and about
me aren't true, of course, but we won't discuss that just now. I--I
fancy we're both feeling a bit fagged. Go to bed, Peggy! We'll both
go to bed, and the night will bring counsel, and we'll sleep off all
unkindliness. Go to bed, little sister!--get all the beauty-sleep you
aren't in the least in need of, and dream of how happy you're going to
be with the man you love. And--and in the morning I may have something
to say to you. Good-night, dear."
And this time he really went. And when he had come to the bend in the
stairs his eyes turned back to hers, slowly and irresistibly, drawn
toward them, as it seemed, just as the sunflower is drawn toward the
sun, or the needle toward the pole, or, in fine, as the eyes of young
gentlemen ordinarily are drawn toward the eyes of the one woman in the
world. Then he disappeared.
The mummery of it vexed Margaret. There was no excuse for his looking
at her in that way. It irritated her. She was almost as angry with him
for doing it as she would have been for not doing it.
Therefore, she bent an angry face toward the fire, her mouth pouting
in a rather inviting fashion. Then it rounded slowly into a sanguine
O, which of itself suggested osculation, but in reality stood for
"observe!" For the paper Billy had thrown into the fire had fallen
under the gas-logs, and she remembered his guilty start.
"After all," said Margaret, "it's none of my business."
So she eyed it wistfully.
"It may be important," she considerately remembered. "It ought not to
be left there."
So she fished it out with a big paper-cutter.
"But it can't be very important," she dissented afterward, "or he
wouldn't have thrown it away."
So she looked at the superscripture on the back of it.
Then she gave a little gasp and tore it open and read it by the
firelight.
Miss Hugonin subsequently took credit to herself for not going into
hysterics. And I think she had some reason to; for she found the paper
a duplicate of the one Billy had taken out of the secret drawer, with
his name set in the place of hers. At the last Frederick R. Woods had
relented toward his nephew.
Margaret laughed a little; then she cried a little; then she did both
together. Afterward she sat in the firelight, very puzzled and very
excited and very penitent and very beautiful, and was happier than she
had ever been in her life.
"He had it in his pocket," her dear voice quavered; "he had it in his
pocket, my brave, strong, beautiful Billy did, when he asked me to
marry him. It was King Cophetua wooing the beggar-maid--and the beggar
was an impudent, ungrateful, idiotic little _piece!_" Margaret hissed,
in her most shrewish manner. "She ought to be spanked. She ought to go
down on her knees to him in sackcloth, and tears, and ashes, and all
sorts of penitential things. She will, too. Oh, it's such a beautiful
world--_such_ a beautiful world! Billy loves me--really! Billy's a
millionaire, and I'm a pauper. Oh, I'm glad, glad, _glad!_"
She caressed the paper that had rendered the world such a goodly place
to live in--caressed it tenderly and rubbed her check against it. That
was Margaret's way of showing affection, you know; and I protest it
must have been very pleasant for the paper. The only wonder was that
the ink it was written in didn't turn red with delight.
Then she read it through again, for sheer enjoyment of those
beautiful, incomprehensible words that disinherited her. How _lovely_
of Uncle Fred! she thought. Of course, he'd forgiven Billy; who
wouldn't? What beautiful language Uncle Fred used! quite prayer-booky,
she termed it. Then she gasped.
The will in Billy's favour was dated a week earlier than the one they
had found in the secret drawer. It was worthless, mere waste paper. At
the last Frederick R. Woods's pride had conquered his love.
"Oh, the horrid old man!" Margaret wailed; "he's left me everything he
had! How _dare_ he disinherit Billy! I call it rank impertinence in
him. Oh, boy dear, dear, _dear_ boy!" Miss Hugonin crooned, in an
ecstacy of tenderness and woe. "He found this first will in one of the
other drawers, and thought _he_ was the rich one, and came in a great
whirl of joy to ask me to marry him, and I was horrid to him! Oh, what
a mess I've made of it! I've called him a fortune-hunter, and I've
told him I love another man, and he'll never, never ask me to marry
him now. And I love him, I worship him, I adore him! And if only
I were poor--"
Ensued a silence. Margaret lifted the two wills, scrutinised them
closely, and then looked at the fire, interrogatively.
"It's penal servitude for quite a number of years," she said. "But,
then, he really _couldn't_ tell any one, you know. No gentleman would
allow a lady to be locked up in jail. And if he knew--if he knew I
didn't and couldn't consider him a fortune-hunter, I really believe he
would--"
Whatever she believed he would do, the probability of his doing it
seemed highly agreeable to Miss Hugonin. She smiled at the fire in the
most friendly fashion, and held out one of the folded papers to it.
"Yes," said Margaret, "I'm quite sure he will."
There I think we may leave her. For I have dredged the dictionary,
and I confess I have found no fitting words wherewith to picture this
inconsistent, impulsive, adorable young woman, dreaming brave dreams
in the firelight of her lover and of their united future. I should
only bungle it. You must imagine it for yourself.
It is a pretty picture, is it not?--with its laughable side, perhaps;
under the circumstances, whimsical, if you will; but very, very
sacred. For she loved him with a clean heart, loved him infinitely.
Let us smile at it--tenderly--and pass on.
But upon my word, when I think of how unreasonably, how outrageously
Margaret had behaved during the entire evening, I am tempted to
depose her as our heroine. I begin to regret I had not selected Adèle
Haggage.