"MAY I GO?"
The very day after this, Octavia opened the fourth trunk. She had had it
brought down from the garret, when there came a summons on the door, and
Lucia Gaston appeared.
Lucia was very pale; and her large, soft eyes wore a decidedly frightened
look. She seemed to have walked fast, and was out of breath. Evidently
something had happened.
"Octavia," she said, "Mr. Dugald Binnie is at Oldclough."
"Who is he?"
"He is my grand-uncle," explained Lucia tremulously. "He has a great deal
of money. Grandmamma"--She stopped short, and colored, and drew her
slight figure up. "I do not quite understand grandmamma, Octavia," she
said. "Last night she came to my room to talk to me; and this morning she
came again, and--oh!" she broke out indignantly, "how could she speak to
me in such a manner!"
"What did she say?" inquired Octavia.
"She said a great many things," with great spirit. "It took her a long
time to say them, and I do not wonder at it. It would have taken me a
hundred years, if I had been in her place. I--I was wrong to say I did
not understand her: I did--before she had finished."
"What did you understand?"
"She was afraid to tell me in plain words.--I never saw her afraid
before, but she was afraid. She has been arranging my future for me, and
it does not occur to her that I dare object. That is because she knows I
am a coward, and despises me for it--and it is what I deserve. If I make
the marriage she chooses, she thinks Mr. Binnie will leave me his money.
I am to run after a man who does not care for me, and make myself
attractive, in the hope that he will condescend to marry me because Mr.
Binnie may leave me his money. Do you wonder that it took even Lady
Theobald a long time to say that?"
"Well," remarked Octavia, "you won't do it, I suppose. I wouldn't worry.
She wants you to marry Mr. Barold, I suppose."
Lucia started.
"How did you guess?" she exclaimed.
"Oh! I always knew it. I didn't guess." And she smiled ever so faintly.
"That is one of the reasons why she loathes me so," she added.
Lucia thought deeply for a moment: she recognized, all at once, several
things she had been mystified by before.
"Oh, it is! It is!" she said. "And she has thought of it all the time,
when I never suspected her."
Octavia smiled a little again. Lucia sat thinking, her hands clasped
tightly.
"I am glad I came here," she said, at length. "I _am_ angry now, and I
see things more clearly. If she had only thought of it because Mr. Binnie
came, I could have forgiven her more easily; but she has been making
coarse plans all the time, and treating me with contempt. Octavia," she
added, turning upon her, with flushing cheeks and sparkling eyes, "I
think that, for the first time in my life, I am in a passion,--a real
passion. I think I shall never be afraid of her any more." Her delicate
nostrils were dilated, she held her head up, her breath came fast. There
was a hint of exultation in her tone. "Yes," she said, "I am in a
passion. And I am not afraid of her at all. I will go home and tell her
what I think."
And it is quite probable that she would have done so, but for a trifling
incident which occurred before she reached her ladyship.
She walked very fast, after she left the house. She wanted to reach
Oldclough before one whit of her anger cooled down; though, somehow, she
felt quite sure, that, even when her anger died out, her courage would
not take flight with it. Mr. Dugald Binnie had not proved to be a very
fascinating person. He was an acrid, dictatorial old man: he contradicted
Lady Theobald flatly every five minutes, and bullied his man-servant. But
it was not against him that Lucia's indignation was aroused. She felt
that Lady Theobald was quite capable of suggesting to him that Francis
Barold would be a good match for her; and, if she had done so, it was
scarcely his fault if he had accepted the idea. She understood now why
she had been allowed to visit Octavia, and why divers other things had
happened. She had been sent to walk with Francis Barold; he had been
almost reproached when he had not called; perhaps her ladyship had been
good enough to suggest to him that it was his duty to further her plans.
She was as capable of that as of any thing else which would assist her to
gain her point. The girl's cheeks grew hotter and hotter, her eyes
brighter, at every step, because every step brought some new thought: her
hands trembled, and her heart beat.
"I shall never be afraid of her again," she said, as she turned the
corner into the road. "Never! never!"
And at that very moment a gentleman stepped out of the wood at her right,
and stopped before her.
She started back, with a cry.
"Mr. Burmistone!" she said: "Mr. Burmistone!"
She wondered if he had heard her last words: she fancied he had. He took
hold of her shaking little hand, and looked down at her excited face.
"I am glad I waited for you," he said, in the quietest possible tone.
"Something is the matter."
She knew there would be no use in trying to conceal the truth, and she
was not in the mood to make the effort. She scarcely knew herself.
She gave quite a fierce little laugh.
"I am angry!" she said. "You have never seen me angry before. I am on my
way to my--to Lady Theobald."
He held her hand as calmly as before. He understood a great deal more
than she could have imagined.
"What are you going to say to her?" he asked. She laughed again.
"I am going to ask her what she means. I am going to tell her she has
made a mistake. I am going to prove to her that I am not such a coward,
after all. I am going to tell her that I dare disobey her,--_that_ is
what I am going to say to her," she concluded decisively.
He held her hand rather closer.
"Let us take a stroll in the copse, and talk it over," he said. "It is
deliciously cool there."
"I don't want to be cool," she said. But he drew her gently with him; and
a few steps took them into the shade of the young oaks and pines, and
there he paused.
"She has made you very angry?" he said.
And then, almost before she knew what she was doing, she was pouring
forth the whole of her story, even more of it than she had told Octavia.
She had not at all intended to do it; but she did it, nevertheless.
"I am to marry Mr. Francis Barold, if he will take me," she said, with a
bitter little smile,--"Mr. Francis Barold, who is so much in love with
me, as you know. His mother approves of the match, and sent him here to
make love to me, which he has done, as you have seen. I have no money of
my own; but, if I make a marriage which pleases him, Dugald Binnie will
probably leave me his--which it is thought will be an inducement to my
cousin, who needs one. If I marry him, or rather he marries me, Lady
Theobald thinks Mr. Binnie will be pleased. It does not even matter
whether Francis is pleased or not, and of course I am out of the
question; but it is hoped that it will please Mr. Binnie. The two ladies
have talked it over, and decided the matter. I dare say they have offered
me to Francis, who has very likely refused me, though perhaps he may be
persuaded to relent in time,--if I am very humble, and he is shown the
advantage of having Mr. Binnie's money added to his own,--but I have no
doubt I shall have to be very humble indeed. That is what I learned from
Lady Theobald last night, and it is what I am going to talk to her about.
Is it enough to make one angry, do you think? Is it enough?"
He did not tell her whether he thought it enough, or not. He looked at
her with steady eyes.
"Lucia," he said, "I wish you would let me go and talk with Lady
Theobald."
"You?" she said with a little start.
"Yes," he answered. "Let me go to her. Let me tell her, that, instead of
marrying Francis Barold, you will marry _me_. If you will say yes to
that, I think I can promise that you need never be afraid of her any
more." The fierce color died out of her cheeks, and the tears rushed to
her eyes. She raised her face with a pathetic look.
"Oh!" she whispered, "you must be very sorry for me. I think you have
been sorry for me from the first."
"I am desperately in love with you," he answered, in his quietest way. "I
have been desperately in love with you from the first. May I go?"
She looked at him for a moment, incredulously. Then she faltered,--
"Yes."
She still looked up at him; and then, in spite of her happiness, or
perhaps because of it, she suddenly began to cry softly, and forgot she
had been angry at all, as he took her into his strong, kind arms.