"Heigh ho! sing heigh ho! unto the green holly;
Most friendship is feigning, most loving is folly."
"Did you forget?" asks Dysart, looking at her.
"Forget?"
"That the last dance was mine?"
"Oh, was it? I'm so sorry. You must forgive me," with a feverish attempt
at gayety, "I will try to make amends. You shall have this one instead,
no matter to whom it may belong. Come. It is only just begun, I think."
"Never mind," says Dysart, gently. "We won't dance this, I think. It is
cool and quiet here, and you are tired."
"Oh, so tired," returns she with a little sudden pathetic cry, so
impulsive, so inexpressible that it goes to his heart.
"Joyce! what is it?" says he, quickly. "Here, come and sit down. No, I
don't want an answer. It was an absurd question. You have overdone it a
little, that is all."
"Yes, that is all!" She sinks heavily into the seat he has pointed out
to her, and lets her head fall back against the cushions. "However, when
you come to think of it, that means a great deal," says she, smiling
languidly.
"There, don't talk," says he. "What is the good of having a friend if
you can't be silent with him when it so pleases you. That," laughing,
and arranging the cushions behind her head, "is one for you and two for
myself. I, too, pine for a moment when even the meagre 'yes' and 'no'
will not be required of me."
"Oh, no," shaking her head. "It is all for me and nothing for yourself!"
she pauses, and putting out her hand lays it on his sleeve. "I think,
Felix," says she, softly, "you are the kindest man I ever met."
"I told you you felt overdone," says he, laughing as if to hide the
sudden emotion that is gleaming in his eyes. He presses the hand resting
on his arm very gently, and then replaces it in her lap. To take
advantage of any little kindness she may show him now, when it is plain
that she is suffering from some mental excitement, grief or anger, or
both, would seem base to him.
She has evidently accepted his offer of silence, and lying back in her
soft couch stares with unseeing eyes at the bank of flowers before her.
Behind her tall, fragrant shrubs rear themselves, and somewhere behind
her, too, a tiny fountain is making musical tinklings. The faint, tender
glow of a colored lamp gleams from the branches of a tropical tree close
by, and round it pale, downy moths are flitting, the sound of their
wings, as every now and then they approach too near the tempting glow
and beat them against the Japanese shade, mingling with the silvery fall
of the scented water.
The atmosphere is warm, drowsy, a little melancholy. It seems to seize
upon the two sitting within its seductive influence, and threatens to
waft them from day dreams into dreams born of idle slumber. The rustle
of a coming skirt, however, a low voice, a voice still lower whispering
a reply, recalls them both to the fact that rest, complete and perfect,
is impossible under the circumstances.
A little opening among the tall evergreens upon their right shows them
Lord Baltimore once more, but this time not alone. Lady Swansdown is
with him.
She is looking rather lovelier than usual, with that soft tinge of red
upon her cheeks born of her last waltz, and her lips parted in a happy
smile. The subdued lights of the many lamps falling on her satin gown
rest there as if in love with its beauty. It is an old shade made new, a
yellow that is almost white, and has yet a tinge of green in it. A
curious shade, difficult, perhaps, to wear with good effect; but on Lady
Swansdown it seems to reign alone as queen of all the toilets in the
rooms to-night. She looks, indeed, like a perfect picture stepped down
from its canvas, "a thing of beauty," a very vision of delight.
She seems, indeed, to Joyce watching her--Joyce who likes her--that she
has grown beyond herself (or rather into her own real self) to-night.
There is a touch of life, of passionate joy, of abandonment, of hope
that has yet a sting in it, in all her air, that, though not understood
of the girl, is still apparent.
The radiant smile that illumines her beautiful face as she glances up at
Baltimore--who is bending over her in more lover-like fashion than
should be--is still making all her face a lovely fire as she passes out
of sight down the steps that lead to the lighted gardens--the steps that
Joyce had but just now ascended.
The latter is still a little wrapt in wonder and admiration, and some
other thought that is akin to trouble, when Dysart breaks in upon her
fancies.
"I am sorry about that," says he, bluntly, indicating with a nod of his
head the departing shadows of the two who have just passed out. There
are no fancies about Dysart. Nothing vague.
"Yes; it is a pity," says Joyce, hurriedly.
"More than that, I think."
"Something ought to be done," nervously.
"Yes," flushing hotly; "I know--I know what you mean"--she had meant
nothing--"but it is so difficult to know what to do, and--I am only a
cousin."
"Oh, I wasn't thinking of you. I wasn't, really," says she, a good deal
shocked. "As you say, why should you speak, when----"
"There is Beauclerk," says Dysart, quickly, as if a little angry with
somebody, but certainly not with her. "How can he stand by and see it?"
"Perhaps he doesn't see it," says she in a strange tone, her eyes on the
marble flooring. It seems to herself that the words are forced from her.
"Because--because he has----"
She brings her hands tightly together, so tightly that she reduces the
feathers on the fan she is holding to their last gasp. Because she is
now disappointed in him; because he has proved himself, perhaps,
unstable, deceptive to the heart's core, is she to vilify, him? A
thousand times no! That would be, indeed, to be base herself.
"Perhaps not," says Dysart, drily. In his secret heart this defence of
his rival is detestable to him. Something in her whole manner when she
came in from the garden had suggested to him the possibility that she
had at last found him out. Dysart would have been puzzled to explain how
Beauclerk was supposed to be "found out" or for what, but that he was
liable to discovery at any moment on some count or counts unknown, was
one of his Christian beliefs. "Perhaps not," says he. "And yet I cannot
help thinking that a matter so open to all must be patent to him."
"But," anxiously, "is it so open?"
"I leave that to your own judgment," a little warmly. "You," with rather
sharp question, "are a friend of Isabel's?"
"Yes, yes," quickly. "You know that. But----"
"But?" sternly.
"I like Lady Swansdown, too," says she, with some determination. "I find
it hard to believe that she can--can----"
"Be false to her friend," supplements he. "Have you yet to learn that
friendship ends where love begins?"
"You think----?"
"That she is in love with Baltimore."
"And he?"
"Oh!" contemptuously; "who shall gauge the depth of his heart? What can
he mean?" he has risen and is now pacing angrily up and down the small
space before her. "He used to be such a good fellow, and now----Is he
dead to all sense of honor, of honesty?"
"He is a man," says Joyce, coldly.
"No. I deny that. Not a true man, surely."
"Is there a true man?" says she. "Is there any truth, any honesty to be
found in the whole wide world?"
She too has risen now, and is standing with her large dark eyes fixed
almost defiantly on his. There is something so strange, so wild, so
unlike her usual joyous, happy self in this outburst, in her whole
attitude, that Dysart regards her with an astonishment that is largely
tinctured with fear.
"I don't know what is in your mind," says he, calmly; "something out of
the common has occurred to disturb you so much, I can guess, but,"
looking at her earnestly, "whatever it maybe, I entreat you to beat it
under. Conquer it; do not let it conquer you. There must be evil in the
world, but never lose sight of the good; that must be there, just as
surely. Truth, honor, honesty, are no fables; they are to be found
everywhere. If not in this one, then in that. Do not lose faith in
them."
"You think me evidently in a bad way," says she, smiling faintly. She
has recovered herself in part, but though she tries to turn his earnest
words into a jest, one can see that she is perilously near to tears.
"You mean that I am preaching to you," says he, smiling too. "Well, so I
am. What right has a girl like you to disbelieve in anything? Why,"
laughing, "it can't be so very long ago since you believed in fairies,
in pixies, and the fierce dragons of our childhood."
"I don't know that I am not a believer in them still," says she. "In the
dragons, at all events. Evil seems to rule the world."
"Tut!" says he. "I have preached in vain."
"You would have me believe in good only," says she. "You assure me very
positively that all the best virtues are still riding to and fro,
redeeming the world, with lances couched and hearts on fire. But where
to find them? In you?"
It is a very gentle smile she gives him as she says this.
"Yes: so far, at least, as you are concerned," says he, stoutly. "I
shall be true and honest to you so long as my breath lives in my body.
So much I can swear to."
"Well," says she, with a rather meagre attempt at light-heartedness,
"you almost persuade me with that truculent manner of yours into
believing in you at all events, or is it," a little sadly, "that the
ways of others drive me to that belief? Well," with a sigh, "never mind
how it is, you benefit by it, any way."
"I don't want to force your confidence," says Dysart; "but you have been
made unhappy by somebody, have you not?"
"I have not been made happy," says she, her eyes on the ground. "I don't
know why I tell you that. You asked a hard question."
"I know. I should have been silent, perhaps, and yet----"
At this moment the sound of approaching footsteps coming up the steps
startles them.
"Joyce!" says he, "grant me one request."
"One! You rise to tragedy!" says she, as if a little amused in spite of
the depression under which she is so evidently laboring. "Is it to be
your last, your dying prayer?"
"I hope not. Nevertheless I would have it granted."
"You have only to speak," says she, with a slight gesture that is half
mocking, half kindly.
"Come with me after luncheon, to-morrow, up to St. Bridget's Hill?"
"Is that all? And to throw such force into it. Yes, yes; I shall enjoy a
long walk like that."
"It is not because of the walk that I ask you to go there with me," says
Dysart, the innate honesty that distinguishes him compelling him to lay
bare to her his secret meaning. "I have something to say to you. You
will listen?"
"Why should I not?" returns she, a little pale. He might, perhaps, have
said something further, but that now the footsteps sound close at hand.
A glance towards the door that leads from the fragrant night into the
still more perfumed air within reveals to them two figures.
Mr. Beauclerk and Miss Maliphant come leisurely forward. The blood
receding to Joyce's heart leaves her cold and singularly calm.