"'I thought love had been a joyous thing,' quoth my uncle Toby."
"He hath a heart as sound as a bell, and his tongue is the clapper.
For what his heart thinks his tongue speaks."
"More?" says Dysart startled by her expression, and puzzled as well.
"Yes!" hurriedly. "This!" The very nervousness that is consuming her
throws fire into her eyes and speech. "During all these long twelve
months I shall be free. Quite free. You forgot to put that in! You must
remember that! If--if I should, after all this thinking, decide on not
having anything to do with you--you," vehemently, "will have no right to
reproach me. Remember," says she going up to him and laying her hand
upon his arm while the blood receding from her face leaves her very
white; "remember should such a thing occur--and it is very likely,"
slowly, "I warn you of that--you are not to consider yourself wronged or
aggrieved in any way."
"Why should you talk to me in this way?" begins he, aggrieved now at all
events.
"You must recollect," feverishly, "that I have made you no promise. Not
one. I refuse even to look upon this matter as a serious thing. I tell
you honestly," her dark eyes gleaming with nervous excitement, "I don't
believe I ever shall so look at it. After all," pausing, "you will do
well if you now put an end to this farce between us; and tell me to take
myself and my dull life out of yours forever."
"I shall never tell you that," in a low tone.
"Well, well," impatiently; "I have warned you. It will not be my fault
if----O! it is foolish of you!" she blurts out suddenly. "I have told
you I don't understand myself: and still you waste yourself--you throw
yourself away. In the end you will be disappointed in me, if not in one
way, then in another. It hurts me to think of that. There is time still;
let us be friends--friends----" Her hands are tightly clasped, she looks
at him with a world of entreaty in her beautiful eyes. "Friends, Felix!"
breathes she softly.
"Let things rest as they are, I beseech you," says he, taking her hand
and holding it in a tight grasp. "The future--who can ever say what that
great void will bring us. I will trust to it; and if only loss and
sorrow be my portion, still----As for friendship, Joyce; whatever
happens I shall be your friend and lover."
"Well--you quite know," says the girl, almost sullenly.
"Quite. And I accept the risk. Do not be angry with me, my beloved." He
lifts the hand he holds and presses it to his lips, wondering always at
the coldness of it. "You are free, Joyce; you desire it so, and I desire
it, too. I would not hamper you in any way."
"I should not be able to endure it, if--afterward--I thought you were
reproaching me," says she, with a little weary smile.
"Be happy about that," says he: "I shall never reproach you." He is
silent for a moment; her last speech has filled him with thoughts that
presently grow into extremely happy ones: unless--unless she liked
him--cared for him, in some decided, if vague manner, would his future
misery be of so much importance to her? Oh! surely not! A small flood of
joy flows over him. A radiant smile parts his lips. The light of a
coming triumph that shall gird and glorify his whole life illumines his
eyes.
She regarding him grows suddenly uneasy.
"You--you fully understand," says she, drawing back from him.
"Oh, you have made me do that," says he, but his radiant smile still
lingers.
"Then why," mistrustfully, "do you look so happy?" She draws even
further away from him. It is plain she resents that happiness.
"Is there not reason?" says he. "Have you not let me speak, and having
spoken, do you not still let me linger near you? It is more than I dared
hope for! Therefore, poor as is my chance, I rejoice now. Do not forbid
me. I may have no reason to rejoice in the future. Let me, then, have my
day."
"It grows very late," says Miss Kavanagh abruptly. "Let us go home."
Silently they turn and descend the hill. Halfway down he pauses and
looks backward.
"Whatever comes of it," says he, "I shall always love this spot. Though,
if the year's end leave me desolate, I hope I shall never see it again."
"It is unlucky to rejoice too soon," says she, in a low whisper.
"Oh! don't say that word 'Rejoice.' How it reminds me of you. It ought
to belong to you. It does. You should have been called 'Rejoice' instead
of 'Joyce'; they have cut off half your name. To see you is to feel new
life within one's veins."
"Ah! I said you didn't know me," returns she sadly.
* * * * *
Meantime the hours have flown; evening is descending. It is all very
well for those who, traveling up and down romantic hills, can find
engrossing matters for conversation in their idle imaginings of love, or
their earnest belief therein, but to the ordinary ones of the earth,
mundane comforts are still of some worth.
Tea, the all powerful, is now holding high revelry in the library at the
Court. Round the cosy tables, growing genial beneath the steam of the
many old Queen Anne "pots," the guests are sitting singly or in groups.
"What delicious little cakes!" says Lady Swansdown, taking up a smoking
morsel of cooked butter and flour from the glowing tripod beside her.
"You like them?" says Lady Baltimore in her slow, earnest way. "So does
Joyce. She thinks they are the nicest cakes in the world. By the by,
where is Joyce?"
"She went out for a walk at twenty minutes after two," says Beauclerk.
He has pulled out his watch and is steadily consulting it.
"And it is now twenty minutes after five," says Lady Swansdown,
maliciously, who detests Beauclerk and who has read his relations with
Joyce as clear as a book. "How she must have enjoyed herself!"
"Yes; but where?" says Lady Baltimore anxiously. Joyce has been left in
her charge, and, apart from that, she likes the girl well enough, to be
uneasy about her when occasion arises.
"With whom would be a more appropriate question," says Dicky Browne,
who, as usual, is just where he ought not to be.
"Oh, I know where she is," cries a little, shrill voice from the
background. It comes from Tommy, and from that part of the room where
Tommy and Mabel and little Bertie are having a game behind the window
curtains. Blocks, dolls, kitchens, farm yards, ninepins--all have been
given to them as a means of keeping them quiet. One thing only has been
forgotten: the fact that the human voice divine is more attractive to
them, more replete with delightful mystery, fuller of enthralling
possibilities than all the toys that ever yet were made.
"Thomas, are you fully alive to the responsibilities to which you pledge
yourself?" demands Mr. Browne severely.
"What?" says Tommy.
"Do you pledge yourself to declare where Miss Kavanagh is now?"
"Is it Joyce?" says Tommy, coming forward and standing undaunted in his
knickerbockers and an immaculate collar that defies suspicion.
"Yes--Joyce," says Mr. Browne, who never can hold his tongue.
"Well, I know." Tommy pauses, and an unearthly silence falls on the
assembled company. Half the county is present, and as Tommy, in the
character of _reconteur_, is widely known and deservedly dreaded,
expectation spreads itself among his audience.
Lady Baltimore moves uneasily, and for once Dicky Browne feels as if he
should like to sink into his boot.
"She's up on the top of the hill with Mr. Dysart," says Tommy, and no
more. Lady Baltimore sighs with relief, and Mr. Browne feels now as if
he should like to give Tommy something.
"How do you know?" asks Beauclerk, as though he finds it impossible to
repress the question.
"Because I saw her there," says Tommy, "when Mabel and me was coming
here. I like Mr. Dysart, don't you?" addressing Beauclerk specially. "He
is a very kind sort of man. He gave me half a crown."
"For what, Tommy?" asks Baltimore, idly, to whom Tommy is an unfailing
joy.
"To go away and leave him alone with Joyce," says Tommy, with awful
distinctness.
Tableau!
Lady Baltimore lets her spoon fall into her saucer, making a little
quick clatter. Everybody tries to think of something to say; nobody
succeeds.
Mr. Browne, who is evidently choking, is mercifully delivered by
beneficent nature from a sudden death. He gives way to a loud and
sonorous sneeze.
"Oh, Dicky! How funny you do sneeze," says Lady Swansdown. It is a
safety valve. Everybody at once affects to agree with her, and universal
laughter makes the room ring.
"Tommy, I think it is time for you and Mabel to go home," says Lady
Baltimore. "I promised your mother to send you back early. Give her my
love, and tell her I am so sorry she couldn't come to me to-day, but I
suppose last night's fatigue was too much for her."
"'Twasn't that," says Tommy; "'twas because cook----"
"Yes, yes; of course. I know," says Lady Baltimore, hurriedly, afraid of
further revelations. "Now, say good-bye, and, Bertie, you can go as far
as the first gate with them."
The children make their adieus, Tommy reserving Dicky Browne for a last
fond embrace.
"Good-bye, old man! So-long!"
"What's that?" says Tommy, appealing to Beauclerk for information.
"What's what?" says Beauclerk, who isn't in his usual amiable mood.
"What's the meaning of that thing Dicky said to me?"
"'So-long?' Oh that's Browne's charming way of saying good-bye."
"Oh!" says Tommy, thoughtfully. He runs it through his busy brain, and
brings it out at the other end satisfactorily translated. "I know," says
he: "Go long! That's what he meant! But I think," indignantly, "he
needn't be rude, anyway."
The children have hardly gone when Joyce and Dysart enter the room.
"I hope I'm not dreadfully late," cries Joyce, carelessly, taking off
her cap, and giving her head a little light shake, as if to make her
pretty soft hair fall into its usual charming order. "I have no idea
what the time is."
"Broken your watch, Dysart?" says Beauclerk, in a rather nasty tone.
"Come and sit here, dearest, and have your tea," says Lady Baltimore,
making room on the lounge beside her for Joyce, who has grown a little
red.
"It is so warm here," says she, nervously, that one remark of
Beauclerk's having, somehow, disconcerted her. "If--if I might----"
"No, no; you mustn't go upstairs for a little while," says Lady
Baltimore, with kindly decision. "But you may go into the conservatory
if you like," pointing to an open door off the library, that leads into
a bower of sweets. "It is cooler there."
"Far cooler," says Beauclerk, who has followed Joyce with a sort of
determination in his genial air. "Let me take you there, Miss Kavanagh."
It is impossible to refuse. Joyce, coldly, almost disdainfully and with
her head held higher than usual, skirts the groups that line the walls
on the western side of the room and disappears with him into the
conservatory.