"Ah, were she pitiful as she is fair."
"Life's a varied, bright illusion,
Joy and sorrow--light and shade."
"It was almost warm," says she, turning round to him. She seems to be
talking all the time, so vivid is her face, so intense her vitality. "I
was so glad to see the Brabazons again. You know them, don't you? Kit
looked perfect. So lovely, so good in every way--voice, face, manners. I
felt I envied her. It would be delightful to feel that every one must be
admiring one, as she does." She glances at him, and he leans a little
toward her. "No, no, not a compliment, please. I know I am as much
behind Kit as the moon is behind the sun."
"I wasn't going to pay you a compliment," says he, slowly.
"No?" she laughs. It was unlike her to have made that remark, and just
as unlike her to have taken his rather discourteous reply so
good-naturedly.
"It was a charming visit," she goes on, not in haste, but idly as it
were, and as if words are easy to her. "I quite enjoyed it. Barbara
didn't. I think she wanted to get home--she is always thinking of the
babies--or----Well, I did. I am not ungrateful. I take the goods the
gods provide, and find honest pleasure in them. I do not think, indeed,
I laughed so much for quite a century as to-day with Kit."
"She is sympathetic," says Felix, with the smallest thought of the
person in question in his mind.
"More than that, surely. Though that is a hymn of praise in itself.
After all it is a relief to meet Irish people when one has spent a week
or two in stolid England. You agree with me?"
"I am English," returns he.
"Oh! Of course! How rude of me! I didn't mean it, however. I had
entirely forgotten, our acquaintance having been confined entirely to
Irish soil until this luckless moment. You do forgive me?"
She is leaning a little forward and looking at him with a careless
expression.
"No," returns he briefly.
"Well, you should," says she, taking no notice of his cold rejoinder,
and treating it, indeed, as if it is of no moment. If there was a deeper
meaning in his refusal to grant her absolution she declines to
acknowledge it. "Still, even that _bêtise_ of mine need not prevent you
from seeing some truth in my argument. We have our charms, we Irish,
eh?"
"Your charm?"
"Well, mine, if you like, as a type, and"--recklessly and with a shrug
of her shoulders--"if you wish to be personal."
She has gone a little too far.
"I think I have acknowledged that," says he, coldly. He rises abruptly
and goes over to where she is standing on the hearthrug--shading her
face from the fire with a huge Japanese fan. "Have I ever denied your
charm?" His tone has been growing in intensity, and now becomes stern.
"Why do you talk to me like this? What is the meaning of it all--your
altered manner--everything? Why did you grant me this interview?"
"Perhaps because"--still with that radiant smile, bright and cold as
early frost--"like that little soapy boy, I thought you would 'not be
happy till you got it.'"
She laughs lightly. The laugh is the outcome of the smile, and its close
imitation. It is perfectly successful, but on the surface only. There is
no heart in it.
"You think I arranged it?"
"Oh, no; how could I? You have just said I arranged it." She shuts up
her fan with a little click. "You want to say something, don't you?"
says she, "well, say it!"
"You give me permission, then?" asks he, gravely, despair knocking at
his heart.
"Why not--would I have you unhappy always?" Her tone is jesting
throughout.
"You think," taking the hand that holds the fan and restraining its
motion for a moment, "that if I do speak I shall be happier?"
"Ah! that is beyond me," says she. "And yet--yes; to get a thing over is
to get rid of fatigue. I have argued it all out for myself, and have
come to the conclusion----"
"For yourself!"
"Well, for you too," a little impatiently. "After all, it is you who
want to speak. Silence, to me, is golden. But it occurred to me in the
silent watches of the night," with another, now rather forced, little
laugh, "that if you once said to me all you had to say, you would be
contented, and go away and not trouble me any more."
"I can do that now, without saying anything," says he slowly. He has
dropped her hand; he is evidently deeply wounded.
"Can you?"
Her eyes are resting relentlessly on his. Is there magic in them? Her
mouth has taken a strange expression.
"I might have known how it would be," says Dysart, throwing up his head.
"You will not forgive! It was but a moment--a few words, idle,
hardly-considered, and----"
"Oh, yes, considered," says she slowly.
"They were unmeant!" persists he, fiercely. "I defy you to think
otherwise. One great mistake--a second's madness--and you have ordained
that it shall wreck my whole life! You!--That evening in the library at
the court. I had not thought of----"
"Ah!" she interrupts him, even more by her gesture--which betrays the
first touch of passion she has shown--than by her voice, that is still
mocking. "I knew you would have to say it!"
"You know me, indeed!" says he, with an enforced calmness that leaves
him very white. "My whole heart and soul lies bare to you, to ruin it as
you will. It is the merest waste of time, I know; but still I have felt
all along that I must tell you again that I love you, though I fully
understand I shall receive nothing in return but scorn and contempt.
Still, to be able even to say it is a relief to me."
"And what is it to me?" asks the girl, as pale now as he is. "Is it a
relief--a comfort to me to have to listen to you?"
She clenches her hands involuntarily. The fan falls with a little crash
to the ground.
"No." He is silent a moment, "No--it is unfair--unjust! You shall not be
made uncomfortable again. It is the last time.... I shall not trouble
you again in this way. I don't say we shall never meet again.
You"--pausing and looking at her--"you do not desire that?"
"Oh, no," coldly, politely.
"If you do, say so at once," with a rather peremptory ring in his tone.
"I should," calmly.
"I am glad of that. As my cousin is a great friend of mine, and as I
shall get a fortnight's leave soon, I shall probably run over to
Ireland, and spend it with her. After all"--bitterly--"why should I
suppose it would be disagreeable to you?"
"It was quite a natural idea," says she, immovably.
"However," says he, steadily, "you need not be afraid that, even if we
do meet, I shall ever annoy you in this way again----"
"Oh, I am never afraid," says she, with that terrible smile that seems
to freeze him.
"Well, good-bye," holding out his hand. He is quite as composed as she
is now, and is even able to return her smile in kind.
"So soon? But Barbara will be down to tea in a few minutes. You will
surely wait for her?"
"I think not."
"But really do! I am going to see after the children, and give them some
chocolate I bought for them."
"It will probably make them ill," says he, smiling still. "No, thank
you. I must go now, indeed. You will make my excuses to Mrs. Monkton,
please. Good-bye."
"Good-bye," says she, laying her hand in his for a second. She has grown
suddenly very cold, shivering: it seems almost as if an icy blast from
some open portal has been blown in upon her. He is still looking at her.
There is something wild--strange--in his expression.
"You cannot realize it, but I can," says he, unsteadily. "It is good-bye
forever, so far as life for me is concerned."
He has turned away from her. He is gone. The sharp closing of the door
wakens her to the fact that she is alone. Mechanically, quite calmly,
she looks around the empty room. There is a little Persian chair cover
over there all awry. She rearranges it with a critical eye to its proper
appearance, and afterward pushes a small chair into its place. She pats
a cushion or two, and, finally taking up her bonnet and the pins she had
laid upon the chimney-piece, goes up to her own room.
Once there----
With a rush the whole thing comes back to her. The entire meaning of
it--what she has done. That word--forever. The bonnet has fallen from
her fingers. Sinking upon her knees beside the bed, she buries her face
out of sight. Presently her slender frame is torn by those cruel, yet
merciful sobs!