“He swore like a trooper, he thumped his glass down on the table and
smashed it--a disgusting exhibition of temper--I was ashamed of him.
Then he said, ‘Never, as long as he lived and could prevent it--that he
had heard something of my infatuation, so as I am not given that way he
had made inquiries, and found the family was most unsatisfactory.’ Then
he had come here yesterday on purpose to see you--darling,” turning
to me--“and that he had judged for himself. The girl was a ‘devilish
beauty’ (his words not mine) with the naughtiest provoking eyes, and
a mouth--No! I can’t say the rest, it makes me too mad!” and Robert’s
eyes flashed.
Lady Merrenden rose from her seat, and came and took my other hand. I
felt as if I could not stand too tall and straight.
“The long and short of it is, he has absolutely refused to have
anything to do with the matter; says I need expect nothing further from
him, and we have parted for good and all!”
“Oh, Robert!” it was almost a cry from Lady Merrenden.
Robert put his arms round me, and his face changed to radiance.
“Well, I don’t care--what does it matter! A few places and thousands
in the dim future--the loss of them is nothing to me if I have only my
Evangeline now.”
“But, Robert, dearest,” Lady Merrenden said, “you can’t possibly live
without what he allows you, what have you of your own? About eighteen
hundred a year, I suppose, and you know, darling boy, you are often in
debt. Why he paid five thousand for you as lately as last Easter. Oh,
what is to be done!” and she clasped her hands.
I felt as if turned to stone. Was all this divine happiness going to
slip from my grasp? Yes, it looked like it, for I could never drag
Robert into poverty, and spoil his great future.
“He can’t leave away Torquilstone, and those thousands of profitless
acres,” Lady Merrenden went on, “but unfortunately the London property
is at his disposition. Oh! I must go and talk to him!”
“No!” said Robert. “It would not be the least use, and would look as
if we were pleading. His face had fallen to intense sadness as Lady
Merrenden spoke of his money.
“Darling,” he said, in a broken voice. “No, it is true it would not be
fair to make you a beggar. I should be a cad to ask you. We must think
of some way of softening my brother after all!”
Then I spoke.
“Robert,” I said, “if you were only John Smith I would say I would
willingly go and live with you in a cottage, or even in a slum--but you
are not, and I would not for _anything in the world_ drag you down out
of what is your position in life--that would be a poor sort of love.
Oh! my dear,” and I clasped tight his hand--“if everything fails, then
we must part, and you must forget me.”
He folded me in his arms, and we heard the door shut. Lady Merrenden
had left us alone. Oh! it was anguish and divine bliss at the same time
the next half hour.
“I will never forget you, and never in this world will I take another
woman, I swear to God,” he said at the end of it. “If we must part,
then life is finished for me of all joy.”
“And for me, too, Robert!”
We said the most passionate vows of love to one another, but I will not
write them here, there is another locked book where I keep them--the
book of my soul.
“Would it be any good if Colonel Tom Carden went and spoke to him?” I
asked, presently. “He was best man at papa’s wedding, and knows all
that there is to be known of poor mamma, and do you think that as
mamma’s father was Lord de Brandreth, a very old barony, I believe,
it is--oh! can it make any difference to the children’s actual
breeding, their parents not having been through the marriage ceremony?
I--I--don’t know much of those sort of things!”
“My sweet!” said Robert, and through all our sorrow he smiled and
kissed me, “my sweet, sweet Evangeline.”
“But does the Duke know all the details of the history,” I asked, when
I could speak--one can’t when one is being kissed.
“Every little bit, it seems. He says he will not discuss the matter of
that, I must know it is quite enough, as I have always known his views,
but if they were not sufficient, your wild, wicked beauty is. You would
not be faithful to me for a year, he said. I could hardly keep from
killing him when he hurled that at my head.”
I felt my temper rising. How frightfully unjust--how cruel. I went
over and looked in the glass--a big mirror between the window--drawing
Robert with me.
“Oh! tell me, tell me what is it. Am I so very bad looking? It is a
curse surely that is upon me!”
“Of course you are not bad looking, my darling!” exclaimed
Robert. “You are perfectly beautiful--slender, stately, exquisite
tiger-lily--only--only--you don’t look cold--and it is just your red
hair, and those fascinating green eyes, and your white lovely skin and
black eyelashes that, that--oh! you know, you sweetheart! You don’t
look like bread and butter, you are utterly desirable, and you would
make any one’s heart beat!”