“YES, COMING.”
“To bear is to conquer our fate.”
--CAMPBELL.
Betty had been out in the garden, gathering a harvest of flowers,
whilst her three companions raced one another round the gravel walks,
or rollicked among the cabbages, and she had now returned with an
armful of roses, carnations and geraniums, to where all the empty vases
in the house were paraded on the study table, awaiting her attention.
They were soon filled from the pile of flowers. Betty had dainty,
tasteful fingers, and knew how to apply a bud here and to insert a bit
of fern there. She took up a late yellow rose quite tenderly, and
gave it the honour of a glass to itself, and set it off with one or
two pretty shaded leaves. Had George her rose still? The one she had
pulled from the old Cloth of Gold tree, now so many months ago. He had
said a year, and a year had elapsed; it was a year and two months since
that summer afternoon, when, as she came in from picking strawberries
she found him waiting for her at the end of the long walk. Oh, and her
heart beat quickly at the thought, if she had only seen him standing
there, when she opened the garden gate to-day! Not that she doubted him
for one second; no, she turned her bangle on her arm, and told herself
she would trust him, and wait for him, if she lived for fifty years.
“Betty, Betty, Betty,” screamed Belle, coming dashing through the
drawing-room, like a whirlwind. “Where are you? News, news, and such
news,” embracing her and hugging her till she was almost suffocated.
“Do put down those wretched flowers, and listen to what I am going
to tell you. Something so very nice,” she added with her usual rapid
utterance.
Betty stuck a piece of geranium in a glass, and turned to her cousin
with an expectant smile.
“Mother has had a letter from George Holroyd.”
Here Betty became rather white.
“It came by the second post; his uncle has made him an allowance, and
he can afford to marry _now_. He has friends going to India next month,
and so he has written home for--guess who?” pushing her cousin away
playfully with both hands and looking at her with a pair of brilliant,
excited eyes. Betty gazed back at her with a stare of awful suspense,
and almost held her breath.
“For _me_!” cried Belle, and she broke into a hysterical peal of
laughter. Betty felt as if her heart had stopped. Her senses seemed
to be suddenly benumbed; there was a dimness over her eyes. “Isn’t it
splendid?” continued Belle exultantly, still holding her cousin by
the wrists. “Am I not a lucky girl? Oh, what a change in one’s life a
little bit of paper and a few strokes can make”--(Yes, poor Betty, what
a change indeed!)
“And is it quite certain--are you sure?” she stammered with a curious
catching of her breath.
“As sure as I am standing here, my dear child! Here’s his letter, you
may read it if you like!”
“Oh, no! no!” averting her face with a kind of shuddering sigh. Belle
in her innocence was turning the knife in the wound.
“Why, Bet! What’s this, are you not glad? Bet, don’t be silly, you
won’t miss me so _very_ much, you have plenty of friends, and perhaps,
if you are good, I shall send for you some day to come out and live
with us. Eh--why don’t you speak? I thought you would have been
delighted!”
“It is all so sudden,” faltered the domestic martyr in a strange voice,
“and--and of course,” turning her white face bravely on her cousin, “I
am glad you are so happy,” but she might have been a different girl, so
changed was she.
“Then look glad, my dear! and kiss me, my Queen Elizabeth. My! how icy
cold you are this broiling afternoon, a walk will warm you.”
Belle was far too pre-occupied with her own happiness to take serious
notice of her cousin’s deadly pallor.
“I want you to go into town on an errand for me at once. I have so
much to do, and think of, and so very little time. I feel completely
bewildered. First of all, I must write to those friends of George’s by
this post on account of taking my passage. _He_ pays for it; is he not
generous? And I am to send him a wire. Look here, do you think this
will do?” producing a bit of paper on which was pencilled:
“George Holroyd, Mangobad, India. Yes, coming.”
“Six words at four shillings and six-pence a word, no need to put who
it is from. _He_ knows,” and she laughed triumphantly. “It will come to
one pound seven; here is the family purse; will you send it at once,
and write it on the proper office form?”
“Yes,” responded Betty with an effort, her throat felt so hard and dry.
“Now don’t be so dull and grumpy, Bet! Do you think distance will make
any difference to me? Do you think I shall ever forget you? I shall
miss you frightfully. Who will bring me my tea, spell my notes, and
help me to do up my dresses, and pack my clothes? When you are up the
street you might run into Dooley’s and tell them they are not to do a
stitch of plain work for any one but me for the next month. I will go
in to-morrow and speak to them myself.”
“Very well,” said her listener mechanically.
“Now I must run and write to these Calvert people, and to lots of
others, and give them ample time to forward desirable wedding
presents. To intimate friends I shall send round a list of what I
require. I hope Miss Dopping will give me something good, _you_ might
suggest a handsome dressing bag--fitted, of course.”
“And won’t you write to Mrs. Malone?”
“Not I,” scornfully. “She can wait. No doubt she has had an inkling of
this all along, and that was why she was always so very cool to me.
_You_ are her favourite, Betty; only for supporting her and Cuckoo, and
her good-for-nothing son, poor George would have married me a year ago.
I believe he made them over every penny of his private means; however,
they have seen the last of _our_ money.”
Betty noted the plural, and how glibly it came tripping off the
bride-elect’s lips.
“Well, I must fly, or the post will be going without my despatches. How
wild Annie Carr will be! I shall write to her at once. I shall write to
tell her that I am going to marry a handsome, rich young officer, who
adores me, and is counting the very seconds till I join him in India!
Poor Annie, her day is over. I feel as if my sun were just rising,” and
she passed into the hall singing.
Who can picture Betty--let them picture her, as she stood alone in
the middle of the room, with pale dry lips, and a face like marble.
Suddenly she sat down, and laid her arms on the table, and leant
her throbbing head on them. All she wanted was time to think, to
pull herself together, to try and understand what it meant; no tear
trickled down her face--a face miserable and quivering with anguish.
What did it all mean? What _did_ it mean? It meant that George
Holroyd, “Gentleman George” as Fred Moore said he was called, her
_preux chevalier_, her model of all that was unselfish, and noble, and
manly, had proved to be a very poor specimen of chivalry after all. He
had merely been amusing himself with her, an ignorant, simple-minded
little country chit! It was true that he had not told his love in so
many words, his proposal at the garden gate had been a parable, but
had that bangle no meaning? Nor a little bunch of forget-me-nots on a
Christmas card, nor the kiss he had imprinted on her hand, nor the look
in his eyes when they had parted? Had not irrepressible, chattering
Cuckoo, plainly informed her that she was sure George worshipped the
ground she stood on, and although she had feebly silenced her, Cuckoo
had persisted in declaring that he had removed her photograph from the
Bridgetstown album; and--and--and it all meant _nothing_. She was only
a stupid, silly little country girl, and he had been in love with her
cousin all along. It was to her he wrote constantly, she had evidently
expected this summons to join him. Pretty, fascinating, well-dressed
Belle! and yet how often had he quitted Belle to speak to her? To dwell
on these cherished memories was folly now; he was going to marry Belle,
and she must stifle her feelings and seem _glad_. Her brief dream of
happiness was over, was gone for ever; before her stretched the old
monotonous existence, with nothing but a blank, hopeless future. All
the light had gone out of her life--quenched in a moment by a careless
hand. Suddenly she heard Belle’s step approaching, and what a light
and happy contrast, to her usual dragging heavy gait.
“What!” she cried, “not gone yet! Oh, do hurry and send off the
telegram. George said he would expect it so anxiously, and moments to
_you_ are hours to him! I want you to get me five shillings’ worth of
stamps. How queer and strange you look; certainly such sudden news _is_
stunning. Here is your hat, you will do very well; come, be off.”
And she hastily escorted her to the hall door, and saw her down the
avenue, accompanied by the three delighted dogs (Mossoo preferred the
fire, and the other dogs preferred his room to his company). As Betty
walked along, smiling and nodding to many acquaintances--for it had
been market day--she was by no means a bad imitation of the Spartan boy
and fox. She was suffering her first keen agonising grief, and wore
a white but cheerful countenance. Oh! what would she not give to be
able to run away and hide herself in the woods, and there alone have
it out with this stabbing pain that seemed to be tearing at her very
heart-strings. She wended her way to the post office, and wrote out
Belle’s message on a telegram form. Strange fate! that hers should be
the hand to extinguish her own best hopes!
Miss Bolland, the post-mistress and Ballingoole daily news, of which
Maria Finny was the supplement, observed more than most people, and
noticed how pale Betty was, and how her hand shook as she guided the
pen, and remarked upon it, with her usual uncompromising frankness.
“It’s the change in the weather,” replied the girl mendaciously. “This
close weather is trying, and I am sure there is thunder in the air.”
“Dear me, do you say so! I’m that nervous in a thunderstorm, on account
of the telegraph wires. Well, miss, you do look poorly, I must say.”
“A telegram to _India_,” as Betty handed it to her; “we never sent one
there before.
“‘George Holroyd, Mangobad, India,
Yes, coming.’”
Now reading it aloud with inexpressible unction.
“From _you_, Miss Betty?” with a quick glance.
“Oh no, but it is of no consequence whom it is from. It need not be
wired. _He_ knows.”
“Yes--but I must know, too,” returned Jane Bolland rather sharply,
“otherwise I can’t send it.”
“Miss Redmond sends it,” said Betty quietly.
“Oh, indeed. So I was thinking; yes, coming to Mr. Holroyd. Oh, of
course. It will be one pound seven shillings. Thank you, miss, it
shall be despatched at once. I quite understand its importance. _Good_
evening.”
In less than five minutes, Jane had darted out with a shawl over her
head, to impart the great news to Mrs. Maccabe--who lived next door
but one--and before the shops were closed, all Ballingoole was in
possession of the intelligence, that Miss Redmond was going to India to
be married to Mr. Holroyd--and no one was the least surprised, except
Miss Dopping and Betty.