I think I saw the dawn that day on which the ball was to be. Whether I
did or not, the morning was still very gray and cold when I crept out
of my bed and stole to the wardrobe to look at our two dresses. There
they hung, carefully displayed upon shifting pegs such as were used in
old-fashioned presses: one soft white muslin; the other of that pale
apple-green shot silk which had belonged to mother in the days of her
youth, and which I had been allowed to make up for the occasion. We had
worked at them for days.
Joyce was clever at dress-making: she was clever at all things that
needed deftness of fingers. She had fitted me with my frock, and we
had both worked together. But now the dresses were finished, the last
ruffle had been tacked in; there was nothing more to do, and the day
wore away very slowly till evening.
At last the hour came when it was time to dress, and such a washing of
faces and brushing of hair as went on in that little attic chamber for
half an hour no one would believe.
Joyce insisted on "finishing" me first. She coiled up my hair at the
back of my head, brushing it as neatly as she could, and laying it in
two thick bands on either side of my temples. It never will look very
neat, it is such vigorous unruly hair, this red hair of mine, and to
this day always has tendrils escaping here and there over forehead and
neck. But she did her best for it, and I was pleased with myself. I was
still more pleased with myself when I got on the green shot silk with
the lace ruffles. Joyce said she was surprised to see what a change it
made in me. So was I.
My skin was very pink and white wherever it was not spoiled by
freckles, and the green of the frock seemed to show it up and make the
red lips look redder than ever. It is true that my neck and arms were
frail still with the frailness of youth, but then my figure was slim
too, and my eyes were black with excitement, and shone till they were
twice their usual size. I thought, as I looked in the glass, that I was
not so very plain. Yes, I was right when I had begged the shot silk.
Joyce could wear anything, but I, who was no "fine bird" by nature,
needed the "fine feathers."
I was pleased with myself, and I smiled with satisfaction when Joyce
declared again that she was quite surprised to see what a good
appearance I had. "If you would only keep yourself tidy, Margaret, you
have no idea how much better you would look," said she.
It was what Deborah was always saying, but I did not resent it from
Joyce--she was gentle in her way of saying it; and I remember that I
promised I would brush my hair smooth in future, and wear my collars
more daintily. I do not believe that I kept to my resolution, but that
evening I was not at all the Margaret of every-day life as I surveyed
myself in the glass.
"But come," said I, hurriedly--half ashamed of myself, I do
believe--"we shall be late if we don't make haste. Do get on, Joyce."
Joyce began brushing out her long golden hair--real gold hair, not
faint flaxen--and coiled the smooth, shining bands of it round her
little head. It was a little head, such as I have seen in the pictures
of the Virgins painted by Italian painters of long ago.
"I sha'n't be long," said she.
I sat down and watched her. She would not have let me help her if I
had wanted to do so. She would have said that I should only disarrange
myself, and that I should be of no use. Certainly nothing was wanted
but what she did for herself, and she did it quickly enough. When she
stood up before the mirror--tipped back to show the most of her person,
for we had no pier-glasses at the Grange--I do not believe that any one
could have found a thing to improve in her. Her figure looked taller
and slenderer than ever in the long white dress, and the soft little
folds of the muslin clung tenderly around her delicate shape, just
leaving bare her neck and arms, that were firm and white as alabaster.
Her face was flushed as a May rose; her lips were parted in her anxiety
to hasten, and showed the little even white teeth within. Her blue eyes
were clear and soft under the black lashes.
She moved before the glass to see that her dress was not too long, and
bent back her slender throat, upon which she had just clasped mother's
delicate little old-fashioned gold necklace with the drops of yellow
beryl-stone. It was the only bit of good jewellery in the family, and
Joyce always wore it, it became her so well.
"Come now, Meg," said she, "I am quite ready. Let's go and see if we
can do anything to help mother."
We went down-stairs. Deborah was there in mother's room waiting to
survey us all. She had just fastened mother's dove-colored satin gown
that had served her for every party she had been at since she was
married. Mother had just the same shaped cap on that she always wore;
she never would alter it for any fashion, but that night the frill
of it was made of beautiful old lace that she kept in blue paper and
lavender all the rest of the year. I thought she looked splendid, but
Joyce was not so easily pleased.
"Dear mother, you really must have another gown before you go anywhere
again," said she, shaking out the skirt with a dissatisfied air. "This
satin has lost all its stiffness."
Mother looked at it a little anxiously herself, I remember, when Joyce
said this. We considered Joyce a judge of dress and the fashions,
and of course the squire's ball was a great occasion. But she said
she thought it did very well for an old lady, and indeed so did I,
although that may perhaps have been because I was very anxious to be
off.
Dear mother! I do not think she gave much thought to herself; she was
taken up with pride in us. Yes, I do believe that night she was proud
even of me.
She smiled when Deborah, with her hand on the door-knob, said,
patronizingly, that although she did not hold with bare arms and necks
for modest females, she never would have thought that I should have
"dressed up" so well. Mother bade her begone, but I think she was
pleased.
"Dear me!" said she, looking at me. "I recollect buying that silk.
It must have been in '52, when father took me up to town to see the
Exhibition. It was cheap for the good silk it is. It has made up very
well."
She turned me all round. Then she went to her jewel-case, unlocked it,
and took out a row of red coral beads.
"That's what you want with that dress," said she, fastening them round
my throat. "And you shall have them for your own. Red-haired women
ought to wear coral, folk say. Though for my part, I always thought it
was putting on too many colors."
How well I remember my pleasure at that gift! Joyce wanted to persuade
me not to wear them; she said the pale green of the frock was prettier
without the red beads. But I wouldn't listen to her; I was too pleased
with them, and I do not believe that it was entirely owing to gratified
vanity; I think a little of it was pleasure that mother thought my
appearance worth caring for.
I should not have thought it worth caring for myself two days ago, and
I should not have cared whether mother did or not. But something had
happened to me. Was it the sight of Joyce and her lover that had made
me think of myself as a woman? I cannot tell. All I know is that when
we walked into the squire's ball-room a quarter of an hour afterwards,
I felt my face flame as I saw his gaze rest upon me for a moment, and
I longed most heartily to be back again in my high-necked homespun
frock, with no corals round my throat at all. So inconsistent are we at
nineteen!
Fortunately my awakening self-consciousness was soon put to flight by
other more engrossing emotions. There was a fair sprinkling of people
already when we got into the room, and more were arriving every moment.
Mr. Farnham and the maiden sister with whom he lived were going busily
about welcoming the squire's guests almost as though they were the
host and hostess themselves: he was the Conservative member. A quiet,
inoffensive old gentleman himself, who would have been nothing and
nobody without the squire; but blessed with a most officious lady for
relative, who took the whole neighborhood under her wing.
She rather annoyed me by the way she had of trading on the squire's
support of her brother. He supported her brother because he was a
Conservative, not at all because he was Mr. Farnham, or even Miss
Farnham's brother.
Poor Mr. Broderick, I dare say, if the truth had been known, he must
often heartily have longed to get rid of them. But the old thing was
a good soul in her way, if it _was_ a dictatorial, loud-voiced way,
and was very active among the poor, although it was not always in the
manner which they liked.
She and mother invariably quarrelled over the advantages of
soup-kitchens and clothing clubs; for mother was every bit as obstinate
as Miss Farnham, and being an old-fashioned woman, liked to do her
charity in a more personal fashion.
I looked with mingled awe and amusement upon their meeting to-night.
Miss Farnham had an aggressive sort of head-dress, with nodding
artificial flowers that seemed to look down scornfully upon mother's
old lace and soft frills. She had not seen me for some time, and when
mother introduced me as her youngest daughter, she took my hand firmly
in hers, and held it a while in her uncompromising grip while she
looked at me through and through.
"Well, I never saw such a thing in my life!" exclaimed she presently,
in a loud voice that attracted every one's attention.
I blushed. I was not given to blushing, but it was enough to make any
one blush. I thought, of course, that she was alluding to my attire, in
which I had felt so shy and awkward from the moment that I had entered
the ball-room, from the moment that I had felt the squire's glance rest
upon my neck and arms.
She dropped my hand.
"The very image of him," said she, turning to my mother.
"Yes, she is very like her father," agreed the mother.
"Why, my dear, the very image of him," repeated the aggravating
creature. "Got his temper too?" asked she, turning to me again.
"I don't know, ma'am, I'm sure," answered I, half amused, but still
more annoyed. "I dare say."
"Oh, I'll be bound you have, and proud of it too," declared she,
shaking her head emphatically. "Girls are always proud to be like their
fathers."
"I don't suppose it'll make any very particular difference who I'm
like," said I. "Things will happen just the same, I expect."
Miss Farnham laughed and patted me boisterously on the back.
I do not think she was an ill-natured woman, although she certainly had
the talent of making one feel very uncomfortable.
"Well, you're not so handsome as your sister," added she. "But I don't
know that you hadn't better thank your stars for that."
With that she turned away from me and sat down beside mother, arranging
her dress comfortably over her knees as though she meant to stay there
the whole evening.
The people kept coming fast now. The squire stood at the door shaking
hands as hard as he could. There was the old village doctor with his
pretty granddaughter, and the young village doctor who had inherited
the practice, and had just married a spry little wife in the hope of
making it more important.
And then there was the widow of an officer, who lived in a solid brick
house that stood at the corner of the village street, and had two sons
in the ship business in town. And there was the mild-eyed clergyman
with his delicate young wife, who had more than enough babies of her
own, and was only too thankful to leave the babies of the parish to
Miss Farnham or any one else who would mother them.
She was a sweet little woman, with a transparently white face and
soft silky hair, and she wore her wedding-dress to-night, without the
slightest regard to the fact that it was made in a somewhat elaborate
fashion of six years back, and was not exactly suited to her figure at
that particular moment. She sat down between mother and Miss Farnham,
and must have been considerably cheered by that lady's remark to the
effect that she looked as if she ought to be in her bed, and that if
she did not retire to it she would most likely soon be in her grave.
I left mother and went up to greet Mary Thorne, who had just come in
with her father. He was a great, strong, florid man, rather shaky about
his _h's_, but very much the reverse of shaky in any other way; shrewd
and keen as a sharp knife or an east wind.
I don't know that I ever spoke to him but this once in my life. Father
had such an overpowering aversion to him that we were not allowed to
keep even the daughter's acquaintance long after this, but he made that
impression on me: that there was only one soft spot in him, and that
for the motherless girl, who was the only person allowed to contradict
him.
She contradicted him now.
The squire had gone up to receive them bluntly enough, even I could
see; but the squire might be allowed to have an aversion to the man who
was going in as a Radical to contest his Conservative's long-occupied
seat, though indeed I believe his dislike to the manufacturer was
quite as much, because he had bought up one of the old places in the
neighborhood with money earned in business. I fancy the Thornes were
only invited that night as old friends of Frank Forrester's, and I
don't think Frank was thanked for the necessity.
"You must have had a rare job, Broderick, lighting this old place up,"
he was saying as I came up; "all this dark oak, so gloomy looking!"
"Oh, papa, how can you!" laughed his daughter. "Why, it's what
everybody admires; it's the great sight of the whole neighborhood."
"Yes, yes; I know, my dear," answered Mr. Thorne; "you mean to say that
we should like to live here ourselves. Well, yes, I should have bought
the place if it had been in the market, but--"
"But you would have done it up," broke in the squire, bristling all
over; "whereas there's been nothing new in the Manor since--"
He stopped.
I fancied that he was going to say, "Since I brought my bride home;"
but he said, after a pause, "since my father died."
"Well, to be sure, I do like a bit of brightness and color,"
acknowledged Thorne, whose fine house, although in excellent taste,
was decidedly ornate and splendid; "and it is more suited to festal
occasions."
"There, papa, you know nothing about it," declared Mary, emphatically.
"I declare I never saw the Manor look better. Those flags and garlands
are beautiful."
"Oh, my nephew Frank did all that," answered the squire, carelessly;
"he likes that sort of thing."
"Captain Forrester?" repeated the girl, with just a little smile on her
frank, fresh face. "Well, it does him credit then. It isn't every one
would take so much trouble."
"He likes taking trouble," said I. "Just look at the trouble that he
has taken over our concert."
"He likes playing first-fiddle," laughed Miss Thorne, gayly, her rosy
face--that was too rosy for prettiness, although not too rosy for the
perfection of health--flushing rosier than ever as she said it; "I
always tell him so."
I did not answer. Mr. Thorne and his daughter moved on, and I looked
round the room in search of the captain. The place did look very
beautiful, although I do not think that I should like now to see its
severe proportions and splendid wood wainscoting disfigured by flags
and garlands. We were dancing in what used long ago to be the monks'
refectory. The house had been built on the site of a part of the
monastic buildings belonging to the abbey, and this portion of the old
edifice had been retained, while the remainder of the house was in
Tudor style. I heard the squire explaining it to the new parson, who
had lately come to the next parish. I had heard him explain it before,
or I do not suppose that I should have known anything at all about it.
"I suppose you consider it shocking to be dancing in any part of the
monastery?" I could hear him say, laughing; "but it isn't so bad as a
friend of mine who gives balls in what used to be the chapel."
The parson was a young man, with a sallow, shaven face and very refined
features; the expression of his mouth was gentle, almost tremulous, but
his eyes were dark and penetrating.
"I'm not quite so prejudiced as that," he said, laughing also,
"although I do wear the cloth."
"That's right," said the squire, heartily. "We have the remains of a
thirteenth-century chapel of the purest period in the grounds, and we
don't desecrate that even by a school-feast. You must come and see it
in the day-time."
Father came up at that moment. He was dreadfully like a fish out of
water, poor father, in this assembly, and looked it. The squire, in
a hasty fashion, introduced him to the Rev. Cyril Morgan, and passed
on to shake hands with a portly wine-merchant, who had lately retired
from business in the neighboring town, and had taken one of the solid
red-brick houses that were the remnants of our own town's affluence.
This gentleman introduced his wife, and she had to be introduced to
the company, and the host's hands were full. Father moved away with
the parson. He looked rather disgusted at first, but the young man
looked at him with a smile upon his gentle mouth and in his dark
eyes, and said, diffidently, "I have heard a great deal of you, Mr.
Maliphant--the whole neighborhood rings with your name. I am proud to
meet you."
Of course, I liked that young man at once, and as I went to sit down
again beside the mother and Joyce, I was pleased to see across
the room that father and the Rev. Cyril Morgan had entered upon a
conversation. But, to tell the truth, I soon forgot him; I was too busy
looking about me.
I could not help wondering where Captain Forrester could be, and I
was quite angry with Joyce for being so dignified and seeming to care
so little. She seemed to be quite engrossed with the Hoad girls,
who sailed in, followed by their father, just late enough to be
fashionable, and to secure a good effect for their smart new frocks.
I am afraid I was not gracious to the Hoads. I could not be so gracious
as Joyce, who took all their patronizing over the concert in the utmost
good faith. I turned away from them, and continued my search for
Joyce's admirer. I disliked them, and I am afraid that I showed it.
But they passed on, Bella, who was the better-looking of the two,
pursued by two town-bred youths asking for a place on her card; Jessie,
the elder, talking with an old lady of title from the seaport town, who
wished her to sing at a charity concert.
They seemed to be very much engrossed; nevertheless, when presently the
band struck up the first waltz, they, as well as many other people in
the room, turned round to look who was dancing it. They put up their
long-handled eye-glasses and fairly stared; for, as soon as the music
began, the squire had walked up to my sister and had asked her to open
the ball with him.
Mother blushed with pleasure and triumph; her dear blue eyes positively
shone. She did not say a word, but I know that if she had spoken she
would have said that she was not surprised.
I was not surprised either, but I was very much annoyed, and I was
not at all in a good temper with Captain Forrester when, two minutes
afterwards, he appeared coming out of the conservatory with Mary
Thorne upon his arm. What had he been about? No wonder that his face
clouded when he saw that he was too late. But it was his own fault;
I was not a bit sorry for him. Mary Thorne was laughing and looking
up half-defiantly in his face. She looked as if she were saying one
of those rough blunt things of which she was so fond; and she might
well say one at this moment to Captain Forrester, although I scarcely
supposed it could be on the topic on which he deserved it.
Could she possibly be chaffing him on having missed the first dance
with my sister? No; for she had had no opportunity of noticing his
devotion to her. She dropped his arm and nodded to him merrily, as
much as to bid him leave her--as much as to say that she knew there
might be better sport elsewhere. And after a word in reply to what she
had said, he did leave her and came across to me.
There was a troubled, preoccupied look on his bright face, which was
scarcely accounted for by the fact that he had missed a dance with
Joyce. He greeted me and sat down beside me without even asking after
father. We sat and watched Joyce float round in the strong grasp of the
squire, but I do not think that we were either of us quite so pleased
at the sight as was mother, upon whose face was joy unalloyed.
She was simply genuinely proud that the squire should have opened the
ball with her daughter. I think she would have been proud of it had
there been no deeper hopes at the bottom of her heart. But there were
deeper hopes, and as I watched Joyce that night I remembered them.
In the excitement of watching the romance that I had fancied developing
itself more quickly and more decisively than I had even hoped, I had at
first quite forgotten my fears about the squire wanting to marry Joyce.
They had not occurred to my mind at all until that afternoon two days
ago, when he had talked so vehemently about Frank's position. But now,
as I watched him with her, the notion which I had rather refused to
entertain at all before took firmer shape.
I was afraid that the squire really did mean something by this very
marked attention to his tenant's daughter. It must needs excite a
great deal of comment even among those who knew our rather particular
position in the village, and the unusual intimacy between two families
of different social standing. Would he have courted that comment merely
for the sake of gratifying his old friend? What if he should propose to
Joyce--if he should ask our parents' consent to the marriage at once?
Would Captain Forrester, the unknown stranger, have any chance beside
the friend of years? Would the soldier, who had nothing but what he
earned by his brave calling, have a chance against the man who could
give her as fine a home as any in the county?
Not with mother; no, I felt not for an instant with mother. But with
father?
I knew very well that father, whatever his respect for the man, would
never see a marriage between the squire and his daughter with pleasure,
and I even thought it likely that he would downright forbid it. But
what would be his feelings with regard to the captain? Would they be
any different because, belonging by birth to another class, he yet
desired to work for the interest of the class that was ours? I could
not tell.
I was roused from my dream by the voice of Captain Forrester at my
side. He was asking me for a dance--this very next one. There was
something in the tone of his voice that puzzled me--a harsh sound, as
though something hurt him. Of course I gave him the dance. I was only
too delighted.
My feet had begun to itch as soon as I had heard the music, and when I
had seen Joyce sailing round, and no one had come to ask me, I had felt
very lonely. We stood up, even before the squire had brought Joyce back
to mother--we stood up, and with the first bars of the new waltz we set
forth. I soon forgot all thought of Joyce, or any one else, in the pure
joy of my own pleasure.
I did love dancing. I did not remember that it was Captain Forrester
with whom I was dancing, I only knew that it was a man who held me
firmly, and whose limbs moved with mine in an even and dreamy rhythm as
we glided across something that scarcely seemed to be a floor, to the
slow lilt of magic music. I was very fond of dancing. I suppose Captain
Forrester guessed it, for he never paused once the whole dance through.
When we stopped, just pleasantly out of breath, as the last chords died
slowly away, he said, with his eyes on my face in that way that I have
described, "Why, Miss Maliphant, you are a heavenly dancer. Where did
you learn it?"
"I had six lessons at the academy in the town," answered I, gravely;
and I wondered why he burst out laughing, "but Joyce gets out of breath
sooner than I do, although she had twelve lessons."
The laughter faded out of his face as I mentioned Joyce's name.
"I don't mean to say that Joyce doesn't dance beautifully," I added,
hastily, "she dances better than I do, because she is so tall and
slight, but she does get out of breath before the end of a waltz."
He did not make any remark upon this. He only said, "Shall we go back
to your mother?"
We got up and walked across the room. Miss Thorne was talking to
mother, and a clean-shaven, fresh-colored young officer was inscribing
his name on Joyce's programme.
Captain Forrester just shook hands with Joyce, and then he came and
sat down beside mother and began talking away to her in his most
excited fashion, telling her all about the waxing of the floor and the
hanging of the banners and the trimming of the evergreen garlands, and
how the gardener would put the Union Jack upside down, until she was
forced to be more gracious with him than was her wont.
Joyce's sweet mouth had the look upon it that I knew well when mother
and she had had an uncomfortable passage, but I could not imagine why
she should wear it to-night. I could look across upon her programme,
and I could see that there were names written nearly all the way down
it, although I could not read whose names they were, and especially
after my one taste of the joy of waltzing, I was beginning to think
that no girl could have cause for sadness who had a partner for every
dance. Alas! I had but one, and my spirits were beginning to sink very
low. I had forgotten love affairs; I wanted to waltz.
"There is a dreadful lack of gentlemen," said Jessie Hoad, who had come
up beside us, putting up her eye-glass and looking round the room.
"That unfortunate man must have his hands full."
"Do you mean Squire Broderick?" asked Miss Thorne. "I don't think he
considers himself unfortunate. He looked cheerful enough just now,
dancing with Miss Maliphant."
Miss Hoad vouchsafed no reply to this; she moved off to where her
father was talking to mine in a corner, and passing her arm within
his, walked him off without the slightest ceremony to be introduced to
the old lady with the handle to her name who had come over from our
fashionable seaport.
I thought it was very rude, but Mr. Hoad was not quite as affable
himself to-night as he was in the privacy of our own Grange parlor.
"I hate that kind of thing," said Miss Thorne to me, in her out-spoken
way. "When are there ever men enough at a country dance unless you get
in the riffraff from behind the shop counters? We come to meet our
friends, not to whirl round with mere sticks."
I thought it was very nice of Miss Thorne, but I wished there were just
men enough to dance with me.
The music struck up again and Joyce went off with her partner. I felt
as though life indeed were altogether a disappointment; and it did
not give me any pleasure to hear Miss Thorne commenting upon Joyce's
beauty, nor laughing in her frank, good-natured way about the squire's
attentions, any the more than it amused me to hear fragments of the
gay descriptions with which Captain Forrester was making the time pass
for mother.
But, after all, I began to despair too soon; it was only the fourth
dance of the evening. Before it was over the squire came up to me.
"I have been so busy," said he, "I haven't been able to come before,
but I hope you haven't given all your dances away?"
Although I was new to the ways of the world, an instinct within taught
me to say, coolly, "Oh no, not all."
"What can you give me?" asked he. And he quoted three numbers further
on in the evening. "I think, being old friends, we might dance three
dances together," added he, with a smile.
"Oh yes," cried I. "I should like to dance them with you."
The squire was a beautiful dancer, although he was not a young man;
or rather, although he was not what I then considered a young man.
I fancied he did not smile at my enthusiastic reply. He even looked
rather grave. I was too simple to think of not giving him my programme.
I saw him glance at it and then at me. From that moment I did not lack
partners, and as far as the company could provide them, good ones.
To be sure I jostled round the room with a raw youth or two, and guided
a puffing gentleman through the maze, and let my toes be trodden upon
by a tall gentleman with glasses on his nose, who only turned round
when he thought of it; but on the whole I enjoyed myself, and it was
all thanks to my host. I scarcely knew a man when I went into the
room, and certainly, save for that one wild, delightful waltz, Captain
Forrester had taken no account of me, although he had sat close to me
half the evening, and one would have thought he would have noticed that
I was not dancing. But then, of course, he was preoccupied. I could not
make him out at all. All the evening I could not once catch him even
talking to Joyce, and I am quite sure that when I went in to supper he
had not asked her to dance once.
If I had been enjoying myself less I might have thought more of it, but
I was too happy to remember it until the breathing-time came, when I
went into the dining-room. Then, when I saw Captain Forrester sitting
in one of the best places with that horrid old Miss Farnham, and Joyce
at a side-table, with scarcely room to stand, and no one but my pet
aversion, Mr. Hoad, even to get her something to eat, my blood boiled,
and I could scarcely speak civilly to him.
And he seemed so interested too, so wrapped up in what the silly
creature was saying, with that nodding old topknot of hers! I
was thankful when he rose and took her outside to finish their
discussion about the poor-laws in the seclusion of some corner of the
drawing-room. I was very angry with him.
I looked suspiciously at the squire, who had taken mother in to supper
and sat at the head of the table with her. Mother was smiling happily:
she was proud of the honor that the squire was doing to her and hers.
But I could not look kindly at the squire. It was infamous if, out of
mere jealousy, he had tried to spoil two lives. Instead of being proud
that he had done my sister the honor of opening the ball with her,
instead of being grateful to him for his kindness to me, and pleased to
see all the attention that he was paying to our mother amid the county
magnates whom he might have preferred, I was eaten up with this new
idea, and felt my heart swell within me as Joyce passed me presently
with that calm and yet half-tired look on her beautiful face.
Midnight was long past, and it was nearly time to go home. In fact,
father had said that it was time to go home long ago. He had made a
new friend in the young parson, and seemed to have passed an hour
happily with him, but the parson had left, and he had exhausted every
argument that he would consent to discuss with the people whom he met
in ordinary society and had been persuaded by Mr. Hoad to speak a civil
word on commonplace subjects to his pet aversion Mr. Thorne, and now he
was thoroughly sick of the whole thing, and would have no more to do
with it.
He came up to mother and begged her to come home, but mother had heard
the squire ask Joyce for another dance later on, and I knew very well
that she would not leave till that was through; besides, she was
the most unselfish old dear in the world, for all her rough words
sometimes, and would never have consented to deprive us of an inch of
pleasure that she could procure us.
Personally I was very grateful to her. I had a dance left with the
squire myself, and besides the pleasure of it, I had been arranging
something that I wanted to say to him. I was standing alone in the
entrance to the conservatory when he came to claim it. I was looking
for Joyce. I had missed her ever since supper. I had thought--I had
hoped--that she was with Captain Forrester, but when Miss Thorne
told me he was talking politics with Mr. Hoad in the drawing-room, I
believed her, and was at a loss to understand my sister's absence.
Could she be unwell? But I did not confide my doubts to the squire. He
put his arm around me and swept me off onto that lovely floor, and I
thought of nothing else.
I remember very clearly how well the squire looked that night--fresh
and merry, with bright keen eyes.
"That's a pretty frock, Miss Margaret," said he, as we were waltzing
round.
"Oh, I'm so glad you like it," answered I. "I was afraid it wasn't
suitable."
In the excitement of the ball I had entirely forgotten all about my
appearance, but now that the squire remarked upon it, I remembered how
uncomfortable I had felt in it at first.
"Why not suitable?" asked he.
"Mother bought it at the great Exhibition in '52," said I.
But the real cause of the awkwardness of my feeling had arisen from the
fact that I felt unlike myself in a "party frock," and not at all from
any fear that the frock might be old-fashioned.
"Oh! and Miss Hoad considers that an objection, I suppose," smiled he.
"Well, I don't. There's only one thing I don't like," added he, in his
most downright manner. "I don't like the trinkets. You're too young for
trinkets."
He had felt it. He had felt just what I had felt--that it was
unsuitable for a girl like me to be dressed up.
"You mean the corals," said I; and my voice sank a little, for I was
proud of the corals too, and pleased that mother should have given them
to me.
"Yes," he answered. "They are very pretty; but," he added, gently, "a
young girl's neck is so much prettier."
We waltzed round two turns without speaking. Then he said abruptly,
"Perhaps, by-the-way, I ought not to have said that, but I think such
old friends as we are may say anything to one another, mayn't we?"
"Why, of course," said I, rather surprised.
The speech was not at all like one of the squire's. I had always
thought that he said just whatever he liked to any of us. But to be
sure, until the other evening, he had never spoken very much to me at
all.
I laughed--a little nervous laugh. I was stupidly nervous that night
with the squire. "I think we should be very silly if we didn't say
whatever came into our heads," said I. "I don't think I like people
who don't say what they think. Although, of course, it is much more
difficult for me to say things to you than for you to say them to me."
"Why?" asked he.
"Well, of course, because you're so much older," answered I.
He was silent. For a moment the high spirits that I had so specially
noticed in him seemed to desert him.
"Well, what do you want to say to me that's disagreeable?" said he
presently, with a little laugh.
"Oh, nothing disagreeable," declared I. "It's about your nephew,
Captain Forrester."
"Oh!" said he.
His expression changed. It was as though I had not said what he had
expected me to say. But his brow clouded yet more, only it was more
with anger than sadness--the same look of anger that he had worn the
other afternoon. He certainly was a very hot-tempered man.
"I don't think you are fair to him," said I, boldly.
He looked at me. He smiled a little.
"In what way not fair to him?" said he.
"Well, if it had been any one else but me," answered I, "and you had
said all that you did say the other day in the Grange parlor, I think
the person would have been set against Captain Forrester. Of course it
made no difference to me, because I like him so much."
He winced, I fancied.
"You don't understand, my dear young lady," said he. "I merely wished
that there should be no misunderstandings."
"I don't think there were any misunderstandings," answered I. "We
always knew that Captain Forrester was not a man of property. He told
us so himself."
"Well, then, that's all right," said the squire.
"We liked him rather the better for it," concluded I, prompted by a
wicked spirit of mischief.
The squire did not reply to this. Of course there was nothing to reply
to it. It was a rude speech, and was better taken no notice of. He
merely put his arm round my waist again, and asked if we should finish
the waltz. I was sorry for my discourtesy before we had done, and tried
to make up for it.
Although the weather was still very treacherous in spite of the clear
sky, couples had strayed out through the conservatory onto the broad
terrace outside. I suggested to the squire that we should do the same.
He demurred at first, saying it was too cold; but as I laughed at this,
and ran outside without any covering over me, he came after me--but he
passed through the entrance-hall on his way and fetched a cloak, which
he wrapped round me. In spite of my naughtiness, he had that care for
the daughter of his old friends.
The moon was shining outside. It made dark shadows and white lights
upon the ivied walls and upon the slender gray pillars of the ruined
chapel; within, beneath the pointed arches, black patches lay upon the
grass, alternated with sharp contrasts of lights where the moonbeams
streamed in through the chancel windows.
The marsh was white where the silver rays caught the vapors that
floated over it, and dark beyond that brilliant path-way; there was a
track of light upon the sea. We stood a moment and looked. Even to me
it seemed strange to leave the brightness of within for this weird,
solemn brightness of the silent world without. I think I sighed. I
really was very sorry now for having made that speech.
We walked round the terrace outside the chapel. We scarcely spoke five
words. When we came to the wood that shades the chapel on the farther
side we stopped. The path that led into it lost itself in blackness.
"It's quite a place for ghosts, isn't it?" said I.
"Yes; it's not the place for any one else," laughed the squire. "Any
one less used to dampness would certainly catch their death of cold."
"Oh, you mustn't laugh at ghosts," answered I. "I believe in ghosts.
And I'm sure this wood must be full of ghosts--so many wonderful people
must have walked about in it hundreds of years ago."
"So long ago as that?" said he.
He was determined to treat my fancy lightly. But his laugh was kindly.
We turned back to the white moonlight, but not before I had noticed a
tall, white figure in the black depths, which I should have been quite
sure was a ghost if I had not been equally sure of the contrary. The
figure was not alone. If it had been, I should have accosted it. As it
was, I took the squire's arm and walked away quickly in the direction
of the house. The music had struck up again. The swing of an entrancing
Strauss waltz came floating out on the night wind.
"We must go in-doors," said the squire, not at all like a man who was
longing to dance to that lovely air; "I'm engaged for this to Miss
Thorne."
Poor man! No doubt he had had nearly enough by that time of playing the
host and of dancing every dance; he wanted a few minutes' rest.
I too was engaged, but not to a very delightful partner. After one turn
round the room with him, I complained of the heat, and begged him to
take me outside. Of course we went towards the ruin.
Of the few couples who had come out, all had gone that way, because
from that point there was a break in the belt of trees, and one could
see to the marsh and the sea. But we went round the chapel to the wood
on the other side.
"I say, it looks gloomy in there, doesn't it?" said the young man at my
side.
"Yes," answered I, but I was not looking into the wood now.
I had glanced into the interior of the ruin as we had passed, and I had
seen a tall black figure leaning up in the deep shadow against the side
of the central arch that stood up so quietly against the soft sky. I
felt quite sure that the "ghost," whom I had seen a few minutes before,
was close by. I was nearly certain that I saw a white streak that was
not moonlight beyond the bend of the arch.
I turned round and went down the lawn a few steps, my companion
following. He began to talk to me, but I did not know what he said. I
was listening beyond him to another voice. It fell sadly upon my ear.
"I've no doubt the girl was right," it said. "I'm sure she was right.
I had never noticed it before, but his leading you out to-night before
every one was very significant."
It was my sister's voice that answered, but she must almost have
whispered the words, for I could not hear them at all.
The man spoke again.
"Yes; that's not very likely," answered he, with a soft laugh. "Of
course, how could he help it? Oh, I ought to have gone away," he added;
"I ought to have gone away as soon as I had seen you. But I couldn't.
You see even to-night, when I have tried to keep away from you, you
have made me come to you at last. And I didn't think that I was doing
you any harm till now."
He emphasized the word "you." I did not notice it then, but I recollect
it now.
Again my sister's voice said something; what, I could not hear.
"Do you mean that, dearest? do you mean that?" said he, softly. "That
you would not marry him if you could help it, although he would make
such a lady of you? Ah, then I think I can guess something!"
A fiery blush rose to my cheek. I was glad that in the white moonlight
my companion could not see it. I ran quickly down the slope of grass
onto the gravel walk. It was dreadful, dreadful that I should have
listened to these words which were meant for her ear alone.
"Come," I called to the lad, who loitered behind; "come, it's cold, we
must go in."
He followed me slowly.
"I believe there were a man and a girl spooning behind that wall," he
said, with a grin.
How I hated him! I have never spoken to him from that day to this, and
yet, was it his fault?
We went back into the ball-room. The waltz was over. I had a partner
for the last one, but I did not care to dance it. I was watching for
Joyce, and when I saw her presently floating round with her hand on
Captain Forrester's arm, I thought I was quite happy.
But mother was not happy. She had thought that Joyce would dance the
last dance with Squire Broderick. She said that father was tired, and
that she wanted to go. And indeed his face looked very weary, and his
heavy lips heavier than ever.
No doubt we were all tired, for the squire too had lost the cheerful
look that he had worn all through the evening.
I sat and waited for Joyce, and I wondered to myself whether any one
would ever make love to me with his heart in his voice.