LOVE'S YOUNG DREAM
After the storm comes the calm, and when trouble has endured for a
season peace descends to refresh the exhausted soul. Montrose had
suffered a great deal during the five-and-twenty years of his present
life, and it was time that he should enjoy a rest. Ever since he could
remember, dark clouds had enshrouded him, and with a fainting heart he
had groped his way through the gloom. The meeting with Eberstein had
been the end of sorrow and the beginning of joy, for the doctor had
bidden him raise his eyes to the hills made glorious by the rising sun.
With the legacy of Lady Staunton the dawn had come, but only when he met
Alice did Montrose feel that the sun was above the horizon. As by magic
the darkness was swept away, and now he walked in golden sunshine, no
longer alone. She was beside him, and he wondered how he could have
endured life without her dear presence. For the next three weeks he was
in heaven rather than on earth.
Of course the first desire of Montrose was to share with Alice the
wonderful knowledge that he had acquired so strangely. But a note from
Eberstein prevented this. The doctor wrote that he was going abroad for
a few weeks, and that in the meanwhile Montrose was to tell the girl
nothing of his late experiences. "Woo her as an ordinary youth woos an
ordinary maid," said the letter. "She is yours and you are hers, so
nothing can come between you for the time being. I say for the time
being, since there is an ordeal which you must face before you stand
before the altar. Whether you ever do stand there to take her as your
wife depends upon your courage and forbearance and love. Meantime keep
what you have seen and what you have heard to yourself. When I return I
shall explain what is necessary for you to know!" This note was
delivered the first thing in the morning after Montrose's weird
experience, and when he called round to see Eberstein he found that the
doctor had already departed for Paris. There was nothing left for him to
do but to obey instructions.
Montrose did this very willingly. After all he was a man living in the
world of men, and wished to make love like an ordinary person. Certainly
Alice was an angel, and might not be satisfied with ordinary
love-making, but she also was human, and appreciated the domesticity of
life. Montrose remembered reading in some book Eberstein had lent him:
"For every step you take in other planes, take two on the plane you
know, since you are here to learn the lessons of this plane!" Thus the
young man abandoned for the moment his search after super-physical
knowledge and gave himself up to the joy of being an ordinary mortal.
And in one way or another he hoped to elevate a commonplace wooing to a
romantic passion, but all strictly within the limitations of the
physical brain. When the gods descended from Olympus to follow after
nymphs, they came as mere men. In a like way did Montrose set about his
courting of Alice as the one woman in the world for him.
Mrs. Barrast quite approved of the romance. For a time she had been
rather annoyed that so handsome and rich a young man had not laid
himself at her feet. But being really good-natured, if extraordinarily
vain, the little woman had ceased to play the part of dog in the manger,
and forwarded the aim of Montrose by every means in her power. At heart
she was a great match-maker like most women, and the fact that Montrose
possessed Lady Staunton's wealth made her zealous to bring about the
marriage. She looked upon herself as quite a _dea ex machinâ_, and,
certain that all would turn out as she wished, had already arranged how
the bridesmaids should be dressed, what people ought to be asked to the
wedding, what present she would give, and where the young couple should
spend their honeymoon. There was no doubt that Mrs. Barrast, like many
another frivolous person, was a great hand at counting her chickens
before they were hatched.
"But the dinky little things will come out of the eggs all right," she
said to Alice, a week after that young lady had made the acquaintance of
Montrose. "He's a nice boy and any one can see he's head over heels in
love with you, my dear. But I wish you would dress in colours, Alice. It
looks so silly for an engaged girl to go about in black."
"I am not engaged yet," replied Miss Enistor doubtfully, "and I never
may be, Amy. My father has to be consulted."
"My dear," said Mrs. Barrast impressively, "he'll jump at the chance of
getting the money back into the family."
"There is Don Pablo, who wants to marry me," ventured Alice anxiously.
"And there's Julian also," retorted the little woman. "What of that?
Why, I had dozens of offers before I met Frederick, though why I
took him I really don't know. Of course, as you told me this Don
What's-his-name is rich and if Douglas--you don't mind my calling him
Douglas, do you, dear?--was poor, I shouldn't advise you to throw the
old thing over. But youth and good looks and money and all those nice
things are better than an old man. And I am glad after all that you did
not accept Julian," ended Mrs. Barrast candidly. "He isn't rich either,
and life's horrid without money. Besides, I wish Julian to marry a rich
girl."
"If he loves her."
"Pooh, what has love to do with marriage? What old-fashioned ideas you
have, Alice. I suppose you wouldn't marry Douglas if you didn't love
him."
"Certainly not," said the girl firmly.
Mrs. Barrast made a grimace. "It's lucky you like him then, my dear. Of
course it's not right to marry for money only," added the butterfly,
contradicting herself boldly, "but when you meet a man with a banking
account try and love him as hard as ever you can."
"I love Douglas for himself alone. If he was a pauper I should love
him."
"I daresay you would. I'm sure there is madness in your family. It's a
mercy Douglas is well off. Five thousand a year is very nice. Be sure
you make him take a house near ours, dear, and get a smart motor-car
with one of those nice chauffeurs who look like engineers but aren't.
They're lots cleaner than engineers, aren't they? And do wear a blue
dress, dear: blue suits you."
"No! no! I am still in mourning for my aunt."
"I'm sure you needn't be. I wouldn't mourn for a horrid, lean, old
thing--she was lean, you know--who didn't leave me a penny."
"She left my father one thousand pounds, Amy."
"Just enough to make him hate her. I'm sure I would if I'd been treated
in that nasty way. And do make Douglas take you out more. I'll come too
as your chaperon, though perhaps I'm too young for the part."
"I go out quite enough, Amy. With my aunt in her grave----"
"Oh, don't talk about graves," cried Mrs. Barrast, rising in a hurry,
"you set my nerves on edge, if nerves ever do have an edge, which I'm
sure I don't know if they have. Not that it matters of course. Has
Douglas proposed?"
"No. But we understand one another."
"Oh, my dear," said Mrs. Barrast in despair, "what is the use of that? I
like everything to be signed, sealed, and delivered--I come of a legal
family, you know, dear--to make certain. Don't lose your salmon after
you've hooked him. Men do wriggle, you know, and if he sees another
girl, he will----"
"He won't," interrupted Alice, with very red cheeks. "How can you talk
so? I am the only girl Douglas has ever loved."
"Oh, he told you the usual lie then," sniggered the little woman
provokingly. "How can men be so silly as to think we believe them! I
wish you'd ask him to make love here, Alice, as I'd like to hear how he
goes about it. It's absurd meeting in Kensington Gardens as you do. It
isn't respectable."
"Then I am not going to be respectable this afternoon," said Alice,
escaping from this wasp, "for we meet there in two hours."
"Make him give you an engagement ring," cried Mrs. Barrast, who always
insisted upon having the last word, "diamonds, you know, dear. If the
engagement is broken you won't want to keep the ring and can always get
market value for the stones. I feel it is only right that you should
have some of that money. Remember what I say, darling: remember what I
say."
Alice, on her way to her own room, did not hear the end of this speech,
although it was screamed out after her. She was rather offended that
Mrs. Barrast should advise Montrose's capture like an unwilling fish, as
if any marriage could possibly be happy with a reluctant bridegroom. But
when putting on her hat, the girl laughed at her reflection in the
mirror, and excused the little woman's well-meant speech. Amy really did
mean well, although she had a rather brutal way of putting things. Miss
Enistor wondered if Frederick had been bargained for in this mercantile
way, and thought it was very probable. Mrs. Barrast was exceedingly
modern, and modern women are very businesslike in dealing with what was
formerly called romance. The Barrast marriage was a kind of mutual aid
society. Frederick had secured a pretty woman to do the honours of his
house, and Amy had captured a rich husband who supplied her with plenty
of money and let her go her own frivolous way. Alice decided that the
shrewd butterfly had made the best bargain, and was taking full
advantage of her cleverness. Then she put Mrs. Barrast out of her head
and started for the place of meeting in Kensington Gardens.
It was a warm afternoon, but not too dazzling, as a thin veil of clouds
was drawn across the sky. Alice alighted from her taxi at the park gates
and leisurely walked up the broad path towards the Round Pond. She
preferred to meet Douglas here rather than in the Hans Crescent house,
because Mrs. Barrast would always have been interrupting. And the girl
was sufficiently in love to think that two was company and three a
nuisance. As a matter of fact, she acknowledged to herself she was as
deeply in love with Montrose as he obviously was with her, though
neither of them had put the feeling into words. On this occasion,
however, Alice decided that it would be just as well to come to some
sort of understanding, since it was probable that she would not remain
much longer in town. At least she fancied so, for her father had been
grumbling about the money she was spending. Of course she had only known
Douglas for seven days, and it was rather early to fall in love with
him. But she felt convinced that in previous lives she had loved the
young man, and that the present wooing was only the continuation of one
interrupted in the distant past. What had interrupted it she could not
say, but this time she was determined to bring it to a head, and learn
for certain if Douglas felt towards her as she felt towards him. If
glances and attentions went for anything, he assuredly did, but modesty
or nervousness apparently prevented his plain speaking. Expecting at any
minute to be summoned back to the gloom of Tremore, Alice felt that she
could not go away without knowing what Montrose's feelings were. And if
he really did love her to the extent of making her his wife, she
gratefully recognised that she would have some one beside her to resist
the pressure put upon her by Don Pablo and her father.
On arriving at the tree under which she usually met her lover, she was
surprised not to find him waiting for her. His absence piqued her,
especially as she was late, for he certainly should have been watching
for her arrival with his heart in his eyes. With a pout she sat down on
one of the two green chairs and stared unseeingly at the many children
playing about the grass and sailing toy ships on the Round Pond. What
would her father say if he knew that she was meeting Montrose, and now
loved him to the extent of thwarting Enistor's darling project of
uniting her to Narvaez. Poor ignorant girl! She little knew that Don
Pablo by his black arts was keeping Enistor advised of all that was
taking place, and that the two men were calmly watching her innocent
luring of the fly into the web. Eberstein could have warned her of this
infernal espionage, but he was absent, and neither Alice nor her lover
had any knowledge how to guard themselves. They were even ignorant that
protection was necessary, and it was only when the worst was at an end
that they learned how the guardianship of the master had been withdrawn
for the time being. The children had to learn to walk alone in their
own strength and by their own will. Therefore, in the Garden of Eden
represented by Kensington Gardens, did they lie open to the assault of
the Serpent in the person of Don Pablo. But their ignorance and
innocence and natural leanings towards the good baffled the black magic
of the evil creature for the moment.
"A penny for your thoughts," said Montrose suddenly, and Alice raised
her eyes to find that he had slipped silently into the chair placed a
trifle behind that on which she was seated.
"They are only worth a halfpenny," she retorted rebukingly. "I was
thinking how little you must care for my company when you are so late!"
"I have been hiding behind yonder tree ever since you arrived,"
explained Montrose, laughing, "and for quite an hour I have been
waiting."
Alice laughed also. The boyishness of his action appealed to her. "But
we are too old to play at Peep Boo like babies," she said, shaking her
head with a would-be attempt at primness which was quite a failure.
"We are not old," denied Montrose, placing his chair in line with hers.
"We are young: we shall always be young, for the gods love us. As to
babies, look into my eyes and you will see yourself as a baby."
But Alice would not look, and the colour came to her cheeks. "There was
a girl at school who talked of babies in the eyes. It was amusing to
hear her talk, but rather silly."
"The silly things are the serious things of life at this moment."
"How do you explain that epigram, Mr. Montrose?"
"Do epigrams require explanations?"
"This one does, I fancy."
"Oh, no, it doesn't. You must guess that the explanation lies in the
words I used. 'At this moment,' I said."
"Why this moment rather than others, Mr. Montrose?"
The young man drew back rather disappointed. "No. I see you don't
understand, Miss Enistor, or you would not call me Mr. Montrose."
"You call me Miss Enistor!" replied Alice, wilfully dense.
For the sake of beating her with her own weapons, he answered in kind.
"Naturally I do. I am a very polite person. But I daresay, in other
lives, in other climes, and when we were clothed in other bodies, I
called you Chloe, or Octavia, or Isabeau, or Edith."
"Greek, Roman, French, and Anglo-Saxon," commented Alice, amused; "you
seem to have settled the countries we lived in. I suppose I called you
Damon, or Marcus, or Jehan, or Harold--that is, supposing we were
together in those days in those places."
"We have always been together," said Douglas decisively. "I am quite
sure."
"Have you any proof?"
"Only the proof of my own feelings. I am not clairvoyant to the
extent of remembering my former incarnations, nor can I--as some
can--consciously leave my physical body at will and return to it with a
recollection of what I have seen. Now you are more advanced."
"Indeed, I am not. I have learned much from my father, who knows a great
deal about such psychic matters. But I have never been properly
instructed and my knowledge is very limited."
"But you believe in the doctrine of reincarnation?" urged Montrose
eagerly.
"Of course. It is a most sensible doctrine to believe, and explains
nearly everything in a common-sense way. But I cannot prove my belief."
"There is no need to prove it to me," said Montrose, thinking of his
vision, "for I know beyond all question that we have lived and loved
before."
"Yes," assented the girl dreamily, "I knew you the moment you entered
Mrs. Barrast's drawing-room."
The young man glanced round, and, seeing that they were more or less
sheltered from observation, gently took her hand. She did not remove it,
although her whole body thrilled to the touch. "You knew me as what?"
asked Montrose.
"I can't say more than that I knew you as a familiar friend."
"So cold a word," pleaded the other softly.
"What other word can I use to you when we have only known each other for
a single week?"
"That is in this life. In other existences we knew each other for
years."
Alice looked down timidly. "It--is--probable," she breathed.
"Then why not take up the new life at the point where the old one left
off?"
"We don't know how it left off, Mr. Montrose."
"No. But assuredly it did at a point where you called me by my then
Christian name--Alice."
Her heart fluttered as he spoke thus intimately. "Perhaps we were not
Christians," she said, rather embarrassed.
"Ah!" he dropped her hand, "you are fencing. I merely spoke in the style
of to-day to illustrate my point."
"Now you are angry!"
"I never could be angry with you; only you will not understand."
"Perhaps I do," said Alice, with a whimsical smile.
"If so, why aren't you plain with me?" said Montrose, ruffled.
The mothering instinct, which makes every woman see in every man a child
to be soothed and petted, rose within her. "Let us slap the bad, naughty
table that has hurt baby," she said demurely, and Montrose looked up to
see the laughter in her eyes.
"You little witch!" He caught her hand again and this time so roughly
that she winced at the delicious pain. "You know quite well what I
mean."
"I do--Douglas!"
"Oh!" He leaned towards her so violently that she swung aside in alarm.
"The eyes of Europe are on us," she said hastily, indicating the throng
of children and nursemaids and grown-up people round the pond and on the
paths and lying on the grass.
"Bother the eyes of Europe." But he saw that she was right and he did
not dare proclaim his love by taking her in his arms. It was rather a
poor thing to content himself with squeezing her hand. But he did, and
so hard that she uttered an exclamation.
"Mr. Montrose, you are hurting me."
"Am I? Poor hand! I wish I could kiss it!" with a swift look round, he
managed to do so. "There--Alice. Don't you dare to call me anything but
Douglas."
"I believe you wish to take me by storm," she pouted, not ill-pleased.
"What! capture my own city?"
"Your own city? What do you mean?"
"I mean that I dwell in your heart. That city is mine."
"How conceited you are."
"Indeed, I am not. You know quite well that I am only speaking the
truth. I loved you in the past and I love you now. All preliminaries of
love were gone through ages ago. Why fence, as if we now meet for the
first time? When I saw you in Mrs. Barrast's drawing-room I said, 'She
is mine!' When you saw me you said, 'I am his'----"
"I'm sure I didn't," interrupted Alice hastily.
"You thought it, though."
"I shan't tell you."
"There is no need for you to do so. Oh, my dear," he went on
entreatingly, "is there so much love in the world that you and I can
afford to throw what we possess away? All my life I have been lonely:
all my life I have wanted to meet you, to adore you, to----"
"How could you when you didn't know that I existed?"
"Fencing again. As if you didn't know that spirit is everything and form
is nothing. We have been apart on earth until last week; but we have
always been together in higher worlds, although neither you nor I can
remember our companionship."
Alice laughed in a rather anxious manner. "Any one listening to us would
be certain both of us were insane."
"I daresay. But as no one is listening, it doesn't matter. For the
convenience of a world that doesn't understand such things, let us
behave in a conventional manner. I shall visit at Mrs. Barrast's and
court you in the approved style. In due time I shall write and ask your
father if I may make you my wife. Meanwhile I want your assurance that
you love me and have always loved me in the past."
"But a single week----"
"Time doesn't matter. You know it doesn't. You love me, Alice?"
"Yes!" She saw that the time for fencing was ended. "I love you,
Douglas!"
He kissed her hand again, then, aware that the place was too public for
him to take her in his arms, suppressed his feelings. Side by side they
sat in a stiff kind of way, while each longed for demonstrations which
the situation forbade. It was decidedly uncomfortable to be thus
conventional. But it was just as well that they thus came to an
understanding in the eye of the sun, as the self-control was quite an
education.
"One would think we were a couple of old married people, sitting side
by side in this stiff manner," said Montrose with a vexed laugh. "I
should like to be a Sabine and carry you away by force."
"Perhaps you will have to do so," said Alice, thinking of Don Pablo. "My
father will never consent to my becoming your wife."
Montrose looked amazed and anxious. "Why not? There is nothing against
my character and position," he said rapidly, "and as I have inherited
Lady Staunton's money, your father will be glad that I should bring it
into the Enistor family again by making you my wife."
"I don't think my father cares anything about the money," said Alice,
ignorant of her parent's true feelings. "He wants me to marry Don
Pablo."
"A Spaniard. Who is he?"
"A Spaniard, as you have said. He is my father's greatest friend."
"Young and handsome and wealthy?"
"Wealthy, certainly. But very ugly, just like a mummy, and as old as the
hills--older, I believe. He must be eighty."
"Then why does your father wish you to marry him?"
"Because Don Pablo is rich."
"Well, I am rich also. Five thousand a year is riches."
"Don Pablo has more, I fancy."
"I don't care what he has. He hasn't got you for a wife and he never
will have. You will marry me and no one else."
"Yes, I promise you that, Douglas. But there will be trouble."
"Pooh!" Montrose laughed joyously. "I'd face a universe of trouble if
you were the prize to be obtained by enduring it. Besides, Eberstein
says that we belong to one another."
"How does he know?"
"He knows many things that are strange and true. When he comes back he
will explain. He promised to do so. Meantime, all we have to do is to be
true to one another. We are engaged. Say we are engaged, Alice."
"Yes. We are engaged. I shall marry no one but you."
"Hurrah! Then we shall be happy for ever and ever----"
"Amen," said the girl thankfully. "All the same, I fear Don Pablo."
Montrose tucked her arm within his own. "We are together," he said.
"Unity is strength. You understand, dear!" And Alice did understand,
smiling happily.
"It is the birthday of the soul," she said; "of your soul and mine,
which are one."