THE PICNIC.
As the words of the music-hall song rise on the clear air, Leslie turns
away. No respectable woman could have sung such a song, and she is not
surprised that her companion, and host, has bidden her "come away."
She steps down from the battlement in silence, and as she does so
glances at him. His face is no longer pale, but there is a cloud
upon it, which he is evidently trying to dispel. She thinks, not
unreasonably, that it is caused by annoyance that she should have heard
the song, and she is grateful to him.
The cloud vanishes, and his face resumes something of its usual frank
light-heartedness, but not quite all.
"We'll give those folks time to get clear away before we begin our
exploration, Miss Lisle," he says, casually, but with the faintest tone
of uneasiness in his voice. "That is the worst of these show places,
one is never sure of one's company. 'Arriet and 'Arry are everywhere,
nowadays."
"Why should they not be?" says Leslie, with a smile. "The world is not
entirely made for nice people."
"No, I suppose not," he assents; "and I suppose you are going to say
that they had better be here than in some other places, and that it
might do 'em good; that's the sort of thing that's talked now. I'm not
much of a philanthropist, but that's the kind of thing that good people
always say."
"They seemed very happy," says Leslie.
"Who?" he asks, almost sharply. "Oh, those people? Yes; Mr. Lisle ought
to get a good sketch somewhere hereabouts," and he leads her back to
the duke and Mr. Lisle.
The duke looks up. Grey has made a "back" for him with the cushions and
the hampers, and he's smoking in most unwonted contentment.
"Back already!" he says. "I thought you had gone to prospect?"
"So we had," responds Yorke, "but we were alarmed by savages from a
neighboring island." He lights a cigar as he speaks. "We are going to
give them time to get away in their canoes, as Robinson Crusoe did, you
know. By the way, Miss Lisle, if you will sit down, I will reconnoiter
and report."
Leslie sinks down beside her father, and Yorke strolls leisurely to the
steps leading from the tower.
He pauses there a moment or two, listening, then goes down. At the foot
of the steps on the grassy slope he stops again, and the cloud comes on
his face darker than before.
"It must be a mistake," he mutters. "It couldn't be she, and yet----."
He walks on a few paces, and at the foot of the tower comes upon traces
of the "savages"--a champagne bottle, empty, of course, and a newspaper.
He takes the latter up mechanically, then unfolds it and turns to the
column of theatrical advertisements, and sees the following:
"Diadem Theater Royal. Notice. In consequence of serious indisposition,
Miss Finetta will not play this evening."
With an exclamation which is very near an oath, he flings the paper
from him and walks on, and as he goes round the base of the tower he is
almost run into by one of the gentlemen whom Leslie saw with the dark
young lady of the song.
They both stop short and start, then the new-comer exclaims, with a
laugh:
"Hello, Auchester! Well, I'm----."
"Hush! Be quiet!" says Yorke, almost sternly, and with an upward glance.
"Eh?" says the other, "what's the matter? Who the duse would have
expected to see you here?"
"I might say the same," retorts Yorke, with about as mirthless a smile
as it is possible to imagine.
"How did you come here?"
"Why, by boat," responds the other. "Didn't I tell you so? What have
you done with my nags?"
"They are all right," says Yorke. "Come this way, will you? Keep close
to the tower, if you don't mind."
The young fellow follows him, with a half-amused, half-puzzled air.
"What's it all mean? Why this mystery, my dear boy?" he asks.
Yorke, having got him out of sight and hearing of the three on the
tower, faces him, and instead of replying to his question, asks another.
"Was that Finetta with you just now, Vinson?"
"Yes," says Lord Vinson, at once; "of course it was. Didn't you see
her, know her?"
Yorke nods curtly.
"Yes. What is she doing here? How did she come here with you?"
"The simplest thing in the world," replies Lord Vinson. "After you'd
left me this morning, I was wondering who I should hunt up to come for
a sail, when I saw her coming down the street. You might have knocked
me down with a feather."
"I dare say. Well?"
Lord Vinson looks rather aggrieved at being cut so short, but goes on
good-temperedly enough.
"She spotted me at once, and the first question she asked was, had I
seen you?"
"Well?" demands Yorke, as curtly as before.
"Well, I didn't know what to say for the moment, because I thought
perhaps you wouldn't care for her to know."
A faint expression of relief flits across Yorke's face, but it
disappears at Vinson's next words.
"She saw me hesitate, and of course knew that I had seen you. 'It's
no use your playing it low down on me, my dear boy,' she said,
laughing--you know her way. 'You couldn't deceive a two-months-old
calf, if you tried. You've seen him, and he's here somewhere.' It was
no use trying to deceive her, as she said, and I had to own up that I
had seen you this morning, and--that you borrowed my rig."
Yorke bit his lip, and nodded impatiently.
"She took it very well, she did indeed. She only laughed and said that
she knew you had left town for some fishing; and, being sick of London
herself, she had sent a certificate to say she was down with low or
high, or some kind of fever, I forget which, and had to run down here
for a bit of a holiday with her brother--or her uncle, I don't know
which it is."
Yorke looks round with ill-concealed anxiety.
"Oh, it's all right," says Lord Vinson; "they've gone on to the inn. I
came back for my stick. There it is. Well, I thought the best thing I
could do was to ask them to come for a sail, and it took her ladyship's
fancy, and here we are, don't you know."
Yorke stands with downcast, overclouded face, and the young viscount,
after regarding him attentively, says:
"Look here, Auchester, I know what it is, you don't want to run against
her just now. Got friends up there, eh?" and he nods his head in the
direction of the tower.
"No, I do not want to see her, and I certainly don't want her to see
me," assents Yorke. "If you can manage to take her away, Vinson!"
He lays his hand on the young fellow's shoulder, and Vinson, who
is never so delighted as when doing a service for his friend, nods
intelligently.
"I see. All right, you leave it to me." He pulls out his watch. "I'll
get her away at once; in fact, it's time we started. Don't you be
uneasy."
"Thanks," says Yorke, and his brow lifts a little. "When does she go
back?"
"To-night; she plays to-morrow."
Yorke's brow clears completely, and he smiles.
"Off with you, then," he says. "I'm awfully obliged to you, Vinson. You
are right; I don't want the--the people I am with to see her."
Vinson looks up at the tower curiously, and rather wistfully.
"No, my dear boy, I'm not going to introduce you," says Yorke, with a
smile. "I'm too anxious to be rid of you--and her. See them safe on
board the train to-night, and if anything occurs to prevent them going,
send me a message to-morrow morning. I'll give you the address----." He
stops. "No, never mind. Make them go to-night. Tell her she'll lose her
engagement, anything, but see that she goes."
Vinson grins.
"I'll tell her you've gone back to town," he says.
Yorke colors.
"Woodman, spare the lie," he says, with forced levity. "No need to tell
her that."
"No, it wouldn't do, come to think of it. She'd find out I'd sold her
when she'd got back, and then----." He whistled, significantly. "I like
Finetta with her claws in, don't you know. I think you're the only man
that's not afraid of her."
Yorke smiles again.
"Well, do what you like," he says. "But go now, there's a good fellow;
and for Heaven's sake, don't let her come this way again. We heard her
singing!"
Vinson laughs.
"Yes, if you were within a mile of her you couldn't help doing that,"
he says, dryly. "Well, good-by, old chap. Don't trouble about the nags."
"They are all right," says Yorke. "I'll bring them back safe and
sound----."
"When the coast's clear," finishes the young fellow; and with a smile
and a nod, he picks up his stick, and goes off.
Yorke Auchester stands where his friend has left him, and looks out
to sea, with a troubled countenance; stares so long, and so lost in
thought that it would seem as if he had forgotten his own party. It is
not often that the young man has a moody fit, but he has it now, and
very badly.
But presently there comes down to him the faint sound of Leslie Lisle's
soft, musical laugh--how striking a contrast to that of the young lady
whom he has just got rid of! and he wakes from his unpleasant reverie
and climbs up to the tower.
The duke is leaning back with an amused and interested smile on his
face, which is turned towards Leslie, and it is evident that he is
happier and more contented than usual.
"Miss Lisle has just been giving me a description of the Portmaris
folks. You have missed something, Yorke," he says, with a laugh. "Have
the savages disappeared?"
"Quite," says Yorke; "and if Miss Lisle and her father would like to
look round, the coast is now clear."
"You go, papa," says Leslie, with her usual unselfishness; "and I will
stay with Mr. Temple."
The duke glances at her.
"You will do nothing of the kind," he says. "I am not going to impose
upon your good nature, Miss Lisle. Besides, I dare say, I shall take
forty winks."
Leslie hesitates a moment, then she gets up and goes for the easel; but
Yorke is too quick for her.
"Come along, Mr. Lisle," he says, touching him on the arm, while he
stands looking from the edge of the tower absently, and the three
descend.
"Now, this strikes me as a good place," says Yorke, setting up the
easel. "Don't know much about it you know, but it seems to me that the
outline and the----."
"Excellent; yes, very good," assents the artist, eagerly getting out
his drawing paper. "Yes, I can make a picture of this. You need not
wait," he adds. "You will want to talk and----."
"I see," says Yorke. "Come along, Miss Lisle; we're evidently not
wanted."
They stroll away side by side, and slowly descend the grassy slope,
which gradually becomes broken by rock, which kindly nature, who has
always an eye to effect, has clothed with ferns and moss and lichen.
"I suppose I ought to show you the hermit's cell?" says Leslie.
"Everybody sees it."
"By all means," he assents, but rather absently--the loud laugh of
Finetta, the music-hall song are still echoing hideously in his ears.
"Which hermit?"
"Didn't you know?" she says, lightly stepping from stone to stone.
"There was a hermit here once ever so long ago. Here is his cell,"
and she stops before a cavity in the rocks, a deliciously shady nook,
overhung with honeysuckle and wild clematis which perfume the air.
Yorke looks in. Somebody since the hermit's time, had been kind enough
to fix a comfortable seat in the little cell, from which a delightful
view of the sea and the cliff can be obtained.
"Let us sit down while you tell me about him," he says.
Leslie seats herself, and looks out at the greenery at her feet and
wide-stretching blue of sea and sky beyond; and he takes his place
beside her, but looks at her instead of the view. "The proper study of
mankind is--woman."
"There really was a hermit here ever so long ago," she says, dreamily.
"They talk of him at Portmaris even now. He was a very great man in his
time, but I am afraid not a very good one. It is said that he killed
his best friend in a duel, and, that smitten with remorse for his crime
and his foolish life, he vowed that he would never set eyes on mortal
man again. So he came and lived in this cell, which he dug out with his
own hands, and spent the rest of his life in prayer and meditation.
Every day the village folks, and sometimes the pilgrims who visited his
shrine, placed food on the ledge of the little window; but though they
could hear his voice in prayer or singing hymns, no one ever saw his
face, nor did he ever look out upon those who came to visit him."
"He must have been fearfully unhappy," says Yorke, in a low voice, for
the soft, subdued tones seem to cast a spell over him.
"No, they say not; for he was often heard, especially after he had been
living here for some years, to be singing cheerfully; but that was
after he had received his sign."
"His sign?" he asks.
"Yes. He prayed that if Heaven forgave him his sins, and accepted his
penitence, it would render the birds tame enough to come at his call."
"And did they?"
"Yes. The pilgrims to the shrine often saw a thin hand thrust through
the window with a hedge sparrow or thrush perched upon it, and the
rabbits, there were numbers of them, here, would come when he called,
and let him feed them with the remains of his frugal fare. One day the
village people received no answer when they called to him, not even
the _Pax Vobiscum_, which amply repaid them for their pious charity.
They waited two days, and then they entered the cell, and found him
lying dead on his stone pallet, and a wild dove was resting on his
breast. It flew away as they entered, but it was seen hovering about
the cell for years afterward, and the Portmaris people say that a dove
is always near here, even now."
If Yorke had read the story of the Hermit of St. Martin in a book--he
didn't read many books, unfortunately--it would not have affected
him at all, but told by this lovely girl, in a voice hushed with
sympathetic awe and reverence, it moves him strangely.
"It's a pity there are not more hermits," he says, "a pity a man can't
leave the world in which he has made himself such a nuisance, and have
a little time to be quiet and repent."
"Yes, your grace," assents Leslie.
He looks at her quickly, and then away to the sea again.
"I wonder whether you'd be offended if I asked a favor of you, Miss
Lisle."
"What is it?" she says, lightly. "In the old times the proper reply
was, 'Yea, unto half my kingdom,' but I haven't any kingdom."
"Oh, it isn't much," he says. "I was only going to ask you if you would
be kind enough not to address me as 'your grace.'"
Leslie looks at him with her slow smile, and a faint blush.
"Is it wrong?" she asks, apologetically. "I didn't know. You see, I
have not met many dukes."
He strikes at the sandy pebbles which form the floor of the good
hermit's cave, with his stick.
"Oh--oh, it's right enough to call a duke 'your grace,'" he says,
hurriedly, "but I'd rather you didn't call me so."
"I'm glad it was right," she rejoins, with an air of relief. "I thought
that perhaps I'd committed some awful blunder."
"No, no," he says. "But don't, please. I have a decided objection to
it. You see I'm rather a republican than otherwise--everybody is a
republican nowadays, don't you know." Oh, Yorke, Yorke! "There will be
no dukes or any other titles presently."
"But until that time arrives what should one call you?" asks Leslie,
not unreasonably. "Is 'my lord' right?"
"It's better," he admits, "but I don't care much about that from
friends, you know. I'm afraid you think it's rather presumptuous of me
to call you a friend."
"'An enemy' would sound rude and ungrateful after your and Mr. Temple's
kindness," she says, as lightly as before.
"My name is Yorke--one of 'em, and it's the name I like best. I dare
say that you have noticed that Mr.--Mr. Temple calls me by it?"
"Yes," says Leslie.
"So it sounds more familiar to me, and--and nicer. I suppose a man has
a right to be called what he likes."
"I imagine so," says Leslie.
"Then that's a bargain," he says, cheerfully, as if the matter were
disposed of. "This place," he goes on, as if anxious to get away from
the subject, "reminds me of Scotland a little bit. You only want a
salmon river. I've spent many a day fishing and shooting in a solitude
as complete as the hermit's. You get scared at last by the stillness
and the silence, and begin to think that all creation has gone to
sleep, and are afraid to move lest you should wake it; and then while
you stand quite still beside the stream, something comes flitting
down the mountain side--something with great antlers and big mournful
eyes, and it steps into the water close beside you, and takes a drink,
looking round watchfully. Then up you jump and give a shout, and away
the stag goes, and all creation's awake again."
It is Leslie's turn to listen now, and she does so with half-parted
lips.
"Then at night you go out with a gun, and you lie down flat amongst
the bracken, and keep your eyes open, and after a while when you are
just feeling tired of it, and thinking what an idiot you are not to
be in bed, or at any rate, beside a cozy fire with a pipe, you hear a
flap, flap in the air, and a couple of heron come sailing between you
and the moon, and you raise your gun carefully and quietly--awfully
sharp chap the heron--and down comes one of 'em, and perhaps, if you
have any luck, the other with the second barrel. Then you load up again
and wait, and after a time, if your luck holds good, a flush of wild
duck come flipperty, flopperty, above your head and you bring one or
two of them down. And all the time the stream ripples and babbles on,
and the soft wind plays through the pines, and----." He stops with a
laugh and that peculiar look which expresses shyness in a man. "I beg
your pardon, I forgot; I mean, I must be boring you to death."
"No, you were not," says Leslie, quietly, and with a little sigh.
"I forgot that ladies don't care for sport, except hunting, some of
them. They like to hear about London, and all the gossip there."
Leslie shakes her head.
"I'm afraid I'm very singular, then," she says. "For I would rather
hear about fishing and shooting, if it is all like that you have been
telling me of."
"But it isn't," he says, with a laugh. "Sometimes the birds don't come,
and the fish won't rise, and instead of catching any you catch a cold.
And then you go back to London, and swear that's it's the best place
after all; but after a little while you get sick of it again, and think
if you could only get on to a Scotch moor, you'd be happy."
"Man never is, but always to be blest," says Leslie.
"Yes, because men are such fools that they spoil their lives before
they know where they are," he says. "I once saw a man try to swim
across the Thames, for a wager, with a ten-pound weight round his
neck. He would have been drowned, if they hadn't picked him up pretty
smartly. It's the same in life----." He stops suddenly and laughs
rather shortly. "We'll get on to a more cheerful topic. There's a hawk,
see?" and he points to a bird circling in the vault of blue.
"I was wondering what it was," says Leslie. "You must have good eyes.
Do you know all the birds when you see them?"
"Nearly all, I think," he replies. "Horses, and dogs, and birds, I know
a little about, but I don't know anything else. I think I should have
made a decent gamekeeper or horse breaker; I'm not fit for anything
else. But sometimes I console myself with something I read in the paper
the other day; the fellow said that there were far too many clever
people in the world, and that very soon it would be quite a distinction
not to have painted a picture, or written a book, or done something in
the scientific way. I'm on the safe road to distinction, Miss Lisle.
There isn't a bigger dunce in Portmaris than I am."
So they talk. It is not much. It is neither witty nor wise; it is
just the pleasant, aimless chatter of two young people who are almost
strangers; and yet so absorbed and interested are they, that they do
not note how time flies, that the sun is sinking in the west, and that
the shadows are stealing over hill and dale.
Leslie is perfectly at her ease. She has almost forgotten, quite
forgotten for the time, indeed, that the young man sitting beside her
with his arms folded behind his head, and talking of his fishing and
his shooting, and of the strange beasts and birds and fishes he has
seen, killed, or captured, is a duke; and he, Yorke, always ready to be
happy, to meet the sweet goddess Happiness, half-way, is filled with a
strange feeling of peace, that yet is not peace, which at times almost
startles him.
In all his life he has not met with a girl like this; so simple, yet so
sweetly wise; so good, and yet so bright and winsome. He is beginning
to know some of the multitudinous expressions of the beautiful face, to
lay traps for the slow heart-winning smile, to set snares for drawing
the clear, darkly gray eyes toward his, that he may look into their
depths. Her voice makes sweet melody in his ears, and stirs his heart
with a vague thrill which will trouble him presently, trouble him very
much. It seems to him one moment that he has known her for years, the
next that she has just lighted from the clouds, or risen from the
depths of the blue sea, and that he shall never know her or get any
nearer to her.
And under the influence of these sensations, which summed up as a
whole, are as a potent spell, he forgets the dark girl whom he has
persuaded Vinson to take away out of sight, forgets the compact that he
has made with the duke, forgets that he is sailing under false colors
and is deceiving the girl beside him--forgets, in short, everything,
save that she is beside him, and that he has the delight of looking at,
and talking to, and, ah, best of all, of listening to her.
He would be content to sit there--so that she were by his side--till
the end of the world, but a shadow falling across the entrance to the
hut rouses Leslie to a sense of the flight of the common enemy.
"Why, it must be late," she says, with the air of one making a great
discovery.
"Is it?" he says. "Must we really go? It is very jolly here--it is as
jolly as it was last night on the water."
But he gets up and follows her, and they make their way back. As they
emerge on the hill-side, they find that the wind has dropped, and is
sighing across the downs rather plaintively; and Yorke, looking up,
sees a cloud, which, though it is not much bigger than a man's hand, is
full of warning.
"Did you happen to bring an umbrella with you?" he asks, with affected
carelessness.
Leslie laughs.
"Not even a sunshade. Why?"
"Nothing," he says, inwardly calling himself opprobrious names for not
providing the Englishman's traveling companion.
"Do you think it is going to rain?" she asks. "Oh, no, it isn't
possible."
"Everything is possible in this charming climate of ours," he says.
"Well, Mr. Lisle, how are you getting on?" he asks, as they go up to
the artist, still hard at work.
He looks up with a start. To him they have only been absent, say, a
quarter of an hour.
"It is difficult," he says. "Very. One needs time--time."
"We'd better come another day," says Yorke. "Oh, you have got on
famously," and he keeps his countenance capitally as he looks at the
sketch. "I'll carry your easel," and he folds it up, and puts it over
his shoulder.
They find the duke waiting for them at the bottom of the tower, and
seeing them all together, he does not suspect that the two young people
have been spending the whole afternoon _tete-a-tete_.
"I was just going off without you," he says, addressing all three, but
looking at Leslie's face, which wears a rapt and dreamy expression.
"It's well you didn't," retorts Yorke. "You and Grey would never have
reached home alive. Miss Leslie and I are the only persons who can
manage these nags. But come on," and he glances upward--that cloud has
grown considerably since they left the hermit's hut--and leads the way
to the inn.
"Now, ma'am," he says to the landlady, in his frank, and genial way.
"Got the kettle boiling? Right! Let us have some tea while the horses
are being put to."
Then he goes round to the stable, inspects the horses, and is back in
time to hand Leslie a cup of the beverage, which be the hour what it
may, is always welcomed by fair women.
"Now up you get," he says, after surreptitiously tipping
everybody--landlord, hostler, rosy-cheeked maid, all round. "Miss
Leslie, we can't get on without you in front, you know," he remarks, as
Leslie is about to go inside; and he helps her to the box.
The horses are fresh and eager for work, and for a time he drives, but
presently he puts the reins in her hands.
"According to promise," he says. "Hold 'em tight while I," and he
bends down and searches for something under the box seat.
"Oh, how beautifully they go," she says, half to herself. "What is it
you are looking for, your gra--Lord Yorke?"
"Never you mind," he says. "You look after your horses."
Leslie laughs, and laughs again as he comes up, red in the face, and
with a Scotch wrap in his hand.
"Are you so cold?" she asks.
"Very," he responds. "It's going to snow, I fancy."
"Why, it is quite close," she says, removing her eyes for a moment from
the horses to glance at him with smiling surprise. "It seems hotter
than it has been all day."
As she speaks, a low rumbling rolls over their heads and a flash of
light cuts across the sky.
"That is lightning," she exclaims.
"It was rather like it," he admits, dryly.
"Did you bring any gamps?" asks the duke.
"Nary one," replies Yorke, grimly. "Slang away, I can bear it--and I
deserve it," he mutters, glancing at the girlish figure beside him.
Mr. Lisle looks round absently.
"I'm afraid--it--it is going to rain," he says.
In another minute it is raining. Yorke takes the rug in both hands, and
deftly wraps it round Leslie.
"Oh, no, please," she says, and she glances behind her. "Give it to
him--Mr. Temple."
"It would be more than my life is worth," he says. "I dare not offer it
to him. Please let me fasten it. How shall I? Give me a hairpin!"
"You must hold the horses, then," she says.
"I can see one sticking out," he says.
"Well, take it," she responds, innocently and all unconsciously, for
she is thinking of her driving far more than the rain or the rug or
anything else.
He looks at her intent and absorbed face, and puts up his hand and
draws the hairpin from its soft and silken nest, and she, unheeding,
does not know that his hand trembles, actually trembles, as he fastens
the rug round her.
"Now give me the reins," he says, "and keep your head down; we are in
for a regular storm."
As he speaks, the rain comes down with a whiz, as if it meant to wash
them off the box.
Leslie laughs.
"After all, it is a proper picnic," she says.
But the next instant her laugh dies away, for the heavens seem to open
before them, a peal of thunder roars like the discharge of a park
of artillery just above their heads, and the horses, startled and
frightened, stop dead short, then rear up on end.
The carriage sways, and for a moment it seems as if it were going over,
and Leslie is forced up close against Yorke.
He holds the terrified horses with one strong hand, against him.
"All right," he says, in a low voice. "Don't be afraid, Leslie!" His
arm holds her, supports her, presses her to him, perhaps unconsciously.
"You are quite safe, dearest, dearest."
Low as his voice is, Leslie hears him, or--she asks herself--is it only
fancy?
For a moment, one brief moment, she cowers, nestling to him, her face
hidden against his shoulder; then with a start, she draws away, and
with her face red and white by turns, looks straight before her.
And through the roar of thunder, and the hissing of the rain, she hears
those words re-echoing, "Leslie, dearest--dearest!"