He thought himself very fortunate that when he crossed the grounds of
Lancaster and entered the house, no one saw him. It was just what he
wished.
He went straight to the housekeeper's room, and he found Mrs. West
sitting alone in the little sitting-room, going over her account-book
with a pen and ink. She rose in some perturbation at the unexpected
sight of the master of Lancaster Park.
"I did not know you were in the house, my lord," she said.
"I have just entered it," he replied. "Do not let me disturb you, Mrs.
West. I came to see your niece."
"Leonora?" she said, with some surprise. "Oh, dear! I am very sorry,
but she is not here;" and she wondered at the sudden paleness that
overspread his face.
"Not here?" he stammered. "Is she gone, then? I thought--I understood
that you would go with her to America."
"Oh, yes, so I shall," she answered; "but she is not gone there yet. I
did not mean that. She will be here this evening."
"Where is she now?" he asked, eagerly, and Mrs. West replied:
"She has gone over to the Abbey ruins to make a sketch this morning."
"Thank you," he said, and hurried out of the room with such
precipitancy that the good soul stared after him in amazement and
consternation.
"Dear me! what has that poor child done now?" she thought, nervously.
"It is a pity she ever came to Lancaster Park. She has but a sorry time
of it here. I almost wish she had accepted Lieutenant De Vere. It would
have been such a grand match for her, and she is too bright and pretty
to remain in my station of life. I wonder what Lord Lancaster can want
with her. Is he going to scold her for anything she has done?"
But while she propounded these uneasy questions to herself, our hero
was striding across the park and lanes and fields toward the Abbey
ruins, every other thought swallowed up in the intense longing to see
Leonora again. His heart beat heavily as he came in sight of her, at
last, sitting among the green graves, as he had seen her before, but
not sketching busily now, for her drawing materials lay beside her on
the grass, and her head was bowed on her arm, her face hidden from
sight on her black sleeve.
"Poor child!" he thought, compassionately, "she has a sorrow to grieve
over as well as I;" and he stepped softly, almost fearing to intrude
upon the sacredness of her grief, yet loath to turn back again, for
something drew him irresistibly to her side.
The soft echo of his footstep in the grass startled her. She looked up
quickly with a low cry. He saw tears upon her face, and her rosy lips
were quivering like a child's.
"Leonora!" he cried, and knelt down impulsively by her side.
She was so taken by surprise for a moment that she forgot to draw away
the hands he caught daringly in his. She looked up at him, and said,
with a catch in her breath:
"I thought you were in London."
"So I was until to-day; but I came down to bid you good-bye," he
answered, feasting his hungry sight unrestrainedly on the pale beauty
of her lifted face.
"Then you knew that I was going away?" she asked.
"Yes; I saw De Vere in town. He told me," he answered; and a pretty
blush crept into her cheeks, and her lashes fell. "And so," he went on,
half smiling, "you refused my friend, in spite of all my advice to the
contrary?"
She pulled her hands suddenly away.
"Yes, I refused him. Was it worth my while," with a stinging scorn her
voice, "to sell my body and soul for paltry gold?"
"No; you were right not to give the hand while your heart was
another's," he said, bending down to look into her face that suddenly
grew burning crimson as she cried out, sharply:
"Why do you say that? How dare you? Has Lieutenant De Vere told you--"
"Yes, he has told me that you would not marry him because you loved
another. He is a thrice better man whoever he may be, Leonora. How
much I envy him I need not say," he said, earnestly, carried away by
the passion that filled him.
She looked at him with her gray-blue eyes full of wonder.
"You! Lady Adela's intended husband!" she said, bitterly.
"I am not her intended husband," he answered. "Do you think I am less
noble than you, Leonora? that I could wrong any one by giving my hand
without my heart? No, I do not love Lady Adela, and I can never be her
husband. Do you know what I was doing up in London, child?"
"How should I know?" she answered.
"Well, I was trying to exchange into a regiment that is _en route_ for
India. I am going to throw over the twenty thousand a year and run away
from England and my pain."
"You are?" she said, drawing a long breath and gazing at him with
dilated, wondering eyes. "But why, Lord Lancaster?"
"Can you ask me why?" he asked, bitterly.
"Yes, because I can not understand at all why you are going to India.
What pain is it you are running away from?"
He started and looked at her keenly. Was it possible that she did not
guess? Had she misunderstood him all along? His heart beat with a
sudden hope.
"I am fleeing from that misery that the poet has put into immortal
doggerel," he said. "Have you never heard of it, Leonora? That pain
which is
"'Of all pains the greatest pain,
To love and not be loved again?'"
She looked at him with a new, strange light in her soft eyes that made
his heart beat tumultuously.
"Yes, I have heard of it," she said; "but I did not know that you were
a victim to its pangs. Who is it that you love, Lord Lancaster?"
"Is it possible you do not know?" he asked; and then he saw that her
eyes were shining with hope, and her whole graceful form trembling.
He took the small hands again into his, and she did not offer to take
them away.
"I will make a compact with you, Leonora," he said. "If I will tell you
whom I love, will you then tell me to whom you have given your heart?"
"Yes, I will tell you," she replied, with a soft, sweet laugh.
"Listen, then," he said. "I have been in love with you, Leonora, ever
since that first day I saw you in New York."
"And I with you," she answered, glowing with happy blushes.
"My darling!" he cried, and caught her in his arms and pressed her to
his beating heart. "Then why have you been so cruel to me all the time?"
"Because I thought you were going to marry Lady Adela, and I was so
jealous and unhappy that I misunderstood you all the while," Leonora
confessed, with shy frankness.