The two friends parted at the gate, Madelaine refusing to go in.
"No," she said; "they will be expecting me at home."
They kissed, and then stood holding one another's hands, both wanting to
relieve their full hearts, but dreading to begin. Hardly a word had
been spoken on their way back, and such words as had been said were upon
indifferent subjects.
But now the moment for parting had come, and they gazed wistfully in
each other's eyes.
Louise was the first to break the painful since.
"Maddy, dear, ought we not to confide in each other?"
"Ah!" exclaimed Madelaine, with a sigh of relief that the constraint was
over. "Yes, dear. Did Mr Pradelle propose to you?"
"Yes."
"And you told him it was impossible?"
"Yes. What did my brother want to say?"
"That we ought to be married now, and it would make him a better man."
"And you told him it was impossible?"
"Yes."
There was another sigh as if of relief on both sides, and the two girls
kissed again and parted.
It was a brisk quarter of an hour's walk to the Van Heldre's, which lay
at the end of the main street up the valley down which the little river
ran; and on entering the door, with a longing upon her to go at once to
her room and sit down and cry, Madelaine uttered a sigh full of misery,
for she saw that it was impossible.
As she approached the great stone porch leading into the broad hall,
which was one of the most attractive looking places in the house, filled
as it was with curiosities and other objects brought by the various
captains from the Mediterranean, and embracing cabinets from
Constantinople with rugs and pipes, little terra-cotta figures from
Sardinia, and pictures and pieces of statuary from Rome, Naples, and
Trieste--there was the sound of music, but such music as might be
expected from a tiny bird organ, whose handle Mrs Van Heldre was
turning as she gazed wistfully up at a bullfinch, whose black cap was
set on one side, and little beady eyes gazed down from the first one and
then the other side of their owner's little black stumpy beak, which it
every now and then used to ruffle the delicate red feathers of its
breast or the soft grey blue of its back.
The notes that came from the little box-like instrument--a very baby of
an organ--as Mrs Van Heldre turned, were feeble in the extreme, but
there was a method in the machine which piped forth most irregularly and
in the most feeble way the quaint old French air "Ma Normandie;" and as
Madelaine heard it, her broad white forehead grew perplexed and a thrill
of misery and discomfort ran through her.
"Ah, my dear, I'm so glad you've come back. Where's papa?"
"I have not seen him, mamma."
"Busy, I suppose. How he does work! But do look, dear, at this
tiresome bird. He'll never learn to pipe."
"Not with patience, mamma? I think so."
"I don't, Maddy. It seems to take more patience than I've got. It's
worse than trying to teach that parrot. It never would learn the words
you wanted it to."
"Is it worth the trouble, mamma, dear?"
"No, my dear, I don't think it is; but I seemed to fancy that I should
like to have a piping bullfinch. Every body has some fancy, dear; and
I'm sure mine's better than Margaret Vine's for aristocratic
connections. Ah! how cross that woman does make me feel."
"She is rather irritating," said Madelaine, holding the tip of a white
finger between the bars of the cage.
"Irritating?" said the plump little woman flushing; "I call her
maddening. The life she leads that poor patient man! dictating as she
does, and worrying him about the French estates and the family name,
while George Vine is so patient that--"
"He would succeed in teaching a bullfinch to pipe, mamma."
"Ah, now you're laughing at me, and thinking me weak; but it's better to
have my weakness than hers. Only fancy: ever since she formed that mad,
foolish attachment for that French scoundrel, who coaxed the whole of
her money away from her and then threw her over, has George Vine taken
her to his home and let her tyrannise over him. A silly woman! Your
father always said the man was a scamp. And, by the way, that Mr
Pradelle, I don't like him, my dear."
"Neither do I, mamma."
"That's right, my dear; I'm very glad to hear you say so; but surely
Louie Vine is not going to be beguiled by him?"
"Oh, no."
"Ah, that's all very well; but Luke Vine came in as he went by, to say
in his sneering fashion that Louie and Mr Pradelle were down on the
shore, and that you were walking some distance behind with Harry."
"Mr Luke Vine seems to have plenty of time for watching his
neighbours," said Madelaine, contemptuously.
"Yes; he is always noticing things; but don't blame him, dear. I'm sure
he means well, and I can forgive him anything for that. Ah! here's your
father."
"Ah! my dears," said Van Heldre cheerily. "Tired out."
"You must be," said Mrs Van Heldre, bustling about him to take his hat
and gloves. "Here do come and sit down."
The merchant went into the drawing-room very readily, and submitted to
several little pleasant attentions from wife and daughter, as he asked
questions about the bullfinch, laughing slily the while at Madelaine.
Evening came on with Van Heldre seated in his easy chair, thoughtfully
watching wife and daughter, both of whom had work in their laps; but
Mrs Van Heldre's was all a pretence, for, after a few stitches, her
head began to nod forward, then back against the cushion, and then, as
if by magic, she was fast asleep.
Madelaine's needle, however, flew fast, and she went on working, with
her father watching her attentively, till she raised her eyes, let her
hands rest in her lap, and returned his gaze with a frank, calm look of
love and trust that made him nod his head in a satisfied way.
"You want to say something to me, Maddy," he said in a low voice.
"Yes, papa."
"About your walk down on the beach?"
Madelaine nodded.
"You know I went."
"Yes; I saw you, and Luke Vine came and told me as well."
"It was very kind of him," said Madelaine, with a touch of sarcasm in
her voice.
"Kind and unkind, my dear. You see he has no business--nothing to do
but to think of other people. But he means well, my dear, and he likes
you."
"I have often thought so."
"Yes; and you were right. He warned me that I was not to let your
intimacy grow closer with his nephew."
"Indeed, papa!"
"Yes, my dear. He said that I was a--well, I will not tell you what,
for not stopping it directly, for that Harry was rapidly drifting into a
bad course--that it was a hopeless case."
"That is not the way to redeem him, father."
"No, my dear, it is not. But you were going to say something to me?"
"Yes," said Madelaine, hesitating. Then putting down her work she rose
and went to her father's side, knelt down, and resting her arms upon his
knees, looked straight up in his face.
"Well, Maddy?"
"I wanted to speak to you about Harry Vine."
There was a slight twitching about the merchant's brows, but his face
was calm directly, and he said coolly--
"What about Harry Vine?"
Madelaine hesitated for a few moments, and then spoke out firmly and
bravely.
"I have been thinking about his position, father, and of how sad it is
for him to be wasting his days as he is down here."
"Very sad, Maddy. He is, as Luke Vine says, going wrong. Well?"
"I have been thinking, papa, that you might take him into your office
and give him a chance of redeeming the past."
"Nice suggestion, my dear. What would old Crampton say?"
"Mr Crampton could only say that you had done a very kind act for the
son of your old friend."
"Humph! Well?"
"You could easily arrange to take him, papa, and with your firm hand
over him it would do an immense deal of good."
"Not to me."
There was a pause during which Van Heldre gazed into his child's
unblenching eyes.
"So we are coming at facts," he said at last. "Harry asked you to
interfere on his behalf?"
Madelaine shook her head and smiled.
"Is this your own idea?"
"Entirely."
"Then what was the meaning of the walk on the beach to-day?"
"Harry sought for it, and said that we had been playfellows from
children, that he loved me very dearly, and he asked me to be his wife."
"The--"
Van Heldre checked himself.
"And what did you say?"
"That it was impossible."
"Then you do not care for him?" cried Van Heldre eagerly.
Madelaine was silent.
"Then you do not care for him?" said Van Heldre again.
"I'm afraid I care for him very much indeed, father," said Madelaine
firmly; "and it grieves me so to see him drifting away that I determined
to ask you to come to his help."
"Let me thoroughly understand you, my darling. You love George Vine's
son--your old friend's brother?"
"Yes, father," said Madelaine, in a voice little above a whisper.
"And he has asked you to be his wife?"
"Yes."
"Tell me what answer you gave him?"
"In brief, that I would never marry a man so wanting in self-respect and
independence as he has shown himself to be."
"Hah!"
It was a softly-uttered ejaculation, full of content.
"He said that our parents were rich, that there was no need for him to
toil as he had done, but that if I consented it would give him an
impetus to work."
"And you declined conditionally?"
"I declined absolutely, father."
"And yet you love him?"
"I'm afraid I love him very dearly, father."
"You are a strange girl, Madelaine."
"Yes, father."
"Do you know what it means for me to take this wilful young fellow into
my office?"
"Much trouble and care."
"Yes. Then why should I at my time of life fill my brain with worry and
care?"
"Because, as you have so often taught me, we cannot live for ourselves
alone. Because he is the son of your very old friend."
"Yes," said Van Heldre softly.
"Because it might save him from a downward course now that there is, I
believe, a crisis in his life."
"And because you love him, Maddy?"
She answered with a look.
"And if I were so insane, so quixotic, as to do all this, what guarantee
have I that he would not gradually lead you to think differently--to
consent to be his wife before he had redeemed his character?"
"The trust you have in me that I should not do anything you did not
consider right."
"Hah!" ejaculated Van Heldre again. And there was another long silence.
"I feel that I must plead for him, father. It would be the
turning-point of his life. You could influence him so much."
"I'm afraid not, my child. If he has not the manliness to do what is
right for your sake, I'm afraid that anything I could do or say would
not be of much avail."
"You underrate your power, father," said Madelaine, with a look full of
pride in him.
"And if I did this I might have absolute confidence that matters should
go no farther until he had completely changed?"
"You know you might."
"Hah!" sighed Van Heldre. "You will think this over, father?"
"There is no need, my dear."
"No need?"
"No, my child. I have for some days past been thinking over this very
thing, just in the light in which you placed it."
"You have, father?"
"Yes, and I had a long talk with George Vine this afternoon respecting
his son."
"Oh, father!"
"I told him I could see that the trouble was growing bigger and telling
upon him, and proposed that I should take Harry here." Madelaine had
started to her feet.
"Presuming that he does not refuse after his father has made my
proposals known, Harry Vine comes here daily to work under Crampton's
guidance." Madelaine's arms were round her father's neck.
"You have made me feel very happy and satisfied, my dear," said Van
Heldre, pressing her to his breast; "and may heaven speed what is going
to be a very arduous task. He will commence in the office next week."
Just then Mrs Van Heldre raised her head and looked round.
"Bless my heart!" she exclaimed. "I do believe I have nearly been to
sleep."