Remember him? ah!
Berry could have laughed aloud at the tender question.
She knew that she could never forget his glance and smile of this
morning her whole life long.
Yet, with her pretty head poised, coquettishly, on one side, and her
eyes half veiled under their shady lashes, she faltered demurely:
“I--I--believe you are the same gentleman that passed with Miss
Montague this morning, and bowed to me.”
“Yes, you are right,” he answered, with a soft laugh, as he leaned his
elbows on the gate with his face very close to her, while he continued
tenderly:
“And from the first moment I saw your lovely face I could not get you
out of my mind. I asked Miss Montague who was that pretty young girl,
and she frowned at me, and said: ‘There’s not a pretty face that can
escape you, Charley; but that is only little Berry Vining, the daughter
of a poor tailoress, not in our set at all, so don’t ask for an
introduction.’”
Berry’s cheeks grew hot, and her heart thumped with anger as she said
to herself:
“I’ll pay you out for that, my proud lady, by taking him away from you!”
Handsome Charley Bonair continued wheedlingly:
“As I couldn’t get properly introduced to you, I thought I’d present
myself. I see you are wearing some of my roses.”
“Thank you so much for them; I love roses dearly,” murmured Berry, in
shy bliss, her head in such a whirl under his laughing, ardent glance,
that she hardly knew whether she was standing on her head or on her
feet.
In his black evening suit, and a white carnation in his buttonhole, he
was superbly handsome, and carried with him that subtle aroma of wealth
and position so alluring to a poor girl brought for the first time in
contact with uppertendom. It was as if a being from another sphere,
a distant star, had fallen at her feet, stooping to lift her to his
dazzling height.
Trembling with mingled pride and love and joy, she looked up at him
with her heart in her eyes, her tender secret plain as day to him,
almost too easy a conquest to the blasé young man of the world.
But he continued to smile very tenderly at her, and venturing to clasp
her little hand as it clung to the top of the fence, he said:
“I am due at the Montagues’ lawn fête presently, but will you come
with me for a little spin in my run-about first? It is just around the
corner, and this is the finest night I ever saw for a moonlight drive.”
“Oh, I shall be delighted--but--but--I must ask mamma first,” declared
the happy girl.
“Oh, no, for explanations would delay our drive, since I must soon be
back to the hall. We will be home before she knows we are gone. Only
a two-mile spin, dear little girl,” pleaded the tempter, pressing her
little hand.
She thought:
“Mamma is asleep by now, and it would be a pity to arouse her from her
nap. Surely there’s no harm in going, as I shall be back before she
misses me! And I shall so like to have this triumph over proud Miss
Montague, who tried to belittle me in his dear eyes.”
He saw that she was yielding, and, unlatching the gate, quickly drew
her outside, placing her small, trembling hand on his arm, and leading
her to the waiting trap.
A moment more, and he was lifting her into the elegant little trap,
drawn by a magnificent blooded bay horse, whose silver-mounted harness
glittered in the moonlight. Seating himself by her side, he took up
the reins, and away they went through the town and out upon the broad
country road, where the air, with the salty tang from the sea, was
fresh and sweet and exhilarating.
“Almost seems like eloping, does it not?” laughed Charley Bonair. “What
if it were so, dear little girl?”
Berry caught her breath with a startled gasp, a dizzy suspicion running
through her mind.
Did he mean it?
Was it an elopement sure enough? Was he taking her away to marry her,
now, to-night?
What would Rosalind Montague say?
She never dreamed of resisting if such were his will.
Poor little Berry was under the intoxicating spell of a maiden’s first
love, and it did not seem to her as if her splendid hero could do
anything wrong.
The bay horse flew over the smooth road, the fresh air blew in their
faces, lifting the soft curls from Berry’s white brow, and she felt
like one in Elysium. She was dwelling in a new and beautiful world, the
golden land of love.
Yet, when her companion gently attempted to slip an arm about her
waist, she decisively repulsed him.
“No, no; you must not make so free--we are almost strangers,” she
exclaimed, blushing warmly.
“Strangers! Why I love you, little girl! Cannot you love me a little in
return?” he pleaded.
Berry was about to answer him yes, taking this for a proposal of
marriage, when she suddenly remembered the gossip about his betrothal
to Rosalind, and drawing back, she faltered tremulously:
“But--but--they say that you are engaged to marry Miss Montague!”
“Bah! What has that to do with your being my sweetheart, I wonder; she
need not know about it,” laughed Charley Bonair, leaning as close to
her as she would permit, for she was recoiling in perplexity, murmuring:
“But is it true?”
“Why, yes, little one, I’m to marry her some day, I suppose! Deuced
pretty girl, you know, and in ‘my set,’ and all that--very proper, of
course. But I mean to have as many sweethearts as I like, before and
after the wedding, if you please!”
If he had thrust a knife in her tender heart Berry could not have
moaned more piteously, for all at once he seemed to her a monster
instead of an adorable Prince Charming. With that heartbreaking little
moan, she cried plaintively:
“Oh, take me home, take me home quickly! Please, please, please!”
And though the moon and stars still gleamed on as brightly as before,
it seemed to her tortured mind as though the whole sky were veiled in
inky darkness, and her dream of love and happiness had faded as before
a chilling wintry blast.
He had told her he was indeed to marry Rosalind, but that he should
continue to have as many sweethearts as he pleased! He dared even think
she would consent to be one of them!
She began to tremble like a wind-blown leaf, and as he only laughed in
answer to her pleading, she added wildly:
“You are cruel; you are wicked, to be making love to me when you are
to marry another! I will have no more to do with you, so there, there,
there!” and tearing the roses from her breast and hair, Berry flung
them in his face with the passionate fury of “the woman scorned.”
“You dear little vixen!” he exclaimed, boisterously, without turning
back.