"There's something in a flying horse."
--PETER BELL.
"For of fortunes sharpe adversite,
The worst kind of infortune is this,
A man that hath been in prosperite
And it remember, whan it passed is!"
--CHAUCER.
"WHERE are you going, Uncle Christopher?" asks Dulce, as Sir Christopher
enters the small drawing-room, booted and spurred for a long journey.
Portia, in the distance, bending over an easel; Julia is forming some
miraculous flower, that never yet was seen by land or sea, on a coarse
towel, with some crewel wools; the Boodie is lying on her little fat
stomach, drawing diligently with a slate and pencil; Dulce, charmingly
idle, is leaning back in a lounging chair, doing nothing.
"To Warminster," says Sir Christopher "What shall I bring you girls from
that sleepy little town?"
"Something sweet," says Dulce, going up to him, and laying her soft arms
lovingly round his neck.
"Like yourself," says Sir Christopher.
"Now that is sarcasm," says Miss Dulce, patting his fresh old cheek very
fondly. "I meant chocolates, or burnt almonds, or even everton toffy, if
all things fail."
"And what shall I bring the others?" asks Sir Christopher, laughing;
"you have a sweet tooth, you naughty child, perhaps they haven't."
"_I_ have," says Portia, turning round on her seat. "Bring us as much as
ever you can."
"Burnt almonds are my chief delight," murmurs Julia, affectedly and
somewhat absently, being sick with grief, because she cannot reconcile
it to her conscience that the stem of an arum lily should be peacock
blue.
"Bring some crackers," says the Boodie, suddenly warming into life, and
so far condescending to notice Sir Christopher as to roll round her
portly person until she lies prone upon her back. From this dignified
position she eyes Sir Christopher magisterially. "_Real_ crackers,
mind," she says severely, "that will say c-r-r-rack, and show fire!
those last you brought"--contemptuously--"were a humbug!"
"Elizabeth!" exclaims her mother in a would-be shocked tone (the Boodie
rejoices in that lengthy name), "what _are_ you saying?"
"The truth," says the Boodie, unflinchingly; "the last he brought were a
reg'lar swindle--ask Jacky; why they wouldn't go off even if you
_stamped_ on 'em."
She so plainly--by the severity of her glance--conveys to every one the
impression that she believes Sir Christopher on that last unfortunate
occasion had purposely bought for them crackers beneath notice, that the
poor old gentleman, though innocent of offence, feels himself growing
warm beneath her relentless gaze.
"It wasn't my fault, my dear," he says, apologetically; "I quite meant
them to go off. I did, indeed."
"Perhaps so. Take care, however, it doesn't occur again," says the
Boodie, with so careful, though unconscious, an imitation of her
mother's manner when addressing her maid, that they all laugh, whereupon
she rolls back again to her former position, and takes no further notice
of them.
Just at this moment Fabian enters the room.
"Going to drive to Warminster?" he asks his uncle.
"Yes."
"Not Bess, I hope?" alluding to a very objectionable young mare in the
stables.
"Yes," says Sir Christopher again. "Why not?"
"She is utterly unsafe. About the worst thing in chestnuts I ever met.
I took her out myself the other day--rode her straight from this to
Grange; and I confess, I should not care to do it again. Take one of the
other horses, and let that beast lie quiet until you can get rid of
her."
"Nonsense!" says Sir Christopher, scornfully; "I wouldn't part with her
for any money. She is the greatest beauty this side of the county."
"Her beauty is her one point; for the rest, she is vindictive and
ill-mannered."
"Don't do anything foolish, dearest," says Dulce, with her eyes large
and frightened. "Do listen to Fabian."
"And let myself be conquered by a pettish chestnut, at my age," says Sir
Christopher, lightly--he had been a famous horseman in his day. "My dear
child, you don't understand, and there are moments when Fabian romances.
To satisfy you, however, I shall take George with me."
"'Wilful man must have his way,'" quotes Fabian, with a slight shrug.
"Before I go out, shall I look over those accounts with Slyme?"
"Where are you going?"
"To the warren, with the others, to have a few shots at the rabbits;
they overrun the place."
"Very good. Just ask Slyme about the accounts. By-the-by, he gets more
irregular daily."
"More drunk, do you mean?" says Fabian. There are moments when his
manner is both cold and uncompromising.
Portia regards him curiously.
"Yes! yes! Just so," says Sir Christopher, hastily. "But for the
melancholy story that attaches itself to him--and that, of course, is
some excuse for him--I really should not feel myself justified in
keeping him here much longer."
"What story?" asks Portia.
"Oh! well; it all lies in a nutshell. It is an old story, too; one has
so often heard it. A bad son--dissipated--in perpetual hot water. A
devoted father. Then, one day, a very bad story comes, and the son has
to fly the country. And then, some time afterward, news comes of his
death. Slyme never saw him again. He broods over that, I think; at
least, he has never been the same man since the son, Matthew, left
England. It was all a very unhappy business."
"For the father, perhaps. For the son, he had more than ordinary luck
to die as soon as he did," says Fabian. He does not speak at all
bitterly. Only hopelessly, and without heart or feeling.
"Nobody knows how old Gregory got him out of the country so cleverly,"
says Sir Christopher. "It was a marvel how he managed to elude the grasp
of the law."
"He satisfied the one principal creditor, I suppose?" says Fabian,
indifferently.
"Oh! impossible," says Sir Christopher. "It came to hundreds, you know;
and he hadn't a farthing. Well, good-by; I'm off. Expect me and the
bon-bons about dinner-hour."
He nods to Portia and Julia, who smile at him in return, and, kissing
Dulce, quits the room.
Fabian, following him, goes on to the library; and, having desired one
of the men to send the secretary, Slyme, to him, sits down at one of the
tables and turns over leisurely the pages of accounts that lie there.
After a brief examination, he tells himself impatiently that they are
somewhat muddled, or have, at least, been attended to in a most slovenly
manner. He has just discovered a serious mistake in the row of figures
that adorns the end of the second page, when the door opens slowly, and
Gregory Slyme comes in.
"Wait one moment, Slyme," says Fabian, without looking up from the
figures before him. A moment passes in utter silence. Then Fabian, still
with his eyes upon the account, says, somewhat sharply: "Why, it is
altogether wrong. It has been attended to with extreme carelessness. Did
you, yourself, see to this matter of Younge's?"
He waits, apparently for an answer but none comes. Lifting his eyes he
fixes them scrutinizingly on the old man before him, and having fixed
them, lets them rest there in displeased surprise.
Slyme, beneath this steady gaze, grows visibly uneasy. His eyes shift
uncomfortably from one object in the room to another; his limbs are
unsteady; the hand resting on the table near him is shaking. His face
betrays vacancy mixed with a cunning desire to hide from observation the
heaviness and sluggishness that is overpowering him.
"Speak," says Fabian, sternly and remorselessly; "you can frame an
answer, I suppose."
The old man mutters something that is almost unintelligible, so thick
and husky are his tones. His eyes grow more restless;--mechanically, and
as though unconscious of the act, he leans his body stupidly against the
book-case near him.
"You are drunk," says Fabian, with slow scorn--"leave the room."
Having said this he turns again to his papers, as though from this
moment contemptuously unaware of the other's presence.
Slyme attempts an explanation:
"You wrong me, sir," he says, in a thick uncertain voice--"I--I am
ill--; my head is bad at times--I--"
"That will do," says Fabian, such ineffable disgust in his whole manner
as makes the miserable, besotted old wretch before him actually cower.
"No more lies. I have spoken to you already twice this week--and--; do
you know what hour it is?--twelve o'clock! you begin your day early."
"I assure you, sir," begins Slyme again. But Fabian will not listen:
"Go," he says, briefly, with a disdainful motion of the hand, and in a
tone not to be disobeyed. Slyme moves towards the door in his usual
slouching fashion, but, as he reaches it, pauses, and for one instant
lifts his heavy eyes, and lets them rest upon the young man at the
distant table.
This one instant reveals his thoughts. In his glance there is fear,
distrust, and, above and beyond all, a malignant and undying
hatred--such a hatred as might project itself from the eyes of the
traitor upon his victim. There is, too, upon Slyme's face a contortion
of the muscles, that it would be sacrilege to call a smile, that is
revengeful, and somehow suggests the possibility that this man, however
impotent he may now appear, has, in some strange fashion, acquired a
hidden and terrible power over the young man, who a moment since had
treated him with such scorn and contumely.
The old secretary's countenance for this fateful moment is one
brilliant, if wicked phantasmagoria, in which the ghosts of long
sustained thoughts appear and disappear, going from fear and its
brother, hatred, to lasting revenge. Then all vanish; the usual soddened
look returns to the man's face; he opens the door, and once more,
instead of the evil genius he looked a second ago, a broken-down,
drunken old creature crosses the threshold, shambles over the hall, and
is lost presently amongst the many passages.
* * * * *
Meantime, _ennui_ is reigning triumphantly in the drawing-room, more
conspicuously in the case of Dulce.
"Hey-day," she says, with a little, idle yawn; "how I do wish everybody
would not go out shooting, all at once. I think they might take it by
turns. But all men are selfish; they never consider how lonely we may
be."
"Why should one miss them?" says Julia, who in her soul considers every
moment unoccupied by the society of a man (that is a possible lover) as
time misspent.
"I don't know," says Dulce, candidly; "I am only sure of this, that I
want them always."
Portia says nothing.
"Well, certainly, at times they are amusing," says Mrs. Beaufort, as
though just awaking to the fact that now and again one _can_ find a man
with some wit or humor in him--"and I honestly confess"--with a little
laugh and a great assumption of candor--"that I wish even Stephen Gower
would drop in now and help us to pass away an hour or two."
"_Even_ Stephen Gower!" repeats Dulce. "Julia, what has that poor young
man done to you, that you should speak thus meanly of him? _Even_, what
an unkind word!"
"I don't believe I quite meant it, do you know," says Julia, relenting.
"I like Stephen Gower very much. By-the-by, what do you think of him? I
never yet heard you express an opinion, good or bad, about him. Do it
now."
Leaning back in her chair, Dulce slowly and thoughtfully raises her arms
in the air, with her fingers tipping each other, until presently they
fall indolently behind her head, where she lets them lie.
"Well, let me see," she says, lazily, "I think, perhaps, like Chaucer's
man, he is a 'veray parfit gentil knight.'"
Portia lifts her eyes from her painting and turns them slowly upon her
cousin; she regards her very silently for a moment or two, and then she
smiles, and leaning forward, opens her lips.
"'And of his port as meke as is a mayde,'" she says, mischievously,
purposely choosing the same poet for her quotation that Dulce had taken
for hers.
Miss Blount laughs.
"You, too, are severe upon our neighbor," she says, defending him more
from obstinacy than from real desire to see justice done. "I confess he
is at times a trifle too mild, but not effeminate, surely?"
"He is very handsome," says Portia, evasively.
"He has a charming mouth," says Dulce.
"I think you ought only to look at Roger's mouth," says Julia,
prudishly, whereupon Dulce shrugs her shoulders, impatiently, and,
turning, devotes herself for the next ten minutes to the small artist
lying at her feet--an attention received by the imperturbable Boodie
with the most exasperating unconcern.
The afternoon wanes; day is sinking to its rest. Behind the tall dark
firs "the great gold sun-god, blazing through the sky" may still be
seen, but now he grows aweary, and would fain give place to his sister,
the pale moon.
"The sweet keen smell--the sighing sound" of coming night is on the air.
The restless ocean is rolling inland with a monotonous roar; there is
scarcely sufficient breeze to ruffle the leaves of the huge chestnut
that stands near one corner of the old house, not far from the balcony
outside the drawing-room windows, where Mrs. Beaufort and the two girls
are sitting.
The children are playing somewhere in the distance. Their sweet and
merry voices come up to the balcony now and then, and mingle with the
breath of descending night.
And now from beneath the fir trees two figures emerge, and come towards
the stone steps where their hostess is sitting.
"Are you clean?" asks Dulce, with a charming smile, leaning over the
railings to see them better as they draw closer.
"To confess a horrid truth, I don't believe we are," says Stephen Gower,
glancing up at her, and regarding his rough shooting coat somewhat
ruefully. "Will that admission exclude us from Paradise?"
"Dulce," says Dicky Browne, who is the second of the two figures, "I'm
worn out. I've been walking all day, a thing I very seldom do; I have
been firing off an unlimited number of cartridges, without, I am bound
to confess--I am, as experience has doubtless taught you, a remarkably
truthful person--without any very brilliant consequences, and I feel
that very little more fatigue will be my death. Have compassion on us.
We faint, we die; show mercy and give us some tea and some cake. You're
awfully hungry, Gower, aren't you?"
"Well, not very," says Mr. Gower, too occupied in his contemplation of
Dulce's charming face to be quite alive to what is so plainly expected
of him.
"Oh, nonsense! He is tremendously hungry," says Dicky Browne. "Let us
up, Dulce, and we will sit out there on the balcony, and won't soil
anything. Except gore, there isn't much staining about us."
"But that is worse than anything," says Dulce with a shudder. "However,
come up, and if you keep _very_ far away, I daresay I shan't mind much."
"Hard conditions," says Gower, in a lower tone.
So tea is got for them again, and the children, who always seem to
_feel_ when plum-cake is to be had, come trooping noisily up the steps
to join, uninvited, in the festivities.
Great content follows, and, indeed, all is peace until something said by
the Boodie creates a confusion that sweeps calm to the winds. She has
ensconced herself on Mr. Gower's knee, without saying so much as "by
your leave" or "with your leave," and now, raising one soft little
dimpled hand to his chin, turns his face towards her own, and for a full
minute regards him with silent curiosity.
"Well, is your Highness satisfied?" says Gower, feeling amused.
The Boodie takes no notice of this enquiry. She puckers up her smooth
brows as if puzzled, and then says, slowly--
"I don't believe one word of it!"
"Of what?" says Gower. Everybody by this time is looking at the Boodie,
and the Boodie is steadfastly regarding Stephen Gower.
"It wasn't true what she said," goes on the Boodie, meditatively,
"because you have hair on your lip. _Girls_ don't have hair on their
lips--do they?"
"Not as a general rule," says Dicky Browne. "There _have_ been noble
exceptions, but unhappily they are rare. Miss Gaunt is perhaps the only
girl down here who can boast of hirsute adornment, and the growth upon
her upper lip is not to be despised. But then she belongs to the higher
and more powerful class of females, in fact, as Wordsworth so touchingly
expresses it, she
'Wears upon her forehead clear
The freedom of a mountaineer.'
I always--mildly--think Wordsworth must have been acquainted with Miss
Gaunt."
"Go on," says Stephen to the Boodie, who is still lost in thought. "You
have not yet told me what it is you disbelieve."
"It was something Portia said," returns the Boodie, composedly.
"That _I_ said! surely you are mistaken, darling," says Portia.
"No, I am not," persists the Boodie, in an unmoved tone.
"Stephen," again turning his face to hers, "are you 'meke'?"
At this word all the truth becomes at once known to Portia and Dulce.
The Boodie had been in the room when they were discussing Stephen with
her mother. She had heard everything. She is a little pitcher--she has
long ears. Can nothing be done to stop her further speech?
"He is a very nice boy, but I'm not prepared to go as far as calling him
meek," says Dicky Browne, who begins to scent mischief in the air. "Who
applied that word to him?"
"I think it is time all you children ran away to nurse," says Julia, in
answer to an agonized glance from both girls.
"It was Portia," says the Boodie to Dicky Browne, in her sweet innocent
treble. "Dulce said first he was a 'knight,' and then Portia said he was
a 'meek maid.' She said something, too, about 'port,' but I don't think
she meant Uncle Christopher's port; I think she meant Stephen's."
Deadly silence follows this bombshell. As Mr. Gower, only the day
before, had been reading the "Canterbury Tales" for them in his very
best old English style, it is impossible to believe the two quotations
from them, used in the morning, are not now alive in his memory.
Gower colors, and looks questioningly at Dulce. His expression is not
altogether one of chagrin. The child had said she (Dulce) had called
him a knight--"a veray parfit gentil knight" it must have been. There is
comfort, and even gladness in this thought; so much comfort, that he
even feels inclined to forgive Portia for comparing him to a "mayde."
Still, some awkwardness is naturally felt by all--except the Boodie, who
yawns indifferently, and finally follows the other children up to the
nursery--and every one is vainly trying to think of some commonplace
remark, that, when uttered, shall have the effect of restoring
conversation once more into a safe channel, when an interruption occurs
that puts chagrin and awkwardness out of their minds for the rest of the
evening.
First upon the air the reports of two guns being fired off quickly, one
after the other; then the quick flinty sound of a horse's galloping
hoofs.
Nearer they came, and still nearer, with that mad haste belonging to
them, that suggests unmanageable fury in the brute beast; and as all on
the balcony rise simultaneously and press forward to see what may be
coming, Bess and the dog-cart turn the corner near the chestnut tree,
and dash onwards towards the lower lawn.
Sir Christopher, grim and as full of rage as the animal in whose power
he now finds himself, is still holding the reins--but more for form's
sake than anything else, as he has no control whatever over the
infuriated chestnut, that, with reddened nostrils, and foam-covered
flanks, is rushing madly down the green slope.
A sudden rise in the velvet lawn, causing the dog-cart to sway rather
much to one side, unseats the groom, who is flung somewhat heavily to
the ground. Being fortunately, however, unhurt, he rises hastily, and
runs frantically after the mare, as though in foolish hope, that he may
yet overtake her and be of some service to his master. With a smothered
exclamation, Gower and Dicky Browne dash down the balcony steps to join
him in his vain pursuit.
Vain, indeed! At the lower end, by the long lawn, runs a river, small,
but swift, and turbulent, that flows for two miles through park, and
waving field, and glowing valley, to throw itself finally into the arms
of the thirsty ocean.
Towards this the horse is rushing madly. Once on its bank, who shall
tell what next may happen. There will be a mad bound--a crash--a cry,
perhaps, that will pierce through all other sounds--and then--and Sir
Christopher--.
As these thoughts force themselves upon the girls, they shudder, and
involuntarily move closer to each other. Dulce covers her face with her
hands, as though to shut out some dreadful sight, and a low dry sob
escapes her. Portia, deadly pale, but calm and wide-eyed, is clinging to
the balcony rails, and is gazing in speechless fear at the chestnut,
that every instant is bringing nearer to the fateful goal. Julia, from
time to time, emits short little shrieks of terror, she being the sort
of person who, in moments of peril, would be always safe to scream.
Onward flies the mare. Sir Christopher (as yet bolt upright in his seat,
and apparently, from the back view they can get of him, still so
possessed with rage as to be unconscious of fear) is trying hopelessly
to manage her.
Nearer and nearer to the brink of the stream they draw; now they are
within a few yards of it; soon help will be of little use, and the
panting groom and the two young men who are following him will only be
in time to witness more closely the disaster. All seems, indeed,
hopeless, when a man, springing from behind the thick laurel hedge that
grows on the right, rushes forward, and, seizing Bess by the head by
sheer force of mind and body, forces her upon her haunches.
"It is Fabian!" says Portia, in a voice sharp with fear.
"Dulce!--Dulce!" there is positive agony in her tone.
Dulce, letting her hands fall from her face, looks up. Julia forgets to
scream; all three watch with intensest anxiety the scene being enacted
below.
And now ensues a struggle between man and beast; a struggle sharp but
short. The beast, frightened, or, perhaps, with fury exhausted, it may
be, compelled against its will to acknowledge the superior power of mind
over matter--gives way, and after a good deal of prancing stands
tolerably quiet, though still trembling from excitement and violent
temper.
By this time the groom, with Gower and Dicky Browne, have joined them.
"Get out Sir Christopher," says the groom, in an agitated voice, the
swift run having added to his anxiety.
"Not a bit of it," says Sir Christopher, indignantly, "I'll take her
back to the stables, or--"
"Get down at once," says Fabian, in a quick, decided tone. "Don't delay,
she is dangerous still and may bolt again at any moment. Besides, you
have had enough of it, surely!"
"I'm not going to be conquered by any mare born," says the old Baronet,
obstinacy setting it at this point; "what d'ye think I bred her for, eh?
To be made a laughing-stock for the county, I suppose, eh? Nothing of
the sort. She shall own me as master if I die for it. Here, get out of
my way all you boys--"
It is plain Sir Christopher is as yet undaunted, though, in truth, there
is danger still; the chestnut is flinging up her head in an uncertain,
frightened fashion, scattering angry foam as she does so, and her eyes
are showing more white than is seemly.
Fabian, who is still holding the bridle with both hands, looks at his
uncle, earnestly, almost, it might be said, curiously.
"If you are bent on taking this brute round yourself, of course, I shall
go with you," he says, indifferently. "Hold her head, George, for a
moment."
Even as he speaks the mare moves uneasily, and, as the groom approaches,
throws up her head impatiently, and in so doing touches Fabian's right
arm somewhat roughly. In spite of his self-control he winces
perceptibly.
"You are hurt," says Sir Christopher, anxiously. "How?--where?"
"This arm," says Fabian, touching the injured part lightly. "A mere
scratch, no doubt, but it hurts. Nevertheless, if you persist, I daresay
I shall be able to hold her in check with the other."
"Here, George, lead her home," says Sir Christopher, hurriedly, throwing
the reins he still holds to the groom, and hastily descending from the
dog-cart. "To drive, indeed, with an injured arm! stuff and nonsense!"
he says, severely. "Some people have no sense, eh? though I must say I
believe that poor brute is maligned. But for those shots fired off just
as I was entering the gates nothing would have happened."
"Roger and Sir Mark discharging their guns, I daresay," says Stephen;
"awkward, they should have chosen just that moment to do it."
"Fate!" says Dicky Browne, solemnly.
Meantime, Fabian has turned away and gone quickly in the direction of
the house. Dulce, running down the balcony steps, goes up to him with a
very white little face.
"Darling, how brave you were. I thought something dreadful was going to
happen to you. It was a horrid moment. If that wicked Bess had persisted
she might have thrown you down and killed you."
"Well, she didn't, you see," says Fabian, lightly--but he shrinks a
little from her embrace, and moves so that she cannot touch his right
arm. His eyes are fixed upon the balcony above, where Portia still
stands, pale as an early snowdrop and thoroughly unnerved. There is,
however, about her a certain calm, that is part of her nature, and that,
perhaps, in her very greatest emergency, and in her bitterest hour of
need, would still be hers.
At this moment, however, Fabian so far wrongs her as to attribute this
inborn quietude to coldness and indifference. He turns again to Dulce.
"Take that terrified look off your face," he says, somewhat languidly,
with a smile that is faintly bitter. "You should show more self-control.
Take example by your cousin; see how composed she can be, and how
sensible."
He smiles again, and indicates Portia by a glance. For an instant his
eyes meet hers. Is he wrong in thinking she is even a shade paler now
than she was a moment since? He is not sure; and he has not time given
him to make the thought a certainty, as Miss Vibart, turning slowly,
goes towards one of the drawing-room windows, and presently is lost to
sight.
There was something in her eyes, in the hurried glance he got at them,
that saddens Fabian. Almost forgetful of Dulce's presence, he walks away
from her, and, having gained the house, goes moodily up the stairs
towards his own room.
His soul is disquieted; an agony of unrest, that even in his first days
of despair had not visited him, is on him now; a longing, a craving, for
what he knows (ah! the deep grief of that!) can never be obtained.
Why had her soft eyes looked so reproachful a while ago? Why had she
turned so quickly away from him when he had spoken those few harsh
words, for which he hates himself now?
Her pallor returns to him, and the fear in her large eyes. Surely he
should have taken note of them first, and not of the calmness and
seeming coldness and her utter composure.
And then a strange soft light comes into his face, as he remembers how
sweet she looked standing there, half leaning over the balcony, and
looking down on him--unworthy, pale, but full of beauty.
It may be that other women have been lovely in his eyes, but, surely,
none have reached her standard. One, indeed, in the past years had
appeared to him (though he had not loved her) as nearly perfect as a
woman can be; but, now comparing her with Portia, as he has often done
of late, she--the former beauty--had paled in comparison.
He has been reading some old book of late, and now, thinking of both
women, a description in it of some ancient queen and one of her court
comes to him as being applicable to the train of thought in which he is
indulging.
"One, amongst other purposes, said unto them of late, that she (the
queen) 'excelleth as far the duchess as the golden sun excelleth the
silver moon,' which appeareth in the gravity of her face. Thus say they
that have seen them both."
As he reaches the corridor, and gains the threshold of his own room, a
light step behind him, causing him to turn, he finds himself looking
once again into Portia's eyes.
She is very pale still, and there is something pathetic about her mouth.
Slowly she comes up to him, without uttering a word, until she is so
close to him that she can touch him, if she will. Then she speaks:
"You wronged me just now," she says, in a low voice: "you had an evil
thought about me! But not _now_, I think," regarding him earnestly. "You
have gone over it all again in your own mind, and you understand now you
misjudged me."
"You are quite right in all you say; I did misjudge you. I have
discovered my error. You will forgive me?"
"I suppose so." She is looking down now, and is tapping the ground
impatiently with her foot.
"You ought," says Fabian, quietly. "To misjudge one's neighbor is one of
the commonest failings of mankind."
There is meaning in his tone. She acknowledges unwillingly the fact that
she comprehends this meaning by a sign, silent but perceptible: she
colors deeply, and, still looking down, continues her tattoo upon the
oaken flooring of the corridor.
"You are not very humble," she says at length, "even now, when you have
had to demand my pardon."
"Am I not?" says Fabian, with a partly suppressed sigh. "I should be.
Forgive me that, too, and--" He pauses to draw his breath quickly, as if
in pain. At this she lifts her head, and something she sees in his
expression tells her the truth.
"You are hurt," she says, hastily, going nearer to him. "Where?--how?"
There is deep, unrestrained anxiety in her tone.
"My arm," confesses Fabian, who is, indeed, suffering greatly, laying
his left hand upon his right arm, high up above the elbow.
"Is it a sprain or a bruise?"
"A little of both, perhaps. I came up-stairs just now to ring for
Parkins to help me off with my coat, and do something for me."
"Parkins!" says Portia, with fine contempt; "of what use is a man in a
case like this. Why not ask Dulce--"
"Oh! it is really nothing; and you saw how frightened she was already. I
had pity on her nerves."
"Then let me be Parkins for a few minutes," says Portia, with a little
smile. "I used to be of great use to George" (her brother, Colonel
Vibart) "occasionally when he came to grief at football, or in the
hunting field. Let me see if my hand has lost its cunning."
"You won't like it," says Blount, hesitating; "it will look nasty, you
know, and there will be blood, I think, and perhaps it will be better
for me to--"
"This is my sitting-room," interrupts Portia, calmly, throwing open a
door on the opposite side of the corridor. "Come in here, and let me see
what has happened to you."
Fabian follows her obediently. It all seems to him something like a
dream, that this girl, usually so listless, should now brighten into
life, and grow energetic and anxious for his sake.
With gentle fingers she helps him to take off his coat, and, in a
business-like, very matter-of-fact fashion, unfastens the gold link at
his wrist, and, though paling a little as she sees the blood upon his
sleeve, resolutely rolls it up and lays bare the injured arm.
It is looking dark and swollen, and the skin has been knocked off it in
several places. The flesh has been a good deal bruised, and altogether
the wound is an ugly one without being in any way serious. In spite of
her efforts to the contrary, she blanches perceptibly, and shudders, and
lets her lids droop rather heavily over her eyes.
"You are unfit for this sort of work," says Fabian, angry with himself,
as he marks her agitation. "It was unpardonable of me even to permit you
to attempt it." He moves back from her, and tries his shirt sleeve once
more over his injured arm.
"Ah! do not touch it," says Portia, hastily; "the sleeve will only rub
against it and make it worse."
Involuntarily she lays her hand on his to prevent his covering the
wound, and looks at him with a glance full of sympathy and entreaty. So
standing, with her eyes large and dark with pity, and her soft white
hand trembling upon his, she seems to him so far
"Beyond all women, womanly,
He dreads to think how he should fare
Who came so near as to despair!"
A pang desolates his heart. Alas! is not despair the only portion that
can be meted out for him! The joy and the gladness of living, and the
one great treasure of all--the heart's love--that beautifies and refines
all it touches, can never be his; never for him, while this shadow rests
upon him, will there be home or "hearthstone," or that deeper, more
perfected sense of fellowship that exists between two souls only.
And this girl, with her hand on his, and
"With eyes like open lotus flowers
Bright in the morning rain."
looking straight up at him, with gentlest concern in her regard, how
might it have been with him and her, if life had flowed in a pleasant
stream, and no turbulent waves had come to disturb its calm and musical
ripple?
How short have been his days of grace, how long must be his years of
misery; just in the very opening of his life, in the silken morning of
his youth, the blow had fallen, deadening his sky, and rendering all
things gray.
In what a very little space, indeed, lie all our happy moments; even the
most successful of us can count them one by one, as it might be, on the
fingers of one hand; and how tardy, how wearying, are those where
sorrow, and trouble, and despair hold their own.
"Ce qui nous charme s'en va, et ce qui fait peine reste. La rose vit une
heure, et le cypres cent ans."
Portia has gone into an inner room, and now returns with a basin and a
sponge. Very gently (and as though afraid each movement may increase his
pain) she bathes his arm, glancing up at him every now and then to see
if, indeed, she is adding to or decreasing his agony.
If the truth be told, I believe he feels no agony at all, so glad he is
to know her touch, and see her face. When she has sponged his arm with
excessive tenderness, she brings a cambric handkerchief, and, tearing it
into strips, winds it round and round the torn flesh.
"Perhaps that will do until Dr. Bland can see it," she says hopefully.
"At least tell me you are in less pain now, and that I have done you
some small good."
"Small!" says Fabian.
"Ah! well," she says, lightly, "then I suppose I have succeeded, but you
must promise me, nevertheless, that you will have a doctor to look at
you."
Her tone is still exquisitely kind; but there is now a studied
indifference about it that hurts him keenly. Perhaps in his surprise at
this sudden change of manner he overlooks the fact that the difference
_is_ studied!
"I have given you too much trouble," he says, stupidly, in a leaden sort
of way. "But, as you say, you have been successful, I feel hardly any
pain now."
"Then I suppose I may dismiss you," she says, with a frugal little
smile, just glancing at the half opened door. The nervousness, the
sympathy is over, and she remembers how lost to social consideration is
the man to whose comfort she has been contributing for the past twenty
minutes.
"I have taken up too much of your time already," he says in a frozen
tone, and then he turns and goes toward the door. But, after a moment's
reflection, he faces round again abruptly, and comes up to her, and
stands before her with set lips and eyes aflame. His nostrils are
dilated, there is intense mental pressure discernible in every line of
his face.
"I do not mistake you," he says, with slow vehemence; "I am not such a
dullard that I should count your bare charity as friendship. You have
succoured me, as you would, of your grace, no doubt have succoured the
vilest criminal that walks the earth, were he in death or pain."
She has grown very pale, and is rather frightened, if her eyes speak
truly.
"Now that the reaction has set in," he goes on, bitterly, "you believe
you have demeaned yourself in that you have assisted one who----"
"You are saying what is not true," she says, in a low but clear voice;
speaking slowly, and with difficulty, because her lips are white and
dry.
"Am I?" exclaims he, passionately. "Say, if you can, that you believe me
innocent of all guilt, and I will believe you!"
He pauses--she is silent. A terrible moment ensues, fraught with agony
for Fabian, and still she makes no sign. Her hands, tightly clasped, are
hanging before her; her head is turned aside; her eyes persistently seek
the floor. As if every nerve in her body is strung to excess, she stands
so motionless that she might almost be a statue cut in marble.
Her silence is painfully eloquent. Fabian, in an excess of passion,
tears off the cambric bandages from his arm, and flings them at her
feet.
"I will have none of your charity," he says, with pale lips, and,
throwing wide the door, strides down the corridor, and is soon beyond
recall.
When the last echo of his feet has died away Portia rouses herself, and,
moving towards a low chair near the fireplace, sinks into it, and
presses her hands convulsively against her heart.
Now that she is at last alone, the excitement of the last hour begins to
tell upon her. Her cheeks and lips, that up to this have been positively
bloodless, now grow dyed with richest crimson, that is certainly not of
this earth--earthy, as it gives no promise of health or youthful
strength. She leans back in her chair as if exhausted; and, in truth, in
the fair shell that harbors her soul but very little power remains to
battle with the varied thoughts that rise within her.
Scene by scene the events of the last hour spread themselves before her:
the maddened brute rushing violently over the soft, smooth lawn to where
the treacherous stream awaits him, running gently between its damp green
banks--Sir Christopher's danger--Fabian's unexpected interference--the
short, but terrible fear for him--and then the sudden fall from the
extreme agony of suspense to comparative calm.
And yet, perhaps, all this does not haunt her so much as one or two
other things, that, in reality, were of little moment. That time, for
instance, when he--Fabian--stood beneath the balcony, and when he, with
a glance, a half-spoken word, accused her of coldness and indifference.
He had condemned her all too willingly. But this was only fair, no
doubt. Had not she, in her innermost heart, condemned him, unheard,
unquestioned.
And what was it he had said to Dulce? "Take example by your cousin; see
how sensible _she_ can be," or something like that. Sensible! When this
terrible pain was tugging at her heart strings, and prolonged
nervousness had made speech impossible.
And why had he said "_your_ cousin," instead of "our cousin?" Was it
that he did not care to claim kinship with her, or because--because--he
did not count himself worthy--to--
Again she raises her hand, and presses it with undue force against her
left side. She is unhappy and alone, and full of a vague uncertainty.
"Each substance of a grief hath twenty shadows," and all the shadows of
her grief seem now to hem her in, and encompass her on every side. The
old troublesome pain in her heart, that drove her from the dissipations
of town life to seek a shelter in the quiet country, returns to her
again. At this moment the pain of which I speak grows almost past
endurance. A faint, gray pallor supersedes the vivid carmine of a while
ago. She sighs with evident difficulty, and sinks back heavily amongst
her cushions.