It was two weeks after the scene at Colonel Archdale's dinner-party.
There was quite a knot of people in Madam Pepperell's drawing-room. All
the household at Seascape had come on the way home from a drive to pay a
morning visit here, and found the in-door coolness refreshing. Colonel
Archdale, who had joined his son, was there also. Mr. Royal, as it
happened, was in Portsmouth that morning.
Edmonson had been exemplary enough in avoiding the cant of pretended
regret for what must have given him pleasure. Archdale had no complaints
to make on that score, but he distrusted Edmonson more and more, and
perceived more clearly that he was attracted by Elizabeth. He wondered
if she encouraged him: that was not like the person she seemed to be;
yet why not? She had assured Archdale more than once that she was free,
and her certainty had given him comfort. But he was here this morning
for another purpose than to weigh the question of Miss Royal's fancy. If
she did encourage Edmonson she was all the more inexplicable.
Stephen bent over Lady Dacre's chair, talking gayly to her; yet his eyes
wandered every now and then, and, gradually, after he had stopped
several times beside one and another, he came up to Elizabeth, as she
was sitting listening to a young lady who, with her brother, had come
back from town with Madam Pepperell, the night before, to spend a few
days at the house.
As Stephen stood behind her chair he looked across the room, and saw
Edmonson leaning with folded arms against a window. The light fell over
his face; he had been looking at Elizabeth, but his eyes met Archdale's
at once with an expression meant for cool scrutiny and a dash of
insolent triumph at the victory he had scored. Edmonson's fierceness was
not easily fettered; the dark shadow in his heart darted over his face,
and, withdrawing as hastily, left to view a light that blazed in his
eyes and only slowly died down into the cordial warmth necessary between
guest and host, even under peculiar circumstances. Stephen's face
darkened also, but his feeling was less, and his control greater.
Elizabeth was listening quietly to some account of a merry-making at
which Katie must have been present, for her name occurred frequently in
the narrative. As she perceived that Archdale was behind her she looked
round at him a moment, and by a few words included him in the
conversation. She was as entertaining as usual and rather more talkative
after he came. Yet he thought that under her ease of manner he detected
a current of nervousness that made him the more anxious to carry out the
purpose with which he had come to her.
But it was not easy to find any excuse for withdrawing her from the
circle in which she had made herself so welcome. At last, however, under
cover of a general movement, which he had secretly instigated, he
succeeded in getting her into the library, on the plea of a message to
her father. When there, he closed the door behind him, and said:--
"I have a message to your father, it is true, Mistress Royal, but it is
only to beg him to interfere."
"Interfere?" she echoed with a nervousness that this time was
unmistakable.
"Pray be seated," he said, drawing a chair toward her as she stood by
the mantel.
"Thank you, but--I don't mind standing. What you--the business will not
take long, you said."
"As you please." And he stood facing her on the opposite side of the
great fireplace.
She heard his tones, glanced at him, and sat down. He took a chair also,
still placing himself so that he could watch her. She grew plainly more
nervous.
"Who is Mr. Hartly?" he asked, abruptly.
She looked at him in a frightened way, and the hand that she lifted to
her throat was trembling.
"He is"--she began, then she stopped; without any warning her expression
and her manner changed, for with the coming of what she had dreaded came
the strength to meet it. There was no more tremulousness of voice or
hand, and the face that looked at Stephen Archdale was the face of a
woman who met him upon equal terms; yet, as he looked at her steadily,
he was not quite sure even of that; it seemed to him that it would
require an effort on his part to keep at her level; that at least he
must stand at his full height. She sat silent, meeting his steady gaze.
There was a dignity about her that would have been haughtiness but for
her simplicity. Even her dress carried out the effect of this
simplicity; it was a white muslin, very plain, and the single pink
hollyhock that the new guest had slipped into her hair, and Elizabeth
had forgotten, gave to her attire the touch of warmth that something in
her face showed, too. It was to Stephen the calmness of flesh and blood,
not of marble, that he was looking at; a possibility of life and motion
was there, but a possibility beyond his reach. Some one might arouse
her; to him she was impassive.
"You've not finished your sentence," he said, coldly.
"Why should I? You know the rest of it."
"Nevertheless, I wish you would say it."
"Very well. Mr. Hartly is an agent of Mr. Peterborough."
"And Mr. Peterborough?"
"My solicitor."
"You mean your father's?"
"Yes, and mine, too."
"Then you have property of your own?"
"Yes. You did not know it?"
"I heard of it yesterday. Your property is no concern of mine, you
understand." She was silent. Under the circumstances the statement was
significant. "Mr. Hartly came to my father the other day," he went on.
Still no answer. "Possibly you knew it?" he persisted. She lifted her
eyes which had been fixed on the cover of a book that her fingers were
toying with, and said:--
"Yes."
Stephen waited to choose words which should not express too forcibly the
impetuous feeling that shone in his eyes and rang in his voice when he
spoke.
"Let me put a case to you," he said, "or, rather, not an indifferent
case, but our own, and hear how it sounds in plain English. How we were
married, if married we are, it is useless to speak of; how absolutely
nothing we are to one another it is unnecessary also to say. I
appreciate your efforts and your courtesy when I see so plainly that it
is with difficulty you can bring yourself even to speak a word to me."
Elizabeth glanced up a moment, and down again, and her fingers went on
idly turning the leaves of the book. "When I see what social powers you
have," he pursued, "I assure you that I shall regret it for you if fate
have denied you a better choice. But at all events" (constrainedly), "I
must thank you for the gracious and successful manner in which you have
kept suspicion from becoming certainty before time proves it so."
She looked fully at him this time, and smiled.
"Gratitude comes hard to you," she said. "There is no cause for it in
anything I have ever done. You may be sure it was not to please you at
all, but to gratify something in myself that demanded satisfaction. Now,
please explain to me what you mean by your extraordinary summary of
things we know too well, and how I have offended you when I am really
your friend--yours, and "--She stopped, a smile flitted over her face
and was gone; it revealed for the unnamed person a gentleness and an
affection that perhaps she did not care to have her tones betray.
"Yes, you have offended me," he said. "I have no right to comment on
your actions in general."
"None whatever."
"But what I do have a right to demand is an explanation from you of
conduct so strange as to be unaccountable."
She flushed a little.
"It's not pleasant," she answered, "when one has done the best that
opened up to be told that it's unaccountable conduct."
"Then it was you? I was sure of it." She looked at him earnestly.
"Why should there be any beating about the bush?" she answered. "I
should like it better if you need never have known; but, since you were
sure to find it out sooner or later, it might as well come now. What I
have done is wise and right, the most satisfactory thing to me, and to
others wiser than I. But I wish you would never speak of it."
"Never speak of your coming forward with your whole fortune to make up
the loss that this fellow's claim will be to us? Never speak of it!"
cried Archdale. "And accept it? From you? You certainly have a
flattering opinion of me."
"If it were like any business losses," she said, "it would be different.
But this is something nobody could have been prepared for; it needs
something outside of the routine to meet it." She waited a moment. "Will
you put your case, as you said you were going to do?" she asked. "It
will make it clearer, and you will see that there is nothing
extraordinary. I think you need not say anything more about--about us,
that is all understood. Go on from there."
"A father and a son, then, are nominally in business together," he
answered; "the father does the work; the son has a generous share of the
profits. Matters are going on swimmingly. Suddenly a claimant turns up
who wants a grand slice of the property. He is the only son of the
father's elder brother,--a being who was not known to have existed, that
is, who was supposed to have died when an infant. The father, my father,
was named for him, and my grandfather's will gave the largest share of
his fortune to his oldest son, Walter, whom he supposed to be my father,
but who was really Gerald Edmonson's father--if the fellow's proofs turn
out valid; they are having a thorough overhauling. My uncle does not
suffer; it is only we. I am sorry," he added, "that you are liable to be
in any way connected with loss, but at the worst it is so remotely that
it will never affect you. As for the other matter, the story,"--he
stopped with a movement of irritation, perhaps of some deeper
feeling,--"that must be borne as best it can, nothing of that falls upon
you, certainly. How the matter concerns a young lady at all I can't
imagine; so I fail to see what interest you can have in it, or what
right to move in it."
"You fail to see?" she said and gave him a smile full of sweetness. It
was not a coaxing smile, as if she begged him to reconsider his
opinions; it indorsed her own while placidly acquiescing in mutual
indifference. "Besides, do you know it was through me that the portrait
was found?" And she gave him an account of the discovery. He did not
think it necessary to interrupt her by saying that he had heard Edmonson
give it with great relish; it seemed a good opportunity to learn whether
he had been telling the truth. The story was substantially the same, but
the enjoyment of the narrator was absent. "And, then," she added,
finishing, "this is not a bad investment."
"It may be now; I can't tell. We were under full sail; we have large
ventures, and to give out so much ready money may mean ruin. In a few
months, perhaps sooner, you may have the happiness of bearing a bankrupt
name."
Elizabeth's eyes were full of pity at the bitter tones in which she
heard suffering; she looked away and answered:--
"It is merely justice to me to let me prevent that, if I can."
"Good heavens!" he cried; and, struck with the readiness of her answer,
he studied her face. He would have liked to be sure from what motive she
was acting. Was it pride, or really pity? The thought of the last made
him furious; the other was at least endurable. "And you might not
prevent it," he added, watching to catch her eyes as she should turn
them back to answer. He was reasonably sure that it was pride.
"Then let me do this for my own sake," she said. "Listen to me calmly
for a moment. There is one thing you ought not to forget. Either I am
your wife, which God forbid, and I believe he has forbidden it, or I am
simply Katie's friend. In case of the first,--if I have destroyed your
happiness and Katie's, and my own,--what can money do for me? Life
offers me nothing; there are no possibilities before me so far as joy is
concerned; there is nothing left for me but to do the best I know how;
we must pick up the little things that lie along the way in life, you
and I; there will be nothing else for us; I have made you suffer so
much, and you deny me this little thing that can never balance any pain,
but is all I can dot? Why are you so unwise? Why should we make
ourselves more miserable than we need be?"
He sprang up. These very words--that he had often said to himself in
regard to his own life, that in effect he had said to her that
morning--how harsh they were, how they cut him! He was tender with his
wounded vanity. What man would like to hear that a woman has nothing
before her but misery if she be bound to himself?
"There is one condition," he cried, harshly, "under which I will accept
your money,--when you love me; when it is the gift of love." He laughed
bitterly. "I am safe," he said.
"Yes, Mr. Archdale, you are safe," she answered, rising to meet him as
he stood before her. "I can use no such weapons. It is beneath you to do
it. To say such a thing to me when you know that in any event my great
blessing is that I don't care a pin's worth for you, that I am not a
sighing woman wasting her affection on you, while you--But I don't
suppose you meant your words as an insult."
"Have I ever been rude to you?" he asked, eagerly. "Such a thing would
be an infinite disgrace to me."
"Yes," she said, answering his assertion.
"'While you,'" he repeated, "you said 'while you'--What were you going
to say about me?"
"While you love Katie with all your heart," she answered, "as it is
right you should do." He looked at her, and remembered that for all
her courage it might be that he owed her at least the courtesy of all
observances of respect and regard before others. He had committed an
unpardonable error that day of the dinner at his father's, and he felt a
confusion, as if the color were coming to his face now as he thought of
it.
"You--mistake," he stammered. "I assure you you do. I think I
understand--I"--
She looked up at him. Her face was pale, and there was in it the kind of
compassion that one might imagine a spirit to feel for a wayworn mortal.
"You owe me no explanation," she said. "Let us believe in the victory of
the right, and put this nightmare away from us. Remember you are
speaking only to Katie's friend."
He looked at her, and he could not be sure.
"But you must let me speak," he said, "because I see you mistake. I
don't want you to think because--I confess it--her beauty has a great
fascination for me that I can forget myself, that I--it was like
admiring a beautiful living picture."
She moved nearer, involuntarily.
"Poor fellow!" she said under her breath, "you have been brave; you are
brave, very brave. I've seen it." Then, after a pause in which she
retreated a little and stood considering deeply, she said, "I will tell
you something; it would be too much to be spoken of, only that you don't
understand why I did this thing about the business. Think how I am
placed. I may be standing between my dear friend and the man who was to
have been her husband, and separating them forever. That night when I
came home from your father's I realized it more than ever before; it
filled me so that I could not bear the thought of life. I happened to
have something by me, and I--almost took it. I should have slipped away
from between you two, I was so bent upon doing it,--only, the warning
saved me from such a sin. It will never be again," she added as she saw
his eyes dilate with questioning horror. "That temptation has gone. I
have accepted my lot, for it was permitted to come, or even that wicked
man could not have brought it. But now, think, think how I must long to
do some little thing, not to atone, that's impossible, but to make life
not quite so hard to you, and to her. Now, this has come for you. Take
it, I entreat you. Some day I may be able to help her in some way; I
think it will be so."
He looked into her eyes as she raised them to his.
"But you didn't mean to--do all this, if it is done," he said. "There's
no need of talking about atoning, as if you were guilty of anything."
"But, then, I ought to have refused; it was my place. It would have
saved everything."
"You wanted to," he said, "and you yielded to oblige Katie."
She looked relieved at his answer. It surprised him; he wondered that he
had remembered her hesitation.
"You will do this thing?" she persisted. "You see it is your duty."
"Do you know the reason you are so anxious to have me do it?" he asked,
the momentary softening of his face gone. "It's out of no love for
Katie, or friendliness to me."
"No," she said to his last statement, and added, "Yes, I know; I've seen
it."
"What is it?"
"I suppose," she said, humbly, "that it's my pride.
"Yes," he cried, "that's what it is--your pride. Well, I have my pride,
too. I'll take your money, when you love me--when it's the gift of your
love, as I said--no sooner; I shall have to do without it this year, I'm
afraid."
Her eyes swept him from head to foot in an indignant glance. Then she
turned and walked away as if disdaining further speech. He bowed in
silence as he opened the door for her, looking at her with a mocking
smile, and even as he did so taking in every line of her graceful
figure, the pose of her head, and the flush upon her face. In answer to
the taunt she did speak one sentence under her breath, but he caught
it:--
"You are not the only one," she said.
When he had closed the door after her he walked slowly the length of the
room, and, standing by the window, in another moment saw her pass by on
her way to the shore where she had learned that the party had gone. If
they were already sailing it was no matter; she could wait for them
there, or come back; but they might not have started, and to put any
part of sea and land between herself and Archdale would be a joy to her.
Archdale watched her until she disappeared.
"And I called myself proud," he muttered. He stood lost in revery,
living the scene over again. "What eyes!" he thought; "they're as
unconscious as a child's, but such power as they have; they call out a
man's best, and I met her with my worst. I never even told her she was
generous. She meant to be kind when she humiliated me so." And then he
thought that she deserved a better fate than to be bound to him whose
heart was with Katie, and realized that Elizabeth was not at all the
kind of woman whom he should choose to set his love upon. Yet he smiled
scornfully at himself for the eager start with which he had cried out
that if she were roused she could be magnificent. A magnificent woman
was not in his line, and if it proved that she was his wife, she would
go through the world a sleeping princess, he said to himself, unless he
should go off to the wars and get shot. Perhaps that would be the best
way out of the difficulty, he thought, and would leave her free. At the
moment Edmonson's face rose before him, and he frowned as he wondered
what feeling there was in that quarter. "No, no," he said to himself.
"Not Edmonson. I know he's a villain; I feel it." He interrupted his
thoughts by asking, sarcastically, what it could all matter to himself,
well out of harm's way, what happened, what Elizabeth or anybody else
did? He was very angry with her, and she did not realize the Archdale
unforgiveness. If she had, would she have cared? She had not yielded her
purpose.