THE EARL RELUCTANTLY ASSENTS.
Three days later they were once more at Linleigh Court. The earl would
hear of no opposition; he ruthlessly broke all engagements, sacrificed
all interest and pleasure; his daughter's health, he said, must be
paramount with him, and so it was. The only drawback was that Earle
could not go; he might run down for two or three days, but until
Parliament broke up he could not be away for very long. The earl and
countess were amused to see how both lovers felt the separation.
"Thank Heaven!" said Lady Estelle. "Ah! Ulric, you do not know how I
thank Heaven that our child loves Earle."
"Did you ever doubt it, my lovely, sentimental darling?" said Lord
Linleigh.
"I was not sure; I was always more or less afraid," said the countess.
"She spoke so lightly of love; but now she seems very fond of Earle."
"I do not think the woman is born who could help loving Earle," said
Lord Linleigh; "he is the finest, noblest man I know. She shows her good
taste in loving him."
"She will be very happy," said Lady Estelle, with tears in her eyes.
"She will be one of the happiest women in the world, and I am so
grateful for it, Ulric; it might have been all so different for the poor
child."
Lord Linleigh looked thoughtfully at her.
"Do you know, Estelle, I have an idea that Doris is very much changed?
Have you noticed it?"
"She seemed to me much fonder of Earle, and not so strong as she was; I
have not noticed any other difference."
"Then it must be my fancy. She has seemed to me more thoughtful, at
times even sad, then strangely reckless. A strange idea has come to
me--do you think she has any secret connected with that former lonely
life of hers?"
"I do not think so," replied Lady Estelle, growing very pale.
"That was a strange notion of yours, my dear, sending her there. Still,
those good people seem to have done their best for her."
"I believe," said Lady Estelle, hastily, "that she was quite as safe as
she would have been under my own roof. I think I have noticed what you
mean--a nervous kind of uncertainty and dread: but I am quite sure it is
not because of any secret. Ulric; it is rather because she has been
overtaxed. I remember speaking to her about it some time since. She will
soon be well now."
Lady Estelle was right. Away from that terrible incubus, the dread of
meeting the man she feared and detested; away from his baneful
influence, she speedily recovered health and spirits; the dainty color
flushed back in her lovely face, her eyes grew radiant, sweet snatches
of song came from her lips; she was once more the bright, gay Doris,
whose winsome smiles and charms had won all hearts. Lady Linleigh
laughed at her fears, and for a short time all was happiness at Linleigh
Court.
Earle came down for a few days, and then the wedding-day was fixed. It
was to be on the tenth of August, and when the wedding was over they
were to go right away until Lady Doris had recovered her usual strength.
It was not until afterward that Earle remembered how strange it was that
she should have hurried on the wedding; when he came to think it over,
he found that it was so. It was Doris who planned and arranged
everything; he had but acquiesced, he had not been the prime mover in
it. So it was settled--the tenth of August; not many more weeks of
suspense and anxiety, not much more dread. Her revenge and her love
would be gratified alike. She should be Earle's wife on the tenth; on
the twentieth, when Lord Vivianne came, she should be far away with
Earle to protect her; Earle to shield her. It would be useless to pursue
her then; even if he did his worst, and betrayed her, she did not care,
her position would be secure. Oh, it would be such glorious revenge, to
find her married, after all his solemn oaths that she should be his
wife, and belong to no other--either to him or to death!
"I will deceive him to the very last," she thought. "I will delude him
until the very hour which sees me Earle's wife."
She bent all her energies to this. It was easy enough to win from Earle
a promise of total silence; it was not quite so easy to win that same
promise from the earl and countess. She did win it, though.
On that same evening that Earle left, a superb night in June, when the
stars were gleaming in the skies, and the night air was heavy with sweet
odors, Lord and Lady Linleigh had gone out into the grounds. The evening
was far too beautiful to be spent indoors, and she followed them. They
were sitting under the great drooping beeches, watching the loveliness
of that fair summer night.
The same thought struck both of them as Doris came to them, that neither
starlight nor moonlight had ever fallen on so fair a figure as this. Her
long dress of white sweeping silk trailed over the long grass, she wore
fragrant white lilies on her breast and in her golden hair; she might
have been the very spirit of starlight, from her fair, picturesque
loveliness. She went up to them, and bending down to kiss Lady
Linleigh's hand, she knelt on the grass at their feet.
"You are alone," she said, "the two arbiters of my destiny. I am so
glad, for I have a favor--a grace to ask."
"It is granted before it is asked," said the countess.
But Lord Linleigh laughed.
"No," he said, "that would hardly be wise; we cannot allow that."
She raised her face to his, and he saw how earnest it was in its
expression of pleading and prayer.
"Dear papa," she said, gently, "you must not refuse me this."
"I will not, my darling, if it be in reason," he replied.
"Earle told me that you and he had arranged our wedding-day for the
tenth of August," she continued. "Dear papa, dear Lady Linleigh, I want
you to promise that it shall be kept a profound secret from the whole
world."
"My dear Doris!" cried the countess.
"It is quite impossible," said the earl. "Besides, I see no reason for
such a thing. Why should you want it so?"
"It _is_ possible," she said. "I have been with you long enough to know
that with you everything is possible. _Why_ I wish it done, is my whim,
my folly--my secret, if you will."
"I really do not see----" began the earl; but she laid one soft, white
hand on his lips.
"Let me show you, papa. Let me hear your objections, and vanquish them
one by one."
"To begin with--your train of bridesmaids, they must be invited."
"Papa," she interrupted, "I want none, I will have none, only Mattie, my
foster-sister--let her come, no one else."
"Then the marriage settlements?" said the perplexed earl.
"They can be arranged with all possible secrecy, if you only say one
word to your lawyers."
"But the bishop, and the marriage. My dear Doris, it is impossible,
impracticable, ridiculous!"
"I am sure that you will be sorry, papa, if you refuse me."
And something in her voice struck the earl with keen anxiety.
"Have you any secret, sensible reason for what you ask, Doris?" he said,
gravely, the old suspicion that there had been something strange in his
daughter's life coming back to him with double force.
"I have my own fancy, papa; do not thwart it, do not oppose me now that
I am so soon to leave you. You will always be pleased to think how much
of my own way you have given me in this instance."
"Let her do as she will, Ulric," said Lady Linleigh; "it would be cruel
to refuse her."
"Listen to my idea first, papa. This is the sort of wedding I should
like--you, of course, can please yourself whether you let me have it or
not. I should like no one except Mattie to know anything about it in
advance of the day. I should like my wedding _trousseau_ to be as
magnificent and grand as you please, all ordered, arranged, and
prepared, to be kept in London ready for me, so that I may select what I
want to take abroad with me, then I should like Earle to come on the
eighth, as though he were coming for an ordinary visit; on the ninth, I
should be quite willing for you to tell the servants in the house, so
that wedding favors, flowers, and a wedding breakfast can be prepared;
then, early on the morning of the tenth, I should like to drive over to
the old church at Anderley with Earle, Mattie, and you--Lady Linleigh,
if she will come--no one else; then to be married in that pretty church,
where the morning sun always shines so brightly, and then go away with
Earle. No pealing of bells, no jewels, no showers of wedding presents,
no pomp, no bishop, with assistant ministers, no ceremony, no grandeur.
That is just what I should like, papa."
"I never heard such an extraordinary idea in all my life," said the
earl. "I do not know what to answer. I should like you to have your own
way; but such a wedding for an earl's daughter is unheard of."
"Yes; it is different to Hanover Square, miles of white satin and lace,
bishops, bells, jewels, carriages, friends, and all that kind of thing.
I know it is quite different; but let me have my own way, papa, please.
Pray intercede for me, Lady Linleigh."
The countess turned to her husband.
"Let it be so, Ulric," she said.
He was silent. He would have refused altogether, but for the
uncomfortable suspicion haunting him that she had some painful though
hidden motive, and that it was connected with that past life of hers, of
which he knew so little; but for that, he would have laughed the whole
idea to scorn.
"My dear Doris, I cannot understand. Most ladies look upon their wedding
as the crowning ceremony of their lives, the grandest event that can
possibly happen to them--the very opportunity for a display of splendor
and magnificence."
"I know they do," she replied, gently. Then, as her hands clasped his,
he felt her shudder, as though cold. She raised her face, and kissed
him; she clasped her white arms round his neck. "Papa," she cried,
"although I am your own child, I have never been much to you; the best
part of my life has been spent away from you; I have never seen my
mother's face; she is not here to plead to you for me. I shall have gone
away from you, and altogether, you will have known but little of me. I
hope Heaven will send you other children to love and bless you; but,
papa, do not refuse my prayer. In the after years, when I am far away,
and perhaps a fair-haired son stands pleading where I stand pleading
now, you will like to remember that you yielded to my prayer--that you
granted me the greatest favor it was in your power to grant."
The earl looked down. Lady Linleigh was weeping bitterly.
"You hear, Ulric!" she said, in a low, passionate voice; "you hear! She
says she has no mother to plead for her! Let me plead in the mother's
place! Do what she asks!"
"I never did anything so unwillingly in all my life," said the earl; "it
is unheard of, inconsistent, ridiculous in the highest degree; but I
cannot refuse the prayer of my wife and child; it must be as you wish."
He saw, even in the starlight, the expression of relief that came over
the beautiful, restless face.
"You promise, then," said Doris, "and you too, Lady Linleigh, that you
will not tell to any creature living, except Mattie Brace, when I am to
marry, whom I am to marry, or anything about it?"
"I promise," said Lady Estelle.
"And I too," repeated the earl, "although it is sorely against my better
judgment, my will, my common sense, and everything else."
"Never mind, papa," said Lady Doris, "you have made me happy."
But even then, as she spoke, the tragedy was looming darkly over her.