A BROKEN ENGAGEMENT
Even after the door had closed upon Lord Nunneley, and Deane was alone
with his fiancee, words did not seem to come easily to either of them.
Lady Olive was sitting back in the corner of a low couch. Deane was
standing upon the hearthrug, his hands behind him, his face a little
wrinkled with perplexity.
"I suppose," he said thoughtfully, "you would like me, Olive, to explain
exactly how this claim came about?"
"On the contrary," she answered, "I do not wish you to do anything of
the sort."
He looked at her in some surprise. Her voice had prepared him for a
change of some sort, but he was nevertheless puzzled. There was a slight
flush of color in her cheeks, and her eyes were softer than usual.
"Stirling," she said, "come and sit down here by my side."
He obeyed at once. She turned and faced him.
"I am puzzled, Stirling," she said. "I want to ask you a question. You
have been lunching with my father?"
"Yes!" Deane answered. "At his club."
"I know that he feels very strongly about this matter," she said. "Tell
me, did the suggestion that our engagement should be broken off come
from him?"
"Certainly."
"And you?" she said. "Tell me exactly what you felt, what it meant to
you? I don't want you to fence with words, please," she went on. "Tell
me this honestly. Was it anything of a relief to you?"
"Assuredly not," he answered wonderingly.
"Think again," she begged. "You answer quickly, but is that because you
are very, very sure, or because you are taking it for granted? You see
you are one of those men, Stirling," she went on earnestly, "whose
disposition does not allow them to look back. We are engaged, I was your
deliberate choice, and after that, so far as you are concerned, the
matter was ended. The possibility that you had made a mistake would
never occur to you, simply because you would regard the matter as
inevitable. Tell me, if it were not inevitable, if you were not engaged
to me at this moment, Stirling, would you ask me again?"
Her words amazed him. He had never given her credit for such insight,
such perceptions. It seemed, indeed, as though she had realized
something of which he himself was not yet conscious, and yet something
which might very well exist.
"How long have you had this idea, Olive?" he asked gravely.
"All the time," she answered. "At first, of course, it seemed all right,
but up in Scotland, and since then, I have wondered whether you have not
looked upon me as something quite outside your life,--a necessary and
desirable adjunct, perhaps, to your household and growing prosperity.
Don't think that I am complaining," she continued, "but in all our
recent communications the personal note has not been very strongly
marked, has it? I can see exactly, too, how my father's suggestion has
moved you. You don't feel, do you, as though the sun had ceased to
shine, or the world to move, because there is a chance that you may lose
me?"
Deane was not often so doubtful of himself. In a sense he knew that she
was right. And yet, her very apprehension of these things, the new
earnestness with which she was looking at him, the thought that he was
very near indeed to losing her, seemed to stimulate his interest,--made
him feel, indeed, that it would not be a light thing to give her up.
"Olive," he said, "I wish I could make you know exactly how I feel. If I
have been a little slow and reticent of speech, believe me, it is not
that I have not cared. On the other hand, there is some truth in what
you have said--I mean that I do honestly believe that I have taken
things a little too much for granted, that knowing there was no other
woman in my life, knowing how desirable you were, and how really fond of
you I was, I think I was content to let the rest come, as I certainly
did feel that it would come."
"I think I understand," she said slowly. "Now tell me exactly what you
think of my father's request?"
"I think that it is reasonable," Deane answered. "It is more reasonable,
even, than your father knows of. I think that I have been a little too
successful, perhaps, during these later years of my life. I have grown
to underestimate the possibilities of trouble."
"This is really serious, then?"
He nodded. "I am afraid," he said, "that I have been a little over-bold.
I ought to have kicked that man Hefferom out of my office half-a-dozen
times, until he came to reason, and then bought him off for good for a
thousand pounds. But you see I didn't. All my life I have hated
compromises. I knew that he was a blackguard, and I dealt with him as a
blackguard, and I have left him with the cards in his hands."
"Then I suppose my father was right," she said, sighing.
"I suppose he was," Deane answered.
She held out her hand. "Very well, Stirling," she said, "let it be so.
Our engagement is broken, and I will see that the proper steps are taken
to announce it. But I want you to understand this from me, that if you
had cared, if I could have seen any signs whatever of your caring, no
word of my father's, nor anything that could have happened to you in the
city or elsewhere, any disgrace or any loss of money, could have
separated us."
He took a step towards her. "Olive!" he exclaimed.
"No!" she said, a little sharply, and rang the bell.
He turned and walked out. In the hall he passed Lord Nunneley. "We have
arranged it according to your wish, sir," he said, "your daughter and
I."
Lord Nunneley looked at him curiously. Deane had the look of a man who
has been hard hit.
"I am sorry, Deane. I hope you understand there's nothing personal in
it."
"I understand!" said Deane, briefly.