MASTER VERE'S CONFESSION.
"Thank God for love, though love may hurt and wound,
Though set with sharpest thorn its rose may be."
--SUSAN COOLIDGE.
"This bud of love, by summer's ripening breath,
May prove a beauteous flower, when next we meet."
--SHAKESPEARE.
"Percival," said Lady Bryn Afon on the last night of their stay at
Glyn Melen, as he sat with her in the copse reading aloud, while
Primrose was busy within doors directing the waiting-maids as to the
packing of their mistresses' possessions previous to their departure
on the morrow--"Percival, pardon me for asking so bold a question,
but have I done well in suffering you thus to share with me the
companionship of my sweet young friend during these happy weeks? I
have watched you both not without some secret misgivings; yet,
knowing I could trust you, have forborne to interfere with your
happiness, content to leave all in the hands of a good Providence,
yet reproaching myself at times for having perchance unwisely
permitted you both at once to be my companions in this solitary
dwelling, where you have of necessity been thrown much together.
Forgive me, dear friend, for thus venturing to address you, but
Primrose is to me as a dear daughter; and you--for the love and
devotion you bestow upon our unhappy family, I can but regard you
also with somewhat of a mother's affection!" "I am grateful for the
confidence you have placed in me," said the young chaplain earnestly,
"and I can but assure you that no word of the love I feel for your
most sweet and fair companion has yet passed my lips, or shall pass
until she is under her own mother's care, which she tells me will
probably not be until a year from now. It is true that in her my
soul has seemed verily to find its ideal, and that I can but feel
there is betwixt us some sweet unspoken tie, which in myself I know
to be the truest love man can offer woman, yet which I dare not yet
presume to think upon as an assured treasure. I have wrestled many
an hour with myself alone on the mountain-top, that I might by no
word or act betray your confidence, or, above all, suffer this
earthly love to take away aught from that supreme love and devotion I
have but lately sworn to my Master in Heaven. Against His will I
dare not seek for myself a bliss for which my soul yearns with deeper
longing than I can tell; but can I only keep this earthly love in due
subjection, regarding it as a priceless gift to help me the better to
serve Him, I can but feel He will perchance look with favour upon us
both, and in His good time suffer me to become the unworthy possessor
of so fair and lowly-minded a helpmeet."
Lady Bryn Afon's eyes filled with tears. "I have no right to betray
a maiden's secrets," she said, "nor have I sought to win them from
her; but I have been young even as Primrose, and methinks can read in
her transparent countenance and clear truthful eyes more than she
wots of. But Percival, be that as it may, you are both wise and
right in your decision to keep strict silence for the present, for
the history of fair Shanno is a passing strange one, and neither you
nor she must surely fetter yourselves by any ties but those of
friendship, while her future with her as yet unknown mother remains
hid in obscurity." "For me, I should feel no fetters," interposed
the young man eagerly. "I would fain be at her side when that
dreaded moment of meeting comes, to shield her from all possible ill,
and take her away from any sorrow it may chance to bring her into the
shelter of such a home as I could offer. It is for her sake alone
that I cannot yet feel it right to seek to bind her by any promises,
nor even seek the confession of a love which I scarcely dare yet hope
for, and which might bring trouble upon her. Nay, I promise you that
I will keep silence, nor attempt to seek her out during the coming
years of separation, darkly though they lower before me." "That is
well," said Lady Bryn Afon. "And as to her, poor child, she will
again be happy by her riverside in her loving guardian's care, even
though a new-felt loneliness will, I fear me, be her portion for
awhile after these happy weeks. Percival, have you verily no fear in
thus giving your heart away to one of whose birth and parentage you
are wholly ignorant? Have you no fear of what the future may chance
to reveal? And will the proud descendant of Ap Gryffyth and the
Veres not hesitate to seek in marriage one whose mother has confessed
herself to be of kin to such an one as honest Jack the boatman--of
long descent indeed, and of a good old family, but withal a humble
one?" "I fear me my love hath so fully eaten up my pride," answered
Percival with a smile, "that I would fain win this fair woodland
flower and wear her next my heart, be she whom she may. Let even
shame and disgrace o'ershadow her unknown parents' history, I would
but the more gladly shelter her beneath my own great love from every
lingering breath of evil, and even so feel myself the more worthy of
the name I bear. Dear madam, trust me that my honour shall be as
great as my love, and all shall go well. Hush, she comes!" And
tripping lightly over the greensward came Primrose, surely more fair
than ever, her white summer gown falling in soft folds around her,
and her wealth of golden hair, still floating childlike over her
shoulders, glittering like streams of gold in the evening sunlight.
And as Percival Vere looked at her a great trembling seized him, and
he buried his face in his hands. "You are weary, Master Vere," she
said, throwing herself on the grass at Lady Bryn Afon's feet, and
resting her head upon her knee. "You have read too long aloud, while
I, who would fain have come and relieved you, have been making ready
with much sorrow for our departure from this beautiful place on the
morrow. I fear me the mountains have made me faithless to the valley
and the river I love so well!" "Nay, I am not weary," answered
Percival. "I did but close my eyes because I saw a vision.
Methought as you crossed the grass I was again by the pool at
midnight, beholding the mystic maiden, and the illusion is not yet
dispelled!" He looked at her with a smile, and yet with so perplexed
an expression that Primrose laughed merrily in spite of her sad
heart. "As we shall part on the morrow," she said, and her voice
trembled a little as she spoke, "and as I would not have you ever
wondering and perplexed in mind until we meet again, I will e'en make
my confession. I was myself the immortal maiden!" "I have suspected
it!" said the chaplain triumphantly, "yet I have not been able to
account for your so deceiving me. Was it so indeed? Then now I can
understand." "Indeed I did not then know you were there!" cried
Primrose eagerly. "Until I saw yon watching me from your dark corner
under the rock, I thought in truth that no one saw my folly but Lady
Rosamond and Sir Ivor, and you, dear Lady Bryn Afon! It was at Lady
Rosamond's bidding I played the maiden's part, since she declared she
had no patience to wait for the true vision, and I would do just as
well, moreover saving her from having had her climb for nought! And
lest any one should perchance be near besides ourselves, she cleverly
threw a large stone into the centre of the pool at the moment when I
should by right have plunged therein to my watery abode, in order, as
she said, that the illusion should be complete, trusting that the
sudden sound might make a chance spectator close his eyes for a
moment in horror, and so let me slip into my hiding-place behind the
rock unobserved." "She truly devised well," said the chaplain with a
laugh, "for it was even so with me, whom she had persuaded into
proving with mine own eyes the truth of her wondrous tale! As you
stood by the lake, I heard the sudden splashing, and clasped my hands
before my eyes in horror at the thought that I must needs see you
plunge into that black abyss; and when I withdrew them I saw but the
ripples on the surface of the water--and you----" "Were laughing in
glee not many yards away," said Lady Bryn Afon with a smile. "In
truth it was a naughty trick of Lady Rosamond's, but Primrose did it
right well." "But indeed I had no thought that you were there!" said
Primrose, looking at the chaplain earnestly. "I truly thought it but
a jest among ourselves. Now I know why my Lady Rosamond bade me
beware of you, for that you looked upon me as a child of the Evil
One!" "I am over cruelly maligned," said Percival, swallowing with
difficulty the eager words with which he was on the point of
repudiating an idea so wholly contrary to his mind. "But Lady
Rosamond ever loves a jest, and I will confess that she practised her
deception right well. I thank you, fair Mistress Primrose, for
enlightening my credulity, and now I must bid you good-night, for I
have much study to complete before midnight."
Primrose lay motionless upon the grass for some moments after he had
left them, and Lady Bryn Afon stroked tenderly the fair head upon her
knee, but said nothing; only when they parted for the night she
folded her in a close embrace, and bade God bless her with an
unwonted fondness, which went to the young girl's heart. Sleep
closed that night unwilling eyelids. Lady Bryn Afon and Primrose lay
long awake, each occupied with thoughts of their own, and Percival
Vere stole forth from a restless couch at midnight into the
mountains, to wrestle and pray in solitude and silence, till the
first rose of dawn flushed the heavens.
At Caer Caradoc, on the following forenoon, Primrose was met by her
old friend the vicar of Cwmfelin, and with a loving embrace from Lady
Bryn Afon and a last long look and pressure of the hand from Master
Vere, that brief dream of bliss came to its close.